The State of Texas: March 17, 2014

Heartwarming Monday

As the Austin American-Statesman duly notes, it was quite possibly the most intimate show of all of SXSW. The band Jared & the Mills played for a fan who was stuck in the hospital, having been one of the victims of the vicious car attack that took place early Thursday morning. It’ll tingle the cochleas of you ear and warm the cockles of your heart:

Photo of the Day

This ain’t your daddy’s McNally road map. It’s actually more akin to your great-great-great grandaddy’s frontier map. Which is probably why it went for $149,000 at an auction on Saturday.

Tweet of the Day

Ted Cruz on his alter-ego T-Cru. No comment necessary:

Saw this, but noticed an error. So I wanted to make one thing clear: I don’t smoke cigarettes http://t.co/3nn2740kkP pic.twitter.com/tPFNqg9vu8

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) March 15, 2014

Daily Roundup

Tyler, the Creator (of Riots) — For you oldies, Tyler (the Creator) is the de facto head honcho of the rap collective Odd Future. They rap about very weird, very dark things. Regardless, Tyler was arrested at the Austin-Bergstrom airport for “allegedly inciting a riot during a show at the South By Southwest music festival,” according to several reports. During his packed-house show at the Scoot Inn the Friday night before, Tyler encouraged those behind the SXSW barricades to make their way closer to the stage. This, apparently, they took to heart, storming the area to get closer to the music. After being nabbed at the airport hours after his show, Tyler was charged and arrested for his class-A misdemeanor punishable up to $4,000, and which came with a $25,000 bail (reports vary), according to the Austin American-Statesman. The increasingly tight security tactics of SXSW and its volunteers didn’t agree with, ahem, Tyler’s enthusiasm, which resultd in a story that garnered national headlines: a musician arrested at the airport as if he were fleeing a serious offense against society and sound. Fear not, the rapper was in Dallas to cause more riotous music the very next day.

50/50 Chance — Good news! Texas is about to get out of it’s drought. The bad news? It might not. That’s the oh-so-accurate predictions from area meteorologists. Years ago, El Niño used to be kind of a problem for the U.S. Now a nuevo El Niño might actually be a good thing. “A developing El Niño weather pattern in the Pacific Ocean could give the border region some relief from its lingering and devastating drought, experts say,” according to the El Paso Times. To be fair, the article quotes an expert as saying that there’s a “glimmer of hope,” which is better than the Dallas Morning News‘s bummer headline: “No drought-buster in the forecast for North Texas.” Not only does DMN remind you kind folks that water levels are still in desert-worthy conditions, a state climatologist informs hopefully and thirty readers that “There’s probably not much hope from El Niño, not until next winter.” Sooooo … your end-of-drought predictions are as good as the weatherman’s.

Glock-Blocking — What’s putting a kink in a $20 billion-plus international trade agreement? Short answer: our love of guns. Laredo International Airport has become the place for aerial exporting between here and Mexico, but the customs agreements between the two country is having difficulty because “American agents carrying weapons is stalling progress.” The subject “has long been a sensitive one between the two countries,” according to Texas Tribune‘s wonderfully reported (i.e. complicated) piece. For Mexico, “the question is one of sovereignty.” For American officials, it’s one of know, Mexico being a near-lawless drug-den where horrid violence seems to be a national pasttime. How important is the gun debate in this instance? “That’s the only issue that’s pending,” in an agreement that, even without the firearms problem is a huge story for three countries: Mexico, U.S., and Texas.

Girl Power — You do not mess with the Girl Scouts. And not just because, when selling cookies, they will plunge into your soul a guilt so deep you’ll feel it in the afterlife. It’s because they will bust your criminal butt. Via Jezebel, which got their story from Houston’s KPRC: “A Girl Scout troop and its mothers stopped shoplifters from getting away with several thousand of dollars in stolen goods.” The girls, having taken their See Something, Say Something badge, noticed “a suspicious man” with a cart that had “had loose items and nothing was placed in HEB plastic or paper bags. So the group kept the man in its sights.” Turns out they were right, and the guy was trying to get away with about $2,000 worth of “goods, including wine, appliances and groceries.” Obviously, the girls were compensated when employees bought about $100 worth of Girl Scout Cookies. Which brings us to the real crime mystery: Did they orchestrate this whole scheme just to sell more thin mints?