Ouch

Big Bend At Six Flags

The more I look into it, the more I'm convinced that it's just an urban legend of someone being killed on the ride back in the day.

But, man, check out these photos. Looks pretty rinky dink by today's standards. And it wasn't exactly designed to handle big crowds.

Top speed was 52 mph and the ride took 1:32.

Link.

Edit: A faithful reader sends along this site which has a great history of the ride including this: "The ride's intense turns and drops inevitably led to numerous urban legends, such as the train jumping the track and killing passengers. While nobody ever actually died from the ride, the exaggerated stories made riding Big Bend an even more thrilling experience and gave those who dared conquer the ride bragging rights. Such legends were likely the result of one real-life event where a passenger stood up during the ride and was promptly ejected."

Movie Review: Lone Wold* Wolf McQuade

One thing I waste my money on is subscribing to every channel in the history of ever. This causes me to constantly channel surf and gripe about how there's nothing on. It's kind of depressing.

But once in awhile I'll stumble upon a movie I've always heard about but never watched. That happened yesterday when I looked up and saw Chuck Norris' Lone Wolf McQuade. It ain't Roadhouse, but it's close to the worst movie in the world and I absolutely loved it. (I tried to get Mrs. LL to watch it with me as she sat two feet away but she's momentarily obsessed with online poker.)

This movie is horrible. Norris is a Texas Ranger who acts exactly like a Texas Ranger would (even in 2013) if those guys didn't have to wear shirts and report to a supervisor. He'll point his gun at a trooper just to teach him a lesson, drive his  SUV - equipped with a "super-charger" button -- through a private gate without a warrant, and single handedly Kung Fu the master of Kung Fu, David Carradine, even though he doesn't come come close to landing a blow. And this thing was definitely made thirty years ago in that when Norris is introduced to his new Hispanic partner he says, "You gotta be kidding me!"

(Side note: I looked the movie up on Wikipedia while it was on and saw "Gary Oldman" listed as playing "Tyrone Jackson". I kept waiting and waiting for him to appear, but once I figured out that Tyrone Jackson was a black guy, I knew someone was pulling my Internet chain.)
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* Man, you guys will dog pile a typo like nobody's business

Edit: Opening scene. Mexicans kidnap bunch of Troopers. Chuck Norris kills bunch of Mexicans.

Skydiver KOs Ballplayer

Was that guy really unpopular of something? No one seems particularly in a hurry to come to his aid.

Random Monday Morning Thoughts

• The lady killed at Six Flags is a bizarre story. Everyone is pointing fingers at Six Flags (yes, I've read the "eyewitness" accounts of her not being secured) but how in the world do hundreds of thousands of people ride the Texas Giant without incident?
• Call in the lawyers. Certainly a big bag of money will make everything right. 
• There was a death on the old Big Bend roller coaster in the early 1970s, right?  Or was it just injuries? Something definitely happened. but I've yet to see a news report about it as everyone reports about the history of Six Flags.
• If interested, Fox 4's Lone Star Adventure had a segment on the newly rescued bears now being housed in the sanctuary in Boyd. 
• I watched the second episode of The Bridge over the weekend. Still good. And getting a little freaky. 
• On my post of "Most Famous Wise Countians" last week,  a couple of people referenced Boyd's Billy Joe Tolliver. He won the Tahoe Celebrity Golf Classic this weekend. 
• House Speaker John Boehner said that Congress "ought to be judged on how many laws we repeal." I couldn't agree more. Any one who is elected to any law making body thinks they have been sent there to make laws. 
• Motorcycle death in North Richland Hills yesterday.
• Motorcycle death on Boat Club Road on Friday night.
• "Batman and Superman to unite on the big screen." Yawwwwwwwn.
• The Fan's Mike Fisher this morning: "I'm told major Cowboys 'business' story is about to explode onto scene." Edit: Richie Whitt says Cowboys Stadium is about to become AT&T stadium.
• This is probably too long unless you are really interested in stuff like this, but Grits For Breakfast had a post which included transcripts from a trial where a Texas prosecutor withheld evidence so the judge granted a directed verdict of acquittal. For some reason, the judge allowed both the State and the Defense to address the jury after the trial was over. The State did a CYA speech while the defense lawyer told the jury that if he had withheld evidence when he was a prosecutor he would have lost his job. Delicious. 
• Car bombs go off in Iraq over the weekend killing over 40.  I'm glad we brought democracy to that country at the cost of thousands of American lives. 

Pretty Spectacular

PIC - Wow. Updated picture of the 2 alarm apartment fire, Irving, near Esters & 161. (Credit: Chris Walker) pic.twitter.com/FTmh2pPtAN
— DFW Scanner (@DFWscanner) July 20, 2013

3 Alarm Fire at the Eagle Crest Apartments. A crew is on the way. Picture Courtesy: Anthony Bond pic.twitter.com/fRCHaEcnnZ
— FOX 4 NEWS (@FOX4) July 21, 2013

Calling All Old-Timers: Is This Correct?

Friday’s death @SixFlags was park's second fatality. In 1999, a woman died and 10 others were injured: http://t.co/p82aM6nSIc
— FW Star-Telegram (@startelegram) July 20, 2013

Without doing research, haven't there been others? Going back to my childhood memories, (1) wasn't there a fatality on some roller coaster in the 1970s. I can't recall the name of it*, but it was the first big and bad one and preceded the Shockwave by a few years; and (2) did someone get killed under the old "sombrero ride" (it looked like this)?  Maybe they were just injuries, but I could have sworn there were some deaths in the early days.
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*Edit: Thanks to the comments. It was named Big Bend.

Above The Fold

Texas Tech Crazy Abs Taking You Into The Weekend

Can You Hear Me Now?

YIKES!! Truck into a T-mobile store off 121/Glade... employees jumped out of the way-no one injured... #fox4news pic.twitter.com/u5RHiaTxCK
— FOX 4 NEWS (@FOX4) July 19, 2013

Euless police: Suspected DWI driver crashed into T-Mobile & Baskin-Robbins off Hwy 121. No injuries. Cindy Cannella of Bedford arrested.
— Deanna Boyd (@deannaboyd) July 19, 2013

Crash and Fire

Just Because

Slowly takes tie off. Unbuttons sleeves. Girl giving it the what for in front of him.

Just oozing Chicago coolness, right?

Random Friday Morning Thoughts

• Breaking and bizarre: "Two fires set outside murdered girl's Saginaw home." Side note: They are never going to find the killer, are they? 
• Troubled Cowboy Josh Brent's "retirement" seems fishy. The Cowboys get to avoid controversy as training camp begins and they can take him back when he "unretires". 
• Dallas Morning News columnist Steve Blow wrote a column this week telling us not to take a side in the Nasher Museum/Museum Tower sun reflection controversy, and today columnist Jacquielynn Floyd writes that "Rolling Stone magazine can’t make a killer cool." They get paid for this junk?
• Should a Fox 4 anchor use a certain profane acronym in his tweets?
• Not only are we replacing all the ten year old door knobs, now I learned that they cost twice as much as I thought. (But they do fall in my theory of of buying quality for something that is used/seen everyday and will last for over five years.)
• Gov. Perry, as expected, made a big media deal about signing the abortion bill yesterday, but I didn't realize that First Baptist of Dallas pastor Robert "Look At Me" Jeffress was in attendance. (H/T BagOfNothing.com) The current majority of the Texas Legislature could very well be called First Baptist Church of Texas it seems. 
• After the signing, Phil King introduced legislation which would restrict abortion so much that, by its very text, it wouldn't take effect until Roe v. Wade was overruled by the Supreme Court or constitutional amendment. So it's a law that admits in its wording that it is currently unconstitutional. I'm not sure I've ever seen anything like that. 
• Per the Update, the two Wise County deputies who shot the fleeing Colorado man earlier this year have been "cleared" by a grand jury. I'm kind of surprised they went to the trouble of going through the motions of even having the grand jury even make a ruling. (Although I bet the whole presentation was under five minutes). We had a couple of troopers kill a couple of guys in separate incidents a few years back, and I don't think the grand jury got involved.
• Since the deputies' case is now closed, all those in-car videotapes are now public record, right? Fox 4? WFAA? Where you at?
• I have a Google news alert for local towns and local politicians, but it seems primarily to alert me to the happenings of the Connecticut minor league baseball team called the Bridgeport Bluefish whenever they play a Texas team.  I kind of want a t-shirt. Edit: Heck, they don't even have T-shirts in their store, but you Bridgeport folks would probably like this jersey.
• For those who think Mark Cuban is a genius because of one championship, consider the fact that it was due to (1) a fluke because every other team went brain dead in the playoffs, (2) Dirk Nowitzki (who Cuban inherited) single handily carried the team, (3) and the existence of a big man -- Tyson Chandler -- who everyone had been begging him to acquire for years and who he summarily jettisoned once the season is over. Brilliant!! 

The Aurora, Texas UFO of 1897

That Dallas Morning News article came from a surprisingly thorough Wikipedia page about the legend that never dies.

That Was Close

On the George W. Bush Tollway in Dallas right now.

All We Are Missing Is, "Hold My Beer."

I'm not a particular fan of these kinds of video clips but this one has two elements that make it golden: (1) Comedy: The girlfriend saying, "How are you going to get down?" as the kid makes his climb is foreshadowing to the Nth degree, and (2) Tension: This thing is 99% buildup and 1% payoff.

Thank goodness for Obamacare. Kid is gonna need a couple of gallons of it.

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• Attorney General Greg Abbott decided it would be a smart thing to do to have an online town hall meeting last night, and all you had to do was tweet your questions to him with the hashtag #AskAbbott. He thought that was a good idea? It turned out to be a hilarious dog pile. 
• It's amazing that we could (and probably will) have more of a conservative-talking-points-robot than Ricky Perry as governor, but that's what you get with Abbott. 
• And, plus, what can possibly go wrong with a would-be governor who thinks it is clever to say: "Some people talk about having a steel spine. I actually have one!" in campaign speeches. **Groan**
• Recent Mark Cuban quote: "We're in a better spot than we were at if we got just [Dwight Howard]." You guy's just keep on blindly following him. 
• If true, the story of the Arlington elementary school principal who allegedly solicited boys online and was arrested when he showed up at a proposed meeting with one of them is beyond shocking. 
• Bridgeport will be spraying for mosquitoes tonight. I still doubt that the mass spraying works. It seems like doing one blast of Raid in a gymnasium. 
• I had a confrontation with a mouse this morning and successfully defended my territory. 
• Mrs. LL replaced a broken doorknob in the house with a fancier one and one with a different style. You know what that means? Now we've got to upgrade all of them. There's no way I can stand a mismatched one. 
• The ESPYs show is painful to watch. 
• A 29 year old is listed in the Update's death notices -- he died of a brain tumor.  I can't imagine what it's like to go through with a family member suffering from something like that. 
• The Ticket's Jake Kemp just got back from a 10 day trip that included Amsterdam, Switzerland and Germany. I could listen to him talk about it all day. 
• I laugh at news reports of the Northeast Heat Wave where temperatures "are over 90 for the third day in a row." But I suppose they laugh at us when we receive a Southern Cold Wave of temperatures below 40 for three days in a row. 
• Johnny Football isn't very smart, but he'll probably have another great season. It's a good thing for the Aggies that his game doesn't require discipline. 

Now I'm Taking Requests?

Twitter direct message from a faithful reader:

Kind of an interesting question which I suppose is answered by how you define famous.

For those who might wonder about the above names.

James Wood -- the car dealer, not James Woods the actor
Ricky Lee Green -- the most famous murderer we've got
Kyle Clifton -- former Bridgeport, TCU, and NY Jets football player
Greg Williams -- former radio personality, "The Hammer"
Buck Taylor -- I had to look him up.

Any others worthy of the Top Five?