A few odds and sods with which to end your soon-to-be-stormy Wednesday ...
State Sen. John Carona was down in Austin today speaking to the chamber of commerce about the state of Texas transportation, which, for those not following along, ain't good. As in: a $50-to-$100-billion-shortfall not good. The Republican from Dallas then said the same thing he's been saying for a long while: We'd best raise the gas tax, which hasn't been done in two decades, right pronto.
"Imagine if the post office had tried to operate on the same postage rate per postage stamp it had back in 1991 ... The fact of the matter is it would be out of business if it tried to operate on 1991 revenues today, but that is what we have asked [the Texas Department of Transportation] to do. That's what we have asked them to do -- build the roads we have to have, but by the way we just can't give you a raise. The public wouldn't stand for it, and we don't know if we want to fight the fight to see if the public would stand for it."Speaking of not handing out raises, Romenesko posted today Star-Telegram publisher Gary Wortel's Monday memo to the newspaper staff informing them they must take an unpaid week off between April 5 and July 4. Question: What is a "week off"? ...
Moviefone today published a list of the "Best Movie Theaters in Dallas, Texas." One of which is in Ennis. And I dunno about the Inwood showing "independent films and foreign language movies" these days, unless you count Gerard Butler in The Bounty Hunter ...
And, finally, the strong Scott Strong at the Nokia Theatre in Grand Prairie sends word that tix for Jackson Browne's August 13 show, with David Lindley, go on sale Friday at 10 a.m. Coincidentally, just last night over at Captain's Dead I found Browne's so-called Criterion Demos dating back pre-debut. Ah, so that's why people like him so much.
