Taliesin West

Our vacation had a distinct architectural bent, highlighted by our visit to Taliesin West and confirmed by our staying at the Hotel Lautner in Desert Palm Springs.  You're probably aware that Taliesin West was Frank Lloyd Wright's winter home, and you can read more about it here.  Touring it and learning about its construction and the school that still exists there were well worth it.  I still have fond memories of touring the Lloyd Wright house in St. Louis, so seeing one of his big'uns in person was pretty damn cool.

After, we drove directly to Desert Palms, googling Lloyd Wright scandals along the way.  They glossed over all of this/stuff on the tour, and even now a quick internet search shows that there are plenty of Lloyd Wright loyalists who refuse to admit that he was kind of a shithead.  Good architecture does not have to come from a good person, people.  Ain't no denying his architectural contributions.

Here's B hopping through the grounds.

This is what a shooting cactus looks like.  I know because some lady got shooed away from it.  And then later, we all wished she had taken a barb to the face as she let her toddler disrespect low-lying architectural gems.  I was so annoyed by the mini-distraction ("mini" references the size of the child, the distraction itself was HUGE) during the tour that I meant to drop a line to the folks at T-West to tell them that toddlers shouldn't be allowed.  Hmm.  Still gotta do that.  I ain't trying to be a baby-hater, all I'm saying is mind yo' baby.

I love this grumpy hippo.  The look on his face tells wayward toddlers to bug off!

Jerome

I hadn't heard of it before our trip, but it seems that little ol' Jerome, AZ is popping up everywhere these days.  This former mining town is now known for being a super-haunted spot and is an easy drive from Scottsdale.  If you don't mind bright-red fonts and groovy background music, you can read more about Jerome here. 

The town is nestled like this, and you can see what is now the Grand Hotel (the big yellow-ish building at center-left) in this shot.  This used to be the hospital, where they couldn't contain all the bodies as people were dying from the Spanish flu.  We had lunch there and the creepy vibe could not be denied.  I was scared being in the bathroom alone.  *shudder*

Then we went to a rock shop nearby and the woman told us all about the ghostly experiences she'd had in Jerome.  Stuff like seeing demons in human form (or half-ass demonic attempts to pass as human), crossing spirits through to the other side, and a banana-curled lady spirit (picture Nellie Oleson) with an ire for men.  She kept going on and M and I were rapt (B was polite enough to stand there without pshaw-ing)... until she described WWII as "the war with the Jews" and later asked us to watch a YouTube movie that sounded like some New World Order shit.  Hmmm.  This should have discredited her accounts of spirits strangling her in the night, but it was too late.  She'd already scared the bejesus outta me and M.  It was a lights-on night back at the Valley Ho.



But anyway, here's a shot looking down on part of the city from the Grand Hotel.

We walked around Jerome a bit, trying to dispel our heebie-jeebies.  On our way out, we drove through the city center to the abandoned mine and the ghost town (not in a supernatural way, this time) next to it.  If you like busted out shit and rotting evidence of previous human settlement, then this is your spot.  Here are some photos:

And here I tried to capture the magical glow of the rocks in the distance.  But much like the big, bright stars that come out over the desert, it can really only be experienced in person.

Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art

M and I left ol' Pink Eye back at the Valley Ho-ser and hit up the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (or SMoCA... it rolls, no?  No.) to check out the James Turrell piece, Knight Rise.  (Funny that James Turrell is totally trending these days anyway due to his current retrospective at the LACMA.  Hipsters be lovin' Turrell.)  We went at dusk, so we could peep the piece with the changing light.

Here:

and here:

It was pretty cool.  Nice and peaceful, forcing you to really NOTICE.  Or just to relax and wait.  And watch.

M and I really loved the light play as you walked to the Turrell piece.  Here are some shots of how the light reflects off the prismatic bits on the glass walls.

Of course with a cactus.

M, ever the photographer, had some fun photographing me through the filter-box that Julianne Swartz had set up.

Speaking of Ms. Swartz, who I was unfamiliar with before, damn does that lady do some good art.  Her art is interactive, working multiple senses at once.  Now I'm listening, now I'm opening, now I'm moving something, now something's moving around me.  Now that's stimulation!  There's an element of discovery to what she does, as well.  Because how often do we adults really discover anything (besides having diabetes or lack of xmas bonuses) anymore?  It feels good.  M and I stood there, listening or watching, and moving around to listen or watch in a different way.  

This, this.  This is my favorite kind of art.  Julianne Swartz is a genius.  She deserves much more renown, methinks.

AZ Intro

I met up with B and our friend Monika in Arizona, of all places.  Random, and honestly we had not planned to be in AZ but it was convenient and sunny and good for road trippin' and so it ended up to be a vacation salvager.  Thanks be to Arizona!

We stayed at the Hotel Valley Ho in downtown Scottsdale, which is recommended.  They did a bang-up job renovating this old Scottsdale hotel, leaving enough of the atomic vibe, but making it comfortable and modern.  The bar scene was also much livelier than that at the hotel where we almost stayed, the similarly retro-modern Saguaro.

This was the view from our balcony the first morning in Arizona.  Nice, right?

We did our best in Scottsdale, which was definitely not our scene.  We were all excited to find a "speakeasy" cocktail bar, which had some rules posted outside, where we had to wait to be escorted in after calling on a private phone.  But when we got inside, the decor felt more Residence Inn than Milk & Honey (the OG modern speakeasy).  And the "mixologist" (yuck, yuck, quick calling them that!) who came to help us was all, like SHOUTING at us, O-M-G, about the COCKTAILS, you know, you guys, and was she, like, wait... is that one of the Arizona Cardinals...?  Yeah, it was gross.  And M's cocktail was bad but the cheer-ologist did comp us for it.  Still, no.  The best meal we had was at a Japanese joint in an outdoor mall run by a James Beard regional semi-finalist.  That was a treat!


B turned up in Scottsdale with not only a nasty cold, but a crusty pink eye full of--PINK EYE!  Yuck-O!  I found I was better at working switches and knobs with my elbows than I'd given myself credit for. (Dear Self, Add new skill to resume?)  And I was constantly wiping my hands with straight alcohol wipes, injection prep-style.  I am happy to report that due to my vigilance, the pink eye virus died right there at the Valley Ho-tel.  Or maybe B left a little in the rental car or perhaps in Jerome, AZ.  But know that we did not bring any crusty eyes to fancy Palm Springs.  Nuh-uh.

Here I am showing off my new jewelries, purchased at the super super swell Chief Dodge in Scottsdale.  Oh, to be head-to-toe in turquoise!

This is my new ring of agate from Montana, made by a Navajo artisan.

And look!  My perm is still in effect!  Must be that dry desert air.