Nobody shows you America up close like Greyhound. –company slogan Glory flashes a yellow, gap-toothed grin and says, “What you need, brother, I got. I got it all.” Glory’s gums are swollen and purple from disregard. He has with him a mangled suitcase that looks as if it contains his…
“What’s in the mountain preserve now?” asked Ruth Hamilton, the octogenarian stalwart of the Phoenix Mountains Preservation Council (PMPC), a citizens’ watchdog group that guards the city’s mountain preserves. She was directing her question at Jim Burke, deputy director of the Phoenix Parks, Recreation and Library Department, who was just…
A few years ago, a pal of mine pointed out a tall, pale man leaning on his walker in front of the Luhrs Building in downtown Phoenix. That’s Neal Roberts, he told me, the guy from the Bolles case. I knew very well who Roberts was, though I hadn’t recognized…
While the state board that regulates medical doctors is still going easy on its own, the board that oversees osteopaths continues to crack down on its doctors. The Arizona Board of Medical Examiners (BOMEX) last week angered Governor Jane Hull when it refused to reconsider its mild treatment of a…
Diary of a Mad House How did you guys get a hold of my real “secret diary” of the impeachment proceedings (Flashes, January 28)? Questioningly, Jon Kyl United States Senator Thanks for your recent satire of Jon Kyl’s “impeachment diary.” I wish you would expose it for what it is,…
Big Red is MIA. We last glimpsed our superheroine–Governor Jane Dee Hull’s tough-talking, get-the-job-done alter ego–in early January, when she gave her State of the State address. Dressed in her favorite color, with every fiery strand of hair sprayed into submission, Big Red vowed to fight for public education, at-risk…
“I’m workin’ tonight,” says the lanky, 30ish man who looks like he hasn’t slept for 60 hours. We are waiting outside the men’s room at Cruisin’ Central, waiting because the door is held shut from the inside, and both of us have to piss. “I can always get some cash…
Jon’s On You’ve got to hand it to U.S. Senator Jon Kyl. With the exception of the impeachment torch-bearers in the House of Representatives, perhaps no other politician has hogged more of the limelight than Kyl. Kyl–who has long grunted in the shadow of eastcoastmediaelite darling John McCain–suddenly is ubiquitous…
This mystery begins with the five known, credible witnesses to a car crash. The scene was north Phoenix. The time was 1:43 in the morning. Robert Nettles was on his back patio, facing Cactus Road, when he heard the chilling scream of tires on pavement. Nettles told police he looked…
At the swap meet on 35th Avenue and Buckeye, the smell of duros fritos blends with car exhaust and dust stirred up from the parking lot. Festive banda music pumps through the outdoor mall where vendors hawking pony rides, discounted window tinting, kitchenware, boots, toys and velvet tapestries vie for…
The child had apparently been eaten, his skull cracked open ear to ear, his brain scooped out, his bones scattered as trash. All that remains of him is the plate of bone that gave form to his face. It had lain for centuries beneath Southwest soil, sat decades more on…
When you are young, you need your father. When you are old, you need your sons. –Vietnamese proverb This much about Loi Nguyen’s last hours may be recounted with reasonable certainty: The 17-year-old awoke on September 24 at his parents’ home near 19th Avenue and Dunlap in Phoenix. It was…
Rockin’ at the Open The Flash hauled a friend from San Francisco to the Phoenix Open. This pal had never been to a golf tournament and scoffed at the notion of watching wealthy men smack little balls around a manicured lawn. The visitor’s disdain for the game sounded remarkably like…
Mad Scientology About the only thing your reporter did right in the article about the Church of Scientology (“Picket Fencing,” Tony Ortega, January 21) was correctly position himself and New Times amongst the shameful ranks of yellow journalism. Your vicious article against my church is simply another clustering of lies…
‘Twas I, row 12, seat 12, surrounded by 12-, 4- and 14-year-olds, their overanimated parents, and the occasional beery-eyed guerrilla who–while handling some comparatively waifish girlfriend–took to crowing things like “Stone Cold sucks, so sit your candy asses down,” and “Blow me, Bad-Ass Billy Gunn.” Banners and signs posting quick…
Hear the snarling and snapping and growling coming from the normally tranquil town of Fountain Hills? Get ready. The great dog-park debate has hit the Valley. So far, the dogs of Fountain Hills have exhibited model behavior. It’s the people who are foaming at the mouth, turning a simple concept…
“I am getting more and more impressed by your publicity machine,” a diner tells Jason Rose as he sits down at Nixon’s. Rose grins and makes the slightest bow of his head, as if acknowledging a hand clap of applause. Nixon’s, a kind of Planet Hollywood for political junkies started…
Ask Angela Bowie which of her ex-husband’s albums is her favorite and–assuming she answers–she’ll probably name David Bowie’s second disc, a 1970 effort titled The Man Who Sold the World. But two decades after the couple parted, the Godmother of Glam isn’t as much interested in peddling the planet as…
Dr. Craig Hiller sighed heavily, then picked up his cell phone to tell his wife he was about to be taken to jail. The physician, who is fighting to keep his medical license after problems with sexual misconduct and drinking, showed up impeccably turned-out in a blue suit for a…
After church services on a steamy Sunday afternoon last May, Najib Savaya tried through an interpreter to put his plight into perspective. “I am not a dishonest liar guy,” said the soft-spoken Iraqi-born man, leaning up against a wall at northeast Phoenix’s Chaldean Catholic Church. “I never have trouble. I…
Show Us the Money Kudos to Amy Silverman for her column on John McCain (Wonk, January 14). The “Keating Coddler” has lined his pockets nicely after a 51U2-year stay at the “Hanoi Hilton” with a current net worth of $8 million. Do we really pay our senators that well? I…
We Read Jon So You Don’t Have To Arizona’s second-favorite senator, Jon Kyl, has been keeping a diary of the impeachment of President Bill Clinton for his grandchildren–because, as we all know, there’s nothing kids like more than hearing gramps tell stories about blowjobs. In the journalistic coup of the…
