February 26, 2014 by justin
in Civic Skinny
How does the voluble Marty Tirrell pay for all those sports tickets that he gives to advertisers and listeners on his radio show? He doesn’t. He stiffs the sellers. That’s clear from reading documents in two federal court cases decided in Chicago in recent weeks. In each case, a ticket
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February 26, 2014 by justin
in Locker Room
What is it about pole dancing that gets so many folks in a tizzy? While the striptease tends to accompany the pole in American culture, it would be ignorant to say stripping is the only form of pole dancing. “Physically, pole fitness has countless benefits for the upper and lower
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February 26, 2014 by justin
in Belly Up To...
Remember that moment in Walt Disney’s animated film “Alice in Wonderland” ─ when the shrunken young heroine finds herself lost in a flower garden and does her best to assimilate with the budding, blooming ladies who belong there by right of roots? Despite her gifts of beauty and song, Alice
Read More →‘LIGHTNING RETURNS: FINAL FANTASY XIII’ (T) *** Square Enix Xbox 360 After taking a break from your combat party in “Final Fantasy XIII-2,” Lightning is back as a playable character to close out the trilogy in all of her maddeningly stoic glory. Taking place 500 years after its predecessor, this
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February 26, 2014 by justin
in Food Dude
Top Iowa chefs and restaurants continue to receive national honors (see “Side Dishes” below.) A different story on the café beat, though, has been every bit as significant to the sophistication of Des Moines’ collective palate. Its main player was not a chef or restaurateur but a politician. Gov. Bob
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February 26, 2014 by justin
in Joe's Neighborhood
You’re tired. You’re tired of winter. You’re tired of slogging through another day. You’re really tired of another year silently slipping away. Your exciting job of last fall has become relentlessly mired. And now even the children are acting squirrelly. Spring probably won’t come. Listen, I’ve heard that can happen.
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February 26, 2014 by justin
in The Sound
All Hail King Buzzo. For 30 years, Buzz Osborne has influenced music and blown minds as the front man of seminal experimental rock outfit, The Melvins. The band’s sludgy sound has directly beget an alarming array of bands, including Tool, Mastodon and Nirvana. But Osborne has never been one to
Read More →The acclaimed “Bates Motel” (Monday, 8 p.m., A&E) adapts Alfred Hitchcock’s horror classic “Psycho,” as Norma Bates (Vera Farmiga) and troubled son Norman (Freddie Highmore) run a motel in a town with more than its share of unexplained murders. The second-season premiere contains all the perversity you’d expect while still
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February 26, 2014 by justin
in Political Mercury
The meat of the recently-passed farm bill, signed by President Barack Obama into a law governing agriculture for the next decade, is the elimination of the $4.5 billion annually in direct payments in favor of an expanded crop-insurance program. The package also reduces spending on food stamps by about $8
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