A 55-year-old “non-pregnant” patient from DeSoto who traveled recently to El Salvador is the fourth person to test positively for infection with the Zika virus in Dallas County, the county’s Health and Human Services Department said Tuesday. Of the four Dallas cases so far confirmed by the Centers for Disease…
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed the first case of the Zika virus, contracted through sex, in a Dallas County resident in 2016. The virus, which causes a relatively minor illness in adults, has tentatively been linked to birth defects in the children of infected women. At…
The Observer has a new food editor on the way at the end of January. Her name’s Beth Rankin, and for the past five years she has been editing the Beaumont Enterprise’s Cat5 Magazine, a weekly arts, entertainment and dining tabloid. She also created, hosted and produced the Local Scene on 91.3 KVLU,…
Earlier this week, Eric Nicholson told you about the latest travesty in the Great Trinity Forest: a long muddy gash of felled trees, cut through the woods by a contractor working to build the private Trinity Forest Golf Club on city property. Ben Sandifer, one of the chief defenders of…
It’s that time of year when we look back at what was and give serious thought to what we need to do to become better people in the year ahead. Which, come to think of it, probably explains why we drink so heavily on New Year’s Eve. Either direction we…
In the big picture, you could say Rowlett was lucky. No one died when an EF3 tornado tore through the northeastern suburb the day after Christmas, unlike in neighboring Garland, where an EF4 twister from the same storm killed eight people as it tossed cars and trucks into the air…
Please welcome back for a return engagement, Joe Pappalardo, who takes over as the Observer’s editor on December 7. Longtime readers with good memories — we’re pretty sure they exist — will remember Joe from his time as a staff writer here 15 years ago. He recalled us fondly, as…
There are a lot of “official surveys” created as backdoor marketing strategies for companies. Car companies will release clever angles on road trip statistics or someone like a doggy poop pick up service might release a list of the poopiest cities in the country. Then, they’ll send these lists out…
Based on what we know, calling University of North Texas journalism dean Dorothy Bland a race-card-playing, self-aggrandizing, lying, cop-hating bigot is entirely unfair. Not that some people care. Trolls, mainly. Still, some serious humans are upset with Bland too. She’s the target of an online petition demanding her firing for…
In this week’s Dallas Observer we profile 20 of the metro area’s most interesting characters, with new portraits of each from local photographer Can Turkyilmaz. The flood of Central American children who poured across the Rio Grande last fall has ebbed. Anti-immigrant protesters have packed up their signs, and reporters…
Possibly, some adult somewhere in America doesn’t know the mystery of Citizen Kane – why newspaper magnate Charles Foster Kane whispers the word “rosebud” on his deathbed. Who hasn’t seen the groundbreaking 1941 masterpiece by Orson Welles, a thinly biography of William Randolph Hearst that’s widely hailed the greatest movie…
Here are some questions to ponder as you wander through the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center, 650 S. Griffin St., during the annual DFW Auto Show. (And many will wander. The show’s vast display of current, concept and classic cars and trucks and product exhibitors drew 400,000 last year, according…
Listen, context is everything. Is Indiana Jones’ sidekick Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom a bit … um … un-P.C. by today’s standards? Perhaps. Is the film’s depiction of Hinduism and India on par with, say, a Three Stooges short’s portrayal of bone-wearing African tribesmen? Maybe…
There are many reasons to see The Book of Mormon, the Broadway musical by Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Robert Lopez. It won nine Tony Awards; Parker and Stone, the geniuses behind South Park, proved they know show tunes with the brilliant big-screen South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut; also, critics…
Elizabeth Julian, head of the Inclusive Communities Project in Dallas, left the U.S. Supreme Court this morning feeling optimistic about the future course of a case that could dramatically change how the U.S. Fair Housing Act is applied. The court heard oral arguments this morning in Texas Department of Housing…
Buzz is rarely shocked, but we must say we’re taken aback by Plano Citizens United, the Texas Pastors Council and assorted fellow travelers such as the right-wing Texas Liberty Institute. It never occurred to us that they had it in for military service members and veterans. We could be wrong,…
It’s that time of year when Buzz gives the real reporters a break and takes a look at the top stories of the past 12 months. This year, we’re changing things up a bit and offering recognition to the many unsung heroes and events that made the year memorable –…
You’ve survived the crowded shopping. You’ve suffered through Jim Carrey’s desecration of How the Grinch Stole Christmas. You’ve sat through tassled titties celebrating the birth of Christ, and ironic Nutcrackers and — shudder — traditional Christmas chorale music. You’re near the finish line, so take this day to relax. Head…
To be fair, the Dallas Police Department’s media unit did send us a press release last week informing us that “North Texas police departments are providing support for an urban training exercise at various unspecified sites.” U.S. special operations forces need realistic urban settings for preparedness training, they said, because…
Thank God for the French and poor white Southerners. In this politically correct age, marginalized groups can get mighty huffy about stereotyping, even if it’s sort of good-natured and just for laughs. Seriously, just try to put on a traditional minstrel show and see what happens (really seriously, do NOT…
So, some Mr. Picky Pants classical music critics don’t much care for tenor Andrea Bocelli’s opera singing, describing his voice as resembling a thin, squeaky fart played on a child’s kazoo. (Not their exact words, but we’ve fairly captured the gist of what they’ve written.) Poor man, it must hurt…
Hmm. Now that I think of it, I can recall only a couple of snatches of music from Alfred Hitchcock films: the screaming violins from the shower in Psycho and the thrumming from the scene with the swinging lamp, when Mother showed her face. Of course, the master director must…
