Through the Looking Glass
The past year brought a range of stunning portraits - and surprising emotions with them.
In retrospect, I’m surprised the picture isn’t blurry given how much my hands were shaking. In fact, I almost put the camera down and considered deleting the picture. Instead I took a breath and kept ...
Issues / 2011 / Dec 29
Food Fright
The year’s biggest food news – much of it spooky – changed our personal habits.
Every December for the last nine years, the Hunter PR firm has announced the results of a survey of Americans’ top 10 food news stories of the year. The list says as much about the ...
Hearty Party
First Night packs in the most intrigue of any event of the year.
First Night Monterey isn’t the last party of the year – other venues stretch deeper into the night. Alcohol isn’t permitted, so it might not qualify as the most raging party. So how does First ...
Steinbeck’s Poker Game
Inside Doc Ricketts’ lab with the Jazz Guy, the Psychologist, the Hotel Guy and the Roughneck.
Sandwiched between the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Intercontinental Hotel sits a shack. Lights burn inside it, back-lit silhouettes move behind the curtain-drawn windows, and this hole in the skyline, which was once known a long ...
Brezsny's Astrology Dec. 29, 2011-Jan. 4, 2012
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): In North America, a farmer who grows wheat gets only 5 percent of the money earned by selling a loaf of bread made from his crop. When my band recorded an ...
By the Numbers: 12-29-11
Real Estate
$995,000 Recent Sale 55 Middle Canyon Road, Carmel Valley Built: 1956 Size: 3,370 square feet Features: 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 3-car garage, 2.5 acres Amenities: Wood-burning fireplace, landscaped yard, guest house, village views Seller: James ...
Soul’s Food
A tale of heart, grit and giving before the holidays fade from view.
This column was supposed to be about food – more specifically, what new restaurant machinations are moving this way in 2012. By the same token, Corral de Tierra resident Brian Poma’s junior and senior years ...
Coral Reefs and Choreography
SpectorDance’s Ocean brings dance and science to classrooms and the stage.
Fran Spector Atkins tells a story about interviewing Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute ocean chemist Dr. Peter Brewer for Ocean, SpectorDance’s latest multimedia dance work. The dance company partnered with MBARI, the National Steinbeck Center ...
Letters to the Editor 12-29-11
The Nader Effect Nader reminds me of many charming, talented, ambitious, wily men from the Arabic-speaking world (“Nader Agha’s holdings span Monterey County, but he’s looking to conquer the world,” Dec. 15-21). Arabic is a ...
A dangerous bill heading toward the president would gut our rights.
You know these are interesting times when Glenn Beck, Dianne Feinstein, Rand Paul and the ACLU all agree on an issue. The issue in question is Subtitle D of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), ...
Pop Fever
A new book reminds us Monterey International Pop Festival will always intrigue music lovers.
In June of 1967, Kenneth Kubernik should have been studying for his upcoming bar mitzvah. Instead, the soon-to-be 13-year-old kid was listening to a live KRLA broadcast from the Monterey Fairgrounds, riveted by the sounds ...
Rubble Rousers
After decades of red-tagged fill piling up, neighbors appeal to Board of Supes.
Good fences aren’t always enough to stop neighbors from sparring, and taking it all the way to the county Board of Supervisors. The Aguajito Property Owners Association joined residents Eric and Teresa Del Piero in ...
Wrong Number
PGUSD attempts damage control on botched AT&T cell tower lease.
The Pacific Grove Unified School District screwed up on a lease allowing a cell phone tower at the P.G. Adult School. Now, PGUSD is asking AT&T to give it a break. Last January, the school ...
Furthering FORA
A legislative debate over the agency’s future is just around the corner.
By this time next week, Bill Monning will be back in Sacramento, attempting to convince non-Central Coast legislators that the Fort Ord Reuse Authority deserves to stay alive past June 30, 2014. It’ll be a ...
Stimulus money to power anaerobic digesters at Monterey Regional Waste Management.
Leftovers are slated to become ingredients in a $1.6 million anaerobic digestion pilot planned to begin at Monterey Regional Waste Management District in Marina this summer. After the digesters capture methane, a greenhouse gas, the ...
Public Citizen 12-29-11
ONGOING CHRISTMAS TREE RECYCLING | VARIOUS LOCATIONS – Get started early with New Year’s eco-resolutions by keeping Christmas trees out of the landfill. Drop trees, free of tinsel, lights and ornaments, Dec. 26-Jan. 31 at ...
What’s next in the ongoing desal drama?
Drip, drip, drip, drip, drip, drip. Wondering how, for the love of God, two taxpayer-funded public agencies and one savvy private water company could have so badly botched the formation of a plan to take ...
Squid Speaks
FUNNY GALS… Popular Carmel City Council member Jason Burnett announced his candidacy for mayor last week. Squid noticed he missed out a perfect primer for his run a few days earlier, when Paula Poundstone spent ...
Inspiration Destination
Sedaris got dark, Sizemore got real and the Weekly kept listening through a 2011 stocked with stars.
Across conversations with comedian Paula Poundstone and playwright Ann Randolph, composer Philip Glass and artist Shepard Fairey, actor Tom Sizemore and Carmel Bach Festival conductor Paul Goodwin, I had the chance to harvest rich insights ...
Best Films for 2011
Art house and heavy punches top the list.
2011 was an overall solid year at the movies. It pushed boundaries, made us laugh, asked questions and, at its best, moved us to tears. But let’s start this list of the Top Ten movies ...
Street Talk 12-29-11 asked at Yangste’s Taste of Thai in Salinas.
Q: What kind of secret club would you form? What would initiation be?
Connie Ortiz | Retired | Salinas A: It would be a behind-the-scenes theater club. They would have to put on a one-act play, presenting a monologue. In the Hot Seat: I’m not exclusive, I’m inclusive. ...
The Women on the 6th Floor
The Help, Euro-Style: The boss falls for the maid, and her culture, in this light comedic tale from France.
The Women on the 6th Floor is a light French comedy that is pure bourgeois fantasy, but a genial fantasy nevertheless. Charming performances and the naivete of the characters go a long way toward smoothing ...
Un-Raveling Ethics Laws
New campaign finance watchdog draws strong reaction.
Ann Ravel, Gov. Jerry Brown’s pick to lead the state Fair Political Practices Commission, has been on the job less than a year but is moving quickly and provoking strong reactions. Ravel’s supporters say she ...
High Five
A handful of especially satisfying adventures for New Year’s Eve
Roman Banquet at il vecchio New Year’s Eve is a time for overindulgence. And the Romans were experts. A small preview of the night’s menu includes lasagna romana with beef and pork ragu, timballo di ...
