God may still be in his or her heaven. I’m not up on that. But I think he’s about to vacate the regional headquarters of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Since the 19th century we Americans have believed that engineers are just a little bit better at building stuff…
Wow. I came home late last night from the Occupy Dallas camp at Pioneer Plaza downtown and couldn’t get to sleep for the longest. Something about what I had seen down there was tearing me up, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. While I was there last night,…
Welcome to Local Music ‘Mericans, where we meet some of the people behind the local music scene — those who aren’t necessarily members of local bands, but more the people who make the scene move. Gavin Mulloy is a young marketing pistol for Granada Theater, and he appears to be…
At 1:20 this morning Boston police stormed an Occupy encampment in Boston Greenway park, hauled off more than 100 protesters in cable-tie cuffs and tore down their tents. Everybody in the Occupy Dallas encampment I talked to at about noon today was aware of what just happened in Boston. They’re…
Start the countdown. How long will it be before Dallas City Hall decides to evict the Occupy protest campers from Pioneer Plaza? You know it’s coming. If the Occupy Dallas anti-corporate-greed protesters continue to camp out in a park just down the block from City Hall, political pressure will build…
I walked for a while yesterday with those Occupy Dallas people. I don’t care what anybody says. They’re cool. You know why? Because they’re awake. People were all over the map about their specific issues. Some of them talked to me about Timothy Geithner and President Obama’s failure to put…
Dear Mexican: I learned Spanish in school as a teen. Then, it seems, because I was young, everybody was an usted. I would like to practice speaking it, but am now an adult and don’t know who gets to be a tú. I’m scared of getting it wrong and unwittingly…
Well, students, the last Dallas City Council meeting was a bad one for you, but like a lot of bad days, this day was important. I’m speaking to those of you who came down to City Hall from Paul Quinn College to lobby the city council. You wanted to stop…
Tea Party people say they hate Washington and its top-down style of governance. They’re the political version of eat-local. Everything should be grassroots. Here in Texas the Tea Party loves Governor Rick Perry, but if you talk to people who’ve gone up against Perry on local issues, they will tell…
So what is all this anger among the old white people really all about? Why are old white people wearing odd costumes and hating the president all the time? We old white people all know exactly what it is. But nobody will say it out loud. It never comes out…
Welcome to Local Music ‘Mericans , where we meet some of the people behind the local music scene — those who aren’t necessarily members of local bands, but more the people who make the scene move. Amy Ivey grew up in Fort Worth listening to her mother play Elvis records…
Well, pardon me for making myself important, but I feel like I do bring a certain perspective to the Rick Perry N-word story. For one thing, I just finished a long stretch of reporting on Perry. I have a story coming out his week in the newspaper that’s pretty much…
Oh, toilet humor. Though Gerard Depardieu gives Anderson Cooper the giggles, I don’t find it funny to dine somewhere where I feel I need to try and — ahem — hold it until I get home, should I drink too much wine or iced tea during my meal. But: I’m…
I had a big light-bulb moment this morning while reading both daily newspapers. We just price things wrong. We need to stop thinking of clean air in terms of dollars and cents and start quantifying it in our heads by cancer cases. Governor Rick Perry keeps telling us that EPA…
You’ve seen this guy, right? Peanut butter jelly time is the number one indicator of poor website design. Sparkling mouse trailers, glimmering lights, dancing bananas — these are the hallmarks of your 13-year-old daughter’s MySpace page. Poorly chosen music played in a loop, excessive flash and clunky navigation also indicate…
Jim Henson modernized the age-old art of puppetry by using foam rubber to coat the puppets’ limbs. Previously, most TV puppets were made of carved wood. But Henson believed that foam rubber and cloth brought more life to the puppets’ movements. Turns out he was right: Henson’s puppet characters took over…
I’m over super-sized onion rings. They first made their appearance at steakhouses and burger joints but have become increasingly popular at bars everywhere. Often stacked like a tower to the heavens, they arrive precariously ready to topple and litter your table in shards of fried breading. Katy Trail Ice House…
Too bad everybody can’t come downtown and hang out in the lobby outside the city council chamber every other Wednesday, because that’s pretty much the only way to understand what the hell’s going on. Yesterday the council rammed through this “flow control” thing, ordering by law all commercial trash haulers…
Dear Mexican: I hear that at the last Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors hearing about redistricting, some lady accused Supervisor Gloria Molina of Reconquista. What is that — and what on earth is going on over there? I don’t get what all the fuss is about. The U.S. Census…
Property owners on Lower Greenville got snookered. They agreed last year to new regulations governing late-night hours for bars. They didn’t agree to get put out of business. They were snookered by the neighborhoods. I should love that, because I love neighborhoods. But, you know, snookered is snookered. In the…
Angela, I was there. I saw everything. I know what they’re doing. I am on my way. One way or another, I will get there, and I will exert myself and do whatever it takes to rescue your husband, even if it means waking up the next morning with extreme…
It’s not just that Rick Perry screwed up in a debate. He is asking supporters to invest millions of dollars in his campaign. When savvy big donors have their phones in their hands about to send the money, they’re all asking themselves the presidential timber question: Has he got the…
