Now that Proposition 201 has passed, you’re paying 82 cents more per pack and counting the days until you’re forced outside in the scorching summer heat for an after-dinner puff. It’s resolution time again, and this year we’re suggesting you take the easy way out. A 1992 study conducted by…
Lost the taste for animal-dominant meals like grandma’s special meat loaf? Looking to lose weight and gain energy? Then it may be time for you to ditch the cow and go veggie. But how does one start to eliminate the main staple of mainstream American cuisine? Slowly, says Stephanie Carrico,…
If you’ve ever wanted to amass a ginormous record collection (à la John Cusack in High Fidelity), but don’t know where to start, peep the advice of Steve Jansen, New Times’ resident record nerd, on journeying into the vinyl frontier. Q: How do you create a collection? A: Get stuff…
You’ve seen prickly pear jam at the supermarket, but did you know many varieties of cholla cactus are edible straight from the ground? According to the James Beard Foundation’s Foods of the Southwest Indian Nations, the Tohono O’odham Indians regularly consumed cholla buds — a smart move considering a palm-size…
It’s just before 2 a.m., and the clamor of the phone ringer yanks me out of the early stages of sleep. I fumble for my cordless and mutter a muted, “Hello?” It’s Katie (names have been changed to protect the innocent — and me), an on-and-off acquaintance I’ve known for…
The alleged Serial Shooters and Baseline Killer are behind bars. But what to do the next time a serial murderer hits the mean streets of Phoenix? Our best advice: Stay in your house! If that doesn’t work, try Seth Moylan’s mom’s advice. “She always told me that if you can’t…
So, you’ve elected to find a honey via the Internet, to use your modem instead of your mojo to secure a first date. It sounds like an impersonal way to meet your sweetie, but I can personally attest to the fact that it works. I placed personal ads on Kiss.com,…
Thanks to photo-editing software such as Adobe Photoshop, it’s never been easier to repair vintage family photos marred by dust, mold, wrinkles and discoloration. And though it does take some time to get to know the program, the rewards are endless, according to Scott Lizama, photography and graphic design instructor…
Phoenix natives usually stick to xeriscaping and cactus gardens when it comes to outdoor gardening, but coastal transplants are determined to grow azaleas and roses that feel like home. Can you grow an East Coast garden in the desert? Yes, says gardening professional Gary “Curly” Smith of Summer Winds Nursery…
Street magician David Blaine amazed television audiences when he appeared to hover four inches off the ground during his 1996 televised special, David Blaine: Street Magic. There were public outcries of witchcraft. Others were convinced Blaine studied Eastern philosophies of meditation until he developed telekinetic powers. “It’s not actual witchcraft,…
Clerks II (Weinstein) Council of the Gods (First Run) Die You Zombie Bastards (Image) Dreamland (Image) Employee of the Month (Lions Gate) Gridiron Gang (Sony) Grim Reaper (Lions Gate) Her Minor Thing (First Look) La Moustache (Koch Lorber) Lucky Number Slevin (Weinstein) Monroe: Class of ’76 (Image) Pulse (Weinstein) Rotation…
She’ll empty ashtrays and even clean the lobby toilet, but don’t ask Laura Kerrigan to make your dog a star. By day, Kerrigan is Desert Stages Theatre’s marketing director; by night, she’s likely to be found reading a trashy novel, stumping for a mattress firm, or pushing her company’s latest…
Yeah, we know your mama slaved over a hot oven, baking each thin layer of this classic Southern dessert in a separate pan. But John Paul Hutchins, executive chef of Scottsdale Culinary Institute’s Le Cordon Bleu program, helped us create this unique 14-layer cake recipe that appeals to the American…
Is your home library stocked with high school reading list classics such as Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter (yawn), Rudyard Kipling’s Captains Courageous (ugh), and Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe (sigh)? Then spice up your reading choices with unconventional literature written in the 21st century that oozes with…
It’s been decades since bad-ass broads like Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem enlightened our primeval patriarchy. Now women watch football and mow lawns while men talk about their feelings and sob. Though we ladies dare not complain about our man’s ability to watch The Way We Were and like it…
Blame it on the History Channel’s Hiroshima documentaries or the section in theology class on the Rapture. Apocalyptic visions are undeniably enthralling. I don’t know about you, but I can’t help but contemplate how mass hysteria would look, feel and smell. So when I come across a show like “Gardening…
In the new Clint Eastwood movie, ordinary young men — husbands and fathers, artisans and aristocrats — are drafted into a war whose motives many of them do not fully understand. There, on an island called Iwo Jima, they fight against an enemy who has been demonized by wartime propaganda…
At face value, Alpha Dog — based on a real-life story that’s still waiting for its ending — plays like an amped-up, drugged-out episode of Dragnet: In 2000, a gang of SoCal kids kidnapped and murdered 15-year-old Nicholas Markowitz, a soft-spoken boy from the San Fernando Valley who dreamed of…
Like his Hero and House of Flying Daggers, Zhang Yimou’s third global-market gigaproduction makes little sense in narrative terms even after two screenings, but the sets, costumes, and cinematography are so intoxicating that it doesn’t much matter. Zhang’s interest in the wuxia (martial arts) film may well extend no further…
Mayme Kratz, 48, is the type of person you just want to hug when you meet her. With a nest of curly auburn hair and a calming smile, she owns a natural beauty that ignites intuition and openness. Her serenity boldly invades her luminescent sculpture of embedded natural objects in…
It’s been 20 years since the first Castlevania bewitched gamers with its gothic horror. Twenty years of vampire hunters going fist to fang with Lord Dracula. With almost two dozen titles in the series, Castlevania is one of the most enduring and beloved game franchises of all time. Castlevania: Portrait…
Bandidas (Fox) This review is not long enough for a suitable treatment of the beauty of Penàlope Cruz and Salma Hayek. The makers of Bandidas would certainly prefer I tried, though, than to discuss this plodding clichà of a western featuring the two. You could write the script right now…
