Dave Devine wrote about the Historic Sign Ordinance debate in last Thursday's issue:

Two years ago, when the City Council began discussing the preservation of Tucson's historic signs, the focus was on "restoration, adaptive reuse, and relocation." Today, a proposed ordinance would also allow exact replicas of signs in place prior to 1961.

"We lost so many (historic) signs; 90 percent of them are gone," laments Carlos Lozano, chair of the subcommittee that prepared the proposal. "Bearing that in mind, along with the huge expense and (the sign) not advertising a current business, why not allow them?"

Tucson's historic preservation officer, Jonathan Mabry, doubts that many replicas will be installed. However, Kathy McLaughlin, a member of the Citizens' Sign Code Committee, has another perspective.

"I suspect there are (sign) interests who would love to sell and put up replicas," McLaughlin warns. "There are ways this ordinance can be exploited that way."

Tonight there's a public meeting on the subject at 5:30 pm in the City Hall's Chambers, if you'd like to weigh in.

I personally have really good intentions about seeing movies in the theater (Tree of Life, for example, which I really want to see, but I'm sure I'll end up missing), but there was a time period when I worked nights that I would just go see movies to get out of the house in the afternoon and have someone else pay for my air conditioned comfort. Back then, I would have gladly signed up for Moviepass, a new service debuting in San Francisco this week.

Essentially, Moviepass is a internet service that allows you to pay a flat rate per month ($50 in San Francisco, although since their movies are priced about $5 ahead of ours here, the service might be cheaper here) and see as many movies as you'd like, as long as you get your tickets through the site (or forthcoming iPhone app). In exchange for offering a discount for avid filmgoers, the studios will get information about what movies you're seeing to use to invite you to exclusive screenings, try to sell you DVDs and such, etc. Maybe not such a bad deal, as long as you're really dedicated to film and think there are are more than four movies a month worth seeing.

[Wired]

The clock is running out on the opportunity to raise the nation’s debt ceiling—and even GOP economists are warning that allowing the U.S. to default on its debt could have devastating consequences for the economy.

As we reported last week, Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl was the last Republican to walk out of debt-reduction talks with Democrats, shortly after issuing a statement complaining that Democrats “are insisting on job-killing tax hikes and new spending.”

If you want to dive into the debt crisis yourself, Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford’s office is hosting a town hall on the topic this Thursday, June 30.

Among the experts who will be on hand: David Walker, the former U.S. comptroller general who has long been sounding an alarm about the deficit.

Walker tells The Range that Kyl’s decision to walk away from the talks was “disappointing and inappropriate,” but he’s more concerned that the House of Representatives is now out on recess, “which is rather hard to imagine when you have something as serious as this to be addressed.”

Walker argues for deep cuts in spending—“In my view, it’s overwhelmingly a spending problem but not exclusively a spending problem”—but expects that some kind of tax increase is inevitable.

“When I look at how we’re going to put our finances in order over time, I think it’s going to be extremely difficult if not impossible to be able to deal with our structural deficit in way that makes economic sense and is socially equitable, culturally acceptable and politically feasible without having some level of revenues above historical levels,” Walker says.

Let's take a virtual trip to Mars courtesy of the UA Lunar and Planetary Lab's HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Here's a shot of Opal Deposits near the Valle Martineris. The marble swirls on this thing remind me of Rocky Road ice cream, and suddenly I'm hungry:

Rice Krispies was marketed for awhile as being full of antioxidants and apparently that was a problem, so now Kellogg's is paying off $2.5 million in a settlement. So, if you purchased Rice Krispies (or the sickeningly sweet Cocoa Krispies) between June 1, 2009 and March 1, 2010 and are willing to attest to that under the penalty of perjury, you can fill out a form online and get $5 per box, up to three. Of course, they'd like to scare you off by telling you that you're stealing money from the charity that will receive the unclaimed money, but forget that. I want my $15 for whatever that evil cereal company did to me.

From Space.com:

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords made her first public appearance since January Monday evening (June 28), showing up unannounced at a public event honoring her astronaut husband and his space shuttle crewmates.

Giffords and her husband Mark Kelly attended the public NASA ceremony for the crew of the shuttle Endeavour's final mission STS-134, a flight that Kelly commanded in May. The event was the first time Giffords, D-Ariz., has been seen publicly since she was shot in the head during a January assassination attempt in Tucson, Ariz.

Seated in a wheelchair, Giffords was rolled into the nearly 600-seat theater at Space Center Houston, the visitor center for NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC), where her husband was waiting. It was standing-room only at the packed event.

Ryan Clark, the executive chef of Lodge on the Desert, is the new Iron Chef Tucson.

Clark beat Steven Schultz of Red Sky in Luna Bella at this weekend’s Iron Chef Tucson competition at Loews Ventana Canyon Resort.

Let’s go over a few factoids about Clark, shall we? The man is in his mid-20s and is attempting to take home three local culinary awards this year. He just nailed the first one, and next up is the Iron Chef competition at this year’s Tucson Meet Yourself. (He’s already a two-time winner.)

Clark will also compete at the Copper Chef Challenge at the Tucson Culinary Festival at the end of October. The word is that he is the only Tucson chef to participate in all three events.

We should also mention that Clark led the restaurant at Lodge on the Desert through some dark times last year. The resort had just finished a massive, multi-million-dollar renovation when a fire decimated the kitchen. The restaurant was closed for all of five seconds or something before Clark had it open again, running the entire operation out of a tiny mobile kitchen.

Yeah, Ryan Clark is killing it. Nuff said.

You'll have to wait a little less than a year, but it looks like Pixar gets back on track with the fairy tale Brave in 2012. To be honest, I'm just happy Larry the Cable Guy isn't involved.

A new restaurant called Three and a Half Brothers Café has opened in the old Sanchez Burrito Company building at 2530 N. First Ave.

I took a quick look at the menu, and it’s all-American fare, with breakfast served all day. "You can sleep in and come on in here, and we’re not gonna say, 'Nuh-uh, it’s after 10 a.m.,'" said the nice lady working the front counter.

A friend who is an aficionado when it comes to Tucson diners ate breakfast at Three and a Half Brothers Café this morning and tells us the portions are enormous.

The prices look fair, too, topping out around $7.

"Harvest," by Tom Philabaum, is on display in Philabaum and Phriends from July 2 through Sept. 30 at Philabam Glass Gallery & Studio, 711 S. Sixth Ave.