Thursday, January 31
I Contact
Bryant Austin finds himself – and a way to help whales – in the eyes of the world’s biggest animals.
Not too long after Carmel Valley resident Bryant Austin looked into the opalescent eye of a humpback whale, Austin’s psychologist looked into his. Then she offered some bad news. “She told me the last thing ...
Stand Up Guys
Brothers in Arms: Stand Up Guys puts aging hitmen together in a mob bromance.
Stand Up Guys is a respectable compact crime drama comedy about camaraderie among a passing generation of retired wiseguys. There’s still some honor among thieves. Christopher Walken, Al Pacino, and Alan Arkin play the film’s ...
Skirts and Sea Stars
Pacific Grove librarian chronicles how women trailblazed hands-on science education.
Hopkins Marine Station library assistant Donald Kohrs sees Pacific Grove not as it is, but as it used to be. As he gazes out a library window, the waves break against Lovers Point as they ...
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked @ The Dunes on Monterey Bay.)
What’s the most unfair obstacle women have to face?
Follow-up: What’s the best thing about being a woman? BECKI ROSS | Corporate Administrator | Salinas A: Themselves. Women oversex themselves and then complain about it. Mother Load: The whole experience of being a mom ...
Men escaping lives of poverty provide the spectacle in the NFL as the rest of us cheer.
This Sunday, citizens across these United States will indulge in the country’s most cherished pastime: watching large men give each other life-threatening concussions. For about 20 weeks, millions of us sit riveted as players in ...
Less Than $2 a Meal
Report suggests changes to CalFresh allotments are based on geography, other factors
Debbie Rohr worked as a clerk for Monterey County for 25 years before losing her job to budget cuts. Since 2005 she hasn’t been able to find regular work, so she keeps her family afloat ...
Otter Project lawsuit against state regulators takes question of ag pollution to the courts.
The years-long controversy over how to regulate agricultural runoff on the Central Coast has taken more twists and turns than the Salinas River. Next month, the courts will begin deciding which elements of the rules, ...
Labor Picking
Ag tries to secure seasonal workers as Obama makes immigration reform priority.
When a bipartisan team of U.S. senators published their proposed framework for comprehensive immigration reform on Monday, there was a loud chorus of voices weighing in optimistically – agriculture industry reps and immigrants’ rights advocates ...
Law-Enforcement Boundaries Blur
Seaside, Pacific Grove consider more shared police services.
They’ve got to hop across Monterey to reach one another, but the cities of Pacific Grove and Seaside are looking to further merge their public safety departments. The cities already share a police chief, and ...
Hole in the Bucket
Cal Am doesn’t squeeze all it could out of aquifer storage and recovery.
De-salting seawater is one of the most expensive ways to supply the Monterey Peninsula. According to California American Water estimates, its proposed regional desal plant would produce water at more than $5,000 per acre-foot. The ...
Building Sound
Restavrant draws from early rock influences and dirty old blues sensibility to churn out unique flavor.
If it wasn’t for a Bob Log III show, Troy Murrah might be another ass-kissing suit in an uptight architectural design firm. Instead he makes music with Restavrant, which perform Friday at East Village with ...
Rocking On
The year 2013 may be Monterey’s best for music because it keeps on getting better.
As memories of the Pop Fest begin to fade, notable rockers like Patti Smith, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the Flaming Lips have been helping Monterey County reclaim credibility as a worthy tour stop ...
Warm Bodies
Zombie Meets Girl: Clever premise and one-liners reanimate this otherwise standard zom-rom-com.
What if zombies were self-aware? That simple premise launches the zombie comedy Warm Bodies, as we meet R, a zombie who lives at the airport with a bunch of other zombies, walking around aimlessly and ...
Letters To The Editor 01.31.13
Run For Your Lives Hey Squid. You’ve got some inaccuracies in your Mike Dove story (“Squid Fry,” Jan. 24-30). There was never any lying – the column in question basically just said, “There was an ...
Dive Bar Boar
A blue-collar watering hole in Seaside teaches us a thing or two about wild boar and togetherness.
“Run! You son of a bitch, RUN!” screams a man at a television when a wide receiver catches the pigskin and goes in for the touchdown with defenders hot on his trail. Not too long ...
Youth Center (?!)
Old-world destination Anton & Michel follows aging Carmel’s trend toward approachability and renewal.
This 1980 original enjoyed all the elements of a classic action movie: fire, knives and raw egg – and the big box-office receipts that come with it. Of late, though, it’s been starting to seem ...
True Believers
The vision of Marina as a medical-marijuana Nirvana has one big problem: a government unwilling to take the plunge.
Marina residents Nobia Monsauret and Kevin Saunders have a dream that looks something like this: The ramshackle barracks of the old Fort Ord – the ones that nobody has been able to knock down or ...
By The Numbers 01.31.13
By The Numbers 01.31.13
$330,000 Recent Sale 1535 Mira Monte Ave., Seaside Built: 1951 Size: 1,015 square feet Features: 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 1-car garage Amenities: Fireplace, garden window, large backyard, patio, wood and tile flooring Seller: Federal National ...
Master Rework
The Monterey Museum of Art forges a new future without Executive Director E. Michael Whittington.
There’s a new round of art going up on the walls at Monterey Museum of Art/Pacific Street, replacing the best-selling Miniatures and Annette Corcoran’s Monterey NOW exhibits. The new stuff draws prints from Henri Matisse’s ...
Squid Fry 01.31.13
16,000: Gallons of sauce Papa Murphy’s Pizza uses on Super Bowl Sunday, the biggest day of the year for pizza sales.
OIL AND WATER… The Monterey Peninsula Water Management District has a bestie in Sand City Mayor David Pendergrass, who’s sat on the board almost long enough to legally start drinking on it. Or at least, ...
Brezsny's Astrology Jan. 31-Feb. 6, 2013
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Wageni ni baraka is a Swahili proverb that means “guests are a blessing.” That’s not always true, of course. Sometimes guests can be a boring inconvenience or a messy burden. But ...
A carb-fueled meeting on mortgages.
So riddle me this. If a city holds a community meeting but forgets the part about inviting the community, should they actually call it a community meeting? Should they call it something else, like, “that ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 01.31.13
ONGOING DONATION STREAM | COUNTYWIDE – Goodwill hosts a donation drive to benefit local schools and nonprofits. Interested organizations can sign up for a donation trailer, which holds clothes, shoes and housewares. Drive runs Feb. ...
Monday, January 28
Extra Helping of Squid 1.28.13
Squid's Senatorial Super Bowl Scoop
The Big Game…Squid loves to gamble. And win: When it comes to horse races of eight or less Squid never loses. One ticket per tentacle insures victory, if not financial gain. U.S. Senators are also ...
¡Ask a Mexican! — 1.28.13
The Mexican defends italics and why Univision is so damn defined.
Dear Mexican: Grammar question/rant. If Spanglish is a legitimate dialect/language, why do you feel the need to italicize every instance of code switching? I seriously doubt that when you speak you emphasize every puta palabra ...
Thursday, January 24
A Q&A with Julia Kennedy Cochran
MC Weekly: Your father had the biggest scoop in Associated Press history. And after he was fired, he didn’t back down—he maintained that he had made the right choice by breaking the news in spite ...
Getting Raw
Oysters rank among the upgrades at Jacks Restaurant, plus an avalanche of incredi-web stories.
At times Jacks Restaurant (649-2698) can evoke linebacker Manti Te’o – the guy who’s got all the game but just can’t find real love. The Portola Plaza location is strategic, the room grand, the eco ...
Girl In the Air
Carmel’s Brita Sigourney has been wearing skis since toddlerhood. Now she’s ready for her biggest event yet – the Winter 2013 X games.
Ask any skater grinding the curbs in your neighborhood parking lot, or any brand manager for an international sports apparel line, and they’ll tell you the same story: The X Games rule. Spawned by cable ...
The Roberts Court has shifted away from ideas necessary to enact policies on guns and mental health.
As President Obama begins his second term, our hopes and expectations are shadowed by shooting tragedies whose nadir was reached with the deaths of so many children in Newtown. If these events have reinvigorated a ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 01.24.13
THURSDAY 1 | 24 FINANCING CALIFORNIA | MONTEREY – State Board of Equalization board member Betty Yee speaks at the Democratic Women of Monterey County’s annual meeting. 11:30am new officer elections; noon lunch and program. ...
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked @ PetSmart in Sand City.)
What’s the strangest Pet accident you’ve heard of?
Follow-up: Which of your pet’s qualities do you wish you had? MARIE VAUGHN | Retired | Monterey A: I have a toy poodle that ate a fingertip toothbrush; $1,400 and 15 staples later, we were ...
Monterey County tallies homeless numbers as economy rebounds.
Scores of volunteers were set to hit the streets to count the county’s homeless population, a number that’s been on the rise. From 2007 to 2011, the number of Monterey County’s homeless grew from about ...
Winning Wager
Monterey Downs developer had a hand in approving new Salinas off-track betting bar.
Horse gamblers may soon have a new hang in Salinas. The Triple Crown OTB & Sports Bar – short for off-track betting – is poised to open in a former card room at the Bankers ...
GMO 2.0
Failed campaign to label GMOs regroups with EcoFarm Conference springboard.
On Election Day, Californians rejected a rule that would’ve required labeling genetically modified food. Now pro-labeling activists are at work on plan B. Locally, that likely means an effort to get a county resolution supporting ...
Funding Fiasco
Failure to pass Violence Against Women Act could slam a key D.A. unit.
Congress’ inaction on a women’s protection law could result in less services for local victims of rape and domestic violence, advocates say. The Violence Against Women Act expired in late 2011, and a divided U.S. ...
Letters To The Editor 01.24.13
Motorhomies I find it very difficult to trust or believe what we are being told by the city of Del Rey Oaks representatives (“Neighbor groups form to weigh in on future of Del Rey Oaks ...
A city this grand deserves a lasting vision.
I can remember the first time I visited Monterey. It was 1976, and I was an undergraduate at Stanford University’s Hopkins Marine Station. There was something about the city that immediately captured me – I ...
Nak Won Korean BBQ
Number Won: Marina’s Nak Won Galbi – or whatever it’s named – unloads a world of must-try Korean flavor.
I’m not quite sure what to call my new favorite Korean restaurant. The title on the menu is . In Romanized script, that’s Nak Won Galbi, which translates to “Paradise Ribs.” But the name on ...
By The Numbers 01.24.13
Real Estate
$750,000 Recent Sale 741 Dry Creek Road, Monterey Built: 1968 Size: 3,137 square feet Features: 3 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms, 2-car garage Amenities: Fireplace, new travertine floors in kitchen, entry and bathrooms, 2 decks, bay view ...
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The German government sponsored a scientific study of dowsing, which is a form of magical divination used to locate underground sources of water. After 10 years, the chief researcher testified, “It ...
Dogs’ Best Friend
Emergency vet saves Monterey’s furry four-pawed friends as the county sleeps.
Dr. Katja Herrmann thinks her life is normal. She rescues animals all night – from 5:30pm to 8:30am at the Monterey Peninsula Veterinary Emergency and Speciality Center in Ryan Ranch – then comes home to ...
Fair Pay
Cities ask Monterey County for $2 million in overcharged property tax fees.
The accounting tricks used to calculate how property taxes are divvied up between state and local governments sound more like gymnastics moves, with the Triple Flip and the VLF Swap. After the California Supreme Court ...
Saddling Up
Local music celeb Mike Beck celebrates another record and continues to show love for the cowboy life.
Sex, drugs and cars are some of the recurring themes found throughout many rock albums. In February, Mike Beck will make a record that takes on a very different motif: horses. Beck, whose renowned horsemanship ...
Chronic Country
One of the country music scene’s biggest names visits the Sunset Center.
Clint Black busted his ass to achieve fame: Over a 10-year period, the Grammy Award-winning country star performed solo at any backwoods honky tonk, raunchy bar or grimey club that would have him. By day, ...
Quartet
Senior Groove: Dustin Hoffman’s directorial debut Quartet sings the tale of elderly musicians at a retirement home.
What’s great about Quartet? It demonstrates a genuine love for the arts, and is quick to point out the importance the arts can have throughout a person’s life. To that end, it’s inspiring to see ...
Career Surrender
The battle over Edward Kennedy’s war-ending legacy continues with a new book and posthumous Pulitzer push.
It was the scoop of Edward Kennedy’s career. The one that cemented his place in journalism history. And the one that cost him his job at The Associated Press and his standing in the national ...
$216,000: Total funding for Monterey Skate Park repairs, $40,000 higher than the initial budget.
ROYAL SCOLDING… Over on Ragsdale Drive, Monterey County Herald Editor Royal Calkins wrote an editorial Jan. 17 in which he acknowledged non-journalist Mike Dove (who along with non-journalist Don Buraglio wrote the paper’s “The Running ...
Monday, January 21
¡Ask a Mexican! — 1.21.13
¡Ask a Mexican! — 1.21.13
Dear Mexican: In 1983 or 1984, I was walking home from work down Haight Street in San Francisco one evening and stopped into Watusi Records to look through the dollar cutout bin. I flipped through ...
Extra Helping of Squid 1.21.13
Squid raps on Carmel restaurant Lokal's Trip Advisor woes.
Carne-vores…Squid is yearning for the dog days of summer—the time of year Squid lights up the barbie and grills krill-marinated skirt steak whilst sipping Singapore slings—and it can’t come soon enough, because the price of ...
Friday, January 18
Sand City's Monterey Sculpture Center creates timeless art with liquid bronze.
Pouring Bronze at the Monterey Sculpture Center montereycountyweekly --> A public hot metal pour will mark the re-opening of the Monterey Sculpture Center in it's new Sand City location on 1795 California Ave. from 6-8pm ...
Thursday, January 17
Off Track
Salinas-to-San-Jose rail project gets stuck in red tape, pisses off property owners.
AMonterey County rail service could mean speedy transit for long-distance commuters, but the process to get the project rolling has been anything but quick. There’s been talk for more than a decade of creating a ...
California Dreamin’
Undocumented students band together to share information at CSUMB.
Like to party? Join a frat. Policy wonk? Check out a political organization. Undocumented student? Now, at CSU Monterey Bay, there’s a campus club for that, too. The Otter DREAM Association—TODA for short (toda means ...
The Laugh Factor
Lily Tomlin has obliterated obstacles at every turn in her famed career.
Lily Tomlin has been a iconoclastic performer without even really trying. She just went about her business – comedy, acting, producing and writing, since the late ’60s – as if there were no barriers to ...
HEALTH & FITNESS 2013 – A Six-Pack in Just Six Miles
An underground running group builds in creative motivators, like beer.
They’ve been called “drinkers with a running problem” – and when you build beer stops into a six-mile run, it may be an apt characterization. The Hash House Harriers are an international social club of ...
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked on Main Street in Salinas.)
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked on Main Street in Salinas.)
Follow-up: What scares you the most about our society’s driving habits? BERNADETTE CONANT | Barista | Seaside A: Texting while driving. I’m self-centered. I’m not going to think about what I’m doing wrong, I’m thinking ...
209 Mil: total cost of the Prunedale Improvement Project, which will eliminate left turns across 9 miles of Highway 101. The first interchange, an overpass to Prunedale’s Blackie and Reese roads, open
TEARS OF A CHOWN… Squid can’t believe it’s been almost a whole year since Pacific Grove rich guy Nader Agha launched his vanity paper, Monterey Bay News & Views. From what Squid has seen, Agha ...
That would be one way to read Republican actions.
Lost in the morass of partisan bickering over the fiscal cliff – Will they or won’t they? They will! With three minutes left to the deadline! – an important little fact for women, or anyone ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 01.17.13
ONGOING BREATHE EASIER | COUNTYWIDE – Monterey Bay Unified Air Pollution Control District awards grants to offset the costs of replacing old diesel engines with cleaner-burning technologies. Since 2006, $6.7 million has helped replace more ...
For all his flaws, Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense might be a smart move.
The battle over Barack Obama’s nomination of Chuck Hagel to be U.S. secretary of defense has many of the elements of a typical episode of insider bloodletting. These happen routinely in every administration whenever powerful ...
Field to Teeth
Scientists find a new way to trace manganese contamination in Salinas Valley.
Public health researchers are looking in a surprising place for traces of banned fungicides: the baby teeth of farmworkers’ children. In July 2011, environmental toxicologist Don Smith of UC Santa Cruz stepped into a lettuce ...
As county braces for thousands of soon-to-be insured, illegal immigrants remain uncovered.
With about 55,000 low-to-moderate income Monterey County residents expected to qualify for expanded insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act, the safety net is stretching thin. If all of those who become eligible for coverage ...
Picks of the Litter
Our absolutely brilliant picks help prepare viewers as Oscar night looms.
The Golden Globes are behind us, and the Oscars are just a few weeks away (Feb. 24). I’ve looked at the nominations announced last week and done my best to give you a crib sheet ...
Mama
Del Toro-backed horror flick Mama offers infantile frights.
Guillermo del Toro – the director of such minor masterpieces as The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth – weakens his sphere of influence by producing a sorely underdeveloped horror movie that manufactures scares from the ...
Facing Fear
Jaimal Yogis’ The Fear Project takes a swim with our most primal emotions.
Jaimal Yogis sits in the line-up at Mavericks, the surf mecca in Half Moon Bay, waiting to ride waves large enough to swallow a house – highly skilled watermen have died here. The first action ...
Letters To The Editor 01.17.13
Trigger Fingers Gun clutchers who cloak themselves in the Second Amendment argue that gun regulations are ineffective because criminals never abide by them (“Local Spin,” Jan. 3-9). That’s a peculiar ration-ale. Let’s try applying it ...
Fishy Wishes
Incredible sustainable sushi and more hopes for a healthier food system.
I ate the evidence. You would’ve too, if you like sushi – it was a beautiful maki roll packed with roasted garlic, daikon, tempura’d yam, togarashi spices, layered with rich marinated shiitake and soft avocado ...
Casanova
Fancy Affordable: Parsing Casanova’s menu for $100 with help from new chef Johnny De Vivo.
An unrestrained meal at many a fine restaurant can easily command hundreds of dollars, especially at a place like Casanova in Carmel-by-the-Sea. Entrees average $32, the selection of antipasto and hor d’oeuvres are nearly impossible ...
HEALTH & FITNESS 2013 – Fish As Drugs
Genetically modified super salmon tries to swim through a hole in the regulatory net.
If you want to bury an unsavory news story, the afternoon before Christmas vacation is a good time to break it. The FDA chose Dec. 21 to release its long awaited Environmental Assessment (EA) of ...
HEALTH & FITNESS 2013 – Hospital Food Trays Gourmet
Monterey County’s medical centers reinterpret the lesson that food is medicine.
It’s almost embarrassing to admit how good the shrimp scampi at Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital is, considering it’s, well, hospital food. But this is flavored with garlic and lemon, sautéed in a mild wine-based sauce ...
HEALTH & FITNESS 2013 - Going with the Gut
Local naturopath promotes a GAPS diet based on fermented vegetables, homemade yogurt and gobs of animal fat.
The severed turkey feet, with their thick toenails and mud-caked pads, are the stuff of an amateur horror flick – especially for a recovering vegetarian. But I’m determined to make my first homemade foot broth ...
HEALTH & FITNESS 2013 - Taking Recovery to National Dance Fame
How J.R. Martinez beat crippling injury, slimmed down and won Dancing With the Stars.
A funny thing happened to J.R. Martinez on the way home from the burn unit. “I got heavy,” Martinez says. “When you’re a burn patient, your metabolism gets thrown out of whack. You’re in recovery ...
HEALTH & FITNESS 2013 - The Treadmill Less Traveled
Rare but revolutionary ways to better well-being, from turkey-foot broth to beer jogs.
It turns out the boss at the Jump N Around bounce house emporium on Del Monte Boulevard in North Monterey won’t let adults use the assemblage of slides, castles and other inflated shapes as an ...
By The Numbers 01.13.13
Real Estate
$565,000 Recent Sale 4381 Shoreline Court, Seaside Built: 2004 Size: 2,465 square feet Features: 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms, 2-car garage Amenities: Fireplace, chef’s kitchen, soaking tub, walk-in closet, patio, landscaped yard Seller: Eric and Erin ...
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): “If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it,” wrote 19th-century poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. “Every arrow that flies feels the attraction of the Earth.” This is ...
Repair-a-Cop
How one retiree helps the Salinas Police – and learns about people’s reactions to the law.
Salinas retiree John Viarengo, 74, isn’t a police officer, but he was driving an officer’s vehicle through his city a few weeks ago when a woman made an unprotected left turn across his lane. When ...
Busting Out
Anticipating inmate surge, county considers regional approach to housing them.
When Sheriff Scott Miller went on a field trip in December to tour a shuttered juvenile correctional facility near Paso Robles in San Luis Obispo County, he was mostly struck by how big the place ...
Solo Home Run
Tim Presley pumps out music at an extraordinary rate with his neo-psych solo act White Fence.
Tim Presley’s creative juices flow like the Colorado River after a storm. Which can be both a blessing and a curse. “My social life and relationships have suffered but [making music] is all I do,” ...
Folk Squared
Two folk musicians of different generations unite for an intimate indoor show at Henry Miller in Big Sur.
Michael Hurley hasn’t done a damn thing for the past 45-plus years other than craft stomped-on packages of bluesy folk – with slightly out-of-key vocals – that are primitive, unpolished and usually involve sometimes-funny tales ...
Rust and Bone
Body and Soul: Jacques Audiard tells another beautiful story about pain in Rust and Bone.
After waking to find both of his legs had been amputated, Ronald Reagan screamed, “Where’s the rest of me!” It was the centerpiece of the 1942 film King’s Row. A couple of decades later, Reagan ...
Monday, January 14
¡Ask a Mexican! — 1.14.13
Immigrant reproduction rates and the real story of the Mexican Cristeros.
Dear Mexican: Can you please tell me something? How do you think it’s fair that all the people that come to our country and stay get treated far better than some of the people who ...
Extra Helping of Squid 1.14.13
Tales from the city.
TALES FROM THE CITY…After almost getting a tentacle ripped off in a freak racquetball accident this weekend, Squid is in an appreciative mood. Tentacles are super useful. Let Squid (using all eight limbs) count the ...
Thursday, January 10
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked @ Happy Girl Kitchen in Pacific Grove.)
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked @ Happy Girl Kitchen in Pacific Grove.)
Follow-up: What do you love to read the most? JAMESON MOHAMMADI| Painter | Monterey A: Love is the best and worst thing that can happen to someone. It leaves a hole like a cavity in ...
Squid Speak, Spoken Here
CATCH AND RELEASE… Squid’s in favor of people eating less calamari; it gives other ocean species a chance to be consumed with lemon and tartar sauce. Still, Squid was sad to see the Salinas Valley ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 01.10.13
ONGOING SPEAK FOR YOURSELF | SALINAS – Radio Bilingüe’s Salinas Youth Radio Project trains bilingual 13-to-19-year-olds with DJ, newscaster and radio announcer skills on 90.0 FM. Participants receive a $40/week stipend for the program. Feb. ...
Will Diane Feinstein lead congress through the door left open by the NRA’s disaster of a press conference?
Thank the National Rifle Association for the continued momentum toward gun control. One week after the horrific shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, and only hours after a nationwide moment of silence for the victims, the NRA ...
Racial tensions inspire new Alisal newspaper.
How many pissed-off Chicano activists does it take to start a newspaper? No seriously, how many pissed-off Chicano activists does it take, especially when the end goal is smacking Salinas’ Gannett-owned daily straight where it ...
Monumental Asset
Activists push Seaside to start marketing Fort Ord National Monument to tourists.
The most likely access point from the city of Seaside to the newly minted Fort Ord National Monument is a dead-end road. There’s no visitor center, no parking, no bathrooms – not even any signs, ...
Monterey County Gives! raises more than $750,000 for local nonprofits.
Ninety-six local nonprofits planted the seeds of their charitable projects, and Monterey County residents dug deep to help them grow. The 2012 Monterey County Gives! campaign raised $750,669, according to the latest available count. (More ...
Potty Break
Chinatown seeks to clean up its act with one new program, another in the works.
Plans to bring a portable toilet to Salinas’ Chinatown could be a major relief, in more ways than one. For the homeless living on Soledad Street, finding a bathroom is a challenge. When nearby service ...
The Culture Cure
Nonprofit 2nd Chance takes aim at getting kids to talk about, reshape self-image.
Hard work, respect, honesty: values some community members say are rooted in Latino culture, but discarded by some of today’s youth. A Salinas nonprofit is trying to re-instill those values through a program called La ...
Land Locked
Yacht Club, Sapporo tussle with Monterey over leases; planning commish cries foul.
It’s easy to pass the Monterey Peninsula Yacht Club on Wharf 2 without noticing the boxy structure, which looks more fitting for a utility building than a private club. But it’s rustic and cozy inside, ...
Blues Blood
Self-taught musician Marty O’Reilly and his trio serve up Americana and folk built on a foundation of Delta blues.
Marty O’Reilly used to sit in his room strumming the same chord on his guitar for as long as two hours straight. He was learning how to play the blues and early on he discovered ...
Far Out Sound
A chance meeting between folks from two different continents turns into a lasting musical relationship.
A couple years ago, the planets aligned in the Santa Cruz Mountains when Swedes Eva Hillered and Patrick Rydman crossed paths with Janni Littlepage of Pacific Grove. The three musicians – Hillered, a Stockholm singer-songwriter ...
Arachnid Rock
May Black gives Oakland garage rockers Spider Heart an unforgettable edge.
Within the ribcage-rattling, garage-punk rock and tinges of psychedelic textures that fuel Spider Heart’s forthcoming debut Under the Gun, a tale circulates throughout all nine tracks. “When I write songs, I sit down with an ...
La Balena Cucina Toscana
Whale of a Spot: La Balena quickly gains a loyal following with Italian authenticity and strict sourcing
I am a food voyeur. I get hot seeing what other people order. So much desire, so little table space. At 10-week-old La Balena, I coveted every dish I saw. Each could have been delivered ...
Zero Dark Thirty
Uncomfortable Reality: Zero Dark Thirty has the potential to be great, but rips off the Bin Laden bandage too soon.
Too soon? Too soon for a kickass political action movie about the hunt for Osama Bin Laden? It’s been less than two years since a black-ops team of elite American soldiers executed the purported mastermind ...
Gangster Squad
Darkly Delicious: Gangster Squad embraces noir of ’40s L.A. cops and cons with reckless, fun abandon.
If L.A. Confidential were a comic book, this is the movie spun outta that: blustery postwar mythologizing about the violent birth of the modern metropolis, all pulpy-bright even when it’s night, bursting with violence that ...
Major Movement
Musician, author and artist Bill Minor combines mediums and genres in his first memoir.
William “Bill” Minor, longtime local jazz pianist, author, poet and artist, now 77 years old, is looking back onto his life in the form of a memoir, The Inherited Heart: An American Memoir. But like ...
Letters To The Editor 01.10.13
Good Medicine Concerning the piece “Patient Patients” (“As SVMH mulls the future of healthcare, business leaders ponder how to stay afloat,” Dec. 27, 2012-Jan. 2, 2013), the most commentary I have heard about this important ...
Recipe for Love
The dedicated catalyst behind Rosine’s earns a much deserved hospitality award.
All four nominees for the third annual John “Spud” Spadaro hospitality award – Carmen Banka (formerly of Mike’s Seafood), Rosine Culcasi (Rosine’s), Terri Scardina Hernandez (Sandbar & Grill) and Anna Vindiola (Schooners) – have huge ...
By The Numbers 01.10.13
Real Estate
$1,294,545 Recent Sale 574 Watson St., Monterey Built: 1905 Size: 3,755 square feet Features: 5 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, 2-car carport, half acre Amenities: 3 fireplaces, bay views, Craftsman style, hardwood floors, built-in shelving, chef’s kitchen, ...
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Writing at io9.com, Charlie Jane Anders provides “10 Signs You Could Be the Chosen Savior.” Among the clues are the following: 1. “How often does someone comes up to you on ...
Survival of the Literate
Taking food orders and reading Darwin, English learners at the local library evolve with oomph.
When Rocio Marin moved from her home in Michoacan, Mexico, to Salinas at age 22, she didn’t need to learn English. “In Salinas, most people can speak Spanish and I could speak with everybody,” she ...
By The Book
Jose Castañeda can’t seem to shake the controversy that’s dogged him for years - but that might be precisely what Salinas needs.
Salinas City hall was packed on Dec. 18, as an overflow crowd filled the hallway to watch as Mayor Joe Gunter, Councilwoman Gloria De La Rosa and Councilman Jose Castañeda were sworn in to office. ...
Monday, January 7
¡Ask a Mexican! — 1.7.13
The Mexican explains Latino love for classic cars.
Dear Mexican: What is it about Mexicans and collecting old cars? I have three Mexican neighbors with middle-class incomes but in each case, when the old car or truck wouldn't run anymore, they would buy ...
Thursday, January 3
Smartphone Photos of the Year
Images Are Everything
Taken with cell phone cameras and shot on the fly, reader-submitted photos show the depth and breadth of life in Monterey County. Ed Bassett, the late, great dean of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, ...
Plastic Loopholes
Even after citywide ban, plastic bags are trashed at the Monterey mall.
At the Del Monte Center mall in Monterey, reusable bags seem to be the latest fashion trend. A look around during the height of holiday season reveals more cloth and woven totes, and far fewer ...
Street Talk 11.08.12 (asked in front of the Apple Store in Monterey.)
What exciting piece of technology is coming in 2013?
Follow-up: What are your words to live by in the modern world? JAMES LINDBERGH | Grocery Assistant | Seaside A: A cellular eye piece that clips to your eye the way a Bluetooth clips on ...
Squid Fry 01.03.13
Squid Fry 01.03.13
ZERO DARK… Squid loves the week between Christmas and New Year’s because it allows Squid to hunker down in a dark movie theater, watching movie after movie and making Oscar predictions. While the based-on-reality thriller ...
A newspaper hires armed guards over a lame story.
Here’s a question: Just because you can do something, should you? It’s been on my mind for days, and at the base of it is the mass killing of 6 – and 7-year-old children in ...
Get Involved
Public Citizen 01.03.13
ONGOING AVOIDING HOLIDAY WASTE | MARINA – The Monterey Regional Waste Management District, in partnership with Waste Management, Inc., offers a special recycling collection for polystyrene, commonly known as Styrofoam. Drop off polystyrene (and other ...
Public Citizen 01.03.13
ONGOING AVOIDING HOLIDAY WASTE | MARINA – The Monterey Regional Waste Management District, in partnership with Waste Management, Inc., offers a special recycling collection for polystyrene, commonly known as Styrofoam. Drop off polystyrene (and other ...
Revolutionary Violin
Tim Fain returns to Monterey County with a live multimedia show with a message.
Violinist Tim Fain is one of those young classical music stars who connects genres and mediums and generations, like a sort-of conduit, an emulsifier, a portal. Fittingly, Portals is the name of his new multimedia ...
Stable Shelter
Salinas homeless build a rules-driven tent community on Soledad Street.
It’s Christmas on Soledad Street. “Festive” isn’t a word normally associated with this part of Salinas, where crates and tarps substitute for homes, and worn buildings hover stonily over drug deals and fights. And yet, ...
Water Wars
State poised to revoke Salinas River water rights; county preps for fight.
There’s something quaint about the typewritten 1949 water rights application the Monterey County Water Resources Agency’s predecessor agency made to the State Water Resources Control board, requesting rights to almost 169,000 acre-feet of water per ...
Make it Snappy
Monterey County offered up a wide range of emotions in 2012.
Whenever someone says Monterey County is boring, I laugh. There was a lot to see in the county last year. Photo Gallery 2012 Photos of the Year - News and Feature On the fun side, ...
Hyde Park on the Hudson
Franklin and the King: Meandering story, inaccurate portrayals hamper exploration of FDR in Hyde Park on the Hudson
There’s a scene in Hyde Park on the Hudson in which a pool of reporters are waiting for President Franklin D. Roosevelt to come out of his mansion and get into his car. They all ...
Lucky ’13
The year ahead brings a stockpile of listening enjoyment to Monterey County.
The year 2012 was a good one for the local concertgoer – Mumford & Sons, Joan Baez, the Flaming Lips, Bob Weir and Jackie Greene entertained us and, more importantly, delivered lasting memories. So far, ...
Off the Clock
Dole workers file class-action suit, alleging wage violations.
The simplicity of opening a pre-washed, bagged salad in your kitchen belies complex systems of conveyors, belts and tumblers that make up vegetable processing plants. The Willy Wonka-style rooms are usually chilly caverns with damp ...
Rock Steady
Santa Cruz’s Deep Ellum hail from a rock and roll land where grooving has no time restraints.
Deep Ellum uses a trio of atypical terms to define its music: “bootcut boogie,” “cosmic country” and “roadhouse rock and roll.” From the sound of the recently released debut EP by guitarist/singer David Glasebrook, bassist ...
The Tops
2012 yielded a bumper crop of stellar flicks.
What a great year for movies. This list of the Top Ten movies of 2012 could easily have 20 entries and there’d still be room to spare. Yes, we had our disappointments – Prometheus and ...
Letters To The Editor 01.03.13
Salt Sense I was surprised to see an item on the consent calendar for the last Salinas City Council meeting, calling for the City of Salinas to “pursue an agreement with DeepWater Desal LLC to ...
Cafe Ariana
Nice Bite: Cafe Ariana’s Italian charms and low prices make a basic menu work.
Cafe Ariana is a welcome newcomer to the Pacific Grove dining scene, keeping things simple with a menu of anytime favorites that hit the spot for a quick lunch or no-frills dinner. But it’s the ...
Theme=Redeem
Rancho Cielo’s saintly work ascends with a cookbook, coach rides and a big party.
So maybe you’ve heard of this place on the northernmost fringe of Salinas where a concerned community led by a former judge provides a path out of the court system for kids who have caught ...
By The Numbers 01.03.13
Real Estate
$525,000 Recent Sale 410 Cedar Street, Pacific Grove Built: 1957 Size: 1,155 square feet Features: 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1-car garage Amenities: Patio, fenced yard, washer/dryer, hardwood floors, fireplace, bonus room Seller: Noel Walling Buyer: ...
Brezsny's Astrology January 3-9, 2013
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): In 2013, I pledge to conspire with you to increase your mastery of the art of friendship. Together we will concentrate on making you an even stronger ally than you already ...
Vexing Texting
Many of Monterey’s naughtiest and implausible activities are captured on smartphones.
Some tales from the area code can be told in texts. Two years ago, the Weekly compiled some of the most loco local examples of the year with the help of a website called Texts ...
