Month: June 2011

Charlottesville School Board member Colette Blount formally announced her candidacy for the Democratic nomination for City Council yesterday outside Jackson P. Burley Middle School, where she will begin the new academic year as a civics teacher.

“Colette is somebody who has over the years demonstrated her commitment to the betterment of our youth," said Mayor Dave Norris during his introduction. "She is somebody who has a strong commitment to our natural environment, somebody who has a strong commitment to community engagement, somebody who will be an effective leader for City Council, for our community."

Blount, who moved to Albemarle County in 1994, said her campaign will be based on the value of education, protecting the environment and engaging people to move the community forward. Her overarching principle, she said, is “equal access to the future for all.”

More after the photo.

Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris introduces Democratic candidate Colette Blount

“A sound education program is a requisite resource for a community,” she said. “When our children have the tools to actively engage in the 21st century and beyond, then the community is on a good path,” she said.

While on the School Board, Blount voted against controversial issues such as an artificial turf field at Charlottesville High School and a nine-acre easement for the Meadow Creek Parkway.

“I voted against the Parkway on the principle of going through McIntire Park,” she said. “Nothing is wrong with open green space.” Kathy Galvin, a fellow school board member and council candidate, voted in favor of the easement.

Chickens are supposed to lay the most eggs when they get the most sun. Thus, winter is the slowest season for egg production and now–barely more than a week after summer solstice–should be their peak.

Every day, whichever one of us feeds the hens will announce to the other how many eggs we collected. And I’m chagrined to say that lately, the numbers have been low. From five hens, we’re getting two eggs, one egg, sometimes NO eggs. It’s nothing like last summer, when each hen was pretty reliably laying every day.

Meh.

There are a couple of possible explanations. One, the chickens have figured out some other nesting location–not unlikely, considering their current spot is rife with berry bushes and other thigh-high vegetation where they can hide.

Full of secrets.

We just haven’t found the time yet to crawl around on hands on knees until we put a hand into an unofficial egg cache (though it does sound like fun, doesn’t it?)

Two, the girls are getting older. It’s to be expected that with age, they’ll slow down the laying. We just didn’t think it would happen this year; the hens are not yet two.

If they really are past their prime, it forces us into some tough decisions. Chickens can live a decade or more. Will we continue to feed their girls (along with younger compatriots) even if they’re not feeding us? At what point will we stop thinking feathered friends and start thinking soup?

I’m sure some of you have confronted this situation. Readers, what have you done with your not-so-productive hens?

After two years at the helm of Big Brothers, Big Sisters of the Central Blue Ridge, Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris steps down as of tomorrow, to pursue another local endeavor. And despite (joking) reports to the contrary—and, yes, a meeting with Snoop Dogg—C-VILLE remains reasonably certain that Norris’ decision does not overlap with plans to pursue a hip-hop career.

Big Brothers announced a search for Norris’ successor on June 3, and closed its application period on June 15. Among other work, Big Brothers helped revive the Westhaven Afterschool Program during Norris’ time with the organization. 

Now, without further ado, here is a video of Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris with Snoop Dogg:

There were always two MySpaces. The first was a kind of proto-Anthony-Weiner-space, a forum where boys could tell girls how hot they are, where they could post shirtless cameraphone pictures of themselves. The other MySpace was the place where you went even before stealing a band’s album off the Internet, to hear a couple of tunes, see where the band is from and more. It was where you went to hear new music.

I’m watching with some ambivalence as MySpace sells, again, from Rupert Murdoch’s NewsCorp to a little-known company Specific Media LLC, whose investors include Justin Timberlake. NewsCorp bought the site in 2005 for $580 million; they are selling it for $35 million six years later. If it isn’t already, it’ll be time to stick a fork in a service that took a great model for sharing music and squandered it by ignoring what people liked about it: it was simple, customizable and versatile.

After an incredibly bad redesign, anecdotal evidence shows that musicians are leaving the website in droves, setting up shop in places like Facebook’s BandPage and the superior, simple Bandcamp. (Facebook overtook it as the most popular networking site in 2008.) Yet, while each of these services improves upon the latest version of the ‘Space, none has provided the sense of community that MySpace did for musicians.

For my part, I spent hours scouring the "top friends" of my favorite bands to see who they were listening to and who their friends were. The "Top Friends" feature created a sense of mystique around physical places. You could know what the Columbus, Ohio’s Shitgaze scene was all about by clicking from Times New Viking to Psychedelic Horseshit. Or about how the Arcade Fire and Wolf Parade were great friends, up in Montreal. If people still looked at it, there would be the opportunity for some local bands to build a positive local buzz around Charlottesville.

MySpace was also the forum where musicians learned to posture themselves in the Internet era. The punk ethos was translated into minimal MySpace layouts and a scourge of capital letters, slashes and exclamation points, all suggesting a crazy typist going through an Iggy Pop moment while filling out an Internet form. The careerist ethos played out in professional HTML design and links to where you could buy the band’s merchandise. The reluctant musician could communicate as much by leaving all fields blank but the media player.

As I became a musician myself, the "page views" prominently displayed became a source of friendly competition—everybody went there. But not anymore. I can’t help but lament the demise of the site where I learned how to find new music on the Internet.

Where do you look for new music on the Internet?

Two months after Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) foreclosed on the Upper Bundoran manor and put the Georgian mansion back on the market, Wells Fargo purchased more than 2,000 acres of southern Albemarle’s preservation development at auction for $7.5 million.

"Still, the current developers are hopeful Wells Fargo will continue their vision," reports the C’ville Bubble Blog. "No Biscuit Run-style bailout here, and no Donald Trump bailout, either"—referring to competing assessments for land preservation tax credits and the Kluge Estate Winery & Vineyard, respectively.

From the start of this year, 13 Bundoran lots (not including the mansion that RBC bought back) sold—including 12 in February to the same Richmond-based limited liability company.

Live Arts announced today that its Board of Directors has completed its search for a new Artistic Director, settling on Julie Hamberg as the theater’s artistic leader.

Hamberg is a theater veteran, having served in a variety of capacities at arts organizations in Ann Arbor, New York City. She was most recently as Interim Producing Director at Southern Rep in New Orleans. She has brought 75 new plays to the stage, according to a release. She will relocate with her husband, a playwright, from Louisville, Kentucky, to begin in September.

Hamberg fills a seven-month personnel void left by Satch Huizenga, the quiet circumstances of whose resignation upset some members of the theater’s large community of volunteers.

Julie Hamberg begins in September.

Starting tonight, the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) will begin overnight repair work on the bridge that takes the 250 Bypass over Route 29 Business (near Best Buy). 

According to VDOT, crews will work on repairing the decks of the bridge, among other parts, from 7pm to 4:30am. After a quick stop for the July 4th holiday, work will resume Tuesday, July 5. From the following Sunday, July 10, crews will work from Sundays through Thursdays, though VDOT points out that no work will take place on Friday and Saturday nights.

The repairs are slated to be complete in late August.

In the meantime, motorists beware: traveling at that intersection could be a nightmare most nights for several months.

The Commonwealth was named "Top State for Business" by cable network CNBC’s fifth annual study, which tests all 50 states on 10 categories including infrastructure and transportation, cost of doing business, education and business friendliness.

Virginia had the best overall score in the study’s history—1,660 out of 2,500 points—but although the state was recognized for its ideal location and friendly business atmosphere, the study found a few bumps.

"But not all is rosy in Virginia," CNBC noted. "The state fell eight spots to number 26 in Quality of Life, which, among other things, measures healthcare. The number of uninsured residents in Virginia has risen steadily in recent years."

Virginia also lost points for its small pool of available workers, in contrast to other states. That dropped the Commonwealth to No. 12 from No. 3 in the "Workforce" category.

Naturally, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell took some credit for the ranking, pointing to his administration’s focus on creating private sector jobs.

“We’ve done that by keeping taxes low, getting government spending under control, having a strong Right to Work law, and making smart investments in transportation, economic development and higher education,” he said in a press release. “It is paying off. CEO’s and entrepreneurs have responded to our efforts and found that Virginia is a great place to start and grow a business.”

The Commonwealth last topped this list in 2007 under then governor and current U.S. Senate candidate, Tim Kaine.

So, with the CSA pumping out loads of veggies–namely beets, cabbage, and potatoes–and ripe stuff beginning to peek out from under leaves in the garden, the season of food preservation seems to be cranking right into gear. I spotted some nearly-mature green beans this morning, and the cucumber yield promises to reach epic proportions by this weekend.

Within the next seven days I expect to pickle cucumbers and maybe some beets, and perhaps freeze some green beans (I’m not fond of canned beans).

Last night I made a triple batch of this tasty potato soup to use up potatoes and carrots, and while it was simmering I bagged up wineberries for the freezer. I’ll be buying pickling spices and hauling my Mason jars out of the attic so they’re easily on hand.

Though I do hope to get lots of canning done this summer, as a still-pretty-new mother, I’m eyeing up the freezer as a ready backup when I just can’t put together enough hours to can. The freezer has its downsides, namely freezer burn and the possibiity of losing food in a power outage, but nothing’s more convenient.

My question is this: What’s the best option for storing food in the freezer, for example that soup I just made? Mason jars would be my first choice. But I can only fit so many of those in there, and they make no sense for little portions of berries or baby food. In that case, I want to use plastic bags. But what about BPA and other nasties leaching into the food?

It seems, if I’m to believe everything I read (!), that major-brand freezer bags are probably safe. See this page and this page. Now, the generic bags I picked up yesterday in a fit of thriftiness…those may not be such a great deal after all. I’ll likely replace them with Ziploc or Glad or somesuch.

Anybody else have a tip on freezing food in plastic?