Month: July 2010

Of a total 1,080 applications—some incomplete, others submitted earlier than Virginia law permits—Governor Bob McDonnell approved the applications of 506 convicted felons who petitioned for the restoration of their voting rights. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that 650 of the applications submitted were leftovers from the administration of former Governor Tim Kaine.

After civil liberties groups cried foul in April over a proposal to make nonviolent felons submit an essay as part of their application, McDonnell nixed the essay idea and announced in May that his administration would respond to completed applications within 60 days or less—a deadline he met with his recent announcement.

A few things worth checking out inside this week’s paper: For my part, I spoke with writer Rob Sheffield and wrote up last week’s WTJU meeting. Plus, our film critic Jon Kiefer wrote up the Inception, the movie that’s supposed to redeem the summer season. So pick up a C-VILLE!

By the time you read this post, I will be a changed blogger. What was intended as a trip to visit friends in Chicago will have ended up being much more: I will have gone from being a guy who had never seen Pavement, to being a guy who saw Pavement play on their reunion tour. (July has been a Pavement-heavy month; I even exchanged e-mails with auxiliary member and UVA grad Bob Nastanovich about the WTJU "crisis.")

To prepare for the joyous occasion, I’ve dusted off my old Slow Century DVD and thumbed through the band’s old videos, realizing again how funny even a serious band could be. At a time when groups were pushing high-concept visual treats for the MTV bloc, Pavement, true to their slacker aesthetic, spent the ’90s making ridiculous low-concept videos about a team of Santa Clauses trying to shoot each other with bows and arrows. You were unlikely to see them, too, unless you were watching "120 Minutes."

But for my money, there’s only video that was ever able to do visual justice to the band’s ability to paste silly things together until they felt profound, and it’s this one:

"Stereo," from Brighten the Corners. More below.

What’s your favorite Pavement tune? Or, do you like Pavement?

Tonight, City Council was slated to discuss lowering decibel limits in the Neighborhood Commercial Zone—Fry’s Spring, and Hinton Avenue in Belmont—to 55 decibels between the hours of 11pm and 6am. Instead, the discussion will take place on August 16.

City Council lowered the decibel level to 65 in March after a public hearing and much debate among local musicians and Belmont residents. The culprit of the noise battle was Bel Rio. But now that Bel Rio is in limbo, what sorts of conclusions will council and others draw? We’ll have to wait until August, it seems.

Council will also hear an update on dredging for the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir and on the search for a new City Manager to fill the spot left by Gary O’Connell—a position with a salary recommended by Richmond-based consulting firm Springsted in the range of $165,000 to $190,000.

Follow C-VILLE on Twitter for the latest from the meeting.
 

A Keswick house, allegedly bought with bribes paid to former Taiwanese president Chen Shui-bian  and first lady Wu Shu-chen, is being seized by Federal authorities, reports the Washington Post. A forfeiture complaint filed in the U.S. District Court of Charlottesville accuses the couple’s son and daughter-in-law of laundering a portion of the presidential bribery money through Swiss bank accounts in order to buy the home for $550,000 in July 2008—nearly $130,000 above its current assessed value.

Last year, the Taiwanese president and his wife were sentenced to 20 years in prison for bribery, embezzlement and money laundering.
 

Here comes another post about food. (Yep, it’s mostly what I think about—the growing, preparing and eating of it—so bear with me.) Deep into summer, the meals are so fantastic: not only delicious but informed by a certain effortless spontaneity that I love.

We went to the market and I bought some parsley, just because I like having it around. Then we picked up a lovely eggplant, for more or less the same reason. When we bought our usual loaf of bread from Bessette Family Farm, I decided to get some fettuccine, too, homemade by one of the teenage daughters in said family. I’ve been wanting to try it all season and this was the week.

You can see the Italian goodness coming a mile away, no? We discussed frying or baking the eggplant, and we thought about using one of the frozen pesto portions we made last year. But I’m a little sick of pesto, and much preferred to make a quick tomato sauce with one of our last few quarts of 2009 tomatoes. I also used CSA onions and garlic from our garden. As for herbs, I kept thinking “You know what else we have? I’ll throw it in”: the parsley from the market, CSA basil, and oregano from the garden. Salads came together in exactly the same fashion.

As for the eggplant, my husband had the brilliant idea to roast it in chunks, then add it to the sauce at the very end. It brought an incredible sweetness to the meal, and the pasta was tender and tasty. We shredded an aged goat cheese from Caromont over our plates. Sheer heaven. I won’t even mention the peach and blackberry cobbler.

What’s your latest culinary triumph?
 

A special guest post from C-VILLE’s Coogan Brennan:

An afternoon community support rally for WTJU took on the air of a celebration Friday, after university administrators announced earlier in the week that they wouldn’t immediately change the station’s format.

Local rockers Invisible Hand and B.C. both put on performances and, despite the low turnout, the mood was high. "It’s a celebration of everything WTJU represents," said DJ Dave Moore, "And a testament of what the community can do."

"The important thing is seeing the community come together for common good," says event organizer Brandon Collins, "To be able to say: This is ours. It’s not about profit but what benefits the community."

Get the backstory here.

Is it time for WTJU to celebrate?

The Belmont music venue that was at the center of the debate over the city’s noise ordinance may have sounded its last note.

Philip Bogenberger, a spokesman for the Alcoholic Beverages Control (ABC), told C-VILLE that ABC "made numerous attempts to get ahold of the owner, and we sent a letter to him notifying him that the license was voluntarily surrendered." Jeff Easter, landlord of Bel Rio in Belmont, confirmed that he voluntarily surrendered the establishment’s liquor license yesterday. Easter also told C-VILLE that he is looking for possible new tenants.

The action came after "activities" during the Fourth of July weekend "got out of hand," said Easter. "They just shot fireworks up, and I think some lady was resisting arrest outside of Bel Rio. It was just rowdy behavior," he says, adding that it was "the straw that broke the camel’s back." A call to Bel Rio owner Jim Baldi was not immediately returned, and a sign on the door states that Bel Rio is closed for a kitchen renovation. However, Easter told C-VILLE he went to the building, and no apparent renovations were taking place.

Easter expressed concern that Baldi was not complying with the terms of his lease and creating a nuisance for the building’s neighbors.  "So I called Jim and I told him no more of the late-night, private parties," said Easter.

On Monday, City Council will revisit an amendment to lower decibel limits in the Neighborhood Commercial Zone—namely, the stretch of businesses on Hinton Avenue in Belmont—to 55 decibels between the hours of 11pm and 6am. In March, Council lowered late-night music to 65 decibels after a public hearing. According to a staff report, the change in decibels has not made a difference in the number of calls to police.

According to Easter, Baldi told him that the new direction of the venue (more jazz music) would hurt business. “… the lease is very clear, it’s supposed to be jazz and similar music and it’s not supposed to be a nuisance to people around him,” says Easter.

“I think before, it really hasn’t escalated like it has in the last couple of months," says Easter. "And I think [Baldi] changed the venue a little bit, and I think there has been some behavior problems that really bothered me more than probably the music.”

Easter, who said Baldi told him to look for other tenants if he desired, said he is doing just that. "If he comes back and he wants to stay, that’s fine," said Easter.

Although no final decision has been made yet, “It’s still up in the air, because there are two other names on the lease and all parties will have to agree to it,” he says, Easter says he could see the space become a family restaurant.

“With the economic times, I think a casual restaurant could be a lot more appealing anyway. It would be so great to see all the neighbors walk to it and enjoy it the way it was set up before,” he says.

For more Belmont noise-related stories, click here.
 

Summer stuff is coming on strong in our garden. Here’s the current scene:

Plenty of tomatoes on our 35 or so plants! Some are showing blossom-end rot, which we often find with the first round of fruit.

Hot peppers have shown up.

Beans are starting to flower.

A few pumpkin plants getting established. We grew these from seeds saved from pumpkins we got at the market last year; they’re a green, goosenecked variety, very decorative. They’re side-dressed with horse manure from our neighbor down the road. Fertilize local!

First zucchini of the year! We have a little rabbit barrier of marigolds planted around the squash patch. So far, so good.

Mmmm…butternut. Just one more:

Zinnias grown purely for pleasure, looking sweet with flowering oregano nearby.

It’s so much fun when this stuff arrives. I’m still up to my ears in cucumbers (anyone know a good cuke soup recipe? that freezes well?), and eating lots of all-local salad to keep up with the good stuff we get from the CSA. What’s happening in your garden?

5. Any reason is good enough to visit Les Yeux du Monde gallery on a nice evening. Tonight? The local gallery partners with the Wintergreen Music Festival for an exhibit of the visual works by the Austrian composer Wolfgang Seierl.

Among them:

4. If you’ve been watching the papers, you’ve probably seen that dead Swedish journalist Stieg Larsson’s violent novels about a badass hacker named Lisbeth Salander have been quietly selling millions of copies. The Girl Who Played With Fire opens tonight at Vinegar Hill Theatre; check out the second of three Swedish film adaptations before the (rumored) American-made versions come out.

 The trailer.

3. Rare is the band that come along that I can recommended to "fans of the Beatles." The Love Language, who play tonight at the Southern, are such a band. Check out "Heart to Tell," the single from Libraries, released earlier this month. An added bonus: these Raleigh denizens are part of the Southeastern U.S. "local pride"-shed.

The Love Language’s "Heart to Tell"

2. This Culpeper treat is quasi-local at best, but among the best ways to spend a Friday night: the Library of Congress’ Packard Campus for Audio-Visual Conservation there hosts three free screenings weekly in an amazing art deco theater. Tonight? The often imitated, never equalled Godzilla.

Halitosis to the nth degree.

 
1. Blues boy. The not-retired blues legend B.B. King comes to the Charlottesville Pavilion. What more can you say?

B.B. King rocks "Ralph Gleason‘s Jazz Casual," 1968.

What’re you up to this weekend?

Former UVA golfer Steve Marino just barely made the cut Friday evening in the British Open at St. Andrews, Scotland. Marino, who graduated from Virginia in 2002 with a degree in sociology, battled horrid wind conditions out there today as he finished the second round with a 76.

Marino, who stands at 145 (1 over par) for the tournament, said after his round Friday that the conditions were just brutal out there. The +1 score was right at the cut-line.

The winds, which stopped play for 1 hour and six minutes, had gusts as high as 41 miles per hour. The wind delay was only the second such non-threatening weather delay in the 139-year storied history of the tournament.

South African Louis Oosthuizen (-12) leads the British Open by 5 stokes over American Mark Calcavecchia.

Tiger Woods is still in the hunt for his 15th major championship as he is only 8 shots back. Tiger said to the press after his round today that he is right where he wants to be. Not sure I buy that…but he still is the #1 ranked player in the world.

First-round leader Rory McIlroy shot an 80 Friday in the blustery conditions. The 80 carded by McIlroy was 17 shots more than the 21 year-old golfer from Northern Ireland shot on Thursday. McIlroy

The weather is supposed to be a little better coming off of the North Sea on Saturday. ESPN carried more than 12 hours of the tournament live Friday, and their coverage begins early Saturday morning at 7 a.m.