One week into November, Dallas- and Wyoming-based BTWW Retail, L.P. — owner of, among other cowboy-wear outlets, Western Warehouse and Boot Town — filed for bankruptcy protection in the Dallas federal courthouse. Two weeks later, BTWW has decided to shut ‘er down entirely: Beginning tomorrow, everything must go, as Western…

Courtesy the mighty fine folks who contribute to the conversation on the Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum comes this montage of Merc photos, some by familiar Friends. Also a bonus for fans of Daft Punk. –Robert WilonskyDallas | The Mercantile (Slideshow) from Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum on Vimeo…

View image Danny Fine, left, and Bob Musgrave in an outtake from Bottle Rocket Spent the better part of last night watching every single second and scrap on the Criterion Collection Wes Anderson-approved Bottle Rocket two-fer, available today (ya think?), and there are copious revelations contained therein. Such as: The…

Friend of Unfair Park Bill Holston, author of the Veterans Day essay to which we linked earlier this month, was kind enough to forward our way this mini-doc about Sarah Jaffe, winner of multiple Dallas Observer Music Awards in July. As photographer Allison V. Smith notes on her blog, it…

From the sound of this morning’s announcement, Dallas-based 7-Eleven has decided that sooner or later, everything in the joint will be branded with the brand name. Three months ago, word was the convenience store chain was expanding into the Jamaican beef patties business — which was fine with a handful…

On the Technological Breakthrough Tuesday Before Thanksgiving, this news: Dallas-based Blockbuster has a set-top box it’d like to sell you for $99, through which you can beam into your home the latest and greatest in what passes for big-screen entertainment these days. Buy the OnDemand now, just in time for…

Normal 0 MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:”Table Normal”; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:””; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”;} As you can see from the photo of Pauline Medrano here, council members spent the first 40 minutes of today’s meeting of the City Smoking…

We’ve spent the last way too long looking for our DSpot; no luck, damndamndamn it. But we do know where John Crawford’s DSpot is, if nothing else: On Friday, via GlobeSt.com, we learned that Crawford and his DowntownDallas organization is moving out of its old digs — in Center City…

It took a few days — five, to be specific. But Texas Department of Public Safety, Dallas Police Department and Dallas North Tollway Authority authorities have issued a warning to folks driving along the Dallas North Tollway: Someone’s throwing rocks off the Cedar Springs overpass. Turns out, it’s been happening…

Courtesy Lynne Rostochil Rostochil is standing to the right of Private Pyle in this photo from 1991 that totally looks as though it was taken in 1963. Photographer Craig Hlavaty spent the 45th anniversary of John Kennedy’s assassination down at Dealey Plaza — so you didn’t have to. His slide…

Dallas Fed prez Richard Fisher This morning, the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas — those bloodsuckers! — released the latest Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey. In a word: Oy. In two: “Plunged sharply.” Or, as the Associated Press puts it: “Texas manufacturers are painting a bleak picture of current and future…

Former Texas Attorney General Jim Mattox, who died in his sleep Thursday at his home in Dripping Springs, will lie in state today in the Texas House of Representatives chamber of the Texas Capitol; hours are from 3 to 7 p.m. As the Star-Telegram noted over the weekend, “The last…

Courtney’s headed back to City Hall at 11:30 this morning, where, yet again, the City Smoking Ordinance Special Ad-Hoc Committee will spark up the debate over where you can’t and can’t light up in this town. For a sneak peek of where this discussion’s headed today, the council has posted…

Three years ago we opened the books of the South Dallas/Fair Park Trust Fund and found that many, many folks who’d borrowed money from the city in order to open businesses in the area never paid back their loans. Some couldn’t; others just wouldn’t. And plenty of cases had been…

Earlier this month, Dallas City Council member Mitchell Rasansky — or, as he’s referred to around the big table at the Hall of Justice, the Calculator — asked to see how the city’s investments were faring during the Great Recession of 2008. This morning, during the council’s Finance, Audit &…

Over the weekend, A Scanner Darkly star (well …) Alex Jones made the trip up to Dallas to take on the Federal Reserve — though, really, how many folks are in the building on a Saturday? Those folks who ditched out on Dealey Plaza brought their bullhorns and placards to…

So, yeah, right — anxiously awaiting Tuesday, when Criterion Collection finally makes available that fully loaded Bottle Rocket two-fer that’s long overdue. While we’re waiting for the package, let’s spend a couple of moments with the man who designed the package: artist Ian Dingman, responsible for the cover you see…

Courtesy Justin Cozart Yesterday, I came across a Flickr page maintained by Justin Cozart, who’s been uploading in recent days photos of a Dallas that no longer exists — as you can tell by the photo of the Baker Hotel above, taken as it was being imploded in June 1980…