Random Thursday Morning Thoughts

• Has what will be the most notorious serial killer in metroplex history been flying under the radar and the story still isn't getting big press? A guy has been indicted for killing twelve elderly women, seven in Dallas County and six in Collin County, as well as indicted on two attempted murder of elderly women in Collin County. And we still don't know anything about the details. The only facts are from this Dallas Morning News story where we learn this about one of the attempted murders: A 93-year-old woman at the Parkview Elderly Assisted Living facility in Frisco said he tried to smother her with a pillow after claiming to be a maintenance man. This is the thing of books and movies.
  
• The great futuristic Black Mirror is coming back for three episodes. And Miley Cyrus will star in one of them. I've said it before: Every episode of  that I've watched I've end up saying, "That will happen one of these days." 
  
• I was at a seminar last week and saw the coolest thing. These little gadgets were handed out which allowed you to respond to multiple choice questions and the group's answers (by percentage) would be projected up on a slide in seconds.  And the devices felt and looked amazingly cheap -- light weight plastic that was the equivalent of holding five credit cards stacked on top of each other. They wanted them back but didn't seem to particularly care if a few got lost. (Oh, I slayed those questions by the way.)
  
• Random discovery by a faithful reader: Someone did a thesis at Texas Tech in the mid-1980s about restoration of the Wise County courthouse. And he built a model. (Alas, no historical picture of the district courtroom with a balcony from back in the day.)
  
• I mentioned a while back I've gone on criminal data discovery analysis for Wise County this year. Here's an example: This is a break down of Class C criminal cases (fine only) filed in the four JP courts this year. One third of the cases, 732, are speeding tickets: 
• JP#1:(Greenwood/Decatur/Rhome and east) 591 (25.65%)
• JP#2 (Decatur/Bridgeport/Alvord and to the north): 851 (36.94%)
• JP#3 (Rhome/Boyd/Cottondale and to the south): 639 (27.73%)
• JP#4 (Bridgeport/Runaway Bay and south): 223 (9.68%) 
• Note those numbers do not take into account the Class C tickets written by local police departments (Bridgeport, Boyd, Decatur, Rhome, etc.) which go to municipal courts.
• I won't reveal the guy's name but the record holder this year for a speeding citation goes to a man who was clocked at 115 mph in a 70 on May 6, 2019 in JP#3. On the other end of the spectrum, only one person has been written up all year long for going 5 mph over the speed limit or less.
• These are the lawmakers who voted for the Alabama abortion law with no exception for rape or incest. I'm trying to put my finger on the common denominator.
  
  
• A new first assistant DA has been named in Harris County.  He is the leader of a band named . . . and I am not making this up . . . Death By Injection.
• Trump has issued a pardon for Conrad Black. Who's he? Some white collar criminal who convicted of fraud and obstruction of justice and spent three years in prison and fined $125,000. Oh, he also wrote this last year: 
  
• Can we just call a war with Iran stupid right now instead of waiting to do so after thousands of American are dead? (Side note: Is there any reason why we haven't had a Secretary of Defense since last year?)
• After all these years, I'm finally reading Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee.  With three years of hearing about The Wall to protect "our land", I'm sure this won't work me up into a tizzy at all. 
• Before I write "tariffs" and you zone out, did you know that one of the classroom questions of the famous Ferris Bueller scene where Ben Stein, as the teacher, asks, "Anyone? Anyone?" is about, yep, tariffs.