Wine List
Wine Classes The interactive classes will explore the essentials of wine and food pairing, tasting techniques and trends in winemaking. Wed., 7pm. $25. Maggiano’s Little Italy, 4400 Sharon Rd. 704-916-2300. Wine Classes for Women A series of classes with three classes per series. Mon & Tues evenings. Salute Wine & Provisions, 2912 Selwyn Ave. 704-343-9095.
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser: I was lying on the beach and then suddenly found myself doing mouth-to-mouth CPR on a drowning victim, who thanked me by vomiting in my mouth. She came out of her coma in three days and was fine. After that episode 15 years ago, I became a paramedic. I was never told…
When Doody Calls
Equipped with the tools of his trade – a little rake and pan – ScooperDude walks in a methodical grid through the yard of one of those Ballantyne McMansions as though he’s mapping out an excavation site. “After a while you learn where the dog poops,” he says sagely. “They’re really creatures of habit. And…
Good Eats
All Around Town Anntony’s Caribbean, 6434-F West Sugarcreek Rd., 704-598-6863; 2001 E. 7th St., 704-342-0749. A hint of the tropics; rotisserie chicken with Jamaican jerk sauce, ribs, Paradise Island fish special, curries, and Caribbean styled greens. $$ Azteca, 116 Woodlawn Rd., 704-525-5110; 9709 Independence Blvd., 704-814-9877; 1863 W. Franklin Blvd. (Gastonia), 704-866-7574. A favorite of…
Letters
Art Facts I am writing to correct the inaccuracies reported by Tara Servatius in her recent article “McCrory Wields Art Axe” (June 22). Ms. Servatius suggests that there was a backroom deal between CATS chief Ron Tober and Mayor McCrory to eliminate specific works of public art not to the Mayor’s liking along the South…
Digging A Hole
Lary says I’m lucky my body isn’t buried in a hole in his basement right now. If he’d hesitated at all before shooting at me that one time, he might have aimed better and actually hit me. And I’d be dead right now “in a big way,” he says. But because he didn’t hesitate, at…
God Shed His Grace
Monday is Independence Day, the day lazy radio jocks and dogmatic nationalists get all warm and fuzzy, break out the old Lee Greenwood/”God Bless the U.S.A.” and Charlie Daniels/”This Ain’t No Rag, it’s a Flag” records, and feel real damn proud to be an American. I’m proud to be an American, too. Proud of America’s…
The Blotter
Cold-Cock Lampin’: A volatile young woman lashed out at two other ladies, smashing a brass lamp over the head of one, pushing and threatened to kill the other. During the melee, a glass table was broken. The police report does not indicate what sparked the nasty catfight. Bedtime for Bozo: A woman was awakened in…
Through The Past, Darkly
Punk rock’s spawned a hodgepodge of mishmashed progeny over the past decade. Lately, a gothic strain has seized the moment, with black-clad, mascara-wearing acts such as My Chemical Romance and AFI popping up everywhere, mixing a maudlin, moribund edge with their emo-core thrash. Of course, this is hardly revolutionary. Punk’s embrace of the dark side…
See & Do
June 29 – Wednesday The Charlotte Knights take on the Pawtucket Red Sox — the AAA affiliate of the defending World Champion Boston Red Sox — today through Friday at Fort Mill’s Knights Castle at 7:15pm. At press time, the expatriate “Charlotte” Knights were 17.5 games out of first place in the South Division of…
Sit & Spin
Stephen Malkmus Face the Truth Matador Records Stephen Malkmus’ third and strongest post-Pavement record suggests the indie icon is the kind of adult that Holden Caufield would have grown up to be had J.D. Salinger penned The Catcher in the Rye II — still too smart for his own good, more sickened than ever by…
Stargazer
Cancer The Crab (June 21 July 21) Good news concerning home, hearth, family and travel begins the week with pleasure. You will be feeling particularly well. Encouragement comes from multiple sectors. You are bringing a 3-year cycle toward a positive closure. Harvest time has come. For All Signs An elemental imbalance of planets continues…
Music Menu
WEDNESDAY 6.29 Stacey Earle & Mark Stuart – The betrothed pair is touring behind Stacey’s shiny new disc, S&M Community Bread, the title and cover of which may elicit a chuckle or smirk until you hear the contents, which paint a much darker picture. Earle sounds as graceful as ever, despite the often heavy content,…
Putting The Sell In Cellulite
It all begins in the heat of a lingerie sale at Bloomingdale’s. An Iowa housewife, an African-American business exec, a kook who got lost in the 60s and a soap opera diva who won’t admit she’s over 40 converge at the undergarments, waging war over a bra. Before you know it, they’ve made peace and…
Soundboard
Wednesday, Jun. 29 Big Al’s Pub, Mooresville Scott Johnson Breakfast Club Dub Access Reggae Double Door Inn Wide Load McKenna w/ Crosstown Traffic The Evening Muse Stacey Earle & Mark Stuart w/ Clare Burson & Peter Adams Excelsior Club IIZM w/ Sweet DreamsGarden Cafe Open Mic w/ Ansel CouchThe Gin Mill Wizard’s Road ShowHearst Tower…
Who’s Our Daddy?
1776 by David McCullough (Simon & Schuster, 386 pages, $32) Who’s your Daddy, America? It’s the George Washington you know: regal, determined and heroic. And the one you don’t: crestfallen during the early years of the Revolution, sensitive to his lack of formal education and vainglorious in winning command of the Continental Army. David McCullough…
Cinema Nation
There’s a scene in the 1960 version of The Alamo in which John Wayne, playing frontiersman Davy Crockett, delivers an inspirational speech, more to the moviegoing public than to anyone on screen. “Republic,” he drawls. “I like the sound of the word. It means people can live free, talk free, go or come, buy or…
CL Recommends
We Are Not Afraid by Seth Cagin and Philip Dray (Scribner). A riveting, thoroughly researched account of the infamous 1964 murder of three civil rights workers in Mississippi and its aftermath, this book reads like a great crime novel. Hopefully, the recent trial of Edgar Ray Killen will lead to it being more widely available…
Film Clips
New Releases BEWITCHED As far as ill-advised Nicole Kidman vehicles that plunder past artifacts of pop culture are concerned, the nicest thing one can say about Bewitched is that it’s an improvement over The Stepford Wives. That’s primarily because of Kidman herself, who manages to harness her maddeningly inconsistent role with such success that the…
Arts Agenda
Classical Music Celebrate America! Charlotte Symphony Orchestra’s traditional, patriotic concert. Symphony Park. www.charlottesymphony.org. Sat., July 2, 7 p.m. Free. SouthPark Shopping Center, 4400 Sharon Road. 704-972-2000. Comedy Charlotte Comedy Theater Live Improvised Comedy. Interactive, improvisational comedy similar to Whose Line Is It Anyway. Rated R. www.charlottecomedy.com. Fri & Sat, 8 & 10pm. $10. 1111 -…
Racial Healing In Mississippi
“So they began to work them over, the three, But most the dark one, Bones smashed like sugarcane In a molasses of blood, Reduced them, young man by young man, To a sobbing retching mass, partly conscious, Till the three hearts shuddered and stopped To the five bullets they shared, unevenly.” — Elizabeth Sewell, “This…
Big Fish
After reminding the hostess with the deer-in-the-headlights gaze that my reservation time was 15 minutes ago, she once again looked at the schedule, and then looked up and asked me for my name for the third time within those 15 minutes. “Even I know your name by now,” the woman waiting beside me whispered. A…
The Fast Money Trap
“Get up to $500 before payday.” “Cash NOW.” “No credit check required.” You can’t help but notice the signs as you drive down Charlotte’s most depressed commercial drags. For some cash-strapped people, relief from having the lights shut off or the car repossessed is found in those signs.These payday loan services, which sprang up about…
At Your Service
Charlotte’s restaurant scene is booming. The local campus of Johnson & Wales University will soon be turning out highly trained chefs, and CPCC and the Art Institute of Charlotte also have excellent culinary programs. But the most delectable food can be ruined by delinquent service. In this fast food age, the person waiting on your…
Breaking News
Southern Baptists End Eight-Year Boycott of Walt Disney for “Violating Moral Righteousness and Traditional Family Values.” Just in time, too: the company that released Finding Nemo, The Incredibles and Pirates of the Caribbean during that span seemed to be hurting bad. Winn-Dixie Closing All Its Stores in the Carolinas Where’s the Beef People? NC Islamic…
Grilling And Chilling
Cookbooks dedicated to the art of grilling are muscling out traditional cookbooks for shelf space at the bookstores. Need help for your Fourth of July celebration? Grill guru Steven Raichlen gives this advice: “Keep it hot. Keep it clean. Keep it lubricated.” To date, he has a series of books about the art of grilling…
In Praise of Weirdos
I come today in praise of creative weirdos, oddballs and eccentrics. In honor of Independence Day and American ideals of freedom, let’s toast the courageous misfits, dreamers and visionaries who have helped make this one of the most interesting nations of all time. It’s especially important to honor our all-American eccentrics during these unnerving times…
Family Ties
GRAND OPENING: June 2, 2005. OWNER: Jai Clemmons, with her son RC Clemmons as General Manager. The name “Jaimama” derived from the family-like atmosphere among the staff, as well as the atmosphere they hope to create in the neighborhood. Many of the members of the staff put their own blood, sweat and tears into the…
It’s The Technology, Stupid
Longterm, Iran’s mullahs are pretty much screwed, and I suspect they know it. Contrary to popular world opinion, their biggest problem isn’t the budding democracy next door in Iraq or the possibility of sanctions leveled at them as punishment for their nuclear ambitions. It’s the roughly two million satellite dishes they can’t account for. So…
Anything But The Pits
Cherries are here. Put on your sneakers and run to the market. Then run like a dog in heat because these sultry summer mamas lose their sheen almost by the time you get them home. Phew. Now you’ve got a cartoon moment to decide what to do with them — eat them out of a…
Freedom Fires
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 22 The US House of Representatives approved a Constitutional amendment outlawing the desecration of the US flag. No word yet on whether “desecration” would include leaving a flag out in all kinds of weather, flying a torn flag, trivializing it by using it in advertising or by owning flag-designed coozies, thongs, flip-flops, pajamas,…
A Grill’s Best Friend
My granddaddy “Snake” birthed my family’s barbecue recipe. Affectionate nickname aside – his real name was Homer, so which would you choose? – the man could cook. Snake lived outside Augusta, Georgia, where “barbecue” meant oven-roasted pork basted with a puckery sauce of piquant black pepper and sharp white vinegar. (In those parts, people consider…
News of the Weird
LEAD STORY: Gerardo Flores, 19, was convicted of murder in June in Lufkin, Texas, in the death of the 5-month-old fetus of his girlfriend, Erica Basoria. Flores admitted that he stood on Basoria’s stomach several times at her request to induce a miscarriage, but Basoria had told authorities that she had also punched herself in…
