%{}% By CHRIS PACKHAM • This morning on KCUR 89.3, I heard President Bush yammering about his proposed economic stimulus package, and for the first time in seven years, I noticed that when he tries to say “principles,” it comes out as “prince-uh-bulls.” • Yep. There’s a new smoking ban for bars and restaurants. The smoking ban’s rules are as…
By PETER RUGG Ralph Roades doesn’t know why more Kansas City women didn’t want a free boob job. Roades raffled off a free breast-augmentation surgery January 13 as part of the Wide Open magazine publisher’s Kansas City bike show. St. Louis-based Fantastic Plastic Surgery agreed to do the work, and Roades called the odds of winning the $6,000 surgery…
%{}% By CHRIS PACKHAM • Pro-life Missourians will soon be able to demonstrate their enthusiasm for fetuses with “Choose Life” license plates. The Alliance Defense Fund sued on behalf of Choose Life of Missouri when the state initially rejected the requested specialty plate. The judge’s ruling, made on First Amendment grounds, brings my dream of an “ASS GRASS OR GAS”…
BY JUSTIN KENDALL The Chiefs didn’t get the roof, but they did get a few hundred mil. Remember a couple of years ago when the Chiefs and Royals held up Kansas City taxpayers for money to renovate Arrowhead and the K? Do you recall the threats of leaving Kansas City and taking away hundreds millions of dollars from…
Gung hay fat choy, kids! The Year of the Pig (year 4706 on the Chinese calendar) is quickly coming to a close. In a pre-Chinese New Year celebration, the West Wyandotte Library (1737 North 82nd Street in Kansas City, Kansas, 913-596-5800) is presenting a 30- to 40-minute performance of three traditional Chinese (Xing Jang) dances by students from Lily’s Chinese…
From a permanent recording booth in New York’s Grand Central Station and a mobile studio in a converted Airstream trailer, radio documentarian Dave Isay’s StoryCorps project has been chronicling the stories of everyday Americans from all strata of life. Armed with a microphone, he travels coast to coast collecting stories from anyone willing to sit down and chat.”I’m inspired…
Christmas at the Kansas governor’s mansion features a time-honored tradition: a rousing round of Don’t Drop the Soap. Designed by 23-year-old John Sebelius (son of Kathleen), the board game plays like an R-rated version of Mouse Trap. Players try to survive life in the joint by stealing painkillers from the nurse’s desk, avoiding the Aryans in the shower room and…
Earlier this month, the Kansas City arts community celebrated the life of Lester Goldman, a longtime professor and artist at the Kansas City Art Institute. Tonight, another notable artist is honored: the late Ken Ferguson (1928-2004), ceramist and KCAI professor from 1964 to 1996. In 1981, Ceramics Monthly readers voted him one of the 12 greatest living ceramic artists. Tonight,…
Rivalries between competitors usually end one of two ways: teamwork or conflict. In the case of two locally grown puppet troupes, it means a war of wits in which fists are thrust up nether cavities.Bear witness to comedic battle tonight at Puppet Wars: Attack of the Felt at Fatso’s (1016 Massachusetts in Lawrence). Lawrence’s the Felt Show and the Shitty…
Kansas City Mayor Mark Funkhouser is under siege. He has lost the City Council. Bloggers nip at his heels. The Kansas City Star editorial board has turned against him. Yep, the 6-foot-8 Funkhouser is even clumsier than he looks. But say this for the guy: He continues to try to engage the public. The mayor’s next town-hall meeting is tonight…
Eight years have passed since KC’s Eddie Griffin roomed with Theo Huxtable in an apartment above Westport barfly-trap Kelly’s. The apartment exists only in TV Land, and technically Griffin wasn’t living with a Cosby kid. Malcolm-Jamal Warner played a levelheaded type constantly putting up with Griffin’s wacky high jinks. The UPN sitcom wasn’t particularly good, but after years of…
When Larry Sells bought the Uptown Theater (3700 Broadway, 816-753-7643) in 1994, the historically designated venue had an appraised value of negative $2 million. Attempts to sell it for one dollar on the courthouse steps were unsuccessful; the only folks who showed up were parking-lot developers. “It was dilapidated, the area was deteriorating rapidly, the roof was leaking, there was…
Some coffeehouse regulars chug their beverages as soon as they see a musical act arrive, opting to scald their tongues rather than endure another strident protest tune or politely incompetent Bruce Springsteen cover. But even the most folk-jaded caffeine connoisseurs need not fear Space Station Lounge, a psychedelic-rock outfit that prefers coffeehouses to clubs. “People come to listen at coffee…
For decades, Nebraska and Kansas faced off every year in both basketball and football but rarely played a competitive game. Nebraska dominated Kansas in football until very recently, with Nebraska fans outnumbering KU fans at routs in Lawrence. Whereas Kansas has recently met or surpassed Nebraska on the gridiron, however, Nebraska’s cagers remain inferior to the ranked Jayhawks. In basketball,…
It’s not easy to forgive a neighbor who trespasses against you. It’s even harder when that neighbor shoots you and a bunch of your classmates.But Garrett Evans has done it. A survivor of the April 2007 Virginia Tech shootings, Evans speaks today at Johnson County Community College (12345 College Boulevard in Overland Park) about his experience. He will also offer…
Author Diane Eickhoff resents the fact that history books often mention only those women who were married to noteworthy men. She wishes more people knew about Clarina Nichols, who helped bring the women’s movement to the west in the 19th century. “She wasn’t hanging on anybody’s coattails,” Eickhoff says. “She really achieved what she did on her own.” Last year,…
The word shitkickers, as applied to well-worn western-style boots, implies the existence of the verb to shitkick. So what if stuffy ol’ Merriam-Webster doesn’t agree? UrbanDictionary.com acknowledges the term and says shitkicking means “to kick the shit out of someone. Literally.” But to most hipsters in shitkickers, shitkickin’ really just means swigging PBR and shooting the shit. Doing this in…
Mark Twain wrote a series of books about Adam and Eve that were published in the form of journals kept by the biblical first inhabitants of Earth. Together, they document a funny but ultimately sad and wistful love story.On meeting Eve, Adam wrote, “This new creature with the long hair is a good deal in the way. It is…
“How does this compare to other film festivals, like Cannes?” asked an inquisitive woman seated next to me at a screening on the first Saturday morning of this year’s Sundance Film Festival. I pondered the question for a moment, then replied that I was pretty sure you would never see a filmmaker in Cannes introduce a screening of his film…
Shauntay Henderson remembers coming home from her first day of school as a little girl and telling her grandmother about all of her new friends. “You ain’t got no friends,” her grandmother replied. Doretta Henderson wanted to teach Shauntay the difference between a friend and an acquaintance. Such distinctions were important growing up in the Charlie Parker Square public-housing development,…
Bloomsday Books is only 14 years old, but it has become an enclave of Kansas City culture. And in a few weeks, it will be gone. It will live on in name only through online sales, but the place where it has spent the past two or so years, a storefront in the old Crestwood shops along 55th Street just…
Armenian-Canadian soprano. Sat., Jan. 26, 8 p.m., 2008 Tags: Night & Day
Texas Hold ‘Em at Winslow’s, Monday and Wednesday nights. Two sessions. Winner receives a cash prize and is eligible to move on to the final round of the $1,000 No-Limit Tournament. Mondays, Wednesdays, 7 & 9:30 p.m., 2007 Tags: Night & Day
This attractive new addition to Martini Corner is ideal for pregaming with your buds before tearing up the town or sharing a bottle of Pinot with your best girl. The bright bar area holds a couple of tall tables, and a second room is filled with cozy booths and couches that flank a big window (perfect for boy watching). Each…
