debmartin

anything by wally lamb seems to be a great read- i just finished his latest "i know this much is true" and really enjoyed it. my nephew gave me hendrik hertzberg's "politics, observations and aruguments 1966-2004" - so far i've only read the intro but it looks promising. right now i'm reading "the heart aroused" by poet david whyte (poetry and the preservation of the soul in corporate america) and it puts into words things i've been trying to figure out, like how to stay in the rat race and maintain sanity. i recommend this book to everyone trying to find balance between their art and their practical obligations to society. debmartin

i wonder if americans could get along better if a movement could be started to call ourselves "americans". anyone wishing to signify their ethnicity could of course be americans of __________ descent. calling someone african-american, mexican-american or asian-american etc. seems to be more of a limitation than an expression of freedom, because it sets us all apart from the onset. i celebrate my irish/italian catholic heritage on certain days but also enjoy participating in a variety of occasions that celebrate other nationalities. especially during war time i feel being pro-american helps to bridge the gap and promote unity. debmartin

i would love to see houston associated with galveston, but i'm not sure how the boi's would take it. (born on island) i have noticed when i'm there that the term ibc (island by choice) is catching on as more non-natives move in. btw the houston/galveston thing has already caught on with one major player, the catholic church. i have never understood why we are supposed to be a tourist town, but houston is exciting as those who travel here are pleasantly surprised to discover. we could do with some stepped-up pr and a new campaign for attracting conventions, especially with all the state of the art sports arenas to advertise. we did get the superbowl even if we never get the olympics - what would we do with the traffic anyway? debmartin

it's called sneed elementary and it's alief. located in the 9800 block of pagewood just off gessner, between richmond and westpark. like i said, you can walk around the corner to emerson elementary on tanglewilde off richmond. i have a friend who used to teach there and we carpooled to emerson - when i was early i would just walk on over. if you can't place it in your mind look it up on har.com's school finder, under sneed ele. it's a nice school and mostly attended by kids from the nearby apts. debmartin

personally i feel if i were a direct descendent of slavery and someone offered me money i would be insulted. i would feel as if their guilt was a motivating factor alone and my forgiveness would not be for sale. slavery is only one chapter in a collection of shame - a cruel and primitive practice that was discarded as society became enlightened. to me it is all about forgiveness, and it is up to each individual to come to terms with that element in themselves and then with others. today i watched "the pianist" which is based upon a true story about the holocaust. i was moved at the end when the german officer who helped the musician survive told him they would survive because "god" wanted them to. i felt sure the german would be saved for his good deed but in the end he was not. not fair but nonetheless realistic - i felt it was a testament to the endurance of the human spirit. america is a relatively young country, and built upon the blood of native americans who were doing quite nicely before any pilgrims arrived. justification for indians killing whites? not in my opinion because equal wrongs cannot inspire equal rights. america as the "melting pot" until too many immigrants arrived, justification for hanging "no irish" signs in the window? not if you were irish. my maternal grandfather was born in kilkenny ireland and my paternal grandfather in sicily. i do not feel responsible for any of the crimes perpetrated by the mafia but on some level i feel shamed by the ignorance that allowed it to perpetuate. perhaps that is why i was raised with such capacity to connect with human suffering. i watched roots in the 70's and i cried. i was so horrified, just as i was reading the diary of anne frank. i read the scarlett letter with anger and my point is that if we could all just drop the defenses we could all probably just agree that right is right and wrong is wrong. in college i attended a workshop where women argued about whether white women or black women had suffered more. i asked if we could just agree that all women have suffered and have triumphed at some point in history. i suggested that once we could move through the past into the present we could open some dialog into the future. i hope the same can be done here on this thread. debmartin

the alief school boundaries are crazy - there is an alief elementary school off of gessner, between richmond and westpark. it's within walking distance to hisd's emerson elementary which is off of richmond and tanglewilde. debmartin

i enjoyed the 24/hr houston news - it was great to be able to tune in anytime and get caught up. another thing i liked was that the reporters seemed to develop stories and not just run with the scanner. the local news teams tend to chase each other around and you can sometimes flip channels and see the same stories on 2 or 3 channels, sometimes in the same order. deb martin

i just read that san francisco will vote on whether to ban handguns like chicago and d.c. that kind of thing would never fly down here in the south, but i would like to see them banned off of public transportation. i know that criminals carry weapons and even if they use metro to get back and forth to their crimes it would seem that knowing citizens are armed would increase tensions and make it more likely for something to escalate. metro should have metal detectors like they do down at the courthouse, but of course that would require personnel and all of the metro cops that sit around parked at the wheeler station would actually have to work. debmartin

Jan. 28, 2005, 12:07AM Metro board OKs concealed guns on buses, trains Riders with permits will be allowed to carry concealed handguns on board By ROMA KHANNA Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle CONCEALED HANDGUN TIMELINE

hisd is broken up by area districts i.e. southwest, west etc. the west district fares a little better on the decent scale and another thing most parents do not take into consideration, the area ofice which is on tanglewilde just off westheimer is very responsive to all issues. pilgrim and piney point are both disasters, although both my kids went to briargrove in the early 90's and it was fine. the best kept secrets in the west district are the school at post oak, which is moving out of the post oak ymca and the briarmeadow charter school. my younger son attended both of these schools and they are both quite parent driven. in some cases this could be construed as a minus but in this case both schools were facilitated by parents who were creative and innovative. the charter school loses points for location (they built on to and rennovated the old hisd tech center on dunlavy off richmond/before westpark) but makes up for it with full length paintable art walls and casio keyboard labs, as well as a tv/weather station. its kind of like children's museum meets school, but it does fill up and keep a wait list. school at post oak will be located behind the galleria where hisd has been keeping some prime real estate and were supposed to build a middle school for the past 10 years. it is only k-5th but maybe that will change. the school has a real international flair and the principal drue mcclure knows every child by name. forget middle and high school in hisd, period, unless you happen to build a mcmansion next door to bellaire high school which is the only way your child will get in the front door there. even if your child has chosen a magnet field of study or gets accepted into the health careers program they should hire a bodyguard or wear a bullet proof vest. some of my friends tell me grady is getting ghetto, and revere is still like a 70's prison movie. westbriar middle and westside high were built for the wealthy kids across the beltway but since these neighborhoods are going down so are the schools. westside does have a water polo team and compared to lee, well there is no comparison. lee is scheduled to become a charter for illegal immigrant students up to age 21. my son plays hockey with a few emo kids who go to lamar and play chess and do oddysy of the mind, mensa type stuff. for personal reasons i took my son out of public school and he attends a local private academy. hisd has an open door policy which means kids can go anywhere in the district, as long as there is an opening and they get their own transportation. they also have virtual school which my older son signed up for which is kinda cool for kids on the go and they log on and do the work online. kids from all over the us are on virtual school as well as a few from other countries. its not cheap but less than some private schools. deb martin

bill gibbons (zz top) used to frequent my dad's comic book store in the 70's. this was before concert tickets were sold through computers and he always came through with a handful for us. the drummer frank beard (the only one without a beard) was in a recovery program and used to give motivational speeches for pdap (palmer drug abuse program). deb martin

something weird is going on around that portion of the richmond strip. the "classic" dennys closed (used to be jo-jo's) and it was crowded around the clock. i moved to the galleria area in '95 and got used to seeing the club signs change names frequently, but that's just business as usual in houston. but chuy's, kingfish and denny's all seemed to be doing ok so it's a mystery. debmartin

parents of course know when their child has a weight problem and children, like adults do not have to be told they're fat. they live it, they hear it from other children. when you're an overweight adult, your peers, co-workers and even your children will usually refrain from calling it to your attention - children on the other hand can be cruel and get away with it. when i was a kid i used to beat kids up for teasing my younger brother for being the "fat kid". he grew up tall and slimmed down but i'm sure it was a rotten part of his childhood. these idiot lawmakers should watch their own weight, quit picking on our children and earn their pay. i'm with pineda on his idea that these fatheads in austin should get a report card of their own, one that includes their bmi - sign me up too! deb martin

in order to preserve greenspace they should go with a skate plaza vs. traditional skatepark. other cities go this way for a nice recreation/park area, complete with fountains and benches. it works well for mixed use in urban areas but i'm not sure how pedestrian friendly the location is. before this site crashed my son posted a drawing of one he visited in utah and it was well received. i'll check and if he still has a copy i'll put it back up. debmartin i found it \/

several doctors i know are spending two weeks over in asia as part of the relief and rebuilding effort - none of them get close to 22 million a year and they are all worth millions more than roger clemens. he should be grateful that at his age he's being offered as much as he is. instead greedy old guys like him try and milk it for all its worth and then feel betrayed when they're put out to pasture. clemens forgets rules #1&2, that there's always a new kid on the block and time is not on his side. he and his family are quite comfortable but no matter how much money he gets he'll always be a chump. he didn't bother showing up at the fan appreciation event at the end of last season, despite the fact that many fans took off from work UNPAID to pay him tribute. it's a shame he's not a better man to teach his sons how to be happy with what you have instead of being a jerk who never gets enough. time for the fans to say adios, roger clemens. deb martin

is it just me or does W. say "world" too much. sometimes when he talks i forget he only leads our country, the united states of america because he tends to focus everything outward, away from domestic issues. i wish he could accept the fact that we are not the keepers of the world, and should probably get our act together better at home before we take it out on the road. debmartin

"Was it an automated response, or did he actually type you an email and send it personally?" (quote, tw2ntyse7en) actually typed me an email and sent it personally. i respond to the chron reporters all the time, if they dare print their email addresses - i am never purposely rude but try to keep them honest. the only one who sent me a rude reply was the traffic guy when i asked him to answer my burning question about the traffic cameras. when i questioned whether or not hpd, metro and other law enforcement vehicles would receive camera generated citations he wrote me back and told me that was not an important question and detracted from the real benefit of the cameras. i recently started printing out these emails in case i decide to turn them into my next book. debmartin

i read the chron article by james gibbons about blogs. i decided to give him the benefit of the doubt about blogs in general since i've run across more than a few that leave something to be desired. i also sent him a link to our new blog and directed him to check it out before passing final judgment. believe it or not i rec'd an email from him right away thanking me - just thanking me. he never said if he checked it out or if he saw anything he liked. debmartin

"Secondly, we rank 176th* in the nation when it comes to pay. San Antonio ranks number 3 with Austin & Dallas ranking 87th & 88th respectively. We're not asking for the world or even the top 10 in pay scale rankings, but we should be at least be considered for something." (quote, tw2tyse7en) i find these statistics disgusting but not shocking. houston has a history for this kind of thing and that is why we lose so many talented and irreplacable people. it's time for the voters to wake up and evaluate why vital public service professionals are devalued when compared to the private sector. maybe it's time to take another look at mayor white. about your pension, just because the firefighters have managed not to squander their pension money does not entitle anyone else to. ps. its statistics like this that drove me away from teaching. debmartin

has anybody heard news about walmart going in at northwest mall? someone recently told me they'd heard walmart would go in where jc pennys used to be but so far from what i can tell it's just gossip. debmartin

hisd has been talking about a school at that location for almost 10 years so it's great they finally made a plan. the neighborhood known as "st. george" is the old lamar terrace addition - i used to live there from '95 - '98 on lampasas street. my younger son was starting school and pilgrim elementary was a nightmare. briargrove was full so i found the school at post oak which was at the time known as the briargrove charter school. the school was located inside the post oak y and it was very unique because they ymca interacted with the school by providing phys ed, and there was only 10-12 students per class. they also had multi-grade classes which worked out for kids a little ahead or behind. the briarmeadow charter school built their own school where the old hisd tech center was located, on dunvale between richmond and westpark and expanded the school from k-8th grade. the school at post oak was then established in the post oak ymca and drue mcclure was a very kind and creative principal. it's good to see the school expanding but it's a little sad to see it leave the y. what's even sadder is the prospect of hisd middle schools for the west district. if you're not fortunate enough to come from a small private niche that belongs to grady your kid will be tossed to the wolves at revere, which is far away past the beltway on briarforest. i chose the virtual school for my son's middle school until i found he could jump on metro and go to lanier/lamar. this was never revealed by hisd, only by TEA when i went to austin with photo's of grady and revere and asked why one school had 600 students and the other 1400. debmartin

"Remember back in the 1970's and early 80's when the world was filled with soda/beer can tabs? People would pull them off and throw them anywhere. I remember as a kid my friends would collect them at the beach and string them into long necklaces" (quote, editor) remember the tv commercial in the 70's with the indian in a canoe surrounded by trash? it ended with a close-up of a tear running down his face, and even though i was just a kid it really touched me and sparked my awareness about just how much litter was around in public. the bottom line is that individuals who litter do not respect their environment and were not taught to do so. in my opinion, it has nothing whatsoever to do with economic status - yes you can always point to poorer areas being trashy but always find people in fancy gated communities who litter. i've also seen firsthand the front porches of poor people that are swept and yards cleaned. my grandmother told me at an early age that cleanliness was next to godliness and even though it sounded corny and i got tired of hearing it as i grew up it started making sense. my parents did not allow us to litter, period. it was the way they were raised and it made such an impression they passed it down. it is also the way i raise my own children and i have no doubt they will carry on the tradition. it makes no difference that i was raised quite poor and my children are financially secure, it's all about upbringing. society would do well to reintroduce the concept of citizenship - many do not even know what it really means and think it concerns a person's immigration status. ethics and civics have been stripped away from public education and placed in the hands of parents, unfortunately many decline to rise to the challenge. deb martin

"my love for houston that began with my parents was only exceeded after i bought my first car and could DRIVE to houston whenever i wanted! (pineda and debmartin cringe" (quote, bachanon) dear bach, fyi i started driving my moms car when i was fourteen, in the late 70's. got a legal license myself at 16 and ventured out first to conroe, galveston and then all over texas. i especially loved driving to austin and san antonio, and confess to have very little affection for dallas driving except for friends in plano. one of my favorite drives was out to lake houston with a bunch of my stoner friends from aldine high school on saturday nights, although i wouldn't recommend it to my kids now as local law enforcement seems to have tossed out their general tolerance for pranks and larks. in 1999 i quit driving, determined to embrace public transportation in order to do my part. fortunately my profession has no schedule whatsoever and here in beautiful uptown houston the bus routes are overall acceptable. i am impressed by the transit centers, where i can get downtown in 17 minutes - being a native houstonian i also confess to being impressed with the metrorail and utilize it several times a week to the medical center. i'm currently ticked off that the trolleys downtown now cost 50 cents, mainly because i seem to have a difficult time remembering change. my older son now drives and thinks i'm crazy, but i can always get him to drive me anywere if the bus is not a good option. i also pay for cabs often, especially to the grocery store or anywhere i go dressed up when i prefer not to chance a drunk falling into my lap. i find it still more ecomonical than paying for gas, parking, car repairs etc. i am not and have never been against anyone owning or driving a car, i'm just still enough of a dreamer to hope one day a few more might be off the roads. i've traveled to countries where i have been amazed at how many people work their day around subways, trains, buses and other shared ride arrangements but i understand why it would never work here in texas. i have family up there in the woodlands, and think it would be nice to travel there freely. also between houston and other small "towns" like sugerland or galveston but i guess that's the idea, keeping the attractions accessible mainly to the smaller populations they are created for and tourist types who drive in. i also think easier access to travel between the 'burbs and houston would benefit those coming into houston to enjoy the sights and sounds. i'm thinking of anyone with transportation issues, teens too young to drive but old enough to travel for the day, and older folks like my aunt who lives outside of houston in a posh assisted living center. she has only a limited access to houston by shuttle and cannot travel spontaneously. i enjoyed your post, thanks for thinking of me, being quoted made me feel important. debmartin ps. props to your parents for doing their part to impress you with houston. my parents also had a habit of dragging us all over town to see the famous spots, homes and local folklore. they met at a carhop place called the buccaneer, which was long ago replaced by the building at 2016 main.

i seem to remember something about mayor brown causing an accident on westheimer at potomac, near augusta. i cannot recall if he was driving or if he had a driver at that time. could have been he was just in an accident and the other driver was at fault. anyone remember?

last year for the holidays my two sons and i traveled to niagra falls, canada and thought riding amtrak would be interesting. there was a special rail pass for $500 each, good for 30 days travel between the two countries - the price more than tripled after i reserved a sleeping car but it was a necessity. my sister was dropping us off and we thought we would miss the train because we could not find the station - after she drove off we were informed that due to a derailment in columbus texas the train was delayed at least 8 hours. we checked our bags and played around downtown until they called my cellphone and told me we could be re-routed through new orleans instead of jacksonville and leave around 5pm. the sleeping cars were awesome, but inspired cabin fever at times, but it worked out as my kids are teenagers and tended to stay up all night in the club car watching movies and playing on the computer. we also took plenty of music and dvd's and my older son spent most of the trip shooting video's and taking photos. the ride was rough and the train pulled over too many times to count while freight trains crawled past. the biggest surprise was the dining car - when you buy a sleeping car all meals are included and my younger son ordered the most expensive steak for quite a few meals. it was a little weird eating while the dishes shook and the food bounced around - also they "seat" incomplete parties together so my family of 3 usually got paired with the one couple on board trying to have a romantic getaway that i'm sure did not include teenage boys. i nearly ran out of cash, as i forgot about needing to tip the sleeping car attendant and waiters, bartender, snack bar worker and red-caps who help with the luggage. crossing the canadian border took hours, as the polite officers quizzed each person on board about their intentions - one couple were taken off the train for bringing pornographic material as it seems they were headed for a "sex" show in toronto to promote her video. we didn't need passports so all we had to show were our id's and birth certificates. coming home we were diverted through chicago after someone jumped in front of the train at a station in some small town. we were stopped for over 12 hours and even the FBI came on board to make sure it was a suicide and nothing more. one thing became apparent, amtrak never takes their schedule seriously and they are constantly re-routing passengers - the chicago route came through san antonio and it put us over our 30 day travel limit and i had to pay $175 to get us home. when i found out that from san antonio it would take over 8 hours i yelled until i got a sleeper car. i figured with the average delays the 8 hours could easily turn into 12 and it was their fault my travel was over the limited days. i must say if you persist you can easily negotiate with the right person at amtrak. overall it was a great experience if you have no time constraints but for business travel amtrak would not be feasible. our station is an embarrasment but the station in new orleans was grand. chicago's was seedy but ample with a great v.i.p. room and of course in new york we landed in penn station to catch the long island railroad for a sidetrip. up north amtrak enjoys a co-existence with other commuter trains, like the one we found in baltimore for another side trip. another very annoying thing is that the schedules always run behind and you end up in cities with screwed up layovers. sometimes we had a few hours that turned overnight like the night we stayed in penn station due to bad weather. a hotel would have been too expensive for a few hours but all night fighting off the bums was draining. at 6am the nypd showed up and arrested anyone without a valid ticket, which frightened my younger son because i had his ticket and he was getting donuts. based on that experience we grabbed a taxi to a nearby hotel a few times, and once amtrak called us and woke us up in the middle of the night to be "re-routed", although they paid for the taxi. too bad the trains have died out down here, but i understand why people usually fly or drive. my kids and i were looking at photos from last christmas and re-living our adventure, and this year we've opted for the beach house in galveston. it's quiet here and i've promised to close my laptop hours ago, and i hope all of you enjoy happy holidays. debmartin