THE ACCOMMODATIONS WEREN’T BAD, BUT THE ALPO WAS SERVED COLD
Curtis Lee Robin, of Vidor, after being convicted of abusing his eleven-year-old stepson by locking him out of the house at night, thus forcing him to sleep in a doghouse, agreed to a plea bargain under which he would sleep in a doghouse for thirty consecutive nights.
FIRST HE ASKED TO AUDITION FOR GOD
Former U.S. senator Phil Gramm played a Confederate politician in the Civil War movie Gods and Generals.
WINONA RYDER WILL PLAY HER IN THE MOVIE
Brooke Stollenwerck Aldridge, a prominent Dallas socialite and a fundraiser for several local charities, was arrested for shoplifting a $120 Kate Spade wallet, a $485 pair of black pants, and a $1,250 Hermès wallet from the Neiman Marcus store at NorthPark Center.
“AND THEY WERE BOTH NAKED, THE MAN AND HIS WIFE, AND WERE NOT ASHAMED, BUT THEIR CREATOR WAS ARRESTED BY THE GARDEN OF EDEN VICE SQUAD”
The police in Pilot Point, north of Dallas, threatened to charge Wes Miller with display of harmful material to a minor because a mural on a building he owned depicted Eve with bare breasts, but they held off pressing charges after Miller draped a piece of yellow crime-scene tape over her nipples.
MAKE THAT “OLDER BUT NOT WISER”
Forty-six-year-old Eddy Lee Dacy, of San Antonio, was sentenced to six months in jail for parole violations, including leaving the state so he could appear with his teenage girlfriend on an episode of Ricki Lake titled “Older Men, Younger Women.”
PUT YOUR EAR UP TO IT AND YOU CAN HEAR A TSUNAMI
The U.S. Shell warehouse, in Los Fresnos, installed on its grounds a 14,000-pound concrete conch shell.
THEN THEY GOOSE-STEPPED TO THE END ZONE
On the evening of September 26, which began the Jewish High Holy Day Rosh Hashanah, the Paris High School band performed a World War II-themed halftime show that included the playing of the song “Deutschland Uber Alles” and the waving of a Nazi flag.
JOEY’S PICK: A JUICY PATTY IN A POUCH OF PETA BREAD
Members of the group In Solidarity With Animals picketed Ziggy’s Healthy Grill, a Houston restaurant, because it serves a kangaroo burger.
IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT, MOVE TO CORPUS CHRISTI
Blanca Castillo, of Richland Hills, asked Tarrant County commissioners to remove the bronze panther from the grounds in front of the county administration building in Fort Worth, which was once known as Panther City, because she considered the artwork a “pagan statue.”
FOLLOWED BY “MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN NAZIS”
The night before California’s gubernatorial recall vote, which resulted in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s election despite complaints by women alleging sexual harassment, Willie Nelson performed at a private party at a Sonoma vineyard and sang a spoof of “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before” called “To All the Girls I’ve Groped Before.”
DUDE, YOU’RE GETTIN’ A CELL
Actor Benjamin Curtis, who played the goofy, smart-alecky “Steven” in Dell Computer’s “Dude, you’re gettin’ a Dell” commercials, was arrested in New York for possession of marijuana.
THAT’S WHAT YOU GET FOR THINKING INSIDE THE BOX
Charles D. McKinley pleaded guilty to federal charges of stowing away on a cargo jet because he had climbed into a wooden crate and had himself shipped from New York City to DFW Airport.
IT’S NOT HER FAULT. AFTER REDISTRICTING, NO ONE IN AUSTIN KNOWS WHO HIS CONGRESSMAN IS
Presidential adviser Karen Hughes, of Austin, after complaining that Democrat Lloyd Doggett doesn’t do an adequate job of representing her in the U.S. House, subsequently discovered that her congressman is, in fact, Republican Lamar Smith.
THEY BOTH HAVE THE SAME GOAL: COMEBACK
After the November 2002 elections, in which most of the candidates supported by the Tarrant County Democratic party lost their races, the group’s Web site became the domain name for a Swiss company advertising male organ-enhancement pills.
THE 20,000-VOLT LINE DOESN’T FALL FAR FROM THE TREE
San Antonio billionaire Charles Butt, the chairman and CEO of H-E-B, had a fifty-year-old apple tree trucked to his estate in Northeast Harbor, Maine, but the twenty-foot-tall tree was so big that every power line it passed under had to be lifted, forcing the truck to stop repeatedly and causing a ten-hour traffic jam.
GOOD GRIEF!
Brazosport High School, in Freeport, sent home senior Marcus Flannel because of his distracting appearance since he had shaved into his hair “RIP Amir,” a tribute to a fourteen-year-old friend who had died.
AFTER THOROUGHLY GRILLING THE CLUB’S OFFICERS
The University of Texas’s Office of Trademark Licensing forced the student Barbecue Club to remove from its Web site a spoof of the university seal that read “The University of Barbecue at Austin. Brisket, Sausage, Pork Ribs.”
SHE REMINDED HIM OF SIMON COWELL
American Idol singer Justin Guarini was ticketed by Grand Prairie police for unsafe boat operation at Joe Pool Lake after he almost hit a girl on the beach.
IF HE DOESN’T HAVE TO DO IT WITH HIS HEAD, IT’S JUST A SLAP ON THE WRIST
Manuel Vera, a former corrections officer for Harris County, was found guilty of misdemeanor official oppression for plunging a probationer’s head into a toilet and was sentenced to ten weekends of toilet-scrubbing at the boot camp where he had worked.
IF ONLY OLD SENATORS WOULD JUST FADE AWAY
Gonzalo Barrientos, a Democratic state senator from Austin, quoted Harriet Beecher Stowe as saying, “Age wrinkles the face; quitting wrinkles the soul”—a line that actually came from General Douglas MacArthur.
IS THERE SUCH A THING AS GOOD PEA SALAD?
More than 600 of the 1,700 inmates at the state’s Darrington Unit prison, in Rosharon, suffered from food poisoning after eating bad pea salad.
SOUTH PADRE OR BUST
After officials in Panama City Beach, Florida, warned the producers of the Girls Gone Wild video series that they would arrest anyone who removed her clothes, the film company moved the set of its pay-per-view special to South Padre Island.
HE JUST LOVES CREMAIN FRAICHE
A thief broke into a van outside an Austin restaurant and stole two boxes of human ashes.
QUEER EYE FOR THE MONEY-SHY
The Houston chapter of the Royal Sovereign and Imperial Court of the Single Star, an international gay group that raises funds for charities through drag-queen shows, donated its used outfits to the Fairy Godmother Project, a local organization that passes them on to high school girls who can’t afford to buy their own prom dresses.
“DOGGONE IT,” SAID THE COP TO HIMSELF. “I WANT TO COLLAR THAT PUG, BUT HE’S GETTING AWAY SCOTTIE FREE. LOOK AT HIM FLEA. GOOD COLLIE, MISS MOLLY, I HAVE TO SPRINGER SURPRISE. IF I CAN’T THINK OF SOMETHING, I’LL BE A BASSET CASE.” BUT THE BURGLAR WAS A REAL SHAR-PEI. “I’M NOT CAIRN WHAT YOU DO, COCKER,” HE YELLED. “YOU’LL NEVER RETRIEVER ME. I SPITZ AT YOU.” THE COP LOOKED TO THE SKYE FOR INSPIRATION. “THE LORD IS MY GERMAN SHEPHERD,” HE SAID. DINGO! AN IDEA CAME TO HIM OUT OF THIN AIREDALE. HE HAD WHIPPET THE PROBLEM. “I HAVE A POLICE DOG,” HE YELLED AT THE BURGLAR IN A HUSKY VOICE. “HALT OR I’LL SETTER LOOSE. SHE’S A HOLY TERRIER. SHE’LL HOUND YOU TO DEATH.” “OH, SHIH TZU,” THOUGHT THE BURGLAR. “I’M GOING TO NEED SOME WHELP TO GET OUT OF THIS.” BUT HE DIDN’T DANE TO REPLY. THE LOOT WAS GETTING TOO HEAVY TO KERRY, AND HE HAD STEPPED IN A POODLE OF WATER SPANIEL. WHAT A ROTTWEILER TURN OF EVENTS. HE STOPPED HIS DASH HOUND, THEN TOOK A PEKE DOWN THE STREET. HE SUSPECTED THAT THE COP’S STORY WAS A MASTIFF BUNCH OF BULL, BUT HE WOULDN’T MAKE A BARBET ON IT. “YOU GOT ME,” HE SAID. “I SALUKI YOU.” “LET ME GIVE YOU A POINTER,” SAID THE COP. “YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO A LEGAL BEAGLE.” THEN HE MOVED IN TO MAKE THE PINSCHER.
After a law enforcement officer threatened to release his police dog, a burglary suspect in Denton stopped running and surrendered, only to discover that the officer had no dog.
THIS WEEK’S FIELD TRIP: GUANTANAMO BAY
Two Russian students who were part of a foreign-exchange program focusing on the structure of civil society in the U.S. mistook the Arlington jail for a gym and cut across a restricted police parking lot, only to end up arrested for criminal trespassing and interrogated by national Homeland Security officers.
SHE’S GETTING MORE HITS THAN THE WEB SITE
A Houston woman named Carmen, aged twenty, solicited money for breast implants through her personal Web site, DonateBoobs.com.
THE IRON FIST IN THE VELVEETA GLOVE
Deer Park High School announced it would proceed with theft charges against sophomore Corey Campbell, for estimated court costs of $400, for taking from the cafeteria a 25-cent container of melted cheese.
DON’T BE CREWEL
Daniel G. Puckett, of Kentucky, was sentenced to six months in prison for his behavior at the 2002 International Quilt Festival, in Houston, where he threw bleach on a quilt featuring Elvis Presley.
THEY SHOULD HAVE TRIED HIM FOR ASSAULT AND PEPPER
Rodger Martin, an automotive shop teacher at Lufkin High School, was acquitted of assault charges after an eighteen-year-old student suffered blistering and swelling because Martin had smeared his face with habanero pepper sauce.
MAROONED IN CYBERSPACE
University of Texas officials discovered that a link on the UT Web site that was intended to help students buy tickets for Longhorn football games took them instead to the Web site for Texas A&M’s Twelfth Man Foundation.
BUT HE’LL RECOMMEND JOHN ASHCROFT FOR A POSITION AT BOB JONES UNIVERSITY
The U.S. Department of Justice investigated Texas Tech biology professor Michael Dini after a student complained about Dini’s policy of refusing to write a recommendation for any student who doesn’t believe in evolution.
TERRELL BOLTON SENDS HIS REGARDS
During a ceremony intended to invite the Dallas City Council to Fort Worth’s upcoming stock show, a horse from the Cowtown contingent bit Dallas mayor Laura Miller on the arm.
ICH BIN EIN EAVESDROPPER
A German couple eating breakfast in the same Los Angeles restaurant as Renée Zellweger started gossiping in their native tongue about the Texas-born actress, criticizing her clothes and speculating about her height and marital status, only to be answered curtly in German by Zellweger herself, who said, “No, I’m not [married]. I’m five foot three, and I always dress this way in the morning.”
PROOF THAT TEXAS POLITICS IS GOING TO THE DOGS
A critic of Rick Perry’s role in congressional redistricting, protesting outside the Governor’s Mansion, displayed a sign suggesting an animal attraction between Perry and Tom DeLay.
THEY TRACED THEM TO THE GOVERNOR’S MANSION
The Clay County courthouse had to shut down for two days in July because of a severe infestation of fleas.
HE WAS HOPING TO GET AWAY WITH $87 BILLION
A Burleson man was apprehended after he robbed the Compass Bank in Salado while wearing a mask of President George W. Bush.
WIDE-OPEN SPACES— BETWEEN HER EARS
Shortly before the invasion of Iraq, Natalie Maines, of the Dixie Chicks, told a London audience, “Just so you know, we’re ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas.”
AND WE’RE ASHAMED THAT TEXAS IS SO CLOSE TO LOUISIANA
After Natalie Maines said that the Dixie Chicks were ashamed that the president was from Texas, some two hundred residents of Bossier City, Louisiana, gathered for a “Chicks Bash” and watched a 33,000-pound tractor drive over and crush tapes and CD’s of the group’s music.
TWELVE ANGRY HE-MEN
A San Antonio jury acquitted Richard Brown, of Michigan, after he shot a man who, during a party, had taunted him about being a “pretty boy” like *NSYNC singer Lance Bass.
DOES ADVERTISING WORK? JUST DIDN’T
To protest San Antonio’s ban on billboards in a scenic corridor, David Arrington advertised his business with legal on-site signs that, in addition to the company’s name, featured a huge hairy belly, a big toe with fungus, and what appeared to be a naked man sitting on the toilet.
THY ROD AND THY DUCT TAPE, THEY COMFORT ME
While flying from Honolulu to Los Angeles, Brian Kane Eager, of Austin, became so disruptive, pacing the aisle and reading loudly from the Bible, that fellow passengers overpowered him, held him down, and bound him with duct tape.
OH, GO CONDUCT YOURSELF
A Caldwell County jury found a man guilty of disorderly conduct for flipping the bird at a passing motorist, but the conviction was overturned by an appeals court, which determined that the use of the obscene gesture, although “repugnant, distasteful, and crass,” did not constitute disorderly conduct.
BOY: “NYAH NYAH NYAH NYAH, NYAH NYAH NYAH NYAH!”
GIRL: “HEY, HEY, HEY!”
SCHOOL DISTRICT: “GOOD-BYE.”
The El Paso Independent School District removed a twelve-year-old student from class, claiming that he had sexually harassed a female classmate when he stuck out his tongue at her.
FOR SALE BY OWNER: CHARMING ESTATE FOR THE ACTIVE COUPLE. HIS-AND-HER KITCHENS, POOLS. 12 LIV AREAS, 2 GAME RMS, CINEMAPLEX W/ CONCESSION STAND. ATTACHED GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE, GARAGE
After building a 48,000-square-foot home in Denton County complete with a 78-foot-high dome, a theater with a lobby, a ballroom, a racquetball court, a bowling alley, a two-story library, two kitchens, two elevators, two pools, and a fifteen-car garage, Shirley and Alan Goldfield decided to sell their house because it was too big.
AND THAT’S WHY THEY CALL IT THE COCKPIT
A pilot and a co-pilot for Southwest Airlines were fired for inappropriate conduct because, according to a flight attendant whom they had summoned, they had allegedly removed most or all of their clothing while in the air.
THEN THEY EXPELLED HER FOR RECOVERING
According to news reports, Caney Creek High School, in Conroe, expelled fifteen-year-old Brandon Kivi for distributing a dangerous drug because, after his girlfriend had suffered an asthma attack, he had lent her his inhaler.
JESUS WOULD HAVE ALSO PREFERRED SHORTER END-ZONE DANCES
A Dallas automotive shop owner sued Deion Sanders over a repair claim and testified that the former Dallas Cowboys cornerback had told him that Jesus wanted him to pay only $1,500 of a $4,265.57 bill.
REFUND FORM
YOU MUST PROVIDE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION:
1. NAME
2. AGE
3. U.S. CITIZEN?
4. IF THE ANSWER TO NUMBER 3 IS NO, ARE YOU WILLING TO CLEAN OUR STORE SEVEN DAYS A WEEK WITH NO VACATION TIME OR BENEFITS?
A Mission teenager stabbed a man who was defending his mother during a purse-snatching at a McAllen mall and then, along with two friends, returned the knife to Wal-Mart for a full refund.
STARTING WITH YOURS
Dale Remy, the general manager of KZTV, in Corpus Christi, and KVTV, in Laredo, refused to air a miniseries about the early life of Adolf Hitler during prime time because he was afraid it might give some people bad ideas.
RACIST MORONS EAT FREE
To demonstrate their opposition to affirmative action, the Young Conservatives of Texas held bake sales at Southern Methodist University and Texas A&M at which cookies were offered for prices that varied according to race and gender, such as $1 for white males, 75 cents for white women, 50 cents for Hispanics, and 25 cents for blacks.
HERE’S TWO QUARTERS. NOW SHUT UP AND EAT YOUR COOKIES
Two black women sued Dallas-based Southwest Airlines for racial discrimination after they were among the last people to board an airplane and the flight attendant said over the intercom, “Eenie, meenie, minie, moe, pick a seat, we gotta go.” The women claimed that they were being ridiculed by the reference to a counting rhyme whose old-fashioned version once included the N-word.
HE GOT SCOOPED
Matt Boswell, of Little Elm, who owns a company that picks up pet poop, fabricated a story about a man stealing two bags of feces from his pickup truck so he could get free publicity from a story in the Dallas Morning News.
THE LOSING NUMBERS WERE 10-2-24
José Luis Betancourt, of Brownsville, won $12 million in the Texas lottery but was sentenced to prison and ordered to forfeit the jackpot because he had bought the winning ticket with drug money.
QUICK! SEND OUT FOR 40,000 PACKETS OF TARTAR SAUCE
A trucker from Oregon wrecked his trailer near Kerrville, causing the loss of 40,000 pounds of fish.
JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT IT WAS SAFE TO GET OUT OF THE WATER
Houston fisherman Saul Gonzalez hooked a three-and-a-half-foot-long bull shark and, wanting to pose for a picture with the live fish, pulled it into the boat, where it twisted around and bit him on the arm.
“SUSPECT REQUESTS OSSIFERS TO STOP PICKLING HIS FOLLOWUP TRUCK”
An Oklahoma man who was driving while intoxicated used his cell phone to dial 911 and ask that Oak Ridge police officers stop chasing him.
LOOK AT THE BRIGHT SIDE: IT SAVED THEM FROM THE PINE BARK BEETLE
Houston logger George Crow, hired by a private landowner to fell some one hundred acres of trees infested by the pine bark beetle, got lost in adjacent Brock Park and accidentally clear-cut one thousand of the city’s loblolly pines.
GOOD THING IT WASN’T THE WAGON
When President George W. Bush first attempted to ride his new Segway scooter at his family’s home in Kennebunkport, Maine, last June, he fell off.
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE NEXT GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA
Hollywood producers discovered that Dallas attorney Rob Campos had been dismissed from the Marine Corps’ Judge Advocate General training program for drunkenly groping a female officer’s breasts but had failed to reveal that information before they picked him to star in the NBC reality show For Love or Money.
HAVE THEY NO SENSE OF DOCENCY?
The Austin Public Library dismissed two elderly volunteers because they had tried to take home damaged materials that were destined to be thrown away.
HOW ABOUT “RUBIN CARTER”?
U.S. representative Sheila Jackson Lee, of Houston, complained that not enough of the names given to hurricanes sounded black.
BRAS AND PANTIES, 1/2 OFF
The Abercrombie and Fitch corporation and two former employees of its Midland store were sued by a twenty-year-old woman who accused the men of cutting a hole in the ceiling of a dressing room to take photos of female customers trying on clothes.
NO WONDER THE KIDS WERE FAILING MATH
The Houston Independent School District, which received extensive favorable publicity for its reported 1.5 percent dropout rate, learned that, according to outside auditors, fifteen secondary schools were understating dropout rates by 55 percent.
IT’S ABOUT TIME
In the upcoming film Cheer Up, starring Tommy Lee Jones, Rick Perry plays the Texas governor.
TOO LATE
After a reporter called to ask Rick Perry about his yoga class—which he had quit after only three lessons—he became irritated because he was still worried about what the folks back home in Haskell would think.
THE MONEYLENDERS OUT OF THE TEMPLE
To promote the virtues of fuel- e(infinity)cient cars, the Reverend Jim Ball and his wife, Kara, drove a Toyota Prius from Austin to Washington, D.C., in an environmental campaign titled “What Would Jesus Drive?”
THEN THEY CHARGED HIM WITH BREAKING AND ENTERING
Law officers arrested Kris Leija, of Abilene, on an outstanding warrant for failure to meet with his probation officer after a sheriff’s deputy recognized him when he appeared live on ABC’s Good Morning America to discuss his heroic rescue of four children from a burning apartment complex.
HE THOUGHT SHE WAS FROM OUTSIDE EDITION
During a visit to KTVT, a CBS affiliate in Dallas, Deborah Norville, of Inside Edition, became angry when she arrived late for a taping and found the door to the studio locked. The security guard did not open the door promptly enough to suit Norville, who created a ruckus that led to his getting fired.
THE COURT APPLIED THE DOCTRINE OF EX POSTERIOR
In its May issue, Texas Lawyer ran a story about a decision by the Court of Criminal Appeals that affirmed the legality of a Houston cop’s visual search between a drug suspect’s buttocks, which revealed crack cocaine. The magazine titled the story “Texas Court Upholds Butt Search for Crack.”
BEST SELLERS ARE EXPECTED TO BE THE PEANUTS NOIR AND THE CHAWDONNAY
Dallas-based 7-Eleven Inc. announced that it would develop and market its own brand of wine.
CHILI CARNE CON
Don Eastep, of Springfield, Illinois, illegally entered the original Terlingua chili cookoff by posing as his brother, who was properly registered but couldn’t attend, and then passed off as his own creation a batch of chili he made by gathering samples from other cooks in the competition and mixing them together in one pot.
SUSPICIONS CONFIRMED
Before they discovered his fraud, the veteran judges awarded Eastep first prize.
MORE TO BLAME? THERE’S MISTER LAY/WHO I’M GONNA TELL, “MAKE MY DAY”
NRun, a Houston hip-hop performer who, under his real name of David Tunsall, was a former employee of the toppled energy giant Enron, recorded a hip-hop CD called Corporate America in which he slams the company and its disgraced bigwigs, such as Jeffrey Skilling, in many of his lyrics: “America, NRun has a story to tell/How the judiciary system slowed down like a snail/Gave those corporate crooks time to plan their escape/So when I see you, Jeffrey, I won’t hesitate …”
HENRY NEEDS IT WORSE
After former U.S. Housing Secretary and former San Antonio mayor Henry Cisneros criticized two sculptures of fiberglass cows clad in Mexican-style clothing, the City of San Antonio moved the artwork from its original location near the airport to a warehouse because, a spokesman claimed, the sculptures needed refurbishing.
WHERE’S AL QAEDA WHEN YOU REALLY NEED THEM?
Midland’s David Foster, a cousin of General Tommy Franks’s, designed and marketed a comic pro-war T-shirt called Texas Yeehad.
WE HAVE ANSWERED THEIR DEMANDS WITH A SHOT OF RAID
Thousands of termites besieged the Alamo and ate part of the mission’s cedar and cypress window frames.
TAKES ONE TO KNOW ONE
After being pulled over for speeding, Margaret Kidd Duncan, a member of the Seabrook City Council, cursed at the police officer who stopped her, referred to the dispatcher as a “hillbilly,” and called the mayor and other members of the council “white trash.”
THE ON-THE-AIR POLLUTION GETS WORSE EVERY YEAR
The morning-show host at KLOL-101, a Houston radio station owned by San Antonio-based Clear Channel Communications, encouraged drivers who were calling in with complaints about cyclists to honk, throw bottles, hit them with open car doors, and cut in front of them and then slam on the brakes.
SALARY REQUIREMENT: TENS AND TWENTIES ONLY
Frederick McDowell was arrested for robbing a Fort Worth bank because the note he handed the teller had been written on the back of his résumé.
NO WAY, SAN JOSE
In the March-April issue of the Medallion, its official magazine, the Texas Historical Commission mislabeled photographs of four of San Antonio’s five Spanish missions, identifying only the Alamo and its interior correctly.
SHE COULDN’T BEAT THE RAP, BUT, OH, WHAT A RIDE!
In January Kathy Grubbs, of Hallsville, pleaded guilty to driving while intoxicated but had her felony-obscenity charges dropped after she agreed to give up the seventeen sex toys police had found in her car.
AND THIS IS WHY THE TRICKLE-DOWN THEORY DOESN’T WORK
The City of Austin announced, then canceled, plans to sell its tap water for $6 a case, which represented a net loss of $2.90.
BUT THINK OF ALL HE’LL SAVE ON VIAGRA
Two Wichita Falls doctors and their medical group paid a large out-of-court settlement to a 67-year-old man after they mistakenly amputated his penis.
THOSE WHO CAN’T, TEACH
A group of high school teachers in Calallen performed a skit at a pep rally in which they portrayed female students from the rival towns of Robstown and Alice as, respectively, a pregnant, barefoot homecoming queen and a gang member with hickeys on her neck.
HOW MUCH FOR “YANKEES SUCK”?
In September the State of Texas began selling, for a $30 annual fee, “Native Texan” license plates, which anyone can buy.
THE TERROR ALERT IS UP FROM ORANGE (ROUGHY) TO RED (SNAPPER)
For more than a year five Austin police officers who were supposed to be patrolling Decker Creek Power Plant as an anti-terrorism measure were in fact fishing on a nearby lake.
LA CUCARACHA
Becky Whetstone, the ex-wife of Democratic congressman Charlie Gonzalez, of San Antonio, started a Web site called congressmanswife.com to air her marital story of being “squashed like a bug.”
COMICS: $100.00
DAIRY QUEEN: $500.00
BONFIRE AX: $14.00
BEER: $1,000.00
TEXTBOOKS: $1.50
Nick Howard, of Dallas, started a Web site called SendNick2College.com to garner contributions for his educational expenses at Texas A&M.
MAYBE THE PROBLEM IS THAT HE BREEDS CONTEMPT
An out-of-work Fort Worth resident, Frank Familiari, launched getfrankajob.com.
