It’s no secret that we at Houstonist love music, especially of the live variety. We’re also not oblivious to the fact that Houston isn’t necessarily recognized as musical haven, especially not in Texas, which is why our collective ears tend to perk up when we hear about one of the few remaining stalwarts of live music in Houston in the news. On Sunday, KHOU did a piece on Walter’s on Washington and the never-ending......

From local Houston headlines, we bring you these weekend news bits...

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......

Hola, Houston. It's rodeo time. Everyone get happy. Throw ya hands in the air if you love Hannah Montana! Musical acts like Montana, rather the lack of Tejano acts on the rodeo bill, are just what have folks around Houston up in arms. Former State Senator Gonzalo Barrientos is calling for "friends across the whole great state of Texas not to attend the Houston livestock show, period." According to the ABC13.com story, the issue......

• A man who tried to run over his girlfriend after a Valentine's Day argument was killed on I-45 near Richey Road after he was struck by a vehicle while running away from sheriff's deputies. • Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, married Patricia Calmers and Paul Burgess in the cafe of IKEA on I-10 after the couple won a contest sponsored by the Swedish furniture company. Billy Gibbons is an ordained minister of the......

From local Houston headlines, we bring you these weekend news bits... • A bicyclist is in serious condition after being struck and dragged by MetroRail in the Medical Center. The bicyclist was wearing headphones and riiding between platforms. The incident occurred Friday afternoon around 4:45pm. • A car crashed into the State Grille on Alabama after losing control of the vehicle and jumping a curb. The driver had to be cut out of his......

• Over a dozen people have been robbed at gunpoint on and near Lower Westheimer. HPD says that the robbers approach victims with a gun, rob them of cash, cell phones, wallets and purses and a then a black truck pulls up and the robber and accomplice speed away. • HPD has a new toy. It's a 12 ton armored truck dubbed, "The Bear" and it will be used by SWAT and can transport......

• The woman who left her six children home alone while she ran off to Africa to meet a man she met on the internet is headed back home. Shanell Monique Mosley has been charged with child endangerment and abandonment and authorities will be waiting for her when she arrives. • A man who backed up into an HPD car during a car chase last night after a traffic stop got away by fleeing......

From local Houston headlines, we bring you these weekend news bits... • An HPD rookie officer was busted for selling 50 pounds of pot in an undercover sting. If convicted the officer could face two to twenty years in prison. • A frustrated Mom left her 10 year old daughter and 8 year old son at a Cy-Fair fire station Friday afternoon. According to fire station officials, the kids were told by the mother......

As the Texans 2007 campaign draws to a close on Sunday against the Jaguars, putting a bow on top of the most improved season in franchise history, we can look back at the highlights and lowlights. Pros: Mario Williams, the rock solid consistency of healthy Andre Johnson, Mario Williams, rookies Fred Bennet and Abomi Okoye, Mario Williams, possible tradebait Sage Rosenfels, Mario Williams, the revived Ron Dayne, Mario Williams, DeMeco Ryans' appearance on the national......

Good morning, Houston. So you say you're a Dynamo fan, eh? Well, here's your chance to prove it: The back-to-back MLS champs are auctioning off a chance to get close to the team's two MLS cups — literally. If you win the auction, the cups will be dropped off at your house on Christmas Eve and picked up Dec. 26; in between, you can do whatever you want with 'em (within reason, of course).......

Good morning, Houston. Are you a local news junkie? Do you already know all the headlines we're covering here? If so, we'd love to have you: Houstonist is looking to build its news staff, and you're invited. You should keep up with what's going on in and around Houston and be able to put up a couple of posts a week, at least; some background in journalism is always a plus. If it sounds......

Good morning, Houston. If you were an HPD cadet, you'd think you'd want to keep your nose clean — but apparently no one sent that memo to a cadet who was busted this weekend for allegedly buying and selling crack in southeast Houston. The man was caught off Scott and Nagle in the Third Ward; according to KHOU, he told police he had been smoking crack all weekend with at least two other HPD......

From local Houston headlines, we bring you these weekend news bits... • Ashley Benton, the 17 year old accused of murdering a 15 year old, has agreed to a plea bargain and will avoid prison time. • Former President George Bush's favorite BBQ joint, Otto's on Memorial is going to be razed to make way for new construction. There is no current date for the demise of Otto's, so go grab a Bush plate......

From local Houston headlines, we bring you these weekend news bits... • A World War II era ship that Texas A&M-Galveston used as a classroom at sea has been sunk in the Gulf of Mexico to create an artificial reef. • HPD is cracking down on ID Theft. Here's a story that focuses on one recent bust. • Hey, what do you know...people like public transportation. • The U of H Cougars beat Marshall,......

From local Houston headlines, we bring you these weekend news bits... • There's an Amber Alert for a missing teenager from Fort Bend Co. • Houston Dynamo knock off FC Dallas to advance in MLS Western Conference Playoffs • Local authorities have released artist renderings of Baby Grace • An HPD office was hurt overnight in an accident on the Gulf Freeway. • The Museum of Fine Arts has raised over 3 million dollars......

Good morning, Houston. Have you ever wondered why our freeways have multiple names — for example, I-45 south of downtown is also called the Gulf Freeway, the section through downtown is the Pierce Elevated and the part north of downtown is the North Freeway? Yeah, we have, too — and it seems we're not alone: The Chronicle's Tex-Arcana column tackled that question this weekend. The answer? In Houston, at least, the names tell where......

Local tech news in a compact, digital format. Keyboard Reviews Dwight Silverman over at The Chronicle has reviewed a couple of keyboards. One from Microsoft and another from Logitech. Check out his article for the lowdown on this new hardware. Raawwr! Leopard Unleashed The latest OS from Mac, Leopard 10.5 is on the loose. JKOnTheRun, Dwight Silverman and Dr. Mac have all recently run articles on this revolutionary new operating system from Apple. Metro......

Good morning, Houston. You might not remember it, but many local beaches used to be much wider than they are now — and soon, they'll be that wide again, thanks to a multimillion-dollar restoration project that's going to be announced today. The project will widen three miles of eroded beaches west of the Seawall in Galveston, Sylvan Beach in La Porte and other beaches in Surfside; the goal is to combat the erosion that's......

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. It's always nice to see our fair city get some love from outside — so we were happy to hear that Lester Holt and a crew from the Today show were in town filming yesterday for the show's "Cities They Love" segment. The point of "Cities They Love" is to showcase off-the-beaten-path attractions, so Today visited the Beer Can House, took a ride along Buffalo Bayou and checked in at the......

Good morning, Houston. Looks like there's another tropical disturbance out in the Gulf of Mexico — this one is called Invest 90L, and it looks like it could be headed for the upper Texas coast. The Chron's Eric Berger is keeping an eye on the system, which is located west of Florida and is headed in a general northwesterly direction; Berger reports that it could become a tropical storm by tomorrow, but isn't likely......

Good morning, Houston. In the mood for a really, really bad promotional video? It's your lucky day: May we introduce you to "The Metro Report", a quasi-Colbert Report-style production in which a host, Elliot Roberts, "interviews people on the street" about why they love riding public transportation. Which makes us wonder: Where'd Metro find all these people? Oh, right, they're actually actors — and, according to KTRK's Wayne Dolcefino, this bit of self-promotion cost......

Good morning, Houston. We just don't understand the entertainment juggernaut (or is it "juggernette?") that is Hannah Montana: Tickets to her Nov. 11 Toyota Center show sold out in five minutes Saturday, and now they're going for as much as $1,275 on eBay — granted, that's for a set of four tickets, but still, wow. The markup through eBay and ticket brokers has left some parents shelling out big bucks to give their kids......

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......

The latest in urban plight: copper theft. HPD Captain Caesar Moore, who oversees the burglary and theft division, told KUHF that they see about 250 metal-related thefts a month. Oftentimes, the copper is stolen from air conditioning units at churches, and Moore explained how this typically goes down: Usually it's drug related. They'll steal an air conditioning unit, the metal out of it and they may get $40 up to $80 for the copper parts......

Apparetly, the troubles at the HPD crime lab aren't quite over yet: An analyst in the lab was suspended last week, accused of improperly handling evidences, which means that police will have to review about 200 narcotics cases. The analyst, whom the Chronicle identifies as James K. Carpenter, reportedly "was not handling evidence in compliance with lab protocols," which led investigators with the police department's Internal Affairs Division to check out the lab last week.......

Good morning, Houston. In case you haven't noticed, it's finally hot. We've had temperatures in the high 90s so far this week, and coupled with high humidity, they're making it dangerously warm — so much so, in fact, that we were under a heat advisory yesterday. And it looks like today's temperatures will be about the same, so remember to avoid heat exhaustion by drinking plenty of fluids, avoiding strenuous outdoor activities in the......

What might be the world's shortest police chase ended tragically early Wednesday when a couple of suspects crashed an allegedly stolen van, killing one of them and critically injuring the other. It started around 3 a.m. Wednesday when someone in an apartment complex in the 5800 block of Fondren reported that a Dodge Caravan was being stolen; a police patrolman spotted the van leaving the complex and tried to pull the driver over — but......

We love getting the dirt on City Hall by reading the Chronicle's NewsWatch: City Hall blog. But it's usually not quite as titillating as something Matt Stiles put up yesterday: the story of a pink sex toy found in a men's room at the City Hall Annex. Stiles found out about the discovery when he got to his office yesterday: a police officer, a janitor and two security guards were huddled around a trash can......