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The ones we let in by Angela K. Evans
The Garden by Caitlin Rockett
In defense of burning books and abalone by Matt Cortina
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My 100-game season by Stewart Sallo
The quick and the dead by Michael J. Casey
Chief Niwot’s Curse by Sara McCrea
A masochist’s love letter by Emma Athena
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The Anderson Files: History is in the telling Letters: Signed, sealed, delivered, your views Guest Column: The people’s fight for open government Overtones: Clay Rose on the future of the Gasoline Lollipops Boulder County Events: What to do and where to go Words: ‘the river that cries’ by Greg Alston Film: Life in the futter with ‘Uncut Gems’ Tasting Menu: Four courses to try in and around Boulder County Nibbles: 365 days in the life and death of Boulder County restaurants Community Table: Cuckoo for cocoa nog Drink: The year in beer Astrology: by Rob Brezsny Savage Love: Open ended Weed Between the Lines: CBD and canine brain cancer Cannabis Corner: Three dot pot
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December 26, 2019 Volume XXVII, Number 19 As Boulder County's only independently owned newspaper, Boulder Weekly is dedi- cated to illuminating truth, advancing justice and protecting the First Amendment through ethical, no-holds-barred journalism and thought-provoking opinion writing. Free every Thursday since 1993, the Weekly also offers the county's most comprehensive arts and entertainment coverage. Read the print ver- sion, or visit www.boulderweekly.com. Boulder Weekly does not accept unsolicited editorial submissions. If you're interested in writing for the paper, please send queries to: editorial@ boulderweekly.com. Any materials sent to Boulder Weekly become the property of the newspaper. 690 South Lashley Lane, Boulder, CO, 80305 p 303.494.5511 f 303.494.2585 editorial@boulderweekly.com www.boulderweekly.com Boulder Weekly is published every Thursday. No portion may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher. © 2019 Boulder Weekly, Inc., all rights reserved.
Boulder Weekly welcomes your correspondence via email (letters@ boulderweekly.com) or the comments section of our website at www.boulderweekly.com. Preference will be given to short letters (under 300 words) that deal with recent stories or local issues, and letters may be edited for style, length and libel. Letters should include your name, address and telephone number for verification. We do not publish anonymous letters or those signed with pseudonyms. Letters become the property of Boulder Weekly and will be published on our website.
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History is in the telling By Dave Anderson
History is not the past. It is the stories we tell about the past. How we tell these stories — triumphantly or self-critically, metaphysically or dialectically — has a lot to do with whether we cut short or advance our evolution as human beings. — Grace Lee-Boggs
T
he Trump impeachment drama has been compared to what happened to Nixon and Clinton. However, Trump is somewhat similar to Andrew Johnson, the first president to be impeached. Johnson was a bombastic racist phony populist with a persecution complex who held rallies where he threatened to execute his political opponents. Johnson had assumed the presidency when Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865. He was a Democrat and a Southerner who opposed secession. In his 1864 re-election campaign, Lincoln chose Johnson as his running I
mate to convey a message of national unity. After the Civil War, Johnson wanted to quickly reconcile with the South. He unilaterally pardoned hundreds of former Confederate leaders, vetoed civil rights legislation and opposed the 14th Amendment, which gave citizenship to former slaves. When white supremacist terrorists massacred black residents in Memphis and New Orleans, he defended the terrorists. Johnson was in conflict with the Radical Republicans in the U.S. Congress over what postwar Reconstruction in the South would look like. They wanted to create a biracial democracy while he supported a revival of white supremacist rule (minus chattel slavery). That was basically why Johnson was impeached. As historian Brenda Wineapple puts it, the impeachers “really thought he was hindering and betraying the cause of the war. They were outraged because he was restoring the country to what it was, and they had a vision of the future — what it could be.” For many decades, high school students in America were see THE ANDERSON FILES Page 6
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taught that Johnson was impeached in 1868 basically because he broke an obscure law called the Tenure of Office Act. That trivializes the event. The law, which was passed in 1867 over Johnson’s veto, prohibited the president from firing cabinet members without the Senate’s permission. They were trying to prevent Johnson from firing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, who was aggressively implementing Reconstruction. Johnson would fire Stanton six months after the law was passed. Stanton responded by making his home in the War Department, barricading the doors and refusing to leave. Johnson would be impeached in the House but acquitted in the Senate by one vote. That impeachment isn’t properly understood because we have been exposed to a grotesquely distorted narrative about the Reconstruction era, a period of political, economic and social upheaval from 1863 to 1877. According to that view, Reconstruction was a horrible mistake — a time of inept, corrupt and violent rule forced on the South by vengeful Northerners. This interpretation comes from self-serving propaganda by Southern Democrats in the 1870s but then in the early 1900s it gains respectability when it is adopted by scholars connected to Columbia University professor William Archibald Dunning. It persisted as the dominant narrative through the 1960s. It was perpetuated by Hollywood films such as Birth of A Nation and Gone With The Wind. Historian Eric Foner, author of Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 (now widely conI
sidered to be the best book on the subject) says that it was only after the successes of the civil rights movement that we got a more accurate history of the era: “The traditional or Dunning School of Reconstruction was not just an interpretation of history. It was part of the edifice of the Jim Crow System. It was an explanation for and justification of taking the right to vote away from black people on the grounds that they completely abused it during Reconstruction. It was a justification for the white South resisting outside efforts in changing race relations because of the worry of having another Reconstruction. “All of the alleged horrors of Reconstruction helped to freeze the minds of the white South in resistance to any change whatsoever. And it was only after the civil rights revolution swept away the racist underpinnings of that old view — i.e., that black people are incapable of taking part in American democracy — that you could get a new view of Reconstruction widely accepted. For a long time it was an intellectual straitjacket for much of the white South, and historians have a lot to answer for in helping to propagate a racist system in this country.� It is encouraging that the civil rights movement had such an impact. But the successes of regressive and bigoted movements can change perceptions and behavior too. A recent survey conducted by The Economist and polling site YouGov.com asked Republicans who was the better president. Is it Trump or Lincoln? Fifty-three percent of them said Trump was preferable to Lincoln, while 47% chose Lincoln. BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
Toffee troubleshooting
I recently was inspired by a recipe in BW (Re: Jean’s Microwave Almond Toffee, in “Dear Santa,� Nibbles, Dec. 12, 2019). It was a recipe for microwave toffee. It was in a section about Christmas gifts? Possibly? I clipped the recipe and put it in my pocket. I think the idea of something so simple got me in the mood to try it. If it could be made in the microwave, then certainly, it sounded uncomplicated. Obviously, it was a side note, meant for light-hearted entertainment, but I tried the recipe and here is what I found out. I thought you might find it interesting. I had never made toffee before and perhaps had not a clue how this would work out. Disclaimer: I used a saucepan, because... Making toffee in the microwave is a decidedly bad idea. You combine a great deal of butter with a great deal of sugar and then you have to get it to a very high temperature (270 degrees). This temperature is well above boiling (212). Imagine doing this in your microwave (with what would have to be a plastic container) and what could befall a holiday fool doing this for the first time. Also, elevation affects the boiling point of butter. The butter will boil at a slightly lower temperature here in Colorado, so if you assume, as I did, that extra 3 minutes will make the difference, it may not. An extra 3 minutes in the microwave could be the difference between, boiling napalm sugar/butter and melted plastic/sugar/butter. Most plastics can hold boiling liquids. However, when I Googled “boiling butter in the microwave� it spoke of butter exploding and flying all over the place. And sadly your toffee will still be soggy and chewy. I did not expect to troubleshoot this recipe but hope it helps Ginger Zaruckus/Boulder
Codify the impeachment process now
The impeachment process has been abused. That abuse has to be forestalled in the future by codifying BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
the process. Here is a good start: Only current, readily articulated, statutorily defined crimes may be used for impeachable offenses. Nebulous, ambiguous terms such as abuse of office, abuse of power, violation of oath of office shall not be considered impeachable offenses without the support of statutorily defined crimes.
High crimes shall only be defined as felonious criminal conduct as defined by law. Misdemeanors shall only be defined as non-felonious criminal conduct as defined by law. All investigations shall be conducted pursuant to the federal code of criminal conduct, federal rules of evidence, code of criminal procedure and rules of jurisprudence.
All parties shall have the power to call witnesses, rebut testimony, have legal representation and question their accusers in person. Secret, closed door, testimony, except in cases of national security and classified information and documents, shall not be permitted. Anonymous witnesses shall not be allowed. Jim Peel/Longmont
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The people’s fight for open government by Aaron Harbor
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
A
major battle plays out daily in Colorado as some of our elected and appointed officials — all of whom took a solemn oath to serve all Coloradans — do everything possible to frustrate disclosing information belonging to the people. These fights involve access to records concerning public policies created with taxpayer dollars. As someone who has fought on multiple fronts for public access to records and deliberations, I continue to be astonished by how many government employees continue to make it difficult for journalists to do their jobs or for regular citizens to simply find out what is happening in their own communities. While many officials tout their
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belief in “transparency,” their actions often belie their words. They hide and obfuscate — making decisions privately rather than publicly, and making records difficult to obtain by delaying access, charging ludicrous amounts for copies, overly redacting information, and, in many cases, not providing the information at all. They truly believe whatever they do is “right,” because they are convinced they know best what is in the public’s interest. They rationalize bad behavior due to their belief the ends (what they believe is a good outcome) justify the means (making it difficult for journalists and others to access what should be public information). see GUEST COLUMN Page 10
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GUEST COLUMN from Page 9
The current public records debate in Colorado is focused on how long government officials at all levels should retain their electronic records — primarily email correspondence and text messages. Current law generally allows each agency and political subdivision to set its own time period for when emails can be deleted. As a result, some officials are deleting their correspondence after just 30 days! This makes no sense at all and contributes only to greater distrust of government. In the past, one could argue the cost of storing voluminous amounts of information was exorbitant and deletion of certain records made sense. As someone who worked in and is knowledgeable about the high technology arena, I can state, without any qualification, that the cost of electronic storage today is so low an argument could be made that no deletions should ever occur. In 1980, a gigabyte of computer storage on a hard drive could cost $1 million. Today that cost is 2 cents. The entire contents of the Library of Congress could now be stored on a device which costs only $500. Bureaucrats who argue storing all emails indefinitely would make responding to Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) requests difficult are being disingenuous, at best. Today’s search tools allow a user to easily and quickly search and find whatever records are relevant to a request — often in a matter of seconds. Technology simply has rendered the excuses of uncooperative bureaucrats moot. One reason to require all Colorado government agencies to maintain email and text correspondence and related records for at least five years is because it may take a few years before anyone even knows they need the information. A journalist or law enforcement investigation into activities or actions involving government agencies, especially where malfeasance is a possibility, may take several years to develop. When legal processes are involved, it can be one to three years after an event before actual litigation commences and then another year or two before the discovery process (i.e., record acquisition) is completed. That means five years could go by before a case is complete. And if there are delays in I
responding by a government entity, the time periods can be much longer. Another way some government agencies make it difficult for journalists and others to get information is by charging excessive amounts to honor what often are simple requests. Agencies are allowed to charge (e.g., $30 per hour) for the time their staff members spend responding to requests, some of which legitimately do require extensive research and the organization of information. However, there have been instances where agencies have claimed a request will take days or even weeks to process. These agencies then calculate the cost of the request and inform the requesting party that thousands of dollars are needed for a search which actually could be completed in an hour or two. Certainly, the time estimates can be reasonable when documents need to be gathered from disparate sources and have to be reviewed and redacted or even excluded for legitimate reasons (such as confidentiality) but some agencies abuse the process to cover up their own mistakes. Government agencies also may try to provide requested information in a form or format which is less helpful and, at times, even unusable. In my first open records case (I was represented at the time by future Colorado Attorney General and U.S. Senator Ken Salazar), I requested records from a state government office in electronic form. The office agreed the information I requested was public but wanted to provide the information on paper. This would result in the printing of tens of thousands of pages of information which would be next to impossible to organize or analyze. It also would be an environmental disaster. Although I eventually won the case, by the time I got the data, it was no longer helpful. Fortunately, CORA was amended in 2017 so government agencies now are required to provide requested information in the most convenient and least expensive form for both the government agency and the requesting party. In the case I just cited, it was obvious providing the requested records in electronic form was the easiest path for the agency and was the most useful to the requesting party. In a matter involving open meetBOULDER WEEKLY
ings under the Colorado Sunshine Law, I informed a municipality it was against Colorado law for its governing board to meet in sessions about which citizens were given very limited notice and during which decisions were made but were not truly in public view or even in view of the press covering the municipality. Only because I involved legal counsel did the municipality ultimately agree to institute some reforms. Nevertheless, during the entire duration of the matter, it believed what it was doing was appropriate even though few knew the people’s business was being conducted behind the equivalent of partially closed doors. Today, Coloradans who hire an attorney to assist them cannot recover those costs unless they prevail in court. The law should be modified so those costs are recoverable even if the issue does not even go to court. That would create an incentive for government agencies to be more cooperative. This is important because, in some cases, government agencies use the length and cost of the process to stall providing the requested information. In these instances, the officials know they ultimately are likely to have to provide the information but, by forcing the requesting party to go through the legal process, they are confident the information will be useless by the time it is provided. In the first case in which I was forced to be a party after making an open records request, the government entity involved went to court to fight the request knowing it would lose but also knowing the delay caused by the legal process would result in my getting the requested information too late to be used effectively. So, although I won the case, the agency accomplished its goal of “running out the clock” (as well as costing me money). To address these issues, there should be an ombudsman who can quickly size up situations and mediate a final arrangements on the parties in a short time frame (e.g., within three business days of a request). Today, it takes the agreement of all the parties for mediation to occur so either party can now prevent it from happening. If the dispute were submitted to an ombudsman and then goes to court, the ombudsman’s report should be available to the judge in the case so as to expedite a decision. Both the
ombudsman and court processes should be fast-tracked in the law so a decision is issued within a calendar week of a request. While Coloradans’ interests in open government are led by organizations such as the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition (ColoradoFOIC.org), it is up to Governor Jared Polis and the Colorado General Assembly to make our state’s commitment to open records and open meetings a full-
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fledged reality. Most importantly, it is time we make certain we elect public officials who not only say they believe in transparency but have plans to proactively make information accessible. If we do that, we will have fewer barriers being erected to having access to public records and meetings. Hopefully our elected leaders — whose members are subject to open records and open meeting sunshine laws — will do the right thing and
DECEMBER 26, 2019
make these laws work the way they were originally intended. Aaron Harber is the host of The Aaron Harber Show, (www. HarberTV.com/Info). Email Aaron@ HarberTV.com. © Copyright 2019 by Aaron Harber and USA Talk Network, Inc. All rights reserved. This column is published with permission from Aaron Harber. This opinion column does not necessarily reflect the views of Boulder Weekly.
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THE ONES WE LET IN by Angela K. Evans
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CODY TUTTLE
I’m
not a pet person. It’s not that I don’t like animals. Like people, it just takes me time to warm up to them, to let them in. Loyalty isn’t a given, it’s earned. Relationships take time to develop, built around proximity and shared experi- ences, mutual proven reliance on each other in good times and bad. Too often, I find, people expect me to freely offer up my affections to pets I hardly know. Why would I pet an animal without knowing its personality? Its health history? Its hygiene? Why would I offer pets access to my love and care when we’ve only just met? Why would I give them all of my attention when there are so many humans to get to know? I can’t just accept pets’ cuteness as a sign that they’re good-natured, friendly, trustworthy. I have to observe it, witness it, experience it. This is why I’ve always been skeptical of cats. They usually gravitate to the one person in the room (me) trying to avoid them at all costs. Are they rubbing up against my leg to genuine- ly show affection? Or are they simply meeting their own need for physical touch? Maybe even using their purr to manipulate me into liking them, stroking their own ego, before they slink away? Any person acting this way I would find likewise repulsive. But this isn’t about cats. It’s about dogs, one dog in particular — Astroman, Astro for short
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— named after his owner Cody’s favorite Yosemite climb. Before I knew Astro well, I saw him charging along the lake- shore from a distance, the Eastern Sierras Nevada Mountains fill- ing up the sky behind him. A Canadian wolf-dog, he elegantly gal- loped across the dusty sand, chasing nothing in particular, as we motored closer. Easily mistaken for a coyote, he was wild, slightly terrifying, but also alluringly beautiful — abundant white and gray fur, a thick neck, dark, deep eyes. There wasn’t a person in sight, and we debated going in to shore, unsure of this animal we would encounter. Then, as we came around the corner to dock, there was Cody on his small Hobie Catamaran with bright orange sails, comfort- ably trusting Astro to run uninhibited along the expansive shore. When called, Astro returned just as quickly as he had left. Needless to say, later, when Cody and his wife, Cherise, asked to move in with me, bringing along Astro of course, I was skeptical. Who was this dog and what kind of roommate would he be? Would he eat the leftovers on the counter when my back was turned? Or bolt out the door if I inadvertently left it open? Would he demand my attention when there was work to be done? Would his energy take over the house, robbing me of the detachment from others I’d easily cultivated in just a few short weeks of living alone? But Cody and Cherise were convincing: Astro may be big, and hairy, and full of energy when he’s outside. But inside, he’s gentle, even mellow, they said. I don’t like pets, I counter-argued. I can’t trust them. Eventually I relented, and Astro proved me wrong. Although aware of his need for others, Astro was never needy. And I quickly grew used to having him around. On walks, runs and hikes, he’d run free but circle back to me every so often, especially when other pets or people came close, allowing his loyalty to overcome any curiosity he had about the newcomers. Around town, he’d ride in the back of my truck, and stay there, unleashed, as I ran into the store, the post office, the coffee shop, never disappearing from where I last left him. Astro was there for late-night deadlines and early mornings, when I’d come down to the kitchen to make coffee, only to find Cody already awake and working away. I was newly pursuing jour- nalism, Cody had his eyes set on adventure photography and vid- eography, teaching himself how to artfully capture the persever- ance of the human spirit to the backdrop of breathtaking land- scapes. Astro was there as we all talked about the hustle — the balance of enjoying the slow pace of life living in a small town affords, and the desire to contribute to the world around us, not forsaking the meaningful life for an easy one. And Astro was there, lying on his bed in the corner, as our liv- ing room transformed into a gear shop, sponsors sending copious amounts of winter expedition jackets, mountaineering boots and camera equipment, as boxes piled up in my room. After just six months of living together, it was time to go our separate ways — me to Colorado in pursuit of a writing career, Cody and Cherise to Nepal for their most ambitious project to date: to film a record- breaking ascent of Annapurna. It was a place and a people that quickly captured their hearts, as earthquakes rattled the country and upended their plans. But they didn’t know that yet, as they prepared to go. We were all full of anticipation, maybe even hope, of what the future could bring. Astro, though, was staying behind, first with me and then when it was time for me to go, with other friends. In the end, he didn’t leave me. I left him. Astro visited me in Denver, my first Christmas here. Cody and Cherise had been traveling in their Sprinter van around the Southwest, filming epic slackline and base jumping stunts in Utah’s
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canyons before heading to see Cody’s family in the Midwest, where he had once created flower arrangements for Oprah. Astro stayed with me for a week, and we picked up right where we left off — easily falling back into a comfortable rhythm of life. That week, Astro and I walked around the city, leashed up, equally curi- ous about the world of concrete and asphalt we now found our- selves in, making sure to stick close to each other as people — so many people — passed us on the sidewalk, in traffic, in a hurry. We’d get back home and breathe a sigh of relief, spending the evenings laying around the house, or frolicking in the snow in the backyard, free. Soon it was time for him to leave me, onto the next adventure with Cody and Cherise. I followed him from afar — pouring over photos of him paddleboarding with Cherise on thawing alpine lakes, or winter camping with Cody in the snowy Eastern Sierra. I saw him playing with other friends as Cody and Cherise continued to return to Nepal, helping rebuild villages and schools, sharing the story of the people they met there with the world. As they began to pursue paragliding more and more, filling their social media feeds with far off places and mountains from home, I knew Astro was never far away. The last time I saw Astro was this past Labor Day at Cody and Cherise’s house in the Eastern Sierra. A group was gathered for a barbecue, new friends and old, most of us from out of town, former locals who had moved on to bigger cities, chasing dreams that seemed so much smaller now. Maybe more urgent too. After hours of reminiscing, laughing and crying, I went inside to warm up and cool off, take a breather from all the emotion. I found Astro curled up on his bed next to the dining room table. I just laid straight down next to him and buried my head in his fur, draping my arm across him and petting his head. And he let me for awhile, the two of us laying there together, before he decided it was all too much. He needed his space. He got up and moved to the other side of the room, laying down on the wood floor, leaving me his bed if I wanted it. I think he knew. He knew, at least as much as he could, that Cody wasn’t com- ing back. That Cody was gone. Despite his shoes by the sliding door and his jacket hanging on the coat rack. Nevermind his toothbrush on the counter in the bathroom or his clothes still in the closet. Forget his gloves left on the workbench in the garage, next to muddy mountaineering boots waiting to be cleaned. Or his desk still set up in the living room, hand-scrawled notes next to his keyboard, his computer poised to edit. Astro was like the rest of us — he was OK, until he wasn’t. Until he wanted to retreat to his own corner, lay his head down and try to forget that Cody was no more, at least not in this earthly sense. He had gone out flying one day and never came back, and we all were at a loss trying to understand. How could someone who lived so fully, pushed the boundaries of possibility so hard, cared for all of us so well, be gone? How could a friend we’d come to trust so deeply, someone who knew how to laugh but also chal- lenge our perceptions of reality, leave? It’s so much harder to lose someone you’ve actually let in. I didn’t linger long, taking comfort in Astro’s willingness to be alone among so many people. I hugged Cherise and other friends goodbye, promising to “keep the dream alive” in honor of Cody and the expansive life he had pursued. I glanced back at Astro, his head resting on his crossed paws, staring across the room at a photo of Cody para- gliding towards the Himalayas, and walked out into the dark moun- tain night — the sliver of moon just barely visible, the Milky Way radiantly filling up the black sky.
DECEMBER 26, 2019
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2019 CAITLIN ROCKETT
THE GARDEN
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by Caitlin Rockett
sat on a wooden stool in my garden one mid-September evening enraptured by an orchestra of crickets. They sounded louder this year, like they sound in Western North Carolina where I grew up. I let a warm wave of nostalgia carry me out to sea, but a cramp in my lower abdomen sent me crashing into the shore. My period. A reminder of recent loss. I took a drag off a joint and stared at the narrow bed where I’d grown lettuce this year, letting my focus grow softer and softer until everything blurred. Time became meaningless and all that mattered, all that was real, was the sound of crickets singing to one another, the smell of honeysuckle, the warmth of the sun... But time isn’t meaningless... not exactly. I forced my eyes to focus. see THE GARDEN Page 16
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THE GARDEN from Page 15
These  were  the  final  days  I’d  get  to  spend  in  my  garden  before  the  first  mid- October  snow  on  the  Front  Range  took  it  away,  so  I  tried  to  take  it  all  in:  the  ver- dant  husks  of  the  tomatillos,  the  trumpet- ing  squash  blossoms,  the  delicate  tendrils  of  a  pumpkin  vine  grasping  the  trellis,  like  an  infant  seizing  their  mother’s  finger.  The  garden  in  its  current  form  is  two  years  in  the  making,  built  at  my  rental  property  with  permission  from  my  land- lord.  To  build  the  raised  beds,  my  hus- band  salvaged  discarded  wood  from  con- struction  sites  where  he  worked,  and  I’d  spent  days  carefully  watching  when,  where  and  how  long  the  sun  lit  up  the  backyard.  It  started  as  three  beds  the  first  year,  six  the  second.  I  shoveled  at  least  three  yards  of  dirt  into  those  beds,  and  a  couple  yards  of  mulch.  That’s  approximately,  by  my  esti- mate,  a  zillion  shovels  full  of  dirt  in  and  out  of  a  wheelbarrow.  I  painted  the  fence  around  the  garden  barn-Âred  and  put  a  jet  black  latch  on  the  gate.  I  tucked  a  cheap,  solar-Âpowered  bird  bath  that  lights  up  at  dusk  and  a  wobbly  planter  box  full  of  pink  and  purple  petunias  into  a  southern  cor- ner  for  a  spot  of  decoration.  In  a  northern  corner,  a  flower  bed  that  may  one  year  actually  pass  as  a  flower  bed.  I  salvaged  a  tiny  rocking  chair  from  the  bric-Âa-Âbrac  my  mother-Âin-Âlaw  brought  over  for  a  yard  sale  and  set  it  near  the  flower  bed.  I  woke  up  early  most  mornings  to  water  the  garden  while  the  sun  was  still  shy  and  forgiving,  then  I’d  sit  on  that  wooden  stool  and  drink  coffee  until  I  absolutely  had  to  leave  for  work.  My  husband  built  the  beds  (some- thing  he  reminds  me  of  when  we  fight  and  I  say  productive  things  like,  “You  don’t  even  love  me!â€?),  but  what  was  inside  the  beds  was  my  labor,  my  crafts- manship.  It  was  a  tough  start  to  the  growing  season  for  our  little  garden.  A  spring  hail  storm  wiped  out  most  of  the  seedlings  I’d  grown  under  a  cheap  grow  lamp  on  my  dining  room  table  for  six  weeks.  I  knew  I  needed  hail  netting,  some  hoops  —  I  took  a  chance  and  lost.  We  made  up  for  the  loss  by  finding  a  family  nearby  who  sold  homegrown  veg- gie  and  flower  seedlings  out  of  their  driveway.  Supporting  another  family  took  some  of  the  sting  out  of  losing  my  own  seedlings.  (Later,  in  the  summer,  a  com- plete  stranger  gifted  me  a  dozen  or  so  other  plants  and  several  bags  of  soil,  fur- ther  salving  the  wound.) By  late  spring  I  had  a  decent  smatter- ing  of  thriving  plants:  four  types  of  toma- toes;Íž  early  summer  squash;Íž  Bibb  lettuce,  spring  mix  and  spinach;Íž  half  a  dozen  hot  I
and  sweet  peppers;Íž  some  pie  pumpkins.  Apparently,  snap  peas,  cantaloupe  and  strawberries  fell  outside  of  my  skill  level  this  year.  I  choose  to  believe  they  knew  I  tried  my  best.  By  early-Âsummer,  the  squash  were  a  micro  rainforest  in  their  bed,  the  stalks  of  the  tomato  plants  were  thick  as  my  wrist  in  some  places  and  the  alkaloid  smell  of  their  foliage  perfumed  the  air.  The  lettuce  was  long  done  for,  but  the  basil  and  oreg- ano  were  bushy.  Outside  the  barn-Âred  gate  my  hus- band  and  I  were  lumbering  through  a  lab- yrinthine  immigration  process,  making  payments  to  the  IRS,  fighting  back  credit  card  debt,  paying  my  student  loan,  living  without  health  insurance  and  generally  grinding  our  way  through  millennial  adult- hood  questioning  our  very  existence.  I  was  sick  of  coming  home  from  work  to  clean  and  cook  a  meal  every  single  night;Íž  he  was  exhausted  from  12-Âhour  days  of  manual  labor  with  unproductive  men  who  often  had  opinions  about  “illegals.â€?  We  were  pretty  sure  we  were  still  decent  people,  but  we  were  worn  so  thin  we  could  barely  see  each  other.  I  went  home  every  afternoon  and  sat  in  the  middle  of  the  garden  while  the  dogs  chased  each  other  around  the  yard.  Before  I  washed  dishes  or  put  a  chicken  in  the  oven,  I  would  watch  bees  dive  deep  into  the  bells  of  squash  blossoms.  I’d  lose  20  minutes  pulling  weeds.  I’d  wonder  if  I  should  leave,  and  what  would  happen  if  I  did.  I  thought  about  my  hus- band  building  the  raised  beds.  I  noted  where  the  sun  was  in  the  sky  and  what  time  it  was.  Maybe  that  wasn’t  the  right  place  to  plant  the  lavender.  Better  get  that  chicken  in  the  oven. As  the  days  grew  longer  and  hotter,  our  patience  and  compassion  grew  short- er  and  colder.  Everything  was  grounds  for  a  no-Âholds-Âbarred,  knives-Âout,  Katy-Âbar- the-Âdoor  argument:  the  trash  can,  the  recycling,  the  cat  box,  the  dog’s  leash,  the  dead  lavender. After  our  USCIS  interview  in  late  June  confirmed  there  would  be  thou- sands  more  dollars  to  pay  and  many  more  years  to  invest,  I  thought  we’d  hit  rock  bottom.  But  we  hadn’t...  not  just  yet. George  Bernard  Shaw  said,  “The  best  place  to  seek  God  is  in  a  garden.  You  can  dig  for  him  there.â€? You  could  say  the  same  of  staring  into  the  night  sky  and  contemplating  the  physics  that  willed  us  all  into  being,  but  that’s  a  little  too  existential  for  day-Âto-Âday  work  in  my  opinion.  The  garden  —  a  tiny  universe  —  is  BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
much  more  practical.  Tangible,  at  least. In  the  garden  I  put  my  hands  in  the  earth  and  quite  literally  ground  myself.  The  passage  of  time  is  both  important  and  meaningless  in  the  garden;Íž  I  know  when  the  frost  will  probably  come  for  my  plants,  but  until  then  I  will  selfishly  lose  track  of  the  hours  as  I  watch  them  grow  and  climb  and  blossom  and  bear  fruit.  It’s  clear  we’re  meant  to  take  care  of  one  another;Íž  the  plants  take  in  the  carbon  dioxide  I  exhale,  and  I  take  in  the  oxygen Â
they  release.  I  train  them  on  trellis  climb- ing;Íž  they  teach  me  acceptance  in  the  face  of  transience.  On  that  mid-ÂSeptember  evening  my  husband  walked  out  the  backdoor  to  find  me  staring  blankly  into  space,  elbows  on  my  knees,  smoke  curling  up  from  the  joint.  “You  OK?  What  are  you  doing?â€?  he  asked.  A  dull  ache  cried  out  silently  from  my  belly.  I  translated. “Digging  for  God.â€?
“What?â€? I  looked  around  the  garden  and  thought  about  all  the  things  we  lost  this  summer,  and  all  the  choices  we  made.  I  thought  about  all  the  things  we  will  lose  in  the  future,  and  the  choices  we’ve  yet  to  make.  I  thought  of  my  little  seedlings,  the  ones  cut  short  by  hail.  Somehow  we  still  managed  to  grow  a  garden. I  stood  up.  “Come  look  at  this  bug.â€?  Â
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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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PEDRO BERRUGUETE ‘SANTO DOMINGO Y LOS ALBIGENSES’
ome books should be burned. At least one book should be burned. That book should be Ulysses. THE WRONG MOLLUSK
I was at the Kapi’olani Farmers Market in Honolulu a few years ago. It was my first time in Hawaii, and I had a field day buying and tasting fresh, hand-plucked soursop, lychee, apple bananas, pineapple and mango. I ate meaty, knuckle- sized macadamia nuts, sipped fresh Kona coffee and pound- ed purple ube muffins. After feasting for an hour, I eyed a long line that led to an abalone stand. Abalone is a bit of a culinary white whale, to mix maritime metaphors. It’s an endangered species that’s critically over- fished, and so not easily found. But its gustatory reputation is immense. I had heard its taste is unique — like a truffle’s is — its texture as silky as marrow and its briny veil scintillates on the tongue. In Hawaii, there are responsible abalone farm- ers raising the esteemed mollusk and selling it on the island, without imperiling its very existence. Out of cash and my belly full, ruing my splurge of belly and wallet, I decided if I were lucky enough to return to Hawaii, I’d stand in that line and fork over all my dough to eat one. Luck was on my side. I returned to Hawaii. I waited in line. I paid $40 for three abalone, two grilled and slathered in soy sauce, one raw, all placed back on their opalescent shells. I stood in the shade of a banyan tree and slurped them down. “Meh,” I thought. “Tastes like a scallop.”
IN DEFENSE OF BURNING BOOKS AND ABALONE by Matt Cortina
NOW I’M SCREAMING ‘I DON’T SEE A FUCKING UNICORN!’ I felt scalloped after reading Ulysses. Here is a book that “has all the answers,” I’d been told, a book that resides near the top of every list of the greatest novels of all time, an important book with which every serious reader needs to reckon. It’s also a book that sucks to read. James Joyce’s archaic references, scattershot narration, made-up words and uncontextualized dialogue make a chore out of pulling meaning from the book. Four times I’d tried to read Ulysses and four times I’d put it back on the bookshelf alongside books I had read, the indented black words on its cover morphing from “Ulysses” to “You know you’re not allowed to tell people you read this, right?” I couldn’t enjoy other books knowing it lurked in the shadows, so I turned on the high beams, hunkered down and read it, skimming the incoherent parts and letting my eyes go numb, like I’m trying to find the picture in a Magic Eye book, which I could never do, 18
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feeling joyless and confused until I got to the end. A RECURRING NIGHTMARE I was a kid and I’d be sitting in my bed and I’d zero in on one fiber of the carpet. Immediately, I’d be shrunk down to the size of the fiber, and it freaked me out that I knew how large the world was, how long it would take to get to just the door of my bedroom, at that size. And then I’d shrink down to the size of one speck of dust on one thread of one fiber, and the knowledge of the infinite molecules between me and the door, visualized by a counter whose numbers spiraled infinitely upwards, usually jos- tled me awake in a cold sweat. Unable to verbalize the weight and enormity of that, I just screamed. Incoherent, uncontextualized screaming about the infinite size of the universe. My nightmare and Ulysses. RECURRING NIGHTMARE RECURS So I should not have bought Infinite Jest. Acknowledging that it had no “recogniz- able components” or “entry points,” Dave Eggers wrote in its foreword, “It would be I
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
very unlikely that you would find a reader who, after finishing the book, would shrug and say, ‘Eh,’” which is not an endorsement. In fact, it should have been a warning to stay the hell away from it and not let it scallop me. The first time I tried to read it, I got 100 pages in (plus three out of 100-plus pages of footnotes so tedious I audibly groaned at the sight of superscript) and quit. The second time, I got 600 pages in, quit and didn’t read anything for almost a year, figuring I needed to keep all the book’s winding narratives unsullied by other, tidier plot lines, otherwise I’d never get back into it. After over a year hiatus, I finished the final 400 pages or so. Scalloped again. I didn’t say ‘Eh,’ but I probably did say, ‘Huh.’ Now as a book-reading white dude who, in college, tried to win girls by virtue of the books I carried around, cover out, I loved David Foster Wallace, and still do. And Infinite Jest is certainly something — I’d liken it to a self-guided tour to every fold of a human brain. But I don’t look back on it fondly. Its characters stay with me, but only in the way a dent stays in a skull after a copy of Infinite Jest has hit it. “Is it our duty to read Infinite Jest?” Eggers was once asked. “This is a good question,” he wrote in the book’s foreword, “and one that many people, particularly literary-minded people, ask themselves. The answer is: maybe. Sort of. Probably, in some way. If we think it’s our duty to read this book, it’s because we’re interested in genius.”
and so concentrated on hating it, the answer was, I think, I hate to say it, within its many, many convoluted pages. Flummoxed by why people would celebrate this book every year, and why, 100 years later, literary minds still con- sider it essential, I reread Ulysses. With Spark Notes. Like a ninth grader. I don’t feel ashamed about that, by the way. How else would I know when Joyce decides to randomly insert narration from another time and place into scenes in Episode 10? How else would I know Joyce was attempting to recreate nine styles of outdated English literature in Episode 14, and not, as I had assumed, fucking with us? I suppose I could’ve inferred that Episode 15 was a series of hallucinations when Leopold Bloom gave birth to eight children and a woman thanked him for mas- turbating to her in public, but then again, I didn’t the first time around. Episode 18 is 25,000 words and nine sentences. One episode starts with a long list of incoherent fragments. Another is 300-plus questions and answers. Another is cut-up by news- paper headlines. Words and people blur together. And there’s no goddamn context for anything! Turns out, that’s kind of the point. ASTRONOMY LESSON “Observe the attention to details of dustspecks. Never put on you tomorrow what you can wear today. Parallax!” says Bloom’s grandfather during a fever dream about pleated skirts. Parallax. An astronomical term that means things look differ- ently when viewed from different vantage points. Joyce’s dustspecks — the “scrotumtightening sea,” his “chookchook” chickens, calling stamps “stickyback pictures” and cheese “corpse of milk,” Stephen Dedalus’ righteous dis- dain for scholars, Molly Bloom’s clarifying monologue, an ever- changing narrative style and audacious commitment to push- ing every boundary of the English language that feels danger- ous, raw and laudably batshit, even today — are there on pur- pose, to be observed and enjoyed and experienced.
NO ONE IS BORN ON THIS PLANET TO READ INFINITE JEST OR ULYSSES But the bigger question is: Do we have a responsibility to attempt challenging and new endeavors? And if the answer is yes, how do we avoid cynicism when we find a scallop at the end of an abalone line, ‘Meh’ at the end of Ulysses? DESCALLOP YOURSELF When I was 20, a buddy and I rode our bicycles 4,200 miles across the country. Early in the trip, when I was getting my road legs, and particularly on slogs up and down the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia and Kentucky, I fantasized about the feel- ing of arriving at the Oregon coast. I imagined dropping my bike and running into the Pacific, and popping, and chugging, a 40. When I ultimately got to the coast, my immediate thought wasn’t, “This is glorious, where’s the Budweiser?” It was more, “So that’s it, huh?” This all makes me sound like a prick who can’t enjoy some- thing unless he knows how and how much it’s going to benefit him. But what I realized later was that I was bummed at the end of the trip because I was going to miss every day’s little moments: Eating breakfast at diners, chatting with folks in small towns, riding my bike all day long in the sun, playing cards with my buddy at night and camping under the stars;; milkshakes in a pastor’s house, riding in the back of a bourbon distillery tour guide’s pickup in a tornado, selecting “Cotton Eye Joe” 15 times in a row on a jukebox in a Hartsel bar and then leaving...
THESIS You could read Ulysses over and over again until you die and not pull out every speck of dust. At what point do you stop? Will you ever feel like you got the abalone you came for? Can you ever count all the dustspecks in the carpet of your darkest dreams? Nope. Probably not, at least. Give in to it. And if you can’t, just burn Ulysses and move onto something else. P.S. It would’ve been apropos to burn the maps and end the bike trip in Vesuvius, a small town deep in Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains. If I had considered all the peaks I needed to pedal over to get through just Vesuvius, all the miles, all the feet, all the specks of concrete in the road and all the sub- atomic fibers of which they were made, and then added all the headwinds in Kansas, the days on incline in the Rockies, get- ting stuck on a mountain with a flat tire in Montana, I would’ve said, “Hasn’t this gone on long enough?” Instead I put my head down, kept pedaling, spent the night at a woman named the Cookie Lady’s house, which had a robotic, life-sized Santa with whom she swayed as it doot-dooted “Jingle Bells,” woke up and kept going, all the way to the snotgreen, scrotumtightening sea, nary an aba- lone in sight.
DO YOU KNOW THIS ALREADY BC I DIDN’T Somewhere along the way, I forgot I had set out to accom- plish a big, fat, hairy goal, and instead just lived inside it. I effec- tively descalloped myself. ARRGGGGGHH! Now if I hadn’t been so focused on just finishing Ulysses BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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essaysissue
2019 NOELLA SEABURG
M
MY 100-GAME SEASON
y baseball loyalty was irrevocably formed in 1961 at the tender and impressionable age of six when the Washington Senators relocated to Minneapolis and became the Minnesota Twins. At that time, I was a first-grader at Oak Hill Elementary in St. Louis Park, MN, and became terminally infected by “Twins Fever.” Despite leaving the Twin Cities at the age of twelve and spending my high school and young adult years in California – followed by the past twenty-seven years in Colorado – I have remained a loyal Twins fan. The truth be known, spending so many years rooting for my beloved Twins as the visiting team – mostly in Anaheim and Oakland when they were pitted against the Angels and Athletics – has manifested deeply within me as a sort of “fish out of water” personna. It may very well be that one of the Weekly’s primary missions, championing the cause of the underdog, is a reflection of my lifelong habit of cheering for the visiting team. But I digress. My point is that, aside from two brief trips to the Twin Cities in 1976 and 1987, I have had to be satisfied to be a Twins fan from afar. That is until last month when I was invited to play in a baseball tournament in Fort Myers, Florida, the spring training home of the Minnesota Twins, and the site of Hammond Stadium, a 9,300-seat facility where the Twins play their home games in February and March. I have played baseball in one form or another every year of my life since I was a
by Stewart Sallo
see 100 GAME SEASON Page 22
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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NOELLA SEABURG
100 GAME SEASON from Page 21
walk-on addition to a T-ball team at the age of 7. During recent years I have become steeped in the surprisingly vast adult baseball community, and during the 2019 season I found myself playing on three local Colorado teams and traveling to tournaments in Palm Springs, California (January), Las Vegas (March), San Diego (May), Rapid City, South Dakota (September) and Phoenix (October). Around mid-summer I began to embrace the goal of playing 100 games in 2019, but my projections suggested that I would fall short of that goal by around 10 games. It was at that point that one of my baseball buddies mentioned that he was planning on going to Florida in November for the Roy Hobbs “World Series,” and offered to broker an invita- tion for me to play on a team called the Minnesota Goats. Not only would the addition of a trip to Florida enhance my chances of achieving my 100-game goal, but it would offer me the opportunity for an emotional journey back to my child- hood on a team comprised of players from my hometown. As it turned out, I felt an immediate sense of brotherhood with my Goats teammates that belied the 52 years that had passed since my last season as a Little Leaguer in St. Louis Park. My month-long visit to Arizona in October had added 21 games to the 70 I had played prior to my annual 12-and-a- half hour journey from Boulder. And so I arrived in Fort Myers with 91 games under the black belt and gray pants I had packed to complement the yellow and gold Minnesota Goats jerseys I would be wearing during the coming fortnight. The first of two consecutive tournaments with the Goats began the following day, and 22
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six games later as the team’s leadoff hit- ter, shortstop and relief pitcher, we lost in the first round of the playoffs, and I had a couple of days off to enjoy riding my rent- ed road bike in the warm, moist Southwest Florida climate. With 97 games to my credit, 100 games was now a foregone conclusion, as Tournament No. 2 began. We lost the first game and won the second game, which set the stage for my 100th game of 2019. The baseball gods were smiling on me as that game was scheduled to be played at the aforementioned Hammond Stadium. And equally fateful was the fact that I was scheduled to be the starting pitcher that day for the Minnesota Goats in a matchup with the Nova Scotia Monarchs. I was going to pitch in the Twins’ stadium for my 100th game of the year! During a conversation the night before the game with my wife, Mari, I was instructed to ask one of our fans in atten- dance to memorialize the auspicious event with photographs and perhaps a video or two (see the videos by reading this story at boulderweekly.com), and just prior to the game I found a more-than- willing photographer in the stands, Noella Seaburg – the sister of my teammate, James Cottingham – who did a fantastic job. The same sense of boyhood excite- ment that accompanied my first Twins game at the long-since demolished Metropolitan Stadium (“The Met”) in 1961 was with me that evening, as I tried — largely unsuccessfully — to get some sleep. But the next day I was raring to go as my friend/teammate/catcher/pitching coach, Bill Dettmann, and I jumped into our rented Jeep Compass and headed to the stadium. I
Preparing to pitch involves a special series of protocols, beyond the typical ones associated with getting ready to play as a regular position player — dress- ing in uniform and cleats;; preparing the bat with pine tar, a special, sticky sub- stance that improves the batter’s grip;; placing the helmet and batting gloves in one of the foot-and-a-half square cubbies at the end of the dugout;; warming up by running, stretching and playing catch in the outfield to get the arm loosened up. Preparing to pitch includes all of those rit- uals plus two specifically timed “bullpen” sessions, during which the pitcher throws to a catcher from a mound to (hopefully) hone in on a variety of pitches — in my case, fastball, slider, curve and changeup — all thrown at various speeds and loca- tions. The timing of the last bullpen session was less than ideal on this particular occasion, as the Goats were the visiting team, meaning that I would not be able to complete my warmups and walk directly from the bullpen to the real mound, the one in the middle of the 9,300-seat stadi- um where the Twins — my Twins — play every spring to prepare for their season. Rather, my team would bat first, leaving a larger-than-ideal gap between the conclu- sion of my warmups and the bottom of the first inning, when I would throw my first pitch. But the Goats turned lemons into lemonade as the visiting team by scoring four runs in the top of the first, sending me to the mound with a four-run lead. This served to render the solitary run the Monarchs scored in the bottom of the first inning insignificant, and as I walked to the dugout with the first inning jitters behind me, the scoreboard read: Goats 4, Monarchs 1. BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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was 16 years old when my father asked me if I wanted to be a hero. The year was 1999, ’round about late April, and Dad wanted to talk about the shooting at Columbine High School: The one where two stu- dents killed 12 of their classmates and one teach- er before turning the guns on themselves. All in all, 15 souls were lost that day, 21 were injured physically, countless more mentally. Back then, school shootings were a bit out of the ordinary. They weren’t unheard of — a shooting at a middle school in Jonesboro, Arkansas, the previous year left four stu- dents and one teacher dead — but this was something else. This was carnage: Complete with plans, tactics, modified firearms and homemade bombs. For the stu- dents and faculty of Columbine, the events were a cata- clysmic shock to the system. To outsiders, the over- whelming presence of evil seemed insurmountable. The two shooters pretty much did what they pleased until they decided to do it no more. No one stopped them;; no one could. It would take time for the stories to trickle out. In the following weeks, months and years, we would learn of little heroics: Acts of faith and defiance that would give a fractured community some semblance of resilience. There were indeed heroes on that day;; they just now slept six feet under. But when Dad asked me all those years ago if I wanted to be a hero, we didn’t know any of that. We just knew that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold shot the living hell out of the school cafeteria and library, killing their fellow students in the process. The whys were still
were killed;; many never reached the shore. Amid the chaos and carnage, the camera finds a soldier, dead as a doornail, lying in the surf. On his wrist is a watch, a watch that contin- ues to tick — counting all the seconds the soldier no longer can. Dad used to wear a watch. I don’t think he does anymore, but I’m sure if he was wearing one on April 20, 1999, and he happened to be in Columbine’s lunch cafete- ria, and he happened to throw a chair at either Eric or Dylan or both, and he happened to get that pock- etknife out of his jeans, and he happened to remain calm and cool and collected, then there is little doubt in my mind that he would also be dead on the ground, his watch counting all the seconds he could not. You don’t bring a knife to a gunfight;; another movie taught me that. Dad’s fantasy didn’t sit well with me. But a lot of things didn’t sit well with me back then. It’s a weird thing to be 16 years old and go to that many funerals. Like all the other weird things that happened that April, I packed it away, marked it: “To be opened at a later date,” and shoved it deep down. So deep, I forgot about it for 20 years. Forgot about it until July 23, 2019, the night I saw Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood. My later date had arrived. Set in Los Angeles 1969, specifically Benedict Canyon’s Cielo Drive, Once Upon a Time tells the story of two houses. The first of aging cowboy actor Rick Dalton and his trusty drinking buddy, Cliff Booth. The second of up-and-coming hotshot director Roman Polanski and his new bride, Sharon Tate.
THE QUICK AND THE DEAD by Michael J. Casey
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murky, as were the hows. And my father was busy spin- ning over and over in his head if they could’ve been rea- soned with. Or stopped. He asked if I thought about what I would have done, had I been in the cafeteria that particular Tuesday. I said nothing;; I didn’t have an answer. He did. He had a very elaborate answer, and he told me about it. He told me he would start by throwing a chair at one of them, catch- ing them off guard. He told me he would use the pocket- knife he always carried to get one of their legs. He told me he would grab one of their guns and use it on the other, or make them submit. He told me he would use his size and quickness, and that it would all be over in a matter of seconds. He told me all of this with a mixture of confession and pride. He spent time on it, worked out the angles, thought it through. Whenever people tell me fantasies of heroics, I always think of the same World War II movie;; this big, sweeping Hollywood epic with a cinematic reenactment of June 6, 1944, the day (a Tuesday, no less) Allied forc- es stormed the beach at Normandy, France. Thousands
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Most people watching Once Upon a Time probably know who Tate was because of how she died. It’s what makes the final hour of Once Upon a Time almost unbearable;; writer/director Quentin Tarantino turns the screws while counting down those fateful final moments. The first two hours of the movie are an acutely observed medita- tion on age, uselessness and obsole- tion. Watch the movie once, and it seems luxurious, indulgent, lazy even. Watch it again and it’s surprising how tightly constructed each scene, each piece of information is revealed and delivered. And just when you think you’re going to be trapped with these two drunks (charming though they may be) while one of the 20th century’s griz- zliest murders goes down across the cul-de-sac, those three miserable Mansonites — Tex Watson, Susan Atkins and Patricia Krenwinkel —walk through the door of Dalton’s house and find Cliff and his loyal pit-bull, Brandy, instead of Tate and her house guests. The fantasy has begun. And, here, our two stories merge. Cliff may be high on LSD, and hold- ing only a can of dog food — Wolf’s Tooth, as the label reads: “Good food for mean dogs” — but he still has a presence. Cliff may be a creation, a fig- ment of Tarantino’s mind, but he’s played by Brad Pitt. And a 50-some- thing Pitt is a formidable thing. More so when he stands there tall and arresting — bright white jeans radiating in the dark Los Angeles night, skin-tight shirt clinging to his frame, and that perfect Brad Pitt hair swept just so across his movie star face. Tex, on the other hand, has a lanky build, stringy hair, sunken eyes and an all-black get-up. The revolver he holds is so big it’s a wonder he can keep it steady. He looks like a hero’s wet dream of a villain — a punk-ass kid in need of being taught some manners. Eric and Dylan were also clad in
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
black when they took Columbine by storm. But they came armed in combat boots, military fatigues and black trench coats. Tex looks like he’s working stage crew for the drama department by com- parison. I wonder what my father pictured himself wearing. I wonder what he pic- tured Eric and Dylan wearing. Oddly, Tarantino’s revisionist fantasy plays a similar tune my father hummed 20 years ago: Cliff — with the help of Brandy the pit-bull, and a well-timed sucker punch from Francesca, Dalton’s wife — dispatches the lot of them. There’s even a knife in the leg;; two, in fact, and Cliff’s on the receiving end of one of them. I wonder, did Dad think he would get injured? Probably. No blood, no foul, as the saying goes. But I know he didn’t envision a flame-thrower (Dalton has one in his tool shed, it’s a long story), only Tarantino could have conjured that one up. Regardless of hardware, the ends are the same: The villains are van- quished, the innocent live to see another sunrise and history changes course. Once upon a time, indeed. Cliff and Dalton going to task on the Mansonites is fantasy enough, but it’s the how that reinforces the fantasy. Had Manson’s devotees entered the wrong house in the wee hours of Aug. 9, 1969, then it’s pretty plausible that they would have killed whoever lived there as well — even if it was an ass-kicking stuntman they walked in on. Tex has a gun, after all. Cliff just has a can of dog chow. I see a lot of my father in Cliff. The story my father told me back in ’99 is similar to Tarantino’s fantasy. It’s the old: What does it take to stop a bad guy with a gun? Answer: A good guy with a gun. Or a can of dog food. Maybe even a pocketknife. Maybe there are good guys with guns out there, but it seems like they’re on an extended vacation. I wish they would
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punch back in. Things are getting worse. I’ve thought a lot about my father’s fanta- sy in the past few months. At first, it made me feel icky. My father was in his late-30s at the time of the shooting — and here he was thinking about smacking the shit out of a couple of teenagers. Maybe even ending their lives. But the violence he concocted was a means to an end. He was trying to protect the kids who were there. He was trying to protect me from harm. Any father would. He didn’t have to. I, and about a hun- dred students and teachers fleeing the east side of the building, were out the door, down the hill, across the street, and into the adjacent neighborhood before the shooting really got going. Eric and Dylan were still stalking the hallways and executing our friends by the time a group of us found a kind stranger who let us into her house. She let us use her phone to call home. To let our parents know we were OK. And to let them know they could start fantasizing about how they might have prevented this from ever hap- pening. It’s been over 20 years since I ran from my morning math class to the sound of gunshots splitting the spring air. Twenty years and people are still arguing over how to prevent that from happening again. Everyone has a differ- ent answer. Some think it’s discipline, obedience and prayer. For others, it’s a bizarre totalitarian state where everyone is a potential shooter until proven inno- cent. For others still, it’s that good-look- ing guy in white ready to leap into action at a moment’s notice. It’s been 20 years, and no amount of discipline, obedience or prayer has slowed the shootings. Twenty years and even the hint of a totalitarian state makes peo- ple’s trigger fingers itchy. Twenty years and our hero in white is still a figment of the cinema and a few fathers’ imagina- tions. It’s been 20 years;; I think it’s time to try something else. The old ways aren’t getting the job done.
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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
essaysissue
2019
CHIEF NIWOT’S CURSE
by Sara McCrea
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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n the longest night of the year, we sit cross-legged in a circle and watch unfamiliar faces across from us flicker in candlelight. We clasp hands, the one to my right clammy and the one to my left ice cold. The full moon beams through the window like a spotlight on our host, who closes his eyes and begins to speak over the steady beat of a deer hide drum. I have been here once before, sit- ting on the floor of my neighbor Ryan’s living room and shivering when someone coming or going from the winter solstice ritual lets in a draft of December air. During an initial conver- sation in our front yard, my mother and Ryan had quickly bonded over their shared interest in spirituality. Last year, at the beginning of my winter break from college, she convinced me to attend his solstice party, insisting that a Boulder hippie celebration would be a perfect welcome home from my first semester on the East Coast. I was hesitant to go, not because this sort of get-together was foreign to me, but because I was suf- I
fering from altitude sickness, an ail- ment I had previously thought was reserved for tourists. Unwilling to admit the strength of my headache, I had no excuse not to go with my mother to the solstice party around the corner. Now, back for the winter break of my second year away, I am already familiar with the strange metric by which I have come to measure my identification with my home. Any per- sonal development or shifts in per- spective I acquire from my time at school are unintelligible when I am there;; it is only when I return to the place I have always known that I real- ize exactly how much I have changed. Because of this, much of my relation- ship to my home appears to be locat- ed in the 1,800 miles between Colorado and Connecticut. “I want to call in the directions: West, East, South, North, Above, Below. Thank you thank you thank you for joining us.” Ryan’s thanks tum- ble out of his mouth as if pulled from his throat by a string. “Pachamama, our Earth mother, thank you thank you thank you.” “Thank you thank you thank you,” DECEMBER 26, 2019
the girls on either side of me murmur. Beeswax candles in the center of the circle cast shadows around the room and illuminate an altar of feath- ers, stones, sage and other materials typically used in indigenous rituals from North and South America. Ryan welcomes us to his semi-annual sol- stice party, tucking a blond, shoulder- length lock behind his ear and asking us to say our names in a clockwise order. When my parents, sitting a few people away from me, introduce themselves, Ryan smiles and says, “We’re so lucky to have our elders here, to provide their wise insight.” I try to stop myself from wincing at the word elders, not because my parents are nearly twice the age of most peo- ple in the room, but because almost all of the faces flickering in the circle are white. Since neolithic times, the winter solstice has held significance for many different cultures, including indigenous communities in North and South America, East Asia and Africa. Though the solstice marks a time of darkness, its celebration usually see CHIEF NIWOT Page 28
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revolves around light. Pagans regarded the solstice as a time to celebrate the moon;; Druidic tradition used the date to celebrate the light of King Arthur. These days, many people who identify with the label of “spiritual, not religious” use the solstice as an alternate occasion for win- ter celebration, hoping to turn their backs on the greedy consumerism of Christmas. Ryan’s ritual is grounded in Incan tradi- tions — such as the invocation of the directions — but his annual party also blends elements from Native American tribes and India. It is unclear from which culture he takes each component of the ritual. Boulder was like most small, Western mining towns — Christian and conserva- tive — until the late 1960s, when flower children took Volkswagen Fastbacks across the Nebraskan interstate to scour the plains for free love. Many came from the East Coast for Vietnam protests at the University of Colorado, others were on their way to San Francisco when they saw the Rockies and took an eternal detour. They were anti-war, anti-WASP, anti-money. They expected the water that runs from the mountain glaciers to the creek in town to cleanse them of their past lives in places that valued social sta- tus and tradition over social openness and freedom. They found in Boulder natu- ral beauty, stories of indigenous spirituali- ty and psychedelics;; they founded Naropa University and the Jack Kerouac School for Disembodied Poetics. They felt pulled to the place by a force which seemed to emanate from the overlooking Flatirons — the jutting mountains formed by layers of compacted sediments dating back 280 million years. In this utopic town nestled in the mountains, they wanted to be reborn. When my parents and I moved to Boulder 15 years ago, many new acquaintances and neighbors were excit- ed to tell us about “Chief Niwot’s Curse.” As legend has it, people who come to Boulder and see its regal mountains and sun-soaked valleys are cursed to never leave. If they do leave, it will not be for long, and they will be compelled to return. This legend resonated with none more than my father, who left Colorado when he was 5 years old and returned when I was 5 years old. In 1968, his parents divorced and my grandmother took her three children to a rural town outside of Rockford, Illinois, where they attended schools with mascots that wore red body paint and headdresses. My grandfather moved to a plot of land 45 minutes out- side of Boulder, where his children spent dry Colorado summers swimming naked in mountain reservoirs and chopping veg- 28
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DECEMBER 26, 2019
etables in their father’s macrobiotic res- taurant downtown. Grandpa Jimmy expanded the crum- bling cabin on his acre of forest by add- ing geodesic domes onto the main struc- ture and using lichen rocks to build curv- ing pathways and staircases. In the domes, my dad and his siblings watched lightning storms through the fiberglass roof while surrounded by cases of their father’s weed plants. The design of the domes was inspired by Buckminster Fuller and Antoni Gaudí, with whom my grandfather shared a lifelong enthusiasm for integrating materials and patterns found in nature into buildings and reli- gious spaces. From Gaudí my grandfa- ther learned to have an aversion to lines, squares and rectangles;; his passion was reserved for all things rounded, circular and spherical. Grandpa Jimmy grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut, and moved West to enroll in Colorado College, where he fell in love with geology, Gaudi’s archi- tecture and my grandmother. Like many others who came from the East, he was captured by Colorado’s focus on the unin- hibited and the anti-artificial, as well as by the way the sunlight behind the moun- tains threw shadows across the valley and made the red rocks on the hillside glow. In the solstice circle, Ryan speaks about the movement of the planets, our nearness to and distance from the light, and the Earth’s positioning in its revolu- tion. Revolution, a word that means both a return to the same and an action of drastic change. It is a word that suggests that to walk the full circumference of the Earth would lead one to re-evaluate their starting point. I do not remember anything before my parents and I moved to Boulder, and because of this I suspect I will only ever understand my home opaquely. Over the past couple years, I have come to believe much of Boulder’s spirit is from it being the destination of a pilgrimage — not a place from which you can come, but the place for which you are always searching. My father describes it as a Neverland, a place that we must eventually leave to fully appreciate. By the time I left for col- lege in Connecticut, Colorado’s natural beauty seemed to me banal, the cultural emphasis on athletics and tech devoid of substance. My high school friends and I dreamt of cities, of places we could go where there would be things to “do” other than skiing and talking about where we skied. We also talked about going to places with more diversity, where we could meet and connect with people from different backgrounds. I
Leaving home, as I had anticipated, brought many valuable and challenging experiences. Most striking, however, was the overview — the realization of the extent to which Boulder’s homogeneity had become dangerously regular to me. Returning to Colorado sharpened my understanding of its beauty, but my return also implanted an awareness of this beauty as a commodity. For some to have access to the fields of wildflowers and rolling hills, others had the access brutally removed. Access, in some respects, is something I inherited, along with my light skin and green eyes. Ryan passes colored pens and small squares of paper embossed with wild- flower seeds around the circle. He instructs us to write something that we want to leave behind in the previous year and to slip the squares into the ridges of a comically large pinecone, which he plans to torch in the pizza oven he has built in his front yard. This way, he says, the negatives of the past will become smoke that dissolves into the dark sky. Next to the door of my grandfather’s cabin, printed in fading white ink on a dark slab of rock, a stanza of Rilke: “These things that live on departure Just once, everything only for once… Earth! What is your urgent command if not transformation?” I want to believe that an act of recog- nition would somehow absolve my neigh- bors, my parents and me of participating in a ceremony derived from indigenous rituals on land stolen from indigenous people. A recognition is itself a return, an acknowledgment that something has always been true. Perhaps if Ryan had opened the ritual explicitly stating which cultures informed his ceremony, the homogeneity of the guests would be less problematic. I know that Ryan has exten- sively studied these rituals with shamans in Peru, and like many others in the Boulder community, he has appreciation for and knowledge of the cultures that taught him these practices. There is noth- ing mocking about this ritual. And yet. “There is something disingenuous about European Americans — particularly those whom it might be fair to call the ‘winners,’ in terms of economic power and free- doms in America — adopting the identity of... ‘losers’ because we recognize belat- edly how much we lost in the transaction that made us white in this country,” essayist Eula Biss writes in Notes from No Man’s Land. Belated recognitions, I am learning, can be personal or inherited. They can appear as confrontations with our own ignorance or can be reflections on how the awful actions of our ancestors are largely responsible for many comforts BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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upon  first  meeting  the  gold-Âseekers  in  the  Front  Range,  Niwot  issued  a  different  warning. “People  seeing  the  beauty  of  the  val- ley  will  want  to  stay,  but  their  staying  will  be  the  undoing  of  the  beauty.â€? Chief  Niwot  was  fatally  shot  in  the  Sand  Creek  Massacre  in  1858,  along  with  hundreds  of  other  Arapaho  and  Cheyenne,  mostly  women  and  children.  Today,  the  Northern  Arapaho  people  live  on  Wyoming’s  Wind  River  Indian  Reservation,  while  the  Southern  Arapaho  and  Cheyenne  tribes  live  in  Oklahoma,  where  they  were  relocated  after  the  massacre.  Less  than  0.5%  of  Boulder’s  current  population  is  Native  American.  My  grandfather’s  contemporaries  say  that  the  new  influx  of  tech  companies  is  ruining  Boulder’s  spirit.  Open  Space  ordi- nances  prevent  developers  from  expand- ing  to  publicly  owned  land,  and  Boulder  has  instituted  height  caps  on  new  devel- opments  built  in  the  city  with  the  intention  of  preserving  the  town’s  natural  beauty  and  protecting  local  wildlife.  Yet  the  restrictions  also  place  spatial  limits  on  housing  and  are  partially  responsible  for  a  real  estate  market  in  which  the  cost  of  an  average  home  surpassed  $1  million  in  2016.  The  views  of  the  mountains  are  protected,  but  mostly  for  the  white  and  wealthy.  As  Boulder  struggles  to  define  its  beauty,  it  perpetuates  another  fallacy  that  was  held  by  the  gold  seekers,  by  the  flower  children,  and  now  by  the  tech  com- panies.  This  is  the  presumption  that  the  land  on  which  the  town  sits  is  still  a  blank  canvas,  a  place  that  can  itself  be  reborn  each  time  a  new  group  inhabits  it.  Each  cycle  of  settlement  has  imprinted  upon  the  land  as  layers  of  rock  have  compact- ed  into  the  mountains.  And  yet  the  past  remains  unrecognized  as  long  as  we  assume  that  we  do  not  have  to  redeem  the  land  by  making  space  for  those  who  once  inhabited  it.  We  fool  ourselves  in  thinking  we  can  outrun  where  we  come  from.  We  fool  ourselves  in  thinking  where  we  come  from  has  not  already  beat  us  to  where  we  are  going.  When  something  travels  in  a  circle,  its  return  to  its  starting  point  does  not  negate  the  journey  it  has  made.  Each  time  the  town  revolves,  we  assume  it  returns  to  the  same  place,  but  we  do  not  reckon  with  the  irrevocable  change  caused  by  the  cycle. After  the  guests  burn  the  pine  cone,  my  parents  and  I  say  goodbye  to  our  neighbors  and  walk  west  to  our  house  in  quiet  conversation  about  the  ground  beneath  our  feet.  The  moon,  bright  and  full,  lights  our  path.  The  mountains  in  front  of  us  bear  witness.  Â
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in  our  lives. Belated  recognitions  complicate  Boulder’s  self-Âconceptualization  as  a  place  that  generates  rebirth.  We  like  to  imagine  that,  even  though  we  are  white,  we  are  spiritually  returning  to  principles  that  were  abundant  on  this  land  before  the  Gold  Rush.  We  imagine  when  the  hippies  poured  in  from  the  East  and  took  over  the  town  from  the  miners,  it  marked  the  end,  not  the  continuation,  of  the  cycle  of  settlement.  But  these  fantasies  about  rebirth  are  steeped  in  erasure  and  dis- honesty.  There  are  two  public  statues  of  Chief  Niwot  in  Boulder.  One,  in  red  stone,  depicts  him  resting  his  chin  on  his  knee,  looking  over  the  path  next  to  the  creek  that  runs  through  town.  The  other  is  a  bronze  bust  that  faces  the  county  court- house.  Although  I  have  walked  by  the  statue  most  days  for  the  past  15  years,  it  is  unobtrusive  and  hidden  by  tree  branch- es.  Over  spring  break,  around  the  time  of  the  equinox,  I  stopped  and  read  the  plaque  beneath  the  bust  for  the  first  time: THIS  STATUE  COMMEMORATES  THE  ARAPAHO  INDIANS  WHO  HAVE  LIVED  ON  THE  PLAINS  OF  COLORADO  SINCE  THE  1790’S  AND  CHIEF  NIWOT,  WHO  WITH  HIS  PEOPLE  SPENT  THE  WINTERS  IN  THE  BOULDER  VALLEY.  IT  STANDS  IN  TRIBUTE  TO  THAT  SENSITIVITY  AND  RESPECT  FOR  NATURE  WHICH  IS  INHERENT  IN  THE  INDIAN  CULTURE. Like  the  statue,  the  message  on  this  plaque  is  somewhat  obscure,  but  vaguely  patronizing.  Standing  eye  to  eye  with  the  bust,  I  found  myself  wondering  why  the  man  it  commemorated  would  tell  strang- ers  that  they  were  cursed  to  stay  on  his  land  forever,  unless  he  was  vocalizing  a  fear  for  the  future. Ryan  passes  a  second  stack  of  seed  paper  around  the  circle.  He  tells  us  to  write  down  what  we  want  to  welcome  into  our  lives  for  the  coming  year.  We  write  in  silence,  and  when  we  are  finished,  there  is  a  quick  debate  about  whether  we  should  burn  these  squares  along  with  the  papers  that  contain  the  negativity  we  want  to  leave  behind.  The  consensus  is  that  to  do  so  would  complicate  the  sym- bolism  of  destroying  the  darkness,  so  we  slip  the  squares  into  our  pockets,  to  remind  us  of  the  light. There  is  no  historical  evidence  that  Chief  Niwot  spoke  any  curse  at  his  first  encounter  with  the  white  men.  Even  if  he  did,  within  the  legend  there  are  different  accounts  of  what  the  curse  was.  One  story  tells  the  curse  as  I  had  heard  it:  a  premonition  that  anyone  who  sees  the  beauty  of  Boulder  will  want  to  stay  forev- er.  But  according  to  numerous  reports, Â
Dan Ditslear from 300 Suns Brewing. Photo by Sue France.
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A MASOCHIST’S LOVE LETTER by Emma Athena
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AIMEE MURRAY
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love telling the story of my wisdom teeth. Anytime someone mentions a tooth extrac- tion or dentistry mishap, I weasel my experi- ence into the ring — the copious amount of blood, how the anesthesiologist was on vacation, my inability to sleep in my own bed for days. In short, it was one of the most painful experiences of my life. The third-most painful, in fact. I was 17, and it was the winter of my senior year. Essential to the story is the fact that it was basketball season, and I took sports very seri- ously in high school, so the window of opportuni- ty for removing my wisdom teeth was rather small: only the first few days of winter break would leave enough time for recuperation before practice restarted. The thing was, all four of my wisdom teeth were fused to my jaw. That meant they’d have to surgically saw and sand teeth from bone. During the initial consultation, the dentist told me they could squeeze me into that winter break window, but it’d come with a caveat: the anesthesiologist would be on Christmas vacation, so instead of getting put under, I’d receive topical and local anesthetics. Thinking of basketball, of course, I
DECEMBER 26, 2019
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obliged. From the beginning, the dentist tried to set me up for success. He recommended I bring an iPod so I could listen to music during the two- hour procedure. I downloaded Beyoncé’s newest album, 4, but as soon as I was lowered into the horizontal position, I realized even Queen B’s soothing and empowering voice couldn’t help me. No dissociating was going to happen here. A construction zone erupted inside my skull. The whirring drills and whining saws over- whelmed the existence of everything — except for the periodic and predictable strike of nerve pain each time they cut a layer deeper into my gums. The process began with topical numbing gels, then injections of anesthetic solutions in all four corners of my mouth. But, still, as they sliced open my gums and peeled back the pinky flesh to expose my bare jaw, new nerves were contin- uously exposed. Somehow the dentist and I developed a process: I’d roil and convulse each time he hit a new nerve, then he’d apply more numbing solution and the sensations would sub- side. It was a stormy ebb and flow, waves of pain, moments of release, but always an unre- lenting thunder. BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
Beyoncé was reduced to a faint mew in the back of my mind. Front and center was the demolition that echoed between my temples. There was no escape from the trenches of this experience. Each time they cracked a tooth free from my jaw, I thought of walnuts being busted between pliers. It sounded just the same. The constant vibrations and uncompromising pres- sure continued. Some 120 minutes later, they vacuumed out the blood that’d pooled under my tongue and wheeled me out to the waiting room, where someone applied a cooling mask that circled a constant flow of ice water across my jaw. My mom snapped a photo: my eyes spacey and disembodied, the face mask alien. I spent the next days couch-ridden. My bedroom, in the basement, was out of reach because stepping up or down stairs sent throbs of pulsing pressure to my mouth. I was afraid the stitches would burst. Would my brains slip out? My stomach ached. I’d swallowed so much blood. Twenty-four hours passed before I summoned the will to walk outside. Now, eight years later, it’s one of my most vivid memories. I remember the oval fluorescent lights overhead, the cement-like smell of drilled tooth, the metallic film of blood. Yet, I cannot conjure the actual feelings of the experience — the strikes of pain, the nerve endings. Physical pain is funny that way. I remember what I felt, but not how I felt. Physical pain, perhaps, can be the most present of feelings. You feel it until you don’t. The second-most painful thing I’ve experienced was the first time I ran a marathon. Admittedly, I was woefully underprepared and it was a quasi-impulsive decision during a time in my life when I needed a goal to work toward. I didn’t have long to pre- pare, and instead of leading me toward a sense of accomplish- ment and success, it drove me and my body to a grinding halt. The morning of the race, I was alone, in Mar del Plata, a new-to-me ocean-front city in Argentina, lacing up the same pair of Nike running shoes that I’d been wearing everyday for more than a year. The sole was so compressed I could wiggle my toes and feel the imperfections of the floor. The course ran through the city, up and down the main traf- fic corridors, then along the highway that parallelled the beach. I made it to mile 15 before I started to question what I was really getting myself into. A road marathon? A rote, masochistic exer- cise? The farthest I’d ever run before was 18 miles, but sudden- ly even that felt like a stretch. I walked to the next aid station and downed something sugary. The volunteers were so nice and encouraging, I was momentarily spurred by their blanket belief that I, and every other runner out there, could finish this thing. I set off running, but 10 minutes later I was walking. Not long after that, the grinding sensation set in. To this day, I’ve never been more aware of how my femur bones connect to my hip sockets, nor how my femur bones lock in with my knees. Each step compressed my hips toward my knees and that sandpaper sensation rubbed my spirits raw, dis- integrating my will to ever run again. I resolved to at least walk the rest. Dropping out never crossed my mind. I was young. As I approached the finish line, shuffling in that 80-year-old- man kind of way, three people dressed as pirates rushed out, grabbing my arms. They tried to goad me into running the final 100 meters, all cheery and festive and youthful in their cos- tumes and painted faces. I wanted none of it. I yanked my arms back, but they persisted like monsters in a scary manipulative clown nightmare, only Pirates of the Carribean-themed instead. Finally, begrudgingly, they followed me until my last step across the finish line. Someone threw a medal around my neck, and then I was back to being alone. All I had to look forward to was a mile-long uphill walk back to my hostel and a set of stairs that led up to a top bunk in a crowded dorm room. BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
I couldn’t walk for three days, but when I finally got my legs to function again, I boarded a bus to Uruguay and spent the next three days smoking weed on a beach and contemplating my life choices. It’s a strange privilege, putting myself through this self- inflicted pain. In the years after that marathon, I’ve run 100-mile- long trails;; I’ve set multi-day speed records across mountain ranges;; I’ve climbed until blood seeps from the thinning layers of my finger pads;; I’ve willingly showed up to, and welcomed in, all sorts of physical pain. I realized, to some degree, if you get intimate enough with yourself and understand the fleeting nature of pain, you can expand and contract your comfort zones, sometimes at will. Which is, of course, to say nothing of psychological pain, with its complex layers and grippy wraps that can swaddle the conscience forever. Nor chronic pain that may pulse and throb in unrelenting and overwhelming whispers, maybe shouts. I have still to learn about the depths of these pains. I know they will come in life, as they’ve already shown themselves in tickles and tears. And while I wish no kind of pain on no kind of body, I am drawn to the depths of my own physical pain. Mostly, I’m drawn to its erasure. The way it happens, but never quite sinks its teeth into folds of memory. I maintain the singular blessing of physical pain as a reminder that so much of life is temporary. We experience, we breathe, we move on. This holds true even for the number-one most painful expe- rience of my life, the memory that comes the closest to sensory recollection. It was a biking accident that happened my junior year of high school. I say accident because it was an accident, but I was the only one involved. My dad had a bike that I loved to ride — a real adult bike with fancy handlebars that rode fast and smooth. I was riding his bike to school one morning after a big rainstorm. These are important facts because, for one, I was a teenage girl riding a grown man’s bike, and two, the pedals were slippery. My ride to school cut through a patch of woods, and at the start of the woods was a big hill. I always took the hill fast, determined to get over it as quickly as I could. So, per usual, I stood up on the pedals to really crank down, pressing my full weight into my legs, and that’s when my feet slipped. Gravity rushed in. My crotch slammed down, nailing my pel- vic floor on the crossbar that runs, as they do on men’s bikes, in a straight line between the handlebars and the seat post. The bike and I keeled over as one unit, my face landing in soggy dirt, but I don’t remember any of the impact on the ground. I carefully slid out from the bike and stood back up, a little shaken, probably in shock, and righted the bike upward. I tried to lift my leg up and over the bar again, and it hurt, but I made it happen. When I sat back down on the seat, though, that’s when it all hit me in full force: hot white streaks of pain shooting up from between my legs, bursting out from the crown of my head like flames from the mouth of a dragon. I was flesh and bones and nothing more. I fell over again. Face to dirt. I could feel a sticky warmth spread between my legs. I didn’t want to look. I hobbled home and called my dad. He took me to the emergency room and I, thankfully, was treated to full-body anes- thesia. The doctors sewed the jagged edges of my right labia closed, which had burst open upon impact like a smashed egg. Eight stitches later, I woke up, groggy in the hospital ward. The next two weeks, I had to sit on a donut. I felt it fully, then it was gone. It all makes me wonder, quite seriously, about natural childbirth. I
DECEMBER 26, 2019
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No more Mr. Nice Guy
Clay Rose dishes on the future of Gasoline Lollipops, how Tibetan Buddhism is guiding the next album, finding new soul in the South, the sum total of Creedence, scoring a second ballet and leaving it all on the Hill
by Dave Kirby
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ON THE BILL: t’s midday on a chilly Wednesday, Gasoline Lollipops New in a month of Mondays, and Clay Year’s Eve Show — Rose is doing some press in with The Lonesome between bites of lunch. Through Days, The Alcapones. 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. the half-open door of our office, 31, Fox Theatre, 1135 we can hear the TV-compressed 13th St., Boulder. background cadence of outraged poli- Tickets are $25. ticians grilling some hapless govern- ment functionary about some impeachment-related technicality or another, windy performance art for all 11 TV viewers out there still dithering over the president’s moral quotient. Rose, by comparison, is composed and thoughtful, a calming counterpoint to the charade on TV — of course, he isn’t singing. Guys in ties, telling new lies, we comment to Rose. “...Except they’re not new, really,” he counters, and maybe he’s right. Which coincidentally leads to a discussion of the Gasoline Lillipops’ newest project, one that is approaching its finale and is likely to mark a watershed moment for the Boulder-based alt-outlaw- country band, of which Rose is primary songwriter and singer. see GASOLINE LOLLIPOPS Page 35
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“I’ve been writing a lot of political stuff lately,” Rose offers. “Well, I dunno if it’s political... yeah, I guess so. Social songs, maybe. “I just wrote a song called ‘Feed the Rich.’” We ask them for justice/They come out to bust us/They’d rather just let us eat cake instead/But there’s just one winner/ The rest of us are dinner/That’s how the rich get fed Nice. Whatever happened to protest music, anyway? “The only place that I can see it being present at all is in hip-hop. Those are the only musicians speaking out against The Man anymore. And I think it’s because, people think it’s like, glib or something. ‘That’s so 2005’ or something, like Occupy Wall Street. I don’t know what [happened to OWS] — I feel like Facebook and the corporate media conglomerates killed the Occupy movement. They made it... unfashionable... to be socially aware.” Lots has been written and speculated about that whole thing — we recall Michael Moore being interviewed out there in Manhattan, tents and drum circles behind him, swearing with the full force of progressive rage that OWS was going to finally, once and for all, re-order American society around justice and equal opportu- nity and the working stiff;; the days of fat- cat hedge fund managers cashing eight figure checks while retail workers and auto workers and private equity roadkill get laid off were over. Didn’t happen. Maybe it was the lack of a single fig- urehead. Or an expanded social grievance gumbo including environment vandalism, racial and gender inequality, corporate cor- ruption of government, stupid and costly military adventurism. Valid complaints all, of course, but a bucketful of grievance mashed into an unfocused and leaderless collective howl that soon bored the net- works, invited Nixonian hippy-backlash and submerged quietly under the crush of selfie culture and cute cat videos. And yeah, a new figure emerged on the scene not long ago, eclipsing Blankfein and Shkreli and all the others with an entirely new dessert tray of malignancy. “Yeah. Should have been ‘fuck the banks,’” Rose says. “We gotta stay focused. One revolution at a time. “And with this whole fuckin’ PC move- ment, you gotta know every angle of the issue before you speak about it (even though nobody does that, right?), and every- body has a counter argument to everything, it just made everybody really self-conscious. Or, just an ignorant narcissist that doesn’t give a shit, like the president.”
For their part, the GasPops are restruc- turing themselves around Rose’s songs, some co-written with his songwriter mother and with longtime friend Max Davies, and recording the new material (working title of the album: All the Misery Money Can Buy) to tape at Dockside Studios, in Lafayette, Louisiana — a humble little place located on a 12-acre estate in the heart of Cajun country on the banks of the Vermilion Bayou. That Rose and Co. should seek out a studio and ecosphere far from their Colorado base is part of the plan. “There are multiple reasons why I chose Louisiana... but one of them is that’s where... that’s where we need to be having the dialogue. It doesn’t make any sense to be sitting in a comfy home in Boulder, Colorado, arguing about fucking details with my left-wing friends. I would much sooner go down South and speak to our Southern friends. This is kind of how I’m planning this album: “In Tibetan Buddhism, there’s the dou- ble dorje. Each arm of the double dorje represents the four ways of dealing with ignorance. Specifically ignorance. “It starts in the East, and the East is to pacify. You try to calm it down, get it off its soapbox. “In the South, you try to enrich it. You add things to the ignorance, you try to beautify it a little bit. “In the West, there’s the magnetizing — if things aren’t working, you try to get them under your influence, more directly steer it... “And if all those don’t work, and you can’t move the ignorance, and you can’t change the ignorance, then in the North, there’s aggression. You just cut its head off. “But you gotta try these other three first before you go to the North. I just feel like so many people just coming right out of the gate with aggression when they’re talking to people on the other side, and it’s not effective at all, it just polarizes us even more.” One thing that all of us, or most of us, can agree on is that... well, nobody doesn’t like Creedence Clearwater Revival. The GasPops will be showcasing Cosmos’s Factory at their NYE show this year, sharing the covers with openers The Lonesome Days — perhaps an unexpect- ed selection after last year’s Tom Petty tribute. Arguably Creedence at their cre- ative and commercial highpoint, and clos- ing in on 50 years old, the album carried some of the band’s best loved, but schiz- oidally combined, numbers — the old school rocker “Travelin’ Band,” the fatigued melancholy of “Who’ll Stop The Rain,” soul nods like “Heard it Through the Grapevine” and the whimsical “Lookin’ Out My Back Door.”
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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Why Creedence? “Just ’cause we made this [new] album ‘down on the bayou,’” Rose says. “And also because we cut it so fast and loose, with that Southern influence. That was how Creedence rolled. “I just love Creedence, y’know? When you look at any individual part of that band, it’s just garbage. But you put it all together and it’s fucking amazing. It really is. It’s like a beautiful mosaic, made out of garbage.” Amid rehearsals for the NYE show and semi-monthly jumps south (below the Manson/Nixon line, as Rose refers to it) to finish the new album, Rose is also putting the finishing touches on his second opera collaboration with Garret Ammon, creative director of the Denver-based dance com- pany Wonderbound, titled The Sandman (A Newfangled Western). The piece is set to premiere in February, with the GasPops providing musical support. We recall Rose telling us last year that the stress of putting together their first collaboration, Wicked Bayou, just about finished him off for good, so we couldn’t help but ask if he had learned any lessons from the first project. (The ‘ain’t puttin’ myself through that again’ lesson obvious- ly eluded him.) “Ha. I guess I just couldn’t say ‘no.’ “I guess the lesson I learned was just to relax, and have faith. Last time, I was really losing sleep this far away from the production. Just losing my mind. But I have so many pokers in the fire now, I don’t have time to be stressed. I just gotta do the next thing in front of me. So when Garrett calls and says he needs the music, I’ll just not sleep for 72 hours and we’ll have a ballet at the end of the week.” Expect a handful of selections off the almost-finished new album at the NYE show, and while it may come across as a new guise for Rose, it’s actually, in a sense, a return to the type of political song- writing and provocation that he used to do. “All through my teens and 20s, that was the main thing I was writing. I steered away from that for years... But now I have a daughter, and that changes the way I personally view the situation, and I do feel a responsibility to stand up and do my part. And as small and as quiet as my voice may be, there are some people lis- tening to it;; I know for the most part I’ll be preaching to the choir.” Someone once said that protest music was an exercise in finding the right hill to die on. “Well, we’re all gonna die anyway,” shrugs Rose. So pick the right hill to die on? “Right. Make sure there’s not already a statue on it.” DECEMBER 26, 2019
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KITTY CRIMES, SUNSHINE MEDLEY SAT. JAN 18
TUES. JAN 28
BOULDER WEEKLY PRESENTS
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FOXFEATHER, MONOCLE BAND
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WED. JAN 22
YBN CORDAE
ROOSTER PRESENTS
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97.3 KBCO PRESENTS
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MOODY GOOD
MARTIN SEXTON
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THE MIDNIGHT CLUB
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JACKSON CLOUD ODYSSEY
SECOND CITY
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SUMMER CAMP: ON THE ROAD TOUR 2020
LAUGHING FOR ALL THE WRONG REASONS
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LUKAS NELSON & PROMISE OF THE REAL
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FOR THE RECORD | AN ACOUSTIC TOUR
SHAKEY GRAVES THUR. FEB 6
FRI. FEB 21
WESTWORD PRESENTS
LIVE FOR LIVE MUSIC & 97.3 KBCO PRESENT: SQUAD TOUR 2020
TAUK
MAGIC CITY HIPPIES TIM ATLAS
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FRI. FEB 7
88.5 KGNU & PARTY GURU PRODUCTIONS PRESENT
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.......................................................................................... LOS LOBOS .............................................. ANDERS OSBORNE + JACKIE GREENE ....................................................................... THE MUSIC OF CREAM .................................. ROSS MATHEWS “NAME DROP” BOOK TOUR ................................................................. THE DEL MCCOURY BAND
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FEB 22 FEB 23 FEB 27 FEB 28 FEB 29
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see EVENTS Page 38
GET DOWN AT FUNKY TOWN FEATURING MIDICINAL & INDIGENOUS PEOPLES.
7 p.m. Friday, Dec. 27, Dickens Opera House, 300 Main St., Longmont, 720-297-6397.
Come get down at Funky Town as the Grim Beard Productions crew hosts their annual toy drive benefiting Ronald McDonald House Charities (RMHC) at Dickens Opera House. Bring a new, unused toy (no stuffed animals will be accepted) and then get down to performances by MIDIcinal, Indigenous Peoples, Thin Air Crew, Gari-Dose, Butl3r and Judah Noble. For a list of items accepted by RMHC visit mhc-denver.org.
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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FRONT DERANGED AT THE DAIRY.
COURTESY ALL ABOUT THE BRASS
The Front deRanged Improv Comedy Troupe is comprised of artists who’ve performed in the country’s most impressive improvisational realms, including Second City, The Groundlings, Upright Citizens Brigade, Bovine Metropolis and the OxyMorons at Area 45. Reliably unpredictable, smart and silly, these players have honed their skills to use audience suggestions to create scenes, situations and clever one-liners in their delivery of unscripted, unbelievable and unforgiving comedy. This is an extreme play. Tickets are $12-$15, thedairy.org.
ALL ABOUT THE BRASS.
7:30 p.m. Friday, Dec. 27, Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut St., Boulder, 303-440-7826.
DECEMBER 26, 2019
8 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 28, The Wild Game Entertainment Experience, 2251 Ken Pratt Blvd., Longmont, 720-600-4875.
All About the Brass is a seven-piece horn-based group from Longmont. They’ll blow you away with classic rock covers from Chicago, Earth Wind & Fire, Santana, Paul McCartney & Wings, Pat Benatar, Bachman-Turner Overdrive and more. But don’t be shocked when you hear a funky cover from Bruno Mars. Wear your dancing shoes; the enthusiasm is contagious.
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arts Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art (BMoCA), 1750 13th St., Boulder: Adriana  Corral:  ‘Unearthed/Desenterrado;͞’  Gretchen  Marie  Schaefer:  ‘Folding  and  Thrust- ing,’  through  Jan.  19. Â
MONICA TYMCIO
MONICA TYMCIO’S PAINTINGS are a testimonial to her love of nature. She has spent the last 30 years living off-grid near the Indian Peaks Wilderness of Western Boulder County. It is here in this inspirational locale with her rescued horses, dogs and cats that she has made her home. She spends her time exploring the wilderness areas of Colorado on horseback, as well as backpacking in the remote canyons of Utah and New Mexico. Tymcio draws upon the deep sense of emotion she feels about a place or experience and then expresses that through her paintings to share with the viewer. A collection of her paintings are currently on display at the National Center for Atmospheric Research through Jan. 25.
Boulder Public Library, 1001 Arapahoe Ave., Boulder: ‘Build  a  Better  Book:  Stories  for  Your  Senses,’  Canyon  Gallery,  through  Feb.  2.
JAN 16 | EXPLORER SERIES THE STORIES WE TELL
JAN 23 | COLLECTIVE SPEAKERS SERIES DESSA: SENSELESS LOVE
1/24
AN EVENING WITH BUNTPORT THEATER BY STORIES ON STAGE
1/30
JOE SERTICH: DINOSAURS IN YOUR BACKYARD
MATCHSTICK 2/1 PRODUCTIONS: “RETURN TO SEND’ER� 2/7
DAVE SHOWALTER: FREEDOM TO ROAM
2/15
MEADOW MOUNTAIN
2/19
BOULDER’S EARLY AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY
Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut St., Boulder: ‘We  Are  What  We  Wear,’  featuring:  Jim  Ardnt,  Erika  Diamond,  Noah  Pica  and  Winnie  van  der  Riijn,  and  The  Pavlova  Project:  a  brilliantly  costumed  life,  through  Jan.  12.
Lyons Redstone Museum, 340 High St., Lyons: ‘40  years/40  artifacts’;͞  ‘All  Aboard!  Railroads  in  Lyons’;͞  ‘Lyons  Newspapers:  A  History,’;͞  ‘125  Years  of  Distinctive  Cameras’;͞  ‘Tiny  Stories:  Art  of  the  Dollhouse’;͞  ‘The  Flood  of  2013’;͞  ‘Native  American  Artifacts,’  and  more.
Edge  of  Alchemy,’  through  April  5. Â
MONUMENTAL  —  coproduced  by  Black  Cube  and  the  Denver  Theatre  District.  Through  Jan.  31,  2020.  For  times  and  locations,  denvertheatredistrict.com/ event/monumental.
Firehouse Art Center, 667 Fourth Ave., Longmont: ‘Nacimiento’  —  Justin  and  Isabel  Favela,  through  Jan.  5.
University of Colorado Art Museum, 1085 18th St., Boulder: ‘Body  Language:  Picturing  People,’  through  June  2020;Íž Â
Museum of Boulder, 2205 Broadway, Boulder: ‘Wild:  Buffalo  in  Boulder,’  through  Jan.  12;͞  ‘Archive  75:  Multilayered  Stories  Told  Through  a  Boulder  Lens,’  through  January.
Longmont Museum, 400 Quail Road, Longmont: ‘Front  Range  Rising,’  permanent  exhibit;Íž  ‘Ruckus  Rodeo:  Pop  Art  &  Cowboy  Culture,’  through  Jan.  5. Â
Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, 1485 Delgany St., Denver: ‘Francesca  Woodman:  Portrait  of  a  Reputation,’  through  April  5;Íž  ‘Teresa  Hubbard  /  Alexander  Birchler:  Flora,’  through  April  5;Íž   ‘Stacey  Steers: Â
University of Colorado Museum of Natural History, University of Colorado Henderson Building,1035 Broadway, Boulder: ‘Feathers  and  Flora,’  Henderson  Building,  through  Jan.  31;Íž  ‘Fossils:  Clues  to  the  Past,’  Paleontology  Hall,  ongoing  exhibit;Íž  ‘Ground  Level  Ozone,’  McKenna  Gallery,  ongoing  exhibit;Íž  ‘Life  in  Colorado’s  Freshwater,’  ongoing  traveling  exhibit;Íž  and  more. Â
Performing  Arts,  1101  13th  St.,  Denver,   303-Â893-Â4100.  Through  Jan.  5.
David Booker.  The  Tasty  Weasel,  1800  Pike  Road,  Longmont,  303-Â776-Â1914.
Craft Storytime.  10:15  a.m.  Meadows  Branch  Library,  4800  Baseline  Road,  Boulder,   303-Â441-Â3100.
Erik Boa Duo.  5  p.m.  The  Tasty  Weasel,  1800  Pike  Road,  Longmont,  303-Â776-Â1914.
Denver Art Museum, 100 W. 14th Ave. Parkway, Denver: ‘Claude  Monet:  The  Truth  of  Nature,’  through  Feb.  2;Íž  ‘Shantell  Martin:  Words  and  Lines,’  through  Jan.  31;Íž  ‘The  Light  Show,’  through  May  2020;Íž  ‘Treasures  of  British  Art:  The  Berger  Collection,’  through  January  2020;Íž Â
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 26 Music
PROPULSION GOES GREEN
2/27
BOULDER COUNTY BIRDS OF PREY
Celebrate Kwanzaa: Umoja (Unity). 11  a.m.  Blair-ÂCaldwell  African  American  Research  Library,  2401  Welton  St.,  Denver,  720-Â865-Â2401.
2/29
AN EVENING WITH ROSS NEWELL
Dancing, Movement, Music, Community and Chocolate. 7:30  p.m.  Alchemy  of  Move- ment,  2436  30th  St.,  Boulder,  608-Â332-Â4355.
FOR TICKETS & full
events calendar, visit:
chautauqua.com
Skating is in partnership with City of Boulder Parks and Recreation GET YOUR TICKETS AND RENTALS AT THE RINK
900 BASELINE ROAD BOULDER CO | 303.440.7666 @colo_chautauqua coloradochautauqua @colorado_chautauqua
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NCAR/UCAR Community Art Program, National Center for Atmospheric Research Visitor Center, 1850 Table Mesa Drive: Acrylic  on  canvas  by  Monica  Tymcio  and  ‘Chap- WHUV Âś ÂżEHU DUW E\ VL[ DUWLVWV WKURXJK -DQ
EVENTS from Page 37
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Bricolage Gallery, Art Parts Creative Reuse Center, 2860 Bluff St., Boulder: Fifth  Annual  Holiday  Bazaar,  Nov.  29-ÂDec.  31.
Dinner — with Lost Dog Ensemble (Tom Waits Tribute).  6  p.m.  Ophelia’s  Electric  Soapbox,  1215  20th  St.,  Denver,  303-Â993-Â8023. Lionel Young Band. 7:30  p.m.  Nissi’s,  2675  Northpark  Drive,  Lafayette,  303-Â665-Â2757. Mr. Griever (+ American Tomahawk Band), Jonathan Stark, Mehry Eslaminia. 8  p.m.  Hi-ÂDive  Denver,  7  S.  Broadway,  Denver,  303-Â733-Â0230. Open Mic.  6  p.m.  Bootstrap  Brewing  Com- pany,  142  Pratt  St.,  Longmont,  303-Â652-Â4186. Season of Light + Holiday Music Show. 7  p.m.  Fiske  Planetarium,  2414  Regent  Drive,  Boulder,  303-Â492-Â5002.  More  show  times  at  FRORUDGR HGX ÂżVNH Sliver. 7:30  p.m.  Lost  Lake,  3602  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver. Slynger. 8  p.m.  Larimer  Lounge,  2721  Lar- imer  St.,  Denver,  303-Â291-Â1007. Events Camp Christmas. Denver  Center  for  the Â
DECEMBER 26, 2019
Dance For Parkinson’s Program.  11:30  a.m.  Dairy  Arts  Center,  2590  Walnut  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â506-Â3568.  11:30  a.m.  Tuesdays  (Gordon  Gamm  Theater)  and  Thursdays  (Boulder  Ballet  Studio  3).  $5. ‘The Nutcracker’ performed by Colorado Ballet. 7:30  p.m.  Ellie  Caulkins  Opera  House,  1101  13th  St.,  Denver,  720-Â865-Â4220.  Through  Dec.  29.  Out Boulder County Gender Support Group — Boulder.  7  p.m.  2132  14th  St.,  Boulder.
Ethan Mindlin Jones, Lucas Wolf, Nathaniel Riley. 8  p.m.  The  Laughing  Goat,  1709  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,  720-Â201-Â3731. FloydtheSaint.  7  p.m.  Summit,  1902  Blake  St.,  Denver,  303-Â487-Â0111. Georgia Boys BBQ Winter Music Series: Clandestine Amigo. 7  p.m.  Georgia  Boys  BBQ,  250  Third  Ave.,  Longmont,  720-Â999-Â4099. Green Druid.  8  p.m.  Lost  Lake,  3602  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver. Hindsight. 7:30  p.m.  Nissi’s,  2675  Northpark  Drive,  Lafayette,  303-Â665-Â2757.
Storytime Break: Afternoon Open Play. 4  p.m.  Boulder  Library,  1001  Arapahoe  Ave.,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â3100.
Jim Brickman — A Christmas Celebration 2019. 7:30  p.m.  Paramount  Denver,  1621  Glenarm  Place,  Denver,  303-Â623-Â0106.
Storytime Break: Open Play. 10:15  a.m.  Boulder  Library,  1001  Arapahoe  Ave.,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â3100.
Live Music Fridays. 7  p.m.  The  Tune  Up  at  Full  Cycle,  1795  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,   303-Â440-Â1002.
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 27
Loumuzik. 7  p.m.  Summit,  1902  Blake  St.,  Denver,  303-Â487-Â0111.
Music 2000s Party with DJ Spexx.  7  p.m.  Downtown  Denver  Rink  at  Skyline  Park,  1601  Arapahoe  St.,  Denver,  303-Â571-Â8227. Art Lande & Dawn Clement Piano Duo: Standards and such. 7  p.m.  Caffè  Sole,  637  S.  Broadway  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â499-Â2985.
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Music & Movement. 10  a.m.  Louisville  Public  Library,  951  Spruce  St.,  Louisville,   303-Â335-Â4821. The Polish Ambassador & Friends featuring Wildlight.  8  p.m.  Boulder  Theater,  2032  14th  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â786-Â7030.
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
Poolside at the Flamingo’s Ugly Sweater Party.  7  p.m.  Marquis  Theatre,  2009  Larimer  St.,  Denver,  303-Â487-Â0111.
Bob “Chaz� Baker Annual Holiday Concert.  7  p.m.  Classic  Pianos  Concert  Hall,  1332  S.  Broadway,  Denver.
Rigby Summer.  7  p.m.  Longtucky  Spirits,  350  Terry  St.,  Suite  120,  Longmont,  720-Â545-Â2017.
The Born Readies. 9  p.m.  Lost  Lake,  3602  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver.
Seeds of Descent (CD Release Party).  7  p.m.  Herman’s  Hideaway,  1578  S.  Broadway,  Denver,  303-Â777-Â5840.
Celebrate Kwanzaa: Ujima (Collective Work & Responsibility).  1  p.m.  Ford-ÂWar- ren  Branch  Library,  2825  High  St.,  Denver,   720-Â865-Â0920.
Shawn Cunnane Solo Acoustic.  7  p.m.  Por  Wine  House,  836  1/2  Main  St.,  Louisville,   720-Â666-Â1386. Sirdevon.  7  p.m.  Summit,  1902  Blake  St.,  Denver,  303-Â487-Â0111. Thug Scouts, Kyral X Banko. 9  p.m.  Lar- imer  Lounge,  2721  Larimer  St.,  Denver,   303-Â291-Â1007. Umphrey’s McGee.  7  p.m.  Fillmore  Auditori- um,  1510  Clarkson  St.,  Denver,  303-Â837-Â1482. Unauthorized Absence.  6  p.m.  Bootstrap  Brewing  Company,  142  Pratt  St.,  Longmont,  303-Â652-Â4186. Under A Blood Red Sky — U2 Tribute.  7  p.m.  Soiled  Dove  Underground,  7401  E.  First  Ave.,  Denver,  303-Â830-Â9214. Wylie.  7:30  p.m.  Oskar  Blues  Tap  Room,  921  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â776-Â1914. Yonder Mountain String Band.  8:30  p.m.  Fox  Theatre,  1135  13th  St.,  Boulder,   303-Â447-Â0095. Zach Deputy. 8  p.m.  The  Bluebird  Theater,  3317  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver,  303-Â377-Â1666. Events The [SIC] Sense Sketch Comedy Holiday Show. 7:30  p.m.  Dangerous  Theatre,  2620  W.  Second  Ave.,  Suite  1,  Denver,  720-Â989-Â1764. Conversaciones en espaĂąol.  4  p.m.  Boul- der  Library,  1001  Arapahoe  Ave.,  Boulder,   303-Â441-Â3100. Fourth Friday Fandom. 4  p.m.  Meadows  Branch  Library,  4800  Baseline  Road,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â3100.
The Dale Cisek Band.  6  p.m.  Bootstrap  Brewing  Company,  142  Pratt  St.,  Longmont,  303-Â652-Â4186. Dave Fulker Quintet. 7  p.m.  Caffè  Sole,  637  S.  Broadway,  Boulder,  303-Â499-Â2985. DeVotchKa — with Special Guests.  7  p.m.  The  Bluebird  Theater,  3317  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver,  303-Â377-Â1666. Drumming with Horses. Noon.  Medicine  Horse  Program,  8778  Arapahoe  Road,  Boul- der,  707-Â599-Â1908. Dumpstaphunk — with Pocket Protection featuring members of The Revivalists, Dragondeer.  9  p.m.  Cervantes  Masterpiece,  2637  Welton  St.,  Denver,  303-Â297-Â1772. Erik Boa and the Constrictors. 8  p.m.  Os- kar  Blues  Tap  Room,  921  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,   303-Â776-Â1914. Gasolina Party.  9  p.m.  Summit,  1902  Blake  St.,  Denver,  303-Â487-Â0111. Get Down at Funky Town featuring MIDIcinal & Indigenous Peoples. 7  p.m.  Dickens  Opera  House,  300  Main  St.,  Long- mont,  720-Â297-Â6397.
Music Abbigale Dawn, Rigby Summer, Shawn Hess. 8  p.m.  The  Laughing  Goat,  1709  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,  720-Â201-Â3731. All About the Brass. 8  p.m.  The  Wild  Game  Entertainment  Experience,  2251  Ken  Pratt  Blvd.,  Longmont,  720-Â600-Â4875. Amoramora.  9  p.m.  Larimer  Lounge,  2721  Larimer  St.,  Denver,  303-Â291-Â1007. Andy Eppler Live music. 6  p.m.  300  Suns  Brewing,  335  First  Ave.,  Unit  C,  Longmont,  720-Â442-Â8292.
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
The Magic Within, Psychic Explorations with Erica Sodos. 7  p.m.  The  Mercury  Cafe,  2199  California  St.,  Denver,  720-Â883-Â6132. Relationsh*t.  8  p.m.  Grafenberg  Sketch  Comedy  And  Improv  Theatre,  70  S.  Broadway,  Denver. Saturday Morning Groove.  10:30  a.m.  Free  Motion  Dance  Studio,  2126  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,  720-Â379-Â8299. Spanish/English Storytime: Read and Play in Spanish.  10:15  a.m.  NoBo  Corner  Li- brary,  4600  Broadway,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â4250. Storytime Break: Open Play.  10:15  a.m.  Boulder  Library,  1001  Arapahoe  Ave.,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â3100.
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 29 Music ANNA: Multi Media Exploration of the Life & Art of Anna Pavlova.  3  p.m.  Dairy  Arts  Center,  2590  Walnut  St.,  Boulder,   303-Â440-Â7826. Dafna, Hi Crime, Fruta Bruta. 8  p.m.  The  Laughing  Goat,  1709  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,   720-Â201-Â3731.
LOCO Ukulele Jam. 2  p.m.  Bootstrap  Brew- ing  Company,  142  Pratt  St.,  Longmont,   303-Â652-Â4186.
Kissm.  8  p.m.  Oriental  Theater,  4335  W.  44th  Ave.,  Denver,  720-Â420-Â0030.
Melvin Seals and JGB featuring John Kadlecik.  9  p.m.  Owsley’s  Golden  Road,  1301  Broadway,  Boulder,  720-Â849-Â8458.
Nick Colionne. 8  p.m.  Soiled  Dove  Under- ground,  7401  E.  First  Ave.,  Denver,   303-Â830-Â9214.
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 28
Comedy Open Mic Saturday Night. 6:30  p.m.  The  Tune  Up  at  Full  Cycle,  1795  Pearl  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â440-Â1002.
Honey Island Swamp Band — with Ben Miller Band.  9  p.m.  Cervantes’  Other  Side,  2637  Welton  St.,  Denver,  303-Â297-Â1772.
It’s A Wonderful Lifetime: Lifetime Improvised Movie. 9  p.m.  Grafenberg  Sketch  Comedy  And  Improv  Theatre,  70  S.  Broadway,  Denver.
Stor ytime Break: Open Play.  10:15  a.m.  Boulder  Library,  1001  Arapahoe  Ave.,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â3100.
Events
Doom Flamingo — with Special Guests.  9  p.m.  Cervantes  Masterpiece,  2637  Welton  St.,  Denver,  303-Â297-Â1772.
Midnight Party Machine. 7:30  p.m.  Nissi’s,  2675  Northpark  Drive,  Lafayette,   303-Â665-Â2757.
Playtime Stor ytime. 10:15  a.m.  Meadows  Branch  Library,  4800  Baseline  Road,  Boulder,  303-Â441-Â3100.
Yonder Mountain String Band.  8:30  p.m.  Fox  Theatre,  1135  13th  St.,  Boulder,   303-Â447-Â0095.
Happy Hour Live Jazz.  5:30  p.m.  Tandoori  Grill  South,  619  S.  Broadway,  Boulder,   303-Â543-Â7339.
Front deRanged at the Dairy.  7:30  p.m.  Dairy  Arts  Center,  2590  Walnut  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â440-Â7826.
Jordan Rock.  7:30  and  9:45  p.m.  Comedy  Works,  1226  15th  St.,  Denver,  303-Â595-Â3637.  Through  Dec.  29. Â
Wylie.  4:30  p.m.  The  Tasty  Weasel,  1800  Pike  Road,  Longmont,  303-Â776-Â1914.
Old’s Cool Rock.  10  a.m.  Dark  Horse,  2922  Baseline  Road,  Boulder. The Polish Ambassador & Friends featuring Wildlight. 8  p.m.  Boulder  Theater,  2032  14th  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â786-Â7030. Pre-NYE 2020 Bollywood Masquerade Party in Denver.  9  p.m.  Bar  Standard,  1037  Broadway,  Denver,  720-Â416-Â6209. Rally Round The Family.  9  p.m.  Globe  Hall,  4483  Logan  St.,  Denver,  303-Â296-Â1003. Saturday Celebration Service at Unity of Boulder.  5  p.m.  Unity  of  Boulder  Church,  2855  Folsom  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â442-Â1411. Saturday Worship Service.  9:30  a.m.  Boulder  Adventist  Church,  345  Mapleton  Ave.,  Boulder,  303-Â442-Â1522. Stupid Young — with TheyCallHimAP, Covae and FBP Moe. 7:30  p.m.  Marquis  Theatre,  2009  Larimer  St.,  Denver,  303-Â487- 0111. Umphrey’s McGee. 7  p.m.  Fillmore  Audito- rium,  1510  Clarkson  St.,  Denver,  303-Â837-Â1482.
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Phish Live Webcast From Madison Square Garden — Free! 5:30  p.m.  Oriental  Theater,  4335  W.  44th  Ave.,  Denver,  720-Â420-Â0030. Ravenscoon, WRECKNO, Patches O Malley.  7  p.m.  Your  Mom’s  House,  608  E.  13th  Ave.,  Denver,  303-Â860-Â4516. Soundbridge Music Artist Mixer.  2  p.m.  300  Suns  Brewing,  335  First  Ave.,  Unit  C,  Longmont,  720-Â442-Â8292. The Spillionaires Holiday Show.  7  p.m.  The  Clocktower  Cabaret,  1601  Arapahoe  St.,  Denver,  303-Â293-Â0075. Sunday Celebration Service at Unity of Boulder. 11  a.m.  Unity  of  Boulder  Church,  2855  Folsom  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â442-Â1411. Sunday Worship at Mountain View UMC. 8  a.m.  Mountain  View  UMC,  355  Ponca  Place,  Boulder,  303-Â494-Â5025. Ten Miles South, Glass Cases, Bathing Lagoon.  8  p.m.  Globe  Hall,  4483  Logan  St.,  Denver,  303-Â296-Â1003. Three Pianos featuring Eric Gunnison, Art Lande & Jeff Jenkins.  6:30  p.m.  Dazzle  at  Baur’s,  1512  Curtis  St.,  Denver,  303-Â839-Â5100. see EVENTS Page 40
DECEMBER 26, 2019
THURSDAY DECEMBER 26 7:00 PM
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Fiske Planetarium - Regent Drive
(Next to Coors Event Center, main campus CU Boulder)
www.colorado.edu/fiske 303-492-5002 I
39
FILMS %HIRUH KH ZDV D ÂżOPPDNHU Peter  Bogdanovich  was  a  critic  and  KLVWRULDQ SDU H[FHOOHQFH &RPLQJ RI DJH DV WKH ÂżUVW ZDYH RI +ROO\ZRRG ÂżOPPDNHUV ZHUH EHLQJ SXW RXW WR SDVWXUH %RJGDQRYLFK VDW DW WKH IHHW RI WKH PHQ ZKR PDGH WKH PRYLHV DQG IHOO LQ ORYH $PRQJ WKRVH WLWDQV KH DGPLUHG %XVWHU .HDWRQ VWRRG WDOO DQG %RJGDQRYLFKÂśV ODW- HVW GRFXPHQWDU\ Âľ7KH *UHDW %XVWHU $ &HOHEUDWLRQÂś ORYLQJO\ GLVVHFWV .HDWRQÂśV LQIDPRXV DQG GHDWK GHI\LQJ VWXQWV 1LFNQDPHG “The  Great  Stonefaceâ€?  for  his  DELOLW\ WR UHPDLQ FDOP DQG FRRO LQ KDLU\ VLWXDWLRQV .HDWRQ ZDV RQH RI FLQHPDÂśV JUHDWHVW FORZQV DQG KLV IDQV DUH OHJLRQ %RJGDQRYLFK JDWK- HUV D QXPEHU RI WKHP LQWHUYLHZLQJ HYHU\RQH IURP :HUQHU +HU]RJ WR -RKQQ\ .QR[YLOOH WR ZHLJK LQ RQ .H- DWRQÂśV FHDVHOHVV DSSHDO Âľ7KH *UHDW %XVWHUÂś LV D PXVW IRU DQ\RQH ZLWK KDOI DQ LQWHUHVW LQ WKH HDUO\ GD\V RI
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Âś$ +LGGHQ /LIH¡ Âś-XPDQML 7KH 1H[W /HYHO¡ Âś.QLYHV 2XW¡ Âś/LWWOH :RPHQ¡ Âś3DUDVLWH¡ ‘Richard Jewell’ Âś6SLHV LQ 'LVJXLVH¡ Âś6WDU :DUV 7KH 5LVH RI 6N\ZDONHU¡ Âś8QFXW *HPV¡
BOULDER:
Boedecker  Theatre,  Dairy  Arts  Cen- ter,  2590  Walnut  St.,  303-Â444-Â7328: ‘After the Wed- ding,’ 'HF Double Feature: ‘Tragic’ and ‘Beautifully 6FDU\¡ ZLWK Ă€OP- PDNHUV +REDUW %HOO DQG 5XVV :LOWVH LQ DWWHQ- dance, S P 6XQGD\ 'HF ‘The Great %XVWHU ¡ 'HF Âś:KLWH 6QDNH ¡  'HF
DENVER:
The  Bug  Theater,  3654  Navajo  St.,  303-Â477-Â5977: 7KH (PHUJLQJ )LOPPDNHUV 3URM- ect, S P 7KXUVGD\ 'HF Denver  Museum  of  Nature  &  Science,  2001  Colorado  Blvd.,  303- 744-Â9686: Âś$SROOR )LUVW 6WHSV¡ Âś6XSHUSRZHU 'RJV '¡ Âś7XUWOH 2G\VVH\¡ Sie  Film  Center,  2510  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  303-Â595-Â3456: Âś&DELQ )HYHU ¡ S P )ULGD\ 'HF Âś/LWWOH :RPHQ¡ RQ PP Âś8QFXW *HPV¡
Century  Theatre,  1700  29th  St.,  303-Â444-Â0583: ‘A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood’ Âś%ODFN &KULVWPDV¡ Âś%RPEVKHOO¡ Âś&DWV¡ ‘Ford v Ferrari’ ‘Frozen 2’
‘A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood’ Âś%ODFN &KULVWPDV¡ Âś%RPEVKHOO¡ Âś&DWV¡ ‘Ford v Ferrari’ ‘Frozen 2’ Âś-XPDQML 7KH 1H[W /HYHO¡ Âś.QLYHV 2XW¡ Âś/LWWOH :RPHQ¡ ‘Richard Jewell’ Âś6SLHV LQ 'LVJXLVH¡ Âś6WDU :DUV 7KH 5LVH RI 6N\- ZDONHU¡
LOUISVILLE:
Regal  Cinebarre  Boulder,  1164  W.  Dillon  Road,  844-Â462-Â7342: ‘A Beautiful Day In the Neighborhood’ Âś&DWV¡ Âś'DUN :DWHUV¡ ‘Ford v Ferrari’ ‘Frozen 2’ Âś-RNHU¡ Âś-XPDQML 7KH 1H[W /HYHO¡ Âś.QLYHV 2XW¡ Âś/LWWOH :RPHQ¡ ‘Richard Jewell’ Âś6WDU :DUV 7KH 5LVH RI 6N\- ZDONHU¡
LONGMONT:
Regal  Village  at  the  Peaks  12,  1230  S.  Hover  Road,  844-Â462-Â7342:
EVENTS from Page 39
Events Boulder Comedy Show. DQG S P %RKHPLDQ %LHUJDUWHQ WK 6W %RXOGHU Adam Trent. S P 3DUDPRXQW 'HQYHU *OHQDUP 3ODFH 'HQYHU Comedy Legend Sinbad. S P &RPHG\ :RUNV WK 6W 'HQYHU Go Club for Kids & Teens. S P %RXOGHU /LEUDU\ $UDSDKRH $YH %RXOGHU Â Hawaiian Hula Classes. S P $ 3ODFH WR % WK 6W 8QLW %RXOGHU Â
MONDAY, DECEMBER 30 Music Slim Cessna’s Auto Club, Kid Congo Powers, Hang Rounders. S P +L 'LYH 'HQYHU 6 %URDGZD\ 'HQYHU Ande Marimba, Pachedu Orchestra, Chihera. S P 7KH /DXJKLQJ *RDW 3HDUO 6W %RXOGHU Breathwork Journey — with Live Music from Larisa Gosla. S P 7KH 6WDU+RXVH 6XQVKLQH &DQ\RQ 'ULYH %RXOGHU  Fuzzy J. S P /RVW /DNH ( &ROID[ $YH 'HQYHU KT Tunstall. S P %RXOGHU 7KHDWHU WK 6W %RXOGHU
40
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DECEMBER 26, 2019
Melvin Seals and JGB featuring John Kadlecik. S P 2ZVOH\ÂśV *ROGHQ 5RDG %URDGZD\ 6W %RXOGHU
Movement Mondays. S P )UHH 0RWLRQ 'DQFH 6WXGLR 3HDUO 6W %RXOGHU Â
Motown On Mondays. S P 2SKHOLDÂśV (OHFWULF 6RDSER[ WK 6W 'HQYHU Â
Spanish/English Storytime: Read and Play in Spanish. D P 1R%R &RUQHU /LEUDU\ %URDGZD\ %RXOGHU Â
Open Mic. S P %RRWVWUDS %UHZLQJ &RP- SDQ\ 3UDWW 6W /RQJPRQW Phish Live Webcast From Madison Square Garden — Free! S P 2ULHQWDO 7KHDWHU : WK $YH 'HQYHU  Umphrey’s McGee. S P )LOOPRUH $XGLWR- ULXP &ODUNVRQ 6W 'HQYHU  Wooleye. S P /DULPHU /RXQJH /DULPHU 6W 'HQYHU
Storytime Break: Open Play. D P %RXOGHU /LEUDU\ $UDSDKRH $YH %RXOGHU Storytime Break: Toddler Play Time D P %RXOGHU /LEUDU\ $UDSDKRH $YH %RXOGHU Women of the West. D P %RXOGHU /LEUDU\ $UDSDKRH $YH %RXOGHU Â
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 31
Events
Music
“Mis Pininos�/Spanish Conversation for Kids. S P 1R%R &RUQHU /LEUDU\ %URDGZD\ %RXOGHU
Slim Cessna’s Auto Club, Kid Congo Powers, Hang Rounders. S P +L 'LYH 'HQYHU 6 %URDGZD\ 'HQYHU
All Ages Storytime. D P 0HDGRZV %UDQFK /LEUDU\ %DVHOLQH 5RDG %RXOGHU
Against Me! S P 6XPPLW %ODNH 6W 'HQYHU
Celebrate Kwanzaa: Nia (Purpose). S P 5RGROIR ³&RUN\´ *RQ]DOHV %UDQFK /LEUDU\ 1 ,UYLQJ 6W 'HQYHU Citizenship Classes. S P %RXOGHU /LEUDU\ $UDSDKRH $YH %RXOGHU Denver Magic Show. S P 3DWWHUVRQ ,QQ ( WK $YH 'HQYHU
I
Augustus. S P /DULPHU /RXQJH /DULPHU 6W 'HQYHU DeVotchKa with Special Guests. S P 7KH %OXHELUG 7KHDWHU ( &ROID[ $YH 'HQYHU see EVENTS Page 42
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
SATURDAY DECEMBER 28
DUMPSTAPHUNK
W/ POCKET PROTECTION FEAT MEMBERS OF THE REVIVALISTS & DRAGONDEER
SUNDAY DECEMBER 29
DOOM FLAMINGO
FEAT RYAN STASIK OF UMPHREY’S MCGEE W/ MARCUS REZAK’S GATEWAY TO THE GALAXY
FRIDAY & SATURDAY JANUARY 3-4 DUAL VENUE!
5TH ANNUAL WINTER STRING FLING
MOLLY TUTTLE, JERRY DOUGLAS, RONNIE MCCOURY, ALLIE KRAL, MISSY RAINES & BILLY FAILING WEDNESDAY JANUARY 8 RE: SEARCH
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W/ UNTITLD B2B VIDE (LOST DOGZ)
FRIDAY JANUARY 10
TNERTLE
W/ MELODY LINES, TELEMETRY & KAPTAIN
SATURDAY DECEMBER 28
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THURSDAY JANUARY 2 RE: SEARCH
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FEAT JOE TATTON (THE NEW MASTERSOUNDS) W/ DANIELLA KATZIR BAND
FRIDAY & SATURDAY JANUARY 10-11
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WEDNESDAY JANUARY 15 RE: SEARCH
5AM TRIO, MALAKAI & LUSID (THE RUST SHOWCASE)
THURSDAY JANUARY 16
FRONT COUNTRY
SATURDAY JANUARY 11 SOLD OUT
W/ WHITEWATER RAMBLE & ACOUSTIC MINING CO
(LCD SOUNDSYSTEM / DFA)
W/ BEN SILVER OF ORCHARD LOUNGE
JAMES MURPHY DJ SET FRIDAY JANUARY 24
EVERYONE’S DEAD
W/ FLOWER IN THE SUN : TRIBUTE TO JANIS JOPLIN
SATURDAY JANUARY 25
EVERYONE ORCHESTRA W/ THE ELEGANT PLUMS
THURSDAY JANUARY 30
SUMMER CAMP ON THE ROAD FRIDAY JANUARY 31 DUAL VENUE!
EMANCIPATOR
W/ BLACKBIRD BLACKBIRD, FRAMEWORKS, TOR, PLANTRAE, THOMA & IL:LO
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 1
JACQUEES
MONDAY FEBRUARY 3
EARTHGANG
W/ MICK JENKINS, WYNNE & JURDAN BRYANT
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 6
PHORA
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 8
MARCO BENEVENTO
FRIDAY JANUARY 17
THE NEWDEAL
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W/ MOONRADISH & THE SOUL CRUSHERS
FRIDAY JANUARY 24
ARLO MCKINLEY & THE LONESOME SOUND SATURDAY JANUARY 25
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FEAT DAVE WATTS, JASON HANN & IAN NEVILLE
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GOLDROOM
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 1
RE: SEARCH
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W/ LAPA & NADASOUND
RUNAWAY GIN
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 15
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FEAT MEMBERS OF TURKUAZ & DOPAPOD
TUESDAY FEBRUARY 11
IANN DIOR
W/ LANDON CUBE & POORSTACY
W/ RESONANT LANGUAGE
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 14
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 28
KBONG, MIKE LOVE & GIANT PANDA GUERILLA DUB SQUAD
DANCE PARTY TIME MACHINE ROBERT RANDOLPH, MARC BROWNSTEIN, ARON MAGNER, ALLEN AUCOIN, MIKE GREENFIELD, JENNIFER HARTSWICK, NATALIE CRESSMAN & JEFF FRANCA TUESDAY MARCH 3
MARC E. BASSY W/ GIANNI & KYLE
THURSDAY MARCH 5 - DUAL VENUE RE: SEARCH
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CHRISTIAN MARTIN W/ DATELESS & C.H.A.Y.
THURSDAY APRIL 2 - DUAL VENUE
DUAL VENUE!
W/ SENSI TRAILS
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 15
THOUXANBANFAUNI X TEEJAYX6 THURSDAY FEBRUARY 20
CRIS JACOBS BAND & DELLA MAE W/ JON STICKLEY TRIO
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 21
PASSAFIRE
W/ PROJECT 432, BETARAY & DJ NAYSAYERS
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TAUK
W/ AARON KAMM & THE ONE DROPS
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 23
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RE: SEARCH
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THURSDAY APRIL 9
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BREAK SCIENCE RE: SEARCH
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SATURDAY FEBRUARY 29 FRIDAY MARCH 6
NAUGHTY PROFESSOR & THE BURROUGHS FRIDAY MARCH 13
CON BRIO LIVWELL PRESENTS BBNO$ ICE CUBE X METHOD MAN FRIDAY MARCH 20 & REDMAN CITY MORGUE W/ ACTION BRONSON TEXT CERVANTES TO 91944 FOR TICKET GIVEAWAYS, DRINK SPECIALS, DISCOUNTED TICKET PROMOTIONS & MORE MONDAY APRIL 20 - AT RED ROCKS
TUESDAY MARCH 17
MAX 15 MSG/MO. MSG & DATA RATES MAY APPLY TEXT STOP TO OPT OUT FOR OUR PRIVACY TERMS & SERVICE GO TO HTTP://CERVANTESMASTERPIECE.TICKETFLY.COM/FILES/2014/03/CERVANTES-PRIVACY-DOCUMENT.PDF
7ELTON 3T s s #ERVANTES-ASTERPIECE COM
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
Live Entertainment Nightly at our 1709 Pearl St location
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Happy Hour 4-8 Every Day THELAUGHINGGOAT.COM DECEMBER 26, 2019
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EVENTS from Page 40
Navajo  St.,  Denver,  303-Â736-Â2718.
new year’s eve Chimney Choir Album Release and NYE Party. 10  p.m.  The  Mercury  Cafe,  2199  California  St.,  Denver,  303-Â294-Â9258.
Noon Year’s Eve.  11  a.m.  Downtown  Denver  Rink  at  Skyline  Park,  1601  Arapahoe  St.,  Denver,  303-Â534-Â6161.
Cracker & Camper Van Beethoven New Year’s Eve! 8  p.m.  Soiled  Dove  Underground,  7401  E.  First  Ave.,  Denver,  303- 830-Â9214.
The Nuns Of Brixton.  9  p.m.  Lost  Lake,  3602  E.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver.
Cumbia Con Flavor NYE Party. 8:30  p.m.  Otra  Vez  Cantina,  610  16th  Street  Mall,  Denver. Denver’s Grandest New Year’s Eve Party.  8  p.m.  Grand  Hyatt  Denver,  1750  Welton  St.,  Denver,  303-Â603-Â4095. Gasoline Lollipops New Year’s Eve — with The Lonesome Days, The Alcapones.  9  p.m.  Fox  Theatre,  1135  13th  St.,  Boul- der,  303-Â447-Â0095. Harvest House New Years Eve Party.  8  p.m.  Millennium  Harvest  House,  1345  28th  St.,  Boulder. Leftover Salmon Celebrates 30 Years Under The Big Top.  6:30  p.m.  The  Mission  Ballroom,  4242  Wynkoop  St.,  Denver,   720-Â577-Â6884. Magical Mystical New Years Eve 2020. 5  p.m.  Shine  Restaurant  &  Potion  Bar,  2480  Canyon  Blvd.,  Suite  M-Â1,  Boulder,  303-Â449-Â0120. New Beers Eve 2019. 6:30  p.m.  The  Lobby,  2191  Arapahoe  St.,  Denver,  303-Â997-Â9911. New Year’s Eve DJ.  8:30  p.m.  Downtown  Denver  Rink  at  Skyline  Park,  1601  Arapahoe  St.,  Denver,  303-Â571-Â8227. New Year’s Eve with ESCORT. 10  p.m.  Ophelia’s  Electric  Soapbox,  1215  20th  St.,  Denver,  303-Â993-Â8023. New Year’s Eve — with George Nelson. 9  p.m.  Jamestown  Mer- cantile,  108  Main  St.,  Jamestown,  303-Â547-Â5215. New Year’s Party in The Lounge.  9  p.m.  The  Black  Box  (The  Lounge),  314  E.  13th  Ave.,  Denver. New Year’s Eve Gala — with LowDown Brass Band. 7  p.m.  Dazzle  at  Baur’s,  1512  Curtis  St.,  Denver,  303-Â839-Â5100. New Years Eve Ugly Sweater Party.  6  p.m.  GroÃ&#x;en  Bart  Brewery,  1025  Delaware  Ave.,  Longmont,  214-Â770-Â9847. New Years Eve — with Rasputina: A Roaring 1820s Ball. 9  p.m.  Marquis  Theatre,  2009  Larimer  St.,  Denver,   303-Â487-Â0111. A Night in Vienna.  6:30  p.m.  Boettcher  Concert  Hall,  1000  14th  St.,  Denver,   720-Â865-Â4220.
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DECEMBER 26, 2019
Mr. Gatsby’s New Year’s Eve at The Ramble Hotel. 8:20  p.m.  The  Ramble  Hotel,  1280  25th  St.,  Denver. New Year’s At The Brown Palace Hotel and Spa.  8:30  p.m.  The  Brown  Palace  Hotel  and  Spa,  Autograph  Collection,  321  17th  St.,  Denver.
NYE — Silent Disco at Tilt. 7  p.m.  Tilt  Pinball,  640  Main  St.,  Louisville,  303-Â997-Â9548.
NYE 1920s into 2020 at The Cottonwood Club.  8  p.m.  EXDO  Event  Center,  1399  35th  St.,  Denver,  303-Â468-Â5443.
NYE Party With The Yawpers.  9  p.m.  Oriental  Theater,  4335  W.  44th  Ave.,  Denver,  720-Â420-Â0030.
New Year’s Eve Family Celebration: Ring in the New Year with our mascot, Sharkey! Downtown  Aquarium,  700  Water  St.,  Denver,  303-Â561-Â4450.
NYE: Moon Boots, J. Phlip, Durante, DJ Holographic. 9  p.m.  Club  Vinyl,  1082  Broadway,  Denver,  303-Â860-Â8469. Oskar Blues New Years Eve Party — with the Lionel Young Band.  7  p.m.  Oskar  Blues  Home  Made  Liquids  &  Solids,  1555  S.  Hover  Road,  Longmont.
New Year’s Eve Party.  7  p.m.  License  No.  1,  2115  13th  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â443-Â0486. New Year’s Eve Masquerade Ball.  9  p.m.  Por  Wine  House,  836  1/2  Main  St.,  Louisville,  720-Â666- 1386.
Paradise 2020 | A New Year’s Eve Masquerade. 9  p.m.  Bar  Helix,  3440  Larimer  St.,  Denver,  720-Â449-Â8587.
New Year’s Eve Two-Day Camp (ages 5 - 12). Noon.  Tinker  Art  Studio,  693B  S.  Broadway,  Boulder,  303-Â503-Â1902.
Roaring 2020s NYE Party. 8  p.m.  Deviant  Spirits,  2480  49th  St.  East,  Boulder,   720-Â535-Â6824.
New Years Eve Ball.  6  p.m.  The  Grizzly  Rose,  5450  North  Valley  Highway,  Denver,  303-Â295-Â2353.
Slug Wife New Year’s.  9  p.m.  The  Black  Box,  314  E.  13th  Ave.,  Denver.
New Year’s Eve Red Rocks Party. 9  p.m.  Hard  Rock  Cafe  Denver,  500  16th  St.,  Suite  120,  Denver.
Texas Hippie Coalition (New Year’s Eve Blow-Out). 7  p.m.  Herman’s  Hideaway,  1578  S.  Broadway,  Denver,  303-Â777-Â5840.
New Years’s Eve at The Clocktower Cabaret. 7  and  10  p.m.  The  Clocktower  Cabaret,  1601  Arapahoe  St.,  Denver,   303-Â293-Â0075.
Turkuaz — with Swatkins & The Positive Agenda.  9  p.m.  Boulder  Theater,  2032  14th  St.,  Boulder,  303-Â786-Â7030.
Noon Year’s Eve. 11:30  a.m.  Lou- isville  Public  Library,  951  Spruce  St.,  Louisville,  303-Â335-Â4849.
Umphrey’s McGee. 7  p.m.  Fillmore  Auditorium,  1510  Clarkson  St.,  Denver,  303-Â837-Â1482.
NYE 201: Louie’s Roaring 20s Party at Bar Louie Denver. 8  p.m.  Bar  Louie  (The  Shops  at  1RUWK¿HOG 6WDSOHWRQ 1RUWK- ¿HOG %OYG 'HQYHU
Events 2020 Denver New Year’s Eve Bar Crawl.  8  p.m.  The  Celtic  on  Market,  1400  Market  St.,  Denver.
Uptown 5280 Singles New Year’s Eve Party.  8  p.m.  Knights  of  Columbus,  1555  Grant  St.,  Denver.
54thirty New Year’s Eve 2020.  8  p.m.  54thirty  Rooftop,  1475  Cali- fornia  St.,  Denver,  303-Â893-Â1888. Colorado Avalanche vs. Winnipeg Jets. 6  p.m.  Pepsi  Center,  1000  Chopper  Circle,  Denver.
WOW! New Year’s Eve Party #2.  10  a.m.  and  1  p.m.  WOW!  Children’s  Museum,  110  N.  Harri- son  Ave.,  Lafayette,  303-Â604-Â2424.
D&B Denver: Family New Year’s Eve Party 2019. 5  p.m.  Dave  &  Buster’s,  2000  South  Colorado  Blvd.,  Denver,   303-Â759-Â1515.
Carnevale di Boulderado | New Year’s Eve Party at Hotel Boulderado. 7:30  p.m.  Hotel  Boulderado,  2115  13th  St.,  Boulder,  Tickets  $175.  hotelboul- derado.com              Â
Dancing in the New Year ( perfecting a vision for 20/20) Celebration. 7:15  p.m.  The  Star- House,  3476  Sunshine  Canyon  Drive,  Boulder,  303-Â245-Â8452.
2020 New Year’s Eve Party at St Julien Hotel and Spa. 8  p.m.  St  Julien  Hotel  &  Spa,  900  Walnut  St.,  Boulder,  call  720-Â406-Â9696.  stjulien.com
Denver Black Tie NYE Party.  8  p.m.  Sheraton  Denver  Downtown  Hotel,  1550  Court  Place,  Denver,  720-Â238-Â8106.
New Year’s Eve Dance Party at The Avalon Ballroom. 6:45  p.m.  The  Avalon  Ballroom,  6185 Â
Hindsight is 2020: New Year’s Eve at Acova.  9  p.m.  Acova,  3651 Â
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Arapahoe  Road,  Boulder,  tickets  are  $40  and  $45  in  advance;;  $50  at  the  door.  dancelaughlove.com Turkuaz — with Swatkins & The Positive Agenda.  8  p.m.  Boulder  Theater,  2032  14th  St.,  Boulder.  bouldertheater.com  Gasoline Lollipops — with The Lonesome Days and The Alcapones.  9  p.m.  Fox  Theatre,  1135  13th  St.,  Boulder.  foxtheatre. com New Year’s Eve at BDT Stage — with Face Vocal Band.  6:30  p.m.  BDT  Stage,  5501  Arapahoe  Ave.,  Boulder.  bdtstage.com Abear. 9  p.m.  Oskar  Blues  Taproom,  921  Pearl  St.,  Boulder. New Year’s Eve with The Corporation.  9:45  p.m.  Nissi’s,  2675  Northpark  Drive,  Lafayette.  Nissi’s  has  a  three-Âcourse  dinner  DQG &KDPSDJQH WRDVW IRU WKH ¿UVW show  ($80,  6:30-Â9:10  p.m.)  or  late  night  appetizers  and  desserts  with  a  champagne  toast  for  the  second  show  ($40,  10-Â12:30  p.m.).  303- 665-Â2757,  nissis.com Roaring 2020’s NYE Casino Ball.  7  p.m.  300  Main  St.,  Longmont,  tickets  start  at  $50,  thedickenstavern.com Denver NYE Black-Tie Party 2019.  9  p.m.  Mile  High  Station,  2027  W.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver,  tickets  are  only  available  online  and  they  start  at  $95,  newyearsev- enight.com Resolution New Year’s Eve Denver 2020.  9  p.m.  McNichols  Civic  Center  Building,  144  W.  Colfax  Ave.,  Denver,  Tickets  start  at  $99,  resolutiondenver.com New Year’s Eve with Denver Union Station. 9 p.m. Union Station, 1701 Wynkoop St., Denver, $80  per  guest,  exclusive  VIP  speakeasy  in  the  historic  lower  level  of  Union  Station  is  $200  per  guest.  A Distinguished 2020: Improper New Year’s Eve. 9  p.m.  Improper  City,  3201  Walnut  St.,  Denver.  Tickets  start  at  $75.  White Rose Gala — 2020 New Year’s Eve Party 9  p.m.  Ellie  Caulkins  Opera  House,  Denver  Performing  Arts  Complex,  14th  and  Champa  streets,  Denver,  Check  the  website  for  tickets  and  table  reservations.  newyearspar- tydenver.com Bunk With the Beasts. 6  p.m.  Denver  Zoo,  2300  Steele  St.,  Denver,  Must  be  5-Â13  years  old  to  attend.  Tickets  are  $65  for  members,  $75  for  everyone  else.  denverzoo.org New Year’s Eve Fireworks in Denver. 16th  Street  Mall,  Downtown  Denver
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
%28/'(5 9,6,21 &(17(5
The end of the year is approaching This time of year gets busy, but many of us have health savings accounts or vision plan benefits that must be used before the end of the year. Call us to schedule an eye exam. Dr. Terri Oneby
Dr. Lowell Steinberg
303-443-4545
303-447-8470
7+ 1($5 $3$3$+2( %8))$/2 9,//$*( bouldervisioncenter.com 0267 0$-25 +($/7+ $1' 9,6,21 ,1685$1&(6 $&&(37(' BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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Host An Aura Party!
‘STARRY  NIGHT  OVER  THE  RHONE’  BY  VINCENT  VAN  GOGH
Belle Star will come and take ten or more auras, read the photos and interpret the colors.
Call 720.253.4710 All credit cards accepted No text messages
YOUR PHOTO WILL BE
FREE! www.belleStar.net Labellestar12@gmail.com 303-249-6958
WE are here and glad to service the Boulder customers! CERTIFIED PRE-OWNED MacBooks, iMacs, iPhones & iPads
EXPERT SERVICE UPGRADES & REPAIRS
the river that cries
We also buy sell trade upgrade repair PCs and Android Phones
by Greg Alston We specialize in caring for seniors
had  it  been  different  had  it  been  otherwise  i  might  not  have  conceived  such  an  elaborate  disguise  as  we  walked,  that  night  along  the  river  that  cries  for  the  damned,  the  departed  we  can  only  surmise  this  life,  a  bird  and  how  quickly  she  flies  each  birth  borne  for  it’s  own  demise  hilarity,  this  mask  i  wear  to  cover  these  eyes  and  this  cloak  of  deception  has  so  many  ties  intricately  clasped  and  threaded  by  lies  and  the  form  of  a  crow  laughing  may  rise  darkly  into  forbidding  skies  and  can  you  hear  it,  this  music  beyond  reason  there  lies  a  party  and  how  sweet,  the  lullabies  and  joy,  just  a  baby  with  a  spark  in  her  eyes  let’s  cast  off  these  costumes  mortality,  a  guise  naked  on  the  edge  of  this  infinite  night
Greg  Alston  is  a  gardener,  cook,  father  and  some  other  things,  too. Boulder  Weekly  accepts  poetry  and  flash  fiction  submissions  of  450  words/35  lines  or  fewer,  accompanied  by  a  one-Âsentence  bio  of  the  author.  Send  to:  poetry@boulderweekly.com 44
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ON THE BILL: ‘Uncut Gems’ opens everywhere Dec. 25
Nothing  is  easier  than  to  denounce  the  evildoer;;  nothing  is  more  difficult  than  to  understand  him.  —Fyodor  Dostoyevsky,  Crime  and  Punishment
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is  name  is  Harold  Ratner  (Adam  Sandler),  and  he  deals  in  jewels,  watches,  gems  —  all  that  glitters  is  gold  to  him.  Back  in  the  day,  Harold  sold  oversized  jewelry  to  rappers  making  videos  or  going  out  on  the  town.  He  probably  made  a  good  living  at  it  too  —  judging  by  his  home  in  the  ‘burbs,  his  apartment  in  the  city  and  those  designer  clothes.  But  looks  can  be  deceiving,  and  the  more  time  you  spend  with  Harold,  the  more  you  start  to  see  through  the  fast  talk  and  faster  money. Uncut  Gems,  the  third  film  from  the  electric  Safdie  brothers  (Benny  and  Josh),  opens  a  world  away  from  Harold’s  Diamond  District,  in  the  mines  of  Ethiopia,  where  two  day  laborers  sneak  past  guards  and  excavate  a  small  rock  dotted  with  black  opal.  As  Harold  later  says,  if  you  look  into  the  opal,  you  can  see  all  the  heavens  in  the  sky.  What  do  the  Safdies  see?  The  inside  of  Harold’s  colon.  Today  might  be  the  most  important  day  of  Harold’s  life,  and  he  starts  it  face  down  on  the  slab,  his  doctor  search- ing  for  cancerous  polyps. From  black  opals  to  black  holes,  the  Safdies  are  having  fun.  They  follow  Harold  as  he  scurries  across  town,  from  jewelry  store  to  pawn  shop,  from  home  to  apart- ment,  from  wife  (Idina  Menzel)  to  mistress  (Julia  Fox),  from  his  kid’s  high  school  play  to  his  in-Âlaw’s  home  for  Passover.  All  the  while,  Harold  promises  everything  and  delivers  nothing.  Even  the  value  of  his  opal  is  in  question  —  he  thinks  it’s  worth  a  million,  the  reality  is  far  less. The  only  thing  real  in  Harold’s  life  is  the  constant  screech  of  voices  trying  to  shout  over  each  other  and  his  helpless  addiction  to  gambling.  Everywhere  Harold  goes,  it’s  a  flurry  of  voices  and  noise.  It  makes  us  feel  uncomfortable.  It  should  make  Harold  feel  uncomfortable,  but  he’s  learned  to  drown  it  out.  Like  any  addict,  Harold  has  taught  himself  not  to  see  the  numerous  warning  signs.  Most  of  us  would  think  twice  about  our  life’s  choices  if  we  ended  up  locked  in  the  back  of  our  own  car,  stark  naked,  at  our  children’s  high  school  parking  lot.  But  not  Harold.  He’s  just  dodged  another  bul- let,  that’s  all.  He’ll  win  again  tomorrow. Harold  does  win,  eventually.  But  he  also  loses.  So  it  goes.  The  more  you  watch,  the  more  it  feels  like  Harold  stepped  off  the  pages  of  a  Dostoyevsky  novel  and  landed  in  the  streets  of  New  York  City.  And  Sandler  makes  a  meal  out  of  it.  There’s  nothing  lazy  about  him  or  the  movie  surrounding  Harold. There’s  also  nothing  satisfying  about  Harold’s  drive  —  in  the  classical  sense.  Harold  loves  to  win  or,  more  accurately,  Harold  loves  the  act  of  winning.  There’s  noth- ing  left  once  you  won,  just  the  need  to  move  on  to  the  next  one  —  a  bigger  one,  a  more  dangerous  one.  There’s  only  one  way  this  all  ends,  and  Harold  is  fine  with  that,  as  long  as  he  wins  on  the  way  out. Â
‘This is how I win’
Life in the gutter with ‘Uncut Gems’
by Michael J. Casey
WE ARE BOULDER COUNTY! INDEPENDENT & LOCALLY OWNED SINCE 1993 )RU DGYHUWLVLQJ LQIRUPDWLRQ FDOO ZZZ %RXOGHU:HHNO\ FRP
STAY CONNECTED Check us out on Facebook and Twitter for events, local news, and ticket giveaways. facebook.com/boulderweeklymedia twitter.com/boulderweekly
boulderweekly.com BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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BOULDER WEEKLY
BY BOULDER WEEKLY STAFF
Chicken Salad Sandwich
Mon Cherie Bistro and Bakery 211 N. Public Road, Suite 110, Lafayette, mon-cheri-bakery-and-bistro6.webnode.com
Lardo Tigella
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La Tigella at Rosetta Hall 1109 Walnut St., Boulder, rosettahall com/chefs/la-tigella
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he  tigella  is  a  PHOTOS BY STAFF unique  sandwich  created  and  celebrat- ed  in  Bologna,  Italy.  Chef  Alberto  Sabbadini  has  brought  this  hand- sized  delight  to  Boulder  at  his  Rosetta  Hall  stall.  The  tigella  is  composed  of  split,  crispy  bread,  which  is  stuffed  with  any  number  of  fillings  —  Sabbadini  offers  mortadella  with  radicchio  and  aged  balsamic;;  fresh  fruit  and  hazelnut  spread;;  and  one  we  particularly  enjoyed,  a  tigella  stuffed  with  lardo  (cured  pig  fatback)  paste,  rosemary,  garlic  and  Parmigiano-ÂReggiano  cheese.  It’s  delightfully  fatty,  without  becoming  unctuous,  and  the  clever  addi- tions  of  rosemary,  garlic  and  piquant  cheese  bal- ance  each  bite.  Though  the  tigella  is  literally  the  name  of  the  game,  we  recommend  bringing  an  appetite  for  Sabbadini’s  porchetta  plate,  pizzas  and/ or  pasta  Bolognese.  Tigellas are are $9 for two.
here’s  nothing  like  sitting  in  a  little  bis- tro  on  your  own,  book  to  keep  you  company,  warm  coffee  in  your  hand.  We  stopped  by  Mon  Cherie  Bistro  and  Bakery  recently  to  do  just  that,  and  while  we  were  tempted  by  the  selection  of  fresh  baked  goods,  we  couldn’t  resist  the  savory  chicken  salad  sandwich.  Tender  chunks  of  white  meat  are  mixed  with  the  traditional  combination  of  mayo,  celery  and  white  onions,  but  dried  cranberries  and  sage  give  this  classic  a  slightly  sweet  and  delicately  earthy  flavor.  Mon  Cherie  serves  a  hefty  portion  between  a  flaky,  buttery  croissant,  with  a  side  of  crispy  sweet  potato  tots  in  our  case  (fries  or  cole- slaw  are  options  as  well).  There’s  nothing  like  enjoying  a  classic  dish  with  a  gentle  twist. $11.
Cranberry Blackcurrant Sour
Sanitas Brewing Co. 3550 Frontier Ave., Unit A, Boulder, sanitasbrewing.com
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et  it  while  it  lasts:  Sanitas’  Cranberry  Blackcurrant  Sour,  which  launched  in  October,  is  an  excellent  change-Âof-Âpace  holiday  brew.  Cranberries  and  black  cur- rants  complement  one  another  —  it’s  a  juicy,  tart  and  sweet  brew  —  while  a  crisp  body  keeps  the  sips  light.  Sanitas’  Cherry  Saison  is  another  fruit-Âforward  seasonal  brew  to  keep  an  eye  on.  Prices vary.
Hammond’s Peppermint Ice Cream
Sweet Cow Ice Cream Multiple locations, sweetcowicecream.com
H
ammond’s  Candy  is  a  Colorado  original  and  a  holiday  staple.  Their  candy  canes  are  the  stuff  of  legend:  Sweet  without  being  sugary,  hard  without  being  brittle.  ’Round  this  time  of  year,  you’ll  find  them  just  about  everywhere:  sweets  shops,  grocery  stores  and,  magnificently,  Sweet  Cow  Ice  Cream.  They  have  over  20  flavors  to  choose  from,  but  ’tis  the  season  for  Hammond’s  Peppermint  Stick  and  Hammond’s  Peppermint  Bark.  The  former  wraps  creamy,  luscious  vanilla  around  flecks  of  Hammond’s  potent  peppermint,  while  the  latter  incorporates  chocolate  chunks.  One  is  enough  to  brighten  your  day;;  together,  they’ll  make  your  week.  Gobble  them  down  in  one  of  Sweet  Cow’s  oversized  waffle  cones,  and  the  world  shines  a  little  brighter.  $3.25 per scoop, $0.95 for the cone.
1085 S Public Rd. Lafayette (303) 665-0666 Hours: Tues. Weds. Thurs. Sun 11am - 9pm Fri. Sat 11am - 9:30pm Closed Monday BOULDER WEEKLY
Thank You for Voting us Best Asian Fusion
Restaurant
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Paela by Chef Miguel
^ Vegan & Gluten Free
coffee – breakfast – lunch – tapas – dinner 5530 spine rd, boulder 303.719.1431 aperitivoboulder.com
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Executive Chef: Miguel Vazquez
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+1 free happy hour tapa 3pm - close
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www.cosdiner.com
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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
SUSAN Â FRANCE
Open & Shuttered
365 days in the life and death of Boulder County restaurants
TEOCALLI BARthat  address  for  decades.  Pop  culture  TENDER Lindsay historians  revere  the  building.  It’s  one  Balgobin serves of  the  few  remaining  swoop-Âroofed  beverages at one Big  Boy  restaurants.  Downtown,  of the county’s best new restaurants. another  sports  bar,  the  Lazy  Dog  Bar  &  Grill,  also  closed  after  22  years  at  1346  Pearl  St.  The  biggest  local  restaurant  news  of  2019  was  the  opening  of  Rosetta  Hall,  Boulder’s  first  food  hall  featuring  a  movie-Âset  design  and  a  roster  of  new  places  to  eat:  Folsom  Foods,  Jacaranda,  Petite  Fleur,  see NIBBLES Page 50
Th u r sd ay
By JOHN LEHNDORFF
D
ear  Future  Food  History  Researcher,  As  the  year  2020  arrived,  we  heard  that  Ralphie’s  Bar  and  Grill,  which  only  opened  in  February,  would  close  by  the  end  of  the  year.  That’s  the  way  the  restaurant  world  churns  in  Boulder.  I’m  assuming  that  all  restaurants  have  closed  in  future  Boulder  because  all  food  is  personalized  and  deliv- ered  at  home.  Back  in  the  2020s,  we  were  still  going  out  to  eat.  I’m  guessing  your  future  doesn’t  include  sports  bars,  which  were  doomed  by  personal  technology.  The  location  at  2860  Arapahoe  Ave.  had  been  the  sports  bar  Harpo’s  for  15  years,  but  people  had  been  eating  and  drinking  at Â
Ladies night ! " ! " " Longmont Public House 1111 Francis Street, Suite A Longmont, Colorado 303.647.3755 longmontpublichouse.com
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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NIBBLES from Page 49
Confit,  Ginger  Pig,  La  Tigella,  Tierra,  Eridu,  Boxcar  Coffee  and  Barceloneta  Oyster  Co. Downtown  Boulder  also  saw  Arcana  open  Jungle,  a  tiki  bar,  in  the  former  PMG  space  at  2018  10th  St.  Meanwhile,  near- by  Wild  Standard,  1043  Pearl  St.,  was  re- invented  as  Pepper  The  Noshery,  located  next  to  Salt  The  Bistro.  Off  the  Mall,  Ted’s  Montana  Grill  at  1701  Pearl  St.,  famous  for  its  bison,  shut- tered  after  eight  years  in  business.  Nearby,  Emmerson  closed  after  17  months,  and  Leaf  Vegetarian  Restaurant  moved  to  1710  Pearl  St.,  former  site  of  Zeal.  Chef  Radek  Cerny’s  L’Atelier  closed  at  1739  Pearl  St.,  where  Strade  Bianche  CafĂŠ  opened  and  closed  in  2019.  Snarf’s  Sandwiches’  flagship  shop  closed  at  2128  Pearl  St.  On  the  Hill,  Gakku  Ramen  opened  at  1119  13th.  St.  and  chef  Mathew  Koury  opened  the  rotisserie-Âoriented  Chicken  on  the  Hill  at  1335  Broadway. In  North  Boulder,  short-Âlived  Lunetta  closed  at  2785  Iris  Ave.,  former  site  of  Arugula,  Laudisio  and  A  La  Carte.  Mojo  Taqueria  is  open  there  now.  Blooming  Beets  Kitchen  closed  at  3303  30th  St.  and  AOI  Sushi  and  Izakaya  opened.  Nopalito’s  began  serving  Mission-Âstyle  burritos  in  Diagonal  Plaza  near  the  state  DMV  office.   Chef  Kelly  Whitaker  opened  Dry  Storage  near  his  Basta  bistro  at  3601  Arapahoe  Ave.  serving  breakfast,  lunch  and  heirloom  baked  goods.  Lee  Yuan  Chinese  Cuisine  closed  at  4800  Baseline  Road  and  was  replaced  by  Noodle  House  Kitchen  near  the  new  Coma  Mexican  Grill.  Morning  Table  opened  at  6565 Â
Gunpark  Drive.  In  Longmont,  the  award-Âwinning  Babettes  Artisan  Bakery  relocated  from  Denver  to  the  Prospect  neighborhood.  Tangerine  opened  its  third  location  at  379  Main  St.  (formerly  the  Sun  Rose  Cafe).  Blue  Corn  Tacos  opened  at  1515  Main  St.  LoCo  Gastropub  started  serving  at  380  Main  St.,  formerly  Breaker’s  Grill.  In  Lousiville,  Empire  Restaurant  was  bought  by  chef  Jeff  Osaka,  known  for  his  12@Madison,  Osaka  Ramen  and  Sushi- Rama.  Punch  Buggy  Shave  Ice  opened  at  640  Main  St.  In  Lafayette,  Black  Diamond  Restaurant  closed  at  103  N.  Public  Road,  and  Teocali  Cocina  Tequileria,  a  regional  Mexican  eatery,  opened.  Tip  Top  Pie  Shop  began  dishing  crust  at  105  N.  Public  Road.  Brew  Tea  &  Coffee  House  opened  inside  Due  South,  a  clothing  and  gift  store,  at  802  S.  Public  Road.  Meanwhile,  Uturn  BBQ  Brewery  closed  at  599  Crossing  Drive,  Cow-ÂA-ÂBunga  Ice  Cream  opened  at  1455  Coal  Creek  Drive,  and  Simple  Greek  is  serving  at  520  W.  South  Boulder  Road.  In  other  communities,  pie-Âlovers  mourned  the  loss  of  My  Mom’s  Pies  in  Niwot.  The  Happy  Trails  Cafe  in  Nederland  shuttered  after  25  years  in  business.  Ward’s  Utica  Street  Market  was  renovated  into  Jackleggers  offering  snacks,  sandwiches  and  coffee.  The  iconic  Donut  Haus  closed  in  Estes  Park.  Pizzerias  were  in  flux  in  2019.  Fringe  Pizza  opened  at  5400  Spine  Road  in  Gunbarrel.  Boulder’s  Adelia’s  Street  Legal  Pizza  closed  at  3060  Pearl  Parkway,  as  did  1000  Degrees  Neapolitan  Pizzeria Â
(1310  College  Ave.)  and  PizzaRev  (1650  28th  St.).  Oregano’s  Pizza  Bistro  opened  at  2690  Baseline  Road  (formerly  Beau  Jo’s  Pizza,  Two  Bitts  and  Fiasco’s).  Rosati’s  Chicago  Pizza  is  now  deep-Âdish- ing  at  1067  Courtesy  Road  in  Louisville.  In  beverage  news,  BOCO  Cider  opened  in  tasting  room  row  at  1501  Lee  Hill  Drive.  Washington-Âbased  Locust  Cider  launched  a  taproom  at  5446  Conestoga  Court.  Hoplark  Tea  opened  a  taproom  at  3220  Prairie  Ave.  (All  in  Boulder.) Boulder’s  culinary  influence  spreads.  Ku  Cha  House  of  Tea  has  three  locations  now  including  Cherry  Creek  and  Fort  Collins.  Osaka’s  takes  Japanese- American  okonomiyaki  (cabbage  bun)  burgers  to  Guangzhou,  China.  Frasca  Food  &  Wine  will  open  Sunday  Vinyl,  a  music-Âoriented  wine  bar  near  Union  Station,  on  Dec.  22.  River  and  Woods  chef  Daniel  Asher  launched  Denver’s  Ash’Kara  serving  modern  Israeli  fare.  Boulder’s  Rincon  del  Sol  added  a  new  location  in  Nederland.   Coming  attractions  in  2020  include  Avanti,  Denver’s  food  hall  opening  in  the  former  Cheesecake  Factory  in  Boulder.  Torchy’s  Tacos  will  open  at  2805  Pearl  St.,  formerly  Turley’s.  Shake  Shack  is  expected  to  open  in  the  Twenty  Ninth  Street  Mall.  The  Bumbling  Bee  Vegan  Junk  Food  is  set  for  1100  28th  St.  Ska  Brewing  and  Peach  Street  Distillers  hope  to  open  an  eatery,  brewery  and  micro-Âdis- tillery  in  the  former  Fate  Brewing  facility  in  Boulder. Finally,  Liquor  Mart  will  close  in  January  after  53  years  in  business. Â
A GREAT DIP RECIPE SHARED I  learned  a  great  deal  about  entertain- ing  from  my  late,  older  sister  Barbara  who  believed  gathering  your  tribe  was  so  essential  to  life  that  it  overrode  any  con- cerns  about  fancy  attire,  dĂŠcor  and  food.  This  dish  was  her  go-Âto  party  treat  for  the  holiday  season.  Barb’s Artichoke SoufflĂŠ 1  8-Âoz  can  artichoke  hearts,  drained,  chopped 1  1/2  cups  mayonnaise 1  1/2  cups  grated  Parmesan  3  to  4  tablespoons  finely  minced  fresh  garlic  Barb  writes:  “Bake  in  a  375-Âdegree  oven  for  20  to  30  minutes  or  until  browned  and  bubbly.  I  usually  bake  it  in  a  pottery  bowl  or  two  for  a  party  and  garnish  the  top  with  olives.  Great  with  Triscuits.  This  can  be  made  ahead  and  cooked  at  the  last  minute.  Do  NOT  use  microwave  to  bake  or  reheat.â€?  Variations:  Add  chèvre,  chopped  spin- ach  or  green  onions,  hot  sauce,  and  but- tered  panko  breadcrumbs  on  top.  Can  also  be  served  in  an  oven-Âwarmed  scooped-Âout  bread  boule.             Â
WORD TO CHEW ON “Some  foods  are  so  comforting,  so  nourishing  of  body  and  soul,  that  to  eat  them  is  to  be  home  again  after  a  long  journey.  To  eat  such  a  meal  is  to  remember  that,  though  the  world  is  full  of  knives  and  storms,  the  body  is  built  for  kindness.�  —  Eli  Brown  John  Lehndorff  hosts  Radio  Nibbles  on  KGNU  (kgnu.org).  Comments:  nib- bles@boulderweekly.com.
$2 off Shephards Pie during the winter season
It’s never too cold for a Texas slush!
! " "
www.lulus-bbq.com 50
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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
New Years Eve Wine Dinner 6:30pm $70 with wine pairing, $55 without wine pairing 5HVHUYDWLRQV 2QO\
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DECEMBER 26, 2019
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BLUEFIN, BUBBLES & CAVIAR
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JOIN US FOR THE BEST NEW YEAR’S EVE C E L E B R AT I O N I N B O U L D E R Put on your finest festive clothes and join us for champagne toasts throughout the evening —with a midnight champagne toast for all Decadent New Year’s Eve creations by our Master Sushi Chef, Iwasa Yukiji Time’s Square Ball Drop on our big screen TVs Accepting reservations through 11:30pm on Dec. 31—reserve online at BoulderJapango.com or by phone at 303 938 0330 Please note: We will be closed January 1st so our team can enjoy the holidays with family and friends.
6565 Gun Park Drive, Suite 190, Boulder, CO 80301
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BOULDER WEEKLY
ALL PHOTOS BY ARI LEVAUX
W
Cuckoo for cocoa nog
hen the weather turns cold, we turn to hot cocoa. Like the vanishing sun, that steaming cup is a source of warmth and energy, and all-around power, from sled hill to window sill. Mix hot cocoa with coffee for more working power, with booze for more playing power, and with eggnog for more holiday power. With the benefit of eggnog, hot cocoa becomes an extra thick, velvety and luxuri- ous version of itself, especially with a royal hint of nutmeg. I call it cocoa nog. Because cocoa nog contains both hot cocoa and eggnog, today’s recipe is ulti- mately three-in-one. Whatever your preferences, this formula will help you get there smoothly, with no lumps, curdles or burns. With what you spike it, and how your guests make it home afterwards, are your responsibilities. But as we bliss out on these glorious beverages, let’s keep in mind the people who bring us the magical brown substance behind them all. Despite decades of pledges to change, the big players in the chocolate industry continue to buy cacao from planta- tions worked by children, for whom it’s a grueling, dangerous, dead-end life. I am happy to spend a few extra bucks on fair-trade cocoa powder from opera- tions that are certified to be upstanding employers. It guarantees the working condi- tions meet basic standards, that they don’t use child labor and that the workers are compensated fairly. Another consideration when buying cocoa powder is how it’s processed. The big distinction is between the so-called “natural” and “Dutch-processed” forms, the latter of which involves treatment to bring the pH from acidic to neutral. Some people swear by Dutch-processed, which is milder and darker, while others prefer the more complex flavor of natural cocoa powder. I like Volupta brand, which isn’t Dutch-processed but is fair-trade and organic. It makes a great cup of cocoa, with or without eggnog. Today’s recipes spring from a single change I’ve made to the eggnog recipe gen-
The holidays just got better with this three-in-one recipe
by Ari LeVaux
see COMMUNITY TABLE Page 54
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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DECEMBER 26, 2019
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732 Main Street, Louisville, Co 303.666.777 Reservations recommended. meltingpot.com
KIDS EAT FREE
COMMUNITY TABLE from Page 53
Sundays from 11am – 3pm Tuesdays 4 – 7pm Leave the tablet at home We’ve got the entertainment covered.
erously given to me by my friend Luci. All I did was add cocoa powder, in a careful way to prevent lumps. I then combined my hot cocoa with eggs in exactly the same way that Luci mixes eggs with hot cream. Luci uses an immersion blender for the egg step. This utensil, essentially a blender on a stick, occupies such an important place in Luci’s kitchen and repertoire that she calls it simply “the Tool.” Here we use the Tool to furiously beat the eggs while slowly adding hot chocolate, carefully raising the temperature of the eggs without cooking them. If you don’t have the Tool, use a mixer or eggbeater. It can be done with a whisk, but that’s a challenge. The final product is so thick it can be disorienting. For those who want to drink something a little thinner, both coffee and booze will loosen the cocoa nog into a more fluid consistency. Dark rum, bourbon and Kahlua all mix well with chocolate, and I don’t see what could go wrong adding all three to your cocoa. It is the holidays, after all.
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Step one: Hot Cocoa
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6 cups milk 2 cups cream 1 cup cocoa powder 3/4 cup sugar (or to taste) 3 teaspoons vanilla 1/2 teaspoon salt
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Mix the sugar and cocoa powder in a bowl. Add a tablespoon of milk and stir it into the powder with a fork until the milk is all gone. Add another tablespoon, stir it in, and keep going until the lumps and powder are gone and you are left with a smooth, glis- tening chocolate goodness that’s not unlike ganache, the soft frosting-like filling in the middle of a truffle. Put the milk, vanilla and remaining cream into a heavy bottom pot on medium heat. Add the ganache and mix it in. Add the salt and slowly bring the pot to the point where simmer bubbles appear around the edge. Turn off the heat and proceed imme- diately to the next step.
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Step two: Luci’s Nog conversion Note: If you plan to mix cocoa nog with coffee, skip the nutmeg. 8 cups piping hot cocoa (per step one, above) 3 whole eggs fresh ground nutmeg, to taste Crack the eggs into a bowl and prepare to beat them fiercely with the Tool or your best alternative. Slowly, carefully, begin to add the hot cocoa to the eggs. I spoon it in first, pouring it against the side of the bowl and letting it run down into the egg. After about six tablespoons, add it a bit faster, pouring in a thin stream to the foamy froth, beating continuously, “so you don’t cook your eggs,” Luci warned. If you add the hot cocoa too fast, or beat the eggs too slow, it will look like scram- bled eggs. But if combined properly, the result will be perfectly smooth, and thick as whipped cream. Stir in the nutmeg, a little at a time, until it tastes right.
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BOULDER WEEKLY
The year in beer
From seltzer to buyouts, 2019 in brewing
by Michael J. Casey
T
his isn’t a blip;; it’s the new normal.” So said Bart Watson, chief economist for the Brewers Association — the Boulder-based trade group representing craft breweries — at this year’s Craft Brewers Conference (CBC) in April. The centerpiece of every CBC is Paul Gatza (BA Senior Vice President of the Professional Brewing division) and Watson’s State of the Industry address, and this year’s address confirmed what every- one suspected, or feared: The market is getting increasingly complex and shrinking. Craft beer is up (5%), but overall beer consumption is down (1%). Attributing the dip became the topic du jour for producers, marketers and writers for the remainder of 2019. Fingers were pointed at everything from cannabis to cock- tails, from health-conscious millennials to aging boomers, and, naturally, to White Claw — the hard seltzer brand drinkers flocked to, and producers scrambled to mimic. Many brewers tried their hand at a seltzer, but most didn’t leave the taproom. A few did, notably Oskar Blues Brewery, which handed out cans of its new Wild Basin to finishing runners at this year’s BOLDERBoulder instead of Dale’s Pale Ale or Can-O-Bliss IPA. A shame too, Can-O-Bliss Hazy IPA was OSKAR BLUES BREWERY one of the brewery’s best releases this year. Overall, IPA still reigned supreme in 2019 thanks to the continued infatuation of juicy/ hazy New England-style IPA and to a resur- gence of bright and bitter West Coast styles. Completing the trident: Low-calorie hazy IPA, which from Oskar Blues’ One-y to Avery Brewing Company’s Pacer IPA (both are 100 calories), countered hard seltzers’ claim to the lower-in-calories-and-carbohydrates throne. Legally speaking, alcoholic products cannot be labeled “healthy,” but marketers parse the lines by labeling their products “better for you,” or “lifestyle beers,” with the latter trying to convince drinkers that beer is part and parcel of an active lifestyle — not that Boulder County drinkers needed to be told that in the first place. Three BC breweries opened their doors in 2019: Adamant Brewing & Blending (1001 Lee Hill Drive Unit 10, Boulder), Knotted Root Brewing Company (250 N. Caribou St., Nederland) and Unnamed Beer Co. (2907 55th St. Unit 1B, Boulder), while Northglenn’s Mother Trucker Brewery opened a satellite location in Louisville (1134 W. Dillon Road, Suite 4). One closed: Fate Brewing Company. Avery sold a majority stake to Mahou San Miguel, and Boulder Beer Company — which celebrated its 40th anniversary this year — sizeably cut back on production to focus primarily on its brewpub on Wilderness Place. Boulder Beer would have ceased distribution altogether if not for Denver’s Sleeping Giant Brewing Company stepping in at the 11th hour. Statewide, things didn’t look much different. Coors closed its Denver headquarters, relocating in Chicago (the plant in Golden will remain), and Fort Collins’ New Belgium Brewing sold to international conglomerate Kirin. Meanwhile, back in the County, it was announced that Liquor Mart — the first retail liquor store in Boulder city limits — will be closing its doors in January 2020. “This isn’t a blip;; this is the new normal.” Here we go.
BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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End The Year On A High Note
Pick Any Daily Deal Till The New Year
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Delight  Gambles  4)  Sacred  Amusements  5)  Redemptive  Synchronicities  6)  Surprise  Ripenings  7)  Gleeful  Discoveries  8)  Epiphany  Adventures  9)  Enchantment  Games  10)  Elegance  Eruptions  11)  Intimacy  Angels  12)  Playful  Salvation  13)  Luminosity  Spells Â
BY ROB BREZSNY
JUNE 21-JULY 22: “There  are  years  that  ask  questions  and Â
MARCH 21-APRIL 19: Nazi  Germany  invaded  and  occupied Â
Denmark  during  World  War  II.  In  1943,  Hitler  ordered  all  Danish  Jews  to  be  arrested  —  a  first  step  in  his  plan  to  send  them  to  concentration  camps.  But  the  Danish  resis- tance  movement  leapt  into  action  and  smuggled  virtually  all  of  them  to  safety  via  fishing  boats  bound  for  Sweden.  As  a  result,  8,000+  Danish  Jews  survived  the  Holocaust.  You  may  not  have  the  opportunity  to  do  anything  quite  as  heroic  in  2020,  Aries.  But  I  expect  you  will  have  chances  to  express  a  high  order  of  practical  idealism  that  could  be  among  your  noblest  and  most  valiant  efforts  ever.  Draw  inspiration  from  the  Danish  resistance.
years  that  answer,�  wrote  author  Zora  Neale  Hurston.  According  to  my  astrological  analysis,  Cancerian,  2020  is  likely  to  be  one  of  those  years  that  asks  questions,  while  2021  will  be  a  time  when  you’ll  get  rich  and  meaningful  answers  to  the  queries  you’ll  pose  in  2020.  To  ensure  that  this  plan  works  out  for  your  maximum  benefit,  it’s  essential  that  you  formulate  provocative  questions  in  the  coming  months.  At  first,  it’s  fine  if  you  generate  too  many.  As  the  year  progresses,  you  can  whittle  them  down  to  the  most  ultimate  and  important  questions.  Get  started!
TAURUS
LEO
APRIL 20-MAY 20: When  she  was  31,  Taurus  writer Â
Charlotte  BrontÍ  finished  writing  her  novel  Jane  Eyre.  She  guessed  it  would  have  a  better  chance  of  getting  published  if  its  author  was  thought  to  be  a  man.  So  she  adopted  the  masculine  pen  name  of  Currer  Bell  and  sent  the  manuscript  unsolicited  to  a  London  publisher.  Less  than  eight  weeks  later,  her  new  book  was  in  print.  It  quickly  became  a  commercial  success.  I  propose  that  we  make  BrontÍ  one  of  your  role  models  for  2020,  Taurus.  May  she  inspire  you  to  be  audacious  in  express- ing  yourself  and  confident  in  seeking  the  help  you  need  to  reach  your  goals.  May  she  embolden  you,  too,  to  use  ingenious  stratagems  to  support  your  righteous  cause.
GEMINI
MAY 21-JUNE 20: 2020  can  and  should  be  a  lyrically  healing Â
year  for  you.  Here’s  what  I  mean:  Beauty  and  grace  will  be  curative.  The  “medicineâ€?  you  need  will  come  to  you  via  poetic  and  mellifluous  experiences.  With  this  in  mind,  I  encourage  you  to  seek  out  encounters  with  the  following  remedies.  1)  Truth  Whimsies  2)  Curiosity  Breakthroughs  3) Â
LIBRA
SEPT. 23-OCT. 22: Libra-Âborn  mystic  poet  Rumi  (1207–1273) Â
CANCER
ARIES
suspect  that  you,  too,  will  have  the  power  to  transform  a  challenging  event  or  influence  into  an  important  asset.  You’ll  be  able  to  generate  or  attract  a  new  source  of  energy  by  responding  creatively  to  experi- ences  that  initially  provoke  anxiety.
JULY 23-AUG. 22: The  Roman  Emperor  Vespasian  (9–79  AD)  supervised  the  restoration  of  the  Temple  of  Peace,  the  Temple  of  Claudius  and  the  Theater  of  Marcellus.  He  also  built  a  huge  statue  of  Apollo  and  the  amphitheater  now  known  as  the  Colosseum,  whose  magnificent  ruins  are  still  a  major  tourist  attraction.  Vespasian  also  created  a  less  majestic  but  quite  practical  wonder:  Rome’s  first  pub- lic  urinals.  In  accordance  with  astrological  omens,  I  invite  you  Leos  to  be  stimulated  by  his  example  in  2020.  Be  your  usual  magnificent  self  as  you  generate  both  inspiring  beauty  and  earthy,  pragmatic  improvements.
VIRGO
AUG. 23-SEPT. 22: When  Virgo  author  Mary  Shelley  was  18 Â
years  old,  she  had  a  disconcerting  dream-Âlike  vision  about  a  mad  chemist  who  created  a  weird  human-Âlike  creature  out  of  non-Âliving  matter.  She  set  about  to  write  a  book  based  on  her  mirage.  At  age  20,  she  published  Frankenstein,  a  novel  that  would  ultimately  wield  a  huge  cultural  influence  and  become  a  seminal  work  in  the  “science  fictionâ€?  genre.  I  propose  we  make  Shelley  one  of  your  role  models  for  2020.  Why?  Because  I Â
wrote  that  he  searched  for  holy  sustenance  and  divine  inspiration  in  temples,  churches  and  mosques  —  but  couldn’t  find  them  there.  The  good  news?  Because  of  his  disappointment,  he  was  motivated  to  go  on  an  inner  quest  —  and  ultimately  found  holy  sustenance  and  divine  inspiration  in  his  own  heart.  I’ve  got  a  strong  feeling  that  you’ll  have  similar  experiences  in  2020,  Libra.  Not  on  every  occasion,  but  much  of  the  time,  you  will  discover  the  treasure  you  need  and  long  for  not  in  the  outside  world  but  rather  in  your  own  depths.
SCORPIO
OCT. 23-NOV. 21: Among  his  many  accomplishments, Â
Scorpio  rapper  Drake  is  an  inventive  rhymer.  In  his  song  “Diplomatic  Immunity,â€?  he  rhymes  “sacred  templeâ€?  with  “stencil.â€?  Brilliant!  Other  rhymes:  “statisticsâ€?  with  “ballisticsâ€?;Íž  “Treaty  of  Versaillesâ€?  with  “no  cease  and  desist  in  Iâ€?;Íž  and  —  my  favorite  —  â€?Al  Jazeeraâ€?  (the  Qatar-Âbased  news  source)  with  “Shakiraâ€?  (the  Colombian  singer).  According  to  my  analysis  of  the  astrological  omens  in  2020,  many  of  you  Scorpios  will  have  Drake-Âstyle  skill  at  mixing  and  blending  seemingly  disparate  elements.  I  bet  you’ll  also  be  good  at  con- necting  influences  that  belong  together  but  have  never  been  able  to  combine  before.
SAGITTARIUS
NOV. 22-DEC. 21: Sagittarian  poet  Rainer  Maria  Rilke  (1875–1926)  embodied  a  trait  that  many  astrology  textbooks  suggest  is  common  to  the  Sagittarian  tribe:  wanderlust.  He  was  born  in  Prague  but  traveled  widely  throughout  Europe  and  Russia.  If  there  were  a  Guinness  World  Records’  category  for  “Time  Spent  as  a  Houseguest,â€?  Rilke  might  hold  it.  There  was  a  four- year  period  when  he  lived  at  50  different  addresses.  I’m  going  to  be  bold  here  and  hypothesize  that  2020  will  NOT  be  one  of  those  years  when  you  would  benefit Â
from  being  like  Rilke.  In  fact,  I  hope  you’ll  seek  out  more  stability  and  security  than  usual.
CAPRICORN
DEC. 22-JAN. 19: Fifteenth-Âcentury  Italian  metalworker Â
Lorenzo  Ghiberti  worked  for  28  years  to  turn  the  Doors  of  the  Florence  Baptistry  into  a  massive  work  of  art.  He  used  bronze  to  create  numerous  scenes  from  the  Bible.  His  fellow  artist  Michelangelo  was  so  impressed  that  he  said  Ghiberti’s  doors  could  have  served  as  “The  Gates  of  Paradise.�  I  offer  Ghiberti  as  inspiration  for  your  life  in  2020,  Capricorn.  I  think  you’ll  be  capable  of  beginning  a  masterwork  that  could  take  quite  some  time  to  complete  and  serve  as  your  very  own  “gate  to  paradise�:  In  other  words,  an  engaging  project  and  delightful  accomplishment  that  will  make  you  feel  your  life  is  eminently  meaningful  and  worthwhile.
AQUARIUS
JAN. 20-FEB. 18: You’re  wise  to  cultivate  a  degree  of  skepticism  and  even  contrariness.  Like  all  of  us,  your  abilities  to  say  NO  to  detrimental  influences  and  to  criti- cize  bad  things  are  key  to  your  mental  health.  On  the  other  hand,  it’s  a  smart  idea  to  keep  checking  yourself  for  irrelevant,  gratuitous  skepticism  and  contrariness.  You  have  a  sacred  duty  to  maintain  just  the  amount  you  need,  but  no  more  —  even  as  you  foster  a  vigorous  reservoir  of  receptivity,  optimism  and  generosity.  And  guess  what?  2020  will  be  an  excellent  time  to  make  this  one  of  your  cornerstone  habits.
PISCES
FEB. 19-MARCH 20: Dante  Alighieri  (1265–1321) Â
finished  writing  The  Divine  Comedy  in  1320.  Today  it’s  considered  one  of  the  supreme  literary  accomplish- ments  in  the  Italian  language  and  a  classic  of  world  literature.  But  no  one  ever  read  the  entire  work  in  the  English  language  until  1802,  when  it  was  translated  for  the  first  time.  Let’s  invoke  this  as  a  metaphor  for  your  life  in  the  coming  months,  Pisces.  According  to  my  visions,  a  resource  or  influence  that  has  previously  been  inaccessible  to  you  will  finally  arrive  in  a  form  you  can  understand  and  use.  Some  wisdom  that  has  been  untranslatable  or  unreadable  will  at  last  be  available.
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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
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DECEMBER 26, 2019
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BY DAN SAVAGE Dear Dan: I’m  a  twentysomething  bi  man  in  a  loving  relationship  of  three  years  with  a  straight  woman.  Last  year,  we  opened  up  our  relationship.  At  the  beginning,  we  set  some  ground  rules.  One  of  her  rules  was  that  I  could  get  together  only  with  women,  no  men.  It  bothered  me  at  the  time,  but  it  was  the  only  way  she  would  be  OK  opening  up,  so  I  didn’t  press  her  on  it.  Fast-Âforward  to  a  couple  days  ago,  when  I  brought  it  up  again.  She  eventually  admitted  she’s  afraid  I  will  leave  her  for  a  man,  and  that’s  why  the  idea  of  me  being  with  other  men  makes  her  uncomfortable.  She  knows  these  are  stereotypes,  but  she  says  she  can’t  get  over  it.  I  ended  that  night  angry  and  hurt.  Now  I  don’t  know  what  to  do.  To  be  honest,  if  we  weren’t  in  an  open  relationship,  I  wouldn’t  be  bothered  by  the  fact  that  I  can’t  be  sexual  with  men.  But  now  that  I  know  she  is  not  OK  with  me  doing  so  because  of  these  bi  stereotypes,  it  drives  me  nuts.  I’m  not  going  to  end  our  rela- tionship  over  this,  but  how  can  I  get  her  to  understand  my  bisexuality  is  not  a  threat? —Bye-ÂBye  Bisexuality? Dear BBB: “BBB  obviously  isn’t  going  to  leave  his  girlfriend  for  the  first  man  he  sleeps  with,â€?  said  Zachary  Zane,  a  “bisexual  influencerâ€?  and  a  sex  writer  for  Men’s  Health.  “All  bisexual  men  are  not  secretly  gay.  But  this  is  a  lie  —  a  vicious  stereotype  —  that  BBB’s  girl- friend  has  heard  countless  times.  So  even  though  she  knows  this  logically,  she  still  can’t  shake  that  concern.  Fear  often  isn’t  rational  and  it  can  override  logic.  She’s  simply  insecure.â€? And  while  accommodating  a  part- ner’s  irrational  insecurity  is  sometimes  the  price  we  have  to  pay  to  make  an  open  relationship  work,  accommodating  your  partner’s  insecurity  —  one  so  clear- ly  rooted  in  biphobia  —  isn’t  going  to  be  sustainable  over  time.  You’re  already  angry  and  hurt,  BBB,  and  you’re  going  to  get  more  upset  with  every  dick  you  have  to  pass  up.  So  what  do  you  do? “The  key  to  helping  BBB’s  girlfriend  understand  that  his  bisexuality  isn’t  a  threat  is  for  him  to  reassure  her  often  that  he’s  not  going  to  leave  her  for  a  man,â€?  said  Zane,  “and  to  tell  her  and  show  her  how  much  he  loves  her.  He  might  also  ask  if  there’s  a  way  she’d  feel  BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE
more  comfortable  allowing  him  to  be  sex- ual  with  a  man.  Maybe  they  have  a  threesome.  Maybe  she  prefers  that  it  be  someone  she  knows,  or  someone  she  doesn’t  know.  There’s  a  lot  to  discuss.� But  eventually,  for  your  own  sanity,  you’re  going  to  have  to  insist  that  your  girlfriend  get  over  her  biphobia.  She  can’t  just  throw  up  her  hands  and  say,  “I  can’t  help  it!� “Perhaps  I’m  giving  BBB’s  girlfriend  too  much  credit,  but  it  sounds  to  me  like  she’ll  come  around  in  time,�  said  Zane.  “And  while  BBB  is  angry  —  and  validly  so  —  the  anger  shouldn’t  be  placed  on  his  girlfriend.  It  should  be  placed  on  a  society  that  has  ingrained  in  her  the  belief  that  bisexuality  isn’t  valid  and  that  bi  men  will  always  leave  their  wives/girl- friends  for  another  man  if  given  the  opportunity.� And  if  she  never  comes  around,  BBB,  then  you  can  show  her  how  silly  and  irrational  her  fears  were  by  leaving  her  for  another  woman. Follow  Zachary  Zane  on  Twitter        @ZacharyZane_ Dear Dan:  I’m  a  bisexual  man  mar- ried  to  the  most  beautiful  trans  woman.  I  can’t  keep  my  hands  off  her.  But  why  can’t  I  fuck  her  anally  like  we  both  want?  I  can’t  seem  to  push  past  the  gates,  which  sends  a  signal  to  my  brain  that  I’m  doing  something  wrong,  which  make  me  Mr.  Softee.  Every  other  thing  we  do  in  bed  is  smooth  as  silk.  Help! —Limp  Isn’t  My  Preference Dear LIMP:  I’d  have  to  see  video  to  guess  at  what  might  be  wrong  —  not  an  ask,  LIMP,  don’t  send  video  —  but  it  never  hurts  to  use  more  lube,  engage  in  more  anal  foreplay,  and  sometimes  do  butt  stuff  without  even  attempting  anal  intercourse.  And  when  you  do  go  for  it,  maybe  instead  of  you  trying  to  fuck  her/push  past  the  gates,  LIMP,  you  could  lie  still  and  let  her  take  charge.  In  other  words:  Don’t  fuck  her  with  your  dick,  let  her  fuck  herself  with  your  dick.  On  the  Lovecast,  do  you  trust  gay  men  more  to  sell  you  clothes?  Science  has  the  answer:  savagelovecast.com. Send  questions  to  mail@savagelove. net,  follow  Dan  on  Twitter  @fakedansav- age  and  visit  ITMFA.org. I
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Boulder-based company funds CSU research on CBD and canine brain cancer by Seymour
T
here’s lots of buzz about the benefits of CBD. The non-psy- choactive cannabinoid is everywhere: grocery stores, gas stations, liquor stores. A Gallup survey found two-thirds of Americans are familiar with it, and one in seven use it to treat a variety of ailments like pain, anxiety and sleep
issues. But there’s growing evidence that CBD can also help our furry, four-legged family members, and Boulder-based Extract Labs is
helping to further that understanding. The full-service hemp extrac- tion lab recently announced it’s funding canine cancer research being conducted at Colorado State University’s James L. Voss Veterinary Teaching Hospital. Earlier this year, CSU researchers began studying the impact of CBD on canine glioma cells. The researchers are specifically inter- ested in how CBD interacts with cancer cells alone and in combina- tion with radiation therapy. According to Purdue University’s College of Veterinary Medicine, “Canine gliomas (malignant brain tumors usually found
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deep within the brain tissue) are the second most common brain tumors in dogs and the hardest to treat. They are especially com- mon in brachycephalic (short-nosed) breeds like Boxers and Boston Terriers. Many dogs are treated with symptomatic therapy (steroids and seizure medications) and their average survival is just two months.” A growing body of research supports the idea that cannabinoids can reduce tumor growth in a variety of cancers, and CBD specifi- cally may enhance uptake or increase the potency of certain cancer treatment drugs. CBD is best known as an effective treatment for seizures asso- ciated with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome or Dravet syndrome in patients aged 2 years and older. In 2018, the Drug Enforcement Administration reclassified the epilepsy cannabidiol drug Epidiolex from Schedule I to Schedule V. Just this past June, CSU announced “encouraging” results for CBD trials for dogs with epilepsy, finding 89% of dogs that received cannabidiol experienced a reduction in seizure frequency. It’s all encouraging, but more research is necessary. “We are proud to be one of the few CBD companies in America currently funding canine cancer research through a university that is world-renowned for its medical care and research,” said Craig Henderson, CEO of Extract Labs, in a press release. Extract Labs is supplying all of the CBD isolate and oils being used for research in the CSU canine glioma study. The initial phase of research is almost complete, and the team at Colorado State University hopes to publish study results within the next year. “While this research is in very early stages, we look forward to learning more about the potential impact that CBD has on canine glioma cells,” said Dr. Stephanie McGrath, a neurologist at CSU’s veterinary teaching hospital, in a statement about the partnership. McGrath is teaming up with Dan Gustafson, professor of pharma- cology and biomedical engineering, on this study. Consumers who purchase Extract Labs products on the compa- ny’s website (extractlabs.com) have the opportunity to donate toward funding for the CSU study.
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Three dot pot shots ring out in a purple haze By Paul Danish
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t’s  the  mother  of  all  marijuana  legaliza- tion  polls‌  After  a  bill  in  the  New  Mexico  legislature  to  legalize  recreation- al  pot  was  killed  in  a  state  senate  com- mittee  last  year,  New  Mexico  Governor  Michelle  Lujan  Grisham  (D)  appointed  a  blue Â
ribbon  citizens  commission,  dubbed  the  Governor’s  Legalization  Working  Group,  to  study  legalization  issues‌  The  commission  then  commissioned  a  poll  —  which  found  that  a  staggering  75  percent  of  New  Mexicans  favored  legalizing  recreational  pot  in  the  state‌  “In  this  day  and  age,  getting  75  percent  of  people  to  agree  on  the  day  of  the  week  is  hard  if  we  make  it  political,â€?  said  Working  Group  chair  Pat  Davis,  an  Albuquerque  city  councilman‌  The  New  Mexico  legislature  will  hold  a  30-Âday  “short  sessionâ€?  starting  in  January;Íž  Gov.  Grisham Â
wants  marijuana  legalization  on  the  agenda. ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ Speaking  of  New  Mexico,  a  study  con- ducted  by  researchers  at  the  University  of  New  Mexico  and  California  State  Polytechnic  University  found  that  sales  of  one  group  of  products  did  get  hammered  after  pot  was  legalized  in  Colorado,  and  it  wasn’t  alcoholic  beverages‌  The  researchers  found  that  mar- ket  share  growth  for  over-Âthe-Âcounter  sleep  aids  turned  south  when  marijuana  dispensa- ries  opened  in  a  county‌  “Recreational  can- nabis  dispensaries  greatly  increase  the  num- ber  of  individuals  able  to  legally  treat  sleep  disorder  using  cannabis,  particularly  those  with  mild  to  moderate  sleep  disordersâ€?,  the  study’s  authors  found...  “The  magnitude  of  the  market  share  decline  increases  as  more  dis- pensaries  enter  a  county  and  with  higher  county-Âlevel  cannabis  sales,â€?  they  added. ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ Of  course,  if  you’re  going  to  use  pot  as  a  replacement  for  over-Âthe-Âcounter  sleeping  pills,  there  is  an  annoying  trade-Âoff  (at  least  some  find  it  annoying),  going  to  sleep  stoned  usually  dials  back  dreaming‌  As  Dr.  Elliott  Lee  at  the  Royal  Sleep  Disorders  Clinic  in  Ottawa  explained  to  a  reporter  from  Vice,  there  are  several  types  of  sleep,  including  Rapid  Eye  Movement  (REM)  sleep,  and  three  phases  of  non-Ârapid  eye  movement  sleep,  N1,  N2,  and  N3‌  N1  is  when  you’re  dozing  off,  N2  occurs  when  you’re  transitioning  between  sleep  states,  like  going  from  N1  to  REM  or  REM  to  N3,  and  N3  is  the  “deepest  and  most  physically  restorativeâ€?‌most  but  not  all  dreams  occur  during  REM  sleep  ‌  pot Â
decreases  the  amount  of  time  it  takes  to  get  to  sleep  and  promotes  N3  sleep,  effectively  shrinking  the  REM  sleep  dream  window‌  but  you  can  open  it  again  by  discontinuing  use  for  a  few  days,  in  some  cases  just  by  not  going  to  bed  stoned‌  it  seems  there’s  a  rebound  effect  of  high-ÂREM  sleep,  during  which  you  may  experience  particularly  vivid  dreams‌  opinions  on  whether  this  is  a  feature  or  a  bug  may  vary. ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ We  said  ‘Say  it  isn’t  so,  Willie.’  So  he  did‌  A  few  weeks  ago,  Willie  Nelson,  86,  told  an  interviewer  at  radio  station  KSAT  in  San  Antonio  that  he  no  longer  smoked  marijuana  for  health  reasons‌  he  said  breathing  “is  a  little  more  difficult  these  days  and  I  have  to  be  carefulâ€?  so  he’s  quit  smoking‌  the  pro- nouncement  caused  a  mighty  perturbation  to  be  felt  through  the  force‌  Such  moments  cry  out  for  clarification‌  and  earlier  this  month  Willie’s  son  Lukas  provided  it‌  “There  is  a  lot  of  articles  going  around  saying  my  father  is  no  longer  smoking  weed.  It’s  almost  2020,  how  people  ingest  cannabis  has  changed.  Between  vaping,  edibles,  gummies,  drops,  etc.  I  think  it’s  safe  to  say  Willie  will  never  stop  enjoying  Mary  Jane!â€?...  Willie  had  good  reason  to  clear  the  air,  so  to  speak;Íž  he’s  been  in  the  marijuana  business  since  2015;Íž  Willie’s  Reserve  products,  including  flower,  edibles,  and  vapes,  usually  sell  at  a  premium  in  the  dispensaries  that  carry  them‌  “No  pigs  in  the  sky,  Willie’s  still  getting  high,â€?  the  company  tweeted‌  “Willie  does  what  he  wants,  when  he  wants,  when  it  comes  to  smoking,â€?  his  spokeswoman  added  breathlessly.  Â
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