San Antonio Current — October 21, 2020

OCT. 21 - NOV. 5, 2020

The Halloween Issue

COUNTERING ELECTION DISINFORMATION | MADE-IN-SA HALLOWEEN GOODIES | CHINESE FOOD RENAISSANCE

Perfect Pear 1½ oz Tito’s Handmade Vodka ½ oz elderflower liqueur 3 oz sparkling water 1 oz pear juice ¼ oz lemon juice

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Add Tito’s Handmade Vodka, elderflower liqueur, and juices to a shaker with ice.

Shake and strain over ice in a glass.

Top with sparkling water and garnish with a lemon slice.

9/16/20 9:59 AM

sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT 3

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CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

SHE’S GOING TO WORK. VIA HAS A PLAN TO GET HER THERE.

In San Antonio, people need to go to work, shop, care for family and stay connected. That’s where VIA can help. We have a plan to improve the transit system by decreasing wait times, shortening travel times and adding innovative services like ride share. All to help reach the goal of moving people quickly, reliably and easily. See how the plan works at KeepSAmoving.com.

in this issue San Antonio Current

Issue 20-22 /// October 21 – November 5, 2020

29 Music

Publisher: Michael Wagner Editor-in-Chief: Sanford Nowlin

Music Picks

Editorial

Digital Content Editor: Kelly Merka Nelson Contributing Arts Editor: Bryan Rindfuss Food and Nightlife Writer: Nina Rangel Contributors: Ron Bechtol, Chris Conde, Daniel Conrad, Jade Esteban Estrada, Dan R. Goddard, Lance Higdon, Steven G. Kellman, Hannah Lorence, Kiko Martinez, M. Solis, Gary Sweeney, Leah Thompson, Abe Asher Editorial Interns: Emily DiTomasso, Brianna Espinoza Trevor Flynn, Katie Hennessey, Dana Nichols, Deanna Wilson

Advertising

Advertising Director: Michael Wagner

Marketing and Events

Marketing and Events Director: Cassandra Yardeni Events Manager: Chelsea Bourque Marketing Interns: Julia Bentley

Creative Services

Graphic Designer: Samantha Serna Production Interns: Pedro Macias

Circulation

Circulation Manager: Justin Giles

Euclid Media Group

Chief Executive Officer: Andrew Zelman Chief Operating Officers: Chris Keating, Michael Wagner VP of Digital Services: Stacy Volhein Digital Operations Coordinator: Jaime Monzon Senior Marketing and Events Director: Cassandra Yardeni www.euclidmediagroup.com National Advertising: Voice Media Group (888) 278-9866, vmgadvertising.com San Antonio Current 915 Dallas San Antonio, Texas 78215 sacurrent.com Editorial: (210) 227-0044 / Fax - (210) 227-7755 Display Advertising: (210) 227-0044 Fax: (210) 227-7733 Classified: (210) 227-CLAS / Fax - (210) 227-7733 The San Antonio Current is published by Euclid Media Group Verified Audit Member San Antonio Distribution – The Current is available free of charge, limited to one copy per reader.

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Art © 2004 John Picacio, for BUMPER CROP by Joe R. Lansdale (Golden Gryphon). Used by permission.

28 Feature

Hundred-Word Horrors

We rounded up some of our favorite Texas authors and challenged them to dream up scary tales that clock in at precisely 100 words, including the title.

07 News

The Opener News in Brief

Redefining What it Means to Win

Faced with an election loss, Trump will sew doubt about the truth. We can’t let that happen.

All’s Fair in Love and War

San Antonio couple on opposite ends of the political spectrum still butting heads four years later

Glitter Political

Texas House Candidate Claire Barnett Believes Voters Deserve a Democratic Choice

CityScrapes

San Antonians should reject VIA’s vague, open-ended ballot proposal

17 Calendar Calendar Picks

18 Arts

OCT. 21 - NOV. 3, 2020

Homegrown Tricks and Treats Creations of 7 San Antonio artists keep the Halloween spirit alive

25 Screens

Injustice System

Documentarian Sabrina Van Tassel advocates for a new trial for convicted mother in The State of Texas vs. Melissa

27Food

Moving Beyond General Tso

A new generation of chefs and restauranteurs is upping San Antonio’s Chinese food game

The Halloween Issue

COUNTERING ELECTION DISINFORMATION | MADE-IN-SA HALLOWEEN GOODIES | CHINESE FOOD RENAISSANCE

On the Cover: San Antonio book cover illustrator John Picacio transformed this calavera image from his Loteria Grande series into a mask for sale during the pandemic.

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You can vote at any location.

You can vote early.

You can vote safely.

That’s right, it’s your vote!

Find everything you need to know about early, easy and safe voting at bexar.org. And be sure and check the ballot online before you head to the polls so you can get in and out faster.

Learn more at bexar.org This public service message is brought to you by Bexar County.

6 CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

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Grocer H-E-B severed its ties with Dallas-based advertising agency The Richards Group after a report that the firm’s 87-year-old founder said that a new proposed Motel 6 advertisement was “too Black” and would offend the motel’s “white supremacist constituents.” H-E-B follows Motel 6, Home Depot and others in dropping the firm, which the grocery chain had worked with over the past two decades to significant acclaim.

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Federal regulators fined San Antonio’s USAA Federal Savings Bank $85 million for banking law violations — another setback for financial giant USAA’s banking unit, which received a failing grade from regulators earlier this month. USAA’s CEO told the Express-News that it has “fallen short of our high standards and those of our members and our regulators.”

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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia last week handed a South Texas butterfly sanctuary a victory over the Trump administration. The court ruled 2-1 that U.S. Customs and Border Protection didn’t have permission to use the National Butterfly Center’s property, portending further legal challenges for the administration as it tries to complete a section of the wall.

Donald Trump made environmental deregulation a centerpiece of his presidency, and Texas is already feeling the effects. A new report from the Environment Texas Research and Policy Center found that illegal air pollution more than doubled in the state since Trump was inaugurated in 2017, with the number of unauthorized emissions of industrial pollutants rising from 63 million pounds three years ago to 174 million pounds last year. — Abe Asher

news

That Rocks/That Sucks

Twitter / Chip Roy

ASSCLOWN ALERT

U.S. Rep. Chip Roy The following is Assclown Alert, a column of opinion, analysis and snark.

Freshman Republican Congressman Chip Roy must think his constituents have the short-term memory capacity of stoner goldfish.

After all, Roy led off his reelection campaign’s media buy with a TV spot where he brags about his bipartisanship over footage of him playing baseball with his kid. In reality, his talk of reaching across the aisle bears little resemblance to his record representing Texas’ 21st District, which includes part of San Antonio.

During his two years in office, Roy gained a reputation as the hyper-partisan attention hog who singlehandedly held up a disaster relief bill for Texas communities to make a point on government spending. Even though he touts his own bill “written with a Democrat” that helps small businesses during the COVID crisis, he voted in March against a massive bipartisan coronavirus relief package, mocking it on

Chip Roy is running against Wendy Davis to represent Texas’ 21st Congressional District.

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Twitter as “welfare” while millions of Americans lost their jobs.

More recently, Roy introduced an ad in which speaks directly to the camera, telling viewers that people who want more shutdowns amid the pandemic and those who dismiss it as a hoax are extremists, inferring that he’s the smart guy in the middle.

Nope. Roy’s among the bunch writing off the global health crisis as a hoax — at least when speaking to media outlets that target his base.

In July, Roy told right-wing radio host Steve Deace the pandemic is about Democrats being able to reclaim power during the election, adding “I think on November 4, there’ll be a magic awakening on how we suddenly beat the virus.”

Earlier in the year, while chatting with conservative radio host Mark Levin, Roy compared stay-at-home orders to “Nazi Germany.”

It’s awful hard to rewrite that kind of record, no matter the size of your ad budget, assclown.

— Sanford Nowlin

YOU SAID IT!

“I filed on August 4.

Go ahead, look it up all day long.”

— Tony Gonzales,

A federal appeals court last week blocked Texas’ attempt to stop the use of a basic abortion procedure. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans struck down a law passed by the state legislature in 2017 that would have required doctors to stop a fetus’ heart before performing an abortion — a procedure that the court’s majority opinion called “unfeasible” and “dangerous.”

Republican District 23 congressional candidate after his opponent, Democrat Gina Ortiz Jones, accused him of violating federal regulations by filing to run before he left the Navy. His first Federal Election Commission filing was actually on May 15, 2019, almost three months before he left active duty.

Screen Capture / KSAT

At press time, it appears that more than 400 San Antonio-area bars will be able to reopen at limited capacity this week.

While many of Bexar County’s 3,000-odd bars reclassified themselves as restaurants to open legally during the pandemic, Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff last week announced that the county’s remaining watering holes would get the go-ahead to join them, so long as they implement new safety measures such as removing barstools and increasing air circulation. The new safety precautions were recommended by a subcommittee of the COVID-19 Community Response Coalition. — Abe Asher

Find more news coverage every day at sacurrent.com

news Redefining What it Means to Win Faced with an election loss, Trump will sew doubt about the truth. We can’t let that happen.

BY MARTIN WALLACE

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was a staffer on George W. Bush’s 2000 campaign, and I experienced first-hand the chaotic uncertainty and political maneuvering that was the Florida recount. As historically bad as that time was for our country, it pales in comparison to what may be to come if vote counts on November 3 are at all close.

The Atlantic recently published Barton Gellman’s article “The Election That Could Break America,” a must-read for every concerned American. The piece explains in detail just how unequipped our Constitution, laws and procedures are for a scenario in which there is no clear winner, or in which a sitting president refuses to concede and challenges the integrity of the election.

The picture it paints is appropriately alarming.

When we think about the basic idea of an election, we take for granted that there will be something tangible called “the results,” and that those results will provide clear truth in answer to the question “who won?” Ideally, this answer becomes clear on election night, but that’s not always the case. State laws vary as to how mail-in and provisional ballots are processed.

Most states aren’t allowed to start counting those ballots until Election Day itself, and the overtime count of remaining ballots can take days or weeks.

That count can change the course of an election, as it did in the 2018 Arizona Senate race, where Republican Martha McSally saw her 15,403-vote election day lead vanish as Democrat Kyrsten Sinema gained 71,303 votes in the overtime count to win by 2.4%.

Due to the pandemic, we can expect unprecedented numbers of mail-in ballots, with resulting logistical troubles from the untested systems rushed into place to process them.

Here’s the problem: the more mail-in ballots, the longer the overtime count will take, and the longer the count takes, the longer we have to wait to learn who won. Let’s call this the “waiting period.” As best demonstrated by the 2000 Florida recount, the waiting period opens up numerous avenues for challenging both ballots and counting procedures, such that it quickly turns into a legal circus. To make matters worse, there will possibly be outcome-determining overtime counts in multiple battleground states, each with their own specific complications, which will amplify a national sense of confusion and uncertainty.

Massive protests will likely accompany. Gellman’s Atlantic piece details how various scenarios may unfold through key milestones: the deadline for the states to appoint their Presidential Electors on December 8, the Electoral College vote on December 14, the certification of the Electoral College vote before Congress on January 6, and ultimately, the swearing-in of a new president on January 20.

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CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

Wikimedia Commons / Russian Presidential Press and Information Office

And here’s an even bigger problem: in the age of weaponized online propaganda, the longer the waiting period, the more time bad actors have to use proven, industrialized propaganda techniques to cast doubt on the very validity of the results. As the overtime count rolls on, it may become harder and harder to answer who won with a clear, widely accepted and hard-to-refute truth — one up to the task of grounding the peaceful transition of power. Though lawyers and demonstrators will be fighting to protect the overtime count itself, a deeper battle could unfold in the public mind over what the “true” results really are. If that battle is lost, it threatens to undermine efforts to protect overtime counts in key states.

Now, here’s the biggest problem of all: Team Trump has already telegraphed countless times that attacking the validity of the results is its strategy. What’s more, it’s been a remarkably successful strategy for the administration so far. During the first debate, Trump publicly and affirmatively erased any doubt that this is the plan, even saying that he expected the results to take “months.” When you know you can’t win — and arguably aren’t even campaigning to win — there are two options. You can redefine the rules of the game (i.e. redefine the results) to mean, for instance, only votes counted on election night. You can do this so loudly and frequently that you hope people forget it ever meant anything else, as Trump is already doing. Failing at that, you can muddy the issue and cause so much confusion that the American people, in sufficient numbers, won’t feel like they know who won. Team Trump can then use the ensuing chaos to turn what will be a rapidly unfolding constitutional crisis into a chicken match with the Democrats: either let Trump retain power, or the country will be ripped

apart. When confronted with such chicken matches in the past, albeit with lesser stakes, the Democrats have usually been the ones to swerve.

‘Firehose of falsehood’ The second must-read for understanding the Team Trump playbook is a recent piece by national security think tank the RAND Corporation, which discusses the “firehose of falsehood” Russian propaganda model. The titular Russian link is beside the point.

What marked an industrial revolution in propaganda during the 2016 election is now old hat for a certain class of political operatives across the globe. Whether calculatingly or instinctively, the Trump administration fully appreciates the power of this industrialized propaganda, and it has deployed these tactics in the past on a massive scale. In summary, the RAND analysis provides big-picture context for what Team Trump has, is and will continue to do to redefine the 2020 Election. The president’s personality and rhetoric, amplified by industrialized propaganda, threatens to turn the overtime count into a perfect storm.

Industrialized propaganda plays out within the battlefield of the public mind. The RAND analysis emphasizes that this form of propaganda is so effective, in large part, because it takes advantage of the fact that first impressions and resulting beliefs are extremely psychologically resilient, especially when frequently reinforced by information sources and social groups people identify with. Like an army seizing the high ground, this gives tremendous advantage to whomever is first to claim and define an issue.

Consider how Team Trump has and continues to constantly frame mail-in ballots, and more recently, the

2020 election itself, as being “fraudulent.” Trump was out the gate in 2017 with astonishing claims of voter fraud in an election he’d just won, as if doing troop maneuvers to establish a foothold for “voter fraud” in the public mind. Team Trump has gone on to reinforce this messaging countless times, including through tweets such as the following about the 2018 Florida election: “an honest vote count is no longer possible — ballots massively infected. Must go with Election Night.”

The RAND analysis further emphasizes that industrialized propaganda is neither committed to nor restrained by objective reality and consistency. Lacking these restraints, it’s more agile than messaging dedicated to facts and accuracy. Social media makes the famous Terry Pratchett quote all too literal: “A lie can run round the world before the truth has got its boots on.”

Psychological vulnerabilities Through the modern media environment, propaganda has evolved to maximally prey upon our psychological vulnerabilities. It’s become multichannel, transmitted through a variety of formats and mediums. This allows Team Trump to expose a massive number of people to its messaging nearly instantly, many of whom pick it up and repeat it to others online or in person. Studies show that people are more likely to believe something if they hear it from multiple sources in varied formats. Research also shows that the number of arguments can matter more than the quality of argument, especially among people who are “low information” on an issue. The everywhere-at-once media environment makes it so that people can’t put their finger on exactly where they heard something — a factor that leaves people more likely to maintain, and not seek to revise, false beliefs.

What’s worse, as the RAND analysis notes, the modern media environment allows propaganda to be “rapid, continuous and repetitive.” The well documented “illusory truth effect” demonstrates that people are more likely to believe something the more often they hear it, sometimes without any conscious reflection upon having formed a new belief. Repetition leads to a feeling of familiarity, and that feeling can overpower rationality.

These effects are worse when an issue is especially noisy with disagreement, as the overtime count will certainly be. High volume around a contentious issue overwhelms attention, and when overwhelmed, people are more likely to fall prey to psychological processes that make them much more susceptible to false information. When the public is so psychologically overwhelmed regarding an issue to the point that they don’t know what to think, they can lose the will to resist. Recognizing this important fact and how to manufacture it is a pivotal factor in how Putin was able to establish himself as an autocrat.

He waged war on the very idea of reliable truth in his country — and won.

Parade of scenarios This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the power of industrialized propaganda, but it’s enough to illuminate the Team Trump plan. Trump is already redefining the results to create two classes of ballots — Election Day ballots (good) and everything counted after (fraudulent, fake, bad). This division doesn’t need to be grounded in fact; it can merely

Jaime Monzon

be a conditioned association. Consider the effective right-wing messaging around the term “Benghazi,” which operates by associating general negative emotion rather than by specifying factual content. For the plan to work, Team Trump first needs the “good” Election Day ballots to contain a disproportionate amount of his votes. If Trump garners a high enough percentage of in-person ballots, he can preemptively declare victory on election night and thereby reap the psychological benefits of being the first mover to claim that the results make him the winner. Even if he isn’t obviously ahead, if he is close enough for there to be doubt, it could suffice for their plan.

The Trump propaganda arm will then go into overdrive, inundating the public with a firehose of falsehoods and messaging built upon the foothold it’s already established: that mail-in ballots have all sorts of problems and the overtime count can’t be trusted.

We should expect a parade of wild scenarios, running the gamut from purported photos and videos of Democrats destroying ballots to poll workers changing votes to China planting thousands of fake ballots in the mail. The propagandists will make and repeat the claims, and the more pervasive they start to seem, the more likely they will come to “feel” somewhat correct to the less tuned-in American public.

Trump and his enablers were successful with a version of this on the Mueller report. Attorney General William Barr got ahead of the report’s release via his “summary” that had little regard for consistency or truth, and the propaganda machine did the rest. By the time the truth trickled out, it no longer mattered.

What’s so concerning now is that it’s hard to imagine a more perfect scenario than the waiting period for

industrialized propaganda-generated chaos to be at its most effective.

How do we respond?

Team Trump is practically shouting that this is their plan. So, what can we do about it?

First, the RAND propaganda experts warn “don’t expect to counter the firehose of falsehood with the squirt gun of truth.” The specific legal and political fights to maintain the integrity of the overtime count are critical, but they are only one front of the ensuing conflict. Equally important is fighting to protect the concept of the results in the public mind.

The best way to counter this style of propaganda is to expose it and get ahead of it. To protect the public mind, we must shout from the rooftops that because Trump knows he can’t win, he’s planning to redefine the results. Getting this message out inoculates the public mind: it seizes the psychological upper hand obtained by whoever is first to frame an issue, since initial framing is hard to counter once established.

Beyond that, we must constantly affirm that the results mean that every vote counts. We must start doing both of these things immediately. We must also be as loud and pervasive about it as we know Team Trump is going to be in its attempts to redefine the rules and claim victory.

Martin Wallace was a staffer on both of George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns. He has since shifted to working in digital politics for progressive campaigns at the local and national level. sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT

9

Visit www.SanAntonio.gov/Arts

for the line-up of upcoming Virtual Public Art Conversations

Join The

conversation On New Public Art Projects

The Department of Arts & Culture is hosting a series of Virtual Conversations to share the latest on new public art projects and get feedback. These meetings will be held virtually, to meet COVID-19 social distancing protocols.

Learn How You Can Be Part Of The Discussion

10

CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

news All’s Fair in Love and War San Antonio couple on opposite ends of the political spectrum still butting heads four years later

BY KIKO MARTINEZ

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hen Donald Trump was declared the winner of the U.S. presidential election on Tuesday, November 8, 2016, San Antonio stay-at-home mom and Hillary Clinton supporter Celeste Tidwell wept at her sister’s house. Her husband Dave, a prison contractor and avid Trump supporter, was at home, beside himself.

“It was 2:30 in the morning and I was wired,” Dave recalled during a recent interview with the Current.

“All night long, I watched MSNBC, with those two pathetic losers Brian Williams and Rachel Maddow, call every state red. They couldn’t handle it.”

The Tidwells were one of three local couples the Current featured in a September 2016 article titled “It’s Not Easy Being a Politically Opposed Couple, Especially This Election.” They are the only couple of the three who agreed to a follow-up article when the Current approached them again this September. They’re also the only couple of the three that’s still together.

Both couples that are no longer married or engaged said politics had nothing to do with their split.

“We’ve survived,” Celeste Tidwell said. “Maybe it’s because we’ve been married so long, but we had already gone through all the trials and tribulations of a marriage. I actually think we’re stronger than ever.”

Today, the Tidwells might be basking in a 20-year marriage, but their political disputes are as heated as ever. Unsurprisingly, Celeste will be casting her vote for former U.S. vice president Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election. Dave is sticking to Trump, or as he describes him, “the best president since Abraham Lincoln.”

Celeste says she still cringes when Dave says things like that or when he refers to Trump as “God” to annoy her. It might be one of the reasons Celeste keeps deleting his Tucker Carlson Tonight episodes off the DVR and why she tossed one of his MAGA hats in the trash.

“That’s the thing with my wife,” Dave said. “I want to argue over policy, and she wants to get emotional.

She won’t argue the facts.”

Celeste contends that her emotions stem from Trump’s overall divisiveness, childish behavior, unwillingness to take responsibility for anything and his racist comments. She wonders why these things don’t bother her husband, especially since she is Latina.

“Nobody can be perfect,” Dave said. “Sometimes

Photo courtesy of Celeste Tidwell

I do disagree with how he delivers his message, but that’s just the way he is. You’re not gonna change the guy. He’s gonna do what he wants to do.”

For the past six months, Trump has been doing exactly that during the pandemic. He avoided wearing a facemask despite the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advising in early April that wearing them helps prevent the spread of COVID-19. An outbreak of the virus occurred at the White House in early October and infected the president and the First Lady along with numerous staff, advisers, visitors, journalists and others.

As of October 16, more than 218,000 people have died in the U.S. from COVID-19.

“I think the numbers are actually much lower than what they are,” Dave said. “I believe years down the road that we’ll find out there wasn’t over 200,000 deaths. I think a lot has to do with politics. I think California and New York and other liberal states tanked their economies to make the president look bad.”

The Tidwells’ conflicting politics has also trickled down to their children. Their three daughters — ranging in age from 20 to 29 — are liberal like their mother. Their 17-year-old son has a conservative side, so Dave taps into that as much as possible. Celeste believes her son sides with his father because “he doesn’t want to let him down.”

“In private, [my son] and I talk, so I know he doesn’t agree with the way Trump talks about Hispanics,” Celeste said. “He doesn’t agree with his racism.”

Dave doesn’t think Trump is racist. He didn’t watch the first debate between Trump and Biden, so he can’t

Celeste Tidwell (left) and her husband Dave played up their political differences in this Halloween photo.

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say why Trump didn’t denounce white supremacy when given the opportunity.

When it comes to race, however, Dave would rather talk about why he’ll never watch another NBA game again and why Black Lives Matter is a “horrible organization.”

“Left-wing socialists want to completely change our country,” Dave said. “Trump is not for white supremacy. He’s for doing the right things. If Biden wins, he’s going to be persuaded by all that left-wing crap. I can’t even fathom the socialism.”

Celeste scoffs at the idea that the U.S. will become a socialist country if Biden is elected. She said the S-word is a fearmongering tactic used by Trump supporters and has no basis in reality.

“That’s fantasy-world stuff and is not gonna happen,” Celeste said. “Dave can go a little overboard with that.”

With less than two weeks to go before Election Day, the Tidwells have decided to watch the results come in at home this year. Together.

Celeste predicts Biden will win by 14 points. Dave thinks Trump will win by a hair but doesn’t care about the final count. These days, he’s just trying not to be too concerned about how many Biden campaign posters are going to end up on his front lawn.

“I’ll just wear my MAGA hat till then,” Dave said.

“Plus, I like to pick my battles.” sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT

11

Should I get tested for COVID-19?

Individuals with symptoms of COVID-19 and/or individuals without symptoms who have come in contact with persons who tested positive for COVID-19 can get tested at City-run sites.

Symptom of COVID 19 include fever or chills, cough, shortness of breath or difficulty breathing, fatigue, muscle or body aches, headache, new loss of taste or smell, sore throat, congestion or runny nose, nausea or vomiting, and diarrhea.

S e l f S c r e e n i n g To o l :

C ov i d 1 9 t e s t . q u a c i t o . c o m FREE COVID-19 testing sites Walk-up location.

Registration and appointment required.

Monday–Sunday, 10am–2pm.

Monday–Sunday, 9am–4pm.

No appointment required.

Call 833-213-0643 to schedule an appointment.

35 410

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281

35

3

1 90

410 35

2

37 410

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Cuellar Community Center 5626 San Fernando St, San Antonio, TX 78237 Ramirez Community Center 1011 Gillette Blvd, San Antonio, TX 78224 Freeman Coliseum 3201 E Houston St, San Antonio, TX 78219

Parents may be asked to assist with administering the COVID-19 test if their child requires assistance. Locations are subject to change.

c ov i d 1 9 . s a n a n t o n i o . g ov 12

CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

news GLITTER POLITICAL

Texas House Candidate Claire Barnett Believes Voters Deserve a Democratic Choice

BY JADE ESTEBAN ESTRADA

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hen Claire Barnett appears on my screen, the wall behind her is hard to miss. It’s bright blue, the color of the Democratic Party.

“That wasn’t a driving factor,” she says with a laugh when I ask if that’s why she picked the color. However, as the unopposed Democratic nominee for Texas House District 122, she admits that the choice was convenient.

For a second time, Barnett’s political rival is Lyle Larson, a moderate Republican and water expert who’s earned a reputation of working across the aisle during his five terms at the State Capitol.

Despite his good reviews, Barnett, 40, feels that constituents deserve a Democratic candidate on the ballot.

Before deciding to run in 2018, the Houston native came to a realization about her political purpose after sharing her initial concerns with her mother one day in her kitchen.

“Am I the right person to do this? I’ve never done this before,” Barnett told her mother. “My mom said, ‘Well, you know, Claire, sometimes we do hard things because we can ... and not everyone can.’”

Those words continue to echo in her mind, particularly when she’s having a rough day.

“For decades and centuries, Black Americans and immigrants, and Native Americans, who have so many talents, so much light to shine in the world, have not had that opportunity [to run for office],” she says. “We need to hear about them — from them.

I certainly can’t speak to the experience of a Black woman or an immigrant, but we need those voices in our political system.”

As an advocate for education and healthcare, she garnered 38% of the vote in 2018.

Barnett’s interest in politics was sparked in college, when she lived in Argentina as part of a Latin American studies program during the height of that country’s Great Depression, which lasted from 1998 to 2002.

Though she studied Latin American literature and history, she focused largely on politics.

Barnett seems to have come full circle.

She sees a lesson about civil society when comparing Argentina of 20 years ago with what she describes as an “erosion” of our country’s strongest institutions.

She says a certain degree of complacency is to blame.

That, and the idea of American exceptionalism.

“We have this 200-year democracy that was a model for everyone else, like, ‘Nothing like [the Argentine

Jade Esteban Estrada

Great Depression] can happen here!’ and then that [ideological] polarization that has just brought us to this point,” she says. “We’re not even living in the same realities anymore as our neighbors.”

I ask her why she cares.

“Because we’re all human?” she volunteers with a laugh. “I grew up in a family where it was part of our family culture that we were kind and we helped other people.”

In the ’80s and ’90s, her family openly discussed issues of race and economic privilege, she adds.

“I was always surrounded by people who were trying to do the right thing and believed that human goodness drives us all regardless of what church or synagogue, or temple, or mosque you go to, regardless of your race or language.”

In time, gender identity was added to the list.

“My family’s viewpoint on sexuality has evolved over time, and seeing the evolution in my own relatives about their perceptions of the LGBTQ community has been inspiring to me,” she says. “People aren’t stuck in what they were taught.”

Speaking of teaching, Barnett’s job as an instructional designer keeps her on the cutting edge of the distance-learning phenomenon.

I ask her to list the top three things that parents and teachers should keep in mind about online learning.

“I think the first most important thing is you cannot teach online like you do in person,” she says.

“People’s attention spans are different online. What works when you’re in a classroom does not always work when you’re online.”

The second piece of advice is the old adage that less is sometimes more. While it’s possible to piece together mind-blowing side shows, they can be distracting if they don’t reinforce the point of the lesson.

Her third nugget is the importance of human connection and meeting people where they are, both literally and figuratively.

“We need to be careful about how we respect people being in their home and what [instructors] expect from them,” she explains. “When people are in their homes, [these] are usually their private spaces.

Somebody could be embarrassed by what is going on in their home, or maybe there’s just a lot of people in the space and it’s chaotic. Kids will bully each other just about anything, so they’re going to see my house that doesn’t look as good as your house. These things are difficult to navigate.”

When I ask what advice she might offer for people in the district during these trying times, Barnett looks to the legacy of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

“She was a woman who never gave up,” she says. “As dark as these things seem and are now, we can’t give up. We need to keep marching on, and we need to vote like there’s no tomorrow, because we know it’s going to get ugly over the next several [weeks]. We all have to do what we can.”

She smiles, then says, “I’m not giving up.” sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT

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CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

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news CITYSCRAPES

San Antonians should reject VIA’s vague, open-ended ballot proposal

BY HEYWOOD SANDERS Editor’s Note: The following is CityScrapes, a column of opinion and analysis.

V

IA Metropolitan Transit needs to be told, “No, now simply is not the time.”

Right now, the economy, and our lives, are too uncertain.

And VIA’s request on the November ballot for a dedicated tax in perpetuity — a tax that won’t start until January 1, 2026 — is entirely too broad and ill-defined.

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacted a dramatic, devastating impact on San Antonio and our city’s economy. It has, unfortunately, educated a great many people about the fragile economic circumstances faced by a large portion of the local populace.

It’s also revealed vast inequalities in computer and internet access across large swaths of San Antonio.

But while some aspects of our lives have begun to get back to “normal,” the impact of the pandemic and the resulting economic dislocation is far from done.

Perhaps no sector of the local economy has been hit as hard as the hospitality sector. With travel sharply down from historic levels and restaurants and bars still not fully open, the local visitor economy is a fraction of what it once was. Downtown hotel occupancy for August 2020 was just 37%, with sharply lower average daily rates than in 2019. While some weekend leisure visitors are returning, midweek hotel occupancy is notably lower.

The problem we face is that the convention and meeting business, the foundation of our downtown hotel, restaurant and retail business, has effectively evaporated. The Henry B. Gonzaléz Center has seen dozens of events cancel, with cancellations continuing for events scheduled for 2021.

The prognosis for conventions and meetings is similarly bleak, countrywide. National figures from hotel research firm STR show group demand — a block of 10 or more rooms booked together — for September 2020 at just about 15% of the September 2019 total.

And between the enormous economic loss over the past few months and the large-scale adoption of virtual meetings and conventions, the future of the convention business — and the fortunes of people whose jobs are tied to it — remains highly uncertain.

We may simply never see the return of many of the conventions and events that filled the HBG Center, the Alamodome and the city-owned Grand Hyatt hotel.

We are looking at impacts on the city’s revenues and budget that may well extend for a decade. And

Courtesy Photo / VIA Metropolitan Transit

we’re also looking at human needs that will extend for years as well. In this environment, there is simply no sensible reason to commit the sole remaining portion of the local sales tax — a tax strictly limited by the state — to VIA. While the plan on the ballot isn’t technically a tax increase, it does tie up that share of the sales tax, which could be used for other purposes. We don’t really know what the San Antonio economy will look like in 2026, the year the VIA tax boost would begin.

VIA’s pitch for the “Keep SA Moving” proposition on the ballot keeps talking about the 1.6 million new residents living here by 2040. But the events of the last few months should remind us of how uncertain that forecast is, particularly as our economy continues to suffer. We may have far more pressing community needs in 2026 than VIA’s proposed additional HOV lanes and its effort to “plan and develop an Advanced Rapid Transit (ART) network,” whatever that might

actually be.

The VIA board pressed to get the tax scheme on the ballot now, repeatedly arguing that other Texas transit agencies have higher tax rates. And Mayor Ron Nirenberg chose to bend, as long as the city could use that tax revenue for a time.

What we need from the transit agency that gave us a vast light rail plan in 2000 that the voters overwhelmingly turned down, followed by an expensive proposal for downtown streetcars, is far more specifics — and a commitment to require voters to reapprove the tax after a few years. That will give the community an opportunity to see how and what VIA actually delivers.

To commit the sales tax to VIA now and for all time is simply asking for too much, too soon.

Heywood Sanders is a professor of public policy at the University of Texas at San Antonio. sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT

15

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For housing assistance, more information on the CDC's Order ot to receive a copy of the CDC's form, call 210.207.5910 or visit: https://covid19.sanantonio.gov/evictions

A landlord who violates the CDC's Order could face federal penalties including a fine up to $100,000 per event and one year in jail.

Pick Up T-shirts & Resources, Participate in a Memorial Event, Drop off Donations, & Purchase Merchandise, Entirely from Your Car Show Your Support at afsp.org/sanantonio

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Call us today at 210.688.5792 or Live Chat: AARCSA.com | 303 N. Frio San Antonio, TX 78207 16

CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

calendar

FRI | 10.23

all things October. Scheduled for Saturday, October 24, the

right. Viewers can enjoy complimentary popcorn and drinks

family-friendly Halloween celebration will include hands-on

along with admission,

activities, trick-or-treating and the ability to explore the gar-

while those with a heftier

den’s fall flora. Guests at the annual H-E-B-sponsored event

appetite can peruse food

are also encouraged to dress up in their favorite costumes

trucks that will also be on

There are plenty of ways to binge horror movies in the

for the occasion. Access to Bootanica will be included with

site. Further details and

run-up to Halloween — lookin’ at you, Netflix — but the

garden admission and membership, and guests are expected

COVID-19 safety protocols

Mission Outdoor Theater is making the scares a communal

to follow the garden’s COVID-19 guidelines during their

are available on Slab Cine-

experience later this month. The drive-in, which opened at

visit. $12-$15, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday, October 24, San Antonio

ma’s website. $15, 7:30 p.m.

Brooks City Base in September, has a full slate of creepy mov-

Botanical Garden, 555 Funston Place, (210) 536-1400, sabot.org.

Tuesday, October 27, Hot

ies on its October schedule, but one event in particular may

— Brianna Espinoza

Wells Ruins, 5503 S. Presa

FI LM

CHILD’S PLAY DOUBLE FEATURE

St., slabcinemaarthouse.com.

catch the eye of ’80s horror fans. On October 23, the theater is hosting a double feature of Child’s Play and Child’s Play 2 with a very special guest: franchise star Alex Vincent, who appeared as Andy Barclay in four Chucky films. In Child’s Play, Vincent’s character Andy is gifted the possessed doll

SAT | 10.24 ART

— Kelly Merka Nelson

FRI | 10.30

Film Arts Guild

sumed by Mark Hamill in the 2019 film reboot. Naturally, the

BRISCOE’S BIRTHDAY CELEBRATING THE WEST OF MANY COLORS

gift comes with deadly

San Antonio’s Briscoe Western Art Museum is showcasing

consequences. Mis-

the diversity of the Wild West with a new addition to its

sion Outdoor Theater

collection, which will debut at the museum’s seventh-an-

SOLI CHAMBER ENSEMBLE: ‘THROUGH THE EYES AND LENS OF THE BEHOLDER’

owner Fred Reyes

niversary celebration. Western artist Mark Maggiori has

San Antonio’s SOLI Chamber Ensemble returns to form this

told KSAT that Vincent

donated his painting Once Upon a Time, which highlights the

month with an outdoor concert at the San Antonio Botan-

will sign autographs

story of working Black cowboys, to the Briscoe’s permanent

ical Garden. The quartet will perform at the garden’s new

before and after the

collection. Maggiori’s work was inspired by his fan base,

Betty Kelso Center, with distanced patio and lawn seating

drive-in screening.

who challenged the lack of diversity in his prior paintings

available for attendees. Titled “Through the Eyes and Lens of

The drive-in has safety

amid recent protests against racial injustice. The painting

the Beholder,” the concert “focuses on a composer’s realiza-

protocols in place to

will be unveiled during the Briscoe’s birthday festivities on

tion of another artist’s work — be it image, music, or poetry

Saturday, October 24. “History tells us that cowboys were

— reworked into his/her own music and voice.” The program

during the pandemic, including contactless ordering and a

Black, Native American, Hispanic and even Chinese, but

features the Texas premiere of Jennifer Jolley’s “Recomposed

face covering requirement for anyone who exits their vehi-

Western art from that period does not reflect that. Contem-

Scriabin,” paired with Alexander Scriabin’s Etude, Op. 8 No.

cle. A full list of safety guidelines is available on the Mission

porary artists like Mark Maggiori have the opportunity to

1 for piano so that attendees can get a taste of the original

Outdoor Theater website. $43.30-$95.26, 7:30 p.m. Friday,

tell that authentic story,” Briscoe President and CEO Michael

before experiencing Jolley’s reimagining. Also featured on

October 23, Mission Outdoor Theater, 8069 Challenger Drive,

Duchemin said in a release. Along with the unveiling, the

the program are a new arrangement of James Scott Balen-

(877) 494-2560, missiondrivein.com. — Kelly Merka Nelson

October 24 event will provide visitors with opportunities to

tine’s “Asking a Shadow to Dance” and the world premiere

learn from Black Cowboy Museum curator Larry Callies, the

of Michael Matthews’ “till our bodies into the night slip,”

Bexar County Buffalo Soldiers Association and cowboy sto-

plus the delightfully titled “Double-Dog Dare,” composed

ryteller Clifton Fifer. Additional details and COVID-19 safety

for solo clarinet by Jim Stephenson. $15-$25, 7:30 p.m. Sunday,

protocols can be found on the Briscoe’s website. $10-$12, 10

October 25, Betty Kelso Center, San Antonio Botanical Garden,

a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday, October 24, Briscoe Western Art Museum,

555 Funston Place, (210) 536-1400, solichamberensemble.org.

210 W. Market St., (210) 299-4499, briscoemuseum.org. — Dana

— KMN

Chucky, played by Brad Dourif, whose role was later as-

maintain distancing

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment

FRI | 10.23 FI LM

THE BOOK OF LIFE Just in time for Día de los Muertos, the San Antonio Museum

Nichols

of Art is hosting a family-friendly outdoor screening of the 2014 animated feature The Book of Life. Held in collaboration with Slab Cinema, the free screening will take place on the museum’s campus on Friday, October 23. To keep attendees

CLASSICAL MUSIC

TUE | 10.27

FRI | 10.30 CLASSICAL MUSIC

able to attend, determined on a first-come, first-served basis.

REELS AT THE RUIN: NOSFERATU

AGARITA + ANDREA ‘VOCAB’ SANDERSON

It’s recommended that moviegoers arrive early to save their

Slab Cinema has teamed up with the Hot Wells Conservancy

Two heavy hitters in the San Antonio arts scene are pairing

spots. The Book of Life tells the story of Manolo, who strug-

to bring back the film series Reels at the Ruin. This time,

up for a set of concerts at the end of October: SA Poet Laure-

gles to choose between fulfilling his family’s expectations

they’re throwing things back all the way to 1922. On Tuesday,

ate Andrea “Vocab” Sanderson and esteemed local chamber

and following his heart. His fate becomes further twisted

October 27, horror movie fans and film history buffs alike

ensemble Agarita. The quartet will perform a program

when, on Día de los Muertos, the rulers of the Land of the Re-

can enjoy the iconic silent film Nosferatu. An unauthorized

inspired by Sanderson’s personal voice and vision, including

membered and the Land of the Forgotten place a weighted

adaptation of Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, F.W. Mur-

works by Ludwig van Beethoven, John Adams, Paul Wiancko,

bet to see whether Manolo will marry his love interest María,

nau’s German Expressionist masterpiece that set the tone

Pablo Casals, Missy Mazzoli and Arvo Pärt. The icing on the

or whether his rival Joaquín will win her over. Free, 6 p.m.

for the vampire film genre. Though Murnau made cosmetic

cake is a new arrangement of Sanderson’s “The Noveaux,”

Friday, October 23, San Antonio Museum of Art, samuseum.org.

changes to the story, including renaming Count Dracula as

which first appeared on French producer James Digger’s

— Dana Nichols

Count Orlok, he still drew the ire of Stoker’s descendants,

album BADABOOMBAP. The new version was arranged by

who obtained a court ruling that stated all copies of the film

San Antonio composer Troy Peters. The two back-to-back

must be destroyed. Fortunately for horror fans, a few prints

concerts will be held at the downtown Radius Center. To

of the film remained extant, allowing it to assume its right-

maintain distancing, each audience will be limited to 100

ful place in cinematic history. Reels at the Ruin is putting

attendees, determined on a first-come, first-served basis.

a twist on things by adding another element to the event:

However, to make the concert accessible to all, the 8:30

live music accompaniment. During the screening, Cone of

p.m. performance will be livestreamed on Agarita’s website,

Does frolicking through the flowers with the kiddos while

Uncertainty, Ray Palmer, Kory Cook and Danny Toranzo will

where it will remain available for a short time for those who

celebrating Halloween sound like your idea of fall fun? If so,

add to the ambiance with their musical stylings. It’s fitting

are unable to watch the performance as it was occurring.

that’s exactly what the San Antonio Botanical Garden is of-

that the outdoor screening will be held at the Hot Wells Ru-

Free, 6 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. Friday, October 30 (livestream at 8:30

fering during Bootanica — the garden enthusiast’s tribute to

ins, which are a landmark of the silent film era in their own

p.m.), Radius Center, 106 Auditorium Circle, agarita.org. — KMN

physically distanced, a limited number of people will be

SAT | 10.24 SPECIAL EVENT

BOOTANICA

FILM

Reminder:

Although live events have returned, the COVID-19 pandemic is still with us. Check with venues to make sure scheduled events are still happening, and please follow all health and safety guidelines.

Hundred-Word Horrors

O

ctober is a time to close your coat against the chill, to notice that the shadows have grown long and strange, to look over your shoulder and make sure the skitter you heard is just the sound of the wind whipping up dead leaves.

In other words, it’s the perfect time to be scared.

With the Halloween season in mind, we rounded up some of our favorite Texas authors and presented them with the challenge of dreaming up scary tales that clock in at precisely 100 words, including the title. Think of these as bite-sized descents into horror — some eerie, some darkly humorous and some disturbingly close to real life.

Smudge

By KB Rylander

S

ometimes there’s a blurry spot across the street.

Like a smudged Polaroid in real life. Right near the curvy windows of No. 7.

Jane watches from the stoop of her brownstone, plastic jump rope forgotten, yellow leaves scattering the pavement. A rush of cold hits her face and the sidewalk blurs. Dad’s station wagon fades and the light dims to the orange glow of lamplight. A horse neighs. Silhouettes with top hats and long dresses amble by. One beckons. Jane bolts across to them.

The effect disappears. Jane is gone. The scent of burning coal lingers in the fall air.

KB Rylander writes science fiction and fantasy and young adult fiction. When she’s not writing, you can find her sip-

18

CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

ping bourbon or playing Lego with her kids, though hopefully not at the same time. Her fiction has appeared in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and she won the 2015 Jim Baen Memorial Short Story Award.

ing a sound. You don’t want to know what’s so funny.

When you sleep it watches, waiting for something. There is a shadow and it is corrupting your brain. Its presence is like nuclear radiation. Your skin is on fire and your eyes won’t stop bleeding. One of these days you’re going to open your mouth and let it escape inside you. One of these days you’re going to be free.

Home

By Lee Thomas

Max Booth III is a screenwriter, novelist, editor, podcaster and publisher living in San Antonio, Texas. Follow him on Twitter @GiveMeYourTeeth.

L

We Didn’t Always Have the Checkpoints

eaves scuttled through the front door to join a litter of glass from the shattered TV screen. Drops of smashed Jack o’ Lantern dripped from the wall, adding to the disorder.

The creature the children had summoned watched the blaze on the hearth. The thing was tall, emaciated, with enormous, crimson eyes. It clicked its small pointed teeth together. Amid the fire rested the spirit board through which it had passed, now burnt and curled beyond recognition. Lifting a chocolate to its lips, it bit down and gazed despondently into the flames, wondering how it would ever get home again.

Lee Thomas is a Bram Stoker Award- and two-time Lambda Literary Award-winning author of more than 30 books.

His work has been translated into multiple languages and optioned for film.

You & Me

By Max Booth III

T

here is a shadow on the wall that belongs to nothing. Sometimes when you move, it also moves, but sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes it laughs without mak-

by Clayton Hackett

N

ot here anyway. At the border, yeah, but I can’t remember when they started here.

What? No, officer. Sorry, I was just thinking.

Yeah, born here.

Consent to search? Does it matter if I don’t?

Sorry, didn’t mean anything by it.

Yeah, I know him, but how did…

My messages?

Why flagged?

Yes, of course I’ll step out of the vehicle.

I don’t know what that is. You just dropped it— I didn’t, you just put it there…

Why are you taking me?

OK, OK, I’ll lie down!

Ow! Oh God, please no!

Stop!

Clayton Hackett is an attorney and short fiction writer whose work has appeared in Daily Science Fiction and the

arts Art © 2004 John Picacio, for BUMPER CROP by Joe R. Lansdale (Golden Gryphon). Used by permission.

Amazon.com best-selling anthology Alternative Apocalypse from B-Cubed Press. Previously, he has been an English teacher, photographer and alligator wrangler. He lives in San Antonio with his wife and children.

Broken

By Lori Michelle

H

ow could she have been so stupid? She sat, looking at her swollen purple ankle, knowing she wouldn’t be able to get up. Falling down the stairs of her basement had been pure carelessness. If only John hadn’t left her. If only she hadn’t decided to repair the house by herself. If only. The last two days had been hell, waiting for someone to answer her weak cries, hearing the shadows scuttle in the corners. The tears started falling as night crept in again. The whispers of death swirled in her ears. And then the rats began to nibble.

Lori Michelle is the co-owner of Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing and the editor-in-chief of Dark Moon Digest magazine. She formats books for several publishers and freelancers. In the evening, she is Ms. Lori, dance teacher extraordinaire. She lives in Cibolo with her life partner, daughter, son and two dogs. www.theauthorsalley.com

Golden Years

By R.L. Ugolini

A

breath, desperate and ragged, sucked through moist passages.

Next, a pause, all too fleeting.

Then, the inevitable exhalation, a sighing, world-weary wheeze, warm and spent.

Always, she waited, hoping the subsequent intake of air would not come. But it did. Every damn time. She’d told him his labored breathing was a nuisance, yet he refused to breathe quieter, for Pete’s sake.

This was not the retirement she had envisioned.

In the end, the act took so little, she was sorry she hadn’t done it sooner. It was briefly awful, then blissfully silent. Whoever said you can’t change other people?

R.L. Ugolini writes angry fiction and yells at her plants. Her work appears mostly in out-of-print journals and with defunct publishers, but some anthologies including her horror stories may still be found on Amazon, if you dare to look.

The Cure

By Sanford Allen

T

he woman entered the Fungus Man’s dank cave, a child cradled in her arms.

“My boy is dying,” she told the hunkered, misshapen figure. “Please help. They say your magic is strong.”

The Fungus Man lumbered closer, tilting his toadstool of a head to inspect the boy. “So, you want me to cure him of this human disease?”

The woman nodded.

The Fungus Man opened his slitted mouth and exhaled an ochre cloud of spores. The boy’s skin grew fibrous and mottled, his head warped, stretching into a mushroom cap. The

woman screamed.

“Is that not what you asked for?”

Sanford Allen’s alter ego edits an alternative media publication. His short stories have appeared in anthologies that have won or been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award. He’s also the author of the historical horror novel Deadly Passage.

Everyone Looks the Same in the Dark

By Michelle Muenzler ...is what she said, laughing, just before the cracking whine of a blown transformer snuffed out all the lights. Then there was nothing but rain heaving fist-like against the windowpanes and the high whistle of wind bending low the barely visible trees surrounding the property.

“Is that so?” I tried laughing too, but the pressure of something thick — slimy and toothed — circling my waist cut short the attempt.

I’d wondered what kind of woman picks up a complete stranger off the interstate just before a storm...

I didn’t have to wonder anymore.

Michelle Muenzler, known at local conventions as “The Cookie Lady,” writes fiction both dark and strange to counterbalance the sweetness of her baking. Her short fiction and poetry are hidden in numerous science fiction, fantasy and horror magazines, but the links at michellemuenzler.com will help you to unearth them.

Find more arts coverage every day at sacurrent.com

20

CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

arts

John Picacio

Homegrown Tricks and Treats

David Garcia

Creations of 7 San Antonio artists keep the Halloween spirit alive

BY BRYAN RINDFUSS

L

ike everything else in this godforsaken year, Halloween 2020 is going to look and feel very different.

If folks follow CDC guidelines, trick-ortreaters will practice social distancing and trade in costume masks for adapted cloth face coverings (good luck, Mom and Dad). Candy will also be distributed outdoors, eliminating the need to touch that filthy doorbell. And grownups will get sloshed in quaint groups, preferably with family or “pod” members.

As unfun all of that sounds, COVID can’t cancel Halloween. It is a spirit, a theme, an occasion open to interpretation. To prove that case, we rounded up seven local creatives who’ve been rolling with the punches of the pandemic and making spooktacular magic right at home in the Alamo City.

John Picacio

Local artist John Picacio is a celebrated force within the realm of sci-fi and fantasy illustration. The San Antonio native has created original artwork — typically graphite drawings he colors digitally — for more than 150 book covers, including for the Star Trek and X-Men franchises, and a calendar for George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series. An unexpected but well-received spinoff of his Lotería Grande series — a

contemporary, Texas-size version of the beloved card game — Picacio’s calavera mask is one of the many artistic twists born out of COVID. “I felt like people needed something kind of fun to wear during this pandemic,” Picacio said. “And it’s been very popular.”

Popular indeed: After selling out his first run of 1,000 masks, Picacio decided to “spin the wheel again” and make another thousand, which he says are selling steadily. “I love that it’s not just Mexican American people wearing it — it’s been embraced by people of all ethnicities. … It’s furthering that effort towards representation to where the culture is absorbed by all people … and that’s a really important thing.” $25, johnpicacio.com.

David Garcia

Through his award-winning floral design business Statue of Design and his eclectic Beacon Hill shop No. 9, David Garcia has proven himself as an artist with a distinct point of view. When the pandemic forced him to temporarily shutter No. 9, the Laredo transplant rose to the occasion with a series of San Antonio-centric puzzles. In preparation for the season at hand, Garcia partnered with local importer Maria Jose Fernandez Currie to stock the shop with wooden calaveras and Catrinas he packages into giftable kits complete with paint and paintbrushes ($50). But Gar-

Alexandria Kling

cia’s flair for dark drama is perhaps better evidenced by the arrangements he makes in two styles of ceramic skull vases: a small black vessel he fills with fresh marigolds in honor of Día de los Muertos ($30-$50) and a large white variety he fills with a seasonal assortment ($110-$150). $30-$150, no9floralandgifts.com.

Alexandria Kling

San Antonio native Alexandria Kling arrived early to the COVID mask game. At the onset of the pandemic, she enlisted nearly everyone in her family to help her sew 500-plus face coverings she donated to essential workers across San Antonio. That charitable endeavor earned her TV coverage that led more than a few moms to her kids’ clothing line Trendy Little Rebelz.

“I’m pretty much known for over-the-top outfits,” Kling told us over the phone while assembling a custom Medusa costume. “If someone’s going to Disney, they always hit me up for costumes or outfits for everyday life.” Drawing inspiration from Netflix’s summer blockbuster Tiger King, Kling recently whipped up sequined tiger-striped leotards and crop tops just in time for Halloween. While those, like many of her styles, are completely sold out — be on the lookout for trick-or-treaters dressed as Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin — Kling’s slightly irreverent approach to children’s attire can still be had in more casual offerings such as her Halloween-appropriate tie-dyed tees printed with the messages “I Put the Boo in Boujee” and “2020 Is Boo Sheet.” $20-$35, trendylittlerebelz.com.

Aaron Moreno

It all started with a slug. Not your garden variety, but sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT

21

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CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

SOMETHING

FOR

E V E RYO N E

arts

Anthony Diaz

the parasitic alien type that slithers into people’s mouths and zombifies them in the 1986 horror comedy Night of the Creeps. “I didn’t think anybody would care for it,” artist Aaron Moreno said of the first toy he designed. As luck would have it, people — including notable artists Alex Pardee and Skinner — didn’t just care for it, they bought it through Moreno’s Instagram page and reposted it on their own social media accounts. “I went from like 30 followers to 5,000, and then here comes 10,000,” Moreno said. A kid of the 1980s who “grew up in drive-in theaters,” Moreno painted murals before finding his niche in the realm of collectible toys. Since establishing Retroband Toys circa 2013, the San Antonio native has made toys for Columbia Pictures, Orion Films, Adult Swim and Cartoon Network as well as horror icons Clive Barker and George Romero. In addition to a nostalgic and often-gruesome aesthetic, one of the key aspects that sets Retroband apart is that Moreno takes an old-school approach, sculpting everything in wax by hand and having them fabricated in soft vinyl in limited runs. Whether small-scale ($25-$40) or large-format (up to $300), pretty much everything he creates for Retroband and its spinoff Deadly Delivery — a sinister riff on Mr. McFeely, the “speedy delivery” man from Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood — sells out quickly.

Aiming to capture some of the childlike excitement of Saturday morning cartoon time, Moreno releases new toys twice a month on Saturdays. Scheduled to drop at noon on Saturday, October 24, in an edition of 10, Moreno’s latest offering is SUFFER — a 12-inchtall monster rendered in black vinyl ($300). “It’s a blank, black figure, which is very sought-after. … You don’t really paint black, you kind of leave it alone and

Ray Tattooedboy

it looks mean and aggressive on your shelf.” $300, retrobandtoys.com.

Anthony Diaz

One half of the dynamic gay duo behind the family-owned favorite Karolina’s Antiques, local artist Anthony Diaz creates prints, stickers, T-shirts and accessories that playfully fuse pop culture icons with aspects of his Mexican American heritage. A prime example, his “Latinx Ears” place pan dulce and nopal pads atop headbands one might find in a Disneyland gift shop. Riddled with juxtapositions and mashups, his work — which he sells under the moniker The Lemon — is often conceptualized in collaboration with his brother and co-worker Uriel Diaz. “It’s usually just us looking at each other and shouting words,” Diaz said of their brotherly brainstorming sessions.

With Halloween in mind, the Diaz brothers found amusing ways to reference Beetlejuice, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Little Shop of Horrors, Mickey Mouse, Selena and Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s raunchy hit “WAP” in a tight collection of T-shirts. A standout, Diaz’s “Dreaming of You” T-shirt depicts Freddie Krueger’s finger knives clutching a rose. With a laugh, Diaz explained, “We love horror and we love Tejano music, so we really wanted to mash both of those worlds together.” $25-$30, karolinasantiques.com.

Ray Tattooedboy

Beloved local artist Ray “Tattooedboy” Scarborough has a knack for capturing San Antonio culture in graphic illustrations. Rendered in a cartoony yet reverent style, his work has graced Current covers celebrating everyone from Tim Duncan and Manu

Natazia Gustamante

Ginobili to Pee-wee Herman and Frida Kahlo. As a haunting toast to one of San Antonio’s favorite urban legends, Scarborough immortalized the Ghost Tracks — where a busload of kids were allegedly killed by a train only to return as benevolent ghosts who push stalled cars across the tracks to safety. “It’s been my favorite ghost story from San Antonio ever since I was a kid,” Scarborough said. “Going out there was a family tradition. … [I know] it’s an illusion, [but] I really try not to [read] too much into it because I like the magic of it.” Set for a limited release of 50 signed and numbered screen prints, The Ghost Track Kids will be up for grabs the week before Halloween. For purchasing details, stay tuned to the social media channels below. $35, instagram.com/tattooedboy123, facebook. com/ray.scarborough.

Natazia Gustamante

Beyond offering one of San Antonio’s most playful retail environments, beloved Olmos Park boutique Feliz Modern does a commendable job of stocking wares created by Texas artists. Among the goodies up for grabs this season are ghost piñatas designed by co-owner Mario Diaz and bat-shaped cocktail stirrers crafted by Austin maker Kara Whitten. When quizzed about what might fit best into this roundup, co-owner Ginger Diaz quickly elected the whimsical snake and skeleton earrings shop manager Natazia Gustamante has been making. “Jewelry has become a fun language for me to connect with people,” Gustamante explained. “I’m always thinking about random objects that can be made into something wearable … [and] I wanted to offer something affordable but also weird and cool.” $10-$12, felizmodern.com. sacurrent.com | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | CURRENT

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Documentarian Sabrina Van Tassel advocates for a new trial for convicted mother in The State of Texas vs.

Melissa

BY KIKO MARTINEZ

S

abrina Van Tassel had no interest in making a documentary about Harlingen resident Melissa Elizabeth Lucio, the first Latina to be sentenced to death in the state of Texas. From what the filmmaker had read, Lucio — who was found guilty in 2008 of killing her 2-year-old daughter Mariah — was an abusive mother who confessed to a horrific murder.

Then, Van Tassel met Lucio and her family.

Her opinion immediately changed.

“I was the very first journalist they had ever met in their life,” Van Tassel told said about her new documentary The State of Texas vs.

Melissa. “No one wanted to hear [Melissa’s] side of the story. Right away, I knew there was really something wrong with this story.”

What Van Tassel began to unravel was a complex narrative that many believe involves an unfair trial, a forced confession, incompetent lawyers, incomplete witness testimony and a district attorney who was later sentenced to 13 years in prison for bribery, extortion and racketeering.

Last year, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit overturned Lucio’s conviction.

The state appealed the decision and the hearing was delayed by the pandemic. For now, Lucio waits behind bars. Will her overturned conviction be upheld, or will she have to make a final appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and hope it hears the case?

The State of Texas vs. Melissa is currently streaming on VOD platforms.

What ultimately drew you to Melissa’s story?

My instincts told me that [Melissa] wasn’t the kind of person who could [kill her child].

I called her lawyer and she said she knew Melissa was innocent, but there was nothing they could do. She said I was too late and that [Melissa] was going to be executed within nine months to a year. So, I asked her to send me all the paperwork on her trials, and I started reading. I made calls to people and they would be like, “Oh, why are you interested in Melissa Lucio? Why her?” Melissa Lucio [represents] everything society despises — she’s a woman, Hispanic, poor, she has 14 children. Her life was worth nothing to them.

screens

Injustice System

Film Rise

It was like, “Ugh, let her rot in Hell.” That’s the reason I decided to tell her story.

Do you hope this film can help Melissa’s casemoving forward?

Definitely. So far, every single news article has helped her. From the very beginning of this project, I was like, “This woman is innocent.

What am I going to do? Go back to my life and forget about her?” What you see in the film are facts that have been presented at court and during her appeals. That’s enough evidence for her to get a new trial. Even if she had done what she’s accused of, she shouldn’t be on death row.

How would you describe Melissa when you interviewed her in prison?

She was very calm. Melissa is a very nice person. She is loved by other inmates and by the guards. She doesn’t get into fights. She is the best kind of inmate. She’s very lenient and truthful. The very first time I met Melissa, she told me that she doesn’t deserve to be on death row but she deserves to be where she is because she didn’t protect her daughter like she should have.

What is the current family dynamic between Melissa’s children since one of them, Alexandra, is accused in the film of being the actual perpetrator of the abuse of Mariah?

It’s kind of a mess. All the older siblings stick to the story that Alexandra had some issues

Melissa Lucio, the subject of a new documentary, was the first Latina sentenced to death in Texas.

M

with Mariah. Of course, Alexandra doesn’t see the same thing. There are one or two siblings who grew up with Alexandra who have her back. I interviewed most of [Melissa’s children] and none of them ever said, “We saw our mom [hit Mariah].” All the older kids are still very close to Melissa. They write to her and strongly believe she is innocent. They also believe they are third-class citizens who will not get justice because nobody is interested in their family.

Are you worried about Melissa’s case because of what is currently happening with the U.S. Supreme Court?

We are very worried because Donald Trump has appointed right-wing judges who are in favor of the death penalty and who tend to not want to deal with these cases. And in Texas, they execute. It’s not like in other states where you have years before the execution goes through. In Texas, it can go quite fast.

That’s why I want to make a lot of noise about her story. Melissa wouldn’t be on death row if she wasn’t poor or Hispanic. There is already something wrong with the U.S. justice system. It is unjust and unfair. But if we execute Melissa Lucio, there is really something wrong with the U.S. justice system.

Find more film stories at sacurrent.com

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CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

food

Moving Beyond General Tso A new generation of chefs and restauranteurs is upping San Antonio’s Chinese food game

BY JOSH FEOLA

C

hinese food” in San Antonio has historically meant American Chinese staples such as General Tso’s chicken, a dish with contested origins that first rose to culinary fame in Manhattan in the 1970s. The dish reflects America’s love for all things sticky-sweet and deep-fried, and it shares space in the pantheon of American Chinese staples with other items that you can find at your neighborhood Chinese restaurant, cream cheese-filled wontons and starch-thickened egg drop soup among them.

American Chinese food is as diverse as America itself: Missouri has the egg foo young St. Paul sandwich and Boston its “Peking ravioli.”

Likewise, Chinese food within China is incredibly varied, with eight major regional culinary traditions. I lived for nine years in Beijing, where hearty bread dumplings called baozi and starchy meat and vegetables dishes from northeastern China helped chase away the winter cold. I spent two more years in Shanghai, which favors the lighter, subtler palates of culinary traditions in nearby Jiangsu and Zhejiang — it’s hard to come by American-style thick-glazed dishes in Shanghai.

Fortunately, San Antonio’s understanding of Chinese cuisine has expanded greatly over the past several years. From restaurants zooming in on regionally specific Chinese foodways to a new generation of San Antonio chefs seeking to articulate a locally rooted cuisine drawing on pan-Asian influences, the city’s access to both traditional and novel takes on Chinese cuisine is growing.

One newcomer to the scene is Shifu Noodle, which specializes in dishes from Sichuan province in Southwestern China. Co-founders Chrystal Yi and Wendy Jiang signed a contract on the space a few days before the pandemic, opened in August, and have done a booming trade since, serving regional specialties including crispy wok-fried green beans and numbing, spicy dandan noodles.

“People from a younger generation like us are willing to try new things,” says Yi, an Incarnate Word University graduate who’s been in San Antonio for eight years. She’s originally from Hunan province, which like Sichuan, is famous for its spicy food. “It’s the

Instagram / Sichuan House

same in China nowadays — the restaurant industry is having a revolution, and traditional restaurants are [finding it] hard to compete due to new business concepts and changing tastes.”

Shifu Noodle taps the same culinary vein as Sichuan House, which has been serving San Antonio high-quality Sichuanese fare since 2015. One of that restaurant’s biggest early challenges was to expand what customers understood about the food on the menu, says co-owner Kristina Zhao.

“We put so much effort into people experiencing the culture, the family-style eating, the opportunity to connect with our guests and explain where these dishes come from,” she says.

Before the pandemic, 85% of Sichuan House’s business was dine-in, with emphasis placed on “finding ways to bridge the cultural gap,” such as referring to pig intestines with the more locally familiar term “tripas.”

“Those interactions are so important in getting people to try something new,” Zhao says.

Beijing-born San Antonio resident Ming Qian entered the culinary scene in 2011 with what remains her signature item: the sloopy, a steamed bun that places a Chinese flavor profile (star anise, ginger and scallion) into a format familiar to the Texan palate (a pulledpork taco). She successfully opened the second location of her restaurant Ming’s Thing last month, crediting the ingenuity of her staff, some of whom come from the nearby Culinary Institute of America (CIA).

Rob Martinez is one of the CIA graduates creating new dishes at Ming’s, where the menu draws on East and Southeast Asian influences. Martinez’s mother was the head chef of a Mexican restaurant in San Antonio,

and his stepfather was a military cook during Vietnam. After graduating from CIA in 2018 and completing an externship at Momofuku Ma Peche in New York, Martinez landed a part-time job at Ming’s Thing that turned into a full-time managerial role this year.

“During my time at Ming’s, I’ve seen such a different feeling and overall readiness to embrace change in flavor, but also change in dining experience,” Martinez says. He added that generational “shifts in management,” such as Kristina Zhao’s work at Sichuan House, have resulted in more modern takes on Asian food and a “hip edge to traditional Chinese flavors and dishes.”

Another restaurant braving the pandemic for a November opening is Best Quality Daughter, a “New Asian American” concept from Jennifer Hwa Dobbertin and Quealy Watson of Tenko Ramen in the Pearl. Dobbertin’s family ran an American diner when she was growing up, but after work hours, she ate Chinese food prepared by her mother. She describes her new venture as “a mishmash of what it is to be a child of a hybrid immigrant American family.”

The menu will feature a few China-Texas hybrids, including breakfast taco dumplings and a red-braised beef rib prepared barbecue-style. Dobbertin says there’s an “eagerness to learn” in the Alamo City’s culinary scene.

“San Antonio is eager for our-generation Asian American food,” she adds.

Sichuan House’s Kristina Zhao echoes the sentiment: “There’s more representation in the city, and that’s exciting. … I’m really glad to see that there is an increase in awareness of the varieties of authenticity, and the acceptance of wanting to try new things.”

Find more food & drink news at sacurrent.com

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CURRENT | October 21 – November 5, 2020 | sacurrent.com

music

music | music picks

Instagram / Saliva

Guillermina Zabala

END OF DAYS FEST

NINA DIAZ

The aptly titled End of Days Fest is about to hit San Antonio like a hurtling comet. Headlining the two-day heavy music fest are nu-metal stalwarts Saliva, best known for their hit “Click Click Boom,” and Ellefson, the solo project of Megadeth bassist David Ellefson. The concert also features a bevy of regional and San Antonio-based talent including metal core heavy-hitters Ammo for My Arsenal. However, we recommend staying out of the mosh pit this time, y’all. You don’t wanna get the COVID. $20-$250, Noon-midnight, Historic Sunset Station,1174 E. Commerce St., (210) 474-7640, sunsetstation.com. — Chris Conde

Nina Diaz, frontwoman of beloved San Antonio indie act Girl in a Coma, was one of countless performers unable to share their art live during the pandemic. Thankfully, livestreamed concerts, including the upcoming #iVoted music festival, in which she’s slated to perform, have been a lifeline for both musicians and fans. The event is being billed as the largest single-day digital concert to date. Beyond Diaz, the 600 featured acts will include SA-based funk duo Cadillac Muzik and scene-boi pop group 3OH!3, best known for its 2008 bop “DONTTRUSTME.” Free with RSVP, ivotedfestival.com. — CC

Friday, October 30-October 31

Wednesday, October 28 AARON LEWIS & SULLY ERNA

A match made in nu-metal heaven, Staind frontman-turned-country-singer Aaron Lewis and Godsmack vocalist Sully Erna will descend on the Alamo City for their American Drive-In Tour. Lewis, you may remember, told a Rio Grande Valley audience last year that he “doesn’t speak Spanish.

I’m American.” Not exactly the best way to win favor with South

Tuesday, November 3

Texans. Sold out, 7 p.m., Bud Light Courtyard at the AT&T Center, One AT&T Center Parkway, (210) 4445000, attcenter.com. — CC

Friday, October 30Saturday, October 31

Friday, October 30

Virtual Riot and Cash Cash headline the second installment of this locally grown, socially distanced electronic music fest.

The drive-in festivities include more than just a two-day lineup of music, though. There’s also a fireworks show at the end of each night, and live theatrical performers, including stilt walkers and fire breathers, will be among

RAUL MALO

Multi-genre artist Raul Malo will ride into town a solo performance apart from his usual band, retro-twang stalwarts The Mavericks. $30-$125, 5 p.m., John T. Floore Country Store, 14492 Old Bandera Road, (210) 695-8827, liveatfloores.com. — CC

EDM DRIVE-IN VOL.2: HALLOWEEN SPOOKTACULAR

the visual stimuli. $238.15-535.84, 7 p.m., Freeman Coliseum, 3201 E. Houston St., (210) 226-1177, freemancoliseum.com. — CC

Saturday, October 31 NIGHTBIRD

This Sam’s Burger Joint mainstay tribute act will return for a show packed with clever covers of Fleetwood Mac and Stevie Nicks classics. $60-$175, 7:30 p.m., Sam’s Burger Joint, 330 E. Grayson St., (210) 223-2830, samsburgerjoint.com. — CC

Reminder:

Although live events have returned, the COVID-19 pandemic is still with us. Check with venues to make sure scheduled events are still happening, and please follow all health and safety guidelines.

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