Category: Far North

what goes better with the blue suede shoes: the pink peg slacks or the red blue jeans? This raspberry beret matches the pants, or I could do the fez and switch to the boogie shoes with the diamonds on the soles. Can I borrow your famous blue raincoat? The cheap sunglasses I got’ll accessorize with it well. And what goes better with a brand-new leopard-skin pillbox hat than some electric boots and a mohair suit? I know those boots were made for walkin’ but honestly I prefer a hi-heel sneaker or an old brown shoe if I can’t find some boxing gloves. I feel like a Dirk wearing white socks and my Adidas But when Goody Two Shoes rocks those hot pants it’s goodbye pork pie hat, hello vicar in a tutu. Steve Carll…

A story in the April 18, 2024, edition of the North Coast Journal headlined “Seeking Salvation” included an inaccurate location for the California Healthcare Facility, which is located in Stockton. The Journal regrets the error.

As the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case that could shift the legal landscape underpinning how governments can treat homeless residents, local officials watched with mixed emotions and hopes. Since 2018, a decision known as Martin v. Boise out of the U.S. Court of Appeals’ Ninth Circuit determining that governments cannot criminalize camping in public spaces unless people are given shelter as an alternative has been the case law dictating the terms of the debate. It’s been the legal precedent cities and the county have pointed to while crafting policies aimed at mitigating some of the impacts of homeless encampments, providing guard rails that have prevented some from crafting stricter ordinances. But the case Johnson v. Grants Pass that was argued before the United States Supreme Court on April 22 could shift that landscape entirely. If the court’s majority sides with the homeless residents who filed a lawsuit in 2018 challenging the small Oregon city’s three ordinances that combine to criminalize sleeping in public streets, alleyways and parks while using a blanket or bedding, things will remain status quo. But if

Editor: I appreciate your seemingly through expose, (fine journalism) recounting Patrick Harvey’s history (“Seeking Salvation,” April 18). Our humanistic compassion should allow this man to return to the community, “if so hap may be.” Linda Koenig, Eureka…

Editor: The American flag should fly above the Earth flag because that arrangement portrays our view of the world (“Judge: Arcata Can’t Put Earth Flag on Top,” April 11). The Project for the New American Century is alive and well, with its mantra of “military strength and moral clarity … good for both America and the world” as articulated by Dick Cheney et al. in 1997. We’ve claimed that right — to be on top of the world — by turning a bunch of countries to rubble, killing and displacing millions, and pushing close to a thousand military bases into countries around the world. After Gorbachev lifted the Berlin wall, we treacherously broke our word, and marched a missile-loaded NATO eastward to the Russian border. Then we put Russia on our “to-do” list for a later time when, tired of destroying little countries on the cheap, we would want a “near-peer” war. We’re trying mightily to provoke a near-peer war with China, too. We just have to find and incite the right proxies (probably the Uyghurs, well infiltrated with Isis). It’s become impossible to list

Speaking of hip hop (and for that matter, an organic, career-length artistic celebration of the fun side of weed) Houston’s screwball master MC, guest star and laid back producer Devin the Dude is posting up at Humbrews tonight at 9 p.m. on a stop on his Whole New Ballroom tour. He might be a few days late for 4/20, but I have no doubt the vibe won’t be affected in the slightest, and, although it’s easy to over-simplify his act as a rolling carnival of High Times, the Dude has got effortless flow rolling over a production style that is deceptively brilliant in its underlying smokescreen groove. He’s a peer-respected icon at the top of a game he helped develop over decades ($25).

The Cal Poly Humboldt campus is closed today, as dozens of protesters continue to occupy Siemens Hall, having barricaded its entrances, while calling on the university to divest from entities they say fuel Israel’s ongoing war on Hamas in Gaza. “The message from inside is that, first of all, they feel the university is complicit because of the campus’ investments with weapons companies and Israeli companies,” said Ryan Connelly, a junior biology major who identified himself as a spokesperson for those occupying the building. “Their conditions for release of the building: Divest, and then we’ll talk.” The building was the epicenter of an intense standoff between protesters — whose ranks reportedly swelled to several hundred yesterday evening — and police from a host of local agencies who attempted to clear the building. The situation seemed to be escalating, with reports of police attempting to arrest protesters only to have them pulled back by the crowd, a request for a special team from the California Highway Patrol and for the deployment of pepper ball guns used to disperse crowd until police withdrew from the area around

A group working on a fall ballot initiative that would limit the rights of transgender students lost a round in court Monday when a judge sided with the state in its description of the measure. Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Stephen Acquisto ruled that Attorney General Rob Bonta’s title, “Restricts Rights of Transgender Youth,” is a fair description of the initiative, which would require schools to notify parents if a student identifies as transgender, ban gender-affirming care for those under 18 and place other limits on students who identify as a gender other than what they were assigned at birth. The ruling is a setback for the group, dubbed Protect Kids California, as it tries to meet a May 28 deadline to collect 550,000 signatures to qualify for the fall ballot. The group has so far raised just over 200,000 signatures, organizers said. Protect Kids California, led by Roseville school board member Jonathan Zachreson, put forth the initiative in November, calling it the “Protect Kids of California Act,” but a day after the group filed its paperwork with the Secretary of State, Bonta gave the

The calendar marks the onward tapping of time, and once again the first days of the working week is capped off with a 7 p.m. installment of Metal Mondays at Savage Henry Comedy Club. Tonight’s fare includes two Midwestern touring bands, Cincinnati’s power-violence crew Slut Bomb and noise violence mercenaries Blackwater Snipers from Chicago. Local heavy hitters Malicious Algorithm and Brain Dead Rejects will bring it on as well ($5-$10 sliding scale).

Fans of ensemble vocal jazz and pop are in for a treat this afternoon when the Mad River Transit Singers present a matinee performance at Fulkerson Hall at 2 p.m. ($10, $5 children and seniors, free to Cal Poly Humboldt students). The program will include an array of swing and jazz standards, as well as some pop gems by the likes of Willie Nelson and local hero Sara Bareilles. …

I’m too far removed from cannabis culture to comment on the current street value of 4/20 as a holiday, but I have to imagine it’s been a cycle of diminished returns regarding coolness in the wake of legalization, market busts and gross spurts of venture capital. Like music festivals and world travel, the online cult of the self has turned everything spontaneous and exciting into a teeming social media world of curated projections lacking anything resembling human reflection. All populated by a hierarchy of influencers whose language is a megaton chorus of babble. I try not to think about it too much. However, I do need to think about a fun gig for today, and rather than make a list of the many hyped-up musical smoke-outs, I’m going to suggest the OTT. show at the Arcata Theatre Lounge at 9 p.m. ($25, $22 advance). This British electro artist has been pumping out his ambient dub and club tracks for more than 20 years while holding it down as a respected engineer and producer in the professional level of the industry. This show looks like a

Those of us craning our necks in Old Town can satisfy our curiosity at last. The frankly named Rooftop Sushi is out in the daylight at last (148 E St., Eureka). Slip into the modest entrance on the E Street side of the new building and ride the elevator (a Eureka rarity) to the fourth floor, where the soft opening is in full swing.  Opening during a welcome streak of sunshine, co-owner and chef Joe Tan and his business partner Lily Tan (no relation) say the first couple of days have been busy. While the indoor dining space and counter were empty off hours, every seat on the patio was taken with diners enjoying nigiri, maki sushi and plates of spiraling beef carpaccio. And sunshine — lots of sunshine. The view of the bay is reserved for the event space on the other side of the rooftop, but the restaurant’s half of the partially covered wood deck overlooks Old Town and environs.  Chef Tan has said he was looking forward to turning his sole attention to the venture, a smaller restaurant, now that he’s moved

This week we’re looking at the life of Patrick Harvey, an incarcerated man who could potentially be resentenced in Humboldt County. We’re also sharing the story of a volunteer for CASA who’s making time for kids in foster care. Finally, a humorous fish story just this side of NSFW. Hit subscribe for weekly updates on Humboldt stories. …

Editor: Our “last best chance” is, and has always been, empowering the people in their own backyards (“Our Last Best Chance,” April 11). Weaning ourselves from “fast-track global destruction” requires ecological humility. Each of us can and must eliminate greenhouse gas emissions to fast-track our children’s survival. By omitting consideration of the most effective alternative energy sources available today, your article urinates into the wind onto the people. Clearly, the best chance to address the climate crisis is empowering the people to place solar on their rooftops. This is not just aspirational: I, along with many others, have relied on rooftop solar since the 1970s. Solar energy is so much easier and affordable to implement now than 50 years ago. Fast-tracking our children’s survival requires that subsidies flow toward rooftop solar/battery; but self-reliant families don’t assure big energy profits. Artificial intelligence businesses and the military need huge amounts of power and are the primary beneficiaries of centralized electric power. We the people just need enough to power our lights, appliances and vehicles; a rooftop/battery solar system. Installation costs zero out in just a few years, especially

I like it when a new group I haven’t heard before drops a line to let me know about an upcoming gig because I am given the chance to see what the music makers (and the dreamers of dreams, per Roald Dahl writing as Willy Wonka quoting the poet Arthur O’Shaugnessy) are up to. But things really line up and start sparking and twitching for me with the holy amperage of life when I actually love the music they send. I got treated to just that sort of galvanic shock this week when Liz, aka Trash Panda, from the new Eureka duo Hermit Crab sent me the goods: a link to their latest work, The Earth is Visible from Space. Dear lord of the deadly glowing seas, what a beautiful, stuttering mess of sputtering beats, all chopping through a tideline of battered shoreline debris and foamy toxic unguents. Samples, beats, sax, voices, all funk-scuttling over an ambient mapped fallout zone of music, land-mining Mother Nature with barbs of exploded pop culture and crooning about the mess. This trash is a blast and I love it.

Local guitar playing and soothsaying storyteller Anna Hamilton brings her trio and its blues to the Basement tonight for a free recitation at 8 p.m. I remember her tunes and chatter fondly from the good old days at the Clam Beach Inn (RIP), where she’d take over a corner and fill the barroom with her earthy magic that expanded as the beer taps flowed like the wavy drizzle in the backyard Strawberry Creek forest basin. Here’s a glass tipped to those memories and a sip in honor of those to come…

Editor: Thadeus Greenson’s coverage of Cal Poly Humboldt’s work confronting the glut of plastic everywhere and in everything now (“Turning the Titanic,” April 11) was an encouraging start. However, at the end of the article was Morgan King’s more important point, I think, that the fossil fuel industry and the plastics industry’s shift of responsibility to the consumer is, perhaps more crucially, what needs to change. If companies make and promote products that create immense problems for the planet, those same companies need to be held responsible for solving those problems that they have created, the onus ought to be on them. And why isn’t it? Advertising (professional lying) is part of the problem. That “recycle” is a euphemism for what is in actuality a nonexistent service — that’s part of it. That, as King points out, companies have done a great job moving where the spotlight goes. And, of course, there’s profit. Companies only do what they ought to do that would benefit the well-being of others if doing so is profitable. New World Water, in Arcata, is one solution: refillable glass containers, as well as

‘Living in amends,’ a candidate for resentencing hopes for another chance Patrick Harvey, speaking to the Journal from the California Medical Facility, a state prison in Vacaville, falls silent for a moment, considering the question about hope. Harvey, who has served 25 years of a 25-to-life sentence, reportedly the first under California’s three-strikes law handed down in Humboldt County, has a tendency to speak quickly over the phone, though it’s unclear whether that’s the product of his attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder or the prison’s phone system only allowing 20-minute calls. But asked about hope, he pauses. “I’m what they call state-raised,” he says, explaining that at 52, he’s only spent 14 months as a free man since he turned 18. And even before he came to prison, he says, there were stints in juvenile halls and the California Youth Authority. He says he’s been accustomed to incarceration since his early teens, since he was first sent to juvey in San Diego County after he ran away from home and was caught breaking into a vacant apartment, looking for a place to sleep. “Once that began, I was

Welcome to Washed Up’s Xucation Channel where we present science education in a format that people will actually watch. In this episode, a lady visits a gentleman and we learn about an interesting fish. “Hey handsome, bet you can’t resist these.” While he fails to resist those, let’s discuss the Pacific tomcod (Microgadus proximus). This fish is in the family of true cods, which can be distinguished from other fishes by their three dorsal fins, two anal fins and a single whisker, or barbel, at the end of their chin. (A lot of non-true cods are commonly called “cod,” such as “rock cod” for rockfish, and “black cod” for sablefish.) “Let’s see how big you are.” The relevant part of our well-above-average gentleman performer is approximately the size of an average adult tomcod. So, unlike the bigger cod species, there is only a very minor commercial fishery for Pacific tomcod. But they are a somewhat popular sportfish that are often caught from piers. Like other cod, they have delicately flavored flakey white meat. And some people cook them as you would freshwater panfish. “You deserve

I want to be A good ancestor To plant seeds for Future generations To harvest I want to leave A foundation For strong community Happy and willing to Work together I want to work For bringing humanity Back to humans Because a good future A strong future Needs all of us Dottie Simmons…

Editor: The shadows do grow long for our species. Perhaps the Gods would be pleased to witness their followers use some of the land and sea to preserve the biosphere (“Our Last Best Chance,” April 11). We can only hope that it is not too late. Fred Summers, Ferndale…