September 2005 Issue

On the Cover

The Eyes of Texas Are Upon Him

And why wouldn’t they be? As the head coach of the UT football team, Mack Brown is responsible for the way millions of Texans feel every day.

Features


Image of a man in scrubs holding a knife in front of a bloody wall.
Feature

Dr. Evil

By almost any measure of performance, including the sheer number of patients who are crippled and maimed, the medical profession has rarely seen anyone like Houston orthopedic surgeon Eric Scheffey. So why did he get to keep his license for so long?

How To Open A Restaurant

You have to be either crazy or masochistic to do it—maybe both. But for Lisa and Emmett Fox, owners of the new Austin eatery Fino, the benefits of taking the heat far outweigh those of staying out of the kitchen.

Polaroid shot of Bob Dow hugging Bobbi Jo Smith from behind, surrounded by other polaroids of them and Jennifer Jones.

Girls Gone Wild

Bobbi Jo and Jennifer were young, in love, and on the road, with the wind at their backs and a happy future ahead of them. All that stood in their way was a dead body back in Mineral Wells.

Feature

The Answers

1. a, 3; b, 1; c, 2 2. d 3. the horny toad 4. c 5. b 6. XIT 7. c 8. 1936 9. a, 2; b, 5; c, 6; d, 7; e, 1; f, 3; g, 4 10. buffalo 11. Mirabeau Buonaparte Lamar was the second president of the

Columns


Reporter


Music Review

Cruel and Gentle Things

To those accustomed to catching bluesman “Little Charlie” alongside the likes of Stevie Ray Vaughan, it was a surprise in 1985 when the seventeen-year-old CHARLIE SEXTON turned up on MTV (mascara, cheekbones, and all) belting out his synth-pop hit “Beat’s So Lonely.” Sexton has come far since those moments of

Music Review

Pajo

Were there such a thing as alt-rock royalty, DAVID PAJO would be swimming in blue blood. Not only was he a member of the influential post-rock deconstructionists Slint, but he also played with Chicago’s jazz-rock champs Tortoise, then lent a hand in Will Oldham’s fabled Palace projects and released a

Music Review

Paradise Hotel

Like all the best folksingers, ELIZA GILKYSON draws from anger at the way things are. It wasn’t always so; the daughter of songwriter Terry Gilkyson did dabble in the bliss of new-age music. But times change, and Eliza found her way to her folk roots and, eventually, to Austin. PARADISE

Book Review

Panic

PANIC (Dutton), Austinite JEFF ABBOTT’s first stand-alone thriller after seven serial detective offerings, is chock-full of the bold twists that make for a tell-your-friends page-turner. The plot is not groundbreaking: Young Houston documentarian Evan Casher finds his mother murdered in her Austin home; he learns that both his parents were

Book Review

Where Dreams Die Hard: A Small American Town and Its Six-Man Football Team

In the wake of 9/11, veteran Texas true-crime writer CARLTON STOWERS was consciously seeking out a story that might recharge his flagging faith in humanity and restore, in his words, “some degree of comfort and innocence.” He stumbled across the Wolverines of Penelope High School (town population: 211), whose recently

Book Review

Last Chance in Texas: The Redemption of Criminal

The Giddings State School is home and high school to 325 boys and 65 girls who have been convicted of heinous crimes—rape, murder, arson, and the like. But these hard-luck kids caught a break when they were sentenced to this rare youth correctional facility, which genuinely seeks to rehabilitate, not

Reporter

The War on Thugs

Five years after the Tulia fiasco put the state’s amateurish, irresponsible drug task forces in the national spotlight, more than half of them have been dissolved. That’s a good start.

Anita Perry

“He’s probably stronger now than when we were younger, but I’ve changed that same way. And we’ve probably gotten more conservative as we’ve gotten older.”

Web


Pat's Pick

The Sandbar

Seldom has the buzz been so great for something so small. After months of anticipation, the Sandbar has finally opened in downtown San Antonio. Does the minuscule urban fish house live up to the hype? Decidedly. Scrunch around one of the seven paper-topped tables and order a sumptuous bowl

Recipe

Ceviche from the Sandbar

2 pounds snapper (or fish of choice) 2 medium white onions 2 cups freshly squeezed lime juice 1⁄2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice 1 large bunch cilantro, leaves only 1 pinch cayenne 4 tablespoons salt freshly ground pepper to taste 4 cloves garlic, minced kernels from 3 ears freshly cooked

Web Exclusive

Quiz Show

Writer-at-large Anne Dingus on testing your Texas know-how one riddle, rhyme, and pun at a time.

Pat's Pick

Czech, Please

Best Fests | The month in kolaches.Even if you’ve never eaten a kolache, you’ve surely seen the roadside signs duking it out for the attention of weary travelers barreling down the highways of Central Texas: “Exit now! Get your kolaches here!” “The very best kolaches are here!” Clearly a claim

Texas Tidbits

Texas Tidbits

Dig into the archives of some famed Texas music halls, and you may hear history whispering more than just melodies.

Man of the Cloth

Senior editor Michael Hall on tackling Mack Brown—UT’s minister to footballers, alums, and Saturday fans alike—who’s made donning burnt orange cool again.

Web Exclusive

Mineral Hells

Associate editor Katy Vine discusses how she pieced together the small-town murder saga for this month’s feature “Girls Gone Wild”.

Miscellany


Around the State

09.25.05

September—People, Places, Events, Attractions09.25.05Love him or hate him, you have to respect Anselm Kiefer’s sheer ambition. “The scale of his ideas is daunting, and the size of his works—some paintings are twenty-four feet high—is incredible,” says Michael Auping, who organized the Kiefer exhibit opening this month at the Modern Art

Roar of the Crowd

House of Corrections

Your justification for including me on the Ten Worst list was primarily based on your false assertion that I was to blame for the demise of a judicial pay raise bill [“The Best and Worst Legislators of 2005,” July 2005]. In fact, I voted “present not voting” on

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