Whipped Cream Difficulties

The crawfish of Lake Tahoe.

No snark here: I think this story is awesome for several reasons.

1. It is an example of the “defeat invasive species by eating them” strategy.
2. I like crawfish.

Chuy’s is planning a stock offering. I like Chuy’s Mexican restaurants; they’re the most tolerable TexMex I’ve found in Austin so far, if you can deal with the crowd. But there is something I’m curious about:

Chuy’s was founded in 1982 by Mike Young and John Zapp with a single restaurant at 1728 Barton Springs Road in Austin. The company now operates 32 restaurants in seven states.

Are all the restaurants Chuy’s? A long time ago, the Chuy’s holding company ran the Romeo’s on Barton Springs, but they spun that off (and the restaurant closed several years later). I believe Chuy’s still runs the Hula Hut on Lake Austin, but I can’t find any proof of that. I’m thinking the Chuy’s holding company also runs a couple of other non-Chuy’s, but I can’t find a complete list of their holdings online.

Balko and Reason, among others, have been all over the painkiller issue. The government repeatedly and consistently has attempted to make criminals out of doctors who legitimately prescribe high doses of painkillers for patients suffering from intractable pain. Not just that; the government has stomped on the First Amendment by going after patient advocacy organizations, and has even threatened to shut down pharmacies for filling prescriptions.

As a Libertarian, I come down on the Balko/Reason side. Actually, I think if people want to take painkillers, they should be available OTC without a prescription; heck, let’s have the autonomous Glock/heroin/Oxycodone vending robots now!

But this s–t ain’t helping:

Though the X-ray for a German shepherd had the dog’s name, Recon, and the name of an animal hospital printed on it, the doctor wrote the deputy a prescription for a powerful narcotic painkiller and a muscle relaxant, law enforcement officials said.

On the other hand:

• the doctor’s license was placed on probation in 1996 “after accusations that included excessive prescribing”.
• “In 2010, the medical board required the doctor to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. Doctors evaluating him expressed concern that he might have had ‘early signs of dementia,’ according to medical board documents.”
• He was convicted of a felony for “taking illegal kickbacks in return for referring Medicare patients for home health services”.

How in the frack did this man even have a license to practice?