2014-04 5enses

Celebrating art and science in Greater Prescott

Alan Dean Foster takes auto ads for a spin P. 12

Ty Fitzmorris springs into the new season P. 16

Jimmy Polinori hams it up for an Easter feast P. 11

Gene Twaronite Mother Nature’s selfies P. 25

And much 2 more!

APRIL 2014 | VOLUME 2, ISSUE 4 | 5ensesMag.Com

Robert Dubac male intellect: May 28 the an oxymoron

Preservation Hall Jazz Band Apr 10

PUCCINI’S LA BOHÈME APRIL 5 - 9:55 AM MOZART’S COSÌ FAN TUTTE APRIL 26 - 9:55 AM ROSSINI’S LA CENERENTOLA MAY 10 - 9:55 AM tickets - 928

776 2000 - www.ycpac.com

5enses In which:

Zach Smith

4 4 5 6 7 10 11 12 13

conjures an oft-overlooked bird from his proverbial hat for cogitation and investigation.

Sharon Arnold

trails off on a jaunty jaunt down Prescott’s Centennial Trail and rediscovers a paradise regained.

Ruby Jackson

gives a hoot about the Earth every day, but especially when it’s actually Earth Day.

16 18 19 21 22 24 25

Ty Fitzmorris

springs into high gear and tries to catch a glimpse of nature’s bodacious blossoming bounty.

Jonathan Best

notes that musical shorthand is a double-edged sword that can dull musical intuition.

Helen Stephenson

pre-views and previews a funny film and thank-you day for Prescott Film Festival volunteers.

Robert Blood

Lauren Antrosiglio

Matt Dean

Mike Vax

builds the buzz around a worldwide problem and offers a hive-minded solution in honied tones.

shows that you don’t have to go to the main air-time event to catch a noteworthy spectacle.

chops, boils, and distills arguments for and against raw foods and raw foodies.

Paolo Chlebecek

Jimmy Polinori

Gene Twaronite

pigs out on a holiday favorite and offers some saucy advice sans a ham-fisted approach.

Alan Dean Foster

discovers that when it comes to car commercials, the rubber doesn’t always meet the road.

James Dungeon

discusses chalk, art, and community with Susan Crutcher, Dana Cohn, and Holly Schimeller.

8 20 26

Plus

Left Brain/Right Brain Find out what’s going on in Greater Prescott

Oddly Enough

Comics by Russell Miller

Spot-on Spotlights

Prescott’s premier happenings and happenstances

Greg Ewald lovingly labors over a piece at 2013’s Chalk it Up! event. Photo by Tim Adams.

See James Dungeon’s article on Page 13 for more.

squares off against a digital foe and rounds out an arguement in favor of a disc world.

Heather Houk

digs herself out of a gopher hole by offering an oil-slick solution that would make Carl Spakler smile.

April 2014 • Volume 2, Issue 4

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 weekend of every month.

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

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

goes viral with a piece that relates the cold hard facts about malicious software.

frames the perfect snapshot of a self-indulgent pastime in a picturesque setting, naturally.

COVER: A hand wields the mighty power of chalk at Chalk it Up! 2013.

Photo by Tim Adams.

Design by Jimmy Polinori.

�ENSESMAG.COM • APRIL ���� • CONTENTS • �

Bird of the Month

The Merlin

A Merlin perches atop a wooden post.

Photo by Zach Smith.

Prescott 2014 6th Annual

FRE E

Com mun Don ity Eve a nt Wel tions com e!

d rovide e P k l a Ch om s Welc All Age rtainment te Live En

May 3-4, 2014

10:00AM-4:00PM National Bank of Arizona parking lot

201 North Montezuma, Prescott www.PrescottChalkArt.com & Chalk It Up! Prescott (928) 308-8762

By Zach Smith

Often

overlooked by all but the most serious birders is the Merlin (Falco columbarius). From fall through early spring, this dove-sized member of the falcon family (Falconidae) haunts open habitats with scattered trees in search of sparrows, starlings, finches, Horned Larks, and other flocking songbirds around Prescott.

Their Latin name, columbariues, means “dove-like” and refers to the resemblance of their flight to that of a dove or pigeon.

The famous saying “off on a lark” comes from ancient falconers who hunted larks with Merlins.

Two fairly reliable places to find Merlins are Willow Lake and Chino Valley. Seek them out on trees, poles, and fences bordering open areas.

Locating one usually requires a keen eye and a bit of luck because they don’t want to be seen. That’s because larger raptors are known to attack smaller species, Merlins included.

Plus, they must keep a low profile so as not to alarm potential prey as to their presence. This balancing act is played out among many organisms

in the natural world: Try to eat without being eaten.

Witnessing a Merlin hunt is a rare occurrence but not one soon forgotten — as long as you can follow the action. They attack at impossible speeds with aerial agility that seems to defy physics. True to their namesake, they’re definitely wizards.

As with other raptors, Merlins frequently use man-made structures to mask their approach, often hugging the ground with smooth, powerful pumping of their sickleshaped wings. At times, they mimic the flight of non-predatory birds such as woodpeckers and doves for an extra split second of surprise.

In your wanderings through the natural wonders of the Central Highlands during winter, don’t forget to keep an eye out for this small falcon wizard. The encounter may be brief, but knowing they’re out there should enhance your experience. ***** Contact Prescottonian Zach Smith at GavilanPhoto.SmugMug.Com. Contact Prescott Audubon Society at PrescottAudubon.Org, Contact@ PrescottAudubon.Org, or 928-7786502.

Wandering the wilds

By Sharon Arnold

Built

to celebrate 100 years of statehood, Prescott’s Centennial Trail lures you into a mini-wilderness in the midst of the city.

It has two trailheads — one off Westridge Road and the other off of Kile Street. Choose either, and you’ll soon find yourself in a jumble of granite boulders, pinions, and oaks.

Fine views toward the north and east offer a different Prescott perspective.

Your surroundings are home to the critters and birds that give our city a wild reputation. Watch for signs of coyotes, bobcats, raccoons, and javelina.

Scrub Jays, Spotted Towhees, and House Finches chatter warnings as you approach. A Cooper’s Hawk could be circling overhead on the lookout for a meal.

If you go to the highest elevation on the trail — Petroglyph Point — you’ll discover symbols left by long-absent Native American artists and a favorite picnic spot of early Prescott settlers.

Join Sharon Arnold, Highlands Center for Natural History naturalist, 10 a.m.

Wednesday, April 9 at the Kile Street trailhead for a leisurely Discovery Walk. *****

� • FEATURES • APRIL ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

Around ...

... the Corner

April appearances

By Ruby Jackson Rather than culminating in a single day, Earth Day events promise a red-letter month for Prescott.

The proficiently proactive Prescott Creeks Preservation Association has planned some stellar jollifications beginning with their own fete on Arizona Gives Day, Wednesday, April 9. Activities begin bright and early at 8 a.m. with a guided bird walk in Watson Woods, courtesy of Karen O’Neal of the Prescott Audubon Society. If you’d rather indulge in sweets rather than nature, stop by at noon for a cupcake at their brand new cabin (office) adjacent to the Watson Woods Riparian Preserve (northeast corner of Arizona 89 and Rosser), one of the Creeks’ own ongoing projects. Hunt for art materials at 2 p.m. in the preserve with Paula Cooperrider followed by an upcycling mini-seminar at 3 p.m. with local philanthropist Jean Lutz.

Top the day off with a glass of wine at 5 p.m. and listen to Sharon Arnold wax lyrical.

Arizona Gives Day, Wednesday, April 9 is a statewide opportunity to show your support and connect with the state’s various nonprofit organizations by donating online at AZGives.Razoo.

Com. One related deal, among many leading up to the day, is at The Hike Shack: Buy any pair of Patagonia shoes and the shoe company will donate $20 to the Highlands Center for Natural History. If your wallet feels a little lean, consider giving the gift of your time by volunteering.

You can start by showing up for Prescott Creeks’ Granite Creek

Cleanup 9 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday, April 19 at Granite Creek Park.

This community litter-cleanse fest is actually fun, and true trash is separated from treasure (objets with a future destination other than the landfill or recycling center) with upcycling activities later.

One Man’s Treasure, a fundraiser party and art exhibit with live and silent auctions is also presented

by Prescott Creeks in partnership with Prescott College. Though the event itself isn’t until Saturday, May 3 at the Prescott College Crossroads Center, ’Tis Art Center & Gallery is hosting a preview April 17-22. A few of the pieces that caught my eye: Jody Skjei’s “Relax and Dream Green,” a Zuni-esque rocking chair suitable for any sled or ski hill, Rick Hartner’s “Taking a Different Angle” bird spa, Bryan Cooperrider and fam’s fantastic floral arrangement, “Reincarnation,” and Chelsea Stone’s funky fresh Lifesaver necklace.

Earth Day is Tuesday, April 22, but the big local event will actually be held in advance 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday, April 12 on the Yavapai County Courthouse Square. Sponsored by the Open Space Alliance and Prescott College, music and entertainment join vendors and earth-friendly organizations for an experience that will put you in proper spirit to gather ’round the Maypole by May 1. Can someone tell me where that pagan klatch is going down?

Are you a secondhand maven? If so, get ready to jump up and down, because one of Prescott’s most beloved former resale stores, Threadheads, has reincarnated once again

inside the Miller Valley Indoor Art Market. Though it be a small space, owner Marinna MacMinn has it packed floor to ceiling. The grand opening is Friday, April 11, but the store is open now, accessible via the market Wednesday through Sunday.

While you’re there, take a look around; the Art Market has winsome local flavor.

The Prescott Public Library is the place to be and be seen on Sunday, April 27. The fundraising extravaganza Our Library Rocks takes place amongst a kitschload of mid-century pop culture, and the blowout is comprised of memorabilia including vintage cars, ’50s and ’60s music with dance contests to boot, appetizers by Free Range Feast, hooch (wine only), and mag-

nificent raffle baskets. Tickets are $30-$35 and include a Friends of the Library membership. Ticket money goes toward new programs, expanded services, and technology improvements. Yay! Special Mention: The Red Chair is making an appearance at Prescott Pines Inn Bed and Breakfast on Monday, April 21 as part of its coast-to-coast journey.

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

FROM TOP: “Reincarnation” by Bryan Cooperider, his wife, Beth, and kids, Wren and Zinnia; “Relax and Dream Green” by Jody Skjei. Photos by Ruby Jackson.

�ENSESMAG.COM • APRIL ���� • COLUMN • �

A buzzworthy topic

By Robert Blood

Weather

was the likely culprit.

“We first noticed it about December,” said Kim Garrett, owner of Silver Creek Stone, 1464 Masonry Way, in Prescott. “That warm streak that started in January — that’s when they really started buzzing.”

She’s talking about honeybees. It’d be easy enough for her to have called an exterminator — this was the first time this had come up in her three decades of business — but she hesitated.

“We’ve all heard about declining bee populations,” Garrett said. “They’re an important part of our ecosystem, especially for pollination, so I started asking around about local beekeepers.”

Thus Garrett found Bee Enthusiasts and Educators of Prescott, a group of about 30 or 40 apiarists.

She arranged for members to relocate her hive.

“No everybody calls us, obviously,” said Steve Read, BEEP member. “A lot of people have had bad experiences with bees or trauma in child-

COUNTER-CLOCKWISE, FROM BOTTOM RIGHT: Peggy Mackey, of Bee Enthusiasts and Educators of Prescott, examines a honeycomb from a hive at Silver Creek Stone; local bees work as busily as, well, bees; Prescott’s BEEP helps connect unwanted bees with apiarists. Photos by 5enses, Jason and Hilary Heartisan, and (again) Jason and Hilary Heartisan. hood, and they’re uneducated about them or have an unfounded fear of them.”

In February, Garrett, along with fellow BEEP member Peggy Mackey, arrived at Silver Creek Stone, donned protective suits, smoked out some bees, pried back the wall in which they’d made their home, removed layers of honeycomb, and sucked up the bees with a device that’s pretty much a vacuum cleaner.

The bees were relocated to Read’s place where, within a couple of weeks, they died.

Weather was the likely culprit.

“We had a cold weather snap — just enough to kill them off,” Read said.

Though this chapter

Highlands Center for Natural History Nestled in the Lynx Lake Recreation Area, 15 minutes from Prescott’s Courthouse Square, The Highlands Center for Natural History invites you to explore the wonder of the Central Arizona Highlands.

• Free Naturalist-led walks, Saturdays 10 AM • Year-round kids’ camps, scholarships available • Fun and educational family programs • Native Plant and Outdoor-Art Festival May 3 • Beautiful location for your special event Mention 5enses and get $10 off a Family Membership through April.

Wonder

Explore

928-776-9550 www.highlandscenter.org

Discover

� • FEATURE • APRIL ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

ends on a sad note, it can still be taken as a learning experience. For Read, it’s a matter of public education. Bees aren’t just an indicator species, he said, they’re really, really important pollinators.

“They’re probably the largest pollinators in our area,” Read said. “They also mix pollen from plant to another, so they really add greatly to the biodiversity of the area.” ***** Visit Bee Enthusiasts and Educators of Prescott at PrescottBeekeepers.Com. Robert Blood is a Mayer-ish-based freelance writer and ne’er-do-well who’s working on his last book, which, incidentally, will be his first. Contact him at BloodyBobby5@Gmail.Com.

Bird Watching (No, The Other Kind)

By

almost any count or account, the 2014 Luke Air Force Base Open House and Air Show was a success. Two hundred thousand people were expected over the two-day event, which featured a static display of the new F-35 and headlined the Air Force Thunderbirds aerial display team.

But for this aircraft enthusiast, the crowds proved too cumbersome.

Instead, my family went to another kind of air show — the kind featuring non-mechanical fluttery flight.

The first stop of the morning was Butterfly Wonderland, on the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community. This venue is an atrium filled with thousands of butterflies in a tropical rainforest environment.

The atrium features a stunning butterfly emergence gallery where

chrysalides of varying size, shape, color, and life stages hang in rows behind glass.

The conservatory requires guests to enter through a vestibule where an air curtain keeps butterflies from fluttering out. Once inside, you’re transported to the tropics and immediately surrounded by butterflies of all colors and sizes. Folks from young to old appear stunned upon entry at the sheer number of butterflies that alight on them.

While I enjoyed the butterflies, I still craved mechanical powered flight.

Several

weeks prior, I’d researched plane-spotting locations at Sky Harbor and had found a quiet spot by the perimeter fence at the end of one of the north runways. As the family lounged around on a quiet, warm Phoenix afternoon, I decided to try

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day with the family at the butterfly conservatory and my solo spotting excursion at Sky Harbor were well worth the time spent. Any time with my family is always the best day I can have.

But, next year, I’ll finally brave the crowds at the 2015 Luke Air Force Base Open House and Air Show. ***** 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.

4 Prescott’s 4th Friday

4FRIDAY

ART WALKS

’S

By Matt Dean

My

COT T

A view of Terminal Four at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. Photo by Cygnusloop99, Creative Commons 3.0.

Aside from the aircraft and the occasional stray vehicle, there was only the sound of the breeze. It was a strange quiet place next to an international airport in the middle of a large city. As expected, the area was a hodgepodge of concrete barriers, chain link fencing, a radar tower, industrial buildings, asphalt, concrete, and blowing litter. It’s a place only the people who work near ever see.

PRE S

Improvised air shows

my luck there.

Luckily, it was a 10-minute drive from where we were staying. I was immediately rewarded with an Airbus A320 touching down on the tarmac. I found a spot to park, pulled in, rolled down the windows, and shut off the engine.

The bustling north side of Terminal Four was on display in front of me. By and large, Airbuses of the U.S. Airways livery were taxing for takeoff to the south runways where the roar of accelerating aircraft reverberated. To the east, I could see the slow descent of aircraft coming in for their landings on the tarmac.

Multiple variations of the A320 and the Boeing 737 touched down during the hour I was there. One Airbus, for reasons indiscernible, didn’t taxi to the south runway for takeoff and, instead, roared off in front of me.

This was the closest I had ever been to the runway with large jet powered aircraft. It is more thrilling than the prop whine of a Cessna 172 I typically hear and see at Prescott Municipal Airport.

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

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Left Brain: April’s mind-full events

Events

2 5

“Astrophotography” • 6 p.m. Wednesday: Jeff Stillman discusses astrophotography at monthly Prescott Astronomy Club meeting. (Yavapai Title Junction, 1235 E. Gurley St.)

Willow Lake Prehistoric Site rededication • 10 a.m. Saturday: Free use day and rededication of the site where it’s believed a large population lived between 850-1025 C.E. Via the Arizona Archeological Society and city of Prescott. (Watson Lake, north shore, CityOf Prescott.Net) “Sammy Keyes & the Killer Cruise” & “Road Rash” • Noon Saturday: Authors Wendelin Van Draanen and Mark Huntley Parsons present their teen mystery and music novels.

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

6

“Journalism & Ethics in the 21st Century” • 2 p.m. Sunday: A short film, “Film in Times of War: The Ray Parker Story,” followed by a symposium about the changing landscape of journalism and ethics in the 21st century, then a photojournalism lecture and competition with Kim Newton, of the University of Arizona, then a memoriam for fallen journalists. (Elks Theatre, 117 E. Gurley St., 928-777-1366)

8

“Filling & Spilling” • 6:30 p.m. Tuesday: Kyle House, of United States Geological Survey Flagstaff, discusses the role of lakes in the origin and evolution of the lower Colorado River. (Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

15

Grace Burford • 5 p.m. Wednesday: Grace Burford, Buddhist scholar, and Tom Fleischner, conservation biologist talk. Campus Conversations event.

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

“Prescott Chinese Pioneers” • 2 p.m. Saturday: Rhonda Tintle Davis discusses the Chinese residents who owned businesses and land, fought, gambled, and participated in the cultural growth of Territorial Prescott. (Sharlot Hall Museum Library & Archives, 115 S. McCormick St., 928-445-2133)

16 17

“Understanding Variation in Plant Communities” • 6 p.m. April 10: Dr. Patrick Alexander, New Mexico State University professor, discusses plant community variation at monthly Arizona Native Plant Society meeting.

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

“Comet Smorgasbord” • 6:30 p.m. Thursday: Dr. Dave Schleicher discusses his research on the physical properties, chemical composition, and behavior of comets. Via Prescott Astronomy Club. Third Thursday Star Talk. (Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1500)

“Mules at the Grand Canyon” • 7 p.m. Thursday: Skull Valley resident Ron Clayton discusses mules at the Grand Canyon at monthly Yarnell Historical Society meeting. (Peeples Valley Schoolhouse, 18205 S. Arizona 89)

“Amazonia Revisited” • 7 p.m. Thursday: Prescott College student Micah Riegner shares cutting-edge research, including identification of a new bird species, from his past two summers in Brazil.

(Trinity Presbyterian Church, 630 Park Ave., 928-778-6502)

12

19

Granite Creek cleanup • 9 a.m. Saturday: Watershed clean up for true trash and potentially reusable material.

(Granite Creek Park, 554 N. Sixth St., 928-445-5669)

Arizona Gives Day • Wednesday: Donation day benefiting Arizona-based nonprofits. Deals and incentives abound. (AZGives.Razoo.Com)

“Adventures of a Curious Traveler” • 2 p.m. Saturday: Leslie Ross, former owner of Kachina Travel, reads from her work.

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

PHOTO: Connie Barlow.

Courtesy photo.

Earth Day events • 10 a.m. Saturday: Earth Day natural history-related info and events. Via Open Space Alliance and Prescott College. (Yavapai County Courthouse Square, 120 S. Cortez St.)

“The Ghost of the Cuban Queen Bordello” • 5 p.m. Thursday: Author Peggy Hicks discuses the sordid history of Jerome and its infamous bordello. Third Thursday Dinner Lecture. (Phippen Museum, 4701 Arizona 89, 928-778-1385, $20-$25)

9 10

“Climate, Trees, & Legacy” • 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 15: Author and activist Connie Barlow discusses climate change and its ramifications for rare and common American trees.

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

18

Moonlight Naturalist Walk • 7:30 p.m. Friday: Experience the wonder of nature at night. (Highlands Center for Natural History, 1375 S. Walker Road, 928-776-9550)

� • EVENTS • APRIL ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

“Taking Caesar Out of Jesus” • 2 p.m. Saturday: Author and ordained Episcopal priest Robert M. Wills reads selections from his new book. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

23

“Days of Remembrance” • 6:30 p.m. Wednesday: Dr. Leo Goldberger, Danish Holocaust survivor, discusses how Danish people defied the Nazis and saved the Jews of Denmark during the Holocaust.

Via Jewish Community Foundation.

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

24

“Falling in Love with the World” • 7 p.m. Thursday: Dr. Tom Fleischner, director of the Prescott College Natural History Institute, discusses natural history — the practice of focused attentiveness to nature.

(Prescott College Crossroads Center, 220 Grove Ave., 928-350-4505)

26

“Growing up in Prescott” • 1 p.m. Saturday: Prescottonian Judy York discusses the history of Prescott. Heritage Conversation. (Phippen Museum, 4701 Arizona 89, 928-778-1385)

“Location Filming in Arizona” • 2 p.m. Saturday: Author Lili DeBarbieri discusses movies and shows shot in the state and other aspects of Arizona film culture.

(Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000) “Starry Nights” • 8 p.m. Saturday: Star party. Via Prescott Astronomy Club. (Vista Park, 1684 Sarafina Drive, 928-778-6502)

29

Ermal Williamson • 3:30 p.m. Tuesday: Poet and author Ermal Williamson discusses his work, which includes body-double work for some Coors Light commercials. (Prescott Public Library, Founders Suite, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-777-1509)

Multi-day Prescott Area Boardgamers • 5 p.m. April 2, 16, & 30: Play board games.

(Prescott Public Library, Bump and Elsea conference rooms, 928-777-1500) Bird walks • 8 a.m. April 4, 10, & 26, and TBA April 16: Bird walks at Stricklin Park, Willow Lake, and Bradshaws, and owling at the Bradshaws.

(Jay’s Bird Barn, No. 113, 1046 Willow Creek Road, 928-443-5900, RSVP) “Fire in the West” • 6:30 p.m. April 2, 9, & 16: Series of firerelated classes including “History of Fires in the West,” “Managing the Risk of Wildfires in the National Forest,” and “Protecting Your Property from Wildfires.” (Highlands Center for Natural History, 1375 S. Walker Road, 928-776-9550, $10-$12 per class, $25-$32 for series, RSVP) Mindfulness meditation • 6:30 p.m. informal sit, 7 p.m. formal sit Tuesdays: Meditation group open to people of all faiths and non-faiths followed by optional discussion. (601 Miller Valley Road, park in back, PrescottVipassana.Org) 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)

April’s art-full events :niarB thgiR

2 3 5

3

Events

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)

10

“52 Views” • 7 p.m. Thursday: Poet Jim Natal reads from his most recent collection. Via Prescott College’s Southwest Writers Series.

(Prescott College Art Gallery at Sam Hill Warehouse, 232 N. Granite St., 928-350-2341)

11 14

“Oleander Girl” • 7 p.m. Friday: Author, poet, activist, and writing teacher Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni reads her work. Via Yavapai College Literary Southwest series. (Yavapai College Library, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2261)

“When My Brother Was an Aztec” • 7 p.m. Monday: Poet Natalie Diaz reads from her book exploring memory’s role in human identity. Via Prescott College’s Southwest Writers Series.

(Prescott College Art Gallery at Sam Hill Warehouse, 232 N. Granite St., 928-350-2341)

16 23 25 26

“Almost Winter” • 5 p.m. Wednesday: Osher Lifelong Learning Institute poetry students read from their new chapbook. (Peregrine Book Co., 219A N. Cortez St., 928-445-9000)

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)

4th Friday Art Walk • 5 p.m. Friday: Monthly art walk including more than 18 galleries, artist receptions, openings, and demonstrations. (ArtThe4th.Com) Mother’s Day Gift Bazaar •12:30 p.m. Saturday: Local artists proffer wares for Mother’s Day gifts. Includes free wellness talk, body sculpt and yoga classes,

“Go With Le Flo” • 6:30 p.m. April 26: A romantic comedy in French and German from two American filmmakers. (Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $5-$8)

Art

“Write Now!” • 9:30 a.m. Saturday: Creative writing conference including “Writing Workout 101” with Laraine Herring, “Conflict and Suspense,” with Kristen Kauffman, and “The Magic of Metaphor,” with Michaela Carter.

Sponsored by the Yavapai College Creative Writing program. (Yavapai College, Building No. 3, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000) Mad Women Poets • 6 p.m. Thursday: Reading in honor of National Poetry Month. (Prescott Public Library, 215 E. Goodwin St., 928-221-2306)

“Così Fan Tutte” • 9:55 a.m. April 26: Via satellite, The Metropolitan Opera’sencore presentation of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s story about testing the ties of love.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $24)

“Distinct & Recent” • From April 4: Spring 2014 juried exhibit of student art from Yavapai College art students. (Yavapai College Art Gallery, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000)

“Slade at the Raven” • March 31-May 18 show, 5 p.m. Thursday April 3 artist reception: New art by Prescott favorite Slade Graves.

(Raven Café, 142 N. Cortez St., 928-717-0009) IMAGE: “Move,” oil on canvas painting by Slade Graves.

Courtesy image. Manipulated. and more. (Body Language Studio, 990 N. Arizona 89, Chino Valley, 928-636-2007) Contra Dance 7 p.m. lessons, 7:30 p.m. dance Saturday: Contra dancing. Calls by Judy Zeidel, music

by Privy Tippers. Via Folk Happens.

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

30

Alberto Álvaro Ríos • 5:30 p.m. Wednesday: Arizona’s Poet Laureate Alberto Álvaro Ríos reads his work.

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

Multi-day Mata Ortiz pottery • 10 a.m. April 12 & 13: Annual pottery show and sale with Lucy Mora and Lorenso Bugarini. (Smoki Museum, 147 N. Arizona Ave., 928-445-1230) “Wonder, Explore, Discover … Art!” • April 12 & 13: Juried art show and sale showcasing the natural wonders of Arizona.

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

Theater & film “Agnes of God” • 7:30 p.m. April 3-5 & 10-12, 2 p.m. April 6 & 12: John Pielmeier’s play about a novice nun who champions a virgin conception. Directed

by Layla Tenney. (Prescott Center for the Arts, 208 N. Marina St., 928-445-3286, $12) “Red Hot Patriot” • 7:30 p.m. April 3-5 & 11 & 12, 2 p.m. April 12: Gail Mangham’s one-woman show about humorist, political columnist, and author Molly Ivins. (Elks Theatre, 117 E. Gurley St., 928-777-1366, $16-$18) “La Boheme” • 9:55 a.m. April 5: Via satellite, The Metropolitan Opera’s presentation of Giacomo Puccini’s story of young love. Starring Anita Hartig.

(Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St., 928-776-2000, $24) Young Playwrights Festival •2 & 6 p.m. April 6: Seven plays written by elementary and high school students.

(Prescott Center for the Arts, 208 N. Marina St., 928-445-3286, $7) “Enchanted April” • 7:30 p.m. April 17-19 & 24-26, 2 p.m. April 19 & 26: Four dissimilar women in 1920s England go on a holiday to a secluded coastal castle in Italy. Directed by Melanie Sapecky.

(Prescott Center for the Arts, 208 N. Marina St., 928-445-3286, $15-$19) Improvitonians • 10 p.m. April 19: Improv comedy at 5,000 feet. (Stage Too, North Cortez Street alley, 928-445-3286, $5)

Youth Scholarship Exhibit • From April 7: an array of styles and media by middle and high school art students competing in Prescott Center for the Arts’ annual scholarship program.

(Prescott Center for the Arts, 208 N. Marina St., 928-445-3286) “When Opposites Attract” • From April 15: Photography by George Lewis and Arlene Minuskin. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223) “Ink Spots & Impressions” • From April 17: A show of diverse forms of fine art printmaking from Christina Altfeld, Karen L. Brown, Donna Carver, Dana Cohn, Carol Darling, Robin Lieske, and Cindi Shaffer.

(Mountain Artists Guild & Gallery, 228 Alarcon St., 928-445-2510) “One Man’s Treasure” • From April 17: Auction preview of recycled art benefitting the Prescott Creeks Preservation Association. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223) Found object show • From April 24: Artists unearth meaning in objets trouves. (’Tis Art Center & Gallery, 105 S. Cortez St., 928-775-0223) PC arts & letters faculty show • Through April 26: Art from Prescott College arts and letters faculty. (Prescott College Art Gallery at Sam Hill Warehouse, 232 N. Granite St., 928-350-2341) “Human Potential” • Through May 1: Rachel Houseman’s “Human Potential” painting series.

(Method Coffee, 3180 Willow Creek Road, 928-777-1067)

�

Undermining underminers How to deal with with garden-variety foes

By Heather Houk I was recently talking to a fellow as he tried to figure out how he knew me. I ran through the unusual occupational or academic paths upon which we may’ve crossed. Then, I mentioned I used to be the Prescott Farmers Market director. He grinned and said, “That’s it.”

This is one of the things I love about Prescott — how friendly and familiar everyone seems to be.

He asked me a question that was a new one for me: “In a nice 20x30-foot garden space, what is your favorite thing to grow?”

It took me a second, but then I could almost taste the sweet, fresh, popping flavor of a young snow pea, which led to a great conversation about Prescott gardening.

As

I left that lovely encounter, I got to thinking about what I want to plant this year.

I’m a pretty traditional organic gardener for our region. I prefer using drip tape to irrigate right at the source of the roots, and I use well-composted horse manure for fertilizer, cardboard for sheet mulch, and tons of mulch on top to keep the cardboard securely in place, increased water holding capacity, and to block out every ounce of light from potential weeds.

Did I mention that I loathe weeding? Well, I do.

One

of the main challenges of gardening here is the ever-present battle with gophers. I’m sure many of you are well-acquainted with the eye twitching frustration that accompanies the sight of a gopher mound where once stood a beautiful tomato or eggplant. Those buggers are my gardening nemeses, and I found a wonderful resource a few years ago that doesn’t kill them but deters them from a particular location, such as your garden or yard.

The smell of castor oil or nibs of corn soaked in castor oil works pretty well at keeping the digging fiends out

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of an area for about a month before reapplication.

It’s not hard to find an all-natural source of castor oil for gardening in catalogues or online. The application is fairly simple: Dilute the liquid form and spray from the center of the garden and move outward to the edges of the area you desire to keep gopher free. For the dried form, just broadcast in the same pattern.

I’m a pacifist when it comes to humans, but gophers send me to the dark side. I’m not afraid to get a gopher trap set when I have to. But, at the heart of it all, I’m lazy and traps require constant checking and (when lucky) emptying. The castor oil approach — though not nearly as satisfying as the trap — requires far less effort.

For this gardener, I would rather plant my seeds and starts, sip lemonade in the shade with my son, and wait for the glorious snow peas to be harvested. By us, of course — not some subterranean rodent. ***** 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@PrescottFarmers Market.Org.

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

brain food 6 tips for a perfect Easter ham

By Jimmy Polinori – The Culinary Composer

Ham has long been the traditional star of the Easter holiday.

Though one may assume that preparing a ham properly is an easy task, it’s actually not as straight forward as one might think. Here are six tips to help you present the perfect ham for Easter or any time you feel so inclined to enjoy the tastes of spring.

Be selective

It’s Easter, not just another Sunday meal. Call your butcher to reserve a good-quality smoked bone-in ham instead of buying from the supermarket. If that doesn’t work, look for online resources that ship overnight. Whether it’s bone-in or partially deboned, order a ham with some kind of bone in it. It will give you a sense of where to take the ham’s temperature to determine doneness, plus, that leftover bone will bring a soup or pot of beans to the next level. Also: Plan to buy at least 1 lb of meat per person so you’ll have plenty of leftovers.

Don’t skip the liquid

Gently cook the ham with at least 1/2 cup of water, wine, stock, or my favorite, pineapple juice, in the pan and cover it with foil to make sure the ham won’t dry out (until you’ve applied the glaze – then the foil comes off).

Throw away that glaze packet

If you purchase your ham at the grocery store, promptly throw out the glaze packet and make your own. My favorite is honey, brown sugar, and pineapple juice.

Find more tips and recipes at

Facebook.Com/TheCulinaryComposer

Don’t glaze too early

To avoid burning the glaze, apply it 15-30 minutes before taking the ham out of the oven, and take a peek once in a while to make sure it’s not burning.

Use your thermometer

Hams are often already cooked (they’re usually smoked and boiled or baked), so don’t go past an internal temperature of 145 degrees – it’ll dry out. Stick a thermometer deep into the ham near the bone to get an accurate reading.

Don’t dig right in

For the ham to be juicy, it needs some time to rest like any other piece of meat. Let it sit for about 20 minutes once it’s out of the oven.

Weddings | Special Occasions | Co Corporate Events

Ingredients for a glaze to amaze!

Call for f a FREE Event E Consultation and Estimate

(602) 790-6828 | facebook.com/dishduet

�ENSESMAG.COM • APRIL ���� • COLUMN • ��

Alan Dean Foster’s Perceivings

By Alan Dean Foster By my admittedly imperfect but likely adequate calculations, I reckon that in the course of my lifetime I’ve seen (Been exposed to? Been infected by?) something like 20,000 TV car commercials.

They first began to impinge on my slowly coagulating consciousness while I was watching “Rocky Jones, Space Ranger,” “The Howdy Doody Show,” and “The Kate Smith Show” (“When the moooon, comes over, the mouuuntain!”) on our black-andwhite blonde console Emerson TV back in the Bronx, New York.

Though no more than between 3 and 5 at the time, one advertisement I distinctly remember was for the Oldsmobile Rocket 88. Not only did this mighty paragon of Detroit steel feature more chrome than typical kitchenette furniture of the ’50s, the hood ornament was an actual rocket!

What could be more appealing to a kid than a rocket except — a rocket coated in chrome. Pretty smart, those Detroit ad guys. Except …

They were wrong. It didn’t work.

At least, in my case they were wrong. Setting aside the fact that, given the way our bureaucracy malfunctions, my dad could probably have obtained a legitimate driver’s license for his gabby 4-year-old, all the Olds 88 advertisements I saw never propagated in me the slightest desire to actually own an Olds 88. But that neat hood ornament, now …

A

lot of science is supposedly put into studying what persuades people to buy specific products. Whole battalions of psychology majors who are otherwise unable to secure actual gainful employment are vacuumed up by the advertising business with the sole agenda of trying to learn what makes folks buy this and ignore that. We’ve

Fallaces of advertising #8C (Eight Cylinders) identified the regions of the brain that respond to pleasure, and to disappointment, to satisfaction and to pain. But we still haven’t isolated that special, still sought-after corner of the amygdale that contains the specific network of “Buy!” neurons.

It’s entirely possible that this Holy Grail of Madison Avenue doesn’t actually exist.

By way of proof, I offer those 20,000 car commercials. Most, I ignored, notwithstanding the often exquisite locations (“See the USA, in your Chevrolet!”); the music that ran the gamut from Hendrix to Hermann, hip-hop to Holst; and, increasingly, the elaborate digital special effects.

Oh, I remember the advertisements. That’s selfevident. A few I even enjoyed, for their own sake.

Among so many efforts directed toward any goal, a few must perforce prove memorable. So many that I sometimes wonder why the big car manufacturers just don’t buy one of the major networks.

Why place thousands of expensive Ford ads on CBS when you could just buy CBS, rename it the Ford channel, and deny access to all your competitors?

But not one, not a single one, of those thousands and thousands of ads ever persuaded me to even look at a certain car — much less buy one.

I doubt I’m alone in this. In fact, I suspect that I’m in the majority.

We

chat) sells cars. The recommendations of friends and neighbors sell cars. Not fast music. Not driving cars on beaches. Not helicoptering them to the top of buttes in Monument Valley or Canyon de Chelly. Not draping the impossibly handsome driver with even more impossibly beautiful women.

We car buyers are not handsome, we don’t listen to music that loud, we don’t drive on beaches (much less atop buttes in Monument Valley) and we sure as hell don’t know any women who look like the ones in your ads, nor do we for one second believe that buying and driving your particular vehicle will suddenly make us irresistible to such exotic representatives of the opposite gender. We want reliable, reasonably priced, decent-looking vehicles that fit our individual wants. Preferably obtained via a buying process that doesn’t entail dealing with characters who are all shady versions of William Macy’s persona in “Fargo,” so that after we’ve made the second biggest purchases (after a home) of our lives we can drive away feeling that we’ve acquired something worthwhile and that we haven’t been cheated.

And if you think that interminable hammering of your product via television commercials is accomplishing that, then the only ones believing your own hooey for the last three-quarters of a century is you.

Or, to put it more succinctly: It’s. Bad. Science.

buy our cars based on research that we conduct ourselves, on recommendations ***** from friends, on whatever dealer or individual Alan Dean Foster is author of more than 120 gives us good value for our hard-earned cash, books, visitor to more than 100 countries, and and on personal or family need. Not because of still frustrated by the human species. Follow him the dozens of flashy, incredibly expensive adverat AlanDeanFoster.Com. tisements that afflict the airwaves during the commercial breaks for some of our favorite shows. We don’t buy new cars because of heavyhanded product placement (“Transformers,” I’m looking at you) or because our hometown quarterback drives one (we know he’s only driving it because the manufacturer gave it to him), or because it goes 8,000 mph (“professional driver, closed track: do not attempt”), or because it’s somehow favored by giant dancing hamsters.

Do you hear me, Detroit? IT DOESN’T WORK! Television and movie advertising don’t sell cars.

I don’t care what your “audience Images via research” says. Researchers have their All-Free-Download.Com. own agenda. Reliability ratings sell cars. Social media (person-to-person Illustrations by 5enses.

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A HAPPY MEDIU M Chalk It Up! returns to Prescott

By James Dungeon

Maybe

Onlookers enjoy street art at Chalk it Up! 2013.

Photo by Tim Adams.

you shouldn’t read too much about Chalk It Up! It might be more fun to stumble upon it. That approach certainly worked out well for Susan Crutcher.

“My first time, I was probably coming from coffee, going back home, and I saw something was going on,” said Crutcher, who happened upon a couple of dozen people milling about the parking lot at the corner of Sheldon and Montezuma streets in Prescott circa 2009. “I just walked around and started talking to people.”

As she paced the lot, she spied chalk drawings of animals and people and more of all shapes and sizes. She’d discovered a chalk art gallery.

“I was surprised to see it, but it also felt somehow fitting,” Crutcher said. “It was fun, and I asked what I could do to make it happen again.”

That’s how she ended up on the board of the annual Chalk It Up! event.

In the past five years, it’s grown from some 400 artists to more than 1,200. That includes everyone from featured professionals who construct huge, elaborate pieces during the course of two days to children and older folks who sketch a few figures during the course of minutes.

Last year, the event drew between 2,000 and 3,000 people. This year, when the National Bank of Arizona closes its 201 N. Montezuma St. parking lot to traffic and opens it up to the community for the sixth annual event — Saturday and Sunday, May 3 and 4 — Crutcher expects even more.

“It’s grown and grown,” she said.

“We’re still growing, but there are some changes, and it’s going to be a watershed year.”

That’s because … wait, you didn’t think we’d give away the whole story in the first section, did you?

CONTINUED ON PAGE �� >>>

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... FROM PAGE 13 Taking chances Chalk It Up! seems pretty straightforward. And, in many ways, it is. Show up and take a look around.

Sign up (it’s free) and get a 12-piece box of chalk.

Still, surprises abound.

“Chalk behaves differently on the street than it does on a flat surface,” said Prescott artist Dana Cohn. “People are starting to learn that if you crush it up, wet, and brush it on, though, it’s like painting.”

Chalk is not his primary medium. (That’s painting.) However, he’s been involved with Chalk It Up! since the get-go.

“That first year, I was trying to get a feel for how to do it,” Cohn said. “Who knew the event would be so popular?”

As he’s honed his technique, Cohn’s taken cues from some of the younger folks who attend.

“The children are fearless,” Cohn said. “They’ll try anything with art. And, when something blows in the wind, they’ll chase it, you know? And that spirit, that energy, makes the whole thing more fun.”

As such, Cohn’s chalk art often embraces whimsy.

“Whatever you do with chalk, it’s going to be destroyed pretty quick,” he said. “That frees you to take a lot of risks that you might not do in the studio.”

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Mediums & platforms Tempe artist Holly Schineller is no stranger to chalk art. In fact, she travels quite a bit to attend events like Prescott’s Chalk It Up! despite the fact that her bread and butter is glasswork.

“I tell everyone about the Prescott event, and when I do that, I talk about it as a model event,” Schineller said. “At a lot of these things, they separate the professionals from the walkups, but in Prescott, everyone’s side-by-side, and it breaks down the wall of who’s a ‘real artist’ and who isn’t.”

Schineller often incorporates scientific themes into her artwork to highlight the overlap between the seemingly disparate fields.

“I like to bridge the gap between art and real life,” she said. “Street art is a way to do that.”

Schineller’s 2013 Chalk It Up! piece included overlapping color spheres in the center of celestial imagery. She wanted to spark conversations about the coloring of astrophotography.

“Sometimes those colors are accurate, but often they’re coded to specific elements,” Schineller said.

“At some point someone decides that, ‘OK, carbon dioxide will be blue.’”

Other pieces she’s worked on include an homage to stem cell research and a piece celebrating the importance of honeybees.

(And, as long as we’re getting technical: Chalk art is primarily made with soft pastels, not chalk proper. The former sticks better.)

Opportunities After the sixth annual Chalk It Up! event, three of the all-volunteer board’s five members are stepping down.

“We know what’s happening this year,” Crutcher said. “Beyond this point? We don’t know yet.”

The biggest expense is chalk. In 2013, the tab came to $2,800, a cost shouldered by a coterie of sponsors and organizations.

The larger issue, though, is oversight. Crutcher confirmed one organization has expressed interest in taking over, but there’s been no formal action.

“We’ve got a good foundation — a package that could continue to thrive in the community,” Crutcher said. “It could take on new dimensions, as well.”

Volunteers are always welcome, she added.

There’s one aspect of Chalk It Up!,that’s unlikely to

change, no matter who’s at the helm: Spontaneous interactions.

“One of my favorite memories of the event is this little girl, 5 or 6, who came on a Sunday dressed in little pink finery,” Crutcher said, grinning at the story before she could start it. “She’s there with her aunt or grandmother and sits down next to this big burly guy — tank top, lots of tattoos.

“He keeps looking at her and what’s she’s doing, and the adult keeps pulling her back, ever so slightly. Well, he finally reaches over and points to something on her chalk piece and asks her, ‘How did you do that?’ She looks at him and says, ‘Well, first, tell me where you got all those marks on your arms.’ Then they’re all laughing, and she reaches over and shows him something on his piece, and they’re talking and exchanging chalk.”

Those are the kind of interactions Chalk It Up! is all about, Crutcher said.

“Those are two people who probably would’ve never exchanged greetings or given each other eye contact anywhere else,” she said. “I love it.” ***** Visit Chalk It Up! at PrescottChalkArt.Com. See Dana Cohn’s artwork at DanaCohn.Com. See Holly Schineller’s artwork at Facebook.Com/Holly Grounded.

James Dungeon is a figment of his own imagination. And he likes cats. Contact him at James DungeonCats@Gmail.Com.

CLOCKWISE, FROM TOP LEFT: Dana Cohn brings a giraffe to life; a girl gets her hands (and knees) dirty for the sake of art; Holly Schineller and family pose around an art piece celebrating astrophotography; a group of people enjoy chalk art festivities; a man decorates a 3-D collaborative piece; Lori Antoinette checks her art piece against her reference material.

Photos by Tim Adams and David Cottle.

15

News From the Wilds Prescott weather Average high temperature: 66.9 F, +/-3.9 Average low temperature: 34.3 F, +/-3.2 Record high temperature: 88 F, 2012 Record low temperature: 11 F, 1899 Average precipitation: 0.9”, +/-1.13 Record high precipitation: 6.9”, 1926 Record high snowfall: 9.8”, 1964 Record low precipitation: 0”, 7.4 percent of all years Max daily precipitation: 3.4”, April 17, 1917

Collared Lizards are in peak breeding plumage now, and males, such as this, often sun on rocks. Photo by Ty Fitzmorris.

By Ty Fitzmorris

April,

in most years, is the raucous, enlivening yawp of life in the wilds after the long quiet of winter. While snowstorms are still a possibility, the majority of the month is sunny and warm, with extraordinary proliferations of butterflies, returning migratory birds, native bees, growing and flowering plants, and mammals in the thrall of mating and bearing young. There is more activity in the natural world than can be easily followed, and the flowering of plants, emergence of insects, return of migrant birds and bats, and the appearance of mammalian young all typically follow a somewhat regular schedule.

This, year, however, has continued to follow an unusual dry trend for our region and represents a very different kind of year from the usual.

In our 115-year record, there’ve only been two years — 1972 and 2002 — when January-March precipitation has netted less than 15 percent of average for that three month period.

In Prescott, 2002 is keenly remembered because it marked both the Indian Fire, which firefighters narrowly kept from burning the city, and the mass die-off of drought-stricken Ponderosas — which in some areas, such as Crown King, reached 80 percent of the forest cover.

Bark

beetles thrive in these driest years and become particularly problematic in forests that have experienced longterm fire suppression, such as most of those in western North America.

Fire suppression causes forests to become overcrowded, and when water is scarce, more trees compete for it. Higher densities of these stressed trees provide bark beetles with enough food and habitat to reach epidemic proportions and overwhelm trees that might otherwise be able to fight them off.

The primary species of bark beetles include those in the genera Ips and Dendroctonus, with as many as 12 species occupying a forest stand. These beetles are emerging from their winter refugia now and

�� • FEATURE • APRIL ���� • �ENSESMAG.COM

beginning to colonize trees that are weakened or injured. Most are the size and color of mouse droppings and leave tell-tale sawdust piles at the base of excavated trees.

Even

in extraordinary years such as this one, the wilds have a tendency to adapt in ways that prevent most species from becoming too destabilized.

Many plants flower early, providing food sources for insects that are hurrying to find mates and lay eggs.

Young mammals emerge from their dens and begin the long process of learning to forage and navigate their landscapes, preying on the early insects and plants.

Butterflies, the real vanguard of spring, fly in amazing diversity, mating and laying eggs. Look especially for orange and black checkerspots, commas, and question-marks, yellow and sometimes blue swallowtails, dark, low-flying iridescent skippers, and soaring, gold-tinged Mourning Cloaks. In some areas without flowers, many of these species can be seen drinking the sap of

Source: Western Regional Climate Center

tree wounds and from damp patches of mud along riversides, where they gather crucial minerals and salts Please join Prescott Creeks on Saturday, April 19th in their annual Granite Creek Cleanup to celebrate Earth Day. The cleanup is 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. Since the first event in 2007, volunteers have removed 36 tons of litter from our watershed’s creeks.

These volunteers perform a critical service to our area’s wild lands by maintaining creek quality. Visit PrescottCreeks.Org for more information.

Tuesday, April 22 is Earth Day, now in its 44th year. It’s our only holiday exclusively dedicated to the celebration of our natural world. ***** 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@PeregrineBook Company.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 • Black Bear cubs cautiously emerge from dens with their mothers and begin learning to forage for grubs, leaves, and roots.

• Leaf-buds of Gambel Oak and Aspen swell nearly to opening.

• Porcupines give birth late in the month, usually to one baby, and spend more time than usual on the ground. Porcupines feed on the inner bark of conifers, including Douglas Fir and Ponderosa Pine, and can live up to 10 years. They do not, in fact, throw their spines, but rather raise and swing their tails when threatened.

• Long-tailed Weasels give birth to four-five young.

Visit: Maverick Mountain Trail, No. 65.

Ponderosa Pine forests • Ponderosas “weep” sap from their branchtips creating a slight daytime rain of small, watery sap drops. Pines may release sap for several reasons including the movement of water and sap into their growing branch-tips, defense against insect pests — notably bark beetles — and most unusually, to communicate with other trees. As the chemical composition of one tree’s sap changes in response to pest attacks, it can trigger similar changes in nearby trees that fortify them against the pests.

• Bark beetles, including the infamous Ips beetles, emerge from soil and begin excavating nuptial chambers in Ponderosas. Healthy Ponderosas can fight off a beetle infestation, but in drought years, such as this one — which are worsened by the overcrowding of trees that has resulted from the last century of fire-suppression — beetles may overwhelm tree defenses and kill many trees. Interestingly, though, it is not the beetles themselves that kill the trees but, rather, fungi that the beetles carry that infects the living wood of the tree thus making it digestible for the beetles.

Visit: Miller Creek Trail, No. 367.

Pine-Oak woodlands • Acorn Woodpeckers continue breeding and tending young. These woodpeckers are unusual in that they nest in colonies and tend the young of other, often related, nestmates.

• Coyote pups emerge from their dens, though the group of siblings will remain together for up to a year before pairing off with members of other families and establishing their own packs.

• Valerian begins flowering. This plant is used as a muscle relaxant, sedative, and soporific.* • Black, Gray, and Arizona Oaks change color and drop last year’s leaves, as they grow soft, lighter-colored ones.

Visit: Little Granite Mountain Trail, No. 37.

Pinyon-Juniper woodlands • Lemonadeberry (Rhus trilobata) flowers.

This species gets its name from its tasty, though sour, berries, which can be used to make a lemonade-type drink.* • Cliff-rose (Purshia stansburiana) begins flowering, drawing flies and small halictid bees to its blooms.

• Juniper pollen begins to noticeably decline.

• White-tailed and Mule Deer shed their antlers.

• Ringtails, cat-like relatives of Raccoons, begin mating.

Visit: Tin Trough Trail, No. 308.

Grasslands • Spring butterflies fly in dazzling diversity.

Look for fritillaries, sulphurs, blues, duskywings, and swallowtails.

• Many flowers bloom, especially at low and mid elevations. Look for the small yellow flowers of Barberry (Berberis haematocarpa), visited by native bees, and the fragile white flowers of Evening Primrose (Camissonia brevipes), visited by evening moths.

• Parry’s Agave begins growing its long, asparagus-like flowering stalk. Though these agaves flower only once, the plant itself does not die but resprouts a new rosette of leaves from its base after flowering. The flowers are visited by many species of insects, birds, and bats.

Visit: Mint Wash Trail, No. 345.

Buckeyes (Junonia coenia) abound near perennial streams. This one has lost part of its wing, likely to a bird attack. Photo by Ty Fitzmorris.

Rivers, lakes, & streams • Creeks running feebly, with spring algae growth, while water striders reach full size and hunt for other insects on the water’s surface.

• Several additional species of swallows, including Violet-Green and Barn Swallows, return from their overwintering areas in Central and South America, following the wave of emerging insects north.

• Canyon Treefrogs (Hyla arenicolor) emerge from their winter refuges.

• Summer Tanagers return from Central and South America in full breeding plumage, brilliant scarlet for males, and yellow for females.

• Damselflies, including indigo bluets and iridescent rubyspots, emerge from their aquatic pupae in the lower riparian areas. Dragonflies also appear now.

• Riparian trees sprout leaves, including Velvet Ash, Arizona Sycamore, Fremont Cottonwood, and Boxelder.

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

Deserts/Chaparral • Sugar Sumac (Rhus glabra) flowers. It is named for its sugary sap, which has been used as a sweetener. The berries, though edible, are sour.*

• Iridescent tiger beetles (subfamily Cicindelinae) emerge from their pupae and begin hunting for flies and other insects. These beetles are among our most spectacular insects — iridescent green and purple with cream-colored spots — though they are difficult to see. They often fly ahead of hikers on trails, landing and running quickly, and can sometimes be seen with binoculars.

• Eastern Collared Lizards (Crotophytus collaris) can be seen sunning on rocks in riparian uplands. These brightly colored lizards are predators of small insects, mammals, and reptiles.

• False Mock-orange (Fendlera rupicola) begins flowering and is visited by bumblebees and carpenter bees.

• Ocotillos, paloverdes, Creosotebush, and Velvet Mesquite flower, thus drawing an extraordinary diversity of native bees.

Visit: Agua Fria National Monument. *Always consult with a trained professional before ingesting any part of a wild plant.

This information is not intended to encourage the attempted use of any part of a plant, either for nutritive or medicinal purposes.

Night skies April 8: Mars at opposition. This is the closest that Mars comes to Earth, and also when the full disc of the planet is illuminated. A medium-sized telescope will reveal details of the planet’s surface, and possibly its polar icecaps.

April 15: Full moon at 12:42 a.m.

April 15: Total lunar eclipse from 11:30 p.m. to 2 a.m.

Arizona is in the direct path of this event as the moon moves through the center of the Earth’s shadow. The moon will darken then turn to a dark red from 12:06 to 1:24, after which

it will grow brighter until 2am, when it reaches normal illumination.

April 22: Lyrid Meteor Shower peak. This moderate shower will peak after midnight, and will be somewhat washed out by the waning third-quarter moon, though many bright meteors will still be visible.

April 28: New moon at 11:14 p.m.

Astronomical Highlight: Three of the five visible planets can be seen at the same time this month. Mars and Saturn are rising in the east in the evening, while Jupiter is setting, not to reappear in the evening sky until early 2015. Mars, our nearest planetary neighbor, is at its most visible since it is on the far side of us from the Sun, at opposition, and so appears full. Mars is in the constellation Virgo, which is most notable for its brightest star, Spica. Saturn is nearing opposition also, which it will reach in early May, but its rings are beautifully visible with binoculars. Jupiter is heading around the far side of the Sun, but still offers beautiful views of its four brightest moons just after dusk.

��

Notes on notation

How can there be wrong notes when there aren’t any notes at all?

By Jonathan Best “The piano ain’t got no wrong notes.”

-Thelonius Monk

I’m

always on the lookout for things that get in the way of us being our complete musical selves. If we identify these blocks, we can learn to dance around them. And we can sing while we dance.

One of the blocks is notation. It affects us all — even those of us who don’t read or try to read music. That’s because notation affects the way our culture perceives music. We think of music as inherently more complex than it really is. It can be complex if we want it to be, but so can conversation and that doesn’t stop most of us from speaking.

Music notation and music complexity evolved together. The first notes were simply reminders, which is why they were called “notes.” Notes took many forms over the course of centuries from places like Mesopotamia to ancient Greece, but the trajectory that led to modern Western notation started in the middle of the ninth century.

People wrote diagonal lines called “neumes” above the words of poems set to music to indicate where the melody went up or down.

It took another 50 years to place the neumes at varying heights above the words to suggest the shape of the melody. Then people started drawing horizontal lines to really zero in on the pitch. They started with a red line, then they added a yellow line, and, by the 11th century, they had four lines.

The fifth line took another 200 years.

Rhythm was another matter. The notation of rhythm started with rhythmic modes. There were six of them in the 11th century, and they were based on the cadences of poetic verse that people of the time were already familiar with.

In the next century, composers started dissecting rhythms into discreet parts using different note heads with names like “long,” “double long,” “breve,” and “semibreve,” which would be subdivided into twos and threes as the imperfect and the perfect, respectively. These were interpreted by their relationship to each other. Pretty complicated, huh? Time signatures and bar lines weren’t invented until well into the fourteenth century.

Why was it so difficult to nail this stuff down?

They’d been doing it with words for hundreds of years. Maybe the task of notating music was akin to graphing out the experience of eating an apple pie.

My

theory is that in the beginning, individual notes didn’t exist outside the words and melody and all the indescribable nuances of the song. The concept of individual notes had to be created right along with the notation that was being invented. To parcel everything out was a technological feat on par with extracting iron from ore. The music they already had couldn’t be written down so they had to create music that could be.

There was a time when you could sing a song to someone and they could sing it to someone else and other people could join in, just like in any conversation. And when the singing stopped, the song would only exist in memory, ready to evolve into new permutations whenever it was sung again. I look at this time as a kind of Garden of Eden, a time of musical innocence before notation begot the song as a fixed entity. It was hundreds of years before printing technology provided for the selling of songs. The printing of notation grew from the technology that was used to make maps, so I guess we could call musical notation just another map. And you know what they say about maps and the territory.

However you look at notation, it affects us all. Whether you Full Service Certifications & Renewals can effortlessly read whatever “music” is placed in front of you or if you’ve managed to keep written music out of your life completely, Prescott - Prescott Valley it’s hard to escape from Cottonwood - Flagstaff the paradigm of music that’s broken down into individual parts. The Must present coupon at clinic appt. one coupon per patient no cash value. recent med records required. expires 2-28-2014 truth, instead, is that it simply flows through us a like a river.

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Jonathan Best.

Photo by Ramona Smith.

You can put your bucket in the river and attempt to distill it down to its essentials or you can jump in and swim. I invite you to travel with me back to that Garden of Eden before notation, where anyone can sing because there are not notes to be sharp or flat of, where melodies are like tree branches or mountain ridges, where you can learn new songs by listening to birds and you can learn complex rhythms from frogs.

How

do we get there? One way is to teach music to kids. When I teach kids, it’s really just pretend because they’re really teaching me how to hear music in its primordial form.

I still remember the first time I did a playshop with preschoolers. I had to listen very closely to their groove. The only way I could really grok it was to dance to it. It was unlike anything I’d heard before. It would’ve been impossible to notate, but I sure could move to it, and the more I moved, the more it made sense.

I had a 6-year-old student who began developing his own notation. It looked something like this: 2134 1332 1221 1 1 Each piece started at the bottom of the page and went up. The left digit represented the left middle finger. The right digit represented the right middle finger. The middle digits represented the index fingers. Those fingers could play any four consecutive white keys. The numbers represented the order of notes. Blanks meant that those keys weren’t played. He would have to remember the four consecutive keys, although he would experi-

CONTINUED PAGE �� >>>

... FROM PAGE �� ment with different placements. He would also remember the rhythms, which were sometimes very complex. After careful listening, I determined that one piece was in 15/8 time.

In

a certain way, my own musical development followed a path similar to that of the musical explorers of ancient times in that I had no musical training. My inspiration came from the sounds the piano made when I cleaned the ivories as one of my household chores.

I started writing songs down when I was 12. I wanted to make a songbook, so I looked at songbooks around the house and saw that they put sharps and flats at the beginning of the staves to save the trouble of putting them in front of each note that needed them. For instance, if most of the Cs were sharp-ed you could just put a C# in the beginning of each staff. I didn’t know anything about keys, so my key signatures looked like nothing you’d recognize if you went to music school. I sang melodies that sounded good to me and made

up chords that sounded good with the melodies.

I discovered my songbooks later in life and was very intrigued by the odd chord arrangements. One book had a section that went counterclockwise around the circle of fifths. I didn’t know what a circle of fifths was, of course, but it sure sounded cool to me.

Looking through the songbooks today, I see some of the same modes that were used by the churches in Gregorian times and the Greeks before them. These songbooks give me my own unique path back to the Garden.

I

was also fortunate to be inspired through my work with the Maasai in Kenya. Neither their spoken language nor their music is written down.

Music and dance (one word: osingolio) are still passed down through the generations while constantly evolving with the changing times. While their music may sound very complex to our ears with its polyrhythms and compound time signatures, it’s very familiar to them and uses motifs passed down through generations. Get a taste of their music/dance at ComMUSIKey.Org. If you read music and you like to play Mozart, you can make it your own. Mozart has long ago

let it go so you are free to do with it what you will.

Play “notes” that aren’t on the map. Play “notes” that neither you nor Mozart intended. And the next time you have musical inspiration and you want to write it down, remember that the notes you write are just reminders of where to look the next time you want to play it. Know that when you get there, it won’t be the same place you remember.

There are many paths back to the Garden.

Maybe you could follow a Gregorian Chant map back to our innocence.

Music is who we are. Let us be who we are. Let us not be notes. ***** Originally published in the Fall 2013 issue of Connections, a Music For People publication.

Visit them online at MusicForPeople.Org. Jonathan Best, music gardener, is a graduate of Music for People’s Musician Leadership Program and is founder of comMUSIKey, a non-profit organization dedicated to building community through all-inclusive, participatory music. Find out more at ComMUSIKey.Org.

Prescott Film Festival’s SCRIPT NOTES

Funny business

By Helen Stephenson

What’s

the most difficult genre to write?

Ask a random group of screenwriters and they’ll usually say comedy.

What’s the most difficult genre to direct? Ask a random group of directors and they’ll usually say comedy.

That’s why, when the programming department of the Prescott Film Festival finds a high-quality comedy film, they justhaveta grab it to share with their audience.

Ergo, on 6:30 p.m. Saturday, April 26, a fun romantic indie comedy will light up the screen at the Yavapai College Performing Arts Center. That film is “Go With Le Flo,” which is in French and German (with English subtitles) and was filmed in Berlin by two American filmmakers. It’s an early Official Selection for the fifth annual Prescott Film Festival.

Here’s a blurb about the film from a reviewer at The Independent Critic: “Director Michael Glover is spontaneous and spirited enough to breathe life into the familiar with

some interesting twists, entertaining asides, and an absolutely delightful cast that keeps you completely entertained. Denis Aubert’s performance is one of heart, humor and honest goodness and stays with you long after the closing credits have rolled on by. …

You can’t help but fall madly in love with Marina Senckel from the first moment she pops up on the screen.”

Tickets are $8 for general admission and $5 for students from any school and Yavapai College employees.

Buy ’em at PrescottFilmFestival.Com. But wait, there’s more!

sion to the evening feature. ***** 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, 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.

Courtesy image.

Saturday,

April 26 is also Volunteer Appreciation and Sign Up Day. Anyone interested in signing up to volunteer for the Prescott Film Festival or the Yavapai College Performing Arts Center should show up at 4 p.m. for some fun snacks and special short films just for our faithful volunteers. Find out about open positions within these nonprofits and become part of one or both of these teams and help bring entertainment and the arts to Yavapai County. Volunteers enjoy free admis-

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

The quest for greater firepower has produced some sophisticated inventions over the years. One rather unusual weapon was the Puckle Gun, named for its English inventor, James Puckle, in 1718.

It was an early attempt at a machine gun that used a flintlock mechanism and black powder. The weapon was mounted on a tripod and used a revolving block that carried either seven or nine bullets. It was rumored that it would fire round bullets for Christian enemies and square bullets for Turks.

ODDLY ENOUGH ... This gun is mentioned in the transcripts of a trial in 1722. According to the account, this weapon was successfully fired 63 times in seven minutes by one man — in the rain!

In the late 1940s, the Zippo Lighter Company produced a 1947 Chrysler novelty car to help advertise its product. When opened, the “lighter caps” revealed stunning neon flames. Unfortunately, the car was so heavy that ruptured tires posed a constant problem. In the 1950s, the car was sent to a vehicle dealership for refitting and body modifications.

ODDLY ENOUGH ... While modificaitons were discussed, the original Zippo car disappeared. No one seems to know what ever became of it. ***** Russell Miller is an illustrator, cartoonist, writer, bagpiper, motorcycle enthusiast, and reference librarian. Currently, he illustrates books for Cody Lundin and Bart King.

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Holistic Fitness

By Lauren Antrosiglio

Unless

you’ve been under a rock, you’ve probably heard of the raw food craze.

(I apologize to those of you who have, in fact, been living under rocks — I’ll catch you up.)

The underlying philosophy for most devotees of a raw food diet is something like this: “Eating foods in their raw, unadulterated state is eating them as they grow in nature and allows us to absorb a much larger amount of nutrients from the food that would be lost if it was cooked.”

Some facets of this are true, some not-so-true, and some just plain false.

Here are some of the benefits said to be associated with going raw: Better assimilation of nutrients and enzymes from food?

Cooking food above 118 degrees Fahrenheit supposedly destroys many of the nutrients in food as well as the enzymes that help our bodies digest these foods. However, digestive enzymes are actually produced by our bodies — we don’t need to eat digestive enzymes in order to complete the process of digestion.

When we eat food, our bodies naturally break down the enzymes in the food to extract the amino acids for absorption.

Increased energy?

When someone who’s been eating mostly cooked or processed foods switches to a diet based on healthier whole foods, there’s often a perceived increase in energy. If everyone increased the amount of green, leafy vegetables and healthy raw fruits they ate, they’d undoubtedly see a nice energy boost regardless of whether the foods were raw or cooked.

The real raw deal Better sleep?

Raw foodists claiming better sleep as a result of their diets could be experiencing this because of their diet change, or it could be their increased green leafy vegetable intake. Green leafies are chock full of Mother Nature’s sleep regulators — magnesium, calcium, and potassium — and this could account for their better quality of sleep.

Less money for groceries?

Seems intuitive, right? And you’ll probably find that your grocery bill comes down quite a bit when you’re on a raw food diet. However, many raw food blogs are bursting with recipes that include additional ingredients. This is to say nothing of the expense of organic vegetables and fruits. If you start buying all organic and buying for elaborate recipes, your grocery bill may actually climb, not fall.

Raw foods correct the body’s pH balance?

For the most part, cooking a food doesn’t affect it’s acidity or alkalinity. There are some foods that do change from acid to alkaline or vice versa when cooked, but they’re the minority. One can work on managing the body’s pH levels by buying a pH level guide to foods (or checking one out from the library).

A cleaner kitchen?

If you aren’t using pots and pans, your kitchen does stay much cleaner.

No oily messes; no leftovers to keep or throw away. However, you’ll need a lot of counter space for all of the sprouting, chopping, and mixing you’ll be doing.

ently, on a raw food diet, we would’ve needed more hours than there are in a day to consume enough food to build brains so large. Scientists determined that the human brain began to grow at a very speedy rate 1.6 to 1.8 million years ago during the age of our ancestors, Homo erectus.

It was during this time that Homo erectus began roasting vegetables and meat over a fire.

Another study done on a large group of both men and women who had been consuming an all-raw or partially raw foods diet for a long period of time found that most of the subjects who had been consuming an allraw foods diet were underweight and that the all-raw female subjects experienced Amenorrhea — the lack of a regular menstrual period.

For these and the above reasons, I wouldn’t recommend a long-term all-raw diet for anyone.

A short stint, or even a

fast, may be beneficial, though.

Simply adding more green leafy vegetable and fruits into your diet, however, helps you to experience many of the benefits associated with a healthy diet.

So eat ’em raw if you like — just make sure to eat your vegetables. ***** 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@PrescottPersonal Training.Com.

?

Images via All-Free-Download.Com and VintagePrintable.Com. Illustration by 5enses.

Altogether,

the raw food craze comes from a good place.

In fact, a recent study in Cancer Prevention Research claims that eating raw garlic twice a week may cut your risk of cancer in half.

What we must concern ourselves with, though, is the natural process of evolution. A study in the venerable Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concludes that our brains evolved to be what they are today because of cooking. Appar-

�ENSESMAG.COM • APRIL ���� • COLUMN • ��

Mike’s Musical Musings

Digital dearth & dilema

By Mike Vax I just had an interesting exchange on an online music chat list. The topic: “The Price of Music.”

Two major themes were that the ways in which recorded music is sold have changed and that this and other changes in recent years haven’t been good for musicians.

If you trace the history of recorded material — disregarding wax cylinders in the early days — it all started with 78 rpm records. (A footnote for you younger readers: If you dropped them they broke.) In the beginning, they were fairly thick and only recorded on one side. Not long after that, technology got better and you could actually record songs to both sides. They revolved pretty fast on the turntable, and you could only fit a bit over three minutes on a side. These lasted the longest of any

listening medium when you consider that they lasted from the early 1900s through the 1940s and early ’50s.

Then things changed quite a bit.

We had 33 1/3 long-play albums, each side of which could replay about 25 minutes of music. There also were 45 rpm singles with one tune to a side. The ’45s were mainly used to sell pop music, not jazz or classical.

Tape came into play in the ’50s.

We had 8-track tapes that were in a plastic container; they were fairly big and bulky and very frustrating as they had to click into different tracks and interrupt the music for a second.

The most popular form at that time, came next: the cassette. It was small, had pretty good sound, and didn’t have to click over to change tracks. For real audiophiles, there was also reel-to-reel tape that could be played and used to record on machines of higher quality. It was also possible, for the first time, for anyone to take a blank cassette or reel and make their own recordings.

This could be done with live music or by copying existing recordings.

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This

became the beginning of one of the biggest problems in the history of musical performance. I speak, of course, of pirating the product that musicians produce. People could buy an album and then make copies of that recording for their friends. They could even record a live concert and then make copies to give away. With every copy they made, it became a lost possible sale of the recording. It wasn’t too long before actual pirates decided that they could make copies and sell them. This endeavor became known as bootlegging music.

Starting in the late 1980s, when digital recording and reproduction came into play, things started changing really fast. The CD was much smaller, held a lot more music, and was easier to carry than a cassette.

The sound was cleaner, and the medium became smaller.

The iPod changes things again, and mp3 files rose to prominence.

One small device could hold literally thousands of tunes. When people found out how to download music and shares with others at no cost, things got even worse for musicians.

People could download music instantaneously, regardless of whether they were paying for it or stealing it.

And, today, there’s also streaming music — a radio-like technology that allows you to listen to music without retaining the associated files.

Yes,

as a listener, these are all great new ways of getting music. But they’ve also devastated musicians.

There’s been a lot of discussion about how big record companies have been hurting musicians for years via lack of royalties and that downloading hurts those companies.

But, what the music buying (and/ or stealing) public forgets is that the people hurt most — ALWAYS — are the musicians. This is especially true of artists who put out their recordings or work with small, independent labels.

All of these downloads and streams mean that, in the not-toodistant future, there’ll be a lot less professionally recorded material out there. What people don’t seem to realize is that for most of us who finance our own CDs the only way to recoup that money is by selling actual CDs. (Or, perhaps, download cards.) The 1o-99 cents per turn that we might make from Internet sales

— if consumers actually paid those fees — would never cover the cost of making our recordings, much less give us any reasonable profit. Most of us who peddle our own product do it at live concerts and on our own websites. But, because of easier downloading, independent websites have plummeted in recent years.

I

offer two important arguments why you’d be better off “saving your pennies” and actually buying a physical CD rather than downloading a couple of tunes on the Internet.

1.) Consider a high school band, orchestra, or vocal group. When they prepare for a spring concert, the teacher programs music at different tempos, feelings, key signatures, and styles. This is so the concert shows the audience where a musical group is at that moment; it’s a showcase for all of the members’ work. The same logic applies to a CD. When you download one or two tunes from an album, you have no idea where a band is at that moment. That might work for some teenybopper who only wants to hear the latest hit from a rock idol, but it won’t work for someone who wants to hear creative music.

2.) The liner notes that come with an album are really important because they tell the reader/listener about the band, the musicians, the music, and, many times, about the time in which the music was recorded. There’s as much history in an album’s liner notes as there is in any book on music or music history.

(Yes, some digital downloads include these documents, but the files sit dormant on many computers.)

Regardless of your option, I hope this column gives you, the reader, something to think about in terms of how you consume music. The discussion starts with buying albums, but leads to another topic of great importance: Supporting musicians by attending live performances in nightclubs, concert halls, festivals, or wherever the musicians you enjoy are playing. And that’s a topic for another day. ***** 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.

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We got time for that.

Diagnosis: Technology

By Paolo Chlebecek

Why

would someone want to create a virus? And how do they work, anyway? And, more to the point, how do you protect yourself from them?

I get these questions a lot. Let’s explore the answers.

Amazingly, computer viruses are like human viruses. They grow, change, adapt and spread. On average, there are 35,000-70,000 viruses found every day. Each has the potential to be dangerous.

The estimated total virus population “in the wild” exceeds 17 million.

The

chief motivation to create a computer virus is money. In light of what has happened to Target stores recently, the money-making potential is enormous. But who does that?

The first known computer virus, called Creeper, was created as an experiment in 1971. It copied itself to a system and displayed the message, “I’m the creeper, catch me if you can!” The Reaper

Going viral A spotlight on computer viruses program was created to remove it.

Then, in 1974, the speedy Rabbit virus made multiple copies of itself until it clogged a computer, finally reaching the threshold to crash it.

There are other viruses like Melissa, supposedly named after a stripper, and its variants that caused havoc on email servers at the turn of the century. Its author, David L. Smith, a network programmer, launched the virus simply to see if it would work.

Smith was caught, but many virus programmers are not. That’s mostly because there are so many of them. There’s lots of money involved, and organized crime even funds viruses.

Indeed, organized crime seems to be where the bulk of spam emails and viruses originate. Criminals can buy packages of viruses or virus components. Viruses come from all over the world and spread much like the flu — by taking advantage of weakened, compromised systems, sometimes even via another virus. Once launched, they weaken or compromise computer systems and can steal bank passwords, IDs, and other information.

As

far as your computer goes, it doesn’t matter whether a virus was created in the spirit of revenge, destruction, greed, vanity, or even terrorism. Your primary objective is to protect yourself.

You know the drill: Update the latest security patches for your operating system and get (and, again, update) anti-virus and malware software. In terms of the latter, free versions are fine, but often lack a total solution. One of the advantages of paid antivirus programs is that, if you get infected despite the software, you usually have the option of contacting the company and getting help removing it.

With careful prudence, you can avoid many malicious viruses. ***** 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 four-legged children. Contact him at Paolo@PaoloTek.Com.

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Gene Twaronite’s The Absurd Naturalist

Selfies from Mother Nature life was very hard back then, especially if there’s here real fast. That’s because a huge asteroid is directly overhead. When that puppy hits, all those a big cat like the one over there that’s about to eat you. In about 3.2 million years, give or take a dinosaurs will be history. Have to admit, I hate to see them go. But 165 million years is long enough. month, human scientists will discover some of her Out with the old, in with the new, I say. bones and go gaga over them.

Here I am at the beach under clear blue skies I’ll go online to check out again. Boy, my “little” asteroid sure made a mess what pix you humans are of things. Couldn’t see the sun for years. It got so cold I had to put on my woolies. But it’s over posting these days. Oh dear — what is now, and we’re at the beginning of the Cenozoic that? It looks like somebody’s … gross!

Era. OK, I admit, there were a lot of casualties And there’s more. After all these years besides the dinosaurs. Over I thought there was nothing that could shock me. I was wrong. What are you three-quarters of all people thinking? Hmm. … Maybe it’s living things on earth time for another asteroid. went extinct. Evolu©Gene Twaronite 2014 tion is a messy business, and sometimes you just have to hurry things ***** along a little. But fortuGene Twaronite’s writing has nately, I still have plenty appeared in numerous literary of stuff to work with. See journals and magazines. He is my squirrel-like animal the author of “The Family That Wasn’t,” “My Vacation in Hell,” friend here? He doesn’t and “Dragon Daily News.” look like much. But he Follow Gene at and his warm-blooded TheTwaroniteZone.Com. kin are about to become the next big thing. HuImages via All-Free-Download.Com. Illustration by 5enses. mans sometimes refer to this era as the Age of Mammals, but it could also be called the Age of Flowers. Just look at the beautiful magnolia in back of me.

Think

By Gene Twaronite Ever since the Oxford English Dictionary people proclaimed “selfie” as their word of the year for 2013, I’ve been struggling to find a way to use it in one of my essays. It would not be my first choice.

As a word, it has all the charm of that scummy ring of hairs at the bottom of your bathtub drain.

But in writing, as in life, sometimes one just has to go with the flow.

So, I got to thinking about what kinds of photo self-portraits ol’ Mother Nature would post, assuming she had a smartphone. They might go something like this. ...

Here

I am sitting by a tidal pool at the start of it all — over three and a half billion years ago — when life first appeared on this planet. Welcome to my kitchen. They’re too tiny to see now, but in these waters chains of complex molecules are slowly coming together.

Wait till you see what they become.

And here I am at the bottom of the sea during what you humans call the Cambrian Period. It was one of my favorite times, when the diversity of living things on this Earth literally exploded. Paleontologists have discovered more than 20,000 different species from every continent. Must confess, I got a bit carried away with cute little critters. They were the first animals with complex eyes. They ruled the seas for nearly 300 million years, and then they were gone. Oh well, time to move on.

Here’s me riding a Triceratops — yippee, ride ’em, cowgirl! We’re nearly at the end of the Mesozoic Era when dinosaurs of every description ruled the Earth. I have a little surprise for them.

You see this big shadow where I’m standing?

I’m on what humans will later call the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico. It’s going to get dark around

I’m

standing at the edge of Grand Canyon, one of my most sublime creations. It gets more hits on Facebook than Madonna or Justin Timberlake, whoever they are. It still amazes me after all these years what you can accomplish with a little uplift and erosion.

Here’s Lucy and me lakeside in what humans now call Ethiopia.

She doesn’t know it yet, but she’s going to be famous someday. Smile for all your future followers, Lucy. There, I got it — great one. She’s not much for words, but she’s one of the earliest humans. Soon she will die — sorry, Lucy — for

�ENSESMAG.COM • APRIL ���� • COLUMN • ��

Bonding Parents & Their Children Through Music What: Workshops for parents and children (0-5) to learn music and foster practical and emotional support Who: Step Up For Kids and ComMUSIKey When: 1:30-3 p.m. Wednesdays April 9, 16, 23, and 30 Where: Lotus Bloom Yoga Studio, 777 W. Hillside Ave. Worth: $40+ (four sessions), RSVP Contact: Jonathan Best @ 928-830-4887

Preservation Hall Jazz Band Who & What: Preservation Hall Jazz Band, straight from the heart of the French Quarter When: 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 10 Where: Yavapai Collegre Performing Arts Center, 1100 E. Sheldon St. Worth: $20-$45 Web: YCPAC.Com

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Gouache paintings by Rachel houseman