That's Lady Bunny, Honey

by Bryan James Whitley

Legendary drag queen, film star and DJ Lady Bunny returns to Buffalo this weekend for Summer in the City 2007: A Benefit for Pride Center of WNY. From her early days in Atlanta performing with RuPaul, Mr. Charlie Brown, and a host of others, to her meteoric rise to fame in the “Big Apple,” Lady Bunny has kept audiences entertained for more than 20 years.

This letter is response to the proposed ballot initiative that would end the winner-take-all apportionment of California’s large number of Electoral College votes.

by Chuck Shepherd

■ East Dublin, Ga. (in July), and Athens, Texas (in August), sponsored their own versions of Redneck Games, with events such as mud-pit belly-flopping, seed-spitting and making armpit music (Georgia), as well as (in Texas) “red-neck horseshoes” (played with toilet seats), a Spam-and-jalapeno-eating contest, a mattress chuck, men bobbing for raw animal parts in tomato paste, and the ever-popular coed butt crack contest. Wrote the San Antonio Express-News: “There was something strangely arresting about watching 10 serious-faced guys grind away at pink bricks of Spam while Steppenwolf’s ‘Born to Be Wild’ boomed from the loudspeakers.”

by Rob Brezsny

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Are you ready to leave the past behind, drop all your assumptions, welcome the return of your innocence, adopt a beginner’s mind, and start fresh everywhere? I hope so, because that’s what the universe will be nudging you to do. Here are some words of wisdom to incite you and arouse you. (1) “You don’t know what you can get away with until you try.” ~Colin Powell. (2) “Never underestimate your power to change yourself.” ~H. Jackson Brown, Jr. (3) “If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door.” ~my friend Lucy Spinner. (4) “God calls you to the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” ~Frederick Buechner.

Requiem for a House

by Doug Levy

The property that once stood at 399 Franklin Street is no more. It was demolished late in July; all that exists in its place now is a flat gravel expanse, the site development in anticipation of the addition that will be built onto the adjacent building at 401 Franklin, a printing company.

It's Not Easy Being Green

by Peter Koch

Or is it? Talking frogs aside, it all depends on who you ask. If you ask Buffalo, with its shabby recycling rate—6.5 percent at latest count—compared to the national average of 32 percent, being green is tough. The highest recycling rate ever achieved here was 14 percent in the mid 1990s, but that number’s been steadily sliding ever since, prompting city officials to seek recycling incentives. The upshot of that are the current talks with Recyclebank, a Pennsylvania-based company whose program credits recyclers with cash that can be used to redeem discount coupons for stores like IKEA and Starbucks. The city has the power to impose fines on residents who don’t recycle, a system that has worked well in the Village of Hamburg, but it has never done so. Instead, Buffalo has struggled in vain to engrain environmental awareness and the positive economics of recycling on its residents. According to the city’s Web site, “increasing our recycling rate by a mere 1 percent will bring an additional $72,000 into the city coffers.”

Raise High the Bar: Sea Bar

by Marla Baykan

Mike Andrzejewski has made a name for himself. He brings artistic talent, longevity and not least humility to an industry marred by mediocrity, trend and vanity. Through the years you may have experienced his food, dining at Oliver’s, Warren’s, Rue Franklin and Tsunami. Whether it is classical French, American contemporary or Asian fusion, people just love his food. And now he is back, and the wait is over for many of his fans. He offers us Sea Bar, located on Main Street in the village of Williamsville.

Green Street

by Peter Koch

When the Elmwood Avenue Festival of the Arts (EAFA) was first conceived of eight years ago, its main goal was to be a more locally focused alternative to the Allentown Art Festival, with cheaper booth prices for artists and greater accessibility. While all of that is still true, EAFA has come of age since then. It’s achieved the numbers—180 artists, 40 community organizations, more than 40 musicians, bands and dance troupes, tens of thousands of visitors annually—that prove that it’s no fly-by-night operation, and is now refocusing its energies to build on the features and highlights that have made it a truly one-of-a-kind festival. EAFA itself has become such a high-profile entity that it’s now being used, in a positive way, to make political and environmental statements, as evidenced on the festival’s Web site. There it states, “Art cannot thrive, because we can’t, in an environment that is sick or a community without peace.”

by M. Faust

Don't You Buy No Ugly Truck

by Jim Corbran

Used to be a time the only people who bought pickup trucks were those who needed them. You know, farmers, highway departments. Then something happened to make everybody and his brother (and sister!) want to drive a pickup truck as their everyday vehicle. All of a sudden, Ford’s F-150 pickup truck was America’s top-selling vehicle. And instead of ending up in the scrap heap after a long and illustrious career helping some painter haul his equipment around for maybe ten years, these things were being traded in after three or four years of running around town with nary a scratch in their virgin beds.

A year after we broke up, I’m still trying to get back CDs and books from my ex. The worst part is, as a result I’m reluctant to mix my CDs and books with my current girlfriend’s collection. She doesn’t say anything, but I know it bothers her. What can I do—about my lost CDs and my current girlfriend? —Lo Fidelity