Walgreen Company

Thieves' Bazaar: Medicare Fraud

Hospitals, doctors and dealers have made Medicare the nation's sweetest crime. The feds are now trying to shutter the door.

5 Ways Bands Could Make Compilations Actually Interesting

Recently my colleague Nathan Smith cobbled together the Destiny Child's compilation Beyonce doesn't want you to see and it gave me an idea. Compilations are both the most necessary and aggravating albums in an artist's catalogue. One the one hand, it's always nice to have a good, definitive greatest ... More >>

5 Bands Studies Show Make You a Bad Person

We've been hearing for years that rock music makes us bad people. We've heard it from our parents, from teachers, from those goody-goody kids at school. AC/DC has probably written at least 100 songs about the subject. But what if I told you that scientists in the Netherlands have proved definitively ... More >>

What Is Houston Cowboy?

I spend too much time on the Internet, but occasionally get rewarded for my rabbit-holing with stuff like Houston Cowboy. (And this GIF of a kitten getting slapped by a cat for wearing a dumb bowler hat.) I saw Houston Cowboy floating around in a few places yesterday and decided to figure out what t ... More >>

Christmas Past: 10 Christmas Songs That Are Really About Drugs

While we celebrate the holidays, Rocks Off is resurrecting a few of our best Christmas-themed blogs from the past few years. (Wait... resurrecting is Easter. Never mind.) This blog originally appeared October 26, 2011. Halloween is right around the corner, so you know what that means: Time to start ... More >>

5 Ridiculous/Offensive Memorial Day Commercials

Some businesses are jerks for pimping a junk heap on wheels on Memorial Day. Others are silly for trying to sell sexual innuendo-heavy mattresses ("firm," "spread out," "not squishy") on a day that's supposed to be all about giving it up to American servicemen and women. Then there are these super- ... More >>

Friday Night: Rev. Al Green At Arena Theatre

Rev. Al Green Arena Theatre April 27th, 2012 Mark my words. If you check the local hospitals exactly nine months from now, you will surely see a spike in activity in the maternity wards. Al Green gets everyone and anyone into the baby-making mood. Even the comedian who opened the show alluded to th ... More >>

Save Yourself: The 10 Worst Online Retailers

Ads like this are the only reason to visit AmericanApparel.com...if you like that sort of thing​It's frustrating enough to shop for friends and family members during the holidays. Do I get my 80-year-old aunt a gift card to Kroger or H-E-B? Decisions, decisions. Unfortunately, some online mer ... More >>

Corpus Man Steals Beer Twice, Gets Beaten Up, All in One Evening

Beer: the cause of and solution to 99 percent of life's problems since 5000 BC.​For most people, a single day in which you were beaten badly enough by a group of men at a bus station to require a hospital visit and were caught (allegedly) swiping beer not once but twice would qualify as rock b ... More >>

The Great Escape: 8 Ways to Ditch Your Family This Thanksgiving

The holiday of plenty is finally here. The house smells of cranberries and fried delights. Your home is a bustle of relatives, cousins, aunts... neighbors? All of a sudden a severe panic envelops your body: it's only 8 a.m. You have an entire day to spend with these people - and they just keep comin ... More >>

Freeway View

The scenery ain't much, but Azul Lounge is a bubbling little Southside R&B cauldron.

Feds Bring Down Hammer on Lufkin Meth Trade

In two distinct actions, federal authorities have indicted 17 East Texans on over 200 counts of crimes related to the crystal methamphetamine trade in and around Lufkin. You just might be hearing this song all over town this week: In the first action, the Lufkin Daily News has reported that a fed ... More >>

Walgreen's Electric-Car Charging Stations: The Rest Of the U.S. Is Catching Up To Houston

Charge it up​We can't say we've exactly seen the electric-car charging stations at various Walgreen's around the town, but we'll take the company's word that they exist. And now the rest of the nation will be following in Houston's footsteps, as the drug giant expands the concept to more than ... More >>

Prog-Rock Bassist Enters Stupid Criminal Hall Of Fame

GroovehouseCoheed's Claudio Sanchez: Now auditioning bassists.​Sometimes when Rocks Off interviews this musician or that one, we'll ask them what they do to kill time on the road. Some of them read, others take in the local sights if they have time, obviously a lot of them listen to music. The ... More >>

Free HIV Testing at Walgreens: Five Reasons To Get Tested

Drop and give us twenty...minutes to test you​Walgreens is all kinds of sexy lately. In March, it became the first pharmacy to carry the female condom, a plastic pouch that gives females the power of putting up their own STI-barrier. Now for the first time ever, Walgreens is offering free HIV ... More >>

Five Texas Sluts Worth Admiring

SlutWalk Houston is right around the corner, and we've decided to celebrate, (Hair) Balls out. In case you're not familiar with the march, SlutWalk was born of a Toronto police officer's comment that women should avoid "dressing like sluts" in order not to be raped. It's a chance to stop the cycle o ... More >>

Food Fight: Vanilla Malt

The Burger Guys.​Way back in 2009, Katharine Shilcutt wrote in considerable detail about exactly what sort of drink could properly be called a milkshake. I have no intention of fighting that battle again, primarily because there's nothing to debate. A milkshake means milk and ice cream, and it sho ... More >>

Which Houston Rappers Deserve Their Own Streets?

The hip-hop world is a less than sensible place - lots of times, you're even required to clarify when bad means bad and when bad means good - so once a week we're going to get with a rapper and ask them to explain things. Have something you always wanted to ask a rapper? Email sheaserrano@gmail.com. ... More >>

Brew Blog: Rogue Morimoto Soba Ale

​I needed a break after last week's Brew Blog. It's not that I don't love darker, heavier beer, it's just that I drank quite a bit of the stuff last week. So I went in search of the lightest, most easy-drinking beer I thought I could swing without earning eternal derision from you fine folk. J ... More >>

This Week in (Unrestrained) Deliciousness

Here at Eating Our Words, we all like the green ones. ​In true Mardi Gras fashion, this week Eating Our Words was a celebration of excess. After all, we kicked it off with a gallon of butter and a call to judge our Burger Brackets. Your enthusiasm for beef is overwhelming (and I want one of t ... More >>

Ten Charmingly Strange Old Postcards from Galveston, Beaumont and Baytown

Last month we shared with you ten charmingly strange old postcards from Houston. Now it's time to give equal love to the places that surround Houston. As always, Card Cow is the place to go for your vintage-postcard needs. 10. Beaumont: Plenty of Parking! The Beaumont Village Shopping Center featu ... More >>

First Look at Piola

Photos courtesy of Piola because I also managed to forget my camera last night on top of everything else.​Between a dead car battery and an inhaler emergency (thanks for nothing, Walgreen's) last night, I didn't make it to Piola (3201 Louisiana, 713-524-8222) either on time or in my typical ca ... More >>

Darrell Craig Vogel: Beaumont Prosecutor Picked Up Twice In 24 Hours For DWI

The prosecution rests, excessively​Darrell Craig Vogel, 50, is an assistant prosecutor for the city of Beaumont, meaning he deals with municipal court stuff. The pressures of holding in your hands the Sophie's Choice of whether or not to prosecute that 41-in-a-35 mph-zone case may have been t ... More >>

10 Places I Liked as a Photographer, Want to Try as an Eater

Photo by Jeff BalkeSteak and cheesy grits at Plonk Beer and Wine Bistro​Last week, I wrote about my experiences photographing 100 restaurants for the Houston Press online restaurant guide. During the month I was shooting, I shot eateries both familiar and not so much. Given my time constraints ... More >>

Houston Slammed By European Travel Blog: We're Boooorrring

But...but...there's the Kemah Boardwalk!!​Among world cities, in which category does Houston rank second only to Brussels, the capital of the European Union? Tedium, at least according to the European Union-funded wiki blog OpenTravel. According to "Chili," an English-language challenged scr ... More >>

$2.99 Southern Point Wine from...Walgreens

​It's called Southern Point, retails for $2.99, and you can only get it at Walgreens. Oh, and it's as good as any $10 to $12 wine in recent memory. Yes, Walgreens. America's largest retail drugstore brought wine and beer back to its shelves earlier this year, ending a nearly 15-year sales b ... More >>

Come See My Dead Person Gives Rocks Off A Spelling Lesson

Come See My Dead Person​Each Wednesday, Rocks Off arbitrarily appoints one lucky local performer or group "Artist of the Week," bestowing upon them all the fame and grandeur such a lofty title implies. Know a band or artist that isn't awful? Email their particulars to sheaserrano@gmail.com. ... More >>

Stuck On You: Farmville Fanatic Arrested In String Of Bizarre Summertime Adhesive Attacks

​One of the more bizarre Houston-area crimes of the past year has apparently been solved.Back in July, Pasadena police were seeking a man described as an "older teenager" who they believed attacked random women in retail outlets. His assaults took a peculiar form: he would squirt a tube of what w ... More >>

He Said She Said: Songs We Are Least Thankful For

​ She Said heard her first holiday song Monday, at around 9 p.m. in the Montrose Walgreens, and suddenly she was transported to her own personal hell - one filled solely with late-night pharmacy shoppers and Mariah Carey's

If Halloween Is Coming, So Are Offensive Costumes

​The "Illegal Alien" costume causing uproar amongst immigrant rights activists, anti-immigrant supporters and free speech advocates is the first major faux pas of this Halloween season. While anti-immigrant supporters are scrambling to find the costume, immigrant rights activists are calling for ... More >>

Inept Pregnant Woman Spoils Motorcylist's Getaway From The Cops

​You know what you just hate when you're on a motorcycle trying to get away from a DPS trooper because you're wanted on a burglary charge?Pregnant women who slam their cars into drug stores.The sad tale of 18-year-old Daniel Nuno of League City proves the point. Nuno was on his motorcycle in F ... More >>

Cyberchondriacs

Generation DIY turns to self-diagnosing to save money.

I Have a Problem With The Hills. Like a Drug Problem.

Photo courtesy of VlastulaSeriously.  Why do I torture myself?  Why do I find myself creating an appointment television relationship with MTV's reality show, The Hills?  And by reality I mean as real as Heidi Montag's tits.  Frankly, I think it's pretty much basically sick to ... More >>

Sole Of Houston: Airline Drive, Part 1

The longest walk in the history of the Sole of Houston requires the longest piece. This being a blog and all, we have decided to break it up into three installments. Coming today, tomorrow and Thursday in this tale of 22-plus miles of concrete, mud, and fairly cold weather: The fending off a pote ... More >>

Turning the Screw: Dustin Prestige, Lupe Fiasco, Katy Perry/Travis McCoy, Dr. Dre, DJ AM, Lil' Kim, Damon Dash/Jay-Z, Talib Kweli and More

Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: "Funny Valentine," Dustin Prestige Wire To Wire Lupe Fiasco, whom you'll remember recently announ ... More >>

Places That Are Open -- Constantly Updated

It's Debt Collection, Not Extortion

Shoplifting -- A Gateway Crime to Extortion?

Emo Poems About Adult Every Day Life

David Wildbur's Sage Decision

Sole of Houston: Bissonnet, from Synott Road to Montrose

PRINCE'S DRIVE IN

This hamburger joint -- and its chocolate malted -- make a comeback

Patriot Game

What's a real American to do on Cinco de Mayo?

I Resolve to Get Laid

Houston is crawling with opportunities to get off

Fringe Characters

This summer the PC Cowboys trade KILT for kilts

Rave Rules

No one over 25 should be in attendance, but if you are, here's the game plan

Listen In

30footFALL, ragtag, secretsunday and Paul English

Pure Puerto Rico

Tex Chick goes from fast food to home food of the island

Pop Moment