Cover Story
Weed Killers
Last Wednesday morning, in a remote valley of the rugged Trinity Mountains, a couple dozen volunteers pulled their cars onto the dusty gravel road that dead-ends between the South Fork Trinity River and the Hyampom Airport. “Airport” may be too strong. It’s a landing strip, 1,250-feet high, in the middle of the Trinity National Forest.…
Mushrooms at Moonstone
It happens. You finally go out for a fancy meal on the town and you freeze up — what to order? The special? The signature dish? Good God, what if someone at the table orders something better than what you’re having? If you find yourself in a panic (or just disoriented by the view) at…
Meet Your Next Eureka Councilmember via Facebook, Vol. 1
UPDATE: Albin’s Facebook page seems to have disappeared: Original post: In less than a month, Eureka Mayor Frank Jager will select one of three candidates who have thrown their names in the hat, hoping to replace 5th Ward representative Lance Madsen on the Eureka City Council. Yesterday we showed you the applications each candidate submitted…
Paul Gallegos Will Not Run for Re-election
In a curiously unheralded note, Paul Gallegos announced that he will not run for Humboldt County District Attorney in 2014. The Journal received a message a few minutes ago, emailed by Gallegos’ executive assistant, with no subject line and a pdf simply titled “press release thank you.” Read his. Arnie Klein is the only candidate so far…
Higher Edcuation
Oops. Humboldt State University students Sebastian Hedberg and John Ferrara noticed something amiss after a respray of the curb outside the College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences dean’s office.
Fieri Sighting!
The spiky-haired version of Where’s Waldo has begun. Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives crew has made camp and is filming over at Paul’s Live from New York in Eureka. The man in the Oakley’s is in the kitchen filming with Paul this very moment. Nobody will say what they’re cooking up back there (my…
Developer Group Seeks to Rewind General Plan Update
In the wake of the recent rewrites of the guiding principles for the county’s general plan update, a politically active contractor association is asking the county to rewind the entire update process by sending the plan back to the county planning commission, a body that’s been stacked with the group’s political allies. The Humboldt Builders’…
Ease Up on the Spigots: Water District Turning off Flows Wednesday
Maybe take your shower in the rain tomorrow morning? The Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District is asking its customers to conserve water Wednesday while it shuts off its water supply for repairs. That includes homes and businesses in Arcata, Eureka, Blue Lake, McKinleyville, Manila and those served by the Humboldt Community Services District and Fieldbrook-Glendale…
Cycling Champs!
It must be our steep, steep hills whose harshest training trails were shaped by the original quick skidders, those ax-felled sylvan behemoths. The twists and turns were enhanced later by maniacal cyclists, we presume. And now our latest generation of bicyclists up at Humboldt State University has made cycling history, according to news from HSU…
UPDATE: Eureka Council Candidates Named
UPDATED: Read the applications submitted by all three candidates . There are officially three candidates in the running for a soon-to-be-vacated council seat from Eureka’s Fifth Ward. They are: Chet Albin, who’s currently the vice chair of the Eureka Planning Commission; Leslie Lollich, a spokeswoman for the Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services; and…
Calf Saved After Falling out of a Truck on Highway 101
Arcata Exchange owner Gene Joyce is a lot of things. Businessman. Family man. Scout leader. Member of various boards. Bat N’ Rouge player. Probably more. But today, he added another to the list: Baby cow rescuer. From Joyce’s FB page: To the person that was driving south on 101 in Arcata around noon with the…
Last Day to Apply for the Eureka City Council
Today’s the deadline to get your name in the running for Eureka’s Fifth Ward council seat. Lance Madsen announced last month he will step down once a replacement is named. At the council’s Nov. 5 meeting, councilmembers agreed unanimously to select a replacement for the Fifth Ward seat, according to the Times-Standard, thereby avoiding the $30,000 to $35,000 it…
From the Hum: Seriously Good Andrew Bird
The simply wonderful Andrew Bird performs in the Van Duzer Theatre tonight. Since his early days of success, Bird has continued his quirky musical odyssey tripping down his own jazz-indie-folk path without being really exactly any one of those things. He’s also a hell of a whistler. Please enjoy the above video, “Give it Away.”…
From the Hum: The Logger Celebrates, Sold-Out Mr. Humboldt to Live Stream, The Meat Puppets at Hum Brews, Jay Arner to Prettify the Alibi
Long live the Logger! Saturday offers a chance to celebrate one of the most exciting resurrections in Blue Lake’s history — the return of the Logger Bar. One year ago, winsome Kate Martin and her crew recreated and reopened the bar and the community leapt for joy in response. Go help them celebrate with LaPatinas…
Here Comes the Judge
Miss seeing Marty L’Herault drive the horse and carriage around Old Town? Catch him on Tuesday, Nov. 26 at 7 p.m on the Investigation Discovery Channel. (Wait, do you have that at home? Make arrangements.) L’Herault, who left us to pursue a career in acting last year, will appear in the “Judge, Jury, and Executioner”…
SF Giants Hall of Famer Makes Store’s Grand Opening Relevant
The Bayshore Mall has added a couple of stores to its exterior this month (don’t worry, the inside still looks like an ’80s ghost town). ULTA Beauty and Sports Authority both have grand openings this weekend, Nov. 15-17 and Nov. 17 respectively. Keeping with the modern tradition of luring shoppers into their stores with the…
Kai the Homefree Hitchhiker Indicted For Murder
Caleb McGillvary, who called himself “Kai the Homefree Hitchhiker,” charmed and alarmed us when he burst on the news scene with his ax-wielding heroics and then made it onto the Jimmy Kimmel show. For a spell, before going east, he hung out at the Arcata Plaza and up at Humboldt State University, and he called…
RIP: The Hardest Working Man in Humboldt County
Hard-toiling exercise fanatic, exuder of tact and charm and recognizable recycler Ken Kyle has died. If you’ve been in Humboldt long, you probably saw him working. His familiar pickup trucks sported an assortment of barrels, bags and boxes always filled — or about to be filled — with recycling; 10,000 pounds of glass a week during…
From the Hum: Dick Dale Destroys Winema Theatre while Matt Beard Busts Live Art
Dick Dale and his band perform “Miserlou” aka “That song from Pulp Fiction” Tonight offers an especially cool event. As if the eardrum-destroying, genre-defining-surf-guitar-master Dick Dale at Scotia’s amazing Winema Theatre wasn’t enough, Eureka’s own AidCurrent artist Matt Beard will be live-arting the show. The artwork he creates that night will be available to the highest…
Big Talk
You know that TED Talk you watched and live-tweeted and re-posted and how you wished we could do something like that here? Well, you might have magical powers, because on Sunday Nov. 17 at noon, 22 speakers are taking the stage at the Arcata Theatre Lounge for TEDxYouth@HumboldtBay ($50, $10 for people under 25). It’s…
Peat Miner Must Pay
A complaint filed over a long-time allegedly illegal peat-moss mining operation in Bridgeville has resulted in two Humboldt County residents — peat moss miner Daniel Wojcik and landowner Robert Wotherspoon — entering felony and misdemeanor pleas yesterday for violations of the Surface Mining and Recovery Act and Lake and Streambed Alteration permitting process and of…
Humboldt County is About to See More Feds Hunting Marijuana
As we reported last year, Humboldt County Sheriff Mike Downey has long been asking the federal government for help tracking down and arresting marijuana growers, and now he’s gonna get it. Today the White House announced that Humboldt County has been lumped into the Northern California “High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area,” or HIDTA. What does that …
Correction
In last week’s Field Notes Dr. Peter Higgs was incorrectly identified as Scottish. He is British. And, in the cover story, the photographer who took Dr. Rosa Rangel’s picture was incorrectly identified; Esther Wu took the photo. The Journal sincerely regrets the errors.
Mr. Humboldt
When somebody puts on a Mr. Humboldt pageant, you go. Beauty pageants are passé (does anybody even protest those things anymore?), but consider the possibilities. Dreads? Flannel? Tattoos? Indie musician or burly lumberjack? Hipster or hip waders? Mountain biker or mountain man? Trim beard or trim job? Go ahead and peruse the candidates, who range…
Fired up
Were one to judge by the first moments of last Wednesday’s presentation on new firearm regulations, Humboldt County gun owners would appear to be an extraordinarily polite set of people. Dozens of them, many wearing Mossy Oak camo, jammed into Pacific Outfitters in Eureka. Every folding chair was quickly filled so staff dragged ice chests…
Smoke Organic
This week’s cover story goes digging around in the contaminated dirt of a trespass marijuana grow site deep in the Trinity National Forest. Last August, law enforcement confiscated more than 5,000 plants at the site, which was likely maintained by five or six men. Only one was arrested — a 21-year-old Mexican man who’s already…
Brave the Elements
Crisp fall nights, increased chances of rain — this is the time of year when I once again wonder why none of Humboldt County’s many venues offer coat checks. Wouldn’t you happily pay a few dollars to leave your coat in a safe, clean spot rather than slung over the back of a chair, hooked…
Bakers, Mustard Makers Break Free
When Mary Ann Hytken needed surgery two years ago, she began asking herself bigger questions. “The surgery gave me time to think about what I really wanted to do,” says Hytken, a former junior high English teacher. Faced with her own mortality, her mind turned to an unlikely source of inspiration: banana bread. Or, more…
Third Friday McKinleyville Arts Night
A celebration of local art and artists, music, food and fun. McKinleyville Arts Night is open for all McKinleyville businesses to display work from local artists on the third Friday of each month. For more information, call 834-6460 or visit www.mckinleyvilleartsnight.com. 1) CALIFORNIA REDWOOD COAST-HUMBOLDT COUNTY AIRPORT 3561 Boeing Ave. Works by Robert Benson, Floyd…
Timed Out
Previews ABOUT TIME. I like Rachel McAdams and dislike most of her movies in nearly equal measure. Not that she picks bad projects, but she tends not to stray from the very-beaten path of romantic comedy. And it is a rare rom-com indeed that satisfies my weird predilections. I harbored some hope for About Time,…
November Gardening
Though that primal urge to get out in the garden isn’t as strong now as it was in spring, November is one of the most active months in the garden, just because there’s so much to prepare before the winter weather arrives. Pruning and cleanup, some judicious fertilizing and the start of bare-root season are…
Pixels or Paper?
An article in the Nov. 2013 issue of Scientific American magazine confirms what most of us already know: We prefer reading words on paper to the screens of e-readers (Kindles, Nooks, etc.) and tablets (iPads, Galaxys, etc.). More than 100 comparative studies over the past 20 years in the U.S., U.K., Taiwan, Sweden, Norway, France…
concerning the rights of mother earth
it’s not the comforting heat of the hot sheet metal of the car door under an arm propped out the open window — the panamints on the right — speeding toward stovepipe wells. — a self-shattering dream. you know what i mean. the unease is palpable in the weight we all carry. our collective breath:…
Towering Beauty
Editor: The Blog Jammin’ by Heidi Walters from Wednesday, Oct. 23 (“Human Intervention”) had me thinking about a topic I have discussed with friends and acquaintances on occasion: What would it take to beautify the Eureka water tower with a mural or something? The tower is a town landmark that can be seen far and…
Science. Pfft.
Editor: The most obvious conclusion to be drawn from the construction of the Large Hadron Collider (“God Particle or Goddamn Particle,” Nov. 7) is that scientists are very persuasive people. European scientists have convinced their struggling taxpayers to spend billions of euros on this massive project which will yield results only these scientists can understand…
A Better Idea
Editor: Polite people in Guy Fawkes masks are complaining about how the government tramples our constitutional rights. Well, I, too, am worried about the government taking too much power. The NSA surveillance and spying scandals alarm me. The drone program is a terrifying example of government overreach — judge, jury and firing squad rolled up…
Thanks, T
Kudos to the Journal and to Heidi Walters for her well-written and well-researched article about medical providers (“Come Hither, Dear Doc,” Nov. 7). Terence Marlow, Trinidad
Story Time
Nothing beats a good story, and the weekend is bursting with them. On Friday Nov. 15 at Crush, settle in for Jeff DeMark’s annual one-man show Writing My Way Out of Adolescence at 8 p.m. ($10, $40 with dinner) and find out how he made it. On Saturday Nov. 16,, take a trip to the…
