Review: Double Down

Amazon

From Double Down, by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann:

On election night, when Mitt called the president to concede, he had congratulated Obama for his side's turnout efforts -- specifically expressing his own team's astonishment at the numbers in Cleveland and Milwaukee, where African American participation was off the charts. When Obama related Romney's comment to Axelrod, Messina, and Plouffe, they all had the same bemused reaction. What Boston was saying, in effect, was, Holy cow, where did all these mysterious minorities come from?"

"Big Boy [Chris Christie]'s sense of where the real fault lay was crystal clear: with the clowns on Commercial Street. On the phone with Ryan two days after the election, Christie listened while Fishconsin [Ryan] talked about how he, too, had been certain that he and Mitt were headed for the White House. 'On election morning,' Ryan said, 'they told me and my wife we were going to win.' 'Well, that just shows how shitty they were,' Christie harrumphed."

After the jump, my review.

Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)

IMDB

Inside Llewyn Davis (2013): '60s folk singer's life and career going nowhere. Character-driven movie by Coen Bros succeeds. Great songs. B+

Raytheon. Mixed-Use? By What Definition?

Source: The Dallas Morning News.

This is what Richardson Mayor Laura Maczka said when Raytheon announced plans to build a 490,000-square-foot office campus near the Bush Turnpike DART station:

We are also excited about this addition to KDC's CityLine project, which is poised to become one of the region's premier mixed-use developments, anchored by outstanding corporate citizens.

Source: Mayor Laura Maczka.

After the jump, questioning the mayor.

Final Four Block Party

From 2014 04 04 Final Four

The NCAA Final Four basketball tournament this year is being held in North Texas (specifically, AT&T Stadium in Arlington). The City of Dallas hosted a block party downtown on the site of the old, long gone, Reunion Arena. The main attraction was a March Madness Music Festival sponsored by AT&T. A lot of people came out for the music, but it wasn't hard to spot the people who were in Dallas this weekend for basketball.

More photos after the jump.

S2L77: North Atlantic

From 1977 05 10 England

After the jump, the end of the road.

OTBR: Morning Mood near Joehlingen, Germany

Latitude: N 49° 02.724
Longitude: E 008° 33.942

A child on a road trip with his family asks, "Where are we?" and the father answers, "Let's check the map. We're off the blue roads [the Interstate Highways marked in blue on the road atlas]. We're off the red roads [the US and state highways]. We're off the black roads [the county highways]. I think we're off the map altogether." It was always my dream to be off the map altogether.

After the jump, a few of the random places (and I mean random literally) that I visited vicariously last month that are "off the blue roads".

"All the Beachfront on Renner"

Earlier, I looked at the GreenVUE apartment complex under construction at Greenville Ave. and Collins Blvd. and was disappointed in its failings as transit-oriented development. Today, I look north to another apartment complex under construction "just south of State Farm and the CityLine mixed-use development at Plano and Renner roads". It doesn't have a name yet that I know.

After the jump, you guessed it, another opportunity lost.

Repeat Tweets: Really Dumb Column

Repeat tweets from March, 2014:

• Mar 2 2014: "Some really smart people have praised this really dumb idea." But not Steve Blow. Really dumb column. dallasnews.com
  
• Mar 2 2014: .@DMNSteveBlow, really dumb column. You say really smart people have praised this idea, but you don't address any of their arguments.
  
• Mar 3 2014: "Blow doesn't understand how traffic works." A good explanation for Steve Blow's really dumb column. frontburner.dmagazine.com
  
• Mar 3 2014: Blow to conventional wisdom: Texas "taxes the middle class at rates as high or higher than in California." washingtonmonthly.com
  
• Mar 3 2014: Blow to conventional wisdom: "Except NY, every major state has lower total effective business tax rate than Texas." washingtonmonthly.com
  
• Mar 3 2014: Blow to conventional wisdom: "Smaller share of people in Texas own their own business than in all but four states." washingtonmonthly.com
  
• Mar 3 2014: No surprise: Texas' "Robin-Hood-in-reverse system gives Texas the fifth-most-regressive tax structure in the nation." washingtonmonthly.com
  

After the jump, more repeat tweets.

What Makes GreenVUE Transit-Oriented?

San Antonio development firm Embrey Partners Ltd. has started work on a luxury, transit-oriented multifamily development on Greenville Avenue in Richardson near the DART rail line.

Source: Dallas Business Journal.

What makes the GreenVUE apartments under construction at Greenville Ave. and Collins Blvd. transit-oriented development? Beats me. Other than maybe because it's somewhat near a DART station. More likely, just because the developer uses the description when plugging it.

After the jump, the GreenVUE impostor.

ADEC at the Eisemann

The Richardson Community Band performed a concert, "A Kaleidoscope of Color," at the Eisemann Center Sunday afternoon featuring the RISD All-District Elementary Choir (ADEC). The band was conducted by George W. Jones, with the RISD's Director of Fine Arts Brian Britt as guest conductor. The choir was directed by Lindy Perez. As usual, the band was enjoyable and the choir delightful.