What do you do when a loved one is reduced to an unsavory housekeeping problem? Even the world’s best-known authority on cleaning is scratching her head over that one. “[Homicide and suicide cleanup] is a real-life issue,” volunteers Heloise, the syndicated “high-priestess of household hints” whose column appears in 500…
Step into Cynthia Gooding’s enclosed garage and you might believe you wandered into an extraterrestrial petting zoo. But as your eyes adjust to the dimly lighted room, you realize that you’re not mistaken at all. Outside of a sci-fi menagerie, where on Earth would you ever see the large-eared, nearly…
Fabio? Fabio who? Chalk it up to extreme good fortune, but Chandler rodeo cowboy Norm Nelson somehow managed to reach the ripe, old age of 50 without ever being exposed to the ubiquitous name, image and voice of romance readers’ favorite F-word. But in the past few weeks, Nelson has…
In 1962, Grover Cleveland Thompson decided to spruce up the front lawn of his Sunnyslope home with a salute to the then-current Seattle World’s Fair. Using concrete, marbles, broken pop bottles, shattered ceramic figurines and shards of brightly colored Fiesta Ware, the retired plant foreman created a nine-foot-tall replica of…
First it was Burt and Loni. Then it was Ted and Whoopi. And now, after one of the hottest, heaviest and most embarrassing relationships the town has ever seen, the honeymoon between Planet Hollywood and the Phoenix media finally appears to be over. And not a moment too soon. Just…
First it was Burt and Loni. Then it was Ted and Whoopi. And now, after one of the hottest, heaviest and most embarrassing relationships the town has ever seen, the honeymoon between Planet Hollywood and the Phoenix media finally appears to be over. And not a moment too soon. Just…
First it was Burt and Loni. Then it was Ted and Whoopi. And now, after one of the hottest, heaviest and most embarrassing relationships the town has ever seen, the honeymoon between Planet Hollywood and the Phoenix media finally appears to be over. And not a moment too soon. Just…
When Judy Garland died of an accidental drug overdose in the bathroom of her London town house in 1969, a British writer sifted through the sands of a turbulent career marked by successive disappearances from the spotlight and triumphant returns to the stage. “Judy has been coming back since she…
When Judy Garland died of an accidental drug overdose in the bathroom of her London town house in 1969, a British writer sifted through the sands of a turbulent career marked by successive disappearances from the spotlight and triumphant returns to the stage. “Judy has been coming back since she…
When Judy Garland died of an accidental drug overdose in the bathroom of her London town house in 1969, a British writer sifted through the sands of a turbulent career marked by successive disappearances from the spotlight and triumphant returns to the stage. “Judy has been coming back since she…
When Judy Garland died of an accidental drug overdose in the bathroom of her London town house in 1969, a British writer sifted through the sands of a turbulent career marked by successive disappearances from the spotlight and triumphant returns to the stage. “Judy has been coming back since she…
A few weeks ago, billboards sprouted up all over town touting the arrival of news anchor Fred Powers, Channel 5’s latest addition to its 9 p.m. weeknight newscasts with Karen Carns. Never heard of the guy? Welcome to the club. Up until he accepted the job at KPHO earlier this…
A few weeks ago, billboards sprouted up all over town touting the arrival of news anchor Fred Powers, Channel 5’s latest addition to its 9 p.m. weeknight newscasts with Karen Carns. Never heard of the guy? Welcome to the club. Up until he accepted the job at KPHO earlier this…
Valley channel surfers who stumble upon the nation’s strangest home-shopping show should be forgiven if they mistakenly believe they’ve picked up a TV signal from a parallel universe. After all, how many video merchandisers would dare use dawn-of-television production values, cornball gags and swap-meet bargaining tactics to hawk this one-of-a-kind…
A couple of Valley filmmakers responsible for a horrific new “shockumentary” are out for blood. “The whole intent of our film was to have red in every scene,” says Darrin Ramage, co-producer of Traces of Death, a grisly compilation of actual murders, suicides and fatal accidents culled from unedited TV…
Scanning an office decorated with a shoe-shaped planter, a giant, boot-shaped piata and a picture of actor Daniel Day-Lewis as he appeared in My Left Foot, Jeanne Sallman smiles beatifically before offering a rather startling description of her occupation: “You might say I’m running a dating service for the feet.”…
After months of arguing with his grade-school-age son about the importance of making his bed every morning, William Calderwood finally hit the ceiling. Some time later, so did Calderwood’s out-of-sight, out-of-mind solution to those daily squabbles–a helium-filled bed that floated to the top of the room when not in use…
@body:TUCSON–Bagging rays under a crisp blue sky backed by a postcard-perfect view of the majestic Santa Catalina Mountains, the husband-and-wife writing team of Jane and Michael Stern rhapsodize over the Western wonderland we know as Arizona. “If we were driving down a highway and saw the Grand Canyon on our…
Totally tiki! Radically rattan! Bombastically bamboo! Gloriously garish, even! But no matter how you looked at it (and over the years, millions of motorists, many coming to and from Sky Harbor International Airport, did), the landmark motel at the intersection of 24th Street and Van Buren was perfectly Polynesian. How…
Shad Kvetko’s house looks a fright. And, frankly, the 21-year-old wouldn’t have it any other way. Kvetko has spent more than half of his life collecting ghoulish artifacts that have allowed him to turn his west Phoenix bachelor pad into something resembling a year-round spook house. He may not have…
Matchbook covers. Cigarette wrappers. Business cards. Coffee stirrers. Fingernails. Thanks to the ingenuity of a pair of Mesa businessmen, the orally aggravated can add another item to this list of unorthodox toothpicks: a two-inch spine clipped from a saguaro cactus. “They’re much superior to traditional, wooden toothpicks,” claims Anthony Williams,…
David Parker lovingly unwraps a plastic baggie and carefully flattens it on the coffee table. Inside the bag are the remains of a badly disintegrated cigarette butt. Most of the tobacco has long since fallen out, and one end of the crumpled paper bears a faintly visible crimson smear. As…
