A man swimming off a sandbar near Stingray Road at Crystal Beach on Boliver Peninsula was bitten by a shark right above the knee. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water… A Harlingen man reeled in a 12-foot tiger shark last weekend at South Padre Island after a 2-hour fight. He released the shark after taking pictures and measurements and says that he knows in his heart that he got a state record so releasing the shark was more important. Nice.
In celebration of Shark Week, I bought my son a silly stuffed shark that makes shark noises if you push its little fin. I found it at Walmart. The kitties at my house did not like it at first, but they have now warmed up to the idea because you now hear shark noises at all hours of the day and night. It’s not unusual at all to see a cat tearing through the house carrying a stuffed shark that is almost as big as she is. We laugh. Life is good. PS – It’s been 40 years since of the release of JAWS 2.
About 15 miles from downtown Austin, there is a 14-acre, rainwater-fed, state-of-the-art surf park that has rideable waves every two minutes. It’s called NLand. In addition to surfing, you can head to the NLand Juice Bar or eat at the Blue Prairie then have a beer at the NLand Brewing Company. There is live music and film screenings. Sounds like a daytrip to me.
A friend of mine has a little one that LOVES tractors and trucks. I thought of her as I read about Extreme Sandbox. It’s located in Pottsboro, a small town in north Texas and if you’re 14 or over, you can ‘rent time’ on excavators, backhoes and bulldozers then play in the dirt. The Sandbox Crew gives you 25 minutes of classroom instruction then they let you start your adventure in an air-conditioned cab as you haul wrecked cars, move barrels and dig dirt. Picnic tables are available for spectators. There are gift certificates and different packages that start at $195 and some even include a room at Tanglewood Resort. At their Minnesota location, there is a firetruck where you can spray the giant water hose or rent it, so you can arrive in style at your wedding. Eat your heart out, Tonka trucks.
The Marriott Marquis Houston has opened its Parkview Terrace to the public, which just happens to include the beautiful Lone Star state-shaped lazy river, heated infinity pool, hot tub, fitness center and food & drinks from the High Dive restaurant. There is still a little summer left to go play. See above.
An employee spotted a garter snake in the basement of the Georgetown library in DC. They released the snake outside only to discover three more snakes in a knot hours later, so they closed the library for two days as pest control did what was needed to rid the library of the snakes. When the library reopened, one of their first scheduled educational programs was ‘Reptiles Alive,’ a show-and-tell with snakes, frogs and other reptiles. What are the chances.
After 17 years of working as a morning news anchor, Rachel McNeill has announced that she will be leaving KPRC and her co-anchor, Owen Conflenti, to move to Phoenix, Arizona where her husband will be working as the Chief of Cardiology and Director of Adult Medicine at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. I will miss her. She is very genuine and one classy looking lady.
When it rains, the frogs start their singing. You listen and say to yourself that it’s because they’re so happy that their little hole in the dirt is now cool and comfortable. Nope. The males are singing to woo the females for breeding. Sly devils. The males arrange themselves and try to sing in unison. Females (just like a girl) take their time to arrive and select a mate, preferring the ones that sing longer or louder. It rained today, and I can hear two of them outside my office window screaming, “Pick me, pick me.”
RECENT BIRTHDAYS: Actress Catherine Hicks is 67. Dr. Faith Coleridge on Ryan’s Hope. Basketball Hall of Fame David Robinson is 53. San Antonio Spurs. Entrepreneur Mark Cuban is 60. He started out as a bartender and is now the owner of Dallas Mavericks. Actor Wesley Snipes is 56. Author J.K. Rowling is 53. Country singer-musician Zac Brown is 40. Actor Martin Sheen is 78. Lifestyle guru Martha Stewart is 77. NFL quarterback Tom Brady is 41. Actress Evangeline Lilly is 39. Madonna is 60. She is celebrating with a fundraiser for orphans and children in Malawi. Actress Loni Anderson is 73. Actress singer Maureen McCormick is 62. Author David Baldacci is 58.
Remember the gorgeous Tab Hunter, blond and beautiful movie idol from the 50’s. He died last month at the age of 86.
Hope you took advantage of tax-free weekend to get your school supplies. At one school district, a parent will spend about $132 on supplies for a second-grader. And that’s not including new jeans and underwear. To save money, I always tried to gather stuff for my kids all year long when it was marked down, especially in September and October at office supply locations and Target. We still have more than our fair share of notebook paper in my supply closet because $.25-cents a package was always so appealing.
Tilly is the newest Asian elephant calf born at the Houston Zoo, having arrived June 17. Her older sister, Joy, was born last year and has a different mom but they share the same father, Thai aka Baby Daddy. This is a great thing for the Houston Zoo because Tilly is one of only two elephants have been born in captivity in the US this year.
A 25-year-old man who was being detained by police officers in Maryland, told them that since he worked at Krispy Kreme Donuts, he would give them donuts if they let him go. Hmmm.
The novel, The Fault in our Stars, was first published in January 2012. The title is inspired by Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, in which the nobleman Cassius says to Brutus: “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, / But in ourselves, that we are underlings.” By June 6, 2014, it was released as a movie and opened at number one at the box office. It is quite a lovely love story that also tackles life, terminal illness, and death successfully. John Green is now one of the biggest young-adult authors in the world and plans to do something totally crazy by releasing the book in a much smaller form – all the original words just squeezed down to the size of a cellphone; it’s horizontal and you flip the pages up like you do when you swipe your phone screen. The spine is a hinge that helps the book remain open and the paper used is the same that’s been in Bibles forever – so very thin without being see-through. The Penguin Minis by John Green that will be released on October 23rd, are “Looking for Alaska, An Abundance of Katherines, Paper Towns and The Fault in Our Stars” and will sell for $12 each. I, for one, am excited to see this. Teens will love this.
John Green – “You don’t get to choose if you get hurt in this world, old man, but you do have some say in who hurts you.”
Just saw the email for Hatch Chilis at Central Market, so it must be the 23rd Annual Hatch Festival. Buy them for the freezer. I used my last bag in early spring to make two meat loaves that were just full of chopped Hatch peppers. So delicious.
Crestless Wave – “August is a gentle reminder for not doing a single thing from your new year resolution for seven months and not doing it for next five.”
A father and his 17-year-old son were captured on video cameras installed by wildlife officials, after they shot a mother bear and her crying newborn twins inside their Alaska den. The clip shows the men skinning and butchering the bear as they declare, “They’ll never be able to link it to us.” The mother bear had been part of a three-year study due to concerns about the declining black bear population in the area. I vote for skinning the dad. Sometimes immature boys do things that they think will make their dads proud of them.
Apple became the world’s first publicly traded company to be valued at $1-trillion.
The Han Solo jacket worn by Harrison Ford in the Star Wars film, The Empire Strikes Back is expected to bring as much as $1.3-million in an auction of rare movie memorabilia on September 20th at London’s BFI Imax. There are many other items including a Star Wars lightsaber, Johnny Depp’s costume from Edward Scissorhands and a hat worn by Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump.
Brazosport Rotary Club 57th Annual Shrimp Boil and Fish Fry. Don’t worry, you haven’t missed it. Harvey changed the date and location for them last year, but it worked out so well that they decided to try it again. Thanks, Harvey. This year it will be Sunday, October 7th at Lake Jackson Civic Center. The list of various community service projects that are helped by this fundraiser is enormous, so don’t forget to support them with your purchase of meal tickets and Raffle tickets for the 2018 Honda Accord EXL with additional prizes that may include an Apple Watch, Go-Pro and Samsung tablet. Our whole community benefits in ways that you can’t imagine. www.BrazosportShrimpBoil.com
Pray for California.
A couple in Houston were fighting as they left a restaurant. Not normal fighting where you say ugly stuff to each other and then immediately regret it. Nope. They ended up taking it to the streets and were chasing, hitting and running into each other’s cars. As the man sideswiped the girlfriend’s car, he lost control of his own vehicle, struck a pole and was thrown from his truck. He died at the scene. Yikes.
A burglar broke into a home through a basement window, opened a bottle of wine and passed out in an available bed. The wife came home and discovered the stranger in her son’s bed, then told her husband. He confronted the thief but couldn’t understand what he was saying because he was so drunk.
Southwest Airlines decided to discontinue the little bags of peanuts out of concern for those with allergies. I have a son who is allergic to peanuts, so I appreciate what they’re doing but I’m really going to miss those peanuts!
The McDonald’s Big Mac is turning 50. ‘Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun.’ That TV jingle stuck in everyone’s head. We all knew it. I ate a Big Mac almost every single day my senior year of high school along with an order of fries and a Dr. Pepper. Well, occasionally, I ate a Filet-of-Fish. Fast food has since become a little more sophisticated. We didn’t know then that fresh meat patties were better than frozen ones and we didn’t know that kale was better than lettuce, we just knew that Big Mac’s were good. If you haven’t tried one lately, you should.
I turned this column in early this week because I’m leaving early to deliver my youngest child and 14-pairs of her shoes to college. I’m not sad, because this is what I have raised her to do, but I do know my life will be different now. I’ll let you know what happens next week. PS. I’ll have tissues in the car.
Thanks for taking the time to read this. I appreciate it. Lisa
