This year, one Mill Avenue worker bee whose office affords an unobstructed view of the intersection at Fifth Street and Mill Avenue has one-upped 'em with a camera closely focused -- 24/7, updated every 30 seconds -- on a bench just outside Cold Stone Creamery ice cream and sweet shop.
Chow down, Tempe! You're on candied camera!
It did make the morning drive more riveting than the hackneyed "wacky" fare that he and his partner Greg Simms usually dream up (like polling listeners for "kissable news anchors," for instance), but frankly we're too cynical about radio in the year 2000 to think Smiley's weeping was anything but crocodilian in nature, especially since he snapped back into his "professional" voice so quickly you'd think Don Pardo just walked into the room.
Maybe a marketing group told him the only way to beat Dave Pratt and Howard Stern in the morning ratings was to get disaffected female listeners by becoming a sensitive weeping jock. Or maybe someone just shoved the latest Arbitron numbers under his nose and let the teardrops fall.
Suddenly, this year's fun in the Mexican sun was interrupted by an abstinence-only public service announcement approved by the Arizona Legislature, produced by the state Department of Health Services and funded with our tax dollars.
The ad featured head shots of a half-dozen Jennifer Aniston look-alikes, taking turns delivering the following lines:
"To all you guys out there who see me as just another sex story to brag about to your friends: reality check. You know that thing between your legs? That is not what makes you a man. Not now. Not ever. But don't worry. There's a solution for guys like you. It's called a blow-up doll. Personally, I'd rather keep my self-respect than sleep with you."
The commercial ended and the screen filled again with writhing, near-naked coeds in Cancún. Earth to Arizona Legislature: "Come again?"
Opened in early 1999 by fledgling art czars Ryan McNamara and Andy Guzzanato, Barlow & Straker is the ne plus ultra of local performance spaces -- and it rarely performs below expectations with a lineup that's wild, weird and wacky -- but rarely fathomable.
Take, for example, last year's "Squeak and Clean," a performance by Phoenix artist Angela Ellsworth and collaborator Tina Takamoto. While Ellsworth exercised for two straight hours on a NordicTrack in a gigantic exercise ball hooked up to vibrating massagers (attached to large bars of soap, no less), Takamoto simultaneously scaled a gallery wall in rock-climbing gear and made gestural drawings with her feet.
Well, maybe you had to be there. We were -- and we're still trying to figure it out.
When you are talking balls, you are talking Phoenix. Not just any balls, either. We are talking big ones. Three feet tall and just as big around. And made out of solid concrete to boot. Strong enough to stand up to a desert summer without breaking a sweat.
Yup, right out in front of BOB for all the world to see. Along the corner of Fourth Street and Jefferson you'll find almost a dozen stone baseballs welcoming you to the home of the Diamondbacks. A perfect spot to grab a photo of the baseball-loving young'un on the way into the game. Are you man -- or woman -- enough to straddle 'em?
Most afternoons, you'll see a photographer, usually with a British accent, shouting at his subject, "Great! Great! You're giving me great stuff!" You can sympathize with his numerous lackeys, buzzing around in the blazing-hot sun with huge silver screens at half-mast, forever fussing with light meters. Hopefully, you'll be in the company of some deliciously catty women who'll quickly size up the competition and snipe, "She ain't all THAT!"
Although this location no longer offers an unobstructed view of Camelback Mountain as it had in seasons past, who's gonna notice on an earring spread? They keep coming back anyway. All the better for you to hang around at a distance -- like a model busybody!
Each weekend, hundreds of vendors gather to sell all the crap they couldn't unload at their garage sales -- old tools, rusty golf clubs, eight-track hi-fi's, and ancient, tube-powered Zeniths. Hundreds more vendors sell newer things like packaged socks, luggage, clothes, art and furniture -- the list is endless.
And if you don't happen to be in the market for someone else's castoffs or a 99-cent liquidation sale? Well, haggling over the price of old eight-tracks is just part of the fun.
For pure people-watching, the dog track is the flea market equivalent of Rodeo Drive. A seat near the snack bar provides a primo view of the crowd, and a live band sometimes plays background music for an hour or two. A pan flute and guitar duo recently hypnotized passers-by with soft, mellow rhythms as worn-out shoppers guzzled beer and scarfed nachos.
As the time passes, so does a passing parade of diverse humanity, the likes of which you're unlikely to assemble en masse anywhere else in town -- or at least until the state fair rolls around again. And where else in town can you gawk at the myriad forms of your fellow man while getting your ears pierced on a lawn chair?
Estrella Mountain Ranch
11800 South Golf Club Drive
602-468-0800
Estrella Mountain Ranch
11800 South Golf Club Drive
602-468-0800
