The Great Psychedelic Armadillo Picnic by Kinky Friedman Page B

can’t
believe
I’m shaking hands with Larry Mc
Murtry
.” I smiled and said, “Thank you kindly.”
    As this situation progressed through the evening, I noticed George W. watching with a certain bemused interest. Finally he came over with a rather quizzical expression on his face. I explained to him that McMurtry was a shy little booger and would never be this outgoing himself, so actually I was giving him some good PR. The governor just chuckled to himself and whispered something to one of his security people. I figured I was being eighty-sixed from the function, and when that didn’t happen I went over and asked the security guy what the governor had told him. The security guy looked around furtively, then told me, “The governor said, ‘I want that guy for my campaign manager.’”
    George W. and I have been good friends ever since.
    AUSTIN, BEING THE HIGH-TECH university city it is, loves its bookstores. Yeah, we have the corporate chain bookstores here, but why patronize those places when you can go to a local store that has attitude and soul?
    BOOKWOMAN
918 West 12th Street (12th and Lamar)
512-472-2785
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    There are almost no sure things in life; 100-percent guaranteed usually tallies out to 99.9 percent and that remaining .1 percent is often the killer. There is one sure thing I know of that I can say with 100-percent certainty, and that is this: my song “Get Your Biscuits in the Oven [and Your Buns in the Bed]” has never been played in the BookWoman store, ever. There is not even a .1-percent chance that it has. I think the refrain “You uppity women I don’t understand, / Why you gotta go and try to act like a man, / But before you make your weekly visit to the shrink, / You’d better occupy the kitchen, liberate the sink” torpedoes any chance of that happening. I am not offended that this is true. Instead, I find comfort in knowing I have contributed this small piece of certainty to an uncertain world. It brings a level of assurance during these .1-percent times.
    That said, the BookWoman bookstore deserves to be supported because it contributes to Austin’s unique, independent flavor. Where you spend your dollars does make a difference, so, as the BookWoman proclaims, “Go support your feminist bookstore; she supports you!”
    BOOKPEOPLE
603 North Lamar
800-853-9757
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    In 1970 the edge of the University of Texas was a student slum. From the wasteland of this slum, a haven for readers sprang from the cracks in the concrete like the proverbial rose in Spanish Harlem. At the time the store was called Grok Books. Grok flourished, nurtured lovingly by book lovers.
    The store, which later became BookPeople, carries regional titles, as well as small-publisher titles. Their inventory-control staff resides in the store, which means the store knows its clientele and their tastes. Its mission in the world is to fight the homogeneous blight that massive chain bookstores leave in their wake. Here, you decide what you want to read, not some Book of the Month Club cult leader. It is one of the establishments that campaign actively to keep Austin weird.
    REMEMBER GOOD OLD MIRABEAU and the settlement of Waterloo? Perhaps fittingly, Waterloo is now the name of what I like to think of as the best record store in the world. And also, perhaps fittingly, it’s on Lamar Street. It all makes sense now, doesn’t it? Not really.
    WATERLOO RECORDS AND VIDEOS
600 A North Lamar Boulevard
512-474-2500
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    Waterloo Records has been in Austin for over twenty years. While the store specializes in Texas Music, it has a large and diverse selection of artists from every genre and style, filed all together alphabetically, not by category. This, of course, means that Texas music star Willie Nelson and Las Vegas lounge singer Wayne Newton are filed together in the same neighborhood as Nelly the hip-hop star and boy band N’Sync. That visual experience