Robert Downes

Features Robert Downes Warning! Be careful you don’t pee your pants laughing when you see
Urinetown at the Old Town Playhouse this month.
Having seen the play myself several years ago in Toronto, I can guarantee it’s one of the funniest, most offbeat and thought-provoking musicals ever to hit the stage.

Random Thoughts Robert Downes Here’s something we haven’t seen in many years: posted in a few yards around Traverse City you’ll find campaign signs for Obama next to those of Wayne Schmidt -- the Republican candidate for State Representative in the 104th District.
Say what? Is it possible that in some small way, we’re moving toward a spirit of bipartisanship? Sort of like a dog and cat snuggling up together when its too cold outside to bear their differences?
There’s been endless speculation in the press about undecided voters this year and who the independents will vote for in the national election.
But those “undecideds” are primarily Republicans who are thinking of jumping ship for the first time in their lives, the same way that many Democrats voted for Ronald Reagan in 1980.
This is why we’re seeing defections by the likes of Colin Powell, who served as Secretary of State under President Bush, and Christopher Buckley, the son of conservative icon William F. Buckley. Both are Republicans voting for Obama.
Call it the Reagan Effect.

Random Thoughts Robert Downes Here are some questions for Joe Plumber:
Are you afraid that giant biomedical corporations will start pumping out human clones if Proposal 2 passes in Michigan this November?
Or, are you more afraid that you (or a member of your family) will someday come down with MS, diabetes, Lou Gehrig‘s disease, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Krohn’s disease, blindness, cancer, heart disease, damaged organs, stroke and a host of other afflictions?
You know, things that may be cured someday by the stem cell research encouraged by Proposal 2.
Embryonic stem cell research is one of the greatest discoveries of our time. It has the potential to cure our most devastating illnesses. It’s possible that it will someday help quadriplegics rise from their beds, and make diseased hearts strong.

Features Robert Downes Parents and their kids will have something to smile about this Saturday, Oct. 25 at 10:30 a.m., when a Dental Health Morning program takes the stage at the State Theatre in Traverse City.
Hundreds of kids are expected to attend the educational event that brims with fun, including a 25-cent matinee showing of “The Sandlot” baseball flick, along with a skit on orthodontics and dental hygiene handouts of 1,000 toothbrushes, floss and toothpaste.
The event is one of many creative ways that children and adults are being helped by the Dental Access Program of the Traverse Health Clinic and Coalition (THC&C) and Northland Dental Hygienists.
“We screened 4,040 kids last year through the Traverse Bay Give Kids a Smile program,” says Rene Louchart, dental health coordinator for THC&C. “At the State Theatre, we’re going to offer more awareness of preventive oral health services and habits that parents may not be are of.”

Random Thoughts Robert Downes Gee, this is a great time to be young. Why? Because if you‘re in your teens or 20s, you probably have little or nothing in the stock market and haven‘t lost a dime in the crash.
While you kids were wisely investing your money in Jello shots, iTunes downloads and the latest Xbox games, your parents were foolishly gambling in the Wall Street Casino, where we‘ve lost thousands, tens of thousands, and even hundreds of thousands in the last few weeks on our 401Ks and other retirement plans.
If you‘ve been too busy playing Guitar Hero to keep up, here‘s the deal: The stock market has dropped by 40 percent of its value in the past year, with a wild roller coaster ride, spiralling ever downward.
And this time around, there hasn‘t been any inspiring leader at the helm to calm the sense of panic that‘s sweeping the world, as was the case in 1932, when presidential candidate Franklin D. Roosevelt declared that: “There is nothing to fear but fear itself.“

Random Thoughts Robert Downes Back in college economics 101, we learned that the Great Depression could never happen again because our wise legislators had enacted many iron-clad regulations and safeguards to ensure that the stock market would never again reach such a state of peril.
But, like the chaos theory taught by the mathematician in Jurassic Park, you can never say never -- the destruction of those market regulations over the years has let the T-Rex out of its cage.
Thus, the rampage on Wall Street last week and terror plastered across the media. Let’s hope we don’t all get eaten alive by this thing.
Now, millions of Americans are of the opinion that the gamblers on Wall Street should bail themselves out. Why should we contribute a nickel to help these pirates? They can sink or swim.
But unfortunately, we are chained to the pirates. In some pirate navies, if you killed another sailor, your ankle was tied to his corpse and it was shoved overboard.
So, if you oppose the bailout, consider that you’re likely to go under too.

Art Robert Downes There’s no other way to say it: poet Derrick Brown kicks ass. He’s an action-adventure poet, swinging to the stage from the end of a vine with a ululating Tarzan yell and a ray gun in his belt. Well, not really, but the one thing you can expect from Brown’s multi-media poetry readings is the unexpected -- and that it will be the best night of poetry you can imagine.
A former paratrooper, gondolier, magician, and “fired weatherman,” Brown is bringing some of the world’s top-gun poets to the Traverse City Opera House stage on Saturday, Oct. 4 as part of his “Junkyard Ghost Revival” show that blends comedy, music and performance art with poetry.
“It’s more like a theater experience than a poetry reading, with everything planned out,” Brown says by phone from his home in Venice, California.
“Most of the poets who will be appearing are those I met at the National Poetry Slam in Madison, Wisconsin,” he adds. “We’ve got a world champion on our team, who won slams in Munich and Paris. We decided that it would be better if we all got together and went on tour.”

Books Robert Downes Summer produced a slew of new books by Northern Michigan authors. In particular, local writers were absorbed with local history this season. Here’s a look at what you’ll find on area bookshelves:
Old Mission kids enjoying a trip by goat cart -- circa 1900, from A Century of Service.

A Century of Service -- The People and Places on Old Mission Peninsula
Edited by Jack and Vi Solomonson Photo editor Mary Jo Lance

Largely a picture book, you’ll find over 300 photos in A Century of Service, many of which are from the family albums of the residents of Old Mission Peninsula and have never been seen by the public.
Many of the photos date back to the early 1900s, with glimpses of farm life at a time when horses were still used to plow the fields and pull buggies to market.
Here too are photos of the “bustling port” of Old Mission Harbor, with steamships docking at the town. There are histories of prominent families as well as the Indian residents and humble postmen.
The reader will also find tales of how memorable sites on the peninsula came to be. Did you know, for instance, that Marion Island -- once a gathering spot for Indians -- was acquired by the Chicago Yacht Club and was later sold to Henry Ford for $100,000?
Published by the Peninsula Telephone Company, this book is full of such nuggets and is a must-have for any resident of the Old Mission Peninsula.
The Unraveling Thread
By Priscilla Cogan
$26.95

Random Thoughts Robert Downes Do you like bugs in your food? Neither do I. But not so long ago, that was a fairly common occurrence.
Sorry to gross you out here, but it used to be possible that you’d open a box of pancake mix, or a bag of flour or instant potatoes that had been sitting around a couple of months and find... weevils!
Those are beetle larvae for those of you who flunked biology.
Then the food industry started irradiating all of the above in the 1980s. This involves zapping food with a burst of high-energy radiation. It not only killed the critters and bug eggs that hatched in these products, but did away with a lot of bacteria and micro-organisms that make people sick. It also served as a preservative -- doubling the shelf life of strawberries, for instance.
I once interviewed a scientist at Oakland University who ate a piece of steak that had been sitting on a shelf for two years without refrigeration. The steak had been irradiated and sealed in a plastic bag. Since all of its bacteria had been killed, it was still safe to eat two years after being zapped.

Art Robert Downes Marcia Bellinger will be bringing back some familiar faces for the Sept. 19 Art Walk in downtown Traverse City. Dan Oberschulte, former owner of Gallery 544, and many of the artists he used to feature there, will be the focus of Bellinger’s show at her Belstone Gallery.
“The Art Walk is a wonderful event, with all the downtown art galleries,” Bellinger said. “I do a show every Artwalk. Most are up two weeks to a month. This display will run through the end of October.”
In addition to Oberschulte, the “Gallery 544 Revisited” show will feature Mary Fuscaldo, Joe De Luca, Jerry Gates, Dorothy Grow, Dan Heron, Joe Stearns, Angela Saxon, Flora Stuck, Nancy Hoffman, Billie Hoxie and Julie Pearson.

Random Thoughts Robert Downes There was an historic moment last month which Michigan Senator Carl Levin can be proud of: the U.S. Senate passed his legislation for the Great Lakes Compact by a unanimous vote, protecting our water for all time.
Or does it?
The Compact bans the diversion of water from the Great Lakes. The agreement has already been signed by the governors of eight states along the lakes, including Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
“Senate passage of this compact will help us protect the Great Lakes from water diversions and preserve this invaluable resource for future generations,” said Sen. Levin in a published report.
The Compact is also considered a slam-dunk for approval by the U.S. House of Representatives, and President Bush will surely sign it. Plus, the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec have already passed the Compact.
“It’s looking like an unstoppable tide now,” said Cameron Davis, president of the Alliance for the Great Lakes.

Music Robert Downes If you see the members of Rootstand wanted for arson one of these days, you’ll know they’ve set another dance floor on fire with their hot licks and burning rhythms.
A Rootstand show has the flavor of a Grange hall stomp when the harvest is finally all-in. There’s a sense of joy in the air with that old-timey music kicked up a notch. The explosive power of the band’s bluegrass-meets-reggae sound seems to literally blast people onto the dance floor from the moment they kick off their show. And that’s saying a lot, considering the band uses traditional instruments including acoustic guitars, a banjo, mandolin and harmonica.
“Our sound has evolved based on who we’re playing for,” says John Snyder, 32, who performs on acoustic guitar and harmonica. “We’re proficient in many forms of music. Depending on the crowd, we can either play bluegrass or bust out with some hip-hop stuff.”

Random Thoughts Robert Downes Choosing Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate for vice president was a brilliant idea -- if you were trying to write a comedy skit for Mad TV or the Conan O’Brien Show, that is.
John McCain has a lot of wear on his tires. Five years in a Vietnamese prison camp played hell with his health, and he’s also battled skin cancer three times. If he takes office at the age of 72, McCain will be two years away from the average life expectancy of the American male.
So, it’s nice to know that he picked someone younger “just in case.”
But Sarah Palin? She’s been governor of one of the least-populated states in the country for just two years. Prior to that, she was mayor of Wasilla, a town of 7,000 people.

Art Robert Downes Walk into Richard Schemm’s studio in a cool forest valley west of Traverse City and you’ll be pleasantly overwhelmed by color and creative energy. Dozens of small paintings hang on the wall, surrounded by larger works in colors as vibrant and alive as the neon of butterfly wings.
Schemm’s paintings have a distinct sense of depth. They contain veils, swirls, canyons and fissures that lead your eye ever deeper into the work. You get the sense that there is a ‘story’ within each painting, and if you go deep enough, your imagination will be fired with visions of what’s around the next bend in the canvas. There is a sublime power here -- and energy -- that goes far beyond other examples of abstract art in Northern Michigan.
“There’s a lot of storytelling in my work,” says Schemm, 56, whose personal intensity is as vibrant as his work. “In a way, these are not ‘abstract’ paintings. They’re abstract compared to realism, but they aren’t without content that informs.”

Features Robert Downes The advancement of tech gear is whooshing along faster than a Mercedes in the left hand lane of the Autobahn. And given the innovations of the past several years, it’s more affordable than ever, too; things like miniature videogame systems, USB storage sticks, portable MP3 players, cell phones that can handle phone calls and text messages, plus video and miniature applications of all kinds. All of these high-tech gadgets were unattainable except for the wealthy folks a mere 10 years ago - but now they can all be snagged for around $100 or under. But what are the newest must-haves, especially for guys, in 2008? We’ve uncovered a selection from $99 on up that you just might find tugging at both your wallet and your gearhead sensibilities.