January’s Arts Alive! is as notorious for its low attendance as the December one is for its celebratory crowd — especially when it falls two days into the new year, two days before the official end of the holiday season. People can be forgiven for opting to stay home polishing their resolutions and packing up […]
Jennifer Savage
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Insolvency Resolved
The confession took place, as they do, at a dinner party turned late-night wine-flavored gabfest. The blonde leaned in closer, voice dropping: "I’m overdrawn — again. It’s crazy. If you knew how much I’ve paid in overdraft charges this year …" Others nodded. One whispered a four-figure amount. "It is crazy," she agreed. None of […]
Posted inNews
Buy local! Holiday gift sure to please
Because what could be better than a piece of Absynth? Quintet, that is. Would you like to give a friend a slot as the sixth member of Humboldt’s renowned* gypsy-jazz-string-happy Absynth Quintet? Or have the erstwhile male models** follow them about for part of a day a la Jonathan Richman in Something About Mary? Or […]
Posted inArts + Scene
No Limits
Ask people and most will agree adolescence is an especially intense time. Feelings overwhelm; desire consumes; fear paralyzes; triumph burns pure and sweet. Even through the most slothful of teens, a mysterious energy triggers the transformation from child to adult. This metamorphosis demands so much. The world looms, full of complexity, danger and dreams, yet […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Food Stamps and You
Shocking, totally shocking. According to a Saturday, Nov. 21, Times-Standard story by Donna Tam, "More than half of the residents in Humboldt County eligible for the federal food stamps program don’t access it." What? In these ever-more-harsh times of unemployment, school budget slashes, incremental closures of state parks, threats to shut down the Healthy Families […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Art (and Craft) for Art’s Sake
Anyone who’s seen Victor “Vico” Hernandez’s art work will recognize a similar vibrancy and ambition in his new venture, Humboldt Arts Project, a nonprofit visual and performing arts space. Described as a “fluid” group of artists, HAP’s first exhibition takes place Friday, Nov. 13, from 6 to 9 p.m. in the Feuerwerker building, 854 9th […]
Posted inNews
One idea for today’s lunch
? You can read more about CR art prof Garth Johnson in next week’s Art Beat , but for now, drop everything and hustle to College of the Redwoods to hear this smart, funny and accomplished man breeze through the history of creative reuse. After the historical part – and, please note, our era is […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Damn Santa
Hating Christmas began in 1976, when my mom broke the news that Santa Claus wasn’t real. An imaginative child, immersed in Pippi Longstocking and Narnia, doubting the existence of magic had never occurred to me. Having that belief shattered embittered me toward myths throughout my adolescence. Make-believe is for suckers, Virgina, miracles on 34th Street […]
Posted inArts + Scene
One More Line
This is a tale of two artists: the one determined to die without a legacy and the one determined to preserve it. Jack Mays and Carrie Grant met in Ferndale, back in ancient times. She was 19 and had no idea what a stunning, accomplished woman she’d one day become — she just wanted to […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
No Surprises
Yet another issue of Money magazine arrived at my house (my dad means well). Once again, the fact that I am not their target demographic couldn’t be more obvious. The cover story is "4 Steps to a Great Retirement." Without opening the magazine, I’ll try to think of how they’ll advise me to get from […]
Posted inArts + Scene
What Happened, Arts! Arcata?
September’s arts events in Arcata typically inspire crowded streets, as Humboldt State University students have rolled back into town and locals feel the rainy season breathing down their necks. True, wine and bathroom seekers filled Jacoby’s Storehouse last Friday, where Northcoast Environmental Center staffers kept pouring vino and providing the toilet key, but outside, attendance […]
Posted inLetters + Opinion
Programmed for Poverty
Many factors play into how we behave with money. Do we come from wealth or poverty? Has our job grown unexpectedly obsolete? Have health expenses drained our savings? Our society claims to value family, but provides so little support for parental leave, childcare, health coverage, well-funded schooling that parents prioritizing childraising risk poverty. America’s financial […]