Ask me a question about Texas, and I'll give you an honest answer

I'm bored for twenty minutes while my dinner warms in the oven.

And not that I'm disparaging Houston, (I was born there) but it always has a funky smell.

I haven't really noticed that it SMELLS. Or were you talking about Pasadena?

but Houston in general smells like bayou. Or maybe it's that after living in Central Texas for a few years, I finally know what clean air smells like. Now when I go back, it's more noticeable?

I much prefer Austin, too. :D

nasty place...the whole upper Texas coast is stinky, all the way to Orange.

we lived in Galveston (1958-1960) but moved to Houston for my dad's job. We were looking at houses in Texas City (why, I have NOOOO idea)
and I said "Daddy, it smells like a doodoo factory!"

If you're downwind from the Texas City refineries, then yeah, it stinks! I'm from Houston too, southwest side. I never noticed anything especially "funky" other than just air pollution.

And yes, Austin smells much nicer :bounce:

Austin's a nice place to visit, but I prefer living in Houston. More Middle Eastern restaurants/groceries, no hills (:P), great parks and museums, great people (rednecks are easy to spot and avoid.)

Since I'm also on the semi-SW side, I only smell the local greenery. Now if you live in Stinkadeena, sure, you smell it ("The air is greener in Pasadeener!") But that's all on the east and southeast side. The ozone can get bad, but some of that is also Nature attempting to fight the carbon-monoxide pollution and then it all just stays in the stillness of the day during the summer. Perhaps with fuel prices higher, the air pollution and ozone won't be as bad this year.

Can't live without that high humidity, though :D

Texas?

But there is currently an exhibit about them at the Texas State History Museum!!!

http://www.thestoryoftexas.com/

hmmm.....I was being a smart ass and I guess Texas takes them more seriously.

I used to be a Capitol Tour Guide, and, at not quite 5'1" people would sak me regularly, "I thought everthang wuz spost ta be bigger in Texas?" ;)

Khash.

Do they shoot you when you try and run away?

According to Churches and Church Membership in the United States 2000, Texas ranks:

• First in number of Evangelical Protestants, with 5,083,087.

http://www.texasalmanac.com/religion/religion_chart.pdf

-from the Texas Almanac 2008-2009 ("Your source for all things Texas since 1857"),

Cheese, beer, wine, food, sex, culture, architecture, accent...I'll have to think long and hard to find any way that France is lacking in this regard...perhaps Texas Instruments and some of their ICs are a small one-up, but France has the outstanding Kobol synthesizer, etc. so perhaps not.

Give them a friendly greeting on the street and they look at you like you're crazy

:eyes:

But what ever happened to "Southern Hospitality"?

I make eye contact and smile at people on the street all the time, and no one looks at me like I'm crazy. Back at home, people still wave at me as I pass them going the opposite direction on a farm-to-market road. :shrug:

Or are you Karl Rove?

Right there on 6th St.

I pretty much felt lonely in that town... Until I ran into a bunch of relocated New Yorkers.

$0.02

They're destroying us. Fuck illegial Mexican immigration. Can we trade all the Californians for Mexicans, PLEASE?!

I've even had Californians tell me that friendly greetings are met with disdain.

Which is one reason why I'm glad that I've lived in the East for most of my life

People here are friendly

and you probably won't be able to STOP people from talking to you. And talking, and talking, and talking.

a very relaxed and laid back city

We're snobs.

Learn it!

probably from repuke families that aren't really from Texas originally.

Everyone I met wanted me to move there, even though I am a commie-pinko-atheist, or whatever....got job offers, places to stay, you name it! I coulnd't find more friedly people anywhere else!

;)

I actually prefer the taste of the nasty stuff. I lived in the UK for four years, and finally got used to their Dr Pepper, which tasted... flatter and sweeter (as opposed to twangier, if that makes sense).

When I moved back here in 2005, I found myself one afternoon in Hico, Texas, which is in the Dublin distribution area. Imagine my excitement, as a longtime Dr Pepper aficionado, to see they had rows and rows of bottles of Dublin Dr Pepper! I couldn't wait to buy one and pop it open and taste it!!!

It tasted just like English Dr Pepper. :(

I buy it when I find it in bottles (which is possible at a few select locations here in Austin), but, honestly, I prefer the HFSC stuff. :spank:

And bless her heart, she brought back some Dr. Pepper for me the last time she was home for a visit. If you're over forty, all I can say is that it tastes like soft drinks used to taste when we were kids -- prior to HFCS -- and I'm amazed at how dull and desensitized our tastebuds have become.

It's the national religion.

And, no, we won't fucking shut up about it.

We still have a nationalist mentality, and make no excuses for it.

But, yeah, that was a joke.

The clocks, the oven mitts, and everything else shaped like the state confuse me.

And, mostly, we just really love Texas. Hell, I'm practically an anarchist, I'm a feminist, an atheist - and I LOVE Texas. I love Friday night football, and enchilada plates, and swimming in the lake in summer, and the heat, and chips and salsa, and the diversity of our terrain - from desert mountains to deep green woods to wide beaches to flower-blanketed prairies, and our history of colorful politicians, and so, so much more. I even lived abroad for four years, as an adult, and only reluctantly came back. But now I'll never leave again.

but not enough to go all hog wild about it like some citizens do. :hi:

From 1836 to 1845.

We had a very short war gaining our independence from Mexico. We were fighting the Mexicans for slavery. They don't tell you that in school.

I have a land grant on parchment from the Republic of Texas,
signed by Anson Jones, dated 1845.


So why does the California flag say "California Republic" but they were not a republic, and we Texans WERE?????

:shrug:

We were our own country for quite a bit longer than Texas ever was.

But, Hawai'i oven mitts would only cover little bits of your hand. OWWWWWWW!!!

Honestly, I really think that's the reason for everything shaped like the state. It's graphically a very appealing shape, very distinctive, and easy to put on swag! :D

:shrug:

:shrug:

Especially the coastal areas... ?

Half the time, it seems like the Texas Highways Department intentionally sets up roadsigns so that people will get lost. I visited some friends in Austin a couple of years ago, and lost count of the number of signs that were placed after the intersections they were meant to direct drivers through, perfectly placed to let people know they'd just missed their turn or off-ramp.

This was most noticeable on the freeways (or whatever they're called there). The road would majestically split in two with no warning, then I'd catch a glimpse of a sign straddling the other road, informing me that my destination lay thataway. The sheer number of drivers I regularly saw slewing across multiple lanes at the last second to get to an off-ramp or side road leads me to believe I'm not the only one who finds the signage confusing.

Either the highways engineers have a twisted sense of humor, or they haven't quite worked out what signs are for.

compared to other states I have visited, some of which seem entirely devoid of signage.

If you are talking about I-35, which runs through Austin, though, you have my sympathies. It was designed by Aggies, what can I say? :shrug:

Also, some of our highways here in Austin are oddly numbered. 290, for instance, which comes into town from Houston in NE Austin, runs into I-35 then appears to disappear. But, oh no!, it reappears several miles away, in SW Austin, going west off Mo-Pac Expressway, toward the Hill Country.

The signage on that road was just perverse. It also seemed to be unaccountably full of furniture. I had to swerve around tables, chairs, even a table lamp on one occasion. There were mattresses and sofas along the verge, too. If I'd had a van, I could have furnished a moderately large apartment with the stuff strewn around the highway. Is this some sort of "Texan hospitality" thing, where visitors are encouraged to sit back and relax, even in the middle of the interstate?

were moving out for summer and overloading their trucks. I spotted a mortally wounded sofa on the I-30 overhead going toward downtown Ft Worth this morning.

when they designed the expressways.

I think our freeways up here were better designed than some others due to the person in Congress at the time...Jim Wright :dem:

ramps. and there are other signs in the middle of the freeway telling you the next 3 or 4 exits and the distance remaining.

Austin is very strange to drive in, as is Dallas. Fort Worth is one of the easiest cities to learn that I have ever experienced.

Texas lesson over.

Someone else can take over if there are any new questions. :)

or is someone putting me on?

She was the daughter of Governor Jim Hogg, never married, settled in Houston, and basically MADE that town in terms of culture. I mean, I kinda hate Houston, but it would be purely a shithole without Miss Ima Hogg. She started the Houston Symphony, was a great art and American antiques collector (the latter at a time when virtually no one thought American antiques were worthwhile), was way ahead of her time in pushing for mental health treatments, and worked to integrate the public schools while on the HISD school board. Among many, many other things.

There is, however, no Ura Hogg. THAT's an urban legend.



http://www.mfah.org/bayoubend/home.asp?par1=1&par2=1&par3=1&par4=1&par5=1&par6=1&par7=¤tPage=

Probably about the same distance as from Texarkana to El Paso.

Than from El Paso to Los Angeles or from Port Arthur to St. Augustine FL

It showed Texas as 80% of North America. There was all kinds of funny little cartoons about Texas drawn on it.

One of the cartoons said "Due to a surveying error, the correct distance from Amarillo to the North Pole is only 23 and 1/2 miles". Apparently it gets cold in Amarillo.

when it's pretty much hot hot hot for 6 months straight during the summer

and it is actually true. Although at certain times of year our weather can change drastically and in some very strange ways.

Yeah, it is sort of surface of the sun from June until November

Today - hot and dry
Tomorrow - hot and dry
Next week - hot and dry

light......followed by darkeness :D

Gotta love a smart ass meterologist.

*YOU* TRY GOING UP AGAINST MOTHER NATURE!!! - that's what he'd say

:mad::grr:

I'm serious.

At least their remains would be useful. ;)

had been removed but the building is a total loss. Find him!

:shrug:

That's what I always figure. I always joke to my parents, "Why the hell didn't our ancestors keep going, so we could live in California? But, hey, at least they stopped in East Texas, instead of... Abilene."

I lived in Longview awhile.

My grandmother lived in Timpson until her death.

Know of "Tenaha, Timpson, Bobo, and Blair?"

:hi:

to Jackson, MS and always filled up in Teneha

to Jackson, MS and always filled up in Teneha

I drove it a lot! LOL

:hi:

because I lived in Midland as a kid and I hated it there.

For those of you who don't know the area, watch the films "The Last Picture Show" and "Friday Night Lights"


God what a horrible place.


It explains a lot about W

My step-father moved there in his mid-50's after living in NY his whole life (except for the time spent in the Korean war). He grew up in the Bronx and was a retired State Trooper and had been a marine. He called it shit-kicker country. Didn't exactly fit in out there. My mom had grown up in Lubbock, but had met and married my dad (who was from NY and in the Air Force).

Can you please pen him up on his ranch and never let him out again?

REAL Texans don't claim that carpetbagger!

:hide:

I never got that.

Just lotsa BUTTER!!

Texas toast is 2-3" thick white bread, toasted with LOTS of butter:



(not usually shaped like Texas)

File under: Everything's Bigger in Texas / Toast

Are there any authentic style Thai restaraunts there?

How about a Marriott hotel? Preferably a Marriott proper with full amenities, as opposed to a SpringHill Suites or Residence Inn.

the least populated county in the state -- I'm betting NO. :D

heard of someone driving through the tippy-top part of the panhandle?


Tikki

We used to drive from NE Texas to New Mexico and it took about 15 hours, in total. :shrug:

Awesome building, that...

:grr:

:D

I went to UNT in Denton with Mike Judge's sister years ago before he got famous, and read that years later.

My friend calls it "Carland" because of all the old crappy used car lots. :D

I pfled with my pflogger from Pflugerville...



:shrug:



Okay, seriously — why the undue emphasis on high school football? It ain't healthy.

?



PFLUGERVILLE, TEXAS

Located about fifteen miles north of the Colorado River on the eastern edge of the blackland prairies, Pflugerville was founded in 1860 when William Bohls established a general store and post office in his residence, and named the town in honor of Henry Pfluger. Pfluger first arrived in the area in 1849, leaving his German homeland to escape the Prussian War. He first purchased 160 acres of land two miles east of Austin from John Liese, a brother-in-law who had immigrated before him. In 1853, Henry Pfluger exchanged the land for a larger farm about five miles east of present day Pflugerville. There, the family lived in a five-room log cabin and raised corn, wheat, rye, beans, sweet potatoes, and sugar cane. They also raised cattle, which Henry and his sons drove to market on the Chisholm Trail.


ANAHUAC, TEXAS

The city was named after a region in Mexico. The first dwellers in this area were the Atakapan Indians. In 1721, Frenchman Jean Baptiste de La Harpe reached this area. The area became known under the name Perry's Point, named after Colonel Henry Perry, who erected a military post here in 1816. In October 1830, the Mexican commander Colonel John Davis Bradburn claimed the area for Mexico with three officers and 40 soldiers. In January 1831, General Manuel de Mier y Terán officially named the city Anahuac.

1. Why does the Dallas/Ft Worth airport smell like old cowboy boots?

2. Why is the name an anagram of "Taxes"?

1. It doesn't. It smells like money and hairspray.

2. Because it contains the same letters.