Get Ready For Fine Dining!!!!

The new Wendy's in Decatur is opening! The new Wendy's in Decatur is opening!

(Either today or tomorrow at 10:00. I don't know which one.)

It'll be a fat gram explosion!!

Thursday Afternoon Pick Me Up

Stay Classy, America

A Grand Junction billboard depicting President Barack Obama as a terrorist, a gangster, a Mexican bandit and a gay man is getting national attention.

The billboard, erected along the I-70 Business Loop between 28 1/2 and 29 roads sometime Monday, depicts the four “Obamas” sitting around a table with playing cards showing only sixes bunched in groups of three.

Also on the table is a copy of the Declaration of Independence, a liberty bell, a toy soldier and a statue of Justice holding a balance.

Beneath the Obama caricatures are numerous rats, some of which are labeled as the IRS, trial lawyers, the EPA and the Fed. Sitting above all that is a line, “Vote DemocRAT. Join the game,” which is positioned between two vultures, one of which is labeled the U.N. and the other with the name Soros, a reference to George Soros, a major national Democratic financial supporter.

More.

The Dallas Morning News Decides Its . . .

"Am I sexy?"

. . . 2008 "Texas Of The Year" is now not worthy of getting the paper's endorsement in the upcoming election.

I'm with them. That guy gets under my skin.

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• Gov. Perry proposed yesterday that if you weren't a high school graduate or trying to become one, you couldn't get a driver's license. That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Let's cripple someone who already is guaranteed to struggle.
• Then Fox 4 tells me that's the law already. (I've never heard of that, and it must be the least enforced laws in the State.)
• Obscure humor: You have to be a Ticket Fan who is familiar with the Fake Nolan Ryan to laugh at this (and you will.)
• After this Rangers season, I hope every abandons this claw and antlers silliness.
• I've got to drive to Arkansas next weekend. Ugh. Suppressing a "I did not sign up for this!" proclamation. But I guess I kind of did. 
• Hey old timers: Remember the radio duo Stevens and Pruett who, I think, ruled the DFW  airwaves in the 1980s? Well, Mark Stevens has died. (I think they moved onto Houston after Dallas.)
• Motorcycle death in Arlington.
• Drug War death in Plano.
• Here's a fight in the stands at the FSU/Miami game last weekend if you like that sort of thing.
• Hmmm. Those last three bullet points contain things that will never go away in America. 
• Yesterday the federal 5th Circuit upheld a lower court's ruling allowing "under God" to stay in the Texas pledge yesterday. Man, it would have been a firestorm today if it had gone the other way. 
• I finally mailed off my taxes yesterday (but I had filed for an extension.)
• A criminal court docket call (I've got one this morning) is always full of at least one person scared to death and another person with a "screw this" attitude. 
• Either the cat got to my laptop last night or it is possessed since there were about 30 tabs opened up on my Internet browser this morning. Or maybe the cat's possessed. (She also made me fall on the stairs this morning after I lost my balance by stepping on her. That "cat scream" is a universal sound, isn't it?)

A Little Wise County Love

On a back road between Decatur and Paradise.

(Thanks Will.)

We're Doomed

He's in the military?

Earthquake?

People are telling me they just felt an earthquake around 9:00 a.m.

Reports?

Edit @ 9:25 a.m.: Wow. A 4.5 near Norman, Oklahoma at 9:08 a.m. that was felt a long way away. There are reports on Twitter of homes shaking in Dallas.

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

• Baseball is fantastic when a game is an elimination game. Every pitch matters. That's what makes college football so great -- every game is like an elimination game.
• Just as the Rangers were winning, Mrs. LL came running in yelling from off the treadmill. She's a baseball fan? Nope.  "It was Rapunzel! It was Rapunzel!" she said. (It seems like her and the girls couldn't place a character they met at Disney World and a commercial had just triggered her memory.) *Head Shake*
• The lead Mexican investigator in the border lake shooting case was found beheaded? [Fixed]
• One last thing about Cliff Lee in this Tampa Bay series: 16 innings, 21 Strikeouts, 0 Walks.
• Be sure to watch a little of the Chilean miners being rescued this morning. Pretty moving.
• I'm surprised someone hasn't tracked down Baby Jessica to interview.
• But back to Chile, at 6:00 a.m. I was wondering how it was daylight on the western side of South American. Then I remembered that below-the-equator-tilted-Earth thing.
• Tell me this screenshot of the miner coverage is fake.
• Our new cat is driving me crazy when I sit with the laptop. All he wants to do is set on the keyboard and swat at the screen when it scrolls. 
• Bridgeport is considering banning K2. Hey, you've got worse problems over there.
• While you were sleeping: Triple murder in Haltom City (assuming no murder suicide.) Here's Google Streetview of the street -- seems kind of desolate.
• One story getting little press: Gamestop is a huge DFW employer but a federal court has ruled they basically can't do what they do: Buy and resell video games. (Half Priced Books? Apparently they are OK. I honestly don't understand it since it has something to do with licensing and intellectual property. But it would apply to you reselling Madden '09 at garage sale or Ebay.)
• Baylor's basketball team is under investigation by the NCAA. It's not been a good couple of weeks down there.
• Edit: Man, I had a bad linking day. 

Glorious: I've Said It For Thirty Years . . .

 . . .  it's all about pitching.

Cliff Lee was fantastic. Only the fourth pitcher in the last 20 years to pitch a complete game in a winner-take-all game. That's money, baby.

That the way baseball go!!!! Just like I predicted! (Wait, what?)

Anyone Watch Big Brother 12?

Well, apparently this chick is on it and tomorrow she'll be at "Nutrition Wise" in Decatur from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. So far all I know is that her name is Britney.

Tuesday Afternoon Pick Me Up

USC Song Girls searched before football game.

Is This The New Trend?

I've seen two or three times where a mentally handicapped kid has been allowed to score and it's touching because you know the kid, smiling from ear to ear, believes he has accomplished something.

But I'm not sure I've ever seen an injured (albeit extremely injured) player score by consent. I can't decide if this is odd or great.

(Wait. Wasn't there some female basketball player a few years back who was allowed to score a lay up so she could keep some personal record intact?)

Idiocracy: Anyone Want To Go To A Game?

"This fight happened on Sunday in the upper deck at the San Francisco 49ers-Philadelphia Eagles game. Some highlights — at the :16 mark, watch the cop pull Joe Montana down two rows and then at the :25 mark watch the girl clock the long haired gentleman IN THE FACE."


I stopped watching after that.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• Today is the biggest day in Ranger baseball history. Failure? (And to reminisce, here's a pic of the old stadium scoreboard for the now gone Arlington Stadium.)
• Man, there was a missing kid in my neighborhood yesterday evening that brought out the cops and people searching everywhere. What was odd was that he was always on his little scooter and there it sat in his open garage. Everything turned out fine (he went to a new friends house without telling), but for thirty minutes the overwhelming feeling of everyone was "there is something very horrible that has happened here." I was shook up all evening
• Police ambush in Mexico. 8 dead. It has turned into Columbia. 
• Former Empire great Colt McCoy, because everyone else is injured, should make his first start this Sunday. Unfortunately, it's against Pittsburgh. That's a sports "something very horrible will happen" feeling. 
• The link wouldn't be safe for work, but Kim Kardashian photos came out of her recent photo shoot for W Magazine. Oh, my. Cue Sir-Mix-A-Lot.
• The Rangers are cutting loose TV play by play man Josh Lewin. I thought he was great. And isn't it the weirdest timing to announce that yesterday? (Note: WBAP's Steve Lamb at 7:43 a.m. this morning said he "was just handed this note from the Texas Rangers" about this news. Sheesh. The news came out yesterday afternoon.)
• Holy, cow: A collection of Fiona "Hey, Nows!"
• Fox 4 spent a full 10 minutes last night leading with the North Dallas High transgendered homecoming queen wannabe story including a live interview. Puuhhlleeeze. 
• Deborah Foreman, who was the cutest thing in the history of ever in Valley Girl and My Chauffeur turns 48 today. 
• Colleyville Heritage High School girls will go without make-up on Tuesdays. This uprising must be stopped before it grows!
• This church is straight out of the Blues Brothers.
• If you've ever been to City Streets night club in downtown Fort Worth, you soon won't recognize it.

From Texas Ghosthunter Site

Link.

I've never heard of that place in my life.

Let's See . . .

We've got a governor who bad mouths the federal government at every turn, and tried to show up President Obama with the "immigration letter" he tried to hand to him at the airport. I wonder why Texas could possibly be turned down?

Story.

Crazy Students. Crazy Teacher.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – A teacher was removed from McGavock High School after a bizarre incident in a classroom that forced the principal to call parents and explain what happened. (More.)