SXSW Review

Kanye West closes out SXSW at 5 in the morning with Jay-Z on hand

By Jennifer Patterson

03.20.11 | 10:07 am

Kanye West closed out the South by Southwest Music Festival early Sunday morning with the festival's most buzzed-about show, amid a lot of griping from people who didn't ...

Where to go, what to see

SXSW: Your plan of attack

By Jennifer Patterson

03.16.11 | 12:18 pm

With over a thousand bands playing— 1,273 to be exact— and countless unofficial day parties, South By Southwest can seem overhwhelming. Music blares from every bar, club and street ...

Fitzgerald's showcases

SXSW comes to Houston? Some of the music portion is Bayou City bound

By Jennifer Patterson

03.13.11 | 9:00 am

Can’t make it to Austin for the South by Southwest music festival, or just need a break from the Rodeo’s country twang and radio's mainstream pop? Houston ...

SXSW Do's and Don'ts

Your cheat sheet to South by Southwest: Do walk, don't make fun of the hipsters

By Jennifer Patterson

03.09.11 | 12:50 pm

So what exactly is South by Southwest? Here’s a brief overview if you haven’t been, followed by some simple DOs and DON'Ts. When people ask if you ...

The Do's and Don't of Love

Why you should date the "crazy girl" after all

By Jennifer Patterson

03.06.11 | 6:20 pm

I’ve had some disappointing dates. For reference, my best Valentine's Day ever, the guy I was seeing showed up to my apartment with a half drunk bottle of ...

Don't rush the talent

The real Oscars winner: Heidi the opossum's star is rising faster than Natalie Portman's

By Jennifer Patterson

03.01.11 | 2:20 pm

Crossed eyes didn't stop one opossum’s psychic vision. Heidi, Germany’s cross-eyed opossum who rose to stardom through YouTube videos, is back in the spotlight, correctly predicting two ...

Flapjack Tips

Forget IHOP's free short stacks and celebrate National Pancake Day with DIY style

By Jennifer Patterson

03.01.11 | 12:24 pm

Need an excuse to indulge in a stack of butter-smothered pancakes? Lucky you: March 1 is National Pancake Day! Sure, IHOP — which may or not have actually started the latest ...

CNN Reaches for Buzz

Camille Grammer and her bratty ways are perfect for the Oscars

By Jennifer Patterson

02.23.11 | 3:53 pm

Camille Grammer, reality TV diva and recent divorcee of Frasier’s Kelsey Grammer, has a reporting gig. But don’t worry, news fiends — she’s set to cover the Oscars ...

YouTube Inspired Hit?

Houston's real-life Angry Bird: Costume character finds himself under attack

By Jennifer Patterson

02.23.11 | 11:12 am

Big Bird ate the pavement after two men attacked him near a Houston furniture store last weekend. The men jumped out of a silver Scion near Almeda-Genoa and 45 and ...

What Is Banter?

Jeopardy! robot champ is smart, but he's no Sherlock: Three things Watson needs to adapt

By Jennifer Patterson

02.20.11 | 12:27 am

We’ve got robots vacuuming our floors, beating us in chess and even filling in for elementary school teachers. Now they’re ruling the game show world. IBM’s robot ...

Silly over revolutionary

One tweet erects Robocop: Statue craze shows Americans don't exactly tweet like Egyptians

By Jennifer Patterson

02.19.11 | 2:02 pm

Egyptians utilize Twitter to organize political revolutions. Americans turn to the social media site to ... promote fictional robotic police officers. Oh, the land of the free! On Feb. 7 a ...

Highly requested add

What Facebook's new civil union status really says

By Jennifer Patterson

02.19.11 | 11:02 am

The social networking behemoth that brought Defining The Relationship to a new level of public has extended its relationship status options to include “in a domestic partnership,” and “in a ...

Indie Pop Chick

Tapes 'n Tapes & Oberhofer rock the Houston night, prove SXSW worthy

By Jennifer Patterson

02.18.11 | 10:27 am

Remember when Tapes ‘n Tapes debut album Loon set the indie-Internet ablaze with buzz? No? Well, it's OK— no one else does either. But Thursday night the beneficiary (or ...

Now that she's 30, Paris Hilton focuses on babies and self tanning

By Jennifer Patterson

02.18.11 | 12:40 am

The wealthy heiress who made a name for herself dancing atop New York City’s swankiest bars and brattily balking at farm work in The Simple Life turned the big ...

Lackluster list or stellar stars?

Weezer, Ween, Cut Copy, Yeasayer to headline Free Press Summer Fest

By Jennifer Patterson

02.15.11 | 11:08 am

Weezer, Ween, Cut Copy, Yeasayer, MF Doom and Sharon Jones will headline the 2011 Free Press Summer Fest, scheduled for the weekend of June 4-5. Festival organizers announced the lineup ...

Skip the restaurant, forget the flowers

You don't have to be rich to be romantic; how to do V-Day on the cheap

By Jennifer Patterson

02.14.11 | 6:00 am

Regardless of whether you’re tightening your belt or simply rejecting the commercialism of the holiday, there are plenty of ways to celebrate V-Day without breaking the bank. But before ...

A hero is down

Angry Birds peck Guitar Hero to death: Could Call of Duty be next?

By Jennifer Patterson

02.13.11 | 1:20 am

A hero has fallen. Guitar Hero has officially died while iPhone games like Angry Birds and Words With Friends grow in popularity. According to publisher Activision, which has called it ...

Big D's Comeback

Not her fault: Was Ashlee Simpson simply caught up in a new divorce trend?

By Jennifer Patterson

02.12.11 | 2:52 pm

Apparently an affinity for cliché tattoos and pseudo rock music just isn’t enough to keep a marriage together. Ashlee Simpson and Pete Wentz are headed to Splitsville. The couple ...

Hometown Glory

The best children's museum in the country? It's in Houston

By Jennifer Patterson

02.12.11 | 8:12 am

When you combine kids and museums the result is often a slightly disastrous version of a bull in a China shop. However, children’s museums around the country have eliminated ...

A Tale Worthy of Hitchcock

A righteous Angry Bird: Rooster kills a cockfighting trainer

By Jennifer Patterson

02.08.11 | 1:51 pm

The birds are angry, and not just the ones on your iPhone. In the world of underground cock fighting you’d imagine the biggest risks would be losing a fortune ...