Month: December 2008

Freedom of Information silent protest at McGuffey Art Center

In response to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, artists across the nation are uniting in a day of protest. The “Freedom of Information 2008” initiative is a 24-hour symbolic vigil and protest that represents refugees and their struggle to survive. Artists from 32 states are blindfolded and ear-plugged for 24 hours while moving and dancing nonstop.

Local dancer and artist Zap McConnell is representing Virginia. In studio 11 of the McGuffey Art Center, dressed in black, McConnell has been dancing since midnight last night and will continue to do so until the stroke of midnight tonight. Her movement is only interrupted when she decides to write her thoughts on a scroll of paper placed in the middle of the room.

You can watch her silent protest here.

Something to celebrate: no-trash partying

The C-VILLE cover story this week highlights the mess that’s left behind after certain big local parties. Appropriate, given that tonight is another occasion on which corks will pop.

First Night Virginia. That’s non-alkie champagne, thank you.

And this morning as I was driving to work, I heard some talk on NPR about the celebration in Times Square. More than a ton of confetti will flutter down on revelers, along with thousands of balloons. The second photo on this site gives you some idea, as do Aaron Farrington’s photos for C-VILLE, of what that’ll look like when the crowds disperse. 

Well, long may happiness reign. By the end of the holiday season, I find myself a bit immune to waste, even though the rest of the year my skin will crawl at the sight of a needlessly bagged purchase or an unwanted catalog in the mail. Sometimes, like when I was handed three different plastic plates by a well-intentioned hostess over the course of a recent Christmas party, you just can’t fight the tide.

However, January would be an excellent time to think ahead about our 2009 celebrations—personal, local, national—and how we could plan them so they’re just as much fun, but leave zero mess behind. Plastic cups aren’t fun. Styrofoam coolers aren’t fun. It’s people, food, and good spirits that are fun. What would Foxfield, or the Dogwood Festival, or any UVA home game be like without the garbage? I dare us all to find out. (As I wrote in November, the Live Arts Gala—one of Farrington’s subjects—actually was a great step in this direction.)

If you’re reading this after New Year’s Eve and you were at First Night, or any other party, let us know how green it was. And, dear readers, Happy New Year.

Categories
Living

Mind games

Trivia is a highly valued commodity in our culture. Just think of all the pastimes that revolve around it: “Jeopardy,” trivia nights at bars, Trivial Pursuit, um…yeah. Regardless, I firmly believe that we prize random facts if for no other reason than to satisfy the basic desire within us to impress the people we want to impress with the unexpected party trick that we know. For example, who Mary Queen of Scots was sleeping with in 1565 (Lord Darnley). Further evidence of this cultural pastime is the proliferation of quiz sites on the Interwebs.

The very best of which is perhaps Sporcle, a site that hosts (and posts) what it calls “mentally stimulating diversions.” Sporcle has got some nerd stuff, some pop culture stuff, some history stuff, some basic knowledge stuff. It’s a site that can quiz you on whether you are average, below average, or above average, when it comes to the facts your brain contains. Of course, the possible number of facts for your brain to contain is infinite, so Sporcle posts new quizzes every day, just to keep you on your toes. For example, in the more esoteric department, you can quiz yourself on people who have won the Grammy for Best New Artist, on Famous Fivesomes, on the States of Germany, Famous Sidekicks, or French Open Tennis Champs. In the basic knowledge department, you can quiz yourself on state capitals, countries of the world, the Periodic Table, and “The Simpsons.”

Never fear, however, if you are stupider according to Sporcle than you think you are (as I have found that I am): You can always practice. If you get stuck, Sporcle will give you the answers and you can take the test again another day. Then, before you know it, you will be the proud knower of all the Cereal Mascots you could ever want to know.

 

 

Categories
Arts

Ain’t too proud to beg

So here you are, actually reading a review of Marley & Me. Don’t feel guilty, OK? It’s perfectly natural to want to know what happens when John Grogan’s bestseller about building a family around an obedience-proof Labrador retriever, a.k.a. “the world’s worst dog,” becomes a movie starring Jennifer Aniston and Owen Wilson.

Maybe you tried to build a family once, or train a dog or write a bestseller. And you figure you might relate. Or maybe you’re just feeling worn out by the seasonal ambush of

Aww, blondes really do have more fun! Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston try to retrieve their Labrador in Marley & Me.

earnestly striving Oscar bait, and now you’re in the mood for a movie to turn off your mind and cuddle up with. A movie that tugs so friskily, unwittingly hard on the heartstrings, you’ll practically have to yell “Drop it!” to keep from spraining something. A movie so constitutionally sunny that its main characters don’t even have to be human, as long as they’re all cute and blond.

Well, it’s true that Marley & Me isn’t especially complicated. Here, all chewing of scenery is literal, and everyone (except the chewer, who’s obviously delighted) agrees on how annoying it is. Wilson’s Grogan is the sort of easygoing everydude who gets a dog in order to hit the snooze button on his wife’s biological clock, names the little fella after a reggae superstar, and gradually comes to discover that his own adulthood has been happening to him anyway. Generally, it goes about like so: Wow, this whole marriage and career and parenting thing is hard. I don’t know if I can—hey, Marley! Stop that! Marley!

Which is to say that the movie offers a lot less actual drama and comedy than episodic observation and chronology. But how much did you really care about that? Your only real concern was about whether Marley & Me might somehow actually be more appetizing than a dog’s breakfast.

Rest assured. Yes, there’s cuteness aplenty, but also tender, unpretentious performances from Aniston, Alan Arkin as Grogan’s friendly editor-boss, and particularly Wilson, whose sweetly melancholic receptiveness honors the person-pet bond and disarms potential bathos. In fact, upon closer inspection, you might even notice a surprising lack of sentimental credentials among the creative team that brought this film to fruition.

Improbably, Marley & Me was adapted by Don Roos, the writer and director of such edgy indie fare as Happy Endings and The Opposite of Sex; and Scott Frank, who cut his teeth adapting fiction by Elmore Leonard and Philip K. Dick, and made his own directorial debut with The Lookout, a character-driven caper thriller. The director here, David Frankel, most recently made The Devil Wears Prada, which at least allowed the eventual dog-centric filmmaker a close observation of bitches.

In the end, Marley & Me is about as profoundly substantive as you should expect a movie made from a book made from a collection of regional daily newspaper columns to be. But that probably won’t stop you from getting weepy about it when the time comes. And you know the time will come, for every best friend must one day leave that friendship behind, and go drink out of the big toilet in the sky. Yes, you know.

 

 

Categories
Arts

New year, new shows

New Year’s Eve TV
Wednesday, multiple channels

My fellow shut-ins and social pariahs: Let’s all vow to close out 2008 the way we spent most of it, with our asses glued to the couch and our peepers set squarely on the tube. Who needs to interact with actual people anyway, right? New Year’s Eve offers multiple viewing options, from the traditional countdowns (Ryan Seacrest and the now-terrifying Dick Clark on ABC, 10pm; the even more terrifying Carson Daly on NBC, 10pm; queen dream team Kathy Griffin and Anderson Cooper on CNN, 11pm) to TV show marathons (“Dog the Bounty Hunter” on A&E, 8am-4am; “CSI” on Spike, 9am-midnight; “South Park” on Comedy Central, 9pm-1am; “Twilight Zone” on Sci-Fi, 8am-5:30am on Friday). The lovelorn among us may want to catch screenings of Pride & Prejudice (Oxygen, 6pm and 9pm) or Maid in Manhattan (FX, 8pm and 10pm) and wonder why we don’t have boyfriends like Mr. Darcy or Ralph Fiennes. Or you could ponder what the hell USA is thinking with back-to-back screenings of Elf (6am-4am) on December 31.

“Superstars of Dance”
Sunday 9pm, Monday 8pm, NBC

Dance shows are rivaling police procedurals in the ubiquitous programming department lately. You’ve got “Dancing with the Stars,” “So You Think You Can Dance,” “America’s Best Dance Crew,” “Step It Up and Dance,” “Your Mama Don’t Dance”—it goes on like this. This new talent show puts an exotic twist on the proceedings by featuring professional dancers from eight countries—Argentina, Australia, China, India, Ireland, Russia, South Africa and the USA—competing via solo dance, duos, and group numbers. (The real question: Why were we robbed of the rich cultural movements sure to spring from the Canada contingent?) “Lord of the Dance” Michael Flatley bravely hosts the proceedings despite his crippling shirt allergy.

“Game Show in my Head”
Saturday 8pm, CBS

This new game show, masterminded by modern-day Puck Ashton Kutcher, mixes elements of “Candid Camera,” “Punk’d,” and “Jackass,” with the additional motivating factor of cold, hard cash. Participants are fitted with an earpiece from which host/professional tormentor Joe Rogan (formerly of “Fear Factor,” and now seemingly devoid of any sense of shame) instructs them to perform various humiliating tasks in public. How much money they make depends on how willing they are to debase themselves. Will the young jock scamper about on the street in nothing but his Underoos, begging passers-by to clothe him? Will the fat guy stuck in a Port-a-Potty be able to harangue people into doing his bidding? Or will Kutcher have to hit up Demi to pay next month’s mortgage if this goes the way of “Opportunity Knocks”?

Categories
News

Deliver spot

Dear Ace: The Shoppes of Clover Lawn is a shop-ping center on Rockfish Gap in Crozet. Why do the businesses in that area, including Blue Ridge Builders Supply across the street, have Charlottesville addresses and not Crozet ones? —Biff Clavin

Biff: Bear with Ace, because the answer to this question may be slow going. But first, to lighten the mood, let Ace provide you with a joke: Knock knock! (Who’s there?) Juno! (Juno who?) Juno why the turkey crossed the road? It was the chicken’s day off! (Ace’ll have you notice, that was a two-for-one special.)

And now back to the task at hand. Ace thought, as you did, that the address conundrum was very peculiar. Especially since, on one map Ace found of the Shoppes, it looked as though they were located in a veritable no man’s land (postally speaking, of course) somewhere between the city and Crozet. So he called Mason Graham, a Real Estate Agent for Downer & Associates, which leases the Clover Lawn properties, and she told Ace that even they weren’t aware the properties had Charlottesville addresses until they needed one for the first tenant. “But,” she said, “that’s just the postal standards!”

The addresses all have 22903 zip codes, despite their Crozet location. Ace thought about calling the post office to get more answers, but he knew better—waiting to talk to a postal worker would eat into his holiday party time (like a post office, Ace has his priorities). And so, being the sly, creative investigator he is, he approached the question from a different angle. He “addressed” the source you mention.

The helpful man on the other end of the horn from Blue Ridge Builders Supply had this to say: “We’re in the Charlottesville delivery area; we’re not under Crozet.” Hoping to get more out of him, Ace prodded further: Does this confuse your customers? “Yeah,” the man said. Ace appreciates his brevity. After all, he’s got those parties to go to.

You can ask Ace yourself. Intrepid investigative reporter Ace Atkins has been chasing readers’ leads for 19 years. If you have a question for Ace, e-mail it to ace@c-ville.com.

Categories
Living

Do it your way

New Year’s Eve is an extrovert’s dream holiday. You party all night long in Time Square or some other overly crowded place and kiss strangers at midnight. As an introverted single, I would never do these things unless I had a lot of alcohol. Result: New Year’s was always a mixed bag. Going to a bar to try to generate relationships with complete strangers takes a

lot of energy, and did I mention alcohol? Luckily, only once did I spend way too much money on a crappy club party, watered down drinks, and a midnight breakfast with the hope of meeting someone special. I would rather have spent the time dancing and dining with a small group of friends.

Why didn’t I do what I really wanted? I blame it on a whole list of “shoulds.” The two biggies were: “I should get out and try to meet someone,” and “I don’t feel like I have a lot of options, so I should take whatever plans I can get.” My social life was in flux and any plan was better than no plan at all.

I’m an advocate for doing what you really want on New Year’s, but if you can’t let yourself off the big party hook, be kind to yourself.  Many a party I berated myself for not being a social butterfly, bouncing from person to person. Try not to compare yourself to the extroverts. They need a high level of face time to feel energetic. They can stand in a group throwing out jokes, quips and one-liners at the speed of lightning and get more and more energized by it. Extroverts use their short-term memory, so when they think something it pops out of their mouth simultaneously. Introverts tend to wilt in this situation. Our one-liners come from our long-term memory, and by the time we come up with our witty reply, the conversation has moved on.

Engaging in a deeper conversation with one person is a comfy situation for an introvert. Learn to spot other introverts to chat with.  They’ll be relieved to be exempt from working the room, too. Also, try to find yourself a chair—you’ll feel more content and grounded if you can sit down. 

If you run into someone worth meeting, it’s golden if you can get introduced. If not, consider taking the initiative. Being an introvert doesn’t mean you can’t be assertive. You’ll just want to break the interaction into small chunks. Make eye contact and smile when you’re one on one at the food table. A little later, say hello and smile. Think of a few easy comments to make, initiate chit-chat again, and introduce yourself. Move away to regroup and breathe. After some time, say hello again and have a longer conversation. You’ll feel like old friends by the end of the night. 

There are plenty of resources out there for introverts to help you succeed in social situations. The trick is to look for strategies that take advantage of your strengths, which may be very different from an extrovert’s social strengths. While they might meet more people, you probably can get to a deeper level of interaction very quickly. For more on this, I frequently recommend The Introvert Advantage: How to Thrive in an Extrovert World, by Marti Laney, to my clients. 

Categories
News

What's in your backpack?

Sida Png

Age: 21

Year: Sophomore

Hometown: Nan Jing, China

Major: Math

What’s in your backpack? Pepperidge Farm butter cookies, wallet, beef flavor Nissin Cup Noodles, empty plastic UVA Bookstore bag, pens, Getting Started with MATLAB 7: A Quick Introduction for Scientists and Engineers.

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.

Categories
News

Clarification

The inside headline for last week’s cover story, “City missteps,” is inadvertently misleading, as it implies that the story contains more criticisms than questions about the city’s Downtown Mall rebricking project. The inside headline should have been the same one that appeared on the cover, “City misstep?”

Categories
News

Slowdown gives Planning Commission time to plan

Handed the giant lemon of a recession, Charlottesville’s Planning Commission hopes to squeeze lemonade. Because applications for development review have dwindled since the summer, the Commission gets a chance to tackle the bigger picture.

“Although an economic slowdown is, in general, not a healthy thing for our economy,” says Commissioner Dan Rosensweig, “it has given us an opportunity to retool, to set ourselves up to do more long-range planning.”

The Commission has four strategic goals: rezoning to fulfill the city’s Comprehensive Plan; examining density in residential areas; increasing the value and presence of the Rivanna

When planners plan: Dan Rosensweig and other city planning commissioners can think about parking, infill and urban forests for a change, now that development applications have slowed.

River in city life; and ensuring trees eventually shade 40 percent of Charlottesville. Cheri Lewis, another member of the Commission, has asked to add Downtown parking to the agenda.

Already, the Commission has made progress. It revised the Rezoning Petition Review Sheet, Rosensweig notes, to better help developers that are “considering how they can make their applications mitigate any potential impacts of their development.” The city is also researching splitting the single definition of a bed and breakfast into three classifications by size. That, Rosensweig says, “will put limits on the number of guest rooms and on some of the activities taking place in the establishment, while at the same time opening up the possibility of locating small B&Bs—as small as one room—in less intensive zoning districts.”

Residential density is also on Lewis’ mind when it causes “inappropriate infill development in neighborhoods.” Without a limit on the floor area ratio, or footprint of a home relative to the size of its lot, the Commission cannot easily prevent developers from “shoehorning too much into a neighborhood,” she explains. “There’s the threat of tear-downs for monster mansions,” which the Commission hopes to address.

Meanwhile, for the Rivanna, Lewis says the Commission will consider “more recreational uses of the river—not paddleboats or anything” but maybe more canoeing or fishing. She adds the commission is exploring significant waterfront redevelopment opportunities along High Street.

While Charlottesville’s mini-festival marketplace future may be hazy, developers Downtown clearly want more parking. There’s talk of a third municipal garage, although Lewis hopes the Commission will review two-hour parking Downtown and consider metering or other ways “to get people into garages and out of the neighborhoods” in the first place. The Commission also should recall its urban forest goals whenever it approves removing an existing tree.

Finally, Lewis looks on the bright side for developers. Despite the slowdown, Charlottesville is “experiencing lots of thoughtful development” because people appreciate its walkable lifestyle. Developers may even benefit from falling costs and may “get more help from the city staff” because the slowdown has freed some of its time and the city may appreciate—instead of circumscribe—development. “This isn’t a free pass,” she cautions, “but a sense that, hey, as a jurisdiction, we’re glad to have some development going on.”

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.