Cover Story
Fur Real
Sitting in an armchair at Because Coffee, Michael Genzoli hoists a big, blue fox head out of his bag and combs the turquoise shock of hair between its ears. If the weather holds, he and his roommate, who suits up as a white tiger, are going out for Arts! Alive in Old Town Eureka. “If…
Crab Invasion
In the same way that pumpkin spiced everything shows up in the fall, in winter legions of crab specialties hit our county like Attack of the Crab Monsters, which maybe you caught during the Crab Festival. The overwhelm — not to mention the underwhelm — is enough to send you straight back to cracking your…
Trying Sanity: What Does Gary Lee Bullock’s Insanity Plea Mean?
The man accused of torturing and murdering St. Bernard’s Pastor Eric Freed on New Year’s Day 2014 has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity but statistics indicate that will likely have little impact on his ultimate fate. With his trial slated to begin in March, Gary Lee Bullock stood in court on Feb. 10…
Drowning Victim Identified as 33-Year-Old Eurekan
The Humboldt County Coroner’s Office has identified the man who drowned in Redwood Creek after a rafting accident Friday afternoon as 33-year-old Jonathan Walsh Mellon, of Eureka. “We’re viewing this as an unfortunate accident,” said sheriff’s Sgt. Ernie Stewart, adding he doesn’t anticipate any criminal investigation stemming from Mellon’s death. According to the sheriff’s office,…
Inked Hearts: A Photo Essay by Mark Larson
As I entered the Inked Hearts Tattoo Expo, I was immediately struck by buzzing of tattoo guns and the unusual sight of many people lying passively on tables, receiving their latest ink. I enjoyed my visit to the sixth annual tattoo expo held in the Blue Lake Casino’s Sapphire Palace on Feb. 8, partly because…
Korean Tacos: Geography vs. Destiny
The Bering Strait, scientists speculate, could have once been a land bridge between Asia and North America. Just a hop, skip and a jump across some glaciers, and yet we’ve had to wait thousands of years for that hybrid of Asian and Mexican cuisine, the Korean taco. It’s a schlepp to to the Creamery District…
Plaza in Pink
Scores of young folks descended on the Arcata plaza Friday to sing, dance and take a stand condemning violence against women. The annual event came as a part of V-Day Humboldt’s education efforts and conjunction with One Billion Rising Revolution, a global event that bills itself as the “biggest mass action to end violence against…
Squires Tenants File $25K Claims Against City
Seven former tenants of Floyd and Betty Squire’s Blue Heron Lodge have filed nearly identical claims for damages against the city of Eureka, arguing the city unlawfully evicted them, violated their civil rights and intentionally inflicted emotional distress upon them when the city moved to condemn the lodge earlier this month. Each of the claims…
Building Lincoln’s Hearse
Some of the cats are sacked out in the sunshine and others inside the Blue Ox Millworks office by crackling wood stoves. Bluto, the golden-eyed, bear-faced dog, flops like a giant, piled-up rug on some unevenly stacked timbers in the yard. Birds are talking, the air is still, it’s an early spring in early February.…
Swingers
Did you blow Valentine’s Day? Don’t despair, you can fix this. Have a night out on the day after without the rom-com pressure or smug couples. Now that the swing craze of the ’90s is over, we can enjoy it without feeling smarmy. Big-band big shots Swing Fever are at the Morris Graves Museum of…
Metal Hearts
Valentine’s Day doesn’t have to be about romance — let’s open this thing up to all kinds of love. You could, for example, spend the evening with a sister. No, not the one who looks just like you and steals your eyeliner and boyfriends, but the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, the ones who do all…
Before Buying Your First Sex Toy(s)
1 Don’t wait until you win your local Planned Parenthood’s Sexytime Trivia contest (next one is Feb. 20) and, as a prize, receive a goodie bag with oh-my-would-you-look-at-that to discover the joys of toys. Whatever your situation, orgasms are awesome and a world of enhancement awaits. Come on in. 2. Who have you come shopping…
Spent
The very existence of this book stands as a testament to one of the oldest clichés there is: Sex sells. If it didn’t, Spent would never have been published, and I wouldn’t be reviewing it; let’s admit that right up front. This is not meant as a slam on Antonia Crane, who tells her story…
Comedy Takes Wing
Over 2,000 years ago in ancient Greece, crowds gathered to enjoy a funny, bawdy, topical new satire by Aristophanes titled The Birds. It was applauded for its humor, the wit of its references and its engaging music. A classic comedy, the play has since seen multiple adaptations, its story of the search for a life…
The Extended Gaze
Andrew Daniel likes to stare. “I love looking at people,” he says. “I like studying their gazes and faces and fashion. You can’t stop and do that, usually. It makes people uncomfortable. But when you’re doing portrait work you can stare for a long time. I don’t think of it as voyeuristic. It’s humanistic.” Daniel…
Second Friday Arts! Arcata
For more information, visit artsarcata.com or call Arcata Main Street at 822-4500. ARCATA PLAYHOUSE 1251 Ninth St. Unveiling of the 16-foot-tall Pink Polka-dot Peg-legged Pony pull toy. ARCATA ARTISANS 883 H St. Libby George, pastels, and Natalie Dicostanzo, ceramics. ARCATA EXCHANGE 813 H St. Denise Dodd, acrylics. Music by Dale Wingett. Wine service by Trails Trust…
Buhne: Just a Troll?
Editor: Ryan Hurley’s snippet on Santa Rosa North (“No Jojo Left Behind,” Feb. 5) says he was in Eureka’s Old Town and was accosted by six drunk, crazy, homeless people in one day. Ryan needs to get out more. My office is in Old Town (First and E streets). I’ve been there for 17 years,…
Moldy Laundry
Editor: I am astounded by the vitriol in Janelle Anderson’s letter (“Oh, Sit Down Already,” Feb. 5) aimed at Linda Stansberry’s column “Are You OK?” (Jan. 29). Stansberry has been writing from under the green cloud of silence that infects Humboldt culture, and it takes courage to do it. Thirty-two years behind the skunky curtain…
Eye-Witness Account
Editor: I want to express my agreement with and thanks to Paul Mann for his “Bomb Throwers and Bridge Builders” column in the Feb. 5 North Coast Journal. He hit it right. The days he mentioned that included checks and balances and compromise are long gone. He mentioned when Newt Gingrich and the Republicans took…
‘Virtually Worthless’
Editor: Regarding Grant Scott-Goforth’s Feb. 5 column (“Buying in”), the suits cashing in on the current green rush will ultimately be replaced by farmers in overalls. One day marijuana will be fully legal nationwide and there will be no suburban basement grows with artificial lights and massive carbon footprints. Environmentally destructive wilderness grows will become…
In Weed Veritas
It should come as no surprise to anyone who’s done more than a cursory perusal of the World Wide Web that weed and porn show up online together — to paraphrase a psychologist in Jennifer Fumiko Cahill’s cover story this week, “overlapping interests.” But most of those Tumblrs and Instagrams don’t really incorporate weed into…
Funky Cold Medina
We’re all adults here. We know what we like and we know what we want. Often, what we want is sex. We look around and see it permeating every aspect of our lives, so it should come as no surprise that there’s an overabundance of drinks with names that go from the merely flirty to…
The Kit
In my work as a psychology teacher, and particularly in my practice as a psychologist, I’ve been witness to far too much suffering about sex. For something as potentially joyous, affirming and even spiritual as sexuality can be, it seems tragic to me how conflicted some of us are about this essentially human behavior. Occasionally…
Sinking Ships
Reviews BLACK SEA. Director Kevin Macdonald, known best for The Last King of Scotland (2006) and more recently for the documentary Marley (2012), switches here to action-thriller-undersea-heist mode, with some socio-economic commentary thrown in for good measure. The result is a well-acted, intermittently tense muddle with a narrative incapable of supporting its own substantial weight.…
Culture Change
As public outrage and awareness intensify, universities around the nation are grappling with one of campus life’s cultural mainstays: sexual violence. As acceptance of the scale of the problem grows and attitudes begin to shift, colleges are being scrutinized for a lack of disciplinary action or even investigation into frequent assaults on students. No student…
Your Guide to Love
Oh, Valentine’s Day. On one hand, an opportunity to offend your partner by not celebrating with enough enthusiasm; on the other, a reason to feel shut out by society for not having a partner to “celebrate” with. But let’s find a happier path, shall we? Let’s start with those of you waking up next to…
V is for Viagra
“A hard man is good to find,” goes the saying. Hardness, in this case, results from blood flowing into and engorging the spongy tissue of the penis: the more blood flow, the harder the erection. And increased blood flow comes about by relaxing blood vessels in the penis, a process known as vasodilation. The trigger,…
