Metro Spirit 06.23.2011 by Metro Spirit

table of contents whine line

- tom tomorrow

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insider

metro

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are you not entertained

- calendar

- augusta tek

- the8

- art45

- sightings

- jenny is wright

- crisp

- nytimes crossword

- free will astrology

slab

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Want to advertise in the Metro Spirit? Call Joe White at 706-373-3636 or email joe@themetrospirit.com

Writer Eric Johnson eric@themetrospirit.com

Production Director Amy Christian amy@themetrospirit.com

Publisher’s Assistant Account Executive Emily Stone Brenda Carter brenda@themetrospirit.com emily@themetrospirit.com INTERNS Jordan White design

Lead Designer Gabriel Vega gabe@themetrospirit.com

cover design

KRUHU kruhu.com

Geetu Vailoor editorial

Metro Spirit is a free newspaper published weekly on Thursday, 52 weeks a year. Editorial coverage includes local issues and news, arts, entertainment, people, places and events. In our paper appear views from across the political and social spectrum. The views do not necessarily represent the views of the publisher. Visit us at metrospirit.com.© 15 House, LLC. Owner/Publisher: Joe White. Legal: Phillip Scott Hibbard. Reproduction or use without permission is prohibited. One copy per person, please.

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Canal Swimming Is Unsafe, No Matter How Tempting To the Editor: With the onset of hot weather, local media outlets have been running photos and stories about the aqueduct area and the Rae’s Creek spillway area as a great place to swim. As inviting as it may be on a hot summer day, this area can be a dangerous place for swimming. Because it is

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caused by the intake gates near the mills, waterworks pumping station and the Olmstead Bulkhead can trap This summer we’ve also seen an increase in other risky behaviors such as jumping of f canal bridges,

has been illegal for 150 years. Likewise, swimming in the Rae’s Creek canal spillway is not advised. For the continued safety of the public, please discourage your readers from taking these risks. Sincerely,

OPEN LATE

Rebecca Rogers Director of Marketing and External Af fairs Augusta Canal National Heritage Area

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it may appear safe, the swift, treacherous currents

For public safety reasons, swimming in the canal

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Swimming in the canal itself is not allowed. Although

injury.

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danger for non-swimmers.

swimming risk noted above. Jumpers risk serious

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easily step of f into water over their heads — a serious

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pool below is sudden: Waders on the rock ledge can

The canal is only about 10 feet deep and has logs and

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torrent with no warning. In addition, the drop-of f in the

water pumping station. This is dangerous and illegal.

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slide” at any time. The water can go from a trickle to a

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a drainage overflow for the canal, unexpected rushes

whineLINE Ok Thomson is a mere 35 miles from the city core, still a part of the metro area yet we’re getting no service here. When are you going to either going to start distributing the new times to our area or at the very least make the events available on the web so that we can be aware of them? One other lesson we should be really careful about electing people to public office who desperately need the job, either because they have no other job skills or because holding a public office makes them more important than they’ll ever otherwise be. Can one say Bill Lockett. Thank you for your article about motorcycle safety. I have ridden my whole life and there is nothing quite like it. Just like people in their cars, I have a family at home and a house and a job. I deserve the same measure of conscientiousness they receive in their cars. Mr Austin Rhodes listens to the national talk radio hosts each day and gets his point of view and talking points correctly in line. He googles his columns. He bloviates on any message board that accepts the written word. And thanks to the geniuses at WGAC, he is all ours forever. Did the publisher have a stroke, or something? 35000 people without electricity in the CSRA. Some like my situation, just need a fuse replaced. But GA Power doesn’t think my situation is important

enough. Temps are hitting triple digits. Why has the CSRA not been deemed an emergency by our governor? Why are we not receiving federal aid? If the CSRA was hit with this kind of outage during Masters week I bet it would be back on in no time. Kudos to the monopoly GA Power has on the residents of this state. Initially, I didn’t get the new layout, covers and overall vibe of the new paper. To be honest, I hated it... I wished that the Metro would go back to the days of old. But I’ve changed my tune. Different is good. I’m really starting to look forward to the new covers and new approach. Every Wednesday night I get a copy at Augusta State’s Campus. Keep up the good work guys! Seriously. I’m a hard working, law abiding resident of Summerville. I pay hefty taxes to live there and until recently have stood by my decision to do so despite the increasing crime and deteriorating schools. However, my views have now changed and I would like to thank the Richmond County police officer who was directing traffic on Milledge Road the morning of June 16th for being the straw that finally broke this camel’s back. For whatever reason, this officer thought it was his right to stop drivers, such as myself, in order to berade and belittle them as they head to work. I was literally being screamed at and told to repeat myself several times in my responses (“yes, sir!”). I pulled off thinking that perhaps it’s time to do what so many of my former neighbors have already done...move to Evans.

whineline@themetrospirit.com

Country and rock concerts have been banned from the new Lady A Amphitheater. Well, not exactly. They have banned smoking at the Lady A Amphitheater. So… basically the same thing.

up THUMBS

Hey, guess what? The website for this year’s Westobou Festival is now up and running at westoboufestival.com. And visitors can actually find stuff on it. Still no luck at metrospirit. com, though.

down THUMBS

Two beautiful waterfalls spill into a pool of cool water. Occasionally a train rumbles overhead. The aqueduct that channels Rae’s Creek beneath the Augusta Canal is a monument to engineering (circa 1845). Today it is a monument to trash. For years volunteers have been cleaning the area, and for years trashy people have been treating the place of such breathtaking beauty as a garbage can. Let’s set an example and have them clean it up instead. Let them spend their Saturdays picking up diapers, underwear and Cheetos bags.

Air conditioning, fans, ice cubes, cold water… And whatever else you can find to keep cool. Did you know Sonic sells bags of their ice? We may buy enough to build an igloo.

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METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 5

6 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

INSI ER INSIDER@THEMETROSPIRIT.COM

Insider is an anonymous, opinion-based examination of the hidden details of Augusta politics and personalities.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz…

Local leaders are stepping all over themselves to make comments and statements related to Dr. Ricardo Azziz’s admonition to Augusta to develop a little more “cool,” when it’s not even clear that Azziz was being critical of Augusta in his now-infamous Rotary Club address. All this furor has probably been caused by nothing more than a very poor choice of words. It appears that Azziz has the facility and smooth-talking ways of former mayor Bob “Take That E-Z-Go” Young. In an effort to point out all sides of this flap, the Insider notes that Azziz does a credible job of amplifying and explaining his comment in this blogpost: http:// azziz.georgiahealth.edu/archives/272, citing a study by Next Generation Consulting attempting to quantify and rank attractiveness of cities to young professionals. The Insider suggests that Azziz needs to bring cool to his own house. MCG, er... GHSU (Let’s just call it MCGHSU, shall we?) is suffering from a severe lack of cool at the moment. Insiders report that morale is at its lowest point among staff since MCGHSU moved from Telfair Street and the students had to find their own cadavers. Study that, Next Generation Consulting. MCGHSU has had to recruit recent retirees to return to their positions in part-time capacities because they can’t find younger hires. Staff members work on a “point system” of demerits. Infractions result in the accumulation of points, which result in termination. Points are accumulated for, among other things, being five minutes late and calling in sick. Is that a way to attract highly trained personnel with advanced degrees? Sounds like high school instead of medical school (excuse me, Georgia Health Sciences University school) to us. MCGHSU will always be able to attract fine students and researchers, but staffers can be really hard to find. Azziz has changed the name of the institution and changed the carpet in the MCGHSU president’s house on Milledge Road. Maybe he should change MCGHSU into a cool place to work before he comments on the town he’s just getting to know. I mean, we thought this relationship between us had been working really well for the last 183 years; but if it isn’t, maybe it’s really not us. Maybe it really is you.

We’ll tell you what is cool… Fort Gordon and the U.S. military are cool. Over the last 24 months, the Insider has observed some seriously cool people moving to AugustaEvanez and becoming locals. The military intelligence, high-tech and NSA missions that Fort Gordon serves are bringing a cosmopolitan and highly intelligent population to Augusta. Many of them are buying houses and are here to stay after leaving the military. The Fort Gordon soldier of today is likely to have a 140 I.Q. and speak two or three languages. They are coming here for long-term assignments (these people are so hard to replace, they can exact long-term assignments here as a condition of re-enlistment) and are an example of the Augusta of tomorrow. People make a city cool and our Fort Gordon soldiers are a group of people who will not tolerate inferior educations for their children, racial division and corruption in government, parochialism and the others problems that have beset our city.

Bennett Back on the Radio Nice to hear Chad Bennett back on the airwaves in Augusta. Chad was a victim of the bottom of the recession cost cutting at Beasley Broadcasting a couple of years ago. He had been an evening jock on HD 98.3 before the grim job reaper caught up with him. Insiders say it was one of the very toughest decisions to come out of that belttightening period. Not only is he very talented, he is one of the more likeable guys in the radio business. He can be heard doing traffic updates on WGAC, as “full time” as that position allows. Hopefully it is a way of getting back in the door.

”Naw, it’s cool man. I ain’t done nothin” Two weeks after The Guv signed a $30 million tax break for Delta, the airline upgraded Deal and his wife to first class — “Diamond” medallion status the company awards to its most valued passengers. That status includes free upgrades when seats are available, Sky Club membership, bonus miles, priority checkin and boarding, fee waivers and more. Deal’s spokesman said there was no connection between his signing of the bill and his new medallion status and called the gift a “contribution to the state of Georgia.” The top staffer of the state ethics commission is resigning after the panel voted to slash her salary by a third and eliminate her number 2. Commission Chairman Patrick Millsaps said these two changes will free up $40,000-$50,000 in the budget. Executiive Secretary Stacey Kalberman

had coincidentally sought subpoenas to investigate the Deal campaign. Kalberman had raised questions about the timing of the salary cut and efforts to advance the agency’s investigation into a complaint against Deal. Watchdog groups dismiss the idea that the commission proposed the personnel moves because of budget constraints. During Nathan Deal’s campaign for Guv, the Office of Congressional Ethics reported he may have violated House ethics rules by using his congressional office to pressure Georgia officials to keep an inspection program that funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars into his auto salvage company. “Nathan Deal did nothing wrong,” Harris Blackwood said in March of last year. (In December, Blackwood was named the public information officer for the Georgia Department of Highway Safety, where his background

as a newspaper editor and columnist obviously serves him well. Wait. Check that. He was named the director of the

Governor’s Office of Highway Safety, not the PR flack. The director. The flack is Katie Fallon. We regret the error. METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 7

metro Eric Johnson

The Carrot and the Stick Local counties learn to work together for a chance at the money

Officials from 13 counties will be meeting over the course of the next month or so to choose $700 million worth of road projects the state of Georgia estimates a special penny transportation tax will fund. The only catch? Officials from these 13 counties will have to agree on the list of projects… and they’ll have to convince voters that the projects are worth voting for another tax. The vote part won’t come until next July, but paring down the list… that’s happening right now. “It’s a learning process for us all,” said Matt Schlachter, Columbia County’s director of Construction and Maintenance. “Working together as a region is new to all of us, so we’re going to have to get our heads wrapped

8 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

around it and figure out what we can do and what we can’t do.” They’ve been working toward this point since February, forming first a roundtable and then an executive committee. The roundtable is comprised of the commission chairmen from each county along with a mayor. The roundtable then voted five members of the roundtable to the executive committee, which was in charge of creating the list of projects that goes back to the roundtable. While Richmond County is by far the largest county in the region, Columbia County comes in second, ensuring that the two should get the lion’s share of the projects, especially since they are directly connected. “This being a regional system, some

of our biggest projects are moving traffic from Columbia County to Richmond County,” Schlachter said. “One project is going to be the extension of Riverwatch Parkway from Baston Road to Washington Road in Evans.” That’s a project that helps both counties. “It gives you a quick route from Evans to downtown Augusta, so even though it’s in Columbia County, it’s still a benefit to other counties,” he said. “Projects like that, I hope, will gain support from both counties.” For Columbia County and some of the smaller counties, such politics play a factor in project selection. But since in many ways all roads in the area lead to Augusta, the Augusta project list comes across a bit more selfish.

“Windsor Springs is near and dear to everyone’s heart,” Fred Russell said. “And we have some bridge projects and some stuff at the airport, too.” According to Russell, Augusta officials will gather together to review their portion of the list to make sure they’ve got everything in order. “The hard part — like everything else — is you’ve got competing needs and a limited amount of dollars,” he said. “Richmond County and Columbia County are going to contribute the most to the pot, and in my mind we have the worst need. But you need everyone else’s needs to be met as best you can to get the votes. It’s another juggling act that I hope will bring unity rather than discord.” Though $700 million seems like a

lot of money to spend, the list they’re culling from started at $3.6 billion worth of projects. “The way Columbia County approached it, we asked for everything we could think of in the beginning stages because if we don’t ask for it now, we’ll never get it,” Schlachter said. Ultimately, though, the must-have project list for the county is relatively small. “Chairman Cross has made it quite clear that Riverwatch is the number one project we’ll have on the list,” Schlachter said. After that, he fills out the list himself, though he makes it clear he doesn’t have a vote.

“I’m thinking our top projects are going to be Lewiston Road — that’s a major traffic issue from Columbia Road over to I-20,” he said. “And I’d like to see Fury’s Ferry taken care of from the state line to Evans to Locks Road. And possibly Flowing Wells Road, too.” Ultimately, everyone involved knows this first phase is just an audition. They’re really going to have to work together later to sell the tax to the voters. “I think that’s the whole carrot and the stick deal,” Russell said. “If you can work together, you get a whole lot better deal than if you can’t,”

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Blondes in broadcasting

12 News WRDW • Katie Beasley •Age: 25 •Where do you call home? Right now I call Augusta home, but I grew up in Canton, Ga., just north of Atlanta, so a big piece of my heart will always be there. •Why did you choose Augusta? I’m a southern girl and it seemed like the perfect place to start a broadcasting career after college. I fell in love with the city and the people I work with immediately. •Why news broadcasting? I love telling stories. I anchored my fourth grade newscast and decided then it was something I really enjoyed. I guess you could say I never looked back. •What do you do to relax? I love to read, travel, shop, watch movies and hang out with my fiancé, friends, family and co-workers. •Do people look like their animals? Do you? Haha, I think some people do. I don’t have a pet in Augusta, but I do miss my family’s black and white chihuahua, Lily, that I grew up with. We didn’t really look alike though. •Who does your hair, makeup and clothing for the show? News 12 First at Five co-anchor and I call or text each other every morning and try to match our outfits. It’s a fun, little thing that viewers seem to enjoy and have come to expect. I do my hair, makeup and style

10 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

my own clothes. I enjoy being in control of my look each day. •Name the best place you’ve ever traveled to. That’s a hard one. I’ve been fortunate enough to be able to travel a lot. When I was younger my grandparents spent some time living in Europe. One year my family met them in Germany. We skied in the Swiss Alps, road a rail car to the top of the highest point of the country, and visited Dachau, an old Jewish concentration camp. It was such an eye-opening experience I’ll never forget. It made me care so much more about history. •What’s the craziest thing you’ve done

on camera or that’s happened to you on camera? I got to meet golfing great Jack Nicklaus. I was born the day he won his last Masters in 1986 and it was a great moment to be able to meet him. He did a sit-down interview with me in the clubhouse in 2009. I ended up winning an award for the piece. He could not have been more gracious. •If I put your family in a room and asked them something about you, what would they say about you that you would say is not true? My family and fiancé all say when I get excited or upset I talk too fast. I think they just aren’t listening fast enough. •What thing have you done that you are the proudest of? In this business, awards are a huge pat on the back that you’re hard work is appreciated. I’ve won three Gabby awards in three years. Two for Best Sports Story in 2009, 2010 (even though I do news 99 percent of the time) and one for Best TV On-Air Personality Merit 2010. •What’s the best club in Augusta? There are a few really good ones, and my group of friends likes to bounce around and mix things up, but right now we’ve been spending a lot of time at Bar on Broad. •Favorite indulgence. Cheese, wine and sweets. I could probably never give any of them up without going crazy! •Streaking in public once or wearing

a burka for a month. Pick only one. Streaking in public once. •Favorite team any sport. Georgia Bulldogs, of course. Through thick and thin. •Fast food: evil or tasty? Why doesn’t McDonald’s sell hotdogs? Both... but tasty always wins. I love a mean gourmet hot dog, but I doubt I’d order one at McDonald’s. •If you could replace the Easter Bunny with another character, which one would it be? I wouldn’t... I love the Easter Bunny! •Do you have any tattoos? If so, what and where? If not, why not? No tattoos, mainly because I don’t have something to honor enough to permanently stamp it on my body. •Coolest thing to do in Augusta? I enjoy running by the Augusta Canal. On a cool, crisp morning nothing beats the view. •Favorite TV show. I’m a television junkie, but I’m really excited about the new season of “True Blood” on HBO, it’s a wild, fun hour every week where I get to unwind. •How would the country be different if a woman were president? I think women are more naturally caring, and thoughtful. We wear our emotions on our sleeves a lot of times and that can be both good and bad with a position like that.

12 News WRDW Weekend Meteorologist Saturday and Sunday at 6 and 11 •Vicki Graf •Age. 25 •Where do you call home? Massachusetts. •Why did you choose Augusta? Growing up in the North, I wanted to get a chance to experience southern hospitality. We also get a lot of interesting weather here, i.e. tornadoes, hurricanes, snow… •What do you do to relax? Run •Is it hard being a blond? Do people treat you differently or respond to you as a news reporter differently? There seems to be a notion that blondes are not as bright. I can’t disagree any more. I was able to achieve a meteorology degree with blonde hair and haven’t noticed different treatment because of my hair color. •Name the best place you’ve ever traveled to. My sister is an airline pilot so I’ve had the opportunity to travel to a lot of interesting places — one of my favorites being Scotland, where my ancestors are from. •I’ve seen reporters wearing PJs when the shot is waist up. Do you do that? What are your comfy clothes. Since I stand in front of the green screen, I can’t get away with wearing PJs, but sometimes I will wear flip-flops. •What thing have you done that you are the proudest of? I ran three marathons. •If you could be a superhero, what would your superpowers be? Controlling the weather — it would make my job a lot easier. •What’s the best club in Augusta? Augusta National.

o f

t h e

WEIRD

O (“raspberry, rose hips and birch”). Another “vampirist” called the whole idea “cheesy.” (2) Artist Charity Blansit (aka Cherry Tree) told AOL News in May that she has been working on a fragrance based on her own urine (although not prepared to bring it to market yet), enhanced mainly with sugar.

Fine Points of the Law

•Favorite indulgence. Ice cream. •Favorite team, any sport. Boston Red Sox. •Fast food: evil or tasty? Why doesn’t McDonald’s sell hotdogs? Fast food: Necessary for a journalist who is always on the go. McDonalds sold hotdogs at one point but it didn’t go over too well. •Favorite TV show. Any show on the Food Network. •How would the country be different if a woman were president? I don’t think it would. A woman would be just as competent as a man.

Channel 12 News Anchor

•Meredith Anderson •Age. Younger than my co-anchor, but older than all the reporters at News 12. •Where do you call home? Columbia County. (But I was born in Charleston,

n e w s

S.C.) •Why news broadcasting, as opposed to print or radio? Print... has words. Radio... has words and sound. Television... has words, sound and video. I like having more tools in my

A 53-year-old man with failing eyesight and who had recently undergone intestinal surgery told Sonoma, Calif., police that on Sunday afternoon, May 1, a woman had come to his home and instructed him to drop his pants and get face-down on the bed so that she could administer an enema. He said he assumed his doctor had sent her and thus complied, and it was over in two minutes, and she was gone. The doctor later said he had no idea who the woman was. (In the 1970s, in the Champaign, Ill., area, Michael Kenyon operated similarly as the “Illinois Enema Bandit” — and inspired the late Frank Zappa’s “Illinois Enema Bandit Blues.”)

The Entrepreneurial Spirit! Several funeral homes in the United States have drive-thru windows to serve rushed mourners or those stressed by the parlor experience. “Not quite as emotional,” said one visitor to the Robert L. Adams Mortuary in Compton, Calif., referring to the need not to linger in the queue of bereaved, idling motorists. The Adams facility was even more popular during the peak of gang murders in the area, according to an April Los Angeles Times report, because the drive-thru window’s bulletproof glass rendered unnecessary the precarious indoor service in which gangbangers tried to further desecrate late rivals’ corpses. Noses Know: (1) In April, two Italian entrepreneurs introduced a perfume meant to evoke the scents of a person’s blood, varying by type (A, B, AB, O) — but with no actual blood. A prominent member of the U.S. “vampire community” fondly described the “intriguing” olfactory sensations of Type B (the “black cherry, pomegranate and patchouli infusions”) and Type

Because of a loophole in Michigan law (which, at press time, legislators were working to fix), a winner of the “Make Me Rich” lottery game in July 2010 (publicized value: $2 million) has been openly receiving the same food-stamp allotment he had been receiving before he won. In May 2011, confronted by WNEM-TV in Saginaw, winner Leroy Fick was defiant about his food stamps. Currently, eligibility is based on regular income, and Fick had taken his payoff last year in one lump sum.

Leading Economic Indicators Prison guard is “the greatest entrylevel job in California,” according to an April Wall Street Journal report highlighting its benefits over a typical job resulting from a Harvard University education. Starting pay is comparable; loans are not necessary (since the guard “academy” actually pays the student); and vacation time is more generous (seven weeks, five paid). One downside: The prison system is more selective (Harvard accepts 6.2 percent of applicants versus the guard service’s fewer-than-1 percent of 120,000 applicants). California taxpayers were also astonished to learn in May that several beach communities (led by Newport Beach) pay some lifeguards more than $100,000 annually in salary and benefits. (Generally, those are for longtime and supervisory jobs; ordinary “summer job” lifeguards typically make $16 to $22 an hour.)

Weird Animals Cat Failing to Know Its Role: In Cleveland, Texas (near Houston), a man had to be airlifted to an emergency trauma unit after losing a fight with a house cat. He was even armed with a knife as he took on the beast, but somehow the attacking cat caused him to lose his balance and fall on the blade.

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 11

tacklebox. •What do you do to relax? I like to wind down with a glass of wine and a good book. •Married? How many kids? Yes. One. I have a daughter who just turned one this month. Ella doesn’t just have my heart: she is my heart. •Do you look like your pet, if you have one? I wish. I have a Great Dane. He’s tall. Really tall. •Name the best place you’ve ever traveled to. My favorite place in the whole world is Edisto Island, S.C. My parents had a house on Big Bay Creek, and I spent every summer knee deep in pluff mud with a fishing rod in my hand. Nowhere has ever matched that place for me. Nowhere. •What’s the craziest thing you’ve done on camera or that’s happened to you on camera? Here’s the link: http://www. youtube.com/watch?v=-z1bYRrQztc.

•Is it hard to be a blonde in journalism? No. But it sure is expensive. My hair is naturally blonde, so under the lights it looks really blonde. I have to let lowlights to keep viewers from having to wear sunglasses when they watch the news. It’s that bright. •What thing have you done that you are the proudest of? Personally: become a Mom. Ella’s awesome. Professionally: I found out last week I won a National Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Video News Documentary. I’m really proud of that, but honestly, the best part of that documentary isn’t the hardware. It’s what it represents. Two families who had been searching for each other for years were reunited because of information we uncovered. That is the biggest reward. •If Hollywood made a movie about you, what celebrity would you choose to play you? Julia Roberts. I look nothing

12 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

•Favorite team, any sport. Georgia Bulldogs. I love college football. •Fast food: evil or tasty? Fast food is tasty. Seriously... what’s better than McDonadld’s french fries? And Sonic has the best ice. •Do you have any tattoos? Tell the truth! If so, what and where? If not, why not? No. Oh, my mother would kill me! •Coolest thing to do in Augusta? Sit under the green and white umbrellas Masters Sunday. •Favorite TV show. “Lost.” I miss “Lost.” But the funniest show on TV right now is “Modern Family.” •What makes you angry or frustrated? Close-minded people. •How would the country be different if a woman were president? Depends on the woman.

Anchor at WAGT 26 News

WAGT 26 Channel 26 •Liz Hill •Age. 28 •Where do you call home? Louisville, Ky. •Why did you choose Augusta? After college I sent out applications all over the country. I had an offer Idaho, and in Texas, but I’m kind of a Southern girl. •Why news broadcasting? I’d always wanted to be a Capitol Hill reporter. I always had the vision in my head of being a news reporter. •What do you do to relax? I watch really bad reality TV. •Do people look like their animals? I have a white fluffy shelter dog, her name is Chloe. She does have blonde ears. People who know her say she’s a little high maintenance so maybe in that way she’s like me. •What is your theory on looking good? Who does your hair, makeup and clothing for the show? Heather from Accent on Hair does the cut and color. But I do it. •Name the best place you’ve ever traveled to. Mykanos, Greece. •What’s the craziest thing you’ve done on camera or that’s happened to you on camera? One day Jay scared the living heck on me live on the air. I’m not a huge Halloween fan. I don’t like people walking around in masks. It’s creepy. He got one of our producers to put on a mask and tap me on the shoulder from behind. I screamed live on air. •I’ve seen reporters wearing PJs when the shot is waist up. Do you do that? No but I don’t wear any shoes. That is the truth. •What is your favorite feature? My sense of humor. I like to laugh. •As a blonde do you ever find that people misjudge you? I don’t but I have

like her... but I love her laugh. She laughs with reckless abandon. So do I. •What’s the best club/restaurant in Augusta? Boll Weevil. Eat dessert first. •If you had to interview a man who had just been shipwrecked for 15 years alone on an island, what would your first question to him be? Can I buy you dinner? •Favorite indulgence. The salt air. I don’t get to the coast nearly enough. •Favorite band or singer. What’s on your iPod? Fleetwood Mac is my favorite band, but if you looked at my iPod, it would confuse you. It goes from James Taylor to 2 Pac to Lady Gaga to Rage Against the Machine to Dave Matthews to Broadway show tunes. My iPod has multiple personality disorder. •Streaking in public once or wearing a burka for a month. You can pick only one. Streaking in public once... if it’s summer. I am a wimp in the cold.

gotten blonde jokes since I was 4 years old. •What thing have you done that you are the proudest of? One of the most nerve-wracking was during James Brown’s funeral. They had me doing live shots of the James Brown Arena and all of a sudden Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson walked out. Everyone from the networks, CNN, etc., I interviewed both at once. •If Hollywood made a movie about you, what celebrity would you choose to play you? Sometimes people say I look like Drew Barrymore, but I think it’s the chubby cheeks. •Favorite indulgence. Sweets and chocolate. •Favorite band or singer. I grew up a huge Dave Matthews Band fan, so I still love them. •Streaking in public once or wearing a burka for a month. Pick only one. I guess I’d be more comfortable wearing a burka. •Favorite team any sport. I love to watch Braves games on TV. •You find a hair in your salad. What do you do? Absolutely send it back, unless it’s mine. •What makes you angry or frustrated? Liars.

•Paige Tucker •Age. 20s •Where do you call home? Marietta, Ga. •Why did you choose Augusta? Came for the job, and it was close to home and family — and got married. •Why news broadcasting? I was just drawn to it from a young age. •What do you do to relax? I like to go to the beach or the pool, and hang out

•What’s the craziest thing you’ve done on camera or that’s happened to you on camera? Oh gosh, I broke out into hysterics and couldn’t stop laughing. It sounded like Google and it cracked. •I’ve seen reporters wearing PJs when the shot is waist up. Do you do that? What are your comfy clothes. I’ve never worn PJs; usually just jeans and flip flops. •If I put your family in a room and asked them something about you, what

and do nothing. •I have a theory. Do people look like their animals? We have a black lab mix. I feel like it looks like my husband. Its name is Tibi. •What is your theory on looking good? Who does your hair, makeup and clothing for the show? Me. We wish we could have those frills. •Name the best place you’ve ever traveled to. Playa del Carma, Mexico, for my honeymoon.

would they say about you that you would say is not true? They would say I’m the “ruling child,” meaning what I say goes for the family! Ha! I would disagree. •What thing have you done that you are the proudest of? Move up here in news, climbing the ladder here in a short time in Augusta. Instead of having to go to far away places •What’s the best club in Augusta? I love eating out — I’m very picky. I like

American and Mexican. Frog Hollow is probably the best restaurant. •If you had to interview a man who had just been shipwrecked for 15 years alone on an island, what would your first question to him be? How’d you survive without a woman? •Favorite indulgence. Facials. •Favorite band or singer. I love music. I’m very bad. I like Top 40. •Streaking in public once or wearing a burka for a month. Pick only one. Definitely a burka for a month. • Favorite team any sport. Bulldogs. •Fast food: evil or tasty? Evil. •If you could replace the Easter

Bunny with another character, which one would it be? I don’t know, a kangaroo? They have built-in baskets. •You find a hair in your salad. What do you do? I get completely grossed out and I’d tell the restaurant. •Do you have any tattoos? If so, what and where? If not, why not? No. I’m not into ink. I hate needles. •Coolest thing to do in Augusta? Go to the Masters. • Favorite TV show. Currently, “The Bachelorette.” And “Sex in the City.” • What makes you angry or frustrated? People who are inconsiderate. I hate waiting.

Mack Taylor ATTORNEY AT LAW

TIME

LOCATION

Monday, June 27, 2011

5:00 P.M. to 7:00 P.M

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

5:00 P.M. to 7:00 P.M.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

4:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M.

Aiken County Planning & Development Department, Conference Room, 1680 Richland Ave West, Ste 130, Aiken, SC Evans Government Center Auditorium 630 Ronald Reagan Drive Evans, GA

This announcement shall serve to fulfill the public activities and time requirements for the Section 5307 Program of Projects developed for the Augusta Public Transit as well as Aiken County Transit (a project funded in part through Section 5307 of the Urbanized Area Formula Grant Program of the FTA, and managed by Lower Savannah Council of Governments).

DUIs/Traffic Administrative License Hearings

MEETING DATE

A summary of the draft TIP can also be viewed at the following web site: http://www.augustaga.gov/DocumentView.aspx?DID=3127

CRIMINAL DEFENSE Free Initial Consultation

The public is invited to review and comment on the draft FY 2012 - 2015 Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) for the Augusta Regional Transportation Study (ARTS) during three public information meetings (dates and times listed below). The ARTS area covers the urbanized portions of Richmond and Columbia County, GA and Aiken and Edgefield County, SC. The TIP includes federally-financed trans-portation projects (road, bridge, transit, bike/pedestrian, and enhancement) scheduled to be implemented over the next four to six years in the ARTS area.

Note: Drop-in Format applies to all meetings. Public invited to drop in at any time during the meeting times indicated.

-Former DUI Prosecutor-

706.922.1992

PUBLIC MEETING NOTICE

INVITATION TO COMMENT ON TRANSPORTATION PROJECTS

Please contact the Augusta-Richmond County Planning Commission at (706) 821-1796 for more information about the meetings or to review a copy of the draft TIP. Persons with special needs re-lated to handicapped accessibility or foreign language may contact the Planning Commission for assis-tance. George A. Patty, Executive Director Augusta-Richmond County Planning Commission

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 13

ABC WJBF News Channel 6 Weekend Anchor/Digital Journalist •JiIlian Benfield •Age. 23 •Where do you call home? Titusville, Fla. •Why did you choose Augusta? How long have you been at the station? Actually, I got married two years ago in July. My husband applied to dental school where there were news stations — I commuted to Columbia and anchored there for a while — I like it here better. How long will you stay in Augusta? Things are up in the air, he’ll be a dentist — he’s 2nd. Lt. in the Air Force — after he graduates we’ll see. •Why news broadcasting? I think it was one of those things where I was fascinated growing up. I started in 5th grade reading the news — when I was in high school, after play practice, I would go home and immediately turn on the local news. English was my favorite subject and I was a singer in high school. Broadcasting fit my talents. •Have you ever sung professionally? I’ve sang in weddings here and there — my first real TV debut was a singing competition in Orlando — I think it was called Gimme’ the Mic — like a local American idol. I didn’t win but I got Viewer’s Choice. •What do you do to relax? I need to figure out something better. My weekends are Thursday and Friday. I feel like I never stop working. I do yoga. •You have a golden doodle. I have a theory. Do people look like their

animals? I guess you could say that. My hair is naturally curly. I’ve had people tell me that. •Who does your hair, makeup and clothing for the show? Me. People always think we get it done professionally but we do it ourselves. •Name the best place you’ve ever traveled to. Athens Greece, I’d put that in the top few. •What’s the craziest thing you’ve done

on camera or that’s happened to you on camera? I could have gotten fired for this, thankfully I didn’t. It was a really long two days after a snowstorm in South Carolina, I had been working for 24 hours basically. So, instead of doing a live shot for the wrap up, I recorded a tag. The camera guy goes, 321, I did my intro and then messed up and I said dammit. The editor didn’t catch it, either.

•I’ve seen reporters wearing PJs when the shot is waist up. Do you do that? No. I have never done that. Coat, tie, gym shorts and shoes. Maybe a pair of jeans. I’m not a heels girl when it comes to work. •Favorite indulgence. Glass of wine. •Favorite band or singer. Michael Buble •Streaking in public once or wearing a burka for a month. Pick only one. I’m gonna go with streaking in public. • Favorite team any sport. They only sport I really follow is Georgia football. •You find a hair in your salad. What do you do? If it was just one hair, I’d probably eat it. My husband likes to say I can interview murderers but I can’t send something back to a waiter. •Do you have any tattoos? If so, what and where? If not, why not? No. I don’t think they look good. My mother always threatened if I got a tattoo I’d have been cut off — I’d have been cut off financially. •Coolest thing to do in Augusta? My favorite thing to do is Friday 5 o’clock. We go do happy hour. • Favorite TV show. “Modern Family.” • What makes you angry or frustrated? Lazy people. People that don’t care about what they do. •How would the country be different if a woman were president? I don’t think it’d be different at all. All the politicians I’ve met are the same, male or female.

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14 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

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Taking Command

A new program at Augusta Tech helps responders be more effective

“Incident Command is huge. Without it, there’s chaos.” When Sean Joiner, chair of Augusta Tech’s Criminal Justice Department, took his idea for a new Incident Command Technology program through the process of becoming an actual line of study, he found his audience was very receptive. “Our advisory board here for the criminal justice program saw that there was a need for this type of certificate out there,” he says. “Augusta is quite unique, having Fort Gordon, the NSA, Plant Vogtle, SRS, a huge medical community, Clarks Hill dam, the Savannah River…” You get the point. All the things that make our community thrive also make it particularly vulnerable to a wide range of potential incidents, ranging from the natural to the accidental to the purposeful, and Joiner feels his new program will help those looking out for us look out for us better, no matter what the incident. “First on the scene,” he says. “Those are the ones who are going to comprise the team that’s going to try to eliminate the threat or handle the emergency, and understanding the concepts of what incident command is and how that structure works can make all the difference.” Students completing Augusta Tech’s new Incident Command Technology program will earn a Technical Certificate of Credit (TCC). Joiner says it’s the only program like it in the area. “It’s largely for people who are working in the field,” he says. “And the

particular certificate of credit would be used in areas of advancement within their potential job skills.” Though it’s structured so that a fulltime student could finish the course of study in one semester, Joiner’s been at Augusta Tech long enough to know that’s not the likely scenario. “A working individual — and in reality that’s more of what we’re going to get, I think — will take a couple of classes a semester,” he says. Partnering with Fire Sciences, the coarse load for the 17-credit-hour program includes an introduction to Homeland Security, Methods of Criminal Investigation, Private Security, Hazardous Materials Operations and Incident Command. Joiner had been mulling over the idea for a couple of years. “First, I wanted to look at something for Homeland Security, but I found it was just too specific of an area, especially on a federal level, so I looked at it again and saw that Incident Command encompassed any critical incident,” he says. “For anything that happens, there’s going to be a command system in place, and so we evolved it from there.” EMA Director Pam Tucker, who gives a presentation to Joiner’s criminal justice students at least once a semester, says the program will be a welcome addition for all types of emergency response providers. “Incident Command is huge,” she says. “Without it, there’s chaos.” As EMA director, Tucker coordinates

Sean Joiner and prepares for all forms of incidents, and she knows how difficult it can be to establish a proper command structure. “It can’t just be fire or it can’t just be law enforcement,” she says. “It’s got to be everybody, because they’re not autonomous anymore.” Having recently completed the final draft of the latest update of the Emergency Operations Plan, issues of incident command factor highly in her preparations. “Educating the people who are in charge of the different departments is a part of it, but what this coursework does is help those other people,” she says. “They’ll do what you tell them because that’s how they operate. But doesn’t it make it easier if everybody understands why they’re doing it and why it’s important? That’s where I think this can be most valuable for any entry-level person.” While thunderstorms like the ones that recently downed trees and cut power lines are by far the most common type of incident encountered in this area, Tucker says they are by no means the only one. “Anything can happen here except volcanoes, avalanches, tsunamis and landslides,” she says. “So, we take the whole list of 25 or 30 public health emergencies, because, really, anything could impact a large section of our population.” Joiner also believes that the more people are aware of Incident Command procedures the more effectively

emergencies will be handled, but he insists it’s not just about responding quickly. For him, it’s also about responding smart, and, as a retired law enforcement officer, he feels the responsibility to keep his students safe. “I think we also have a duty to make sure that they are able to learn and to keep safe, to keep their partners and their coworkers safe and just like any other area of law enforcement, to go back home to their families,” he says. “I don’t care if that’s private security or it they work for SRS — the goal at the end of the day is to use that knowledge and preparation to go back home.” While Joiner’s experience has been wide and varied, his connection to Augusta Tech is focused and strong. A member of its first graduating class in criminal justice, he went on to earn his master’s in international relations, then came back to chair the Criminal Justice department. “What I like about it — I’m able to talk to students and say, ‘hey, you’re working adults, maybe you’re single parents and you’re not sure of your career path, but I sat in the same seat you’re sitting in and I graduated from the same program you will,’” he says. “‘This is what you can accomplish.’ I like to give that message back to the students.” Incident Command classes will begin when the fall semester begins on Aug. 22.

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 15

Too many buildings Augusta deals with its surplus properties

16 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

While everyone’s been fretting over the future of Regency Mall, complaining about its condition and eager to hold its absentee owners responsible for its deterioration and overall ugliness, Augusta has plenty of governmentowned buildings taking up space. And unlike Regency Mall, they’re not paying for the privilege of being an eyesore, since neither the city nor the Board of Education pays property taxes. That’s the thing about the old library, the old Chamber of Commerce building and any of a handful of deteriorating old schools still owned by the Board of Education — they’re not bringing in a dime. In spite of the fact that these extra properties that are sitting empty, the city actually pays a considerable amount of money to lease office space. Thanks to the additional space provided by the Judicial Center, the city is working toward consolidating its business onto its own property. Currently, the District Attorney, the law department, the Disadvantaged Business Enterprise, the Equal Employment Opportunity, Augusta Cares and Heery Program Management all lease space in the Hatcher Building at the corner of 5th and Greene. “We’re looking to get those folks out,” says Rick Acree, operations manager of Recreation, Parks and Facilities. Though the county produced an initial space study in the late 1990s that assessed all of the county offices and their functions, the study is 15 years old and it’s safe to say that a lot has changed since then. “When that study was done, there was still a Public Works department,” Acree says. “That doesn’t exist anymore. There’s no Human Relations department.” And there wasn’t a Judicial Center. “As we looked at the Municipal Building and what space was being freed up by the exit of the courts, we had our program manager look at the space available as we vacated the outlying buildings. The first consideration, obviously, was to see if we could get the people out of leased space and not continue to spend money on lease payments.” And those payments, he says, have been considerable. “Moving the District Attorney out, who had the entire fourth floor, and with us on the third floor — if I remember correctly, it was roughly $120,000 to $130,000 per floor,” he says. As far as what the makeup of the Municipal Building will be like, he says a lot is subject to adjustments with the reorganization. Administrator Fred Russell acknowledges the preliminary plan is,

by necessity, simply a starting place, like the decision to move the commission chambers to one of the second-floor courtrooms. He says that was done almost two years ago in preparation. “We had to decide that in order to do some of the preliminary planning,” Russell says. “Once we get an architect on board, they’ll get a chance to go through everything again. But we had to put together something to make sure we could do it and to give the architects something to bid on, some of whom did and some of whom, according to me, didn’t.” He’s speaking of the recent controversy over the bidding of the Municipal Building remolding project, which has been stalled because of a protest by one of the bidders. Even if that protest is resolved, there’s no real rush, since nothing can happen until an earlier lawsuit over the city’s use of the construction manager at risk process is resolved. In the meantime, however, Russell says the commission is moving forward with the potential sale of its surplus property. “In the next committee cycle they’re going to recommend a Realtor to look at all our surplus property and help us market them,” he says. “There’s the old chamber building, the library, the old depot property and a couple of old fire stations that we’re using for stuff. They’ll be looking at all that and trying to put together a list for the commission to look at and determine what they want to do with it.” The consolidation of License and Inspection and Planning and Zoning means that License and Inspection will be moving in from its digs out on Marvin Griffin Road and Planning and Zoning will be vacating the majestic, though impractical space behind the Municipal Building. “That building is really not set up for office operations,” Acree says. “It also would be next to impossible to really retrofit for ADA compliance in terms of making it functional as an office space without making significant modifications to a historic structure.” Russell agrees. “Obviously, part of it is the old Jewish synagogue, and that’s historic,” he says. “We attempted to look at it a couple of times, but I don’t think that will go anywhere. I don’t know what we’ll end up doing with it.” Given its significance and the fact that it’s basically part of the Municipal Building complex, Russell says they’ll probably end up holding onto it. “I don’t think anybody could afford to fix it the way it would need to be fixed up,” he says. Even with the surplus buildings and all the shifting of departments, Russell says

Exclusively bitter

] v i z , v i s o o l k s [ik

Commission continues to squabble, word by word

In a contentious commission meeting that saw Commissioner Bill Lockett bring up a vote of no confidence in General Counsel Andrew MacKenzie and more back and forth regarding the bid protest by Johnson and Laschober involving the Municipal Building project, perhaps the most meaningful exchange came as a result of the surprising move made by Mayor Pro Tem Joe Bowles and Wayne Guilfoyle to delete the word “exclusive” from the Personnel, Policy and Procedure Handbook. Back at the first of the year, Lockett and Mason fought against the inclusion of the word, which gives the administrator the exclusive right to nominate a department head. Axing the word would not change the administrator’s ability to nominate, but it would also allow commissioners to nominate. “Mr. Guilfoyle and I spent a lot of time discussing this with other commissioners and we think it’s time we take the word ‘exclusive’ out of his recommending powers,” Bowles said. If he expected that announcement to be received with open arms, however, he was mistaken. “I want to applaud my colleagues for putting this on the agenda,” Lockett said, pausing in such a way to imply that there would be a “but” following. “Since January, I’ve continually complained about things that were in the Personnel, Policy and Procedure Manual that were not legitimate, that were illegal. This is one of the things that I complained about, but this is only one of many. And if you really want to do something great, we can also take out from the personnel board that the administrator has the final decision.” Lockett drew a picture of the organizational chart, pointing out that

as a commissioner he works for the people and the administrator works for him. Alvin Mason, however, wasn’t ready for even a backhanded compliment. “I can’t help but mention some of what bill has already stated,” he said. “Bill and I spoke up here for the last five or six months, almost to the point of making us sick, about the fact that the word ‘exclusive’ was a word that we practically begged folks not to place in because we knew the issue it would cause. It has actually contributed to the division on this commission.” He said their efforts to change were tuned back at every turn, eventually causing them to be vilified as obstructionists. “Now, four months later or five months later it appears someone sees fit to go back and say what we had been stating from the very beginning,” he said. “And we’ve now had five months of discord and dissension.” He took a breath and waited until he had everyone’s attention before he continued. “What makes it right today if it wasn’t right when we said it?” he asked, generating considerable agreement from the nearly full chamber. “It’s tough being up here. We’ve developed relationships that have gone sour for the word ‘exclusive,’ which we begged against, time and time again. We weren’t against it. We simply said let’s do it right and let’s do it fair and let’s do it legal, and we got beat down. We got beat down.” After that, voting for the motion was all over the map, with Aitken, Bowles, Guilfoyle, Hatney and Smith voting for it and Johnson, Mason, Lockett, Jackson and Brigham voting against it. Mayor Deke broke the tie by voting for the motion. METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 17

the city might still need to build a new building for its IT department. “We’ve looked at a couple other places, including the old library, but we have not found anything that’s appropriate yet. And it’s at the point now, because of the specific needs for IT, that it’s almost cheaper to design something specifically for them rather than try to retrofit something,” he says. “But that’s a conversation down the line. Maybe in a year or so.” Which leaves the old library, hale, hearty and empty. “I’ve been talking to some of the educational institutions about the potential for them using it for something, and we occasionally have someone who comes through to look at it, but we haven’t done any serious marketing,” he says. “Hopefully, that’s going to happen in a couple of weeks.” He says he’s pushing for its use as some form of class space or art space. “To me, it makes a lot of sense, if you look at the model they’ve used in Savannah and a couple of other places,” he says. “We’ve had some conversations with ASU and Paine and MCG, so that’s not off the table. It’s just in the conversation stage.” Though Columbia County’s restructuring has been piecemeal and has occurred with far less public outcry, it has left the commission with its own share of shifting around. Right now, the additional 24,000 square feet of space that’s part of the Building C expansion will allow them to do some remolding of their existing facilities and move out of the leased

18 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

space behind Zaxby’s on Ronald Reagan Drive. “We’re looking at all that right now,” says Facility Services Manager Paul Scarbary. “Myself, the county administrator, the Construction and Maintenance director and the division heads who would be affected will look at the spaces we have available. Then, we’ll look at the information and determine the final layout.” Perhaps the most glaring example of surplus property, however, belongs to the Richmond County Board of Education. Historic Augusta has put several of these properties on their endangered properties list, including Old Davidson, the hulking school hiding in plain sight behind the trees on Telfair. “I don’t even know if the building is still there,” says Rob Sherman, director of License and Inspection. “I haven’t even noticed that building in some time, but I think it’s secured. I know there were some concerns with it several years ago.” It’s still there, though part of the fencing surrounding it is non-existent, leaving free access to the school. Vandals have exposed one of the doors, and the inside is an example of total destruction — a sunken floor, collapsed ceiling, toilets dipping down to oblivion. Senior Director of Facilities Services Benton Starks admits Davidson has severe roof issues, but says it, like all the schools, is as secure as he can make it. “We try to be a good neighbor,” he says. “We work closely with Augusta Cares keeping the grass cut and the vagrants out of the buildings. We try to

keep them secured and we try to keep them repaired to a reasonable degree, but some of the buildings are just so far gone. Like Old Davidson. It would just not be prudent for me to sink any money in there. Just to board that place up costs $10,000.” While that is certainly a significant cost, how neighborly is it to have a pathway into an unsafe and unsecured property? “There’s a board rule that says I have to inspect these buildings once a month and report to the board the conditions of these facilities,” Starks says. This monthly surplus building report includes a number of photographs of each property documenting break ins and other disrepair. Erick Montgomery, executive director of Historic Augusta, says he tried to get the Board of Education to allow him to use his organization to help them find qualified, preservation-minded buyers for the properties. But he says the school board was more interested in conducting their surplus property auction, which failed to legitimately unload a single property. One school was pulled out of the auction and sold directly to the city of Hephzibah while another was purchased through contacts of Historic Augusta. Though Montgomery realizes the Board of Education has slightly different goals than he does, he maintains that the two goals can be compatible. “Our point is that it’s probably the best approach,” he says of the preservation tax credits and incentives available to interested parties. “You have a building that’s rehabbed. It’s back on the tax roll

and it’s being used in the community. An empty school building is a blight on the neighborhood. It’s not generating any income or any good for anyone.” Starks doesn’t pretend to be interested in preservation. That’s not his job. He’s looking to unload buildings in a tough economy, and he’s willing to try anything, including an online auction. “We’re checking with our board attorney for the legalities of it,” he says. “We’re trying to do something different, because in this market, it’s just hard to move real estate.” Building or land, he makes it clear it doesn’t matter to him. “Whether the land is more valuable than the building, that’s something people have to determine depending on what their use is going to be,” he says. “Some property may be sold and they make tear down the building just for the land. We’ve had sales like that before.” The city of Augusta, however, isn’t willing to take a chance on the mercurial market. “The bottom line is, we don’t have staff that has the expertise to market real property,” Acree says. “So going outside for that service makes sense. It’s a professional service just like architectural and engineering work.” To sweeten the deal, the city is even forking out for a new roof for the old chamber building, an architectural anomaly designed by I.M. Pei, and the depot building. What ultimately happens to those properties, however, is up to the commission.

TURN of the

CENTURY A look back at the news the Metro Spirit was covering at the turn of the century

June 22, 2000 In the feature, Brian Neill reports on the declaration of a 90-day moratorium on an ordinance that would remove signs, banners and outdoor dining areas downtown. After having to endure endless, rambling rhetoric on issues that likely didn’t concern them, downtown merchants silently left the Augusta Commission chambers June 20, having received temporary satisfaction from a temporary moratorium on their temporary signs. But the ugly monster that threatened to gobble up their café tables, gallery banners and signs advertising fresh fudge will return in 90 days to fight again. Though this time, it may be de-clawed and have a few teeth missing. Downtown merchants were angered

by the recent enforcement of a new sign ordinance, which they felt jeopardized their livelihoods and the charming atmosphere that has developed along Broad Street, particularly in the area known as Artists’ Row. Under the ordinance, adopted in May, merchants would have to remove sandwich board signs on sidewalks, banners and café tables and chairs. Later in the feature, Carol Craig, president of Artists’ Row, states, “Almost seven years ago, we moved downtown as part of the revitalization. We feel that, if we have to move our banners, which the city already approved, and the [sign] hardware, nobody will find us.” Merchants were told at the special-

called meeting that, even under the current ordinance, they can have temporary signs for a period of 15 days each calendar quarter. However, merchants balked at the $25 and $15 fees for permitting and inspection, respectively. Commissioner Mays introduced a substitute motion, which was passed, to issue the permits free of charge. Said Mays, “Now, I’m hoping we’re talking about a permit that allows our folks to look at something, but not a permit that we’re fixing to charge folks for. Some of these folks are making some very serious risky investments to be down there in the very beginning, and to highlight something that has brought back a life downtown, to where you’re being able to function, to come back and to be able to see people, and I think it’s a little punitive… to allow them now to do it and then to turn around and charge them to do it. I just don’t think that’s fair.” Mayor Bob Young added, “…I think we’re headed on the right track. And we’re going to reach a comfort level that I think the ordinance will recognize the differences — the uniqueness — of the different areas of the city, and each one will be addressed.”

The issue also got a double dose of Feel Good Whine Line: “For years the Augusta-Richmond County Civic Center has been underused and a general money-loser. But, after getting professionals to run it and getting hockey and arena football and a few more concerts, it is finally getting to be used on a regular basis by the citizens of the CSRA. I see no reason why Augusta cannot honor its most famous entertainer by renaming the civic center in his honor. Long live James Brown!” A few pages later, Austin Rhodes was cited as wanting the name-change to occur as well…Commentary: Insider “Insiders close to the civic center report that most coliseum authority members are in no hurry to name the building for James Brown. Insiders report that authority member Austin Rhodes is in the minority over the namechange issue. Reliable sources say that even some African-American authority members have spoken privately against the idea. Rhodes will have his hands full on this one.” Austin Rhodes, being Austin Rhodes, called out the future.

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calendar Arts

Arts groups are invited to apply to the Greater Augusta Arts Council for grants. Grants will be awarded on a competitive basis, with primary consideration given to the quality of artistic activities, management of fiscal responsibilities, demonstrated financial need, and the degree of benefit to the Augusta community. Deadline for application is Friday, July 22. E-mail Grace Inman at grace@augustaarts.com or visit augustaarts.com.

visit themorris.org. Art Greene Photography Exhibit is at Sacred Heart Cultural Center through June 30. Call 706-826-4700 or visit sacredheartaugusta.org.

Music

Savannah River Bluegrass performs at Music in the Park at North Augusta’s Maude Edenfield Park Thursday, June 23, at 7 p.m. Free. Call 803-442-7588 or visit naartscouncil.org.

Day of Art, hosted by the North Augusta Artists Guild, is each Tuesday from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. at the Arts and Heritage Center and includes a group of artists painting in the center who will answer questions or allow visitors to join in. Call 803-441-4380 or visit artsandheritagecenter.com.

Sugarland: The Incredible Machine Tour is Thursday, June 23, at 7:30 p.m. at the James Brown Arena. Sugarland will perform along with special guests Ellis Paul. $24.50$54.50. Call 706-722-3521 or visit augustaentertainmentcomplex.com.

Exhibitions

Music at the Morris with Keith Gehle is Sunday, June 26, at 2 p.m. at the Morris Museum of Art. Free. Call 706724-7501 or visit themorris.org.

Will Barnet: Works on Paper, 14 color lithographs, serigraphs and etchings by the American master, is on display at the Morris Museum of Art through July 8. Call 706-828-3867 or visit themorris.org. Aiken Artist Guild Gallery-Heart Gallery exhibit includes portraits of children in need of adoption made by local photographers. Call 803-641-9094 or visit aikencenterforarts.org.

Candlelight Jazz Series is Sunday, June 26, at 8 p.m. at the Jessye Norman Amphitheatre and features jazz musicians The Low End from Savannah in a tribute to Gerry Mulligan. Bring your own seating and picnic. $6. Call 706-495-6238 or visit gardencityjazz.com.

Keep it clean at this Belly Dancing for Beginners class, of fered Thursday, June 30, at 6:30 p.m. at the Headquarters Branch Library. Why? Because those ages 12 and up are invited to attend as well. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org

30, at 7 p.m. Free. Call 803-442-7588 or visit naartscouncil.org.

by a NOOKcolor tutorial at 12:30 p.m. Free. Call 706-737-0012 or visit bn.com.

Literary

Theater

Philip Juras: The Southern Frontier, landscapes inspired by Bartram’s travels, shows at the Morris Museum of Art. Call 706-724-7501 or visit themorris.org.

Crooked River Dixieland Band plays at the Hopelands Summer Concert Series Monday, June 27, at 7 p.m. at Hopelands Gardens in Aiken. Call 803-642-7630 or visit aiken.net/ hopelandsgarden.html.

The Eclectic Works of Joe Rob is an exhibition that shows on the third floor of the Headquarters Branch Library until July 8. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org.

R. Kelly with special guests Keyshia Cole and Marsha Ambrosius perform Tuesday, June 28, at 7:30 p.m. $47-$77. Call 706-722-3521 or visit augustaentertainmentcomplex.com.

The Charleston Renaissance: Works on Paper, an exhibition of more than two dozen watercolors and etchings by Ellen Day Hale, Alfred Hutty, Alice Ravenel, Huger Smith, Anna Heyward Taylor and Elizabeth O’Neill Verner, shows at the Morris Museum of Art through June 26. Call 706-724-7501 or

Appleby Concert Series presents Savannah River Brass Works on Tuesday, June 28, at 8 p.m. at the Appleby Branch Library. Call 706-736-6244 or visit ecgrl.org.

Book Discussion Group meets Tuesday, June 28, from 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. at the Headquarters Branch Library to discuss “The Walk” by Richard Paul Evans. Come discuss one man’s inspirational journey from Bellevue, Wash., to Key West, Fla. Call 706-8212600 or visit ecgrl.org.

Sand Hills String Band performs at Music in the Park at North Augusta’s Maude Edenfield Park Thursday, June

NOOK Tutorials at Barnes and Noble in the Augusta Mall are each Saturday beginning at noon, followed

Non-Fiction Book Club meets Monday, June 27, at 6:30 p.m. at the Columbia County Library. Group will be discussing “My Secret: A Post Secret Book” by Frank Warren. Call 706-8631946 or visit columbiacountyga.gov.

“Amadeus” shows June 23-25 at 8 p.m. at Le Chat Noir. This period piece portrays the remarkable and unremarkable lives of the composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri. Call 706-722-3322 or visit lcnaugusta.com.

Dance

Dancing on the River, hosted by Family Y of North Augusta, is Friday, June 24, from 7-10 p.m. Free to the public. Call 803-278-0882 or visit familyy.org. Belly Dancing for Beginners is Thursday, June 30, at 6:30 p.m. at the Headquarters Branch Library. For ages METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 21

Want to head out to the lake? Get to Mistletoe State Park early on Saturday, June 25, and take part in the Mountain Dulcimer Workshop. Providing participants hands-on instruction led by the Garden City Strummers, it begins at 9:30 a.m. Free. Call 706-541-0321 or visit gastateparks.org.

12 and older. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org. Friday Dance is every Friday night from 8:30-11 p.m. at The Ballroom Dance Center in Evans. $5. Call 706854-8888 or visit thebdc.us. Christian Singles Dance, for ages 18 and over, is every Saturday night at The Ballroom Dance Center in Evans from 7-11 p.m. $8-$10. Call 706-8548888 or visit thebdc.us.

Flix

“Freakonomics”showsThursday, June 23, at 2:30 p.m. at the Maxwell Branch Library. Call 706-793-2020 or visit ecgrl.org. “Desipicable Me” shows Friday, June 24, at 7 p.m. as part of the Movies Under the Stars Series at the Columbia County Ampitheatre presented by MCGHealth Children’s Medical Center. Free. Call 706-722-5736 or visit mcghealth.org. “Legends of the Guardian: The Owls of Ga Hoole” shows Tuesday, June 28, at 2:30 p.m. at the Maxwell Branch Library. Call 706-793-2020 or visit ecgrl.org.

22 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

“The Searchers” shows Tuesday, June 28, at 6:30 at the Headquarters Branch Library. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org. “It’s Kind of a Funny Story” shows Thursday, June 30, at 2:30 p.m. at the Maxwell Branch Library. Call 706793-2020 or visit ecgrl.org. “Vanishing Georgia” shows throughout June at the Augusta Museum of History as part of the museum’s History Theater Film Series. Free with admission. Call 706-722-8454 or visit augustamuseum.org.

Special Events

Augusta Pride Parade begins at 10 a.m. Saturday, June 25, in downtown Augusta. It ends at the Augusta Common where the Augusta Pride Festival will take place from 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Visit prideaugusta.org. Fire Over Aiken is Saturday, June 25, at 3 p.m. There will be kiddie rides, games, food, merchandise and bands. Parking, $5. Visit westerncarolinastatefair.com. Young Professionals of Augusta Celebrity Softball Game is Saturday,

June 25, at 6 p.m. at Lake Olmstead Stadium. $10. Call 706-312-2427 or visit ypaugusta.com. Cruise In at The Snow-Cap Drive In is on Saturday, June 25, from 6-8 p.m. Proceeds benefit the Wounded Warrior Care Project. Call 803-279-4004 or visit snocapnorthaugusta.com. Stop the Violence Community Altar Call with William McDowell is Saturday, June 25, at 7 p.m. at the Imperial Theatre. $10-$20. Call 706722-8341 or visit imperialtheatre.com. Globe-Trotting, Learn to Plan a European Vacation, is Thursday, June 30, at 1:30 p.m. at the Headquarters Branch Library. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org. Saturday Market at the River, located at 8th Street Plaza, downtown Augusta, is each Saturday through Oct. 29, from 8 a.m.-2 p.m. Visit theaugustamarket.com.

Health

Food Safety Awareness, a nutrition seminar at the Wilson Family Y, is Thursday, June 23, at 6 p.m. This seminar is hosted by Doctor’s Hospital to help build healthier habits. Free to members; $10 to non-members. Visit the familyy.org. Shepeard Community Blood Center will be hosting a number of blood drives Friday, June24, through Thursday, June 30. On June 24, from 1-4 p.m., they will be at Uni-Health Post Acute Care; Sunday, June 26, at Trinity CME Church from 10:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m.; Tuesday, June 26, at Doctor’s Hospital from 10:30 a.m.-4 p.m. For a complete list of blood drive locations, call 706-737-4551 or visit shepeardblood.org. WeekendChildbirthPreparation Class, a complete childbirth preparation class designed for those with time constraints or fluctuating schedules, is Friday, June 24, from 6:30-9:30 p.m., and Saturday, June 25, from 9 a.m.5:30 p.m. Call 706-774-2825 or visit universityhealth.org. ChildcareandBabysittingSafety, including instructions on playtime, hand-washing, telephone calls, infant and child feeding, diapering, sleep time, and providing emergency care, is Saturday, June 25, from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. For those ages 11-14. $30. Pre-registration required. Call 706-481-7535 or visit trinityofaugusta.com. The Ryan White Outreach Team will offer free testing throughout June

in honor of National HIV Testing Day at locations around Augusta. Results available in 20 minutes. Get tested from noon-6 p.m. June 25 at Augusta Pride, from 2-6 p.m. June 26 at the National Guard Armory, and from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. June 28 at Mercy Ministries. Call 706721-4463 or visit csrasafetynet.org. Le Leche League will meet Tuesday, June 28, at 7 p.m. at Inner Bean Café, Davis Road. Visit lllofga.org. Multiple Sclerosis and Parkinson Disease Aquatics Class, sponsored by the CSRA Parkinson Support Group and The Family Y, is a group class designed specifically for ambulatory participants affected by Multiple Sclerosis and Parkinson Disease. Held each Friday at noon at the Wilson Family Y indoor pool. Call Claudia Collins at 706-922-9664 or visit thefamilyy.org. Joint Efforts, an informational class about knee and hip pain causes and treatments sponsored by Trinity Hospital of Augusta, meets every Thursday at 11 a.m. at Augusta Orthopaedic Clinic. Call 706-481-7604 or visit trinityofaugusta.com.

Support

A.W.A.K.E. sleep apnea support group meets Thursday, June 23, from 7-9 p.m. at MCGHealth. Call 706-721-0793 or visit mcghealth.org. Kids In Need of a Cure (KINCS) Support Group meets Saturday, June 25, at 10 a.m. at Panera Bread on Robert C. Daniel Jr. Parkway. Call Stephanie Fuller at 706-541-0146 or Gretchen Daly at 706-955-8232. Cancer Share Support Group meets Monday, June 27, from 6-7:30 p.m. at University Hospital. Call 706-7748308 or visit universityhealth.org.

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MultipleSclerosisSupportGroup meets Monday, June 27, from 6-7:30 p.m. at MCGHealth. Call 706-721-7239 or visit mchealth.org. Let’s Talk Cancer Support Group meets Tuesday, June 28, from 5:30-7 p.m. at MCGHealth. Call 706-721-0550 or visit mcghealth.org. Parkinson’s Disease Support Group meets Tuesday, June 28, at 6 p.m. at University Hospital. Call 706-8636355 or visit universityhealth.org. Moms Connection meets every Tuesday from 1-2 p.m. at 1225 Walton Way (the old Fairway Ford dealership), room 1010C. Pre-registration

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required. Call 706-721-9351 or visit mcghealth.org. Joint Efforts, a informational class about knee and hip pain causes and treatments sponsored by Trinity Hospital of Augusta, meets every Thursday at 11 a.m. at Augusta Orthopaedic Clinic. Call 706-481-7604 or visit trinityofaugusta.com. Weight Loss Surgery Support Group meets each Wednesday at 1:30 p.m. in Suite 110 of Medical Office Building 2, 3624 J. Dewey Gray Circle, on the Doctors Hospital campus. Call 706-651-2229 or visit doctors-hospital.net.

Education

Beginning Word II Computer Class is a two-session class that meets Thursday, June 23 and June 30, from 6-7:30 p.m. at the Wallace Branch Library. Call 706-722-6275 or visit ecgrl.org. Mountain Dulcimer Workshop, with hands-on instruction provided by the Garden City Strummers, is Saturday, June 25, at 9:30 a.m. at Mistletoe State Park in Appling. Free. Call 706-541-0321 or visit gastateparks.org. “The Other Tubmans,” a Voices of the Past Museum Theater Series of character monologues, this one highlighting the connection between local Tubman slaves freed in the 1830s and William Tubman, shows Saturday, June 25, at noon, 12:30 p.m. and 1:30 p.m. Free with museum admission. Call 706-722-8454 or visit augustamuseum.org. Beginning Word I Computer Class is Tuesday, June 28, from 6-7:30 p.m. at the Wallace Branch Library. Call 706-722-6275 or visit ecgrl.org. Pride and Progress of Augusta, a group that seeks to improve South Richmond County, meets Tuesday, June 28, at 6:30 p.m. Call 706-833-0168 or visit southaugustabusiness.com/prideand progress. Saturday Historic Trolley Tour, every Saturday, begins at the Museum of History and tours historic downtown Augusta from 1-3:15 p.m. Reservations required. All seats are $12. 706-724-4067.

Benefits

Karma Yoga is offered at Just Breathe Studio, downtown Aiken, each Friday at 10 a.m. and is free if participants bring a donation of a

24 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

personal item which will be given to the Cumbee Center to Assist Abused Persons. Call 803-648-8048 or visit justbreathestudio.com.

Sports-Outdoors

Augusta Elks Annual Golf Tournament at Jones Creek Golf Club is Thursday, June 23, at 1 p.m. Free barbecue dinner for the players follows the tournament. Pre-registration required. Call 706-564-4314 or email patdb1946@aol.com. Moonlight Music Cruise will be held on Friday, June 24, at 7 p.m. and features entertainment by folk rock singer/songwriter Amy Coccia. $25 per seat. Call 706-823-0440 or visit augustacanal.com. The Augusta GreenJackets play the Charleston RiverDogs MondayThursday, June 27-30, at 7:05 p.m. at Lake Olmstead Stadium. Tickets are $1-$13. Call 706-922-WINS or visit greenjacketsbaseball.com. Augusta Rugby Football Club meets every Tuesday and Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at the Larry Bray Memorial Pitch. New players are welcome. Email arj6402@yahoo.com. Group Run begins each Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. at Nacho Mama’s. Threeand four-mile routes are available for all ages and abilities of runners. Call 706-414-4059 or email jim@ enduranceconcepts.com.

“Woman Reading” from 1970 can be seen in an exhibit at the Morris Museum of Art called “Will Barnet: Works on Paper.” It includes 14 color lithographs, serigraphs and etching by the artist, who received the first Artist’s Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Design. The show remains at the Morris through July 8. Call 706-724-7501 or visit ecgrl.org.

Hockey Skills & Drills is every Thursday from 6-8 p.m. at Augusta Ice Sports Center. $10-$15. Call 706-8630061 or visit augustaicesports.com.

Wheelchair Tennis Clinic, presented by the Walton Foundation for Independence, meets each Monday at 6 p.m. (weather permitting) at The Club at Rae’s Creek. Free and open to the public. Call 706-826-5809 or email alsalley@ wrh.org.

Thursday Night Chain Reaction Ride begins at 6 p.m. each Thursday at Patriots Park in Grovetown. For intermediate to fast-paced cyclists, who average 25-32 miles. Participants should bring their own water and helmet. Call 706-855-2024 or visit chainreactionbicycles.net.

Augusta Canal Boat Tours lasting one hour are offered daily at 10 a.m., 11:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 3 p.m. Saturday Sunset Cruises, lasting three hours, are at 5 p.m. All tours include admission to the Augusta Canal Interpretive Center. Call 706-823-0440 or visit augustacanal.com.

Riverview Disc Golf League meets each Thursday at 6 p.m. at Riverview Park in North Augusta. $5 entry fee and $1 ace pool. Call 803-2158181 or visit augustadiscgolf.com.

Kids

Road Bike Ride meets each Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at Andy Jordan’s Bicycle Warehouse downtown for an approximately 25-mile ride at a moderate to fast pace. Front and rear lights, as well as a helmet, are required. Call 706-7246777 or visit andyjordans.com.

Nurturing Nature Walk at Reed Creek Nature Park, for ages 3 to 5, is on Thursday, June 23, from 10-11 a.m. Free for members and $2 per child for non-members. Call 706-210-4027 or visit reedcreekpark.com. Pond Exploration at Reed Creek Nature Park, for ages 5 and up, is on Thursday June 23, from 10-11 a.m. Free for members; $2 for non-members. Preregistration required. Call 706-210-4027 or visit reedcreekpark.com.

Special Story Times at Pendleton King Park with Mayor Deke Copenhaver will be Thursday, June 23, at 10 a.m. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org. Jazz4Kids is on Friday, June 24, at 9:30 a.m. at the Headquarters Branch Library. For ages 9-11. Call 706-8212600 or visit ecgrl.org. Bricks 4 Kidz, Building with Legos, is on Saturday, June 25, at 10 a.m. at the Headquarters Branch Library. For ages 6-12. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org. Martial Arts: Fitness With a Little History in the Mix, presented by Johnny Hughes of the CSRA Defensive Arts, will be held Saturday, June 25, at 11 a.m. at the Friedman Branch Library. The class will be non-contact and will cover basic kicks, punches and blocks from the Kindai Karate system. For ages 8 and up. Call 706-736-6758 or visit ecgrl.org. Parent’s Night Out at Wilson Family Y, for ages 6 weeks-12, is Saturday, June 25, from 6-9:30 p.m. $10 per child for Family Y members; $15 per child for non-members. Pre-registration required. Visit thefamilyy.org.

Parent’s Night Out for Children of Deployed Soldiers at the Marshall Family Y, for ages 2-12, is Saturday, June 25, from 6-9:30 p.m. Free. Visit thefamilyy.org. Pond Exploration at Reed Creek Nature Park, for ages 5 and up, is on Tuesday, June 28, from 10-11 a.m. Free for members; $2 for non-members. Preregistration required. Call 706-210-4027 or visit reedcreekpark.com. SRS Ecology Lab Visit, including live reptiles and amphibians native to the area, is Tuesday, June 28, at 10 a.m. at the Friedman Branch Library. Call 706736-6758 or visit ecgrl.org. What Sound Do Mosquitoes Make is Tuesday, June 28, at 10 a.m. at the Diamond Lakes Branch Library. Richmond County Mosquito Control will be answering this question and many more. Call 706-722-2432 or visit ecgrl.org. Therapy Dogs: Learn How to be Safe Around Dogs will be Tuesday, June 28, at 6 p.m. at the Euchee Creek Branch Library. Call 706-863-1946 or visit ecgrl.org. Trickster Tales from Around the

World will be Wednesday, June 29, at 10 a.m. at the Maxwell Branch Library. Call 706-793-2020 or visit ecgrl.org. The Flower Hunter story and craft time with the Morris Museum of Art is Wednesday, June 29, from 10-11 a.m. at the Wallace Branch Library. Call 706-722-6275 or visit ecgrl.org. Reptiles with Savannah River Ecology Lab is Wednesday, June 29, at 2 p.m. at the Columbia County Library. Call 706-863-1946 or visit columbiacountyga.gov. InternationalDancePerformance will be Wednesday, June 29, at 2:30 p.m. at the Harlem Branch Library. Call 706556-9795 or visit ecgrl.org. Make a Coffee Stir Bookmark Craft Time, for grades 6-12, is Wednesday, June 29, at 3 p.m. at the Friedman Branch Library. Supplies provided. Call 706-736-6758 or visit ecgrl.org. Games from Around the World will be Wednesday, June 29, at 5:30 p.m. at the Diamond Lakes Branch Library. For young adults 12 and older. Preregistration required. Call 706-722-2432 or visit ecgrl.org.

Special Story Time at Pendleton King Park with Anne Sprinkle and the Therapy Dogs will be Thursday, June 30, at 10 a.m. Call 706-821-2600 or visit ecgrl.org. Kangaroo Boxes Craft Time is Thursday, June 30, at 10 a.m. at the Diamond Lakes Branch Library. Kids ages 6-12 can decorate their own ceramic kangaroo box. Call 706-722-2432 or visit ecgrl.org. The Power of Art, a summer arts camp for children ages 4-6 who have not yet started the first grade, meets from 9 a.m.-noon the weeks of July 11, 18 and 25. There is also an afternoon session from 1-4 p.m. the week of June 27. All take place at the Aiken Center for the Arts. Camps are $130 per week and preregistration is required. Call 803-6419094 or visit aikencenterforthearts.org. In My Backyard shows at USCAiken’s Dupont Planetarium Saturdays in June at 8 p.m. Visitors will learn how they can identify objects in the sky using the naked eye, binoculars and telescopes. Tickets are $4.50 for adults, $3.50 for seniors, $2.50 for 4K-12th grade students and $1 for USC-A students, faculty and staff. Call 803-641-3769 or visit usca. edu/rpsec/planetarium/.

Monday Movie Matinees at the Diamond Lakes Branch Library show at 2 p.m. throughout the summer. Participants may bring their own snacks. Call the library for a list of movies to be shown. No movies are scheduled on June 20 or July 4. Call 706-772-2432 or visit ecgrl.org. Less Than Two Minutes Film Contest for Young Adults is going on through Monday, July 18. Movies less than two minutes in length submitted by that deadline will be eligible for prizes and will be shown at the Diamond Lakes Library’s Less Than Two Minutes Film Festival on Monday, July 25, at 6 p.m. Prizes will be awarded for best of show, best of show runner-up, most innovative and fan favorite. Call 706-772-2432 or visit ecgrl.org. World Capitals Guessing Game for kids is going on throughout the month of June at the Headquarters Branch Library. Winners will be announced on July 5. Call 706-8212600 or visit ecgrl.org. Registration for Gertrude Herbert Institute of Art Summer Camps, for kids ages 5-11, is going on now. The camps, held at either the GHIA location downtown or at The Quest Church

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on Washington Road in Martinez, are held in one-week sessions beginning June 6. Afternoon camps at the GHIA’s downtown location, are offered the weeks of June 27, July 11 and July 18. Camps are $60 per week for members and $75 for non-members. Call 706-722-5495 or visit ghia.org. Family Y Day Camps, at all area branches, run weekly thoughout the summer beginning May 23. For ages 5-17, pre-registration is required for all camps, and a deposit of $15 per child per week is charged upon initial enrollment in a camp program. Register at any Family Y location or online at thefamilyy.org.

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Summer Art Camps at the Aiken Center for the Arts, for those ages 4 and up, will be conducted weekly June 20 through July 25 and feature a different theme each week. Half-day and full-day programs available. $117$193.50 for members and $130-$215 for non-members. Pre-registration is going on now. Call 803-641-9094 or visit aikencenterforthearts.org. Story Time at Diamond Lakes Branch Library, including books, stories, songs, games and more, is each Tuesday at 10 a.m. Pre-registration required for groups of six or more. Call 706-772-2432 or visit ecgrl.org. The Augusta Arsenal Soccer Club Junior Academy, for boys and girls ages 5-8, meets each Thursday at 5:30 p.m. at the Augusta Soccer Park. Call 706-8540149 or visit augustasoccer.com. Toddler Time, free play for children ages 5 and under, is each Monday and Wednesday from 9:3011:30 a.m. at the H.O. Weeks Center in Aiken. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov. Ceramics Class, for ages 14 and up, meets Mondays at 9 a.m. or 6 p.m., Tuesdays at 6 p.m. and Wednesdays at 9 a.m. in the Weeks Ceramics Center. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov.

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Wacky Wednesday Story Time is each Wednesday at 10 a.m. in the children’s department of Barnes and Noble in the Augusta Mall. Call 706-7370012 or visit bn.com. Homeschool Playgroup meets each Thursday at 10:30 a.m. at Creighton Park in North Augusta. Call 803-613-0484.

Seniors

Games for Seniors at the Weeks

Center in Aiken include Rummikub each Thursday from 9 a.m.-noon, Mahjong each Thursday from 1-4 p.m., Bridge each Friday from 11:30 a.m.-3 p.m., Bingo each Tuesday at 9 a.m., Pinochle each Tuesday from 10:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m.; and Canasta on Tuesdays and Fridays from 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Call 803-6427631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov. Line Dancing is each Tuesday at the Weeks Center in Aiken at 10 a.m. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov. Silversneakers I is offered Mondays and Wednesdays at 9 a.m. and Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays at 11:15 a.m., while Silversneakers Yogastretch is offered Mondays and Wednesdays at 11:15 a.m. at the Weeks Center in Aiken. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov. Ceramics Class is offered at 9 a.m. on Mondays or Wednesdays and 6 p.m. on Mondays or Tuesdays at the Weeks Center. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov. Fit 4 Ever is offered at the Weeks Center in Aiken on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 10-11 a.m. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov. Yoga I and II is offered at the Weeks Center in Aiken on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 8:45-9:45 a.m. and on Mondays and Wednesdays from 5:30-6:30 p.m. Call 803-642-7631 or visit cityofaikensc.gov.

Hobbies

Augusta Genealogical Society meets every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday at 9 a.m. and Sundays from 2-5 p.m. at the society’s Adamson Library, 1109 Broad St. Free. Call 706-722-4073. Georgia-Carolina Toastmasters Meeting, for those who want to brush up on their public speaking skills, is every Wednesday at noon at the Cotton Patch downtown. Free. Call 803-593-6605. French Club meets each Thursday at 7 p.m. at Borders. Free. Call 706-737-6962. If you would like to see your organization’s events listed in our calendar, please email Amy Christian at amy@themetrospirit.com. The deadline for each Thursday’s issue is the previous Friday at noon.

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Questions about Cloud Computing Greg Baker

The other week at the Jones Creek-National Hills swim meet, the group of parents I was sitting with got into a discussion about Cloud Computing. Apparently, there are a number of questions still remaining about cloud services. Here’s some of the discussion that I think might be helpful. Enjoy! We have a friend whose computer often gets knocked out by power surges. Why do Google and Microsoft put so much power in their clouds? As your friend correctly observes, cloud computing harnesses a great deal of energy. If not applied correctly, things have the potential to get out of hand. The old ways don’t hold up well when you hook into the cloud. I would recommend that your friend seek professional guidance. When I apply patches, will that help close holes in the ozone layer? Very astute question. Keeping systems patched can directly mitigate the atmospheric impact of greenhouse gas emissions. Viruses resident on infected computers unnecessarily burn a tremendous amount of CPU and bandwidth as they systematically search, download or destroy your data. Patch your system and save the world from global warming.

Does rain fall through memory leaks? I guess fixing them wouldn’t be good for farmers. Memory leaks are a problem, but other cyber meteorological phenomena can cause greater impact on internet usage. For example, I recently heard about a bit coin mining operation that was wiped out by a broadcast storm. Simple rain through memory leaks isn’t a problem. Unless of course it turns into a bit torrent.

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If it’s a sunny day with no clouds, is my bandwidth going to suf fer? Not at all. Internet providers have their own weather teams, each with the internet equivalent of live Doppler radar. If the forecast is for clear skies, proprietary algorithms kick in to ensure clouds are always available. Tweet your cool tech story to #AugustaIsCoolBecause, and follow me @gregory_a_baker.

Gregory A. Baker, Ph.D., was raised in Columbia County and is currently the vice president and chief rocket scientist for CMA, which provides information technology services to CSRA businesses and nonprofits. He has been married for 15 years and is the father to twin girls, so he supports 37 Barbies, eight American Girl dolls and innumerable stuffed animals. METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 27

THE

BOX TOPS

Despite mediocre reviews, “Green Lantern” charges to the top of the box office for the past weekend. RANK TITLE

WEEKEND GROSS TOTAL GROSS

WEEK #

LAST WEEK

GREEN LANTERN

$53,174,303

SUPER 8

$21,472,020

$73,002,809

MR. POPPER’S PENGUINS

$18,445,355

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS

$11,933,524

$120,358,086

THE HANGOVER PART II

$10,071,339

$233,110,617

“Green Lantern” Sam Eifling Latest superhero flick sets the bar low and still fails to reach it All this time we wondered what a Ryan Reynolds was for and it turns out he’s perfectly serviceable as a cocky man-child who goes from flying jets to becoming an intergalactic superhero with the power to shape reality into a Tex Avery cartoon. He doesn’t ask to be taken too seriously as Hal Jordan in “Green Lantern,” and neither does the rest of the movie, which is just skippy, because it’s so thoroughly a geeky sci-fi comic book flick that any hint of pretense would burst in a green cloud. “Green Lantern” is a fine example of a movie that accomplishes almost everything it sets out to accomplish, and still isn’t all that great. Twelve-year-old boys will love it while their chaperones at least are able to tolerate it. The huge comic universes of Marvel and, in this case, DC keep churning up characters that might have been vaguely familiar to non-fans. The Green Lantern, despite some level of name recognition, turns out to be a more challenging fellow to film than, say, Batman or some other heroes who aren’t ostensibly made of malleable green space energy. His powers and back story require so much illustration, in fact, it seems like long stretches of “Green Lantern” are just

Reynolds’ talking head superimposed on a CGI suit on a CGI deep-space background along with the CGI aliens he’s fighting or chatting with. Picture the Toontown sequence from “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” and you’re getting close. Before he gets whisked into the void, Hal is a test pilot whose first act on-screen is to outfly a pair of fighter drones, crashing his own jet in the process and raising all sorts of consternation that he’s the leastresponsible person on the planet. Thus it seems incongruent when a member of an alien guardian brotherhood crash-lands on Earth and passes his green ring and green lantern onto Hal. Understandably he’s a touch concerned, even after realizing that the ring has the power to manifest thoughts

as objects; if he can imagine a thing, he can instantly conjure it out of energy. He becomes more concerned when he learns a long-imprisoned superfiend named Parallax, played here by a digitized blob that looks like scorched calamari, threatens the universe and everything Hal sort of cares about. Parallax is fueled by fear, whereas the Lanterns, of which there are thousands, fuel their exploits with the willpower gathered from the living beings of the cosmos. This is as deep as the metaphorical aspects of “Green Lantern” reach: fear vs. well, who ya got? Along the way we get to ogle the nasty descent that Peter Sarsgaard makes as Hector Hammond, a biology teacher who’s exposed to some truly unpleasant elements, and admire Tim

Robbins semi-slumming in a turn as a Machiavellian senator. There are a couple of women in the movie, including Angela Bassett as a government scientist and the perfectly pleasant Blake Lively as Hal’s romantic interest, but “Green Lantern” seems doomed to fail the Bechdel Test, as it’s virtually all dudes interacting, boys with men, men with space men, space men with space monsters. A sequence midway through the closing credits gives strong hints on the path for a “Green Lantern” sequel, of which there may be several, but you wonder whether Warner Bros. can crank ’em out fast enough to catch the true fans of this movie before they sprout chest hair and start noticing girls, or the lack thereof.

MOVIE REVIEW 28 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

Opening Friday, June 24

THE8ERS Going to the movies this weekend? Here’s what’s playing.

Comedy “Bad Teacher,” rated R, starring Cameron Diaz, Jason Segel, Justin Timberlake. Man… we never had teachers who looked like Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake way back in the dark ages. And it’s got “iCarly”’s Gibby in it, so what’s not to like?

Family “Cars 2,” rated G, starring Owen Wilson, Larry the Cable Guy, Michael Caine, Eddy Izzard. Poor Mater — Lightning McQueen can’t take him anywhere without something happening. On this overseas trip, Mater actually gets mistaken for a spy. So I guess pity for the other guys is in order as well.

The Big Mo thebigmo.com June 24-25 Main Field: Cars 2 (G) and African Cats (G); Screen 2: Green Lantern (PG-13) and X-Men: First Class (PG-13) Screen 3: Super 8 (PG-13) and Mr. Popper’s Penguins (PG) . Gates open at 7 p.m.; shows begin at 8:30 p.m. (approximately)

Masters 7 Cinemas georgiatheatrecompany.com June 24-25 Something Borrowed (PG-13) 1:10, 3:50, 7, 9:40; Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil (PG) 1, 3:10, 5:15; African Cats (G) 2, 4:10; Water for Elephants (PG13) 6:40, 9:25; Rio the Movie (G) 1:40, 4:45, 7:30, 9:50; Soul Surfer (PG) 1:50, 4:20, 7:20, 9:45; Source Code (PG-13) 7:40, 9:55; Limitless (PG-13) 7:10, 9:35; The Lincoln Lawyer (R) 1:20, 4, 6:50, 9:30; Rango (PG) 1:30, 4:30

WE D N E M M O EC “The Goonies” (1985) Before Josh Brolin was an Academy Award nominee, Sean Astin was a hobbit, Martha Plimpton was a grandma on television and Corey Feldman was, well, Corey Feldman, they were all Goonies. And before you go see “Super 8” and wonder who inspired J.J. Abrams’ to create his merry band of adventurous, middle-school friends, you might want to check out this movie. Because, chances are, it was Mikey, Chunk, Mouth, Stef and Data. — MS

Regal Augusta Exchange regmovies.com June 24-25 Cars 2 (G) 10:45, 11:15, 11:45, 12:15, 1:30, 2, 2:30, 3, 4:15, 4:45, 5:15, 5:45, 7, 7:30, 8, 8:30, 9:45, 10:45, 11:15, 12:30; Bad Teacher (R) Noon, 12:30, 2:20, 2:50, 4:40, 5:10, 7:10, 7:40, 9:30, 10, 11:50, 12:20; The Art of Getting By (PG-13) 12:45, 4:20, 7:20, 9:35, 12:05; Green Lantern (PG-13) 11:10, 11:40, 12:10, 2, 2:30, 2:50, 4:45, 5:10,

5:40, 7:05, 7:35, 8:05, 9:15, 9:45, 10:15, 10:45, 11:55, 12:25; Mr. Popper’s Penguins (PG) 11, 1:30, noon, 1:20, 1:50, 2:20, 3:40, 4:10, 4:40, 7:05, 7:35, 9:25, 9:55, 11:45, 12:15; Super 8 (PG-13) 11:25, 12:25, 2:05, 4:30, 5, 5:30, 7:15, 8:10, 9:55, 10:25, 10:50; X-Men: First Class (PG-13) 11:50, 4, 7:10, 10:10; The Hangover Part II (R) 12:20, 4:05, 7, 9:50, 12:20; Kung Fu Panda 2 (PG) 12:40, 2:55, 5:10, 7:25, 9:40, midnight; Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (PG-13) 10:15; Bridesmaids (R) 12:05, 4:25, 7:15, 10:05; Thor (PG-13) 2, 7:45

Evans Stadium Cinemas georgiatheatrecompany.com June 24-25 Bad Teacher (R) 12:35, 2:55, 5:25, 7:50, 10:10; Cars 2 (G) 11:45, 12:15, 12:45, 2:15, 2:45, 3:15, 4:45, 5:15, 5:45, 7:15, 7:45, 8:15, 9:45, 10:15; Green Lantern (PG-13) 12:30, 1:20, 3:30, 4:20, 6:40, 7:25, 9:25, 10:10; Mr. Popper’s Penguins (PG) Noon, 12:55, 2:25, 3:05, 4:55, 5:35, 7:20, 8, 9:35, 10:15; Judy Moody and the Not Bummer Summer (PG) 11:50, 2:05; Super 8 (PG-13) 11:55, 2:30, 5, 7:35, 10:05; X-Men: First Class (PG-13) 1:10, 4:10, 7:05, 10; The Hangover Part II (R) 1:05, 3:45, 6:50, 9:30; Kung Fu Panda 2 (PG) 12:05, 2:35, 5:05, 7:30, 9:50; Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (PG-13) 1, 4, 7, 9:55; Bridesmaids (R) 4:30, 7:10, 9:55

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30 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

Amy Christian

ART Love Wins

Augusta Pride plans bigger and better event downtown this Saturday

Last year’s inaugural Augusta Pride Parade and Festival drew nearly 4,000 people to the streets of downtown on June 18. This year, organizers are expecting even more. “The city’s official count was 3,800 for the festival, says Chris Bannochie, public relations director for Augusta Pride. “It’s hard to know how many people were on Broad Street for the parade, but, if you look at the photos, it was pretty full. We’re expecting that number to go up to 5,000 plus [this year].” Bannochie said a number of factors are contributing to the expected rise in the number of attendees, not the least of which is the fact that last year’s event went off without a hitch. “The sheriff was so pleased at how the parade and festival went off last year,” Bannochie says. “He said he’d never seen a parade and festival of this magnitude go so smoothly.” Also contributing to this year’s growth this the quality of the entertainment. Similar to last year, when “American Idol” alum and current “The Voice” finalist Frenchie Davis and Thelma

Houston performed, organizers have booked top-notch entertainment. This year, crowds will be entertained by Kristine W., a singer who holds the world record for most consecutive No. 1 Billboard club hits with nine, and Niki Haris, an Augusta native who spent 18 years of her career touring as a backup singer and dancer for Madonna. Larry Flick, host and executive producer of The Morning Joint and Feel the Spin on Sirius/XM’s OutQ, will serve as celebrity grand marshall for the parade, as well as master of ceremonies for the festival. “He’s flying in from New York for it,” Bannochie says. He continued that the Augusta event is receiving unexpected help from outside sources, including the Atlanta group’s decision to move their event to October due to that city’s restrictions on the size of summer events at places like Piedmont Park. Georgia Voice, a newspaper headquartered in Atlanta that serves the LGBT community, is also helping spread the word. “And that’s a big community over there

with about five million people,” Bannochie explains, “so even if just a handful come over, it’ll make a big difference.” Also making a difference is the uptick in corporate sponsorships. In addition to the Georgia Voice’s presence, Verizon Wireless, Mercedes Benz of Augusta, the Human Rights Campaign, Georgia Equality and South Carolina Equality will all be participating in either the parade or the festival… or both. Even the number of food vendors is on the rise. “We’ve been turning food vendors away for the last month,” Bannochie says. “Everybody who was at the festival last year came back, so it’s growing. We may be growing out of the Commons soon.” In addition to food, merchandise and entertainment, the festival will also include a family friendly children’s area for those with kids. And although that might surprise some, Bannochie says it’s all part of Augusta Pride’s plan to be an all-inclusive event. “Well, not to be trite, but I really do

Kristine W. think it says it all,” he says of festival’s theme of Love Wins. “I know the board’s feeling is that this is all about relationships and respecting everyone. We specifically don’t call it Augusta Gay Pride because it’s about being proud no matter what your sexual orientation is.” Augusta Pride Parade Saturday, June 25 Broad Street, between 6th and 10th, ending at the Augusta Common 10 a.m. Augusta Pride Festival Augusta Common 11 a.m.-7 p.m. prideaugusta.org

sightings Michael Johnson

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Joey Redd, Elaine Varos and Tyler Maxwell at Stillwater Tap Room.

Jay Weigle with Asheville Tourists Kyle Parker and Kasey Deuchar at the GreenJackets game at Lake Olmstead Stadium.

Arden Rall, Morgan Piunti and Travis Cason at Robbie’s Sports Bar.

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JENNY is WRIGHT

Jenny Wright lives in Summerville with her husband, who she calls The Man, and two kids, who she affectionately calls The Boy and The Girl. She enjoys taking photos, cooking and playing tennis.

Hey, You Parents Out There: Hover Much? The Boy plays soccer. Until they are over seven years old, we aren’t allowed to keep score. We can’t even have a real goalie. Everyone gets a chance. No one fails. What are we doing to our kids? When did competitive sports lose the competition part? Why do we hand out trophies just for showing up? Encouraging general involvement is definitely a good idea. We’re all beginners at some point. Sometimes we move on and excel, sometimes we remain average (and content with that) and sometimes we find out we’re terrible at it, or really don’t like it at all. All of these discoveries and realities are part of developing a healthy sense of self. But why can’t we teach or kids what it’s like to win and to lose? It’s starting to feel like we’re raising a bunch of mediocre, 100-percent cotton softies. Don’t get me wrong. It can be heartbreaking to watch your kid try and try again, failing several times in a row (it’s also time to grab the video camera). On the flip side, it’s supremely rewarding to watch them figure it out on their own. When The Boy started kindergarten, I cried when I dropped him off. I didn’t cry because I was sad. He made me so proud that day. He happily walked into that classroom, hardly looking back at me. Why wouldn’t

Hey! You kicked my feelings! we raise our kids to be confident, independent children? I fail to see a single reason why not. I am pretty sure that there aren’t any C-levels wiping the bottoms of their entry-level junior salespeople. And we should protect our kids; it’s a parental instinct. There is a fine line between protecting and isolating. The world is indeed a scarier place these days, though I do think that if kids just watch Dateline and Lifetime on a

Matthew Duncan, Travis Jenkins, President of Augusta Pride Isaac Kelly and Tyler Galles at Club Argos.

regular basis, they can pretty much get everything they need to take care of themselves. Kidding. They need The Food Network and Discovery Health, too. We teach them the difference between right and wrong and hot and cold, how to say please and thank you, and eventually how to drive a car. It’s also our job to teach them to navigate difficult or new scenarios. If we constantly rescue and bail

Mr. Augusta Pride 2011 Stacy Simpkins with Sasha and Carlos McKie at Club Argos.

them out, what will they become? They can make decisions on their own. They can solve problems, even as toddlers. Suggestions and nudging are encouraged. Puppies get more credit these days. When was the last time you fetched the ball for your dog? Never? Thought so. I’ll bet that the rule leaflet in board games will change any day. Where it now reads “how to win,” it should say “how to stroke your kid’s ego and make them feel good about themselves even though this game will be boring as hell.” Can you imagine the Honors Student bumper stickers? “My child is an average student at ABC Middle School.” I guess we should get rid of grades altogether. I’d hate to make anyone feel bad because my kid actually did his homework and studied for that test. The Kids are doing swim team this summer and it’s brutal. They are expected to actually swim (and win) races! Here I thought they were all going to just tread water and smile at each other. Since it’s their first season and first-place finishes are infrequent, it’s going to take months of therapy to get their feelings in check again. Since we are all about finding someone to blame for such things these days, where should I send the bill?

Don Leonard, Charles Turner, Matt Tinsley and Drew Rowell at Club Argos.

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 33

Nickie Willgus, Ashton Fulcher and Sarah Blakely at Vue.

Renae Warkenton with Miss Augusta Rugby 2011 Crystal Bailey and Ashton Edwards at The County Club.

McKenzie Dicks, Matthew Martin and Haley Percival at Wild Wing Cafe.

Sgt. Eric Vanatta, Kerrie Tildwell, Sarah Black and GYSgt. Robert Worthington at Vue.

Wes Zamzow and Patti Peabody with Jennifer and Kyle Scott at the GreenJackets game at Lake Olmstead Stadium.

Jenna Giello, Adam Harden, Zach Smith and Jessica McCoy at The Country Club.

Will Nelson and Joel White at the Augusta Canal.

Carmen Bishop and Jessica Warren at the Augusta Canal.

Phil, Anna and Mary Harris at Rhinehart’s in Evans.

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CRISP California Adventure

Le Café DuTeau proprietor heading to the west coast after a five-year stop in North Carolina photography: jWhite

Those who have lived in Augusta for any length of time have no doubt heard some hair-raising tales of debauchery that went on during the heyday of Le Café DuTeau. “True,” said a nodding Donn DuTeau when confronted with someone who says he had heard numerous crazy stories about the restaurant. Press him, however, and DuTeau won’t say more. Well, not now anyway. “I want to write a book about the place,” DuTeau says of his namesake restaurant, which remained a fixture on the Augusta dining scene from the time it opened in 1977 to the time it closed in 2006. “There are a lot of good stories.” Sure, there are some things DuTeau will talk about. Things like how The Green Jacket was pretty much the only fine dining restaurant in Augusta before Le Café DuTeau came along. Things like how, despite its eventual status as a beloved Augusta institution,

reception to the former electrical shop turned restaurant was initially chilly. “One time we started remodeling in that back room. It was zoned residential and, you know, they were fighting us and they said stop construction and we said, screw that,” he remembered. “And we had to go to a rezoning hearing and they showed up protesting. Protested the liquor license. Protested everything.” Despite initial protests, the café became a favorite of both residents and visiting celebrities, attracting golfers, members of the Masters press corps, the governor of Michigan and one surprising but memorable name. “I had dinner one year with Jim Belushi two nights in a row,” DuTeau said. “He was here for a show and came in with his manager and we had dinner together.” Musicians, too, favored the café. “You just never knew who was going to show up, that was the beauty of it,”

he said. “I mean, these guys would start walking in about 11 o’clock with their cases and you never knew who you were going to get. Wycliffe Gordon used to play there and James Brown made a couple of appearances there.” These days, DuTeau is in transition. He moved to North Carolina shortly after closing Le Café DuTeau. Now, after a brief layover in Augusta to visit family, he is heading out on a California adventure. “I closed the restaurant in ’06 and for the last three years I’ve been executive chef at a country club in North Carolina,” he said, adding the odd coincidence that he once ran into Todd Schafer of Bistro 491 in a wine shop there. “I’m getting ready to head out to California, to Santa Ynez. I have a friend out there and I’m going to drive a taxi.” Don’t worry, though; DuTeau says he hasn’t given up cooking. “It’ll help me get some cash flow going and it’s a way to get to know people,” he

explained. “I’ll eventually start small on a catering business, but it can be done.” The Santa Ynez Valley, inland from Santa Barbara in central California, is home to many wineries, and taxi drivers often escort passengers between the stops during wine tours. DuTeau said that he enjoyed his time in North Carolina, but was ready for something different. “Three years at a country club is probably close to the normal life span of a chef,” he laughed. “I went out there [California] for a couple of weeks and I really liked the area. It’s a mountain climate, it’s dry and it has a coastal wind. So I’m just going to go out there and give it a shot and, if I decide to, I can always come back. But I’m ready for my adventure to California.” And it can begin none too soon, he said. DuTeau planned to leave before this issue of the Metro Spirit hits the street.

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Growlers and cupcakes are a hit at Sundrees By the time you read this, Sundrees Urban Market will probably be the first outlet in Augusta to carry growlers. “Hopefully, they’ll be up and running anytime between Wednesday and Friday. Definitely, by Friday, I would think,” said Claire Schaffer Riche, manager of store that bills itself as a downtown bodega. “The only thing we’re waiting on now is for the kegs to come in and be hooked

beer for our bottled beers as well. We’re just getting started, but I think we have about 35 bottled beers right now, and we’ll probably go up to 50-60. Maybe more than that.” Riche says the price will depend on the beer, but the growlers will go for between $12-$25. Plans are also in the works for a Growler Club. Sundrees’ variety of beer might surprise some, who have seen their small space on Broad Street next to the J.B. White’s Building. This store, however,

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up. I think most of the kegs are coming in Wednesday and then we’ll just have to do a little bit of testing.” For the uninitiated, a growler is a reusable half-gallon glass container of draft beer to go. And, yes, they are legal. “When they leave the store, they’ll be sealed,” Riche explains. “It’s kind of like shrink wrap. It’s a sealed container so there won’t be any issues with [open container laws].” Sundrees, open since the beginning of May, will offer four beers, beginning with Fat Tire’s Tire Bite, Wild Heaven’s Invocation, Southern Tier’s Unearthly Oaked Aged Imperial Pale Ale and Southern Tier’s Jahva Coffee Stout. “We planning on switching them out,” she says of the store’s growler collection. “We’ll try to keep the newest things on tap. We are primarily focusing on craft

36 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

carries more than just beer. Focusing on locally sourced products, they carry meat, eggs, produce and more, but one of their most popular items has to be the cupcakes. Delivered each morning from local caterer Delightful Bites, the cupcakes sell for $2 each or $20 a dozen and come in varieties wild and tame, from Margarita to vanilla bean. “She tries to come up with a new one every few days, if not every day,” says Riche. “We usually get pretty close to selling out, if not selling out, each day.” Sundrees Urban Market, located at 930 Broad Street, is open from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. Monday-Thursday, and 7 a.m.-10 p.m. Friday and Saturday. For more information, call 706-945-1310 or visit their Facebook page.

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Last week, Beth Frits gave Metro Spirit readers a great summertime recipe: Texas Caviar. This week, she passes the tongs to one of her best friend’s daughters, who also makes use of a seasonal favorite with her Peach Cobbler recipe. Evann Rowland, an 18-year-old student at Samford University in Birmingham, Ala., considers herself an area native even though her family moved to Gainesville, Fla., for 10 years. “I was so grateful when we moved back to Augusta,” she says. “It’s the place I’ve always considered in my head home.” The daughter of Greg and Tori Rowland, Evann has a sister Jordan, who is 22 years old. Family, especially spending time with them at Clarks Hill Lake, is one thing Evann is passionate about. Her other passions include hunting, fishing, photography, playing with her dogs and, of course, baking. Peach Cobbler ¾ cup flour ¾ cup milk Pinch of salt ½ cup sugar ½ cup brown sugar ¼ tsp. cinnamon 2 tsp. baking powder ½ cup butter 2 cups fresh peaches, peeled and sliced ½ cup sugar

706.724.2218 - ON PREMISE CATERING AT THE MARBURY CENTER

ROUXSCATERING.COM 38 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

Sift together salt, cinnamon and baking powder. Mix in sugars. Stir in milk and beat. Melt butter in 9x9 inch baking dish. Pour batter over melted butter. Do not stir. Pour peaches mixed with ½ cup sugar over this. Do not stir. Bake at 350 degrees for one hour.

PULLET

By C. W. Stewart / Edited By Will Shortz 1

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DOWN 1 Kind of metabolism 2 Military camp 3 *Certain study session 4 Head of Haiti 5 ___ formality 6 Actor Hauer

7 Believe in it 8 Not his’n 9 Ad-packed Sunday newspaper section 10 A giraffe might be seen on one 11 Pound sound 12 You may catch them on a boat, in two different ways 13 Shrimp 14 Old Church of England foe 15 Role in 2011’s “Thor” 16 Chinese dynasty of 1,200 years ago 17 Curved molding 18 Drops (off) 20 Start of a childish plaint 24 Believe in it 29 “Goody goody gumdrops!” 32 At any time, to a bard 34 Ward (off) 37 Survey choice, sometimes 38 Less cramped 39 Like some maidens 40 Trolley sound 41 Expedition 42 Keyboard key 43 Shows, as a thermometer does a temperature 44 “Uh-huh, sure it is” 45 The very ___ 46 Hinder 50 Test ___ 51 *Something to stand on 52 Piece over a door or window 53 It had a major part in the Bible 55 Descent of a sort 57 Many a summer worker 59 Solitaire puzzle piece 62 Wander 65 Blue Angels’ org. 66 Ain’t fixed? 67 Classic brand of hair remover 68 Line of cliffs 69 Intolerant sort 70 Bouquet 71 ___ of the past 74 Taper off 75 *It may be found near a barrel 76 Feudal serf 77 Fanny 79 Decrees 80 Lady of Spain 85 “___ do” 89 Service arrangement 90 Know-how 91 Boo follower 92 They’re often acquired at a wedding 94 Drunk’s activity 95 Scribbled 96 Got up on one’s soapbox 97 One waving a red flag 100 Wild 102Dentist’s advice 103Actress Berger 104Bros, e.g. 105Pass over 106 ___ no good 107 S. C. Johnson brand 108 “Dirty rotten scoundrel,” e.g. 110 Old NASA landers 112 Half of a sitcom farewell 115 Project closing? 116 It might get your feet wet

previous week’s

ACROSS 1 Bushed 5 Entrance to many a plaza 9 Rimsky-Korsakov’s “The Tale of ___ Saltan” 13 Exactly right 19 Free 21 ___ avis 22 Attempted something 23 *Boardwalk offering 25 Thought out loud 26 It might make you snort 27 Home of the World Health Organization 28 Stickers? 30 ___ Day, May 1 celebration in Hawaii 31 Must-have 33 Soft ball brand 35 “___ mine!” 36 One on the way out 38 *Diamond substitute 44 1987 disaster movie? 46 Rest spot 47 Place for a pickup? 48 Word with exit or express 49 Something that’s drawn 50 Whiz 51 Any hit by Little Richard 53 Many a Bob Marley fan 54 Mideast title 56 Seaport on the Adriatic 58 Turned away from sin 60 Earth 61 Outstanding 63 Lawn tools 64 *Handy things for a toy? 68 ### 72 Free 73 Itching 78 Took a corner on two wheels 81 Fix, as brakes 82 Vituperation, e.g. 83 Wake Island, e.g. 84 “Nothing ___!” 86 Transplant, in a way 87 “Up in the Air” actress Kendrick 88 Do followers 89 Navel buildup 90 Former flier, for short 91 Slugger 93 *Staple of “Candid Camera” 97 Xerox product 98 Baseball’s Master Melvin 99 Loughlin of “Full House” 100 Nincompoop 101 Conditions 104 Killjoy 109 Comparatively statuesque 111 Point of view 113 Enfeeble 114 *Radio Flyer, e.g. 117 Like a winter wind 118 1997 Peter Fonda title role 119 Hoax 120 Old-fashioned 121 TV’s Foxx 122 Brake 123 “Superman II” villainess

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 39

free will Rob Brezsny

a s t r o l o g y freewillastrology@freewillastrology.com

CANCER (June 21-July 22)

A company that manufactures processed food made a promotional offer: If you purchased 10 of its products, it would give you 500 frequent flyer miles. An American man named David Philips took maximum advantage. He bought 12,150 pudding cups for $3,000, earning himself more than a million frequent flyer miles — enough to fly to Europe and back 31 times. This is the kind of legal trick you’re now in a good position to pull off. How could you play the system, outwit the matrix, rage against the machine or subvert the Man? No need to break any laws; the best gambit will be an ethical one. LEO (July 23-Aug. 22)

While watching fast-talking politicians talk on TV, my Polish grand-uncle would sometimes mutter, “Zlotem pisal, a gownem zapieczetowal.” I only learned what those words meant when I turned 18 and he decided I was old enough to know the translation: “written in gold and sealed with crap.” Identify anything that fits that description in your own life and get started on exposing the discrepancy and cleaning up the mess. VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22)

Years ago I did a book tour that brought me to Eugene, Ore., where my sister, her husband and their daughter live. My Virgo niece Jasper was seven years old at the time. I was surprised and delighted when she heckled me several times during my talk, always with funny and good-natured comments that added to the conviviality of the moment and entertained everyone in attendance. Who said Virgos are wellbehaved to a fault? Be inspired by my niece: With wit and compassion, disrupt the orderly flow of any events that could use some smart agitation. LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22)

“Life is like playing a violin in public and learning the instrument as one goes on,” wrote author Samuel Butler. You may be practicing as diligently as you can, gradually trying to master your complex instrument, but in the meantime your lack of expertise is plainly visible to anyone who’s paying close attention. Luckily, not too many people pay really close attention, which gives you a significant amount

40 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

of slack. Now and then, too, you have growth spurts — phases when your skills suddenly leap to a higher octave. The coming weeks should be one of these times. SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21)

In August and September, millions of seabirds known as Sooty Shearwaters leave their homes in New Zealand and travel thousands of miles to the Gulf of the Farallones, just off the coast of San Francisco. Why do they do it? The feeding is first-class; the tasty fish and squid they like are available in abundance. I suggest you consider a Sooty Shearwater-type quest in the coming weeks. The very best samples of the goodies you crave are located at a distance. SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21)

I really thought I’d understand sex better by now. After all these years of doing it, studying it, thinking about it and talking about it, I still can’t regard myself as a master of the subject. The kundalini’s uncanny behavior continues to surprise me, perplex me and thrill me with ever-new revelations. How about you? You’re due for a round of novel revelations about the nature of eros. As long as you keep an open mind, heart and libido, it should all be pretty interesting. CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)

A few years ago, Eve Ensler took her famous play “The Vagina Monologues” to Pakistan. She and a group of local Muslim actresses wowed a crowd in Islamabad with discourses on vibrators, menstruation and “triple orgasms.” Try something equally brave. Give your spiel to a new audience; take your shtick to a wild frontier; show who you really are to important people who don’t know the truth yet. AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18)

When my “macho feminist” memoir “The Televisionary Oracle” was published in 2000, I suffered from comical delusions about its chances for mainstream acceptance. I tried to get a review in The New York Times. As I know now, that had as much likelihood of happening as me traveling to the moon in a rainbow canoe carried by

magical flying mermaids. But in lieu of that kind of recognition, others arrived. My book went along for the ride with a group of goddess-worshipers on a spiritual tour to the ancient matriarchal city of Catal Huyuk in Turkey. You will soon have a similar experience: having to “settle for” a soulful acknowledgment that’s different from what your ego thought it wanted. Take it from me: That’s actually better. PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20)

My favorite plant food for my African violets is a natural fertilizer called Big Bloom. One of its key ingredients — the stuff that makes it so effective — is bat guano. You’re about due to embark on the Big Blooming phase of your own cycle. And it’s more likely to reach its deserved pinnacle of fertility if you’re willing to summon just a hint of batsh** craziness from the depths of your subconscious mind. But remember: just a dollop, not a giant heap. ARIES (March 21-April 19)

Golden orb spiders of Madagascar spin robust webs. Their silk is stronger than steel yet able to bend and expand when struck by insects. Each morning they eat what remains of yesterday’s web and spend an hour or so weaving a fresh one. Your task has some similarities to the orb spider’s: creating rugged but flexible structures to gather what you need, and being ready to continually shed what has outlived its usefulness so as to build what your changing circumstances require.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20)

The year is almost half over. Shall we sum up the first part of 2011 and speculate about the adventures that may lie ahead of you in the next six months? You’ve been going through a boisterous process of purification since last January. Some of it has rattled your soul’s bones, while some of it has freed you from your mind-forged manacles. In a few short months, you have overseen more climaxes and shed more emotional baggage than you had in the past three years combined. Now you’re all clean, clear and fresh, and ready for a less exhausting, more cheerful kind of fun. GEMINI (May 21-June 20)

Advertisements are often designed to make you feel inadequate about the life you’re actually living so you will be motivated to “improve” your lot by buying what they’re selling. Recently HBO unleashed an especially nefarious attack. Promoting its new streaming service, it informed us that “The story you could be watching is better than the one you’re in.” Fortunately, you won’t be tempted to swallow that vicious propaganda anytime in the coming weeks. Your personal story will be profoundly more interesting and meaningful than the narratives that HBO or any other entertainment source might offer.

Surrey Tavern

Helga’s

Friday, June 24 Check out this foursome, who combine rock, reggae, funk and roots, at Surrey Center’s favorite hangout.

Thursday, June 23 Trivia: Come up with a clever team name and buy the hosts a shot or two. Great bar food.

Surrey Tavern the original neighborhood bar The Vue upscale dance club w/ occasional bands Sheehan’s Irish Pub the nicest pub ever

Pizza Joint

Tuesday, June 28 Beer me Tuesday. $1.95 draft and specialty slices.

Polka Dot Pig

Tuesday, June 27 Try the jalapeno fried pickles with honey-citrus -pepper dipping sauce and a trio of mini burgers, one beef, one crab and one lamb.

Verandah Grill at the Partridge Inn Augusta’s best balcony

· PIG

Club Argos LGBT

POLKA

Crums on Central live jazz on weekends Helga’s med student heaven Bistro 491 fancy food with a sense of humor

GASTR OP UB

Calvert’s old school Continental

Laura’s Backyard Tavern

The Tavern at the Bean

Polka Dot Pig gastropub with emphasis on gastro

Saturday, June 25 On South Belair Road between I-20 and Columbia Road. That’s where Mama Says will be Saturday night.

DOT

Friday, June 24 In the back of Bean Baskette is the Tavern at the Bean, where you can have a happy-hour drink (or two) to start the weekend off right.

Sidetrack Bar & Grill by the railroad tracks Pizza Joint Beer Me Tuesday The Tavern at the Bean discreet, top shelf Laura’s Backyard Tavern Laura’s house

THE HILL

EVANEZ

WEST AUGUSTA

SOUTH AUGUSTA

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 41

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The Highlander - real Bristish pub Sweet Lou’s Crab Shack - Broad & 13th

The Highlander

Frog Hollow Tavern - upscale restaurant & bar / locally sourced Tropicabana - salsa. no chips.

Friday, June 24 Don’t miss out on the authentic British food at this underground (literally) club in North Augusta. The Scotch Egg Plate and the Shepherd’s Pie are out of this world… or country, at least.

Pizza Joint - 40 beers on tap and slices

13T H

Mellow Mushroom - plus full bar Sky City - large music venue Firehouse - proud downtown dive 1102 - block deep restaurant & bar Metro Coffee House - coffee, beer, liquor, people

Soultry Sounds - jazz club

Wicked Wasabi - authentic Japanese Soy Noodle - Asian sensation New Moon Cafe - ecclectic grindhouse

Casa Blanca - JB White’s storefront

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Soul Bar - pure funk

Stillwater Taproom - blugrass before bluegrass was cool

Bees Knees - small plates

Playground - rock-n-roll

Sweet Lou’s Crab Shack

Augusta Canal’s Moonlight Music Cruise

Thursday, June 23 Shrimp are $10 a pound and oysters are $8 a dozen tonight.

Friday, June 24 This is your last chance to take a twilight boat ride on the canal while listening to live music before this event packs it in until September, so don’t miss it.

Wheels - cool & on the corner The Loft - liquor with attitude

Club Rehab - upscale sportsbar Joe’s Underground - live music underneath Broad St.

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Bar on Broad - contemporary South Beach vibe

12T

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Tipsy McStumbles - confess later Sector 7G - laundromat turned landmark Eagle’s Nest - best view downtown Blue Horse Bistro - jazz tapas The Sports Center - old school pool hall and burgers Luigi’s - Augusta institution

LOOKING FOR

SOMETHING

TO DO?

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The Cotton Patch

Saturday, June 25 Seeing Brandon Reeves live is good. Listening to him while on the Cotton Patch’s pretty patio having a drink is even better.

Sky City

Friday, June 24 This is going to be a real party, featuring the Favors,Sumilan, Ganja, video by Lee Landers and Marianna Harkleroad and artwork by local favorites in addition to Artemia’s live set.

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Cotton Patch - eat, drink, be happy Mi Rancho - chips & salsa on the Savannah Cafe 209 - soul food & lounge Fox’s Lair - coolest bar in America Augusta Canal - music on the water

The Loft

Saturday, June 25 Karaoke for sissies, this ain’t. The Loft only plays the head-banging, hard-rocking best.

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The Soul Bar

Thursday, June 23 Boom Box

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The Sports Center

The Fox’s Lair

Saturday, June 25 The burgers here are good enough to make that trip downtown. Ask for a goblet of their finest ale to go along with it.

RD ON

Discoteque girls dancing nightly

Fantasy Showgirls girls dancing nightly

Friday, June 24 A fixture on the local music scene, Roger Enevoldsen loves playing guitar ever since he first picked it up in middle school.

The Joker Lounge girls dancing nightly

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The Boll Weevil - great food and the best desserts

OLD

5TH

Beamie’s Restuarant & Oyster Bar - taste of the beach downtown

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 43

French Market Grille West

Carolina Ale House

Tuesday, June 28 Offers a pound of crab legs, including a salad and potatoes, for $7.99. Live music by Wayne Capps. It's crowded.

Sunday, June 26 Watch the final round of the PGA Traveler’s Championship. Carolina Ale House sports themed restuarant / feat. outdoor covered bar Limelite Cafe extensive beer selection Doubletree Hotel popular restuarant TakoSushi Asian / Mexican Fusion French Market Grille West NOLA in the Garden City Malibu Jacks beach themed restaurant & bar Rack & Grill true pool hall

Rack & Grill

Allie Katz

Cadillacs cozy neighborhood spot

Monday, June 27 While you’re waiting for the pool tourney to start ($5 entry; winner takes the pot), have a half-pound hamburger. At $3.75, it’s a steal.

Friday, June 24 Drafts for $1, Jell-O shots for $2 and Jagerbombs for $3? Nuff said.

Shannon’s old lounge / new look

3112 (b

Allie Katz good cheap drinks Wild Wings Cafe live music 7 nights a week

A Neigh

Cue & Brew great burgers Hooters hooters Somewhere In Augusta sports bar & grill Robbie’s Sports Bar true pool hall

Rae’s Coastal Café

Country Club dance hall and saloon

Saturday, June 25 Jerk chicken with a Red Stripe beer and a slice of key lime pie.

The Country Club

Cadwallader’s Cafe Italian flair

Saturday, June 25 A star in the making, Tyler Reeve brings his Southern Americana style to Augusta.

Rae’s Coastal Cafe worth finding

Road Runner Cafe in front of Coyote’s Coyote’s great live music & DJs

THE HILL

44 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

EVANEZ

WEST AUGUSTA

SOUTH AUGUSTA

Banks Pappas

“Stars and Bars Aflame”

Local filmmaker prepares to submit Augusta Riot documentary to film festivals

Soon after film student Banks Pappas transferred to Augusta State University, he made a discovery that would redirect his life. “I was up checking out the special collections and I asked if they had anything interesting,” he recalls. “They pulled out the footage they had from the incident known as the Augusta Riots. As soon as I saw that, I said, ‘This is going to be the first film I make.’” True to his word, Pappas is preparing his documentary, “Stars and Bars Aflame,” for submission to the Sundance and Tribeca Film Festivals, and the Metro Spirit is going to follow the process. Local filmmaker. Local topic. National stage. “While my documentary is essentially complete, I’m still playing around with different aspects of the score, different cuts and different edits,” he says. “I’m tweaking it, but, at the end of the day, it’s complete.” Named after famous botanist Luther Burbank, a pioneering horticulturist who developed more than 800 strains and varieties of plants, Burbank Pappas worked in television news before moving to Augusta, where he began to indulge his love of film. That indulgence caused him to think big. “I’m not cocky,” he says. “I try to keep humble and I like to laugh at myself, but I’m pretty proud that I completed and essentially wrote, scored and voiced a full-length documentary on my own.” He says he hopes to use his filmmaking abilities to convey to audience members the power of the story that first captivated him up in special collections. “I begin in 1954, with Gov. Vandiver of Georgia talking about the fact that

Georgia does not want to desegregate and then I kind of move from there, interweaving events in the national perspective of civil rights within the microcosm of Georgia,” he says. “I know after a screening that the big critique from the people of Augusta will be that only about a third of it is actually about the Augusta Riots.” To make a thoughtful, effective film, he says, such a broad approach was necessary. “For me, it was important to take the story and place it within the middle of the bigger, more well-known and visible events,” he says. “Because I just feel like it’s such an important thing.” Overshadowed by Kent State, where four students protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia were killed by National Guardsmen, and the events at Jackson State, in which two students were killed by police in Mississippi, the Augusta Riots have been largely overlooked outside Augusta, and Pappas would like his film to introduce more people to the story the way the Freedom Riders documentary has enlightened people about the 1961 non-violent protest in which nearly 400 black and white Americans risked beatings and arrest by riding together on buses and trains in the segregated south. “I’ve seen that documentary, and while I’m a huge fan of documentaries — I love Ken Burns and I love all sorts of documentaries — to me, that kind of documentary can be too slow and tedious to absorb for the majority of the population,” he says. “My perspective, being 33 and coming up in the age of MTV, where everything we see in media is slick and polished and hip, has kind of an edge to it. I’ve taken that perspective and tried to merge it with the traditional realms of historical documentary.”

That merger has actually given him his pitch: “If Andy Warhol and Ken Burns had a love child and that love child made a civil rights documentary, this would be it.” The more sober-minded “Freedom Riders,” directed by Stanley Nelson, was an official selection for the 2010 Sundance Film Festival and is now receiving wide acclaim as part of PBS’s stable of historical documentaries. In other words, the traditionally presented “Freedom Riders” hit it big, and though Pappas’ film is edgy, quick and nontraditional, he nevertheless hopes it achieves a similar level of success and exposure. The riots, which occurred in May of 1970, were instigated by the death of 16-year-old Charles Oatman, a mentallyill African American who had been beaten to death while in jail. In the film, Pappas juxtaposes historical footage with interviews of Grady Abrams, Dr. Malory Millender and Dr. Jimmy Carter, who he calls the “big three” of Augusta’s African American community. Abrams, a city councilman at the time of the riots, is a central figure in the story. “He was the one who was called to Mays Mortuary about the 16-year-old kid who was killed,” Pappas says. “The next day, he had his radio program on James Brown’s radio station and they followed up with a meeting that night at Tabernacle Baptist Church and called for a gathering at City Hall.” During the ensuing rallies, someone threw a rock at a bus and the violence began. A total of six African Americans were

shot for looting, and fires destroyed several businesses throughout town. Able to take advantage of archival footage from several institutions, including the University of Georgia and Vanderbilt’s TV news archive, Pappas has included 30 minutes of national and local news film, including some rare footage of segregationist Lester Maddox before he was governor. “He became kind of the antagonist of the story,” he says. He also found footage of Dr. Martin Luther King speaking at Tabernacle Church in 1961. “It’s pretty interesting how what you discover always finds a way to weave itself into the story and the story ends up telling itself,” he says. While he plans on having a special media screening to raise interest in the film, the rules for submitting to the different festivals prohibit public screenings. “The early deadline for Sundance is Aug. 15, and I do plan on making that,” he says. “I will probably submit it pretty close to that date simply for the fact that if you don’t have a deadline you could work on a project forever.” He’ll submit, and we’ll be following.

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 45

Thursday, June 23 Live Music Coyote’s Loose Cannon French Market Grille West Doc Easton Smooth Jazz James Brown Arena Sugarland w/ Ellis Paul Joe’s Underground John Kolbeck Malibu Jack’s Marilyn Adcock One Hundred Laurens Kenny George Rose Hill Stables Preston & Weston Sky City Eat Lightning Wild Wing Now You See Them The Willcox Four Cats in the Doghouse

What’s Tonight? Cadillac’s Karaoke Club Argos Karaoke Club Rehab Candy Stripers Cabaret Club Sparx Playlist with Shannon Cocktails Lounge Karaoke Fishbowl Lounge Karaoke Fox’s Lair Soup, Suds & Conversations Helga’s Pub & Grille Trivia Islands Bar & Lounge DJ Fred Nice The Loft Karaoke Mi Rancho (Downtown) Karaoke Mi Rancho (Evans) Karaoke Pizza Joint (Evans) DJ Kris Fisher The Playground Open Mic with Brandy Shannon’s Karaoke Soul Bar Boom Box Villa Europa Karaoke with Just Ben Wooden Barrel ’80s Night Karaoke

Friday, June 24 Live Music Augusta Canal Moonlight Music Cruise w/ Amy Coccia Cotton Patch Alan Thompson Country Club Ross Coppley Coyote’s Swingin’ Medallions Doubletree Hotel 3 Sides of Jazz Fox’s Lair Roger Enevoldsen French Market Grille West Doc Easton Joe’s Underground Pretty Petty Laura’s Backyard Tavern Live Music Malibu Jack’s Tony Williams Express One Hundred Laurens John Kolbeck Partridge Inn A Step Up The Playground John Berret and the Laroxes Polo Tavern Robbie Ducey Band Shannon’s Bill Tolbert and the New BTUs Sky City Artemia Album Release w/ The Favors, Sumilan, Ganja Stillwater Tap Room Livingroom Legends Surrey Tavern Simplified Wild Wing Brandi Thornton Band The Willcox Kenny George

46 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

What’s Tonight? Cadillac’s DJ Doug Club Argos Variety Show Club Rehab DJ C4 Club Sparx DJ Rana and Music Explosion Cocktails Lounge Grown-Up Fridays with DJ Cork and Bull Pub Karaoke with Libby D. and Palmetto Entertainment Fishbowl Lounge Karaoke Iron Horse Bar & Grill Karaoke Islands Bar & Lounge Caribbean Night with DJ Spud Mi Rancho (Downtown) Karaoke with Ryan Moseley Mi Rancho (Washington Road) Karaoke with Jeff Barnes Mi Rancho (Clearwater) Three J’s Karaoke Ms. Carolyn’s Karaoke Palmetto Tavern DJ Tim The Place on Broad Rock DJ Rebeck’s Hideaway Open Mic Roadrunner Cafe Karaoke with Steve Chappel Sector 7G Rave Night w/ The Fence Sitters Soul Bar Disco Hell Tropicabana Latin Friday Wooden Barrel Karaoke Contest

Saturday, June 25

Ms. Carolyn’s Karaoke One Hundred Laurens DJ Kenny Ray The Playground DJ Fugi Tropicabana Salsa Saturday Wooden Barrel Kamikaze Karaoke

Sunday, June 26 Crums on Central Jim Perkins Jessye Norman Amphitheatre Candlelight Jazz w/ The Low End P.I. Bar and Grill Live Music Wild Wing Patrick Blanchard

What’s Tonight?

Live Music

Caribbean Soul Love Jones Sundays Malibu Jack’s Karaoke with Peggy Mi Rancho (Downtown) Karaoke Mi Rancho (Washington Road) Karaoke, Salsa Dancing

Monday, June 27 Live Music Hopelands Gardens Fort Gordon’s Crooked River Dixieland Band Sector 7G Millionares, Breathe Electric, Set It Off, Christian TV, Hennesey Williams, Gibby Redbeard, Jappa Soul Bar Metal Monday

What’s Tonight?

The Acoustic Coffeehouse Open Acoustic Jam Session with Eryn Eubanks and the Family Fold Blue Horse Bistro Live Music The Cotton Patch Brandon Reeves Country Club Tyler Reeve Coyote’s Daniel Lee Band Fox’s Lair Billy McKnight Joe’s Underground Irwin Ritchie Laura’s Backyard Tavern Mama Says Malibu Jack’s Pretty Petty P.I. Bar and Grill Live Music Polo Tavern Jim Fisher Band Shannon’s Tony Howard Sky City Sibling String Wild Wing Derogatory

Applebee’s (Evans) Trivia Club Argos Karaoke Club Rehab Jenn’s Crazy Karaoke Malibu Jack’s Team Trivia with Mike Thomas Mi Rancho (Downtown) Karaoke with Danny Haywood Somewhere In Augusta Karaoke with Charles Wild Wing Trivia and ’80s Karaoke

Cadillac’s DJ Doug Club Argos Variety Show Club Rehab DJ C4 Club Sparx DJ Wreboot House Party Cocktails Lounge Latin Night Fishbowl Lounge Karaoke Helga’s Pub & Grille Trivia Islands Bar & Lounge Reggae Night with Island Vybez The Loft Karaoke Mi Rancho (Downtown) Karaoke with Rockin Rob Mi Rancho (Clearwater) Karaoke with Danny Haywood Mi Rancho (Washington Road) Karaoke

Live Music 209 on the River Smooth Grooves Cadillac’s Live Band Joe’s Underground Sibling String Malibu Jack’s Marilyn Adcock Shannon’s Preston & Weston Wild Wing Matt Acosta & The Special Guests The Willcox Hal Shreck

Live Music

What’s Tonight?

Wednesday, June 29

Tuesday, June 28 Live Music Appleby Library Music in the Garden w/ Savannah River Brass Works Blue Horse Bistro Tim Sanders Cocktails Lounge Live Music Fox’s Lair John Fisher James Brown Arena R Kelly w/ Keyshia Cole and Marsha Ambrosius Wild Wing TJ Mimbs The Willcox Hal Shreck

What’s Tonight? Club Argos Karaoke Club Rehab Jenn’s Crazy Karaoke Club Sparx Karaoke with Big Tony Fishbowl Lounge Dart League Islands Bar & Lounge DJ Fred Nice Malibu Jack’s Karaoke with Denny Somewhere in Augusta Trivia with Charles

Club Argos Santoni’s Satin Dolls Club Rehab Jenn’s Crazy Karaoke Club Sparx Trivia Cocktails Lounge Augusta’s Got Talent The Cotton Patch Trivia and Tunes with Cliff Bennett Laura’s Backyard Tavern Karaoke The Loft Karaoke Mi Rancho (Downtown) Karaoke Mi Rancho (Washington Road) Karaoke with Rockin’ Rob The Place on Broad Jazz DJ The Playground Krazy Karaoke with Big Troy Polo Tavern Karaoke with Tom Mitchell Somewhere In Augusta The Comedy Zone w/ Mike Siscoe and Kris Shaw

Upcoming Papa String Band Stillwater Tap Room July 8 Blair Crimmons and the Hookers Stillwater Tap Room July 15 Dave Desmelik Band Stillwater Tap Room July 22 Merle Haggard Bell Auditorium August 6 Keith Urban James Brown Arena August 13 Casting Crowns USC-Aiken Convocation Center November 25

Elsewhere Athfest w/ Futurebirds, Centro-Matic, Guadalcanal Diary, Chickasaw Mudd Puppies and Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit Athens June 23-26 Steve Miller Band Chastain Park Amphitheater, Atlanta June 24 Skid Row Wild Bill’s, Duluth June 25 R. Kelly Philips Arena, Atlanta June 25 Dinosaur Jr. Variety Playhouse, Atlanta June 26 Florence and the Machine The Fox Theatre, Atlanta July 1 Jennifer Hudson Chastain Park Amphitheater, Atlanta July 2 Classic City American Music Festival w/ Nomad Artists, Packway Handle Band The Melting Point, Athens July 3

the download Matt Stone

Matt Stone can be heard weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 95 Rock Raw.

Burr Would Win a Cursing Contest, Hands Down If there was a contest to see who could drop the f-bomb the most in a given hour, the clear cut winner would be Bill Burr. This Boston comedian kicks off your week with the Monday Morning Podcast. Why do a podcast? “There’s people that sit in their cubicle every week that want to f***ing kill themselves. I think my podcast helps that guy not do it,” Burr explains.

Burr as one of the cops in the Steve Carell/Tina Fey movie “Date Night.” But when it comes down to it, Burr is a stand-up comic. It’s what he’s best at and it definitely comes off on the podcast. He’s quick witted and has a no-holds-barred attitude. If you can take a thick Boston accent for an hour, you will love the podcast. Burr runs the gamut on topics. From homosexuality to religion, he covers it all. If there’s one thing that Burr is

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This is basically Burr hitting record and talking for an hour. No intro music, sponsors or sound effects. Just Burr talking. And it’s hilarious. Picture being able to hear someone’s inner thoughts, and that’s the Monday Morning Podcast. Some weeks Burr comes prepared, but most weeks he just wings it. He connects with listeners on a personal level. Burr even takes time each week to read emails, no matter how insane these people are. The podcast is raw. It seems very original. It’s just Burr talking to himself, even reasoning with himself. But the main thing is, it’s entertaining. Burr is a great stand-up comedian. He has done tons of appearances on Letterman and Conan, and has now taken to acting. His latest project, “Cheaters,” is one he co-wrote and starred in. You may also recognize

obsessed with it is sports. Being the typical Bostonian, he is passionate about every New England team. It’s been more present in the last couple weeks with the Stanley Cup finals. And luckily for him, the Bruins took the cup. Burr has had no problems calling out teams and players, mostly for being sissies (and yes, I changed that word from what he really called them). Bill Burr comes across as a very nice, passionate guy, someone I would never want to get in a fight with. He’s one of the most well-respected comedians out today, so if you like comedy with a hint of vulgarity, try the Monday Morning Podcast. Download the latest and get your week kicked off right. And he’s right; it does make the temptation to kill myself a little less present.

OLD MAN CRAZY this weekend line-up. 6.23 Thursday Now You See Them 6.24 Friday Night Rocks Brandi Thornton Band 6.25 Saturday Pig Pickin Plus Late Night with

Derogatory 6.26 Sunday Blue Jeans Brunch 11am-3pm Patrick Blanchard Acoustic Washington Road just past I-20 • 706-364-WILD (9453) w w w. w i l d w i n g c a f e . c o m METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 47

earDRUM Traveling song

If you’ve got rambling in your blood, check out these upcoming shows

Some crave the mudpits of a fourday jam band music festival during the summer like others crave the sand of the beach between their toes. To those who fall squarely in the former category, here is a list of upcoming shows and festivals. Some are right in our backyard; others may cost you a little more time and money. All are worth it.

Savannah 7/14 Corey Smith, Johnny Mercer Theatre 7/30 Lucinda Williams, Fort Stewart Stadium, Hinesville

Charleston 7/1 David Gray, North Charleston Performing Arts Center 7/16 OAR, Family Circle Magazine Stadium 7/18 Elvis Costello, North Charleston Performing Arts Center

Charlotte 7/3 Zac Brown Band, Verizon Wireless Ampitheatre 7/8 Taylor Swift, Time Warner Cable Arena

48 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

7/12 Mötley Crüe with Poison and the NY Dolls, Verizon Wireless Ampitheatre 7/21 Wiz Khalifa, Time Warner Cable Uptown Ampitheatre

Atlanta 7/8 Dead Confederate, The EARL 7/9 Indigo Girls, Atlanta Botanical Garden 7/12 Rihanna, Chastain Park Ampitheatre 7/22 Emmylou Harris, Atlanta Botanical Garden 7/26 Christina Perri, The Loft at Center Stage 7/28 Bob Dylan, Chastain Park Ampitheatre 7/30 311, Aaron’s Ampitheatre at Lakewood

Festivals

Summerfest Milwaukee, Wisc. June 29-July 3; July 5-10 summerfest.com The largest festival in the United States in terms of attendance, this concert extravaganza draws hundreds of thousands of people to hear music on a dozen stages. This year’s headliners include Kanye

West, Katy Perry, Kid Cudi, Hall & Oates, Better Than Ezra, Toby Keith, Kid Rock, Sheryl Crow, Def Leppard, Heart, The Black Keys, Sugarland, Peter Gabriel, Buddy Guy, George Clinton, Girl Talk, Los Lonely Boys, Loretta Lynn, Cowboy Mouth and more. What It’ll Cost Ya: Round-trip airfare from Augusta starts at $263. $33 gets you a three-day pass. High Sierra Fest Reno, Nev. June 30-July 3 highsierramusic.com About 80 miles north of Reno, the High Sierra Fest highlights an eclectic array of musical offerings focused on jazz, newgrass, bluegrass and jam bands, with a little funk, electronica and world music thrown in. It also includes workshops, classes, shopping and familyoriented activities. 2011 headliners include My Morning Jacket, Ween, Neko Case, Warren Haynes Band, Beats Antique, Emancipator, Orgone, Ernest Ranglin, Bill Frisell’s Beautiful Dreamers and Maceo Parker. What It’ll Cost Ya: Round-trip airfare from Augusta starts at $795. A two-day pass is $155.

All Good Festival Masontown, W.V. July 14-17 allgoodfestival.com This jam-band festival features two side-by-side stages, fresh mountain air and panoramic views of rolling hills. Headliners include Furthur featuring Phil Lesh and Bob Weir, Primus, Pretty Lights, STS9, moe., Umphrey’s McGee, John Butler Trio, Dark Star Orchestra, Beats Antique, Galactic and many more funny smelling bands. What It’ll Cost Ya: Round-trip airfare from Augusta starts at $513. Advance four-day pass is $199. Pitchfork Music Festival Chicago, Ill. July 15-17 pitchforkmusicfestival.com Featuring “hot as fire” acts on their way up, headliners this year include Animal Collective, Neko Case, Destroyer, The Dismemberment Plan, No Age, Fleet Foxes, James Blake, Das Racist, TV on the Radio and Cut Copy. What It’ll Cost Ya: Round-trip flights from Augusta start at $231. Tickets are $45 per day.

Elvis Costello

Fleet Foxes

Wiz Khalifa

Neko Case

Lucinda Williams

Kanye West

Indigo Girls

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 49

Genius and Loathing in the Eighteenth Century Josef Patchen

50 METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11

There are many questions posed by Le Chat Noir’s production of “Amadeus.” How did Doug Joiner, director, and Rhiannon Martin, stage manager, adapt a huge and lavish Broadway production into a streamlined drama that seemed to have been written for the much smaller venue of Le Chat Noir’s theater? The question of adequate, accepted talent confronting true genius is one that

seem to be lifted up to a higher plane. This was what Joiner calls “poetic spectacle” at its best throughout. The actors were superb, all of them, in all of their parts. Jerod Gay shone as Mozart, bringing out both the great childishness and the enormous musical sophistication of the character with gusto. The young Salieri was played with enormous and appropriate glibness, irony, wit and an uncanny sense of

the play dramatizes, and the production itself, in all its aspects, shows what genius in staging and acting can do with a work of real power. The fit was superb. All adaptations made to the script seemed as natural as if they had been original. The second act particularly seemed to be operating on an entirely different level from the real and ordinary, and culminated in what Joiner calls “holy theater” — a moment of transcendence when the audience and the cast together

existential immorality by Krys Bailey. Kudos! My hat, if not my wig, is off to you. The crucial role of Mozart’s pretty, flighty wife, Constanze, who began as a childlike figure and was then brought low by her own experience with the disillusioned Salieri, was beautifully and cunningly played by Andrea Collins. The young singer (and sing she did) Katherina Cavalieri, who Italianized her original Germanic name because then, as now, talent is always better

and inadvertently, to keep Mozart down. All the court hangers-on imbued their characters with the pomposity, fatuousness and fuzzy-mindedness appropriate to the roles. Bob Rollins’ additional corpselike portrayal of the old Salieri, who was spoken for by the young, was perfect in his depiction of a man brought low by Karma, if not by God. And here lies one of the play’s moral questions. An ambitious young artist has made a bargain with God (a sort of anti-Faustian bargain) — he will be virtuous and moral throughout his days in return for artistic renown. What happens when he encounters a creature beyond the God that he knows — a Mozart who seems to embody the existential, the chaotic and the genius Salieri alone has the ability to recognize he himself does not have? It is a question I am sure that Shaffer himself wrestled with in creating this

play. What happens when high talent, rewarded and self-satisfied, confronts a freak of nature that can nevertheless create things that only the high talent itself can realize as genius? It is a question that Salieri put before his God, only to be confronted with resounding silence. In despair, Salieri sought to break every vow he made to God to achieve fame, and, in the process, destroyed the very thing, Mozart, that he most admired, annihilating the man that he felt had been most rewarded by God in ability. In all, it must be said that the questions that the maddened Salieri puts to God are eventually answered. As time passes, the Karmic wheel that had spun to reward Salieri and to forget Mozart turned back upon itself, leaving us the shining repletion of the Mozart opus. It damned Salieri to a not-so-salient circle in a hell for the unremembered, one of his own making. In despair, at the end of his life, Salieri offered himself as the patron saint of mediocrity, and damned his own soul for his misdeeds. By so doing, Salieri becomes the true hero of the show — for are we not, almost all of us, little talents? Must we not in our daily lives learn to recognize and learn to live with talent beyond our own in whatever field, sometimes with

only our own comprehension to tell us it is so? So many questions! They are pondered in such splendid circumstance here in this brilliant production. What a spectacle for the eye and a feast for the ear! As for dealing with some of the questions the play raised, I must say that, like Salieri, I have felt bitterness and jealousy at the greater talent of others in my field. I found the best advice in the old ’70s recording of the Desiderata, which is a recitation of the 1927 prose poem by Max Ehrmann. It says, in part: “If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.” If you don’t, you become Salieri. Le Chat Noir’s production of “Amadeus” continues June 23-25 at 8 p.m. at the black box theater downtown. For tickets, call 706-722-3322 or visit lcnaugusta. com.

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regarded if it comes from a long way off (in this case, particularly Italy) was handled and sung beautifully by Brandy Bunch. Two irreplaceable talents, Gene Howard and Ernie Williamson, made themselves audience favorites and indispensable plot elements as Salieri’s “little winds” (venticelli), who kept the rumor mill abuzz, and Willamson also delightfully played the bumbling and clueless Emperor Joseph II, whose catchphrase, “Well, there it is” has become as familiar to some as Ben Stein’s “Bueller… Bueller… Bueller” from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.” Rounding out the cast of court officials were Tom Colechin as Count OrsiniRosenberg, Mark Swanson as Johann von Strack, and, in a dual role, Bob Rollins, here mentioned as Baron von Sweiten. All ably acquitted themselves as rather mediocre eminences-grises who conspired with Salieri, advertently

METRO SPIRIT 6.23.11 51

Ball

Matt Lane is host of The Weekend Rundown which airs from 10 a.m.-noon Saturdays on News-Talk-Sports 1630 AM. He can be reached at mattlane28@gmail.com.

Matt Lane

Two Championship Series, One Upcoming Draft

NHL Playof fs

One series went six games, the other went seven, and each left their own indelible mark in the sports history books. A tale of two seasons that, when juxtaposed, will arguably be remembered more for who the runners-up were than the champs themselves. A quick recap of what just happened before we preview what’s to come.

NBA Playof fs The Mavericks finally get their title and redemption from ’06 when they lost in the finals to the Heat. But every high five and cheer for the Mavs — who suddenly became “America’s Team” although their only star, Dirk Nowitzki, is European — felt like a slight at the expense of the Heat. What we’ll remember when looking back on this year: No matter how many championships Lebron wins in his career, none will ever feel as purely satisfying as this one did for Dirk. Ever.

Riot! Riot! The blue-collar Boston Bruins travel 2,000+ miles to beat a more talented team in the Vancouver Canucks at home in Game 7 and trigger doomsday in downtown Vancouver. We still won’t remember how to pronounce any of the players’ last names, but we’ll surely remember that picture of the guy stealing second base in the middle of the street during the riot. It’s the 2011 version of Noah Calhoun! How romantic! Good luck fellas with the “kiss

first and ask questions later” model for picking up girls. Make sure you bring a change of shirt for that 7&7 you’re about to be wearing, and some bronzer for that Coach knockoff that’s headed straight for your temple. What we’ll remember when looking back on this: Thank God Canada won the Gold in the 2010 Winter Olympics, otherwise I’m not sure if Vancouver would even exist anymore.

NBA Draft The NBA draft is upon us and we have a few players from our regional colleges that have a chance to be selected: Iman Shumpert, Guard, Georgia Tech — Could be a combo guard in the NBA; possesses requisite size and toughness (averaged six rebounds a game as a guard); was always the best player in Tech’s backcourt, so increased competition

will help nudge him to develop a better jump shot. Trey Thompkins, Forward, Georgia — Was thought to potentially play himself into being a lottery pick this year, but he depreciated in value. He has never been in great shape (had 15.5 percent body fat at the NBA Combine); does not lack in skills, good face-up jump shooter, quick hips and feet, and excellent touch around the rim. He needs

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an increase in physical toughness to contribute on next level. Travis Leslie, Guard/Forward, Georgia — An A+ athlete, maybe the best in the draft. Will be drafted on pure upside as we’ve only seen flashes of what type of player he could become. Needs to fall in love with the game in order to offer more than just flashing drives from the wing and YouTube sensation dunks.

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The Princess And The Pee My fiance’s been treating me badly for a while. When I’m at his place, I spend most of my time watching him play video games and drink beer until he’s ready for sex or he passes out. He calls me “insecure” and says “get over it” if I bring up anything controversial, like when I noticed the box of condoms we’d just bought was suddenly short one. (There’s other evidence suggesting he’s cheating.) He’s also developed the nasty habit of peeing into two-liter bottles and leaving them around until they’re full. He isn’t good for me in many ways, but I love him and don’t want to devastate him by ending our engagement. While I need that feeling of having someone whose feet I can find with mine under the blankets, I’m a seize-the-day kind of person,

and whether or not he’s cheating, he’s still passing out on his couch, and I’m lonely. — Sad Fiancee The water conservation-minded have that saying, “If it’s yellow, let it mellow,” but they mean in the toilet bowl, not in the living room. (When’s the last time you walked into Crate&Barrel and saw two-liter bottles of urine on the Ainsworth Cognac Bookcase next to an antique typewriter and a bowl of seashells?) Your fiance is acting like you don’t exist in his life — except on nights when he manages to stay conscious long enough to put down one joystick and order you to hop on the other. Oh, and by the way, that condom isn’t missing. It’s on vacation. You’d know that if you

Urine for Surprises! On both of my dinner dates with this guy, he’s excused himself to the bathroom and taken forever. Longer than any girl I know. Like, 10 minutes. Although I barely know him, he doesn’t seem vain or like someone who’d be doing drugs. We’re going out again, and I hate to be rude and pry, but I’m really starting to wonder. — Mystified It could be something intestinal. Protozoan sock hop? Parasite pride rally? He could’ve been calling his wife or his bookie or enjoying a mid-date masturbation break. Or, maybe he just needed a good cry. Saying nothing to him sets you up as an easy mark if he’s a scammer, and as a pushover if he’s just a garden-variety jerk. Saying something is less uncomfortable if you

use humor. Next time he returns from a sabbatical in a stall, maybe ask “That time of the month again?” and see if he offers some sort of explanation or just asks to borrow a tampon. If you keep dating him, put him on double secret probation and be prepared for the other shoe to drop (perhaps in a Larry Craig “wide stance”). A guy who takes a 10-minute bathroom break needn’t lay out all the icky details, but one who isn’t socially incompetent, devoid of empathy or too troubled to care will volunteer some hint that he wasn’t snorting lines of powder off the toilet seat (“I picked up something in Guatemala, and it wasn’t one of those brightly colored bags”).

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weren’t so pathetically insecure. If this is how he acts before marriage, imagine what you’ll be saying after the honeymoon phase ends: “You never blatantly ignore me, treat me like an idiot and just use me for sex like you used to.” Still, you aren’t without standards. You say you need a partner whose feet you can find with yours under the blankets, which rules out any degrading and dismissive jerks who also happen to be double amputees. As for being a “seize-the-day kind of person,” you don’t mention which day you plan on seizing, but apparently, it’s one far into the future. You claim to love this guy, but maybe what you really love is not admitting you’re engaged to a lost cause. You worry that you’d “devastate” him by ending

your engagement (assuming you could get his attention before he passed out playing “Grand Theft Your Dignity”). Just wondering: While you’re busy caring about his feelings, who’s caring about yours? Going limp in the face of confrontation sets you up to have a cheating fiance who’s decorating the house with a week of his urine. If you refused to put up with a lack of respect, you’d either get treated with respect or get out of any relationship where disrespect is the main theme. You might end up alone — maybe for a while — but that’s got to be less lonely than being engaged to a man who not only refuses to go the extra mile for you but won’t even go those extra 12 steps to the bathroom.

©2011, Amy Alkon, all rights reserved. Got a problem? Write Amy Alkon, 171 Pier Ave, #280, Santa Monica, CA 90405, or email adviceamy@aol.com. Also visit advicegoddess.com and read Amy Alkon’s book: “I See Rude People: One Woman’s Battle to Beat Some Manners Into Impolite Society” (McGraw-Hill, $16.95).

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austin R

Boortz’s Great Advice Falls on Dumb Ears Neal Boortz has apparently offended someone. Imagine that. Last week the syndicated radio talk show host, columnist and senior puddin’ stick found himself squarely in the crosshairs (am I allowed to say that?) of about a gazillion left-leaning advocacy groups because he dared to suggest that it was time to eradicate some brutal ruffians and assassins. Sounds reasonable to me. Boortz actually said, and I quote: “Carjackings, violence, people getting shot. It’s ridiculous. This city harbors an urban culture of violence.... we don’t care enough to paint over graffiti on the overpasses that come into our city, advertising welcome to Atlanta, here’s some of our finest graffiti, from some of our finest urban thugs and their little gang signs. And pick up the paper tomorrow morning. Read about all the carjackings. Read about the innocent people shot for the pure hell of it.

“This town is starting to look like a garbage heap. And we got too damn many urban thugs, yo, ruining the quality of life for everybody. And I’ll tell you what it’s gonna take. You people, you are — you need to have a gun. You need to have training. You need to know how to use that gun. You need to get a permit to carry that gun. And you do in fact need to carry that gun and we need to see some dead thugs littering the landscape in Atlanta. We need to see the next guy that tries to carjack you shot dead right where he stands. We need more dead thugs in this city.” While certain sensitive individuals rate Boortz’s comments as “racist,” “offensively boorish” and (I love this one) “inciting violence,” I look at the comments in the same way I would a weather report. Rain is coming. Get an umbrella. Use it. Makes sense to me. Most of the detractors immediately

seized on the notion that Boortz was singling out minorities for some kind of vigilante justice, but, upon closer inspection, it is clear that he was urging crime victims (those would be the people who are in the process of being carjacked or shot at) to become proactive when it comes to self defense. Try as I might, I could not find a reference to anyone’s ethnicity, just their hideous behavior. He tells us to arm ourselves, get trained to use said arms, and then, in the event that you have a brutal ruffian or an assassin (which is the Merriam-Webster Dictionary definition of “thug”) stick a gun in your face, use that training. I understand times are tough, and I certainly know that there are grown people whose desperation and hunger are inspiring episodes of shoplifting and theft that they would likely never have the nerve to attempt in better times. But when you choose to put a deadly weapon in another human being’s face in order to take from them what is lawfully theirs, I don’t believe most rational adults would have a problem with dispatching that criminal. I am not one of these people who feels the need to shoot car burglars or property

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vandals who are caught in the act, but if there is an individual who is willing to use deadly force to terrorize innocent victims as they steal from them, I have no problem with a societal policy that states loudly and clearly that we want those thugs “DRT” (a Boortz shorthand for “dead right there”). The alternative is to announce to said scumbags the following: “We apologize to you poor felonious souls who are seeking to liberate us at gunpoint from the spoils of our hideously unfair capitalistic endeavors. Please feel free to make off with what you need, and we pledge to behave during our brief faceto-face encounters like the true sheep we all aspire to become.” To hell with that. It is time to either fight back, and be proud in the effort, or bend over and get ready for the invasion. But, as those who have lived to tell the story are sad to report, the bad guys keep coming back as long as you are bent over, and Astroglide is nowhere in their vocabulary. The views expressed are the opinions of Austin Rhodes and do not necessarily represent the views of the publisher.