Former Cowboy Daryl “Moose” Johnston will present “Rebound and Recovery Concussion Discussion” at the Center for Brain Health at the University of Texas at Dallas on Tuesday.
“With sports programs gearing up across the country, it’s important that parents, teachers, coaches and other adult supervisors understand concussions and how to handle them should a child or teen they know experience one,” said Johnston. “People immediately think of football when they think of concussions but other sports such as soccer and activities like cheerleading are potential environments for head injuries.”
To purchase tickets to the Aug. 31 event, visit concussiondiscussion.eventbrite.com.

Parents are facing more and more challenges in protecting their kids. Dallas Children’s Advocacy Center is providing a remarkable opportunity to learn from experts in child protection this Sunday. With The 22nd Annual Crimes Against Children Conference kicking off Monday, DCAC has managed to have some of the conference experts arrive a day early for “Keeping Our Children Safe In The Real & Virtual World.”

Featuring sessions from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Sheraton Dallas, topics will include “Back To School: Why Educating Parents Is Key To Keeping Kids Safe Online” and “Protecting Yourself And Your Family On The Internet.”

One especially poignant segment will be “Staying Safe: Advice From A Survivor” featuring “a moving story by abuse survivor John Warnick, who was molested for six years by his trusted soccer coach.”

So, if you work with children or have kiddos, you would benefit from a Sunday afternoon learning from the best. Registration fee is $29.

Highland Park’s very own Talmage Boston will be breaking down the Rangers’ bankruptcy proceedings at 6 p.m. on Channel 8 for those of us who still haven’t a clue as to what’s going on.

Will Nolan Ryan actually own the team? What’s the bidding process? Can anyone bid? How will all the debts with the league be settled? Will Boston answer all of these questions?

On the last one, your guess is as good as mine. Otherwise, I’m just hoping that, no matter the new owner, it will still be time.

Short on friends? It’s your lucky day. You can rent one. Just enter your zip code and find someone like Richmond, he’s available to the friendless from 75205. He’s 24 years old and is available for prom dates or to be your wingman. He’ll give you advice and introduce you to people. As if you weren’t already sold, he also has a driver’s license and is available to run errands or be friends with the handicapped or disbaled.

If you’ve been in the Park Cities long, I expect you’ve either met, seen, and/or been smiled at — warmly —  by Liz Healy. A University Park native and the effervescent sister of a certain local Realtor (Rogers), Healy, 25, is SMU’s former student body president, too, and scarce to meet a stranger.

You can read up on hireastang.com, her newly launched business to connect odd-job seekers with employers (slogan: “There’s a Stang For That”),  in our last issue of Park Cities Two. In the meantime, some news from Healy: A Words With Friends tournament sponsored by her site netted $1,000 in its first day for Genesis Women’s Shelter.

“Should be fun to see how it pans out,” writes Healy, who went on to relay the following:

The official WWF Facebook fan page found out about it and I got a personal e-mail from someone at Newtoy, Inc., the developers of the game. They ended up posting it on the page, and now I have players from 14 different states! Just from their post, I had about 500 new hits on my website. Aaahhh, the power of Facebook …

Then came a love story, aided along by one of the website’s gimme shirts. Really.

HireAStang helped with a marriage proposal on Saturday! My friend needed an excuse to get his girlfriend to campus so he could propose, so I told her I needed her there to take a pic in one of my HireAStang T-shirts and she bought it! They went together, met the photographer, then I called to say I was running late but they should go ahead and get some cute shots first. When they started taking pics, my friend dropped to one knee and popped the question! She said yes, of course. They’re both good friends of mine so that was a lot of fun.

Perhaps you’ve heard of the DFW Most Powerful list. It’s already been made fun of on the Observer and D Magazine blogs.

Take this for what it’s worth, but Jerry Jones is the highest-ranked Park Cities resident. The Cowboys’ owner and general manager has the No. 7 slot, two ahead of fellow Highland Park resident Harlan Crow.

The most powerful person in University Park, according to this list, is SMU benefactor Gerald J. Ford, who came in at No. 12, right behind Mark Cuban. (The Mavericks’ owner lives in Preston Hollow, as do six of the top 10 people on this list.)

So earlier this week, I plugged the blog site of a neighborhood group that opposes construction of a new parking lot at Highland Park Presbyterian Church. To be fair, you should probably see this, too, from HPPC — it’s a newly updated project page (from whence I lifted the illustration above) full of plans that will be distributed in hard copy to churchgoers.

Thoughts?

I got a call today from Karen Vandermeer with Neighbors For the Preservation of the Neighborhood, in University Park. At issue, if you’ll recall, is a proposed new parking lot for Highland Park Presbyterian Church — one that could involve demolition of some church-owned houses, and which has surrounding residents fired up about aesthetics, potential harm to property values, and HPPC’s relationship with the community in general.

I’ve yet to confirm anything on the church’s end, but Vandermeer tells me HPPC’s governing body voted 23-14 last night to move forward with rezoning for parts of University and McFarlin, and that plans could be in the works within about a week. Meanwhile, she said, more than 80 yards in the nine-block area surrounding HPPC now sport the sign you see above.

Click here to see the neighborhood committee’s blog.

UPDATE: Rezoning progress confirmed. To see design plans and renderings of the proposed changes, drop by HPPC’s welcome center.

Your intrepid reporter is camped out at the Cafe Brazil at North Central and Fondren. Besides being crowded with SMU students clad in sweatpants and bedhead, this place is full of Parkies looking for some hot coffee, good food, free Internet, and a spare table to set their Louis Vuitton purse.

I just spoke to a couple from Lakewood who said that this was their third try for a place to charge their phones and check e-mail. Coffee shops and restaurants with power outlets and free Internet are all packed. Another nearby gal asked if we knew how many people were without power, or when it would be restored.

Know of a good spot to wait out the power outage? Share in the comments.

Obviously, we jumped the gun by shutting down Overheard before we had worked out all the kinks on this site. Please bear with us.