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Music In The Garden

Justin Mcclung | June 12, 2019

Topics: garden, live music, music, summer, The Valentine

The Valentine is kicking off its free Music in the Garden series with performances by Deau Eyes and Justin Golden. Taking place in the Valentine Garden on June 6, 13 and 20, these free events will offer audiences unique, family-friendly performances in a beautiful atmosphere, as well as free access to the Valentine’s exhibitions.

Each evening will feature two performances by musicians from different genres and with distinct styles, encouraging fans to interact and explore their musical boundaries. Beer and wine will be on sale, and the Carriage House Cafe at the Valentine will be open.

June 6
Deau Eyes & Justin Golden

June 13
Black Liquid & Matt Coyle Music

June 20
Paulo Franco of Paulo Franco & The Freightliners & Tavishi

No one with outside food or drink will be admitted (except one bottle of unopened water). Additionally, attendees are not permitted to bring folding chairs or their pets (except service animals).

RVA’s Summer Field Guide Hits The Streets Today

RVA Staff | June 6, 2019

Topics: bars, beer, events, Family, festival, field trip, Fun, issue, magazine, music, nightlife, outdoor life, print magazine, RVA Magazine, rva summer field guide, scavenger hunt, Students, summer, summer events, summer guide, travel

With Memorial Day Weekend in the books, summer in Richmond is officially here!

To celebrate the liveliest season in the River City, RVA Magazine is proud to release the RVA Summer Field Guide: Our take on a solid season to get outdoors and enjoy the city’s best, out and on the streets today.

Beat the heat and humidity, and grab a first-edition copy of your new summer go-to guide. With a classic outdoor field guide feel, the RVA Summer Field Guide brings all the sunny-day feels and boozy ideas to make the most of your days.

The guide is packed with upcoming music events, summer festivals, guides to Richmond nightlife, summer beers to look for, the best watering holes in the state, plenty of planned trips for students and families alike, and many more. Oh, yeah — and we also have quite possibly the best scavenger hunt in existence.

While it’s impossible to include everything and everywhere that make summer fun so great in this state, what comes with the RVA Summer Field Guide is a quinnessential start to exploring the city we all call home. Pick up a free copy today at any of our amazing vendors and local hot spots in town, and be sure to grab one before they run out — we guarantee you’ll be glad you did!

You can check out a PDF of the guide online below. Check our Instagram and Twitter for a special release at Hardywood tonight, or check any of the spots listed below to get a copy of your own.

View the full RVA Summer Field Fuide here!

Grab yours before they run out! The RVA Summer Field Guide can be found now at these locations:

Hardywood
Mekong 
The Answer Brewpub
Ellwood Thompson’s

Check this weekend for more issues at these locations:

Colonial Shooting Academy 
The Boathouse
En Su Boca
Beauvine Burger 
River City Roll
Fire & Hops Pizza Co.
Rva Paddle Sports
The Poe Museum 
Taylor’s Barber Shop
Quirk Hotel 
Graduate Hotel 
Can Can Bar
Solita 
Little Saint 
Kabana 
Plan 9 
World of Mirth 
Chop Suey 
Havana 59
Capital Ale House
Station 2 
Union Market 
Legend Brewery 
Strangeways Brewing
Triple Crossing Beer 
Väsen 
The Veil Brewing Co. 
Ardent Craft Ales
Bingo Beer Co.
Three Notch’d RVA Collab House 
Canon & Draw 
Basic City Beer
Isley Brewing Company
Tang Biscuit 
The Hoff 
Circuit Arcade Bar
Black Heath Meadery
Final Gravity Brewing Co. 
Garden Grove Brewery
Tabol
Stone Brewing Richmond 
Lickinghole Creek Craft Brewery (downtown) 
Champion Brewing RVA 
Stawberry Street Market 
The Hop
Black Hand Coffee
Lamplighter Coffee
Gallery 5 (First Fridays) 

*Along with other local hot spots, markets and restaurants.  

Broadening my Perspective on Technology by Debating AI

Henry Haggard | September 20, 2018

Topics: artificial intelligence, debate camp, henry haggard, personal experience, summer

About nine months ago, I was applying for a scholarship to Capitol Debate’s American University residential program. I didn’t know what to expect, but was interested in the central goal–to encourage public speaking and debate.

In a fortunate coincidence, though, I spent time this summer researching a topic that would be central to my experience in the program, artificial intelligence. I looked at it as part of a rough podcast I recorded on my phone, titled Technology: Good or Bad?, which I uploaded to my new website.

From a clumsy unpacking to a few mold-related room swaps, followed by unpacking, waiting, and goodbyes, my time at camp began.

I went through my first real daily routine the next day: games, icebreakers, and a lab group assignment based on age and level. From my garbled notes, an average day went something like this: wake up, go to lab group, go to breakfast with group, go to assembly room with everyone, listen to a leadership lecture, go back to lab and work on stuff there, go to lunch, continue working with lab, residential (play) time, and then back to dorm.

The very first leadership lesson wasn’t a lesson, but instead, an introduction to the topic of Artificial Intelligence. I was ecstatic because not only had I researched technology and considered its effects before, I had also brought a Foreign Affairs AI article, a book about DARPA, and a copy of George Orwell’s “1984.”

Lab work, on the other hand, wasn’t a great experience for me. My teacher didn’t understand electronics, manifesting both in their computer presentations and their knowledge of AI itself, and the class was below my level and not very engaging. If nothing else, I felt like I was wasting my time.

My dad, probably quoting someone, told me once, “If you’re the smartest man in the room you’re in the wrong room.” I took that advice to heart, knowing that experience doesn’t equal intelligence. I was afraid to broach the topic, but knew that I had to go to the camp director and ask to be moved up a level.

Although I’d been nervous, my attempt paid off, and it was agreed that my dorm mate Leo and I could go into a lab for older kids. Here, I was challenged and made good use of my time; we learned the debate format, and crucially, how it always ends with weighing impacts.

Impacts can be measured by time frame, probability, and magnitude, a set of criteria which, for instance, would allow one to effectively argue that guns have a greater impact than nuclear weapons.

More research for contentions and arguments, especially argument structure, led me to believe that AI had a beneficial lean, with healthcare benefits, and that job losses could be quickly countered by new jobs both at the low and high-end of experience and training.

One factor that weighed on me was the social obligations of spending more and more time with people. Not only could I not handle so much extrovertedness, but also I met many people with whom I disagreed. Some of them I could have a civil conversation with, and some I couldn’t. I still ended up becoming kind of friends with a lot of people, and learned about living “on my own” for a period of time that felt long.

The tournament came and went, and after all the build-up, we won three out of five while debating in the advanced league.

In the end, the camp deepened my thoughts on AI and technology. In contrast to the binary my podcast posed, I realized that it’s not inherently good or bad; it just is, and it’s coming. We can either prepare for the negative impacts through public education and action or, we can run away in fear, claiming that technology is inherently bad. I know my choice.

First Giant Terror Plants, Now Snakes. What’s Happening in Virginia?

Landon Shroder | July 2, 2018

Topics: richmond, snakes, summer, virginia, Virginia snakes

What is happening out there, Virginia? Nature is in revolt, and according to the experts, there has been a serious uptick in the reporting of snake sightings across the Commonwealth in recent months. First it was blister bursting terror plants, now this. NBC 12 first broke this story earlier in the summer, when they interviewed companies that specialize in the kind of remediation needed to manage a surge in the kinds of slithering serpents that hide in bushes, watery canals, rock walls, and your neighborhood garden. One such company that operations throughout the piedmont and coastal regions of Virginia even claimed that they are getting 150-200 reports of snake sightings daily.

That is a lot of snakes. Or as some who are more zoologically inclined might call them, ophidians.

Why so many snakes? The experts are saying part of the reason has been due to the mild temperatures this past winter. Thanks, climate change (again). Some of the world’s foremost experts in snake removal hail from the land down under and one such snake-whisperer, Andrew Smedley, claims that snakes live for an environment that is overcast, rainy, and humid – pretty much the last two months in Virginia. He says that this kind of weather provides for them a perfect opportunity to hunt other amphibians, telling The Chronicle in Australia, “The rain definitely brings them out. They are chasing the frogs.”

While the threat of terrestrial killing machines looms much larger in the Australian outback than in Virginia, sightings of the venomous Copperhead, or Agkistrodon contortrix, have spiked this year. Richard Perry, who owns Virginia Wildlife Management and Control, told CBS 6 said that people who see snakes will likely see the same ones over and over since evidently, snakes leave a sent as they slither, which attracts other snakes. Where are you most likely to encounter these summer serpentine satans? Perry says “homes with piles of leaves, grass, bushes, or shrubs.” Less reassuring: It is illegal to kill a snake in Virginia, unless posing a threat. What burden of proof must be met to satiate that legal quagmire? TBD. Just call a guy like Perry who specializes in this kind of thing.

There are a handful of indigenous species and sub-species of snakes in Virginia. Here is a list of snakes from the Virginia Herpetological Society that a person might come across in their daily travels in the Commonwealth, along with some other interesting snake trivia. When spotted, stay cool, breathe, and proceed to panic in an orderly fashion; be sure to avoid running into the giant hogweed as you beat tracks (terror plant).

Eastern Copperhead: Venomous, Virginia 

“Eastern Copperheads are terrestrial snakes inhabiting a wide array of habitats. They are found in hardwood and mixed hardwood-pine forests, pine woods, abandoned fields in various stages of succession, high ground in swamps and marshes, forest-field ecotones, hedge rows, suburban woodlots, ravines along creeks in agricultural and urban areas, upland rocky areas, rock walls and woodpiles, and forested dunes near beaches, as well as around barns and houses (especially dilapidated ones) in agricultural areas.”

*Apparently Copperheads also love blueberry thickets.

Timber Rattlesnake: Venomous, Virginia

“In western Virginia, Crotalus horridus inhabits upland hardwood and mixed oak-pine forests in areas with ledges or talus slopes. Ledges and exposed areas are usually facing within 45° of south to allow maximum exposure to the sun during spring and fall. Habitat during summer is in open woods, grass fields, and secondary growth. In southeastern Virginia, C. horridus occupies hardwood and mixed hardwood-pine forests, cane fields, and ridges and glades of and adjacent to swampy areas. Rattlesnakes are usually terrestrial, but occasionally ascend low shrubs to obtain prey.”

Snake Plissken: Venemous, New York City  

A former US special forces soldier (from an alternative future), Plissken was assigned to the “Black Light Unit” during the Leningrad and Siberia campaigns of WWIII. Shortly after his meritorious military service, he turned to a life of crime, after his parents were burned alive by the government for a perceived betrayal on his part. Deadly, cool under pressure, and cynical to his core, Plissken was eventually sentenced to life in prison in the New York City maximum security prison – which was the entire island of Manhattan.  He was eventually offered a pardon if he agreed to rescue the president after Air Force One crashed in the New York City, precipitating the events of the cinematic masterpiece Escape from New York.

Northern Scarlet Snake: Non-Venomous, Virginia

“Northern Scarlet snakes are found in areas where the soil is loose, well drained, and (usually) sandy, and where the vegetation is dominated by pine trees. This snake is a burrower, seldom found in day-light except in or under logs and other surface objects; most have been encountered in late spring or summer as they crossed paved roads at night. Northern Scarlet snakes are reported to eat skinks (Plestiodon, Scincella), small snakes, frogs, small mice, and soft-bodied insects, although reptile eggs, particularly eggs of small snakes, are preferred.”

Eastern Mudsnake: Non-Venomous, Virginia

“Almost nothing is known of the biology of F. abacura in Virginia. Of the specimens available, most were killed on roads that traversed swamp habitat. It is a secretive, burrowing snake that spends most of its life associated with lotic water. Habitats include slow-moving streams and canals, swamps, forested wetlands, sluggish mud-bottom creeks, and ponds and lakes with swampy margins and aquatic vegetation. They may also be found occasionally during the day on banks under vegetation cover.”

Snake Island, Brazil: Terrifying 

The first rule of Snake Island, Brazil – do not ever go to Snake Island, Brazil. Located 25 miles off the coast, the island known as Ilha da Queimada Grande is illegal to visit, since it is home to one of the deadliest pit viper’s that has ever had the pleasure of slithering into our nightmares. The Golden Lancehead can grow to be over a foot-and-a-half long and has a venom that is so deadly that one nibble can cause death in close to an hour. According to the Smithsonian, local lore collected about Snake Island has one story that goes something like this: “From 1909 to the 1920s, a few people did live on the island, in order to run its lighthouse. But according to another local tale, the last lighthouse keeper, along with his entire family, died when a cadre of snakes slithered into his home through the windows.”

Snake Island, Brazil (Red Marker)

Northern Cottonmouth: Venomous, Virginia

“Agkistrodon piscivorus is a semiaquatic snake inhabiting lowland habitats in southeastern Virginia. These snakes have been found in swamps, freshwater and brackish marshes, ditches, streams, rivers, and forested and grassland habitats adjacent to wet areas, as well as around permanent and semipermanent ponds. When out of the water, Northern Cottonmouths often lie under vegetation, in grasses, or under boards and other shelters. Some individuals bask on logs and horizontal limbs overhanging water. Adults will not venture far from water, but juveniles may disperse over long distances.”

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