Celebrating Bastille Day a few weeks too early?

Str8 Up With A Twist’s First Marie Antoinette Award goes to Commissioner Steve Radack.

Radack on Tuesday said of drivers unhappy about peak-hour pricing, "Let them go down Richmond Road. Or they can use Westpark," a secondary road near the tollway. (In other words, let them eat cake!) His office received a slew of phone calls and e-mail from residents critical of his comment, he said.

Toll transactions along the main part of the tollway now cost $1. That fee will rise to $1.25 per transaction during nonpeak hours. And the rate during peak hours will be $2.50 per transaction.
As of 1100A on Thursday, it seems that commissioners have had second thoughts about the toll increase.

Happy Birthday Roni!

Today is the longest day of the year. Summer arrives today. According to Eric Braate at Your Education Station, summer officially arrives at 1:06P CDT. We will have 14 hours and 4 minutes of daylight today.

Today is also Roni’s birthday. Roni is my only sister. I won’t tell you how old she is today but I will tell you that Eisenhower was President. (hint hint) Roni has been teaching in FWISD since 1981.

I won’t tell the story about how she bit me because I wouldn’t stop reading the comics over her shoulder. And I won’t tell you how she would tell me to go hide because there was a tornado coming…just so I would leave her alone...and the sun would be shining. And I won’t tell you how later in life she turned into a Mardi Gras bead wh_re (I set the example and she learned from the best). I won’t tell these stories because I’m sure she could one up me.

I’ve posted some photos of Roni. If you’re in Ft. Worth and you see her today, wish her a Feliz Cumpleaños!

This is Roni when she was very young. One of my uncles said she was the prettiest baby he had ever seen. (Those words just sting!) :-)

Here we are in coordinated outfits. She is acting a bit coy and I'm doing my best imitation of a Weeble Wobble. On second thought, I look a bit drunk. Maybe this was a premonition of what would happen years later in the French Quarter.

Here are the three siblings.

Here is Roni's Senior picture. All three of us went to Nolan High School in Ft. Worth.

This is Roni & Joey at the Krewe Ball in 2006. Once again, she is acting coy and only wearing a "couple of strands" of Mardi Gras beads. (I'm sure there was a bag full of beads that didn't get photographed.)

Ramblings Of A Caffeinated Mind 1.0

When I last spoke of the weather, I said that it was going to rain on Monday and Tuesday. Well it rained somewhere in Houston but not on me.

Guess I shouldn't have been feeling so cocky 'cause I got my due about 230A or so this morning.

OMG! The house was shaking and it was lit up in that electric blue-white light that only comes with lightning.

At one time, Jim and I lived much closer to Memorial Park. We were always getting hit by heavy storms. I'm not as close to the park but close enough and now I'm closer to the bayou. I'm beginning to think Mother Nature is upset that so much development is going on in NoRO and she is making us pay the price.

Without me even calling him, Calvin jumped on the bed with me to ride out the storm. I kept thinking we would lose power; we didn't. However, later on in the morning I would discover that the the office had lost power.

Because the rain continued for awhile, I had to delay Calvin's morning walk. I debated about going for a run. Ended up going and sure enough Yoga Boi was there. I will say that there is something very refreshing about running in a light rain when it is about 79 degrees.

After I dropped off Calvin at doggy daycare, I went to the office and that is when I realized I
would be a displaced worker. I went to one of the other locations and discovered that some of my office mates were there.

What are those birds? Lemmings? That's what I feel like some days.

So, I'm going to try and change my attitude about this weather. After all, on my way to the park this morning I did see a rainbow. What better way to start your day?

So rather than b!tch about the rain, I'll sing a ditty about the rain. I think I'll start with Viola Willis's dance version of Stormy Weather.

On a completely different thought, in my search for a substitute for The Spin Doctor, I went to a different spin class last night. I thought DIT was tough...Connie was much tougher than DIT.

Neighbor Nina (NN) had told me about her. Connie had been on vacation and came back with a vengeance. Last night my calves were twitching and my fingers were cramping so I loaded up on Gatorade and bananas.

Don't forget...tomorrow is June 21 which is the first day of Summer and the longest day of the year!

Life in NoRO (aka 007/Houston)

I'm not much of a Chatty Cathy at LeFittes but on occasion I do strike up a conversation. (At some point, I'll do another post about the snob appeal of the gym.) The other day I was talking to a guy and he asked me where I lived. I told him that I had nicknamed the area North River Oaks. (It really is Rice Military or West End.)

He laughed liked many others have because there really is no North River Oaks. The only thing that separates me from Houston's Old Money and New Money is Memorial Drive and Buffalo Bayou. Well...my people are accustomed to barriers (i.e. Rio Grande River) so I guess it is a given that I should be able to look into the backyards of the rich while I'm out with The Calvinator

He suggested that I name the neighborhood NoRO. LOL I asked him where he lived and he laughed and said ERO. LOL He happens to be on the wrong side of Shepherd Drive.

This morning before I went to meet RunnerOne at Memorial Park, I took The Calvinator out for his morning stroll. Get this. At 530A it was 80 degrees and 80% relative humidity. According to Anthony Yanez at The Education Station it felt like 91 degrees!!!!! Sultry and sauna were words he used to desribe the feeling outside.

It was so sultry that I noticed many windows on houses had condensation on the outside of the windows.

Needless to say, my shorts and shoes were soaked with sweat by the time RunnerOne and I finished running.

OK. So I haven't posted a pic of Calvin in awhile. I tried the other day to take some cute photos and I kept getting the evil eye. Just to prove it, here is Calvin giving me the evil eye. Have a good day everybody!

Age appropriate attire

Jeremy in Oklahoma (JIO) contacted Str8 Up With A Twist to offer his best recollection of the previously mentioned Will and Grace episode.

From JIO: "Now that I've read that post, I have to correct your quote. Jack actually said 'Will, your youth called and it wants it's shirt back.' If I can remember correctly, it was when Will was trying to wear a sleeveless shirt from A&F."

Str8 Up With A Twist must admit that there are several A&F shirts in his closet as well as one pair of boxer shorts. However...none of the shirts are sleeveless. It is so difficult to part with one's youth.

Str8 Up With A Twist reported to AttyHou about his visit to A&F last week and how out of place he felt. AttyHou replied that Str8 Up With A Twist should have stopped going to A&F 20 years ago! And also asked did he get called "sir"? EVIL I tell ya!

Still I wonder. Who'll stop the rain?

I know. I should be grateful. It's a bit difficult to welcome the rain when your personality rivals that of Mary Sunshine.

Right now the sun is shining. The ground is so wet that the heat with moisture makes it a bit sticky outside.

The Calvinator is getting tired of getting toweled-off every time we come back from a walk. His paws and underside get wet from the wet grass. He realizes that the downside to going on a walk is that he has to endure the toweling-off process.

I guarantee you that at some point today it is going to get dark, the wind will kick up and it will rain. For 6 consecutive days this has happened and today and tomorrow will prolly be the same.

I can't get my running shoes to dry out and they're getting a "stench".

OK...on a happy note:

2 SNAPS UP to Ellen DeGeneres. At the 34th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards, Ellen won awards for Best Talk Show and Best Host. Ellen stated that she wanted to stir things up on her show. Instead of Hot Topics, ala The View, she is going to have Hot Pockets. Her first controversial comment, “Bob Barker is a quitter.” LOL

2 SNAPS UP to the Rice University Owls. Having pounded Louisville into submission in their College World Series opener Friday, the second-seeded Owls cranked out 14 more hits Sunday to beat the tar out of North Carolina 14-2.

Happy Father's Day Joe!

How many of you know the history of Father's Day? I did some research for you and this is what I found out...

The idea for creating a day for children to honor their fathers began in Spokane, Washington. A woman by the name of Sonora Smart Dodd thought of the idea for Father's Day while listening to a Mother's Day sermon in 1909.

Having been raised by her father, William Jackson Smart, after her mother died, Sonora wanted her father to know how special he was to her. It was her father that made all the parental sacrifices and was, in the eyes of his daughter, a courageous, selfless, and loving man. Sonora's father was born in June, so she chose to hold the first Father's Day celebration in Spokane, Washington on the 19th of June, 1910.

In 1926, a National Father's Day Committee was formed in New York City. Father's Day was recognized by a Joint Resolution of Congress in 1956. In 1972, President Richard Nixon established a permanent national observance of Father's Day to be held on the third Sunday of June. So Father's Day was born in memory and gratitude by a daughter who thought that her father and all good fathers should be honored with a special day just like we honor our mothers on Mother's Day.

I thought I'd show you some family photos and sorta remember the past...

This is a photo of my Grandfather Joe Martinez.

I chose this photo of my Grandfather Ralph Guereca because I'm it and I look cute. (FYI...I was almost 2 years old in this photo.)

Here is a picture of my father Joe Martinez. He was in the U.S. Army during the Korean War. I believe he was in the Army from 1951-1953. Years later, I would go to South Korea and no, I wasn't in the Army. My tour of South Korea was much different from Joe's.

Here is Joe with his saxophone. Years later I would learn to play the clarinet and my brother would become a saxophonist.
Here are Joe and Helen in 1993 at Diamond Hill-Jarvis High School Prom. Joe was a principal there for several years.
Here we all are at Joe's Retirement Party in August 1998. (When I master PhotoShop I'm going to get rid of that apple behind my head. For 9 years that has bugged me.)

And here is la familia Martinez in December 2006. Joey (my brother-in-law) must have been taking the pictures 'cause he's not in it. As you can tell, we were trying to get the dogs to pose but we weren't successful...and one of the dogs is missing. At least it's a good photo of Joe and Helen!Little known fact about Joe...

My sister Roni was born on June 21, 1959 which happened to be Father's Day. He became a father on Father's Day.