Leading Off (11/21/11)

Tough Times For Dallas Tech Sector: In a new Forbes survey of technology jobs, Texas doesn’t fare well and Dallas fares worse, something the magazine admits is “shocking,” considering the area’s long-time role as a telecommunications powerhouse. Nonetheless, Dallas, “generally a job-created dynamo,” Forbes writes, “has seen roughly a quarter of its high-tech jobs go away, due primarily to losses in telecommunications carriers and in manufacturing of communications equipment and electronics.”

Hairdresser Murder Still Mystery: On November 3 around midnight, Elizabeth Lightfoot purchased two packets of ramen noodles at a Tom Thumb at the corner of Preston and Belt Line. An hour and a half later, and the woman was dead, her body and automobile burned. No one knows what happened or who did it, but what is baffling is that there is little evidence (sub. req.) that any of the typical explanations – sexual assault, robbery escalating to murder – apply.

Dried Up Lakes Reveal Underwater Ghost Towns: At a number of lake sites throughout the state, water receding from the drought has uncovered long submerged remnants of towns once flooded. Depleted Lake Whitney, south of Fort Worth, uncovered Native American tools and fossils. Underneath Lake Texoma, foundations from the long lost town of Woodville, Oklahoma are now visible again for the first time since the Red River was flooded to create the lake in 1944.