Image: Dan Page

During my childhood spent on a ranch outside of Houston, my driving desire was to escape to New York City, the first place I ever loved. My passion for Manhattan, like all first loves, was absurd and absolute. When I was seven or eight, my mother and I checked in to the Plaza Hotel for a week of shopping and theater—in memory, we seem to have spent the whole of the oil boom striding through gilt and marble lobbies, a flurry of fur and French luggage. (I’d imagine that, in those flush, petroleum-rich years, Texans must have racked up more frequent flyer miles than at any other time in our history. I remember a lady who used to book one seat on the Concorde when flying to Paris, but two when traveling home—one for herself, and the other for her new dresses.) Back in Texas, we spent every available minute in Houston, mostly at Neiman’s, a place my mother held in the kind of holy reverence that Catholics reserve for the Vatican, but Manhattan was another thing entirely. From my first Fifth Avenue afternoon, my fate was sealed; soon after turning eighteen, I packed my bags and booked a flight for New York City.

At the time, I had many good reasons for running away. Knowing what I know today, I’m certain I wasn’t the only gay kid in my high school, but I was the only obviously gay kid. This was well before school districts were successfully sued for tolerating bullying, and for a year or so, I was spat upon every day by a series of slack-jawed hoodlums who are now serving hard time in Huntsville prison. I hope. Anyway, I don’t know how many of you have ever been spat upon, but trust me, it’s overrated. And every time somebody hurled spit or unprintable epithets in my direction, I planned my exit strategy, and pictured how happy I’d soon be, yukking it up at Barneys, and how miserable they’d soon be, pumping gas in Dogpatch.  

But after moving to Manhattan, the most extraordinary thing occurred. I suddenly realized that there was something I’d loved about Houston all along but had always been blind to. Perhaps it was the fact that Houston was the place my mother took me to escape the unpleasantness of my childhood. As a little gay boy stuck out on the ranch, I’d dreamt of becoming a writer and leading a glistening life of cocktail parties abuzz with witty women in glamorous gowns. At the time, I believed this to be a fantasy of New York—but in truth, it was a fantasy of oil-rich Houston. In my Plaza-fueled reveries, I managed to convince myself that once I got to Manhattan, every night would be the Grand Gala Ball. 

The truth about the Big Apple was disillusioning. I soon grasped that although there are many lovely things about New York, if what you’re after is drinking champagne from a satin slipper, if what you desire is the company of larger-than-life characters draped in even larger jewels, then you really can’t do better than Houston, Texas. (I recall, years ago, a socialite who delighted in stroking the “Batista rubies” that hung about her neck. I still have no idea what Fulgencio Batista, the notorious Cuban dictator, had to do with that lady’s sparkling neckwear, but how the thought of it captured my imagination!) 

Now, that's Houston—a city where ladies may occasionally murder their husbands, but will not wear white after Labor Day.

What, you may ask, inspired this revelation? My first long-term exposure to proper Yankees. I’d come to New York City to attend Sarah Lawrence College, where many of my classmates had graduated from the kind of posh prep schools that make most Texans’ Stetsons shrink. (I’ve always believed, by the way, that the secret of the Bush family’s staggering success in the Lone Star State is that your typical Texan harbors a paralyzing inferiority complex when it comes to pedigreed New England WASPs.) It’s a fine thing to spend time among that patrician, Lilly Pulitzer-ed breed of lily white Northeasterners, because it makes you realize that, as my grandmother would have said, “Their veins are filled with sugar water.” That’s a real ladylike way of saying that they’re just a bunch of limp, sallow, real superior-actin’ sons of bitches, who’ve managed to make a way of life out of being anesthetizingly dull. To be fair, though, how could any people who grew up without Marvin Zindler, Mattress Mack, Maxine Mesinger, or the Shamrock Hilton be expected to understand true joy? 

You know how, when Americans go to Europe, they become oh, so much more American? Well, living in New York taught me, to my amazement, that the greatest thing in the world to be is a Texan, and especially a Houstonian—Houston being the most Texan of all the state’s major cities. (In 1961, John Bainbridge wrote a bestselling book called The Super-Americans, in which he portrayed Texans as the embodiment of a heightened version of the nation’s virtues and faults, and I think there’s an argument to be made that Houstonians are the Super-Texans.) I’ve always believed that, way down deep, Austin really wants to be Berkeley, and Dallas wants to be Chicago, but Houston is just pleased as Punch to be Houston. I mean, our municipal sobriquet is the Bayou City, for heaven’s sake—a bayou being, after all, more or less a swamp. Houstonians possess such remarkable self-assurance, such an ornery kind of confidence, we’re proud to declare ourselves citizens of Swamp City, and if anybody doesn’t like it, then they can go straight to Dallas. 

I once saw a televised interview with Lynn Wyatt—to my mind, the blonde bombshell personification of what’s best about our fair city. When asked about her beauty, she smiled wryly and said, in her splendid Bacall purr, “Powder and paint make a girl what she ain’t.” I thought then, and I still think now, that there’s something about that statement—the blue-skied, Western, straight-talkin’ swagger of it—that made it the Houston-est thing I’ve ever heard. Yankees have an absolute mania for “subtlety.” In matters of fashion and hair and jewelry, they’ll less-is-more you until you’re dressed like a cat burglar, and your hair is plastered flat to your skull. But Houston is a fabulously more-is-more city, undaunted by the prospect of ruffles and flourishes, as evidenced by our towering coiffures—and also, perhaps more profoundly, by our rich vernacular. Grace Paley, one of my great teachers, always said that, in order to become a writer, you had to learn to listen to the world with two ears—one tuned to the classics, the exquisite English of Shakespeare, Byron, and W.H. Auden, and the other tuned to the language of the street on which you grew up. 

In my childhood home, filled with five generations of Houstonians, no one was merely ugly; he was “so ugly he had to slip up on the dipper to get a drink of water.” Mendacious fellows were “all hat and no cattle.” And no gathering was simply marvelous; it was “the most fun since the pigs ate little brother.” Reared in a milieu of such startling lyricism, how could I have helped becoming a writer? 

I first heard many of these colloquialisms from the scarlet-painted mouths of Houston women, who in my opinion are vastly superior to—stronger, savvier, and more capable of reconciling internal contradictions—their male counterparts. My partner Michael says, “The thing about the women in your family is, they’re ladies, yes, but they’re also bad-asses.” That’s certainly the case with my mother, but I think it’s true of Houston women in general. They don’t seem to find it difficult to stand by their guns (and even to fire them) while also maintaining perfect hair and makeup.  

Take my great friend, Susan DuQuesnay Bankston. A firebrand local journalist, founder of the blog Juanita Jean’s: The World’s Most Dangerous Beauty Salon, and the woman who first dubbed Tom DeLay “Hot Tub Tom” in the early ’80s, Susan dogged that man until he was eventually indicted in 2005 on conspiracy charges and forced to resign from political life. I once asked Susan whether she feared reprisal from the Republican establishment, and she said, “Oh, honey, I have come to consider tar and feathers fashion accessories.” 

And then there’s Candace Mossler, one of my all-time favorite Houstonians.  If Lynn Wyatt is the better angel of Houston’s nature, then Candy Mossler was its bubbly, blonde devil. In 1964, she and her hunky young boyfriend, who was also her nephew, were accused of murdering her multi-millionaire husband. Despite overwhelming evidence, Candy was acquitted of all charges, largely for reasons of personal charm, and in gratitude kissed each man on the jury as he filed out of the box. 

During the trial, she was confronted by a news reporter. “Mrs. Mossler,” he said, “you stand accused of adultery. You stand accused of incest. You stand accused of murdering your husband. Now, just what do you have to say for yourself?” Batting her eyes and smiling brightly, Candy Mossler replied, “Well, suh, nobody’s perfect.” 

Now, that’s Houston—a city where ladies may occasionally murder their husbands, but will not wear white after Labor Day. 

At the moment, “curated” is one of the most overused words in New York City. Suddenly, everybody, from the loftiest director of the Whitney to the lowliest clerk at Bergdorf’s, seems to be busily “curating” everything down to its barest elements, because god forbid anything might suffer from an excess of personality. And though, I, too, enjoy concision and refinement, there’s a part of me—the happiest, Houston part—that believes a touch of vulgarity to be a necessary component of joy. Today, I’m grateful to make my home in Manhattan and Houston—in a condo near the corner of Montrose and Alabama—the two cities that have made me an artist, and where, I have found, you can get anything you ever wanted. 

Image: Dan Derozier

Until quite recently, our beloved metropolitan statistical area was but the parti-colored jellyroll of competing fiefdoms you see above. Its many peoples lived lives of fear and isolation, their very existences caught up in a hysteria of annexation and relaxed zoning restrictions that lasted decades. And there things would remain until the dawn of the 21st century—its thirteenth year, to be exact, and the fourth month if you want to get technical.

Click to enlarge. 

It's a great time of year to make the short drive down the Southwest Freeway or 288 to Brazos Bend State Park, Houstonia as the dinosaurs knew it.

And they still do know it, because you can't tell me that an alligator is anything other than a living dinosaur. Right now the giant reptilians are in full effect, maxin' and relaxin' in full view of the park's many visitors. Below, we find this gator using his turtle tanning buddy as a headrest:

Trust us, we saw it through our binoculars. He was not eating that turtle. They were snuggling.

The gators will let you get much closer than that. Though the largest one we saw was basking on the other side of a creek (and a good thing too, because that behmoth was at least 11'), this little seven-footer let me walk right up to him. (Note: alligator is not as close as it appears: I zoomed in on it. Don't approach them too close.)

 Much to the dismay of my daughter:

So yes, it was a grand day out, and a bargain at the price: $7 for each adult, kids under 12 free. Camping ranges from $12/night (primitive) to $20 for water and electricity. You can reserve a site online.

Fishing requires no license in Brazos Band or any Texas state park, but Brazos Bend comes with some caveats. Wading in the water is utterly inadvisable and as noted in the park's online guide, "if an alligator becomes interested in your fishing line, you need to find another place to fish." If you can avoid enticing the gators, you can haul out bowfin, gar, crappie, perch, black bass, and catfish. 

Away from the gators, Brazos Bend is a birdwatcher's paradise: over the years, we've seen ibises, anhingas, bitterns, pileated woodpeckers, various warblers and birds of prey, herons (blue and white, great and small) and too many others to remember right now.

Miles and miles of trails offer hikers, cyclists and horseback riders access to most of the 5,000 acres of Spanish moss-draped oaks, palmetto undergrowth, swampy sloughs, and surprisingly high-banked and steep-sided creeks and riverfronts. 

 Please call park information (1-800-792-1112) for the latest updates. The daily entrance fee is charged in addition to any facility fees, unless otherwise stated. A Texas State Park Pass will allow you and your guests to enjoy unlimited visits for 1-year to more than 90 State Parks, without paying the daily entrance fee, in addition to other benefits. 

Well, it looks like either the Buffalo Bayou Partnership has gone hog-wild with their improvements or GMC built us a lake (with marina!), because that sure does not look like the same Allen's Landing or Houston's muddy, trash-strewn waterway I saw last time I was downtown.

Or maybe a Photoshopper in the employ of GMC let his imagine and his mouse get away with him and changed Commerce Street into Chi-Town's Lakeshore Boulevard. Where is our Navy Pier?

At any rate, I don't think there's been a more inaccurate portrayal of downtown Houston since about 1850, when this doozy appeared in Gleason's Pictorial, a long-vanished Boston magazine: 

Note: not only were those mountains never actually there, but by the time this ad appeared, Austin had been the capital for about 15 years.

If you are wondering what this post is doing on a travel blog, we regard these places as imaginary cities you can visit in your fantasies. 

Earlier this week over on Wanderlust, we unveiled the ongoing Texas Music Map, in which we are attempting to pinpoint the locales that inspired hundreds of Texas songs.

Of course, we've focused most keenly on the Houston area, and in doing so, we found about 20 songs that at least name-checked Houston restaurants.

Here are eleven of them.

11. "La Tapatia" by Houston often-hilarious psych rockers Linus Pauling Quartet. Just your everyday, run-of-the-mill Satanic death metal tribute to a beloved, once-gritty Montrose taqueria. 

10. "Poppa Burger," by indie-pop rockers Junior Varsity. A sassy and catchy commercial for the venerable 24-hour Near Northside burger shack.

9. "Showdown at the 59 Diner" by Sprawl. Frenetic funk-rap-rock by one of Houston's most popular '90s bands about a memorable night at the landmark Shepherd Plaza burgers and shakes joint.

8. In "The Almighty Dollar," Devin the Dude is too cash-strapped to do anything more than smell the chicken at Frenchy's, which also figures in Beyonce's "Bow Down" and many, many other songs. Here's Devin:

7. "Goin' to Da Clinic" is an extremely NSFW (language) cautionary tale on suicidally unsafe sex by K-Rino, an underground legend and the most gifted pure lyricist in Houston rap history. Here he says one woman "is hotter than the barbecue sauce at Timmy Chan's."  The local chicken and Chinese chain is by far the most-mentioned restaurant in Houston music, especially rap.

6.  Pappadeaux is up there in rap circles with Timmy Chan's and Frenchy's. Back when hip-hop was fascinated with all things pimp, it helped that Pappadeux was famous for peddling shrimp. Ten years ago Mississippi rapper David Banner teamed up with southside Houston rapper Lil' Flip, who opined that the ladies liked "the way me and Banner pimp /  You can catch us at Pappadeaux / Eating steak and shrimp." On "I'm a Pimp," Mike Jones added a third line to the pimp-shrimp rhyme scheme with his laughably terrible "I'm a pimp, I walk with a limp, stepping into Pappadeaux eating on some shrimp."  Not Houston hip-hop's finest moment. Here's Banner and Fliperace:

5. Along with Lil' Keke, Paul Wall was a guest rapper on Jones's "I'm A Pimp," and "the People's Champ" sent out a rare tribute to a Houston Mexican restaurant when he declared that all drinks were on him at the now-shuttered Cabo. Since it shouts out two restaurants, we'll go ahead and embed this tune, even though it's mediocre and has the worst line of Mike Jones's career. (He had some highlights too -- I still like "Still Tippin'" and "Back Then.")

4. Talk about foresight -- back in 1995, on "Caffeine," Houston's ska kings the Suspects shouted-out two restaurants that are still here 18 years later: Mai's (famous for iced coffee) and Cafe Brasil: "I'd like to kill all the people at Brasil but the house blend really rocks my world."  "Caffeine" was 1995's song of the year at the Houston Press Music Awards.

3. Speaking of caffeine, Diedrich Coffee garnered a mention in Craig Kinsey's "Montrose Boulevard Blues." 

2. Though known more as a bar, Under the Volcano is classed by the City of Houston as a restaurant. On "Neon River," country-rocker Jubal Lee Young exults that after miles on the road, he's almost at his home away from home "Under the Volcano."

1. Though the others are not ranked in any particular order, we've saved the absolute best for last: "Last Concert Cafe" by country-rockers Horseshoe, whose chorus goes like this: "I've got my backpack and rollin' papers, wrinkled old suit and a pack of Lifesavers, another day, another test of my faith: sittin' in a booth watchin' the rain at the Last Concert Cafe."

 Know of some we left off? Please add them in the comments!

 Want to show the kids what cinema was like in the American Graffiti days? Want to take a hot date out for some heavy petting under the flickering lights of the silver screen? 

If the answer to either of those questions is yes, you are in luck. For the past seven years, the Houston area has been home to the Showboat Drive-In, an off-the-radar theater on FM 2920 in Hockley.

Built, owned and operated by the Rumfolo family, for whom drive-ins are seemingly embedded in their genetic code, the Showboat takes its visitors back to the days when whole families would get off the couch and actually go out to have fun together.  

Open every Friday-Sunday at six p.m., the Showboat's early screenings begin at the delightfully vague time of "dusk." There are two screens, each accomodating 400 cars. At least one of the early screenings is family-friendly. Adult admission is $6, kids 3-12 are $4, and babies are free. The snack bar offers burgers as well as traditional box office fare.

Getting there from Houston is easiest on Saturdays and Sundays, when traffic on the federal disaster area otherwise known as Highway 290 clears out. To get there from downtown, take 290 to the Becker Road exit, head four miles north, hang a right on Waller-Tomball Road (FM 2920) and drive just over a mile-and-a-half, whereupon you will see enormous screens looming over the prairie.

In our case, the last drive-in movie we ever saw was in 1989. That was when we smuggled in a handle of Bacardi and viewed Patrick Swayze's Palme D'Or-winning Road House at a theater that once stood on the North Freeway near Spring. We can't let our drive-in experience go out like that, so see you at the Showboat soon. 

Houston’s West End is a neighborhood unmistakably in transition.  The homes cluttering Floyd, Rose and Reinicke Street are a hodgepodge of simple one-story brick and wood-paneled houses, various tin structures born of the area's 1990s flirtation with the tin house movement, and newly-constructed, brightly-painted stucco condos.  Tucked away in this neighborhood lacking in visual unity, is the Tempietto Zeni. 

The home and studio of architect Frank Zeni, this metal fortress is impossible to miss. Built in 1990 and designed by Zeni himself, the house is a three-and-a-half story metal garage-like structure with an open front, offset by three large Ionic columns. The entire first floor serves as a studio, the second floor is divided between an open balcony and Zeni’s kitchen, and, finally, the third floor consists solely of Zeni’s spacious and artistically decorated bedroom.

“I wanted a loft house and the buildings at the time were too big for me,” Zeni says. “Those buildings made me feel lonely and kind of isolated so I decided to build my own loft here in this neighborhood.”  

Despite its awe-inspiring exterior, Zeni says the house is traditional in its own way. 

“The DNA of Houston architecture seems to be basically a bungalow with a porch. And that’s what this is, just larger.  "

Because real estate was less expensive when he began building his house, ten to 15 other tin houses popped up in the neighborhood over the next year, Zeni recalls.  These homes were a part of a movement that started during the 1970s with the first tin house built at 507 Roy Street, about three blocks from Tempietto Zeni.  Zeni says affordability and quick construction times helped tin houses became so popular. “It took about a week to build this house,” Zeni said. “It was easy because the house was basically already made because it’s metal so we just brought in a crane to set it up. It was like erecting a toy kit.”  

Since then, many of the other tin houses in the neighborhood have been razed and replaced by those lovely candy-colored stucco condos. (Houston's original tin house was demolished in 2011.)

And so the West End goes, one of this ephemeral cities most ephemeral area.

Still, Zeni says he enjoys living there.

“I enjoy the neighborhood. It’s been pretty nice for the last thirty years,” Zeni said.  

Each year TripAdvisor.com ranks American and world cities based "on millions of valuable reviews and opinions from TripAdvisor travelers.  Award winners were determined based on the popularity of destinations, taking into account travelers' favorites and most highly rated places."

Last year, Houston came in 18th on the list of top American cities. This year we've slipped to number 25, behind a bevy of more traditional tourist towns such as New York, San Antonio, and New Orleans and a few Hawaiian destinations.

Here's the opener of the accompanying blurb for this year's Houston entry. 

"This sprawling city hums with the energy and independent spirit that turned it from swampland into the fourth-largest city in the U.S. Everything is big, from the towering skyscrapers to the city's prominence in aerospace, oil, shipping and finance. Even the architecture makes big, bold statements, like the medical center towers that resemble two giant syringes."

 The blurb goes on to tout our museums, arts, multiculturalism, Space Center Houston, and then, puzzlingly, it suggests that visitors escape the scorching summer heat either in an indoor attraction, or "particularly in the pedestrian-friendly 6.5-mile underground city."

The tunnels? Really? That's the best we can do?

The prospect of chomping on Ninfa's Express or Whataburger while watching people get haircuts and shoeshines in what amounts to a sterile, depressingly-lit underground airport terminal (with no planes) does not strike us something that would wow a seasoned traveler, but to each his own.

TripAdvisor readers (as opposed to writers) have a better sense of what's great about Houston: our museums, which comprise eight of the eleven top-rated local attractions. 

Earlier this year as part of its multi-pronged "Houston Is Inspired" marketing campaign, the Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau unveiled its most prominent tangible creation: Houston Is, Aerosol Warfare Collective founder Gonzo247's vast (3,300 square feet) downtown mural.

I posted a picture of the work on my Facebook when it was nearing completion, and it was very well-recieved, garnering dozens of likes, exclamations like "Fantastic!" and "I Love it, love it, love it," and a request for directions, so that one admirer might gaze upon it person.  (It's on the side of Treebeard's on Market Square.)

But apres Gonzo's voila, le deluge of derision, led by local arts blogger Harbeer Sandhu. In his post Houston is Insipid // Enmired State of Mind, Sandhu blasted the mural as vapid commercialism, far less a work of art than a mere billboard. (Albeit one that required 250 cans of spray paint, per Gonzo.) Sandhu blasts the mural as childish (like pre-k pudding paintings) and that it commits the mortal sin of telling all and showing nothing.

"Frankly, I don’t know how to organize my thoughts around this one," Sandhu writes.  "I read those words and I wonder how they might have been represented visually, in a way that rings true for Houston. How is Houston 'funky?'  Show me that.  How is Houston 'hip?'  Show me that, please.  And what the f*** does 'savvy' mean, anyway?  How is a city 'savvy?'  Why isn’t the 'y' in 'savvy' a cute little spork?  Could it be because of the glaring contradiction between the meaning of 'savvy' and turning a letter of the alphabet into a cutesy utensil, or did somebody run out of pudding?"

Sandhu's disdain for Houston Is comes in spite of the fact that he even claims to admire "obnoxious ugly narcissistic tags with nothing but the writer’s name because those sing to me I AM // I EXIST // YOU DON’T SEE ME BUT I MATTER TOO."

Which seems to be precisely the GHCVB's point in commissioning this mural, but anyway...

Ultimately, Sandhu's other overarching point -- that Houston Is seems utterly untethered to the place it purports to represent, is fairly convincing. (In contrast, he offers a series of murals from a San Francisco Whole Foods that showcase the array of wildlife in the Bay Area.) With the mere subtractions of the skyline, the city seal, and the word "Houston," Houston Is could as well adorn -- or deface, as Sandhu would have it -- a wall in Dallas, Tacoma or Bangor, Maine.

The comments section of Sandhu's post is well worth reading.

One commenter accused Gonzo of being nothing more than a "puppet for a dim marketing bureau" and that his work was nothing more than "inconsequential psychedelia" which makes it sound like the visual equivalent of Tripping Daisy or the Strawberry Alarm Clock.

Swamplot blogger Allyn West said that Sandhu's slam knocked the scales from his eyes.

"Look, I’m susceptible to garish colors and curlicues and 'inconsequential psychedelia,' as Manuel wonderfully calls it, and I’ve been one of those giddy Instagrammers posting images of this mural to his Facebook page. And I have to confess that I was fooled — or shocked, maybe — by the spectacle of it.

My reaction was 'Oh! Pretty!' And then I drove away.

But this essay talks me out of that. This point nails it: '[The Whole Foods] mural is tied to a place. It says something about the past AND the present of that place, which makes the viewer think of what the future might bring and how present choices will impact that possible future.'”

Further down in the comments, there's a great if long-winded back-and-forth between Sandhu and local arts advocate Jenni-Beck, who defends the mural and the GHCVB.

So, what do you think? Is it sordid advertising or glorious work of art or some combiantion of the two? Does Houston Is show what Houston is, or is it merely visual Polyphonic Spree?  

FEMA’s website offers the following tips for anyone choosing to ride out a tropical cyclone: keep a radio handy, buy dry goods, batteries and bottled water, fill up the tub, hunker down. Curiously, there is no mention on the site of whom one should hunker down with; whether, say, one should hunker down with a potential love interest with whom she’s had just one date. 

In a way, FEMA’s silence on this matter is understandable. The idea of using a deadly storm as an excuse for a romantic fling sounds preposterous, at least on the surface, the sort of thing that only a girl with a crush on a cute vegan and fantasies of taking shelter in his arms as the world outside goes nuts would think of. Still, it can be done, as long as you pay close attention and learn from my mistakes.   

Tip No. 1: Be careful what you wish for. 

Like everyone else on the morning of September 12, 2008, I was glued to my computer screen, watching Ike lumber toward us. A feeling came over me—let’s call it excitement—as I reflected fondly on the last hurricane I’d experienced, way back in 1983, when I was six and Alicia came to town. I had some vague memories of a dark house, candlelight, and a street that looked like a river, but I didn’t remember the experience as unpleasant. 

There was excitement too in the thought that unlike so many times in the past, this would be no near-miss, no non-event. This time it would happen. The world would stop for a minute, we would eat all the peanut butter we wanted. No one would die. It wouldn’t cost billions to rebuild a battered city. The worst that would happen is that I’d be stuck in my apartment with a great-looking vegan.  

What was I thinking? That the storm would be hitting on a Friday night, that’s what. Date night. I pulled out my first-generation iPhone, scrolled to the vegan’s number, and texted: “Want to ride out the hurricane with me?” Ten long minutes later, the phone beeped. “Of course I do,” he replied.  

Tip No. 2: Get food your date can eat. 

What to feed a vegan? I turned the thought over and over in my head as I drove to the Kroger on West Gray. The shelves had been ransacked by the time I arrived, but I did manage to get wine (priority number one), peanut butter (yes!), bottled water, rice, a couple of cans of black beans, a bag of tortilla chips, and the ingredients for some killer guacamole. 

Even as I pulled these items from their paper sack, there was a knock at the door. In he strolled. We had an awkward hug. I poured some wine. There were several uncomfortable pauses, between which we discussed the storm’s progress. 

Desperate to cut the tension, I announced I would prepare dinner. I mashed the avocadoes, boiled some water for rice, grabbed the can of beans off the counter and—uh oh. They were flavored with bacon. I looked at the vegan guiltily. “It’s okay,” he said. But was it, I wondered? I could swear I caught him grimacing. 

Tip No. 3: Be prepared to freak out.

Dinner over, it was time for the fun to begin. We settled onto the couch to watch the storm come in. Our thighs touched. TV reporters in Galveston were being jostled by the wind and rain, sometimes losing their balance as they staggered through surging waters, even as a message scrolled across the bottom of the screen: “Anyone ignoring evacuation warnings faces certain death.” We looked at each other, shaking our heads. It was hilarious, right? Or rather, hilarious and scary. The vegan put his arm around me. 

We heard the explosions first, jolting us out of comfy couch time. Transformers all over Midtown were going off; it sounded like cannon fire. The TV flickered and then went dead, taking with it all the little sounds a house makes when it has electricity. Our eyes fell on the window. The tree across the street started to dance wildly, then bent over in a low bow. Lightning flashed, and the sky glowed an eerie green. 

I’d always loved my little historic apartment at Isabella Court, but with history came poor insulation, and when I got up I could feel the wind blowing past me in the living room. Suddenly seized with yet another good idea, the cute vegan and I tiptoed out into the courtyard, finding it filled with swirling wind and the smell of smoke. 

At last I began to wonder what the folks at FEMA must have wondered: what the hell was anyone doing on a date in the middle of such danger? Soon, however, we were back inside and I got my answer: he kissed me. Silently, I congratulated myself for my courage and cunning.  

Tip No. 4: When filling the tub, for the love of God, make sure the stopper is secure. 

It was a long, restless night in my bed, and not the good kind. I was sleeping with two strangers, Ike and the vegan, each annoying and disappointing me in different ways. I felt like I’d gotten five minutes of sleep when morning finally arrived. I got up to go to the bathroom, noticing that Ike was gone and the vegan wasn’t; also that the power was still off, as was the water. Worst of all, the tub, which I’d dutifully filled the previous evening in case my utilities were turned off, had somehow drained. How could this happen? I almost screamed. I stared in disbelief as the horrifying realization set in: there was no way to flush the toilet. 

Tip No. 5: As soon as you can, hit the drugstore. 

I looked in the mirror. My hair hung in greasy chunks around my face, my skin was oily. There were bags under my eyes from lack of sleep. The apartment was already getting hot. My body, I was sure, stunk, but of course I couldn’t take a shower. I couldn’t even really wash off unless I used bottled water, but could I risk it, not knowing if we’d need that water to survive? 

How I longed for some astringent to lift the oil from my skin! What I wouldn’t have given for a dry shampoo! Baby wipes would have been a godsend. But I hadn’t thought to get any of those things. And so I did my best to make myself presentable, pulling my hair back into a ponytail and wiping off last night’s makeup. It was a vision no cute vegan should ever have to witness, I tell you. Take lessons from my cautionary tale. 

Tip No. 6: Be honest about when you’d like the date to end. 

Sadly, the sight of my harried, storm-tossed visage did not send the vegan fleeing into the street. In fact, it didn’t even occur to him. No, he just rolled out of bed and wandered into the kitchen. The gas was working, so he made toast with peanut butter and boiled water for coffee, which he prepared campfire-style. So busy was I scheming about bathrooms, I wasn’t even able to enjoy my guilt-free peanut butter, which is when I decided to broach the topic of ending the date. “You know, you can leave and go check on your family if you want,” I said. “Do you want me to leave?” he countered. Reader, I couldn’t do it. “Of course not,” I said. But as I watched him saunter around my kitchen like he owned the place, I started to feel a bit resentful. We weren’t on a date anymore; he was just hanging around.  

Tip No. 7: If your date won’t leave, find an activity (and a bathroom).

There was a knock: my next-door neighbors. They announced they wanted to go exploring. The vegan and I piled into their car and set off through Midtown, full of toppled trees and blinking stoplights, ostensibly to check on the building where I worked as an editor, which was pitch-black and, in places, ankle-deep in water. But all I really cared about was the bathroom. I found my way to it in the dark, discovering that—hallelujah!—it even flushed.

Tip No. 8: Ask yourself if you’d rather hunker down with friends. 

It would be one day before the water came back on, and five days before power returned to Isabella Court. But I know what you’re really wondering. How long before the vegan left? Not until 40 hours after he arrived, by which time it felt like he’d been in my apartment for months. We didn’t have much to say to one another at that point, not that we ever did. (Thank God he was cute.) I could have kicked him out, I know. But nobody had told me about Tip No. 6. 

The following evening, the vegan long gone, my neighbors cooked up a gigantic paella out of everything in their freezer, studding it with homemade deer sausage. By then, a cool front had blown into town, and the candlelit meal, enjoyed in the pleasant breeze, not a vegan in sight, was spectacular. Especially the sausage. I thought about the offending bacon beans in my cupboard as I poured wine for everyone. I should have known, then and there, that it wasn’t going to last with the vegan. 

While many people would call me crazy for spending Ike with a date, I like to think my absurd scheme paid off in the end—after all, it surely accelerated the course of a relationship doomed to failure from the start. We revealed ourselves right away, and we parted that much sooner because of it, off to separately navigate a world that is still plenty nuts, even when the wind isn’t blowing through that apartment where I used to live. 

The Menil Collection: A Fourth Ward cultural jewel.

Yes, EaDo is lame.

I’ll give the mysterious blogger behind “Keep Houston Houston” that one. In fact, I beat him to the punch by four full years. Back in January of 2009, very shortly after the name’s introduction, I went on the record thusly:  

Those of you who have been witness to the genius on display in the re-branding of Houston neighborhoods in recent years -- NoDo and Midtown come to mind -- will doubtless be unsurprised by the districts' new name: EaDo.

Get it? It's East of Downtown? It's one of them right fancy names, just like one of them-there NoLitas, SoHos and TriBeCas they got in Noo York.

In my article, I noted that the neighborhood did need a name of some sort, because it wasn’t really Third Ward. It doesn’t feel like Third Ward today and it didn’t before it got condofied. Calling it Chinatown or even Old Chinatown today might cause tourists to miss out on our real-live, thriving Chinatown ten or 12 miles down the Southwest Freeway, so that’s no good either.

KHH thinks it should simply be known as Third Ward.

Now, some might argue that this isn’t actually Third Ward. These people are wrong. If you want to see what is and isn’t the Third Ward, walk into Ninfa’s on Navigation and scope the map they’ve got hanging up front by the waitstand. Now find the area to the immediate east of Downtown. See what ward it’s in? Yep. You in the Tre, homie. You too, Eastwood.

First, he's wrong about that. Some of what is now EaDo was in Second Ward.

And if you scope that same map, downtown is clearly within First Ward, and Montrose is clearly in the Fourth. Yep, Montrosians, you in the fo’th, homies.  You too, Hyde Park. Let’s ditch our most iconic neighborhood name in favor of reverting to an archaic political designation, and use offensive language while we’re at it!

KHH dude also has a bone to pick with “Washington Heights.”

Again, this does not actually exist. There are legitimate grounds for nitpicking over what to call the small finger of the original Heights plat that extends south of IH-10, but this is a miniscule area – and in any event, if it’s part of The Heights, then it is simply The Heights. If you live off Washington, you live off Washington. If you live in an area covered by another historical name, like “Rice Military” or “Cottage Grove,” that works too – although I’ve always tended to look askance at people who use sub-neighborhood names. It’s as if they’re too elitist for general neighborhood or street names. “Oh you live in Avondale? Tell me more.” However, Washington Heights is right out.

Nice Monty Python reference, but what the the Sam Hell is wrong with Washington Heights?  And what’s wrong with Cottage Grove and Rice Military? Both are time-honored names describing areas that have slightly different feels. Until quite recently, saying you lived in Cottage Grove unequivocally branded you as a barrio dweller, so there was no elitist cachet to it whatsoever. (Today, vestiges of barrio remain, like the La India Taqueria and the pack of pitbulls that attacked me on my bike a few weeks ago, but Cottage Grove is getting condofied at a gasp-inducing pace.)

Neither Rice Military nor Cottage Grove was in the Houston Heights. Both lay outside the historic wards.  So what “general neighborhood name” should these effete snobs adhere to if not Washington Heights? Should they go around telling people “I live kinda near Memorial Park but south of the Heights”? Should people in First Ward and Sixth Ward say they live "off Washington," the same as people out near the roundabout? KHH dude apparently thinks so.

He also lays into Neartown, which is pretty unnecessary. Nobody uses it except Neartown Little League, to whom it’s pretty useful, as in their case, the league’s boundaries extend beyond Montrose (which by his logic, should be rebranded Fourth Ward), in to River Oaks, and all of Upper Kirby.

Which is a name I’m sure KHH thinks should be junked, as he writes that “Lower Westheimer” should be swept in to the dustbin of history:

This does not actually exist, it’s just Montrose. Or “The Montrose” if you wish to rebel against popular linguistic conventions without going full retard.

Sigh. Lower Westheimer has a feel that differs slightly from its surrounding area. It's been in use for decades.

And again, with the offensive language ... "Retard," really?

And as we've already shown, by his logic, neither Montrose nor “the Montrose” exists. They are both Fourth Ward. Why KHH dude refuses to “look askance” at these elitist, sub-neighborhood-name-using snobs is beyond me.

And let's make one last grasp at getting his drift.

Apparently every neighborhood that was once in a ward should use its ward name, except for those who live "off Washington." By extension, we suppose, people who live in areas built outside of the historical wards should shun their sub-neighborhood names like Oak Forest and Sharpstown and use things like "off Ella" and "off Bellaire" instead.  "Lower Westheimer" is identical to Courtlandt Place as both are in Montrose Fourth Ward. 

And trust me, “Houstonia” grows on you. 

Always wanted to go to Morocco, but scared of flying? Don't worry: a Casablanca-style castle is right here in town, on West Rivercrest Drive, and it's for rent. 

For a mere $26,000 a month, you can drive up to this every day:

 The stresses of navigating nearby broad majestic Westheimer soothed by the waters of the burbling star-shaped fountain, step inside to this:

 All that stone-work, all those tiles, that chandelier? Those braziers and that tea set? All from Morocco.

Now look up. Dome sweet dome!

  The formal dining room gets all Versailles up in this piece. 

 While this salon looks like the setting for a bracing round of Middle East peace talks.

The internal courtyard is a pleasurable setting to take a cocktail in the cool of the evening.

Freshen up here.

 Want to see more? Dash like a Rabat on over to HAR.com. 

Struck by the urge for adventure last week,  I Googled “outdoor activities in Houston” and stumbled upon Armand Bayou Nature Center’s website. The ABNC is located about 25 miles southeast of Houston and is the largest urban wilderness preserve in the U.S., maintaining 2,500 acres of mixed marsh, prairie, and forest. They offer various classes, camps, and canoe and pontoon tours, and more, including something that interested me – the Owl Prowl Night Hike.

The Owl Prowl costs $8 and takes place after the park's normal hours (9 am- 5pm Wednesday-Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. on Sunday).You’ll need to call ahead to make a reservation and are advised to bring along a flashlight, though I didn’t use mine much.

Before the actual hike, ABNC volunteer David Kovach played the hoots of the four types of owl that lived on the grounds and gave a presentation on their anatomy. During this presentation, he warned that there was no guarantee that we would actually see an owl, but he promised that we would hear them. My expectations tempered, I still held out hope deep in my heart that I would glimpse of one of these mysterious creatures.

 The kids on the tour were given the chance to examine a couple of owl pellets, which were more interesting than they sound, and then we ventured out into the night. (Owl pellets are the regurgitated undigestable remnants of owl prey.) The tour took us through the 1.5-mile Lady Bird Trail, which traced a forest, where hawks roost high above three box turtles,  and a pond, where a lone alligator resides. The last leg of the hike goes through a prairie where two bison roam.

While on the hike we overheard a conversation between two barred owls and possibly the distress call of some owlets, but unfortunately the tour ended owllessly, my hopes dashed cruelly.

Still, I wanted to see more of the ABNC. The Sunday afternoon farm life demonstration also struck me as interesting, especially the butter and cheese making (and tasting) portion. The nature center was much livelier during the daytime (General admission is $4 for adults and $2 for kids’ four to 12 and seniors over 60) and I was given a map and encouraged to explore the park before heading to the the Martyn farm, the site of the demonstrations.

I meandered along the Discovery Loop, which includes the education building and exhibits. Inside, I looked at the various species of king snakes on display and had a lovely conversation with a visiting volunteer from Houston Bat Team,  who sat at a bat information table and display. Eventually, I found the Martyn Trail and made my way to the farm.

Unfortunately, there was no butter or cheese to make or taste. There was a crochet display and demonstration and ABNC volunteer Eleanor Stanley was giving tours of the Robert-Hanson family home, built in 1895 and donated to ABNC when the original Martyn farm house was destroyed by vandals. The house featured appliances, clothing, and furniture from the early 20^th century. Most interesting to me was the antique wood cook-stove (cooking was way more complicated back in the day) and the manual type writer.

I left Armand Bayou, once again a tad bit disappointed, but also feeling like I’d discovered my own hiding place not too far from Houston. These were the things I knew: if I had to go on every night hike for the next year, I would eventually see an owl and that I loved the staff.  While you may not get exactly what you came for on your first visit, the friendly people and relaxing environment will encourage you to return. 

The Fourth of July is right around the corner and the Lone Star State is kicking out the patriotic jams from the coast to the Hill Country and beyond.  Here are a few of the best places to get your American pride on, and maybe avoid Lee Greenwood overexposure.

Up in the Ft. Worth Stockyards, Willie Nelson is celebrating the 40th anniversary of his fabled Picnic, and this year's line-up is strong indeed. The Red-Headed Stranger headlines the event, which also includes fellow Country Music Hall of Famers Kris Kristofferson and Ray Price,  Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Leon Russell, hardcore troubadors Billy Joe Shaver and Ray Wylie Hubbard, honky-tonk crooners Dale Watson and Dallas Wayne, western swing preservationists Asleep at the Wheel, crazed outlaw David Allen Coe, neo-traditionalist Jamey Johnson and Texas country-rockers the Randy Rogers Band, among others. Tickets are $35 in advance and $55 at the gates on the day of the event. Here's a map and a list of nearby hotels. Organizers are expecing a flotilla of Ft. Worth food trucks to be on site.

With all that twangy talent 187 miles up I-35, the Live Music Capital of the World is left with a symphony performance at Auditorium Shores on Lady Bird Lake. Admission is free to the classical soiree, which will feature patriotic music and the 1812 Overture, culminating in fireworks booming over the water with the skyline in the background.

Ten years ago I spent a memorable Fourth with my family in a beach-house in Crystal Beach on the Bolivar Peninsula. Nothing of real note was organized or publicly funded about this bash, but pretty much everybody in town spent several hundred dollars each on fireworks at Crystal Beach's Pyroshack and put on independent displays that started at sundown and lasted deep into the night, the sea air exploding with Roman Candles, Rum Runners, Sin Cities, Sleepy Hollows, Black Cats, bottle rockets and every other variety of gorgeous ordinance China's teeming fireworks factories can supply. It might well have been the best fireworks display I've ever seen. Check here, here, or here for beach house rentals. 

Just outside of Schulenburg lies the tiny hamlet of St. John, Texas, where each year the descendants of the area's Czech and German settlers host a polka-riffic Fourth-fest.  The day begins with Mass in the village's 125-year-old St. John the Baptist church, followed by a flag-raising and a meal of locally-famous stew and fried chicken. Then the Shiner Hobo Band, Czech And Then Some, the Dujka Brothers and the Red Ravens follow one another to the stage in the preserved and recently expanded dance hall. Old-fashioned games abound for the kiddies -- ring toss, cake walks, fish ponds, etc. And these being Bohemians, it's safe to say there will be beer.

Robert Earl Keen and Owen Temple will precede the largest fireworks display in the Hill Country at Kerrville's 4th on the River.  Admission is free to the party in Louise Hays Park on the banks of the Guadalupe.

Know of any others? Tip us off in the comments!  

TripAdvisor has its uses in a surface-y kind of way. Yes, they'll guide visitors to Houston to the obvious spots -- the Museum District, NASA, concert venues, the better hotels, parks and the zoo, but they aren't going to send you to true hidden gems like Chinatown, Sunny Flea Market, the Station Museum, zydeco dances, or even well-known nightspots such as Warren's, Rudz, or anywhere near the Continental Club. They even manage to ignore the West Alabama Ice House, whose ramshackle charms are praised in pretty much every "72 hours in Houston"-type article since the seventh of ever.

Of the 31 bars and clubs TripAdvisor does list on its atrocious round-up, Red Star, Scott Gertner's SkyBar, the Engine Room and the Mercury Room are shuttered. But at least at one point they did exist, which is more can be said about TripAdvisor's weirdest recommendation.

Namely, that you visit some place called the "Houston Underground."

Image: comforta.com

The alleged "Houston Underground" during its yearly Yuletide celebration.

Ranked #5 of 24 shopping destinations in town, this mythical subterranean Shangri-La is purportedly sprawls Bond-villain-lairishly deep beneath the quaint surface of the Greater Heights. Odder still, the picture accompanying the article looks for all the world like Galleria I.  

"Impressive, functional and green," rhapsodizes one reviewer; a second praises this non-existent Xanadu thusly: "Amazing underground world."

We think they are talking about the downtown tunnels, but if there really is an enviromentally-friendly three-story shopping mall complete with ice rink deep beneath White Oak or West 19th, someone please take me there.  

Earlier this year Houston came in as the 25th most visited city in the U.S., behind a bevy of garden spots in Hawaii and Florida and a slew of traditional tourist towns and/or historic metropolises such as New York, New Orleans, DC, San Francisco, Vegas, San Antonio, Boston, Charleston and Savannah.

Truth be told, Houston seems like the odd city out on that list. Where are our quaint historic districts, like the ones in the Big Easy, Philly and Boston? Where are the grand government edifices of DC? Where's the humming street life of the Big Apple, the sizzle of Vegas, the majestic splendor of SF's natural setting? Where's our Disney, our Riverwalk, our Hawaiian-style white sands and crystalline waters?

Nowhere, that's where. The top three attractions listed on the Trip Advisor list are the Museum District, the Water Wall, and Hermann Park.  All are wonderful amenities, yes, but hardly worth flying across the country or world for.

And people don't.

At least that's the consensus over on Swamplot, where talk of the Astrodome's planned grand overhaul has spurred a philosophical discussion about why all those out-of-towners do come here.

Beneath the Dome piece, commenter "Thomas" sketched out his dream for a teeming Reliant Park tourist district, with hotels looming over a "City Walk" of restaurants, clubs, shops and theaters.

"Sure it’s touristy, but most events at Reliant are visited by tourists," Thomas opined.

"Houston doesn’t have tourists. Houston has visitors," rejoined "Old School" after Thomas's post was deemed Swamplot's best of the day.

"People visit Houston to see family, for special events, conventions, for business and so on." [To which I would add, to shop at the Galleria and to receive treatment at the Med Center] "But people do not go to Houston on vacation. There is simply no comparison between Houston and Boston, LA, San Fran, Washington DC etc when it comes to tourism."

And that's a good thing, Old School believes. Tourists get underfoot. Rashes of godawful T-shirt shops erupt in their wake. They clog restaurants and roads with their open-top double decker buses, he says, his words beginning to resembleEric Idle's epic anti-tourist screed.   (You know the one about Watney's Red Barrel, fat German businessmen pretending their acrobats, and Welsh typists from Rhyl addled on Watney's and singing "Torremolinos.")

Old School believes Houston should stick to meeting the needs of these visitors, not tourists, and furthermore, Houston simply can't wave a magic wand and change itself into San Francisco anyway.

The back-and-forth continued today with commenter "Patrick," who believes we are this-close to becoming a grand American destination city, or at least overtaking San Antonio as the top draw in Texas. All we need, he writes, is an indoor ski center inside the Dome, a Schlitterbahn outlet (unless he is referring to the one already in Galveston), and a reboot of Space Center, and presto, the Bayou City would be the kind of place where people would pack up their families and stay for a week.

Of course, any authority he might have is eroded by his claim that "the Riverwalk is poorly done," "the Alamo does not exist" (Huh?) and is "not a point of pride." (Yeah, neither is the Wailing Wall, or the Red Army shrines in Stalingrad. Sure, the Alamo is not quite in that league, but to millions of Texans, it fills the same sanctified role.)

Anyway, what do you think? Should we try harder to get touristy, or should we be content in our own sweaty, mosquito-bedeviled skins?

To me, it's always been like this: Houston is a great place to live, but I wouldn't want to visit. 

Or as Old School put it, "Houston is a great place for visitors. Everyone I have ever hosted had a whale of a time. But, when those folks go home, they don’t tell their friends “you should visit Houston.’ They say ‘if you are ever in Houston, you should . . .’”

Image: Astrosdaily.com

They say the past is a different country. The past is also a different city, at least if the June 1983 Texas Monthly Houston listings / city guide is any indication. The Bayou City of 30 years ago might as well be Timbuktu, so strange and exotic were its ways.

Most striking is the nightlife.  Yes, of the 25 bars and clubs listed, a few establishments remain, albeit most changed utterly in spirit. Rockefeller’s, then a showcase of “national and regional musical acts of every type,” is now a high-end function room. Sam’s on Richmond is now known as Sam’s Place (and adjoins the notorious Sam’s Boat). Back then it was a hot-spot for “urban cowboys and preppies, post-college on up.” Who seemed easily impressed: “It’s easy to be loyal when the chips and salsa are always forthcoming from the kitchen in ample baskets.” The Carillon Center Sherlock’s Baker Street Pub still stands, but it seems unlikely that much of today’s bro-tastic clientele convenes there to discuss antiques, as the clientele of 1983 was reportedly wont to do.

Two of the places seem more or less unchanged. Then as now Anderson Fair was a folk / bluegrass club with uncomfortable chairs, and then there's soon-to-reopen Marfreless : “Definitely not a pick-up joint, this dimly-lit club has an upper tier lined with seductively soft sofas that we wouldn’t occupy with anyone we didn’t know quite well.” Hubba hubba.

Others have been vaporized, are as lost as the planet Alderaan. A CVS now occupies the Waugh at West Dallas address of Metropol, a “big sleek room with mirrors and a lot of vinyl booths” featuring “stylish customers who put on a real show.”  Celebration, a Galleria-area disco on West Alabama is now a parking lot. In its heyday it sported a “sleek” and “basically high-tech” dance floor “under a battery of blinking lights,” and…drum roll please…a game room.

Big box retail has also apparently spelled doom for both forward-looking Echo Beach and nostalgic Rockabilly’s, an odd pairing of adjoining establishments anomalously situated on the frowsy corner of North Gessner and Kempwood. The latter’s name said it all about the goings-on within; Echo Beach was described as a “new wave club,” with little further explanation by Texas Monthly's scribes. Save for a show in which Austin’s Big Boys opened for NYC’s Kingpins there, Echo Beach seems to have left little trace of its existence on Texas’s punk and new wave history.

Image: Houstonpunkart.wordpress.com

Back then, people evidently clamored to trip the light fantastic in Sharpstown hotel bars. The Dunfey Houston Hotel’s vaguely “oriental” Tingles on the Southwest Freeway was one such. “This disco has no particular theme (it’s not even a fern bar, though a brave group of potted plants atop the bar hold out for the tradition.)” Not even a fern bar? Imagine.  Tingles and the Dunfey are both gone, demolished to make way for Allen Samuels Chevrolet, but while Tingles was still jinglin', in "beautiful southwest Houston," we're betting this suave fellow was a regular:

A few places have been recycled. Quasimodo’s Sanctuary—a quiet bar sporting a Count Basie / Benny Goodman soundtrack—has been reborn as Mockingbird Bistro. Lott’s Emporium, a Third Ward bebop club with an interracial clientele co-owned by Texas Tenor sax legend Arnett Cobb, now houses the Eta Rho Sigma chapter of TSU’s Phi Beta Sigma fraternity. Jack and Hector’s Piano Bar out in Memorial, “inelegant but comfortable,” is today’s First Tee Pub, which bills itself as “West Houston’s neighborhood pub.” Today’s Under the Volcano was yesteryear’s Munchies, featuring live chamber music and wind ensembles and “delicious rye bread sticks.” P.J.’s Sports Bar on West Gray has always been the most atypical of sports bars; so too was its predecessor on the site: Las Brisas, a Tex-Mex café fused with a jazz joint in which you could chow down on flautas and bliss out to Mingus Ah Um at the same time.

Sometimes the name changes but the ambience remains much the same. In 1983, 4608 Westheimer was occupied by a place called Remington’s, where "starched young professionals congregate after work and don’t let up until singer Scott Gertner has done his last Stevie Wonder tune.” Gertner is gone to greener pastures, and the Remington prints have been stripped from the walls, but that building today houses Sullivan’s Steakhouse, where the clientele is still plenty starched if not as young.

Some of the clubs reek of their time and place and seem ripe for a revival. Take Faces: “A ‘video dance’ club: Instead of watching rock video tapes at home, a hundred under-21s watch them together on a giant screen. The waitresses wear leg warmers and pastel minis that match the balloons hanging everywhere. Entertainment runs the gamut from jugglers to (every Monday) male dancers.”

Rock music videos? On tape? On a giant screen? Waitresses in leg-warmers and pastel minis? Freaking balloons, jugglers and male dancers? The first hipster to open a joint like that today would become the irony era’s Steve Rubell.

(Faces stood in what had been the Agora Ballroom and then became City Streets. An Office Depot now stands on the site. Note: this Faces is not to be confused with the still-extant Spring Branch dive of the same name.)

Bentley’s lived up to its name.  “A $180,000 1949 Bentley right there alongside the dancers establishes this club as numero uno among the vintage car-theme bars tearing up the tracks around Texas.” Like we said before, back then, people were easily amused, especially the sort of proto-douchebags who would go to a club to gawk at a fancy car . Bentley’s was in Woodlake Square (corner of Westheimer and Gessner) and would end up as a hip-hop club for a time.

And my how the tenor of the times has changed. Today, we Houstonians break our arms patting our own backs and shout ourselves hoarse about our LESBIAN MAYOR!, but back then, that was still a love that dare not speak its name.

Literally, as this description of Kindred Spirits attests: “Two-level bar where women of like mind crowd in to share common interests,”—get it?—“peruse the eclectic bulletin board, and exchange names and occupations on the dance floor.” 

Like so many of the other places, Kindred Spirits is gone. It stood next to the Luby’s on Buffalo Speedway and the whole shebang was bulldozed to make way for H-E-B’s parking lot. 

Behold the Lords' Cycle Club, which once stood at the corner of Chenevert and Congress. By 1897, when this photo was taken, the home was 38 years old and had formerly served as the residence for a German baker by the name of Michael Floeck and later a Mississippi River steamboat captain by the name of Longcope.

At its peak, the Lords' club was the largest such society in the South, with a membership approaching 500 men, all of them, apparently, so handsome they could only be known as "lords." (Women would only be allowed to take up cycling later; for a time, to ride was to be known as liberated and modern.)

According to the Southwestern History Quarterly, cycling was one of 1890s Houston's chief pastimes. The first Galveston run was undertaken in 1892 and took ten hours to complete, and that same year, according to local historian Betty T. Chapman, 6,000 people braved a 94-degree day to view and gamble on a 30-man bike race in Magnolia Park.

Those fragrant environs -- now a barrio of the same name, though lacking in aromatic trees -- were also the site of Lords' Cycle Club-hosted bike-themed field day in 1900. According to the May 6, 1900 Houston Daily Post, the Lords' "amusement committee" came up with a "programme" including (but not limited to) potato, sack, backward and three-legged races; a "comic prize fight and doughnut dance"; a flour dive; and apple-biting and match-chewing contests. (Don't worry: I don't what the sam-hell some of things are either.) Nearby Buffalo Bayou was the scene of the day's swimming, boating and "high and fancy" diving competitions. 

All of this was to be set to the strains of "Herb and Lewis' band of 12 pieces," which, as a band name, needs some work, though modern trends in pop group nomenclature seem to be heading more in that direction than away.

This being a Lords' event, of course there was cycling on display, namely "fancy trick bicycle riding by Prof. Latosi of Chicago, the world's renowned trick rider."  

"The club guarantees a fine assortment of pretty prizes," the Lords' promised. "Some of the finer prizes will be on exhibition this week in the different show windows on Main Street."

The coming of King Car spelled doom for this halcyon era of H-Town cycling. Fitting (if sad) it is then that that the majestically New Orleanian former site of the Lords' Club on Chenevert is now a surface parking lot for Minute Maid Park. 

Speaking via email to the late journalist Chet Flippo, east Houston country song poet Rodney Crowell once typed the following lines:

Hallowed be the Houston Ship Channel...fifty miles of salt marsh bayou turned world's longest deep water shipping lane, host waterway to the most sludge pumping, poisonous gas spewing paper mills, chemical plants and oil refineries in the Western Hemisphere. The Houston Ship Channel on whose creosote-soaked banks new monied oil-boom tycoons rub chafed elbows with Mexican drag line operators and Coonass pile drivers in a payday Friday winner-takes-all beer and whiskey chugging contest. Piss on Enron, Houston's heart and soul is over on the east side...

Amen to that. And there's no better way to take it all in than booking a voyage aboard the M / V Sam Houston, the Port of Houston Authority's free tour boat. The 90-minute voyage takes you past the might tankers from Bergen and Rotterdam, the gargantuan container ships from Guangzhou and Busan, wharves and warehouses, refineries and tank farms. Yes it's ugly, and the water stinks, but it's an ugly so true it's beautiful and that stench is, as they used to say, "the smell of money, son." 

To see it all up close, log on at the Port's Sam Houston page right here. The tour is absolutely free (as is parking) but take note: You MUST MAKE A RESERVATION in advance. Also note: all passengers 18 and up must present a valid government-issued photo ID. No food or drink or large bags may be brought aboard, but they will give you a free Coke around the half-way point of the voyage. 

Some days they allow photography, and others they don't, so take your camera just in case and ask. 

Trips launch Wednesday-Saturday at 10 A.M. and 2:30 P.M. and Sundays at 2:30 only. It's a popular tour so be prepared to book your trip weeks in advance.