Stan Ascher

DENTON TX — How are people surviving in this difficult economy? Gregory Lange, owner of the Little D guitar shop in Denton, does it by growing slowly, staying out of debt, and forging ties to the community.

PLANO TX  — Lisa J’s 14-year-old son Lane overdosed on drugs last October. (She wishes to hide her last name to protect the identity of her son.)

He had been robo-tripping, a fad among teens in which they consume cough syrups that contain the drug Dextromethorphan, like Robitussin DM, in excess. On one occasion, he swallowed 40 capsules, and ended up in the hospital.

DALLAS — The Family Gateway Center in Dallas, a homeless shelter for Dallas County families with children under 17 years old, has launched a new two-part training program to help homeless people get jobs in the food service industry.

It's part of their Gateway to Jobs program, which offers job readiness classes and job search assistance to adults. It runs for 12 weeks and is offered in conjunction with El Centro College, where students learn how to work in a commercial kitchen.

The North Texas Exes, NT's alumni association, announced Friday it will renew efforts to reach out to both alumni and current students by increasing its online and campus-wide presence. 

This new approach of connecting students to the association is spearheaded by Derrick Morgan, the new executive director of the Exes.

"We're looking to increase the value of the degrees earned here at UNT," he said.

Morgan said that the Exes have started a group on the social networking Web site, LinkedIn.com.

DALLAS — Abbie Chesney knows what it's like to be hungry. She also knows what it's like to be depressed. When the Dallas native was 16 and a student at Lake Highlands High School, she fell into a cycle: She would stop eating to make herself feel better, but then feel worse because she was not eating. So she'd abstain from eating even more.

"If I didn't eat, I would focus on the fact that I was so hungry, and not think about being depressed," she says.

PLANO TX— On a cold afternoon in January, Dr. John Pippin stood with more than 100 people outside a veterinarian’s office in Plano being sprayed with water while protesting the alleged sale of puppy milled dogs by the Petland Corporation.

Said veterinarian, who certifies animals for Petland stores in the area so they can be sold, decided to turn the lawn sprinklers on the crowd of protesters standing in the cold wind.

DESOTO TX — Cindy Herb says she was nine when she was sexually assaulted while delivering newspapers. "This man came up to me and asked me to help him find his cat, and then, the next thing I knew, I was being raped," she says.

Shortly after that, she said that her father fondled her. But according to Cindy, the worst part of the whole ordeal was being silenced by her mother. "My mother refused to talk about it -- it was like I was at war," she says.