Silver City, New Mexico

Whew! What a week. I had two big teeth extracted on Tuesday and it has been harder to recover than I expected. I have twice had a single tooth removed in the past and do not remember it being such a big deal. Do you think maybe twenty years has something to do with it? Or was it the double-tooth double-whammy effect?

Anyway, now I am eating like a baby and I do not like it! Texture has got to be as important as taste. Variety is nice.

Silver City has a Christmas parade every year and I have only seen it once, I guess because it is always a couple of days after Thanksgiving. I need more separation between holidays and golly-gee, today is the winter solstice!

On the way home from Farmers Market I saw a woman with an evergreen wreath on her head. It was fantastic, and as we passed one another she wished me a happy solstice. Yay! I love this celebration of the beginning of the return of the light.

Luckily if that particular holiday observation has more official obligations than just to acknowledge the fact I do not know about it. We had a good sunrise this morning, though, and that was celebration enough.

Silver City, New Mexico 

Every week or so I help unload and shelve books donated to the Friends of the Library in Silver City. If they hang around too long on the very cheap sales shelves, we put them on a free shelf close to the checkout desk. One of those free shelves is dedicated to kids books, another to books for young adults.

For two weeks the young adults shelf has been completely full. They are not moving at all, even the wonderful Walter Farley books I loved as a young maybe sub teen. Those books are about horse racing and were the inspiration for the Black Stallion movie.

Somebody come save them! Too bad not many local folks come to my website.

I asked a librarian about the not moving books, and she told me not many young adults come into the library at all.

Well, that would explain it.

Silver City, New Mexico

Yesterday on my way downtown I saw a man rolling a large wheel-like object towards his garage. I asked him what kind of wheel it was because it looked a little odd. He said it was something that was not a wheel of conveyance. It was from an old theater nearby that is being remodeled - I think he said it was part of a heating or cooling system. He thought maybe he could use it in a sculpture - maybe a kinetic one.

Later, walking up the neighboring street, I saw a box marked free that had a bunch of very small wheel assemblies in it. More possible raw material for a found object sculptor!

If I see him again before too long I will tell him about it.

Silver City, New Mexico 

Have you ever had a dream in which you lost a couple of teeth? They just tumbled out of your mouth? It was a nightmare, right? The feeling was awful.

Well, forty years later I am scheduled to have two teeth extracted next week. Oh, if only they would just fall out of my mouth! No blood, no pain, no time spent with my mouth hanging open for hours. The only feeling - regret.

Now that nightmare seems like a pleasant dream.

Silver City, New Mexico 

Just read a book by Rachel Maddox from half a dozen years back about the fossil fuel energy industry - Blowout. It is not a happy tale for most of us, but very readable considering the subject matter. In it she lists states that have/had fracking going on. New Mexico was not listed.

Yay! I thought.

The other day, though, I was talking with a former Forest Service employee about it and she told me someone in the know told her there have been earthquakes registering in eastern New Mexico from fracking. I looked it up.

There has been a lot of fracking going on in this state! The Northwest corner and the Southwest corner of the state each appear to have multiple fracking sites involving the injection of toxic chemicals into the ground numbering in the hundreds.

New Mexico has had over 3,000 earthquakes in the past year. I just tried to look up statistics for 2014 and did not see much, but the same request for the year 2018 gave me a source that reported New Mexico had an average of 120 earthquakes a year.

This kind of research begs the question of how do we popularly define an earthquake - is it something we have to feel in order to have such a discrepancy in numbers?

The whole subject is very intriguing, but hey, it is almost 12:30 and I want my lunch.

Silver City, New Mexico 

I was going to write yesterday about the Volunteer party last night to give us a chance to see a preview of the lates big exhibit at the Silver City Museum, but I did not get to it. This announcement is even better: quick! Become a member of the Museum Society and you can go to a party tomorrow night for the same purpose. There will be refreshments, and the exhibit will be even a little closer to being ready!

A lot of lovely people belong to the Museum Society and there are half a dozen times more of them than comprise the total of volunteers.

Have fun!

Silver City, New Mexico 

Spending Thanksgiving weekend with my daughter and her husband in Las Cruces was wonderful. We had a fun morning at Farmers Market on Saturday. Having said that, I must now say it is misnamed. There are blocks of booths: craftspeople, purveyors of rocks and other objects abound. At least four different musical groups or soloists performed. I even bought a book signed by the author who I bought it from. (I guess I already wrote about this - alert for those of you studying dementia progression (I wish I were kidding.))

At any rate, Saturday I went to our local Farmers Market. So much food! Much more than in Las Cruces. I have to admit, though, Las Cruces is growing on me. Spectacular views! On the day I left the clouds were billowing over the high rugged Organ Mountains in a way I have not seen anywhere before. Stunning.

Silver City, New Mexico 

On my way down here to the museum I realized how entitled what I wrote yesterday sounds. Many people have to get up when the alarm rings. No question about it - mood does not enter into it at all.

Of course to some extent I was entitled. I have also been entitled in a way other than socially or economically, though: I possess the entitlement of the early riser.

Usually. This morning, however, I woke up with light streaming into the windows. I had missed the sunrise, which a friend had texted was unique. Nothing got me out of bed but the time. Aargh - if I did not hurry I would be late to work.

How often the universe makes me a liar.

Silver City, New Mexico

I remember reading that William James, one of the fathers of modern psychology, commented that what got him out of bed in the morning was anticipation and excitement about what he was going to do that day. 

His writer brother said that what got him out of bed was the need to escape from negative thoughts.

Some years ago, when I read about this contrast, I felt more like Henry. Too bad.

Now, however, positive thoughts, negative thoughts, a hodgepodge of thoughts - it does not matter.

Now I get up when I have to pee.

Las Cruces, New Mexico 

Farmers Market in Las Cruces is huge, with fewer produce vendors than the much smaller Farmers Market in Silver City. We did buy honey, Jerusalem artichokes, jujubes and pears from a couple of different vendors, but most of the vendors sold non-edible items. There were at least three stalls of belt makers, multiple jewelry vendors selling jewelry made of multiple substances in a plethora of styles, and of course fabric item vendors. Stone and gemstone sellers are well-represented as well.

I bought a book from the author who signed and dated it. It is not long but I have not read it yet. Too busy visiting!

Since the market is downtown you can bounce back and forth between the market and stores if you want, to a lot of musical accompaniment. There must have been at least four different groups and/or solo entertainers in the quarter mile or so strip that is the Las Cruces Farmers Market.

In the afternoon we dropped in on Mesilla and did some shopping

in stores that still had Black Friday-like sales. Quite a fun day!

Las Cruces, New Mexico

Now this website is twenty years old!

Happy Birthday to Walking Tours of the Heart of the Valley! In other words, to me. And a thank you to my son, Martin Kretzmann, for making this forum possible. Little did he know when he created this site that was intended to be a site offering walking tours of Corvallis, Oregon, that it would end up being a site offering a plethora of other features entirely. He has always been incredibly good-natured in his continuing support of this outlet for self-expression with nary a word of complaint about any use I have made of it.

After my big vacation and writing hiatus I do intend to start writing again. How and when

I am not sure. I have managed to create for myself a more rigorous schedule of physical workouts and volunteer commitments than I have had in previous decades, so how I will actually feel about returning to writing remains to be seen. These days I have more social contacts than I had for years; maybe those are enough of an outlet for self-expression.

Anyway, here I am in Las Cruces. The physical setting is awesome, especially the craggy rugged Organ Mountains. We took a pretty easy hike yesterday morning - about one mile up and one mile back - to a potential waterfall (only after a rain?) that yesterday was a mere seep. The face was wet with no visible flow. Some of it was a little shiny, though! (Smile.)

Well, people do not come to New Mexico for the water.

Nor do we come here for greenery, although plant life here can be gorgeous, if not exactly lush. Today walking by a local park I that saw a shrub I had paid no attention to in the past is blooming. It has charming pink lavender flowers of medium color value - not pale at all - and gray-green leaves. My daughter tells me it is called Texas sage. Its tendency to shoot out impulsive growth when the weather is right also has earned it the name barometer sage. Prickly pear here is larger than it is in Silver City without the support of a gardener, and ocotillo - not a cactus at all though it looks like one - also grows here.

Tomorrow we plan to go to the local farmers market - which is by no means limited to farm produce. I will report what it is like this end of November time.

Albuquerque, New Mexico

I want to apologize in advance for the program glitches that make me look as if I am cursing. Those are supposed to be apostrophes. Hey, this website is almost twenty years old!

Yesterday there was a police presence for hours in the northeast neighborhood where my daughter lives. Although mildly curious, we did not go out to inquire about what was going on. Hours later, talking with some neighbors who were walking by, we learned that someone had broken windows at a messianic synagogue close by. 

The conversation turned onto the subject of Albuquerque and its  reputation for violence. This is nothing new, really, but Silver City has a similar reputation. Hmmm. Let me compare the two -or maybe it will turn out to be a contrast!

Wow.  Violent as Silver City seems to be, Albuquerque has it beat. It has over ten times the violent crime per 1000 capita than Silver City.

Albuquerque probably also has over ten times the yummy restaurants as Silver City. Silver City has not one Indian restaurant I can frequent for my favorite cuisine. There are good restaurants in Silver City, though.Jason Pierre has a great restaurant -La Vie c’est une Bistro - right downtown on the corner of Yankie and Texas. The Corner Kitchen is exceptional. Jalisco’s is hot in more ways than one. There is a new place in my neighborhood near the University called the Duck Stop which is supposed to be wonderful, too. I will definitely check that out - maybe on the way home from a workout.

Here in Albuquerque during my stay I and mine have eaten at several great restaurants. One (I think Las Palomas) has exceptionally wonderful blue corn pancakes on their brunch menu. The grounds are beautiful also, and I am not talking about coffee!  Although I did have a good latte with a lovely frothy frond design on its surface. Limonada is always a favorite. Yesterday I got there the crepes that some restaurants seem to be better at offering than actually providing. They must have had close to twenty varieties offered - some sweet, some savory. We ate at the Taj Mahal the other day, but it is not the only great Indian restaurant in Albuquerque. There are others. 

The Artisan shop supplied the needs of the artists in the family, but other than that we have not yet indulged in much shopping.

Albuquerque, New Mexico

Yesterday we went to an escape room simulating a subway stranded at the bottom of the ocean. What a challenge! If I had been there by myself I would have assuredly been lost. My son, daughter-in-law, and grandson took charge. Two of them had been there last year, so they at least had familiarity with the scenario. I was clueless.

What amazed me was the combination of independent exploration and teamwork the family displayed. There was no commander. All was chaos. The kid, though, was the one who successfully “drove” the submarine out of the cave it had to enter in order to get supplies for the operation. This he was able to do because of his experience playing - guess what - video games. This year we (they) won! Yay!

I sure hope I get to participate in another one - maybe next year.

August 8 & 9, 2024

Albuquerque, New Mexico

This old Scrabble fan was introduced to a new-to-me (but older than Scrabble) game called Anagrams. I was always bad at the anagram puzzles in the newspapers, but I am beginning to enjoy scrambling words in Anagrams. It is a similar game to Scrabble in certain ways, but no board, no points, no such scoring. Whoever has the most words at the end of the game wins.

I have been on the lookout for old Scrabble games to increase my tile supply. The other day I walked over to a Saint Johns thrift shop in the neighborhood looking for Scrabble tiles. No luck (although it is a very nice shop!) My son got online, saw a game called bananagrams and presented it to me as a surprise! The tiles are Las tic, but they feel great. Not at all like the slick nasty hard-edged plastic tiles of old! They might even feel better than the wooden tiles. In fact, they do. 

Albuquerque, New Mexico 

Just arrived in Albuquerque yesterday afternoon on Advanced Airlines, the way to fly from the Grant County Airport to the Sunport in Albuquerque. The weather was only partly cloudy, so there was plenty of time to see the terrain below. For the first time I was able to see a huge mine, multicolored and multi-terraced. I am not sure it was the Chino mine, partly because it appeared to have two lagoons at the bottom - a feature I do not recall from the overlook that has the big nine-foot tire (which I am told is smaller than the tires currently in use.)

Interesting little factoid I learned from a visitor at the museum: if you have an ambition to drive a big truck in a big mine, you better not be prone to seasickness; those trucks sway and weave like crazy. Wild, huh?

I also got to see the Very Great Array of radio telescopes for the second time from above. My son tells me you can drive by. He went with his Dad once on the way to an engineering job. Alas, sounds as if it is quite out of the way as a possible detour between Albuquerque and Silver City. It is a two-hour drive from Albuquerque.

Silver City, New Mexico 

Museum shift dead so far. I wonder why? Was it this slow this time last year? I guess the pattern is there is no pattern.

I cannot help but wonder if the tragic Ruidoso fire has affected travel to the whole state. I wonder how Hawaii is doing tourist-wise.

One way the internet is inhibiting is in the indulgence of idle wondering. Now even more than ever, the activity deserves the response Look it up!

That activity used to require a trip to the library - discouraging to many. Now it requires a dunk in the Internet. Easy? No!

The Internet does not have the objectivity of the card catalog. Or was that so objective? Maybe the biases in operation were just more hidden.

I have known libraries that had new nonfiction shelves I could find treasures in every week. A change of library directors, and the nonfiction section might become unappealing if not downright unappetizing. After all, some of us are turned off by cookbooks.

Trying to find the truth on the Internet is equivalently unappetizing to me. Is it true that the first items on the response list are usually advertisements, or at least money-motivated? How far down must I scroll to get real information before the list becomes about something else I did not ask for?

At least the old card catalog did not offer books about zebras when I was researching anteaters!

Of course, I have no right to complain. For almost twenty years now I have used the domain called corvalliswalkingtours.com when it has been much closer to, successively, Valparaisowalkingtours, Madisonwalkingtours, and now, SilverCitywalkingtours than anything close to Corvallis.

Oh well, just goes to show you the power of inertia. Searcher, beware!

Silver City, New Mexico 

Well, for once I have time to write during my museum shift. Silver City finally got rain a couple of weeks ago after two months without significant rain. What a relief! Wildfires basically destroyed Ruidoso a month or so ago, and although we do not have many big trees around here it is scary not to have rain for so long.

It rained so little that a mama bear and her cubs were spotted on Boston Hill open (where I and others hike alone!). I guess they were desperate for food and water, but they were tranquillized and taken out into the wilderness.

Life in the no-longer Wild West still has its moments!

It appears I am celebrating the almost-twenty-year equivalent of a sabbatical!

I am just as opinionated as ever - I had some really important (heh) insights this morning. 

Unfortunately they are evidently not important enough to write down, or I forget to do so, or....

What was I on about??