November 2005

Table of Contents

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Features

Southern Comfort

Fabulous fried chicken, marvelous meat loaf, great greens, outstanding okra, perfect pie, and more: where to find our favorite staples of home cooking.

Dome Away From Home

Inside the Eighth Wonder of the World—the largest shelter ever organized by the American Red Cross—faith, hope, and charity helped the survivors of Hurricane Katrina begin the process of rebuilding their lives.

The Last Ride of Cowboy Bob

The feds knew him as a prolific bank robber. But the bearded man who eluded them for so long was not who they imagined him to be. And absolutely no one expected the story to end the way it did.

Hurt? Injured? Need a Lawyer? Too Bad!

What tort reform has done to Texans in need would be grounds for a lawsuit—if there still were any lawsuits.

Yao Got Game

China’s most famous athletic export arrived in the U.S. as a seven-foot-four-inch seventeen-year-old who excelled at every move except America’s most glorified one. Given his upbringing, getting him to stuff the ball in the hoop in rim-rattling fashion was no slam dunk.

Columns

Sarah Bird

And the Celly Goes to...

That jerkwad talking on his phone in the movie theater.

Behind the Lines

Hammer Time

Tom DeLay versus Ronnie Earle.

Gary Cartwright

State of Dysfunction

Three Austin boys + the hatred and intolerance of their Boys State experience = a lesson in today’s democracy.

Don Graham

You’ve Got Mailer

The famously crotchety writer’s hate-love relationship with Texas.

Patricia Kilday Hart

Who is Joe Barton?

The most powerful Texas congressman you’ve never heard of. And a partisan hack. And a bipartisan pragmatist.

Reporter

Reporter

Hail to the Chief

For going on five years, my admiration has grown for the weekly paper in the tiny Panhandle town of Miami (above). The New York Times it ain’t, but it tells me everything I could ever want to know about local births and deaths, windblown mail, bad potholes, and good yards. And Theo.

Minister of Health

Oh, Lardy

Fat versus Fit.

The Horse’s Mouth

Everything I Could Ever Tell You About Writing a Novel

A few novel ideas.

Previews+Reviews

Books

The best new books from Texas.

Previews+Reviews

Music

The best new music from Texas.

The Filter

Pat's Pick

Cova

Pat's Pick

Upper Crust

Miscellaneous

Web Extra

Comfort Zone

Senior editor Patricia Sharpe, who wrote this month’s feature on home cooking, talks about local opinions and okra.

Texas Monthly Talks

Robert Rivard

“People speak nostalgically about family newspapers. For every decent one, there were literally hundreds of embarrassingly bad ones.”

Web Extra

Welcome to the Dome

Associate editor John Spong talks about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, its survivors living in the Astrodome, and new beginnings.

Roar of the Crowd

Seeing Red

Web Extra

Stormin’ Norman

Writer-at-large Don Graham on provocative writer Norman Mailer, New Journalism, and existentialism.

Web Extra

Made in China

Brook Larmer, Newsweek’s Shanghai bureau chief and the author of Operation Yao Ming, on basketball sensation Yao Ming, sports in China, and writing his first book.

Web Extra

The Reformers

Executive editor Mimi Swartz on Proposition 12, partisan politics, and consumer rights.

Web Extra

The State of Boys State

Senior editor Gary Cartwright on the McCallum boys, Boys State, and democracy.

Web Extra

The Cowboy and the Lady

Executive editor Skip Hollandsworth on Peggy Jo Tallas (the infamous bank robber known as Cowboy Bob) and rooting for the bad guy.

Texas Tidbits

Once the pride of Houston, the Astrodome now faces a midlife crisis.

Texas History 101

The rise and fall of Galveston.

Recipe

Pie Crust

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