Cafe Rouge
Is it just me or is Berkeley really more there than most other places in the Bay Area? Whatever it is, I shamelessly confess that I like having lunch all by myself at one of the outdoor tables of Cafe Rouge. This hopelessly hip place holds down one corner of the 4th...
Diving Bell Hits Bottom
How much is Julian Schnabel paying the film critics? There's no other reason why intelligent film-goers would succumb to the sophomoric exercise in cinematic vanity that is The Diving Bell & the Butterfly. Intrigued by raves from a wide range of reviewers, including...
Smith Gallery Opening
We joined art lovers this weekend at the opening of Linda Pope's latest curatorial creation at the Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery at UCSC. Claire Lerner's eclectic combinations of photographic images and mixed media - "The Relaxation Project" (detail,r.) fills the Main...
Dish du Jour at Avanti
Once again, Avanti scores a direct hit - this time the kitchen won us over with a lunch special of braised pork (pastured pork from TLC Ranch, butchered at the restaurant), golden chanterelles and tumescent, gravity-defying gnocchi. The pork surrendered upon impact,...
Apocalyptic Behavior
Americans in record numbers are exercising their metastasized souls and fickle appetites. And it's not on eBay - it's on the presidential primaries. I thought this was supposed to be a presidential election, not a national installment of "American Idol." But I was...
Inside the Flame
A book of sensory adventure: The rituals, passions and discoveries of an engaged life.