In late 2010, the social gaming company Zynga was on a buying spree. Riding high on the success of FarmVille, the San Francisco-based startup was snatching up smaller rivals across the country, including Dallas’ Bonfire Studios some three months after the firm released the not-at-all derivative We Farm. But there’s…
There are some differences between the crisis Steve Abraira has been facing in recent weeks as Boston’s fire chief and the one he faced eight years ago in Dallas. Here, he was popular with the rank-and-file, a familiar presence at even minor blazes, but he was politically maladroit. There, his…
Not long ago, there was some discussion of whether Anson Chi, at that point the otherwise undistinguished author of a remarkably terrible novel (Yellow on the Outside Shame on the Inside: Asian Culture Revealed) really merited his own Wikipedia page. But then, in June 2012, he tried to blow up…
@princessology @ms_meepsheep THERE ARE NO BRAKES ON THE GROPE TRAIN #gropecrew5ever— Mærty Townsend (@kingtytan) May 31, 2013 This weekend, thousands of anime aficionados, a large percentage of them in remarkably elaborate costume, descended on the Hilton Anatole for A-Kon 24. It was, as always, a lighthearted celebration of geekdom –…
The trustees of 92-year-old Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church in South Dallas realized they’d made a mistake almost as soon as they’d hired Calvin Wayne Thomas to tend their flock. His first sin was a minor one, coming during an early meeting to discuss church business that Thomas presided over…
It may have been just a random prank: two dozen paintballs fired behind the Sonic in a McKinney strip center in the middle of Saturday night. The same could be said of the man whose car was hit while he drove away. But the Council on American-Islamic Relations has another…
Cathie Adams, the president of the Texas Eagle Forum who briefly chaired the state’s Republican Party, made her thesis clear early in a recent presentation to the Far North Dallas Tea Party with a quote from author Paul Sperry. America is fighting a perfect enemy, one protected by religious freedoms…
It’s not easy being gay in El Salvador, which, in addition to being the second most violent place on earth, is not particularly hospitable to LGBT citizens. A 2010 report presented to the United Nations by several human rights groups described a number of grisly murders. In one case, the…
Every year, the American College of Sports Medicine ranks the 50 largest U.S. cities by fitness levels, and every year we are disappointed, if not particularly surprised, to learn that Dallas ranks near the bottom. There are a number of reasons why ACSM deems Dallas is unfit. We do poorly…
After this month’s city elections, we repeated a quote that District 14 candidate Bobby Abtahi gave to the Morning News alluding to Philip Kingston, his opponent in next month’s runoff, as “someone who sues their neighbors.” Kingston wasn’t pleased. He called shortly after to offer a barbed response, calling Abtahi…
Tesla’s bid to sell cars directly to Texas consumers, thus bypassing the state’s deep-pocketed car dealers, came up short this legislative session. But that’s not stopping the electric car company from edging its way into the Texas automotive market. Tesla announced Thursday that it’s tripling the number of Tesla Supercharger…
There are any number of ways to get out of an unhappy marriage. Divorce is the obvious option, but there are others. If your wife happens to be, say, Malaysian, you can frame her for a crime and get her deported. Hiring a hit man is also an option, although…
The news broke, as tends to happen in these cases, on Twitter. Omfg that just shows you Irving teachers don’t pay any attention to not review that they changed a girl’s name to UGLY HOE— Haleigh ❁ (@sleepyhaleigh) May 29, 2013 And sure enough, thumb through Irving High School’s brand-new…
A gas station surveillance camera captured a Trinity Railway Express train slamming into a pickup in Irving on Thursday and killing the 79-year-old driver. The crash happened just after 1 p.m. at the intersection of Rock Island Road and Irby Lane. “Early accounts are that driver was trying to beat…
Christine Sexton’s family made several calls to the River Oaks Jail on February 6. They’d paid a bondsman to bail her out as soon as she was transferred to the Tarrant County jail on a forgery charge she’d been picked up for four days earlier. They say a River Oaks…
Jimmy and Sandy Martin live in a 4,000-square-foot McMansion off Inwood Road in Bluffview. Architecturally, it’s completely unremarkable. The home they recently built in Central Texas, on the other hand, is much more interesting: It’s a 75,000-pound treehouse. The structure, perched on an isolated clump of trees on their ranch…
Fresh off its registration-blocking, car-impounding victory in the state legislature this month, the North Texas Tollway Authority is hiking the cost of driving on its roads. The agency announced this morning that toll rates are increasing by slightly less than a penny per mile come July 1, from 15.3 cents…
Glenn Beck’s wild-eyed, usually paranoid rants are such a common occurrence, Right Wing Watch has an entire category devoted to chronicling his crazy. Most of them are rather uninspired and give the impression that Beck is merely going through the motions in order to fulfill the persona he’s built. But…
In the end, it wasn’t the opposition of the Fort Worth City Council that killed the Cotton Belt project, nor was it the opposition from neighbors in North Dallas. Not directly, at least. Rather, the 62-mile commuter rail that would run from Plano to Fort Worth, died a quiet death…
When the city first began putting down bike lanes last year, it was hard to divine if there was any grander vision than simply flinging paint at random patches of asphalt. In a century or so, we figured, they’d coalesce into the long-awaited Dallas Bike Plan. Until then, we were…
There’s still some debate over whether the return of manufacturing to the U.S. — “reshoring,” it’s called — is a lasting trend or just a bump on the road toward an entirely knowledge-based economy. Some experts suggest it’s merely a byproduct of the recession. But there’s no doubt that it’s…
Edwon Julian’s case didn’t get much attention when he was arrested in Richardson last July. Now that his trial is under way, the the Metroplex Animal Coalition and Dallas County District Attorney’s Office are working to spread the word. Because Julian allegedly threw his girlfriend’s cat out the window of…
