Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts

This was a weird case about a Dallas plaintiffs lawyer who died in a shootout at an Uptown condo. The Dallas Morning News reported two months later that the autopsy revealed he "had mixed cocaine with hydrocodone, alprazolam — commonly known as Xanax — and phenazepam, a Russian-made drug similar to Valium." He is still listed on his firm's website. Side note: He represented the family in a case of a stripper killed by a monster truck in the parking lot of Spearmint Rhino.

---

• That's a story out of Jacksboro.
  
  
  
• I'm telling you, something is going on. Cuban is acting like a man trying to get his hands on a mountain of cash. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• I don't know much about the implications of this, but it is all over the news this morning. The "slain general" is the guy who Trump's Administration took out about four years ago. 
  
  
  
• When I saw this headline, I thought it would be about a snow monkey invasion. But this is the lede: "Texans bought land in Brazoria County looking for solitude. Then they heard about the monkeys. Last year, a $12 billion biomedical research firm quietly bought more than 500 acres of land in a sleepy corner of the county and shared a plan to house up to 43,200 monkeys on the property."
  
  
  
• The great reporter Trish Choate asked why the sheriff didn't complete his 10 days behind bar, and she got an answer. Wichita Falls lawyer Bob Estrada provided to the jail a court case that "says" a defendant should receive credit for the time served while released (to go the hospital or even home, for example) through no mistake of his own. Here's the case provided.
  
  
  
• Oh, Dallas.
  
  
  
  
• An incredible image of a home explosion in Michigan over the weekend that you probably didn't hear about. It killed a family of four from Arkansas.
  
  
  
• This is very true.
  
  
  
• Quick hits with sports images/graphics:
• Two more pics of the last play of the Texas/Washington game.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• A score from last night. That's a "159." 
  
  
  
• Baylor opened up a new basketball arena last night, and Bill Gates was there in Baylor gear. Here's why.
  
  
  
• Extremely legal nerdy stuff: What's up with brief writing these days where lawyers are attempting to conduct clever and cutesy comedy routines? Take a look at a brief filed during the Christmas break in the Paxton criminal case which has been pending for almost a decade. The footnotes are full of references to obscure quotes from high brow literature, but there are also the use of phrases like "two dogs who won't hunt."