Doomsdaze of 2012
Mayan theories and astronomy conspiracies abound, making the upcoming year – if it lasts – one for the paranoid records.
By now, the holiday detritus has mostly been put or tossed away, the menorah placed on the shelf, the dying Christmas tree out on the curb or the aluminum Festivus pole back in the garage. ...
Issues / 2012 / Jan 05
Gimme Shelter
Occupy Monterey looks forward to an uncertain future.
The 20 or so tents clustered in Monterey’s Veteran’s Park look worse for wear Dec. 29 after nearly two months of continuous use. Their occupants, a mix of the older homeless population and younger (but ...
Eyes Have It
Face of Islam closes human and geographic gaps at Pacific Grove Art Center.
Jean Brenner has traveled across Muslim countries for nearly 20 years, each time bringing back pieces of each country, culture and people she’s encountered, both in stories and in the photographs she’s taken since 1993. ...
Very Fast Gas Relief
Local pioneer of aerodynamic motorcycles aims to ride without foreign oil.
Like a lot of people, 69-year-old Craig Vetter begins his days at a local coffee shop just down the road from his house in Carmel Valley. It’s how he gets there that’s different. He drives ...
Letters To The Editor 1.5.12
Born to Run Good to know that Jason Burnett will run. Now who can we get to bump Dave Potter from the Board of Supervisors? (“Squid Fry,” Dec. 29-Jan. 4). Any real progressives out there ...
By The Numbers 1-5-12
Real Estate
$405,000 Recent Sale 703 Ocean Ave., Monterey Built: 1926 Size: 2,013 square feet Features: 3 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms Amenities: Fireplace, wood floors, fenced yard, refrigerator and dishwasher included Seller: Marilyn Buck, Matthew Lemarque and Deanne ...
What’s Cookin’
A stirring look at eight things bubbling up in the broth for 2012
There will be Prohibition-style tastings. There will star chefs who obey and those who rebel. There will be fines, loopholes, a drop in consumption and an equal surge in confusion. Or so says Michael Ginor ...
Caffe Trieste
Cool Beans: Espresso pioneers of the West Coast Caffe Trieste bring good java, Italian cuisine and lasting legacy to Monterey.
Ever since Caffe Trieste first opened its doors in 1956 in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood, it’s been a Mecca for artists, writers and freethinkers to congregate. In a swirl of caffeine and hot, frothy ...
Street Talk 01-05-12 asked at Pilgrim’s Way Bookstore in Carmel.
What is the best evidence that the world is ending?
Follow-up: What three things would you bring if you survived? PAUL FRIDLUND | Bookstore Owner | Carmel Valley A: The insanity of the people in Washington. They are not serving the people anymore. There is ...
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Following his breakthrough movie, 2008’s Let the Right One In, Swedish director Tomas Alfredson returns with his first film in English, the sprawling spy thriller Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, which opens this Friday at Century ...
Squid Fry: 01-05-12
Squid Speaks
PLEASE, NO MOORE… Squid had a classmate in high school who flicked wads of paper at Squid’s head in math class. Squid ignored him for most of the school year and then, one foggy morning, ...
I Melt With You
Starring Big Sur: The director of the new indie film I Melt With You talks about shooting in Monterey County.
Even though Rob Lowe, Jeremy Piven and Thomas Jane star in I Melt With You, director Mark Pellington believes that the film might not have gotten a theatrical release if it hadn’t been set in ...
LOCAL SPIN: Frankenfood Fight
Initiative on GMO labeling could change how we eat.
Food Inc.’s stranglehold over the nation’s food and farming system is about to be challenged in a food fight that will largely determine the future of American agriculture. A coalition representing a broad and unprecedented ...
Public Citizen 01-05-12
ONGOING P.G. PLANNING | PACIFIC GROVE – City staff host community meetings to discuss P.G.’s fiscal outlook and service challenges. 6pm Mon Jan. 9, Monterey Bay Charter School, 1004-B David Ave.; 6pm Tues Jan. 10, ...
Postmod Piano
Armed with an unusual instrument, Eliza Rickman conjures up a one-of-a-kind sound.
After Eliza Rickman graduated from college, she started gigging around Los Angeles. The petite, porcelain-skinned girl – an army brat born in Okinawa, Japan – was tasked with the constant challenge of hauling her enormous ...
The federal prison system includes units where inmates can be rarely seen or heard.
When the Abu-Baker family arrived to visit their father, Shukri Abu-Baker, at the secretive federal prison known as a Communications Management Unit (CMU) in Indiana this past fall, they were forced to sit in silence ...
Pick Your Poison
State figures on pesticide use show increasing reliance on methyl bromide alternatives.
It was a good year for strawberries in Monterey County, and also for the pesticides that make them a nearly $1 billion crop. The quantity of pesticides applied locally to all crops rose to nearly ...
Making Goals
Seaside’s Cutino Park gets a water-wise makeover.
Grass is so 2011. The new trend at city parks is a low-maintenance native landscape. Seaside’s David Cutino Park, a multi-use ball field on Noche Buena Street and San Pablo Avenue, recently made the upgrade ...
Runoff Standoff
City of Salinas fights stricter (and more expensive) urban stormwater rules.
Forty volunteers woke up in the middle of the night in early October during the first heavy rain of the year, collecting water samples from 20 points where stormwater carries everything in its path directly ...
Pacific Grove’s ambitious tree plan makes its long-awaited debut.
The city of Pacific Grove is hoping to put a long battle over its tree policy to rest with a new Urban Forest Management Plan. But the 178-page draft, released in mid-December, might raise as ...
Bargain Beats
The first ever Acoustic/Electric Festival at Fernwood offers a monster amount of music that won’t break the bank.
Back on Oct. 4, Keigan Skydecker held the 12th and final installment of his widely popular and mostly free Acoustic/Electric Concert Series, which showcased everyone from sci-fi psych rockers Howlin’ Rain and metal guitarist Scott ...
Eyes Have It - Pt.2
More of the interview with Face of Islam photographer Jean Brenner.
You started out as a painter. When did you start showing your photographs? I started in 1993, when I had my first show. I [had done] a lot of landscape paintings, based on things I ...
