Houston has long had a bunch of Cajuns living there who don’t use the term properly, it not being actually Cajun, and their use has infected the Houston area.
Because my husband was in the oil bidness, we did know a lot of Cajuns when we lived there — except they called themselves “coona$$es” and said it with pride. The wife of an Exxon exec even drove around town with a bumpersticker on her station wagon that proclaimed, “Proud to be a Coon Ass”.