Thursday, July 29
Letters
Railroading The Public I want to start out by thanking Coast Weekly for its excellent article on plans for a train offering service to our region. I wanted to clarify and add some of my ...
Environmentalists and housing activists join forces to promote new growth principles.
The longstanding enmity between environmentalists and affordable housing advocates may have finally been put to rest with a breakthrough agreement that could have significant political impact on future land use planning in Monterey County. The ...
It's Our Land --Salinan Indians left out in the cold again.
The Salinan Indians of Central California have endured much in the last 230 years. The tales of how the Spaniards mistreated the California Indians is an old and grisly one. The Mexicans weren''t much better, ...
Michael Patrick Jann's mockumentary bypasses funny and arrives at merely crude.
Coming as this does from a television director (Jann, late of MTV''s "The State") and a television writer (Lona Williams of "The Drew Carrey Show"), it''s no wonder that this biting parody of beauty contests ...
A firsthand account of life with cockroaches.
My first apartment was in the bowels of hell. OK, so I exaggerate. It was actually only the "Halls of Hell." I found out later that "Halls of Hell" was the nickname Marina police officers, ...
By Catherine Coburn
Some new food has recently come into my life, I must report with great joy. It started with my buddy, Jose, bringing me a sack of plantains. And it has transformed my appetizer repertoire from ...
Roach-infested apartments, human feces in the hallway, broken toilets. Substandard living situations are more common in Monterey County than you know.
An east Salinas grandmother pays $625 a month for an apartment in a downtrodden building where the stairwells reek of urine. The laundry facilities have been out of order for more than a year--don''t even ...
Man of La Mancha La Mancha enchants at the Outdoor Forest Theater.
A poet and madman is telling tales in the forests of Carmel. Ostensibly, the story at the heart of Man of La Mancha, which opened last weekend at Carmel''s Outdoor Forest Theater, takes place in ...
Forget the Bach Festival's namesake; performance highlights of this festival were written by Franz Josef Haydn.
On the conductor''s podium, a reinvented Bruno Weil sparked genuine excitement in the works of Haydn and Mozart during the first Tuesday night performance of the Carmel Bach Festival last week. Mostly gray readings of ...
There's plenty of rock in town to roll you through this weekend.
Guess we complained enough about rock venues (or the lack thereof), and with all the choices coming up for this weekend, you''ll be able to spend some excellent nights out on the town. Coming at ...
Some sources for help and advice.
The Conflict Resolution and Mediation Center of Monterey County is a free, neutral service that helps resolve problems between tenants and property owners, 649-6219. Legal Aid of the Central Coast, 375-0505. Monterey County Health Department, ...
Help is elusive for poor people suffering from depression.
Ray Lillo is a sick man. Two years ago, Lillo, age 50, says he "just broke down." He began to break out in night sweats, he couldn''t sleep, he couldn''t muster the energy to get ...
Mellower, more soulful Chris Cain plays Sly McFly's; Christine Lavin at Media Room.
I got a confession to make. I know there are a lot of people who really dig blues guitarist Chris Cain. But I haven''t been one of them. His music always struck me as having ...
Chef Profile
If it's meeting your mates to toss back a pint you're after, Cannery Row has recently become part of the pub scene. Bullwacker's has long been a familiar eatery on the Row, under the same ...
Kinder and Gentler
Say Something Nice or Shut Your Goddam Mouth The love-''n''-peace folks over in Santa Cruz are busy collecting signatures for a ballot initiative to declare Santa Cruz the nation''s first "hate-free" city. Nothin'' new for ...
Children's Calendar, August 1999
3 Tuesday Circus Zucchini Have you ever thought there are too many video games, TVs and computers around? If you''re a kid, maybe not, but a free, new circus show might change your mind. The ...
Dante Rondo displays 30 years of his artwork at the PG Art Center, now celebrating its 30-year anniversary.
Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed--that could be Peninsula artist Dante Rondo. He doesn''t fit the stereotype of the dark and moody creative mind but seems filled with color, vibrancy and exuberance, all of which he infuses into ...
Annoying or Amusing? --Commercial Crazy
Advertisements barrage us at every public place possible. Although some are clever, others are trite, annoying or just plain bad. Here''s what some locals think about advertising. Serena Hughes Age: 18 Occupation: Grocery clerk Resides: ...
Thursday, July 22
What Comes Around, Goes Around
Smart Growth? Not in Our Backyard! Traffic jams, water shortages, and sprawling subdivisions here in Monterey County? Why, it''s all a figment of your imagination, at least according to local business honchos who are gearing ...
Jeffrey T. Heyer''s performance as Sherlock Holmes is the real reason to see this play.
The Western Stage is now presenting Hugh Leonard''s comedy spoof-cum-Sherlock Holmes murder mystery, The Mask of Moriarty, starring Jeffery T. Heyer as Holmes in a role he was seemingly born to play. Heyer''s arch delivery ...
No matter whether you're from Abilene, Texas or Aberdeen, Scotland we got your soul music.
What''s Up Chuck? Probably the biggest bang for your musical buck is at the Summer Fat Fry Music Festival in Aptos Village Park this weekend. The two-day festival features headliner Merle Haggard with Robert Earl ...
By Catherine Coburn
If you read the Weekly''s cover story last week about women''s roles in society in the new millennium ("Women on Top?" July 8-14) you may also be scratching your head, trying to figure out which ...
Environmentalists question the impacts on the Central Coast of turning range lands into vineyards.
Coast residents love the wine industry. We love the plethora of local labels on the shelves, spending an afternoon in the tasting rooms, and the air of sophistication it lends our sleepy stretch of coastline. ...
Conductor Bruno Weil doesn't miss a note--but he does miss most of the soul.
If J.S. Bach had been only a technician, his place in history would remain the standard of comparison. But Bach was also a man of deep feeling, a fact which sometimes escapes the notice of ...
A new performing arts center opens in Carmel Valley.
The stage is set and the curtain is almost ready to rise on Carmel Valley''s new Magic Circle Center for the Arts. We''ll have to wait for opening night next Friday to see if the ...
'Where Has John-John Gone?' John F. Kennedy Jr., 1960-1999
For many, the image of toddler John F. Kennedy Jr. saluting his father''s casket epitomizes the sadness of the tragic end of J.F.K. Now the man who was the little boy is gone. Here are ...
Seaside's lone art gallery closes, leaving some to wonder about the future of the city's art scene.
In November 1995, Seaside artist Sandra Gray was on a high. An arts commissioner for the city of Seaside, she had just opened the city''s first commercial art gallery, Gray''s Art Gallery, at 1104 Broadway ...
Stanley Kubrick's final film is a dark journey into a dangerous jungle of lust and love.
Who knows what darkness lurks in the hearts of lovers? Stanley Kubrick, apparently, did. Eyes Wide Shut, Kubrick''s 13th, final, and most eagerly awaited feature film takes us on a bizarre nighttime ride into the ...
One Main Street Cafe
When the National Steinbeck Center opened last year in downtown Salinas, the idea was to eventually create an on-site foodservice outlet. Something to meet the basic needs of the visiting public in search of a ...
Wine Industry Adopts More Sustainable Agricultural Practices
The Central Coast wine industry has adopted more sustainable, environmentally sensitive agricultural practices in the last few years. That is the conclusion of studies by the Central Coast Vineyard Team, a group funded by a ...
Letters
He Loves Peruvians Lest I be misunderstood, my objection was not to the Peruvian music, I even bought one of their tapes ("They Tried to Pull the Plug on The Beatles, Too," Squid, July 15). ...
The Media Room says it's being silenced by the city of Pacific Grove.
One of the county''s coolest little concert spots could be shut down in the next couple of months, courtesy of an ongoing squabble between the venue owner and the city of Pacific Grove. At issue ...
Monterey's newest rock club opens this weekend.
On Friday, at MoCo''s newest nightclub, club owner Kathi DeMaria will open the doors at STARZ for the very first time. Sharing the bill on opening night are two local bands, The Mudskippers and Amazon ...
Monterey mayor responds to Evans'' public forum.
Monterey has a number of community values that the City Council always keeps in mind--public participation, fairness, protecting the city''s interests, implementing the city''s well-thought-out land use plans, and protecting our unique environment. These values ...
Thursday, July 15
Mudfrog makes Monterey County debut at BlueFin.
The bio for Santa Cruz-based Mudfrog reads like a musical receipe that includes REM, The Beatles, and Steve Earle as major ingredients, with "strange electronic devices" added as secret spices. Guitarist/vocalist Scott Beesley describes the ...
Around Town
Do not be alarmed if a man--about 5 feet 9 inches, medium-build, sporting a goatee, wearing a white coat--approaches you and demands your lemons. That''s just Chef Brandon from Stokes Adobe, who is regularly moved ...
Humor and special effects make this a cut above the average horror flick.
Lake Placid has both full-fledged, post-modern, tongue-in-cheek dark humor, and there''s state-of-the-art special effects surprises in this movie about a mysterious Loch Ness-kind of beast that haunts a Maine lake while developing a taste for ...
Running Amuck
They Tried to Pull the Plug on the Beatles, Too Somebody stop him. Local history buff Neal Hotelling is out of tune this time. Hotelling, usually a rational advocate for preserving the precious historical resources ...
The Monterey Junior Lifeguards program trains local youngsters to be safe and to protect the oceans.
Lifeguards in Monterey County are a rare breed. With 80 miles of coastline to patrol, the two California State Parks lifeguards are the only professionally trained lifeguards hired to watch city, county and state beaches. ...
Letters
Thanks, But... Although thanks are in order for the acknowledgment of my environmental sensitivities, your article ("Toxic History," July 8) failed to identify the fundamental facts that form the basis of the Cannery Row Marketplace's ...
Plans are chugging along to bring passenger train service back to the Monterey area, but not everyone is on board.
Ron Sanders isn''t at all happy at the idea of Seaside building a train station right where his auto repair shop now stands on Del Monte Boulevard. Sanders, owner of Ronnie Sanders Auto Service, moved ...
Pacific Grille
If it seems like deja vu, you're not imagining things. The sign that used to read Holiday Inn as you drove through Monterey on southbound Highway 1 has, for the last year and a half, ...
Smells Fishy--Changes to the Monterey city code seem suspiciously tied to Cannery Row Marketplace.
The old saying "Carmel by the Sea and Monterey by the Smell" still holds true today. Yes, there is something mighty smelly in Monterey, but this time what is fishy on Cannery Row is not ...
MPC revival of this paean to the 1960s is good, but not quite great.
What Saturday Night Fever is to the 1970s and Working Girl is to the ''80s, Hair, the "American Tribal Love-Rock Musical," is to the ''60s. Now considered a period piece, it evokes better, perhaps, than ...
Bruno Weil, Bach Festival artistic director, pushes festival to new heights.
Acclaimed yet controversial, the Carmel Bach Festival under Music Director Bruno Weil is startlingly different from the days when Sandor Salgo ran the fest. While a fond recollection of those days continues to haunt many ...
Can Pebble Beach's new owners bathe in the glory of their new acquisition? Or are they about to take a bath?
When contemplating ownership of Pebble Beach, the intangibles of ego must blur the bottom line of return on investment. How else can one explain the $820 million paid by actor/director Clint Eastwood, golfer Arnold Palmer, ...
Seaside to San Francisco--The Train's a Comin'
The Transportation Agency for Monterey County, in conjuction with Amtrak, is planning to open a train line from San Francisco to the Monterey Bay. What do local residents think of having a new mode of ...
This debut film from Britain documents a gay teen's coming-of-age.
The best scene in the new movie Get Real takes place in a public toilet. Not an ordinary toilet, but the kind of washroom playwright Joe Orton was alluding to when he wrote, "The men''s ...
Thursday, July 8
The First Sex?--Feminism in the New Century
The First Sex by Helen Fisher discusses whether women''s role in society is learned or innate and how that affects the feminist movement. What do locals think of the future of the feminism? Max Pahl ...
In her book The First Sex, Helen Fisher argues that women are genetically better suited than men to face the future.
Will traditional gender differences serve women well in the 21st century? Emily Jenkins profiles anthropologist Helen Fisher, author of The First Sex and champion of the"natural woman" in FEED Magazine. Emily Jenkins, author of Tongue ...
Carmel writer J.S. Holliday strikes again with a lively history of California's golden glory days.
There is something rather fitting about the fact that historian Jim Holliday doesn''t use a computer. Working from his tranquil Carmel studio, the 75-year-old author and former executive director of both the Oakland Museum of ...
Barry Sonnenfeld's remake of the '60s television show lacks soul (or even a plot).
The pillaging of classic (and in the case of Wild Wild West, not-so-classic) television series marches relentlessly onward. One wonders where Hollywood will turn once the final cathodial grave is plundered (sure to be, as ...
Schooners Bistro
Conventional wisdom used to maintain that if a restaurant had a view, food came as an afterthought. While this may still be the case in many heavily trafficked tourist domains, the smart money knows that ...
Graham Nash takes aim at photography's next frontier.
It''s next to impossible to think of Graham Nash as anything other than the Woodstock-era icon whose landmark recordings with David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Neil Young represent one of the more enduring legacies of ...
History and environmental concerns clash on Cannery Row Marketplace site.
Dan Summers is an environmentalist. Sort of. Summers, the developer of the Cannery Row Marketplace, a proposed four-building shopping and residential complex slated for construction on the south end of the Row, wants nothing more ...
Letters
Save An Old Friend As I drive along Highway 1 heading north, with Fort Ord to my right and the old Soldiers Club (now called Stilwell Hall) to my left, I see an old friend ...
Don't forget to pack the books when you're getting ready for your summer getaway.
Paris Trance: A Romance By Geoff Dyer Farrar Straus and Giroux $23 hardcover With Paris Trance: A Romance, Geoff Dyer--Oxford-educated scholar of jazz and D.H. Lawrence--gives us a lyrical meditation on desire, memory, and time. ...
By Catherine Coburn
OK, all you righteous culinarian wanna-be''s: What do your Goodyear radials and the cultural revolution that overthrew the Coca-Cola Company have in common? Give up? Let''s go double jeopardy: What did New Product News tout ...
The SPCA goes "no-kill," but that doesn't mean local shelters have followed suit.
Unwanted animals will still be killed in local animal shelters, despite all the attention given to the SPCA''s "no-kill" policy. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) will no longer be euthanizing ...
MoSymph's newly appointed music director Kate Tamarkin ready to go.
Last week, this column called into question the decision by the Monterey Symphony to postpone by one full concert season the full-time installation of elected music director Kate Tamarkin. In the interim, we spoke by ...
Big Fish in Small Ponds
You Bite Me? Here''s a movement Squid can really get behind. Those caring PETA folks--People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals--are prevailing upon Monterey Bay Aquarium Executive Director Julie Packard to stop serving seafood in ...
Stroke 9 returns to Monterey for their debut at the Long Bar.
Though the pickings are slim, the rock ''n'' roll sound that''s been coming our way has more than made up in quality what it lacked in quantity, and this weekend will be no different. If ...
Thursday, July 1
Traditional Weekend--Few musical surprises in town this week as MoCo relies on the tried and true.
Ahhhhh, tradition...Fourth of July and it''s time for burgers, barbecue, beer, fireworks--In a world that''s constantly changing, it''s nice to know there are some things that we can count on to remain the same. Like ...
September Ranch lawsuits charge corruption of county planning process.
If it''s spectacular fireworks you''re looking for, there''s no need to wait until the Fourth of July. The hottest show in town this holiday weekend begins July 1 at the courthouse in Monterey, where Superior ...
American Sentiments--Locals On America
Monterey County is home to many immigrants. America is thought to be the land of choice and freedom, but some newcomers find obstacles. What do locals think that "America" means? Eli Severson Age: 19 Occupation: ...
Predictable story plus predictable humor make for predictable mainstream effort by Adam Sandler.
Akinder, gentler Adam Sandler targets a whole new demographic--women--in this lighthearted (but still marginally obnoxious) tale of unplanned parenthood and wayward parental mores. I''ve followed Sandler''s bizarre career trajectory from his Studboy character on MTV''s ...
Kid Picks
16 July Monterey Olympics For kids in the Monterey Recreation Department playground programs, this week is all about sports. The 38th annual Junior Olympics takes place on the Monterey High School football field, with almost ...
The manipulation of trademark and copyright law has a chilling effect on Web users.
The 800-pound gorillas are taking control. In an ideal world, the Internet would be a free-form medium that provides a way for individuals and small companies to express and promote themselves in a worldwide forum. ...
Communication Breakdown
Innocent by Association I sure hope I don''t end up in a jar down there. I''m referring to the proposed San Xavier Foundation, the brainchild of Cannery Row Marketplace developer Dan Summers, who plans to ...
Immigrants caught in the complex web of immigration laws struggle to stay in America.
In 1979, "Antonio" walked "across the mountains" and crossed the Tijuana border into California as easily as an American tourist returning home. He came here, like many other Mexican immigrants, to seek a better life. ...
Exploitation cartoon soap opera of sex and violence damages Spike Lee's credibility.
With Summer of Sam, Spike Lee revisits his proclivity for the ill-effects of New York''s extreme summer heat waves by pasting together dissonant scenes of David Berkowitz''s ''76-''77 murder spree with the tawdry relations of ...
Il Fornaio
Alessio Giannuzzi is from Pistoia, an area in the Tuscan region of Italy, about 15 minutes out of Florence. Appointed as chef at Il Fornaio in Carmel last September, he sums up the essence of ...
Steve Allen plays at the front lines of the culture war.
This article was supposed to be devoted to the musical side of the multi-talented performer, author and television pioneer Steve Allen, who is appearing this Saturday at the Jazz & Blues Company in Carmel. But ...
Bread Winner
There''s no bathing suit competition in this contest. No singing. And no dancing, unless you count the kind of unique choreography it requires to hustle back and forth between mixer, work bench, proof box and ...
Why Wait?--Why must ticketholders wait a full year before new conductor takes podium?
Some Monterey Symphony ticket-buyers are now openly questioning the decision to delay the installation of new music director Kate Tamarkin until the fall of 2000, some 15 months and one full subscription season after the ...
Salinas eyes comprehensive plan for social change as cure for violence.
In a city that has spent the last decade rocked by youth gangs and crime, Salinas community leaders are promoting a plan to replace violence with peace. Although there are few new concepts outlined in ...
STARZ--New dance club promises live music and lots of ambiance.
As of July 16, there will be new life at the old After Dark. That''s when STARZ, a new live-music dance club, will open its doors. With any luck, it will fill some of the ...
Eye-burning exhibit at Monterey Museum of Art throbs with intense colors.
Light bounces off Lukas Blok''s op-art-ish paintings, leaving multi-hued puddles on the scuffed varnish of the gallery floor. The uneven finish on the floor, pockmarked by years of use, causes the colors to ripple and ...
Baseball Diplomacy?--Will a series of simple baseball games open doors of communication between the U.S. and Cuba?
In Havana on March 29, the Baltimore Orioles edged out the Cuban All-Star team by 3 to 2 in the 11th inning. In the rematch, on May 3 in Baltimore, Cuba struck back with a ...
Letters
No Way Road Way The city of Monterey is about to create a hazardous traffic situation through a residential neighborhood and at the entrance to adjoining York School. Two York students were killed at the ...
