Mountain Xpress 02.08.17

OUR 23RD YEAR OF WEEKLY INDEPENDENT NEWS, ARTS & EVENTS FOR WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA VOL. 23 NO. 29 FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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OUR 23RD YEAR OF WEEKLY INDEPENDENT NEWS, ARTS & EVENTS FOR WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA VOL. 23 NO. 29 FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

C O N T E NT S

PAGE 18 NICHE LOVE Asheville has long been a mecca for smart, talented, creative oddballs, many of them entrepreneurs. So is it any wonder that a dizzying array of boutiques cater to these niche interests? From shops serving an evolving nerd culture to retail outposts in the River Arts District, Xpress takes a look.

COVER DESIGN Scott Southwick

C ONTAC T US

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10 SPACE RACE Deconstructing Asheville’s affordable housing problem

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36 LIFESTYLE DISEASE Exercise and a healthy diet help prevent Type 2 diabetes

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5 LETTERS 39 WATER IS LIFE Local experts share tips for making sure water is healthy and safe

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42 SPREAD THE LOVE Valentine’s Day feasts, fun and philanthropy

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67 SCREEN SCENE 52 WHOSE TALE TO TELL? Different Strokes opens its season with a provocative play

69 FREEWILL ASTROLOGY 70 CLASSIFIEDS 71 NY TIMES CROSSWORD

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O PINION

Send your letters to the editor to letters@mountainx.com.

STA F F PUBLISHER & MANAGING EDITOR: Jeff Fobes ASSISTANT TO THE PUBLISHER: Susan Hutchinson ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Virginia Daffron A&E EDITOR/WRITER: Alli Marshall FOOD EDITOR/WRITER: Gina Smith WELLNESS EDITOR/WRITER: Susan Foster OPINION EDITOR: Tracy Rose STAFF REPORTERS/WRITERS: Able Allen, Thomas Calder, Virginia Daffron, Dan Hesse, Max Hunt CALENDAR EDITOR: Abigail Griffin CLUBLAND EDITORS Abigail Griffin, Max Hunt

CARTOO N BY RAN D Y M O LT O N

Look closely at district voting push When you have the time, try this experiment. Starting in North Asheville, take Kimberly Avenue, then Edwin Place south, turn south on Charlotte Street, make a left at the College Street lights, then a right at the Martin Luther King Jr. Drive lights. Follow MLK Drive to the intersection with South Charlotte Street.

Notice anything?

Here are some questions to get you started (it’s OK, I know the answers): MLK Drive was built half a century ago on the ashes of the homes of East End residents — has it been resurfaced? Ever?

Kimberly Avenue and Edwin Place have traffic-calming measures along their length. Despite the addition of traffic generated by the 500 apartments built over the last few years, MLK Drive has none anywhere. Why not?

Kimberly Avenue and Edwin Place have marked pedestrian crossings and pedestrian refuges. There are school bus stops on MLK drive, but no signed crossings anywhere and no pedestrian-controlled lights at the MLK Drive/Hazzard Street intersection. Why not?

There are stoplights at the intersection of Edwin Place and Charlotte Street. There are none at the intersection of MLK Drive and South Charlotte Street, despite the traffic from the new apartments. Why not?

The city’s motto, “Our quality of service, your quality of life,” rings a bit hollow in the face of these differences. In many parts of the world, it would be surprising that a city can find millions of dollars to build a mile of “green”way to benefit tourists and bike-rental shop owners, but nothing to ensure that kids from the East End get to and from school safely. Here, of course, not so much.

Council members may talk a good game but don’t seem as good at getting their staff to live up to the policies we hear discussed every other Tuesday.

We are assured that some of the $74 million bond money will go to maintenance that has been deferred for far too long. We are asked to join in the process of recruiting a city equity manager. But half a century of experience tells us that while clever people come up with clever slogans like “Beer City” and “Climate City,” an honest slogan might be far less comfortable.

The current Council may be ineffective, but its composition is a testament to the efficiency and integrity of at-large representation — at nearly half female, one-in-seven minority, it mirrors the makeup of

MOVIE REVIEWERS: Scott Douglas, Jonathan Rich, Justin Souther CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Chris Changery, Peter Gregutt, Rob Mikulak, Margaret Williams REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS: Jonathan Ammons, Edwin Arnaudin, Jacqui Castle, Leslie Boyd, Coogan Brennan, Scott Douglas, Steph Guinan, Corbie Hill, Rachel Ingram, Tony Kiss, Bill Kopp, Cindy Kunst, Kate Lundquist, Lea McLellan, Kat McReynolds, Clarke Morrison, Emily Nichols, Kyle Petersen, John Piper Watters ADVERTISING, ART & DESIGN MANAGER: Susan Hutchinson GRAPHIC DESIGNERS: Norn Cutson, Jordy Isenhour, Scott Southwick MARKETING ASSOCIATES: Thomas Allison, Sara Brecht, Bryant Cooper, Tim Navaille, Brian Palmieri, Heather Taylor

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O P I NI O N

Send your letters to the editor to letters@mountainx.com.

the city. And yet the cry goes up that the people living in South Asheville deserve their own representation because — well, because they live in South Asheville. There are two ways this might happen: First, put in the hard yards and come up with a platform of South Asheville-friendly policies that also appeal to the rest of the city. The dogwhistle being used at the moment is so crude that it’s impossible to get beyond the racial animus, so it’s hard to tell what those policies might be.

Or second, cheat. Make the votes of South Ashevilleans count more than those of other city residents.

Switch to district-based voting and gerrymander the districts. The words used so far and the maps floating around show that this is precisely what is intended.

— Geoff Kemmish

Asheville

No justice without truth Asheville seems to think itself the kind of place that believes it polite to say that we should all just agree.

Agree that everyone’s ideas are equally valid. That no one’s thoughts or beliefs have an edge over anyone else’s — that no one view on truth is the “right” one. It’s only fair, right?

All else might feel “oppressive.” How else could we live peaceably in a pluralistic society? It would feel unAmerican to say otherwise.

And yet, at the same time, we act in complete contradiction to this almost endlessly. As though magically, we have the “right” to be indignant. That certain views and ideas are “right,” and some are “wrong.” Not just that we are just merely discontent with such opposing views; but that they are morally and ethically wrong and therefore bad for society.

“We have an obligation,” we say.

“We must fight against the dying of the light and snuff out all who say otherwise. Unite against the evils of white privilege, patriarchy and cisgendered norms!” And then, after a moment of not-so-mild self-satisfaction, we sit back and marvel in a moment of pure bewilderment at the contentious state in which we find our society.

There is a kind of ignorance that engenders more ignorance. There is kind of “enlightenment” that only seems to bring darkness to the public discourse. It’s this specific kind of “tolerance” that kills the discourse that is needed now more than ever. If you’re wondering why you keep fighting the good fight, and no one seems to be listening to you except for those 6

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with whom you already agree, it’s because of this simple reason: That there can be no justice where there is no truth.

We can’t say as a society that truth doesn’t really exist in a universal sense — and then decry universal injustice. You don’t get to do that. If we want to fight the good fight against injustice, we are going to have to start by admitting the obvious: that we believe in this inescapable and infuriating thing called Truth. Nothing lasting or truly good will come out of all this talk until we do.

— Ryan Russell Woodfin

Hiking offers health benefits, too In your two [Wellness] issues, [“Healthy Futures”] and “Beyond Medicine,” [Jan. 25 and Feb. 1, Xpress] I was surprised that none of your articles mentioned hiking, hiking trails and hiking clubs. Western North Carolina is an outdoor paradise.

Come and take a hike with Carolina Mountain Club (www.carolinamountainclub.org), the largest hiking and trail-maintaining club in Western North Carolina, maybe the largest in the state. CMC leads four hikes a week year-round. Meet hikers mostly between 45 and 85 (yes, over 85 — not a typo) who show up week after week. But there are many other clubs and meetup groups in Western North Carolina that cater to various levels, interest and age groups.

People are drawn to our area because of our mountains, trails, national and state parks and forests. Spending time in nature makes people healthier, both physically and mentally. It’s now accepted that trees, streams and trails heal. Doctors are prescribing an outdoor cure for their patients on prescription pads.

When you walk, you’re then encouraged to eat better and be more active in the rest of your life. And if you hike with an organized group, you learn about the area and bond with friendly people who quickly become part of your community.

You might want to revive your outdoor section and give readers an idea of the outdoor opportunities that we have in Western North Carolina.

— Danny Bernstein Asheville Editor’s response: Thumbs-up to your suggestion that people get out and hike for its health-giving (and other) beneficial effects. We didn’t

mean to slight hiking’s importance by not including it in this year’s Wellness supplements. However, we have published Wellness section stories on hiking and the benefits of getting out in nature, including our recent story on forest “bathing” in the Nov. 30 issue.

Why don’t dentists share tooth tip?

I appreciated the excellent article “Tooth Talk: Local Dentists Offer Tips for Preventing Oral Health Problems”

by Cindy Kunst [Jan 25, Xpress], but I would like to mention an additional dental hygiene regimen.

I have been plagued by tooth decay all my life, and by age 70, I was spending thousands of dollars every year and still losing teeth. About this time, I developed a dull ache in a molar that I could tell would be another abscess.

I mentioned this to a friend, and she said, “Have you tried this thing they do in India, of rinsing your mouth every day with coconut oil and turmeric?” She said that she had been doing it for a while and that the toothache she had had disappeared.

I was skeptical but desperate, so, following her instructions, I began rinsing my mouth for 20 minutes or more twice a day with about a tablespoon of coconut oil and a half teaspoon of turmeric. After about two weeks, my toothache was gone. After six months, I went in for my regular cleaning and, for perhaps the first time in my life, the hygienist found no new decay, and she was effusive about how healthy my gums looked.

Six months after that, again, no new decay. It has now been over two years with no new decay.

This is the only thing that has ever worked for me for preventing tooth decay. My question is this: Why have none of the dozen or so dentists I have had in my life ever mentioned it? If I had known about this 30 years ago, or even 10 years ago, I would still have a full set of teeth. Should we not be able to rely upon those who are specifically charged with dental health to tell us the things that are really effective?

Dentists, as well as the other mainstream health professionals, focus on those aspects of medicine that are the most profitable: those being diagnoses and treatment. They largely neglect prevention and aren’t that strong on cure, either. I see this as being due not to the integrity of the dentist, but to structural biases within the professions that make practitioners confine themselves to only those things they are trained in.

C A RT O O N B Y B R E NT B R O W N I’ve tried to follow my dentists’ recommendations for tooth decay prevention all my life, and it never really worked. Only this worked, plus taking vitamin K as recommended by an article in the excellent Well Being Journal (“Nutritional Remedies for Tooth Decay and Bone Health,” www.wellbeingjournal. com, March/April, 2014).

I urge dentists reading this to inform yourselves about this regimen by googling “oil pulling” and to inform your patients about it. It’s easy, safe, inexpensive, and it really works. I welcome comments from readers at 828-242-6073.

— Rusty Sivils

Leicester

Support breastfeeding as preventive medicine Breast-feeding is preventive medicine. The advantages to breast-feeding are numerous, and as a society, it benefits us all to support breastfeeding families. Breast-feeding is protective against maternal diseases such as breast and ovarian cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes and postpartum depression. For babies, it is the best nutrition offered. It can reduce

ear infections, GI infections, dermatitis, rheumatoid arthritis, respiratory tract disease, asthma, obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, childhood leukemias, osteoporosis and, most importantly, infant mortality, just to name a few.

For us as a society, breast-feeding is environmentally friendly, and breast milk is a naturally renewable resource that requires no packaging. Breast-feeding reduces health care costs; mother’s milk serves as baby’s first vaccine leading to lifelong health for that child. Because breast-fed babies are healthier than their formula-fed counterparts, breast-feeding families will miss less work to care for an ill child.

In the Affordable Care Act, breastfeeding is covered under the women’s health and well-being preventive medicine section. We need to speak up to our elected representatives to ensure these vital services continue not only for women, but for their babies and for our world.

As a registered nurse and international board-certified lactation consultant, I have been supporting families since 1997. My private practice allows me to be an independent practitioner and provide lactation and infant feeding support. ... Women with support breast-feed longer and feel better

about their transition into motherhood. It is an honor for me to be part of the mothering journey. Thank you.

— Kimberly Rush

Hendersonville

Freelance news writers wanted Are you a news wonk? Mountain Xpress is looking for a few good freelance news writers to cover local issues and meetings, including local government and politics, the environment, community activism, education, business, law enforcement and cultural debates.

Can you write stories that represent the perspectives of all sides, engage readers, empower them to think critically and take part in local civic issue?

Qualified applicants will have experience in news writing, be familiar with AP style, write clean copy, take pride in getting the details right and meet deadlines. Photography skills are a plus. Must have knowledge of Asheville and WNC.

Send cover letter, resume and clips/links to employment@mountainx.com

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O PINION

Send your letters to the editor to letters@mountainx.com.

Move your money!

BY CATHY HOLT I recently spent a week in Standing Rock protesting the Dakota Access pipeline, and the experience was a kind of initiation for me. I came home from North Dakota determined to make a difference locally. On a cold, drizzly Dec. 4, after thousands of veterans had gone to Standing Rock in solidarity, more than 100 people rallied in Asheville. We marched to four banks, with Suzannah Park leading chants like “Water is life!” and “Defend the sacred!”

If you’ve ever asked yourself “What can I do to make a difference?” this is a great place to start.

It seems pretty clear that the new administration in Washington will be all for big banks, oil, fracking and the Dakota Access pipeline. On Jan. 24, President Donald Trump signed a series of executive memorandums aimed at expediting the Dakota Access and other oil pipelines. Those seeking to profit from extracting the dirtiest of fuels are using their money and power to try to lock in a fossil fuel infrastructure, with no regard for cataclysmic climate change.

But we don’t have to let them.

Starting right here in Asheville, we can derail those plans by moving our money out of the big banks that are financing the pipeline.

The movement to divest from South Africa helped bring down apartheid.

Student organizing led hundreds of colleges and universities to divest, with cities, counties and states following their lead. Now, the youths of Standing Rock are asking people across the country to divest from the banks that fund the pipeline.

Here in Asheville, there are branches of Wells Fargo, Bank of America, SunTrust, TD, PNC, Citibank and UBS. Collectively, these giant banks have over $2 billion invested in the project, according to the activist group Food & Water Watch.

Water is sacred to all indigenous people, who have typically lived in harmony and connection with the elements. They see clearly that without clean water, there is no life for us, our children or the other species with whom we share this earth. We need to listen to them and stop the pollution and desecration of our water.

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Divestiture could help halt Dakota Access pipeline

leaders emphasized respect and peace toward the police.

The website defunddapl.org lists 38 banks as pipeline funders; some are foreign but have branches in the U.S. The site lays out simple steps to close an account while making a public statement, and it tallies the funds that have been reported as divested so far. On Feb. 2, that total stood at more than $56 million. And as of this writing, the Seattle City Council was gearing up to withdraw $3 billion from Wells Fargo to protest its funding of the pipeline.

CATHY HOLT KEY ISSUES I believe the three greatest issues of my lifetime are: • Clean water — defending it as a sacred birthright for all and protecting what’s left of it.

• Indigenous rights — sovereignty over their own lands and water.

• Preventing climate catastrophe — keeping as much fossil fuel in the ground as possible.

The Dakota Access pipeline’s planned route goes under Lake Oahe, the Standing Rock Sioux’s sole source of drinking water. Together with their allies, indigenous people from over 300 tribes have designated themselves water protectors. “Water is Life!” proclaims many a banner. And it’s not just the Lakota either — the Missouri River provides water for 17 million people.

How likely is it that the Dakota Access pipeline would leak? In 2016 alone, multiple U.S. pipeline leaks spilled nearly 300,000 gallons of crude oil and 331,000 gallons of gasoline, Wikipedia reports — and those are only the documented cases.

Although the Army Corps of Engineers finally denied an easement needed to run the pipeline under Lake Oahe, I soon learned that Energy Transfer Partners had publicly stated its intention to complete the pipeline without changing the planned route.

Meanwhile, the pipeline and the violence used to construct it are only the latest chapter in 500 years of colonial oppression of native people, the land’s original inhabitants. During my week in Standing Rock, respected elders led prayers, and drumming and chanting frequently filled the air. Despite the brutal response to the demonstrators — dogs, pepper spray, rubber bullets, water cannons and concussion grenades — tribal MOUNTAINX.COM

PRETTY WORDS, UGLY DEEDS A lot of people lack a clear understanding of how banks invest their money. I was surprised to see how many of the folks attending fundraisers for Standing Rock said they had accounts with Wells Fargo or Bank of America.

Aghast to learn that their money was funding the pipeline, however, many of them promised to close those accounts.

As for-profit institutions, the big banks try to maximize the gains for their shareholders. And their pretty words about human rights contrast starkly with the violence inflicted on the water protectors.

TD Bank spokesperson Judith Schmidt, for example, said: “TD has heard concerns from the community about DAPL and will continue to advocate that Energy Transfer Partners engage in constructive dialogue and work toward a resolution with community members, including the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. TD played an active role in helping to secure an independent human rights expert to conduct a review on behalf of the lenders and advise on improvements ETP and Sunoco Logistics can make to their social policies and procedures moving forward.”

Wells Fargo’s Demond Hunter said, “Wells Fargo is committed to environmental sustainability and human rights, but we must fulfill our legal obligation to serve the financial needs of our customers under the credit agreement.”

SunTrust and Bank of America did not return my calls requesting an interview or comment.

A BETTER WAY Wouldn’t you rather have your money help the local economy and meet genuine social needs? The nonprofit Self-

Help Credit Union, for example, makes loans to charter schools and small, local businesses; it promotes things like affordable housing and child care centers. Ellen Schloemer, the director of marketing and communication, says Self-Help offers interest rates and credit cards and belongs to the CashPoints network. Unlike big commercial banks, however, credit unions are membershipowned, and any profits are reinvested in the organization. Other local options include the Mountain Credit Union and Telco Community Credit Union.

In September, Asheville City Council unanimously approved a resolution supporting the rights of all indigenous peoples, including the Cherokee and Standing Rock Sioux, to self-determination, environmental justice and respect for their ancestral lands, sacred places and water.

Council member Cecil Bothwell is asking the city to divest from banks that fund the pipeline. Both the Seattle and Minneapolis city councils are studying ways to break their financial ties with Wells Fargo and other banks financing the project.

As a few of us stood outside Wells Fargo Bank in late December, politely inviting people to move their money elsewhere, a sympathetic employee came out and told us that seven people had closed their accounts in less than a week. A pregnant woman at the ATM spoke regretfully of having a credit card to pay off before she could divest. “I want my baby to grow up in a world without these fossil fuels,” she declared.

Each person who closes an account is sending an unmistakable message to the banks. It’s not just the dollar amount being withdrawn — it’s the loss of legitimacy that threatens the stranglehold the big banks have enjoyed for so long. Time is short to prevent the completion of the pipeline, so if you have an account with any of the above-listed banks, please move your money now! X The local Defund the Dakota Access Pipeline group will hold a public meeting on Sunday, Feb. 19, at the Kairos West Community Center (below Firestorm Books — enter from the corner of State Street and Haywood Road) from 3-5 p.m.

Longtime environmental activist Cathy Holt (cathyfholt@gmail. com) works with Defund DAPL, the Citizens’ Climate Lobby, the Creation Care Alliance and Asheville TimeBank.

Besides coaching in communication and personal resilience (HeartMath), she teaches the Connection Practice.

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NEWS

SPACE RACE

Deconstructing Asheville’s affordable housing problem

BY MIKE CRONIN michaelccronin@gmail.com There’s a chasm separating what statistics say about the Asheville area’s current rental landscape from the actual experiences of people seeking a place to live. Real life doesn’t seem to be reflecting the data — at least, not yet.

Emily Coates, 29, is a professional photographer who moved to Fletcher in August. Buddy Chambless, a 65-year-old retiree, has lived in Asheville for more than four years.

Different in many ways, both have struggled to find affordable rentals here — an all-too-familiar ordeal for many locals.

For Coates, who’s currently looking to move again, that’s meant focusing on communities more than a 20-minute drive from Asheville, such as Fletcher, Black Mountain and Hendersonville. Chambless, a West Asheville resident on a fixed income, says he’s had to “live in less desirable areas and in substandard physical facilities,” an experience that “really has made me feel ‘less than’ and like some type of lowlife.” He pays $550 a month for “a very small one-bedroom apartment,” plus utilities.

Renters on the hunt tell a well-worn tale: There are precious few decent, modestly priced digs in Asheville and environs, and getting one often requires some combination of creativity, compromise and luck. Yet according to the most recent data available, the vacancy rate is increasing, and while rents continue to rise, the rate of growth slowed over the past year.

Nonetheless, by mid-January, Coates had been looking for three weeks and hadn’t found anything in Asheville for less than $800 a month.

“The prices keep going up and up and up,” says Coates, who shares her renovated barn in Fletcher with a roommate. Their $750 rent does not include utilities. “That just makes the economy weaker. If that keeps happening, it’s going to be difficult for people who want to live here to thrive.”

DUELING NUMBERS During last year’s fourth quarter, the rental vacancy rate in Buncombe, Haywood and

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BARN SWEET BARN: Emily Coates, 29, a professional photographer, stands in front of the renovated Fletcher barn she shares with a roommate. They split the $750 monthly rent that does not include utilities. Coates said she doesn’t mind the more than 20-minute drive to and from Asheville. Photo by Mike Cronin Henderson counties stood at 7 percent, says economist Barbara Byrne Denham of Reis, a New York City-based real estate research firm.

That’s slightly higher than the 6.8

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percent vacancy rate Reis reported during the third quarter of 2016.

Either figure represents a huge improvement over the 1 percent vacancy rate that the Ohio-based

Bowen National Research cited in a January 2015 report covering Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson and Transylvania counties. The same report found an even lower

rate in Asheville and Buncombe County. In December, the real estate market consulting firm issued a new report that looked only at Buncombe. As of the end of 2016, it said, the county’s rental vacancy rate had risen to 2.7 percent. The city paid Bowen $29,750 for the 2015 assessment and $4,500 for the update.

During a Jan. 17 meeting of City Council’s Housing and Community Development Committee, Council member Julie Mayfield said the city should stick with Bowen’s numbers. “We’ve used the Bowen report, and we’ll continue to use the Bowen report, so it’ll be apples to apples,” said Mayfield.

But Jeff Staudinger, Asheville’s assistant director of community and economic development, and Barry Bialik, who chairs the city’s Affordable Housing Advisory Committee, argued that local policymakers would benefit from having such additional data.

Committee members, however, unanimously recommended to City Council that Bowen conduct another assessment at the end of this year to track changes.

the influx of new market-rate rental units has alleviated Asheville’s “severe shortage, the affordable housing crisis persists,” continued Smith, who chairs both the city’s Housing and Community Development Committee and the Asheville Regional Housing Consortium.

A glance at the region’s rental rates (excluding utilities) supports that contention.

The median “asking rent” in Buncombe, Haywood and Henderson counties rose to $1,044 in the third quarter, from $1,016 in the previous quarter, Reis researchers found.

Bowen, meanwhile, reported in December that since the close of 2014, the median rents for studio, one-, two- and three-bedroom units in Buncombe County had increased by an average of $140 monthly. The update reported median rents ranging from $875 for a studio to $1,127 for a three-bedroom unit.

Last year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development calculated affordable rents for the Asheville metropolitan statistical area — a federally defined region

comprising Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson and Madison counties — as $685 for a studio and $1,116 for a three-bedroom unit.

THE VIEW FROM THE STREET

HOUSING HELPER: Asheville City Council member Gordon Smith chairs the city’s Housing and Community Development committee. File photo

No wonder Asheville has a housing crisis, says the Rev. Amy Cantrell.

“When we still see, at any given time, hundreds of people with incomes who are still homeless, then we still have a housing crisis,” says Cantrell, who runs BeLoved House, a homeless support and transitional living facility near downtown. She’s also the community organizer for Just Economics of Western North Carolina, an Asheville-based nonprofit that advocates for a living wage and a sustainable economy.

Scott Dedman, executive director of Mountain Housing Opportunities, sounds a similar note. “The slight easing of the market for middle- and upperincome apartments, though a positive trend, has not helped those

CONTINUES ON PAGE 12

AFFORDABLE VS. MARKET-RATE RENTALS To produce its December report, Bowen researchers surveyed 105 multifamily rental properties. Reis surveyed the units in 58 multifamily developments. Both surveys considered rentals of various sizes.

Experts consider 5 percent to be a healthy rental vacancy rate, meaning it’s low enough “that landlords are filling their units easily,” says Denham. “There is always turnover in leases, so a 5 percent vacancy accounts for that turnover and the need to paint and touch up a unit between leases.”

Both Bowen reports, though, found the vacancy rate for “affordable” rentals, such as subsidized housing, to be essentially zero percent. More than 550 people were on waiting lists for such homes, according to the December update.

And while at least 1,500 new rental units have come on the market in the last two years, the vast majority of those have been marketrate, notes Patrick Bowen, the firm’s president.

Nonetheless, Asheville City Council member Gordon Smith applauded the increase in supply, saying, “We need more housing across all price points.” Although

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NEWS who can’t afford a middle- or upperincome apartment,” he points out.

MHO builds and renovates homes while helping people find affordable places to rent and buy.

“If you make $10 or $12 an hour in Asheville or Buncombe County and you have only one earner in your household, there is no easing in the housing market yet for you,” says Dedman.

But Denham, the Reis economist, downplays such talk.

“Rents are still below $1,000 per unit,” she points out; the company’s methodology employed a weighted average of rents for units of different sizes. “While I could see residents worrying about gentrification and the rising cost of housing given the newer high-end construction, the numbers do not substantiate the claim that costs are rising significantly. This story and fear is heard across the U.S. in a number of metros both big and small.”

VACANCIES GALORE? Some developers go much further, predicting that before long, there’ll be a glut of rental housing that will cause rents to fall and deter additional projects. With up to 1,400 rental units currently under construction, says developer William Ratchford, the area’s vacancy rate could soon rise so high that his company might not want to build additional rentals here.

Bowen researchers say the number of rental units now being built is much higher. City officials worked with Patrick Bowen to correct some figures in the December report, concluding that 1,970 multifamily rental units are under construction, with another 2,677 “planned or proposed.” Most of those units — 3,799, or 81.8 percent — will be marketrate rentals.

Denham, on the other hand, simply says, “We see vacancy ticking up a bit in Asheville” from 2017 through 2019 “due to the new construction.”

Ratchford, who’s vice president of Southwood Realty Co. and Triangle Real Estate in Gastonia, also cautions that actual vacancy rates are probably higher than what property managers report. “People lie about them,” he explains. “Banks start asking questions if the occupancy rate falls below 90 percent.”

Ratchford, whose companies have built several rental developments in the Asheville area, says, “We’re starting to worry that the market is becoming oversaturated.”

That would be good news for folks like Coates and Chambless.

“Now is the time that rents actually are going to start to come down,” Ratchford predicts.

That hasn’t happened yet, though the rate of increase has slowed. In the three counties Reis looked at, says Denham, “Rent growth was 5.3 percent in 2015 and should be at or just below 3.5 percent for 2016. Both of these rates are in line with the U.S. average.”

Bowen’s December report, on the other hand, says that nationally, the rate of increase was 3 percent in 2016, and market rate rents in Buncombe rose 4.4 percent during that period.

GOOD NEWS The $74 million bond issue that Asheville voters approved in November will include $25 million for affordable housing. The city’s Housing Trust Fund, which makes low-interest loans to help developers build affordable housing, will receive $10 million of that money, says Smith, and City Council will decide how to spend the rest. One

ASHEVILLE METRO AREA* FAIR MARKET RENTAL RATES Efficiency One-Bedroom Two-Bedroom Three-Bedroom Four-Bedroom

2016

2017

$588 $664 $819 $1,073 $1,360

$709 $713 $891 $1,194 $1,553

PERCENT CHANGE

* The federally designated Asheville metro area comprises Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson and Madison counties.

Source: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

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21% 7% 9% 11% 14%

option he’s asked staff to explore is building hundreds of affordable apartment units on land the city owns on South Charlotte Street.

The $15 million could also be used for land banking, notes Staudinger.

This strategy involves buying suitable parcels at current prices and reserving them for future affordable housing projects. It’s most effective, he explains, in areas where property values are projected to increase steeply. If that happens, this could enable the city to provide housing in prime locations at much lower cost than the surrounding residences.

The bond issue’s affordable housing component will also enable Asheville to allocate more money to specific projects each year, says Staudinger. In recent years, City Council has typically budgeted about $500,000 for affordable housing, he points out. Against that backdrop, having $25 million “exclusively for affordable housing over the next five to seven years is significant.

This is really good news.”

TWEAKING THE RULES In December, City Council approved several changes to the Housing Trust Fund aimed at making it easier to build affordable housing. These included: increasing the maximum loan amount from $500,000 to $1 million; explicitly making tiny homes, container homes and other innovative approaches eligible for loans; and giving smaller projects the same priority as larger ones in an effort to get more builders involved.

Meanwhile, the 2015 expansion of Asheville’s land-use grant program has begun yielding results. The expansion made grants available for both “affordable” and “workforce” apartments; the move has drawn praise from experts across the state.

“This could make a dent in Asheville’s affordable housing shortage,” says Samuel Gunter, the director of policy and advocacy at the N.C. Housing Coalition in Raleigh. “The incentives allow developers to get returns on their investments close to market rates.”

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development defines affordable and workforce rents based on median incomes in each of the country’s metro areas.

Affordable rents target those whose household income is no more than 80 percent of the median for the area. Those qualifying for work-

Monthly force rents can have household incomes up to 100 percent of the median. In the Asheville metro, the median income for a family of four was $57,900 in 2016, according to HUD. To qualify for a grant from Asheville’s land-use program, at least 10 percent of the project’s units must be affordable or workforce housing, and rents must remain at those levels for at least 15 years. If a grant recipient violates the terms of the agreement, the city reclaims the land, Vice Mayor Gwen Wisler noted during the Jan. 17 committee meeting.

Grant amounts are calculated based on the city property tax for the new development and a formula that awards points for various aspects of the project, Staudinger explains. The grants may include a percentage of city building permit fees, and developers may reap additional benefits by increasing the number of years those rents remain at affordable or workforce levels.

PLANNED PROJECTS Since May 2015, the program has funded four projects with grants totaling about $1.8 million. The final amounts will be determined upon project completion.

In May 2015, the RAD Lofts development in the River Arts District was awarded about $580,000. Despite substantial delays, Harry Pilos still plans to proceed with the massive $60 million project. Plans call for about 227 apartments, ground-level retail and almost 400 parking spaces. About 95 percent of the units would be workforce housing; the remaining 12 or so would be for low-income residents. Rents would be kept at affordable rates for at least 15 years.

In July of last year, Biotat LLC, the contracting company for Griffin Realty and Construction Enterprises Inc., received a roughly $457,000 grant. Asheville developer Ward Griffin plans to build a 72-unit apartment complex at 29 Oak Hill Drive in West Asheville, with half the units reserved for renters earning up to 60 percent of the Asheville metro’s median household income. Those apartments would remain at the affordable rate for 15 years. The other 36 units would be workforce housing and would remain so for 20 years.

Last October, Beaucatcher Commons LLC was assigned about $296,000 for a 70-unit apartment complex to be built by local developer Kirk Booth of Kirk Booth Real Estate. All of the apartments at 43 Simpson St. would be for households earning up to 60 percent of the median income and would stay at that rate for 20 years. Construction could start by the end of this year.

And in December, City Council awarded Atlanta-based Hathaway Development about $530,000 over three years for a four-building complex in South Asheville. For at least 15 years, 10 percent of the 290 planned apartments will be reserved for tenants who qualify for affordable housing. Located at 55 Miami Circle and 70 Allen Ave., Skyland Exchange will include one-, two- and three-bedroom units, with projected rents ranging from $850 to $1,350.

But those figures could be adjusted, noted Hathaway, depending on the market conditions when the apartments are ready to rent. The first units could be available as early as next January.

REPURPOSING CITY-OWNED LAND Another innovative project aims to take advantage of property the city already owns. Asheville issued a request for proposals for a 0.8acre parcel at 338 Hilliard Ave. last May. Currently the site of the city’s park maintenance facility, the property will become available when that facility moves to a new address this year, Staudinger explains.

The parcel, he adds, represents “the first repurposing of city land for housing.”

Proposed projects had to include at least 40 units. The Wilmington-based Tribute Cos., a real estate development, management and investment firm, won the bid in August.

“We’re in negotiations with the city now,” says Paul D’Angelo, the company’s director of affordable housing. The project is a first for Tribute, he notes, adding, “If it works, we’ll repeat it elsewhere.”

Hired by the company in February 2016, D’Angelo was formerly the Wilmington Housing Authority’s planning manager.

Tribute executives, he continues, have chosen to enter this market because they understand “the real need out there. We want to be part of the solution.” And though such projects are expensive to build, the Asheville venture “has the potential to create partnerships down

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Snapshot of

ASHEVILLE-SUBSIDIZED AFFORDABLE-HOUSING PROJECTS from FY 2011-12 through FY 2015-16

Total units subsidized Total funding awarded Subsidy per unit

985 $7.9 million $8,052

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the line.” The company will pay $450,000 for the property and plans to apply for a land-use grant worth about $308,000.

Rents in the four-story complex will depend on the unit’s size.

Forty-two of the apartments will be affordable by those earning up to 80 percent of the metro’s median income. That total will include units for the homeless and those earning 30 percent and 60 percent of the median. The remaining 18 will be at workforce rental rates. Rents will remain at or below the rates in each respective category for 25 years. The 60-unit complex could be completed by spring 2018.

On Jan. 17, the Housing and Community Development Committee unanimously approved recommending the project and its terms to City Council.

THINKING BIG Not all the planned projects are being done by private companies, however. Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity is proposing a 100-unit development for another city-owned parcel, this one near the intersection of Pisgah View and Deaverview roads in West Asheville. In December, City Council approved selling the 17-acre site to Habitat for its appraised value ($458,300) and financing the purchase at zero percent interest.

Habitat officials say the project will be a mix of single-family homes and townhouses.

“This is pretty exciting for us,” says Executive Director Andy Barnett.

“This would definitely be a departure from our usual slow and steady approach.” Up till now, he notes, the nonprofit has built only single-family houses. The project’s homes will be

2/20/17

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NEWS affordable to “buyers who struggle to find decent, affordable housing on the market,” he explains.

Habitat is also considering selling part of the parcel to a partner who could develop an apartment complex with affordable rents. The nonprofit is currently “lining up funding,” and construction could begin within a year, says Barnett.

ENGAGING THE PRIVATE SECTOR Across the country, public/private partnerships between local governments and developers are becoming more common as a way to create affordable housing.

“I see this being done more and more,” says Jonathan Miller, cofounder of the New York City-based Miller Samuel Inc., a residential real estate appraisal company, and Miller Cicero LLC, which specializes in commercial valuation.

“By working with a developer, municipalities can enable the creation of product specific to the needs of the community over a long period of time while spreading out the risk,

LEAVING BIG SHOES: Jeff Staudinger, a longtime city staffer and current assistant director of community and economic development, has recently announced his retirement. File photo usually enabled by some sort of private financing,” Miller explains.

Many experts say increased private-sector involvement is essential if communities are to solve their affordable housing shortages.

Council member Smith sees the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce as a potential partner in such efforts. “It is my hope that the chamber will lead the way in modeling how a business community can effectively help to support, build and maintain affordable housing,” he says.

Last year, the chamber organized a series of meetings to explore what role, if any, the local business community could play in addressing the issue. Options discussed included public/private partnerships; encouraging large employers to help employees with housing costs; companies building employee housing; and paying higher wages. To date, however, nothing concrete has materialized from those meetings.

“We were happy that the housing bonds passed,” notes Kit Cramer, the organization’s president and CEO. “We look forward to working with the city on the specific strate-

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BUDGET CRUNCH: Buddy Chambless, 65, a retired executive on a fixed income, pays $550 a month before utilities for his West Asheville duplex apartment. But that amount, which is all he can afford, “doesn’t get me much,” he said. Chambless has had to “ “live in less desirable areas and in substandard physical facilities” during his four years in the city, he said.

Photo courtesy of Chambless gies that will be used to entice developers to participate in building more affordable housing.”

ONE MAN’S PLAN In the years ahead, both the bond money and the changes to the Housing Trust Fund could improve the housing prospects for tenants like Buddy Chambless. A marketing, public relations and development executive for 40 years, the West Asheville resident also believes that increased cooperation among city officials, local executives and other community leaders could help increase the supply of affordable housing while making it harder for landlords and property management companies to “milk the situation for all they can profit.”

Like Emily Coates, the photographer in Fletcher, Chambless is trying to find a better living situation. He’s even considered leav-

ing town altogether, though the costs and inconveniences of starting over in a new place are discouraging. “But the main reason is that I feel and experience a certain positive energy from living in the valley between the Blue Ridge and Smoky mountains that is deep, peaceful and serene,” says Chambless. “I really like that feeling, even with all the challenges I’ve encountered.”

And since he doesn’t expect to see “any major changes” in the local rental dynamic “in the near future,” Chambless has hatched his own plan.

“My goal is to purchase one of the longer-sized, used Airstream trailers, which can be picked up for less than $25,000,” he reveals.

“With a mortgage or personal loan, payments would be less than prevailing rent payments. And in three to four years, tops, I would own my own place and never have to worry about having to move.” X

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B U N C O M B E B E AT

Parks & Rec on the hot seat at Southside town hall Residents criticize city’s past actions, question plans for the future “We’ve been through tons of meetings ... and I felt that the community was at the table every single step of way. Unfortunately, that’s not how the community felt.”

— Roderick Simmons, Asheville Parks & Recreation Director Billed as a Southside community town hall meeting, a Jan. 31 public input session to discuss recreational facilities in the Southside neighborhood drew a crowd of over 100. A city announcement for the session, held at the Arthur R. Edington Center on Livingston Street, outlined three topics for discussion: “The location of a new pool for the Southside community, a more attractive Walton Street Park and the next phase for the Grant Southside Center.”

While city staff wanted to move forward on gathering input on new facilities, community members had other ideas.

Many members of the public spoke of decades of broken promises made by the city during and after its campaign of urban renewal in the 1960s and 1970s. Several referenced the destruction of many of the physical manifestations of the community’s African-American history, saying Walton Street pool is an irreplaceable reminder of the history of segregation and community resilience.

“Walton Street is a historic site, and it should have a historic marker right now, today,” said Willie Mae Brown.

Renee White, president of the East End Neighborhood Association, said she stands in solidarity with the Southside community, as well as with other historically African-American neighborhoods in Shiloh and Burton Street. “The East End has been lied to,” she said. “You put Stephens-Lee [Recreation Center] under the control of Parks and Rec. It was ours from the beginning. Experience has taught me the city just tells lies.”

Oralene Simmons, a leader in the local African-American community and a retired Parks & Recreation Department staffer, said the community had been promised an indoor 16

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

ON MESSAGE: City Parks & Recreation Director Roderick Simmons told Southside community members he understands that many feel the city hasn’t followed through on promises for recreational facilities in the neighborhood. Photo by Virginia Daffron pool facility at both the Livingston Street Center (now the Edington Center) and the Montford Recreation Center over the years. Neither has been built. “I am very saddened at what our recreation programs have become,” she said.

Some commenters expressed fear that traffic on Livingston Street will continue to increase as redevelopment in the River Arts District moves forward, creating a safety hazard for children walking to the Grant Center site from the area surrounding the Walton Street pool. Others said city assertions that the Walton Street facility is underutilized need to be seen in the context of limited operating hours, use of the facility by summer camp programs and the fees charged.

Raymond Harrell, who has managed the Walton Street pool for the city every summer for the past 20 years, pushed back against claims that the facility is monopolized by summer camp programs or that people are turned away because they can’t pay. He said when kids come MOUNTAINX.COM

without money, “more times than not I let them in for free,” only requiring the kids to pick up trash or do other chores to earn the entry fee. Harrell advocated focusing on moving forward rather than being distracted by broken promises or conspiracy theories. “We can complain about all the things that haven’t happened in the past,” said Harrell, whose full-time job is magistrate. “All the fussing in the world won’t make a bit of difference if you don’t show up.”

Council member Keith Young echoed that sentiment after the meeting, conceding that he understands people need an opportunity to express past frustrations. Still, he said, he wants to put his energy toward coming up with the best solution for the community given the availability of funding and opportunities presented by development in adjacent areas.

Copies of a printed survey soliciting input on Walton Park and Grant Southside Center were available for attendees to

complete. In addition to questions, the survey summarized the status of the issues under consideration.

The Parks and Recreation Department has funds budgeted to replace the pool at Walton Park at 570 Oakland Road. However, the passage of $18 million in funding for parks and recreation facilities in the city’s 2016 bond referendum — which includes money for the second phase of the nearby Wesley Grant Southside Center on Livingston Street — has spurred city planners to consider a new question: Should the city rebuild or replace the 1938 Walton Street pool or relocate the swimming facility to the Grant Center site? What facilities and programming would the community like to see in the Southside neighborhood?

Roderick Simmons, Parks & Rec director, concluded the meeting by urging those present to turn in their completed surveys, and for those who were unable to attend to submit input online at the city’s Open City Hall website by

SENSE OF HISTORY: Willie Mae Brown argued that the historical significance of the Walton Street pool should not be overlooked. Photo by Virginia Daffron

Saturday, Feb. 18. Written responses can be turned in at the Grant Center or the Edington Center. A followup meeting will be held at 6 p.m., Tuesday, Feb. 28 at the Grant Southside Center.

— Virginia Daffron ANNUAL STATE OF DOWNTOWN EVENT FOCUSES ON INVESTMENT, OPPORTUNITY Are Asheville and Buncombe County investing enough in the city’s popular downtown? Speakers at this year’s annual State of Downtown luncheon, held Jan. 31 gave different answers to that question. While Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer and Buncombe County Board of Commissioners Chair Brownie Newman touted lists of major projects and initiatives that benefit downtown, urban planning consultant Joe Minicozzi argued that tax revenue data show more municipal investment in downtown is both warranted and needed.

The annual event is organized by the Asheville Downtown Association, a membership organization made up of business and property owners and residents. According to board President Ben Colvin, this year marks the organization’s 30th anniversary.

Addressing a capacity crowd of over 200, Manheimer called downtown “a place for both locals and visitors.”

She cited the Jan. 21 Women’s March on Asheville as one of many events that drew large crowds over the past year. The city’s winter lights program coaxed many visitors downtown during the holiday season. However, she continued, “I don’t want any more emails about how bad our Christmas wreaths look,” noting that the city probably won’t be using those decorations again.

Manheimer pointed to the hiring of downtown development specialist Dana Frankel, the launch of Walkable Wall Street pedestrian-only days, a pilot busker policy, street median maintenance, upgrades at the U.S. Cellular Center and a task force to develop a community vision for cityowned property at Haywood Street and Page Avenue as significant initiatives the city has undertaken to support downtown. She outlined proposed zoning ordinance changes that, if passed, will give City Council greater oversight of proposed downtown development projects.

Improvements planned for Pritchard Park this month “didn’t quite hit a brick wall,” the mayor said, but ran into questions and concerns. Though the proposed lighting and signage improvements will move forward, the

landscaping and hardscaping components of the planned upgrades “are going to take some more study before recommendations come forward,” she said. City staff members are collecting more public input on the proposed design.

The city’s Planning Department is undertaking a 12-month study of the fast-growing South Slope district, and the Transportation Department is close to completing a comprehensive parking study. The mayor also said the city will be launching a new website on Feb. 10.

County Commission Chair Newman recalled that, since moving to this area in 1990, he’s lived within walking distance of downtown for all but two of those years (when he was attending Warren Wilson College in Swannanoa). Downtown plays a key role in making this a unique community, he said.

County government is focused on policies that meet the core needs of its citizens, provide opportunity for all and create connections between different parts of the community, Newman said.

One important example of this commitment is $135 million of investments over the past four years in new public education facilities, including the new Isaac Dickson Elementary School, Asheville Middle School, A-B Tech Ferguson Center for Allied Health and the Mission Health/A-B Tech Conference Center. Over the next few years, he said, the county will be called on to invest $25 million in critical repairs to stabilize buildings on the historic Asheville High School campus. “It will be extremely expensive,” he conceded, “but it is critical to extend the life of Asheville High School for another 50 years.”

The county stepped in to fund a new gym floor at the Arthur R. Edington Education and Career Center, Newman said, and the commissioners are interested in funding additional projects to benefit areas where concentrated poverty exists. He also touted the new Family Justice Center on Woodfin Street. With 4 miles of greenways completed, over 6 miles planned or under construction and additional connections moving forward from the River Arts District to Woodfin, the county will have over 15 miles of continuous greenways in the foreseeable future, Newman said.

An initiative to develop public art that recognizes and honors local AfricanAmerican heritage is underway, said Newman. The county and the city have contributed funds to a planning process to determine the next steps for that effort.

After the elected leaders had their say, Minicozzi took the podium to declare that Asheville is not doing nearly enough to invest in and grow its downtown.

Minicozzi outlined the story of Asheville’s original development boom in the 1920s,

as well as the debt crisis that boom left in its wake. Now the city is in the midst of a new boom era that’s bringing 10 million visitors to the city’s downtown each year, he said. The value of all taxable property in the city has reached $12.8 billion, Minicozzi said, and the taxable value of downtown real estate is close to $1 billion.

Minicozzi posited that $26 million in downtown investments in the early 1990s, which financed projects such as the revitalization of Wall Street and the construction of the Wall Street parking garage, laid much of the groundwork for the current tourism boom.

In 1991, 43 Haywood St. had been vacant for 40 years and its tax value was just over $300,000, Minicozzi said. The city provided benches, trash receptacles and a street tree outside the building, which now houses the modern furniture retail store Mobilia. Today, he said, the property generates the equivalent of $634,000 annually in real estate taxes and $83,600 in retail taxes per acre. It is valued at over $11 million, a 3,500 percent increase over 15 years for the 1/5-acre site.

By contrast, the Walmart on Bleachery Boulevard sits on 34 acres and generates $6,500 in property taxes and $47,500 in retail taxes per acre.

Because the infrastructure needed to support dense development in areas like downtown costs less than that required to service sprawling development that yields far less tax revenue, Minicozzi suggested focusing public investment on promoting dense urban development in both downtown and outlying areas such as West, North and East Asheville.

Colvin presented the results of a recent ADA survey, which showed that downtown business owners continue to prioritize expanding parking and transportation, investing in infrastructure and supporting small businesses over other concerns.

— Virginia Daffron X

Buncombe Beat HQ

To read all of Mountain Xpress’ coverage of city and county news, visit Buncombe Beat online at avl. mx/3b5. There you’ll find detailed recaps of government meetings the day after they happen, along with previews, in-depth stories and key information to help you stay on top of the latest city and county news. X

MOUNTAINX.COM

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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Bohemian commerce

Just about everyone has something quirky or unusual that floats their boat, some special interest or passion that makes their eyes shine and curves their lips into a smile. Asheville, meanwhile, has long been a mecca for smart, talented, creative oddballs, many of them entrepreneurs.

Put the two together and you get a dizzying array of boutiques that cater to these niche interests.

Accordingly, this year’s edition of Xpress’ annual Specialty Shops supplement homes in on local businesses offering unique goods and services. Able Allen’s “It’s Geek to Me” spotlights stores serving an evolving nerd culture.

Thomas Calder’s “Taking the Plunge” looks at new retail outposts popping up in the River Arts District.

And Kat McReynolds’ “A Mannequin’s Best Friend” explores the eclectic selections at Dema Badr’s Scout Boutique in Biltmore Village.

But regardless of their emphasis, what drives all these businesses is love: the proprietors’ passion for their work, and their customers’ fervor for whatever’s on offer.

And since this is also our Valentine’s Day issue and Asheville is Foodtopia, Nick Wilson’s “Feed the Love” hones the focus a bit, zeroing in on some interesting food-related gift ideas.

In the end, however, there’s more at stake here than mere shop-tillyou-drop suggestions. By supporting the particular passions and obsessions of a diverse populace, the offbeat enterprises presented in these pages help this community thrive. X

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

IT’S GEEK TO ME

Local businesses that serve your inner nerd

BY ABLE ALLEN aallen@mountainx.com These days, geeking out is hot.

Asheville is home to a vibrant community of people looking to express their nerdier side, and abundant businesses to serve them: From comic books to games to movies and more, this town has it all.

Across the country, the cultural partitions surrounding geekdom are being torn down: What was once solely the province of bespectacled, pocket-protector-wearing oddballs is now beloved by broad swaths of the mainstream.

And in Asheville, the nerd-iverse is growing in ways particularly suited to local predilections.

Amid this increased popularity, the owners of geeky stores are playing as a team, happily sending their customers to another small, independent shop if they can’t provide the desired item. Of course, with Target now carrying Catan (a popular strategy board game), Barnes & Noble stocking a boatload of graphic novels and Best Buy offering a huge video game section, there’s a lot more competition. But it also means the market has expanded enough that the chain stores now find it worth their while to sell such items.

FINDING AN IDENTITY Pastimes opened in Asheville back in 1980 as a coin-and-collectibles store, notes co-owner Scott Russell. After experimenting with a few different names and iterations, the owners settled on comics and games in the late ’80s as the shop moved up Merrimon Avenue all the way to Woodfin. Comics were on the rise, with a run of successful, groundbreaking storylines like V for Vendetta, Spawn, the launch of X-Men (as they’re known today) and a Superman series that culminated in the death of the icon.

Pastimes got on board, becoming part of a wave of geek stores serving the reemerging national market.

Russell started out as a customer, then began working at the store and, a couple of years ago, bought an ownership share. A true lover of comics, he can’t pick a favorite genre. “I love all of it — all the superhero stuff, crime stories, even romance stuff,” he says. And comics remain the shop’s bread and butter, though it does sell some games and toys as well.

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SUPER SALES: There are two kinds of comic book shops in Asheville. Comic Envy, pictured, has grown to include all sorts of comic-oriented paraphernalia and things nerds love. Haywood Comics takes much the same approach, with an even broader focus in a smaller space. Meanwhile, Pastimes has narrowed its inventory of other things to improve its selection of comics. Photo by Able Allen “Games are cyclical,” says Russell, and though he’s noticed that a lot of folks have started playing Dungeons & Dragons again, he sees the market as unpredictable and is content to leave most of that business to stores like The Wyvern’s Tale and Hillside Games. “We’re the comic shop in town,” he explains. “That’s our No. 1 passion, then the collectible stuff on the side, and then we have some games and toys.”

For a while, Pastimes was pretty much the only comics shop in town. But Comic Envy came on the scene over eight years ago, and Haywood Comics has now opened in West Asheville.

Darrin Williams had trouble finding a job in Asheville when the economy tanked in 2008. So, having worked as a bookstore manager, he decided to go into business for himself. He and his wife tried to get a bank loan to get Comic Envy off the ground, but in the midst of the credit crunch, they came up empty. They eventually got the boost they needed from Mountain BizWorks.

Tucked away off Tunnel Road, the storefront was a little hard to find, which made for a sluggish start. But

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

they persevered, nurturing a friendly vibe that kept customers coming back.

Comic stores, says Williams, have a reputation for being cliquish, so he tried to “make sure that I’m not the typical comic store, where you go in and ... if you don’t know the owner or whoever is working, then you just get a kind of a look — like, ‘What are you doing here?

You’re not part of this.’”

Business improved significantly when the shop moved to a larger space on Tunnel Road a few years later. The orientation is also evolving as Williams found an expanding market for toys, collectibles and comicrelated knickknacks, says Williams.

“Initially, I thought of it as a comic book shop that also sold other stuff, but I think right now we’re morphing into something else. At this point, it’s probably just as much other stuff as it is comics,” he reveals.

AN AMERICAN ART FORM To Williams, comics are “one of the few truly American art forms. They were made here … and it’s an art form

[that] has no boundaries. If you can imagine it, it can go on the page. Just the storytelling ability in comics is wonderful. It’s magical.”

And Asheville, he maintains, is a great place to peddle comics. “Honestly,” he observes, “Asheville’s not a huge town, and if it were a more conservative town — not necessarily politically, but just the people themselves — I don’t think you could sustain the three stores that are here now. But because there are so many people that are into art and into the nerd culture and things like this, it helps all of us.”

The Comic Envy crew has also organized the Asheville Comic Expo in recent years, providing a place where geeks can let their freak flags fly. The event was on hiatus last year, but Williams says they’re pulling together a smaller version for October, and bringing it back full scale in April 2018.

Attendees come out in full celebration mode, often sporting elaborate costumes as they check out original art and collectibles and generally applaud their favorite nerd stuff.

Doug Cegelis appreciates that spirit.

He’d been running an online business for years, peddling geeky essentials out of a warehouse in Arden, before open-

ing Haywood Comics just over a year ago. “More than anything, what I felt was missing in selling online was the sense of being part of the local community,” he explains. “Having the store has allowed us to get to know so many people who we never would have met.”

Things like comics, video games and movies “provide people with an escape from everyday life — at least that’s my excuse!” says Cegelis. As a businessman, his approach is pretty much just selling things he loves, whether it’s music, comics, video games, toys or Star Wars items. And indeed, he’s managed to cram an amazing assortment of nerdy accouterments under one modestly sized roof. “It’s pretty great to get to be surrounded by all of it every day,” says Cegelis.

GAME ON “It’s hard to find a space that’s open late enough for you to get in the game you want to get in,” explains Cortland Mercer, co-owner of the soon-to-open Well Played on Wall Street. And with board games gaining popularity, he and his business partner, longtime friend

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Kevan Frazier, are trying to offer everyone the home-and-hearth feel of a kids game night, says Mercer.

He’s always loved board games, and in college, he started playing The Settlers of Catan, a gateway for many newbies to the world beyond Parcheesi, Scrabble and Clue. So when Mercer read about restaurants that catered to board games popping up in other countries, it got his attention. Toronto, for example, now has more than a dozen such establishments, ranging from simple coffee shops to high-end teahouses and bars.

After researching the emerging business model, says Mercer, he emailed Frazier about a year ago and jokingly told him that this was his dream job. But then they asked themselves, “Why not?” and set about figuring out how to make it happen here.

There are other places in town that offer a comfortable atmosphere and a good supply of games such as The

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Prospect. And the popular Meetup group, Asheville’s Bored Game Geeks (boasting 1,336 members) holds its weekly gaming sessions at rotating venues, including Noble Cider, Asheville Pizza & Brewing Co. and Earthfare. But Well Played will be the first Asheville eatery that’s focused on hosting board gamers.

The café partners expect to open next month, offering more than 500 gaming titles as well as a robust selection of locally sourced comfort food, desserts, beer, wine and coffee. And they believe the time and place are ripe for it. “Just speaking from my own experience, I went to college here and came back, and a lot of my friends are at the point where we love the local brewery scene, but at the end of the day we’ve done that,” says Mercer. “We want a different social outlet.” And Well Played wants to be “an alternative answer to ‘What are we going to do tonight?’” You can have

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great local beer, he notes, “but you can also do this awesome, social, fun, engaging thing as well.”

Mercer and Frazier won’t be selling games, though. If people like something they’re trying out at the cafe and want to have it at home, Mercer says he’ll direct them to The Wyvern’s Tale.

Deklan Green, co-owner of the Merrimon Avenue store says it’s seen steadily growing community support since it opened several years ago.

And while he doesn’t consider himself an expert salesperson, Green says, “Whatever you are passionate and knowledgeable about, you will certainly find a way to sell that. I just help people find what they want.”

BUILT ON COMMUNITY For many people, sharing games and seeking out folks who can compete at a

similar level just feel right. “I think the reason a game store exists at all,” says Green, “is not just to sell things: It’s to provide a community space. And that’s really, for me, what makes it enjoyable.”

That seems to be a common sentiment among local game store aficionados. Alaric McDonald loves attending Friday Night Magic (a weekly tournament featuring the popular card game Magic: The Gathering) at Gamers Haunt. The tiny shop is on the upper floor of the little strip mall next to the Enmark gas station on Merrimon.

And though McDonald says he doesn’t play much anymore, he still enjoys meeting up with his friends and watching the matches, or leafing through the binders filled with extra cards that players sometimes trade.

He even designs and produces cards to be used as tokens, which the games sometimes call for. “There’s a card that produces [weak] red humans and then turns into big monsters that destroy the world, so I chose mainstream establishment Republicans and then made Trump and Pence tokens for the other ones,” says McDonald. His fellow Magic lovers seem to get a kick out of that as well.

Dale McKinney, who runs the store, deals exclusively in Magic. A passionate expert on the game, McKinney says the customer base defies age demographics, with players ranging from teens to seniors. Although players spend hundreds of dollars refining their gaming decks, he says, the previous owner sold the shop because he couldn’t support his family on the modest income it generated. McKinney, though, is able to keep his cost of living low enough that he can make ends meet while doing what he loves.

He also wants to foster a friendly and welcoming atmosphere for players. There’s no entry fee for the weekly tournaments, and half the winners get prizes. “That encourages people who are brand-new, who maybe haven’t won any games yet, that if they win at least one or two more games in the night, they can at least get a prize,” McKinney explains.

GETTING COMFORTABLE “We’re probably the most full-service of the game stores in town,” says Nate Sykes, co-owner of Hillside Games on Tunnel Road. “Everybody else kind of specializes and just does certain things, but we have a little bit of everything.”

The shop, which has been around for a dozen years, includes 1,000 square feet of designated space for tournaments and regular gaming events.

Each week, Hillside hosts several events, including role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons as well as card games like Pokemon. There’s also a Friday Night Magic tournament. A longtime D&D player, Sykes has been playing Magic since it came to the East Coast in 1993. His wife, co-owner Amanda Sykes, also does some of that, but she’s really more into the board games, he notes.

That’s fine with Sykes, who wants his store to be a place where gamers of all stripes can thrive. “The best thing I can say about the gaming community in general,” he says, “is it tends to be very welcoming and open. ... For many years, the geeks and the nerds didn’t really have a fantastic place to be comfortable. And we try to encourage them to be as comfortable as possible.”

McKinney shares that sentiment.

Having a store in Asheville is great, he says, because although the city’s in a pretty conservative part of the country, the people here tend to be accepting, future-oriented and open to things that folks in other areas might find strange. “That really lends itself to gaming,” he points out, “because, in a lot of ways, there’s still some newness to that culture.” Even the growing popularity of video gaming, McKinney maintains, can serve as a bridge back to the physical games.

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STRONG BONDS AND RETRO MEMORIES When Rich Simpson opened what’s now GameXcape on Patton Avenue 14 years ago, he took the name of his brother’s video game retail franchise operation, Play N Trade. After the brother sold his business, Simpson had to change his own store’s name, but that didn’t bother him since he was moving and adding a gaming lounge anyway.

Simpson enjoys video games, but he can’t devote the kind of time to them that’s needed to become a master. “I’m competitive: That’s my problem,” he explains. “You put me at anything, I don’t like to lose.” And with the new games, he continues, “You see how much time commitment it takes to get good. I finally accepted the fact that I’ll never be able to hold my own with today’s gamers, who can spend three to six hours or more a day on those things.

They’ll eat you alive online.” So, these days, Simpson says he plays mainly for entertainment and distraction.

Manufacturers, notes Simpson, have made directly downloading new games so easy that retail businesses like GameXcape aren’t selling them as

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much anymore. He also feels there’s less innovation in video game development these days, and since people tend to play only one kind of video game, he’s seen many of his customers lose interest in new products. A lot of those folks, however, then turn their attention to retro games. Simpson’s store includes a lounge that features the latest in video gaming systems, but he’s preparing to tear out the back wall to put in a retro gaming lounge stocked with older Nintendo products and maybe some other vintage games.

And despite changes in the way people play games, Simpson still believes that lounge style play will continue to be a draw. “When you played games back in the day, you were generally playing with your friends. And that’s changing nowadays — you’re playing online with your friends, but they’re not side by side anymore,” he points out. “To me, that’s the best part of gaming, and those are the memories that formed strong bonds in your brain. So you recall all those fun times playing that game. And that’s why you’re seeing Super Nintendo and N64 games go for crazy prices because people want to buy that happiness again.” This phenomenon, says Simpson, accounts for half his business.

The Asheville Pinball Museum in Battle Square, across from the Grove Arcade, boasts over 75 pinball and classic video games. After paying a flat admission fee, patrons can play to their hearts’ content.

The Asheville Retrocade, which just opened in West Asheville, employs the same pricing strategy. The new bar features cabinet arcade games and pinball machines dating back to the childhoods of Gen Xers and Gen Yers.

Owner Michael Penland has been in the bar business for a long time and also owns arcades. The Haywood Road location, he says, brings those two interests together. Starting with a single Mortal Kombat 2 cabinet that he grudgingly bought seven years ago, Penland has built quite a collection after discovering that people love to play them. He also has a large trove of beer memorabilia dating to the 1930s.

Penland loves everything about the games, right down to the smell of the wooden cabinets and the feel of the joystick. His new place is a step into the past, with classic music and some 5,000 vintage games, most of them on computer emulators.

“I like it when people can come in and play the game they used to play in high school or show their kids how they used to hang out,” he explains. “The gaming industry now is just sit on the couch with a headset on, and I want to get away from that.”

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FORBIDDEN FILMS Orbit DVD takes the whole world of nerdy, geeky stuff, shakes it up like a martini and spits out a tasty mix of weird. With the recent closing of Rosebud, Orbit is now the lone remaining video store in Asheville, and it owes at least some of its market viability to the geeks.

Owner Marc McCloud is a true movie buff who managed the Blockbuster video store on Tunnel Road in 2003 (kids, ask your parents what this was).

But when he asked if he could bring in certain titles that he wanted to rent out to customers, McCloud was told he’d be fired if he did that. The offending films were the documentaries I Am Trying To Break Your Heart, about the band Wilco, and Lost in La Mancha, about Terry Gilliam’s ill-fated attempt to make a Don Quixote movie with Johnny Depp.

Yet the demand for those movies was astronomical, says McCloud, and in Asheville, “People like the offbeat type stuff.” So he quit the uncomprehending corporate structure and opened a store where he could rent out whatever he wanted. What sets Orbit apart is its collection of hard-tofind items. The owner’s favorite is the “WTF section,” which boasts some of the strangest, most grotesque films one could ever hope to see (or not).

“First and foremost, we’re a neighborhood store,” he says. “So we always look at requests, no matter how silly.”

That anything-goes approach has served the store well, as video-rental stores across the nation have all but gone extinct.

Although the DVDs still take up a lot of floor space, they no longer provide a majority of the revenue. “About five or six years ago, I realized that the time was up for the rental business,” he reveals, “so I took steps to stay open. We brought in other things. A good example is we’ve always rented video games, but then we found other people were wanting to buy them. So eventually that turned into ... a huge part of our business.”

Like GameXcape, Orbit does well with retro games, but it also carries comics, toys, books and board games, offering a small but wellselected sampling of both new and used merchandise.

NERD IS THE WORD But if nerdy stuff has helped a local movie store survive, mainstream media have returned the favor for comic book boutiques. Russell attributes a lot of the growth in Pastimes’

HEY YOU GUYS!: Orbit DVD in West Asheville is run by movie nerd Marc McCloud. He sells a little bit of everything to support his first love — films that fascinate. The store is easy to spot with its eye-catching pop art murals. McCloud is shown here holding his favorite movie from the “WTF” section, The Sinful Dwarf. Photos by Able Allen customer base “to the diversity, actually, from movies and TV. Gaming, too, like video games. You know, it’s not just a guy thing anymore: It’s everybody, and I think that’s awesome because I can recommend something to anybody.” In years past, he says, if a female came in seeking guidance, he’d hesitantly mention Wonder Woman or Archie. But these days, there are many great titles with cross-gender appeal, from Ms. Marvel to The Walking Dead.

And that feedback loop of a market continually reinventing itself shows no signs of slowing down.

“There’s a lot more people buying graphic novels now,” says Lauren Napoli, a buyer for Malaprop’s Bookstore. And part of the reason, she believes, is the increased availability of titles with broader appeal.

Back in the ’80s and ’90s, the world of comics didn’t have much to offer people of color — or, for that matter, anyone who wasn’t a straight, white, teenage male. But these days, says Napoli, a more diverse crowd is reading graphic novels and comics because a more diverse crowd is writing them. She credits AfricanAmerican writers like Octavia Butler and Ta-Nehisi Coates, among others, with expanding the audience for the nerdier side of literature.

Patrons of the store’s graphic novel section, notes Napoli, say things like, “Look at all the comics for young women that you have here. Look at all the comics that have a diverse, catholic, LGBTQ and people of color [cast of characters].”

Because of the increased media attention accorded graphic novels like Watchmen or Persepolis, she points out, more of them are getting banned from schools and libraries. Ironically, however, that can actually give them a boost. After several failed attempts to ban Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, for example, it was adapted into a Tony Award-winning musical. The book, meanwhile, has won multiple awards and is now considered a classic work of gay literature. Author Alison Bechdel told The Comics Journal that she considers the attempted banning a sort of honor and sees it as “part of the whole evolution of the graphic novel form.”

Haywood Comics owner Cegelis sees all this as adding up to a geek golden age. “What’s been great is that nerd culture has sort of morphed into just culture. There are so many different ways to nerd out these days,” and lots of people shop in his store who probably wouldn’t have in the past. “I feel like nerds are the new hipsters, in that they knew what was cool before it was cool. It’s a great time to be a nerd.” X

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TAKING THE PLUNGE

Retail comes to the RAD

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When you think of Asheville’s River Arts District, what comes to mind are probably things like painting, sculpture, pottery, glass blowing — you get the drift.

But as the neighborhood continues to expand and evolve, new businesses are also popping up. In the last six months, a number of retail shops have opened in the district. Xpress met with the owners of three of these newbies to discuss the challenges of developing a business while surfing the changes in a rapidly evolving area.

DEALS ON WHEELS “My story is a little weird,” says David Kopelman of Northville Apparel, which is housed in the Avion trailer parked alongside Pink Dog Creative on Depot Street. The business, which buys overstocks, overruns, samples and surplus clothing and offers them at wholesale prices, specializes in fashionable outdoor attire. Kopelman describes it as clothing you can hike in during the day and continue to wear downtown at night.

The shop opened in December, and for Kopelman, being there still feels surreal at times. The Asheville native spent his youth playing hide-and-seek in the abandoned buildings that now anchor the River Arts District. As teenagers, he and his friends would walk the railroad tracks, stacking quarters on the rails and kicking the empty beer cans that littered the ground. “If you had told me I’d being doing this then, I would have told you you’re crazy,” he says.

In 2002, Kopelman left Asheville to study finance at UNC Wilmington. He envisioned working as a stockbroker in New York City. “But I ended up getting really sick,” he explains. For six years, doctors misdiagnosed him. Some thought he suffered from depression; others tested him for diabetes. In 2009, the cause was finally discovered: Lyme disease. “My brain stopped working,” says Kopelman.

The illness led him home. And as he convalesced, Kopelman worked in e-commerce, selling clothing among other things. The online business model, however, wasn’t for him. “People think working from home is the ideal lifestyle,” he says. “But it drove me crazy.”

As his health improved, Kopelman began peddling some of his product at outdoor events like Goombay and MOUNTAINX.COM

FAMILY AND FURNITURE: Siblings Will and Charlotte Hough sit inside Sunnyside Trading Co., a family business they opened in the River Arts District in July. Photo by Lisa Wood the Mountain Sports Festival. He enjoyed his interactions with shoppers, but he didn’t want a traditional brick-and-mortar store.

Since buying the Avion last August, Kopelman has had his share of setbacks — a process he calls “paying the ‘stupid tax.’” For a first-time business owner, he maintains, the key is learning from these inevitable mistakes. Another component is recognizing and applying insights gained from other experiences. Kopelman says his e-commerce days provided an invaluable introduction to the industry; he also continues to research and develop relationships with outdoor clothing brands in order to expand and improve his niche market.

Some setbacks have been beyond his control. A week after opening, Northville Apparel suffered a break-in.

Product was stolen, and the interior was vandalized, forcing a temporary shutdown and a revamp of the trailer’s security measures.

Since July, there have been 15 burglaries in the RAD, according to statistics provided by the Asheville Police Department. “Like anything else, as the area becomes more desirable for business, it also becomes more desirable for thieves,” notes APD spokesperson Wallace Welch.

He recommends installing an alarm system, proper lighting and video surveillance, with conspicuous signage

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telling would-be thieves that these measures are in place. Beyond that, keeping inventory up-to-date (including serial numbers) is “the best way to assist police with the recovery of their product,” says Welch, adding that if serial numbers aren’t available, product photos also help.

The robbery is still under investigation. Meanwhile, Northville Apparel is also ironing out legalities with the city. At present, the shop has a temporary permit that allows it to stay at a single location for only 180 days a year. Kopelman says he’ll need an amendment to the current zoning ordinance in order to remain at Pink Dog year-round.

Nonetheless, Kopelman is optimistic about his business’s future in the district. He’s also pretty busy. “You’re looking at the janitor, the repair guy, the CEO, the sign maker, the everything,” he says. “I wear all the hats.”

ALL IN THE FAMILY At the other end of Pink Dog Creative sits Sunnyside Trading Co. The family business specializes in furniture and bohemian home décor. Siblings Charlotte and Will Hough opened the shop last July. “Since then, we’ve been teaching ourselves how to run a business,” Charlotte says.

But if they’re still learning how to operate a retail shop, the furniture business is familiar ground. In the early ’90s, their father, Stuart Hough, moved the family to France to pursue his passion as a dealer in European antiques. “We grew up running around the Paris flea market, helping clients bargain at fairs at 5 in the morning and being little translators,” remembers Charlotte.

In the early 2000s, Stuart’s interests shifted toward midcentury furnishings and bohemian textiles. Charlotte, who’d worked with her father in Colorado, relocated to Connecticut, where they ran a wholesale business.

Will remained out West. “Neither of them really enjoyed Connecticut or the wholesale business,” he says. “I kind of joked, if you move somewhere cool, let’s start a family business.”

In October 2015, Charlotte began searching for a new location in earnest. “Asheville never really crossed my mind,” she says. But she and her father visited the city on a whim, and in the window of the Asheville Market Basket, Charlotte spotted a chair she’d sold six months before at a furniture show. “It felt like a sign,” she says.

Since launching Sunnyside, the siblings have continued to sharpen their

business acumen. Besides accumulating hands-on experience, they’ve gotten help from the Asheville branch of SCORE, a national nonprofit that pairs veteran executives with budding entrepreneurs. They also participate in 1 Million Cups, a free national networking program.

At the same time, the two are acutely aware of what’s happening in the neighborhood and the need to connect. “We have a lot of intention to get involved with the community as much as possible,” says Charlotte.

Although the shop deals mainly in foreign-made items, both owners are emphatic about soliciting and featuring local work as well. Their current inventory includes locally crafted jewelry, pillows, purses and aromatherapy supplies, and they’re always on the lookout for ceramics, candles and soaps. The River Arts District, Charlotte notes, “is gentrifying quickly, and we know that we’re part of that.”

CREATING COHESIVENESS Farther down Depot Street, in the former Glen Rock Hotel, is the Eco Depot Marketplace. The gallery, which

opened on Labor Day weekend, features more than 50 works by local and regional artists and crafters. Those pieces range from paintings to sculptures, furniture to candles, pottery to lamps. The unifying theme is environmental consciousness, whether it’s expressed through materials, techniques or subject matter.

“It helps create a cohesiveness,” notes owner Shelley Schenker, who’s also an artist. And when people come in, she says, “They want to find a reason to buy something, because it’s such a great concept.”

Still, the idea didn’t come from some grand plan. Originally, says Schenker, she leased the space intending to turn it into studios for herself and four other artists. Pretty quickly, though, “We realized it was going to take a lot more people to make this work, to be able to pay the bills. So the business model morphed. … The universe said, ‘You may make your plans, but I am going to laugh at you and show you the direction you really need to take.’”

Although the gallery has only been around for a few months, Schenker has been in the RAD since 2008, in a space in Warehouse Studios; she’s had a frontrow seat for watching the district evolve.

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And because the building Eco Depot is in is among the more recently renovated spaces, she says, many residents are only now discovering it. “It got to the point where locals didn’t even come down this street,” she says. “Or they’d come down it with blinders on, and they’d suddenly go, ‘How long have you been open?’”

Like the RAD, Schenker finds herself in transition — in her case from artist to artist/business owner. “For the next couple of years, my focus can’t be my personal art,” she explains. “That has to take a back seat … because all my creative energy is going into this space, making sure I’m trying everything I can to bring people here to see what my community of artists has to offer.”

It’s a continual learning process, she says, and like Charlotte and Will at Sunnyside, Schenker has sought business counseling through SCORE. Her advice to those who are just starting out — whether it’s in the RAD, greater Asheville or beyond — is to seek out guidance and take advantage of what their particular community has to offer.

“That has proven invaluable to me,” she says. “It’s taken me to an upper level: I’m inspired.” X

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EXOTIC TASTE: The Tree & Vine owner Terri Karlsson stands next to her shop’s extensive selection of imported oils and balsamics ready for tasting. The South Asheville store stocks many fun and unusual gift items for food lovers. Photo by Nick Wilson

BY NICK WILSON nickjames.w@gmail.com Valentine’s Day draws near, and with it comes the opportunity to express our love to those significant people in our lives. Unfortunately, for many of us, this celebration of the heart can morph into a serious case of stressing out over details.

But if your sweetie is a foodie or home chef, there are some locally owned shops that can help with outside-the-box gift ideas to make the day special.

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“Everyone’s idea of romantic is slightly different,” says The Tree & Vine owner Terri Karlsson. The store offers a wide selection of high-end olive oil, balsamic, tea, coffee, wine, gourmet foods, kitchenware and other fun gifts and accessories. Karlsson has run the business, which includes locations in Gerber Village and Knoxville, Tenn., alongside her husband, Paul, for about six years.

“Somebody may prefer to grill a filet for Valentine’s Day, and we have all kinds of stuff for that ... spice blends, barbecue sauces, everything for the

griller. But really, we have everything for the wine or spirit connoisseur and everything for the foodie,” says Karlsson.

For those looking to double down on traditional V-day themes in a nontraditional way, The Tree and Vine offers a collection of heart-shaped items, including olive oil dishes, ice cube molds that can be used for cocktails, homemade chocolates or shooters, and cake pans from Nordic Ware, “so you can make your own bakery-quality Valentine’s cake with very little effort,” says Karlsson.

Other ideas she offers include sourwood honey from Black Mountain, treats from Chapel Hill Toffee, a Valentine’s Day red ceramic French coffee press paired with a bag of coffee from Black Mountain’s Dynamite Roasting Co. and gourmet chocolate-covered peanuts from Hubs in Virginia. She also recommends including a bottle of Spanish Cava wine that she says is a bargain at $13.99.

“Cava is so amazing,” says Karlsson. “It’s made exactly the same way as Champagne, except it’s made in northern Spain, in the Catalonia region surrounding Barcelona. ... I find myself shipping it to people all over the country who have difficulty getting it where they are.”

Michael Liss has been running Common Housefly, a Black Mountain indie shop that bills itself as a “Toy Store for Foodies,” for nearly a dozen years. “If your valentine is at all into food or drinks, then we’re your spot,” he says. “The store is like a big treasure hunt. There are probably about 1,800-2,000 things that people haven’t seen before — ingredients, tools, gadgets, things people freak out over.”

Liss recommends visiting the shop to check everything out, but he offers a few ideas to get started. “It’s not necessarily a traditional Valentine’s thing,” says Liss, “but we have these beautiful handblown glass pitchers from West Virginia. It’s actually still the oldest handblown-glass company in the U.S., called Blenko, which is a family name.”

He also suggests Theros extra virgin olive oil, which has a unique local connection. “The Theros family live here in Asheville, but they own an olive orchard in Greece,” Liss explains. “They only bottle what’s from their own farm. And when it’s gone, it’s gone. It’s amazing stuff.”

Liss also raves about a product line from East Asheville resident Karen Paly, who owns Karen’s Spice Kitchen. Paly’s company offers a line of gluten-free, natural

and preservative-free spice blends for use in making exotic, restaurantstyle meals in less time at home.

Paly, who’s originally from South Africa, says, “It’s a very, very easy way to make one of these dishes that would be otherwise intimidating. ...

You’d have to go out and buy 10 to 12 different spices. You have to know how much to put in; most people are just really intimidated by it. I figured this way would make it easy for people.”

Karen’s Spice Kitchen products come in 13 flavors and are available in 23 stores in the area, including Common Housefly. “It’s a a great idea if you want to cook your sweetheart a meal,” says Liss.

Another option for a romantic evening at home is to swing by The Rhu in Asheville. “We’re promoting an awesome wine and cheese basket,” says Ellie Wigodsky, assistant general manager and director of marketing at The Rhu and Rhubarb.

“They include wine, laminated baguettes and a selection of cheeses.

We’re also doing some individual chocolate tarts. It’s a great package to pick up if you don’t want to go out for Valentine’s Day and just want to have a special night with wine and cheese at home.”

In addition to other interesting retail and gift options for the baker or cocktail lover, Wigodsky notes that the store is also offering packages of macaroons with aphrodisiac flavors. And staff are available to help customers assemble custom gift baskets at the store.

Karen VanderElzen runs The Shop Around the Corner, an independent store in Weaverville with a flair for French country meets cottage shabby chic. She recommends giving regionally produced gourmet foods as Valentine’s Day gifts. “Two of the coolest things we have that are totally local and exclusive to our shop are gourmet marshmallows and candied, sugared pecans from the [Weaverville-based] Blue Eyed Baker and the Hazel Eyed Taster,” she says. Some of the more popular marshmallow flavors include maplebacon, lemon meringue, chocolate raspberry, Key lime pie and toasted coconut. “They’re out of this world,” says VanderElzen.

Tea lovers can also be accommodated with an unusual item from The Shop Around the Corner. “We actually have Downton Abbey tea, which is kind of cool,” says VanderElzen, referring to the British television drama. “That’s from the Republic of Tea, and we’ve done real well with that.” X

DELIGHT YOUR VALENTINE! 5 Elements Custom Organic Facial & Spa Pedicure $145

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Downtown: 59 Haywood St. 828.253.3222 South: Hilton Asheville - Biltmore Park 828.687.8760

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27

MANNEQUINS’ BEST FRIEND Scout Boutique owner Dema Badr retraces her footsteps in local fashion

SHELF LOVE: A relatively new addition to Biltmore Village, Scout Boutique clothing store will host a Valentine’s Day trunk show on Thursday, Feb. 9, from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., with lingerie, candles, cosmetics and more. “I don’t really care about Valentine’s Day,” says shop owner Dema Badr, “but I do love lingerie and cosmetics.” Photo by Emma Grace Moon

BY KAT MCREYNOLDS kmcreynolds@mountainx.com It’s been years since Dema Badr was employed by her parents at Asheville Discount Pharmacy, but the more colorful interactions there still stand out. There were the tourists seeking relief from terrible blisters.

Or travelers realizing they’d forgotten important prescriptions at home.

“None of the problems were fun and exciting,” Badr says, but the emotionally taxing moments were offset by an effective approach to human resources. Some employees had been with the company for more than a decade.

“My parents made a small business feel like a family business, even to the people who weren’t family,” she says, recalling her mother packing

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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lunches for employees and her father teaching business skills to those with an interest. “I didn’t realize — until I was older and had worked at other places — that that was rare.”

While Badr says valuing employees and relationships was the greatest entrepreneurial lesson she took from her parents, a later decision to shut down her first solo venture, Zakya — a high-end boutique that operated on Haywood Street from 2006-08 — was the toughest source of growth. “It was a huge emotional and also monetary investment,” she says. “But in hindsight, it was a great thing, because it made me go off and try different things and learn a whole new skill set.”

Badr got her first corporate job at Anthropologie and later spent five years in China working at a manufacturing position with Coach

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International. The decision to return home (by way of New York) came after her two sisters opted to do the same — one to take over the pharmacy and the other to work at the law firm of Ward and Smith, P.A. Surveying Asheville’s fashion scene in late 2015, Badr saw room for another specialty shop. “I grew up and had spent so much time downtown,” she says. “I was like, ‘Maybe the challenge will be to not do it downtown and to figure out a new neighborhood.’” By February 2016, she had found a location in Biltmore Village, and her second shop, Scout Boutique, opened in April.

From its post between Fig Bistro and WINK salon, the store offers what she calls an approachable selection of women’s apparel, accessories and art. “In my first store, I feel

like a lot of things were unique to Asheville, but they also needed a unique place to wear them,” Badr says. “A majority of the selection in this store is buy-now-wear-now. You don’t have to wait for an occasion.”

Badr’s personal style, which informs her picks for the store, tends toward well-made pieces with a feminine edge. “They don’t have to be girly, flouncy dresses, but I like femininity to be expressed,” she say.

“Because why not? We can.”

Buying from local designers, she adds even more variety to that theme.

For instance, Rachel Weisberg brings hand-dyed, bohemian pieces to the mix, while Angela Kim makes more polished garments.

If curating products is the easy part of running the shop, making time to do everything else is what presents the challenge. Plus, Badr launched a “nonline” matchmaking service called Modern Blackbook in October, and it’s been growing faster than anticipated. “You have to stay on top of all these little things,” she says, admitting that social media was an acquired taste. “I’m like, ‘Oh my God, I haven’t updated Instagram in three days. Come here, mannequin!’”

One matter that’s not worrying Badr, however, is the presence of chain stores in Asheville. Not only do they draw customers to neighboring businesses and nudge Asheville toward shopping destination status, she reasons, but corporate stores also tend to keep doors open and lights on later, making some areas feel safer for retailers and customers. Finally, she says, chains can inspire small businesses to keep up with attractive merchandising and other standards. “It should always be a mix,” she says, noting the role of landlords and developers in keeping the balance. “They’re basically inviting a chain to come in when they set the rent at 10 grand, or spend so much money upfitting a place that that’s all they can do.”

Since Badr sees room for big and small to coexist, she’s focusing on upping her own contributions to Asheville’s fashion scene. In the short term, she aims to build more of a following among locals, and, eventually, she hopes to put her manufacturing skills back into play.

“I’d love to see a product that is Scoutbranded be born in this store,” she says, “and then take on a life of its own.”

Learn more at scoutboutiqueasheville. com X

Are you hosting a kids camp this summer?

Wild Mountain Bees Monday - Saturday 10 AM - 5:30 PM YOUR LOCAL SOURCE FOR:

*Complete Beekeeping Supplies *Local Honey *Gifts *Classes *Bees, Nucs, Queens 828-484-9466 23 Merrimon Ave Weaverville, NC 28787 www.wildmountainbees.com

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Would you like to be listed in our camp directory?

Please contact Dan Hesse at dhesse@mountainxcom

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COMMUNITY CALENDAR FEBRUARY 8 - 16, 2017

CALENDAR GUIDELINES

Saturdays 11:45am Beginning Aerial Arts Classes happen weekly on Sundays 4:15pm, Mondays 5:15pm, Tuesdays 11:00am and 6:30pm, Wednesdays 4:15pm, Thursdays 5:00pm and 6:30pm, Fridays at 6:00pm, Saturdays at 1:00pm and 2:30pm. More information at Empyreanarts.org or call/ text 828.782.3321.

For a full list of community calendar guidelines, please visit mountainx.com/calendar. For questions about free listings, call 251-1333, ext.

137. For questions about paid calendar listings, please call 251-1333, ext. 320.

SEX AND INTIMACY (PD.) Loving Through Conflict. Saturday, February 11, 10 am-5pm at Earthaven Ecovillage.

Explore practical, embodied techniques with Steve Torma and Michelle Dionne and learn to remain centered and loving while in the fires of conflict. Couples and singles welcome. $105 for the day. www.culturesedge.net

ANIMALS TRANSYLVANIA COUNTY LIBRARY 212 S. Gaston St., Brevard, 884-3151 • TH (2/9) & TH (2/16), 6:30pm - "Wildlife of Transylvania County," presentation by the Friends of DuPont Forest. Free.

BENEFITS ASHEVILLE MARDI GRAS EVENTS 335-3986, ashevillemardigras.org • SA (2/11), 8pm - Proceeds from "The King's Thing," costumed electronic music party, benefit the Asheville Mardi Gras royal float. $10. Held at The Summit at New Mountain AVL, 38 N French Broad Ave., Asheville CANTARIA: THE GAY MEN'S CHORUS OF ASHEVILLE 4049645420, cantariaasheville.org • SA (2/11), 6:30pm - Proceeds from this four-course dinner, silent auction and performances by Cantaria benefit Cantaria-The Gay Men's Chorus of Asheville. $40. Held at Renaissance Asheville Hotel, 31 Woodfin St. CELEBRATION SINGERS OF ASHEVILLE 230-5778, singasheville.org • Through MO (2/13) - Proceeds from purchasing a singing telegram Valentine's Day delivery featuring chocolate, roses and the Celebration Singers of Asheville benefit the Celebration Singers of Asheville.

Registration: 424-1463 or charmsfloral.com. $40-$200.

DRAG QUEEN BINGO & TRIVIA WITH THE QUEENS dragqueens.bwar.org • FR (2/10), 8pm - Proceeds from "Drag Queen Bingo," with New York City drag queen Lady Bunny, benefit Brother Wolf Animal Rescue. $45/$100 VIP. Held at US Cellular Center, 87 Haywood St. • SA (2/11), 8pm - Proceeds from “Trivia with the Queens,” with New York City drag queen Lady Bunny, benefit Brother Wolf Animal Rescue. $45/$100 VIP. Held at US Cellular Center, 87 Haywood St. • FR (2/10) & SA (2/11), 10pm - Proceeds from the "Drag Queen Bingo & Trivia with the Queens After Party," with Lady Bunny as DJ, benefit Brother Wolf Animal Rescue. $20. Held at O.Henry's/The Underground, 237 Haywood St.

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PORTRAITS OF PERSECUTION: UNC Asheville will host the North Carolina debut of the traveling historical exhibitions, Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933-1945, produced by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and Pioneering Voices: Portraits of Transgender People, created by the Family Diversity Project. Both exhibitions will be on view from Sunday, Feb. 12, until Friday, April 7, and are free for the public. In addition, UNCA is hosting lectures, film screenings and discussions to complement the exhibition, including a keynote lecture at 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 16, in the Humanities Lecture Hall by Erik Jensen, Miami University associate professor of European history and a specialist in the history of Germany and of gender and sexuality. For more information visit goo.gl/q7gcWQ. This photo, from the Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933-1945 exhibition, shows German police filing a photo of a man arrested in October 1937 for suspicion of violating Paragraph 175, which criminalized homosexual conduct. Photo from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Landesarchiv, Berlin (p. 33) FOLKMOOT USA 452-2997, folkmootusa.org • TH (2/9), 6pm - Proceeds from this live music event with wine and food benefit Folkmoot's fundraiser for curtains in the Sam Love Queen Auditorium. $60.

Held at Classic Wineseller, 20 Church St., Waynesville MADISON HAS HEART FANCIFUL FLEA • SA (2/11), 10am-4pm - Proceeds from this community bazaar with upscale treasures, antiques, vintage items, art, live music and food benefit crisis heating assistance for the community. Free to attend. Held at Marshall High Studios, 115 Blanahassett Island Marshall ORGANIC GROWERS SCHOOL 552-4979, organicgrowersschool.org • SU (2/12), 3:30-8:30pm - Proceeds from this farm tour, workshop, farm-to-table dinner and dancing, with live music by Cailen Campbell and the Pond Brothers, benefit the Organic Growers School. $75-$125.

Held at Event Barn at Yesterday Spaces, 305 Sluder Branch Road, Leicester OUR VOICE 252-0562, ourvoicenc.org/trauma-education-series • TH (2/16), 5:30pm - Proceeds from this dialogue on human trafficking in WNC with wine and chocolate benefit Our Voice. $10.

Held at Metro Wines, 169 Charlotte St. QUEER ORIENTED RADICAL DAYS OF SUMMER qords.org, qordsinfo@gmail.com • FR (2/10), 8pm - Proceeds from this all-ages musical event and family-friendly drag show and silent auction benefit

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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benefit QORDS. $5-$15. Held at Toy Boat Community Art Space, 101 Fairview Road, Suite B STEPHENS LEE RECREATION CENTER 30 George Washington Carver Ave. • SA (2/11), 7-10pm - Proceeds raised at this supper, silent auction and live music event, featuring Jonathan Santos and The Soul Evolution and Leeda Lyric Jones, benefit the YTL GRACE for Teens Summer Program. $45/$85 couples.

BUSINESS & TECHNOLOGY A-B TECH SMALL BUSINESS CENTER 398-7950, abtech.edu/sbc • WE (2/8), 10am-noon - "Starting a Better Business," workshop. Registration required.

Free. Held at A-B Tech Enka Campus, 1459 Sand Hill Road, Candler • TH (2/9), 5:30-8:30pm - "How to Start a Non-Profit Entity," workshop. Registration required. Free. Held at A-B Tech Enka Campus, 1459 Sand Hill Road, Candler • SA (2/11), 9am-noon - "SCORE: How Entrepreneurs Can Overcome Barriers to Success," Seminar. Registration required: ashevillescore.org. Free. Held at A-B Tech Enka Campus, 1459 Sand Hill Road, Candler • WE (2/15), 1-4pm - "The New Option for Local Financing in NC," seminar. Registration required. Free. Held at A-B Tech Enka Campus, 1459 Sand Hill Road, Candler • TH (2/16), 6-9pm - "QuickBooks Online for Natural Products Businesses," seminar.

Registration required. Free. Held at A-B Tech Enka Campus, 1459 Sand Hill Road, Candler

G&W INVESTMENT CLUB klcount@aol.com • 3rd WEDNESDAYS, 11:45am - General meeting. Free to attend. Held at Black Forest Restaurant, 2155 Hendersonville Road, Arden SMOKY PARK SUPPER CLUB 350 Riverside Drive, 350-0315, smokypark.com/ • MO (2/13), 5:30-7:30pm - Gathering of Asheville business community with presentations by local business organizers.

Registration required. Free.

WOMANUP goo.gl/oQ8uXV • TU (2/14), 8-9:30am - Panel discussion featuring local successful businesswomen regarding their business success. $10. Held at Diana Wortham Theatre, 2 S. Pack Square

CLASSES, MEETINGS & EVENTS A NEW ERA IS DAWNING (PD.) Hope in a Time of Chaos - a Spiritual Perspective. The World Teacher, Maitreya, is in the world. His galvanizing energy is inspiring people to stand up for justice and equality...to see that we are one human family. Find out the role you can play in the coming time. Saturday, February 18 - Asheville Friends Meeting. 227 Edgewood Rd. 2pm.

Free. 828-398-0609.

POLE DANCE + AERIAL ARTS CLASSES AT EMPYREAN ARTS (PD.) Beginning Pole Classes happen weekly on Sundays 5:45pm, Wednesdays 5:30pm, Thursdays 11:00am, Fridays 7:15pm, and

AMERICAN ADVERTISING FEDERATION ASHEVILLE 658-0281, aafasheville.org • TH (2/16), 6:30pm - "American Advertising Awards," honoring WNC creative talent. $30/$25 members. Held at US Cellular Center, 87 Haywood St. ASHEVILLE CHESS CLUB 779-0319, vincentvanjoe@gmail.com • WEDNESDAYS, 6:30pm - Sets provided. All ages and skill levels welcome.

Beginners lessons available. Free. Held at North Asheville Recreation Center, 37 E. Larchmont Road ASHEVILLE NEWCOMERS CLUB ashevillenewcomersclub.com • 2nd MONDAYS, 9:30am - Monthly meeting for women new to Asheville. Register for location: ashevillenewcomers@gmail.com.

Free to attend.

ASHEVILLE TOASTMASTERS CLUB 914-424-7347, ashevilletoastmasters.com • THURSDAYS, 6:15pm - General meeting.

Free. Held at YMI Cultural Center, 39 South Market St. BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/depts/library • FR (2/10), 3-4:30pm - Get to Know Asheville Series: “French Broad Chocolate Lounge,” presentation to get to know more about this local business. Free. Held in Pack Memorial Library Lord Auditorium, 67 Haywood St. GIRLS ON THE RUN 713-3132, gotrwnc.org • SA (2/11), 9am-1:30pm - Coaches training, for women over 21. Free. Held at United Way of Asheville & Buncombe, 50 S. French Broad Ave. HOMINY VALLEY RECREATION PARK 25 Twin Lakes Drive, Candler, 242-8998, hvrpsports.com • 3rd THURSDAYS, 7pm - Hominy Valley board meeting. Free.

LEICESTER COMMUNITY CENTER 2979 New Leicester Highway, Leicester, 774-3000, facebook.com/Leicester.Community.Center • 2nd TUESDAYS, 7pm - Public board meeting. Free.

• 3rd THURSDAYS, 7pm - The Leicester History Gathering general meeting. Free.

ONTRACK WNC 50 S. French Broad Ave., 255-5166, ontrackwnc.org • WE (2/8), noon-1:30pm or MO (2/13), 5:30-7pm- "Budgeting and Debt Class."

Registration required. Free.

• SA (2/11), 9am-12:30pm - "Manage Your Money Series," workshop. Free.

• TU (2/14), 5:30-7pm - "Understanding Credit. Get it. Keep it. Improve it," workshop. Free.

• TH (2/16), 5:30-7pm - "Understanding Reverse Mortgages," class. Registration required. Free.

TARHEEL PIECEMAKERS QUILT CLUB tarheelpiecemakers.wordpress.com/ • WE (2/8), 9:30am - Pot-luck meeting.

Free. Held at Balfour United Methodist Church, 2567 Asheville Highway Hendersonville TRANSITION ASHEVILLE 296-0064, transitionasheville.org • MO (2/13), 6:30-8pm - "Working within communities to achieve change: Lessons learned the hard way about diffusing sustainability," presentation by Dr. Annie Pearce. Free. Held at St. Mary's Episcopal Church, 337 Charlotte St. VETERANS FOR PEACE 582-5180, vfpchapter099wnc.blogspot.com/ • 2nd TUESDAYS, 6:30-8:30pm - General meeting. Free to attend. Held at Firestorm Cafe and Books, 610 Haywood Road WNC KNITTERS AND CROCHETERS FOR OTHERS 575-9195 • MO (2/13), 7pm - General meeting for those interested in knitting for those in need. Free. Held at New Hope Presbyterian Church, 3070 Sweeten Creek Road

DANCE POLE FITNESS AND DANCE CLASSES AT DANCECLUB ASHEVILLE (PD.) Pole Dance, Burlesque, Jazz/Funk, Flashmobs! Drop in for a class or sign up for a series:• 6 Week Burlesque Series - Begins Jan. 24• 4 Week Beginner Jazz/ Funk to Bruno Mars - Begins Jan. 26• 6 Week Intro to Pole - Begins Jan. 26• Tues., Thurs. and Fri. at 12PM - Pole class for $10• Memberships available for $108/ month• 1st class free with the mention of this ad DanceclubAsheville.com 828275-8628 Right down the street from UNCA - 9 Old Burnsville Hill Rd., #3 STUDIO ZAHIYA, DOWNTOWN DANCE CLASSES (PD.) Monday 12pm Barre Wkt 4pm Ballet Wkt 5pm Bellydance Drills 6pm Hip Hop Wkt 7pm Classical Ballet Series 8pm Bellydance with Veils Series • Tuesday 9am Hip Hop Wkt 6pm Intro to Bellydance 7pm Bellydance 2 8pm Advanced Bellydance • Wednesday 12pm 80/90s Hip Hop Wkt 5pm Hip Hop Wkt 5pm Bollywood 6pm Bhangra Series 7pm Hula 8pm Lyrical Series • Thursday 9am Hip Hop Wkt 4pm Girls

Hip Hop 5pm Teens Hip Hop 6pm West African Drumming 7pm West African • Friday 9am Hip Hop Wkt 4:30pm Kids Jazz • Saturday 9:30am Hip Hop Wkt 10:45 Buti Yoga Wkt • Sunday 4:30pm Dance party 6:45pm Electronic Yoga Wkt • $13 for 60 minute classes, Wkt $6. 90 1/2 N. Lexington Avenue. www.studiozahiya.com :: 828.242.7595 ASHEVILLE MOVEMENT COLLECTIVE ashevillemovementcollective.org • FRIDAYS, 7-9pm - Community ecstatic dance wave. $8-$20. Held at Terpsicorps Studios, 1501 Patton Ave. • SUNDAYS, 8:30-10:30am & 10:30am12:30pm - Community ecstatic dance wave. $8-$20. Held at Asheville Masonic Temple, 80 Broadway CAMILLE A. BROWN AND DANCERS • TH (2/16), 4pm - Camille A. Brown and Dancers, community workshop celebrating African-American social dance. Free.

Held at the Arthur R. Edington Education and Career Center, 133 Livingston St. • TH (2/16) & FR (2/17), 7pm - Preperformance discussion regarding Camille A. Brown and Dancers led by poet, artist and community activist DeWayne Barton.

Free to attend. Held at The Block Off Biltmore, 39 South Market St. SWING ASHEVILLE swingasheville.com • TUESDAYS, 8-11pm - Jazz N' Justice: Beginner swing lessons at 8pm. Open swing dance with live jazz at 9pm. $10 beginner lesson/$5 open dance. Held at The BLOCK off biltmore, 39 South Market St.

ECO 24TH ANNUAL SPRING CONFERENCE (PD.) March 10-12, 2017. Keynotes: Gabe Brown & Matthew and Althea Raiford.

UNCA. 140+ practical, affordable, regionally-appropriate sessions on organic growing, homesteading, farming. Trade show, seed exchange, kid’s program.

Organicgrowersschool.org.

ASHEVILLE GREEN DRINKS ashevillegreendrinks.com • 3rd WEDNESDAYS, 7pm - Ecopresentations, discussions and community connection. Free. Held at Lenoir Rhyne Center for Graduate Studies, 36 Montford Ave. BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/depts/ library • TH (2/9), 2pm - Economics & Environmentalism Book Club: The Vandana Shiva Reader by Vandana Shiva.

Free. Held at Pack Memorial Library, 67 Haywood St. DOGWOOD ALLIANCE 251-2525, dogwoodalliance.org • TH (2/9), 5:30-8pm - "Beyond Logging: The Future of Our Forests," panel discussion featuring Jim Furnish, former deputy Chief of the US Forest Service. Free. Held

at The Collider, 1 Haywood St., Suite 401 FRIENDS OF THE SMOKIES 452-0720, friendsofthesmokies.org, outreach.nc@friendsofthesmokies.org • TH (2/16), 7pm - "Salamanders and Storms: Climate Change in the Smokies," presentation. Free to attend. Held at Blue Ghost Brewing Company, 125 Underwood Road. Fletcher PUBLIC LECTURES AT UNCA unca.edu • WE (2/8), 4:30pm - “Climate Resilience in Asheville, NC—Moving from ‘Did you know?’ to ‘What can we do about it?’,” presentation by Jim Fox, director of UNC Asheville’s NEMAC. Free. Held in the Reuter Center RIVERLINK 252-8474, riverlink.org • TH (2/16), 11:45am-2:30pm - Riverfront bus tour. Registration required. $20.

FARM & GARDEN BUNCOMBE COUNTY EXTENSION MASTER GARDENERS 255-5522, buncombemastergardener.org, BuncombeMasterGardeners@gmail.com • TH (2/16), 11:30am-1pm - "Healthy Soil for Healthy Plants," workshop with master gardener Mary Hugenschmidt. Bring your own lunch. Registration required: 255-5522. Free. Held at Buncombe County Cooperative Extension Office, 49 Mount Carmel Road, Asheville HAYWOOD COUNTY MASTER GARDENERS 456-3575, sarah_scott@ncsu.edu • Through FR (3/17) - Plant sale. Order forms available by calling 828-456-3575 or by email at mgarticles@charter.net.

MEN'S GARDEN CLUB OF ASHEVILLE 683-1673, mensgardenclubofasheville.org • Through FR (3/17) - Open registration for a container garden contest for Buncombe County Kindergarten through fifth grade classes. Registration details: heidelad@yahoo.com. Free.

POLK COUNTY FRIENDS OF AGRICULTURE BREAKFAST polkcountyfarms.org • 3rd WEDNESDAYS, 7-8am - Monthly breakfast with presentations regarding agriculture. Admission by donation. Held at the 4-H Center, Locust St, Columbus

FOOD & BEER FARM-TO-TABLE DINNER WITH CHEF JOHN FLEER (PD.) SUN. FEB. 12TH 3:30-8:30PM, hosted

by Organic Growers School. Celebrate Valentine's Day. Dancing with Cailen Campbell. Workshop with Meredith Leigh. Artisan Menu. Gather in Community. http://organicgrowersschool. org/events/farm-to-table-dinner/register/ CALDWELL CUSINE 726-2478, kandreasen@cccti.edu • TH (2/9), 6pm - Culinary Arts student

Scandinavian themed meal. Registration required. $21. Held at J.E. Broyhill Civic Center, 1913 Hickory Blvd., SE Lenior FAIRVIEW WELCOME TABLE fairviewwelcometable.com • THURSDAYS, 11:30am-1pm Community lunch. Admission by donation. Held at Fairview Christian Fellowship, 596 Old Us Highway 74 Fairview LEICESTER COMMUNITY CENTER 2979 New Leicester Highway, Leicester, 774-3000, facebook.com/Leicester.Community.

Center • WEDNESDAYS, 11:30am-1pm Welcome Table meal. Free.

FESTIVALS WALKABLE WALL STREET dfrankel@ashevillenc.gov • SA (2/11), 4-9pm - Wall street is closed to cars for a festive pedestrian experience with luminaries. Free to attend. Held along Wall St., Asheville

GOVERNMENT & POLITICS BEEN TOWED? FRUSTRATED? UNHAPPY WITH LOCAL GOVERNEMENT STUFF? (PD.) ASHEVILLE CITY WATCHWe want to hear from Asheville Citizens. Call 828-2159880. KEEP ASHEVILLE WEIRD!!

YOUNG DEMOCRATS OF HENDERSON AND TRANSYLVANIA COUNTIES myhcdp.com • WE (2/8), 6pm - Public interest meeting. Held at the Etowah Smokehouse, 6577 Brevard Road, Etowah

Special Offer *

6 Classes for $33

KIDS ASHEVILLE ART MUSEUM 2 N. Pack Square, 253-3227 • 2nd TUESDAYS, 11am-12:30pm Homeschool program for grades 1-4.

Registration required: 253-3227 ext. 124. $4 per student.

ASHEVILLE MUSEUM OF SCIENCE 43 Patton Ave., 254-7162, colburnmuseum.org • 2nd & 4th FRIDAYS, 9-9:45am - "Little Explorers Club," guided activities and free play for preschoolers. $3.50 per child/Free for caregivers.

BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/depts/ library • Through WE (2/8) - Submissions accepted for the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival. See website for guidelines: 90secondnewbery.com/.

• 2nd WEDNESDAYS, 4-5pm - "After School Art Adventures," guided art making for school age children with the Asheville Art Museum. Free. Held

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Downtown Asheville 62 Wall Street violetowlwellness.com 828.785.3041 *Classes Must Be Used in Two Weeks Time.

Purchase before 3/31/17.

One Per Customer.

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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C O N S C I O U S PA R T Y

By Kat McReynolds | kmcreynolds@mountainx.com

Female Artist Spotlight Night

Downtown Asheville’s University 36 Montford Avenue, Downtown Asheville Call Us Today! (828) 407-4263

We our

advertisers!

Thank you for supporting local, independent journalism!

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

MIXED FEELINGS: “I tangle myself up in the writing process,” says local musician Aileen Pearlman, “and the songs that come out tend to err on the side of the supernatural and spiritual as well as [containing] heartache and sadness — with, of course, a laugh or two in between.” Photo by Peggy Ratusz WHAT: A monthly, female-fronted music showcase WHERE: The BLOCK Off Biltmore WHEN: Wednesday, Feb. 15, at 7 p.m.

WHY: Four decades of experience as a singer/songwriter, along with personal research, have shaped Peggy Ratusz’s understanding of gender issues in the music industry: “There’s still a fairly big margin between how many female-fronted or female solo acts are picked [to play at] local bars all the way to big festivals,” she says, noting the greater frequency of male bookings. “But I see it improving all the time, I really do.”

Ratusz has taken steps to expedite that progress. From 2010-12, for instance, she hosted a Female Artist Spotlight Night at Tressa’s Downtown Jazz & Blues, and in recent months, she’s partnered with The BLOCK Off Biltmore owner Cam MacQueen to reinstate the series.

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The first iteration, which takes place Wednesday, Feb. 15, will feature three acts: fiddler, guitarist and vocalist Kare Strong; vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Lucy Ray, who will perform with backing guitarist Randal Gary; and headlining singer/ songwriter Aileen “Big Al” Pearlman.

Collectively, the three performances will bring old-time, folk, Irish and pop influences to the stage, and Ratusz aims to book equally diverse soloists and groups (up to quartets) for each future show. The ideal lineup, she says, highlights females who are passionate, emotive and confident.

Since the venue and audio equipment are being donated (with Ratusz running sound), 100 percent of the door will go to performers. And MacQueen is giving 10 percent of bar sales at each monthly showcase to a nonprofit — alternating between Girls on the Run and Girls Rock Asheville,

beginning with the former. As artists and attendees envision new ways to personalize and build on the series, its format and details may evolve.

To rally further support, Ratusz has also launched a quarterly Western North Carolina Female Musician’s Soiree, which includes an open mic, jam session and “schmoozing.” The inaugural gathering in January drew 20 performers and 50 additional spectators. “It was really and truly amazing the range of ages and styles represented,” she says. “The audience ate up every single performer, and a few of them elicited standing ovations.”

Visit theblockoffbiltmore.com for more information on the Female Artist Spotlight Night, which costs $3 at the door. The next WNC Female Musician’s Soiree has yet to be scheduled. X

C OMMU N IT Y CA L E N D AR

at Leicester Library, 1561 Alexander Road, Leicester • MONDAYS, 10:30am - "Mother Goose Time," storytime for 4-18 month olds. Free. Held at Skyland/ South Buncombe Library, 260 Overlook Road • TU (2/14), 4pm - “Reading with J.R. the Reading Therapy Dog.” Registration required. Free. Held at the Swannanoa Library, 101 West Charleston St. • WE (2/15), 10:30am-noon - “Preschool Storytime & Valentine’s Tea Party,” costumed party. Free. Held at LeicesterLibrary, 1561 Alexander Road • WE (2/15), 3:30pm - Movers and Shakers: “We Love Shrinky Dinks,” crafts for ages 5 and up.

Free. Held at Pack Memorial Library, 67 Haywood St. FLETCHER LIBRARY 120 Library Road, Fletcher, 687-1218, library.hendersoncountync.org • WEDNESDAYS, 10:30am Family story time. Free.

LAKE JAMES STATE PARK 6883 N.C. Highway 126 Nebo, 584-7728 • SA (2/11), 10am - "Predators of Lake James," indoor rangerled activity for kids. Free. Meet in the Catawba River area basement classroom.

MALAPROP'S BOOKSTORE AND CAFE 55 Haywood St., 254-6734, malaprops.com • WEDNESDAYS, 10am - Miss Malaprop's Story Time for ages 3-9. Free to attend.

• SA (2/11), 11am - Acree Macam and illustrator Natalie Nelson present the children's picture book, The King of the Birds. Free to attend.

RIVERLINK 252-8474, riverlink.org • Through MO (3/20) Submissions accepted for the annual Voices of the River Art and Poetry Contest for pre-K to 12th grade students. Contact for full guidelines.

SPELLBOUND CHILDREN'S BOOKSHOP 640 Merrimon Ave., #204, 708-7570, spellboundchildrensbookshop. com • SATURDAYS, 11am - Storytime for ages 3-7. Free to attend.

WNC HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION wnchistory.org • SA (2/11), 2pm - "Victorian Tea Party," for girls ages seven and up. Includes a program, high tea and a craft activity. Registration required: 253-9231. $18. Held

by Abigail Griffin

at Smith-McDowell House Museum, 283 Victoria Road WNC NATURE CENTER 75 Gashes Creek Road, 2985600, wildwnc.org • SA (2/11), 11am-3pm - "Critter Check-Up," event for children to bring their stuffed animals for a check up by staff veterinarians.

Admission rates apply.

OUTDOORS LAKE JAMES STATE PARK 6883 N.C. Highway 126 Nebo, 584-7728 • FR (2/10), 10am - "Walk Like a Duck," ranger-led hike to along the Paddy Creek Trail to observe waterfowl. Free.

PISGAH ASTRONOMICAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE 1 PARI Drive, Rosman, 862-5554, pari.edu • FR (2/10), 7pm - "Messier Objects," presentation, campus tour and night sky viewing.

Registration required. $20/$15 seniors and students.

• FR (2/17) & SA (2/18), 6-8pm - “Stargazing Nights,” night sky viewing. Registration required. $15 PISGAH CHAPTER OF TROUT UNLIMITED pisgahchaptertu.org/NewMeeting-information.html • 2nd THURSDAYS, 7pm General meeting and presentations. Free to attend. Held at Ecusta Brewery, 36 E Main St., Brevard THE WILDERNESS SOCIETY wilderness.org • FR (2/10), 10am-5pm - Winter tree identification workshop and moderately easy three mile hike in the Craggy Mountain Wilderness near Barnardsville.

Registration required: michelle_ ruigrok@tws.org. Free. Held at Big Ivy Community Center, 540 Dillingham Road, Barnardsville

PARENTING ASHEVILLE AIRPORT Terminal Drive, Fletcher • Through SA (2/11) - Open registration for the "Wings for Autism" familiarization program for people with autism spectrum disorders and their caregivers.

The event gives participants a realistic air travel experience in a safe, controlled environment.

Registration: flyavl.com/wings.

FLETCHER FATHERDAUGHTER DANCE fletcherparks.org/2016father-daughter-dance/

• SA (2/11), 3:30pm & 6:30pm Fletcher Father-Daughter Dance. $16/$6 daughter/$18 nonresident/$8 non-resident daughter. Held at Calvary Episcopal Church, 2840 Hendersonville Road, Fletcher JUBILEE COMMUNITY CHURCH 46 Wall St., 252-5335, jubileecommunity.org • SA (2/11), 5:30-7:30pm "Parent's Night Out," drop-off event for children ages 3-10.

Free.

RAINBOW COMMUNITY SCHOOL 574 Haywood Road, 258-9264 • WE (2/15), - Open house for grades K-8. Free to attend.

• WE (2/15), 4-6pm - Open house for prospective elementary and middle school students.

Free to attend.

SWANNANOA VALLEY MONTESSORI SCHOOL 130 Center Ave., Black Mountain, 669-8571, swanmont.org • 3rd THURSDAYS through (5/18), 9:30am - School tour.

Registration required. Free to attend.

PUBLIC LECTURES ASHEVILLE SCIENCE TAVERN 404-272-4526, sciencecandance@gmail.com • SA (2/11), 6-8pm - "Dark Skies Sparkle More," astronomer Stephan Martin talks about light pollution. Bring your own refreshments. Free. Held at WCQS, 73 Broadway BEVERLY HILLS BAPTIST CHURCH 777 Tunnel Road • TH (2/16), 7pm - Historian Rob Neufeld presents stories of the people and events that shaped the history of East Asheville. Free to attend.

PUBLIC LECTURES AT UNCA unca.edu • TH (2/9), noon - "The Literary and Legal Genealogy of Native American Dispossession: From the Marshall Trilogy to Standing Rock," lecture by attorney George Pappas. Free. Held in the Laurel Forum • MO (2/13), 3:30pm Black History Month: “A Reintroduction: Black Lives Still Matter,” discussion facilitated

by Dahlia Hylton, director of the Intercultural Center and Multicultural Student Programs.

Free. Held in the Highsmith Union Mountain Suites, room 221 • TU (2/14), 7:30pm - “Conflict in

Magical Offerings the South China Sea,” presented

by Jim Lenburg, professor of history emeritus at Mars Hill University. $10. Held in the Reuter Center • WE (2/15), 5-6:15pm - Black History Month: "From Allyship to Advocacy: Repurposing Your Privilege," discussion facilitated by Megan Underhill, assistant professor of Sociology.

Free. Held in Highsmith Union Mountain Suites, room 221 • TH (2/16), 7pm - "Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933-1945," keynote lecture

by Miami University Associate Professor of European History Erik Jensen. Free. Held in the Humanities Lecture Hall • TH (2/16), 7:30pm "Morgantina in Sicily and Studying Ceramics at a Large Archaeological Site," lecture by archaeologist Shelley Stone.

Free. Held in Ramsey Library's Whitman Room.

SENIORS AARP 380-6242, rchaplin@aarp.org • WE (2/15), 3:30pm - "HomeFit Workshop," focused on aging while continuing to live at home. Free. Held at Weaverville Public Library, 41 N. Main St., Weaverville BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/ governing/depts/library • WE (2/15), 4pm - Care Partners Present: “I Don’t Want to Move into a Skilled Nursing Facility…

What Are My Options?” Free.

Held at Enka-Candler Library, 67 Haywood St. COUNCIL ON AGING OF BUNCOMBE COUNTY, INC. 277-8288, coabc.org • FR (2/10), 2-4pm - "Medicare Choices Made Easy," workshop.

Registration required. Free. Held at Goodwill Career Training Center, 1616 Patton Ave. OLLI AT UNCA 251-6140, olliasheville.com • TH (2/9), 4:30-6:30pm Advance care planning workshop and panel discussion. Free.

Held in the Reuter Center SENIOR OPPORTUNITY CENTER 36 Grove St., Asheville • WEDNESDAYS, 1:30-4pm "Bid Whist," card players club.

Free.

• FRIDAYS, 12:30-3:30pm "Canasta," group card game gathering. Free.

• TUESDAYS, 2-3pm - "Senior Beat," drumming, dance fitness class. For standing or seated

participants. $3.

• THURSDAYS, 1-2pm Contemporary line dancing class. Join anytime. $5 per class.

SPIRITUALITY A COURSE IN MIRACLES (PD.) A truly loving, open study group. Meets second and fourth Mondays. 6:30pm, East Asheville, Groce United Methodist Church. Information, call Susan at 828-712-5472.

ABOUT THE TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION TECHNIQUE • FREE INTRODUCTORY TALK (PD.) Deep within everyone is a wellspring of peace, energy and happiness. With proper instruction anyone can access that rejuvenating inner source— effortlessly—and enjoy great results from every meditation.

Learn how TM is different from mindfulness, watching your breath, common mantra meditation and everything else. NIHsponsored research shows deep revitalizing rest, reduced stress and anxiety, improved brain functioning and heightened wellbeing. Thursday, 6:30-7:30pm, Asheville TM Center, 165 E. Chestnut. 828-254-4350. TM.org or MeditationAsheville.org

Feb. 10 - FULL MOON Reader: Cumulus, 12-6pm Feb. 11 - 14% off select jewelry for Valentine’s Day! Feb. 12 - Intro to Elder Runes: w/ Tree Higgins, 1-4pm, $20 Feb. 16 - Circle Round: Medicine Wheels in Plain Language, 7-9pm, Donations Feb. 19 - The Welcoming Circle: 5-6pm, Donations Feb. 21 - The Psychic Mediumship Development Circle: Andrea Allen, 6-8pm, $30

Over 100 Herbs Available!

555 Merrimon Ave. (828) 424-7868 Daily readers including Scrying, Runes, Tarot, & More! Walk-ins welcome!

ASTRO-COUNSELING (PD.) Licensed counselor and accredited professional astrologer uses your chart when counseling for additional insight into yourself, your relationships and life directions. Readings also available.

Christy Gunther, MA, LPC. (828) 258-3229.

EXPERIENCE THE SACRED SOUND OF HU (PD.) If you’re in trouble, in pain, in need of comfort, or in need of love, sing HU quietly to yourself.

If you know how to sing HU, you can open yourself to the Holy Spirit. You can open yourself to the inner guidance available to help you take the next step. • Sunday, February 12, 2017, 11am, fellowship follows.

Eckankar Center of Asheville, 797 Haywood Rd. (“Hops and Vines” building, lower level), Asheville NC 28806, 828-2546775. (free event). www.eckankar-nc.org FULL MOON TRANSMISSION MEDITATION (PD.) Want to help the world? Group meditation that 'steps down' energies from the Masters of Wisdom for use by people working for a better world.

Non-sectarian. No fees. A simple altruistic service for the world.

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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C OMMU N IT Y CA L E N D AR

Free. Wednesday. February 8, 7pm.

Crystal Visions. 5426 Asheville Hwy. Information: 828-398-0609.

versary celebration with a community dinner and tour. Registration: 253-3316. Free.

MOVING TOWARDS PRESENCE (PD.) February 25th, 4-5pm. Gurdjieff said by developing attention in movement, there is the possibility of "awakening" to something deeper. Workshop will offer exercises and opportunities with local members Info: gfofwnc@gmail.com or 828.551.0116.

CREATION CARE ALLIANCE OF WNC creationcarealliance.org • MONDAYS through (3/6), 7-8:30pm - Conversations on climate change and the poor and discussing Pope Francis’s Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home. Free. Held at Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church, 789 Merrimon Ave.

CENTER FOR ART & SPIRIT AT ST. GEORGE 1 School Road, 258-0211 • 2nd SUNDAYS, 7-9pm - Dances of Universal Peace. Free.

CENTRAL UNITED METHODIST CHURCH 27 Church St., 253-3316, centralumc.org • WE (2/8), 6-7pm - 180 year anni-

Send your event listings to calendar@mountainx.com

by Abigail Griffin

GRACE LUTHERAN CHURCH 1245 Sixth Ave., W. Hendersonville, 693-4890, gracelutherannc.com • 2nd FRIDAYS, 1-2pm - Nondenominational healing prayer group. Free.

MARY WHITESIDES: GATHERING OF FRIENDS dolly3695@aol.com

• FR (2/10), 7-9pm - Non-Duality gathering with Mary Whitesides on the topic of "relationships." Free to attend. Held at Asheville Women's Wellness & Education Center, 24 Arlington St. MEDITATION IN ASHEVILLE 1070 Tunnel Road, Building 2, Unit 20, 668-2241, MeditationInAsheville.org • SA (2/11), 10am-1pm - "Love without Pain: Half-day Meditation Course," with guided meditation, talks and refreshments. $20/$15 students or seniors.

SHAMBHALA MEDITATION CENTER 60 N Merrimon Ave., #113, 2005120, asheville.shambhala.org • WEDNESDAYS, 10-midnight, THURSDAYS, 7-8:30pm & SUNDAYS, 10-noon - Meditation and community. Admission by donation.

Nurture Brilliance. Broaden Horizons. Change The World.

Become a Teacher.

UNC Asheville has a teacher licensure program for professionals who already have a bachelor’s degree.

Fall 2017 applications are due by June 2, 2017.

Learn more at education.unca.edu teach@unca.edu 828-251-6304

Give your Valentine a gift that keeps giving!

15% OFF

ANY BEER or WINE Kit 712-B Merrimon Ave, Asheville (828) 285-0515 Mon-Sat 10-6 & Sun 11-4 AshevilleBrewers.com Free Classes!

Family Owned Living Wage Certified 34

(Ingredients or Equipment) Deal good through 2/28/17.

In store purchases only.

No further discounts.

ASHEVILLE BREWERS SUPPLY The area’s largest selection of ingredients and equipment for making beer, wine, cider and mead

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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URBAN DHARMA 225-6422, udharmanc.com/ • THURSDAYS, 7:30-9pm - Open Sangha night. Free. Held at Urban Dharma, 29 Page Ave

SPOKEN & WRITTEN WORD 35BELOW 35 E. Walnut St., 254-1320, ashevilletheatre.org • TH (2/15), 7:30pm - "Listen to This," storytelling series hosted by Tom Chalmers. $15.

ASHEVILLE DISTILLING COMPANY 12 Old Charlotte Highway • SA (2/11), 4pm - Troy Ball presents her memoir, Pure Heart. Free to attend.

BARNES AND NOBLE BOOKSELLERS ASHEVILLE MALL 3 S. Tunnel Road, 296-7335 • SA (2/11), 2-4pm - WNC Author Fest with 12 Asheville-area authors.

Free to attend.

BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/ depts/library • WE (2/8), 4pm - The Liberators; No Shame in Escapism Book Club: Kraken by China Mieville. Free.

Held at Pack Memorial Library, 67 Haywood St. • TH (2/9), 6:30pm - East Asheville Book Club: When the Moon Is Low

by Nadia Hashimi. Free. Held at East Asheville Library, 902 Tunnel Road • SA (2/11), 3pm - West Asheville Book Club: Imagine Me Gone, by Adam Haslett. Free. Held at West Asheville Library, 942 Haywood Road • TU (2/14), 7pm - Friends of the Fairview Library meeting. Free. Held at the Fairview Library, 1 Taylor Road • TU (2/14), 1pm - Book and Movie Club: The Friendly Persuasion by Jessamyn West. Free. Held at Leicester Library, 1561 Alexander Road • TH (2/16), 2:30pm - Skyland Book Club: The Sympathizer by Viet Than Nguyen. Free. Held at Enka-Candler Library, 1404 Sandhill Road FLETCHER LIBRARY 120 Library Road, Fletcher, 6871218, library.hendersoncountync.org • 2nd THURSDAYS, 10:30am - Book Club. Free.

• 2nd THURSDAYS, 1:30pm Writers' Guild. Free.

MALAPROP'S BOOKSTORE AND CAFE 55 Haywood St., 254-6734, malaprops.com • FR (12/10), 4-5pm & SA (12/11), 4-5pm - "Poetry on Request," with local poets. Free to attend.

• SA (2/11), 6pm - Natalie Anderson presents her young adult novel,

City of Saints and Thieves. Free to attend.

• SU (2/12), 3pm - Lydia Peelle presents her novel, The Midnight Cool with musical guest Ketch Secor. Free to attend.

• MO (2/13), 6pm - KJ Howe presents, The Freedom Broker. Free to attend.

• WE (2/15), 6pm - Authors for Action! Event featuring Timothy Tyson presenting his book, The Blood of Emmett Till. Free to attend.

NORTH CAROLINA WRITERS' NETWORK ncwriters.org • Through WE (2/15) - Submissions accepted for the Doris Betts Fiction Prize. Contact for full guidelines.

SYNERGY STORY SLAM avl.mx/0gd • WE (2/8), 7:30pm - Open-mic storytelling night on the theme "Guts."

Sign-ups at 7:30pm. Free to attend Held at Odditorium, 1045 Haywood Road THE MOTHLIGHT 701 Haywood Road • SU (2/12), 7:30pm - "Salvation In Steel," storytelling by Abby the Spoon Lady. $15/$12 advance.

WILMA DYKEMAN LEGACY 458-5813, wilmadykemanlegacy.org, stokely.jim@gmail.com • 2nd THURSDAYS, 5:30pm Thomas Wolfe Book Club: The Bell Remembered, discussion led by Ellen Brown. Free. Held at Thomas Wolfe Memorial, 52 North Market St.

SPORTS APA POOL LEAGUE (PD.) Beginners welcome & wanted!

Choose Asheville, Arden, or Brevard.

HAVE FUN. MEET PEOPLE. PLAY POOL. 828-329-8197 www.BlueRidgeAPA.com ONGOING – weekly league play SOCCER REFEREE TRAINING (PD.) Referees needed throughout Western NC. Minimum age 14.

More information: Ed Guzowski at guzowski@charter.net • Register here, complete the online training: Go to website: http://ussfnc.arbitersports.com/ front/102762/Site

tion on 2/22 (9:00 am) or 2/23 (5:30 pm) by emailing volunteers@litcouncil.com. www.litcouncil.com ASHEVILLE AREA HABITAT FOR HUMANITY 2515702, ashevillehabitat.org, emellert@ashevillehabitat.org • SA (2/11), 8:15am-3:30pm "Singles Build," event for single, 21-40 year-old professionals to participate in a volunteer build with Habitat for Humanity. Registration: goo.gl/h75BjI. $20 includes lunch.

Held at Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity, 30 Meadow Road HANDS ON ASHEVILLEBUNCOMBE 2-1-1, handsonasheville.org • WE (2/8), 4-5:30pm - Volunteer to help keep up with the maintenance of the Verner Community Garden.

Registration required.

• SA (2/11), 9am-noon- Volunteer to help pack food items into backpacksized parcels that are distributed to local schools.

Registration required.

• SA (2/11), 9:30am-noon - Volunteer to assist with unpacking and pricing merchandise in a fair-trade retail store. Registration required.

• SA (2/11), 10:30am-noon Volunteer to help create book packages for people recently placed in new housing by Homeward Bound of Asheville. Registration required.

• TU (2/14), 1-4pm - Volunteer to help sort and organize donations to Buncombe County Schools Crisis Closet. Registration required.

HOMEWARD BOUND OF WNC 218 Patton Ave., 258-1695, homewardboundwnc.org • 3rd THURSDAYS, 11am "Welcome Home Tour," tours of Asheville organizations that serve the homeless population.

Registration required. Free to attend.

MOUNTAINTRUE 258-8737, wnca.org • FR (2/10), SA (2/11), TU (2/14) or WE (2/15), 10am-4pm - Volunteer to help plant live-stakes along eroding riverbanks. Registration: mountaintrue.org/eventscalendar/ BLUE RIDGE RAIDERS

VOLUNTEERING TUTOR ADULTS IN NEED WITH THE LITERACY COUNCIL (PD.) Literacy and English language skills help people rise out of poverty and support their families. Volunteer and give someone a second chance to learn. Sign up for volunteer orienta-

mizzarnette@gmail.com • SATURDAYS (2/11) through (5/6) - Volunteer to help with ticketing, concessions and apparel for Blue Ridge Raiders home games. Contact for full guidelines.

For more volunteering opportunities visit mountainx.com/volunteering

LOCAL VIEWS

Kids protest Trump A crowd of children and parents gathered at the Vance Monument in downtown Asheville on Sunday, Feb. 5, to protest policies implemented by President Donald Trump’s administration. After making signs and singing songs at the monument, the protesters made their way down Patton Avenue to Pritchard Park.

Asha and Kale, both 10, said they came up with the idea for the protest after seeing how sad Trump’s recent immigration

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ban had made their mom, local musician Sparrow Pants.

Pants said her role in facilitating the protest had been small: “They helped me make the protest flyer. They picked out the graphic, and I taught them a little bit about how to use Photoshop, and they created this.” She and other parents emphasized the importance of taking children’s responses to Trump’s policies and tone seriously.

- Text and photos by Emma Grace Moon X

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WELLNESS

LIFESTYLE DISEASE

Exercise and a healthy diet help prevent Type 2 diabetes

BY TIFFANY NARRON tfnarron44@gmail.com Buncombe County, like much of the nation, has a diabetes problem. The disease was ranked as the 10th-leading cause of death in the county in the 2015 Community Health Assessment, an annual gathering of data from residents to determine local wellness in relation to state and national averages.

While there are numerous reasons why this has become an epidemic, the assessment found that 23.5 percent of Buncombe adults are obese, and that just over 30 percent of students in K-5 public schools are overweight or obese, factors that increase the incidence of diabetes.

The good news: Asheville-area health professionals say there are affordable and accessible ways to address this growing risk for generations young and old. A wealth of information, diet trends and practices has emerged to address weight loss and the prevention of diabetes.

Christine Banman, a registered dietitian with Mountain Kidney and Hypertension Associates, is accustomed to dealing with the factors that lead to diabetes, Type 2 in particular.

“You immediately have to get into the home life situation with these issues,” she says. “Who does the cooking?

Who’s in the house?” The majority of her patients have fought weight gain, high blood pressure and long-standing medical issues their entire lives. Their multiple problems create the onset of Type 2 diabetes, she says, which in turn causes kidney malfunction due to higher levels of blood sugar.

Banman’s advice for someone who has contracted the disease and is seeking reversal of the diagnosis is similar to that she’d offer anyone who is prediabetic. She recommends affordable and simple dietary solutions that include buying frozen vegetables for cost and longevity, avoiding most beverages in favor of purchasing foods, buying grains in bulk, and shopping at Aldi and other affordable markets in their area.

Watching your weight is key to help preventing Type 2 diabetes, Banman says. “I really feel like if someone can jumpstart or hit the restart button with the sugar busters or Atkins diet just to get an initial amount of weight off, I’m a supporter of that. I think the

36

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

STAIRSTEPS TO HEALTH: Martha Mosseller, left, a participant in the YWCA Diabetes Wellness and Prevention Program, receives coaching from fitness associate and personal trainer Jackie Robertson. Photo courtesy of the YWCA long-term benefits of just getting a little bit of weight off exceed the consequences of that diet.

“I think what we’re dealing with is what’s referred to as a toxic food environment, where we have heavily marketed, very inexpensive, unhealthy foods on every corner — in hospitals, airports and even in our school systems,” she continues. “This food environment surrounds us. So it’s hard for me to argue with someone who says, ‘The croissant sandwiches were two-for-one on the way in.’ With someone that has limited food money, that speaks. So that’s part of the food environment we’re dealing with.”

DIABETES AND LIFESTYLE Type 2 diabetes affects 29.1 million people in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The most common causes for the onset of this illness are obesity, smoking, physical inactivity, age, family history, high blood pressure and a high alcohol intake, according to WebMD.

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Diabetes causes blood glucose levels to rise above normal. When people eat, their bodies turn food into glucose, or sugars, for their body to use as energy.

The pancreas creates the hormone insulin, which allows those sugars to get into the cells of the body. But with Type 2 diabetes, the body is no longer able to use its own insulin as well as it should, causing sugar to build up in the blood.

In 2014, the North Carolina State Report named diabetes as the seventh-leading cause of death in the state, the fourth-leading cause for African -Americans and the third-leading cause for American Indians. In WNC, the rate of white people living with the disease is highest, at 11.6 percent, while the rate of African-Americans in the eastern part of the state is 15.3 percent.

Harvard University’s PATHS (Providing Access to Healthy Solutions) report for North Carolina in 2014 outlined how legislation could mitigate the disease, including a mandate for insurers to cover diabetes-related services as well as the creation of a unified public

health system to provide “whole-person care.” The PATHS report is funded through Together on Diabetes, a philanthropic program of the BristolMyers Squibb Foundation, and was launched in 2010 to improve the health outcomes of people living with Type 2 diabetes by strengthening patient selfmanagement education, communitybased supportive services and broadbased community mobilization.

Short of legislative measures, how can the millions of Americans seeking to control their weight and improve their health avoid Type 2 diabetes?

Dr. Daniel Stickler of the Apeiron Center for Human Potential in Asheville relates the illness to lifestyle.

“Type 2 diabetes is not truly a disease,” he says. “Type 2 diabetes is a lifestyle aspect. You can progress to the point where you actually poison your beta cells in the pancreas after years of being Type 2 diabetic, but it really is a lifestyle. We’ve seen plenty of reversals on people that were diabetic or prediabetic that changed their lifestyle and completely reversed the disease without medication.”

Stickler says that a whole-person approach is needed. Apeiron uses that approach, looking closely at a person’s genetics and at about 75 different genomic variations that help predict appetite, hunger and nutrient selection — from fats to carbs and proteins. Apeiron tailors diets specifically around a person’s genomics, goals and experiences to create a program that is individualized, rather than using a diet from a book.

“The problem that you run into is that when you diagnose someone with a disease, they become the disease,” Stickler says. “The title becomes them, and until they can get to the point where they understand they are not Type 2 diabetes, you’re not going to make any progress with them. We’re treating it with these medications that aren’t treating the core cause, which is lifestyle. It’s OK to bridge that to get things under control, but the whole focus needs to be on treating the core cause, which is a lifestyle component that has created an insulin resistance in the body. And it is easily reversible.

“We have epigenetic coaches that work with clients and read their genetic data, looking at 500 genetic variations and working with sleep, stress, nutrition, exercise and human movement ... environment, thoughts,

etc. So we’re venturing into all realms in how we address health.”

WAYS TO APPROACH DIET, EXERCISE Banman notes that Medicare initially covers only three hours a year of dietary intervention and just two hours annually thereafter. “This is where support becomes very limited,” she says, adding that a majority of her patients are diagnosed in their mid60s, which makes it difficult for them to get up and get moving. In addition, stress from finances, work and family are debilitating factors, pushing diet and exercise to the bottom of their priorities. “I’m struck with the layers in their lives that are making things so complicated, and I’m very sympathetic to it and help however I can,” she says.

Stickler and Banman both recommend the Mediterranean diet, “which is in concert with the diabetic diet,” according to Banman, and which research has consistently shown to be an effective way to also reduce the risk of heart disease, lower low-density lipoproteins (or bad cholesterol) and lower risks associated with cancer, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases.

The American Diabetes Association outlines a Mediterranean meal plan on its website. Key components of the diet, according to the Mayo Clinic, are limiting red meat; eating fish at least twice a week and otherwise primarily plant-based food, whole grains and nuts; replacing butter with olive oil; and using herbs and spices instead of salt.

In Buncombe County, residents can address stress, exercise and diet through the Diabetes Wellness and Prevention Program offered by the YWCA, a program designed specifically for adults with or at risk for Type 2 diabetes. Preventive health coordinator Leah Berger-Singer says that participants are given a gym membership, bimonthly personal training, a weekly support group (which discusses health-related topics such as living healthy on a budget) and tips on stress management. “We’re aiming to provide access to people that may not otherwise have access to a gym, cooking classes, swim lessons and other options,” she says. “We also provide monthly dinner lectures or ‘lunch and learns,’ hands-on cooking demos, field trips and other extracurricular activities.”

Chiropractor and yoga instructor J. Anya Harris of Crystalign Chiropractic

in Asheville says that stress-reduction techniques coupled with group exercise can be keys to combating many diseases, including diabetes. “Getting out of your routine and your house and away from your cellphone is really important,” she advises. Her approach with patients is to address both spinal health and overall physical health, as well as stress and energy levels. Chiropractic care helps to create a range of motion and mobility, freeing up the body to get patients to the point where they feel good enough to exercise again or continue exercising, she explains. It also opens up the neural pathways that keep the organs, muscles and spine balanced, she adds. “With the energy work, I’m shifting relationships and trauma to give them the spark to get them moving. It’s all about setting up the mind, body and soul to help them feel at ease in their own skin and really define their ‘why.’ If you don’t know your why, then none of it matters, because you won’t stay consistent. The why will give them reframing in their consciousness that will keep them moving toward their goal.” X

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Mountain Kidney & Hypertension, 10 McDowell St., Asheville, offers a variety of services, including diet and meal planning for diabetics and services for those suffering from hypertension and kidney disease. 258-8545 The Apeiron Center for Human Potential, 190 Broadway, focuses on preventive wellness, including genomic assessments, epigenetic coaching and human potential assessments and coaching.

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Crystalign Chiropractic, 36 Clayton St., off Charlotte Street in Asheville, offers head-to-toe chiropractic adjustments, trigger-point muscle therapy, energy work, nutrition analysis and wellness coaching.

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The YWCA’s Diabetes Wellness and Prevention Program operates at the YWCA in downtown Asheville, offering a comprehensive diabetes program to prevent or reverse the illness. Preventive health coordinator Leah Berger-Singer can be reached at 254-7206, ext. 212, or Leah.bs@ywcaofasheville.org.

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

37

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WELLN ESS CA LEN DA R WELLNESS LET YOUR LYMPH SYSTEM WORK FOR YOU (PD.) Clear stuffy heads, heal quicker, reduce stress, detoxify, decrease fluid retention.Discover Manual Lymph Drainage Massage with Jean Coletti, PT. 828-273-3950. ColettiPT.com ASHEVILLE COMMUNITY YOGA CENTER 8 Brookdale Road, ashevillecommunityyoga.com • SA (2/11), 12:30-2:30pm - "Yoga: A Personal Practice," workshop. $20.

• SU (2/12), 12:30-2:30pm - "Poetry in Yoga: A Yin & Writing Practice," workshop. $20.

HAYWOOD REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER 262 Leroy George Drive Clyde, 456-7311 • TH (2/16), 5pm - Presentation about leg vein health. Registration required: 828-452-8346. Free.

MEDITATION IN ASHEVILLE 1070 Tunnel Road, Building 2, Unit 20, 668-2241, MeditationInAsheville.org • FR (2/10), 7-8:15pm - "Finding Freedom," lecture including guided meditation and refreshments. $10/$5 students & seniors.

Acupuncture • Herbal Prescription Therapeutic Massage

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THE MEDITATION CENTER 894 E. Main St., Sylva, 356-1105, meditate-wnc.org • 2nd WEDNESDAYS, 6-8pm - "Inner Guidance from an Open Heart," class with meditation and discussion. $10.

YWCA OF ASHEVILLE 185 S French Broad Ave., 254-7206, ywcaofasheville.org • SA (2/11), 9am-1pm - Community health fair with pop-up classes, tastings, demos, mini-bodywork sessions, refreshments, Blood Connection blood drive and activities for kids.

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SUPPORT GROUPS ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS & DYSFUNCTIONAL FAMILIES adultchildren.org • Visit mountainx.com/support for full listings.

Whole Body & Local Cryotherapy for: * Pain Management * Athletic Performance * Overall Wellness * CryoFacials™

ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS • For a full list of meetings in WNC, call 254-8539 or aancmco.org

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ASPERGER'S TEENS UNITED facebook.com/groups/ AspergersTeensUnited • For teens (13-19) and their parents.

Meets every 3 weeks. Contact for details.

Learn more & make an appointment at www.InnerChillCryo.cool 1863 Hendersonville Road # 133, Asheville, NC • 828-785-4001 38

QIGONG/CHI KUNG COMMUNITY PRACTICE GROUP allen@ashevilleqigong.com • FRIDAYS, 9:30am - Qigong/Chi Kung class. All levels welcome. Free to attend. Held at The Alternative Clinic, 23 Broadway

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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ASHEVILLE WOMEN FOR SOBRIETY 215-536-8026, womenforsobriety.org • THURSDAYS, 6:30-8pm – Held at YWCA of Asheville, 185 S French Broad Ave.

BRAINSTORMER’S COLLECTIVE 254-0507, puffer61@gmail.com • 3rd THURSDAYS, 6-7:30pm - For brain injury survivors and supporters. Held at Kairos West Community Center, Haywood Road, Asheville

BREAST CANCER SUPPORT GROUP 213-2508 • 3rd THURSDAYS, 5:30pm - For breast cancer survivors, husbands, children and friends. Held at SECU Cancer Center, 21 Hospital Drive BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/ depts/library • WE (2/8), 5:30-7pm - Transformers discussion & support group for non-binary and transgender people.

Held at Pack Memorial Library, 67 Haywood St. CHRONIC PAIN SUPPORT 989-1555, deb.casaccia@gmail.com • 2nd WEDNESDAYS, 6 pm – Held in a private home. Contact for directions.

CODEPENDENTS ANONYMOUS 242-7127 • FRIDAYS, 5:30pm - Held at First United Methodist Church of Waynesville, 556 S. Haywood Waynesville • WEDNESDAYS, 7-8pm & SATURDAYS, 11am – Held at First Congregational UCC of Asheville, 20 Oak St. • TUESDAYS 7:30pm - Held at Asheville 12-Step Recovery Club, 370 N. Louisiana Ave., Suite G4 DEBTORS ANONYMOUS debtorsanonymous.org • MONDAYS, 7pm - Held at First Congregational UCC of Asheville, 20 Oak St. DEPRESSION AND BIPOLAR SUPPORT ALLIANCE 367-7660, depressionbipolarasheville.com • WEDNESDAYS, 7pm & SATURDAYS, 4pm – Held at 1316-C Parkwood Road.

DIABETES SUPPORT 213-4788, laura.tolle@msj.org • 3rd WEDNESDAYS, 3:30pm - In room 3-B. Held at Mission Health, 509 Biltmore Ave.

GROUP 386-801-2606 • TUESDAYS, 6:30-8pm - For adults managing the challenges of life limiting illnesses. Held at Secrets of a Duchess, 1439 Merrimon Ave. LIVING WITH CHRONIC PAIN 776-4809 • 2nd WEDNESDAYS, 6:30pm Hosted by American Chronic Pain Association. Held at Swannanoa Library, 101 West Charleston St., Swannanoa LUPUS FOUNDATION OF AMERICA, NC CHAPTER 877-849-8271, lupusnc.org • 2nd WEDNESDAYS, 7-8pm - Lupus support group for those living with lupus, their family and caregivers.

Held at All Souls Cathedral, 9 Swan St. MEMORY LOSS CAREGIVERS network@memorycare.org • 2nd TUESDAYS, 9:30am – Held at Highland Farms Retirement Community, 200 Tabernacle Road, Black Mountain MINDFULNESS AND 12 STEP RECOVERY avl12step@gmail.com • WEDNESDAYS, 7:30-8:45pm Mindfulness meditation practice and 12 step program. Held at Asheville 12-Step Recovery Club, 370 N. Louisiana Ave., Suite G4 MISSION CHILDREN'S FAMILY SUPPORT NETWORK 213-9787 • 2nd TUESDAYS, 5:30-7:30pm Mission Children's Family Support Network youth group from ages 11 to 21. Dinner is provided. Held at Mission Reuter Children's Center, 11 Vanderbilt Park Drive MOUNTAIN MAMAS PEER SUPPORT GROUP facebook.com/ mountainmamasgroup • 2nd THURSDAYS, 1-3pm - Held at The Family Place, 970 Old Hendersonville Highway Brevard

FOOD ADDICTS ANONYMOUS 423-6191 or 242-2173 • SATURDAYS, 11am- Held at Asheville 12-Step Recovery Club, 370 N. Louisiana Ave., Suite G4

MY DADDY TAUGHT ME THAT mydaddytaughtmethat.org • MONDAYS & WEDNESDAYS, 6-8pm - Men's discussion group.

Free. Held in 16-A Pisgah Apartment, Asheville

FOUR SEASONS COMPASSION FOR LIFE 233-0948, fourseasonscfl.org • TUESDAYS, 3:30-4:30pm - Grief support group. Held at Four Seasons - Checkpoint, 373 Biltmore Ave. • THURSDAYS, 12:30pm - Grief support group. Held at SECU Hospice House, 272 Maple St., Franklin

NATIONAL ALLIANCE ON MENTAL ILLNESS 505-7353, namiwnc.org, namiwc2015@gmail.com • 2nd MONDAYS, 11am Connection group for individuals dealing with mental illness. Held at NAMI Offices, 356 Biltmore Ave.

G.E.T. R.E.A.L. phoenix69@bellsouth.net • 2nd SATURDAYS, 2pm - Group for people with chronic 'invisible' autoimmune diseases. Held at Fletcher Community Park, 85 Howard Gap Road, Fletcher

OUR VOICE 35 Woodfin St., 252-0562, ourvoicenc.org • Ongoing drop-in group for female identified survivors of sexual violence.

GAMBLERS ANONYMOUS gamblersanonymous.org • THURSDAYS, 6:45pm - 12-step meeting. Held at Basillica of St. Lawrence, 97 Haywood St. GRIEF PROCESSING SUPPORT GROUP 452-5039, haymed.org/locations/the-homestead • 3rd THURSDAYS, 4-5:30pm Bereavement education and support group. Held at Homestead Hospice and Palliative Care, 127 Sunset Ridge Road, Clyde LIFE LIMITING ILLNESS SUPPORT

OVERCOMERS OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE 665-9499 • WEDNESDAYS, noon-1pm - Held at First Christian Church of Candler, 470 Enka Lake Road, Candler OVERCOMERS RECOVERY SUPPORT GROUP rchovey@sos-mission.org • MONDAYS, 6pm - Christian 12-step program. Held at SOS Anglican Mission, 1944 Hendersonville Road OVEREATERS ANONYMOUS • Regional number: 277-1975.

Visit mountainx.com/support for full listings.

GREEN SCENE

WATER IS LIFE

Local experts share tips for making sure water is healthy and safe

BY VIRGINIA DAFFRON vdaffron@mountainx.com At Greenlife Grocery on Asheville’s busy Merrimon Avenue, filtered water from the store’s FreshPure water dispensing machine is in high demand.

Shoppers sometimes line up to fill multiple jars and jugs. According to store manager Lou Phillips, prices range from 39 cents a gallon for reverse osmosis-filtered or deionized water to 99 cents a gallon for highalkalinity water.

But is filtering or purchasing drinking water really necessary — or better for you than what comes from the faucet? The answer, says Katie Hicks of the nonprofit water advocacy organization Clean Water for North Carolina, depends on the source of your drinking water and how you assess the risk of possible chemical or biological contamination.

On the whole, though, Hicks says, “People are usually surprised to learn just how little guarantee there is that water coming out of the tap will be perfectly clean and safe.”

Water users, Hicks continues, should check with their water supplier for data about water quality and safety, since that information can vary widely from one municipality or water system to the next.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requires public water systems to provide an annual report to their customers.

At her own home, Hicks is hooked up to Asheville’s municipal water supply. Asked whether she uses any sort of filtration system or bottled water herself, Hicks responds, “No. I drink it straight from the tap.”

UNDER LOCAL CONTROL Like Hicks, over 124,000 people in Asheville and Buncombe and Henderson counties draw their water from the city of Asheville’s water system.

Jade Dundas, the system’s director, oversaw municipal utilities in the Midwest for over 20 years before moving to Asheville to take the city’s top water job in 2015. Asked what lured him to the Southeast, Dundas pointed to the superior quality of this area’s water. “This is by far the

COVERING ALL THE BASES: “Water quality tests are conducted on a routine basis throughout the day at all three of our treatment plants,” says Asheville Water Resources Director Jade Dundas. Photo by Adam McMillan

says, “You can’t really separate how the water is governed and managed from what’s actually going to be the end result.”

According to a footnote in the Supreme Court’s ruling, the Asheville water system is a significant asset: “As of June 2014, the city’s water system consisted of a sizable watershed; two impoundments; three water treatment plants; 29 treated water storage reservoirs; 1,661 miles of transmission and distribution lines; at least 40 pump stations; and certain intangible assets, including, but not limited to, approximately 147 trained and certified employees, numerous licenses, wholesale water supply contracts, contracts for the supply of goods and services and revenue accounts containing more than $2,218,000 that are held for the purpose of ensuring repayment of outstanding bonded indebtedness.”

CONTINUES ON PAGE 40

best water that I’ve been responsible for, because the source is so pristine,” he said.

Since then, Dundas has focused on day-to-day system operations as a legal battle for control over the city’s resource raged in state courts. On Dec. 21, North Carolina’s Supreme Court reversed an earlier appellate court ruling, finding Buying/Selling a car that the city should retain ownership of the system.

Before/After long road trips That’s good news for customers of Regular total vehicle assessthe system, Hicks says. “As we’ve seen mentof the water sysfrom the example tem in Flint, Mich.,” she explains, “the governance of public water systems does have an impact on health.” Flint’s system gained national attention in Great for pre-trip 2016 when state and federal officials declared a state of emergency after a vehicle insepctions!

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G REEN SC E N E In a statement released after the Supreme Court’s decision, Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer said, “This ruling ensures that Asheville can continue to own this great water system and continue to provide safe drinking water for years into the future.”

DON’T PANIC OVER NEW ADVISORIES At each of the city’s three water treatment plants (the North Fork and Bee Tree reservoirs east of the city, and the Mills River treatment plant to the south), the water is tested three times every day, according to city spokesperson Polly McDaniel. The Water Resources Department conducts additional testing at different locations throughout the system on a regular basis and as needed after work on the waterlines.

Replacing pipes or making emergency repairs requires workers to reduce the pressure in the lines, which can create the conditions for contamination, McDaniel explains. Beginning Jan. 9, the city added a new boil water advisory protocol to its customer notification practices. Whenever the water pressure drops below a certain level, the city will issue an advisory to let customers know that additional testing is underway.

According to a media release from the city, “A boil water advisory does not mean that the water is contaminated, but that the possibility exists.”

Because of the new protocol, customers will likely see many more notices for possible contamination, McDaniel says, but that doesn’t mean the system is less safe than before.

Whereas a boil water advisory indicates that there is a possibility of water contamination, a “boil water notice” indicates that contamination has been detected.

During either type of notification, a notice or an advisory, the Water Resources Department offers these guidelines for customers in the affected area: “Boil tap water vigorously for at least one minute before using it for drinking, cooking or any consumption.

This includes water used for dental care, making ice, food preparation or any other consumption purposes. It is not necessary to boil water for showering, laundry or other nonconsumptive uses. Continue boiling water intended for consumption purposes until the advisory is lifted. Advisories can last from 24 hours to several days.”

McDaniel recommends that water customers sign up for citizen alerts on the city’s website. The link is at ashevillenc.gov. Customers who reg-

40

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

TESTING, TESTING: Brenna Cook of the Asheville Water Resources Department tests treated water at the city’s North Fork Reservoir treatment facility. Photo by Adam McMillan ister will be notified of alerts via text, email and telephone.

ON THE LEVEL According to the city’s latest annual water quality report, which was published in March 2016, the system is required by the EPA to test for over 150 substances in drinking water. In 2015, 13 of those substances were detected. Some — such as trihalomethanes, haloacetic acid, chlorine and fluoride — are actually introduced into the water during the treatment process.

To test for lead, system technicians sample water throughout the year at 50 sites determined to have a risk of elevated lead levels. The sites include homes built before 1986, when

MOUNTAINX.COM

lead solder was used in fitting copper pipes, and in areas where lead service pipes could still be present. None of the 50 sites exceeded the target action level for copper and only one exceeded the target level for lead.

To prevent corrosion that could result in pipes leaching lead into drinking water, the city adds sodium hydroxide, sodium bicarbonate and zinc orthophosphate to the water.

However, for four of the detected substances — strontium, chlorate, vanadium and hexavalent chromium — the EPA has yet to establish a standard safe level. Clean Water for N.C.’s Hicks says she thinks that’s a problem. What’s more, she continues, many of the standards that the EPA has established are “a lot weaker than what would actually be consistent with good health.”

GOING TO THE WELL Plenty of homes and some businesses in Western North Carolina aren’t served by municipal water systems. But because the state only began requiring permits for new well construction in 2008, no one knows how many private wells are in use in this area, says Tracy Shinn, who supervises the Buncombe County Health and Human Services’ wastewater and well permitting office.

Under current law, anyone wishing to drill a well in Buncombe County must file a permit application at 30 Valley St. in Asheville. The $300 application fee covers three on-site inspections — before, during and after well installation — and water testing, Shinn explains.

Once the well is completed, further testing isn’t required by law, but Shinn says he recommends annual water tests.

Shinn’s office provides water testing for a fee that can range from $25 to $75, depending on what substances are selected for analysis.

If a problem is detected during testing, Shinn and his colleagues can often help troubleshoot the source of the issue. In the case of chemical contamination or a “gasoline” smell to the water, Shinn says, an old buried oil tank might turn out to be the culprit.

If a test shows bacterial contamination, a leaking septic tank could be the source, though Shinn says he’s seen a “vast array” of issues lead to a positive reading. “It could be a rodent nest around the wellhead. It could be ant colonies,” he says.

The N.C. Department of Environmental Quality recommends annual chlorine disinfection of wells; instructions for the process are available online at avl.mx/3c6.

NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND Clean Water for N.C.’s Hicks points to concerns over contaminated groundwater at the South Asheville CTS Superfund site (see “Toxic Legacy,” June 1, 2016, Xpress) as an example of

the types of hidden risks well users face.

“In North Carolina, there is no requirement to notify people if there is a known possible groundwater contaminant, so people on well water have to look for that information themselves,” she says. State law also doesn’t require disclosure of possible water contamination when property is sold, she continues, though a mortgage lender may ask for testing.

Concerns about possible well contamination in the area surrounding Duke Energy’s Lake Julian power station (“New State Law Limits Coal Ash Cleanup,” July 20, 2016, Xpress) are another example, Hicks says, of how vulnerable well users can be when substances turn up in their water. “Even when is there a nearby likely source, it’s very hard to get clear about where contamination is coming from,” she says.

On Dec. 13, Duke Energy received preliminary approval from state regulators for its proposed plan to compensate plant neighbors for well contamination believed to have originated from coal ash ponds. However, says Hicks, the plan doesn’t provide a remedy for some Lake Julian plant neighbors who are across the French Broad River from the facility.

KIDS ISSUES Coming MARCH 15 & 22

MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE Some of those Hicks talks to about water shrug off contamination concerns, declaring, “I only drink bottled water.” But, Hicks says, that attitude may reflect a false sense of security.

“Bottled water is regulated under the Food and Drug Administration rather than the EPA, so it’s actually less monitored and controlled than public water supplies,” she explains.

In some cases, where a specific contamination concern exists, bottled water may be a better choice, Hicks continues, but it’s not automatically healthier or safer than what comes from the faucet.

Regarding home water filters, Asheville’s Dundas says the city “doesn’t promote” the use of home filters. If residents do choose to use a filter, he continues, they should make sure the filter is effective for the substance they wish to remove and that it’s properly installed and maintained.

“For example,” Dundas notes, “carbon filters remove chlorine. Those using filters need to follow the manufacturer’s instructions because if the filters are not maintained properly,

they could potentially grow bacteria and introduce water quality concerns in the home.”

So whether you drink from a citysupplied tap, a well, a spring or even a plastic bottle, assessing the quality and safety of your water is probably more complex than any single test or consideration.

With a new administration taking over in Washington, Hicks notes, regulations that control source water and water treatment could change or even unravel. If that happens, she says, “People could have less information about their drinking water, what’s in it and what they can do about it. It’s important for people to realize where water comes from and to be ready to stand up and have a voice in protecting it.”

Here in the mountains, Hicks says, our abundant and pristine water supply sometimes leads us to take for granted “what a precious resource it is.”

“It’s much easier to protect our water than to try to clean up once it’s been contaminated,” she concludes.

“We all need to keep an eye on what’s going on.” X

Like what you’re reading?

There’s much more online. mountainx.com MOUNTAINX.COM

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

41

FOOD

SPREAD THE LOVE

BY JACQUI CASTLE

Valentine’s Day feasts, fun and philanthropy

Community Supported Agriculture produce subscriptions to a family or individual in need for an entire growing season. Chefs Mike Moore, Steve Goff, Sam Goff and Josh Armbruster will craft a six-course menu with a vegetarian alternative. Optional Champagne cocktails and wine pairings will be available for an additional charge. DJ Kipper Schauer will host sexual trivia as the evening’s entertainment.

6 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 14, The Orange Peel, 101 Biltmore Ave. Tickets are $68. theblindpigsupperclub.com

jacquicastle@gmail.com The Feast of St. Valentine is just around the bend, and the Asheville food scene is teeming with possibilities for an amorous evening with a special somebody. Most local restaurants are planning prix fixe or a la carte menus for the occasion (book tables early, reservations fill up fast). And some events promise to offer a unique experience in addition to dinner and dessert — including opportunities to give from the heart.

WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH APHRODISIACS?

THE BLIND PIG SUPPER CLUB AT THE ORANGE PEEL

Rhubarb chef John Fleer will revisit last year’s Valentine’s Day theme with another four-course meal featuring aphrodisiacs. Menu items will include Arabian-spiced Border Springs Farm lamb, duck confit ravioli and Va-va-voom oysters on the half shell. “Valentine’s Day doesn’t need to be about buying

The Blind Pig Supper Club will host a wood-fired pop-up Valentine’s Day dinner at The Orange Peel to benefit the Blind Pig’s new Rally Around the Family Campaign. A portion of the event’s proceeds will support the campaign, which partners with local farms to provide

greenteasushi.com

Small SAKI or House Wine on the house!*

FROM THE HEART: Students in Youth Transformed for Life’s after-school program at Hillcrest Apartments make Valentine’s Day art. YTL’s Sweethearts Supper, which features dinner, music and a silent auction, is a fundraiser for the organization’s teen summer programs. Pictured clockwise from bottom left are Aeon Benjamin, Octavia Hamilton, Ameerah Splawn, Khorin Carson, Tony Shivers and Ameer Splawn. Photo by Cindy Kunst someone chocolates or cards or flowers,” says Rhubarb marketing manager Jasper Adams. “Accept that it’s a schmaltzy holiday, come to terms with it and take the opportunity to have fun.” Whether or not aphrodisiacs actually work, Adams adds, “there’s no question that they’re delicious.”

5-9:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 14, Rhubarb, 7 S. Pack Square. Tickets are $78 each, $120 with wine pairings. rhubarbasheville.com/reservations/vday SWEETHEARTS SUPPER

* With $30 Purchase Limit one per table

TUESDAY 02/14/17 ONLY

Happy Valentine’s Day!

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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If a weeknight on the town doesn’t sound like your cup of tea, an early Valentine’s Day celebration in support of a worthy local youth charity might fit the bill. Nonprofit organization Youth Transformed for Life will host its Sweethearts Supper fundraising dinner and silent auction at the StephensLee Recreation Center on Saturday,

Feb. 11. Green Opportunities Kitchen Ready chef Gene Ettison will team up with Ramona Young of Kente Kitchen West African and Southern Cuisine Catering Co. and Clarence Robinson from Cooking with Comedy Catering to offer a menu of Cajun meatballs, fried green tomatoes, chicken gumbo and Creole side salad with Berry Love Cake.

Jonathan Santos, the Soul Evolution and Leeda “Lyric” Jones will provide musical entertainment for the evening. Auction items will include artwork by regional artists, restaurant gift certificates and an assortment of other products donated by local businesses.

Proceeds from the event will support YTL programs focused on creating equity for disadvantaged and homeless teens and young adult offenders reentering the workforce.

7-10 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11, StephensLee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave. Tickets are $45 each or $85 per couple. ytltraining.org

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Valentine’s Day! WINE AND ADVOCACY: Metro Wines co-owner Gina Trippi will offer guests a free glass of shiraz or chardonnay and treats from French Broad Chocolates during an upcoming benefit for Our VOICE. A $10 admission fee supports the local sexual assault prevention organization, which will present a discussion on human trafficking in Western North Carolina during the event. Photo by Jack Sorokin CIDER AND SUPPER ON THE FARM For a literal breath of fresh air, head out to Fairview on Saturday, Feb. 11, for a five-course cider dinner in the event barn at Hickory Nut Gap Farm. The menu will match local, seasonal fare with ciders from Urban Orchard. Skip the drive and nab the free shuttle that leaves from Urban Orchard at 6 p.m.

6:30 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11, Hickory Nut Gap Farm, 57 Sugar Hollow Road, Fairview. Tickets are $68 plus tax and gratuity. hickorynutgapfarm.com/product/valentines-cider-dinner VALENTINE’S DAY THE SOUTHERN WAY Looking for a hands-on way to spend Valentine’s Day? Grab a friend or loved one and head to the Mountain Kitchen Boutique Cooking School for an interac-

tive cooking class that ends with a decadent meal. Taught by chef Ofri Gilan of Ofri’s Home Cooking, the class features crawfish canapés, shrimp etouffée with red beans and rice, and beignets with whiskey chocolate sauce for dessert.

Participants are invited to bring a bottle of wine. Space is limited.

6-9 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 14, Mountain Kitchen Boutique Cooking School, 332 E. Sondley Drive. Tickets are $65 each or $120 per couple. ofrishomecooking.com/ valentines-day-the-southern-way

Enjoy a 3 course prix fixe menu Make reservations at reserve.com 28 Hendersonville Rd 828.277.1510

3-2-1 AT ADDISON FARMS VINEYARD Addison Farms Vineyard is collaborating with chef Corey Marino of Catering

by Cory to present the fourth annual Perfect Pairings dinner on Saturday, Feb. 11, at the picturesque Leicester

CONTINUES ON PAGE 44

ISA’S BISTRO IS GOING GLOBAL!

Join us Sunday, February 12th for our first global dinner!

This Sunday we will feature cuisine and drinks from France APPETIZERS HNG PORK SHOULDER CREPE tarragon aioli SALAD LYONNAISE frisee, benton’s bacon, poached farm egg TRUFFLED MUSHROOM SOUP herbed croutons ENTREES ROOT VEGETABLE CASSOULET roasted root vegetables FILET MIGNON AU POIVRE rissole potatoes, grilled broccoli raab CHICKEN COQ AU VIN roasted mushrooms, pearl onions, bacon lardons DESSERT PARIS BREST cognac caramel CHOCOLATE MOUSSE toasted hazelnuts, raspberry sauce

FEB. 12: FRANCE FEB. 19: CUBA FEB. 26: ITALY MAR. 5: ARGENTINA MAR. 12: NEW ZEALAND MAR. 19: CALIFORNIA, USA MAR. 26: SPAIN

local, ingredient driven cuisine. since 1979

1 Battery Park Ave. | Asheville NC 28801 | 828-575-9636 info@isasbistro.com | isasbistro.com Complimentary valet parking available at the Haywood Park Hotel MOUNTAINX.COM

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FOOD winery. Marino’s 3-2-1 menu features a welcome bite followed by a second course composed of three items, a third course with two items and a dessert course of one item. Guests can expect dishes such as macerated blood-orange salad with pistachio, mint and feta, and grilled beef and pork tenderloin sous vide served with sweet potato and apple gratin. Dessert will be chocolate cherry tart with Amarena cherries, cherry gelato and chocolate ganache. Reservations are required.

7 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11, Addison Farms Vineyard, 4005 New Leicester Highway, Leicester. Tickets are $79. addisonfarms.net/perfect-pairingsfeb-2017 or 828-581-9463 WINE AND CHOCOLATE FOR OUR VOICE Buncombe County sexual assault prevention organization Our VOICE will host a sweet benefit on Thursday, Feb. 16, at Metro Wines. The $10 admission includes a glass of either Woop Woop Australian shiraz or Helena Ranch chardonnay from California plus treats donated by French Broad Chocolates.

For the program, Our VOICE Executive Director Angelica Wind will lead a dis-

cussion about human trafficking in the region. “We were surprised to learn the staggering amount of human trafficking in WNC,” says Gina Trippi, co-owner of MetroWines. “We are proud to host this event to raise awareness and funding for this most-needed life saving work.”

5:30-7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 16, Metro Wines, 169 Charlotte St. Admission is $10, includes a glass of wine and chocolate. metrowinesasheville.com

70 N. LexiNgtoN aveNue 828.225.8880

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MG Road will celebrate with events both crafty and sweet. On Sunday, Feb. 12, the Wall Street cocktail lounge’s Leah Spicer will host an afternoon valentinemaking party, complete with craft supplies, postage, roses and candy. Love songs and poetry readings will round out the fun. Then, on Tuesday, Feb. 14, the bar invites an all-star lineup of Asheville pastry chefs, including Ashely

Capps, Logan Pollard, Emily Cadmus and Jessica Rosenkoetter from Buxton Hall Barbecue along with Tony Scalia of Farm & Sparrow and Leah Edwards of Plant, to present a candlelit after-dinner dessert salon. In addition to the sweet creations, there will be Champagne specials and romantic music to set the mood.

The valentine-making party is 2-6 p.m.

Sunday, Feb. 12; the dessert salon is 8 p.m.midnight Tuesday, Feb. 14, both at MG Road, 19 Wall St. mgroadlounge.com X

Life is sweet Short Street could be just the thing.

The 4-inch round cakes are $16 each; available flavors include strawberry Short Street, red wine velvet, salted caramel and gluten-free chocolate raspberry. All cakes come decorated with hearts or a short, custom message. Call 828-505-4822 to order. 225 Haywood Road

The first half of February is a busy time for chocolatiers and bakers as they work to whip up the sugary confections that sweeten Valentine’s Day. Here are a few of the local shops that are offering love-themed goodies.

RUTH & RANSHAW The Fairview bakery will offer boxes of a half-dozen truffles (flavors include white chocolate Oreo, salted caramel and peanut butter) on a first-come, firstserved basis or by preorder. Custommade cakes, pies and specialty items are also available if preordered by 4 p.m.

Wednesday, Feb. 8. On Valentine’s Day, the shop’s usual Two for Tuesday buytwo-get-two-free cupcake special will be available with love-themed decorations.

For preorders, call 828-338-9854. 1207 Charlotte Highway, Fairview KILWINS

melaasheville.com

DIY AND DESSERTS

The sweets shop’s two local locations offer a variety of heart-shaped boxes and gift baskets, which can be customized with freshly made chocolate truffles, creams, clusters and more. For the young at heart, handmade, chocolatedipped crispy rice treats, party cups and cookies will be available topped with valentine-themed candy. Chocolate roses, two flavors of house-made hot chocolate mixes and chocolate-dipped strawberries are also featured. Extended holiday hours are noon-8 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 12, 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday and Tuesday, Feb. 13-14. Call ahead to order strawberries: 828-669-6119 Black Mountain, 828-252-2639 Asheville. 116 W. State St., Black Mountain and 26 Battery Park Ave., Asheville

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SWEET HEARTS: Fairview’s Ruth & Ranshaw is one of many local bakeries and sweets TRUE CONFECTIONS shops offering artisan Valentine’s Day treats.

Photo courtesy of Ruth & Ranshaw In addition to chocolate-covered THE CHOCOLATE FETISH New this season at the Chocolate Fetish are hand-piped chocolate conversation hearts exclaiming “Kiss Me,” “Be Mine,” “Marry Me?” and other cheeky sayings. The shop will also offer its award-winning Hearts on Fire collection again this year, which includes Ancient Pleasures truffles and habanero-sea-salt and spicy pecan caramels. Chocolatecovered strawberries and Dark Desires seasonal truffles will be available as well.

36 Haywood St. HOLE The West Asheville doughnut shop will present its own special valentine to the community with an event called Hole Lotta Love 5-8 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 14. During those hours only, Hole will offer three Valentine’s Day-themed doughnuts: Persian love cake-inspired pistachio, rose and cardamom; French Broad Chocolates malt; and cherry-amaretto. 168 Haywood Road SHORT STREET CAKES For loved ones who would rather eat cake, a personal Sweetheart Cake from

strawberries, this longtime Grove Arcade shop features heart-shaped shortbread dipped in chocolate plus a variety of Valentine’s Day tarts. Call 828350-9480 to order ahead. Grove Arcade, 1 Paige Ave., No. 147 CITY BAKERY City Bakery locations will have Valentine’s Day cookies aplenty, but why not give a heart-ier sweet gift with the featured bread of the month — chocolate-cherry sourdough? Available on Fridays throughout February, it’s a decadent blend of cocoa, local Dynamite Roasting Suplicar Clemencia dark roast coffee, dark chocolate pieces and coffeesoaked dried cherries. 60 Biltmore Ave. and 88 Charlotte St. WELL BRED BAKERY Raspberry swirl cheesecake, tiramisu, strawberry eclairs, pink Champagne cake, festive cupcakes, decorated shortbread hearts and red velvet cake are just a few of the special offerings Well Bred Bakery’s two locations will offer between Friday, Feb. 10 and Tuesday, Feb. 14. 6 Boston Way, Asheville (Biltmore Village) and 26 N. Main St., Weaverville X

SMALL BITES

by Thomas Calder | tcalder@mountainx.com

Celebrating the season with Farm-to-Table Dinner Smashed and seared beets, a winter sharing salad and pork confit on Argentinian sweet-potato guiso are among the menu items included at the upcoming Farm-to-Table Dinner with chef John Fleer of Rhubarb and The Rhu restaurants. The four-course meal, which is a fundraiser for the nonprofit gardening education organization Organic Growers School, will provide a literal link between farm and table with its locale in the Yesterday Spaces event barn at Gaining Ground Farm in Leicester.

Tickets are available on a sliding scale of $75-$125 per person.

All proceeds will help the Organic Growers School keep costs down for future classes and conferences. “I see this as a community event,” says Sarah Seldin, the dinner’s coordinator. “It’s an opportunity to build connections ... and to introduce more people to Organic Growers School and local food.”

Before dinner, guests will be able to tour the working farm, then Meredith Leigh, author of The Ethical Meat Handbook, will present a talk on sustainability as it relates to the evening’s meal. The brief discussion will offer insight into the roles of good farming, mindful harvesting and culinary ingenuity in the farm-to-table movement.

“We wanted to keep the menu seasonal,” says Seldin, emphasizing the event’s focus on sustainability. “We wanted to highlight what is actually available in February.”

Cailen Campbell and the Pond Brothers will provide musical entertainment during the meal.

Seldin hopes that folks leave the event with a full belly as well as a better understanding of local foods and the seasonality of the food system.

“Our core mission is to provide education on organic growing for home growers and farmers and gardeners,” she says. “This event allows us, as a fundraiser, to do more of that. … We want to keep this kind of education accessible to everyone along the economic spectrum.”

Farm-to-Table Dinner with chef John Fleer begins at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 12, at Yesterday Spaces, 305 Sluder

bottomless buffet is $10 and includes eggs, bacon, sausage, potatoes and toast.

Guests get their first bingo card with the purchase of their meal, and subsequent cards are $2 each or three for $5. Prizes will be awarded.

The Bingo Brunch Buffet starts at noon Sunday, Feb. 12, at Ole Shakey’s, 790 Riverside Drive. For more information, visit avl.mx/3d8.

SEASONAL GREETINGS: At the Organic Growers School’s upcoming Farm-to-Table Dinner, chef John Fleer will prepare a menu that highlights local winter food options as a way to promote food sustainability. Photo courtesy of Organic Growers School

YACHT INTO PORTO CERVO Nate Allen, chef and owner of Spruce Pine’s Knife & Fork, continues his annual globally focused winter pop-up series with a weekend highlighting the cuisine of the Mediterranean island of Sardinia. A team effort with Cucina24 owner and executive

chef Brian Canipelli, Yacht into Porto Cervo features an a la carte menu of fresh, extruded pastas and herb-heavy pork and grilled sardine dishes. A chef’s tasting option is also available, which is a five-course meal for $55 per person.

Yacht into Porto Cervo runs 5-9 p.m.

Thursday-Saturday, Feb. 16-18, at Knife & Fork, 61 Locust St., Spruce Pines. Reservations are encouraged and are available by calling 828-765-1511.

Follow Knife & Fork’s Facebook page for updates on the event’s menu: avl.mx/3cd.

CASABLANCA CIGAR BAR A new cigar bar opened recently in Biltmore Village. Casablanca Cigar Bar operates as a private club, offering daily ($2) and yearly ($5) memberships. A variety of cigars is available for guests to sample and smoke in-house, and the climate-controlled humidor and retail space offers pipe tobacco and smoking accessories. There is also a fully stocked bar serving liquor, beer, wine and coffee.

Casablanca Cigar Bar is at 18 Lodge St. Hours are 9 a.m.-2 a.m. For more information, visit avl.mx/3d9. X

Branch Road, Leicester. For details and tickets, visit organicgrowersschool.org.

CHARCUTERIE WORKSHOP In addition to speaking at the Farm-toTable Dinner, Meredith Leigh will host a two-day charcuterie workshop through the Organic Growers School at Gaining Ground Farm. Those who attend will work with a half hog. According to the class description, participants will turn “every scrap of it into charcuterie, from fresh sausages to smoked hams, from pate to hard salami.” Other topics will include discussions on sustainable farming, mindful slaughter, good cooking and artisan butchering. Samples will be available throughout both days of the session. Participants will also leave with take-home items.

The workshop runs Friday-Saturday, Feb. 10-11, at Gaining Ground Farm, 298 Sluder Branch Road, Leicester. Tickets are $250 per person and include a copy of Leigh’s book, The Ethical Meat Handbook. For more information and to register, visit avl.mx/3d3.

BINGO BRUNCH BUFFET AT OLE SHAKEY’S On Sunday, Feb. 12, Ole Shakey’s will host a mix of late brunch and bingo with the Bingo Brunch Buffet. The

! y a w MX givea Find this MX Promo at mountainx.com and comment before midnight Friday, Feb. 10th for a chance to win a ticket to the Organic Growers School’s Valentine’s Weekend Farm-to-Table Dinner!

Sunday, February 12th at Yesterday Spaces in Leicester, NC • 1 Ticket to the Organic Growers School Farm-to-Table Dinner • An exquisitely prepared four-course meal by award-winning Asheville chef, John Fleer of Rhubarb • Includes a tour of Gaining Ground Farm and live dance music • For more event details visit OrganicGrowersSchool.org

Go to avl.mx/3dk to enter

mountainx.com/promo MOUNTAINX.COM

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BEER SCOUT

FOOD

by Scott Douglas | jsdouglas22@gmail.com

Beer bars Pour Taproom’s journey to its new home in Biltmore Village (not Park) was a challenging one. Leaving West Asheville was hard for owner Nate Tomforde, but the decision was largely out of his hands. The selfservice beer bar’s lease was up in October, and despite its successful run at the original Haywood Road location, the landlord refused to continue renting the space to Pour.

“I still live in West Asheville, and we got our start there, so it was emotionally difficult,” says Tomforde.

“But I think sometimes in life things are meant to be, and it gave us an opportunity to get a bigger space and to build out a kitchen, to combine the love of food and beer together by partnering with a local restaurant.

I feel like we made the best of a difficult situation.”

Seizing the opportunity, Tomforde signed a 10-year lease on a much larger location on Hendersonville Road, installing a full kitchen and partnering with North Asheville restaurant HomeGrown in the process. But the clock was ticking as Tomforde continued to pay his employees during the taproom’s hiatus. So the West Asheville bar was dismantled, permits were secured and, after the holidays, he and a crew of dedicated contractors and staff spent three weeks of sleepless nights building out the new facility.

Pour is now open and fully operational, with 48 draft lines of craft beer (and an additional 12 of wine and cider for those with gluten sensitivities) available for guests to sample at their own pace, and a full menu of Southern comfort food designed and executed by HomeGrown on offer for lunch and dinner seven days a week.

The Biltmore Village location is substantially bigger than its Haywood Road predecessor, with an expansive bar area, 75 seats for indoor dining and a 1,500-square-foot, pet-friendly outdoor patio. The new site also addresses the issue of parking that plagues many bars and other businesses in town, with more than 40 spaces available in the evenings.

Despite the expansion, the bar still feels like the original Pour.

Coffee tables made with wood from Asheville Hardware were shaped by local woodworker Fatie Atkinson,

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Pour Taproom opens in Biltmore Village; The Black Cloud joins the West Asheville bar scene The new Pour Taproom is at 2 Hendersonville Road. For more information, visit pourtaproom.com.

METAL UP YOUR GLASS

RAISING THE BAR: After losing its lease at its original West Asheville location, Pour Taproom seized the opportunity to move to a much larger space in Biltmore Village. The new facility features a total of 60 draft lines and a full kitchen serving food from North Asheville restaurant HomeGrown. Photo by Scott Douglas who used a distinctive natural staining process to obtain a slate-black finish.

Antique games, including a 1940s shuffleboard table purchased at the nearby Antique Tobacco Barn, provide plenty of distraction for patrons between pours. A woodland mural painted by Gary Ball echoes the design aesthetic of the previous bar, as does the industrial facade of the 30-foot walk-in cooler adorned with the iPads metering Pour’s self-serve Perlick flow-control taps.

The draft system inside the cooler is a meticulously organized, high-efficiency direct-draw setup installed by Arden-based Divinity Beer Systems.

Short, 4-foot draft lines simplify cleaning, and a McDantim gas blender maintains an 80/20 ratio of CO2 and nitrogen. The nitrogen is essentially inert when in contact with beer, allowing the system to push liquid without overcarbonating the beer.

A computerized flow-metering system, which Tomforde compares to those found in gas pumps, ensures that customers with no draft experience can achieve a perfect pour and are

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never charged for foam. The result is a dialed-in system that minimizes waste.

According to Tomforde, industry standard waste on a keg is 15-20 percent, while Pour is operating near 1 percent.

For Tomforde, Pour is about people. Though the business has locations in Greenville, S.C., and Santa Cruz, Calif., those bars are operated by his brother-in-law and childhood best friend, respectively, and were opened to include his loved ones in his success. Beyond the bottom line, Tomforde’s objective is the creation of employment opportunities within his community — positions with a pay scale well above industry averages. Although Pour is currently fully staffed, the demands of the restaurant may necessitate future hires.

“I’m passionate about employing people; that’s one of my greatest joys as a small-business owner,” Tomforde says. “We’re not a robot bar; we’re not eliminating jobs. Our staff operate in a host capacity, providing customers guidance and an interactive experience. For me, it’s always people first.”

The cross section of beer lovers and metalheads in Asheville is larger than you might expect — a heavy-metal-themed beer bar has quietly opened in West Asheville, and its reception has been impressive. The Black Cloud is located in a basement adjacent to The Hop at 723 Haywood Road. But owner Brett Morgan is quick to point out that, despite its underground location, it’s anything but a dive bar.

His protestations are understandable, considering the bar’s sleek, industrial interior and carefully curated beer list.

Ten taps run the gamut of styles, focusing on North Carolina breweries. Draft offerings are augmented by bottle and can selections, but there is no wine or liquor. The next keg to rotate into a draft position is listed on the menu beneath the current offering, a nice touch indicative of an attention to detail aimed at pleasing both those in the industry and beer lovers in general.

The Black Cloud seems poised to become the new local beer industry hangout, as the grand opening was attended by professionals working for Burial, Hi-Wire, Wicked Weed, New Belgium, Wedge, Twin Leaf, Highland, Bruisin’ Ales, Tasty, Hops & Vines and Tryon Distributors.

Response was unanimously and enthusiastically positive.

LPs from some of metal’s greatest bands are played from beginning to end, and classic horror movies are screened on the bar’s lone TV. But Morgan emphasizes that the bar’s appeal reaches beyond headbangers. When asked about the idea behind The Black Cloud, Morgan defies attempts at categorization.

“I would rather not try to describe the concept or direction in words,” he says. “I would rather each person formulate a description for him or herself.”

The Black Cloud is at 723 Haywood Road. Hours are 5 p.m.-midnight. X

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A R T S & E N T E R TA I N M E N T

LOVE STORY

Where to celebrate, laugh about or find romance this Valentine’s Day

BY ALLI MARSHALL

in the greater Asheville area on Monday, Feb. 13, and Tuesday, Feb 14. To order, call 866-290-7269 or visit ashevillebarbershop.com

amarshall@mountainx.com Lest you believe Feb. 14 is all about romance and chocolate truffles, according to corsinet.com, “Alexander Graham Bell applied for his patent on the telephone … on Valentine’s Day, 1876.” (He probably then gave his wife a new washboard.) In a really not-sosweet turn of events, the guy for whom the holiday is named was beheaded in 270 A.D. for performing marriage ceremonies. But somehow that bloody beginning was downplayed along the way and, by the Middle Ages, men and women were drawing names from a bowl to see whom their sweetheart would be. “They would wear these names on their sleeves for one week,” says the website — and that’s where the phrase “to wear your heart on your sleeve” comes from.

All things considered, flowers and candy aren’t so bad. And, in and around Asheville, there’s also plenty of music, comedy, dancing, dining, volunteering and even Drag Queen Bingo to commemorate Valentine’s Day. Here’s a list of places where you can be with the one you love, or love the one you’re with, however the cards fall.

For more Valentine’s Day events, visit Clubland, Calendar and mountainx.com • If you hated high school and you’re not too big a fan of Hallmark holidays, PROM 2017! might not be for you.

Or it might be the perfect immersion therapy. Or — and we really hope this is the case — you’re all in when it comes to adult proms and either reliving or redoing that most hallowed of teenage experiences. Rent your limo and your powder-blue tux: The Grey Eagle, 185 Clingman Ave., brings its own version of prom back on Tuesday, Feb. 14. The all-ages evening starts at 8 p.m. $12 advance/$15 day of show. thegreyeagle.com • Sweethearts of the Rodeo is the theme for the night at The Crow & Quill, 106 N. Lexington Ave. “Two fantastic lady-fronted honky-tonk bands will be giving us a reason to put tears in our beers this Valentine’s Day,” says a press release for the show, which features classic country-inspired quartet Cindy Lou & the Want To and country collective Hearts Gone South in one of the band’s only appearances scheduled before the spring. Tuesday, Feb. 48

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• Local jewelry maker Amber Hatchett and photographer Sara Hooker have teamed up on a Valentine’s Day pop-up shop. The two will transform Engaged Asheville, 41 N. Merrimon Ave., Suite 107, into a curated boutique with floral bouquets, handwritten valentines, gifts made by local artists, local chocolates and baked goods, a gift-wraping station and more.

The pop-up will be open Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 11 and 12, 10 a.m.-8 p.m. avl.mx/3d1 • “Most people who know him would say Bengt [Washburn] is a logistically impaired ditz,” says a press release for his upcoming Valentine’s Day show in Asheville, “but his comedy is described as intelligent, surprisingly universal considering the content matter, and profoundly funny.” The comedian, who has performed on “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson,” “Live at Gotham” on Comedy Central and “Conan,” is known for making fun of love (like his story about a canoe trip he took with his wife). He’ll bring the romance to The Grey Eagle on Saturday, Feb. 11, 7 and 9:30 p.m. $15. avl.mx/wordcant

MAKE A PLAY: The residents of Almost, Maine — in a production named for the small town — “find themselves falling in and out of love in unexpected and often hilarious ways.” The show runs through Sunday, Feb. 19, at 35below. Photo courtesy of Asheville Community Theatre 14, 9 p.m., $5-$10 suggested donation. thecrowandquill.com • Here’s one just for teens: The Biggest Valentines Party of the Year, aimed at those ages 15-19, takes place at the Masonic Temple, 80 Broadway. DJ Migo and Ron Tune spin, and there’s a dress code: “Singles wear black, ‘just having fun’ wear white and couples wear red,” according to a show flier.

Saturday, Feb. 18, 9 p.m.-12:30 a.m., $12. facebook.com/fortunetellerent MOUNTAINX.COM

• You don’t ever need to leave the house for this one: Youth chorus The Celebration Singers of Asheville will deliver love songs — along with roses and chocolate — to your sweetie’s door.

The serenades are a fundraiser for the choral group. Deliveries are made on Tuesday, Feb. 14, between 3:30 and 6:30 p.m. Packages range from $40 to $80. Place orders at 828-424-1463 or charmsfloral.com • The Asheville Barbershop Quartet also offers singing valentines

• Everything about the Friday and Saturday, Feb. 10 and 11, Drag Queen Bingo shows adds up to big love. First, the Valentine’s Day-themed events, presented by O.Henry’s, feature “the famous Lady Bunny from NYC as event emcee, drag queens from near and far, aerialists, hoopers, bingo games and other entertainment.” Even better, the shows — held at the U.S. Cellular Center, 87 Haywood St. — benefit Brother Wolf Animal Rescue. 8 p.m. both dates, $44. ticketmaster.com • “On a cold, clear, moonless night in the middle of winter, all is not quite what it seems in the remote mythical town of Almost, Me.,” says a description of the play named for the chilly town. “As the northern lights hover in the star-filled sky above, Almost’s residents find themselves falling in and out of love in unexpected and often hilarious ways.” Asheville Community Theatre brings Almost, Maine to the 35below stage, 35 E. Walnut St. The show stars Ellen Soderberg, Dylan Murray, Heather Nicole Bronson

! y a MX giveaw Find this MX Promo at mountainx.com and comment before midnight Thursday, Feb. 9th for a chance to win a pair of tickets to Brother Wolf Animal Rescue’s Drag Queen Game Nights: Trivia With the Queens!

Saturday, Feb. 11th

at the uS Cellular Center

• A Pair of Tickets to Trivia With the Queens • Event Proceeds Benefit Animals in Need • Event details at dragqueens.bwar.org

Go to avl.mx/3dm to enter

mountainx.com/promo DAUBERS READY: Comedian, DJ, actress and singer-songwriter Lady Bunny was the creator and emcee of drag festival Wigstock. The larger-than-life personality comes to Asheville to host Drag Queen Bingo, a fundraiser for Brother Wolf. Photo courtesy of Lady Bunny and John O’Neil, and is directed by Reeni Lindblom Dowd. It runs through Sunday, Feb. 19, Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m., Sundays at 2:30 p.m. $15. ashevilletheatre.org

Feb. 14, 9 a.m.-noon, noon-3 p.m., or 3-6 p.m. bwar.org

• Show some love for talented youth artists at the CommUnity Youth Spotlight with GlocalSoul Edutainment. While the monthly event, held first Tuesdays, is not specifically Valentine’s Day-themed, local musician and host Jonathan Santos discusses topics like self-acceptance and contributing to community. His aim is “creating safe spaces for youth, especially youth of color, to make their voices heard.” The open mic takes place at partnering business The Hop West, 721 Haywood Road, on Tuesday, Feb. 14, 6:30-8 p.m. Free. avl.mx/3b7

• “Sip a glass of wine and nibble on chocolates while you and your partner explore the sensual aspects of clay,” says an invite to Valentine’s Day pottery for couples, led by Cayce Kolstad and Kelsey Sickmeyer. “We’ll even help you re-enact the scene from Ghost.” Work made during the event will be glazed and fired by Kolstad and Sickmeyer “so you can have a permanent reminder of your passion for each other.” The pottery dates take place at Odyssey Center for Ceramic Arts, 236 Clingman Ave., on Friday, Feb. 10, Saturday, Feb. 11, and Tuesday, Feb. 14, 7-9 p.m.; and Sunday, Feb. 12, 4-6 p.m. $95 per couple. odysseyceramicarts.com

• Really, the best valentines are small, fuzzy, cute and K9. That’s why Brother Wolf Animal Rescue’s Puppy Grams are back, with two options. For $65, you or your sweetie gets a balloon, a cupcake, a rose, a personalized card and 15 minutes of puppy cuddle time at a location of your choosing. For $150, add a box of truffles, another 11 roses, and two puppies to snuggle. All Puppy Gram deliveries take place on Tuesday,

• Not your average blind date: The Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity hosts a Singles Build on Saturday, Feb. 11. Participants ages 21-40 volunteer a day’s work on a Habitat construction site, building a home for a local family in need, followed by a happy hour. No experience is necessary, and a $20 donation covers lunch and building materials. Register at vhub.at/AVLconstruction X MOUNTAINX.COM

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A&E

PARADE PARTY

2/26

After the parade:

by Alli Marshall

amarshall@mountainx.com

SWING SHIFT

Local dance group supports nonprofits with weekly events

• Low Down Sires • Cajun Cuisine

32 Banks Ave Asheville, NC 28801 catawbabrewing.com

IT DOES MEAN A THING: “We’re all pretty optimist-minded,” says Franklin Smith of Swing Asheville’s members. “The idea is to do more than just have a dance.” The group’s move to The BLOCK off Biltmore offered the opportunity to benefit local nonprofits.

Photo by Heather Hambor, HH Photography Even if it doesn’t necessarily look that way from the outside, swing dance provides “a community where people who don’t fit in somewhere else can find a home,” says Franklin Smith, a representative of Swing Asheville.

The local organization hosts a variety of dance events, from lessons to social gatherings that, of course, center on swing dance moves and music.

The group recently relocated its weekly events to The BLOCK off Biltmore and is now part of that venue’s Tuesday night Jazz N’ Justice series, which benefits a different charity each week through donations and a percentage of bar sales. The first dances at the new location benefited the Women’s March on Asheville. “One of the reasons Swing Asheville was interested in partnering with nonprofits is that we are a nonprofit as well,” says Smith. “All of the organizers are volunteers, and our main focus is providing a time and place for folks to gather and learn about vintage music and dance.”

Plus, “We’re all pretty optimist-minded,” says Smith of Swing Asheville’s members. “The idea is to do more than just have a dance.” The Tuesday, Feb. 14, 50

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event is appropriately Valentine’s Daythemed, with music by The Lovebugs.

Beyond the social justice component, the Tuesday night sessions offer lessons to beginners as well as intermediate instruction to those with some experience, and there’s also a dose of history. Bands that play the dances lean toward traditional jazz from the ’20s, ’30s and ’40s, such as The Low-Down Sires (“dedicated to the lost sounds of early jazz”), The Posey Quartet (“rhythm-centric arrangements of hot jazz and swing obscurities”), The House Hoppers (“swinging jazz and early-20th-century vintage pop”) and Sparrow & Her Wingmen (“early ragtime-pop to New Orleans blues”). Sparrow Pants, who fronts the latter, coordinates the weekly benefit aspect of the Jazz N’ Justice series.

“We call it vintage,” says Smith.

“There are different styles [of dance] that are represented. The Charleston is the earliest form of swing dance.

There’s even different styles of Charleston. The Lindy Hop came a little bit later. We do dance all the styles.”

Smith is a fan of the Balboa, which originated in the ’30s and ’40s, around

the time of the Lindy Hop. It’s characterized by full-body connection — something Smith thinks is often missing from contemporary socializing.

Swing dance remains relevant, he says, because so much of most people’s time is spent online. “To go out in the community and interact with people face to face is something that’s really hard to find nowadays,” he says.

“I think it’s superimportant that we get off Facebook and get out of the house. Exploring physical components” — through safe channels, such as a partner dance events — “is not something everyone has a chance to do anymore.” Dance, Smith says, counteracts a lot of the isolation that is common in modern society.

One thing local swing dance enthusiasts need never feel is isolated.

Beyond the weekly gatherings at The BLOCK off Biltmore, the website DanceAsheville.com lists a number of opportunities to cut a rug in various locations around Western North Carolina, with moves ranging from Lindy and West Coast swing, to other styles like bachata and blues.

The annual Lindy Focus — which just celebrated its 15th year, and is held in Asheville — “is an all-encompassing celebration of swing, featuring many of the world’s best dance instructors and the best live music on the planet,” according the the event’s website. Plus, says Smith, “We like to dress up. The vintage dance, the vintage music and vintage attire and hairstyles go along with it. There’s a whole subculture, which was really in effect at Lindy Focus. People go all out.” Plan to dress accordingly for the Valentine’s Day dance.

The Blue Ridge Bal, held June 30 to July 2, promises “Balboa workshops, amazing music [and] tubing.” The riparian entertainment, in past years, included a float down the French Broad complete with waterproof instruments. “We wanted to create an event to help grow the regional and local Balboa scene,” Smith says.

“Some of the fun things we did was a flash mob that we called a shuffle mob. We danced down the sidewalks and did a routine at Pritchard Park.”

The spirit of fun extends to newcomers. If, in the past, swing dance communities have been criticized for been exclusive, “We’ve really made it a point to cultivate an environment where anyone can come and feel welcome,” Smith says. The move to The BLOCK off Biltmore aids that goal by making possible a lower cover charge and bolstering community spirit.

At the events, some dancers are experienced, and others are new to swing, “but everyone has a good time,” Smith promises. He does caution that, unlike contra dance — a style that can be picked up within a couple of nights, because the moves are called and there’s no footwork involved — swing dance takes some work to master. But the lessons offered in advance of the weekly fêtes address that learning curve and, as Smith points out, “There’s no wrong way to dance.”­X

WHAT Swing Asheville swingasheville.com WHERE The BLOCK off Biltmore 39 S. Market St. theblockoffbiltmore.com WHEN Every Tuesday Beginner lesson at 8 p.m., $10 Dance at 9 p.m., $5

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A&E

by Tony Kiss

avlbeerguy@gmail.com

WHOSE TALE TO TELL? At some theaters, a big musical or classic comedy is the major part of the season. But you won’t find Rodgers and Hammerstein or Neil Simon onstage at a production by Different Strokes! Performing Arts Collective.

This group goes another route, mostly doing shows that haven’t been previously performed in Asheville, and its productions often touch on serious and provocative issues. Different Strokes is opening its seventh season on Thursday, Feb. 9, with The Submission by Jeff Talbot, about a young white playwright who has written a piece about black life that he has no personal knowledge about. Is that OK, or has he stepped over a racial barrier that should not be crossed?

Director Steph Hickling Beckman first encountered The Submission when she was asked by a friend to direct an out-of-town production of the play. “There was no way I could do that, take a month and a half to

Different Strokes opens its season with the provocative play ‘The Submission’

HARD TRUTH: “Can a writer tell a story about the hardships of a life he’s never had to experience himself?” asks a press release for The Submission, the new production by Different Strokes. The thought-provoking show asks if the attempt to diversify stories leads to cultural appropriation and casual racism. Photo courtesy of Different Strokes go and direct a play,” she says. “But then I thought, ‘Why don’t I direct it here?’” She assembled her cast — Jon Stockdale, Kirby Gibson, Travis Lowe and Maximilian Lee, and began developing this powerful story.

The tale centers on the character of Danny, a struggling playwright whose years of rejection might have come to an end. His new show seems destined for greatness. But should he hide behind a false identity and go forward with the production hoping that no one will catch on that he is white? Or is it better to be honest about who he is?

The entertainment industry has recently been forced to confront racial issues. The Academy Awards were accused of overlooking outstanding minority performances. After outrage at 2016’s “white” Oscars, there are many minority performers up for the awards this year. “Since #OscarsSoWhite, the theater and Hollywood have been criticized for their lack of diversity and whitewashing of characters,” says a press release for The Submission. “But is the attempt to diversify the stories we tell just another example of cultural appropriation? ... Throughout The Submission, [characters] Danny, Pete, Trevor and Emilie must confront the ugliness of casual racism and the shock of how deeply they misunderstand each other.”

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In Asheville, there is a similar racial situation, though few ever speak about it, Beckman says. “Asheville theater is exceptionally white,” she says. “We have few actors and actresses of color who get picked [for parts repeatedly].

Asheville is not that diverse.

“I have not wanted to say that [minority performers] are not welcome, but I would audition and get offered the role of the maid,” Beckman continues. “It has gotten better in recent years, [but] it has a long way to go.”

She has been able to break down barriers with Different Strokes, and other local companies such as Anam Cara and Attic Salt “have had more diverse casting, and we’re excited to see that,” Beckman says. “And the Montford Park Players has made it their mission to have more diversity in their Shakespeare productions.”

Beckman says she wants her audiences to think after seeing a Different Strokes production. The Submission may make some feel uncomfortable, but hopefully those viewers will also reconsider their thought process and perspectives.

After Friday and Saturday night performances, a post-show discussion offers the audiences an opportunity to pose questions. Part of the proceeds from the run of performances goes to Asheville Writers in the Schools, a local nonprofit program that links working writers with students, teachers and community members. X

WHAT The Submission

by Different Strokes!

Performing Arts Collective WHERE The BeBe Theatre 20 Commerce St. WHEN Thursdays-Saturdays Feb. 9-25, at 7:30 p.m. $15 opening weekend (online sales only)/ $18 advance/$21 door differentstrokespac.org

A&E

by Jeff Messer

upstge@yahoo.com

BEYOND THE FOLD The story of country music’s long-lost forefather Lesley “Esley” Riddle was born in 1905 in Burnsville and lived in Kingsport, Tenn., as a young man. It was there, in 1928, that he met budding musician A.P. Carter. It was not only the beginning of The Carter Family’s career as recording artists — they’d go on to become country music royalty — it was the beginning of the recording and broadcast industries. Riddle helped Carter gain access to rural musicians and storytellers who shared their songs.

Riddle would work out the music on guitar, and Carter would write down the words.

Still, no one knew much about Riddle either before or after the Carter family became a household name. Riddle was a black man traveling with a white man in the Jim Crow-era South. Once, in a small cafe in Georgia, when the owners refused to serve Riddle, Carter declared that they would not be serving him as well. That story and others were uncovered by folk musician and folklorist Mike Seeger in the mid-’60s.

“Mother” Maybelle Carter told Seeger in an interview that she learned much of her legendary guitar style from Riddle. Her admission made sense: Riddle had lost two fingers on his picking hand in a gun accident in his youth (he was also missing his right leg from the knee down). The missing fingers caused him to adjust his playing style, and Maybelle adopted that technique as Riddle taught her songs.

Seeger sought Riddle out, and together they made a number of recordings over several years, documenting Riddle’s life with the Carter Family, as well as the origins of many of the songs for which the country artists were famous. The songs Riddle played for Seeger were familiar, but more raw, more bluesy and less refined than the versions the Carters recorded.

Desegregation allowed Riddle’s place in music to come to light.

Among the discoveries was how Riddle lived with the Carters over periods of time, even helping to raise their children when A.P. and his wife, Sarah, divorced. The children credited Riddle with their

HELLO STRANGER: African-American musician and Burnsville native Lesley “Esley” Riddle helped to shape the sound of legendary country artists The Carter Family. After being discovered by folklorist Mike Seeger, he appeared at the Smithsonian and Mariposa folk festivals. Photo by Kitty Smith, and courtesy of Traditional Voices Group very survival as their father became distant and despondent.

When Riddle died in Asheville, in 1980, he had finally achieved some degree of recognition for his contributions to the origins of country music. Efforts are ongoing to give him formal recognition within the Country Music Hall of Fame and official circles. His legacy lives on in Burnsville, where he still has family and a loyal base of fans. In 2009, this writer penned Esley, a stage play based on Riddle’s life, which premiered at Parkway Playhouse and was reprised in 2015. X

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SMART BETS

A&E

by Emily Glaser | Send your arts news to ae@mountainx.com

An Exposé of Fashion Asheville photographer and Xpress Best of WNC readers poll winner Micah Mackenzie opens his latest exhibition, Black History Month in Photo Prose or An Exposé of Fashion, at UNC Asheville. The display is a tribute to the city’s African-American community. Mackenzie, a 25-year resident of Asheville, hopes to offer a unique perspective on the town and its black history through his photographs. The collection features local models in scenes that meld modern Asheville and African roots through current fashion. “Being black, I have my own narrative of how America looks to me, and I wanted to show a little bit of my perspective,” Mackenzie says.

The salute to local black history will be on view at the UNCA Intercultural Center, HIG 114, through Sunday, Feb. 26, with an artist reception on Monday, Feb. 13, at 5:30 p.m. msp.unca. edu. Photo by Micah Mackenzie

Lydia Peelle “I have been road tripping to beautiful Asheville for many years, as a sort of honorary roadie for my husband’s band, Old Crow Medicine Show,” says Nashville, Tenn.-based author Lydia Peelle. “Nothing in Asheville is nearly so rock ’n’ roll as Malaprop’s, a bookstore that I find to always be humming and crackling with electricity, full of people and books and inspiring conversation and ideas.” It’s here that she’ll host a celebration of her first novel, The Midnight Cool. Already a recipient of multiple literary awards, including two Pushcart Prizes and an O. Henry Prize, Peelle’s debut novel is a Tennessean tale of war, love and — like all good Southern stories — mules.

Husband Ketch Secor will provide musical accompaniment for the reading, which takes place on Sunday, Feb. 12, at 3 p.m. malaprops.com. Photo by Andrea Behrends

Folk Art at TC Arts The Transylvania Community Arts Council fosters the arts through a variety of programs, classes and special events, including up to 12 new exhibitions at the TC Arts Council Gallery every year. This February the organization will host a show with deep ties to the Carolinas: folk art by regional artists. Featuring work in a variety of mediums from North and South Carolina makers, the exhibit will run Feb. 10-28. “I love that folk art centers on strong forms in simple arrangements and explores the rich possibilities of ordinary materials,” says artist Deane Bowers. “I am excited to share my environmental folk art in Western North Carolina and celebrate recycling as an art form.” Those interested in meeting the artists can attend a reception at TC Arts on Friday, Feb. 10, at 5 p.m. tcarts.org. “The Hallelujah Choir” by Bowers

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Salvation in Steel One of the most recognizable of Asheville’s buskers is Abby Roach, aka the Spoon Lady. With the recent release of a debut album by her band The Fly By Night Rounders and YouTube video views in the millions, she’s reached celebrity status. Want to get to know the performer? She’ll be sharing stories and songs during the fourth annual Salvation in Steel event. “It’s just a window into a part of my past,” Roach says. “I talk a little bit about what it’s like to live with nothing and to place yourself in the hands of human nature.” It’s not just a chance for the Spoon Lady to share her personal narrative, it’s also a welcome performance during the slow season for local buskers. Roach and The Fly By Night Rounders play at The Mothlight on Sunday, Feb. 12, at 7:30 p.m. $12/$15. themothlight.com. Photo courtesy of David Joe Miller

MOUNTAINX.COM

A& E CA L EN DA R

by Abigail Griffin

‘MUTTS GONE NUTS’: Expect the unexpected as canines and comedy collide in Mutts Gone Nuts, a popular touring show that is making a stop at the Flat Rock Playhouse on Saturday, Feb. 11 at 1 and 5 p.m. The show features talented rescue animals doing a variety of stunts in a show that promotes rescue animal adoption and is deemed a “must see” by The Washington Post. Tickets are $28 for adults and $14 for students and are available at flatrockplayhouse.org. Photo of Mutts Gone Nuts courtesy of the Flat Rock Playhouse. (p. 56) ART ART AT WCU bardoartscenter.wcu.edu • TH (2/9), 3:30-5:30pm - “Africa, Cultural Exchange and Soft Diplomacy” roundtable discussion with curator Stephanie Beck Cohen and gallery walk related to the Soft Diplomacy: Quilting Cultural Diplomacy in Liberia exhibition. Held in the Bardo Fine Arts Center.Free.

• TH (2/9), 6pm - “Piecing a Quilt Top” activity in conjunction with the Soft Diplomacy: Quilting Cultural Diplomacy in Liberia. Free. Held in the Bardo Fine Arts Center CAROLINA’S NATURE PHOTOGRAPHERS ASSOCIATION asheville.cnpa-regions.org/ • SU (2/12), 5:30pm "Optimizing Photos for Printing," presentation by Jeff Miller and monthly meeting. Free. Held in the UNC Asheville, Reuter Center

ODYSSEY COOPERATIVE ART GALLERY 238 Clingman Ave., 285-9700, facebook.com/odysseycoopgallery • SA (2/11), 11am5pm - "Second Saturday Celebration," with food, muic and artists' demonstrations.

Free to attend.

TRYON ARTS AND CRAFTS SCHOOL 373 Harmon Field Road, Tryon, 859-8323 • TH (2/9), noon-1pm - Crafts & Conversation Series: Presentation by Monica Stevenson on horse photography. Bring your own lunch.

Free.

• FR (2/10), 6pm - Wine & Crafts Series: "Date Night Shag Dancing," with Petra Brooks. $40.

• SA (2/11), 10am-1pm - Coffee & Crafts Series: "Heart-Shaped Basket Weaving," workshop With Pam Herres. $40.

AUDITIONS & CALL TO ARTISTS ASHEVILLE AREA ARTS COUNCIL 258-0710, ashevillearts.com • Through WE (2/15) Submissions accepted for the Asheville Art in the Park Arts & Community Grant application. Contact for full guidelines. Information session: Wednesday, Jan. 18, 5pm.

Held at The Refinery, 207 Coxe Ave. • Through MO (5/15) Applications accepted for the 2017 Professional Development Grant for Artists.

Contact for full guidelines.

HENDERSONVILLE COMMUNITY THEATRE 229 S. Washington St., Hendersonville, 692-1082, hendersonvillelittletheater.org • Through WE (2/15) Submissions accepted for the 2017 "New Playwright Series."

Contact for full guidelines.

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E T H I O P I A N R E S TAU R A N T

Happy Valentine’s Day from Addissae!

MONTFORD PARK PLAYERS 254-5146, montfordparkplayers.org • Through WE (3/1) - Open call for directors and technical staff.

Contact for full guidelines.

SALUDA ARTS FESTIVAL 817-2876, saluda.com/events_artfestival.html • Through FR (3/17) - Vendor and performer applications accepted for the Saluda Arts Festival scheduled for Saturday, May 20.

TRANSYLVANIA COMMUNITY ARTS COUNCIL 349 S. Caldwell St., Brevard, 884-2787, tcarts.org • FR (2/10) through TU (2/28) - Folk Art, juried group exhibition. Reception: Friday, Feb. 10, 5-7pm.

$40 Dinner for Two: Includes:

•Choice of Vegetarian or Meat Messobs •2 glasses of Latue’s Organic Tempranillo •Chocolates and Flowers

MUSIC

Delicious, Authentic, Farm-to-Table Ethiopian Cuisine!

ANDALYN • THIS FRIDAY (PD.) Wild Wing Asheville, Downtown Biltmore Avenue presents ANDALYN, 9:30pm, Friday, February 10. A CMA artist featuring Zach Haney guitar, Harry Lewis drums, returns with a power packed night of Rock, Blues, Cool Country, and unique originals.

LUNCH 11:30-3 •DINNER 5-9, 9:30 FRI-SAT In the International District in downtown Asheville

48 COMMERCE STREET (Behind the Thirsty Monk)

828-707-6563 www.addissae.com

ASHEVILLE CHAMBER MUSIC SERIES 259-3626, ashevillechambermusic.org • SU (2/12), 4pm - The Asheville Chamber Music Series: Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quintet concert featuring works by Reicha, Haas, Milhaud and Nielsen. $40.. Held at Diana Wortham Theatre, 2 S. Pack Square ASHEVILLE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA 254-7046, ashevillesymphony.org • SA (2/11), 8pm - Masterworks Series: "Music from Fantasia," featuring guest pianist Inon Barnatan and music from Mussorgsky, Shostakovich, Ponchielli and Stravinsky. $22 and up. Held at Thomas Wolfe Auditorium, 87 Haywood St. BLACK MOUNTAIN CENTER FOR THE ARTS 225 W. State St., Black Mountain, 669-0930, blackmountainarts.org • SA (2/11), 7:30pm - Zoe & Cloyd Valentine’s concert, bluegrass. $16.

BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/ depts/library • SA (2/11), 2-3pm - Michael

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Jefry Stevens plays the songs of Irving Berlin. Free. Held at Pack Memorial Library, 67 Haywood St. • TU (2/14), 2pm - “Appalachian Love & Murder Ballads,” with Iren and Mark Moser. Free.

Held at the Swannanoa Library, 101 West Charleston St. CALDWELL COMMUNITY COLLEGE 2855 Hickory Blvd., Hudson, 726-2200, cccti.edu • TH (2/16), 1pm - Diali Cissokho concert, percussion from Senegal. Free. Held in B-100 CITY OF MORGANTON MUNICIPAL AUDITORIUM 401 South College St. Morganton, 433-SHOW, commaonline.org • FR (2/10), 7:30pm - Live From Nashville, music and dance. $18-$26.

FLAT ROCK PLAYHOUSE DOWNTOWN 125 S. Main St., Hendersonville, 693-0731, flatrockplayhouse.org • THURSDAYS through SUNDAYS (2/16) until (2/26) - The Music of the Beatles.

Thurs.: 7:30pm. Fri. & Sat.: 8pm. Sat. & Sun.: 2pm. $15$30.

FLOOD GALLERY FINE ART CENTER 2160 US Hwy 70, Swannanoa, 273-3332, floodgallery.org/ • TH (2/9), 7pm - "Songs of Love and Revolution," concert with Ash Devine, singer-songwriter. Free.

HENDERSON COUNTY LIBRARY 301 N. Washington St., Hendersonville, 697-4725, henderson.lib.nc.us • WE (2/8), 6:30pm - M. King Goslin, guitar concert. Free.

J.E. BROYHILL CIVIC CENTER 1913 Hickory Blvd., SE Lenior, broyhillcenter.com • SA (2/11), 7:30pm Concert with Hot Rize, bluegrass. $30/$16 students & children/$13 for pre-show dinner.

PUBSING 254-1114 • 2nd SUNDAYS, 6-8pm Gospel jam and sing-along.

Optional snack time at 5:30pm.

Free to attend. Held at French Broad Brewery, 101 Fairview Road VOICES IN THE LAUREL voicesinthelaurel.org • SA (2/11), 3pm - “My Funny Valentine,” jazz and show music concert featuring the Laurel Strings Ensemble. $15/$10

advance. Held at Hart Theatre, 250 Pigeon St., Waynesville

THEATER 35BELOW 35 E. Walnut St., 254-1320, ashevilletheatre.org • FRIDAYS through SUNDAYS (2/3) until (2/19) - Almost, Maine, romantic comedy. Fri. & Sat.: 7:30pm. Sun.: 2:30pm. $15.

DIFFERENT STROKES PERFORMING ARTS COLLECTIVE 275-2093, differentstrokespac.org • THURSDAYS through SATURDAYS (2/9) until (2/25), 7:30pm - The Submission. $21/18 advance. Held at BeBe Theatre, 20 Commerce St. FLAT ROCK PLAYHOUSE 2661 Highway 225, Flat Rock, 693-0731, flatrockplayhouse.org • SA (2/11), 1pm & 5pm - Mutts Gone Nuts, comedy show featuring rescue animals. $28/$14 students.

NC STAGE COMPANY 15 Stage Lane, 239-0263 • WEDNESDAYS through SUNDAYS until (2/19) - Jeeves In Bloom. Wed.-Sat.: 7:30pm.

Sat. & Sun.: 2pm. $14-$60.

PUBLIC EVENTS AT ASU 262-2000, appstate.edu • WE (2/8), 7pm - Jessica Lang Dance, classical ballet and contemporary dance performance. $25. Held at the Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts THE MAGNETIC THEATRE 375 Depot St., 279-4155 • THURSDAYS through SATURDAYS until (2/25), 7:30pm - Money and How To Make It! $25/$21 advance.

THEATER AT WCU 227-2479, bardoartscenter.wcu.edu • WEDNESDAY through SUNDAY (2/15) until (2/19) King Lear. Wed.-Sat.: 7:30pm.

Sun.: 3pm. $16/$11 faculty and seniors/$10 students. Held in Hoey Auditorium.

TRYON LITTLE THEATER 516 S. Trade St., Tryon, 8592466, tltinfo.org • THURSDAY through SUNDAY (2/16) until (2/19), 8pm - The Drowsy Chaperone, musical comedy. $11-$22.

GALLERY DIRECTORY AMERICAN FOLK ART AND FRAMING 64 Biltmore Ave., 281-2134, amerifolk.com • Through MO (2/27) - Miniature Show, group exhibition of miniature paintings. Reception:

GREEN SAGE CAFE - WESTGATE 70 Westgate Parkway, 785-1780, greensagecafe.com • Through SA (4/15) - 20 Below, underwater photography exhibition by John Highsmith.

Friday, Feb. 10, 5-7pm.

HABITAT TAVERN & COMMONS

ART AT UNCA art.unca.edu

174 Broadway St, habitatbrewing.com • Through TU (2/28) - Exhibition of work by Leah Mangum.

• Through FR (2/10) - Exhibition of new works by

HICKORY MUSEUM OF ART

printmaker Jonathan Fisher. tional juried exhibition of contemporary drawing.

243 3rd Ave., NE Hickory, 327-8576 • Through (5/21) - Solitude & Mystery, exhibition featuring works by John Julius Wilnoty.

Held in the S. Tucker Cooke Gallery in Owen Hall

JUBILEE COMMUNITY CHURCH

• Through FR (2/17) - Senior BFA exhibition of the Highsmith Intercultural Gallery

46 Wall St., 252-5335, jubileecommunity.org • Through TU (2/28) - Exhibition of paintings by Cecil Bothwell.

• Through SU (2/26) - An Expose of Fashion, Black

PUBLIC LECTURES AT UNCA

History Month photography exhibition by Micah

unca.edu • SU (2/12) through FR (4/7) - Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933-1945, traveling exhibition produced by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Reception: Thursday, Feb. 16, 5:30-6:45pm. Held in Ramsey Library SU (2/12) through FR (4/7) - Pioneering Voices: Portraits of Transgender People, traveling exhibition produced by Family Diversity Projects. Reception: Thursday, Feb. 16, 5:30-6:45pm. Held in Karpen Hall

• Through FR (2/17) - Drawing Discourse, interna-

fiber installation created by Sally C. Garner. Held in

MacKenzie. Reception: Monday, Feb. 13, 5:307pm. Held in the Highsmith Union Intercultural Center ART AT WCU bardoartscenter.wcu.edu • Through (5/5) - Soft Diplomacy: Quilting Cultural Diplomacy, exhibition. Reception: Thursday, Feb. 9, 6-7pm. Held in the Bardo Fine ArtsCenter ART IN THE AIRPORT 61 Terminal Drive Fletcher • Through TH (3/16) - The Student Artwork Showcase, exhibition of WNC student art.

ASHEVILLE AREA ARTS COUNCIL 258-0710, ashevillearts.com • Through FR (2/17) - CMYK (cyan - magenta - yellow - black), mixed media exhibition. Held at The Refinery, 207 Coxe Ave.

painting exhibition.

373 Harmon Field Road, Tryon, 859-8323 • FR (2/3) through FR 3/17) - Red-Carpet Artist Of The Year, exhibition.

BLACK MOUNTAIN COLLEGE MUSEUM & ARTS CENTER

TRYON FINE ARTS CENTER

BUNCOMBE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARIES buncombecounty.org/governing/depts/library • Through TU (2/28) - Exhibition of the art of James Cassara. Held at West Asheville Library, 942 Haywood Road CRUCIBLE GLASSWORKS 60 Clarks Chapel Road, Weaverville, 645-5660, crucibleglassworks.com • Ongoing - Exhibition of the glass work of Michael Hatch.

(River Ridge Shopping Center)

299-1145 • www.mrksusedbooks.com

THE REFINERY

TRYON ARTS AND CRAFTS SCHOOL

tion.

800 Fairview Road Asheville

67 Broadway, 785-1357, craftcreativitydesign.org • Through WE (5/20) - The Good Making of Good Things, exhibition exploring the 1941-1979 Craft Horizons publication.

• Through TU (2/28) - For the Love of Art, group

Photographers of Black Mountain College, exhibi-

Over 10,000 SQ FT of used books, CDs, DVDs, collectibles, video games, audio books, vinyl records, comic books & more!

THE CENTER FOR CRAFT, CREATIVITY & DESIGN

ashevillegallery-of-art.com

• Through WE (5/20) - Begin To See: The

VINYL RECORDS, CDS, DVDS

BUY • SELL • TRADE

Used Books, CD’s DVD’s & more

360 Asheville School Road, 254-6345, ashevilleschool.org • Through FR (3/3) - Counterpoint, abstract oil and cold wax paintings by Douglas Lail.

82 Patton Ave., 251-5796,

56 Broadway, 350-8484, blackmountaincollege.org

GET YOUR FIX.

Mr. K’s

THE ASHEVILLE SCHOOL

207 Coxe Ave., ashevillearts.com • Through FR (2/17) - Susanna Euston: Nature in Abstract, exhibition.

ASHEVILLE GALLERY OF ART

THE GEEK THE COLLECTOR THE ENTHUSIAST THE FANatic THE connoisseur THE aficionado

34 Melrose Ave., Tryon, 859-8322, tryonarts.org • Through SA (3/4) - Contemporary Modernist, paintings by Eric McRay. UPSTAIRS ARTSPACE 49 S. Trade St., Tryon, 859-2828, upstairsartspace.org • Through SA (2/11) - Have a HeArt, silent auction exhibition benefiting for Big Brothers Big Sisters.

• Through WE (3/10) - Tripping the Light Fantastic, exhibiton of the art of Veronika Hart and Dabney Mahanes.

VORTEX DOUGHNUTS 32 Banks Ave #106, vortexdoughnuts.com • Through TU (2/28) - Doughnut Art Show, exhibition of ceramic and painted doughnuts created by Evergreen elementary students.

Contact the galleries for admission hours and fees

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CLUBLAND ALTAMONT THEATRE BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet (Cajun, zydeco, folk), 8:00PM

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 8

ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Will Ray & The Space Cooties, 7:00PM

185 KING STREET Vinyl Night, 6:00PM 5 WALNUT WINE BAR Les Amis (African folk music), 8:00PM

BARLEY'S TAPROOM & PIZZERIA Alien Music Club (jazz), 9:00PM

550 TAVERN & GRILLE Karaoke, 8:00PM

Valentease Show for Our Voice theblockoffbiltmore.com 2/11, 8PM - $10

39 S. Market St., Downtown Asheville

BEN'S TUNE-UP Chris Coleman Blues Experience, 8:00PM

ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Brad Hodge & friends (singersongwriter), 7:00PM

BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Patrick Fitzsimons (roots music), 7:00PM

BARLEY'S TAPROOM & PIZZERIA Dr. Brown's Team Trivia, 8:30PM

BONFIRE BARBECUE Social Function, 8:30PM

BEN'S TUNE-UP Soul Magnetics (soul, R&B, funk), 7:00PM

CLASSIC WINESELLER "Wine, WOW & More" (FolkMoot USA benefit), 6:00PM

BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Open Mic w/ Mark Bumgarner, 7:00PM

CROW & QUILL Carolina Catskins (gritty ragtime jazz), 9:00PM

BONFIRE BARBECUE Trivia Funtime w/ Kelsey, 8:00PM

DOUBLE CROWN Sonic Satan Stew w/ DJ Alien Brain, 10:00PM

BROADWAY'S Broadway HumpDay Variety w/ DJ NexMillen, 9:00PM

FLOOD GALLERY FINE ART CENTER "Songs of Love and Revolution" w/ Ash Devine, 7:00PM

BYWATER Cocktail night w/ DJ Dr. Filth, 9:00PM

FOGGY MOUNTAIN BREWPUB King Garbage (Americana, soul), 9:00PM

CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE Open mic jam w/ Riyen Roots & friends, 7:00PM

FRENCH BROAD BREWERY Tina Collins Duo (folk), 6:00PM

DOUBLE CROWN Classic Country Vinyl w/ DJ David Wayne Gay, 10:00PM GOOD STUFF Jim Hampton & friends perform "Eclectic Country" (jam), 7:00PM GREY EAGLE MUSIC HALL & TAVERN Brody Hunt & the Handfuls w/ Bryan Marshall & his Payday Knights (honky-tonk, country), 7:00PM HENDERSON COUNTY LIBRARY An Evening w/ M. King Goslin, 6:30PM HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Woody Wood Wednesdays (rock, soul, funk), 5:30PM ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL An evening w/ Flagship Romance [CANCELLED] An Evening w/ Letters to Abigail, 7:00PM

ONE WORLD BREWING Bean Tree Remedy, 8:00PM

JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Old-time session, 5:00PM

POUR TAPROOM Pizza Karaoke, 7:00PM

LAZY DIAMOND Killer Karaoke w/ KJ Tim O, 10:00PM

SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Karaoke, 7:00PM

LOBSTER TRAP Ben Hovey (dub, jazz), 6:30PM

THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE Single Mingle (music, games), 8:00PM

ODDITORIUM Synergy Story Slam, 7:30PM Cardinal State w/ Strange Avenues & Nomadic (metal) , 9:00PM ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Evil Note Lab, 9:00PM

58

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

NO SIGNS OF SLOWING: After 42 years of touring, one might assume alt. country icon Fred Eaglesmith is nearing the end of the road.

But the veteran singer-songwriter is sharper than ever, bringing tears to Tom Waits’ eyes and cheers from legions of “Fred Heads” with his bittersweet lyrics and lachrymose twang. Come get your nostalgia on Saturday, Feb. 11 when Fred Eaglesmith returns to Asheville for a 8 p.m. show at Asheville’s Altamont Theatre. Photo by Tweten’s Photography

MOUNTAINX.COM

PILLAR ROOFTOP BAR 3 Cool Cats (50s & 60s vintage rock, swing), 7:00PM

THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Bingo night w/ Nude Canoe, 7:00PM THE SOCIAL LOUNGE DJ Phantom Pantone (international soul, R&B), 8:00PM

TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES Blues & Soul Jam (blues, soul), 9:00PM UPCOUNTRY BREWING COMPANY Widescreen Wednesday w/ Slightly Stupid Live, 7:00PM WILD WING CAFE Jason Whittaker (acoustic), 6:30PM WILD WING CAFE SOUTH Paint Nite "The Milky way for the first time", 7:00PM

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 9 5 WALNUT WINE BAR Pleasure Chest (blues, rock, soul), 8:00PM

GREY EAGLE MUSIC HALL & TAVERN Freestyle Funny Comedy Show w/ BDAHT, Darren "Big Baby” Brand & more, 8:00PM HOPS AND VINES Sam & I (guitar duo), 7:00PM ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL An evening w/ RUNA, 7:00PM The Aaron Austin Trio, 9:15PM JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Bluegrass jam, 7:00PM LAZY DIAMOND Heavy Night w/ DJ Butch, 10:00PM

PURPLE ONION CAFE Laura Blackley & The Wildflowers (folk, country, soul), 7:30PM SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Emily Bodley (singer-songwriter), 7:00PM SOUTHERN APPALACHIAN BREWERY Ellen Trnka & Carrie Morrison, 7:00PM THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE Unite! Open mic night w/ Asher Leigh (sign up @ 7 p.m.), 7:30PM THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Tricky Trivia w/ Sue, 8:00PM THE MOTHLIGHT Jackson Harem w/ The Cannonball Jars & Kingdom and Classes, 9:00PM TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES Jesse Barry & The Jam (live music, dance), 9:00PM UPCOUNTRY BREWING COMPANY Eric Congdon & Billy Cardine, 7:00PM Peggy Ratusz & Eric Talb, 8:00PM WILD WING CAFE Mike Snodgrass (acoustic), 6:00PM WILD WING CAFE SOUTH Darren Nicholson (acoustic), 7:00PM WXYZ LOUNGE AT ALOFT HOTEL WXYZ Unplugged w/ Stevie Lee Combs, 8:00PM

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10 5 WALNUT WINE BAR CaroMia & Ryan Oslance Duo (soul, R&B), 9:00PM 550 TAVERN & GRILLE Daddy Rabbit (blues), 9:00PM ALTAMONT THEATRE Reasonably Priced Babies (improv comedy), 8:00PM ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Joe McMurrian, 7:30PM

LOBSTER TRAP Hank Bones ("The man of 1,000 songs"), 6:30PM

ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Col. Bruce Hampton & Madrid Express (blues, rock), 9:00PM

ODDITORIUM InAeona (metal), 9:00PM

BEN'S TUNE-UP Woody Wood (acoustic, folk, rock), 8:00PM

ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Mitch's Totally Rad Trivia Night, 6:30PM Vibe & Direct (electronic, jam), 10:00PM ONE WORLD BREWING Rossdafareye, 8:00PM OSKAR BLUES BREWERY Circus Mutt (bluegrass), 6:00PM PULP The Blackout Diaries (comedy), 9:00PM PISGAH BREWING COMPANY February Thursday Residency w/ The Big Deal Band (old-time, bluegrass), 6:00PM

BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Acoustic Swing, 7:00PM CATAWBA BREWING SOUTH SLOPE Carolinabound (singer-songwriter duo), 7:00PM CORK & KEG Frank Lee & Allie Burbrink (bluegrass), 8:30PM CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE Andy Ferrell (folk, Americana), 7:00PM CROW & QUILL Poesy Quartet (swing jazz), 9:00PM

DIANA WORTHAM THEATRE Edwin McCain (indie, rock, pop), 8:00PM DOUBLE CROWN Garage & Soul Obscurities w/ DJ Greg Cartwright, 10:00PM FLOOD GALLERY FINE ART CENTER Classic World Cinema, 8:00PM FOGGY MOUNTAIN BREWPUB Freeway Revival (rock, soul), 10:00PM GOOD STUFF Ben Sparaco (singer-songwriter, rock, blues), 8:00PM GREY EAGLE MUSIC HALL & TAVERN Mike Live Birthday Bash w/ Free The Optimus, King Garbage & special guests, 9:00PM HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Imperium Russian Imperial Stout release w/ The Lazy Birds, 7:00PM ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL An evening w/ Amy Steinberg, 7:00PM Randall Bramblett Band, 9:00PM JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Wyatt Yurth & the Gold Standard (western swing), 9:00PM K LOUNGE DJ Phantom Pantone (Korean pop, trap, dance), 10:00PM LAZY DIAMOND Rock 'n' Soul DJ, 10:00PM LOBSTER TRAP Calico Moon, 6:30PM LUELLA'S BAR-B-QUE Ashley Heath (folk), 8:00PM LUELLA'S BAR-B-QUE BILTMORE PARK Carver & Carmody (Americana), 8:00PM NEW MOUNTAIN THEATER/ AMPHITHEATER Hemispheres, The Mantras & Sanctum Sully (jam rock), 9:00PM ODDITORIUM Lifecurse w/ Built On The Ruins, I,The Supplier & 8 Vacant Graves (metal), 9:00PM ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Free Dead Fridays w/ members of Phuncle Sam, 5:00PM Lagoons (jam, rock), 10:00PM

ONE WORLD BREWING Liz Brasher & Her Band, 9:00PM

TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES Company Swing (swing), 7:00PM The Jordan Okrend Experience (blues, dance), 10:00PM

ORANGE PEEL P.O.S. w/ Ceschi Ramos (hip hop), 9:00PM OSKAR BLUES BREWERY J.J. Hipps (blues), 6:00PM

TWISTED LAUREL Request-powered dance party w/ Phantom Pantone, 10:30PM

PACK'S TAVERN DJ MoTo (dance hits, pop), 9:30PM

US CELLULAR CENTER Drag Queen Bingo, 8:00PM

PISGAH BREWING COMPANY Gaslight Street (blues, rock), 8:00PM

WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN Pierce Pettis (singer-songwriter), 8:00PM

ROOT BAR NO. 1 The Whiskey Riders (Americana, Southern rock), 7:00PM

WILD WING CAFE A Social Function (acoustic), 9:00PM

SALVAGE STATION Ryan "RnB" Barber's Funk Soul, 9:00PM

WXYZ LOUNGE AT ALOFT HOTEL WXYZ Electric w/ Ben Hovey, 8:00PM

SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Hunnilicious (Americana), 8:00PM

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 11

SCARLET'S COUNTRY DANCE CLUB Open Mic night w/ Sam Warner, 8:00PM THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE Jordan Okrend & Rachel Waterhouse (singer-songwriter), 7:00PM World Beat Dance Party w/ DJ Selecta Red iyah, 10:00PM THE DUGOUT FineLine, 9:00PM

5 WALNUT WINE BAR Chuck Lichtenberger (eclectic piano), 6:00PM Jason Moore & Trust Trio (jazz, funk), 9:00PM 550 TAVERN & GRILLE Karaoke, 8:00PM ALTAMONT THEATRE Fred Eaglesmith w/ special guests (alt. country), 8:00PM ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Joe McMurrian, 7:30PM

THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Bean Tree Remedy (acoustic, folk, eclectic), 8:00PM THE MOTHLIGHT Morbids w/ Kortriba & Lebaron (chamber punk, Motown), 9:30PM THE SOCIAL LOUNGE Ultra Lounge w/ Phantom Pantone, 10:00PM THE SUMMIT AT NEW MOUNTAIN AVL Sol Vibes Valentine's Day Kickoff w/ DJ Dara, 8:00PM TIGER MOUNTAIN Friday Nite Mash Up w/ B-Boy Evan & Nex Millen, 10:00PM

ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Concrete Community (N.) w/ DJ Hillbilly Ocean, The DiMarcos & Pleasures of the Ultraviolent, 3:00PM BEN'S TUNE-UP Gypsy Guitar Trio (gypsy folk), 3:00PM The WildCard (funk, dance), 9:30PM

Fri•Feb 10 Imperium Imperial Russian Stout

Release Party 4-9pm Music by Ashley Heath & Her Heathens 7-9pm

Sat•Feb 11

Island 2 Highland Winter Reggae Showcase 6-10pm (FREE) Music by CHALWA, Mystic Vibrations, & Snake Oil Medicine Show

Tue•Feb 14

Valentine’s Day Dessert & Beer Pairing 4-8pm check website for details

BLACK MOUNTAIN ALE HOUSE Big Deal Band (bluegrass), 7:30PM BLACK MOUNTAIN CENTER FOR THE ARTS Zoe & Cloyd w/ Will Straughan (bluegrass, Americana), 7:30PM

TOWN PUMP Breadfoot w/ JC Tokes (country), 10:00PM

BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Billy Litz (Americana, ragtime), 7:00PM

TOY BOAT COMMUNITY ART SPACE Love Who You Want QORDS Benefit (family-friendly drag), 7:00PM

CATAWBA BREWING SOUTH SLOPE Fin Dog (bluegrass, folk, ragtime), 7:00PM

2.9 10PM Vibe & Direct (Jam/Electronic) Ca$h Donation ONE STOP

COL. BRUCE HAMPTON and Madrid Express

LaGoons

2.10 9 PM

AMH

2.10 10PM

ONE STOP

2.11 3PM

AMH

2.11 10PM

ONE STOP

(IDES Fundraiser) adv. $15 (Jam/Rock) Ca$h Donation

CONCRETE COMMUNITY (n.)

FREE!

(River Arts Ride-able Sculpture Park Fundraiser)

C2 & The Brothers Reed w/ Lord Nelson

(Rock) Ca$h Donation MOUNTAINX.COM

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

59

CLU B LA N D

TAVERN

CLUB ELEVEN ON GROVE Class of 65 Reunion (ole skool hip hop, R&B, soul), 9:00PM

Downtown on the Park Eclectic Menu • Over 30 Taps • Patio 14 TV’s • Sports Room • 110” Projector Event Space • Shuffleboard Open 7 Days 11am - Late Night Our Winter Warme r Specials Sun-Thur!

Try eals On Your F t ea D avorite Food & Drink! r G

CORK & KEG Menage-a-Swing (Gypsy jazz), 8:30PM

East Asheville’s Craft Beer Destination • 29 Taps

And

FRI. 2/10 DJ MoTo

$3.50 DAILY PINTS

(dance hits, pop)

THIS WEEK at THE CREEK

SAT. 2/11 Crocodile Smile

MON Monday Burger + Trivia w/ Ian - 7pm

(classic covers, rock)

TUE WED

6PM DOORS

BRODY HUNT AND THE HANDFULLS + BRYAN MARSHALL & HIS PAYDAY KNIGHTS

THU

7PM DOORS

2/10 Free The Opti mus

8PM DOORS

2/11

MIKE LIVE BIRTHDAY BASH W/

Wings + Open Mic Jam w/ Roots & Friends - 8pm Chef’s Choice

FRI

Fish n’ Chips + Andy Ferrell - 8pm

SAT

$6 BBQ Pulled Pork Sandwiches + King Garbage - 7pm

SUN

jane kramer

6PM DOORS

Feb. 14th 7-10pm Win “date night” packages!

If you’re single - we’ll pair you up!

Complimentary Food/Drink/Live Music

OPEN MIC NIGHT 6PM SLICE OF COMEDY OPEN MIC 9:30PM

PROM 2017!

JOHN GINTY FEAT. ASTER PHEONYX

2/21 SKYDYED 2/22 WAYLAND (UNPLUGGED)

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

DOUBLE CROWN Pitter Platter w/ DJ Big Smidge (50's/60's R&B, rock 'n' roll), 10:00PM FOGGY MOUNTAIN BREWPUB Soldado (rock), 10:00PM FRENCH BROAD BREWERY Skylarks (indie, rock), 6:00PM GOOD STUFF Banjo Mitch McConnell (folk, oldtime), 8:00PM GREY EAGLE MUSIC HALL & TAVERN Valentine's Comedy Show w/ Bengt Washburn & Wendy Wroblewski (comedy), 7:00PM Valentine's Comedy Show w/ Bengt Washburn & Wendy Wroblewski, 9:30PM HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Island to Highland winter reggae showcase w/ Chalwa, Mystic Vibrations & Snake Oil Medicine Show, 6:00PM

PURPLE ONION CAFE Peggy Ratusz (blues, jazz, swing), 8:00PM

LAZY DIAMOND Sonic Satan Stew w/ DJ Alien Brain, 10:00PM

RENAISSANCE ASHEVILLE HOTEL A Night in Paris w/ The Gay Men's Chorus of Asheville (benefit for Cantaria), 6:30PM

LOBSTER TRAP Sean Mason Trio (jazz), 6:30PM

SALVAGE STATION Head for the Hills, 7:30PM

MARS HILL RADIO THEATRE Hope Griffin w/ Ashlar Sargent, 7:00PM

SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Yoga w/ Cats with Blue Ridge Humane Society, 10:00AM Todd Cecil & Back South, 8:00PM

NEW MOUNTAIN THEATER/ AMPHITHEATER Hemispheres, The Mantras & The Digs (jam rock), 9:00PM ODDITORIUM Joyboy w/ Mariner, Pig Latin & Gullible Boys (screamo, punk, indie), 9:00PM ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL C2 & The Brothers Reed w/ Lord Nelson (rock), 10:00PM ORANGE PEEL Kid Hop Hooray (children's wintertime dance party), 10:00AM Ms. Lauryn Hill (R&B, neo soul, hip hop), 10:00PM OSKAR BLUES BREWERY Calvin Get Down (funk), 6:00PM PACK'S TAVERN Crocodile Smile (classic covers, rock), 9:30PM

SOUTHERN APPALACHIAN BREWERY Ross Osteen & Crossroads, 8:00PM THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE Conscious Comedy Night, 7:00PM Valentease Burlesque Show (benefit for Our Voice), 8:00PM Latin Rhythms & Salsa w/ DJ Malinalli, 10:00PM THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Alarm Clock Conspiracy (indie rock), 8:00PM THE SOCIAL LOUNGE Ultra Lounge w/ Phantom Pantone, 10:00PM THE SUMMIT AT NEW MOUNTAIN AVL The King's Thing (Asheville Mardi Gras King's party), 8:00PM

Valentine’s Day Food Specials

6PM 6PM DOORS DOORS

2/12 2/13 2/14

BENGT WASHBURN

(TWO SHOWS 7:00 & 9:30) W/ WENDY WROBLEWSKI

CROW & QUILL Tom Waits for No Man (Tom Waits tribute), 9:00PM

JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Woody Wood & The Ends (rock, soul), 9:00PM

PISGAH BREWING COMPANY Roots of a Rebellion w/ Positive Mental Attitude (roots, reggae, ska), 9:00PM

Sunday Nachos

AND KING GARBAGE FUNNY BUSINESS PRESENTS

2/17 SUSTO 2/18 DRIVIN N CRYIN

60

THU

Tacos!

7PM DOORS

TUE

MON SUN

BDAH T & DARREN 2/9 “BIG BABY” BRAN D

FRI

FREESTYLE FUNNY COMEDY SHOW

SAT

WED

20 S. Spruce St. • 225.6944 packStavern.com

2/8

BREWS

CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE King Garbage (soul), 7:00PM

ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL Daydream Creatures w/ Brooke & Nick, 7:00PM Laurel Lee & the Escapees w/ The Wobblers, 9:00PM

Parties of 10+, please call ahead

MOUNTAINX.COM

FRI - 2/10 • 8PM PEGGY RATUSZ (BLUES/JAZZ) Expires 2-28-17

SAT - 2/11 • 3-7PM

Little Crafty (CRAFT FAIR)

SAT - 2/11 • 9PM JERRY PRANKSTERS (JERRY GARCIA COVER BAND)

THOMAS WOLFE AUDITORIUM "Music From Fantasia" w/ The Asheville Symphony, 8:00PM TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES The King Zeros (delta blues), 7:30PM Jim Arrendell & The Cheap Suits (live music, dance), 10:00PM

SOUTHERN APPALACHIAN BREWERY The Dan Keller Trio, 5:00PM THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE Equal Means Equal (documentary screening), 4:00PM

TWISTED LAUREL Dance Party w/ Phantom Pantone, 10:30PM

THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Laura Blackley (folk, country, soul), 8:00PM

US CELLULAR CENTER Trivia with the Queens, 8:00PM

THE MOTHLIGHT Salvation In Steel w/ Abby the Spoon Lady & The Fly By Night Rounders (storytelling, old-time), 7:30PM

UPCOUNTRY BREWING COMPANY "Something sweet for your Sweetie" (craft show), 3:00PM Jerry Pranksters (Jerry Garcia Band tribute), 9:00PM WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN Asheville Jazz Orchestra, 7:30PM WXYZ LOUNGE AT ALOFT HOTEL WXYZ Live w/ Crooked Old River, 8:00PM

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 12 185 KING STREET 185 Jam Sessions w/ Mike Guggino & Mike Ashworth, 12:00PM 5 WALNUT WINE BAR Purple (funk, jazz), 7:00PM ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Guitar Bar Jam, 3:30PM BEN'S TUNE-UP Dub Kartel (reggae, dub), 6:00PM BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Larry Dolamore (acoustic), 7:00PM BYWATER Grateful Sunday (Grateful Dead covers), 8:00PM

2/09 thu jackson harem

THE IMPERIAL LIFE DJ Phantom Pantone (french pop, disco house), 9:30PM

w/the cannonball jars, kingdoms and classes

2/10

fri

morbids

(album release) w/ kortriba, lebaron

THE OMNI GROVE PARK INN Bob Zullo (rock, jazz, pop), 7:00PM

2/11

sat david joe miller storytelling presents:

salvation in steel with

abby and the fly by night rounders

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 13

2/13 mon

185 KING STREET Open Mic Night w/ Chris Whitmire, 6:00PM

free monday!

gardener

free!

w/ debtors prism, falcon mitts

5 WALNUT WINE BAR Siamese Jazz Club (soul, R&B, jazz), 8:00PM

' 2/14 tue valentine s cover show!

in dudero (nirvana covers) ' w/ aberdeen, the franks (90 s), fashion bath (pavement covers)

ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR AGB Classical Guitar Mondays, 7:00PM BEN'S TUNE-UP Open Mic Night, 7:00PM

Woodpecker Pie

BYWATER Open mic w/ Rooster, 8:00PM

Savory and Sweet Hand Pies!

5pm to last call

CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE Trivia night, 7:00PM

Yoga at the Mothlight

DOUBLE CROWN Country karaoke w/ KJ Tim O, 10:00PM

Tues., Thurs., and Sat. 11:30am Details for all shows can be found at

GOOD STUFF Songwriter's "open mic", 7:30PM

themothlight.com

CATAWBA BREWING SOUTH SLOPE Andy Ferrell (bluegrass, folk, Americana), 6:00PM DIANA WORTHAM THEATRE Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quartet, 4:00PM DOUBLE CROWN Killer Karaoke w/ KJ Tim O, 10:00PM GREY EAGLE MUSIC HALL & TAVERN Jane Kramer (folk, Americana), 7:00PM HABITAT TAVERN & COMMONS Acoustic Sundays, 4:00PM HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Reggae Sunday w/ Dennis "Chalwa" Berndt, 1:00PM ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL Larry Mangum, 5:30PM A Vintage Valentine Dance w/ Russ Wilson & his Famous Orchestra, 7:30PM JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Irish session, 5:00PM LAZY DIAMOND Punk Night w/ DJ Chubberbird & Hard Mike, 10:00PM LOBSTER TRAP Hunnilicious, 6:30PM ODDITORIUM Sam Fox's Sweet 16 (punk), 9:00PM ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Bluegrass brunch w/ Aaron "Woody" Wood, 11:00AM Bastard Bearded Irishmen (Celtic punk), 9:00PM ORANGE PEEL Ms. Lauryn Hill (R&B, neo soul, hip hop), 9:00PM PISGAH BREWING COMPANY Sunday Travers jam, 6:00PM SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Carrie Morrison (singer-songwriter), 2:00PM SCANDALS NIGHTCLUB Miss & Mr Sweetheart Pageant (drag show), 9:00PM

MOUNTAINX.COM

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

61

CLU B LA N D

Send your listings to clubland@mountainx.com

JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Quizzo, 7:00PM Open Mic Night, 9:00PM LOBSTER TRAP Bobby Miller & Friends (bluegrass), 6:30PM ODDITORIUM Risque Monday Burlesque w/ Deb Au Nare, 9:00PM

Where The Blue Ridge Mountains Meet the Celtic Isles

MONDAYS Quizzo – Brainy Trivia • 7:30pm Open Mic Night • 9pm CAJUN TWO STEPPIN’ TUESDAYS Every Tuesday in Feb. • 7pm Gumbo, Po Boys and more!

WEDNESDAYS Asheville’s Original Old Time Mountain Music Jam • 5pm THURSDAYS Mountain Feist • 7pm Bluegrass Jam • 9:30pm Bourbon Specials

YURTH FRI &WYATT THE GOLD STANDARD 2/10 9PM / $5 WOOD SAT WOODY AND THE 2/11 9PM / $5 ENDS

FRI THE OLD CHEVROLET SET 2/17 9PM / $5 IRISH SUNDAYS Irish Food and Drink Specials Traditional Irish Music Session • 3-9pm

OLE SHAKEY'S Honky Tonk Karaoke, 9:00PM

COMING SOON wed 2/8

7:00PM –LETTERS TO ABIGAIL thu 2/9

7:00PM –RUNA 9:15PM –AARON AUSTIN TRIO IN THE LOUNGE fri 2/10

7:00PM– AMY STEINBERG

9:00PM– RANDALL BRAMBLETT BAND sat 2/11

7:00PM– DAYDREAM CREATURES WITH BROOKE & NICK 9:00PM– LAUREL LEE AND THE ESCAPEES

WITH THE WOBBLERS sun 2/12

62

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14

OSKAR BLUES BREWERY Mountain Music Mondays (open jam), 6:00PM

5 WALNUT WINE BAR The John Henrys (hot jazz), 8:00PM

THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Trivial trivia w/ Geoffrey & Brody, 8:00PM

550 TAVERN & GRILLE Mountain Shag Club (shag music, dancing), 7:00PM ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR AGB Gypsy Jazz Jam Tuesdays, 7:00PM ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Tuesday night funk jam, 11:00PM BEN'S TUNE-UP Eleanor Underhill (Americana, roots, fusion), 7:00PM BLACK MOUNTAIN ALE HOUSE Trivia Night, 7:30PM BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Erin Kinard, 7:00PM BONFIRE BARBECUE Thunder karaoke w/ Jason Tarr, 8:00PM BYWATER Open Drum Circle, 6:00PM Spin Jam, 9:00PM CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE King Garbage (soul), 7:00PM CROW & QUILL Cyndi Lou & The Want To w/ Hearts Gone South (country, honky-tonk), 9:00PM

7:00PM–GINA SICILIA

HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Valentine's Day Dessert & Beer Pairing, 4:00PM

tue 2/14

7:30PM– TUESDAY BLUEGRASS SESSIONS wed 2/15 7:00PM–BRIE CAPONE AND FRIENDS:

GOOD STUFF Old time-y night, 6:30PM GREY EAGLE MUSIC HALL & TAVERN Prom 2017! w/ John Ginty (blues), 8:00PM

ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL An evening w/ Gina Sicilia, 7:00PM Tuesday bluegrass sessions w/ Jack Devereux & friends, 7:30PM

NEWMUSIC

JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Cajun Two-Steppin' Tuesdays, 7:00PM

thu 2/16

LAZY DIAMOND Valentine's Dance Party w/ DJ Oskar Malinalli & Abu Disarray (benefit), 10:00PM

8:30PM– ALASH 7:00PM –BOB BOVEE WITH THE CAROLINA CUD CHEWERS

8:30PM –THE CHARLES WALKER BAND W/ BYGONE BLUES DUO FT. PEGGY RATUSZ fri 2/17

7:00PM–AYREHEART 9:00PM –DIRTY DOZEN BRASS BAND ISISASHEVILLE.COM

CRAFT BEER, SPIRITS & QUALITY PUB FARE SINCE 1996

DINNER MENU TIL 9:30PM LATE NIGHT MENU TIL 12AM

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

THE SOCIAL LOUNGE Karaoke, 8:00PM

DOUBLE CROWN Honky-tonk, Western & Cajun night w/ DJ Brody Douglas Hunt , 10:00PM

WITH THE GET RIGHT BAND

252.5445 • jackofthewood.com

THE OMNI GROVE PARK INN Bob Zullo (rock, jazz, pop), 7:00PM

5:30PM– LARRY MANGUM 7:00PM–A VINTAGE VALENTINE DANCE : RUSS WILSON AND HIS FAMOUS ORCHESTRA

OPEN MON-THURS AT 3 • FRI-SUN AT NOON

95 PATTON at COXE • Downtown Asheville

THE MOTHLIGHT Gardener w/ Debtors Prism & Falcon Mitts (electronic, psychedelic), 9:00PM

TUES-SUN 5PM-until 743 HAYWOOD RD 828-575-2737

MOUNTAINX.COM

LOBSTER TRAP Jay Brown (folk, singer-songwriter), 6:30PM ODDITORIUM Free open mic comedy night w/ Tom Peters, 9:00PM OLE SHAKEY'S Booty Tuesday, 11:00PM ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Turntable Tuesdays, 10:00PM ONE WORLD BREWING TRIVIA! w/ Ol' Gilly, 7:00PM Beats & Brews w/ DJ Whistleblower, 9:00PM PILLAR ROOFTOP BAR Tuesday blues dance w/ The Remedy (blues), 7:30PM SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Taco and Trivia Tuesday, 6:00PM THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE Valentine's Day Dance w/ Swing Asheville & The Lovebugs (jazz, swing, love songs), 9:00PM Vintage Blues Dance, 11:00PM

THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Open jam w/ Rob Parks & Chuck Knott, 7:00PM THE MOTHLIGHT In Dudero w/ Aberdeen, The Franks & Fashion Bath (Nirvana, 90s, Pavement covers), 9:00PM

JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Old-time session, 5:00PM LAZY DIAMOND Killer Karaoke w/ KJ Tim O, 10:00PM LOBSTER TRAP Ben Hovey (dub, jazz), 6:30PM

TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES Early Jazz & Funk Jam (funk, jazz), 9:00PM

NEW MOUNTAIN THEATER/ AMPHITHEATER Anders Osborne & The Ghost of Paul Revere (folk), 9:00PM

WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN Irish sessions & open mic, 6:30PM

ODDITORIUM Electric Phantom w/ The Generic Terrors & Tombstone Highway (metal), 9:00PM

WILD WING CAFE Carolina Blue & The Dixie Darlins, 6:00PM

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15 185 KING STREET Vinyl Night, 6:00PM 5 WALNUT WINE BAR Les Amis (African folk), 8:00PM 550 TAVERN & GRILLE Karaoke, 8:00PM ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Brad Hodge & friends (singer-songwriter), 7:00PM ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL The Werks & Russ Liquid w/ Funk You (funk, rock), 9:00PM BARLEY'S TAPROOM & PIZZERIA Dr. Brown's Team Trivia, 8:30PM BEN'S TUNE-UP Soul Magnetics (soul, R&B, funk), 7:00PM BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Open Mic w/ Billy Owens, 7:00PM BONFIRE BARBECUE Trivia Funtime w/ Kelsey, 8:00PM BROADWAY'S Broadway HumpDay Variety w/ DJ NexMillen, 9:00PM BUFFALO NICKEL Spoken Word open mic w/ Pete Koschnick & Gary Sizer (storytelling), 7:00PM BYWATER Cocktail night w/ DJ Dr. Filth, 9:00PM CORK & KEG Jesse Lege Cajun Dance & The Running of the Winos (Cajun, accordian), 6:00PM CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE Open mic jam w/ Riyen Roots & friends, 7:00PM CROW & QUILL Live Horror Movie Score w/ Andrew Fletcher & Drayton Aldritch (1922 Haxan), 9:00PM DOUBLE CROWN Classic Country Vinyl w/ DJ David Wayne Gay, 10:00PM GOOD STUFF Jim Hampton & friends perform "Eclectic Country" (jam), 7:00PM HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Woody Wood Wednesdays (rock, soul, funk), 5:30PM ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL Brie Capone & friends, 7:00PM An evening w/ Alash, 8:30PM

ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Evil Note Lab, 9:00PM ONE WORLD BREWING Billy Litz, 8:00PM PULP TRiG w/ Trip Gang & Slu (hip hop), 8:00PM PILLAR ROOFTOP BAR 3 Cool Cats (50s & 60s vintage rock, swing), 7:00PM SALVAGE STATION McLovins w/ Hayley Jane & The Primates, 9:00PM THE BLOCK OFF BILTMORE WNC Female Musician's Soiree w/ Peggy Ratusz (Girls on the Run benefit), 7:00PM THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Kathryn Proctor & Dan Falkenstein, 7:00PM THE MOTHLIGHT Luxury Club w/ Metaphonia & The Volt Per Octaves (math rock, dance), 9:00PM THE SOCIAL LOUNGE DJ Phantom Pantone (international soul, R&B), 8:00PM

BEN'S TUNE-UP Chris Coleman Blues Experience, 8:00PM BLUE MOUNTAIN PIZZA & BREW PUB Patrick Fitzsimons (roots music), 7:00PM BONFIRE BARBECUE Social Function, 8:30PM

LIVE MASHUP: FRI 6-9 PM IGGY RADIO: ONE MAN BAND

ISIS RESTAURANT AND MUSIC HALL An evening w/ Bob Bovee & The Carolina Cud Chewers, 7:00PM The Charles Walker Band w/ Bygone Blues Duo & Peggy Ratusz, 8:30PM

VINYL NIGHT: FRI 10:30 PM - 1:30 AM WITH DJ KILBY GYPSY JAZZ: SAT 3-6 PM GYPSY GUITAR TRIO: INSTUMENTAL JAZZ

JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Bluegrass jam, 7:00PM

FUNKY DANCE PARTY: SAT 10 PM - 1 AM THE WILDCARD: FUNK FUSION

LAZY DIAMOND Heavy Night w/ DJ Butch, 10:00PM

GOOD VIBE REGGAE: SUN 6-11 PM THE DUB KARTEL: ROOTS/ ROCK /REGGAE

LOBSTER TRAP Hank Bones ("The man of 1,000 songs"), 6:30PM ODDITORIUM Pedalstrike (punk), 9:00PM ONE STOP AT ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Mitch's Totally Rad Trivia Night, 6:30PM Findog (bluegrass, Americana), 10:00PM

195 Hilliard Ave Asheville Nc

ONE WORLD BREWING Pendulum Trio, 8:00PM

PURPLE ONION CAFE Red Hot Sugar Babies (jazz), 8:00PM

BARLEY'S TAPROOM & PIZZERIA Alien Music Club (jazz), 9:00PM

BREWS N' BLUES: THURS 8-11 PM THE CRIS COLEMAN BLUES EXPERIENCE

HIGHLAND BREWING COMPANY Community Night w/ Eblen Charities (benefit), 4:00PM

WILD WING CAFE Paint Nite "Love is in the Air", 7:00PM

ASHEVILLE GUITAR BAR Will Ray & The Space Cooties, 7:00PM

SOUNDS OF THE SOUTH: WEDS 7-10 PM SAVANNAH SMITH & THE SOUTHERN SOUL

FRENCH BROAD BREWERY Chris Jamison's Ghost (Americana), 6:00PM

PISGAH BREWING COMPANY February Thursday Residency w/ The Big Deal Band (old-time, bluegrass), 6:00PM

ALTAMONT THEATRE Deja Fuze (prog. rock, fusion), 8:00PM

SOULFUL TUNES: TUES 7-10 PM RHODA WADER: ECLECTIC SOULFUL SOUNDS

FOGGY MOUNTAIN BREWPUB Ashley Heath Duo (folk, Americana), 9:00PM

TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES Blues & Soul Jam (blues, soul), 9:00PM

5 WALNUT WINE BAR Pleasure Chest (blues, rock, soul), 8:00PM

February's Weekly Lineup

DOUBLE CROWN Sonic Satan Stew w/ DJ Alien Brain, 10:00PM

ORANGE PEEL Josh Garrels & John Mark McMillan [SOLD OUT], 9:00PM

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16

Tune Into The Tune-Up's Local Music Scene

CROW & QUILL Carolina Catskins (gritty ragtime jazz), 9:00PM

THOMAS WOLFE AUDITORIUM Alakazam Magic Show, 4:30PM

WILD WING CAFE SOUTH Ashley Heath (acoustic), 6:00PM

Ben's

CREEKSIDE TAPHOUSE Chris Hendrick Band (alt. pop, rock), 7:00PM

SALVAGE STATION Groove Fetish w/ Electric Love Machine, 9:00PM SANCTUARY BREWING COMPANY Billy Litz (soul, Americana), 7:00PM SOUTHERN APPALACHIAN BREWERY Carver & Carmody, 7:00PM THE JOINT NEXT DOOR Tricky Trivia w/ Sue, 8:00PM THE MOTHLIGHT The Moth: True Stories Told Live ("Love Hurts" storytelling), 7:00PM TRESSA'S DOWNTOWN JAZZ AND BLUES Jesse Barry & The Jam (live music, dance), 9:00PM WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN The Blue-Eyed Bettys (Americana), 7:30PM WILD WING CAFE SOUTH Jason Whittaker (acoustic), 6:00PM WXYZ LOUNGE AT ALOFT HOTEL WXYZ Unplugged w/ Sarah Tucker, 8:00PM

MOUNTAINX.COM

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

63

MOVIES

REVIEWS & LISTINGS

BY SCOTT DOUGLAS, JOHNATHAN RICH & JUSTIN SOUTHER

HHHHH = H PICK OF THE WEEK H

Director Pablo Larraín and star Natalie Portman dig deep into the heart of Jackie

Jackie HHHH DIRECTOR: Pablo Larraín PLAYERS: Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup, John Hurt, Richard E. Grant, John Carroll Lynch, Beth Grant, Max Casella, Caspar Phillipson BIOGRAPHICAL DRAMA RATED R THE STORY: Jackie Kennedy struggles to cope with her husband’s death and maintain her composure under intensive public scrutiny in the weeks following JFK’s assassination.

THE LOWDOWN: A moving emotional portrait that sheds new light on the internal landscape of an iconic American figure and the turmoil surrounding a pivotal moment in American history, earning Natalie Portman a well-deserved Oscar nod in the process.

Pablo Larraín shoulders the dubious burden of debuting two films within two weeks of each other (at least here in Asheville), meaning that those films will inevitably be compared to one another. Yes, Jackie and Neruda are

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both fictionalized biographical portraits of significant political from the same director — and this is unfortunate, as they’re starkly different pictures that should be allowed to stand on their own merits rather than being judged as bastard siblings. However, they do bear one significant similarity — that being that Larraín seems to be allergic to making a standard biopic. For this cinematic gift among many others, I am thankful to him.

Jackie is less concerned with historical detail than with emotional verisimilitude, and a great deal of that visceral expressionism can be chalked up to Natalie Portman’s remarkable performance. Portman has more than earned the Oscar nomination she received for the role, embodying Jackie Kennedy as an immediately recognizable screen presence without diverging into imitation. The mannerisms, the breathy voice sometimes slipping from poised selfcontrol into an unchecked New England accent, even the subtle nuances of facial expression, all capture the former first lady while still remaining a character of

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Portman’s own design. The consistency with which she maintains her portrayal is impressive, and the emotive range she covers is a remarkable accomplishment.

Of course, part of the credit for what Portman pulls off has to go to Jackie’s deceptively simple yet inventive script, penned by Noah Oppenheim. My shock at this authorship should be understandable, considering Oppenheim’s only other writing credits are contributions to tween-lit adaptations Allegiant and The Maze Runner — and prior to that questionable curriculum vitae, he was best known as a producer for reality TV and cable news shows. His screenplay utilizes the famed “Camelot” interview published in LIFE Magazine — with Billy Crudup standing in as a fictionalized proxy for journalist Theodore H. White — as a framing device to bookend an evocative portrait of a woman in the midst of a very public crisis.

Larraín and Oppenheim structure their story carefully, getting the assassination of JFK (mostly) out of the way in a brutal first act. This leads into a contemplatively paced second act in

M A X R AT I N G which we see Jackie struggle to maintain a strong front in the face of aggressive overtures from Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson (a subdued but suitably sleazy John Carroll Lynch and Beth Grant) while quietly breaking down around confidants Bobby Kennedy (a stellar Peter Sarsgaard), secretary Nancy Tuckerman (a gracious Greta Gerwig) and John Hurt in one of his final performances, a sadly appropriate role as the Kennedys’ family priest.

Watching Portman’s Jackie plan a funerary procession to top Lincoln’s and try to explain to her painfully young children the intricacies of assassination is as heart wrenching as it is galvanizing, and Larraín deftly avoids exploiting the tragedy of the scenario.

If Jackie lacks the subversive humor of Neruda — although it does boast the most depressing “trying-on-outfits” montage in the history of cinema, so unremittingly bleak that it borders on black comedy — Larraín’s auteurial signature remains intact, his eye for character and detail supported by an understated visual style. But the aesthetic and narrative world he creates, like the supporting cast, is here to enable Portman’s portrayal of Jackie Kennedy. When we see her regain her composure in the third act, sticking it to noted douchebag Jack Valenti (Max Casella) and editing Crudup’s article on the spot with icy resolve, it becomes clear that this story has a complete (and completely gratifying) character arc that adds a new dimension to an oft-examined historical personage whose internal struggle I now realize I’d never adequately considered.

While part of me would like to see Isabelle Huppert take home the statue for her bizarre performance in Elle, Portman is going to be hard to beat when the Academy voters cast their ballots. Then again, I have a lousy track record with Oscar picks, so your guess is probably as good as mine when it comes down to it at the end of the month.

Either way, you’ll kick yourself if you miss this film, not only for Portman’s performance, but for the humanization and emotional shading it adds to a beloved American icon. Rated R for brief strong violence and some language.

Now playing at Fine Arts Theatre.

REVIEWED BY SCOTT DOUGLAS JSDOUGLAS22@GMAIL.COM

Rings H DIRECTOR: F. Javier Gutiérrez’s PLAYERS: Matilda Lutz, Alex Roe, Johnny Galecki, Vincent D’Onofrio, Aimee Teegarden, Bonnie Morgan, Chuck Willis, Patrick Walker, Zach Roerig HORROR RATED PG-13 THE STORY: The demonic-girl-crawlsout-of-a-well video is back to kill more unsuspecting viewers, but this time she has the internet on her side. Also, her biological dad is revealed to have been a creep. Go figure.

THE LOWDOWN: An unnecessary sequel to a franchise I’d long considered dead, Rings contributes nothing of value to the mythos and somehow manages to detract from the low-fi spookiness of the originals with its updated CG effect work.

In a classic example of going back to a dry well, cash-hungry producers have inflicted upon unsuspecting audiences an entirely redundant third installment in a 15-year-old franchise with director F. Javier Gutiérrez’s Rings. I can’t remember when I took it upon myself to watch Gore Verbinski’s 2002 American version or Hideo Nakata’s vastly superior 1998 Japanese original, but I recall being impressed by both. The question of when that date falls is significant (to me, anyway) in that I started film school in 2002, so the callouses of critical cynicism that currently shield my eyes were not yet fully formed. I don’t know if either film would hold up for me today (2005’s The Ring Two didn’t the first time around), a question that’s largely based on how profoundly silly Rings is and how heavily indebted it is to its predecessors.

The plot, scripted by David Loucka and Jacob Estes with a polish from producer Akiva Goldsman, is essentially just a retread of the demonicgirl origin story covered in the first two American films with an updated internet-heavy twist. But its complete inability to recapture the charm of the initial J-horror version left me wondering if anyone involved actually took the time to watch the damned thing. The dialogue is some of the most insipid and uninspired in any modern horror film I’ve seen, with characters referencing events they should have no knowledge of strictly for the audience’s potential benefit. Why should Johnny Galecki mention that a VCR containing the cursed tape from the first film came from the estate of a young man killed

in a plane crash? Because the writers don’t trust the audience to remember the cold-open that happened five minutes prior, that’s why. This sort of thing is unfortunately to be expected, as Loucka took a 10-year break from writing following Eddie, the Whoopi Goldberg coaches the Knicks “comedy” (and hasn’t done anything of note since), while Goldsman will likely never earn my forgiveness for last year’s The Fifth Wave.

The film isn’t only derivative at the level of plotting, as director Gutiérrez similarly doesn’t seem to have an original idea to call his own. His sad assortment of tepid jump scares borrows liberally from such other ill-conceived fright flicks as the Final Destination series and the unendurable Unfriended while also (probably unintentionally) lifting the climax from Don’t Breathe (albeit to drastically diminished effect). More damningly, he violates the maxim established

by Val Lewton’s work — and notably dramatized by Kirk Douglas in Vincente Minnelli’s The Bad and The Beautiful — by showing the audience too much too soon and leaving nothing to the imagination. As if all that weren’t bad enough, he employs the ring itself as one of the laziest visual motifs ever committed to celluloid (not that this was shot on celluloid). He seems to be laboring under the delusion that the more often he shows a circle the more significant it will become, passing the point of diminishing returns well before the first act is over. (At one point, a character drinks a prominently placed Coke Zero because a zero looks like a ring. Get it?) It’s a good thing Gutiérrez didn’t direct The Ring Two or it would’ve been called The Ring TOO just so he could fit one more in.

The performances might be the least objectionable aspect of this debacle, but that’s not to say they’re good. You could be forgiven for thinking that Galecki had too much Big Bang Theory money and Vincent D’Onofrio had too much integrity to stoop to slumming on this level, but you’d be wrong. I could go on for pages about all of the specific details that made me angry I had to sit through this film, but then I’d be doing my audience a disservice on par with the atrocities committed by the filmmakers responsible for this dreck. It should suffice to say that watching Rings won’t kill you — but sometimes what doesn’t kill you makes you dumber. Rated PG-13 for violence/ terror, thematic elements, some sexuality and brief drug material.

Now Playing at Carmike 10, Regal Biltmore Grande, Epic of Hendersonville.

REVIEWED BY SCOTT DOUGLAS JSDOUGLAS22@GMAIL.COM

The 2017 Oscar Nominated

Animated Short Films HHHH

DIRECTOR: Various PLAYERS: Various SHORT ANIMATION COMPILATION RATED NR THE STORY: This year’s nominees in consideration for the Best Animated Short Academy Award.

THE LOWDOWN: While some are better than others (as usual), this year’s batch of animated Oscar nominees is worth a look for anyone interested in short-form animation.

This year’s batch of animated shorts are either stronger than in years past, or my memory isn’t what it used to be (honestly, both could be true). One is great, two are very nearly as good, and the likely winner comes second-to-last in my qualitative estimation — but will probably take the prize on the basis of its technical virtuosity and mass appeal.

Borrowed Time.

Directors: Andrew Coats, Lou Hamou-Lhadj.

Country: USA. 7 min. Despite its Western setting and seemingly juvenile aesthetic, Borrowed Time is a deceptively moving piece of filmmaking, and possibly the closest on this list to functioning as pure cinema.

Sporting only five spoken words of dialogue, it tells the story of a world-weary sheriff reflecting on a formative trauma from his youth, harboring a decades-old regret that threatens to consume him until a fortuitously placed memento literally draws him back from the brink of the abyss. My only complaint with this one is the tonal dissonance between its style and content, but beyond that, it’s remarkably affective.

Pearl. Director: Patrick Osborne.

Country: USA. 6 min. A schmaltzy and disorganized heartstring-tugging

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melodrama told from the point of view of a car, as it houses a singledad slacker who makes his living busking from town to town until he decides to settle down for his daughter’s sake. Predictable teen-rebellion and subsequent reconciliation ensue.

By a wide margin my least favorite of the bunch, this one feels like it could easily have been a car insurance ad aimed at listless Millennials.

Blind Vaysha. Director: Theo Ushev. Country: Canada. 8 min. By far my favorite of this year’s nominees, which probably indicates that it hasn’t got a chance of winning.

Vaysha is a young girl born with one eye that only sees the past, while the other only sees the future, leaving her blind to the present. Told with a mythic, fairytale structure through a beautifully rendered animation style that evokes German Expressionist woodblock prints, the parable relayed through Vaysha’s story is both timely and well executed. Probably the only one of this year’s animated shorts that I’d like to rewatch for my own benefit.

Pear Cider and Cigarettes.

Director: Robert Valley. Countries: Canada and UK. 35 min. Up there in terms of enjoyability with Borrowed Time but not on the level of significance or subtlety with Vaysha,

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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M OVIES Pear Cider and Cigarettes recounts the autobiographical tale of writerdirector-animator Valley’s mission to a retrieve a self-destructive childhood friend who is drinking himself to death while awaiting a liver transplant in China. An intensely personal freewheeling narrative with a consistently distinctive and engaging animation style, my chief complaint with this is that it goes on ten or fifteen minutes too long. Your mileage may vary on that count.

Piper. Director: Alan Barillaro.

Country: USA. 6 min. Those of you who saw Finding Dory probably caught Piper before the feature. It’s a technical masterpiece, and may well end Pixar’s fifteen-year losing streak in the animated short category. Originally conceived as a test animation in new techniques for modeling difficult textures such as sand and feathers, it absolutely succeeds in that regard. As a marginally fleshed-out narrative, its highly derivative and uninspired. It worked well as an intro to a kids’ movie like Dory, and it absolutely cements Pixar’s preeminent position as the leading animation studio in the world, but its saccharinity and lack of purpose left me cold. If I had to guess, I’d say this is your presumptive Oscar winner.

Not Rated.

Opens Friday at Grail Moviehouse.

REVIEWED BY SCOTT DOUGLAS JSDOUGLAS22@GMAIL.COM

The 2017 Oscar Nominated

Live-Action Short Films HHHH

DIRECTOR: Various PLAYERS: Various LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM COMPILATION RATED NR THE STORY: This year’s collection of Academy Award nominees for Best Live-Action Short.

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THE LOWDOWN: Three great films, one that’s very good, and an absolute dog that should never have seen the light of day.

Of the five live-action films nominated this year, none are from the U.S. This probably has a great deal to do with the fact that most Western European countries have some form of nationalized support of the film industry that allows for the production of unpopular media such as short films which, in our country, are more commonly relegated to aspiring filmmakers who go into personal debt to realize their creative vision — but I digress. This year’s collection of live-action narrative shorts up for Academy consideration are pretty great for the most part, if you’re willing to overlook one of the worst short films I’ve ever seen make the cut (which I am not).

Ennemis Intérieurs (Enemies Within). Director: Selim Azzazi.

Country: France. 28 min. The first of two of this year’s nominees to deal with the immigration crisis in Europe, Enemies Within is set in France during the Algerian civil war of the 1990s, but its message is particularly poignant today. Playing something like an episode of 24 told from the point of view of an innocent guy being harassed by Jack Bauer, Enemies tells the story of a humble teacher of Algerian descent applying for citizenship at the worst possible time and suffering the consequences of his religion and ethnicity in a paranoid bureaucracy driven by the fear of terrorism.

It’s heart-wrenching, extremely well executed and deftly skirts the edges of being heavy handed. My guess is that this will be the winner, although it’s in a close tie with two others for my favorite nominee.

La Femme et le TGV (The Woman and the Train). Directors: Timo von Gunten and Giacun Caduff.

Country: Switzerland. 30 min. About as inoffensive as a film can be, The Woman and the Train nevertheless lost points with me on account of its saccharine predictability. An aging empty nester who lives by the high-speed railroad in a small town near Zurich finds her life revitalized when her daily habit of waving a Swiss flag at the passing train garners her an unexpected pen pal. It’s not particularly bad, I just struggled to see much of a point to the proceedings – and this assessment did not benefit from the “based on a true story” tag accompanying the credits.

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Silent Nights. Directors: Aske Bang and Kim Magnusson. Country: Denmark. 30 min. This is, without a doubt, an egregiously awful film.

The second of the five nominees to deal with the immigration crisis, Silent Nights seems to come down on the side of the “give them money and maybe they’ll go home” school of thought. As deplorable as that ideological stance may be, the film makes matters worse by taking a circuitous and nonsensical route to arrive at its asinine conclusion, as a young woman falls in love with a Ghanan immigrant who steals from her and impregnates her while concealing the wife and children he left behind. Her response? Send him back to Africa with a pocket full of Euros. My profanity-laden notes on this one were unprintable.

Sing. Directors: Kristof Deák and Anna Udvardy. Country: Hungary.

25 min. Number two in my threeway tie for best of the bunch, Sing is a beautiful little film. Set in Hungary in the early 90s (as evinced by a wellplaced slap-bracelet), Sing tells the story of a young girl who joins her new school’s award-winning choir, only to be confronted by a disturbing secret behind the ensemble’s success. Witty and engaging, this film masterfully captures the drama of childhood conflicts with authority while managing to respect its protagonists despite their youth. I would be absolutely comfortable with this one winning, though it might not be my first choice.

Timecode.

Director: Juanjo Giménez. Country: Spain. 15 min.

This is the one I would probably pick as my winner, although I suspect the Academy’s opinion may differ. The story of two isolated parking garage security attendants who find a surprising connection, Timecode may be a bit of a one-note joke — but its execution is flawless. It gets in and out without overstaying its welcome, it makes a statement without bludgeoning the audience over the head with it and the punchline absolutely works in the context of its quirky premise. It’s a testament to what can be accomplished with story and character in a short period of time, which is what the essence of this competition should be about.

Not Rated.

Opens Friday at Grail Moviehouse.

REVIEWED BY SCOTT DOUGLAS JSDOUGLAS22@GMAIL.COM

The Space Between Us HS

DIRECTOR: Peter Chelsom PLAYERS: Asa Butterfield, Gary Oldman, Britt Robertson, Carla Gugino, Janet Montgomery TEEN SCI-FI ROMANCE RATED PG-13 THE STORY: A boy raised on Mars escapes to Earth to track down his father.

THE LOWDOWN: A cornball teen romance mired in hokey, sentimental hogwash.

If you insist on sitting through the pap that is Peter Chelsom’s The Space Between Us, consider taking a Lactaid — there’s enough cheese here to affect even the heartiest disposition. Yes, it’s a mostly harmless tween romance with tinges of sci-fi. But, boy, is Chelsom’s movie an exercise in earnest gooeyness, a film that just oozes schmaltz right down to its cornball title. It’s the kind of movie that’ll make your teeth hurt while never being actively horrible enough to be memorable. Even the film’s silly conceit — “bored teen born on Mars heads to Earth to probably die” — isn’t enough to save The Space Between Us from the trash heap of forgotten cinema.

The film is about a boy named Gardner (Asa Butterfield), born on Mars by his astronaut mother (Janet Montgomery) who then dies in childbirth. This is about all the film has in common with 1979’s Alien, as Gardner is raised by another astronaut (Carla Gugino) who — with the help of NASA head Nathaniel (Gary Oldman) — gets the teenage Gardner a quick trip to Earth, the planet the lonely kid (his only friend is a robot) has always longed to visit.

Being the only person who, at this point, wants to be on Earth, Gardner escapes into the greater world as a means of tracking down his long lost — and still unknown to him — father.

(Big twist: It’s exactly who you think it is from the onset.) The film quickly turns into a weepy teen romance, as our hero risks his life every minute he’s on Earth due to an enlarged heart from years living on Mars. (I’m

SCREEN SCENE just now realizing the symbolism here. Boy, is it gross.) Falling in with a jaded teenage girl named Tulsa (Britt Robertson), who’s skeptical about his time on Mars, the film slowly becomes about their budding romance and her gradual belief in his story as she sees him slowly dying the longer he’s on Earth.

Gardner roaming our planet is where the film truly gets knee-deep in its own sentimentality. Since he’s never been socially trained and knows little of what is actually on Earth, the film becomes reel after reel of seeing the beauty in the world. (He’ll flat out state his emotions while being awed at the sight of a horse.) The idea is to create a sense of wonder at the world and the miracle of life, but The Space Between Us never quite gets there.

Look, one of my great weaknesses is finding comfort in the sentimental, but it has to be earned and steeped in some greater emotional truth than whatever it is this movie wants to peddle. This here is the tender-moments, Hallmark greeting card type of sentimental, and it just seeps out of the screen. Butterfield does his best with this junk and has enough charm to make the unbelievable nature of the plot’s basics able to be overlooked. But the film itself can’t escape the barren landscape of its own shallow, cheap tepidity, lazily constructed and undeserving of any real greater emotions. Rated PG-13 for brief sensuality and language.

Now playing at Carmike 10, Carolina Cinemark, Epic of Hendersonville, Regal Biltmore Grande.

REVIEWED BY JUSTIN SOUTHER JSOUTHER@MOUNTAINX.COM

FILM FLOOD GALLERY FINE ART CENTER 2160 US Hwy 70, Swannanoa, 273-3332, floodgallery.org/ • FR (2/10), 8pm - Classic World Cinema: My Life as a Dog, film screening. Free.

TRANZMISSION Tranzmission.org, Info@Tranzmission.org • TH (2/9), 7-9pm - From This Day Forward, movie screening followed by a panel discussion with transgender parents and youth with LGBTQ parents. Free. Held at Grail MovieHouse, 45 S. French Broad Ave. UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST CONGREGATION OF ASHEVILLE 1 Edwin Place, 254-6001, uuasheville.org • FR (2/10), 7pm - Environmental & Social Justice Film: Do Not Resist, film screening. Free.

by Edwin Arnaudin | edwinarnaudin@gmail.com

TRULY TRANSPARENT: A still from the documentary From This Day Forward, in which director Sharon Shattuck reflects on her father, pictured, coming out as transgender. The film screens at the Grail Moviehouse. Photo courtesy of Sharon Shattuck • QORDS (Queer Oriented Radical Days of Summer) along with COLAGE (Children of Lesbians and Gays Everywhere) and Tranzmission will screen From This Day Forward at the Grail Moviehouse on Thursday, Feb. 9, at 7 p.m. Sharon Shattuck’s 2015 documentary looks back on her father coming out as transgender and changing her name to Trisha when the filmmaker was in middle school. The film is primarily set at a family reunion to plan Sharon’s wedding, during which she seeks a deeper understanding of how her parents’ marriage survived the changes that could have torn them apart.

A panel discussion with transgender parents and youths with LGBTQ parents will follow the screening. Free admission with limited, first-come, first-served seating. Doors open at 6:45 p.m. and donations are welcome. grailmoviehouse.com • Grail Moviehouse’s and the Asheville Jewish Community Center’s monthly Israeli Film Series — designed to allow viewers to use film as their window into the minds and culture of Israel — continues Sunday, Feb. 12, at 3 p.m., with The Kindergarten Teacher.

Nadav Lapid’s 2014 feature centers on an educator who discovers a 5-yearold poetry prodigy in her classroom and takes unusual steps to protect and nurture his talent. A discussion will take place after the film. Tickets are $7 and available online or at the Grail box office. avl.mx/3d4 • The Leicester Public Library Book Club & Movie Group turns its attention to Jessamyn West’s The Friendly Persuasion on Tuesday, Feb. 14. The discussion of the novel — about a Quaker family whose pacifism is put to the test by the American Civil War — begins at 1 p.m. and will be followed at 2 p.m.

by William Wyler’s 1956 film adaptation starring Gary Cooper, Dorothy McGuire and Anthony Perkins.

Popcorn will be provided. Free and open to the public. avl.mx/1c9 • The North Asheville Public Library’s Western film series continues Tuesday, Feb. 14, at 6 p.m. with My Darling Clementine. John Ford’s 1946 work tells the story of Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday and the shootout at the O.K. Corral. Henry Fonda, Linda Darnell and Victor Mature star. Free and open to the public. avl.mx/1d0 X

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M OVIES

by Scott Douglas

S TA RT IN G F R ID AY

S PEC IAL S C REEN ING S

Fifty Shades Darker The hotly anticipated (in some corners) sequel to last year’s Fifty Shades of Grey, this adaptation of E.L. James’ bestselling novels picks up where the last film left off, with a lovelorn Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan) trying to coax a reluctant Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) back into his bed, until a woman from Christian’s past (Kim Bassinger) threatens the newly rekindled relationship. No early reviews. (R)

Love Affair HHHHH DIRECTOR: Leo McCarey PLAYERS: Irene Dunne, Charles Boyer, Maria Ouspenskaya, Lee Bowman, Astrid Allwyn, Maurice Moscovich ROMANTIC COMEDY Rated NR In honor of my least favorite holiday (you’ll notice I didn’t devote a month’s worth of programming to this one), the AFS will be screening Leo McCarey’s classic romantic comedy, Love Affair, this Valentine’s Day. With a script that vacillates between pithy humor and tear-jerking melodrama from Donald Ogden Stewart (The Philadelphia Story) and Delmer Daves (3:10 to Yuma), cinematography by the great Rudolph Maté and tremendous performances from Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne, this might be one of the best date movies of all time. Although it was remade three times — once by McCarey in 1953 as An Affair to Remember, then in 1993 by Nora Ephron as Sleepless in Seattle and again under the original title in 1994 by Glenn Gordon Caron starring Warren Beatty and Annette Bening — the first film is still the best by far. The Asheville Film Society will screen Love Affair on Tuesday, Feb. 14, at 7:30 p.m. at The Grail Moviehouse, hosted by Xpress movie critic Scott Douglas.

John Wick: Chapter 2 Sequel to Keanu Reeves’ 2014 surprise hit John Wick. In this installment, according to the studio, “Legendary hitman John Wick is forced out of retirement once again and heads to Rome to face off with the world’s deadliest killers.” Starring Reeves, Common, Laurence Fishburne, Ruby Rose, John Leguizamo and Ian McShane, directed by Chad Stahelski. No early reviews. (R)

My Life as a Dog HHHH DIRECTOR: Lasse Hallström PLAYERS: Anton Glanzelius, Melinda Kinnaman, Tomas von Brömssen COMEDY/DRAMA Rated NR Despite the controversy surrounding director Lasse Hallström’s most recent film (A Dog’s Purpose) and my personal disdain for the practices employed on set, I still have a soft-spot in my heart for My Life as a Dog (1985). The director’s first mainstream success outside of Europe — unless you count ABBA: The Movie — My Life as a Dog is replete with the sort of quirky characters and improbable storylines that would come to define European cinema in the following decades. So why do I like this tale of a precocious young boy from a struggling single-parent household who’s sent to live with his aunt and uncle when he begins to identify a little too closely with Laika, the cosmonaut dog? In short, I’m not quite sure. It harbors a lot of qualities that have left me jaded over the years, but perhaps this was one of the earliest examples (though far from the last) of the oddball import comedy to leave its mark on my moviegoing mind. Regardless, it’s a warmhearted little film that was well-received on its release and holds up today, my current thoughts on Hallström not withstanding. Classic World Cinema by Courtyard Gallery will present My Life as a Dog on Friday, Feb. 10, at 8 p.m. at Flood Gallery Fine Art Center, 2160 Hwy 70, Swannanoa.

Oscar Nominated Animated Short Films, 2017 See Scott Douglas’ review

Oscar Nominated Live Action Short Films, 2017 See Scott Douglas’ review

The Lego Batman Movie Director Chris McKay (The Lego Movie) returns to the LEGOverse to direct what some have called the best Batman movie ever made. According to Warner Brothers, “In the irreverent spirit of fun that made The Lego Movie a worldwide phenomenon, the self-described leading man of that ensemble — LEGO Batman — stars in his own big-screen adventure. But there are big changes brewing in Gotham City, and if he wants to save the city from The Joker’s hostile takeover, Batman may have to drop the lone vigilante thing, try to work with others and maybe, just maybe, learn to lighten up.” Starring Will Arnett, Ralph Fiennes, Rosario Dawson, Zach Galifianakis, Jenny Slate, Michael Cera, Mariah Carey, Billy Dee Williams, Héctor Elizondo, Eddie Izzard and more. Early reviews almost unanimously positive. (PG)

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The Sadist HHHH DIRECTOR: James Landis PLAYERS: Arch Hall, Jr., Marilyn Manning, Richard Alden, Helen Hovey, Don Russell EXPLOITATION THRILLER Rated NR I canceled The Sadist in November to make way for a bit of post-election counterprogramming, although in retrospect, this might have been almost as appropriate as what I screened instead. We’re finally getting back around to this creepy thriller about a madman with his finger on the trigger and a penchant for pushing people around. Better than most B-movies have any right to be, James Landis’ The Sadist is a surprisingly powerful post-noir protoslasher that was the first to deal with the twisted true story of Charlie Starkweather, a tale that would later be addressed by Terrence Malick in Badlands and Oliver Stone in Natural Born Killers. This film benefits greatly from a bizarre, yet profoundly unnerving, performance from Arch Hall, Jr., whose brief career was entirely conceived by his father, drive-in movie producer Arch Hall, Sr. What really distinguishes The Sadist from other films of its low-budget ilk, however, is the atmosphere created by future Oscar-winning cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, making his U.S. feature debut. Pulpy, disturbing and cheap, cultexploitation cinema doesn’t get much better than The Sadist. The Thursday Horror Picture Show will screen The Sadist on Thursday, Feb. 9, at 9:15 p.m. at The Grail Moviehouse, hosted by Xpress movie critic Scott Douglas.

The Taming of the Shrew HHHH DIRECTOR: Franco Zeffirelli PLAYERS: Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, Cyril Cusack, Michael Hordern, Alan Webb COMEDY Rated NR Franco Zeffirelli’s The Taming of the Shrew (1967) wasn’t the first time this Shakespeare play was served up with a famous married couple in the lead roles. No, that honor goes to Sam Taylor’s 1929 version starring Hollywood royalty of that era, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford. (And whether or not the main title really originally read, “by William Shakespeare, additional dialogue by Sam Taylor,” is hard to say, since Ms. Pickford re-cut, re-titled and re-scored the print in the 1960s.) Truth is the play is the perfect vehicle for notoriously battling couples who are larger than life, because it’s almost impossible to overplay Petruchio and Kate — though both actor couples tried (in different ways). The Zeffirelli film is easily the better of the two films — not only is more of the play preserved, but the director was determined to return the material to its rather earthy roots. This is no subtle entertainment. Rather it’s a broad and boisterous comedy where lines are shouted as often as not, and slapstick is never far away. (In some respects, the film visually resembles Richard Lester’s slapstick in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum from the previous year.) The results are good, but it’s not great Shakespeare.

Zeffirelli can’t bring himself quite to the realm of radical Shakespeare. However, the film is a great vehicle for the two most famous stars of its era. Does it really need to be more than that? This excerpt was taken from a review by Ken Hanke, published on Oct. 10, 2007. The Hendersonville Film Society will show The Taming of the Shrew on Sunday, Feb. 12, at 2 p.m. in the Smoky Mountain Theater at Lake Pointe Landing Retirement Community, 333 Thompson St., Hendersonville.

MOUNTAINX.COM

FREEWILL ASTROLOGY

BY ROB BREZSNY

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Your reputation is in a state of fermentation. Will this process ultimately produce the metaphorical equivalent of fine wine or else something more like pungent cheese? The answer to that question will depend on how much integrity you express as you wield your clout. Be as charismatic as you dare, yes, but always in service to the greater good rather than to self-aggrandizement. You can accomplish wonders if you are saucy and classy, but you’ll spawn blunders if you’re saucy and bossy.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Even if you’re not an occult wizard or pagan priestess, I suspect you now have the power to conjure benevolent love spells. There’s a caveat, however: They will only work if you cast them on yourself. Flinging them at other people would backfire. But if you do accept that limitation, you’ll be able to invoke a big dose of romantic mojo from both your lower depths and your higher self. Inspiration will be abundantly available as you work to reinvigorate your approach to intimacy and togetherness.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Using a blend of warfare and diplomacy, Napoleon extended French control over much of Western Europe. In 1804, he decided to formalize his growing sovereignty with a coronation ceremony. He departed from tradition, however. For many centuries, French kings had been crowned by the Pope. But on this occasion, Napoleon took the imperial crown from Pope Pius VII and placed it on his own head. Historian David J. Markham writes that he “was simply symbolizing that he was becoming emperor based on his own merits and the will of the people, not because of some religious consecration.” According to my reading of the astrological omens, Taurus, you have the right to perform a comparable gesture. Don’t wait for some authority to crown you. Crown yourself.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Here’s some advice from Scorpio writer Norman Rush: “The main effort of arranging your life should be to progressively reduce the amount of time required to decently maintain yourself so that you can have all the time you want for reading.” It’s understandable that a language specialist like Rush would make the final word of the previous sentence “reading.” But you might choose a different word. And I invite you to do just that. The coming weeks will be an excellent time to devotedly carve out more time to do The Most Important Thing in Your Life.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Have you heard the fable about the four blind men who come upon an elephant for the first time? The first man feels the tail and declares that the thing they’ve encountered must be a rope. The second touches one of the elephant’s legs and says that they are in the presence of a tree.

The third strokes the trunk and assumes it’s a snake.

Putting his hand on a tusk, the fourth man asserts that it’s a spear. I predict that this fable will NOT apply to you in the coming weeks, Gemini. You won’t focus on just one aspect of the whole and think it’s the whole. Other people in your sphere may get fooled by shortsightedness, but you will see the big picture.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): For now, at least, your brain is your primary erogenous zone. I suspect it will be generating some of your sexiest thoughts ever. To be clear, not all of these erupting streams of bliss will directly involve the sweet, snaky mysteries of wrapping your physical body around another’s.

Some of the erotic pleasure will come in the form of epiphanies that awaken sleeping parts of your soul.

Others might arrive as revelations that chase away months’ worth of confusion. Still others could be creative breakthroughs that liberate you from a form of bondage you’ve wrongly accepted as necessary.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Human beings upload 300 hours of videos to Youtube every minute of every day.

Among that swirling flow is a hefty amount of footage devoted exclusively to the amusing behavior of cats.

Researchers estimate there are now more than two million clips of feline shenanigans. Despite the stiff competition, I suspect there’s a much better chance than usual that your cat video will go viral if you upload it in the coming weeks. Why? In general, you Leos now have a sixth sense about how to get noticed.

You know what you need to do to express yourself confidently and attract attention — not just in regards to your cats, but anything that’s important to you.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): I know you haven’t literally been wrestling and wrangling with a sweaty angel. But if I were going to tell a fairy tale about your life lately, I’d be tempted to say this: Your rumble with the sweaty angel is not finished. In fact, the best and holiest part is still to come. But right now you have cosmic permission to take a short break and rest a while. During the lull, ratchet up your determination to learn all you can from your friendly “struggle.” Try to figure out what you’ve been missing about the true nature of the sweaty angel. Vow to become a stronger advocate for yourself and a more rigorous revealer of the wild truth.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Sixteenth-century Italian painter Titian was renowned for his brilliant use of color. He was also prolific, versatile, and influential.

In 2011, one of his paintings sold for $16.9 million.

But one of his contemporaries, the incomparable Michelangelo, said that Titian could have been an even greater artist if he had ever mastered the art of drawing. It seems that Titian skipped a step in his early development. Is there any way that your path resembles Titian’s, Sagittarius? Did you neglect to cultivate a basic skill that has subtly (or not so subtly) handicapped your growth ever since? If so, the coming weeks and months will be an excellent time to fix the glitch.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Our obsessive use of digital devices has diminished our power to focus.

According to a study by Microsoft, the average human attention span has shrunk to eight seconds — one second less than that of a typical goldfish. I’m guessing, though, that you Capricorns will buck this trend in the coming weeks. Your ability to concentrate may be exceptional even by pre-Internet standards. I hope you’ll take opportunity of this fortunate anomaly to get a lot of important work and play done.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): The time is now, Brave Aquarius. Be audacious about improving the big little things in your life. (That’s not a typo. I did indeed use the term “big little things.”) For example: Seek out or demand more engaging responsibilities. Bring your penetrating questions to sphinx-like authorities. Go in search of more useful riddles. Redesign the daily rhythm to better meet your unique needs. Refuse “necessary” boredom that’s not truly necessary. Trust what actually works, not what’s merely attractive. Does all that seem too bold and brazen for you to pull off? I assure you that it’s not. You have more clout than you imagine.

You also have a growing faith in your own power to make subtle fundamental shifts. (That’s not a typo. I did indeed use the term “subtle fundamental shifts.”)

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): “Love does not at first mean merging, surrendering, and uniting with another person,” wrote the poet Rilke, “for what would a union be of two people who are unclarified, unfinished, and still incoherent?” That’s an excellent meditation for you to entertain during the Valentine season, Pisces.

You’re in the right frame of mind to think about how you could change and educate yourself so as to get the most out of your intimate alliances. Love “is a high inducement for the individual to ripen,” Rilke said, “to become something, to become a world for the sake of another person.” (Thanks to Stephen Mitchell for much of this translation.)X

The

Sustainability CELEBRATING EARTH DAY 2017

Series

Exploring the landscape of sustainability in WNC in all four April issues of Mountain Xpress

Contact us today!

828-251-1333 x 320 advertise@mountainx.com

Are you hosting a kids camp this summer?

Would you like to be listed in our camp directory?

Please contact Dan Hesse at dhesse@mountainxcom

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FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

69

MARKETPLACE REAL E S TAT E | R E N TA L S | R O O M M ATES | SERV ICES | JOB S | A N N OU N CEMENTS | M I ND, BO DY, SPI R I T CL AS S E S & WOR K S HOP S | M U S IC IA N S’ SERV ICES | PETS | A U TOMOTIV E | X C HANG E | ADULT Want to advertise in Marketplace? 828-251-1333 x111 tnavaille@mountainx.com • mountainx.com/classifieds If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Remember the Russian proverb: “Doveryai, no proveryai,” trust but verify. When answering classified ads, always err on the side of caution. Especially beware of any party asking you to give them financial or identification information. The Mountain Xpress cannot be responsible for ensuring that each advertising client is legitimate. Please report scams to ads@mountainx.com REAL ESTATE HOMES FOR SALE

5 ACRE HOMESTEAD • VERY PRIVATE Spruce Pine, NC. Organically farmed, many outbuildings. 30x50 multifunctional woodshop and studio, quonset hut, barn, garden shed, coop and fenced pens. 1978, 3BR, 3BA home, 2232 sqft w/ new 12x45 wraparound deck overlooking springfed pond and pasture. Finished basement with doors to fenced-in backyard and salt water pool. • And so much more! Call for appt: (828) 545-5988 or bruchm20@gmail.com

COMMERCIAL PROPERTY ASHEVILLE RIVERFRONT LAND 3.79 acres on Swannanoa River Road near Biltmore. Please call (828) 2798562.

REAL ESTATE SERVICES

RENTALS APARTMENTS FOR RENT

DOWNTOWN! BEAUTIFUL NEW APARTMENT IN HISTORIC BUILDING Amazing downtown location! Completely renovated, second floor, one-bedroom apartment with high ceilings, large windows and hardwood floors. Washer and dryer included. $1550/ month.

828-252-6664 rentals@bassandroyster.com bassandroyster.com/vacancies/ QUAINT E. CANDLER STUDIO APT. Quaint 1 bedroom/1 bath in E. Candler. Just 1/2 mile from the new Ingles. 500.00 deposit and 625.00 a month. No pets, no smoking. Available immediately.

Contact Robin 828-575-2233

WANTED TO RENT SMALL APARTMENT NEEDED In exchange for work and cash.

(404) 740-6903.

EMPLOYMENT

NEED A HOME APPRAISAL? We will appraise your home for Tax Appeal, Divorce, Sales Pricing, Litigation, and Estate purposes. • Covering Buncombe, Henderson, Haywood, Madison, Transylvania, Yancey, and Mitchell Counties. Earnhardt and Associates Appraisers. Residential, Commercial, Consulting: (828) 253-1930.

Reasonable Fees.

EarnhardtApprais@Bellsouth. net

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ADMINISTRATIVE/ OFFICE FINANCE COORDINATOR Carolina Mountain Land Conservancy seeks a Finance Coordinator to join a dynamic and growing staff. Work in coordination with Finance Director to manage day-to-day financial activities including AR, AP, and grant management. Full job posting at www.carolinamountain.org.

Email cover letter and resume to info@carolinamountain.org.

FINANCE COORDINATOR Carolina Mountain Land Conservancy seeks a Finance Coordinator to manage day-to-day finance functions in coordination with the Finance Director. Full job posting available at www.carolinamountain.org.

Email cover letter and resume to info@carolinamountain.org.

SALES/ MARKETING

GENERAL

EXPERIENCED PROFESSIONAL REALTOR I am a Realtor with Keller-Williams Professionals. With a strong desire to make the world a better place, I donate 10% of my commission to local public schools! (828) 707-8916 ronh@kw.com

WANT A FUN JOB IN THE OUTDOOR INDUSTRY? Our fastgrowing, locally-owned outdoor adventure company is hiring raft guides, zipline guides, photographers and reservation staff for the upcoming season. Experience is preferred but we will train the right people. Apply online at www.FrenchBroadRafting.com/ jobs

SALES PROFESSIONAL BUSINESS TO BUSINESS FULL TIME Local – Digital Marketing Agency – Salary + Commission – Full Time – Asheville Area – Telecommuting OK –Self Motivated - Ethical - Experience Required. Resume to: jobs@netsitemarketing.com www,netsitemarketing.com HIRING FOR NEW HIGH ADVENTURE JOB! Seeking canyoneering guides for 2017 season. Must have a great attitude and be comfortable at height.

Preferred climbing/ ropes experience. Apply at: frenchbroadrafting.com/jobs LOOKING FOR INVESTORS Licensed teacher wanting to find investors to help open an intermediate private school in the Asheville area. Must be passionate about education! contact alleneducationacademy@gmail. com TROLLEY TOUR GUIDES If you are a "people person," love Asheville, have a valid Commercial Driver's License (CDL) and clean driving record you could be a great TOUR GUIDE! Seasonal FULL & PART-TIME positions available.

Training provided for upcoming season. Contact us today! www.GrayLineAsheville.com; Info@GrayLineAsheville.com; 828-251-8687.

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

recruiting potentially income eligible families with pre-school aged children, assessing family strengths and challenges, guiding and documenting family goal setting, progress, and evaluating and reporting outcomes. • The FSA/Interpreter is primarily responsible for a sub-set of work activities across all program areas for families whose primary language is Spanish. Work also requires considerable discretion, judgment, initiative, accuracy and strong oral and written communication and teamwork skills.

Work occurs under the general supervision of the Lead Family Service Associate, and is evaluated through observation, conferences, goal achievement and, significant Incidences that demonstrate job quality, quantity, timeliness and results. Work is formally reviewed, and future goals are set, during an annual performance appraisal. Education and Experience • Graduation from a regionally or CHEA- accredited four year college or university with a Bachelor’s degree in Social Work or related field and, at least two years of experience working with low wealth families, and have pre-school children. An equivalent combination of education and experience can be considered. Requirements • The Family Service Associate/Interpreter must be fluent in both Spanish and English. • A valid N.C. Driver’s License. • Ability to pass, a physical examination, TB test, criminal background check, and drug screen. • Eligible to obtain the DCDEE Qualification letter. Salary: $15.39/hour$21.55/hour. • Send resume, cover letter, and 3 work references with complete contact information to: Human Resources Manager, 25 Gaston Street, Asheville, North Carolina 28801.

Or for information: Admin@ communityactionopportunities. org Or Fax (828) 252-6319. Open until filled. EOE and DFWP.

MEDICAL/ HEALTH CARE COOPERRIIS HEALING COMMUNITY ASHEVILLE CLINICAL DIRECTOR CooperRiis, a progressive mental health treatment program, has immediate opening for Clinical Director in Asheville, NC. Please send resume to HR@cooperriis.org. Compensation based on experience. http://www.cooperriis.org/ employment/ for more information. www.cooperriis.org LICENSED MASSAGE THERAPIST IN PHYSICAL THERAPY PRACTICE 640 Merrimon Ave, Ste 107 www.Physiownc.com

HUMAN SERVICES FAMILY SERVICE ASSOCIATE/INTERPRETER Available Immediately. Community Action Opportunities is seeking a Family Service Associate/ Interpreter to recruit, enroll, and assist families of enrolled children to set and achieve individual and family development goals, and facilitate family engagement in their child’s development and school readiness activities. • Work includes

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MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN THE LIFE OF A CHILD! METHODIST HOME FOR CHILDREN is hiring Resident and Assessment Counselors to work with at-risk youth.

Flexible schedules. Competitive pay. Paid training. Excellent benefits available. Must have a valid driver's license and be at least 21 years old. We offer a rewarding work environment and advancement opportunities. Apply online at www.mhfc.org.

PARAPROFESSIONAL Paraprofessional needed at Waynesville Park Vista Group Home (32) hour modified full time position working with individuals with Intellectual Developmental Disabilities.

Send Resume to veronica.long@ eastersealsucp.org 828-7780260 THERAPEUTIC FOSTER PARENTS NEEDED Davidson Homes Inc. is seeking Foster Parents in Swannanoa and the surrounding

areas. • All training is free and daily rate is great! Call Debbie Smiley: 828-776-5228. www.davidsonhomes.org

PROFESSIONAL/ MANAGEMENT

CAREER TRAINING AIRLINE CAREERS BEGIN HERE Get started by training as FAA certified Aviation Technician.

Financial aid for qualified students. Job placement assistance.

Call Aviation Institute of Maintenance 800-725-1563 (AAN CAN)

COMPUTER/ TECHNICAL COORDINATOR CONTINUING EDUCATION HEALTH OCCUPATIONS A-B Tech is currently taking applications for a Full- Time Regular Coordinator, Continuing Education Health Occupations position. For more details and to apply: www.abtech.edu/jobs MARKETING AND DEVELOPMENT COORDINATOR Helpmate, Inc., a domestic violence organization in Asheville, NC, seeks a full-time Marketing and Development Coordinator. Primary responsibilities will include implementation of marketing and fundraising strategies, supporting resource development committee, updating website and social media content and donor messaging. This position also provides support for the capital campaign committee under the direction of the Associate and Executive Directors. Diverse candidates are encouraged to apply.

Email resume and cover letter to HelpmateAsheville@gmail.com

by February 8th with "Marketing and Development Coordinator" in the subject line. No phone or email inquiries -- please.

TEACHING/ EDUCATION FULL TIME TEACHERS Licensed in Secondary Science/Math Education. Licensure required. This position is for a year-round school with small class sizes and a high school curriculum. Experience with alternative settings and/or learning disabilities a plus. Our beautiful 145-acre campus, minutes from Hendersonville, NC provides a safe setting for our students to transform their lives.

Equinox is a residential treatment center for boys ages 14-18.

Check out our websites for more information: www.equinoxrtc. com • Benefits are offered to full time employees and include health, dental, vision and life insurance as well as holiday pay, vacation and sick leave. • Please send a resume and cover letter to humanresources@solsticeeast. com. Equinox is an Equal Opportunity Employers. • No phone calls or walk-ins please.

PROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER Experienced photographer needed for real estate and architectural photography. Set your own hours/days. Must have your own equipment. For more info: marilynnkayphotography.com/ photographer-position.

Contact marilynn@ marilynnkayphotography.com

RETAIL WORK IN HISTORIC BILTMORE The Market Center Convenience Store in Biltmore is hiring a cashier for 3rd shift (10:30 pm till 7:30 am). Starting pay is between $9.00 and $9.50 / hr, DOE. Enjoy a 4-day work week, flexible scheduling, and a weeks paid vacation after one year. Come by 97 Hendersonville Rd to fill out an application. louiseianderson2@ gmail.com

SERVICES BEAUTY/SALON DREADLOCKS We loc heads and open minds. Natural hair care specialist. We loc your hair so you can comb your thoughts. • Sista Sherrie (828) 215-0548 for your kinky hair needs.

COMPUTER PHOTO EDITING Photo editing services: • Airbrushing • Combining Group Photos • Exposure issues • Removal Extraneous Objects • Cutoff Images • Lighting Effects • Old Photo Retouching Pricing based on complexity of editing. kennedy@ photocontemplations.com www.photocontemplations. com/photoedit.html

HOME IMPROVEMENT

BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES

HANDY MAN

PAID IN ADVANCE! Make $1000/week mailing brochures from home! No experience required. Helping home workers since 2001! Genuine opportunity. Start immediately! www.

IncomeStation.net (AAN CAN)

HIRE A HUSBAND • HANDYMAN SERVICES Since 1993.

Multiple skill sets. Reliable, trustworthy, quality results. $1 million liability insurance. References and estimates available. Stephen Houpis, (828) 280-2254.

ANNOUNCEMENTS ANNOUNCEMENTS MAKE THE CALL TO START GETTING CLEAN TODAY Free 24/7 Helpline for alcohol & drug addiction treatment. Get help! It is time to take your life back! Call Now: 855-732-4139. (AAN CAN) PREGNANT? CONSIDERING ADOPTION? Call us first. Living expenses, housing, medical, and continued support afterwards.

Choose adoptive family of your choice. Call 24/7. 877-362-2401.

(AAN CAN) STRUGGLING WITH DRUGS OR ALCOHOL? Addicted to Pills? Talk to someone who cares. Call The Addiction Hope & Help Line for a free assessment. 800-978-6674 (AAN CAN) UNCLAIMED FIREARMS The following is a list of unclaimed firearms currently in the possession of the Asheville Police Department: Grey/Brown Colt 9MM 70L20751, Black/Brown Remington 12 Gauge 474086, Black/Brown Winchester .22 315629, Chrome/Black Winchester 12 Gauge L2109201, Black/ Rusted Colt .38 878879, Black/ Brown Winchester 12 Gauge L573838, Black/Brown Winchester 16 Gauge 126584, Black/Brown Remington 12 Gauge 705454, Black Smith & Wesson 9MM TZT7004, Black/Brown Smith & Wesson .38 J1888, Black/Brown Colt .45 708675, Black/Brown Sears & Roebuck Co. 12 Gauge Q123820, Black/Brown Ithaca 12 Gauge 371136189, Silver/Brown Taurus .357 ME781079, Black/Silver Fabrinor Vitoria .45 71-04-02801-02, Black Beretta .25 B100855V, Black GLOCK .45 WB464US, Black Keltec 9MM 78591, Black/Brown Colt .45 70734, Silver/Brown Colt .38 813450, Silver/Black Bryco Arms 9MM 948403, Grey/Black Colt .32 53663, Grey/Black Jennings .380 1425120, Black Unknown Unknown 0050, Chrome/Brown Raven Arms .25 606336, Black/Green Taurus Multi S2022243YOD, Black/Brown Unknown (SKS) 7.62x39 730863, Black Mossberg 12 Gauge P836824, Black/Brown Stoeger 12 Gauge 560285-06, Black/Brown Benelli 12 Gauge U328195, Chrome/Black Clerke .32 826406, Chrome/Tan Raven Arms .25 1359518, Black F.I.E. Corp. .25 D970146, Black/ Brown Armi Tanfoglio .25 S14518, Grey/Brown Marlin .22 99146066, Black/Brown Norinco 7.62x39 11086469, Black/Brown Marlin .22 22457852, Black/Brown Norinco 7.62x39 1701356J, Black/Brown Ithaca 12 Gauge 371136244, Black Mossberg 12 Gauge MV57905F, Black/Brown Connecticut Valley Arms .50 011713, Chrome/White Rohn .22 985832, Chrome/Tan F.I.E. Corp. .25 894089, Chrome/ Brown Raven Arms .25 768948, Black Star 9MM 2111856, Silver/ Brown Taurus .22 USA0180, Black/ Brown Excam .25 DK17374, Black/ Brown H&R .22 AM50158, Black H&R .22 BB015188, Black Armi Tanfoglio .25 M171381, Black/Brown F.I.E. .22 TR43982, Anyone with a legitimate claim or interest in this property must contact the Asheville Police Department within 30 days from the date of this publication.

Any items not claimed within 30 days will be disposed of according in accordance with all applicable

laws. • For further information, or to file a claim, contact the Asheville Police Department Property and Evidence Section at 828-232-4576.

CLASSES & WORKSHOPS CLASSES & WORKSHOPS LEARN RADICAL SUSTAINABILITY AT SCHOOL OF INTEGRATED LIVING Gain whole-life skills for radical sustainability through SOIL’s Permaculture and Ecovillage Immersion at Earthaven Ecovillage, June 10–August 11.

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FOR MUSICIANS MUSICAL SERVICES NOW ACCEPTING STUDENTS IN JAZZ PIANO, COMPOSITION, AND IMPROVISATION (ALL INSTRUMENTS).

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PETS PET SERVICES #1 AFFORDABLE COMMUNITY CONSCIOUS MASSAGE AND ESSENTIAL OIL CLINIC 4 locations: 1224 Hendersonville Rd., Asheville, 505-7088, 959 Merrimon Ave, Suite 101, 785-1385 and 2021 Asheville Hwy., Hendersonville, 6970103. 24 Sardis Rd. Ste B, 828633-6789 • $33/hour. • Integrated Therapeutic Massage: Deep Tissue, Swedish, Trigger Point, Reflexology. Energy, Pure Therapeutic Essential Oils. 30 therapists. Call now! www.thecosmicgroove.com

COUNSELING SERVICES

ASHEVILLE PET SITTERS Dependable, loving care while you're away. Reasonable rates. Call Sandy (828) 215-7232.

PROFESSIONAL AND RELIABLE PET CARE IN YOUR HOME! Mountain Pet Valet is an experienced pet sitting service with commitment to your pet's needs! Daily dog walks, pet visits and overnight stays. Mention ad for 10% off! (828)-490-6374 mountainpetvalet.com

AUTOMOTIVE TRUCKS/ VANS/ SUVS FOR SALE 1949 CHEVY PICKUP Daily driver.

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Could use paint job. $13,400 or best offer. (828) 606-8566.

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RETREATS SHOJI SPA & LODGE * 7 DAYS A WEEK Day & Night passes, cold plunge, sauna, hot tubs, lodging, 8 minutes from town, bring a friend or two, stay the day or all evening, escape & renew! Best massages in Asheville 828-299-0999.

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AUTOMOTIVE SERVICES WE'LL FIX IT AUTOMOTIVE • Honda and Acura repair. Half price repair and service. ASE and factory trained. Located in the Weaverville area, off exit 15. Please call (828) 275-6063 for appointment. wellfixitautomotive.com

T H E N E W Y OR K TI M ES CR OSSWOR D PU ZZLE

ACROSS

1 Bee ball?

6 Somewhat 10 Historian’s focus 14 Sarcastic “Amazing!”

15 Hedonistic sort 16 Janis’s spouse in the comics 17 The new dentist wanted to make a good …

20 Gymnast’s asset 21 Secret group in “The Da Vinci Code” 22 Impor tant contacts 23 Kind of cross or yogur t 24 The dentist helped the patient afford the visit with a …

28 Previously, previously 32 Mystical character 33 Albanian currency 34 Info on a wine label 35 Target of crunches 36 Heads for the bar?

39 Org. that prohibits traveling

40 Dispatched, as a dragon 42 Young sea lion 43 Big D.C. lobby 44 Rogen of “Sausage Party” 45 The dentist sorted all the bristled instruments into …

48 “Too rich for my blood” 50 Flub 51 Super 8 alternative 54 Burst out laughing 58 When it was time for the filling, the dentist asked for, well, …

60 “Diana” singer Paul 61 Like Mother Hubbard’s cupboard 62 Insurance giant 63 Capone’s nemesis 64 Call in court 65 A workout works one up

DOWN

1 Loose change “collector” 2 Fillmore’s party 3 Prefix with cultural

edited by Will Shortz

4 Decline again 5 Parceling (out) 6 ___ ant 7 Word after carrot or muffin 8 Night light up north 9 Intensify 10 It’ll open many doors 11 Like much of Arizona 12 Plum used to flavor gin 13 Singer Tennille 18 By ___ (alone) 19 Good name for a plaintiff?

23 Die 24 Pentagon V.I.P.s 25 Belarussian money 26 Atlas extra 27 Barack Obama, astrologically 29 Kidney-related 30 Buffalo pro 31 Bunkers 37 M M M 38 Shape of the world 41 Friskies rival 43 All plane attendants in attendance

45 Congo ape 46 Where fashions debut 47 Some luxury bags 49 Short amount of time?

51 Cannon on screen 52 Best of the best 53 Big laughs

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PUZZLE BY SAMUEL A. DONALDSON

54 Word in some French restaurant names 55 Franklin’s flier 56 What’s got the upper hand?

57 Surveyor’s map 59 Numero after due

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE

ADULT

LIVELINKS CHAT LINES Flirt, chat and date! Talk to sexy real singles in your area.

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No. 0104

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• Black Mountain

FEBRUARY 8 - FEBRUARY 14, 2017

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