📝 5 state parks within 30 min of Madison

🗳️ Election News To Know

• School board: Maia Pearson and Savion Castro are running for reelection. The two Madison Metropolitan School District Board incumbents announced their bids in a recent joint statement. Pearson was elected in April 2021 after running unopposed for an open seat, while Castro was appointed to the Board in 2019 to replace Mary Burke, who resigned. After winning an election in 2020 to serve out that term, he ran again unopposed in 2021. The upcoming election is set for April 2, 2024.
• Wisconsin Supreme Court: The election isn’t until 2025, but the race for state Supreme Court has already begun. Former Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel announced his intent to challenge incumbent Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, a member of the court’s 4-3 liberal majority. Schimel is a Republican who served as attorney general under former Gov. Scott Walker, and has been a judge in Waukesha County since 2018 when he lost his seat to Democrat Josh Kaul. [Madison365, Wisconsin Examiner]

🫖 Madison’s First Kava Bar

• The owner of SolEscape spa plans to open Rooted in Sanity, Madison’s first kava bar, by the end of the year at the former SolEscape location on Atwood Avenue.
• What’s kava? If your idea of kava is the Spanish sparkling wine, you’re close, but that’s cava. Kava is a tropical root used to make a psychoactive tea. It can have a calming effect and some consider it an alternative to alcohol — though that’s not to say it’s not without its own risks.
• In addition to kava, Rooted In Sanity Kava Lounge will also serve other nonalcoholic beverages like mocktails, coffee, tea, and cacao. [SolEscape, Cap Times, NIH]

🦡 The Fight Over ‘Buckynomicks’

• An energy economist at the University of Houston is in a legal battle with UW-Madison over his attempt to trademark the terms "buckynomics" and "buckymarkets." Ed Hirs applied to trademark the two terms earlier this year, intending to use them in his lectures and academic papers. Hirs’ terms are a play on “buckyballs,” a form of carbon whose intricate molecular structure can be compared to the complexities of the markets he studies.
• “I am being badgered by a badger,” Hirs told the Houston Chronicle. UW claims the terms could be confused with the well-established "Bucky Badger" trademark.
• Related: How did Wisconsin become the Badger State? We have the answers. [Sports Illustrated, Madison Minutes]

The Bizarre Story Behind Wisconsin’s Unofficial Lottery

If you’ve been to a Wisconsin bar, you’ve likely seen a pull-tab machine. Pop in a buck and out comes a rectangle cardboard card that may get you a cash prize of up to $250. Tea Krulos got the bizarre backstory of this unofficial — yet legal — lottery.