LosGatosObserver.com

Community Sat, November 07, 2009

• Local Poets, Local Inspiration

  Nov 06, 2009, by Staff Community

• Ten Questions for Jordy Topf

  Nov 06, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Ten questions for Jordy Topf, starving artist and lead singer for the Vox Jaguars.

• Son of A Lost Tribe

  Nov 05, 2009, by Austin Sardella Community
  

  In the late 1940s and early 1950s, following the establishment of the state of Israel and heightened hostility toward Jews inside Iraq, some 120,000 Kurdish Jews were airlifted out of the mountainous area known as Kurdistan and relocated to Israel.

• Santa Cruz Bartenders Spill the Beans

  Nov 04, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  To thirsty patrons, a bartender is a hero with a thousand faces: analyst, confessor, entertainer, clown, crush, captive audience, authority figure, giver of all good things, withholder of same, fount of wisdom or trivia—even friend, for all we know (and hope). When we walk in the door and perch on that barstool, we see someone with godlike powers to make us happy. Someone wise. Someone who’s got it all together. With slide show of photos by Dina Scoppettone.

• Ten Questions for David True

  Oct 31, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Ten Questions for Community Restoration Program Director and proud Deadhead David True.

• The Vampires Motorcycle Club

  Oct 30, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  THEY DON’T drink blood. They don’t wear fake fangs or black trench coats. They don’t read Anne Rice novels and they wouldn’t be caught dead watching Twilight. What they do is ride souped-up motorcycles at ridiculous speeds, party like rock stars and occasionally forget to wear clothes while doing either. They’re the Vampires. And they’re Santa Cruz’s most recognizable motorcycle club.

• The Female Gaze

  Oct 23, 2009, by Christina Waters Community
  

  Perhaps best known for her high-key colors, historic murals and consummate plein air pastels, Ann Thiermann is a tireless connoisseur of other people’s artwork—especially of the vibrant variety of women’s artwork.

• Ten Questions for Rudy Guzman

  Oct 23, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Ten questions for owner of T-Shirt Mafia Rudy Guzman.

• Hundreds Attend Meeting on Gang Violence

  Oct 23, 2009, by Staff Community

  Clothing was a big issue at the meeting on gang violence held at Santa Cruz High School Wednesday evening. The color shirts that students wear could potentially identify them as gang members, no less than something as basic as school colors.

• Night of The Living Thrill

  Oct 23, 2009, by Rula al-Nasrawi Community

  Zombies converge on Cooper St. Saturday to celebrate Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”.

• 350 Day Activities

  Oct 22, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community

  Come celebrate Climate Action Day and help spread environmental awareness with these activities.

• Ten Questions for Heather Tyler

  Oct 16, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Ten questions for the Santa Cruz Derby Girl known as Brawley Parton.

• Quake Led to Setting of Santa Cruz ‘Sun’

  Oct 15, 2009, by Stephen Kessler Community
  

  It was hard not to take the earthquake personally. That October Tuesday, my newspaper, The Sun, which I had started three years earlier in a surge of journalistic urgency and entrepreneurial folly, was on deadline, preparing to go to press the following morning.

• Santa Cruz Parties Like It’s 1989

  Oct 13, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  Post-quake Santa Cruz wasted no time coming up with irreverent slogans about the disaster it had endured—bumper stickers like “Shift Happens” and “It’s All Our Fault” popped up all over town in the months after Loma Prieta. In the same spirit, the town commemorates the 20th anniversary of the 7.1 monster this weekend by both thumbing our noses at the San Andreas Fault and engaging in some healthy introspection about what exactly happened at 5:04pm on Oct. 17, 1989 and how far we’ve come since.

• Ten Questions For Joe Paquin

  Oct 10, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  The office manager for WAMM shares his enthusiasm for hunting mushrooms and wild boars and reading Robert Anton Wilson.

• Cabrillo’s Creative Complex

  Oct 09, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  To the approximately 1600 people who snapped up free tickets to this weekend’s gala opening of Cabrillo’s new Visual and Performing Arts Complex in a freakish 56-minute display of enthusiasm for the arts on the first day tickets became available: Congratulations. Your efforts were not in vain. The three “sold”-out performances, a mélange of music, theater and dance, will be staged in a shiny new showpiece of a venue, the Crocker Theater, the crown jewel in a glitteringly modern complex 11 years in the making.

• Farewell to Selman’s Glass

  Oct 09, 2009, by Staff Community

  L.H. Selman’s Glass Gallery, once one of Santa Cruz’s most beloved art institutions, is leaving California for Chicago.

• The Randall Grahmophone

  Oct 08, 2009, by Christina Waters Community
  

  While it may come as no surprise to aficionados of the wit and wisdom long promulgated by vinographer Randall Grahm, this handsome new book from University of California Press will doubtless incite, even irritate, the far-flung empire of wine snobs, honchos and poobahs.

• Local Libraries Looking for Ideas

  Oct 05, 2009, by Staff Community

  Do you have any ideas about how local libraries can improve their services? Teresa Landers wants to hear about them.

• Ten Questions for Hillel Rom

  Oct 04, 2009, by Hillel Rom Community
  

  The founder of the Breakaway College Access Project is into roast beets with truffle oil. He is not into people who don’t clean up after their dogs in parks or beaches.

• Artists Open Their Doors in North Santa Cruz County

  Oct 03, 2009, by Austin Sardella Community
  

  Imagine a day touring local artists’ workshops and getting to find out what inspires Santa Cruz’s thriving art culture. Now imagine six. Over the first three weekends in October, nearly 300 local artists will open their studio doors across Santa Cruz County—not unlike a multitude of Willie Wonkas—for the Cultural Council of Santa Cruz County’s 2009 Open Studios Art Tour.

• Scottish Games Just Say ‘Aye’ to Santa Cruz

  Oct 02, 2009, by Rula al-Nasrawi Community
  

  After 13 years in Ben Lomond, the Scottish Games and Celtic Festival hike up their kilts and take up residence in Santa Cruz. But let’s face it—Santa Cruz is a far cry from Scotland, and we cannot help but wonder if our lazy beach town is truly ready for the downpour of bagpipes, kilts and haggis. Chieftain Jeff Simpson is ready to prove us wrong.

• Art Replaces Graffiti on Swift Street

  Sep 28, 2009, by Staff Community

  The Aliberti Construction building on Swift Street has long been a popular target for Keith Haring wannabes devoted to spray-painting their way into the art world.

• Ten Questions For Ron Kaplan

  Sep 27, 2009, by Ron Kaplan Community
  

  Ten questions for the executive director of the American Songbook Preservation Society, Ron Kaplan.

• City of Watsonville Wins War of the Strawberry Festivals

  Sep 23, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community

  After a drama-filled feud with its fired promoter, the Watsonville Strawberry Festival turns a profit.

• HUD Helps Santa Cruz County Fight Homelessness

  Sep 23, 2009, by Staff Community

  Homelessness is rampant in Santa Cruz County. With the current recession, about 2,260 people—1 percent of the total population—are currently homeless, says the 2009 Santa Cruz County Homeless Census and Survey.

• Street Signs: Dress Your Goats in Corduroy and Denim

  Sep 23, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  “Best Dressed Goat” contest brings the 2009 Santa Cruz County Fair to a close.

• Yoga the New Fad at Santa Cruz High

  Sep 22, 2009, by Staff Community

  For an increasing number of students, yoga wins out over other more convention sports

• VIDEO: Santa Cruz AIDS Project Drop-In Center shuttered

  Sep 18, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  An inside look at the center, filmed just prior to the final closure on September 15.

• The Children of Santa Cruz’s Beach Flats Neighborhood

  Sep 16, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  Curtis Cartier photographs the children of Beach Flats.

• Harbor High School Football Team Hit by Flu

  Sep 15, 2009, by Staff Community

  First theft, then flu: the football team at Harbor High School hasn’t had a good season this year.

• Welcome to New Bohemia

  Sep 14, 2009, by P. Joseph Potocki Community
  

  Take the Bay Area out of California. Give it statehood and a constitution. Move there. Be happy.

• Sneak Peek With Santa Cruz Geek

  Sep 12, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  I’’m a geek. Not the useful kind that can build a website or de-frag a hard drive, but the worthless kind that can quote passages from Lord of the Rings and kill a level 70 demon lord on World of Warcraft.  So when I showed up last Wednesday at the Santa Cruz New Tech MeetUp, a monthly gathering of tech-savvy entrepreneurs and IT specialists, it became quickly apparent that my geekdom was severely outgunned.

• Ten Questions For Rebecca King

  Sep 11, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  The local dairy sheep farmer dishes on her love of the Twilight series, cheese, and the farmers market.

• Watsonville Cracking Down on Speeding in School Zones

  Sep 05, 2009, by Staff Community

  The City of Watsonville is adding 38 new speed limit signs around school zones as part of a crackdown on speeding.

• Santa Cruz Drop-In Center to Close

  Sep 04, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  After ten years, Santa Cruz AIDS Project is forced to shutter its Front Street drop-in center.

• The King of Santa Cruz Skateboards Returns

  Sep 04, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  In a garage in a middle-class neighborhood at the edge of Santa Cruz, the improbable is happening. Decades after he created some of the most enduring images in the genre, the artist whose name is virtually synonymous with Santa Cruz Skateboards is once again drawing pop-eyed monsters, warhorses and nubile mermaids for skateboard decks so the youth of today can thrash in style. Jim Phillips is back. With slide show.

• Local Poets, Local Inspiration

  Sep 04, 2009, by Ellen Bass Community

  Santa Cruz poet Ellen Bass writes about a near miss in this monthly installment of locally inspired verse.

• Ten Questions for JP McDaniel

  Sep 02, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Right in the middle of tomato season, the dry-farming expert at Sea Level Farm in Corralitos takes time to answer our questions.

• A Supermarket in Santa Cruz

  Aug 29, 2009, by Stephen Kessler Community

  Across two streets from my old house on Younglove Ave., with only U Save Liquors in between, stood the sprawling monstrosity of the ancient Safeway, the Westside’s sole supermarket.

• Ten Questions for Al Frisby

  Aug 28, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  The Louisiana-born multi-instrumentalist and fixture of the Santa Cruz rock & roll community spills the beans on what makes him tick.

• Harbor High Football Team Suffers Pregame Loss

  Aug 27, 2009, by Staff Community

  The Harbor High football team got a bad start to the new season—even before their first game started.

• Parking Meters for Homeless

  Aug 21, 2009, by Danny Wool Community

  A new project proposed by the Imagine Positive Change Coalition calls for installing old parking meters along Pacific Avenue, so that people who want to help the homeless can drop their spare change in them. The money collected will be used to help pay the salaries of two municipal social workers to work with the homeless. 

• Ten Questions for Craig Calfee

  Aug 19, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Bike design innovator Craig Calfee talks about preconceptions, bamboo bicycles and Bamboosero, his plan for fighting poverty in Africa. “The charity model doesn’t work (except in disasters) and it will be good to see people realize that being a customer is a great help,” he says.

• Politics Rule in Shakespeare Santa Cruz’s ‘Julius Caesar’

  Aug 14, 2009, by Christina Waters Community
  

  An Elizabethan playwright shed light upon a political coup carried out 1500 years earlier and in a few deft strokes illuminated both the English language and the politics of the moment. The man was William Shakespeare, and the words fueled a high-stakes drama called Julius Caesar.

• Ten Questions for Sara Friedlander

  Aug 13, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Multimedia artist Sara Friedlander on Barack Obama, summer salads and how much she paid for her first apartment in Santa Cruz.

• Impressive Opening for Cabrillo Festival

  Aug 11, 2009, by Scott MacClelland Community
  

  For even brand new music, the traditional expectation for personal artistic expression holds. Whatever else is afoot, the composer is expected to have something to say. So says Marin Alsop, music director of the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, in defending her choices of orchestral music.

• The Few, The Proud, The Jazz Harmonicists

  Aug 10, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  In the harmonica world, musicians are represented by two separate but equally important groups: the blues players who dominate the limelight and the jazz players who settle for what they can get. This is the jazz players’ story.

• Ten Questions for Marin Alsop

  Aug 08, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  The decorated conductor of the Baltimore Symphony and longtime director of the Cabrillo Music Festival tells us what she likes about Santa Cruz—and what she doesn’t like, ever.

• Cabrillo Festival Hits The Street

  Aug 08, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  This weekend the Cabrillo Music Art & Wine Festival turns 18 years old—legal and ready to party with 14,000 of her best friends (by last year’s count).

• Capitola Mobile Home Park Set to Vacate

  Aug 07, 2009, by Kat Lynch Community
  

  A cool coastal breeze flows between the coaches lining the uneven asphalt of the Surf and Sand Mobile Home Park overlooking the Monterey Bay. A community made up largely of retirees, the Capitola park’s future is looking dim. While a few residents use the Surf and Sand as the location of a second home, the formerly over-55 park is the only home to many of its residents, and its closure will leave many homeless. (With slide show)

• The Cabrillo Music Festival Bursts into Santa Cruz

  Aug 06, 2009, by Scott MacClelland Community
  

  The Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music doesn’t just offer the best of today’s leading American composers, to say nothing of their genius counterparts from other countries. It also proves, summer after summer, that there is a great hunger for excellent new music and, just as important, one that spans many generations.

• Behind the Scenes at Santa Cruz’s Festival for New Music

  Aug 05, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  It’s early Sunday evening and musicians are trickling in to the Civic—musicians in flip flops, musicians in blue jeans, musicians in stylish haircuts. Slowly the orchestra comes awake in a chaos of indelicate morning noises: bleeps and sour yawns and fragments of melody abandoned before they’ve started make sense. Tuning up, the two harpists strain to hear the bell-like tones of their instruments, then fall to chatting.

• Ten Questions for Mike Ryan

  Aug 02, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Shakespeare Santa Cruz veteran Mike Ryan hates hulking vehicles in oncoming traffic, thinks he’d make a good spy and is reading Robinson Crusoe. But wait! There’s more.

• ‘Shipwrecked’: Shakespeare Santa Cruz’s Entertainment

  Aug 01, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  They say truth is often stranger than fiction. But in a tale told by master raconteur Louis de Rougemont, both fact and fantasy have their place. Explorer, seaman, survivalist and con artist, de Rougemont, as played by seasoned television and stage actor Dierk Torsek, spins his greatest yarn ever in Shakespeare Santa Cruz’s production of Shipwrecked! An Entertainment: The Amazing Adventures of Louis de Rougement (As Told By Himself).

• Happy Little Headbangers at UC-Santa Cruz Rock Camp

  Jul 31, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community

  In my day, “summer camp” meant bunk beds, nature walks, BB guns and calamine lotion. Obviously I didn’t grow up in Santa Cruz.

• Jamming at the Watsonville Berry Festivals

  Jul 30, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  It started out, simply enough, as a celebration of the crop that put Watsonville back on the map. The Monterey Bay Strawberry Festival had enjoyed 14 summers of peace and prosperity in various locations in and around town, where many of the men and women who pick the county’s top crop live and work, and where nationally renowned apple orchards had once reigned supreme.

• ‘Midtown’ Santa Cruz: Fact or Fiction?

  Jul 30, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  We’ve heard enough longtime locals sneer at the newish term “midtown”—most commonly used to describe the section of Soquel Avenue between Shoppers Corner and the Rio Theatre—to make us wonder where it came from and who uses it. Bill Tysseling, executive director of the Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce, doesn’t. But the guy who answered the phone at the Bagelry does. In fact, he says he’s been using the term for five or six years.

• Shakespeare Santa Cruz Glows in ‘Midsummer’

  Jul 30, 2009, by Christina Waters Community
  

  Rarely has such a tortured plot been so clearly articulated. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, one of Shakespeare’s most popular offerings, explores the elaborate mistaken-identity twists that Elizabethan audiences adored. Three mortal couples—Duke Theseus of Athens and his Amazon bride-to-be, plus two sets of love-struck (but not with each other) mortals—find themselves in a wooded dreamscape rife with fairy mischief. In bravura fashion, Shakespeare adds yet another layer of play-within-a-play complexity in a sextet of rough Athenian workmen rehearsing a play they intend to perform in honor of the Duke’s upcoming wedding. Meanwhile, Titania and Oberon, king and queen of the fairies, are quarrelling over custody of a pretty Indian baby.

• Ten Questions for Tim Jackson

  Jul 25, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Co-Founder of Kuumbwa Jazz Tim Jackson shares his favorite foods and what he’s reading.

• Santa Cruz Cougar Night Misunderstood

  Jul 23, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  I’ll level with you. I walked into the Single Professional Society’s first ever Santa Cruz Cougar Night at the Scotts Valley Hilton last week thinking it would be a convenient anecdotal doorway to my personal opinions on the term “cougar.” Those are, in a nutshell, that the term has been fallaciously embraced by single women over 40 as some kind of womanpower thingy. Allow me to remind everyone: the term is not flattering.

• Serpents and The Rainbow

  Jul 23, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  Underneath the front porch of a house in Santa Cruz—the kind of comfy family home that has very thick wall-to-wall carpeting—there is a secret room accessible by a crude path of boards laid over the steep dirt incline under the deck. “They’re out of the house, in here,” says Brad Loofbourrow as his 13-year-old son Tristan opens the door to the small, hot room. This is where Tristan keeps Ellen, Rachel, Shelby, Bruce, Sahra and H.P. “He names them all,” says Brad. “They’re his friends.”

• Championing the Little Dogs of Santa Cruz

  Jul 22, 2009, by Kelly Luker Community
  

  We’ve heard it all before: “Is that a dog or a rat?” “Hey, a punt dog!” Or the highly original “Why don’t you get a real dog?”

  As far as membership in that sector of society still safe to belittle, we who own smaller canine breeds rate right up there with rednecks and the obese. Stereotypes abound, both for us and our pint-sized pals. We’re airhead heiresses with a Shih Tzu parked in our Gucci bag or post-menopausal women who’ve restocked their empty nests with furry surrogates. (With slide show)

• Science of Sex Author at Capitola Book Cafe

  Jul 21, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  Author Mary Roach studies the people who study the nasty.

• Ten Questions for Becky Olvera Schultz

  Jul 18, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  Artist Becky Olvera Schultz on how she got to Santa Cruz, what bugs her and what she’d be doing if she had all the time in the world.

• Santa Cruz Fencers Practice Swordplay

  Jul 17, 2009, by Kat Lynch Community
  

  The clash of steel and the patter and squeak of athletic shoes fill the Waldorf High School gym. People wearing white and full of energy dance forward and backward, trying to catch their opponents off guard or waiting for the most opportune moment to attack. A beeping sound accompanied by a red or green light on the scoring machine resting on a chair identifies the winner of the point, or touché. (With slide show)

• Ten Questions for Larry Blood

  Jul 11, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  The host of KUSP’s “Out Front, Outback” gives us the scoop on how a jazz lover makes it in this town.

• Tandy and Bobby Reunited

  Jul 06, 2009, by Staff report Community
  

  In a celebration of world vocal music, Tandy Beal and Bobby McFerrin have reunited in Switzerland for the Festival Stimmen. Based loosely on the story of Babel, their new show Bobble will premiere in an ancient Roman amphitheater along the Rhine River in Basel.

• Ten Questions for Mas Hashimoto

  Jul 03, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  Former Watsonville high school history teacher Mas Hashimoto explains why the simple things make him happy.

• Santa Cruz Man’s Goatee Judged Greatest On Earth

  Jul 01, 2009, by Curtis Cartier and Jessica Fromm Community
  

  For as long as he’s been an adult, Paul Beisser has had a beard. Be it a full and bushy face mane, a chiseled Fu-Manchu or a long and proud Van Dyke, the 58-year-old Santa Cruz postal worker’s chin skin has rarely seen the light of day. It wasn’t until May 23, at the World Beard and Moustache Championships in Anchorage, however, that the world finally recognized the whisker whiz for all his worth and awarded him the coveted trophy for World’s Best Natural Goatee. 

• Sound Museum Searches for New Home

  Jun 30, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  In an unremarkable office trailer tucked in a corner of the sprawling California Grey Bears thrift complex on Chanticleer Avenue in Santa Cruz is one man’s ode to the stereo. No more than a modest collection of dusted off old speakers, televisions, radios and record players stacked on flimsy shelves amongst a scattering of musical and political posters, the room is the pride of Grey Bears employee and local activist Franklin Williams. But one person’s “sound museum” is another’s “inappropriate use of space,” and come July 16, these old relics will need to find a new home.

• Olallieland Ride

  Jun 27, 2009, by Kat Lynch Community
  

  Berry picking without poison ivy? Definitely a first for me. Driving down the dusty, winding roads past fields of berries to Watsonville’s Gizdich Ranch, my mouth waters and my fingers twitch—whether in anticipation of picking or memories of scratching, I’m not sure. Once there, I eavesdrop for instructions. “Pick the darkest and the shiniest ones you see,” a grandmother tells her squealing grandson. For my first olallieberry-picking excursion, I listen, excluding the light saber sound effects.

• Place And Time: Photographs by Pete Saporito

  Jun 26, 2009, by Kat Lynch Community
  

  A long gravel driveway shaded by overhanging trees recalls the long, humid summers of Savannah, where the photograph was taken. In an aged-looking, high-contrast photo, dried roses wilt in their vase, as if exhausted. Nearby, a heavily made-up San Francisco woman leaps out at the viewer from a hazy, glossy closeup.

• Ten Questions for Miranda Janeschild

  Jun 23, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  Mir and A Company founder Miranda Janeschild on miracles, her work and accidentally forgetting her coffee cup.

• Santa Cruz Hardbodies Go Bicep-a-Bicep

  Jun 22, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  “Guys,” calls out Kelvin Fountano, president of the World Body & Fitness Association. “Make sure when you go onstage your wear your number on your left side.” Left side, on the left. The words ripple through the dimly lit Rio Theatre auditorium as family members and trainers fuss over bodybuilders of all sizes at Saturday’s Santa Cruz Bodybuilding and Figure Championships in Seabright. “This isn’t one of our biggest events,” says Fountano. “But it’s one of our funnest.

• Ten Questions for Noah Meites

  Jun 20, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  The winner of the prestigious BMI Student Composer Award answers our nosy questions about what he likes, what he doesn’t like and how he got here.

• Owlets on The Wing in Downtown Santa Cruz

  Jun 19, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  It’s late dusk, about an hour after sundown. That’s when the first hissing screeches begin to sound in the treetops.

  “There they are!” exclaims a binocular-wielding Rebecca Dmytryk, founder of the emergency wildlife care organization WildRescue. “You can hear the juveniles. The whole family will be hunting overhead soon.”

• Pet Day Care Center Caters to Santa Cruz’s Fluffiest

  Jun 17, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  Dealing with 70 dogs and cats every day can be a challenge. Dealing with 70 dog and cat owners every day can be downright maddening.

• Undaunted, Man Tries for Second Photo Shoot Record

  Jun 15, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  Virgil E. Robinson, a sporty, boyish-looking 42-year-old in a matching “Possibility Advocate” cap and long sleeve T-shirt, sits across from Hannah*, a recent divorcee who has been slowly losing control of her mortgage.

• Ten Questions for Sandy Faber

  Jun 13, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  UCSC astrophysicist Sandy Faber on unprepared graduate students, her current reading material and what makes her a typical Capricorn.

• David Sedaris Tells All, Or At Least Some

  Jun 11, 2009, by Molly Zapp Community
  

  The king of deadpan humor dishes with Santa Cruz Weekly’s Molly Zapp about homophobia, unemployment and finally getting online.

• At Last, A Venue for Canine Film Fans

  Jun 10, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community

  In honor of Doggie Drive-In’s film selection of the month, Beverly Hills Chihuahua, the Crepe Place was offering $3 well margaritas to the small gathering of Woofers & Walkers members assembled on the patio.

• Santa Cruz is Country’s No. 1 Surf Spot. Duh.

  Jun 10, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  How do local surfers feel about Surfer Magazine naming Santa Cruz the number one surf spot in the country?

• Ten Questions for J. Nichols

  Jun 06, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  Marine conservation activist J. Nichols explains how he got to Santa Cruz and why he’s excited about 2010.

• Fear and Loathing at the Santa Cruz Libraries Book Sale

  Jun 03, 2009, by Jaime Nabrynski Community
  

  The rules on the flier for the “Friends of the Santa Cruz Public Libraries HUGE Civic Book Sale” on May 30 sounded simple.

• Ten Questions for Amber Coverdale Sumrall

  May 27, 2009, by Staff Community
  

  The Santa Cruz poet answers our burning questions about what she’s reading, what she’s learned and what she’s currently snacking on.

• Civil War Reenactment Rattles Felton

  May 26, 2009, by Jaime Nabrynski Community
  

  This year’s Memorial Day wasn’t quite the usual scorcher, but the line for $3 bottles of water at the Civil War reenactments at Roaring Camp in Felton was nonetheless a 30-minute ordeal.

• Local Teens Talk About Porn

  May 21, 2009, by Jessica Lussenhop Community
  

  It is easier than ever to watch, create and share pornographic images and text, and as the first generation of web-savvy teenagers who have always had the instant gratification of DSL, who get cell phones as soon as they’re old enough to talk and who’ve never used air quotes with the word “blog,” their knowledge can easily be applied to creating their own porno paradise. Which leads to the question, can this be bad for them?

• Bike Week Race

  May 19, 2009, by Traci Hukill Community
  

  A commuter race leaves one contestant in the slow lane.

• A March Toward Machinery

  May 14, 2009, by Curtis Cartier Community
  

  With several lecturers and professors already holding pink slips, it seems all but certain that UCSC will follow through with its rumored plans to phase out its Community Studies program. Retired professor and Santa Cruz resident Paul Lee knows what it’s like to be deemed expendable.