Police in Clovis were summoned to a local Catholic church in 2006 to investigate a burglary. Near the church, they came across an inebriated man wandering in the street.

When they questioned him, he admitted he had broken into the church with a hammer and drank a large quantity of communion wine. Police also found about $100 in cash on him.

After that, his further recollection of events became a bit fuzzy. 

Police checked out the church, where they found the empty communion wine bottle and the church offertory box smashed by a hammer  — apparently the source of the cash.  Then they found the hammer apparently used in the crime near the offertory box.

At that point, one of the officers noticed a round indentation on the man’s forehead. The indentation was a perfect match of the business end of the hammer found in the church.

 

That discovery and the empty wine bottle seemed to go a long way to explain the perp’s lack of recall of events. However, it was never determined at which point the self-inflicted bash to the head was administered. And no one could explain the most important question — WHY?

The year 1999, where many were fearing the arrival of an apocalyptic Y2K, seems to have somehow adversely affected critters in New Mexico. Consider these incidents:

A female wolf who was introduced during a Defenders of Wildlife news conference in Albuquerque, did not seem to generate much goodwill during her stage time. The wolf managed to appear aloof during the entire press conference, sniffing boots and jumping up on the speaker’s table, then promptly piddling on the plush carpeting at the Hyatt Regency hotel.

In Carlsbad, a 250-pound bear jumped over a fence at the city zoo and led police on an elusive chase for hours. As a police cruiser was patrolling the street for the bear, officers did a double take when they noticed the animal trotting alongside their vehicle. The bruin quickly scrambled up a nearby tree and was tranquilized and returned to its home.

In a case of confused identity, a bighorn sheep roaming around a pasture near Cimarron became amorously interested in the horses in the pasture. So lusty in his pursuit of the horses, the sheep drove two of them into a fence, whereupon he was captured and relocated to the Manzano Mountains. Game and Fish officials were hopeful he would find a more compatible partner and kindle a romance in that area.

In Taos, a one-ton Angus-Limousin bull escaped from a nearby ranch and began terrorizing the downtown.  He managed to dent a police car, knocked over a cowboy, frightened some tourists, wandered into a hardware store and dented yet another vehicle before he could be zapped with a tranquilizer gun. The first shot didn’t calm down the animal, so a second dose had to be administered before he was loaded into a horse trailer and unceremoniously hauled back to his home.

And finally, a story of invaders. People apparently tired of their pet goldfish dumped them into Quemado lake in western New Mexico. Apparently grasping the fact that their life was no longer limited by an eight-inch glass bowl, the goldfish managed to grow and reproduce with reckless abandon, threatening the trout population in the lake. Game and Fish Department officials instituted a program to eradicate the thousands of fish and return it to a mostly trout environment.

As one fisheries expert explained it, “Goldfish are like the people who like to hang out in smoky bars and get really friendly and multiply. Trout are the guys who like to go outside and have a beer by themselves.”

I’ve written several blogs over the past couple of years under the general heading of “burritos behaving badly.” I don’t know why I find burritos to be an amusing topic, but you’ll just have to put up with it as an off-bubble glitch in my personality. This blog focuses on a personal burrito adventure, conducted in the interest of science.

On a recent trip to my local burrito joint on South Main, I glanced at the menu even though I had already ordered a gastronomic bomb that my digestive system could tolerate. And there it was on the menu: “NEW. WOLVERINE. $10.94. Brisket, potato, green chile, bacon, milanesa, cheese.” A burrito for more than $11 (with tax) for Pete’s sake!!! And it’s not even from the trendy Coyote Cafe in Santa Fe or one carefully crafted by culinary masters Wolfgang Puck, Emeril Lagasse or Giada De Laurentis.

With a name like “Wolverine,” how could a guy with a reputation for eating disgusting things pass up a taste test? And to be truthful, I was short on blog topics at the time.

“So do many people order these?” I asked the woman behind the counter who was wearing her required “Body by Burrito” T-shirt uniform.

“Well, no, not really,” she said. 

That should have been my first clue to back away from the experiment.

Then I asked her what the ingredient “milenesa” was. She pointed to a metal tub with something reddish colored and lumpy simmering on the grill. She said she didn’t know exactly what it was. I looked it up. Wikipedia identified it as “a South American variation of Italian cotoletta or schnitzel, where generic types of meat” are used to make it. 

“Generic types of meat” should have been another clue.

I watched it being made, and I think she got distracted and forgot the bacon and the green chile. 

Another clue.

I carried it out of the store to my car, impressed by its heft. When I got home, I weighed it on our food scale — 1.097 pounds.

 

Then I ate it for lunch. As I mentioned, I could not detect any bacon or green chile and the “generic types of meat” ingredient did not lend any clue as to what kind of animal had been sacrificed to make it.

You may remember the guy who wrote a book several years ago about eating only McDonald’s food for an entire year in which he gained an enormous amount of weight. Maybe I thought my experiment might result in a book deal. Nope — one burrito was enough. I did, however, feel his pain for the rest of the day and well into the next morning. The burrito seemed to swell up inside me after I ate it. It wasn’t terrible, but its taste wasn’t memorable.

So, as a self-appointed food critic, I can recommend that you stay away from the “Wolverine.” Order my personal favorite, “The Undertaker” which was discovered by my son a few years ago.  (Maybe they could sell the Wolverine at the “Big House” stadium in Ann Arbor every fall when Michigan plays football there.)

Oh, and by the way, if you want a brisket burrito, our other nearby Mexican food outlet famous for its mystery cheese sells one for just $4.50 and can add green chile, potato, bacon and exotic cheese for just a buck more. You can add your own milenesa if you can figure out how to make it.  For starters, there’s a roadkill squirrel on a nearby street in the neighborhood.

In July, a man entered a Walgreen’s in Las Cruces, jumped up on the check out counter, demanded money from the cash register and then reached in his pocket to brandish — well, not a gun or knife but a screwdriver.

The tool-wielding robber told the cashier at the counter that the store owed him money. The cool-headed cashier said he couldn’t open the cash register and suggested the man speak with the store manager.

The manager was summoned and the would-be robber then demanded a pack of cigarettes. Again, the cashier stalled the situation and told the perp that he couldn’t sell him cigarettes unless he showed him a driver’s license proving he was old enough for the purchase.  The manager showed up at that point and said he couldn’t refund what the robber said he was owed.  Apparently, the robber saw through the ruse at this point, grabbed a pack of smokes and bolted for the door without producing his driver’s license or paying for the cigarettes.

He was arrested a short time later, proving once again that smoking is hazardous to your well being.

A recent story made me wonder what kind of basic training applicants for the police department in Portales is required. It must not have included basic chemistry.

Police reported that a guest at a local motel complained that when he turned on a faucet in his bathroom, a shard of methamphetamine shot out of it and struck him in the eye. 

Drugs on tap? Well no, actually it was just a piece of salt from a malfunctioning water softener at the hotel. The faulty water softener also managed to send some of the sodium chloride into the ice making machine.

However, when the incident was first reported, police were so convinced that the crystal object was an illegal drug that they shut down the motel, called in a hazmat team and tested the city’s water supply. They feared a large amount of meth had mysteriously made its way into the eastern New Mexico city’s water supply. The suspected injection of the drug and the investigation to protect Portales citizens was proudly featured on the department’s Facebook page.

When the lab analysis of the substance was reported as being common table salt, the police department had no further comment and there was no more reference to the incident by the agency on its Facebook page. Well, except for a post by one follower who opined: “No wonder the water bill was so high.”

I spotted this fireworks combination pack a couple of weeks ago while traveling along I-10 east of Deming at the Bowlin’s Akela Flats store. The store has all kinds of interesting and unusual (some might say tacky) kitsch for sale, none of which I wanted except possibly for this. It’s the largest fireworks combo pack I’ve ever seen. 

For only $799, you can have the Godfather package of fireworks. Among the individual pyrotechnic marvels are “Frat Party,” “La Famiglia,” Dragon’s Breath,” “Shark Bite,” “Spider Web,” “The Freak” and “God Bless America.” 

I don’t think I can legally shoot any of these off in my neighborhood, but if you think you can get away with it where you live, let me know and I might split the cost with you. 

You may have been following recent news stories about the arrest of two Americans for espionage in a scheme to pass nuclear submarine secrets to the Russians. The plan might have worked except that the “Russian agents” turned out to be American counter-intelligence officers. 

I found this interesting because the oddball method used to transfer the top secrets was not unlike one which played out almost 75 years ago in New Mexico.

In the most recent case, secrets were passed to the faux Russian agents in the form of a memory chip enclosed in a chewing gum wrapper. There was also a report that another set of documents in a memory chip were inserted in a peanut butter sandwich and passed to the agents.

On June 2, 1945, Klaus Fuchs, a German physicist turned Russian spy who had been working in Los Alamos on the Manhattan Project, met with his Russian contact, Harry Gold. The two met at a small bridge over the Santa Fe River where Fuchs passed the first set of atomic bomb secrets to Gold.  The bridge was torn down long ago for construction of the Paseo de Peralta loop around downtown Santa Fe. It was similar in design to the still existing Delgado Street bridge in Santa Fe, shown in the photograph below. (For many years, I was told this was the bridge where the secrets were passed.) Fuchs went on to pass more secrets to Gold, including some regarding development of the hydrogen bomb. Fuchs eventually confessed to espionage in 1950 and was convicted and served nine years in prison before he was released, whereupon he relocated in the German Democratic Republic, then part of the Soviet Union. 

Fuchs’ handler, Gold, also acquired secrets from a machinist on the Manhattan Project, David Greenglass. Greenglass’s sister was Ethel Rosenberg, who along with her husband Julius Rosenberg, were also Soviet Union spies and the first American citizens to be executed for espionage for the passing of atomic bomb secrets to the USSR.

When the Rosenbergs were on trial, it was revealed that a pre-arranged code involving two raggedly cut parts of a Jell-O box was used to verify identities of the agents, Greenglass and Gold. The transfer of the documents occurred in the Albuquerque home of Greenglass. 

So before you try that coconut Bavarian cream Jello-O recipe, make sure there’s nothing “chippy” inside the box. 

Last week, police in Albuquerque were able to recover a stolen vehicle using a “Tile” tracking device attached to the SUV.

Police were notified by the SUV owners that the vehicle had been stolen from their property. Using an app associated with the tracking device, Police were able to begin following the vehicle. When it was finally stopped, police arrested two people and found a stash of illegal drugs and a gun inside it.

The woman suspect in the case told police she had been walking “for a while” in the vicinity of the vehicle. She said she had become “tired” from walking so much and, well, just decided to take it so she didn’t have to walk any more.

Which proves what your mother probably told you about avoiding making important decisions when you are too tired.

I participated in a Trout Unlimited project last weekend in the Gila, helping to garner support for the region by introducing new people to fly fishing. A group of five of us, four from TU and our one “student” hiked up Mineral Creek canyon to try to catch Gila trout on a fly rod. Everyone seemed to be successful in catching the trout but me. I had to leave early and didn’t make it further up the creek where the fish seemed to be more receptive to a fly cast into the clear waters of this unexpected creek. 

Every time I go into the Gila, I am amazed at how such a lush microclimate is able to thrive in a narrow rock canyon in close proximity to an arid landscape with cactus and stunted juniper growing on sheer cliffs just a few feet above the water in the creek. 

On this trip, I discovered something I had not seen on my previous hikes up the canyon. A natural arch in the rocks on the south side of the rim. 

And in the early 1900s, this area was bursting with mining activities. Many remnants of the mining boom, including old pieces of equipment and holes dug into rocks are still visible in rusting and rotting formats. On this trip, I found the remains of an old safe, its front door missing. I wonder how much labor was involved in originally transporting it to the mining camp and how a powerful rush of flood water shoved it down the canyon. 

So no trout this trip, but still well worth the drive. Take some time to explore the Gila — it’s truly a fascinating place. And next trip, I guarantee a Gila trout. Maybe more than one.

(With apologies to Snoopy)

It was a dark and stormy night.

Chester, the Golden Doodle sensed that something was awry in the dark corners of his back yard. He ran to the back door, tail on high alert mode. His dimwitted co-owner, not picking up on the intelligent clues that Chester was offering, opened the back door.

Like a shot, Chester bolted toward the far corner of the yard, tracking something moving. No, it wasn’t the gray cat that had been taunting him in recent weeks. It was black and white and ambling along slowly.

The brain in Chester’s co-owner suddenly went into limited turbo-boost mood, recognizing that the object of Chester’s chase was another skunk.

Then peaceful late evening silence of the neighborhood was fractured.

“No, Chester, NO, NO, NO,” his master’s voice rang out. 

Chester, apparently remembering his previous encounter with a skunk about four weeks earlier, hit the brakes and tried to turn back. But it was too late, for the skunk had tossed a volley of toxic perfume his way. It glanced off Chester’s nose — not a full frontal attack like he had experienced earlier. But he was still fully odiferous. 

He ran back to the house, where of course he was not welcomed with the usual enthusiasm he had come to expect. He was collared, drug to the bathtub and doused with patchouli oil soap in a humiliating cleansing ordeal. He was dried off as best as can be done for an exceptionally wooly dog, then parked in his kennel for the night.

Meanwhile, outside, the drama continued. The skunk, apparently terrified by Chester’s advance and the shrieking of the owner, cowered in a corner next to an outdoor storage shed. A flashlight pinpointed two beady red-glowing eyes next to a flower pot. The skunk would occasionally make aggressive hops forward in hopes of scaring the owner away. It worked.

Chester’s co-owner then came up with a ridiculous plan. Maybe the skunk could be scared away with the blast of a shotgun. Of course, discharging a firearm in a residential neighborhood is illegal, but by this time all logic in the co-owner’s brain had vaporized. 

After what seemed like hours of fumbling through a closet to locate a shotgun and digging through cluttered shelves in the garage for a shotgun shell, the plan was put into motion.

Chester’s co-owner bravely stepped out into the dark, weapon hoisted in the general direction of the skunk. His wife pleaded with him to return to sanity and come up with a better plan to deal with the skunk — of which there were many. His ears were deaf to the pleas as his testosterone infused instinct to protect his home from the sabre toothed tiger kicked in.

Suddenly a shot rang out.

BLAM!

The maid screamed.

(Well, okay, there wasn’t a maid and there was no scream. But there was a rather punctuated retribution from a female voice.)

A door slammed. 

(Actually it was the sound of a sliding glass door.)

Neighbors’ lights turned on. People scrambled to their back porch to see what was happening. Apologies were issued for the infraction. 

Yet, the skunk did not move. It continued its beady-eyed stare at Chester’s co-owner. It had not been injured — just enraged more and now intent on holding its ground.

Chester’s master, his ego deflated, then cowardly concluded he would wait until the morning to see if the skunk had moved on. 

Early the next morning, an inspection of the back yard was made. There was no evidence of a live skunk, dead skunk or skunk parts. The only evidence that a shotgun had been discharged was a sprinkler head that had been blasted out of its place in the lawn. 

A few days after the incident, Chester is still somewhat perfumed by a blend of skunk blast and patchouli oil. The skunk has not been seen in the vicinity. And Chester’s owner is contemplating additional firearms training while repairing his sprinkler system. 

There’s a website used mostly by car nerds looking for classic or collector cars called Bring A Trailer, or BaT, as it’s referred to in gearhead jargon. Here’s the website:

bringatrailer.com

After spotting the vehicle below in my neighborhood today, I’m wondering if someone has started a new website called “Bring Your Own Tires and Wheels.”

This late 80s vintage Toyota pickup truck has everything you need to become a classic — except for tires and wheels. It’s held off the ground by four jacks and has a “FOR SALE” license plate on the front. The undercarriage has been nicely sprayed with new black paint, possibly to fool someone into mistaking the black space as tires.

It reminded me of another pickup I spotted in town sometime last year that was for sale but lacking something most people might want — doors.

Which brings me to ponder the mindset of people in our town who are trying to sell vehicles missing obviously important components. I guess we should be glad they’re not trying to sell airplanes without wings. 

My wife and our dog Chester traveled to Sunspot in the Sacramento Mountains this weekend, hoping to catch some turning aspen leaves. The drive was spectacular but the leaves were not quite ready to show their fall brilliance.

It was a good trip, but a bit sad as well.

Sunspot, which I mentioned in an earlier blog, was established in the late 1940s to observe the sun and in particular to spot massive solar flares which could disrupt communications worldwide. At one point, I was told it had the authority to shut down air transportation around the world if it detected a flare of such magnitude that could temporarily black out radio and navigational instruments. I have not been able to confirm that, but I suspect it did command a lot of authority.

I remember going to Sunspot with my family at the age of about 10 and learning about this high tech facility on our doorstep. We went on a day that was mostly cloudy, so when the sun broke through the clouds, we thought we might get a glimpse of the sun through one of the telescopes. The scientists operating the telescope, however, announced rather huffily that with the brief break in the clouds, he was “very busy” and didn’t have time to allow tourists to peek at the mysteries of the solar surface.

Sadly, only one of the four original solar telescopes is still being used, and much of the work there seems to be for minor research projects under the auspices of New Mexico State University. At its peak, there were almost 150 people stationed at the mountaintop research facility. Now, more powerful and sophisticated telescopes are doing the work, including a new one in Hawaii. Much of Sunspot now seems to be in a state of moderate disrepair.

It’s still worth a trip there to drive through the beautiful forest and view the vast Tularosa Basin from the crest of the Sacramentos. There is a very well done visitor center, with interactive displays and a nice gift shop.

The blog I wrote earlier about Sunspot concerned a mysterious shutdown of the facility, which turned out to be an investigation into unauthorized use of the site’s computers for searches for pornographic materials.  The story briefly stirred a series of conspiracy theories about how some aliens had been spotted by a telescope at the site. I’m sure it was a disappointing ending of the story for conspiracy theorists.

I’m attaching a link to a story which appeared recently in Wired magazine, which discusses both the porn incident and the future options for the facility. One of those options sadly includes complete dismantling of Sunspot and restoration of the area to natural habitat. Returning the site to natural habitat is okay, but I wish there could continue to be research done at this facility. 

https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.wired.com%2Fstory%2Fthe-strange-sad-case-of-sunspot-the-empty-astronomy-town%2F&data=04%7C01%7C%7C82957644e96f4d29844108d981bb2e05%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C637683463191760008%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=ob7oPS7ihBJtiP1MhdDuQzY%2F99jfYiDAYbeg8ltQdVQ%3D&reserved=0

 

Earlier this year, I wrote about an Albuquerque city bus driver who was distracted while munching on a burrito during his route along Central and rear-ended another car.

Earlier this week, we had another incident of a driver under the influence of burrito (DUIB — I think it could be pronounced “dweeb”). 

In this case, it was an Albuquerque city policeman who, while taking a prisoner to the city-county correctional facility,  was captured on his police cruiser’s dash cam driving with his knees on the steering wheel while eating not one, not two but three burritos.

When the incident was first reported, the Albuquerque Police Officer’s Association said it was not a crime to eat a burrito in a police car while on duty. Then the video of steering with knees was released and the burrito incident was apparently topped off with big serving of crow.

In all fairness, my daughter once had a friend, who while driving to a concert in Phoenix, took a picture of herself driving with her feet. And I’ve been known to order extremely stupid things to eat while driving — a chili cheese dog for example — which certainly took away a lot of my focus on keeping my car straight while hurtling down the Interstate at 75 miles per hour.  Honestly, a burrito would have been much safer — they’re probably the best choice if you have to eat at the wheel.

All of this got me to thinking about why burritos often seem to invoke funny responses or comments.

I found it humorous last year when our neighborhood Mexican eatery added WiFi and announced to customers that the password was “Burrito 1.”

And further down the street, there is a Mexican food carry out place in a convenience store which specializes in burritos. The kitchen offers no less than 81 varieties of burritos. And they have names for everyone of them: “Macho Man,” “Breakfast Bomber,” “Burrito Too Far,” “Jerry Springer” “Junkyard Dog,” “Ultimate Sin” and my favorite, “The Undertaker.”

But in keeping with the oddly humorous nature of burritos, the employees are asked to wear t-shirts that announce “Body By Burrito.”

Last week, the New Mexico Supreme Court handed down a decision that probably encompasses a lot of attitudes in our state.

The ruling said in essence that if most of your car’s taillights were working, it was “good enough.”

The decision grew out of a case involving a traffic stop by an Albuquerque policeman who cited the driver of a car that had only one of two taillights working on one side of the vehicle. The rest of the car’s taillights were in working order, and according to state law, appeared to be able to pass the test of being visible from 500 feet away. 

The court justice said that New Mexico law only stipulates that certain vehicle equipment be “in good working order.” He said if the vehicle had to be held at standards that were completely free of flaws or defects “it would impose an absurd standard for vehicles on New Mexico roads and highways because it would require that equipment be in perfect condition, beyond a reasonable expectation that equipment functions for its intended use.”

In this particular case, the officer who stopped the vehicle for the suspected taillight violation also found the driver for being under the influence and arrested him. But because the stop was determined to have been illegal, DWI charges against the driver were dismissed.

I think most of us who view the often dilapidated rolling stock on our highways and roads in New Mexico would agree that few, if any, vehicles are in “perfect condition.”

So for those of us who have one or two burned out bulbs in our taillights, or a taillight patched up with duct tape or red cellophane, you can keep driving — knowing that you fully comply with the attitude of only needing to be “good enough” in the Land of Enchantment.