andrea's spare time

it just might happen! a federal commission is proposing to raise the federal fuel taxes more than 50%... for gasoline from 18-cents to 28-cents... and for diesel from 22-cents to around 34-37 cents per gallon. it's also proposing a 40-cent increase phased in over 5 years.

the commission is the one in charge of funding federal highways, bridges and transit systems. It says now that people are buying less fuel, the current tax rate isn't generating enough money.

so... using less fuel... good for the ecology... bad for the economy??? would you go along with the tax hike? if now where do you think the government should get the money?

ok weather gurus.... i've lived in houston nearly 19 years and i never remember so many frequent wild temperature fluctuations!  how many big cold fronts have we had this season? (and by big i don't mean long lasting, just ones that drop the temps at least 20 degrees.)  it seems this has been going on since october.

no kidding, i have a hard time deciding what to wear in the morning! it seems i'm always a day late too. i dress for normal weather and i wake up to blustery cold winds. i dress for cold weather and find the cold front du jour split when i was sleeping and i look totally overdressed. 

so tomorrow, i've already been told i'll probably be out in the bitter cold. i got it for tomorrow.  but are the weather stats showing that this is unusual, or am i just too sensitive about it because i'm normally standing outside a 4am every day?

last week i was at my parents house in the hill country helping them out with some health matters. i needed to come home friday because my husband was heading to austin for a job, and i needed to be there for the kids.

so... i'm driving home when i get a call from my husband.  he's angry and frustrated because he was on a phone call and missed the exit from i-10 wanted to take.  he missed it by so much he was just going to exit 1-10 at luling to head north.

i need to pass through luling too on my way home. severo tells me he's 14 miles from luling and within ten seconds i see a sign that' i'm 14 miles from luling to!! i hadn't been home all week so we stopped to say hi, (hug... etc. you know) at the luling civic center parking lot. crazy huh? i told him i felt bad that i didn't have anything to give to him and he said "actually you do."  he wanted the ipod car converter i had had all week.

so maybe that doesn't seem like a biggie, but it sure was good fun at the time! especially when we were both 14 miles from luling.  i think it was just meant to be... like there's no such thing as a coincidence.

so what about you? got any of those "coincidences" to share? do you believe it's synchronicity?

it's hard to believe. 4 fridays in a row someone's set a fire out near 6000 bissonett. the first two fires turned major at the briar forest apts. then the past two weeks he through fire into occupied units in the azalea place apartments at 5900 bissonett. forturnately quick thinking... and perhaps on alert residents put the fire out before it erupted into a large fire. the fires all happen around 4am-5am. you gotta know residents of these apartments are having trouble sleeping.

investigators tell me they're working on it as hard as they can. i can feel their frustration and concern for life and property. i  really hope that anyone who knows something about this will call crimestoppers with an anonymous tip (713222tips). 

the firebug has been regular and predictable, maybe that's helped. but what happens when he decides to break his pattern? i'm going to hope that i'm out there at those complexes next week talking about an arrest in this case.... not another fire.

i love this... and hate this at the same time.

precinct 570: election judge alvin pinon says the alternate election judge refused to show up. that took away his witness who is required to be present to start up the computer and the voting machines. (he is a democrat, the no-show was a republican.) people are standing outside his precinct wanting to vote.... and he gets the go ahead from the county judges office to swear in two voters from the line who are willing to volunteer.   THEY became the official witnesses... and the precinct got up and running by 7:20am.   that's the part i love. people pitching in and getting it done.

the part i hate.. (well... i don't hate it but it's unusual and it bugs me) how can a person who's sworn in to be an election judge go awol on THE big voting day?  actually refuse to show up?  i'm sure that person has a reason... and we don't know what that is.... but it seems whatever the problem... you fulfill your duty and work through the issues. ... that's a new one on me... and election judge pinon told me he's volunteered three elections and this is the first he's ever heard of this problem.

you're thoughts??

did you vote? i did.

do you know anyone who's not going to vote?  i don't.

harris county estimates that turnout of registered voters will be about 70-75%... but that means 1 out of 4 people aren't going to vote. 

how about giving us your best guestimate of what voter turnout will actually be and we'll see which blogger comes the closest... WHAT DO YOU THINK?

ok happy commuters! how's life on the new katy freeway? it's 2 days now that that hov lanes have been open. are you using them? do you like the added on and off ramps? if you're not using them do you feel they've help move the traffic on the main lanes faster?

i know i think the afternoon rush hour is loads better going outbound... but my husband still sees some really slow traffic at hwy 6.

what are your thoughts?

timothy sheperd is already convicted of murdering former texas a&m student tynesha stewart.  now the jury is deliberating on his sentence, and i can't imagine them deciding to go easy on this man.

i was in the courtroom yesterday when shepard got on the witness stand and gave the details of killing, dismembering, and disposing of stewart's body. he said things, admitted to things so horrible i can't even believe they could come out of anyone's mouth.

under oath he said he strangled her after they fought about her having another male friend. that was somewhere around 2 in the afternoon. he decided to cover his tracks, so within a half hour he headed to ace hardware to get an electric jigsaw.  he says he took her clothes off and put her in the bathtub where he began cutting with the saw.  even though he said he burned some of her remains on his outdoor grills, he repeated on the stand "i didn't grill tynesha, i didn't grill tynesha." i think it was the implication of food he was objecting too, but clearly he said he thought that burning her remains would eliminate evidence. he testified that he put most of her body parts in a plastic tub and put that in his apartment's dumpster. he even said he accepted a dinner invitation that night, so he "wouldn't look suspicious."  and when stewart's missing teeth was brought up by the prosecutor, he said he knew that dental records were frequently used to identify victims. therefore, he testified to the jury and everyone else listening, that he used some pliers he had and pulled her teeth out one by one.

i still can't figure out why shepard's attorney put him on the stand. did he think shepard would show remorse? i didn't see it. the only change in his presentation through this whole thing was a slightly softer voice.

imagine how the jury feels. they sat through 5 days of testimony and a defense attorney imploring them to find his client not guilty because he said the prosecutors didn't prove their case.  i wonder if the jury feels their time was wasted? why didn't this man just plead guilty?

so the maximum sentence for him is life in prison and a $10K fine. minimum sentence 5 years probation. we're waiting to see what the jury decides.

ok.. happy first day of school everyone! lots of new stuff going on at hisd, but there one thing that sticks in my mind more than the others.

the student code of conduct now prohibits students from giving gifts to teachers in exchange for a better grade.

huh? you mean it was acceptable to do that in years past? there are going to be kids that wished they'd known that!

yes, says hisd spokesperson terry abbott. there was nothing in the code of conduct before about that, therefore a student couldn't face disciplinary action for it.  well what about the teacher? if the gift indeed results in a better grade, isn't that a violation of teacher ethics. "yes" says abbott, and that would be dealt with, but there was nothing to punish a student for trying to do so.

good grief. for starters, it's the wrong thing to do. so why can't we just know that the teachers would nip it in the bud and refuse the gift, especially a gift with strings attached.  secondly, i guess it bugs me that the district thought they couldn't discipline the kid (an example of this happened last year, according to abbott) because it wasn't prohibited in writing. what about cheating? that's in writing.  isn't cheating finding a way to improve what do you guys think?

lots of people are talking about the two tragic deaths of kids locked in hot cars. (one in northwest harris county yesterday, and one in webster on wednesday.) please please talk about what has happened.  the more people talk about it the more people will be aware enough to not let it happen to them.

how could someone forget?? i don't know the circumstanced behind these two incidents, but i have read a few of the heartbreaking stories online.  in one case a dad of a 6 month old forgot to take his child to daycare because he was forced to take a big construction detour and then got a distracting cell phone call. in another, a grandfather forgot about the child because he was preoccupied by his new diagnosis of leukemia.

in 1990, about 5 children died in hot cars. that number has steadily climbed, and in 2005 more than 40 kids died in hot cars! we say our lives have gotten crazy busy? well i guess so. this seems to be evidence.

i know we all think this couldn't happen to us, BUT just to make sure, here are a few things you can do or put in your routine that will be added safety.

i'm thinking of the david bowie song as i write this. i'm actually surprised no one has blogged about the chinese decision to put the "best voice" with the "cutest face" during the opening ceremonies.

if you hadn't heard, the 9 year old that came out before the cameras to sing that beautiful anthem was lip-syncing. the voice was from a 7 year old whom the chinese said was not cute enough... because she had crooked teeth.

give me a break. that girl was plenty adorable! that decision takes my opinion of the opening ceremonies down a notch or two. it's been pointed out for me that that's par for the course in china. they'll do anything to make themselves look good.. and hide the many, shall we say... not so good things that go on inside their borders.

what do you guys think?  do you think anyone in the u.s. would do what the chinese did?

i know the construction is still not complete in a few areas.. but there's a major stretch of i-10 inbound between hwy 6 and the loop that have 5 or 6 lanes open. i drive that stretch every morning at 3:15am. not much traffic then... but if you drive that part during rush hour, is it any better??

i also want to know how the new i-10 tollway is supposed to work. we still will have a FREE hov lane to use when we have passengers right? (the answer better be yes, or i'll be steamed.) i've tried to figure out how the tollway/hov lanes work, but whizzing by at 65 mph it's been pretty difficult to do.

ok.. have you guys heard this speculation? that maybe john mccain might pledge not to run for a second term in office?  it's interesting. do you think you would be more likely to vote for him if he promised just one term? and who do you think his v.p. nominee might be with that in mind??

or i'll just plain ask... do you think that's a good idea?

broken records can be looked at as good or bad... good... for example in the olympics, bad if it's something that repeats until its welcome wears out.

now we've learned that exxon mobil broke the its previous record of record profits... with second quarter earnings coming in at $11.68 billion dollars. its previous record was the the 4th quarter of 2007... earning $11.66 billion.

i can imagine that exxon mobil stockholders won't get tired of this kind of broken record... but what about you? do you feel it's greed like many do? or do you appreciate that that's what capitalism is... and maybe even see that exxon mobil's success helps houston and texas as a whole?

you know one of the crazy things about this record profit announcement. it triggered a drop in exxon mobile's stock price by almost 5%! a drop! analysts thought the company would make even more! i don't even know what to think about that.

what do you think?