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Vast San Luis Valley is Colorado’s newest cultural destination

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

They came from the Bay Area, Boulder, Nashville, Tenn., and Denver. They bought old homes, found new communities and then got to work creating. Listening rooms, live music venues, artist residencies, social spaces and live-work co-ops are all parts of the quiet movement happening in Colorado’s San Luis Valley.And if the artists are any indication — and they usually are — then the tiny southern Colorado towns of Saguache and Del Norte, along with more communities down valley, are on the verge of entering our collective imagination.Though, for some, these places have long been cemented.Colorado’s high alpine desert, the San Luis Valley is larger than the state of New Jersey with fewer than 50,000 residents and an outsized concentration of natural wonders — from the Great Sand Dunes to the headwaters of the Rio Grande.This swath of the West once comprised border territory between the U.S. and Mexico, and 175 years later, its land and water divisions remain complex, if...

Keeler: Sorry, LeBron. Sorry, Anthony Davis. Nuggets, Bruce Brown aren’t going anywhere. Except to L.A. for their close-up with destiny.

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

I know, America. I know. Gotta be a misprint. LeBron must be hurt. AD must be thinking about his golf game. Darvin Ham must be drawing up recipes on that white board instead of defensive sets.I mean, it can’t be that the NBA’s No. 1 seed in the West is, oh, the best team on that side of the bracket. Surely not.“Let them keep watching, man,” Nuggets defensive ace Kentavious Caldwell-Pope said of an America that’s largely discovering this NBA monster for the first time now that it’s handed King James and the Lakers a two-game playoff losing skid. “We (were) No. 1 (in the West) for a reason.”Know this, America: As good as they are, the Nuggets are twice as tough. And three times as stubborn.Kendrick Perkins wants them to go the (expletive) away. Nick Wright wants them to go the (expletive) away. Lisa Salters wants them to point out to her which one Nikola Jokic is.“I mean, if you don’t know (the Joker), I don’t know if you watch a lot of basketball or not,” Nuggets super su...

Homeowner ready to move and help the next generation 

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

Question: Recently, three homes have sold on my street. Collectively, over 20 offers were presented to the sellers. I’d sell, too. However, I need somewhere to go. I’m a widower — a homeowner of over 40 years. My lifelong best friend lives two hours away. His son is my successor trustee. They live in the same city. My dear neighbors have moved away or passed away. I’m still very fit and active. However, I’m one of the many older adults in America living alone in a multiple-bedroom house. How do lone seniors in my predicament free up their homes for young families without rushing the process?Answer: It is laudable that you are contemplating moving to free up your property for first-time homebuyers — especially when fit. Many older adults wait until it’s too late. An accident, illness or worse can result in others making moving decisions for you. Gather information now. You can avoid having your successor trustee make a four-hour round trip on every visit to help you or settle your es...

Smiths bassist Andy Rourke dies at 59

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

LONDON (AP) — Andy Rourke, bass guitarist of The Smiths, one of the most influential British bands of the 1980s, has died of pancreatic cancer, his former bandmate Johnny Marr said Friday. He was 59.In a lengthy post on Instagram, guitarist and songwriter Marr paid tribute to Rourke, who he first met when both were schoolboys in 1975.“Throughout our teens we played in various bands around south Manchester before making our reputations with The Smiths from 1982 to 1987, and it was on those Smiths records that Andy reinvented what it is to be a bass guitar player,” Marr said.During their short time together as a four-piece band, The Smiths deliberately stayed away from the mainstream of popular music, garnering a cult following on the independent music scene.Though much of the attention focused on the song-writing partnership of Marr and frontman Steven Patrick Morrissey, better known as Morrissey, the sound of The Smiths owed much to Rourke’s bass and his rhythm sec...

Skelton: Newsom, lawmakers need to take stance on reparations

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

Gov. Gavin Newsom and the California Legislature will soon receive a sweeping set of recommended reparations for African Americans whose ancestors suffered economically from slavery and racial discrimination. Then what?Then the governor and lawmakers will need to emerge from cover, face the public and devise a better response than we’ve been hearing: “I’m waiting for the final report of recommendations.”The report will be sent to the state Capitol by July 1. That’s the deadline for the California Reparations Task Force — created by Newsom and legislators — to finish its two years of often-acrimonious work.This will be a tough one for every politician and policymaker who tries to create a balance between providing some realistic semblance of justice without breaking the state bank. And there’ll be some who just flat-out think that major reparations are unreasonable but hesitate to say it publicly.“I’m a hard ‘no,’” one influential Sacramento Democrat told me. When asked whether I cou...

Opinion: Social media reform needed to protect children, democracy

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

Technology has transformed the way we live, the way we communicate with one another and the way we relate to the world around us. It has also deepened the political and cultural divisions so prevalent in society today, but Americans are united on at least one point: Most people agree that social media is a social ill.A recent poll undertaken by the nonpartisan democracy-focused group Citizen Data found strong bipartisan evidence of this sentiment. Regardless of political party, the vast majority of Americans believe social media are toxic to our children and our democracy. A scant 7 in 100 respondents believe that social media’s benefits outweigh its harms.As former elected officials, we can confirm that a 7% approval rating is a clear call to action. It’s past time for legislators to pass social media reforms that increase transparency, ensure privacy and protect children. Waiting to act — or failing to act at all — will carry a steep cost, one that will be paid by our children, by...

Review: Moments of clarity in murky ‘Master Gardener’

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

By Lindsey Bahr | Associated PressPaul Schrader plants the seeds of an intriguing melodrama in his latest creation ” Master Gardener.”Sigourney Weaver is a wealthy dowager with a stately name (Norma Haverhill), a large house and a dog she’s named porch dog. She also has a horticulturist (Joel Edgerton) in her employ who she occasionally calls on for extracurricular, indoor activities. There’s even a big charity auction coming up that she and the gardening staff are intensely focused on.But this being a Schrader film (he wrote and directed), it is mostly window dressing. There even is a palpable (and, I’d imagine, intentional) artificiality to the whole endeavor, creating an unease that looms over the most mundane and superficially pleasant interactions. The ceremony never feels quite right. The house, though grand, is also sparse in its décor. It feels like a set — not a place that a real human being lives. We don’t even get to see the charity auc...

Review: Jason Mamoa brings new energy to ‘Fast X’

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

By Mark Kennedy | Associated PressFans and critics may disagree over when exactly the “Fast & Furious” franchise jumped the shark, but there is only one correct answer: When the Pontiac Fiero went into space.Weightless and violating every physical law, the floating car — tasked with bumping a satellite in the ninth installment — was the very symbol of how bloated and crazed the once-plucky series had become. There really was no way down after that.And yet we have come to 10, part of a planned series of films finally saying goodbye. “Fast X” is, thankfully, shackled to Earth’s gravity — sometimes tenuously, it must be said — but it has become almost camp, as if it breathed in too much of its own fumes.“Fast X” reaches into the fifth movie — 2011’s “Fast Five” — for the seeds to tell a new story. In a memorable moment five movies ago, Vin Diesel’s Dom Toretto wrecked a bad guy and his team on a bridge in Rio de Jane...

Magical Montclair Mediterranean

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

This gorgeous Mediterranean in a prime Montclair location features a generous-size lot with a park-style level backyard, gardens and mature trees — great for entertaining, play and gardening.The home includes rich architectural details and spacious rooms. A charming front yard and garden welcomes you to this three-plus-bedroom, two-bathroom home packed with rich architectural details and spacious rooms. The entry level features an inviting living room, formal dining room, updated kitchen with breakfast nook, two bedrooms, a large bathroom with classic tile and a separate sunroom/office.The lower level includes an additional living/media room, a bedroom with an adjoining room ideal for a playroom, art studio or guests, a full bathroom, laundry room and bonus space with a built-in desk.Live in the coveted Fernwood neighborhood — blocks from Montclair Village shops, dining, farmers market, top-rated schools and close to all major transportation, trails and parks.Address: 1435 Moun...

Former Italian Premier Berlusconi leaves hospital after 45 days

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:15 GMT

MILAN (AP) — Former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi was discharged on Friday from a Milan hospital, nearly a month and a half after he was admitted with a lung infection.Berlusconi waved at journalists from behind a closed window as his car drove away from the San Raffaele Hospital. He arrived shortly later at his villa in the suburb of Arcore. The 86-yeaer-old three-time former premier and media mogul has been treated for chronic leukemia, in addition to the lung infection that landed him in the hospital on April 5. Berlusconi’s Forza Italia Party is part of Premier Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing coalition, but he currently has no cabinet posts. He holds a seat in the senate.Meloni, who is in Japan for a Group of Seven summit, greeted Berlusconi’s return home with a social media message, telling Berlusconi, “We are waiting in the field to fight many battles together.” Source