What About My Mint Mocha Chip Frappuccino® With Chocolate Whipped Cream?

Any word on the Decatur Starbucks? The chain said it would close some of its underperforming stores but I have no idea how the local store stacks up. I just never have gotten into the high tone coffee - the menu looks to intimidating and I fear the hidden fat grams. (Nutrition info here.)

But I see lots of people drinking that stuff.

When Did Susan B. Anthony Come Back To Life?

How did this slip by me? The First United Methodist Church in Bridgeport has a new pastor and he is a woman? Huh? Is that possible? Doesn't the Bible call this an "abomination" or something like that? (Edit: My bad. It's homosexuality that's an abomination. That and the eating of fish. Liberally Lean regrets this error.)

This progressiveness has to stop. The next thing you know they'll want to vote or something.

Note: Unlike the Baptists (where God lets the congregation choose its pastors and routinely only leads preachers to higher paying jobs), the Methodists "assigns" its ministers. Kind of like being a manager of Arby's, but different.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• If I were at the beach.
• The Cotton Bowl is adding complete upper decks to the end zones. That's quite a few more seats (and a pretty good pic of it is here.) But based on stubhub.com, that doesn't make Texas/OU tickets any cheaper.
• Wal*Mart is getting rid of the "*". As smart as they company has been, that was a goofy idea to put it there in the first place.
• Funny line from Vegas Vacation (I saw parts of it again last weekend) when Clark asks Eddie if he is worried about living near a radioactive site: "All I know is that my garden is spittin' out 10 pound tomaters and my teeth have never been whiter."
• I receive Newsweek every week and never get around to reading any of the articles like I promise myself.
• The find-a-parking-space-dance at Casa Torres on a given weekday in Decatur will suck the life force out of you. And there always seems to be a pack of guys in Haliburton outfits in there.
• There was a huge wreck on I-35E at the Lewisville Lake bridge this morning. There's simply no way to get around that and the traffic folks were suggesting people exit at Teasley Lane in Denton. Oh, my.
• The story all over the AP yesterday was that "9 out of 10 Families Affected By Gas Prices." Isn't that the same thing as saying that 9 out of 10 families aren't rich.
• My cruise control has gone out on my vehicle. Beating.
• I saw the movie Fragile in a theater and its been on HBO pretty frequently over the last couple of months. Verdict: It's ridiculous. 
• The new First Financial Bank building in Decatur at 51/287 looks pretty good. But it appears there is yet another hotel going in right by it. 
• Fox 4's medical reporter John Hammarley has been suspended. Don't know why.
• There was a report yesterday that many people will have to walk one mile from their parking space to the new Cowboys Stadium. But if you ever parked at the outer lot at Texas Stadium, that's about the same distance. 
• I saw a book review in the paper last weekend about Doris Day. I didn't know that she was still alive, in her 80s, and a recluse for the last 40 years. I like that "recluse" idea.
• It is coming up on the 4th of July and that means fireworks. Overrated? And haven't they been exactly the same for the last 30 years?
• And isn't it amazing that 30 years ago there was a firework sold that had an unofficial racist name. Uh, it ended in "chaser"?  I remember every kid on my block calling it that and we didn't think twice about it.
• Former Fox 4 traffic reporter Todd Caruth went to the ER for kidney stones. That cost him $4,227.85.(before a voluntary discount.)
•  Back in November I posted the 911 call where the man pretty much told the operator that he was going next door to shoot two guys robbing a house. He did. It was chilling. Yesterday a grand jury no-billed him.
• I do a good job of keeping house plants alive.
• That Granbury killing of two women is also chilling. But it was odd that they met in a Women's Shelter.
• By the way, Embarq promptly showed up on Monday morning and replaced the defective modem in our office. Good job. 
  

I'm In Tomato Heaven

So I come back to my office and find these two bottles on my desk. I'm still trying to figure out where they came from but they have a "Decatur, TX" label on them.

Edit: I made a Dan Quail spelling error but quickly corrected it before anyone saw. I thought. 

Your Liberally Lean Financial Minute

NEW YORK -

Shares of Devon Energy Corp., the largest U.S.-based independent oil and gas producer, rose Monday as an analyst boosted his price target and estimates on the company, and oil prices touched a high.The stock gained $4.35, or 3.8 percent, to $119.23 in morning trading.

So far this year, shares of Devon have jumped 29 percent.Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co. analyst Rehan Rashid raised his price target to $140 from $125, implying he expects the stock to rise about 22 percent from Friday's $114.88 close. He kept an "Outperform" rating.

Since I took economics at Weatherford College, let me explain what this means: Devon will continue to make big bags of money.

Now let me check into my portfolio and figure out how this effects me. Uh . . . not so much. I'm still banking on a Worldcom and Enron comeback. (And be careful using google images for a "Devon" search. Apparently there's a gal who works in what you boys out there call the "adult industry" - and she ain't camera shy, if you know what I mean.)

Text Of Wise County Historical Markers

Link.

Most Tragic Death Of The Week

Hot model suicide.

vs.

Dumb kid.

Random Monday Night Thoughts

• And to think that the most comments ever received (in the Comment Moderation Era) would be a post that began "I'm having Internet issues at the office."
• I could eat Mexican food every day. 
• I saw an ad for a contemporary Christian music compilation on TV and it really looked pretty good. Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith, and some groups that seemed familiar. Then the TV ad told me that they would slash the price from $19.95 to $9.95 if I "called within 10 minutes." Of course, if I call anytime I can get it for $9.95, and it felt odd to be lied to in connection with Christian music.
• I would never go to Branson, Missouri.
• I don't think I ever remember two movies cracking the $50 million barrier on the same weekend. But it happened this week. And that Indiana Jones movie is an eyelash shy of the amazing $300 million mark - and I've nothing but bad things about it. 
• Has the economy ever seemed more fragile? The stock market has plunged, gas prices at an all time high, the mortgage crisis, air travel is becoming unaffordable, and food prices are becoming alarming. Then again, the public is still going to the movies.
• Whatever happened to that kid from The Sixth Sense?
• During the last "energy crisis", Congress lowered the speed limit to 55 mph to save on gas. I haven't heard that proposed at all this time.
• And that was an example of Congress imposing its will on the states by utilizing a legislative trick. Congress can't control state speed limits so it simply said it would withhold federal highway funds from any state that didn't comply. Somehow that's legal. (That's also why every state lowered it's DWI alcohol concentration level to .08,)
• I wouldn't be a coach, teacher, or school administrator. Seems like a constant beating of politics, parents, and crazy kids. Except the summers off would be cool. 
• Giggle.
• I like "bullet points."  
• Legends become stronger with the passage of time. Case in point: The Spaceman in the Aurora Cemetary.
• They are hard to find, but an incredibly crazy book about the story of Boyd's Ricky Lee Green is called Blood Rush.  I lent mine to someone in the county about three years ago but I can't remember who it was.
• Most TV weathermen appear to talk without a teleprompter and with the graphics constantly changing in the background. And they are generally stutter or misspeak free. I think that would be hard to do. 
• I heard that we crowned a new Miss Texas USA over the weekend. That pageant, along with almost all pageants, have seemed to fallen off of our radar.
• Not sure what I think about this: If you have a family member who was killed on a state highway due to an drug or alcohol related incident (whatever that definition may be), you can pay the State of Texas $300 a year to put up a marker at that location.
•  I've been fairly satisfied with Embarq internet services at the office, but being down for three days (and still down as of this morning) is not a good experience.

From My Back Parking Lot This Morning At The Office

Now That's What I Call A Tease

My sources (which infiltrate every precinct in the county and some selected homes) tell me that this weekend The History Channel is at the Aurora Cemetery using radar and good old fashion digging to look for the legendary spaceman's body.

Developing . . .

Edit: Confirmed.

Other famous Aurora Cemetery residents:

Herd Burger

The Star-Telegram profiles the retirement of the owners of Herd's Hamburgers over in Jacksboro. No fear - the son will run it now.

I've been to Jacksboro a thousand times. I've never eaten there.

More photos of the joint at the bottom of this page.

Mugshots Of The Week

Link. I love this stuff. JUNE 27--This summer's first installment of our end-of-the-week mug shot collection needs a few footnotes: 1) The twin brothers on page #5 were nabbed last week while celebrating their 22nd birthdays; 2) The 18-year-old Florida woman on page #9 has been nabbed three times in the last two months, including twice in the past two weeks; and 3) The perp on page #18 appears lost...and very, very sweaty. (18 pages)

Random Thoughts While Temporarily Connected to The Internets

• I'm not saying I'm dying because Embarq went out on me, but I'm dying.
• I told the Star Telegram about the Dr. Grotti case yesterday, and they printed it today. (I bet my 6th ex-wife on that so I guess I get to keep her. Wait.)
• If you get Confused Head reading Supreme Court opinions, don't worry about it. 95% of the lawyers out there don't understand them (me included most of the time.)
• That "well regulated militia" language sure did cause a lot of controversy.
• Saw where they were going to charge the guy that blew through the red light and killed a family of five last Saturday in Plano with manslaughter. (Reckless killing.) It was an accident. A horrible one, but an accident. (And didn't the Tarrant County grand jury this week no bill the kid that killed the Chico family for running a red light?)
• Video of the day: If you want to see a kid learn to ride a motorcycle and see the most prophetic words ever spoken ("Don't get cocky"), you've got to see this. (Thanks emailer James.)
• Shout out to Jamie Stone over at Adult Probation who delivered to me a ton of home grown tomatoes. And they are great. (He also dropped off some jalapeños but I’m not sure how to cook them.)
• As big of a star as Madonna is, she could have been even bigger if she had been a tad bit “fan friendly.”
• I’ve been hearing some nightmare stories about electric bills. I haven’t got my first big one yet.
• Even though the President has no direct impact on gas prices, the public wants something to be done. And that may be the biggest factor in the November election.
• I got an AARP letter in the mail the other day with my name on a proposed membership card. I was in a fetal position after that for hours. And that junk mail, by the way, was a mistake. I promise.
• I get at least five credit card applications in the mail each week. And I feel compelled to tear them up into many pieces before I throw them in the trash.
• I did some negotiating on a plea bargain via text messaging the other day. That was a first for me.
• “Baby Mama” is a funny name.
• Toddlers always seem to like me. Babies don’t.
• Being a traffic reporter assigned to a helicopter would be a good gig.
• I can remember my fifth birthday but none before that. We had a treasure hunt in my backyard and my next door neighbor grabbed a shovel and said, “Let’s start digging!” even though there was a box right in front of him with a big “X” on it.
• I’m five chapters into that Scott McClellan book. I’m extremely disappointed.
• Replaced a tire, had tires balanced and rotated and my front end aligned yesterday. I hate spending money on stuff that simply places me back in the position I used to be.
• Does anybody know what that building is that is going up behind The Home Depot at Basswood and I-35 in Fort Worth? It looks like a church. (And Home Depot needs to drop the formal “The” in front of its name.)
• It looks like every cell phone will have GPS tracking within five years. Teenagers will have to get creative if they want to go somewhere there not supposed to. And the would-be wayward spouse will find his life much more complicated.
• Understanding that 99% you haven’t watched it, but I saw a scene in the fourth episode of The Wire last night which might have been the greatest television moment ever. And I’m serious.
• And while waiting on my car, I saw a young mother slap her child’s leg (maybe two or three year’s old) as a discipline measure. It dawned on me I don’t see that as much as I used to and I was kind of bothered by it.
• I still think about the young black guy that went on the hate filled profanity laced rant after he was arrested for killing the guys in Garland. I Did you know he was 19? If he were 12 we would blame his childhood. Maybe even at 14 or 15. But somehow when a person gets into his late teens he is completely to blame for his actions in our eyes.
• Ok, away from the Internet. I'm dying here.

Edit: I think I have posted that girl before. Freaky. Edit #2: Getting a couple of posts about John Trice submitting a resignation letter. As with all comments posted on this crazy thing, you should never assume anything is true until confirmed. Edit #3: Uh, edit #2 has been confirmed. You heard it hear first.

And Another

This is a Teacher Scandal so shocking I won't even post the picture.

Let's just say I'm finally voting for prison. Some things just ain't right.

Judge for yourself.

(Thanks emailer.)

Still Hot

From My Email Bag

[Email deleted] Edit: OK, my sweet emailer couldn't take the verbal attack you boys were dishing out and asked me to take it down. So I did. See what a nice guy I am? But, basically, it was a story of a car being broken into last night at Dollar General in Bridgeport. (Side note: One of my ex-wives would occasionally shop at a dollar store over my strenuous objections. My bit was to always find something she bought that cost over a dollar and express shock that the store carried a product that cost more than that. Then she'd reply, "It's the dollar store, not a dollar store. Idiot." Good times.) Anyway, a purse was stolen out of the car and the liberal weenies came over to Decatur and bought a bunch of gas and used the stolen debit card. So the emailer was trying to be sweet and warn everyone to be careful. But you guys turned on her. I've raised you better than that. And I don't know what she looks like. I just assumed she was a "hey, now." That's why I posted it. The End.

Don't Sell Your Gun Rack

Supreme Court just said the 2nd Amendment has meaning. But, wow, it was 5-4. PDF version of opinion is here. HTML version now available here. (And I've been fascinated by this picture for over a decade. It appeared in either Time or Newsweek - and, look closely, that's a T-shirt bearing the logo of the now defunct DFW country station, "Young Country.")

In related news, sheriff's deputies in Denton County got in a shootout this morning.

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

- I can't tell you the number of times a married guy with kids has told me that "if I were you, I'd" walk away and go run a bar/surf shop/etc. in Mexico.
- The underlying facts of the No Death Penalty For Child Rape Case handed down yesterday were as about as awful as anything I've ever read.
- But I don't think the world will end just because a child rapist is locked up for life instead of executed.
- I you stole an ATM machine, is it hard to open?
- Coldplay was on Jon Stewart last night and, after the performance, Stewart looked short standing next to the lead singer. I checked The Google and found out Stewart is only 5'7".
- The Wire is great.
- I completely forgot to watch any of the final game of the college world series. The tell me that Fresno State, which entered the tournament as about the 50th ranked team, won.
- Note to the Star Telegram: Look up the case of Dr. Lydia Grotti handed down by the Court of Criminal Appeals yesterday - you missed it. (I will now bet my sixth wife that you will now see a story about it in tomorrow's paper. You're welcome.)
- I once held a $3 million insurance check in my hand that was being paid to a wrongful death claimant. Her husband had died of skin cancer after her doctor failed to send off a skin biopsy to the lab - and then lied about it by telling the now dead guy that the lab had said it was benign.
- Random girls on a boat. Rethinking my rant about boats.
- After giving it some thought, I think all the coverage of the Wise County duct tape case was overblown. I'm not saying that's good parenting, but it's not exactly chain-up-a-kid-in-the-basement crazy.
- A group of people at the courthouse thought that I was nuts when I claimed that around 1979, when gas prices soared, that the pumps weren't capable of calculating gas prices over $1.00. So, in response, gas station owners would set the pumps to 1/2 of the actual price with a note on them that the actual price you would pay would be double the final reading.
- Crazy new Mexican midget video on youtube.
- Somebody complained to me yesterday about the male nudity in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. I saw that movie and don't remember any male nudity.
- Tim McGraw kicked a fat cowboy out of his concert (via youtube.)
- If you don't watch anything else today, watch this compilation of reporters getting owned.
- I've never been impressed with Stonehenge. (OK, that's the most random thought of the day.)
- I've thought about for two months: The Fountainhead is the most juvenile and simplistic book every written. And the movie is worse.
- I've thought about buying a cemetery plot. For me.
- I bet the only reason local TV wasn't interupted last night with constant "Breaking Weather News" was that the weathermen weren't around since the storms came completely out of nowhere.
- Some of my readers know defense lawyer Jim Shaw out of Fort Worth (he makes an occasional appearance in Wise County.) If you do, check out the end of this story. If you don't, move along.
- NBC has settled a lawsuit brought by the sister of the assistant DA who off'd himself when To Catch A Predator came after him. But no one will say how much was paid. (And I've pointed it out before, but if you're interested and have some time, this Esquire article has the best story of what really happened. And it has the most eye catching title, "Tonight On Dateline: This Man Will Die.")
- I was serious when I said I didn't think the United States would last for another 200 years. But I think it'll last for 150 years. And, as Pat Buchanan has said, I can see the southwest United States basically turning into an extension of Mexico. (Some people try to equate if to Kosovo or Croatia - I think - but I don't know enough about that to even have an opinion.)
- Most people seem to be on a cell phone all the time. They can't possibly talking about anything that deserves to be talked about.
- My tires on my car are out of balance and my steering wheel now vibrates slightly.
- At 8:42, Mark Davis on WBAP said he's worried about today's upcoming ruling by the Supreme Court on the constitutionality of the D.C. gun ban. That's just dumb. It'll be struck down. (And I'll double down the bet on wife #6 because I'm so sure. We'll find out in moments.)