11/28/17 12:00pm

Today’s sponsor is Dawn in Damnation, a new paranormal Western novel by Clark Casey. Thanks for supporting Swamplot!

Dawn in Damnation features affordable and creative living spaces . . . in the town of Damnation, on the south side of the afterlife just short of hell. The newly gentrified neighborhood is popular with gun-slinging outlaws from the Old West, as well as werewolves and a lone vampire.

Need a better sense of Damnation? Think True Blood meets a shabby-chic Deadwood. Here’s a review of the book from the Vampires.com website. In Damnation, the local rooming house offers amenities such as cots and the smell of decay, while the saloon functions as a flexible workspace. The best part about Damnation is . . . it hardly every rains.

The novel is available now in paperback and as a Kindle download.

Thrills? Chills? Become a Sponsor of the Day.

Sponsor of the Day
11/27/17 3:15pm

Yo dawg, they heard you like dog parks. So they put a dog park in EaDo and called it . . . EaDog Park.

The fenced-off big-dog, little-dog assemblage is on the Bastrop St. right-of-way at 2216 Polk St., between Hutchins and Emancipation Ave.; the official opening is this evening.

Photo: EaDo Houston

Ruff Neighborhood
11/27/17 2:15pm

COMMENT OF THE DAY: DON’T TALK TO ME ABOUT THE WEATHER “I lived in Washington, DC for 8 years and the typical Washington summer day is every bit as miserable as a Houston summer day. (There are somewhat fewer of them, of course.) And all summer, the streets were crowded with people walking. In the dead of winter, when it was 20 degrees out, the streets were full of people walking. The difference is that the city was built for walking; sidewalks rarely vanished mid block. Pedestrian crossings weren’t a mile apart. There were relatively few city streets eight lanes wide to get across. Obviously the central city density was a big part of that, but funny thing: people seem to actually like walking. Part of that time I lived in Arlington, VA, which is about like the Heights in density, and I thought nothing of walking 15 minutes up the street to the Metro station or the main boulevard where the shops and cafes and whatnot were. I also would regularly visit friends in Takoma Park, MD, another surburban-ish area, and . . . people walked. When I was in college in upstate NY, people walked (most students didn’t have cars on campus, because why would you have a car on campus). People walked 20 minutes downtown on subzero nights to go drinking. People trudged up the giant hill to campus in snow and wind. They could wait for the campus shuttle bus a lot of the time . . . but mostly they didn’t. They walked. There are very real reasons that people don’t walk as much in Houston, but the weather ain’t one of them.” [John (another one), commenting on Comment of the Day: Walking Is Not Native to Houston] Illustration: Lulu

11/27/17 1:00pm

Where’s the University of Houston going to put its new College of Medicine? In the top 2 floors of this new structure behind the campus Rec Center, pictured here as construction completed this summer: the new Health and Biomedical Sciences Building 2. The College of Pharmacy is expected to complete its move into lower floors of the building by the end of this year. The adjacent tower (shown in the upper right of the photo below) is the 4-year-old Health and Biomedical Sciences Building (soon to be known as HBSB1), which, together with the older but also-attached Armistead Bldg. at the corner of Calhoun and Wheeler, houses the school’s College of Optometry.

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Campus Med Center
11/27/17 12:00pm

Today’s Swamplot sponsor: personal coach Cricket Buchler. Thanks for the support!

Searching for a creative, personalized holiday gift for friends, family members, or employees? Consider the gift of a fun and inspiring 90-minute personal coaching session with coach Cricket Buchler. An experienced corporate trainer who has helped top executives, Hollywood celebrities, and employees in a range of industries address personal and professional development issues, Cricket also works one-on-one, guiding clients to explore and unlock possibilities and design plans to realize change, and coaching them through their journey toward an intentional life.

A coaching session can be an inspiring gift for anyone on your list who is looking to take the next step forward in life, work, or relationships, but feels a bit stuck as to what next steps might look like. You’ll find a sampling of testimonials from Cricket’s clients on her website, along with more information about coaching sessions.

Swamplot readers want to hear from you! Become a Swamplot Sponsor of the Day.

Sponsor of the Day
11/22/17 12:00pm

COMMENT OF THE DAY: WHAT WE MEAN NOW WHEN WE TALK ABOUT ‘TRADITIONAL’ BUILDING “. . . A ‘real’ dome would be constructed of stacked bricks that rest on each other and use physics to stay in place, like they did in the ancient times that you seem to be so fond of. This is a faux dome made of steel meant to replicate a classical look. Just because something mimics an older style, does not mean that it’s any more ‘real’ than the new stuff.” [Superdave, commenting on New Dome Rises from the Streets of Montrose to Top Church Position] Illustration: Lulu

11/21/17 3:30pm

Leo Tanguma‘s 240-ft.-long, 70-character 1973 mural slowly peeling from the southern facade of the former Continental Can Company warehouse in the East End (pictured above in 2013) was whitewashed over the summer. Mario Enrique Figueroa Jr. — better known to Houstonians as Gonzo247 — is now hard at work on the Chicano-art landmark’s replacement: creating with a small crew a mural of the same name, size, location, characters, and intention. These recent photos show the progress so far:

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Gonzo, Not Forgotten
11/21/17 12:00pm

Sponsoring Swamplot today: ASCOT — also known as the Alcohol Servers Counsel of Texas. Thanks for the support!

If you work in a restaurant, or in any kind of food-service or food-prep operation, you’re probably already familiar with state requirements for training in food-handling safety. And if you work in a bar or for an alcohol distributor, you probably already know why it’s so important that everyone who has anything to do with selling, dispensing, or delivering any kind of alcoholic beverage complete state-certified training in alcohol safety.

Since 1988, ASCOT has been licensed by the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission to provide TABC-certified alcohol-server training programs. That makes ASCOT one of the oldest and most established food and beverage certification programs in the country — as well as Texas’s longest-running provider of training in this important field. And ASCOT has been a preferred source for training in food handling in Houston since 2004.

If you’re responsible for making sure new employees are trained promptly and well in these particular areas, you can be sure they’re getting the exact program they need — in the most helpful format possible — by sending them to ASCOT. ASCOT offers its training courses both in a classroom setting and online, in both English and Spanish.

Use the discount code ASCOT on the alcoholservers.com website and the online alcohol-server training course works out to just $9.89 per class. The food-handling class costs just $7.00 — no discount code is needed.

ASCOT’s server-training program is certified by the TABC, and its food-handler program is ANSI Accredited as meeting the ASTM E2659-09 standard. For more details, or to sign up, head over to the ASCOT website — alcoholservers.com — or call 713.922.1223.

Swamplot readers are Houston’s leaders. Reach them by becoming a Sponsor of the Day.

Sponsor of the Day
11/20/17 3:16pm

COMMENT OF THE DAY: SELLING THE HOUSE AT THE END OF THE RAINBOW “Fabulous lot adorned with critters of all varieties, this property now features wild herrings, cranes, frogs, alligators and migrating herds of antelope during the rainy season. The home was originally built as an ark on pristine gathering grounds for pairs of animals to accumulate during the final days of destruction per sellers disclosure. Tall mature trees on property present amazing opportunity to cultivate your very own white dove habitat for olive branch collection.” [Toby, commenting on Houston Home Listing Photo of the Day: Outdoor Dining Area] Illustration: Lulu

11/20/17 12:00pm

Today our sponsor is Dawn in Damnation, a new paranormal Western novel by Clark Casey. Thanks for supporting Swamplot!

Dawn in Damnation features affordable and creative living spaces . . . in the town of Damnation, on the south side of the afterlife just short of hell. The newly gentrified neighborhood is popular with gun-slinging outlaws from the Old West, as well as werewolves and a lone vampire.

Need a better sense of Damnation? Think True Blood meets a shabby-chic Deadwood. Here’s a review of the book from the Vampires.com website. In Damnation, the local rooming house offers amenities such as cots and the smell of decay, while the saloon functions as a flexible workspace. The best part about Damnation is . . . it hardly every rains.

The novel is available now in paperback and as a Kindle download.

Got some action and adventure for Swamplot readers? Become a Sponsor of the Day.

Sponsor of the Day
11/20/17 11:00am

LIBERTY KITCHEN NOW FREE FROM GARDEN OAKS 5 months after a grand reopening to celebrate the end of road construction along Alba Rd. that had been hindering access to the restaurant, Liberty Kitchen Garden Oaks has shut down. Last night was its last meal. The restaurant had opened at 3715 Alba Rd. in June 2016, taking over a renovation of the property (and demolition of an adjacent Quonset hut to make room for parking) originally intended to house a Facundo Restaurante. “We debuted a new menu, a new beer garden and a new parking lot in an effort to revitalize patronage” after the road construction ended earlier this year, write the owners of Liberty Kitchen. But that wasn’t enough, and Hurricane Harvey “served as an additional financial hurdle company-wide.” The Liberty Kitchen Heights, San Felipe, and Memorial City locations remain open; the Little Liberty in the Rice Village closed this past March. Photo: Oksana W.

11/17/17 3:15pm

COMMENT OF THE DAY: WHAT FLOODING ON THE WEST SIDE TOOK AWAY “Homes underwater for extended periods can be rebuilt, as long as they were not subjected to currents sufficient to cause major structural damage or foundation scour. They just take longer to dry out (ours took over a month). Like Local Planner said, in many of the flooded neighborhoods north of the bayou, original-condition homes had basically no value before the flood (i.e. they were being sold for lot value and torn down). The process is indeed accelerating, with new builds being elevated à la Bellaire and Meyerland. The big question mark for me is how much of a market there’ll be for $1+ million new homes in a potentially flood-prone area (even if your elevated home doesn’t flood during the next big one, you’d likely lose the cars in your non-elevated garage and need to be evac’d by boat). The market was soft in the Energy Corridor even before the flood. A new supply of high-end homes doesn’t automatically beget demand. Hopefully the new MD Anderson complex in the area will help (and potentially spur further diversification of employment in the Energy Corridor beyond oil and gas).” [Grant, commenting on Daily Demolition Report: Memorial Glint] Illustration: Lulu