August 26, 2005

Lost From Midland. West Texas wishes to reclaim the folks who fled to the bigger cities of Texas, and this is how they are trying to do it. Census facts on Midland. [via The Austinist]

The line that sold me was on the Business page: "Midland boasts a skyline more reminiscent of Houston and Dallas than other cities of comparable size." So it's a city of 100k people that looks more like a city of 1.1 million (Dallas proper) or 1.9 million (Houston) than other cities with 100k people? Or, put more simply, "huh?"

posted by patita 19 years ago
  • Are they saying Midland has no stressful, crappy office jobs? Because I'm all for that.
  • The banner ad on the site says they have over 250 new call center jobs... so, no.
  • Oh, bullshit. I lived in Midland/Odessa (two dead sister cities in the middle of nowhere) for two weeks, and it was two weeks too long. West Texas is flat, dead, and outright boring, except for the odd rusty oil rig. Did I mention the tap water tastes like oil? "Oh sure, we have lakes nearby -- just a short 8 hour drive east..."
  • the real west Texas is full of cactus Tejanos vamoosed west of the Pecos north of the Big Bend hope at an end those who knew it well just called it hell
  • You were lucky, LordSludge - I lived there for 25 years. Stay away, everyone. Faaaaar away...
  • About two summers ago I worked the Texas State Fair. Not to tar folks with too broad of brush, but what the hell is up with texans? I have never seen a group of more uppity folks. Every other texan is wearing a t shirt that says "don't mess with Texas" on it. Now, I wanna ask ya, who am I gonna mess with, and how does one exactly "mess" with an entire state? *intercom buzz* "Excuse me, governor, but there is a gentleman here from Los Angeles, a Mr. Squidranch, who want's to "mess" with us?" I have to admit, I met some really cool folks there too, but Texas, you got to chill with this whole "knock this chip off my shoulder" mentality. Take a tip from Hawaii. Their t shirts say "aloha" and "mahalo" and "chill brah"... Smoke a big fatty texas. No one wanna mess with you.
  • "Don't Mess with Texas" was, I think, orginally an anti littering slogan. If the folks wearing the shirts also do not throw their trash, then I am all for it. The Permian Basin oil field, where Midland is located, is slowly being played out. The big banks and major oil companines have closed some of their offices or sold the business to banks and companies that can still make money on the reduced oil flow. Midland/Odessa is an area to be from. Not one to go to, to live, without a really good reason.
  • Don't Mess With Texas is the official highway anti-litter campaign, squidranch. Stickers and shirts with this slogan are distributed by the Texas Department of Transportation. Part of the reason that Texans may seem to have a chip on their shoulder is that people come here with preconceptions of what Texas should be (based on the current Connecticut-Yankee-in-Chief and that godawful show from the 80s). "You come to see what you wanna see, Ah, you come to see but you never come to know."
  • There's something eerily Lovecraftian about the "Once a Midlander, always a Midlander" at the bottom of the page.
  • Ok, glad to hear it. I thought half the damn state wanted to get into a street fight.
  • Oh, Kinky. I wish I were still a registered Texas voter just to vote for him.
  • Also, I love how the Odessa site touted the availability of jobs, and when you get to the jobs site, they have 19 whole positions available.
  • Kinky probably deserves an fpp at some point. There are signs up for him all over Austin (in unlikely locations too).
  • Oh, man. I would *love* it if he won. He hired Jessie Ventura's guy, which is a sign of seriousness! My parents have promised to vote for him, in the good ole "Vote early, vote often" Texas style ;)
  • All I could think of when I read this post was the Mollys' song "Odessa": Odessa, Odessa, sunlight in the gray Didn't you and I fall in love that way? Boom town love in a boom town city, Come on back and make that city pretty. And, as usual, meredithea says what I have to say, this time about Kinky.