Saturday, October 22, 2011

Have Gloom, Will Travel

Your human brain is remarkable in many ways, but a lot of what makes it remarkable also makes it very wrinkly, and that means it requires some upkeep to keep it moist and in tip-top shape. The wrinkles are prone to filling up with lint if exposed to too much drudgery, despair, or television. For proper maintenance, the brain needs to have beauty pounded into it as often as possible. You never know when you're going to need it later. That's why we hike the alpine meadows of Oregon, and that's why we just went to New Mexico.

My friend Melissa lives there, in Los Alamos, so we figured she should know some stuff. She advised us what to pack: "t-shirts,  a lightweight long-sleeved shirt for layering, shorts, sunscreen and maybe a pair of long pants--it gets cool at night sometimes." On my own initiative, I added eight pairs of underpants to the list: one per day plus an oopsie pair for burrito country. And off we went.

The day after we arrived, it snowed. I put on all seven t-shirts, all eight pairs of underpants, and an expression of betrayal. "It's unusual this early," Melissa admitted. "But the great thing about New Mexico is that even when it's cold in the winter, the sun's out. We don't get that overcast you all do.

That evening a weighty fog rolled in and erased the nearby canyons from the landscape. It's a common thing to accuse visitors of having brought weather with them, but it's generally meant in jest. Dave and I eased our rain gear over our underwear collection and strode like rubbered shmoos through the familiar gray pall to the grocery store. There, shoppers sulked under the awnings and peered out with bafflement and alarm, as though something had gotten loose from the Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory. Slowly, wary eyes turned towards us. We had carefully scrubbed the moss off our north sides before leaving home, but we looked suspiciously comfortable. Frankly, I thought maybe we'd brought it with us, too.

Our powers lasted only a few days before the sun reasserted itself, and we huffed our way around the landscape, much of which had been pushed up above 10,000 feet and then left there, for no particular reason. Dave reassessed and concluded we hadn't brought the weather, because if we had, we would have thought to bring some air with us as well. As he explained breathlessly to passing hikers who looked at us with concern, where we come from you can actually see the oxygen molecules. They're all over the place.

New Mexico and Oregon are both beautiful in opposing ways. Western Oregon has just as much geology as anywhere else, but we keep it demurely draped in greenery. In New Mexico the geology is buck-ass naked. It has tipped and rocked and rolled and been stripped and blown and it doesn't care who's looking. We gaped like Lutherans at a bawdy-show.

Rare Alpine Snow Pootie
Still, it was colder than advertised. We intended to go to the high mountains and look at turning leaves, but it was already half-past aspen and a quarter to winter up there. Well, as the saying goes, when God closes a door, he opens an all-night donut shop. Branches may have been bare, but much to our surprise, we got a glimpse of the rare Alpine Snow Poot. Meanwhile, at lower elevations, plucky plants scribbled all over the terrain, their main feature being their ability to hold water, and I admire that, especially since menopause. They clutched and clambered and flowered ferociously, sparking under the broad, broad blue: desert in session, Ubiquitous T. Raven, presiding.

A word about the cuisine. Wherever you go, the menu will list lots of ingredients that you don't recognize. You took French in high school and that's all well and good for finishing crossword puzzles but it isn't going to help you here. All  you need to know is that all of these words are interchangeable and may refer to something in the pepper family, something in the meat family, something in the bread family, or cheese.  It doesn't really matter what it is, because it will all look exactly the same under the camouflage sauce. The meat family may include items customarily discarded by your home butcher. The only thing under your control is the color of the camouflage sauce (red or green). Your best bet is to scan the ingredients for signs of Latin roots referring to insects, and then order the Menudo con papadzules, pepitas, poblano rellenos, burro bits, cacahuete and roasted corn tracers in mole sauce with achiote "ricky" recado. This is either pig lips and little squiggly ambush peppers rolled into a bread product, or it is minced nostril and allergens stuffed in a pepper the size of a buttock. The cheese is directly under the camouflage sauce and its function is to expeditiously remove the roof of your mouth, which may then be placed to the left of the salad fork. You really can't go wrong. It will all be delicious. Also, order water. You should drink lots and lots of water. Beer is practically all water.

Speaking of lips, my own sheared off in papery shreds and are resting on a canyon floor somewhere, where industrious lip-scavenger beetles are using them to line their nests. Water is scarce in this country, because no one is keeping an eye on it. I'm as guilty of inattention as anyone. I kept pouring a bunch of it into myself and it kept vanishing in some way I'm not familiar with. After a week my hair couldn't be contained without baling wire and the mummification process had begun. It was a splendid trip, but we got home just in time. It's raining here. Good lip-growing weather.

40 comments:

  1. Love, love, love the Rare Alpine Snow Pootie. I wish we had snow so that our chance of seeing him was greater than a snowflake in hell. Wonderful post as always. Thank you.

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  2. PS. Having recently leaving much of my top lip on the road I would appreciate you sending some lip growing rain.

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  3. While stationed in Colorado I was able to visit New Mexico several times, although thinking about it now not as much I should have. Love the pictures!

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  4. Write to Rick Perry and ask him for his best offer for you to take an extended trip to Texas. Since the praying-for-rain schtick hasn't worked, he might be ready to pay top dollar for some imported Oregon weather.

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  5. One rule of thumb...if you can't pronounce it don't eat it....when in doubt go to McD's. As you get older it takes longer for your lips to grow back.

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  6. That Snow Pootie looks familiar but I can't quite place it. Snow like that in New Mexico already? I am glad you're back home in familiar weather. It's raining right now and expected to stay around most of the week. Nothing naked here...

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  7. Akshully, we have lots of naked geology in Oregon. It's on the dry side of the Cascades. See, for example, Smith Rocks, the John Day Fossil Beds, and much of Harney County. I was raised in those parts, but managed to escape before the leatherization process got into full swing on my skin.

    Your photos are stunning! I am especially impressed with the Snow Poot sighting.

    And you are so right-we need to marinate the brain in beauty as often as possible!

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  8. I am nursing a case of shingles and the last thing you want to do with this malady is to heave your belly up and down against sandpaper clothes. Have you no mercy? This was an eyewatering post, partly from laughing so darn hard and partly from shingle pain as a result of the laughter. Inspite of that, thanks for the huge laugh. Great medicine, wonderful post.
    Arkansas Patti

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  9. I love NM - forests and mountains in the upper half becoming rocky formations and then desert as you drop south. And I love this line:

    "... it was already half-past aspen and a quarter to winter up there."

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  10. Oh my, Elephant's Child, ideally you shouldn't break your fall with your face, even if you are a piano player.

    Infidel753, Rick Perry wouldn't line the pockets of an Oregonian, but if he can pick up some cheap Chinese weather, he'd be all over it.

    Arkansas Patti, no! Shingles? I got chicken pox when I was nine and spread it to the whole summer camp because I never felt sick, and even my doctor thought it was poison ivy when he cleared me to go. Maybe if I get shingles now I won't even know it. Although I hear that's unlikely. Feel better soon.

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  11. We gaped like Lutherans at a bawdy-show.

    I didn't get this, and yet it was still funny.

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  12. Lovely pictures. Our weather has been gloomy without end. Good thing we couldn't afford those solar panels.

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  13. Those beautiful photos are food for the soul. Love those cool rock formations. They tell a story or three hundred million. Being there must have been that much better.

    And I'm very impressed with the creation of the Alpine Snow Poot, obviously much more complicated than a watch. Veritable proof that there is a god.

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  14. You are so jealousy-provoking wonderful in describing your trip. I just got done posting about a trip and there is not one laugh in that post, but I laughed out loud at your travelogue. How DO you do that? Wonderful stuff, wonderful place. I agree about the altitude. Son lived in Santa Fe, and between the hot peppers and the altitude, we never were able to catch our breath. And yes, I was raised Lutheran.

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  15. I'm glad you had a good time. My parents used to live near Los Alamos. Its beautiful.

    Best line in the whole blog (possibly in the history of blogs)? "On my own initiative, I added eight pairs of underpants to the list: one per day plus an oopsie pair for burrito country."

    I'm still giggling over this one.

    ♥Spot

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  16. I suppose seven tee shirts and eight pairs of undies qualifies as layering! Great post.

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  17. Murr, you are a treasure! You have the genius to turn ordinary events into poetry and laughs. Please don't ever stop.

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  18. Love that Alpine Poot!
    Word to the wise: steer clear of Perry;he may be contagious.

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  19. You know, I've never had a desire to see Texas. Too many prominent fools and buffoons. And that's a shame, because there are so many great bloggers from Texas--and of course St. Molly Ivins.

    Spot, you don't get your name from anything related to your underpants, do you?

    alwaysinthebackrow, the cool thing about being raised Lutheran, at least in my experience, is there's nothing to recover from. You can abandon the beliefs and it's a good idea to shelve the tuna hot dish too, but there's no lasting damage.

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  20. Now I want to go to New Mexico. Thanks for the trip and the snow!

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  21. You are so right about filling up our brains with as much beauty as possible. Aren't we lucky there's so much of it around. Lovely photos, my adventurous friend.

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  22. Those photos were incredible! Such natural beauty!

    "...a pepper the size of a buttock."

    I have GOT to look for those during my next trip to the farmer's market. Are buttocks peppers in season?

    "The cheese is directly under the camouflage sauce and its function is to expeditiously remove the roof of your mouth, which may then be placed to the left of the salad fork."

    All this time, I'd been laying it across my lap like a napkin. I had no idea I was committing an etiquette breach.

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  23. Please tell Melissa that when I run away from home, she will have to take me in, 'cause I love me some desert!

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  24. Ahab, even if buttocks peppers aren't in season, you can find them in the can.

    Jayne, you're beautiful. And I'm not just sucking up. I'm sucking up, but not just sucking up.

    And Ed? I believe Melissa would love to have you. I can see you walking up there with your bandanna-on-a-stick.

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  25. Condolences on your New Mexican misadventure. Up here in the Great White North we haven't had any snow yet. Totally shocked that the south, as in New Mexico, had snow before us.
    Is this proof of climate change, or global warming? Ask the Snow Pootie about it, will ya, Murr.

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  26. So - snow, fog, asphyxia, scorched mouths, dehydration. Clearly the holiday of a lifetime....

    Amazing rock formations though.

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  27. Wonderful travelogue, Murr. The NM tourist bureau should pay you for writing up their state. Snow in New Mexico? I didn't know it snowed in southern USA. No snow in Ukraine and Siberia is still in the high 60's, tanya's sister calims.
    Your use and abuse of the English language is hard on an old man. My fat bouncing up and down when I laugh is killing me.

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  28. Here in Michigan, where all the surplus water is stored, we have not yet had our first snow. The first flakes usually drift down the first week of October. I think the beginning of the election cycle is heating things up too much here.

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  29. God has an all-night donut shop? Who knew. And Murr, is there something happening with the gravity down there in NM? Your arms are always in the air.

    Thanks for the trip down memory lane. Went to NM on our honeymoon 13 years ago.

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  30. Hey Murr! "For proper maintenance, the brain needs to have beauty pounded into it as often as possible." Well said, ma'am. The final ohto was something. Water formed? Probably. But just plain fabulous. More, please! Indigo

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  31. Well done, Murr! After your post about the snow, fog, skin-withering lack of humidity and scorching hot New Mexican chili, tourists will be scared off forever and we'll have the Land of Enchantment all to ourselves! However, you then blabbed about the rare snow pootie sighting, and that will, no doubt, bring them in droves.

    Loved seeing you both again, and so glad you could appreciate the crazy beauty of this rough country.

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  32. Ain't misadventures the best adventures? Otherwise, think how boring this story could have been. I think you did a good job of surviving.

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  33. What a wonderful post with many-layered pleasures.

    I've enjoyed visits to Oregon (Rouge River area) and New Mexico (Taos, Los Alamos - facinating - Albequerque) and thought it was quite beautiful.

    Thanks for your visit and comment on my site. Glad to "meet" you.

    Jamie

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  34. You took the wonderful weather with, but most kindly returned it home...
    Everything is bigger in Texas...just say'n...

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  35. It's smarts that makes the brain wrinkly? I thought it was age. Whatta relief. Thank heavens the snow and the Pootie drove away all the snakes for a great trip. I believe New Mexico hogs all the sunshine so it's played out by the time it gets to the NW.

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  36. Well Murr, you've done it again...

    I was raised Lutheran too, and except for a few minor tics, I seem to have survived.
    Oopsie! panties, ass-peppers in the can, wrinkled brains and snow. What more could a girl ask for?

    TTFN....I have to have a nap.

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  37. Glad to support another fellow Portland blogger... Cheers!

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  38. Jealous! We must go family camping there. Might I assume there are no stinkbugs in the vicinity?

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