Articles for November, 2011
Money for Nothing: Ex-Manager’s Defense Points to Others in DAS Animal-Cruelty Trial
In the felony trial that began yesterday of Tyrone McGill — the former manager of Dallas’ city animal shelter, where a cat was allowed to die trapped inside a wall last year — the defense is taking this tack with prosecution witnesses who worked at the shelter under McGill: So, why didn’t you do something about the cat? The strategy if successful would tend to shift blame for the animal’s death from McGill, who ran the place, to the subordinates who pleaded with him to take care of the situation. Which is, well, an interesting theory of management accountability.
Tuesday’s testimony also revealed that when the cat was finally pulled out of the wall, dead and badly decomposing after being trapped for 15 days, its nails were worn down completely from clawing to escape.
While details like that are heartbreaking, what also continues to rile animal-activist observers like Jonnie England is that McGill has been on “paid administrative leave” — in other words, drawing his $66,122 annual city paycheck for doing nothing — ever since being indicted on the animal-cruelty charge 15 months ago. “If a police officer is indicted on a felony, he’s put on unpaid leave,” England says. She adds that McGill’s treatment, by contrast, is “unbelievably outrageous,” and an insult to Dallas taxpayers.
More like one of a series of insults coming out of this wretched incident.
Christina McLarty Item Featuring David Arquette!
David Arquette is definitely not reconciling with Courtney Cox. Because, according to this Daily Mail item, Arquette is now making the sign of the musical octopus with former Dallas gal Christina McLarty (now that she has freed herself from the evil clutches of Joe Francis). [reaches for Purell hand sanitizer to cleanse typing fingers of celebrity gossip jick oils]
Things To Do In Dallas Tonight: Nov. 9
Oh, hey, friends. Previous Secretaries of State James A. Baker III and Condoleezza Rice are in town. Veterans of two Bush presidencies, and Baker even served under Reagan. Unfortunately, Jack Donaghy’s fantasy playland the luncheon at which the duo will appear is sold out. But don’t despair. Rice’s cameo on 30 Rock is worth watching again and again.
On a related presidential/historical note, the clever Sarah Vowell is also here. Well, in Denton— UNT, to be precise. She’s reading from Unfamiliar Fishes, her new book on the history of Hawaii, but she’ll also do a little Q&A. If you haven’t read Assassination Vacation, you’re missing out. Vowell’s pilgrimage to the assassination locations of presidents McKinley, Garfield, and Lincoln is fact-filled and funny. If you email me, I’ll consider loaning it to you, but only if you promise to return it. And if any of my so-called friends are reading this, I’d really like Good Omens, Skylight, and The Hero with a Thousand Faces back. Especially Hero. How am I supposed to write my masterpiece without Joseph Campbell’s guidance?
The Undermain Theatre closes its production of Ages of the Moon this weekend. And since I know you guys all get very busy Thursday through Sunday, seeing the show on a Wednesday night is perfect. I’m fairly positive you don’t have anything better to do, unless you’re busy performing charity work, visiting a loved on in the hospital, or plotting what to do with all the free time in which you’re not watching sports. You guys are excused. As for the rest of you, Lance Lusk has the review on FrontRow. Hint: he liked it.
For more to do tonight, go here.
105.3 The Fan Opens Restaurant on The Ticket’s Turf
Just as Cumulus gets ready to move four of its stations — The Ticket, KLIF, i93, and The Wolf — to Victory Plaza, 105.3 The Fan decides to open a restaurant right in The Ticket’s new backyard. The 8,000-square-foot Fan Sports Lounge, located on Olive Street in Victory Park, is having its grand opening tonight. When asked about this development, Ticket management told me they have no official comment.
My question: shouldn’t The Ticket have thought of this already? When they decided to move to Victory, why didn’t they create some sort of broadcast-studio-sports-bar hybrid, where you could have a beer before a game at the AAC and watch the Ticket hosts do their show — then do the same after the game? Oops.
Leading Off (11/9/11)
Money Offered for Tips to Hairdresser’s Killer. Elizabeth Lightfoot, 22, was found in her burning car Friday night. Cops have no leads on the homicide case. So $10,000 has been offered for tips that will lead to the arrest and indictment of the person who did this. No jokes here.
Nebraska City Mart Coming to The Colony. As of Monday, it was thought that the empty 400 acres along Texas 121 would be used for restaurants, shopping, and most importantly, a theme park. But it was revealed on Tuesday that a majority of that space would be used for Nebraska Furniture Mart. So instead of sitting in tiny chairs attached to rails that twist and turn, people will be sitting in La-Z-Boys, rocking their afternoons away.
Officers Rescue Burglar. Two officers responded to a call where a house and three cars were burning. They realized that someone was in one of the cars. That someone happened to be a burglary suspect. So they ran through the flames and pulled the person out. Thank goodness for people like these cops. We need more of them around. You know what else we need? Details about what happened five minutes before they got to the scene. I have many questions about why and how the house and cars started burning. Sounds like a case for Rica Y Chato.
DMA Prepares for Gaultier Exhibit
Caption contest. My entry: “I’d like to motorboat her grassy knoll.”
“Sexycalifragilisticexpialidopeness” Video for Your Eyes
Andrew Meals and his wife Charlie (aka Multi-ID and Lady Multi) are in a group called The Weekend Hustler. You probably already know this. Me, I’m just now learning about them, thanks to Pegasus News. Below, you’ll find the video for their new song “Sexycalifragilisticexpialidopeness,” which, from what I can tell, is about two zombie skeletons that are installing a chain-link fence. Turn this up really loud at work.
The Steven Doyle Debate
In our November issue, Jason Sheeler wrote about a food blogger named Steven Doyle. The story has ignited a good discussion on SideDish about the changing landscape of food criticism and restaurant coverage. Recommended.
Dave Tarrant’s First Weekend Without Sports
As Zac told us last week, DMN writer Dave Tarrant is trying to go a year without watching sports. Well, the good folks over at Grantland heard about the experiment and chronicled the first Sunday through an email exchange between Tarrant and St. Pete Times writer (and Grantland contributor) Michael Kruse. Both men, it sounds like, had interesting weekends. But think of all the field goals they missed.
Outrage Over Rangers Tape is Weird, Misplaced
Why all this outrage (sub. req.) over the Rangers’ “leaked” audiotape? As in the latest hot-mic incident revealing our leaders’ true thoughts about Israel’s prime minister, seems like folks ought to be relishing, not damning, such entertaining glimpses behind the curtain. Especially at a time when phonied up and scripted is the order of the day — in business, government, sports, whatever — what makes an American League baseball club so sacrosanct? As I recall the Rangers circled the wagons after axing Chuck Greenberg, refusing to talk plainly to the press about what really went down. Now Jon Daniels is clamming up again, about the leaker’s identity, and winning praise for it by a media that’s usually pushing transparency and “sunshine.” Weird double standard, anyone?
Sneak Peek at the New Omni Dallas Hotel
The Omni Dallas won’t open till Friday, but yesterday Zac and I got the nickel tour from Ed Netzhammer, the general manager. You’d expect right now that Netzhammer would be pulling out his hair, given that he’s about to open a 1,001-room hotel in a couple days. Not so much. Netzhammer has opened several Omnis (including the one in Fort Worth), and he says this is smoothest opening he’s overseen. He feels so good about how things are going that he even went to the Cowboys game Sunday. And Netzhammer said that right after he finished our tour, he was planning to open a bottle a Scotch and begin work on a 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle depicting an aerial nighttime view of the Sahara. (Just kidding!)
Jump if you want to see some more pics.
Things To Do In Dallas Tonight: Nov. 8
I’m not unenthusiastic about the imminent opening of Jean Paul Gaultier’s mega exhibit at the DMA. In fact, I will go see it. I like fashion retrospectives. But the handful of well-dressed trees (instead of something so pedestrian as a “yarn bomb,” it’s a “lace bomb” and an “ecru marinière stripe bomb”) I’ve seen on my way down the Street of Weird Smells in no way compares to Montreal’s welcoming parade. I’m just saying.
And while we’re on the subject of retrospectives, Peter alerted everyone yesterday to the USA Film Festival’s week-long look at the films of director Alexander Payne over at the Angelika. You know him: About Schmidt, Sideways (my personal favorite), the first draft of I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry.
Since Sideways doesn’t screen until Thursday, the same evening I was conned into agreed to attend a preview of Happy Feet 2 for FrontRow, I thought I’d go with the next best thing tonight: Election. I’m not Matthew Broderick’s biggest fan, but not only is he the only capable actor in Tower Heist (I know Eddie Murphy can act, okay, he’s just reduced to a cartoon), he manages to project an undercurrent of deep unhappiness into his seemingly happy roles. And as the disgruntled high school civics teacher out to get Reese Witherspoon’s calculating overachiever, well, he’s great. Tickets are cheaper than usual, too, so you might be able to afford popcorn and still get out of there for under $15. Maybe.
Also, Feist, a musician you might know from her former involvement with Broken Social Scene but more likely because you recognize her song “1234″ from the Apple commercial, is playing at the Majestic. Weirdly, the concert hasn’t sold out yet. I still think her appearance on Sesame Street is one of the best. And if you haven’t heard it, check out the Spoon mix of “I Feel It All.”
For more to do this evening, go here. And then head over to FrontRow for a great ticket giveaway— passes to an advance screening of Lars von Trier’s Melancholia. Yes, this guy. But the movie, according to Peter, is good.
Tony Cragg Show in the Wall Street Journal
Sometime D Magazine contributor Willard Spiegelman has a piece in the Wall Street Journal today about the Tony Cragg show at the Nasher. His lead: “If you suggest that artists should create beautiful things, you risk being branded an old fogy. Still, few major artists today make objects as joyously beautiful as the British sculptor Tony Cragg, whose work is having its first U.S. exhibition in two decades at the Nasher Sculpture Center.” Spoiler alert: Willard digs the show.
Texas Rangers Losing World Series in Crushing Fashion Won More Fans Than Would Have Winning
Missed this last week (H/T to The Dish for pointing it out today.) Ross Douthat of the New York Times speaks the truth:
As a rule, it isn’t winning a title that usually cements a fan base’s loyalty to a baseball team. It’s almost winning — having victory within your grasp and then having your heart ripped out at the last moment. World Series titles come and go (just ask a Florida Marlins fan, if you can find one), but devastating near-misses stay with you forever.
The pre-2010s Rangers never inspired much passion from the Texas faithful not because they never won, but because they never broke any hearts. They were just lousy-to-mediocre, year after year and decade after decade, with none of the near-misses and epic disasters that bind suffering sports fans to their star-crossed teams.
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