Micronations
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Charred Restaurants
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Health Care and More! April 13-26 2010
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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Editorial Editor-in-Chief Eric Brew
Sound & Vision Editor Deniz Rudin
Managing Editor Maggie Foucault
Humanities Editor Ross Hernandez
Cities Editor Trey Mewes
Bastard Jonathan Knisely
Voices Editor Matt Miranda
TO THA HATERZZZZ
Production Production Manager Tarin Gessert
Photography Editor Ben Lansky
Graphic Designers Tarin Gessert, Jonathan Knisely, Lucy Michelle, Ryan Webert
Art Director Keit Osadchuk
Distributors Maggie Foucault, Tarin Gessert, Matt Miranda, Pammy Ronnei
By now it’s old news; The Wake doesn’t have any money. The Daily wrote about it. It’s out in the open. We all know how it happened and we know how everyone feels about it. This chapter is closed. The End. Now let’s talk about the future: The Wake will continue to run. We aren’t going anywhere. Sure, The Daily would probably love to have a total monopoly over student press at the U, but that isn’t going to happen. The truth is we at The Wake are dedicated to being an open forum for you to express your ideas.
Copy Editors Katie Green, Brady Nyhus
Business Business Manager Colleen Powers
This Issue Cover Artist Tarin Gessert Illustrators Talia Carlton, Matthew Crawford, Angie Frisk, Andy Kishel, Rachel Mosey, Lucy Michell, Guy Wagner
Advisory Board James DeLong, Kevin Dunn, Courtney Lewis, Eric Price, Morgan Mae Schultz, Gary Schwitzer, Kay Steiger, Mark Wisser
9:5 Established in 2002, The Wake is a fortnightly independent magazine and registered student organization produced by and for the students of the University of Minnesota.
The real plan right now is to do more advertising, apply for more grants, and to keep on keepin’ on. We are still paying people too (yes, really), so come work for us! Apply online at www.wakemag.org for open positions starting in Fall semester. And for many semesters to come.
Contributing Writers Sam Ross-Brown, Desiree Bussiere, Danie Frye, Sam Johnston, Meher Khan, Andrew Larkin, James Litfield, Zach McCormic, Trevor Scholl, Mark Thomson, Kevin Tully
Photographers Creative Commons, Jerry Matthiason (2006)
©2010 The Wake Student Magazine. All rights reserved.
I’ll say it again; The Wake isn’t going anywhere. There hasn’t been any talk whatsoever of just abandoning The Wake and saying, “We had a good run.” We are not only dedicated to the students at the U, but to the staff of Wakes gone by. We are going to put in the same hard work that they did to keep The Wake going when they went through difficult situations in the past; audits, getting funding, and even starting this thing from scratch. I don’t plan on being the one to abandon all this history.
Maggie Foucault
Managing Editor
The Wake Student Magazine 1313 5th St. SE #331 Minneapolis, MN 55414 (612) 379-5952 • www.wakemag.org The Wake was founded by Chris Ruen and James DeLong.
The Wake is published with support from Campus Progress/Center for American Progress (online at www.campusprogress.org).
disclaimer The purpose of The Wake is to provide a forum in which students can voice their opinions. Opinions expressed in the magazine are not representative of the publication or university as a whole. To join the conversation email ebrew@wakemag.org.
voices
A Young Person’s Guide to the Nazi Stalinist Welfare State
Lucy Michell
by Sam Ross-Brown
Making sense of health care reform over the past two years has not been easy. We spend more on healthcare than any other country and yet our life expectancy lags behind Chile, Cuba and the United Arab Emirates. Health insurers can deny coverage to a patient right when they need it most, in fact, because they need it most. Thankfully the Patient Protection and Affordable Healthcare Act was designed to make the system a little more user friendly. Pre-existing conditions won’t be a problem for anyone after 2014, and subsidized premiums (along with insurance exchanges) will allow millions of Americans to buy into private insurance plans for the first time. These reforms are badly needed and are a big step toward the rest of the industrialized world. Young people are among the most uninsured demographics in America, with 49 percent of 19 to 24 year olds lacking coverage. Young people were also some of Barack Obama’s biggest supporters in the last election, preferring the Democrats by a record 38 percent. But how the new bill addresses this large group is not particularly consistent. One provision that has gotten a lot of attention is the extension of parental plan eligibility to 26, which is a big deal for many in the middle class. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean the family rate will stay the same. Young adults will no longer be counted as children on the plan, but rather as adult individuals, meaning that premiums could be quite a bit higher. And because of the insur-
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ance mandate, young people couldnít simply opt out of health coverage and hedge their bets on good health. Paradoxically, this is partly because young people are so healthy and young people buying into coverage helps pay for others who need expensive treatment. So in a way, we’re expected to pay for our parents’ coverage. But the bill offers some solutions. For a start, Medicaid will be expanded to everyone up to 133 percent of the poverty line (which is now around $11,000), and subsidies will be available up to 400 percent (mostly in the form of tax credits). And then there’s the much-advertised employer mandate provision: your boss has to offer health coverage if he or she employs more than 50 people, and there’s tax credits available for employers with less than 25 (covering up to 50 percent of employers’ costs). Young people will also be able to buy into “catastrophic” coverage with low premiums and high deductibles, basically paying for what you use. So if you’re generally healthy, your costs will be low, and if you get really sick, you’re covered. But if you’re not healthy, need expensive medications or can’t afford the out-of-pocket costs, catastrophic coverage won’t help much. For those unlucky people, new high-risk insurance pools are in the works that will offer reduced rate coverage to anyone with a pre-existing condition who has gone without insur-
ance for at least six months. Rates will hover around average premiums for healthy individuals, and the pools will be operated by the federal government, states or nonprofits. Currently 35 states operate such pools (including Minnesota, which has one of the most extensive), but with no rules on premium charges, the plans cost as much as twice the average individual rate. This is likely to change by June, in anticipation of the 2014 deadline, when private insurers will no longer be able to charge higher premiums because of pre-existing conditions. And while there are some doubts as to the financial viability of the program (most states run it at a loss and Washington is only promising about $5 billion), it has the potential to insure millions, including many young people. OK, so there are some holes. The bill will by no means cover everyone. In Massachusetts, where similar reforms were implemented in 2006 (including a mandate and a relatively generous subsidy program), tens of thousands remain uninsured. Of course, things would be so much easier and more efficient if we could have a single-payer plan (of course, of course). But in the real world we have to put up with things like procedural filibusters, blue dogs and cornhusker kickbacks. Overall, the bill will help many people get coverage. Around 16 million will now be eligible for Medicaid and millions more for subsidies and other programs. For many young people, the bill could mean one less headache or one more trip to the doctor.
voices
The Rise (and Fall?) of Micronations By Matthew Crawford
Meher Khan
Do these tiny wannabe nations have a legitimate claim to sovereignty? The tenuous relationship between individual and national identity has been brought into the realm of international law by the emergence of micronations. It is not just the political and moral philosophers in the relatively innocuous space of academia who need to tackle issues of an individual’s relationship to their nation, but lawyers and lawmakers of the world. What precedent is there to hinder individuals who claim state sovereignty over their own land, other than common sense, of course? Common sense, however, has notoriously little to say regarding legal and moral authority. It shouldn’t come as a surprise then, that legal ambiguity and official shunning reigns supreme in relation to the many micronations’ legal status. This is not without some level of justification, as most micronations are harmless vehicles for fantasy and entertainment, as their creators take on the rank and persona of kings, with all the accoutrements of a clichéd ruling party, i.e. fancy uniforms, medals, and a national anthem. Some even go so far as to write a fictional national history. These often function mostly as internet-based entities that are comprised of a small-scale social group of friends and advocates. However, this is not always the case. Other micronations actually inhabit a physical location on the Earth, which they claim authority over and which they are, in some cases, willing to defend with shows of force. Though the concept of a micronation is not necessarily an entirely modern phenomenon, and does not have the significant history of the Utopian-egalitarian commune, the boom of ‘revolutionary’ activity that led to the development of some of the most prominent micronations has come in the last fifty years. Two major micronations that are still in existence today were founded in the tide of revolutionary thought that spread through the 1960’s and 70’s, produced in the time of student riots and the civil rights movement. The Principality of Hutt River was created when a group of farmers seceded from the Australian government in 1970 due to quota laws that would have only allowed the former citi-
zens to sell one-tenth of their wheat production. The formation of The Principality of Sealand, in 1967, was the end result of a group of people attempting to find a place to broadcast pirate radio. Both of these micronations were founded on relatively legitimate concerns, actually inhabit land of some sort or other, and though neither of them have been officially recognized as independent nations, have managed to maintain an odd sort of autonomy, which gives them an intriguing status. Exploiting this status the most effectively throughout its history, The Principality of Sealand is especially interesting. The principality was founded by a man named Roy Bates and his family, and is entirely situated on an old World War II seafort that stands about six miles out from the British coastline. In place of a fictionalized history, Sealand has survived military encounters, a successful takeover followed by a quick retaliation, and diplomatic relations. In many ways, The Principality of Sealand’s history is a microcosm of the violent, turbulent origin stories that are at the basis of most nation’s battles for independence. However, it is difficult to discern whether this microcosm is truly akin to the actual struggles of a large-scale developing nation, or is simply the delusional game-playing of a handful of eccentric people who are poking holes in the fabric of international law. In 1968, after the British Navy became aware of the repurposing of their old seafort, they sent warships out to the newly claimed sovereign state of Sealand. Roy Bates, construing the actions of the navy as an unwelcome intrusion on his territorial space, fired warning shots. Since Bates was still considered a British subject, and firing shots at one’s own Navy is not looked upon kindly, he was accused of various crimes and was summoned to a British court. The judgment that the British court passed on Bates typifies the ambiguous legal space that most micronations exist in to this day. The court declared that its jurisdiction did not extend outside British national territory and, thus, could not persecute Bates. Without giving credence to the claims of Sealand’s sovereignty, the British government conceded that it was not part of the motherland. In the vacancy of any clear jurisdiction, the official history of Sealand states that this is a de facto claim to sovereignty.
In 1978 the Principality of Sealand was invaded, while Bates was away in England, and taken over. The invaders, led by the German Alexander Achenbach, held Bates’s son hostage. In response, Bates enlisted armed assistance and retook the fort with the use of a helicopter. The invaders were held as prisoners of war until Germany was forced to send a diplomat to Sealand to negotiate their release. Once again, the official historians of Sealand use this to their advantage and declare that this diplomatic relation with Germany is a de facto claim to sovereignty. The potential that is found in the micronationality movement is often hindered by their paradoxical and fetishistic nature. Micronations, at their best, not only provide an extreme option for the separation of an individual or small group from a national agenda that is growing more incomprehensible or alienating to them, but also play upon the possibility that is part and parcel of the commune movement toward a more personally run community that has laws and goals more closely related with its population. At their worst, most micronations are mired in their claims to old pseudo-feudalist notions of regal lineage and the novelty and entertainment value that implies. They often seem to mimic sovereignty in all the wrong ways – as though the claim to right over a territory must imply a miniature display of absolute power. I am thinking here of the Republic of Molossia, which is competently run, I’m sure, by President Kevin Baugh who governs over the vast national territories comprising mainly his house, backyard and garden somewhere in California. It seems certain that the micronation movement will only exist as a fringe element in the larger global society. The risk inherent in separating oneself from the resources, protection and critical services of a large, established nation are daunting. The challenges of economically supporting a micronation, with such a minimal amount of land, are usually insurmountable. This is why most micronations are not comprised of the revolutionary temper that is part of the Sealand or Hutt River efforts. It seems as though the movement has lost the fire and ingenuity that it had in past decades, and these days, with the internet providing endless digital realms, most micronationalists are willing to let themselves fantasize about their imagined nations while still remaining American or British during their day jobs.
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voices
Music Education Building By Eric Brew
The Music Education Building at the University was constructed in 1888 and is recognized today as part of the Old Campus Historical District. Being the second building ever constructed on campus, the building comes with many forms of what the city now determines to be code deficiencies. The building was first used as a center for the Student Christian Association before hosting a YMCA chapter, Child Welfare and Music Education departments. After being vacated, the building was placed into a lay-away state in 1997. The building was closed for multiple State Building Code deficiecies, a failing roof system, physical inassecibility, lack of elevator, proximity to the roadway and lead and asbestos-containing materials throughout the building. The University explored several reuses of the building during its lay-away status, including offers for use outside of the University. Among these potential uses for the building were: a new Center for Disability Services, renovated classroom or seminar space, a University departmental or student organization office space, rental housing, scholars housing, a unique food service center (restaurant, coffee or snack shop), utility infrastructure or a storage building. Neccessary restoration work is estimated to cost around $2.9 million. Because of the high expense of rebuilding for accessibility it is more financially feasible for the University to demolish the building. President Bruininks recommended for the approval of the deconstruction and demolition of the Music Education Building last July 2009. An Environmental Assessment Worksheet is required to be completed before deconstruction of the building. The worksheet notes certain materials will attempted to be preserved during deconstruction. Salvageable materials identified in the Environmental Assessment Worksheet, such as the building’s exterior stone carvings, will be protected and stored either for reuse in a future University facility or used in an education or interpreteive setting. The latter of these potential uses will be completed with oversight by the Minnesota Historic Preservation Office. Outside of indentified salvageable materials (of presumed historical value), all other materials will be salvaged or disposed at the legal responsibiltiy of the selected General Contractor, PCL Construction. The deconstruction project remains in the environmental assessment stage so no scheduled date or time frame for demolition has been authorized.
Photographs by Jerry Mathiason, Photographer, May 2006
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Once the building is demolished, however, the University plans to extend East River Parkway vehicular, pedestrian and bike roads and trails to connect with Main Street SE just West of where Music Education now stands. It is hoped that better landscape features will be compatible with these new connections and increase pedestrian and bike traffic through the area.
voices
Deconstruction Approved
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE MUSIC ED BUILDING1 1888: Student Christian Association Building (SCA) is
dedicated on June 6, University enrollment is 491 students, up from 164 in 1884. 1889: YMCA begins to rent space in the building.
SCA ceases to exist as a student organization; YMCA continues some SCA activities and lease the building
1895-1896:
1911: Regents take control of the building on March 3 and
rename it the University Association Building. 1914: YMCA rift with Board of Regents over religious is-
sues; YMCA moves out of the building. President Vincent presents the building to the Music Department as a Christmas present.
1914-1915:
1926:
Child Welfare Department occupies building.
1947: Renovation of building for Music Education program
is begun, including construction of the enclosed stair on the south elevation. 1997: Building is vacated and put in lay-away status. 1 adapted from University of Minnesota Board of Regents Facilities Committee notes. July 8, 2009.
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cities
The Future of the GAMC and Low Income Health Care in Minnesota
Danie Frye
By Andy Kishel
Budget cuts have taken their toll on most government initiatives, but few have been hit as hard as those that aid the destitute. In the current fervor of health care reform, Pawlenty aimed to give the General Assistance Medical Care program—a state medical aid initiative serving the most impoverished and needy single adults—a “reform” that was to mesh with his trend of cutting healthcare provisions in favor of lowering taxes. As of March 23, the GAMC was slated for the ax, due to repeated Pawlenty vetoes on bipartisan- supported Democratic renegotiations of the reform bill. Minnesota Health Care Programs include GAMC, MinnesotaCare, and Medical Assistance that provide aid to those who do not qualify for federal assistance. Minnesota Department of Human Services announced the same day that those who were on the GAMC program would still have health care coverage—they would be shifted to another MHCP. Before that date, a mandatory switchover to Transitional MinnesotaCare was in the works for most of those on GAMC. However, MinnesotaCare would have had to expand such that this mandate would only raise costs for patients and providers, and eventually deplete the standing Health Care Access Fund on which it is sustained. MinnesotaCare carries a monthly premium, mandatory copays and a host of services available under most insurance plans, most notably alcohol and drug treatment, doctor and clinic visits, dental care, immunizations, surgery and prescription drugs. GAMC offers most of the same critical services without mandatory copays or monthly premiums—and
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so picks up those chronically poor and mentally ill Minnesotans who can’t afford copays and premiums but may need health care even more than MinnesotaCare members. Proponents of GAMC argue it is critical for these downtrodden that GAMC persists in some form. Erin Murphy, a registered nurse-turned-State Representative and the champion for the continuation of GAMC, was tearful and outspoken on the floor of the Minnesota House. On March 25, Brian Lambert of MinnPost quoted Murphy, who said, “the people who live in the shadows of our society deserve care... and we have made that promise to them...[w]e have said that you still matter to us, and even though we don’t have a lot of money, we are going to make sure that you get the care that you need.” Due to the successful lobbying and bill tweaking of Murphy and her cohorts, Pawlenty was browbeaten into signing a modified GAMC continuation plan on March 26. Maureen, who didn’t give her last name, is covered by GAMC. She caught wind of the impending closure of the program and raced to get a host of medical tests performed before the understood termination date of April 1, cognizant of the fact that she would be unable to afford the copays and premium of MinnesotaCare. The communications trickling out of the bureaucracy are apparently insufficient; she was unaware that GAMC had been extended. Budget cuts being what they are, the GAMC is still due for extermination on June 1. It appears, however, that the Transitional MinnesotaCare got the ax that was originally
intended for GAMC; a MDHS bulletin on April 1 instructed care providers not to approve Transitional MinnesotaCare beyond that date. GAMC benefits and eligibility criteria remain essentially the same except that a GAMC qualifier is no longer needed for eligibility. Said qualifiers include receipt of General Assistance, payment under Group Residential Housing, obtainment of disability income, homelessness and other institutionalized proofs of poverty. The MDHS states as of this issue’s press that GAMC benefits and acceptance will continue through May 31, at which point an as-yet unrevealed care coordination system will take effect. If the destitute are to receive medical care, it must be provided with a reasonable understanding of their poverty level. Paul Farmer, a medical anthropologist—and a vocal advocate for an end to the structural violence that continually crushes the poor—writes in Pathologies of Power that “[i]n the name of ‘cost-effectiveness,’ we cut back health benefits to the poor, who are more likely to be sick than the nonpoor.” Erin Murphy witnessed enough structural injustice in her days as an RN that she asserted the necessary humanity on the House floor throughout March and shifted the tides of reform toward more compassionate shores. Murphy, her cohorts, and the rest of us Minnesotans now have the opportunity to affect how humane the outcome of the new care coordination system will be. Given this chance, we can determine whether this system will be adequate for those who may need medical care more than us, and whether it will help to mediate that structural violence that creates and sustains poverty.
cities
Greenprint or Bust By Trevor Scholl
Talia Carlton
New bike trails, more public gardens, higher emission standards, cleaner air, lakes and drinking water. These are just a few of the aspects Minneapolis Greenprint looks at, evaluates and fixes. Minneapolis Greenprint is a project run by the city of Minneapolis to improve and evaluate environmental conditions in the city and to continue to promote green energy. On April 5, Greenprint released its 2010 environmental report at city hall, which outlines through stats and graphs how the city has improved and tried to improve the city in a green fashion over 2009 and the last five years. “Our environmental efforts go beyond the borders of this city,” says Greenprint project coordinator June Mathiowetz. Mathiowetz says the project started five years ago when the mayor and city council wanted to develop a community environment project to measure certain aspects of the quality of outdoors in Minneapolis. The effort, funded by taxpayers, has required a large staff to track dozens of environmental standards in the city. From where the city was five years ago to now, Greenprint has made big changes and advancements in certain aspects of the city. Minneapolis is the only city in the country to now accept electronics free of charge for curbside pickup, which promotes cleaner ways to dispose of some hazardous materials. According to the report, 800 tons of electronics were picked up in 2009. The city dealt with heavy rainfall complaints where if flooding occurred, causing septic systems to possibly back up, wa-
ter could become polluted. Through the project the city has done extensive work to make sure when there are heavy rainfalls the impact is minimal. They have also rapidly expanded the number of rain gardens in the city.
Council Member Diane Hofstede was impressed by the findings. “This is a remarkable report. We have made incredible strides,” Hofstede says. “Now people can see how dedicated we are to alternative methods of transportation and energy.”
To promote cleaner air and reduce carbon emissions the city began the Northstar commuter rail, which was actually a direct impact of findings by Greenprint. The city increased its number of hybrid vehicles by 9 percent. The big improvement the city has seen is through their promotion of bicycling. According to the report since 2000 the total miles of bikeways in the city has increased by 34 percent. Now Minneapolis has been rated the number one city for the percentage of people who ride their bikes to work.
The report did find some failures. The Emerald Ash Borer is causing a losing battle against the city’s tree population and around the state. The city has to cut down trees faster than they can plant them, and it is hard to replace the canopy of one mature tree when multiple little ones need to be planted to replace its impact. There have also been issues with getting residents motivated and able to purchase solar energy for their homes. There was also a dip in regional transit ridership, possibly due to new higher costs.
The number of bicyclists in Minneapolis is 20 times higher than the national average. University of Minnesota student and cyclist Nicole Muenchow says she is not surprised by the findings because the city does a great job in adding bike lanes and promoting less driving. “I’ve noticed that more and more people are biking to school, work or wherever. Now all types of residents seem to be out on their bikes and not just in fair weather.”
Greenprint has bold visions for their future. They plan on increasing bikeways from 123 miles to 178 by 2015. They are working hard to retain the 148 green businesses in Minneapolis and vastly increase that number. They want to continue to promote local farmers while protecting the land they are using. They plan on encouraging homeowners to plant their own gardens, trees, and reduce carbon emissions inside their homes.
Greenprint has also been working with the U of M for its research. They don’t have the funding or staff to do most of the background research for many areas, so the researchers at the university provide the city with much of that information. They also work with them on the development of local food and compost projects.
“We have to give the people the information they need to make an impact,” Mathiowetz says. The environmental report is now available to pick up in city hall, and much of the information is placed online as well.
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cities
Creative Commons
Islam Cultural Awareness Week by Zach McCormick By this point in the year most U of M students are probably so full of information from their various classes and the deluge of prior “Awareness Weeks” that the thought of attending any of the events in the Al-Madinah Cultural Center’s Islam Awareness Week probably seems like a chore, which is an utter shame considering that if there’s one culture the average American is woefully ignorant about, it would probably be Islam. “The idea is to bring about awareness and give students a public face of Islam, rather than the negative portrayal they often see in the media,” Mohammed Hanif, the vice president of Al-Madinah says. Blame can reside with the mainstream media for a distinct lack of nuance in its coverage of Muslims or a variety of other parties, but the fact of the matter is
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that most Americans just don’t see much of the human face of Islam, which is something that Hanif and the Al-Madinah Cultural Center are actively working to change. According to Hanif, the event was a smashing success. Islam Awareness Week featured a variety of events, mostly lectures and panel discussions based around key facets of Islam as well as current events in the Islamic world. Monday featured a lecture on the influential teachings of the Prophet Muhammed as well as a documentary film on the rise of Islam. Lectures on Islam’s contribution to the scientific community and medical ethics in Islam took place on Tuesday. Wednesday saw what Hanif claims to be the one most successful event of the week: an activity on the lawns of Coffman that allowed non-muslim women the chance to wear a hijab (traditional headscarf) for a day. “The hijab and niqab [facial veil] are the most obvious sign that a person is a Muslim,” says Hanif, “Muslim men are able to blend in easier in America since they don’t have to wear it, this activity let nonMuslim women experience the immediate identification that comes with wearing the hijab.”
Hanif cites Thursday’s lecture and discussion on Women in Islam as another popular event. “Our women in Islam event had our best turnout, it’s always a big topic for students,” he says. The often misunderstood and complex issue of women’s role in what, to an outsider, might appear to be an oppressive religion is exactly the kind of gray area Islam Cultural Awareness week seeks to shed light on. Thursday’s other event, a lecture titled “Does Islam Guarantee Human Rights?” also took a loaded topic head on. The week wrapped up with entertainment from local artists and members of Al-Madinah. Hanif hopes that if U of M students took only one thing away from the week, it would be a better understanding of what Islam actually is, rather than the image American media has created for it. He encourages curious people to “go to the texts” and read the Qur’an for themselves rather than have a third party interpret it for them. Without bandying about clichés like “global citizen,” campaigns like Islam Cultural Awareness Week enrich the U of M, shedding insight and allowing students to have a personal connection with a culture most of us don’t fully understand.
sound & vision
Embracing Biseasonality:
Fashion In Transition By Desiree Bussiere For the past 132 years we Minnesotans have not been able to make it through March without a snowfall, but it appears that we’ve finally done it. Not only did winter arrive late this year, but it quit our normally frigid doorsteps early as well. Our winter clothing barely had time at the front of our closets. Yet, the ice is gone. The birds are back. The squirrels in my backyard, looking more plump than usual, are disturbing my sleep with their racket. The number of bikers and joggers is swelling. Track shorts, sleeveless tees, and athletic camis are taking over campus. No one can resist the weather—there couldn’t be a more beautiful early spring. But this is a college campus, and melting snow produces much more than just peppy animals and joggers. Dinkytown’s streets are full no matter the season, and the early arrival of spring weather brought with it memories of last fall’s antics. Vodka bottles, Bud Light cans, grimy busted beer bottles and McDonald’s wrappers started popping up all over curbs and front yards as the melting snow revealed November, October and September of 2009, bit by bit. No stretch of sidewalk went trashless. The happy sight of this debris serves as a reminder that it is once again warm enough to leave all windows and doors open when having a party, and to blare music with the bass pumping loudly across town to mingle with dolled-up girls’ shouts and screams of “Jessica, wait, I lost my shoe!” (I think it would be safe to anticipate an early influx in noise violations.) And the lingering heat of the day means that you won’t need your winter jacket for the 6 a.m. walk of shame on Saturday mornings. Who needs a jacket now anyway! For most of us, gone are the days of Uggs, sweats, and layers of scarves; bring on the T-shirts and bermuda shorts! This sudden spring, however, has provoked an awkward transition into the new season’s clothing: people can’t decide if it’s still a bit chilly or not. There are people at the extremes, either still bundling up in their puffy jackets—complete with hat and gloves!—or overestimating the heat of the sun and wearing their summer clothes all day, and then there are those who are stuck in transition. Previously accustomed to dressing for Old Man Winter, students are now experimenting with Lady Spring, but are afraid to go all the way. Let’s label these seasonal swingers “biseasonals.” Biseasonals are easy to spot. Most of the students bumbling around campus are a part of this crowd: sporting a spring dress under a Columbia jacket, or pairing a flowy skirt with furry boots. A typical thing one might say to a biseasonal would be “may I offer you a light spring coat instead of that thick wool jacket to go with those booty shorts?” My fellow students, it’s time to embrace the fashion woes of the biseasonal trend. There are paths to biseasonal success. The first echoes the ‘I’ll-probably-leave-with-someone-soon’ look. The sight of literal debris reminds us of the fashion de-
rachel mosey
bris that half-dressed girls have attempted to clothe themselves with. That’s right, the balmy weather means the smallish patches of clothing came out of their closet hibernation. While this bare-skin look may have success for a night on the town, it’s probably considered less acceptable in the classroom. The runways have opted to overlay their revealing outfits with sheer materials. The finished look: provocative yet elegant. The second look is more along the lines of ‘I-look-good-butI’m-not-flaunting-it-for-you.’ The key to embracing this biseasonal look: if you’re going to wear those furry boots with your flowy skirt, at least add neutral tones and tights to the ensemble. The tights will hold the winter-spring mixture to-
gether, while the neutral tones will offset those bright spring colors everyone is sporting. And if you’re watching the runways, you’ll notice the spring fashions add both glitters and feathers to their ensembles. Exchange your furry boots for gold sandals and your Columbia jacket for a feathery coat; not only does it look glitzy, but the feathers add a playful levity that fits right in with the weather outside. It’s not often we students have a chance to enjoy biseasonality. With tips from the runway, this biseasonal period can be enjoyable without stepping too far out of our comfort zones. Before we know it, summer will be here, school will be done, and the only thing you’ll need will be your swimsuit.
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feature
That
Stole
by Maggie Foucault Whenever a natural, or not so natural, disaster happens within the city limits, there is usually an outpouring of support for whomever has been affected. But this large amount of support does not always guarantee that the affected people will remain in the same place. As the recent fire in South Minneapolis shows, no area of Minneapolis is safe from “white flight” and the degradation of the neighborhood that follows. While currently one of the restaurants affected by the fire, Heidi’s, plans to reopen in the near future, no one knows whether it will be in the same location, or some far flung suburb where their insurance settlement will afford them a snazzier location and clientele. The situation is reminiscent of the time when a tornado ripped down Park Avenue in the early 80s, destroying mansion after mansion and forcing hundreds of white people to flee to the suburbs. At this time, the suburbs included the furthest reaches of what is now South Minneapolis, and so the white people only had to go so far to settle in what is now Linden Hills and the surrounding area. And so Heidi’s was set up for success, surrounded by gourmet-food-hungry white people whose old gigantic homes had recently been destroyed and were now replaced with even bigger homes paid for by insurance money. But then came the fire; we didn’t light it, but we tried to fight it. The destruction was massive; four separate businesses were brought to their knees by this fiery force. While currently none of the affected businesses have publicly announced their plans to abandon this neighborhood for the promise of the good life in the suburbs, slowly but surely these oncelocal businesses will move their way out of their once-posh, toeing the line between urban and suburban neighborhood.
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Already, the future is clear. Heidi’s and Blackbird will make their way further south, into the nearest reaches of Edina, and settle back into their swanky new digs and continue to flourish. Patina and its local goods store will cut its losses and move on with their three other metro locations, and possibly open a fourth in the Galleria near Southdale. This location would be perfect to reach its bourgeois clientele that live near the city, but not too close. But what will take over this now-vacant space? My best guess is two mini-marts, both supplied with Halal meats, a botanica, and a Super America. Half of the residents of the neighborhood will be scared off by the very idea of Halal meats, with another quarter of the residents annoyed by all the “illegals” frequenting the botanica. The Super America will be put in only to add insult to injury; it will be easier for the youth of the neighborhood to buy their American Spirits and fill up their mom’s Volvos. Soon there will be for-sale signs on every house in the neighborhood, and they will quickly fall into disrepair, seeing as the families who once lived in those homes will choose to cut their losses and move right in to their new suburban digs before their old homes have even sold. Houses will be broken into for their copper pipes, and accidental home explosions from accidentally cutting the gas lines while scrapping will become rampant. But the residents who used to run this neighborhood will have forgotten about this place by now, this place that was once their home has now become unrecognizable to them. They will vaguely recall their first homes in such a grandiose neighborhood while sipping their wine at Heidi’s new location on 50th Street and France Avenue.
feature
Keit Osadchuk
by Zach McCormic So, like most of you, I was shocked, appalled, angry, scared, disgusted, aroused and hungry when I heard the news via Twitter update that the block that contained the Malt Shop, Patina, Blackbird and Heidi’s had effectively burned to the ground on Feb. 18th. As a longtime Southwest Minneapolis resident (I grew up less than 6 blocks away), the news hit me pretty hard. Bryant and 50th, the stricken intersection, was quickly becoming the tastiest spot in all of Southwest, with the twin upstart cafés Blackbird and Heidi’s cranking out award winning cuisine, and neighborhood favorite The Malt Shop serving as an excellent cheap greasy-spoon alternative with serious ice-cream slinging skills to back up the salt. I remember countless times taking bike rides with my friends around the neighborhood and finishing it all up with what could very well be god’s own recipe for Hot Fudge Banana shake. Stewart Woodman, owner of Heidi’s, was quickly becoming a jewel of the Minneapolis foodie scene. With a nomination for the James Beard Award under his belt for his work at the celebrated Levain, Woodman’s homey little café named after his wife was a racking up awards like nobody’s business. The Blackbird Café next door had the distinction of being one of Mayor R.T. Rybak’s favorite places in town to eat, and even Patina next door had an amusing array of nick-knacks and gifts for the garden party set. Neighborhood residents can take some solace in the fact that The Malt Shop, in an adjoining building, was only lightly damaged by the fire and therefore will probably keep on serv-
ing shakes as the city crumbles around it. For the rest of the block, through the wonderful machinations of property insurance, the losses will likely be at least partially reinstated. Patina, a chain, still stands strong, with several other locations for you to purchase your ornate bird-feeders at. For Heidi’s and Blackbird things aren’t so rosy though. As a restaurant, they don’t really have Internet sales to fall back on or really any other way of making money while they wait for their space to be reopened. They live or die on the money they make in the kitchen. But fear not, southwest residents and friends: there is good news coming for prized cafes. As often happens when tragedy strikes a beloved business, the charity and goodwill of the entire neighborhood is shining down on our stricken chefs. Donations have poured in from concerned citizens along with gifts of flowers and very thoughtful cards bought from another Patina location. A mysterious benefactor donated a hefty sum, cryptically signing the sizeable check with the words “your favorite crowdsurfer,”just days after the crisis, a fleet of Toyota Priuses converged on the intersection of 50th and Bryant, and a silent vigil was held. A neighborhood task force is being mobilized to take decisive action to aid the area’s businesses, as soon as they finish voting on a committee leader. So fear not Southwest foodie and let it echo from Washburn High, from the bottom of Minnehaha creek to the top of the Watertower, loud enough to hear in Edina: 50th and Bryant will live again!
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sound & vision
Greenberg By Andrew Larkin
Noah Baumbach’s Greenberg is, in certain ways, a competition between its two leading characters for the director’s attention. The film opens with Florence, an LA maid whose life consists only of the things she’s been pushed into through necessity or indifference. She goes to a bar, drinks herself into a stupor and sleeps with a guy because she could almost have a conversation with him and, well, he wanted to. She likes playing with the Greenberg family children and dog—incidental perks of a job inherently lacking dignity. As her disinterest in her own life becomes more apparent, she becomes more compelling. Or maybe frustrating. But at least imbued with potential. Roger Greenberg is introduced as he comes to LA to house-sit while his brother’s family goes on vacation. This is how Roger and Florence meet and begin an awkward, temperamental affair. Yet from the moment Roger is introduced, he becomes the film’s focus; it loses interest in Florence except insofar as Roger
She and Him
Volume Two by Zach McCormick
Measure For Measure by Ross Hernandez
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is interested in her. This is the film’s tragedy. Roger Greenberg is 40 years old, selfish, washed up, neurotic and irredeemably mean, in particular to Florence, who he abuses as blatantly as her past flings, but with more regularity. In the competition for Baumbach’s attention, Roger Greenberg, as the film’s title indicates, unambiguously wins. Ben Stiller’s performance, reaching squirm-inducing heights of awkwardness and awfulness, is commendable, and the film is consistently entertaining. Yet Greenberg is never made adequately sympathetic. This is problematic because the film seems to trace his attempt to redeem himself, implying some sort of achievement on the part of Roger Greenberg at the end that isn’t believable and is, by this point, even unwanted. His worst characteristics stubbornly remain throughout the film, which watches him alienate his few remaining friends. Florence becomes static as Greenberg moves into the spotlight, which is a shame. She is the real protagonist in this story, but in the film, as in her life, she is relegated to second place.
For such an unlikely team-up, the duo of indie-folk heavyweight M. Ward and actress Zooey Deschanel has had remarkable staying power. Far from a novelty group, She and Him specializes in lush folk- and country-tinged pop songs that recall Phil Spector’s girl groups and Nashville chanteuses. On Volume Two the duo sprinkles in elements of Motown for a slightly different flavor, but She and Him hardly needs to reinvent the wheel for their records to be enjoyable. Major credit should go to Ward for his sterling production and impeccable playing throughout this record: otherwise unmemorable tunes are redeemed via drooping steel guitar or softly chirping strings and the truly winning songs crackle with analog warmth. “Into the Sun” features an upbeat soulful piano and backing vocals courtesy of
Tilly and the Wall, while “Lingering Still” evokes the best parts of the 70’s Tex-Mex sound.
The sophomore BFA class’s performance of Shakespeare reminds the audience that being lewd was often central to performances in English Renaissance Theater. In this production of Measure for Measure the pre-show consists of a flamboyant striptease, often involving audience members in lap dances. This seemingly “bad behavior” was for a purpose: showing the audience the city of Vienna in a state of flux while the Duke passes legal responsibility to his magistrate, Angelo (played by Liam Benzvi). When the party stops, the lights turn on and the businesses that were once prosperous are now morally objectionable. Of course those who go to Measure for Measure intending to see a high class production of one of Shakespeare’s most problematic “problem plays” will get what they want from the brilliant cast members including the Duke, played by An-
gie Janas. This directorial choice (casting the Duke as a woman) makes the dynamics of a play with a seemingly nonsensical love story (between the Duke and Isabella, a novice nun, played by a woman as well) much more nuanced and believable. This production has an advantage by portraying the Duke’s elaborate plot as an inconspicuous front for the Duke to confront her lover. Suzy Kohane and Andrea Gonzales also bend genders in hilarious ways (Kohane’s verbose portrayal of the pimp, Pompey, in contrast to her timid and frail Friar Peter was brilliant). It’s refreshing to see Shakespeare without so much starch in the collar.
“Home” rides along on a toe-tapping country two-beat while Deschanel delivers a vocal performance dripping so thick with charm that it’s almost impossible not to fall in love with her. There’s hardly any singing from Ward on Volume Two, and it seems a shame to place such a fantastic voice in the background, but of course the real star of the show is Deschanel, who is more than happy to croon and warble her way adorably through the record. She and Him aren’t venturing into particularly profound territory here, and some of the songs sound suspiciously Prius-commercialready, but one couldn’t ask for a better summer record: lazy, warm and charming enough for a garden party.
Blue hairs beware.
sound & vision
Your Life is Twilight by Sam Johnston In my excitement about the upcoming release of Eclipse, the third installment of the Twilight saga, I found a web site called mylifeistwilight.com. The site has the same format as fmylife.com, but instead of writing about how awful their lives are, users write short stories about how their life is like Twilight. One person posted about how she saw a silver Volvo when it was rainy and just knew, in her heart, that it was Edward. Another girl asked her boyfriend to hold ice in his mouth before he kissed her so she’d know what it was like to kiss the cold, lifeless lips of a vampire. Some of us might laugh at the web site, but I think we all belong on it. Twilight is like puberty. You wake up one day and realize the school you’re at feels completely different, and you don’t understand your body, and all the boys are starting to notice you. All of them except your lab partner Edward. He’ll barely even look at you, but he’s the only boy you want to look at. You’re sure he’s perfect, you imagine he sparkles in the sunlight, and you think if he went out for track he’d definitely be the fastest one on the team, but he’s not really into sports. You’re not really sure what he’s into, but you’re desperate to know more. He’s perfect, you think. One time you accidentally touch his hand during your lab and that night you write about it in your diary. And then all of a sudden he’s talking to you and soon he asks if you want to go out with him and you say yes and now you’re dating. He’s so protective of you. It makes you feel safe knowing he’d fight a man for you. Probably he’d even kill a man for you. At the school dance, during one of the slow songs, he looks at you with his golden eyes and says, “Isabella Swan, I promise to love you every moment, forever.” You wipe away the tears and think “so this is what love feels like”. You can’t believe you found it so young. Two weeks later it’s your birthday and you get a paper cut and Edward dumps you. It hurts so bad you’re afraid you’ll never feel again. The Edward-shaped hole in your chest is the only thing you have left of him. You waste your days lying in bed staring at the ceiling, sometimes rolling over to cry into your pillow. You’ve accepted the fact that you will likely never be happy again. Your dad tries to comfort you but he absolutely wouldn’t understand what you’re going through. The pain feels like it lasts for months but in a few days you meet a new boy. Jacob has a bunch of older brothers and lives in abject poverty and fixes motorcycles and he’s actually pretty cute when he cuts his hair. You know Jacob would kill a man for you. But Edward wants you back before you get too serious with Jacob. He says he hates it when you hang out with Jacob, he says he can smell Jacob on you. Jacob takes offense and re-
minds you of how Edward dumped you on your birthday. It’s hard, but you have to tell Jacob that you like both of them, but you like like Edward. You stay friends with Jacob, but Edward demands to know whenever you’ve been with him. Edward is so jealous it seems like he’ll only talk about Jacob. And Jacob is just as jealous of Edward. Both of these men will kill for you, you know it. You just don’t want them to kill each other. Then one day you’re walking in the woods with Edward and you see Jacob down the path. First they exchange glares, then words, then Jacob takes off his shirt and they start punching and you’re begging them to stop but the punches turn into grabs and holds and finally they’re on the ground, muscles flexed, locked into place. You stop your whiny hysterics and the woods are silent except for their quiet, low growls. You notice the sidelong glances they give each other while they jostle around in their embrace. Edward’s shirt is wet with Jacob’s sweat. You’re pretty sure this isn’t about you anymore.
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sound & vision
CONCEPT ALBUMS BY Kevin Tully
Great concept albums are certainly a dying breed, but that’s not to say that there aren’t a ton of them already out there. Here are a few:
Charles Mingus “The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady” This 1963 concept album by batshit musical genius Charles Mingus is widely recognized as one of the greatest compositions of all time. Written as a six-part jazz ballet, “The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady” is an incredibly emotional, beautiful experiment in orchestrated chaos. Mingus called this his masterpiece, and I wouldn’t argue with him (partly because I completely agree, and partly because arguing with Charles Mingus never ended well).
Deltron 3030 “Deltron 3030” Deltron 3030 is/was a rap supergroup consisting of Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Dan the Automator and DJ Kid Koala, who released this space-opera concept album in 2000. It’s about the future, android and cyber warlords, has guest appearances up the wazoo from Damon Albarn to Prince Paul to Sean Lennon, and contains the line “Fuck dyin’, I hijack a mech” in the opening track. Need I say more?
Genesis “The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway” Before Peter Gabriel got busy playing Magnetic Fields covers, writing songs for Pixar soundtracks, and even before “Sledgehammer,” he was playing ringleader in the highly influential prog-group Genesis, who released the double concept album “The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway” in 1974. It’s about a Puerto Rican kid named Rael living in New York City who goes underground and explores cool shit like red corridors filled with carpetcrawlers, caverns of blinding light, and colonies of slippermen in order to find his brother, John, and in doing so, find himself, man… The lyrics are reminiscent of one of those early text adventure video games, and the instrumentation basically exemplifies the term progressive, making “Lamb” one of those records that still sound great even in these days of auto-tune and Gaga ladies and fully forgiving Genesis for ever releasing “I Can’t Dance.”
Titus Andronicus “The Monitor” New Jersey lo-fi punk band Titus Andronicus released this concept album in March to near universal acclaim. It’s based on the Civil War, as evidenced by song titles such as “A More Perfect Union” and “Four Score and Seven” and lyrics about how much being a soldier, having to shit yourself and watching people die all suck. It seems obvious and lame to compare this band and record to Bruce Springsteen, but it’s really more than appropriate with references to New Jersey, rambling piano solos, and lines like “Tramps like us, baby we were born to die” running rampant. “The Monitor” is a lofty project but not to a fault, because the band accomplishes everything they set out to do in its hour-and-five-minute run time. It plays out like a drunken, hopeless, sloppy “Born To Run” that’s not actually sloppy. And it fucking rocks.
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sound & vision
The Cult of Novelty by mark thomson Speaking in broad strokes, to make music is to create. All musicians, in one way or another, bring something new into the world, whether through simple songwriting or technical artifice. We revere musicians for their ability to make something new, and we encourage experimentation. So should creativity always be rewarded?
04.14- southern theater. nico muhly, sam amidon. 7:30pm $22 04.15. 04.15.
the cedar. dark dark dark, brett bullion (of tarlton), spirits
of the red city 8pm $8-10
Well, no. You see, my fellow Generation Y-ers, our precious Internet has created something of a catch-22. On one side, it allows people all over the world to experience things like the UK’s dubstep movement or a great unsigned band from Australia called The Middle East. Few would argue that the ‘net hasn’t expanded the common man’s access to music in seemingly unthinkable ways. Less obviously, though, the last decade has seen something of a race to the bottom on the Internet as far as music is concerned. While the infinite frontiers online allow you and I to peruse music blogs to our every caprice, it has a very different effect on many aspiring musicians.
04.15. turf club. quasi, let's wrestle 9pm $10-12
Growing up in a super-charged environment of breaking Brooklyn buzz bands getting famous on bedroom-recorded demos, there’s a certain pressure that starts to build on anyone who would like to someday make music. Each new band paves their way to indie-stardom through a novel derivation on what has been done, a tangent on a tangent. And the obsessive, incessantly bitchy community of cravenly anonymous online commenters feeds the perception that authenticity is reserved for those who break new ground, shutting out those who might create something beautifully familiar. This leaves us with droves of 19-year-olds who craft songs with the sardonic jibes of the blogging masses pinging around their heads. Which in turn leads us down rabbit holes like chillwave and no-fi (and god forbid, glo-fi). While I don’t dismiss any of these “genres” categorically, they are representative of the larger problem the independent music world faces. The world of hyper-critical commenters that comprise forums, message boards and blog audiences have created the perception that glory is reserved for those who can outshock, out-weird or out-hip the last batch of musicians. Certainly, reinterpretations of old classics are still being made. Look no further than Girls’ excellent Album from last year for proof. And, defying all odds, a smaller group of people is even making music that can truly be called “new.” Spend ten minutes trying to find musical precedents for Joanna Newsom’s Ys and get back to me (my goodness, there’s a column waiting to happen). But the trend toward novelty of any kind is one that will ultimately hurt to the quality of music. Let’s remember, making music should be about pleasure and fulfillment, not some intellectual divining of progress and uniqueness. It’s striking how different a record like Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks sounds from anything coming out now. Today’s musicians would be well advised to heed Van’s words: “In silence easy, to be born again.”
04.16.
501 club. whites and badlands, tips for twat, blackcloud
stallion heart 10pm
04.16.
first ave. voltage: fashion amplified, ruby isle, mayda,
caroline smith, red pens 8pm $25-30
04.17.
400 bar. the wedding present, girl in a coma 9pm $13
04.17.
501 club. 4onthefloor, palomino, dan tedesco 9:30pm
04.17.
nomad pub. zombie season, the funeral and the twilight,
painted saints, poor weather club 9pm $5
04.18. kitty cat klub. we are the willows, the cloud hymn, you &
yourn 9pm 21+ free
04.20. kitty cat klub. velvet davenport, superfluous glowshoes, thee
evil creatures 9pm 21+ free
04.21. the entry. we are wolves, parlovr. 8pm $7 04.22. turf club. wizards are real, party ready, kruddler, rank
strangers 10pm $5 21+
04.23. the entry. the magnolias, ten ton bridge, north of grand 9pm
$8-10
04.23. varsity. here we go magic, laarks, the arms akimbo 9pm 04.24. pantages theater. jósi (of sigur rós) 04.25. first ave. gogol bordello, devotchka, jesse malin 7pm $25-27 04.26. varsity. plants & animals, zoo animal 7pm $10-12 04.27. the entry. the besnard lakes 8pm $10 04.27. first ave. yeasayer, sleigh bells 8pm $15-17 04.27. turf club. lotus easter, jeremy boettcher quartet, aaron
hedenstrom quartet. 10pm $5 21+
04.28. kitty cat klub. the butcher's bag, the dry heaves, clawthroat
9pm 21+ free
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mind’s eye
Smashing Forward:
Hadron Collider Ups Wattage
Lucy Michell
By Andrew Larkin March 30th was another significant anti-climax for doomsday-ers. Zapped with seven tera-electron volts, protons underneath the Swiss-French border raced around a 27 kilometer track at a fraction below the speed of light just to smash into each other, play-acting the universe moments after the big bang or, to use the analogy of some scientists, the absolute worst freeway accident imaginable. The astute reader may note that, no matter how fast they were going, an accident involving only two cars couldn’t be the worst one imaginable. Yet the analogy still works; these particle collisions are happening at the rate of 50-100 per second, with plans to increase the rate to 300 a second. Just imagine a 300-car pile-up. Then imagine it happening at light speed. More than 10 million of these miniature big bangs have occurred since scientists flipped the switch.
theoretically, created by the entry of light through the ozone layer regardless of human creations.
The miniature-scale replication of the big bang had caused many ill-informed people of apocalyptic bents to predict that the miniature black holes that should be created by the crashing protons would grow and envelop the solar system. Obviously this has not happened. The predicted miniature black holes, which consume themselves more or less instantly, are,
It may also shock readers to know that anybody who would build a thoroughly magnetized, hyper-sensitive 27 kilometer underground racetrack would ever let the word “practical” enter their stream-of-consciousness. Never fear; it does little more than that. The discoveries scientists are hoping to make at CERN pertain to completing the Standard Model of
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The Large Hadron Collider has been in the works for roughly 25 years. It uses about three and a half times as many electron volts as its now-obsolete competitor, Fermilab, operating near Chicago. As if this unprecedented and semi-incomprehensible quantity of energy (a tera-electron volt is a million million electron volts) weren’t already adequately over-the-top, by 2013 the facility hopes to up this number to 14. Still, no matter how fast it can throw things into other things, physics isn’t totally sexy yet. Data will be compiled and analyzed for months, and scientific discoveries, regardless of how they’re sensationalized, will proceed slowly from long laborious analysis.
particle physics. That is to say, even if you could understand what these people are doing (apologies to our readers who are physics professors) you would probably have trouble figuring out how it will be useful. Yet the theoretical importance of actually completing this body of research is hard to understate and will justify years of accumulated theory if validated. Analysis regarding the validity of string theory, which hopes to reconcile modern quantum theory and Einstein’s general theory- the two grand and incompatible frameworks for contemporary physics- should proceed. The big gun is the Higgs boson, a particle thought to imbue all other particles with mass. If it exists, it will complete the Standard Model of particle physics. If it doesn’t, then the more serious discussion of eleven dimensions and parallel universes will begin. In spite of the gratification of completing the standard model of particle physics, science is always more fun when it leads to more questions. So now that we’re $10 billion into CERN, the best thing for the amateur science-reader to do is hope things keep getting weirder.
mind’s eye
Cheap Eyesight for the World By James Litfield
Politics and science aside, both groups want the same thing. To make an indiscriminate, tax-deductible donation and help provide eyesight for the world visit www.vdw.ox.ac.uk.
Google Voice does more than just voice mail transcription; it will give you one number to ring all or a select number of your phones, free SMS and can record and store your calls online. It all sounds terribly convenient and there may be many users of Google Voice who utilize all these functions. Apple was considered innovative with their “visual voicemail”—which iPhone owners could use to see the name or number of the person leaving a voicemail and selectively listen or playback sections of the voicemail. With Google voice integration (available on any phone) users can opt to receive e-mails or text messages with a transcription of the voicemail along with a link for audio playback. The use of Google voice’s service disables the iPhone’s native visual voicemail functions but provides its own App providing a similar function. Google’s transcription software is fairly accurate and places guesses for words it has a difficult time understanding (this is denoted by underlined and faded text in their online service). So exactly how useful is Google’s transcription services?
Google Voice:
A Review (of Transcription Services) By Eric Brew
sk
Despite the discrepancy in cost, the groups maintain there is little competitiveness in the industry. With enough glasses being made at once by either group, the unit cost would go down drastically. Yet everyone maintains their system is the best: Adspecs because of their optical range and quality; Alvarez for simplicity and durability.
Voice mail transcription services have been around for a few years now but like most things it only gets big when Google does it.
Guy Wagner
Fr i
Because Adspecs are not meant for the eager consumer who demands the latest style from his or her eyewear they don’t appear in the most attractive forms. They could be considered ‘timeless’ in that Harry-Potter-wore-them-for-sevenyears sort of way. As of now, the technology used limits the lenses to being round and cost about $19 a pair to be manufactured.
gie
Adspecs, an invention of a Professor Joshua Silver at Oxford University, utilizes a clear oil to fill the eyeglasses lenses, thus making the prescription adjustable for any individual. Silver hopes to distribute a billion pairs of his glasses around the world by 2020 to combat the millions of individuals with debilitating eyesight problems.
Several other groups are working on distributing similar glasses throughout the world for a similar price. U-specs and Focusspec eyewear are designed using the Alvarez lens system in their glasses: two lenses of varying thickness that are capable of sliding past one another to change the prescription. Manufacturers using this system can produce about four pairs of glasses for the cost of every single pair of Adspecs.
An
You may have heard about the idea behind these eyeglasses a few years ago. The lenses are completely adjustable by the consumer. No more expensive replacing of lenses and frames when your eyes require a new prescription.
Very useful. For your health at least. I don’t mean that you no longer have to raise your personal radiation piece to your brain to access your voice mail either. I mean previously innane voicemails of old roommates announcing they will be visiting soon turn into hilarity-ensuing texts: “Hey bruise, Joe calling. Yeah, I just left Somalia up to the cities. Then dot Canadian Jeff at Starbucks. I wasn’t here, so ah I don’t know if you’re not. But if you cool to hang out. Lemme in the city. Talk to you later. Bye.”
Aside from the dotting Canadian Jeff at Starbucks, myself knowing the context of this voicemail, this transcription was useful for me. With a glance at my phone during a concert I could decipher that a) my old roommate was now a crack addict and therefore did not have to leave the show to return his call. Google Voice saves the day. Here are some other excerpts from my personal voice mail, to give you an idea of how valuable this service is. “Hello areas. Well, I stopped a the top of the still, but man I got that I’d right after that. I know where you are. Where are you? Give me a call back. Okay bye.” This transcription was useful because I know I have to call this person back. And they may or may not know where I am. “I think 2741.” Cool, I was thinking the same. “Hey dude, this at church. Hey babe, but I think I’m gonna go out in the remains see if you know on. But give me a jingle. Bye” I didn’t return this call because I thought it was rude to make a call during church. And to call me babe. And the vague reference to bodily remains. “Hey Eric. Tatem. Haiti and I are gonna go get some breakfast. Yeah. Anyway, let me give me a call back.” No action required on my part thanks to Google Voice: this person will call themself back. Unfortunately by this point the transcription software has learned my name and now leaves out otherwise great name changes like “areas” and “bruise” and once, Mark? Fortunately, it has yet to learn my friends names: Tatem and Haiti.
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19
humanities
Betz By Deniz Rudin As it rotates dreamily in the air the patterns of yellow light dropping dimly from the ceiling shift and shift, chasing themselves around the thin rubber surface, the yellow diffracting into white on a background of pink that tumbles in any direction, on any axis. Making delicate contact with his fingertips and floating back up, fingers just brushing against it like it were a pair of lips and it recoiling coyly, not offended but not yet ready to kiss his spiral fingerprints. The way it caroms upward with the lightest tap as though weightless and then drifts slowly down, some unnamable force connecting it tenuously to his hands, some thin but unbreakable link. Slowly swishing his palms about the atmosphere in front of his face, moving gracefully, giving it subtle shoves with the thumbs and handcheels, rolling it off the backs of the knuckles; in this room crammed with sound and heat and bodies he has attention for no other thing, not for the women in their partyclothes dancing arbitrarily, the beat never reaching them, nor for the huge idiot sound of dancemusic and drunken chatter, nor for the tinselstrewn floor and paintsmeared walls, his eyes following its path through the air, its contact with his digits, the rest of the scene available only peripherally and that input ignored. Time passing unheeded.
But then a thing happens: he allows himself to speculate about the thoughts of other people. They must notice him here, the only inhabitant of the row of chairs along the wall, playing with a sphere of inflated latex for minutes like a child, neither conversing nor dancing, a lonely static soul at the center of a whirlwind of peripateticism. What is in their heads? How do they see him? He thinks that some of them must assume his intoxication by way of some illicit substance, though he has put nothing more into himself than cola. He thinks that some of them will have assumed him to be bored. He imagines conversations he might have with partygoers who ask him if he’s having a good time, in which he explains to them the importance of simple pleasures and the contemplation of the beautiful in the quotidian; conversations in which he talks and they listen. But there will be no such exchanges, for they rely on some other person being interested enough in his situation to comment on it, and nobody takes much notice of him at all. They are too involved in their own experience to consider his, and rightfully so; there are dances to be danced, drinks to be drunk, words to slur, tongues to touch
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13–26 april 2010
humanities
tongues to and feelings to feel, yourself to focus on instead of the man in the corner idly and contentedly amusing himself with the decorations. He imagines that a passing drunk will slap his plaything from the sky and martyr him, but no such person will come and the bitter glow left in his stomach by this fantasy is not entirely pleasant. Frustrated, Eric Betz lets the balloon drop to the slatwood floor. • • • • A room full of birds and noise, tables piled with glass bottles and plastic cups, the wood floor dotted with featherstrewn puddles of alcohol. We put enough spirits into ourselves to flirt nervously, and after a time things become clear. I unfold my wing to its full horizontal length and let it fall around your shoulder, and I can feel your spine straighten with surprise and pleasure and then slouch into drunken euphoria as I walk you to my room, your plumage rustling with anxiety and anticipation tempered by lassitude.
Our beaks nuzzled into each other, bird’s tongues crossed, your feathers dropping to the floor until you have been plucked smooth, and you remove mine one by one. We become babyskinned white things, modest genitals bare and humble, and at the sight our beaks snap off and fall like great eggshells and underneath are strange red things that we press against each other, prying them open to free wet interior flesh so that it may come into contact with the other’s soft body. And it is with our new tongues entangled, nude and entwined on my bed, that you pass peacefully from consciousness, asleep before we could break in our bodies, and for a time I lie watching your eyes moving underneath their lids, the breath coming from the smallest sliver between your lips, trying to match the rhythm of your baby’s breathing as it comes loud and even and unassuming with each rise and fall of your chest, the sound suggesting the last beautiful halfremembered moments when I’m perfectly comfortable in bed and know that I’ll soon be sleeping. I roll you into a position that looks more comfortable, and I match myself to that position and fall asleep fitted into you. • • • • Eric Betz woke in the fuzzy space between late night and early morning next to a naked body subtly expanding and contracting with dreambreath and rose silently from the sheets to piss and drink water, but before he could make it to the door of his sheerdark bedroom she rose up black silhouetted on black with two colors glowing from her face—thick hoops of red hugging pinprick pupils, the shining whitesharp triangles that are teeth—and she came toward him a thing not of this world, guttural sounds and globs of spittle ejected in unison from her demon throat, the scene soundtracked with shrieking horrorfilm tones as she came toward him with impossible speed, with unspeakable desire, an animal with its mouth wide, shining teeth entering him with furious force, claws cleaving his body into a series of separate sections. He shook his head as though he were a dog with latenight death-fantasy hanging in its shag fur and exited the room.
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humanities
Swearing Patterns By Ross Hernandez I took my meal near the window. The glass was replaced by a membrane of plastic that alerted me to every mention of my name. I locked both doors in my kick drum house from the inside, something I hadn’t done since nineteen ninetyfive. It went like this: Mund: Can you tell her to stop? Cue: Sure, but it’s not a guarantee. Mund: We got young kids right next door fer chrissakes. Cue: Can you take your hand away from your face when you talk to me? Mund: Sure. Cue: That’s better. But the sun stayed up all day. And if it were darker outside I might have felt less guilty. And the sun stayed up for more than a day (same shadows, same length) and I ate very slowly to crush all the germs. Mund: Please hug me. Cue: Finish chewing first. When I was ten I wasted a whole ten-dollar bill on a jet-ski arcade game. I was expecting forty quarters back, and I pushed the coin return for five minutes looking at my brothers’ disappointed faces while they pointed to a machine that read “tokens.” And I knew what my dad was doing to that lady from the church. I played Wave Race Extreme dispassionately for twenty minutes to teach my brothers something about reconciliation. Mund: I’m going to kill your mom. Cue: I know.
without before,
there is no after
before the show,
we must get faster
without the woe,
we know no laughter
before we hoped,
saw no disaster
without the crack,
no need for plaster;
before we go,
we’ll cause a fracture
-gorman rockwell
22
13–26 april 2010
Bastard
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