🌱 Holy Insurance + Sports Meetup App

Wake up, Space City! It's me, Chris, your humble servant of the Houston Daily — coming right back at you with the plug on what's happening.

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But first, today's weather:

A stray afternoon shower. High: 66 Low: 45.

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Here are the top stories today in Houston:

1. A faith-based Houston insurance company is buried in nearly 200 complaints after leaving its consumers high and dry. Despite advertising claims saying the company offered legitimate full coverage insurance, customers have received insurance cards in the mail that state their new insurance policies aren't insurance at all. Instead, they are a part of something known as a health care sharing ministry that pools customer's money together to cover all members of the organization. However, the ministries are not regulated nor are they legally bound to pay claims. The Houston company in question is known as Jericho Share and is linked to a local church called the House of Prayer and Life. (KHOU.com)
2. Houston-based app sports app Teamates connects sport-minded Houstonians with one another so that they can enjoy their favorite hobbies among friends. Users of the app follow their favorite sports and then become informed about meetups for those sports in the app's social feed. Additionally, users can make posts about sporting events, request to join meetups, favorite friends, and enjoy all of the other functions of more generic social media apps. Whether its surfing, pickleball, soccer, biking, or any other sporty activity, Teamates may be able to link you up with fellow players and enthusiasts. (CultureMap Houston)
3. Latin-Mediterranean restaurant the Lymbar at the Ion in Midtown hopes to follow in the footsteps of father locations Churrascos and Americas. Owner David Cordua is son of Nicaragua-born chef Michael Cordua who introduced Houston to some of the best South American and Latin flavors have to offer. After studying cooking abroad and working underneath his father for 11 years, David Cordua is now running the show at the newly opened, posh Lymbar. The menu features Mediterranean and Latin favorites including empanadas, ceviche, various meat dishes with accompanied glazes, and more. The truffle Twinkies dessert in particular is something everyone should try at least once. (PaperCity Magazine)
4. The 36 day charity event Houston Restaurants Week managed to raise $1,240,811 million for the Houston Food Bank this year. That's a total of over $300,000 more in donations for the less fortunate than last year. Putting things into perspective, each dollar the non-profit receives provides three meals for someone in need. That's a total of nearly 4 million meals created this year. In 2023, Houston Restaurants Week will celebrate its 20th anniversary and look to break previously set annual donation records yet again. Their next charity event is the less expensive and more casual Eat Drink HTX occasion taking place in February. (CultureMap Houston)
5. Houstonians push for improvements to Westpark Tollway as wrong-way driving crashes and scares continue. Wrong-way drivers have become so common on the Tollway that the city put in place a wrong way detection system on the highway. Natalia Herrera, manager of a business near the Westpark Tollway, says her surveillance system catches multiple crashes on the highway a week. Since April of last year, six fatal wrong-way crashes have occurred on the toll road. Herrera said, "To be honest, I'm always waiting for a car to hit the building or to hit the office because it's crazy. They have to do something about it." Just last night, police detected and apprehended a drunk driver headed the wrong way on the tollway. (KTRK-TV)

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Headlines you need to see:

• Houston woman charged with scamming man with autism out of $35,000 (KHOU.com)
• League City Parkway, Walker Street intersection improvements to start next year (Community Impact Newspaper)
• Houston weather: Arctic blast could bring snow and land top 5 coldest Christmas morning to the city (KTRK-TV)
• Houston crime: Man hospitalized after he was allegedly beaten with a baseball bat at METRORail stop, HPD says (KTRK-TV)
• This day in Houston history, Dec. 16, 1951: 'Bottle-slinging youths' led by boy in wheelchair terrorize cafes (Houston Chronicle)

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Today in Houston:

• Film: National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation at Rooftop Cinema Club (6 p.m.)
• Theater: Panto Snow White and the Seven Dorks at Stages (7 p.m.)
• Theater: What-A-Christmas at Alley Theater (7 p.m.)
• Theater: The Nutcracker at The Wortham Center (7:30 p.m.)
• Concert: DJ Mohawk Steve at Discovery Green (8 p.m.)

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From my notebook:

• The emergency SOS feature on the iPhone 14s of two consumers led to their rescue after their car plummeted 300 feet into a canyon in the Angeles Nation Forest. Responders to the scene described the crash as a car having fallen off of the side of a mountain, but neither passenger was severely hurt. (ABC13 Houston via Facebook)
• The Houston Astros annual Fanfest event will be hosted on Jan. 21, 2023. The event provides Astros fans with the opportunity to meet their favorite players face to face. (FOX 26 Houston via Facebook)
• The largest cylindrical aquarium tank in the world holding over a thousand tropical fish at the Berlin hotel Radisson Blu burst this morning. The tank was 82-feet tall and police believe that exceedingly low temperatures led to a crack in the tank's glass. None of the fish in tank survived. (FOX 26 Houston via Facebook)

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Events:

• Uterine Fibroid Embolization Webinar by Medical Clinic in Houston (December 16)
• Breast Ultrasound Screening Coming Direct to You! (December 21)
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That's it for this week. Enjoy the weekend, and I'll catch up with you on Monday.