Jan
8th
Sun

42/365: Fritellas in College Station. Boy Howdy!

41/365: Fritellas at Fritella Italian Cafe with @geeology. Mmmm, boy howdy

February 11, 2011.

My first time stopping in Aggieland, College Station, Texas. Sarah took me to Fritella’s Italian Cafe where we ordered Fritellas which are essentially yummy calzones!

After having our fill, we joined the Valentines’ Dance Party hosted by the Christian fellowship Sarah was a part of while at Texas A&M. Think 80s & 90s proms meeting present day dance parties. Of course leaving room for Jesus & appropriate dress & dancing, but still having a blast. Loved it. The music beats were jamming & the company was delightful. Thanks Sarah.

36/365: Houston Dynamo’s New Stadium Groundbreaking

Groundbreaking the new @HoustonDynamo stadium! Woohoo! Goal!

February 5, 2011.

On Saturday, February 5, the weather cleared up and the blistering cold subsided just a tad. However, there was no stopping the Houston Dynamo’s New Stadium Groundbreaking party & the fans & soccer enthusiasts who flocked in. Houston’s MLS soccer team, the Dynamo, will have their own stadium mid-2012.

I was impressed by the club & players’ openness and friendliness shown to fans. After the groundbreaking’s formal ceremony, eager fans simply surrounded their calm soccer heroes and received their signatures and pictures.

Sarah Gee (awesome!) below invited me to come out & introduced me to many of her friends and former coworkers at the Houston Dynamo.

36/365: Sarah & I Go Go Dynamo

KHOU 11 News story & Dynamo website article. More of my photos from the groundbreaking here.

Mar
2nd
Wed

33/365: Hello, 20 degree temps! Rolling Power Outages

33/365: Hello 20 degree temperatures! Why is our power out? Thanks Reliant Energy, rolling blackouts

Welcome to a couple of the coldest days in Houston! Especially in February.

During this time, ERCOT (Electric Reliability Counsel of Texas) began initiating rolling electricity black outs throughout Houston (and Texas) to keep up with the high demand of electricity-intensive home heaters. An investigation has been launched into ERCOT’s decision reports the Wall Street Journal.

32/365: Bitter Sweet Freedom, Jury Duty Summons

32/365: Bitter sweet freedom. Entire jury panel busted and released.

Postponed once because of our product’s December release date, my jury duty day was upon me. An odd time slot of 12:15pm loomed over my day putting a damper on any afternoon coding plans / meetings and possibly for the remainder of the week.

The day happened to coincide with Suit Up Day @ PROS so I decided to keep my suit on to let the judge know I meant business… I made my way to the courthouse through the blustery cold & wind after taking the rail from my office into downtown.

On the Metro Rail on my way to Jury Duty summons, should I speak w/ a thick Russian accent.

Houston Jury Room downtown off Congress. Civic duty :)

Some cameraman argues with a Houston Police Officer. Eventually let in...

Some cameraman argues with an HPD officer. Eventually is let in… apparently he was filming the DA.

Took the Oath & now we're on a break. District Attorney gave a lil pep talk

Taking an Oath!

 They haven't called my number yet... 20 of us still wait!

I wasn’t a part of the first few juror calls, but with ~20 people left I thought for sure we would be free to go. NOPE. They called all of us to line up and a sheriff walked us over through the howling wind to the Harris County Criminal Justice Center where we passed through a metal detector.

Now we walk outside in the crazy wind to our court

At the Harris County Criminal Justice Center... gonna go thru metal detector

View from our Jury deliberation room! Does this mean we're picked?

We then went up into a juror deliberation room while the judge reviewed a list of all of us. He then called us all in and debriefed us on the importance of serving as a juror and being impartial & basing our verdict on the facts presented to us. Each representing side of the court asked several pointed questions pertaining to the case both to us as a whole and individually.

Due to the subject matter of the case (DWI) and involvement in some way of almost everyone on the jury panel, the judge declared our entire panel a “bust” and dismissed us all.

Someone is missing their hot date's number. Officer Evans...

Taking the rail back, I found that someone is missing their hot date’s number. Officer Evans…

Feb
15th
Tue

31/365: Fog in Houston

31/365: Fog in Houston

Monday night, the last day of January, in Houston was a foggy foggy night. The beginning of a crazy odd week of weather in Houston. My street had an eerie stillness to it disturbed only by the occasional wandering cat.

30/365: Phil Wickham Sings It Out

30/365: At @philwickham concert singing it out to our God! Fun night w/ @geeology & @TheRealCDub09

Sunday, Sarah invited me to a Phil Whickham concert at Friendswood Community Church. I met several more cool, Freebirds-loving Aggies there (Chris, Jamison, Ian…). An amazing night of praise & worship to our loving God followed!

A Divine Romance
by Phil Whickham 

The fullness of Your grace is here with me
The richness of Your beauty’s all I see
The brightness of Your glory has arrived
In Your presence God, I’m completely satisfied

FOR YOU I sing I dance
Rejoice in this divine romance
Lift my heart and my hands
To show my love, to show my love

A deep deep flood, an Ocean flows from You
Of deep deep love, yeah it’s filling up the room
Your innocent blood, has washed my guilty life
In Your presence God I’m completely satisfied.

Listen to “Divine Romance” here