We’re Not Worthy

The savings of the poor are made little by little; they come out of that broken, fragmentary condition of humanity to helpfulness and self-respect. — Reverend Oscar McCullough, 1890 Denver City Council was packed Monday night, overflowing with supporters of the city’s 10-Year Plan to End Homelessness, a proposal that…

Bark If You Love Jesus

SUN, 10/2 At 4 p.m. today, after workers remove the pew cushions and burn some incense, the annual St. Francis Day Blessing of the Animals will commence at St. John’s Cathedral, 1350 Washington Street. “There’s always a certain degree of joyful chaos because we get a wide variety of animals…

Curb Your Enthusiasm

THURS, 9/22 Musicians may have been temporarily silenced in New Orleans, but local acts are making lots of noise on their behalf. Help unsink the South when the Colorado Hip-Hop Coalition hosts Kickin’ Katrina to the Curb!, a two-night fundraiser that runs from 6 p.m. today to 1 a.m. tomorrow…

The Wilding Blue Yonder

Like its commander in chief, the Air Force Academy has weathered some rough times lately. Last Thursday it hosted the world premiere of Jewel of the Rockies: The U.S. Air Force Academy’s First 50 Years, a Rocky Mountain PBS film that airs at 9 p.m. September 19. Producer Trux Simmons,…

Time Capsule

FRI, 9/16 “Pod is dead. Long live Pod.” That’s Lauri Lynnxe Murphy’s weary-yet-relieved refrain as she closes the book on Pod, the quirky artist-run and artist-supporting retail adventure she and a partner oversaw for two years in a Santa Fe Drive storefront. Pod and the partner are gone (though Murphy…

Let Us Prey

SAT, 9/10 “Having been the first American Buddhist monk to be ordained in a Buddhist country,” confesses Alan Clements, “I think I’ve logged more damn hours on my ass than anyone I’ve ever met.” According to Clements, the time for meditation is over. Tonight at 7 p.m. at the Boulder…

Bayer Assets

TUES, 9/6 The notion of the total artist — one who juggles many media and genres with ease — defines the career of Bauhaus master Herbert Bayer, who danced between graphic and fine art, architecture and sculpture. He created diverse works, ranging from stylish Aspen ski posters touting his adopted…

Screwed for Life

No question, Kumbe Ginnane lied. At least twice. He lied when University of Colorado cops, and then the Boulder District Attorney’s Office, asked if he’d had sexual contact with a coed on October 19, 1990. No, he said then, he hadn’t had sex of any kind with her. He told…

Comic Relief

I was feeling safer already. The demonstrators who’d gathered on the plaza outside of the Central Library at high noon on Monday were waving the flag and protesting a collection of novellas, not because the comic books were in Spanish — oh, no — but because they were pornographic, depicting…

Belly of the Beast

One day last week, a construction crew building a behemoth in the 400 block of South Franklin Street fired up shortly after 6 a.m. According to city rules, they’re not supposed to start work until 7 a.m. — but when “Housing Goes Frothy to Flat in the Denver Area,” as…

Come Together

SAT, 7/16 Responding to the death of John Lennon, punk sage Tesco Vee of the Meatmen sang his unabashed ode to the Beatles, “One Down, Three to Go.” By way of worship, the world has also seen such Fab Four interpretations as William Shatner’s “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds,”…

Crash Course

At nineteen, Sonja DeVries had her life mapped out. She was going to go to college, become a psychologist, work with children, have children. The future looked blindingly bright. Last July 18, Sonja enjoyed a belated birthday celebration with co-workers, then put her party hat on the front seat of…

Racial Profiling

WED, 7/13 “I was at a comedy club in the Midwest once where three black comics got put on back-to-back just as a fluke,” remembers Denver-based comedian Louis Johnson. “Myself, Tommy Davidson and Percy Crews, and we killed it; it was the funniest thing. The next day the front office…

Canine Pride

SAT, 6/25 How exactly do you outfit a dog in drag? Do you dress him up like a cat? Do you put Fifi in a muscle tee, squeeze Buster the boxer into a tutu? Anything goes, say organizers of the Dogs in Drag competition at this year’s PrideFest. So feel…

Rock the Mike

WED, 6/15 In one of his bits, comedian Tony Rock discusses the need for a black president. Not a Colin Powell-type black president, Rock explains, but somebody with an edge, somebody just out of prison. “We need a president named Keef,” Rock concludes. “K-E-E-F. President Keef’s entourage would include the…

Out of Iraq

SAT, 6/11 Iraqi intellectual and artistic life essentially ceased to exist under the relentless grip of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist regime. If you weren’t willing to paint glowing images of the despot, you simply weren’t allowed to be an artist in Iraq, and many people fled the country as a result…

Tour de Farce

I lost a bet. That’s why I’m playing booster for a morning meeting with the marketing advisory committee of the Denver Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau when I should be over at the Grand Hyatt, sitting in on “Arresting Computer-Assisted Reporting: Using Data to Cover Cops.” The Investigative Reporters and…

Aging Well

SAT, 6/4 Helen Hand knows all about life transitions. Navigating her fifties at a time when younger people of a different mindset seem to rule the roost, she’s also adjusting to a caretaking role with her aging father. And about a years ago, following the murder of her brother, Colorado…

Names and Faces

Before Donald Young was shot, before suspect Raul Garcia-Gomez got his job at the Cherry Cricket, before John Hickenlooper was elected mayor, even before Tom Tancredo was elected to Congress, Pablo came to Denver. He grew up in this city, attending elementary school here, then middle school and finally West…

Mass Appeal

FRI, 5/27 Connoisseurs and dilettantes alike will be treated as gallery critics this weekend at the seventh annual Colorado Arts Festival at the Denver Pavilions. Today through Memorial Day, more than 180 of Colorado’s finest painters, sculptors, photographers and visionaries will dazzle your eyes and stimulate your creative talent with…

Ready, Set, Action!

Nineteen-year-old Quincy Shannon has a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But if you’re a budding broadcast journalist, as Shannon is, that puts you in the right place at the right time. On the second weekend of June last year, the place was LoDo, where…

A Class Act

In June 2003, Richard Florida, author of the hot-hot-hot Rise of the Creative Class, was speaking to a group of despairing alternative-newspaper types when one asked if Florida had any hope for the political future. Yes, he replied. In Denver, where John Hickenlooper had just been elected mayor. Two years…