When Weed is Legal
Taxed, regulated marijuana sales might help save the state’s economy, but will it ruin ours?
Cover Story
When Weed is Legal
Pardon the use of Bob Dylan’s chorus-cum-cliché, but it’s the truth: The times they are a-changin’. A year ago, if you’d told even the most sanguine of Redwood Park stoners that the state legislature would be considering a bill to legalize marijuana — actually considering it — and that op-eds in newspapers from the Sacramento…
There’s a gay storm brewin’
Run for cover, everybody! It’s raining gayness! Following the recent same-sex marriage victories in Iowa and Vermont, a group called the National Organization for Marriage is paying $1.5 million to air an ad (shown below) that flaunts homophobia like its the world’s most fabulous feather boa. With a backdrop of ominous gay clouds ejaculating their…
Blind Pilot’s Bicycle Tours
Blind Pilot’s Bicycle Tours: NPR talks with the indie band about their bicycle tour of Washington, Oregon and California, with special mention of a magical impromptu show in
Woodstock West Fest coming to S.F.
there.Woodstock West Fest coming to S.F.: You may recall a link posted here last week about plans to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Woodstock with a massive concert in the Willits area. Well, that’s off. Instead the plan is for a free concert Sunday, October 25, in Golden Gate Park’s Speedway Meadows. Production will be…
Bosco Dinged By FPPC
The California Fair Politics Practices Commission has fined Doug Bosco, chair of the state Coastal Conservancy, the grand sum $200 for failing to file his his 2007 Statement of Economic Interest in a timely manner. Bosco represented the North Coast in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1982 to 1990. He is currently a principal…
MediaNews Misses Debt Payment
MediaNews Misses Debt Payment: Deep, deep in debt and nearing default, the Times-Standard’s parent corporation has reached a deal with creditors that will allow it to (temporarily) forgo payments on its ghastly, ungodly, mid-bogglingly Himalayan debt, reports the New York Times. The Wall Street Journal has a story up too.
First Saturday Night Arts Alive!
First Saturday Night Arts Alive! is proudly presented by USBank, with Eureka Main Street and the Humboldt Arts Council. Opening receptions for artists, exhibits and/or performances are April 4 from 6-9 p.m. Phone 442-9054, for more information or to have an exhibit/performance included. http://aweurekatoday.blogspot.com/ 1. WORLD CUP 1626 F St. Anne Christensen. 1a.…
Starry, Starry Night
The dog finishes her business And I notice…
Hummie, Monster of the Bay
I was about to send off this week’s column (an erudite look at the curious genetic connection between Garberville gophers and Arcata aardvarks) when my visiting Russian cousin Evan S’bov rushed in. He’d been taking a last walk on the boardwalk before I was to drive him to the airport for his long flight back…
The Science of Seedlings
Last month I offered up some ideas for getting seed started indoors. It’s not too late; summer vegetables like tomatoes and squash really shouldn’t go in the ground until mid-May at the earliest. If you live near the coast like I do, it is entirely likely that temperatures won’t reach tomato-friendly levels until June. So…
Beware
Aptly named Beware, Will Oldham’s subtle and mysterious new album is not what it initially seems. Depths of strange light and dark meaning emerge with repeated listening. The cover presents a skull visage against sinister black, a pale orb of the title’s warning hovering above; on the back a surging planetary volcano. The palindromic catalog…
Easy Come Easy Go
Marianne Faithfull’s hard, troubled life has hardly been a secret. And her voice seems to directly reflect her long road. There’s a combination of beauty, sadness and pathos in her low delivery that calls to the ghosts of Nico (former Velvet Underground chanteuse), German actress/singer Lotte Lenya and Bessie Smith. So, it’s no wonder that…
Great Dates
I had my doubts. I was going to a show called Bad Dates, written while Sex in the City was hot, by a New York playwright who made her living in television: a monologue about romantic misadventures by a woman surrounded by her several hundred pairs of shoes. When I could be at home witnessing…
Milk the Story
In the Eel River Valley of Northern California everyone is tied by blood or business. That was how New York Times columnist Dan Barry led a March 23 story about how the collapse of the Humboldt Creamery affects dairy farmers here. The column was 1620 words long — almost as long as the first five…
Regarding Local Festivals
A front page article last week and a Sunday editorial in the Times-Standard bemoaning the fiscal travails of the Redwood Coast Jazz Festival got me thinking. Over Spring Break, we took a short vacation to attend the Oregon Cheese Festival in southern Oregon. Jackson County, at this time of year, has a microclimate similar to…
Two Lovers: Love It!
Note to Readers: I will be on hiatus for six weeks while I’m in Portland. See you mid-May if I’m renewed. Previews Opening Friday, April 3, is Fast & Furious, 2009 version and the fourth in the series but set between Nos. 2 & 3. The film features four actors from the original: Vin Diesel,…
Fools
Woke up this morning with a tune in my head: an old Joe Jackson thing called "Fools in Love." "Fools in love, they think they’re heroes ’cause they get to feel no pain. I say fools in love are zeros; I should know. I should know, because this fool’s in love again." Joe comes off…
