Astros-Diamondbacks: Playing Around with Play by Play
PREGAME: Here are some of the basics that must be known before tonight’s game with the D-backs gets started. The D-backs possess the best record in major league baseball. The Astros, well, they’re not the worst. The D-backs have scored a MLB high 153 runs, for an average of 5.9…
Reverberations: Clarences, Flamin’ Groovies, Scott Deluxe Drake and Liverpool Five
Power-pop fans take note: Next Monday, you can catch Oakland band The Clarences live on the Internet at 11:30 p.m. CST. I hear drinks will be dirt cheap. This week brought another reissue of Flamin’ Groovies’ 1970 sophomore album, Flamingo, which showed the Groovies stripping down and proving that the…
The Blog of Lists: 20 Teetotaling Musicians other than Ian Mackaye
Last week we gave you the vegans. This week, the designated drivers: David Bowie Eric Dolphy Davey Havok (also a vegan) Elton John Chris Martin Ted Nugent Donny Osmond Jade Puget Henry Rollins Gene Simmons…
More Googlism Poetry
Back in January, I plugged the names of Houston musicians into the endlessly amusing but mostly pointless site Googlism and generated a few poems composed entirely of the collective conventional wisdom of the web. (Read the results here.) This time, it’s the turn of Kenny Rogers, King’s X and Mickey…
Rockets-Jazz Game Five: Return of the Streakers
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. Last night, the Rockets grabbed an early lead and never looked back, thanks in large part to a balanced offensive effort, crisp ball movement, inspired play by a cast of no-names off the bench, and superior defense. Sprinkle in a sublimely efficient…
Star Jones Reynolds and Her D-I-V-O-R-C-E
In some not-shocking-but-wonderfully-true news this past week, we learned that Miss Payless Shoes (Star Jones Reynolds) is about to knock off that second last name with her pending divorce from Al Reynolds. Somewhere, Barbara Walters is allowing herself to giggle with glee and Joy Behar is cackling as she rubs…
Looking Back at the 2007-2008 Houston Aeros
Fred Trask The Houston Aeros season ended a bit earlier than I expected. I didn’t expect them to win the Calder Cup, or to get to the Calder Cup finals, but I still thought they would defeat Rockford. But that’s not why I’m writing. I just wanted to rehash bits…
Steroids and Roger Clemens: Looks Like Two More Ladies Might’ve Taken a Ride on the Rocket
Just when you think things are beginning to die down in Rocketland, something else happens. While stating that his daughter admitted to the affair with Rocket because she is trying to re-launch her career, Mindy McCready’s dad did confirm that the two had a sexual relationship, but only after she…
Ron Paul, the Jason Voorhees of Presidential Candidates
Like a disgustingly rich, misanthropic cancer-ridden nonagenarian clinging on his hospital bed to what few remaining brain cells haven’t atrophied, just to spite all his would-be heirs, Ron Paul’s presidential campaign just won’t freaking die already. Apparently unfamiliar with the terms “graceful exit” or “shut the fuck up already,” Paul’s…
Astros-Diamondbacks: Back Down to Three Games Below Five Hundred
Lance Berkman was named NL Player of the Week The vaunted offense of the Houston Astros was shut down yet again last night, this time by a score of 5-3. Dan Haren and the Arizona Diamondbacks dominated the ‘Stros, as the vaunted machine strung together only five hits. Haren was…
Steroids, Roger Clemens and Mindy McCready: It’s Getting Shakespearian Up in Here
I thought Rusty Hardin’s initial comments yesterday regarding the latest Rocket fiasco were rather subdued for Rusty Hardin. And they were, because yesterday afternoon, he went on the attack. “There’s no question in my mind that this is a really filthy smear campaign orchestrated by McNamee’s lawyers clearly intended to…
Last Night: Sean Reefer & the Resin Valley Boys at Boondocks
Photo by Rosa Guerrero Sean Reefer & the Resin Valley Boys Boondocks April 28, 2008 Better Than: A double drive-in bill of Dazed and Confused and Reefer Madness, reenacted Rocky Horror-style. Download: The Velvet Underground’s “Heroin,” so nobody feels left out. If you go see Sean Reefer & the Resin…
Cheap Gas Just Outside of Houston (and the Time-Space Continuum)
This weekend we were driving down FM 529 outside of Copperfield when we saw a sign from a bygone era. Regretfully, the country store’s pumps haven’t been in operation for at least five years. — Keith Plocek…
Get Lit: W.A.R.: The Unauthorized Biography of William Axl Rose, by Mick Wall
Admit it, people: Guns N’ Roses’ 1988 multi-platinum debut Appetite for Destruction was the best Aerosmith album of the decade. Through the vicarious thrills this accessibly sleazy record offered, millions of middle-class high school kids had their final flirtation with juvenile delinquency before preparing to become tax lawyers, physical therapists…
Pupusa Truck Invasion on South Post Oak
When did South Post Oak go Salvadorean? I counted three new pupucerias south of 90A, including this charming pupusa trailer near the intersection of Tidewater…
Lonesome Onry and Mean: Steve Earle at Verizon
In the wake of all the in-depth analysis on DC9 at Night about the burning question of whether Bruce Springsteen’s Dallas or Houston show was “better,” I now find myself lost in the fallout of Friday’s show by the southern Springsteen, Steve Earle. Everyone is a music critic. Immediately after…
Going to the Chapel, Going to Jail
This past year, two of my very best and oldest friends that I grew up with in Pittsburgh got married, one in Chicago and one in Austin. The Chicago wedding took place in a basement theater of the city’s main public library. Vows were exchanged onstage after bride and bridegroom…
Twitter This
All right, so everyone was all in a tizzy last week when it was discovered that some American graduate student was able to get himself out of an Egyptian jail by alerting his friends through Twitter, a social-networking site that allows people to send short messages to each other. I…
Steroids and Roger Clemens: Enter Mindy McCready
Well, things have been kind of quiet in Rocket World lately — discounting that whole Jose Canseco book thing. But the New York Daily News is reporting that if Rocket continues with his little defamation suit against Brian McNamee, the world — and presumably Mrs. Rocket — will get to…
Astros-Cardinals: STL Takes Two From HOU
The saying is that good pitching always beats good hitting. Which is why I find it amazing that the St. Louis Cardinals have been shutting down the vaunted Astros offensive machine this year. Braden Looper, Friday’s starter, is a failed closer. Adam Wainwright, Saturday’s starter, is a converted reliever, and…
Over the Weekend: Hockey and Lots of Drinking and Dancing
As April, a month of nonstop outdoor festivals, winds down, we don’t have quite the overload of event coverage we’ve had the past few weeks, but we try to make up for it with gusto. The End of the Aeros Season Well, that’s it. The IceHogs bested the Aeros. Game…
Aeros-IceHogs: Season Over
Fred Trask Here’s the thing about a team that needs to play perfect hockey to compete against the best. When things fall apart, they fall apart quick. And for the Houston Aeros on Friday night, things fell apart just 1:55 into the game. The Houston Aeros charged out of the…
Get Lit: Vindicated: Big Names, Big Liars, and the Battle to Save Baseball, by Jose Canseco
If there is anybody who has the right to take a victory lap amidst all of steroid discussion that’s overtaken baseball, it’s Jose Canseco. Canseco’s first book, Juiced, was his story of using steroids to make himself a better player. His story of spreading the joys of steroids about major…
$13 at Pappas Bar-B-Q
Where: Pappas Bar-B-Q, 1100 Smith, 713-659-1245 What $13 gets you: Some not-too-bad barbecue from the city’s biggest corporate chain of barbecue restaurants I never much cared for Pappas Bar-B-Q. The barbecue sauce is thin, the links and ribs are nothing special and I still don’t get the appeal of sliced…
Why You Say Pong?
About a decade ago, Ed Hall staged sweaty, savage shows marked by the Austin trio performing in body paint, bizarro film projections second only to the Butthole Surfers and suffocating psych-punk that made the Black Angels sound like Donovan. Along with Crust and the Cherubs, Ed Hall was one of…
Astros-Reds: That’s Five in a Row
At the risk of jinxing the Astros, I’m going to mention that they’ve now won five straight games. With an 11-12 record, the Astros are now one game below the .500 mark. A win tonight against the St. Louis Cardinals would put the Astros at the break even point, a…
Last Night: Steve Earle and Allison Moorer at Cactus Music
Steve Earle, Allison Moorer Cactus Music April 24, 2008 Better Than: “A Night at the Opry, Sponsored by C-SPAN” Download: It was an IN-STORE, for God’s sakes. No downloading allowed. For all his prickly politics, Steve Earle deserves credit for knowing exactly what his audience wants to hear. The grizzled,…
Last Night: Day 26 at Cullen Performance Hall
Think boy bands died in the ’90s? Apparently you haven’t been watching P Diddy’s Making the Band, where Sr. Combs uses his unique expertise to keep the world populated with pop stars. Season Four’s Day 26 performed yesterday at the University of Houston for the Block Explosion, and we had…
Texas Girl Amanda Brooks Teaches Internet Prostitution 101
Women: Have you ever dreamed about being a prostitute, but not the yucky street-walking kind? Maybe you were afraid of being called “whore” or “criminal defendant.” Well, a retired, Texas-born hooker has now written a pair of how-to books for you to get off your foot and on your back…
Mp3s: The New Orleans Hustlers Brass Band
Lumar Leblanc, T.S.U. grad, snare drummer/bandleader for the Soul Rebels Brass Band, and post-Katrina Houstonian, has a new Houston-based group. The New Orleans Hustlers Brass Band is available for “parades, stage shows, jazz funerals, weddings and parties.” In LeBlanc’s words, the Hustlers will “travel the world over and provide quality…
Aeros-IceHogs: More Wet Ice, Another Loss for Houston
Fred Trask “When someone wins four, it’s over,” Houston Aeros coach Kevin Constantine said last night following Houston’s 2-1 loss to the Rockford IceHogs. “It’s not over because no one’s won four. So we’ll go battle tomorrow night and see what happens.” The Rockford IceHogs have not won four games…
Picnic Platter at the Russian General Store
Sasha Kogan, salami consultant at the Russian General Store You can put together a picnic lunch for two at the Russian General Store for a pittance. The gourmet meats are sold for less than half the price that upscale grocery stores charge. And the General Store has the best selection…
Get Lit: The New InterCourses: an aphrodisiac cookbook
All right, so you might not actually want to bring your date to this event, but it could make a future evening hawt. Martha Hopkins will be appearing at Central Market on Saturday from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. to promote The New InterCourses: an aphrodisiac cookbook. The book includes…
Snoop Dogg Goes Country, Y’all
Do you know what “Dopestick pimpin’ on the one-trick pony” means? I sure as Hell don’t either, but I like the sound of it. Where do these lovely words come from? From a little tune called “My Medicine,” performed by country music’s latest addition, Snoop Dogg. Yes, Snoop Dogg. The…
The Blog of Lists: 25 Vegan Musicians
Bryan Adams Fiona Apple Cedric Bixler Geezer Butler Common Michael Franti Robin Gibb Ben Gibbard (lead singer of Death Cab for Cutie) John S. Hall (frontman for King Missile) Davey Havok (singer for AFI) Chrissie Hynde…
Downtown Firefighters Finally Get New Digs
It took a long, long time, but the firefighters at Station No. 8, the downtown station, finally have a permanent home. They’ve been housed for seven years in temporary digs, as one delay or another has blocked the effort to build a new facility. Station 8 actually combines firefighters who…
Elvis Takes a Milby Coed to the Carhop
When you get right down to it, most often the blogosphere is usually a pretty obnoxious place. But every now and then you find a story like the first one in the comments box of this post on John Gonzales’s old Bayou City History blog. Here’s some backstory and an…
Erin Andrews Goes from Not Posing Nude in Playboy to Hosting Spelling Bee on ESPN
I’ve never understood how a spelling bee can be considered a sporting event, even though it does air on ESPN every year. Apparently, I’m not the only who thinks this because the network is looking for a new host to help boost ratings. For years, before she went legit and…
Episcopal and Cinco Ranch Win Big at Tommy Tune Awards
Theatre Under the Stars had its annual Tommy Tune awards Tuesday, the coveted Tonys for local high schools. Judges saw 41 productions in the 2007-08 school year, God bless `em. The biggest surprise (to us)? A religious school did Urinetown. Those scamps at Episcopal, man. It paid off, though, because…
Listen Up: K-Rino’s “Holla at Me”
Here’s a new video from K-Rino. Great song and video. This guy is on a whole other level, and it’s a shame he didn’t get more shine in the big H-Town rap boom of 2005. Hell, after 20 years of steady, even expanding genius, I think they should put a…
Astros-Reds: The Vaunted Offense Keeps Hitting
Here are the basics from last night’s Astros-Reds tilt: The Astros won 9-3. The Astros had 14 hits. They have now scored 30 runs in the past three games. Hunter Pence continues to be on fire as he had another multi-hit night to move his average up to .256. And…
All the Dom You Can Drink
Mother’s Day is right around the corner (May 11), and if you’re looking for the ultimate food and wine experience for dear old Mom, don’t miss this: the Dom Perignon Buffet Brunch at the Marriott Westchase (2900 Briarpark Drive). The restaurant is offering limitless glasses of Dom Perignon champagne, served…
Q&A: Reverend Bob Levy Talks Howard Stern, Blue Cheese and Killers of Comedy
Though they aren’t really well known in mainstream stand-up comedy circles, among the millions of fans of Howard Stern’s radio show, they are superstars and like family…albeit a hugely dysfunctional one. The Killers of Comedy are an amalgamation of stand-up comics (including a racist clown), Stern show staffers, and sideshow…
The Five Biggest Choke Jobs in Houston Sports History
Since it is playoff time for the Rockets and Aeros, and since the Astros and Texans probably won’t be seeing the playoffs for a long time to come, I figured it was an appropriate time to visit the Five Biggest Choke Jobs in Houston Sports History. So, in descending order,…
Vijay Iyer
Called one of the “new stars of jazz” by U.S. News & World Report (the magazine that’s always in your dentist’s office), and one of “today’s most important pianists” by The New Yorker (the magazine that’s always in your scholarly uncle’s bathroom), Vijay Iyer has certainly become one of the…
Paul Mooney
Paul Mooney doesn’t care if he offends whites. “I ain’t sugarcoating shit, because white folks didn’t sugarcoat shit to me,” he says. Mooney’s material on race in America has earned him top writing jobs with shows such as In Living Color and Saturday Night Live. In one bit, he explains…
Itzhak Perlman
With 15 Grammy Awards on his shelf, Israeli violinist Itzhak Perlman could sit back and enjoy his success. Instead, he’s keeping up a rigorous touring schedule, which, happily, includes a stop in Houston. Today’s program will include works by Bach, Strauss and Schumann. 8 p.m. Jones Hall, 615 Louisiana. For…
Billy Budd
Nautical tragedy Billy Budd, one of the major operatic works of the last century, has impeccable credentials: a script based on Herman Melville’s novella first published in 1924, written by A Room with a View author E.M. Forster, and a score by Benjamin Britten. All Music Guide says Britten’s music…
Bevin Bering
Photographer Bevin Bering has the ability to take the familiar and make it seem new and different. Her “Houston Series” focuses on local landmarks, including downtown skyscrapers, tree-lined streets in West University and well-known outdoor art. In City Hall, we see a picture postcard shot of the building, but shadows…
“The Hour: Cocktail Time Design 1930-1980” & 20th Century Modern Market
Don Browne’s interest in modern design led him to some bad habits. “The smoking kind of came along with the drinking,” he says. Browne isn’t referring to his personal habits, though — he’s talking about his preference for collectibles. He’s spent more than 20 years acquiring objects associated with the…
Anne Appleby and Maddy Rosenberg
“Concrete painting” isn’t a home-decorating fad — it’s a term used by Wade Wilson Art to describe the work of Anne Appleby, whose minimalist one-color abstracts are as smooth and monotonic as concrete. The Montana artist has been showing her simple, subtle works since 1977; a book of them was…
Fabulous Fridays
Get a jump start on iFest’s second weekend at Fabulous Fridays, the free lunchtime concert series. Today one of Houston’s longest-running, best-loved party bands, the Zydeco Dots, brings some Bayou City pizzaz to the proceedings. The National Dance Theater of Ethiopia offers up its own rhythmic interpretations. Stick around a…
Katy Heinlein
Katy Heinlein does her best work between the sheets. For her show at CTRL Gallery, the artist draped brightly colored fabrics off wires and wood beams to create ambiguous wall- and floor-based sculptures. They look as if they could be forming landscapes, body parts, buildings or something else — Heinlein…
Coert Voorhees
Think local author Coert Voorhees’s young adult novels are just for kids? Well he doesn’t think so, and to prove it, this reading will be at a bar. “My target audience will not be joining us for the reading,” says the author of The Brothers Torres, laughing. Voorhees assures us…
One Flea Spare
If one thing could make cabin fever worse, it would be the black plague. (Okay, so maybe that would actually make it a lot worse.) Brought to you by Mildred’s Umbrella Theater Company, Naomi Wallace’s One Flea Spare is set during the Great Plague of 1665 and tells the story…
East Meets West
Let’s face it: Relations between China and the West aren’t in tip-top shape right now (see the recent torch-extinguishing episode in France). Fortunately, performing arts pros rarely let themselves get caught up in the political kerfuffle, so tonight’s East Meets West dance concert at the Miller Outdoor Theatre will eschew…
Houston Metropolitan Dance Company’s Spring Concert
The innovative Houston Metropolitan Dance Company routinely draws the eye of established local and national choreographers, but the company puts a special emphasis on incubating choreographic talent from within its own ranks. A “dancing think-tank” might be a good way to describe the cerebral group, which combines ballet, modern, classical…
Tea with Mussolini
If you’re hoping to see a serious historical portrayal of an Italian dictator, don’t bother with Franco Zeffirelli’s Tea with Mussolini. There are plenty of things to enjoy in this satire, but its focus is more on a group of snooty, middle-aged British women than on fascism. The main character…
“Happiness Is a Warm Gun: The Thomas Imbach Films”
Genre. Tone. Fiction. Fact. Documentary. Drama. These terms don’t seem to mean much to Switzerland’s Thomas Imbach, a director for whom the term “experimental filmmaker” may be too narrow and specific. The selections at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s “Happiness Is a Warm Gun: The Thomas Imbach Films,” playing…
Dersu Uzala
There aren’t many Russian/Japanese films out there, and fewer still that can be called classics, which is why this screening of Dersu Uzala is an especially nice treat for film buffs. The 1975 flick, which won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film that year, was the only film Japanese…
Dan Fesperman
Dan Fesperman has spent the last 17 years as a war correspondent. It shows in his writing. Known for his blistering renditions of world politics in a post-9/11 world, the award-winning novelist reads from his newest novel, An Amateur Spy, today. His fifth thriller, Spy takes us into the dirty…
Sgt. Pepper at Discovery Green
Man, there is a lot going on downtown this weekend. Not only are there a bunch of good shows in the clubs (see elsewhere in this section for details), but it’s also the second and final week of the Houston International Festival. And we will have more on the iFest…
She & Him: Volume One
With the possible exception of the three people who look back fondly on Bruce Willis’s recording career, we’re well acquainted with the eardrum damage that can occur when actors live out their rock-star fantasies. But don’t shy away from She & Him’s debut just because the female half of the…
Capsule Art Reviews: “Craft in America — Expanding Traditions,” “Dario Robleto: Oh, Those Mirrors With Memory (Actions 1996-1997),” “John Alexander: New Paintings and Drawings,” “Katy Heinlein,” “Miwa Yanagi — Deutsche Bank Collection,”
“Craft in America — Expanding Traditions” With a lush catalog introduced by Jimmy Carter, an extensive Web site and an accompanying three-part PBS series, “Craft in America — Expanding Traditions” has “blockbuster” written all over it. Organized by Craft in America, Inc., the exhibition seeks to explore the “many cultures…
Reviewing The Reviews with Tristan Prettyman
(In which some of Wack’s favorite artists respond to their critics.) Tristan Prettyman — the San Diego folk-pop singer-songwriter, surfer and former Roxy model — is back with her sophomore album, Hello. Over the phone from New York, where she was getting ready to board a plane to Nashville to…
Unwelcome: The Visitor
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: A lonely dwarf, a wisecracking Cuban-American and a grieving mother walk into each other’s lives, laugh together, cry together, grow, change and heal each other’s emotional wounds. Cue Sundance prizes, Miramax pickup, torrent of glowing reviews and surprisingly robust indie box-office. The…
David Beebe’s Matagorda Island Discs
In our second installment, David Beebe of Banana Blender Surprise and the El Orbits weighs in from his trailer in Marfa: “This is a tough one, but since I’m basically in a desert (and an Airstream) and the nearest airport is three hours away, I may be more equipped to…
Steve Earle and Allison Moorer
Her husband might be the headliner with his name in much bigger print in the ads, but Allison Moorer could very well steal the show. She’ll certainly be more enchanting, with the languidly melodic way she interprets songs from her 2007 collection of mostly covers, Mockingbird (New Line), which has…
Harold and Kumar Go to Prison
Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg wrote Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle with the novel idea: What if you made a John Hughes movie, but instead of writing garishly caricatured bit players with names like Long Duk Dong, you cast an Asian actor as the smart, handsome, upwardly mobile…
Elf Power, with Lazy Horse and the Missing Files
Before amorphous Canadian musical collectives like Broken Social Scene rose to prominence (in certain circles, anyway) with forever-changing rosters and deadly pop hooks veining a mountain of free-form jamming, a tribe of wayward Americans known as Elephant 6 was already there. The founding troika of bands that made up Elephant…
The Annotated Alberto Gonzales
Some Houstonians have long been inordinately proud of Alberto Gonzales. Raised in Humble, he went to Rice and spent his early career working for one of Houston’s largest law firms. Breaking down barriers along the way, he fought his way up the ladder to become the first Hispanic Attorney General…
The Mighty Orq: To the Bone
They must hear it every single show, so it was downright gracious (and no doubt ironic) of the Mighty Orq to thank the people who “yelled ‘Play some Stevie!'” in the liner notes of To the Bone. In truth, the Bayou City blues-rockers are much less indebted to Stevie Ray…
Monotonix: Body Language
It used to be that a band’s records enticed you to the live show. Though a studio recording, Monotonix’s Drag City debut EP Body Language, on the other hand, is best appreciated as a memento of the delirious tumult this band puts on live. You know of a lot of…
Foreclosure Pets
The rising number of foreclosures in the area has created a new term in the animal welfare lexicon: “foreclosure pets.” As realtors and junk haulers find more and more animals left behind in foreclosed homes, workers with humane agencies are trying to determine a way to solve the problem. “It’s…
Bayousphere
Discovery Green has been officially christened!! Ivana pours out the traditional “Blessing of the Dog Area” with all the panache and style you’d expect from someone named Ivana who pees in public. To view image larger, here…
Sex, Drugs and Amputees in “Apertura-Colombia”
A young man in the jungle is trying to wash the camouflage paint from his face. It’s an unusually laborious process for him — he doesn’t have any hands. He dips the stumps of his forearms into a pool of water and rubs them over his cheeks, slowly wiping the…
Rogues’ Torment in Baroque
First of all: God bless Atlus. As a publisher devoted to bringing obscure Japanese gaming gems to the West — basically the much-needed heir apparent of Working Designs — Atlus is the only hope for gamers who crave oddball, strange or downright niche titles from the Land of the Rising…
Antone’s Market, Chef’s Table, Philippe, and Russo’s New York Coal-Fired Pizzeria
At Bistro Moderne, Chef Philippe Schmidt won many accolades for his take on French bistro food; when he left, the Houston food world was disappointed and wondered what he would do next. The Press was surprised to find him turn up at, of all places, the new Antone’s Market (2311…
The Lowrider Band
While the name “Lowrider Band” may not be familiar, their set-list certainly is, as a sweet harmonica riff wafts through funky material like “The Cisco Kid,” “All Day Music,” Slippin’ Into Darkness,” “Why Can’t We Be Friends?” and “Low Rider.” It’s a War cover band, right? Well, legally yes. But…
Capsule Stage Reviews: La Bohème, Leading Ladies, Love Loves a Pornographer, Rounding Third, Twelve Angry Men
La Bohème It doesn’t really matter that there’s no passion or fire between Ana Maria Martinez and Garrett Sorenson in their roles as eternal lovers Mimi and Rodolfo, in this Houston Grand Opera production, because there’s plenty in the orchestra to make do. Giacomo Puccini’s La Bohème is usually called…
Cleaning Up Foreclosed Homes After the Mortgage Crisis
Victor Correa approached the abandoned house with caution. The lawn was overgrown, and various pieces of junk — a broken charcoal grill and rusted push lawnmower included — littered the backyard. A mortgage lender hired Correa, 25, to clean the foreclosed home. Other than the address, Correa had little information…
No Drama for Baby Mama
Could have sworn I’ve seen this episode of Baby Mama before — like sometime in January 2007, when it was originally titled “The Baby Show” and aired on the other prime-time series starring Tina Fey, 30 Rock. (Waitaminute — you say Baby Mama’s a movie and not a TV show?…
No Child Left Behind?
To the Test A teacher’s thoughts: I read “Exit Exams” [by Margaret Downing, April 10] with great interest. As a first-year teacher, I couldn’t agree more with many of the flaws of standardized testing that you pointed out. However, your view that the testing doesn’t match the curriculum because “[the]…
Short Order Thai at Thai Lily Café
The tom kha gai soup at Thai Lily Café on Dairy Ashford is made with chicken in coconut milk broth with lemongrass, fresh chiles, lime juice and mushrooms. The soup was so fantastic, I picked up my bowl and slurped down the last of it. And I ended up with…
ASK A MEXICAN
Dear Readers, The paperback version of my book is out in stores now, cheap enough so that even a Guatemalan can afford it. Buy, por favor! Now, on to the preguntas… Dear Mexican, Lately, I’ve been hearing how punks and metalheads in Mexico are trying to beat up emos because…
Seafood Lasagna at Sage
When in Rome: The “Roman’s open seafood lasagna” ($24) at Sage (2221 W. Alabama, 713-526-6242) is worthy of any Roman feast. The dish consists of large, thin squares of Chef Paolo Mascio’s homemade pasta layered with a seafood mixture of shrimp, crab, scallops and fish filets cooked in a cream-based…
Band of Heathens
Austin’s Band of Heathens has a nice little notch on its belt: being named the best new band in Austin at last year’s Austin Music Awards. Not too shabby. But maybe it was just an off year? Nah, the fellas in the Band of Heathens bring it just fine, thank…
Genghis Tron, with Converge, the Red Chord and Coliseum
In addition to having possibly the coolest moniker ever conceived, Genghis Tron is blessed with a genuinely idiosyncratic electro-metal sound. Fusing the synth-driven sensibilities of electro with metal’s brutal crunch has led most acts toward the late, largely unlamented genre of industrial, but that’s not the case here. Starting with…