New ventures for the new year

Blue; Streets Deli & Market; Liberación Juice Station bus repurposed as the Young People's Power Bus

• by Emily Wallace

Deciphering wine by type of grape or its region

Gerald C. Hammon's Wine 101 is "the first line of defense against wine snobs."

• by Amber Nimocks

The year's 10 best movies fused tradition and modernism

The films that moved us most were the films about moving on.

• by Neil Morris

Some of the year's best didn't make it to Triangle theaters, but does it matter?

The fact that anyone with a computer, a few cable channels, a mailing address and a credit card can now see almost anything is one of the best things to ever happen to movie culture.

• by Nathan Gelgud

Is there hope for our culture on a 4-inch screen?

There's more culture than ever—even if it's not as popular as it used to be.

• by Zack Smith

Walking the walk in stellar True Grit

Between an opening scene that features an arrival by railway and an epilogue in which icons of the era are relegated to fodder for a traveling road show is a story line about duty and honor driven not by men on horseback but a headstrong 14-year-old girl.

• by Neil Morris

Speaking the speech in stellar The King's Speech

Not merely a lusciously creamy Masterpiece Theatre-style history lesson, David Seidler's screenplay has a satisfyingly hesitant arc.

• by Laura Boyes

It's good that somebody loves Phillip Morris

Phillip Morris generally succeeds as a satirical farce of middle-class mores; the explicit sex scenes nearly take care of that by themselves.

• by Neil Morris

Perdue, GOP could collide over state budget

Perdue is challenging Republicans to show her how state spending can be slashed without cutting vital services.

• by Bob Geary

Employers indicted on charges of immigrant smuggling

The Lopez brothers also allegedly failed to pay employment taxes while paying the immigrants less than minimum wage, and allegedly charged the workers rent for "spartan" accommodations.

• by Rebekah L. Cowell

WikiLeaks and the right to know

We spoke with UNC Associate Professor of Journalism Lois Boynton, a fellow at the University's Parr Center for Ethics, about WikiLeaks

• by Joe Schwartz

The war on WikiLeaks

This was originally published by Facing South, the online magazine of the Institute for Southern Studies

• by Institute for Southern Studies

Happy holidays

• by Jeremy M. Lange

Five-alarm turkey

The oven door flew open. The turkey shot out, and smoke billowed.

• by Memsy Price

Wish List

• by V.C. Rogers

White Rabbit Books—a personal reminiscence

We originally designed the store so that it got gayer the farther back you went. Sometimes folks would wander in, get right to the middle of the store and then stop, levitate slightly, spin around and head—polite but panicked—for the door.

• by Jim Baxter

Chapel Hill rapper Kaze may never be famous, but he's local hip-hop's most dependable anchor

For the past decade-plus, Kaze has worked as a tireless local tastemaker while trying to catapult himself from his respected local stature into the national spotlight.

• by Eric Tullis

All Day Records co-owner Ethan Clauset works tirelessly in the wings

For decades, Clauset has been instrumental in outfits as diverse as the Empowerment Project, Webslingers, Internationalist Books, Chicago's Lampo, the Nightlight bar and club and WXYC—sometimes for pay, but often as a volunteer.

• by Brian Howe
• Tags: The Year in Music, All Day Records

Local label Holidays For Quince almost collapsed this year; instead, it dropped a hit parade

As the year's output illustrates, Holidays For Quince has always focused more on documenting its region than any specific sound.

• by Bryan C. Reed

Alumni of Raleigh's Enloe High School gather their tunes in Chapel Hill

All Enloe Performer Night aims to be equal parts reunion and showcase for students who attended the Raleigh magnet school.

• by Ashley Melzer

The year in Triangle theater

Presenting a theatrical GPS device that will direct you to a number of rooms where we have been amazed this year, and tell you who amazed us. And if oriented properly, it points not only to past wonders but to those places and people most likely to produce future ones as well.

• by Byron Woods

Tough year? The best medicine was on television

Seven of these 10 entries are comedies. These are the days when we all need a good laugh, no?

• by Danny Hooley

Dec. 22 sudoku solution

Dec. 22 crossword solution

Eh? Eh?

• by Ben Tausig

Dec. 22 crossword puzzle