We are out this week but we hope you're having a safe and festive holiday season.

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A titan in Arizona arts turned 60 this year. Locals might know it as the "pink birthday cake," but everyone knows it as ASU Gammage. Opened in 1964, Gammage is the only public building Frank Lloyd Wright made in Arizona. In partnership with his good friend and president of Arizona State University at the time, Grady Gammage, the renowned architect took plans originally for an opera house in Baghdad to create the university's performing arts space.

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we sit down with the executive director of ASU Gammage Colleen Jennings-Roggensack to talk about the history of the theater and the magic it has kept for 60 years.

She tells Valley 101 inside stories about working with NASA engineers to innovate the theater, her admiration for Wright's dedication to the desert and how she brought Gammage into the modern day.

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In New York, you've got the big tree at the Rockefeller Center looming over the ice rink. In the small town where I grew up in the mountains of Virginia, there is a parade the whole town comes out for.

And in Arizona, you've got tamales.

The Mexican dish is a staple of Christmas time in our border state. But how did they become so connected to the holidays and why do they matter so much?

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, I talked to a couple of people who know their tamales. One is Brenda Mercado Valdez, the owner of Fire and Braids and the winner of the La Voz Top Tamale contest. The other is Paula Soria, the La Voz reporter who wrote about the contest — and who, like Brenda, has a family history with tamales.

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Tempe Town Lake is a project whose development no one would call perfect, but one that most people seem pretty happy about how it turned out. The lake celebrated its 25th anniversary recently. It's one of those things that seems like it can't have been that long ago, and yet it seems like it's always been there.

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we talked to a couple of people who were instrumental in getting the lake project done.

Neil Giuliano was mayor of Tempe when it finally happened, and Diana Kaminski played all kinds of roles in the project.

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Chances are I watch more movies in theaters than you do.

And like people who live in the Valley, or anywhere else they have theaters, I love Harkins Theatres popcorn the most.

I found a couple of people who know a lot about the subject to answer this week's question — or questions, really: What makes Harkins popcorn so good? And why are people obsessed with it?

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, I spoke with Dan Harkins, who owns Harkins Theatres and whose mother created the recipe, and Stephen Jackson, a huge movie fan and a popcorn expert. It was a fun talk.

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Holidays are all about traditions.

Sort of. They're also about whatever person or event you're celebrating. Beyond watching the Macy's Thanksgiving parade and then eating too much turkey and falling asleep during football games, what else is there?

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, Betsy LaVoie from the Fountain Hills Thanksgiving parade, Alan Collier from the Mesa Turkey Trot and Kent Somers reporter of the Territorial Cup, the football rivalry game between Arizona State University and the University of Arizona discuss thanksgiving traditions.

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You've probably heard the jokes — being a meteorologist for a Phoenix TV news station must be the easiest job in the world.

Today it's hot, tomorrow it's hotter, that kind of thing. And while there is some truth to the joke (Arizona doesn't exactly have a lot of wintery weather), the last few summers have changed things. The last two summers have been the hottest on record in Phoenix. That's changed the minds of many climate-change deniers and changed the jobs of meteorologists.

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we spoke with Sean McLaughlin, meteorologist at Arizona's Family stations, and Amber Sullins, chief meteorologist for ABC 15.

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It's Scorpio season. Yes, the zodiac sign. So what better way to honor this water sign than by learning about the historic creatures that share its name.

With more than 50 known species in the Valley — including the giant desert hairy and the Arizona bark scorpion — these eight-legged creatures are far more noticeable than you might think, especially under a blacklight.

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com. Ectotherms keepers Luke Starkweather and Kevin Vogt share everything you need to know about Arizona's native scorpions, from myth-busting to fascinating facts.

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For a long time, Arizona was not always in the political spotlight — or if it was, it was for controversies like former Gov. Evan Mecham, who was impeached and removed from office, or SB 1070, the legislation that made being in the country illegally a state crime, and made it illegal to fail to carry immigration papers, among other things.

How things have changed. Now Arizona's a swing state; presidential candidates visit as often as kids visit the desert bar at an all-you-can-eat buffet. But some of those rough edges Stewart called out remain; the state is also ground zero for election denialism and conspiracy theories.

Someone has to shine that spotlight, and it's the journalists from around the country who flock to the state, providing coverage like never before. TV, newspapers, magazines — everyone's getting in on it. So why is the national media obsessed with Arizona?

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we find out. We spoke with George Packer, a reporter for The Atlantic magazine who wrote an epic story about Arizona; Vaughn Hillyard, a reporter for NBC News who grew up in Arizona; and Jack Healy, a New York Times reporter based in the state.

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Dia de los Muertos is a popular holiday in Arizona, and really everywhere, but also one that many of the people who celebrate it may not know much about. And while there my be no technically wrong way to celebrate, there is definitely a right way.

So how do you celebrate Dia de los Muertos respectfully?

This week on Valley 101, a podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we find out. I spoke with Mathew Sandoval, an Arizona State University professor and an expert on the holiday, as well as Tiffany Acosta, a Republic reporter who has written about it a lot.

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