Dancing with Dawson
photograph by Kenny Braun When people talk about a “free spirit,” they’re talking about someone like Carol Dawson. When I first met her, it was at an event where dancing was going on, and after we met one another she asked me if I knew how to two-step. I said no. Immediately, I regretted that…
AISD Bond Construction Projects
List Sorted by Name of School/Project Projects completed early in the bond program ran close to or under budget, but cost projections for schools now in construction or design phases are more problematic. The worst budget hassles are on campuses being remodeled or expanded. BLGY/Sverdrup says escalating costs are due to market pressure and protracted…
Wilde Life
“I’d like to welcome all the Walk-on-the-Wilde-Siders!” announced State Theater Company artistic director Don Toner during his curtain speech at the play Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde. The Importance of Being Oscar, An Artist of No Importance, Wilde and Woolly … Tag lines for these events are always hokey, but Oscar Wilde…
Postscripts
Babich’s Book Regular readers of our “Postmarks” section of the paper — the letters to the editor — are familiar with Amy Babich, who routinely and earnestly writes us and our readers about transportation issues, in particular advocating the use of bicycles and their efficacy as a mode of transportation. Lately, though, Babich has been…
AISD Bond Construction Projects
List Sorted by Stage of Completion Projects completed early in the bond program ran close to or under budget, but cost projections for schools now in construction or design phases are more problematic. The worst budget hassles are on campuses being remodeled or expanded. BLGY/Sverdrup says escalating costs are due to market pressure and protracted…
Dancing About Architecture
Throw That Beat in the Garbage Can Well, let’s just call it quits, shall we? Austin’s music scene is falling by the wayside at roughly the same rate we’ve been losing revered old blues musicians (R.I.P. T.D. Bell– see obit). Liberty Lunch isn’t an important concern to the city, not in the face of bringing…
About AIDS
In an ingenious stroke of bio-chemical manipulation, researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have developed a protein which causes HIV-infected T4 cells to kill themselves, taking the virus inside with them. As a critical part of its reproduction process inside the T4 cells, HIV uses an enzyme called protease (PRO-tee-aze). The researchers chose a…
Meet the New Boss
In other agencies, the shake-ups have hardly been as dramatic as those instituted by Dewhurst. Comptroller Carole Keeton Rylander made her nod to “efficiency” by eliminating 53 of the agency’s 2,800 workers, or about 2%. Rylander spokesman Keith Elkins says that those laid off were mainly human resources workers and employee trainers whose jobs could…
Coach’s Corner
A children’s story tells of a paranoid and loudmouthed chicken who gets it in her hen head that the sky’s going to fall, presumably squishing her. Henny Penny’s her name. The hen has many friends. She tells a fox, and the fox tells a bird, and the bird tells her friend the rabbit, and the…
AISD Bond Construction Projects
See also: list sorted name of school/project. See also: list sorted by stage of completion This map indicates schools where construction costs have run over budget. Schools which have most recently received bids over budget. Extensive value engineering is being applied.
Day Trips
Before the October floods that hit South Texas, the Texas Zoo was a semi-tropical park showcasing native Texas animals. photograph by Gerald E. McLeod The Texas Zoo in Victoria is one of Texas’ best-kept secrets. Situated in a beautiful small town park on the Guadalupe River, the zoo is dedicated solely to native animals, many…
A Hunger for Hard News
Barring any late-breaking news on the Clinton debacle, 60 Minutes is scheduled to examine the Lacresha Murray case on Sunday. Murray was twice convicted in the 1996 beating death of two-year-old Jayla Belton, but her supporters have charged that the now-teenager (she was 11 at the time of Belton’s death) was railroaded into making a…
Page Two
Nineteen ninety-nine, let the games begin — state and local politics, arts and culture, the future and the past — it is a brave new year. The legislature is in session, which is always entertaining, but not always fun. The leadership of the state government has almost entirely changed hands from Democrat to Republican, which…
Naked City
After a four-month hiatus, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman returned to work last week with a bold proposal: impeach George W. Bush. Oh, sure the guv hasn’t even declared himself a candidate, but Friedman jokes that the idea isn’t so ludicrous when you consider that many right-wing Republicans have been calling for Clinton’s head…
Public Notice
Food is the great equalizer. Everybody wants it; everybody needs it. Everybody eats it, but each person’s idea of what makes for good food is certainly influenced by culture, skill, and economics, among other things. Regardless, food remains a great equalizer. Whether your daily bread is tortilla, croissant, loaf, or ciabatta, this is one benefit…
The Child Support Mess
Howard Baldwin has a lot of experience in child support issues, but also a daunting job ahead of him. photograph by John Anderson Howard Baldwin will look like either a fool or a hero; there won’t be much middle ground. This month, Baldwin takes over the most fouled-up agency in state government, the Child Support…
Mr. Smarty Pants Knows
According to one authoritative source, in the sexual world of domination in Austin there are more slaves than masters. A new psychological disorder has recently been recognized called “titanicitus.” The term describes people who have seen the film Titanic at least 10 times. Psychology professor Jonathan Freeman has said that the symptoms are due to…
Pretty Sneaky
illustration by Doug Potter Back on the City Council’s agenda is the fate of the Up To Me drug rehabilitation center, which may have snuck around city regulations requiring council approval for the move of its facility from North Lamar to Webberville Road. The city rejected Up to Me’s request to move following a public…
Food-O-File
Formerly a Rumor The local wine biz rumor that heated up fax machines around town during December has become a reality. Former Central Market wine buyer David Huffaker, former Twin Liquors wine buyer Greg Steiner, and former 34th Street Cafe chef/owner Tim Albright have secured the necessary venture capital and expect to open The Grapevine…
Miss You
“Nine Faces We’ll Miss” certainly hit home. Last issue, I picked nine not-so-arbitrary television faces who passed on in 1998 but once again, readers rallied with their own suggestions, starting with Michael S., who said… Okay, okay, maybe it was harder than I thought to figger out which one of your nine faces I didn’t…
Cafe Mundi
1707 E. Sixth, 236-8634 Cafe Mundi reminds me of the small coffeehouses I loved so much in Paris. It’s a cozy little haven off the beaten path, the kind of place that attracts a clientele of regulars who relish their few moments of peace in a place they feel privileged to have discovered. Located in…
Far from Hollywood
Ice Cube (l) and Michael Boatman in The Glass Shield In the late 1960s, Burnett realized that he wanted to write and direct films about people he knew, about real life, about the dignity of the daily struggle just to make an honest dollar and hold the family together. A proponent of realism, he has…
Rural Kraut
Walburg Mercantile corner of FM 972 & FM 1105 512/863-8440 photograph by Gerald E. McLoud They rarely use turn signals. Sometimes they go way too slow, other times they’re unspeakably sloppy and dangerous. Say what you will about Austin drivers, one thing’s for sure: They’re not about to let a little distance spoil a good…
Schedule
Killer of Sheep (January 19) (1977, 83 min., b&w, 16mm) Director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer, editor: Charles Burnett; with Henry Sanders, Kaycee Moore, James Miles, Charles Bracy, Angela Burnett, Eugene Cherry, Jack Drummond. My Brother’s Wedding (January 26) (1984, 116 min., color, 35mm) Director, screenwriter, cinematographer, co-producer: Charles Burnett; with Everett Silas, Jessie Holmes, Gaye Shannon-Burnett,…
Expectations of Future Growth
Meg Hentges photograph by Two Guys Photography Monte Warden photograph by Two Guys Photography Kelly Willis photograph by Two Guys Photography It’s entirely appropriate that Meg Hentges’ February 9 release date is the first local album scheduled for a major label launching in 1999. After all, the local guitarist has been waiting well over two…
Blueprint for a Breakdown
photograph by John Anderson “We’re not bidding any more bond work with [AISD],” says David Bandy of D.L. Bandy Constructors, which just completed renovation work at Allison Elementary. “For the effort we expended, there was nowhere near the return there should have been.” Bandy, whose job was delayed three weeks while he waited for confirmation…
According to Soundscan …
Although there’s a few surprises on the report card below, it’s not so shocking anymore that the raw sales data for releases from Austin’s Class of ’98 (or any class before them, for that matter) is once again something of a reality check. The numbers speak for themselves, but remember, these SoundScan figures — number…
Scanlines
D: John McTiernan (1990) with Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, James Earl Jones, Tim Curry Crimson Tide D: Tony Scott (1995) w/ Denzel Washington, Gene Hackman, Viggo Mortensen, George Dzundza Das Boot (The Boat) D: Wolfgang Petersen (1981) w/ Jurgen Prochnow, Herbert Gronemeyer, Klaus Wennemann Francois Truffaut claimed that a true anti-war film is…
Articulations
Wanted: Cultural Czar Two months ago, inquiring minds wanted to know why the city was taking so long to post a job opening for the Director of Cultural Affairs post vacated by Jack Anderson in October. We learned that the delay was the handiwork of councilmember Beverly Griffith, who felt the job was too vital…
State Agency Turnovers
AGENCY NEW CHIEF OFFICER # EMPLOYEES (1998) # FIRED TO DATE % FIRED General Land Office David Dewhurst 690 110 16% Office of the Attorney General John Cornyn 4,000 0 0% Comptroller of Public Accounts Carole Keeton Rylander 2,840 53 2% SOURCES: GLO, AG’S OFFICE, COMPTROLLER’S OFFICE
Short Cuts
The Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center in San Antonio is hosting one of five nationwide community forums with Chicano/Latino producers and PBS programmers concerning the creation of a new funding organization for Latinos producing public television programming. The overall purpose of the forums is to discuss an ongoing funding mechanism for Latino productions for public television.…
Exhibitionism
Nancy Wilson Scanlan Gallery, St. Stephen’s School through February 3 Richard Bartholomew Sadly, there are three things I remember from my childhood: 1) Saturday morning cartoons; 2) arguing with my sister over which Saturday morning cartoons to watch; and 3) arguing with my mother over when to stop watching Saturday morning cartoons and go mow…
Live Shots
Charlie Burton at the Hole in the Wall’s weekly “Unplug This” gig January 11. photograph by John Carrico ENDURO, ANTEBELLUM, SWITCH HITTER Stubb’s, January 6 All things being equal (and we know they never are), last Wednesday’s rock & roll show at Stubb’s was a disappointment. This is not to say that the local bands…
Cordie’s Walks
photograph by Annie S. Lewis Most of the neighbors were there at Cordie’s funeral at the Methodist Church, even some that had moved away years ago. Cordie’s nephew was the only one who came forward as a “witness” to recap the family sleep-overs, pancake breakfasts, and sage advice dispatched from the porch swing over the…
Memories of My Father Watching TV: A Novel
by Curtis White Dalkey Archive Press, $12.50 paper Philistinism runs stronger than ever in American society these days. There’s virtually no support for fiction writers wanting to do anything innovative. Nevertheless, Curtis White displays plenty of literary daring in his most recent volume, Memories of My Father Watching TV. White, who teaches and co-directs a…
Little T-Bone
photo from Sage Goodman/Blues Family Tree Archive Tyler Dee Bell — “T.D.” — prominent local guitarist and “godfather” of the local blues scene — died Saturday at the Austin Diagnostic Center Saturday of heart and kidney failure related to prostate cancer. He was 76. Born December 22, 1922, outside of Dimebox, Texas, Bell first made…
Broken Mirrors
illustration by Penny Van Horn The reflection was shattered. Perhapsnot the first time in my life, but surely the most jagged, shards of me scattered at my feet. I could hardly bear to look down, to catch a glimpse of these pieces of me glinting up, daring me to try to put it back together.…
