At the end of this school year, Mrs. Davie’s fourth-grade class at McKinney’s Glen Oaks Elementary School had expected to be saying goodbye to Kathryn Benton, who is two years older than her classmates and was slated to attend a special-education program in a McKinney middle school next year. Afflicted…
A few weeks ago, as Cheryl Wattley was filling out her daughter’s financial-aid package for Amherst College where she’ll be a freshman this fall, the Dallas attorney and single mother of four paused when it came to questions about her job status. Are you employed? the application asked. Well, sort…
Who’s watching the store? We don’t know about you, but Buzz counts on the Better Business Bureau for information on sleazeballs who might be ripping us off on brake jobs or roofing work or whatever this week’s scam is. So we had to scratch our head when we saw the…
Ban the Bumps I had already determined for myself, through a personal experience, that what the media say is quite often not the whole truth. First of all, the headmistress of the lower school at Greenhill is Carol Morrow and not Gail Maura, as was reported in your story [“Scary…
At 3 o’clock in the morning, Darryl Burrows is prowling a parking lot on the northern fringe of downtown. Night lights from the city’s skyscrapers burn over empty streets, and sunrise is still several hours away. But Burrows is already damp with sweat. His glasses are askew, his hair sticks…
It had been clear for a month that Al Lipscomb–“Big Daddy,” as his grandchildren like to call him–was in deep financial trouble. But on this Friday afternoon in mid-May, Lipscomb seemed full of good cheer, doing what he does best–pressing flesh, meeting and greeting, holding court in the back of…
Daddy dearest Father’s day is coming, and you’re probably harboring the mistaken notion that your dad is Father of the Year. You would be wrong. The Fathers of the Year have already been anointed by the Dallas Father of the Year Committee, and your dear Paw-Paw most likely wasn’t one…
Gather a group of McCommas and Monticello Avenue homeowners together, and traffic horror stories flow as steadily as the cars streaming through their neighborhood at rush hour. For decades, commuters heading east and west between Central Expressway and Greenville Avenue have used the M Streets, particularly McCommas and Monticello, as…
Free verse Seeing fellow poets generate ink in the local press is always encouraging, so I’d like to take a moment to salute Robert Wilonsky’s coverage of the new Leaning House Poetry book and CD package [“Rhyme and reason,” May 16]–but I won’t. I can’t. I can’t because Mr. Wilonsky…
We’d like to feel his pain Whatta guy! Southwest Airlines chairman Herb Kelleher has frozen his own pay through 1999 as a sign of solidarity with Southwest’s pilots. The pilot’s union agreed to a pay freeze in exchange for some stock options. Buzz bets the pilots feel real close to…
A real poetry slam No doubt Robert Wilonsky has heard, being as he is music editor for the Observer, the never-ending litanies of Dallas’ popular-music community and how band members and fans alike still feel the media give local music short shrift. But when this staunch supporter of the local…
“I hate bigotry. I hate racism. I hate sexism. I hate classism. When I confront people with those ideas, I am ready for battle.”mmm So says Clarence Glover, the new man at the Dallas Independent School District, hired six months ago to craft a more understanding racial climate for Dallas…
Shyster! is a multimedia computer game that outrageously lampoons the American legal system. The interactive satire casts the player in the role of a shady lawyer as either the defense or prosecution. In playing the game, you select minute details about your alter ego: your gender, race, clothing style, and…
As of this week, Dallas Observer Assistant Editor Julie Lyons takes over as the paper’s editor. She replaces Peter Elkind, who left the Observer in April. Lyons’ writing at the Observer has brought her national recognition. “Journey to hope,” the moving chronicle of her search for faith that ended in…
The Center for Texas Studies at the University of North Texas has been a sort of literary clearinghouse for all things Texan. If you have a story about the evolution of the cowboy boot, or a poem about life, chances are the center has a publication to fit it. For…
The Dallas Observer has won the prestigious Missouri Lifestyle Journalism Award for general excellence. The Missouri School of Journalism studied more than 1,400 entries from papers of all sizes around the country last year in its search for outstanding lifestyle journalism in categories that included arts and entertainment, short features,…
A year ago, Clara Miles lay in her bed in a gray hospital room, a dreaded place filled with bottles that led to tubes that led to needles that led to her arms, where they threaded into tired veins. She had lost everything–her health, her money, and Clara’s Kitchen, the…
Mark Elliott and Keith Foerster named their jazz label Leaning House Records for a very good reason. Their Lower Greenville house-cum-business headquarters sits at a disorienting slant, so much so that if one were to place a marble on the floor at one end of the house, it would seem…
Cassandra Lee Dean says she isn’t looking to bring anyone down or ruin anyone’s life. All she wants to do is make the man who fathered her child acknowledge his daughter. Especially since that man has become a celebrated symbol of paternal responsibility. Dean, 26, received a default judgment in…
Scary school Greenhill School, Dallas’ liberal yet no-less-elitist private academy, has taken a step to preserve its academic purity by banning from campus the Goosebumps series of children’s books because its “graphic” content “doesn’t leave much to the imagination.” Goosebumps, a sort of kiddie pulp fiction featuring ghouls, ghosts, and…
Lancaster’s tempest Please allow me to offer some brighter colors to the dark picture painted of Lancaster in a recent Observer article [“Storm warning,” May 2]. While the city’s unique personality has always kept its politics interesting, there is much to appreciate about our rich history and promising future. Big…
The man at the pulpit with the mass of neatly coiffed silver hair is speaking of sin and redemption, pleading with his flock to forgive him his very human frailties. “No one is free from sin,” he says. His eyes have filled with tears. The camera lens zooms in, and…
