a thirty-minute drive to see...

...a bug.

It's a Tucson tradition to drive out to the western edge of the city to watch the sun set from Gates Pass. You climb into the red rocks, past the neo-adobe palaces, curving between saguaro-studded crags, to end up looking west over pristine desert:

But while waiting for the sun to set behind the mountains, my eye caught this guy, about two inches long from antler-like antennae to bottom tip--some kind of beetle, I guess:

He (why not "she?") seemed to be admiring the evening light as well:

So, yes--a thirty minute drive, to end up seeing a bug.

It was a highlight.

And speaking of highlights...Go see Wall-E! (Click here for reviews.)Yes, the animated film about a boxy robot in the dystopian future. Poetic (yes, I wrote 'poetic') animation, allusions to classic science-fiction-films, the myth of Sisyphus, and the animated marvel of making a rusty box and even a roach (!) cute, an allegory of the dangers of too much ease and overconsumption--the film has it all. My wife and I were surprised at how much we enjoyed the film...it was even (whoa) thought-provoking.

...

And here's a thought-provoking expression: "nuke the fridge." Who out there has already heard it? It seems it's becoming a catch-phrase. Today's International Herald Tribune has an article: Indiana Jones and the temple of absurdly implausible excess.

And that's it for this Sunday night.