USA TODAY

The 30 Essential Texas Restaurants: Nearly Made It (a.k.a. the Dan Marino Restaurants)

If you've read this week's feature -- "Eat Here: The 30 Essential Texas Restaurants to Visit Before You Die" -- then you've no doubt already asked why X, Y or Z restaurant didn't make the list. Maybe you've asked this question angrily to your computer, or rhetorically to a coworker who actually trie ... More >>

Game Changer

Chris Kluwe is prying open America's last closet: major league sports.

Joe Paterno's Family Vows To Find The Real Child Molester Harborer

Another day, another story from Happy Valley that makes me question my faith in mankind. Two, actually. First, predictably, three more men have come forward claiming they were sexually abused by Jerry Sandusky, one citing abuse that took place all the away back in the 70's. If you remember, Sandus ... More >>

Longhorn Panic: Sealy WR Ricky Seals-Jones Decommits

It wouldn't be June if we didn't have some sort of off the field drama to worry about with our college football. And since the realignment talk this summer is at a dull roar at best, and since the resolution of a college football playoff is still several weeks away, how about a little recruiting ang ... More >>

The Rest of the Best: Houston's Top 10 Seafood Restaurants

For the next 20 weeks, we'll be rounding up the runners-up to our 2011 Best of Houston® winners. In many categories, picking each year's winner is no easy task. We'll be spotlighting 20 of those categories, in which the winner had hefty competition from other Houston bars and restaurants.

Coogs Whip Tulsa, Now One Game Away from the BCS

It's the same story that's been written six other times about the Cougars this season. Team goes on the road. Struggles in the first half. Explodes in the third quarter. Buries opposition in the fourth quarter. It's the same story, but this time it's different. This time the Cougars were vis ... More >>

Rap Boom Reload

In 2005, rappers put Houston on the map. Then the spotlight moved on. Some musicians are working hard to turn it back this way.

Glen Campbell's 15 Greatest Hits - As A Guitarist

Yet another reason to love Pet Sounds.​In a few hours, Rocks Off will be down at the Stafford Centre, watching the sold-out first Houston-area stop on Glen Campbell's extended "Farewell Tour." It might be the only one, but the tour is booked well into 2012, so we figure there's got to be a Dos ... More >>

The Top Ten Greatest Gays of Texas

Here in Texas, we lay claim to some of the most interesting and influential GLBT men and women of our time. Admittedly, they generally get out as fast as they can, but to us, they'll always be Texans. Here are ten GLBT men and women we're proudest to call Texans, especially during this season of Pri ... More >>

Houston First In Race to Gaily Cruise the Amazon

Photo from www.conciergetravel.ccA gay cruise to the Amazon awaits.​Nobody's celebrating Pride month quite like Concierge Travel, the Houston-based GLBT cruise agency. They just announced the first gay cruise on the Amazon is scheduled to set sail, reported USA Today. So grab your breathable c ... More >>

Houston Doing Its Part To Destroy West Virginia Football

Dana Holgorsen: Part of a one-two Houston punch​The once-high-flying football program at West Virginia University seems to be imploding these days, and Houston is doing more than its fair share to move along the process. Two of the three main protagonists: a) newish athletic director Oliver L ... More >>

Beyond Green Beer: St. Patrick's Day Dining

blog.sandraisawesome.info​There will be plenty of St. Patrick's Day shenanigans going on all around town this Thursday. But if you're looking for more than a dyed-green tongue and a chicken tender basket, we've listed a few (slightly) more original offerings below. Azuma Sushi & Robata Bar ... More >>

Charles Barkley Drops "Jackass" on Billy Packer (And Seven Other Barkley-As-Analyst Highlights)

Don't mess with the Barkley​The unveiling of the brackets for March Madness, which is a scant 48 hours away, takes on a little different meaning this year, for three intertwined reasons: 1. The field has expanded to 68, so now Tuesday and Wednesday will include four play-in games to get us to ... More >>

Stephen Jabbour, Mark Tilford: Kiddie Porn Cases Face Two Prominent South Texas Lawyers

Stephen Jabbour and Bill Clinton​What is going on with these prominent, middle-aged lawyers in the Texas Coastal Bend and their kiddie porn? Just last week, one got sentenced to federal prison, and it seems another is likely to follow. Last Friday, 57-year-old Stephen Jabbour, the former chai ... More >>

Coogs Win...With A Running Game?

Bryce Beall ran wild​Football is a game of adjustments. The team that makes the proper adjustments at the right time is usually going to be the team that wins when things are otherwise more or less equal. So it was obvious when, come the start of Friday's Houston/UTEP game, UTEP drove the field ... More >>

Breaking Down HPMA's Best Latin Hip-Hop Ballot

​Nearly eight months ago Rocks Off began covering the hip-hop movement in Houston's Latino community. Latino hip-hop artists in Houston have been putting out music since the early '90s and have largely Latino followings. Some have a bit of crossover appeal, but for the most part, it lives with ... More >>

Train Wreck

How Metro and its president Frank Wilson got so far off track.

Neil Young Said To Be Playing Jones Hall June 4 With Folk Legend Bert Jansch

UPDATE (12:32 p.m.): Now Rolling Stone is reporting Houston has been added to the tour, so it MUST be true. UPDATE 2 (3:17 p.m.): Confirmed via press release from Young's label, Reprise Records. It's definitely happening. Ticket on-sale date still TBD. ​USA Today's "LifeLine Live" blog reported M ... More >>

Yates Vs. Lee, The Rematch: Generals Stay Within 100

Photos by Aaron M. Sprecher / Click here for a slideshow​The Lee High School "cheering section" sat in the smallest little section of stands, in the lowest corner of the east side of the bleachers at Delmar Field House, during Saturday's rematch between the Lee and Yates High School boy ... More >>

Inquiring Minds: AC Pianist Jim Brickman, More Than Just "Jingle Bells"

​Rocks Off spoke with songwriter/pianist Jim Brickman recently. True, the AC piano king isn't the type of musician we usually focus on, but talent is talent and oh, yeah, a Grammy Award nomination for Best New Age Album for his CD Faith doesn't hurt.   Rocks Off: First, congratulations o ... More >>

Adios Otilia's? Not So Fast.

Strict dress code at Otilia's. Word hit the streets this week that Otilia's, the venerable restaurant on Long Point which has served old-fashioned interior Mexican cuisine for almost twenty years, was on the auction block.  Restaurant, employees and recipes -- all reportedly for sale.&n ... More >>

No Pressure. It's Just Texas High School Football.

Katy High School was going to play against a Florida team on national TV. Now all it had to do was find a way to win again.

TDCJ Death Sparks A Lawsuit

Critics question realtor Wayne Stroman's timeshare resale business

The Getaway

APRIL Donate Life Month

St. Patrick's Day Guide

Haunts

They'll scare the crap out of you

Ready for a Rumbo?

News wars return as two Spanish papers go mano a mano

Toll-Free Hassle

When good EZ TAGs go bad

The Reorient Express

Some churches are still trying to "cure" homosexuals. And some people are still lining up to trade in their sex life for eternal life.

Jekyll & Hydesky

Two trips to steak house Smith & Wollensky yield wildly different results

Blunt About High Fashion

Roll up more than your sleeves with this clothing line

Serious Cinema

Set in 1948, Kedma explores a present-day problem

War Is Not Hell

The Chron's embedded reporter is far from the action

Duh Press

Fear and self-loathing at the Minority Report junket

In Search of the Sleuth

Edmund J. Pankau trades on his hard-boiled private-eye image to attract clients and speaking engagements. To find out more about him, we resort to some Sam Spade work of our own.

Stone Soup

Austin's Davíd Garza shuns talk and comparisons and lets his muse do the cooking

Almost Famous

Sex and the City author Candace Bushnell isn't Carrie Bradshaw. Like, really.

Live Free and Die

Smokers' rights activist Dave Pickrell thinks his freedom is being stubbed out cigarette by cigarette. He's fighting to stop that, coughing all the way.

Same As the Old Boss

A lack of Bush means a lack of news in Houston

Voters' Vida Loca

Uncle George's nephew finds what he never knew at Rice: Latino causes

Real Life

When He Was King: The city that convicted Muhammad Ali now hosts a film about the boxing legend

Winning in the Worst Way

Rock Knapp transformed little Northwest Academy from gridiron patsy to playoff powerhouse. So why are some parents calling for his head?

Big Talker

From the Geto Boys to his new nationally syndicated radio show, Willie D has kept his mouth moving. But where his rap was once down and dirty, not it's--gasp!--respectable. Has the gangsta of love sold out, or just grown up?

Snitch Vs. Snitch

In the drug world, you can't trust anybody - especially a federal informant

The Insider

Even the Normal (Get Lucky Sometime)

Craftsman Tom Petty uses the right tool for the right job

Press Picks

The Trial of Joe Russo

An intimate look at how -- and why -- Houston's high flyer of the '80s was taken apart in court