On the one hand, I’m afraid to call anybody, because everybody I call tells me he or she is thinking about running for mayor. The field of people considering the 2007 Dallas mayor’s race is starting to look like the Turkey Trot, the city’s annual Thanksgiving Day run. If this…
Dear Mexican, What’s up with the bull stickers on the truck doors? Is this a secret business, something earned at some unmentionable contest south of the border or a brotherhood of sorts? I thought about taking Spanish lessons so I could politely ask one of these guys. –Native California Whitey…
Don’t let him fool you: Within 10 years, Jim Schutze will be living at the Azure, working on his tan and his book about high-rise living called The Accommodations. This is not me eating crow. This is more like me barely sniffing a small crow. From several inches away. A…
Dear Mexican, The last two movies I attended were rated R. Sitting around me were Mexican families with very young children. Why do Mexicans bring their 8-year-old kids to see a movie like Hostel? Do Mexican parents just not give a shit, or can they not afford a baby sitter?…
They’re gonna save this old house on Bryan Parkway after all. Now the neighborhood can go find something else to destroy. On a street where every barking dog is heard by pointed ears and every ambling pedestrian shrewdly watched by beady eyes, the first clue that the 6015 Bryan Parkway…
Dear Mexican, The Mexican presidential elections have been a freaking mess. I voted for the conservative candidate, Felipe Calderón, who almost everyone agrees won the election. But the leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador is making a mess out of this by claiming electoral fraud. Does the Mexican have an opinion…
Strange stuff struts across the stage of life every once in a while. There just isn’t time to stop and figure it all out. Like the oddly recurring story in Dallas every two to three years: “Proposed WRR Frequency Swap.” Proposed what? It’s like clockwork. Every few years somebody wants…
This old house on Bryan Parkway’s gotten a lot of attention lately. And to think, it came out of a catalog. In 1925. Look it up, Byron. It’s a fact. As I predicted yesterday, WFAA-Channel 8’s Byron Harris did a story last night about 6015 Bryan Parkway, the much-disputed historic…
Dear Mexican, I just don’t get Mexicans and their grooming. The men slick their hair with baby oil, gel or Vaseline or just shave it all off. The women wear it in a ponytail with a neon green hair band or in pig tails or wear bangs created with the…
Here’s the thing. People call me up. They abuse me. They ask if I’m an idiot. No. Frankly. I am not an idiot. They ask, “Don’t you think it’s worthwhile for the city to offer developers tax breaks if doing it encourages development?” Here’s the thing. I don’t know. It…
Look for a story tonight on WFAA-Channel 8 about 6015 Bryan Parkway, one of Dallas’s 11 most endangered dumps…oh, I’m sorry, I meant to say historic sites that I blogged about yesterday. My snitches tell me Byron Harris was down there this morning interviewing folks. I blogged about how somebody…
I was watching CNN this morning and spotted my son’s Woodrow Wilson High School classmate and fellow alum, George Hale, being evacuated from Beirut. Called the Hale house, and George’s mom, Clare, told me the kid will be on with Larry King tonight. George’s father, Harlin D. (better known in…
This historic home on Bryan Parkway is either a landmark or a teardown. The courts are deciding now. The neighbors too. And not in a nice way. Oh boy. The Hatfields is loaded up, and them McCoys got blood in their eyes too. This is when I really love my…
What’s uglier: Dallas City Hall or the nonsense that takes place inside its walls? Jacquielynn Floyd has a great column in today’s Dallas Morning News, in which she shares letters from readers about Mayor Laura Miller’s announcement she will not seek re-election. As is often the case for some reason,…
Calatrava Trust Why are we getting the Calatrava bridges (well, maybe not)? Because they’re pretty. That’s it. When Mayor Laura Miller and I spoke about her decision not to run for reelection, we covered a lot ground, politics and policy, all that stuff, and finally I sensed we were about…
Dear Mexican, I’m a culturally sensitive, PC Asian-American who laughed my head off at Jack Black’s imitation of a Mexican in Nacho Libre. Is this wrong? –Vietnammy Mammy Dear Chinita, Wrong? Of course not. While Latino activists weep and moan about how gabachos like Jack Black reduce Mexicans to stock…
Oh, please. Give me a break, willya? If I hear one more word about how all these old white guys running for mayor of Dallas are going to “heal the racial divide,” I’m gonna blow lunch. Or, on the other hand, one more word about how all the old preachers…
So I’m wondering out loud here. Larry Duncan? Could he be viable for mayor? The Dallas Morning News is touting its usual suspects list of people it considers viable mayoral candidates in Dallas, like the famous Phil Ritter, a governmental relations person for Texas Instruments. He may be a great…
Would you have rather looked at this for four more years or, oh, Darrell Jordan or Don Hill or Gary Griffith? Last time I watched Mayor Laura Miller in action was at a recent briefing on the bond issue (topic of my column in the current Dallas Observer). She and…
Dear Mexican, Why do Mexicans traditionally like Chevys? Did Chevy once target the Mexican consumer base for some reason and it worked? –Pocho in a Pontiac Dear Pocho, An urban legend suggests that Mexicans don’t like Chevys (pronounced with a harsh “ch” as in “chicken” and “chupacabra,” gracias) because the…
Fine. Go ahead. Vote for it. Swallow it down whole. But you better keep some Tums handy. Next fall the entire City Council and all of the heavy-hitters in town will be all over TV and billboards barking at you that you better vote “yes” on a record-setting bond issue…
Dear Mexican, I caught your appearance on the June 19 episode of The Colbert Report. I admire your insight and cultural references, but I noticed you mispronounced the Spanish word “patience.” You told Colbert that the word was pacencia instead of the correct word paciencia. Why do assimilated Mexicans lose…
