Mendocino County Today: Monday, Oct 27, 2014

• Next AVHC Board Meeting
• Giants Win Game 5
• 3rd District Candidates
• Hooked
• 48 Hills
• Catch of the Day
• Postgame Celebrations
• Online Shopping
• Elvis's Pills
• Boyish Figure
• Poem in October
• Clock People

A READER WRITES: "Although the Health Center web site still carries the unchanged information about regular meeting dates (fourth Monday, 5:30, AVHC, open to the public), at the Community Meeting board president Ric Bonner announced the next meeting of the Board of Directors would be at the Health Center at 5:30 on Tuesday, Oct. 28th. I have heard nothing further and have no information on any possible agenda, or on what has happened with staff or program in the meantime, but will send you anything I get between now and then. You may wish to ask directors for yourself: Ric Bonner; Sandy Parker; Eric Labowitz; JR Collins; Gaile Wakeman; Wally Hopkins; Kathy Cox; Claudia Jimenez; Yadira Mendoza, Lynne Sawyer."

MASTERFUL MADISON BUMGARNER shuts out Royals as Giants cruise to 5-0 win to take a 3-2 lead in the 2014 World Series.

A win in Kansas City would give the Giants their third World Series win in five years.

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory/bumgarner-giants-lead-royals-innings-26472684

A READER WRITES: "Your comments about the lack of any real political dialogue or accountability for local candidates (using Fort Bragg and Willits city council candidates as examples) is right on the mark, but applies equally to the candidates for Third District Supervisor. Holly Madrigal, a ten year veteran of the Willits City Council, is the perfect example of your statement that incumbents have an advantage gained by their mere attendance at council or board meetings. They get a vague familiarity with the issues and memorize a few buzzwords (like "sustainable" and "inclusive") which makes it look like they are in the know. No one ever pins them down with the hard questions.

"THE WILLITS NEWS also did interviews with the Third District Supervisor candidates a week or two ago. Woodhouse came off as generally thoughtful but maybe a little naive. Madrigal had all the buzzwords and spoke as if she knew the score but a close look at what she really said ought to be a concern. Her top three campaign promises, in order, are 1) Commission an economic analysis of marijuana's impact on Mendocino County. (The impact is huge but not readily quantifiable and the info would be instantly outdated by state legalization which is coming at the ballot box in 2016.) 2) Build a pedestrian trail in Round Valley. (This is an easy "promise" to make since it is already going forward thanks to Supervisor Pinches — but is this really one of her top priorities for county government?) 3) Pay more money to in-home health care workers. (They deserve it, but is this one of the three top priorities of county government?).

"WHEN ASKED ABOUT WATER Madrigal focused on issues with Lake Mendocino, but not a drop of water from the lake goes to Brooktrails or Willits. Holly never mentioned the Scout Lake project, spearheaded by Supervisor Pinches, which could supply Brooktrails and Willits. After the county paid for the studies to prove the project was viable, they offered it to Willits and Brooktrails, but neither of them were interested. Is this the visionary leadership that Holly claims for herself? And she continues to claim to be a key player on the county water ad hoc committee despite only having attending one meeting several months ago.

"GIVEN THE PROTRACTED LITIGATION between Willits and Brooktrails, Madrigal's comments on that topic are worth quoting at length: ‘I think that I have shown a history of being able to get parties to come together and see both viewpoints, and as third district supervisor I'm going to be advocating for Brooktrails, so once they see how effective I can be at working for them, the fact I already have good positive relationships with the city of Willits will allow me to basically build that bridge.’

"WHICH BEGS THE QUESTION: Why hasn't Holly Madrigal been able to use her influence and position on the city council to resolve this dispute before now? If she really wanted to be an advocate for Brooktrails and help settle the lawsuit, what better opportunity than right now while she is Mayor of Willits? Holly concluded her interview by making a pitch for people to vote for her based on her experience. She also claims: ‘I know how to craft and keep people on budget,’ but does not explain why Willits has been unable to adopt a balanced budget for the last five years under her guidance.

"WOODHOUSE WAS MOSTLY NON-COMMITTAL on all the issues, making the point that government can only do so much with the limited funding available and stressed the need to set priorities. In an obvious reference to his opponent, Woodhouse said it is irresponsible to say you are going to support spending more money on every issue. Holly is hoping that no one will add up all the funding commitments she is making.

"UNRAVELING THE BROOKTRAILS DISPUTE is complicated and could probably fill several editions of the AVA. But the different approaches of Willits and Brooktrails are telling. Brooktrails features the issue on the home page of its website with a brief summary with links to dozens of documents and expanded explanations of each aspect of the dispute. Willits, in stark contrast, does not even mention the lawsuit and obviously hopes the whole mess will just go away. But instead it is going to trial sometime next year — unless the parties reach an agreement. Holly has been unable to settle the case during her ten years on the city council, but maybe if she gets elected Supervisor she can get it resolved, right?

"THE DISPUTE BEGAN WITH accounting questions back in 1997 and culminated in a lawsuit in 2010 after Brooktrails was unable to get the City of Willits to comply with the terms of their agreements. The main focus of the dispute now is that Willits expects Brooktrails to pay for treatment capacity at the new plant that is needed to treat the sewage from Willits. Brooktrails is willing to give up treatment capacity that it is entitled to, but only if Willits will agree to pro-rate the treatment plant construction costs based on the flow that each party contributes to the plant. Willits is supposed to meter the flow but the meter quit working in 2002 and Willits never replaced it with a meter capable of accurately measuring the amount of flow that each party contributes.

"AS MAYOR HOLLY MADRIGAL sent Brooktrails a letter demanding as a pre-condition to further settlement talks that Brooktrails agree in advance to pay for treatment capacity that they do not use (and probably never will use given the current moratorium on building in Brooktrails). Why hasn't Mayor Madrigal used her current position and influence with her colleagues to reach a fair settlement with Brooktrails? I hope anyone who is considering voting for Holly will take a really hard look at her record of non-accomplishment.

"I INVITE ANYONE who wants to learn more about the Willits-Brooktrails dispute to go on the Brooktrails Township website. Everything is there, including letters from Mayor Holly Madrigal which are signed with an illegible scribble (usually meant to indicate ‘I am so busy and important that I don't have time to sign my name legibly — plus you peons are supposed to know who I am anyway’) followed by a meticulously drawn couplet of holly leaves (which undercuts the idea that she lacks time to sign her name legibly.) Think about it for a minute — the holly leaves may have been a cute touch in junior high school, but the Mayor of Willits?"

CANDIDATES MADRIGAL AND WOODHOUSE, January to June, have spent $16,000 and $14,200 respectively on their campaigns for 3rd District supervisor.

RECOMMENDED READING: 48 HILLS, Tim Redmond's on-line San Francisco newspaper. Redmond and Company cover in depth what the Chron either ignores or only mentions. Redmond, City readers will know, was one of the main guys at the now defunct SF Bay Guardian.

CATCH OF THE DAY, October 26, 2014

STEVEN AMATO, Ukiah. Assault with a deadly weapon not a firearm, battery with serious injury, probation revocation.

JAMES ANDERSON, Willits. Probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

NOLAN BOWERS, Ukiah. Probation revocation. (Photo not available.)

MARIA CORTES-TORRES, Fort Bragg. Petty theft, retail.

JAMES COX, Ukiah. Burglary.

SHAYLA CRANFORD, Willits. Burglary.

JOSEF GAVETTE, Fort Bragg. Failure to register.

CHAD GOODIN, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, processing, honey oil manufacturing, armed with firearm.

SPENCER HARVEY, Garberville/Ukiah. Dirk-dagger, petty theft retail.

ANTHONY HERRERA, Hopland. DUI, resisting arrest.

ALAN KNUTH, Ukiah. Pot cultivation, processing, honey oil manufacturing, armed with firearm.

JEREMIAH LUNA, Covelo. Drunk in public, probation revocation. (Frequent flyer.)

MARIA MORALES-GUDINO, Redwood Valley. Petty theft retail.

CRUZ REA, Ukiah. Trespassing. (Frequent flyer.)

ARTURO RIVERA-GARCIA, Gualala/Boonville. Possession of controlled substance, under influence of controlled substance, driving with DUI-suspended license.

LACEE ROSS, Willits. Petty theft, vandalism. (Frequent flyer.)

KATHY WALKER, Willits. Possession of meth, possession of drug paraphernalia.

RICHARD WILLIAMS, Ukiah. Drunk in public.

SEPTEMBER 29TH, 1989 — Postgame celebrations can be anxious times for TV crews, and it has nothing to do with the spraying of champagne. Wednesday night’s division clinchings by both the Giants and the A’s gave local stations twice the risk of catching accidental nude shots of ballplayers, coaches and trainers. Channel 4 caught A’s Barry Weinberg au natural for several seconds, and Channel 5 had an exclusive shot of Dennis Eckersley’s bare rear end. Mark Ibanez had survived the Giants’ champagne onslaught unscathed until he started to sign off. Just as he said, “Things have calmed down quite a bit here in the clubhouse,” he was doused by Matt Williams and hit in the face with a shaving cream pie by Brett Butler. Butler also scored a direct hit on Channel 4’s Gary Radnich and dumped water on him. At least Will Clark minded his manners. “I can’t say the F-word this time,” he told Channel 7’s Dan Lovett before going on the air. When the Giants won the division two years ago, The Thrill was profanely shrill.

—Tom Fitzgerald

ELVIS'S PILLS

Elvis Presley may genuinely not have realized how far gone into addiction he was, because unlike most addicts he never had to go without. With his very own circle of tame doctors (the kind Burroughs would call ‘real writing croakers’) he never had any kind of crisis with supply and demand. He demanded, they supplied. Elvis’s biggest drug problem was that he had no problem getting drugs. Foremost among his legal drug suppliers was the infamous Dr. Nick, George C. Nichopoulos. For one ten-day tour in 1977, Nichopoulos secured 682 different pills and tablets for Elvis, plus the dauntingly strong narcotic Dilaidid in liquid form. It was later established in court that in the seven months before Presley’s death the good doctor had prescribed 8805 pills, tablets, vials and injectables. Elvis also had regular supplies coming in from other star-struck doctors. One night, Nichopoulos accompanied Elvis to the dentist; when the dentist briefly left the room, even Dr Nick could hardly believe his eyes as Elvis began to scrabble around the surgery in a desperate search for codeine.

Presley’s drug reliance initially took hold during his army posting to Germany in the late 1950s — the period when true-blue fans claim the real bad-boy Elvis was effectively neutered. While off base in Bad Nauheim — it was in some sense appropriate that it should have been an old spa town — he was introduced to prescription amphetamine and became and avid proselytizer. When the 14-year-old Priscilla first fetched up in Elvis’s boudoir and was having trouble adjusting to his night-for-day timetable, out came the little Sunkist-coloured vials. She blanched, Elvis soothed. If it was in the Physicians’ Desk Reference it was not a ‘drug’ drug. If he thought it was a ‘drug’ drug he’d have nothing to do with it! (Maybe this made some sense at a time when avuncular, white-coated surgeons routinely advertised cigarettes.) The trouble with running your metabolism on amphetamine rails is the eventual nerve-jangled crash. And what better way to offset the hyperintense zig of speed than with the zzzaaaaag of some new soporific? Without even noticing, you’ve already slipped into a way of dealing with life’s quandaries that is entirely chemical in its logic.

A day in the life: pure liquid cocaine soaked into cotton balls and stuffed up his nose for breakfast; a tutti-frutti of eviscerating biphetamines to get the day off to a smart jog; a whole undulant funhouse spin of downs, any downs at all, for tea. And yet, and yet… Presley’s excess never feels particularly Dionysian; it seems far more a matter of exerting control. Sex and drugs were never binged things, but run always according to his pernickety little itineraries. In the 2005 photo history Elvis by the Presleys, there are two books embossed with his special golden name-stamp: a slim black New Testament Prayer Key and his colossal, multi-coloured Physicians’ Desk Reference. (The latter was his bible, next to the Bible.) Life became more and more a closed-off space, Graceland a cathedral dedicated to endless self-reflection. He was his own icon, long before he became ours.

— Ian Penman

Dorothy’s hips were 36 and a half inches; her bust measurement was only 31, a fact which did not dismay her, as she intended to marry one of three young men out of her extensive acquaintance who happened to find themselves drawn to boyish figures, and although she did not know about such things as precisely as did her aunt, Dorothy knew well enough that her hipless and breastless shape would always attract the sort of young man who felt at home with it. Dorothy could emit, at any hour of the day or night, a waterfall of debutante chatter, which rightly gave the impression that on any occasion between talking, eating and sleeping, she did not think, except in terms of these phrase-ripples of hers: “Filthy lunch.’ ‘The most gorgeous wedding.’ ‘He actually raped her, she was amazed.’

— Muriel Spark

POEM IN OCTOBER

It was my thirtieth year to heaven

Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood

And the mussel pooled and the heron

Priested shore

The morning beckon

With water praying and call of seagull and rook

And the knock of sailing boats on the webbed wall

Myself to set foot

That second

In the still sleeping town and set forth.

My birthday began with the water-

Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name

Above the farms and the white horses

And I rose

In a rainy autumn

And walked abroad in shower of all my days

High tide and the heron dived when I took the road

Over the border

And the gates

Of the town closed as the town awoke.

A springful of larks in a rolling

Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling

Blackbirds and the sun of October

Summery

On the hill's shoulder,

Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly

Come in the morning where I wandered and listened

To the rain wringing

Wind blow cold

In the wood faraway under me.

Pale rain over the dwindling harbour

And over the sea wet church the size of a snail

With its horns through mist and the castle

Brown as owls

But all the gardens

Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales

Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.

There could I marvel

My birthday

Away but the weather turned around.

It turned away from the blithe country

And down the other air and the blue altered sky

Streamed again a wonder of summer

With apples

Pears and red currants

And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's

Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother

Through the parables

Of sunlight

And the legends of the green chapels

And the twice told fields of infancy

That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.

These were the woods the river and the sea

Where a boy

In the listening

Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy

To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide.

And the mystery

Sang alive

Still in the water and singing birds.

And there could I marvel my birthday

Away but the weather turned around. And the true

Joy of the long dead child sang burning

In the sun.

It was my thirtieth

Year to heaven stood there then in the summer noon

Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.

O may my heart's truth

Still be sung

On this high hill in a year's turning.

— Dylan Thomas

AFRICAN TRANSLATOR JAMES COVEY related a story about the perception of time discipline among the Amistad Africans while they were in jail in Connecticut awaiting trial. In the New Haven jail on a Sunday morning Covey and rebellion leader Cinque heard a church bell ring. Cinque, asked (no doubt in Mende, which Covey later translated into pidgin English), "What for bell ring?" Covey explained, "When ’Meriky people go pray to God, they ring bell." Cinque was perplexed. He said, "These people be fool. When want to pray to God what for ring bell?" It was a real question for someone unaccustomed to social life organized by the clock. Missionary George Thompson noted that the Mende people in Africa were both fascinated and puzzled by his watch which they called "the living man," probably because it seemed to give instructions to the one who wore it. Cinque and his comrades would have to come to terms with "the living man" — and much else — no matter how strange it all may have seemed.

— Marcus Rediker, "The Amistad Rebellion"