Saturday, May 28, 2011
Me and Tom
This picture was taken some time during 1966-67. What you have here are a couple of high-school friends who were posing for someone's mom. I'm not sure where the picture was taken. I got a copy of it in May of 2011. That means I had to wait for about 45 years before I got to see it. That might make me a little upset if not for the fact that I'm just glad to have the picture. This is Tom, a friend who recently passed away. I'm very glad that I got to spend some time with him over the years. We were good friends in high school and room mates in college. He would eventually go to Albuquerque to work at Sandia Labs. I stayed in Oklahoma to be a computer grunt. The last time I saw Tom was a couple of weeks before he passed. God have mercy on his soul.
Toms BackPorch
This is a picture of my friend Tom's back porch. It was taken after the funeral. A bunch of people gathered on his back porch. I will say one thing for Tom, he knew how to create a real nice back porch and back yard. I'd been there before and had found it very relaxing. Everyone I met who had ever been there always talked about what a great back porch he had. What's even nicer is that the house stayed in the "family" and I'll probably get to enjoy it again when I go back to Albuquerque. AS I get old, I probably need to find more places where I can go and just relax. This is one of them. I'm looking for others, by the way.
Pancakes
It's a pancake machine. It's the first one I've ever seen. It was located at the hotel where I stayed in Albuquerque when I attended services for my deceased friend. I never did get to try out the pancakes. There was just so many other things to eat there that I forgot all about getting a pancake. I should have got one. All a person had to do was to push a button and out came a pancake.
MidPoint
Apparently, Adrian, TX is the midpoint between Chicago and Los Angeles. I stopped with my friend Tony who told me about the place. We stopped at the MidPoint Cafe to have a hamburger and a piece of pie. The cafe is located on the old Route 66 highway. The hamburger and the pie was great. The only thing I mis are those pre-interstate prices. I guess the picture was worth it.
Rosa de Jamaica
It's an almost-used-up bag of tea. There's a good story here. I was looking around in the cabinet at home and asked my wife what she wanted me to do with this bag that was just taking up space. She said that she didn't know. The bag was mine. I asked her what it was. She told me it was tea that I had bought in Guatemala. I said "Really?" She told me it was true. So, I opened the bag, intending to use it up. Now, I'm hooked on the stuff. Seems it's addictive and very hard to get, at least his brand of tea, I'm now a fan of hibiscus tea. If anyone knows where to get this particular brand in the states, I'd appreciate a note about its' location.
ALB Buddy
I can only sit around so long. I was in Albuquerque. I was sitting around on a back porch. There was a bicycle in the back yard. I asked if I could ride it. I decided to ride it over to the University of New Mexico. I met his nice man outside of the Student Union on the campus. We had a nice talk.
John At Blakes
It's my friend John. We were in Albuquerque to see our friend Tom. We went to Blakes to get one of their famous green chile cheeseburgers. Yum. Double Yum.
At ALB Hospital
That's me sitting outside on a bench at the Albuquerque hospital with my friend Tom and a couple of friends. Tom had to go out periodically and have a smoke. Actually, the day was really nice. It was a good day to go outside and sit around on a bench for a while.
New Mexico 1598
Juan de Oñate led an expedition into New Mexico for Spain in 1598. This snapshot is of a memorial to the people who came with him and is located near the Old Town in Albuquerque. New Mexico is an old settlement.
Easter Mass 2011
I attended Easter Mass at the San Felipe de Neri Church. This church is a Catholic church located on the north side of Old Town Plaza in Albuquerque. It was built in n 1793, and is supposed to be the oldest surviving building in the city of Albuquerque.
Hospital Crew ALB
We were playing farkle. For those who do not know what farkle is, it's a dice game that can be carried around in a really small container and can be played almost anywhere. All that is needed is a small flat surface. We were playing it in a hospital room. There is a Wikipedia entry for the game. If you've never played farkle, you should. Life is a little better when you can farkle whenever you need to. Farkling is satisfying. To farkle is to sparkle. Things go better with farkle. I'm sure there are all kinds of cool sayings that one can make with the word farkle.
Great Shakes Alive
There is a cafe in Albuquerque named the Route 66 Cafe. They have the old fashioned style of shakes. Notice the big metal container where they twirl all that goodness around before bringing it to the table. It was a Mud Pie malt. It was really good.
NRM Music Festival
Every year in Norman, Oklahoma they block off several streets in the downtown section and set up a dozen or so band stands and have music for a couple of days while the carnival is in town. It's called the Norman Music Festival. Some of the acts are so-so. Some are fairly good. Some are excellent. The best thing about the festival in 2011 was the weather. It was perfect. There are days that are meant for getting the bicycle out of the garage and go for a ride. This was not only one of those days, I had somewhere to ride to.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
This is Machu Picchu. It's a picture taken by schmaeche, a fellow traveler who used Fujifilm FinePix F20. I found it when I was sitting at home, thinking about my next trip and looking for a little inspiration. Machu Picchu is the 600 year old Inca site located in Peru. I plan on going there this fall. In doing my planning for the trip, sometimes I need to see a few pictures to keep my motivation up. There are some really great photos that have been taken of the site and placed on the internet for all of us to see. This is one of them. Click on the link above for Machu Picchu to see a slideshow of some of the pictures taken by other travelers.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Students 2
There was one whole day when I got interviewed by about five groups of English students who were instructed by their teacher to roam the streets of Medan, find a native English speaker, capture them and do an interview. I was about as obvious a native English speaker as you could get in Medan. This was one of the groups that captured me. They were really nice and I'm glad I got to participate, but by the end of the day I felt like some sort of celebrity and it wasn't as much fun as I might have imagined. The first two interviews were stimulating, but by the end of the fifth one, I didn't need another one.
Students 1
There was one whole day when I got interviewed by about five groups of English students who were instructed by their teacher to roam the streets of Medan, find a native English speaker, capture them and do an interview. I was about as obvious a native English speaker as you could get in Medan. This was one of the groups that captured me. They were really nice and I'm glad I got to participate, but by the end of the day I felt like some sort of celebrity and it wasn't as much fun as I might have imagined. The first two interviews were stimulating, but by the end of the fifth one, I didn't need another one.
Pocari Sweat
Okay. I've seen this stuff all over SE Asia. The name really turned me off. I think it was the "sweat" part. I never did know what it was. So, one day I asked. "It's like Gatorade." someone told me. I tried one. I'm sticking with Gatorade.
Chili Sauce
I would have thought it was ketchup. But it's not. In many countries in SE Asia, when you see a push-pump out in the condiments section, it doesn't contain ketchup, it contains chili sauce. Ketchup you have to ask for. So is the chili sauce hot? You're kidding, right? You're asking me if the chili sauce is hot in places like Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia where you can't get bland food? Yes, it's hot. I usually cover my nachos in jalapenos back home, but I've had a couple of situations in SE Asia when I really regretted taking a bite of food, because it contained some of the hottest chili peppers I've ever had the displeasure of tasting.
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