Life at a Standstill

I-30 is not pretty.

What Would You Do?

So, say you have a coworker that not only taps his foot constantly and drums on his desk, but also whistles. Not any particular tune, and not for a short duration, but long spates of tuneless whistling.

Now, assuming you are working someplace with a less-than-liberal HR policy manual, do you:

a) Punch him in the throat;

b) Turn your iPod up, and risk going deaf;

c) Tell this person everything about him irritates you and risk cutting off your supply of bean burritos with extra red sauce;

d) Sneak in early one morning, and empty the better part of an entire tube of Super Glue in his ever-present jar of Carmex;

e) something creative from a random FrontBurnervian.

About Those DISD Whistleblowers

I mentioned this morning that some DISD whistleblowers were getting a nice payday. The DMN wasn’t clear on this point, but DISD is not paying this round of settlements. They paid two earlier settlements totaling about $1.5 million. Yesterday’s $1.4 million, though, will be paid by HP. Jon Dahlander, the district’s spokesman, points us to the settlement, if you’re inclined to read the whole thing.

Leading Off (11/11/10)

1. This morning on FrontBurner, it’s not about winning. It’s about rediscovering effort. And reinventing compassion. And prospecting for stick-to-it-iveness. Accordingly, we are typing in full pads.

2. We mentioned earlier in this space that the Cowboys had trouble keeping their website up earlier this week. The News wrote about it, too. But there’s something charming about the way this British news outlet described the snafu:

A leading US professional sports outfit saw its website go down this week following the failure to renew its domain name. Struggling American Football club the Dallas Cowboys — who have lost seven of their first eight fixtures this season — witnessed a number of days of downtime following the administrative oversight.

Makes it sound like the Cowboys lost some drawer pulls in their kitchen.

3. We’ve had three suicides in two days on our roadways. One guy jumped from the High Five. Another hung himself from the Houston Street viaduct. [shaking head, having a hard time understanding the need to turn such a tragic act into a public spectacle]

4. If my math is correct, yesterday’s settlement of a whistleblower suit in connection with the computer contract shenanigans at DISD means the district has now paid out nearly $3 million to whistleblowers who were involved with this case. Suggestion to DISD teachers: might want to focus less on the teaching and more on the whistleblowing. It pays better. [Update: HP paid yesterday's settlement.]