6.01.2016

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts


  • Lake Bridgeport is above conservation level again with more rain forest like weather coming.
  • Two different kind of tweets from Argyle which are weather related: (1) One guy thinks it is a big deal that running water along a curb moved trash containers a few inches, (2) And by contrast, if this is real, we have kayakers navigating a roaring and quickly developing river.  (That's an amazing short video link). 
  • Isn't this a crisis? The Update reports that due to plunging oil and gas prices that Wise County's "preliminary total taxable values are at $6.1 billion, down 19.04 percent."  So the County Commissioners have only 80% of the money they had to work with last year? Seems like a big deal.
  • Houston has given us maybe the most hot "And Another" entry ever. And the facts may set a new bar for the Shocking Index For Teacher-Student Relations. Her:
  • We have another murder in Southlake, and the victim's estranged husband is the suspect. She was a realtor.
  • Unrelated note on realtors:  The National Association of Realtors paid money to the producers of Modern Family to have character Phil Dunphy explain that a "realtor" is different than a real estate "agent" in one episode. 
  • I saw a tow truck from Rick's Towing hauling a broken down dump truck yesterday morning. That tow truck is massive. What's sticker price on one of those things. 
  • Crazy Glenn Beck "was suspended for a week by Sirius XM for not reining in his guest, fiction author Brad Thor, who hinted that maybe President Donald Trump should be 'removed from office' by a 'patriot' because the 'feckless Congress' won't do it."  (The Ticket played one of Beck's all time radio meltdowns this morning. You can listen to it here beginning at the 3:00 minute mark.)
  • There are a series of documentaries called "The Golden Age of Texas Courthouses" which were produced in the 2000s. Wise County's courthouse has to be featured in that right? Reviews indicate that it "featured thirty courthouses." (h/t BagOfNothing.)
  • Wise County's courthouse is its fifth. Three of them have been on the courthouse square with the first two having burned down in the 1800s. The current one was completed in 1896.
  • Over the weekend there was a gunman who opened fire in Houston killing one and injuring six. He was a 25 year old Afghanistan veteran. 
  • Fish out of Water: Baylor has named an interim president (I don't even know his name) and he will spend his second week attending meetings with other Big 12 presidents where they will discuss expansion and a Big 12 title game. 
  • A staff attorney for the Second Court of Appeals in Fort Worth won the Texas Bar Journal's annual "short story" writing competition.  Stories here. That's a competition I've always wanted to enter but have never got around to doing. (But my entry would probably turn into something from Quentin Tarantino and would be too dark to publish.)
  • Dan Patrick's obsession with the toilet continues. Yesterday he announced that he would send an opinion request to Attorney General Ken Paxton as to whether Fort Worth ISD's superintendent can declare its schools' bathrooms transgendered. Paxton (yes, that guy) is already suing the federal government over the issue so how do you think he will rule?