The Rainbow Run 5K is a new event that will weave through the streets of downtown Ferndale on Sunday, June 17. A family-friendly event, the Rainbow Run will also have a 2K kid’s run/walk that will pass by three of the color stations. Strollers are welcome (but no bikes or dogs, please). The run/walk is for everyone of all ages who supports diversity, acceptance and anti-bullying programs and people who believe we cannot be complete until all persons are included.

The run will be loosely timed for those runners who want to track their pace, but runners will not be placed. The race will start and finish along West Troy Street one block south of Nine Mile Road between Woodward Avenue and Allen Street. There will be a closing ceremony with a release of 300 rainbow-colored balloons. The balloons will be biodegradable with no strings attached so the environment is not negatively impacted. It will create a colorful kick off for Ferndale Pride street festival that will begin in the same location at noon. .

Participants will receive white T-shirts with the Rainbow Run logo to wear, and as participants pass six stations along the course, volunteers will throw a different colored non-toxic powdered paint at their shirts. By the end of the race, the T-shirts (and other parts of the body) will be decorated with all six colors of the rainbow and is a symbolic of how much more beautiful things are when you mix diversity and colors.

Registration will begin at 9:30 am. The run/walk start times will be staggered by category starting at 10:30 am.

The cost to participate is $25 per person for the 5K run or walk, and $15 per person for 2K run/walk. For those who register the day of the event, the cost is $30 for the 5K and $20 for the 2K.

All proceeds from the event will go to the Ferndale Area Chamber of Commerce; the Ferndale Community Foundation, Affirmations and Upstander, an anti-bullying program established by the Friendship Circle.

Visit www.rainbow-run.com to learn more or to register.

The bash started with only 50 artists and has grown in participants and attendants over the last decade.

“We’ve got a great line up of talented artists, hip crafters, cottage food creators, authors & student artists this year… 122 of them to be exact, the most we’ve ever had,” said April McCrumb, owner of  Catching Fireflies and Yellow Door Art Market.

This year, bashers will have a chance to see a live performance by the band, I Love Lightning Bugs, among others. The three-man band formed 2 years ago and quickly made its’ mark by playing local stages in Ferndale, Berkley and Detroit proper. Likened to U2, Psychedelic Furs, The National and New Order, the band was named CW50’s 2011 Best Blowout Band after a performance at the Metro Times Blowout in Hamtramck.

If you’re going with the intent to snag some art, you’ll be able to get your hands on anything from organic teas to paintings to hand sewn handbags or gourmet doggy treats.

Be sure to bring your appetite because classic culinary delights like corn dogs, burgers, pizza and fresh lemonade are sure to satiate the crowd. Festival favorites including elephant ears, whoopee pies and kettle corn will also be sold, hold your breath for fried Twinkies.

Listen to some of I Love Lighting Bugs music here: http://ilovelightningbugs.com/videos/

“I love bacon!” Bach says. “I eat bacon every day. I grab a piece off the grill when I come into work. I’ll eat it on a BLT sandwich. I eat it at home. I only wish they sold chocolate-covered bacon at the check-out lanes. They sell beef jerky. Why not bacon? When they start selling chocolate-covered bacon at Rite Aid, I’ll buy everything there.”

Although Bach, owner of Dino’s Lounge in Ferndale, serves some of the best apple wood smoked bacon on his brunch menu, he decided to take the “let’s get crazy” approach when he was taken to task to come up with something wild for Baconfest Michigan – bacon ravioli and bacon cheesecake.

The ravioli is stuffed with leeks, chopped bacon, carrots, nutmeg, ricotta cheese, parsley and Gruyere cheese and topped with a prosciutto, bacon, wild mushroom, garlic and chopped tomato cream sauce. But don’t think you can bypass Baconfest Michigan and head to Dino’s for your own plate.

“It’s way too expensive to make,” Bach says.

As for the bacon chocolate combination, Dino’s will be serving a chocolate wafer crust cheesecake topped with bacon.

The Detroit Film Club, of which Bach is the director, will be handling the bar service for Baconfest Michigan. No hints of what the signature cocktail will be, but there will be plenty of Bakon Vodka, which makes its Michigan debut that evening.

Baconfest Michigan takes place at the Royal Oak Farmers Market, 316 E. 11 Mile Road in Royal Oak, on the evening of Saturday, June 2. Tickets are available on the Baconfest Michigan website.

Tawyna started testing out new breakfast recipes when her grandmother (99-years-young) became bored with her restricted diet. Inspired by television cooking shows, Tawnya decided to see what kind of treats she could create with sweet potatoes. As she continued to cook, her family and friends kept asking for more. Eventually, they began asking her to cook for parties, and for large quantities to keep in the freezer.

Tawnya Clark

The Batata Shop, a Detroit based start-up breakfast eatery and specialty bakery was born. Tawnya creates her sweet potato waffles from scratch, working out of kitchen space at Traffic Jam & Snug, where she can roast mass quantities of sweet potatoes in large commercial ovens. This past Mother’s Day, she hosted a pop-up event at TJs offering waffles and fixins.

Tawyna focuses on quality ingredients, small batches and lots of love–”yummy goodness,” says Tawnya. She also makes a pecan-cinnamon butter to serve alongside the waffles. She envisions a future of Batata products that can be sold wholesale to grocery stores and eateries. She is working on having a stand at Detroit’s Eastern Market by July. “Take a chance on something you love,” is Tawyna’s advice.

I had the pleasure of trying these out a couple weeks ago at a pop-up event at the Anthology Coffee Shop, located within Detroit’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCAD). The warm sweet potato waffles with Tawnya’s pecan butter were inviting and delicious. I didn’t bother with syrup–they were already perfect as is. The sweet potatoes in the batter make these waffles ideal for either a sweet breakfast or a savory lunch– they pair well with maple syrup and some eggs, bacon or sausage, or even “chicken and waffles”!

Tawnya is working on the next pop-up event, which will most likely take place at Anthology coffee shop. To keep up with Batata Shop events, check out their Facebook page, and follow them on twitter.

The artistic relevance of Detroit’s contested cityscape is once again at the center of local debate and global discussion. This time the spotlight shines on “The Death of Street Art,” a new mural depicting the iconic character representations of legendary street artists such as Banksy and Shepard Fairey serving as pallbearers to a coffin that reads “STREET ART.” “The Death of Street Art” was painted by Atlanta-based artist SEVER and approved by Hamtramck’s Director of Community and Economic Development, Jason Friedmann. It is the latest installation of The Detroit Beautification Project, supported by 323East Gallery, 1xRun and others.

A handfull of Hamtramck citizens are outraged by the image and initiated a petition against it, but even more citizens felt strongly enough to defend the work by launching their own counter-petition. Friedmann is in the latter camp, stating, “This kind of mural is absolutely appropriate for a city-owned building. Hamtramck is a cosmopolitan, creative powerhouse and remains proud to take ownership of such an internationally relevant artistic statement.”

“The Death of Street Art” deserves to be talked about at every level of interest. What does it mean for street art to proclaim the death of street art, particularly as an early installment in a series of street art installations (The Detroit Beautification Project)? Does street art mean the same thing when it is paid for by galleries and approved by governments? To what extent do public bodies have to consider citizens’ personal tastes when approving public art projects? If someone steals the wall the mural is painted on in the middle of the night, can they charge people $5 to see it a few years later? How effective is The Detroit Beautification Project when it is active outside of Detroit proper? How can we distinguish beautification from vandalization?

Photo Credit: 12oz Prophet

(photo courtesy of Charles C. Avison)

A lot of cities and states lay claim to being the best sports town. LA on the West Coast with its riches of baseball and basketball mastery but it lacks hockey and has non-existent professional football. Boston has the Celtics and Bruins and can lay claim to the Red Sox and Patriots though they are more regionally loved than just in the city. Cleveland had Jim Brown and Indianapolis had Peyton Manning but neither had much else to cheer about. New York can lay claim to plenty of professional sports and has divided championship banners for the better part of a century.

But there’s really only one real City of Champions. And it happened the year gas cost only 10 cents a gallon, a new car was around $625 and a house would set you back about $3,500. It was 1935, the middle of the Depression Era and Detroit was hit the hardest of most US cities with its loss of industrialized jobs. Monetary and personal depression was at an all time high and everyone, no matter their social status, hung their hat and heart on local sports.

Jumping ahead to 2005, Charles C. Avison was hanging out with some buddies and they were reading a Detroit Tigers media guide. Guys love stats and a team’s media guide is a gold mine to useless yet priceless information.

“Basically, I’m a Detroit sports fan. I’m not saying I’m the best Detroit sports fan. I’m not saying I’m the biggest but I’m a fan,” Avison said. “I had just come back from the University of Edinborough, Scotland as a research historian. We were screwing around with this Tiger’s Media Guide and somebody said, ‘hey, when did the Tigers win their first World Series?’ We looked up that page and then there was a note at the bottom of the page that said ‘Did you know the Tigers, Lions and Red Wings had all won their first championship in 1935?’ It became known as the City of Champions.”

Avison was taking a sports history class and immediately found the topic of his impending two-page paper. He found very little about the fantastic year until he made a trek to the Detroit library where he found a gold mine of information. Enough to write a book about it.

So he did.

The in-depth book details the events of that year in Detroit sports history including individual feats such as Joe Louis becoming the heavyweight champion and voted the that year’s Outstanding Athlete of the Year – beating out Jim Braddock, the focus of Ron Howard’s “The Cinderella Man” movie starring Russell Crowe. Louis won the award with 182 votes. Braddock only garnered three.

“Who really captured the heart of sports fans that year?” he said. “No one knows about 1935 Joe Louis,” he said. “Every year a new list comes out but on none of those list does the 1935 Joe Louis come out. He had an 85 percent knockout rate – 14 fights, 12 knockouts. At the beginning of 1935 he was ranked 10th in the boxing world and no one knew who he was. By the end of the year he beat five out of the nine guys who were in front of him including Max Baer and Primo Carnera.”

Avison is a walking/talking encyclopedia of Detroit sports knowledge of 1935 and is glad to share. The topic is so huge that he’s in the works of a second book detailing the athletes from those teams. He has thoughts and plans for other unannounced projects as well. But his book has gotten a cold shoulder from local and national sports outlets.

Something he can’t understand.

“There’s something special about Detroit sports,” he said. “What’s different about us? That’s something that’s never been asked. In the middle of the Great Depression they’re looking for anything to get excited about. They danced in the streets for a solid year. They were endeared to these teams on a level no one could ever understand. These teams created a new identity in Detroit in a single year. This is perhaps the greatest sports story that’s ever been told.”

Avison will be at the Berkley Arts Blast June 9th, www.berkleyartbash.com, selling his book and telling stories from the era to anyone interested in listening. And his stories are worth listening to and worth repeating, oh, and worth writing down.

“When I first released this thing I tried to get it out to the media and I got ignored. They slammed the door in my face. So I’ve found a niche in these art show circuit and I make my living as a traveling story teller.”

Mama Tried

This Merle Haggard song tells the story of a young man who, despite all of his mother’s efforts, ends up on the wrong side of the law anyhow. Haggard sings, “And I turned twenty-one in prison doing life without parole / No-one could steer me right but Mama tried, Mama tried.”

In real life, the singer was at Johnny Cash’s 1958 concert at San Quentin prison–not as a musician but as one of the inmates.

Mama Tried by Merle Haggard

Dear Mama

This was an enormous hit for Tupac Shakur in 1995. It’s one reason why Shakur is so revered, unafraid to acknowledge a sensitive, introspective side in a genre that thrives on machismo and braggadocio. “I finally understand / For a woman it ain’t easy trying to raise a man / You always was committed / A poor single mother on welfare, tell me how you did it / There’s no way I can pay you back / But the plan is to show you that I understand / You are appreciated.”

Shakur, like Merle Haggard before him, lived the life he sung about.

Dear Mama by 2pac

I’m the Only Hell (My Mama Ever Raised)

Along with Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings, Johnny Paycheck was one of the singers credited with beginning the outlaw country movement of the 1970s. Most famous for “Take This Job and Shove It”, Paycheck also sang the song “I’m the Only Hell (My Mama Ever Raised)”. It goes, “When they put those handcuffs on me, Lord how I fought to resist / But that agent clamped ‘em tighter, ’til that metal bit into my wrist / They took my boots and my billfold, my fingerprints, and the profile of my face / Then they locked away the only hell my mama ever ever raised.”

Paycheck served 22 months in prison for shooting a man at an Ohio lounge, the bullet just grazing the man’s head.

I’m the Only Hell (My Mama Ever Raised) by Johnny Paycheck

Redefining Dreamland

There are two primary Detroit narratives in all media, both local and national, whether it’s corporate TV news or crowdfunded documentary. The first is that Detroit is a big, steaming pile of shit. The second is that Detroit is matched only in potential and promise by the western American frontier of the 19th century.

Where other recent Detroit documentaries either exclaim, “Hey, check out all this empty shit,” or, “Hey, quit looking at all our empty shit,” Redefining Dreamland actually takes the time to examine how the shit got shitty and how people are making the shit less shitty, ultimately making Detroit a place with some really cool shit.

Filmmaker Brad Osantoski has assembled an informed bunch here, led by Professor Jerry Herron, Dean of the Irvin D. Reid Honor College of Wayne State University. Whenever the film begins to meander and dawdle, Dr. Herron’s insights tighten things back up.

And meander it does. While there’s plenty of quality content in its 74 minutes, the movie drags as its edited more like an outline than a film. The result is Redefining Dreamland playing more like a really well-developed, thorough class presentation than a documentary.

It’s informative and beautifully shot but slightly boring.

All in all, it’s good, not great, but better than most. Its biggest success is avoiding the trap of becoming a Detroit-is-a-cool-place-for-young-white-kids puff piece–though it does come close. It dodges such a cruel fate by taking the time to examine the good and the bad, giving the film balance.

Detroit’s a weird, complicated place and it’s no easy task documenting this city. Redefining Dreamland makes an honest attempt at doing so and is a success at that.

See it and judge for yourself: HERE.

“We are launching the first of hopefully many on-street bike parking racks,” said Cindy, DDA Volunteer Coordinator.

The racks will fit 14 bikes in one space that have previously been occupied by a motor vehicles. Just one more way Metro Detroit is becoming increasingly bike-friendly. As bikers hit Ferndale next Thursday to reclaim the streets the Ferndale Police Auxiliary will be there to make sure they do so in a safe manner. Bikers may acquire bike licenses to track bikes in case of stolen or missing property. The licenses are usually a nominal fee but will be free on Bike Night. The Downtown Ferndale Bike Shop will also be performing bike safety checks, also free to the public.  Event goers will enjoy giveaways around town and the ever-popular food trucks behind Rust Belt Market.

The highly anticipated bike racks will provide more than just function with a public art component designed by local sculptor Richard Gage. Gage, who has an art incubator called TANK in addition to his studio on 9 Mile, collaborates with artists to give back to their communities. Gage is a skilled sculptor proficient in the metal fabrication process and previously proposed turning blighted land in Hazel Park into rotating sculpture gardens designed by local artists.

It’s sure to be a good time and exciting event, so grab your helmets and pedal down to Ferndale to support local biking and for special deals and giveaways. There are sure to be a few surprises in store!

Lucky for you, the Rattlesnake — one of 36 participating restaurants, bars and markets — is offering a taste of what’s to come during happy hour on Thursday, May 10.

Happy hour (5-8 p.m.) will be about all things bacon. There will be three different complementary bacon appetizers featuring their award-winning bacon mac and cheese, BLT skewers, and bacon and grits fritters in addition to their full happy hour menu priced at $5. There will also be special bacon cocktails priced at $7.

Like everything else on the menu, bacon is special at the Rattlesnake.

“We’re known for your unique style of bacon,” says Alexandria Franz, marketing director of the Rattlesnake. It’s honey-pepper bacon that we make in-house. It has a good balance between sweet, spicy and smokiness. We use it in some of our menu items alike our chicken club sandwich.”

If you haven’t picked up your tickets for Baconfest Michigan, they’ll be available that evening.

The Rattlesnake is located at 300 River Place in Detroit.