Since Eastern Mennonite’s WEMC signal on 91.7 FM cannot be heard in Charlottesville, there are now fewer opportunities for Classical music radio listening in the Charlottesville area. [“What’s the frequency, Martha?” 7 Days, January 14, 2007] WVTF would like to let folks know that even though WMRA has abandoned the classical music genre in Charlottesville during prime listening hours, we (WVTF) are still committed to serving that audience.
WVTF Public Radio (88.5 FM and 89.3 FM) continues to offer classical music for the greater Charlottesville-Albemarle County community:
Weekdays, 9am-4pm, and Saturday afternoons, 1-5pm.
Our complete schedule is listed on our website: wvtf.org.
Also, our other service, RADIO IQ (89.7 FM and 91.5 FM), continues to offer the best in public radio news and talk programs.
Glenn Gleixner
General Manager
WVTF and RADIO IQ
Charlottesville’s NPR-BBC stations
Cry for helpful
J. Tobias Beard: Your January 22 article “A crushing development?” [The Working Pour] sounded more like sour grapes. Wine not.
I enjoyed your first article and appreciated your desire to get away from the many strange ways we have learned to describe wine. (I was probably one of the many who taught that, especially in the early days—945 years ago—of my career.)
I think Will Richey’s comments have overblown what objections were actually made about the Wine Guild. Oh, sure, I can bet that a Downtown retailer would complain, but I believe the bigger issue was: 1) How was a Gourmet License issued? 2) Wholesalers’ price lists are proprietary and indeed if you choose to show them to a customer or make public, they do have recourse.
On the issue of license: Wine guilds or clubs number in the thousands and have been around since the mid-1600s.
And indeed they started when a group of vineyard owners (I think in the Champagne District) got together monthly to enjoy fine food and drink. Almost every wine club in existence is sponsored by a real brick and mortar retailer, open six or seven days a week with inventory, staff and investment. The Guild was not that.
Also under Virginia law, you can walk into Sam’s Club or Costco and say you want to purchase alcohol or cigarettes and they may give you a hard time at the door, but they must allow you to purchase. So if I wanted to come to your function and not be a member, you must sell to me.
For distributors, they may not be able to refuse to sell to you (unless you have bounced a check), but they can refuse to give you a price list if you show it to the public. They may also have a civil case against the guild for breach of contract.
I cannot comment on intention to hurt but it seems there was an intent to circumvent the process of doing business and trying some shortcuts. Richey says he was “unprepared for negative reaction.” I think the group was unprepared, period.
I also would not be surprised if there was a little less than honest pricing to the members. Meaning front-line pricing be used to establish discounts, instead of actual cost. If this is true, that is also a dangerous position because this truly is a small industry and believe it or not everybody knows everybody’s business.
My suggestion to you is get back to go, stick to writing about wines or wine things. Be helpful to the consumer!
Stan Rose
Albemarle County
Get out the dictionary
Please let Josh Levy know that we still have troops in South Korea, and that North Korea is still a serious threat [“Man of the Decade,” Opinionated, January 29, 2007]. It’s been more than half-a-century, and we’re still there. So why does he think we can now break out the champagne and celebrate the great triumph in Iraq? Perhaps Josh’s grandchildren can be the ones to celebrate the victory. Also, perhaps unintentionally, Levy cited the Iraq War as an “enormity.” Some would agree, since the word means “excessive wickedness or outrageousness.” Again, get back to us in 50 years and let us know.
Carl Briggs
Charlottesville
Rave on
I’m writing to “rant” against The Rant published every Tuesday by the C-VILLE Weekly. Although I am an exponent of free speech, I believe bitching just for the sake of bitching is demoralizing and just sets people up to be negative. That being said, I am not advocating the “deletion” of The Rant, but only balancing it by publishing a “Rave” and allowing the reader to decide what to read. The Rant promotes people to look for things to rant on and therefore call in, which can’t be healthy to start your day. The newspapers in our culture are already too negative to read (a news reporter once told me that papers don’t write about airplanes that landed) and that will never change, but why can’t we as a people notice the news that refreshes our faith in living in a kind world? The Rant goes against any attempt to share the many acts of kindness that occur every day in our own little town. I’m totally confused as to why it is so difficult to be benevolent to each other, but being kind to others takes courage, strength and fortitude to reach out to one another, even if it has to be one person at a time but is considered and deserves to be mentioned. I believe in the human spirit and have faith in people that this can happen and it can start right here in Charlottesville. I would rather leave a lasting impression of hope on people who visit Charlottesville and not soak them with what’s so bad about our town. Sure, there are terrible things that happen in Charlottesville, and every other town for that matter, but why focus on it? Bitching about it doesn’t do anything to solve it and for me, just puts me in a bad mood. Yes, people can be rude, inconsiderate, and just plain mean but they can also be kind, fun and thoughtful. Send in the times you see someone says “good morning” to you when you’re having a bad day or maybe a charitable act that you saw on the Downtown Mall or on campus. The one-sided Rant section of the C-VILLE Weekly is the only objection I have to such a fine paper. The paper is provocative, interesting to read, and stimulates people to think. By adding a Rant without a Rave section at the end just kills the credibility of all the authors, editors, and subjects them to the level of a bad Jerry Springer show. Again, let people see the brighter side of society.
Let us start a revolution. Let’s start a revolution that combats the negativity of The Rant. Acknowledge the kind deeds done by our fellow man and woman by sending them to the C-VILLE Weekly. Now that is something worth reading every Tuesday.
Dan Bayliss, MS
UVA Graduate Nursing Student