Getting close with a death odor

This stink is on: Corpse flower Lois lets her odor loose as Zac Stayton saysfull bloom within 24 hours

Lois this a.m. (Thursday)
Photo by Rachel Hanley
Lois on Wednesday
Zac Stayton watering Lois
Photo by Rachel Hanley
As the news spread that Lois was close Wednesday afternoon, the line ballooned.
Photo by Rachel Hanley
It's every corpse flower watcher for themselves.
Photo by Rachel Hanley

The wait for corpse flower Lois' stinky stank is over and Houston Museum of Natural Science horticulturist Zac Stayton says that the infamously waffling rare flower will fully bloom within "24 hours."

CultureMap's reporter on the scene, Rachel Hanley, describes the odor as more rotting fish than rotting flesh at the moment, but either way it's quickly becoming a powerful smell. KTRK Channel 13 has handed out masks to its on-site crew and museum staffers are equally prepared. Many visitors are embracing the smell though, trying to get into the best position possible to get the most odor for their buck (or $8 admission fee in this case).

The tiny hallway room that Lois is crammed into is packed, but the line to get into HMNS itself isn't very long. The museum abruptly switched back to being open 24 hours a day last night (which was first reported by CultureMap), scrapping a planned midnight closing, in the wake of the corpse flower's progress and it will stay open all the time now past the complete bloom.

The corpse flower still hasn't come close to completely opening though and now the pressure isn't just on Lois. In some ways, Stayton has put it on himself by declaring the flower will fully bloom within the next 24 hours.

Update, 3:51 p.m.: News on this corpse flower travels fast ... The line is stretching the entire length of the HMNS' long lobby and then some.

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Stretching the budget

A $100,000 salary in 2026 goes further in Houston than it did last year

Photo by Leo Yao on Unsplash

$100,000 stretches a little further in 2026.

A 2026 income study has good news for big earners in Houston: A six-figure salary goes further than it did last year.

A Houston resident's $100,000 salary is worth $84,840 after taxes and adjusted for the local cost of living, according to the new financial analysis from SmartAsset. That's about $1,500 more than Houstonians were bringing home last year.

The 2026 take-home pay is about eight percent higher than it was in 2024, when the same salary had an adjusted value of $78,089.

SmartAsset used its paycheck calculator to apply federal, state and local taxes to an annual salary of $100,000 in 69 of the largest American cities. The figure was then adjusted for the local cost of living (which included average costs for housing, groceries, utilities, transportation, and miscellaneous goods and services). Cities were then ranked based on where a six-figure salary is worth the least after applicable taxes and cost of living adjustments.

Houston ranked No. 60 in the overall ranking of U.S. cities where $100,000 is worth the least. If the rankings were flipped and the cities were ranked based on where $100,000 goes the furthest, that places Houston in the No. 10 spot nationwide.

Manhattan, New York remains the No. 1 city where a six-figure salary is worth the least. A Manhattan resident's take-home pay is only worth $29,420 after taxes and adjusted for the cost of living, which is 3.10 percent lower than it was in 2025.

SmartAsset determined Manhattan has a 29.7 percent effective tax rate on six-figure salaries. Meanwhile, the effective tax rate on a $100,000 salary in Texas (based on the eight cities examined in the report) is 21.1 percent. It's worth highlighting that New York implements a statewide graduated-rate income tax from 4-10.90 percent, whereas Texas is one of only eight states that don't tax residents' income.

Oklahoma City, No. 69, is the U.S. city in the report where a $100,000 salary stretches the furthest. A six-figure salary is worth $91,868 in 2026, up from $89,989 last year.

This is the post-tax value of a $100,000 salary in other Texas cities, and their ranking in the report:

Plano (No. 27): $72,653
Dallas (No. 47): $80,103
Austin (No. 53): $82,446
Lubbock (No. 59): $84,567
San Antonio (No. 62): $86,419
El Paso (No. 67): $90,276
Corpus Christi (No. 68): $91,110

According to the report, getting some "financial breathing room" by making six-figures really depends on where someone lives and what their lifestyle is. For residents living in the 42 states that levy some amount of income tax, their take-home pay dwindles further.

"And depending on how taxes are filed, reaching a $100,000 income may push a household from the 22 percent to 24 percent marginal tax bracket," the report's author wrote. "Meanwhile, locations with high costs across housing and everyday essentials may be less forgiving to a $100,000 income."

smartasset income finance six figures