Thursday, July 28
A Look Bach
Taking stock of the Carmel Bach Festival’s new groove.
Paul Goodwin, the Carmel Bach Festival’s new music director, is widely recognized as a Baroque specialist, exactly what a Bach festival would be looking for. Only the Bach festival in Carmel has long stretched its ...
Brezsny's Astrology July 28-August 3, 2011
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): I love how the poet Rachel Loden describes her impressions of Daniel Borzutzky’s The Book of Interfering Bodies. She says that reading it is like “chancing upon a secret lake full ...
By The Numbers 07-28-11
Real Estate
$814,545 Recent Sale 170 Del Monte Blvd., Pacific Grove Built: 1951 Size: 1,367 square feet Features: 2 bedrooms, 1.5 bathrooms, 2-car garage Amenities: Wood-burning fireplace, expansive bay and golf course views, corner lot Seller: The ...
Sip of Success
1833’s drink program best epitomizes the epic heights it’s after.
Levi Mezick’s warm goat-cheese custard ($12) moves eyebrows and hearts. Like the truffle-butter-rubbed roasted chicken breast with artichokes, bacon and black garlic ($23), the mac cheese and cheese ($5) and the caramelized endive with Medjool ...
Street Talk 04.28.11 (asked @ McAbee Beach in Monterey.
)
What animal scares you the most?
Follow-up: What is your spirit animal? KELLY CABRAL | Homemaker | Tracy A: A lot of animals. The birds that are moving around here. I’m scared to pet the sea animals at the Aquarium. Big ...
Letters To The Editor 07.28.11
Where’s the Beef Thursday I rushed out to get what I thought would be the California Rodeo edition of the Weekly and was disappointed to find “Sex for Sale” instead (“Tricks of the Trade,” July ...
¡Ask a Mexican! 07.28.11
Dear Mexican: A few years ago, my girlfriend and I visited the beautiful city of Merida in the Yucatan. We were surprised to see a sentence in our guidebook warning us to be on the ...
The Smurfs
The Smurf Hits the Fan: The Smurfs is a weird mix of potty fixation, misguided logic, and the urge to violence.
I’ve been giving this some serious thought and I believe I may have figured out who is the intended audience for The Smurfs: An incontinent semi-slacker thirtysomething dude who is insecure in his high-powered career ...
Crazy, Stupid, Love
A dynamite cast can’t quite rescue Crazy, Stupid, Love.
Steve Carell, Julianne Moore, Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Kevin Bacon and Marisa Tomei star in Crazy, Stupid, Love. It is unlikely you will find a better assemblage of talent anywhere. But wow, what a mediocre ...
Riddem Nation
Monterey Bay Reggaefest ropes in some of the genre’s loftiest names for its 16th annual installment.
As reggae prophet Bob Marley famously sang: “One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.” The Monterey Bay Reggaefest, as it hosts more than 50 groups on three stages, may ...
Ramone Love Poem
An alum of one of punk rock’s most beloved bands revives the music of The Ramones at Planet Gemini.
Between 1974 and 1996, The Ramones – arguably the most popular American punk rock band of its era – performed more than 2,200 times. During many of those infamously wild shows, former marine Chris Ward ...
Through the lens of wild horses, a view on salvation.
There is a major land grab taking place on our public lands, one that is both criminal and exploitative, and it is being perpetuated by our government and with judicial approval. But there is a ...
Fuzzy Situation
Ten families sue military housing operator on the former Fort Ord, complain of toxic mold.
Retired Air Force Staff Sgt. Thalvick Mosquera was laying in bed in 2009, recovering from ankle surgery and staring at the walls of his Seaside bedroom. He noticed a patch of mold growing, and then ...
Council agrees to put hotel room cap measure on the ballot.
On July 20, the Pacific Grove City Council unanimously opted to put a revision to a 25-year-old city law on the Nov. 8 ballot. Measure C, passed in 1986, capped the number of new rooms ...
Trawlers’ Tribute
Long-time local fishing family hopes to memorialize those lost at sea.
Having stuffed the hold of his 50-foot trawler, Relentless, with Dover sole, David “Rowdy” Pennisi, 43, and crew member Michael Odom headed to San Francisco in the early hours of June 21, 2004 to offload ...
The Trees for the Forest
New book by local nonprofit shines light on our own Monterey pine.
Rita Dalessio has learned to spot a Monterey pine by the elegant circle of cones radiating around the trunk. It’s one of many lessons learned in her seven years working on Coastal California’s Legacy: The ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 07.28.11
ONGOING LEADERS IN ART | COUNTYWIDE – The Arts Council for Monterey County is accepting nominations to honor exemplary leaders who promote access to and excellence in the arts. Nominations due Aug. 1. 622-9060, www.artsformontereycounty.org. ...
Killer Instincts
It’s legal to trap and euthanize raccoons, but not relocate them.
Raccoons have it good at the Skyline Forest home Charles Van Vliet shares with his family. They sit and eat dinner on the deck, peek in the windows and miraculously climb pillars and squeeze through ...
Inside the Lines
Redistricting inspires Assemblyman Bill Monning to consider a state Senate run.
Going from long and skinny to short and squat may not be a popular diet plan. But local Democrats are eagerly awaiting the July 29 release of redistricting maps that are expected to do just ...
Cute or Evil: A Quest for Raccoon Truth
Raccoons own a stunning array of skills and a non-negotiable place in our local existence. Yet few know much about them.
The checkout guy at Sand City’s Costco looked like he’d just been served a plate of poison-oak Parmesan. He stared at the customer in front of him, his face twisted into a portrait of undiluted ...
Stage Next
Big Sur’s children’s summer theater group again stands a beloved fairy tale on its head.
It’s the first of three consecutive Friday evening shows at the Big Sur Grange Hall and artistic director, Jaime Arze, to his own amazement, isn’t racing backstage and running up and down the stairs to ...
Salinas City BBQ
Veteran Salinas City BBQ converts nonbelievers into barbecue disciples.
I’d heard about the barbecue joint that took the place of Smalley’s Round Up a year ago from my friend who works nearby. He swears it has transformed him into a barbecue addict. So it ...
Squid Speaks
IF A TREE FALLS… Just as Squid started tuning up Squid’s trike for summer romps on the former Fort Ord, the Board of Supes OK’d the county’s Whispering Oaks development, which would level 3,400 coast ...
Tagging a City’s Identity
Scott Lydon spent a year researching Salinas’ graffiti “problem” and found something unexpected.
Hideous. Modern art. Criminal. Free expression. Graffiti can inspire strong, divided reactions within a community, leading to disagreements over what it is, whether it has purpose, and what to do about it. For recent CSU ...
Thursday, July 21
Slim Up
Alt-country rocker Langhorne Slim broke away from his East Coast roots to find solace in Oregon
In 2009, Sean Scolnick, aka Langhorne Slim, sang “God Bless America” during the seventh inning stretch in front of his favorite baseball team, the Philadelphia Phillies, and 40,000-plus fans. The honor was part of NPR’s ...
F(ail) Buddies
Friends With Benefits lacks the money-shot moments.
Let’s get this out of the way: The only thing Friends With Benefits and Natalie Portman’s No Strings Attached have in common is that they’re both romantic comedies about friendships with casual sex. In terms ...
Trigger Happy
Small Town Murder Songs introduces an awesomely conflicted police officer and too much Canadian indie music.
Writer and director Ed Gass-Donnelly’s Small Town Murder Songs places a Twin Peaks-like murder in a setting that is more Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon than David Lynch’s fictional Washington town. When a nude young woman ...
Hitch the Wagons
Seaside banks on Monterey Downs to fund its veterans cemetery.
I n the historical wars of the West, soldiers depended on their horses to keep them alive. Today, Seaside officials are depending on a controversial horse park project to create the funding base for a ...
One reporter investigates rumors regarding more than a massage.
Tucked back in a fairly quaint and non-descript little strip-mall in Salinas is a well-advertised Asian massage parlor that, from its ads, suggests beautiful women are at the ready to help release the stresses of ...
Stalled For Cash
Green Vehicles screeches to halt; city points finger at California Energy Commission.
A s electric vehicle charging stations go up around Monterey County, a would-be manufacturer of cars that could use them closed the doors of its Salinas-area headquarters—before ever getting its assembly line running. Eco-conscious redevelopment ...
Bagging AMBAG
Transportation agencies consider dissolving the tri-county planning association.
T here’s more to road rage than angry drivers. Transportation and planning agencies in the region are butting heads when it comes to who does what, and some of them are proposing to eliminate the ...
Song As Savior
For singer-songwriter A.J. Croce, music was first a refuge, then a trampoline to underground stardom.
A.J. Croce, who visits Seaside’s Alternative Café on Saturday, endured a lot of hardships as a youngster. He was left completely blind for six years after suffering a brain tumor at the age of 4. ...
Gluttony a Go-Go
XL Grindhouse’s monster burgers and giant beers turn heads, moisten mouths in Oldtown Salinas.
In Cleveland, Ohio, the Melt Bar & Grilled has a five-pound grilled cheese challenge. In Nashville, Tenn., Roosters Texas Style BBQ and Steakhouse has a 72-ounce odyssey. Trimbo’s Pizza in Butte, Montana, tempts customers to ...
Tricks of the Trade
Undocumented women servicing field workers, streetwalkers in seedy motels, high-end flesh sold at high-end events: Sex sells in Monterey County.
an intricate dance takes place weekend nights on the streets of East Salinas. As the bars and clubs close and people seep onto the streets, the women come out of the shadows and into plain ...
Two looks at one subject: closure.
I ’ve had Green Vehicles Inc. on my deadpool list almost since the very first day I heard the words “Green Vehicles” put together with “incorporated.” Deadpool, for those unfamiliar, is a list of things—companies ...
Squid Speaks
TURF WAR…Squid’s enormous eyes allow for extraordinary depth perception, which not only helps Squid shovel in fish, but also makes Squid a pretty damn skilled soccer player. So you can imagine the shock on July ...
The Fast and the Furious
A trifold look at the 101st California Rodeo Salinas most fans don’t have a chance to observe.
A few seconds. That’s how long a typical rodeo event lasts. A successful bronc rider only has to stay atop his bucking horse for eight. The fastest steer wrestler pins his calf to the ground ...
Con Artistry
Debut AnimeiCon convinces audiences that imaginative geeks equals creative cool.
Let’s start with the name. It’s pronounced “ANN-nih-may.” But what is anime? Anime is the genre of animated films—and TV and web shows (and, recently, video games)—that originated out of Japanese manga, or comic books. ...
Has Roger Ailes tapped American phones on behalf of Fox News?
“H as Roger Ailes been keeping tabs on your phone calls?” That’s how Portfolio.com began a post back in 2008, when a former Fox News producer charged that Ailes had outfitted a highly secured “brain ...
Letters To The Editor 07.21.11
Thanks, Brett My husband and I would like to thank Brett Melone for his leadership at ALBA (“Farming incubator ALBA loses its director during its best season yet,” July 7-13). We would also like to ...
Birthdays on the Bay
Abalonetti’s gives itself a makeover at 60, Domenico’s throws a party at 30.
Last year, World’s Strongest Man competitor Mark Felix set a world record in London by dead lifting almost 500 pounds. With one arm. Forgive the folks at Abalonetti’s (373-1851) if they are unimpressed. At one ...
Inside Track
Looking at the Red Bull MotoGP from the photo pit provides a new reckoning of the breakneck race.
Andrew Wheeler compares motorcycle racing to ballet. “It’s like dancing on a knife edge at higher speeds,” he says. “You can relate to their form, on a human level.” This is what inspires him to ...
Slipping Containers
On Feb. 25, 2004, the container vessel Med Taipei headed south through 30-foot swells on its way from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Rolling violently, the freighter lost 15 containers inside the Monterey Bay National ...
Street Talk 07.21.11 (asked @ Music Unlimited in Monterey.
)
What technology would you invent to make life easier?
JOSH KIM | Student | Marinae A: Some device that could teleport you places, with items with you if you needed. You wouldn’t have to factor in travel time. Outside the Bo:x: Pandora. I find ...
By The Numbers 07-21-11
By The Numbers
$1,050,000 Recent Sale 70 Rancho Rd., Carmel Valley Built: 1948 Size: 2,864 square feet Features: 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2-car garage Amenities: Outdoor cooking area, hot tub, separate artist studio, organic garden Seller: Alain and ...
History in the House
How a humble Pacific Grove property changed the course of computing.
T here is a decent case to be made that much of the fate of the modern world can be traced back to a modest Victorian in Pacific Grove. That’s because the computer operating systems ...
Thursday, July 14
It’s Electric
Pacific Grove native Sean Smith readies to release a standout album wielding addictive experimental sound.
Guitarist Sean Smith’s forthcoming album Huge Fluid Freedom – due out on Aug. 30 – will be available for early purchase at his Sunday (July 17) show at Carbone’s. The LP cover, featuring a close-up ...
By The Numbers 07-14-11
Real Estate
$2,100,000 Recent Sale 1017 Ocean View Blvd., Pacific Grove Built: 1990 Size: 2,833 square feet Features: 5 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, 2-car garage Amenities: Ocean views, three fireplaces, patio, deck, vaulted ceilings, radiant heat Seller: Sylvia ...
Oh It’s On, Johann
Even as it closes in on three quarters of a century, Carmel Bach Festival grows more adventurous and accessible in its programming.
The two-week-long Carmel Bach Festival turns 74 years old this week, and it just got younger. That’s thanks to a guard change at the top of the artistic slots, including incoming Music Director and Conductor ...
Bach Notes
Twenty insights into the reason for Carmel’s classical-music season.
Today, Johann Sebastian Bach’s name and music are known virtually all around the world. But during his lifetime, he never traveled more than 200 miles from the small town, Eisenach, where he was born. There ...
Death and New Life
What the new Mucky Duck has to do with the end of your existence.
Maybe you’ve asked yourself: What would be my last meal? I’ve asked plenty of people. Answers are rarely boring. When I conducted a survey around the office, certain answers stood out beyond the brief and ...
El Callejón
Ambitious Eats: El Callejón in Oldtown Salinas does seafood and nightlife quite nicely.
“Aim for the moon,” W. Clement Stone said. “If you miss, you may hit a star.” The famous businessman and self-described “main promoter of a positive attitude” may have died well before El Callejón opened ...
Letters To The Editor 07.14.11
Me and Mr. Jones I am not the only one who thinks that Hell’s Kitchen was truly based on [Chef] Michael Jones and the way he treats his guests and staff (“The low-down on high ...
Change Agent
A wave of multicultural, conscious hip-hop outfits gather to celebrate local wordsmith Cambio’s new release.
On the heels of a month-long tour through Mexico, hip-hop artist Mike Fernandez, aka Cambio, will lay down new material on his home turf Friday at American Burger along with Dominican native Hache ST, regular ...
Red-Hot Blues
Seaside’s free Blues in the Park series raises temps with help from a rock legend’s offspring.
In 2002, Shana Morrison found her way into the hot seat on Howard Stern’s radio show. The shock jock began with a rant about how the children of rock stars (Shana’s father is Van Morrison) ...
Marina mariner detained in Greece after setting out on humanitarian mission to Gaza.
After spending four nights in a foreign prison and appearing for a baffling legal proceeding, local mariner John Klusmire is back home in Marina with a better understanding of the term “It’s all Greek to ...
Seaside’s Extreme Budget Diet
Fire Department remains relatively plump while City Hall starves.
A shift in Seaside’s political wind has spared its fire department from budgetary scorching, but left more City Hall positions in the inferno’s path. Last year’s city budget projected a $132,000 savings from the first ...
Balanced budget amendment will require radical shifts in government, a fact nobody seems to get.
This week, as the federal debt ceiling battle churns closer to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s Aug. 2 deadline, there’s increasing talk about an amendment to the Constitution that would require balanced budgets. Senate Minority Leader ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 07.14.11
ONGOING ECO-INTERNSHIPS | BIG SUR – Ventana Wildlife Society is offering one-week volunteer internships to assist with a California condor restoration program and avian research and education projects, providing a rare opportunity for close encounters ...
Ratepayers are SOL if the current desal project proceeds.
Robert Louis Stevenson once wrote that Monterey’s Spanish landowners lost their property to unscrupulous Yankees because, unlike Americans, they had not been raised “to understand all business as a competition in fraud.” To the extent ...
Street Talk 04.28.11 (asked @ Music Unlimited in Monterey.
)
What does classical music make you think of?
JOHN BROOK | Office Manager | Monterey A: All the great stuff that Beethoven wrote when he was completely deaf, like “Moonlight Sonata.” Starred and Feathered: Buckethead, guitar player for Guns N’ Roses. He wears ...
2x4 to the Head
Western Stage’s brave new “Theatre on the Edge” aims at young theater fans.
There was no big announcement, press release, leaks or fanfare. It just appeared. As if it had always been there. But Hartnell College Western Stage’s new theater group, 2x4Bash: Theatre on the Edge, set to ...
District 5’s Discontents
Potter’s vote on Whispering Oaks could dog his re-election run.
Hundreds of supporters cheered in the Board of Supervisors’ chambers on July 12 after the board approved a controversial development that had long languished in the planning process. It was by a narrow 3-2 margin ...
Fixing Baroque
Pianist-composer Stephen Prutsman constantly evolves the meaning of Bach.
To achieve fluency in music is a feat in and of itself, but pianist Stephen Prutsman moves freely from classical to jazz, and even to theater, in conversation. He proceeds to recite the opening line ...
No Warren-tee
Sheriff Scott Miller transfers detective who sued him after meth bust of Miller’s son.
What a difference a year makes. Monterey County Sheriff Scott Miller spent most of 2010 distinguishing himself from then-Sheriff Mike Kanalakis in his successful campaign to unseat the two-term incumbent. In doing so, Miller presented ...
Oh, Bother
Winnie the Pooh: confessions of a honey addict.
Oh, it’s more of the same old crap we’re feeding our kids these days: Gratuitous destruction of the English language. Partial ursine nudity. Hunny abuse. And new revulsions, too: The glamorization of obesity. The romanticization ...
Hogwarts Wild
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 sends J.K. Rowling’s gang out with a bang.
Harry Potter deserved to go out on a high note, and with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, he has. This film is a fitting conclusion to a grand, 10-year saga told on ...
Brezsny's Astrology July 14-20, 2011
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): In the coming days you have permission from the universe to dwell less on what needs to be resisted, protested, flushed out, and overcome. Instead you have license to concentrate on ...
High Water
Marina Coast hires spendy defense attorney for its GM, anticipates criminal investigation.
Marina Coast Water District is like a deer in the headlights these days, awaiting impact but not sure what form the impending disaster will take or how big it might be. Anticipating the worst – ...
Squid Speaks
KEN DOLL… Squid’s never been much of a circus fan, considering Squid can outshine a two-armed juggler any day, even while listening to music and eating a tuna sandwich. But Squid’s current entertainment of choice ...
No Ordinary Artistic Angle
Aleks Raskin finds inspiration for his unique “photos” in an aborted biochem career, and meditation.
While around three dozen quazi-photographic images burst loudly from canvases hanging on the white walls of Aleks Raskin’s gallery, incense burns peacefully in one corner and the graying artist stands in another, twirling two Chinese ...
¡Ask a Mexican! 07.14.11
Dear Mexican: Say the immigrant makes a few bucks and goes back to his/her hometown. Think they’ll put up with the shit that prompted them to move in the first place? (How ya’ gonna keep ...
Thursday, July 7
Page One: Inside the New York Times
Times Will Tell: Page One’s peek behind the scenes at The New York Times proves sobering and inspiring.
Controversy erupts around the publication of classified documents WikiLeaks obtained. Colleagues head off to cover news in war zones like Iraq. Legal action by media conglomerate the Tribune Co. threatens. Though The New York Times ...
Squid Fry 07.07.11
Squid Fry 07.07.11
ON THE [WITCH]HUNT… Even with eight tentacles, Squid can’t keep up with humans and the 10 fingers to point at you with, and also to show you the door. And that’s what any Monterey County ...
The Other Offal
Borrowing from the “waste not” school of animal parts works for veggie lovers as well – and saves cash.
The preparation and consumption of animal offal has become trendy in recent years. From headcheese to braised pig feet, there are many ways of turning animal innards into delicacies. And while plant offal hasn’t exactly ...
Cut to Death
State budget decisions complicate the county picture on gangs, drugs.
The only thing county officials agree on, regarding how the state budget will hit their coffers, is that nobody knows what their departments will look like next month. “Everything’s so nebulous at the moment, it’s ...
Methyl Madness
As fumigant applications begin, new grassroots coalitions form in opposition.
Baby rabbits may be an unlikely flashpoint for activist campaigns, but the irresistibly cute creatures – and the damage the fumigant methyl iodide can do to them – are helping mobilize dozens of organizations calling ...
Peak Harvest
Farming incubator ALBA loses its director during its best season yet.
One day after a Salinas nonprofit published a glowing biennial report on its growth and success in organic farming and business incubation, its executive director of nine years left his post and a founding member ...
At the Core
Projects on the horizon may revitalize many of Monterey County’s downtowns. But each city faces its own fiscal challenges.
If, as Greek statesman Pericles of Athens once put it, “All good things on this Earth flow into the city,” then he might well have considered cash, construction, manufacturing and jobs bad in these modern ...
Everyone Under the Bus
Dueling reports point fingers in many directions on Regional Water Project conflicts.
TomKat and Brangelina may be international sensations, but a new supercouple is stealing even more media attention in Monterey County: Collinsweeks. That’s Steve Collins, former Monterey County Water Resources Agency board member under investigation for ...
Viral Vittles
Whole Foods is on my mind, homie, as is grilling fava beans.
You can’t spell identity without a “d,” “i,” “e” and “t.” We are what we eat. And right now, a lot of us are eating at Whole Foods – this year Weekly readers voted the ...
Drawn to Flame
Massive Moth scores big with its creepy music video and ever-changing sound.
Salem, Ore.-based Massive Moth’s brand-spanking new video for “Patrons of Wanderer’s Way” – from its sophomore album More Scenery Than Man – begins with a disturbing shot of a whimpering woman in tattered clothes struggling ...
Big Storm
The 10th acoustic/electric installment goes big with hot commodity Howlin’ Rain.
After four years of labor, Howlin’ Rain is in the final stages of releasing its third full-length album, under the care of legendary production savant Rick Rubin. “It’s getting to the end of a long ...
Horrible Bosses
Like a Boss: Horrible Bosses thrives on a standout ensemble cast and a wacky screenplay.
A much more successful bromance comedy than The Hangover 2, Horrible Bosses benefits from the volatile comic mixture of chemistry between its actors and a genuinely quirky script. Contentious scenes between Jason Bateman’s corporate-climber Nick ...
¡Ask a Mexican! 07.07.11
Dear Mexican: Why do Mexican soccer fans chant “Osama! Osama!” when their side plays the United States? You don’t hear American soccer fans yell “¡La migra!” _ White Boy Dash Dear Gabacho: You think hurling ...
Skin Close
Jon and Susan Baker both got their first tattoos later in life, but their uncanny commonalities don’t stop there.
Susan Baker didn’t get her first tattoo until after 60. Same goes for Jon Baker, her husband. At the time of their first tattoos, though, the couple hadn’t started dating, nor reconnected since high school. ...
By The Numbers 07-07-11
Real Estate
$545,000 Recent Sale 538 Grove St., Monterey Built: 1996 Size: 2,103 square feet Features: 3 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms, 2-car garage Amenities: Two fireplaces, vaulted ceilings, tub with jets, breakfast bar Seller: Deutsche Bank National Trust ...
Struggling in Salinas
Oldtown Salinas: Go Big or Go Home
Around dusk on a recent Wednesday evening, Main Street in Oldtown Salinas resembles a classic Wild West ghost town, sans tumbleweeds. Empty storefront windows reflect the sunset, faded paint flakes off aged buildings, and the ...
Mediocrity in Monterey
Downtown Monterey: Ripe for Reinvention
Time and again, Monterey’s elected officials describe their fair city as “internationally renowned” and “a world-class destination.” But when comes to describing their downtown, these selfsame praise-singers aren’t exactly effusive. They sigh when discussing Alvarado ...
Status Quo in Sand City
The Line in Sand City: Where a mall defines downtown
It’s possible to walk for an hour in the afternoon along the calm dead-ends lined with industrial warehouses – roofing parts, auto repair, stone design – that comprise Sand City’s West End without encountering a ...
Golden State of Frustration
Redevelopment on its Deathbed
The towns of Monterey County have no shortage of development projects in the works. There’s just one problem: One of their key funding sources could be sucked dry by the state in the very near ...
Mixed Messages in Marina
Disappointment in Marina: The Kids Aren’t All Right
Mayor Bruce Delgado is the first to admit parts of Marina look abandoned. “General Jim Moore [Boulevard] right now looks kind of like a road to nowhere,” he says. “We assumed, like the world did, ...
Stalling in Seaside
Seaside Slump: not even Obama can fix downtown
Four years ago, Seaside was buzzing with ambitious plans to reinvent its sluggish downtown corridor. At the heart of the project: lower Broadway Avenue, a wide and rather lonely stretch occupied by niche shops, industrial ...
Salvage Love
A case for city-scale recycling
Dan Cort coined a new word to describe what he does: “contra-development.” It’s done by buying decrepit historic buildings in flagging downtowns and renovating them into functional spaces that restore life to city neighborhoods. Cort’s ...
Letters To The Editor 07.04.11
Squid Smackdown I notice Squid speaks a lot about fairness and equality in your writing (“Squid Fry,” June 30-July 6). Let’s talk about that. The name of this publication indicates that it is a news ...
Eyes Wide
Mystery Lights frontman Mike Brandon readies to embark on the most important journey of his music career, alone.
Come July 20, Mystery Lights singer-guitarist Mike Brandon will quit his managerial job at a Prunedale Starbucks and head to New York City for three months. There he’ll master his new solo LP – under ...
The great Republican obsession: women’s bodies and killing Planned Parenthood.
I suppose that conservatives aren’t going to be happy until they kill off Planned Parenthood. Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin just signed a two-year, $66 billion budget stripping the organization’s health clinics of their state ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 07.07.11
ONGOING MAPPING FAMILY TREES | CARMEL – The Carmel Foundation offers a genealogy class on creating ancestral charts online. Basic computer skills required. 1:30-3pm. July 12, 19 and 21. Eighth and Lincoln. $30/members; $40/non-members. To ...
Find the leak, says SVMH. Everyone else: stop wasting cash.
The hourly rate for a competent private investigator in Monterey County – the kind of guy a company might hire to run background checks – is about $125 an hour. The average hourly rate for ...
Street Talk 04.28.11 (asked @ The Park Lane in Monterey.
)
If you had to get a tattoo, what and where would it be?
Follow-up: What is the most misguided stereotype about old people? MELANIE SHEBALIN | Retired | Monterey A: A hummingbird on my ankle. I love hummingbirds; I think they’re beautiful birds. Old News: That they don’t ...
Brezsny's Astrology July 7-13, 2011
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): It’s my observation that women find it easier than men to tune into their natural rhythms. The menstrual cycle helps cultivate that ability. We men experience less dramatic physical shifts, and ...
Promise in Pacific Grove
Downtown Upturn: Pacific Grove’s Lighthouse lights up
Just about every California city is facing hard times, but old-fashioned charm seems to have softened the economic blow to Pacific Grove. Sure, America’s Last Hometown still struggles with out-of-control CalPERS costs and bickering political ...
Friday, July 1
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Spas
Pampering in Luxury
There’s only so much a box of bath salts can do to relieve stress. When life gets to be a bit tough to handle, a full-service spa is just the thing to polish and pamper ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – dream dates
A look at Monterey County’s biggest draws.
The incredible events come at Monterey County quickly – like a charging bull. Wait. Make that a speeding MotoGP cycle. No, a California International Airshow Blue Angel. Or a blistering Bach Festival violin solo. Whatever ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – At Play
Out and about in the Monterey Bay’s great outdoors.
Monterey County is a black hole in the most beautiful way: Its gravity sucks many in and lets few escape. Beautiful beaches and the lush forests make this a perfect playground for any outdoors adoree, ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Welcome
The Best of Monterey Bay® represents two decades’ worth of readers’ polls, editors’ picks and insights from Monterey County Weekly.
Dozens of celeb chefs like Thomas Keller, Daniel Boulud and Tyler Florence collaborate to make Pebble Beach Food & Wine a singularly epic epicurean event. Runner’s World – and anyone who knows Highway 1 – ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Shopping
The skinny on getting the goods.
To shop or not to shop. That is not the question, at least around cobblestoned Carmel-by-the-Sea, character-rich American Tin Cannery and lush Del Monte Center. It’s a foregone conclusion. Whether visitors are looking for trendy, ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Dining
A cuisine for every taste.
First things first: Thank you. You are to thank for the seemingly bottomless bounty of restaurants in this section. You see, Monterey County doesn’t have the population to support the wealth of nice eateries that ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Wines
Monterey County wines from Albariño to Zinfandel
Some 175 unique vintners tend to 40,000 acres of grapes in Monterey County, harvesting $250 million in grapes – which ultimately earns millions more as it ferments and ages – and the most Chardonnay grapes ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 - Arts & Culture
Getting in touch with the finer things.
Not content to live on the legends of the past, from Ansel Adams and Edward Weston to John Steinbeck and Robinson Jeffers, the local visual and literary scene is constantly unfolding, whether it’s at the ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Bars & Nightlife
Music and libations from Big Sur to Moss Landing.
You can sip blackberry pomegranate martinis by the fire and listen to some of the best jazz artists pick up an instrument at the Hyatt’s Fireplace Lounge. You can thirstily slurp locally crafted English Ales’ ...
Best of Monterey Bay Visitor Guide 2011 – Golf
Links and Luxury
Mecca is an overused descriptor. Around here, however, there’s no better word to describe the preponderance of world-class courses, for this Mecca of manicured grass includes far more than the most famous courses this side ...
