Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• Halloween and trick or treaters is pretty fun. Cute kids. Sweet kids. Older kids. Rude kids. Kids who climb on rocks. (But uttering the phrase, "Trick or treat" literally doesn't make sense, does it?)
• We had one girl come up to the door who was obviously going through chemo.  That sight was a kick in the gut that I probably needed to get some perspective. 
• The Eighth Grader in the House was gone for quite a while with friends last night but came back with very little candy.  I wonder if she was up to hood rat things? I sure was back in the day on the mean streets of Bridgeport on Halloween. 
• I've mentioned before that our group lobbed a bunch of eggs at a highway patrol car that was in my neighborhood on Halloween when I was in high school. The police response looked like something out of Smokey and The Bandit as about thirty of us scattered into the woods behind my house. They came in after us. My superior back country night skills prevented me from being apprehended. 
• Saw this online: Fake Gary Patterson sweating with his towel girl right by him. 
  
• And this was some good sports humor: 
  
• Horrible news out of Baltimore this morning:
  
• I think I was in a grumpy mood when I wrote yesterday's Random Thoughts. 
• The reward for the missing ZuZu is now at $200,000. I'm not sure I've ever heard a figure that high before. 
• Can Baylor please get some scene control on this scandal? They got hit by the Wall Street Journal on Friday and will be hit by 60 Minutes Sports on Showtime tonight. When they fired Briles they should have just come clean. Make is one massive explosion instead of an ongoing civil war that seems to never end.
• I've mentioned before  these weird fentanyl overdoses that have been rampant throughout Ohio and Pennsylvania. Now we've got maybe five such deaths in Lubbock.  

Guy vs. TSA: Who Ya Got?

I'm A Little Confused By This

Hillary Duff apologises for her Pilgrim costume and her boyfriend's American ... https://t.co/bxxgjqLUvi pic.twitter.com/PDZqtLS2Iq

— ff @replayList (@Remi_Kuti) October 31, 2016

Random Monday Morning Thoughts

Mrs. LL and I just happened to be looking at the remains of a house fire early Saturday morning when a guy walked up to us and asked us if we were the owners. He said he was "public adjuster." There's no such thing, right? What the heck was he up to? (And once he found out that the fire involved a fatality, he left.)

The Evil Empire beat Baylor on Saturday. Hot sports opinions: Baylor isn't very good, I'm not sure Art Briles' son didn't throw that game, and K.D. Cannon is the biggest waste of talent in Baylor history. And it's on him. 

Jim Harbaugh on Saturday looked like Kiefer Sutherland from Designated Survivor.

                                 

Mark Cuban has to be coloring his hair. It's blacker than black.

And yesterday Cuban said on Fox News that Trump called him "a couple of times" at the beginning of the campaign. No way. No how. 

That vague letter to Congress from FBI Director Comey to Congress is just, well, weird. 

I have an official lock bet: Hillary will win the election. And I'll go one step further: I'll bet ALL CAPS guy any amount he wants. $100? $1,000? 10,000? Keep it coming.(Edit: I'll cap it at $25,000. I'm not crazy.).  Condition: He has to put his money in the hands of a third party whom I approve of beforehand.

There was a great bet on Liberally Lean many years ago between two commentors on the outcome of the first Obama election. I was to hold the money which, I recall, was $100. It was delivered in a  sealed envelope in my office. When the winner showed up to collect his winnings, he opened the envelope to find it full of worthless shreds of paper. (I did a blog post about it with a photo but I can't find it. A Google search for a Google hosted blog post is ridiculously awful.) 

Comedy gone wrong:

"A state forensic scientist whose work has been called into question will no longer serve as an expert witness or perform lab work in drunken driving cases in Dallas, Collin, Denton and Rockwall counties." That is huge, huge news criminal justice news. But this next sentence confused me: "At the request of court officials in those counties, cases pending trial that were worked by Chris Youngkin will be reanalyzed by another DPS forensic scientist, according to a statement from the Texas Department of Public Safety." At the "request of"? There is no way that's an accurate statement.

I watched half of Cape Fear yesterday. What a weird movie. It's chillingly great and creepy for the most part and then ends as a horrible action movie. And I never noticed at the end they were on a  house boat which was basically in the odd combo off a swamp and a hurricane. 

Off.

And I saw a portion of Gran Torino yesterday which re-affirmed my belief that Clint Eastwood may be one of the worst actors and surely one of the worst directors in history. Million Dollar Baby, anyone? (Think the GOP wants his "empty chair" speech back?)

And to think that tax dollars pay someone to sit around and post things like this:

Speaking of Fort Worth PD, the father of Texas Tech's quarterback was arrested at TCU game on Saturday -- by an off duty police officer. Too many cops?

The Messenger used the Stranger Things font generator this weekend on a Halloween story. You can, too.

Someone threw a sex toy onto the field during an NFL game yesterday.  WBAP's/TCU's play by play man Brian Estridge said this morning, "Does anyone know where [Traffic reporter] Laura [Houston] was yesterday?" And that is why the Trump supporters will lose.  The old, white, and oblivious male no longer controls the country.

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It's Friday. Let's Get Out Of Here.

Leaving the office can be difficult.

Bits are fun.

"I suddenly feel you have something for me."

Not impressed, kid. Little short on the landing. 

Bouncing off cars ain't no big thing to this guy.

Let Me Explain This

FBI REOPENS CASE INTO HILLARY EMAILS... https://t.co/VLHvXikL4O

— DRUDGE REPORT (@DRUDGE_REPORT) October 28, 2016

There are the existence of emails. They are probably nothing. (Edit: They may not even be Hillary's emails.) But if the mere existence of the emails is leaked before the FBI says anything, the FBI looks bad. So they went ahead and got ahead of the story and any potential leak by simply sending a letter to Congress.  And all they are saying is: We are going to look at the new emails. To call it "re-opening the case" is a reach.

Edit: And, once again, I'm being proven right. Just didn't think it would happen so quickly.

BREAKING: US official: Newly discovered emails related to Clinton investigation did not come from her private server.

— The Associated Press (@AP) October 28, 2016

WaPo changed its headline from "reopens investigation" to "takes new investigative steps."

— James Oliphant (@jamesoliphant) October 28, 2016

Big Capital Murder Case Reversed

There was a huge case a couple of years back where two females were found dead in a Granbury restaurant parking lot. I could have sworn I wrote about it and thought there was a Wise County connection. The defendant was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to life without parole.

The Fort Worth Court of Appeals just ruled the evidence was insufficient and ordered an acquittal. Barring further appeals by the State, he will be set free and can never be retried.

Edit: Found the connection from a prior post.

Further edit: I thought the case was weak back then

Random Friday Morning Thoughts

• Mike Pence's plane skidded off the runway. He'll probably get a replacement plane but it won't have the Trump/Pence paint on it. Where does one go to get a custom paint job for a jet?
  
• Two odd things about the middle school teacher double murder case: (1) His wife, who was arrested for tampering with evidence yesterday, started a GoFundMe page Wednesday, labeled “Mom needs help raising boys alone." (2) I didn't know after her husband allegedly shot the two guys he also is alleged to have beat the men with the butt of the gun. What a weird case.
• Everyone was posting their favorite Vines on Twitter yesterday and it was a huge, fun time-waste.
• DPS has really ramped up its drug interdiction. There was a time in the late 1990s they basically got out of the drug business. However, they've had three unrelated stops over the last two days resulting in finds of 50, 63, and 67 pounds of marijuana. Yep. Marijuana. (None of the stops were in Wise County.) 
• I had to buy Mrs. LL some Jell-O and learned you really have to look at the package to see what you are buying when it is a gelatin that doesn't have the Jell-O brand. Seriously. Those companies have a hard time coming up with a name.
• Donald Jr. just happened to help a motorist in traffic. And then he just happened to tweet about it.
  
• "Hundreds of American kids suddenly became paralyzed – and doctors don’t know why" a headline in the Star-Telegram.  That's either a sensational headline (if paralysis happens all the time) or a shocking story. 
• I think I heard a radio ad for Railroad Commissioner Wayne Christian this morning wanting us to not import oil from those "countries who hate our flag." That's just a funny way to insert the Colin Kaepernick controversy into that political race. 
• Funny Second Amendment exchange (early in the week former congressman Joe Walsh said that he would grab his "musket" if Hillary was elected):
  
• Hillary would probably prefer the news that the polls are "tightening" instead of the exact opposite. The news helps defeat voter overconfidence.
• "Bridgeport Parks and Recreation’s Spooktacular Fall Festival is 5:30-8 p.m. Saturday at the Bridgeport Community Center . . . . The Texas Rangers mascot, Rangers Captain, will be there." Serious question: What does it cost to get that mascot there?
• We have a Bundy acquittal and a big loss for federal prosecutors. (Sounds like they overcharged them.)  And I love the second sub-headline:

In Light Of Twitter's Announcement To Kill The Vine Video Service

The best Baylor Vines: Dead kickers and messing with Craig Sager's hair https://t.co/WLy7QPAfpq https://t.co/E7H3x4BKz8

— Adam Grosbard (@AdamGrosbard) October 27, 2016

We remember Baylor's (almost) dead kicker.

Gig 'Em

Texas A&M student crashes into patrol car while taking topless Snapchat selfie, police say https://t.co/PEkaNJdmPs via @dallasnews

— Valerie Wigglesworth (@vlwigg) October 27, 2016

And I feel safe in saying that the Internet Punishment she will receive is punishment enough.

Wikileaks Has Stolen Footage Of My Golf Practice

A video posted by Taylor Laybourne (@jt_laybourne) on Oct 25, 2016 at 5:35pm PDT

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• Didn't there used to be "mobile" or "temporary" early voting locations? Didn't we have one in the Walmart parking lot in Decatur once? I always thought it was weird and probably illegal. Where you put that location in some races in some counties could directly impact the election. 
• If you haven't seen the NBA's Double Bird Guy video, you probably should. I think I'm more entertained by Westbrook's reaction than seeing a middle aged man child. 
• Saw a long ad on Fox News or CNN for some medical product for Hepatitis C which "may have been lingering in the bodies of Baby Boomers for years." That is praying on fear. And it is directed at the older demographic of America. 
• I'd tap the brakes on the "polls tightening" in the presidential race.  I'm not sure that Bloomberg group didn't fudge Florida's numbers for Trump just to break from the crowd and get a ton of publicity yesterday  -- which it did. And even if Hillary wins Florida, they can point to their margin of error and still say they were accurate.
• Selfies aren't banned at the polls in some states, cameras are.  And even that seems to have some constitutional free speech issues. 
• Trump caught heat yesterday for being in D.C. to open up a new hotel instead of being in a swing state. I don't have any problem with him being there. He was all over TV so that worked. And his bit of "look what I can do in this city of do-nothing" was a smart theme. 
• There's a trial I haven't followed very closely going on in Collin County which is a who-done-it. It's a circumstantial case where a woman is found dead in her garage and the husband is later arrested.  But this tweet from reporter Valarie Wigglesworth caught my attention yesterday as she covered the trial: "[Detective] spoke to neighbor Stephen Brockway who lives on Newport Dr; Brockway arrested 2 mo later on unrelated murder for hire."  Good grief. That's one heck of a neighborhood.
• I don't know how to fix CPS in Texas but it seems a lot more complicated than simply paying the current staff more money. I'm sure they might need a pay raise, but that shouldn't impact the performance of the current make up of CPS. 
• Watching a girl have a panic attack on Survivor was fascinating depending on how much you know about them.
• The hunt for ZuZu has taken a couple of turns. The police are saying they are "focusing" on Brewster and Presidio counties means they have no idea where she is. Secondly, the Alpine police called the boyfriend and his "family" the dreaded "persons of interest" until yesterday when the boyfriend, who had retained an attorney, suddenly became the "suspect." 
• Let's look at that situation from a different perspective. The Alpine police have a high profile case on their hands which they can't solve. The police chief feels heat. The last person the girl was with is the boyfriend. So let's name him a "person of interest" to send the message that we are actively working on this case and making progress. (And we all know that term officially doesn't mean suspect.) Plus, the police named his family as "persons of interest", too, to give them wiggle room. Ok, for the sake of discussion, let's assume the boyfriend is innocent. He is now widely known as the focus of police. Let's say he knows of how people can get railroaded in Texas (see Michael Morton) and gets scared and hires a lawyer. The lawyer tells him not to talk to the cops because who in their right mind would? The cops, now with a greater opportunity to take the heat off them, name him a "suspect" pointing out how he has retained a lawyer and call it "not cooperating."  See how the boyfriend's reputation has been ruined? But here's the ultimate question: Why are the police naming anyone a "person of interest" or a "suspect." They know where he is!!! What's the purpose -- other than to take off the heat?
• Mrs. LL had her Katie Couric Procedure at a facility that was dedicated to that procedure. Five doctors on staff and they were churning out three to four people an hour. All professional, however. We even had a brief doctor's visit and written report before we walked out the door.

Let's Check In On Mark Cuban's Mavs

send the tape to springfield pic.twitter.com/ZS3ih1MUVd

— James Herbert (@outsidethenba) October 26, 2016

I've told you this mess was coming for years.

This Couple's First Kiss Was At Their Wedding

I'm not sure how I discovered this. She tells the Twitter world that they were 29 years old and dated for 11 months.

Always Interesting

USA Today updated their head coach salary database for 2016: https://t.co/kR2AVDkfs7 pic.twitter.com/ihZRKDx1OV

— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) October 26, 2016

I remember when we all freaked out when the Aggies agreed to pay Jackie Sherrill around $1.7 million on a six year contract.

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Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

• Former NFL player Dennis Byrd died last week. He was famously paralyzed for a time after an on the field which  at the time, as Sports Illustrated recounted, the first player to speak to him was Bridgeport's own Kyle Clifton. 
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• There was a story making the rounds yesterday of a Whataburger mascot being a girl's Homecoming date. That's a planted, paid ad. Someone check the girl's family tree and see if anyone is associated with Whataburger's PR department. 
• I didn't realize Boyd was having a beer and wine election.  At this point, why not? 
• Frisco building four schools but not having the money to open them is beyond bizarre. 
• Losing my desire to care about professional sports is something I wish never happened. But it finally dawned on me it makes no sense.  I can be entertained by a professional sport, but I no longer care who wins. I think age 35 was my point of transition. 
• I might be out of pocket this morning as I tend to Mrs. LL who is having, uh, what I will refer to as the "Katie Couric Procedure." There will be no live telecast.
• There was fake news about voter fraud in Tarrant County yesterday. Get back to me after 11/8 and tell me the Democrats won in Tarrant County via voter fraud. 
• In this day and time when you can watch any type of entertainment on any type of platform, why is the only place you can watch Tower, the documentary on the UT shooting, is at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth for three days in early December? Put it online and I'd buy it. 
  
• I just learned this week that I have mispronounced "gyro" all my life. Fortunately, I think I've only said it three times. 
• Man, Megyn Kelly of Fox News and Newt Gingrich got into it last night. Gingrich told her she was "fascinated by sex" (her expression was great) and she ended the interview telling him he could go work on his anger issues. (Political advice: A man berating a woman and mentioning sex is not exactly what the GOP needed right now.) 
• Remember Wendy Davis? 
  
• The ex-wife of Jared Fogle sued Subway and alleged on Monday that the sandwich chain knew about its former spokesman's interest in minors as early as 2004 but didn’t do anything to stop it. Am I missing something? Why is she suing? I think I missed that class that says an employer is liable to the spouse of an employee for not telling the spouse her husband is a bad guy. 
• The former producer of Mark Davis' radio show is a Never Trumper as she reiterated last night. 
  
• Whatever happened to Kay Bailey Hutchinson?
• I'm a baseball idiot and looked up last night at the World Series game to see a pitcher for the Cubs with "Wood" on his jersey. My gut reaction was "Is that Kerry Wood?" whom I quickly discovered retired in 2012. Random news: While paddle boarding the next year near Chicago, Wood came upon a dead body the next year.

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When I Left The House Before Dawn

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