You might have read recently that THE Ohio State University has trademarked the use of the word “THE” when the school is referenced. The presumptuous move supposedly means no other university can use the word “THE” (all caps, please) when referring to the institution. Hence, there can be no “THE University of Humor Impaired of Southwest Wisconsin” or “THE University of the Severely Indecisive of Wyoming.”

I got to thinking about this last week when listening to a football game in which the announcer made a reference to “the Ohio State University fullback.” So now, should the correct reference be “the THE Ohio State University fullback?” A double entry, so to speak.

Well, it’s time to fight back. I propose that in the future, New Mexico State University now be referenced as “EL New Mexico State University,” capitalizing on our Hispanic heritage and beating the equally presumptuous University of New Mexico to the punch.

I’ve even started design work on t-shirts that EL NMSU could sell to protect this important naming right.

East of Albuquerque, along Interstate 40 near Sedillo Hill, the New Mexico Highway Department placed a directional sign at an exit showing a town named “Albuqueque” was thataway.

Clearly, when the signmaker produced the sign, he or she didn’t notice that the letter “R” had been dropped from the name of the state’s largest city. And whoever was responsible for proof reading didn’t catch the error either. Or maybe spell check wasn’t working that day.

A public information officer from the New Mexico Transportation Department, said it was an honest mistake and the sign was being replaced with the correct spelling. But, she added, “I honestly think it’s funny.”

Albuquerque’s name — how to spell it and pronounce it — has been befuddling people for years. Originally the town’s name, honoring a Duke in Spain, had an additional “R” and was spelled “Alburquerque.” Over the centuries, the extra “R” was dropped. Noted New Mexico author Rudolfo Anaya even wrote a novel entitled “Alburquerque.”

It’s not the first time the Highway Department has embarrassed itself with a misspelling on a sign.

Between Socorro and Truth or Consequences, there is a deep canyon with a major bridge on Interstate 25 spanning it.  Because of the steep decline entering the canyon, the highway department needed to warn truckers to slow down.

The sign posted at the lip of the canyon was “Vehicles With Trailors Must Reduce Speed” (or something to that effect.)

My good friend Joel, a college professor at the time, was so incensed by the misspelling that he contacted the highway department, saying that the mangling of the word “trailer” left visitors thinking New Mexico was illiterate.

His rant to the highway department was taken seriously, and the sign was corrected soon thereafter.

Maybe there is a conspiracy underway to remove all consonants in the city’s name. In which case Albuquerque might someday be known as “Uueue” — pronounced “You-Youee-Youee.” Maybe some rock band could put the new name to the tune of “Louie, Louie.”

 

 

 

As with most cities these days, we’ve seen an influx of homeless people. Because of the inviting shady and lush green park on the east side of our church, St. James Episcopal, we’ve been an especially popular place for the homeless during our recent heat wave.

One homeless visitor to the church was particularly entertaining and a little bit scary for some of our members.

My wife first discovered him when she was inside the church and opened the outside door leading to the sacristy. He was sitting on the sidewalk next to the door, dressed in a red and gold robe, new blue tennis shoes, a tattoo of his name “James” on his neck and not much else. After almost stepping on him, my surprised wife engaged in conversation with him while she was waiting for me to arrive to help her with a problem with the church sound system. The fact that she reacted so calmly to his presence was both surprising and gratifying to me.

When I arrived, I talked to him a little more and asked that he clean up his “nest” by the sacristy door and be aware that he could be frightening to some of the older women who enter the church through that door to prepare for services.

Sure enough, a few days later, James was leaning on the door again when a member of the Altar Guild opened it and he halfway tumbled inside the church. She was frightened by the man and he eventually left without causing any more problems.

The following Sunday, when my wife and I were on the way to the church, I got a call from our Senior Warden (Episcopal-speak for head of the church governing board) saying James was at the side of the church again, this time wearing nothing at all. She had called to warn Margo not to use that entrance. She also said she had called police to respond to the situation.

When I got there, James was fully exposed for the world to see, wearing only his blue tennis shoes. He quickly began wrapping himself in his red and gold robe and put on some gold lame’ pants. I approached him and told him that I didn’t think it was appropriate for him to be at the church on a Sunday wearing no clothes. He pleasantly agreed.

About that time, the police arrived and approached the two of us.

“Let’s move along, James,” the officer admonished the homeless man.

“You know his name?” I asked the policeman.

“Yeah, he’s one of our ‘frequent flyers,'” he responded.

James wandered off toward Interstate 10 after gathering up his accoutrements, snacks and water and we haven’t seen on the church grounds since. We have spotted him walking along nearby University Ave. a couple of times,

Our visiting priest on the day that James appeared naked was Father Tom. He was unfazed by the incident and saw the humor in it. He tossed off the best quip of the day.

“I guess we’ll just have to refer to him as ‘St. James, the Naked.'”

Las Cruces has been used as a location for many movies over the years. Some were dreadful, others marginally okay. I can’t really remember a truly good one. Nevertheless, it does bring some income and notoriety to the area.

The latest movie to plan on filming in Las Cruces is one that will feature Mel Gibson. “The Informant” began filming mid-July in the old Dona Ana County Courthouse, which has been abandoned for several years in downtown Las Cruces.

The movie focuses on an undercover narcotics officer with a terminal illness who is trying to assure his family of financial support. He hatches a scheme to work with his former partner and an informant to stage his own death in the line of duty, assuring his family of a comfortable living.

The movie is based on a true story, which occurred in upstate New York. So how do you fit a place like Las Cruces in that script?

“It’s not easy to make Las Cruces look like (upstate) New York,” said producer Daniel Cummings.

Well, at least he was honest about it. Most the Las Cruces scenes will be interior shots, which could be done anywhere. But there are some exterior shots planned around the old residential area near Pioneer Park. Still kind of a stretch, I think.

My concern is that during the middle of filming the exteriors, someone will drive nearby in a beat up Chevy pickup with loud mufflers and a Juarez radio station blasting loudly through an amped up super woofer speaker. It would kind of kill the mood, I think.

Next Monday, my pig sourced replacement aortic heart valve will have been working three years in my ticker.

All seems to be going well with regular checkups and EKGs showing it’s doing its job. Seems like I’m a little short on breath on some occasions when hiking in higher altitudes, but I think that just has to do with the fact that I’m not the spring chicken I once was. Margo and I try to walk some every day, hopefully at least two-plus miles. I don’t get winded on those journeys along the irrigation ditches as I did three and one-half years ago.

It’s still amazing to me that I did as well as I did for many years with a heart valve with just two instead of three flaps. I did a lot of skiing, running, playing football, playing rugby, biking, fly fishing and hiking up until I started feeling something was wrong in 2019.

I’m told by a friend who had a similar heart valve replacement that the procedure has become much simpler these days. Instead of cracking my chest open, pulling my heart out and keeping me alive with an artificial pump while the replacement valve was sewn in, it’s simply done now with tiny medical instruments that go up a big blood vessel in your leg. I’m told that my piggy sourced replacement valve does have a shelf life and will have to be replaced at some time in the future, unless the good Lord has decided that I’ve done enough damage on earth and relocates me somewhere else before then.

Anyway, thanks to all of you who remain supportive in my adventure, and I’m enclosing a cartoon from last month’s Albuquerque Journal about my procedure which made me chuckle. And a special thanks to Mongo.

My wife and I have been ordering food items online from Wal-Mart since the pandemic. We pick up what we’ve ordered at a special drive-up section at the side of our nearby store, avoiding mingling with lots of people and dodging those expensive impulse buys that double your shopping bill.

The pick-up routine requires you to phone the store at a special number once you’ve arrived so the staff can come outside and load your items into the trunk or back of your vehicle.

This morning, we forgot to bring our phones when we went to pick up our items. I mean really, do you even have an identity if you don’t have your phone with you at all times these days? How could you live without Apple Pay, driving directions, constant access to texting and phone calls, constant access to news media and Twitter, etc?

So not having our phones, I tried the only thing I could remember to alert someone inside a building of my presence. I knocked on the door. What a concept.

After a few seconds, the door opened and I saw four stunned-looking people staring at me, probably wondering if they had opened the door to a mass murderer.

“I forgot my phone,” I said, looking embarrassed.

“No one’s ever knocked on our door to get their groceries,” one nice young woman said, making me feel especially stupid.

Assured that we were not mass murderers, the staff loaded our groceries in the car, then went back in the store probably to begin telling stories about what a bunch of dolts we were.

Meanwhile, outside and parked in the next space, was a woman at least 15 years older than us, sitting in a clapped out 84 Buick with fading paint, duct-taped bumpers and a barrage of dents. While she was sucking on a cigarette, I could see through the cloud of smoke that she indeed had her cell phone with her and was summoning the Wal-Mart crew to bring her order.

Before we could escape the parking space, the crew had brought out her order, giving us a glancing “you guys are really dumb” kind of look.

We’re probably going to have to start wearing clothes with a scarlet letter “A” on our chests to warn others that we are indeed “Addled.”

Our daughter and our two grandchildren visited us earlier this month and we made the most of their time here by traveling to various sites around the region. We stopped at City of Rocks State Park, the Catwalk near Glenwood, the Organ Mountains and other places in Las Cruces to keep them entertained.

Our biggest trip was a one-day excursion to Carlsbad Caverns National Park. My wife and I had not been there since our kids were about the same age as our grandchildren, so it was a great time to revisit the park and remember what a spectacular place it is.

Hayes, our grandson who is about to turn four, began having some concerns about what might be in the cave. He knew there would be bats, stalactites and stalagmites but he wondered about other creepy cave dwellers.

At one point he questioned whether zombies might be present in the depths of the cave.

We finally encountered a park ranger on our walk down the steep narrow pathway to the Big Room. I asked Hayes if he wanted to ask the ranger anything. He was reluctant to speak, so I asked for him.

“Hayes wants to know if there are any zombies down here,” I said.

The ranger chuckled and nicely replied.

“We get that question a lot,” he said. “I don’t think there are any down here, but if there are, I’m sure they won’t bother good little boys like you.”

That seemed to satisfy Hayes who became so relaxed that he fell asleep in the arms of his weary mother. She had to carry him the last quarter mile to the elevators, a task I was pretty sure I could not have done at my age. 

About three years ago, out of the blue, I was contacted by an individual wanting to know if I would be willing to allow an oil company to acquire drilling rights from a piece of property near Pecos, TX, that I had inherited.

WHAT???!!!???

I never even knew this piece of property existed. After discussions with the agent from an oil development company, I learned that my father and at least one of his sisters had purchased a few acres of land in a Godforsaken patch of west Texas years ago. My father never mentioned it to me or any of my siblings.

The agent informed me that I was one of many heirs that held an interest to the property. Initially, all the development company wanted was the right to produce oil from the property, if it ever became economically feasible to do so. After some negotiations, each of the heirs agreed to a payment of about $1,500 for rights to develop the property, with an option for renewal three years later.

I never expected much to happen with the property, but over the years had calls from several other oil production company representatives wanting to buy the property outright or acquire the rights to develop that we had already sold. When the development rights option matured last year, the company renewed it, which surprised me.

Then last fall, I received a surprise check for royalties on production of oil on the property. With the continuing boom in the Delaware Basin of the Permian Basin, the property I didn’t know I partially owned was suddenly producing. From what I understand, there were no new wells drilled on the property. The oil was extracted through modern horizontal drilling techniques which can significantly reduce production costs.

Since then. I’ve been getting regular checks for royalty on the oil production on the property. Not much, but between $300 and $400 per month.

That is, until last month, when it dropped down to $285.16.

So this makes me wonder if high gasoline prices this summer are indeed the result of intentional cutbacks in oil production. According to my calculations, the royalty revenue reflects almost a 25% reduction in production since the high point of production in the first quarter of the year. 

If oil companies want to drive up prices, cutting back on production seems to be a good, if not entirely ethical, was to achieve that goal.

But I can’t complain since I never expected to get the money anyway. I guess I’ll just use what I get to pay my gasoline credit card bills. 

 

The City of Albuquerque recently decided to re-implement speeding cameras on several of its high-trafficked streets.

The city had used the speed cameras several years ago, but ultimately took all of them down after a series of complaints, legal challenges and questions about their effectiveness.

Apparently some drivers still aren’t warming up to the idea that they’re being watched so closely. Just 17 days after the new cameras were put into place, someone carefully removed one of the speed cameras at the corner of Lead and Cornell just south of the University of New Mexico. All that was left was the mounting pole, some dangling wires and a few bolts that held the device in place.

The city said it plans to re-install the camera, but this time with more tamper proof hardware to keep it in place.

I’ve had friends who were nabbed by the speeding cameras in Albuquerque, but I never got targeted for speeding where they were located. 

However, I know they are effective. Several years ago, while visiting our son in southern California, I accidentally ended up on a toll highway without paying for the privilege to drive on it. I was in a rental car, so I figured that they’d never figure out who was driving it.

Wrong. About two months after my illegal usage of the highway, I got a letter from the California highway department asking me to pay for using the road. The agency had managed to track the license plate on the rental car on the date that I drove it, find my rental agreement and then procure my name, address and driver’s license number on the document. They sent me a nicely worded suggestion that I pay up ASAP or face the consequences. It didn’t cost that much, and I grudgingly paid it. But I quickly learned that you just can’t hide in today’s high tech, someone’s always watching world.

And I’ve always wondered why the Border Patrol has those cameras on the opposite side of the highway from where the checkpoints are located. Just to be careful, I always flash a friendly smile when I drive past them. If Big Brother is watching, maybe they’ll think my smile is a sign that I’m no threat — or maybe that I’m trying to hide something. 

My good friend Cheryl who doubles as an additional research assistant and fact checker for my blog (I need to increase her salary) came up with some new information about the infamous “Motel Boulevard” that I mentioned in one of my blogs last week.

It turns out that a short section of that road south of Interstate 10 is actually designated as a New Mexico Highway 292. That’s the part where the Coachlight Inn is located, so it’s really not on Motel Boulevard at all.

And even more confusing is that when State Road 292 enters the northern Mesilla Town Limits at Glass Road, the street becomes “Calle de El Paso,” which is odd because it really doesn’t head towards El Paso, which is way south of Mesilla.

Apparently when the street was named during construction of Interstate 10, it was hoped that many Motel 6s, Holiday Inns, Comfort Suites, Hampton Inns, etc., would build along that street.

Now, as my good friend Mike points out, the name of the street must be really confusing for travelers along Interstate 10 who take the exit in hopes of finding a plethora of motels.

So imagine someone traveling on Interstate 10, coming across a street named “Pat Garrett Boulevard. They might think: “Oh, that’s cool. I heard of Pat Garrett and how he killed notorious outlaw Billy the Kid. I’ll bet the town has some interesting things to tell us about its history. Let’s stop and check it out and spend money staying there and finding out what a great place it is.”

Instead, travelers get off I-10, thinking they will find a good motel on “Motel Boulevard.”

After traveling on the street, they probably think: “Well how dumb is this town? It lured me onto a street suggesting there would be motels, but the only thing I saw were some giant truck stops and the stench of a nearby sewer plant. Guess they really don’t want us to stop. I’ll just keep going until I come to Deming (or El Paso).”

And by the way, Cheryl points out that boulevards are typically streets lined with trees with a divider in the middle.

This is from the internet:

Boulevard (Blvd.): A very wide city street that has trees and vegetation on both sides of it. There’s also usually a median in the middle of boulevards.

For our Motel “Boulevard,” the occasional yucca, mesquite or creosote bush — complete with a with a Wal-Mart bag stuck on it and flapping in the wind — only makes us look even more like we’re trying to dupe traveling guests.

A story in last Sunday’s Las Cruces Sun-News announced that Louisiana had named a section of highway in honor of legendary New Mexico lawman Pat Garrett, who killed notorious outlaw Billy the Kid. The Louisiana Legislature designated a section of Louisiana Highway 9 from the towns of Homer to Junction City as “Sheriff Pat Garrett Memorial Highway.”

The story notes that history-minded individuals in that state had confirmed that Garret grew up in the Claiborne Parish area of Louisiana before moving to New Mexico to become one of the state’s most recognized citizens. And the Louisiana residents recognized the publicity value of putting his name on a roadway in that area.

“Pat’s youth was spent working on the farm and hunting in the woods of Claiborne Parish (Louisiana), acquiring the skills to prepare him for a future of hard long trails and difficult times,” the Claiborne County Library said in a notice about the dedication ceremony for the stretch of highway.

But in Las Cruces, our local government couldn’t find the wisdom to offer the famous New Mexico lawman that kind of recognition by renaming a short street in his honor. The local historical association had suggested that a street with the existing uninspiring name “Motel Boulevard” be renamed in honor of Garrett, who was Sheriff of Dona Ana County at the time he killed Billy the Kid. And the current Dona Ana County Sheriff’s Office headquarters is located on that street. Truth be told, there’s only one run-down motel on Motel Boulevard anymore, so any new street name would have been better than that. The motel, called the Coachlight Inn, was once owned by former Dallas Cowboy player Bob Lilly and has seen better days. A faded billboard promoting the property on eastbound Interstate 10 is in a bad state of repair as well, with part of the sign missing but Lilly’s jersey number 88 still proudly on display on a Cowboys helmet.

The Las Cruces City Council, in its wisdom (or lack thereof) decided that there were lots of people who could be recognized for their role in the history of our region. One city council member suggested and all-encompassing but insipid name — “Legends Boulevard.” And then another complained that the cost of changing street signs to honor Garrett would have been too expensive. Eventually, the City Council axed the idea on a 4-3 vote, seemingly oblivious to the additional exposure our city would have had (and possibly leaning too much on political correctness.)

So I’ve decided to start a petition to have the street in question re-named in honor of our City Council. It would be “Unimaginative City Council Boulevard.”

A CW Network TV show currently airing is yet another attempt to conjure up stories of space aliens who arrived in Roswell, NM, in 1947. I confess that I’ve never watched it, and at this point don’t really plan on it.

What I found amusing in the promotions for the TV show is the picture showing Shiprock, the famous rock formation on the Navajo Nation with the word Roswell beneath it. That’s about 350 miles away as the crow flies.

Or maybe in the case, as the UFO flies.

It’s another case of people from the West or East coast not really understanding where or what New Mexico is. It’s kind of like sticking a saguaro cactus in the middle of a map of our state — which happens all the time.

Of course, maybe the TV show is trying to tie into the Navajo legends surrounding the impressive rock outcropping. One version is that the mountain, whose name in Navajo is “rock with wings,” flew to northwestern New Mexico to bring the Dine‘ to their new homeland.

Maybe aliens captured the rock on another planet and flew it to earth and picked up the Navajo people along the way.

I’m sure the overly creative minds of Hollywood screen writers could come up with a great story line around that topic. I’m not so sure how the Navajos would feel about being painted as descendants of aliens.

Police in Albuquerque say a man wandered into a Bank of the West branch last month and verbally demanded a teller give him the money in her drawer.

What was distinguishing about him was that he was carrying a red gas can at the time he committed the crime.

Police, who have now dubbed the perp as the “Out of Gas Robber,” had not arrested him by the time this post was written. 

Given the price of gasoline these days, perhaps the suspect was actually hoping the bank would fill up his can in lieu of cash. 

I stumbled across a social media post recently in which New Mexicans’ passion for green chile was on clear display.

It seems a young woman and her boyfriend had broken up, and in the ensuing split, the subject of her frozen green chile stash became a point of contention.

“At one time I went through a breakup and that vato’s mom was trying to move my deep freezer full of green chile out the door,” she said. “I had to put my foot down.”

Responses to the post were pretty funny as well.

“That is sooooo New Mexico,” one person said.

“I can now die happy. That is all anyone needs to know about dating in NM. Green Chile over bros!” another responded.

“Always the chile,” said anaother.