The Rake Magazine

Category: Blog Post

  • The TV Writers Strike: Reverb into Newsrooms?

    The average couch tuber probably isn’t tracking this TV writers strike too much. Not beyond fretting over an early end to Heroes and no new Daily Shows. Beyond that the affected "workers," a lot of smart-ass Bimmer-driving West L.A. espresso sippers, are never going to win an outpouring of empathy from the people who obsessively consume their programming.

    I’m not going to argue that this is the moral equivalent of the Harlan County coal miners, but as so many businesses, media in particular, try to find a way to monetize the Internet, this particular strike seems likely to set some important precedents for a lot of industries, possibly even newspapers.

    For a short (and funny) primer on the basics of the TV strike, check out this video posted yesterday by The Daily Show writers.

    The central claim is this: On one hand a media tycoon like Viacom’s Sumner Redstone, (Viacom owns Paramount Pictures, CBS, MTV, Blockbuster video, etc.), will sue YouTube for $1 billion based on its perceived effect — financial — to his value, while simultaneously arguing that there isn’t enough value on the Net to justify sharing …. ANYTHING … brought in via new technologies with the people who created it.

    No one knows for sure what tomorrow will bring, but the TV writers are smart enough to know that unless they nail down every possibility today they will continue seeing zip tomorrow … as billions in value pile up around the feet of the Redstones, and Rupert Murdochs of the planet.

    Ron Moore, showrunner for the series, Battlestar Galactica gave an interview offering a tangible example of how the media empires are overplaying their hand.

    He says:

    "Fundamentally this is about the internet, and this is about whether
    writers get paid for material that is made for the internet or if
    they’re paid for material that is broadcast on the internet that was
    developed for TV or movies.

    "I had a situation last year on Battlestar Galactica where we were asked by Universal to do webisodes, which at that point were very new and ‘Oooh, webisodes! What does that
    mean?’ It was all very new stuff. And it was very eye opening, because
    the studio’s position was ‘Oh, we’re not going to pay anybody to do
    this. You have to do this, because you work on the show. And we’re not
    going to pay you to write it. We’re not going to pay the director, and
    we’re not going to pay the actors.’ At which point we said ‘No thanks,
    we won’t do it.’"

    "We got in this long, protracted thing and eventually they agreed to
    pay everybody involved. But then, as we got deeper into it, they said
    ‘But we’re not going to put any credits on it. You’re not going to be
    credited for this work. And we can use it later, in any fashion that we
    want.’ At which point I said ‘Well, then we’re done and I’m not going
    to deliver the webisodes to you.’ And they came and they took them out
    of the editing room anyway — which they have every right to do. They
    own the material — But it was that experience that really showed me
    that that’s what this is all about. If there’s not an agreement with
    the studios about the internet, that specifically says ‘This is covered
    material, you have to pay us a formula – whatever that formula turns
    out to be – for use of the material and how it’s all done,’ the studios
    will simply rape and pillage."

    If you missed it, Damon Lindelhof, co-creator/writer of NBC’s Lost, wrote an Op-Ed piece in last Sunday’s New York Times, a key assertion of his was this:

    "Twenty percent of American homes now contain hard drives that store
    movies and television shows indefinitely and allows you to fast-forward
    through commercials. These devices will probably proliferate at a
    significant rate and soon, almost everyone will have them. They’ll also
    get smaller and smaller, rendering the box that holds them obsolete,
    and the rectangular screen in your living room won’t really be a
    television anymore, it’ll be a computer. And running into the back of
    that computer, the wire that delivers unto you everything you watch? It
    won’t be cable; it will be the Internet."

    He adds:

    "My show, Lost, has been streamed hundreds of millions of times
    since it was made available on ABC’s website. The downloads require
    the viewer to first watch an advertisement, from which the network
    obviously generates some income. The writers of the episodes get
    nothing. We’re also a hit on iTunes (where shows are sold for $1.99
    each). Again, we get nothing.

    If this strike lasts longer than
    three months, an entire season of television will end this December. No
    dramas. No comedies. No Daily Show. The strike will also prevent any
    pilots from being shot in the spring, so even if the strike is settled
    by then, you won’t see any new shows until the following January. As in
    2009. Both the guild and the studios we are negotiating with do agree
    on one thing: this situation would be brutal."

    With talk that a long strike, relegating viewers to 52-week runs of Dog the Bounty Hunter and Tila Tecquila (and worse) could do for internet "programming" what the 1988 writers strike did for cable programming this Los Angeles Times piece, with a quote from Twin Cities-based media guru, John Rash, lays out the consumer conundrum. In short, pulp TV junkies though we may be, most of us have been spoiled by the production values of scripted television.

    Personally, I’ve got a stack of unwatched DVDs six feet high, college basketball will soon be in high gear and I can happily spend months without a fresh episode of Two and a Half Men.

    But the somewhat out-of-left field relation to newspaper writers is not so much that Katherine Kersten deserves a cut of every dollar Avista Capital Partners might make re-packaging her "Worst of the Flying Imams" columns for dowloading, but rather the pressure to add blogging and other web-related work to the existing job description … without additional compensation.

    It goes without saying that there aren’t more than a half dozen writers at either paper with the leverage to demand more compensation for anything, even if they agreed to spit polish the publisher’s car. But the point is … the future, man.

    The Pioneer Press recently wrapped a new contract with Dean Singleton’s Media News group and Guild officer/reporter Alex Friedrich says discussions of additional duties were pretty much brushed away in the rush to conclude negotiations quickly.

    "There is no new language in the contract that forces us provide any new work for the web," says Friedrich. There was also no discussion of anyone getting paid more for blogging and taking pictures, etc.

    Friedrich says the Guild made the point that they see a need to "get this thing laid out" in the not -too distant future, but that it just didn’t happen this time around.

    "Our big thing," he says, "is what ‘What are we going to judged on?’ All of us recognize that things are changing, and I know I don’t mind taking a picture. But I want some assurance that I won’t be dinged if it takes time away from my main job."

    The bet here is that, win or lose, the TV writers will establish precedents for a lot of other "creative" industries.

  • T-Day Seven Days Out: The Bird

    The bird is the word.

    We used to go to my aunt’s house in North Oaks for Thanksgiving. I clearly remember her perched on a chair next to the oven, heater and scotch in one hand, turkey baster in the other as she dutifully doused the bird every five minutes. From that chair she barked orders to the rest of the family to execute the remainder of the meal, I was in charge of rolling butter into pretty balls. Others can mash the potatoes or slice the beets, but she couldn’t, wouldn’t leave her post or her mission, all in the name of moisture.

    A dry turkey is a sin. You don’t build an entire feast around one main protein only to realize you’ve served a chew-toy. I can’t seem to get my mother-in-law to see that you don’t need to start cooking the bird at 6am for a 4pm dinner. Gravy needn’t be the real main course, there is another way.

    In the past few years, it’s been all about the brine. Brining a turkey involves soaking the thawed bird in a salt and herb solution. The theory is that the meat absorbs the flavorful solution and the proteins, when heated, lock the moisture inside. Although it does change the texture slightly, the resulting meat is ultra-moist, even when slightly overcooked.

    Change the flavor of your brine with the addition of cider or different herbs, just don’t oversalt. The first time I made my own brine, my turkey tasted like ham. There are a ton of good brines on the market, Golden Fig’s locally made brine mix is one of the best.

    If your bird is frozen, start thawing it in the fridge on Monday. By Tuesday, you should mix your brine solution and let it sit overnight. If you don’t have a big enough pot or bucket, don’t worry, there are plenty of giant bags meant for brining. I don’t even need to say that you shouldn’t use a scented garbage bag, do I? Get the bird into the solution by Wednesday and let it soak until you get it ready for the oven.

    I guarantee that any old-timers who haven’t had a brined bird will flip over the juiciness.

    Now for the ultimate question: to baste or not to baste? I’ve never basted a brined bird, and have yet to be disappointed. I have a chef friend that laughs at the basters, swearing that they only thing you have to do is slow-roast the bird at a low temp wrapped in parchment paper and foil, followed with a turn under high heat to add the crispiness.

    I’m sure I could have explained this all in detail to my aunt, but I fear not even a lecture from the turkey himself could have moved her from her perch.

  • Be Kind: Go To Rewind

    Um, I hardly ever do this. But since I missed the big
    opening of the Gucci boutique at Nordstrom MOA last week, I figure I’d better slobber over some other local shop or other. Now, I assume that some of you, like me,
    are decidedly lacking in coin these days, and therefore cannot rationalize the
    purchase of a new GG bag. So, I’ve decided to take you to a shop that won’t
    unravel the billfold …

    Rewind is a vintage store on Johnson Street in Northeast
    Minneapolis    . Of course, this corner of the world is particularly tough to get
    to now that the 35W bridge is gone, especially if you’re coming from the
    Southside. But it’s worth the trek. I stopped in Tuesday night, and the first
    thing I spotted once inside: A slice of Uptown history.

     

    Schlampp’s Furs was a high-buck store in the Uptown Area
    that closed in, oh, I think it was sometime in the ’70s. (I don’t have my
    Uptown History book with me at the office today, but I’m pretty sure that’s
    where I acquired this hazy factoid). Now, here’s the cool thing: At stores vintage
    and consignment stores all over town, you will occasionally spot a beautiful 40s, 50s, or 60s-era Schlampp’s store-brand coat—and no, they’re not all fur. But they are extremely
    well-made. Last year, I picked up a 60s-era slate-blue wool one with big buttons and a
    flattering sash along the waistline. (But that wasn’t at Rewind. It was at
    Everyday People.) This one I’d like to buy for my mother.

    Note that Rewind favors looks from the 70s and 80s. For
    example, these killer boats …

    This knit Ella Moss dress I’d like to buy but, sadly, I
    implemented a Christmas gifts-only policy as of the first paycheck of November. Here’s a question, while I’m at it: Is it tacky to buy presents second-hand? I
    think not.

    Love this season’s over-sized sweaters, but choke every time
    you spy the associated price tags? Here’s a lovely vintage version, from Sears
    …

    Finally, check the selection of clutches. We love clutches
    and, yes, sadly, that has much to do with packing these teensy purses into the
    ginormous, back-breaking sacks we all lug around these days.

  • Groovy Throat-Singing Indigenous Men Who Do Good Deed

    ART, MUSIC, AND WINE
    Groove to the Music, Groove on the Art

    That’s right, folks; it’s time for another Gallery Grooves, The Rake’s monthly art, jazz, and
    wine event. Socialize and discuss the latest jazz with Kevin Barnes
    from KBEM, and enjoy free libations compliments of The Wine Company. The Hennepin History Museum’s current exhibition, Studies from Life,
    feature costume and object portraits by Minneapolis artist Timothy G.
    Piotrowski    . Come meet Piotrowski and learn more about how he uniquely
    interprets and photographs the Hennepin History Museum’s luscious costume
    collections on living models against a back-drop of vintage furniture,
    art objects, and historic locations. Tonight’s featured jazz selections include Champian Fulton’s Champian, Herbie Hancock’s River, and New York Voices’ A Day Like This.

    7-9 p.m., Hennepin History Museum, 2303 Third Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612-870-1329.

    FILM
    Journeyman

    Finally someone addresses the so-called “boy problem,” and it’s just some punk with a camera and a PhD father as the subject. No, seriously folks: Kevin Obsatz is a young, but plenty talented, filmmaker with several upstanding shorts under his belt. But his latest, and most ambitious, project (his first documentary) deals with the culture’s desperate need to engage boys in rites of passage (partly on account of their fatherlessness). The film asks at least one interesting question: Are men afraid of boys? Here, we have our own interesting question: Will there be footage of savage men running through woods wearing nothing but codpieces and warrior paint? Yes, friends, that looks to be the case. It’s worth noting: The subject matter is related to that of Protagonist, a documentary soon to be released nationally. But here we have a local bent, replete with home-grown experts like Dr. David Walsh and Kevin’s dad, Dr. Michael Obsatz, someone who’s been involved in mentoring boys and men. —Christy DeSmith

    7 p.m., Riverview Theatre, 3800 42nd Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612-729-7369; $8.

    MUSIC
    Huun-Huur-Tu

    Do you know the guy in the upper left corner of our website? His name is Owen, and he’s an odd sort of chap. In fact, a couple of months ago, he even took a Tuvan throat singing class. Tonight, you can get the real deal. (Owen still has a lot of practicing to do.) "Throatsingers, as they’re called, can produce up to four notes at the
    same time, layered one on top of the other, rumbling like an earthquake
    or whistling like a mutant cricket. It’s unearthly stuff, seemingly
    more likely to come from Mars than the open steppes north of Mongolia.
    Huun-Huur-Tu is only one of several Tuvan groups who’ve successfully
    conquered Western world-music stages, and they’re probably the ones
    least influenced by outside genres and electric guitars… But the four fellows in Huun-Huur-Tu are all masters of the genre and
    have the advantage of numbers—to hear the full quartet boom out
    together into a reverberating, rich kargyraa will send a tingle up and
    down your spine."

    7:30 p.m., Cedar Cultural Center, 416 Cedar Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612-338-2674; $25.

    THEATER & PERFORMANCE
    Indigenous Voices

    What happens when Indian of the Future and Buffalo Man face off? Who wins the epic battle to protect Indian Country? The past? The future? Something entirely different? Beats me. But John Bently Spang and Marcus Amerman seem to have an answer. Interested? You ought to be. This evening brings you the answers… or at least one step closer.

    7:30 p.m., Intermedia Arts, 2822 Lyndale Ave. S.,
    Minneapolis; 612-871-4444; $12 (members $8).

    GOOD DEED
    Green Thursday

    Forget Black Friday, which is just around the corner. Today is Green Thursday, and that’s somehow so much better. If only we knew what it was… Ok. Today kicks off a three-day eCycling event. No, you can leave the bicycle at home. This is three days of major electronics recycling. Today through Saturday you’ll see truckloads of TVs, VCRs, toasters, computers, and monitors being hauled to the Mall of America — not to sell them, not to buy them, but to simply save them from the landfills (or to save our landfills from them, rather). Grab your crappy electronic equipment — now is the time — and drop it off. Heck, you can always buy a new one at the mall, right? The Environmental Protection Agency puts electronics at the top of the black list when it comes to environmental threats. Just think of it as planting a tree.

    6 a.m. – 7 p.m., Mall of America, Met Lot, just north of the Mall and near Ikea.

  • The Three Pointer: A Breakthrough W

    Home Game #3: Minnesota 108, Sacramento 103

    Season Record: 1-5

    1. Mea Culpa–For Now

    I thought Rashad McCants had a horrible game during last Saturday night’s Wolves loss to the Kings in Sacramento, and quite righteously said so. Thought he was a narcissistic gunner who sabotaged the team’s offensive priority of pounding the ball into Al Jefferson in the paint. And when McCants stubbornly came out playing the same way tonight against these very same Kings at the Target Center–missing two shots and turning the ball over two times before Jefferson even got a touch in the half-court set as the Kings raced to a 7-1 lead in the first two and a half minutes of the first quarter–I started sharpening the knives to slice him up again in this trey.

    Except that after that heat check, McCants began looking for Jefferson and others a bit more. And then when he did start gunning again, and pirouetting through the lane, the ball was going in on a pretty regular basis. He finished with a career-high 33 points, on 13-22 FG, 4-7 from beyond the arc and 3-5 from the line. More importantly, that second turnover early in the first period was his last. Jefferson likewise got off, to the tune of 23 points (11-16 FG), including 13 first half points on just eight shots in a glorious display of footwork, shooting touch, and the psycho-physics of ignoring elbows and hands in your face, but it was McCants who made most of the big shots that cinched the victory down the stretch.

    I still think this is a risky circumstance. I don’t buy Kent Youngblood’s column in the Strib today, in which Shaddy says "We’re a post-first offense. Our main objective is to get it into Al and play off of that," and adds that he hopes "people will really see what I can do," followed by Youngblood opining, "But he won’t force it." Really? Right after he just compared himself to Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade earlier in the piece? And after we’ve seen him continually force it first, to see if he can take over, and only then defer to Jeff?

    Tonight, things worked the way they were supposed to work, with McCants and Jefferson forming a dynamic outside-inside punch that forced the Kings to pick their poison. And there are those who will logically ask, why can’t the team strive for that every game and just play out the hot hand? My response is that young teams create an identity by establishing patterns; and that one key to good team chemistry is a consensual pecking order. McCants has a strong enough sense of self confidence to believe he is the alpha option on offense, and not Jefferson, if his shots are falling early. And yes, that could disrupt the team’s progress this season.

    So why is this point called Mea Culpa? Because tonight the Wolves made it work and very effectively rebutted my kvetching. Because the greater lesson, for this game anyway, might well be that Minnesota does indeed have a dynamic scorer on the perimeter who can also take it to the hole, which was far from a sure thing before the season started, and must be taken as a very good sign, or at least a pleasant dilemma, should pecking order questions arise due to McCants’s continued strong production. I can suspect that the risk remains, and the situation won’t last, but those who were chiding me about this last time I brought it up were vindicated by this win. Hats off to both McCants and Jefferson for enabling the other.

     

    2. A Veteran’s Poise, and the Serbian Sidekick

    Even in this season of the post-Garnett rubble, it wouldn’t be productive for Coach Randy Wittman to just let all the kids play without salting in a few veterans for ballast. (How’s that for a multi-mixed metaphor?) A series of 20, 30, 40 point losses while the rooks and sophs and young newbies to the squad try to read the license plates of the trucks rolling over them isn’t quite the way to engender either confidence or perspective and context. The team needs some poise. And believe it or not, tonight–with Greg Buckner hobbled and Theo Ratliff merely adequate–that means they needed Antoine Walker, who filled the void with grace and intelligence.

    Everyone knows that ‘Toine and the Wolves have a footnote relationship, and that even under the best of circumstances, ‘Toine likes doing the big things. such as launching three-pointers and dominating the rock. But tonight he was the balm, the sage, the guy who was more valuable on the court than he appears to be in the box score. He dutifully banged with the Kings’ two very different bruisers, forward Ron Artest and center Brad Miller, and held his own defending against both.

    When it was apparent that the Wolves didn’t have numbers in their favor on the fast break, it was Walker who slowed it down and brought the ball back out to set up a play. It was Walker who knew the Wolves had a foul to give–and committed it to waylay a Kings’ play–near the end of the third quarter; Walker who also fouled Miller from behind before he could dispose of an easy putback through the hoop; Walker who drove the lane with the shot clock going down; Walker feeding both Jefferson and Shaddy and fostering ball movement in general. He finished with 19 points in 29:33, plus a pair of steals and four rebounds. Given that his presence on the Wolves means that Ricky Davis and Mark Blount have taken their dysfunction to Miami, any other positives he produces for the rest of the season is all gravy.

    Some might wonder why I didn’t cite Marko Jaric as the veteran poise tonight. After all, he’s been with the team much longer than Walker, plays the point, and had a game-high plus +12 and a game-high 8 rebounds in 25:24. The quick answer is that Marko is not poise, not balm, not sage. I suspect you will cut him much more slack and like him a lot better if you realize he is not a leader in most any way. He is, however a glorious sidekick when you’re bent on stoking an adrenaline rush. When bodies are flying around and the ballclub is in that sweet, overlapping zone in the venn diagram of being loosey-goosey and razor-sharp, Jaric thrives like no other and winds up being a super character actor in the prevailing drama. Tonight, given the added advantage of matching up against Slovenian Beno Udrih, whose game Jaric almost surely knows well, he was a large pain in the Kings’ posterior, crashing the boards, diving on the floor for loose balls, snatching a pair of steals and dropping three dimes on his teammates.

     

    3.The Boon of Defensive Aggression and other Quick Takes

    Last Saturday the Wolves limited the Kings to just 40.5% shooting (30-74) and 100 points. Tonight Sacramento shot 50% (39-78) and scored 103 points. Yet I think Minnesota’s defense was more effective tonight. The reason? Pick and roll defense. "We worked on it this week and decided to just be aggressive," Wittman said in the postgame press conference. "Before we were playing one part soft and then one part aggressive." Sometimes this varied approach confuses the opposition. But it also brings forth a cascade of whistles from the refs.

    Flip Saunders used to preach that "the more aggressive team gets the calls." In other words, if you are consistently laying a body on somebody and dogging their every dribble, the refs become accustomed to it and consider it part of your "normal" defense. But if you play loose or soft on one play and aggressively the next, the disparity is heightened and is the aggression seems harsher.

    Coming into tonight’s game, the Wolves had been hamstrung by an exorbitant disparity in fouls, and thus free throws. Opponents were getting to the line an average of 30 times; the Wolves, just 13. Obviously, that’s a huge disadvantage. Tonight, the Wolves were pretty much on their standard pace, generating 12 before the Kings were forced to foul in attempt to overcome a fairly big deficit late in the game, resulting in an additional ten free throws for the Wolves in the final minute and four seconds of play. But
    the real difference was that the Wolves enabled the Kings to get to the line only 14 times, or less than half the season average for Wolves opponents. Yes, the Kings made more field goals and ultimately more points in tonight’s second meeting than as compared to Saturday’s game, but there is something energy sucking and momentum-depressing about frequent stoppages in play that allow opponents to score when the clock isn’t ticking. Making hard, aggressive "shows" on the pick-and-roll, and then sustaining that aggressive approach to the end of the play reduced the whistles. So did better footwork and a slightly more lenient officiating crew.

    Randy Wittman coached a good game from the sidelines, voicing his verbal displeasure more frequently in the first half at a plethora of mental mistakes, and deploying a crisp rotation schedule that had nine different playing logging at least 20 minutes of action. But even the mere 3:42 that second-round pick and backup center Chris Richard received is instructive of Witt’s acumen. Richard subbed in to be matched against another, younger rookie in Sac center Spencer Hawes. In addition, Richard’s college teammate Corey Brewer was with him on the floor during his stint and assisted on a nifty pick and roll that resulted in a Richard slam dunk. Nice of the coach to give the kid an optimal chance to succeed.

    Point guard Sebastian Telfair had one of those inexplicable games where he recorded eight assists and three steals in merely 20:13, yet still seemed inept at decision-making and ineffectual on defense en route to a team-worst minus-3.

    Finally, I never would have thought that less than three weeks into the season scrappy rook Corey Brewer would be giving currently moribund vet Ryan Gomes a run for his money at the starting small forward position.

  • Sapor: Be Happy For TWO Hours

    Last time I went to Sapor Cafe, it was with a man who used to say things like, "Don’t you think that dress is a little low-cut?" and "I don’t think I could ever marry a woman who’s as smart as I am." Also, he was a Republican who lived in the suburbs and went antiquing on weekends.

    This was during a brief period in my life when I was trying to be traditional — more like my mom — but it didn’t work out too well. For one thing, it made me irritable. And for another, the man waffled a lot, telling me he couldn’t "handle" a woman like me and retreating, then calling to say he was still hooked and could I meet him for drinks. After a couple weeks of this, I told him we clearly had no future as I was actually quite a bit smarter than he was.

    Maybe this is why I hadn’t been back to Sapor until tonight.

    Well, for a smart woman who drinks quite a bit between the hours of 5 and 7 o’clock, this really was quite stupid. Because Sapor has an amazing Happy Hour menu: everything — from appetizers to beer to wine — is three dollars. And never have I had such a nice, stoutly-poured $3 glass.

    Currently, they’re serving a Luzon Mourvedre-Grenache blend from Spain, which is light, fruity, and not quite dry. The white is an Austrian Gruner Veltliner, aged in stainless steel with a flinty, citrusy edge. You can also get a quesadilla, a plate of French fries with aioli, a small hamburger, a wasabi potato cake, or a bowl of olives for three bucks.

    What’s more, the bar at Sapor is a lovely place to sit, looking out over Washington Avenue and all that rush hour traffic you’re not in. And apparently many people know this already, because while it was nearly empty when I entered at 5:15, by 6:30 the place was jammed.

    The restaurant next door is quite good, too, as I remember. Though I’m going to have to give it another try now that I’m with an enlightened man. Under the circumstances — what with $3 wine and Tanya Siebenaler’s fantastic cuisine and a partner who likes my necklines low and my I.Q. high, rather than the other way around — I’m bound to see Sapor in a whole new light.

  • Karaoke Night at Pancho Villa

    It’s Thursday night at Pancho Villa on Eat Street, and thejoint is jumping. The Mexican restaurant on Eat Street has karaoke four nightsa week, but Thursday night is contest night, and more than a dozen singers arelined up to compete. The prizes in tonight’s semi-final round are small stuff –a bottle of wine, a gift certificate, but the singers who make it to the finalson December 6 will be competing for a top prize of $1000; plus CD recordings of their performances and other prizes.

    Every seat in the house is taken – mostly, it seems, byfriends of the singers, there to cheer them on. It also happens to be 2 for 1night for Margaritas – actually, every night Monday to Friday is two-for-onenight at Pancho Villa: two margaritas for $4, or two beers for $3.65. So themood is festive and the decibel level is high. I thought the crowd was about three quarters Latino, one quarter Anglo, but owner Ivan Cardenas says most weeknights it’s about 50-50.

    We had just finished our dinners as the competition wasstarting, and were lingering by the door when a table of young women beckonedus to join them. We squeezed two more chairs around the table, and were quicklyintroduced to Carmen from Puerto Rico, Sandra from Mexico, and Marta fromColombia, and a guy named Jesse, who were all there to cheer on their friend Silvia from Guatemala.They’re friends from work – medical interpreters at HCMC – except for Marta,who worked with them, but now teaches English Language Learners at a Minneapolis elementary school.

     

    When the competition got underway, Silvia was the firstcontestant, and she wowed the crowd with her full-throated version of a song byPaquita la del Barrio. As she roamed the restaurant floor, mike in hand, sheflirted with the young men in the crowd.

    Most of the contestants, like Raimundo, who sangPepe Aguilar’s Por Tu Maldito Amor, and Samuel, who performed RosasBlancas by Los Johnnys, seemed to be from south of the border. But there were a fewexceptions, like Jeff, tall with blond hair and a pontail, who thrilled thecrowd with an uptempo version of Hank Williams’ Jambalaya On the Bayou, in whatsounded to me like perfect Spanish. Amanda from Burnsville made it into thefinals with a crowd-pleasing rendition of Luna by Ana Gabriel.

    It turns out that Amanda is a regular – she and hergirlfriend Stacy go to all the local Mexican clubs – El Nuevo Rodeo, El Pantano, evenJunBo in Richfield, a Chinese restaurant that hosts Mexican dances on weekends.Amanda and Stacy are both fans of Mexican culture: “we like Mexican food andenjoy the company of Mexican people.” Amanda’s fluent in Spanish, and startedmaking friends with her Latino co-workers when she worked at local restaurants. “To be honest, Mexicanguys love white women, and if you can speak their language, even better. We getbought drinks all the time, we get bought dinners, and we don’t even ask – theyoffer."

    Amanda says she tells the owners, Ivan and Patricio, that“it’s great that you are trying to get white people in, but don’t Americanize(Pancho Villa). People come there because they want to be in the Mexicanculture and we want them to stay true to that." When men at Pancho Villa try tospeak to her in English, she insists on answering in Spanish, Amanda says. “ Ifwe wanted to speak English, we would go to Champps.”

    At the end of the evening, the votes are tallied, and Silviaand Amanda have both made it into the finals, along with Raimundo,Samuel and Perla. There will be two more semi-final rounds thisThursday, and November 29 (they are skipping Thanksgiving) and then they willall compete in the finals December 6.

    The food, by the way, is great. My favorite dining companion ordered the camarones al aijillo, a generous serving of large shrimp sauteed with garlic and very spicy guaillo peppers ($12.99), while I opted for the filete patron, a grilled steak topped with mushrooms and garlic, and flambeed (not at tableside) with Patron tequila ($11.25) both accompanied by rice, beans and tortillas. There’s lots more on the menu that I would like to try, ranging from the huachinango (red snapper) a la Veracruzana ($15.95) to the menudo, the traditional tripe soup hangover cure ($7.99). We washed it down with another daily special – a very drinkable bottle of Abrazo Garnacha for $12 – regularly $24. That half-price offer is good every day, so I guess that’s really the full price.

    Pancho Villa also has some special promotions for parties – if you come in with a party of six, you get to spin a wheel when you leave – top prize is, all the drinks are on the house. And for birthday celebrations, the birthday boy or girl gets to drink on the house (again with a party of six or more.)

    Pancho Villa Restaurant and Bar, 2539 Nicollet Ave Minneapolis, 612-871-7014.

    For a sample of the musical delights, click the multimedia links at left, or use the links below.

     

    Listen to Amanda singing I Will Always Love You.

    Listen to more traditional Mexican selections.

  • Startribune.com Readers: Very Sticky Eyeballs

    Holy eyeballs Batman!  The latest newspaper website readership numbers were released today by Nielsen Online (and printed on the  Editor and Publisher website) and startribune.com placed third (behind the Arizona Republic and New York Times websites) in the amount of time readers spent on the site.  Readers in October spent an average of 27 minutes, 40 seconds on startribune.com as compared to 34 minutes, 53 seconds for the New York Times, and almost 40 minutes for AZcentral.com.

     

    Could it be, with circulation down, that readers are spending more time  reading the entire Strib online?  The website’s readership numbers (1.5 million unique readers per month) didn’t change all that much, ranking 26th out of 30.  The New York Times website ranked first , with more than 17.5 million unique monthly visitors, up from 14.5 million in September. 

  • Banana Republic Fades into the Sunset

    Damn! Over here I keep a list of great story ideas and names of people I’ve really got to get around to catching up with, just to see what their story is today. Like MPR’s Bill Kling. Like all the guys who played in The Warheads years ago. And like Kirk Anderson, the former cartoonist for the Pioneer Press whose heave-ho in April 2003 was early, solid confirmation that "local, local" was going to have more to do with "money, money" and "innocuous, innocuous" than reader appeal.

    So what happens? That bastard, David Brauer at MinnPost.com, posts the news that Anderson’s weekly, spot-on evisceration of the myriad Bush follies, "Banana Republic: Adventures in Amnesia" is being dropped by the Star Tribune. (Brauer likes being called a bastard when he beats someone on a story.)

    Much to my disappointment, when I called Anderson was not raging against the machine. "It had to happen sooner or later," he said. "I’m thankful to the Star Tribune for giving me the opportunity." And, "I wish that it could have gone on endlessly." Well, you and me both, Kirk.

    With 70% of the public saying they believe the country has jumped the rails and is wandering in a profoundly bad direction (not to mention seriously considering a 180 degree change next year) you would assume the topics Anderson was trading in — gross abuse of executive power, officially sanctioned torture, the decline of our international reputation, etc. — would be thoroughly mainstream fare — and in a novel, entertaining concept.

    Obviously the quarter page the Strib had been giving Anderson will not go to a Denny Hecker ad — (but let’s not give them ideas) — and most likely will be filled with … well what? More deep thoughts from Debra Saunders and Jonah Goldberg?

    Anderson is very complimentary to opinion exchange editor, Eric Ringham. The feeling is mutuial.

    "I think Kirk’s a genius," says Ringham. "I really hope we can find a way to work together again. I just wish his fans were more vocal than they were. I loved it. But I didn’t hear the kind of buzz I wanted to hear. But the decision was strictly about money."

    Being a classier guy than me Anderson wouldn’t
    divulge how much the Strib was paying him, (I’m guessing
    somewhere between a free-lance music review and a quarter the monster
    salary of one of those sweet old switchboard ladies). He did put it in
    perspective saying that he and his wife aren’t big spenders and "pretty
    much live like college kids".

    Ringham likewise insists that the decision to drop, "Banana Republic" was, "not content driven." And, as for the money involved, the intention, he says, really is to hire a part time writer with the Anderson money, someone who will have to be paid at Guild rates. (If Captain Fishsticks or John Hinderaker gets the job the Strib will take unholy hell from this quarter.)

    As Ringham describes it he approached Anderson around the time of the Strib’s expensive re-design with the idea of doing some kind of "graphic novel", (as Brauer also pointed out). "In very short order Kirk brought back four different proposals, all of them very professional."

    The decision to drop "Banana Republic", he says, was made by interim editor for the editorial page, Scott Gillespie, who was recently elevated (some say "pushed") into the Op-Ed department in the wake of the paper’s not exactly cheery parting with Susan Albright.

    "But," says Ringham, "I don’t know that I fault him for the decision, and I may very well have made the same decision were it mine to make."

    It is my opinion that Steve Sack does a very good job as the paper’s official cartoonist. But in an age of declining readership … yadda yadda .. when papers are supposedly on high alert for topics and concepts that attract the mythical "younger reader", the decision to drop a sharp-edged, "Daily Show"-worthy weekly cartoon strip/graphic novel arouses suspicions (again) that the new, "local, local, hyper-local" Strib’s idea of irresistible fare for "younger readers" and people hip to "new media" are celebrity consumer features on Hannah Montana, reviews of "Halo 3" and of course, the latest sighting of Josh Hartnett.

    Anderson also has no bitter rip for the PiPress, although literally everyone who might have had a hand in "right-sizing" him out of that building in ’03 are now gone themselves. (For all intents and purposes the PiPress editorial "department" has been reduced to a staff of one, Jim Ragsdale. He’ll be local enough.) Neither paper, Anderson says, rode him hard to mushify his cartoons, even in the run-up to the war in ’03, when almost every paper in the country (with the notable exception of deputy editor Jim Boyd at the Strib) was swallowing the Bush administration bit and charging hard for freedom and glory, shock and awe.

    "Of course," he says, "as a staffer at the Pioneer Press my cartoon ideas got shaped a lot more than as a freelancer for the Star Tribune. I’d be told to ‘tweak this’ and ‘change that’. But it wasn’t that bad. I look at some of the ideas I had and I’m grateful they said, ‘No’."

    This despite the prevailing mood at the recent Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, where, he says, most of the complaining was about "the push toward the mushy middle" and the "local, local" gimmick, the latter of which — as has often been said — serves to discreetly remove the biggest and most provocative themes and material of the moment from the playlist of editorial writers and satirists.

    "The war in Iraq is a huge national story and provides a lot of ideas," says Anderson, who by the way is free to re-launch "Banana Republic" anywhere he chooses. "It’s tougher doing a cartoon on the Chamber of Commerce. It’s not nearly as juicy."

    No kidding.

     

     

  • T-Day: Eight Days Out

    It’s go time.

    It’s the opening of Feast Season, are you ready? This is the week that my head starts spinning with potato options and I rip through the internet trying to find the cranberry recipe that will outshine last year’s. Thank goodness one of my kitchen walls is made of slate, because it is now chalked over with lists of ingredients crossed with possible permutations in a mad Kaczynski-esque fashion.

    While the lead-up may be crazed and insane, the feast must be about balance. I have 15 or so coming for dinner, some are food-driven (like me) and some aren’t. While I would love to break the mold on every dish, creating an entirely new feast each year, that wouldn’t be right. That wouldn’t serve my eaters very well. There are people coming whose food agenda is focused simply on the turkey and my husband’s creamed corn, they just agree to suffer through whatever cranberry concoction I serve.

    My ulimate goal is to create a spread from which you can assemble the perfect plate, however that suits you. Ignore the brussel sprouts, that’s fine, there are two kinds of potatoes. I’d love all to know the glory of ginger glazed carrots, but if not, there’s more room for pumpkin pie.

    Corny as it sounds, I am thankful for the challenge. It’s my industry background, only under pressure do I truly thrive. This is a week in which all cylinders are firing and I could yap endlessly about yams.

    So, tomorrow it’s turkey talk: to brine or not to brine.