Category: News

As someone that’s driven from Charlotte to Atlanta (or vice versa) dozens of times, I’ve often been… intrigued by the dozens of billboards for Café Risque, a restaurant\strip club in the small town of Lavonia, Georgia. I guess this is because I have some kind of morbid curiosity about the place. Why do they have 30 billboards on each side of I-85 advertising the place? What kind of girls work at a strip club in Lavonia? Do they have all their teeth? What kind of food does a Lavonia-based strip club have on its buffet? Is it safe to eat?

In a way, it’s similar to the curiosity I used to have as a child about the “alligator farms” advertised along the interstates in northern Florida. I remember begging my mom to stop at one of those farms on several car trips to the Sunshine State. But she never would.

And it seems that I’ll never get my chance to visit Café Risque, either: the city of Lavonia purchased Café Risque in late July for $997,000, and plans to convert the property to a family-friendly restaurant.

You might not think the story of a strip club in a tiny Georgia town would be that interesting, but the tale of Café Risque is actually chock full of intrigue.

Back in 2001, a man named Jerry Sullivan approached city officials about building a family restaurant at the site. Sullivan told the city council that he was “building a Cracker Barrel-type restaurant, and [the restaurant would] make the best tomato gravy in the world”. He further told the council that the restaurant would be called “Skeeter’s Big Biscuits”. Sullivan then gave city officials a tour of the restaurant, which was in the final stages of construction. After the city council approved Sullivan’s business license, the smut peddler immediately set to work removing the booths, replacing the lunch counter with a bar, and even bricking up the windows. By 5am the morning after he got his business license, Sullivan had Café Risque open for business.

As you might guess, this infuriated city officials. They were, however, powerless to stop him, as the city had never passed any sort of law regulating adult entertainment venues, because (quite frankly) the issue had never come up before. The city launched a series of expensive lawsuits against Sullivan, which they almost always lost due to First Amendment concerns. In 2003, the city sued Sullivan again, and this time he agreed to stop selling alcohol… if the city would allow more nudity (which they grudgingly agreed to). In 2006, Café Risque was raided by local police, who seized a number of illegal poker machines. Sullivan sued the city, saying that the action violated his agreement with the city, which banned police officers from coming onto Sullivan’s property for any reason (QUESTION: how can I get that kind of deal?)

Jerry Sullivan died in 2006, but the club continued to operate. Earlier this year, a third-party informed the city that he had been approached by the mysterious new owners of the club, who were interested in selling. In complete secrecy, the city quietly used its emergency fund to pay off a bond issue (which saved the city $1.2 million in interest payments); the third party (a local bank) then lent the city the money to buy the club. In late July, Lavonia mayor Ralph Owens announced that “the city was offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get rid of a very undesirable business in Lavonia. The transaction has now been finalized, and we can make history for our city. By purchasing the Café Risque property, the city can now rid itself of that terrible business and the awful billboard blight”. This set off a round of celebration from the crowd, who followed the mayor to the Café Risque site, where all the signage was taken down from the building and set alight in a huge bonfire.

And thus, Café Risque ceased to exist. There remains only one question in my mind, though: what reason do I ever have to visit Lavonia now?

The jimcofer.com Death Watch 2008 continues: Isaac Hayes had died. From CNN.com:

Soul singer and arranger Isaac Hayes, who won Grammy awards and an Oscar for the theme from the 1971 action film “Shaft,” has died, sheriff’s officials in Memphis, Tennessee, reported Sunday.

Relatives found Hayes, 65, unconscious in his home next to a still-running treadmill, said Steve Shular, a spokesman for the Shelby County Sheriff’s Department.

Paramedics attempted to revive him and took him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after 2 p.m., the sheriff’s department said.

No foul play is suspected, the agency said in a written statement.

Dude… what the hell is up with all the beheadings lately? I’m sure you’ve heard about the beheading on a Greyhound bus in Canada… but did you heard about the Greek guy that beheaded his girlfriend on the island of Santorini, then walked around the island showing off the head to tourists? And it’s not just the crazy men out there… a Malaysian woman living in London became jealous of another woman and beheaded her, dumping her body in the Thames. Oh, and seven London men were recently convicted of attempting to behead a man using samurai swords… At least here in the US we can just shoot people and get it over with quickly!

You might think that all this is bizarre… but how about this: remember the 2002 Bali bombings? Three of the men convicted for that terrorist attack… are demanding (yes, demanding) to be beheaded (instead of facing the firing squad).

The older I get, the less I understand. Really.

Sigh… the world really *is* going to hell, isn’t it?

In a brief filed by the MPAA in the Jammie Thomas file-sharing trial, the motion picture industry’s trade group said that “[i]ntellectual-property holders should have the right to collect up to $150,000 per violation without having to actually prove copyright infringement” (emphasis mine). In other words, the MPAA thinks that they should be able to sue me for $150,000, without having a single shred of proof that I’ve done anything illegal. What I want to know is… why aren’t more people up in arms about this? Of course, many people don’t download movies off the Internet, and many people only download a movies once or twice a year and don’t consider themselves “true pirates”. But come on people – this affects you too! Do you have teenagers? It’s entirely possible that they’re downloading movies and you don’t even know it. And it’s entirely possible that MediaSentry (or some other investigative company) could get your IP address by accident… what then? This scheme smacks of extortion on a massive basis… and no one seems to care.

The UK continues its slide towards Oceania with this story from The Telegraph. Apparently the UK’s National Children’s Bureau, a charity which receives almost £12 million a year from the British government, has released a guide which states that employees should be on the lookout for “racist behavior” in children. According to the guide, this includes children as young as three turning their noses up to curry and other exotic dishes. So if you have a three year-old boy in a British day care center, he is apparently a dirty racist if he says “yuk!” to Tikki Masala. Incredibly, the guide even says that babies should be monitored for racist behavior! Why, Britain, why? I swear, for a country that once ruled 25% of the entire world, you guys sure have lacked balls in the past 40 years!

Rejoice, Charlotteans! Our local monopoly airline – US Airways – announced this week that they will stop showing movies on domestic flights. This will lighten up each airplane by 500 pounds and will save an estimated $10 million a year in fuel. The airline says that no one watches movies on flights any more (thanks to portable DVD players and handheld video devices) and that the few that do watch the films usually bring their own headphones these days (which cuts off the $5 per headset fee the airline used to get). Good Lord, people! What’s next? Will US Air put in pay toilets? Will they charge a $15 “seatbelt rental fee”? You know, Lisa and I normally prefer taking “more, smaller” vacations a year to nearby places like Charleston or Isle of Palms. We think it’s nicer to go to the beach 2-3 times a year instead of saving up for one big (expensive) vacation. But news like this isn’t helping. We could go to New York City or Chicago, but to do that, we’d have to fly. And crap like this makes Charleston and Isle of Palms look better and better!

And, in the last bit of “bad business” news… Charter Cable ran a “World’s Greatest Dad” contest on their website, where children submitted stories about why their dad was the best dad in the world. Mike Lewis’ daughter submitted the winning entry, and the family was supposed to win a 65-inch TV. As Charter marketing wizard Jeff Hatcher began to to process the Lewis’ W-9 (the form the Lewis family needs for taxes), he noticed that  65″ TV was “too expensive for his marketing budget”. So he sent the family a 19-inch TV instead. Classy!

I bet you didn’t know this, but Microsoft still sells Windows 3.11! Or at least they will… until November 1, 2008. Although consumers have long since moved on to Windows 9x or XP\Vista, Windows 3.11 was still incredibly popular with the “embedded devices” crowd. “Embedded devices” are computers that perform specific tasks, like ATMs, cash registers and information kiosks. Although most of the embedded devices average consumers use have been running Windows XP or Windows CE for ages, there are millions of embedded devices running Windows 3.11 in businesses all over the country. There is a Charlotte business that I know that uses a Windows 3.11 machine to control a sheet metal cutter, for example.

Joey Chestnut defeated Takeru Kobayashi in a rare “overtime victory” in the 2008 Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest today. In fact, this was the first ever overtime for the contest! Both Chestnut and Kobayashi had eaten 59 hot dogs by the end of the 10 minute “regulation time”. A “sudden death” was then declared, where each contestant was given 5 hot dogs to eat in the shortest amount of time. Chestnut, of San Jose, California, squeaked by the former 6-time champion to retain the crown for the United States.

“USA! USA! USA! USA!”