F'ing sad.

Check out this Rolling Stone article for details on the cancer that killed Adam Yauch at 48.

In the meantime, here's a little story I got tell about three bad brothers you know so well..

One thing you should do today is read Lily Raff’s op-ed about hunting and the NRA, published in the New York Times on April 24.

The longtime Bulletin reporter and columnist lays out one hell of a well-researched and well-written argument for why hunters and NRA members are not one and the same.  

Raff has written a book about hunting—learn about it in this week’s issue of the Source—called Call of the Mild: Learning to Hunt My Own Dinner. It’s a great read that changed my perspective on the topic and we highly recommend you pick up a copy when it comes out in June.

In her op-ed and in her book, Raff describes that, for her and for many other gun owners, hunting isn’t about the guns. It’s about learning to read landscapes and understanding the animals that live in them. Her op-ed is full of such smart comments and worth the time to read it. Well done, Lily.

It's getting easier and easier to find local food and I'm not just talking about CSAs.

Two locally grown food-related organizations are launching parallel campaigns that aim to connect food buyer with local producer.

Central Oregon Intergovernmental Council is launching a new campaign called "Buy Fresh, Buy Local" that should make it easy for people to tell what food at a business is locally produced.

Buy Fresh, Buy Local will also put out a directory. So, if you are looking for goat meat or locally grown basil, you can look it up in the directory and know which grocery stores and restaurants are selling that thing.

A local arts organization just won a grant for $6,000. That sounds like small potatoes until you hear what the Arts and Culture Council for Central Oregon is going to do with the money. It’s pretty cool.

It’s sort of like the Ale Trail, but rather than following a map to the local watering holes, the arts group will create a special arts and culture trail guide showing locals and visitors the way to the region’s museums, art and entertainment venues.

The new map project will be a special collaboration of a new group called the Arts and Culture Alliance and several other regional arts and culture organizations.

If successful, Central Oregon could even get a special Scenic Byways highway designation affiliated with the map, which will encourage visitors to stop by places from the museum in Warm Springs to the Tower Theater in Bend

Director of the Arts and Culture Council, Cate O’Hagan has been working to build the new alliance for over a year, and put in for the grant several weeks ago.

Eli Sanders, associate editor at The Stranger, was recently awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his 2011 story The Bravest Woman in Seattle.

Sanders' gripping narrative recounts the horrifying experience of a Seattle woman who survived an attack that left her partner dead.

If you haven't yet read the story, do so. You will immediately become gripped. Trust us. But be prepared for a graphic and emotional story of justice and lost love.

The award marks the first Pulitzer awarded to an alt-weekly writer since Jonathan Gold, then a food critic for the L.A. Weekly, won one in 2007.

Congrats Eli!

Teachers and school district staff in Madras are about to become Central Oregon bike-sharing pioneers.

The school district up there is launching a new bike-share program, the first of its kind around here. It’ll work like this: bikes will be housed at the high school, middle school, elementary school and a few other administrative locations and checked out by staff as needed.

For instance, if a teacher at Madras High School needs to run a quick errand over lunch, they can check out a bike to make the quick trip and skip firing up the car.

Local Bend bike guru Eric Power, owner of Bend Velo, will refurbish 10 bikes for the program. The bikes are all of the J. Livingston model, named after Bend local John Livingston, a burly dude who generally wears Carharts as he commutes religiously all over town. 

Money for the program comes from an Oregon Education Association grant to the Jefferson County School District’s Wellness Program.

So, there’s a new radio station in town. It’s called Wild 107.7 and it plays top hits.

At the moment Rihanna is singing about how she really doesn’t want someone to stop the music. We’re streaming the station live from their website, www.wild1077.com.

Wild is owned by Combined Communications, which also owns The Twins 98.3, KSJJ 99.7, Clear 101.7 and 1110 KBND. Combined also used to publish Gusto, which is now Central Oregon Magazine.

We’re happy to welcome Wild into the media fold, but have to say we are a little sad about the loss of the '70s and '80s funk music Combined was playing on 107.7 in the short interim between getting that spot on the dial and launching Wild.

A station devoted to songs like “Super Freak?” Now, that’s something we can get behind.

After speaking at Virginia Tech and North Carolina A&T this spring, First Lady Michelle Obama is scheduled to deliver the commencement address at Oregon State University, according to OregonLive.com.

The White House says she's enthused by OSU's efforts to promote healthy communities, one of her biggest focal points as First Lady.

And, as basketball fans are aware, OSU men's team coach Craig Robinson, is Michelle Obama's brother.

This a great opportunity for friends and family of this year's crop of OSU grads. Hit them up for tickets, because that's the only way you'll get in. Tickets for the event are not for sale, except perhaps on Craigslist, where you might find a few being sold by college kids looking to make a buck.

Below is video of Michelle Obama's commencement address at Spelman College last May. Like her husband, she too is a tremendous public speaker.

To those of you who like to hang around the Mirror Pond Gallery and smoke in the nearby parking lot- you just got lucky.

The Bend City Council was considering making it illegal to smoke in any city parking lot at its regular meeting last night.

But, instead, the council decided to ban smoking in only one parking location—the city’s downtown parking structure.

So—whether you are a punk or not—from here on out the cops can give you a $200 ticket for lighting up on those premises. Take note.

There will be no food cart regulations—at least for now. 

The Bend City Council decided to hold off on passing new rules that would have forced some food carts to upgrade the locations of their carts with potentially costly additions such as parking, landscaping and possibly even paving. 

Food cart owners had been highly concerned by the proposed new regulations on their carts and packed the city council chambers Wednesday night. 

In a surprise move, City of Bend Senior Planner Aaron Henson recommended that the new food cart rules be removed entirely from a larger group of regulations being considered by the council. 

The city will now work closely with food cart owners to draft rules applying to them. The council gave no timeline for the completion of that process.