By Mike Luery, KCRA-TV
California is looking to crack down on water wasters and make saving water a way of life — no matter how much it rains.
California’s restrictions on water use in September were effective, As a result, the state saw a 15 percent drop in water use.
But those emergency regulations expire on Sunday — and that means no state enforcement until new rules can be put in place.
Read the whole story
By Colton Lochhead, Las Vegas Review-Journal
Nevada’s recreational marijuana continued its strong start through the third full month of sales, data released Monday by the Nevada Department of Taxation show.
The state’s licensed and regulated cannabis dispensaries sold approximately $27.7 million in recreational marijuana in September — more than $5 million over the state’s projected sales for the month.
By Samantha N.N. Cross, Iowa State University
I have always been intrigued by Thanksgiving – the traditions, the meal, the idea of a holiday that is simply about being thankful.
For my family, Thanksgiving is all about the food. Some foods, like turkey and mashed potatoes, may be familiar. But there are a few twists. Since I grew up in the Caribbean, I’m allowed a Caribbean dish or two. The reliability of the menu – with a little flexibility sprinkled in – seems to unite us as a family while acknowledging our different cultural backgrounds.
Chances are you and your family have similar traditions. Filipino-American families might include pancit. Russian-American families might serve a side dish of borscht. That’s what makes Thanksgiving unique. It’s a holiday embraced by people regardless of their religion or ethnicity.
Yet despite this adaptability, there’s a core part of the meal that almost everyone embraces. How did this come to be? Although few appreciate it, advertisers have shaped the meal as much as family tradition.
When Sarah Josepha Hale, the editor of Godey’s Lady’s Book, first advocated for Thanksgiving as a national holiday in 1846, she argued that it would unify the country. In our research, my colleagues and I have been able to show that Hale’s vision for the holiday has been largely fulfilled: Inclusivity of people and traditions has been Thanksgiving’s hallmark quality.
A reason for its broad appeal is that it lacks any association with an institutionalized religion. As one interviewee told us, “There is no other purpose than to sit down with your family and be thankful.” And after interviewing a range of people – from those born in the U.S. to immigrants from countries like South Africa, Australia and China – it became obvious that the principles and rituals they embraced during the holiday were universal no matter the culture: family, food and gratitude.
But as a relatively new holiday – one not tied to a religious or patriotic tradition – a shared understanding of the celebration and the meal is crucial to ensure its long-term survival.
While there might be subtle variations, the Thanksgiving meal is the lodestone of the holiday, the magnet that brings people together. Today, familiar items constitute the meal: turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing, gravy, alcohol, salad, apple pie and pumpkin pie. Many of our interviewees tended to serve some version of this list.
But why these items and not others? What makes turkey, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie so special? My colleagues and I studied 99 years of Thanksgiving ads in Good Housekeeping magazine to find out.
Starting with Thanksgiving’s early champion, Sarah Josepha Hale, the history of Thanksgiving is rooted in marketing. Marketers not only helped create many of the rituals and cultural myths associated with the Thanksgiving meal, but they also legitimized and maintained them.
Initially, the Thanksgiving turkey competed with other meats, like duck, chicken and goose, for centerpiece at the Thanksgiving table.
But by the 1920s, turkey had become the only meat advertised. Early ads would focus on how to prepare and present the perfect bird, promoting branded tools like roasters, ranges, pop-up thermometers and oven-cooking bags.
Iconic Swift’s Premium turkey ads focused on the sacredness of the meal by featuring families at prayer, giving thanks before the meal begins. The importance of the turkey to the Thanksgiving celebration dominates, helping to perpetuate the Thanksgiving turkey tradition.
Meanwhile, early ads for the Eatmor Cranberry Company positioned their whole cranberries as a perfect complement to any and all Thanksgiving meat dishes. This brand dominated until the 1930s when another brand, Ocean Spray, entered with its canned gelatin cranberry sauce.
Ads for both brands implied that cranberry sauce has been around since the first Thanksgiving dinner, which was highly unlikely. However, the brand positioning war successfully promoted cranberry sauce as the natural condiment for the Thanksgiving turkey. Ocean Spray would triumph and, to this day, promotes whole cranberries and canned gelatin.
Considered by many to be the quintessential Thanksgiving dessert, pumpkin pie also wasn’t present at the first Thanksgiving meal. (The Pilgrims lacked the butter, wheat flour and sugar to make the pastry.) Nonetheless, beginning as early as 1925, a range of brands – for example, Borden’s, Snowdrift, Mrs. Smith’s and Libby’s – have competed fiercely to connect pumpkin pie to the season, the holiday and the meal. It’s a rivalry that continues to this day.
Not every product category or brand succeeded in becoming a core part of the Thanksgiving meal.
A Welch’s ad from the 1960s implies that the first Thanksgiving meal included juice made from grapes. In 1928, Diamond marketed their walnuts as an accessory to dress up Thanksgiving dishes. Despite vociferous ad campaigns, few associate Welch’s grape juice or Diamond walnuts with Thanksgiving today.
But those early 20th-century ads for turkey clearly resonated: Today, nearly 88 percent of U.S. households have turkey on Thanksgiving, and approximately 20 percent of the turkeys consumed in any given year are consumed at Thanksgiving. This is a testament to the enduring influence of marketing on the holiday. For brands like Butterball (formerly Swift’s Premium), Thanksgiving is big business.
Whether you’re a turkey fan or not, prefer apple pie to pumpkin pie, enjoy canned gelatin over whole cranberry sauce, by celebrating Thanksgiving, you play a role as well. Marketers may have shaped many of the rituals of the holiday. But all Americans – from all backgrounds – certainly do their part to maintain them.
After all, brands need customers to survive.
Samantha N. N. Cross is an associate professor of marketing at Iowa State University. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.
This is a South Lake Tahoe Fire Department Christmas tree fire safety tip.
Select a fresh tree with good color and firm, flexible needles that do not easily pull from the branches.
Place the tree in plain water immediately after recutting the trunk at least one-half inch above the old cut. The container you use for your tree should hold 2 to 4 quarts of water. The longer you wait to place your tree in water, the greater the chances are that it will lose the required moisture content to keep it fresh through the holiday season. Never place your tree on a wooden stand.
Locate the tree away from sources of heat. Avoid placing the tree near heaters, wood stoves, fireplaces, large appliances, such as TVs, and direct sunlight. Be careful not to block a door or other exit with the tree or rearranged furniture.
Use mini-lights on your tree and never place candles on or near your tree. Remove your Christmas tree as soon as possible after the holiday. Never burn your Christmas tree or wrapping paper in the fireplace. The rapid burning and excessive heat can damage the firebox and chimney creating a serious fire hazard.
The SLTFD wants to wish everyone a fun and safe holiday season.
— Sallie Ross-Filgo, SLTFD
Lake Tahoe South Shore Chamber of Commerce’s annual Go Local & Win contest is kicking off Nov. 25.
Pick up a passport at participating businesses or download one online, then shop or dine at any of the participating business through Jan. 1. For every $25 spent contestants will receive a stamp on their passport. Completed passports are eligible to up to $500 in cash prizes and those that follow along on the @GOLocalTahoe Facebook page have more opportunities to win.
Something new this year is the opportunity to hunt down and “capture” a Tahoe Chamber elf. The elf on the shelf will be living at different local businesses throughout the season. Each week Go Local participants will receive clues about how to spot an elf. Capture a photo with the elf and be entered to win more prizes.
By Jonathan Erdman, Weather Channel
Global temperatures are on pace to make 2017 the second warmest year in 137 years of record keeping, according analyses by NASA and the Japanese Meteorological Agency.
October 2017 was the second warmest October in records dating to 1880, according to data released by NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
Only 2015 had a warmer October in NASA’s analysis than 2017.
The first 10 months of 2017 as a whole rank second warmest only to 2016, according to NASA and JMA.
South Lake Tahoe Cancer League will begin its See’s Candy sales on Nov. 27.
The temporary storefront is in the Raley’s Y center near Starbucks. It will be opne daily from noon-5:30pm, through the end of the year.
This the the Cancer League’s biggest fundraiser of the year .
Volunteers provide transportation for cancer patients for free. Small grants are also available to help with people while they are in treatment.
Phil Stevenson
Lake Tahoe Community College instructor Philip Erik Stevenson died Nov. 14, 2017, after an injury from a fall. He was 77.
Phil was born in Palo Alto in August 1940. He graduated from Atherton High School in Palo Alto, received a bachelor’s in science in chemistry from Harvard University, and a doctorate in theoretical chemistry from the University of Chicago. He pursued post doctoral studies in Brighton England and later acquired an MBA from Rutgers University.
Phil taught chemistry at Worcester Poly Technical Institute in Massachusetts for seven years. Switching his focus from academia to business, Phil moved to South Orange, N.J., and spent the next 25 years at Allied Chemical. His lifelong fascination with computer science eventually led to a later position in programming.
Coming full circle, Phil’s last job returned him to teaching chemistry at Lake Tahoe Community College. “Dr. Phil” as his Tahoe students called him, was a natural educator, a successful scientist and a great guy to have on your team.
He met and married his wife, Susan, while he was teaching at WPI. They spent their vacations traveling, backpacking, rock climbing, cross country skiing and hiking in the U.S. and abroad.
Phil had extensive interests. He was equally happy outdoors in nature, or at home reading or computing. Although he took great pleasure in learning, singing, and landscape photography, his primary love was traveling the world to ride and photograph trolleys and electric trains.
Phil was a celestial type. The moon, planets and stars lured him out at night for moonlit hikes and he marveled at the recent eclipse of the sun.
As a man of faith, he put his beliefs into action, serving his church communities by singing in the choirs, sitting on church councils or as webmaster. He was sensitive to the needs of the disabled, building ramps to access his church and his home. Phil was a modest quiet intellectual who was very content in life, whether with his family and friends, or on his own.
A friend described him as “a kind, humble, talented and responsible man.” He was tolerant and forgiving, smiled easily and laughed loudly.
Phil is survived by his wife, Susan Stevenson of South Lake Tahoe; sister, Phoebe Newlove of Los Gatos; and niece Mary Newlove Black and her family of San Ramon.
A sacred memorial service is planned for his immediate family and his church family on Dec. 2 at 3pm at Hope Lutheran Church of the Sierra, 930 Julie Lane, South Lake Tahoe.
A public celebration of Phil’s life will be scheduled in spring 2018.
Gifts in memory of Phil may be donated to Tahoe Symphony Orchestra and Chorus at TOCCATA, 586 Douglas Court, Incline Village, NV 89451, or The Sempervirens Fund, a land trust dedicated to preserving the Redwood forest of the Santa Cruz Mountains, at Sempervirens Fund, 419 South San Antonio Road, Ste. 211, Los Altos, CA 94022.
Marking 15 years of adventure sports cinematography and culture, Tahoe Adventure Film Festival is the annual gathering of the who’s who of outdoor adventure set in a hypnotic theatrical show of go-go dancers and action imagery.
It’s where the industry’s best filmmakers premier their latest adventure sports films one night only hosted by festival creator and adventurer Todd Offenbacher.
Filmmakers capture the power and intensity of skiing, snowboarding, kayaking, rock climbing, surfing, mountain biking, BASE jumping and other heart pounding sports that feed our addiction to adventure. Some segments are special edits, including previews of films that have not been released.
Each year, the festival highlights the lifestyle and culture of the action and adventure sports. The 2017 festival will feature women athletes in mountain sports. A never before seen edit from Match Stick Production, cut from the 2017 film “Drop Everything,” features Offenbacher. Action photography by Christian Pondella, one of the top adventure sports photographers in the world, will be on display.
The coveted Golden Camalot award will go to South Shore local Olympian Jamie Anderson. Offenbacher created the award to honor action and adventure sports pioneers for their astounding contributions, excellence, achievements, and leadership that have shaped so many lives and defined our culture.
The 2017 Tahoe Adventure Film Festival debuts Dec. 9 at MontBleu in Stateline. The doors open at 6:30pm, followed by the films at 7:30pm. Tickets can be purchased at the MontBleu ticket office or call 775.588.3515.
Starting in January, Offenbacher takes his show on the road to Petaluma, Park City, Jackson Hole, Mammoth, Reno, and Minden.
By Joaquin Palomino and Kimberly Veklerov, San Francisco Chronicle
In the early hours of the most destructive firestorm in California history, officials in Napa and Sonoma counties knew their local first responders would be overwhelmed and turned to a statewide mutual-aid system designed to swiftly bring in support crews from other regions to protect homes and save lives.
They got help, but they didn’t get what they asked for — not nearly.
Commanders in the two counties requested 305 fire engines through the state’s mutual-aid program as the Tubbs Fire swept west from Calistoga to Santa Rosa and the Atlas Fire raced through the hills north of the city of Napa. But only 130 engines would be sent to those blazes over the first 12 hours, according to data obtained by The Chronicle under the state’s Public Records Act.
Officials in Mendocino County, where nine people were killed by another big fire, requested 15 engines from outside the county. None was sent the first day.
