Dallas / Fort Worth and Me

Welcome back, Gentle Reader! Last entry, I introduced you to the 46th Annual Nation Championship Indian Pow Wow, which was so splendiferous that I actually visited it on two consecutive days (September 6-7).  Now, an event this big isn’t something you can easily review in a single entry, and so I didn’t even try. In fact, it’s gonna take three.

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First of all, folks, allow me to assure you that I haven’t fallen off the face of the Earth. I’ve been going places and seeing things and taking photos, all for your sake (it’s a hard life!), and now I’ve got several blog entries waiting and eager to be written. I’ve also been working on the 2009 Calendar of Events, which I’ll be unveiling shortly.  

Today, let’s talk about the 46th Annual National Championship Indian Pow Wow, one of many Pow Wows around the continent, which I visited at Trader’s Village in Grand Prairie this past weekend.   It was a fascinating cultural event, about which I’m going to have a lot to say — at least two entries’ worth, I suspect. 

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In my last exciting entry, I told you about my recent visit to the House of Blues in Dallas, which I rather enjoyed and heartily endorse to you all. When I left you, we were waiting for the band (Tokio Hotel) to come on stage. And waiting. And waiting.

That’s the Tokio Hotel symbol up there on the curtain, by the way.

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I spent the evening of August 27, 2008 (last night, as I write this missive) at the Dallas iteration of the House of Blues. HOB is a relatively new addition to the West End; it’s been there, at 2200 N. Lamar, only since 2007. I’ve never been inside before, much less to one of their many concerts, but I have to say this:  both are a kick. Especially when you’re rockin’ to a band as young and energetic as Tokio Hotel.

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Finally, finally, I’m back. As I mentioned in this entry, I’ve been moving my household, and oh what a pain it’s been. Not only was the move massive — I had to move a whole house full of stuff as well as the leftover stock of my defunct bookstore — the Internet company blundered and turned off my Internet on August 19, A WEEK EARLY. I got it back up a day or so later, but of course all that punched a big hole in my production schedule. I’m still catching up.

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To paraphrase an old Mark Chestnutt song, I’ll sure be glad when these ol’ dog days of summer are gone. There’s just not much brewing here in the middle of August, when it’s omigod hot and the days go on and on — what Southern novelist Babs Deal described as “acres of afternoon.”  You want to know what I’ve got planned for the rest of this month? Well, you’ve seen a lot of it already in my recent entries on July Jazz and Symphonic Saturdays, both of which we can thank the civic-minded Town of Addison for. So gracias, Addison, for doing your damnedest to keep culture alive as we slide slowly toward fall.

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It’s August in DFW, and you know what that means? Yep, dozens of days in a row with triple-digit temperatures, and not a hell of a lot going on around the metroplex — because hey, it’s too bloody hot. Thank goodness that there’s an oasis in the cultural drought we’ve got around here, and it’s called Addison.

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There was a time — up until last year, actually — that Garland was well known in the area for its extravagant, multi-day Star Spangled Fourth celebration. It used to be three days of festivities scattered over several venues, including the Old Downtown, and the city went all out to support it. As you may have gathered from my groans in several previous entries, however, those days are past. This year, the SSF was diminished to one location, one day: July 4 itself, at the sprawling shopping center called Firewheel on the north side of town, nearly in the neighboring city of Sachse. While I’ve made no bones about the fact that this annoys me — I used to own a business in that now-ignored Old Downtown — I guess I shouldn’t blame the city too much. They’re probably under a budgetary crunch in these days of $4 gas and mortgage meltdowns, and Firewheel has got to bring in substantially more tax money than the Old Downtown does. Heck, the Barnes and Noble alone probably does that.

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Back on Summer Solstice Day, June 21, I sauntered down to Cedar Hill (a berg due south of Dallas) and took a look at their Neighborhood BBQ Cook Off and Small Town Saturday Night celebration. It was really set up for local people to get to know each other, but I know I wasn’t the only interloper there, and it was a great little get-together all in all. Hey, there was free barbecue; what’s not to like?

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Okay! Despite the hammering heat and horrific humidity, June and July are busy times for the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. Mad dogs and Englishman, folks, but be that as it may, even as the heat sizzles up off the asphalt and sane dogs hunker down for the long summer — which officially begins on the 21st but has actually been here for over a month — the social calendar is purring right along. There’s so much to do, in fact, that the average human will have a heckuva time getting to everything. That should tell you right there that I won’t be able to make it to all the pertinent events. Sad but true. I will, however, do my valiant best.

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