After a Fashion

Moët Hennessy's Ed Kukol, renowned artist Graydon Parrish, Texas Advocacy Project's Heath Riddles, and ASA Development Director Marilyn Willson at ASA's last Red Ribbon Dinner of 2008 at Zoot (Photo courtesy of Micah King)

A LIGHT DEBATE All right, how do we really feel about the new holiday lights Downtown? For nine years I've been ragging on the city about its hideously tacky and tinselly decorations, and finally we see a change. But do we like it? It's true that the retired decorations should be publicly destroyed so that they can no longer harm anyone's sense of style – perhaps a bonfire at Festival Beach where every concerned citizen will we allowed to add more fuel to the fire as he or she sees fit until the offensive and tawdry decorations are nothing but a dim memory. The new lights? Well, they don't exactly make me yearn for tinsel, but nor do they make me feel as if driving up the grand thoroughfare of Congress Avenue was like entering the Kingdom of Heaven on Christmas morning. And that's really what I expect out of holiday decorations. I mean, if the lights don't make you feel festive, then they're not doing their job. Let's take a look at the new lights that span Congress, shall we? I remember the first time I realized they were up, it was twilight, and I couldn't really tell enough about them except that they were the new, efficient LED lights. I've truly gotten to love the LED lights – the big tree outside of Sago (www.sagomodernmexican.com, the fabulous modern Mexican food restaurant in the Triangle) is so brilliant it reminds me of the Ginza district in Tokyo ... or at least of Times Square. So I rather expected that when I viewed the new lights on Congress under the proper circumstances (in the dark), they would dazzle in the night and sparkle like there was no tomorrow. Traveling the length of Congress, including stopping for red lights, I saw the sort of dim mauve and light-blue lights skittering in skinny chasing patterns above me for a brief period, then they just stayed sort of mauve-ish as I traversed the rest of the avenue. Am I missing something here? Was I perhaps supposed to drive up and down Congress many times in repetition to see the array of colors and tricks of the lights in their full glory? I'm afraid I'm too busy for that. Is it too late to return them and order new ones? Perhaps it's just the beginning of a grand scheme to annually add to the lights until heaven is created on Congress. The ugly reality is that I have no business criticizing the lights. After annually complaining, I was invited to be in on the selection committee for the new lights ... but I was somewhere far from earth at that time, even if I wasn't in heaven. So it's my fault that we have this scant display to replace the execrably awful tinsel. I shoulder the blame entirely. I should have done something about it when I had the chance. But no. I was only thinking of myself. So now I ... we have to suffer for it. Forgive me.

ZOOT SUIT The last of the fabulous Red Ribbon Dinners for AIDS Services of Austin has been given for 2008 ... and it was, of course, divine. How could it not be divine when it was at Zoot (www.zootrestaurant.com)? Co-owner and co-chef Stewart Scruggs is also co-owner of the fabulous Wink (www.winkrestaurant.com) and is one of the founders of ASA's Red Ribbon Dinner Series and has seen it turn into a hugely successful fundraiser. Attracting co-sponsors such as Glazer's Distributors and Moët Hennessy, these dinners always bring together a wide array of supporters from the ridiculous (me) to the sublime (Robert F. Dailey, who invited me). Speaking of which, the next Red Ribbon Dinner begins the 2009 series at Wink in January, and ASA's always fabulous Viva Las Vegas fundraiser is Saturday, Feb. 21, 8pm-12mid at the Austin Music Hall. This year's Viva will have a fashion show ... at which I will be making some sort of tragic appearance (tix and further details of these upcoming events are available at www.asaustin.org).