• Keith Hickman-Perfetti

Performers at "The Sexy Love Show" at the Urban Tribe space put on various skits about sexuality and love. Skits ranged from aerial rope dance, to fire dancing, to an audience sing-a-long.

The Urban Tribe rents out their warehouse space to various local Tucson artists for events, and also offers classes in capoeira, yoga and aerial silk dancing.

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

The UA Lunar and Planetary Lab's Alfred McEwen talks about a HiRISE photo from Mars:

Some of the largest landslides known in the Solar System have happened on Mars. These are interesting phenomena, but they also sometimes produce excellent exposures of the bedrock geology, in cross-sectional views. The purpose of this image was to view bedrock exposures at a deep level in Valles Marineris.

We have only a vague idea how old these rocks are. Crater counts date landscapes, and clearly this is a young landscape with very few impact craters due to the continual mass wasting (landslides) of the steep slopes. The rocks are much older—probably older than the plateaus surrounding Valles Marineris (2 to 3 billion years based on the large craters), unless these are intrusive rocks emplaced later from migrating magma. We need radiometric age dating, either on Mars or from returned samples, to measure the age of igneous (volcanic or plutonic) rock layers within the strata.

The age of sedimentary layers such as river or lake deposits can be bracketed by the ages of overlying and underlying igneous layers. Not knowing the absolute ages of bedrock units on Mars is a huge limitation to our understanding of the geologic history.

Lots more here.

• Teenagers opened the parade down the south side.

PHOTOGRAPHS BY SAMANTHA SAIS

The 86th Annual La Fiesta De Los Vaqueros officially started today with the parade on the south side of Tucson. Thousands of Tucsonans lined the streets to partake and participate in the old Tucson tradition.

(more after the jump)

• Members of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' office were honored at the rodeo parade.

Photographs by Samantha Sais

In what seems like already a lifetime ago, a deranged gunman killed six people and injured 18 more in a shooting spree one quiet Saturday morning in January.

What followed was a month-long display of community solidarity and support for the heroism that was displayed on a Safeway parking lot that fateful morning.

Today, La Fiesta de los Vaqueros celebrated their 86th annual event, starting with a tribute to those who died and the heroes from that morning.

Here is just a glimpse of some of the scenes at today's Rodeo Parade.

• Christina Taylor-Green is remembered on one of the tribute horses at the parade.

(more after the jump)

[Note from Dan Gibson: In December of 2010, we published a series of stories by University of Arizona journalism students who traveled to New York to see the lives of immigrants living far from the border itself. This week, we have an additional multimedia feature from the Beyond the Border project by Austin Counts and Clayton Norman focusing on Staten Island.]

Slideshow

The Remnants of Miracle Valley

Click to View 36 slides

If you blink while heading East on Highway 92 going through Palominas, you may miss the decaying ruins of one of southern Arizona’s most peculiar settlements. Nestled in between Healing and Deliverance Way, the main tabernacle of Miracle Valley stands tall off the side of the highway, but in ruin. You can catch a glimpse of the main service hall through the gaps in between wooden supports that once held up the church roof. Overgrown desert grass surrounds the tabernacle, and at first glance, it appears to stand alone.

Walking up on the chunked up pavement, I began to see that tabernacle was part of an abandoned community.

What was left were deserted buildings with traces of a once-thriving religious community. Entire apartments and offices left fully furnished, classrooms with desks lined up neatly and ready for eager young minds. There were books, magazines, bibles and records left scattered in nearly every room. Children’s toys and personal trinkets made dormitories feel eerily inhabited, as if its residents never planned to leave. Religious imagery always reminded you of where you were. One section of the living quarters was charred from a previous fire. The walls were black with ash and the roof looked like swiss cheese where flames burned holes in the ceiling. The entire time I kept wondering where I was. A small piece of paper taped up on a window of the main office read; “Miracle Valley.”

Originally founded in 1958 by Pentecostal evangelist, Asa A. Allen, Miracle valley was originally a bible school in southern Arizona. It functioned under the care of Allen for many years until he was found dead in a hotel room in San Francisco in 1970. He died of alcohol poisoning. Throughout the years, Miracle Valley has seen many religious fundamentalists come and go. In the 1980s, a series of conflicts occurred between locals and members of the Chicago-based Healing Center and Church that took residence in Miracle Valley, including the famed “Miracle Valley Shootout” in 1982 between church members and local authorities which ended in the death of two men. Miracle Valley has suffered numerous incidents of property damage that was forcefully left unattended to due to a lack of money. The men’s dorm was left charred from a previous fire. An entire section of the service hall roof is missing, allowing the elements to wreak havoc on the interior of the tabernacle.

Canadian couple, Gilles and Diane Langevin from Quebec, are now raising funds to restore Miracle Valley.

This is some real Day After Tomorrow stuff going on at Lakeshore Drive in Chicago.

In other news, I complained about having to wear a sweater today.

[Twitpic]

• PHOTOGRAPH BY ALLISON MULLALLY
• Rebecca Hudson, 19, left, and Amanda Normington, 19, attend the motorcade this morning that moved Congresswoman Gabriel Giffords from University Medical Center to a rehabilitation center in Texas.

Community members and media lined the streets this morning as Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was moved from University Medical Center to an awaiting flight out of Davis-Monthan Air Force Base for a rehabilitation center in Houston, where she will begin the next step of her rehabilitation.

• PHOTOGRAPH BY SAMANTHA M. SAIS
• The motorcade to move Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords started at 9:15 this morning outside of UMC.

More after the jump

From Kenny G's Facebook wall:

[HT: Eric Harvey/Ned Raggett]