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        For those unschooled in music history, the names of some of the instruments in the museum of the Cape Fear’s upcoming exhibit Rhythm and Roots of North Carolina Music, might sound like something out of a Dr. Suess book. The melodeon, the cimbalom and B-flat Flugelhorn all play a part in the heritage of North Carolina and will be on exhibit starting Saturday, Nov. 22. As part of the opening, the museum is hosting an old time music band featuring local musicians Marvin Gaster and Richard Owens.
        The goal of the exhibit is to not only preserve artifacts like the instruments, but to bring meaning to them as well. While the exhibit covers North Carolina music in general, there is a specific focus on the Cape Fear Region.
        For example, there is a hand-crafted drum made by Joe Liles of Durham County on display. It was used in 1971, as the center drum at the Lumbee Indian tribe’s first pow wow, and is still in use to this day. Liesa Greathouse, curator of education at the museum, pointed out the process that people go through at an exhibit is simple but important.
        “When you sat down and saw this drum you didn’t know anything about it and now through talking about it; it has more meaning to you,” she said. {mosimage}
        There is a similar reaction with the old time music program that the Museum of the Cape Fear sponsors. “We provide a place for people who want to keep that alive. This is a place where they can come and learn and do and teach each other. Museums are great for doing that; keeping those things preserved and ongoing,” she added.
        As society has moved on and progressed in different ways it is a museum’s job to help the community remember by preserving and interpreting traditions.
        Unfortunately, since the instruments on display are artifacts, they can’t be handled — which may be hard to resist.
        “That is the thing about musical instruments they make you want to pick them up and touch them and see what they sound like and how they work,” said Exhibit Designer Margaret Shearin. “We do have an interactive thing called jukebox interactive and they will be able to hear different types of music using that.”
        The exhibit opening will give everyone a chance to come and hear history first hand. Officially dubbed Old Time Music by the Library of Congress, the music has a direct link to the history and heritage of North Carolina. According to musician Marvin Gaster, this genre is very traditional. 
        “There are quite a few songs that I play that no one else knows because I learned ‘em from old people.     They are very traditional and a great many of them are from the upper Cape Fear Valley,” he added.
    One such song is “The Boatmen.” It is about the boatmen and riverboats and dates back to the pre-Civil War era.
        “’Rye Straw,’ is an old song, that is a local one, too, and ‘Dancing Ladies’ — they are both Cape Fear River Valley stuff.”
        Chris Woodson, Arsenal Park educational coordinator, credits generational changes for the decline of old time music. 
        “A lot of that stuff is passed down generationally and a lot of it just didn’t get passed down,” he said. “That is part of the reason for doing this, to preserve some of these songs and styles of playing that are unique to North Carolina or even unique to the Sandhills region,” explained Woodson, noting that when some of these older “fellas” are gone, the tradition may ver well die with them because they are the keepers of the music. 
        Through exhibits like this, Woodson hopes that interest can be generated and perhaps a few folks will connect with old time music and the rich local heritage. “Every once in a while you can see it connect with some of the people who come through,” said Woodson. “Hopefully it will spark an interest in this older kind of music that is dying out.” 
        The jam session begins at 2 p.m. on Nov. 22. Admission is free. The exhibit will be on display through Apr. 5, 2009. The Museum of the Cape Fear is on the corner of Bradford and Arsenal.

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        What people name our most precious possessions, our children, has always fascinated me, as longtime readers of this column may have noticed.
        Some of us, including the Dicksons, opt for traditional family names, even if they sometimes sound a bit old-fashioned, odd or dated. This course does seem to have limits, however. I know several young Emmas and Ellas and Jacobs and Aarons, but no young Ethels and Berthas or Clarences and Elmers. Perhaps the resurgence of those names lies in the years ahead.
        {mosimage}Others of us go for the creative, choosing names from other nations and cultures, or simply creating a new and unique name for a new and unique human being. Occasionally I run into an unusual name whose bearer tells me it means virtue or beauty in some other language, but this path has its pitfalls as well. Naming a girl Chandelier seems a bit off base to me, as does the legal name I once read in the newspaper for a girl. The name was spelled using the numeral 8. Both of those choices seemed destined to set up those individuals up to deliver explanations all their lives.
        Still others of us honor someone we admire by naming our children for him or her. I have a cousin named Jessica in honor of a great friend of her parents and another cousin named Robert in honor of the doctor who delivered him.
    Some of us name our children for people we admire but may not know personally, and with the advent of a new administration in Washington, we seem to be entering a new era in Presidential baby-naming as well.
        When I was growing up, it was common in Fayetteville to meet men named Franklin Roosevelt Smith or Franklin Roosevelt Jones in tribute to the President who led our country out of the Great Depression and who guided us and the world through World War II. My generation has more than a few Dwight Davids, in honor of the World War II military hero and United States President Dwight David Eisenhower. A bit later, I met several John Kennedy Somebodies, and there were even a few Lyndons running around, probably mostly in Texas. Not surprisingly, the name Theodore as in Theodore Roosevelt, our 26th President from 1901-1909, peaked in the early 1900s, according to the Social Security Administration which keeps up with such things. A trip to its Web site to tour baby names makes an interesting afternoon diversion and clearly illustrates the long American tradition of honoring our Presidents in this fashion. It is an Internet journey well worth the trip to me.
        The practice of Presidential naming seems to have fallen from favor shortly after the rash of Lyndons. Maybe folks just did not want to name their sons after Richard Nixon and his successors. Maybe we became cynical about instead of admiring of our leaders, or maybe the 1960s made us all especially creative, but for whatever reasons, there do not seem to be many Jerry Fords, Jimmy Carters or George Bushes running around in American neighborhoods these days.
        All of that appears ready to change.
        Jennifer 8. Lee — yes, 8, just like the newborn whose name I read in the newspaper, reports in the New York Times that Barack Jeilah was born to a mother in Phoenix, Ariz., after she got so excited on election night that she jumped up and down and promptly went into labor. Across the Atlantic Ocean, Michelle Obama was born to a mother in Kisumu, Kenya.
        Can little Malias and Sachas be far behind? {mosimage}
        If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then American Presidents, or at least some of them, should be proud that we lesser mortals name our children after them and their families. But the honor of Presidential naming comes with built in risk. The Times also tells us that bad economic times and scandal bode ill for Presidents with such problems and their potential namesakes. In 1928, Hoover — as in Herbert, was in the top 400 for boy’s names. But three years later, when the Great Depression had the entire nation in its grip, Hoover was pushing 1,000. Similarly, Clinton was a top 200 boy name during much of the 1970s and 1980s, but by 1999 and countless news stories about Monica Lewinsky and her berets and blue dresses later, Clinton had tanked to nearly 700.
        I suspect that what we are already beginning to see is the first wave of many Baracks, Michelles, Malias and Sachas who will be named in honor of our nation’s new, young, and attractive First Family. None of us can predict the future, of course, or know whether or how long these names will make the Social Security Administration’s Top 20 list.
        I do believe, though, that kindergarten teachers in classrooms across the nation in the fall of 2013 will make name tags for so many eager Baracks, Michelles, Malias and Sachas that most of them will be known as Barack A, Michelle B, and so on through Z.

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        My fellow conservatives, take heart. We won Canada!{mosimage}
        Not only does President-elect Obama deserve our admiration, so does the whole Democratic Party, though I would argue that they benefited from a complicit media and a dis-spirited Republican Party that gained momentum too late in the game.  Nonetheless, the Democrats were passionate, disciplined and mobilized, electing, in defiance of conventional wisdom that we are a center-right country, one of the most liberal members of their party. To the victor goes the spoils and may the next four years bring us peace and prosperity.
        In an endless campaign full of surprises, a final twist is that the U.S. of Ronald Reagan, Rush Limbaugh and George W. Bush has taken a hard turn left, while Canada has turned to the right (to saying nothing of France and Germany veering to the center).
        Yes, that Canada. The Canada whose national healthcare system has been held up by the left as a model. The Canada of gay marriage and liberal immigration and stifling taxation. The Canada that some liberals threatened to move to if George W. Bush was re-elected (that was the premise of Blue State, a 2007 film starring Anna Paquin).
        The Conservative Party, led by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, picked up 16 seats in Parliament on Oct. 17, making them not a majority but a greatly strengthened minority. The Washington Times’ Jeffrey T. Kuhner writes that, “For decades, the country’s liberal elites have sought to transform Canada into a North American version of Scandinavia — a multicultural social democracy characterized by economic [control], moral permissiveness and a United Nations-first internationalism. The results have been devastating.”
        So, what do the results from Canada say for America’s political future? Nothing hard and fast, they just remind us that there is a cyclical aspect to political fortune. The Republican Party is now at its lowest point since the years just after Watergate. The GOP was blown out in the 1974 midterms and lost the presidency in 1976 — and then, under Ronald Reagan, won an electoral landslide in 1980 and a dominating bloc that finally crumbled on Nov. 4, more than a generation later.
        America is much more diverse than it was in 1980 and Republicans face an uphill climb in winning votes from racial and ethnic minorities and nontraditional families, groups that don’t traditionally vote Republican. Barack Obama may well have altered America’s political landscape for at least a generation.
    Or Obama-mania may fade in a single term.  Who knows? Conservatism in this country is not dead. If Canada and France can see a resurgence, there is no reason to believe the U.S. won’t. I started out here graciously but I end defiantly: I do not believe that most Americans want government-mandated healthcare and higher taxes on businesses. I believe that most Americans’ values are more in sync with those of Joe the Plumber than of Barack Obama. I believe that Americans are still deeply concerned about illegal immigration and national security, two issues that received scant attention in the general election. I do not believe that liberalism, on an issue-by-issue basis, won in 2008. Americans, justifiably upset and betrayed by their leaders, voted for change, which is neither a philosophy nor an ideology.
        Note to the Democrats: with leadership comes responsibility. The possibilities of economic catastrophe, a nuclear Iran, a resurgent Russia and the continued threat of radical Islam require more than bumper sticker-isms promising hope. They may require unpopular decisions. And remember, every president ran promising something new or in contrast to the previous administration. Indeed, today’s change is tomorrow’s status quo.

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        The recent brouhaha over a leak on the city council has gotten many on the council up in arms. It has also put the spotlight on open meetings and what business is and is not subject to our state’s open meetings laws.
        As a young reporter, I had a crash course in the state’s open meetings laws. The local community college was involved in an internal squabble. Some members of the board of trustees wanted to fire the college’s president. {mosimage}
        Others wanted to keep him. They tried to do most of their bickering behind closed doors — even though most of the time what they wanted to talk about did not fall into the realm of a closed meeting.
        So, it was with a copy of the state’s open meetings law clutched firmly in my hand that I stood the board down one day. It’s the kind of right versus wrong moment that young reporters dream about. I had right on my side, and I was not going to stand for any business going on behind closed doors. The board was, as you can imagine, rather surprised that a 22-year-old reporter would call them on the carpet. They railed against it. But I was right. Later, when everything came down, the very folks who were ready to blow a gasket when I questioned their practices, wanted to use the law to bring discussions on the president’s annual review out into the open. They were wrong.
        The state’s sunshine laws were not written to give boards an excuse to conduct business outside the sight of the public. Nor were they written to give board members an out when things don’t go their way. What is covered by the open meeting laws should be respected — personnel matters, real estate transactions, economic development, etc. If it is covered by the open meetings law as something that should be discussed in a closed session, then no one on the council has the right to discuss the gist of that meeting outside the confines of that closed session. All the law requires is that if an action is taken, then it is reported by the board.
        That doesn’t mean that every statement made within the closed session is discussed or shared with the local media.
        It may seem odd that I am writing this, but Fayetteville has a problem. We have too many leaders who want headlines and not enough who want to do what is right. Transact the business of this city, make good decisions and you won’t have to seek headlines. You’ll get them because people see you as someone who knows what they are doing; as someone who is truly serving this city. If you have to seek the spotlight, it’s because you’ve got the newspaper on your speed dial and have already written your next headline.

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        {mosimage}Sitting down to chat with Pete Skenteris was like listening to a favorite uncle or catching up with an old friend. He is the owner of the Haymont Grill, and a spaghetti dinner fundraiser volunteer with a fabulous way of bringing the flavor of Fayetteville’s past to life. He remembers the first spaghetti dinner like it was yesterday.  
        “We started 50 years ago with the late Pete Parrous. In those days we only had 30 or 35 families (in the Greek Orthodox Church congregation) and when we built the fellowship hall we didn’t have any money coming in. So anyways, Mr. Parrous came out and said he wanted to do something to help us raise money. So that is where we came up with the idea to make spaghetti — it was the cheapest thing we could do to make money. We started to make spaghetti and we’ve  gone all these years; we built the fellowship hall, we made the church, we built the education center. Of course a lot of this goes to charity too.” And yes, Skenteris noted, they still use the same recipe.
        Fayetteville, prepare your tastebuds.  On Wed. Nov. 19, from 10 a.m. - 8 p.m.  the Hellenic Center is hosting it’s 50th Annual Spaghetti Dinner. Each meal costs $6 and includes spaghetti with meat sauce and a hard roll and cheese, so each one is a complete meal. “We do not only the spaghetti, but also the pastries. It is not just the worlds largest spaghetti sale but the worlds largest spaghetti and greek pastry sale;  lets correct that one” Skenteris laughed.  Pastry sales can add as much as $7000-$9000 dollars to the fundraiser. “It still goes to the church though, it goes to the Philoptochos Society — that stands for friends of the poor” he added.
        In the past, the funds have benefitted  organizations like the American Red Cross and the Salvation Army. Some pastries to look forward to this year include Baklava, Finikia, Kaitaifi, Kourambiedes and Koularakia as well as home made breads and cakes. “They make thousands of pastries” Skenteris noted. This year there will be 60 pans of baklava prepared with each pan yielding 85 baklava pastries. No matter how you slice it, that is a lot of baklava. “These ladies been working hard making homemade breads, homemade cakes... they put in more time than the men” said Skenteris.
        Don’t be shy, there is always plenty to go around. In past years the church has served as many as 13,000 meals to the community in 10 hours. Preparation starts several days in advance. “Everybody pitches in, but when it comes to selling the spaghetti...Sunday through Wednesday night all of our volunteers are helping.” Each year, the cooks prepare 4,000 pounds of dried pasta, 1,000 gallons of sauce, 1,300 pounds of high-grade hamburger meat, 1,500 pounds of fresh onion, 400 pounds of grated Romano cheese and 13,000 rolls for the citizens of Fayetteville. The event is such a tradition that attempts to table the fundraiser have always been discarded — and quickly. “The spaghetti dinner, everybody enjoys......everybody likes it. We were going to stop it many times but we get at least 10-15 phone calls a week at the church ‘When you gonna have the spaghetti dinner?’”  said Skenteris. “In the meantime we were able to raise funds to do what we wanted to do and like I said we donate to charities” he added. 
        Come on out to the Hellenic Center at 614 Oakridge Ave. or call the church for more info at 484-8925. Tickets can be purchased at the door.

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        There is nothing more priceless than the look on a child’s face on Christmas morning; however, some children wake up on this much anticipated day only to receive nothing.  Methodist University and Samaritan’s Purse are making a concerted effort to make sure that every child around the globe receives a shoe box filled with goodies in order to have a wonderful Christmas.
        {mosimage}“We have had the wonderful opportunity to be a part of this event for several years,” said Michael Safley, vice president for university relations and campus ministry. “We are the regional collection site for Operation Christmas Child.”
        National Collection week is Monday, Nov. 17 through Monday, Nov. 24 from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. Gift-filled shoe boxes can be dropped off in front of Reeves Auditorium on the campus of Methodist University. Tractor trailers will be on site to receive the shoe boxes. The boxes will be transported to the distribution site in Charlotte to be shipped all over the world. 
        The directions for packing the shoe box are fairly straightforward. First you have to decide whether the gift will be for a boy or a girl. The label can be downloaded and printed by visiting the Web site www.samaritanspurse.com. Next, select the age group of the child which includes: 2-4-years-old, 5-9-years-old or 10-14-years-old. The box should be filled with gifts that will bring joy to the child of that particular age group. Some gift ideas are school supplies, toy cars, hygiene items, dolls, stuffed animals, hard candy, lollipops, yo-yo’s, T-shirts, socks, coloring books, educational toys, crayons and other items. Do not pack toy guns, knives, chocolate, food, liquids, lotions, perishable or breakable items. Donate $7 to help cover shipping overseas and other project costs. Place a rubber band around the shoe box before dropping it off to the collection site at Methodist University.  {mosimage}
        Since 1993, more than 61 million shoe boxes have been packed with gifts for children and shipped around the globe. Last year 7.6 million shoe boxes were collected and more than 100,000 volunteers helped inspect and prepare boxes for shipment. Samaritan’s Purse is an international Christian relief and evangelism organization that provides spiritual and physical aid to victims of war, poverty, disease and natural disaster. 
    “We expect to collect thousands of shoe boxes this year,” said Safley. “It feels good knowing that children will have something to open for the Christmas holidays.”
        For more information call 630-7043 or visit www.samaritanspurse.com.  

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        Artists, particularly painters, don’t have to be verbose to explain the meaning of their work. Some artists rather not explain their work, instead preferring to let the viewer interpret all meaning without any influence from the artist.
        No so with the painter Dr. Mohamed Osman. He loves to talk extensively about his paintings. And he is very clear about the purpose of his work. For Osman, a clear vision is the underpinning of content; relaying the message or the emotion he is trying to convey. It’s a positive that Osman likes to explain his work. His style and subject warrant questions as to their meaning.
        Being a physician by profession, Osman infuses work experience into the meaning of his paintings. Titles like Obesity, Touch Healing and AIDS in Africa are examples of what the exhibit titled Art and Medicineis about. The exhibit is on display at the Rosenthal Gallery on the campus of Fayetteville State University.
         Bright in color and expressionist in style, Osman is very clear on what he is trying to capture on canvas for this exhibit — all types of diseases, acts that cause pain and death.
        The painting titled Opisthotonus is an example of Osman’s use of a limited palette of primary and secondary colors. The figure in the painting is on her back, yet her back is arched due to severe spasms of the muscle along the spinal column, clouds of color push against the top edge of the body.
        In reference to Opisthotonus, Osman carefully explains on his Web site the meaning of the painting. “Such posture is linked to tetanus and can predict imminent death. Tetanus occurs almost exclusively in people who are unvaccinated or inadequately immunized,” said Osman.{mosimage}
        Osman’s empathy for the unsuspecting and his slant on the political come into play in his text about the painting: “There have been numerous accounts of tetanus as a result of female genital cutting. Such occurrences were linked to the use of non sterile, contaminated instruments. Are parents of female genital cutting of their loved ones aware of such a complication like tetanus? Are they conscientious about the fatality of such a complication? It has to stop.”
        In another painting titled Female Genital Mutilation, Osman talks about the history of such an act and its psychosocial, psychosexual and physical impact on the female. “Instruments used for this painful procedure may vary to include knives, scissors, razor blades or the sharp edge of broken glass. Once the cutting is complete the genital area is cleaned with water and stitched up, legs are bound for nearly 45 days.”
        Clearly Osman’s artist’s statement reflects what his work is about. “Art is a strong feeling that communicates with us. Art conveys energy. We are surrounded by this invisible energy. My unconscious part of me strives to capture this energy and to transcribe it into fine art images. I am inspired by what I see, feel, touch, dream and remember.”
    In addition I would say that Osman feels a strong purpose to educate and illuminate the public through his paintings. Although the text about many painting is straight forward in content, he can also become poetic in his explanations. A good example of this is his writing on the painting titled Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. 
        His poetry about the above painting starts like this: “I feel overwhelmed. I feel preoccupied with intruding thoughts. I feel I am unable to control the flow of my thoughts. I feel unable to control self. . . .”
        Osman’s personal history is as interesting as his paintings. Born in Somalia and educated in Kalinin, Russia, Osman is presently the physician in charge at the Primary Care Center in St. Pauls, N.C. He speaks five languages: English, Italian, Russian, Somalia and Spanish.
        A self taught artist, he grew up in the midst of a turquoise-blue Indian Ocean and the orange dunes of Merka, Somalia. His father owned a tailor shop and Osman worked daily with bolts of fabric in all colors. Perhaps these are the colors reflected in his paintings. After his training as a physician, he went back to Africa. He later immigrated to Canada as a refugee in the 1990s. He eventually became a resident physician in Toledo, Ohio. During the late years of his training he started painting.
        His work is included in many medical journals and local newspapers. Exhibitions include, but are not limited to, the Emerging Artist Exhibition at Ohio University, the African American Museum of Art and Pratt Art Gallery, both in Tacoma, Washington, and the Sundiata Arts Festival in Seattle, Washington. Locally, Osman has exhibited at the Architect’s Gallery,the Arts Council of Fayetteville-Cumberland County and the Fayetteville Museum of Art.
        To see Art and Medicinevisitors will need to come over to Rosenthal Gallery before the Thanksgiving holidays. Visitors will see 24 paintings by Osman which include subjects from diabetes to cancer. Through his paintings and in his text and in poetry, Osman examines that which causes bodily and psychic harm.
        In Osman’s own words he writes, “What I create is far from being named primitive art. It communicates with the psychosocial, ego, spiritual and aesthetic sense of your being.”
        You can view the works online at www.osmanart.net or visit the Rosenthal Gallery between the hours of 9 a.m. – 4 p.m., Monday through Friday. For more information on the gallery, contact Shane Booth at 910-309-0309.

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        My boyfriend’s from a socially prominent family, complete with a long line of sycophants and hangers-on. I apparently passed the initial vetting process, but a year later, I still feel like I’m auditioning. He sometimes doesn’t invite me to events where everyone brings a spouse or a date. I feel like he and others don’t think I’m “fabulous” enough. He said his not including me is related to issues he has with letting go and trusting, and mentioned an ex who attended events with him, then let him know she was doing him a favor. I’m trying to be patient and gradual, stop analyzing, and just enjoy our time together. How else can I cope and make this work?
                                —The Girlfriend

        Perhaps you could do more to let these blue bloods know how much you and they have in common. Maybe mention how you learned the ABCs of diplomacy from your father’s work at the Embassy (Suites Hotel, where he’s the night manager). Share how you felt the day you discovered that you, too, are an heiress, as your father waved his hand over the family holdings, proclaiming, “Someday, this will all be yours.” Unfortunately, he wasn’t gesturing at the homes, the cars, the yachts, but at the boxes of crap piled up in the basement.
        If that campaign doesn’t get you in, you might take a lesson from the society stiffs — those who made their money the old-fashioned way, by inheriting it from their robber baron ancestors — and stop trying so hard. You’ve already asked, watched, waited, avoided analysis; you’ve pretty much done everything short of enrolling in suck-up lessons at the community college. Yet, a year later, your boyfriend’s still trotting off solo to society events, leaving you to wait home on the foyer rug like the family dog. (Some girls get into the society pages, some just go on them.)
        Your real problem is your failure to be difficult. I’m not suggesting you start flying around your relationship on a broom, but that you become somebody who couldn’t fathom trying to “cope” with a guy who balks at presenting her to Mummy, Daddy and the drunk trust-fund uncles. Tell your boyfriend “I don’t date guys who don’t feel they can bring me around.” And be willing to walk away. Don’t just get behind the idea of that; be a girl who needs her dignity more than she needs a boyfriend. This should eliminate the need for icky conversations about how you’d like to be treated. Instead, you’ll communicate it from the start, from within: Oh, what’s that? They don’t want my sort around? Well, who wants them? My family got an engraved invitation to be here, right on the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, your poor; your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...” Nowhere does it say “Give me your stuck-up snots, your country club masses in scary-ugly golf pants yearning to get everything for free...”

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           Legendary banjo player Eddie Adcock, age 70 and suffering hand tremors that failed to respond to medication, volunteered for a revolutionary neurosurgery in August in which he finger-picked tunes while his brain was exposed, and Vanderbilt University Medical Center surgeons tried to locate the defective area. In “deep brain stimulation,” doctors find a poorly responding site and use electrodes to arouse it properly. As Adcock, conscious but pain-free, picked out melodies, doctors probed until suddenly Adcock’s playing became disjointed, and electrodes were assigned to that spot. By October, according to an ABC News report, Adcock, with a button-activated chest pacemaker wired to his head, was back on stage, as quick-fingered as ever. 

    Fat is Good
        Clair Robinson, 23, told an interviewer in September that she believes the only reason she survived the deadly flesh-eating infection recently was because she had too much weight for the bacteria to consume. “Being big saved my life,” she told Australia’s Medical Emergency TV show.

    Fat is Good, Part II
        Though Mayra Rosales, 27, stands charged with capital murder in Hidalgo County, Texas, she was not ordered to jail pending trial but was allowed home detention because of her obesity. At about 1,000 pounds, Rosales requires special transportation and facilities and was ruled by a judge in August certainly to be no “flight risk.”

    The Litigious Society
        Murderers in the Money: Reggie Townsend, 29, serving 23 years in a Wisconsin prison for reckless homicide against an 11-year-old girl, won $295,000 from a jury in September as compensation for a two-month confinement with only a “wet, moldy and foul smelling” mattress to sleep on (about $4,900 per unpleasant night). 

    When it Rains...
        Neighbors in the previously quiet New York City neighborhood of Nolita complain about the raucous, late-night trance music and crowds at the recently opened Delicatessen, according to an August New York Post story, but with little success. However, 10 of the apartments next door happen to look directly down upon the club’s architectural signature, a see-through ceiling, and at least one resident has taken to relieving himself out his window, splattering the roof. (Another of the residents, though, said that when the man misfires, it ruins his air-conditioning unit.)

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        A few years ago, Bob and Elnora Hollingsworth, along with Tommy and Becky Lewis, had an awesome idea. They wanted to do something special for the kids in Robeson and the surrounding counties: a toy run.         
        On Saturday, Nov. 8 and 9, the Annual Red Springs Toy Run will take place at the Red Springs Fire Department.
        “This event started with 75 bikers and last year we had 502 bikers,” said Hollingsworth. “Everybody in town gets involved.”
    Hollingsworth added that each year the event has gotten bigger and has become one of Red Springs’ favorite events.   
        {mosimage}The bike run begins at 11 a.m. in Red Springs and is led by the police department through each county. The bikers ride from Red Springs to Pembroke, then up Hwy. 74 to Laurinburg. In Laurinburg there is a stop at Golden Corral to take a break. From there the route continues to Raeford with the final stop in Red Springs.
        “We have a chase pick-up truck with a trailer that follows behind us on the route,” said Hollingsworth. “This is in case one of the bikers breaks down or runs out of gas.”
        The bikers are escorted back into town and fed along with their guests. Door prizes are distributed and a 50/50 raffle is held.  
        There are organizations that donate the food for the event and toys for the children.
        Mountaire Farms donated bicycles for the children and Boles Funeral Home donated tricycles and wagons. 
        Proceeds are used to purchase toys for the kids. The toys are given to the police departments or sheriff’s department in Red Springs, Lumberton, Laurinburg, Pembroke, Raeford, as well as the Department of Social Services in Lumberton. The community delivers the toys to the children. A cash donation is given to the kids at the Waccamaw Children’s Home to purchase school items.  
        “The Red Springs Rotary Club is very integral in the toy run,” said Hollingsworth. “They help us and in exchange we help them raise funds for the Waccamaw Children’s Home.” 
        Every year a mother asks Hollingsworth for his assistance in getting her child something for Christmas. He does not mind helping and wants kids to have a great holiday season.
        “We can’t solve the problems of the world,” said Hollingsworth. “But we can make sure that a kid gets something for Christmas.”
        Registration is from 9-11 a.m. For more information call 843-6131.

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       Pride and Glory (Rated R) 2 Stars�

        About three-quarters of the way through Pride and Glory (130 minutes) one of the characters heads off-screen, mumbling “I’ve had enough.” At this point in the movie, pretty much everyone should be able to clap in agreement. Did the world really need yet another police procedural focusing on corruption in the NYPD? Especially one so utterly boring and poorly acted? There was not one person in the movie correctly cast, there is no audience connection with the characters and the writing is boring and predictable.
        {mosimage}We open on men playing football while their families cheer them on. Get used to it, because for the next two hours men are pretty much just shoving each around while women sit in the background with nothing to do but provide emotional support for the men while they argue with each other. The game is interrupted, and the film moves to a bloody scene, the aftermath of an ambush in which four officers were killed. The chief of police, Francis Tierney Sr. (Jon Voight) asks his son, Detective Ray (a miscast Edward Norton), to lead an investigation into the murders. Meanwhile, Ray’s brother Francis Jr. (Truman’s best friend Noah Emmerich) and brother-in-law Jimmy Egan (Colin Farrell) trigger his supercop radar by looking at each other shiftily, and generally telegraphing their guilt to everyone in sight. 
        The film certainly recalls police corruption in the 1970s, but there is nothing new here. Director/screenwriter Gavin O’Connor can’t even write decent dialogue. This is a movie by, for and about men. It wasn’t the most terrible police movie ever, but neither is there anything to really talk about, so let’s play improve the movie. 
        Idea one: Make Francis Tierney Jr. a woman with a sick husband instead of a man with a sick wife. It would be so much more interesting to add another layer to a clichéd character by making this a movie about the pressure on women to conform to masculine ideals while caring for a sick husband who is challenged by his inability to conform to masculine ideals. It would just make more sense if there was a legitimate reason for a detective to turn a blind eye to the kind of extreme corruption (Pride and Glory is a little short on character motivation) shown in the film. 
        Idea two: Replace Jon Voight. His strangely waxed and stiffened complexion was distracting as anything, and he can’t seem to meet anyone’s eye. In every scene, rather than talking to the character he is with; he seems to stare directly at the floor. Did he even know he was making a movie?
        Idea three: Create female characters who aren’t poorly written, badly acted wallpaper. Aren’t there any corrupt female police officers? Aren’t there any capable female politicians? This is the one of the most sexist movies I’ve recently viewed. All the women stay home; safe behind four walls…the men wander the streets and then come home to their women, whom they ignore. At one point, and I swear my mouth dropped open, Tierney Sr. orders his wife to leave the conversation and go to her room — and SHE DOES. Of course, when the character is first introduced she seems more like his daughter than his wife, since he is approximately 90 years old and she can’t have celebrated her 50th birthday yet. So, wrapping up — don’t bother. Two minutes after the credits roll, you’ll have forgotten what you just watched.

  • Details
        The name itself may confuse you. I mean Worth Dying For — what do you consider worth dying for? For a group of musicians from California, their belief in God and their passionate desire to worship him falls into that category.
        Formed in Modesto, Calif., the band began performing at Calvary Temple’s weekly youth event, “The Stadium.” The group sees its calling to awaken today’s youth from a state of lethargy and despair that seem pandemic. The band sees its work as more of a mission than music, but they tend to let their music talk for itself.
        {mosimage}Released this spring, Worth Dying For’s self-titled debut marks the national launch of a movement destined to impact youth culture in a whole new way. Featuring 15 pop/rock anthems and impassioned ballads, the debut CD draws heavily on themes that define the band’s mission: infiltrate, destroy [the darkness] and rebuild today’s youth culture.
        “Jesus Christ and music are the two things that consume the thoughts and lives of this band,” said Sean Loche, one of two lead vocalists in Worth Dying For. “Combine the two, and you get what we love to do: worship. We are ordinary people who have a desire to show others how to fall in love with God in a deeper, more passionate way. The music that God has used us to write has changed our youth ministry and our city. Now, God has put it on our hearts to let these songs resonate in the hearts of the young people across this nation.”
        Josh O’Haire, the band’s 20-year-old drummer adds: “Everything we’re doing from the ministry to the music, we want it to make an impact on this generation. We see so many young kids each week … so much that they go through. Broken homes, depression, suicide. In mentoring them, I’ve seen how they feel like they’re not a part of something… Our goal is to give them hope and something to be a part of, something real.”
        “Our dream is to see lives changed,” Loche continues, “to ignite and empower them to go out and do big things… It’s not just about us playing songs, but helping them connect, letting a revolution begin with them.”
    Many of WDF’s songs are born in personal times of worship, time alone spent with God in prayer and study.
        “The biggest place we’re seeing growth as a band is lyrically,” Micah says.  “As we keep growing in God, he begins to give us even deeper, more mature songs. ‘At Your Cross’ is a great example. I’d been praying for a song to take us past the level we were used to, a song that would tap into a deeper presence.” He says the song spontaneously came to him at a youth camp during a worship service. Not forced or planned, but a natural result of being ‘at worship.’ 
        In these and all their songs, the band says, that their mission is front and center.
        “Our message is: The revolution is you… one person standing up for Christ,” Loche continues. “We have a different sense of Christianity than some do. We talk about duty, the forces of darkness and spiritual warfare, and we try to empower our kids, not to sit back but to engage, to stand up and realize that when they do that, they are empowered by the king of kings to fight the darkness. With Jesus on their side, nothing can stand against them…”
        Worth Dying For will lead the worship during the Creation Festival: The Tour, a two-month, 30+ city tour that features some of Christian music’s top acts. 
        Nick Kulb, Executive Producer, Creation Festival: The Tourstates, “We are very excited to have Worth Dying For on Creation Festival: The Tour with us this fall. We had a blast getting to know them at the festivals this summer and we’re looking forward to not only an amazing worship time each evening, but also a lot of fun off-stage as well.”
        Worth Dying For will be joined by Kutless, Thousand Foot Krutch, Pillar, KJ-52, Fireflight, Run Kid Run, Esterlyn, Capital Lights and guest speaker Bob Lenz at the Crown Coliseum on Thursday, Nov. 6 at 6 p.m.     Tickets range in rice from $25 to $38 and may be purchased at the Crown Box Office or all Ticketmaster outlets. For more information, visit creationfesttour.com.

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        Dear EarthTalk: I saw a cover line on a magazine that said, “The next world war will be over water.” Tell me we’re not really running out of water! 
                                        — Nell Fox, Seattle, Wash.

        Today fully one-sixth of the world’s human population lacks access to clean drinking water, and more than 2 million people — mostly kids — die each year from water-borne diseases. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), an independent organization that provides economic, development and humanitarian assistance around the world in support of the foreign policy goals of the United States, predicts that by 2025, one-third of all humans will face severe and chronic water shortages.
        Needless to say, water is of primary importance to our survival, and protecting access to and the quality of fresh water supplies will likely become more and more of a challenge in the coming years. According to the nonprofit World Water Council, the 20th century saw a tripling of the world’s population while freshwater use grew by a factor of six. With world population expected to increase as much as 50 percent over the next half century, analysts are indeed worried that increasing demand for water, coupled with industrialization and urbanization, will have serious consequences both for human health and the environment. Access to freshwater is also likely to cause conflicts between governments as well as within national borders around the world.
        {mosimage}According to USAID, the world’s “water crisis” is not so much an issue of scarcity as it is of poor management and inequitable distribution. The hardest hit regions have been countries in the Middle East, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa. Worldwide demand for water is presently doubling every 21 years.
        Water-related problems are not the sole purview of the developing world though. We here in North America have polluted and diverted our fresh water supplies far beyond nature’s capacity to restore the flows, notably in the West where sprawling, thirsty metropolises have grown up in deserts where the only way water can be provided is to siphon it from other regions.
        So how do we fix the world’s water woes? The key lies in using water more efficiently — especially in agriculture and industry, which together account for over 90 percent of the world’s total freshwater use. But changing the practices of millions of farmers and businesses around the world is a Herculean task.
        Irena Salina, director of the award-winning documentary film, FLOW, about the world’s dwindling water supplies, thinks it can be done if world leaders, international banks, the United Nations and other governmental organizations establish cooperative agreements for the use of bodies of water, including groundwater, and economic mechanisms to make sure those who need access to water can get it.
        As for the developed world — where we use 10 times the water as do developing countries — Salina remains pessimistic. “If our own leaders were serious about solving problems, we would not allow corporations to discharge pollutants into our water sources,” she says. “Instead of spending billions on technologies that clean up pollution, we would be using resources to prevent water pollution in the first place.
        CONTACTS: Ocean Conservancy, www.oceanconservancy.org; Natural History Magazine, www.naturalhistorymag.com.
        GOT AN ENVIRONMENTAL QUESTION? Send it to: EarthTalk, c/o E/The Environmental Magazine, P.O. Box 5098, Westport, CT 06881; submit it at:  www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/thisweek/, or e-mail: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Read past columns at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/archives.php.

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        The first gold record ever released by Atlantic Records was Percy Sledge’s No. 1 song “When a Man Loves a Woman.” Sledge wrote the song after his girlfriend left him for a modeling career after he was laid off from a construction job late in 1965. Was Percy Sledge giving marital counseling? Probably not on purpose, but he is on the road to a successful marriage.{mosimage}
        The Apostle Paul gave some similar advice in the New Testament book of Ephesians to husbands and wives. He says, “Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.” (Ephesians 5:33, NASB).
        First, Paul tells husbands to love their own wives. We all recognize that men and women are different. And that includes how husbands and wives give and receive “love.” Wives need to not only be told their husband loves them; they need to see it, to feel it, to sense it. Paul looks at the men of his day and says, “Guys, love your wives.” He then goes on to add “even as himself.” Love them the same way you want to be loved…fully, forgiving, forever.
        Paul then gives some marital advice to the wives of the day, “and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.” Again, men and women are different. Women want to hear and sense that they are loved by the husbands. But men are different. Men, though all tough-guy on the outside, really want just one thing. They want to feel like the hero of their home. They want to be respected…and that is exactly what Paul is saying in this verse.
        Percy Sledge got it right when he said “When a man loves a woman, can’t keep his mind on nothing else; He’ll trade the world for the good thing he’s found.” Husbands, love your wives. Wives, respect your husbands. Both, make Christ the center of that forever relationship.

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        The state treasurer’s race is the most important political contest in North Carolina that isn’t making the daily headlines.
        Current Treasurer Richard Moore did make headlines recently when he discussed the 12 percent drop over the past year in the assets of the pension fund for teachers and state employees. This is neither a surprising performance nor a sub-par one, due to the fund’s relatively conservative asset allocation.
        Still, Moore’s announcement underlines the critical connections among the expectations of state employees, the interests of state taxpayers, and the prospects for economic growth far away from the Tar Heel State.{mosimage}
        Democrat Janet Cowell and Republican Bill Daughtridge are trying to replace Moore as North Carolina’s chief investment officer.
        Cowell and Daughtridge both have relevant experience. Cowell is a liberal state senator (she scored 21 percent on Civitas’ new Conservative Effectiveness Ratings) who previously served on the Raleigh city council. She previously worked as a securities analyst in Asia and consulted with a venture-capital fund in Durham. Daughtridge, a moderately conservative state representative (he scored 67 percent on the CER), worked as a financial analyst in Texas before taking over the operation of Daughtridge Group, a family gas and retail concern in Rocky Mount. Both have MBAs and years of legislative experience.
        The candidates’ personal backgrounds and legislative records are worthy of consideration on their own terms. More important, it seems to me, is trying to assess whether their backgrounds and voting records telegraph how they would respond to the kinds of challenges that the state treasurer will almost certainly face in the coming years. For example:
        The new governor and general assembly will likely face a budget deficit next year of between $1 billion and $2 billion.
        There continues to be talk in Raleigh political circles of proposed bond issues for transportation, land preservation, water and sewer and school construction that would add many billion of dollars to the state’s bonded debt. But state debt per North Carolinian has nearly tripled in just the past decade, and is already close to the limit that Moore believes is affordable. Will the new state treasurer oppose massive new state borrowing?
        There’s been a troubling increase in the share of state debt issued without a vote of the people, as the state constitution requires. Will the new state treasurer cry foul?
        While the pension fund has endured some losses, a far more yawning gap exists between the state’s assets and its liability to finance supplemental health benefits for retired state employees. When I say yawning, I mean an unfunded liability in the tens of billions of dollars. Will the new state treasurer demand legislative action on the issue?
        Periodically, lawmakers and others propose that the state directly invest a portion of its pension funds in North Carolina companies. Although touted as a way to boost job creation in the state, such policies are inevitably at odds with the interests of state employees and taxpayers. Political constraints on investment choices necessarily reduce expected returns, which increases the risk the taxpayers will have to pay more to finance promised retirement benefits. Will the new state treasurer always say no to such “economic development” schemes?
        These are the questions that North Carolina voters ought to be thinking about as they choose between Cowell and Daughtridge. But given the far-larger media attention paid to high-profile races for president, U.S. Senate, and governor, I wonder if the electorate is thinking about the state treasurer’s race at all.
        Voters should be. A lot.

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        What about the other races?{mosimage}
        Few people, other than political insiders, are asking this question when they talk about the possible results of the upcoming elections in North Carolina.
        All this is understandable given the excitement surrounding the races at the top of the ballot — the close governor’s and U.S. Senate races and, for the first time in recent memory, a real contest in the battle for North Carolina’s 15 key presidential electoral votes.
        North Carolinians are experiencing continuous courtship from John McCain, Barack Obama, Sarah Palin, and Joe Biden. When we are “in play” in the critical contest for the Presidency, it is harder to concentrate on other races.
        Perhaps the well-funded gubernatorial campaigns of Bev Perdue and Pat McCrory may be getting through to us, as maybe also are the U.S. Senate candidates Elizabeth Dole and Kay Hagan.
        But mostly we are thinking presidential, overlooking important council of state, congressional, state legislative, judicial and local races. It is like the Fourth of July when it is hard to watch the sparklers in your own backyard, when there is a massive fireworks show over at the football stadium.
        So it is possible, even likely, that the days after the election are going to disclose some surprising election results that could have a profound impact on political life and government in North Carolina?
        A few days ago I talked to John Davis, one of North Carolina’s most respected political observers.
    Davis pays attention to the polls and to the relative strengths of the competing political parties the same as other consultants. But he puts extra weight on other considerations. He factors in the rapidly changing electorate. For instance, although many new North Carolinians who have moved here from the Northeast may be registered Republicans, they tend to be more independent and less conservative than North Carolina Republicans. They are more likely to be ticket splitters.
        This year, he says, the new youthful voters may have been registered as a result of the efforts of the Obama campaign, but they should not be expected to vote a straight Democratic ticket. Many of them will be voting for youth and for change, rather than for a particular party label.
        These factors, says Davis, make an Obama win in North Carolina a real possibility — even a likely outcome. These considerations work against the incumbent Senator Dole in her contest with Kay Hagan, who Davis thinks will win.
        On the other hand, these same factors operate in the governor’s race to work in favor of Pat McCrory, the likely winner in Davis’s view.
        Most surprising to me is Davis’s prediction that the upcoming election will bring about a change in control of the North Carolina Senate, in which Democrats currently have a commanding 29 to 21 seat edge.
        He identifies several senate seats currently held by Democrats that are likely, for various reasons, to be won by Republicans this year — enough, he says, to give Republicans a majority for the first time in modern history.   
        Marc Basnight, the Democrats’ current senate leader, has gained enormous influence, which he has used to insure generous legislative support for environmental programs and for the University of North Carolina. New leadership would mean new priorities — and big changes in the support level for these and many other programs.
        If Davis proves correct in his predictions, there will be a lot more to talk about after the election than just who won the presidential race.

  • Details
        {mosimage}America loves the misadventures that frequently beset normal people in their daily lives. Even more engaging is the over-the-top misadventures – think Lucy and Ethel – that happen in the lives of some people. That misadventure is the type of farce that leaves us in stitches. On Friday, Nov. 7, the Cape Fear Regional Theatre will bring a beloved farce to the stage as Lend Me a Tenoropens.
        Bo Thorp, the artistic director of the theatre, is excited about the opportunity to direct the show. “It is absolutely so funny,” said Thorp. “It is such a well-crafted play. Farces are very often cheap material, but that isn’t the case with this play. It’s a classic. It truly is.”
        The play written by Ken Ludwig, focuses on the arrival of a great tenor at the Cleveland Grand Opera. The organizers of the event are so excited about his arrival that they bend over backwards to ensure that all will go well – until a crisis happens.
        “The crisis is so improbable, which is the case with most farces,” explained Thorp. “The stage is surrounded by six doors and the trick is to try and get in one and get out the next without anyone seeing each other.”
        The story revolves around a gastrointestinal problem the tenor has. Upon his arrival, all he wants to do is take a nap, instead he argues with his wife, who leaves abruptly, further upsetting the tenor. Everyone wants to be helpful and tries to give him a little bit of something to make him feel better – a little more relaxed.     The problem is that everybody gives him a little something, which knocks him out. Then the madness ensues.
        “It’s a kind of sexy play,” continued Thorp. “a little naughty.”
        This isn’t the first time Tenor has been on stage at the CFRT. It first debuted 18 years ago. “We haven’t done a farce for quite some time,” continued Thorp. “This is the best one that I know. There are a number of Neil Simon farces that are quite good, but this is the best one out there, so I thought ‘Let’s do this one.’”
    Her affection and knowledge of the play allowed Thorp to cast it almost immediately, and with people who are well-known to the theatre’s audiences. “If I ever brag about myself about anything, I have to say it is that my casting is very good,” said Thorp. “That’s when I’m at my best.”
        She think she’s outdone herself on this cast. “This is an excellent cast. So it’s not only a well-crafted play, but the actors know how to use the material. All eight of the actors are capable of the comedy,” she said. “Comedy is a different thing than a drama or a musical. It’s dependent on people who are capable of humor.”
        The play runs through Nov. 23, with tickets ranging in price from $17 to $23. Tickets may be purchased by calling the Cape Fear Regional Theatre’s Box Office at 910-323-4233 or via the Web site at www.cfrt.org.

  • Details
        On Friday, Nov. 7, the Department of Fine Arts at Fayetteville Technical Community College will present Fiddler on the Roofat Cumberland Hall on the FTCC campus. The performance will be on stage following the annual FTCC Foundation dinner.{mosimage}
        The dinner will begin at 6 p.m. at the multipurpose room of the Tony Rand Student Center. Students from FTCC’s Culinary Technology program will provide the meal. Tickets to the dinner are $50 and can be purchased by callin 678-8441. Proceeds from the foundation dinner will be used to fund scholarships and mini-grants for students and faculty.
        An exhibition of landscapes by award-winning artist Benjamin Billingsley will run in conjunction with the production of Fiddler. Billingsley will lecture on his exhibit on Saturday. Nov. 15 at 5:30 p.m, in the gallery at FTCC.
        Other productions of Fiddler will be performed on Saturday, Nov. 8 at 7 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 9 at 2 p.m. Friday, Nov. 14 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, Nov. 16 at 2 p.m. Admission to the play is free and open to the public.

    Headquarters Library to Remain Closed to Public
        The Headquarters Library at 300 Maiden Lane will remain closed to the public for an undetermined time. Cumberland County Public Library & Information Center administration and staff are dealing with the aftermath of a fire in the library’s basement during the early morning hours of Oct. 25.
        Library Director Jody Risacher told staff Monday, Oct. 27, that the building will not open to the public until the fire alarm system is cleaned and operational; the heating and air conditioning ventilation system is cleaned, and the public areas on the first and second floors have been cleaned of soot. 
        “All exposed areas will be wiped down,” Risacher said.
        Two offices were gutted in the basement. All ceiling tiles in the library’s basement are being replaced. Administrative offices are being moved to other areas of the three-story building. Other departments being moved include Community Relations, Technical Services, Computer Services, Facilities and Mobile Outreach.
    Risacher is not able to predict when the library will be open to the public. In the meantime, the public is asked to return their books and other library materials to any of the system’s other six branches.
        All programs scheduled at the Headquarters Library have been canceled through the end of the year. With staff from the various departments taking over the Pate Room and the two conference rooms for work areas, the library will not be able to offer programming or conference and meeting room space even after the building opens to the public.
        However, the Friends of the Library Annual Author Event and Library Endowment Trust Benefit set for Nov. 10 at the Cape Fear Regional Theatre will go on as scheduled.

    Gibson Named Interim Director
        Michael Gibson has been selected as the interim Fayetteville-Cumberland Parks and Recreation director, effective Nov. 1.
        Gibson has been with the parks and recreation department for 20 years having served in a variety of positions, including athletic program coordinator, parks superintendent and most recently parks division manager.
        He has a B.S. degree in physical education from Fayetteville State University.
        Gibson was selected from a pool of three highly qualified internal candidates.
         “It is clear from the quality of the candidates, that retiring Parks and Recreation director Robert Barefoot made it a high priority to prepare his employees for advancement,” City Manager Dale Iman said. “I am confident that Mr. Gibson is ready and anxious to meet the challenges of this important position.”

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        {mosimage}Across the nation, the official kickoff of the Christmas shopping season is the day after Thanksgiving — or Black Friday.
        But leave it to Cumberland County to be ahead of the curve.
        For the 42nd consecutive year, the Holly Day Fair christens the holiday shopping season, bringing more than 180 vendors peddling arts, crafts and other unique gifts to the Crown Expo Center for four days of shopping bliss.
        The Holly Day Fair — the largest holiday gift and craft show in the South — begins Thursday, Nov. 6, and runs through Sunday, Nov. 9. It is sponsored by the Junior League of Fayetteville, with the money raised through the event donated to local worthy causes and organizations.
        Last year, the Holly Day Fair drew more than 20,000 attendees and raised more than $264,000.
        Leonna Byrd, Holly Day Fair organizer, says she expects this year’s fair to be the biggest yet, as well as offering the largest variety of shopping options.
        “With the economy the way it is, we decided to offer wider variety of vendors so there will be something for every budget,” said Byrd. “We’ve also signed up some vendors that we think will appeal more to males, such as a vendor offering every type of neck tie imaginable, as well as a vendor offering personalized golf markers.”
    Tickets for the event are $8, with the exception of opening day — Thursday — when tickets will be $12.     Thursday is “Super Shopper” day, which means fewer shoppers and limited tickets, though you are asked to leave your child strollers at home on this day. Thursday’s festivities get started at 9 a.m. and last until 8 p.m. (Super Shopper is 9 a.m. until noon).
        Tickets revert back to $8 on Friday, which kicks off at 10 a.m. and runs until 8 p.m.; Saturday, the action also runs from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.; on Sunday, the doors of the Charlie Rose Agri-Expo Center at the Crown open at noon, with the closing bell at 5 p.m. Children under 5 are admitted free.
        The Junior League of Fayetteville contributes more than 80,000 hours of service annually to local worthy causes, helping out such organizations as the Partnership for Children, CONTACT of Fayetteville, Inc., the Salvation Army and the Boys and Girls Clubs.
        In May, the Junior League raised money for premature babies during the March of Dime’s WalkAmerica.
    Through fundraisers such as the Holly Day Fair, the Junior League issued more than 20 grants of $100-$1,500 in 2007-2008 to such organizations as Cumberland County Schools, Rape Crisis, Fayetteville Urban Ministry and the La Leche League. In addition, 2007-2008 Partnership Grants of $1,500 to $50,000 and volunteer support were given to the Boys and Girls Club of Cumberland County, the Child Advocacy Center, the Care Clinic, Cumberland County Coordinating Council on Older Adults and the Pilot Club of Fayetteville.
        The Junior League of Fayetteville has more than 400 volunteers. Over the past 40 years it has provided more than $1.3 million and countless volunteer hours.
        However, despite its past good works, the ladies of the Junior League also want to have fun, which is a major part of the Holly Day Fair.
        “It’s just a great event that’s a lot of fun,” said Byrd. “And it’s really not Christmas around here for a lot of folks until they’ve been to the fair and listened to our Christmas music. This is the area’s biggest Christmas tradition.”    

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        {mosimage}Everyone has probably met someone that you immediately felt comfortable with. Anyone meeting Calvin Mims, the new art services coordinator at the Fayetteville- Cumberland County Arts Council, is more than likely going to feel immediately at ease. After meeting him you will readily understand the arts have a new advocate in Fayetteville.
        Mims moved to Fayetteville in 2006. I met him when he was working with the Art and Soul Gallery in the downtown area. Mims has a passion for art that is self evident to anyone who speaks to him about the subject.
        Coming to terms with the reality of the arts in Fayetteville, I have become acutely aware of the impact leaders in non-profit arts organizations have on the cultural community of Fayetteville and the surrounding counties. Deborah Martin Mintz, the Arts Council’s president, clearly understands how individuals have significant roles in art organizations and how their leadership can help foster an environment in which the arts can thrive in and contribute to the creation of more livable communities for all types of people, of all ages. Proof of her understanding and insight — she hired Mims.
        Mims is still somewhat new on the job. Visitors to the art center may be running into him at 4th Friday openings. His experiences and passion for the arts are sure to influence the 2009 line up of exhibitions.
    How Mims ended up in Fayetteville is an interesting story. His home is Detroit, Mich. I asked Mims what made him decide to retire in Fayetteville. He commented, “I visited friends in Fayetteville six years ago. When I got here I was impressed with the relatively low cost of housing as compared to Detroit and most of all I was impressed with the diversity in Fayetteville. It was refreshing to see so many different cultures coexisting with respect and harmony, so I decided to retire here.”
        He and his small family moved to Fayetteville to retire; yet he immediately became involved in the arts. I was interested to know how he got involved in the arts so quickly when it takes so many years for others.
    Mims smiled, “Once I settled in Fayetteville I was told about the Art’s Council’s 4th Fridays. I was impressed with the number of businesses that supported this event and showcased local artists. This is when I met C.J. Malson, the owner of Art and Soul Gallery. We started a conversation and I discovered she had a great vision for the art community and for her gallery. We talked about some of the changes she wanted to make and I wanted to help her achieve them, so I went to work for her.”
        Just two years living in Fayetteville, and Mims has done more in the arts than many people take years to accomplish. Mims, C.J. Malson and Dwight Smith brought a traveling exhibit to the Fayetteville Museum of Art titled Voices: Twenty-Three African American Artists. And he is just getting started!
        The passion Mims has for art advocacy can be explained by the way in which the arts changed his own life. “I became interested in the arts as a very young man. I found it comforting to spend time in the Grand Hall of the Detroit Institute of Art where I would sit and read in the quietude. Although I didn’t pursue it immediately, it was in the museum I learned that you could have a career in the arts. I left the automotive profession after 12 years and became the executive director for the Ellington-White Project for the Visual and Performing Arts.”
        He continued, “Art changed my life. I am aware of how I personally came to discover the arts. And when I did, it gave me something to relate to. I bring this experience to the job at the arts council in the same way it helped me to reach young people to come to the arts and have their lives changed in the Ellington-White Project Foundation.”
        Mims time at the arts council is just beginning. I asked him what he would like to see happen at the arts council. He said, “I would like to see more educational programs to help the general public understand contemporary art forms. I would also like to initiate an educational program in which people can have art works appraised and understand how to develop a collection. So many young artists come to the arts council looking for ways to develop or market their talent, a program that helps those young artists become a reputable artist in some way would be worthwhile. I see my role as fostering an environment in which the arts can survive.”
        “Right now the greatest challenge in the arts is maintaining the funding sources by private patrons and government. When times get difficult, often art can be seen as a fringe benefit. It important for a community to see art is part of commerce, it defines a community – ultimately it is the foot print for the future generations.”

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        Looking for a special Christmas gift but don’t want to get caught up in the holiday crush, yet still want the advantage of talking to a human face-to-face instead of doing the online thing?
        Then the Home-Based Business Holiday Shopping Expo is tailor-made for you.
        The expo, as the name implies, features representatives showing off products sold through home-based businesses. It will be held Saturday, Nov. 15, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Carolina Room of the Hampton Inn across from Cross Creek Mall.
        The event is in its first year and is the brainchild of Amber Wellman and Bria Cunnien, who dreamed up the idea after attending a similar expo.
        {mosimage}“We decided, ‘Hey, we could make this really big... We can really do this and make it a lot better and get more vendors,’” said Wellman.
        As of press time, 13 vendors had reserved booths at the expo, with more on the way, said Wellman. And even though she says women are generally the chief demographic for such expos, everyone is invited.
    “If a man needs to get his wife a Christmas present, we’re all right here,” said Wellman. “We’re all women and we can help out.”
        Among the vendors who will be offering plenty of gift options is Amy Stewart, a consultant for Longaberger, an Ohio-based company that’s been in business for 35 years which sells handcrafted baskets and other home and lifestyle products, including pottery, wrought iron, fabric accessories and specialty foods. The company has 45,000 independent home consultants located in all 50 states who sell Longaberger products directly to customers.
        “We (consultants) can’t sell on the Internet,” said Stewart, who’s been a Longaberger consultant for about two months. “The company wants to keep us very home-show specific and committed to our clients.
        “The great thing about our baskets is if you go to a big-name retailer and buy a basket and it breaks, you just pitch it out,” said Stewart. “Longaberger is going to fix it for you and you don’t have to worry about it.”
        Stewart says Longaberger has a variety of unique products in a various sizes, shapes and colors.
        Another vendor who will be offering a unique gift experience at the expo is Bridget Barreira, who represents Ribbon, The Gift of Choice. This endeavor offers a gift card that comes in the form of an album showcasing gifts the recipient can choose for himself. Gifts vary widely in price and type, with items representing such brand names as Fossil, Sony, Dooney & Bourke, Ghirardelli, J.A. Henckels and others.
    “You get a wide variety and you get to choose your own gift,” said Barreira. “You really get to receive the gift three times — when you receive the gift certificate, when you go online to order the gift, and when you actually receive the gift through the mail.”
        A vendor proffering a more service-based gift is Nubian Farley, owner of Fondue 4 U — a catering service that offers scrumptious fondues of every variety to groups as small as two people on up to “as many as my client can safely seat” said Farley.
        Farley said her mother first got the idea for the business back in the 1970s when the military family was stationed overseas. Farley said a friend from Belgium invited her mom over and it was the first time she’d ever seen a fondue.
        “She fell in love with it and decided she wanted to bring it back to the states with her as a business,” said Farley. “My folks did just that and I helped over the years. When they became ill I took it over and put my own twist on it.”
        Farley says there are “no limits” as to what kind of fondue she can set up.
        “I do vegetarian fondue... all poultry... it’s a very client-specific dinner,” said Farley. “I can conjure up pretty much anything that you would like.
        “Cheese fondue is included with the dinners and veggies for dipping and chocolate fondue for dessert,” said Farley. “I have done expos; I do demos -  I do it as a sit-down but also as a buffet. I have set up a demo for realtors to try and sell homes, office parties, etc. My biggest hurdle is trying to get folks to realize that I am not a restaurant, that I am a traveling fondue service and I come on location to wherever you’d like me to come.”
        And you don’t have to travel far to check out these vendors and others at the Home-Based Business Holiday Shopping Expo. Admission is free and there will be door prizes and a massage therapist on site doling out free massages.

  • Details
        Syndicated columnist Leonard Pitts Jr. is the featured speaker for the Friends of the Cumberland County Public Library & Information Center’s 9th Annual Author Event and Library Endowment Trust Benefit on Nov. 10 at the Cape Fear Regional Theatre, 1209 Hay St. Pitts writes a column that appears in newspapers across the country, including The Fayetteville Observer. His topic for the evening will be “Owning What You Know: The Decline of Reason in Politics & Public Discourse.”
        During his speech, scheduled just a few days after the presidential election, Pitts will discuss “the phenomenon we’re seeing played out in the political sphere right now where phony outrage …and intellectual dishonesty … substitute for any sort of substantive discussion of the issues before us,” Pitts said.
        “I believe part of the reason we as a nation are in the polarized state we’re in is that some seem to have decided that ideological purity is more important than making sense. And until we decide that country does, indeed, come before party, we’re going to keep going around in the same old tiresome circles.”
        When he won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for commentary, the awards committee commended Pitts for “his fresh, vibrant columns that spoke, with both passion and compassion, to ordinary people on often divisive issues.” His commentaries cover a wide range of topics, from pop culture and family life to social and political issues.
        {mosimage}Pitts began writing professionally in 1976 as an 18-year-old college student. He began doing freelance reviews and profiles for SOUL, a black entertainment tabloid, and two years later, he was its editor. In the years since then, his work has appeared in such publications as Musician, Spin, TV Guide, Reader’s Digest and Parenting.
        He joined The Miami Herald in 1991 as its pop music critic. Since 1994, he has written a syndicated column of commentary that is now read by millions of people. Pitts will sign copies of his book Becoming Dad: Black Men and the Journey to Fatherhood, first published in 1999. Books will be available for purchase at the event. Born and raised in Southern California, he lives in Maryland with his wife and five children.
        A benefit reception to meet Pitts before his presentation will be held at 6 p.m. in the Glass Block Room of the theatre. Tickets are $85 for one or $150 for two. Please call 483-7727 ext. 119 for reception tickets or more details. General admission tickets are $10 and may be purchased at City Center Gallery, 112 Hay Street. All proceeds benefit the Library Endowment Trust.
        This year’s sponsors for the author event are: SYSTEL®; The Fayetteville Observer; Carlos and Terri Union Zukowski; Kiwanis Club of Fayetteville; Jim and Shirley Konneker; Lynn and Karl Legatski; Matlack Sales and Marketing, Inc.; Joyce and Ole Sorensen; Sharon Valentine; and www.OldMountainPress.com.

  • Details
        Reinterpret the line at Fayetteville Museum of Art’s latest exhibit, Energy of a Line opening Nov. 7 and running through Jan. 11, 2009. The premiere party is Nov. 7 from 6 to 8 p.m., and is free to the public. Artists will comment on their large-scale works that through depth and layering bring to life linear dimensions. The exploration of the physical manifestations of a line provides insight to the structure and chaos of art. Whether implied or stated, artists Jason Craighead, Gerry Lynch and Seth Hicks will deconstruct the line.
        {mosimage}Craighead is a Raleigh-based artist whose work Metro Magazine described as “conjuring up ghosts of everyone from Motherwell to Franz Kline to Cy Twombly.” This exhibit will feature a collection of at least three 64 x76 inch works on canvas, and six 22 x 30 inch works on paper that Craighead states are “passionate and emotionally charged, an evolving exploration of line and space, from scribble to scrawl.” Craighead is grateful for the opportunity that Executive Director Tom Grubb and Curator Michele Horn have extended; Craighead also displayed work at the museum’s satellite at the offices of Up & Coming, Gallery 208. “I can’t think of another museum I’d rather show in first more than the Fayetteville Museum of Art — I’m appreciative of the museum giving me another opportunity as I move forward. This really feels like good, forward motion.”
        When asked about his continually evolving work, Craighead said his work was “the ultimate transitional moment for me. And I feel these pieces are representative of that transition. I’m beginning to have a more philosophical approach to my work…I’m detaching from ‘things’, finding space and creating rhythm, letting my work become the pure thing that it is. With less fear comes more freedom.” Craighead is also thrilled to be placed alongside artists Lynch and Hicks. Lynch is an “artistic hero” of his and was blown away by her work when he discovered her 10 years ago.
        Located in Apex, N.C., Lynch’s fiery mixed-media works are inspired by “Asian calligraphy, primarily Arabic script, haute couture, mainly Christian Dior, all the great ‘50s abstract expressionists, and contemporary artists such as Cai Guo-Qiang, who makes drawings using explosives.”
        Lynch’s works take a personal look at what is often depersonalized; “Five of the paintings are named for the birth dates of members of my family, and these paintings, in one way or another, suit the character or personality of the person. For instance, the painting titled Tony, February 1963 resembles the line and movement of my son’s personal signature.” Remaining humorous on her age Lynch finds it “a kick to be in a show with two young guys.” Lynch doesn’t seem to take herself too seriously, for her advice for young artists is “marry a rich man (or woman) who has a generous heart.” Lynch also greatly admires her co-exhibitors’ works; the first time she saw one of Jason Craighead’s paintings, she felt the “fission of excitement when one knows they are in the presence of something special.” In addition, years ago Lynch bought one of Hick’s sculptures for its “simplicity and power.” {mosimage}
        Rounding out the exhibit is celebrated sculpturist Seth Hicks showcasing his varied interpretations of the line — large-scale works and small-scale sculptures that playfully depict in daring black and white statements or subtly in distressed structures. The focus of geometrical objects in his work reinforces a clinical look at the line that his bold color choices never leave cold and calculated.
        Find more information about the Energy of a Line exhibit at www.FayettevilleMuseumArt.org or by calling 910-485-5121. If you miss the opening on Nov. 7, catch the exhibit for free during the museum’s normal operating hours, Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and on Saturday and Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. 

  • Details
        What is the difference between Memorial Day and Veterans Day? According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, most Americans don’t know the answer to that question. They just know one is in the spring, the other in the fall. Who we are honoring on these holidays though is significant. Memorial Day is set aside so American’s can pay our respects to service members who have died on our behalf in combat, or as a result of wounds from combat. While fallen service members are also remembered on Veterans Day, it is a day set aside to thank the veterans who are still with us, those who have served honorably in wartime or in peaceful times.  {mosimage}
        On Saturday, Nov. 8, at 11 a.m. the Cumberland County Veterans Council is hosting a parade to celebrate and honor our veterans. Event co-chair Keith Bates listed an impressive number of participants in the parade. There are about 90 entries, including 5 local high school bands, Rolling Thunder, Triple Nickel, VFW Posts and American Legion Posts and several high school JROTC units.
        “There will be an Air Force flyover, an Army helicopter flyover - right through downtown, up and down Hay Street,” said Bates.  
        Some of the 82nd units that have been deployed numerous times overseas to Iraq and Afghanistan will march and display equipment in the parade too. “It’s really a sight to see when they come down,” said Bates. “We’ll be there to show our support for them.” 
        The parade route starts at the intersection of Hay Street and Bragg Boulevard – the Airborne and Special Operations Museum - and goes down Hay Street to the courthouse.
        As a veteran of more than one combat tour, the gravity of what service members endure is not lost on Bates.  “When you go away for 10, 12, 14 months at a time you endure some hardships. You could be living in a tent for 12 months at a time, and you have to make the mad dash 100 yards to the bathroom in 30 degree weather….and then just being there especially when your buddies get killed, it takes a toll,” he said.
        The Cumberland County Veterans Council, made up entirely of veterans, looks forward to being able to support and encourage their brethren with the parade.
        “It is just a way to show our appreciation for the ones that are still serving,” said Bates. “The thing to me is to show our support for the many sacrifices that the men and women are enduring so that we can be free here. We don’t have to worry about getting blown up when we got to the polls, we don’t have to worry about getting harmed when you got to the Obama rally or the McCain rally or to the mall.” 
        While parades are fun, and a great way to say thanks to America’s vets, they are out there every day on our behalf going places and doing things that the rest of us pray we will never have to endure.  It doesn’t have to be Veteran’s Day to say thank you, and it doesn’t always take a parade to show you appreciate what our service members do.  “All you got to do when you see ‘em is just say thank you,” said Bates. “The best way (to thank them) is to just tell them everyday ‘thank you.’” 
        And we do thank you, for your service, your sacrifice and the many freedoms that we have because of you. Thank you.

  • Details
        To annex, or not to annex... that is the question faced by many growing municipalities, including Fayetteville.
    At a joint meeting between the the Fayetteville City Council and the Cumberland County Commissioners held Tuesday, Oct. 28, a visiting state official gave our elected leaders a lesson on the reasons for annexation, as well as other items concerning city and county government.
        David Lawrence, who teaches public law and government at the School of Government at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, gave two reasons for annexation: money and munificence.
       {mosimage} “It’s been shown in studies that people often move into the proximity of an urban center, such as Fayetteville, because of the advantages it offers,” said Lawrence. “So, it’s only fair that these new residents help pay some of the costs for the services they take advantage of.”
        “Secondly, cities should annex areas in need of basic services,” said Lawrence, “such as good, clean water, sewage and trash pickup.”
        Lawrence made those remarks in answer to a question posed by Fayetteville City Councilman Ted Mohn: “Should we annex areas to add communities that can bring us more tax revenues or annex communities that badly need services such as water and sewer, or a little of both,” asked Mohn.
        The council recently voted to involuntarily annex the Gates Four community — a gated community of 600 homes located off Lakewood Drive. However, there have been questions as to why the city hasn’t annexed the Shaw Heights community — a neighborhood that is predominately African-American and which suffers some infrastructure problems. The annexation of Gates Four is expected to bring tax revenues of more than $2.5 million to the city over the next five years.
        While some residents of Shaw Heights — which takes up 340 acres and is bordered by Fort Bragg on three sides, forming an “island” adjacent to the city — have said they would welcome annexation by the city to repair some of the infrastructure issues, most Gates Four homeowners vehemently opposed annexation proceedings; North Carolina is one of only four states that allows forced annexation with the approval of voters.
    In addition to annexation, Lawrence also addressed issues such as the combining of city and county services in order to save money. However, he pointed out that the pooling of city and county resources can be problematic, such as combining city and county law enforcement.
        “The police provide law enforcement in the City of Fayetteville,” said Lawrence. “The sheriff provides law enforcement outside the City of Fayetteville. Unless you want to argue that one or the other is overfunded and has more people than it needs and you merge the two (to save money), it’s hard to see how you’re going to cut very many patrol officers.”
        On the subject of the division of county and city services, Dr. Jeannette Council, vice chairman of the Cumberland County Commissioners, had an issue with the poor job she says local media has done delineating the differences between services provided by the city and those provided by county.
        “This is not a slap at you (Up and Coming Weekly)... We don’t have this problem with your publication,” said Council. “Mainly, we are not, in the county, trying to shirk a responsibility when it is suggested that we fund this, we fund that, we fund the other... It’s almost as if we have an unlimited pool of resources for anything that anybody brings up just off the top of their heads and I think if citizens knew, and editorial boards knew and understood more, the function of city government and the function of county government, that we would have fewer controversies.
        “Sometimes when parties disagree, then you have a big editorial that says what we ought to be doing and we can’t defend ourselves without sounding defensive,” said Council. “We (the county) provide the bread, the meat, the vegetables and the potatoes; municipalities are only mandated to provide dessert. I just want to shout it to the rooftops to have everybody working together.”

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