You bet we will. There's no "hold your nose" candidate on the Republican side this time.

I heard he was inspired by The Searchers. Or are you joking about Flash Gordon?

Also, an Iowan invented the first digital computer. A lab in Ames was part of the Manhattan Project.

Local news showed all the clips where Iowa was mentioned. They weren't happy. Yes, Iowans have X-boxes. And it's damn hard to even find a loose meat sandwich. Which are properly referred to as maidrites, even though the Maidrite chain isn't what it used to be, and Iowans prefer our awesome pork tenderloin…

I haven't read "Oil". Meyers' book doesn't get into the oil business until fairly late in the story. It's been a couple years since I read it. In my head, it's a combo of The Searchers, Lonesome Dove, Little Big Man, Giant, The Alamo, Romeo and Juliet, and the movie that hasn't been made yet about a strong woman…

I'm not holding my breath. It's not like David Milch is known for his dependability.

The book was excellent — if they do it right and don't soap it up, it could be great.

The book was excellent — if they do it right and don't soap it up, it could be great.

The opening paragraph quoted in the article isn't the opening paragraph of the original version of the book. Many of us read the sanitized version. In the original, mom had died of natural causes, and dad died of drink. The original is available on-line at the usual places. It's a much better read than the revised…

I'm too lazy too, but I think he's the maternal grandparent. The original can be read on-line via Gutenberg and other sources. Anyone wanting to read the book needs to be careful to get the original 1924 version — it's better in a lot of ways. And if you can locate an actual copy, it's worth some money.

Here are the first few paragraphs of the original version of the book:

It's true that I read it somewhere — I think on an Amazon review. I'll see if I can find it.

I read somewhere that mom died of natural causes, and that dad took to drink and died after falling down some stairs. There are two versions of the first book. One has more about the parents, especially dad's drinking, but that was determined to be too "adult" for kids.

Stinger by Robert McCammon, published in the 70's, if I remember right. It's a nifty concept. Someone should make a TV show about it.

Mennonites migrated to Mexico in the 1920's. There's a recent HuffPo article about Mennonites smuggling drugs for the cartels. Who'd suspect them?

Except that Daniel did smile in this episode. I don't recall the exact scene, but it was so nice to see him smile. Maybe he even laughed — I need to watch again.

She could have let Kyle go. He would have talked to his friend but he wouldn't have told any adults. Now Kyle has disappeared and she's going after his friend, so there'll be another disappeared or dead kid.

I'm not feeling the love for Eleanor's character. I like my killers (serial or otherwise) to have a reason for killing. She killed her henchman in the first episode because he didn't follow instructions, so I figured that'll be her schtick. But Kyle did everything she asked and still died, and Kyle's doomed friend…