‘When the Lord Restored Our Fortunes’
The mission, capture and liberation of Jeffery Woodke
Cover Story
‘When the Lord Restored Our Fortunes’
It was toward the end of a small press conference in the Fireplace Room of Arcata First Baptist Church, where McKinleyville’s Jeffery Woodke was offering his first public remarks since being freed March 20 after being held hostage by kidnappers in Western Africa, when a local reporter rose to ask about the process of reconnecting…
Music Tonight: Wednesday, April 19
Assuming you are not one of the lucky few to nab a ticket to Tech N9ne at the Arcata Theatre Lounge at 7 p.m. (as of press time, the venue’s website is suggesting all is sold-out except for the $65 advance tickets), then you will want something to do tonight on the eve of the…
Music Tonight: Tuesday, April 18
What’s that you say? You’d like a little more metal in your ears? Well, here ya go. The Siren’s Song Tavern is hosting Canada’s death metal act Atrae Bilis (“black bile”) at 7 p.m., for a show that will include support acts Echo Death and Sacrophilus Satanicus. As I do with as many of the…
Music Tonight: Monday, April 17
Blues trio GA-20 is playing a free show at the Cal Poly Humboldt quad today at noon. Seven hours later at Savage Henry Comedy Club, it’s just another manic, no, scratch that, Metal Monday. This week’s edition has a bunch of bands with names that are adjacent to the Dungeons & Dragons universe: Ex Mortus,…
Music Tonight: Sunday, April 16
The Siren’s Song Tavern is hosting a night of grind-oriented metal, with Knoll from Tennessee rolling in on a local’s joint featuring Malicious Algorithm, God is War and Grug! This is chug chug scream metal, not noodley falsetto metal, and the price is $10. Everything kicks off at 7 p.m.
Music Tonight: Saturday, April 15
There are two indie-style shows tonight at two indie-style Arcata venues, both happening at 7 p.m. Over at Blondies by the university, $5 gets you four fine bands, with Tektonic, Wild Abandon, Icarus & Suns and the Drastic Gnarlys all playing the magic juggling act of setting up equipment on the stage by the big…
Music Tonight: Friday, April 14
Spring has sprung and Money is back in business. No, I’m not talking about the dark force of mammon that weaves its evil spell through our very lives, but rather Humboldt’s premier Pink Floyd tribute act. Tonight at 9 p.m. at the Wave Lounge at Blue Lake Casino, the group will be performing a free…
Dance Visions at Cal Poly Humboldt
The Cal Poly Humboldt Department of Dance, Music and Theatre’s annual spring dance concert Dance Visions, takes the stage on Thursday, April 13 and Friday, April 14 at 7:30 p.m. in the Van Duzer Theatre ($10, $5 child, free for CPH students w/ID). Get ready for a dazzling array of dancers performing a multitude of…
Music Tonight: Thursday, April 13
Flint, Michigan, is the home of many things. Some good, some wild. I once played a show there that had to be locked down because the neighboring trailer park to the club had a domestic disturbance involving a man brandishing a gun from the roof of a trailer (thankfully, no one was harmed). Among the…
Looming DEA Rule Change Brings Concerns of Limited Rx Access
The DEA plans to reinstate federal requirements that patients see a doctor in person before receiving prescriptions for Schedule III drugs. During the declared COVID-19 public health emergency, the DEA had waived the requirement, but with the Biden Administration announcing it will end the public health emergency May 11, the DEA plans to end the…
The California Mask Mandate is Gone. Now Some Patients Fear for Their Health.
For months California disability and labor advocates have been attempting to preserve statewide masking requirements in health care settings. But with the sunset of one of the last remaining COVID-19 mandates, they say people who are the most vulnerable to severe illness now have to make an “impossible choice” — risk getting the virus at…
Fatal Shooting in McKinleyville
One person has been arrested on suspicion of murder after a shooting at a McKinleyville residence Saturday afternoon left another dead, according to the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office. In a news release, the HCSO states deputies responded to the 1200 block of Windy Road just before 1 p.m. on a call of an unwanted subject,…
What Can California Do About Abortion Pill Ruling? Not Much
California’s Democratic lawmakers have spent the past year enacting legislation to protect abortion rights in the wake of Roe v. Wade’s reversal, but an April 7 ruling by a Texas federal judge is one thing they can’t touch. U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk suspended the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approval of mifepristone more than…
Bushnell Quiet on Possible Cannabis Conflict
With Humboldt County’s cannabis cultivation industry on edge after an initiative to overhaul local cannabis regulations qualified for next year’s ballot, an ad hoc committee is attempting to negotiate with the initiative’s proponents to see if they’ll withdraw it. But questions have abounded about whether it’s appropriate for one of the Humboldt County supervisors who…
Salmon Season Closure: Huffman, Pelosi Pledge to Work to Fast Track Federal Aid, Cite Need for Long-Term Solutions
North Coast Congressmember Jared Huffman joined other officials today in pledging to work for the expedited release of federal dollars to help those impacted by the all-but-certain closure of the 2023 salmon season due to what’s forecasted to be near record-low returns of Chinook to the Klamath and Sacramento rivers. “We can’t afford to wait…
NCJ Preview: Release of Woodke, Spring Art and Taco Week
This week we’re talking about the release of Jeff Woodke, a McKinleyville man held hostage in West Africa for six years after being kidnapped while doing missionary work in Niger. We’ve also got a preview of NCJ’s inaugural Taco Week and a look at the Redwood Art Association’s Spring Exhibition. Hit subscribe for weekly updates…
What Stands Between You and a Four-day Week
It’s Thursday evening. You pack up your things at work and hit the road. Maybe you’re thinking about a lunch plan you’ve got with a friend or a show you plan to binge. But you’re not thinking about clocking in tomorrow: You’ve got a three-day weekend. All your weekends, in fact, are three-day weekends. It’s…
Re: Life Plan Humboldt
As a volunteer and board member of Life Plan Humboldt (LPH), it is always great to get questions about the new senior community we are working to build in McKinleyville. It is a complicated project still in development. Recently, a letter to the editor about LPH contained misconceptions and inaccuracies (Mailbox, March 23). One example among…
‘Excitement and Mayhem’
Editor: Thank you, Mark Larson, for laying out HSU’s, sorry, CPH’s timeline and budget for all the upcoming excitement and mayhem in Arcata (“It’s Time to Buckle Up,” March 30). Keep in mind that proposed budgets are generally just an idealized suggestion. Assuming my math is correct (and it’s worth checking), the five major construction…
‘Unnecessarily Butcher Trees’
Editor: Thanks to Louisa Rogers for writing, and the NCJ for printing, her letter about the needlessly murdered Eureka tree (Mailbox, March 30). And a word of caution to those who embrace wildlife, both plant and animal: beware of the Arcata Marsh, where saws and a masticator have recently been employed to unnecessarily butcher trees…
Seeking Benjamin Graham
Editor: To Benjamin Graham, just this weekend I read your letter to the editor in the North Coast Journal, (Mailbox, March 9). I apologize if there has been ongoing conversation since then; I have not seen them. Thank you! Your letter is the first I have wanted to respond to regarding housing challenges. I would…
‘Learn the Rules’
Editor: There should be no doubt in any mind or heart, but that the Earth is all there is for us no matter how far we learn to see or travel (‘A Symbolic Gesture,” March 30). Our political demarcations shift and change, our cultures merge and flow, our footprints and waste can consume anything in…
Correction
A story in the March 30, 2023, edition of the North Coast Journal headlined “Lawsuit Alleges Humboldt, California Unfairly Denied Foster Care Benefits,” inaccurately stated a request for comment went unanswered by county officials. The request for comment was directed at a third-party and not received by the county. The Journal regrets the error.
Trans Residents Celebrate Transgender Day of Visibility
As lawmakers across the nation work to advance hundreds of bills targeting trans rights and anti-trans rhetoric increasingly fills local online community forums, some used Transgender Day of Visibility on March 31 to celebrate trans joy. “We spend so much time thinking about what we’re losing and what we’re worried about,” Tommie Moore conceded after…
Wetness
A pinging singing of Rice bouncing off roof Spittering, splattering. Deluge of ball bearings Heralding forty-four Days and 44 more nights Rain again and again When, when will it end? The sheeting sleeting rain Gray days, wet lawns But look: a yellow revolution Retribution of the daffodils James Floss
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Aries-born René Descartes (1596–1650) was instrumental in developing of modern science and philosophy. His famous motto, “I think, therefore I am” is an assertion that the analytical component of intelligence is primary and foremost. And yet, few history books mention the supernatural intervention that was pivotal in his evolution as a…
Tastemakers
A lot of important figures in the music world have passed away recently, three that I consider quite notable are saxophone god Wayne Shorter, multi-instrumentalist and hired gun David Lindley, and bassist Steve Mackey, whose work with one of my favorite Brit bands, Pulp, was both melodic and charging. However, the last week has seen…
Godwit Days
When you live in a place as awash in natural wonders as Humboldt County, it can be easy to take it for granted. Towering redwoods with trunks as thick as Volkswagens? Just look out the window. Miles of rocky coastal beaches with endless tidepools to explore? Been there, done that. But how about backroads that…
Spring is in the Air
The signs of Humboldt spring are everywhere: budding trees, muddy holes, emerging trilliums and gardeners doing their thing. What does spring look like to you? If you hurry and visit the Redwood Art Association Gallery before April 15, you will get a chance to see what spring looks like to some of our local artists.…
Spring Brings New Angling Opportunities
Spring, along with the accompanying nice weather, will arrive eventually. At least that’s what the calendar says. And when it does, a new set of angling opportunities will come with it. As the number of storms begin to lessen, we’ll see some much-improved ocean conditions. With that, anglers will head to the jetties and beaches…
The True-ish Story of Tetris
TETRIS. When, after a trying workday, my wife set about retiring to another room with a book and a cat, as is her wont, I did not intend to deter her. But when I suggested I might watch a movie based on Tetris, she stopped abruptly. When I continued that it starred Taron Egerton, she…
