I just got a call from a woman who was taking Amtrak from Hanford to Bakersfield this morning and she wasn't best pleased at the conductor who called her 'honey' and then 'baby.'

She said to him, "I'm not your baby."

And as far as I know she was right.

I don't think I've ever been called 'baby' by a Vons checker or a GET bus driver, but I've been called 'honey' a few times, and not just by the bartender at VIP. It doesn't bother me too much, but then again it's not being uttered by a possibly lecherous old geezer with a disturbing twinkle in his eye.

There's nothing sexy about bad air or foreclosures, but there's something rather naughty about the latest list Bakersfield finds itself on top of.

That's right, if proof were still needed that we're a stubbornly religious city, it can be found in the list of Top 10 Craziest Sex Laws in America.

Number 1: In Bakersfield, Calif., if you're going to have sex with Satan, you've gotta use a condom.

Perhaps a campaign will be started to put up posters of that law in high school classrooms across the county.

Alongside the railroad tracks in downtown Fresno about 200 people live in tents and improvised shanty-type buildings.

Under the freeway overpass, just south of this first camp is another camp with about the same number of dwellings.

And throughout the western U.S. similar makeshift homes are springing up.

Bakersfield too has its share of the homeless, in shelters and on the streets. Along the bike path, tarps strung on tree branches hint at human life inside.

But we don't have tent cities, yet.

High Country News has written a fascinating piece about Fresno's tent cities and similar projects around the nation.

Which famous Bakersfield resident was born on this day, many years ago.

We were originally drawn to this Web site about Portland because No, 68 on their list of "Things about Portland that suck" is Gresham, and this is what the site has to say about Gresham:

In Oregon, there lies a place just outside the city of Portland where people go to escape being awesome. Every major city throughout our country has this. Los Angeles has Bakersfield. New York City has the entire state of New Jersey. Detroit has 8 Mile Road.

Our initial dismay at yet another Intersult (our just-coined phrase for an Internet insult, as opposed to one that's, heaven forbid, delivered face to face) turned to delight when we carried on reading and found ourselves laughing out loud at the reasons why Gresham is such a miserable place.

Anyway, a similar site could be started in Bako land.

We'll get things started:

Things about Bakersfield that suck

No. 37: The two-beer limit at John's Incredible Pizza.

Driving the 65 north up to Porterville is always a scary proposition. It's kind of like taking the 46 west to the coast (though the Central Coast is about as comparable to Porterville as an apple is to a three-legged elephant) with mad drivers in souped-up Acura's dodging in and out of traffic in a deadly effort to trim a few seconds off the drive time.

Anyway, it's not just the humans who suffer on 65. Spare a thought for our bovine brothers.

This incident release just moved on the CHP's Web site:

8:14 a.m.: Vehicle vs. cows

8:14 a.m.: 2 cows 1144

In CHP parlance that means possible fatality.

Calling the incident a non-injury accident does a disservice to the cows.

One of the joys of working with the Breaking News Team is listening to the police scanner. The scanner broadcasts incident updates from all kinds of local law enforcement agencies, includes alien chatter and a never ending chorus of reports from the BHS campus police.

It was the latter agency which presented one student with a dilemma this morning:

Turn in your cell phone or face suspension.

He chose suspension.

The student's reasoning (according to scanner traffic) was that his grandma would not give his phone back if she found out it had been taken away. Thus, he would rather face the principal's wrath than his grandma's.

It's all about choices.

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Nick Belardes over at facebakersfield.com is sort of a competitor of ours, so we'll try not to sing his praises too much, but we did relate to his recent commentary on local homicides and how the media covers them.

Belardes writes:

"While each shooting in one aspect becomes a Bakersfield crime statistic and a toll on local emergency services, there’s also some kind of human story behind each tale — though most are lost to the populace at large. The local media, myself included, reduce such stories to either a brief news item built around a press release, or a few quotes from law enforcement officers and disturbed next-door neighbors, once again shocked that someone died in their neighborhood."

and

"Here in Bakersfield, the gang stories rarely get told. We get the law enforcement perspective and the dry media flavor (that I also write unfortunately). There’s rarely any thick narrative, or storytelling, or deep description of blood and guts shootouts and drug running streets. There’s rarely a tale told because likely the gangs and the police want it that way. Though not all tough neighborhood shootings are gang-related."

We're debating the same issue here within the Breaking News Team and with our bosses. We have a duty to inform our readers what's happening out there, but do our readers really want the details? Do they really care about  another gang shooting in southeast Bakersfield?

So thanks to Mr. Belardes for voicing a seemingly universal local media theme, and (because we don't want to be too sycophantic!) thank you for providing this little gem from yesterday's homicide report:

"The area is located close to the intersection of Niles and Oswell Street across from a vacant field. There’s no front yard or fence surrounding the small white house that can be seen on a quick googlemap investigation."

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Our buddy Alex over at laragmag.com has issued an unequivocal statement on the stunning demise of the Ed Hardy fashion line.

For Alex, it all came to a head when he, "walked into my neighborhood 7-11 and that insufferable logo was on lighters for $1.99."

But it was over before that.

It was truly over when Bakersfield's Rosedale mafia started wearing it on their baseball caps, perched slightly askew on their angry heads. Ed Hardy hit Bako like Juicy pants and Uggs hit Luigi's every Saturday.

When it comes to fashion, we know when something's out ... because we're the ones wearing it!

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And it's got nothing to do with 'your buds' at Kern Hydroponics.

Most tweets about Bakersfield are derogatory and blah. You can only be so creative in 140 characters, but that's ample room for drive-throughs to vent their disgust of our city.

That's why this tweet about our green grass was so pleasurable:

just noticed that all the grass in bakersfield is perfectly cut and bright green.

Of course, the reason for this is the abundance of water we sprinkle on it (even when it's raining) and because we pay other people to cut it because we're too lazy to do it ourselves.

Still, that's a tweet for another day!

Bakersfieldnow.com has a short story on the cancellation of Panama-Buena Vista School District's 8th grade graduation with the obligatory outrage from one student and one parent.

The story says the district will save $25,000 with this move.

Let's be honest here, graduating from 8th grade is not particularly difficult. It's expected. The same thing could be said about high school. If you show up to class and turn in your assignments, graduating from high school isn't much of a chore.

Perhaps those wild celebrations will be the next to bite the budget bullet. Would anyone care?

A few minutes ago we got an e-mail from a parent arguing against the cancellation. Here's an excerpt:

Just last year, one of my younger sisters had her 8th Grade Graduation from Junior High School. It was a day she (like most students) looked forward to the entire year. My mother, two sisters and myself searched high and low for her perfect dress, even going out of town to make sure she would be her happiest. She was "glammed up" for her big day and you can see the joy in her pictures she experienced. We then had a nice lunch afterward and toasted her achievements. My youngest sister, is in 8th Grade this year and has been talking about her graduation since last year. She has been overly excited about getting to do all the same things as our other sister; going all over to find the perfect dress, how she wants her hair, etc. Sadly, my mother will now have to inform her that she doesn't deserve the same as her sister because someone at the district level has unilaterally decided to strip them of this right.

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According to a KGET-17 story, the new Hooters on Rosedale Highway won't be sharing its ample feast with locals anytime soon.

We reported back in December that the restaurant known for chicken wings, cold beer and gregarious, top-heavy waitresses was scheduled to open around April.

The TV story said a new opening date hasn't been determined.

Was watching the news on 5 p.m. news on Channel 17 yesterday when anchorman Jim Scott responded to the weather report with the following line:

"I'm a sucker for a big moon."

No one knew what to say next.

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Drove past this small group of people on the corner of Oak and Truxtun on Saturday afternoon and initially thought it was another car wash.

But then as we got closer and read the signs, it was clear this was no fund raiser.

The signs read (and we're trying as hard as we can to remember the exact proclamations, for obvious reasons) stuff like "Honk if you love vaginas," "I love my vagina," and another one used the cat euphemism for said organ. One sign read "Stop rape."

A few cars honked as they drove past.

It was a refreshing change from the usual Yes on 8, No on 8, Pizza Pizza signs one usually sees on Bakersfield intersections.

If anyone can provide more information on this 'demonstration,' would be interesting to hear what it's about.

Aha, facebakersfield is back online after a brief hiatus, and here's their report (with photos of the signs so you can tell we're not making this up!)

Continuing the theme of humorous local commercials, we're wondering how many people would buy their insurance from a company called Pirate Insurance?

On the fence? The commercial's tagline may convince you:

"We'll save you a shipload of money!"

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For the first time in ages me and the missus used our cloth grocery bags for recent trips to fresh & easy and Vons. Our intentions have been good, but the bags would never quite make the short trip from the hallway closet to the car, or if they did, from the car to the store.

So it's fair to say we've used and (sometimes) recycled our fair share of plastic grocery bags. The convenience factor often clouded us to the landfill problem.

Anyway, it was good today to read about some proposed state legislation that would levy a 25-cent tax on all plastic bags distributed by supermarkets and other stores. And it reminded me of a similar story that made the paper a year or so ago about the plastic bag problem in Ireland. Here's an excerpt from the New York Times:

"In 2002, Ireland passed a tax on plastic bags; customers who want them must now pay 33 cents per bag at the register. There was an advertising awareness campaign. And then something happened that was bigger than the sum of these parts.

Within weeks, plastic bag use dropped 94 percent. Within a year, nearly everyone had bought reusable cloth bags, keeping them in offices and in the backs of cars. Plastic bags were not outlawed, but carrying them became socially unacceptable — on a par with wearing a fur coat or not cleaning up after one’s dog."

No one likes new taxes, but it's not like you have to pay it. You do have an alternative. And it might be right there in your hallway closet.

— Andrew Mockett

From the National Homeschooling basketball tournament to the city parks of Bakersfield: One man rekindles his love for the game.

Heard a radio commercial yesterday afternoon for Kern Hydroponics on Brundage.

Among the more memorable lines were:

"Grow like a pro with your buds at Kern Hydroponics"

and

"Surround yourself with green."

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John Malkovich plays magician and mentalist Buck Howard in the new movie, "The Great Buck Howard."

Tom Hanks' son, Colin Hanks, plays Troy Gabel, Howard's road manager.

We stumbled across a review of the movie on The Daily Aztec's web site, which included the following description:

Gabel’s journey begins in a dusty, old theater in Bakersfield. Though the audience is sparse and the venue dilapidated, Howard, played by Malkovich, greets them as he would any other city by proclaiming, “I love this town!”

Wonder which local theater would fit the bill?

If you sign up to receive our news alerts you may be wondering why you've been inundated with the same "Kern's unemployment hits 13.8 percent" alert multiple times.

While this is indeed a newsworthy issue, it doesn't bear repeating about 10 times.

We're working on getting this resolved (the technical issue, not the unemployment problem, though that would be nice too).

This is from a Steve Swenson story about the D.A's office filing a consumer fraud civil suit against a car dealership.

I got the flier in my mailbox and stopped in to the Oak Street dealership one lunchtime. As I approached the lot I was warned by a couple of crazy-looking women that it was all a big scam and you had to go onto the Internet to maybe get some free gas. They were confused. I was unperturbed.

I went in and was approached by a glib and oily salesman who immediately asked if I wanted to buy a car. When I replied in the negative he offered to pay off my car and give me $2,000 toward one of their cars. I declined again. He was getting frustrated.

When all avenues had been exhausted, he motioned me to the prize board. No, I didn't win a free car, or a flat screen. What I did win was a voucher for free gas. When you spend $100 in gas in the same month you have to mail in the receipts and a few months later you get a gas card for $25 mailed to you. I read the fine print. It's tricky. The dedication and commitment required was beyond me and I gave it up as a lesson learned.

— Andrew Mockett

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There's a story on thepacker.com about purple and yellow carrots hitting the commercial market.

The carrots come from Nunhems, a German-based Bayer CropScience’s vegetable seed business, and so far are only processed in the U.S. in Idaho.

The story goes on to say Grimmway grows colored carrots using the German seeds and is currently doing field trials with the new varieties.

Perhaps soon, we'll be muching on these distinctly-colored vegetables. The seed company hopes to debut a red carrot in 2010, the story says.

Which two companies in the Dow Jones industrial average were the only two to see their share prices INCREASE in 2008?

Clue: They both operate right here in Bakersfield!

Sunny and Norma Clemons just celebrated their 65th anniversary. The couple lives in South Carolina now, but they met, romanced and got married in Bakersfield.

The Aiken-Standard wrote a nice story about them.

Here's an excerpt:

"She was flouncing her long beautiful dark hair and I thought 'I need that,'" said Sunny. "We saw each other a total of 10 times before we were married. I hitchhiked every Saturday two hours to Bakersfield from the base to her boarding house where we sat on the front porch for hours."

The early visits included long walks around town where the couple often sang songs to one another. One of the songs they sang in 1944 called "It Had to Be You," they still sing to each other in 2009.

"This girl and I walked all over Bakersfield talking. The more I talked to her, the more I knew this was the girl," said Sunny as he stared into Norma's eyes. "In my heart I was looking for someone like my mother with loving characteristics, and I found her."

Look, we enjoy the Kern County Fair as much as anyone and we understand it's important not to rain too heavily on the fair's parade, but we did think one local TV station's description of the fair's entertainment lineup was a bit over the top.

Here's a http://www.bakersfield.com/...>few of the acts:

Tower of Power, soul/funk band, on Sept. 23.

Phil Vassar, country, Sept. 24

Larry Gatlin & The Gatlin Brothers, country, Sept. 30

Salvador, contemporary Christian, Oct. 1

And here's KERO-23's intro:

With the theme “Best in the West,” planners of this year’s Kern County Fair
are lining up a star-studded showcase of free concerts for Bakersfield’s
largest annual celebration, Sept. 24 - Oct. 4.

Let's not get carried away now!





 

The local gun shop announces a 3-day "WE HATE TAXES SALE."

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Pretty soon (well, in 6 years or so) us locals will be able to add another positive when talking about living in Bakersfield.

Two hours from the beach, an hour and a half from Hollywood, snowboarding a short drive away, 45 minutes from Merced.

Yes, that's right. 45 minutes from Merced, gateway to Yosemite!

Not in some modified Honda Accord that you see every day racing along on Highway 99, but via high speed rail.

A flat, straight stretch through the San Joaquin Valley connecting Merced and Bakersfield will likely be the first completed, the AP reported Monday. The journey, which usually takes about 3 hours by car would go by in a quarter of that time, should the train sustain it's 220-mph speed.

Of course, that's not taking into account various stops for big-rigs trying to beat the train at the crossings.

Eventually the fast train will run from Los Angeles to San Francisco, a 2-hour, 40-minute jaunt.

Book your tickets for 2015 now!

It's very annoying that Congress pushed back the digital TV conversion date for two reasons.

First, because anyone who wasn't prepared for the initial date of Feb. 17 has only themselves to blame, and this is just another example of people's bone-idleness. Our screens have been bombarded with messages about the transition. Anyone who has watched TV for longer than five minutes in one sitting will have seen something scrolling across the top of the screen. If it's not high winds in the desert regions of eastern Kern County, it's the endless reminder of the digital conversion plan. We thought the Mor Furniture commercials were bad, but these just never stop.

And secondly, because now we have to put up with those intrusive alerts for another few months.

The only thing that's mildly cool about the delay is that now you can see local stations in both analog and digital formats and it's blatantly clear which has the better picture. Of course, that when it's not scrambled or frozen.