Above The Fold

I'm Taking A Blogging Day Off

The Family Unit watched the birth of a single puppy last night. A puppy that didn't make it.

It was as horrible as it sounds.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• The Farmers Branch illegal immigrant ordinances, which have been defeated at every level, were a concept that was beyond stupid.
• Thanks to Mrs. LL,, I received another DVD of converted 8 millimeter films found in my parents' home. I can't describe the feelings of anticipation when I loaded it up.And it didn't disappoint.(The company is Southtree.com)
• Thank goodness it's election day. I can't handle much more conservatism. 
• Missed this one: Wrong way driver in Fort Worth.  
• For weeks now, The Family Cat has been dragging around a shoe string with as much love as a child loves its doll.
• I jogged yesterday morning. Man, it was cold. 
• The 'job of the day" this morning on Fox 4 was for an attendant at Cowboys Stadium. You need to be able to stand for up to nine hours at a time. It paid $9 an hour. Think about that.
• I've got five insect bites on my right arm, and I have no idea of how that happened. 
• Does anyone else think about Kramer from Seinfeld saying "The Ukraine is weak" when they watch the news these days?
• Mrs. LL yelled at me this weekend when I happened to say, "You just went full retard. No one goes full retard."
• I've noticed Mrs. LL is eating regular TV dinners for breakfast. Girl ain't right.
• I watched the newest episode of Aerial America with the Fifth Grader in The House that featured Idaho. Now we want to move to Idaho.
• Flashback: On The Ticket this morning they talked about Barry Switzer's decision to go for it twice on fourth and one when the Cowboys faced Philadelphia in 1995. That's one of my favorite moments. First, it was a crazy decision. Second, John Madden has no idea of the rules (the referee has to sound the whistle to kill the play at the two minute warning?), and Third, I remember Chuck Cooperstein on the radio the next day yelling, "That is a fireable offense!!!!"
• I had a chance to re-listen to Matthew McConaughey's acceptance speech yesterday. Great actor. But that guy is an idiot. 
• NFL Draft Thought: "Take the best athlete available?" That's dumb. The chances of determining the best athlete is laughable. 
• How is the world can George P. Bush be elected to anything? But he will.
• Hey, I've got a flat tire!!! Come on!

Random Monday Morning Thoughts

• That was a crazy temperature drop yesterday. For some reason, I took an extended nap on Saturday which caused me to end up standing in the front lawn at 1:00 am on Sunday. (Don't ask,)  A very warm front lawn.
• I'll often refer to a movie or TV program as "good but not great". I finally watched all episodes of True Detective over the weekend. It's not good. It's great. And I've done a 180 of Mathew McConaughey. He's fantastic.
• I told the Family Unit that I had never seen Mary Poppins. That, of course, caused a Forced Watch Event of the movie over the weekend. Verdict: Meh.
• Then I made them watch two episodes of the Dick Van Dyke Show. I think I was the only one that laughed.
• The Girls In The House coaxed me into jumping on the trampoline with them. I'm not sure what happened but the Fifth Grader In The House went head over heels over the side and ended up in a crying crumpled mess on the ground. Scared me to death. Then, once all was well, I couldn't stop laughing. 
• Many years ago, my favorite burger place was something called Chip's off of Central Express Way in Dallas.
• A lot of those political ads stressing "border security" have a KKK feel to them..(There is a "What kid of Christians are they?" ad that is snuck between the ads every now and then.)
• I had a weird moment of contentment the other night when, during the stillness, I realized I had a pregnant dog and non-pregnant wife lying next to me. 
• David Dewhurst's Jeopardy style commercial against Dan Patrick borders on Idiocracy. He doesn't want a runoff with a Tea Party candidate (ala Ted Cruz) but the ad borders on his "he represented the Chinese" mistake. (Just so everyone knows, the brain dead guy behind those campaigns is Dave Carney.)
• "I have hip hop questions that need answers!" -- Me while watching the 100 Greatest Hip Hop Videos with the family and no one knowing the name of the artist on the screen.
• As I'm writing this, I'm looking at footage of I-45 between Houston and Dallas and it is completely shut down. 
• Awkward Mother-In-Law moment when we were talking about House Of Cards. Her: "I liked it until it got perverted." Me: "When was that?" Her: "When he hooked up with that young girl." Me: "Oh, yeah. That part."
• The goofy Electra city attorney who was caught on video berating a citizen asserting his right has been fired. 

Above The Fold

Just Your Typical Swashbuckler In A Sports Bar Taking You Into The Weekend

There Was A Jacksboro Murder A Couple Of Days Ago

Completely missed this.

You Know It'll Get Nasty When Utah Valley and NM State Get Together

Random Friday Morning Thoughts

• There seems to be a whole lot of politics going on with the Allen ISD's shut down of their $60 million stadium. It looks like there were some cosmetic cracks which were noticed by stadium critics, those critics tipped off the Dallas Morning News, the News makes open record requests to obtain emails about stadium, and the ISD then holds a news conference to do damage control before the News could run a big story. 
• Freezing rain on Sunday afternoon?
• "A protester filmed what is possibly the first public footage of a Supreme Court . . . ." It's about as boring as you would expect.
• Just when I thought nothing else was left to break in the house, the "coil" on our garage door popped. We went from a "single coil" to a "double coil" which doesn't mean much to me. 
• It's been a while: Driver slams into Dallas cop car overnight. 
• Weird shooting in Bridgeport yesterday. Suicide attempt? 
• WBAP's Steve Lamb says he had a "mini stroke".
• I'll be at the courthouse fairly often when I'll run into a government employee who'll go off on a Big Government Rant. 
• Missed this Channel 5 story: "A Wal-Mart store in Decatur dismantled a dog food display that was stacked almost to the ceiling, amid questions about the safety risk." (Photo) That was ridiculous. 
• A hot chick, whom I'm sure I featured, sued a mugshot website for using her image. 
• For those of you who want to be beaten down with Margaritaville for the zillionth time, Jimmy Buffett will do his tired old bit again in Frisco this summer. (Can't stand that guy' music.)
• I mentioned that I watched an episode of True Detective the other day and really liked it. I also had no idea what was going on since I hadn't seen this six prior episodes. I may catch up on it this weekend. 
• Good radio this week when The Ticket interviewed Tom Landry, Jr. on what it was like when Jerry Jones flew down to Austin to tell them about the hiring of Jimmy Johnson. Everyone has always criticized Jones about the way he "handled" the firing, but what more can you do than fly down to Austin and handled it face to face? 

Random Giggle: Happy Gilmore Drive

"Sydney Rae Leroux (born May 7, 1990) is a Canadian-born American professional soccer player and Olympic gold medalist. As a forward, she currently plays for the Seattle Reign FC in the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL)."

Don't Taze Me, Bro!

I have it on really good authority that we had an accidental Wise County deputy on deputy tazer attack this week. I'm still trying to get the details.

It Might Be The Weirdest Story Ever

Hey, I normally shy away from stories involving barnyard animals in compromising positions, but this story has it all.

And some major market needs to hire that on the scene reporter. Loved that delivery. "Two men are in jail. One cow is dead. And three cars are totaled."  And then he just throws a haymaker with that Jell-O reference.

Crandall Cop Allegedly Kills Wife, Self In Dallas

This is yesterday's news but some more photos and a video of the guy shooting a shotgun have emerged. No real motive other than some have referred to the guy as "jealous."

(And in the absolutely-irrelevant-but-caught-my-attention, some outlets referred to the couple being found by Dallas police and firefighters in "their home in the Cedars".  I had never heard of the "Cedars" area of Dallas.)

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• Our state rep. Phil King got scammed out of almost $46,000.
• I thought the Arizona governor would veto SB 1062, but I didn't think she would do it so quickly. (And the text of the bill has been read by basically no one -- it never even mentions sexual orientation.) 
• Funny line from The Ticket this morning about Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer: "She looks like she has a box of wine every night."
• "A Plano man was killed early Friday morning after returning inside a burning home to retrieve his cellphone."
• I finally watched the new episode of Aerial America featuring Texas. It was incredibly disjointed (but it did show Palo Duro Canyon and zoomed in on a high peak that Mrs. LL once climbed to the top of in a death defying stunt.)
• We are taking a Family Trip which requires a plane flight in a couple of weeks, and this has all sorts of potential for disaster. (And I've been yelling "you girls are packing light" for the last three weeks and receiving blank stares in return.)
• The Messenger has an article this week looking back on the 1988 military helicopter crash near Chico that killed ten. Of all the possible litigation that could have happened, I ended up helping defend, of all things, a worker's compensation claim filed by one of the paramedics who was in one of the careflight helicopters out of Fort Worth. It actually ended up in a jury trial in Decatur. 
• I was skeptical of the story of the Texas high school kid who claimed he "accidentally" packed a beer instead of a soft drink in his lunch. But I didn't know he's the one who reported his mistake to his teacher. Kid might be telling the truth. 
• There's a story making the rounds of an Austin man arrested for DWI who blew 0.00 and then agreed to give blood which tested negative for drugs. But the cops say that it "is still possible he was intoxicated with a drug, including marijuana, that may not have shown up in the blood test." That quote makes absolutely no sense to me. Every DWI case I've seen where they've screened the blood for drugs, they've screened it for marijuana. 
• I've never been down to the boys or girls UIL basketball tournament in Austin but I've had buddies swear that it's a heck of a fun experience. Hey, has either Bridgeport or Decatur ever made that tournament? 
• It's a weird world when Seth Rogen speaks before a U.S. Senate hearing and then calls out a bunch of senators for not attending or leaving early. 
• I've told folks who visit the Wise County Courthouse all the time that the district courtroom once had a balcony which would have made the place look like a scene from To Kill A Mockingbird.  But I've never seen one single photo of the way it used to look -- and I've never met anyone who has. 

Forget Arizona, They Are Coming For Texas!

Federal judge voids Texas' gay marriage ban, though he delays order from taking effect immediately. http://t.co/saWj3VGoPG
— Bob Garrett (@RobertTGarrett) February 26, 2014

Edit: Dan Patrick had a great typo after the news was released . . .

Mid-Week Pick Me Up

They have baseball cheerleaders? (With the exception of watching TCU/UT at the Ballpark in Arlington many years ago, I don't think I've ever been to a college baseball game.)

Legal Stuff: Texas Highest Criminal Court Just Ruled That Your Cell Phone Isn't "Like A Pair Of Pants"

This case raises the issue of whether a person retains a legitimate expectation of privacy in the contents of his cell phone when that phone is being temporarily stored in a jail property room.  The trial judge granted Anthony Granville's motion to suppress, concluding that the high-school student did not lose his legitimate expectation of privacy in his cell phone simply because it was being stored in the jail property room after he had been arrested for a Class C misdemeanor. The court of appeals affirmed that ruling. We granted the [government's] petition for discretionary review, but we reject its argument that a modern-day cell phone is like a pair of pants or a bag of groceries, for which a person loses all privacy protection once it is checked into a jail property room. We therefore affirm the judgment of the court of appeals.  More.

And Another - California

Link.