Recently in 3 Category

It occurred to me as I was casually browsing cnn.com and came across their current poll question that I hadn't known who would be playing in the Super Bowl today. It's not that I didn't know about the event; I'm well aware that it's Super Bowl Sunday. It's that I had no idea who was good this season, who made the playoffs, and so forth; and realistically, it didn't bother me much that I didn't know. (It's the New England Patriots vs. the Carolina Panthers, for those similarly oblivious.) My level of apathy was such that I didn't even realize that I didn't know until this morning, and ultimately, that's alright with me.

I intend to spend part of my Super Bowl Sunday at the Austin journaller meeting this afternoon. The place we're meeting ought to be pretty quiet, since the rest of Austin will be off flushing their toilets simultaneously during halftime.

Interestingly, I ran into a few of the Austin journallers and webloggers at the grand re-opening of the Museum of Ephemerata last night. They were all doing their part to keep Austin weird, I suppose. The museum was far more crowded than I remembered it; perhaps this is because it was a chilly evening, but indoors, the combination of the heater and body heat made the tiny place stiflingly warm. The group I was with added our own bit of chaos to the mix before retreating outdoors to sit in the side yard, recently vacated by the aforementioned journallers and webloggers.

It's hard to characterize what we were doing over there, other than to say that we were having the same random conversations we always have when C, the cool neighbors, and I get together. We were a bit startled when a woman and her boyfriend came over to talk to us. I thought she was going to ask us to hold it down, but instead, she asked if she could perform an improvisational piece for us. (Actually, I'm not sure we asked. I don't remember having the opportunity to say 'no.') And then she started talking, and I watched her with rapt attention, fascinated. I don't remember a word she said, and I certainly couldn't tell you if her performance was good, but that one moment, taken out of context of everything that came before or after it, was sublime. Keeping Austin weird, indeed.

I think it was around the same time that we decided on Chicago as our first soundtrack purchase, before we realized that listening to Chicago for a week straight, on a continuous loop, would make us absolutely nutty, that C and I decided that we needed the Dirty Dancing soundtrack, as well. We never bought the soundtrack, but when we got back to Austin, C reminded me to add the movie to my Netflix queue, and it arrived today.

When Dirty Dancing came out, I was ten, going on eleven, and that movie served as my own personal introduction to what love with a tough-but-kind-hearted rebel might be like. I learned valuable life-lessons about back-alley abortions and the merengue and joining the Peace Corps, and my sister and I watched the film over and over, making fun of the (geeky) older sister and admiring the hip, sexy younger one. I'm not sure what that said about us, or me, the geeky older sister, for that matter.

It's harsh to watch a movie like that years after the fact. Suddenly, the plot was forced (though I remembered lots of crucial lines, years and years later. "Nobody puts Baby in the corner!"), the dance moves were sort of stupid, Patrick Swayze was sorta gross and greasy, and the dialogue was insipid in spots. C once told me about how she watched Dirty Dancing illegally when she was younger, having obtained a pirated copy from some other country somehow, and I understand now why she couldn't bear to have the film ruined for her by the Mr. Sinus guys -- this stuff was sacred to our childhood and adolecence. But it was great to laugh at now, more than fifteen years later.

The part that really made me laugh, though, was the part where C asked, in all seriousness, "Where's the pottery scene?" I lost it then, explaining as nicely as I could in between uncontrollable fits of laughter that there was no pottery scene in Dirty Dancing, she was thinking of Ghost. With Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg.

She didn't believe me, and between you and me? I think it ruined the movie for her.

As I write this, it is 11:56 in Tucson, Arizona, but C and I have already celebrated New Years on Texas time, and we're satisfied with that. You might call us wet blankets, but we prefer to call ourselves overachievers.

As for Tucson, well... as far as we're concerned, we resolve celebrate the fact that we don't live in Tucson daily. Austin is so, so, so much cooler. We weren't able to find any planned events for New Years, so C and I headed to downtown Tucson to look for something interesting going on.

As C explains it, it's a Romanian superstition that whatever you're doing at New Years, that's what you'll be doing for the rest of the year to come. It's been a long day of driving, so I had decided I'd be happy with a year of sleep and relaxation, but C seemed interested in celebrating, so we went downtown. We were unimpressed.

We found a grill with decent pasta primavera, so we're starting the new year with our bellies full, but we weren't halfway through dinner when we decided to celebrate New Year's on Texas time, an hour ahead of Arizona. We decided we'd buck the trend by going back to the hotel and watching Dick Clark on television, rather than going to a bar that requires a cover charge in exchange for the honor of buying drinks from them.

As it happened, we brought in the new year in Texas time laughing uproariously; if I spend the entire year laughing, it'll be a good year, as far as I can tell. And now, just after midnight in Arizona, I'm relaxing, listening to a biography on television, and posting this entry with the sound of fireworks cracking outside. I have money in my pocket and food in my belly, and I'm indulging my constant desire to travel; if the Romanian supersitition is right, I think 2004 will be a good year.

We hit San Diego fairly early in the morning yesterday. We headed directly to Balboa Park, one of my most vivid memories of the city. Along I-15, which we drove down from Escondido, we could still see huge patches of burnt ground from the wildfires that swept through here a few months ago.

Much of Balboa Park wasn't open yet when we arrived; we had anticipated that, and we found a parking space and started wandering around as we waited for the museums to open. We spent most of the day wandering through museums of anthropology and art; the most colorful exhibit we saw was of the woven silk Japanese costumes used in Japanese Noh plays. They were rich and beautiful, and I wished I could touch the elaborate kimonos.

At lunchtime, we ate in the art museum cafe. We both got veggie burgers, which were really yummy; handmade bread, avocado, roasted onions, and an aioli sauce made them better than the average veggie burger. So far, that's been the culinary high point of our time in San Diego.

We left Balboa Park at around 4:30, and I knew the sun would set around 5:00PM, so we took I-8 to Ocean Beach to see the sunset. Our timing was perfect; we arrived at Ocean Beach just in time to see the sun dip below the sky. It was chilly, but the clouds and sky were brilliantly warm, and we spent quite a while sitting by the Pacific, watching the surfers in their wet suits and the kids playing along the surf.

I took a zillion pictures, of course; the Pacific sunset looks like the second in a pair of bookends, like the end of our journey that began with a Gulf sunrise. It isn't really the end, though; there will be more updates to come.

After all, we haven't seen the saguaros yet, and that was the original point, wasn't it?

We left Kayenta, Arizona at around 7:00AM Arizona time, before the sun had even started to peek out of the horizon. The plan was to visit Monument Valley early in the morning, then to go to the Grand Canyon before heading toward California. We wanted to get an early start so that we could make up some of the time we lost in the ice and snow the previous day.

From Kayenta, in the heart of the Navajo Nation, it was only a short drive to the Utah state line and to Monument Valley. Before dawn, we could barely see the ominous rock formations standing on either side of us, but as the sun began to rise, we saw their silhouettes against the glorious rich colors of a desert sunrise. We stopped and waited, snapping pictures from time to time, as often as our cold fingers would allow us; it was only around 15†F.

Lots of people can say they've been to Monument Valley, but we can count ourselves among the relative few who can say they've been there at daybreak.

When the sun had finished its ascent into the sky, we left Monument Valley (and Utah) and headed for Tuba City on our way to the Grand Canyon.

(An aside: Every time I see, hear, or think about the name, Tuba City, the worst song ever composed gets stuck in my head. "The tuba, the tuba, aruba, aruba..." Thanks, Dad.)

Between Tuba City and the Grand Canyon, there are a few scenic overlooks which double as tourist traps; to reach the overlook, you have to pass through two rows of stalls where dealers peddle Navajo jewelry to unsuspecting tourists. We, of course, bought a few things. My favorite purchase is a silver turtle with its shell inlaid with azurite and malachite; they resemble the earth as they blend together.

The road to the Grand Canyon is uphill most of the way, and pretty soon, we found ice and snow along the road again. For the most part, the roads were well-cleared, and it didn't take us long to get up to the canyon itself. Traffic was nearly non-existant in the direction we were travelling.

We stopped at a few vistas to look out over the canyon. They say that the Grand Canyon looks different in every season. In the winter, the north rim, currently closed for the winter, is pale and pastel in the distance, while nearer by, the red rock along the south rim is peppered with snowfall on every flat surface. It was stunning, of course, and overwhelming.

There is a tradeoff, of course, to visiting a place like this during the winter. On the positive side, the park wasn't nearly as crowded as it would have been during the summer. Each vista had plenty of room for those who braved the cold winter day to see the beauty of the canyon, and the forest was beautiful beneath the powdered snow. However, as cold as it was, we weren't able to explore the park the way we might have liked to. We could only tolerate 15 or 20 minutes outside of the car at a time. It would have been nice to spend more time there.

As we drove our way slowly down the winding paths toward the exit, we noticed some cars pulled over on the side of the road. To our surprise, a wolf was standing nearby, within range for a beautiful picture. We snapped a couple of shots and left, but we were dismayed to see people getting out of their cars to get a closer shot. Back in the forest, there were a few more wolves scrambling through the snow, but we drove on and away from the canyon.

Once we left the Grand Canyon, we took an almost straight shot to California, heading through Williams, AZ to get onto I-40 and head west. We stopped in Kingman to eat and buy drinks for the road. While we were there, C picked up the soundtrack to the movie version of Chicago. By the time we hit the outskirts of L.A., we knew most of the songs on the CD, and we sang along loudly as we flew downhill with the L.A. traffic. C gripped the seat tightly the whole time, but we had a straight shot down toward San Diego, our intended destination, so we took it. We stopped for the night at a motel in Escondido and went to bed, so that we could be up early in the morning to visit San Diego.

That was our day trip through Arizona. We'll pass through there again tomorrow on our way back to Texas.

Sunday was Georgia O'Keeffe Day for the road trip crew. We started by visiting the O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe when it opened at 10:00 AM.

Before it opened, we wandered around the Plaza area one last time, taking a few daytime pictures of the adobe and the shops. The sky was clear and blue, so it isn't obvious at first glance how cold it was, but it was around 18†F, so we would take a few pictures, then run back to the car and turn on the heat to thaw out our hands.

The museum itself was nice, however. In addition to many of O'Keeffe's works, it featured an exhibit of the works of Alfred Stieglitz, O'Keeffe's husband, himself a renowned photographer. After that, we went to Museum Hill, where we saw the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture.

From Museum Hill, the view of Santa Fe and its surrounding mountains was breathtaking, but the wind was bracingly cold, so we didn't stick around long afterward, instead deciding to head out into O'Keeffe country before cutting back to Arizona in the late afternoon.

We took US 84 north from Santa Fe, passing by O'Keeffe's beloved Ghost Ranch and admiring the bluffs and mountains that appear in many of her paintings. It was a beautiful day (though still well below freezing), and it wasn't until we had made it far to the northwest that the roads began turning icy and snowy.

I've never driven in ice or snow before; in Austin, it is common knowledge that freezing weather shuts the entire city down for days at a time. I was rather petrified about driving through it, but it was relatively easy; nonetheless, we never stopped to get pictures of the snow that covered the landscape. To me, it was an impressive amount of snowfall, but C assured me that it was just light snow.

Along the way, a deer bounded in front of us. I was going slowly, and the buck was fairly far ahead, so there was plenty of time to stop and watch him as he pranced across the road.

The icy conditions slowed us down a great deal, and it took us far longer to get to western New Mexico than we had expected. As the sun set, we passed through Farmington, New Mexico. We decided to go twenty miles further to Shiprock to spend the night, but even though that town had a McDonald's and several gas stations, it had no motel, so we continued on to Kayenta, Arizona, about 100 miles away, the same night. We (not-so-affectionately) dubbed the town "Shitrock" as we were leaving. I'm sure the residents don't find that nearly as original or witty as we did at the time.

Thus ended our first journey through The Land of Enchantment.

On the morning of the third day of our road trip, the thermometer shows that it is 9ƒF outside. For the record? I'm from Texas, and I'm not sure I have the tools to deal with that kind of cold. It's nice to be bundled up in a warm hotel room, but we're bundled up in here without food, so C is headed down to the car to bring in some of the food we left in there.

One of the cool things about this road trip is that we're taking it during the winter. This is mostly incidental; I'm taking advantage of my winter vacation so that I don't have to use much of my annual leave. But since the number of people travelling during the winter months is fewer than those who travel during the summer, prices are lower, hotels are less crowded, and we're seeing things that I've never seen before, despite having travelled through most of these areas before, like the Christmas decorations in Santa Fe. One area I'd like to see during this time of year is Taos. I don't think we'll be headed there this trip, but there's always another winter.

An aside: C just got back with food from the car. We're eating cinnamon-flavored French twists, sweet pastries that taste a bit like Christmas to me.

This morning, we're going to go walk around Santa Fe again (well-bundled, of course), and see the Georgia O'Keeffe museum before we drive northwest into Georgia O'Keeffe country. This region was clearly insipirational to her, not to mention the other artists who make their homes here, and we're coming to discover why.

We left CY's new place early in the morning and headed off into New Mexico. We decided to head to Santa Fe today, despite the unseasonably cold temperatures, because our schedule wouldn't work if we came back to it toward the end of the trip. On the way, we saw the exit for White Sands, and we went there first, though it was a bit out-of-the-way.

The park itself was stunning; the eponymous white sands were formed from gypsum on the sea floor millions of years ago. The dunes are constantly moving, so most of them have very little vegetation, leaving them pristine and glistening in the sun. The temperature was in the 40s, but the sky was entirely clear. In the middle of the dunes, the white sands seemed to extend to the horizon, where they met the mountains, and I could hear nothing but the sound of blood flowing to my ears. It was extraordinary, and I was so glad that I went.

After White Sands, we headed more or less directly to Santa Fe. We kept checking our altitude with the GPSr, and by the time we got to Santa Fe, we were at 6,000 feet above sea level. The temperature dropped continually as we approached the city nestled in the mountains as well; the high temperature in Santa Fe today was in the 20s.

Despite the cold, we wandered around the downtown area, entering shops or art galleries when we needed to warm up. Santa Fe is a beautiful city, particularly in the downtown area, and filled with amazing arts and crafts. We walked around until most of the shops had closed, then went hunting for places to eat dinner. It was mostly luck that we found Cafe San Estevan, a restaurant with beautiful Santa Fe ambience. I had chicken enchiladas with a red chile sauce that was delicious but almost too spicy to eat. C had stuffed poblano peppers, which she couldn't stop raving about.

Tomorrow, we head to the Four Corners area and into Arizona. Though we're both tired, thanks to all the driving we're doing, we're keeping (mostly) sane and enjoying watching the landscape change as we travel. The adventure continues!

For pictures, check the photolog to see where we've been so far.

As we sat down for Christmas dinner tonight, people squeezing in around the too-small table, my aunt Susan said to me, in front of everybody, "Rachel, I need to tell you that you have the most infectious laugh."

I think I looked stunned, because she continued, "Whenever you laugh, it makes me want to start laughing too. I bet nobody ever tells you that, and it's important that you hear it."

Which is true. They don't, and it's the nicest thing anybody has told me in a while.

I spent the evening leading up to dinner playing with my little cousins. C and I went with them to the park and took lots of pictures, I with my digital camera, and C with the black and white film in my SLR camera. We had the black and white pictures developed at the one-hour processing place, and they came out beautifully, cementing my belief that my little cousins are the cutest little cousins ever.

My cousins have been completing puzzles all week on a card table at my grandmother's house. These are complicated puzzles, mind you, with repeating patterns and irregular borders and 1000 pieces. As they were finishing the last puzzle, C and I went to the madness that is Toys 'R Us on Christmas Eve to find more puzzles for the girls to work on while they're in Corpus Christi.

It was insane. The place was packed with people buying last-minute Christmas presents for their kids. It was Barbie and Disney and bicycles as far as the eye could see, and the shelves were rather bare, as though all the Christmas cheer had been combed out of them.

The people standing in line, many of whom looked like young parents who could ill afford the presents piled in their shopping baskets, were all weary and frazzled. In the aisle next to us, a couple purchased some wicker doll furniture and a number of other items, most notably a Barbie bicycle. They peeled off bills with a grimace as they paid the final total, well over $200, and I imagined how hard it must be to have young kids at Christmastime and felt very thankful not to be in that position.

I wonder how many oranges a person would have to eat to overdose on vitamin C. In a day at the ranch, I must've eaten twenty oranges.

There isn't much to do at the ranch; I have a hard time imagining living there. It's that downtime -- that utter stillness -- that I love about visiting. Late in the evening, with no lights anywhere around, the stars above our campfire were so thick in the sky that I couldn't tell where the night ended and the stars began.

The little house out there is full of energy. It's hard to describe, but you're never alone inside it, even when there's no one else around. In the chill of the evening, I slept under a pile of blankets, beneath a portrait of a fine Mexican lady with a stern gaze. I never think of anything but the most respectful thoughts in that room, for fear of the well-dressed lady in the portrait.

In the morning, a misty fog lay low over the fields like a quilt, but the trees were bustling with birds and butterflies. Vivid green jays flocked into the trees, staying just out of range until my camera ran out of batteries, then approaching me, taunting. Red cardinals, titmice, and muted pyrrhuloxia ate from feeders along the perimeter of the yard.

We spent several hours puttering around the yard, doing odd jobs and feeding range cubes to the cattle before breakfast. The cattle live on a different part of the property. There are perhaps fifteen full-grown cows, one bull, and three or four calves, one brand new with his umbilical cord still attached. Two of the cows are very close to calving, as well. They came to us when they heard the truck's engine, bellowing loudly as they approached. The brand new calf is too young to be afraid of people, and he let my mother pat him. Most of the cattle are friendly and will eat from your hand, so my mom likes to acquaint the babies with human contact as soon as she can.

I had sustained myself on oranges in the meantime, but the homefries we ate were indescribably delicious and rich by the time we ate breakfast at noon. It was 2pm when we left for the hour-and-a-half drive back to Corpus Christi, after having swept, made the beds, and gathered everything we packed. Since my trip to Romania with C over the past summer, I spend a lot of time looking at the landscapes that are so familiar to me, and wonder whether they would be exotic to someone else. I find nothing exotic about the flat agricultural plains of the coastal bend. The roads stretch on to nowhere, past rustic old farmsteads and old-fashioned windmills until we reach the outskirts of town, where new housing developments are constantly cropping up.

And so we found ourselves home, walking distance from the bay, and it seems unbelievable that the landscape could be so different from the way it was an hour and a half away.