Good Morning, RVA: ARCTIC BLAST

Arctic blast: an unacceptable weather phenomenon or an unacceptable flavor of Mountain Dew?

February 13, 2015; 7:02 AM • by Ross Catrow

Photo by: kafkan

Good morning, RVA! It’s 18 °F. That’s stupid cold, and the windchill makes it even stupider cold. Sure the sun will shine, but single-digit “feels like” temperatures, people! Unacceptable.

Despite today’s frigid temperatures, I do feel a weird sense of schadenfreude toward my future self (selfenfreude?), as Sunday will welcome even colder, more miserable lows. I’m sure Sunday Ross will shake his fist angrily at Friday Ross.

Water cooler

Looks like Superintendent Bedden will recommend shuttering Elkhardt Middle permanently after mold and busted heating equipment forced its temporary closure earlier this month. Zachary Reid has some details while we wait for Bedden to present his full plan at this coming Tuesday’s school board meeting. This whole episode should underscore the need for the city to spend the money to get ahead (just getting caught up would be nice) on RPS facility maintenance and repairs.

This year Valentine’s Day and Mardi Gras are just a handful of days apart, which probably means a lot of flustered bakers. If you’re looking to celebrate the latter with a traditional king cake, put your order in at Jean Jaques in Carytown. If you’d like to try something a little different, The Dog and Pig Show in Church Hill has king cake knots. Heck, for $40 WPA Bakery will make you any cake you can dream of. If you’ve got a favorite king cake provider, especially one that does a non-traditional interpretation, shoot me an email!

Speaking of Valentine’s Day, that day is tomorrow. Celebrate, don’t celebrate, it’s up to you. I always end up at Lee’s Famous Recipe Chicken, which I would definitely classify as a celebration.

I give you this week’s beer news, which includes the opening of Garden Gove Brewing Company in Carytown. They hosted their soft opening last night and launched with a menu of seven beers and a soda. Impressive.

New York Times media reporter David Carr collapsed and died yesterday. His AMA on Reddit was great: When asked about his favorite cure for writer’s block, he replied, “Typing.”

Sports!

• Hokies head to South Carolina on Satuday to face Clemson at 12:00 PM and look to pick up their third ACC win.
• #20 Rams travel to George Washington Saturday hoping to avoid their third straight loss. Tip off at 2:00 PM.
• #2 Wahoos will host 12-13 Wake Forest on Saturday at 2:30 PM.
• Spiders also head to NOVA to take on George Mason, Saturday at 4:00 PM.
• Caps and Kings, out in LA, at 10:00 PM on Saturday.

This morning’s longread

The Trip Treatment

Michael Pollan with a truly long look at how hallucinogenics are working their way back in to medicine as a treatment for existential dread, anxiety, and addiction. Fascinating!

Participants ranked these experiences as among the most meaningful intheir lives, comparable to the birth of a child or the death of a parent. Two-thirds of the participants rated the psilocybin session among the top five most spiritually significant experiences of their lives; a third ranked it at the top. Fourteen months later, these ratings had slipped only slightly.

This morning’s Instagram

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February 13, 2015 7:02 AM 0