Corrin the Inquisitor

Welcome to Walter World

2010-12-20T23:57:00.006-07:00

by Corrin Green

for JAVA Magazine

January, 2011

All is not as it seems with Walter, billed with only a slight wink as "The World's Largest VW Bus". Already gaining local fame as a show-stopper at parades and festivals, the status of this four-wheeled colossus as a rolling entertainment venue, minor engineering marvel and art piece is immediately evident.

And yet, even when housed out of public sight and with his engine off, Walter is always busy. For a small but growing number of people, this road-worthy piece of heavy equipment is ardently at work as a metaphor, a social experiment and, unlikely as it may sound, a spiritual leader.

Yes, really.

No one from Walter's previous incarnation could have guessed he'd someday reach such an exalted place. Long before people around Walter began addressing him in personal terms, as they do now, the 1963 Walter CF model crash truck was a definite it. Essentially a 10-ton fire truck, it first served at Luke Air Force base, where it sat at the ready in case of a plane crash.

In time, the Air Force sold the truck to the New River Fire Department, who used it until it became unreliable and they could presumably afford a more modern fire truck. New River sold it, cheap, to a man named Don, who had a collection of old, cool, vehicles sitting overlooking the town of Jerome.

And for five years, Jerome is where the 1963 Walter CF model crash truck, with a broken fly wheel and numerous other decrepitudes, sat, waiting for time and the elements to bring eventual ruin. People who spied it and the other vehicles sitting on the hill above the Gold King mine were free to climb on and in it. Barring an earthquake, almost no one could imagine the truck actually moving again.

The fateful exception to this was Dr. Kirk Strawn, a Valley doctor and entrepreneur. Kirk and some friends had driven his own customized Volkswagen bus to the Jerome Jamboree, an annual event held by the Arizona Bus Club.

"We'd gone up the mountain to see some of the old relics, most of whom were just junk and would never move...and there was Walter sitting there...and we said, 'this is the biggest (bleep)ing Volkswagen bus', cause he had these huge tires, short wheel base, and he looked like a bus, basically, but on a 2-1 scale", recalls Strawn.

Kirk's vision for the vehicle didn't stop there. During his and his friends' time at the Jerome Jamboree, the group imagined not only Walter's new look, but also his next mission. "I'd just learned about Burning Man and how they have these mutant vehicles. I'd never been there, but I wanted to go. He was a fire truck, so we knew he had water tanks with him...and we got the idea that if we misted at Burning Man, maybe it would attract the naked people."

Ah sex, creator of life and ten ton mutant party vehicles.

Burning Man is a gathering of thousands of like-minded people on a dry lake bed in Nevada, held annually on the week leading up to Labor Day. During the event, participants party heartily, share and share alike (outright commerce is nearly non-existent) and learn to live with their fellow revelers. The tenets of the event are radical self-expression, radical self-reliance, communal effort and immediacy. The idea is to slough off the shackles of the outside world for a week, have fun and get along with as few rules as possible.

A fundamental part of the Burning Man experience is randomness. With no agenda, the party goes where the party goes.

Kirk eventually traded his VW camper for the crash truck, which was trailered and transported to the Valley. Over the next few years, he attracted a cadre of artists and technicians to the project and Walter as we now know him took shape. Those involved refer to themselves as members of "Tribe Walter."

In 2009, Kirk's original plan to take Walter to Burning Man was finally realized, to his own delight and that of the sweaty, dust-encrusted celebrants. Walter arrived with new water tanks hooked to an array of spray nozzles to mist the crowd below, a bamboo dance floor on his upper deck, a 15,000 watt sound system driving fifty speakers, a laser array, and over 50k led lights.

The least discerning of readers will doubtless have noticed that Walter has no real connection to the Volkswagen Company, and yet Kirk insists that Walter is truly a VW bus in every way except origin. "When the VW bus came to the U.S., what it stood for was freedom. For the first time, it was easy for people without a lot of money to be anywhere in the country they wanted...you could sleep wherever you wanted and be freaky. Walter has that same spirit."

Back in the Valley, Walter spends his down time at the Walter Dome. Located at the Ponderosa Lumber facility on Thomas Road in Scottsdale, the Walter Dome has space for Walter and a couple hundred of his closest friends, and features a zen garden, performance stage, and wet bar. Future plans may include renting the Dome out for special events, though for now it's for tribal use only.

As Walter was being transformed, so, too, was Kirk's understanding of who Walter was and what he could achieve. The creativity and enthusiasm brought to the project by the tribe of electricians, artists, mechanics, and fabricators demonstrated the power of a diverse community who shared a common goal. Although Kirk was essentially bankrolling the endeavor, he felt he wasn't the one in the driver's seat. "The inertia of creation has just not stopped since day one", he reflects, enthusiastically. "I have no idea how the ideas have come to get us where we are now... about 100 people have had some significant role in the creation of this vehicle and every single person who's been involved has directed it in some way. There's no question it's taken on a life of its own".

As James Vito Palazzolo, tribe member and spokesman puts it, "Randomness is a big generator of the energy around here, and we just focus it." Very Burning Man, man. Ken Lemoine, who is bringing his decades of down-to-Earth business prowess to the project lifts the conversation to a still higher plane when he explains, "Walter's really the one in charge. We go where Walter wants to go." Everyone agrees.

And Walter is a very ambitious fellow. In addition to his slate of appearances, which the past month alone has included the Electric Light Parade and the Fiesta Bowl Parade, Walter has directed his tribe of followers to run a machine shop, and convert another part of the Ponderosa facility into a co-op micro-brewery. Yet another endeavor, the Walter Oil Company, will involve the collection of vegetable oil and its conversion to bio-fuel.

The trajectory of the Walter project has echoed that of Burning man in that both have found the need to somewhat temper their respective exercises in randomness and collective will with some practicalities of the outside world. In the case of Burning Man, this has meant the formulation of a small bureaucracy to handle logistics and finances, as well as a growing list of rules and regulations for attendees. For Walter, who has expensive appetites, this has meant finding ways to manage liability issues and generate revenue - not exactly the warm fuzzy part of anyone's utopian pipe dream.

"We're actually developing more structure just to make sure it's sustainable. We formed Walter LLC", says Kirk. "We're following an atypical business model in that the idea is really a NOT-for-profit business. We need to generate revenue to make the things the Walter project wants to do possible. None of us want to get rich off of Walter, but we want to provide a good place to work, where people can earn a fair wage and do good things - that's the general idea."

Kirk dismisses the notion that Walter's cache as a marketable curiosity will ever wane. "I'm not ready to accept that," he says. "The novelty will wear off unless you go with the personification thing, and everybody who meets Walter refers to him as 'Walter.' He has the ability to reinvent himself and not to fall into that trap of being just an object...he is a living, breathing thing."

"That's very much been a theme of the entire project, too, taking something that seemed old and worn out and giving it a new life. Not only Walter himself, but also the Walter Dome, which was kind of in disrepair before we converted it… recycling vegetable oil for use as fuel…all of it."

As for the scope of Walter's future reinvention, there is no hedging Kirk's sense of enthusiasm and earnestness on the topic. Changing Walter's propulsion system to a virtually emissions-free hydrogen power-plant is being researched, and Tribe Walter (and Kirk Strawn) has no lack of other ideas.

"In Europe, the way they're transporting very large things these days isn't on the roads, but by using a really OLD technology - blimps."

"I fully expect Walter to fly one day."

First Friday Firsts

2010-09-22T21:23:00.004-07:00

The first Friday of September, 2010, saw the downtown Phoenix launch of two entities which hope to become Valley staples.

The re-introduction of A-1 Beer, after a twenty-plus year absence, occurred early in the evening in a combined tasting and photo exhibit at Icehouse Gallery. Later on, The Firehouse Gallery debuted it's First Friday Night Live showcase of local comedy and music.

First Friday Night Live

The far more ambitious first of the evening, which you should catch the follow-ups to on the first Friday of every month through March, was the ensemble sketch-comedy effort First Friday Night Live. Some forgivable opening-night hiccups aside, this event was impressive both for the attendance it drew and for how close it came to the high mark it set for itself.

The idea of a semi-topical but local take on Saturday Night Live has been tried before in the Valley (Citrus Valley Playhouse most recently, and The Gits in the 80's), but FFNL is more true to spirit than the former and has more resources than the latter.

It was also able to attract a standing room only crowd for its very first outing. This must have been a major boost to the cadre of talented writers, actors and producers who are basically devoting a great amount of their spare time to making the show a success, with little hope of compensation beyond the satisfaction of practicing their craft. As one of the principle writers, Alia Souissi, puts it, they are all "doing it for love." That certainly showed on opening night.

Held on the outdoor stage at The Firehouse Gallery, FFNL has been a long-time ambition of Firehouse proprietor Micheal23, who watched the proceedings from the wings with evident delight. As was the Hate House, The Hub and the House Studios before it, the Firehouse has become a nexus for local artists, writers and craftspeople. Unlike its predecessors, though, the Firehouse is going a step further with FFNL and providing not only a haven but an outlet for the talent in its sphere.

Just like Saturday Night Live, not all of the skits worked entirely; but none failed for lack of effort, and that's where the show is to be particularly commended. All comedic bases were covered, from broad slapstick to high-concept, but the show never condescended to the audience. Nor did it put ideology above humor. The opening skit was a case in point, featuring parodies of not only Jan Brewer's hysteria, but also Obama's deadpan and the news media's heard mentality. Funny reigned, and all else took a back seat.

Where the show could have been heavy-handed in its reliance on current topics, FFNL threw plenty of timeless themes and a couple of curve-balls into the mix. One skit imaged a hot and heavy encounter between an oh-so-ready girl and the radio voice of "Smooth Jazz," with the voice pointing out that, while the girl's boyfriend needed to use his penis to satisfy her, the voice only needed his "dic(k)...tionary" to achieve the same effect. Base, true, but clever and funny.

One particularly high-concept piece involved not only illegal immigration, but also the pitfalls of inept communication to produce a punchline of immigrant domestic workers protesting against "ethnic cleaning" and carrying signs denouncing filthy white people.

Another skit, which has the earmarks of a recurring motif, was that of a girl's school teacher whose lessons about haiku invariably careened toward inappropriate sexual disclosure until ALMOST all of the class had finally walked out in disgust.

Though somewhat unpolished due to budget constraints, FFNL is not amateurish. These are not writers trying to be comedic, but comedy writers in the truest sense, trying to connect to an audience.

Each FFNL will feature a special guest personality of local note; the first one having been Peter Petrisko, who seemed to be involved in the vast majority of vignettes. October's guest is New Times writer Leslie Barton, and local windsurfer-cum-painter (or is it the other way around?) Mike Little will fill the bill in November.

Musical guests will rotate through as well, with the debut having featured Underground Cities (who did a fantastic job, btw), Travis James on tap for October and The Haymarket Squares in November.

Those who can't catch the performances in-person can still watch them live via a stream on strivedreams.com. Mark your calendars!

As writer Souissi puts it, "This is our chance to show the world that Phoenix has some intelligence."

A-1 Beer

In the the mid-Twentieth-Century United States, having a beer almost invariably meant a domestic, U.S. brew. Imports, where available, were not yet in fashion. Then as now, Budweiser, Coors, Pabst and Miller were major players among the several nationals responsible for roughly half of all U.S. beer production.

The OTHER half was produced by regional breweries, most of which would eventually be swallowed up by the majors. New York had Reingold, Cincinnati had Hudepohll, the midwest with its high concentration of German immigrants had Point and many others.

Arizona had A-1 Beer, with its pop-western custom artwork and almost industrial-looking "A-1" logo topped by the American Eagle. From shortly after its emergence in the early 1940's, the local popularity of A-1 increased until it rivaled that of any of the individual nationals. When the Phoenix Suns would score, spokesman Al McCoy would announce that it was "good like A-1 beer!"

Although it lingered for some 40 years, its real heyday was brief; and by the late 1950's changes in brewery ownership and increasingly aggressive competitive practices on the part of the better-funded nationals were dealing the label blows from which it would never fully recover. By the late 70's, the once proud lager whose label boasted it to have been "judged the finest by the world's beer experts" was by all accounts a watery vestige of its former self and was being sold at bargain prices. The brewery closed in the early 1980's and the A-1 brand became inactive.

Until now, that is. Nimbus Brewery of Tucson (they have the bottles with that chimp on the label - yeah? No?) purchased the rights to the brand and relaunched it with a new label and a new recipe. Distributed by Alliance Beverage, A-1 can already be found in bottles at Whole Foods, and Tops, and on tap at (appropriately) Yucca Tap Room, Roosevelt Bar and Time Out Lounge. According to Nimbus, other outlets will be announced in October and MAY include BevMo, Total Wine, Sprouts and Sunflower Market.

The "launch" event at Icehouse Arts and Entertainment received the desired publicity, but was curiously lackluster otherwise; giving the overall impression that it was either thrown together in haste or otherwise not taken seriously. The cavernous aspect of the outer gallery hall was not assuaged in the least by the presentation from Nimbus, as there were virtually no props or decorations, with the exception of a large banner featuring a carrousel of old A-1 cans. There was no beer for sale, and attendees had to stand in a long line to finally receive a 2oz (not kidding) sample from the lone brewery representative, who was manning the keg. A second sample meant a second period en queue.

Across the floor and against the opposite wall from the overburdened keg table, looking exactly like the crusty old cowboys they more or less are, brothers Herman and Marvin Dickson sat with a small display of reproductions of original A-1 promotional artwork. Herman had been such a fan of the original commissioned pieces, paintings by artist Lon Megargee III, that he had secured the reproduction rights, unaware that they would come in handy so soon. Brother "Big" Marv, himself a notable local who has been head cook at Pinnacle Peak Patio for the last 48 years, was apparently along for the night out.

Both men were amiable in an authentically old western way that juxtaposed humorously with the crowd of late-twenties to mid-fifties hipsters. When asked if he remembered what the old A-1 had tasted like, Herman replied, "Eh...like beer, I guess. I dunno. Beer is beer, right?" Refreshing.

Photographer William Legoullon occupied the inner art space with his "A-1 Country" photo exhibit. Consisting of straightforward shots of old A-1 cans as well as macro-shots of old beer caps and promo items, as photography it was competent. The real value was in seeing how some of the labeling had changed over time which, with the total lack of promotional collateral from the brewer, provided the only hint of context surrounding the brand re-launch.

The beer itself was certainly tasty - undoubtedly more so than its prior iteration had been. Perhaps the strategy was to leave one unsatisfied and wanting more. In this, the event was an unqualified success.

What genius!

The Natural - Natalie Vie

2010-08-27T23:57:00.031-07:00

(excerpted in JAVA Magazine, September, 2010)

Inside the dank helmet, moist with breath and sweat, the sound of your own respiration is as audible as the sounds in the hall around you. Thus insulated, your world narrows until there is only you and your opponent and the yard-long steel blade you each possess. Final salutes given, you now adopt the traditional stance. Knees bent, lead leg to the fore, trailing arm behind with elbow bent at 90 degrees and open hand pointing casually at the ceiling, sword forward with wrist up, elbow bent close to your body, ready to strike.

Ready to kill.

The stiff steel mesh an inch in front of your eyes all but disappears as your focus zeroes through to your opponent, six feet away and just as ready to kill YOU. Not so tough. Keep your confidence or they'll know it and smell blood. Then you're dead. Take an easy breath - the last one for a while - and release it slowly. Focus now. Look at nothing in particular, the better to see everything...

"En guarde!"

An involuntary but welcome adrenaline surge doubles your heart-rate and halves your perception time. You're prepared for action and you can barely wait. The record shows that six matches out of seven, your opponent has been the first to strike - usually at the face. Always in the upper area. When they do, you'll deflect that and stab their torso with the same lunge. Should they deflect that strike, you know exactly how you'll set yourself up for the next one. What are they waiting for?

Damn. Fine! Advance. Advance. They also advance. You're within striking distance now. Your blades meet almost casually in several small, swirling feints, each of you trying to draw the other out. Watching… watching…

Their shoulder drops and you instinctively move to block the lunge that will invariably follow. Except that this time it doesn't. This time the true attack happens just as you've become off-balance and un-guarded. You FOOL! Your blade scrapes theirs and jabs ineffectually at the air while the tip of your opponent's blade, with their full weight and power behind it, slams into your mid section. Were this not a game, the contents of your spleen would now be fouling your shoes.

Ask Olympic hopeful and four-time women's collegiate fencing champion Natalie Vie why she chose a sport derived from mortal combat and her initial answer is deceptively superficial. "I was reading a book, and the main character worked on the fencing team and...that just put the idea in my head…"

What she doesn't say, although true, is that she and championship fencing were made for one another.

Natalie Julia Vie was born in Los Angeles and raised in Phoenix, the eldest of four children. She credits the family responsibilities she undertook after her parents divorced and her mom began full-time work with keeping her on the straight and narrow; but it doesn't seem to have slowed her down much. A confirmed polymath, she can alternately and credibly describe herself as a writer, sculptor, fencer and coach. Active in sports from first grade on, Natalie competed in three prior to college: Swimming, track and...cheerleading.

"I was really into competitive cheerleading my whole life growing up and I know that sounds dorky, but I loved performing and challenging myself and the physicality of it." Fun as it was, though, Natalie was increasingly drawn to the more individual sports in which she was also involved. "I'd done cheer since first grade and it's just part of my personality that I stuck with it… but it ended up not being as fun for me as the swim team or the track team… the individual sports."

All sports went on the back-burner during her senior year in high school, when Natalie focused on academics and her role as editor of the school newspaper. It was also when she read Catcher In The Rye and, even though its depiction in the novel is decidedly lackluster, became curious to know more about fencing. She looked up local fencing clubs and, along with a friend, checked one out.

"My friends thought it was hilarious! 'Fencing? Who's ever heard of fencing?!' but at the same time they were super curious." Still, Natalie doesn't think they were too surprised. "I don't think they expected anything less from me because they knew I kind of go with my passions, and if I get an idea I just go after it."

Fencing was the right thing at the right time for Natalie. "Graduating high school left a huge void, especially in time, before college started." She also found that it satisfied her in ways that her previous activities hadn't. "It involved a mental aspect that I'd never found in the other sports I'd done, with the physicality and the fact that it was an individual rather than a team sport...so it was the perfect combination for me."

Of the three weapons used in Olympic competition, Natalie competes with the eppe' - the heaviest and most rigid, and the one whose rules allow the most freedom of form.

Though she began fencing at a relatively late age for a future champ, Natalie realized she'd actually been in training for years. "The competitive cheer I did outside of school was closely tied to a gymnastics program...and through that I really learned about rhythm and dancing and mastering my own body in terms of coordination - all the physical things that fencing requires. So it's almost as if I'd been leading up to this my whole life. When I came to fencing, it just felt natural."

Another natural thing may help explain Natalie's success. One of her great uncles, Julio de Caro, is considered by many to have been a prime progenitor of modern Tango; and for Natalie, who enjoys Latin dance herself, the footwork which carries her comparatively slight frame into battle exhibits an apparently effortless facility. An example of this can be seen on YouTube.com, in a video of highlights from Natalie's title-winning Duel in the Desert bout this past January in Las Vegas. Her opponent, also a world-class fencer, always searches out a solid footing. Natalie, in contrast, seems to be continuously moving to an inner rhythm; pivoting her hips as she shifts her weight back and forth. Her steps are more frequent, more evenly measured and more fluid. The more intense the action, the more Natalie seems to be dancing.

According to Natalie, a fencer's style is as unique as her finger print. "Even if I didn't know who was out there, I could tell who they were as soon as they started fencing." This is why several seasons ago she began taking notes on every fencer she might be matched against. She noted their strengths and vulnerabilities, patterns of behavior, and individual peculiarities. Natalie knows she can only take this so far, though. "Obviously, you try to avoid their strengths and exploit their weaknesses. But you can't rely on it," she says, "because as soon as you do, then they do something totally unpredictable and you're not ready for it. More than that, the whole process of taking the notes helps me keep my focus the entire time while I'm waiting for a bout."

In the few short years since she began fencing, included four years on ASU's Salle Diablo Fencing Club, Natalie has earned bachelors degrees in both Political Science and Sculpture (graduating magna cum laude), and competed in fencing championships in five different countries, some multiple times.

Despite her relatively brief time at the sport, she has racked up an enviable ratio of wins, including four U.S. championship titles. In fact, her win/loss ratio suggests she would be evenly matched in the highest echelon of women fencers in the U.S., the top four of which will automatically earn a spot on the 2012 U.S. Olympic team.

If only it was that easy. Due to the way fencing rankings are calculated, (cumulatively and with the lowest three scores discarded) a dominant fencer's ranking will generally improve the more bouts they are able to compete in. In countries which sponsor their athletes, this isn't a problem, and rankings are likely to have a direct correlation to raw talent. U.S. fencers, on the other hand, must pay their own way to every event. Here, talent is necessary for a high ranking, but not sufficient. A fencer also needs funds.

Natalie has a job coaching up-and-coming athletes at Phoenix Falcons fencing club, which is one of the few employers able to understand and work with her unique scheduling requirements. Up until final Olympians are selected in April of 2012, she will have the opportunity to travel to as many as twelve competition per year worldwide. That's a lot of time off, and a lot of airfare, lodging and fees to pay for.

And of course Natalie's not alone. The roster of U.S. fencers tends to be younger than their international counterparts - a competitive disadvantage in a sport where experience is an asset - due to the fact that there is no living to be made from it. Also, unlike many other countries, the U.S. does not subsidize their Olympic athletes. "We have an incredibly young team...once you leave college there's no support system. It's sad, but that's the truth."

That's not to say that U.S. fencers aren't competitive, all things being equal. Far from it. In fact, in the last two olympics, of the six medalists in the sabre category, FIVE were Americans. What leveled the playing field somewhat for sabre was that it was a new olympic adoption, and so all of the competitors were new to the sport on the Olympic level. The oldest forms of Olympic fencing, which use either the epee' of foil, however, are still dominated by Europeans.

French fencers are rock stars in their home country, where champs can be certain not only of sponsorship, but also career-spanning endorsement deals, paid guest spots and the like. In many ways the sport perpetuates itself through personality in Europe much the way that U.S. basketball does here, where the public is always looking to the next Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, LeBron James, etc.

"If you think of any popular sport, one of the biggest factors is the individual athletes and whether you care about their story or not," Natalie reflects, "and so I think if we start to put our athletes forward that will only be good for U.S. fencing."

There is a long way to go before the sport gets mainstream recognition here (and pro soccer looms as a prescient example of the difficulty of an internationally adored sport to usurp any of the attention we give to the big 5 of baseball, basketball, football, golf and NASCAR); but if anyone can turn some heads to it, it's probably Natalie Vie. She has not only the captivating mix of sex appeal, athleticism and ambition necessary to gain attention, but also the intellect and grounding to maintain it.

Would SHE like to become the popular figurehead of U.S. fencing? "I have a lot of support here in Phoenix and a lot excitement from people at my club and I love it when some of the kids at the club look up to me, but... the most important thing to me is that I get my tournaments paid for. I'm not looking to get famous - I want to be an international player and get as good as I can get."

Tempe Town Lake Mishap July, 2010

2010-07-23T00:43:00.022-07:00

I'd never taken many pictures of Tempe Town Lake, because I knew other people would shoot it just fine. The only ones I had taken were to show the light rail line when it was new...

...or the Tempe Center for the Performing arts when IT was new...

...and it was sort of a backdrop for that photo-play I did last year with my friend, Ana; but not the most prominent feature in that one, either:

I remember as far back as high school in the '80's, reading in the New Times about plans to make the dry bed of the Salt River into a lake, with a sort of boardwalk area, water sports like rowing and fishing available, as well as shopping and dining. The idea always seemed too progressive for the voters, though, who kept shooting down bond proposals, one after the other. A funding method was finally approved in 1989, though, and the lake filled in July of 1999. Gradually, the area around Tempe Town Lake has become the focal point for city fetes such as fairs and holiday celebrations. A family can have a nice evening there for free, and it's a clean, casual, safe place in the city for just chilling out alone or with friends. There are boat and bicycle concessions along the shore, and the lake is stocked with fish.

Historically, the Salt River (or Rio Salado) had been a normally dry river bed that cut a broad swath through the south central portion of the valley and provided a natural boundary between Phoenix and Scottsdale on the north shore and Tempe and Mesa on the south. The only time it ever had water in it was on the infrequent occasions when water shed from snow and rain in north central Arizona would overwhelm the reservoirs further upstream. At those times, not only would the Salt have water, but it would often flood. Most bridges would wash out, save always the 1937 structure carrying Mill Avenue traffic, and its 1912 railroad counterpart, just a few hundred yards to its west.

With the exception of flooded periods, car traffic on the Mill Avenue bridge was north-bound only, and south-bound traffic actually took two paved lanes down into the river bottom and back up the other side. If unobserved, semi-athletic people could climb up under the bridge from the middle of the river bed and spend unmolested time in the archways just below the road surface. I did this on more than one occasion and became familiar with the clack-clack-clacking of the boards on the underside of the roadway as cars passed overhead. (I assume the boards must have formed the roadway floor during the bridge's construction phase and had since been loosened by decades of traffic and seismic vibration.)

Prior to the existence of the lake, walking out and dangling off of the train bridge was actually potentially lethal, because a careless move could easily result in a 25ft fall onto jagged rocks. In current times, the potential 9ft fall into a 16ft lake could almost be taken as sport. Even if you didn't know how to swim, you were probably out with a friend who did and could rescue you.

The state of affairs took a temporary but swift turn back toward the pre-lake days on July 20th, 2010, when the western dam of the lake failed, and most of the lake's approximately 1billion gallons of water made an abrupt exit downstream.

I was alerted by a friend on FaceBook that SOMETHING had happened, and I scooped up my camera bag and tripod and went to see what I could see. The path from where I could park a car, to my eventual perch about 100yrds downstream of the actual rupture was sufficiently strenuous and circuitous as to cause me to be slightly muddied and bloodied by the time I was finally able to get a shot. Although there was no signage saying I COULDN'T be in the area, the police were quickly erecting barricades all around, and policing (!) the area with both a patrol car driving along the river's northern pedestrian footpath, and helicopter. I was counting on eventually being kicked out, but wanted to delay that event as long as possible. Luckily for me, a portion of land adjoining the river bank has a fenced off area of construction, with a crane on it. I climbed the fence into this area and was able to wait unnoticed until the coast was briefly clear and then slide down the riverbank.

By then, an hour had passed since the initial flood and, although the bank was saturated to about the 6ft level, I was easily able to find a stable place to set up the camera. The current was lazy at this point, and didn't seem to be more than 2ft deep.

I could get a fair idea of what had happened with my naked eye; but it wasn't until I set the E-P1 to a long exposure that I could actually see any details.

The picture above, taken from the downstream river bank, shows the failed center section of the lake's western levee. More than an hour after the initial breach had sent the contents of the lake careening down the normally dry riverbed, water was still gushing through the opening with visible force.

The picture below is grainier, but I upped the iso to 6400 and was better able to capture the splashing water.

By the next evening, the dwindling pools were teaming with the remaining fish, all huddling together trying not to be noticed by the increasingly corpulent herons.

To anyone who grew up here, the dry(ish) river bed doesn't look so foreign or jarring.

Unfortunately the remaining fish won't be saved alive. Instead, there's a report today that they'll be saved freshly dead, and given to a local man who owns an alligator named "Tuesday." I can't make this stuff up.

The plan is to have all of the rubber bladders which comprise the western levee replaced, and for the lake to be full and operational (as it were) by November, 2010. Ironically, the refurbishment of the western levee had been scheduled to begin on July 21 - the day AFTER the big spill. The plan was for a temporary structure to be put in place during the work, which would then not require the lake to have been drained. Closed-circuit tv footage of the instant the dam burst showed a spontaneous rupture at the seem of one of the bladders; meaning no foul-play is suspected. It is sheer good luck that it didn't rupture a day later than it did. Had that happened, lives definitely could have been lost.

Although I've seen homeless people sleep basically right below the dam in the past, the authorities report having found no inadvertent victims.

Heidi Abrahamson

2010-06-18T19:58:00.019-07:00

For JAVA Magazine, July-August, 2010

A scene in the middle of the film The Lion In Winter depicts captive 12th century English Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine at her dressing table, surrounded by the various and sundry baubles befitting a female monarch of the Middle Ages. She chooses a ring with which to bribe her guard. Like the stones which built the surrounding castle, her jewelry seems roughly-hewn and elemental - ostentatious for its boldness rather than the intricacy of its detail. Size certainly mattered, with large jewels held fast by large metal bands. She was, after all, Queen.

Flash forward to the 20^th century and "modern" design. The very term (and its derivatives) has different connotations, depending on the specific field of endeavor, be it architecture, painting, jewelry, etc., but can probably best be defined in terms of what it is not. It is expressly not anything that preceded it. Not Victorian, not Baroque, not able to be defined on any terms but its own. By equal measure both carefree and highly self-conscious, "modernist" jewelry could have extremes of form with zero function, or it could have extremes of function and minimal form. It can make ones head spin to try and nail down the term, which is largely the point.

Seemingly at the union of these two design worlds has emerged the jewelry of local artist Heidi Abrahamson, who conjures her wares, item by item, in a small studio within the former warehouse space in which also resides Phoenix Metro Retro, a showcase of mid-century modern furniture on Hazelwood, just west of Seventh Avenue in Phoenix.

Heidi's parents immigrated from Germany in the 1950's, looking to restart their life in the States where, out from under the cloud of Nazi defeat and ruin, all things still seemed possible. Settling in Indiana, the couple took stable jobs and started their family.

Family lore has it that that the course of their lives changed one day when Heidi's mother made an impetuous purchase. "She'd seen this interesting vase at the Salvation Army shop and just had to have it. My father thought it was really kind of silly to spend so much money on a second-hand vase, when money was so tight for us, but mom really thought the vase was special." It turns out Heidi's mother had an excellent eye. The vase was an Amphora, designed by a popular designer of the avant guard. Before long, a buyer for the vase had been found and the family had made a tidy profit.

Thus began a decades-long immersion into the world of resale which over the years would grow from a hobby to a way of life. Long before eBay made the practice all but obsolete, Heidi's family would scour estate sales, auctions and the like, for objects whose value was underestimated by sellers who didn't really know what they had. They would then bring those finds to gathering places throughout the midwest, and resell them to people who valued them more greatly. "They don't do it like that these days, but my mother used to put up curtains and really decorate the selling space at these shows we were selling at. It was really pretty cool," recalls Heidi.

Although the family was living in a large Victorian-era house in Columbus, Indiana, Heidi's parents were gung-ho for modernism. "My parents used to drive the us through town and point out all the cool buildings with modern design influences. Especially being from Germany, they'd get really excited when they'd find something like a Bauhaus influence or something," she says.

Unlike the average child, Heidi soaked it all up; both the elements of style, which were such a departure from her Victorian surroundings at home, and even the names of architects and designers her parents enthusiastically imparted to her. "We'd drive into Chicago and they'd say, 'look - there's a Frank Lloyd Wright' or 'there's a Mied van der Rohe!'"

It was in high school that Heidi became drawn to the possibilities of silver as a medium for jewelry and art. She was particularly attracted to works of such contemporary silversmiths as N.E. From, Georg Jensen, Andreas Mikkelson, Esther Lewittes, Ed Levin.

Heidi studied fine arts and interior design at Indiana University and eventually moved to Seattle, Washington, where she began a career in visual merchandising. She planned and executed in-store decorations for some of the elite retailers in the city, including I. Magnin, Burberry's and the Bon Marche'.

It was in Seattle that Heidi met and married Douglas Abrahamson, who shared her eclectic tastes. After briefly returning to Indiana, Heidi and Doug moved their young family to Phoenix in the summer of 1995.

During her time in the Valley, Heidi began to pursue outside interests, such as desert landscaping (she has a degree in it from Desert Botanical Gardens) and beaded jewelry. Following a desire to have more creative possibilities than she felt were allowed her by stringing beads, Heidi eventually re-acquainted herself with silver. Although she still describes herself as "primarily self-taught," she has taken courses in casting, smithing and stone-setting.

What "self-taught" usually means is lots of experimentation, and Heidi's body of work reflects that. While certain themes recur (the juxtaposition of circles with spheres, for example), overall there is an unbridled crossing of genres and styles.

One stylistic trait evident in many of her rings is that of semi-precious stones encased in broad bands of silver, where the sides of the band actually extend beyond the apex of the stone. Tending toward a muted color palate, many of Heidi's pieces feature stones of dull amber (such as yellow quartz) side by side with stones of complimentary red and/or blue hues.

Pearls are a favorite feature, says Heidi, because of the possibilities for quirky or ironic mountings. One pendant features a shallow dish of silver, with a pearl placed off-center inside the dish. A silver and gold ring features a perfectly flat top, upon which is mounted several pearls in tight alignment. One silver ring features a pool of dark onyx atop which a white pearl seams to float.

There is both motion and tension in Heidi's designs.

Another successful and eye-catching theme is that of large quartz crystals placed within, instead of atop, vertical straps of silver. Some of these rings must be placed on the finger of the wearer horizontally until past the wearer's knuckle.

Tall and with the fair complexion and flaxen hair characteristic of her German lineage, Heidi Abrahamson has a broad, unguarded smile, and an infectious laugh. Though clearly serious about her work and her art, she also displays a healthy sense of humor. When asked if any of her design concepts have ever proved plain unwearable, she spontaneously guffaws, "Oh GOD yes!"

To say that Heidi is still learning her craft would be accurate but misleading. Each finished piece is a cohesive work which

achieves the goals Heidi had for it; but as her technical skills grow, so too do her expectations of herself and her work.

Last September, Heidi was invited to attend the "Ormania" trade show, an annual "selling exhibition" held in Paris, France. Heidi was surprised and honored at her inclusion in the exhibition, which seeks out the best of unique jewelry making the world over. "I didn't apply or lobby for it," she explains. "It was members of a silver forum I belong to who put my name forward."

Heidi is visibly moved when she reflects on the recognition she's received from peers and others with influence in the jewelry world. Her creations have already been displayed as jewelry as well as art at venues such as the Herberger Theater, Red Door Gallery, SMoCA and the Phoenix Modern Expo '09.

Although popular among those in the know, Heidi Abrahmson is still approachable - probably even more so if you happen to catch her at Bikini Lounge, one of her and Doug's favorite hangouts. Her "brand" is also not yet so big that she wouldn't consider commission work, and has designed custom wedding bands for clients in the past.

You can visit Heidi in her studio at Phoenix Metro Retro (which she and her husband own) at 708 West Hazlewood in Phoenix. They're open Wednesday to Sunday, 11am to 6pm. Her website is www.heidiabrahamson.com.

Studio Joy Li

2010-05-21T17:09:00.029-07:00

for JAVA Magazine, June, 2010

In modern relationship terminology, fashion is bad for us. Time after time it betrays us, and yet we keep going back to it. Even as we remain hopeful, we eventually learn not to put much faith in it.

Rightly so. By its very nature, fashion is an inconsistent and unpredictable partner. Sometimes the traits we initially found charming end up being plain annoying, and it stays around way too long. Other times, just when we think we're ready to settle down and make a long-term commitment, it comes through the door with a crappy new tattoo and an expensive habit and makes us wonder how we could have been so blind to its true nature. Oh fashion - "I don't know you anymore."

The truth is, fashion was always just too self-centered and mercenary to be trusted. How many of us have made the mistake of investing our hearts, only to find that the same pants we thought we understood like no other, will drop for just about anyone with a credit card or a cheap compliment? Fashion uses us and loses us...but still makes us want it.

To flip the (admittedly shaky) metaphor: The purpose of the fashion industry is to get us to stick around - to continue shelling out money in the desperate hope of not being left behind. In a partnership with fashion, any sense that we're in control is merely the result of mind games.

What's worse, and not at all metaphorical or funny, is that the fashion industry has a sad history of overlooking human rights abuses in favor of increased profits.

As you may have guessed, I am not the best choice for a fluff piece on "fashion." Not only am I cynical by nature, but...actually, "cynical by nature" pretty much does sum it up. Thankfully, I met someone related to the world of pret-a-porter with whom I couldn't agree more.

Joy Li, the designer behind Studio Joy Li on Stetson Drive in Scottsdale, has looked at the fashion industry from every angle in her 25-year career, and some of what she's seen has not been pretty. Along with her business partner, Jean Bartolomei, she has begun a design and manufacturing business that is meant to be the exception and perhaps eventually the rule - a partnership between consumer and fashion based upon mutual satisfaction and no guilt.

Studio Joy Li seeks to restore our faith in women's fashion. There is good reason to think they will succeed.

It would be easy to assume that Joy Li's success in the industry was a foregone conclusion. She's beautiful, articulate, self-assured and energetic. Though in her forties, she still has the figure that once inspired ready-to-wear mogul Liz Claiborne to make Joy THE shape of the Claiborne petit model in the 1980's ("I had to lay down in this stuff and they made a mold out of me…then they made dress forms out of the mold.") She has a degree in graphic design from Carnegie Mellon University. Isn't that enough?

"I was LUCKY!" she says more than once, when describing her circuitous rise to independence in the fashion business. And it was luck, both good and bad, along with her innate talents, which brought her to where she is today; bringing both practicality and a conscience to Studio Joy Li.

The first-born child of Chinese immigrant parents, Joy grew up in Buffalo, New York. "We didn't have toys." Instead, Joy expressed her creativity by drawing paper doll designs on the window panes. Still, the choice of a career in fashion was a non-starter as far her father was concerned. "My father always said that the fashion business was bad because it exploited Chinese labor," she says.

One stroke of luck was that Joy's father had been a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University. "I still couldn't take fashion, but since [her dad] had gone there, too, he didn't mind when I took Graphic Design because it was Carnegie Mellon." Though not fashion-oriented, this education gave Joy what she needed in the way of conceptual design fundamentals.

After university, Joy found graphic design work with a Fortune 500 company in Connecticut. One day she saw an in ad in the New York Times, looking for a petit fit model at Liz Claiborne in New York City. "I took the train into New York City and I got the job on the spot," remembers Joy.

Today, the Liz Claiborne company owns many other labels, such as Kenneth Cole, Kate Spade and Lucky Brand Jeans. Between the late 1970's and late 1980's, however, Ms. Claiborne herself was still in control and in the middle of the company's first major growth explosion. Joy had the luck of joining the company during this phase and the opportunity to learn from the master herself.

As a fit model, Joy was part of a small team which would fly to factories around the world where items for the Liz Claiborne brand were manufactured. Being the definition of what was then considered a size 6 (a 2 by modern standards), Joy would try on prototype clothing inside the factory. "Usually we'd put on the samples and then we'd go over the fit - Liz was always there - I'd say this is where it's a little snug or not quite right...then we'd be on our own until they were able to re-make the sample and call us back for another fitting. I always had a pager on me."

Often, Claiborne would be right beside Joy in the fitting room. "Liz would actually strip down and try on clothes right next to me...she was involved in everything...she really wanted to make sure that the quality was consistent. The goal was for all the clothes to fit exactly the same, no matter where in the world they were manufactured."

One challenge for Joy during this time in her life was that she needed to maintain a consistent body shape throughout the year. "It was a challenge because when I started, I was lifting weights...and then they told me that my arms were starting to get too big...also, on some of these trips maybe I'd get sick and so I'd maybe lose a little weight…"

This was clearly a pivotal and formative period for Joy, and one that she remembers with reverence. "I wasn't making much money, but I was living high and learning about the business," she recalls. "...I wanted to get in to fashion design so bad, but I hadn't gone to school for it. Usually that meant you'd have to start as a receptionist or something and try to work your way up." Joy's foot in the door was undoubtedly more fun than that.

Within two years, Joy had transitioned from model to designer when she accepted a role at Claiborne competitor Carol Little. Other jobs followed, including ones at Guess and Newport Blue Men's.

One incident during this period brought Joy back to Earth and served to mature her thinking as regards fashion and its place in our lives. A family emergency called her briefly to China, where the contrast between the lives of the coastal U.S. fashion set and those of the average Chinese citizen could not have been more pronounced. While frivolous fashions may have artistic significance, and may be fun, Joy started thinking more about clothing that was easy to live in.

In 2001, Joy relocated to the Valley, where she decided the time and place were right to strike out and do things her own way. Two tenets of Joy's "way" were specific corrections in the path she had watched the fashion business take over the course of her career.

The first of these was that the core of Joy's collection would be fundamentals of women's clothing that were meant to be kept for several seasons instead of tossed after only one. These would employ state of the art fabrics that kept their shape and resisted wear. Designed with equal emphasis to form as well as function, the pants, skirts, shirts and dresses in the Fundamentals line come in core colors of black, white and grey and can be mixed and matched with anything else in a woman's wardrobe.

Other lines, while more to the fore stylistically, still employ the ethos of wearability and matchability. Joy describes the brand as "for the woman going from the gym to the office or for the jet-setter who believes that Europe is possible with a single carryon."

The second intentional divergence from what many consider the fashion business mainstream is Studio Joy Li's commitment to fair treatment of the people who make the clothing that bears her brand. All the clothing in every Joy Li line is manufactured in the United States, with Joy and business partner Jean Bartolomei making frequent visits to the factories.

Though Joy doesn't want to isolate any of her past employers as particularly deserving of scorn, she has vivid memories of working conditions that repulsed her. "I'm talking women who had ropes tied to their arms so they had to pull enormous, heavy boxes across the floor…" The words of Joy's father about the exploitation inherent in the fashion business were given vivid detail. "I've quit jobs because of what I saw," she says.

Was there anywhere in the world where it was particularly prevalent?

"In every country in Asia."

Studio Joy Li is located in the Mix group of shops on Stetson Drive in Scottsdale's "SouthBridge District." There, all of Joy's current lines are on display in a showroom that is crisp, airy and bright. Joy encourages women to give her feedback and become real fans. American labor and small runs of fine fabrics mean that clothing from Studio Joy Li is not priced to compete with J.C. Penny; but it is more than reasonable considering the craftsmanship and exclusivity of the line. Prices typically range from tops in the $60's to outerwear in the high $400's.

There are, however, exceptions if you're among the Studio Joy Li in-crowd. "We hold a twice-a-year sample sale. I want to keep it fresh, so we'll have a box where anything in it is $20 and another where everything is $40 and so on."

And the future? "I definitely want to expand the size range. Right now it would be too expensive to offer more sizes than we do." Joy also sees philanthropy and sponsorship in the brand's future, but first things first.

There are a couple of ways to keep current with Studio Joy Li. The best is to stop by the shop at 7144 E. Stetson Drive, Suite 100 in Scottsdale. She also has a Twitter feed, which is studiojoyli, or you can visit the website at JoyLi.net.

JAVA Country Bar Roundup

2010-05-17T22:41:00.014-07:00

For JAVA Magazine - May, 2010

(Miss Brittany Doster at Shotgun Betty's)

This ain't yer grand-pappy's Western scene, young 'un. The days when REAL cowboys frequented bars in the downtowns of Phoenix, Scottsdale or Tempe ended in the 1970's, if not earlier, and the establishments which catered to them ended as well. What replaced them were bars, steak restaurants and lounges which chose western-ness as a theme to attract the growing tourist and college dollars.

If you seriously want to get in with the crowd that knows how to castrate a bull (properly, I mean), then you'll have to head out of town. Go to Wickenburg, Casa Grande or Coolidge. Just remember, REAL ranch folk party a little differently. They're up and out before dawn, and in the sack (sleeping) by 8pm.

If you want to get your country groove on, but do NOT want to have to feign interest in the latest hilarious insemination mishap, the Valley proper has you covered. The past few years have seen the emergence of several new venues for those looking to scoot their boots, along with the demise of others. Here we present a roundup of some of the hottest of the kicker bars in the area. One thing is for sure in the Valley - when it comes to Western, there's something for nearly everybody, even if you don't own a hoof pick.

Hot Off The Grill Country

When trends ignite, club owners scramble to cash in, and the collection of clubs that spring up are often a mixed bag. Such is the case in downtown Scottsdale at the moment, where three new clubs are hoping to ride the current cow-person trend through to the end. They are Saddle Ranch Chophouse, Shotgun Betty's and Revolver. One of these places definitely has some charm.

Saddle Ranch (Scottsdale Rd between Fifth Avenue and Drinkwater) is the Western bar Disney would build if Disney still built bars. It's sort of like a double decker Cracker Barrel restaurant, but with booze and more expensive meat. Although the space is cavernous, the central mechanical bull ring doesn't leave much room for dancing, unless it's in the main thoroughfare to the bathrooms. There's a lot of staff running around talking to one another, but they seem to leave the patrons pretty much alone.

While the mechanical bull is a unique attraction in the area, it doesn't take long to figure out that it's not the "bull's" good side you have to get on, but the dude in the booth with his hand on his joystick, CONTROLLING the bull. Basic rule: Hottie girls stay on as the dude bumps and grinds them via his cyber-bovine proxy / too-drunk frat guys get spanked (not in a good way.) Though this may be a suitable ethos in many respects, it spoils the notion that chance or skill are really at play, and means that the bull thing gets boring real fast. If you DO decide to ride, however, remember to tip the joystick dude. Got yer back.

One final word about Saddle Ranch - I was referred to their publicist in L.A. for all comments, and the monitors throughout the place were playing Lady Gaga, Jay Z and Usher. Make of that what you will.

Shotgun Betty's, just down the street at Stetson and Wells Fargo, is a better bet. It's just as inauthentic (when did the country aesthetic and the 1990's Poison video one combine?) but a better place to hang your hat for a couple hours.

Just to get it out of the way, if you haven't heard, it's owned and operated by the same person that owns Skin Caberet, and is his take on the type of bar made famous in the movie Coyote Ugly, where the bar girls get on top of the bar and put on a show periodically. The girls employed seem to be between the ages of 21 and 22, and have a body fat percentage somewhere in the 12% - 15% range. They're dressed in daisy dukes, boots and cowboy hats, and the Western theme pretty much ends there, visually.

It's a small and semi-dark place once night falls, and the walls are lined with tall, cozy banquets. The dancers are there when you want some eye candy, but it's also possible to sit back, have fun with your friends and get pleasantly bombed without the typical Scottsdale meat market mentality taking over. Shotgun Betty's is fun and doesn't take itself too seriously. In that way, it actually does kind of embody the old country spirit.

Besides their nubility, the bar and cocktail staff also seem to actually care about the patrons. They are present enough to be there when you need them, and they pay as much attention to the women as the men. Score one for good, old-fashioned hospitality - a much welcome return to form for Old Town!

Three doors to the west on Stetson, a new club called Revolver has taken over the space once occupied by Six. Revolver describes itself as "western chic." Seems like the same old vibe, though, and you'd be damned before you find any decor from farther west than Chicago. Fortunately they kept the absolute best part of Club Six - the bathrooms. There may be a reason (besides the bathrooms) to go here, but not if you're looking for anything remotely cowboy or western.

Old Country

(Model: Anakaren Slazar)

The Rusty Spur (Main Street in old town) beats Handlebar J's (just north of Shea) by a couple of years, 1958 versus 1960, but surely there's room enough for both under the heading of "oldest western bar in town." Your experience at either would be just about what you would have had there thirty years ago. The wood is real, the live country music is real, and they are both locally owned and operated. They were ALWAYS places that attracted a large percentage of tourists versus locals, but at least at this point they're authentically OLD places that do so. In a town that does very little to preserve its real past in favor of pandering to winter visitors and college kids with the latest re-interpretation, their very survival all these years merits you stopping in at least occasionally.

The Rusty Spur, in particular, is ripe for a local revival! This Summer, after the tourists have gone and ASU is on hiatus, this is the place to be. No table is too far from the bar to yell for another round,

or too far from the stage to join in on a verse of "Cold, Cold Heart."

An honorable mention must at this point go to The Coach House Tavern, located on Indian School Road, at Goldwater. It's not particularly country/western (the only real nod to the genre being an old wagon wheel nailed over the entrance,) but it's another leftover from a city that once proclaimed itself "The West's Most Western Town." A determinedly un-pretentious hole-in-the-wall, the Coach House has been the neighborhood bar of choice for locals for fifty years and continues to go strong. A large patio was added not too long ago, which doubled its capacity, but the heart of the bar is still a small, dark and funky room with decades of residue in the cracks. It's easy to find patrons who have been coming for twenty years or more, no matter when you visit. With drink prices approaching half of what you would pay at some of the surrounding clubs, it's no wonder, either.

Cattle Baron (people who own people who own cows) Country

The Stockyards Restaurant (Washington, just west of 48^th Street) is another hold-over from the Valley's past that has retained much of it's original character and mission. Though difficult to imagine now, as recently as the early 1970's, there was an enormous cattle yard located between Van Buren and Washington at 48^th street. At one time it was the largest in the world, and old-time residents can attest that it smelled like it, too. Beginning in 1954, The Stockyards Restaurant sat on a small elevation usually just upwind (to the south.)

The Tovrea family which owned the meat packing company and the restaurant were local upper-crusters, and The Stockyards became the meeting place for the men (such were the times) who made Arizona happen. Backs were slapped, deals were sealed and pesky investigative reporters plotted against in the overstuffed leather booths. Though cleaner and much less stuffy since a 2005 renovation, it is just as quietly iconoclastic as ever, and the hand-carved mahogany bar is still a sight to behold.

The Stockyards Restaurant is the Durant's of the western crowd. It's just right for those nights when you got $200 bucks to blow and only a nice sippin' whiskey and a charred chunk of large quadruped will do. You know what I'm talkin about.

Alt Country

For men and women who dig men and women, respectively, there's a happening and locally famous bar at Camelback and 7^th Avenue in Phoenix called Charlie's. Long before Brokeback Mountain lifted the weathered canvas veil on same-sex kicker love, Charlie's was strumming that crowd's tune. Now celebrating its 25^th year, Charlie's remains the premier place in the Valley where couples can do the Texas two-step cheek-cheek, toe-to-toe, and scruffy beard to scruffy beard. It's a wild Western place, actually, renown as much for being fun as for being gay. LOTS of straight people go, too, because Charlie's knows how to have a good time, western style. Just leave your inhibitions at the door and nobody gets hurt, yuh hear?

Big Country

There is an entire class of country club which doesn't aim to be anybody's cozy watering hole - they want to attract people by the heard, and they do! Mostly off the beaten path, where lower real estate prices help make a basketball arena-sized bar more viable, clubs such as Graham Central Station, Whiskey River, Tom Ryans and Toby Keith's "I Love This Bar and Grill" load people in by the thousands. Whether you're line dancing, seeing a country band or just getting loaded, bring a posse - a BIG one. You'll need them to hold your seat when you hike to the bathroom!

We've focused on just a few interesting places, but by no means is this sampling of western night life exhaustive. In a city with the footprint of the greater Phoenix metro area, there are tons of out-of-the-way places and many of them attract a more or less countrified crowd. Find em and tell your friends. Stick them in the pocket of your Lee jeans and make em your own.

Valley Fever Sundays at Yucca Tap Room in Tempe

2010-05-08T08:12:00.010-07:00

For JAVA Magazine May, 2010

Once a week, there's a place in Tempe where time takes a cigarette and country music lovers are transported to the smokey, whiskey soaked days of the early 1970's. Dana Armstrong, a third-generation Valley of the Sun girl, has done her level best to conjure up that bygone era for patrons of Yucca Tap Room at Southern Avenue and Mill.

For the past five years, Armstrong has hosted Valley Fever, Sunday nights at Yucca Tap. At the weekly gig and various special events throughout the year, fans can experience a more authentic version of the "Arizona country" Dana and many grew up with, albeit with much less nicotine.

"I wanted to recreate a kind of old Arizona feel...kind of like Mr. Lucky's" Says, Armstrong. Mr. Lucky's, which closed in 2004, was a long-time favorite of the Valley honky-tonk set. Although it spawned such pale imitations as big-box country-themed clubs Graham Central Station and Toby Keith's, Mr. Lucky's was there from the get go, and there was nothing ironic, kitschy or retro about it's country/western character.

"I wanted to rebuild that moment. I just brought the records I wanted to hear to the place I wanted to hear them," she explains. "I invited everybody I knew and hoped some would show up...I figured if they stayed that was just a bonus. I didn't want to force it on anybody - Whoever else appreciated it, that's who I wanted to be there."

Dana thinks the Yucca Tap Room was the perfect environment. "It looked right - it's been there for forty years."

The Yucca Tap Room is kind of easy to miss, but once you find it you'll understand the appeal. To say it's unassuming is an understatement. It looks very much as it has for forty years, just off the southwest corner of Southern and Mill, with a low, flat roof and peeling paint. Yucca still doesn't accept credit cards, either - yet another charming throwback to the past!

Once inside, though, the atmosphere is warm, and you can hear some of the best music in town. "After about three months [spinning records at Valley Fever], we decided to start adding [live] music...usually just one band every Sunday…"

The bands are mostly NOT cover bands, though. "Some of them are just straight honkey-tonk bands, like Junction Ten...they write their own songs, but they sound like they're from 1975, which is perfect for me. I can't really label it...we have some bands that come at it from a sort of folk angle, but they all have the same spirit. The bands don't stick to covering those songs, but they're definitely strongly influenced and inspired by those old songs."

Valley favorite Flathead is part of what Dana calls the "Valley Fever family" of bands. "Greg Swanholm [lead singer of Flathead] is like our biggest supporter...he was there from the beginning and still comes every Sunday," she says. "The thing about Flathead is they're so unique and hard to categorize...I don't know what to call their music, but it fits right in."

Armstrong has noticed the popular re-discovery of country/western culture of late, but draws a distinction between that and Valley Fever. "It may be a trend right now generally, but at Valley Fever it's the real deal." Instead of re-packaging and borrowing from the original version of the culture, "we're actually trying to re-cultivate and delve into it."

Why 1970's honkey tonk? "I have this thing where I just want to be living in a very specific era...it goes back to my childhood and my dad's taste in music...Waylon Jennings, George Jones, Mo Bandy…" She plays older stuff, too. "I'll play anything from the fifty's...Hank Snow, Hank Thompson...but my favorite is the late 60's to early 70's."

In addition to Sundays, Valley Fever typically hosts several day-long events throughout the year. "We have our annual all-day show called the Quarantine usually in March. Last year we had Waylon day, to celebrate his birthday, then we had HanksGiving, where six bands played all Hank Williams covers."

"It's still fun!"

Modern Phoenix Dot Net

2010-04-05T08:44:00.010-07:00

for JAVA Magazine

"We all have to do it for ourselves, that's the message," says Alison King who, along with Husband Matthew, run Modern Phoenix, a web presence devoted to the preservation of Modernist residences in the Valley. Perhaps so, but in terms of understanding the mid-century architecture that surrounds us, the Kings alone have given the rest of us an enormous head start.

What began as a visual scrapbook for the two design fans, has grown in less than a decade to be THE source for information on the subject; as well as a virtual meeting place for fellow enthusiasts and homeowners.

Between March 28 and April 11 this year, that virtual meeting place becomes actual, as Modern Phoenix holds its sixth annual Modern Phoenix Home Tour and Expo. For details on this, go to ModernPhoenixWeek.com. The subject of the tour this year is the Paradise Gardens community of Central Phoenix, a 1960's era neighborhood designed in conjunction with famed Modernist architect Al Beadle.

Growing up in a Modernist-designed Scottsdale neighborhood, Alison didn't always see the charm in her surroundings. "When you grow up with it, it just seems normal and you don't appreciate it," she says. It wasn't until she lived in New York, where most of the housing was of pre-war design influence, that she came to see Valley architecture differently. "It was just just so different there, with all the brownstones…," she says.

"When my husband and I went to Parson's School of Design [in NYC] we took classes in architectural design and started going to the Guggenheim and the Met and I was coming to understand the vocabulary and detail of it...so when we would come back here for holidays I started to appreciate it more and more."

"When we decided to give living in Phoenix a shot, we had to decide between [traditionally] historic bungalow, Willow-district homes, which people were really fixing up, and more modernist homes, which were really actually in decline."

The Kings bought a "cracker box" current home in North Phoenix and began searching the Valley for someplace more suitable. That search formed the foundation of Modern Phoenix.

Alison would use her spare time to drive around Phoenix and take pictures of homes she thought might be possibilities or which generally suited the couple's aesthetic sensibilities. "This was before Flickr, before Facebook...but I could build my own page with my pictures and give my husband the URL so that he could look at them," she explains. "...but once you start naming things [on the internet] people start finding them."

Soon, Alison and Matthew began to get lots of correspondence from people interested in individual architects, or Modernist dwellings in general. "People would write me from Texas or someplace and say 'I'm coming to Phoenix and I have no idea where to look.'"

Alison didn't intend to be the go-to guru for all questions regarding local Modernist architecture. "It started to be a serious time commitment, for one thing," she says. "That's why I started the forum; so people could get in touch with one another and share their own information."

Ultimately, though, another unforeseen time commitment arose. "Within months of putting up the message boards and getting people to talk to each other consistently making these sort of virtual friendships and this network...it became obvious to us that we really needed to do a home tour." Modern Phoenix was taking shape.

"It started off as a group of like-minded friends who wanted to get together and talk about somebody's house or bathroom or whatever…" The first event was in 2005. "We just said, 'let's be Arizonans and walk around.'" Sounds care-free, doesn't it? Not so fast. "The minute it was over, people kept asking me 'when is the next one?'"

And so a new annual Valley event was born, the Modern Phoenix Home Tour and Expo.

Aside from the very first event, organizing the homes to be toured was more difficult that Alison first imagined. Not only did many people not know what they had in terms of the significance of their own houses, but putting that forward as the basis for a community activity was something Alison sometimes had to work at. "That's the hardest thing...it's not like it was in the '70's when I was growing up - sometimes these neighbors don't even know each other…"

It's getting easier as the event matures, Alison explains. "I still do a lot of the recruiting by word of mouth or door-to-door or phone calls." Thanks in large part to the King's efforts, awareness has been raised about mid-century architecture in general and the Modern Phoenix site and tour in particular. "They've heard of us now," she says.

In fact, the event has become successful enough to pay for itself. "We charge a fee for the tour...but this is the first year that we're able to offer most of our educational events for free," she says. In addition to the actual tour, other items on the roster include seminars, discussions and slideshows by architects, designers and historians.

Anyone curious about researching their own home (or their future one) will find resources and guidance at this year's event as well.

Besides having become a second career, Modern Phoenix has benefitted the Kings in a particularly tangible way. It was through a connection made on the website's message board that the Kings found their own current home, just outside Phoenix's central corridor. A participant with whom Alison had once corresponded got back in touch, wondering if the Kings had any interest in a home that was about to go on-market. "If we'd just gone with a traditional realtor, I doubt if we ever would have found anything like this."

In fact, the home they found was close to the very heart of mid-century, Modernist design. "Our house was designed by Ralph Haver, who first built the house next door as his own residence, and then this one." From it's "spider legs" exterior columns and beams, to it's low-slope roof, the house is a classic example of modernism for the masses.

Though small by today's standard, the main impression one gets is of spaciousness. De rigueur design elements from recent decades, such as framed-in alcoves, artificial columns, rounded corners, and elaborate window coverings are absent in a modernist home. In Alison's, house, clean lines are the order - lines that seem to go toward infinity, as they begin at the front door and cary through to the furthest reaches of the patio (shown here.) The far wall of the living room is a picture window; essentially making it a landscaped view of the world beyond. Her breakfast table nestles at the joint of two more broad expanses of glass (shown below.)

Form follows function here. Designed for life where temperatures can exceed 110 degrees, the living spaces are quick to heat and quick to cool, as there is no additional airspace given to vaulted ceilings. While entire walls of glass feature prominently in some parts of the house, sides facing full sun (such as the traditional front of the house) have none.

Other intrinsic advantages? "These things are built like tanks," says Alison. She says an independent home inspection on her Haver house turned up a small fraction of the problems that previous, contemporary, home had - even though the Haver home had a good 50 years on the other.

At this point, Alison believes she has a good handle on what once was and what now remains of the mid-1900's Modernist dwellings in the Valley. Her main source of initial research has been at the Phoenix Public Library's Arizona Room. Developers used to announce their plans for new subdivisions in learned journals and trade-to-consumer publications, many of which are are stored there. These aren't available online and can't be loaned out; so Alison has multiple three-ring binders straining to hold page after page of old articles and advertisements that she's photographed at the library, and brought back to "Modern Phoenix Central" to follow up on with a personal visit.

"1953 to 1964 was the heyday of Modernist home building in the Valley," says Alison. "Around the mid-sixties is where single family homes gave way to multi-family homes." "Also, at one point there was apparently a mason's strike, and all these homes that were built out of block or brick [like virtually all of the Modernist ones] were in crisis...that's a unique regional thing that influenced what was being built at the time."

Being old and of limited supply in the Valley housing market at one time meant the likelihood of protection and even assistance when it came to preservation. Neighborhoods with early 20^th century housing, such as the Willow and Encanto areas are designated as historic and owners are kept from making alterations that run too far afield of the property's original design.

Mid-century homes, on the other hand, didn't have time to reach the same type of popular appeal before a critical change took place. In 2006, Arizona Proposition 207 was passed which, among other things, put the price of historic designation so high as to make it nearly impossible to achieve, says Alison. "The city has played its role maintaining the historic neighborhoods that were already designated prior to Prop 207, but now [a neighborhood would] have to hire a private consultant for thousands of dollars before you'd even have a chance."

And so the importance of Modern Phoenix grows even further. In the place of neighborhood associations and historic designation, it hopes to raise the value of mid-20^th century architecture in the Valley by raising the awareness of it. "As owners of Modernist homes, we're on our own," says Alison. "A lot of homes have been lost just out of neglect and because people really didn't know what they had. A huge part of the fight for preservation is education."

The Doctor Is In...teresting!

2010-02-20T02:34:00.021-07:00

An Evening With Dr. Dot

Excerpts in JAVA Magazine

March, 2010

The business and personal promotion phenomenon that is Dr. Dot whirled in and out of the Valley briefly a couple of weeks ago. The self-described Massage Therapist, Sex Columnist, Author, Singer and Celebrity Confidant came to town to drum up massage business at an annual convention for the performance tour industry. Marginally successful there, she truly excelled in her main area of expertise - BEING Dr. Dot!

The JAVA offices made the connection for me. She had come in yesterday and was leaving tomorrow. "Tonight," I was told, "she plays." If I was going to behold the good doctor (an admittedly un-official title) this would be my only opportunity. 10:30pm. Uncle Monkey's in Mesa. I'm in.

Search your heart out on the net - there's plenty to see and most of it is supplied by her. The basics are thus: Hippie parents taught her massage. Became a teenage concert junkie. Supported her habit by trading massage favors for access to gigs. Went from massaging for access to massaging for pay thanks to Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones. Toured with the Dead for a year with a German boy who "looked like John Lennon." Had a baby with him. Dated Bruce Willis. Has apartments in Berlin and the New York City area. Featured multiple times on German TV. Can drop names like most people drop skin cells.

In recent years, she's developed a worldwide army of "Dot Bots" - licensed massage therapists and/or chiropractors who get their assignments directly through Dr. Dot. They earn a spot on the team by either auditioning in person or, more typically, for someone else who has, and who knows what Dr. Dot requires.

In addition to that, she writes contributions for Penthouse, a regular sex and relationship advice column for the NYC alternative rag, the New York Press, and something similar for a German sex publication. "I'm really mean in that one. Oh God, am I MEAN!"

Right at 10:30 I enter Uncle Monkey's, a hopping and unpretentious joint in a strip mall near Southern and Dobson in Mesa. Looks like a dive, smells like a dive, but the place is packed with regulars, drinks are cheep and the girl behind the bar is cute as Hell (cuter, really.) At the far end of the room, past the dancing couples and the young guys playing pool, in front of the DJ booth, at a cocktail table with an entourage of two, stands the figure of Dr. Dot. She looks for all the world as if she could be Christina Applegate's busty younger sister.

She's doing karaoke.

More to the point, she has come to kick some karaoke ASS. "Did you see me do Stevie Wonder?!" she asks.

"No - I didn't even know he was here!" She doesn't get it. "What did you sing?"

"I did 'Livin For The City.'"

"Great song! How did you do?" I ask.

"It was phenomenal."

I'm expecting her to smile, but it's immediately clear that she is merely stating a fact. No irony at all, and she doesn't stay engaged for my reaction. She's busy looking through the catalog, trying to decide on her next phenomenal performance. "Nobody even clapped. Everybody here is so apathetic."

Hmm.

Not wanting to interrupt her search, I introduce myself to one of her two companions, a pretty young lady in jeans named Rachel who, though attentive, seems very tired. I tell her the conversation I'd just had. She chuckles knowingly at my description of Dr. Dot's glowing self praise and then acknowledges, "well she WAS pretty damn good."

And so she would continue to be. Over the next couple of hours and at two different bars, she does a handful of other songs and owns each and every one. Her takeover of Tina Turner's part in "Proud Mary" was a revelation. Sure, Ike was still helping out on the low end, but Dr. Dot was neither derivative nor inferior. It helped that she had the short skirt and pumps, but the vocal alone would have still passed the audition.

As it turns out, Rachel and the other girl in the entourage are Dot Bots, and joined up in Mesa to man a booth at the convention. Rachel is local, Dr. Dot flew in from New York City ("O.K., well Hoboken"), and the other girl is from Michigan.

There's no phony pretense that this is a party of equals, and no reason there should be any. They all have an easy rapport with one another, but there's no disputing who is in charge. The alpha is not prepared to concede any ground and the betas don't try.

If she's king of the hill, though, she's a benevolent one. Both in person and online, an unavoidable aspect of her personality is that she gives credit where it's due. She is fiercely proud of the Dot Bots and credits their talent with the success of the concept. Instead of saying good things happen to her because she's innately deserving, she comfortably and naturally acknowledges others for giving her the various opportunities that have come her way.

She also has, when she wants to exhibit it, something that customer service experts call "relationship extension." She can approach strangers and develop a mutually rewarding, temporary, relationship with them. This skill was on display throughout the night whenever something would catch her attention or pique her curiosity. Not only with men (who are more apt to allow her in anyway) but also with other women; such as servers, karaoke dj's, and various strangers in the clubs. If she wants to know something, she asks. She made them feel that she was genuinely interested in them, and she seemed to be.

At Uncle Monkey's, she leeds a one-table rebellion to change the mood of the room. We clap for every karaoke performer, good and not so much, because it's only right. Dot's not looking for anything she's not prepared to reciprocate.

Dr. Dot says she only drinks alcohol occasionally, and tonight she has cranberry juice at one bar and club soda at the next. That is one thing that separated her from most every other patron. She doesn't smoke - neither cigarettes nor marijuana ("It makes you apathetic!")

The doctor works her message - it's her primary asset these days - and that message is "I've been included in the lives of celebrities." It's not mere words. At least three different times between the two clubs and at breakfast afterward, she took out either her phone or camera and riffled through scads of candid photos of her with artists of varying renown. There are far too many to mention, but try these on for size: Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Sting, Joey Ramone, Motorhead, Tool, Depeche Mode… They kept coming, long after the point had been made.

Which is cool in a way and a shame, as well. Dot Stein (her real name) is talented and energetic in her own right. She's built - and is still building - a small empire in a niche market. She's smart enough not to let her indulgences drag her down, yet independent enough to carve her own path. She is every bit as rock and roll as the "stars" she massages and banks on. When pressed, she concedes that the celebrity angle is a means to an end - it opens doors. One must wonder, though, if she will always be comfortable being so strongly identified in terms of the company she keeps rather than her own achievements.

The entire Dr. Dot International Massage operation is, apparently, done from her cell phone; with ALL the calls worldwide going to Dr. Dot personally before being assigned out. She maintains absolute control over everything. Obviously this saves her money, and satisfies the control freak in her, but how much larger can it all get before she goes nuts? She just shrugs.

While virtually everyone else around us was getting loose and letting it all hang out, she kept her cool, kept her edge and kept control. She observed everything and everyone. If this was an example of blowing off steam, I felt a little sorry for her, actually. There was never a ten minute period where she wasn't checking her cell phone for new messages and massage requests. If there's a time when she's not on, it wasn't this night.

After the bars, we headed to Denny's for breakfast, where Dot let her guard down a bit. She's a natural observer and formulates opinions on many things. "Are you circumcised?" Uh… "American guys are usually circumcised. They're also limp. I've known some boys in Ireland and their dicks were hard as diamonds over there! It's because they put fluoride in the water here - it gives guys limp dicks and makes them apathetic." Yes, sir, opinions.

By 3:30am, fatigue was taking its toll. The girl from Michigan had long since left, and Rachel was about to pass out. I had begun my day intending to end it at least five hours earlier. Tomorrow, Dr. Dot had another busy day ahead, with an early afternoon flight back to New York and some potentially contentious negotiations with a band manager who wasn't towing the line; yet only she seemed unfazed by the late hour. Finally, though, she took pity on us and called it a night. Sort of.

"If you want to talk more you can come back to the hotel," she said, "but I'm not going to fuck you. I'm also not going to give you a blow job." In true rock and roll fashion, Dr. Dot knows how to get her point across.

Some other times a comment like this, though coming from left field, may have offended me. Maybe I would have protested about how much I've avoided drinking fluoridated water all these years. I mean, a guy likes to be asked, you know?

In the end, though, I just smiled and said, "That's o.k." The evening, and not marijuana or fluoride, had rendered me apathetic.

POSTSCRIPT

I've heard from Dr. Dot since this piece (or most of it) came out in the print version of Java. She was at first very complimentary, and ultimately very bitter. In the space of three days (March 5 - 8) she friended me and UN-friended me on Facebook. She claims that I misquoted her. I don't believe so. One error that I DID make was in describing the nature of the publication she writes for in Germany. What I called a "sex publication" is actually an arts/entertainment magazine that Dot informs me is similar to JAVA, only larger. Fair enough. I stand by all the rest.

You can read her blog post about it here, and read the original excerpt printed in JAVA Magazine. The full piece is what you see above. There was one line she asked me to omit in my online posting. I did so as a courtesy, and because from my standpoint the change was insignificant. It's neither the first, nor the last, instance of me eating a little shit to keep the peace. It's usually more effective.

I certainly can't fault her for wishing to guard the value of her "brand." The piece I did is the only thing I can find online that is anything but a re-statement of her own advertising message. If that's what all this is, though, then I think she's being much too sensitive. I said some pretty nice things about her, after all. She tells me that in her public railings against me she intentionally omitted my last name so I wouldn't have to "worry about anybody looking [me] up." How kind. She did, however, reprint the entire article; so I presume that she feels my veracity is only questionable when she doesn't like what I say. I'd like the by-line back, but no worries, Dot - my gift to you. Rock on.

(Space) Rocks In Her Head

2010-01-22T22:03:00.025-07:00

For Java Magazine,

February, 2010 - On newststands now!

You may be surprised to know that the top of the world is a cluttered office at ASU's main campus. Behind a desk there sits the stunningly beautiful Professor Meenakshi Wadhwa, Director of ASU's Center for Meteorite Studies. Not content with merely being a renowned scientist in the field of cosmochemistry, (because, honestly, who couldn't do that?), this PhD from Punjab is also an avid hiker, triathlete, pilot and potential astronaut. She's doing what she loves, and having a great time doing it - on top of the world, as they say. Did I mention the stunningly beautiful part? Well, it bears repeating.

Sorry guys (and girls), she's taken.

Born and raised in India, Mini (her favored nickname) was not the typical young Indian girl. In a culture that generally expects different things from its daughters than from its sons, she credits her parents for keeping her free to set her own path. "My father was always very progressive and my family never imposed any limitations on me. A lot of girls in India grow up with the pressure to get married as soon as they can."

"IF they go on to higher education at all, it's with the idea that it will just help them get a better match when they do get married. More often, they just learn how to cook and how to clean. I didn't even learn to cook until I attended graduate school here in the states."

How is she now? "I'm pretty good!"

Professor Wadhwa is by no means boastful, but she's not self-effacing, either. When our conversation gets to how she spends her leisure time, tucked between running and seeing bands, she casually mentions "I just got my pilots license." It's clear she didn't want to draw attention to it, but when I do a double-take, she admits her enthusiasm. "Yeah, I've wanted to do that for a long time… it was very cool!"

Perhaps she's accustomed to being exceptional, but she bears herself with an easy assuredness and lack of affectation. "Cool" seems to be how she describes the things that please her the most.

Her path to ASU began with a youthful interest in rocks and the physical world, but she says she wasn't one of those people who knew what they wanted to do from an early age. "I went into geology not fully appreciating what it was all about, really. I knew that it required a lot of field work and I liked the idea of being outdoors and basically doing something in the physical sciences."

It was early on, however, that she realized she'd chosen an untraditional pursuit. "...so I went to the university to sort of talk to the professors and look into it, and there wasn't a single woman faculty member; and even today it's a very small minority of departments of geology in India that will have faculty that are women."

Though she won't describe it as a struggle, she did have some convincing to do. "They were not very encouraging. The professors would say 'no no, it's not a field for women. You have to go on these long field trips and trudge around a lot…' They didn't think I could do it. I just said, 'wait a minute, I'm pretty sure I CAN do it.' "

How much of a motivation was proving them wrong? She laughs. "Well their attitude kind of goaded me on, but that was really secondary," she says. "I mean, at that age (17) you're still trying to prove yourself, but I KNEW I could do it just as well as anyone else, and I wanted the chance to actually do the work, that's all. In the end I was first in my class, so I kinda did o.k., I think." Point proven.

In deference to her father, Mini applied for a potentially lucrative position with the Indian oil and natural gas commission just after graduation and got it! This meant financial security, relative prestige and, since she was so young, the likelihood of even higher promotion in the future. Besides which, and not unimportantly as far as her family was concerned, she could still live in India. By any traditional standard, accepting the position was an easy choice.

Mini Wadhwa, as you may have already gathered, is not about easy choices.

"At the same time, I'd applied to grad school here [the U.S.] and been accepted here, too," she explains. "The job in India was just not where my heart was. If I'd taken it I probably would have left anyway...it's not what I wanted to do."

And so she came to Washington University in St. Louis for graduate work in geology - basically the study of physical Earth. One fateful day, however, a professor allowed her to examine a piece of a Martian meteorite that had been discovered. The lightbulb went off that she could apply all of her training not only to Earth, but to the arguably far cooler entire solar system as well! The die was cast, the seed was sewn, insert your own cliche here because I'm out.

Since then, she has done field work in Antarctica, been Visiting Scholar at the University of Chicago, Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Illinois, and Curator at the Field Museum, among other positions and appointments. Some of her awards and honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Wings WorldQuest Air and Space Award, and the Meteoritical Society's Nier Prize - among others.

If you look up at the right time, you probably won't see it, but somewhere up there is an asteroid named in her honor as well - 8356 Wadhwa.

She also got married - to another geologist whom she first met in Hawaii, fresh from her Antarctic stint.

Doesn't that mean she never really gets too far away from work? "Yeah, well, maybe, but we love our work! Also, there's a lot about his work that I don't know and vice versa, so it's always interesting still." Does that sound ideal? Maybe it is. Eleven years suggests something's working here.

"I have absolutely no tips whatsoever on balancing personal and professional time...I'm a big believer in doing the most that you can every single day and having fun with it," she says. Still, she's avoided burnout by getting outdoors. She hikes, goes to concerts and has become, to even HER surprise, a triathlete. "I was an outdoorsy kid, but I never did any of the three sports before really. I got to know people here and they were getting into it and I thought, 'why is it that I can't get into that?' " Why not, indeed?

[One of over 1,500 meteorite samples which comprise the collection of the Center for Meteorite Studies at Arizona State University's School of Earth and Space Exploration]

Drawn To ASU

The Center for Meteorite Studies has been at ASU since 1960, when the university had the foresight to purchase the collection of Arizona resident and avid meteorite collector Harvey Nininger. A "gentleman" scientist who also operated a museum at northern Arizona's Meteor Crater, Nininger virtually established the field of meteoritics in the US, according to Wadhwa. A portion of the collection had already been sold to the British Museum and ASU had to scramble to get the rest.

Today, the center holds the largest research collection of meteorite samples in the world, and the fifth or sixth largest collection even considering those held by museums.

In 2006, ASU incorporated the center into its newly-formed School for Earth and Space Exploration, a multi-disciplinary school, encompassing everything from meteoritics to engineering, geology to astrophysics. It was the attraction of building this dynamic new school from the foundation that lured Mini and her husband (also on the faculty) to Tempe.

Though very active following the lunar missions of the early 1970's which brought back moon rocks for examination, the center itself was still not widely known, despite having such a significant collection. Part of Prof Wadhwa's mission is to change all of that.

"The center really is a kind of unique resource," she says, "so we've been trying to rejuvenate interest in our samples and try to make them more available in the science community as well as to the general public. And now there are plans for the school to have a new building and a big component will be exhibit and interactive space, and the meteorite collection will be a big part of that."

The outreach extends into the local community as well. "We have samples that we take to schools to try to get kids fascinated with this stuff. Plus there's a lot of people who don't know we're here." Probably most people don't, actually.

Like the rest of the faculty, Wadhwa had to take a furlough earlier this year to help make up for budget cutbacks brought on by the recession. In addition, she says they lost the equivalent of at least one and possibly two positions this year.

Might there be a well-endowed benefactor out there who just needs to be made aware of the school?

"That's why I'm talking to you."

Mini Wadhwa, you sweet-talker, you! Oh. Yes, publicity. Yes, I see. I'll certainly do what I can.

As full as Wadhwa's life may seem at the moment, it's about to get even fuller.

After a career spent largely studying Martian soil that has found its way to Earth by natural means, Wadhwa would like to go and get some for a change. She is principal investigator for a Discovery Class mission to Mars, which aims to collect Martian atmosphere and dust samples and return them to Earth for study. "It'll be a big time commitment but I'm really excited about it because Martian samples will mean a lot to different scientists around the world."

"Right now, we can only be 99 percent sure that what we think are Martian meteorites are actually from Mars," she explains. Part of the SCIM (Sample Collection for the Investigation of Mars) mission would be to give us samples that we can be 100 percent certain of for comparison. Further experiments on the samples would seek to answer questions about the evolution of Mars, the solar system and the Earth itself. NASA will decide next year whether or not SCIM is included in its next mission.

Assuming the mission does go through and is successful, Wadhwa and her team at ASU would be first up to receive the fruits of their labors. "We'll have six months after the samples get back to do a subset of experiments on them. The idea is to try and get the most science out of the sample, so the last thing we'd want to do is hoard them. It's impossible to have our small group of individuals do all the research that needs to be done, so we limit ourselves to just what we think we'd be best at and then make the samples available to others."

Having Wadhwa as "principal investigator" on this project will certainly raise her profile, as well as that of the ASU School of Earth and Space Exploration. "Part of the draw of being in this unique environment is that you have all of the different parts together at this one school. The goal is to prepare the next generation of space scientists, so bringing NASA projects here is definitely something we want to do as much as possible."

And what does the future hold for this award-winning and amply accredited professor?

"Twenty years from now I hope we'll have actual samples back not only from Mars, but from some of the other planets in the solar system. I want to be involved in some of these missions."

JAVA: And if there's a manned mission…?

Wadhwa: Oh...

Throughout our long and pleasant conversation, Professor Wadhwa was always sure-footed. She's been interviewed a lot and is justifiably confident of her material. It was intriguing, therefore, when she hesitated slightly at this question.

Wadhwa: Oh...GOD yes, absolutely!

JAVA: Is that why you're keeping in such good shape?

Wadhwa: Well...you know…who knows...

JAVA: Is that actually what's in the back of your mind when you're doing triathlon - so that you can still pass the astronaut exam when you're sixty?

Wadhwa: Ha ha ha ha...of course not...I mean, of course SO! That's what I meant to say [she is now officially blushing.] Yeah, I would LOVE to have been an astronaut. That would have been very cool!

Lest we think that her head is now in the clouds, she takes pains to explain that it is not.

"At the same time, there's so much cool stuff for me to do...and the important thing is to have fun at what you're doing at the present time. You don't want to just sort of make do and bide your time while you're thinking about some really really long term sort of plan that you're aiming towards..." Yeah yeah yeah, the common term for those things is "dreams," Professor. I get the impression that she's trying to convince herself as much as me.

She needn't worry.

Who among us would ever accuse Mini Wadhwa of simply biding her time?

See more pictures of the esteemed professor at my Flickr page.

Queen of the Scene

2009-12-31T17:34:00.020-07:00

For JAVA Magazine, on news stands now!

If you're a part of the local party scene, you probably already know her name. You may be among the few who realized who you were looking at as you watched the thin, buxom visage stride from shadow to shadow around the dance floor, but never on it. Even if you don't go out, you've probably heard of her parties sometime in the last two years. They come up regularly in the mainstream press. They begin waves of copy-cat events throughout the Valley. She is Miss Jen Deveroux, and at the moment she is Queen of the Scene.

I say "at the moment," because nothing so etherial can last very long, and that's fine with Deveroux. With a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Loyola University and more than half-way through pre-med, throwing trendy DJ parties has been more of an inspired diversion than a calling.

Deveroux moved to the Valley from Chicago in 2000 to be on her own and go to school. "In 2007, I had a job as an aesthetician in a clinic, working with reconstructive surgery patients and doing chemical peals and stuff like that, and after eight or nine months, it just got so boring." A friend of Deveroux's, Jas Tynan, introduced her to local powerhouse DJ William Reed, who was an established local act, and the boredom was cured.

"I approached William Reed and asked if he'd teach me how to DJ, and he basically blew me off." He did recommend to Tynan that she help promote a night called Old School Thursdays at Club E-4, and Deveroux found she had a knack for creating energy AWAY from the turntable.

Still, says Deveroux, she found a lot lacking in the local party scene. "Most of these parties put a lady on the cover and they give it some lame name and then that's all they do. It's generic at almost every venue. There are one or two exceptions, but basically all the parties, quote unquote, are the same." Jen wanted more of the diversity and dynamism, some of the "cool" she had seen at parties in L.A.. She set about building a party from scratch.

She lined up Reed and another local DJ, Jared Allen, to share mixing duties. Both men had amassed a healthy following at other venues. In order to provide a diversion from the steady music, she approached various artists and performers who would rotate into the party. Not only would they be selling their art during the shows, but in many cases they would also be creating on-site. Next, they needed a venue.

"We wanted something with its own character that wasn't just an ordinary club. Most big cities have these great old hotels and that's always where the best parties are," she says. "Los Angeles has the Roosevelt on Hollywood Boulevard, and The Standard; San Francisco has tons of them. When I saw the San Carlos, I fell in love with it!"

That's how I met her. I was managing the Hotel San Carlos at the time. It was early April, 2008, and I was looking ahead to a long Summer with no revenue coming into our food and beverage operation. Our restaurant staff already wasn't making much money in tips, and soon they would be making even less. We couldn't count on locals to make up for the absent tourists, either. The hotel had just celebrated its eighty-fifth year in the center of Downtown Phoenix and aside from old-timers, very few people in town even new it existed.

Looking out the window at the outdoor pool deck, I thought there must be a way to entice people to come enjoy the pool and, more importantly, buy booze! A mere day later my phone rang, and Jen Deveroux made her proposal for a weekly pool party. Perfect!

Thus started Adult Swim, the event that put Jen Deveroux AND the San Carlos on the map. Not only did it attract scenesters from all over the Valley, but students, artists, business people and people who didn't even know what a "party scene" was. The event grew to capacity quickly and it wasn't long before hotels Valley-wide were trying to jump on the bandwagon. Still, Adult Swim was the hottest, hippest party in the Valley that season. By the next Summer, the party had outgrown the San Carlos and moved to the Wyndham, which could handle the capacity.

Since then, Jen Deveroux has been a minor celebrity in town. She has launched numerous parties with greater or lesser success, but her reputation for creating a cool event has remained intact and sought after by business people wanting to bolster flagging interest in their clubs and bars.

Her current hit is a party called "Harlot," which inhabits both the Red Room and Peire Lachaise lounges at the Mondrian Scottsdale Friday nights. While there are no bathing suits, the vibe is much the same as Adult Swim. People are laughing, dancing, having a great time. A girl dressed as a living anime character is putting paint to canvas at an easel on one side of the room. On center stage, a contortionist from the performing troop Scandalesque draws whoops of applause for adopting superhuman positions. In the far corner, DJs William Reed and Tricky T are behind their laptops cueing up the next transition of songs.

And in walks Jen in a smart black blazer, skin tight jeans and straight, shoulder-length hair. She looks professional, thin and shapely. She's difficult to get a beed on from across the room because she is everywhere. Two feet through the door, and she's stopped by an admirer. Another joins. She laughs, answers a question or two and excuses herself, only to take a few more steps and then stop to answer text messages. Then it's across the floor and over to Reed, over to the bar to check on liquor sales and out to the patio because someone out there is partying a bit too hard. Over the course of the next hour, she has been downstairs twice to check on the party there, conferred with hotel management three times about sound levels, rowdy attendees and an animated DJ, and given small bits of personal time to about a dozen friends, most of whom she never knew just two months ago and won't see or speak to again until next Friday.

Go to the Mondrian any other night of the week outside of tourist season and it's dead; but on Harlot Fridays, the place rocks and the bars make bank.

There are a couple of reasons why Jen Deveroux's success in the Phoenix party scene is deeply ironic. Private by nature, she is decidedly not promiscuous. She marvels at the level of hooking up she hears about through the party grapevine, but is only interested in it for its soap opera qualities. She only drinks alcohol on rare occasions, and never to excess. Although she can appreciate the thumping beats of the party music, she admits that her secret favorite parties are the ones with live indie bands - a crowd that wouldn't normally be caught dead at a place so chi chi as the Mondrian Snottsdale.

A quick scratch of the surface, however, suggests she may have a genetic predisposition to successful wheeling and dealing on the periphery of the stage.

The name Anthony Pellicano would be familiar to anyone watching the nightly entertainment news magazines a few years ago. Pellicano, once known as "Private Investigator to the Stars," did detective work for the likes of Michael Jackson, Steven Seagal, Michael Ovitz and Chris Rock, among many others.

Possibly not content to just sit back and let clients come to him, Pellicano is alleged to have drummed up business by actually purchasing incriminating information and charging would-be clients big money to keep the information a secret under the pretext of "managing" it for them. What Pellicano may have considered a bold and innovative business idea, eventually resulted in racketeering charges, and later a conviction for other prodigious transgressions.

He's a real go-getter, that Anthony Pellicano; much like Jen Deveroux. Also like Jen, he is creative and energetic and driven. He knows everybody and everybody knows him. Jen Deveroux knows him perhaps best of all.

Pellicano is Jen's father.

(Cue the Darth Vader theme.)

Jen loves and once trusted her father. The revelations of his misdeeds and the reality of his subsequent downfall put Jen through the mill. The move to the Valley was a much needed escape from a more fucked up reality - one she now has in perspective and no longer needs to feel threatened by. The creativity she has exercised here and the success she has had has enabled her to lay claim to her own identity. She is in control of her life and her destiny and is determined to keep it that way.

Even though we admire one another because of our past collaboration, Jen was slightly apprehensive at being interviewed for this piece. I knew I'd have to be somewhat cautious, and ease into it gradually.

Java: Some people say the party scene is where you go to find tomorrow's homeless people today. Basically it's for losers. What do you say to that?

Answer: I'd say they don't know what they're talking about. I'd also say you're an ass!

Wow, a simple question, and she was already being so sensitive!

Java: Why do people go to a "Jen Deveroux party?"

JD: Well, all these parties have their own sort of characters. For Adult Swim, people came to see vast amounts of other people who are cool, artsy, tatted up, in bathing suits. Also because the Hotel San Carlos was just the only place in town where you could get the really hip kind of vibe. So that all came together. And yeah, there was a bunch of people who were looking to get laid. I mean, come on, let's be honest.

...and even now at Harlot, you still have most of that, minus the swimming pool. The Mondrian has its own cool vibe, plus we give them a lot to look at. We get people who wanna hear good music and from the best DJs. And we always get a real variety of people. We get artists, intellects, wealthy people, people on a budget because it IS a free party...

...one thing I want to have at all of my parties is that cool mix. I don't want it to be just a meat market or just for girls or just for rich people. Just for cool people. Haha - You know who you are!

Java: So how do you achieve that?

JD: Through branding. Through the look of the flyers, the promotion, marketing, musicians, the DJs involved. I try to imagine stuff that's totally different than what's going on. With Harlot I'm trying to use the physical entertainment, the contortionists and performers with live painting with DJs and integrate it into a hip night that would be attractive to a lot of the population. You don't really go to a club here and see that type of performance. You see go-go dancers, but not someone breathing fire or hanging from the ceiling. It might be more common in L.A., but it's not here.

Java: What changed after your success with Adult Swim?

JD: It was amazing! For one thing I got a lot of name recognition. We were featured in The Arizona Republic, New Times, on television. I think it gave me credibility right away. People who had clubs started seeking me out to see if I could do something for them. I think it made everything else possible, really.

Java: Unless a party is really successful, there's not a lot of money to go around. Why wouldn't the DJs just do this themselves and cut out the middle-man?

JD: It's funny because back ten years ago, most DJs were hired just as a DJ, but now they've merged into promoters, too. Some DJs are o.k, with it, but most aren't. I mean, I actually used to hear that a lot from some of my DJs, like "why should you get a cut when it's all about the music, and I play the music." That works until one of the hotel managers wants to pull them out of their sets to talk about room capacity or until one of the DJs friends does something stupid to get themselves ejected. The truth is these DJs are performers. They can't do what they do if they're also juggling the other performers, the guests, the parking, the receipts... Some of our DJs are absolutely wild, too, and that's part of their popularity. From the venue's standpoint, they always know where to find me and I'll solve their problems and keep the party going. From the DJs standpoint, they don't have to worry about anything but the music. Ha - I'm VITAL!

But so are they. I love my boys! William Reed, Jared Alan, Sean Watson and Tricky T. They're the best, and I couldn't do it without them.

Java: Was there a party you did that just didn't work and that baffled you?

JD: Yes! Royal Filth! That was downtown (Phoenix) at Rose and Crown. I thought the concept was very intriguing. It was a really attractive place and it was outdoors. Ultimately, though, there are a lot of thing going on on Saturdays that targeted the same people - other really well-established parties - and that's probably what did us in.

Java: You're in great shape! What's your routine?

JD: Well, I run six to seven miles, four times a week. Twice a week, I do yoga at Bikram Yoga of Phoenix. They're actually the only place in town I'll go for Yoga. I've been Vegetarian since I was fifteen. I'm one of twelve brothers and sisters, and I'm the only vegetarian. I started that because I became aware of the torture that animals go through when they are in our food chain, but I also loved the health benefits I got from it.

Java: How old are you?

JD: 37

Java: You're not going to be mysterious about that? You know, that makes you the oldest girl at most of your parties.

JD: No, I'm not going to be mysterious, I think that's great! I'm very proud of my age.

Java: What are your parties going to be like ten years from now?

JD: Ha! I'm not going to be doing this ten years from now!

Java: Back to medicine?

JD: Maybe. I really love that, and I love helping people. I'm thinking about some other things too, though. I've met a lot of really talented people over the last couple of years. I think I could do a good job representing them.

Java: O.K., now just a couple of quick questions "for classification purposes:" First, boxers or wrestlers?

JD: What? Boxers, because they're extremely disciplined as far as their workouts and I admire that. There's also something about two dudes rolling around on the floor. I mean not that there's anything wrong with that...

Java: O.K., Rough or smooth?

JD: Rough or smooth? Rough, definitely! Wait - What are we talking about? Did you go to school for this?

Java: What's coming up, party-wise?

JD: Harlot's still the big thing right now - it's getting bigger every week! What we've got planned for Valentines Day, though, is going to blow everyone away. It's a French Revolution themed masquerade night - We're calling it Let Them Eat Cake. We're having a fashion show with six or seven designers, contortionists, aerialists, fire eaters, clairvoyants. No admission without a costume. People should hit me up on Facebook to keep up to date.

You can see more pics from Harlot and other of Jen Deveroux's parties, along with a whole bunch of random stuff in the JAVA set at my Flickr site.

Also, pick up a copy of JAZA Magazine around Phoenix and Tempe. Among the places that carry them is Zia Records, Buffalo Exchange, Urban Grocery, Tempe Camera.

The Real Deal

2009-12-17T21:45:00.008-07:00

A large group of friends and peers gathered in the office of Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon tonight to celebrate the work and accomplishments of Mr. Scott Phelps, who was the Mayor's Communications Director until today at 5pm, when he began his retirement. A 19-year employee of the Mayor's office and a nearly thirty-year civil servant in various capacities, Scott chose early retirement ahead of upcoming budget cuts mandated city-wide. Had he not elected to do so, it would have meant a less senior employee (or more than one, since Scott had a relatively high salary by city standards) would have been out of work; a situation Scott was quoted as saying "would certainly not have been acceptable."

You can find plenty of accolades of Scott on the web, so I won't be too expansive with mine. He's affable, intelligent, and absolutely tuned-in. He makes friends easily and has tons of them. Even after nearly thirty years of being in the orbit of the local political world, he seems remarkably un-jaded and un-guarded. He once devoted some of his scarce time to advising me how to work within the system to get something done - note that I said "within" and not "around" the system. Scott's response to my gratitude was to say "Government should be in the business of achieving the right outcome." It's the attitude and mindset we can only HOPE our public servants will have.

It's further testament to Scott as a person that among the many well wishers were political operatives of both major parties, as well as two former Phoenix mayors, business people, media personalities, sports personalities and a contingent from the Phoenix zoo - just one of the local concerns Scott has made better with his service over the years.

Along with the recent retirement of Frank Fairbanks after 20 years of HIS service as Phoenix City Manager, Scott Phelps' departure highlights the importance of the unelected and mostly unlauded people BEHIND the scenes of our government. Scott worked for several different mayors during his career with the City, in both Republican and Democratic administrations. His devotion was to the City and its citizens, rather than to a person or party. In truth, Scott, Fairbanks, and other long term civil servants have an impact every bit as important, if sometimes less tangible, as that of the elected officials they report to.

Without them, there would be no continuity, no institutional memory, and reckless follow-through, if any, on long-term goals and projects. Without Fairbanks' dedication, spanning multiple administrations, Valley lightrail would still be a dream and downtown redevelopment would have stagnated. With the wisdom and network of contacts that only comes with time, Scott Phelps was able to help new administrations hit the ground running and avoid many of the pitfalls and errors of rookiedom. He put the right people in touch with the right people. What's more, these men didn't need to make a profit with each connection. They weren't "owned," except by us.

It will be interesting to see where each of these men target their talents next. They are both retiring with many good years left, and it's unlikely they will be satisfied with lives of leisure. For all his joking about having time on his hands now, I doubt that Scott's Blackberry will actually get much of a rest. If nothing else, there is a small army of public servants that both of these gentlemen have inspired and who, if they find themselves at a loss, will be well-advised to "use a lifeline."

Volcanico a tranquilo

2009-11-28T22:11:00.018-07:00

Something really cool happened over at my Flickr account last week. Two people started out being pricks to one another and ended up friends. As is the nature of Flickr, it all surrounded a picture. In this case, one that I posted of a lady at a demonstration in downtown Phoenix, supporting immigration reform. Since we're dealing with humans here, the debate began with vitriol, generalization and accusation. Thankfully in this case the parties remained engaged long enough to actually come to some understanding and even cordiality. Maybe friendship.

You can check go see the bile in all its glory at my Flickr site, or continue reading here, where I've selected choice bits. If you do go to the Flickr site, you'll need to look at the comments HERE and HERE and HERE.

Here's the picture that sparked the blowup:

And here's the result:

Rick248: Too bad the real illegals don't look like that. Most people that protest think of them as poor, misunderstood types. Not the drug dealers, murders, sumgglers and I could keep going on but you get the picture. They use our emergency rooms for their personal doctors, so when you need to go to the ER it's a five to seven hour wait. Of course they don't pay so guess who picks up the tab? No matter what that poster shows, your more likely to be shot than handed flowers. I've with Sheriff Joe. I don't have a problems with sending someone back who interes our country illegally.

Corrin: By all means, Rick248, I certainly hope that you support a comprehensive guest worker program that allows the immigrant labor we exploit to also buy health insurance and be registered as having limited rights as long as they contribute to our economy. Please vote for that the next time you have a chance. Also, unless you are approaching the issue with a purely racist foundation, you will surely concede that even Arpaio's office admits that the vast majority of the illegal aliens he has turned over to the feds are not guilty committing a crime other than coming here.

Rick248: I knew it wouldn't take very long to be called a racist. If wanting my country to be safe with secure borders is racist, fine, go ahead and call me anything you want. Tell me something, when did we start picking and choosing what laws to enforce and what laws to ignore?... During my years as a LEO, I've been in four shootings. Three were illegals. I was stabbed by an illegal. You're doing no one a favor by allowing illegals to remain here. They don't learn the language so we have things in two languages. I'm 61 now and have been out of L.E. for quite a while. Both my wife and I have CCW permits. Six times I've been accosted (that is a polite way of saying attempted robbery) by illegals. Displaying my holstered weapon was enough to stop them. Two months ago three gentlemen tried a home invasion on my house. I make it a habit of answering my door with my former duty weapon in my hip pocket.

Corrin: This goes on all around the world, and it's always a problem. I really don't see it as liberal versus conservative, either, because it seems to cut across party lines. No one wants to be taken advantage of financially and certainly no one wants to be a victim of crime. It's a fantasy, though, to think that we could honestly secure our borders and an economic reality that in a profit-driven economy rotten jobs will always fall to an underclass to perform.

Plus which, having guest workers that only tap a small portion of the benefits of citizenship allows us to use them to support a time of economic growth and abandon them during a recession. Illegals aren't coming here in smaller numbers over the last year because of Sherif Joe - it's because the jobs are no longer here.

... sorry about your personal experience, but I see this as a result of not having a comprehensive guest worker policy that would truly allow us to attack the violent criminals separately from the busboys, housekeepers, produce pickers, etc.

Rick248: I'm 61 and I remember when we did have a "guest worker" program. I don't remember when it expired. I'm in favor of bringing that program back. We both know that there are jobs that Americans just don't will not do, If that program came back, then things would be better for everyone. Pay would be fair, benefits would be provided, it would be legal to obtain a drivers license and insurance. I wouldn't have any problems then.

A "guest worker" is not citizenship. If that is desired, then the person in question would be required to go though normal channels. I would be quite happy with that arrangement. It should work to everyone's advantage. Does that work for you?

Corrin: Oh definitely that would work for me - sanity, that's all. My neighborhood has a mix of both legals and illegals from Mexico and the lower Americas, so I hear a lot of different perspectives. Some of the most vehement critics of illegals are people who came during the 80's and worked really hard WITHIN the system to finally get full citizenship. I can see their point very easily. "I earned this, what did all of YOU guys do?" At the same time, I'll sit outside with the parent of a family of illegals and he tells me how much happier they were in Mexico where they had family, property and a lot less stress; but that their family is relying on them to send money back.

I didn't mean to soft-sell the crime among this group; but aside from what is a direct result of the border issue, it doesn't SEEM to me to be any different from what you find among the lower socio-economic strata in general, regardless of ethnic makeup. Also, to be sure, they have their saints and sinners like the rest who further muddy the issue.

Then in a follow up letter, Rick wrote: Just because we disagree doesn't mean we can't be friends and respect each other. You seem like a pretty good person to me.

There. Hope for humanity?

Here's a great picture from Rick's Flickr site

2009-11-27T17:09:00.007-07:00

Official White House Photo by Samantha Appleton

An hour ago, the Whitehouse posted a photo taken by one of their official photographers of the President greeting Mr. and Mrs. Dumbass at the state dinner for visiting Indian president Singh. The photo can be viewed and reproduced in any of six different sizes by anyone who has copy/paste capabilities and can find their way to the Whitehouse's Flickr account.

They didn't have to do this. They could have rightly claimed the photo was evidence in a potential criminal case. Its only real value is to administration critics who already feel that the office of the presidency is being dishonored by its current resident. They could have waited until someone in the media went through months of petitioning under the Freedom of Information protocol, betting that demand for the image itself would wane with time. That has been a common tactic in the past.

I wonder if I'm the only one who thinks this is refreshing. Understanding as they must that it will not always paint them in a positive light, I think they are showing a deliberate commitment to openness. They seem to have much less of a filter before the public than even the Clinton administration had (even PRIOR to Monica-gate.) From what I've noticed so far, they take their hits pretty straight on. Isn't it nice not to have a presidential administration described as "secretive" for a change?

Ralph Nader and the Urban Grocery

2009-11-23T18:41:00.018-07:00

It always amazes me how quickly people can turn when their need for instant gratification isn't met.

A Zogby pole conducted in late August found that over the preceding six weeks, support for Barack Obama fell a whopping 18 percent among liberal voters aged 18 to 29 years. This is when it was being suggested that Obama may not find it possible to abandon the Afghan war right away and may entertain a compromise in order to pass healthcare reform legislation. Lower support will translate to fewer of these voters turning out for crucial mid-term elections, or to their votes shifting to fringe left candidates who don't have a real chance of getting elected.

One consequence of this last phenomenon was evident in the presidential election of 2000, when Ralph Nader's candidacy drew votes away from Al Gore and effectively put George W. Bush in the White House. How many well-meaning but short-sighted liberals ended up saying "oops" after that?

There's more than a little of this short-sightedness surrounding some Phoenix residents' reception of the Urban Grocery and Wine Bar.

If you're one of the privileged few, you will have read here about the wonderful fact that Phoenix now has a store right in the middle of downtown where we can get farm-fresh produce five days a week during regular hours. The store also serves food and wine that patrons can enjoy on-site or back at home. It's not perfect. For one thing, it's small and therefore its assortment is limited. It's run by a not-for-profit entity, and at the moment can't afford to stay open seven days.

Just the same, isn't this a step up? Won't downtown dwellers who have been clamoring for this for decades bend over backward to show their support? Isn't it better than nothing? Doesn't the fact that it DOES have farm-fresh produce, fresh bread, pasta, and candy mean that it gets at least 3 out of 5 stars for merely existing?

Not according to some people on social networking sites such as Yelp.com. "Glen D." of Phoenix writes that he's "been waiting for a grocery store downtown for almost 5 years." You might think he'd be really happy to have his five-year dream come true, but you'd be wrong. "...I do my grocery shopping on Sunday...but they are closed. Try and go back Monday...they are closed. At this point, I really need those items and I'm just going to buy them from a normal store." Great job showing your support, Glen D.!

His tag line says, "I act real shallow when I'm in too deep." Boy oh boy, Glen D. of Phoenix must be in really REALLY deep. I can't emphasize enough how "in deep" I think Glen D. of Phoenix is. So deep, in fact, that instead of reading the store hours on the door, he just keeps coming back day after day. D'oh! That's deep, Homer - I mean Glen D of Phoenix.

I won't go too far into the fact that his wife writes a second two-star review on top of his. Don't know what that's about, unless her father is Mr. Safeway or something. Please get a different hobby, guys. Remember that episode of Extreme Makeover you Tivo'd last week? It's calling you.

So...The reason for the tiresome paragraph on politics at the beginning was to underscore how sometimes we humans unwittingly do ourselves in by not seeing the big picture. I don't want supporters of a downtown farm-to-table grocery to end up saying "oops" because they fail to support the Urban Grocery and Wine Bar and thereby lose the only chance Phoenix has had in decades of making a permanent farmers' market a reality.

This is a sprout, if you will, that needs to be sheltered and nourished if it's ever going to flourish. It has City backing and an entity with full non-profit 501c-3 status running it. This is our best shot, Phoenix. It will grow or die based upon its viability as a business, for sure; but for us to doom it because it isn't perfect would be...that's right...voting for Nader.

Eat THIS!

2009-11-12T22:23:00.018-07:00

Nothing poetic this time, but I have great news for anyone living or working around downtown Phoenix. If you like to cook with farm-fresh, locally grown produce, you no longer have to wait for a weekly market. In case you haven't heard, the Urban Grocery and Wine Bar is open for business at Central Avenue and Pierce St. It bridges the gap between the convenience of Safeway and the direct-from-the-Earth purity of Phoenix Public Market.

The grocery occupies a building adjacent to the parking lot where the normal Wednesday and Saturday markets continue to be held. Sharing the space is Royal at the Market coffee bar, which roasts their own coffee and offers a variety of homemade baked items.

Local farmers, four of whom I profiled in my piece for JAVA Magazine, keep the grocery supplied with fresh fruits and vegetables on a daily basis. The current inventory also includes locally made pasta, bread, chocolates, sauces and artisan cheese. Don't feel like cooking? Order a sandwich or soup from the lunch counter and choose a glass of Arizona wine to get that glow going. A handful of tables just inside the sunny front window make this a great place to pass the time with a friend (Or the remainder of the bottle of wine. Or both.)

The Urban Grocery and Wine Bar is all part of a master plan developed by Community Food Connections to bring a thriving and much larger permanent market to the heart of the city. According to Cindy Gentry, Director of CFC, this stage of the plan has so far gone well. "I think it's exceeded our expectations. We did a lot of careful planning because there's not a lot of room for mistakes...but we're right on target."

By next week, the Urban Grocery shelves should be completely full, after the arrival of staple items that Gentry feels are absolutely vital to the success of the shop.

"People need to be able to do a lot of their shopping here and not just their produce. Rice, flour, baby food...we're not very big, but we need to have some of the everyday items." That gives people less reason to make a trip to one of the huge, traditional stores, where convenience will likely tempt them into buying their produce as well.

"The next step is to grow the capacity of these vendors and increase the size of the store...A typical public market is about 25 to 40 thousand square feet. We have about 17 hundred here now." Whether that means purchasing adjacent lots or moving elsewhere in downtown, only time will tell. First Community Food Connections needs to prove that the community at large will support Urban Grocery by giving it some of their regular shopping time and money.

Urban Grocery and Wine Bar is located at 14 E. Pierce St., and is an easy walk from the lightrail and bus hub at Central/1^st Ave and Van Buren St. Hours are 11am to 8pm, Tuesday through Saturday. Royal at the Market coffee bar is open 7am to 8pm, and can be entered through a door around the side when the grocery is closed.

Growth Industry

2009-11-09T22:55:00.008-07:00

For Java Magazine

November, 2009

Corrin Green

"How ya gonna keep 'em down on the farm after they've seen Paree?" So went a popular song of 1918, as American sons and daughters began trading the agrarian lives of their ancestors for cleaner, more "sophisticated" work. Over time, giant agri-business concerns gained control of much of U.S. food production and either consumed or killed their smaller rivals. What family farms remained became slaves to government subsidies which dictated not only what they raised but how they raised it. Bigger was better, and Americans experienced "better living through chemistry."

Today, though, innovations in farming methods, and growing consumer demand for healthier food has opened a niche in the U.S. food supply chain which allows small farms to exist, if maybe not quite thrive. Increasingly, the grandsons and granddaughters of the generation which abandoned farming are returning to the land. They hope to change the way we grow as well as the way we eat.

Maya Dailey tends an acre and a half of land near 32nd Street and Southern, known as Maya's Farm. She is a powerhouse, and among a number of locals who are helping the small farm niche grow in the Valley. Her father was in the garment business in New York and her mother was an activist for human rights, but her grandparents were immigrant farmers. "Farming is in my blood," she says.

It's easy to imagine you're in another time and place as you walk into Maya's Farm, which sits inside a larger compound on the grounds of "The Farm at South Mountain." Remnants of a grove of elderly pecan trees soften the sunlight as you approach row upon row of ripening melons, sprouting carrots and assorted other vegetables and flowers. The rows are precise and the plants are well-manicured. Roughly twenty chickens peck and poke and go about their poultry lives in a shady area that allows them plenty of space to socialize. If one wanted to glimpse idyllic scenes of rural life (albeit on a small scale), one need look no farther.

None of it is for show. Maya's produce is featured at several local farmers' markets, and is also sold on-site. In addition to that, a growing number of locals actually subscribe, in a way, to be first in line for a selection of her vegetables and eggs on a weekly basis (It's called CSA. More on that, shortly.) She claims to be making a profit. She took her life in a new, old, direction and it is rewarding her.

New directions seems to be a theme among local small farmers, in fact.

Carl Seacat ran a successful software design company in Seattle for a couple of decades prior to starting Seacat Gardens, basically in his backyard. Today, he manages an acre of land in Litchfield Park, and couldn't be happier about it. "We designed a specialty piece of software that addressed a need in this one industry," he says, "and that kind of sustained us for about fifteen years." Does he miss the business world? "You joking?"

The geek side of Seacat shows as he explains the workings of his farm, but it's engaging. He's kind of a mixture of your favorite teacher, the next door neighbor who always has the barbecues, and Bob Ross, the painter guy from PBS. He's had this acre for a year now, and discovering what makes workable land healthy and productive clearly turns him on.

"We'll actually save a few of the best items of each crop for ourselves." Those would be the actual fruits or vegetables from each variety, each season, that displayed the quickest time to-harvest, and the choicest characteristics for color, shape and flavor. "We'll eat them and save the seeds, and those will be the seeds we plant when we raise that crop again next year." No microscopes and no teams of white-coated vegetable Nazis, conducting evil experiments. Just good old genetic engineering the way agrarian civilizations have been doing throughout history - ways that didn't put extra chemicals into the soil or make genetic alterations with possibly unpredictable consequences.

In addition to selling directly to the consumer at farmers' markets, Seacat supplies to a small handful of local restaurants. Although he can't compete in volume with some other growers or the traditional suppliers, he plants certain crops specifically for chefs who talk with him and, in some cases, also help him plant and tend. He gets some extra help in exchange for an assurance that, if the produce is excellent, it will be bought.

Not that he is content with this arrangement as is. Oh no. By planting more than one variation of a single item, each suited to a different temperature range by nature of its origin, Seacat hopes to extend the period during which he can provide that item to the restaurants and markets.

He takes me to a section of six rows of vines, all with broad green leaves. On closer inspection, though, it's easy to tell that the leaves in the first three rows are starting to get yellow. "These plants over here," he points to the yellowing ones, "...are starting to die out because it's already getting too cool for them at night. The ones over here, though…" the very green ones, "…they come from a slightly cooler part of the world and are just now starting to really thrive and produce. That means I can pretty much double the time I can deliver this fruit." That's not only cool in kind of an agri-Tetris sort of way, but that's a great selling point when trying to convince a restaurant or third party purveyor to start getting their produce from Seacat Gardens.

On the other side of town, in the Lehi district adjacent to downtown Mesa, another budding family farmer is following a similar route, but with some notable differences. Michael Thompson had a digital imaging business in San Francisco before chucking it all and moving to the Valley where his wife was born and raised. He bought a house and several acres of land which had never been cultivated (not in modern times, at least) and started Love Grows Farms.

Thompson's intensity is conspicuous, even in a peer group of all intense people. It's easy to see why farming and the business of farming suits him - it's an all-encompassing endeavor that uses every bit of energy he can give it. He hit the internet, he hit books, he hit chickens. (Just seeing if you're awake, that should be "got" or "purchased" chickens, of course.) He also built two greenhouses where he grows luscious herbs, and did a lot of digging. He got selling to restaurants and he got in-touch with the public through some great publicity (including a piece in Martha Stewart's living) and a concept called CSA.

Now I'll tell you what CSA is, in case you haven't heard.

CSA stands for "Consumer Supported Agriculture" and is a growing trend in this growing trend. Basically, a consumer buys a periodic subscription to a farm. In the case of Love Grows Farms, that period is 10 weeks and the price is $250, up front. It's a win for the farmer, who gets some cash for a change; and it's a win for the consumer, who gets a weekly selection of the freshest, local, hand-picked, pesticide and hormone-free produce and, in many cases, eggs. For some, the rub in the CSA equation is that the consumer has little say over the exact contents of their weekly package. Whatever is ripe for picking is what goes into the mix. On the other hand, that's no different from if they actually owned the farm themselves.

For the week of October 17 2009, Love Grows Farms CSA members received tons of fresh basil, four kinds of squash, tomatoes, okra, a sweet pepper, a pomegranate, a red chile pepper, and half a dozen freshly-laid eggs.

Both Maya's Farm and Love Grows Farms feature a CSA program.

Maya's Farm, Seacat Gardens and Love Grows Farms are relatively small. One could walk around all three of them combined and still be less than halfway around McClendon Select Farms in Peoria. At 25 acres (with another parcel in a cooler area just out of town), McClendon dwarfs them all in geography as well as production, yet it is every bit a family farm.

True to form, Robert McClendon wasn't born a farmer. For twenty years he was a pharmacist and eventually the head of Surgical Pharmacy at St. Joseph's Hospital. A backyard garden put him in touch with nature and growing. The business began strictly with internet sales. "We started by selling citrus, dates, and honey over the internet and then people started coming to our farmers markets at Town and Country," says McClendon, referring to the seasonal weekly farmers market at Phoenix's Town and Country shopping center at Camelback and 20th St. "We used to sit and wait for people to come up to us and buy our stuff. We kept putting the best quality out there and finally it caught on. Now when we do Town and Country we have five cashiers and 600 customers in about five hours."

McClendon uses not only his family, including son Sean, daughter-in-law Kate, and wife Marsha; but also paid and volunteer help. He has also hosted interns from Israel who he says brought his organic farming techniques back home.

Today, internet sales are the smallest portion of McClendon Select Farms' revenue. "Our biggest business is restaurants - around 35 or 36 restaurants in the Valley and four in Flagstaff. We also supply to three restaurants in Las Vegas," he says. "We're very closely attuned to the chefs. They basically request more things all the time. We'll always try it and if it works for us, great." Direct sales at farmer's markets make up most of the rest of McClendon Select's sales.

Clearly McClendon Select Farms is a rousing success which has far outgrown Robert McClendon's ability to be out picking the potatoes (just chosen because it starts with "p" - I'm not sure he grows 'em). And yet when you call the toll-free hotline to order your gallon of Desert Blossom Honey for $38, you better believe it's Robert who answers the phone.

Among this diverse group of farmers, there are a couple of constants. One is involvement in the product. Each one can quote chapter and verse on what went into their soil on any given date and in what quantities, what pests had been spotted and repelled, what they produced for their weeks of labor. Carl Seacat won't say who, but a large entity in the state hired him as a consultant when they wanted to enter the agriculture business. It wasn't pretty, and it wasn't successful. "When I start hearing 'oh we didn't get around to that', or 'that's not so important so let's just skip it,' that's when I knew it wouldn't work. You gotta be out here every day and you gotta know what's going on with every plant." They all agree.

They also all agree on the concept of organic farming as the way to responsibly treat the earth as well as our bodies. According to McClendon, "organic was a personal part of our mission as a family. As we became educated to realize the health benefits of organic there was just no question." Both his and Seacat's operations are certified organic by third parties who base their certifications on federal guidelines. Love Grows Farms and Maya Farms aren't certified yet, but both are using methods which meet or actually exceed the standards, and say they are going through the necessary steps to achieve certification.

In many ways, a certification is more relevant in the marketing of organic produce than it is in actually describing the specifics of the growing method, which is why each of these farmers encourages consumers to learn beyond the label.

Each of these farmers shows a real passion for what they're doing. They believe in it, and they believe all our lives would be better if more people joined the cause, both as producers as well as consumers. Maya Dailey even has a patriotic angle: "We get our food right now from Argentina, from Asia. We depend on all these other countries. America's independence, its REAL independence, is in its ability to grow its own food. Food that doesn't make us sick, food that makes us smarter and healthier. Not just nationally, but locally, too. Every community. That's what makes a strong, healthy nation."

Touched

2009-11-09T08:48:00.018-07:00

It's a difficult thing, to withdraw from a touch on moral grounds, when one aches to be touched. Aches to have someone want to touch them, to desire them nonchalantly; not out of lust as much as out of acceptance. Many lucky people are touched routinely and without a thought, and reassured of their own desirability by partners who may or may not even truly love or accept them. Still, they get touched. They are able to take their acceptability for granted, and have a bowl filled to the top with spare reassurances shown them in passing. Touches they don't need and may not consciously notice. But for the lonely, the isolated, a touch opens a gate back into humanity. It's difficult not to rush that gate, let alone pass it by. Because of "morality?!"

I sat quietly beside her in the airport as she, talking to her husband on the phone, casually traced the outline of my bare ankle with her finger. I stayed still and feigned indifference.

Halloween - Protection PSA

2009-10-31T17:38:00.017-07:00

Happy Halloween!

I have to say that this is not my favorite holiday. Actually, I'd be hard pressed to name a favorite, because I pretty much hate all of them for one reason or another. The one exception is probably Veterans' Day (or Remembrance Day for my U.K. friends - you know who you are.) In my opinion, that's a great reason to have a holiday. Most of the others are just pandering to one religious constituency at the expense of all the rest; which is un-American, isn't it?

Nonetheless, I've produced a little PSA - because I care - and this is a better time than most to raise awareness of the issues within it. It's hard to explain, so you should just watch. In order to allow you to focus on the images, there is no sound (It WAS going to be very elaborate, though, I assure you.) Enjoy.

Not to be preachy, but I hope you all learned something from that.

BTW, some of those photos were actually not bad, and you can see a slightly less racy, but way larger version on YouTube if you like here

Next blog will be about small farming around Phoenix, AZ. It's a growth industry (ugh - couldn't help it.) I did it for JAVA Mag.

House of the Frying Bread

2009-10-22T09:48:00.042-07:00

Corrin Green

For Java Magazine, October, 2009

Right up front, let me say that if you demand irony in dining, keep looking. If you only go to restaurants with names that leap from a Prince song, described with a quirky color such as raspberry, paisley, purple or some such, then there are innumerable other options. If, however, you have some money to spend on dining out and you want to be absolutely positive about what you will be getting and where you will be getting it, then Valley perennial The Fry Bread House at Seventh Avenue just north of Indian School Road is an outstanding choice for you. Guess what The Fry Bread House offers. Yes, fry bread. Where is it located? You got it - in a house.

Purity like this is in abundance at The Fry Bread House, which has brought Phoenicians a little slice of Native American culinary life for the past seventeen years. That's when owner Cecilia Miller, a member of the Tohono O'Odham Nation, opened her 40-seat lunch-counter style restaurant at 4140 N 7th Ave in Phoenix. They use nothing but fresh ingredients, cooked to order, and they do it quickly, courteously, and without fanfare.

My friend and I first visited on a Tuesday afternoon at 1pm, and business was hopping. While the ethnic makeup of the clientele was diverse, Native Americans dominated. I never go to an Asian restaurant that doesn't attract Asians, and the fact that natives seem to flock to The Fry Bread House speaks volumes for its authentic appeal.

One happy observation is that the restaurant is cleaner than it has a right to be. It should come as no surprise that fry bread is cooked by dropping dough into sizzling, boiling hot fat. Despite that fact - despite seventeen years of that fact, in fact - the interior of the restaurant is crisp and clean and fresh-smelling.

There is no table service, but the tables are bussed quickly when patrons leave. The floor is clear of debris and spills. Even the kitchen, which you can peer into from over the counter when you order, is clutter free and clean. It's easy to see why they don't obstruct your view into the kitchen. It's because this place has nothing to hide.

The menu fits one side of a normal piece of card stock, including appetizers, drinks, entrées and dessert

With the exception of the drinks and soups, nearly every item is something else that can be done with fry bread. Flat or folded, the fry bread is first. The choice comes in what to top it with. The spice level runs from chorizo at the high end to unseasoned refried pinto beans. In between you'll find the house specialty red or green chile beef stew. Green chiles - sweet, tangy fresh-roasted ones - are a common ingredient.

Prices range from $2.60 for a plain fry bread, to $7.19 for the "Ultimate Taco."

The mainstay of the menu, the fry bread itself, seems simple, but could easily be ruined. Cook it too hot and it burns, too cool and it is nothing but a grease-sponge. It starts to get stale in about 10 minutes and doesn't refrigerate well. The Fry Bread House makes each disc fresh to order, and it turns out a crisp, golden brown with a perfect, soft, bready center. Their frying oil is kept fresh - there would be no hiding it if it wasn't.

Other specialties include the Hominy Stew, at $3.75, served in a 12oz bowl, chocked full of plump hominy, and chunks of stewed beef, tomatoes and onions. Rounding out the menu is a vegetarian tamale (which they were unfortunately out of when we visited) and either red or white menudo. For those watching their fat intake, anything that can be put into a fry bread is also available in a flour tortilla.

Countless state fair concessions have taught me that the true, God-given purpose of fry bread is to be drizzled with honey and eaten for desert, and The Fry Bread House graciously complies with that notion. Other desert concoctions you will later take minutes to clean off your face include chocolate and butter, cinnamon and sugar, and melted butter and jam. Glug glug yum! Seriously, though, they need to market bibs like the lobster houses do.

If you are from the southwest U.S., then you are probably already familiar with the flavor palate here. The Tohono O'Odham nation, where owner Miller learned her recipes, straddles both sides of the Arizona/Sonora, Mexico border, and there is no spice combination that won't be found in ordinary Mexican food. Actually, the way to appreciate this food is to relax and get in touch with the natural, unadorned flavors of the chiles, the lettuce, the pinto beans. If you think it's bland, you're missing the point entirely.

My dining companion, Roxanne, is from the Hualapai Nation and was raised in Northern Arizona. This was my chance to finally fill a gap in my knowledge of indigenous culture. For instance, what distinguishes the food made by her people from that of the Fry Bread House, whose recipes are Tohono O'Odham? Certainly climate must be play a role, as must elevation. At 5,600ft above sea level, the Hualapai had to contend with vastly different crop varieties than the Tohono O'Odham at 1,600ft.

"Let me explain it to you this way," she said. Roxanne pointed to the first item on the menu, the "Indian Taco," a golden fry bread, stuffed with homemade refried pinto beans, cheddar cheese and lettuce for $5.99. "This is different at home. We call it a Hualapai Taco.'"

Me: O.K., so what ingredients are different for the Hualapai?

Rox: Nothing. They are the same.

Me: Well cool, but what do, say, the Apaches do...

Rox: Apache Taco.

Me: No, you gotta be kidding.

Rox: Nope.

You gotta love the refreshing lack of pretense here. People from MY tribe (the Europeans) would have to puff ourselves all up about how special and unique we were. We'd have a different name for every goddam thing, you better believe it, and we'd change some of the ingredients just to show you. Even if it tasted like Hell. Just so you'd know how cool we are. We'd offer 30 varieties of dough, including 9-grain, roasted olive and acai berry. We'd also have to give it a pain in the butt ironic name, like Custer's Last Sand-wich.

Good thing we haven't got our filthy paws on The Fry Bread House!

The Fry Bread House, 4140 North Seventh Avenue, Phoenix, Az, (602) 351-2345