Arts : The art capades
Pre-CAM razzle-dazzle with pen and lights Well, it was another successful First Friday — we came, we saw, we conferred. And if you spent the evening circling the block for parking and missed the shows, you still have time to get to Blue Star to see them. New work by UTSA MFA students Judith Cottrell…
Food & Drink : All you can eat
News and notes from the San Antonio food scene If you’ve already affixed a “Kinky for Governor. Why the hell not?” bumper sticker to your vehicle, consuming the greasy goodness of a limited-edition Casbeers Kinky Burger is one more way to support Friedman’s campaign. For $5.95, the famous Central Texas music venue and bar, located…
Arts : Off the bus
Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves are star- and time-crossed lovers in The Lake House The last time Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock teamed up onscreen, all they had to do was keep a bus from slipping under 50 mph. In the process, Fox made more than $350 million worldwide, and oh, yeah, Bullock — an…
Food & Drink : Ice cream on the clock
For the record, SAISD 5th-grader Alex and his dad Raul were not playing hooky on this ice-cream run. It was sometime between noon and 5 p.m. — and where was that playful Time Warner cable guy, Juan de la Playa? Enjoying a cheerful disregard for your installation appointment, and today’s second trip to the ice-cream…
Media : Armchair cinephile
Not quite as cliché as a tie Do middle-aged men still go for old Westerns and war films? I know my father holds them in no special esteem, and I’m pretty sure my father-in-law is even less interested. Nevertheless, every June the studios unleash crates of the stuff for Father’s Day. It could just be…
Media : That’s a wrap
The low-down on this week’s premieres Six new flicks this Friday. (Or four, if you’ve got any taste at all.) “Jack Black as a Mexican wrestler, with the Napoleon Dynamite guy.” That, most assuredly, approximates fairly closely the extent of the studio pitch necessary to win the greenlight for Nacho Libre — and, really, the…
Media : Special screenings
ACADEMY SHORTS 2005 The Academy Awards Shorts program will catch you up on nine of this year’s nominated short films as part of Public Radio’s Cinema Tuesdays. Bijou at Crossroads. Tuesday, June 20. 7:30 p.m. $10 for members, $12 for non-members. 496-2221. SLAB CINEMA: THE OUTLAW Howard Hughes (1943) Doc Holliday and Billy the Kid…
Food & Drink : Value vino – great wines for under $15
Bonnie Bonny Doons Randall Grahm is nothing if not an iconoclast. The irrepressible owner of Bonny Doon Vineyards was in town recently for a tasting of his winery’s latest releases. Granny glasses, grey-streaked ponytail and all, it was hard to believe that “he has toned down quite a bit,” as one local wine worthy claimed…
Media : Tough medicine
Al Gore wants to stop global warming, but will anyone listen? “This is not a political issue so much as a moral issue,” insists Al Gore about global warming. That is the only dubious statement made by the former vice president in An Inconvenient Truth, a film consisting largely of his urgent warnings that contemporary…
Food & Drink : Ich bin ein chalupa
What’s a fella got to do to get a taco named after him? What’s in a name? Well,the Chalupa Robert from El Milagrito (top) features beans, cheese, picadillo, and a fried egg, while the Niles Taco (middle) from Tito’s keeps it simple with beans, cheese, bacon, and avocado. The Ralphie Special (bottom) from Taco Haven:…
News : Making the Party 3
Dem Convention holding auditions for its supergroup What if shamed former majority leader Tom DeLay was given only two calendar options for “exiting stage right?” The born-again Christian could either quit Congress on 06-06-06, the same day The Omen was released, or three days later, when his sworn mortal enemies opened their Texas Democratic Convention…
News : Need some plaza background?
So do the people who use it The discussion of Main Plaza and its architecturally redesigned future is no stranger to the River City. The Mayor and various city-council members have held public meetings, and Main Plaza ain’t hurtin’ for ink or air time in the local press. But just to recap, here’s what’s transpired…
Music : In the garage
Local, laid-back yearling Left Hand Lucy plays for the gusto Forming a rock band is a lot like home-brewing beer. Both activities start with a few like-minded people, a little equipment, and sometimes, a garage. Half the fun is in talking about the project or coming up with a name and label design, but sometimes…
News : Pushing water through a maze
Navigating SA’s aquifer proposals in its twists and turns The quality of water in San Antonio and how to keep it from deteriorating is an ever-flowing issue around here, and the city is once again revamping an ordinance to protect the Edwards Aquifer. The process has been a long one; reviews were commissioned, recommendations were…
News : Counterpoint
Hurrah for Main Plaza Now how about that formula-restaurant ban … The word on the street more than a month ago was that the Main Plaza expansion was a done deal. Market and Commerce streets would remain open, the rumor mill said, as a compromise with local businesses, but Soledad and Main would go the…
Music : Requiem for a ‘Dreamer’
With the recent passing of Freddie Garrity, one burning question remains: Freddie who? Yes, the dream is still over … but even before the passing of rock’s original dork, the media would rather have pretended that Freddiemania never happened. Freddie Garrity: rock ‘n’ roll’s original dork. Sadly, the rock press has paid virtually no attention…
Feature InJustice System
The 2005 bankruptcy “reform”: an anti-consumer law even judges hate In December, Alfonso Sosa, a house painter in Fredericksburg, Texas, fell behind on the payments for the mobile home he shared with his wife Melba. The mortgage holder moved to foreclose, and Sosa filed an emergency petition in federal court for bankruptcy protection. But the…
Music : Current choice
Culture sounds Through the recent efforts of local emcees, including Question and Notes, heads across the globe are slowly starting to take notice of Alamo City hip-hop. San Antonio indie-hip-hop mainstay Ernest Gonzales, aka Theory of Everything, founded his own record label – Exponential – in 2000 and has been producing and releasing challenging music…
Culture : Artist’s best friend
SA’s close-knit creative community supports a good habit: pet rescue In November 2004, Robert Rivard wrote an editorial in the San Antonio Express-News called, “How animals are treated helps define a city and its people.” This was a call to arms that accompanied the paper’s groundbreaking report on San Antonio’s rampant animal population and care…
Music : CD Spotlight
After the flood He may be a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but Allen Toussaint remains one of the most underappreciated giants in the history of American music. As a writer/producer, he had a hand in practically every significant record cut in New Orleans from 1960 to 1975, and his piano-playing…
Arts : The roads most traveled
Ethel Shipton talks about meaning and direction in a world of man-made paths “This city lets you play hard,” Ethel Shipton likes to tell recent transplants to San Antonio. You can try, fail, try again, go out on a limb everyone warned you five times was gonna break, and people will still turn up for…
Arts : Something to chew on
Anel Flores’s Empanada makes for a juicy TeatroFEST Ever fantasize about performing cunnilingus while you’re chewing bubble gum? That was the big question on my mind last Friday as I left the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center’s presentation of Empanada, by Anel I. Flores, a play in which references to delicious food and delicious women…
Arts : On the street
SA mixer: 2 parts trust fund, 1 part philanthropy, and long bar lines Green wristbands abounded at an “adults-only” mixer held last Thursday at Ácenar on Houston Street. MESH was an evening of multiple purposes and veiled intentions, the most benign being to meet, chat, and carouse with scores of people you know or will…
Arts : The things he carried
When I was a child my father could lift anything: a refrigerator, a tree stump, the front end of our Mazda. One summer I recall wrestling my brother on our front lawn in Sacramento. Apparently, the spectacle degraded my father’s sense of propriety, for suddenly Dad’s Nikes appeared on either side of my head. Then…
