Tuesday Bag o’ Beans

Some time last week it got cold. No autumn lead-in, just straight to winter. Oh, maybe a little: over a ten-day period nighttime temperatures started dropping down into the 40s, but we were still hitting 90 during the day. Nothing I would call autumn, in any case. Then, wham, it’s freezing at night and everyone […]

You Can’t Read That! Banned Book Review Lookback: The Giver

You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. Arizona Banned Books Week had a special resonance here in Tucson, where we wear the scarlet letter of shame over one of the nation’s most infamous cases of book banning, a banning made all the worse by the racism that […]

Sunny, Mixed with Clouds

Our view this morning, looking north toward the Santa Catalinas: Isn’t that lovely? Two hours later, as I write this, the clouds have thickened. They say it might snow down to 6,000 feet this weekend and even dip below freezing down at our level. Time to find some old towels and wrap the outdoor water […]

Updates from Another World

What world? Planet X, the world one of my embittered Missouri relatives inhabits. The last post appeared this morning. Most people climb down from the ledge after a night’s sleep. Ain’t happening on Planet X, clearly. Collective farms, sharia law, gun confiscation, Obamaphones, black helicopters, FEMA camps … dreadful things are happening on Planet X. […]

Monday Bag o’ Anxiety

Just posted to Facebook: “If the candidate’s a legitimate asshole, the voter has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” Some of my friends’ll get the Todd Akin reference, some won’t. I’d like to believe most of my friends are informed voters, but some of their Facebook updates indicate otherwise. By this time […]

Our Bike to Beer Morning

Our friend Martha, a local bicycling and community activist, organizes an annual ride called Bike to Beer. The purpose of the ride is to cycle through parts of Tucson where residents are trying to build better neighborhoods, stopping to look at and discuss watershed management, urban farming, recycling, and traffic calming projects. The ride ends […]

Lamestream Thinking

I was noshing on a dumpling at my favorite cheap Chinese buffet yesterday when I heard a woman’s voice saying “that’s what you’ll hear on the lamestream media.” I looked up, expecting to see Sarah and Rush sitting at the next table. No such luck. It was just some normal, totally-not-famous middle-aged Tucson lady sharing […]