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Style & Design|
March 31, 2010

Ghassan “Gus” Karim, Tailor

Karim, who immigrated to the U.S. in 1969, has been a master tailor for fifty years. He is the owner of Gassane Tailors, in Austin, and has made custom suits for Bill Clements, Lyndon B. Johnson, and George W. Bush.My father was a tailor and had a big shop in

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The Culture|
March 1, 2010

Andrew R. Espinosa Jr., Process Server

Espinosa, a lifetime Houstonian, has been serving legal papers—summonses, subpoenas, complaints, writs—to people facing court action for the past sixteen years. He is an owner and the director of civil process at Court Record Research.I kind of fell into this. Around 1989, I had picked up a job with a

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Art|
February 1, 2010

The Illusionist

For more than thirty years, artist Damian Priour has crafted beautiful sculptures made of limestone, metal, wood, bronze, and glass.

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How to dance Cumbia.
Music|
February 1, 2010

How to Dance Cumbia

Before waltzing into a Tejano nightclub—or into any big party in South Texas, for that matter—you should know how to dance cumbia. Originally a folk dance from Colombia, the cumbia shuffled across Latin America, picking up small changes along the way, and has comfortably settled here with a distinct Tejano

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The Culture|
February 1, 2010

Melanie Matcek, Matchmaker

A San Antonio native, Matcek runs Heart and Soul-Mates, a personalized matchmaking service for clients across South Texas. She is also a licensed relationship coach.After becoming single again in late 2006, I started to do the online dating thing. I had heard the horror stories, and I quickly realized

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The Culture|
January 1, 2010

Captain Michelle Racicot, Army Trauma Nurse

Racicot grew up in New Mexico, but San Antonio has been her home base since she was stationed at Fort Sam Houston in 1998. She plans to leave the Army next spring and get a graduate degree in nursing from the University of Texas at San Antonio.My mom was an

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Sports|
December 1, 2009

How to Barrel Race

HistoryAs with most rodeo events, pinpointing barrel racing’s exact origin is near impossible. “It probably started out as pretty women on fast horses, but now it’s a competitive sport for serious athletes,” says Martha Josey, a world-champion barrel racer, Texas Rodeo Cowboy Hall of Famer, and co-owner of Josey Ranch,

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The Culture|
December 1, 2009

Adam Ohler, Firefighter and Paramedic

Ohler, who was born in New Mexico, worked as an EMT and firefighter in Utah before moving to Houston six years ago. He is stationed at the West University Place Fire Department.I’m not going to lie: I enjoy fighting fire. There’s an adrenaline rush—it’s exhilarating. I hate to say it,

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How to Build a Día de los Muertos Altar
The Culture|
October 31, 2009

How to Build a Día de los Muertos Altar

Every November 2, known as the Day of the Dead or All Souls’ Day, Hispanics across the Southwest transform grave sites, offices, and corners of their homes into vibrant memorials for their deceased loved ones by assembling multitiered ofrendas, or altars. “The day is devoted to the departed, and an

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The Culture|
October 31, 2009

Randy Goode, Artificial Inseminator

Goode grew up on a ranch in Damon, where he now runs an artificial insemination business. He travels the country collecting DNA for a U.S. Department of Agriculture research project on mad cow disease.Back in the seventies, my dad learned to artificially inseminate cows by reading a book and using

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Web Exclusive|
September 30, 2009

High Society

The Houston Chronicle’s loss is CultureMap’s gain—Shelby Hodge.

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The Culture|
September 30, 2009

How to Build a Barbed-Wire Fence

The HISTORYIn 1876 salesman John W. Gates brought barbed wire to Texas when he wagered $1 million that he could build a fence that would capably contain cattle. Some incredulous gambler took the bet. Gates erected a fence in San Antonio’s Military Plaza and shocked a gathered crowd as a

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The Culture|
September 30, 2009

Doug Ables, Chimney Sweep

Ables, who grew up in Brady, owns and runs Ables Top Hat Chimney Sweeps. He has been sweeping chimneys in Central Texas for almost thirty years.When I was 28, my wife and I moved into a house in Brady, and I started looking for someone who could sweep our chimney.

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The Culture|
September 30, 2009

Last Rights

The tragic case of Lloyd and Kim Yarbrough raises an old question: Why doesn’t the decision to die belong to the person who is dying?

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The Culture|
August 31, 2009

Why Are Tortilla Chips So Damn Good?

Is it the crispiness? The crunchiness? The saltiness? Thankfully, a small cadre of researchers in the Department of Soil and Crop Sciences at Texas A&M has spent much of the past thirty years munching on this question.

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Music|
August 31, 2009

Tanya Tucker

“I don’t let people run over me. From the very beginning, I’ve never changed my ideas about what music should be.”

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Health|
August 31, 2009

Dawn Cockrell, Midwife

Cockrell has lived in West Texas for twenty years and has been delivering babies for fourteen. She opened West Texas Birth Services, in Odessa, in 2001.My mother gave birth to my younger sister when I was sixteen. They induced her at forty weeks, and I was present for the

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Kevin McCarthy, Jacob Schulze, and the author.
Music|
July 31, 2009

G-L-O-R-I-A

When the legendary Liberty Lunch club closed in July 1999, senior editor and musician Michael Hall came up with a way to say goodbye to an era—play “Gloria” for 24 hours straight.

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Food & Drink|
July 31, 2009

How to Brew Sweet Tea

It seems simple enough—make tea, add sugar—but brewing a high-class glass of Southern champagne is “all about time, temperature, and quality,” according to Clayton Christopher, the founder of Austin-based Sweet Leaf Tea Company. He should know: In just over ten years, he’s gone from making batches of the stuff at

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The Culture|
July 31, 2009

C. Andrew Doyle

“The complexities of the world are just now being tippy-toed into by churches, and that keeps us out of a place where people can find us, where they’re building community. It’s not that we’re locked out; it’s that we can’t find the door.”

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The Culture|
July 31, 2009

Jim Adler, Personal-Injury Lawyer

Adler, who grew up in Dallas, has been a personal-injury lawyer for 36 years. He is the founder of the Houston law firm Jim S. Adler & Associates and appears in television ads in Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio.I started out doing law enforcement work for the Texas State Securities

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The Culture|
June 30, 2009

The French Way

To a bystander, the French red, white, and blue covering the lawn of the historic French Legation Museum might seem as if a confused group of Austinites was celebrating the Fourth of July a week too late. But when night falls, the scene turns into an outdoor Parisian café nestled

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The Culture|
June 30, 2009

How to Pack a Cooler Tube

Some things never change, like the irrepressible desire to float a Hill Country river on a 100-degree day—with, most naturally, a cooler of beer. And while the basic art of loading one’s booze boat also remains the same (use a separate inner tube with a bottom, pump it with extra

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Style & Design|
June 30, 2009

Susie Q., Mystery Shopper

Susie Q. (not her real name) has been reviewing hotels, restaurants, and retailers anonymously for about six years. She works for several market research companies, such as Sinclair Customer Metrics, to whom she reports her findings after posing as an everyday customer and testing out products and services. She has

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Sports|
May 31, 2009

Cecil Cooper

“People are going to hit, or they’re not going to hit. Some guys are going to have a better season than they had before, and some aren’t. There’s not a whole lot I can do except put the right players in the right positions and expect them to perform.”

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The Culture|
May 31, 2009

How to Spit Watermelon Seeds

Emily Post may have deplored any sort of public spitting as “disgusting” and “too nauseating to comment on,” but such notions of etiquette have never stuck with the patrons of Luling’s annual Watermelon Thump. Every June, the World Championship Seed Spitting Contest draws hundreds of spectators who hope to witness

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Being Texan|
May 31, 2009

Jennifer Love, Forensic Anthropologist

Love has been the director of the forensic anthropology division at the Harris County Medical Examiner’s Office since 2006. She was raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.The forensic anthropology division here has three anthropologists, and we have three main responsibilities: identification, skeletal recovery, and forensic anthropology services. Anyone who is a victim

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The Culture|
April 30, 2009

Juan Muñoz, Sheriff’s Deputy

Muñoz is a native of El Paso who has been with the sheriff’s department for eight years.In the sheriff’s department you start out working in the jail, and then you take a test to come out on patrol. I’ve been a patrol officer since 2004. Back in January of last

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The Culture|
March 31, 2009

Kinky Uncut

David Hartstein’s film about Kinky Friedman’s 2006 gubernatorial run shows the candidate’s earnest sincerity, a quality frequently obscured by his larger-than-life persona.

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The Culture|
March 31, 2009

Ghosts Of War

Happy Texas Independence Day! Read five stories about our state's history, including this piece about the battlegrounds of Texas, which tell an incredible story of struggle, sorrow, triumph, and terror.

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The Culture|
March 31, 2009

How to Chase a Tornado

The RationaleTexas soil is arguably Mother Nature’s favorite dance floor: More twisters touch down here annually than in any other state (132 on average). As a result, storm chasers consider the Panhandle and Red River Valley requisite destinations during tornado season (April through June). This activity won’t suit the lily-livered

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