For decades we on the “right” have stood by and watched as “liberal” mobs have destroyed buildings, attacked individuals, and seen laws passed to prevent individuals from expressing their views. Add to this the denigration of those on the “right” by the mainstream media, and one should be able to recognize the frustration felt by the common person on the street.
The Liberal Lies
Posted inMusic
What Can I Get For Ten Bucks?: How about ten bands at the High and Dry Bluegrass Festival
Sixty-three year old John Hancock has been pickin' and grinnin' for as long as he can remember.
“I've been playing guitar as far back as my memory goes,” Hancock said recently in an interview with the Source, “I don't know. I grew up with it. I'm originally from way, way back east and my whole family is musical. We've been around music our whole lives and bluegrass is where we started and stopped.”
So when he and his wife, Nancy, looked at a 40-acre piece of property out by the Bend airport, the first thought that came to mind was that it would make a really good venue for a bluegrass music festival. After buying the land, they set to work on creating what Hancock calls the “best bluegrass festival in Oregon” (though he admitted he might be bias), the High and Dry Bluegrass Festival.
Posted inCulture
Shot Down: Pools, burgers and failing to complete the BendFilm 72 Hour Shoot-Out
After handing over $10 and collecting his free t-shirt at the sign-up for the BendFilm 72 Hour Shoot Out, my boyfriend Guy wanted to go swimming. At the panel discussion the week before, we'd been warned that making a short film over one intense weekend warranted a case of Red Bull and a gang of helpers. Other filmmakers hustled away like they hadn't a minute to spare. But Guy had made well over 200 short movies before, and even some feature-lengths, in well under 72 hours (see youtube.com/guyjjackson). That was his method; putting his energy into writing rather than elaborate production, rarely using more than one actor and never a crew, wielding the camera like that cartoon Tasmanian Devil, and being happily surprised when he created entirely different movies at the editing stage than were originally conceived.
Posted inOutside
Nature's Grand Light Show: Capturing the cloud that isn't really a cloud
Every once in a while, Old Mother Nature knocks my socks off. While heading home last Thursday night with a small swarm of bees I gathered out of a water-meter box in Bend, the scene above began to take shape.
At first, I didn't get it, and had no idea it was going to get better, but as the eye of God began to close, and darkness slowly eased across the western sky, those gigantic ice clouds, perhaps 50 miles or more high above the Earth, began to glow with eerie luminescence. By 10pm the light show was absolutely breathtaking. It left me with the feeling that a giant hole had been torn open in our Galaxy, and I was looking into another Universe.
Wanting to photograph the event, but not having my tripod with me was a problem, but I took a chance anyway, I had to capture that moment. I placed my tough old, true-blue, through-and-through Canon Rebel on the roof of the canopy of my Chevy S-10 (the replacement for my elk-killed Westy) and shot away. Not bad for a shaky old codger…
Posted inOutside
Chatting in the Peloton: ValueAct and a class act
A RIDE WITH VALUE ACT
Last week, in between the Cascade Cycling Classic and the National Road Championships in Bend, I joined the ValueAct women's professional cycling team on an easy reconnaissance ride through Tetherow. We analyzed the hills and the turns, discussing which ones could be taken at full speed in aero bars during the upcoming time trial. While riding, I had a chance to chat with several members of the team.
All of the riders said that the CCC was a really hard race, but the team did well. Bendite Chrissy Ruitter races on the ValueAct squad and placed sixth in the GC in the Cascade Cycling Classic, while Kristin McGrath, from Durango, CO soloed to victory in the final stage in the Awbrey Butte Circuit Race.
“The whole team rode a great race,” commented team director, Lisa Hunt. “I told them they could win it and that's what they did. I'm so proud of all of them! Now that we've had a taste of victory on this course, we're going to try to do it again [at Nationals], but they might not let one of the girls go at the exact spot!”
Posted inCulture
Dream On: The spawn of Saw resembles a broken nightmare
Here we have proof that no matter how cool a movie looks, how dazzling the photography, how mesmerizing the score, how nail biting the suspense, there is no masking a stupid story. The Collector is one of those movies, and here's why…
Arkin (Josh Stewart) has problems. His wife owes a vague yet sufficiently large amount of cash to loan sharks, and his handyman job doesn't pay enough to help. It does get him into homes, however, and being an ex-con in cahoots with a robbery ring, he decides to steal a huge gem from the house he's been casing. All looks well and good, but as soon as he breaks into the home he finds that someone has beaten him to it. A masked creep has been torturing the family, and has booby trapped the house to the hilt. The burglar is faced with the moral dilemma of stealing, fleeing or saving the family. Escape is not going to be fun.
Posted inCulture
Comedy Grows Up: Apatow and Sandler team up to add maturity to their hilarity
In Funny People we may have the delicious beginnings of a great collaborative team, Adam Sandler and Judd Apatow. The two, who were once roommates early in their respective careers, join forces here for the first time on the big screen (if you discount You Don't Mess With The Zohan, which Apatow evidently had some hand in writing) and the results are excellent.
This is the movie many fans of Sandler and costar Seth Rogan have been waiting for. Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Knocked Up were fun, uneven, and promising. And Zohan, of course, made Billy Madison look like high art. But both may be coming into a period of very good work. Funny People has higher goals than groin humor, though there's plenty of that if you're a south-of-the-border type. It seeks not only to tell a story, but the movie attempts to navigate some of life's more difficult regions like aging, facing death, and the issues surrounding the limits of friendship. And the movie dares to ask the question “What would you do if you got a second chance at life?”
Posted inFood & Drink
Industry Round Up: West Side Sipping
Beer is the big news this week. (It's recession proof – donchayaknow?) As reported above, a new beer bar is planned for the area around College Way. The Abbey Pub will start serving as soon as Wednesday. But that's not the only westside beer news; it appears that 10 Barrel Brewing has found a home for its lineup of micros at the former Di Lusso digs on Galveston. The local brewery, which is an offshoot of JC's Bar and Grill, has been searching recently for a spot to showcase its beers and briefly considered taking over the Rising Star building, but decided to search for a more modest investment. Operations manager Garrett Wales told The Source recently that the brewery was trying to steer clear of micro-heavy downtown Bend, favoring a westside location. With the deal for the former Di Lusso space it appears that 10 Barrel will have the smaller westside environs that it was searching for. The arrival will also help solidify Galveston as a beer drinkers haven with 10 Barrel joining the recently opened Brother Jon's Public House, a neighborhood bar launched by several Deschutes alums, that features a nice selection of micros and a laid back beer sipping atmosphere, complete with a sneaker summer patio around the back.
Moving from beers to margaritas, Hola! held its grand opening party last Friday in the Old Mill after last minute mechanical issues forced a delay in the launch. The doors were open, the tables were packed and brass trumpet blasts from the mariachi band could be heard across the parking lot.
Posted inFood & Drink
Little Bites: Industry Round Up: West Side Sipping
Beer is the big news this week. (It's recession proof – donchayaknow?) As reported above, a new beer bar is planned for the area around College Way.
Posted inFood & Drink
Cheeseburger in Paradise: A postcard from summer at Elk Lake Resort
With potential for the madcap hijinks of Meatballs (think Wet Hot American Summer if you were born too late for that reference), the nostalgic romance of Dirty Dancing and the serenity of On Golden Pond, Elk Lake provides the ultimate backdrop for the full lineup of classic cinematic summer fantasies. You can't help but imagine the Brady Bunch pulling up in a Winnebago or catching a glimpse of the twins from The Parent Trap scheming to get rid of dad's fiancée with a tentful of honey. Surrounded by a forest of giant ponderosa pines with snow-capped Mt. Bachelor looming to the east and the Three Sisters to the north, Elk Lake and the resort that bears its name is the very picture of Americana.