By Kathryn Reed

Oh, if only I were royalty, then I could eat fresh asparagus year-round.

“In the 16th century, asparagus gained popularity in France and England, and early colonists brought it to America. King Louis XIV of France so enjoyed this delicacy that he ordered special greenhouses built for a year-round supply. Hence the reference to asparagus as ‘Food of the Kings’,” according to the California Asparagus Commission website.

We common folk are relegated to eating these nutritious green spears seasonally – which means now — and for the next couple months. Seventy-five percent of the asparagus grown in the U.S. comes from California soil.

Here are some facts about asparagus:

Source: California Asparagus Commission

There are so many wonderful ways to cook asparagus. One of my favorites is to steam them and then drizzle balsamic vinegar over them, sometimes adding a squeeze of fresh lemon.

For a snack, I will steam the spears, then let them cool to room temperature. I spread either cream cheese or a light ranch dressing on a flour tortilla. I place a few spears on the tortilla – depends how thick the spears are – then roll up the tortilla. I cut them into about 1-inch segments, put them on a plate, cover them with plastic wrap, refrigerate them, and snack on them like candy.

Wanting a side dish of more than just asparagus, I came up with the following recipe last weekend. You could use oil instead of butter to make it vegan. The butter added a little more richness, plus some salt. I don’t often cook with salt, so having it added other places works for me.

Asparagus, Mushroom, Spinach Medley (serves 3)

1½ C asparagus, chopped into bite size pieces or smaller

1½ C mushrooms, rough chop

2½ ounces fresh spinach

1½ T butter

2 tsp garlic, minced

¼ C Madeira

Pepper, to taste

Melt butter over medium-high heat. Add mushrooms, stir so they are coated with butter and begin to slightly change color. Then add asparagus. Cook for a couple minutes. Add spinach. As spinach is halfway wilted, add garlic and Madeira. Once spinach is cooked, add pepper, stir and serve.

• Nevada Department of Transportation has been named Transportation Owner of the Year in the southwest U.S. by Engineering News-Record/Southwest magazine for innovative construction of state road projects.

• Squaw Valley and Alpine Meadows are scheduled to remain open daily for skiing and riding through April 29, and Alpine is also slated to stay open Friday through Sunday through May 13.

• Leanne Wagoner after 13 years is leaving Live Violence Free to work in Barton’s PR department.

• Colleen Akiko Jackson, certified transformational coach and reiki master therapist, has opened an office in the Levon Professional Building at 10833 Donner Pass Road, St. 201 in Truckee. She is offering complimentary initial coaching consultations and introductory rates through June. For more information, call (530) 308.5053.

• Leland Faegre, owner of Coyote Grill in Round Hill, now owns 20 percent of South Lake Tahoe’s KTHO FM-96.1, AM-590.

By Josephine Marcotty, Star Tribune

The ice went out on Christmas Lake last week, and soon a new gate will go up at its only public boat ramp, signaling the start of what may be the most contentious boating season yet in Minnesota’s two-decade fight over zebra mussels and other invasive species.

The gate, installed in November, is more than a method to keep invasive species out of one of the most pristine and exclusive lakes in the metro area. Some see it as a challenge to individual privacy and a virtual Minnesota birthright — unfettered access to any lake or river in the state.

Those two imperatives — protecting the lakes and keeping them open to all — are at the heart of a lawsuit filed last week by three west-metro lake associations against the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR). The associations claim the state has failed to devise a comprehensive plan against invasive species and has thwarted their efforts to protect the lakes they treasure.

“It’s not clear to the general public that the battleground for zebra mussels in 2012 is Minnesota,” said Joe Shneider, president of the Christmas Lake Homeowners Association, one of litigants. “Every state east of us has lost the war,” he said.

But some say the lawsuit and the gates will only inflame the debate, not solve the problem.

“Those aren’t their lakes,” said Vern Wagner, executive director of Anglers for Habitat. “Those lakes belong to the citizens of Minnesota.”

DNR officials say they are doing more than ever to fight such invasive species as zebra mussels and milfoil. The Legislature has increased funding from $3.8 million in 2010 to an expected $8.6 million this year. And now the DNR is asking for laws that would require boat owner education, give the agency authority to conduct mandatory boat inspections, and allow it to delegate that same authority to counties and cities.

When critics complain about the lack of a statewide plan, what they really mean is that they want the state to inspect every boat before launch in any of the state’s 13,000 lakes, said Luke Skinner, supervisor of the state’s invasive species program.

Not only would that be breathtakingly expensive, officials said, but it raises profound questions about the reach of government into the privacy of the state’s 800,000 boats.

Read the whole story

By Phil Taylor, Sports Illustrated

The most difficult conversation of Patrick Burke’s life did not come on the day his younger brother, Brendan, revealed he was gay. That was a relatively easy talk, at least for Patrick, now a scout for the Flyers. It was just after Christmas in 2007, and he was 24, five years older than Brendan. They were bringing in Patrick’s luggage from the car after a scouting trip when Brendan told him, and for Patrick it didn’t change a thing. Why would it? They were brothers. Just to make sure it wasn’t one of Brendan’s jokes, Patrick made him swear on the Stanley Cup that he was serious, the way the brothers often did, because hockey runs in the Burkes’ blood. Brendan, then the student manager of the Miami (Ohio) men’s hockey team, swore accordingly. “I love you,” Patrick told his brother. Then he told him to grab a suitcase.

No, the hardest conversation of Patrick’s life came a few days later, after he’d had time to think about the years that his brother had felt the need to keep his sexuality secret. He thought about the stereotypes he had joked about in front of Brendan and how he had casually used the word gay as an insult. They weren’t hateful comments, just unthinking ones, but Patrick could hear them now the way Brendan must have heard them then. He would later learn why Brendan had quit his high school hockey team before his senior season: As a closeted gay player, he was uncomfortable with just that type of locker room banter.

“I had to sit down with my little brother, my best friend, and apologize,” says Patrick. “I said, ‘I’m sorry if I made your life harder. I’m sorry if I ever made you think that because you’re gay, I would love you any less.'” It was Brendan’s turn to reassure him. Whatever Patrick had said in the past hadn’t changed the way Brendan felt about him. They were brothers. “He said, ‘I knew you loved me,'” Patrick remembers. “But still I couldn’t believe some of the things I had said.”

You may know what came next, that after Brendan came out publicly in November 2009 and after his father, Maples Leafs president and general manager Brian Burke, not only accepted him but also accompanied him to Toronto’s Gay Pride parade, fate bodychecked the Burke family into the boards. On Feb. 5, 2010, the SUV that Brendan was driving slid out of control on a snowy Indiana highway and into the path of an oncoming pickup truck, killing Brendan, 21, and Mark Reedy, 18. It was a tragedy deepened by its cruel timing—Brendan’s life was over just as he was beginning to live it openly. The Burkes have dedicated themselves to gay activism in his memory ever since, and their latest project is the You Can Play initiative cofounded by Patrick.

Read the whole story

By Kathryn Reed

No. 8626 is home.

While still small at 35 pounds, this black bear left Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care at the break of dawn Thursday headed for Soda Lake near San Luis Obispo. This is the area where she was picked up in September and where California Department of Fish and Game officials released her later Thursday.

At Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care animals don’t receive names. This is because they are not pets and this is not a zoo. It’s a rehab facility for wildlife.

The last bear club rehabbed this season at Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care was returned to the wild March 29. Photos/Kathryn Reed

When this bear came in she was without a mom, was wandering around San Luis Obispo, and not eating even though she would scamper up pear and apple trees.

When Kevin Willitts, LTWC’s veterinarian, examined her he found an injury under her chin. An abscess had formed that made her unable to swallow. She was losing weight. Arriving at 16 pounds, she couldn’t afford to lose much more.

Every two days Willits would work on her until the sore healed.

He was there when DFG picked her up March 29. He took blood, looked at her chin. No evidence of any injury.

“She’s not the same bear,” Willits says. And that’s a good thing. Now she is a healthy bear ready to live in on her own.

It was a slow road to recovery. It was soft foods to begin with – like oatmeal and applesauce. She eventually graduated to solid foods.

Still, being so small, she was never put in with the five other cubs Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care took in last year. Those animals were returned to the wild earlier this year. But based on this one’s size, she was kept longer to put a little bulk on her and to give her a better chance at surviving.

Marc Kenyon, associate wildlife biologist with DFG, said a colleague this week had checked the area out where the bear was to be released.

“The rains we’ve gotten have really greened up the area,” Kenyon said, adding there is plenty of food and water for this youngster.

Normally bears are released into a den while they are hibernating. With bears out and about, a den was not her destination.

To get her into the cage in the back of the pickup she had to be tranquilized. Mixing the Telazol, which comes in powder form, with water, Kenyon puts it in a syringe that is the attached to what looks like a long pole.

She’s upstairs in the bobcat cage wondering who these people are.

It takes a few minutes for her to get woozy. When she is too out of it to harm anyone, Willits hands her to LTWC volunteer Barry Trammell. He carries what looks like an oversized stuffed animal to the scale in the garage. (LTWC is operated out of the Millhams’ home on the outskirts of South Lake Tahoe.)

A monitor is hooked to her tongue to gauge her heartbeat. All her vitals are taken. Kenyon and his two assistants were to do the same when they reached their destination.

At this stage the bear can still feel, see and hear. She’s not totally out. On the table though, her eyes are covered to protect them and not have her become agitated so as to raise her heartbeat.

Kenyon put a tag in her ear – just in case she is caught again they know her history.

Cheryl Millham isn’t sad to her go. It’s the right thing. And it’s what she and husband Tom have been doing for 34 years – rehabbing wild animals.

“They are going on to their next step of life. No animal should be kept in a cage,” Cheryl Millham said.

ngg_shortcode_0_placeholder  (Click on photos to enlarge.)

Combine an Easter egg hunt with an avalanche beacon search practice session, and the result is the fifth annual Beacon and Eggs beacon search contest at Alpine Meadows.

This event is organized by Alpine’s ski patrol and takes place on Easter Sunday, April 8. Not only is it a fun, free event for all ages, but it also raises avalanche awareness and is an opportunity to practice search and rescue techniques.

Avalanche beacons are buried in a 1-acre area at Alpine Meadows and competitors proceed to the buried treasure using their beacons in “search” mode. Competitors work individually or in teams (up to four people) to recover the beacons.

Free registration is at the Beacon & Eggs tent near the top of Subway chairlift (next to the base lodge) from 9-11am. The Le Mans-style start is at noon near the top of the Subway beginner lift, adjacent to the base lodge. Competitors must provide their own beacons, probes, and shovels, and lift ticket.

For additional information and details, call the Alpine Meadows patrol office at (530) 583.4232.

During the month of April the South Lake Tahoe branch library is offering a series of free computer classes. The series consists of four two-hour classes: Computer Basics, Internet, Email and Security.

Classes are on Saturdays from 10am to noon starting April 7 and ending April 28.

Register and get more information at the library or calling (530) 573.3185.

Norah Jones is the latest artist to sign a contract to perform at the Harveys Outdoor Concert Series this summer.

Tickets for the Aug. 12 8pm show go on sale April 6. They range in price from $39.50 to $69.50.

Her latest album — “Little Broken Hearts” — will be released May 1.

Norah Jones

Tickets are on sale now for most of the concerts scheduled for the Stateline venue. The Events page of Lake Tahoe News has the date/time for specific concerts.

Summer concerts:

Chicago/The Doobie Brothers – on sale now

The Beach Boys – on sale TBA

Maroon 5 – on sale now

Journey + Pat Benatar + Loverboy – on sale March 30

Brad Paisley – on sale now

Toby Keith – on sale now

Joe Cocker/Huey Lewis & The News – on sale April 6

Sugarland – on sale March 30.

By Cy Ryan, Las Vegas Sun

CARSON CITY – A Carson City casino and its owner have agreed to pay a $2,000 fine and surrender their nonrestricted gaming license for permitting employees to work in the business without registering with the state.

The High Sierra Brewing Co. and its owner Alan Adam have signed a stipulation with the state Gaming Commission to end the complaint filed against them in January.

Read the whole story

The Tahoe Choir presents three days of music of the ’40s.

Dates are May 4 at 8pm, May 5 8pm, and May 6 2pm.

All concerts are at the Duke Theatre at the Lake Tahoe Community College in South Lake Tahoe.

Tickets are adults $10; seniors $8.