Silent Sunday

There’s nothing like being in a public place without the public. We’ve achieved this higher state of being twice, and we’re not about to tell you where or how. Find your own deserted public crib to crash. As an example, take the Phoenix Zoo, a facility that’s difficult to navigate…

Giant Dork

It’s really bothersome to watch whiny little twerps succeed, and it’s been a bitter pill seeing New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning get mad props after bordering on bust for his first three seasons. Super Bowl XLII MVP? Ooh, that burned. The world-class chump and his world-champ Giants return to…

Inner Booty

Wouldn’t it feel good to own Kobe’s butt for one more afternoon? After Shaq left for Miami earlier this millennium, the Los Angeles Lakers bumbled their way to nowheresville for several years before returning to form – and the NBA Finals – last year. During those lean times in La-La…

A Brief History of Pants

Would Alexander Graham Bell approve of the iPhone? Would horseless-carriage inventor Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot be a NASCAR nut? What would synthetic-rubber godfather Sergei Vasiljevich Lebedev make of the Arizona FetishBall? We can only wonder what Levi Strauss’ reaction would be to a stick-figure model wearing painted-on Stella McCartneys, but we can…

Whole New Ballgame

Well, ain’t this a fine howdy-do? While ASU football, the mack daddy of Sun Devils athletics, has been getting its rump kicked up and down the Pacific Coast, the former 90-pound pipsqueak named ASU men’s basketball has been pondering a potential NCAA-tourney breakthrough year. And the path to March Madness…

The Princess Diaries

So there you are, a couple of average Americans toodling along in Paris’ Alma Tunnel, when all friggin’ hell breaks loose in the form of the car crash that killed Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed. What do you do? Well, since you’re average Americans, you probably seek therapy –…

Civic Engagement and Revitalization in Garfield Screening and Reception

If its name makes this short documentary sound like a how-a-bill-becomes-a-law school project, well, bingo. Still, word is the work is more engaging than its title lets on, and downtownies in particular should be interested in the end result of the two-year study of Phoenix’s Garfield Historic District by ASU…

Full Leather Jacket

We recently heard that Barry Williams (Greg Brady) will portray The Professor in an upcoming touring version of Gilligan’s Island: The Musical. Sheesh. Now try to picture Richie, Potsie, Ralph Malph, and the Fonz belting out showtunes. Unfortunately, the stars of Happy Days – A New Musical aren’t the original…

ASU Football vs. Washington State

The Sun Devils will be bowl-eligible at 6-6 if they win out. A tall order, given the way this season’s gone and that the final game of the regular season is at UofA in Tucson. Still, every journey begins with a single thrashing, and their Homecoming opponent are the hapless…

To B or Not to B

The Hollywood Sexy Horror Party is not falsely named, technically. It is Hollywood in a B-list way. It might be sexy in spots, as there are a couple of cute B-listers scheduled to attend. The horror part? Well, there’s the rub. The high-concept notion behind the event is that most…

Bad News Bears

We like many things about Memphis. We like the blues. We like the ribs. We like that the joint was named after the ancient capital of Egypt. We like that it’s not Nashville. We loathe the Memphis Grizzlies. We’d rather see the Spurs win the friggin’ title – again –…

Irreconcilable Differences

Oh, John, where did our love go? When first we met, you were dashing and dauntless, a young Turk fresh from the fight, a wounded Greek god. And how we loved you for it. Nowadays? Not so much. Take your things and get out, you old crank. You can have…

Tall Order

Last year this time, we were chuckling hubristically about our legends of the tall, the Phoenix Suns, opening at home against the L.A. Lakers. We’d owned those clowns for eons. Right. So we’re not about to take this year’s home-opener opponent, the New Orleans Hornets, lightly. For one thing, the…

Catty Kathy

Kathy Griffin is the biggest bitch on the planet. Or not. She wants you to think so, then doesn’t, then most emphatically does. We’d call the comedian passive-aggressive, except there’s nothing passive about her. She’s a combat guerrilla with orange locks. Look, we’re not much for standup comedy, but this…

Just Ken, Baby

Curiouser and curiouser. About now in most Arizona Cardinals campaigns, pre-Ken Whisenhunt, the Redbirds would’ve been folding like cheap tents, making off-season travel plans, and pondering the firing of yet another head coach. In this Alice in Wonderland world we’re now inhabiting, the Cards are right in the thick of…

For Those About to WRock . . .

Harry and the Potters may have started the whole Wizard Rock/WRock mess, but it was L.A.’s Remus Lupins who penned the movement’s anthem, “Wizard Rock,” which pretty much sums things up in its opening lines: “I’m skipping Potions class/To teach you how/To rock and roll.” You, too, should skip class,…

Phoenix Suns vs. Portland Trail Blazers

However well they might do this year, Your Sunnies are a team on an inevitable decline. Portland is either the NBA’s team of tomorrow or its biggest bust, and which way the Blazers go depends on the bum foot of presumed superstar Greg Oden (pictured), the big-upside center who’s played…

Oklahoma? Not OK.

We’re not saying it’s the greatest draw in the history of the world, but here’s your first chance to see the Phoenix Suns take on the new-look – hell, new town! – Oklahoma City Thunder. Oklahoma City? In the National Basketball Association? Like, all permanent and stuff? Thunder? What is…

Bringing Out the Dead

It’s amazing the difference a few steps can make. Among youth-obsessed Anglos living on this side of the border, death is something to be outwitted. But walk across that invisible line and you find yourself in a land where the people not only don’t fear the Reaper, but openly welcome…

Cry Wolf

Wolf of AzRockabilly.com is a fanatic. Not a buff. Not an enthusiast. Not a devotee. There’s a difference. Obviously, his main squeeze is rockabilly, but he’s currently on a psychobilly bender thanks to his group’s Psychobilly Monster Mash. The bill is massive, anchored by the legendary Quakes, and it’s got…

The Hole Shebang

Okay, so it wasn’t Tiger versus Rocco at the U.S. Open, but the finish of last year’s Frys.com Open was satisfyingly tight, with Mike Weir edging out Mark Hensby by a measly stroke. Was the nip-and-tuck finish just beginner’s luck for a tourney in its inaugural year on the PGA…

Guys and Molls

Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., and Dean Martin were glorified hoods, or at the least gambled (and gamboled) with floozies and wiseguys, so if you’re looking for a PBS-style documentary about what really happened during the Rat Pack’s famously tawdry run of concerts at the Mob-owned Sands in Golden Age…