The Association of Alternative Newsweeklies announced the winners of its nationwide alt.weekly journalism contest—and three Alibi contributors locked down four awards! Here’s how they did:

• Best Food Writing (circulation under 50,000): Alibi restaurant critic and food columnist Ari LeVaux swallowed up third place. (“Le Fooding,” “An Offal Story” and “Chewing the Fat.”)

• Best Column (circulation under 50,000): Our Miss Diagnosis column, penned by family nurse practitioner Whitny Doyle, took a healthy third place. (“Seduction of a Nurse,” “Robbins Burns Rubbers” and “Life and Death on the Night Shift.”)

• Cover Design (circulation under 50,000): Alibi graphic designer Jeff Drew hit the contest’s zenith with a first-place cover he did for Vermont’s Seven Days.

• Illustration (circulation under 50,000): Jeff also picked up third place for artwork in the Pacific Northwest Inlander.

Well done and congratulations!

The Association of Alternative Newsweeklies runs a notoriously tough, nationwide alt.weekly journalism contest—and the Alibi is kicking some unprecedented ass in it. This year, more than 88 publications submitted their very best stuff in design and writing categories. Here’s how Albuquerque is representing:

• Alibi restaurant critic and food columnist Ari LeVaux is one of four finalists duking it out for Best Food Writing, circulation under 50,000. (The three stories we submitted: “Le Fooding,” “An Offal Story” and “Chewing the Fat.”) Masticate the competition, Ari!

• Registered nurse and recent UNM family nurse practitioner program graduate Whitny Doyle writes our Miss Diagnosis column. She’s been selected as a finalist for Best Column, circulation under 50,000. (The articles we submitted: “Seduction of a Nurse,” “Robbins Burns Rubbers” and “Life and Death on the Night Shift.”) Draw some blood out there, you phlebotomist!

• Last but not least, Alibi graphic designer Jeff Drew is up for awards in two distinct categories. His cover for Vermont’s Seven Days and illustrations for the Pacific Northwest Inlander are both heavy contenders. Render those other fools into a vanishing point of pain, you X-ACTO knife-wielding art-school murderer!

The Sundance Institute announced its short film program for the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, and Alibi illustrator and graphic designer Jeff Drew made the esteemed list. (According to Sundance, “This year's international short films were selected from a record 2,588 submissions.”) He animated and directed “One Square Mile of Earth,” the anointed entry. (See all of Jeff’s illustrated, animated and musical projects at JeffDrewPictures.com.)

His anthropomorphic animal comedy was co-written by Mark Chavez and Shenoah Allen, better known as The Pajama Men, who are in London right now with their original comedy show The Last Stand to Reason. (Read fresh interviews with them in The Guardian and The Times.) “I was the guy in the audience calling out locations,” says Jeff of his job in the improv-based, living room writing sessions. “It’s ‘A PJ/JDP Joint.’ Just like Spike Lee! ... Just kidding!” Jeff tells me this as he simultaneously designs 20,000 ads and the cover for the Alibi issue going to press today.

This isn’t the first time Jeff’s been to Sundance. His "Walk" animated short screened there in 2002. It’s proof that once you go JD, you never stop craving the flavor. (Or, at least, you crave it once every eight years.)

The 2010 Sundance Film Festival takes place Jan. 21-31 in ice-cold Park City, Utah.