Bravo to the return of Tempe Town Lake. More than two months after the great drain of our city’s centerpiece, the Arizona Department of Water Resources is scheduled to begin refilling the lake with the help of thousands of athletes’ tears of joy. So get those Speedos and swim caps back on, Ironmen and women; we’ve got a triathlon around the bend.
Boo to the NBA referees at Wednesday’s Toronto Raptors vs. Phoenix Suns game for kicking out two players for excessive butt slapping. The Suns’ Grant Hill and Raptors’ Reggie Evans were removed from the contest after receiving their second technicals of the game. The first was for some jaunting between the two players. The second was, well, for a couple nice pats on the keister. If this is going to be considered intolerable in the NBA, then it is going to be a long season without much male bonding.
Bravo to Conor Oberst for taking a constructive step in the name of the Sound Strike, a group of artists opposing Arizona’s immigration bill. While it seems the Sound Strike buzz came and went almost as fast as the lightning bolt in its logo, Oberst recently filmed a music video for his new song about the border, “Coyote Song,” which is being sold for $2. The money made off the song will go to The Florence Project, an Arizona nonprofit that provides free legal services to people detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Although no one spends that kind of money on a digital download anymore, it’s a nice change to see an artist actually working to benefit something, rather than just signing a name on a petition and resolving to silence.
Boo to bombs. Well, bomb scares. Two suspicious packages were found at light rail stations this week, one in downtown Phoenix on Monday night and another in Tempe on Tuesday. Police departments detonated the packages and both transit stations were shut down for some time. Although Phoenix Police are not sure of the motives, there is suspicion that the threats were related to the Veolia Transit Service strike that began this week. We saw a few scares last month as well, with police called to investigate at the BAC building and mysterious backpacks at Fall Frenzy. Let’s try to make it at least a month without any of these incidents, and if you have a dispute with someone, try settling it with words, OK?
Bravo to scientists discovering what’s been killing our nation’s honeybees. Alas, it looks like the “colony collapse disorder” has nothing to do with evil mobile phone radiation, either. Nope, it’s what scientists are calling a “double whammy” of a fungus and a virus in bees’ guts. While there is still no cure for our declining bee population, perhaps we may not have to imagine a world with love only being described as “the birds.”
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