Rocky Point Rocky Review Plus Free Don't Cut It

June 28, 2011

Taped my narrator part for a Cave Creek doc all morning. Started in the cave that Cave Creek is named for and ended on Saguaro Hill behind the library. Had lunch at Bryan's BBQ and had the tomato summer sando and it was fantastic.

Here are the Bell kids in Mexico (Deena and Thomas), getting ready to enjoy a lunch at La Roca in Nogales. The whole family is hooked on great Mexican food south of the border (see next item).

Rocky Point, Rocky Times

My son Thomas went to Rocky Point, Mexico last weekend with his girlfriend Amy and bunch of other people. They shared a house on the beach and enjoyed the Mexican food. Here is the food tour part:

"Saturday we went taco hopping and found an amazing place (they were all amazing so if the others were 9's this was a 10) called El Grillo or The Cricket. The wife serving tables out of the patio built on to the back of their house and the husband grilling up meats. The accoutremal included a roasted chile salsa whose recipe was passed down from the grandpa. I learned that sincronizadas are quesadillas with meat in them.

"Mannys closed down. The owners son was in the parking lot and said they were losing money and that all the action was now over by the resorts towards Cholla Bay. In fact that whole side of town looked a little dead which was kind of sad. The little cabana street joint down the street from Mannys that had amazing shrimp tacos that Bill Glenn and I lived at for 2 days before Deena came down was closed.

"Before we left on the trip Mad Coyote Joe recommended we get fresh Red Snapper. Supposedly it's the best fish in Mexico so we picked one up at the market and had it de-scaled and Amy got all Thai on its ass and stuffed it with onion, cilantro and thai chiles and we threw the son of bitch whole on the grill. I think you know how that turned out."

—Tomcat

Free to Leave

Had an insightful encounter in Denver at our booth last weekend. Guy came by, looked at the magazine and said he used to subscribe but stopped. I asked him why and he kind of blew the reason off, but I insisted he remember what exactly it was that made him not renew his subscription. He finally relented and said there were a couple articles where he couldn't figure out where it was going, what copy went where, who was talking to who. He felt confused, he told me, and with a shrug, he said he didn't renew. I asked him to name the article if he could. He thought for a moment and said, "I think it was called Free."

Well, that would be Mickey Free and the big issue with the three narrators. Couldn't duck that one. That is totally my bad (David Zucker dubbed the 20-page feature "a mess"). So, I offered the ex-subscriber a $11 for 11 issue rate and he's back in. I also promised him Mickey Free would be easier to follow in the future.

Whew.

"If you ware successful in getting what you want it's called destiny. If you're not successful, it's called fate."

—Old Vaquero Saying