Bonus points for naming the landmarks and streets he drives down!

Hat tip - Unfair Park

Scat Jazz Lounge | Map
Randy Lee - Friday - 9:00 PM
Bett Butler - Saturday - 9:00 PM

Bass Performance Hall | Map
Imagination Celebration presents Debbie Allen Dance Institute - Friday - 7:00 PM
Metropolitan Classical Ballet presents Summer Gala - Saturday - 8:00 PM
D Magazine and Bass Performance Hall present Bridal Show 2008 - Sunday - 11:00 AM

McDavid Studio | Map
No events scheduled.

Van Cliburn Hall | Map
No performances scheduled.

Click below for more great shows!
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Rumor has it that the Rahr & Sons Brewing folks will be hosting a pub crawl on the Near South Side this Friday night.

I’ve been told that they’ll be starting at Chadra Mezza and Grill at 5PM, so be sure you leave work early to get there in time.

Also, for those of you living on the South Side, Chris Cole has challenged you to either walk or ride your bike to Chadra and the on for the rest of the pub crawl. From Chadra I’m guessing they’ll probably go to Finn MacCool’s, then up to Magnolia for a few stops up there. That’s the typical route. Easy to do on a bike!

While Fort Worth has made great steps forward on heavier rail systems, first with the Trinity Railway Express and now with the upcoming Southwest-to-Northeast Line, those systems are primarily concerned with moving across longer city-to-city type distances. What’s been missing is a proposal to do something greater for central city urban mobility, something beyond The T’s little-used (and in some ways rather lackluster) bus system.

Until now.

For several months now, a proposal has been working its way through the city’s ether to bring back Fort Worth’s streetcar system, silenced long ago and replaced with the bus. Decades ago, Fort Worth had one of the finest streetcar systems in the entire country, with routes linking downtown to many dense, walkable “streetcar suburbs” like the Magnolia/Fairmount/Ryan Place area, the west side, and places like the Stockyards. Now, with Fort Worth witnessing the success that modern streetcar systems are having in places like Portland, work is underway on returning these central city circulator vehicles to the neighborhoods around downtown.

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I read an article in Wired Magazine recently about free being the future of business and in that article is a story about this Brazilian group called Banda Calypso that literally gives away its music. They distribute masters of their CDs and CD liner art to street vendor networks in towns it plans to tour, with full agreement that the vendors will copy the CDs, sell them and keep all the money. That’s OK, because selling discs isn’t Calypso’s main source of income. And how’s that working for them? Not bad. They’ve paid for a private jet.

So I thought of this when Fort Worth’s Green River Ordinance sent us an email saying they’re giving away a copy of their 2005 album “The Beauty of Letting Go” for free at FreeGRO.net. Are they angling for a Gulfstream? Not exactly.

“We decided to give that CD away to show our appreciation for our fans, to build an email list, and to broaden our fan base,” said GRO guitarist Josh Wilkerson. “Almost anyone will take a free CD.”

He’s right about that. But is it worth it? I gotta say I liked it, but I like powerpop. It may be a few years old, but “Breath of Life” is going into heavy rotation on my iPod. And now I think I need to check these guys out live, too.

Besides Wilkerson, GRO is made up of Josh Jenkins (vocals and acoustic), Jamey Ice (electric), Geoff Ice (bass) and Denton Hunker (drums). They are working on their first major label release for Capitol records right now, and they just completed two weeks of recording with producer Mark Endert (Maroon 5, The Fray, Madonna) and will begin sessions in Memphis, Tenn., with producer, Paul Ebersold (3 Doors Down, Sister Hazel, Third Day) next week.

Check ‘em out. I think you’ll find you get more than your money’s worth.

Unfair Park reports on today’s S-T job cuts. According to a memo from S-T publisher Gary Wortel, cuts will come “from the newsroom to advertising, circulation and the press operation.” Also, sections will also be consolidated and subscription rates will also be raised. Unfair Park learned that the Star-Telegram’s print version will no longer take breaking-news items after 11 p.m., forcing readers to go to the Web in yet another money-saving effort.

Unfair Park and Poynter have both blogged this morning about impending job cuts at McClatchy, parent company of the Star-Telegram. In a release, McClatchy said it’s trimming its payroll by 10 percent through both voluntary and involuntary separations. The Kansas City Star — the S-T’s long-time sister paper in terms of size and demographics, has already announced its intention to cut 120 jobs. Don’t be surprised to see a similar announcement out of West 7th Street today.

• Jehovah’s Witnesses Meet in Fort Worth This Weekend - Let's make sure they know where the Libertarians are meeting!
• Q Cinema Announces Winners - Fort Worth, TX - Associated Content - We are HORRIBLE supporters of the arts… I can't even begin to state how sorry I am that I missed all of this and provided no coverage whatsoever.
• Plano mom that severed baby’s arm seeks freedom - No, really! God says I'm fine now!
• Shari.com: Joe T. Garcia and The Fort Worth Botanical Gardens - And now I know what it is about Joe T.'s that I don't like. It's not really like "real" Tex-Mex, it's like a California/Nevada misinterpretation of Tex-Mex, and NOTHING like real Mexican food. I wonder if she's actually TRIED any of the other restaurants
• SUV donations at a high as demand evaporates - Let's just hope that all those altruistic people are deducting the ACTUAL value of the vehicle, not what they paid for it.
• Concerns create locally-grown produce demand - I love it when the things I advocate for start happening!
• Fort Worth Cats Not Viable - Fort Worth Cats - American Association - nlfan / aabfan Discussion Forums & Chat Rooms - Message Board - Yuku - There should be a question mark in the headline, but nonetheless, this is an interesting thread. Gives you an idea of what things are going to be like on the Northside REALLY SOON.
• The Conde Nast Traveler “Hot List 2008″ - Tim Love does it again, this time for Love Shack.
• Child abandonment suspect: ‘I was there spiritually’ - What "work," exactly, did God call you to do?
• Longtime Terrell High teacher Hazel Harvey Peace dies | Fort Worth | Star-Telegram.com - Thanks for your service, Ms. Peace

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Back in February, I got a burr in my saddle. Right after Mayor Mike decided to put the fix in on the Gas Drilling Task Force, stack the deck heavily in favor of the industry and keep any meaningful discussion about injection wells out the public eye, I got a little curious.

What’s going on here? How does the Mayor take an issue that the public is keenly interested in and completely cut the public out of the process?

So, on Feb. 26, I submitted a Freedom of Information Act request with the City of Fort Worth to find out why. I asked the City to supply all emails between the Mayor and anyone affiliated with Chesapeake Energy between that day and Jan. 1, 2007. I also asked for email between the Mayor and any city department on the topic of injection wells over the same period.

I can’t possibly cover everything that I gleaned from the entire process in one post, so I’m just going to focus on the emails between the Mayor and Chesapeake Energy over that period.

My assumption going in to this process would be that there would be a heavy volume of email. After all, this is the same period of time when the Trinity Trees incident went down. I expected some interesting stuff.

And how many emails did I get between Mikey and Chesapeake mouthpiece Julie Wilson, CEO Aubrey McClendon or anyone else at Chesapeake Energy?
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Catherine Cuellar at Pegasus News is reporting on the Square Pegs blog that McClatchy, the parent company of the Star-Telegram, will be downsizing next week, “costing dozens if not hundreds of local staff members their jobs.” The Star-Telegram fired 15 people back in April as part of a staff reduction.

Certainly, the scuttlebutt has been swirling through the newsroom since Thursday and a lot of people at West 7th Street are on edge. I was a little skeptical about the idea the “dozens if not hundreds” number. Once upon a time, the S-T newsroom was about 400 people. Could McClatchy really lay off several hundred people? Well, a ZoomInfo search shows the S-T has about 1,800 employees, so it isn’t outside the realm of possibility. I’m not hearing much else. Right now, the Sergeant Schultz rule seems to be in effect — no one knows nuthin bout nuthin.

UPDATE, 6.15.08: This from an email: “S-T HR Director in building Sunday night. Why is HR in the building on a weekend? Must be sharpening the ax for next week…”