Above The Fold

Houston Rockets Dancers Taking You Into The Weekend

Like They Need Help: Texas Judge Assists Prosecution

Link.

No Justice. No Peace.

I'm coming to help you, Marilyn!

Entertaining Maid Of Honor Toast

Not bad, but the chances of this chick being annoying in real life are off the chart.

Random Friday Morning Thoughts

• Police called the murder of the six year old girl in Saginaw an "isolated incident." Uh, once you make an arrest and know exactly what happened you can get back to me on that. Until then, everyone has a reason to freak out. 
• Double motorcycle death in Venus in Johnson County. (No link yet). 
• There's a 21 year old missing in Lake Grapevine. He was discovered missing when a party boat carrying 60 people got back to shore with only 59. It's like a fresh water version of Open Water. 
• I had a discussion with the County Attorney the other day about the public's seemingly acceptance of Vampire Weekends. He believes the public supports it and has grown comfortable with the concept. He's probably right, but it may be more public apathy than public acceptance.  
• We were at a fireworks show in the Mid Cities last night but the crowd got captivated by some strange flying object with green and red lights. The kids thought it was an alien UFO, and I tried to calm them down by telling them it wasn't --- but it was the most bizarre thing I've seen in quite some time. It would hover and then streak for five seconds and hover again. 
• For some reason, I'm fascinated by this photo before/after the speech of I'm "the luckiest man on the face of the Earth."
• Bret Michaels got handsy with Fox 4's Fiona yesterday. (Speaking of, here's Fiona re-enacting the Flashdance water scene. Hey, now.)
• If I listened to music I'd probably listen to John Mayer. 
• I saw a "sponsored tweet" by David Dewhurst the other day on his abortion stance. I suppose if you are going to do political advertising, that's as useful as anything else. But if he only had mentioned something about the Chinese.
• But the irony is that Dewhurst is using social media when he acts like (and is) a politician stuck in the 1970's Old Boy's Network.
• A rising star on my most despised list is Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. I never knew he was paralyzed by (an almost unbelievable) event of being hit by a falling tree while jogging. And, get this, the tort reformer sued the property owner and is believed to have received $10 million. 
• The "average asking price" for the TCU/LSU game at Cowboys Stadium is $584 -- the second highest price for all games this season behind Aggie/Alabama ($626). But those numbers have to be skewed because of the prime and ridiculously priced seats.
• When I see footage of the Hot Dog Eating Contest from Coney Island I can understand why the "hate us for our freedom." 
• You should really think twice before watching this, but there's a video of police in California arresting a man for videotaping their conduct (which is absolutely legal) and then shooting his dog who comes to defend him. It literally made me sick to my stomach and furious with rage. 
• If George Zimmerman is convicted it'll be a massive tragedy of justice. I'm not saying he's innocent, I'm saying that no jury can believe he is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. (And whoever is sitting second chair in his defense is really good. He's dry but good.)
• Grand finale inadvertently on the ground injures 28. (Video.)

Boomtown

This particular firework explosion at the field of the Fort Worth Cats apparently scared a lot of people -- especially those at the new Drive In theater.

Here's one more traditional:

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• Is the Update updating? No. Is Random Thoughts random thoughting? Yes. Once again proving I'm the hardest working man in show business.
• When I was growing up on the mean streets of Bridgeport, the neighborhood kids would divide into teams and go out onto the road and line up about 60 feet from each other. From there, we'd set up a ton of bottle rockets pointed at each other and light them with a "punk". It was nuclear war. It was fantastic.
• Every now and then a kid would get hit in the chest by one of the bottle rockets. Were we worried about him? Heck no. That was a moment of high comedy.
• You remember "cherry bombs"? My neighbor Chris displayed its power one time when his parents were getting some carpet replaced in their house. How thick is the hardened cardboard that serves as the tube that new carpet is wrapped around? A half inch around the circumference? More? Whatever it was, he put a cherry bomb in the end of a discarded one of them and it blew the end of it into a shreddy mess. 
• The Cherry Bomb was outlawed shortly thereafter.
• In high school, one of my buddies made a make shift bottle rocket launcher by taking an old golf club and sawing the the club end off of it. He would light a bottle rocket, insert it in the golf shaft, hold out his newly made launcher -- arm extended -- parallel to his chest, and let it rip. It was awesome.
• We might have tried out the golf club launcher on a house of a man who would later become the mayor of Bridgeport. He was none too pleased and called the cops. As my buddy and I hastily retreated to a nearby field and laid in a culvert, my buddy - as spotlights came and went overhead - gave me the greatest piece of criminal law advice I've ever heard: "Shut up and don't move."
• Changing gears . . . 
• I hate ESPN's Sportscenter, but they've been playing a montage of soldiers coming home to the surprise their parents, wife, and kids and . . . it's fantastic. It's overlaid with Daughtry's "I'm Coming Home."
• The Ticket's Jake Kemp had a segment this week of his upcoming 12 day trip to The Netherlands, the Czech Republic, and Switzerland. I'm so jealous. I once heard someone say that disposable income should be spent on travel and not things. I'm so conflicted by that. You want to spend a week in Cancun or, these days, buy three monster flat screen TVs for the house? I guess the answer depends on your age, how much you've traveled,  and whether you've ever had a monster flat screen TV.
• Funny bit this week: Mrs. LL tried to buy a membership online to the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art and ended up buying one for the MoMA in New York. (I would laugh at her, but a Google search, and the MoMA's nondescript website, would have caused me to do the same thing.)
• She managed to get a refund, which will occur within the next 30 days, but, for awhile, I was a member of The MoMA.
• Still remember the person who told me that my posts are "over comma'd".
• Regardless of your position on the issue, here's a great Dallas Morning News piece on the stats about abortion in Texas.
• I'm not sure I've ever heard as many negative reviews as I have about The Lone Ranger. 
• Sports: (1) The Texas Rangers signed Manny Ramirez yesterday to a minor league contract. He's 41 years old. (2) Chris Davis hit another home run, and (3) Dwight Howard talk gives me Tired Head, and he ain't that great. 
• Someone asked yesterday about whatever happened to the PI Dallas lawyer who advertised that he would "bring you flowers." Oh, my. He died earlier this year after falling 1,500 feet while hiking in New Hampshire.
• Also from that obit: "He ran half marathons on the Great Wall of China, up Pikes Peak, and in Luxor, Egypt. He climbed mountains in places such as Nepal, Ecuador, and Tanzania." Once again, I jealous. 
• I tried switching to boxers from boxer briefs about six months ago but just couldn't do it. (I'm only mentioning this because the BagOfNothing guy wrote that he tried the same thing. Weird.)
• What's going on with Steve Eager at Fox 4? They are making him read social media comments on their newscast and he's also posting off-the-cuff opinionated Tweets? He seems like a good guy being bossed around in an unstable media market.
• If you aren't a documentary fan, watch The Wild and Wonderful Whites Of West Virginia and get back to me.
• And the new documentary of How To Make Money Selling Drugs -- a film attacking the War on Drugs -- looks promising.
• Sports Talk Radio: I've already listened to some of The Ticket's all day Rotten Radio extravaganza this morning and it's fantastic. 
• Egypt's Al-Tahrir newspaper takes a shot at the President in English:
  

From The Email Bag: "Brian Loncar loves Giant Burger"

That man is an advertising fool.

(Thanks, Shawn.)

I Told You That Case Seemed Weird

Uncle of little girl found dead in Saginaw Mon. says his brother involved in 'reverse polygamy' marriage with girl's mother and another man.
— LARI BARAGER (@laribaragerfox4) July 3, 2013

Edit: Identified by ME

Why Didn't That Liberal Mainstream Media Star-Telegram Cover This Story?

She's from Keller Fossil Ridge. And for some reason I think a lot of you will enjoy the web site which this story came from.

Skype Comes To The George Zimmerman Trial

It was Zimmerman's online college instructor (or something like that) from Colorado.

And then the wheels fell off when he started receiving calls which created graphics and an irritating sound during his testimony. I don't use Skype, but apparently those watching were able to figure out how to call him.

Edit: Watch it on youtube here.

Aggie (Hullabaloo Caneck Caneck) Wedding

Just click around to get a feel for the great event. (The "pastor" in the referee outfit was a nice touch, no?)

And nothing says love like Journey:

Fox – Could this be every Aggie’s dream? Not sure about that, but at least no one will dare question Harvey and Heather Willis’ loyalty to their alma mater after making their wedding entirely Aggie football themed. From the referee wedding officiant, to the 12th man jersey-wearing groom and groomsmen huddling together before saying “I do,” this wedding had it all– if you’re an Aggie.

The journey apparently started on the Texas A&M campus, where Harvey proposed to Heather under the famous “Century Tree” according to the maid of honor during her toast. For those of you unfamiliar with this one of many old Aggie legends: The “Century Tree” is a live oak more than 100 years old, and if two lovers pass beneath the tree’s branches, they are destined to be wed, and if a couple become engaged under the tree, the marriage is said to last forever.

The wedding party was led down the aisle by a mini Fightin’ Texas Aggie Band drum major to the tune of “Noble Men of Kyle Field” followed by the bridesmaids complete with, you guessed it, Texas A&M dresses. The referee wedding officiant even tossed a flag for “misconduct” before starting the ceremony due to one of the guest wearing an orange shirt.

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

• The Obamacare requirement that all employers with 50 or more employees provide them insurance in 2014 has been delayed by the Administration to 2015.  This is pretty surprising, but I'm not buying the right wing conspiracy theory that the delay was to get past the 2014 mid-term elections before it is implemented. How does that make sense? Thousands and thousands of employees would suddenly have had health insurance and that would have hurt the Democrats? 
• But how can the Obama Administration just stop the implementation of a law? That's a right wing criticism that I agree with. 
• Mrs. LL made the Kids In House wash our cars yesterday.  They did a fantastic job. Being a step-parent, I don't impose a lot of rules or chores instead deferring to Mrs. LL to do so with my role being to support her in front of the kids. But, man, I would run afoul of child labor laws if I were a biological parent. 
• The abortion hearing seemed pretty wild in Austin last night (the issue was being "debated" in a House committee hearing.) Love this picture of two troopers looking down on pro-choice/pro-life folks in the Rotunda. And confused that this picture is being held by a man. 
• Mrs. LL is taking the prosecution's side in the George Zimmerman case! She can't get past that he "provoked the difficulty." 
• Facebook pic of the ammo shelves in Decatur Walmart. 
• Porsche slams into DPS Trooper car in Dallas.
• This Saginaw-child-found-under-a-tarp case is weird. Everyone knows who the girl is (there was a vigil last night) and the media knows that her parents' home was searched yesterday. But no name is being released. Why?
• I'm not sure what her deal is, but this female Texas coach claims that this "prayful wish" post got her suspended from Facebook. 
• The Paradise/Bridgeport model is now in a Coed Magazine Miss July 2013 contest. 
• Radio talk show host Mike Gallagher said in righteous indignation this morning, "Have you ever been to a restaurant which had a mandatory-tip-on-your-bill policy?!" Uh, who hasn't?  Also about three months ago he had an African-American female caller who told him that the black man "likes the big booty".  His reply, "Is that true? I've never heard that."  That man sure knows America.
• Greatest July weather week ever? 
• Dallas DA Craig Watson is being accused of an ethics violation for appearing on The Fan and saying that he expected Cowboy Josh Brent to be convicted. That didn't bug me all that much (although it's improper), but what really got my attention is that he said the judge would order a psychological evaluation before sentence was imposed.  That's not true at all if Brent elects the jury to assess punishment if convicted -- something he would surely do. 

Above The Fold

More Austin Weirdness In The Legislature

State Troopers reviving woman who fainted while waiting in large lines for #AbortionBill debate at Capitol. pic.twitter.com/Kuf6Rymdb6
— David Schechter (@DavidSchechter) July 2, 2013

Wendy Davis Harvard Law School Photo

Then:

Yesterday:

Source.

Random Tuesday Morning Thoughts

• What a violent and bizarre afternoon/early evening in the Metroplex yesterday (1) A small girl's body was found under a tarp in the middle of a residential intersection in Saginaw, (2) A fatal triple shooting in Fort Worth which included a 10 year old boy and a pregnant woman, and (3) A couple in their 50s were found dead in their Grand Prairie home.
• And all the while, this guy (accused of sexual assault of a child) was threatening to jump off the the High Five in Dallas for hours. (Previous mugshot here.)
• And what was the name of the Wise County guy in the 1990s who was mentally challenged and was convicted of killing Opal Jennings in Saginaw after a very questionable trial? 
• My personal experience with Obamacare: I got a check yesterday from Blue Cross. It seems Obamacare requires that no more than 20% of insurance premiums can be used on administrative costs instead of actual healthcare. And the new law, and I didn't know this, requires that any amount over 20% be refunded to policy holders. In 2012, Blue Cross received $1.038 billion in premiums but spent 22.3% of that amount in administrative costs.. So 2.3% of my total premiums which was refunded: $38.13.
• The Family Pup threw up three times yesterday and was lethargic. I was stunned how concerned I was about her, but I guess I shouldn't be. 
• If you ever hear an attorney at a Wise County Docket call use a booming voice you know (1) he's from out of town, and (2) It's his first time in a Wise County court.   
• There has been a personal injury verdict of $53 million in California. If you want to see a disturbing photograph to explain why, click here. 
• Lots of Pro-Life/Pro-Choice folks in Austin yesterday (with the Pro-Choice far outnumbering their opponents).  And in connection with that issue, and if you have the time, listen to this short "Call of the Day" to the Mark Davis show from a a very emotional woman who had an abortion.  Anyone spot a huge contradiction from her?
• Raising Cane's offers free agent Dwight Howard lifetime chicken if he'll sign with the Mavericks. What a publicity stunt. And it worked perfectly. (But that signing still ain't gonna happen.)
• I've followed the George Zimmerman trial fairly closely, and I don't know how in the world he can be convicted (unless some bombshell is coming.)  Every juror has to have a doubt about what happened out there, right? And if that doubt is reasonable --- which it absolutely has to be --- they can't convict.
• It'll be DWI Vampire Extended Weekend in Wise County beginning tomorrow. 
• I had never heard of this crazy buyout: Yesterday former New York Met Bobby Bonilla received a check from the Mets for $1,193,248.20. He hasn't played for the Mets since 1999, but the Mets bought out his contract on a deferred basis with annual payments of $1,193,248.20 which began two years ago. He'll receive those annual payments until 2035.

Well This Walmart In Oklahoma Footage Is Insane

Police have released surveillance video from an Oklahoma Walmart of a man who allegedly took a 2-year-old girl from a mother’s shopping cart and held a knife to the child’s throat.

Surveillance cameras at the Midwest City, Okla., Walmart were rolling June 17 when police shot and killed the suspect, Sammie Wallace, in the head at point-blank range and safely returned the toddler to her mother.

In the dramatic video, Wallace, 37, takes the toddler hostage while her mother, Alicia Keating, had her back to the shopping cart. Keating began to scream and pleaded with the suspect to return her daughter.

Keating’s older daughter was also present as the incident unfolded in front of panicked shoppers.

Law enforcement quickly moved in and evacuated the store. Police began more than 30 minutes of negotiations with Wallace and, at one point, even offered him a chair.

“He had a weapon in his hand. A knife-type weapon holding up against the child, threatening the child’s life,” Midwest City Assistant Police Chief Sid Porter said.

Police say Wallace was uncooperative and the situation quickly deteriorated, with the suspect making odd demands. The tipping point came when Wallace started an ominous 60-second countdown with the knife still close to the toddler’s neck.

  More.

Porn Wars

More.

But what's up with that one year deal?  Is that a concession "forever" isn't possible?

Sign up here guys. (Although when you click on the link to "Get On The Wall" you keep getting kicked back.)

Running From Something.

Pretty fascinating out of Dallas. 

Rich People Suing Their Kid's Rich Private School

If I'm following what is going on here, the wife is a "renowned artist" and donated a piece of art (which sounds like something she threw together) to their kid's private school for the school's fundraising auction. Since they couldn't attend the auction, they decided that they wanted to be the winning bidder so they had the school (I think) bid on their behalf. They figured that the high tone folks at the auction might cause the price to get around $3,000 tops. (Tuition for the school runs $39,000 a year.)

But these New Yorkers now say that the school rigged the auction in their absence to cause the price to be driven up -- ultimately causing their winning bid to become $50,000.  The school told them that a deal was a deal so pay up. The couple found Jackie Chiles and sued the school.

The story is here. But you have to get past some crazy lines like the one that said the couple claims their damages include one of their kid's "$60,000-a-year chauffeur, whose job they want to save."

Is it OK just to hate everyone involved in the story?

Doggie Almost Causes Pile Up At Tour De France

Photobomb Silliness

What is that? Beaker Face?

Random Monday Morning Thoughts

• While you were sleeping: Nineteen firefighters dead in Arizona. Horrible. 
• Another massive water main break in the metroplex this morning. Photo. I suppose it's the heat causing all the breaks, but it really hasn't been hot. 
• Watched a little bit of Joel Osteen this weekend. In his sermon he said that God's blessings on a family can be built up from generation to generation and will only be released when you are worthy. "The first generation that breaks the negative cycle is the generation that gets paid back for everything that should have been yours . . . . Some of you have a whole lot in your account. It's been building up for generations and I believe it's about to be released into your account."  Somebody want to point out a basis for that statement. 
• And then I flipped over and ran across some preacher named Keith Craft out of Frisco who read a poem that he had written in preparation for his sermon. But, he proclaimed, "If you've never had anyone write you a poem just know this one is from God." He said that in a couple of different ways and made it very clear that the the poem had equal weight to scripture. 
• And at the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Sen. Ted Cruz got a standing ovation when he said that the IRS should be abolished.
• What's going on with churches these days? 
• The Empire State Building turned gay this weekend. 
• My Chris Davis watch: He hit three home runs this weekend bringing his total to league leading 31.  (Josh Hamilton has 10.)
• I'm a huge fan of the The Ticket's Gordon Keith but he's a great writer. His last column in the Dallas Morning News on fear is fantastic. (Compare that to the junk that Steve Blow and Jacquielynn Floyd have been churning out for years.) 
• Mrs. LL finally bought into Arrested Development this weekend. 
• I think this is shocking. Some company named Fidelity Investments now employs 4,500 people in the small town of Westlake. 
• David Dewhurst thinks the media might be responsible for the "mob" that followed the Wendy Davis filibuster. “We have reports, and I have my staff taking a look at the video,” Dewhurst explained, “and if I find, as I’ve been told, examples of the media waving and trying to inflame the crowd, incite them in the direction of a riot, I’m going to take action against them.” What the heck is he going to do?

Oh. My

PIC - Up-close picture of the wrecked Ferrari from the Fort Worth accident. Yowch! #dfwnews #ferrari pic.twitter.com/rYYVgU3QjP
— DFW Scanner (@DFWscanner) June 30, 2013