The News Journal from Wilmington, Delaware • Page 48

SPARK WANTS YOUR INPUT You speak (we listen) OBOISTS TO DESCEND ON DELAWARE Dear Matt, Last night, I was driving through Delaware on my way home to Baltimore and I purposely stopped off in Newark to pick up a copy of your newspaper. I am an oboist with the Baltimore Symphony and I was especially taken by your column "Perhaps I should take up the oboe." As you can see, I have taken up the oboe. One of the reasons that I wanted to have a copy of your paper was that some of my colleagues, which make up an "oboe trio" (two oboes and an English horn) will be in residence at the University of Delaware on Monday, November 10. Our chamber music ensemble, Trio La Milpa, is comprised of myself, oboist Sandra Gerster and Baltimore Symphony Principal Oboist Katherine Needleman. In August 2007, Trio La Milpa earned the distinction of being the first American music ensemble ever to tour the country of Greenland.

Now we are heading to Delaware! Yes, we will be performing a recital at UDel. Yes, we will be presenting a master class at the university as well. So, back to you. Yes, Matt Sullivan is an oboist. Yes, Sandy is a friend of Matt Sullivan.

(She says he's a "good I am not asking that you "take up the oboe." But if you were so inclined to write publicize our recital, we would be grate- ful. We have LOTS of interesting stories to share. Greenland alone is worthy of a book. How many oboists have eaten musk ox and reindeer shortly before a performance? How many oboists have had to speak to audiences where the country's language averages about 30 letters in a word? What do you when you are on an island and you run out of food? I'd be happy and eager to share our stories. I look forward to reading future issues of Spark and I also wanted to let you know that I enjoyed reading my latest issue.

Best wishes, Michael Lisicky We say: Dude, with a segue that strong, you get a little free publicity. SPARK TAKES A BITE OUT OF CRIME Hey Spark, I wrote to you about a month ago about the man running with the fish bowl full of our tip money. Anyway, I wanted to give you an update. Today, I get a letter from the guy who stole the tip bowl. He said he was sorry and enclosed a $50 money order.

Crazy, huh? Aimee We say: Well, get that. Apparently reporting crimes to Spark instead of the police does work. Sparkweekly.com is where you'll find everything you want from this issue, but also: places you can go to pick up Spark, the latest on our promotions and contests, and daily updates on the coolest thing you can do tonight from Spark staffers. Want to help us paint the town Spark green? We're looking for help spotting: Cool places for us to go and things to do to put in our new feature, Weekends. People making a difference in Delaware whom you want to know more about in Community Profile.

Classes, tutorials or other secret tips that should be shared with the world in How Parties, soirees and gatherings where our photographer should be On the Scene Cool and undiscovered restaurants for our food pages. Events of all kinds that we can list in What to Do. And, of course, we welcome your letters, telling us what we're doing right (and wrong). Our guarantee: All letters will be read, some will be printed. To submit letters and info: Log on to sparkweekly.com or: Write to: Spark 950 W.

Basin Road New Castle, DE 19720 Fax: 324-7774 E-mail: 4 10.15.08 SPARKweekly.com SOUnD OFF A shower, a beer and a brontosaurus I was sitting at the counter of my local sushi joint the other day when the lovely lady sitting next to me bit into a tempura pepper and said the following: "I'm not going to lie, there's nothing like a beer in the shower." And that seems like a good enough reason to spend a few minutes talking about Delaware's relationship with alcohol. Let's start with this the lovely lady at the sushi counter was no beer-swilling, Jager-shooting college kid. I can tell you that she was in her 30s and well familiar with a variety of classic Delaware drinking establishments, and this is all I will say because I was eavesdropping and I don't want people to stop talking when I sit down at a sushi counter. I get too many good ideas that way. So let us just call her Typical Delawarean Girl.

And this TDG has spent her entire drinking life as a resident of the First State. She's done her time in Trolley, ridden a loop bus, snuck beers at the Down Under when she was underage and quaffed cocktails at the Hotel DuPont when in the mood to dress up. TDG's drinking habits were born and bred right here in Delaware. TDG is still pre-gaming. In the shower.

And I don't think it takes an expert in Delaware sociology to conclude that, when last call comes at 1 a.m., grown adults start acting like 19-year-old college kids who don't know where their last beer is coming from. It's the economics of scarcity, coded into our DNA during caveman times when brontosaurus burgers on the menu meant eat up and as much as you can, because no one knew where the next brontosaurus was coming from. When faced with the possibility of famine, we feast. We horde. We prepare to go into hibernation, which in modern times lasts for about six hours before we have Matt to get up and go back to work.

This is the drinking life cycle of the TDG. This is what leads to beer in the shower. (For tips on better imbibing in the shower, by the way, go to your nearest available Internet, where I found the following suggested technique: turning on the shower turn around, open your beer, and begin to drink, while occasionally turning around to keep your whole body warm. I recommend a lager, but in a pinch malt liquor will do." They are connoisseurs of the shower beer at Humboldt State University.) Am I saying that things would be markedly different if Delaware did not have the second most stringent last-call hours in the nation? (Quick aside: You really don't want to go party in New Hampshire.) I don't know. I'm not that smart.

But I can make an educated guess that TAG (Typical Alaskan Girl) does not feel the need to start drinking early when the bars are allowed to stay open until 5 a.m. I also know this: Back when the drinking age in most states was 18 and men and women who were old enough to fight in foreign wars could also drink the occasional beer, my dad could go to the bar on campus and have a drink. And then he could go back to his dorm room without feeling the caveman compulsion for a second, because he knew where his next beer was coming from. And he could go get it fairly late if he so chose. Prohibition to any degree is a tricky thing.

It has its upsides (fewer drunks on the road at 2 a.m.) and it's trade-offs (more drunks on the road at 1 a.m.). But in the end, all prohibition comes down to not trusting people, and the belief that, left to their own devices, people will not make good decisions. TDG grabs her shower beer, either as a consequence or just proving the point. And so the question we must ask is this: Is the shower beer the chicken, or the egg? Sullivan Editor General Manager Spark 324-7728 NEXT WEEK Looking to get all the details on the Loop? Or are you searching for something slightly more sophisticated? Ready to have strangers scare you while RE you walk through the woods? Check back here next week when we have all the details about the best Halloween parties, and the scariest haunts..