Category: New Mexico

Where Credit is Due

For all the ways she made me who I am…


Today is the celebration of the birth of my own dear mom. I don’t think she would mind me saying that today she is 79 years old. If you met her on the street, you’d probably guess her age was much, much younger (like early sixties). That alone inspires me.

If you have read my blog for a few years, you will have learned a bit about the patience and understanding of my mother.

Here are a few choice places to get caught up:


There was the time I threw a snake at my mother.


There was the time I shot her in the arm with a BB gun.


Or when she thought I’d drowned in the bathtub.


And one of the many times I crushed the aspirations she had for me.


But mostly, a story about when she was just being, quite frankly, awesome.


I am the sum of all my parts and much of the good stuff I owe to my mom.

I am proud of her and I’m lucky she was kind enough to give me life.

Happy Birthday, Mom! You deserve cake!





Easter 1976, Albuquerque, NM. We are a good looking crew! Thanks mom!




Image from the family photo albums.




All The Many Ways I Told You So

Mmm, hmm. There are things I know and know with certainty. There are things I know that people deny. There are things I say that are fundamentally true but are denied time and again by those around me.

Know this, good readers of my blog: Squirrels are vermin. They are not cute, they are not cuddly, and they are not adorable. They are rodents and should be treated as such.

I say this to the squirrel huggers and they tell me that I’m being silly. I say plague and they scoff.

So here’s how we are going to play this today. I am going to repost something I wrote in 2007. And then at the end I’ll give you an update to show you just how exactly 100% right I am.

Then I will do a superior dance. You’ll have to just visualize that one but know I’m dancing hard like I’m counting coup.

I am a woman of the west. The real west. The range land, unpopulated and dirt covered west. I know things. Behold.


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People who are not like us…

First published June 12, 2007

So, where I live, we have a lot of squirrels. Now when I say “a lot of squirrels” I don’t mean “oh my, there’s quite a few out there”. I mean a whole horde, an army, a remuda, of squirrels.

They run around everywhere, up and down power lines, around trees, hither and yon. When I go for a walk at noontime from work, I walk down this one street and they scatter in all directions like a squirrely sea of doom.

People here think they are cute. Find them amusing. The fluffy tails make them laugh. People here FEED THEM. Yes, they put out food for the little b*stards.

They don’t understand my revulsion, my utter HORROR that these vermin are allowed to roam free in a civilized society.

They don’t understand this because I am a New Mexican. One of the bonus features of being raised in New Mexico is, da da dummmmmm, bubonic plague.

In fact, according to an article in today’s ABQjournal, there have already been four cases this year, including a boy who died.

To quote the article, “Plague, a bacterial disease, is generally transmitted to humans through the bites of infected fleas but can also be transmitted by direct contact with infected animals, such as rodents, wildlife and pets.”

Unh huh, no wonder every little rat with a fluffy tail gets the suspicious eye from me. Early on in life my mom would yell at all us kids to stay back from any wild creature, especially the small rodenty kind.

I will not draw one of those beady-eyed plague-carrying varmints closer to me or my home! I live in a duplex and for a while my next door neighbor put out bird seed with no cover or protection from the squirrels. I would stare horrified out my living room window to see a swarm of the things eating with reckless abandon in my back yard.

THE PLAGUE!!! THE PLAGUE!!!!

In my old place, a couple of squirrely warriors had an epic territory battle on the roof right over my apartment. Not only did I have to hear the squeals and the death call of the loser, I *freaked out* about the dead rodent right there over my doorway. As you know, fleas leave the dead rodent searching for a new home.

I shall print out the referenced article and keep copies handy for the next person who looks me and says “how can you not like squirrels, they are sooooo *cute*!!”

I’m keeping an eye on you, you plaugey b*stards!!!!


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And now, the update and my vindication:

Plague-Infected Squirrel Closes California Campground

A plague-infected squirrel has closed a California campground for at least a week, according to Los Angeles County health officials.

The squirrel, trapped July 16 in the Table Mountain Campgrounds of Angeles National Forest, tested positive for the infection Tuesday, prompting a health advisory and the closing of the campground while investigators tested other squirrels and dusted the area for plague-infected fleas.

…L.A. County health officials are urging Angeles National Forest campers to avoid contact with wild animals, steer clear of squirrel burrows and report any dead squirrels to the department of health. (emphasis added)

Oh! Oh! There it is. The I Told You So Dance.








You Can Take The Girl Out Of the Desert…

…but you can’t take the desert out of the girl.

So here’s something that is grinding my gears lately.

It is the summertime here in the Bay Area and that is a complicated thing. As many know, the marine layer and I have long had a tempestuous relationship.

July looks like this: overcast morning gives way to a very hot and sunny day which is then doused by fog by the afternoon.

This phenomenon is why you see tourists shivering in their shorts down on Fisherman’s Wharf. The Bay Area warms up quickly then is naturally cooled.

However….

Before the fog rolls in, it can get truly hot around here. Hot enough that a little air conditioning would be a nice thing.

Most of the Bay Area doesn’t believe in air conditioning. I recall when I first moved here and was shopping apartments. I asked one landlord “where are the air conditioning controls?” and he laughed and said, “No air conditioning.”

“Whaaat?!” Was my reply. That was when I lived in the South Bay and temps could climb into the high 90’s during the day.

“Just open the windows. We get a cross breeze,” he said.

I scoffed. And harrumphed. And muttered something like “I’ll give you a cross breeze you rattin’ smattin’ rootin’ tootin’ son of your mother….”

As it turns out, very few homes in the Bay Area have air conditioning. No place I have lived since I’ve been here has had the sweet miracle that is air conditioning. Only some windows and a hope for a cross breeze.

Compare that to New Mexico where every home has some form of AC. It’s only right. Just. Moral. Upstanding.

I’ve survived many a Bay Area summer season by working a few longer hours at work, sucking down their gentle corporate paid cool air, or riding in my car with the AC on max to cool off.

But what’s grinding my gears lately is all of the retail stores that either don’t have or don’t use air conditioning.

Look, I learned as a young child about moving quickly from the freon cooled car into the refrigerated air cooled grocery store that was so frosty it would raise goose flesh on arms and my legs clad only in shorts. Malls and clothing stores and other retail shops are a respite from the heat.

Not here. Stores have no windows and no AC and no moving air at all and they become this stale pit of muggy heat. Bleah! I saunter around the store wiping sweat off my fevered brow.

My desert hewn body was made to be a wonder of convection cooling. I sweat, breeze passes over it, water evaporates and I’m cooled.

This is how nature made me!

But deep inside a Walgreens or a Safeway there ain’t no breeze and only the sweat remains. Gross.

So then I take up residence somewhere near the freezer section where I crack open a door and it takes me a reeeeaaaalllly loooooong time to select which brand of frozen orange juice I would like.

It just ain’t right.










Image created by quickmeme.




How I Learned To Re-Love My Home by Being a Tourist

When you live and work in an area that is a poplar tourist destination, once can get a bit…weary…of the whole out-of-towner schtick. Come summertime when the weather starts to warm up and school lets out, the San Francisco Bay Area is certainly a popular place for folks to visit.

When I first started dating The Good Man (lo these many years ago), he lived just off the Embarcadero and I learned to not just deal with tourists, but to be fully submerged into their every photo clicking, map pointing good times.

I grew a little tired of it, honestly. Kind of made me want to stay inside and avoid those types.

Enter this past weekend and the arrival of my almost fourteen year old goddaughter. She lives somewhere in that no man’s land between Las Cruces and Radium Springs, New Mexico and her view of the world is a little different from mine. She had briefly been in San Francisco five years ago around the time of my wedding, but hadn’t really spent time in the City.

So Uncle Good Man and I did it up right. We loaded her in the car and headed off for destinations such as Golden Gate Park, Ocean Beach, the Cliff House, Lombard Street, the Wharf and more.

As I huffed and puffed walking many of the seven hills and jostled my way through tourists and took in my beloved sights once more, I too became a tourist. A tourist with a memory.

Oh yes, I recalled the stone risers near Ghiradelli Square where I sat on that beautiful California day and contemplated if I could really live here. I watched the gentle waves in the Bay and summoned my courage. And OH! There is that little dude who wears a full old-time golfer uniform and waxed mustache who does a rollickingly fun shell and balls game on the streets. Man, that guy is still there? And oh muh lord, the Golden Gate on a clear day. What a gorgeous little orange gem.

I saw the familiar sights with new eyes and I remembered fully, totally, and completely why San Francisco is one of the most wonderful places in the world.

I think I needed that. I needed to remember why I live here, why it matters, why I left not just my heart but my liver, and pancreas and eyes and all the other major body parts in San Francisco. I felt the energy and excitement of all the tourists visiting my fair City and I echoed it back to them.

Good ol’ San Franciscio, she made me fall in love all over again, and that leaves me with a happy smile.

And a huge stack of Ghiradelli chocolate bars in my kitchen cabinet. Buy four get one free! Whatta steal!





Time To Be The Grownup

Amidst one of the craziest couple weeks on record at any job I’ve ever held, I do have a wonderfully bright spot ahead. I get two days off for vacation this week, both Thursday and Friday.

But that’s not the bright spot.

I’m taking those two days off because my wonderful, adorable, amazing eldest goddaughter is making her first solo voyage on an airplane to come see her Nina Karen.

Now that’s a bright spot!!!

This is big doings for both teen and adult. Her Uncle Good Man and I are so excited to have her in our home and to show her around the Bay Area. There are lots of things to do here and we’re planning big fun.

I did have pause last night as The Good Man and I had a little supper. We were discussing plans for the visit and I reminded him that we have to be the grownups.

“Why?” was his response, so beautifully typical of my spouse.

And I laughed and replied, “Because we are responsible for her!”

He shook his head and said “aw, we’ll be all right.” And I’m quite sure we will.

But for as excited as I am to see my girl, I’m also feeling the responsibility for being her Nina, for being a good Nina and for making sure she has an awesome time.

Uncle Good Man says, “She can have cheeseburgers at every meal if she wants!”

Clearly we’re gonna have different approach to this. Then again I’m the one that yells at the cat for drinking out of the toilet and he says “she’s just thirsty!”

*sigh*

May I be a good co-madre to my precious girl. The kind that makes room for both cheeseburgers and safety.