Vic Kramer, who turned 79 this week, sits in the living room of his home and recalls his earliest memory. He was being held in someone's arms, he says, and he was looking at a light fixture. "It was one of these," he says, pointing to an antique sconce on...
Lately it seems like there's a Chinese restaurant on every street corner in the Valley. Even a recent National Restaurant Association study concludes that Chinese cuisine is so prevalent "it's no longer considered ethnic."Every neighborhood seems to have its own favorite Chinese gathering spot, pleasing its regulars with sweet-and-sour this...
We'll dispense with the baseball shtick and just remind you that the band's name cheekily refers to mediocrity below and barely up to the call of duty à la underachieving '70s slugger Mario Mendoza. We'll attempt to ditch the ready-made Yo La Tengo comparisons -- although the sweetly seesawing guy-gal...
Twenty-year-old aspiring guitar maker Allen Pegues recalls his high school days. "I was all about buyin' me some beer," he says. "That's what I did." Pegues lives near downtown in a neighborhood peopled by crack dealers, whores and kids wielding oversize bikes with bare-rimmed wheels who noisily run over empty...
For Frank Baranowski, the trouble started when he was 8 years old. Until then, Baranowski, the 57-year-old host of KTAR's weekend paranormal showcase "Mysteries Around Us," was just another blue-collar Polish kid growing up in the hayseed town of Michigan City, Indiana. But Baranowski says at the age of 8...
A word of warning, my fellow Arizonans: The Legislature adjourned last month, which means it's high season for fund raising. The next time a candidate comes begging for your hard-earned cash, don't just ask what he or she plans to do, if elected. Ask what he or she plans to...
"Any time you introduce a large body of water into an art museum, it's a little hair-raising," Heather Lineberry, senior curator at ASU Art Museum, confides with a nervous laugh. Lineberry is making uneasy reference to an expansive, 19-by-22-foot reflecting pool brimming with several inches of water, which was recently...
The driver at the Burbank International Airport opens the rear door to his cab and I hop in. He slides into the front seat, puts it into gear and pulls out. Moving toward the airport exit, I tell him the name of my hotel. We turn north and roll toward...
For the record, the members of Death Takes a Holiday don't worship the devil, though you might be confused if you've only caught one of the group's frenetic live performances. Onstage, the band rocks with a ferocity that would make Lucifer beam and bang his head. The band pumps out...
Joe's Real Barbecue, Arizona Barbecue Cafe & Market, 301 North Gilbert Road, Gilbert, 480-503-3805. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Barbecue is a boy thing, my companion wants me to know. After all, it involves great...
UNTIL ABOUT FIVE YEARS AGO, THERE LIVED IN TEXAS AT LEAST one grasping old man with an enormous appetite for pretty young women. His name was J. Howard Marshall II, and for many years, he lived respectably, doing something dull with oil. At last, he diversified his interests. He is...
There is the sound of packs of hogs. An audible rotary force that grasps the chest and rearranges heartbeats. A thousand speed-addled Keith Moons banging contrarily away on tom-toms, kicks and snares couldn't top its fanfare. The crooning grumble of pampered hog motors concedes to snappy spitters and spats, and...
D'Atri's Cinema Paradiso, 10303 North Scottsdale Road (Windmill Plaza), Scottsdale, 480-348-0377. Hours: Lunch, Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Dinner, Tuesday through Saturday, 5 to 9 p.m.; closed Sunday and Monday. Isn't it wonderful to live in a city teeming with cafes? Cafe life is so vibrant, just...
A Journalistic Wilding First Outside magazine took it to task for not being "hippy" enough for the writer's taste, insinuating that Center for Biological Diversity director Kieran Suckling had somehow sold out because he was drawing a $20,000-a-year salary. Now the New Yorker magazine denounces the Tucson environmental group for...
Kimber Lanning is a petite, fair-haired lady. Plopped down in a beanbag chair in a corner of her Tempe Stinkweeds record store and surrounded by records, tee shirts and magazines, Lanning's youthful face and diminutive figure suggest an earnest indie-rock kid rather than the self-made businesswoman she is. Lanning has...
Seasons Rotisserie & Grill, 10050 North Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale, 480-443-1300. Hours: Lunch, Monday through Friday, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.; Dinner, Sunday through Thursday, 5:30 to 10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5:30 to 11 p.m. When a bunch of jocks get together and open a restaurant, you can usually count...
It's a muggy Friday night outside the Metro in Chicago, a club just down the street from Wrigley Field. As drunk and raucous Cubs fans head into the stadium for that night's game, inside the club, equally drunk and raucous fans wait for an event of a different kind: a...
Four Peaks Brewing Company, 1340 East Eighth Street, Tempe, 480-303-9967. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Monday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 1 a.m.; Sunday, 1 to 11 p.m. In spring, the poet says, "a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love." But once spring turns to summer, just about everyone's...
These might be the darkest days in the history of country music. The industry has always been a two-faced creature. While Nashville has long paid lip service to the history and traditions of country music, it's rarely ever practiced what it preached. After all, these are the same people who...
Step inside the "Vaginal Vault," Dr. Brian Finkel's nickname for the clinic where he performs more than 2,000 abortions a year. Finkel's clinic, the Metro Phoenix Women's Center, feels more like a pawn shop. Elvis Presley collectible plates and Native American rugs cover the walls, fertility goddesses and a steer...
Alice Cooper'stown, 101 East Jackson, Phoenix, 253-7337. Hours: Lunch and Dinner, Sunday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.; Friday, Saturday and event nights, 11 a.m. to 1 a.m. It's spring, and our senses are awakening after a long winter's hibernation. Watch the blooming wildflowers swaying in the breeze. Sniff...
thursday february 18 Karate demonstrations, children's singing and dancing groups, strolling clowns, face painters, live music and radio remotes, a carnival midway with 25 rides and 20 games; arts-and-crafts exhibits; and photo opportunities with a live 400-pound tiger, along with an international food festival and beer garden, are among the...
