Good morning, Houston. One thing about the holiday season: You hear Christmas music everywhere you go (and if you haven't been hearing it, just tune in to Sunny 99.1 — you'll catch up quickly). With that in mind, we were interested to check out ASCAP's list of the most-played holiday songs this year. It was released on Dec. 4, but by that time, the group reported that 1,562 different holiday songs had already been......

Good morning, Houston. Hey, guess who's having a birthday today? Well, OK, it's technically not Houstonist — our second birthday was back on Nov. 20, but we figured that if the queen can have two birthdays, so can we. And so we're throwing ourselves a little birthday party tonight, and you're all invited. It starts at 6 p.m. at Monsoon Wok, Lamar at San Jacinto (yes, street parking is free downtown after 6). Six......

The local blog roundup may be a day late, but we can't be a dollar short if we're going to eat at Truluck's. Food in Houston reviewed the popular eatery this week and was not terribly impressed, although their wallets were. Truluck's offers swank without the risk, according to this post. Check out the full entry for a run-down of how Truluck's offers quality food and a fine-dining atmosphere while avoiding that snobby feel. No......

Trying to Change the World... One Blog at a Time picked up on a story that Houstonist wrote about yesterday: three HISD schools that were in jeopardy of being shut down. He raised a lot of the perennial good points about the problems with public education in America and increasing class stratification and questioned the notion that underperforming schools should be shut down. A good, thoughtful post from one of Houstonist's favorite readers and local......

City Council candidate Roy Morales probably has more important things to do than deal with a signmaker who has accused him of not paying $1,000 he owed for signs made during the 2005 election. The printer, Michael Franks, says that Morales also owes him $4,000 from this year's election. Morales didn't deny that he owed Franks the money. The Morales campaign told ABC's Miya Shay that they were working out a payment plan with the......

One of this week's most popular blogging topics was Senator Dan Patrick's trip to Hooter's. Miya Shay broke the story on her Houston Political Blog. It was re-blogged by Burnt Orange Report and several other Texas political blogs. Lone Star Times responded to the slight uproar that had been created in good humor, referring to the incident as "Fried Pickle-Gate," because Senator Patrick was at Hooter's with his son and his girlfriend, who likes the......

More on the story of the 21 guns that turned up missing from HPD's property room: The Chronicle reports today that independent police department investigator Michael Bromwich had warned city officials two years ago that conditions in the property room could lead to lost evidence. "The property room currently uses a number of forms to track chain of custody," Bromwich wrote in a June 2005 report. "The forms are cumbersome and archaic and increase the......

The Houston Archaeological and Historical Commission voted yesterday to begin the landmark designation process for the River Oaks Shopping Center, River Oaks Theater and Alabama Theater/Bookstop, the three significant Art Deco structures that have been in the news since news broke last summer that Weingarten Realty Investors could be planning to demolish them to make way for new development. The move toward designating the buildings city landmarks comes without Weingarten's approval — the first......

The last time we brought you Social-ist, we nearly ended up on National TV. Keyword being "nearly." But thanks to the damn terrorists, our appearance was shelved. We swear! Some people's priorities! Last night Houstonist scoped out Houston's own Project Runway winner Chloe Dao's Rice Village shop, Lot 8, for a Dress for Success fundraiser. From our count, most of the boutique's namesake, the eight Dao sisters, were in attendance, including sister Sydney, who can......

The Chronicle's Matt Stiles and KTRK's Miya Shay reported earlier this week on the "courtesy" program that allows certain local elected officials to park free at Houston's airports, noting that more than 100 city officials, state legislators and members of Congress have racked up around $100,000 in free parking under the perk. Officials have been offered the free parking since the 1980s; it's intended for use during official business, but some of the instances were......

So, the big political news around Harris County today is that County Judge Robert Eckels will step down. It's not like nobody expected the announcement — rumors have been going around for at least a couple of weeks — and it's not like we know when Eckels will quit or what he'll do afterward, but still, it's big news. Right? Eckels, reportedly fighting back tears, began his goodbye during Thursday's State of the County address:......