Carlin Continues

Although perhaps a bit dated, George Carlin’s infamous “seven dirty words” routine is still one of the most famous — and funniest — standup shticks of all time. The world has come to expect nothing less of Carlin, the first person to host Saturday Night Live (on October 11, 1975)…

Good Taste

I have a love-hate relationship with bacon. I love stand-alone bacon, crispy-fried on a side plate. But I hate bacon in my entrees; I don’t do bacon in salads as a general rule, because then my entire salad tastes like nothing but bacon. I feel the same way about bacon…

Smokin’ Hot

I’ll let you in on a little secret: Firefighters are super-hot. Maybe it’s the aura of heroism about them in all their pulling-small-children-and-pets-from-burning-buildings glory. Or maybe it’s just their rock-hard abs and bulging biceps. Whatever that je ne sais quoi quality, there’s no denying that firefighters are sexy, sexy beasts…

Vail Film Festival

With ski season winding down, there seem to be fewer and fewer reasons to load up the car, buckle in and head for the high country and a weekend of scenery and excitement. But forget snow: This week, the Vail Film Festival is the only reason you need to spend…

Fashion with Passion

The fashion at tonight’s Aveda Institute Denver hair and makeup show, “Shampoo, Rinse, Recycle,” is going to be as green as it gets. “Our green team is a group of students and staff in charge of making sure that the Institute is as environmentally conscious as possible,” explains Aveda’s Alicia…

Wild Child

If you were stranded in the wilderness with only the clothes on your back, a harmonica and a Leatherman multi-tool, could you survive? Les Stroud could. The star of Survivorman does just that on a regular basis for the television show. And if you’ve never gotten a chance to see…

Voice of the City

Kevin Larson has something very different planned for his upcoming bash, Theatre Du Vaudeville. “It’s a kick-off party for his new non-profit company,” notes Jodi Johnson of Kevin Larson Presents. “The National Performers Alliance is a group where people can come together and book different kinds of talent that don’t…

Undead Sexy

Poor Felix Gomez. When we first met the paranormal private detective in Denverite Mario Acevedo’s debut novel, The Nymphos of Rocky Flats, he’d returned from a tour of duty in Iraq as a vampire and was attempting to discover what was behind a murderous conspiracy and outbreak of nymphomania at…

Seeing Red

Ladies, be honest: When was the last time you gathered together your best gang of gal pals and set out to paint the town red? And I’m talking crimson — bright, blood-colored red — not merely some wishy-washy shade of pink. If the best memory you can dredge up involves…

Belle Stars

I’m a country girl at heart. Don’t get me wrong: I like the city, and I particularly like all the cultural events and great music you can only experience while living close to a large metropolitan area. But the noise, the pollution, the hipsters — I can only take those…

Lights Out

This past New Year’s Eve, the wind in my neighborhood was so bad that it downed a power line, and the entire area was thrown into darkness for a couple of hours. And though that might sound like the beginning of a “My Worst New Year’s Eve Ever” essay-contest entry,…

Jam Session

The organizers of this year’s Bud Light Spring Jam in Aspen/Snowmass are pulling out all the stops. The eighth annual snowfest will extend over three weekends, continuing each Friday, Saturday and Sunday through April 6. Brand-spankin’-new this year is the Gretchen Bleiler Invitational, bringing together the world’s top female snowboarders…

Zen and the Art of Water

Zen master, artist and author John Daido Loori has a point to make. At a reception, film screening and gallery talk titled “Art and Environmental Activism” — which takes place tonight in conjunction with Loori’s fine-art photography exhibit, The Tao of Water — the artist says he’s going “to try…

The Road Home

“There’s an untold story about this guy who was a muse for several different social movements, and he was born and bred in Denver,” says KBDI Channel 12’s Heather Dalton. She’s talking, of course, about Neal Cassady, aka the notorious Dean Moriarty from Jack Kerouac’s Beat bible On the Road…

Full Fusion

“It’s going to be really interesting,” says Jillian Crandall, director of marketing and public relations for the Boulder Philharmonic Orchestra. “The ballet style from Lemon Sponge Cake is obviously contemporary, not storybook ballet. It’s a high-class, New-York style event, if you will.” She’s talking about the BPO’s latest foray into…

Thinking Green

Even though I don’t like beer (and especially not green beer), St. Patrick’s Day is my favorite holiday. First, because I actually am Irish. Second, because green is my favorite color — and incidentally, with my Irish coloring, I look pretty damn good in it. Third, because who couldn’t use…

Double Team

Storyteller Peninnah Schram and musician Gerard Edery are the two main players in The Minstrel and the Storyteller, An Exotic Journey. “Each of them has their own proficiency, their own expertise and their own magic in their own fields,” notes fellow storyteller Cherie Karo Schwartz, a longtime friend of Schram’s…

The Sound of Ireland

There’s something unbelievably catchy about Irish music, whether you’re listening to a sad ballad about a young man never to return from battle or a rowdy, rabble-rousing drinking tune. And since tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day, what better way to get in the mood than by attending a concert tonight…

Funny Business

It’s St. Patrick’s Day, and you’re bored. You already had your fill of green beer over the weekend, when everyone else seemed to be celebrating, but now that the day of green is actually here, there’s no one to pinch and you’d rather not engage in another drinking marathon with…

Timeless Titillation

“It’s kind of like a live B-movie,” explains Michelle Scheffer (aka Fanny Fitztightlee). She’s talking about Ooh La La Presents…Decades: A Timeline of Tease, her show co-produced with Kitty Crimson that covers more than a century’s worth of sexiness. Starting with 1900, Scheffer says, they’ve coordinated two or three acts…

Rock On

Remember when Chris Rock was asked to host the 77th annual Academy Awards back in 2005? What was the Academy thinking? I mean, after his roles as Nat X, Onski, Buster Jenkins and Young Pop — not to mention his impersonations of celebrities Flavor Flav, Idi Amin Dada, M.C. Hammer,…

Talking Tassels

It might not seem as though burlesque and feminism have much in common, but Michelle Baldwin, Westword contributor and founder of Burlesque As It Was, has several compelling reasons why she considers burlesque a feminist activity. She’ll share her thoughts tonight during Feminism & Co.: The History and Politics of…