Indy Week

Herding chickens

John Valentine — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

I tiptoed up to the first one and bent down. Boom, she was off—looking over her shoulder, cackling, "Who the hell are you?" by John Valentine "Here, let the Chicken Whisperer handle this. Just hold the door open a crack," my wife calmly instructed.…

The Justice Theater Project's stripped-down Ragtime

Byron Woods — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

It's Ragtime on a shoestring, but when the shoe fits, it's worth the wearing. by Byron Woods Given its imposing requirements—including a cast of 40, a 26-piece orchestra and a stage big enough to hold it all—it's no surprise that Ragtime isn't produced more often than it is. Since this adaptation of E.L. Doctorow's turn-of-the-century novel has challenged regional companies with exponentially larger resources, we wondered how The Justice Theater Project was going to pull it off. Now we know: through several compromises that place this sprawling social landscape of early 20th-century America on a very small canvas.…

Steel String Craft Brewery and taproom aims to capitalize on Carrboro's local spirit

Brian Howe — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

"We're as craft as craft gets: Four guys who started a bar in our hometown. We make enough beer to support our brewery, and it only travels 20 yards its whole life before it hits your glass." by Brian Howe On a recent Wednesday evening at Steel String, a craft brewery and taproom in Carrboro, people and dogs press around outdoor tables, while inside, conversations ricochet off distressed brick walls. Nearby in a glass room, several large, silver-colored tanks brew beer destined for Steel String taps.…

Re: Food waste

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

"In 2012, Inter-Faith Food Shuttle recovered more than 7.1 million pounds of food from 365 food donors, including grocery stores, food distributors and North Carolina's State Farmers Market." Thank you for bringing attention to the problem of food waste in your article on June 12, "Lunch and the landfill." I wanted to bring your attention to another community resource not fully explained in your article.…

Mixologists demystify the craft bar experience

Jill Warren Lucas — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

"It's like the first time you go to Char-Grill and try to order a hamburger. You feel like you don't know what you're doing, but the next time you feel initiated." — Will Alphin, Foundation by Jill Warren Lucas Have you heard the one about the guy who walks into a bar and is so blown away by the range of booze that all he can think to order is a 7&7? It's a lot like the one about the blonde bachelorette party that can't count how many gins are on the list so they stick with Cosmopolitans.…

Trophy Brewing & Pizza: Three barrels and a dream

Curt Fields — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Although brewing comes before pizza in Trophy's name, one bite of their specialty pies is testament that food is not an afterthought. by Curt Fields If you happen to take your dirty clothing to the laundromat, I've found the perfect spot. It's on West Morgan Street in Raleigh.…

June 19 crossword solution

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

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Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing is a treat for fans of Buffy and Shakespeare alike

Laura Boyes — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Joss Whedon's vanity project/summer tent-pole detox, filmed in black and white in his own Santa Monica house, should be a disaster. Instead, it is intimate, casual and sexy. by Laura Boyes Much Ado About Nothing, Shakespeare's romantic battle of wits, is the template for pretty much every Hollywood romcom: The feuding lovers, supportive pals and sabotaging frenemies are instantly recognizable. Joss Whedon's vanity project/summer tent-pole detox, filmed in black and white, in his own Santa Monica house over the course of two weeks with a bunch of his actor friends in midst of The Avengers shooting schedule, should be a disaster.…

Toast the Triangle: New brewpubs, distilleries and bars

Lisa Sorg — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Talented local beer artisans and distillers craft the elixir that, as country star Webb Pierce used to sing, stands in your glass and settles your mind. by Lisa Sorg There stands the glass Before we get into INDY Week's celebration of the Triangle's new watering holes, I'll tell you a short and true story about a odd bar and a human foot.…

June Solve Locally puzzle

Carla Frechette & Marya Doery — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Head East by Carla Frechette & Marya Doery The print version of the puzzle features standard-difficulty clues; expert solvers and masochists can find the hard clues here: Hard Clues PDF or Hard Clues Across Lite puzzle. We welcome questions, feedback and (especially!)…

Elevator bureau falls down on the job

Lisa Sorg — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

After reading a state report on North Carolina elevator inspections, you might want to take the stairs. by Lisa Sorg After reading a state report on North Carolina elevator inspections, you might want to take the stairs. The Elevator and Amusement Device Bureau, which operates under the N.C. Department of Labor, has failed to adequately inspect elevators and follow up on violations.…

What New Orleans can teach North Carolina

Bob Geary — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

What strikes me about New Orleans is that, eight years after the flood, it is a case study of this country's political paralysis in the face of major challenges that threaten to tear us apart. by Bob Geary This dispatch comes to you from the city of New Orleans, where my wife and I have been visitors the last few days. I love New Orleans but it scares me too.…

Law enforcement and drug users embrace needle bill

John H. Tucker — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

"It's much better to protect an officer from a health problem than worry about the offense of possessing a needle." — Edmond W. Caldwell Jr., North Carolina Sheriffs' Association by John H. Tucker Last Wednesday inside a Durham Fire Station auditorium, a beefy flank of police officers, deputy sheriffs and Duke University security personnel watched a woman in front of them play with needles. "This is the part where I break out my bag of paraphernalia," said Tessie Castillo, allowing the contents of her satchel to spill onto a table, revealing syringes, a cooker, a tourniquet and other tools of the intravenous drug user's trade.…

Bar Lusconi: downtown Durham's new hotspot

Victoria Bouloubasis — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Chemistry beakers as a décor focal point can be easy to miss in the dark, until you spot a meandering white lab coat behind the bar. by Victoria Bouloubasis There is no flashy neon sign glowing over Bar Lusconi. There is barely any light.…

June 19 crossword puzzle

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

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An 11th-hour move restores some arts funding in the House budget

Byron Woods — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

"I used to work a little bit in the summertime at my grandparents' farm. We used to clean out stalls. And in reference to Rep. Stam's statement, I could never have piled it that high." — Rep. John Torbett, R-Gaston by Byron Woods If you're a fan of either theater or history, grab a front-row seat in the House chamber when lawmakers debate arts funding. During a committee debate over budget cuts, Rep. D. Craig Horne, R-Union, an appropriations committee vice-chair, observed that Prime Minister Winston Churchill ensured the arts were funded in Great Britain during World War II.…

George Packer's The Unwinding is a novelistic nonfiction about how we live now

David Fellerath — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

If you've ever driven through freshly paved suburbia and wondered at the absurdity of two different pharmacies occupying opposite corners, The Unwinding might be for you. by David Fellerath If you've ever driven through freshly paved suburbia and wondered at the absurdity of two different pharmacies—a CVS and a Walgreens, say—occupying opposite corners, George Packer's The Unwinding might be for you. On the street corners, the legal drug dealers compete for a piece of the high-margin prescription trade for our medicated population.…

The week in music: June 19-26, 2013

Bryan C. Reed — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Inter Arma; Shana Falana; Airstrip, Shockwave Riderz, Heads on Sticks; Owen; Small Black, Heavenly Beat; Grandchildren; Bleeding Rainbow; Tall Tall Trees, Prypyat; Dax Riggs; Kim Arrington; Blues Caravan; Jason Bonham's Led Zepplin Experience by Bryan C. Reed 1. Inter Arma There's nothing monolithic about Sky Burial, the second full-length offering from Richmond, Va., quintet Inter Arma.…

Former Brooklyn rocker Kamara Thomas pursues a singer-songwriter future in Durham

Corbie Hill — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Thomas' new album, Earth Hero, travels in gently melancholic, acoustic-based Americana and allegorical storytelling. She's been bringing that same approach to her June residency at the Casbah. by Corbie Hill Kamara Thomas is new to Durham, but she already seems quite comfortable here. After eight years playing with Brooklyn rockers Earl Greyhound and nearly 13 years in New York overall, she finds the Bull City comparatively quiet and peaceful.…

Who will rein in the General Assembly?

Kirk Ross — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

As the session winds down and the fundraising for 2014 begins, the pressure to move to the right will increase. by Kirk Ross "Governor McCrory will be back out tomorrow throwing the baseball perhaps with children who share his All-American passion." —A statement from McCrory's press office…

A sympathetic depiction of eco-anarchists in The East

David Fellerath — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

In this indie thriller, we see a world that rarely makes the screen: the American leftist fringe of freegans, vegans, skaters, freight-hoppers and elusive activists whose tactics veer into law-breaking. by David Fellerath It's not often that Hollywood movies portray America's radical left in any light at all, let alone a sympathetic one. Eighty years after the Depression, there's still a subculture of people riding the rails, living in modern hobo jungles and "living off the fat of our great land," as Merle Haggard sang in one of his anthemic celebrations of society's outsiders.…

This week in disappointment: energy efficiency, electric cars and 751 South

Lisa Sorg — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

A rundown of what the General Assembly is up to by Lisa Sorg We know that the General Assembly is expert at time travel, having sent North Carolina's social and political progress back to the Antebellum era. But reversing course even just three years could cost the state a half-billion dollars (that's billion with a b) annually.…

Theatre in the Park's madcap thriller Fuddy Meers

Byron Woods — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

In this world of intimate strangers, everybody's hiding something. by Byron Woods The alarm clock rings, and a woman wakes up just as her husband enters with the morning coffee. The sun is up, and a beautiful day is in the offing.…

Ponysaurus: a brewery in the making

Emily Wallace — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

A nanobrewery with big plans for the Bull City, the Ponysaurus comes out of the barn in September. by Emily Wallace Not 24 hours after Keil Jansen finished his last day as a special education teacher at Central Park School in Durham, he sat next door at Cocoa Cinnamon with two collaborators in his new venture, Ponysaurus Brewing Co. It sounds like the title of a children's book, but Ponysaurus is a nanobrewery—smaller than a microbrewery—with big plans for the Bull City. "I was having a hard time deciding whether the totem should be a pony or a dinosaur," Jansen says of the name.…

Bottle shops

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:00:00 -0400

Where to get the goods Raleigh Bottlemixx 8111 Creedmoor Road, Suite 153, 919-615-1703, www.bottlemixx.com…