I’m giving this special award to Chevy’s, which likes to call itself “Fresh Mex”. I’m wondering if they actually have anyone on their staff besides busboys who speaks Spanish at all. I’ve ridiculed them for years because they make their tortilla chips with “El Machino”. Every truly Ugly American knows, of course, that in order to make yourself understood in Spanish, all you need to to is speak really loudly and slowly, and add “O” to the ends of English words. Fortunately, “El machino” is pretty inoccuous, since it means nothing at all in Spanish. (The Spanish word for machine, BTW, is “Maquina”, which would get the feminine article, “la”.) Today, however, their ignorance and UA-ness moved me to post. In an advertisement, they are promoting “dinero” for two. Lissen up, Chevy’s, if you’re going to pretend to have anything to do with Mexico whatsoever, you need to learn that sometimes a word with the UA “O” added to the end of it is simply an Ugly American tourist word. Other times, though, it turns out to be a real word, and in this case it has nothing to do with what you think it does. “Dinero” is not “Dinner-o”, but “Money”. I would like to sponsor a protest in which pairs of people converge on Chevy’s restaurants around the country and ask for their “Money for two”. It doesn’t say exactly how much money, but I think enough people asking for it will eventually either impact the bottom line, or get them to stop pretending to be Mexican while simultaneously butchering the Spanish language.

I was really happy to read the news today and see that he got what he deserved. Now, instead of having the possibility of parole in another ten years, he’s in jail for good. Of course, his attorney is already planning what they’re going to say in the appeal. This is absolutely shameful. If ever there were a case in which guilt is fully established, this is it. And after that outrageous lies he and his counsel came up with this time, is there any doubt that any “further evidence” will be equally as fabricated? The most blatant, of course, being that his brother did it – despite the fact that his brother was a big bruiser at the time, and Weinstein said on the tape that Michael looked more like 13 than 17; and that his fingerprints got on the photographs of Weinstein’s son when he was unloading the car – except that they were found on her body, and he claimed to have not seen her body at the scene while unloading the car, and his brother’s fingerprints were nowhere to be found. I really hope he’s denied further appeals. The idea of our tax dollars being wasted to defend this guy again when the verdict will most certainly not change gets me pretty angry.