The Black Rock desert has both negative and positive connotations to people.  Some hate it because a huge, chaotic event occurs there that attracts freaks and artists.  Some love it because they are freaks and artists.  Others still don’t care about it one way or the other, and some like the area for it’s superb flatness and if you’re a dust lover, and from New York, well as they say, forgeddaboutit.

Black Rock Pizza Co. got it’s namesake from well, it being Nevada.  In fact, the owners are really into Nevada as a whole.  We’ll talk more about that later.

Dave and Linda Winchester own the joint, at 2855 N. McCarran Blvd #106, (a few doors east from the Raley’s in Sparks Mercantile center) and have done a fantastic job with it since it’s beginnings about five years ago.  It started out with an expansive menu, with plenty of Nevada-themed pizzas, or just strange toppings to begin with.  Sun dried tomatoes, pumpkin seeds, celery and dried cranberries just to name a few.  Tempting patrons with purely Nevada names and places like “Carlin Trend,”  and “Smoke Creek,” there’s no end to the Nevada worshiping you can do with your tongue.

Once you walk into the place you’re greeted with very friendly and professional food staff.  Heck, even Dave and Linda will probably be there, and have no problems with bussing the tables or interacting with happy guests.  Believe me, the guests are always happy.  In fact, the food staff is seemingly happy too, because the same faces seem to be there every time I go in.   That’s a rare thing in the foodservice industry.

The walls are hand-painted with a huge Tomato (sunrise/sunset?) atop Nevada hills, beaming a promise of something interesting, as well as other western-themed artwork.  It apparently has inspired other artists, for hung proudly around the kitchen are crayon representations of people trying their best to be a part of the western-action in Black Rock Pizza Co.

There’s fine pizzas that will tempt your palette, such as “Chicken Springs,”  and the “Red Headed Stranger,” offering wonderful combinations of the most interesting ingredients around.  If you want a real bizarre flavor, try the “Poker Brown,” which is a nod to Chinese/Thai flavors and has won some attention nationally very recently.

As far as gourmet pizza is concerned, Black Rock Pizza Co. is almost certainly top brass.

Pizza isn’t the only thing they do well there.  Among fine cheesecake for desert,  there’s a spinach salad that’s nothing short of amazing called “Warm Springs Salad.”  It consists of well, spinach of course, pine nuts, prosciutto, olive oil and aged Parmesan cheese.  The healthy simplicity of it all makes you only feel like you’re expanding your waistline.

Ask about their selection of fine beers on tap while you’re at it.  Drink them.

The other amazing thing that Black Rock Pizza Co. has going for it is it’s frequent visitor’s program known generically as “Royalty Rewards,” on a purple card.  The more you eat, the better stuff you get in the mail.  That includes free appetizers, even free pizzas.  It’s WELL worth it, because not only do they tempt you back, they tempt you with free stuff.  Postcards and mailers with fun games also are mailed to you, even funny emails telling you of the interesting things going on at the time.

My only complaint is there’s been no talk of expanding into an additional location around town.  Which may be a smart move, considering the owners like to hang out, more square footage means more time and effort.  Let me tell you though, I’d love to see one centrally located closer to downtown or south of town in the new developments towards Double Diamond.  That means where ever you are, work or play, you’re close to a great pizza.

Hours are Sunday through Thursday, 11AM - 9PM, and Friday and Saturday 11AM - 10PM, and you can order to-go by calling 356-1771.  They’ll also do a “Take and Half-Bake,” situation, where they undercook the pizza and let you cook the rest at home, since there’s separate licensing for actual take-and-bake pizza versus cooked (stupid legislators…).  Want web action?  Go here:  http://blackrockpizza.com/

I have had few pizza experiences better than Black Rock Pizza Co.   Appetizers, drinks and desserts are better than good, but their light way of cooking on thinner-crust pizzas with amazingly tasty and interesting ingredients are out of this world.  Prices can be a little higher, between $8 and $17 a pie, but it’s gourmet pizza, folks.  You want cheap crap?  Go to Dominoes.  Not that you would want to, right?

- Gay Rodeo

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Many things are indestructible in Reno, Se7en Teahouse was not one of them. Though on the coolness scale, they’re second-to-none.

The recent earthquakes kind of gave them a rough ride.

All of their high-quality liquor and tea took a nosedive, and evidently, injured a worker.

On May 10th, 5pm to 11pm, there will be a fund raiser, and I’m pretty sure patronizing the place will help it’s recovery efforts. There will be entertainment and the ambiance and libations only Se7en can provide.

http://renopassport.blogspot.com/2008/04/se7en-teahouse-and-bar-update.html

See you there.

Gay Rodeo

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Yeah yeah, it’s no big news. Reno’s been having earthquakes.

Besides the obvious fact that Reno is hated by every god, not just the “main one,” (whatever that means to you)…

…a lot of people aren’t aware that Reno and Northern Nevada as a whole really IS earthquake country.

I have overheard people in the last few days saying, “I moved here from the Bay Area to get away from this shit!”

Oh yeah? Go back to your city then.

The dynamic earth ain’t gonna quit just because your self-important ass decided to move here.

Geologists describe Reno’s seismic activity as “active,” Nevada being one of the top (#3?) seismically-active places in the nation. We sit surprising close to the major Pacific fault lines that give San Francisco, Los Angeles, Japan and Hawaii their movement. Yet their activity or the “Pacific Ring of Fire,” isn’t what’s causing us to shake.

Though no one really knows for absolute sure why the shaking is happening directly, it should come as no surprise. Reno is striated with hundreds of fault lines. Some of them aren’t even discovered as of yet. Combine that with Reno and the Truckee Meadow’s unstable soil situation, being backed up to huge granite mountains, and you’ll start to see exactly why we’re getting some shaking.
But to what end? Though the seismic activity has only been kept since about 1850, there’s evidence that this area has been shaken, and shaken hard in the geologic past. Reno is very capable of having a HUGE earthquake. An earthquake that no one can really predict, no suspect even with recent activity.

Though the news programs love showing shots of freaked-out geriatric churchgoers complaining of their curios and “Precious Moments,” figurines taking a facedive off the bookshelf, there isn’t much damage happening. Reno’s buildings are pretty robust, not to mention, required (as of sometime in the last two decades) to have more earthquake-mindful engineering than say, Las Vegas.
The most recent quake was listed as a 4.7-4.9 magnitude, centered somewhere around Mogul, April 25 at about 11:40PM. I was hanging out with a friend of mine in her shack-like two-story apartment off California Ave. Boy was that a boat ride. Of course we were all jazzed by the occurrence, because unlike other people, we just don’t freak out over shit like that. Evidently people from bars, movies and other social gatherings around town went home on a perfectly nice Friday night because of a little shaking. My question is, how the hell is that going to save you?

Regardless, if a little rumbling makes you upset, I hear the Dakotas are a nice place to be. Reno isn’t going to quiet down any time soon, that is for sure. In fact, I’ve done a good job of taking off heavy things from the shelves, and anything else that can fall over and break for a little while. It’s no guarantee that something won’t get destroyed, but I’d like to not curse Ma Nature so damn much if my precious lava lamp collection meets gravity the wrong way.

If you’re curious like I am, however, there’s a few sites you can report quake activity and see it almost real-time for yourself:

USGS Reno Quake Info: http://quake.usgs.gov/recenteqs/FaultMaps/120-40.htm

The Nevada Seismological Laboratory: http://www.seismo.unr.edu/

Enjoy Reno shaken, not stirred, everyone.

- Gay Rodeo

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While I’ve been to a good number of American cities in my lifetime, shabby towns and derelict villages, Reno of course has it’s own flavor. So it makes me wonder, is it such a bad flavor?

Reno is one of the worst towns I’ve come across for spitting. Yes, spitting. Around here, it’s not just for truckers, baseball players and cowboys.

What caught my eye today was I noticed someone had launched a throat-rocket on my license plate. My license plate, mind you. It doesn’t say anything offensive, but it is one of the “Nuclear Test Site,” plates. So evidently, some idealogical pansy has chosen to christen something less meaningful and more amusing with their bodily fluids. What’s amusing is, I don’t have stickers or notations on my vehicles that would say, “Let’s feed all children nukes and I’m really fucking serious!” In fact, there’s plenty of amusing things that would suggest I’m a less than serious individual, so it bewilders me that someone went out of their way to be so laughably lowbrow.

This isn’t the first encounter I have with this, what I’m convinced of is, “emotional spitting,” in Reno.

I have been through countless bathrooms, in the downtown area, restaurants in the south neighborhoods, fast food joints, bars, etc., and noticed a disturbing trend. There’s people that spit on the mirrors. Not just accidentally like, “Whoops I missed the sink or the trash can…” But I mean, a viscous, runny churned-up mucous blob running face level all the way down to the edge. Like someone was terribly upset at what they saw and just didn’t know what else to do. Was it an image problem? Did they hate the establishment?

Another place I see spit is on storefront windows, especially lining downtown and Virginia street. It’s usually a volley of spittle-fire, not just one person, or someone who happens to have very active saliva glands. Nice dress shops, costume stores, decent small restaurants, tattoo shops… you name it. It’s as if someone was walking with their friends and they all got a jovial kick out of just spitting and snot-rocketing all over some poor bastard’s store. Far too many loogeys (lugies? lugeys?) to be a disgruntled customer. Even if it was a disgruntled customer, I’d hope they had a set swinging between their legs to simply go adress the store owner rather than achieve some simian method of communication.

What IS the communication trying to convey, anyhow?

One method of communication I see frequently in Reno, and once in a rare while in other small towns is what I like to affectionately call the “Tough Guy Spit.” I think this only happens if you’re a male and come across another male. Walk around someplace after 10PM, usually where there’s at least a mild hub of activity, a bar, a shop, etc. Notice token swaggering tough guy, denoted by ring-around-the-mouth goatee, off-center ballcap, baggy jeans, maybe a gold chain or two. If you’re a guy, I’m pretty sure you’ve seen this happen. Whether crossing paths or just standing around, they’ll make brief eye-contact with you and then spit, and swagger even harder. It’s fucking ridiculously funny. Sometimes I’ll be with friends and say, “Hey, I’ll bet you a dollar before this dude passes us he looks at us and spits.” I’ve ended up with a few dollars. Observant? Sure. But what’s the point? I suppose overall the “Tough Guy Spit,” is better than other forms of random tough male interactions I’ve witnessed. In San Francisco I was walking with a group of people years ago, and three guys were passing us. They didn’t say a word and started swinging, almost as if choreographed. Then they just walked quickly in the same direction they went. I’ve never really seen this in Reno, such interactions are followed only by tons of yelling and pushing, and yes, even spitting. Even that is far rarer than just… spit.

The super irritating thing I tend to see with Reno Spitters is on just about anything new Reno tries to put up. For example, there’s a run-down boarded-up casino of times yore with perfectly clean boards, no graffiti, no marks, not even a drop of spit. Yet you go to some place like the open-area for ice skating on First St., between Virginia and Center, and you see spit. All over the art, the pictures of Reno in lit-up columns, the lights, anything that looks too new. People constantly complain how much this town sucks, how awful it is to hang out here, and the few times the city or private enterprise tries to put up something great, it gets soiled by someone’s… opinion? Malice? Hatred? Idiocy? I can’t figure it out.

The most interesting by far was three young skateboarders shredding outside of the Nevada Museum of Art on Liberty one evening last year. One skated by the large, funky iron horse made from faux branches, and spit right in it’s face. I walked over a few obstacles and lightly confronted him and asked him what the fuck his issue was. His reply?

“Why do you care?”

I said, “Well, I’m just curious. This is a cool as fuck place, it’s not a Denny’s, or some piece of shit abandoned building, but you felt the need to spit on a piece of art. Do you hate art?”

“Well, no but fuck it man, who cares.” He argued. His friends were laughing at him at this point.

“How about if I spit on you? Does that seem like no big deal?”

His 14-year-old face contorts, and thinks about it for a second. “I’d kick your fucking ass.” His friends laugh a little more.

One of his friends says, “You could try (name), but he’s a lot bigger than you and well dude he’s kind of right. We won’t back you up.”

“What do you think then?” I said to the kid. “Maybe you should go clean up that art.”

His friends say “…come on, come on man… just clean it up man, don’t be a dick.” They’re still laughing.

He goes and wipes tall horse’s face with his hand, then on his pants, muttering if it were any other day, that I’d get my ass kicked.

I laughed and cordially agreed with him and walked on. His friends think this is a great comedy. They were right, in a way.

It’s still a mystery, nonsensical and bewildering in it’s entirety. Reno evidently has this problem keeping fluids in the mouth. It could be jealousy. It could be indignity. It could be boredom. Whatever it is, it’s something I hope will eventually fade out. If you have a problem, confront it. If you are angry, let it out. If you’re just a scumbag, well there might not be much hope for you, but you could at least not be a total pussy about it.

Reno’s not such a bad place, and has it’s downfalls and benefits. Yet if there’s emotion enough to go out of one’s way to spit on things like an ape, there must be something deeper, some thought that could be built upon and changed. Some form of humanity that just doesn’t know how to express itself in the proper way.

Or a lot of humans are total morons.

Who knows.

- Gay Rodeo

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The Best Protest Music- Rick James!!!

The third protest by Anonymous against Scientology began at 11 o’clock on April 12th and it was already getting to be a sunny and hot day. I got to Virginia and Maple Streets, next to the Walgreens around noon, armed with my camera and tape recorder, ready to record what I could see.

The crowd was about the same size as previously, but it seemed to be more animated than the February protest since there was an iPod attached to an iPod Hi-Fi playing music. Despite the heat, the protesters mostly wore the Guy Fawkes masks, bandanas and other masks and were giving out flyers to the many passers-by. During the time I was at the protest, I never saw anyone that the Anonymous members claimed were Scientologists, but they several members of the protest said they saw people on top of the Circus Circus parking lot taking pictures and several people milling around the the Walgreens parking lot, but I didn’t see anyone like that. I did see the Reno police drive by several times and I saw the new police paddy wagon, which is a converted mini-bus, come by. As it was a fine early Spring day, there were many more people in cars and most of them honked their horns, waved, gave thumbs up and generally smiled at the protesters.

The focus of the protest on April 12th, called Project Reconnect, was to let people know about the claim made by Anonymous that after joining Scientology, its members are forced to cut off contact with members of their family who are not Scientologists. AnonymousFox put out a call to people in the Reno/Carson area who were Scientologists, current or former, to contact the Reno Anonymous group with more information, and none have as of last Saturday on the day of the protest.

The protest went very peacefully and even several passers-by joined with the protest, after the iPod started playing the theme song from “Fresh Prince of Bel Air”. A man that was intoxicated came up to the protest and set a plastic shopping bag and took a bag of cheese slices out and started eating it and offering it to anyone who’d take it. The man said “I’m cheesing it!” and started ranting and asking strange questions of the protesters. After I asked him a few questions and he answered in various states of incoherency, he left. But, he left the protesters the contents of his bag- some frozen burritos, some frozen pizzas and the processed cheese slices.

Two gentlemen came into the protest and passed out flyers to attractive young women that came by. One of the men called it “protest macking” and it seemed to work as it did get the attention. The other one started looking at the iPod and he set it to play Rick James. As “Brick House” belted out of the iPod Hi-Fi’s speakers, the Anonymous members danced and grooved to the song. Then, several members of the group began to march up and down Virginia Street with their signs and as most of them went down the street, I ran into Walgreens for some water and batteries, the two most important things to a writer covering something on a hot day.

I came back out, saw most of the protesters were gone and was told the protest was moving over to Ralston Street, to stage the protest across the street from the Scientologist Mission in Reno. AnonymousFox and Clove, a new protester I’d met that day, were going to walk over to to other site. I chose to walk over with them and ask them a few questions that had come up.

Scientology released a statement after the second protest saying Anonymous was “perpetrating religious hate crimes. It is Anonymous that has repeatedly attempted to suppress free speech through illegal assaults on church websites so as to prevent internet users from obtaining information. They have also engaged in other harassment including threats of violence in telephone calls, fax transmissions and emails, not to mention the Anonymous mailing of white powder to dozens of our churches.”

As far as AnonymousFox could tell me, he knew nothing about most of these allegations. A group did hack into the voice mail system of the Reno Scientology Church, but AnonymousFox and Clove both disagree with this- they support freedom of religion and do have religious beliefs of their own. The reason they protest is to make light of the dangers of Scientology and make sure the public knows about it. Clove especially wanted to educate people about what Scientology believes as it had shocked her.

I also asked the two Anonymous members a big question, one that many people might have in general- with all the big issues and terrible things going on right now, why protest against Scientology? AnonymousFox said that he feels that with the many issues in the world, this is one that Anonymous can do something about. One of their primary goals is to try to convince the IRS to revoke Scientology’s tax-exempt status, which they feel they can do. However, in Anonymous there has the start of a split in the group.

Anonymous, as a group, has been active for about three years or so. Before this January, they primarily played pranks against various people and organizations and that is the cause of the split between the “new fags”, who are the people who have joined Anonymous to be against the Scientologists and the “old fags” who have been involved in Anonymous since its start. Many of the old fags did the first and second protests for the “lulz” and nothing else. Lulz according to urbandictionary.com is a corruption of L.O.L., which stands for laugh out loud- Anonymous gets BIG lulz from pulling random pranks! AnonymousFox is an old fag, however, he is against the people in Anonymous that are just for pulling pranks and not doing something to better the world.

It was around 12:30 that I followed Clove and AnonymousFox down Virginia Street, down 4th Street and to Ralston Street to where the Scientologist Church is in Reno. The protesters gathered in front of the motel on Ralston, across the street from the Church. By the time I’d gotten there, the protesters were muted and simply stood there, holding their signs. Some cars that drove down Ralston honked and cheered for them but it wouldn’t last long. A blue truck with an extended cab pulled out of the gas station at 4th and Ralston and almost ran into a brown sedan. The two bros in the truck immediately jumped out of it and started yelling at the people in the sedan. The Anonymous members quickly talked amongst themselves and decided to leave the scene, before anything else happened. The main group started to march back, their signs above their heads, while a few others got in a car and drove back to the Walgreens. I decided to walk back since I had a few things to think about. I also took a look at the Scientology Church in Reno- it’s an old two story Victorian house with a big back yard, some nice looking fruit trees and an infrared sauna.

As I walked back to the protest, the day was getting to be genuinely warm. I had on a henley-style shirt and a T-shirt and I was hot, since it was at least 73 or so. And by the time I got back to the protest, I noticed that many of them were now just wearing bandannas and head coverings instead of their Guy Fawkes masks since it was too hot. But the protest continued and the iPod Hi-Fi came back on. I said my goodbyes to the Anonymous protesters and went home to get ready for Yuri’s Night. (See post below!)

The complete photoset from the protest can be found here.

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Yuri Gagarin was the first man to fly into space on April 12, 1961 and the the first flight of the Space Shuttle Columbia was on April 12, 1981. So what? We live in the space age and have lived in it since 1957 and in the immortal words of both William Burroughs and Brion Gysin “What are we here for? We are here to go to outer space!” Since 2001 in places across the Earth on all seven continents and on Mars, there Yuri’s Night has commemorated these events in the form of parties and happenings. The organizers of Yuri’s Night call it St Patricks Day or Cinco de Mayo for space and I think it’s a great idea! This year marked the second celebration of Yuri’s Night in Reno, and at the last moment, I decided to go check it out.

Yuri’s Night was being held at Bliss Nightclub, at Valley Road and 4th Streets and at Artspace On 4th St across the street on 4th, right next to one of the best bars in Reno, Abby’s Fourth Street. Yuri’s Night in Reno is a fund raiser for some art installations out at Burning Man, so I knew it would at least be an interesting time. Before I left, I had read on the site that it was recommended to get tickets in advance, but I thought I’d be able to just get in- so I paid it no mind. After a nice long nap and rest, following a long day of running around, I was able to get over to Bliss by 11:45 pm. I parked on Valley Road and walked toward thumping, loud, electronica. I rounded the corner by the gas station on Valley and saw Bliss, dozens of people decked out in playa gear, a few stragglers in normal Saturday night wear and firemen who were running to keep an eye on the fire twirlers. Everything seemed fine so far, so I went to Bliss’s front door to go inside.

I walked up to the door, following some burners I recognized. I waited a moment after they entered and met the bouncer at the door. He asked me very politely if I had ID or a bracelet and I answered, I had ID. He wouldn’t take it and he wouldn’t sell me a ticket to get inside Bliss. Besides, nothing seemed to be happening inside other than the usual bar scene there. After being rebuffed, I went around to the back of Bliss and watched the scene there.

If you’ve never been to Burning Man, the pictures I took of the event in the back give a bit of a taste of it. The night was still warm but had a tinge of the cold of winter and the sky was deep and blue. A DJ was spinning and many different people were twirling fire, juggling and dancing to the beats. All manner of people were dressed in various costumes just like they would be on the playa- some were like ravers, a couple guys were dressed like firemen, a lady was on stilts and dressed like a raver and there were quite a few very nattily dressed dudes. There were several art installations- one was a radio hooked up to a spectrograph, one was an outdoor fireplace that was made up to be a steam-punk smokestack, there was a neon Burning Man statue and an art car with several people chilling in it. I again tried to get into Bliss but was rebuffed by the very polite and buff bouncers. Since this was a no-go, I decided to see what was up across the street.

There was no person manning the door at the Artspace On 4th St and I walked right in. That place, next door to Abby’s, has been many different things over the years and now it is a space that is up for rent to various people and groups for various things. On Yuri’s Night, it was the chill-out room for the event- it had a DJ spinning some down-tempo music - I’m not so clear on my , a bunch of pillows on some very comfortable carpets and a hookah, along with the bar. Not too much was happening there and no one seemed to be selling tickets there, so I went back to Bliss, was rebuffed again and just hung out in the back. Since I couldn’t get in, I ended up leaving and driving into the night with Siouxsie & the Banshees leading me on. Overall, Yuri’s Night was cool and I had a fairly good time. I will get a ticket early for next year’s event and make plans to blast off into the space age with some very interesting folks and some decent music.

You can see the full set of pictures I made with my trusty iPhone here.

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