A pair of contractors are suing Kansas City Live, claiming the city’s new entertainment district stiffed them on work performed. Taylor Kelly and Teague Electric Construction are suing KC Live, the city, LaSalle Bank and three restaurants. I read through the lawsuit, which alleges that KC Live still owes Taylor Kelly $68,141 plus interest on completed work. The suit also…
The Pitch’s tech priest, Matt Spencer, passed along this photo from 83rd and Metcalf. The message — “H.R. 676 Universal Health Care” — in thick red letters on the traffic control box is about the federal “Expanded & Improved Medicare for all” bill introduced by U.S. Reps. John Conyers and Dennis Kucinich. Spencer notes the “strong grassroots support” for the…
Did you know that there’s an office at 635 Woodland that collects reports from local police departments about suspicious activities in the metro area and analyzes them for terrorist threats? And that “suspicious activities” can include taking pictures of questionable aesthetic value, lurking around potential terrorist targets like power plants and oil refineries, or looking up subversive stuff on the…
In November, I wrote this story (“117 Homicides and Counting,” November 18, 2008) about how dumb bureaucracy and egotism was getting in the way of Aim4Peace, the city’s new anti-violence program. Despite using a template that was successful across the nation and being run by dedicated people like Tracie Mclendon, the program just couldn’t get the financial support it needed or hire…
It happens every so often in a town like Lawrence: four dudes go to college, start a band, make a record, graduate college, party a couple more years, and get the hell outta Dodge. The Volunteers are no exception to the rule, unfortunately, and this month lead singer Tyler Jack Anderson and guitarist and keyboardist Andrew Kissel will answer New…
BPU watchers definitely want to read Mark Wiebe’s column in The Kansas City Star’s Wyandotte Couny section about oversight of the troubled utility company. Wiebe does a great job of outlining the failure of the BPU to self-police and the need for independent oversight. The Unified Government looks to be fed up with letting the BPU raid the liquor cabinet…
Last week, the Oklahoma State Legislature passed Senate Joint Resolution 24, naming this OK’s official state rock song. From the press release: Jill Simpson, Director of the Oklahoma Film & Music Office, expressed: “The legislature’s official naming of ‘Do You Realize??’ as Oklahoma’s Official Rock Song is the culmination of a nearly two-year process. I don’t think any of us…
Nearly everyone with an Internet connection has seen the “Will it blend?” videos from Blendtec. Add the video below, by St. Thomas Creations, for its Quattro Super Toilet, to the “Will it flush?” category. The answer, of course, is yes — or the company would have left the footage on the cutting- room floor. But as you’re watching three pounds…
The Johnson County Sheriff’s Office launched an interactive map of registered sex offenders in JoCo this morning. Search by name or address and see if your next door neighbor — or the guy bagging your groceries at Price Chopper — is a registered offender. The list is pretty detailed with info on the offender’s name, crime, home address and employer…
Just last week, I was semi-defending Rachael Ray against the charges of being Rachael Ray. This week, a press release inadvertently caused me to check out her magazine-cum-Web site Every Day With Rachael Ray.It has an extensive section called “Mapped Out,” which features the “tastiest spots” in 40 states and 100-plus cities — including such thriving metropolises as Bisbee, Oskaloosa…
I lived in southwest Missouri for several months but never acquired a taste for Springfield cashew chicken. I was definitely in the minority. Around Springfield, every restaurant has its own spin on the dish, and locals gobble it up like mad. Yesterday The New York Times featured the regional delicacy and was much too kind in describing it as “deep-fried…
How many times have you seen an ad for a cold, refreshing beer immediately after an anti-drug or anti-smoking commercial? We tell children alcohol is a drug, but commercials show it as something fun and sexy with the power to rewind time. It’s OK, though, because beer companies insist they’re not advertising to minors (but if underage drinking stopped, conservative…
In the past two months, two restaurants have opened that prominently feature gluten-free items. The first is Pizza Fusion, which is trying to appeal to people with food restrictions. The second, as KC Lunch Spots pointed out, is Daniel’s Bar-B-Q, in all other ways a normal Kansas City barbecue restaurant. Andee Hindery of gluten-free bakery Astrocakes has a gluten allergy…
%{}% The Lincoln Protocol: The “historical puzzle mystery” genre was a short-lived multi-tentacled media shit-octopus, producing horrible media outputs in the fields of publishing, film and boring Flash-based puzzle games. Here’s a board game played by absolutely nobody I know or have ever met in my entire life. Or maybe Dan Brown played it once, to get ideas for his…
As the buildings turned Mass Street into a piercing cold wind tunnel, a crowd of Lawrencians took refuge inside the Jackpot Music Hall. Once inside, in the dim red bar light and the sweltering heat, that same crowd found themselves wishing they’d left their coats in the car. Alela Diane came on first, backed by a four-piece band: hairy dude…
Came across this post about the upcoming Kansas City Star layoffs from a former writer at the daily. The Wednesday Weekly recalled a 2007 all-newsroom meeting with then-executive editor Mark Zieman (now the paper’s publisher) who likened working at the Star to “working in a collapsed mineshaft where we were all stuck and could potentially die.” A collapsed mineshaft? That…
%{}% I think we’ve all suffered from a barista crush or two, like the one on Taylor the latte boy. Sometimes living on a farm just seems so darn romantic, like when there’s a beautiful rustic barn outside your window. 75th Street Brewery keeps things fresh by mixing up its beers. What was formerly “chocolate assent” is now “hot chocolate.”…
Jesus must be bored if he’s taking time to appear in a bucket of ice cream … or a sink … or a sonogram … or (my favorite) a Cheeto. Everything is Terrible put together this video of religious apparitions from 2008. Kudos to Fox 4 for making the cut with a Jesus sighting “in the folds and shadows of…
D. Rider Mother of Curses (Tizona) D. Rider’s Mother of Curses is at once artful, playful and sinister — a cacking 1930s cartoon villain sentenced to hang because of what he did to the heroine just after he tied her to the train tracks. Amplifying this notion, the cover features a piece of embroidery that’s either been ravaged or left…
By BRIAN BARR Raphael Saadiq just wasn’t made for these times. Then again, maybe he was. Like Erykah Badu, the former Tony! Toni! Tone! frontman, who is playing tonight at the VooDoo Lounge, is an analog guy in a digital world. But his old-school way of thinking has lead him to successful collaborations with Q-Tip, Mary J. Blige, The Roots,…
