Heights2Bastrop

From BENEATH Earth to the Moon – Houston Does it All!

This is a takeoff of a previous suggestion about earth and space exploration.

Some cities promise. Some brag. Some hope.

Houston DOES!

“From oil exploration to exploring space– Houston does it all”

“Houston - The Future is Here. The Future is Now.”

What I wanted to say was:

“The Future is Here. The Future is Now. The Future is Houston!”

But that’s too many words.

Houston – A Power Hitter Without the Glitter.

"Houston – At Least We’re Not Cleveland!"

OK, hold on. Maybe I can come up with a better one.

Are these slogans supposed to be HAIF related? You know, like:

“Houston – we got Red Scare. Whadda you got?”

Or are these for Houston in general?

OK, another silly question. When I would see that bar running across a thread, I would hit the minus sign to try to make it disappear. Does this somehow mean I have been dissing certain people?

Moni, I have been talking with people from all around the country, and Hatch peppers seem to be readily available just about everywhere. So, I figured that the Greater Hatch Growing Area must have a 200-mile radius.

I buy into the Hatch phenomenon and extol their wonder even knowing, or believing that. But, the thing is, and at the least, Hatch (or whatever passes for Hatch) peppers are just as good if not better than Anaheim peppers. And for the cost of “Hatch” peppers, it’s still a great deal no matter what.

Actually, at $1.29/pound, Hatch peppers are a bit higher than they were last year due, I’m sure, to their popularity. That’s still a good deal. And you can find then occasionally for 99¢ at some places.

OK, so now I understand that part. Now that leads me to another question – why the heck should the employee get involved in Monkey Business? And it seems like there would be a liability issue at stake. Does an employer have the right to test an employee without his knowledge, and just because of his wife’s suggestion?

For that matter, other than law enforcement or other government agencies, who has the right to test another without consent? Or at least without notice?

My guess is that Mayor Naggin' would tell his citizens they were on their own, and then take himself and the ark up the Mississippi to a safer location.

I’m confused (so what else is new?). Just what should the SO be (SOB?) tested for. Would some woman want her husband tested to make sure her baby is his? I don’t get it?

I have a recipe for a creamy poblano sauce, and I will just substitute Hatch for poblanos. It would be great over a grilled chicken breast, chicken enchiladas, chili relleños, etc., and it’s a great pepper to use in making chili relleños.

I do a dish I call “Lazaña Verde” where I layer corn tortillas with cheese, chicken, green chilies and tomatilla sauce., pretty much like an enchilada casserole.

Does anyone go to CM’s Hatch Chili Festival, or anyone else’s? This is the first year we have done so. Hatch peppers only come out once a year for about two weeks at the end of August. We normally buy about 15 or so pounds of them and roast them on the grill.

This year we bought a whole case, and CM roasted them on the spot in a large drum with a propane burner.

I love Hatch peppers, and Michelle makes a great Green Chili Stew with them. It is chock full of melt-your-mouth goodness!

Any other Hatch lovers out there. Anyone going to Central Market this weekend, or next?

Testing, one, two, three.

No, better test him more times than that.

One of these days they’re gonna come up with a PED that is totally undetectable. Maybe that day is here. Something just doesn’t sound right about this.

The bar was smoky.

As a non-smoker, I should have the right to be free from the nasty, murderous, foul odor of second-hand smoke. All smokers should be hung up by their – uh, thumbs until they lose the filthy habit.

Man, that felt good to say that! Nothing more rewarding to us self-righteous ex-smokers than to spout of to those still with the habit!

The Chili's here has a bar. You have to pass through it to go to the bathroom, and sometimes it's so smoky, it would gag a maggot!

I just noticed an ad at the top of the page, and I just had to comment. It’s a Chili’s ad for three courses for two people for $20. Michelle and I went there last Saturday, and I mean to tell you, that’s a durn good deal!

Their chicken fried steak dinner is $10.59. With the deal they have, the CFS is only $10, plus you get an appetizer and desert along with it.

Anyone else try this special?

How to describe Houston?

“We know”

It doesn’t matter what other areas of the country think of us, “we know” what Houston is all about.

It doesn’t matter how they rate us in any stupid, inane poll, “we know” where Houston stands in our minds and hearts.

It doesn’t matter how others see Houston’s future. “We know” Houston will come out on top in the long run.

“Can do” is another two-word description.

How to describe Houston Architecture?

“It works”

I don’t mean to be confrontational, but I think the Dallas skyline is – well, less than appealing. Same goes for Austin and that gawd awful spiked tower. Some people love it, but not me. There are some interesting buildings, but they don’t go together, in my opinion.

Houston’s skyline is a jumble of architectural styles, but they just seem to somehow fit together like pieces of a landscape puzzle. I think the Houston skyline is the best in the country. But then, I’m biased.

My personal two words?

“I left”, but only because I was ready for some Country Living. And I love it!

“Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana's hubris at the Alamo may well have cost him the entire war. Think about it. Instead of chasing the proper Texian army eastward with crushing numbers, he went after a rather insignificant garrison”

True. However, Santa Ana took his hubris with him wherever he went. He took it all the way to San Jacinto, and that probably cost him that battle, and the war. He lost some of his best soldiers at the Alamo, but had they been at San Jacinto, would they have made a difference in the outcome?

“And as a show of force (against people who he knew were going to die by one means or another), he formed columns and marched headlong into cannon fire.”

That’s how armies attacked back then. Remember Picket’s Charge? At the Alamo, the charge began at 5 am, so even though the Alamo defenders could see them, they couldn’t see them all that well. So there was a something of an advantage in that.

Granted, he could have chosen not to fight, and just starve the defenders into submission. But, as the head of the Mexican Army, I don’t think that was a realistic option. In hindsight, his decision seems ill advised. But many decisions seem that way after the fact.

“He probably had no concept of the power of martyrdom, but that probably played against him as well, swelling the Texian forces relative to his own during the runaway scrape.”

That, too, is debatable. Martyrdom seemed to work against the Texas army at times. Many were so itching for a fight that they wanted to desert from Houston and make an immediate stand against the Mexicans.

“I wish I could say that Texas won the war by way of brilliant military tactics, but those would have to wait until the Mexican-American War to be witnessed on our soil”

I can’t say whether Houston’s plan was “brilliant” or not, but it seems to me it was the only option he had – to separate Santa Ana from his reinforcements as far as possible.

I look at the Texas Revolution quite a bit like I used to look at College Football. Conference winners were committed to particular bowl games, and there were seasons that two (or more) powerhouses were vying for Number 1. But due to commitments, they didn’t play each, and there was no way to settle the question. And so the two sides would debate the issue for years to come.

Remember Mike Renfro’s catch in the AFC finals in Pittsburgh? Earlier this year I heard someone mention that play. Had the NFL had Instant Replay, the matter probably would have been resolved, and it would have become just another play in a football game. But people still remember that play, and still debate the difference it made in the game, and the rest of the playoffs. But here it is some 30 years later, and people still talk about that game.

How did Crockett die? Was there an actual “line in the sand”? What was really in Houston’s mind on the Runaway Scrape? It’s the controversy and the debate over the truth of the events of the Texas Revolution, and the effects and outcome over why certain things happened, and the “what ifs” that make the history so fascinating. It keeps people talking about it.

I don’t know how I missed this thread when it was posted originally. I love old photos like these.

A couple of questions were asked but not answered about Christie’s. The photo with the frying pan sign would have been the east side of the restaurant. The west side had a sign on the side of the building saying, “We serve pizza pie”.

The Christie’s on Westheimer was the same family I am sure. As a small kid I was fascinated the posters of the different types of salt-water fish. The same posters were at the Westheimer restaurant. And they served the same fish salad at the newer place as they did at the South Main location.

As to the monorail, I was so excited to see photos of the interior of the car. It was exactly as I remembered it. The whole structure was dismantled, probably in ’56 or ’57, and then reassembled at the fairground in Dallas. That’s where I rode it. I didn’t know until a few years ago that the two monorails were one and the same.

My computer won’t let me use the posting functions for some reason, so I can’t link the pages, but some of the Life photos are of “Harmon Park”. What you hear is what you print, I suppose. Few people know this, but George Hermann actually pronounced his name as “Harmon”.

I used to date a woman whose direct descendant was Jesse Burnham. He was the 13th person to sign up with The Old 300 of Austin’s colony. Burnham’s grant was outside LaGrange along the Colorado where he opened a store as well as operated a ferry.

While never on good terms with Sam Houston, they became bitter enemies when, in the course of the Runaway Scrape, Houston had all of Burnham’s buildings burned, and then burned the ferry after the army crossed the river.

All of this is well documented. The ferry had to have been on a major road of the day. However, no one knows the exact location of Burnham’s Crossing. The probable location is on private property, and the marker is along a public road a good ways from the river. We found all this out while searching for information on Jesse.

Since then I have wondered how such an important piece of Texas History could be lost. There could be all sorts of reasons why, but the best reason I can come up with is that it just wasn’t all that important after the Revolution.

The reason I believe that is because of the history of the Alamo following its fall. No one gave much thought to preservation back then. The Long Barracks were rebuilt, but much of the work was done as a sales gimmick when the structure was used as retail space.

This lack of incentive to preserve is probably why old major routes were all but forgotten. No one really cared, until the country was struck with a desire for nostalgia about their past. .

We went through this a number of years back with the Timbergrove Hate Gate at where Dian turns into Wynnewood. The main opponents were Timbergrove (east of White Oak) where I lived and Clark Pines, where I grew up, and where my mom still lived. Things got really nasty, and friends for years quit talking to one another.

The issue was before City Council a few times, but then Lanier just told his workers to put the gate up anyway. I’m not sure if it even came up for a vote. Then when Lee Brown became mayor, the gate came down.

The Timbergrove folks claimed the road was used as a cut-through for traffic, and that is why it was necessary. If you live in or know that area, you may know that using Dian/Wynnewood is in no way an advantage, except for people living in adjacent neighborhoods.

If you want to see nice people turn ugly in a hurry, then try putting up one of these gates.

There is a proposed residential development (XS Ranch) going before City Council now. The 10,000-acre project is mostly within the Bastrop ETJ, so it needs the City’s approval. It will be a gated community of both houses and condo/townhomes, and with a wide price range. It will be controlled by a super MUD made up of between 5 and 10 mini-MUDs.

At a meeting last week, it was determined that if and when the City annexes any portion of the development, the gates in the annexed sections must come down. That will be written into the contract.

BTW, the current Texas Highways has a couple of articles on “Our Iconic Landmarks”; the Alamo, San Jacinto Monument and windmills. It’s a pretty good read.

I did a rewiring job on an old house. It wasn’t all that difficult, but it was very time-consuming. I went through the entire house and traced and logged every single light fixture, switch and outlet and which breaker each one went to, as well as the order that the outlets ran along the line.

All I replaced were the outlets, as grounding the lights was not necessary. I cut the bottom 3 or 4 inches of wallboard along the bottom of the wall and ran my wire through the studs at that level. The replacement baseboard covered the access.

It was quite a job, but much better than paying an electrician to do it. There were no permits involved, of course, so I pretty much ignored the legalities of the situation.

“And am shockws that Blagojevich did not accept, if he ever was considered.”

I think the idiot who started this post meant that as a joke.