So when I found myself staring straight up into the oculus of the 208 foot tall Rotunda of Idaho’s most stately building, I was overcome with vertigo. I craned my neck to capture all of the gleaming marble. I believe my simple statement was something like: “Wow.”

Robyn Lockett, capitol services coordinator, guided me through the new underground legislative hearing rooms that replace the old fashioned ‘Knight of the Round Table’ style rooms that were used in the early part of the century.

After we descended the outside staircase into the basement, we walked down a long marble hallway. Robyn told me, as we passed an antique 20’s roll-top desk, that we’d just entered the original basement. A few short steps seamlessly blend the new with the old.

The additions are capped with skylights made of a special glass that keep the basement from roasting, but allow both an excellent natural light source, and provide a view of that impressive dome.

The Idaho State Capitol Commission released a statement this week, deeming the Capitol building “substantially complete.”

The Legislature will begin moving in, selecting chamber seats, and finalizing furniture arrangements this coming Monday, with the executive following within the next month and a half. The building will open once more to the public on Jan. 9, “on-time and on-budget” as Robyn put it.

Our question of the day off Questionland is more of an answer of the day. In a lengthy response to A&E editor Amy Atkins' question "Do raccoons hibernate?" user Trespasser somehow slipped in the following oh-no-you-didn't raccoon cutdown:

"If La-Z-Boy made a recliner out of half-eaten bacon, you can be sure a raccoon would never be chivalrous enough to offer that seat to a lady."

Geeeeenius.

A case, filed in Idaho District Court in September against TTJ's Inc., d/b/a The Sport Cellar, a/k/a Boomers' Sports Cellar and Club 301 and The Garden, a/k/a Boomers' Garden, Jay B. Starnes, lists among the plaintiffs, Songs of Universal Inc., EMI Blackwood Music Inc., Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp., BMI and Taylor Allison Swift, an individual d/b/a Taylor Swift Music.

Boomers' Sports Cellar owner Jay Starnes couldn't be reached for comment, but a daytime employee at the bar said she'd only learned of the allegations after someone from Georgia kept calling repeatedly asking about the story, so she looked it up online.

You mean my desk is a bed and I get paid to orgasm too?

Who ...

Fake it? Why fake when you can have one.

Focus ... focus ... here it comes ... here it comes and

WHAM

What!? You're done, I was almost there. There's no time. I'm gonna get my call.

Oh well, can't be selfish. I'll just play with the perfect man—the one with attachments.

Trick: Did you?

Kitty-Cat: Umm ... yeah

Trick: How many times?

Kitty-Cat: Umm ... two times

Trick (Scratching his head): Are you lying?

Kitty-Cat (Slipping on her heels): Couldn't you tell?

Was that apart of the negotiations you really want

It's just sex.

You pay

we play

we both go our separate ways ...

It's just sex?

For some, there is always that one that can make

With Love, Sex Guidess

Here is the 2003 column for your pleasure...
—————————————————
When you sit down at the dinner table over this next week, first eating the big turkey, then the myriad of secondary dishes made from the leftovers, it might be food for thought to contemplate these Thanksgiving facts and myths.

Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November as established by the United States Congress in 1941. This was a compromise between tradition and a non-binding presidential declaration. Two years before, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt declared that turkey day should be celebrated on the next to last Thursday of November rather than the last Thursday of the month—to lengthen the period of time for the Christmas shopping season. In those years, you see, it was uncool to shop for Christmas until after Thanksgiving but coming out of the depression the middle-class merchants needed all the help they could get. Today, big corporate stores start setting up after Halloween and holiday catalogs begin arriving just after we’ve thrown out all the back-to-school catalogs. “Oh come, all ye faithful…”
Before Roosevelt’s declaration in support of America’s merchants, Thanksgiving had been recognized for only 76 years as an annual event. In 1863 president Abraham Lincoln declared a national day of Thanksgiving on the last Thursday of November in an effort to help forge a national identity during the tumultuous divisions between Americans resulting from the Civil War. It was also a way to welcome the huge influx of immigrants coming to America by involving them in a common, American holiday.
Several other presidents had proclaimed days of thanksgiving. James Madison declared the holiday twice in 1815. John Adams proclaimed it in 1798 and 1799 and George Washington in 1789 and 1795. The only thing was, none of these days of Thanksgiving were in the fall. George Washington, while leading the revolutionary forces declared a day of Thanksgiving in December, 1777, but it was a victory celebration for beating the British at Saratoga.
Prior to that, communities would hold Thanksgivings which were primarily glorified harvest festivals. There was no particular day, differing from colony to colony and in unfavorable harvest years some celebrated with a fast. Algonkian tribes in the area held six thanksgiving festivals during the year. The first pilgrim’s Thanksgiving was actually the local tribe’s fifth celebration of the year.
We can thank the American Public School system for teaching us that in 1621, the Wampanoag Indians and the Pilgrims who settled in Plymouth celebrated their friendship through a fall feast, which actually was a three-day event. We are taught that the Wampanoags tutored the Pilgrims how to grow foods, how to harvest the native flora and fauna and various survival tactics. It took the Pilgrims two years to get it right because it wasn’t until 1623 that they had enough food to hold another feast.
Today, the USDA estimates that 269 million turkeys were raised in 2003, with a good portion allocated to the annual gorge fest. Most families enjoy turkey, corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, yams or sweet potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and for desert, pumpkin pie. These, most Americans believe (like they believe that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11), were the dishes served to the Pilgrims by the Indians. Historians believe that turkey was probably not served at the first Thanksgiving. Nor was corn on the cob, mashed potatoes or pumpkins in any form. What they agree on is that cranberries were most likely served in some fashion, as well as venison, other fowl like geese and ducks and probably some kind of squash and breads made from ground corn, but not on the cob.
I asked my daughter, age seven, what she knew about Thanksgiving.
“I know about when they first celebrated it, they celebrated it with Indians. They were celebrating thanks to people for helping them,” she said.
“What did they eat?” I asked her.
“They ate turkey, mashed potatoes with gravy, cranberries, cider, fruit, cider sauce…” she said.
Her eyes lit up when I asked about Squanto. She told me this tale.
“Squanto, um, he was hunting for food and then he saw this place with the pilgrims and they were talking and then they became friends. And then, um, Squanto came back and brought another friend and that other friend was very nice and he taught them other stuff too. And then Squanto came back with a bunch of Indians and then his second friend, um, he came and told them stuff that he needs to know. He needed to know how the Indians were doing.”

One half of the famous large-scale, Reichstag-wrapping, umbrella-happy duo Christo and Jeanne-Claude passed away suddenly on Wednesday, Nov. 18, due to a ruptured brain aneurysm. The couple stole the spotlight in 2005 with their contentious Central Park installation The Gates, which draped thousands of white frames with fluttering orange cloth throughout Central Park in New York City.

Christo, who has created temporary public art with wife Jeanne-Claude for the past 51 years, notes on the couple’s Web site that he will continue on with the projects they currently have in production. Over the River, plans to suspend miles of woven fabric over a stretch of the Arkansas River in Colorado, while The Mastaba involves erecting a pyramid-like structure from 410,000 oil barrels in the United Arab Emirates.
Though the artistic nature of duo’s work has long been debated, Jeanne-Claude and Christo have undoubtably embodied the phrase “go big or go home.”

• "Shhhhh. Ms. Winfrey is thinking."

Ending her "talk" show—she talks and ... uh ... everybody listens—will free her up to dedicate her energies to her new cable television network. No, you didn't read wrong. Not her new cable television show, her cable television network.

OWN as it will be called, NATURALLY, will be a "joint venture between her production company and Discovery Communications. It is intended to replace the Discovery Health Channel in more than 70 million households."

I wonder if it will be one of Ms. Winfrey's favorite things?

• TMP dancer Chanel DaSilva shows off Matthew Grover's "Highwheeler."

After the cash was tallied from auction bids as well as the money we raised on beer and wine, the auction grossed more than $15,000. Once we've paid the bill for framing every piece, we expect to put more than $12,000 into Boise Weekly's private art grant, for which any local artist or organization is eligible to apply. That's roughly $800 more than we've ever put back into the art community. The grant process opens in January, so get your ideas ready.

Since 2002, when Boise Weekly held its first auction, we've raised $92,838 for the arts community. That first year, we netted a mere $3,196, which was donated to children's arts programs through the YMCA.

Fun facts about the auction:
• 350 people attended this year, a record to date.
• Also a record to date: the number of bidders at 94.
• This year's highest bid $1,200. The record bid is $1,900, which was in 2007.
• Beer and wine sales raised about $400, which bought you a keg of beer, three cases of wine and 18 bottles of beer.
• In 2007, BW employees spent $3,520 collectively on covers. In 2008, we spent $1,160 and this year, we threw down a meager $160. But we're only slightly puzzled by those numbers: 2007 was back in the day before we all had kids and mortgages. Take it from someone who didn't buy a darn thing—it wasn't because I didn't love a few pieces enough to look at them everyday.

• Two auction attendees look for the meaning of life in a cover.

Now that we've sold all of our art, the walls in BW's offices are back to bare grey. Get paintin/drawing/scupltin/shootin so that we have something to look at.

She alleges sex discrimination on the ITD Board, for which she tells the Spokesman's Betsy Russell, she has proof that will emerge at trial. But she also alleges cronyism, corruption and political favors all the way up to the Governor's Office that thwarted her efforts to do her job, as Russell reports:

Lowe contends that she was fired because she insisted on cutting back a $50 million contract with a politically well-connected contractor to manage a string of bond-funded highway projects, with Otter’s then-chief of staff, Jeff Malmen, and Transportation Board Chairman Darrell Manning directly pressuring her to keep the big contract intact. Malmen hasn’t responded to requests for comment; Manning has disputed Lowe’s charges.

You can read the lawsuit, courtesy of the Spokesman-Review. The state will respond in a few weeks.

• ITD
• ITD Director Brian Ness

"Ness possesses the professional background, leadership skills, and energy to make an immediate impact on transportation in Idaho," stated Idaho Transportation Board Chairman Darrell V. Manning in the ITD press release. "We know that his degree in public administration coupled with his transportation background will serve him well in effectively leading the transportation department."

Ness begins Jan. 11, 2010, replacing Acting Director Scott Stokes, who took over when former Director Pam Lowe was terminated in August. Lowe recently filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against Manning and the rest of the Board. Stokes will resume his former position as deputy director.

Man, who would see that coming? Watching the game on a wide screen television with friends, divided and discussing the facts ... a second later there was a moment of shock and silence as we watched Antar Yahia score his side's winning goal in the 39th minute of the match. No one, including myself, would think of Algeria qualifying after watching them going down 2-0 to the Pharaoh on Saturday in Egypt.

Maybe we should just never predict a game until the final whistle. Shout out to all Algeria and congratulations for joining South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory coast and Cameroon as teams to represent our lovely Continent of Africa.

In Europe Portugal repeated the same 1-0 effort of last weekend to down Bosnia Herzegovina and clinch their ticket to South Africa. Greece forced Ukraine out of their way with a 1-0 win, while Guss Heddink could not come in with his genius ideas to save Russia from missing out on the world's number one party, as Russia lost 1-0 to Slovenia. But the night and attention shifted to France as they were getting inches away from losing their ticket to Ireland, with the Irish slotting a goal in the 32nd minute from Robin Keane.

With France winning the first leg with the same margin at the Stade of France on Saturday, the game was a draw, therefore they had to play two additional 15 minute halves extra time to find the winner and the last European guest to South Africa next year. Thierry Henry, the player I idolize, stood up with a what ever it takes attitude and controlled the ball twice with his hand, which the ref did not notice and superbly passed the ball to William Gallas to slot the winner for the French. Now France, Portugal, Greece and Slovakia join Denmark, England, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain and Switzerland as European representation in 2010.

New Zealand has qualified after beating Bahrain 1-0 and will be there together with Australia, Japan, Korea Rep and Korea PRR.

Uruguay was the last to grasp their ticket after drawing with Costa Rica to win the playoff by 2-1 on aggregate and join United States, Paraguay, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Honduras and Chile as the American and Caribbean representatives. As people are celebrating victories in qualified countries tonight, many are already thinking about who they will want to play 204 days from now in South Africa.

And as that decision lies in the mother city of Cape Town South Africa, and the entire world is waiting to hear their 2010 FIFA World Cup group on December 4. To those in the United States with a basic cable television, ESPN2 will broadcast this event to you live at 12 pm Eastern time while it will be at 7 pm in Cape Town Internationale Convention Center. According to fifa.com, celebrities and sport stars and world leaders will be seated in the audience, eager to hear the draw.

Now, who do you think will win the big trophy next year? That’s the million dollar question right there, but according to an ESPN poll, the favorites are Brazil, Italy, Germany, England, Argentina, Spain. Netherlands and the Ivory Coast.

What is your first choice? Let us know.

• City Light Guest House

The new shelter, called City Light Guest House, 1417 W. Jefferson, is in what was once a parking area for the apartments above. The Mission fully renovated the space with mostly donated labor and materials.

“Women with children have been the fastest growing population of homeless people over the past decade. With the economic situation as it is we have seen that number rise even faster. For the past several months, we have had up to 46 women and kids sleeping on the floor at City Light. In order to be sure we can meet this growing need, and to better accommodate the women and kids we’re serving, we are pleased to accomplish this project,” said Mission director Bill Roscoe.

• Mission residents Lavern Powe and Randy Marlette, Jr. provide security at the ribbon cutting.

BPD Chief Mike Masterson, with Mission Director Bill RoscoeRoscoe effusively introduced Boise Police Chief Michael Masterson, calling BPD the "finest and most compassionate" police force. Masterson avoided the topic of the lawsuit altogether, talking about volunteering at the Mission and officers handing out meal tickets.

• 
  We waited a while to ask Roscoe, who has not returned several calls from BW for several days now, and Masterson, about the city's anti-camping policy, but the list of donors Roscoe needed to thank took a very long time.
  

  • Jean Lockhard, director of City Light, in the new shelter.
  ]]> [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:44:19 -0700 Boise Weekly
  

  Today’s Questionland question of the day today comes from squeaky-clean user Trespasser.
  
  "Where do you begin washing? I read a study that says most showerers begin with scrubbing their bellies. Is it true of you? I'm a left-arm loofah-er, myself."

  So far, user Ronnie also admits to being a left-armer: “Left arm ... Riveting answer I know. Butt crack is second to last ... then my hands of course.”

  User Jessi, on the other hand, starts things off by washing her hands.

  Do you have a bodycleaning routine? Or do you prefer to go with the flow? After quick glance at You Tube, it seems like the manliest soap detonation spot for the American male is the left arm:

  While in Japan, it looks like the ladies are left-thighers:

  ]]> [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Questionland Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:24:09 -0700 Boise Weekly I love a blog or Web site that is little more than a collection of photos, especially if said photos are accompanied by funny comments or captions. For me, it all started with I Can Has Cheezeburger and now includes Cake Wrecks, People of Walmart, Regretsy, Failblog, This Is Photobomb, Ugliest Tattoos and Autocomplete Me.

  In looking for a Liz Lemon food quote today (don't ask), I came across Insanewiches, a site dedicated to cool and clever examples of that all-important food source, the sandwich. That led me to Fancy Fast Food, a site that shows what true gourmets can do with fast food. The funny factor isn't as high on these sites, but they are still now on my "sites I must visit every day" list.
  

  
  

  

  • If by insane you mean delicious, then yes. They are insane.

  Be careful looking through these at work. Some of the material may be unsuitable—especially on Regretsy and Ugliest Tattoos (people are so weird)—and you may look up to see it's suddenly 5 p.m. and you never even started that important report that was due today.

  Let me know of any I missed.

  ]]> [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> funny Wed, 18 Nov 2009 12:58:54 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Arts/Stage Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Music/Music Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Covers/BW Covers Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Rec/Rec News Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Screen/Film Reviews Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> News/True Crime Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Music/Listen Here Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly [ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]
  ]]> Cartoons/The Sockratic Method Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:00:00 -0700 Boise Weekly