Ain’t That a Kick in the Head

In FC Dallas’ 3-2 win over Chicago Saturday, the local kid made good, scoring the winning goal in the 70th minute–just five minutes after entering the game. But that kid wasn’t Mario Torres, the local Latino league phenom whose story we chronicled last July. Nor was it fellow Dallas products…

King for a Day

Maybe one day The Dallas Morning News will do a story on Bill Parcells’ feelings about the Terrell Owens signing. Till then, we’ll just have to take Peter King’s word for it. By the way, that is good enough for me. –Robert Wilonsky…

Writes Idea, Not Quite There

If you missed The Writer’s Garret’s inaugural Writes of Spring Literary Festival of Books and Authors over the weekend, you didn’t miss much. The fest took place Friday through Sunday at the South Side on Lamar lofts, and it was sponsored by the likes of Borders, DART, KERA, Comcast and…

The Good, the Bad and the Really, Really Ugly

The Dallas Stars may win the NHL’s Stanley Cup this spring. Regardless, it’s already been a positive season, mainly because after tonight’s clash against the San Jose Sharks at the American Airlines Center, the Stars’ ridiculously hideous alternate third sweater will be loaded on a truck and sent to Goodwill…

Gang Bang

The bad news: Dallas-Fort Worth has a severe gang problem–has for years, in fact, and it’s only getting worse, say officials with the Department of Justice. The good news: DOJ’s going to make an effort to do something about, announcing on Saturday it’s going to channel $2.5 million in grant…

Hello, Larry

My Associated Press pal Christy and her husband, formerly of local Fox affiliate KDFW-Channel 4, are in town this week for the Texas Rangers opening series against the Boston Red Sox–not to see the Rangers, mind you, but their beloved Red Sox. Also in town is their pal Dan Shaughnessy,…

Hercules, Hercules

If you see Kevin Sorbo walking around town, it’s because he’s Walking Tall. And because The Rock wasn’t available. I think the key phrase in this particular story is “each with budgets of $2 million,” which oughta go into that fund the mayor’s trying to build up in order to…

Shot All to (Little Forest) Hills

I noticed two things this weekend during a visit into the quaint, quirky White Rock Lake neighborhood known as Little Forest Hills: the astounding number of hideous McMansions springing up like weeds in the woods, and the tiny signs trying to fend them off like disposable Davids dueling Tyveked Goliaths…

Don’t Express Yourself

Dear Cafe Express on McKinney Avenue, Things you may not want to publicize to your customers in the form of an “award”: Lowest Crew Turnover — 64.5 % Lowest Food Cost — 28.8 % Perhaps you might place these placards in the back room as motivational tools instead of on…

Another Brick in the Wall of Sound Preview

Pink Nasty (Austin): This blurb was originally directed towards the jagged, worn-down blues-rock of Denton’s jetscreamer, but we got a little good-news-bad-news this afternoon: Spune Productions’ Lance Yocom e-mailed to say that jetscreamer guitarist and lead singer Samantha Moss broke her hand and had to back out of next weekend’s…

Just Shoot Him

When a crap director leaves a movie he’s scheduled to direct, you just know said movie has to be dreadful. For a week it’s been rumored Robert Luketic was gonna leave the big-screen adaptation of Dallas, which Mayor Laura Miller’s so desperate to get shot here. The initial reason offered…

Open Letter # 19328471

To: The West End Historic District From: Andrea Grimes, Rick Kennedy and Matt Pulle, Dallas Observer staff writers Dear West End, Last night began fabulously at the Sixth Floor Museum with a Scotch tasting hosted by Chivas, at which Grimes re-re-affirmed her love for non-Chivas whiskys. Pulle, meanwhile, laughed a…

Mark Your Calendars

On Wednesday night, a Deep Ellum club employee said he had a scoop for me: “On April 10, all of the cooks are walking out.” He talked about rampant rumors he’d heard about a Dallas-wide initiative that involves all Latino restaurant employees skipping out of work on the Monday after…

Good News is Not Good News

Robert Decherd’s gotta be scratching his head. Yesterday, he got the good news that the U.S. District Court, Northern District of Texas, was dismissing a shareholders’ suit against the owners of The Dallas Morning News over the company’s circulation scandal that turned into quite the mess in 2004. But for…

The Silence is Deafening

The best radio announcer in Dallas Cowboys history is staying, and the best offensive lineman in Cowboys history is going. Of course, if you rely on the area’s mainstream media these days, you’re clueless to both transactions involving Brad Sham and Larry Alllen. The Cowboys new flagship radio station–KTCK-AM (1310),…

Howdy, Folks…in Reverse

Some folks have asked about the change in our Unfair Park blog banner–the chalk outline, the crime-scene tape. Well, yesterday we said goodbye to Big Tex, the original mascot of Unfair Park. We’d been told that we “can’t have Big Tex” because he’s a registered trademark, and the State Fair…

The SMU Prof and The F-Word

There’s been an interesting drama developing in the pages of SMU’s The Daily Campus this week involving the university’s Spanish lecturer George Henson. It began when the student paper reported that Henson showed up to work Monday to find that someone had scrawled the word “FAGGOT” across his office door…

Damned Hollywood Liberals

Since August, we’ve been writing about local filmmakers Mark Birnbaum and Jim Schermbeck’s The Big Buy, which deals with Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle’s investigation into the allegedly dirty doings of DeLay’s Texans for a Republican Majority political action committee (TRMPAC). Last week, we had the item about how…

RoughRiders Already in Toilet

On Thursday, the Frisco RoughRiders begin their 2006 campaign for the Texas League Championship (that’s Double-A baseball, y’all), hoping to rebound from last year’s disastrous 24-games-under-.500 campaign. Who the hell cares, right? Well, if you are ever up in Frisco (which just so happens to be my neck of the…

Another Brick in the Wall of Sound Festival

Man Factory (Arlington): For my first assignment as the full-time music editor, I drove to Eric “Fishboy” Michener’s house to draw cartoons. It was a good, strange time–we drank punch, brainstormed kooky art ideas and listened to whatever CDs of his I didn’t recognize. Of all the CDs he played…