Good morning, Houston. Sure, we may grumble when TSA agents ask us to take our laptop out of our bag when we go through airport security, but we should look on the bright side: At least we aren't Mandi Hamlin, a Dallas-area woman who says she was forced to remove her nipple ring with pliers so she could board a plane last month. Hamlin, 37, was on her way to Dallas from Lubbock when a TSA agent's handheld scanner picked up on her nipple rings; she offered to bare her breasts to the female agent, but she said the agent told her she would have to take the rings out. She did — with the help of the pliers — and was allowed to board the plane even though she was still wearing a belly button ring, which apparently wasn't a national security threat. Now, Hamlin is calling for a civil rights investigation and an apology from the feds: "My experience with TSA was a nightmare I had to endure," she said at a news conference yesterday. "No one deserves to be treated this way."

>> Pleas expected in City Hall payraise scandal: Remember two years ago, when news broke that staffers in the mayor pro tem's office had allegedly taken more than $200,000 in unauthorized bonuses and payraises? Well, here's more: Two of the four people accused in the scandal are expected to plead guilty or no contest this morning. Rosita Hernandez, one of the women, is expected to enter a plea without a deal with prosecutors, which will leave her punishment up to state District Judge Michael McSpadden. The other, Florence Watkins, will also be sentenced by McSpadden, but her attorney told the Chronicle that he's going for deferred adjudication, which would mean she could end up with a clean criminal record (Watkins, if you remember, said she knew she was wrong for taking the extra money when the scandal was making headlines back in February 2006). The pleas will leave two people unaccounted for: Theresa Orta, whose attorney maintains that she is "100 percent innocent," and Christopher Mays, whose attorney the Chron couldn't reach yesterday.

>> We doubt that's in the 'firefighter' job description: Two years after a couple of volunteer firefighters were arrested for a spate of arsons in the Cloverleaf area, three families whose homes burned are suing Harris County, claiming little has been done to help them. "They wouldn't even admit to it, that this house was on the list. They never admitted to anything," Mary Renterias, one of the plaintiffs, told KTRK. "No one's responded in any way, shape or form." The issue, said Cloverleaf Volunteer Fire Department Chief Michael Batisse, is that the firebugs — Jason Southard and Marvin Romero — acted on their own, not as part of the fire department. Even so, plaintiffs' attorney Mark Weycer said the department ought to be held responsible. "They failed to supervise these firefighters," he told Channel 13. "We believe they were negligent in hiring these individuals."

>> This weekend's weather: Aside from a slight chance of rain tomorrow and Sunday, things should stay pretty much like they have been through the weekend: clouds and sun all day, with afternoon highs around 80 and lows in the mid-60s.

Speaking of more of the same, guess what comes after the jump?

• Kerry Stevens, the former secretary to ex-Harris County DA Chuck Rosenthal, has retired
• An 11-year-old Montgomery County boy found his parents dead at home Wednesday after a murder-suicide
• And elsewhere in MoCo, a woman was arrested earlier this week when police found pornographic pictures of her 6-year-old daughter in her home
• Joshua Mauldin, the man convicted of burning his baby in a Galveston hotel microwave, is refusing to give up parental rights
• Texas' unemployment rate dropped to 4.1 percent in February, the lowest in 30 years
• In Houston, the economy continued growing in February, albeit more slowly than last year
• As more red-light cameras were put up around Houston, the number of citations went down
• In League City, residents are getting upset over a dilapidated apartment complex that still hasn't been torn down
• Hermann Park's Lake Plaza will close this week for a year-long, $15 million renovation
• Word from HISD as statewide steroid testing of student athletes begins: We're all clean so far!
• A Continental plane landed safely at Bush Intercontinental yesterday after four of its tires blew
• A 15-year-old girl was nearly abducted while walking home from school in Sugar Land on Tuesday, the third such incident in two weeks
• The Texas A&M regents have approved tuition hikes ranging from 4 to 14 percent