Monterey County Weekly back issues from December 2007:
Second Life
Dec 06, 2007; ... How a secondhand uniform changed a Lockwood homemaker's world. Diane Pirzada has long had a strong sense that a special mission awaited her. "I'd always felt there was something calling me," says the energetic mother of three. Four years ago, the former flight attendant and ...
STReeT TaLK
Dec 06, 2007; ... Asked at the Bagel Bakery in Carmel. Q: WHAT EARTH-DAMAGING HABIT IS HARDEST TO QUIT? Follow-up: What eco-friendly custom do you practice now but didn't 10 years ago? STEVE BUCK Painter | Pacific Grove A: Well, I work with paint, so some of the ...
BIG SHOTS
Dec 06, 2007; ... Monterey County stars at a new photography exhibit. Marilyn Monroe shines a tired smile at photographer Margarete E. Clovis. Around them, onlookers pack shoulder-to-shoulder, waiting excitedly for a chance to meet the Hollywood idol. More pour out on the street The year is 1948, ...
Acting Locally
Dec 06, 2007; ... CSUMB and Monterey Institute of International Studies pledge to teach sustainability. The transformation of former Fort Ord into CSUMB evokes sayings like "turning swords into plowshares" or "bayonets into baccalaureates." Now the campus is embarking on another about-face: the conversion ...
GREEN COMMITMENT
Dec 06, 2007; ... Local governments are taking global warming fight in their own hands. Monterey city officials hosted a green building expo last week, and in January, a green building ordinance will begin making its way through the city's approval process. Encouraging businesses and homeowners to go ...
Dem Votes
Dec 06, 2007; ... Central Coast Democrats descend on Salinas for straw poll. After Hillary Clinton lost more ground in Iowa polls, her campaign this week dug deep into Barack Obama's presidential aspirations. Clinton's camp cited Obama's kindergarten essay "I Want to Become President" to counter Obama's ...
Up the Wrong Tree
Dec 06, 2007; ... Pebble Beach fixes botch in proposed fire code. Pebble Beach Community Service District made a hasty revision to its proposed fire code update after a local environmentalist pointed out an error he feared would force the removal of "possibly a million" native Monterey ...
KICKING THE BOTTLE
Dec 06, 2007; ... New Monterey business makes water filtered, tasty and bottle-free. By now, all San Francisco public buildings should have made the switch to bottle-less water dispensers, using Hetch Hetchy drinking water. The move is a result of the mayor's directive requiring city and county agencies ...
CORRECTION
Dec 06, 2007; ... A story headlined "Rubble Trouble," [Nov. 29-Dec. 5] incorrectly reported that a civil complaint filed by the Monterey Bay Unified Air Pollution Control District alleged a legal violation by the Monterey Regional Waste Management District, and that Monterey ...
It's Not Over Yet
Dec 06, 2007; ... THE LOCAL SPIN Newspapers still have a key role to play in our lives. I was struck this past weekend by the announcement in the Monterey County Herald that the Sunday "Commentary" section I was reading would be the last one printed. According to a note from Opinion Page ...
SQUID FRY
Dec 06, 2007; ... SEX AND TAXES ...Squid feels a tad bit sleazy when driving past L'Amour Shoppe adult DVD store on East Alisal Street in Salinas. Apparently, L'Amour's services are in high demand: The store has tried to add about a dozen more private movie booths. Salinas police officer Richard Lopez says ...
Failure On All Fronts
Dec 06, 2007; ... FORUM Oil spill in San Francisco Bay underscores deficiencies in safety regulations and rules of the sea. The first headline the San Francisco Chronicle ran after the Cosco Busan crashed into a Bay Bridge protective fender Nov. 7 implied that nothing terrible had happened. It ...
High Stakes
Dec 06, 2007; ... Without U.S. participation, the first-ever global-warming treaty was doomed to only partial success. Will Bali be better? Ten years ago, the nations of the world gathered in Kyoto, Japan, to move to prevent dangerous interference with the planet's climate. Many hoped meaningful steps ...
We're Getting Warmer
Dec 06, 2007; ... Why has so little been accomplished to halt global warming? I remember so well the final morning hours of the Kyoto conference. The negotiations had gone on long past their scheduled evening close, and the convention-center management was frantic-a trade show for children's clothing was ...
The California Experiment
Dec 06, 2007; ... Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's green state and the mathematics of carbon. If you wiped California off the face of the planet, just made it disappearleft behind no car or SUV, politician, person or cow-you'd eliminate only about 1.6 percent of the greenhouse gases that are warming the ...
Desert Greenhouse
Dec 06, 2007; ... What global warming could do to the world's deserts. How will global warming affect the world's deserts? Scientists in Nevada predict potentially heartbreaking outcomes. Imagine a future where hundreds of thousands of people in the more arid parts of the country flee wildfires ....
Back in the Saddle
Dec 06, 2007; ... Back in the Saddle Ian Tyson plays 7pm Saturday, Dec. 8, and 2:30pm Sunday, Dec. 9, at the Monterey Bay Cowboy Poetry & Music Festival located in the Monterey Marriott, 350 Calle Principal, Monterey. $35/Tyson performance; $190/alkvent pass. 1-800-722-9652. Ian Tyson ...
The Range
Dec 06, 2007; ... Four other outstanding acts round out the festival round-up. All performances take place at the Monterey Marriott. R.W. Hampton A former cowboy who has driven cattle and shoed horses, Hampton is involved in many artistic endeavors to keep the Western lifestyle in the spotlight ....
Bad Like Me
Dec 06, 2007; ... Bad Like Me Malo, Tierra and La Ventana play 8pm Saturday, Dec. 8, at the Fox Theater, 241 Main St., Oldtown Salinas. $15-$40.1-888-825-5484. Lead singer Arcelio Garcia explains why everybody wants to be like Malo. Arcelio Garcia, lead singer of the pioneering Latin rock ...
Ragtime Revolution
Dec 06, 2007; ... Ragtime Revolution The Ragtime and Stride Piano Extravaganza takes place Saturday, Dec. 8, with an afternoon session from 11am to 5pm and an evening session from 7:30pm to 10pm, at the Pacific Grove Performing Arts Center, 835 Forest Ave., Pacific Grove. $85/general; $30/ students ...
Raw Talent
Dec 06, 2007; ... Raw Talent Etta James and the Roots Band play 8pm Friday, Dec. 7, at the Golden State Theatre, 417 Alvarado St. in Monterey. $45-$100.372-4555 or goldenstatetheatre.com. Etta James continues to push the envelope at the Golden State. "You better roll it while the rollin'is ...
Shipping Shape
Dec 06, 2007; ... Moss Landing's Diamond Organics sends prime local produce all over the country overnight. Minot, North Dakota is quite a ways from the Central Coast. There the soil, setting and the seasons do not allow for the fields of greens which are enjoyed here, where arugula and radicchios abound ...
Cheer Schmeer
Dec 06, 2007; ... MERRY ME ...This time of year really starts the emotional sap oozing out of our family trees. The holiday season exposes my innards (emotionally speaking) more so than any other time, excepting of course those rare life-changing moments like birth, death and infinity (Martha, I think he's got ...
Lost Direction
Dec 06, 2007; ... Lost Direction THE GOLDEN COMPASS ** Directed by Chris Weitz * Starring Dakota Blue Richards, Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig * PG-13, 113 min. * At the Century Cinemas Del Monte Center, Maya Cinemas, Northridge Cinemas. If you pay attention to entertainment headlines, you're ...
Returning to the Scene
Dec 06, 2007; ... Returning to the Scene SLEUTH ** Directed by Kenneth Branagh * Starring Michael Caine, Jude Law and Harold Pinter * R, 86 min. * At the Osio Cinemas. Michael Caine graduates to the elder man's role in Sleuth, but the movie still flunks. It takes something really special ...
Grand Land
Dec 06, 2007; ... Carmel Valley house sits on lush acreage along the river, offering peace and beauty. 1947 was a very good year, a very good year for a meadow of level land to transform into a home, grow trees, have horses roam. Sweet piece of heaven, 1947. The story may not be of the house ...
SERIOUS SWELL
Dec 13, 2007; ... Admiration for Peter Davi only grows with his dramatic death. The first beach I went to in Monterey County was Asilomar. That day I noticed a guy who looked like the Incredible Hulk pushing a small, blond-haired, 10-year-old boy into the whitewash. I never knew Peter Davi, who ...
DEPARTMENT OF DA FENCE
Dec 13, 2007; ... Bidder alleges Seaside unfairly treated his minority-owned business. A fence-building company is sour at the city of Seaside for flip-flopping on its bid requirements for a local project. But the City says the company's got its chain link all in a bunch over an innocent ...
STReeT TaLK
Dec 13, 2007; ... Asked at Phil's Fish Market in Moss Landing. Q: WHAT SCARES YOU MOST ABOUT THE OCEAN? Follow-up: What ocean creature do you identify with the most? JOAN GARCIA Board of Education Trustee | Holllster A: The pull of the tide. I'm from a place ...
SECRETS AND LIES
Dec 13, 2007; ... Sex abuse allegedly occurred under former Monterey vicar's watch. Diocese of Orange County Bishop Tod D. Brown has tried mightily to position himself as a leader in the Catholic Church's sexabuse scandal. He's settled multiple lawsuits, met with victims, and has urged his fellow bishops ...
Fields of Science
Dec 13, 2007; ... Salinas Valley tech center could bring new ag innovation to salad bowl of the world. Salinas Valley lettuce could become much more than a salad staple, according to Dr. Henry Daniell, professor and trustee chair at the University of Central Florida. Daniell has produced insulin from ...
CORRECTION
Dec 13, 2007; ... Craig Wright of Lovers Point Jazz Productions was the organizer of the Ragtime and Stride Extravaganza ...
The Audacity of Oprah
Dec 13, 2007; ... FORUM Her backing Obama could invigorate our political landscape. This Christmas, the film The Great Debaters will come to theaters nationwide. Starring Denzel Washington and produced by Oprah Winfrey, it tells the story of an award-winning team of debaters from Wiley College, a ...
SQUID FRY
Dec 13, 2007; ... NICE KITTY ...Oh, Darryl, when will you ever learn! Seaside voters ousted the long-time city councilman last year, perhaps because they were tired of Darryl Choates' bluster and bullying antics-like threatening future pay and benefits of two Seaside cops because they did not endorse his ...
China's Valley of Tears
Dec 13, 2007; ... FORUM After the breakdown of state socialism, success as a market economy cannot be immediate. The explosion of capitalism in China has many Westerners asking when political democracy-as the "natural" accompaniment of capitalism-will emerge. But a closer look quickly dispels any ...
Slough of Change
Dec 13, 2007; ... Scientists and activists aim to save Elkhorn Slough from erosion and development before it's too late. The tide is high at Elkhorn Slough, as it usually is this time of year. Harbor seals and sea otters take refuge in the sheltered waters, sunning, feeding on crabs and entertaining ...
Now She Gets It
Dec 13, 2007; ... The allure of Elkhorn Slough is clear from the vantage of a kayak. In Monty Python's Spamalot, there's a song called "The Song That Goes Like This." It's too long, it changes key, and it parodies Broadway musical love songs. (Its opening lines: "Once in every show there comes a song like ...
Like the Back of His Hand
Dec 13, 2007; ... Professor dedicates himself to learning all he can about Elkhorn Slough. Rikk Kvitek knows nearly every inch of Elkhorn Slough. For the past 25 years, Kvitek, a CSUMB science and environmental policy professor, has been studying environmental changes in the slough and surrounding ...
Freeze Frame
Dec 13, 2007; ... Carmel's Robert Knight shares the icy photo that earned him international accolades. It was late afternoon in the stormtossed Scotia Sea just off the frozen coast of Antarctica's South Georgia Island. A small group took off in a Zodiac to explore the waters near their expedition's supply ...
Hearty Winter Fare
Dec 13, 2007; ... Hearty Winter Fare PacRep's The Full Monty satisfies theatergoers' hunger for edgy, character-driven musical-comedy. The Full Monty continues through Dec. 29 at Pacific Repertory Theatre's Golden Bough Playhouse, Monte Verde between Eighth and Ninth, Carmel. Tickets are $20-$28, ...
Imagine That
Dec 13, 2007; ... Imagine That Drew Harrison evokes Lennon in Monterey, then joins a Beatles tribute in Salinas. Drew Harrison performs a solo acoustic tribute to the music of John Lennon 8pm Friday, Dec. 14, at Carleton Hall, 400 W. Franklin St., Monterey. $20/in advance; $22/at the door ....
THE CULT: Born Into This
Dec 13, 2007; ... THE CULT Born Into This Roadrunner Twenty years ago, producer Rick Rubin thrust an obscure British psychedelic alt-rock band by the name of The Cult into the mainstream with Electric, still the best AC/DC record that AC/DC never recorded. From there, singer Ian ...
MAHAVISHNU ORCHESTRA: Live At Montreux 1974-1984
Dec 13, 2007; ... Eagle Vision USA In the wake of Miles Davis' jazz-rock explorations, fusion bands such as Weather Report and Return to Forever were born. Less easily accessible was the Mahavishnu Orchestra. Led by guitarist John McLaughlin, himself a Miles alum, Mahavishnu fashioned jazz improvisations ...
U2: The Joshua Tree: 20th Anniversary Remastered
Dec 13, 2007; ... U2 The Joshua Tree: 20th Anniversary Remastered Island/Universal Long since resigned to the coffee tables of khaki families or wedged on shelves next to the Bible and The Da Vinci Code, it's easy to forget the widescreen impact of U2's 1987 world-altering breakout The ...
Lars' Star Track
Dec 13, 2007; ... Lars' Star Track Already ambitious MC Lars further expands his sound. MC Lars plays 8:30pm Wednesday, Dec. 19, at Monterey Live, 414 Alvarado St., Monterey. $10.375-5483. Teenager Elisa Greubel immediately identified with MC Lars' "Download This Song," a plea for the ...
Inventive Eats
Dec 13, 2007; ... Five local chefs lay out unconventional holiday treats. The holiday for monsters normally takes place at the tail end of October. No longer, says the fine-food-wielding man in L'Escargof s Carmel kitchen: Chef Kerry Loutas would like to introduce "Monster Nog," his chief celebratory ...
Grand Designs
Dec 13, 2007; ... COUNT IT.This fine publication that so graciously allows me this weekly rant recently put out its 1,000th issue. That's consecutive, friends, with nary a burp. That translates into 19 straight years of bringing you the very best in conscious reporting and editorials (alright, mostly conscious ...
Poison Pen
Dec 13, 2007; ... Poison Pen Atonement ponders the words that wound. ATONEMENT ***1/2 Directed by Joe Wright * Starring Keira Knightley and James McAvoy * R, 130 min * At the Osio Cinemas. In Atonement, the wrong word seen by the wrong eyes-in this case, a bookish, sheltered 13-year-old ...
Unholy Matrimony
Dec 13, 2007; ... Unholy Matrimony The Squid and the Whale director Noah Baumbach takes another look at family with Margot at the Wedding. MARGOT AT THE WEDDING ***1/2 Directed by Noah Baumbach * Starring Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jack Black * R, 91 min * At the Osio ...
Look Again
Dec 13, 2007; ... The outside of this Carmel home belies the distinctive touches inside. Anyone looking at this house from the outside will be amazed to discover the trove of revelations inside. The view of the house from the street isn't the best: the facade is flat, straight up and down (attached double ...
Word Up
Dec 13, 2007; ... Ol' Factory Café reminds us why we love spelling bees. Americans are infatuated with spelling bees. It's the reason the National Spelling Bee is broadcast nationally on ESPN every year. It helps explain why the intellectual competition is featured in the 2002 Oscarnominated documentary ...
Naan Starter
Dec 13, 2007; ... India Clay Oven likely to close Monterey location after 15 years. The nose-twitching smell of stale grease occupies the kitchen air. A creepy, high-pitched whine stirs from an industrial fan tucked into a corner. Outside the kitchen, next to the iconic painted window that has greeted ...
One Man, 1,000 Instruments
Dec 20, 2007; ... The bizarre story of a local man and his abiding love for music. Sean Folsom lives in a pocket-sized one-room cottage just beyond Carmel Valley Village. He owns the adjacent main house, but rents it out to help support his three children-and to fund his ever-increasing collection of ...
STReeT TaLK
Dec 20, 2007; ... Asked at the Fishwife next to Asilomar Beach. Q: GIVE THE SHORT STORY OF YOUR LIFE IN 15 WORDS OR LESS. Follow-up: If someone made a movie about your life, who would play you? WHITNEY STONE Waitress | Carmel A: Wanderlust and independent. Also, ...
NEST BEST THING
Dec 20, 2007; ... Jayson Fann's latest Spirit Nest creates peace from myriad sticks. A thick 10-foot wooden ladder leads up to a circular entrance wreathed with a spray of branches-oak, plum, willow, and eucalyptus. Each bough gracefully bends to form this supple arch, almost as if nature intended them to ...
Saline Solution
Dec 20, 2007; ... Monterey council OKs evaluating feasibility of a desalination plant Monterey may join the list of California cities looking to the sea as a solution to its water shortage. At a recent City Council meeting, council members agreed to move forward with a preliminary step toward ...
AG CONTRACTORS ACCUSED OF CORRUPTION
Dec 20, 2007; ... Lawsuit says ag company stole from farmworkers. When celery harvesters left his crew, supervisor Jorge Aguilar allegedly kept some of the farmworkers on the payroll. Aguilar, who used to work for Castroville-based Sea Breeze Harvesting, then pocketed the checks of the "ghost employees," ...
Crisis Management
Dec 20, 2007; ... Monterey County Rape Crisis Center, with a new office in Salinas, fills the need following the Women's Crisis Center closure. For 31 years, the Women's Crisis Center in Salinas shelled out services mostly free of charge to survivors and families of sexual assault and domestic violence ....
The Other Moth
Dec 20, 2007; ... This year's oak moth epidemic leaves local trees ugly, not dead. They've been busy-feeding off oak leaf surfaces as larvae, wolfing down entire leaves as red-headed worms, morphing into tannish-brown moths, fluttering around in courtship, and laying clusters of whitish eggs on ...
Mighty Rights
Dec 20, 2007; ... FORUM Poll shows we care a lot about human rights. While the topic of human rights is frequently in the news, mainstream media coverage of human rights invariably describes violations in faraway lands. Social injustice in the United States almost is never discussed in terms of ...
SQUID FRY
Dec 20, 2007; ... EXTREME MAKEOVER ...Squid feels for Marina, reallyr While some cities struggle with things like, say, violent crime, or multimillion-dollar budget deficits, Marina city officials tackle the hard stuff: a new city logo. Last year, the city paid $30,000 to hire a Sausalito-based design firm, and in ...
Hunger? What's That?
Dec 20, 2007; ... FORUM Heritage Foundation says let them eat broccoli. While most Americans were planning for the annual ritual of overconsumption known as Thanksgiving, the good folks at the Heritage Foundation, America's leading architects of conservative thought, were doing their part to add ...
Short Takes
Dec 20, 2007; ... EVERY WRITER HAS A STORY, EVEN IF IT'S ONLY 101 WORDS. More than 200 readers took the time to enter the WeeMy's contest for short sagas. The quality of many of the entries was high-choosing one winner was hard. We also awarded second and third place, as well as 22 honorable mentions. For ...
He's Got That Funny Feeling
Dec 20, 2007; ... Collin Moulton makes fun of homeless pets, God and his own mom. Local comedian Collin Moulton knows that real-life experiences are better grist for his comedy routines than made-up situations. Therefore, like many comedians before him, Moulton retells true stories about his life with the ...
The Black and White Album
Dec 20, 2007; ... THE HIVES The Black and White Album Interscope The Black and White Album marks the attempt by Sweden's The Hives to fully transform themselves from mere garage-revivalists into a straight-up party band. It's The Hives at their most radio-friendly. Gone is the ...