Messenger Above The Fold

Chloe Sims Taking You Into The Weekend

"Three Second Roooooooooooooooooooooooooo"

And I think we'll all agree that the song hits its peak at 2:34.

I was going to make this a "Taking You Into The Weekend" special post but I just couldn't stand to wait.

George Zimmerman's Bail Set At $150,000

With GPS monitoring. The State had asked that bond be denied but, if set, be set at $1,000,000.

Zimmerman testified at the bond hearing, but I'm not sure how much they got into the facts of the case. I don't think it was very much.

Bonding companies normally charge 10% to 20% of the amount of the bond (they are on the hook for the bond amount if the defendant fails to show for court.)

SMU's New Basketball Coach

I care absolutely nothing about the hiring of 71 year old Larry Brown. But a picture of him coaching the Denver Nuggets in 1974 in overalls is gold.

Random Friday Morning Thoughts

• A wrong way driver on the Dallas Tollway again last night. She just managed to get into a one car wreck, however.
• I'm now generally in charge of running the scoreboard at softball games. I'm thinking about bring an amp and firing up a little play-by-play while I do it.
• The lead singer of The Band has died. I knew basically nothing about The Band yet everyone else acts like they were a household name.
• A picture of the bloodied head of George Zimmerman? ABC News thinks so.
• One of these years, the Main Street Arts Festival in downtown Fort Worth is going to get hit with a major storm that'll send all that art flying over I-30. That wind tunnel effect down there will do the trick.
• Steve Wariner is playing at the Festival. There was a time I loved Steve Wariner's music. I guess I still do. 
• It's 4/20. WBAP's Hal Jay said today he had never heard of the drug reference for those numbers.
• Ousted Secret Service agent posted a picture of him checking out Sarah Palin on his Facebook page. 
• A little kid ran out onto the field during the White Sox/Orioles game yesterday afternoon. To quote Latarian Milton, "It's fun to do hood rat thangs."
• I saw where a long ago neighbor -- two door's down -- who I played with as a kid has died. Time for reflection. 
• C.J. Wilson lost last night. That's the most important baseball news to me. 
• I bought two American Airlines tickets in February for travel in July. And in the news every day is about bankruptcy, union strife, and takeovers. And somehow I'm not worried. 
• Got another photo of the Decatur Beggar off of 377 in Keller yesterday.  He needs to remember his roots. 
• Mrs. LL, coaching third base last night, sent a runner home for a potential home run even though the ball was in flight back to the infield. Runner scored. I was so afraid she'd panic and make the kid hit the brakes, but I guess that's the way aggressive softball go. 
• That was fast: The parents of the kid who was mauled by a dog two and one-half months ago while they slept (and which gave rise to a great Lari Barager ducking out of the way video) have pled out to probation.

Afternoon Pick Me Up: The Escort Who Brought Down The Secret Service!

Source.

High Speed Chase In Dallas Right Now Is Like A Batman Movie

Guy is speeding down the highway and then decides to go to downtown Dallas and drive by City Hall. Every cop in the Southwest Proper is after him. Including the SWAT team in a tank!!! Straight up gangsta.

Then they finally got him. The Channel 8 reporter said, "This gentleman is now out of the vehicle."

So Creepy

Reminds me of when Payne Stewart's plane was flying across America.

NASCAR: Oh, My

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• First Don Cornelius, then Dick Clark. If I'm Casey Kasem, I'm worried.
• With no one to host New Year's Rockin' Eve, those Mayans might have been right.
• I saw the DPS Academy campus yesterday in Austin. Had a Guantanamo feel to it.
• There was a huge Asian (Korean?) section of Austin that we drove through. So much so that even banks would have very nice signs on the outside with alternative spellings.
• I could have sworn one judge at oral arguments yesterday gave me the "Talk To The Hand" sign. It was almost bizarre.
• I was nervous before the argument because there seemed to be a lot of people in the courtroom -- maybe about 20. Then the doors opened up and in came about 50 students to observe. 
• A guy whose name we don't know yet but is about to become Metroplex Public Enemy #1: The subject of the warrant which was just issued for the person who set fire to the puppy named "Justice." And WBAP reported this morning the cops believe the incident was videotaped. This will be a firestorm.  Edit: It looks like his name is Darius Ewing. I feel sorry for a guy on Facebook and Twitter who goes to Baylor who happens to have the same name. 
• And we're finally realizing just how bizarre that Montgomery County story is of the nurse who waited outside of a doctor's office to kill a woman so she could take her three day old child. I'm correct in understanding the nurse didn't know the woman?
• Mrs. LL is tricking up our kitchen table and chairs with cloth and ribbons that I can't begin to describe.
• Remember the flute in Men At Work's "Down Under"? That man and Dick Clark had something in common yesterday. 
• Bridgeport High School girls golf team playoff scores: Cassi Smith, 89; Tiffany Hawkins, 92; Remi Swensson, 131; Cassidy McKibbens, 141; Jessica Windham, 161.
•  I don't know about personally, but occupationally I'd love to be Skip Hollandsworth. 
• If you've ever eaten at Tony's Pizza in Springtown, you'll be interested in this.
• It's the anniversary of Waco Siege Fire and the Oklahoma City Bombing. I know a conservative who has a big conspiracy theory about the latter. 
• The only reason we know of the Secret Service/Prostitution scandal is because one hooker wasn't paid and raised a ruckus. 

Dead

What is this hanging in State Capitol?

Sheesh. This lady would not shut up about her problems

School. Work. Husband.

Just killed me at Chuy's.

Getting peppered with questions . . .

. . . From eight judges is brutal.

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

• By the time you read this, I'll be in Austin. I left this morning. That means I've been up a looooong time.
• It all so means I've been in a car with two prosecutors. We battle, but we're friends. (But I brought earphones as a backup.) They talked me into not going down early and spending the night -- I'll tell you how this works out. 
• It's an appellate argument before the nine judge Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. I've done it once before and, honestly, it's not the funnest thing in the world to do.
• Our case is a DWI case -- important to my client -- but a misdemeanor. The case being argued before us deals with the youngest person ever placed on Death Row in Texas (for a triple axe murder in 1991). It also appears it might have been prosecuted by a corrupt DA.
• Alabama's National Championship trophy (a Waterford crystal replica of a football valued at $30,000) was shattered two days ago. Great idea: Sell the broken glass to fans. They'd make a fortune.
• Ted Nugent continues to be irresponsible and now the Secret Service is looking at him (once they get through with Columbian hookers.)
• The Cowboys 2012 schedule was released -- 6 of the first 9 are on the road. Washington (with RG3 presumably at quarterback) will be the Thanksgiving game.
• I may be one of five people that saw the Texas debate for U.S. Senator sponsored by Belo on Friday night. Let me recap: The moderators were a train wreck, Craig James was incredibly polished (as he should be), Ted Cruz is like a rabid dog (a small one), Tom Leppert still looks like your crazy uncle, and David Dewhurst acts like he has inherited the throne and doesn't understand why no one else doesn't realize it.
• At UTA, says WFAA, "There is a man who is slapping a woman on the buttocks and then running off." I think the "running off" aspect is what makes it a funny visual.
• Jamie Moyer first pitched for the Texas Rangers in 1989. He's still active and got a win last night at the age of 49.
• Weird, weird year for Baylor sports: Their baseball team has won twenty games in a row and ranked sixth in the nation. 

Above The Fold

Edit: Missed this error. The high school is in Trophy Club.

Nicolette Sheridan Still Killin' It

Bridgeport Caveman Crawl

The Wise County equivalent of crossing the Trinity at the Mud Run.

Facebook link.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• I was just going to go with the bodybuilder, but I panicked at the last second. 
• Pilot/Hero Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger is releasing a second book. I've got a short hero's list, and his profiting with the first book was almost enough for me to kick him off it. The second book will do it.
• Notre Dame will play Navy in Ireland on September 1st. It'll start at 8:00 a.m. here. Cool. Very cool. 
• "Why?" - WBAP's Hal Jay after hearing their Sports Director say that "The White House will welcome defending NASCAR Champ Tony Stewart today."  (Shaking. Head.)
• The Anderson Cooper giggle fits are funny. 
• I always file a federal income tax extension (which is the easiest form in the history of ever.) Today is the deadline in case you didn't know. 
• My dreams continue to exhaust me. Last night I'm in a river. I see a fish. Then I see a bear come up out of the water to snag the fish. Then he looks at me. 
• If you drive on I-35 south of Fort Worth you'll see a restaurant called "The Rig" which has, uh, a big fake oil rig in front of it. It had a trailer in its parking lot which caught fire last night killing a homeless man who was inside.  I don't think that will help its Zagat rating. 
• Caught the premiere of "Girls" on HBO -- the new edgy series. Meh.
• The "60 Minutes" special on Mike Wallace on Sunday was great. That's a lot of tension between he and a translator when he asked the Ayatollah Khomeini during the Hostage Crisis if he was a lunatic.
• I don't care about the Mavericks and it wouldn't bug me if they missed the playoffs. But I get interested when one player got a technical foul last night for giving a Utah Jazz player a violent "Wet Willie." 
• I find it bizarre that a tremendous athlete died in a "Mud Run" in Fort Worth while trying to cross the Trinity River. Channel 8 had a great segment on it which had video shot from the water of people trying to cross it. It was chaotic. Since there was a rope from one short to the other, the organizers told participants they didn't need to know how to swim. Oh, my.  I predict that will be the last "Mud Run" at the Trinity. (The Dallas Observer has a pretty good story on it.)
• Bridgeport had one of those runs about three years ago. I prefer pavement. 
• Mrs. LL is a huge "The Office" fan and we've watched a ton of them with her in syndication. An oddity: One of the first ones I ever saw began with Dwight dressing up as The Joker. I've never seen it again despite rerun after rerun. 

Offensive TSA Patdown?

DM – A traveller’s sobs were left ignored this weekend, as she was subjected to an invasive pat-down despite her cries – in another blow to the TSA. A video posted to YouTube captures the weeping woman’s ordeal during the security checkpoint at an airport in Madison, Wisconsin. Mr Hoft wrote: ‘This morning at a Midwest airport I witnessed this poor woman suffering through this horrible sexual violation’. It’s the latest in a long line of disturbing behaviour during security checkpoints. Loud sobs can be heard as the woman, wearing a pink sweater, is patted down by a female TSA agent. The woman is then left alone, and can be seen hunching over, her arms crossed across her body in humiliation.The TSA has come under intense scrutiny for the pat-down and body scanner policy in recent years, especially in the age of YouTube.

Oh, come on lady. Suck it up. The only person that should be crying is the TSA agent

Just Announced: Pulitzer Prize For Breaking News Photography

In Wise County, we have car wrecks. In Afghanistan, they have bombs.

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Woman Went To Bridgeport To Have Third Baby . . .

And she left her other two kids with a boyfriend who would eventually be sentenced to life in prison for killing one of them. Today she pled guilty in Denton on her first day of trial in exchange for a 10 year sentence for neglect.

The prosecutor said she will have to serve "at least two years" but I don't think that's right. I think it's probable that she'll serve more than two years, but I don't know of a two year minimum.

(In a completely unrelated story, two Denton prosecutors were banned from a courtroom earlier this month after the judge told them they did not have “the innate intellect of a fifth-grader.” Ouch.)

Boston Marathon Live Results

Kinda cool.  Wise County attorney Thomas Aaberg is here, The Ticket's Junior Miller is here. 

Thomas posted this pic yesterday from Fenway Park:

Hologram Concert?

I'm way out of my element on this one, but apparently "Tupac performed by a hologram last night at Coachella." And by this I mean, some guy that got killed in Las Vegas was recreated via technology at a big old concert.  It may or may not be music, but it's pretty cool.

And who knew that the Japanese have been doing this for years?

Random Monday Morning Thoughts

• You know, "Cabin in the Woods" sounds like it might be pretty good. 
• I got sucked in to quite a few Titanic specials yesterday. (Thought: I wonder what it would cost to rebuild the Titaninc and put it in service today?) 
• I miss that Little Ceaser's guy who would say, "Pizza! Pizza!"
• The feds are re-trying Roger Clemens for perjury beginning today. And they are using five prosecutors. Good grief.
• I finally saw "Bridesmaids" over the weekend. Funny, funny stuff. 
• Hayden Panettiere playing tennis in a bikini.
• Because temperatures might be in the 80s in Boston today, marathon organizers are allowing any runner to defer participating until next year.  I can't see many going to the trouble and expense to get to Boston taking them up on that offer. 
• My hair is getting long, but deciding to grow it out in the windy Spring was a dumb idea. I've got to wearing a visor on weekends because Mrs. LL says I'm "not a cap guy."  Edit: Hey!! If it is good enough for Steve Spurrier, it's good enough for me. 
• A 21 year old from Rhome is in the obituaries. What happened?
• I'm not sure I've ever seen so much early warning for tornadoes in the Midwest -- a warning that was dead on. 
• The Marlins finally hit a home run so we got to see what that awful looking contraption in the outfield actually does. Idiocracy.
• Fox 4 News at 9:00 last night was an epic train wreck. For some reason, they couldn't get any video to play so they were left to vamp and stretch things out. After 30 minutes, they abandoned the news altogether. But the anchors were very good sports about it. 

In Alvord

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