PicoBlog

You may have seen images showing the groundbreaking of a new bus shelter known as “La Sombrita” go viral on Twitter over the past few days. If you’ve been out of the loop, this is what it looks like: Now obviously, La Sombrita fails to accomplish the goals of a bus shelter: it provides no seating, almost no shade, and no protection from the elements. While politicians and planners celebrating this silly structure are obviously deserving of criticism, the story behind this joke of a bus shelter is actually quite revealing of the broader failures of American transportation infrastructure.

Genesee and Labatt USA have been owned by the same parent company since 2009. First under North American Breweries and now under the Costa Rican-based FIFCO. But until now, the flagship beers from each brewery were made in different countries. Genny’s core beers were made at the brewery’s sprawling St. Paul Street campus near downtown Rochester, while Labatt was produced in Canada and then imported into the U.S. That is changing today, however.

That’s what my driver’s ed teacher used to say to me. My initials are not AJ, but I knew what he meant. I grew up in Indiana – so I was familiar with all the famous race car drivers, like Mario Andretti, Bobby and Al Unser and… AJ Foyt. Despite living in Indiana the first 25 years of my life, I have only been to the Indianapolis 500 once (!), but I do remember that 23 years ago, history was made when not one but TWO women were competing.

On Tuesday, an innocuous photo of noted Italian-American excellence Lady Gaga and infamous Big Boy Adam Driver on the set of their new film House of Gucci shook the world. The film, directed by Ridley Scott, is the story of the events preceding and following the assassination of Maurizio Gucci (Driver), ordered by his spurned ex-wife Patrizia Reggiani (Gaga). And as if that wasn’t enticing enough, the photo of Gaga and Driver posing together in their best après ski couture on the slopes of Gressoney, Italy is here to feast our eyes on.

I decided to check out “Lady Sings the Blues” for two reasons: it’s out in a gorgeous new Blu-ray edition, and it’s the first major biopic of jazz icon Billie Holiday, preceding “The United States vs. Billie Holiday” by nearly 50 years. I thought Andra Day was terrific in “United States,” though the film is somewhat slapdash and takes a lot of liberties with historical fact, up to and including concocting a romance between Holiday and the federal agent who was supposed to be keeping tabs on her.

“An expansive look at Mississippians - the transplants like myself, the natives, the ones who moved away, the ones who came back. It's a touching, thoughtful, look into the diversity, creativity, passion and strength coming out of one of the most derided states in the nation from the voices of it's individuals. If you've never been to Mississippi, this is a great way to gain insight into why it is better than, and more than, you've ever given it credit for - until you can see it for yourself.

NAPA COUNTY, Calif. — Lake Berryessa is almost a living creature. It breathes in and out, grows and shrinks. But it breathes water, not air. It breathes in through rainfall and runoff during the winter season and breathes out all year through evaporation and the outflow pipes of Monticello Dam. The Lake Berryessa region encompasses a large part of eastern Napa County. The lake was formed in the Berryessa Valley, which was a major agricultural resource for Napa County and exported tons of produce before the lake was formed in 1958.

NAPA, Calif. — In a previous Napa Valley Features article, Lake Berryessa: Glory Hole watch 2024, I described the basic structure and operation of Lake Berryessa's Monticello Dam and its internationally famous Glory Hole - 62 million views on YouTube. But Glory Hole has not overflowed yet this year. As of March 26, the lake level has only reached 439.6 feet, a frustrating 5 inches below the rim. An asymptote is a mathematical value that continually approaches a given target value (like the 440 foot water level at which Lake Berryessa's Glory Hole officially overflows), but does not meet it at any finite distance.

For reasons unbeknownst to me, the world was taken aback when one of its most beautiful women, 10 years into her mind blowingly illustrious career, put on a couple old fashioned LBs. Hot off the trail of releasing TWO of the year’s best albums, she was ridiculed by a swarm of her gay fans after being photographed walking out of a building. (I’m sure the straights had comments too- but I thought I’d just get at the majority of her audience.