2011 November

Beauty Under the Knife

Linda–not her real name–decided to have cosmetic surgery eight years ago. Then sixty, the U-M prof took a group of her students to Europe during winter break. “Some of the pictures, when we got back–I...

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Fire and Pain

Lieutenant Scott Robertson loved his life as a member of the Ann Arbor Fire Department. “I hired in on November 10, 1985,” says the forty-nine-year-old. “In fact, the current chief and I, we started on the same...

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Three and Out 2011

In Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football, the key word is “crucible.” If there’s a single takeaway from John U. Bacon’s account of his three years...

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New bridges at last!

Work begins this month to replace the failing Stadium Boulevard bridges–and thanks to a quick change of plans, the city will pay only a fraction of the estimated $23 million price tag. Homayoon Pirooz, who heads the...

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Class reunion

When members of the Ann Arbor High School class of 1964 learned that one of their classmates was suffering from multiple sclerosis and feeling depressed, they cheered her up by quickly organizing a lunch at Weber’s...

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Dan’s Wonderful Musical Toys

When musician Dan Orcutt’s expensive brand-name guitar turned out to be a lemon, he decided to make his own.”I always made stuff,” explains Orcutt, who’s been playing around Ann Arbor since the 1980s....

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Blackbird’s Intermission

In August, tragedy struck Shakespeare West, the Blackbird Theatre’s summer season in West Park. A car crash took the life of seventeen-year-old performer Danny Friedland, who was appearing in the performance of Twelfth...

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Art Van PureSleep

If you want a mattress, Art Van has them. But if you need to buy more than that to help you sleep, you can go to the Art Van PureSleep store, a stand-alone emporium that opened in the former Blockbuster space on Jackson across...

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A life in tile

It’s the monthly staff lunch at Motawi Tileworks, and Nawal Motawi and her thirty-or-so employees have dragged tables together in the middle of the factory floor and thrown open the loading-dock doors to a sun-drenched...

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Quizno’s Meets Meijer’s

As obesity rates attest, people will eat just about anytime and anywhere there’s food. Grocery stores have figured out that people will even eat while they shop for groceries. Subhash Patel figured it out too.He owns a...

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A second ReStore, nearby

Habitat for Humanity celebrated the fifth anniversary of ReStore, their second-hand retail store on Aprill Dr., by opening a second ReStore just a few hundred yards north of the first one October 1. Vic Whipple, director of both...

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Playing for Haiti 2011

Ann Arbor piano teacher Renee Robbins was deeply touched when she heard Romel Joseph’s story on NPR last year. Blind from birth, Joseph became a violinist and educator, only to lose both his music school and his pregnant...

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Tammy Kraeger, Tooth Lady

Brothers Mitch and Logan Abrams don’t have far to go to get their teeth cleaned. Students at Ann Arbor Open @ Mack, they’re among the more than 200 kids a year who are seen at the Washtenaw Children’s Dental...

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Imbibing at home

Jason Smith started brewing beer at home when he was twenty. “I couldn’t buy it, so I made it,” he says. Smith, now thirty-eight, has been brewing beer at home ever since. In 1999, he started helping other home...

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The Busiest Intersection

“You can’t bring bags inside the stadium!” Laura Burke yells to the U-M football fans converging on the corner of Main and Stadium. “No bags! No purses! You can check them in Crisler Arena.” A...

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1918 Flu Epidemic in Ann Arbor

Q. How hard was Ann Arbor hit by the 1918 flu epidemic–approximately how many died?A. Between the summers of 1918 and 1919, millions of people around the globe died of a deadly variant of influenza known as the...

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From Tile to Pasta

“You already had lunch? You’re not hungry?” asked Michael DeCola incredulously of the idiot reporter who showed up at an Italian restaurant on a full stomach. “Let me get you something. A meatball....

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Trees

Now that bands from Washtenaw County are once again getting heard around the region and the country, let’s think back to the last time that happened, in the 1970s. Clubs like Mr. Flood’s Party on Liberty hosted quite...

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The Ann Arbor Way of Death

When the baby boomers finish their life’s journey, they’ll find plenty of room in local cemeteries.Even as the United Kingdom tries to cope with its overflowing burial grounds, and some U.S. municipalities have...

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Bongs, Yes; Thongs, No

Steve Abouna and Kilo Hassan opened Bongz & Thongz on September 10, after they’d taken some hazing from the city. The city’s problem was with the thongs rather than the bongs–the idea of a sex toy shop...

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