The holiday lull in candidate filings is officially over - things were very busy today. Here's a roundup of who's running for what:

- I was very pleasantly surprised to see that Jim Henley (who's gonna need a new domain name) has filed to run for the Harris County Department of Education in Place 7. Not only does that clear the path for Mike Skelly to get the nomination for CD07, it also gives us an opportunity to elect an actual educator to the HCDE, which is currently populated by the likes of Roy Morales and Michael "Ronald Reagan Roolz!" Wolfe (sadly, neither is on the ballot this time around). Henley is joined on the ballot by the also-well-qualified Debbie Kerner, who's running for Place 5. Interestingly, both Republican incumbents have primary opponents, each of whom is a member of the Republican Leadership Council, and one of whom is Michael Riddle, husband of Debbie "Pit of Hell" Riddle. I wonder what's up with that.

- In my previous filing update, I mentioned that Harris County Sheriff Tommy Thomas had a primary opponent, and I mused about the motivation behind that. A little research tells me that Thomas' opponent has run against him at least twice before, in 2004 and 2000, so I daresay it's just a perennial candidate thing.

- David Mincberg has a primary opponent for County Judge, a fellow named Ahmad Hassan, who appears to have been Sheila Jackson Lee's Republican opponent for CD18 last year. Hal had the opportunity to hear him speak, and came away duly unimpressed. As I said about the Senate primary, if it gets Mincberg to start identifying and targeting voters earlier on, then it's all to the good. He's certainly in no danger of losing.

- Numerous Congressional filings: The Democrats now have two candidates for CD03 (Tom Daley and Ron Minkow), a candidate for CD12 (Tracey Smith), a candidate for CD19 (Dwight Fullingin), and a candidate for CD13 (Roger Waun, who ran last year). On the Republican side, Ron Paul and one of his primary opponents (Chris Peden) are in, while Mike McCaul picked up a challenger in CD10 (Charles James). I'm hoping that some Democrat files in CD14 on the odd chance that Paul survives his primary, then drops out to pursue an indy/LP Presidential campaign. I'm not sure if the Tom DeLay situation would apply here, but wouldn't it be freaky if the GOP had to run two write-in campaigns for Congress in a row? Also, as yet no one has filed to run against Chet Edwards in CD17. Wouldn't it be a hoot for Edwards to get a free pass?

- Victor Morales has made official his candidacy in Texas House District 4. John McClelland is set to file for HD64 in Denton County. Chad Khan is back for a second run here in HD126. Still no GOP opponents for Ellen Cohen or Scott Hochberg, or any other Harris County Dem besides Hubert Vo. Meanwhile, Republican John Davis has a primary opponent in HD129, a Jon Keeney. I've heard some rumblings that the party is unhappy with Davis, but I don't know any more about it than that. No Republicans have yet filed (according to this, anyway) for any of the HDs between 31 and 43, all of which are in South Texas and which include the likes of first-termers Juan Garcia, Solomon Ortiz Jr, and Eddie Lucio III. I can't believe that will still be true on January 3, but hey, one can hope.

- State Sen. Mario Gallegos will have a familiar Republican opponent, Susan Delgado. If that name doesn't ring a bell, read here, here, and here (scroll down). She's no threat to his re-election, but her presence will up the titillation factor next year, as if Chuck "Sexy Ears" Rosenthal needed the competition.

- We have a Democrat running for State Board of Education, District 7, one Laura Ewing, who appears to be a member of the Friendswood City Council. Anybody know anything about her? Now we need someone to step up for Districts 6 and 8, and if we get them I think the ballot will be full (modulo whatever's left for the Supreme and Criminal Appeals courts). That would be excellent.

- Speaking of judges, there are still a lot of candidates who have not yet filed (I'd guess they're still getting their petition signatures in order), and as there has been some recent shuffling on the Democratic side, I'm not sure who's still to file. I'm going to see what I can find out about that today.

Less than a week to go. Hang on!