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GOING OUT

By D Magazine |

HOT TICKET

“Vision for the Nineties: An Event for Women” is a comprehensive conference/trade show/info fair designed with Everywoman in mind. This two-day event at the Infomart {Sept. 22 & 23) includes everything from seminars on child care, health, and career opportunities to cooking demonstrations and fashion seminars. Tickets are $5 per day and proceeds benefit The Dallas Women’s Foundation. Call 871-2461 for info.

Despite her busy schedule, Kate Tamarkin manages to sandwich in guest-conducting stints across the country.

THE CONDUCTRESS

Profile Since helping to inaugurate the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in her first week of employment as the Dallas Symphony’s associate conductor, Kate Tamarkin has conducted more than 50 concerts. This October and November, she’s scheduled to conduct in the DSO’s regular season, but it’s inevitable that someday she’ll leave us for a music director slot elsewhere. Such is the career path for symphony conductors, and at 34, Tamarkin is a hot property in the world of conducting, where batons are not twirled, but pointed, waved, and wielded like a Nintendo Power Glove. In her spare time, which is infrequent, the California native enjoys playing folk and bluegrass guitar and listening to recordings of Javanese gamelan ensembles. Even when she puts her baton down, Tamarkin’s life is filled with music. -Michael Pellecchia

Social Moves



Dancing Tired of the two-step? Is the tango getting tedious? Join the folks at White Rock Lake’s Winfrey Point social center for a few reels of rousing, rollicking contra dancing, held on the third Saturday evening of each month.

Contra is a bit like square dancing, hut less structured and more social-a traditional get-together activity since colonial days. Contra partners begin the dance in lines, rather than in squares, so you eventually “balance-and-swing” and “circle-left, circle-right” with everyone else’s partner. Social interaction is the name of the game; couples are prohibited from dancing solely with each other unless they arc currently betrothed.

Novices need not fear… instruction is delivered explicitly at the beginning of each dance. Now’s a great time to get started, as the heat abates and autumn treats Winfrey Point more kindly for high-energy dancing. Organized by the North Texas Traditional Dance Society, with live music provided by the Winfrey Point Volunteers, dances begin at 8 p.m., with “last call” at about 11. Admission is $4; society members get off a buck cheaper. Both Winfrey Point (950 E. Lawther) and the Dreyfuss Club (610 E. Lawther) are located near the northeast shore of White Rock Lake. -David Alex Schulz

Buckaroo Bonsaiman



REAL PEOPLE Four months ago ex-interior landscaper and film-video production artist Bob Bouwman moved into an abandoned gas station on West Davis in Oak Cliff and officially turned a 15-year hubby into a new career. Now Bouwman is the neighborhood bonsaiman, carefully tending a bevy of miniature trees and shrubs in his Oak Cliff Bonsai Garage and diligently spreading bonsai fever to all who happen by.

So far response has been promising. Bouwman says in the past couple of years there’s been an Americanization of the art of bonsai, making it more accessible to garden-variety gardeners with the use of easily attainable native trees. Bouwman uses trees at his nursery that are indigenous to Texas-a practice that sets him apart from other bonsaimen and keeps his prices reasonable.

Bouwman also carries other kinds of plants at the garage, hut his emphasis is definitely on trees of the petite variety. Currently, he’s also developing an on-site space where he can exhibit and sell the works of local photographers and artists, rounding out his repertoire and making his little corner of Oak Cliff a haven for the artistic and the unusual. OCBG, 1424 W. Davis, 948-3639. -Anne Warren

Wild Things



Discovery N*V*Us is the newest haute spot in Deep Ellurn, having recently moved into Sandra Garratt’s old space on Elm Street. Interior designer Phillip Hopkins (who designed Nuvo) brought the store up to date by adding more windows, painting the brick walls a Warhol-inspired silver, and painting the floor in a wonderful Vasarelli- and Escher-inspired design.

The merchandise is a cross between the high-punk of Moda up the block and the mainstream malls in the burbs. Shoes by Nana, Berlin Wall, Red or Dead, and Harley Davidson. Glasses from LA Eyeworks and picture frames from Milano. There are also Fossil watches, Harry’s furniture, Desert Lite candles. Spirix phones, Elan Varshay and Company jewelry, and clothes by Windblown Duck and the Atomic Age. N*V*Us, 2644 Elm Street, 748-4584. Mon. & Tues. noon-5 p.m., Wed. & Thur. noon-10 p.m., Fri. & Sat. noon- midnight. -Layne Morgan

Camelot, Las Vegas-Style



GETAWAY Few things in life live up to their hype. So when we heard about the Excalibur Hotel-Casino in Las Vegas, we were duly skeptical. The largest medievally themed property in the world? In Las Vegas? Yeah, right. But we went, we saw, and guess what? We believe.

I’m not sure if that’s good news for the rest of the globe, but for us Las Vegas is a quick two-and-a-half-hour plane trip, and Excalibur is realty worth beholding. And, by all means, take the kids.

The 4,032-room (for obvious reasons, they don’t offer room service) hotel is actually a white-stoned castle, complete with towering spires, massive stone turrets, moats, and a drawbridge. You won’t find any bell captains, clerks, or cocktail waitresses here-they employ 4,439 knights and ladies-in-waiting to do the dirty work.

For fun, try starting on the first floor. The Fantasy Faire level, a 25,000-square-foot medieval midway, if ! you will, features such favorites as archery and hatchet throwing. Then, while the tots are busy tearing through the Middle Ages, you can make a Decline back to the present by scooting one floor up to the adults-only casino, the size of four football fields and nicely furnished with 2,630 slot machines and 100 blackjack tables.

For a final attraction, make reservations for the dinner show that takes place in a 925-seat arena. But one thing to know: you have to eat with your hands (it’s that medieval thing again), and although we personally had trouble with the broccoli with cheese sauce, the kids will think this is a scream.

The rooms are cheap ($45-$55 a night), the medieval madness free, and you won’t see the kids for days. For reservations, call 1-800-937-7777. -Luck Nelka

A Sentimental Journey

An evening with Ed Bernet and The Levee Singers is a trip back in time, when life was good, living was easy, and you could understand the words to the songs. Sing along to Golden Oldies Thursdays through Saturdays. The Levee at The Pontchartrain, 13444 Preston Rd.

The Texas Theater, Part II



CHANGES Lately there seems to be an increasing number of

artists and performers who are madly dashing south of the Trinity, establishing themselves in the new artistic haven of Oak Cliff. To Oak Cliff residents, perhaps the most obvious sign of this creative stampede is the current campaign to renovate The Texas Theater on Jefferson Avenue and turn it into a performing arts complex. The Texas Theater Historical Association has scheduled a fundraising gala at Red Bird Mall on September 8 in order to raise the $250,000 necessary to purchase the historic theater from its current ” owner, United Artists. Originally built by Harold B. Franklin and Texas tycoon Howard Hughes in the early Thirties, the theater hosted such stars as Roy Rogers and Gene Autry in its first-run celluloid heyday. In the early Sixties, the theater gained international notoriety as the spot where Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was apprehended. More recently, singer Don Henley filmed his End of the Innocence video there.

There seems to have always been an attraction to the theater, even though in its present run-down condition it only hosts B-run movies and a scant crowd. Once boasting state-of-the-art acoustics, lavish carpeting, and mosaic tile walls, most of the theater’s earlier elegance has been covered over with stucco.

Restoration costs are estimated at $1 million, in addition to the $250,000 purchase price, so there are high hopes for the old-fashioned Hollywood gala, which will be sponsored by Red Bird Mall in conjunction with its 15th anniversary.

For ticket information, call the Oak Cliff Chamber of Commerce at 943-4567.

-Cathlynn Richard

A Bus, a Bottle of Wine, and Thou



CHEAP DATE The adventure begins at 9 a.m. on a Sunday at Tony’s Wine Warehouse on Oak Lawn. Ahead lie three wineries in eight hours. Take my advice: get there at 8:30 a.m. and snack on the free pastries and coffee. Drink lots of coffee; you’ll thank me later. You and about 20 to 50 strangers then load up the bus and head for the western parts of Texas. Your host and emcee is Jean-Pierre Butter, a wine anti-snob. Garrulous yet sincere, the man lives for wine and he wants you to also.

So you visit your first winery, see how the grapes are grown, how wine is made, and how a winery operates. Samples of the winery’s wares are passed around. Then you go to the next winery, and have some wine. Stop for lunch, and have some wine. And on to another winery, and have some wine. In between stops, Butter offers samples of wine along with a bit of education. Wine all around.

Close friendships have been made on the bus ride home, deep bonds forged, and more than a few embarrassing confessions made. A few folks have even seen God. And somehow through a vino haze you will have absorbed a great deal of information about wine. Perhaps it’s the state of mind you’re in. Or perhaps the state. At $32.95 a head, it’s not exactly cheap, but a small price to pay for illumination. If you can’t set aside a whole day for adventuring, try one of TWW’s afternoon tastings held at the store. Champagnes of the World was my personal favorite, even if I did look a little odd sitting on somebody’s car bumper in the parking lot, watching bubbles drift over the Melrose long after I ceased sipping.

To sign up for one of Jean-Pierre’s wine tours, call 520-WINE, or go by Tony’s Wine Warehouse at 2918 Oak Lawn. -Amy Martin

ART ATTACK Taos, New Mexico, is infested with art. But just wart until the 16th Annual Taos Arts Festival, when it will be spilling out of studios and galleries onto city streets, taking over the entire community for two weeks, Sept. 21-Oct. 7. For information, call 1-800-732-TAOS.

SAKHAROV SPEAKS Former Soviet diplomat Dr. Vladimir Sakharov will speak at the Richardson Civic Center, Wednesday, Sept. 26 at 8 p.m. 238-4000.

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