GCCB

Yes, we're on the green chile cheeseburger thing again. I know most readers will never come here and experience this sensation. So here's some propaganda from the NM Dept. of Tourism that will hopefully entice you. And if you make your base of operations Las Cruces, you'll have a place to stay!!!!!!

First, please watch this so you can understand:

Got your taste buds all atwitter??????? Don't tell me your mouth isn't watering........lying isn't very nice!!!!!! Especially to Pirate Dogs who will haunt your darkest nightmares if you treat them so.............Note the loser Bobby Flay in the video. Buckhorn has excellent GCCB but we still rate The Owl numero uno!!!!!! The atmosphere adds to the experience and The Owl, with Conrad Hilton's original bar, the business cards and dollar bills stuck to the walls and ceilings, is the ultimate environment for enjoying this unique treasure of the Land of Enchantment.

So click on this link for the only map of New Mexico you will ever need. You trust the Pirate Dogs, right??? They are waiting for you to come and join them in the trek to taste a green chile cheeseburger at each of the locations on the map---except for the Blake' s Lotta Burger locations. Those are pretty inconsistent, it being a fast food chain. But the two locations in San Antonio---MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

LOL

P.D.

THE MAP

Ok---it's one year for Obama, State of the Union time, all kinds of stuff----like the Massachusetts senate seat the Republicans just won that has been held since 1952 not only by Democrats, but by BROTHERS John and Ted Kennedy. So much for the forefathers diatribes about royalty............And the Pirate Dogs are observing all this and we will comment----over the week-end.

But right now----it's green chile cheeseburgers!!!!!!!!! The NM Dept. of Tourism has released the map for aficionados of this culinary treat. In the Clovis area, Taco Box made the cut and their version isn't bad, much better than say Mickey-D's, Wendy's, or Sonic. Peppers on the Plaza made it in La Mesilla. Bobcat Bite is on the map. Of course both the OWL and the Buckhorn are there. Who wants to accompany me and the Pirate Dogs in visiting as many as we can over maybe a long week-end this summer??

Of Cheeseburgers and Properties

Oh, my, another weekend, another 600 miles. We need to get moved............

Our house has been on the market about 40 days with over 30 showings. I wish some of these people would open up the checkbook already!!!!! It's nice to get a lot of positive feed-back but I'd really rather have a signed contract.

Yesterday we went to Estancia, this time we met a realtor, to check out the 2 houses on 20 acres. Now the property is on the side of a hill, which makes for some great views:

There are wonderful outbuildings---a marvelous barn and a separate tack room/horse stall that would make an ideal kennel as well. Problem is that the houses are too close to the property line and the outbuildings are in better shape than the houses. One is definitely cognizant of being in a 15 year old or so double wide. I've seen manufactured houses and mobiles that are very nice. We considered one in NH before we found the Podunk place. These two are very spacious (one has 4 bedrooms, two and a half baths, formal dining room, a breakfast nook and 2 fireplaces!!!) but all in all, you're in an older trailer. Afraid I just can't do that. So hopefully we get an offer this week and can go buy the Pecos place next weekend.

Now about them burgers----as you can tell from my new profile photo on this blog, as well as the photo on Facebook, I love green chile cheese burgers. I study them. I'd drive miles for one. I'm always willing to try out a new source of one of these culinary fiestas. So when I saw that a place in Santa Fe called Bobcat Bite had won awards for its green chile cheeseburger, I had to go there. Now I'll say this---it's the largest of the good samples I've tasted. But I'm afraid I can't rate it higher than number 3, behind The Owl and The Buckhorn in San Antonio, NM. The Owl is the gold standard---home-made patties, dare I say poignant green chile, and a wonderful atmosphere. The Bite has a friendly staff, an old adobe building, and seats only 26 so there's frequently a line at the door. But the burger just doesn't stand with The Owl. But after we move to Pecos, I'm sure I'll frequent Bobcat Bite when the craving for one of my favorite foods assaults me if for no other reason than The Owl is 100 miles away.

Frustrated

Well, I almost managed to blow a long weekend. Finally got to The Owl on Tuesday for a couple green chile cheeseburgers. Also got hold of a realtor in central NM where we have been looking on our own to set up a tour of some properties.

I have followed the political doings in our capitol over the past couple of weeks. The elected representatives in Congress have basically tabled environmental legislation. Cap and trade only works if there's some payment and the special interests have convinced our representatives to represent them, not the people. So a lot of the caps are not traded but given away. Maybe, hoping against hope, the Congress will realize over recess that this idea stinks worse than a coal fired power plant and change the bill to allow and enforce a carbon tax with the proceeds going to provide affordable renewable clean energy.

Next is the Sonia Sotomayor hearings in which a bunch of old white men proved that a "wise Latina" is, in fact, smarter and wiser than them. Of course, some senators absolutely have to play politics so they will oppose the nomination not because of anything the nominee said or did during the hearings; nor are they in total disagreement with her record as a jurist. They even admit she'll be confirmed. So why are Cornyn and Hatch voting no if not for purely partisan reasons??

Finally there's health care. What the hell is Barack Obama thinking leaving the shepherding of this most important of all reforms in the hands of Pelosi and Reid!!!! At best these two are political hacks. At worst they are absolute proof that absolute power corrupts absolutely. They go out of their way to antagonize the minority---I would hope after their years of being out of power they might realize that allowing the opposition to inject a few ideas might make the bipartisanship that Obama seeks possible. But, oh no, these two dunderheads just keep ramming through their agendas and the poor citizens,as well as the G O P, be damned. I guess I'll be spending a lot of time watching "West Wing" dvds---at least when Jeb, Toby, Leo, CJ, Sam, and Josh screw up I don't pay for it.

Feeling Like Lord Voldemort

Horcruxes----splitting the soul and storing the pieces in special places. Now according to Dumbledore and wizarding lore, this occurs with each killing by the creator of the horcrux---very dark magic. But is that the only way???????? Can't the soul be split by natural forces, like loving and longing??

Dad feels his spiritual place is Pecos, specifically the ruins of the ancient (did you know people settled there as early as 800AD???) pueblo, in the kiva-- Horcrux #1.

I've been with him on a pilgrimage to The Owl Bar and Cafe, home of the BEST Green Chile Cheeseburger in the world (and the green chile cheese fries too!!!)---#2.

Of course there's the Sacramento Valley where the kids and grand-kids reside----#3.

I know we Pirate Dogs are #4:

Now according to the books, the most powerful magic would be to have 7 horcruxes. We'll see what Dad does for the other 3.

Leny

How the Mighty Have Fallen

I have always loved San Francisco.  To me, a perfect evening is dinner at The Stinking Rose, then browsing through Lawrence Ferlinghetti's City Lights bookstore.  Those were days.......

I remember after one visit I came home and we tried to duplicate the ravioli, stuffed with potato, garlic, and cheese I'd enjoyed at The Stinking Rose.  We made the dough from scratch, rolled it out, formed and cut the ravioli.  There were three batches of dough--one had carrots added, one spinach, to give it color and texture as well as the plain white flour ravioli.  We used to make linguine and spaghetti from scratch, as well as gnocchi, redoing whole batches if the fork marks in the dough weren't just so.

Then, last Saturday, there was an end cap display at Albertson's---3 for $5.00 Hamburger Helper, lasagna-, beef stroganoff-, and salisbury- flavored mixes.  Don't know why but we bought some.  The stroganoff wasn't bad, the lasagna was awful.  We might try the last flavor this weekend.  I think it's time for a trip to the Bay Area or at least The Owl.  

  Be still, my taste buds........................

658 Miles and a Red Meat Burrito, Part 2

In 1940, Thomas Wolfe, best known for Look Homeward, Angel,  wrote that "you can never go home again. "  This sentiment is easy to find on any website devoted to American cliches. How must an author feel when his book title and theme are so characterized......Is it a disappointment to be regarded as a cliche, or the ultimate thrill for a writer to have one of their ideas become so entwined in our language and culture?

Those words of Wolfe's ring true, however, cliche or not.  I have that feeling of longing unfulfilled whenever I visit the area I called home when I was growing up.  I find it very stifling and unappealing.  So at the end of a 300-plus mile drive across New Mexico to Las Cruces, I was appalled at the sense of unfamiliarity engendered by the growth of the city over the past ten years.

This was a scouting trip for retirement.  We've been looking at houses online, shopping for potential retirement sites.  Thanksgiving's trip to Northern CA was part of the plan.  Las Cruces and the high desert spoke to my soul when we were there ten years ago.  So as we descended from the 5700-foot St. Augustin Pass and saw the developments spreading into the foothill of the beautiful Organ Mountains, all I felt was a sense of longing for the jeep roads where I used to mountain bike and hike with St. Hannah, the tan dog.  Were they gone, swallowed up by the bulldozers of the developers?

We had found a house online in a new area and decided to trek across the state to scout the area.  Plans were to drive to Las Cruces, gorge ourselves on green-chile cheeseburgers at Guacomole's, tour the historic district, and check out the real estate market.  For a city recently rated one of the top places to retire, prices still seemed fairly reasonable.

Turning off the Bataan Memorial Highway, we entered the subdivision that looked so good on the Web.  We found the house we had devoured online.  It faced the mountains alright. Unfortunately, that view would have to be eliminated if we wanted any privacy in the living area.  Shoehorned onto small lots with minimal height masonry walls, the adobe style houses provided little privacy or feeling of "neighborhood."  We drove around a bit and decided to go have lunch.

The road to the restaurant went right by our old neighborhood so we succumbed to the temptation and drove by our old home.  Nothing had changed, except for an attractive repainting of the house on the corner and the addition of a small satellite dish to the roof of our old place. 

We proceeded to the restaurant only to find it "Temporarily Closed.  Sorry for any Inconvenience."  Well it was damn inconvenient, having traveled over 300 miles to eat there!! But then we remembered Nellie's, the finest Mexican food in the area.  Of course, Nellie's has grown with the city and the line was long just to get into the establishment.  Plan B--Roberto's--famous for its drive thru.  The food was great but dining inside is much less pleasurable an experience than getting the wonderful burritos, pinto beans, rice, and sopas "to go" so as to enjoy them while picnicking by the Rio  Grande with los perros. 

After lunch we proceeded to tour the city.  Auntie Bucksnort insisted it was like CA, even denigrating it by comparing it to the developments of Daly City, with its sloping lots and phalanxes of houses that seem to march up and down the pathetic asphalt covered hills seemingly out to eternity.  Our car conveyed us down the boulevard and turned left at the end, east toward Tortugas Mountain.  The developments faded and soon we were standing on the high desert.  The dogs were relaxed and enjoying their release from the crate and the myriad new odors.  The bustle of the commercial district was just a memory, rapidly retreating into the past and out of our consciousness.  The feeling was akin to rebirth.

We had braved snow in the Sacramento Mountains in the morning.  We had been disappointed by the newer developments.  We hadn't had the time to explore a couple of other areas we knew.  The journey back to the plains was uneventful, other than a stop at the pistachio farm and vineyard for some wine-tasting (we purchased an excellent Cabernet Sauvignon and a chocolate wine).  But while we acknowledge that the Las Cruces we knew has changed, there was a comfortable and restful feeling in the soul that spoke to us and said that maybe, Thomas Wolfe notwithstanding, we can go home again. 

Driving 580 Miles for a Burger

All right, so even in "Nuevo Mehico" gasoline is approaching $4.00 a gallon. Who cares?? Not the 3 Pirate Dogs!!!!!!! They convinced their dad, mom, and auntie to load them into the vehicle and trek about halfway across the 5th largest state for a HAMBURGER. Not just any hamburger but a green chile cheeseburger from the Owl Cafe, home of arguably the best burgers in the WORLD!!!

We used to live about 100 miles from the Owl so a quick run up the Interstate was nothing. To taste the green chile cheese fries, enjoy a cold Bud, and eat a couple of those burgers was so satisfying. And to be able to just do it on a moment's notice was wonderful. Now we live half a state away----yesterday was a 580 mile round trip---si, a little planning is required. But it's the trip as well as the culinary orgasm.

Leave the flat plain of "West Texas" to encounter the foothills of one of the few mountain ranges that run east-west (the Capitans). Be alert and ready with the brakes. Off to the right a herd of pronghorn antelope graze. A few miles further and there are some of the largest longhorn cattle not yet in the feedlot. As the sign for the Roswell UFO Crash site (no trespassing, call some limo company) approaches, a paisano runs across the road with "is that a snake or a lizard?" in its beak. A few miles later another roadrunner crosses, this one still searching for its meal.

Cross the mountains. The pass is only 6900 feet on this route. But the land has changed. Scruffy trees, maybe oaks, shelter a few head of cattle. The highway allows a view of hawks from above as it proceeds in switchbacks up the mountain. Then there is the first sighting of the Tularosa Basin stretching for miles north-south and to the west we spy the the next mountains to cross.

The land has morphed into black lava flows as the car ascends into the Malpais. One more hill----and the high desert reveals itself--the "Jornada del Muerto." A fitting name for the land that was scarred by the Trinity blast in 1945. There's the turn for Stallion Gate.

It's been a long ride but that sign means the Rio Grande, El Camino Real, and the Owl are only about half an hour away. Another hill and the river valley, almost obscenely green against the adobe colored sand and mountains beyond, appears. Cross the Rio, muddy, fairly high (the dams upstream must be open). There's the sign with the nocturnal bird, our destination.

Of course the pirates can't go in, not a seeing eye dog among them, but there's a shady parking place. The humans gorge themselves on the wonderful fare. The pirates get a hamburger of their own for their patience. A quick turn on the leash for relief and renewal and it's time for the trek east.