Forget about booting up the computer this weekend — instead, strap on a pair of real dust kickers and take a spin on a Jersey ox, during the Western North Carolina Nature Center’s fifth annual Farm Fun Day. An ox, you say? Yep — who knew that early Appalachian homesteaders often rode oxen? You’ll learn … Read more
If you didn’t know what you were looking for, you’d most likely walk right by the undersized yellow sandwich board parked on the sidewalk in front of Sluder’s Furniture Store. (“Umbra,” whispers an announcement tacked on the board, accompanied by a blurred, black-and-white photo of a girl under an umbrella. Little arrows point inside.) And … Read more
Truly timeless stories — the ones that transcend generation gaps — always include some lesson about the way the world should work. The Emperor’s New Clothes teaches us not to be vain; Rip Van Winkle warns us not to be lazy; and, according to Aesop’s famous fables, all immoral acts inevitably lead to bad luck. … Read more
One fall day in 1984, the demon-god Boognish appeared to Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo, a pair of eighth-graders in New Hope, Pa. The boys followed his command, changing their names to Gene and Dean Ween and beginning a Scotchguard-huffing, mushroom-eating musical collaboration that can only be loosely classified as bizarre. From there, the story … Read more
What th–!?! They’re cancelling Yeah!? Oh, $#%)•TT”! All across the universe, millions of aliens are mourning because Yeah!, a nationally syndicated comic book, is no more. And with it goes the three-piece girl band that built its reputation entirely on interplanetary gigging, but could never develop a following at home. Central characters Woo-Woo, Krazy and … Read more
“We stumbled and we all felt very sad, but we’re feeling like, OK, we’ll just stand back up and move in the direction we had hoped to move in,” said board Chair Nelda Holder at the May 8 meeting of the WNC Regional Air Pollution Control Agency board. That was just after she’d announced, “We … Read more
Back in the ’80s, someone broke into a beer joint on Swannanoa River Road, robbed it, and then set the place on fire to cover their tracks. “It was an obvious torch job,” says arson investigator Harley Shuford, Asheville’s longtime representative on the Asheville Buncombe Arson Task Force. “You could see the pour patterns from … Read more
On her 25th birthday, Erin Conklin made a resolution. “By the time I turned 30, I wanted to have a master’s degree, a good career, or be in a position where I could own a home,” she said during an interview in her cellar apartment in north Asheville. “Well, 30 came, and I’m as far … Read more
Burning homes for the insurance money just isn’t all that common in Western North Carolina, according to arson investigators. It does happen, but getting even is a more likely motive. “I’ve seen a lot of the spite-and-revenge types of fires,” reveals arson investigator Harley Shuford. Among mountain folk, says the straight-talking Shuford, a spurned lover … Read more
By recent standards, Asheville City Council’s May 9 meeting was an extraordinarily quiet one. It was mercifully efficient and short, as well, clocking in at one hour and 20 minutes. The one issue that could have been contentious — a zoning change and conditional-use permit for a proposed apartment complex in north Asheville — proved … Read more
