Best example of why smoking can be bad for one's health: An oxygen tank blows up an apartment at the Trail Motel off U.S. 29 October 29. Resident James Paige, who smokes and is on oxygen, is critically injured in the blast and taken to UVA Medical Center.

Best example of why boys, aerosol cans, and matches don't mix: Two Shenandoah County boys are taken to UVA Medical Center October 29 after an aerosol can explodes on their front lawn, WCAV reports.

Best break for former Waynesboro councilor: Dubose Egleston, 55, pleads guilty to misdemeanor sexual battery November 2, dodging a felony charge for an alleged attempted rape of a 27-year old woman September 25, as well as jail time, the Staunton News Leader reports.

Worst shooting: A woman is injured when someone fires into her home in the 900 block of Rives Street around 3am November 1, NBC29 reports.

Worst shootings: A teen couple sitting in a car outside Blue Ridge Commons are shot by a Halloween-mask-wearing man October 29 around 7:30pm and taken to UVA Medical Center with non-life-threatening injuries.

Worst news for the 181 local postal workers: A recent study recommends consolidating some operations at the Airport Road facility and moving them to a larger U.S. Postal Services plant in Richmond.

Biggest boost to SPCA budget: The animal shelter presses Charlottesville and Albemarle for funding more in line with industry standards. If approved, the SPCA will get between $4 and $7 per capita instead of the $1.60 local governments currently pay for it to provide pound services. Rachana Dixit has the story in the Progress.

Highest profile bust: Raymond J. Devere-Austin, 76, prolific actor, stuntman, and director of classic TV shows like The Avengers, The Saint, Hawaii Five-O, Hart to Hart, and Magnum, P.I. (and a titled baron), is charged with felony larceny for allegedly taking objects valued at $740.52 from the Antiquer's Mall in Ruckersville, the Progress reports.

Closest proximity to power: The Miller Center of Public Affairs opens a satellite office on K Street in Washington, D.C., to assist its nonpartisan study of the American presidency-- and to tap into the 35,000 UVA alums who live in the area.

Best land deal: Charlottesville adds 1.5 acres to Forest Hills Park, courtesy of builder Southern Development.

Most perplexing PAC donations: An organization called the Monticello Business Alliance has contributed to both Rio District candidates for the Albemarle Board of Supervisors--- incumbent David Slutzky and Republican challenger Rodney Thomas--- $7,500 and $5,000 respectively, according to Charlottesville Tomorrow.

Least likely to have her library card renewed: Tracy Bishop, 35, pleads guilty to two counts of grand larceny and one count of breaking and entering the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library on Market Street in June and swiping computers. She'll be sentenced April 27.

Best Lawn bachelor pad: Larry Sabato's Pavilion IV makes the cover of the October 31 Washington Post real estate section, which details the political-junkie-upstairs and period-reception-rooms-below decor.

Luckiest: Joseph Nailler wins $250,000 from an October 27 lottery drawing. The Palmyra man bought the ticket at Harris Teeter in Barracks Road.

Hungriest: Two 400-pound pigs go missing from their bloodstained pen in Augusta County, and believed to be the victims of a bear, according to the News Leader.

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Men think: Flowers die, they don't do anything when they are alive, they cost a fortune, and they are a cliché. Men know that women in general like flowers, but men also believe that women they know personally do not like flowers. The women they know are the exception to the rule.

I think it's safe to say that mostly women are reading this. Women are reading to figure out how to get the men in their lives to send flowers.

Here is what it is going to take: Bottom line impact. Yes, the guys want to get laid, but dinner seems better: it is like money well spent to them – you still get the sex, but you also get good food. What do you get with flowers? This is how men think, for the most part.

So, here's what you get:

1. Flowers make the giver happy.

The act of giving flowers elicits a real smile (as opposed to a fake, oh-that-was-nice smile) more often than other gifts of similar cost, according to research from Jeannette Haviliand-Jones, psychologist at Rutgers University. And men are conditioned to react very positively to a real smile.

2. People think you are smarter if you're a guy who gives flowers.

That's right. Send the flowers to your significant others' workplace. Science says that people will perceive you as having higher emotional intelligence than your peers. Next step: Start milking your significant other's network of contacts since they are already impressed with you.

3. You will be a better manager.

Men give flowers at work, too. Not every bouquet means I love you. Some bouquets mean, "Get the project done on time or we're screwed." Give flowers during crunch time because flowers and plants at the workplace increase productivity. This seems like a good time to link to the post about when I got flowers from Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com. They definitely made me more productive.

Nancy Etcoff, evolutionary psychologist at Harvard and author of "Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty" (Doubleday) concurs that flower make people happier. She found that if you see a vase of flowers in the morning, you have more spunk all day and less stress and anxiety at work. So don't just send flowers to your girlfriend and your co-workers. Send flowers to yourself.

 ~

Penelope Trunk has started several companies and worked for many more.

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Undissolved Mysteries By JOHN ALLEN BREEN41@AOL.COM

Slow Wave By JESSE REKLAW
www.slowwave.com

Berard's news cartoon (see news story for context) By DON BERARD dwberard@laposadagv.net #]]> http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/cartoons.aspx http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/cartoons.aspx Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:05:18 +0000 Last week's news story, "Single shot: Can an independent win Council seat," inaccurately stated that the city unveiled its plans to chop two softball fields from McIntire Park to make way for the YMCA. The city has long maintained the chopping of the softball fields had nothing to do with the Y.

Last week's cover story, "'Off the face of the earth': the hunt for Morgan Harrington contained the following errors:

• Her mother's rhetorical question was misprinted as "Should we have have installed fear?" It should have been "Should we have instilled fear?"

• The year that UVA grad student Pat Collins disappeared was not 1985 but was actually 1986.

• Relying on older information, we reported an alleged 8:40pm phone call between Morgan and her friends. After press time, police adjusted that time of the communication to 8:48pm.

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Justin Humphreys

PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

Rashomon (1950) 

In Akira Kurosawa's frequently imitated story of four witnesses' highly subjective accounts of a rape and murder— none match (and one is told by the murder victim himself, via a medium). Rashomon is a grave, beautifully shot meditation on the elusiveness of truly true second-hand information and humanity's inherent selfishness. Director Sam Peckinpah called it "the finest picture ever made." 

3pm Saturday, November 7, Regal 3 

Pink Flamingos (1972)

Nearly 40 years have in no way dissipated this unrelenting movie's ability to horrify, offend, and amuse. Festival guest John Waters set out to terrify hippies (and everyone else) with this, his cinematic anti-Woodstock. The film follows two factions warring for the title of "The Filthiest People Alive," all set to a phenomenal, gutbucket R&B and rock soundtrack. Waters himself narrates as "Mr. Jay," a reference to Mr. Ray's Wig World, a seedy shop in Waters' beloved hometown, Baltimore. 

10pm Friday, November 6, Newcomb Hall

My Man Godfrey (1936)

A film that asks the question, "If you're so rich, why aren't you smart?" Depression-era audiences no doubt relished seeing high society get literally trashed (in several senses of the word) in Gregory La Cava's flawless, stylish, and very relevant screwball comedy. A brilliant, hilarious supporting cast (including Eugene Pallette and Mischa Auer) nearly steals the show from the sublime Carole Lombard and William Powell (as Godfrey). 

12:30pm Saturday, November 7, Regal 3

Sherlock, Jr. (1924) and Safety Last! (1923)

Watch silent comics Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd perform the most insane, dizzying stunts this side of Jackie Chan. Keaton was, to me, the single greatest silent comedian, and an astoundingly good stuntman, to boot. Keaton directed and stars in Sherlock, Jr. as a daydreaming projectionist and wannabe detective who enters into the world of the film he's screening. Keaton's deft and advanced manipulation of the cinematic medium goes way beyond being merely imaginative. 

11am Saturday, November 7, Culbreth Theatre

Duck Soup (1933)

"If you think this country's bad off now, just wait 'til I get through with it," sings President Rufus T. Firefly (Groucho Marx) of Fredonia, who for once is telling the truth. This beloved, anti-authoritarian Marx Brothers classic launches a multi-megaton assault on politics, diplomacy, wealth, and propriety. The film is loaded with classic Marx bits: Groucho demolishing a Cabinet meeting; Chico's "Shadowday" exchange; and the immortal mirror pantomime, starring three Grouchos. The Marxes' only flop during their heyday, subsequent generations have lovingly embraced this farcical tale of a venal government miserably failing its populace. 

4pm Thursday, November 5, Regal 3

Justin Humphreys has written several books and numerous articles on film and has appeared in documentaries for Paramount Home Video and the Starz Channel.  

Steve Warren

PHOTO COURTESY STEVE WARREN

Death at a Funeral (2007)

Currently being remade in "American" with Chris Rock, this English comedy directed by Frank Oz is unlikely to be surpassed for hilarity.  It's a typical story of family secrets coming out after the death of the patriarch, but brilliantly constructed so the laughter keeps building. Oz orchestrates to perfection, and Alan Tudyk raises stoner shtick to new highs. You'll have to see for yourself whether the title refers to a literal death or just the likelihood that you'll die laughing.

Noon Friday, November 6, Regal 3

Departures (2008)

A Tokyo cellist becomes an encoffinista-- one who prepares bodies for burial in a Japanese ritual-- in the 2009 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar winner.  Returning to his hometown, Daigo (Masahiro Motoki) applies for what sounds like a travel agent's job and winds up with a good gig that takes some getting used to. Yôjirô Takita's serious consideration of death is spiked with quirky, mostly deadpan humor. It's long and slow but wouldn't work so well if it were rushed.

9:45pm Friday, November 6, Regal 4

Somers Town (2008)

Short and sweet, this simple black-and-white dramedy directed by Shane Meadows (This Is England) details the friendship between a Polish immigrant and a Midlands runaway in a working-class London neighborhood.  It delights film buffs by revealing its inspirations when its two mid-teen protagonists, brunet Marek (Piotr Jagiello) and fair-haired Tomo (Thomas Turgoose) romp through London with a woman they both desire. The woman is older (Y tu mama tambien) and French (Jules and Jim).

7pm and 9:30pm Sunday, November 8, at Newcomb 

That Evening Sun (2009)

In a clash between two unpleasant men, retirement home escapee Abner Meecham (Hal Holbrook) wins our sympathy because he's "an 80-year-old man with a bum hip and a weak heart." His son (Walton Goggins) is trying to sell Abner's Tennessee farm to white trash wife-beater Lonzo Choat (Raymond McKinnon) and Abner plants himself in the sharecropper's house to fight the sale. Scott Teems' slow, deliberate drama (from a William Gay short story) shows why the South looks "strange" to outsiders.

7pm Saturday, November 7, Regal 3

Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg (2009)

In the early 1950s, even before everybody loved "Lucy," Jewish-Americans-- and enough gentiles to impact the ratings-- loved Molly: Molly Goldberg, the Bronx housewife created and played by Gertrude Berg (1898-1966). Berg receives a loving tribute in Aviva Kempner's no-frills biographical film about the granddaughter of immigrants from "the Old Country" who created a radio show that evolved into television's first sitcom. Berg was also branded a "communist sympathizer" for supporting Philip Loeb, a cast member who was blacklisted. 

2:30pm Saturday, November 7, Regal 3

Hook movie reviewer Steve Warren is available to scare you on Halloween with his appearance in Scarce, available on DVD.  

Laura Parsons

PHOTO COURTESY LAURA PARSONS

Easier with Practice (2009)

Non-writers fantasize about the thrill of book tours and adoring fans, but authors know writing is the refuge of misfits who often are better at dealing with imagined narratives than real life. Director Kyle Patrick Alvarez's humane and tenderly funny movie about a lonely writer who finds solace in phone sex has won numerous awards on the film festival circuit. Filled with gorgeous shots reminiscent of Hopper paintings, the film features a cast who hit every beat with unhurried perfection. Trust me, it's not what you think. 

5:30pm Thursday, November 5, Newcomb Hall

Monty Python & the Holy Grail (1975)

Never ever to be missed, this Terry Jones- and Terry Gilliam-directed Monty Python cult classic, featuring Eric Idle, John Cleese, and Michael Palin, is an absurd send-up of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table's quest for the legendary grail. The Knights who say Ni, the Trojan Rabbit, and 16-year-old virgins in need of a spanking have been making viewers cry with laughter and offer up random quotes at dinner parties since 1975. I fart in your general direction.

10pm, Thursday, November 5, Newcomb Hall

The Garden (2008)

Following the 1992 L.A. riots, a group of enterprising South Central community members began cultivating a 14-acre stretch of gutted inner-city blight, turning it into the nation's largest urban garden. But endings are rarely happy when politics and money get involved. Filmed over six years, this Oscar-nominated documentary follows the impoverished farmers' attempt to keep their garden after a land deal of questionable legitimacy threatens to evict them. The film's production values may be uneven, but the story unfolds with gripping intensity and the beauty of a Shakespearean tragedy. 

10am, Saturday, November 7, Regal 4

Pixar Shorts (2007) 

Who could have predicted a Luxo adjustable desk lamp would become one of the most beloved animated characters in history? Luxo, Jr., which launched computer animation giant Pixar on its course to thrilling moviegoers with Monsters, Toy Story, and, most recently, Up, is just one of the shorts in this family-friendly animated feast. Unfortunately scheduled at the same time as The Garden (sigh-- the Film Festival curse), these witty and visually stunning films are definitely not a downer.

10am, Saturday, November 7, Paramount

Election (1999)

Reese Witherspoon may have won an Academy Award for her role as June Carter Cash, but her acting masterpiece is her portrayal of high-school perfectionist Tracy Flick in Election. Matthew Broderick is also stellar as Flick's foil, nebbishy civics teacher Jim McAllister, who is determined to bring her down. Darkly humorous, the film has become a cult classic, and Tracy Flick has risen to the status of cultural icon, now serving as the gold standard of ruthless ambition when assessing female politicians (both Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin were called Flick-like during the 2008 presidential campaign).

3pm Sunday, November 8, Culbreth

Laura Parsons is the Hook's art critic.

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PUBLICITY PHOTOS

Waters moved from extreme film to mainstream in 1988 with Hairspray, which is also being screened at this year's film fest. He's made 16 movies, including Serial Mom and Cry-Baby, written five books, published collections of his photographs, released music compilations such as A John Waters Christmas, and staged art exhibits. 

And over the years, he's crossed paths with some of the most memorable characters of the late 20th century: Divine, Manson follower Leslie Van Houten, kidnaped heiress Patty Hearst, and Johnny Depp.

Baltimore, his hometown, has been the setting for most of his movies. Some people see Baltimore through the lens of The Wire; our Charm City has always been Waters tinged. But we catch up with him recently by phone in New York. 

Hook: What did you do today in New York?

John Waters: This morning, I wrote my 10 best films list for Artforum. Yesterday, I had to write a speech that I gave for the design awards last night that I gave to a company called Boym, which builds these little things called Buildings of Disaster, which are four-inch, nickel-plated replicas of everything from the Oklahoma federal building to Waco to the Unabomber's cabin, and I presented them with the award. And today-- every morning I have to think up something and sell it in the afternoon-- and this morning, I just turned in the copy-edited version of my book, which I've been working on for two-and-a-half years. It's called Role Models, and it comes out next May from Farrar, Straus and Giroux. It's my memoirs told through people that have excited me and impressed me, everybody from Dora the lesbian stripper in Baltimore to Tennessee Williams to Madalyn Murray O'Hare to St. Catherine of Sienna. Quite a pack.

Hook: We read an excerpt of that.

John Waters: It was Leslie Van Houten...

Hook: It was quite revealing.

John Waters: Well, that's probably the only serious chapter in the book. The only thing that's happened new from that chapter is one of the three [Manson] women has died recently. Susan Atkins would have been the last of the three to get out, but she's the first to get out. In a box.

Hook: What should have been obvious to us was that Multiple Maniacs and Pink Flamingos were inspired by the Manson--

John Waters: Were influenced, not inspired, influenced by. Multiple Maniacs-- we took credit for the crime before they caught them. That's really horrible. And come to think of it, Multiple Maniacs was a dress rehearsal for Pink Flamingos, I mean, Divine ate a cow heart in that; that was training wheels. It glorified violence in a comic way which people had not really done then, for a hippie audience. So what it was was punk, but we were just five years too early. 

Now you can go to the drugstore in middle America and buy the exact same hair color that Mink Stole had and David Lochary wore in Pink Flamingos. At the time, they had to strip their hair of all color and dye it with magic marker and peacock blue fountain pen ink to get that color.

What's interesting to me about that movie-- it's not my best movie, but certainly it will be right in the first paragraph of my obituary, no matter what I do the rest of my life-- it didn't get nicer. Nineteen-year-olds today have the same reaction to that movie as 19-year-olds did in 1972. So I'm proud of that. That's hard to pull off.

Hook: So how do college students react today?

John Waters: When I go to colleges-- and I go a lot-- the average age, even in New York, if I have a new DVD come out and I do a signing, the average age is 23, and I'm 63. So that has always been the only crossover that counts to me. When they use the word crossover in the movie business, they mean money, they mean going over to middle America. I've only had one movie that did that. It was Hairspray. But oddly enough, they all play on television now. Who would have ever imagined that?

And you look at that movie, and what has changed. It was supposedly shocking they sold babies to lesbian couples. Now lesbian couples have more kids than Catholics. That's really the only thing that's different. Of course when they kidnaped the girls and impregnated them, that's still not politically correct. 

Eating dog sh*t was not technically illegal then, and that's why we did it, because that's the year Deep Throat became legal, but as a joke-- what can you do that is worse than pornography but isn't illegal yet. And it is illegal now.

Hook: Really?

John Waters: Yeah. In porno, there's only three things [you can't do]-- two things, now. They can show urine, and it didn't used to be. They can't show sh*t or pedophilia. But the difference is, we certainly were not doing it for sexual reasons. There's nothing sexual about that scene. It's about anarchy. The same way I've always said Johnny Knoxville [of Jackass] would have done that if I hadn't. But he didn't have to. And I've told him that.

Hook: At the film festival here in Charlottesville, Pink Flamingos is going to follow Hairspray.

John Waters: [Laughs.] That's kind of an interesting double feature. I totally understand that they're opposite ends of the spectrum of John Waters movies. But I think they're the same. They talk about an outsider winning, an outsider being confident, about minding your own business, what's right should be right, and don't judge other people. Pink Flamingos says it in a much more aggressive way, and Hairspray says it in a much more socially redeeming way. But I didn't plot that. 

When I wrote  Hairspray, Divine was supposed to be both the mother and the daughter, kind of like the Parent Trap. But Divine was 40 or so when we made that movie. So he was the mother. 

But in Female Trouble, which we made in 1974, he was 28 or 30, but he then played a teenage high school girl and it was quite funny. That movie is probably the most popular and the most long lasting of my Divine movies. I think it's a better movie than Pink Flamingos.

Hook: When was the last time you were in Charlottesville?

John Waters: When I came to visit Sissy Spacek to see if she'd be in my movie, and she didn't.

Hook: Which one?

John Waters: Let me think. It was probably Pecker. I didn't take it personally. 

My two sisters live in Virginia. One lives in Alexandria, and the other one lives very deep in Virginia. I'll tell you where. I'm looking it up. I go there all the time. I'm going there for Thanksgiving. I just can't remember the name of that town... 

And both my sisters went to Sweet Briar, and my mother went to Sweet Briar. And it's certainly an irony that I get invited there to speak. 

She lives in Bridgewater, Virginia. It's in the middle of the Bible Belt. My sister loves it. I go there every Thanksgiving. It's very near a turkey Auschwitz. There's the most shocking turkey, poultry [facility]. Really, it is Auschwitz, and it's really booming right before Thanksgiving. It's not especially empty. But we always go by it, and it's always so alarming for me to see it, and it really is huge. 

Hook: At least your turkey will be fresh.

John Waters: I guess she got it there.

Hook: Back to your memoir. There's this one line. You say you're "guilty of using the Manson murders in a jokey, smart-ass way in my earlier films without the slightest feeling for the victims' families or the lives of the brainwashed Manson killer kids who were also victims in this sad and terrible case." What caused that realization, or have you had a change of perspective? 

John Waters: I went to that trial, and to me, it was the first real media sensation, way before OJ. It was greatly theatrical, and at the same time, the Manson family was everything every parent was worried their kids would turn out to be. And then I taught in prison, and I took it seriously. I read books about victims. And so it wasn't anything that happened over night. Doesn't everybody do things when they're young that they regret? I don't regret any of that, but I look back on it and realize it was kind of wrong-headed. 

But what has happened since then is that no one knew that Manson was going to turn into a Halloween costume, that it would never end. Even Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor, he said in the original Helter Skelter that the girls would do 20 years. 

It gets more and more notorious each day. Susan Atkins dies, and then Polanski gets arrested. The story never ends. And one hopes, if Manson dies, will that help Leslie? But I say he'll outlive Keith Richards. It is a story whose endless running time is way beyond the expiration time everybody thought it would have. 

Getting to know Leslie, to look back on that and imagine, because she really believed, it's almost impossible to understand that they thought they were doing the right thing. And now, what can she say? It's the most horrible, horrible kind of realization ever to come to terms with. And yet, she can never ever change that, and she's changed everything else she possibly can. She has become now the woman she would have been if she hadn't met him. 

I have always been drawn to extreme lives, and to questions with no fair answer. If there's a fair answer or easy answer, I'm not that interested.

Hook: What was the last thing that shocked you?

John Waters: I like to be shocked at contemporary art. The kind I like makes me mad, and then I end up buying it. I saw [Lars von Trier's] Antichrist and I loved the movie. It's like an old-fashioned shocker. I don't like reality TV. Most of it is offensive to me because it's classist, and it's asking you to feel superior to the people you're laughing at, and I really don't think I did that in my movies. And reality shows almost always do. And people's endless capacity for humiliation to be famous was new at the beginning but it's getting really tired as a subject matter.

Hook: Yeah, you covered that so long ago.

John Waters: Yeah. I don't really feel bad for them any more. I just click. I don't want to watch it.

Hook: So can we expect another movie from you?

John Waters: I hope. But I don't know any director in my world that is getting a $5- to 7-million independent film made today. There aren't any. If you look at Sundance this year, only one or two movies sold for over a million dollars. Toronto this year-- nobody bought anything. New Line, all the companies I dealt with are gone. 

But I'm in the middle of it. I'm thinking up a whole new one. I've got two, really, and I just had a meeting about them yesterday. I don't give up. I've been doing this for 40-something years. Fruitcake, my children's Christmas movie has almost gone twice and fallen through at the last minute. I think it will [get made] eventually, but the economy has played havoc on independent film.

Hook: That's too bad because we heard you speak years ago and you mentioned the trouble getting funding.

John Waters: It's never been easy to get a movie made in my whole life. Once it was. Cry-Baby, because Hairspray had just come out, and it was a hit. That was the only time. And the only time I really had enough money was Serial Mom. But I'm not whining. Because if it was easy, wouldn't everybody make movies? They think they can get laid, they'd go to good parties, they'd get to travel first class-- wouldn't every person in the world? There'd be no other careers. Everybody would like to be a film director. You get to boss people around, and you get to travel. But the reality of it, even James Cameron, when he was making Titanic, he had to put his own money in at the end.

Hook: You mentioned Cry-Baby, and we have to ask the obvious. What was it like to work with Johnny Depp?

John Waters: Johnny didn't want to be a teen idol, and he was at the time. I said, come with us, and we'll make fun of it. The same way I did in that movie for Traci Lords. She was escaping porn; and I said, let's make fun of it. Patty Hearst-- who wants to be a famous victim? She said she'd never signed an autograph until she made a movie with me. Who wants to sign an autograph because you were kidnapped? I had a critic once at the beginning of my career who said it wasn't fair that I beat the critics to the typewriter by calling it a trash epic. It's the same principle. You embrace the negative things and exaggerate them and make them your style. And then they can't use it against you. Well, they can, but...

Hook: So, do you ever think about shaving off your mustache?

John Waters: You know, one time I thought about it for an art project, what would it be if I just filmed it, like a loop that would play over and over again, and that's the only time I thought about it. Well, even if I had to go underground, like if I committed a crime and I wanted to go in disguise, I guess if I shaved it, and wore a wig, and let a beard grow that was gray and wear a baseball cap, that I could really get away with it. But no. Every day, I don't debate that. Should I? No. I don't even know I have it. I've had it since I was 19 and I'm 63. If I did shave it off, I think it might be like, it is where the sun don't shine.

~

 John Waters' talk, "This Filthy World," at 4:30pm Friday, November 6, at Culbreth Theatre, will have a limited number of tickets released at the door that day. Hairspray screens at 7pm, Friday, November 6, at Newcomb Hall. Waters introduces Pink Flamingos at 10pm that evening, also at Newcomb Hall. 

And he drops by the "Dirty Pink Polyester" Dance Party at the Southern from 10pm Friday to 2am. Drink o' the night is the Pink Fetish, and the ladies of CLAW and the C-ville Derby Dames make a special appearance. Tickets are $10-- $5 for 21-year-old UVA students. 

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 I grew up drinking milk. We even had a milkman come to the door twice a week. It was my chore to take the milk out of the milk box on the front porch. Sounds simple enough, but I seemed to forget quite often. At suppertime, my mom would ask me, "Did you get the milk?" Oops!

So I'd go to the porch to collect frozen milk (winter time) or sour milk (summer time). Needless to say, we had good milk only in the spring and fall. But you know what? Milk was really like Milk of Magnesia for me because it gave me diarrhea.

 Should lactose intolerance be considered the norm instead of a disease?

 USA Today on August 31 printed that 60 percent of people are lactose intolerant. So really shouldn't we spin it that 40 percent of the world is lactose persistent? 

 First of all, what is lactose? It's milk sugar. The small intestines have cells that produce an enzyme, lactase, to digest the lactose into two smaller sugars: glucose and galactose. (I bet Carl Sagan's favorite sugar was Galactose.)

 However, if the small intestines stop producing lactase, up to 75 percent of the lactose will zoom to the colon where bacteria will then be like fraternity brothers who just bought a keg of beer: they'll gobble up all the lactose to produce hydrogen gas and short-chain fatty acids. The literally "end" results: gas, flatulence, bloating, diarrhea, and even nausea and vomiting (the last symptoms particularly prevalent in adolescents). 

 Almost every infant and very young child has small intestinal production of the enzyme lactase. But by the ages two to five, it goes away for most people-- like in 100 percent of Native Americans, 95 percent of Asians, 75 percent of Africans Americans and Caribbeans, and 50 percent of Hispanics.

 On the other hand, only 10 percent of northern Europeans lack lactase. PLoS Computational Biology published a study that showed that about 7,500 years ago there was a genetic adaptation to help some ethnicities continue their lactase production past the age of five. Perhaps this genetic change was in response to the lack of sunlight in northern Europe, where they don't get enough vitamin D. And what foods do you think of when you hear Scandinavia, Denmark, etc? Dairy! 

 Not everyone who lacks lactase enzymes has watery, frothy, bulky stools after eating lactose. The amount of lactose consumed and the transit time in the small intestines can make the difference between a skirmish and WWII in the colon. 

 The typical Western diet for an adult is about 300g carbohydrates a day, 5 percent of which consists of lactose (unlike infants, who get 50 percent of their calories from lactose). Milk and ice cream contain the most lactose, and cheese has less. Less than 8 ounces of dairy a day can reduce/prevent the uncomfortable GI symptoms. Lactase enzyme pills are over-the-counter and can be helpful to some. Eating a fatty meal can slow down the GI tract to reduce symptoms as well. Personally, I know I cannot drink a glass of skim milk (yes, I drink non-fat) without having food at the same time.

 I don't know if milkmen exist anymore, but I now buy organic milk and immediately put it in my fridge when I get home.

~

Dr. Hook cracks a joke or two, but he's a renowned physician with a local practice and an interesting website, drjohnhong.com. Email him with your questions.

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Lora Lee Jones (not shown) and Lara Blake and Ashley Florence (quite shown here) star in Mantra, a film written and directed by Brian Wimer and available on DVD through mantramoviesite.com.
Photo by Sallah Baloc

And what medium does local best, but indie film? The neo-localist movement, with its home-knit mittens that fit like Ziploc baggies and heritage tomatoes that look like malignant tumors, gives us more than wormy produce and scratchy sweaters. It gives us Brian Wimer.

This guy is brilliant. Six foot four (he edges out our other best local filmmaker, Johnny St. Ours, by about a half-inch), raffishly handsome (Errol Flynn with aberrant facial hair), he's a Hollywood slickster (I tried to buy a ticket to his show and wound up asking for his autograph). He also has a serpentine mind for juggling people and ideas, and nobody likes him.

Charm, poise, genius, and universal loathing. Who could ask for better in a visionary, someone who looks good in Armani while you're stoning him to death? And, in a way, he's receiving a stoning: he makes great art, and nobody notices.

Mantra is his latest work, and it's making a solid showing at U.S. festivals, winning awards and audience acclaim. His advertising of it reveals his own twisted cleverness. He's too confident to fear labels, and he deliberately taunts a potential audience to ignore the film by printing his cinematic formula: zombies, tits, and gore at ten minutes apiece. And he delivers, by the second-hand on my watch, each of these.

But somehow, in what time remains on the clock, he shocks the audience into disbelief that they've just seen a DIY genre-piece. At a sparsely attended showing at Vinegar Hill, audiences seemed not to know what the hell to make of it, but in the out-procession nobody said "zombie" and nobody said "slasher." About the most literate critical comment I heard was "whoa," and that was from a UVA professor.

A handful of average-looking actors get into an average bus and go off on an average New-Age Retreat. Wimer plays the guru, and in five screen-minutes steals the film; to the extent that the hoariest part of the suspense in the oeuvre is the edge-of-seat hope that Wimer might appear again, and again, and again on-screen to wow us more. The film unrolls, and stuff happens.

We're never quite clear what that stuff is, and it makes not the slightest difference to enjoyment of it. There are Zen pronouncements that while delivered with irony somehow manage to settle on the viewer like the real thing; I found myself repeating them as if I'd just sat at the knee of Dalai Lama.

Flashback, flash-forward, funny interactions between realistically differentiated characters, long-angle shots of faces twisted into boredom-shock-confusion-beatitude, those infinite moments of camera stillness watching someone stir a pot, then a frightening downpour of synesthesia and jumpcuts and just-plain-weird visuals.

Then the final credits roll. Abel Okugawa's music haunts the thing, a trance of temple-bells and three-chord Ommms.

Was there a plot? Maybe. Did the film start-develop-culminate-resolve? Maybe. Did a character change? Maybe.

Did the audience leave wanting more, wondering more than they imagined they would, wishing they knew what the hell was going on? Absolutely.

Wimer buses us in and buses us out, and we wonder where we've been for over an hour: pure escapism and pure art, the art of out-of-body transport, an abduction.

Mind this: Mantra uses all the tricks of the horror film for suspense and the avant-garde film for art. It is as horrific an art film as I've seen, and as artful a horror film as I've seen. Yet somehow Wimer's Hollywood-without-Hollywood wit knows better than to make Mantra wholly either. It is not a didactic or exploratory yawn. It is not a formulaic or re-tread nail-biter.

We see breasts but can't take the time to notice whether they are shapely or perky, see gore and barely notice it's gory, violence and barely notice it's violent.

And that is Wimer's gift to us, that somehow he delivered absolutely on his promise that Mantra would be every zombie-gore film you've ever seen, and that you'd never have a second's sense that you had just seen one.

This is the most polished Charlottesville film work I've seen to date: cinematographically gorgeous; a created world of its own, perfectly consistent and drawn; unique and differentiated characters, doing smooth acting; a lush-lush-lush soundtrack.

I'm not sure we need to care, and I'm not sure Wimer would care, that we don't have a clue what it's all about. In The Big Chill, a 1983 movie with too much plot and too much soundtrack and too much to tell us, William Hurt delivers flawlessly that film's anti-thesis, and it sticks to Mantra: "Sometimes, you've just gotta let art kinda flow over you..."

~

Matthew Farrell reads cvillenews.com, which first published a longer version of this review, and he launched the Hypocrite Press in 1991.

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Alan Ball
PUBLICITY PHOTO

"I happen to live in suburbia," Ball, 52, told the Hook recently. "And I like it." 

His script dealt more with the zeitgeist of suburbia, and he intended his account of middle-class dad Lester Burnham's dissolution "to be an indictment of the shallowness of American values that [Americans] are basically conditioned from birth to accept as gospel," he explains.

"In that regard," he says, "I don't know if there is any more scathing indictment of American culture than American culture itself." 

Ball's targets seem peculiarly ironic— but not illogical-- considering that his prior writing background was mainly in pure Americana: sitcoms. But his days of unrewarding toil on shows like Grace Under Fire soon ended: American Beauty won him the 1999 Academy Award for best original screenplay, among numerous other laurels. 

"It became this phenomenon," Ball marvels. "Who knows why?"

Being thrust into the spotlight, Ball recalls, "was a strange experience... It's a place that I'm not entirely comfortable. And all the things that are really, really huge traps for an artist of any kind were all just sprung on me at once." 

Ball dodged those traps smoothly, and next developed the hugely popular HBO series, Six Feet Under, which, for five seasons, chronicled the lives of a family of morticians. In 2008, he followed it up with HBO's True Blood, an adaptation of Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse vampire novels. Set in Louisiana, the series traces a vast undead community's attempts to assimilate into everyday human life. 

Appropriately, Ball discovered the novels while waiting for a dental appointment. At a bookstore, he was amused by the tagline for Harris' Dead Until Dark-- "Maybe having a vampire for a boyfriend wasn't such a good idea after all"— and bought the book. "I really just couldn't put it down," he says.

Like a vampire guzzling type-O negative, he was hooked. Somewhere around reading the fourth book, he envisioned Harris' novels as a TV series. "What I really loved," Ball says, "was that they walked this razor's edge of tone between romance and the supernatural and horror and comedy and social commentary and Wal-Mart trailer park people... I just found it delightful. It was so escapist and so much fun."  

True Blood has further cemented Ball's warm relationship with television, in which, it seems, he is content. Or is he?

"It's just a lot easier to get interesting, complicated, morally ambiguous stories about flawed characters done on the small screen," he says, "than it is on the big screen."

Pinning down a unifying theme in the wildly disparate subjects of Ball's work is tricky. But while discussing his sense of humor, he gives more than a little hint about it.

"One of my ways of dealing with depressing matters," he explains, "is to make fun of them. It is one of the things that I learned in adolescence, and I've never really outgrown it because it has helped me survive a lot."

~

Alan Ball will host a screening of True Blood at 10:30 am Sunday, November 8, at UVa's Culbreth Theatre. At noon that day, also at Culbreth, he will introduce American Beauty, which will be followed by a Q&A. 

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"What wouldn't attract one to CLAW?" Wimer posits. "Pregnant brides, dominatrixes, lesbian homewreckers-- it's all the ingredients for fun."

CLAW brings together upstanding, somewhat-radical women to participate in evenings of theatrical competition to raise money for women-initiated charities and make "absurdist political and social commentary," according to Wimer. 

But what it really does is allow a few rough 'n tumble gals to let their hair down and display their arm-wrestling prowess to a willing and wild crowd. It's the ultimate underground spectacle-- and all Wimer had to do was be in the right place at the right time.

"I usually get word of bizarre things happening in town," Wimer says. "I just showed up and asked if I could film. It was a pain to have such a big camera in a small venue though-- I got heckled by people at one of the events for blocking the view."

The ladies of CLAW draw on somewhat antiquated female personas-- the "Bridezilla," the "Homewrecker," the "School Marm"-- allowing each match-up to be a crusade against stereotypes (one participant recently competed in a burka). As each wrestler inevitably brings her own story to the fight, subsequently outdoing one another with costumes, props, and co-characters, the plot is already laid out for Wimer to follow.

In a two-part documentary (only the first, a mere 27 minutes, will be screened at the Festival), Wimer follows a July 2008 match between the Bridezilla and the Homewrecker. Beyond interviewing participants and spectators and adding in a soundtrack by local electro-pop ensemble Straight Punch to the Crotch, the filmmaker just had to sit back and enjoy the spectacle.

"You never know what's going to happen with a documentary-- it just happens that in this one, everything happens," he says. "Once they put on the wig and makeup and transform themselves, it allows them to scream, holler, be uncontrollable, thrashing and wailing."

No stranger to spectacle (recent films include Eat Me: The Musical, a zombie musical starring local absurdist rockers The Falsies, and Mantra, an award-winning Buddhist horror flick), Wimer continues to seek out the unconventional forms of entertainment in the local community. After screening CLAW, he'll turn his camera to the Charlottesville Derby Dames.

"Why do women do roller derby? Because it provides the antidote to the banality of living in the suburbs without having to leave the suburbs," Wimer explains. "That's why we love freak shows; they provide what life doesn't. That's what makes this town liveable, stuff like CLAW-- if it were all pizza and Fridays After Five, I think you'd go mad."

~

11:15pm Saturday, November 7, Regal 3 on the Downtown Mall. Q&A with director Brian Wimer to follow.

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Norman Jewison
PUBLICITY PHOTO

Those lines from Academy Award-winner Norman Jewison's legal satire ...And Justice for All (1979) became a signature Pacino moment, and sum up the fiery conflict at the film's core. 

Jewison, 83, recently discussed making the film and working with Pacino, who he describes as "one of our finest and most theatrical actors." 

But, Jewison cautions, "He's like a doberman pinscher: If you take him off the leash, forget it! The anger is so incredible." During production, Jewison says, "He actually smashed the windshield of a Cadillac with a briefcase, and that's hard to do!"

But Pacino's operatic acting style ideally suited the film's script, which Jewison says was "a little over-the-top, like most good comedy/satire should be." Despite the film's occasional outrageousness, he says, he strove for believability, because regardless of genre, "If you don't believe it... you tune out of the movie. And this had some strange scenes in it, so that's why I went for seasoned actors."

Among the veterans were Pacino's mentor, legendary acting teacher Lee Strasberg, whom Jewison brought on to keep Pacino in line, and two-time Academy Award nominee Jack Warden. 

The leading lady, however, was Christine Lahti, a newcomer Jewison discovered "in New York Off-Broadway," he says, whose height intimidated the diminutive Pacino. 

 "So there's a lot of scenes where I have them sitting down," he says, laughing.

The film's top-flight cast was given meaty legal roles. "Trial lawyers are really exciting people to watch because they're consummate actors," Jewison explains. "And justice doesn't even figure into it." Nor do right and wrong, or the truth, he says. "It's about winning.

"Winning is everything. And if winning is everything in your society, then there isn't any grace left. It's all about beating up the next guy. It's a pretty tough society." 

As ...And Justice for All turns 30, Jewison feels that its potent satire largely still holds true: "I think it's still difficult to find justice unless you're white and very wealthy. There seems to be a justice for the rich and a justice for the poor." 

When originally released, many Americans disliked the film, Jewison says, "because they felt it ridiculed the judicial system. So the American Bar Association wasn't happy. 

"Now, so many, many years later, they've kind of embraced the film," Jewison marvels. "It's strange. I get invited to address law societies."

~

Norman Jewison hosts a screening of ...And Justice for All at 4pm Saturday, November 7, at the Paramount Theater. At 1pm Friday, November 6, he will host his film The Russians are Coming! The Russians are Coming! at the Regal 4. 

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John and Don Martin enter Lane High School-- and the history books-- September 8, 1959.
PHOTO COURTESY WCVE

Those first 50 black students who walked through the doors of hostile white schools in 1959 learned firsthand what it was to be on the front lines of integration. And their stories are told in Locked Out: The Fall of Massive Resistance, a Center for Politics-sponsored documentary produced by WCVE public television. 

"The Center for Politics felt this was an important chapter in Virginia history," says Bruce Vlk at the Center, which held a conference on massive resistance this summer in Richmond. 

 "[Locked Out] is less about massive resistance than these students taking on something brand new," says WCVE director/producer Mason Mills, who has worked with the Center on its series on Virginia governors-- one of whom, Doug Wilder, will be at the Locked Out premiere.

Mills talked to 21 of the students and whittled 20 hours of interviews down to an hour. "The one thing you don't want to do is mess up a story," he says.

"These were kids," says Mills. "What hit me the hardest was how adults were treating kids. They were integrating schools and treated so poorly."

Don Martin was one of those children. He was 12 years old entering the eighth grade at Lane High School in 1959, and the photos of him and his brother looking for an unlocked door-- literally-- into the school are iconic.

Over the years, he's done many interviews and appeared in other documentaries. Still, the 50th anniversary has been "quite consuming-- far more than I anticipated," he says. 

Nonetheless, he'll be there for the premiere of Locked Out. Because his history is part of our history.

~

5pm Saturday, November 7, Culbreth Theatre. Discussion with Larry Sabato, Governor Douglas Wilder, Mason Mills, Delores Brown, Rita Moseley, and Donald Martin. 

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"People at UVA are very much well-rounded people-- especially in this band," says sophomore piccolo player Abby Heider. "We're all involved in so many different activities, and there are a variety of interests and goals. We're not all music majors!"

Diversity is a key factor, for both the band and the film. Miller and his production team contacted band director William Pease in February, 2008, as the presidential race began sweeping across the country, and Virginia was identified as a crucial swing state.

Hoping to find a group of students to parallel the wave of enthusiasm seen in the youngest voting demographic, Miller identified UVA and fellow state school Virginia State University's marching bands as passionate, educated, and vocal student groups.

"They came to talk to us about our vision of the marching band and what we do on a daily basis, but they were never clear about the angle," says Pease, now in his sixth year directing UVA's ensemble. "It ended up being more a political statement about the election than about the activity of a marching band."

Miller has previously been vocal in the French media about his fascination with the American institution of marching bands, stirring up vintage ideas of grandstand bands rallying behind a political candidate on a soapbox. While admittedly a more liberal-leaning band, UVA's marching band insists that it was its diversity-- in political preference, extracurricular activities, backgrounds-- that matched Miller's preconceptions of both American bands and youth.

"It's great that you can talk politics and still be a part of the same group-- that's one thing we agree on with the students," says Pease. "You don't see divisiveness here on Grounds; it's a nice culture to be a part of."

Despite the political charge resonant throughout the film, the students and their passion for both music and change remain the cinematic highlight, according to Pease. 

Infiltrating the band for nearly three months in the fall of 2008, Miller and his crew attended summer band camp, cheered at football games, and (supposedly) tagged along to parties. And although the band only comprises a small portion of the university population-- just two percent-- and has mixed political leanings (despite the film's emphasis on Democratic supporters), they managed to accentuate a key characteristic of university students, a mainstay of the Obama campaign, and a feature of an emerging generation: the willingness to accept change. Even if that change meant camera crews, lights, and microphones taking over their lives and practice time. 

"It was very strange having a camera there from the very first day the students arrived for band camp," Pease recalls. "But it ended up blending in with everything else that was there-- the traffic, Cav Man running a horse through the band, the railroad tracks-- I don't think it made much of a difference in anything we did."

7pm, Thursday, November 5 at Culbreth Theatre. Q&A with director Claude Miller, Annie Miller, Professor Peter Kirkpatrick, and members of the UVA and VSU marching bands to follow.

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A high school student, Kacie Peterson, disappeared from Washington state on Oct 2nd and was found in Times Square New York on Oct 9 with amnesia. Is Morgan a Dissociative Fugue victim?

L.K. Tucker
Montgomery, Alabama
VisionAndPsychosis.Net

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1. Was it necessary to make her depiction such that she looks like a ghost when she hasn't even been declared dead?

2. Do you really think such a fuzzy grainy photo/illustration with the dire headline "off the face of the earth" is helping at all towards recovery efforts? (It appears as if you have capitalized on the dramatic to spite what is constructive.)

3. Most importantly, would you have dedicated the same amount of layout pages had she not been blonde and beautiful?

She and her family have done nothing wrong, nor is their anything wrong with being blonde and beautiful; I do very very much hope to see a safe return of Morgan to her family. It is simply that every time I see a publication plastered with blonde white women, I think about how many others we don't see and why this is the case.

Please consider your covers more carefully next time.

Hannah Elliott
Charlottesville
helliott1004@gmail.com

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PUBLICITY PHOTO

The Coen Brothers return to their cultural and geographical roots with one of the year's strangest comedies. It's set in Minneapolis in 1967, the year big brother Joel Coen turned 13. Does that mean it's autobiographical? Who cares? It's the most Jewish movie since Fiddler on the Roof, but most of the singing is done by Jefferson Airplane.

Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) is on top of the world. His doctor just gave him a clean bill of health, he's soon to become tenured as a physics professor, and his son Danny (Aaron Wolff) is about to be bar mitzvahed. Things at home might be better if Larry's brother Arthur (Richard Kind) wasn't staying with them and driving everyone crazy, but overall life is good.

It's funny how things can change, almost like in a movie. Suddenly, Larry's wife Judith (Sari Lennick) wants a divorce so she can marry widower Sy Ableman (Fred Melamed). The tenure is threatened by someone sending anonymous letters to the committee. Larry suspects the Korean student (David Kang) who may have tried to bribe him for a passing grade. Mr. Brandt (Peter Breitmayer), the gentile next door, is encroaching on his property line. Danny owes money to the local pot dealer and is always fighting with his sister Sarah (Jessica McManus); Arthur's in trouble with the police and maybe the mob for gambling; and Channel 4 won't come in, so Danny can't watch F Troop.

Then Judith banishes Larry to the Jolly Roger motel, there are auto accidents, legal expenses, more charges against Arthur, threats from the Koreans and the Columbia Record Club... Oy! Job didn't know how easy he had it.

Of course there are still some good things. Climbing on the roof to fix the TV antenna, Larry sees Mrs. Samsky (Amy Landecker) next door sunbathing in the nude, offering him a view of her promised land.

You don't have to be Jewish to appreciate A Serious Man. Assuming you have a passing familiarity with the importance of a bar mitzvah to a boy approaching manhood, most of the relevant Yiddish terms are explained, and the others just add seasoning. (You can find a glossary on the film's website if you're curious.)

Just as you don't have to know Yiddish, you don't have to know the actors, who were obviously chosen for their great character faces. Eugene Levy could have played Larry, Gina Gershon would have been a great Mrs. Samsky; but they wouldn't have been better than the actors the Coens have chosen, and they would have been more expensive. (I'm just saying...)

The most Jewish scenes in A Serious Man (other than all of them) are a prologue set in the Old Country and a story, "The Goy's Teeth," a rabbi tells Larry. They help explain why Larry teaches, if only in his dreams, "The Uncertainty Principle: We can't ever really know what's going on."

A Serious Man can hardly be seen as a celebration of Judaism, although there may be some affection buried deep in its satire. With its slight exaggeration-- and remember, it takes place 42 years ago-- it emphasizes the sense of otherness some Jews feel (if they don't actually cultivate), despite the possibilities for assimilation.

Even if you've never kibitzed in a kibbutz, if you're a fan of great filmmaking, you'll agree Joel and Ethan Coen have earned another mazel tov with A Serious Man.

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Mike Fermahin of Sarisand Tile
PHOTO BY RYAN HOOVER

So I had the surveyors come out and lay out the building. I was supposed to go behind and check that, but we were so busy that day I didn't check. 

So we're building and building, and months went by. You couldn't see the other building from one hallway to the other one which was about fifty feet across from it. There was a big opening for the hallway that was just closed off with a temporary plywood wall. The plumber was looking through a hole in the wall and asked, "Are these buildings going to line up?" 

I said, "Don't you worry about it. You let me handle the building, and you handle the plumbing." 

So we finished, and I tore down the plywood wall and looked around. 

The whole building was five feet too far forward than where it was supposed to be.

 My heart almost fell out. 

The 15,000 square-foot building's already up: it's already been tiled, everything's done in it. It's an ordeal to build a building that far off. The buildings weren't supposed to line up, but the hallway was. 

They made us draw up new plans. It was originally just supposed to be a hallway, but since we had to fix that, they made us add on a new room with an eating facility. We wound up losing around $250,000-300,000 on that mistake. There was no way to move the building, of course.

So normally they would initially lay four corners for me and they would be offset so that I could run strings everywhere. And after that, I would measure from the property line's corners over to the building to make sure that they were in the right place. 

I had never had a surveyor put a building in the wrong place before in my life.

So it was easy to be lackadaisical. 

The surveyor was late that day. I was in such a rush since we had to have those footings at least dug that day so we could start work that I didn't go back and measure and double-check his work. The surveyor eventually admitted that it was his fault, but that doesn't excuse me for not having double-checked it. 

Trying to rush and get stuff done and my boss being on my back all contributed to it. 

The hospital's still sitting there, still being used. I just had blood drawn there about a month ago. 

There's a very simple moral to this story: "Measure twice, cut once." It's a human world. We all make mistakes.

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Malaina Poore: "I'm going to go see Hairspray and I'm going to go see Alan Ball speak on Sunday morning, and maybe go to the CLAW [Charlottesville Lady Arm Wrestlers documentary] on Saturday night."

David Crowe: "I'm going to go see Mr. Smith goes to Washington and the panel afterwards, with the correspondents from Washington."

Bree Spriggs: "I'm not sure yet what I'm going to see, but I'll probably decide based on the venue that I'd want to go to, and I'd like to go to Vinegar Hill Theatre or Paramount."

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Address: 10029 Hatton Ferry Road

Neighborhood: Scottsville

Asking: $1,995,000

Assessment: $738,700

Year Built: 2007

Size: 2,200 fin. sq. ft. / 25,000 unfin.

Land: 102 acres

Agent: Mary Leavell, 220-2200, Keller Williams

Curb Appeal: 8 out of 10

Bluebird Hill Farm will be home to at least two types of residents: people and horses (and possibly some pigs, goats, or chickens). Unlike a regular home, though, the horses have had the most design input.

The current owner built the farm, located footsteps from the Hatton Ferry/James River Runners complex, to be an equestrian center, with a 25,000 square-foot barn as the centerpiece. Visitors enter through a front room that could be an office or reception room with built-in benches and a reception desk. 

The warm-up ring and riding ring, carpeted with soft sand, are cavernous, with high ceilings and windows to let in natural light. Without the windows and sand, it would feel suspiciously like a warehouse. 

Each of the 28 twelve-by-twelve stalls has its own water source, ceiling fan, and movable partitions, and there's separate storage for tack and even a blanket-drying room. Shower stalls feature both hot and cold (apparently atypical in horsey amenities). 

In 2007, a 2,200 square-foot apartment was added to the complex along one outside wall, with windows on two sides. Though visitors enter from the barn, there's a clear transition to the personal space, which features a large living room opening to a roomy kitchen.

Two full baths and a stacked washer/dyer are convenient-- and probably necessary here-- although the barn does have another bathroom off the office for visitors. The apartment is big enough that a small family probably won't feel too cramped. 

The area outside the barn has also been carefully planned. The driveway runs around the entire structure, so trucks don't have to back up to exit. Twelve paddocks have freeze-free watering and recently-treated four-board pine fences. (For non-horse people, a paddock is a fenced area for the steeds to cavort in.)

The farm boasts many riding trails including some along the James River. Railroad tracks do cross the property, but a crossing allows access. 

Beyond amenities, Bluebird Hill Farm is poised to be a lucrative enterprise. With monthly boarding fees and other services, the farm could quickly start providing income to help with the mortgage. Beyond the financial investment, any farm is also, however, a labor investment, and anyone considering undertaking this enterprise will obviously have to love horses and the work that comes with them.  

As an added bonus, there's an old brick rancher on the property above the complex. It's not updated, but it's satisfactory enough that the current owners live there. But even here, as with the rest of Bluebird Hill, horses are the priority-- a smaller, private barn with seven stalls is within walking distance of the house. Designed in the same style as the main complex (cream with bright blue trim), it offers access directly into a paddock. 

Depending on the situation, the apartment or the house could be ideal for a farm manager. If a buyer wants to run the business side of the farm, one space could even be a rental. As is, the property's obviously large enough to accommodate new construction. 

And who wouldn't want to personalize such an inviting space? The horses are already taken care of. With 102 acres, it's not like there isn't plenty of room.

PHOTOS BY MICHAEL BAILEY

Each week, a brave local seller invites the Hook to provide an impartial, warts-and-all look at their real estate listing. E-mail yours today!

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Property: 711 Elsom Street

Debtor: Jerry L. Crute

Amount owing: $158,000

Bidder brings: $11,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: ALG Trustee LLC 703-777-2448

November 6 at 8am at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 208 Greentree Park Road

Debtor: William Sean Stavitski

Amount owing: $210,000

Bidder brings: $20,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Friedman & MacFadyen PA 804-288-0088

November 6 at 9am at the Charlottesville Circuit Court 

Property: 729 Orangedale Avenue

Debtor: Richard K. Norwood

Amount owing: $54,150

Bidder brings: $11,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Friedman & MacFadyen PA 804-288-0088

November 9 at 10am at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 9065 West End Circle, Crozet

Debtor: Jeffrey L. and Rebecca A. Perkins

Amount owing: $246,743.90

Bidder brings: $24,500 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Glasser and Glasser PLC 757-321-6465

November 9 at 4pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 3545 Sacre Meadow Lane

Debtor: Mary E. and Ronnie Herring

Amount owing: $288,000

Bidder brings: 10 percent of sale price

Info: Bierman, Geesing & Ward 301-961-6555

November 9 at 4:01pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 3360 Meadowfield Lane

Debtor: Lemuel E. and Melissa H. Muller

Amount owing: $360,000

Bidder brings: 10 percent of sale price

Info: Bierman, Geesing & Ward 301-961-6555

November 9 at 4:02pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 1001 Black Branch Farm Road, Scottsville

Debtor: unknown

Amount owing: $316,000

Bidder brings: 10 percent of sale price

Info: Bierman, Geesing & Ward 301-961-6555

November 9 at 4:45pm at the Charlottesville Circuit Court 

Property: 2511 Plateau Road Unit A

Debtor: unknown

Amount owing: $114,000

Bidder brings: 10 percent of sale price

Info: Bierman, Geesing & Ward 301-961-6555

November 11 at 3:30pm at the Charlottesville Circuit Court 

Property: 1505 Grove Road

Debtor: Mark P. Wilson and Maria Novella Wilson

Amount owing: $382,500

Bidder brings: $15,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Shapiro & Burson LLP 757-687-8777

November 11 at 3:45pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 139 West Park Drive

Debtor: Joseph R. Dane

Amount owing: $107,000

Bidder brings: $10,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Samuel I. White PC 757-457-1460

November 11 at 4pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 3645 Worcester Lane, Keswick

Debtor: Robert J. Andris

Amount owing: $436,000

Bidder brings: $15,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Shapiro & Burson LLP 757-687-8777

November 11 at 4pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 104 Camelot Drive

Debtor: Floyd Alston

Amount owing: $158,800

Bidder brings: $15,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Shapiro & Burson LLP 757-687-8777

November 12 at 10:30am at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 5960 Markwood Road, Earlysville

Debtor: Lee and Helena Brady

Amount owing: $150,000

Bidder brings: $15,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Friedman & MacFadyen PA 804-288-0088

November 13 at noon at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: Lot 27, the Rocks

Debtor: Skyline Home Builder LLC

Amount owing: unknown

Bidder brings: 10 percent of sale price

Info: B.E. Brannock 540-885-1517

November 13 at 1:30pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 501 Westmoreland Court

Debtor: Savaminee Inthisen and Vilawan Inthisen

Amount owing: $263,700

Bidder brings: $20,000 

Info: Samuel I. White PC 757-457-1460

November 17 at 10:30am at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 1052 Glenwood Station Unit F-3

Debtor: Leland Rex Harper

Amount owing: $232,000

Bidder brings: $26,079.82

Info: Diann E. Green, Esq. 301-490-3361

November 18 at 3:30pm at the Charlottesville Circuit Court 

Property: 111 Lodge Creek Circle

Debtor: Jose R. Cornejo

Amount owing: $196,000

Bidder brings: $15,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Shapiro & Burson LLP 757-687-8777

November 18 at 3:45pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 139 West Park Drive

Debtor: Joseph R. Dane

Amount owing: $120,000

Bidder brings: $10,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Samuel I. White PC 757-457-1460

November 18 at 4pm at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 4622 Richmond Road, Keswick

Debtor: Alix Zephyr and Nadine Zephyr

Amount owing: $276,000

Bidder brings: $15,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Shapiro & Burson LLP 757-687-8777

November 19 at 9:30m at the Albemarle County Courthouse 

Property: 2659 Barracks Road Unit 4

Debtor: Seth O. and AnnJeannette D. Feiner

Amount owing: $101,175

Bidder brings: $10,000 or 10 percent of sale price

Info: Friedman & MacFadyen PA 804-288-0088

[This compilation was culled from published accounts of auctions scheduled by creditors. Such plans may change if the alleged debt is satisfied.]

#

5/22

Beverly M. Maupin to Erika L. Packard, 6.03 acres at 6002 Free Union Road, Free Union, $190,000.

Beverly M. Maupin to Charles J. Packard, 4.08 acres, $160,000.

Carl S. Matthews to Robert F. Moshier, trustee, parcel in Barterbrook, $245,000.

Gary Wayne Morris to Corey E. Walton, 13.46 acres on Virginia Ridge Road, gift.

Old Trail Homes LLC to Owen L. Nolasco, 218 Millstream Drive, Creekside, Old Trail, Crozet, $680,000.

Professional Foreclosure Corp. to Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp., parcel in Briarwood, $151,721.

David Marshall Oxford to Verdant Lawn LLC, 5.12 acres near Ivy Depot, $1,000,000.

David E. Winchester to Keith W. Nordstrom, 339 Glade Lane, Townwood, $187,000.

5/26

W. Nathaniel Perkins to David M. Oxford, 12.173 acres on State Route 680, 1850 Brown's Gap Turnpike, $975,000.

Michelle L. DeMory to Abigail A. Amoako, parcel in Village Homes II subdivision, 1366 Stoney Ridge Road, $249,900.

Ernest Franklin Dukes III to Reginald R. Jones, 1625 Robin Lane, $284,900.

Keith L. Hammon to Petya V. Aleksieva, 104 Merlin Court, Camelot, $203,400.

Duane L. Penny to Jonathan R. Grohs, 1222 Raintree Drive, Raintree, $328,700.

Mark A. Wenger to Keith L. Hammon, 315 Leaping Fox Lane, Foxcroft, $349,700.

5/27

Owen C. Maher to Jennifer L. McKeithan, 3268 Arbor Trace, Forest Lakes, $243,400.

Ashley P. Maddox to John Paul and Mary M. Mays, 1048 Tudor Court, Avon Park, $250,000.

Michael R. High to Wachovia Bank NA, parcel, $303,400.

NVR Inc. to Heather Roberts, condominium unit at 1543 Montessori Terrace, the Pavilions at Pantops, $244,990.

Fred O'Bryant to Ashley P. Maddox, 1602 Merano Lane, Fontana, $352,500.

5/28

Edwin L. Patterson III to Mary Elizabeth Creasy, 4498 Nahor Road, Blenwood subdivision, $51,000.

Peter Russell, trustee, to Peter Sorensen, 1143 Cambridge Hill Lane, Glenmore, Keswick, $245,000.

J. P. Morgan Mortgage Acquisition Corp. to Claire Whittaker, condominium unit at 140 Yellowstone Drive, Parkside at Eagles Landing, $99,900.

J. P. Morgan Mortgage Acquisition Corp. to Claire Whittaker, condominium unit at 122 Yellowstone Drive, Parkside at Eagles Landing, $99,000.

Barbara P. Rhen, trustee, to Ronald T. Rhen, 3615 Blandemar Drive, Blandemar Farms, gift.

John H. Skinner to Benjamin A. Armentrout, 122 Running Fox Court, Foxcroft, $340,000.

Fannie Mae to James C. Scales, 205 Westbrook Place, Woodbrook, $285,900.

Gregory L. Slater to Prakash M. Shah, 1765 Webland View, Webland Park condominiums, $161,000.

UB Properties Inc. to U001/E C LLC, parcel in Wickham Pond subdivision, $90,000.

Russell D. Martin to Brooks D. Hathaway, 201 Devon Road, Ednam Forest, $1,007,800.

NVR Inc. to Daniel J. Brady, condominium unit at 1539 Montessori Terrace, Pavilions at Pantops, $308,170.

John D. Ratza to Michael J.Vassallo, 3393 Piperfife Court, Glenmore, Keswick, $405,000.

Margaret V. Vance to John A. Skinner Jr., 1230 Hatcher Court, Mosby Mountain, $551,000.

5/29

Lyle V. Rogers to Leslie R. Martin, 3342 Kirkwood Court, Glenmore, Keswick, $470,000.

Polly Gadd to Joshua C. Grimsley, 550 Stonefield Circle, Earlysville, $290,700.

NVR Inc. to Russell D. Martin, 643 Eight Woods Lane, Kenrise, $624,990.

James E.Hochmuth to Li Ni, 1853 Steeplechase Run, $310,000.

WB Investments LLC to White House Property LLC, 1.6050 acres at 330 Winding River Lane, $585,500.

Jo Carol Vaughn to John E. Beerbower, 1529 Lake Forest Drive, Four Seasons, $255,000.

Shu Jen Chen to Thomas S. Lennon, parcel in Kendalwood, Forest Lakes, $400,000.

Richard R. Wightman to Babak Alimard, 1832 Westerham Street, Glenmore, Keswick, $778,800.

Mark P. Sanford to Karen Ann Penno, 1090 Amber Ridge Road, Highlands at Mechum's River, $208,100.

R. George Anderson to Meera Murgai, 672 Lockesley Terrace, Sherwood Manor, $170,000.

Christopher Shaner to Eric Kullmann, 1.494 acres on State Route 795, $203,700.

Michael A. Panas to Amar Cheema, 824 King William Drive, Dunlora, $515,000.

Susan S. Ferguson to Amir A. Jazaeri, 5.8779 acres at 330 Barracks Hill, Ivy Farm, $610,000.

Howard C. Whetzel Jr. to Charles J. Torian Jr., 5.36 acres at 948 Cismont Ridge Road, Keswick, $527,000. 

Big deal:

5/28

Russell D. Martin to Brooks D. Hathaway, 201 Devon Road, Ednam Forest, $1,007,800.

#]]> http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/REALESTATE-Sold-0844.aspx http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/REALESTATE-Sold-0844.aspx Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:05:18 +0000
FILE PHOTOS BY SARAH JACOBSONAPPEARED IN THE HOOK: June 25, 2009 in issue 0825
ADDRESS: 3830 Blufton Mill Road, Free Union ASKING PRICE: $499,900
SELLING PRICE: $425,000
DAYS TO CONTRACT: 73
ASSESSMENT: $295,900 (under Land Use program)
SELLER'S AGENT: Mary Leavell, 434-989-5860   BUYER'S AGENT: Carter Hilliard, CB Richard Ellis-Charlottesville LLC, 566-5787

#]]> http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/REALESTATE-update-0844sold.aspx http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/REALESTATE-update-0844sold.aspx Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:00:00 +0000
One of many huddles.
Erick GustafsonMonday night's Game 5 of the World Series didn't turn out quite as many expected, i.e. the Phillies won. After their pitiful offense against C.C. Sabathia and their highly embarrassing defense against Johnny Damon in Game 4, the general concensus was that Philadelphia was down for the count. Though the Phillies pulled it out of the fire Monday night, their 8-6 win did little to dispel that belief.

But whether you are a Yankees fan or a Phillies fan, this has been a very interesting Series. Records have been made and broken, major calls have been blown, and the pitcher's mound has seen more meetings than the Hyatt Regency. Let's see how much you know about the 2009 World Series.

1. In Game 3, A-Rod's drive to right field hit what object overhanging the fence? (The hit was initially ruled a double but after video review was ruled a two-run homer.)

a. a fan's glove

b. a television camera

c. the Phillie Phanatic

d. a homemade sign

2. As of Game 5, Chase Utley has hit how many home runs in the Series, tying Reggie Jackson for most home runs in a World Series?

a. Seven

b. Nine

c. Five

d. Four

3. In Game 5, Phillies' NLDS MVP Ryan Howard tied what World Series record set in 1980 by Royals' Willie Wilson?

a. Most foul balls caught 

b. Most bats shattered

c. Most strikeouts

d. Most intentional walks

4. In Game 4, Yankees' players held how many meetings at the mound in the first inning?

a. Two

b. Six

c. Four

d. One

5. In that same game, Yankees' players met how many times in the fifth inning?

a. One

b. Three

c. Eight

d. Five

 6. Which Phillies' pitcher declared of the Series, "I can't wait for it to end. It's been mentally draining."

a. Cole Hamels

b. Cliff Lee

c. Pedro Martinez

d. Brad Lidge

 7. In Game 2 at Yankee Stadium, what did fans chant throughout Pedro's time on the mound?

a. "Pedro, go home!"

b. "No, no, Pedro!"

c. "Who's Your Daddy?"

d. "I'm Your Daddy!"

8. Both Game 5 starting pitchers, A.J. Burnett and Cliff Lee, are from what state?

a. Arkansas

b. South Carolina

c. Indiana

d. Oklahoma

9. In Game 4, which Phillie was called safe at home at the bottom of the fourth, tying the game, but actually never touched the plate?

a. Chase Utley

b. Ryan Howard

c. Shane Victorino

d. Jason Werth

10. If the Yankees win the World Series, how many total championships will they have?

a. 31

b. 26

c. 27

d. 36

answers:

1.b, 2.c, 3,c, 4.b, 5.c, 6.a, 7.c, 8.a, 9.b, 10. c

~

Juanita Giles lives in Keysville where she makes videos and updates her http://thesportsdr.com/">Sports Doctor site.

#]]> http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/SPORTSDOC-worldSeries-0844-a.aspx http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/SPORTSDOC-worldSeries-0844-a.aspx Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:00:00 +0000

DRAWING BY DEBORAH DERR McCLINTOCK

Q. "The fans they chew their pencils,/The fans they beat their wives./They look up words for extinct birds--/ They lead such puzzling lives!" Fans of what, as penned by U.S. humorist Gelett Burgess some years ago? –W. Shortz
A. The early 20th century "word-cross" puzzle, later a "cross-word" puzzle, finally a "crossword," by U.S. journalist Arthur Wynne, a Liverpudlian emigre who was trying for something boldly new for the 1913 Christmas edition of the New York Sunday newspaper World, says David Crystal in Language Play. Wynne originally slotted the words into a diamond-shaped grid which eventually became standardized into a square. 

The new fad crossed the Atlantic to Britain, where numerous organizations were invited to submit potential entries. At one point, it is reported, officials at the London Zoo announced they would no longer answer telephone enquiries about the gnu, the emu, or any other three-letter creatures. The genre is continually evolving, adds Crystal, with compilers devising more and more ingenious, even "tortuous" puzzles and adopting such professional pseudonyms as Torquemada and Ximenes, leaders of the Spanish Inquisition!
Q. How to mummify a corpse: Pump in an embalming mix of salts, then draw out whatever moisture can be removed, "turning up the thermostat" to "cook off" the H2O and wrapping the body in hundreds of yards of linen to help facilitate the 70-day demoisturization process. Push the arid airflow up to max. For a regal touch, smother the body in honey to ward off decomposition and to keep fungi and bacteria at bay. When and where was this done? –K. Tut
A. The honey was reportedly applied to Alexander the Great in the warm, arid environment of ancient Egypt, part of the mummification process 5,000 years ago, says Amy Barth in Discover magazine. Mummies' long-kept secrets are coming to light these days as interdisciplinary groups like the Swiss Mummy Project in Zurich use MRI and the like to probe mummies' internal structure without harming the fragile figures. Forensic examiners carefully access soft tissue for evidence of disease, trauma, and cause of death-- vitamin C deficiency, syphilis, tuberculosis-- while bones reveal height and lifespan, and teeth provide clues to diet and nutrition. 

Although Egyptian mummies are best known, such remains also turn up in China, South Africa, and Greece. 

Apparently, "It's never too late to look your best. In ancient Egypt, the deceased's skin was sometimes cut and stuffed with layers of mud to make tissue look livelier," Barth writes.
Q. Where on (in) Earth did that flashy engagement ring diamond come from? –L. R. Kelly
A. From the upper regions of our planet's mantle, pushed surface-ward via volcanic eruptions, says University of Tennessee planetary geoscientist Lawrence Taylor in Physical & Chemical Properties of Diamonds and Their Inclusions. 

Geologically marvelous, diamonds are the densest form of carbon, their atoms fitted like myriad tiny pyramids. A diamond may not be forever, but it's about as hard as things in Nature get, formed under a pressure of 40-60 kilobars (600,000-900,000 psi) and temperatures of 1100- 1400 C (2000-2500 F), coming from Earth depths of 120-180 km (75-110 miles).

Common especially in South Africa, Zambia, and Russia, diamonds can be thought of as highly, highly compressed chunks of coal, says University of California-Los Angeles paleobiologist William Schopf. Lower-grade ones are used industrially in things like saw blades, hard enough to cut rock. Synthetic diamonds are now made commercially, "so, buyers beware when purchasing that engagement ring."
~

Send Strange questions to brothers Bill and Rich at strangetrue@cs.com.

#]]> http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/STRANGE-0844.aspx http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2009/11/05/STRANGE-0844.aspx Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:00:00 +0000