In the Tradition of Eldon Rudd Sportscaster-cum-lawmaker J.D. Hayworth has received lots of attention since his arrival in Washington, D.C. Last week, the Washington Post featured him in an article about freshmen members of the House who have unorthodox occupations. Hayworth told the Post, “Our founders didn’t name this just…
Imagine my shock when I found out last week that Money magazine had released its annual list of the top 300 U.S. cities to live in, and Phoenix had come in at the lowly 94 slot. Finished third in the entire state of Arizona. That’s third out of three, mind…
In August 1987, the Secret Service arrested a Phoenix man in Southern California on charges of threatening to kill then-President Ronald Reagan. It didn’t matter to the feds that John Sahhar was being held in the Santa Barbara County Jail on minor charges when guards heard him utter threats against…
Nine years ago, U.S. Senate candidate Richard Kimball implored Arizona journalists to “follow the money” that was flowing into his opponent’s campaign coffers. Few heeded the Democrat’s pleadings. The 1986 senatorial race lifted Republican John McCain, a two-term member of the House of Representatives, into the U.S. Senate to replace…
The Fault Line Earlier this year, a young man named Rudy Buchanan Jr. was shot to death by Phoenix police. Buchanan was brandishing a weapon at the time, but police officers fired 89 shots, hitting Buchanan at least 30 times, including several times in the soles of his feet. Maricopa…
La Guadalupana, 2243 North 16th Street, Phoenix, 254-5114. Hours: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner, 8:30 a.m. to 10 p.m., seven days a week. Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche thought that mankind continually struggled with two conflicting impulses. On the one hand, he said, we yearn for adventure and risk, the rush of excitement…
If I hear one more newscaster say, “What a long, strange trip it’s been,” I’m going to heave up lunch from a week ago. Don’t get me wrong. I’m sorry Jerry’s gone. I’m sorry his old frame finally couldn’t accommodate all the drugs he believed it should. I’m even sorry…
This New York theatre season will be remembered as the year of the penises. The age of the gay play has arrived with a vengeance, and with an unprecedented display of genitalia. With five gay plays currently playing on New York stages, it is clear that repressing one’s behavior is…
Earth to Joe Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has gained international fame for his harsh treatment of criminals. Just ask him. Last week that fame earned Arpaio ten minutes of face-to-face with Tom Snyder, the guffawing host of CBS’s Late, Late Show. Arpaio assured Snyder he was a straight-shootin’, coffee-,…
You can see something a million times before an epiphanous truth hits you, and this is what slammed into my consciousness as I switched on the TV the other day: Andy and Opie. You know what, and whom, I’m talking about. The theme, more familiar than “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and…
After months of promising to pursue prosecution of hunters who sponsored an illegal event in which nearly 700 birds were released from cages and shot, both the Arizona Game and Fish Department and the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office have backed out. The event, sponsored by the Valley of the Sun…
An obscure state Supreme Court ruling may allow auto accident victims to collect additional large settlements from their insurance carriers. The June 29 ruling means an additional $400,000 for Janice Lindsey of Phoenix, who was severely injured in a 1989 automobile accident that also killed her husband, Walter. Lindsey sued…
Practically every month, 85-year-old Edith Christy hightails it down Central Avenue in her Ford Taurus, parks in the underground garage of the Norwest Tower and rides the elevator up to the headquarters of the Arizona State Retirement System just in time for the pension fund’s board meetings. Like dozens of…
Disc jockey Jose Cortez, the grinning “Homeboy de Aztlan,” is enjoying his little weekend corner of heaven at KNAI radio in El Mirage. First he plays a little something in Spanish, and already there are three callers on hold. Then he throws on Santana’s “Oye Como Va,” and after that…
It’s time to hit the road. One last time. Calls are made. Entanglements broken. The appointed time for departure comes and goes. A revised departure time is also missed. Things are going well. A montage of characters gathers, cutting ties to the grind, if only for a while. The group…
At six o’clock on the evening of July 7, a Friday, James Witt was standing on a boulder in his front yard near the corner of Alma School and Dynamite roads in north Scottsdale, looking for the signs of a lightning strike one of his house guests had seen from…
High school teacher LouAnne Johnson gave the title My Posse Don’t Do Homework to the 1992 book she wrote about her experiences teaching gifted but underachieving inner-city kids in California. The producers of the film version have changed the title to Dangerous Minds, which is meaningless, but somehow more painless…
As with most science fiction, Waterworld requires a certain amount of ignorance of, or indifference to, science to enjoy the fiction. The film is an action-adventure set in the distant post-Apocalyptic future–a time when the polar ice caps have been melted by some cataclysm. Surviving humanity lives on skiffs and…
Bye-bye BYOB: Maybe the Arizona Legislature has a little too much time on its hands. Why else pass a bill, like the one that went into effect last month, forbidding customers from bringing their own wine or beer to restaurants? Our elected guardians are apparently more frightened by the prospect…
I first heard Primus when a stoned philosophy major lured me out of a dorm hallway with the offer of a new version of rock that would “blow your mind like an orgasm.” She was standing in her doorway holding a CD, which I took to check out the cover…
You know what I hate about rock? I hate tie-dyed tee shirts. I wouldn’t wear a tie-dyed tee shirt unless it was dyed with the urine of Phil Collins and the blood of Jerry Garcia.–Kurt Cobain, 1992 The only tie-dye I remember from Lollapalooza ’95 was a cut-rate, red- and…
Sue Ellen Allen once wore a crystal-studded frog pin on the back of her blouse, hoping to get attention for her costume-jewelry business. The gimmick worked. In the early Nineties, jewelry from Tempe-based Collectibles by Sue Ellen was featured in fashion periodicals like Women’s Wear Daily and in stores like…
