English Bulldog Puppies for Sale in College Station, TX

City tourism organization and university use final rodeo weekend to promote Aggieland

HOUSTON, Texas (KBTX) - Visit College Station and Texas A&M are promoting the community at the Houston Rodeo as the event enters its final weekend.

Visit College Station set up a booth at the rodeo for the first time, creating an experiential display to showcase what the city has to offer.

“We’re promoting College Station and visiting, coming and staying in our hotels, eating in our restaurants,” said Angie Bertinot, the marketing manager for Visit College Station. “It’s a really a big play for us but it’s been a perfect fit.”

Bertinot said the organization wanted to make a big first impression.

“Our campaign is learn why you’ll love it here. And that’s part of our advertising campaign. So our little twist on it is learn why you’ll love Rd. tripping it here,” Bertinot said.

The booth has been handing out luggage tags, bandanas and temporary tattoos.

Texas A&M Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences has also been at the rodeo throughout the month with a recruitment booth stocked with information and giveaways.

Juna Glasscock with the Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences school said the booth helps raise awareness of the college and university.

“It’s just getting the name of the college and the university out there. When we have people that are at events, they can educate people or if there’s questions, they can easily answer them because most of them, it’s their job to be answering questions,” Glasscock said.

As Texas A&M Night got underway, Glasscock said Aggies were stopping by the booth.

“We’ve had a lot of people stop by tonight, even just giving us a gig ‘em, a howdy, or saying their class years and seeing if maybe we know people that they do,” Glasscock said. “And then we have some who are current students that have stopped by and they just see our cut out of Miss Rev and they want to say hi or take a picture.”

College Station City Manager Bryan Woods attended the festivities with his daughter. He said the rodeo is an opportunity to reach people in Houston and other areas around Texas.

“It’s really the perfect combination of everything for us to be here and be able to meet all the Aggies coming in and hopefully those who aren’t in College Station anymore can remember what it was like to be there and come back and visit. So it’s exciting. It’s the perfect night,” Woods said.

Representatives from both Visit College Station and Texas A&M said the rodeo run was successful and they hope to return next year.

A Utah-born “dirty soda” trend has arrived in College Station with FiiZ Drinks, the first Brazos Valley shop offering customized sodas mixed with syrups, fruit purees and cream.

COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KBTX) - A Utah-born viral beverage trend is making its way into the Brazos Valley, with a new soda shop aiming to become a gathering spot for locals.

The trend is called “dirty soda,” a customized drink that starts with a soda base and adds flavored syrups, fruit purees or cream.

FiiZ Drinks opened just off Texas Avenue South in College Station. Co-owner Sophie Platt said it’s the first business in the area to bring the viral “dirty soda” concept to the community.

Why is dirty soda a viral trend?

Platt said the idea gained attention through the reality TV show The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives and Utah’s enthusiasm for mixing flavors into sodas.

“Dirty soda kind of started from the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives,” Platt said. “And it’s kind of anything that you could ever imagine putting into a soda that we can do.”

Platt said the shop offers a range of options, including 39 syrups and soda choices such as Pepsi, Coke, Dr Pepper, Mountain Dew and much more along with add-ons like cream or whipped cream.

Some of the most popular flavors, she said, include coconut, pineapple, strawberry and raspberry, along with classic vanilla. She said FiiZ Drinks also has nine sugar-free flavors, including pomegranate and cranberry.

Platt demonstrated one of her favorites, a Dr Pepper-based drink called the “Pirate Jack,” adding coconut, pineapple and raspberry syrups before topping it with cream.

Building a local tradition

Platt, 25, said she is a Texas A&M graduate from the Class of 2022 with degrees in public health and nursing and previously worked as a nurse.

She said opening in College Station was about more than launching a business.

“This town has a special place in my heart,” Platt said. “I wanted to give back to the community that gave so much to me.”

Platt said her husband is from Bryan. The couple moved back to the area in 2024 after living in Killeen for about two years.

Platt added that she hopes the shop can provide a place where residents can create their own traditions.

“This community is rooted into traditions,” Platt said.

Platt noted that she owns the business with her parents, and it started as a family idea that quickly turned into a new path.

“At the dinner table, we were discussing maybe, possibly the idea of doing something similar to this, and the next day, he’s like, ‘Okay, we’ve got a meeting on Friday. We’re doing it,’” Platt said.

In addition to drinks, Platt said FiiZ Drinks sells sweet treats and snacks, including pretzel bites, churro bites, cookies, cookie dough and “FiiZ puffs,” which she described as beignets filled with cookie butter or chocolate.

Platt said the response since opening has exceeded expectations.

“Never in my wildest dreams have I thought that we were going to be this successful and this popular,” Platt said.

The shop’s grand opening is on Saturday, March 21, with a limited menu of six free drinks, gift card giveaways and stickers.

Dick Bedford Simmons Sr. passed away peacefully in his sleep on Sunday, February 22nd, 2026 while in the care of Cornerstone Specialty Hospitals in Conroe, TX. Dick Simmons (or “Papa" as he was lovingly called by his children and grandchildren) was born in Houston, TX on December 24th, 1937 and was the third of six children to Emma Louise (Baker) and Charlie Duncan Simmons.

The following is the summary of a passage from Dick B. Simmons Sr. himself, as written in his Storyworth response to the question, “What is your idea of perfect happiness?” (submitted 12/12/2022)

“I do not know how to describe perfect happiness. I can describe times in my story that I was very happy. After 12 years of grade school I was very happy to graduate from Lamar High school in Houston in 1955. I was happy that Julie agreed to marry me in 1959. After many years of study I was happy to graduate from Texas A&M College [before it was a University] in 1959, receive my MS degree in Electrical Engineering from University of Pennsylvania in 1961 and my PhD degree in 1968. I was very happy after the successful birth of Dick, Jr. in 1960, Hugh in 1962, Elizabeth in 1966, granddaughters Anastasia in 1995 and Samantha in 1997.

I was happy to be hired in 1959 by Radio Corporation of America Electronic Data Processing Division as a Design Engineer; 1961 by US Army Signal Corp, Computer Systems Directorate as an officer; 1963 by Bell Telephone Laboratories as a Member of Technical Staff; and 1970 by Texas A&M University as a Member of the faculty. [Dick also went on to be the head of the Computer Center at TAMU, Tenured Professor, and eventually Professor Emeritus]

I was elected President of Data General Computer Users Group in 1974-5; Amdahl Computer Users Group in 1976-78; IEEE Computer Society in 1976; and Software Commercialization and Innovation Center, Inc. in 2001-3.

I was happy to receive the following awards from The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) [summarized]: 1984 Centennial Medal; 1987 Distinguished Service Award "for Continuous and Outstanding Leadership on Inter society Activities”; 1996 Golden Core Member; 1998 Elected Fellow of the IEEE, “For the development of software models, metrics, and agent-based tools for software project management.”; and 2000 Third Millennium Medal “in recognition and appreciation of valued services and outstanding contributions”.

As you can tell, Dick Simmons was remarkably dedicated to his work as well as sharing his knowledge with others. This quality is also shown through his dedication to his church and Sunday School Class, the “Golden Rule Class” at the A&M United Methodist Church, of which he was a member for over 50 years. Dick also enjoyed a life of traveling the world, supporting the Fighting Texas Aggies in football and basketball, attending the Opus productions at the Rudder theater the TAMU campus, and vacationing with his friends and family, especially in Galveston, TX. Even in his spare time, he was a scholar through his love of reading, especially Texas or US history, along with his research and thorough documentation of his family’s genealogy.

Dick Simmons, or “Papa”, was always willing to give his support and guidance at a moment’s notice to anyone he loved, from career, education, or just life mentorship. His brilliance, witty humor, fierce love for his family along with an after dinner scoop of ice cream and decaf coffee will be held near to our hearts forever.

Pickleball Kingdom is opening a new location in the Bryan-College Station area and will host more than a dozen courts at the facility.

What readers need to know

While Pickleball Kingdom has hundreds of locations across the United States, this location will be a franchise.

"We're an Aggie-owned franchise, and at heart we're just another small business working to serve our community with fun, fitness and connection," officials with the business said in a Feb. 17 email. "This isn't an out-of-town investment for us. It's home."

While the timeline is not set in stone, as officials said they are moving through a series of construction milestones, the goal is to have the facility open by the summer.

Diving in deeper

The facility is anticipated to have 17 courts, according to the location's website page.

More broadly, Pickleball Kingdom is a business centered around offering indoor pickleball, as well as organized competition, according to its website.

Managing Editor

James joined Community Impact in June 2023, and became the editor of both the Bay Area paper and the Pearland-Friendswood paper in December 2023. After nearly two years in the role, he was named managing editor of the Houston metro. Before joining the team he worked for several newspapers in both Texas and Illinois. Since graduating from the University of North Texas in 2018, James has covered more than a dozen communities and school districts, and three counties. When he’s not at your local meeting, he can be found reading history books, trying to make music, learning Spanish and podcasting about football.

Explore more on this topic and related local coverage

Daily news about your community is free, and your support is invaluable.

Become an InCIder

Texas A&M fans recently got an inside look at how involved Marcel Reed was in bringing Isaiah Horton to College Station. During an appearance with Johnny Manziel on the Glory Dayz Podcast, the Aggies' quarterback explained that his connection with the former Alabama receiver goes back years.

That history played a significant role in Horton's move to Texas A&M. After the 2025 season, Horton was easily one of the biggest wide receivers to enter the transfer portal. In his only season with the Crimson Tide, he caught 42 passes for 511 yards and eight touchdowns.

Now, Horton will be catching passes in College Station from a quarterback he has known since pee-wee football. That familiarity could end up being a major benefit for the Aggies' offense, especially if Reed takes another step forward ahead of the 2026 season.

Reed Helped Get the Ball Rolling

“Me and Isaiah Horton kind of grew up together,” Reed told Manziel. “We were kind of rivals in high school. I saw him enter the transfer portal, and I was like, ‘Woah.’ I hit him up, and he said, ‘The only way I’m hitting the portal is if I’m coming to A&M.’ I said, ‘Say no more.’

That statement alone says plenty about Reed's ambition to make his team better. The Aggies' quarterback didn't wait and see if things would just fall into place. Instead, he immediately stepped in and helped the program make a legitimate push for Horton.

"I went straight to call Coach Wiggins, and we jumped on that horse right away. We got his family in town, and I came back from Nashville to College Station and kind of chopped it up with his family. I was like, ‘Let’s get this done.’"

For a quarterback preparing for a big year in College Station, that kind of leadership stands out. Reed clearly understood that Horton is a player that can make the Texas A&M offense better. It's also worth noting that the quarterback traveled over 750 miles back to College Station to help the Aggies close the deal.

“That guy is a hard worker, and I was really excited to get him," Reed added. "I feel like we have dreamed about this, and now it’s finally happening.”

That final remark made Horton's commitment feel like more than just another offseason addition. For Reed, this is the opportunity to finally team up with someone he knows can be a true contributor for the Aggies.