For the second time in 6 months, the original Ninfa’s at 2704 Navigation has a brand new parking lot surface. The owners hope this one will last a whole lot longer than the sog-prone crushed-limestone install that crews replaced prematurely last week (see photo above). “There were potholes everywhere,” declares a press release put out by the manufacturer of its replacement. Here’s a pic of how it looked before (found-in-place jalapeño included for scale and local flavor):
Blank Slate Tattoo Removal decamped from the corner spot of this building at Houston Ave and Crockett St. at the end of January. (You can head for 5320 Cornish Rd. in Cottage Grove now to correct your body-inked misspellings.) In its place, there’s a new sign up at 1720 Houston Ave., providing evidence that a new beer-and-wine-serving cafe is getting ready to move in — right next door to Café Brussels. The street-front First Ward building just north of downtown was built in 1925.
Photos: Swamplot inbox
HOUSTON’S LAST TEXADELPHIA HAS SERVED ITS FINAL CHEESESTEAK 
Texas cheesesteak sports bar Texadelphia has closed, a couple of readers tell Swamplot. The spot at 6025 Westheimer Rd., west of Fountainview, was the first and last of the Houston locations for the Austin-born franchise. This spot had been open for about 20 years. Photo: Jack S.
YUM YUM CHA CLOSING HINTS AT RICE’S PLANS FOR RETAIL BUILDING IT BOUGHT NEXT TO VILLAGE ARCADE 
The owner of Rice Village dim sum spot Yum Yum Cha tells Eric Sandler that Rice University’s management company “can’t decide what they’re going to do” with the building it bought earlier at the corner of Times Blvd. and Kelvin St., but that demolition is possible. Yum Yum Cha was offered only a 6-month renewal on its lease. Instead, the restaurant, which has occupied the space at 2435 Times Blvd. for 10 years, will be shutting down June 15th or as soon as it runs out of food — whichever comes first. The 1955 building that houses it forms a small portion of a double block dominated by the Rice-owned Village Arcade shopping center — but lacks any off-street parking of its own. Remaining tenants in the building are Grace Anna’s boutique, Myth Hair Salon & Spa, Joseph Keith Jewelry, and — around the corner — Vietnamese restaurant Miss Saigon. Yum Yum Cha owner Lisa Mak says she and her father, the restaurant’s chef, are already looking for a new location. [CultureMap; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Swamplot inbox
A new sign is up already on the building next door to Katz’s Deli, at 608 Westheimer Rd. But Vinoteca Poscol won’t be moving from its current strip-center spot at 1609 Westheimer to this new, and lower, Westheimer location until sometime after the Fourth of July, owner Marco Wiles tells Houstonia‘s Katharine Shilcutt.
The exterior of the former home of Azamian Rugs and (before that) AIDS Foundation Houston’s Stone Soup has already seen quite a few changes in its new Italian Restaurant redo, especially to the front of the house. Gone is the old single-story addition that pushed up to the sidewalk. Next to be completed: interior renovations, and perhaps an extra letter for the sign.
Photo: Swamplot inbox
The bar taking over for Downtown’s shuttered State Bar and Lounge opened quietly yesterday. That’s pretty good timing for a new establishment in an older haunt that’s a flight up from street level: Lawless Kitchen and Spirits is now serving food and drink on the second floor and over-the-sidewalk perch of the Rice Lofts building, carved from the former Rice Hotel at the corner of Texas Ave. and Travis St.
Here’s the streetside balcony, a suitable platform for viewing traffic, parades, flooding, or anything else of interest —from a safe distance above ground:
The old Vargo’s Restaurant, a lakeside steak house and wedding venue nestled between Piney Point Village and the Westheimer strip for 47 years, was torn down in May of 2013. Its replacement at 2411 Fondren Rd., a 5-story apartment complex, keeps the name (minus the apostrophe) and the lake, and maybe a peacock or 2 by the pool for photo ops. After 17 months of construction, Vargos on the Lake is ready for a grand opening shindig next Thursday followed by open houses the next couple of days.
Here’s a site plan of the revamped grounds, showing how the 276-unit apartment building (of 1- and 2- bedroom units) and 13 townhomes (all 3-bedrooms) have been arrayed around the lake:
The little windowless Montrose building across from the University of St. Thomas at the corner of Richmond and Mt. Vernon known as Talk of the Town III (pictured above as it appeared in 2011, shortly before much of it burned in a fatal fire) will soon join the ranks of the original Kirby Dr. Carrabba’s, Divino Italian Restaurant at 1830 West Alabama, and L’Olivier Restaurant and Bar at 240 Westheimer as yet another former Inner Loop adult bookstore turned legit non-porn restaurant. But it’ll be no staid European cuisine going into 1201 Richmond Ave. Former Brooklyn meatbrowner John Avila plans to open a barbecue joint in the building that incorporates a range of Texas food styles; he may or may not call it El Burro & the Bull. Culturemap’s Eric Sandler has a little fun describing the building’s repurposing: “Together with his wife Veronica, Avila plans to remodel the space to expose its original brick and to build a new kitchen and pit room onto the back of the structure. He’s already begun the process of pulling permits for the project and hopes to be open as soon as September.”
Photo: ClutchFans poster juicystream
The colorful team behind the beer-and-hot-dog hangout Moon Tower Inn has plans to open a much larger and meatier restaurant a couple blocks northeast of its spot on Canal St. in the East End. A new “Proper Texas BBQ and Watering Hole” will go into a warehouse-turned-auto-repair-shop at 3125 Navigation Blvd., a few blocks down the street from Ninfa’s and El Tiempo, sometime in 2016, according to a post on the Moon Tower Inn’s Facebook page. Its name: B.R. Young’s Lost Indian.
Here’s a view of it:
HOW YOU CAN HELP HOUSTON’S FIRST FULL-TIME HUMAN TRAFFICKING COFFEE SHOP COME TO LIFE 
Been looking for a good coffee shop somewhere around the Heights where folks can get together and discuss Houston’s role as a major hub for human trafficking? Where caffeine-hunters can experience moments of genuine outrage — then find themselves drawn toward information sessions, group discussions, planning meetings, and double espressos — knowing that all profits from their chatting and coffee-drinking habits will go toward charitable stuff like providing classes and counseling for survivors of human trafficking? If so, then you’ll be happy to learn about A 2nd Cup, which opened as a part-time “incubator” project a couple of years ago. Now the nonprofit, led by former junior-high science teacher Erica Raggett, has begun work on a buildout for a permanent, full-time home — in the Vineyard Church of Houston’s Storehouse storefront at 1111 E. 11th St., just east of Studewood St. (pictured above, right next door to longtime late-night cop favorite Andy’s Café). A 2nd Cup’s backers are trying to raise an additional $100,000 toward the effort on Indiegogo now. [Indiegogo] Photo mockup: A 2nd Cup
The sixth and last of the replacement street trees was planted in the public right-of-way surrounding the Wendy’s drive-thru at 5003 Kirby Dr. over the weekend. “It is a big specimen tree, taller than what was removed,” writes the reader who sent in these photos of the installation paid for by a special city fund for Houston parks — so we can all see for ourselves. The previous weekend, 5 replacement oaks were put in along the side street, North Blvd. Crews hired by the franchise owner, Mohammed Ali Dhanani of Haza Foods, had chopped down 6 trees on adjacent city property last October. You can compare the current scene in these photos and in our story last week with how it all looked before the chainsaws were fired up.
A row of 5 already-growed-up oak trees took up their new home along the North Blvd. flank of the Wendy’s drive-thru at 5003 Kirby Dr. last weekend, to replace the same number along the public right-of-way that went missing after dark last Halloween on account of they were chopped into pieces by order of the franchise owner. “The new trees at Wendy’s are so big they had to close the road to install them,” writes the reader who sent in these photos. “. . . almost as big as the ones cut down.”
One more tree is still to come — for this spot on Kirby Dr., right in front:
The letters are down at the Cabo Grill in the West U Shopping Center (the one with the Kroger and all the oaks) on Buffalo Speedway between Westpark and Bissonnet. This Cabo Grill — not to be confused with the also shuttered Cabo Mix-Mex Grill known best for its former location at the corner of Travis and Prairie Downtown (now home to El Big Bad) — was formerly named Fish City Grill. A reader tells Swamplot that a sign posted on the front door of the shopping center slot at 5172 Buffalo Speedway says that the locks have been changed as a result of a payment failure. The place appears vacant.
Photos: Swamplot inbox
FOOD TRUCK GOING FOOD COURT 
Next venue for the 2-truck Chinese-food-about-town hotspot known as the Rice Box? A non-mobile location in the food court at 5 E. Greenway Plaza, Alison Cook reports: “[Owner John] Peterson has signed on Jim Herd’s Collaborative Projects to design a Rice Box Greenway prototype that will set it apart from its more conventional neighbors. Under a crimson sea of 80 Chinese lanterns (one of the visual totems on the original Rice Box truck), informal barstool seating will range across a counter overlooking oscillating video panels and a custom tea bar. The menu will appear on its own video screen. Red roof tiles from China have been ordered to construct an awning over the counter. ‘It’s one step closer to the White Dragon Noodle Bar,‘ jokes Peterson, referring to the Blade Runner food stand that was his visual inspiration for the Rice Box truck. (All he and Herd need to do is rig some kind of periodic rain showers.)” [Food Chronicles] Photo: The Rice Box
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE MORNING RITUAL 
“. . . They subject themselves to the wait. They have to sit in their cars, inching forward, seething with rage at the a-hole in front for being slow, cursing the a-hole behind for being impatient, wasting precious minutes of finite existence, instead of sipping a cup of joe in tranquil splendor with the morning digital paper at the kitchen table.
I understand the desire for convenience. I don’t understand how morning rush hour Starbucks can be seen as anything but torture.” [Memebag, commenting on Hedwig Village’s New Freeway-Side Starbucks Drive-Thru Is Coming To Save Your Missed Exit] Illustration: Lulu
