Credit goes to Laura Martinez at Mi Blog es tu Blog for turning us on to this Japanese commercial for Mexican food.
Embedding has been disabled, but you can watch the commercial here.
All right, so I spent the morning checking out the new Liverpool at Plaza Las Americas, snacked on artisanal Italian ice cream, and didn’t see any Mexicans marching to the beat of Don Taco.
Everybody wants one, but few are those who actually have one. The Estadounidense media would have you believing that every second Mexican has, or is in the market for, an assault weapon. You know, the garden variety AK-47s that are flooding the borders southward, a dozen or more in exchange for every northbound illegal immigrant, one of those balance of trade deals. And then there are those foreigners who seem to think that it’s illegal to possess a gun in Mexico. Dead wrong, of course, they are.
There is a way to buy a legal gun in Mexico.
The Nutmeg Lawyer Denny Crane takes on the taxonomy of clients, more comprehensive than the ten most likely to get a lawyer into hot water:
1. The serial client. You’re not the client’s first lawyer or even the third, but you’re seduced in the belief that you’re somehow special, possessed of magic powers unknown by your predecessors.
2. Last minute Charlie. His summons arrived a month ago, but he’s waited until the last day to call a lawyer, knowing that lawyers really love rush jobs. After sifting through discovery materials amassed in giant trash bags (because this client knows how much lawyers enjoy a good mystery), prepare yourself for the suspense of wondering whether this client will show up for trial.
3. The irresponsible and noncompliant client. Appointments are often cancelled and seldom kept, court orders are suggestions, and directions are wishful thinking. It’s just as likely that this client won’t burden you with irrelevancies such as the whole story or your bank account with unnecessary deposits.
4. Blanche du Bois. Always dependent upon the kindness of strangers, this client will expect you to make all decisions, clinging to you with all the ardor of kudzu. Indecisive waffling is far easier on this fragile soul, trapped in desperate, desperate circumstances, who’ll toughen into a Steel Magnolia when it’s time to blame you.
5. The professional victim. Abusers as well as the abused fall into this category, whose lawyer soon joins the ranks of betrayer.
6. The bitter, hostile and greedy. No win will ever be sufficient, no Balm in Gilead, nor salvo will appease or succor the wounds of these scorched earthlings.
7. The disbeliever or negotiator. Evading the real issues, fudging on the issues and hedging on the truth, this client sidesteps reality. Simple indisputable facts such as "the sun rises in the east" become subject to debate as this client blurs and distorts anything to shape his own view of the world.
8. The Principled Crusader. Cause-oriented, maintaining "it’s the principle, not the money," this client harbors unreasonable expectations that no White Knight or hired gun can ever adequately fulfill.
9. The Expert Pollster. Lawyers are a vestigial organ, a mere formality, to these self-proclaimed experts who have legions of highly skilled, much-respected counsel consisting of the neighborhood yenta, Uncle Cedric, and the Internet aiding and abetting malpractice.
10. That hinkey feeling. You just know there’s something wrong, but you can’t identify it. Listen to your gut – and to your staff
Popcorn lung is the new black lung. The next time you pop open a bag of butter-flavored Orville Redenbacher, you might consider the plight of the poor factory worker who’s now hacking away with half a lung just so that you’d have something to munch during the HBO special. Popcorn lung is insidious enough to attack ardent popcorn consumers as well. Oh, so they’ve gone and reformulated microwave popcorn while I was away? Well, that shouldn’t stop you from feeling guilty and scared, just the same.
Just around the corner lurks another danger. You’d think Jell-O, the state dessert of Utah and the entire Mexican Republic, wouldn’t hurt a soul. Think again. Snorting Jell-O could be dangerous to your health. Or not.
You thought Frank Constanza was joking about the manssiere. He wasn’t. Leave it to Nebraska native Julie Carmann, better known as Midwesterner in Mexico to ferret out important news you can use. That is, if you’re a man who could use some support. Or care enough about one who does to buy him one.
Small town gossip, whether in BFE (which I’ve just learned stands for “Bum Fuck Egypt) or Hell’s Kitchen, is always juicy, embellishing some tiny grain of truth, a complexion changing with each telling.
But instead of talking about others’ sex lives and financial straits, the gossip has turned to narcos, narcoterrorism, and the never-ending cops and robbers scenarios. Last week’s robbery at OXXO and break-in at Banamex, right through the roof, they said, is last month’s news. Stale. Other topics endure, lasting maybe as long as a full six months.
You remember those deaths on the horse ranch between here and Patzcuaro, right? Well, I’ve got some more details …
Oh yeah, and that arms stash in …
And the little matter of the SWAT team …
Well, wait until I tell you what I heard happened at this beauty salon …
There are the Zeta wannabees, and there are those impersonating law enforcement …
So, what was really up with the guy who ended up dead at 3:30 a.m. (somehow everything that happens happens at 3:30 a.m.) right in front of that pizza place?
You’re not going to believe this, but …
You know that little abarrote that pretends to sell groceries but sells something else?
Narco pervades even more than idle, trashy gossip. It’s a style all its own. Whole schools of architecture have been tabbed narco. Narco has replaced naco has replaced nouveau riche. Drive a Hummer, and you’ll be tabbed a narco. Any business which doesn’t seem to be doing enough business, does too much business, or somehow just doesn’t fit in with the rest of the crowd just has to be laundering money. Is your neighbor a narco? Are you one? (Or are you a narco-facilitator, just because you smoked pot back in your college days?)
There was a time when the most damning accusation which could be leveled against a Mexican politician was to infer, intimate, suggest, and right out openly call him a homosexual. That’s just so 2000. Sexual preference just isn’t a big deal these days. Salem had its witch hunts. Today’s red-baiting is narco-baiting.
Red Shoes are Better than Bacon 