Month: August 2019

Categories
Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Get Out of the Sun at Sunrise Memphis

CREDIT: MIchael Donahue

MIchael Donahue

New enclosed patio at Sunrise Memphis.

Here’s a quick news bite for sun/culinary worshipers who like to dine outdoors.

Thanks to the new enclosed front patio, customers now can enjoy their food and drink outside at Sunrise Memphis.

The 20-plus-by-10-plus foot patio was completed August 1st, says manager Sarah Morse.

The wooden picnic tables currently on the patio eventually will be replaced with about 10 or so four-tops, Morse says.

During the winter, the patio will be enclosed with plastic. “And we can use it all year,” Morse says.

Then you’ll be able to see the sun rise at Sunrise Memphis.

Sunrise Memphis is open from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. seven days a week. Breakfast is served all day. long. Lunch is served between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. Brunch is served and the bloody Mary bar is open 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

Categories
News News Blog

Memphis Pets of the Week (July 30-August 5th)

Each week, the Flyer will feature adoptable dogs and cats from Memphis Animal Services. All photos are credited to Memphis Pets Alive. More pictures and more information can be found on the Memphis Pets Alive Facebook page.


Categories
Music Music Blog

Robert Earl Keen’s Countdown to Christmas Comes to GPAC in December

As August appears and the kids brace themselves for the return to school, one thing looms large in their minds: Christmas vacation. Yes, they’ll have many hours of homework, homeroom, and home games in store before then, but we know that it’s the dream of a holiday break that keeps them going. And what applies to kids applies to parents and single folks too. In Amurica, it’s never too early to dust off those Christmas decorations and start dreaming tinsel dreams.

The Germantown Performing Arts Center realizes this too, so today they’ve announced the holiday concert that keeps things real: Robert Earl Keen’s Countdown to Christmas. Keen, of course, is the artist behind the all-too-real Christmas song of the not-quite dysfunctional American family, “Merry Christmas from the Family.” It’s worth a listen even if your stockings are yet hung with care, simply as a chronicle of what it means to be a modern extended family with, uh, issues.

With its good-natured evocation of everyday alcoholism, bland racial bias, and running out of tampons, it achieves, in the end, a kind of unsentimental sentimentality to which anyone who’s had to listen to brother Ken’s new wife Kay, who “talks all about AA,” can relate. In fact, the song has resonated with audiences to such a degree since its release in 1994 that it’s even spawned a sequel song and a book of the same name. It’s in such demand that Keen has had to draw the line on when he’ll perform it. “We get requests for it all year round,” he’s told NPR. “So, I had to create this rule, I call it the ‘Linen Rule’, where we don’t play the song as long as you can wear linen. So it saves it and makes it fresh for the holiday season. So we start playing it around Labor Day and we play it on through the holidays. It’s the big number particularly in December that we close with.”

Robert Earl Keen’s Countdown to Christmas Comes to GPAC in December

Of course, there’s much more to Keen than this song. Having cut his teeth in the late-70s scene around Austin, Texas, he now has 18 albums worth of songs chronicling the foibles of everyday lives, much in the vein of Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, Steve Earle, and other masters of Americana. While they may not all be kid-friendly, they do resonate with the struggles and joys of everyday adults going through life with open eyes. It’s a refreshing way to digest the holidays at GPAC, a couple days after the gifts are all unwrapped, but before we must face the onset of New Year’s Day and the inevitable return to jobs and school that follows.

Countdown to Christmas, with Robert Earl Keen and opening act Shinyribs, Saturday, December 28, 8:00 PM, Germantown Performing Arts Center (GPAC)

Tickets on sale to general public at 10 AM on Friday, August 9. See website for information on artist pre-sales and GPAC subscriber pre-sales.

Categories
News News Blog

Thaddeus Matthews Intensifies Attack on Candidate in Homophobic Tirade

CREDIT: Davin Clemons/Facebook

Davin Clemons/Facebook

Talk show host Thaddeus Matthews ratcheted up his attack of a Memphis City Council candidate in another homophobic scree on his podcast.

On his show Monday, Thaddeus Matthews targeted Davin Clemons, who is running for the council’s District 6 seat. If he wins, Clemons will be the council’s first openly gay member.

On his show Wednesday and Thursday, Matthews unleashed a hateful torrent against Clemons, the Memphis Police Department’s LGBTQ liaison.

The LGBTQ Victory Fund, a national organization dedicated to electing LGBTQ leaders to public office, has been monitoring Matthews’ attacks on Clemons closely.

The group said that during the show Matthews repeatedly calls Clemons a “wife.”

“The man running for office is the wife, right?” Matthews asks someone off-screen.

Matthews’ language gets more explicit as his show wears on. In an exchange with an irate caller, Matthews says, “You a dick-in-the-ass bitch. Now, be quiet.”

“Are you fucking, uh, pardon me, are you screwing Davin Clemons? You seem concerned,” Matthews said to another caller. “I’m going to hang up on you because you won’t listen. That’s what you faggots do. You like to run your damn mouth.”

Matthews goes on to attack Clemons’ mother, his husband, and the “gay agenda.”

Much later in the show, Matthews notes that his words are “not an attack on homosexuals.”

The LGBTQ Victory Fund compiled Matthews homophobic statements here. This week, they called Matthews’ earlier attack on Clemons “cringe-worthy” and “insidious.”

This year is not, of course, the first time Matthews has spoken out against homosexuals. In 2011, he disparaged then-city-council-candidate Lee Harris with homophobic slurs.

“Is Lee Harris a faggot?” Matthews asked his listeners in 2011.

Categories
News News Blog

FedEx Invests Another $450M in $1.1B Hub Project

CREDIT: FedEx Corp.

FedEx Corp.

FedEx Corp. will invest an additional $450 million in its $1.1 billion Memphis Hub modernization project, according to state and company officials on Friday.

The company announced the modernization project in March 2018. That project includes a new sort facility, installation of state-of-the-art systems, and construction of a new bulk truckload building to support changing e-commerce needs, according to the company.

The total investment is now more than $1.5 billion over the next six years. The project is expect to be complete by 2025. The hub now employs more than 11,000 people.

“FedEx continues to be both a global leader and a Tennessee icon,” Tennessee Governor Bill Lee said in a statement. “In a fast-paced market, we are proud of this company for continuing to invest with an eye on the future and supporting more than 30,000 Memphis area employees.”

Raj Subramaniam, president and CEO of FedEx said the hub improvements will allow the company to “continue to provide outstanding service to our customers around the world and the best workplace for the thousands of FedEx team members who make our Memphis World Hub operations possible every day and night.”

Categories
News News Blog

‘Energy Democracy’ Tour Wants More ‘Public’ in ‘Public Power’

Memphis is the first stop of the “Energy Democracy” listening tour hoped to put more of the public in Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) “public power.”

Tour stops will give community members chances to discuss the history and impacts of the TVA energy system, evaluate decision making, and “will invite attendees to envision how our public power could better serve communities in the Valley.”

“In the Tennessee Valley, our ‘public’ power often feels no different than if we received an electric bill from a private utility like Duke or Dominion,” reads a statement from the groups. “When big decisions are made about our energy, community voices get sidelined by outside decision makers. The Energy Democracy Tour will unite these voices to create a new vision for public power in the Tennessee Valley.”
[pullquote-1] Dennis Lynch, chairman of the Sierra Club Chickasaw Group Memphis said utility customers have high energy burdens, meaning they spend a large portion of their paychecks on power. Memphians also have relatively small amounts of low-cost clean energy sources, like solar, he said.

“Fortunately, the local utility (Memphis Light, Gas & Water), community organizations, and public officials are working to address both of these problems, and maybe even separate from TVA,” Lynch said. “The Energy Democracy Tour will amplify these efforts, helping to energize the public around the need for more public input and financial resources dedicated to addressing the problems.”

The “Democracy” tour will make stops in Nashville, Knoxville, LaFollette, Chattanooga, and Rogersville, Tennessee. The tour will also stop in Bowling Green, Kentucky and Huntsville, Alabama.

The Memphis tour stop is on Saturday, August 3rd, noon-3 p.m., at the Bickford Community Center (233 Henry Ave. Memphis, Tennessee 38107). The event is hosted by Save Energy Save Dollars Coalition, Friends of the Earth, Chickasaw Group of the Sierra Club, the Memphis Climate Reality Project, and MLGW.

Categories
Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Best Bets: Elvis Food: Peanut Butter N’ Banana Sandwich at the Arcade

CREDIT: Michael Donahue

Michael Donahue

Peanut Butter N’ Banana Sandwich at the Arcade Restaurant

It’s time to get your Elvis on.

Elvis Week – with all the tributes to the King – begins August 8th. If you want a taste of what’s to come, try one of Elvis’ favorite delicacies – a fried peanut butter and banana sandwich. You can get one at the Arcade Restaurant.

If you like peanut butter sandwiches, this is one to the nth degree. It’s called the “Peanut Butter N’ Banana Sandwich.” The runny peanut butter melts into the creamy banana on toasted bread.

You’ll want more than one. I know I did. I could have eaten at least three.

Asked how they make the sandwich, Arcade owner Jeffrey Zepatos says, “You’ve got to fry up a good bit of butter on the old griddle, where we cook our bacon and everything.”

They use Texas toast, Zepatos says: “It’s just a little bit thicker. Texas toast has more of an egg base than regular bread. So, it fries a little better.”

They make the sandwich with the peanut butter and banana before they put it on the griddle. Everything is squished together. “You want to hold in the heat while you’re cooking it.”

They use about a half of a banana. “You want to get a little banana in every bite.”

The sandwich is fried for about two and a half minutes each side. “It’ll get a good brown crust to it.”

They added the PBB sandwich to the menu after his parents Karan and Harry Zepatos took over the restaurant in 2001, Jeffrey says. They wanted to serve an Elvis food item.

People mistakenly think peanut butter and banana sandwiches are strictly an Elvis food item, Zepatos says. The sandwich was “made famous by Elvis, but that was a North Mississippi meal. My mom grew up eating those even before Elvis became famous. It’s a good bit of protein with the peanut butter and the banana.“

The sandwich is a popular Arcade item, Zepatos says. “Oh, goodness. We sell five to 10 a day. On Saturday and Sunday we go through 30, 40. I’m talking at least 100 a week.”

They sell many more during Elvis Week, says Zepatos, who tried to keep count during last year’s Elvis Week. “We went through around 300 of those sandwiches. Maybe more. So, we’ve got to order many cases of bananas.”

Elvis actually was a customer at the Arcade, Zepatos says. “Elvis’ cousins would come in and wait for Elvis and they’d all hang out.”

If his fans became too aggressive, Elvis literally would leave the building. “When Elvis started getting famous, he’d get up and walk out that back door.”

Elvis fans love that door, Zepatos says. “It’s become a thing for people to do the old Elvis door. They’ll pay, obviously, but they’ll walk out the back door.”

Categories
News News Blog

City Expects to Collect $500K from Scooter, Bike Operators Over Next Year

CREDIT: Facebook

Facebook

Three little Birds


Memphis officials project that the city will collect about a half a million dollars from scooter and bike operators during the first year of its Shared Mobility Program.

The program officially launched here last week at the same time the dockless scooter company Spin, joining two other operators here, Bird and Lime, brought 150 scooters to Memphis.

Spin is slated to increase its fleet to 500 scooters over the next few weeks. Also, this month under the shared-mobility program, another company, Bolt, is expected to add its scooters to the city’s fleet. Early next year, Explore Bike Share is planning to roll out a new fleet of e-bicycles.

Together, Spin, Bolt, Bird, Lime, and Explore Bike Share are slated to operate 3,300 shared-mobility devices in the city once the program is fully in place.

Dan Springer, the city’s deputy director of media affairs said the city anticipates collecting about $500,000 from the operators during the first year of the program.

Per the companies’ agreements with the city, the for-profit operators are required to pay the city an initial permit application fee of $10,000 and then an annual renewal fee of $1,000.

Additionally, each year for-profit companies must pay $50 for every non-electric shared-mobility device they have in the city and $365 for every electronic device.

Non-profit operators, like Explore Bike Share, are required to pay $1 per non-electric device and $10 for every electric device each year.

Officials said that the fees collected from each operator will be used to support targeted safety and educational programs. Nicholas Oyler, the city’s bikeway and pedestrian program manager, said the content and structure of those programs is yet to be determined.

Generally, he said the programs will target all users of the street in an effort to improve the safety of walking, as well as riding a bike or scooter. Oyler said this will include instructions on safe riding and walking, as well as a focus on the laws applicable to drivers as it relates to sharing the street with other users, such as the requirement for drivers to stop at crosswalks.

[pullquote-1]

The fees collected from the operators will also go toward improving and expanding the city’s bikeway network. Oyler said with the increase in shared-mobility options, there will be an increased use of bike lanes.

“Providing separate space on the street where people can comfortably operate these vehicles, without vying for room on the sidewalk or in travel lanes, enhances everyone’s safety,” Oyler said. “Widespread adoption of these new mobility technologies will depend on a safe and connected network of on- and off-street spaces to ride and reach destinations.”

Specifically, Oyler said improvements could mean installing new bike lanes entirely or upgrading the physical separation from automobile lanes along existing bike lanes. Additionally, Oyler said the city will likely install scooter parking spaces and racks in high-density areas.

Oyler said as the program continues, the city will determine where to make these infrastructure improvements based on data collected from the shared-mobility operators.

Per the city’s agreement with the operators, the companies are required to submit real-time usage data to the city. Oyler said if the data shows that certain streets are commonly used for routes, then that might justify infrastructure improvements on those streets.

To ensure the program is equitable, the city is also requiring each operator to do the following:

• Provide a service area that includes low-income communities

• Implement marketing and targeted community outreach plans to promote the use of shared-mobility devices in low-income communities

• Offer cash payment options or other strategies to ensure equitable payment options

• Provide options for Spanish-speaking users and those with special needs to access the programs and memberships

• Redistribute and re-balance devices daily and in order to not “discriminate against communities of low and moderate income” and to help promote equitable access to and from these communities

For riders, the city encourages:

• Wearing a helmet. (It’s required for users under 16 years old)

• Riding scooters on the street, bike lanes, when available, and on bike paths

• Yielding to pedestrians on crosswalks and sidewalks and to bicycles on the street or in bike lanes

• Parking devices upright on hard surfaces in the furniture zone of the sidewalk, in a bike rack, or in another area designated to bike parking.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

Dear Brucey …

I’m going to give you a look into my world, or at least a tiny, troubling slice of it: the weekly emails I get from, well, MAGAs, the angry white males who walk among us like zombies — and write me really dumb letters.

I try to avoid opining about this president too much, but I succumb to temptation every month or so, mainly because I believe that those of us with a public platform have to speak out against the daily assault on basic decency and our core democratic values by the charlatan in the White House. I won’t be a “good German.”

Last week, I wrote about how Trump has built walls between us. It didn’t seem like a particularly controversial take to me. Even his supporters should realize that it’s the main arrow in his quiver: Find a division between groups of people and exploit it to make them angry at each other. Trump is, as Jeb Bush predicted he would be, a “chaos president.”

I got several nice emails from readers, lots of reposts on Facebook, Twitter, etc. — and I appreciate that. But, as always, I got some hate mail, too. I’m reprinting one here (sans typos and misspellings), along with my responses, just so you can see the kind of mind-set we’re dealing with:

What’s the matter, Brucey? Trump’s winning and successes getting to you? I read your little left-wing hissy fit about Trump and the wall. Hasn’t built it? That’s because the Dems are blocking it at every turn. … But you know that.
Oh, my bad, Biff. (You sound like a Biff, and since you didn’t sign your email, that’s what I’ll call you.) I thought Mexico was going to pay for the wall. So why are we taking $2.5 billion allocated for our troops out of the defense budget?

Children mistreated or in cages? Started with Obama putting millions of children in cages and deporting millions more. Why weren’t you bitching about that?
Obama did not put millions of children in cages. You’re either spouting some Fox News crap, or you’re just making something up (or, conceivably, both). Obama deported around 2.4 million people in eight years, about half of whom had criminal records. Why weren’t you applauding that?

You also know that the Dems have left working-class Americans for the coastal and Hollywood elites. And the party of crime needs those illegal immigrants’ illegal votes to stay relevantly in power.
Where to start, Biff? I don’t know if you noticed, but the president is a coastal elite and a former Hollywood TV show star. There is zero credible research that supports the claim that illegal immigrants have voted in any number, anywhere in the U.S. And speaking of illegal votes, have you talked to Vlad lately about his plans for 2020?

But isn’t it wonderful how Trump’s economy is making Memphis Great Again? Billion$ being spent on our Downtown and bringing it back to life. Black American and Latino employment is at record highs. Food stamp usage is down because jobs are finally plentiful. (Democrat Strickland will claim credit for the booming Memphis economy, but we know better, don’t we, Brucey?)
Trump’s economy is piggy-backing off of eight solid years of sustained growth under President Obama. Food stamp usage has been dropping steadily since 2013. The president’s economic “plan” is a house of cards, built on impulsive and ill-considered tariffs, a $30 billion government payoff to farmers, and tax cuts for corporations and the rich. Ask farmers how that’s working out for them. The deficit is now at an all-time high. Keep an eye on your 401k, Biffy.

And of course you used the worn-out Dem diversity word. How many black employees are at the Flyer? What part of town do you live in, an all-white area?
Diversity is one of this country’s strengths. We have several POC and members of other minority groups on our staff and several others freelancing for us, and we are always striving to do better. I live in Midtown and have black, Asian, and Hispanic neighbors on my block. So what?

Now Brucey, do you really want us to support a party that is for infanticide? A party that is for an open-borders agenda that will change the culture of this nation?
No. And I don’t know of a party that supports either of those things.

Do you really want us to vote for a party that favors socialism? Really, Brucey?
You mean like Social Security and Medicare? Yeah, I’m for that — and for the goal of getting every American access to affordable health care. “Socialism” is this year’s GOP scare word, kind of like “CARAVANS!” Nice try, though.

I can’t go there, Brucey. You try to cram this left-wing crap down our throats every week, but we have caught on to you, Brucey. We aren’t listening anymore.
Thanks for reading the Flyer every week, and for the use of your throat. Too bad you won’t read this, since you aren’t listening anymore. We appreciate all of our readers — even you, Biff.

Love, Brucey

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Love It or Leave It: Again.

There’s this memorable lyric from Bob Dylan on his classic album Blonde on Blonde. Maybe I remember it so well because it came from his song, “Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again,” which was recorded in Nashville in 1966. It goes:

“And I sit here so patiently/

Waiting to find out what price/

You have to pay to get out of/

Going through all these things twice.”

I have lived through LBJ, George Wallace, Richard Nixon, and the Vietnam era. I’ve seen the golden idol with the feet of clay — Ronald Reagan — say that “Government is the problem,” which was arguably the beginning of all our problems. I’ve seen the hapless Poppy Bush, the lascivious Bill Clinton, and the war-mongering Dick Cheney with his malleable puppet, George Bush “The Lesser.” But never in my life would I have expected to relive this “love it or leave it” bullshit. I thought we’d put that jingoistic, racist rubbish to bed along with “go back where you came from.” But then, I also believed in the evolution of man, a theory sorely tested by the current squatter in the White House.

The old “love it or leave it” slogan was the conservative redneck’s response to the anti-war protesters of the late 1960s. The “go back where you came from” probably dates from the post-Reconstruction era and into the Jim Crow South, when cracker assholes forgot that black people were brought here as slaves and had no place from which to go back.

I have heard these remarks — aimed at African Americans, hippies, feminists, and others — dripping from ignorant cretins all my life. Those who proclaimed it or repeated it were on the wrong side of history then and are on the wrong side of history now. And it will be remembered long after this bulbous, bilious aberration of a human being has been driven from his hideous presidency.

This latest horror began, as per usual, with Trump’s barely literate Twitter feed. After being provoked by a segment on Fox & Friends about the four freshman Democrats known as the Squad, the Ignoramus in Chief went off on an angry and racist Twitter tirade. I’ll reprint it here, but to avoid writing sic after every word, the punctuation and misuse of capitalization are all Trump’s: “So interesting to see ‘Progressive’ Democratic Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe … now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States … how our government is to be run. Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.”

The twits on the Fox & Friends couch laughed when they read the tweet and said that Trump is “very comedic” but he’s “making an important point.” Yeah, Trump’s a regular laugh-riot. He has since learned, or maybe not, that the congresswomen in question were all born in the United States except for Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, who came to this country from war-ravaged Somalia and became a naturalized citizen at age 17. The common denominator is that these are four women of color and two are Muslims, an accelerant to Trump’s racist ideology. I agree with President Caligula on one point: They need to fix the totally broken and crime-infested places, which perfectly describes Trump’s White House, his corrupt cabinet, and his extended family of shameless grifters.

The “love it or leave it” idiocy emerged during one of Trump’s Nazi rallies in Greenville, North Carolina. Broadening his message to include anyone who disagrees with him, Trump echoed Richard Nixon, and after he verbally assaulted Representative Omar by name, the crowd of “Good Germans” went wild, breaking into a chant of “Send her back!” After hearing from some of his party members, who informed him that this mantra wasn’t quite as acceptable as “Lock her up,” Trump disavowed the chant, then changed directions, calling his enraged, aggrieved audience of red-hat-wearing Caucasians “great patriots.”

Even some members of the misnamed “Freedom Caucus” thought he went too far. Now that Trump’s annoying repetition of “No Collusion! No Obstruction!” has been disproven by the halting, monosyllabic testimony of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the bottomless well of prideful stupidity that occupies the Oval Office has ramped up his free-range racism to stoke the animosity and fear of his fellow travelers. Trump’s latest target for his vile abuse is another African-American congressman, Representative Elijah Cummings of Maryland. 

After Cummings’ criticism of the inhumane treatment of immigrants at the border, Trump lashed out on another Twitter bender. Again, the bad grammar is Trump’s: “Rep. Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting & screaming … about conditions at the Southern Border…The Border is clean, efficient and well run … Cumming [sic] District is a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess … No human would ever want to live there.” Followed by: “The Democrats always play the Race Card, when … they have done so little for our Nation’s great African American people.”

Then Trump called Cummings, the son of a South Carolina sharecropper, “a racist.” A psychologist would refer to this sort of noxious ranting as “projection.” 

The Baltimore Sun editorial board responded in an editorial titled “Better to have a few rats than to be one.” It referred to Trump’s tweets as “undiluted racism and hate.” If there were any question before, there’s no doubt now that a very sick man is running the government, along with his lapdog “Moscow” Mitch McConnell and his legion of ass-kissers. Robert Mueller claimed the Office of Legal Council’s (OLC) opinion forbade him from indicting a sitting president. But the OLC’s opinions are just suggestions. As stated in their 1973 decision, the OLC reserves the right to “reconsider and modify or disavow that determination.” These are very perilous times. If no man is supposed to be above the law in this land, it’s time to disavow that archaic decision and show the proper justice to Trump that he so richly deserves.

Randy Haspel writes the “Recycled Hippies” blog.