Swamped!

Since Monday, we've recorded 5.58" of rain here in our Northshore neighborhood. Anyone got an ark?

Best of Flower Mound #3: Restaurants

In many of my previous restaurant reviews, I've said I'm no professional food critic. I'm just a Flower Mounder who likes to eat out. Same goes for the rest of my family.

It's hard to pick just one restaurant to call the best in Flower Mound. So I'll leave you with four opinions from the four people in our family. So here's the Flower Mound Road official "Best of Flower Mound Road Restaurants Survey":

My 6-year-old daughter's favorite: McDonalds (I presume it's the one closest to our house, but she didn't specify)

My 11-year-old son favors Culver's.

My wife loves the casual atmosphere and the good food at Alforno's.

And my favorite -- out of all the restaurants in Flower Mound ... it's a close call, but I'm going with Pazzo. Lately I've been getting more pizza from Palio's, but over the long haul of the time I've lived here, Pazzo's been at the top of the list for a longer period of time.

More delays for FM2499

I think I've written this headline before. I traded voice mails today with a Town of Flower Mound staffer who told me it will now be July before TxDOT gives us 6 lanes of FM2499 between FM3040 and Spinks. It looks like it's ready to open now, but they're not going to open it until they get that median landscaping just right. The staffer says there was some seepage under part of the road, and that caused a delay above and beyond the delay caused by the rainy weather.

Best of Flower Mound #2: Paula Paschal

Paula Paschal (nee Lawrence) has served as Town Secretary longer than I've lived here. Not only is she a nice person, but she's been enormously helpful when I've asked for records. I've filed several Open Records requests over the years, and she makes sure I get a quick response every time. Thanks Paula for all your help.

Best of Flower Mound #1: Traffic

I guess it's hard to relate the words "best of Flower Mound" and "traffic" in the same sentence, but I'll tell you what works here. I like the way the roads are laid out. Unlike Lewisville, where the streets are laid out in a grid, Flower Mound is built around a framework of old country roads that were draped across the community in such a way to connect important places together. The Flower Mound map may appear more irregular in the way the city's laid out, but there are better shortcuts to get from point A to point B. Morriss Road, Firewheel Road, even Flower Mound Road (west of FM2499) are good examples of point-to-point roads that take you directly where you want to go, without having to go up-and-over like you would in a grid.

Free custard at Culvers Thursday

Culver's (FM2499 at FM3040, near Chili's) is advertising free custard tomorrow, Thursday June 21. I saw their ad emblazoned on the baggie that my Star-Telegram came in this morning. No strings, no buy-one-get-one-free, just free custard. If you haven't been to Culver's, they have a wide variety of food on their menu, including their signature custard (think soft-serve ice cream). They have two house flavors (vanilla is one, is chocolate the other?) and then they run a flavor-of-the-day, which is always advertised on their electronic marquee on FM3040.

The end of the Road, at least for this blogger

The news I promised is about as big as it gets for me and my family. As one reader predicted last night in the comments of a previous post, I am indeed leaving Flower Mound. We're moving to Richmond Virginia, where I'll be the news director for WTVR-TV Channel 6, the CBS station there. It's a big step for me in my career. A TV newsroom is much like a baseball team. Right now at FOX, in baseball terms, I'm an assistant coach (perhaps the 3rd base coach or the pitching coach). Where I'm going, I'll be the manager, in charge of the entire team.

It will be very difficult to leave our Flower Mound home and our neighbors here. We love it here, and we have hundreds and hundreds of friends here. My wife and I have both enjoyed our respective TV jobs in downtown Dallas. But when the call came last week with the chance to advance my career, and live in a city that I also love, I jumped on it.

I'll be leaving here in early July. But before I leave, there are some things to wrap up. I'll need to find someone to take over the nominal oversight I've given so far to RoundTheMound.com. And you know, if one of my readers makes a good case, I might even let them take over this blog. Send me a pitch if you're interested.

My swansong on this blog will be one final gift to my readers and the Town I love so much. I'll sign off by doing a Top 10 list -- the Top 10 things I love most about Flower Mound. I'll try to do a post every day, starting tonight or tomorrow. If I miss a day, don't shoot me -- there's just a lot going on. I'll catch up.

Writing this blog has been a great joy in my life. I hope you've enjoyed reading along. I appreciate all your comments over the years. My e-mail address will stay the same (chip@smartbusy.tv). Please stay in touch, and let me know if there's any way I can help. I'll be watching to see what happens around Flower Mound, and I can't wait to visit again. My parents still live nearby, so we'll be back!

I've got a great house to sell now, and I'll be posting more about that later tonight or tomorrow! People have always told us that if we ever decided to sell our home, they wanted to know first. So here's your heads up. Watch this blog for more details tonight or tomorrow.

What the --? It's 2am, and that's the tornado siren!

Since I help produce FOX 4's severe weather coverage, I'm usually at the TV station when the big storms roll through. So in my 11 years of living in Flower Mound, I've never been here to hear the Flower Mound tornado sirens go off - until tonight.

Tonight's sudden storm was pretty freakish. It wasn't a classic severe weather situation, but it was a close call. The National Weather Service issued a tornado warning about 1:40 this morning because they saw some storm circulation tightening near Trophy Club. As the storm moved through, it didn't maintain that circulation very well, and from what I can see, the tornado threat passed here without any apparent incident.

Actually I got a head start on the sirens. My wife is in charge of the morning news team at a competing TV station, and she was already up getting ready to go to work. She got us up out of bed, and believe it or not, the four of us (plus the dog) actually all fit into the closet below the stairs while the sirens blared.

Back to sleep, I hope. The little one is right next to me, still scared from the big show tonight.

Did the sirens wake you up?

7am Update; The storms overnight dropped another 1.52" of rain here. That makes 3.83" of rain since Friday night.

By the way, it's raining again

12 midnight, and whaddya know? It's raining again. I'm waiting for the little one upstairs to wake up, but so far she's sleeping sound.

For the weekend, we had another 2.31" of rain. So far tonight, at least one half inch by my estimation looking outside the living room window. And now I see the National Weather Service has put Denton County under a Flash Flood Warning.

Big announcement Monday

As promised, I expect to announce some big news tomorrow. There has been some interesting speculation posted by Road readers in the comments of my posts earlier this week. All I can say is that the news will affect me a great deal. It will affect several other people significantly. And it will affect all of you Road readers at least a little.

One comment posted below predicted I'd be announcing the opening of the first stretch of the expanded FM2499. I only wish I had that power!

See you tomorrow. Check back in the afternoon, and I'll do my best to have the news posted by then. Meantime, enjoy four new regular Flower Mound Road posts immediately below.

Is this how lizards die?

I wish I had a picture of this. The other day, while I was at work, my kids and my dog discovered a lizard (about 12-14 inches long, most of it tail) climbing up one of our backyard trees. It stayed motionless, as if it were playing dead. It was perched vertically, with its head at the top and its long tail draping below. My wife swore it moved its head, and then responded when she poked it with a stick. But the lizard never left its spot.

When I got home hours later, it was still there. I told them to leave it be. The next morning, still there, still hanging to the tree. It poured overnight, so I figured it couldn't be just hanging out. Sure enough, when I stuck it, it was dead. Do lizards die upright when they're climbing trees? Weird.

Northshore Club gas wells planned

The Northshore Club has been around since the 1950s, I think. They own a large tract of beautiful land on Grapevine Lake, right behind the Villages of Northshore, where I live. They've been great neighbors. Outside of a little occasional gunfire (they have a range), I never hear anything from them.

Now I read on their website, and specifically in their newsletter, that they are close to making a deal to allow natural-gas drilling on their property. I've e-mailed two Northshore Club leaders to find out where they plan to locate the wells. Developing ...

Thank goodness for more apartments!

Why am I ecstatic about the new apartments on FM2499 just over the Grapevine line? Because the new apartments cover up the hideous Hillwood warehouse that greets drivers as they come into Flower Mound from the south.

From finger-lickin good to an eyesore

Worse than not having a neighborhood KFC is having a closed KFC building that looks like this, behind Walgreens at FM2499 and FM3040.

I hate to be a tease ...

... but I've got to put off the big news until Monday. It's a bit out of my hands. And while you're here, let me reset your expectations. In my previous post, when I wrote "this little corner of Flower Mound", I meant just that. My news is about as local as local news can get. But in some ways, it is big news too. You can be the judge. Sorry for the delay. Thanks for your patience!

Stay tuned for big news!

Can't say much else, other than it will be the biggest news to hit this corner of Flower Mound in years. Check back Thursday.

Would you do this job?

Sign on the front door of Walgreens (2499 & 3040) tonight: "Wanted Overnight Clerk: Work 8 nights. 6 nights off."

8 on, then 6 off? I'm almost tempted.

Saturday AM update: Road opening

Little Pete's now hopes to be available for automobile traffic later today. The Corps expects to have their road open sometime this afternoon.

Update on Little Pete's: Bring Your Oars

This is pretty interesting -- the latest e-mail today from Little Pete's:

Hello Everyone! Okay, the road is shut down for the next few days, but we (and the marina) are getting creative!

Little Pete’s is going to OPEN for business today (June 8th), Saturday, and Sunday, with regular business hours! So, we will open today at 11:30 a.m. for LUNCH and will open at 8 a.m. on Sat. & Sun. We will still have Karaoke tonight (we went ahead and cancelled Filet of Soul for tonight), Dear John will play tomorrow, and Bob & Frank will be back on Sunday!

Having said that…you must go to TWIN COVES PARK for a FREE SHUTTLE to Little Pete’s & the marina by boat. The marina will be running a shuttle during the day, and Duckriders will take over at night. All you have to do is get to TWIN COVES PARK, park your car, and take the shuttle over. It’s only a 6 minute boat ride and will run all day & night, until about 1 a.m. We even heard that there might be some refreshments on the shuttle boat!

When it sucks to be at the end of the road

Greetings from your Nation's Capitol, where I'm officing for a couple of days. This breaking news dispatch came in the e-mail tonight from the folks at Little Pete's:

Hey Everybody – we got the call tonight around 8 p.m. that the corp. is shutting down the windy road for 7 days. Apparently, it was worse than they thought. Once they caved in the road to repair it, they found another huge hole on the other side of the road underneath, and therefore, have shut the entire road down for a week.

We are going to try to stay open for business, but we won’t know anything until the morning. We are truly sorry for the inconvenience. We just wanted to give you a heads up, and we will keep you posted. More details to follow as we know them. I hope we can answer more questions in the morning.

Until the hole in the road is fixed, I hope you have a boat to get to Little Pete's. Or perhaps a helicopter. We'll keep you posted.

In a related story, a friend of mine here in DC just flew in from Cincinnati. He said his flight had to be suddenly rerouted off of one Cincy runway, because it cratered too!

Speaking of restaurants...

... let's you and me start a Restaurant Customer Bill of Rights. I've heard reported that we here in the greater DFW area eat out more often, as a whole, more often than people in any other city in the world. (I think Paris France is a close second.) Indeed, there are lots of restaurants born here that grow into chains elsewhere. We love our eatin' out, don't we?

So let's start this Bill of Rights. I'll pitch the first one.

1. Any restaurant that doesn't take reservations should immediately adopt "call-ahead seating". The new Life's a Beach does it. It saved us a 60-minute wait a couple of weeks ago on a Saturday night. Every restaurant should do this.
   

Your turn. Post a comment, and I'll promote the best ones to this space on the blog.

The Anamia's seating bluff

Last night the Mrs and I were looking for a dinner venue, and we settled quickly on the always-popular Anamia's, just across FM2499 from our neighborhood. During rush hour, Anamia's usually requires a wait in the small foyer before seating. But what happened last night was a first.

We pull into Anamia's around 6:15pm and we ask for a table on their patio. (Last night was beautiful, perfect for outdoor dining.) The hostess tells us it will be 25-30 minutes. No problem tonight, so we decide to wait. We have to stand at first because there's no available seating, but a moment later, a couple of chairs open up, so we take them. Within 2 minutes, the entire waiting area is cleared, and within another minute after that, we're seated at our table. So while we were promised (threatened?) a 25-30 minute wait, we were seated within 4 minutes. It's certainly better than the other way around, but what's up with that?

The harsh realities of the new FM2499

I'm still impatiently waiting for the 99%-completed stretches of FM2499 to be opened. They promised late May. I know it's rained a ton around here, but the only work that has to be done (by my estimation) south of FM3040 is the leveling of the grass in some of the medians. And how would rain stop that from taking place? All the concrete is poured, as are all the fancy brick work in some of the medians.

The new road will help move traffic a lot faster, so hopefully we'll have fewer backups at the key intersections (namely FM3040 and FM1171). But there's a price to pay.

• Driving northbound, no more left turns into the Kroger shopping center. Same coming southbound -- no more turning left to go to Celebrity Bakery. You'll have to turn early and snake through the parking lots, or U-Turn at 1171 or Churchill.
  
• Where you can cross FM2499 (for instance, at Northshore Blvd.), you'll have to be able to cross both sides of traffic at the same moment. There won't be enough room in between the two sides of FM2499 to idle in the median safe-zone. I can't see how we'll ever cross FM2499, coming out of Northshore.
  

How will the FM2499 change things for you, for worse or for better?