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Tonchi · 02-25-2006, 08:03 PM

The only time I ever saw rocks flying across the road in New Mexico was in that canyon above Taos on the way to Angel Fire. The name escapes me right now. But I have arrived on the scene shortly after rockslides in many places in the Jemez Mountains, even going around curves to discover a huge boulder in the middle of the road. But California takes the prize for cracked windshields in my experience, due to the insane speed that pickups and transport rigs pass you on the highway, kicking up a cloud of gravel and other debris that hits your windshield at 80 mph. I was lucky enough not to collide with any of the 4-footed road hazzards, but I remember an office mate losing his truck to a rather large deer one time. Not only that, but he was really pissed off that the Highway Patrol would not let him even claim the head and its spectacular rack because it wasn't in season and the critter wasn't "taken legally".

Ferret, if you got stuck in Moriarity, I now understand why you are so indifferent to living in Albuquerque. Simply put, Albuquerque is about FREEDOM. Sure, the town is not fancy, public services are primitive, and sometimes it appears to lack any "culture" but it's a place where YOU can be anything you want to be. Anything at all, and nobody cares. Everybody lets everybody else alone to go their own way. No crushing pressure from the religious right, no neighbors spying on your every move and gossiping, no pre-determined work that everybody is expected to get into. You can be whatever you want to be and go wherever you want to go and you will have a warm home waiting for you right there in Albuquerque. It's the only place I've been able to sit in a bar with a PhD in Mathmatics or a rocket scientist on one side and a working cowboy or a full-blooded Indian on the other and find both of them equally interesting. Within a day's drive is some of the most beautiful and varied country in the nation, you are a 1/2 hour plane ride from Mexico, a one-hour plane ride from the beaches of the Pacific, and good red-eye connections to anyplace else you would like to get away to. You can ski in the morning and play tennis in a bathing suit that afternoon, you can ride horses or race sports cars and meet experts in either field just walking around in the crowd. Everybody's friendly, because they have nothing to prove and neither do you. If you like to show off, this is not the place for you. But if you want to meet a lot of famous people who got tired of living where they have to be showing off all the time, New Mexico is where they come to be by themselves. I think Albuquerque is about infinite choices, but only if you like yourself enough to find them. Otherwise, you are just another vaguely disgruntled person "stuck" there, like the characters in The Last Picture Show.

02-25-2006, 08:03 PM	#86
Tonchi Victim of gravity Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Hiding in plain sight Posts: 1,412	The only time I ever saw rocks flying across the road in New Mexico was in that canyon above Taos on the way to Angel Fire. The name escapes me right now. But I have arrived on the scene shortly after rockslides in many places in the Jemez Mountains, even going around curves to discover a huge boulder in the middle of the road. But California takes the prize for cracked windshields in my experience, due to the insane speed that pickups and transport rigs pass you on the highway, kicking up a cloud of gravel and other debris that hits your windshield at 80 mph. I was lucky enough not to collide with any of the 4-footed road hazzards, but I remember an office mate losing his truck to a rather large deer one time. Not only that, but he was really pissed off that the Highway Patrol would not let him even claim the head and its spectacular rack because it wasn't in season and the critter wasn't "taken legally". Ferret, if you got stuck in Moriarity, I now understand why you are so indifferent to living in Albuquerque. Simply put, Albuquerque is about FREEDOM. Sure, the town is not fancy, public services are primitive, and sometimes it appears to lack any "culture" but it's a place where YOU can be anything you want to be. Anything at all, and nobody cares. Everybody lets everybody else alone to go their own way. No crushing pressure from the religious right, no neighbors spying on your every move and gossiping, no pre-determined work that everybody is expected to get into. You can be whatever you want to be and go wherever you want to go and you will have a warm home waiting for you right there in Albuquerque. It's the only place I've been able to sit in a bar with a PhD in Mathmatics or a rocket scientist on one side and a working cowboy or a full-blooded Indian on the other and find both of them equally interesting. Within a day's drive is some of the most beautiful and varied country in the nation, you are a 1/2 hour plane ride from Mexico, a one-hour plane ride from the beaches of the Pacific, and good red-eye connections to anyplace else you would like to get away to. You can ski in the morning and play tennis in a bathing suit that afternoon, you can ride horses or race sports cars and meet experts in either field just walking around in the crowd. Everybody's friendly, because they have nothing to prove and neither do you. If you like to show off, this is not the place for you. But if you want to meet a lot of famous people who got tired of living where they have to be showing off all the time, New Mexico is where they come to be by themselves. I think Albuquerque is about infinite choices, but only if you like yourself enough to find them. Otherwise, you are just another vaguely disgruntled person "stuck" there, like the characters in The Last Picture Show. __________________ Everything you've ever heard about Fresno is true.