or most of us who simply go to work, ruthlessly stab our livers, mow our lawns, and try to find enough time to fight off sleep deprivation, voting is the most impact you will likely have on the world you live in. SO GO. Vote your brain. Vote your heart. Vote your history. Vote your soul. I don’t care, just go vote for something. STAY FOR THE CAUCUS!!!...

Yeah, while you and your other bubble people are mercilessly burning the ghosts of dinosaurs long since passed, I’m out here inhaling your shit results. And man, I gotta say, it makes me feel like a better person than you. Like, Jesus better. While your mouth is all agape with impressedness, go ahead and roll down your window, Rapunzel. Let down your ratty mane of ignorance. Take a long gander at moral superiority. Check my dope shades. Smell the sweat. Yeah. Suck it in. ...

For a year now it’s been a strange coexistence with these beasts of inconvenience. It’s not like I’d crack open a box of cereal and they’d pour out in a waterfall of crippling disappointment. Or that they’d even be found in the kitchen at all. Normally I’d find one pathetically backstroking on the floor tile in my hallway, and then dispose of it neatly. But every once in a while there’d be an adventurous fucker that would show up on the ceiling above our bed, as we were going to sleep, threatening to drop down like some crazed black-ops periplaneta. All hell would break loose for an hour or so until I could get the thing quarantined and dismissed. Neither of us would sleep for an hour after that. ...

Nothing quells the squabbling mass’s ire like a fat check. You want those three dudes who pissed in your gym locker to change their tune? Buy them off. You know what will impress the volleyball team? Bomb-ass circuses. What do all bouncers and voters in Florida understand when it comes to deciding whether they like someone or not? Bread. Dinero. Duckets. Dosh. Some-other-D-word-for-money. That’s a uni-goddamn-versal hand-shake that says “if you didn’t believe in my powers of affable superiority before, perhaps the fact that I can magically produce some money for your wallet will change your mind.” ...

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors SMACK! [clackity-clack-clack-clack] “This shit just isn’t worth it to me anymore.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ And so it sits, the burrito, on the floor. Silent. A crowd gathered about the thing. Halfway on a slip-resistant fat-nap mat and halfway on the marred and dirt-clodded floor tiles of the 183 and Braker Taco Bell. This burrito......

I left you somewhat in the lurch last week concerning my plans for a weekly column devoted to guests (that would be you), and that was a bit rude of me. But honestly, at the time I wasn’t convinced that I knew exactly what I was looking for....

I don’t believe I’m properly equipped to "welcome" myself after yet another year of meeting with you on Tuesdays (sometimes Wednesdays, Thursdays, Whateverdays). And it’s not easy to express my gratitude to people I’ve never met. People who have so many different reasons for being here, for something so irreverently personal. So I’ll defer my copy to the illustrious Mr. Samuel Clemens, as he handed thanks to the Lotus Club in 1908....

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors To begin, I want to reiterate from last week that the email to send story submissions to is truecraig[at]austinist.com, not any of the other addresses you may have seen posted somewhere for me. I’m trying to keep this thing as organized as possible, see? And I'm not very skilled with email herding.......

I bet you DO. So it’s the holidays, and people are cheering with cheer and whatnot. Lots of eggnog getting sloshed on your under-aged cousin’s workboots and such. Your aunt booted her meds and has already stripped down and dry-humped your artificial tree. Twice. Dad was putting lights on the house and somehow managed to take out your Mom’s azaleas and his left knee. So you painted his cast to look like the trampled azaleas and that caused your Mom to rage like a stuck bull and she drop-kicked a honey-roasted ham through the back door window. Your sister got caught masturbating with two of your younger out-of-town cousins, and she had white-boarded diagrams and a Powerpoint presentation on technique like it was a well-practiced roadshow routine in a Santa hat. ...

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors I don’t want to say that there’s a right way and a wrong way to celebrate The Holidays. That would be foolhardy and dickish. Especially in a city as diversified as this one (we celebrate Christmas AND Thanksgiving!). But something this chick was crying about on NPR this morning got me thinking......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Every city goes through its own little evolution. Not always pretty, not always clean, but always in the process of becoming. Our little oasis is no different. There is a change upon us, and it is high time we grabbed the wheel and started to do some stunt steerin’. You know, to......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Pardon me in full if this week’s column is completely baron (or BARREN, if you're into 'homonym correctness'. Damned good drugs here) of clean direction. The majority of it was conceived and written while suffering a heavy fever and enjoying some heavy cough medicine. I’ll get around to the birth of that......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Whoo-yeah and all that kind of excitedness, today is HALLOWEEN! You ready? You got all those party invites from all the smooth folk? Got that evite from the chick who you swear you gave your number like, six times already but she still hasn’t fucking called you yet? Oh, well, her party......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors H O M O G E N Y. Or so everyone keeps telling me. Like all these damned cat photos you're supposed to go apeshit over.......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors This week is dedicated to all those intrepid fun-finders who have been inspired by those three cave-riders who were rescued yesterday. May you find something more constructive to do with your time. My rendition of a fictional attempt by myself to rescue the three bored college kids from the clutches of Airman’s......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Bro-dawgs, huddle around the Axe Body Wash fountain and check this out: There’s a new lounge opening up where that freakshow movie place used to be, and it’s gonna be sweet bangin’ with more honeys than we’ll be able to drug in a single night, and more lesser bro-hams than we’ll be......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Writer's note: this is the longest post I’ve ever written. If you hate long posts, don’t torture yourself any further. There are many moments over the course of their life when the average person should feel a nip of introspection and take a look back on their time here while asking whether......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors It was sometime after four in the morning. Several years ago. July of the summer months. We had just finished a night out making mistakes all over the city, the lake, the river, and some apartment off Riverside where we smoked out with football players who were the largest hulks of humanity......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Dearest members of our esteemed Neighborhood Association Board of Directors, I would like to begin this letter by way of gracious manifest: you are all perceivably noble and considered generally benevolent in all the interest you show toward our collective reputation to outside neighborhoods. I feel that your presence here has been......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Usually at this time of year I’m hunting down the best afterparties related to ACL, stocking up on Emergen-C, and whispering sweet nothings to my liver like a good liver-beater does. But for some reason, this year the whole shebang-e-bang has taken me by surprise. Totally slipped my mind. I blame our......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors I used to have a friend-in-drinking who worked with me, many summers passed. We were pretty tight cohorts. Stood up for each other at the work place, and then poured liquid disaster-hammer all over our livers after punching the clock. “He’s a good guy,” I’d say to anyone who tried to disparage......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors I cry about it every year. What can I say? I’m Nordic. My peoples battled chill and rain-brought illness. Snow drifts and day long nights. Christmas trees and rowing to Greenland to fish. Various doings in the cold. They never sweat to death. So this current variety of heat, though delayed this......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors I loves me some fried items. For the mouth. Just place them in a red DQ-lookin’ basket with some wax paper to cradle them and BOO-YEAH: let’s watch some professional sports teams. Fried jalapenos. Zucchini. Human toes. Whatever. Fact of our day and age: no matter any particular thing’s beginnings, it’s delicious......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Initially, I planned on writing about the boat-party-Summer-Extrav-O-Ganza thing. But, I didn’t attend, so I’d be talking out of my ass. Well, I'd be pulling more out of my ass than normal. So I won’t even touch on that event, as I’d just be speculating without a real purpose. (though I soooooo......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Last week I stressed the whole “stage” thing. You know, that it’s all important to seize la dia and shit, and that you only live once, yadah-yadah-yadah. And yeah, for serious, it’s important as hell to take your stage. I can’t stress that enough. Voyeurism holds the benefits of safety and anonymity,......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors This life is complicated, and it’s certainly got its surprises. The diversions, as it were. Like the runaway trains, the bank robberies, and the dirty alley awful-mistake-sex. But often times- hell, most of the time --it’s one contemptible bore after another. Seriously, the vast majority of our days are spent droning along......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors It isn’t always easy to strike out all by your lonesome, to do your own thing. Lots of weight to take on. All that responsibility and shit. People watching with a mix of curiosity, hope, and ravenous jealousy. But I know how it is: the desire’s always been there, just not the......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors It was in my sixth hundredth year that I made a humble man’s plans to perform the recently accepted annual rite of loose boozery and off-cuffed shenanigans designed to commemorate the birth of broad-scale marketing for the two-piece bikini. This rite was to revolve around a vessel, and the Central Texas sea,......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors If you look at life as little more than the process of tissue oxidation, then there’s nothing particularly negative or cynical about viewing most vices as harmless escapism; more a road of diversion rather than a path of destruction. For the vast majority of my cognitive life, this is exactly how I’ve......

*The views expressed in Foodie Friday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist (and quite often our readership) as a whole. Ahh, the subjective nature of tastebuds.* -The Editors (Playing the part of Foodie Column-IST this week is one of our newest food writers, Veronica Meewes, freshly returned from the greater Tri-state Metropolitan whatsit.) When I return to the Tri-state Area I called home for so many years, there are several......