This past Tuesday, communities all over the United States gathered for National Night Out Against Crime and Drugs. Tucson’s festivities included a get-together at the Northwest Center in Mansfield Park. Severe thunderstorms kept attendance below the usual triple digits. They also forced the cancellation of several other NNO events. Weather notwithstanding, we enjoyed some high-quality…
This past Saturday, the Watershed Management Group helped me get my yard into better shape. Permit me to explain… After I moved in here, I set about the task of planting a xeriscape so I wouldn’t spend a fortune on water bills. In addition to planting low-water use plants, I tried to contour the property…
Changed planes in Houston a couple of weeks ago. While I walked from one terminal to another, I encountered this statue of former President George Herbert Walker Bush… Among other things, I told the statue that the elder Bush was no John Adams, and that the son certainly doesn’t measure up to John Quincy Adams….
Looking for something interesting to do while visiting a small Southern town? Well, how about a walk around the cemetery? Yes, it will be quiet, and you may well be the only live person there, but, oh, the stories. Some people’s lives just read like a good book. Take, for example, this rockin’ Army veteran…
Just returned from another week of post-Katrina reconstruction in Mississippi. Although much appears to be back to normal, there’s still quite a bit of work to be done. Take, for example, this house. Almost three years after the storm (local people rarely call it Katrina), the owners are still living in a trailer. Since drywalling…
Went past a former place of employment a few weeks ago. The place has been out of business for almost eight years, and it’s been six years since any other business occupied the space. The landlord’s attempts to lease aren’t going very well. It’s been for rent for a couple of years… Before it rents,…
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina came ashore along the Gulf Coast of the United States. It proved to be one of the most destructive storms in U.S. history. Although cleanup and rebuilding efforts are well underway, much work remains. San Diego-based International Relief Teams (IRT) is helping to rebuild Katrina-damaged homes in southern Mississippi….
A few days after I moved to Tucson, I heard that my neighborhood was having a July 4th parade. Being the new kid in town, I was curious to see what a parade in 100-degree heat would be like. So, I ventured over to the corner of Camden Street and Palo Verde Boulevard to see…
Last Thursday, my part of Tucson received .70″ of rain in less than an hour. The water has had a chance to soak into the ground and revive the plant life, including this dinner plate cactus… March 2019 update: Oops! Looks like that photo went bye-bye when I had this blog redesigned. But, never fear,…
March 2019 update: The photos associated with this post are now part of my Tucson Event Photography website. They are linked in the text. This is a continuation of my previous post on the Summer Solstice celebration at the Arizona State Museum. The festivities included a Tucson-based group of fire dancers called Flam Chen. Here…
March 2019 update: The photos associated with this post are now part of my Tucson Event Photography website. They are linked in the text. Saturday was the longest day of the year. So, how did we Tucsonans celebrate the Summer Solstice? With an outdoor festival, of course! The triple-digit temperatures didn’t stop thousands of people…
My stock photography collection covers a wide variety of topics – everything from the back roads of rural America to urban street scenes. They are available for use in your print and Web design projects. The photo on the front of this postcard is of an abandoned gas station that I encountered in Washington State…
On this project, I worked with Sheila Tobias, a Tucson-based educational consultant who wrote the best-selling book, Overcoming Math Anxiety. Sheila collaborated with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to establish the Professional Science Master’s degree program. The Science Master’s is an M.S. degree that prepares students for work in fields such as consulting, banking, insurance,…
Remember when going to college meant leaving your home and job to study on a faraway campus? Nowadays, college can come to you. It’s as simple as logging on to your computer and enrolling in a distance degree program. Established with a $2.06 million gift from University of Arizona alumni David and Edith Lowell, the…
April 2015 update: This site was redesigned by the university. On this project, I worked with Terence Monks, Ph.D., head of the University of Arizona Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology. My job was to design an attractive, fast-loading website that combines the natural beauty of the Tucson area with information on his lab’s research and training…
Note: The following post refers to content that I have removed from my website. Reason: Flash is not supported by mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. This Flash slideshow uses photographs that I took on trips to the Mississippi Gulf Coast during November 2006 and July 2007. While in Mississippi, I worked with International Relief Teams,…
March 2019 update: This website is no longer online. Here are a few of the many accomplishments of Leon E. Barstow, Ph.D.: Created the world’s first commercial DNA synthesizer, which is now in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institution. Developed and commercialized new products with sales totaling $200 million. Raised more than $35 million…
I have a confession to make: I like airports. Even in these days of flight delays, lost luggage, overpriced food, and surly service. Among my favorites is Dallas Fort Worth International, aka DFW. Like its home state of Texas, DFW is huge. So huge that it once took me an hour to walk from one…
Looking for something a bit more interesting than the white background that’s currently gracing your current website? How about something lively and different that will make your pages totally unreadable? After all, you didn’t want those pesky visitors reading your copy anyway. In the spirit of giving that has made the Internet what it is,…
Last week, a neighbor came over to alert me that she and her roommates were having a Saturday night house party. With live bands. "What kind of music?" I asked. "Punk rock," she replied. Now, that brought back some memories of house parties back in my early twenties. Back when this punk thing was just…
Good landscape planning and design is one of those things that a lot of us talk about, and some of us even do it. But, here’s Martha from Reality-ville: I didn’t plan the design of my yard. I just made it up as I went along. And my forary into water harvesting was motivated more…