So you stayed in to avoid the bongos, fire-breathers, and curfew-cutters on First Friday. No judgment here. But there's a well-known local secret to catching up on what you missed: Third Friday.

Skip a week, check out art openings in Scottsdale on Thursdays, or visit a museum almost any day of the week. And after you've made a few notes, get back out on Roosevelt Row, Grand Avenue, 16th Street, and to a few galleries outside the "district path" (including Icehouse on Jackson Street, Willo North on Seventh Avenue, and Practical Art on Central Avenue) to catch another (quieter) round of art openings and receptions. It's true: Third Friday is geared toward artists and their friends, families, and collectors who still want to venture downtown and see a few shows but could do without the free hugs and Ghostbusters. Now keep a secret and get out there.

In January, three DC Super 3 planes were given contemporary facelifts by How & Nosm, Nunca, and Retna, a C45 was stenciled and painted by Faile, a Lockheed VC 140 Jetstar was given a shiny political treatment by Andrew Schoultz, a C97 cockpit was covered with work by Saner, and more than 30 nose cones were painted by international artists such as Richard Prince, Lee Quinones, Kenny Scharf, Aiko, Futura, Peter Dayton, JJ Veronis, Mare, Tara McPherson, Crash, Daze, Ron English, Erik Foss, Tristan Eaton, Lisa Lebofsky, Mark Ryden, Walter Robinson, Judith Supine, Ryan Wallace, Jameson Ellis, Mark Kostabi, Eric White, and Arizona-based artists Colin Chillag, Daniel Martin Diaz, Randy Slack, El Mac, Dave Quan, and Hector Ruiz.

These names are as big in the contemporary art work as their canvases. The artists spent weeks attempting to transport, visualize, and ultimately transform discarded aircraft pieces under the careful eyes of curators Eric Firestone and Carlo McCormick. It's a tough — if not impossible — show to sell; the planes are huge and not operational, the nose cones won't fit through most standard doors, and the most anyone could take home was a flyer and a few Instagram photos.The Space Museum agreed to host the show for a few more months past its official closing date in May, but there are no solid buyers lined up for the larger-than-life contemporary art canvases, which means they'll likely return to the Tucson desert boneyard in which they were found and perhaps live to see another reincarnation.

Buddy Stubbs isn't your ordinary hawg lover. Unlike your average weekend warrior, the local motorcycle aficionado has been sucking down exhaust fumes and riding steel steeds pretty much since reportedly being born in the back room of his parents' Harley Davidson shop. The septugenarian chopper fiend was raised around two-wheelers, began riding one at only 10 years of age, and went on to have a championship motorcycle career before opening his Cave Creek dealership in 1966. In addition to riding bikes for most of his life, Stubbs has spent decades accumulating arguably one of the biggest and best cycle collections in the entire Southwest. And he's more than happy to show 'em off to the public. Each Friday night, as well as the last Saturday afternoon of every month, guided tours are led through the 3,000-square-foot garage housing his treasure trove of more than a hundred vintage rides. Naturally, the collection is dominated by a meticulously maintained selection of Harleys that run the gamut of much of the company's 109-year history. Some of the gems include a cherry version of a circa-1918 Model J, a rare 1926 Peashooter racer, and a 1942 olive drab military-grade WLA from the era of World War II. Antiques and classics from around the world that were built by such iconic and throwback motorcycle manufacturers as Peugeot, Francis-Barnett, Indian, and Triumph also are featured around the place and are sure to get any gearhead's motor running. And if they have some serious cash squirreled away (we're talking $10,000 or more), most of the bikes are for sale.

Pop quiz, hot shot: What's the only major Civil War battle ever to be fought in Arizona? If you're drawing a blank on the answer (it was the Battle of Picacho Peak, by the way), consider spending an afternoon boning up on your history at the Arizona Military Museum.

Inside this 1930s-era adobe building located on an Arizona National Guard base are displays and dioramas exhaustively chronicling our state's vast military past, including every single skirmish ever fought around these parts. Depictions of historic moments from local military lore are in abundance, ranging from the U.S. Cavalry's battles with Geronimo and General John J. Pershing's pursuit of Pancho Villa to the World War II-era caper when 25 captured German soldiers tunneled out of a Papago Park POW camp. And if any kith and kin happen to be veterans, be sure to invite 'em to tag along, as a significant number of exhibits are designed to honor Arizonans who served in every major armed conflict of the last 150 years — from the Spanish-American War right up to the current combat taking place in the Middle East. An endless cache of military supplies and retired vehicles also occupies the place, such as a meticulously restored Huey UH-1C gunship from the Vietnam War. And though freedom ain't free, admission to the museum certainly is, as there's never a charge to enter.

John W. Edwards has never met an action figure he didn't like. Or didn't want to immediately buy, for that matter. The 54-year-old's sprawling collection of more than 13,000 figures and toys, all of which are housed in a cavernous location at Desert Ridge Marketplace, is evidence of this. Edwards, who grew up wanting to be an astronaut, has been accumulating out-of-this-world playthings since childhood, and his haul includes toys from every geek-friendly franchise imaginable. The rooms and halls are filled from floor to ceiling with mint-on-card figures from Star Wars, Star Trek, Indiana Jones, and Doctor Who, as well as mannequins sporting screen-worn costumes from Stargate and Caprica. And that's just the first floor. Upstairs is a twisting maze of racks containing plastic representations of sports heroes and rock 'n' roll icons, as well as numerous G.I. Joe dolls. More than just a gigantic nerdatorium and museum, the Arizona Pop Culture Experience is an example of the joys of a second childhood, as well as a massive monument to one man's various obsessions. For instance, Edwards apparently is a die-hard DC Comics supporter, as superheroes like Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, and the Flash widely outnumber their Marvel counterparts on the walls and inside a case filled with custom figures. We're sure Superman would approve.

For most locals, Memorial Day weekend is a time to bust out bikinis and board shorts, fire up the grill, and dive into the nearest pool. For geeks of the Valley, however, it's a time to dust off costumes inspired by superheroes and dive headfirst into the pop culture extravaganza known as Phoenix Comicon. For four days, the Phoenix Convention Center becomes ground zero for diehard devotees seeking to celebrate any and all aspects of geekdom, be it anime, science fiction, horror flicks, fantasy worlds, or video games. Oh, and there's also enough comic book-related content to satisfy any follower of the sequential art form. Phoenix Comicon's popularity keeps growing each year, blowing up faster than Apache Chief after chanting his magic phrase, as evidenced by the record-setting crowd of 32,127 who attended this year. The cavernous exhibition hall, which featured more than 800 vendors and artists, doubled in size. And there were twice as many geek-oriented panels, seminars, workshops, and discussions devoted to topics ranging from cosplay to getting into the sci-fi writing game. Then there were the special guests, who included some of the biggest nerd icons ever. For instance, this year's edition offered an appearance by William "Captain Kirk" Shatner, DC illustration god George Perez, and Preacher creator Garth Ennis. And that was just on Saturday. We can't wait to see what they come up with next year.

Phoenix's downtown art scene is alive with unique and colorful characters, whether it's a homeless artist adorned in aluminum pull-tab chain mail or some punker sporting a multicolored Mohawk. None of these freaky folk, however, is as memorable as Don Roth. After all, it's hard to forget an encounter with a septuagenarian spoken-word artist who's known to many as Space-Alien Donald and refers to himself as "the world's oldest gay Canadian rapper." A regular at such eclectic art establishments as Space 55 (natch) or his own funky venue Funny World, the spacey septuagenarian has a yen for performing eccentric and humorous beat poetry set to warbling keyboard beats. And he usually does it while wielding a plastic lightsaber and wearing a rainbow hat and a silver lamé sarong. Roth possesses a lifelong fascination with outer space after spending decades as a technician in the radio astronomy lab at UC-Berkeley, and that obsession bleeds over into his performance art pieces, which typically concern intergalactic affairs. Needless to say, the eccentric artist crowd populating downtown has embraced him as one of its own.

Video-gaming isn't just an ordinary hobby for Melissa Kaylor. In fact, it's a ginormous obsession for the 25-year-old Tempe resident, who spends practically all her waking hours either wielding a control pad or engaging in gaming-related pursuits in many different forms. As her alter ego, Mel the Office Gamer girl, Kaylor produces a YouTube series profiling obscure old-school titles, crafts cutesy plastic "pixel art" of iconic characters like Yoshi and Sonic the Hedgehog, and blogs about the gaming scene in the Valley. And in the past year alone, Kaylor has also helped organize a Nintendo-related art show at Bookmans in Mesa and participated in a nationwide 24-hour gaming marathon last fall to help raise money for the Children's Miracle Network. So devoted is Kaylor to gaming that she managed to keep up her playing habits even after suffering a fractured pinky last year. Now that's hardcore.

Hardcore Star Trek geeks can be an obsessive lot, to say the least. Fanatic followers of the final frontier regularly spend thousands of dollars collecting Trek-related merchandise, devote hours to creating screen-accurate costuming, or exhaustively translate great works of Earthen literature into Klingon. Valley resident — and lifelong Trekker — Andrew Atwood, on the other hand, chose another route for showing off his obsession: He had one of the most recognizable symbols of the Star Trek universe painted onto the side of his CenPho auto repair business. Several years ago, the local gearhead integrated the triangular sigil of the Klingons (the noble warrior race that served as longtime foes for Captain James T. Kirk and the USS Enterprise) into the logo of his garage, which services European imports and sports cars. It also bears more than a passing resemblance to the iconic logo of Mercedes-Benz, one of the makes the shop handles. Atwood, who has watched Star Trek since childhood and is adorned with a pair of tattoos inspired by the show, also has a copy of a Klingon-English dictionary at the shop on the off-chance that a wayward Bird of Prey might cruise by to get its laser guns repaired.

Whenever the members of the Arizona Cacophony Society don crazy costumes and stage one of their events, three things are guaranteed to ensue: drinking, hilarity, and mass amounts of chaos (pretty much in that order). These masters of madcap mischief organize four outrageous outings throughout the year that are open to the public and boast hundreds of participants. Each essentially is a massive bar crawl or boozefest where nutty outfits (not to mention a sense of humor) are the norm.

In the midst of the Christmas season, they don red Kris Kringle wear for Santarchy and descend upon Old Town Scottsdale in droves for a ho-ho hootenanny. Come springtime, bridal gowns are de rigueur for both men and women during the Brides of March bar crawl, followed a few weeks later by Fluor-Ascent (where participants cover themselves with glowsticks before climbing Piestewa Peak at night). The most creative annual event has to be the yearly Idiotarod, featuring humorously decorated shopping carts getting pulled and pushed around downtown Phoenix. If you happen to spy any of the Cacophony members bombing around, find a safe spot away from the madness and grab a few memorable pics with your cell phone. Or better yet, hit up their website and plan on joining in the fun.