I Don't Do Reviews
By Ben Tennison, Editor
Western Mule Magazine

I don’t do book reviews or video reviews. There are three reasons why I don’t:
#1 I don’t have time.
#2 It lives in me to spend way more time on what’s wrong with the book or video than what’s good about it. Ask me on the street about a book I’ve read or a video I’ve watched and 80% of the time my answer will go something like, “It’s good, you need to read it” or “I liked the video; it’s worth watching.” Ask me to write you an answer to that same book or video and I will mention the good, but I’ll dwell on what I believe to be wrong with it. Then I’ll spend countless hours, ink and paper trying to explain why I feel that way about it and in the end there’ll be two feeling bad, the one that wrote the book or shot the video and me. So I don’t do reviews.
That very thing that lives in me that cause me to dwell on the wrong is the very reason why I’m not in the mule selling business. Ask me about a mule I own that is Not for Sale and I’ll tell ya all that’s good about him and little if anything that’s wrong with him. If I wanted to sell that same mule, I’ll spend waayyy to much time telling you what’s wrong with him. If you want a definition for an oxi-moron you just read one. I don’t know why I’m like that. Someone told me once: I have deep rooted desire not to disappoint my fellow man. I hope that’s what is it is. 
#3: The third reason I don’t do reviews is because I’m an editor. When I first started Western Mule Magazine I handed a piece I had written to a long time editor of a newspaper to tweak. He looked over his glasses and said, “you don’t want me to read this, I’m an editor,” Looking at him puzzled, he went on to say, “In every man and especially in editors lives a strong desire to change another man’s editorial.” At the time I had no earthly idea what he was talking about…Well I do now! Heck yeah, I’ll want to change your book or your video…No its not fair and by golly I can’t help it.

I’ve told you all that to prepare you, I’m doing a review on a video…Kinda of Hard to keep up, ain’t it?

The DVD MULA by J&S Productions is the best video I’ve ever watched on mules. The great Southwest and the Spanish Trail has a lot of history to be told. Here, mules were front and center. Filmmakers, Susan Jensen and Paul Singer tell the story in genius way, bringing to the DVD, the history of mules and cultures from California, all the way to Missouri and Tennessee. They tell the story the only proper way to tell by combining history and mules from the East to the West.

MULA is a film of heroes. The Mules! If you own a mule, like mules, are interested in mules or just curious about the mule, this video is a must.

Would I have done this film differently? You bet ya..only to tell you, every time I watch this DVD, Mula and when it ends…I only wish I had the ability to make a film so full of history, so full of information, so deserving for heroes, The Mules. I might have done it differently but I couldn’t have done I better.

Get a copy. It is the best film on mules and their history I’ve ever seen!
BUY NOW