sheryl crow: visual reviews of aural entertainment

sheryl crow, kennett opera house, kennett,mo. 27 november 2010, attendance ~250

Photo credit: Joe Craig Photography

lydia loveless: visual reviews of aural entertainment

lydia loveless: davey's uptown, kansas city, mo. attendance ~25

roast pink: the breast cancer awareness soup

I've been thinking lately of how the Think Pink campaign of the Susan G. Komen Foundation has to be one of the most successful marketing campaigns ever conceived. It's also interesting to see how long it takes for brands to emerge, years typically. Think Pink has grown somewhat organically over the past 5 years and this year it just seems to have exploded into every available market. Pink is everywhere these days.

So when I was making one of my standard fall soups recently (roasted cauliflower) and went to finish it I remembered those roasted red peppers that were in the fridge. So into the blender went the roasted cauliflower, apples, onion, and red peppers which resulted in this dish. Garnished with ground roasted cashews seasoned with just a small amount of bacon bits.

los lobos: visual reviews of aural entertainment

los lobos: folly theater, kansas city, mo. 8 October 2010. attendance ~1500.

the walkmen: visual reviews of aural entertainment

the walkmen: standard style fashion show, country club plaza, 30 september, kansas city, mo. attendance ~2,000.

chaka kahn: visual reviews of aural entertainment

chaka kahn, kc live stage, kansas city, mo; 26 september 2010. attendance ~1,000

snuff jazz with annie ellicott: visual reviews of aural entertainment

snuff jazz with annie ellicott, 25 September 2010; jardine's, kansas city, mo. attendance ~150

the avett brothers: visual reviews of aural entertainment

the avett brothers,25 september 2010; crossroads kc @ grinders, kansas city, mo. sold out

sharon jones and the dap kings: visual reviews of aural entertainment

sharon jones and the dap kings, midland theater, kansas city. sept. 20, 2010; attendance ~1,200.

david prince balloon launch

David Prince, an artist who floats on the periphery of object making in a cloud of humor and particle physics, was in Kansas City this past week making work and leading workshops on the making and use of bio-degradable plastics. The plastic was then fashioned into aerial objects which were then released into the atmosphere at one of the highest points in the city, Penn Valley Park.

girl talk: visual reviews of aural entertainment

girl talk: 10 sept 2010. crossroads sculpture park, kansas city, mo. attendance ~2000.

Mr340 Independent Spirit Awards

Labor Day seems like a good time to announce the first winners of the MR340 Spirit Awards. Open to racers, ground crews, and volunteers of the Missouri River 340 Canoe-Kayak Race, the MR340 Spirit Awards are bestowed upon individuals who demonstrate qualities that further aspects of the river or the event. Like most of life, winners of the Independent Spirit Awards receive no cash prizes (or corporate gift cards). Instead, Warrior Ant Press makes a small contribution in the honorees name to Missouri River Relief, which, among other river-related activities, provides safety boats for the MR340.

MR340 Independent Spirit Award Winners Awards are given for each of the first 5 years of the race. Hats off and paddles down for these honorees.

2006: toughness/kindness
Jim Low, Jefferson City, MO. A long-time outdoorsman and reporter, Jim sensed the true adventure of the race and wrote the first news articles about it when only 15 boats were involved. Over the last 5 years, several of Jim's articles have appeared in the Missouri Conservationist which, because of the widespread readership of the magazine (both in-state and out), has convinced many new to ultarmarathon racing to venture out on the Big Muddy.






Dawn Keller, Outer Banks, North Carolina. A survival trainer, at er being thrown from her boat during the first night of the inaugural race, Dawn went on to shepherd two boats to the finish line with her relentless spirit and simple mantra of "if you aren't paddling, then you aren't moving".






2007:sacrifice
Mark Handley, Holt, Missouri. When long-time friend Richard Lovell was diagnosed with terminal cancer, he and Mark decided to race the river they loved. They were the last boats to arrive in 2007; a landing which moved anyone lucky enough to have witnessed it.







Barbara Edington, Groves, Texas. Since year 2, Barbara has worked 24-7 during the race, talking to checkpoint volunteers to provide near-real-time race results so that friends, family, reporters, and the general public, can follow the race as it unfolds.






2008:friendshipBlack Coffee, Smithville, MO and Uncle A Dog, Lee's Summit, MO. In a test of wills that will likely never be exceeded, Coffee and Dog, built home-made trailers and stuffed them inside their home-made kayaks. Lashed to the top were their bicycles. Shortly after landing in St. Charles, the dynamic duo reassembled everything and pedaled back to the start along the Katy Trail. Not tough enough for you? Try this without a ground crew; they did.

The Ninja Racoons: Jana Shannon Bradley. Durham, North Carolina and Mike Massey, Bellingham, Washington. In 2007,friends Jana and Mike drove from both coasts, meeting in the breadbasket of America to take on the Mighty MO. Through careful planning and determination, they managed to win their division in their first year of competition. The nocturnal pair returned in 2008 to defend their crown and were summarily crushed by the competition. They have not returned but have remained friends.

2009: inventiveness
Jodi Pfefferkorn, Rocheport, MO. Jodi continues to document the experiences of the MR340 and those who share a river life on film. Best be careful not to stand in the way of her camera or her razor-sharp wit.








Joe Wilson, Jefferson City, MO. The Mayor of Noren Access. Shed a tear in Joe's honor, he deserves it for creating a serene, beach-front park from a flood deposit.[photo:riverrelief.org]








2010: personal improvement
Joe Mann, San Antonio, Texas.The Dark Horse Paddler, after reading about the inaugural MR340, put out his cigarette and got off the couch. He stepped into a kayak for the first time in February, 2007 and in 3.5 years has become a formidable presence who contends in any race he enters.





Christina Glauner, Lawrence, KS.A veteran of all five MR340, Christina managed to convince 20 other people to sit in a dragon boat for 40 hours and paddle for the children. When the crew attempted to pitch one racalcitrant paddler overboard into the fog, Christina successfully intervened on their behalf.

loufest: visual reviews of aural entertainment

loufest: the great lawn @ forest park, st. louis, mo, day 2, attendance ~5000

Carolina Chocolate Drops


Alexander Escavedo

Jeff Tweedy

She and Him

loufest 2010: visual reviews of aural entertainment

loufest 2010, the great lawn @ forest park, st. louis, mo; day 1, attendance ~7500.

Airborne Toxic Event
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Built to Spill
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Titus Andronicus

m.o.i.: policy bat

m.o.i.: "policy bat", 2010.
Found and re-purposed objects. Dimensions vary slightly, approximately 10 inches by 6 inches by 8 inches; 16 multiples.



m.o.i's version of a top-kill. It remains to be seen if it can accomplish its intended objectives.

kc sprint championships

Race Director Scott Mansker takes advantage of a quiet pre-race moment to tell the assembled crowd a fish story.

The Mann family, Joe (rear left with white ballcap), Grandpa Hoot, and Grandson Frank took top style points by winning 2 divisions with 3 generations of racers.

Women's solo division winners. Left to right in 1st,2nd,and 3rd were: Katie Pfefferkorn, Shannon Twenter, and Barbara Stoppelmoor.

This was a tough landing in high water.

Well worth the price of this downriver run was a trip back to Kaw Point in Race Organizer Russ Payzant's beautifully restored 1950's era cabin cruiser.

corny hot dog contest

Perhaps the only thing more ridiculous than cramming more than 50 hot dogs down your pie hole in less than 10 minutes is the fact that during yesterday's Nathan's Hot Dog eating contest, the organizers had 4-time former champion, Takeru Kobayashi, hauled away from Coney Island in handcuffs. The reason? Kobay, as his devoted fans call him, refused to sign a contract with Major League Eating–the "official sponsor" of the event. Well, ain't that America, home of the free?

If that isn't real enough for you then how a wi game devoted to competitive eating. Ready to barf yet?

reason #47 for not shopping @ walmart

That venerable news source, the New York Times, reported today that a Walmart employee was fired for smoking medicinal marijuana. The employee, who lives and works in Michigan, which has legalized medicinal marijuana, failed a drug test and was summarily released from the company. The employee, who had a prescription for the drug, was smoking weed but he has an INOPERABLE brain tumor! Apparently, so does the store manager.

higher ground

This black rat snake, likely chased from the den during our recent floods, has discovered a better vantage point for surveying onlookers. I've seen a lot of confused animals over the last couple of weeks, turkeys walking in circles, fawns looking unsure of their next steps, and snapping turtles dragging themselves through high ground.

summer medley

Ahh...summer...tall flowers, big water, juicy fruit, and summer cakes.

edward sharpe and the magnetic zeros: visual reviews of aural entertainment

edward sharpe and the magnetic zeros: 16 June 2010 @ the beaumont club, kansas city, mo. attendance ~1,000

pfefferkorn takes on world record and memorial day complacency

Updated 30 May 2010

Just talked to Scott: the new (unofficial) world record and soon to be a Guinness world record for farthest distance paddled by a woman on moving water is held by Katie Pfefferkorn at 192.1 miles. She finished with 12 minutes left on the clock, but was near a mile marker, so it was easiest to catch it on film to make it official.
--West Hansen via rivermiles.com

Katie Pfefferkorn, that bolt of Kansas sunshine who never seems to drop her wing paddle, solos past Paseo Bridge construction on her most recent world record attempt. Pfefferkorn, who broke the previous mark for the longest distance paddled by a woman in a 24-hour period less than a month ago, hopes to put in 200 miles before her day is done—which should happen at 7:45 am Sunday. Scott Mansker and Russ Payzant, a major part of the MR340 brain trust, are providing support and verification for the attempt.

our national debt, 18 million gallons and counting

Funny stuff from BP Public Relation

livestrong, die, or take performance-enhancing drugs

While some cycling fans, many of whom coincidentally seemed to be Reaganites, steadfastly stood by Floyd Landis' claims of innocence, readers of this blog will know that I never gave either Landis or Reagan much credit for being anything other than big dopes. However, just because Landis is the dopiest, angriest, most vindictive former member of the peleton doesn't mean he can't occasionally tell the truth.

Lance Armstrong has been the other big bully in cycling for years and bullies are yellow. Landis is Armstrong's 2nd teammate to accuse the 7-time TDF winner of systematic doping. Armstrong won the first case against Frankie Andreau and is winning the second one against Floyd in the court of public opinion. But should he? How is Lance any different than Barry Bonds? It's yet to be proven that Bonds took performance enhancing drugs to become the all-time home run king but everyone believes that he did. Only the superficial American cycling fan doesn't understand the fact that sure Lance has done more victory laps down the Champs Elysee than anyone in the history of cycling but that doesn't mean he's wasn't using. Listen to Lance and his coach when he speaks to the public, you'll hear him talk about being clean now and how he never had a positive test for performance enhancing drugs in his career.

The beloved and current US road champion, George Hincapie, sounded a lot like Mark McGuire the other day when he said he'd rather focus on the current state of cycling. Hincapie's sponsors (not the Steroids Anonymous ones!) would probably agree. A lot of cyclists can make similar statements about being clean today (ignoring yesterday) but no one else has Lance's seven TDF victories. And in America, we're all about winning. We're all about not getting caught. And we're all about being white.

It's hard to defend Landis because he has been such a bitter loser. Obviously what pains him the most is that he was doing what everyone else was doing at the time and he was the one who got caught and labeled a cheat. And others are seen as heroes. The timing of Landis' allegations during the Tour of California demonstrate just how bitter he remains. Landis, a former mountain bike world champion won the inaugural Tour of California. Now, he rides for a middling team that can't even buy entry into the event. And to make matters worst, Armstrong comes out of retirement and now all the media wants to do is talk about Lance. Lance. Lance. What a great guy. And his foundation. Awesome. All the time Landis is thinking, Jesus (forgive me, I have forsaken you), but I was just as good as this guy except I got caught and then burned by the system. This guys does it and he's a hero?

I don't think you've heard the end of this story but a lot of people with money and influence sure hope it goes away soon. Among those I count Radio Shack and the Livestrong Foundation. When the bottom line suffers, people take notice. Listen closely to their arguments against Landis and you'll discover that they always focus on labeling him and not on the issue of whether on not the accused took steroids during the time in question. Landis claims he spent as much as $90,000 a year on performance enhancing drugs. That should be pretty easy to prove if Landis cooperates. Authorities won't be able to access the finances of other riders who were implicated so all this will be hard, if not impossible to prove.

Ask yourself this. If Landis spent this kind of money to dope then the other top riders who claim innocence spent nothing? Also ask yourself this. Why are you so eager to find Barry Bonds guilty in the court of public opinion but not Lance Armstrong?

One of the more damning allegations, that the $100,000 contribution that Lance gave to the US anti-doping agency was in reality a bribe. UCI director. Pat McQuaid, strongly denied these allegations but this is one that should be pretty easy to uncover. For example, how many other $100,000 contributions did/does Lance routinely give and how many does UCI receive? We know the answer to the second question-none.

pat metheny–orchestrion: visual reviews of aural entertainment

Pat Metheny: Orchestrion, 7 May 2010, Uptown Theater, Kansas City, MO. Attendance ~1500.

Other reviews:
pat metheny trio

grass is stupid

OK. The lawnmower was secured (with a Kryptonite lock) to a tree late last summer lock to prevent property redistribution. The key was then lost for the next 9 months and lucky for us, most of this time was fall and winter. Then came spring, and rain.

Finally today, the key, having been hiding in the bottom of a dish, serendipitously resurfaces like a daylily. Then, 15 minutes into pushing the mower through foot high grass we encounter one of the many boulders lining our raised beds and KAPOW, THUNK. DUH.

All of which leaves me to believe that unless it's getting you high, grass is really stupid.