Help, I’m Dating a Mexican!

Dear Mexican: Why do so many of my peers assume I must have low self-esteem just because I’m dating a Mexican guy? I finally found someone with my same values who treats me way better than any gringo I ever dated. The same women who complain about “sleazy” Mexican men…

Dinger Bell

“The Rockies mascot is named Dinger,” comedian Jay Mohr wrote in “It Sucks to Be Them,” a piece on SI.com. “He is a big, fat, purple dinosaur who sports a baby T-shirt that barely covers his nipples. According to the web site, Dinger travels the land promoting physical fitness and…

Beer Today, Gone Tomorrow

At Sunday’s game, I sat next to two fellows who said they were with the brewers. In town for the Great American Beer Festival? No, with the Milwaukee Brewers, they corrected me, and since their team beat the Padres, the Rockies really owed them some thanks. Or at least a…

The Mexican Dismembers History

Dear Mexican: What is it with the Mexican hangup on body parts? When General Antonio López de Santa Anna was struck by a cannonball in one of his 8,000 wars, his right leg was removed from the knee down. When he returned to Mexico City, he ordered that a state…

Ballot Up!

Timing is everything. Imagine that you’re the mayor of a big city with some big, expensive ballot issues coming up — an alphabet soup of nine proposals that would fund assorted infrastructure repairs around town to the tune of well over $500 million. What day would you want those big,…

Rock Bottom

Dinger must go. The most embarrassing mascot in the major leagues is a fossil on the field. Dinger should be as dead as a dodo. Last week, as the Colorado Rockies clinched their place in the playoffs by beating the Padres, a sister who’d been watching the game in New…

Fire and Ice

Westword was going to challenge our partner paper, Phoenix New Times, to a bet on the outcome of the Rockies/Diamondback series — but we couldn’t think of anything we wanted from Phoenix. A downtown that’s a ghost town at night, instead of the party that LoDo has become almost every…

Has-Beans

Dear Mexican: We were in a restaurant the other day, eating refried beans and green chile, when I overheard some gringos in the next booth making fun of Mexicans. One thing they said that really made me mad was, “Why do Mexicans refry their beans? Stupid Mexicans! Don’t they know…

Carlos Mencia: Racist Jerk or Thieving Jerk?

Dear Mexican: I’m a minority, and I know we can be overly sensitive sometimes, but I just can’t stand Carlos Mencia. Not only are his jokes asinine, but I feel they are actually racist. Whereas Dave Chappelle tried to make fun of society’s racist thoughts, Mencia seems to promote them…

Art Attack!

Look for art to break out all over the mall during Denver Arts Week, which runs October 5-12 (for details, go to the Night & Day section of the October 4 Westword). But in fact, you can expect art to break out even earlier, since a few underground-art types, concerned…

They Like Us, They Really Like Us

Denver has always been the Sally Field of cities, grateful for the slightest nod of recognition from the national media. Under normal circumstances, the filming of an Eddie Murphy movie in this town — Nowhereland, for example, which is currently shooting around Denver — would be front-page news. But these…

Charity Begins at Home

Elected officials in Denver get to do double duty. In celebrity-short Denver, they’re in constant demand for do-good events. On Friday night, for example, Denver DA Mitch Morrissey was on deck at Elway’s in the Concerts for Kids “celebrity server” event, which raised more than $50,000 for children’s charities. The…

Bilingual Education and Ignorance

Dear Mexican: After the great migration of Jews to this nation, a question was posed: “How long does it take a Jew to go from being a street sweeper to becoming a corporate attorney?” The answer: “One generation.” Not so for Mexicans. Most Mexicans seem to recoil from education like…

Fucking With McSwane

Once again, David McSwane is the most talked-about student journalist in the country. But rather than saluting his enterprise with awards, this time the prudey-pants professionals are tsk-tsking the editor of the Colorado State University newspaper for this shocker: He published an editorial with the headline:”Fuck Bush.” If you can’t…

Mex and Match

Dear Readers: A couple of weeks ago, I asked half-breeds to write in with nicknames that describe their mixed Mexican heritage. Many, muchos responses continue to trickle in; gracias for the submissions. The following is a handy glossary that ustedes wrote, with the occasional Mexican commentary — enjoy! If you’re…

Things to Do in Denver When You’re Not Dead

Now it looks like Colorado’s latest celebrity arrived in this state by accident. . According to his attorney, fugitive financier Norman Hsu was “sick and confused” and may have mistakenly gotten out of an Amtrak train heading to Denver rather than the Bay Area Rapid Transit train that would have…

On The Road, Again

Unpack your berets and bongos and prepare for a finger-snappin’ sit-in at the Denver City & County Building. Because on September 18, when the city reveals its choice for the next One Book, One Denver selection, it will not be On the Road. Again. Never mind that author Jack Kerouac…

Papi Dont Preach

Dear Mexican: I am addressing this to both you and Dan Savage, hoping one of you will have an answer: Why do Mexican chicks yell for their papi during sex? Daddy del Diablo Dear Readers: After getting the above query, Dan Savage, author of the pinche hilarious column Savage Love,…

Michael Heckuva Job Brown Knows Disaster

It’s a disaster in the making. “Since the terrible events of September 11, 2001, and with the increasing and widespread concern for pandemic influenza worldwide, Coloradans have been deluged with constant warnings about their ongoing safety,” reads the What If? Colorado program overview page prepared by the Office of Emergency…

So Hsu Me!

Some boosters think Colorado needs celebrities in the worst way. And that’s how this state gets them. Earlier this summer, Andrew Speaker was kept under wraps — literally — at National Jewish, after his global run from a tuberculosis diagnosis. And yesterday, fugitive fundraiser Norman Hsu wound up in a…

Ports-to-Plains: Keep on Truckin’

“Mexican Trucks Stampede to U.S.!” Web sites and radio shows are full of talk today about the Mexican truckers who will soon — perhaps even today — cross the border into Texas in a Bush-sanctioned trade deal. This talk describes the Mexican truck deal as the camel’s nose under the…

Funny Business

Dear Mexican: A new line of Speedy González clothing came out earlier this year. As a black vendor in a predominantly Mexican market, I immediately thought about selling some of these items. I am 35, and although I remember the cartoon coming on when I was a young kid, I…