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City of Gastronomy and SAZAND December Mixer. Here's your chance to learn about what Tucson is doing with its UNESCO City of Gastronomy designation from members of the non-profit "Tucson City of Gastronomy" and the "Southern Arizona Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics." 10 percent of all drink and food sales at the bar will be donated to the organizations. 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 18. Reilly Craft Pizza and Drink. 101 East Pennington Street. Free. Details here.

Don Pedro's 12th Avenue Pop-Up Lunch. Now that winter is coming into Tucson, Don Pedro's Peruvian Bistro is serving up some chilly season favorites: a limited-time aguadito soup, plus other secret menu items that are perfect for warming you up. 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Dec. 18 and 19. 4101 S. 12th Ave. Details here.

Whale Rider. In a sense, this is the superior and arguably more art-house version of Free Willy (minus the Michael Jackson soundtrack). This 2002 movie tells of a young Maori girl who "fights to fulfill a destiny her grandfather refuses to recognize." The lead actress, Keisha Castle-Hughes, received an Oscar-nomination for her role at only 12 years old. 7:30 to 9:15 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 18. 3233 E. Speedway Blvd. Free. Details here.


Send Us Your Photos: 
If you go to any of the events listed above, snap a quick pic and message it to us for a chance to be featured on our social media sites! Find us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @tucsonweekly.

Events compiled by Tirion Morris, Emily Dieckman, B.S. Eliot and Jeff Gardner.

With Tucson Mayor Jonathan Rothschild deciding that two terms atop City Hall is enough, the rumor machine is already manufacturing the names of potential candidates for the 2019 election.

The two biggest names we’re hearing: Tucson City Councilwoman Regina Romero, who is up for reelection to her Ward 1 seat in 2019; and state Sen. Steve Farley, who is on his way out of the Legislature after an unsuccessful run in this year’s gubernatorial primary.

Both Romero and Farley told The Range today that they are giving the race some serious thoughts but aren’t likely to make final decisions until after the holidays.

Ward 2 Councilman Paul Cunningham, who is up for reelection next year, tells the Range he hasn’t decided whether to run for mayor and will spend the holidays talking it over with his family. “I can say without question I will be running for office in 2019,” Cunningham told The Range. “I cannot specify on whether it will be for Ward 2 or mayor at this time.”

Ward 6 Councilman Steve Kozachik has already told the press he’s not going to run. In a prepared statement, Kozachik said he’d have to resign from his Ward 6 seat to run for mayor; since he’s shepherding several major projects—including the upcoming Broadway widening and the redevelopment of the Benedictine Monastery property on Country Club Road—he doesn’t want to step away from the table.

We also hear that developer Randi Dorman has expressed interest in the job. She tells The Range that she's been encouraged to run in the past and she "would love to serve the city that way" but she's waiting to see whether Romero decides to get into the race.

We’re sure some political gadflies will be exploring runs as well as well. (We’re looking your way, Felicia Chew.)

Democrats still have a huge voter-registration advantage in the city of Tucson and GOP candidates got clobbered across the board in Pima County in this year’s election, so it’s gonna be an uphill battle for any GOP candidate who steps into the ring.

A national day that might make you think of our neighbors to the North; It's National Maple Syrup Day!

While there are lots of syrups out there, some trying to trick you i.e. "pancake syrup" and some obvious like the blueberry, raspberry and other flavors you can find at the diner, true maple syrup is a special delicacy. Here are some fun facts about the celebrated sweet treat:

1. Maple syrup does not stay good forever. Unlike its sweet sibling honey, Maple syrup can go bad and grow mold. Keep it in the fridge after opening and throw the bottle out after six months.

2. Most people know that maple syrup is made from the sap of maple trees, but did you know a it takes 40 years before a maple tree is big enough to tap!

3. The Canadian Province of Quebec produces two thirds of all the maple syrup in the world, and the whole country is responsible for 80 percent of all the maple syrup. Oh, Canada!

4. There is an International Maple Syrup Institute that works “to promote and protect pure maple syrup and other maple syrup products.” Talk about a sweet job!

5. While still almost pure sugar, Maple Syrup is one of the most low-calorie natural sweeteners at about 54 calories per tablespoon. So enjoy your pancakes (almost) guilt free!

Find more fun facts here, here and here.

Are you a planner? Thinking ahead beyond the holidays and straight to New Year's Eve? Well, pick up a copy of the Tucson Weekly on stands Thursday for a complete list of what to do in the old Pueblo this New Year's Eve. For now, here are three ideas for those who plan early to stay up late!

The Labyrinth New Year’s Eve Party and Masquerade Ball. We know what you’re thinking: Why haven’t you been kicking off every new year with a sing and quote-along edition of Labyrinth? Maybe that’s why 2018, and all those other years, just weren’t your year. Not to worry: Just head over to The Loft to watch David Bowie do his thing, and Jennifer Connelly learn that age-old “Be careful what you wish for” lesson. There’s a costume contest before the show, pre-show Bowie music videos, a make-your-own mask table in case you forget your masquerade mask at home. Plus, lots of props and a free champagne toast at midnight. Event starts at 11, but movies starts promptly at 11:45. Loft Cinema, 3233 E. Speedway Blvd. $15, or $12 for Loft members. Details here.


Through The Decades Party at Congress. Hotel Congress is putting the cap on A LITERAL CENTURY of business with this bash from the past. Featuring music and decorations from the best decades since opening 100 years ago, Congress is hosting multiple parties all under one roof. We’re talking multiple stages of live music, all-night dancing, photo booths, a Ferris wheel and more. Here’s your chance to fully embrace the “born in the wrong generation” fact you’ve been touting to all your friends. And if you didn’t know, Hotel Congress is also a hotel! So if you party too hard, you can sleep right then and there. 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. 311 East Congress Street. $35 early bird, $70 general admission, $140 VIP. Details here.

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Ring in 2019 at Topgolf. If celebrating with sports sounds good to you, head to Topgolf this New Year's Eve. One of their biggest parties of the year, the evening will include live music, a chef-inspired menu and a midnight celebration. If you really want to send 2018 off with a bang, upgrade to VIP status for a New Year's Eve Feast complete with a carving station and bottle of bubbly. The Topgolf New Year's Eve-evening includes unlimited games from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. for up to six guests, front-row seats for a fireworks show and party favors to make the night one to remember. Details here.

“I am an affectionate boy who hopes my forever home has a cat tree just for me.”

-Wilbur

Visit Wilbur at HSSA Main Campus at 635 W. Roger Rd. For more information give an adoptions counselor a call at 520-327-6088, ext. 173.

Find more Claytoonz here.

Holiday Planetarium Shows at Flandrau. If you're like us, the holiday season really has a way of getting you in the mood for some laser light shows. Flandrau's annual family favorite, "Season of Light" explores the many festivals of light (hello, Christmas and Hanukah!) that surround the Winter Solstice with the spirit of renewal. A chance to learn about the origin of today's Christmas customs, how the darkest days of winter have inspired people throughout history to start light festivals, and how this all connects back to astronomy will be set to holiday music and narration by Noah Adams of NPR. The new "Holiday Magic" laser light music show will leave you all singing and smiling as well. "Season of Light" shows at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, 6 p.m. on Fridays, 5 p.m. on Saturdays and 3 p.m. on Sundays. "Holiday Magic" shows at 2 p.m. on Mondays, Wednesdays and Friday, 7 p.m. on Fridays, 3 p.m. on Saturdays and 4 p.m. on Sundays. Through Jan. 6. Flandrau Science Center & Planetarium, 1601 E. University Blvd. $16 adults, $12 kids 4 to 17/senior/military/college students. Details here. 

Facing Work. Need a break from the holiday hustle and bustle? Maybe a little bit of the excessive commercialism? If you haven't swung by the Arizona History Museum yet to check out artist Kim Nicolini's exhibit highlighting the stories and lives of the people behind cash registers yet, now's your chance. Nicolini combines creative art, living people and archival photos to tell a rarely heard story about the people who—in many ways and for many years—have shaped Tucson into exactly what it is today. There's hardly a time where those working behind store counters could use more empathy from their customers, after all. Exhibit is open through Feb. 16, 2019, at the Arizona History Museum, 949 E. Second St. Museum hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. $10 adults, $8 seniors, $5 student adults, $4 youth 7 to 17. Free for kids 6 and under, veterans and museum members. Details here.

Meadowbrook Holiday Hayrides. Are you dreaming of a horse-drawn sleigh ride through the snow this Holiday season? Well we may not have a chance of snow here in Tucson, but you can swap the sleigh for hay and enjoy the magic from a mule-drawn hay ride through the Meadowbrook subdivision. Jingle all the way while looking at holiday decorations and enjoy hot chocolate around a campfire to finish off the night. Tickets are $15 per person. Details here.

Send Us Your Photos:
If you go to any of the events listed above, snap a quick pic and message it to us for a chance to be featured on our social media sites! Find us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @tucsonweekly.

Events compiled by Tirion Morris, Emily Dieckman, B.S. Eliot and Jeff Gardner.

Welcome to the most wonderful part of the college football season, by which I mean the half-hearted consortium of exhibition games known as bowls.

This year's selection of exhibitions for the so-called 'Conference of Champions,' better known as the Pac-12 leaves much to the imagination, with no teams qualifying for the College Football Playoff.

What the conference's bowl games lack in name-brand recognition, they more than make up for in batshit crazy sponsors. Take, for instance, the 'Cheez-It Bowl,' held inside Phoenix's Chase Field; or the 'Mitsubishi Motors Las Vegas Bowl,' which pits ASU and Fresno State against each other in the Sin City.

The cynics among us might ooh-pooh such a wholesome bounty of capitalism. I, on the other hand, welcome your generic brands to sponsor these wholesome exhibition games.

Before I chase too far down that rabbit hole, let me dispense my take on how each of the conference's seven bowl-eligible teams will fare in their contests.

Without further ado, here's who I expect to win the battle royale(s) that dot the college football bowl industrial complex over the next month:

Mitsubishi Motors Las Vegas Bowl — Fresno State (11-2) vs. Arizona State (7-5)

1:30 p.m. Arizona time, Saturday, Dec. 15

Line: Fresno State, -6

My Pick: Arizona State wins, 28-24

Tomorrow is the official start of the bowl season, with uncle Herm and the Sun Devils taking to the cement-enclosed confines of Sam Boyd Stadium in the annual debaucherous bowl game known as the Las Vegas Bowl. Fresno State is a helluva team, with former Cal coach Jeff Tedford turning a Mountain West also-ran into a bona fide contender in two years' time. I expect the Devils to do juuust enough to eek out a victory in the Sin City, giving the Pac-12 the same number of bowl wins (1) as they achieved in nine tries last year.

Cheez-It Bowl — California (7-5) vs. Texas Christian (6-6)

7 p.m. Arizona time, Dec. 26

Line: EVEN

My Pick: TCU wins, 21-17

Hot damn, am I tempted to take Justin Wilcox and the Bears, who are in their first bowl game since a quarterback named Jared Goff singlehandedly dragged a rotting carcass of a Cal team into the 2015 Armed Forces Bowl (which they won, 55-36, over Air Force). This year's team has the offensive firepower of a cold bowl of oatmeal, but features one of the best pass defenses in the nation. I wonder whether their milquetoast offense can score enough to knock off Gary Peterson's Horned Frogs squad, so I'll give TCU the slight edge here.

Valero Alamo Bowl — Washington State (10-2) vs. Iowa State (8-4)

7 p.m. Arizona time, Dec. 28

Line: Washington State, -3.5

My Pick: Washington State wins, 45-21

I'm not one to second-guess Mike Leach and his fifth-year quarterback (and mustache aficionado) Gardner Minshew, especially considering the fact that both have had more than a month to prepare for their bowl matchup with the Cyclones. Also, while I agree that ISU coach Matt Campbell is one of the sport's brightest minds, I don't believe that his squad has the talent on both sides of the ball to contend with the well-oiled machine that is Leach's air raid offense. I expect Iowa State to hang with the Cougs' for a half, before Minshew and his host of merry receivers torch the Cyclones to pieces in the game's latter half.

Hyundai Sun Bowl — Stanford (8-4) vs. Pittsburgh (7-6)

Noon Arizona time, Dec. 31

Line: Stanford, -6.5

My Pick: Stanford wins, 31-14

I know I'm starting to sound like a Pac-12 homer with these picks, but I'm of the opinion that Pat Narduzzi's offense has the consistency and firepower of a bowl of cottage cheese, so I'll stick with Bryce Love and the Cardinal. This take assumes, of course, that Love can actually take the field, which isn't a guarantee, given his frequent ankle injury issues during the past two seasons. If Love is healthy, and QB K.J. Costello can avoid making brain-dead passes, then the Cardinal will roll past the Panthers. If not, then look out Betty, as it might be another bowl season to forget in Palo Alto.

Redbox Bowl — Oregon (8-4) vs. Michigan State (7-6)

3 p.m. Arizona time, Dec. 31

Line: Oregon, -3

My Pick: Oregon wins, 45-31

I'm not going to sit here and tell you that Mario Cristobal's Ducks squad has lived up to expectations, because they clearly haven't. That said, they do have the best quarterback west of the Mississippi, in Justin Herbert, and I'm not convinced that the Spartans can beat a pack of disease-ridden squirrels with the way their offense is faring at the moment. I expect Herbert to ride off into the (relative) sunset against MSU, feasting on the Spartans' overmatched secondary in what should be his final collegiate start for the Ducks.

Holiday Bowl — Utah (9-4) vs. Northwestern (8-5)

5 p.m. Arizona time, Dec. 31

Line: Utah, -7.5

My Pick: Utah wins, 28-10

Kyle Whittingham somehow always seems to get the best out of his Utah teams in the bowl season, going 10-1 in these glorified exhibition matchups in his coaching career. I believe that the Utes, who surged into the Pac-12 Championship Game for the first time this year, will roll past a Northwestern squad that's done exceptionally well under Pat Fitzgerald. The X-factor for the Utes is their exceptional defense, which was led by Gary Andersen all year. It'll be interesting to see how that unit fares, with Andersen returning to his previous post in Logan to coach Utah State University. Expect the Utes to stifle the Wildcats in San Diego, getting Utah back to the 10-win plateau once again.

Rose Bowl — Washington (10-3) vs. Ohio State (12-1)

5 p.m. Arizona time, Jan. 1

Line, Ohio State, -7

My Pick: Ohio State wins, 34-31

The expert's pick here is for the Buckeyes, who will be coached for one final time by Urban Meyer, to romp the Huskies. I, on the other hand, wonder whether the Buckeyes will be all that fired up to play in the Rose Bowl, after missing out on the CFP for the second-straight season. I believe OSU will win, but by less than Vegas expects, with Chris Petersen's squad rising up to give Meyer and company all they can handle in Pasadena. I believe this one will be the game of the bowl season in the Pac-12, with both squads playing their best ball of the year in what used to be the marquis matchup of the bowl calendar.

Win-Loss Expectation: I expect the Pac-12's teams to go 5-2 in the bowl season. 

In the end, it wasn’t even close. When the time came for the TUSD Board to discuss the Freedom Center-created textbook for the high school course, Ethics, Economy, and Entrepreneurship, not a single board member had a kind word to say about it. And since the textbook and the course are inextricably linked, the board’s consensus opinion was the course will not return to TUSD.

[A Personal Note: For this post, I'm once again donning the blogging hat I took off recently. I'll most likely return to The Range in January, though I'll be writing less frequently. Stay tuned.]

A bit of history: Ethics, Economy, and Entrepreneurship somehow managed to sneak into the TUSD curriculum in 2016 as a yearlong course which fulfilled the state's economics requirement and could also be taken for dual credit at the University of Arizona. No one at the district knows how it got there (or at least no one is saying).

The Board is supposed to approve new courses, but they were kept in the dark on this one. Most of them first learned of the course's existence when I wrote an article about it in the print edition of the Weekly in October, 2017. Since the school year had begun and students were already enrolled, the board decided to let the course stay until the end of the school year, then discontinue it. Possibly, they said, they would take a closer look at the course at a later date.

That later date was Tuesday, December 11. After the textbook was opened to the public for inspection and evaluation, and a citizens' committee was created to make a formal assessment of the book, it was time for the board to decide on the fate of the textbook and the course.