Top picks of the week:

Inkognegro writes about abandonment, about being a father and being a son, and about learning about your father after he’s gone in a post that lays it all on the line …Emily at the Balcom Ad Agency blog writes about how she feels about her tattoos …

Battling Episcopalians

Newly installed Bishop  Edwin F. Gulick Jr. has sent a letter to Fort Worth Episcopalian Clergy who have stated their intention to leave the American Episcopal church with Bishop Iker, asking them to reaffirm their desire to defect to the Provence of the Southern Cone which is headquartered in South America. For more on the rather bizzare legal battle about who actually is the REAL Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, see a post by Virtue Online (written by conservatives). The more-liberal Episcopal Life Online blog last covered the story in November 2008.

Arts and Leisure:

Dave at Dallas photoworks has done some creatively colorful flower photography out at the Colony

Fort Worth Hole in the Wall goes to the Swiss Pastry Shop and by the time you’re halfway through the review you’ll want to go, too … Austin checks out Berri Blu, a healthy yogurt place on Camp Bowie.

Fort Worth South began it’s Fridays on the Green concert series, according to Fortworthology, and Ellerbie’s Fine Foods has opened this week …Julie at Silversmyth is designing a cute silver mouse pendant … with more to come soon.

The Amon Carter Museum blog reminds us that it was June 6, 1944 when Amon Carter handed over the deed to the land for Big Bend national park, after he and the Star-Telegram spearheaded the drive to purchase the land.

Education:

The Extra Credit blog reports:  A high school senior from Mansfield won a national contest to decorate a fiberglass cow.

Politics, etc:

Fort Worth Can Do continues its exploration of urban gas drilling,referring to a New York Times story on methane emissions and cattle about how dairy farmers are cleaning up their act. Why, they ask, can’t Chesapeake energy do the same?

Fort Worth is becoming more bike friendly than Dallas, according to Bike Friendly Oak Cliff blog in Dallas.

Social Media and PR:

Richie Escovedo has a post that comprises a #chat group on twitter. That means he’s posted an entire tagged thread on his blog using a site called Scribd... it happens to cover Public Relations types taking the PRSA exam. An interesting idea to get tweeted information to non-twitter uses, which there are, of course, a lot of. Now if I could just have a thread for experienced teachers to tell those of us currently looking for a first job how to handle that, it would be great.