Markers Strike Again

The Gurley Street bridge was hit again by either grafitti "artists" or gang markers. Actually, it looks more like would-be artists, but then I'm not in the know about these matters. I just see the result, until it gets washed away or covered up.


The removal squad did a pretty good job on this face in the bridge sidewalk as you approach the Chase Bank -- but they could have done better -- I was able to bring up the image with a little PhotoShoppping.


The phone booth across the street in front of the Dinner
Bell is a favorite target -- including very polite anti-war taggers. Tain't often you see the word "please" in grafitti!


This quick cartoon around features of the meter box is kinda fun. It doesn't shout "Look at me. I am grafitti Boldly Defying The Man!" Instead, it's rather subtle and you might easily miss it in passing.


This entity's tag can be seen around and about town. Just the two words: "Xert! Xhort!" I guess one is supposed to exert! and exhort! simply for the sake of Doing Something, since there are no further instructions.


Bridges and bridge abutments are favorite canvases for the tagger -- even out in the countryside. The elephant (above) is on the Willow Creek bridge out Williamson Valley Rd. The camera caught the mess below earlier this summer out on the Old 89 crossing at Sullivan Lake. Note the swastikas.


Why post this patently "illegal" art? Because it's part of the scene. Because it's evanescent, here today and gone very soon ... a small slice of our daily life here in comfortable Prescott.

Wow! Macadamia Nuts For Breakfast...

And in chocolate, to boot! All the way from Hawaii. Just in time for my coffee, newspaper and to-do list this morning. Thank you, Kailani and the Carnival of Family Life, whose drawing I won a couple of weeks ago.

Thanks to Blogger's interminable delay in downloading that picture, it's almost time for lunch: GrannyJ's special trail mix of every kind of dried fruit I can lay my hands on plus sunflower seeds, pistachios and maybe some cut-up pieces of apple and celery.

And comes six or seven PM, pie, of course.

I'm Guilty! So Arrest Me

The crime, in case you aren't up on these matters, has to do with morning glories. More specifically, growing them.

If you collect seed catalogs and turn to the morning glory department, you might notice a warning note at the tag end of the descriptions: cannot ship to AZ. Or something something of the sort.


As an afficienado of these wonderful old-fashioned vines, I've often puzzled over this legality. Precisely, I ask myself, what crime did ipomoea commit that got the state legislature down on them? Especially since they seem so very much at home along fences and embankments once the monsoon rains have arrived. Just like they belong here.


Was it the fact that in the age of hippies and the drug scene, some clever kid discovered that morning glory seeds are a psychedelic? Couldn't have that since the same clever kids realized that commercial packaged seeds are treated with a poisonous anti-fungicide. Voila! Grow your own!


Maybe the common white/pink bindweed above (or other morning glories) tangled up the cotton plants, making mechanical harvesting difficult. Couldn't have that -- cotton was one of Arizona's 3 Cs (cotton, copper, citrus) supporting the economy before growing houses and shopping centers began turning a bigger buck.

Yet another explanation from a friend I consider reasonably well informed and trustworthy -- cattle ate the plants and were sickened. Makes sense if the seeds are as powerful as reputed.


In any event, the area where I live is home to one helluva lot of vines with blue-turning-to-purple and little bright red flowers. The blues (which I'm sure are the precursor to the big Heavenly Blues of the catalogs) are from Mexico/Central American, long since gone native, but the reds belong here from the get-go.


Curious: tho cattle may not be able to stomach ipomoea plants, grasshoppers and snails and leaf miners all have a feast as you can plainly see above. Even people -- The Google informed me that there's a Chinese morning glory often dished up as ong chow or water spinach. Furthermore, morning glories are first cousin to a yummy member of the convolvulaceae family -- the sweet potato.


The Asian connection reminds me that a zillion years ago, my then partner rented a garage workshop from an elderly Japanese couple. The husband was a fancier of Japanese morning glories -- beautiful, bushy plants; he got the seed illegally from his home country! In more fortunate states of the union, you can now buy seeds for these splendid ornamentals.


Here's more background on ipomoea from Wikipedia:

It was first known in China for its medicinal uses, due to the laxative properties of its seeds. It was introduced to the Japanese in the 9th century, and they were first to cultivate it as an ornament. During the Edo Period, it became a very popular ornamental flower. Aztec priests in Mexico were also known to use the plant's hallucinogenic properties to commune with their gods (see Rivea corymbosa).

Ancient Mesoamerican civilizations used it to coagulate rubber latex to produce bouncing rubber balls. The sulphur in the Morning Glory vine served to vulcanize the rubber; a process which pre-dates the Charles Goodyear discovery by over 1000 years.

Quite a history for a pretty flower!

What to Do While Waiting for Pictures?

Hi -- this is a place holder until Blogger lets me download last night's pictures!

Perhaps I'd best consider a picture-less post! A difficult task, since I'm a picture-and-words sort of author. There's a reason. Let me explain.

Yes, I'm a journalist -- worked at it about 30 years in a real Journalist's Town -- Chicago. However, most of that time was spent on magazines. Magazines for the trade, in this case, foodservice. That translates out as everything from restaurants and hotels to race tracks and grammar schools.

Our magazine -- originally called Institutions and, later, Restaurants & Institutions -- was an early, early user of color pictures (4-color in printing parlance.) For good reason: food people are visually oriented readers. They want to set a beautiful plate -- that's why all those otherwise useless little sprigs of parsley and purple cabbage and shredded carrots and cherry tomatoes and such. They put color into what would be a sea of basic brown and white (think meat and potatoes or fried rice or almost any entree.)

Another reason we were pioneers in the trade with 4-color -- it brought in big ad bucks from the big food companies. Worked, too. With an inevitable hang-up. There are/were those two problem advertisers for magazines -- Campbell Soup and Eastman Kodak. Campbell Soup's red is a very special red, just as EK's yellow is unique. If your printer doesn't match those colors exactly, it's not just "Ooops" but no payment and a free ride next edition for the advertiser. We needed special inks just for the Campbell Soup ad; no, we never had a page from EK -- not our audience.

In any event, we were big on pictures and 4-color, primarily food -- and, of course, a lot of big shiny high volume kitchen equipment. Want to hear about real torture? Try spending a long afternoon writing captions for absolutely, mouth-wateringly yummy pictures sent in by those high-powered west coast ad agencies that specialized in food and recipes. The kitchen equipment usually went with layouts for efficient food production.

Basically what I am trying to say, in the midst of all these words, is that I learned early on to do word-and- picture story-telling -- not strictly picture journalism as in Life and Look magazines nor straight copy, as in newspapers or Atlantic.

That's where I'm at right now -- stuck until my host, Blogger, gets its picture downloading into gear. I was going to talk about the problem with morning glories in Arizona.

The Festival of Books

If you recall the pictures of my front hallway, you might wonder that I dared to show up at Book Festival #5 over at the Sharlot Hall museum grounds this afternoon. But you wouldn't be at all surprised! It's a fatal attraction. And, yes, I did spend some money.


Individual authors took booths, as did the two local presses (Prescott College and Sharlot Hall.) Booksellers came from as far away as Tucson and as close as across the street from the museum.



Organizations of writers also took group tables -- here, a rep from Professional Writers of Prescott, with her latest. Also present: Arizona Sisters in Crime and the Arizona Authors Association.


New this year -- and in town: a craftsman book binder who moved from the academic library millieu into a more intimate relationship with books after retirement. Welcome to Prescott, Spires Bindery!

What was selling? Southwest, of course. A neighbor manning the Friends of the Library 2nd hand book booth said that most of their regional titles had sold by the end of morning. And there were booths promoting Arizona and Mexican foods (above)...


...books about pioneer women...

...this highly recommended tour guide to the Arizona tribes and their reservations...

...and more Arizona history.

So what did I buy? Well, the Western National Parks Association was there with a tempting assortment of guide books, many of which I already own. I bought Insects and Reptiles/Amphibians, plus Creepy Critters of the Southwest for my granddaughter.

And, because she is from China, Chinese Sojourners in Territorial Arizona from the Sharlot Hall Museum Press to read many years from now. Couldn't resist Growing Up in the 30s and 40s--Life Was Simpler Then by a local author the same age as me.

Big temptations, too. Sabino Books had replicas of 1880s topo maps of the Southwest. Oh, how I wisted -- among other things, for enough wall space to display such a wonderful treasure! And a former Chicagoan had a pair of self-published books -- on Chicago crime and Arizona history.

There you have it. A backpack provides a convenient limit to one's book purchases, fortunately.

Three Squares

After Sam and Linda took me to retrieve my walking stick at the bank, after we had ah-ed and eyed the awesome saurians out Iron Springs Road, it was time for -- you guessed it -- rhubarb pie. And so I was in PV for the first time in quite a while. With my new eye, which is trained for spotting the off-beat Whatever.

Thus it was that I discovered Berry's version of three square meals: breakfast ... lunch ... pies. I'll buy that approach to nutrition any day. Berry's is in a modern, shopping center type of location these days. I liked it better over on Grove Street in the old Victorian. Besides -- it was a helluva lot closer to home. But the pies haven't changed, thank goodness.


Some PV businesses just wouldn't fit into a modern shopping center like the city fathers are promoting these days. Where, for example, would Prescott Valley Archery put all those antlers? Where, by the way, did PV Archery get all those antlers in the first place?


Also ill-suited to the slick modern commercial environment, a business such as this. Tattoos plus a boutique and a Mystery Merchandise clothing exchange. Wonder if they have second hand leathers?

How About a Jurassic NeverNeverLand?

It's only been a couple of months since I was last out Iron Springs Road. In that short period, a window to Faerie or perhaps a time warp to the Jurassic has opened up. However you view it, there's a growing zoological wonderland in full sight at one of the big estates to the south of the highway near Willow Creek. Gossip says that the huge life-size (or bigger) scupts are created by the son of the house, who needs a place to store his output. It's a super gallery, too!


When I last photographed the scene, Old Triceratops was the lone dinosaur present. Now he's been joined by T. Rex #1 (top shot) and Brontosaurus (above with the Triceratops), not to mention T.Rex #2 below.



The bucking bronc was there previously -- but the dragon is a welcome new resident.


Also combining the imaginary menagerie with the real -- a bucking unicorn plus a mountain sheep.


Two life-size ostriches -- only one is visible here -- plus H.M. Cobra (Highly Magnified) complete my day's collection.


Honest, everybody -- this is simply an amazing sight to come across! There are other smaller animals I couldn't reach from the road with my current lens. I expect that the collection will grow in the months ahead; I'll keep you posted. In the meantime, if you want a dinosaur or two, how about something a little less imposing -- say, origami.

Further Note: my dinosaurs made it onto the Friday Ark (just barely)...go take a look, if you're into any kind of animal! Another link that might interest you: Angie included Walking Prescott in a neat list of Arizona links; she's a Prescott writer.

Beaucoup Badgers at Prescott High School

One thing that calling your team The Badgers has going for it -- it's not likely some interest group or another will boycott or protest the name. Prescott High School is home free!

Not that I'm a big one for football. I gave up on that sport the day I graduated from Robt. E. Lee HS down in Jacksonville FL almost too long ago to recall. In fact, I'm not one for sports that involve stadiums, large crowds, cheer leaders, TV cameras/ announcers, and all that paraphernalia. Do like marching bands, however.


The real reason I'm writing this right now is I passed by the practice field this afternoon. I was reminded by all those young men in shoulder pads and helmets that not only is it the right season, but the football operation created a lot of photo ops over at PHS! I took the pictures on an evening in July when I visited the school for the first time for the Arizona Shakespeare Festival.

Take a look at the neat tile likeness above...


...or the big tracks on a sidewalk leading to the field.


The wily badger even gets his picture (and tracks) into one of the many mural windows on the campus.


However, he must have been in his den when this billboard was painted. While the ferocious look more or less duplicates the mascots above, I doubt that it is a good portrait of any of the players. If I thought that muscle-bound comic book barbarians like this lurked about at PHS, I'd make myself scarce!

But if you're into football or want to know more about the team, they keep a web site you can visit here.

After the Rains, It's Mushroom Time

It wasn't the rainy season when I found the mushroom above; it would have been even better if a caterpillar with a hookah were sitting atop. But you can't have everything.


Now that we have had a couple of weeks of real rain, the ground is soaked and real mushrooms are finally popping up. Probably the two fist-sized specimens here are just a beginning; both were in my yard this past week.


I'm not a mushroom fancier; if you are, then the Arizona Mushroom Club is for you:

"The main activity of the Arizona Mushroom Club is hunting for wild mushrooms. The first forays (mushroom hunts) start in the spring (usually mid-May) when we begin searching for the elusive morel. After the summer monsoons (July-August), the club starts its second round of forays where we hunt for popular edibles such as Ceps (Boletus edulis) and Chanterelles (Chanthrellus cibarius). It is during these summer forays that a wide variety of Arizona macrofungi can be seen."

That's big, cooperative talk.

Wasn't that way back in Chicago, where mushroom sites out in the countryside were family secrets among the Polish, Bohemian and other Central European ethnics in the machine shops and factories where my engineer husband worked. One of the prize finds was the hobie -- a giant puffball -- and there was always competition as to who could locate the biggest in any year.

All this mushroom hunting presumes there's somebody who knows how to tell the delicious from the deadly. In Norway and in Poland, I saw little government-run stands out in mushroom country where the collector could ID his/her bounty.

If you want to dig deeper into the world of mycology, you might visit the Arizona Mycota Project organized by Scott Bates down at ASU. The site has a number of useful resources, including a list of the state's 1290 varieties of large fungi. Good hunting!

9/11 Comment

My husband and I were alerted by NPR to turn on the tube; we saw plane #2 strike one of the Towers; we saw the improbable collapse of both buildings as it happened.

We had been foolishly innocent about the worshippers of Death who claim the religious high ground. No more. Like most of my fellow countrymen, I believe in the power of Life; I celebrate Life here, now and in the future.

Like a Butterfly Tasting Nectar...

Sometimes a walk is like that. Ostensibly, my goal this afternoon was the bank -- and I did make it there. But on the way, I couldn't help stopping to grab a picture of this and of that distraction.

My one disappointment: the loud to-do among the acorn woodpeckers. Some five to seven in one pine tree, shouting loudly about Something of Great Importance to acorn woodpeckers. I'll never get a good picture of birds such as these until I graduate to a grown-up camera and expensive lenses!


In compensation, I was introduced to Linus. He is the Central American parrot sitting on neighbor Bill's shoulder. I also enjoyed a brief tour of his backyard garden (below).



Further along my route, free books, on a bench in front of the Dinner Bell. Somehow the preprinted plastic bag, although maybe a good idea during the monsoon, takes away from the spontaneity of the gesture. The books? A Lewis Gizzard and a John Grisham.


The seeds and the leaves of this tree along Granite Creek literally shout, "MAPLE!!!" Indeed, the boxelder is "neither a boxwood nor an elder, but a maple," says my Shrubs and Trees of the Southwest Uplands guidebook. One un-maple-like disappointment: no brilliant red leaves in the autumn.


Still further on my walk, after a session at the bank, where I foolishly left my walking staff, I spotted this brickwork at the Underground, a religious operation in the basement at the corner of Gurley and Montezuma.


Next pretty thing catching my eye -- parasols in a shop window across from the Courthouse. I've already bemoaned the passing of the parasol from our sunny state.


And, finally, ceiling fans at The Raven, a new bistro over on Cortez, where I stopped, hoping to learn more about Coyote Radio which currently resides there. Nobody was home so I had a huge (really huge), yummy club sandwich instead. By the way, it took more than a little PhotoShopping to make those fans visible...

There you are: a partial look of my picture-taking afternoon. Be warned by my experience: the more you shoot those nearly cost-free images on a digital camera, the more you see to take pictures of. Already I've got over 2,000 stored on my computer, awaiting the right time and place!