Cover Story
‘Down for my hood’
New Times is retracting the cover story, “’Down for my hood,’” that was published on Oct. 26, 2011, about gang activity in Paso Robles and the death of Bryan Brady. The story contained gratuitous descriptions of violence, among other issues, and no longer abides by New Times Media Group’s ethics policy, which includes the concept of minimizing harm to…
What’s your favorite tattoo?
Heather Brown hairstylist at HepKat “My favorite tattoo is my tat of Conan O’Brien because I love him! We both have pale skin and don’t tan, so our inability to go into the sun brings us together. I’ve seen him several times and when he was doing The Tonight Show I called him over during…
Dry Creek 2007 Meritage Dry Creek Valley
I thoroughly enjoyed this Bordeaux-style red from one of my favorite producers in Sonoma County. It’s a delicious blend of all five Bordeaux varieties: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, and Petite Verdot. Beautifully balanced, it offers bold aromas and flavors of currants, plums, and blackberries that are nicely woven with a thread of herbs…
Still Weird!
Los Angeles Times reporter Peter King, MLB pitcher Mike Krukow, NFL Hall of Famer John Madden, and NASA astronaut Rick Sturckow notwithstanding, I think you’ll have to agree that for sheer name recognition, the title of Cal Poly’s Most Famous Alumnus has to go to “Weird Al” Yankovic, the architecture major who became the world’s…
Excess recess
Ah, the ’80s! That decade of excess brought on an economically debilitating recession, made neon clothing and cocaine popular (Connection? You decide!), and, musically, took a sharp turn away from ’70s classic rock and disco into a fecund era of wild creativity, fueled by the rise of MTV. I can barely remember it! Well, it’s…
Peru in pictures
Photographer Janna Nichols began traveling and taking pictures at the age of 16, as an exchange student in Guatemala. Her arrival the year after a devastating earthquake had rattled the nation—destroying much of the country’s infrastructure and leaving more than a million people homeless—gave her a new look into the human condition. Seeing a country…
Such hopeless optimism!
Disclosure: Neal Bretonhas had a longstanding and multifaceted relationship with New Times. The artist is our frequent freelance illustrator—his drawings brought to life our annual 55 Fiction short story contest, among other things, and his doodles created in city council meetings recently began to appear our pages, too. Breton’s bearded likeness and colorfully snarky quotes…
The Cubist affair
The first thing to strike you about “Picasso and Braque: The Cubist Experiment, 1910-1912” may well be Pablo Picasso’s enigmatic Man with a Clarinet, which greets viewers upon entry. Or it may be the exhibit’s unorthodox color scheme, which eschews a sterile white cube aesthetic in favor of the palette and style of the artists’…
Clubs
Goin’ South … BRANCH ST. DELI: 203 E. Branch St., Arroyo Grande, 489-9099. Live music Fri. from 5:30-8:30 p.m. THE CLIFFS RESORT: 2757 Shell Beach Road, 773-5000 or cliffsresort.com. F. MCLINTOCKS SALOON: Two locations: 750 Mattie Road in Pismo Beach and 133 Bridge St. in Arroyo Grande. 773-1892 or mclintocks.com. Live music at the…
Pumpkin seeds galore!
Have you carved your Halloween pumpkin yet? Here are a few short and sweet ideas to make your pumpkin carving experience TO DIE FOR. Go pumpkin patching! Half the fun is picking out the pumpkin that will inevitably be your grand work of art. Here’s a rundown on a few good places to shop: Avila…
Staete Landt 2010 Sauvignon Blanc Marlborough
This zingy white is classic New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. Bright and racy, with aromas and flavors of green apples, grapefruit, and lime, it’s nicely offset by subtle melon notes. Easy drinking on its own, it’s best at the table with lightly spiced dishes from Mexico or Asia, or a main dish salad with chicken, pears,…
Can you take on the Brahma Bull?
Most restaurateurs would love to be able to say they sold out of food daily for three days straight. But not the owner/chef who actually experienced such a phenomenon: Brian Appiano of the original Rib Line in SLO and a new Rib Line by the Beach in Grover Beach. A throng of food lovers bombarded…
The noose tightens for Sunny Acres
The final chapter in the sober-living program, Sunny Acres, may be at hand. Owner Dan De Vaul appeared in court on Oct. 20 for a hearing to determine if a receiver will be appointed to manage his property. The county claims De Vaul allowed people to stay in structures that don’t meet code, therefore violating…
Atascadero moves to deal with vacation time
The Atascadero City Council voted at its Oct. 26 meeting to confer with its worker unions to modify the city’s policy on vacation time. Former city councilman Mike Brennler and other residents have been hounding the City Council for months about the city’s habit of violating its own personnel rules. A New Times review of…
Cougars and Mustangs
Community colleges go head to head to benefit breasts and put the smackdown on cancer on Oct. 28. SLO County folks (and Santa Barbara County residents whose sympathies lie north of the border) can cheer on Cuesta College’s volleyball team, which is inviting fans to join the squad in going pink for their conference showdown…
SLO the warming
The reasons to love the Central Coast are endless. We have access to some of the world’s most gorgeous beaches, parks, and wildlife. Thousands of tourists flock to our coastline each year to enjoy our sun and sand. We also happen to share our home with some increasingly rare species of animals, such as the…
Think about the children
California’s proprietors of medical marijuana dispensaries and their landlords have taken fire lately from the Obama Administration, but the most recent federal offensive is now threatening to pull more people into its crosshairs. The latest escalation of the crackdown on medicinal cannabis has one U.S. attorney publicly toying with the idea of pursuing criminal prosecutions…
Proclamation occupation
On Oct. 20, the Occupy San Luis Obispo camp on the courthouse lawn was less than a day old. “We’ve been here about 12 hours,” Jeremy Kastner, 25, said with a laugh. But even at the half-day mark, the occupiers were drawing a crowd. A woman in a business suit stepped onto the grass to…
Corrections
The Oct. 20 Shredder column (“Sometimes you feel like a nut …) wrongly stated that Aaron Ochs illustrated county supervisors’ heads on stakes. Actually, an illustration featuring Adam Hill’s head on fire accompanied a piece by Ed Ochs on The Razor Online.
The cost of strategy
Not everyone is so eager for San Luis Obispo County to spend $399,000 on strategic growth. An item intended to be noncontroversial took on a bit of edge at the Oct. 25 Board of Supervisors meeting. Supervisor Frank Mecham said he had concerns about strategic growth principles—sometimes dubbed either smart growth or slow growth—and a…
Hate charges stand in cross-burning trial
A San Luis Obispo County Superior Court judge let stand hate crime charges against four defendants accused of burning a cross outside of a black woman’s Arroyo Grande home. Defense lawyers argued the hate crime allegations should be dropped because, in this case, the cross burning was symbolic speech. The cross was burned March 18…
Batten down the hatches, Oceano
When the rains come this year, county officials think they’ll be ready, even if some residents in Oceano disagree. On Oct. 25, county Public Works officials got $785,000 from flood control and water conservation district reserves to start preparing flood control measures for the coming deluges. San Luis Obispo County supervisors unanimously approved the budget…
Montebello turns out empty
After 11 days of testing, the multi-agency task force assembled to assess the threat posed by the sunken S.S. Montebello concluded that there are no visible signs of oil in her hull. “Our No. 1 objective for this mission was to determine what threat, if any, the Montebello poses to the waters and shorelines of…
No free parking
Yawn. You’ll have to pardon my incoherent babbling and try not to stand downwind of my morning breath. I spent the day in bed. Not because I’m lazy or anything. It just happens to be my day of rest. Why does someone who naps 20 hours a day and hoovers the kitchen floor for cookie…
Ted Sabatini, cycling instructor
NEW TIMES Do you get to wear those awesomely tight riding outfits when you teach a class? SABATINI Is there any other kind of outfit? NEW TIMES What’s the greatest benefit someone can get from cycling, as opposed to jogging? SABATINI Cycling is very low impact, so the injuries you could get from running…
Let’s modify our housing standards
How inspiring! There is now a free health clinic in San Luis Obispo, serving the county. And it took an Afghan to start it. This is a national story that will bring even more praise to an area known as the “Happiest Place in America.” But I’m surprised officials don’t understand that it will also…
Let’s talk about maintaining a livable Earth
“In just 2 weeks time, PR, Communications, Media, Stakeholder and Community Relations, Corporate and Public Affairs executives from the shale gas industry will be meeting at the Media and Stakeholder Relations Hydraulic Fracturing Initiative (October 31-November 1, 2011, Houston, TX) to develop solutions to the highly challenging public and community engagement issues associated with hydraulic…
Some final words in this bailout conversation
I responded to a lady who wrote a letter, “Occupy San Luis Obispo,” because she thought financial institutions, Bank of America in particular, should not “run the country any longer.” I agree with her! In response to her letter, I suggested in a letter, “No more bailouts” (Oct. 13), that she should, “keep writing those…
Read the news before you criticize!
If you’re studying “Demagoguery 101” this semester, then Robert Scot’s ridiculous diatribe (“Shame’s last name is Obama,” Oct. 20) is required reading. Scot claims “‘Occupy Wall Street’ is no grassroots silent majority middle America movement.” Incorrect! These protesters are mostly ordinary Americans angry about unemployment, debt, health care, retirement, and the growing gap between rich…
Respect keeps the peace
I was disappointed to learn that the Board of Supervisors has been paying for a sheriff’s deputy to stand in the back of their chambers during public hearings for the last year (“Hill gets an earful on the First Amendment,” Oct. 20). While I am sure it provides a valuable civics lesson for the assigned…
We should find out if seeding works
That was a great article on cloud seeding (“Weather or not,” Oct. 20) by Kathy Johnston. That is what I call news journalism. It brings up some very interesting questions also, like is Santa Barbara coordinating with the national seeding program? Because sometimes we could be getting double, triple doses of the seeding effect, and…
I’ve got questions about the sweet taste of silver
In response to the New Times article “Weather or not” (Oct. 20), the agricultural community of Huasna certainly appreciates winter rainfall but asks the question: Was Santa Barbara County Water Agency seeding clouds during the heavy rains of 1998, 2000, and 2005 when there was excessive run off and flooding? Sure. Santa Barbara County benefited…
Your exploitive Homeless Project wasn’t such a hot idea
I read with great disappointment in a recent issue that New Times has run out of homeless people to help and now the weekly is actually soliciting for people to come in to be photographed and have their un-fact- checked stories printed. There are only two possible conclusions I can reach: Either New Times has,…
Behold the next subprime loan crisis
In California, indeed throughout the nation, student loan debt surpasses credit-card debt, and youth unemployment hovers between 14 and 17 percent: We are witnessing the next subprime crisis of the United States. Students have demanded relief, yet we hear only the same bromides about better times to come; how we’re the future, how investment in…
