Everything legislators need to know about the special session

So, legislators, the big special session starts today. I'm guessing it will only be special in the constitutional sense, because Governor Perry won't let anybody have any fun. He has his three issues, and apparently he's stickin' to 'em.

According to the presiding officer in each house, all 3 of the relevant Senate bills will immediately be referred to the Finance Committee, and in the House, they'll be referred to 3 different committees.

What this means: this means that of the 181 of you (plus one freshly-married Lt. Gov.) forced against your will to return to Austin, approximately 112 of you will be bored out of your minds, with absolutely nothing to do until a final floor vote. This is dangerous. Very. Very. Dangerous.

In fact, it's so dangerous that this seems like the perfect time to remind everybody of the hapless Drew Nixon. Senator Nixon was a very bored Senator indeed. He was so bored that during the legislative session of 1997, he took himself for a little drive down South Congress, and was subsequently arrested after he was videotaped soliciting a woman for sex. That woman turned out to be an undercover police officer doing a prostitution sting operation. As you might imagine, Senator Nixon didn't remain in the Texas Senate very long after his rural East Texas constituents learned of this tidbit (word on the street is that the East Texans weren't so upset that he had broken the law, as much as they were jealous that he almost got some, with a person who wasn't his cousin). Nixon didn't even get a free state-paid trip to Argentina like a certain South Carolina Governor apparently did recently.

So, Texas Legislators, we urge you: take up chess. Or poker. Or something else that doesn't include the likelihood of a squad car and a mug shot.

But wait: Letters From Texas Worldwide Headquarters always goes the extra mile to serve you, the crap-reading public. An additional helpful tip is in order, in case you decide to ignore our advice to take up chess.

In case you decide to take yourself for a little drive anyway, we will now tell you how the average innocent-as-the-driven-snow bored Texas legislator would be able to tell the difference between a legitimate prostitute, and an undercover police officer. We happen to know the answer to that question, because during the Drew Nixon episode, we asked one of Austin's Finest that very question. And by "one of Austin's Finest," of course we mean "one of Austin's oldest and most grizzled cops."

His answer (to be read with the same long drawn-out Texas drawl in which it was delivered): "Well, as a general rule of thumb, it's real easy to tell a real prostitute from one of our officers: if you'd f[have sex with] her, she's one of ours." Well, clear enough. Hard to believe they didn't cover this material in your freshman orientation class.

As further evidence of the wisdom of this grizzled old officer's words, we now present to you a photo line-up of the people the Knoxville Tennessee newspaper has posted as the area's most popular - I repeat, MOST popular - prostitutes in their coverage area.

Chess is sounding better and better all the time, huh boys?

And oh yeah, you also need to know that things will move faster than you think, but slower than Perry hopes, and that Perry's not going to add your constituent's precious bill to the agenda. That's pretty much it in a nutshell.