The Armory Park Historic District Home Tour is 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. tomorrow, Saturday, Nov. 3. It starts at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, 545 S. Fifth Avenue. Tickets cost $20 and proceeds benefit Neighbors Feeding Neighbors and other Armory Park community programs. For more info go to www.armoryparktucson.org and purchase tickets in advance.

From tour organizers:

Journey through Tucson’s architectural evolution on Saturday, November 3, when downtown residents open their doors for the Armory Park Historic District Home Tour. This self-guided stroll offers a glimpse at styles ranging from California bungalow and dainty Victorian to contemporary, energy-efficient homes in a “New Urbanism” village. You’ll also see a neighborhood that continues to transform, as downtown feels the swirl of renewed development.

Ten homes will on display for this popular annual event, each exemplifying a notch on Armory Park’s eclectic timeline. They include the Goldtree home, a 1898 Queen Anne cottage built by pioneer brewer Samuel Goldtree. It’s believed to be a “kit home” due to abundant redwood frames and trim; popular in the late 19th and early 20th century, these dwellings were ordered from catalogues pre-cut and ready for assembly.

The home of Betsy Dokken and Rand Carlson is another kit house; picked from a Sears and Roebuck catalogue, it was shipped by rail to Tucson and assembled in 1906. In 2000, the home underwent an extensive, architect-guided renovation, including the installation of concrete floors and the addition of a master suite.

Nearly all of Armory Park’s colorful architecture dates back to the railroad’s arrival here in 1880. Within a few short years, Victorians and Queen Annes had become all the rage among railroad executives, who looked down their noses at the traditional adobes then dominating the town.

But such snobbery came at a cost, says Tucson historian Ken Scoville. “They used double brick and a lot of material that was largely imported. It was the pressure of fashion, with people scorning adobe, but as a result, their homes were colder in the winter and hotter in summer.”

He says Armory was also among the first parts of Tucson to be laid out on a grid. “And today, unlike other downtown districts, such as the barrios, which were chipped away, Armory Park is pretty much intact.”

Taking its name from Armory Park, located on Sixth Avenue at the site of a former military plaza, the neighborhood initially spread up Third and Fourth avenues, and by 1900 had reached all the way south to 18th Street.

As noted by Scoville, traditional Spanish and Mexican designs were giving way to Anglo styles in this boom, and even existing adobe homes were retrofitted—ergo Anglicized—with wooden porches and roofs.

Ultimately, home designs flourishing during that period still make Armory Park's architecture distinctive. This area is also known for a design called Anglo-territorial, with pyramidal roofs and broad porches.

“It’s not the barrio style, and it’s not (downtown's) El Presidio Neighborhood,” says Chris Stebe, an Armory Park resident and organizer of this year's home tour. “Armory has its own feel and character.”

Like them or not, we gave you our endorsements for this election season, which you can check out here for a refresher before finally turning in your early ballot (which are due today, but can be taken to any polling place on Tuesday) or heading to your polling place on Tuesday.

When it comes to the race for the Tucson Unified School District governing...well, there are 12 candidates, including three incumbents we didn't endorse.

Through the power of social media everyone is getting in on the endorsement action and reminding folks to vote — including Tucson City Councilwoman Regina Romero. This was brought up to us by folks still frustrated that voters may focus on only two candidates and not three, even though there are three seats available.

In one post, Romero made it clear she was endorsing three candidates — Cam Juarez, Kristel Foster and Betts Putnam Hidalgo:

And there's what I'm calling this election season, "Hey, take a looksee at my early ballot" shot. Kids, everyone is doing it — in this Facebook day and age, voting isn't as private as it used to be:

Oh no, Regina, you didn't forget to fill in that third oval? Well, hopefully she remembered after posting her looksee. If you're still thinking about your choices, it's understandable — 12 candidates makes it difficult. Since Romero put Putnam Hidalgo on her first endorsement post, we'll include an interesting Q&A interview with the candidate by Jeff Biggers in an Oct. 25 Huffington Post piece you can read here.

Good luck making your final decision.

Tucson's Museum of Contemporary Art wraps up this year's book club—Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’12—with a discussion of Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72, moderated by yours truly, Tucson Weekly senior writer Jim Nintzel.

It all goes down at 5:30 p.m. at MOCA. You can find the details here, but as for the important stuff: Yes, there will be beer and wine.

I first read Hunter S. Thompson's 1972 campaign dispatches back in 1983, when I was in Mr. Albertson's government class at Rincon High. (I scored high enough on an initial civics quiz that Mr. Albertson, in his infinite wisdom, felt it would be waste of time for me to sit in class with everyone else, so he sent me off to the library to read books about government and produce reports. Fear and Loathing was first on my list. How I got away with that is one of the great mysteries of my life.)

I'm left with a number of impressions as I've re-read it all these years later, some of which we'll dig into this evening. To wit: In a historical context, HST's observations rolled back the curtain on what campaigning like no one else; it must have been deeply weird to watch these dispatches unfold in the pages of Rolling Stone (which itself was a youngster in those days); running for president has changed a lot in the last 40 years; HST had a lot of filler and digressions in these articles (but it's great filler and digression); and I sure wish I could read Hunter's impressions of Campaign 2012. It's just a delight to read the words that poured out of him.

Matt Taibbi has a wonderful introduction in the 40th anniversary edition of the book that was reprinted in part in Slate a few months back. An insightful excerpt:

People who describe Thompson’s dark and profane jokes as “cynical humor” don’t get it. Hunter Thompson was always the polar opposite of a cynic. A cynic, in the landscape of Campaign Trail ’72, for instance, is someone like Nixon or Ed Muskie, someone who cheerfully accepts the fundamental dishonesty of the American political process and is able to calmly deal with it on those terms, without horror.

But Thompson couldn’t accept any of it. This book buzzes throughout with genuine surprise and outrage that people could swallow wholesale bogus marketing formulations like “the ideal centrist candidate,” or could pull a lever for Nixon, a “Barbie-Doll president, with his box-full of Barbie Doll children.” Even at the very end of the book, when McGovern’s cause was so obviously lost, Thompson’s hope and belief still far outweighed his rational calculation, as he predicted a mere 5.5 percent margin of victory for the Evil One (it turned out to be a 23 percent landslide for Nixon).

"Divas and Doctors" is the theme for the AIDS Ribbon Tucson's "AIDS Entry" walk at this year's All Souls Procession on Sunday, Nov. 4. Ribbon is reaching out to the community to reach out to more volunteers who would like to join them in their walk.

"We will be paying tribute to drag queens and performers, as well as those in the medical profession who have given so much of themselves in the fight against HIV/AIDS," said Jeffrey Scott Brown, one of the faces of AIDS Ribbon Tucson.

Along the route, which is now (because of the modern streetcar construction) from Congress Street and 4th Avenue to Mercado San Agustin on West Congress Street and Avenida Convento, Ribbon participants will collect written prayers from spectators to then burn them in a ceremonial urn onstage, and then hold up a huge red ribbon, which symbolizes HIV/AIDS awareness.

The organization wants to remind the community that HIV/AIDS affect thousands of people in Tucson, and millions around the world.

Brown would love for everyone who has been touched by the disease, and even those who haven't, to join them at the procession and remind everyone that HIV/AIDS is not necessarily a death sentence anymore. With support from friends, family and organizations such as AIDS Ribbon Tucson, people have been able to live with it and make a difference in others' lives.

If you would like to volunteer with AIDS Ribbon Tucson message Brown on Facebook, and he will give you more information. The color theme this year is white, so wear white clothing!

• Jim Nintzel
• Calexico at Portland's Aladdin Theatre, 10/21/12

My travels in the Pacific Northwest last week happened to coincide with a couple of Calexico shows, so I got a preview of what’s on tap at the concert at the Rialto Theatre this Friday, Oct. 26.

Here’s my takeaway: If you’re a fan of Calexico, you need to get your ass to Friday’s show.

Sure, you may have seen a lot of Calexico over the last few years, what with their concerts in conjunction with the All Soul’s Procession, the Festival en el Barrio and the other one-off performances they’ve been doing here and there.

But the show that Calexico is bringing to town tomorrow features a lot of songs from the new album Algiers. While there are plenty of old warhorses mixed in—“Across the Wire,” “Crystal Frontier,” “Guero Canelo” and more—the Calexico concert experience has been refreshed and rejuvenated with the new material.

Both at Seattle's Neptune Theater and Portland's Aladdin Theater, Calexico opened with “Epic,” the song that also opens Algiers. And new tunes like “Splitter,” “Sinner in the Sea” and the show-closing “Puerto” simply explode as rock anthems when they’re played live.

The touring band has set up John Convertino’s drums at the front of the stage, so his expert craftsmanship is on display alongside Joey Burns’ guitar work. Tucson’s Jacob Valenzuela and Germany’s Martin Wenk continue to mix and match with trumpets, vibes, accordion and whatever else happens to be onstage. Sergio Mendoza is the master of the keyboards, newcomer Ryan Alfred is handling the bass and Spain’s Jairo Zavala is lighting it up on electric guitar. The chemistry works—you can see it in the smiles on their faces as they play each concert.

I’m sure we can expect plenty of special guests to join them here in Tucson. On the road, I saw some astounding collaborations: In Seattle, Devotchka came out to join them on “Corona” (as well as “Para,” from Algiers), which was an unforgettable encore. In Portland, Steve Berlin of Los Lobos came out to play saxophone with the band on “Splitter” and Luzelena Mendoza of Y La Bamba provided vocals for “He Lays In The Reins.” At both shows, Portland’s Laura Gibson joined Burns for a haunting duet of Leonard Cohen’s “Waiting for the Miracle.”

My advice: If you like Calexico, you’re gonna love this show. The Dodos open.

It all starts at 8 p.m. at downtown’s Rialto Theatre. Tickets are $22 today and $24 tomorrow, unless you want to spend an extra 10 bucks on balcony seats. You’ll find the details here.

(Of course, if you're in the Phoenix area, you'll have a chance to see them Saturday and Sunday nights at the Crescent Ballroom. Details here.)

Sometimes exciting things do happen on the internets, such as last night's announcement that author and Mexican-American studies champion Luis Alberto Urrea returns to Tucson for a Day of the Dead celebration at 4 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 1, at the UA Student Union.

Praise the literature gods!

Press release from the UA Bookstore and the Confluencenter for Creative Inquiry:

A celebration of Day of the Dead (“Día de los Muertos”), including traditional Mexican food and entertainment and Day of the Dead altars created by UA students will be held on Thursday, Nov. 1, 2012 at the University of Arizona Student Union Memorial Center beginning at 4 p.m. All events are free and open to the public and sponsored by Confluencenter for Creative Inquiry.

Luis Urrea, a member of the Latino Literature Hall of Fame, will join in the festivities at the University of Arizona BookStores, Student Union Memorial Center in the lower level, speaking with the UA students who have designed their own Day of the Dead Altars for the occasion and meeting with the public. The altars, traditional remembrances of the deceased, will be on display at the bookstore through Nov. 3.

The festivities begin at 4 p.m. and will include performances by Grupo Folklórico Miztontli and Las Aguilitas de Davis Mariachis. Traditional bread made for this holiday, “Pan de muerto” or Day of the Dead sweet bread, will be served along with hot chocolate at the bookstore event.

At 5:00 p.m., the mariachis and dancers will lead the audience in a procession to the Student Union Ballroom where Urrea will give a reading followed by a book signing. Along with the UA BookStores, the event is co-sponsored by Asian Pacific American Student Affairs/JEDI, Binational Migration Institute, Mexican American Studies, Chicano/Hispano Student Affairs and the Department of English.

A celebration of life and a way to honor deceased loved ones, Día de los Muertos is a 3,800-year-old indigenous Mexican tradition. It is a holiday that is gaining popularity in the United States. The holiday focuses on gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and family members who have passed away. Despite its name, this holiday does not glorify death and is not associated in any way with Halloween. Rather, it is a time of reflection on and appreciation for life.

Chicano/Hispano Student Affairs (CHSA) is also holding a Día de los Muertos Celebration with altars created by CHSA students available for viewing in Chavez Building Room 211 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. with students available to answer questions about their altars from 12:15 to 3 p.m. Altars created by SEED teachers will be available for viewing in Chavez Building Room 205 from noon to 4 p.m. and the teachers will present the traditional altar at 12:20. At noon there will be a procession from the center of the UA Mall to the Chavez Building. The procession is open to all and will include a Catrina Hat contest. At 12:15 pm, the procession will arrive at Chavez Building where there will be refreshments including “Pan de muerto,” champurrado and chocolate on the second floor. Face painting will take place from 12:15 to 1 p.m. in Chavez Room 211.

Male heroes get a lot of play in today's media, from comic books to movies to TV. Kore Press asks, what about the super women?

This Saturday, Kore Press invites Tucson to their Fall 2012 Grrls' Literary Activism Workshop, where they plan to screen "Her Powers. And Ours.," a short film that celebrates the strength of the everyday girls and women in our world; in conjunction, there will be a screening of "Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines."

From Kore Press:

Who's Your Wonderwoman?
What's your strength or superpower?
If you could create a supergirl or super woman,
what powers would she have?

Four teen grrls and their peers in Tucson have been discussing these and other questions as they create a short film on the subject of finding your power, personal challenges, and she-roes.

Onscreen, you'll see Grrl Workshoppers Phoebe Meixner (City High School), Emily Marigold Hall (University of Arizona), Samantha Bell, and Amelia Marsh (both University High School) use discussions, interviews, and memories to explore creative visions for new superheroines. Wonder women mentors Kimi Eisele, and Piper Weinberg led the workshops and helped the grrls create their short film about the strengths and superpowers within everyday girls and women.

Kore also encourages people to send in the names of their personal She-roes, so they can be honored on the heroine list at Kore's website.

Tickets to the screenings are $8 for general admission, and $6 for Loft Cinema members. For more on the event, check things out here.

2012 isn't just about Mittens and Obama. It's the year we were inspired by the Russian punk group Pussy Riot. Two of the group's female members were recently sent far from their young children in Moscow to two notorious prisons in Siberia.

Coincidently, 2012 is also the year of the vagina. Yeah, remember that word that brings some Republican legislators to the knees (so to speak)? VAGINA!

So, let's give thanks to a recent post on Bust Magazine about 10 Awesome Feminist Halloween Costume Ideas. How about going as Pussy Riot, or a gaggle of vaginas?

Tonight marks the final forum between the candidates running for Arizona's Congressional District 2, current Democratic CD 8 representative Ron Barber and Republican challenger Martha McSally.

The two will be squaring off at the University of Arizona Student Union Memorial Center Grand Ballroom, where they'll be asked questions by a panel of journalists, including the Weekly's very own Jim Nintzel. The discussion is set to be moderated by Christopher Conover. Arizona Public Media is sponsoring the event in partnership with the Associated Students of The University of Arizona and the Arizona Students’ Association

Though the event is set to begin at 6 p.m., doors open at 5 p.m., and all attendees must be in their seats by 5:45 p.m. The debate is free and open to the public. If you can't make it in person, don't worry — it will be broadcast live by Arizona Public Media, via the web; on KUAZ 89.1 FM and 1550 AM; and on KUAT Channel 6.

For coverage of the last debate, please see this piece from the Sierra Vista Herald that we ran last week.