Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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NEWS OF THE WEIRD by CHUCK SHEPPARD Leaders of the ice-���shing community, aiming for of���cial Olympics recognition as a sport, have begun the process by asking the World Anti-Doping Agency to randomly test its ���athletes��� for performanceenhancing drugs, according to a February New York Times report. However, said the chairman of the U.S. Freshwater Fishing Association, ���We do not test for beer,��� because, he added, ���Everyone would fail.��� Ice-���shing is a lonely, frigid endeavor rarely employing strength but mostly requiring guile and strategy, as competitors who discover advantageous spots in the lake must surreptitiously upload the hauls lest competitors rush over to drill their own holes. Urine tests have also been run in recent years on competitors in darts, miniature golf, chess and tugof-war, and in 2011, one chess player, two minigolfers and one tugger tested positive. [New York Times, 2-24-2013] Cultural Diversity A frequent sight on Soweto, South Africa, streets recently is crowds of 12-to15-year-old boys known as ���izikhotane��� (���boasters���) who hang out in their Chuck Sheppard designer jeans, ���shimmering silk shirts, bright pink and blue shoes, and white-straw, narrow-brimmed fedoras,��� according to a February BBC News dispatch. Flashing wads of cash begged from beleaguered parents, hundreds may amass, playing loud music and sometimes even trashing their fancy clothes as if to feign an indifference to wealth. Since many izikhotanes��� families are working-class survivors of apartheid, they are mostly ashamed of their kids��� behavior. ���This isn���t what we struggled for,��� lamented one parent. But, protested a peer-pressured boaster, ���(Y)ou must dress like this, even if you live in a shack.��� [BBC News, 2-1-2013] India���s annual ���Rural Olympics��� might be the cultural equivalent of several Southern U.S. ���Redneck Olympics��� but taken somewhat more seriously, in that this year, corporate sponsorships (Nokia and Suzuki) helped fund the equivalent of about $66,000 in prize money for such events as competitive pulling using only one���s ears or teeth. ���We do this for money, trophies, fame and respect,��� one earpuller told The Wall Street Journal in February. This year, in the four-day event in Punjab state, the 50,000 spectators could watch a teeth-lifter pull a 110-pound sack upward for about eight seconds and an ear-puller ease a car about 15 feet. [Wall Street Journal, 2-5-2013 COPYRIGHT 2011 CHUCK SHEPHERD WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM WEEKLY HOROSCOPES BY HOLIDAY For the Week of March 30, 2013 ARIES (March 21-April 19) Sometimes you fear that if you don���t do the work that it won���t be done correctly. This week you���ll feel more open to letting people help and give their own spin to the job, too. Your attitude of openness makes life so much easier for all. feel you must act to win your own respect over and over. This attitude keeps you from producing results, but it could also tire you out if you���re not careful. This week, dare to say, ���enough is enough��� and take some time to relax. TAURUS (April 20-May 20) When you hear someone declare that there is no right or wrong way, you���ll be skeptical. There is a right way ��� the way that works for you. This week you may have to try up to three wrong ways in order to get to know what the right way is. SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21) Adventure is a state of mind. You may not travel far and wide, meet fascinating new people or experience foreign cultures and customs this week, but you will do the truly adventurous thing ��� face the life you know so well with curiosity, boldness and a willingness learn. GEMINI (May 21-June 21) You are being subjected to a subtle scrutiny. The trick is not to try and please them. Instead, deepen your belief in yourself to the point where you no longer care what their verdict is. This may require that you make changes, but these changes will be for you not for them. SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) It���s the tendency of human behavior to assume that others are pretty much believing and doing just as you are. You���ll go against that tendency as you realize the novelty of your choices. Truly you are working on something unique and doing it in a unique way too. CANCER (June 22-July 22) Saintly types may choose to frame life in a way that doesn���t allow for feeling aggrieved or resentful ��� everyone is only doing his or her best. A more earthly point of view may be to log the grievance and strive to set the balance straight. Every action has a consequence. CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) It���s dif���cult to get enthusiastic about anything you don���t know much about. But once get some knowledge on a matter, you���ll get a better understanding of what your level of involvement and enthusiasm could be. So before you decline offers, do a little research. LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) Many cats sleep for 70 percent of their lives. Is it because all that agility and sleek ferocity requires more than equal down time for recuperation? Or is it that the dream life of a cat is so compelling that cats want to spend the majority of time there? AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) Accountability is why most marriage ceremonies happen in the presence of witnesses. When making agreements this week, bring several parties into the deal, if only to provide the social accountability that will encourage all to participate as intended. VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) Start with the low hanging fruit, and while you���re eating that you can decide how much life you are willing to trade to go for that juicy morsel at the top ��� the one you���ll have to ���ght the birds, and gravity, to taste. PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) The more opinions you hear, the better you���ll be at knowing which ones to apply. Also, your skin will get a bit thicker in this process. Thicker skin is one of the requirements necessary for creative folks like you to succeed. LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23) In some way, you By Holiday Mathis ADVICE GODDESS Stammer Time I can���t talk to really pretty girls. If I���m talking to a girl I���m not that interested in or a dude, I���m golden. But if I���m attracted to a girl, my thoughts get totally scrambled. After a party, I walked this sweet, gorgeous girl to her car. She said some funny or cute thing about me, and I meant to say something witty back. Instead, I just said, ���Huh.��� Somehow, it was all I had at that moment. It felt too awkward to keep standing there, so I just mumbled goodbye and walked to my car. Pathetic, huh? ��� Kicking Myself University of Chicago researcher Dr. Sian Beilock, author of Choke ��� a book about overcoming performance anxiety in sports, business, and the arts ��� explains that we have different types of memory. The type crapping out on you every time your head says ���Well, hello, beautiful!��� is ���working memory,��� the cognitive horsepower that allows you to hold relevant information in mind (and protect that information from disappearing) while you���re trying Amy Alkon to do something else. Stressing about what a woman might think of you and overthinking things you normally do without much thought, like tossing around witty banter, depletes working memory resources that would otherwise be available.��� maybe to the point where you ���nd yourself glancing around the bar for help recalling the simplest facts about yourself: ���My name? Uh���Bud. Bud Light.��� You stop the pretty ladies from pulling the ���re alarm in your head and evacuating your every thought the same way you, haw-haw, get to Carnegie Hall ��� practice. Beilock lays out numerous examples that suggest that the more you practice under pressure the less likely you���ll be to choke when the stress is on. For example, golfers who had their putting practice sessions videotaped and judged by coaches did much better in competition than those who practiced without scrutiny. You, likewise, would probably be helped by going out and practicing hitting on hot women with your friends watching in the wings or ��� better yet, to raise the stakes ��� with them watching and placing bets with you on how you���ll do. To avoid selfconscious overthink, shift your focus from fretting about what a woman thinks of you to having a good time saying things you ���nd interesting and fun. With practice, words should stop deserting you and you should have fewer grammatical accidents, making you far less likely to compliment a beautiful woman on how smashing she looks with, ���Drop dead, gorgeous. Amy Alkon all rights reserved. MARCH 27 - APRIL 2, 2013 UCW 19