We asked you to send us images of your four-legged buddies enjoying the best the season has to offer—and you heard us.
Month: August 2014
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ARTS Pick: Now That’s What I Call Evil
It’s time to get your evil on, or at least enjoy the sound of evil as your favorite Broadway baddies and Disney villains display their wickedness through song. Play On’s musical revue Now That’s What I Call Evil brings together the most vile characters from the screen and stage for a single evening of musical maleficence. Performing the diabolical hits that define their infamy, these fiendish foes banter, hiss, cackle, and scream as they regale audiences with tales of decadence, corruption, and devilish fun.
Thursday 8/7. $15, 7:30pm. Albemarle Ciderworks, 2545 Rural Ridge Ln. 297-2326.
By the slice
Everything’s bigger in…Virginia, apparently. As of last Monday, Charlottesville is home to the newest location of Benny’s, a southern Virginia restaurant chain that serves up slices of pizza roughly the size of a small child.
According to local co-owner Nick Stancampiano, each pie is 28 inches in diameter, and a slice served in house requires not one but two paper plates (and maybe a forklift). Benny’s is keeping college students full of cheese and pepperoni in Blacksburg, Radford, Smith Mountain Lake, Roanoke, and Harrisonburg, and each location is personalized with a different last name. Charlottesville’s store, at 913 W. Main St., is called Benny Deluca’s.
Benny’s doesn’t deliver, but once students are back in town it’ll be open until 3am on weekends. The menu is pretty simple: Cheese, pepperoni, and sausage will always be available, plus two specialty options that rotate each month. August brings buffalo chicken and garlic mushroom, which Stancampiano said are two of the chain’s most popular pies.
The restaurant just got its ABC license, so it won’t be long before you can enjoy a Three Notch’d brew or a can of PBR with your 14 inches of pizza.
“Moon pie” gets a whole new meaning
The Pie Guy, a mobile food cart that serves up traditional Australian pies, will soon be available to satisfy late-night weekend munchies on the Mall. Beginning in mid-August, Justin Bagley’s cart with its single-serving sweet and savory pies will be stationed outside Chaps on Friday and Saturday nights until 3am. The Pie Guy offers seven savory pies with fillings like steak with gravy, vegetarian quinoa chili, and Thai green curry with chicken, plus a classic apple pie and $1 sodas. Each pie is $5 a pop, and it’ll save you the trouble of asking your cab driver to make a Taco Bell stop on the way home.
Box it up
“It’s been a very fun ride, but every party must come to an end,” said The Box co-owner Chas Webster.
Webster, who could often be found mixing cocktails and chatting with guests as the diminutive bar and music venue on Second Street S.E. filled up in the evenings, said last week that The Box will soon close its doors. Webster opened the downtown spot about eight years ago, and he said ongoing construction on the nearby Landmark Hotel made it difficult to run a restaurant.
“What was supposed to take three months ended up being a construction site for years, which is not very conducive to people wanting to come down and eat lunch,” Webster said.
Over the years, The Box increasingly became known as the place to go if you were looking for drinks under $10 and either a DJ or live band that would leave your ears ringing for days. Webster noted that it’s “hard to get people to come back to eat at a place that’s known as a bar.”
Webster didn’t comment on what the future holds for the space, but keep an eye on Facebook over the next couple weeks for announcements about final events and upcoming plans.
We’re always keeping an eye out for the latest news on Charlottesville’s food and drink scene, so pick up a paper and check c-ville.com/living each week for the latest Small Bites. Have a scoop for Small Bites? E-mail us at bites@c-ville.com.
It’s here. After a slow but productive spring and a gorgeous early summer, we’ve hit the gardening doldrums. The heat and humidity are stifling and it’s tempting to give up until September returns with cooler weather and a whole new harvest. But don’t give up yet! The tomatoes are just coming on, we’re awash in green beans, and the cucumbers are at their prime. To keep the garden happy through late July and August, the key thing to remember is effective watering.
If your idea of watering involves standing straight up while shooting from the hip with the hose, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but as those click-bait headlines say, “You’re doing it wrong.”
First, aim to water the soil—and plant roots—and not the aboveground portion of the plant. Unless you’re growing in a high tunnel, it’s not possible to protect plants from the rain, but you can limit how much moisture they receive from you. Wet leaves contribute to the spread of fungal diseases, and perhaps more importantly, the plants need water at their roots—they don’t absorb it through their leaves! So put it where it belongs—in the ground. If you dislike bending over to make sure your watering can or hose is properly aimed at the ground, consider purchasing a wand, which extends your hose, saves your back, and produces a gentle flow of water.
Which leads me to the second rule of watering: it’s not a car wash. You’re not trying to power wash bird crap off your windshield. You’re aiming for the water to gently settle into the soil without running off or washing out. Use a gentle spray or a watering can to ensure that water stays put. And rather than just standing there while the water pours out of the hose and runs down the garden path, it’s best to water each section of the garden quickly, let the water soak in, and then come back for another pass (or two). This way the water has time to slowly drain into the soil rather than just collecting at the surface and running off.
Lastly, water smartly and conservatively. Water in the morning. It’s better to water deeply but less often than to water lightly every day, which encourages plant roots to stay up near the soil surface and dry out more quickly. Buy a rain gauge and aim for your garden to get a minimum of one inch of water a week from rain, irrigation, or a combination of the two. If you haven’t already, consider installing a rain barrel (or several) to capture the rain that would otherwise run off your roof to use in the garden. Finally, it’s not too late to reap the soil moisture benefits of mulch; put down straw mulch (never hay and never wood chips) around the base of your plants to slow down evaporation (and smother weeds).
Guinevere Higgins is owner of Blue Ridge Backyard Harvest, which provides consultation, design, and installations for home-scale edible gardens. When she’s not gardening, she works in fundraising for the Center for a New American Dream.
Warren Haynes is one of the hardest working guys in rock. In addition to fronting the heavy-edged experimental jammers Gov’t Mule and his own soulful solo band, the guitar hero also holds a longstanding place in the Allman Brothers Band (the legendary band is calling it quits at the end of the year). Haynes also stays active with former members of the Grateful Dead, previously performing in the spinoff The Dead and still regularly joining bassist Phil Lesh in his rotating Friends project.
Following the spirit of these collaborations, Haynes has recently been bringing select cities the Jerry Garcia Symphonic Celebration. The performances, honoring the late Dead guitarist, feature original Garcia songs interpreted by Haynes and a dynamic rhythm section with the powerful backing of a full orchestra. At the shows, fan favorites like “Scarlet Begonias” and “Shakedown Street” maintain fluid rock energy while being infused with classical refinement. It’s a new approach to Garcia’s pioneering jam sounds which have been evolving for five decades—even beyond his untimely 1995 death.
On August 6, Haynes will bring the show to Charlottesville with help from the Richmond Symphony.
C-VILLE Weekly: What sparked the idea to present the music of Jerry Garcia with different symphonies?
Warren Haynes: I wish I could take credit for it. The people who manage Jerry Garcia’s estate called me a couple years ago, and their idea at the time was to have a series of shows with Jerry Garcia’s music being interpreted by a symphony with special guest artists. They asked if I was interested in being the first one.
The biggest task was choosing the material, because there’s such a vast catalog. My main mission was to choose the songs I felt a symphony could elevate to another level, as opposed to just choosing my favorite songs.
You’ve played the Dead catalog in many different incarnations. How is this different?
It’s completely unique—combining the catalog of Jerry Garcia with a symphony. It creates a whole new experience that I don’t think anyone can envision without actually hearing it. It shines a different light on the songs and shows how historically valid these compositions are—exposing their depth in a new way. All the fans of this music [that have seen the show], including myself, have been pleasantly surprised with the final results.
In Charlottesville you’re playing with the Richmond Symphony. Since you play with a different group in each of the select cities where this is performed, how much preparation is required?
It’s the exception rather than the rule that a symphony works with rock or pop music. I’d never played with a symphony until we started this. It’s a whole different world. Sometimes we rehearse the day before the show, but more often than not we just rehearse the day of the show, starting early in the morning. Most of the adjustment period was in the very beginning, when the arrangements were tweaked. The musicians [in the symphonies] are just so good at what they do; it comes across great.
With a symphony is there any room for some of the Grateful Dead’s patented improvisation?
It was very important to me that we include the spirit of improvisation in the overall picture. Since the symphony is reading sheet music and it doesn’t vary, we came up with solutions. There are times when the symphony will stop playing and the electric band will continue improvising, before the symphony comes back in on cue. There are also times when the symphony is reading orchestrated music but what I’m playing on top of it is improvised. That helped me get comfortable with the concept of being locked into a program. We’re still able to keep it nice and loose.
What keeps you wanting to explore the Dead catalog in different ways?
I feel connected to the music on so many different levels. I didn’t become a fan as early as some people. I saw the band once in ’79, when I was 19, but then didn’t see them again until ‘89. The thing that really clinched the deal for me was the amazing amount of great songs in their catalog. It’s just one after another. As important as their version of improvisation is, equally or maybe even more important in the long run, historically speaking, is the depth of their compositions.
You’ll be back in the area next month to play one of the Allman Brothers Band’s final shows at the Lockn’ Music Festival. With that band winding down, what else can we expect from you in the near future?
The Allman Brothers winding down is very bittersweet for all of us, but it’s something we’re all in agreement on. We’ve been talking about picking the right time and place to stop touring for at least three years now, and everyone decided to move on, together. The future for me will be a lot of different projects. Gov’t Mule will remain a big focus. All of the different projects that I do allow me to express myself in completely different ways. I really enjoy being able to show different sides of my musical personality.
Categories
Unbreakable: A story about healing.
“I’m not getting surgery and I don’t need another guru,” I was thinking to myself. “But my back is broken and it’s not gonna get better by itself.”
I was injured during aikido training in Fukuoka, Japan. Years of practice had gotten my body to its peak level of performance, and there I was at 23 with a medical diagnosis for a traumatic pars fracture and a recommendation for spinal fusion surgery.
Categories
New date set for Weiner sentencing hearing
On Monday, a judge agreed to an October 8 sentencing date for Mark Weiner, the 53-year-old former grocery store clerk convicted for abduction with intent to defile in May 2013.
Weiner’s attorneys have raised questions about the evidence used to convict him. They have pointed to expert testimony that contradicts the story that a chemically soaked rag was used to render the victim unconscious and information from cell phone towers that conflicts with the victim’s statement, and they have claimed Commonwealth’s Attorney Denise Lunsford withheld possible exculpatory evidence.
Albemarle County Circuit Court Judge Cheryl Higgins presided over the trial and has denied motions to set aside the conviction, despite the arguments from Weiner’s legal team. She, Weiner, and Weiner’s attorney, Richmond-based Steve Benjamin, were not present in court Monday.
The judge approved a request for a four-hour sentencing hearing.
Each week, the news team takes a look at upcoming meetings and events in Charlottesville and Albemarle we think you should know about. Consider it a look into our datebook, and be sure to share newsworthy happenings in the comments section.
- The Albemarle County Architectural Review Board meets at 1pm on Monday, August 4.
- The City of Charlottesville will hold another public meeting on the future of West Main Street from 6:30-8pm Tuesday, August 5 at Carver Recreation Center. Go to gowestmain.com/latest-news/ for updates on the streetscape redesign process and details on the meeting.
- The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors meets from 9am-7pm Wednesday, August 6 at the County Office Building on McIntire Road. The agenda includes a public hearing on amendments to the county code to extend agricultural and forestal district status for various county parcels, and a vote on converting the Ivy transfer station into a community trash drop-off station—a solution to the controversial issue of how to deal with trash services in the county.
- The Route 29 Project Delivery Advisory Panel meets from 2-4pm Thursday, August 7 at the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Center for Transportation Innovation and Research, 530 Edgemont Road.
- The Charlottesville Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee meets from 5-7pm Thursday in the basement conference room at City Hall.
Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor dropped a bomb Thursday when he announced that he’s not only stepping down from his leadership role, but quitting Congress altogether, raising questions about what’s next for the 7th District Republican—and how quickly his successor might assume office.
Cantor suffered a surprise defeat in the June primary when he was bested by the Tea Party-favored Dave Brat, who will face Democrat Jack Trammell in the November election. In a speech on the floor and in an op-ed in the Richmond Times Dispatch, Cantor, 51, said he won’t serve out his term, and will leave August 18. Cantor said he asked Governor Terry McAuliffe to hold a special election on the November 4 general election day, allowing the victor to take office immediately, rather than waiting until January.
Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at UVA, said Cantor’s early resignation will give his successor seniority in the House, allowing the 7th District to install a new representative ahead of Congress’ lame-duck session.
It’s not clear what Cantor’s next move is, but Sabato said it will likely be lucrative.
“It’s perfectly obvious that he and his wife want to move on,” he said. “[Cantor’s future resides] clearly in the private sector, whether it’s in D.C. or on Wall Street. The only thing I do know is he’s going to be very, very well paid… He’s a very valuable commodity”
In an op-ed published in the Richmond-Times Dispatch, Cantor reiterated his support of the Republican candidate who supplanted him, Dave Brat, and voiced his frustration with the slow pace of Washington. The farewell address itself, recorded by the Associated Press, bemoaned what Cantor called a diminished U.S. role in a world rife with “instability and terror.” He cited problems in the Middle East and tensions with Iran and Russia as took aim at the U.S. foreign policy, saying that the U.S. must “make leadership abroad a priority.”
Cantor did not reveal any specific plans for his career after Congress. “My wife and I are sort of going to make those kind of decisions, and I do think they are best made as private citizens,” he said. “But I’m looking forward to being a very active member in that democratic system and advocate for the cause that I believe in.”
What happens in November?
Sabato explained that, if the Governor approves the special election, the candidates’ names will appear on two ballots on November 4: one for the special election and one for the general election. The elections would take place concurrently, and the winner would take office as soon as the State Board of Elections officially confirms the results.
In the unlikely event that the two elections produce different victors, the winner of the special election would serve until the start of the new Congressional term in January, at which time he would cede the position to the winner of the general election. While winners of concurrent special and general elections have differed in the past, Sabato said a split was historically “very, very rare.”
You don’t often see sculptors in the library at work on invisible projects, but Justin Poe is an exception.
“When I started out, I did these 2″ x 3″ wide sculptures, and I carried everything around in my backpack,” said the Charlottesville-based artist. “I worked in public, in libraries and restaurants, and got a lot of real-time feedback. I just started working smaller and smaller, and it got to the point where people stopped asking because they couldn’t see it.”
The Florida native and 2012 graduate of Guilford College in North Carolina creates “detailed small-scale architectural landscapes.” His miniature houses, apartment buildings, and cabins anchor to natural surfaces and found objects like moss-capped stones and hermit crab shells.
“The smallest house I ever made was a size of a grain of salt,” Poe said. To display that piece, he mounted the house to a quarter-inch nail head and created a little forest around it.
He framed the work with a magnifying lens for viewers, though he didn’t use one himself. “I wanted to reach the epitome of working without a microscope or magnifying glass,” he explained.
So how the hell does he make such tiny, intricate objects?
Practice, apparently. Poe said he’s gotten to the point “where I don’t need tweezers, even. I shave a toothpick to a small point, touch it to glue, dab most of the glue off, and use that to adhere pieces together. That way I get no friction from tweezers.”
Patience is another key. To make his smallest houses, Poe applies a layer of paint to a surface, carves off the edges with an X-acto knife, applies another layer, carves again, and so on. It’s a process he described as “kind of like 3D printing, but manual.”
He’s always liked to look at things in fine detail. “Like moss on a rock, I’m instantly drawn into that,” he said. “It’s a little self-contained world.”
Poe got his start as a technical theater major with a focus in set design. His interest in miniature structures piqued when he began making small-scale models of sets.
“I kind of realized that if I’d been doing something larger, people would be less inclined to buy it as rapidly,” he said.
His forays into small sculpture confirmed his belief that people tended to value small-scale intricacy more than large-scale intricacy. In other words, it’s easier to identify (and therefore applaud) time-consuming techniques over complicated concepts.
“I hate when people look at my work and think they can do the same things, though I fall prey to that too,” he said. “Working really small-scale blows that notion out of the water. That’s a huge benefit to working smaller and smaller over time.”
After graduation, Poe went back to Guilford for a fourth year in sculpture. Inspired by Willard Wigan, a micro-sculptor whose work is small enough to pass through the eye of a needle, Poe pursued the theme of detailed small-scale architectural landscapes in his thesis. In Charlottesville he works with sculptor and contractor Jason Roberson and plans to apply to UVA’s graduate School of Architecture.
Working with toothpicks, cardboard from boxes, and “whatever is free and immediately available,” Poe encourages viewers to reframe their understanding of what it means to be “life-sized.” As a personal practice, this shift in perception has greatly colored the artist’s worldview.
“When you focus in on this really small scale your eyes have to adjust,” he said. “They become so adjusted everything else looks blurry. It enters you into this Zen-like state. When you’re focused on this one small spot, the rest of the world disappears.”