It’s a steamy Friday afternoon in July, and the gates are opening on one of Southside Virginia’s biggest summertime bashes, the Cantaloupe Festival, near South Boston. Cars park on the grass outside of the Halifax County Fairgrounds, just 10 miles from the North Carolina border. The entrance road to the fairgrounds is decorated like a […]
It’s a steamy Friday afternoon in July, and the gates are opening on one of Southside Virginia’s biggest summertime bashes, the Cantaloupe Festival, near South Boston. Cars park on the grass outside of the Halifax County Fairgrounds, just 10 miles from the North Carolina border. The entrance road to the fairgrounds is decorated like a […]
In the late 1960s, when Turner Communications was a business of billboards and radio stations and I was spending much of my energy ocean racing, a UHF-TV station came up for sale in Atlanta. It was losing $50,000 a month and its programs were viewed by fewer than 5 percent of the market. I acquired […]
A:Well, John, take the first clue regarding the personal history of one Claudius Crozet: As we oh-so-continental locals know, “Crozet” is pronounced “Crow-zay” and not “Crow-zette,” indicating a connection to which country? Oui, mes étudiants adorables, vous avez raison! Monsieur Claudius Crozet était francais! To find out about ol’ Claude, Ace took a trip to […]
RESTAURANT Bizou There is something pretty special about a restaurant that can defeat not one, but two upscale French cuisineries (C&O and OXO) in a close race, only to have our unpaid intern stand up and declare, “That’s where I’m going for lunch!” Bizou is the bread-and-butter for restaurateurs Tim Burgess and Vincent Derquenne. The […]
A: John, take it straight from the Ace’s mouth: Not all are as holy as thou. When it comes to musicians on the Mall, Ace admits there is “a wide variety,” with everything from aging hippies with a penchant for James Taylor to the seventh grade fiddle prodigies. Each appeals to his own special demographic who, […]
A: Michelle, Ace understands your concern. It’s not unusual for us humans to get attached (sometimes unhealthily) to our verdant friends. Consider Julia Butterfly Hill, who lived in her pet redwood, “Luna,” for two years out in California to protest logging. But while Butterfly Hill may have been crusading on the behalf of a 1,000-year-old […]
Game on “Oh no!” Twelve-year-old Reid stares at the television in dismay. An Atlanta Braves batter has jacked a pitch deep into the left-center power alley. Reid holds his breath, watching the white dot arc toward the stands…then he sighs, relieved, when the ball plops into the mitt of a Boston Red Sox outfielder. “Reid, […]
A: If one thing’s clear it’s that you, my dear Pia, have been doing some serious wishful thinking. Not that you’re totally off the mark. The dude in question is David Sloan, a real estate agent with Roy Wheeler Realty. But he sure ain’t just giving the scooters away. To get your hands on those […]
The scene is straight out of a junior high dance. Though the pack of would-be dancers at R2, a relatively new Downtown club, are clutching beers and cocktails rather than punch, and the average age is at least mid-’20s, the knots of young women and lone men stick to the walls and stare into their […]
Restaurants help define a place. The world’s great cities are known for their dining rooms: Maxim’s in Paris, Katz’s Deli in New York, Chez Panisse in Berkeley. And Charlottesville is no different. l But behind a restaurant’s feel are its customers, particularly the cast of characters who regularly pull up a seat. l So who […]