This weekend (Saturday, May 9) is the amazing Houston, Texas Art Car Parade, where you can see the sorts of cars that I described in an earlier post, Baby You Can Drive My (Art) Car.
I’m actually going to be in the Houston area that day but I’ll miss it, because I’ll be climbing around the battleship Texas on a special below-decks “hard hat tour,” doing some research for an upcoming article in Texas Highways magazine (the publication also has an excellent Texas travel blog.)
Honk and wave for me, will you?
One of the members of the group C.R.A.S.S. spewed the foulest profanities towards the crowd while skating down Allen Parkway during the parade. Destinee Moore a member of the group C.R.A.S.S. had an outburst and cursed loudly towards the crowd and directly at my children. At least six other families with children who were subject to her most vile behavior Saturday said that they were also offended. Her behavior was offensive. No one said anything to this woman. She just started spewing profanity while skating down the road while tethered to the C.R.A.S.S. float, wearing a C.R.A.S.S shirt. I really thought this was supposed to be a good natured family event, not a venue for its participants to spout vulgar words at a crowd filled with children. Several little girls thought she was talking to them screaming things like, “(Profanity…) get out of here, you’re not welcome at this parade”. She made small children cry intentionally, it was cruel, unnecessary and shocking. What an awful representation of the Orange Show and other good people involved. I have attended the parade for 17 years and to have this type of behavior scar innocent children who were there with their families is a shame. If this is a representation of the direction the art car parade is going, what a huge disappointment it would be to the other decent people who are involved and attend the event each year.
Hi Dawn,
Wow, I’m really sorry to hear that. The event always draws some, er, unique people along with unique cars, but this seems like an isolated event. Hope it doesn’t turn families off to the parade (or the ArtCar Museum, which might be a more controlled environment.)
Hi Sheila,
Apparently this was an isolated event. The good people with the Orange Show have assured me that it won’t happen again. I hope not. A lot of kids attend the event annually and it is a wonderful event. I hope the people who were near me and had to endure this woman’s outburst and who were as offended as I was will return to the parade next year. My family and I will continue to support both the Orange Show, the Art Car Museum, the Art Car Parade and various events the Orange Show is involved in throughout the year. We will not allow one person’s lack of sense deter us from supporting one of our community’s wonderful groups such as the Orange Show. Hopefully next year’s parade will be free of nonsense!
The comments made by Mrs. Frielinghausen are defamatory and false. Orange Show has been contacted regarding these accusations. Please remove these comments as they are a direct personal attack and use a person’s full name. The Houston Press and Houston Chronicle have both been kind enough to remove the spammed comment from their pages and removed DM’s name from their websites. Thank you for your cooperation.
OK, Nikki, thanks for your input but I’m not removing anything. That’s not how I operate on this blog – if the language is reasonably civil, people can have their back-and-forth and readers can decide for themselves who to believe.
They can also leave the blog and go search for additional sources and data about who said what, which would be fine as I have “no dog in this fight.”
Bottom line for me as a travel blogger – the ArtCar event is worthy of attention and attendance.
I agree that the Art Car Parade is an extremely worthwhile and amazing event. While the language may be civil, the action itself is not. Allowing someone’s full name to be posted in relation to such a harsh (and false) accusation just seems like a terrible thing to do. I do, however, understand you stance in wanting to further the hit count on your blog.
Best of luck on that.
I’m now closing comments on this post, which is supposed to be about the Art Car Parade and not devolve into a “who said what in Houston.”
Dawn, I know you submitted another long comment in response to Nikki’s comment, but I really do not want my blog (which I think of as my house) becoming a platform for arguments about some other woman’s actions and whether they occurred or not on the day of the parade.
Y’all take your discussion elsewhere, please. Start blogs or something.
For all the other readers, just go see the danged event, but any verbal or actual brawling that occurs there is out of my control.