The Green Thorn Apple
Name of Kama Sutra Position: The Green Thorn Apple Getting into the position: Crush milky chunks of cactus with sulfur and realgar. Dry this mixture seven times until it can be easily turned into powder. Add in a monkey turd and sprinkle mixture over your lovers head. On a scale of 1 to 10 how…
Cheap Thrills
SALSA NIGHTS Be Shakira for a night and prove that your “Hips Don’t Lie” at the free Latin-style dance lessons offered at the Loft, 1526 Elizabeth Ave. Learn salsa, merengue, bachata and more. Touting “celebrity instructors,” this joint gets hips swiveling every Wednesday night at 8 p.m. Hit www.hispanos-usa.com or call 704-333-5898. TANGO & TAPAS…
The King James version
Here in Dixie, there was never any doubt that the late Godfather of Soul/Hardest Working Man in Show Business/Mr. Dynamite James Brown was “the Alpha and the Omega of the African in African American” — per friend/Ion ikon Greg Tate at Manhattan’s Tonic club, after his big band Burnt Sugar deconstructed the JB Thang with…
Jazz-Funkers Audioform
It’s a busy Saturday at Manifest Records and the joint is jumping — and not just because you scored a $25 copy of Scratch Perry’s Arkology boxset in the used bin. No, the sizzling atmospherics come courtesy of Charlotte’s jazz-funk septet Audioform, who is performing free in-store, pushing its debut full-length, Compositions. Hours later the…
Papa’s got a brand new choir
James Brown came to my neighborhood once. I was about 11 years old, born and raised in the good ol’ city of Augusta, Ga. One of my friends from down the street ran to my house, where I was playing in the yard. “I just saw James Brown!” he exclaimed, out of breath from the…
Ashrei-ly Ever After
It is common knowledge that most Jewish parents want their children to marry Jewish partners. Goyim (non-Jewish people, for you Gentiles) in the family are rarely welcomed with warm hugs and shouts of “Mazel tov!” That said, how does the modern, young, and single Jewish woman go about meeting a mensch (nice gentleman) in a…
Word of the Week
Raillery: n. Good-natured teasing: banter. Example? Raillery is always fun between two friends; it loses its appeal when it’s between a person and a train.
See & Do List
Wednesday, January 17 Oregon-bred trumpet impresario/composer Chris Botti doesn’t leave a lot to be desired. What with his good looks and smooth jazz, he could easily have his pick of any woman on the planet. Instead, this devoted musician prefers to press his lips to a 1926 3 Bach mouthpiece and spend his nights careessing…
Not your Mother’s Milk
It’s kinda hard to believe, but the Red Hot Chili Peppers has been making music for over 20 years now. Honestly, it seems like just yesterday when the members were standing there naked on the cover of Rolling Stone and the only thing hiding their, uh, manhood was their carefully placed hands. Don’t expect any…
How might a troop-level increase in Iraq affect U.S. military operations elsewhere?
With President Bush calling for a troop-level “surge” in Iraq and Iraq’s insurgents no doubt stocking up on surge protectors, politicians and talking heads are busy debating the effect a troop buildup might have on the outcome of the war. Will the escalation be an unmitigated disaster, they wonder? Or will it merely be a…
Stimulation
Hot Linx
Radio on the TV
“The revolution will not go better with Coke.” — Gil Scott-Heron Maybe not … but it will be televised — Mario Lopez and Vanessa Minnillo will probably co-host, and you might have to wash it down with a trans-fat free, no-foam, decaf, chai iced latte. We’ve clearly reached the point when any mundane phenomenon in…
Weapons, Windfalls and Warming
Breaking the Sound Barrier
Letters to the editor
Auspicious Authoring I just finished reading your article “The Black Atlantic” (Dec. 27) and felt compelled to write. I hesitated somewhat as I can see that you are still grieving the passing of your mother; however, I felt if I did not do this now I would never get it done. I had meant to…
The Blotter
THESE CLOTHES AREN’T NATURAL FIBERS: A SouthPark department store employee on a recent Monday found a threatening note in the Ralph Lauren section at lunchtime. No arrest was made. EVEN THE STRONG, ASTHMATIC GET ROBBED: When a thief broke into a rental car on Little Rock Road, he didn’t just get the standard stereo/cell phone…
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser: I have a question about contemporary etiquette. I was invited to a holiday party and decided to attend, RSVPing by phone hours beforehand. At the party, someone stole the selection of imported beer I brought. No one would tell me what brand of radiator fluid was used to sweeten the two sick…
A city and an icon
Boomer With Attitude
Not So Sweet Revenge
Books
Sokha Khen’s Top Five
Culture Surfing
New York, New York: Part 2
With Christmas and New Year’s Eve both embraced in the final week of 2006 — an embrace warmed by El Niño — Broadway producers jubilantly rang in 2007 with the highest grossing week in history, raking in $29.1 million at the box office. Attendance for the week ending Dec. 31 also set a new mark…
Tequila Lary
Moodswing
The Digital Mafia
Ever wonder who’s responsible for e-mailing you all that stuff – the Viagra ads, penis enlargement proposals, job offers, pelvic pain remedies and chatty, half-deranged rants? Sometimes these e-mails don’t even contain any words, just Asian-looking symbols. Most are obviously, transparently spam, but occasionally you get tricked by an e-mail that looks real, appears to…
Academic genocide
Citizen Servatius
What kills us
What kills people in Mecklenburg County? The following list was compiled by the Mecklenburg County Health Department, which tracks the top 10 things that kill us and how that stacks up to the rest of the nation. Cancer — Meck: 1, N.C.: 2, USA: 2 Heart Disease — Meck: 2, N.C.: 1, USA: 1 Stroke:…
Film Clips
Current Releases CHARLOTTE’S WEB Charlotte’s Web is the new live-action treatment of E.B. White’s beloved children’s book, but there’s already been a dazzling screen version of this tale. No, I don’t mean the 1973 Hanna-Barbera animated take; instead, I refer to the 1995 feature Babe. OK, so it wasn’t based on White’s book, but with…
Home green home
News
The sweet spot
Corkscrew
David Gonzalez
Profile
Jan. 17 — Jan. 23, 2007
Aquarius The Waterbearer: (Jan. 20 — Feb 18) This is a very busy period in your life. You probably have travel or education in your path. An issue of helping becomes emphasized. Your empathy extends once again to those needing your care. This month is the time to focus on how you want to direct…
Foreign Affairs: Oscar hopefuls circle the globe
Let’s make this clear from the start: Pan’s Labyrinth (***1/2 out of four) is not one for the kiddies. Even with that inviting title, even with fairy tale trappings full of faunas and faux-Tinkerbells, even with memories of the family-friendly Jim Henson-David Bowie concoction Labyrinth, Mexican writer-director Guillermo del Toro’s R-rated adventure is packed with…
Tropical winter
Kitchen Witch
Smooth sailing
Besides sports teams, Prince, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show, few of us can name anything originating from Minneapolis, Minn. Shoppers may know Target is headquartered there and long-term Charlotteans may remember that those hamster tunnels, um, pedestrian skyways, once so popular downtown (unfortunately a few still remain) were modeled on those used in Minneapolis.…
