Well, here's one where you are more or less complaining about being harassed:

As for me looking for the error of my ways, I tend to do it too much I think. I'm a bit hard on myself. I've done some good things too. I try to balance things. I just finished a tile tub surround for a lady. She gave me a $500 bonus. Pretty wild eh?

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1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

For the tile, or helping her christen the new surround?

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Thanks for the tip on the Malt Shop. I will check it out the next time I am through that way.

One way I have found to beat some of the traffic on 75 through McKinney is to come off the Sam Rayburn and take the service road and not 75 north. You can zip along pretty good even during rush hour until you finally have to rejoin 75, but by the time you have to get back on much of the heavy traffic is behind you and things are moving pretty good again.

Of course, that was the way it was a few weeks ago. It could all be changed by now.

Texas is just one giant headless political machine with no one direction ,if they had built the tri city rail system from Houston ,Dallas and Austin proposed 20 yrs ago their would be alot less vehicles on the road . Instead they decide to build wider beltways encircling EACH city to patch work a mass construction program which has a political agenda of money support running from companies and projects to political connections. The real money is now in Toll Roads ,just search how many proposed TRs will be in the future for our state and you can start to see the built in devise these political types have set as road projects gaining favor via campaign contributers, out of one hand to another.The Gas industry Giants all wear big cowboy hats down here also so all Texans are screwed to the road with no sign of speed rail on this side of the pond .If speed trains were in Texas running times to Houston to Dallas would be shorter than the time it takes to watch a movie in a theatre ,the same for trips to Dallas / Austin .

I remember the push to build the high speed rail line you are talking about. I heard that what killed it was opposition from the airlines that saw their market shifting to rail. Since that project was a government supported one it was easy to bring pressure on the right people to kill it. The new line under discussion is a privately funded thing. Government will still have a say in some parts of it but as a private enterprise government input will be limited.

Miami has the stupidist roads and drivers of all places I've visited. Just a bit north and you've been transported to another planet which is much better.

I found Orlando drivers fell into three classes:
(1) lost tourists
(2) 90-somethings doing 40 mph in the left lane
(3) lifted pickup trucks with irritable rednecks that honked and tailgated if you did less than 15 mph over the limit in the right lane.

If rail had been a part of the city to city system proposed back in the day the percentage of cars entering and leaving a highly cummutered driven city would be dropped by 25% in most cases .In a City Planners eyes the Rail System would also have lessened the need for larger freeway projects ,the immediate value of easy travel times for travelers would be just a bonus to the cities it served. In its place we have laid witness to billions upon billions of dollars in Increased highway taxes $$$$$. The Dark Side to all this is the the Toll Road systems and the crooks who run them,take for instances the Hardy Toll Road here in Houston ,it was orig. designed to be a Toll Road BUT with an expiration date of 15 yrs thus becoming a regular city commutable road ,that was all forgotten ABOUT when the amount of money for the city was examined.
After recently watching a PBS program on a Rick Steves episode in which he was traveling in Europe via rail a point was made about some commuters giving up the need for cars all together ,the cities commuting system is that good.

Ditto on the Rick Steves european experiences traveling via rail. It is no secret the airlines have fought high speed rail; after all, going to the airport, parking then getting felt up by TSA agents, then boarding a sardine can tube filled with fat, overweight people and children kicking the back of your seat is the way to travel.........NOT