The Logical Lizard

Now that hot weather is only a thing of memory, and all of us art-loving desert rats begin to shake off that summer siesta mindset we suddenly notice that Tucson’s events calendar has become very full, seemingly overnight. Tomorrow and Sunday, and hard on the heels of last weekend’s splendid All Souls Procession, comes the fall Open Studio Tour, organized by the Tucson Pima Arts Council.

The fall Open Studio Tour is one of the highlights of the year and, as usual, TPAC has produced an informative and comprehensive guide to the event. On their website you can view an alphabetical listing of participating artists, download a guide in PDF, or else pick up a complimentary printed map/guide/calendar in person at any of the participating studios.

"Surprise." Photograph by and © Suzanne Morrison.

This year my great friends Lisa Marie and Suzanne Morrison are on the tour for the first time. The sisters are both colleagues and associates of mine and I am a fan of their work. Lisa Marie, the owner of Sirocco Design, is a brilliant silversmith and jeweler and her handmade silver creations are unique, fun and thoughtful in their execution. Suzanne works for my company Aerolite Meteorites as a studio and science photographer and is an accomplished fine art photographer in her own right. She is also the owner of Backcountry Photography and just returned from several weeks on the road working as location photographer for my TV series Meteorite Men. In addition to fine art prints and intriguing silver jewelry, the Morrisons will be offering a selection of handmade clasps, bead strands, findings and pendants, gems, and rock and mineral specimens from around the world at wholesale prices. Two Tucson originals, you can visit both of them Saturday and Sunday at 404 South Cherry (two blocks west of Campbell; three blocks south of Broadway and convenient to all Downtown studios) from 11 am to 5 pm. Oh, and there will be wine!

Lisa Marie and her muse, Vegas Jane, in the Sirocco workshop. Photograph by Stu Jenks.

In June, I profiled visionary photographer Stu Jenks here in The Logical Lizard. In addition to being one of the Southwest’s most gifted and spiritual artists, Stu is a remarkable ambient musician. He’s a fine storyteller too and is sure to make you feel welcome. See Stu’s latest work at the Old Arts District Studios, 549 North 7th Avenue, including some lovely framed pieces bargain-priced at under $200, along with advance copies of his new publication Hoop Dancing: Book Two. Please note: Stu was a last-minute addition to the tour and is not listed in the official guide but he’ll be there live and in person Saturday and Sunday.

"Cradle Rocks." Photograph by and © Stu Jenks.

Another local favorite of mine is Molly of Molly Phoenix Glassworks (I have a Molly Phoenix glass spaceship hanging over my bar). This year, The Silver Palate cookbook inspired her and visiting artist Marion Chubon to prepare “light fare and warm libations to keep you going.” Molly designs and builds a delightful line of stained glass artwork, ideal for gifts or for decorating your sunny Tucson retreat. She writes: “It is uncommon for me to have visitors in my studio. It is one of those sacred places where magical things happen . . . The sun provides warmth and rainbows when it passes through the prisms in the west facing window. If there was room for a comfy chair you can guarantee there would be one in the corner with a half full cup of coffee next to it with a pencil or two hiding under the cushion. This weekend it will be wonderful to share this with you.” Find her at 1315 North 5th Avenue (look for signs near 5th Ave & Speedway, and Stone & Drachman).

And that quick intro covers just a handful of local talents I know and like, out of over 160 working artists who will be opening up their personal studios and workspaces this weekend. Many offer snacks and drinks, along with great deals when you buy artwork directly from them during the tour. Get outside, enjoy the moody fall weather, see some original work, visit a studio, immerse yourself in our kooky and vibrant arts scene. And, if you can afford it, please help support a struggling local artist by purchasing something totally Tucson. Times are really tough for many of our most talented.

While our fine city enjoys international fame as host of the annual Tucson gem and mineral shows (and you’ll be hearing plenty about that from me during January and February), tonight is the night that the Old Pueblo is truly at its finest and strangest. The All Souls Procession—Tucson’s hip, weirdo, eclectic, inexplicable and sometimes cutting-edge arts scene’s retrofitted take on Day of the Dead—is the most exciting, inspiring and magical event of the year.

All Souls is already well known to many of you, I’m sure, but I am delighted that this year two of my friends will be experiencing their first procession. If you’ve never seen it, turn off the TV and get yourself downtown by 6 pm. You will not be disappointed. If you’ve watched as a spectator, but never participated, throw on some black and white face paint, don a costume or mask, revel in the ritual, and spare a moment for the memory of a loved one who has moved on to the next world (or whatever you believe in) during the past year.

With local media director, rock star, and bon vivant Caroline Palmer during the 2008 procession

One of my happy annual tasks is designing and building an elaborate mask to wear during the procession. Last year I wore a Hopi-inspired sun god and it was my best-ever effort. I had grand plans for this year—a giant gila monster faceplate was the winning idea—but, alas, the previous two months have been entirely filled by on-the-road adventures filming the new season of my television adventure series Meteorite Men. As such, there was no time to create something new for the 2009 parade. And that, dear readers, also explains why I have been absent from TC.com, lo these many weeks. I missed you, but I am back, and just in time for my favorite, favorite event of the year.

The mighty Flam Chen tear it up during the grand finale to the 2007 All Souls Procession. Photo by Geoffrey Notkin.

I’ll be on Fourth Avenue this evening, likely more than a little fired up, looking forward to bounding through the Fourth Avenue underpass in the company of drummers, dancers, and walking skeletons, watching fire troupe Flam Chen do their amazing thing at the loading docks, and I am hearing rumors of a surprise appearance by Calexico. I hope to see you down there, and I’ll be seeing you here tomorrow as well. I have more than a few tales to tell about life on the road with the Meteorite Men.

Learn more about Tucson’s All Souls Procession

Sometime last year, my co-host Steve Arnold and I had a most interesting conversation with LMNO Productions owner, and our Executive Producer, Eric Schotz. He told us that if he was developing a show about, for example, an emergency room, or armed forces veterans returning from overseas, there would be a number of options; a number of different people to interview and work with. “But I can’t go out and get two other guys who do what you do. The show is about you.” So, no pressure.

But really, I am joking. It is an honor and a privilege to find yourself in a situation where major companies have put a great deal of money, time and effort into making a rather unique adventure series about you and your buddy. Steve had me laughing the other day when he said: “I want our show to be the best meteorite hunting program on television!” It is a most unusual topic for a series, but I do know one thing: wherever I go and whatever kind of people I meet there seems to be a universal fascination with our rather odd profession: “Really? You look for meteorites. You mean, like shooting stars?”

The Logical Lizard (left) and professional meteorite hunter Steve Arnold scouting locations for the new "Meteorite Men" TV series. Photograph by Margaret Haddad.

The fact that our work is so unusual and specialized means we are actively involved in nearly every aspect of pre-production: locations, equipment, wardrobe, logistics, scheduling. We even have the pleasure of inviting some favorite academics to appear on the show with us. We are airing on the Science Channel, so Meteorite Men has to be a lot more than just an adventure series. It’s a good mix: Steve and I go out to the wild places, test new gear, develop hunting techniques, do our research, hike, dig, meet weird and colorful characters along the way, and when each adventure draws to a close we head to a lab or university to meet with one of our colleagues in academia. Will any of our finds help shed light on the mysteries of the universe? Well, maybe not every episode, but each fragment of new knowledge is a piece in the puzzle, and it doesn’t hurt to dream.

And anyway, Steve feels people are tuning in to be entertained, not to have the spotlight of universal understanding turned upon them. We’ll figure it out.

Yesterday, a nice gentleman emailed the company offices and ordered a meteorite. He explained it was a gift for his grandson. He had shown the grandson our Meteorite Men pilot, and said that “all he can talk about is growing up to be a meteorite hunter.” The gentleman went on to say:

“PS: Please tell Mr. Notkin that he has replaced Dennis Anderson, driver of the world-famous monster truck Grave Digger, as my grandson’s favorite superhero.”

Well, I thought this comment rather exciting, especially since I used to work in the comic book industry and have always been quite the superhero fan. Especially X-Men, Iron Man and Fantastic Four. Being a bit of a tinkerer, it’s the gadgets and gizmos they use that really move me, and I always particularly liked the way Tony Stark initially devised the Iron Man chest plate to keep his heart going. In the original comic book, it was a piece of Vietcong shrapnel lodged in his chest that threatened his life; in Jon Favreau’s brilliant and apocalyptic film version (that even beats out even the second X-Men film as my favorite superhero movie) the V.C. were replaced by generic Middle East terrorist villains.

Last night, I wrote back to the grandfather, told him his email had made my day, and that we’d be sending along a signed Meteorite Men photo for his grandson, in addition to the order. We always like to send a little gift for kids who enjoyed the show. I then posted an excerpt from his email on my Facebook page (names and personal details removed, of course). Well, this immediately became the most popular status update on my page for some long time. A few friends made comments about action figures in my future (I wish!) but the most unexpected post was:

“Dude, that is so cool! You just saved a kid from redneck future!”

This morning I received a follow-up email from the gentleman:

“About the superhero thing: I made the mistake of explaining to him that in as much as you can’t jump higher than the tallest building or stop bullets with your bare hands you couldn’t really be considered a superhero. My grandson then explained, very slowly so I wouldn’t get lost, that while some superheroes were born with powers, like Superman, most are normal humans who use technical devices to make them superheroes. He said that made you like Batman.”

Superheroes? Unfortunately not really, but we do use secret weapons whenever possible. Photograph by Caroline Palmer © Aerolite Meteorites

I am hiring the grandson as soon as he’s old enough!

The gentleman then gave me a friendly warning: I should be careful about giving his grandson too much encouragement, because in about ten years the Meteorite Men “may have some serious competition.” I’ll welcome it, and his prediction at once reminded me of the end of my favorite classic Star Trek episode “A Piece of the Action”—that’s “the gangster one” for you non-Trek fans. In the final scene, Bones owns up that he has accidentally left his communicator on the surface of the alien planet Iotia. Spock posits that since they are a highly intelligent and imitative humanoid race, the Iotians will doubtless take the communicator apart, discover how it works, and adapt the new technology for their own purposes. Captain Kirk wraps up the episode by joking: “Well, in a few years, the Iotians may demand a piece of our action.”

I found the episode online and it was great fun to watch that scene again—for research purposes only, of course. By the way, have you noticed how these Internet TV sites are cropping up all over the place and have wasted no time in cramming commercials into their “broadcasts”? Forget I mentioned it. If you want to see “PIece of the Action,” please buy, borrow, or rent the DVD. Really, it’s too fabulous an episode to be chopped up with toothpaste ads.

So, much as I might have wished, as a child, to be an actual superhero, the most satisfying thing in real life is to inspire—by what we do—a little boy to dream big and follow his heart.

Well, I could go for the Meteorite Men action figure too, I guess.

Entry number 2 in an ongoing series chronicling the making of Meteorite Men, the science/adventure show I co-host with world famous meteorite hunter Steve Arnold. Exclusive to TucsonCitizen.com

Okay, so we have the deal. It’s all very exciting. Our friends at Science Channel have ordered an entire series of Meteorite Men shows and that means we have a lot of work to do. Here is the scary part: from concept to its world premiere, our one-hour pilot had a luxurious seventeen months to germinate. And we knew where we were going to shoot as well. Steve had made amazing discoveries at two different sites within the U.S., and we were still working at both of them, so the location choices were easy. Now we have a clean slate to work with and it gets a little more complicated—and we surely do not have the seventeen months to spend on each episode this time around.

Steve and I put our heads together and came up with a list of places we wanted to go explore: places that were perhaps scenic, interesting, historic, strange, or fascinating for one reason or another—and where we could also find meteorites. Well, where we hope we could find meteorites. There were over a hundred place names on that list, so we had to whittle it down somewhat.

Next comes the equipment. We are gearheads and experimenting with new, exciting, cool-science gadgets is one of the best parts of doing this job. We’re working with a few outfits to acquire fun things to play with on camera, some of which are entirely new and not even on the market yet. Other devices we will be designing and building ourselves. In the pilot Steve says something like: “You can’t go to the meteorite hunting aisle of your favorite mega-store and get the things you need.” It’s very true, so when the things we want are not available we just build them.

Geoff and Steve: Two gearheads move out for a day of exploration. The big disk behind my head is part of one of our specialized metal detectors. Photograph by Caroline Palmer.

While the gear is being sorted out we have to plan the scouting. I have a bad habit of thinking: It’ll be fine, let’s just get up to the site and figure it all out, but when it comes to expeditions, that’s a not-very-helpful facet of my spontaneous personality. Planning is important. It’s important when it’s just two guys out hunting in the desert with a couple of metal detectors, and it’s vital when you have a film crew, and a support staff, and all kinds of vehicles, cameras, and hi-tech gear trundling around with you. If the schedule is off, you suddenly have a lot of expensive television professionals standing around waiting for the hovercraft to arrive, or something.

So, in order to hopefully minimize scheduling disasters, Steve and I, and some of our producers and teammates have been out and about making the rounds. It is a very good idea to visit potentially hazardous locations with just a couple of people, before bringing the entire troupe in.

And that is how I was almost struck by lightning.

Last week I was out scouting in the mountains. We had a pretty solid report of a meteorite-related structure being discovered in the Chiricahuas. We are hoping to do a little filming here in Tucson, next year. It’s a natural with the world’s biggest gem show in town, so some contemporaneous Arizona field work wouldn’t be amiss. I traveled up to the site with a friend who knows the area really well. My 4WD truck has a big V6 engine and lots of clearance but there were some spots on this trail that I thought were going to be too much for us. It was surely one of the roughest off-road tracks I have ever traveled.

Eventually, we made it to the side of a slope so precarious we just sat there, several thousand feet up, with the wheels slowly spinning and sending a stream of rock chips cascading down the slopes behind us. It burns gas and it’s bad for the tires. “I think this is as far as we go,” I said. So we suited up, got our backpacks, rock hammers, metal detectors, a couple of large-caliber revolvers (you don’t want to be out in those parts without some serious protection), cameras, binoculars, and anything else we could carry, and started hiking. Remember please, it is August in southern Arizona, and that’s more gear that you really want on a hot day.

We’d only gone a few hundred yards when unpleasantly dark storm clouds began rushing furiously over the mountain peak ahead of us. We weren’t sure if the whooshing sound was rain or wind and it turned out to be both. We ran back to the truck as a massive downpour started. Water flowed under the wheels of my truck, parked awkwardly at an angle on the steep, steep track, because I didn’t dare leave only the breaks to defy that much gravity.

The big storms do leave behind some lovely sunsets. Photograph © Geoffrey Notkin

We waited it out. It wasn’t too bad. Lightning hit all around; the ground breathed in moisture and I recalled cowering from European thunderstorms as a kid in London. After about 20 or 30 minutes the front passed, the sky cleared up considerably and we got out of the truck. We were both readjusting our gear when lightning struck a telephone pole not thirty feet from where we were standing. It was one of those freaky and astonishing moments when you hear the crackling before the thunderclap, and that means it’s awfully close. The blast knocked my buddy’s hat off, and left us with ringing in the ears and nasty headaches for the rest of the day.

All that, and the site didn’t turn out to be what we’d hoped. But that is okay too and exactly why we do the scouting first. There are plenty more places to go, and I’ll be taking you along with us.

I have always enjoyed chronicling things. When I played music professionally I was the band archivist, forever making tapes of our live performances and preserving a copy of every concert poster.

I have been presented with a unique opportunity to document something a little more unusual—the making of new television adventure series. In the coming months I will be sharing, exclusively with TucsonCitizen.com readers, an unabridged, behind-the-scenes diary about how we created my new show. I hope you find the details, mishaps, and insights to be interesting and entertaining.

Just a few days ago my expedition partner, Steve Arnold, and I received a most important phone call from Debbie Myers, President of Science Channel. A little over a year earlier she had ordered a one-hour pilot from our production company, LMNO of Encino, California. The pilot, Meteorite Men, was a success and so Debbie was calling to share exciting news with us: We were going to series.

The Meteorite Men, Steve Arnold and Geoff Notkin, on location in Kansas. Photograph by Caroline Palmer © Aerolite Meteorites

So, Steve and I will be researching, brainstorming, building and testing new equipment, traveling to strange and possibly dangerous places, engaging in some requisite goofing around and, of course, digging for space rocks.

I am more than a little bewildered by the vast amount of work that we must now accomplish but, as Steve is fond of saying: “If it was easy, everyone would be doing it.”

Come along for the ride. Adventures ahead.

Oh, and while you’re waiting, please check out these exclusive video clips from Meteorite Men, courtesy of Science Channel.

So, my latest foray into television documentary land premiered on May 10. For my co-host and expedition buddy, Steve Arnold, the Meteorite Men debut was the culmination of almost seventeen months of work. We have done a lot of other television—Discovery Channel, Wired Science for PBS, Cash & Treasures for The Travel Channel, Naked Earth for National Geographic, and so on—but this was a first for us, our very own big budget one-hour special, devoted almost entirely to our favorite topic: scouring the earth’s surface for fallen space rocks. And there was some hard science and gemology thrown in for good measure.

Filming "Meteorite Men" on location in Kansas

The ratings were good, and Science Channel has now aired the pilot about 15 times. Once or twice, I turned on the TV just to watch the opening credits. It is fun and slightly disorienting to see yourself live on the box. Well, I say I was only going to watch the opening credits, but don’t you know, I ended up sitting there and watching the whole thing over again anyway. I found it difficult to turn off my own show and go do something else.

That one-hour episode had always been intended as a pilot. Since it was was well received we hope more episodes will follow. In fact, I receive emails or phone calls from my friends, colleagues, and customers, pretty much daily, along the lines of: “Any news about the show?”

Looking for weird stuff in weird places. It's what we do. Camo is optional.

Quality adventure television is complicated, time consuming, and expensive to produce. Although I’ve been involved in similar projects in the past, I was amazed by the attention to detail and the level of perfectionism demonstrated by our production company, LMNO,  through the long months of development. I am a perfectionist, and I do appreciate that quality in others.

What will happen if Meteorite Men goes to series? Well, Steve and I will have to come up with a super-secret list of places where we can go and hopefully find meteorites. Actually, we have already compiled such a thing and believe me a lot of people want to know what is on that list.

The trick is to pick sites that are interesting in terms of geography, scenery, or history (or all three), where we also have a decent chance of finding space rocks. As Steve is fond of saying: “You can’t go to the meteorite hunting aisle of your favorite mega-mart” to get that kind of information. We have to figure it out on our own, using knowledge accumulated through years of research and adventuring.

Big country

In order to maximize our production budget and “put every dollar up on the screen,” as some TV and movie makers like to say, we may take Meteorite Men on the road, and film a series of episodes back-to-back. That would cut down on all kinds of expenses, including air fares, vehicle rentals, and travel days for the crew.

So, here comes the question: If such a thing were to happen, would the Logical Lizard’s esteemed readers enjoy an exclusive “on the road” account of the making of a TV adventure series? Speak up please!

Photographs by Geoffrey Notkin and Caroline Palmer © Aerolite Meteorites. All rights reserved. No reproduction without written permission.

It makes me very happy when a person I work for stands up and sets a fine example. I do mean “work for” in a broad sense, since I have owned my own business since 1989, but you will get my point in a minute.

On July 16, Deborah Adler Myers the president of Science Channel, testified before the House Science and Technology Committee, chaired by Arizona’s own Gabrielle Giffords. Congresswoman Giffords is someone else I admire, particularly because of her positive stance on solar energy initiatives here in our home state.

Deborah began with a brief history of Discovery (Science Channel’s parent company), went on to show support for President Obama’s challenge to “restore science to its rightful place” in our nation, and later presented a detailed overview of Science Channel’s mission: “To be the creative magnet for all people—adults and kids who share a passion for innovation and the sciences.”

Towards the end of her address, Deborah included a few sentences that really startled me: “Our television shows cover a wide range of space and exploration topics—from space travel to string theory and wormholes to black holes. We start from the Big Bang beginning and go right to the edge of what we know is possible in the future. We’ve brought back classics like COSMOS and created our own original series like When We Left Earth and Meteorite Men.”

Meteorite Men is the show I co-host with my expedition partner, professional meteorite hunter Steve Arnold. Science Channel is our network. So, in a general sense it’s fair to say that I work for Deborah Myers. And I am quite sure that was the first time anything I have done received a specific mention on Capitol Hill. As one of our producers, TV veteran Bob Melisso said, humorously: “It’s always good to be mentioned in congressional hearings when you’re not being indicted.”

With my co-host at Science Channel HQ. They have their own dinosaur.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Deborah first thing this morning and, of course, I congratulated her on her testimony. We talked about our show for a while, and about our common interest in getting kids excited about science. She told me that when someone is really successful in our kind of work it is because they are sharing their journey and taking viewers along on “an authentic quest.”

It was all very inspiring, so we are going to do everything we can to keep it real. Stay tuned.

Photograph by Ruth Rivin © Aerolite Meteorites. All rights resrved.

Yet another large fireball startled residents of American cities, only two weeks after a spectacular meteor was seen over the greater Tucson area on June 23. This newest visitor from outer space lit up the skies over Pennsylvania and Maryland around 1 am on Monday, July 6 and is already being called, unofficially, the “Mason-Dixon Meteor.” Numerous area residents reported sonic booms. Those sounds can be caused when a meteor of substantial size decelerates suddenly as it travels through thickening atmosphere close to the surface of our planet, or by the meteor fragmenting in flight. If pieces of the meteor make it to the ground they become meteorites.

A fireball streaking across the night sky

In an average year we might expect to record two or three large fireballs worldwide and perhaps one of them would produce meteorites. So, for those of us who research and recover space rocks, a meteorite-producing fireball is a significant event. In the past eight months there have been no less than five major fireballs seen over North America alone, and meteorites have been recovered from three of them so far.

So, what is happening up there in the night sky? This year, I have already been asked many times: “Why are there so many fireballs all of a sudden?” There are two possible explanations.

Before the rapid growth of the Internet and improvements in telecommunications, a fireball sighting would probably not have made the national news; only local residents would know about it. With listserves, bulletin boards, chat rooms, and online publications now dedicated to meteors and meteorites, reports of a new fireball event is disseminated rapidly to interested parties around the globe. In addition, it is conceivable that the Earth is currently traveling in a path that causes it to collide with more asteroid fragments than usual. Imagine driving along a clean, empty stretch of highway for hours and then suddenly encountering a field of debris from a wrecked car.

What’s the answer: better reportage of astral events, or more space junk? Personally, I think it’s a combination of the two.

Professional meteorite hunter Steve Arnold

While I am typing this, my friend, fellow meteorite specialist, and co-host of the Meteorite Men television show, Steve Arnold, is investigating the “Mason-Dixon Meteor” in person, so I expect to have some interesting news soon. Steve is requesting video footage of the Pennsylvania fireball in flight, as it may help him locate fragments from the fall. If you can help, please call him at (620) 770-9612.

Meanwhile, there seems to be an awful lot going on in our part of the cosmos, so watch the skies!

I suppose one of the most conflicted elements of my personality is that I cannot stand watching television but I absolutely love making it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the programming I object to, but the commercials. There’s not much I find more annoying than having a paid actor yelling at me to buy a new car or hamburger when I’m trying to enjoy Star Trek re-runs.

So, understandably, some of my close friends were astounded when I admitted that I recently caved in and ordered digital cable. “But you have to understand,” I implored them. “It’s only so I can throw a broadcast party for my own show.” A pretty solid excuse right?

About 17 months ago my great friend and fellow explorer, professional meteorite hunter Steve Arnold, and I started work on a new adventure documentary, Meteorite Men, for Science Channel. I was thrilled to learn that our Director of Photography would be the brilliant Randall Love who has worked for Lucas Films, Disney, HBO, the BBC, you name it.

The Logical Lizard (above left) and his long-time expedition partner, Steve Arnold, digging space rocks. Photograph by Caroline Palmer.

In the new show we travel to rural Kansas and dig for giant meteorites, buried for thousands of years; pay a visit to the brainiacs at ASU’s fab Center for Meteorite Studies and get to play in their gazillion-dollar iBeAM lab; then skulk along to a second hunting location, so secret everybody on the crew had to sign confidentiality agreements before we’d let them film. They were very understanding about all of our shenanigans.

Meteorite Men airs tonight, June 3, on Science Channel and Science Channel HD at 6 pm in Tucson. It repeats June 4 and 5 and complete Meteorite Men showtimes are here. If the idea of mixing rocks, treasure hunting, astronomy and adventure with some dry comedy sounds watchable to you, please tune in. I won’t spoil it by telling you what we found on the expeditions, but I promise you the rocks are the real stars of the show. Fallen stars.

In "Meteorite Men" we are hoping to find pieces of the famous Brenham pallasite. Pallasites are meteorites packed with extraterrestrial peridot gemstones, as shown in this detail. Photograph by Geoffrey Notkin © Oscar E. Monnig Meteorite Gallery.