Desert Botanical Garden, Phoenix, AZ

The Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix, Arizona, is situated in Papago Park. It presents a lot of the local and regional flora, which you might guess includes a lot of cacti. You are right!

Entrance

The most stereotypical flora in Arizona is the cactus, of which a great many varieties were on display. 

Some barrel cactus

More barrels

The Binns Pavilion was off-limits the day we visited. It is an open air pavilion that is used for receptions, ceremonies, and corporate functions.

Nothing to see here...for you

The variety of cacti continued, including some prickly pears, which I would have assumed were some other type of plant.

Saguaro and prickly pear

Some leafy thing I didn't get the name of

Purple prickly pear

Even pricklier pear!

Flowers also show up, even in December (when we visited).

Radiant

Growing together

Some yellow

A mixed bunch

And...back to the cactus

A particularly nasty cactus is Devil Cholla, a short and very spiky plant that would be good as those chains that pop car tires. They are like an unwelcome mat.

Devil Cholla

Since it was still the Christmas holiday, some of the trees still had lights on them.

Christmas decor

More decor

We did manage to see some fauna at the garden, including some unphotographable humming birds and this cute bunny.

Who's there?

Too shy for a direct picture

Not a humming bird (thus the picture)

We ran into some reruns.

Or maybe we were running in circles?

Weird cactus, but don't say that in front of them

Palo Verde is Arizona's state tree. The trunk has green bark providing water retention and subbing in for green leaves to convert sunlight into nourishment.

Not painted green for Christmas

Nearby, a cute bonsai tree has a tire swing on it.

Bonsai tree

Edible plants do exist in the desert environment. A whole section of the garden is dedicated to herbs and vegetables that grow locally.

Herb garden

Growing greens

Cool flowers!

Cool yet tiny flowers

A sensory garden provides smells, sounds, and feels for visitors. 

Some fragrant stuff

Water fountains give a beautiful sound

Not for feeling

Some of the first cacti collected for display in the garden are still here!

Old growth

A bit overwhelming--Red Torch cactus takes over!

Christmas at the Desert Botanical Garden

A hillside

Another name that caught our eyes was the Creeping Devil, another low-down cactus that looks almost like a snake.

Creeping Devil

A sign explained how the saguaro cactus supports the environment for many different desert dwellers, from birds to coyotes to turtles to insects.

It's good to have friends!

Some art is on display in the garden. Untitled, Blue Gloss is a painted aluminum work from 2017.

I have a hard time titling it myself

Weber agave

An area for relaxing

Some of our crew was pretty tired and left the gardens early, missing a couple of the trails. We'll have to go back and see some more next time!

Book Review: The Serpent in the Garden by M. Mignola et al.

The Serpent in the Garden: Ed Grey and the Last Battle for England written by Mike Mignola, art by Ben Stenbeck, and colors by Dave Stewart

Sir Edward Grey, Witchfinder to Queen Victoria, was granted immortality through a set of bizarre and convoluted circumstances that I won't relate here (many situations in the Hellboy universe result from the bizarre and convoluted). He lives in England, the only part of the planet Earth spared from the apocalyptic ravages that have happened everywhere else. He lives a simple cottage life with Mary, though he is called upon by Queen of Avalon Alice to defend the country from a last ditch attempt by Morgan le Fay to take over. Morgan has her own champion Gruagach, an old foe of Hellboy. Things come to a blows when the small, piglike Gruagach is transformed into a more fitting champion and Grey is similarly transformed into a Green Man.

The story is interesting but leans heavily on previous Hellboy lore, so I am sure newcomers will not appreciate all the details laced into the plot. As with most other Hellboy-adjacent works, the art is delightful, capturing the richness of the world that Mignola has imagined. The ending has a nice payoff that is unexpected and satisfying.

Recommended for Hellboy fans who have kept up with the Witchfinder's tale and the general arc of the Hellboy universe.

Movie Review: Send Help (2026)

Send Help (2026) directed by Sam Raimi

Rachel McAdams is the put-upon Linda Liddle, a genius office worker with no social skills. She dresses a bit shabby and eats at her desk and hasn't made friends with anyone at work. But she's great at numbers and was promised a promotion by the now-deceased owner. The owner's son, Bradley (Dylan O'Brien), is taking over. Linda met him briefly at the office Christmas party months ago and she thought they hit it off. She is excited about getting promoted and maybe having a romantic connection with Bradley. Unfortunately, he's a bit smarmy. He gives the promotion to his pal who passes off Linda's work as his own. Bradley is engaged to a provocative woman (Edyll Ismail) who wouldn't give Linda the time of day. Linda musters her courage and confronts Bradley in his office about the promotion. He's sort of impressed and offers her to come on a business trip to India with some other executives so she can work on an important document. She shows up at the airport ready for work while the guys (all the executives are guys) are ready for fun. She sits in the back of the private plan working on the document while the others are carousing. One of the executives shows Bradley something he's found online--Linda's cheesy audition video for the TV series Survivor. They have a big laugh at her expense. Then the plane hits a storm and crashes, killing everyone but Linda and Bradley. They wash up on a small island in the middle of nowhere. Linda's survival skills come in very handy, especially considering Bradley has none. As she builds shelter and collects food, they have to work out their problems, if they can....

The story, while holding no surprises, still has a lot of tension and drama. Viewers immediately sympathize with Linda, a competent and thorough person who seems to have more compassion than social awareness. McAdams gives a very good performance, slipping into different emotional states with ease and communicating with facial expressions just as much as with dialogue. O'Brien makes a good foil as the spoiled but clever Bradley. He's almost entirely dependent on her and it takes him a while to realize the tables have turned. Raimi gives a lot of his typical stuff in this film, with more blood splatter and gore than you would think. More interesting are some really awful moral decisions that the characters make and deal with (or don't). The visual style is only occasionally over the top (another common Raimi element), suiting the survival story and the head-spaces of the characters. One or two bits look like they were designed specifically for the 3D version (I saw it in 2D), which I found a little distracting but a minor quibble.

The movie presents a fascinating character arc for Linda. She starts off as an unhappy office workers who lives with her parrot and doesn't have much else in her life (though her apartment is full of survival books and things, so she does have that hobby). Once she gets to use her skills on the island, she transforms as a person, to the point where a few times she avoids opportunities to be saved. She turns out to be a more complicated person, which is both good and bad for Bradley (and herself). She takes charge and he has to learn from her. But he also has to deal with her disinterest in getting rescued, something he is very unhappy about. Their conflict becomes very intense at points and the final resolution leaves Linda in a much different place. 

Recommended--if you can put up with the gore and some obvious plotting, some interesting issues are touched upon and the performances are good. This is about on par with Raimi's Drag Me to Hell. 

Old Adobe Mission, Scottsdale, AZ

We visited the Old Adobe Mission in Scottsdale, Arizona, the oldest extant church in Scottsdale and the oldest Catholic Church in the area. It's taken care of by Our Lady of Perpetual Help, the larger parish that was built a decade later when the parish outgrew the original building. Now, the mission church is used for baptisms, weddings, and funerals, otherwise it is a historic landmark in downtown Scottsdale.

The church was built in 1933 by Mexican settlers. The design by Robert T. Evans follows the Spanish Colonial Revival popular in the region. The mission didn't become a parish until 1948 and only served until 1956, when the rapidly expanding parish needed a new and larger building--the current Our Lady of Perpetual Help at Miller and 2nd Streets. The mission was restored in the early 2000s when it was put on the Register of Historic Buildings by Scottsdale's civil government.

We visited over Christmas time and were delighted to see a Nativity scene outside the church.

Old Adobe Mission, Scottsdale

Nativity

The Sacristy (the room where clergy would vest for Mass) has a display of vestments and artifacts from the second pastor, Eugene Maguire.

Vestment cabinet

With the strong Mexican ties, a devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe continued throughout the years. Several statues, a banner, and a mosaic (created and donated by Clare Boothe Luce) are on display.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

The Truth Window is a small cutout in the wall showing the adobe bricks used to build the mission. The builders mixed clay, silt, sand, straw, horse dung, and water, then sun-dried the bricks before they were installed. A mud mixture was used to coat the bricks and serve as mortar. The final layer, the white walls of the church, is a lime plaster. When the restoration happened, they used the same recipe to make the bricks except they did not use horse dung since it was no longer readily available in the 2000s!

Original adobe

The nave of the church is not very large but is quite inviting, full of light and space.

Nave

Over the main altar is a statue of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, dontated by the Dominguez family in the 1950s and imported from Guadalajara, Mexico. The statue was moved to the main parish in the late 1950s and then returned with the historic restoration in the early 2000s.

Our Lady of Perpetual Help

The front altarpiece is a base relief in color of the Last Supper. It was donated to the church in the 1940s by All Saints Church in Tucson.

Most appropriate altar decoration ever?

A side altar is dedicated to Saint Joseph, so naturally I took a picture of that.

St. Joseph Altar

Indoor Christmas decor

Baptismal font

The room behind the altar is set up as a gallery with photos and artifacts from the history of the mission. 

1844 Bible

The original cross from the mission's roof

A choir loft is unused.

Choir loft over the mission entrance

The confessionals were restored by Eagle Scout Kevin Donaldson to their original design, though that corner of the back of the church serves as the gift shop.

No, they don't sell indulgences!

The Stations of the Cross are not the original ones; they are prints of the 1965 Stations created for Tucson's Newman Catholic Student Center.

Jesus falls the first time

The mission is open daily from October to May from noon to 4 p.m.

Book Review: Abiding the Long Defeat by Connor Sweeney

Abiding the Long Defeat: How to Evangelize Like a Hobbit in a Disenchanted Age by Conor Sweeney

As the title suggests, author Conor Sweeney has a bit of a pessimistic outlook. The world's curent post-modern outlook that has little in common with the predominantly Christian culture that came before it. In fact, many elements are in direct contradiction with Christian views. Morality has devolved to the point where everyone is their own moral guide, leading to "anything goes" attitudes, especially with sexual morality. Popular culture makes Christianity look like it is on its way out. Sweeney acknowledges this and even argues that a lot of Christian thoughts and attitudes have unwittingly enabled this outcome. An over reliance on the distinction between faith and reason, between the supernatural and the natural, leads to an eventual bracketing off of the divine in favor of the scientifically verifiable. The next step of leaving the divine out entirely is a short step and quickly taken.

Sweeney traces this intellectual tradition and provides something of a twist to get Christianity back on track. He advocates a return to a perspective founded on the baptismal reality created by Christ. We have become adopted children of the Father, brothers and sisters to the Son, and a deep community founded on the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. This foundation creates a radically different relationships between people and with the world. It's not the layering on of grace on top of nature but a new creation combining both in a dynamic way that is far different than just incorporating Plato or Aristotle into Christian theology, or shoehorning the Christian worldview into modern media distribution channels. While there can be some success in such methods, it also introduces a fundamental misdirection for the faith life. Post-Vatican II Catholic leaders like Pope St. John Paul II and Benedict XVI have shown a more authentic way to get to the roots of the Christian faith and message without watering it down to fit in modern ways of thinking and communicating. The division of the secular and the religious has to be broken down and reality made whole.

Sweeney draws a lot of parallels with Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, specifically how the Hobbits' lifestyle is more conducive to an authentically lived Christian life. They are simple and humble, loving the ground and good food and good drinks and a quiet life. This "salt of the earth" attitude is precisely what makes Frodo an ideal candidate to carry the Ring to Mount Doom. So many other characters (Boromir, Gandalf, Galadriel, etc.) would fall to the temptation to use the Ring for their own ends, though they would wind up as servants of the Ring. Frodo's lack of great ambition inoculates him to a great degree from the temptation to wield the Ring. Secular culture offers a lot of bright, shiny objects to Christian evangelists. It might be good to take a close look at what is being offered and be sure to keep the right things in focus.

In some parts of his arguments, Sweeney struggles with his ideas and what he acknowledges is a pessimistic outlook on the situation. He does provide a way for individuals to get out of the temptations and traps found in modern culture. His focus on fundamentals of faith is refreshing and heartening, ultimately providing the reader with hope that even if the world cannot be saved (and it won't be), the people in it can.

Recommended.

That's Dancing 2025 Winter Showcase Performances

The Winter Showcase at That's Dancing Ballroom & Dancesport Center had "Country Christmas" as its theme. We stuck to the theme with two dances, a Rumba to George Strait's I Just Want to Dance with You and a Foxtrot to Christmas Cookies, also by George Strait. As usual, they had professional videographers and photographers so I can pass on the joy to you!

As I look through the pictures, the opening looks an awful lot like the final bow!

Crossover Side Rocks or Final Bow?

The rest of the choreography was fun.

Underarm turn

Two-hand hold

Closed position

A fancy turn

Crossover Side Rocks or Final Bow?

The second song, "Christmas Cookies," had a more fun flavor, especially since it featured actual cookies!

The "oven" was our toaster oven from home but the cookies were real, as were the sprinkles that I didn't really sprinkle over the cookies.

Getting them out of the oven

Adding those "sprinkly things!"

The oven mitt that matches the apron was a new item made by a precious aunt (who made the original apron for a previous dance of ours, that one involving cake). 

Showing off

Ready for a change

About to get rid of the mitt

Originally, dancing our way back to the oven was just to use the floor space, but we hit on the idea of eating a cookie right in time with the music.

Going back for a bite

Yum!

Back to dancing

Swish!

The second time, when we fed each other, we thought it was extra-cute.

A bite for you!

Back to dancing

On our way

The first bow

We had a lot of extra cookies and distributed little boxes of them to each table, including the judge's table! The bribe didn't really get us anything.

Giving out the last box

The final final bow

At the end, we received the usual certificates and gifts.

With Carlos the studio owner and Christina our instructor

A beer glass!

Book Review: Usagi Yojimbo 25 by Stan Sakai

Usagi Yojimbo Book 25: Fox Hunt written and drawn by Stan Sakai

More adventures of the rabbit ronin...

Kitsune Gari--Usagi and Gen are traveling and come to a crossroads on the way to the next town. The beggar sitting there tells them one is a shortcut and warns the travelers to stay on the path because nine-tailed foxes inhabit the woods. Coming to a bridge, Usagi reluctantly crosses. It collapses just as Gen tries, forcing him to backtrack. On the way, he discovers another shortcut off of the shortcut. He hopes to beat Usagi to town but things don't work out like that. The story is a lot of fun.

Sakura--Usagi and Gen arrive at another town and run into Gen's old friend Sakura. She is a talented performer who is on a mission, so she travels a lot picking up odd jobs here and there. She works for a local gambler and discovers he has enslaved a young girl because her father couldn't pay his gambling debts. The father is now dead after falling into debt again. Sakura tries to pay for the girl, only to be rebuffed. She cold-cocks the gambler and takes the child on the run, which of course brings Gen and Usagi back into the picture. The typical action and excitement ensues.

Snitch--Usagi and Gen get the Yojimbo treatment as a snitch takes payments from them for money on a bounty while also getting money from another bounty hunter across town. The scheme eventually breaks down which is not good for the snitch. It's another fun story and an interesting reconfiguring of Akira Kurosawa's classic.

Saya--Usagi accidentally bumps the sheath of another swordsman who demands an apology. Usagi is initially reluctant but does apologies. That's not good enough for the other swordsman, who assumes he is superior and deserves more respect from a mongrel ronin. They go off into the woods to fight with a surprise result.

The Beggar--Usagi is followed from town to town by a ramshackle beggar, or is it just a coincidence? Paranoia is not Usagi's strong suit, so he does some of his own sneaky work to figure out what is going on. This is another interesting story.

The Fortress--Usagi runs into old friend Chizu, the disgraced leader from the Neko Ninja Clan. She tells him the procession they see below is doomed--they are going to claim a fortress as a reward from the Shogunate, but an ambush awaits them. Usagi naturally wants to warn them. He gets drafted into the procession to see if he is right. It comes true, leading to a lot of bloodshed. This is an interesting one-off showing more about Usagi and Chizu than developing a larger plot.

The Outlaw--Gen and Stray Dog wind up parting ways over a large bounty. They are on the trail of the titular outlaw when a fork in the road has no clue as to which way he went. So they split up, with the deal that whoever gets the guy get three-quarters of the bounty. The story follows Gen who cleverly discovers the outlaw but gets a lot more than he bargained for as he takes the bounty alive. The story is very interesting and touching, a great finale to a nice set of stories.

Recommended, highly for Usagi fans.