2014-03 5enses

Celebrating art and science in Greater Prescott

Alan Dean Foster knocks (and notches) on wood P. 12

Ty Fitzmorris

will either sing in the rain or rein in the singing P. 16

Jimmy Polinori goes green with protein envy P. 11

Gene Twaronite

gives scientists their peer-reviewed ambulatory research papers P. 25

Helen Stephenson pens a picturesque pageant about indie film P. 19

And much 2 more!

Art imitates artist in this tale of mentor Charles Huckeba and his protege, Carleen Blum P. 13 MARCH 2014 | VOLUME 2, ISSUE 3 | 5ensesMag.Com

5enses In which:

Matt Dean

4 4 5 7 10 11 12 13 16

takes a stroll down memory lane to highlight how the F-16 and F-35 are no plain ol’ ordinary aircraft.

Tony Reynolds

contemplates the Governor’s Arts Awards and slings congratulations, castigations, and considerations.

Ruby Jackson

pays tribute to classics, attends healthy mixers, crawls to pubs and a celtic show, then juggles, literally.

James Dungeon

discusses arts and humanities, and mechanisms of social change with Gail Mangham.

Helen Stephenson

pictures an extra-special scene that highlights the shifting movie and media landscape.

Lauren Antrosiglio stresses the importance of keeping your cortisol levels at a dull roar.

Mike Vax

Gene Twaronite

Alan Dean Foster

Find out what’s going on in Greater Prescott

Oddly Enough

Comics by Russell Miller

Spot-on Spotlights

Prescott’s premier happenings and happenstances

competes with a popular narrative about achievement in music ed and trumpets trophy atrophy.

Jimmy Polinori

Plus

Left Brain/Right Brain

strikes a happy medium between forced and genuine smiles sans emoticons ;)

Paolo Chlebecek

proves you don’t have to be a meathead to pack enough protein into your diet.

8 20 26

18 19 21 22 24 25

Jacques Laliberté

Heather Houk

locates the loci of local food and produces a greenie’s rule of thumb for locavores.

March 2014 • Volume 2, Issue 3

Copyright © 2014 5enses Inc. unless otherwise noted.

Publisher & Editor: Nicholas DeMarino Creative Director: Jimmy Polinori Copy Editor: Susan Smart Read a new 5enses the first Friday of every month.

Visit 5ensesMag.Com, Facebook, & Twitter for more.

Contact us at 5ensesMag@Gmail.Com & 928-613-2076.

“Monsoon,” by Charles Huckeba, and “Earth Delight” by Carleen Blum.

Courtesy photos.

warns Windows XP users about the coming operating system techpocalypse.

picks through more papers than an immigration inspecter at the Arstotzka-Wadiya border, naturally.

asks, “How much wood would woodcarver Chuck Carver carve if woodcarver Chuck Carver could carve wood?”

Jacques Laliberté

discusses artistic abstraction and the mentor-protégé relationship with Charles Huckeba and Carleen Blum.

Ty Fitzmorris

proffers predictions pertaining to primary and peripheral precipitation plot points.

COVER: “Wheel of Time“ by Carleen Blum (left) and “Parentheses Envelopes”

by Charles Huckeba (right). Courtesy photos.

Design by Jimmy Polinori.

�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • CONTENTS • �

Bird Watching (No, The Other Kind)

By Matt Dean

If

you live in Yavapai County, you might occasionally hear the sound of tens of thousands of pounds of thrust vibrating through the air. Chances are pretty good that that rumble is from an F-16 Fighting Falcon. In the near future, though, those odds will begin to weigh in favor of an F-35 Lighting II. In January, I mentioned that Luke Air Force Base in the West Valley is transitioning from an F-16 training facility to an F-35 training facility.

This month, I’ll explore some of the similarities and differences between these two aircraft.

The

essential differences are generational.

The F-16 grew up as an idea in the late ’60s and as a a reality in the ’70s alongside other so-called fourth generation aircraft such as the F-14, F-15, and F-18. The F-35 grew up as an idea in the ’90s and as a reality in the 21st century.

The F-16 concept came from lessons learned from air-to-air combat over North Vietnam. Soviet-made MiG-21s outperformed the U.S.’ powerful but less agile F-4 Phantoms. The United States Air Force sought to develop a lighter fighter aircraft that could best the MiG-21 and fly far into the future. General Dynamics Corporation proposed a plane that became the F-16 in 1972.

The F-35 concept was much greater in scope than the F-16. The initial vision for what became the F-35 was a multi-role aircraft (fighter and attack) that could replace nearly all of the fourth generation aircraft used by the United States Air Force, Navy, and Marines. This meant that the F-35 would replace the F-16 Falcon and the A-10 Thunderbolt II for the Air Force, the F/A-18 Hornet for the Navy, and the AV-8B Harrier and F/A-18 Hornet for the Marines.

Both aircraft were designed for supremacy at a reasonable cost. Both planes are the cheaper, single-engine little brothers to their predecessors: the twin-engine F-15 and the F-22. Both planes were (and are) intended to become mainstay of the air combat force for the United States. And, both planes have been (and are planned to be) highly versatile with a long life cycle.

On

March 15 and 16, the public has the opportunity to inspect the latest United States Air Force version of the F-16 and the F-35 at the Luke Air Force Open House and Air Show.

Putting politics and controversy aside (there are plenty of both), F-16s and F-35s showcase the technological transformation of military aircraft.

Fight & flight Luke Air Force Base is transitioning into a training facility for planes like this F-35 Lighting II. Photo by the United States Air Force, public domain. ***** Matt Dean is a Prescott native and a teacher for Prescott High School’s online program who enjoys spending time with his family and walks with the dogs. Contact him at Matt.Dean@ PrescottSchools.Com.

An open letter to the Quad City arts community

By Tony Reynolds

Those

of us in the Quad City’s arts community should send our congratulations to the 84 nominees for this year’s Governor’s Arts Awards. All are, I’m sure, very deserving of the accolades and recognition given to them from their communities. Especially, Lora Lee Nye, vice-mayor of Prescott Valley and Mike Vax, of Dewey.

I must admit, however, that I was a bit disappointed with the announcement. Not in the names nominated, but the fact that with an arts community as wide and deep as there is in the Quad Cities that we only mustered two nominations.

No visual artists, no writers, no craftspeople, no educators or businesses, and no arts philanthropists? Really?

Admittedly, I’m not a political person. Like many in the arts community, I try to keep my eyes focused on the creative side of things. Politics, nominations, state-wide flag waving, and cheerleading are extras.

Shame on me.

From time to time, I grouse and complain that the area’s arts seem to get short shrift; there’s never enough

� • FEATURE & COLUMN • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

community arts news, never enough free advertising space for the arts, and never the recognition commensurate with the arts talent I see in the area. But it’s easy to complain and mutter, after the fact.

Perhaps we don’t believe that there really is that much talent here.

Maybe we’re too cool to toot our own horn. Maybe we’re waiting for the city to wave the banners.

Shame on me and shame on us.

So, congratulations to all the nominees (especially Mike Vax and Lora Lee Nye). I’m glad someone thought enough of you to spend the few moments necessary to nominate you.

And a note to self: “Self, get off your dead end, toot that horn, wave that banner, stand on that soap box and point out the people that deserve to be recognized. Because if we don’t, we’ll remain the never-rans, the rural cultural commons, that quaint little afterthought of Arizona history and arts.”

And that would be a shame. ***** Tony Reynolds is owner of A Small Art Gallery, 115 E. Goodwin St., in Prescott. Contact him at Tony@ ASmallArtGallery.Com.

Around ...

... the Corner

March marvels

By Ruby Jackson How many tribute bands can you fit into the Prescott Elks Theatre? The answer: an awful lot. By press time, the Franki Valli and the Four Seasons December ’63 concert recreation will have already occurred (March 1) on the heels of February’s Neil Diamond and Celine Dion tributes. The Hollywood Stones (who play Rolling Stones hits) will be there on March 8, followed by the Catch a Wave tribute to the Beach Boys on March 14 and the Paperback Writer Beatles experience on March 15. The month wraps up with the Magic of Manilow on March 23 leading up to ABBAFAB on April 19. Evidently the massive renovations and rehab to the building aren’t slowing the theater down one bit, and clearly they’ve found their money-making niche with simulated band experiences. Even so, as a big fan of the Prescott Elks Theatre, it would be lovely to see movies offered (on a semi-regular basis) and occasional acts/bands that appeal to the younger set (or at least the set aspiring to be youthful). This theater, in its present incarnation, has infinite potential.

A few of my favorite words these days are “happy hour” and “free.”

Health Hub Network, an online forum facilitating connections between medical physicians, natural health practitioners, fitness professionals, and the community at large, sponsors a monthly Healthy Happy Hour Mixer that’s free to the public with pre-registration on their website. The March 12 event, is “Massage, Meditation and Yoga,” at the Natural Healing Garden. It features a mini meditation and yoga class along with a massage demonstration, all focusing on your “path to wellness.” Upcoming happy hours include topics ranging from “Insulin Resistance,” “Boot Camp,” and “Horseplay.” Intrigued? You should be.

Incidentally, the Health Hub Network is having its Prescott Chamber of Commerce ribbon cutting ceremony on March 7. Salut!

St. Patrick’s Day usually induces a sea of green revelers to make merry downtown and on Whiskey Row. This year marks the Ninth Annual St. Patrick’s Day Pub Crawl in Prescott — an event brimming with libations, traditional Irish music, beads, and shamrocks. The crawl’s established starting point is at Murphy’s (you can’t miss the giant shamrock painted in the middle of the intersection of Cortez and Willis streets), but it really doesn’t matter where you begin. You may also want to check out the new Celtic Crossings location at Frontier Village.

The March 17 St. Patrick’s Day celebration is so grandiose, they’re closing the joint and taking the day off on March 18.

If you’re more a fan of dance than drink — or in case you unintentionally missed the holiday — you can still get into the spirit of things postparty at “Claddagh! An Explosion of Celtic Dance and Music” on March 27 at the Yavapai College Performing Arts Center.

You’ll definitely see a fair share of step dancing with a contemporary edge. The show promises to be high energy and the costumes are brilliant. Erin go bragh!

Want to join the circus? Prescott Jugglers, Hoopers, and Etc. invites you to practice and train in the circus arts 5:30-6:30 p.m. every Monday at the Prescott College Granite Performing Arts Center. It’s a pretty casual affair consisting of both college and community members, all levels are welcome, and it is of course free. It’s a fantastic opportunity for those interested in both learning and having some fun. Step into the ring — right here in our fair city!

“Claddagh! An Explosion of Celtic Dance and Music” plays 7:30 p.m. March 27 at the Yavapai College Performing Arts Center. Tickets are $19-$38. Courtesy photo.

***** A native of the Windy City, Ruby Jackson is a freelance writer and collector of Norfin Trolls. In her spare time she is an aspiring actress (drama queen) and millionairess (donations gladly accepted). Contact her at RubyJackson@Gmail.Com.

�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • COLUMN • �

Snapshots Congratulations to Jason Teixeira and Mark Timpany, winners of The Artist’s Path 2014 Photojournalism Competition.

Teixeira, Timpany, and others will be discussing photojournalism on Sunday, April 6 at the Elks Opera House as part of 2014’s The Artist’s Path. See page 7 for more info.

BELOW: While standing beside a busy street in Taipei — Taiwan’s largest city — a woman lowers her surgical mask for a cigarette. Surgical masks are a common sight in Asian countries because of air quality concerns.

Photo by Jason Teixeira.

ABOVE: Groundskeepers pose for a photo in August of 2011 in Zarnegar Park in Kabul, Afghanistan. The park, originally the site of Zarnegar Palace, is home to the Mausoleum of Abdur Rahman Khan, who ruled Afghanistan from 1880 until his death in 1901.

Photo by Mark Timpany.

Head for greener pastures

Granite Mountain Outtitters

320 W. Gurley | Prescott 928-776-4949

6 • FEATURE • MARCH 2014 • 5ENSESMAG.COM

Off the beaten path

The Artist’s Path is about the belief that art and artists have a capacity to shape individuals and societies.

2009, that was the very beginning.

We take a theme — and it’s usually a fairly substantive theme — and explore it through at least two artistic disciplines and the humanities. This comes from my interest in the arts, and the interdisciplinary nature of this comes from the fact that I was an educator for years. There’s usually a theater piece as well as something like dance, music, or photography.

It’s often visual arts because we have so many amazing visual artists here. … That’s the kind of thing we try to do.

And the 2014 festival?

This year, we’re doing “Journalism and Ethics in the 21st Century.” That came about primarily through a book my cousin lent me while I was visiting him in East Texas. That book was “Bushwhacked,” by Molly Ivins.

It gave me a heightened awareness of the challenges that journalism is facing today. So, I started thinking about what I could do with that and discovered this play, “Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-ass Wit of Molly Ivins,” which gave me the center piece — a theater piece is usually the center of The Artist’s Path. Then, I started reading books about journalism and where we are today. So, I put together a symposium and a number of questions that we’ll tackle. We’ve got scholars from Northern Arizona University, Arizona State University, and the University of Arizona. We’ve got a local columnist, Tom Cantlon, with the (Prescott Daily) Courier. … And I’ve always been fascinated by photography, and how compel-

Well, I wasn’t surprised by the negatives — that is, by the small number (of turnouts) — for a lot of reasons.

This is for a smaller, limited audience, if you don’t mind me saying.

It’s not exactly a surprise, but it does kind of take you aback when people come up to you after a performance. ... There’s another piece we did called “Seven,” that first year, a play about seven emerging women activists … and there were people coming up to me and saying how it made them feel like they must go home and do something.

That’s the response you want. You want to educate and you want to entertain, but you also want to inspire, if that’s appropriate. You want people to walk away saying, “I’m going to take action,” whether that be starting an organization, joining an organization, or getting out on the street, as Molly would say, and “beating pots and pans.”

If action’s the goal, why see a show?

I’m not sure I could speak for other

Gail Mangham.

Photo by 5enses. ***** Find out more about The Artist’s Path 2014 festival at TheArtistsPath.Org. Buy tickets at ElksOperaHouse.Com. James Dungeon is a figment of his own imagination. And he likes cats.

Contact him at JamesDungeonCats @Gmail.Com.

4 Prescott’s 4th Friday

4FRIDAY

ART WALKS

’S

So, what’s the idea behind The Artist’s Path?

COT T

[Editor’s note: What follows are excerpts from a conversation between the reporter and Gail Mangham, the woman behind The Artist’s Path, an arts festival that runs April 3-12.]

ling it is in journalism — how, in people but, I know for me — and that just a flash, it can shift us, shift our I’m not unique in this — when I go thinking. … So, I decided to try dosee something like a piece of theater, ing a photography contest and kept or film, or dance, or piece of music, it broad, so it’s worldwide, but also I want to be moved deeply. I want encouraged people to think about to laugh until it hurts; I want to cry environmental issues and social until I’m a shell and there’s nothing issues in our own backyard. I also left. I want to feel deeply. I want that came across this lovely film called sense of WALKING IN THE SHOES “In Times of War: The Ray Parker OF THE OTHER in all caps. It’s a Story” about an L.A. Times reporter way of understanding fellow human who quit his job and joined the army beings. I know some people don’t during World War II and ended want anything but comedy, but I up running an underground want comedy with something newspaper in a POW deep in it. In The Artist’s camp. Helen Stephenson Read an extended Path, we do the unfamilwill introduce the film iar. We do theater, plays interview with and lead the discusthat have never been Gail Mangham sion about it — it was a seen here — sometimes online at way to add another art plays that have never 5ensesMag.Com. been produced before — form and, at the same time, team up with the and I think “Red Hot PaPrescott Film Festival. triot” is a beautiful example of what I’m talking about. It’s This is the third time you’ve put what I want, as a viewer, in a theater together the festival. What sur- piece — I want to laugh, I want to prises have you encountered? cry, and I want to think.

PRE S

By James Dungeon

EVERY

TH

2014 January 24 February 28 March 28 April 25 Beginning at 5 PM May 23 June 27 July 25 August 22 September 26 October 24 November 28 December 26

See Special Events

www.ArtThe4th.com

�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • FEATURE • �

Left Brain: March’s mind-full events Events

1

“The Dark Side of GMOs” • 1 p.m.: Public symposium about genetically modified foods with speaker Dr. Lorrin Pang, genetic expert and medical researcher from Hawaii, and a screening of the documentary “GMO OMG.” Via GMO-Free Prescott.

(Yavapai College Library Community Room, 110 E. Sheldon St., 928-717-7755, $15)

18

“Evolution of the Vertebrate Eye” • 12 p.m. Tuesday: Discussion of the dynamics between physics and evolution as seen through the vertebrate eye.

A Science Seminar Series talk. (ERAU AC1, Room 104, 3700 Willow Creek Road, 928-777-6985)

5 19

“Make Way for Monarchs” • 2 p.m. Wednesday: Gary Paul Nabhan, author and conservation biologist, discusses declining Monarch Butterfly populations.

(Prescott College Natural History Institute, 312 Grove Ave., 928-350-2280)

“Growing Food in a Hotter, Drier Land” • 5:30 p.m. Wednesday: Gary Paul Nabhan, Author and conservation biologist, discusses his new book. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

“The H-R Diagram” • 6:30 p.m. Wednesday: Fred Arndt discusses other perspectives about the H-R Diagram at Prescott Astronomy Club’s monthly meeting.

(Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

6 8

“The Pipeline & the Paradigm” • 5 p.m. Thursday: Samuel Avery discusses his book and the Keystone XL Pipeline.

(Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

Prescott Audubon Bird Walk • 8:30 a.m. Saturday: Prescott Audubon Bird Walk. (Highlands Center for Natural History, 1375 S. Walker Road, 928-776-9550)

“Central Yavapai Highlands Water Resources Management Study” • 10 a.m. Saturday: John Rasmussen, Yavapai County Water Advisory Committee Coordinator, talk at Citizens Water Advocacy Group’s monthly meeting. (Granite Peak Unitarian Universalist Congregation Building, 882 Sunset Ave., 928-445-4218) “Architecture in Art” • 1 p.m. Saturday: William Otwell, architect, discusses Prescott architecture’s art and history. An Art and Heritage Conversation.

(Phippen Museum, 4701 Arizona 89, 928778-1385) “The Norton Trilogy” • 2 p.m. Saturday: Dr. Jack L. August discusses his book. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

11

“A Road Trip Through the Geology of Oregon” • 6:30 p.m. Tuesday: Terry Steinborn discusses Oregon geology at Central Arizona Geology Club’s monthly meeting. (Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

Comnick & Floyd-Hanna • 5 p.m. Wednesday: Lisa Floyd-Hanna, plant ecologist, and Julie Comnick, artist, discussion. A Campus Conversations talk.

(Prescott College Natural History Institute, 312 Grove Ave., 928-350-2280)

15

“The Flying Banana” • 7 p.m. Wednesday: Roger Messick, retired U.S. Army and General Electric manager of flight Goldwater Lake Park Day-use Expansion operations, discusses • 1 p.m. Saturday, March 15: Free park admission — fishing, hiking, nature watiching, etc. — Vietnam War helicopand new facilities dedication. (Goldwater Lake, 2900 S. Goldwater Lake Road, 928-777-1122) ter combat including IMAGE: People enjoy activities at Goldwater Lake during a free-use day. Courtesy photo. his flights with H-21 “flying bananas” and CH-47 Chinooks.

(ERAU Davis Learning Center, 3700 Willow medical practices. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A Creek Road, 928-777-6985) N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

20

“Update on Catalina Sky Survey & Target Asteroids” • 6:30 p.m. Thursday: Drs. Richard and Dolores Hill, Arizona State University, discuss near-Earth asteroids and impact threat objects. Third Thursday Star Talk via Prescott Astronomy Club. (Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

22

Agua Fria field trip • 8 a.m. Saturday: Learn about the ancient peoples of Perry Mesa from Scott Wood, Tonto National Forest archeologist, and the watershed from an Agua Fria Watershed Partnership representative. (Highlands Center for Natural History, 1375 S. Walker Road, 928-776-9550, $70-$75, RSVP)

“An Immigrant’s Struggles” • 2 p.m. Saturday: Judy Nolte Temple, University of Arizona professor, discusses the diary of Irish-American “Mim” Walsh. (Sharlot Hall Museum Library & Archives, 115 S. McCormick St., 928-445-2133) Manek & Miller • 2 p.m. Saturday: Dr. Nisha Manek and Suzy Miller discuss how they apply Dr. William A. Tiller’s work in “tomorrow’s physics” in their

� • EVENTS • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

23 27

Prescott Orchid Society • 1 p.m. Sunday: Monthly meeting.

(Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 928-777-1500)

“Animals & the Human Spirit” • 7 p.m. Thursday: Alison Hawthorne Deming, Tucson poet and director of the University of Arizona’s Creative Writing Program, talk and reading from her new book, “Zoologies.” (Prescott College Natural History Institute, 312 Grove Ave., 928-350-2280) “Midway Atoll” • 7 p.m. Thursday: Sharon K. Schafer, artist, discusses seeing 1.5 million nesting Laysan Albatrosses at Prescott Audubon Society’s monthly meeting. (Trinity Presbyterian Church, 630 Park Ave., 928-778-6502)

28 29

“Night Skies, Stories, & Stars” • 6 p.m. Friday: Family program about constellations and nighttime adventures.

(Highlands Center for Natural History, 1375 S. Walker Road, 928-776-9550, $2-$5)

“Starry Nights” • 7:30 p.m. Saturday: Star party. Via Prescott Astronomy Club. (Pronghorn Park, 7931 Rusty Spur Trail, 928-778-6502)

Multi-day

Prescott Area Boardgamers • 5 p.m. March 5 & 19: Play board games.

(Prescott Public Library, Bump and Elsea conference rooms, 928-777-1500) Bird walks • 8 a.m. March 8, 14, & 22: Bird walks at Willow Lake, White Spar, and Fain Park. (Jay’s Bird Barn, No. 113, 1046 Willow Creek Road, 928-443-5900, RSVP) Naturalist City & Field Walks • 10 a.m. Wednesdays & Saturdays: Learn about local birds, geology, plants, and more.

(HighlandsCenter.Org., 928-776-9550) Scrabble group • 1 p.m. Thursdays: Play Scrabble and Upwords. (Prescott Public Library, Bump and Elsea conference rooms, 928-777-1500) Drop in chess • 2 p.m. Saturdays: Play chess, all ages and skill levels welcome. (Prescott Public Library, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

March’s art-full events :niarB thgiR

5 6 15 22

Events

“Art Speaks From the Heart” • March 15- April 15 show, 5 p.m. Friday March 28 artist reception: Delightful, delovely, delirious mixed-media art, poetry, encaustic wax art, and designs by Donna Bobadilla. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223)

Poetry discussion group • 1 p.m. Wednesday: Dr. Janet Preston’s monthly poetry discussion group.

(Prescott Public Library, Elsea Conference Room, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

Poets Cooperative • 6:30 p.m. Thursday: Share your poetry at this monthly meeting.

(Prescott Public Library, Bump Conference Room, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

IMAGE: A painting by Donna Bobdilla. Courtesy photo, manipulated.

Navajo Rug & Indian Art Auction • 11 a.m. Saturday: 16th annual Navajo Rug and Indian Art Auction. (Smoki Museum, 147 N. Arizona Ave., 928-445-1230)

Radiance Fashion Show Benefit • 12 p.m. Saturday: Runway show and shopping lounge. Proceeds go to Camp Soaring Eagle, a camp for children with serious and life-threatening illnesses. (Hassayampa Inn, 122 E. Gurley St., 928-445-0012, $25) Contra Dance 7 p.m. lessons, 7:30 p.m. dance Saturday: Contra dancing, newcomers and singles welcome. Calls by Archie Maclellan, music

by Wild Thyme. Via Folk Happens.

(First Congregational Church annex, 216 E. Gurley St., 928-925-5210, $4-8)

24 26

Embry-Riddle reading • Monday: Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University creative writing students read original works. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

Street alley between Willis and Sheldon streets, 928-445-3286, $12)

28

Prescott Jugglers & Hoopers • 5 p.m. Mondays: Jugglers throw objects into the air and at each other.

(Prescott College Granite Performing Arts Center, 218 N. Granite St., 928-350-3218)

Open mic poetry • 5:30 p.m. Wednesday: Dan Seaman emcees monthly open mic poetry. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

Writers workshop • 9:30 a.m. Saturdays: Weekly critique group.

(Prescott Public Library, Bump Conference Room, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

Professional Writers of Prescott • 5:30 p.m. Wednesday: Monthly meeting.

(Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

Theater & film

28

4th Friday Art Walk • 5 p.m. Friday: Monthly art walk with 18+ galleries, artist receptions, openings, and demonstrations. (ArtThe4th.Com)

Multi-day

Creative Writers Group •12 p.m. March 4 & 18: Creative writing and discussion group.

(Prescott Public Library, Elsea Conference Room, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500) Southwest Leatherworkers • March 6-8: 14th Southwest Leather Workers Trade Show.

(Prescott Resort & Conference Center, 1500 E. Arizona 69, 715-362-5393)

“Academy Awards” • 6:30 p.m. March 5: Via satellite, 86th Annual Academy Awards.

Hosted by the Prescott Film Festival.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000) “Prince Igor” • 6:30 p.m. March 5: Via satellite, The Metropolitan Opera’s encore presentation of Alexander Borodin’s Russian epic.

Starring bass-baritone Ildar Abdrazakov, conducted by Gianandrea Noseda.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $24) “A Lie of the Mind” • 7:30 p.m. March 6-8 & 13-15, 2 p.m. March 9 & 16: Sam Shepard’s three-act play about family dysfunction and the nature of love.

Directed by Catherine Miller Hahn, music

by Brad Newman. (Stage Too, North Cortez

“Werther” • 9:55 a.m. March 15: Via satellite, The Metropolitan Opera’s presentation of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s revolutionary, tragic romance.

Starring Jonas Kaufmann and Elîna Garanèa, conducted

by Alain Altinoglu.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $24) “Don’t Dress for Dinner” • 7:30 p.m. March 20-22 & 27-29, 2 p.m. March 23 & 29: Marc Camoletti’s comedy adapted by Robin Hawdon about a romantic weekend that goes awry at a French farmhouse. Directed by Randy Faulkner.

(Prescott Center for the Arts, 208 N. Marina St., 928-445-3286, $15-$19) “Claddagh!”

• 7:30 p.m. March 27: An Irish music, dance, and multi-media extravaganza with an underlying romantic story line.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $19-$38) “War Horse” • 7:30 p.m. March 28: Via satellite, the National Theatre of London’s epic production based on Michael Morpurgo’s novel.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $20)

Art “Architecture in Art” • From March 8: Art celebrating the beauty and history of Western architecture.

(Phippen Museum, 4701 Arizona 89, 928-778-1385, $5-$7) “Journey Into Colors” • From March 12: Art show.

(Mountain Artists Guild & Gallery, 228 Alarcon St., 928-445-2510) “The Huff Family” • Through March 13: Pastels, watercolors, pen and ink drawings, photography, and recycled art by the Huff family commemorating John and Marion Huff’s 71 years of marriage. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223) “Color My World” • Through March 20: Art by Mary Esneault and Lynn Schmitt. (Mountain Artists Guild & Gallery, 228 Alarcon St., 928-445-2510) Fine art print making • From March 20: Fine art printing making show curated by donna Carver.

(Mountain Artists Guild & Gallery, 228 Alarcon St., 928-445-2510) “Ecology Revisioned” • Through March 22: Ecologically themed art by Wendy DesChene, Jeff Schmuki, and Robin Dru Germany. (Prescott College Art Gallery at Sam Hill Warehouse, 232 N. Granite St., 928-350-2341) “Everyday Precious” • Through March 22: Fine art black-andwhite photography by Caroline Philippone and mixed media fabric art by Eun-Kyung Suh. (Yavapai College Art Gallery, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2031) “Making Our Mark” • Through March 25: Prescott Contemporary Printers Group art show. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223) “Spring Photography Show” • From March 27: Annual spring photography show. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223) Prescott College faculty exhibition • From March 28: Art by Prescott College arts and letters faculty. (Prescott College Art Gallery at Sam Hill Warehouse, 232 N. Granite St., 928-350-2341 “Reflections” • Through March 29: Works of art by contemporary artists using electronic media, metallic, iridescent, and duo-chrome paints and other materials that reflect and respond to environmental light. (Prescott Center for the Arts, 208 N. Marina St., 928-445-3286) Cates & Gauslow • Through March 30: Art by Wally Cates and Bill Gauslow. (Raven Café, 142 N. Cortez St., 928-717-0009) “The Illustrators” • Through March 31: Illustrations from adult and children’s books by Diane Iverson, Beth Neely, Bret Blevins, and Robin Lieske.

(A Small Art Gallery, 115 E. Goodwin St., Suite D, 928-832-3220)

�

Local, local, local

Pinpointing a ‘close’ place isn’t always straightforward

By Heather Houk The phrase “local food” is bandied around a lot. But just what does “local” mean in that context?

Well, it varies for a lot of people.

I might have bought my car locally from our friendly dealers but I know good and well that my sweet blue car is anything but local to Prescott.

I’m always happy to see “made in the USA” on a T-shirt tag. And when I go to local health food stores, I’m supporting a local business , but if I look at the label of my favorite fig rolls, I see that they were grown, processed, and manufactured a great distance from my home town.

If I’m interested in supporting a local farmer, then the definition of local, as outlined by Gary Paul Nabhan — author, expert, and academic in all things Southwest agriculture —is anything grown within 250 miles of your home.

This is better than my car or even my fig rolls, but does it really meet my personal goals of supporting local? I’ve spent over a decade learning and educating others about the value of buying locally and thought this might be a good place to share some of what I’ve learned.

In

the United States, our food, on average, travels more than 1,000 miles from field to processing facility to grocery store. The most common means of food travel are semi-trucks, trains carrying said tractor-trailers, and a great deal that

to commandeer the trucks delivering goods and services to be used for national emergencies. I got that straight from a former truck driver turned farmer, by the way.

So

the next time you find yourself at a grocery store, check your labels and see if you can determine the point of origin for your favorite products and produce. When it comes to shopping for local produce, my personal definition for local shopping is within 100 miles or fewer.

Whenever possible, buy directly from a farmer, either at a farmers market or through a Community Supported Agriculture program. When you do this, you know that you are buying directly from a local farmer and can enjoy getting to know these amazing people and delight in knowing that you are reducing travel, packaging and, best of all, supporting the best farmers in the world. ***** Heather Houk is an agriculture instructor at Prescott College and a volunteer and former Managing Director for the Prescott Farmers Market. For more information on the Prescott Farmers Market email Info@Prescott FarmersMarket.

Org.

LOCAL

is from south of our borders or west of the Pacific Ocean that’s shipped via freighters to ports only to be transferred into one of the trucks heading to a town near you.

As Arizonans, we have a wonderful agricultural history and supply a great deal of the United States with things like lettuce, grown largely in Yuma, and cotton, grown in the southern part of the state. Both are high-water-use crops, but they’re a huge industry in our state.

Yet, if I live in Yuma and I want to buy a head of lettuce that was grown at the farm down the road from my favorite grocery store, I probably am unaware that that locally grown lettuce was shipped to a facility in Central California or Eastern Arizona to be cleaned, processed, wrapped in plastic and loaded into a truck and subsequently shipped back to my store. There are veggies that get to see a lot more of this country than its citizens ever do.

So why does it matter? Why should I care that my lettuce, tomatoes, and fig rolls traveled a thousand miles to get to me?

There’s a great deal of fossil fuel per head of lettuce shipped, there are tons (literal use of the word here) of plastic and cardboard packaging, and more middle-men than you can count. I tried counting on a shipment of tomatoes from Mexico to calculate how many people were paid after the farmer received their few cents per pound, and, to be honest, I lost track at six.

There’s even an argument to be made for national security.

The U.S. interstates are owned and operated by the federal government and, in the event of an emergency, they have the right

�� • COLUMN • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

Image via All-FreeDownload.

Com. Illustration by 5enses.

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My day job requires a vast amount of social media interaction.

As I scroll through news feeds from various sources, some of the highest recurring post themes I see pertain to modified foods, chemicals used in processing, and the treatment of animals raised for consumption.

More and more people have turned to 100 percent plant-based diets (organic, of course). This trend has come and gone before and the arguments from the meat lovers and muscle bound remain the same.

“What about protein?”

Protein traditionally brings to mind meat, eggs, and milk. That wonderful food pyramid we were all forced to memorize in school instilled that memory trigger effectively.

Though it is accurate that consuming a steak racks up grams up protein faster than a plate of broccoli, the real science is in the percentages.

Plant-based foods are rich in nutrients meat and dairy cannot offer and, here’s the shocker, pound for pound, many vegetables carry a substantially higher percentage of protein than the latter mentioned.

Don’t believe me? Look at the comparisons below. A 100 percent vegetarian diet isn’t for everyone, but even just tipping the balance a little in the direction of these vegetables will give you plenty of protein and an abundance of plant-based nutrients for energy and health.

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�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • COLUMN • ��

Alan Dean Foster’s Perceivings

By Alan Dean Foster For the beholder, art is primarily visual. For the artist, though, it’s often as much about what is touched as what is seen. Tactility.

A painter needs physical contact with brushes, or pens, or chalk, or a keyboard. A sculptor feels as much as molds the material, be it stone, clay, metal or silly putty. But there is something special about wood that goes back to the beginning of human artistic consciousness.

Maybe it’s because, unlike welded steel or chiseled marble or coagulated collages, carved wood is like us in that it’s also an organic material.

Wood carving makes art out of something that was once alive.

Unlike other organic materials that are frequently fashioned into art, like ivory or bone, wood is common. The woodcarver’s material lies all around us, even in the depths of big cities. We grow up with it. We live with it and, often, within it. It’s a material that is a part of our lives from the very beginning, lying in a wooden cradle or crib, to the end, when we are returned to the earth encased in a wooden coffin (which, as it slowly decomposes, helps to refertilize the ground and … give birth to more wood).

Hand

the average youth a hammer and chisel and point them toward a pile of rock and the first thing they’re likely to do is put down the hammer and chisel, pull out their cell phone, and start texting. Brush and paint are usually ignored or result in, at best, unidentifiable splotches of color. Welding torches and tin snips we have to leave to the more mature. But hand a youngster a nice solid chunk of wood, give them a sharp knife, and sit back and watch. Unlike any aesthetic medium — with the possible exception of cave painting — woodcarving is even older than human civilization.

Getting a buzz from Woody It feels natural in our hands, this combination of wood and a sharp-edged tool. Doesn’t matter if the latter is made of steel, flint, or laboriously flaked obsidian. The urge to reduce, to transform, to bring something once alive but now dead back to life in a new form, has been with us since the beginning. I can’t help but imagine that one of humankind’s earliest words, now lost to us, was the Neanderthal term for whittlin’.

And what other universally available art form is employed not just to create art, but to pass the time? Nobody paints just to pass the time. People don’t chisel down and polish a hunk of soapstone or porphyry or marble to pass the time.

Only whittling satisfies both desires: to mark the passage of time while simultaneously creating art, with neither objective necessarily taking precedence over the other.

In

Hancock, Maine, dwells Ray Murphy. Ray is a bit like … well, picture a cross between Michelangelo and Leatherface from “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.” Ray is a chainsaw artist who exclusively works, thankfully, in wood. He’s in a lot of record books, not least for once chainsawing the alphabet on the side of a number two pencil. ’Once chainsawed his name onto the head of a match without lighting it — the artistic equivalent of performing surgery with a bazooka.

But, at heart, Ray’s just a whittler.

The only difference between him and the old guys sitting on a porch in their rocking chairs carving away with their pocket knives is that Ray employs a somewhat larger and considerably noisier sharp-edged tool.

Then there was Tilman Riemenschneider whose wood carvings astonished viewers in 16th-century Europe. Viewing his spectacular “Holy Blood Altar” in the town of Rothenburg ob der Tauber

�� • COLUMN • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

ART

(Germany’s “Christmas City,” for Prescott residents interested in another country’s designation of a town as such) completely transforms the viewer’s notion of what can be defined as “woodcarving.” Seeing Riemenschneider’s work is like viewing the drawings of Dürer rendered in wood.

It

doesn’t matter where the whittling hails from.

Whether medieval European woodcarving, or modern Makonde art from East Africa, or blackwood from the Solomons delicately inlaid with bits of mother-of-pearl shell, or exquisite duck replicas fashioned in Virginia and intended for use as decoys, woodcarvers everywhere have that same love for their common medium.

That same essential tactility permeates their work just as it did for Paleolithic whittlers chipping away at their primitive masks while huddled together for protection against the predators roaming outside their cave.

With no other medium does the artist feel as organic a connection. No other medium will get a child to try their hand at art with the same enthusiasm as will woodcarving.

I guess deep down and at heart we are all whittlers. It’s a connection not just to art, but to Mother Earth herself. ***** Alan Dean Foster is author of more than 120 books, visitor to more than 100 countries, and still frustrated by the human species.

Follow him at AlanDeanFoster.

Com.

Images via All-Free-Download.Com. Illustrations by 5enses.

Charles Huckeba and Carleen Blum pose next to their artwork recently. Courtesy photo.

By Jacques Laliberté

Picture

the spiral.

Winding inward. Twirling outward. Back through time. Forward to a new start. Reaching. Connecting.

The cosmically bold paintings of Prescott artist Carleen Blum explode inward and break out into the universe simultaneously – just as spirals do.

Her paintings weren’t always this way, though.

In well-known artist Charles Huckeba, Blum has found the mentor she needed. She’s advanced her expression by tapping into his proprietary techniques and years of R&D.

“Charles has an in-depth skill level from years of education, study, and artistry,” Blum said. “His skills combined with his kindness have taken me far.”

It’s a blend of practicality, artistic sensibilities, and individual aesthetics.

“Carleen came to me and asked me how to get those effects and textures, how to use color,” Huckeba offered.

“At the start, she wasn’t interested in doing abstracts.”

But in many ways, she was primed for such works.

“I am not a realist artist,” Blum said. “Instead, I guess that you could say that I am more interested in abstract, but abstract using symbols, and mandala forms.”

The work of Huckeba’s protégé has, in turn, given Huckeba pause.

“Her subject matter is iconic (and) symbolic, with washes and textures,” he said. “She really surprised me.”

Thus, Blum and Huckeba have become fellow artists, each pushing the other in their respective roles — Huckeba as mentor and Blum as student or mentee.

CONTINUED ON PAGE �� >>>

Art imitates artist in this tale of mentor Charles Huckeba & his protégé, Carleen Blum

�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • PORTFOLIO • ��

... FROM PAGE 13 There’s a bit of trial and error in the process, but this freedom to make mistakes has allowed for more personal expression.

“Learn to take control, do things your own way, I told Carleen,” Huckeba said.

Students Usually when young persons, college age, walk into Charles studio and gallery space in downtown Prescott, they ask questions.

They’re really interested, looking for guidance, and it’s very emotional for them at that level.

“Those who take workshops, though, can flounder,” Huckeba said. “They have an image of how easy it looks to throw paint around, how easy it seems to do abstraction in painting.”

These are the students without a traditional grounding in art history. They’re unaware of what it took for the Pollacks and Rothkos of the art world to create the ground-breaking works that cannot be separated from their time and circumstances.

“They see it is not so easy to match the picture in their minds to what they see on the canvas they are working on,” Huckeba said.

He looked frustrated for a moment then elaborat-

ed. Huckeba wants his students to really get something out of his workshops and his methods, but often times, students who take off on their own fail.

“I ask that the student who is serious find an artist that really appeals to them, study their work, imitate them,” he said.

When his methods work, they stick. To wit: Blum has been with Huckeba for close to six years.

“Charles has been a great teacher and now a mentor for me,” Blum said. “I am an experiential learner, one who learns through doing — and usually doing again and again.”

Hers is a process that requires integration and reintegration.

“Charles has been most patient in demonstrating techniques many times over,” Blum said, “And in encouraging me to use these techniques to create my own style.”

Art works The proof is in the showing.

You can see Blum’s paintings on display at El Gato Azul and, occasionally, at ’Tis and Mountain Artists Guild galleries. And her work is selling well. Blum’s lusciously textured paintings are alive with soft color washes and their brilliantly integrated shapes and symbols — spirals, crosses, and planetary figures —

14 • PORTFOLIO • MARCH 2014 • 5ENSESMAG.COM

create meta structures of universal appeal and connection. They just look — and, well, feel — right.

Outside his gallery, Huckeba’s own journey has taken him, for the 19th year, to the Arizona Fine Art Expo, in Scottsdale, for some hands-on paint demoing and face time with art enthusiasts and buyers.

His latest series, which he calls “chroma-textures,” are popular, indeed. In these, Huckeba recycles his shards, skins, and scraps of acrylic paint into assemblages, which are often animal totems. They’re fun, spiky, bristly, playful, and colorful — not unlike the Jean Dubuffet works that often employed impasto to create amazingly intricate paintings that veered into sculptures.

His “Parentheses Envelopes,” a mixed-media assemblage, evokes Piet Mondrian’s notorious “Broadway Boogie-Woogie” painting in the way the shapes — some of which are torn newspaper pieces thick with typography — jump and jive across the panel like an urban avenue alive with jaywalkers and street hawkers, with jazz and pizzazz.

“Matisse Dancers,” another feverish Huckeba assemblage, could be those city slickers dancing and courting in see-through skins, cells frolicking, the energy between the couple palpable.

Meta workshops The Old World system of apprenticeship may be passé, the tradition of arcane tribal rituals being passed down to younger generations obsolete. Yet, when the time is right, and passion and dedication proven, mentors may show up in your own path.

They will be there to guide you, to lend you confidence and respect your process, and to encourage you past your self-imposed limits.

Listen carefully to them; they know of what they speak. ***** Carleen Blum’s art is on the walls at El Gato Azul, 316 W. Goodwin St., in Prescott.

Charles Huckeba’s art is at Huckeba Art Gallery, 227 W. Gurley St., in Prescott and online at Huckeba-Art-Quest.Com. A 20-year resident of Prescott, Jacques Laliberté has written for and designed several publications, as well as his own Art-rag. See his fine art work at Society6.Com/DaZzlDolls.

FROM LEFT: “Braveheart,” by Carleen Blum; “Matisse Dancers,” by Charles Huckeba; “Flower of Provence,” by Charles Huckeba; and “Ocean Dance,”

by Carleen Blum. Courtesy photos.

15

News From the Wilds March Prescott weather Average high temperature: 59.3 F, +/-4.6 Average low temperature: 28.5 F, +/-3.4 Record high temperature: 83 F, March 18, 2007 Record low temperature: 2 F, March 1, 1913 Average precipitation: 1.68”, +/-1.56 Record high March precipitation: 7.11”, 1918 Record high March snowfall: 34.2”, 1973 Record low March precipitation: 0”, 5.5 percent of all years Max daily March precipitation: 3.21”, March 3, 1938

Black Hawks, the rarest species of hawk in North America, migrate back to the Central Highlands this month. Photo by Ty Fitzmorris.

By Ty Fitzmorris

March

is a deceptive month in the Central Highlands. Temperatures routinely reach 70 degrees, and the sunny, lengthening days suggest that spring is finally here. But March is also one of the wettest months, and most of that moisture comes in the form of snow. Large storm systems over the Pacific Ocean throw off snowstorms that sweep into the area from the north, dropping anywhere from inches to feet of snow and bringing us firmly back into winter.

Even in years such as this one, which could turn out to be among the driest on record, March often can bring enough snow and rain to bolster overall winter averages back to normal. Sometimes, however, after a dry January and February, March precipitation stays below average. The combined effects of this kind of winter drought can be profound.

The last time the Central Highlands experienced this combination was in 2002, and the lack of snow-

pack caused drought-stricken trees to succumb to bark-beetle infestations, which killed 50-80 percent of the Ponderosas in some areas.

The extreme fire danger caused the national forests to close, which has only happened a handful of times.

These driest years, however, are the exception. More often than not, March brings large, wet storms, even after dry months prior. Because of this, however, March is one of the more dangerous times for creatures in the wilds. Many mammals are bearing young now, some insects are emerging from creeks and pupae as winged adults, and birds are making nests or migrating back into the area from the tropics. Dramatic cold snaps can cause many of these species severe temperature and food stress and sometimes lead to their deaths.

Most

of the native plants of the highlands don’t trust the warm times enough to begin growing or flowering just yet. They’ll wait until the days are reliably warm and frost free, though

�� • FEATURE • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

exactly how they determine this is largely a mystery. Non-native plants, such as fruit trees and ornamentals have no such mechanism and flower as soon as the temperatures and precipitation allow. In the lower deserts, such as the western slopes of the Sierra Prieta mountains, the frosts have passed by now, and plants are emerging to greet their early hummingbird, butterfly, moth, fly, and native bee pollinators. The exuberance of spring is in riotous full swing in the deserts, and over the next several months it will climb up the riparian corridors and south-facing slopes into the Highlands.

In

our high desert landscape, water scarcity is the single greatest factor that determines what happens in the natural world. But water scarcity can take different forms — too little falling as precipitation or too little available to plants and animals at the right time of year.

Water is most useful to plants when it’s liquid, and when air temperatures are high enough for plants to

perform photosynthesis. Plants (and animals for that matter) can’t utilize much of the precipitation that falls in the Central Highlands throughout the year because it falls in torrents — such as during the monsoon season of late summer — and washes through the landscape in erosive floods. Other times it falls in the form of snow, when air temperatures are too low for plants to perform photosynthesis.

Snow, however, proves to be the more valuable source of water for our region. That’s because it melts slowly from north-facing slopes, saturating soils and filling rivers slowly but continuously. Long after the lowlands are warm enough for plant growth and flowering, patches of snow remain in the shadows of the mountains providing this precious, scarce resource. ***** Ty Fitzmorris is an itinerant and often distractible naturalist who lives in Prescott and runs Peregrine Book Company and Raven Café as a sideline to his natural history pursuits. Contact him at Ty@PeregrineBookCompany.Com with questions or comments.

News From the Wilds, too A very brief survey of what’s happening in the wilds ...

By Ty Fitzmorris High mountains • Mountain Chickadees move upslope and scrutinize trees for insect larvae as temperatures rise. As other bird species migrate through the region, they find chickadee flocks and forage with them before moving on.

Visit: Maverick Mountain Trail, No. 65.

Ponderosa Pine forests • Bobcats give birth to two to eight kittens who remain in dens until June.

• Wild Candytuft (Thlaspi montanum), a small mountain perennial, blooms with brilliant white four-petalled flowers.

Visit: Miller Creek Trail, No. 367.

Pine-Oak woodlands • All manzanita species continue flowering, providing the first major pollen and nectar crop for native bees, moths, and flies. Look especially for the stunning iridescent Manzanita Mason Bee (Osmia ribifloris) which flies for the next several months. Like the vast majority of bee species, these bees are solitary and do not live in colonies or hives, though their populations are declining because of pesticide use alongside many other bee species.

• Gregg’s Ceanothus, an attractive, succulent-stemmed shrub, begins flowering and displays small white flowers among its tiny leaves.

Visit: Little Granite Mountain Trail, No. 37.

Pinyon-Juniper woodlands • Raccoon mating season is at its peak and may be punctuated with load, clicking nocturnal screeches as males fight over females.

• Gray Foxes give birth to (usually) four pups in their dens. This furtive fox is the most common fox in the higher Central Highlands, though it’s rarely seen. Gray Foxes are unusual in that they can climb trees better than any other North American canid and have been seen as high as 60 feet up in trees. To climb they grasp around the tree with their front feet while pushing with their hind feet, and they can run head first down trees that are nearly vertical.

• Junipers and cypress continue releasing pollen in large, allergy-inspiring clouds.

Visit: Tin Trough Trail, No. 308.

Grasslands • Bats reappear in the dusk skies, including Mexican Free-tailed Bats (Tadarida brasiliensis), which return now from Jalisco, Sonora, and Sinaloa. All bat species are vital to the control of insect populations, and some, including Mexican Free-tails, eat as much as 80 percent of their own body weight per night.

• Female Badgers dig dens and carefully line

them with grass. Here, they will give birth to two to three cubs toward the end of the month. Badgers are rare in our region, but are important predators of rodents, including our ubiquitous pocket gophers, packrats, mice, rats, and prairie dogs. Rodent populations skyrocket in places where predators such as Badgers are hunted. Badgers can live up to 14 years.

• Broad-winged hawks, such as Swainson’s, Rough-legged, and Ferruginous, continue migrating through the region and can often be seen sitting on power-line posts, looking for rodents. During migration, tens of millions of hawks migrate from South and Central America to North America. In one area in Mexico, as many as 1.5 million hawks have been seen in one day.

Visit: Mint Wash Trail, No. 345.

Rivers, lakes, & streams • Northern Rough-winged Swallows return from their overwintering grounds in southern Mexico and the Yucatan Peninsula. While some continue north as far as Canada, many will stay in the Central Highlands and begin breeding, building nests, and laying eggs.

• Contrary to their name, mayfly swarms (order Ephemeroptera) fly from now through the summer above perennial streams. These swarms are short-lived as the now-adult mayflies emerge, mate, lay eggs, and die, all within the space of a few hours. The aquatic larvae may have been alive for several years by this point, but the winged adult stage represents such a brief, though glorious, crescendo that they don’t eat at all, and, in fact, don’t have usable mouthparts as adults. They can be identified by their long trailing tails and slow, fairy-like flight.

• Antlions (family Myrmeleontidae) construct cone-shaped funnels in riverside sand.

The creatures themselves are very difficult to see, as they remain buried at the base of their funnels, but they are the larvae of large, winged damselfly-like insects, and they’re important predators of many species of ants.

If an ant falls into an antlion’s funnel, the antlion flings sand outward, causing the ant to fall to the center, where it’s captured by the antlion.

• Migrating warblers sweep into our region toward the end of the month through riparian corridors. Look for Yellow-rumped Warblers heading the northward charge, followed

by Orange-crowned Warblers, and, later, Wilson’s, MacGillivray’s, and Black-throated Gray warblers.

• Black Hawks (Buteogallus anthracinus), the rarest species of hawk in North America, return to the Central Highlands to begin mating, nesting, and egg-laying in the high Cottonwood trees of our riverine corridors, the leaf-buds of which burst now, revealing brilliant green leaves that provide cover for

Manzanita Mason Bees are primary pollinators for all of our manzanita species. Photo by Ty Fitzmorris.

Black Hawk nests. Black Hawks have been known to catch fish by sitting on the shore and tickling the water’s surface with their wingtips until a fish investigates, at which point the hawk jumps onto the fish.

Visit: Willow Lake Loop Trail, off of Willow Creek Road in Prescott.

Deserts/Chaparral • Spring is in full regalia in the desert and lowlands with extraordinary displays of wildflowers. Most ubiquitous are the yellow flowers of Yellow and Blue Paloverde trees (Parkinsonia florida and P. microphylla) and Creosote Bush (Larrea tridentata), which line roads and the uplands along river corridors. Several species of pink-purple lupines, brilliant orange Mexican Poppies, and the pink-red penstemons are also conspicuous now, as are hundreds of other, more uncommon species.

• The diversity and overflowing abundance of spring flowers offers pollen and nectar to the amazing diversity of native bees in the Sonoran Desert, which has the highest bee diversity on Earth at over 1,000 species, most of which are unstudied. The most conspicuous spring desert bees are the large black carpenter bees (genus Xylocopa) and the emerging queens of the sole bumblebee species, Bombus sonorous.

• In some years, the dayflying moth Litocala sexsignata flies in massive mid-day clouds of thousands in chaparral, while very few can be seen in other years.

• Desert owls, including the minute Elf Owl, begin mating and nesting.

• Desert Tortoises emerge from hibernation.

Desert Tortoises are one of only four species of tortoise in North America, and the most threatened. They can live 50 to 80 years, and consume grasses, cactus, shrubs, and wildflowers.

Visit: Agua Fria National Monument.

Night skies March 1: New moon at 1:00 a.m.

March 16: Full moon at 12:08 p.m.

March 20: Vernal Equinox at 9:57 a.m. The tilt of the Earth is such that the sun shines directly on the Equator, causing day and night to be of roughly equal length everywhere on Earth. The sun also rises exactly to the east today and sets exactly to the west. Between the Autumnal Equinox and the Vernal Equinox, the sun sets south of west; the rest of the year it sets to the north of west.

March 30: New moon at 1:45 p.m. This is our second “black moon” of the year, a rare instance when one calendar month contains two new moons.

Astronomical Highlight: The largest planet in our solar system, the giant gas-planet Jupiter, shines just to the west of the brightest stars in Gemini, Castor, and Pollux. It can be seen to the west late in the evening surrounded by the Winter Hexagon, a collection of the brightest stars in the night sky. The Winter Hexagon is composed of Castor, Pollux, Capella, Aldebaran, Rigel, Sirius, and Procyon, some of the easiest stars to learn the names of because of their conspicuous positions.

��

Miles of smiles

By Jacques Laliberté

Want

to know the secret to happiness?

There’s no shortage of advice. ...

A litany of pop culture pundits, songs, books, slogans, websites, blogs, Etsy products, calendars, and bumper stickers proffer platitudes: “Don’t worry be happy,” “Be calm and carry on,” and so on. Even with all those words of guidance, all those lists and one-a-day inspirational quotes, all those CDs and DVDs, all those quizzes and workshops, all those studies — to say nothing of a recent 172-page U.N. report on the subject — you might feel yourself lacking when your glee languishes. It’s easy to feel jaded about happiness.

Still, all these sources attempt to answer a deceptively simple question: What is happiness?

Here’s an open secret: It’s not the big things. Or, at least, not only the big things and the things that provide us with the greatest, deepest moments.

If we all noticed our soft exchanges of happiness with the people who populate our tiny world, we might see how every interaction can improve our qualities of life — lo, our happinesses.

Gretchen Rubin, author of multiple books about happiness and founder of “The Happiness Project,” has test-driven many studies about happiness as well as commonly held conventions.

Rubin suggests, “One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy; one of the best ways to make other people happy is to be happy yourself.”

Yes, anticipating and receiving life’s big rewards and big experiences is cause for celebration: a daughter’s wedding, a new SUV, a well-earned year-end bonus at work. And yet, the smallest of delights deserve notice and appreciation, too.

When you compliment your barista and she smiles, doesn’t that bring you cheer, too?

On her website GretchenRubin.Com, Rubin offers her personal list of criteria and truths for happiness. Not all ring true, some even contradict each other (Editor’s note: Rubin’s advice quoted earlier is couched in language approaching a logi-

cal fallacy — namely, affirmation of the consequent — and, moreover, assumes an unestablished application of logical equality.), yet others seem to be helpful to guide us to explore our own version of happiness.

Two appear particularly instructive: her Sixth Truth, “The only person I can change is myself,” and Seventh Truth, “Happy people make people happy, but I can’t make someone be happy, and No one else can make me happy.”

Thus, we are each responsible for our own happiness. It lies within us and doesn’t generate from outside our selves.

The current Dalai Lama thinks so, too: “Happiness is not something readymade. It comes from your own actions.”

So how do we use our circumstances to support our happiness? Can we really determine our own emotions? Can we act in ways that increase the likelihood that others will begin to feel happiness, too?

One clue comes from self-help guru Jacob Sokol via his blog at Sensophy.Com: “Savor life’s joys. Deep happiness cannot exist without slowing down to enjoy the joy. It’s easy in a world of wild stimuli and omnipresent movement to forget to embrace life’s enjoyable experiences. When we neglect to appreciate, we rob the moment of its magic. It’s the simple things in life that can be the most rewarding if we remember to fully experience them.”

No. 17 in happiness The U.S. is the 17th happiest nation of some 156 countries. That’s according to the second-annual “World Happiness Report,” published in 2013 by the U. N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network.

The report reflects global happiness levels between 2010 and 2012 based on six categories: GDP per capita, years of healthy life expectancy, social support, perceptions of corruption, prevalence of generosity, and freedom to make life choices.

You’ve got to delight in a title like “World Happiness Report.” Especially when you imagine global powers considering the benefits of subjective well-being in terms of social relations, ecoFull Service Certifications & Renewals nomic productivity and job satisfaction, creativity and collaboration, and health as they write their countries’ policies.

In chapter five, Prescott - Prescott Valley Columbia University Cottonwood - Flagstaff economist Jeffrey D. Sachs offers a remarkable treatise on the Must present coupon at clinic appt. one coupon per patient no cash value. recent med records required. expires 2-28-2014 profound shift that the premise of happiness took around the 1800s

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“Are You Happy?”

An in-depth quiz by Jacques Laliberté.

from the ethics of “virtue,” which was universally grounded in religious belief, to “consumerism,” now (disturbingly) termed “utility theory.”

In essence, an individual’s well-being is now determined by the possession and consumption of material goods. Boo. Remedial happiness Happiness, notes French Buddhist monk Ricard Matthieu, is “a way of interpreting the world, since while it may be difficult to change the world, it is always possible to change the way we look at it.”

And, according to the “World Happiness Report,” that change is cumulative.

“Happiness has the potential to generate positive snowball effects in society. Research has shown that people who are happier are likely to bring happiness to those around them, resulting in networks of happier individuals.”

The “answer,” ironically, seems to be to be happy and that it will spread, though we are still left wondering just how to get there, if not through the consumption of consumer goods.

A shift back toward the “virtue” of a good and grounded life’s “right action,” and close relationships that nourish our day-to-day well-being seem like good approaches.

We need to be aware of our moods and key into what we know makes us happy. We must know that each of us deserves to be happy and commit to taking steps in that direction: to a happier world! ***** A 20-year resident of Prescott, Jacques Laliberté has written for and designed several publications, as well as his own Art-rag. See his fine art work at Society6.Com/ DaZzlDolls.

Prescott Film Festival’s SCRIPT NOTES

All the world’s a staging area arts master. I could have gotten Jackie Chan to star.

By Helen Stephenson Ext. Sunrise Three filmmakers sit on a hillside overlooking the old Senator Drive-In. The marquee says “Happy 50th Anniversary Margie! Remember when we used to make out here?” Kathleen is around 25, dressed a bit “retro” with a 1920s hat perched jauntily on her head and a script on her lap. SAM is around 23, a “hippie-type” with tie-died t-shirt, holey jeans and sandals, a “Film Production” book at his side. ANDY is 20, clean cut and sits military straight, conservative polo shirt and khakis but with red high-top tennis shoes.

KATHLEEN Did you hear what happened with Hannah’s short film?

ANDY The creepy one about the student and the teacher?

SAM (sitting up straight, an imaginary newspaper between his hands,“reading”) You mean the one reviewers call “tantalizing,” “draining,” and “out of control?”

OK – what???

KATHLEEN It’s been picked up

by HBO as a series.

ANDY (Slapping his forehead) I knew I should have shot my action flick about an aging martial

ANDY

SAM Instead you shot a homage to Alfred Hitchcock’s shower scene in “Psycho.”

ANDY (Sighing happily and leaning back) Best production day ever. The crew paid me just to be there.

Kathleen slugs him in the stomach.

He sits back up.

KATHLEEN Well, I think it’s interesting how film, TV, and webisodes are blending together.

Background was called 5 minutes ago!

Sam, Andy, and Kathleen pick up their scripts and follow Teresa to the set.

A film extra’s work is never done.

THE END

SAM Yeah – look at Cary Fukunaga.

Film school, Student Academy Award, more short films, HBO series, and now he’s rumored to direct a Stephen King film.

All of people and projects are real. Hannah Fidell’s short film “A Teacher” is being developed as an HBO series; Cary Fukunaga went from film school to a career in film and television; and Fede Alvarez propelled his “Panic Attack!” Youtube video into his first feature film, “Evil Dead.”

KATHLEEN Or Lena Dunham. Graduated from Oberlin College. Did “Tiny Furniture” and now she’s done 31 episodes of “Girls,” got Emmy Award nominations, two Golden Globes, and is called the voice of her generation.

That’s our generation, BTW.

***** Helen Stephenson is the founder and executive director of the Prescott Film Festival and the director of the Sedona Film School at Yavapai College (interim). She collects old hats and Mary Poppins memorabilia, and wonders why “Saving Mr. Banks” wasn’t nominated for an Oscar. When she’s not helping film school students, watching films, or marketing the fest, she’s writing articles, screenplays, and press releases, and enjoying beautiful Arizona sunrises.

SAM Then there’s Fede Alvarez. Made an $800 YouTube video look like $20 million bucks and directed his first feature film last year.

Courtesy images.

A harried woman, Teresa, carrying a clipboard, comes over the hill.

TERESA (Out of breath) This is where you guys went!

�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • FEATURE • ��

STAY CLASS-Y Experimentation & the Art of Critique with Debra Owen

10 a.m. Wednesdays March 5, 12, 18, & 26 + April 2, 9, 16, & 23 $20. Four sessions.

Develop a weekly painting habit. Practice painting with intent. Try new ideas. Build a vocabulary reflecting your creative journey.

Drawing Skills

By Russell Miller

with Jacques Laliberté

10 a.m. Fridays March 7, 14, 21, & 28 + April 4, 11, 18, 25 $125. Four sessions.

Practive and improve your drawing skills and artistic expression.

Investigate a variety of subjects with focus on line, shading, form, perspective, proportion, composition, and planning.

The Sea Wasp, or Box Jellyfish can grow as many as 60 6-foot tentacles and its hood can reach the size of a 5-gallon bucket. It is so transparent that it barely casts a shadow.

It is known to eat almost anything including crustaceans, snails, worms, fish and one another.

Sewing Techniques

with Denise Martine Gouge 10 a.m. Thursdays March 6, 13, 20, & 27, April 3 $45 per session. $225 for all six sessions.

“Turning textiles into garments,” “Principles of garment patterning, sizing, and fit,” “Construction,” “Stabilization,” “Closure treatments,” and “Edge treatments.”

Relief Wood Carving

with Brenda Behrens 5 p.m. Wednesdays March 19 & 26, April 2 & 9 $160. Four sessions.

Work step-by-step through projects designed to give a thorough grounding in relief carving skills applicable to decorative panels, architectural details, furniture, and carving in the round.

Vessel Layered Expressions with Juliane Ketcher

10 a.m. Saturday, March 15 $125. One-day workshop.

Create your own basket. Explore basic stitches, coiling, layering, and weaving techniques, and see how extraordinary three-dimensional organic forms can be created ... layer upon layer, stitch by stitch.

Encaustic

with Bela Fidel 10 a.m. May 1 & 2 $345. Two-day workshop.

Overview of materials and equipment; starting from scratch, fusing, adding layers, manipulating wax, collage, stencils, stamps, and more!

ODDLY ENOUGH ... this rather unimposing creature is the most poisonous sea animal known to man. It carries three known toxins in its stinging cells including one with enough potency to stop an adult’s heart in less than three minutes! *****

Shadowgraphs, lasting silhouette images of solid objects, have appeared on all kinds of surfaces after particularly bright flashes of lightning. It is a rare event, but it does happen.

ODDLY ENOUGH ... in 1851, in Maryland, an extremely strange event occurred.

A sheep standing near a tree was killed by a lightning strike. It was dressed out immediately by its owners and, to their shock, they found a perfect, detailed Hand Papermaking image of a robin with Annie Alexander 9 a.m. May 17 & 18 including veins in $180. Weekend workshop.

Learn the techniques of papermaking including fiber and pulp the feathers on preparation, sheet forming and pulling, and pressing and drying using materials found in Prescott. the inside of the animal’s skin. They Wet Mosaic & Cement Sculpture also found a dead with Juanita Hull-Carlson 10 a.m. July 26 & 27 robin only a few feet $50. Weekend workshop.

Explore relief sculpture and mosaic in a wet mortar mixture. away!

Create a free-formed piece and one “stepping-stone-like’ piece.

Prescott Arts Journey Textiles & Textures Artisans Studios

217 N. Cortez | 928-925-4356 Wed.-Sat. 10-7 | Sun. 11-4 TextilesTextures@cableone.net

***** Russell Miller is an illustrator, cartoonist, writer, bagpiper, motorcycle enthusiast, and reference librarian. Currently, he illustrates books for Cody Lundin and Bart King.

�� • FEATURE • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

Holistic Fitness

By Lauren Antrosiglio

Stress

is so widespread that it’s pretty much accepted as part of the daily reality of life in modern society.

However, there are just as many ways to relieve (and avoid) stress as there are different types of it.

There are many types of stress, and the following list isn’t exhaustive: • Emotional stress: Relationship problems, worry over a child or family member, job issues, or depression.

• Cognitive stress: Unrealistic demands, constant pessimism, morbid expectations, or living up to others’ expectations.

• Toxin-related stress: Heavy metal toxicity, mercury and other toxins in food, pollution, pesticides, or perfumes.

• Electromagnetic stress: From cell phones, computers, or electronics.

• Metabolic stress: Overexercising, low blood sugar, or lack of food.

• Sensory stress: Frequent loud noises, chronic pain, or excessive external stimulation.

• Immune stress: Food intolerance or allergy, inflammation, or autoimmune disease.

• Endocrine-related stress: Adrenal burnout, endocrine system disorders, menopause, or insulin sensitivity.

• Spiritual stress: Loss of self, lack of purpose, non-empathetic, or unloving.

• Structural stress: Poor posture, bad spine alignment, or physical trauma.

If you only experience one of these types of stress, your system can

Stress is ruining your health & well-being & here’s what you can do about it

deal with it. In response to stress, your body releases cortisol, the “stress hormone,” and subsequently restores equilibrium.

However, most of us deal with a number of these stressors — and on a regular basis, at that. The more stressors we have to deal with, the harder it is for our bodies to restore equilibrium. Chronic stress causes cortisol levels to build up in our bodies.

Here are some ways to help relieve stress and lower your cortisol levels: Identify nutritional deficiencies & correct them Common deficiencies are the B vitamins, calcium, vitamin D, and phosphate. Ask your doctor to check all of these levels at your annual physical.

of fruits and vegetables as well as complete proteins like lean meat, wild-caught fish, and chicken.

Unplug your devices MRIs of the brain indicate that we undergo constant and excessive stimulation when we (over) use Facebook, Twitter, and similar social media.

It appears as addictive and potentially harmful to the brain as methamphetamine and cocaine. When we’re perpetually plugged into technology, it keeps us in something akin to “fight-or-flight” mode, which pumps up the amount of cortisol flowing in our blood.

Drink Holy Basil Holy Basil, or Tulsi orum is (Ocimum tenuiflorum), an herb commonly used in Ayurvedic medicine. Some Practice deep breathing studies suggest that it can exercises effectively lower the body’s Seriously, do them. cortisol levels and, hence, be used to manage stress. It’s also Practice mindfulness purported to boost the immune meditation system, and fight inflammation This increasingly popular — credible claims considering it form of meditacontains COX-2 Images via inhibitors betion is effective at restoring balance All-Free-Download.Com. cause of its high to the autonomic Illustration by 5enses. levels of eugenol. nervous system and simulates dopamine, serotonin, and endorphins which help with mood and relaxation.

On the less provable side, proponents of Ayurvedic medicine claim Holy Basil increases mental awareness and encourages an expanded state of awareness. Because it lowers cortisol levels, Holy Basil may indirectly prevent fat storage in your abdomen as triggered by stress. Anecdotally, it’s less effective in pill or tincture form, and can be purchased in bulk as loose-leaf tea. Brew Holy Basil in your coffeemaker with one rounded tablespoon per cup.

Most people know that stress isn’t good for us. It can do an extensive range and amount of damage to our bodies, minds, and spirits on a daily basis. That includes an impaired immune system, high blood pressure, weight gain, damage to the cardiovascular system, a heightened risk of Type 2 diabetes, or far worse.

Reducing the amount of stress you experience isn’t just about saying “aum” and sitting in silence for a few minutes — it’s about choosing to be ill or be healthy. ***** Lauren Antrosiglio is an ASUdegreed personal trainer in Prescott who specializes in weight loss, increasing muscle mass, rehabilitative fitness, functional exercise and senior fitness. Contact her at Info@ PrescottPersonalTraining.Com.

Laugh and smile There’s plenty of scientific evidence that laughing and smiling release happinessrelated chemicals that reduce stress.

Adjust your diet Avoid simple sugars, processed foods, and any foods you are intolerant to and get plenty

�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • COLUMN • ��

Mike’s Musical Musings

Competing motivations

How not-so-friendly competition in music ed misses the mark

By Mike Vax As you may know, I travel all over the country (all over the world, at times) doing music workshops in schools, colleges, and universities.

I’ve been doing this for 44 years.

In that time, I’ve seen many changes in how music is viewed and taught in educational situations. I’m afraid that it has not gotten better over the years.

As the pressure to achieve gets stronger and stronger, it’s affected the way our young people are educated. The ridiculous fact that many

schools are judged by arbitrary testing has made teachers teach to the test instead of to the student. It’s more important to many administrators and principals to have good test scores than it is to have students learn valuable skills that will help them live their lives and be successful on their own.

In addition, a “wind/beat/put down” rival schools attitude has become paramount in the eyes of administrators, teachers, and, yes, even parents. This has always been the rallying cry for coaches and teams. I don’t see anything wrong with this feeling, as long as it isn’t pushed to the extreme, when underhanded practices mar the otherwise good name of institutions. (There’s apparently much more of this in college athletics than at the high school level.)

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The

sad thing is that beating rival schools has also become the main thrust for far too many band programs across the country. Rather than teaching a love of music and a desire to make beautiful music, students are encouraged to learn a minimum number of pieces and rehearse them over and over again, by rote, until the pieces are so perfect that they can accomplish a singular, ultimate goal — they beat other schools at contests.

Originally, music, art, and drama classes were supposed to teach the “other side” of the human existence.

They were intended to teach about aesthetics; they were meant to show the beauty of things that can be brought to life; they were meant to let students know that there are things in life that are worthwhile outside of winning a contest or a competition.

For me, anytime a student picks up a musical instrument, they have “won.” The main competition is within one’s self. It takes commitment to practice an instrument, learn music, and take part in the joy of performing that music for an audience. This discipline carries over into all walks of life and in all businesses. Practicing and perfecting music shows students that if they work really hard at any endeavor, they can be a success.

at both ends of the spectrum. He instills a real love of music in his students while simultaneously putting together award-winning musical organizations. I am, of course, talking about Dan Bradstreet at Prescott High School.

Bradstreet is a perfect example of what my idea of a great high school band director should be.

I hope that when they put on concerts at Prescott High School, many of you will attend and enjoy the endeavors of our own local student musicians.

The same should be said for all the high schools and middle schools in our area.

Please support these teachers and young people. ***** Mike Vax is a Prescott-based jazz musician and educator. As his column progresses, he’d love to hear your questions, comments, and ideas for future columns.

Contact him via his website, MikeVax.Net or at VaxTrpts@AOL. Com.

I

hope that we can bring about a rejuvenation of music and art in schools that teaches individual success and how to transfer that success into working and cooperating with others à la a band or orchestra. I also hope that we can instill in young people that this endeavor is worthwhile in and of itself without having to win a trophy to prove success.

Still, right here in Prescott, we’ve got a least competitive player high school band director who’s successful

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We got time for that.

Diagnosis: Technology

By Paolo Chlebecek

Tuesday,

April 8 is the end.

It’s called the “End of Life,” but, unless you can predict the future, it’s not your end of life. It’s the end of life for what many have called their beloved operating system — Windows XP. So what does that mean?

Although

it was released on Oct. 25, 2001, Windows XP is still on almost 28 percent of computers as of November of 2012. Its now standard and dated look still functions well and is preferred by some in the computing world. But, after a dozen years, Microsoft is pulling the plug.

To quote Microsoft: “Technical assistance for Windows XP will

The end is nigh ... for Windows XP users no longer be available, including automatic updates that help protect your PC. If you continue to use Windows XP after support ends, your computer will still work but it might become more vulnerable to security risks and viruses. Also, as more software and hardware manufacturers continue to optimize for more recent versions of Windows, you can expect to encounter greater numbers of apps and devices that do not work with Windows XP.” In other words, Windows XP will still run but it will become increasingly difficult to find new compatible hardware and software — not to mention becoming a real security risk.

Medical offices that uses Windows XP will no longer be HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) compliant. Each violation starts at $100 and can go up to $1.5 million per year.

So,

can you upgrade from Windows XP to a newer operating system? Yes and no.

The only “in-place” upgrade is to our terrible old friend Windows Vista, which no one can recommend. This means that if you really can’t get a new computer and can manage to find that last copy of Vista, you can upgrade. Vista will stop receiving support as of April 11, 2017, only three years from now.

There is no upgrade path from Windows XP to Windows 7. So, after a good backup of your data and settings, only a complete wipe of the computer and install of Windows 7 will work — if the computer meets the required specs. However, it’s rarely a good idea to upgrade any computer over 3- to 4- yearsold as components are engineered to last only three to five years.

Incidentally,

I’m not a big fan of Windows 8 or 8.1, which are currently available, but they’ll get the job done. That’s because they have Windows 7 at their core. Most of the fluff in Windows 8 is for touch screens.

Windows 7 is still available, but just barely. It’s usually found on refurbished computers. So, as long as Microsoft supports it, either Windows 7 or 8 is the way to go … for now. ***** Paolo Chlebecek is founder and owner of PaoloTek, which he started in 2003. He enjoys technology of all kinds and, in his spare time, likes to go on adventures with his wife and fourlegged children. Contact him at Paolo@PaoloTek.Com.

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�� • FEATURE • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

Gene Twaronite’s The Absurd Naturalist

By Gene Twaronite In an article on nature writing, author David Rains Wallace once wrote that, “The most daunting challenge facing nature writers today is not travel but data. Someone has to translate information into feelings and visions.”

Thus inspired, I set off on a collecting trip not to some far off corner of the globe but to the musty shelves of a nearby college library. (Yes, I could have done this at home, but, for the true bibliophile, nothing can match the sheer adventure of wandering through towering rows of books.)

There, beneath the covers of the latest science journals, I hoped to “discover” new data that I could translate for my readers.

Hacking my way through the jargon jungle of the specialists, however, I quickly came to appreciate what Wallace meant by “daunting challenge.”

Right off, I knew there might be trouble ahead when the first article encountered in The Biological Bulletin was entitled “Aggregation and Fusion Between Conspecifics of a Solitary Ascidian.”

Suddenly I felt more alone than any solitary Ascidian. All that I managed to ascertain from the article was that this was the first time such a thing had ever been reported and that the frequency of fusion between contacting (presumably consenting) specimens was 20 percent. Also, the fused animals had their outer membranes on at the time, unlike the unfused ones (which could have considerable significance if you’re a solitary Ascidian).

Charting

a new course, I proceeded along the provocative pathways of the London journal Animal Behavior.

Its author left plenty of good leads for me to follow such as “Do Digger Wasps Commit the Concorde

Land of the solitary Ascidian Fallacy?” I’ve committed a few fallacies myself, but this one sounds like one of the cardinal sins.

And how could one not want to know more about “The Responses of Dark-bellied Brent Geese to Models of Geese in Various Postures”? My mind raced with possibilities, and I found myself wondering exactly what kinds of postures those researchers were showing the poor geese. Alas, only three were shown: head up, head down, and extreme head up. I found the last one extremely disturbing, though I’m not a goose. (The geese considered “head down” most attractive. I disagree.)

Another London journal, Annals of Botany, led me to a romantic sounding place with its title: “Alnus Leaf Impressions From a Postglacial Tufa in Yorkshire.” I found myself yearning to sit on a nice soft tufa while soaking in the countryside.

It

was in the physical science journals that I really began to go astray. Several articles in the Journal of Atmospheric Sciences sent troubling images through my brain. What is one to make of the title “On the InterpreImages via tation of Eddy Fluxes During a Blocking Episode”? Does this sound like football, or is it just me?

The article entitled “Improving Spectral Models by Unfolding Their Singularities” left me trying to imagine what a spectral model — especially a “maximally truncated” spectral model — might look like with its singularities unfolded.

The visions became even worse in the Physical Review. Why, for instance, upon reading the seemingly straightforward title: “Interactions of H and H- with He and Ne” did I suddenly think of the old movie “Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice”? And why did the article entitled “Hydrogen Atom in the Momentum Representation” leave me imagining some weird body-building pose?

I

finally lost my way in the Geological Society of America Bulletin. Oh, it started off innocently enough with a “Crab Bitten by a Fish From the Upper Cretaceous Pierre Shale.” But, feeling adventurous, I went further, becoming hopelessly mired in the title “Progressive Metamorphism from Prehnite-Pumpellyite to Greenschist Facies in the Dansey Pass Area, Otago, New Zealand.” In spite of my predicament, it was a fascinating world with lovely creatures like “Mesozoic Graywackes” and “Prehnite-pumpellyite Facies.” I kept up until the author went around a bend and left me alone with “progressive textual modification ranges from massive, nonfoliated greywacke, semi-schist, to thorough-going laminated quartzo feldspathetic schist.”

Dazed and confused, I straggled on home. I’ll leave that for some other nature writer to translate into feelings and visions. ©Gene Twaronite 2014 ***** Gene Twaronite’s writing has appeared in numerous literary journals and magazines. He is the author of “The Family That Wasn’t,” “My Vacation in Hell,” and “Dragon Daily News.” Follow Gene at TheTwaroniteZone.Com.

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�ENSESMAG.COM • MARCH ���� • COLUMN • ��

“Claddagh! an Explosion of Celtic Dance & Music” Who & What: Two hours of Celtic music, dance, and multimedia.

When: 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 27 Where: Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St. Worth: $19-$38 Web: YCPAC.Com

Gary Paul Nabhan Who & What: Gary Paul Nabhan discusses declining Monarch Butterfly populations/reads from “Growing Food in a Hotter, Drier Land” When: 2 p.m./5:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 5 Where: Natural History Institute, 312 Grove Ave./ Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St. Worth: Free Web: PeregrineBookCompany.Com

�� • FEATURE • MARCH ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

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