Category: Albuquerque

I Got A Date

Ever since I was a young girl in New Mexico, I always knew there was a big old world out there full of cities much bigger and much grander than my beloved Albuquerque.

Even as I was a small town girl and in many ways feared big cities, I was inexorably drawn to them as well. Always fascinated.

Once, The Good Man and I were talking about growing up. He in Brooklyn, me in the ‘Burque. I summed it all up this way, he grew up in New York knowing he was in the center of the world. I grew up in Albuquerque knowing I was pretty gosh darn far from it.

I’ve gotten around this big blue marble a little this year and I’ve seen some truly world class cities, but to me, New York (and to be precise, Manhattan) really is the center of the world.

And now, after a very long year with a lot of hard work, I have a little vacation coming due.

So The Good Man and I are getting on an aeroplane.

I have a date with that little ol’ island and I can hardly wait.

(Please forgive if the blogging is a little sparse this week. Just know I’m out there having fun!)









Image from Barewalls.com.



My How Times Have Changed (for the better)

As I usually do when it’s a quiet Friday and I’m having a little lunch at my desk and I’m missing my Fair New Mexico in ways too numerous to count, I head over to Google, hit the news tab and type in “New Mexico” to see what’s doing back home.

After wading through the politics and sports stories, I found a nice little gem today.

An article with the title: N.M.’s First Gentleman Takes a Job

I especially loved this quote:

Franco told the Journal last year that when not traveling back and forth between Las Cruces and Santa Fe, he has filled his time in the state’s capital city with volunteer activities, yardwork at the Governor’s Mansion and a rediscovered passion for painting and drawing.

Wow how times are changing in ways that are both surprising and positive. In this year’s election, a record number of women were elected to public office which means there is truly a cause to start to better define the role of the “First Gentleman.”

I’m no expert in this area, but to my recollection first ladies have often worked with charities and other groups as part of their work alongside their spouse, or they quietly step to the background and work their own lives. To read the quote from Mr. Franco it sounds about right.

It was not so long ago you would have read that exact same quote from woman when asked what she does while her husband runs the state.

Instead it’s the female Governor running the state and her husband being a stay at home guy, and now he’s picked up a part time job. Why not?

I think it’s awesome, doubly so that it’s my homestate at the front of this trend.

My fair New Mexico, a little more progressive than even I ever thought.





Source: Albuquerque Journal

Image from What Comes Around Goes Around



For Comparison’s Sake

Since the 2012 Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta kicked off this weekend, I decided to take a meander down memory lane.

For my Albuquerque folks watching the balloons this year, I present photos from my family’s archives as evidence of what the balloon fiesta looked like in 1977:



Ah yes, I’ve mentioned before on this blog about my love for that blue on bottom white on top 1971 Chevy Blazer my family drove around as I was growing up. My goodness I loved that truck.

This photo just goes to show you that back in the day, the Balloon Fiesta was a big open field and spectators simply drove up and parked. And we helped. If you were standing idly, the balloonists would shout at you to help, even if you were a kid. We held and shook the envelope while that big burner whooshed hot air into the balloon as slowly it rose from the ground.

It’s a visceral event that still gets to me, even today.



I always loved this purple and white balloon and I believe when I went to the 2010 event I saw either this exact same balloon or one of it’s replicas. I love that this balloon is still up in the Albuquerque sky on a cold October morning.



And the basket and burner. Such the epitome of the event is the sight of firey flames shooting upward. That sound as the whoosh fills the air. That feeling as heat blows back. Watching the envelope shudder and move. The smell of fuel. Truly an assault on every one of the five senses.

Magic!

I had planned to go to the Balloon Fiesta this year, and then, as you know, the best laid plans of mice and men and stressed out overworked girls in the Bay Area.

Oh yes, I also have this already scanned. Here is the 1976 balloon fiesta. For some reason I only have the one photo in my album. That’s me walking with my dad and older brother. My mom must have taken the photo. My dad loved the balloons and couldn’t resist helping every pilot who asked (or didn’t ask).



Ah Albuquerque, my hometown, how I wish I could be with you this week. As the Balloon Fiesta snarls traffic and causes everyone’s noses to point skyward, I’d love to have a breakfast burrito and a hot chocolate and cry a little and laugh a little and love every minute of it all.

My last Balloon Fiesta was 2010 and I gotta get The Good Man out there so he can understand too.

I follow Neil Patrick Harris, a good New Mexico native son, on Twitter and he’s been tweeting that he took his family to ABQ for the Balloon Fiesta. After the events on Sunday, they went and ate at El Pinto.

I’m so damn jealous I can hardly stand myself.

Anyhow. Off to Monday and a drab ol’ day at work with no ornaments in my sky.

*sigh*

Miss you, my Fair New Mexico.



Photos from the family archives are Copyright 1976 and 1977 Karen Fayeth and subject to the Creative Commons license in the far right column of this page. Be respectful with my memories, please.



You Think Apple Maps Are Bad?

“My current home address is 200 meters north of the Pizza Hut then 400 meters west…” says San José Mayor Johnny Araya

As I’ve documented here on this little ol’ blog, in May of this year I spent a week of my life in San José, Costa Rica.

Having been reared in New Mexico, the Land of Mañana, I am not unfamiliar with the more laid back ways of Latin culture.

But even to me, Costa Rica was a bit of an eye opener.

People walk down the center of major roads and cars accommodate this.

Buses stop on the freeway to pick up passengers who wait between two lines painted on a guard rail. The bus drivers shout “¡andele!” as it’s not really a stop as much as a fast roll (I rode the bus in San José, an experience not soon forgotten).

If a dog happens to trot out into a major road everyone laughs and says, “¡Ay, perro!” as they stop and wait for the hound to find it’s way through. (Costa Rican’s LOOOOVE their dogs)

And directions? Forget about it. After growing up in Albuquerque with well marked roads laid out on a grid, I always carp about California’s lackadaisical approach to marking roads and exits.

Compared to Costa Rica, California looks perfectly well organized. The roads in CR go all over the place and everyone just seems to know how to get there. Thank the god (my Costa Rican employee’s favorite expression) that my Tico minion drove me everywhere because I would have been utterly lost.

And let me tell you…Google maps don’t know nuthin’ about how to navigate San José.

So this evening while winding down with a nice glass of red, I smiled when I saw this headline:

San José, Costa Rica to install its first street signs

However, it wasn’t the headline that made me grin. It was this quote from the article:

“I don’t think it’s going to work”, 29-year-old taxi driver Manuel Perez said. “If a tourist tells me to take him to a hotel in whatever street, I’m going to say ‘you’re speaking to me in Chinese,’ because I don’t know where that is. I need a landmark.”


That is so the essence of my beautiful, magical, insane as the day is long but also kind as the day is long Ticos.

By the way, the cab drivers in CR are THE BEST. The running dialog I’d get during rides was priceless. You can’t buy that kind of entertainment.



These were my most favorite road signs in Costa Rica. They mean “give way” and were posted everywhere, on every corner and road and driveway. No one ceda’s the paso to ANYONE. These signs might as well say, “have a nice day” for all the good they do.




Image from Wikipedia and used under Creative Commons.




From The Whoa Fair New Mexico Files

Another news story to make me proud shake my head.

Oh Fair New Mexico, how I love you AND your government minions.

_______________________________________


Homeland security official tried to take loaded gun on plane.

(CBS/AP) ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – “Have Gun – Will Travel” was a popular TV western series in the late 1950s and early ’60s.

It is not, however, a recommended way to travel today, as New Mexico Homeland Security official Anita Tallarico discovered when she tried to take a loaded gun past an Albuquerque airport security checkpoint.

Tallarico, the state’s Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security, told Albuquerque Sunport police that she forgot to leave the weapon at home when TSA agents spotted it in her purse passing through a scanner.

CBS affiliate KRQE reports Tallarico says she was on her way to a funeral, was upset, and simply forgot about the gun. She was cited for unlawful carrying of a deadly weapon.

Airport police chief Marshall Katz says he’s not sure how a person of Tallarico’s position could make such a slip-up, but added that it happens frequently nationwide.

Tallarico’s gun was turned over to city police as evidence.



Source.