Desert Botanical Garden: Sonoran Light

 

Garden entrance: Chihuly structures at dusk

 

We just got back from Tempe, AZ, where we spent three days immersed in baseball spring training. As usual, we had a good time attending games and eating the local cuisine. (Click here for past spring training trips.) But, for me, this year's highlight was seeing "Sonoran Light," an evening art installation at the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix. The artist, Bruce Munro, uses common recycled items and fiber-optic lights to create luminescent sculptures that change colors and engage the viewer. The most spectacular piece, called "Field of Light," features some 30,000 spheres (recycled Christmas ornaments?) illuminating the Garden Butte hillside, flowing, like lava, into the Sonoran Desert Nature Loop Trail. In the dark, "Field of Light," in particular, seemed to go on for miles and was absolutely breath-taking.

Although "Field of Light" was impossible to capture with our cameras, we did manage to take some good photos of the other exhibits (click on images to enlarge):

"Water Towers," made with recycled water bottles

 

"Water Towers" detail 

 

Tim standing in front of a geodesic dome made of

water bottles

 

Dome detail

 

Enormous "Chindi" mobile with moon (left)

 

"Eden Bloom" with cactus in the background

 

A second "Eden Bloom"

 

A tiny portion of "Field of Light"

We also, of course, got to experience the garden's less flashy residents at night, enhancing the desert's dark mystery.

 

Boojum tree, a Garden favorite

 

Majestic saguaro

For more information about "Sonoran Light" and/or the Botanical Garden, please watch:

 

Desert Botanical Garden

Chihuly structures before entering

the Garden

In addition to watching baseball and eating food, we also visited the amazing Desert Botanical Garden while we were in Phoenix, thanks to a tip from our good friend Vicki J. Not only is the garden beautiful, it's located just east of the downtown area, at the intersection of Priest and Van Buran, two of the main streets in Phoenix. Can you imagine such a sight in the middle of L.A.?

Greeted by blooming barrel cactus

Magnificent saguaro

Wildflowers in bloom

Sonoran Dessert

Cholla

Tim checking out the view

More wildflowers

Marching cactus

Yucca

Blooming tree

"Twisty" cactus

Philip Haas's enormous "Four Seasons" sculptures

Spring

Summer

Autumn

Winter

Spring Training: Food

Lunch at Matt's Big Breakfast

With three games to attend over three days, many of our meals were eaten at the ballpark: popcorn or some sort of fried or barbecued chicken for me and dogs for Tim. We did, however, get to sample some of the local fare, mostly for breakfast.

We made our pilgrimage to the Waffle House our first morning in town. The restaurant is so small that the kitchen is in the open, right behind the counter. Booths and tables are squeezed in every which way to accommodate as many people as possible. Still, there's usually a line when we go. This time we got there early enough to be seated right away at a booth. The waffles, of course, are good, but it's the hash browns that keep us coming back. You can order them "regular," "large" or "tripled" with or without an assortment of toppings (e.g., cheese, tomatoes, onions, jalapeños, and even ham chunks). We like ours just plain. Even so, they're the best. A great way to start the day!

Waffles, breakfast meats and, of course, 

those hash browns for two

Day #2, we made our way into downtown Phoenix to eat at Matt's Big Breakfast, a great place we first heard about on Guy Fieri's Drive-Ins, Diners and Dives several years ago. Matt's has moved to larger quarters since the last time we ate there in March 2009, but the food was just as good. In fact, we loved it so much we returned for lunch the next day after touring Chase Field, which is located just a few blocks away. Neither of us could resist the BLT: thick-cut pepper bacon with lettuce and vine-ripened tomato on thick-sliced, toasted country bread. I got mine with the homemade cole slaw. Absolutely to die for. You can see the rest of the menu here.

A big breakfast at Matt's

My BLT & cole slaw

Eating Our Way Through Arizona

It’s March, so of course that means we spent last weekend in Arizona watching spring training baseball. As usual, we stayed at the Sheraton within walking distance of Diablo Stadium (over the I-10 freeway and through a cemetery), home of the Angels. The hotel’s food is adequate to sustain hungry baseball fans. But this year we decided to sample some of the local cuisine and so drove the six hours from L.A. to Phoenix so we wouldn’t have to rent a car.

Our first stop was Joe’s Farm Grill, one of Guy Fieri’s featured spots on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. Located in Gilbert, about 25 miles southeast of the hotel, the Grill was built in the shell of what used to be the farmhouse Joe Johnston, the owner, grew-up in during the 1960s. In keeping with the retro theme, Joe runs continuous-loop videos of one of my top childhood TV shows, Fireball XL5, in the bathroom, which is decorated with enshrined Barbies and GI-Joes. If the food wasn’t so good, I could have easily spent the entire day in the bathroom watching TV, but didn’t. Instead I got a salad and Tim a hot dog with real potato French fries, which they serve without salt, if you ask. Heaven on earth!

The next morning, we tried to get into another Guy Fieri favorite, Matt’s Big Breakfast, in downtown Phoenix, but the wait was too long (20 people ahead of us!). So instead we headed over to The Waffle House, a national chain of greasy-spoon restaurants not available in Southern California. Despite the name, the best thing on the menu is the hash browns, which are served in a round patty in three different sizes (single, double and triple), with or without four different types of toppings! Like a fool, I got a plain single, but am already smackin’ my lips in anticipation of next year when I’m going to order a double serving smothered in onions. Talk about your morning wake-up call!

For lunch, we ate both days at the ballpark. Tim couldn’t get beyond his ubiquitous sausage hot dogs (b-o-o-o-ring!), but I ventured forth and discovered the machaca beef tacos. Though I stopped eating beef almost 20 years ago, I’m still a sucker for a good taco and so I was in my glory. Who cares about baseball when there are tasty tacos to eat? I have no idea who won the games.

We went to a movie Saturday night, followed by a quick meal at Johnny Rockets. Quite a comedown from the rest of our dining experiences. But then suddenly, at 8PM, the jukebox started blasting the Village People’s “YMCA” as the entire wait-staff dropped what they were doing and began dancing a choreographed routine! Afterward, I asked our otherwise mild-mannered server what the deal was. He told me they dance every half-hour. So if you’re ever shopping at the Arizona Mills mall in Tempe, run over to Johnny Rockets at the hour or half-hour to see the staff dance. They do a pretty mean boogaloo.

We drove home Sunday morning, but not without first eating breakfast at Matt’s. Even though we arrived before 7:30AM, there was still a bit of a line. Since there were only two of us, we were able to squeeze in ahead of several large parties. The restaurant is tiny, but the food is good. Tim had the salami scramble. The weekend had finally caught-up with me, however, so I just ordered oatmeal.* We were back on the road again by 8:15AM.

Lots more diners, drive-ins and dives to sample in the Phoenix area, so we can barely wait to return next year.









*If you follow this blog, you know I’ve been battling the ear disease Meniere’s for the past few months. This trip was the first big test of my newly regained health, though I’m still very careful about what I eat, especially in restaurants. Luckily, most places are willing to prepare certain foods without salt and there’s always the option of eating a salad without dressing. My ear and I passed the test without any serious side effects. I continue to cautiously edge my way back to normal.

March 2008

One of the difficult things about maintaining a blog is that, when you’re too busy doing fun stuff, there’s no time to write about the fun stuff you’re doing! Case in point: the entire month of March.

Week 1: I had a free Southwest airline ticket that was about to expire, so Tim and I decided to fly over to Phoenix for a little spring training baseball. The only room we could get at the Sheraton (within walking distance of the stadium) was four doors down from the Club Lounge, where we could eat all the complementary breakfast and “happy hour” treats we could stand (bummer!). With no car, we were pretty much stuck in the hotel or at the stadium; but it was just the mini-vacation we needed. Plus the Angels won both games. Tim was in heaven.

Week 2: On Thursday, Karen and I schlepped to UCLA to see NY Times columnist Frank Rich interview Stephen Sondheim, Karen’s all-time favorite playwright. I especially enjoyed his tales of old Broadway and Ethel Merman, Jerome Robbins, et al. Then, on Friday, Tim and I saw the touring company’s performance of “Sweeney Todd,” perhaps Sondheim’s best known musical. The young woman sitting next to me was disappointed to hear that Johnny Depp wasn’t in this version. Still, we both survived and agreed at the end that this was almost just as good.

Tim and I finished the week by attending yet another play, “Top Secret: Battle for the Pentagon Papers,” performed by L.A. TheatreWorks, a local company that stages radio plays for later broadcast on NPR. The plot revolved around the Washington Post’s decision to publish the Pentagon’s infamous chronicle of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Although a completely different theater experience altogether, I must say I liked “Pentagon” better than “Sweeney” because of its relevance to today. Congresswoman Jean Harmon was part of a panel afterward that compared the Nixon White House to that of George Bush. It was my turn to be in heaven!


Weeks 2-4: As it does every March, PaleyFest—the Paley Center for Media’s (formerly the Museum of Television and Radio) three-week long homage to TV—came to town in a big way. The festival has become so huge, in fact, that it moved this year to the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood so more people (some 800 every night) could attend. We went to the following five events over a span of eleven nights: “Pushing Daisies” (Chi McBride was a riot), “Friday Night Lights” (my current fave show), “Damages” (Glenn Close—serious actress!), “X-Files” (the lead actors were not there, but we did see a trailer for this summer’s movie), and an evening with Judd Apatow, creator of “Freaks & Geeks” and box-office hits “The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” “Knocked-Up” and “Superbad.” Of them all, the Apatow event was the most outrageous as he shared the stage with his mentor Garry Shandling, protégés Seth Rogan and Jason Segel, actor friends Jonah Hill and Paul Rudd, and an assortment of other wackos. Clips of the entire festival are available on the Paley website.

Week 4: The month ended with me taking a three-day trip to Minneapolis, where I attended the Public Library Association conference. Two hours after landing, my roommates and I were riding a shuttle to a free reception, given by an architectural firm that designs libraries. Their offices were located in an old burnt-out flour mill that overlooks the Mississippi River. Before leaving home, I thought for sure I’d be trapped in Minneapolis by inclement weather. But standing there, looking out at the view, I was glad I came. Nonetheless, there were still remnants of snow on the ground, so most of us opted to take the downtown area’s intricate series of skyway bridges from our hotel to the convention center. The skyways, which link the 2nd stories of most of the buildings downtown, look like one continuous mall and are really quite amazing.

Just as I was beginning to miss my garden back home, I wandered into the Macy’s across the street from the hotel and, to my amazement, found a display of succulents and tropical plants in the cosmetics department! I cheered up immediately, but silently thanked my lucky stars that poor Tim wasn’t there, because even he’s starting to grow weary of my born-again fascination with all things botanical.

The weather held long enough for my flight home to be rather uneventful. More than half the plane was filled with librarians, so I relaxed, closed my eyes and happily listened to my iPod for five hours.

The next morning, Tim and I got up early to tour architecturally-significant mid-century homes in Pasadena. It was good to be back in L.A.