Dallas Observer staff writer Kaylois Henry received two Griot Awards, given by the Dallas/Fort Worth Association of Black Communicators to honor “journalism which promotes greater understanding of the lives, conditions, and cultures of African and African-American people.” Henry captured top honors in two of the three Griot Award categories for…
Mother of all Websites (really!) As anyone this side of a rosary knows, getting in touch with Yahweh can be iffy at best. But the never-vengeful Virgin Mary is always there to listen–no matter how little juice you’ve got on this plane of existence. Our favorite incarnation of the Madonna…
Las Colinas company which operates a rendering plant in southern Minnesota is under federal investigation for allegedly violating a number of environmental laws–including allowing employees to dump animal carcasses, blood, industrial solvents, and acids into drains that lead directly to a Minnesota river. Although the U.S. attorney for Minnesota and…
Dry day at Texas Stadium The article on Promise Keepers written by Jimmy Fowler [“60,000 naked men,” November 14] gave a very clear sense of what Promise Keepers is all about. I have been a volunteer at all four conferences held in the North Texas area and have never really…
Robert Riggs and John Miller were in New York to bask. Riggs, a 16-year veteran reporter for WFAA-Channel 8, was about to be invested as a top gun. At a ritzy luncheon, he would accept the George Foster Peabody Award for Investigative Reporting. For broadcast journalists, there is little to…
It’s political theater imported from another time and place. In the packed pews of Kirkwood Temple Christian Methodist Episcopal Church in South Dallas on a recent night, two groups of actors–one speaking English, the other Spanish–reinterpreted a biblical story of Moses seeking God’s counsel. In this version, Moses, played by…
Bandit, our winsome, butterscotch-colored golden retriever, is like a lot of men I know: not very complicated and utterly focused on meeting his basic needs. In Bandit’s case, this means eating as often as he can and getting his tummy rubbed even more frequently. (This, too, could apply to several…
Whatever happened to “We May Never Pass This Way Again?” Buzz has been monitoring a disturbing trend of totalitarianism emerging in Dallas area high school mottos. Highland Park High School’s football squad’s motto, for instance, is “Nothing Short of Perfection.” Which makes a lot of sense when you recall that…
Cyberhubris Congratulations on an excellent presentation of all sides of the issue about the cyberstalker incident [“Cyberbunk,” November 21]. I believe you correctly portrayed that all principals are both “guilty” and “innocent” in the affair. No clear black and white for anyone. A few comments about the portrayal of Robert…
The mimosa tree stands between two houses sheathed in aluminum. It grows in a yard on Sherman Street, in the waning heart of Dalworth, a predominantly black Grand Prairie neighborhood where drugs are sold in vacant lots amid boarded-up houses waiting to be torn down. The tree’s branches shade a…
Sometime in the early 21st century–when America is scourged everywhere by violent crime, and terrorist groups roam the world with biological weapons and suitcase-sized nuclear bombs–a computer programming genius and his Dallas-based company perfect the first 100 percent foolproof lie detector. Its use throughout American society–in law enforcement, the judicial…
Gather the elders. Light the faggots. After a 300-year hiatus, witch-hunting is back! Not since the days of the Massachusetts Bay colony has the prospect of barbecuing Satanists been so much the rage. And it’s right next door in Arlington. Bless their hearts, those godless witches of Interstate 20, and…
News hounds KRLD-AM radio sure knows how to kick off a promotional campaign. No sooner did the station put up bold new billboards advertising, “KRLD: The Source For Local News,” than the station made big changes in its newsroom–reducing its news staff by five employees. What’s going on at KRLD?…
Reefer madness A recent article [“Just say maybe to nicotine,” Buzz, November 7] described “a cop in Arlington” who was seen smoking a cigarette “in a spanking-new, tricked-up Ford Taurus emblazoned with the DARE logo.” I am writing this letter on behalf of all the officers in the Arlington Police…
San Francisco isn’t just the setting of Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo: It’s the movie’s muse. Along with composer Bernard Herrmann, who transforms convoluted psychology into resounding lyricism, and co-star Kim Novak, whose pheromones and otherworldliness give body and soul to tortured romance, San Francisco enables Hitchcock to conjure a nether world…
Kevin Massey gets so worked up before he “posts,” he can feel the sweat. His face aglow in the blue light of his 20-inch Sony monitor, he grips a pencil-shaped “mouse” in his right hand–the letters “F-T-W” (Fuck The World) tattooed between his knuckles–and prepares to cast his thoughts worldwide…
Human remains from at least 40 unmarked graves dating back to pioneer days have been hastily excavated and reburied to clear the way for Columbus Realty Trust to develop a 6-acre tract of the historic Greenwood Cemetery. Although excavation work at the site proceeded methodically and quietly for about three…
No pity Your recent story concerning the “victims” of Kathy Kingsmore [“God and mammon,” November 7] elicited no feelings of sympathy from me. There is only one reason why someone would invest his money in a scheme that promises “500 percent within 90 days” or “100 percent every 30 days.”…
San Antonio goes in the toilet It isn’t often that Buzz is lured away from home turf for a choice idiocy, but we couldn’t resist this story out of San Antonio. Station KENS-TV Channel 11 hit the ratings-sweeps bottom with a splash of slime last week when reporter Al Zimmerman…
“Pornography,” Randy replies. It is rather more than I expect to hear, having interviewed a half-dozen men on the floor of Texas Stadium during the Promise Keepers rally. Dallas is the latest stop on the Promise Keepers tour, a traveling stadium revival that has allowed Christian men to make a…
Most con men flourish in anonymity and forever seek fresh territory. Roll into town, filch bingo money from a few grandmothers, then split before the heat comes down. Never stand still. That’s the hustler’s way. But Bryan Wilson Taylor is no ordinary hustler. He’s more of a hometown boy who…
For more than a year, elected officials have agreed that Dallas needs a Hispanic cultural center. After all, Hispanics are the fastest growing segment of the city’s population, and not having a center dedicated to their cultural contributions seems a huge oversight. The prerequisite feasibility study has already been performed,…
