Nothing brings people together like a shared enemy – except maybe a shared enema. It’s one thing to share hatred with other people – even complete strangers. It’s quite another to share an enema tube – even with your bestie. It should come as no surprise then that statistically, at least, hatred tops enemas by a large margin. Regardless of President Clinton’s exhortation for Americans to expand the definition of “us” and shrink the definition of “them,” we’re still very comfortable with the hatred. We seem to like getting our panties in a wad. We especially like to hate on our neighbors to the north. Not Canadians. Hating Canadians is like hating Jesus or Santa Claus. Sure, they’re so sweet you get sick of them every now and then, but if you start posting Photoshopped pictures of them having sexual congress with assorted farm animals on your Facebook page – however hilarious they might be – you would, in the end, only be screwing yourself. Besides, people hate a mean drunk. That’s why Billy Joe Shaver could shoot one in the face and still get acquitted. Of course, if you decide to try that in the parking lot of your local shithole honky-tonk, make sure you have plenty of celebrity friends and Dick DeGuerin heading up your all-star, pro bono legal defense team. Canadians may have dangerous socialist tendencies, but it’s universally accepted fact that they’re happy drunks. Plus, you don’t have to travel that far north to hate, just cross the Red River. Okies are as easy to hate as Tim Tebow on a Vegas bachelor weekend. Why? Simple. Oklahoma’s football team has won more national championships than ours. Admit it. In terms of offensive behavior, they could just as well have gang-banged Bevo and broadcast it on the Godzillatron at the Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium. Being better than Texas at football is nearly unforgivable, but Okies somehow manage to up the ante by being equally loud and obnoxious drunks – superseded only by Alabamans, who are even louder, more obnoxious, and completely incomprehensible after a few Budweisers. Is it any wonder they have the most national football championships of all? Still, no matter how ugly a drubbing they gave us in the Rose Bowl, it seems a lot of trouble to cross two states to piss on the Crimson Tide when we have crimson and cream right upstairs. Fortunately, you don’t even have to go that far north to find someone to hate and ridicule – especially when you have Pflugerville just 10 minutes up the interstate. Yes, desirable, affordable Pflugerville. What’s not to hate? First, there’s the galling effrontery of sticking a “silent” P in front of a perfectly good F. F alone isn’t good enough for you Pflugerville? Well, F you with a P on top. Pflugerville also has good schools, huge sports fields, a lake, roomy houses, and the celebrity cachet of having been the filming location for Pfriday Night Lights. Hate you, Pflugerville. Adding insult to injury is its annual Deutschen Pfest, a three-day pfestival pfeaturing pfood, arts & crafts, music (yes, they scored Dale Watson and Bruce Robison), and even a 5K Pfun Run/Walk. You’re probably tasting vomit in the back of your mouth right now, but if you can somehow get over your Central Austin hipster haughtiness, you might find that you have a lot in common with your northern neighbors – if not genetically (really, who in America hasn’t been pfucked by a German?), then perhaps spiritually. After all, you probably come from the ‘burbs just like they do. “Them” really are “us.”
