Author: jbenton

News flash: Garland Fifth Grader Predicted Attacks on Sept. 10! (And if you’re doubting anything at a site called cosmiverse.com quoting something called the “Dallas Chronicle,” the story is legit, although it ran in the Houston Chronicle.)
Of course it’s true. I have no doubt that when Osama was planning the attacks, he only told his closest confidants: Allah, Mulla Mohammad Omar, and the Metroplex winner of his annual “What the Taliban Means to Me” essay contest.

For anyone who’s read any books by Calvin Trillin — and if you haven’t, you’re just wasting time — there was another reason September 11 was a horrible day. On that day, his wife Alice (the one in the title of “Travels With Alice”) passed away. (There’s a piece in next week’s New Yorker, which for many years has been Calvin’s home base, and which published a piece of Alice’s own earlier this year.)
I never met Alice, but anyone who’s heard her voice in her husband’s columns would recognize her mix of fierce intelligence, kindness of spirit, and common sense.

From the Self-Promotion Dept.: Two more of my stories have hit print. Today was a piece on how Catholic schools are going through a serious teacher shortage, primarily because they don’t pay nearly as much as public schools. (If you think public school teachers make too little, Catholic school teachers get $10K or $12K less.) This story’s been finished for a couple of weeks, but it’s just getting in the paper now because of the Current Situation’s understandable monopoly on newsprint of late.
And speaking of the Current Situation, my interview with Afghanistan expert David Lesch ran Sunday.

As Matt points out, Dallas is the #1 city to start a business in. (And the number one city in which to end sentences with prepositions.)
I’d like to state for the record that I never considered starting dallasstories.com anywhere else.

From the Yeah, That’d Be A Tip Off Dept.: “[Suspected terrorist hanger-on Zacarias] Moussaoui apparently had raised suspicions because he sought training in flying commercial jets at flights schools in Oklahoma and Minnesota but showed no interest in learning about takeoffs or landings.” – CNN.

A review of the State of My Body over the last three days, since my first football game of the year:
Saturday: Oh, this is nothing! All parts reporting ready for duty, sir. A little hungover, but that’s okay.
Sunday: Well, it’s awful nice of my body to alert me to the existence of so many small muscles I otherwise wouldn’t notice. Like that two-square-inch patch of muscle in my middle back that feels like a rubber band being snapped whenever I move, or that place that used to be the back of my right knee and is now an 80-year-old rusty door hinge. At least the pains are isolated.
Monday: Sweet heavenly grace, make it stop! I swear I had functioning limbs once. Just a couple of days ago, I think.

I am proud to report that, just like the last game of last season, today’s Media Football League opener ended with a touchdown by yours truly. Please see the contact page to see where to send congratulatory flowers.
But halfway through our game, the Park Nazis paid us a visit. See, we play at Northaven Park in North Dallas, and some of the neighbors evidently don’t like it when people use their park for strange things like recreation. They got parks officials to ban soccer in much of the park earlier this year; some say it was for nasty racial reasons, since most of the soccer players were Hispanic and it’s a white neighborhood. Anyway, when 10 of us showed up at 9:30 a.m. to play football, two different neighbors called to complain! I have no idea why — we certainly weren’t being noisy or obnoxious; there was no one else in the park at that early hour; the homes are quite some distance away from where we were. So this parks official shows up and says he’s gotten these complaints, but “now that he’s seen” us, “it’s not as bad as I thought it would be.” What’s that supposed to mean, that because 7 of the 10 of us were Anglo, everything is okay? It left us all (or me, at least) quite angry: since when do our tax dollars go to harrass Dallas residents using public parks to the detriment of absolutely no one?

Went to the Gypsy Tea Room last night to see Wilco for the third time. At one point on stage, Jeff Tweedy said something about how this was a historic night in the band’s existence, and I suppose it was: it was the first time the new lineup (sadly, sans Jay Bennett) played live, and it was the world premiere of most of the songs from their new, as-yet-unreleased album, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.
(Wilco was summarily bounced from their silly label, Reprise, a couple of months ago because higher-ups deemed the new album “too uncommercial.” While it won’t be out through the normal channels until early 2002, you can find it online in the usual illegal places, and it’s streaming at the band’s web site.)
While it was a dumb move on Reprise’s part, I have no trouble understanding why a scared label exec might not get the new stuff; it’s much more shambolic and found-sound-y than earlier Wilco. Several of the songs devolve into quiet, collapsing structures. (The closest analog I can think of is some of Big Star’s third record, like “Kanga Roo.”) It was a much more subdued Wilco show than the others I’ve gone to; instead of the usual rave-up on “Casino Queen,” the last half of the show was quiet stuff like “Sunken Treasure.” But I’m more than willing to follow Tweedy on whatever path he takes the band down. He’s got a touch of artistry about him not many folks do.

One other story from Thursday’s paper: the local school district is announcing a new initiative to get area residents to serve as mentors to at-risk ninth-graders. Sounds like a good idea.

There’s currently a debate going on at dfwblogs about the patriotic color scheme on the group’s web site. (If you can’t see what I’m talking about at that link, it’s probably because the site is scheduled to be redesigned today.) Some members of the group have expressed dismay at the idea of having a neutral community site take on a partisan air.
I tend to agree, although in the end it’s not my site and the owner should have final say. But the whole incident did call to mind one of my fears during times like this: that refusing to give over one’s life entirely to all things patriotic ends up being accused of being a Fifth Columnist or anti-American or whatever epithet someone can come up with. (It used to be “Communist,” of course.)
On Tuesday, I interviewed Pat Snuffer, owner of Snuffer’s, a two-restaurant chain here in Dallas. He has a longstanding policy at his restaurants that employees can’t wear ribbons, buttons, or any other sort of adornment on their uniforms. And it doesn’t matter whether it’s a Korn button or an American flag ribbon — no dice. Some people are mad and say he’s somehow being un-American. He’s gotten emails saying “Snuffer’s supports Bin Laden.” Whatever you think about the man’s actions (he willingly labels himself “controlling”), it says something that uniform policy at a restaurant best know for its cheese fries has become a point of patriotic argument. (Snuffer says he’s having small American flag sewn onto all employee aprons in response to last week’s events.)