Because August 32 doesn't exist

More than 20 celebrations for unofficial Houston holiday 713 Day

July 13 isn’t officially a holiday in Houston, but lots of people treat it like one. After all, 713 is Houston’s oldest area code, which means the number will always be part of the city’s identity.

Also, we can’t celebrate anything on February 81 or August 32, because they don’t exist.

As has become a tradition, organizations and businesses all over the city are planning special events for Saturday. We’ve rounded up all the best food pop-ups, car shows, markets, concerts, and more.

Go out and enjoy. After this week, we could all use some fun.

Community Celebrations

Children’s Museum Houston invites you to chill out on 713 Day with frosty melodies, cool sculptures and breathtaking science. Also, dance and sing-along with your favorite Frozen-inspired characters and friends in a wonderful show of music. 9 am.

Over at 8th Wonder Brewery enjoy live music from Donny Houston, Matt Mejia, and Shame On Me, a vendor market curated by Good Market HTX, outdoor activities, cannabis beverages, beer, and more. It’s free and open to the public. Noon.

Fonde Community Center and the Houston Rockets are teaming up for a 713 Day of Basketball. There will be a youth basketball clinic, a dunk contest, a dance fitness class, and appearances by Trae tha Truth, Cynthia Cooper, Sheryl Swoopes and others. 10 am.

Harrisburg Art Museum will be the place for Houston Culture Fest’s 713 Day Fest. There will be a live performance from Lil O, a puff and paint sesh, live graffiti art, a slab meet/contest, and a bunch of vendors. 5 pm.

Market Square Park will have a special edition of the We Heart HOU Music Series. The event will feature more than 20 local vendors and live performances by Aire Fresco and EZ Band. 5:30 pm.

Starseed Hostel will have a 713 Day Fest, hosted by Off Record Media and Coexistence Collective. Slum City Art Department, Goosechase, The Chevy Bois, Junkyard Cat, and The Kiddos are scheduled to perform. 5 pm.

Restaurants & Bars

Cadillac Bar will keep things figuratively and literally flowing throughout the day. They will have an extended, all-day happy hour, hitting you with cervezas, margaritas and over 70 tequilas. 11 am.

Cafe Leonelli invites fellow Houstonians to celebrate their city with its festive 713 Day cocktail, the Comet Crush. Priced at $7.13, the Comet Crush is the perfect tribute to Houston’s unofficial holiday. 5-9 pm.

Craft Pita is bringing back their “Only in H-Town” summer cookout event to showcase the combination of cultures and flavors one can only experience in Houston. Created in collaboration with guest chef Gabe Medina (formerly of Click Virtual Food Hall), the menu will celebrate Lebanese, Filipino, Palestinian, and Peruvian cultures. 11 am.

Over at Diversion Cocktails, Space City area-residents are invited to sip on a $18 Candy Paint cocktail with rum, candy syrup, citrus, soda and cinnamon. It’s a drink for the senses and a must-try. Reservations are strongly encouraged through Tock. 5 pm.

If you’re near either the downtown or Galleria Grotto restaurant, you can stop in and get their famous peach bellini for $7.13. (Call the Galveston location and see if they’ll also have this.) 11:30 am (noon Galleria).

FAO HTX will get its party on with a 713 Day bash. There will be door prizes, a Houston-inspired scavenger hunt, Houston trivia, photo opps and $7.13 H-Town margaritas. The Do713 crew will also host a countdown, a celebratory toast and confetti cannon blasts at 7:13 p.m. RSVP here. 6 pm.

J-Bar-M Barbecue will host Cadillacs and Coffee, a free-to-attend car show featuring unique stock and modified classic Cadillacs. Barbecue connoisseurs can enjoy J-Bar-M’s “El-Dog Sando” with a side of french fries for $20. 1 pm.

King Ranch Texas Kitchen will have an all-day, extended happy hour, with speciality cocktails for $7.13. You can get such delicious drinks as the spiked cucumber fresco, the Texas peach tea and the grilled pineapple margarita. 11 am.

Marmo will have $7.13 spritzes, which will be available all day long. Indulge in a classic aperol spritzor a mesmerizing purple spritzmade with Empress gin for a festive and refreshing treat. 11 am.

Pizaro’s Pizza is offering a deal for customers who show their H-Town pride. Customers sporting a Houston-themed outfit or shirt on July 13 are invited to purchase an 8-inch personal margherita pizza for $7.13. 11 am.

Nashville hot chicken restaurant Red Chickz is giving diners a free chicken sandwich with the purchase of any combo.

Tacodeli will be offering $5 margaritas and $2.13 beersto mark the occasion. Combine the specials for a total of $7.13to show some Houston pride. Specials will be available at both the Washington Avenue and Post Oak Plaza locations. 8 am.

The Tipsy Sloth will celebrate its grand opening with a 713 Day Market. DJ Areal and Whitney Screwston will provide the grooves, while Baked Potato Mannn will serve up the food. There will also be an H-Town cocktail menu. 7:13 pm.

Treebeards in Bunker Hill will be celebrating 713 Day with $7.13 summer cocktails all day. Cocktails include the watermelon spritz, the grapefruit chilton and the Greta Garbo (we’re assuming that one is best consumed alone). 11 am.

WILD Concepts invites Houstonians to salute the city’s oldest area code with both of its locations in Montrose and The Heights. They’re offering $7.13 specials all-day on their popular cocktails Swangin’ and Bangin’ and Still Sippin’. 8 am (10 am Montrose).

Over in Spring Branch, Wild Oats is serving $1.50 oysters (half dozen minimum), $4 guacamole, $7.13 queso, $7.13 margaritas, and $3 select beers.

Courtesy of 8th Wonder

8th Wonder is celebrating with concerts, a market, drinks, and more.

holidays festivals 713 day

Movie Review

New film Love Hurts serves as vehicle for Oscar-winner Ke Huy Quan

Photo by Allen Fraser/Universal Pictures

Ke Huy Quan in Love Hurts.

Career revivals like the one that has happened to Ke Huy Quan are extremely rare in Hollywood. As a child, he scored two big back-to-back roles in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and The Goonies. While he found occasional work after that, his career mostly went dormant starting in 2002 until he was cast in Everything Everywhere All at Once, a role that won him an Oscar.

Now, he’s the toast of the town, including his first-ever starring role as the lead in Love Hurts. Quan plays Marvin Gable, a relentlessly positive real estate agent who’s the top seller in his area. But from the beginning of the film, it’s clear that he has a hidden backstory, as he receives a veiled threat in a note from a woman named Rose (Ariana DeBose), who is seen early on defacing many of his advertisements around town.

When a heavy called The Raven (Mustafa Shakir) confronts Marvin at his office, he is pulled back into his old life, one where he was involved in the criminal enterprise of his brother, Knuckles (Daniel Wu). Soon he’s dodging attacks on multiple fronts, looking out for Rose, and all the while trying to keep up appearances at his day job.

Directed by Jonathan Eusebio (a stunt coordinator making his directorial debut) and written by Matthew Murray, Josh Stoddard, and Luke Passmore, the film is one big excuse to have Quan show off the martial arts skills he demonstrated in his Oscar-winning role. While there is some semblance of a story, it’s mostly to set up the various fight scenes; there’s little attempt to make the audience care about any of the stakes.

Instead, Eusebio and his team vacillate between moments of calmness and sequences with extreme violence. Quan and his fellow combatants (in addition to Shakir, he faces off against Marshawn Lynch, Cam Gigandet, and others) engage in a series of creative moves designed to inflict as much pain as possible. The juxtaposition of the seemingly mild-mannered Marvin with his abilities works relatively well, as does the variety of implements used as weapons (pencils, boba straws, feathers, and more come into play over the course of the film).

But the lack of a full story catches up with the film in the end, as instead of building to some kind of grand finale, there are diminishing returns with every scene. The filmmakers try to distract with a semi-amusing romantic connection between The Raven and Marvin’s assistant, Ashley (Lio Tipton), something that works much better than allusions to a bond between Marvin and Rose. There’s also a mini-Goonies reunion with Sean Astin as Marvin’s boss that’s kind of fun, but the antipathy between Marvin and his attackers never fully develops.

Quan is a joyful presence who does his level best to make himself into a lead actor, but he’s not served well in the film as a whole. DeBose, an Oscar winner herself, seems to be stuck in a rut of mediocre roles, ones that don’t allow her to show off her skills like West Side Story. Lynch shows again he’s reliable in comic sidekick roles, while Tipton and Shakir are the only other actors to make any kind of impact.

The Valentine’s theme of Love Hurts is not the only part of the film that feels tacked on. While the idea of letting Quan show off his skills is a good one in theory, very little thought appears to have been put into making that showcase effective. The result is a forgettable action comedy that puts more emphasis on ultraviolence than its story.

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Love Hurts opens in theaters on February 7.

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