Have a Great Weekend

Have a Great ARTwalk Weekend

It’s ARTwalk weekend, the organizers are encouraging a Halloween theme, and the location is in a classic Seventies-era shopping mall. All we need is an audience-participation screening of this midnight movie classic to make the weekend complete, and sadly, the downstairs movie theater was stripped out decades ago when General Cinema went bankrupt. Blues.

“We have such sights to show you…”

The days are much shorter. The air no longer smells like burning flint. Sundays are the perfect days to run errands, because most people are at home watching football. It’s that most wonderful time of the year, and by being in Texas, it gets to keep going until the end of the year. Sure, it’s not cold enough to justify dragging out jackets, but that also means that moongazing isn’t painful, and it’s perfect T-shirt weather. The wonderful weather also gives less of a reason to skip out on going out, and most of us have been waiting underground like Gila monsters until the summer heat breaks. Well, it’s broken, and we’re hungry.

Because of that and the general vibe of the season, things have been exceedingly busy around the Triffid Ranch. Besides a consultation meeting with the Dallas Arboretum (expect a surprise when the Children’s Adventure Garden reopens in March after the winter hiatus), it’s been work, work, work in getting ready for both upcoming shows and the impending holiday season. Combine that with still not knowing for sure about the status of the mall and its announced demolition…if someone could develop a cure for sleep, I’d really appreciate it.

Well. To begin, October 15 is the date for the next Midtown ARTwalk, and the new organizer wants everyone to know that all attendees are encouraged to show up in costume. Not a problem here: we generally treat Halloween the way Hunter S. Thompson treated New Year’s Eve. We aren’t just encouraging attendees to come out as their true selves, but we’re rewarding it. While supplies last, those showing up in appropriate attire will receive a prize, and kids are encouraged to attend as well. ARTwalk starts at 6:00 p.m., and keeps running until it’s done.

Four weeks later, the Triffid Ranch makes its first big leap: showing plants outside of the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. I’ve heard all sorts of fascinating stories about the Blood Over Texas crew in Austin, enough to make the four-hour drive to Austin to investigate, and this year is the one to make the trip for the Horror for the Holidays bazaar and festival. It’ll be right at the end of Sarracenia and flytrap season, so this gives those wanting to work with temperate carnivores the opportunity to see what their plants will look like when they re-emerge from winter dormancy in March and April. If this works well, not only expect Triffid Ranch involvement with other Blood Over Texas events through the rest of the year, but an active push to encourage similar events and activities in the Dallas area. We have enough lovers of the macabre in this town, and it’s time to show some solidarity.

And speaking of Dallas solidarity, the word came out recently that Convergence, the first Internet-ready goth convention, runs in Dallas in 2017. As details present themselves, they’ll be mirrored here. In a way, it’s a convergence in more ways than one: the Triffid Ranch first launched the weekend of the Ybor City Convergence in 2008, so as ninth-anniversary parties are concerned, we couldn’t have picked a better one.

And further plans? Things are tentative this year, but it’s time to expand viewing hours at the main space for the holiday season. If you’re in need of gifts for friends and family that stretches the definition of “appropriate,” give a yell.

Have a Great Weekend

Lots of news to process, including show news, but first some music to set the mood.

Have a Great Weekend

Have a Great Weekend

Upcoming events and random fun

Yes, so it’s been a bit quiet around here, but that’s because life at the Triffid Ranch continues to amaze. The Sarracenia are now all coming out of summer-induced dormancy, and our unusually humid August means that they’re both larger and more colorful than usual. At the gallery, the process of making new enclosures continues, with new ones planned for Heliamphora and Roridula displays to go along with the Nepenthes. With all that going on, apologies for the lack of immediate updates, and things aren’t going to get any less intense for the next few months.

For instance, last Friday, my plans for September 23 were reasonably easy. Do the laundry, vacuum the house, shave the cat, and otherwise recuperate from a very intense week. That was before Amie Spengler of ConDFW let me know that the Alamo Drafthouse Richardson (one of my favorite movie theaters, mostly because of its policy of kicking out any patron using a phone or tablet during a screening, with no reprieve) was hosting a full movie party around a screening of Little Shop of Horrors. At this point, laundry can wait, and anyone in the mood for repertory cinema this Friday evening is welcome to come out both to view plants and to meet the giant Sarracenia leucophylla that will be the host for the evening. It’s bad enough that the plant and I will be a horticultural Penn & Teller, but the hilarity for people who know me went to “prolapse-inducing” when they discovered that I get to be the Teller.

Surprisingly, that’s not all. It’s also time to note that after years of shows in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, it’s time to expand outward. This time, it’s a trip to Austin for the Blood Over Texas Horror For the Holidays bazaar on November 13. It’s a one-day show, but after hearing for the last two years about how Blood Over Texas was the next best thing to Texas Frightmare Weekend, as well as one of the ways that Austinites dealt with the impending holiday season, it was time to jump in. Details will follow, but until then, know that after years of Houston, Austin, and San Antonio customers wishing that the Triffid Ranch could get closer, you’ve got your wish. And to quote one of the great philosophers of the Twentiety Century…