Ice Sculptures

CHAMBERSBURG, PA. - It didn't take long for Mike Carr to make a name for himself after he moved from Ohio to Chambersburg last August. Carr, 28, bested six other contestants Saturday afternoon to win the hot pepper-eating contest during this weekend's Chambersburg IceFest. "I just ate as many as I could as fast as I could," said Carr, who had sweat pouring off his face from the natural spices that he had just ingested. "I needed the money. " He won $25 for taking first place - actually $24 if you subtract the $1 entry fee. Carr said he will return next year to defend his crown.

IceFest See ice sculptures and shows at downtown shops and restaurants. There also will be special performances and fireworks. Today and Sunday. Downtown Chambersburg, Pa. For a schedule, go to www.icefestpa.com . Saturday Plus Roger or Ellen Collins will present "Raising Seeing Eye Dogs" with one of their trainees as part of Discovery Station at Hagerstown's Saturday Plus program. Today, 1 and 2:30 p.m. Discovery Station, 101 W. Washington St., Hagerstown.

CHAMBERSBURG, PA. -- Members of the Young Lawyers Division of the Franklin County Bar Association classified their chili recipe as confidential. Enjoying the dish Saturday at the seventh annual IceFest in downtown Chambersburg wasn't so restricted. The young lawyers appealed to the hundreds that made rounds in the Central Presbyterian Church gymnasium around lunchtime for the Chili Cook-Off. Shortly after 1 p.m. the verdict was in. Their chili -- the first batch they've entered in the contest -- was the People's Choice.

By BRUCE HAMILTON / Staff Writer photos: KEVIN G. GILBERT / staff photographer It's not easy to shape a seashell with a chainsaw. Danny Blackstock tried Tuesday, but a bad cut split his shell into snowy shards. The sun was melting his medium, making messy work of ice carving. cont. from front page "You can work forever on one and the next thing you know, it will be destroyed," said the Washington County Technical High School senior. "So you say, 'well, I'll make the next one better.

Normally on the first night of IceFest, downtown Chambersburg is packed with curious spectators watching huge blocks of ice carved into frozen masterpieces. But, not this year. The rain put a damper on the 10th annual event. Not only is the rain going to erode the sculptures, but also attendance will be down, IceFest committee members said. All of Thursday's IceFest activities, including the ice carving, were postponed due to the rain. The ribbon cutting ceremony will be held at 5 p.m. today.

It probably will be be easy to spot the contestants, even in a crowd. They'll be the ones with the watery eyes and flushed skin - the faces that prove you are what you eat. And in this case, what they'll be eating is jalapeno peppers. A little bit of fire will mix with IceFest in downtown Chambersburg when the annual winter celebration offers two food competitions - a chili cookoff and a challenge to see who can eat the most hot peppers. The contests have become a popular tradition during the four-day event, said Tina Flohr, coordinator of the Downtown Business Council of Chambersburg.

"I agree with the person who said that Hagerstown will look like a dump. Well it already does, now can you imagine what it is going to look like with only once a week pick up, we are going to have no place to walk, unless somebody wants to walk in garbage up to their knees. I personally don't want to, and I sure don't want to spend an hour every day, sweeping up and cleaning up stinky garbage. The councilman don't realize that they are going to spend more money if they switch it to once a week, because they are going to have to pay the city extra money to come and street sweep all the garbage up. That's probably why they want to raise our landfill fees so they can get paid extra to do something that could have been avoided by keeping it twice a week.

pepperb@herald-mail.com Hagerstown is a long way from Hollywood, but the distance might not seem so great next week when organizers pull out all the stops for the local premiere of the movie "Gods and Generals. " There will be a red carpet, search lights and, among the tuxedos, an actor or two in Civil War-period garb. Re-enactor Tyler Keeler, 34, of Aldie, Va., said he plans to attend the screening dressed in a Civil War uniform. "I was just trying to do what I could to make the movie accurate and representative of what happened," Keeler said of his part in the film.

New Year's Eve 1999 was supposed to be the bash of the century, but computer jitters, concerns over terrorism and other factors have forced organizers to cancel or scale back some local parties. cont. from front page A millennium parade scheduled for New Year's Eve in Waynesboro, Pa., and a dinner in Frederick, Md., have been canceled due to lack of interest, for instance. A New Year's party set for Martinsburg, W.Va., has been put off until March because organizers did not sell enough tickets.

The sweat and swamp of Louisianna bayou country has been so thoroughly, but not necessarily accurately, portrayed in cinema that Hollywood broadly assumes mugginess equals murder. That's why Volker Schlondorff is wise to place his film noir "Palmetto" in a fictitious Florida town by the same name. His acumen ends there, for much of the rest of this adaptation of James Hadley Chase's 1962 novel "Just Another Sucker" bores and confuses the viewer. The anonymous swelter of Palmetto hits Harry Block (Woody Harrelson)