Categories
Fun Stuff Metaphysical Connection

Metaphysical Connection: Pluto Retrograde

In astrology, Pluto is the god of the underworld. Pluto may have been demoted to a dwarf planet in astronomy in 2006, but it is still an astrological powerhouse. As one of the modern rulers of Scorpio, it symbolizes how we experience power, sex, death, renewal, rebirth, and hidden or subconscious forces. Pluto went retrograde on May 2nd and will stay retrograde until October 11th.

When a planet goes “retrograde,” or moves backward through the zodiac, it often brings challenges in the areas of our life that the planet represents. Communication planet Mercury creates misunderstandings and technology breakdowns when in retrograde, for example. But Pluto’s backward shift doesn’t make us confused — it makes us reflective.

Pluto is named after the Roman god of the underworld. Like its namesake, the planet Pluto rules over the shadow side of life. When it goes retrograde, it forces us to look at our own shadow side. Two of Pluto’s big themes are power and desire. With it in retrograde, now is a good time to take an honest look at how much we’re motivated by a need for recognition, money, and authority.

Pluto can stay in one sign of the zodiac for up to 21 years and retrogrades every year for anywhere from five to six months. In the last year, Pluto has been undergoing an era-defining shift in our cosmos from Capricorn to Aquarius. It represents a moment in time in which we also find ourselves somewhat straddling two worlds — the old and the new. Pluto in Capricorn is the old and Pluto in Aquarius is the new. We are dancing intimately with change. We are preparing for a new era, and Pluto retrograde is an integral part of the dance.

Some believe that in astrology, as you move further away from planet Earth into the outer planets, the frequencies of those outer planets are more subtle, more complex, and more mysterious. Pluto and its influence cannot be grasped with the mind. It represents the unseen, the mysterious, and the hidden aspects of ourselves and humanity. It represents the reserves within us that are not often journeyed to, including our shadows, darkness, and vulnerabilities.

Retrogrades in astrology represent “re” words, such as review, revise, reconsider, realign, revisit, etc. They are the one step backward to allow for the many steps forward. They are a sacred pause inviting us to look around, review who we are and the direction we are walking, integrate our past experiences, and bring closure to what is needing it.

This is all so that we can arrive present, centered, and aligned before continuing forward. Retrogrades remind us that, no matter how we try, life is not linear. Our journey is cyclic. We move sideways, upside-down, and every other direction in our outer and inner worlds.

Pluto represents the kind of cracking open that brings change down to the roots of who we are. Pluto journeys through our underworld, our psyche, our unconscious, our emotional body. Pluto excavates. It brings to light. Its retrograde shows us what is hidden within us and waiting for healing, acceptance, and closure.

Here, we are revisiting what is ready to be transformed. Throughout Pluto retrograde we may find what we have labeled “old” emotions, stories, or pain resurfacing. And while transformation is rarely easy, it is deeply nourishing.

This retrograde invites us to be vulnerable while it peels back layers to sit with what lies underneath. We are asked to witness parts ourselves we have disowned and cast into the shadow, all so that we may reach acceptance and reclaim ourselves. We are asked to sit with what has been keeping us chained, dimmed, powerless, and fearful, so that we may remember our freedom, power, and light.

Our role is that of surrender, presence, and grace, to allow our humanness to be as messy as it desires for this time. For we are quite literally taking a step back, picking apart the pieces, making a mess, and then placing them back together in a way that is aligned, empowering, freeing, and real, all in time for our forward movement. It’s time to close a chapter.

Emily Guenther is a co-owner of The Broom Closet metaphysical shop. She is a Memphis native, professional tarot reader, ordained Pagan clergy, and dog mom.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Starting Over in Overton Square

Madison Tavern will open May 10th at the site of the old Local on the Square at 2126 Madison Avenue.

Tim Quinn, who owns the bar/restaurant with his wife, Tarrah, hoped to open last November, but it took longer because of technicalities involved with starting a new place.

They chose the name “Madison Tavern” because of “the feel of the building. It’s got two fireplaces upstairs. It’s just a cozy, comfortable place.

“When I think of ‘tavern’ I think of some movie where people are walking down the road in the Middle Ages. They stop in and get a beer and something to eat. It’s nice and quiet. Candlelight. The owner who works there all the time serves them the daily special. And then back on the road they go.”

Why a new name? “Just a fresh beginning with a new family,” says Tim, 42, adding, “It’s been around 12, 15 years. Sometimes it’s just time to have something new.”

The Quinns, who bought Local on Main Street about four years ago, says they’ll “start working on a rebrand for Downtown as well.” They plan to change the name to “Quinn’s.”

Tim wanted to buy Local on the Square as soon as he began working there as general manager in 2017, when Jeff Johnson was the owner of both locations. “When I first worked in this building I was there one week and I asked Jeff how much to buy the place. He kind of laughed.”

Johnson gave him “a large number” as the selling price. Tim told him, “Woah. That’s a big number. Let me work on that.

“Within three years he sold me the Downtown location. And here, three more years later, I’m moving into the old spot.”

The Quinns gave the old Local on the Square a facelift, but they’re not changing the personality. They painted over the purple walls. They’re now blue with red accents, and they redid the floors. “Not a whole lot as far as the footprint of the place goes is changing. We cleaned it up to make it look fresh. Some new light fixtures, new tables, new equipment behind the bar.”

And, he says, “We took out the old games — the old Skee-Ball. We’ve got new dart boards coming in. Bubble Hockey. It’s like foosball, but it’s hockey. I’ve never played that before.”

The walls will feature “all consignment artwork by local artists.”

As for the food, Jose Reyes, who was kitchen manager when Tim worked at Local on the Square, will be back. “He took a leave of absence and went back to take care of his mother in Mexico. He’s from Mexico City. While he was there he purchased an avocado farm and opened another restaurant with his brother.

“He loves being in Memphis. Once his mom was up and good and everything was taken care of — one of his sons is running the avocado farm — he came back to Memphis.”

Tim plans to keep some of the old Local on the Square food items, including the sausage cheese board, which he will upgrade, and pretzel sticks. But he will now feature “an American menu” with “Southern-influenced” fare.

Most of the new items come “from conversations with the staff, with Jose, and some other managers, other food vendors.”

Tim is gathering his staff’s favorite family recipes, which he’ll “tweak a little bit.”

And, he says, “We’ll be, hopefully, doing a daily special: a paella. My brother’s wife’s family is from Zaragoza, Spain. Whenever we get together to eat, his wife makes her family’s paella. She’ll come in and show us how to make that.”

Tim plans to offer paella “a couple of times a week. It’s not really something you can cook on the fly. It’s something that gets better after it sits in the pot a bit.”

He also plans to serve grilled cheese sandwiches, which are popular at the Downtown location.

Tim began making grilled cheese sandwiches with Adam Hall and friends when they had a team at Memphis Grilled Cheese Festival, where they have been “fan favorites every year so far.”

The sandwich, which Hall came up with, is made of grilled chicken, buffalo sauce, white cheddar cheese, and regular white bread. “You put a mixture of butter and Miracle Whip on the bread and toast it.”

It was a hit from the beginning at Local on Main Street, Tim says. “Originally, we put that on the menu just as a special. It evolved into having grilled cheese on the menu all the time.”

The Downtown menu now includes various grilled cheese sandwiches, including ones made with duck and lobster — “different meats with different sauces.”

“We’ll do grilled cheese here as well. For the late-night menu we’ll slap a couple of grilled cheeses on there and a couple of egg rolls. And everybody’s going to be happy.”

Categories
Film Features Film/TV

The Fall Guy

Hollywood is not exactly a place where justice flourishes. But aside from all of the sexual assault, and the way some white guys keep failing upward, one of the biggest injustices in Hollywood is the fact that there is no Academy Awards category for stunt work. 

I don’t know if you’ve looked at a movie lately, but stunt performers are getting more screen time than ever. Many great pioneers of cinema built their reputations on hair-raising stunts: Think Charlie Chaplin roller-skating backwards on the edge of an abyss in Modern Times, or Buster Keaton riding on a locomotive cow catcher, batting railroad ties off the tracks in The General. Jackie Chan, the king of the Hong Kong stunt performers, has broken so many bones his injuries were shown as outtakes in his film’s credit sequences. Chan’s pain became part of his star attraction. 

It’s not like stunt work is not artistic. Look at the greatest film of the 21st century, Mad Max: Fury Road, and tell me the pole cat attack, where the performers are swinging on 20-foot poles mounted on vehicles traveling 80 miles per hour, is not artistic. Even if you do define “art” more narrowly, there’s still the existence of technical categories like Best Sound Design and Best Visual Effects. Stunt work is every bit as necessary for the success of the film as the talented professionals in those categories.

And look, if you want to jazz up the rating of the Academy Awards (and who doesn’t want jazzier ratings?), adding categories where Mission: Impossible and Fast & Furious could win something is just the ticket. 

One person who definitely agrees with me on this, the most pressing issue of our time, is director David Leitch. He’s a former stunt performer himself, having been at one time Brad Pitt’s stunt double of choice, before directing the star in Bullet Train. He’s also the co-creator of the John Wick franchise, which has taken fight choreography into the realm of modern dance. The Fall Guy is his love letter to the world of stunt performers. It’s the rare action movie that really feels like it’s made with love. 

It’s also relentlessly inside baseball because there’s nothing film people like more than films about themselves, or “self-reflexivity” in film theory-speak. The Fall Guy is ostensibly based on a TV series from the 1980s starring a post-Six Million Dollar Man Lee Majors as a stunt man who solves crimes. (In the 1980s, it was a requirement that every TV star had to solve crimes. But I digress.) In a weird way, The Fall Guy owes a great deal to Francois Truffaut’s Day for Night, the 1971 romantic comedy about a film set that’s always on the verge of falling to pieces but never quite does.  

Leitch’s star is Ryan Gosling, and to say he’s perfect for the role of Colt Seavers is a profound understatement. The source material is a notoriously rich vein of Reagan ’80s masculinity, with Majors driving a truck and singing country music between bringing in bounties. Gosling brings some much needed Kenergy to the role. This Colt Seavers cries to Taylor Swift songs. There’s not too many actors who could convincingly make a phone confession of their love to their girlfriend, director Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), while also fleeing from assassins in a stolen speedboat. 

Jody and Colt met years ago when she was a camera op and he was the preferred stunt double for megastar Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson). While filming Tom’s latest sci-fi blockbuster, their relationship evolves from a semi-recurring, on-set fling (which is a fairly common thing in the film world) to something more serious. Then, producer Gail Meyer (Hannah Waddingham) insists Colt do another take of a dangerous high fall. Colt’s luck runs out, and he wakes up on a stretcher with a broken back. 

Eighteen months later, Colt is hiding out in Los Angeles, working as a valet at a Mexican restaurant, when Gail catches up with him. Jody is directing her first big feature film, a passion project she and Gail have worked for years to put together. They need Colt for a big stunt, a dangerous cannon roll on a beach. Jody has personally asked for him, Gail says, to support her as she tries to make good on her first big break. More inside baseball: Jody’s “passion project” is apparently a remake of the 1983 movie Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn, a 3D debacle so notoriously awful it is nowadays only watched by sick cinematic masochists such as myself. 

Colt arrives on set in Sydney and pulls off the spectacular stunt, which in real life broke the Guinness World Record for most on-screen rolls by a car — a fact the film-within-a-film’s stunt coordinator Dan (Winston Duke) points out. But Jody’s not happy to see Colt. She was crushed when he cut off contact after the accident, and tells him via bullhorn as she repeatedly sets him on fire. “That was perfect! Let’s do it again!” 

When Colt confronts Gail, she reveals the real reason he’s been brought on board. Tom Ryder has gone missing, and since he and Colt used to be tight, Gail thinks he would be the best at discreetly tracking down the wayward movie star before Jody and Universal Pictures find out he’s gone AWOL. 

Gosling and Blunt are breezy and charming, and the supporting cast all understand the assignment. The whole point of the now-forgotten TV series was to cut to the chase, forget about all those pesky story beats, and get to the good stunts. The Fall Guy is at its best when it’s putting its small army of crack stunt performers through their paces with the safety wires and crash bags fully visible for once. It only makes the stunts more harrowing by emphasizing the human frailty of the performers. 

The Fall Guy
Now playing
Multiple locations

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

(Don’t) Break a Leg

I can’t even think about my bones. I’m not sure why, but envisioning the inside of my body — nerves, muscles, veins, and organs — gives me the ick. I’m the type to faint while a nurse gathers blood for a routine lab test. And I’ve learned my veins are small and hard to find, so even the pushing and prodding of my flesh as they attempt to plump up a good one to poke makes me woozy. Once I was watching a TV show where a character had undergone breast augmentation surgery and described the feeling as having salt rocks in her chest, and I went pale and tingly and had to splash cold water on my face and lie down on the bathroom floor. Until recently, although I’m probably the clumsiest person I know, I’d prided myself on never having broken a bone. All my structural pieces were intact and in working order, aside from some likely weak tendons from many ankle sprains through the years — most recently a gnarly sprain to the left ankle last May (and another the previous December). Walking is harder than one might think.

Today, there are seven prescription bottles on my nightstand, and I am writing this from bed with my left foot iced and elevated on a pile of pillows. Some of you may have noticed I’ve been absent from this space for a few weeks — and a shiny new table of contents with accompanying photos teasing the week’s feature stories took the place of my editorial. We already had plans to occasionally run an illustrated table of contents in lieu of an editor’s note on those pesky weeks when words escaped me, but wound up launching it unannounced. I was down for nearly a week in early April with a flu-like illness, and in my feverish haze was unable to conjure up a column. So the first of the designed table of contents pages was set forth into the world. When I started feeling better, I decided to get dressed and go visit a friend. I’d been cooped up for days, swapping out one pair of pajamas for another, and at that point needed desperately to speak to another human in person before turning into a goblin. I put on some makeup and real pants and my favorite clunky platform Doc Martens (middle-school Shara would think today Shara was so cool with those boots) and left the house — free at last!

As I mentioned above, walking is harder than one might think, especially for a person who is prone to rolling their ankle, and even more especially when that person is wearing heavy platform boots. All I know is I was walking down the sidewalk one second, and the next I was on the ground in pain. When I managed to get that super-cool boot off, my ankle shifted unnaturally and sort of dangled at the end of my leg like a pendulum on a grandfather clock. Needless to say, a trip to the emergency room was in order, and what followed was as close to me living my actual nightmares as I’ve yet to get in this life. (I had to think about my bones!)

Medical staff sedated me and attempted to perform a manual “reduction” on the dislocated ankle. A funny aside, one of the medications they gave me before the procedure was propofol, which, a nurse informed me while I was still somewhat alert, was the drug that killed pop star Michael Jackson. After a dose of morphine that didn’t quite do the trick, I saw them coming toward me with another needle and asked, “Is that the Michael Jackson drug?” Then proceeded to sing, “got to be startin’ somethin’ …” as I drifted off to dreamland (I have no recollection of this). The reduction — basically several medical professionals roughly tugging at my foot — was unsuccessful, there was mention of risk of necrosis, and I was rushed to the OR for surgery. I awoke with metal pins in both sides of my heel and two in my shin. The contraption — a multiplanar external fixator, to be exact — holding everything together was bulky, heavy, and increasingly uncomfortable, and I laid up for several days in the hospital awaiting the second surgery, in which I had a titanium plate installed to hold my “blasted” fibula in place. (The surgeon said the mess I made by simply falling looked like a “high-impact” injury. I never half-ass anything.) There’s a pin in there somewhere holding things in place that will have to be removed in a few weeks. So, yeah, a broken fibula and tibia, a dislocated ankle, 30 staples, bionic parts, and seven nights and eight days in the hospital. (I’ll spare you the gruesome photo of my mangled Frankenstein leg.) The past couple of weeks since surgery have been both physically and mentally taxing, as I consider myself an incredibly independent (and stubborn) person — laying around unable to do things on my own is a pain unlike any other. Well, aside from that hospital bill.

Anyhow, that’s where I’ve been. I’ll be recovering for several more weeks at least but now I’m on the other side of the worst of this ordeal (and mostly out of the pain-killer coma). See you here again soon. In the meantime, don’t break a leg!

Categories
Cover Feature News

IPA All the Way

Soul & Spirits Brewery’s Hoochie Coochie IPA is the best craft beer in Memphis, according to the more than 800 voters of the Memphis Flyer’s 2024 Beer Bracket Challenge, sponsored by City Brew Tours, Eagle Distributing Company, and Cash Saver.

This marks the first time Soul & Spirits has won our challenge. The brewery had not yet opened its doors in 2021 when we last held it. Their win unseats Crosstown Brewing Company, who has held onto the VanWyngarden Cup since 2021. Back then, Crosstown’s Traffic IPA upended Meddlesome Brewing’s three-year reign atop the Flyer’s annual beer bracket contest with its 201 Hoplar.

Soul & Spirits takes home the prestigious VanWyngarden Cup.

Ghost River Golden took top honors in 2017, the first year of the competition. But it’s been IPA all the way since then. That’s five wins for an IPA — apparently the top style in Memphis — almost every year we’ve done this.

Since Soul & Spirits opened in 2021, it’s won top honors — Brewery of the Year — in 2022 and 2023 in the Tennessee Championship of Beers.

“Winning a competition against your peers is really cool but to have people locally vote for us — that this is their favorite beer in Memphis — that means a lot,” says Blair Perry, who co-founded and owns Soul & Spirits with her husband, Ryan Allen. “We’re still really new, so it is nice that people acknowledge that we’re around and like what we’re doing.”

Allen and Perry say Hoochie Coochie IPA started as an American IPA, “but it just turned into chasing a flavor.” When asked what flavor, Allen says “goodness.” Hoochie Coochie’s hops change from batch to batch, he says, based on what’s available.

“But just trust me, we’re going on a road,“ Allen says. “We’re going on a journey.”

Perry says they’re always chasing a “juicy, citrusy flavor with a nice bitterness that makes you want to keep drinking.”

As for the name? It’s fun to say, they note, and one of the first beers they named. But it also fit with the Soul & Spirits naming convention. Memphis-area music plays onto the labels and into the names of Soul & Spirits beers. So conjure up “I’m a Hoochie Coochie Man” by Muddy Waters next time you sip a pint and search the can label for song references.

Blair Perry, Ryan Allen, and the ever-famous writer Toby Sells

This year was completely different for the Beer Bracket. First up, we opened up the challenge to any brewery in Memphis, any size, whether or not they had beers in stores or not. That brought in Boscos, who, one could argue, blazed the path for craft beer in Memphis. The change also made room for some newcomers like Urban Consequence Brewing, Memphis Filling Station, Cooper House Project, and Memphis-area beer bar and brewpub, Mississippi Ale House.

Gone were any divisions that have, in the past, separated our bracket into very basic beer categories — light, dark, IPA, and seasonal. The beers commingled — stouts vs. IPAs, for example. Though, we made sure no two beers from the same brewery were seeded against one another.

In the end, we had 32 beers from 16 breweries. Each brewery selected two beers for random seeding. (I literally pulled the match-ups out of a hat.) These went right on our bracket. That bad boy was digitized, and over two weeks these beers faced off, fell out, or advanced to the next round.

The final round had Hoochie Coochie up against Cooper House Project’s Midtowner lager, which won a narrow victory over Hampline’s Tandem Pilot double IPA to make the finals. In the end, Hoochie Coochie emerged as the winner, edging out Midtowner by only 130 votes.

The Memphis Flyer Beer Bracket had more than 10,500 votes this year from states across the nation, though most votes came from Midtown Memphis.

You know we love beer at the Flyer. And we know you do, too. (Well, at least hundreds of local voters do, anyhow.) So, we felt a duty to let you know that state lawmakers had you on their minds this year. Here’s rundown of some legislation that could find its way to a pint glass near you.

The Law and Your Beer

It wouldn’t be a regular session of the Tennessee General Assembly if lawmakers didn’t change the way you drink, or try to, anyway.

Lawmakers thought about cold beer, drunk cops, and Sunday sales. They also thought about more serious matters like date rape and treatment programs for DUI offenses. Some ideas worked. Some didn’t.

No Cold Beer for You

Rep. Ron Gant (R-Piperton) knew his legislation “got quite the buzz,” a phrase pounced upon by another GOP lawmaker with “no pun intended!” Har har.

That legislation would have banned the sale of cold beer at stores. So you don’t have to go back and make sure you read that right, here it is again: That legislation would have banned the sale of cold beer at stores.

Eyebrows raised everywhere. Headlines stacked up. Message boards dripped with disbelief.

But when Gant first spoke about the bill, he said “the buzz” about banning cold beer sales was moot. It was part of the original legislation, but after meeting with stakeholders across the state (probably meaning lobbyists for retailers), it was no longer part of his proposal.

He clarified this during an early committee review of the bill. The intent was never to target 12-packs or 24-packs, it was on “high-alcohol, single-serve containers.”

“Some people have educated me on this,” Gant said. “They call them 2x4s or tallboys. You see them laying on the side of the road where they’ve been obviously thrown out. So, we know that they’re being abused, and people are drinking these, and not making it home to enjoy at their house.

“So, there was never going to be any intent — by me as the sponsor — to take away the right and the privilege for the good actors of being able to buy a 12-pack or 24-pack and take that home as responsible adults. I just want to make that clear, you know, for the record. So that everybody feels at ease. But none of that is included in this legislation.”

And feel at ease they did, it seems. Those hard headlines that read like “Proposed Tennessee Bill Bans Selling Cold Beer” (from VinePair) had softened to jokier ones like “Tennessee’s Cold Beer Ban Bill Is Officially On Ice” from Nashville’s News Channel 5.

For many, though, the idea seemed in range and on-brand for the GOP. Memphis Reddit users called it “stupid shit” and “bullshit” and that (sarcastically) these lawmakers were “tackling the real issues.” It also reminded them of another GOP fave: gun control.

“But … but … beer is an inanimate object,” wrote u/Boatshooz. “It doesn’t drink itself. And we don’t need to pass further laws that just hurt responsible drinkers, we just need to enforce existing laws.

“I swear I’ve heard that same argument from those same legislators about something else … can’t remember what it was. Why are they taking the opposite stance with beer?”

The law would, however, create a new group to study alcohol consumption and abuse in the state, with a report due annually. Gant said (but didn’t cite sources for his information) that drunk driving and alcohol consumption has surged in recent years. The bill was passed by the legislature but had not been signed by Gov. Bill Lee as of press time. 

Sunday Sales

You’ve been there, probably. You’re headed to your Sunday Funday, walk into the grocery store only to find the beer section dark, maybe with shades drawn over them or a lock on the cooler door.

Then it hits you. That backward-ass state law says I can’t buy beer here until noon. You may even have a thought about some pious state lawmaker sitting in a church somewhere, praying that the law will somehow nudge you out of the beer aisle and into a pew somewhere. Well, those beer lights will remain off on Sunday mornings, at least for another year.

Nashville Democrats Rep. Bob Freeman and Sen. Jeff Yarbro tried to change that. They described the bill simply as “the alignment of the sale of alcohol on Sunday to every other day of the week.” They said many sporting events are overseas and on different time zones. Some venues, they said, would like to sell alcohol to those who want to watch them. 

The only real vocal opponent of the bill was Rep. Tom Leatherwood (R-Arlington), the former Shelby County Register of Deeds. He tried hard to marry the Sunday-sales legislation with another Freeman bill focused on preventing sexual assault.

He called them “twin bills” even though they could not have been more different. But still he told his GOP colleagues that limiting Sunday sales could save a life, and someday, maybe, end up on your end-of-life sizzle reel.

“Now, any of us that have drunk the alcohol [yes, he said the alcohol] before … it will just naturally reduce the natural defenses of some. It’ll increase the natural aggressiveness of others,” Leatherwood explained. “Hence, it’s good to be aware of what can happen, as we will hear more about later. If you vote no on this bill, you may never know what young lady you save from sexual assault and harassment, to use the language coming up. You may never know. But then again, on the other hand, in that final judgment we will all face, you may find out who you save by voting no on this bill.”

For his part, Freeman tried to separate the two, saying, “You should be able to drink responsibly without being raped.”

Loaded Cops, Loaded Guns

Sen. Joey Hensley swore he had no idea where the idea came from or how it ended up in his legislation. But there it was, raising almost as many eyebrows as the cold beer ban: We were going to allow drunk cops to carry and use concealed firearms.

“As introduced, allows law enforcement officers to carry a firearm when under the influence of alcohol or controlled substances and certain other circumstances,” reads the bill description on the state website.

Hensley said all he wanted to do was allow everyone to carry weapons on college campuses, for crying out loud. (That idea didn’t even get the support of his GOP colleagues. The bill failed.) The drunk cops thing was added without his knowledge, he told Fox 13. But there it was in black and white pixels and the damage was done.

“TN GOP probably: Wait guys, I’ve got an idea,” tweeted Rep. Gloria Johnson (D-Knoxville). “I know Missouri one-upped us with their bill arming 3 [year olds], but I think we can counter with arming police officers who are drunk or high. Hear me out on this one …[three clown emojis].”

One supporter, though, over on a forum at tngunowners.com had another take.

“I know many seem to find fault with the concept of being armed and drinking, but really, as long as you’re not impaired,” wrote a user named Defender. “If you feel that strongly against it, maybe we should allow cars at bars or restaurants that serve alcohol.”

Date Rape

Rep. Freeman’s legislation (discussed earlier here) on alcohol and sexual assault passed this year, was signed by Lee, and will go into effect in January. That law will require anyone who serves alcohol to the public to take a course on the role of alcohol in sexual assault and harassment and on recognizing and reporting signs of human trafficking.

“If any of you remember, several years ago, the horrible rape case on a university campus here locally where a bunch of men carried a passed-out woman past 20 or more individuals that allowed it to happen,” Freeman said. “Not one of them stopped, said anything, felt empowered to do it, [or] understood what they could say.”

After this, the Safe Bar Tennessee program was developed by the Sexual Assault Center of Middle Tennessee. The program’s slogan is “See Something. Do Something.” Such training is already underway in Nashville, including some 50 bars Downtown, Freeman said.

Odds and Ends

Right now, certain folks under 21 can taste alcohol legally in the state. But they can’t drink it. Make sense?

Motlow State Community College, Jack Daniel’s, and Uncle Nearest have developed an associate’s degree in distilling that could produce more professionals in that industry’s workforce. Tasting the product gives students “real-world, practical experience” to “meet the critical need for their industry.” But they have to spit it out.

If you get a third DUI or BUI, you’ll have to wear a transdermal patch that will send a report to law enforcement if you have a drink. The main part of this legislation reduces jail time for the third DUI. Yet that only serves to give more time to commit to a 28-treatment program.

But the stranger, kind of Big Brother-y part of the law would make you wear that tattletale patch under your skin (so many questions) for three months or until your case is resolved, whichever came first. It goes into effect in July.

A bill would have yanked the alcohol license of a venue that served someone who later got into a car wreck that killed someone. It failed. Another bill sounds like it’s from the Prohibition era. It would have reduced “from two to one the number of credible witnesses who must be present when a law enforcement officer destroys an illegal distillery, a still, fermenting equipment, or related property.” It failed, too.

Categories
At Large Opinion

Course Correction

The jokes write themselves.

In January, when I asked Dr. Nickalus Khan — the talented young neurosurgeon from Semmes Murphey Clinic who had rebuilt my upper back a year earlier — if I could play golf again, his answer was a reassuring “Absolutely.” When I told my friend John Ryan that my doctor had said I could play golf, his response was: “That’s amazing! You couldn’t before.”

See what I mean?

For six months, I had been working to get my body back in some sort of shape after a bout with lymphoma and a concurrent rebuild of my upper back because of damage from the tumor. I was declared in remission last July — a happy day to be sure — but I’d lost 30 pounds and almost all my muscle tone during the six-month chemo protocol: too much time on my back; too little time moving. I’m in my 70s, and it didn’t take long for me to realize the road to full recovery would be long.

When I began my comeback in July, the slightest exercise made me stiff and sore. Getting out of bed required pushing off the wall into a seated position. My oncologist, Dr. Mike Martin of West Clinic, said my condition was a common one following chemo treatment and that I needed to begin — slowly — working to strengthen my stomach and back muscles.

Getting back into the swing of things (Photos: John Ryan)

Thanks to the fact that I have two very persistent dogs, I resumed walking every day last summer, mostly in Overton Park. When I began, I was winded after 15 minutes, but after three months, I worked my way up to a brisk 35 to 40 minutes with no stress. Progress! I also began something of a fitness regime at home: pushups (at first, from my knees), leg lifts, stretches, sit-ups. As hair returned to my head, strength began to return to my muscles.

What about playing golf again? I used to play at least once a week, but my golf-friends and I got out of the habit during the pandemic. They still play, though less frequently. Now that Covid is a lesser concern and cancer is in my rearview, I began thinking maybe it was time to get myself out on the links again. Perhaps golf could even be a way to accelerate my physical recovery.

Feeling frisky in early January, I tried swinging a 5-iron 100 times. The next morning, the pain in my lower back was nearly intolerable. It was obvious that I would need golf-specific exercises.

I checked in with Dr. Google and found lots of interesting connections between golf and fitness. I learned that golf is often used to rehabilitate people from addiction: “Since golf is a type of exercise that enhances the release of endorphins, it becomes an effective way for patients to recover from substance abuse disorders,” claims a site called Healthy Life Recovery. And I learned, from the same source, that golf is used in the treatment of some mental health disorders: “Golfing enables patients to form and foster cordial relationships based on shared interests, a crucial factor for mental health recovery.”

All good to know, but what about getting my ancient body back in shape to make a full swing at a golf ball and not embarrass myself in front of my friends? You know, the physical stuff (and the pride stuff). As I’d learned the hard way, golf puts a lot of stress on the back muscles. This paragraph from a golf-instruction website sums it up: “The athletic, correct golf swing is a total body movement that requires flexibility, mobility, and stability in a wide range of joints. Utilizing the ground for a powerful hip extension through the shot along with pulling left and delaying release of the clubhead puts a great amount of strain on the body. That is the swing most of us are searching for.”

There’s a huge body of literature online on the subject of how to get your body in “golf shape,” and lots of instructional-video options: “Best Back Exercises for Golfers,” “Tips for Maintaining a Healthy Back While Golfing,” “Rehabilitation of the Back for Golfers.” The list goes on longer than a Dustin Johnson tee shot. I eventually settled on HansenFitnessGolf.com. Coach Mike Hansen has a lo-fi approach, and looks a little lumpy, like the kind of guy who’s not going to be too judgy, even if he can’t see me. He clearly lays out the issues for senior golfers, and for those trying to return to playing golf after injury or illness. I qualified on both counts.

The three major issues that Hansen addresses are, yep, flexibility, mobility, and stability. If we can improve those three areas, he says, we’ll be well underway to finding a real golf swing again. Hansen’s exercises are easily done at home on a carpet or yoga mat and focus mostly on strengthening lower back muscles, stretching and turning the torso, strengthening the knees and thighs, and my favorite, “firing your glutes.” Frankly, mine should have been fired a long time ago. I jest. But anyway, yes, strengthening your butt muscles is important.

After a couple of weeks, I was swinging that 5-iron 100 times a day with no pain cropping up. I still couldn’t turn into a complete back-swing because of the reconstruction of my upper spine, but I felt like maybe I was ready to try the real thing — with a ball. I enlisted my cynical friend John and we drove out to Mirimichi Golf Course and each bought a big bucket of balls to hit on the practice range.

As I rolled a shiny, white Pinnacle into position on the astroturf practice mat with my trusty 5-iron, I got a little nervous. I was worried I might be unable to hit the ball straight with my shortened swing, or worse, shank it horribly. It was my first time on a golf course in 16 months.

I said something to John about not feeling comfortable over the ball and he said, “Just swing smooth and easy and try to make contact. You don’t have to kill it.”

He was right. I focused on just hitting the ball and took what felt like a half-speed swing. I was elated to see the white pellet fly straight, and to feel the joy of flushing a shot right in the middle of the clubface. I hit the remainder of the bucket of balls, maybe 75 or so. Sure, I hit some clunkers, but I hit enough good shots with my new, easy swing that I was eager to try the real thing.

Playing a round of golf is, of course, much different than hitting balls from a mat. There is grass and dirt and trees and water and sand, all of which delight in diverting golf balls from their mission of falling into a hole on a green. I drove to the Links of Riverside on a Sunday afternoon in late February for my first test. Riverside is a modest, nine-hole muni run by the city. Nothing fancy. I figured I’d be able to play by myself with no issues. But nope. As I drove my cart to the first tee, a single golfer was preparing to hit. “Hey,” he said, cheerfully, “Want to play together?”

The guy looked to be about my age and was playing from the old-man tees, so how bad could it be, I thought. “Sure,” I said, “but I have to warn you I haven’t played in more than a year, so I might slow you up.” No worries, he said.

And there weren’t any. We had a great time and I didn’t embarrass myself. After the round, we had a beer in the clubhouse and agreed to play again. I’d made a new friend and was back in the swing of things. You might even say I was rehabbed. Huzzah.

Categories
Theater We Recommend We Recommend

Quark Theatre Concludes Season With Constellations

Quark Theatre is gearing up to finish off its season in the coming weeks with the regional premiere of Constellations by Nick Payne, opening Friday, May 10th.

“I have been calling this a multiversal love story,” says director Tony Isbell. “Because it’s about two characters — Roland and Marianne — and the story is they meet, they go on a date, they hit it off, they fall in love, they break up, they get back together, and they deal with some very serious issues along the way and some very funny issues. But it’s not that straightforward: We follow their relationship through the lens of the multiverse. … It jumps to different universes and it occasionally jumps back and forwards in time as well. So there’s a lot going on.”

At just about 80 minutes, the play, Isbell says, feels like a montage sequence. “Like short scenes cut together,” he says. “But these two actors [Carly Crawford and Nathan McHenry] are phenomenal because when they switch universes there’s no technical aspect — there’s not necessarily a scene change or sound change. It’s all conveyed by the actors and just something as simple as a change of tone of voice or a change of their posture or the way they’re relating to each other. And the amazing thing is you can almost always tell when there’s a change, when they jump through the universe, not only because they end up repeating some of the same lines but just because of the nuance they bring to the characters as they move from universe to universe.

“I call it a love story because that’s really what it is. The most important thing here is the relationship between these two people and how much chemistry they have and how much the audience roots for them. Because they’re both really likable people most of the time, and in a couple of universes, they’re not so nice, but most of the time they’re really likable and the audience is really rooting for them. I think people will just really be fascinated by the show.”

Isbell hopes this production follows the success this season has offered so far with The Wasp and The Sound Inside. “In terms of audience we’ve just done really well,” he says. “This has been our most successful season, and we’d like to continue that with this show.”

Tickets for Constellations can be purchased at quarktheatre.com. Performances run Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. with a Sunday matinee at 2 p.m., May 10th through May 26th.

Constellations, Theatre South at First Congo, 1000 Cooper St., Friday, May 10-May 26, $20.

Categories
Music Music Features

Sunset Jazz

As many music lovers savor memories of hearing their favorite bands on the Mississippi’s shores at last weekend’s RiverBeat Music Festival, another such experience is just heating up: the Sunset Jazz series at Court Square. And while the performances, taking place once a month from May through October, may lack strobe lights, flame cannons, or the feeling of a weaponized kick drum rattling your chest, they will offer their own kind of fireworks: the sheer virtuosity of the series’ featured artists.

The musicianship is top-notch partly because the series’ producer and curator, Deborah Swiney, is a seasoned jazz singer herself. After she released her 2017 album, I Remember Rio, there were precious few jazz-friendly venues in which to promote it — so she took matters into her own hands.

“I had been wanting to do something at Court Square Park forever,” she recalls. “It’s a beautiful park, with the gazebo there to use as a stage. So I contacted Penelope Huston at Downtown Memphis and threw the idea out there, and she loved it. We did a pop-up event and had a great turnout, far beyond what we would have ever imagined. So I did a couple more.”

Pivoting from her own work to the likes of Chris Parker and Kelley Hurt, who had only just premiered their stunning No Tears Suite in Little Rock, those other 2018 pop-ups set a tone of eclecticism and quality that has continued to mark the series, now in its fifth year (after a two-year break during the worst of Covid). “I try to do something different each time,” Swiney says.

Ted Ludwig
This year’s lineup carries on that tradition, while keeping the focus firmly on Memphis-based artists. Season opener Ted Ludwig (appearing on Mother’s Day) has become a fixture at The Green Room at Crosstown Arts, for instance, with his trio often backing talent visiting from elsewhere (as in this Wednesday’s performance with New York saxophonist and composer Jim Snidero). “To me, he’s one of the top guitar players around,” says Swiney, “and we have a bunch of great guitarists in Memphis. He grew up in New Orleans and won the Louis Armstrong Award in high school there, then studied with the great pianist Ellis Marsalis.”

Ekpe & the African Jazz Ensemble
June’s concert will feature the more international side of Memphis jazz with percussionist Ekpe Abioto’s African Jazz Ensemble, one of the few local groups who pursue the sounds of contemporary Africa. “Ekpe also has a great resume, and he does a lot of studio work,” says Swiney. “He played on my Rio album and if someone needs a percussionist here it’s likely to be either Ekpe or Felix Hernandez.” While Abioto’s ensemble is often known to delve into Afrobeat territory, Swiney says, “he’s likely to focus more on the jazz part for this series.”

Stephen M. Lee
While many parents and aspiring young players know of Lee as a teacher, some may not realize that he’s a world-class pianist in his own right. He studied under fellow Memphian Donald Brown in his college years, then went on to develop a career in New York for over a decade. When he received the Steinway and Sons Top Teacher Certificate Award in 2017, he returned to Memphis and founded the Memphis Jazz Workshop to fill in gaps in public school music education here. The program has been a great success. Swiney sees his July performance as a chance to showcase “more straight-ahead jazz.”

Soul Ingredient
After Lee’s July performance, the following month will present the best of what his educational efforts have wrought. Soul Ingredient collects some the Memphis Jazz Workshop’s finest young players into a powerhouse ensemble. “Have you ever heard these guys?” exclaims Swiney. “I heard them at an event last year, and had I been in another room and not seen that these were kids, you couldn’t have convinced me that they were so young. Of course, all their instructors are professional musicians and you can just tell they’re getting taught by some of the best top players.”

Soul Ingredient (Photo: Elizabeth Fitzgerald)

Patrice Williamson
Memphis doesn’t see enough of the singer featured in the September Sunset Jazz show, possibly because she teaches at Berklee College of Music in Boston. But Jazz Times magazine wrote that “Patrice Williamson isn’t a singer, she’s a one-woman jazz sampler. She is a woman of many voices, each distinctly intriguing, all distinctly her own.” Growing up in Memphis, Williamson’s father introduced her to both gospel and the music of greats like Louis Armstrong, Nat King Cole, and Lena Horne, and that blend influences her singing to this day.

Patrice Williamson (Photo: D&D Pro Imaging)

Brian “Breeze” Cayolle
Further cementing the close ties between New Orleans and Memphis, this Crescent City-native has been a fixture in Memphis since Hurricane Katrina nudged him northward. “He brings a bit of New Orleans wherever he goes,” says Swiney of the clarinetist and saxophonist, who held down Wednesday nights at Lafayette’s Music Room for years. “He’s played with a bunch of people and he’s quite celebrated,” Swiney adds. Cayolle will wrap up this year’s Sunset Jazz series on October 13th.

Visit sunsetjazzmemphis.com for details.

Categories
News The Fly-By

MEMernet: RiverBeat, Drama, and a Beer Prediction

Memphis on the internet.

RiverBeat

The inaugural RiverBeat Music Festival drew throngs to the Mississippi last weekend. Most on the MEMernet agreed Tom Lee Park was amazing and the production value was second-to-none.

But being Memphis and that park in particular, detractors complained the crowd was smaller than Memphis in May’s Beale Street Music Festival and that hurt Downtown businesses. Others griped that ticket prices didn’t match the lineup.

Drama

If you are looking for a local drama rabbit hole to fall into, head over to the Memphis subreddit and look for “Fox and Cat Vintage drama.” The basic story is there to get you started. Then, follow the links to fall as far as you’d like. Yowza.

Beer Prediction

Posted to Reddit by u/etherian1

“Only a matter of time before someone turns Germantown Lumber into a brewery/tap room,” u/etherian1 predicted on Reddit.

It’s a fitting prophecy for our beer-soaked issue, focused on the winners of our 2024 Beer Bracket Challenge.

“First round on me for whoever can will this into existence,” wrote u/HeyYouGuuys.

Agreed. Second round on us.

Categories
We Recommend We Saw You

WE SAW YOU: Zio Matto Gelato Now at Central Station

Matteo Servente and Ryan Watt don’t care if their business takes a licking. In fact, that’s what they want.

Servente and Watt are owners of Zio Matto Gelato, which recently held its grand opening celebration at 545 South Main Street, Number 110, inside Central Station.

Julianne Watt
Grayson West and Santiago Arbelez
Armani Featherson
Felicia Willett-Schuchardt and Clay Schuchardt

“Gelato is the best Italian treat,” Servente says. “It’s like ice cream, but better. It’s got less fat. It’s got less sugar. And it’s creamier and packs more flavor.”

They offer 14 flavors at a time, but, he adds, “We have recipes for many, many more.”

Servente, who is from Turin, Italy, founded the business. “Matto” is what his niece called him when she was little. And “Zio” is “uncle” in Italian.

Jalyn Souchek and Keith Evanson
Will and Thomas McGown
Christine and Carroll Todd

“We love being on South Main because it’s a neighborhood similar to Italy,” says Watt, a filmmaker, adding, “You get the gelato and take it right outside and walk down the neighborhood.”

Also, he says, “Being near the [National] Civil Rights Museum and being here at Central Station, [there’s] a mixture of tourists and locals. It’s a perfect location.”

We Saw You