Friday, December 20, 2024

Interior Chinatown (TV 2024)

Rotten Tomatoes

Rotten Tomatoes

Interior Chinatown (TV 2024): Play within a play. A waiter in a Chinese restaurant who is tired of always playing a background character in TV shows finds the wall between TV and real life breaking down. Great concept for satirizing how TV and society treat ethnic characters. B-

Hulu

Thursday, December 19, 2024

A Man on the Inside (TV 2024)

Rotten Tomatoes

Rotten Tomatoes

A Man on the Inside (TV 2024): Ted Danson stars as a recent widower who takes up a new hobby by going undercover in a retirement home to investigate a series of thefts. The mystery isn't the point here. Neither is the comedy. It's the relationships he forms. A sensitive treatment of aging. Seniors will like it. B+

Netflix

Wednesday, December 18, 2024

What Did We (Not) Learn from the Boil Water Notice

Source: 5 NBC DFW.

Richardson City Manager Don Magner read a memorandum to the City Council on December 16 titled "Boil Water Notice: Summary of Findings and Recommendations." I have three takeaways:

  1. To his credit, Magner admitted that individuals on City Staff made errors in judgment on the day of the event and he disciplined four individuals.
  2. Magner failed to assign blame for all of the "gaps in training and operational oversight" that contributed to the need for a BWN.
  3. There is still a five hour period in the timeline that deserves more investigation.

Tuesday, December 17, 2024

Pedro Páramo (2024)

Rotten Tomatoes

Rotten Tomatoes

Pedro Páramo (2024): Spanish. Adaptation of Mexican masterpiece. A surreal story of a man who returns to his family home only to find it a ghost town. Literally. Ghosts still inhabit the town, and, through flashbacks, tell the story of his cruel father's quest to gain power. C+

Netflix

Monday, December 16, 2024

City Charter: Single-Member Districts

Zachary Carnell/WUFT News

On December 2, 2024, the Richardson City Council appointed eleven members to a Charter Review Commission, as required by law every ten years to review and suggest changes to Richardson's City Charter. I will be presenting my own suggestions.

The City of Dallas just completed its own once-a-decade review of its City Charter. As homework, the Richardson Charter Review Commission ought to review the City of Dallas's work, certainly before concluding that no significant changes are needed to Richardson's Charter.