BOBBLE TIKI: BREAKFAST WITH BOBBLE TIKI >>>

THE DAILY WORD
Misnomer \mis-NO-muhr\, noun:
1. The misnaming of a person in a legal instrument, as in a complaint or indictment.
2. Any misnaming of a person or thing; also, a wrong or inapplicable name or designation.

USAGE EXAMPLE: Calling it a hangover was something of a misnomer. Bobble Tiki felt like that when he woke up every day.

MORNING NEWS

TACOMA: Wave of retirements

OLYMPIA: Graffiti to stay for a week

SEATTLE: Parachute could be D.B. Cooper’s

WORLD: Mayhem in Tibet

THINGS TO DO TODAY
FILM LISTINGS: Look here
MUSIC LISTINGS: Here’s what’s happening

MICHAEL SWAN: I BET THIS  WILL BE PACKED >>>

The Suburban Times reports that Save Lakewood, Lakewood citizens' anti-Gambling Initiative group, will hold its first public meeting Monday at the Lakewood Library Meeting Room.

The old stigma that gambling brings crime is nonsense. It brings revenue to the city, it brings people to patronize businesses and it brings money for police and fire services. It brings jobs, too.

Gambling, like sex and alcohol, is not inherently good or bad. If you think gambling is immoral, do not participate. If you are trying to protect people from themselves, quit wasting your time.

KEN SWARNER: MENUDO >>>

Admittedly, I skipped the impetus, the need, the NEED for menudo and dipped my spoon in just for the fun of it. Maybe I should have thrown back five or six So-Cos on the rocks, suffered the apocalypse to follow and then tested if this Mexican “breakfast of champions” really does kill a hangover … but it was a Thursday … and 11 a.m.

As part of my tripe investigation, which will run in tomorrow's Weekly Volcano, I felt compelled to include Menudo in my story. A Mexican-American co-worker who grew up in Houston said Menudo, like other regional dishes, varies in taste from place to place. In other words, if Taco Bell carried it â€" beware!

I did what any reasonable food enthusiasts does in Tacoma, I stopped along Pacific Avenue near 56th Street and visited Vuelve A La Vida, one of two places I always expect authentic Mexican flavors. Tacos Guaymas on South Tacoma Way is the other, but they serve menudo only on the weekends.

Mexicans swear menudo is better than any hair of the dog (which is a different soup altogether). They slurp it for breakfast, but no one batted an eye when I ordered it for lunch.

The dark, red-brown soup based on tomato and beef broth features hominy the size and texture of garbanzo beans with cubed cutouts of honeycomb tripe. A plate of cilantro, onions and lime slices accompany the bowl â€" I dumped them in with reckless abandon.

If you approach menudo skittishly, reciting to yourself, “I am eating cow stomach, I am eating cow stomach,” likely you’ll miss the point and quite possibly convince yourself into a queasy stomach. Don’t. Menudo tastes like rich, deep, earthy tomato soup â€" period. The rest is texture â€" the hardness of the hominy and the pillow soft puffs of fatty, flavorless stomach. The tripe lacks an ounce of gristle or firmness â€" literally I thought I was eating the perfect sponge.

Would I try it again? Maybe. It’s not about acquiring the taste (it tastes great), it’s more in the realm of being a comfort food (familiar) or not.

I did find menudo in cans at Safeway. The one pound, 13.5 ounce cans feature menudo with and without hominy, spicy and mild. I suppose buying a can for when Alka Seltzer fails to soothe the savage beast of post-Saturday night binge drinking assures I’ve covered all of my bases. And that’s certainly a comfort.

MATT DRISCOLL: MARTIN BLANK AT THE MUSEUM OF GLASS >>>

Fans of the classic John Cusack film Grosse Point Blank may be surprised to hear Martin Blank is currently holed up at the Tacoma Museum of Glass, engaged in a Visiting Artist residency that will keep him in the City of Destiny through the month of June. The purpose of his stay is to “create components for ‘Fluent Steps,’ a new permanent installation designed for the Museum’s Main Plaza reflecting pool and scheduled to open in early fall.  The sculpture will capture the emotive nature of water and play with the light and water echoing the Pacific Northwest’s unique environment,” according to the Museum of Glass’s Web site.

And, of course, he’ll probably need to kill a few folks, right? He is, Martin Q. Blank, after all.

Wrong.

As it turns out there’s more than one Martin Blank in this world, and the one who’ll be at the Tacoma Museum of Glass isn’t a hit man. He’s a world renowned glass artist who began his career as one of Chihuly’s lackies and has gone on to become one of North America’s premier figurative sculptors.

While this revelation may disappoint Cusack buffs, in term of glass art, Tacoma’s receiving a much better deal from this Blank. If you’re interested in watching him work, Martin Blank and his team will be constructing the new installation in the Museum of Glass Hot Shop from now until June. A schedule of that work can be found here.

You can also check out the Hot Shop action live via the Interweb anytime you want by going here.

STEPH DEROSA: WINESTYLES >>>

Well, I did it: I am easily suckered into a wine club. My problem is that I join, and if I have to go pick up my monthly wine, I forget. Fortunately I have KAke and Bandito to help me drink up the multitudes of wine I end up having at the end of the year.

Hopefully that won't happen this time, for I have joined a wine club right by my house. For $35 monthly I get two bottles of wine per month, and 10 percent off my purchases at WineStyles. Meh, it's an OK deal â€" but for as often as I buy wine, and as often as I frequent the 99 Bottles located right next door â€" this is more than convenient.

The selection is almost always stuff I've never heard of, but the price is always very competative. It's definately a "get what you pay for" kind of deal. The knowledge of the sales people has always been spot-on, and I've never left with a bottle I didn't like. Regular wine tastings held at WineStyles are helpful as well.

Don't be scared. Next time you're at 99 Bottles, and you're afraid of your wife bitching about your beer purchase, slip into WineStyles and grab her a good bottle of wine. Unless she's like me, I'd be happy with any amount of liquor a man brought home to me.

TAMMY ROBACKER: O HEAR MY WORDS >>>

April is National Poetry Month, and all over the South Sound, writers will be rhymin’ and readin’ their swirl of stanzas.

I’m running a list in tomorrow’s today's print and online versions of the Weekly Volcano.

Below are the events taking place at the Tacoma Art Museum. They’re all about poetry in April, too. In honor of National Poetry Month in April, visitors are encouraged to write poems inspired by landscapes on view in Veiled Northwest: Photographs by Mary Randlett. A notebook for visitor-written poems will be available in the gallery during the month of April.

Thursday, April 17
11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
In recognition of National Poetry Month, the Tacoma Art Museum’s free Third Thursday Art Walk program offers a variety of fun, poetry- and literacy-related programs for all ages.

4:30-6:30 p.m.
Word Travels
Jason Lee Middle School students present their artwork and poetry.

6-8 p.m.
Word Up!
Teens perform spoken word poetry, enjoy free food, listen to live music, and create artwork.

And don’t forget A Couple of Ways of Doing Something: Photographs by Chuck Close, Poems by Bob Holman on exhibit, too.

PAUL SCHRAG: ONE LOVE >>>

Sincere congratulations to David Fischer and the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts for having the courage to host a community dialogue about hip-hop culture.

From the official release:

• “Hip Hop music is at risk of being marginalized in our society as solely focused on violence and the degradation of women. The Broadway Center will host a community dialogue to challenge those assumptions and discuss ways in which Hip Hop music can be presented in a safe and positive manner.”

This forum, scheduled for April 27 at 3 p.m. at Theater on the Square, arrives on the heels of challenges from the hip-hop community. Those challenges include claims that the BCPA tried to exclude the whole of hip-hop culture when it shut down a scheduled concert celebrating releases from East Tacoma-based label Rottweiler Records, featuring special guest E-40. For that story, visit the Weekly Volcano Web site.

This conversation is rich with risk, and it’s not always positive. It is definitely not safe. But it is as real, significant and meaningful a conversation as any that has ever occurred in Tacoma.

I would encourage the people involved in organizing this dialogue to include voices from all corners of hip-hop culture â€" not just the components that middle-class Americans can immediately identify with. A panel of academics, community leaders and so-called conscious rappers won’t be talking about hip-hop â€" not all of it anyway. They should be welcomed, but so should Kyle Nephew, General Wojack and West Coast Stone.

I also hope this is the first of a series of larger, long-overdue conversations about all the issues that hip-hop has been talking about for decades. Not all of that should fall on the shoulders of the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts. How about it, heads? Can we stand up and make “One Love” more than a catch phrase?

I believe that the Broadway Center is truly dedicated to making its venues accessible to a diverse audience. I also believe that most of the people that are truly involved in hip-hop culture want to make their community a better place. Both groups are now in a unique position to prove it. If we can come together and do right, we’ll have a much better chance of succeeding at both.

LECTURE
Buddhism
You are doomed. You are all doomed if you do not attend the Introduction to Buddhism by Geshe Kelsang Gyatso book talk. Buddhists have all that karma business in the bag, and if you do not go to this discussion, you will probably rue the day. Arguably, the beautiful thing about Buddhism is that, by and large, it seems to willingly allow for adaptation, welcomes it and encourages it, in the full understanding that so long as clear, divine intent is in place there can be no real threat to the Four Noble Truths to the honest path. (Though there is no shortage of strict Buddhist sects who believe their version is the one true way.) American Buddhist nun Kelsang Jindak of the Olympia Mahayana Buddhist Center will lead the dicussion … and the rest of your life. â€" Suzy Stump
[King’s Books, 6 p.m., free 218 St. Helens Ave., Tacoma, 360.754.7787]

COMMUNITY
Coffee and Rhetoric
Cutters Point Coffee on Pacific Avenue will host another Coffee and Rhetoric live talk show tonight hosted by urbanXchange focusing on non-profit arts venues and their place in Tacoma’s milieu. The discussion will center on the work of gallery owners Peter Lynn and Sean Alexander, who together run The Helm gallery on Broadway. The event announcement invites everyone to “find out how they ever pulled together this great concept, why it's relevant to our cultural life, how we can support and how more such spaces can be created.” â€" Joe Malik
[Cutters Point Coffee, Thursday, March 27, 7 p.m., no cover, 1936 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, 253.272.7101]

LINK: Electric Children and others in the clubs tonight.
LINK: Advice Goddess helps two more with problems.
LINK: Let’s eat tripe today.

JOE MALIK: COFFEE AND RHETORIC >>>

Cutter’s Point Coffee on Pacific Avenue will host another Coffee and Rhetoric live talk show tonight hosted by urbanXchange focusing on non-profit arts venues and their place in Tacoma’s milieu. The discussion will center on the work of gallery owners Peter Lynn and Sean Alexander, who together run The Helm gallery on Broadway. The event announcement invites everyone to “find out how they ever pulled together this great concept, why it's relevant to our cultural life, how we can support and how more such spaces can be created.”

[Cutter's Point Coffee, Thursday, March 27, 7 p.m., no cover, 1936 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, 253.272.7101]

BOBBLE TIKI: BREAKFAST WITH BOBBLE TIKI >>>

THE DAILY WORD
Acrid \AK-rid\, adjective:
1. Sharp and harsh, or bitter to the taste or smell; pungent.
2. Caustic in language or tone; bitter.

USAGE EXAMPLE: It was an acrid American Idol dispute, Bobble Tiki supporting Chikezie and Mrs. Tiki leaning towards David Cook.

MORNING NEWS

TACOMA: Freakin’ snow

OLYMPIA: Rezoning fight

SEATTLE: McDermott’s trip to Iraq

UNITED STATES: Today’s papers

THINGS TO DO TODAY
FILM LISTINGS: Look here
MUSIC LISTINGS: Here’s what’s happening