Good morning, Houston. If the dearth of new TV in the wake of the writer's strike has left you willing to watch anything, we've got some news for you: HTV, the municipal station, is launching a new program! Woohoo! Entertainment Houston, a 30-minute show, will focus on — wait for it — Houston's facilities, included the Wortham Center, Jones Hall, the George R. Brown Convention Center and the not-quite-finished Discovery Green. A new episode......

Happy bissextile day, Houston. If you're reading this from jail — we're actually not even sure if you can use the Internet in jail — well, don't feel alone: According to a new report from the Pew Center on the States, 1 of every 100 American adults are behind bars today. Good lord. The good news: Texas is one of the states that has tried to slow the growth of its inmate population through......

Oh, indie rock. Does such a genre even really mean anything anymore? What was once "independent" is now major label material; a few major label material acts are now "independent." The grass is blue, the sky is green, up is down, down is up; nothing makes sense in this day and age. Leave it to Built to Spill to defy space and time by continuing to rock the same songs they've been playing since 1993......

Yeah, yeah, we know — Shelterporn has slacked off, and in recent weeks you've had to look for your own dream real estate listings. We're awfully sorry to have put such a burden on you and are making a Chinese New Year's resolution to be more regular. We'll do better at keeping up with Shelterporn, too. All of which brings us to the home we couldn't ignore: the Frame house, located off Memorial and......

Good morning, Houston. Remember the city's smoking ban, which went into effect in September? Well, so does KPRC. The station checked around and found something that will shock you to your very core: Houstonians are still smoking in bars and restaurants! No, really. One of the bars Channel 2 visited was Henry Hudson's Pub on the west side, where reporters found customers and the bartender smoking — and "we even bought a pack of......

Good morning, Houston. One thing about the holiday season: You hear Christmas music everywhere you go (and if you haven't been hearing it, just tune in to Sunny 99.1 — you'll catch up quickly). With that in mind, we were interested to check out ASCAP's list of the most-played holiday songs this year. It was released on Dec. 4, but by that time, the group reported that 1,562 different holiday songs had already been......

Good morning, Houston. We remember our days as student drivers — not bad overall, though we did have a pregnant in-car instructor who had a nasty habit of slamming on the brakes every time we passed a doughnut shop. Still, we didn't have it anywhere near as bad as the kid who passed his driver's test Monday, then crashed his car into the side of a Houston DPS office. The driver was parking his......

Good morning, Houston. We heard a few weeks ago about a bat infestation at TSU, but now there's something else happening in the halls of academia: a bee infestation at UH. It seems 100,000 of the industrious little critters have taken up residence in the walls of the Cullen College of Engineering, but rather than exterminate, the university is planning to move the bees to a wooded section of campus. Beekeeper Mike Knuckley will......

Well, good news from the Texans, Cougars, and Dynamo camps. All three were winners this weekend. But there was a lot more going on in the Houston sports universe this week. Let's take a look at what people were saying: - Chronicle columnist Jose de Jesus Ortiz got called out for misdiagnosing the Astros offseason needs, and the commenter used complete sentences and no profanity. Intelligent comments on a sports blog (other than this one,......

The Texans bandwagon that looked so promising at the beginning of this season has definitely seen better days: the wheels have fallen off, the axles have snapped, and all but the Pollyanna-esque optimists and the mentally ill have given up the possibility of the playoffs. So as the Texans make their second trip to California in as many weeks to face the Raiders in Oakland, the question becomes: what's the best case scenario from here......

Ok, so it’s been like eight years since American Pie came out. Can you believe it? We know, we’re so old. It was a totally different decade then. A forgotten, distant time in our culture. An innocent age when we’d not yet seen Tara Reid’s, well, pretty much everything. A time when most of us had never heard the term MILF. A time when Eugene Levy had not yet sold his once funny soul to......

Good morning, Houston. How better to end the week than with a little soul searching — and when better to do it than on Evaluate Your Life Day? Yeah, we know, it used to take hours (days, even) to find your true self, but the good news is that you can get things taken care of much more quickly these days: using online quizzes, you can figure out whether you're CEO material, which celebrity's......

Good morning, Houston. Looks like our freewheeling land-use policies have gotten some national attention: The Wall Street Journal has a story focusing on the proposed residential tower at Bissonnet and Ashby. "The condo-tower dustup is just the latest in a string of odd situations allowed by Houston's lenient land-use rules," the article explains. "Rowdy cantinas, rock-crushing operations and commercial dumps sometimes pop up in residential neighborhoods. Condo towers sprout next to schools. A pay-by-the-hour......

In the city of gas, no-zoning and laissze-faire developers, local eco-sensitive construction will get the Houstonist’s attention. So, when we recently spotted this article in Dwell Magazine, we just had to share the good news with as many Houstonians as possible. Matt and Tina Ford seem to have figured out a way to make eco-friendly design both attractive and affordable. Having built in the Houston area for a few years under their company Esplanade......

With the wounds from the Texans' loss to the Jaguars still fresh this morning, let's browse the blog world and see if there's any good news to be found. - Here we go. Rick Adelman + Rafer Alston = BFF. OMG ROFL. ;) - The Chronicle picks up a new blogger/editiorial columnist. It's always amusing to watch a non-Houston native try to put their finger on the pulse of this city's schizophrenic sports fans. It's......

Good morning, Houston. Have you ever been lounging around on the couch, curious about how the state of Texas spends its money but frustrated because you can't hop online and find out? Well, cheer up: Now you can, thanks to a new feature on the state comptroller's website. The database allows users to search the $74.5 billion in expenditures from fiscal 2007 by agency, payee and spending category. For folks with the ability to......

Good morning, Houston. If you've ever been to Rich's, the dance club in midtown, you probably won't be surprised to hear that the crowd there Saturday was sporting "feather boas, glittering hair accessories, sparkling dresses and tutus." But exactly who was in the crowd might take you by surprise: It was a bunch of kids there for Baby Loves Disco, part of a national series of dance events that benefit childhood cancer research. (In......

Good morning, Houston. Want to hear something weird? Investigators say a North Texas man had a stolen bone implanted in his neck. The man, Jim Livingston, had a herniated disk in his neck; in 2005, a surgeon replaced it with a small bone from a donor. Everything was fine until last year, when Livingston got a call informing him that the bone was believed to have been stolen from a body at a funeral......

So, did you miss the opening of 600 sq mi: Photos from Houston a couple of weekends ago? Needless to say, you missed a heck of a party — if you don't believe us, you can check out some of the photos from the event here. At any rate, we have some good news: You can come check out the photo show and meet some of the incredible artists whose work is included during the......

Good morning, Houston. The Chron's Eric Gerber points out something interesting: a Washington Post story that says people hold onto utterly untrue myths even when they're faced with factual information that disproves them. An example: A University of Michigan psychologist showed people a CDC flyer stating that myths about the flu vaccine aren't true — such as the story that the side effects of the vaccine are worse than the flu itself — and......

Good morning, Houston. Next time you happen to be walking along Northwood Drive in Baytown — and really, we can't imagine why you would be — be sure to use the sidewalk. If you don't, you could end up being slapped with a $150 citation. It happened to Clifton Stewart, a minister who said he moved to the neighborhood to save money; on Aug. 21, Stewart was cited for violating a state law that......

Good morning, Houston. Sure, you've heard a lot about Alamo defender Davy Crockett — but have you ever read his final letter? Soon you'll be able to see it in person: The Texas Historical Commission has bought the letter, which was discovered in a file folder last month, for $550,000. Crockett wrote the letter to his children Jan. 9, 1836, shortly after he arrived in Texas and less than two months before he died......

Good morning, Houston. Looks like we'll have a tougher time cracking out those fake Benjamins next year: The $100 bill will soon be getting a high-tech makeover to thwart counterfeiters. The key feature: 650,000 tiny lenses embedded in each bill, which will magnify the printing so that the portrait of Benjamin Franklin appears to move up and down or side to side, depending on which way you move the bill. "It makes for a......

With unseasonable weather descending upon much of North America, schools getting ready to reconvene, and sports seasons getting exciting, it's a busy time of year for us here in the Ist-A-Verse. Luckily, even with all the things we have to do, we still managed to get together to let you know what we've all been up to. After cooling down from a hot weekend of many badass Sunset Junction Street Fair photo dispatches, LAist asked......

Admit it: At one point or another, you've sat back and thought to yourself, "You know, I really wish I lived in an embassy." And sure, it would be fun, but who wants to deal with all those pesky diplomatic staffers? Well, we have good news: There's a pretty embassaic home available in River Oaks, and the only people who'll live there with you are the ones you invite. (Did we mention that we're looking......

Only in Houston could a month with an average temperature of 90 degrees be considered refreshingly cool — but that's what July was, according to KHOU. Our average July temp of 90 was four degrees cooler that the normal July average, and the hottest temperature recorded last month was 96 — short of the near-100s we'll probably see later in the summer. The persistent rain was part of the reason for the low temperatures, but......

Good morning, Houston. Seems like everyone's listening to iPods these days, eh? And even if you don't have one of the near-ubiquitous mp3 players, all might not be peace and quiet: As the AP notes, iPod-related noise pollution is a growing problem. It can happen in several ways, including people who turn their iPods up to top volume and others who sing along with the music in their heads. Bbut there are ways to......

Good morning, Houston. You know what today is, right? It's the day before what's apparently the most important book in the history of the world, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, is released. If you're a Harryhead and a fan of Katy, our neighbor to the west, you should be delighted to know that Katy has been named the "Harryest" town in Texas — the distinction that goes to the town that pre-ordered the......

Good morning, Houston. If you're looking forward to Earthquest, the $600 million-plus, 250-acre theme park being planned for east Montgomery County, you should be happy to know that the park plan has gotten a boost: Earlier this month, Gov. Rick Perry signed legislation to enable tax incentives for the project. The park, to be built on Caney Creek near Highway 59 and FM 1485 in New Caney, is the brainchild of paleontologist Don Lessem,......

Sorry to break it to you on this lucky day, but there are more traffic headaches ahead on the Katy Freeway this weekend. This time around, the freeway will be closed in both directions between Wilcrest and Gessner beginning at 5 a.m. Saturday, and they won't re-open until 5 a.m. Monday. Feeder roads at the I-10/Beltway interchange will also be closed, so don't expect to be able to use them as a detour. Of course,......