City Weekly Oct 13, 2022

By Jason Stevenson

Protect the Vote

States are scrambling across the country to assure folks about the integrity of the upcoming elections. This is a baby step in response to a gigantic effort to install a system of au tocratic government where the people trust what the leader says, no matter what.

The world has seen populist dictatorship before. It hap pened in England about the time of the great Puritan mi gration to America. The group of Puritans that left England brought their senses with them to America, but the group that stayed behind lost their wits to a highly Christian dic tator by the name of Oliver Cromwell.

Cromwell took away the vote from the poorest and the richest segments of English society, claiming they were too corrupt to participate. He used secret police as poll watch ers in order to assure that the very righteous, middle-class Christians supporting him would win the most seats in Par liament.

It is not clear yet if the world will see another example of this kind of magic act in 2022 and 2024. This time the rich are on the side of the dictator, so watch out.

KIMBALL SHINKOSKEY Woods Cross

See No Evil

With all the new wardrobe restrictions and recommenda tions emanating from the recent Latter-day Saint General Conference, it would appear that young Mormon women are over-sexed and lose all self control if a young man walks by wearing a tank top or his jeans too low.

And of course—as usual—there was the usual slutshaming of women, with extensive warnings about how the young Mormon men would also lose all control if a young woman should (Celestial Kingdom forbid!) go around with any cleavage showing or with bare shoulders or upper legs.

It’s interesting to note that even with all these chaste guidelines, the Saints still rank right up there with the Catholics and Southern Baptists when it comes to sexual assault and pedophilia, as seen by the flood of charges and pending law suits.

I wonder if Mormon women will ever demonstrate against clothing dictates, as the women in Iran are doing. Will we ever see LDS women burning their garments, long skirts and long-sleeved blouses in the streets?

TED OTTINGER Taylorsville

Form of Government

Politicians toy with the meaning of democracy, And shout “No, we are a republic for the free.” But both have voters elect their representatives, So let’s ignore their rhetoric manipulatives.

The United States is a “precious politic” A representative democratic republic. Where minority rights are a priority, With a constitution guaranteeing liberty.

But minority rights can’t rule the majority, Must respect the rights of all for our society. Elected representatives need to have a “calling”, To preserve our “precious politic” enthralling.

We have a democracy if we can keep it, With diversity to which our nation must commit.

GEORGE KIBILDIS

Sparta, New Jersey

THE BOX

1.What websites do you visit the most?

2. What phone games do you play?

Sofia Cifuentes

1. YouTube. I love following travel blogs.

2. Brain Yoga.

Kelly Boyce

1. Is this a family-friendly paper? Let’s go with Instagram and cityweeklystore.com to get all my exclusive discounts!

2. Ruzzle (Boggle) and Impulse Mind Games. Plus messaging girls that play games with my heart.

Bryan Bale

1. I probably spend the most time on You Tube and Facebook. I guess I can’t resist the siren call of rabbit holes.

2. I spend more time than I should on An gry Birds Journey, though it often makes me angrier than the birds are.

Scott Renshaw

2. I’ve rotated through a few over the years, most of which I delete as soon as they become addictive. The “one-a-day” games like Wordle and Framed are great alternatives to that problem, so that’s kind of what I’m sticking with now.

Benjamin Wood

1. CityWeekly.net, obv! But after that prob ably a tie between IMDB and FiveThir tyEight (Twitter doesn’t count, right?).

2. Not much of a gamer and not much of a phoner, so I’ll say the “game” of planning my routes with UTA’s Transit app.

Bill Frost

1. Reelgood.com—I use it to keep track of the TV shows I watch (which is all of them). Second would be Reverb.com, because I have an unhealthy guitar pedal addiction.

2. Annoy a Right-Wing Assclown, a Twit ter game. I’m proudly blocked by local conservative talk radio station KNRS for repeatedly referring to them as KKKNRS.

BY JOHN

Mike Lee’s Baggage

Today is my fourth day of suffering from jetlag af ter visiting Greece (and then Amsterdam) for most of the month of September. While I was away, this space was more than capably filled by the likes of Chris topher Smart, Michael Robinson and Jim Catano—three respected Utah opinionators, each of whom I owe a debt of thanks to for keeping this wobbly machine of a newspaper running on time.

No less so, thanks go to City Weekly editors Benjamin Wood and Jerre Wroble and Art Director Derek Carlisle, who were left scrambling each week when I’d feebly an nounce to them that I would not be able to write a longdistance column for a myriad of lame reasons.

For the 28 days I was away, I never turned on a television. It was like divorcing the spouse you hated in the first place. I’d long abandoned all of the hyperventilating cable news channels (Tip o’ the hat to Gov. Cox for following my lead on that one), and for the past year or so, I tuned in to only cooking and food-challenge shows.

I don’t think that’s what Philo T. Farnsworth had in mind for the world when he invented the TV, but that’s what he has wrought. Although I don’t know who my local schoolboard reps are, there’s no sweet and savory holiday-pie recipe I can’t recite by heart.

It was with some trepidation that I did turn on the set for the very first time this past Saturday in order to become fully flummoxed by the University of Utah’s Ute football team getting whipped by UCLA. Only 24 hours earlier, I was having a coffee in an Amsterdam coffee shop, fully taking in the wafts of marijuana smoke left behind by ev ery patron inside and being very aware that my blood pres sure was flat-out normal. Then the Utes played like they

were the ones sucking in the sedative smoke, and my blood pressure spiked.

I thought watching BYU get smacked around by Notre Dame would be of some relief, but it wasn’t. As much as I don’t care for Cougar football, it’s hard to miss that they can do what Utah cannot: Move the ball downfield in big chunks. Thus, when BYU made a game of it, my BP spiked once again.

The only relief I got was that somewhere in the broad cast, I was able to catch up on the Utah Senate race, thanks to another abomination of Farnsworth’s invention—the TV commercial. I was therefore able to quickly measure the status of the current world-record holder in the category of “I’m bullshitting you and laughing all the way to the bank,” our smarmy current Sen. Mike Lee, compared to his oppo nent, “I’m a real man and you’re not,” Evan McMullin.

If elections were won on commercials alone, it would be McMullin in a landslide. But alas, Utah still allows voting, and voting for a jerk Republican in Utah is still regarded as favorable to voting for an honorable person of any party.

Lee has earned every slap in the face that McMullin’s team and supportive PAC messages are delivering to him— he has failed not only Utah but has failed each and every needy constituency there is, from moms to veterans. Lee has produced nothing of substance after 12 years in Wash ington, D.C., outside of comical soundbites and panicstricken face memes.

Lee is the opposite of a virile man. Actual, real men stand by him not for his brilliance or prowess, but for the fact that standing next to Mike Lee makes even George Mc Fly look like Superman. With no muscle behind his mad ness, then, Lee’s commercials just play on the tried and true “vote for me because I’m a good Mormon” chorus.

His nuance this year, though, is to make sure it’s Mor mon women who are his public face. Evidenced by what

appears to be a newly formed PAC of his own, Lee’s ads are seemingly paid for by the “obscure local female mayors who don’t mind that Mike Lee is a lame and weak scoun drel so long as it means we stay in good graces with the party!” coalition.

I will never understand why Utah women so un-be grudgingly stand by Utah “men” like Mike Lee. What am I missing? What exactly has Mike Lee done for the residents of South Jordan and Kaysville, the burghs represented by Lee’s ad supporters, Dawn Ramsey and Tamara Tran?

Nothing. Salt Lake County Mayor Jenny Wilson—a Demo crat no less—supports the independent Evan McMullin while representing more people than both Ramsey and Tran combined.

I don’t like for a second that McMullin has yet to give an adequate record to the Democrats who need to abandon their own party and vote for him in order to defeat Lee. I am going with Wilson on this one, however.

Wilson’s dad, former Salt Lake City Mayor Ted Wilson, is a real man who didn’t need to stand next to Mike Lee to prove it. Has Lee ever led a mountain rescue in the Grand Tetons? Nope, but Ted did.

Besides Ted (and anyone who ever dug coal, thinned beets or worked the track gangs in the Bingham Canyon copper mine), the last real Utah men that Utah produced were Butch Cassidy, Bus Hatch, Jim McMahon and the aforementioned Philo T. Farnsworth. The realest man sup porting Mike Lee is Mike Pence. Let that sink in.

Now it’s come to pass that Mr. Lee has women carry ing his baggage. And baggage he has—more even than the baggage room at Charles-de-Gaulle airport, where my own luggage lingered for the first eight days I was in Greece. That’s a lot of baggage. CW

Send comments to john@cityweekly.net

HITS&MISSES

BY KATHARINE BIELE @kathybiele

HIT: Kicking the Can

We know what doesn’t work—just about everything we’ve tried. That’s the prob lem with homelessness, it’s a com plicated and hard nut to crack, even while everyone agrees it’s not accept able for the unhoused or the general population. So a recent report from the Pioneer Park Coalition was a welcome “something” in the search for a solu tion, or at least a serious dialogue. Nei ther Salt Lake City nor the Legislature has been able to address the problem in real time. Attempts to arrest away the criminal homeless or scatter them to the far corners have not been success ful. Mayor Erin Mendenhall doesn’t like the idea of “sanctioned camping,” opting instead to allow unsanctioned camps to continue, according to the De seret News. This is more than a financial problem, although money is necessary. There needs to be a will and an accep tance that the unhoused will have to go somewhere or they will be anywhere.

MISS: We Go Low

You can tell it’s election season by all the attack ads on TV and in your mail box. There’s one that calls all Demo cratic leadership “corrupt politicians,” and yet there’s no acknowledgement of the former president’s problems in this area. In Utah, it’s all about Sen. Mike Lee and Evan McMullin, although both candidates also have fawning ads pro claiming how great they are. The cur rent wisdom is that Lee will skate to another term because … entrenched Republicans. But it may not be a guar antee because of all the icky ads from dark-money sources. “Positive ads work no better than attack ads. Repub licans, Democrats and independents respond to ads similarly. Ads aired in battleground states aren’t substantial ly more effective than those broadcast in non-swing states,” concludes a study from Yale University. They maybe make a 0.007% difference in how you’ll vote. But the one thing you can say is that all of these ads punch up name recogni tion, and that may make a difference.

HIT: Some Pigs

Chalk one up for the piglets—or at least their liberators. Two animal rights activists were acquitted on burglary and theft charges after they took two sick pigs from a Milford industrial pig farm. Who knew this was the biggest pig farm in the nation—and one owned by a subsidiary of a Chinese company? One of the defendants asked the jury to “acquit us as a matter of conscience. There’s a big difference between steal ing and rescue,” according to Fox13 News. The jury was unanimous, and the law partner of one of the lawyers said on Facebook that she was “still amazed at the government resources expended on this case.” Why? The pigs were worth less than $100 and yet the FBI sent in its agents anyway.

ON THE STREET

Price-y Art

If you don’t regularly venture out to the far west side of Salt Lake City—where ware houses outnumber homes—you probably haven’t come across this pair of embedded shipping containers on the outside of buildings near 4800 W. California Ave. and 5600 W. 300 South (above) .

No doubt, when you first see one you can’t help but wonder, “what exactly hap pened here?”

Are these the scenes of the wildest indus trial accidents OSHA has ever witnessed?

The remnants of one of the all-too-frequent Salt Lake windstorms? Or maybe this is the source of some of the supply chain issues we keep hearing about?

Nope! The two pieces above are actually art installations located in one of the most art-unfriendly areas imaginable. Regard less of their intended purpose, the contain ers are certainly eye-catching, breaking up the monotony of the large, mostly un adorned buildings that are found way out west near the city limits.

A casual look on the Salt Lake County Tax Assessor’s website, plus a little bit of online sleuthing, traces the ownership of both of these two particular distribution centers to a company called Price Real Estate.

If the name sounds familiar, it may be because Price is also responsible for the se ries of seemingly out of place, but nonethe less interesting, animal sculptures along South Temple near downtown (below) .

That menagerie includes an incredibly lifelike ostrich—which I’d imagine Hogle Zoo wouldn’t mind getting their hands on—as well as a couple of rhinoceroses, one of which stands stoically outside the Price Real Estate company office building.

Price’s public art extends well past the animal kingdom. Recently, a 15-foot-tall pencil—appropriately entitled “On Point— was installed out front of 242 E. South Temple. In fact, you can stay downtown and see a scavenger hunt-worthy amount of “Price Pieces,” though the shipping con tainer sculptures out west make for a fun trip—especially if you want to thoroughly confuse any out-of-town visitors.

DINING

Dead Certain @ Grand Theatre

In 2019, The Grand Theatre pre miered A Wall Apart, a new musi cal with songs by Air Supply song writer and longtime Utah resident Graham Russell, and a book by Sam Goldstein and Craig Clyde. That tale explored love and family dynamics through the lens of the Cold War in divided Berlin. This year, The Grand Theatre continues its relationship with the same cre ative team with another world premiere musical, Dead Certain—but unlike the real-world ground ing of A Wall Apart, this tale takes on a somewhat darker, Halloween-season-appropriate tone. It’s the story of Boyd Denning, an unemployed mortuary assistant from Iowa who considers himself particularly unlucky. Looking for a radical change in his life, Boyd makes a big move to Denver, and finds himself guided toward a work opportunity after a chance encounter on a bus with a fellow named Mr. Parrish. He begins his primary job driving a hearse for the Daley family funeral home, but also gets an offer for an odd moonlighting opportunity offered by Mr. Parrish— one that’s hard to accept even before it involves the girl of Boyd’s dreams. With great catchy tunes like “I Believe in Love” and “Fix You Up,” Dead Certain mixes the kind of music that leaves you humming with a twist of the macabe.

Dead Certain runs at Salt Lake Community College’s Grand Theatre (1575 S. State St.) now through Oct. 29, with performances Thursday – Saturday at 7:30 p.m., and 2 p.m. Saturday matinees. Tickets are $30; visit grandtheatrecompany to purchase tickets and for additional event information. (Scott Renshaw)

COURTESY

Liz Miele @ Wiseguys Gateway

Stand-up comedy is built on stage persona; some folks turn their jokes outward, and some choose to turn them inward. New Jersey native Liz Miele has developed her self-deprecating style over a career that has already spanned more than half of her life— and like the true pro that she is, she finds the funniest material in the most uncomfortable events in her life.

In her latest one-hour special, The Ghost of Academic Future, Miele builds on the most uncomfortable event in many of our lives: the COVID pandemic: “I had a boyfriend before the pandemic,” she says. “I don’t anymore. I take responsibility, because I said, ‘We should quarantine together.’ That’s hilarious now, right? It was supposed to be two weeks; anybody can love anybody for two weeks. … It fast-forwarded our relationship like 40 years. We were like two 70-year-olds: We had no work. We had no place to go. All of our friends are dead.”

She also finds humor in the unique experience of being an artist on unemployment, and actu ally having a regular weekly income. “It’s like pretty good money for me,” she says. “Remember how they said if you give people who don’t make much money too much money, they might not go back to work? That’s me. I don’t want to be here right now.

You’ll want to be there when Liz Miele visits Wiseguys Comedy’s Gateway location (194 S. 400 West) Oct. 14-15 for two shows each night, 7 p.m. & 9:30 p.m. Tickets are $20; visit wiseguyscomedy.com for tickets and for additional event information. (SR)

Reza Aslan: An American Martyr in Persia @ SLC Main Library

The complex intersections between Islam and Christianity have long been a subject of personal and academic interest to Reza Aslan, a scholar and frequent television commenta tor who himself converted from Islam to Christianity and eventually back to Islam again. Aslan applies that interest to a fascinating, little-known footnote in American/Persian rela tions in his new book, An American Martyr in Persia: The Epic Life and Tragic Death of Howard Baskerville

The book’s subject, Howard Baskerville, was an American Presbyterian missionary teacher working at the American Memorial School in Tabriz, Persia (present-day Iran) in the early 1900s. That work coincided with the short-lived period in Iran when Mohammad Ali Shah dismantled the country’s parliament and began a tyrannical rule that was opposed by a rebel force in the city of Tabriz. Baskerville’s support of that opposition and his involvement in helping rescue the besieged rebels in Tabriz, including applying his military background to training the local population, ultimately led to his death during a battle in April 1909 at the age of just 22. Emerging during the current upheaval in Iran, An American Martyr in Persia explores the principles and background that drove Baskerville’s activism, as well as the Iran’s long history of seeking freedom, and how Americans have both helped and hindered those battles.

Aslan visits the Salt Lake City Main Library’s Tessman Auditorium (210 E. 400 South) on Wednesday, Oct. 19 at 6:30 p.m., with a book signing after his lecture (copies available at The King’s English Bookshop, 1511 S. 1500 East. Admission is free to the public; visit kingseng lish.com for additional event information. (SR)

PETER KONERKO

“Have They Even Read the Comic?”

A&E BIG SHINY ROBOT

BY BRYAN YOUNG comments@cityweekly.net @swankmotron

Marvel has been pumping out tele vision shows faster than anyone except Lucasfilm, and their most recent, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, has been a delight from start to finish. Part of that is because it’s so different, part of it is be cause it’s charming, and part of it is be cause it’s so damn self-aware.

Perhaps the best way to describe this particular show to an average audience is to imagine Ally McBeal , but set in a super hero universe. (For those of you too young to remember Ally McBeal , just insert any standard comedy sitcome that takes place in a legal setting, then plop that into the Marvel universe and you’ll get the idea.)

Of course, you understand—you’re smart. Otherwise you wouldn’t be reading words like this, right? Instead, you’d prob ably be watching grifters on YouTube to help form your opinions about things. But the problem with them is they only live to monetize and manufacture outrage. Seri ously. It’s true.

Take She-Hulk , for example. It’s a terrific show, and critics are really into it (myself included). It has an 87% score on Rotten Tomatoes (typically a worthless metric, but instructive in this case).

Thanks to some of those manufactured campaigns railing against how “woke” the

show is (woke is a word defined as “being conscious of racial discrimination in society and other forms of oppression and injustice” but somehow to these folks this is a bad thing), some folks have reviewbombed it on every platform they can, driv ing the user ratings through the floor. They also rail against the jokes. And they ask in the reviews over and over again if anyone involved in making the show has ever read a She-Hulk comic.

Now, this is the dead giveaway that they have no idea what the hell they’re talking about. She-Hulk comics have always been exactly like this show. Jennifer Walters— She-Hulk’s lawyering alter-ego—has al ways been quippy and broken the fourth wall. In one of my favorite comics, she liter ally turns to break out of the gutters of the comic, threatening the writer of the book— John Byrne—with violence for some inane plot twist or another.

In fact, given how far some of that fourth wall breaking has gone in the comics, Ta tiana Maslany’s performance has been

downright restrained in its zaniness and strikes a terrific balance between the source material and the demands of the realities of live television. The only major change is that all the feminism that was in the subtext of the comics has been dialed up to 11—and rightly so.

When you look at the She-Hulk comics at their best side-by-side with the show, the only conclusion that one can come to is that folks complaining in these brigades across social media are the ones who have never actually read a She-Hulk comic. They do not know what they are talking about. They are unwitting soldiers in a culture war that their side is losing miserably—again, right ly so. These people did the exact same thing to Ms. Marvel earlier this year. And they’ve tried to do it in other franchises, too.

The lesson here is to not listen to “user reviews,” and certainly don’t watch any YouTube videos that star conservative out rage-grifters complaining about popular culture. I watched Ben Shapiro’s latest for you, so you don’t have to. In it he asks, “Do

you remember when [Disney] used to make comic-book movies that were fun, and didn’t lecture you on woke garbage?” Then he proceeds to explain that he canceled his Disney+ subscription because Disney is trying to “indoctrinate kids into LGBTQ+%[sic] queer theory.”

This bigot admits in his video he doesn’t even watch the shows, let alone read the comics. So who cares what he has to say?

It would be fun to see these clowns flail around like this, angry that they’re los ing, if it weren’t so depressing to see how they’re infecting others with their hateful rhetoric. It’s no wonder these sorts of folks turn out to be the real villains of She-Hulk .

I can only imagine what She-Hulk’s legal advice to you would be: Do your own re search. Read the comics. Watch the shows. Skip the conservative hate machine. I hope it’ll all turn out in the end.

In the meantime, I’m going to go watch and read some more “woke garbage,” be cause it’s some of the best and most in sightful art being produced today. CW

She-Hulk and the epidemic of ignorant vitriol aimed at anything deemed “woke.”

the for

By Jason Stevenson comments@cityweekly.net

Ten Salt Lakers share their hopes and fears for a neighborhood in distress.

Less than two miles separate the Ballpark neighborhood apartment complex where a re cent homicide occurred and the new fiberglass whale that soars out of a roundabout near 9th & 9th.

A person could walk between them in 30 to 45 min utes, or bike it in much less. But within that relative ly short distance lies a pronounced shift in city liv ing. And this social gap exists even though both the crime scene—one of five violent deaths in the Ball park neighborhood this year—and the whale are located in the same Salt Lake City Council 5th district.

The issues that keep Ballpark residents up at night—dominating their discussions over kitchen tables, backyard fences and social media forums— are profoundly different from the conversations in 9th & 9th. According to data shared by the Ball park Community Council, residents here report 10 times the number of “person crimes”—aggravated assaults, homicides, rapes, robberies—than their neighbors in East Liberty Park. As a result, Ballpark can often feel like a separate city within the city.

The Utahns who appear in this article chose the locations where they wanted to be interviewed. Their perspectives—condensed from longer transcrip tions and edited for clarity—show a tight-knit community of neighbors and business owners who are proud of Ballpark’s identity, aware of its challenges and profoundly concerned about its fate. They de scribe a crossroads neighborhood facing many pos sible futures, but one that no one can be sure of.

The Urbanist

Taylor Anderson

Partner and editor, Building Salt Lake Interview location: 1700 S. Main, SLC

This intersection is the place I most affiliate with Ballpark. I live two and a half blocks from here, in Liberty Wells, but the closest mixed-use commercial node of any signifi cance is right here. And I love it.

I don’t think there’s anything else in Salt Lake City like it. It’s a true mixed-use, ur ban neighborhood that still has grit and af fordable prices. There’s mixed-use next to businesses, next to dive bars, next to yoga studios, next to car dealerships, next to tire shops, next to a 7-Eleven across the street, plus office space on all sides.

The people that were here when I first got here are still here today, and it’s fascinating to see how it’s growing. And what’s wild is that the new development isn’t pushing out the older stuff.

At this intersection, there’s low-income housing right across the street from new, for-sale row housing that’s all sold out. The new housing here didn’t displace the low-income housing.

Ballpark is huge, maybe one of the city’s biggest, densest neighborhoods that’s not on the west side. Many parts of Ballpark have crime problems. It’s still in District 5, but the issues facing Ballpark are so different from Liberty Wells and East Liberty Park.

Since Ballpark was ignored by the city in the past, it’s nice to see that it’s getting more full-throttle atten tion today with the new Ballpark Station Area Plan. It might be desperate attention from the city—because they are afraid they could lose the Salt Lake Bees baseball team. I hope that the city can figure out how to keep them. A lot of the families here are deciding to get out of Ballpark for a slew of acute issues that no other neighborhood is facing.

When I moved to Salt Lake, I wanted to live in the most walkable, most urban area. Yet, I like to garden, so I wanted to have some space. Ballpark offers that. Anything that I would want to do is right here, and it keeps growing every month and every year. I’m bullish on Ballpark’s current and its future path forward.

“I don’t think there’s anything else in Salt Lake City like it.” —Taylor Anderson

The Advocate

Amy Hawkins

Chair, Ballpark Community Council

Interview location: RoHa Brewing

Project, 30 E. Kensington Ave., SLC, 385-227-8982, rohabrewing.com

Kensington Avenue is a street that’s undergoing transition, and it’s a transition that absolutely needs to happen. It’s a short street—only a couple of blocks long between Main and State streets—but it has real problems.

Two homicides happened here, the first across the street and the second a few doors down.

If you look at a map of homicides, you see they happen in certain plac es—like Ballpark—over and over.

This community is experiencing the cumulative effects of violent crime. I’ve sat on this patio and heard

sirens go by when somebody was stabbed to death a few blocks from here. That’s substantial. Any other time I’m sitting on this patio and hear sirens, I check to see if someone else was stabbed to death.

A few weeks ago, we held the first ever Kensington Avenue Street Fair sponsored by the city and RoHa Brew ing Project. We had artisans selling their goods, plus two murals were be ing painted. There were activities for kids, and we had a beer tent. And city officials and the mayor were here to engage people about how they want to see Kensington Avenue transform.

We want those empty storefronts full of local businesses. We want a nice mixture of denser, owner-oc cupied housing. I’m hoping this is a neighborhood where younger fami lies can get a foothold in Salt Lake City, maybe choose to make it their long-term home. I would love to hear

about families moving into the neigh borhood instead of moving away.

I want to see more people engaged. The phrase “eyes on the street” gets used widely without thinking about whose eyes are watching. People need to feel ownership in the neigh borhood to say, ‘Hey, what’s going on here?’ and intervene and make a positive difference.

I hope the Bees are still here in the future. Beyond being the namesake of the neighborhood, the Bees are vital because we need the stadium ac tivated. That place brings outsiders in. That activity deters crime. When the Bees have a game, they hire extra security.

The public becomes more familiar with Ballpark because they visit to see the Bees. And I think it’s an important time for everyone to check in on our progress. I would hate for them to lose that opportunity.

The Family Business Owner

Jim Grisley

President, J.M. Grisley Machine Tools

Interview Location: 1485 S. 300 West, SLC

Our company is 100 years old, and we’ve been at this location on 300 West for 60 years. I’ve personally been here 45 years. In the last two years, since the Gail Miller [resource] center has been in place, our neighborhood has completely devolved.

It is extremely disappointing. Before, we never had to lock the doors. We didn’t have a security gate. We didn’t have to lock our cars. It was completely safe. And now, it’s completely unsafe.

At first, they promised that everything was going to be Alice in Wonderland with the homeless center. We wouldn’t have to worry about anything. And we took their word for it.

After about a year, the street was literally dangerous. People started getting as saulted. My tenant next door had a gun put to her head. Her car was stolen. I have a new tenant who had his front windows busted out. Then his side windows were bro ken. He just moved in two weeks ago.

The city is stuck in stasis. They can’t make a decision. They can’t do anything. So, the local businesses got together, and we started emailing and campaigning to get our situation in front of people who can actually make a decision. Our goal is to get these centers into compliance or have them shut down until they do so.

We are not unsympathetic to the homeless issue. Something needs to be done and it needs to be done urgently. The way it’s currently being handled by Salt Lake City means that everyone should be fired because they are not making decisions and helping these people who so desperately need it.

The Manager

Matt Melville

Former director, Gail Miller Resource Center Interview location: Outside Horizonte High School, 234 S. Main, SLC

My connection to Ballpark began long ago, when I would visit family who lived here. My dad grew up here, and my mom and grandma lived on 1700 South.

It was just a beautiful neighborhood. I re member going to Salt Lake Trappers games and eating at Coachman’s on State Street.

I came back to Ballpark and oversaw the Gail Miller Resource Center. I worked heavily in setting it up and running it for almost two years. At first, there was a lot of excitement around the resource centers.

I started attending every Ballpark Commu nity Council meeting. I was just blown away by how dedicated this community is. They had their qualms about the centers and questions about funding and resources. It was a big ask for this community—not just once, but twice.

Looking back now, it is difficult seeing the promises made by state and policy leaders to

nonprofits and the communities. All of the nonprofits knew the bed reduction was a big mistake. But leadership told us it was going to work, and we would be able to get people into housing much sooner.

The reality is that we went into crisis mode from literally the day we opened, knowing we couldn’t meet the community’s needs. The issues we are seeing today were predictable by almost everybody who was involved—be sides the people who made the decisions.

The resource centers were never able to function the way we hoped because we didn’t have enough resources. Case managers were getting stretched every which way.

We were having to turn people away. And when that happens, it spills into the neigh boring communities.

We can bring Ballpark back to those glory days by making sure that public safety is a priority for all community members, includ ing the unsheltered.

We need to make sure it’s a safe neighbor hood for everybody who is coming through, even if you’re just buzzing by on Trax from Draper to Salt Lake. People need to know that they’ll be safe in Ballpark.

“We went into crisis mode from literally the day we opened ... The resource centers were never able to function the way we hoped.”—Matt Melville

“The city is stuck in stasis. They can’t make a decision. They can’t do anything.”

—Jim Grisley

“I’m hoping this is a neighborhood where younger families can get a foothold.”

—Amy Hawkins

JASON STEVENSON

JASON STEVENSON

JASON STEVENSON

The Emigrant

Shelley Bodily, former resident

Interview location: Outside SLC Fire Station 8, 15 W. 1300 South, SLC

My husband Terrell and I owned our house on Richard Street for 15 years, and we rented before that. We bought our house in 2007 when places were selling for $70,000.

We moved here because we were both going to the U. Living in Ballpark, we had mass transit, we had commercial areas, we had a little bit of open space, we had proximity to downtown, we had af fordable housing and we had the stadium.

At the time, it was a little bit gritty. We had some petty crime, but it didn’t affect us. It wasn’t terrible when we had our first daughter.

Then the two homeless resource centers came in. I have mixed feelings about this because I think homeless shelters weren’t necessarily a bad thing. But when you place one homeless shelter about five or six blocks from a second one, with

Ballpark in the middle, I think that’s a design flaw.

The violence escalated. There was crime that we had never seen before. It got so extreme that we didn’t know if it was ever going to get better. The neighborhood just turned for us.

There were four or five families on our street with small children, and they’re all gone now. When our next-door neighbors—who had chil dren the same ages as ours—decided to leave, that was the breaking point for us. We just decid ed we couldn’t stay.

We still have good friends in the neighbor hood that we talk with all the time. We love to see what’s changing and hopefully good things will continue to happen, and we’ll be wrong.

When my husband and I drive through Ball park, it still feels like home. But now it feels like a home that I don’t regret leaving. Before, it was very upsetting and emotional.

Now we live in Fruit Heights. It’s lovely. It’s wonderfully clean and quiet. It’s not Ballpark, it’s not this. Ballpark was our home. I wanted to be here for a reason. We came here for a reason.

The Longtimer

Clay Gail Miller Resource Center resident Interview location: 1500 block of 300 West, SLC

My first name is Clay. I was one of the original ones in the Gail Miller shelter when it opened up three years ago.

It started out really pretty good. It was clean and nice and all that— less troubles. But over time, it’s just kind of gone downhill a little bit each year. They do have case managers to help you out, but they’re so overwhelmed that only a small amount of people actually get help.

I generally try to stay close to the shelter during the day so that I can return for lunch or dinner. The bus transportation is a little costly and it’s not worth the $100 fine trying to ride Trax without a ticket. So, I just kind of stay close to the shelter around here.

In order to leave the shelter, you need to have some sort of income— like disability or a part-time job or something like that. The housing vouchers they give out aren’t enough.

In December, I found an apartment listed for $950 including utili ties. But when I contacted the management, they said the rent is actu ally $1,300 plus utilities. So, that won’t work. And it’s just like that all the time. It’s twice as hard to get back on your feet.

The Next- door Neighbors

Bob and Tom Danielson

Owners, Alpha Munitions

Interview location: 268 W. Paramount Ave., SLC

Tom Danielson: What I always think about is if our mayor, our police chief—you name it—walked out of their house and if at the corner of their street, every single day, there were people doing drugs, drinking and telling them they’re not leaving, and the police aren’t going to do anything … would things change? Would they allow that? Would they feel safe? Would they let their kids out of the house? That’s what we live with every single day here.

Bob Danielson: We don’t know, when we come into our business every morning, if our win dows are going to be busted out again. It’s 50-50.

You know the comfort you feel at your home when you’re sitting on your couch, or when you go to your office and can just focus on work? That can’t happen here. Because if you do, something horrible is going to happen.

Tom Danielson: It’s not that we’re not compassionate. We see people leaving the resource center early in the morning wearing their high visibility vests to do their construction jobs. But if you’re an individual who is in recovery, how many times can you walk by a drug dealer before you fall off the wagon? Is it three? Do you last a month, or two months?

To me, the current situation—which is people on the street doing drugs and alcohol when the individuals that shelter is designed to help are being preyed upon—is the least compassionate thing you can ever do.

“If you’re an individual who is in recovery, how many times can you walk by a drug dealer before you fall off the wagon?”—Tom Danielson

“The violence escalated. There was crime that we had never seen before.”—Shelley Bodily

“It started out really pretty good ... But over time, it’s just kind of gone downhill a little bit each year.”—Clay

JASON STEVENSON

JASON STEVENSON

The New Friends

Erika Carlsen, resident

Ron Johnson, owner, Stained Glass Illusions

Interview location: Stained Glass Illusions, 1414 S. West Temple, SLC

Erika Carlsen: I moved to Ballpark about a year ago, and I’m still settling in. The thing that I love most are my neighbors. It feels like so many people in this neighborhood are artists and creatives, heal ers and social workers.

Ron and I met recently when I wrote a little flier and passed it out to my neighbors. I said, “Hey, I’m going to have some wine and cheese at my house, bring whatever you’d like.” I always love getting to know my neighbors because it just makes for a stronger commu nity. And as the new kid on the block, I want to meet new people.

Ron Johnson: She lives right over there, but I didn’t know her un til then. I went on a whim because I had no idea what was going on. And that’s really unlike me because I’m very shy and introverted. I bought this building in 1973. They built it in 1938 as a grocery store and then converted it to a barber shop.

I ran a sign shop for 35 years before switching to stained glass when the Olympics were here. I live next door, which means I spend way too much time in my shop. But it’s been fun. I’ve really enjoyed this area, even as it changed.

Carlsen: It feels like the last year has brought a lot of changes, from new development on Main Street to the road work on 300 West. I’ve also observed an increase in what my neighbor calls “informal residents” in the neighborhood—the people who don’t have a home.

Johnson: I’m concerned about the homeless people in the neigh borhood, but I’m more worried about the gang activity. I used to en joy going for walks, but I don’t do that here anymore.

Maybe if I was younger, I’d feel differently. But with gangs of kids running around, I just feel intimidated

Carlsen: Maybe we should organize a walking group? I definitely need more motivation to get out of my house and be active.

Johnson: I like that idea. I used to walk everywhere. I bought this house in the first place because of the convenience you can’t find anywhere else in town. When I first moved here, there weren’t any huge grocery stores on 300 West. We had a little IGA down the street and that was it. The improvements made to the neighborhood have been fantastic.

Carlsen: I’m also here because it’s so convenient. All the shops that we need are right here. If we need to get on the freeway or catch a train, they’re nearby. I love hearing the Bees games, when I’m in my living room and I can hear the crowd cheer and the fireworks go off. It feels like Ballpark is nestled in the right place.

The Go-Between Wendy Garvin

Executive director, Unsheltered Utah

Interview location: 1500 block of 300 West, SLC

This block of 300 West is filled with semi-industrial buildings. Most of them are older buildings. Right here is a small brick building next to a larger ware house, and there’s about a 3-foot gap between the two buildings. Currently, it is blocked off by some sheet metal, but there are similar gaps all around us.

These little spaces between buildings are prime real estate for the folks who are looking for a way to escape the elements. These gaps block the wind, and provide shade and protection from rain or snow. You could put a tarp up and be protected from the ele ments.

I have a friend who owns a business here and she keeps me updated on where the camps are. She al most always has people camping in this back alley.

The challenge facing business owners is that some times people want to light fires for warmth. And that puts the buildings at risk. There’s this constant giveand-take where even the most compassionate busi ness owners start to feel unsafe because of fires or break-ins in the area.

When I first started coming out to this part of the city, there were a few dozen—maybe 50—unsheltered people. Now, it’s more like 200 or 300 people living on the streets.

I’m sympathetic to the challenges businesses face. At the same time, I‘m more sympathetic to the people who are living exposed to the elements. The homeless resource centers aren’t big enough, there’s just not enough to go around.

I spend a lot of time on foot. I walk in and out of camps on a regular basis. I also use tips from social media to learn where an encampment is growing.

It is the darker corners of the city where people find refuge. You have to be willing to go into those cor ners. And it is really a fantastic society and commu nity that they build.

Not without its challenges, for sure, but I feel well rewarded by the connections that I have with the un sheltered population. They are great people.

The Instigator

Bernie Hart Founder, Understanding Us Interview location: Library Square, SLC

Salt Lake City doesn’t have a homeless problem— we have a problem dealing with the homeless peo ple in our city. We cannot meet their needs, and we cannot solve their problems.

Our inability is the real problem. The people who are homeless are just there. They’re waiting for help. They’re waiting for change. They don’t want to be homeless, but they’re stuck in a place that we don’t understand how to get them out of.

I talk to people in Ballpark because I want to know what they think. They don’t like the stuff that is happening—the needles in the street, the drunks and addicts, and the people wandering around talking to themselves.

They expected the city to step up and fulfill their promises to help the population, but they’re not seeing it. These people are questioning the city’s inability, and now they’re angrier at the city than they are at the homeless.

The people in the homeless community—other than those dealing with severe mental-health conditions and addiction problems—seem to have found a home at the shelters. They are extremely comfortable there. They’ve learned to deal with the turmoil of being bedded down with 200 people every night. They know they have a bed and a meal.

But the shelters aren’t providing them with the services and the interaction they need to gain the confidence and expand their ability to deal with the problems of society. They’re stuck.

I want to know what the system does with those people. I want to know how long they’ve been in the system. I want to get information about the effectiveness of the system. And nobody wants to share that information.

I am pushing their buttons and insisting that they share that information. And they can’t. And every time I ask them to share it, they get more up set at me. CW

“It feels like so many people in this neighborhood are artists and creatives, healers and social workers.” —Erika Carlsen

“These little spaces between buildings are prime real estate for the folks who are looking for a way to escape the elements.”

—Wendy Garvin

“It is the darker corners of the city where people find refuge.”

—Wendy Garvin

COURTESY

PHOTO

JASON STEVENSON

JASON STEVENSON

Long Live the King

Life may not be a combination of magic and pasta, but Valter’s Osteria is.

BY ALEX SPRINGER comments@cityweekly.net @captainspringer

I’d been thinking a lot about the passing of Valter Nassi, along with his impact on Utah’s food scene over the past few weeks, when it occurred to me that I had never actually visited Valter’s Osteria (173 W. Broadway, 801-521-4563, valtersoste ria.com). Of course, the place has been on my list since I started taking an interest in local restaurants; if you are a culinary explorer in the Wasatch Front, you know that Valter’s is much more than an institu tion. Based on the rows of photographs that feature Nassi posing with the celebrities and professional athletes who have come through town, he was one of the original ambassadors of Utah’s true talent in the restaurant industry.

I guess my lag in paying Valter’s a visit comes mainly from my food aesthetic. Those of you who regularly read this col umn will know that I’m very much a take out and tacos kind of guy. However, that doesn’t mean I’m not able to appreciate the finer things, which is precisely what a trip to Valter’s is all about. I booked a reserva tion for me and my wife at 5:30 p.m. on a Wednesday because I thought it wouldn’t pick up until later, but Valter’s hits full ca pacity pretty quickly after the doors open. If you’re planning on paying a visit, call them up for a reservation beforehand.

After we took our seats, my wife and I were both floored at the game face that Valter’s puts on. It’s one of the most pres tigious restaurants in town, and the staff is no doubt busy busy busy. When they come to your table, however, you feel like you’re the only person in the restaurant. It’s espe cially impressive when you decide to order the prix fixe tasting menu ($95), a fourcourse meal that is heavy on tableside pre sentation and comes out like clockwork.

Yes, it’s a hefty price tag, but if you order this and still happen to leave the restaurant unsatisfied in any way, your problems tran scend mere finance.

So what does the prix fixe get you? I’m glad you asked. It starts off with a combination of three different salads—a chopped romaine salad with gorgonzola dressing, a prosciutto and arugula salad and another romaine salad with shrimp and a light po modoro sauce. It’s the weakest of the four courses, but they can’t help the fact that they’re salads, and that’s kind of how sal ads work. All the same, the gorgonzola dressing was rich and creamy, and by the time you worked your way through the arugula and prosciutto to get to the acidic pomodoro sauce, you’ve still been taken on a well-curated journey of flavors and tex tures.

From there, it’s on to the tableside pre sentation of some house-made ravioli, which change based on the day. Ours were a mix of butternut squash ravioli served with a lemon sage sauce and a spinach ricotta ravioli. I’ve griped before about how I like a generous heap of ravioli if that’s what I’ve ordered, but I will give Valter’s a pass here since four ravioli pack enough of a punch to stand on their own. Both versions of ravioli were excellent, but I can’t help comparing the two, so the butternut squash won out over the spinach ricotta. Ravioli can be hid den purses of subtlety in the right hands, and that’s exactly what I experienced here.

From the lemon sage sauce that has a fleet ing kiss of citrus to the earthy sweetness of

the butternut squash filling, this is every thing one wants in a stuffed pasta.

While I was still swooning over the ravi oli experience, our main courses arrived. You get a choice of mains here, so I went with the pollo peperonata , a dish of chicken scallopini served with a sweet pepper sauce that also comes with a filet of fresh salmon topped with a lovely mustard sauce. My wife opted for the Duroc pork medallions in pepper sauce, and we did a bit of sharing. It’s worth noting that this part of the menu has some vegetarian options, including a ricotta-stuffed bell pepper and a lovely mix of sauteed portobello and oyster mush rooms. I think I enjoyed the pork just a bit more than the chicken, largely because the reduced pepper sauce slathered all over those juicy pork medallions also had sliced sausage in it. The chicken was tasty and light, and the salmon with its mustard sauce was stellar. Excellent main courses all around.

The meal ends with a cocktail glass filled with a half-and-half mixture of lemon sor bet and a dark chocolate gelato that comes with a tiny cup filled with drinking choco late. It’s a miraculous sort of experience made up of a few seemingly simple ingredi ents. The chocolate elements are deep and rich, capturing everything you love about chocolate; then you hop over to this bub bly little lemon number that dances its way through all that richness while priming your tongue for the next bite.

It’s uncommon to find a place like Val ter’s in Utah, or anywhere in the United States for that matter. I’ve been to hun dreds of restaurants, and I love each of them in their own special ways, but Valter’s is one of those rare restaurants that makes sure to love you right back. CW

AT A GLANCE

ALEX SPRINGER

on

TAPonTAP

2 Row Brewing

6856 S. 300 West, Midvale

2RowBrewing.com

Avenues Proper

376 8th Ave, SLC

avenuesproper.com

On Tap: Less- West Coast IPA

Bewilder Brewing

445 S. 400 West, SLC BewilderBrewing.com

On Tap: Gluten Reduced Kolsch

Bohemian Brewery

94 E. Fort Union Blvd, Midvale BohemianBrewery.com

Bonneville Brewery

1641 N. Main, Tooele BonnevilleBrewery.com

On Tap: Peaches and Cream Ale

Craft by Proper

1053 E. 2100 So., SLC craftbyproper.com

On Tap: Do Less - West Coast IPA

Desert Edge Brewery

273 Trolley Square, SLC DesertEdgeBrewery.com

On Tap: Red Butte Bitter on Nitro

Epic Brewing Co.

825 S. State, SLC EpicBrewing.com

On Tap: Barrel-Aged Imperial Pumpkin Porter

Fisher Brewing Co.

320 W. 800 South, SLC FisherBeer.com

On Tap: Fisher Beer

Grid City Beer Works

333 W. 2100 South, SLC GridCityBeerWorks.com

On Tap: Extra Pale Ale

Hopkins Brewing Co.

1048 E. 2100 South, SLC HopkinsBrewingCompany.com

On Tap: Basic Witch - Pumpkin Pie Chocolate Stout

Kiitos Brewing

608 W. 700 South, SLC KiitosBrewing.com

Level Crossing Brewing Co.

2496 S. West Temple, S. Salt Lake LevelCrossingBrewing.com

On Tap: Zappa Hops Philly Sour IPA Tuesday Nights = Game Night!

Moab Brewing

686 S. Main, Moab TheMoabBrewery.com

On Tap: Squeaky Bike Nut Brown

Mountain West Cider

425 N. 400 West, SLC MountainWestCider.com

On Tap: Sweet Herbed Hard Cider

Offset Bier Co

1755 Bonanza Dr Unit C, Park City

offsetbier.com/

On Tap: DOPO IPA

Ogden River Brewing

358 Park Blvd, Ogden

OgdenRiverBrewing.com

On Tap: Injector Hazy IPA

Policy Kings Brewery

223 N. 100 West, Cedar City

PolicyKingsBrewery.com

Proper Brewing

857 S. Main, SLC

ProperBrewingCo.com

On Tap: East Side Paradise - Rice Lager

Red Rock Brewing

254 So. 200 West

RedRockBrewing.com

On Tap: Bamberg Rauch Bier

Red Rock Fashion Place

6227 So. State Redrockbrewing.com

On Tap: Dunkelweizen

Red Rock Kimball Junction Redrockbrewing.com

1640 Redstone Center

On Tap: Black Bier

RoHa Brewing Project

30 Kensington Ave, SLC RoHaBrewing.com

On Tap: FRESHIES IPA

Roosters Brewing

Multiple Locations

RoostersBrewingCo.com

On Tap: Cosmic Autumn Rebellion

SaltFire Brewing

2199 S. West Temple, South Salt Lake SaltFireBrewing.com

On Tap: 10 Ton Truck West Coast IPA

Salt Flats Brewing

2020 Industrial Circle, SLC SaltFlatsBeer.com

On Tap: Oktoberfest Vienna Lager

Scion Cider Bar

916 Jefferson St W, SLC

Scionciderbar.com

On Tap: Original Sin Pineapple Haze 6%

ABV

Shades Brewing

154 W. Utopia Ave, South Salt Lake ShadesBrewing.beer

On Tap: Prickly Pear Sour Ale

A list of what local craft breweries and cider houses have on tap this week

Silver Reef

4391 S. Enterprise Drive, St. George StGeorgeBev.com

Squatters

147 W. Broadway, SLC Squatters.com

Strap Tank Brewery

Multiple Locations StrapTankBrewery.com

Springville On Tap: PB Rider, Peanut Butter Stout / Lehi On Tap: 2-Stroke, Vanilla Mocha Porter

Stratford Proper

1588 Stratford Ave., SLC stratfordproper.com

On Tap: Lake Effect Gose

TF Brewing

936 S. 300 West, SLC TFBrewing.com

On Tap: Edel Pils

Talisman Brewing Co. 1258 Gibson Ave, Ogden TalismanBrewingCo.com

On Tap: Witches Brew- Wassail Inspired Kolsch

Uinta Brewing

1722 S. Fremont Drive, SLC UintaBrewing.com

On Tap: Was Angeles Craft Beer

UTOG

2331 Grant Ave, Ogden UTOGBrewing.com

On Tap: Trail Rye’d - Amber Rye Ale 5% abv

Vernal Brewing

55 S. 500 East, Vernal VernalBrewing.com

Wasatch

2110 S. Highland Drive, SLC WasatchBeers.com

Zion Brewery

95 Zion Park Blvd, Springdale ZionBrewery.com

Zolupez

205 W. 29th Street #2, Ogden Zolupez.com

OPENING SOON!

Helper Beer

159 N Main Street Helper, UT 84526

Apex Brewing

2285 S Main Street Salt Lake City, UT 84115

Prodigy Brewing

Logan, UT

Continental Drift

Regional flavors with broad appeal

BY MIKE RIEDEL comments@cityweekly.net @utahbeer

Proper - White Raven : At its base, this is a golden ale aged in Sotol bar rels. If you’re not familiar, Sotol is part of the tequila/mezcal family, and im parts a very earthy and herbal quality to the spirit. Taste-wise there’s definitely a steeper learning curve than most of its aga ve-based cousins. Over the years, my taste for tequila and mezcal has softened a bit; I’ve never been a fan of salt-and-lime shots, but as I prepared to crack open my White Raven, I paired it with a split of Sotol gift ed to me. Since I didn’t consume its entire contents, I had a shot to go with the beer.

The aroma was earthy and grassy, with some whiffs of vanilla down below. The mouthfeel was average, and the taste be gan with a strong earthy quality and a light wheatiness. Before the Sotol fully mani fested, it gradually grew into a char that re sembled caramel. Mmmm. You better enjoy the flavor of booze if you want to drink this kind of beer; despite having an American Golden Ale basis, it actually changed after its transformation in the barrel. The Sotol comes in waves, and intermingles well with vanilla and bubblegum from the base beer, Verdict : Returning to the beer after try ing some Sotol, it was practically impossible to distinguish between it and the beer, or vice-versa, primarily because the earthiness and that faint vanilla sweet ness, which was certainly from the bar rel’s char, remained plainly recognizable. I’d be really interested to know what kind

and brand of Sotol was used. The finish in this 7.0 percent ale was quite dry, but how could it not be? On a housebound evening, this was a tremendous delight. I could see getting another can.

Level Crossing/Easton Archery 100 Years: This beer is a collaboration with Utah’s Easton Archery, celebrating Easton’s 100 years of making arrows and shafts. This beer is a Belgian-style blonde ale with no ticeable yeast spiciness. There’s an aggressive amount of citrus peel that takes this into that witbier territory.

This peach-hued clear beer flows with a thick collar of beautiful Belgian lace and a billowing white head that retains its shape well. That blonde sure is hot! In this one, the Belgian yeast is prominent. Many es ters—including earthy notes like clay and dirt, white pepper spice, lemongrass notes and a hint of clove—flow forth. Interest ingly, it has a faint aroma that vaguely re sembles skunky marijuana.

The sweet Belgian malt and smoky hops serve as an excellent foundation for the yeast esters. Further into the brew, a very subtle buttery note comes through. The spicy American hops and a slew of more complex yeast esters may stand out thanks to the crisp, citrus profile. The Belgian blonde is extremely spicy, though less so in the taste than the aroma. Lemongrass, cloves and white pepper are all similar to what you could notice on the scent—flavor ful, yet in no way overpowering.

Verdict: The Easton Belgian Style Blonde Ale from Level Crossing is crisp and re freshing with just a hint of dryness show ing through the finish, like a gentle summer wind. The finish begs for another sip due to the harmonious mix of the somewhat sweet malt and peppery hops.

The Easton Blonde is slightly bigger in alcohol at 6.2 percent and comes in Level Crossing’s standard, 16-ounce can, avail able now at Level Crossing. White Raven also finds itself in a 16-ounce can. It wasn’t too long ago that you’d never see a barrelaged beer in a meager can. The times, they are indeed a-changin’.

MIKE RIEDEL

MIKE RIEDEL

BY ALEX SPRINGER @captainspringer

Turkey Preorders at Beltex Meats

Though Thanksgiving may seem like it’s miles away, it’s never too late to get the ball rolling on your favor ite meaty centerpiece. For those who want to inject a little local flavor into their holiday, Beltex Meats (511 E. Harvey Milk Boulevard, 801-532-2641, beltexmeats. com) offers pre-orders for whole turkeys or spiral cut ham via their website. If this sounds like something that will tickle your fancy come November, you’ll want to hop on this bandwagon sooner rather than later. Beltext is home to some of the finest local meats you can get, so demand is expected to be high. Best of luck, you turkeys.

Rockwell Old-fashioned IceCream Opens in Salt Lake

With a location in Provo and one in Gilbert, Ariz., Rockwell Old-fashioned Ice Cream has set its sights on downtown SLC. This creamery and bakery recently opened a new location on Regent Street (115 Regent Street, Ste. 115 A., rockwellicecream.com). All the usual ice cream sus pects will be present and accounted for, but it’s Rockwell’s more unconventional flavors that are sure to tantalize the theater crowd. I’m keen on trying their muddy buddy ice cream, complete with my favorite Chex cereal snack, along with their award-winning G.O.A.T., which features a goat cheese base, blackberry, honey and lemon jam. I think an ice cream parlor is just what Regent Street needs, so I’ll be sure to check this out next time I’m in the area.

Crisp and Green Opens

On the healthier side of things, a spot called Crisp & Green recently opened in Sandy (9710 S. State Street, cris pandgreen.com). Its menu looks like it’s of the acai bowl, smoothie and salad school of thought, an arena in which I dabble from time to time. Their salad menu has all of the classics, many of which feature some nice crispy accoutre ments like blue corn tortilla chips and parmesan crisps, along with a great selection of fruits for their salads—and yes, I did just name-check the carbs and fats on the menu. Regardless of whether your appetite heads toward the savory salads or the sweet acai bowls, this place looks like it’ll be stocked with all kinds of healthy options.

of the Week: “Forget art. Put your trust in ice cream.”

Baxter

Queer Eye

Previewing a few offerings from the 2022 Damn These Heels film festival.

BY SCOTT RENSHAW scottr@cityweekly.net @scottrenshaw

Utah Film Center’s Damn These Heels Queer Film Festival returns Oct. 14 – 16 at the Regent Street Black Box off the Eccles Theatre (144 Regent St.) and online, offering a wide range of feature and short film offerings with LGBTQ+ themes. Here are previews of just a few of the 2022 offerings; the full lineup and schedule is available at damntheseheels.org.

Unidentified Objects: The set-up is tried and true—the “mismatched souls on a road trip” comedy—but the central per formances in Juan Felipe Zuleta’s feature steer it towards something more authentic than the quirkiness always threatening to bubble over the sides. In a New York apart ment building, Peter (Matthew Jeffers), a misanthropic little person, gets an un expected request from neighbor Winona (Sarah Hay): borrowing his car so that she can drive to Canada and rendezvous with the spacecraft she believes is coming to take her away. Neither Hay’s performance nor the script by Zuleta and Leland Frankel underlines the notion that Winona is either clearly delusional or just a free-spirited kook; there’s an edge to the character that suggests darkness Winona may be trying to escape. There’s even more complexity to Peter, tangled in his dually-ostracized identity as a little person and a gay man, yet also tied to a death he still grieves. It’s also one of the few recent fiction films where the COVID pandemic is treated as a fact of life with some impact on the narrative, yet not the defining subtext. The premise makes it hard to find an ending that would feel com pletely satisfying, and the obliqueness near

the end feels a bit off. That stuff is more for givable when scenes like Peter’s awkward flirtation in a bar hint at the happiness for himself that he doesn’t risk imagining might be possible. [Opening Night Film]

Framing Agnes: A solid conceptual foun dation drives director Chase Joynt’s docu mentary focusing on 1960s academic case studies of transgender people, built—in the words of historian Jules Gill-Peterson—on “performance as an aspect of trans-ness.” For the primary framing device, Joynt em ploys transcripts of these case studies—be ginning with “Agnes,” the celebrated trans woman interviewed by UCLA sociologist Dr. Harold Garfinkel, and whose story in spired the discovery of many other such case studies in Garfinkel’s files. These in terviews are dramatized in performances by trans actors, and Joynt spends nearly as much time asking the actors what they’re learning from the people they’re playing as on the staged interviews themselves. Then there’s a lot of time spent with Gill-Peterson

talking about historical transness, including fascinating observations about what ideas like “visibility” mean both positively and negatively, and the history of science defining “aberrant” sexuality. As poten tially compelling as all of these ideas are individually, they muddle one another: Is this primarily a story about what these case studies tell us about trans experience decades before social normalization was re motely conceivable? Or is it about modernday trans people finding both comfort and frustration in these stories? The 72-minute running time feels too densely packed with data and anecdotes for it all to cohere.

Long Live My Happy Head: What starts as something that feels like a somewhat stan dard “triumph of the spirit” documentary evolves into a uniquely heartbreaking CO VID era love story. Filmmakers Will Hewitt and Austen McCowan profile Gordon Shaw, a cartoonist who created a graphic novel titled Bittersweet chronicling his experi ence after receiving a brain cancer diag

nosis at the age of 32. While the film does address his artistic projects—including a proposed music composition inspired by the sounds of MRI machines—the eventual focus is more on Gordon’s mostly-long-dis tance relationship with his partner Shawn, an American director of an arts non-profit. And as a bleak turn in Gordon’s prognosis coincides with the start of the pandemic in 2020, both men face the additional emo tional strain of having to go through this process while separated by an ocean. Gor don provides a lively and engaging center, though the film isn’t afraid also to show him at his most physically and emotionally vulnerable. But as much as this is a record of one man turning a terminal illness into art, it’s also a record of the love in our lives that gives people a reason to want to keep going. CW

FIRST

Matthew Jeffers and Sarah Hay in Unidentified Objects

Finding Meaning in Life Again Singer/Songwriter Scott Lippitt confronts depression and existentialism on his latest album

BY EMILEE ATKINSON eatkinson@cityweekly.net

The feeling of existential dread has probably snuck up on most of us at some point in our lives. It’s easy to get caught up in the minutiae of life and begin to feel as if we have no purpose. This isn’t a new concept, but it’s one that is very relatable.

For singer/songwriter Scott Lippitt, this feeling hit hard during the pandemic. An uncertain time in the world mixed with un certain times in his own life, forcing him to sit down and complete some of the most emotional work he’s ever created.

Stories of religious trauma in the state of Utah are not uncommon; many of those who leave the LDS Church end up having to unpack their negative experiences with it. In the case of Lippitt, however, his experi ence was more unique. He was very inter ested in Buddhism, and spent a lot of time meditating for about a decade or so.

“I think I meditated at least 20 minutes a day, and then hours here and there. I was really into it. I was really into that whole idea of progressing towards enlighten ment, whatever. It sounds silly now,” he says. “It was great. At first, it was awesome, but then sort of towards the latter half of my experience, I started feeling a lot of weird stuff, just a lot of fear and panic but specifically, started to lose my sense of self a bit. I’d look in the mirror, and it wasn’t like I was really me.”

The album inspired by this period is ti

tled Meaning Maker, describing this period of uncertainty in his life . “If I looked at a picture of myself with friends at a concert versus something really mundane, like a banana, there wouldn’t be any difference going on inside my emotional state. Not a fun place to be in at all,” he says.

Lippitt sought help for the issue through meditation teachers, but it wasn’t until he found a researcher at Brown University that he got the help he needed. Dr. Wil loughby Britton, a professor of psychia try and human behavior at Brown, hosts a podcast called When Meditation Causes Harm. With Dr. Britton as a resource, Lip pitt began to find the answers he needed.

“She’s been studying this for over 10 years, and has found that adverse effects and meditating are actually not uncom mon, and they’re pretty lined up with any thing you would do, any sort of psycho therapy or whatever,” Lippitt says. “There’s some percentage of people that it’s just not going to fit for.”

Society is very meditation- and mindful ness-forward right now, and Lippitt wants to let people know that it’s okay if these techniques aren’t the right fit for your situation. “Shout out to anyone who, if it

doesn’t work for you, it’s not your fault. It’s okay,” he says.

With this realization, Lippitt began to re construct his own sense of identity. “I found ways to build meaning again from scratch, and slowly have kind of come back to a space where absolutely now if I look at a picture of my friends, it’s like, ‘Oh, yeah,’ I can feel that,” he says. “It’s been a bit of a journey. It’s kind of a niche thing. Maybe not everyone can relate to that part. I think people can re late to just the meaningless in general.”

For Lippitt, the main goal of Meaning Maker is to reach people and help them not feel so alone. “That’s the biggest summary or takeaway from this album, for me,” he says, “meeting people in their darkness.”

From the moment listeners press play on Meaning Maker, it’s obvious Lippitt has poured his all into the album. Standout tracks include “Hope in Hiding,” “Why I Always” and especially the title track. The song fades in with rhythmic acoustic gui tar with soft electronic beats in the back ground before Lippitt’s gentle voice comes in. Each line of the song hits with so much emotion, especially, “You have got to be kidding me / Your solution to everything / Is to close your eyes and make it seem /

Like everything is just a dream.” While Lippitt has his specific experiences behind the song, it isn’t hard for listeners to relate to this type of subject matter, that it’s okay to not be okay.

Fortunately, Lippitt isn’t in such a dark space anymore. Through the help of sup port groups, and the cathartic feelings that came from putting together Meaning Maker, Lippitt says, things are much better.

“I feel really good, especially on put ting all of that, both the darkness and the journey forward into this album. That feels amazing,” he says. Lippitt hopes that as he shares his dark feelings, others won’t feel so alone in theirs. “My goal isn’t to be big,” he said. “My goal is to reach people that connect with [my music]. My real goal is connection in general.”

Lippitt invites listeners to message him on Instagram, @scott_lippit_music, if they want to talk about his music, or just say hi. In addition to streaming online, Meaning Maker is available on CD, vinyl and cassette on his website, scottlippit tmusic.com. Catch his headlining show at Kilby Court on Oct. 13 at 7 p.m.; tickets for the all-ages show are $10 and can be found at kilbycourt.com. CW

Scott Lippitt

By Emilee Atkinson

Geekin’ Out—A Monthly Queer Variety Show @ DLC 10/13

With some of the sassiest drag queens, talented queer musicians and comedians in town, this month’s Queer Variety Show at the DLC will be an event show goers won’t want to miss. The stunning Sequoia hosts the event. Well-known in the drag scene, she performs regularly around SLC, serving marvelous looks with her outfits. This queen also has a voice of gold, slay ing songs like “Jolene” by the iconic Dolly Parton. Special guests at the event include Marrlo Suzzanne, The Pho3nix Child, Corbin Bronson, Brandi the Kween, Craig Sorensen and Suchii. Cassie Houston, A.K.A The Phoe3nix Child, a self-described “non-bina ry, femme-presenting, bi-polar poet, rapper and dancer from Salt Lake,” they told SLUG Soundwaves in February of this year. “I feel like it’s important to show face as a queer, femme-presenting person in Salt Lake, especially with the scene just being so mas culine,” they said. “There’s not many of us, you know.” Pop artist Suchii has also made a splash on the local music scene with his debut EP Summer on Venus. His new track “Fila Fila” was made with the queer commu nity in mind, each verse including a different pronoun so everyone has a song to sing to the ones they love. This queer extravaganza features music, comedy, drinks, giveaways and performances from some of the best drag queens in town. The show begins at 8:30 p.m. and tickets for the 21+ event are $12. Find tickets at quartersslc.com. (Emilee Atkinson)

Panic! At the Disco @ Vivint Smart Home Arena 10/14

Embarking on tour once more, iconic poppunk act Panic! At the Disco will stop in SLC on their extensive fall tour entitled Viva Las Vengeance, echoing the title of their recently-released seventh studio album. Viva Las Vengeance showcases a new process for frontman/songwriter Brendan Urie: He cut everything live at home with his friends/ production partners at his side. The cinematic musical journey is about the fine line between taking advantage of your youth, seizing the day and burning out. The songs take an introspective look into his relationship with his decade-plus career, including love, fame and growing up in Las Vegas. “I wanted to step away from production styles I had done in the past. I’ve kind of started drifting fur ther and further away from over-production and this whole album was recorded to an 8-track tape machine. It was like, ‘Just figure it out and record it in the moment,’” Urie told Audacy in September. While writing the title track, Urie describes having a melody stuck in his head, but needing inspiration for lyrics. “I went in my notes app and I was just scrolling through and was like, ’Oh Yeah! This ‘Viva Las Vengeance,’ that came from a movie. I was watching this horror movie, Army of the Dead. Dave Bautista’s character, he’s this ex-Marine and his jacket has a patch that says ‘Viva Las Vengeance’ so I was like, ‘Oh, great!’ And it makes sense for me being from Vegas,” he said. Catch this iconic band on Thursday, Oct. 14 at 7 p.m. Tickets are $26$126 with VIP packages ranging from $241$427. Buy tickets at vivintarena.com.

ALEX STODDARD

MUSIC PICKS

By Emilee Atkinson

This Moment

In This Moment @ The Complex 10/15

For nearly two decades, frontwoman Maria Brink has been on the forefront of leading ladies in rock and metal. The L.A.-based metal group have been consistently pumping out heavy tracks since their inception, creat ing a strong and dedicated fanbase. In This Moment’s shows are as theatrical as they are heavy; the stage is always decked out with props, the band has wicked face paint and costumes, and Brink is typically flanked by masked dancers who add to the creepy and heavy vibe that the band gives off. Even though the band can look rough and spooky, they’re extremely down-toearth, and are very kind during meet and greets. In This Moment is gearing up to release their newest work, Blood 1983, commemorating the 10-year anniversary of their 2012 album Blood. “We are excited to celebrate the 10th Anniversary of our album Blood by bringing this new EP to life. Blood changed our lives and shifted our career in a way we will never forget,” said Brink. “We created this reimagined version because we wanted to give our beautiful fans something to be excited about. Blood 1983 is just that. We can’t wait for the world to hear it.” In This Moment will be joined by a lineup of guests including Nothing More, Sleep Token and Cherry Bombs. Catch this all-ages metal performance on Saturday, Oct. 15 at 6 p.m. Tickets are $40 and can be bought at thecomplexslc.com. (EA)

MUNA @ The Depot 10/17

After a period of uncertainty and difficulty, indie-pop group MUNA are making a return. Their latest self-titled album is a forceful, deliberate dimensional output from a band that has nothing to prove to anyone except themselves. Though they were dropped by their label, RCA, during the pandemic, they managed to get picked up by Saddest Factory Records with label head Phoebe Bridgers, and now MUNA has found a new home. Their track “Silk Chiffon,” became a cult smash online, gleaning critical acclaim from publica tions like Pitchfork, NPR and Rolling Stone. For Naomi McPherson, MUNA’s guitarist and producer, it’s a “song for kids to have their first gay kiss to.” And several thousand unhinged Twitter and TikTok memes bloomed. With their place secured, and their selftitled album out, the band is hitting the road to share their infec tious live energy with the world. “The album is kind of disparate sonically, disparate in terms of what the songs are saying, but the connective tissue is self-definition and agency and identity and interrogating those things,” McPherson told The New York Times in June. “And also knowing that nothing is fixed.” The trio have gone through a lot, but they’re not letting go of the past. “I don’t want this era to be, ‘Oh, we used to be one way, and now we’re another way, and everything’s great now,’” she said. “We are who we are, but it’s the compassion we have for ourselves, the awareness we have,” bassist Katie Gavin told The New York Times. This indie-pop trio will be at The Depot on Monday, Oct. 17 at 7 p.m. Tickets for the all-ages show are $30 and can be found at livenation.com. (EA)

Monolink @ The Complex 10/19

Many artists blend different genres to create a personal and unique sound, something that becomes their own. German musician Monolink does this with seemingly contradictory genres: EDM and singer/songwriter type music. “To many that might sound like two very different aspects of modern sound culture—which in turn makes Monolink a fascinating character, because he’s both rolled into one. His style seam lessly connects the narrative structure of a song with the compelling forward thrust of electronic rhythms,” says his online bio. “Guitar chords merge into synthetic pad sounds, hypnotic bass vibrations meet emotional vocal parts, pas sionate physicality meets sublime stimulation for the mind.”

In 2021, Monolink released his latest album Under Darkening Skies, for which the tour is named. “Under Darkening Skies is an album that’s connecting different dots in my life, repre senting phases or moments I went through. I wanted to go back to writing actual songs again instead of adding vocals to a beat, which gave me the freedom to express more musical facets of myself,” says Monolink in a statement. “Eventually it became the most diverse record I have made so far, influenced by a time of global social and economic uncertainty at an everincreasing tempo of change. Like a dark cloud approaching,”

Monolink told We Rave You back in June 2021 when the album was released. Catch this unique act on Wednesday, Oct. 19 at 7 p.m. Tickets for the all-ages show are $25 and can be found at thecomplexslc.com. (EA)

JEREMY SAFFER

weekly

Man On The Street

Cole Fullmer – Publisher at Salt Baked City

hen Utah’s medical cannabis law, also known as Proposition 2, was voted through by Utahns during the 2018 Primary Elections – home-grow rights were included for patients. Originally, those living 100-miles or further from a state authorized medical cannabis pharmacy could harvest up to four plants per grow without the risk of persecution. The initial Prop 2 language was designed to cater to patients living in rural parts of the state who have little, or no access to cannabis medicine. Although 14 pharmacy licenses were awarded by the state in 2019, those living in Uintah, Emery, and San Juan counties seemed left out of the I-15 stretch the pharmacy belt follows between St. George and Logan.

W

At Salt Baked City, we feel patients should have the right to harvest their own medicine – especially when it’s out of reach, or more readily available by black-market and illegal options. To find out if our thinking is out-of-line, or right on track, we visited WholesomeCo Cannabis in Bountiful and asked our fellow patients if they felt homegrow rights should be allowed in Utah. Although the results below probably won’t surprise you, check out these answers from Utah’s Greenscene..

Zach M. - 32

“For sure. I moved here from Denver a few years ago, so I’d like to see Utah move in the same direction.”

Kris A. - 29

“I feel like it can be a slippery slope. Coming from a place where it’s fully legal like Arizona, I’ve seen some irresponsibility with people growing for themselves. So, there is kind of a downhill side that I’m wary of, but I also feel like if we issue out licenses and create some organization, it should be ok.”

Cami B. - 21

“Yes. There are a lot of rural areas in Utah that don’t have access to the dispensaries. I think it would be easier for them. I also think it will be more sustainable for a person who is stuck at home and can’t afford as much at once.”

Chris H. - 26

“I don’t think it would hurt. I think it would be beneficial to patients because they would be able to dial down the medicine they need.”

Miguel B. - 35

“Yes, I think the state should allow homegrow rights. Cannabis should just be

normalized like any other plant medicine. The negative stigma attached to it makes it a difficult problem to fix though.”

Mitchell G. - 32

“I believe so, yes, one hundred percent. I understand the dispensaries still need to make money, but I’m sure there are ways the State can tax home-grow.”

Ivy E. - 37

“I think home-grow should be legal. We always talk about this topic at home. I mean, it’s just weed. I understand there needs to be limits, so people aren’t growing 10 plants in their backyard, but what about two though? That would be enough to save us a lot of money over time and not be a problem to anyone else.”

Andy L. - 36

“Yes, I think patients should have homegrow rights. It can be difficult to find the exact strain you need inside the pharmacies.

This would allow patients to get the medicine they need without relying on growers.”

Anni B. - 24

“Yes, I do. Medical cannabis is not accessible for most people in Utah, and I don’t think you should be able to capitalize on a plant.”

Do you think Utah medical cannabis patients should be allowed home-grow rights?

FREE WILL ASTROLOGY

BY ROB BREZSNY

Gotorealastrology.comforRobBrezsny’sexpandedweeklyaudiohoroscopesanddailytext-messagehoroscopes.

Audiohoroscopesalsoavailablebyphoneat877-873-4888or900-950-7700.

ARIES (March 21-April 19)

“Magic Realism Bot” is a Twitter account that generates ideas for fairy tales. Since you will benefit from imagining your life as a fairy tale in the coming weeks, I’ll offer a few possibilities. 1. You marry a rainbow. The two of you have children: a daughter who can sing like a river and a son who is as gleeful as the wind. 2. You make friends with a raven that gives you savvy financial advice. 3. You invent a new kind of dancing; it involves crying and laugh ing while making holy prayer gestures toward your favorite star. 4. An angel and a lake monster join forces to help you dream up fun new adventures. 5. You discover a field of enchanted dande lions. They have the power to generate algorithms that reveal secrets about where to find wonders and marvels.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20)

On Feb. 1, 1976, Elvis Presley was partying with buddies at his home in Memphis, Tennessee. As the revelry grew, he got an impetuous longing for an 8,000-calorie sandwich made with French bread, peanut butter, blueberry preserves and slabs of bacon. Since this delicacy was only available at a certain restau rant in Denver, Colorado, Elvis and his entourage spontaneously hopped onto his private jet and flew 900 miles to get there. In accordance with astrological omens, Taurus, I encourage you to summon an equally keen determination to obtain pleasurable treasures. Hopefully, though, they will be more important than a sandwich. The odds of you procuring necessary luxuries that heal and inspire are much higher than usual.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20)

Gemini writer Nikki Giovanni reminds us, “It cannot be a mistake to have cared. It cannot be an error to have tried. It cannot be incorrect to have loved.” In accordance with astrological omens, I ask you to embody Giovanni’s attitude. Shed any worries that caring and trying and loving have been blunders. Celebrate them, be proud of them and promise yourself that you will keep caring and trying and loving. The coming weeks will be an excel lent time to renew your commitment to your highest goodness.

CANCER (June 21-July 22)

I was born near Amarillo, Texas, where the U.S. Energy Department stores over 20,000 plutonium cores from old nuclear warheads. Perhaps that explains some of my brain’s mutant qualities. I’m not normal. I’m odd and iconoclastic. On the other hand, I don’t think my peculiarity makes me better than anyone. It’s just who I am. I love millions of people who aren’t as quirky as me, and I enjoy communicating with unweird people as much as I do with weirdos. Everything I just said is a preamble for my main message, Cancerian: The coming weeks will be prime time for you to give extra honor and credit to your personal eccentricities, even if they comprise a minor part of your personality.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22)

Author Jennifer Huang testifies, “Poetry is what helps me remember that even in my fragments, I am whole.” What about you, Leo? What reminds you, even in your fragments, that you are whole? Now is an excellent time to identify the people, ani mals and influences that help you generate a sense of unity and completeness. Once you’re clear about that, spend quality time doing what you can to nurture those healers. Maybe you can even help them feel more cohesion and harmony in themselves.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22)

Virgo journalist Sydney J. Harris described “the three hardest tasks in the world.” He said they weren’t “physical feats nor intellectual achievements, but moral acts.” Here they are: 1. to return love for hate; 2. to include the excluded; 3. to say “I was wrong.” I believe you will have a special talent for all three of these brave actions in the coming weeks, Virgo. Amazingly, you’re also more likely than usual to be on the receiving end of those brave actions. Congratulations in advance!

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22)

When he was young, Libran poet W. S. Merwin had a teacher who advised him, “Don’t lose your arrogance yet. You can do that when you’re older. Lose it too soon, and you may merely replace it with vanity.” I think that counsel is wise for you to meditate on right now. Here’s how I interpret it: Give honor and respect to your fine abilities. Salute and nurture your ripe talents. Talk to yourself realistically about the success you have accomplished. If you build up your appreciation for what is legitimately great about you, you won’t be tempted to resort to false pride or self-absorbed egotism.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21)

In his absurdist play Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett offers us two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, who patiently wait for a white-bearded man named Godot. They’re convinced he will provide them with profound help, perhaps even salvation. Alas, although they wait and wait and wait, Godot never arrives. Near the end, when they have abandoned hope, Vladimir says to Estragon, “We are not saints, but we have kept our appointment.” My sense is that you Scorpios, like Vladimir and Estragon, may be close to giving up your own vigils. Please don’t! I believe your personal equivalent to Godot will ultimately appear. Summon more patience.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21)

Poet Charles Wright has testified, “I admire and revere and am awed by a good many writers. But Emily Dickinson is the only writer I’ve ever read who knows my name, whose work has influenced me at my heart’s core, whose music is the music of songs I’ve listened to and remembered in my very body.”

In my astrological reckoning, now is an excellent time for you Sagittarians to identify artists and creators who provide you with similar exaltation. And if there are no Emily Dickinsontype influences in your life, find at least one! You need to be touched and transformed by sublime inspiration.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)

I’ve read and studied poetry for many years, but only recently discovered Capricorn poet Lizette Woodworth Reese (1856–1935). How is it possible I missed her? Her contemporary, journalist H. L. Mencken, described her work as “one of the imperishable glories of American literature.” She received many other accolades while alive. But today, she is virtually unknown, and many of her books are out of print. In bringing her to your attention, I am announcing my prediction about you: Anything in your life that resembles Reese’s reputation will change in the next 12 months. If you have until now not gotten the recognition or gratitude you deserve, at least some of it will arrive.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18)

Author Sophia Dembling defines a friend as a person who consoles you when you’re feeling desperate and with whom you don’t feel alone. A friend is someone whose life is interesting to you and who is interested in your life. Maybe most importantly, a friend must not be boring. What’s your definition, Aquarius? Now is an excellent time to get clear about the qualities you want in a friend. It’s also a favorable phase to seek out vital new friendships as you de-emphasize mediocre and overly demand ing alliances.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20)

Do you or do you not wish to capitalize on the boost that’s avail able? Are you or are you not going to claim and use the challeng ing gift that would complicate your life but also expedite your growth? Act soon, Pisces! If you don’t, the potential dispensa tion may disappear. This is an excellent chance to prove you’re not afraid of achieving more success and wielding more power. I hope you will summon the extra courage necessary to triumph over shyness and timidity. Please claim your rightful upgrade!

Last week’s answers

URBAN

BABS DELAY

Spooky Rates

Haunted houses, spiders, grave

yards—all scary things to some folk. However, the scariest thing right now is inflation and interest rates! Some say the silver lining to the increased costs of groceries is that, compared to what you spent on food items last year, your bags will be fewer and lighter to carry up the stairs. I bought three bags of groceries the other day, and they were a whopping $180.

I admit I did buy a bit of expensive pro tein, but I tried to be careful and shop for deals. I can’t imagine the cost to feed a fam ily with kids right now. The way things are going, prices will just keep increasing.

Let’s say a year ago, you and your beloved were in the market to buy a home. Compe tition was fierce for what little inventory was available to purchase. You were preapproved for a zero-down loan for $550,000 at 3.5% interest. Your monthly payment with taxes and insurance was going to be around $3,000 per month—totally doable.

But after offer after offer, you tired of running around with your agent looking at properties. You might have even tried to cast spells at the sellers, smudged your car and apartment to clean your vibes, made offerings to God, Satan or the big Spaghetti Monster in the sky. Nothing worked.

So, you decided to wait until the mar ket cooled. Now, it has but, damnit, inter est rates have gone up to almost 7%! That makes the monthly payment more like a frightening $4,200—a $1,200 difference.

Should you wait for rates to come down?

According to my crystal ball, that won’t be any time soon. Inflation for the year is around 8.26%, purchasing power is way down and the cost of goods and services are high. You know this because gas, groceries and just about everything is frightening high.

The Fed oversees monetary policies in the U.S. and has suggested rates will keep going up and up until inflation cools. Mortgage rates could go up to 9% by spring, which means that same loan payment— zero down, $550,000 sales price—would be $5,000 per month!

The answer is simple: Don’t wait for the grim reaper to appear, buy now if you can. With the market getting softer for sellers, ask your lender about “2-1 buy down” loans. Ask sellers to contribute to some of your closing costs to buy down your mortgage rates. Homes are sitting on the market lon ger, which gives you bargaining power like we haven’t seen for buyers in several years.

When you go looking again, remember, haunted houses are often down dead-end streets, ghosts usually avoid living rooms, run away if the key looks like a skeleton and if the sheets are missing off the beds, the place is probably rife with ghosts! n

ANDREWS McMEEL

Holding a Grudge

A family is seeking to press charges against an unnamed man who was briefly married to their mom in the 1970s, the New York Post reported. Their beef? Allegedly, the New Jersey man arrives at Linda Torello’s tombstone in Orangetown, New York, almost every morning with his current wife in tow, where he urinates on the grave and sometimes leaves a bag of excrement. Torello died in 2017, according to her son, Michael Andrew Murphy, 43. In April of this year, he and his sister discovered a bag of poop and supposed a dog walker had dropped it. When the second bag showed up, they called police. Then they went to work, setting up a trail camera that recorded the man’s visits, and on Sept. 18, taking video with a cellphone that identified him as Torello’s onetime husband. “My sister was crying ... I was sick I was so angry,” Murphy said. “No one in my family has had contact with him since 1976 or so.” Police have been unhelpful; Murphy said he’s called them three times, and they won’t put him in touch with a detective.

Ewwwwww

Amanda Gommo, 51, of Bristol, England, required hospital ization after an unfortunate incident involving her daughter’s Chihuahua, Belle, the Daily Mail reported on Sept. 26. As Gommo and Belle cuddled together during a nap, Belle suffered “violent diarrhea,” some of which fell into Gommo’s open mouth.

“It was disgusting, and I was hurling violently for hours after. I just couldn’t get the taste out of my mouth,” Gommo said. Afterward, she suffered cramps so bad that two days later, she went to the hospital, where doctors discovered an infection that had been passed on by the dog. “I’m happy to say both me and Belle are on the mend,” she said, but noted that she’ll “be more mindful of what position we sleep in in the future.”

Bright Ideas

n Can’t sleep? Pack your bags and head for Sussex, England, where you can spend a night next summer in a “luxurious” double bed at the Shleep Sanctuary, according to the Daily Star. As you drift away, numbered actual sheep will mill around the grassy hillside outside the glass dome enclosing your bed. Emma Sleep, a tech company, is offering the one-night stay, which includes dinner, morning yoga and breakfast. “Counting sheep is more than an old wives’ tale,” said Dr. Dennis Schmoltzi, CEO. “It’s a tried-and-true visualization technique that Brits are relying on to send them to sleep.” Zzzzzzz.

n From the “make your resume stand out” files: Karly Pavlinac Blackburn, 27, of Wilmington, North Carolina, was recently laid off from her job, the New York Post reported. Hoping to land a position with Nike in Beaverton, Oregon, and knowing they’d be celebrating Just Do It Day on Sept. 8, Blackburn cooked up a plan: Working with Albertson’s Grocery Store, she ordered a sheet cake with an edible resume printed on top. Next, she talked with Instacart driver Denise Baldwin, who promised her she would “do whatever it takes to get this cake to where it needs to be.” Sure enough, Baldwin delivered the sweet treat into the appropriate hands, and Blackburn has meetings on the calendar with the sportswear brand and more. “There are a bunch of companies that are kind of involved in the process,” she revealed.

The Neighbors (Naked Edition)

The obvious question is: Why are there so many naked people outdoors these days? On Sept. 25 in McMinnville, Oregon, KOIN-TV reported, an “unclothed male subject” was in his front yard, which drew the ire of his across-the-street neighbor. The neighbor launched two full beer cans, hitting the naked man’s house, which prompted him to go inside to retrieve a shotgun.

The neighbor grabbed a handgun and shot five shots into the ground in an effort to scare the naked man. No one was hurt, but the beer thrower was cited for criminal mischief.

Sweet Revenge

Porch pirates in Austin, Texas, are driving residents crazy, KXAN-TV reported. The same people in the same car are hitting front stoops day and night, so a woman identified only as Gabriela came up with a plan. Her husband put a box of used, dirty diapers on the porch, and sure enough, “The same people came back and took the package,” she said. Unfortunately, they “came back and smeared those diapers on our front door. Thirty minutes later, they came back with a giant bag of cow manure. They spread that all over our front porch and on our cars in the driveway. I called police, filed a report, and now there’s a detective on the case.” Britany Walker, who lives near Gabriela, confronted the thieves herself, yelling, “I have a baby,” but she said they just laughed at her. “It was a really upsetting moment.” Austin police advise against engaging with the suspects.

Unclear on the Concept

A second grader in Jacksonville, Florida, has been expelled from Victory Christian Academy after their parents objected to a homework assignment suggesting students “send a picture of you doing reading homework in the bathtub,” Action News Jax reported on Sept. 22. Misty Dunham emailed the teacher:

“Hey, you might want to explain that. Send something out to the parents. Let them know what the intentions are.” Dunham also reached out to school administrators and the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. School officials responded by suggesting that the Dunhams “should do a parental withdrawal for the child.” When Dunham refused, the school expelled the 8-year-old. Pastor Jesse Latta issued a statement about the assignment but did not address the child’s removal from the school.

It’s a Mystery American Airlines appears to have an unexplained noise issue on its planes, The Washington Post reported. On a Sept. 6 flight from Los Angeles to Dallas, passengers were subjected to groans and moaning that sounded human and vaguely sexual.

Passenger and film producer Emerson Collins recorded the noises and posted them to TikTok; his guess was that someone was pranking the public address system on the plane. Collins walked up and down the aisle looking for a possible culprit, but “I didn’t see anything,” he said. Passengers on different American flights have reported hearing a hearty “oh yeah” when the plane landed and the “moans and groans of someone in extreme pain,” but spokesperson Sarah Jantz said the noises are “caused by a mechanical issue with the PA amplifier.” Maybe. Or maybe the ghosts of passengers past?

Wait, What?

In January, Reebok introduced a new sneaker in collaboration with the French luxury brand Maison Margiella. The Classic Leather Decortique Tabi Low is distinctive for its “toe cleav age” design—and now, Indy100 reported, for being identified as a sign of the devil. A Facebook page called Prophecy News warned followers on Sept. 19 that the shoes resemble the feet of Baphomet, a goat deity associated with the occult. Reebok’s Instagram account has drawn similar reactions: “This is so satanic!! My family will never buy another shoe from you,” one follower wrote. Another said, “Satanic, no way will I ever wear those.” Reebok counters that the shoes are based on a traditional Japanese shoe design called tabi.

Business Analyst.