Anchorage Press 10/22/15

ANCHORAGE PRESS • ANCHORAGE’S PICKIEST NEWSPAPER • OCTOBER 22 - OCTOBER 28, 2015 • VOL. 24, ED. 41 • FREE

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Publisher Nick Coltman [email protected]

Editor Susy Buchanan [email protected]

Contributing Editor David Holthouse [email protected]

Website Editor Dave [email protected]

Calendar Editor/Staff Writer Zakiya McCummings [email protected]

Editorial Intern Nicole Lang [email protected]

Business Manager Maggie Balean

Art Director Stefanie Vigoren [email protected]

Contributors Andew Sims, Aurora Ford, Bob Grimm, Brendan Joel Kelley, Barbara Hood, Bridey Heing, Charlie Earnshaw, Chuck Shepherd, Dan Savage, David Fox, Dawnell Smith, Debra McKinney, Elissa Brown, Geoff Kirsch, Hillary Walker, Indra Arriaga, James ‘Dr. Fermento’ Roberts, James R. Evans, Jeri Kopet, Jessica Stugelmayer, Jonathan Bower, Joseph Bul-lington, Julia O’Malley, Katelynn Sortino, Katie Pesznecker, Kerry Tasker, Kirsten Swann, Kris Farmen, Lee Harrington, Libby Petrivelli, Lisa Fox, Logan Stolpe, Matt Iverson, Megan Zlatos, Mike Gordon, Ned Rozell, Owen Tucker, Patrick Dough-erty, Peter Dunlap-Shohl, Priscilla Hensley, Rachael Peltier, Rachel Kenshalo, Ray Troll, Rob Brezsny, Shane Castle, Silas Campbell Stefanie Miller, Tarzan Dog, Teeka A. Ballas, Tom Tomorrow, and Zack Fields

Advertising Account Executives Bridget Mackey | [email protected] Edes | [email protected] Menzel | [email protected]

The Anchorage Press is an Anchorage-wide news, features, arts, entertainment, and recreation paper. Established in 1992, the Press is printed weekly on Thursdays and distributed at over 500 locations.

Copyright: the Anchorage Press is published by Wick Communica-tions Co. With the exception of syndicated features and cartoons, the contents of the Anchorage Press are copyright 2015 by Anchor-age Press. No portion may be reproduced in whole or in part by any means including electronic retrieval systems without the express written permission of the publisher.

contents.4 OPINION: IN THE BLINK OF AN EYEBY MIKE WACHSMUTH

4 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

5 OPINION: EYEWITNESS TO A RAIDBY KRIS CASSITY

6 BLOTTERBY BRENDAN JOEL KELLEY

7 SPICED OUTAbsolutely Chronic Delivery Company is

resurrected to combat Anchorage’s Spice problem

BY BRENDAN JOEL KELLEY

8 LINDA’S LABOR OF LOVEA new bright spot in Moutain View

BY KIRSTEN SWANN

11 AUTUMN ON THE CHICKALOONTurquoise, white, water

HEADLAMP BY ZACH FIELDS

12 TOP-NOTCH TOPPINGSGo to Midnight Sun for the bruschetta, stay for

the beerRESTAURANT REVIEW BY DAVID HOLTHOUSE

13 GOOD-ASS BEERThings are quaking on Tudor Road

BY JAMES “DR. FERMENTO” ROBERTS

15 OPEN CELLARBordeaux: comfort food in a glass

WINE REVIEW BY MATT IVERSON

17 PRESSING EVENTS

19 AMP-LIFY THE SOUNDHelping youth through music

BY JESSICA STUGELMAYER

20 GOT TIX?

21 SHE-RAWRock feminist, Catie CurtisMUSIC Q&A BY TAYLOR WEESE

22 EVENT CALENDAR

23 LEADERBOARDHow 907 Gamers pwned for a cause

BY JESSICA STUGELMAYER

25 PATCH TOWNGood ingredients, but still just cabbage soup

FILM REVIEW BY INDRA ARRIAGA

27 TANGLED WEBDead Man’s Dancer: The Mechele Linehan

StoryBOOK REVIEW BY DAVID FOX

27 ART LISTINGS

29 FULLY OURSELVESSlam poetry meets language activism

BY MEGAN ZLATOS

31 NEWS OF THE WEIRDBY CHUCK SHEPHERD

31 I SAW YOU

32 SAVAGE LOVEOne last time

BY DAN SAVAGE

33 ASTROLOGYDon’t cling to the illusion of “permanence,”

GeminiBY ROB BREZSNY

34 PRESS PIXWeekend round-up from around latenight

Anchorage

35 CROSSWORDS & COMICSNabbing yearly awards

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Dear Editor,Being the simple man that I am, and not

able to solve all of the world’s problems, be-cause, after all, I am just one man, and not a very smart man at that, I take great com-fort that Anchorage’s First Lady, Mara Kim-mel, has taken an active interest in trying to end the white slave trade in Anchorage. I take comfort that our illustrious and honor-able Mayor, Ethan Berkowitz, is committed to creating an Anchorage that encourages and attracts new businesses to Anchorage by providing a positive business climate, as well as pointing out the innumerable positive things about Anchorage, such as our parks and recreational opportunities. In today’s competitive global marketplace, it is the job of the Mayor to pitch to possible new busi-nesses how wonderful Anchorage is, and what a great place to locate or relocate their either mom and pop or corporate business Anchorage would be, if only they would give Anchorage a chance. I know that both the First Lady of Anchorage and the Mayor would like to know about my stay at the Hil-ton Hotel last week, because they are working hard to make Anchorage a city we can all be proud of living in.

Let me start by saying that all the employ-ees of the Hilton Hotel treated me with all the professional and personal courtesy and kindness that their corporate masters would allow. I met and enjoyed the graciousness of employees who are from all over the world: Mexico, Costa Rica, Thailand, to name just a few of the many countries the employees come from.

I was staying at the Hilton Hotel because I had both a personal and professional reason to do so: the Alaska Federation of Natives Convention, better known as the AFN Con-vention. Personally, I have always felt wel-come at the AFN convention, where I get to see and visit with old friends like Tom Abel and Harry Lord, and meet new friends from all over Alaska. It is like coming home for me, for although I am a white guy, I have always been welcomed and made to feel at home at the AFN convention. Professionally, I was covering the AFN convention as a freelance poet and artist as a member of the media. I took many photographs, which are, I like to think, both historically and artistically significant. I took photographs of Senator Murkowski, Senator Sullivan, and Governor Walker and his First Lady. I was awestruck upon seeing the legendary Don Young and his new wife, and was too slow to get a photo of Don, but it was good to see him, none the less. Don Young has been a pretty effective Congressman for all of Alaska, except D’Ear and a few others, and I admire his chutzpah. He stands tall in a House of Representatives filled with midgets. I took photos of the May-

or and his First Lady, and the photos which are the best, I think, and those are of the at-tendees of the Convention, the First Peoples of Alaska.

My stay at the Hilton Hotel was unfortu-nately less than stellar, given that the Hilton Hotel is supposed to be a five-star hotel. I was charged $229 a night, and was billed for four nights although I only stayed for three. The Hotel survived the 1964 earthquake, but it has not been maintained, and I would not want to be up in the higher floors when the next earthquake hits. The corporate master had a AFN convention rate of $99 a night, but withheld that information from guests, who were made to pay $229 a night, like me. Although the AFN convention brings a lot of business to town, the Hilton corporate mas-ter exploits their guests instead of welcoming them home. The internet did not work and the new GCI cable television connection was in code known only to GCI. Exposed pieces of loose roofing could be seen below my third floor room.

I tried to provide housing to a homeless AFN shareholder women to keep them safe from being raped and abused while in An-chorage, and negotiated the $99 AFN special rate for those rooms, only to find out that the corporate master lied to me, because when I tried to pay for the room of a grandmother from Tanana, I was told that the rate was ac-tually $229 a night, even though I had an old fashioned verbal agreement that the Hilton Hotel would rent the rooms to me for $99 a night. I did succeed in housing two home-less sisters from Old Harbor, but they had to change rooms when their toilet flooded and would not stop flooding. The bathtub in my room would not drain adequately. And these are only the the things I know about, but if you asked any of the other guests I am sure you would hear similar observations.

As a retired member of the Laborer’s Union, who has picketed the Hilton Hotel in support of the Hotel Union Unite! members who lost their jobs when the corporate mas-ter of the Hilton Hotel took over, I can only say that I am glad I picketed, because clearly there is something very wrong at the Hilton Hotel, and it makes Anchorage look bad. We can do better, and we should do better, be-cause it is the right thing to do.

One final thought: an update. I now have stock options controlling 25,100 shares of British Petroleum, and am in the process of preparing bids on the upcoming State of Alaska oil lease sale ... Stay tuned ...

Jed WhittakerJed WhittakerAnchorage

We love letters

I saw a man die one night last week. I was traveling to a photo shoot and came upon an accident that must have just occurred.

A white ford pickup had crashed through a chain link fence on the side of Arctic Boule-vard and vehicles parked at erratic angles on the road. People were scrambling to get the truck’s doors open.

I watched them pull a man out of the driver’s seat and lay his lifeless body on the ground. There was a pregnant woman in her work scrubs directing a construc-tion worker as he gave the man CPR. Traffic came to a stand still as these complete strangers fought to keep this man alive. I pulled my truck off the road and called 911.

Someone gave up their coat to place it under the man’s head. Seconds went by but it seemed like minutes to me and must of felt like hours for the strangers who were try-ing to save this man’s life. Push, push, push, breath, push, push, push.

I watched these complete strangers work tirelessly on this man, hoping, straining and anxiously pumping away until the ambu-lance arrived. A man in a red hoodie and Carhartt pants got out in the road and made sure traffic stopped as the first APD cruiser arrived. He was at one end of the scene and I at the other, so I stepped out in the road and did the same. The officer jumped out of his cruiser, grabbed an automatic defibrillator

and rushed over to where the man lay on the ground, complete strangers were still pump-ing on his chest, fighting for his life. Another APD cruiser shows up, the two officers calm but energized in their movements trying to find a way to help with what limited emer-gency equipment they carried in their patrol cars.

Finally I heard the wailing of the ambu-lance followed by a fire engine. The medics rushed out of their vehicle serious and deter-mined to keep this man alive. They took over CPR, hooked up a defibrillator and tried to

revive the man as strangers stood by solemnly watching them work.

The medics lifted the man urgently onto the gurney, put him in the ambu-lance and closed the doors. There’s noth-ing left for these strangers to do. They talked among themselves wonder-ing what was going to become of the

man as the ambulance sat there, and gradu-ally filtered back to their vehicles. If they’re like me I’m sure their hearts were heavy, and I hope they found solace in the fact that they, these complete strangers, did every-thing they could to save this man. I hope the family of the man can take comfort that their loved one was surrounded by strang-ers in his last moments, but these strangers were fighting for his life. He was surrounded by people whom he had never met but still loved their fellow man enough to stop and do everything in their power to try and get him home to his family. n

OPINION BY MIKE WACHSMUTH

I hope the family of the man can take com-

fort that their loved one was surrounded by

strangers in his last moments, but these

strangers were fight-ing for his life.


ON SEPTEMBER 18 the Criminal Division of the Alaska Depart-ment of Law filed charges against

the owners of three Anchorage busi-nesses for distributing marijuana with-out a license. I wouldn’t have given this news item much thought if I hadn’t wit-nessed one of the raids leading to these charges.

The extraordinary level of force de-ployed by law enforcement and the mis-identification of the agents and agencies involved in this raid raised doubts in my mind about the purpose of these actions.

Law enforcement would not speak with an Alaska Dispatch News (ADN) reporter at the scene of the raid and di-rected the reporter to leave.

Since the media was barred from making an eyewitness report, let me tell you my experience.

I didn’t see the SWAT team surround-ing the building where I was working on Thursday afternoon, August 6. I was using my brother’s studio on the second floor of a building on Old Seward since he didn’t have students that day. On most days his studio would have been filled with parents bringing their chil-dren for music lessons.

When the floor began to shake, I thought at first it was an earthquake. Then I made out the sound of boots pounding up the front and rear stair-ways.

I was inside the studio facing the wooden entry door, which has a narrow glass window through which I could see a part of the second floor landing. Men in military “camo” gear and body armor wearing clear goggles and gripping rifles ducked into positions around my door and filled the landing.

Then a man in body armor facing me through the glass pointed his rifle over my head and shouted, “Police! Come out with your hands up!”

The rifleman’s bulletproof vest had large black letters: “FBI.”

The rifleman seemed to interpret my incomprehension as a sign of resistance and began to shout even louder: “Police! We’re serving a search warrant! Come out with your hands up!”

The thought kept going through my head, “Why is he shouting, ‘Police,’ when his vest says ‘FBI’?”

I heard a woman start to cry and real-ized that they must be searching the of-fice right next to me.

Then another man in a helmet and pointing a rifle put his face up to the glass in my door. He motioned me to open.

I complied.Standing at the open threshold, I

could see men searching the adjacent of-fice. A young woman who worked there was sitting on the floor sobbing.

“Is this your office?” the rifleman asked, nodding toward my brother’s studio.

“No,” I said, “it’s my brother’s and an-

other teacher’s music studio.”“Can you get him over here right now?’’ “I don’t know,” I said, wondering

where this inquiry was headed.A small army was positioned around

the stairway landings and waiting area. In addition to the SWAT team, three people were dressed in powder blue dress shirts and navy blue blazers—no ties—like they were security at a pro-fessional sporting event. I couldn’t see anything that identified who they were or what agency they represented.

Except for “FBI” printed on some of the flack jackets, no one I saw had agen-cy insignia or personal identification.

One of the three people in blue sport jackets acted like he was a supervisor. He walked around and conversed qui-etly, mostly with the man who appeared to be the SWAT leader.

Suddenly a man appeared in front of me from the back hallway. He wore a black cloth sack fully covering his head, face and neck—with cutouts only around the eyes. The man with the masked face was dressed in body armor and “camo” gear, but had no agency markings or insignia.

No one questioned or challenged the man in the black face mask. He did not appear to operate as part of the chain of command of either the SWAT team or the three dressed in blue sport jackets. I didn’t hear him speak to anyone or hear anyone speak to him.

The man in the face mask appeared to go unrestrained wherever he chose. He darted first into the office next door to me that was being searched and then back into waiting area.

Then the eyes in the cutouts of the mask locked onto mine.

Before I could react, the masked fig-ure moved around the rifleman who was questioning me and into the music stu-dio.He scanned the room.

No warrant.No request for permis-sion to enter.

Apparently the masked man didn’t see anything of interest, and he van-ished down the back stairway.

When the lead man in the blue sport jacket approached, the rifleman seemed to lose interest in me. He swung his weapon away. The two conversed quietly for several minutes.

“Am I free to go?” I finally asked.“Yeah,” the rifleman said.That was all.I had been detained and illegally

searched. There was no apology; no ex-planation; no acknowledgement.

When I walked into the parking lot, a squad of riflemen was jogging, platoon style, around the building toward the back.

I didn’t see a vehicle anywhere that was identified with the Anchorage Po-lice Department—or any other law en-forcement agency.

A young man who works on the street level of the office building told me that an FBI surveillance van was parked be-hind an adjacent restaurant. My broth-

er’s computer had been showing a Wi-Fi connection named “FBI Surveillance Van” for a couple of weeks.

I went by the van as I made my way to a side street where it would be quiet enough to call my brother.

The next day—August 7—ADN re-ported that the Anchorage Police De-partment (APD) had served a search warrant on a marijuana delivery service called ACDC operating in the newly oc-cupied office next to my brother’s studio.

In my mind the ADN report raised many more questions than it answered.

Why were the law enforcement agents who conducted this raid wearing FBI insignia if this was an Anchorage Police Department action?

Alaska voters have established by ref-erendum that the personal possession of marijuana is legal under state law. But personal possession of marijuana re-mains a crime under federal law. State and federal law do not merely overlap in this instance; they are in direct conflict.

How then could the FBI and APD have lawfully and ethically conducted a joint enforcement action?

If FBI agents participated in this raid, will they use the evidence obtained in the investigation, charging or sentenc-ing of individuals who purchased mari-juana from ACDC?

The Alaska Department of Law has given public assurance that people who purchased pot from the businesses un-der indictment will not face charges (ADN 9/27/15, A-5).But the Depart-ment’s restatement of current law can only cover state actions.The US District Attorney’s Office has not—to my knowl-edge—offered an equivalent federal am-nesty.

Did APD conduct this raid in compli-ance with the spirit of Alaska law gov-erning the decriminalization of mari-juana? SWAT teams aren’t deployed for liquor license infractions. Why was a SWAT team necessary in this instance?

Under our constitutional systems—both state and federal—the use of force by government agents against citizens is only legitimate when it is exercised through clearly identified lines of au-thority and is proportionate to the harm being addressed. Whenever law enforce-ment deviates from these well-estab-lished requirements, the public deserves an explanation.

Alaskans are entitled to know what agencies were involved in this raid, why unidentified and misidentified agents conducted this raid and why these agents deployed with such extraordi-nary force. n

Kris Cassity holds a law degree and a master’s degree with an emphasis in pub-lic policy. Cassity has taught law at UAA’s Graduate School of Business and Public Policy and has provided legal representa-tion in constitutional cases in front of the Alaska Supreme Court, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the US Supreme Court.

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blotter.COMPILED BY BRENDAN JOEL KELLEY

THE DOG’S NOSE KNOWSOn Thursday, October 8, about 7:30 p.m., troopers in

Ketchikan spotted a blue Subaru parked in the fire lane at Safeway and pulled it over in the parking lot. The troopers deployed a K-9 named Lutri, and discovered the 25-year-old woman behind the wheel had crystal meth, prescrip-tion drugs that weren’t prescribed to her, and drug para-phernalia in the car. The 25-year-old male passenger was holding too, and was in violation of the conditions of his release by doing so. They’re in trouble.

MORE DRUGSTroopers did a welfare check on a woman sleeping in

her car in a parking lot off the Palmer/Wasilla Highway on Friday, October 10. Unsurprisingly, the 26-year-old Hous-ton woman was in possession of what we assume was more than one controlled substance (the troopers don’t always name the drug). She was charged with one count of third degree misconduct involving a controlled substance and another fourth degree charge of the same.

UNDERAGERSIn the Valley on Saturday, October 11, about 12:30 a.m.,

troopers responded to a REDDI, or Report Every Danger-ous Driver Immediately, report and found the 2003 Hum-mer H2 the caller had mentioned. The troopers “observed bad driving” and pulled over a 19-year-old Anchorage man. He only had a learner’s permit, was alone in the car, plus the young’un was high on the devil’s lettuce. It’s not legal for those under 21, and it’s not legal to drive high, as we remind everyone so often in this column. He was popped for a drug DUI, possession of over an ounce of weed by a person under the age of 21, and driving in violation of his permit

MEANWHILE, IN

DUTCH HARBOR…Categorized as

“Suspicious Person/Activ-ity,” on Sunday, October 27, a Dutch Harbor police of-ficer “moved misplaced traffic cones from a section of roadway.” Mischievous bastards …

About 9 on the morning of Monday, Septem-ber 28, a woman called Dutch Harbor police and told them she’d gotten a phone call from Jamaica from a dude who said he was with Publisher’s Clearing House. The caller clearly knew they show up at your door, not on a phone call from Jamaica, and told the man she was calling the police, at which point, she told the cops, he began to curse at her.

A caller told Dutch Harbor police a young man was kick-ing beer cans into Margaret Bay the evening of Wednes-day, September 30. Officers found the underage dude, and he confirmed he’d kicked a can in the water “because it seemed trashy for it to be on the ground in front of the Grand Aleutian Hotel.” The kid told cops he hadn’t drunk the beer or anything else alcoholic. Case closed.

A LITTLE TOO MUCH OF A TASTETwo guys, a couple, went to a wine tasting event on

Thursday, October 8 in Fairbanks. They got thrown out of the event because one of them was wasted and being loud and aggressive. He was pissed after being thrown out, and started throwing shit at his boyfriend on their drive home. Once they were home, he kept throwing things and said he was going to throw a big mirror at his obviously better

half. The sober half of the couple called their landlord and asked her to call the cops. The officers found the drunk asleep on the couch, stinking of booze, wasted and argumentative. He was arrested for fourth degree assault.

WHAT’S THE OPPOSITE OF DOMESTIC BLISS?Early on the morning of Saturday, October

10, troopers in Delta Junction got a call from a man saying his girlfriend had come home and at-tacked him. He was pissy with the troopers and told them they’d better show up before he took care of the situation himself. Turns out he’d told

his girlfriend he was in bed with another woman and she yanked the sheets off the bed and scratched his face—no word on if

there actually was another woman. She was arrested for fourth degree assault.

GETTING ANXIOUS JUST READING THISTroopers in Fairbanks showed up to a domestic

disturbance on the morning of Saturday, October 10. The husband told them that his wife had gone off her anxiety meds about a month earlier because she found out she was pregnant, and since then she’d had trouble controlling her anger. She was pissed about their dog chewing up a book the night before. They argued, and she bit him on the neck. Troopers found older bite marks and bruises on him as well. She admitted to the attacks and told troopers she “lashes out” due to her anxiety. She got popped for fourth degree assault.

THINK HE WAS HIGH?Cops in Fairbanks got a report of a man sleeping behind

the wheel of his red Camaro about 7 p.m. on Friday, Octo-ber 9. When they arrived, the 41-year-old driver was asleep with his foot on the brake and the engine running. He took a while to wake, and didn’t know what the hell was going on when he did. The police say he couldn’t keep his eyes open and told them he just wanted to sleep. His breath-al-cohol was 0.000, but he admitted he’d smoked and injected meth, and had taken Ativan, Seroquel, and Lithium. That’s a hell of a cocktail. He was arrested for DUI. n

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IN SEPTEMBER, Mi-chael Crites, owner of Absolutely Chronic Delivery

Company, a marijuana delivery service, was charged with five felonies after police officers purchased weed from him five times over the summer. ACDC, as the company is known, was shuttered. Now the company is making a comeback, intending to battle Anchorage’s Spice problem.

Last week’s Press cover story explored the reality of the dangerous synthetic drugs that are sprayed onto plant material like hemlock, and have made Anchorage into a poster city for the ill effects of Spice. Contrary to popular belief, calling Spice “synthetic marijuana” is bullshit. As contributing editor David Holt-house noted, “One cocktail popular with Spice traffickers is a mixture of cheap knock-offs of LSD, methamphetamine and PCP.” Espe-cially popular with the homeless population in Anchorage, Spice has sent some 500 people to the hospital, and accounted for one in 10 emergency trans-ports by the Anchor-age Fire Department from mid-July through September.

Nicole Criggler, who’s married to ACDC’s Crites, but wasn’t charged in the takedown, which also netted Alaska Canna-bis Club owner Charlene Egbe (aka “Charlo Greene”) and the own-ers of Discreet Deliveries, has her own plan to battle the Spice epidemic in Anchorage.

Starting on October 22, she’ll

trade four joints of high-grade marijuana

for any two joints of Spice, and then destroy the Spice.

“This is the only way we can figure as part of the community to try and address [the Spice problem],” Criggler told the Press last week. Criggler says ACDC is “back from the black,” as in back from the black market. As far as Criggler can tell, there’s nothing il-legal about trading weed for Spice—unless she’s found in possession of the Spice, which would net her a $500 misdemeanor ticket.

Criggler says she contacted Bean’s Café, site of many Spice-related 911 calls, to ask about offering the exchange to their clients, but “understandably they said they couldn’t have that on their property.” She also says she’s contacted the city to tell them about her plan, but hasn’t received a response.

ACDC will be getting the word out about the Spice exchange by passing out informa-tion about the dangers of Spice along with the number to call for the exchange at Darwin’s Theory (426 G Street) downtown on Satur-day, October 24 from noon until 2 p.m. The phone number for the Spice exchange is 336-

2232. Criggler says the exchange will be ongoing, with no set time that ACDC will stop making the exchanges.“We just want to basically deter

the Spice,” Criggler says. “Nothing’s happening to stop it, and this is the only

solution we can provide.” n

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Bagad New York was made possible with funding by Rasmuson Foundation, through the Harper Arts Touring Fund and is administered under contract by the Alaska State Council on the Arts.

NEWS BY BRENDAN JOEL KELLEY

Starting on October 22, she’ll trade four joints of high-grade marijuana for any two joints of Spice, and then destroy the Spice.

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REATING A MURAL takes more than paint alone.

In fact, painting might just be the easi-est part, says Anchorage artist Linda

Lyons. The bulk of the work is the preparation: finding the perfect de-

sign, mapping the surface of the wall, projecting the image onto its oversized

canvas and mixing all the right colors. The finished product is part planning, part passion and part physical labor.

Lyons has worked on murals before. She’s traveled the state through the Alaska State Council on the Art’s Artist in Schools Program, and she’s led collaborative projects with children at the Laugviik School in Kobuk, the Kingikmiut School in Wales and the Gambell School, among others. Her work hangs in permanent collections and public buildings around Alaska. Up until a few weeks ago, though, she’d never created a full-scale mural of her own.

Check that one off the list. Lyons added another piece to her portfolio last month, splashing a full-size mural across the eastern wall of the Hispanic Cultural Center in Moun-tain View.

“I just wanted to give back and have some connection to the community,” said Lyons, sitting in her studio a few blocks away. “I wanted something that was uplifting.”

Her mural came to life during a week of sunny weather in the middle of a month of rain.

Before, the cultural center wall was painted pale beige. Now, two large hummingbirds hover over a bright orange flower. Shades of green give way to a pool of aqua, rolling golden hills and a variegated lavender sky. The painting is an oasis of color on the Mountain View street corner.

The Hispanic Cultural Center itself is an aging, well-used building, home to a regular food pantry and daily AA meet-ings. It sits on the east end of Mountain View’s commercial cor-ridor, where it’s hemmed in by a pawn shop, a church, a transi-tional living facility and a new affordable housing project. The sidewalk out front is traveled by people walking to the bus stop, the Holiday gas station, Red Apple and Brown Jug.

Painting the side of the two-story structure had some chal-lenges, Lyons said. One part of the wall protrudes from the rest. The bottom is cinderblock and the top is plaster. The mu-ral design also had to fit around a light, a satellite dish and a

window.“Everything had to be placed perfectly,” Lyons said.To transfer her design from canvas to cultural center, she

drew the flower and the hummingbirds then used a projec-tor to enlarge the images on her studio wall and create giant stencils. Using a computer, a grid was placed over a digital photo of the cultural center wall, and the design was copy-and-pasted to scale.

“So now I have this image – I have a grid – so I knew where everything is and how big it had to be,” Lyons explained. “By placing those elements on to the picture of wall with the grid, you could make it fit.”

Graham Dane—Lyons’ husband, fellow artist and studio-mate—helped throughout the process, she says.

When the design was ready and the weather was right, they covered the face of the wall with scaffolding and a snap-line

grid, using the stencils to trace the main elements of the mu-ral and outlining the background using the computer-gener-ated measurements. Then came the color.

Lyons spent days on the scaffolding, filling the walls with layers of blue and green and tangerine. One man brought her dinner, and passersby stopped to watch her while she worked. Some people would yell “Good job!” from the sidewalk; oth-ers would offer a thumb’s up from across the street.

“One guy told us that he had been watching out for the mu-ral, and had put the word out not to disrespect the art,” she said.

Nobody disrespected the art: Things like that really touched

her. Mountain View holds a special place in her heart, she says. She wanted to make a mural that fit the neighborhood around it.

From the new housing development across the street, Dana Andrews has a direct line of sight to the repainted Hispanic Cultural Center wall. He watched the mural take shape in passing; work takes up most of his days. And while he says he doesn’t know much about art, he knows about chess, which gives him an appreciation for things that take patience and time. The mural across the street looks like it required both.

“I think you have to be very creative to do that,” he said. Lyons’ work is shaped by the world around her.Raised in Anchorage with roots in Kodiak, she received a

degree from Whitman College in Washington and spent 18 years living in Chile, where she studied at the Escuela de Bel-las Artes de Vina del Mar. Her artistic career runs the gamut.

Her dreamy, ethereal landscape paintings and stark, vivid photographs have appeared everywhere from the Anchorage Museum, the International Gallery of Contemporary Art and Out North to Stephan’s Fine Art Gallery, the Bunnell Art Center in Homer and the Wells Street Art Center in Fairbanks. She’s taught art at the University of Alaska Anchorage, Juneau’s Canvas Community Art Center, the Anchorage Museum, grade schools around the state and her own studio in Moun-tain View.

Lyons’ work has taken her to the far corners of Alaska, the Lower 48 and Europe: She’s completed artist residen-cies at the Stikine River Bird Festival in Wrangell, De-nali National Park, Munich, Germany and Santa Fe, New Mexico. While she finds inspiration in travel, Mountain

View has served as her home base for about three years now.Her studio is tucked into the back corner of a commercial

building across from Clark Middle School. She shares the suite of studios with a handful of other artists, including Alaska Native maskmakers Perry Eaton and Drew Michael. Adjacent to the parking lot is an empty lot; on the other side of the building, Alaska Regional Hospital is preparing to open a new primary care clinic.

The inside of the workspace Lyons shares with her husband is cozy and inviting. The paintings that line the walls depict tranquil landscapes in soothing, subtle palettes, and a deep, soft couch is pushed against the wall. The studio hosts regu-


lar open gallery events, classes and a stream of original work. Here, Lyons feels at home.

“I spend a lot of time walking around Moun-tain View,” she said. “It almost feels like I’m in a different little town; I’m in a distinct com-munity.”

She leases the studio space from the An-chorage Community Land Trust, the non-profit community development organization that owns the building. When she told ACLT she was interested in pursuing some kind of neighborhood art project, the organization began looking for money to make it happen, ultimately receiving a $10,000 grant from the Atwood Foundation. Lyons says she painted the mural for less than half the cost of similar projects—the work on the Hispanic Cultural Center was a true labor of love.

A summer artist residency at the Santa Fe Art Institute set the mural timeline back a few months. Lyons made plans to paint in Sep-tember. She knew time would be tight.

“People were saying, ‘Are you sure? The weather’s gonna turn on you,’” she said.

But working on the painting crew for the feature film Big Miracle taught her a thing or two about painting outdoors. They’d painted exterior sets while the snow flew. Lyons knew it could be done, as long as your paint didn’t freeze and you were dressed well. And if you could avoid rain long enough to put paint on the wall, it would dry quickly and the mural would be unharmed.

Thinking about the design took time. Lyons looked through some of her older paintings and found a lot of flowers and birds—images that seemed to disappear in her more recent work. The summer spent in Santa Fe provided its own inspiration.

In New Mexico, the rock formations and thunderstorms were a stark contrast to the familiar Alaska landscape. Santa Fe was filled with hummingbirds. One day, Lyons paid a visit to Ghost Ranch, Georgia O’Keeffe’s sum-mer home. There, she was hiking through the desert when a lone hummingbird appeared out of nowhere and seemed to hover over her head.

“So I thought that was a sign,” Lyons said.Alaska has a hummingbird of its own, she

learned.The rufous hummingbird is known for its

vast migration, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. While the bird’s body weighs only a few grams—less than two pen-nies—it flies from its wintering grounds in Mexico and the southern United States to breeding grounds in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Canada and southern Alaska. It breeds further north than any other hummingbird, and it travels farther than many birds 10 times its size.

Fueling the marathon journey takes a com-bination of food sources. The diminutive ru-fous depends on plant nectar, small insects

and wells drilled in trees. Over the course of a year, the bird pollinates flowers across state lines and thousands of miles of terrain, play-ing an important role in plant reproduction, according to the USFWS. The rufous’ young learn to fly within 15 days of birth.

The birds are golden bronze. Both males and females have a white spot behind their eye, and the male birds have a vibrant copper or green throat patch. Lyons used the hum-mingbirds as inspiration for her Mountain View mural.

They were some of the first things Janell Moody noticed as she walked by the com-pleted mural one rainy Sunday afternoon. Living in Mountain View, Moody goes by the cultural center often. She noticed the scaf-folding cover the eastern wall last month. The next time she passed, the scaffolding was down and the artists were posing for pictures in front of the giant painting. The excitement was contagious.

The mural adds a pop of color to a some-times-dreary stretch of road, Moody says.

“I think it’s friggin’ beautiful,” she said, stepping back from the sidewalk to admire the scene. “It reminds me of my hometown; Tucson, Arizona.”

The browns and reds and purples remind her of the desert, and the orange flower with the skinny, spiked petals reminds her of palm trees and the south. She misses that place, she says, and she’s doing everything she can to get back. In a way, the mural is like a portal to home.

“It just looks so friendly,” she said. “When it’s snowing outside, it’s going to look amazing. It’s go-ing to stick out. People will look at it and get a warm feeling.”

That’s exactly what Ly-ons hoped to do.

She says she imagined the mural as something stimulating, yet calming and meditative—some-thing that would have the same effect on the neighborhood around it. She plans on staying and working in Mountain View well into the future, and she says she hopes to create even more pub-lic art for the spaces that surround her.

“I just love it here,” she said.

Paint may fade with time, but creativity and a passion for place can leave an indelible mark. n


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SUMMER’S HEAT BRINGS HIGH WATER to the Chickaloon River as its eponymous source glacier un-leashes thousands of gallons of milky grey water. In au-

tumn, glacial melt subsides and the Chickaloon becomes an enchanting, translucent turquoise. Lower water also makes the river easier and more accessible for human-powered trav-ellers, so fall is the best time to visit for most paddlers.

Historically, the Chickaloon was either difficult or quite expensive to access. River pioneer Chuck Spaulding, who owns the NOVA raft outfitter, used to haul in boats on horse-back. Rafters and kayakers flew in to the gravel strip about thirty miles upstream from the Matanuska.

You can still fly in to the Chickaloon with Last Frontier Air Service (helicopter) or Mike Meekins (wheel plane). But pay-ing for the fly-in and waiting for flying weather is no longer necessary: The Chickaloon is quite accessible for packrafters, particularly in the autumn. While summertime high water creates turbulent, pushy whitewater, autumn’s low water is perfect for packrafts, and the wider gravel bars make up-stream travel easier.

There are multiple routes into the Chickaloon. Local ex-plorer Brad Meiklejohn details a scenic route (see packrafting.org for details) that starts in the Kings River drainage and crosses into the Chickaloon at Moss Creek. Alternatively, it is possible to walk all the way up Caribou Creek and cross over the ridge at Glass Creek, a route some of NOVA’s clients still walk before meeting up with rafts that have been air dropped. Finally, you can simply walk up the river valley on an exten-sive network of ATV, foot, and game trails. Time availability, weather, and snow conditions can dictate your route choice: When there’s snow in the high country, it’s probably expedi-ent to walk up the valley. Prior to snow, the routes from Kings River or Caribou Creek have expansive views in the alpine, though the Caribou Creek Route is likely to take longer.

The valley route is simplest. Turn left off the Glenn High-way just before the Chickaloon River bridge, approximately an hour-and-a-half from Anchorage. After a couple of miles, the pavement ends near a significant ledge rapid and a cabin. This ledge is the largest rapid of the lower river, and a good place to gauge water level. If the water is flowing through a gap in the rock and creates a tongue, and the rocks on river

right are above water, the river will be Class II to III, and the ledge rapid is innocuous. However, if the ledge rapid is a boil-ing, recirculating hole, then the rapids upstream will be much pushier and the ledge poses a significant risk of trapping un-lucky paddlers. In general, the color and volume of the water will coincide: Clear to turquoise water usually means low vol-ume, and opaque grey or brown colors mean the water is high.

After scouting this lower rapid, take a slight right past the cabin onto a potholed dirt road. This road eventually turns into an ATV trail and then a footpath, passing by the prop-erties of unusually irritable landowners en route toward the Chickaloon’s headwaters.

Under Alaska law, rivers and their gravel bars (areas be-low the high water line) are public property, and paddlers have every right to be there. However, some residents of the Chickaloon River area have a problem with other people, and may harass paddlers. Just be aware you have the right to be on public roads (such as the route upstream), on the river it-self, on the river’s gravel bars, and on public lands a relatively short distance upstream of where the pavement ends.

Since the road gradually tapers into an ATV trail, it can be tempting to keep driving. However, the rutted, potholed road is hardly faster to drive than walk, so you might as well park at the pull out a couple of hundred yards past the cabin. Alternatively, you can park in the public right of way farther downstream, such as by the old covered bridge adjacent to the road. After finding a place to leave the car, follow the road/ATV trail upstream. It forks in a couple places where private driveways clearly are marked with “No Trespassing” signs: Simply continue on the main (public) road, ignoring

“No Trespassing” signs that have no authority to deter passage on it. After a few miles, the trail forks, with one trail head-ing downstream and the other turning abruptly uphill. Either

route is passable. The down-stream route leads to a river-level route with cobble bar hopping before the trail reenters the woods. Or the uphill ATV track leads to an old cabin and the end of the double track. From the cabin, continue upstream following large game trails at approximately the same elevation. These continue for a half mile or so before descending and meeting the ATV trail.

After crossing a tributary that descends from Castle Mountain, the ATV trail climbs several hundred feet away from the river, and feels like it might be going the wrong way. It isn’t: The trail is avoiding a two-mile canyon along the river, and

takes a path of less resistance up on a high bench with de-lightful tundra and forested glades. From this high bench, the bands of rock and spires of Castle Mountain are visible to your left. After about a mile-and-a-half of walking on this bench, a very well-established foot and pack trail descends to the right while the ATV trail goes left. The correct route up-river is on the foot trail, while the ATV trail peters out a few hundred yards later. From this point on, the route up-river follows a highly popular game trail that enjoys intermittent human maintenance. The USGS topographic map locates the route of the actual trail with impressive precision.

After leaving the ATV trail, this foot path descends to the river, crosses Doone Creek, and then ascends and descends steeply again. After the second trail descent, the trail is very close to an unusual rock formation that, as far as I know, is unparalleled in our region. The point is near a location known as “Ninety-Eight Bridge” on the USGS topographic map. Here, the Chickaloon River passes through a deep, un-dercut gorge whose opposing rock walls lean over the water and come within about ten feet of touching one another. They are so close to each other that a fallen tree straddles the void. Huge rocks and a cluster of logs clog the right side of the river downstream. This remarkable canyon is worth a visit regardless of one’s interest in paddling, and has plenty of good camping nearby. It is close enough to the road to make a logical day trip put in—these eight or so miles take about six hours total to walk in and float out, if you are moving at a leisurely but steady pace.

Paddlers planning on an overnight can keep heading up-stream to earn views, because the valley changes radically in the next few miles. Fortunately, the trail continues to make for easy walking, mostly through the woods with occasional stints on small sloughs or riverside gravel bars. Not far past the gorge, a massive rock tower comes more clearly into view. This sheer face with twin buttresses is marked as Point 5504 on the map. There is a wide gravel bar padded with Alaska cotton where Fourteen Mile creek flows into the Chickaloon. The nearby rock tower looms over the gravel bar and provides a setting worthy of aspiring Romantic painters, and a nice camp site. Most of the rapids are downstream and 14 miles upriver is a reasonable day’s walk for a weekend paddle trip in the fall.

It doesn’t take nearly as long to paddle out. The current moves quickly, first through Class I and II gravel bars as the creek gradually compresses. After a few miles, the Chickaloon goes through its first significant rapid, a hundred yard long or so boulder garden (Class III at low water, probably Class III+ or IV at higher summer flows). Entertaining paddling contin-ues from the boulder garden down to the overhanging gorge at Eight Mile. Scout this canyon before running it, as wood can obstruct the entire outlet of the gorge, where two large rocks catch many river-borne trees during flood. The small informal trail up to the gorge’s rim also provides birds eye views of paddlers passing through the amphitheater below.

The river continues through a less vertical canyon below the gorge, with more rapids that are mostly Class II. Boul-der Creek is the final major tributary to enter the Chickaloon, and enters from the left where the Chickaloon flows around a massive boulder. It is only four miles or so from Boulder down to the road. Paddlers who hiked in from Kings River may wish to float down the Matanuska back to their car.

The Chickaloon River is a magical place in the fall. In Sep-tember, blazing yellows and oranges light up the river valley and dance on the turquoise water. In October, snows often blanket the mountainsides even while the valley provides easy walking for paddlers. If you want to explore one of the Talkeetnas’ great rivers, take a fall trip to the Chickaloon. n

HEADLAMP BY ZACH FIELDS

If you want to explore one of the Talkeetnas’ great rivers, take a fall trip to the Chickaloon.

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THE FIRST AND MOST IMPORTANT job of pub grub is simple: provide a solid foundation for the consumption of alcohol.

But in Anchorage there are those exceptional drinking establishments that, while remaining first and foremost pur-veyors of alcoholic beverages, also offer culinary options that far surpass the bar food standard of various unimaginative permutations of grease and starch.

Midnight Sun Brewing Company is one such establish-ment. While inconsistent, its menu offers more than enough delightful selections to make a trip to the relaxed-atmosphere brewery’s dining loft worth it for the food alone, with the award-winning, crafted-on-the-premises beers a welcome bonus.

Among a solid line-up of sharing plates, the best standard item is the bruschetta, which comes in five varieties and is priced at $9 for five portions of one kind, or $13 for a combo platter of three portions each of three different varieties. By all means, splurge for the three of three kinds. That’s an easy call. Then comes the tougher decision: which three kinds of bruschetta to go with.

This reviewer recommends earthy, smoked, and spicy, a trifecta of deliciousness. Earthy is a mix of avocado, roast-ed mushrooms, onions and red peppers, with a goat cheese mousse, tossed in truffle oil. It’s subtle but amazing. The smoky bruschetta topping is gourmet smoked salmon dip and creamy smoked salmon mousse with roasted shallots and capers sprinkled with dill. Fish on. Rounding out this delectable trio is the spicy, a bright and powerful combina-tion of adobada pulled pork, marinated Mexican taco truck style and blended with southwest slaw, chipotle mayo, topped with a smattering of “green heat” peppers.

The other two bruschetta options, BLT and fresh, aren’t bad. They’re just not as good. The same chipotle mayo that holds its fiery own with the adobada pork in the spicy top-ping overpowers the pecanwood-smoked bacon and arugula in the BLT, and the fresh grouping of mozzarella, tomatoes and pesto is solid but unimaginative by comparison (though it’s also the only topping resembling classic bruschetta).

All the bruschetta options are served on the same toasted baguette rounds, which is fine. With such complex flavors in the toppings there’s no apparent need to get fancy with bread pairings.

Other sharing plates include bountiful, no-frills cheese and meat plates at $14 each, and off-the-hook dip that var-ies daily. On a recent Monday afternoon it was warm goat cheese blended with fig compote and topped with crunchy prosciutto ($10). It wasn’t the most inventive dip in town, but it wasn’t trying to be, and the ingredients were of high quality.

The soft pretzel sticks ($6) served with a choice of whole grain beer-mustard, mixed berry, or creamy beer-cheese dip-ping sauces, are perfectly fine but overpriced at three bucks each because, come on, they’re pretzel sticks.

Also solid but pricey enough to give a cost-conscious diner

pause is the ancho beef dip sandwich. Slices of slow-roast-ed, ancho chile-rubbed tri-tip are stacked on a baguette and served with the obligatory au jus and horseradish for a base price of $15, but if you desire the op-tional slice of provolone cheese for an extra buck, and the roasted onions and mushrooms for an extra two, plus a sal-ad or soup substituted for potato chips, you’re ringing $21 for a sandwich and a side salad. It’s a tasty sandwich, but not that tasty.

The cashew chicken salad ($13 for an entrée size) is a better value. It’s a plate loaded with purple cabbage, romaine lettuce, shredded carrots, and cashews tossed in a house-made cilantro lime dressing and a generous helping of sliced chicken that tasted fresher and had a firmer texture than is typical for Anchorage restaurants.

Ironically, the only unpleasant item on the Midnight Sun Brewing Company menu is the brewery’s cheddar-ale soup ($6 cup, $10 bowl), which melts white cheddar cheese into the brewery’s Kodiak Brown Ale. The result is a bitter, thin gruel that cannot be salvaged by any of the optional stir-ins (garlic croutons, broccoli, chorizo or bacon).

Far superior to the beer soup is the brewery’s variation on Dublin coddle ($6/$10), a regular in the brewery’s daily spe-cials rotation. This age-old Irish comfort food is so named for a long, slow simmering, or “coddling” of the stew. There’s a saying that there are as many recipes for Dublin coddle

as there are pubs in Dublin, but the Midnight Sun Brewing Company has a fantastic one. It’s a dark and smoky bowl of magic, with hearty chunks of sausage, potatoes and onions,

an ideal cold weather dish.In addition to beer, the Midnight

Sun Brewing Company also serves two flavors of non-alcoholic house-made sodas daily ($3 for a pint). The lemon fizz in particular is lovely: 16 ounces of not-too-sweet, not-too-tart effervescent citrusy awesome-ness.

Located on Dimond Hook Drive in the industrial zone just northeast of the Abbott Road to Dimond Bou-levard S curve, the Midnight Sun

Brewing Company does not take reservations and is often packed after work up to its 8 p.m. closing time. It’s not a place to go if you’re in a hurry. It can take a while to get a table, and the service borders on lackadaisical, even when some tables are empty. Two recent visits yielded an average wait time for a check for 20 minutes.

But relax, because there’s an app for that. It’s called beer. n

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It’s a dark and smoky bowl of magic, with hearty chunks of sausage, potatoes and onions, an ideal cold weather dish.

RESTAURANT REVIEW BY DAVID HOLTHOUSE

Midnight Sun Brewing CompanyOpen daily 11 a.m. – 8 p.m.

8111 Dimond Hook Drive344-1179 | midnightsunbrewing.com

WELCOMEAFN DELEGATES!

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KaraoKeAlAskA NAtive OwNed ANd OperAted


Tips for Spending Your PFDBy Katelynn Sortino

I WAS AT A WORK-RELATED semi-nar in the Westmark downtown and before the meetings started, I wan-

dered the lobby and a trifold in a small display of rack cards caught my atten-tion. Another brewery is coming to An-chorage; Quake Brewing Company has announced plans to set up shop on west Tudor Road. Are you as excited as I am?

According to owner and founder Danyelle Kimp, leaving the Army as a captain in Human Resources helped push him beyond a homebrew habit into something bigger. “Retirement made me decide to go commercial. I didn’t want to do HR anymore. I had some money saved up. I thought that I liked to brew my own beer, why not buy my own brewery?” says Kimp.

Friends and co-workers were a big inspiration. “I brought my homebrew to work in bottles. I shared it with peo-ple I hang out with. The people down the hall, my friends, they all said ‘this stuff’s good. It’s commercial grade.’ I said ‘okay, cool, that’s the stuff. Maybe I can make a go of this thing,’” he says.

Kimp put together a business plan. He paid off all his bills, and five years ago he quit smoking. “I did it cold turkey. I used that as a baseline. If I can quit smoking, I can make a good brewery; it’s the same discipline,” says Kimp. “It happened in late March this year. I’m as resolved as I was when I quit smoking.”

Kimp’s beer-loving roots ex-tend back to college days when he attended Jackson State University in Mississippi. He was in a band. He was drinking a lot of Budweiser and Bud Light. A friend of his introduced him to craft beer and he never turned back.

“A class leader in a military course introduced me to Magic Hat #9,” says Kimp. Magic Hat Brewing Company is a Vermont brewery that’s highly re-spected in the craft brewing industry. They call their beers elixirs. I know Magic Hat well and am not surprised Kemp was hooked.

“Man, it was just different from any-thing else I’ve ever had. First, it wasn’t cheap. Wow. back then, it was the most I’d ever paid for beer. I tasted it and it was just awesome. I thought, ‘dang, what have I been missing?’” he says.

Kimp had the same epiphany most bland beer converts experi-ence. “I went on to trying differ-ent beers. Budweiser hooked the

American blue collar worker up. I get it. They serve a purpose, but craft beer is a whole new world. It was more about the emotion of discovering good beer. It was eye opening. My pupils dilated,” says Kimp of his experience. He chased good beer and went on to homebrewing.

“When I got up here to Alaska, I saw what a whole different wonderful beer world there was. I went to Glacier, the Goose, Midnight Sun, Resolution and others. This is awesome; I wanted to try my hand at it,” he says.

In particular, Resolution Brewing Company’s opening earlier this year in Mountain View inspired Kimp, and Resolution’s Brandon Hall helped nudge Kimp along. “Brandon is my beer mentor. That brewery had success. I can have success. I don’t have to be big,” he said, comparing the Mountain View upstart to his own aspirations.

Kimp originally thought he might get into music management and even start-ed Double Octave Productions. “I al-ways wanted to play, produce and write music and make a career of it. The cost to reproduce music went through the roof. It would have been a trillion times harder as a producer and composer,” he admits. Instead, he applied the same acumen to brewing.

“Once I started brewing, I did the same analysis,” says Kimp. “What’s the cost to produce beer? What’s it going to take to have a brewery?” he mused. In the end, he hopes his vision will sustain him. “If people drink QUAKE! beer, they’ll literally be drinking my music. I’ve got a pretty good approximation of how my art translates into beer,” he says.

I wondered about the QUAKE! name, although I suspected the obvious con-nection to Alaska. “Sure, it’s all about that,” says Kimp. “Actually, it was my wife Keiva who came up with it. I told her I just couldn’t think of anything that connected the brewery to something lo-cal. She said to just call it QUAKE!, and although I didn’t think much of it at the time, it stuck. I slept on it and when I woke up I thought ‘that is it.’”

Kimp couldn’t put a finger on any particular brewery mantra or how that might shape the resulting beers. He stumbled around the question a little bit. “I don’t think it’s the beer that brings people in,” he says. “I want a cul-ture. It’s QUAKE!. It’s me.”

Still something did push through in our conversation. “I’m really proud of one of my beers. It’s Magnitude Stout. It’s a roasted pecan stout,” Kimp re-vealed while he was making a sweet po-tato ale. “I’m bringing a southern flair to these particular ales. I respect every-thing my brothers and sisters are doing

here in Alaska, but my beer will be a direct interpretation of who I am,” he says.

Kimp wanted to start off with a brewpub to meld his passion for beer and his wife’s passion for stuffed burgers. Monetary con-straints kept him from chasing the more expensive brewery pub license. He’ll bank on food trucks stopping by, but really wants to feature flavored popcorn in the brewery. “I want to do butter, white cheddar, ranch, caramel and chocolate drizzle popcorn. That’s for now while I get my brewery on line,” he says. “I’m looking for the

ultimate flavor combinations in the ul-timate hang out,” he says.

Kimp’s a long way off from pouring beer. He’s sourcing his 10-barrel brew system from Portland’s Kettleworks, and sourcing equipment and pouring are polar entities when it comes to put-ting a brewery together. He’s secured a location on west Tudor Road on the right hand side heading west between C Street and Arctic Boulevard. Kemp’s using crowdsourcing to help fund the brewery and looking at an early 2016 opening date, enjoying the game so far. “I like the chase, you know?” he says. Getting things kicked off is what he’s fo-cused on. “I just need to make good-ass beer. I got to fit in where I fit in,” he says, adding “that’s a Mississippi phrase.” n

“I quit smoking five years ago. I did it cold turkey. I used that as a baseline. If I can quit smoking, I can make a good brewery; it’s the same discipline,” says Kemp.

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WE HAVE PUT AWAY the garden for the year, dug up every last potato, cut the heads off all the cabbage, and

alas, made freezer poultry out of every single chicken. And now that we’ve got some good wintertime foods stocked away, I’m feeling the need for a wine that matches up, some-thing hearty and familiar that plays nice with comfort foods. Fitting the bill like no other: a good bottle of bordeaux.

If you haven’t had a wine from the Bor-deaux region of France, well, you’ve likely heard of it at least. And you may equate it with expensive, stuffy wines meant for rich, stuffy people. To some extent, that reputation is deserved. Think of it as the Laurence Ol-ivier of wine: eminently traditional, beloved by the British, and sometimes more than a little bit pompous. Historically, it helped the region’s reputation by having ports easily ac-cessed by British ships, and also by the fact that the traditional cuisine of Bordeaux is rather unadorned fare much like what Brits were used to eating: lamb, potatoes, cabbage. That the wine could, in the right years, be staggeringly good didn’t hurt either!

The wines are virtually always a blend of different types of grapes, most typical using merlot, cabernet sauvignon, and other minor players in varying proportions. The art of the blend is in finding the balance between the various component grapes—a little cabernet for tannic sturdiness, a good dose of merlot for that yummy, fleshy mid-palate, and a dash of this and that for aromatic flourish. In a way it’s like carpentry (granted, carpentry as a wine geek understands it): cabernet for the framing, merlot for the walls, and those other grapes adding all the little touches that make a house a home. Now doesn’t that just sound lovely? Yes indeed. And with that, I give you three lovely wines from Bordeaux, ready for your table and what comforts you may find there.

FEELING SAUCY: CHÂTEAU BOUTISSE, SAINT-EMILION GRAND CRU

Talk about dressed to impress! From the fresh berries more or less bursting out of the bottle, to the tingly afterglow full of sweet lit-tle nothings on the finish, this wine is practi-cally a blueprint for how to make the winter dark bearable. Give me some choice cuts of

medium-rare steak with béarnaise sauce and a few bottles of this, and I see very little argu-ment for leaving the house until ski season. And yes, it’s pricey, but c’mon, just think how much money you’re not spending on sun-screen these days. Costs about $30.

ME SO HAPPY: CHÂTEAU RECOUGNE, BORDEAUX SUPÉRIEUR

If you’ve never had a bottle of Bordeaux before, start here; and if you have, try this anyway. Beautiful aromas and soothing fla-vors, yes, but this wine has deeper, more vital flavors in store than that. It works the most magical trick on bad moods darn nearly ev-ery single time, as my partner can attest. Try it yourself: next time your BFF is all pouty, pour them a glass of this, stand back and watch as that frown turns upside down. It normally only takes a few seconds, which as far as I’m concerned makes Château Re-cougne one of the more effective and eco-nomical mind-altering substances I’ve come across in my day (and I’ve shopped around, believe you me). If that doesn’t convince you, consider that it is poured at Crush Wine Bistro, at Paris Bakery, and who knows how many other houses and apartment building potlucks around town. And what a perfect combination with some of my fave midwest-ern-style potluck food: mashed potatoes and meatloaf with caramelized onions. Oh man, I can feel the smiles coming on already ... Costs about $20.

NOSING INTO FIRST: CHÂTEAU LYONNAT, LUSSAC ST.-EMILION

If you haven’t noticed by now, Bordeaux doesn’t exactly go in for originality when it comes to names, as darn near every bottle is from Château Someone-or-Another. Luckily, the juice inside a bottle from Château Lyon-nat is distinctive enough on its own. One of the very best moments with this wine is when I first pop the cork, because I am instantly awash with the most gorgeously perfumed and sharply etched aromas: fresh plums as if just plucked from a fruit-laden limb, the sweet, dusty scent of fresh-hewn floorboards, and finally the gutsy vigor of coffee freshly brewed in the next room. Really, while many bordeaux can have a very pleasant flavor, it’s the nose on this one that sets it apart and makes it worth savoring. Costs about $27. n

WINE REVIEW BY MATT IVERSON


[[HED]] Donuts as Art[[DEK]] Anchorage’s art scene moves south[[BY]] Food review by Zack Fields[[PQ]]With donut varieties ranging from German chocolate to cherry glaze to

maple bar to apple fritter to coconut to traditional glazed crullers, ordering just one or two donuts seems imprudent.

[[CUT]] Dino’s doesn’t confine art to First Fridays[[CREDIT]] Restaurant Review by Zack Fields[[infobox]]Dino’s Donuts929 E. 81st Ave.(907) 562-3466 PENN & TELLER

November 6 & 7 // 7:30pm // Atwood Concert Hall

Redefining the Genre of Magic

Anchorage Press 10/22/15

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Transcript of Anchorage Press 10/22/15