The Displaced New Mexican

Happy Thanksgiving and here's a big story

First of all, happy T-day to everyone. I hope you are reading this with a belly full of good food, even those of you who don't celebrate this very American holiday. I will be eating the Big Dinner at the home of our newsclerk, Roberta, who I understand has prepared quite a feast (Thanks, Waburta!).
The last couple weeks have been fun-filled and action packed. As I said, Lindsay and Steve's friends Jay and Tres were with us for a few days, and also as I said, they deserve a write-up. I first met them after work at K.B. Dillon's, a local watering-hole about a block from my house. They had been in town about three hours and already had friends and phone numbers and people giving them hugs before leaving the bar. The next day was the much-hyped arrival of the National Christmas Tree, which was harvested in Cuba, N.M. and was making a tour of the state before being towed off to Washington, D.C. to go on display early next month. Different folks had different ideas about what taking such a tree on tour meant, but most were disappointed to see it almost completely covered, save a small window in the side of the plywood housing and the open rear of the trailer. Lindsay was on scene photographing and I just rode by to see what was going on. The Portland boys were at the bowling alley bar watching football and Linz called them to warn of the disappointment. Not about to put up with that, they showed up with hand made placards and balloons and began loudly trying to incite the citizens of Farmington to demand that the tree be erected right there in the parking lot of the Animas Valley Mall. On the whole they were well-received, most people thought they were pretty funny and they were quoted in the newspaper, which was the goal they had set the night before. The following day plans were made for Steve to fly us to Albuquerque, the closest location where a film celebrating the 30th anniversary of Bruce Springsteen's Born To Run was making its one-night-only showing. We hopped in the Cessna 182 and headed for the big city of New Mexico. The flight down was pleasant, spent joking over the headsets and listening to Johnny Cash. When we arrived in Albuquerque we had little time to spare. The little Double Eagle airport was nearly shut down; we had to tap on the window to get the men inside to lend us a courtesy car. I filled out the paperwork and gave my license for the van while Steve parked the plane, so I was the driver. On the isolated road from the airport toward greater Burqe I called my little brother, who lives there, to see if he could meet us at the theater in say, five minutes. He already had plans, so I promised to give him further notice next time I'd be showing up. I drove the minivan as the others called out the directions they had gotten from the men at the airport. A couple of false interpretations earned me the nickname U-Turn Dave, which I bore for the rest of their visit. The Boss film was great; the first half was a documentary about the making of the historic album and the second live footage from a show in London. The flight back was marked by a sudden rising of winds in Farmington shortly before our approach, leading to a landing not to be soon-forgotten and a hats-off to the skills of our pilot, Steve "eh Steve!" Martin.
On Wednesday Bill Richardson, Governor of N.M. and rumored 2008 Presidential hopeful, made a trip to Farmington. Jay and Tres made sure to make it to the public press conference. When the Gov. turned questioning over to the public Jay was quick to step in with "Governor Richardson, how would you respond to changing the name of Farmington to Charmington because of all the nice people here?" Bill was caught a little off-guard, not sure if that was an actual issue or not, but quite amused. Later he promised to send Jay a New Mexico tourism jacket for his quick answer of "Harrison Ford and Dr. Richard Kimball" to Richardson's trivia question of "In the latest version of "The Fugitive" who played the title role and what was the character's name?" No one was ever sure why the Gov was asking such a question. Suffice to say, the Oregonians' visit was very entertaining and enlightening. I learned a lot from them, ranging from "the phone game" in which participants must blindly scroll through their cell phone directory, stopping on command and calling the number selected (usually played at very awkward hours of the night), to the problems of development in Portland. They have welcomed me to their corner of the Beaver State and I look forward to visiting them there.
As I also mentioned before, Eric Seo was in town since Saturday and left this morning. We wasted little time going back to our old Farmington favorites like ping-pong and jamming in the playroom. E brought his new toy, a Panasonic DV cam, and we spent an afternoon putting together a short film of his conception. Very cheesy but a lot of fun. A scaled-down version can be found on my old music site; just click on 'Rock 'n' Ride' in the upper right once you get there. If it looks distorted, it is because we shot it in widescreen and found out my editing software doesn't really like widescreen. I hope it's good for a laugh.