Year: 2012

Exhibit explores intersection of athletes and art

Arts

“Student-athletes are often recognized for their accomplishments in their respective sports. However, UO student-athletes are well-rounded students with diverse interests that extend beyond their athletics pursuits.” These are the words of Rob Mullens, director of Intercollegiate Athletics at the University of Oregon, lending his perspective on a remarkably unique new exhibit that just opened at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art. Continue reading →

Fade to Black

Film

In the age of the quick fix and pop-up porn, you gotta hand it to E.L. James for hoodwinking the hoi polloi into dicking around with something as atavistic and temperate as on-the-page erotica. Fifty Shades of Grey — the first installment in a trilogy of erotic novels that started online as Twilight fanfiction — sold more than 10 million copies in six weeks in the U.S. alone. This, despite repeated assaults by high-brow literary critics as well as pop sexpert Dr. Continue reading →

Train Talk and Coal Concerns at Reality Kitchen

News

  ROLLING THROUGH, WITH POLLUTION On Saturday June 2nd the Whiteaker’s unofficial community center, Reality Kitchen, will be hosting a meeting to discuss railroad pollution, with Lane County Commissioner Pete Sorenson scheduled to attend and speak on the issue at 6:30 pm. Jim Evangelista, who started Reality Kitchen, a learning center for adults with developmental disabilities, says the community has had ongoing concerns about the train cars passing through the neighborhood. Continue reading →

Face-Eating Zombies and Unicorns

News

If you haven't already heard about the face-eating zombie in Miami, then you're lucky. The details are gross. So I will balance out posting about that fascinating little tidbit with a little news item about UNICORNS.  Over the weekend the Miami Herald reported that right outside its building a naked man was found eating another naked man's face. True story. They even got parts of it on security camera.  Continue reading →

Brimming with Bud

News

Oh hello, Coos County Courthouse, what a delicious aroma you have. The World, a paper out of Coos Bay, reports that "An overabundance of confiscated marijuana, combined with poor ventilation, has left the county courthouse smelling a little wacky this spring." The Beaver Hill incinerator isn't burning anymore, so lockers are actually overflowing with weed. And Coos Bay just is a short 2-hour drive from Eugene… Read more at The World. Continue reading →

The Coffee Road: Part Deux

News

  Nine months after embarking on the original journey to the Mother Coffee tree [as chronicled in this week’s cover story], I had the opportunity to hike to the oldest Coffea arabica tree in the world once again. This time I would do make the approach coming in the opposite direction: a two-day journey coursing through a rocky river valley, relying only on a hastily printed map, my fuzzy memory, and a handful of helpful locals. Again I would wonder: Why all this hardship to make it to a tree? Continue reading →

Hey Marseilles Gigs Cozmic

Music

  It seems indie music is experiencing a movement of flannel-clad gents strumming vintage guitars while tugging at scruffy beards. A token petite blonde with amazing pipes singing backup over sweeping, rootsy tales about vagabonds is standard fair. But if you can wade past all the skinny jeans and saddle shoes you will find your way to Hey Marseilles, and you won’t be sorry. Continue reading →

The Road to Mother Coffee

In Ethiopia, coffee trails open up Kafa Biosphere Reserve to tourists

Culture

Minutes after walking away from the oldest coffee tree in the world, Silje Heyland, a German college student studying fair-trade coffee practices in Ethiopia, had a sudden urge to go back. “Perhaps we can eat lunch under the tree,” she suggested. The rest of our expedition party — wet, tired, muddy, hungry — looked at her with unsympathetic eyes and decided it would be better to eat lunch at a nearby village, where there were primitive huts to duck into for shelter against the afternoon thunderstorm. Continue reading →

Will Mali Bounce Back?

A Eugene Peace Corp volunteer is evacuated to safety

Culture

At first, it seemed possible that what started as a military mutiny on March 22 might simply blow over. After a few days of sheltering in my apartment, I emerged to find Bamako, the capital of the West African nation of Mali, just as I had left it. Besides an underlying uncertainty over just exactly how Mali’s government would shape out, the mood was bright and the city would be as colorful as always. At work, a USAID youth-development project, most of my colleagues insisted the coup could be a positive step for Mali. Continue reading →