Strange & Cool Sedona Stuff
Curious Places: Chapel in the Rock (Sedona/ Arizona) Sun, 28 Apr 2013 Chapel in the Rock (Sedona/ Arizona). The Chapel of the Holy Cross also known as Chapel in the Rock was built into the mesas of Sedona, Arizona in 1956. It was inspired and commissioned by sculptor Marguerite Brunswig Staude, … Stargazing in Sedona – Intelligent Travel Thu, 25 Apr 2013 After a 13-hour drive from Sequoia to Sedona — during which I nearly ran out of gas on a beautiful but desolate stretch of highway 40 (if it hadn’t been for Max’s hybrid endurance, I absolutely would have!)…
Beware the Neonicotinoids
This is the real world, muchachos, and you are in it. –B. Traven Everyone knows by now that to survive in a certain small town, one needs either five homes or five jobs, they know that Mercury is always in retrograde and they realize that pollen production is such that citizens are seen dashing into their homes seeking heavy medication. Paradoxically and ironically, the cause of it all—the juniper—like most local politicians, has no redeeming value: it is poor firewood; it is a poor landscape plant; it is a poor source of food for native animals; and it is poor…
Is That You Socrates?
Given the hour and the quiet coziness of my library, it somehow didn’t seem unusual or even startling when an ectoplasmic vapor came in through the keyhole, drifted in leisurely fashion over the bookshelves, and coalesced into a toga-draped figure which seated itself on the couch and settled into the cushions. “You summoned me?” the shadow asked; for it did appear more shadow-like than real. “I was walking in the Elysian Fields discoursing with Asclepious and several of my brighter students when I felt this urgent necessity to skip through time and distance to attend your thoughts.” “Socrates, is that…
A Man of Parts
Folk wisdom assures us that necessity is the mother of invention, but those of us who live amidst the verdant acres of Doodlebug Island are convinced that the father is as often merely someone single-mindedly given to experimenting with whimsical ideas that float in and out of his consciousness and take root in what thin, fallow layers of gray matter may be found there. Our Loy Lacy Lockhart is such a guy and he’s at it again! Now, if residents hear those words, “He’s at it again!” they know immediately who the “he” is; that ambulance service and medical personnel…
Quarterly Meeting
The Doodlebug Island Development and Adjudication Board, Bureau of Licensing and Energy recently held their “quarterly” meeting; actually held sporadically and on an unpublished basis–to consider two licensing requests. The first involved the application of Bink Manley to start a fish-food operation; the second, an application to establish a counseling service whose purpose centered around a vortex and crystal recovery program. After the shortest meeting on record (no records are ever kept), members of the licensing bureau approved the first and denied the second. Naturally, Bink was elated while the counseling service people were outraged. “Are we to understand,” they…
Outdoor Theater to Be Built
Pictured is yet another example of successful concrete dome amphitheaters. This one is the bronze casting building at Paolo Soleri’s famed Arcosanti, an experimental town that began construction in 1970 in central Arizona, 70 miles north of Phoenix. Soleri started the town to demonstrate how urban conditions could be improved while minimizing the destructive impact on the earth. Sir William is said to be handing the task of painting the inside the dome to his friend Jodi Florman, the woman who designed his editor’s CD covers. Word on the street is her faux painting would mirror that of Michelangelo himself. Of…
Spring Pilgrimage
Life tends to get so hectic that one often does not have the chance to slow down and enjoy the simple things. Fortunately, I was able to take some time this month and go exploring with a trip to the San Francisco Bay including a few jaunts up to Napa Valley. I’ve not been to Napa wine country in some time, so it was nice to visit a few colleagues, relax with the scenic views and beautiful spring weather, and of course enjoy a few glasses of excellent wine along with a bevy of foodie’s delights. For this month’s topic,…
Typical Excentric Reader
This month’s typical Excentric Reader is Nan Anders, of Sun City, AZ who visited Pebble Beach, Monterey and other coastal California cities with her favorite publication in tow. On one of her stops, Nan paused to get her picture taken at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, along with her Excentric. In her note, Nan also mentioned she was traveling with Julie and Kevin Cislo, her daughter and son-in-law. Nan is hoping they find a home soon so she can send them a subscription. We complete a great care package. Related posts: Typical Excentric Reader . . . Typical Excentric Reader…
The Great “What If?”
“The first and great commandment is: Don’t let them scare you.” —Elmer Davis First, the good news: In the year 2036, there will be no income tax due, that’s right, no April 15th deadline, no audits, no needle-nosed accountants charging more per hour than ladies of the night in Las Vegas. Why? According to highly-placed, deeply-knowledgeable scientific sources, there’ll be no taxes due on that April day because an asteroid is due to hit planet Earth. The odds being quoted are 1 in 45,000, that cities, perhaps entire regions, perhaps even the town of Bumble Bee, Arizona, will become mere…
Interview with the Tycoon
At dawn the other morning, just before closing time at the Pink Nectar Cafe, a sleek private jet slithered into the Rimrock International Airport. Surrounded by a battalion of showgirls, who should step out? Fernald Frump, the legendary, the semi-mythical TV star and Eastern land baron. Now it so happened that a Special Excentric Investigative Task Force was also at the airport that morning awaiting a cargo of common sense for local politicians. Sensing a scoop, your intrepid columnist approached the legendary tycoon, and his battalion of barely clothed lollapaloozas. “Get away kid, you’re really starting to bother me,” he…
COVEY OF CAUCUSES…by Will Durst
During the Trump Care Meltdown, when the same Republicans that chanted “Repeal & Replace” for 7 years, folded like a broken down lawn chair in a category 5 hurricane, we learned about a couple mysterious Republican Congressional Caucuses instrumental in torpedoing the AHCA. These two groups come from such opposite sides of the political spectrum they undoubtedly have dartboards with each other’s pictures tacked to the middle. The Freedom Caucus is made up of members that formerly self- identified as Tea Partiers but changed their name to interact with civilized people. Of course we’re referring to those unsung heroes of…
Who Put the Oxy in Moron?
Popular affordable housing options in Sedona I’m not a betting woman, but I’d haul out my two cents, slap them down, and wager that Hollywood is not considering Sedona for its next reality show any time soon. Just when I think that maybe there is normality in La La Land, I encounter something that reaffirms my belief that Sedona is a holding tank for absurdity. I recently spotted a channeling advertisement on a store bulletin board that confirmed my view. Of course, I had to read it. You never know where comedy lurks! According to this notice, Bible characters, Native…
The Mystery of Traveling Food
Nothing helps scenery like ham and eggs. –Sam Clemens Way down deep, the blame likely lies with author Barbara Kingsolver, and a confrontational penman named McKibben. At least that’s the one explanation to explain a recent incident regarding the status of “food miles” at Judi’s notable café in West Sedona. The incident in question unfolded when an itinerant guru—once he’d sampled a bite or two— stopped the redoubtable senior staffer, Deb, in her tracks by asking how many “food miles” his TBLT had traveled. “You’re kidding, right?” she half-smiled. “Not,” reflected the itinerant, free lance guru. “You should label your…
No News From Doodlebug Island…by William F Jordan
In an uneasy truce with cowboy poets of Sedona, I had rather deliberately withheld editorial comments, especially those of a derogatory nature, believing that while no castigation was undeserved there was the slim possibility these folks would either tire of their efforts or pass from the scene entirely. Indeed, the latter appeared possible until one of their number, Spade Hannigan, got himself run over by a logging truck while driving a small herd from one Doodlebug pasture to another. Then, as the expression goes, all hell broke loose. While, the ensuing outpouring of range sentimentality made possible by memories of…
It Takes a Village
Alright, I get it. You don’t like the idea that I put my dog in a mail box and shipped him of to live with a Caribbean witch doctor. No more letters. Please. However, for the sake of full disclosure, it wasn’t my idea. For those of you, who missed last month’s article, let me fill you in. Back in February, I came home one dismal afternoon and found my 90 pound pooch, Jethro, squoze tightly into my mail box. After I had successfully extracted, I noticed he had postage stamps stuck to his forehead and the address of a…
What Goes Up . . .
Clarence Johanson didn’t mean to start a fire in Doodlebug Island’s back country, and he certainly didn’t plan on a $28,000 bill from the Forest Service for suppressing that fire; and most of all, he didn’t mean to upset and alienate his wife, Sally. But he did all three things through the simple means of acquiring the hot air balloon he’d coveted. Sally had insisted that Doodlebug Island was a poor place from which to launch or land a balloon, but Clarence was listening to the siren voice that spoke of limitless views and of wind-borne pleasure. He fancied himself…
Budgetary Fears Overblown
Money is like an arm or leg. Use it or lose it. —Henry Ford To hear city leaders tell it, Sedona is in for some rough financial weather what with perpetually tatterdemalion road construction, high-ceilinged gasoline prices that could scare away Tourons, not to mention store closures due to scandalously high rents and national and international chains gobbling up local shops and stores. What’s clearly needed is a major endeavor to support and sustain local businesses—for openers; meantime, we need fewer people who contend that what’s needed is thinking out of the box. What box? What if the box is…
The Cat and the Cabbie…
We were dressed and ready to go out for a party. We turned on a night light, turned the answering machine on, covered our pet parakeet and put the cat in the backyard. We phoned the local cab company and requested a taxi. The taxi arrived and we opened the front door to leave the house. As we walked out the door, the cat we had put out in the yard, scoots back into the house. We didn’t want the cat shut in the house because she always tries to eat the bird. My wife goes on out to the…
Gun-toting Grandma
Drivers over 65 are more likely to get into crashes. American communities are instituting programs to address the crash rate of senior drivers. But, do you think in Sedona with its inner quest awareness center specializing in bio-kinesiology reframing (I don’t make this stuff up, I report it), that have people who call themselves head estheticians and use tantra to “birth everything from dreams to releasing karmic loads” would follow suit? That’s a rhetorical question. No siree! In the cloud-cuckoo-land called Sedona, we not only put seniors on the road, but also encourage them to join a program that aims…
Dolly’s Argument
Visitors to Dolly Madison Peabody’s home are impressed with the plaques and trophies that overspread her walls and shelves and they are wowed by the autographed pictures of notables that are randomly hung throughout. Indeed, pictures, plaques, and trophies seem to jostle each other for space and, as a result, everything appears to meld together as one giant testimonial to the unusual woman who lives among them and keeps them dusted. Even more striking, however, close attention reveals accomplishment in a staggering variety of fields and testimonials from people from diverse times and backgrounds. A large, bronze plaque, for example,…
