Albuquerque to Portland, Tribune Style

Everyone who worked at The Albuquerque Tribune during my tenure from 2000 on knows and has spent quality time with the green foam football, which is known now by its official title “The Football.” It was an almost daily companion for all of us.

We used to toss it down the office’s long hallway and occasionally, when the boss wasn’t looking, across the entire newsroom. We got caught a few times, pun intended, but the paper had such a nice family atmosphere that the boss was a good sport about it.

During power failures, The Football would always come into the parking lot with us for some “go deep” pass and catch games.

When I left to work at the Santa Fe New Mexican, just before The Trib closed in February 2008, I signed the football and gave it to Mark Holm, generally awesome guy and The Trib’s photo editor.

Mark took the football with him to his new job in New Hampshire, where he worked for a short while, and then to Colorado to the Rocky Mountain News, which itself folded about a year ago.

But The Football’s journey is far from done. So before I took off for Oregon, Mark signed it and gave it back to me so it could start its next adventure.

Here, then, is a chronicle of its journey…

The Football in Albuquerque at my old home

The Football chillin and drinking a beer with my nephew Corey

The Football and the fams -- Ian, Corey and Kathleen Bardwell, Mark Wooldridge and Leo Bartnik -- on a UHaul loading break

The Football gets to Colorado, and thinks to itelf, in an anthropomorphic way, 'haven't I been here before?'

Leo and The Football: 'Listen Football, if you ask me 'are we there yet' one more time, I'll throw you out of this car!'

Somehow the trailer went flat overnight in Provo, Utah. The Football tried to cheer us both up. Here it is with Leo.

Leo, handy guy that he is, called the UHaul folks and got us back on the road in no time. The Football waited patiently with me here while he called.

The Football, hanging out by a sign to prove it was in Provo, Utah

The Football in Idaho, a state with a significant stinky cow population. On a more positive note, though, even the truck stops there have good mashed potatoes.

Finally, The Football gets a chance to relax and hang out with its friend, sweatshirt, at our new home in Portland, Oregon

Now that its journey is done, The Football plans to take a few days to recuperate and help me unpack. It wanted me to tell everybody to come visit, so we can toss it around in the park down the street.

Cheers!
-SueVo

Saying Goodbye to a New Mexico Temple of Science

OK, so maybe the words ‘temple’ and ‘science’ shouldn’t go together in a headline, but of all the science institutions I’ve covered during my 14 year career as a reporter here in New Mexico, possibly the one I revere the most is the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science.

It has everything a science nerd girl could possibly want, and more — dinosaurs, space exhibits, cool rocks, a big IMAX theater, a planetarium and even a collection of fossilized dino dung, called coprolites.

One of two dinosaur sculptures that graces the front of the museum

I’ve been going to the museum ever since I was a student at the University of New Mexico. I remember getting a chuckle out of the “Evolator” — which is a pseudo-ride in the museum, an elevator that takes you through the history of geologic time.

Before leaving the Land of Enchantment, I wanted to pay a farewell visit to the museum, and say hello to one of my favorite science sources, Spencer Lucas, who’s a paleontology curator there.

Spencer Lucas in his office at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science

Some of the best adventures I had as a reporter came from Lucas’ help and input. He’s taken me to see a lot of New Mexico’s geologic treasures all over the state — and in the process has taught me a lot about them.

In my time as a reporter, we’ve visited the Prehistoric Trackways National Monument, and seen it transform from a somewhat secretive site into a now public area that is protected and known as the world’s most important research area for Permian aged animal footprints.

Through that site, you can see what animal behavior was like 300 million years ago. And that’s pretty darned cool considering there were no cameras or video recorders back then.

While visiting Lucas’ office this afternoon, he showed me a couple of his favorite fossils, including this one from Trackways that hasn’t been written up yet:

A scorpion left this impression on the sands in Southern New Mexico 280 million years ago.

The same fossil, with a finger for scale.

This scorpion fossil, which Lucas said is about 280 million years old, is cool because it shows both a track where the creature walked and an outline where it lay in the sand. If you look at the right side of the image, you can see lines where its spine dragged on the ground, and dots where its feet touched. And on the left you can see where it rested before continuing its journey.

Fossils like that are extremely rare, but abundant at Trackways, which Lucas had a hand in preserving.

Here’s another one from the site, which shows tiny jellyfish impressions in the sand:

These circular imprints are fossil jellyfish imprints.

Another one of Lucas’ favorite fossils is much younger, and bigger, than the impressions left at Trackways. Back in the archive — which has always been my favorite hidden part of the museum — he showed me a 3 million year old mastodon jaw:

Lucas holding a 3 million year old mastodon jaw

The creatures, known more for their range in South America, originally evolved in North America about 3 million years ago, Lucas said. And areas like New Mexico, Texas and California mark the northernmost part of where they lived.

“There’s some debate as to when they actually got to South America, and I’m part of that debate,” Lucas said. “Not everybody agrees. But that’s the nature of science and scientists.”

The shelves in the museum’s archives are full of these sorts of treasures. And going into the giant warehouse of fossils has always sort of felt, to me anyway, like walking into a cathedral of science. I’m awestruck by the shear amount of fossils, their size and their range through time.

Lucas in the museum arcive, looking at rows and rows of New Mexico fossils

Lucas collected many of these fossils himself. And in his 22 years at the museum he’s seen it grow immensely as a resource for geologists around the world, he said.

“Before the state of New Mexico built this museum in 1986, what was paleontology in New Mexico?” asked Lucas, who grew up in Albuquerque. “Most of it was from museums in other places. Scientists would come study the geology in New Mexico, collect samples and then take them back to museums in other states. In 22 years since I started here in 1988 we went from virtually no collection to now having over 60,000 catalogued fossils and over 100,000 in the collection.”

The scope of work covers almost every time period and includes unique finds — such as the world’s oldest mammal, the skull of a tiny mouse-like creature that lived in the Triassic period, from about 251 million years ago to 200 million years ago.

The fossil is one of Lucas’ many collected discoveries.

In 2007, when the museum was redying its Triassic Hall, Lucas — who’s always good with a sound bite — held the fossil on his fingertip and told me: “That’s our distant ancestor, many grandpas ago — the first of the begats.”

The museum now houses the largest Triassic exhibit in the Americas. And it allows visitors a rare opportunity to walk through large exhibits of the three time periods when dinosaurs existed: The Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous.

As part of the museum’s effort to increase understanding of these time periods, more recently, while I was a reporter at the Santa Fe New Mexican, Lucas took me to see the only confirmed Tyrannosaurus rex footprint in the world.

It’s safely hidden in Northern New Mexico — but what a thrill it was to look at such a rare find.

Here’s a couple videos of Lucas talking about the site that I took for the paper:

And before leaving from my last visit to the museum before heading out to Portland, I also grabbed a quick video of Lucas talking about yet another cool hidden treasure in the archive — skin impressions from a 75 million year old duck-billed dinosaur:

I’m really going to miss the museum and the access I had to the staff over the years. Budgets may be tight, and Natural History is feeling the pinch as much as anybody, but I hope people realize how important and special a place like this really is.

If you find yourself in Albuquerque, I can’t recommend enough that you pay a visit and check it out.

Farewell, my museum. And stay cool!

Cheers,
-SueVo

Duck Porn

OK, now that I have your attention…

Today, thanks to a little rainy weather, I got to take a walk on the ditch by my house without getting hives. It’s duck mating season, so I brought my camera along to try to catch the little guys behaving badly.

Unfortunately, or fortunately for them, I was out of luck. No duck porno for you, dear reader.

But I did notice the sad plight of this guy:

Poor dude can't find a duck girlfriend

It's sad in spring when the duck ladies aren't digging your plumage

Maybe he'll have better luck downstream

A couple days before there were about 20 ducks of both genders hanging out in a wet patch on the field. I guess this guy just got there a little too late. Hopefully he’ll find his soul mate somewhere further down the ditch path.

With more rain passing through, I also got to capture a few images of New Mexico’s big sky to show you all. The altitude here in the high desert really makes for some beautiful cloudscapes.

The Big Sky

A cloud that appears to be unzipping

That’s one thing I’ll really miss as I head off to Oregon on Friday. Although replacing it with seascapes is even better in my opinion.

Cheers,
-SueVo

Update: The clouds delivered a little moisture as promised, so here’s a couple quick videos — more for sound than pictures — of spring rain in Albuquerque.

Check the upper right corner for a tiny glimpse of lightning:

And finally, a couple of it coming down hard:

Beware of Hula Hoopers

As an effort to burn through the cabin fever, I decided to put up with the hives and hacking and take a walk to the grocery store today.

You know sometimes, when walking around, you see something you never noticed before.

In this case, a good Samaritan decided to add a little extra flair to a pedestrian sign. Drivers really do need to be wary of people using hula hoops in the middle of the road after all.

This pedestrian is getting a little extra exercise, watch out!

Enjoy,
-SueVo

Saying Goodbye to Albuquerque’s Ditches

I’ve always been drawn to watery places — streams, rivers, oceans and here, of course, Albuquerque’s ditches.

The ditch trails are irrigation waterways that have long stretched through Albuquerque’s north and south valleys, used by farmers and livestock owners that have lived here for centuries.

One of the things I’ll miss about this place, and especially my house here, is walking the ditch that runs behind my house to a public agriculture area that was once called Anderson Field.

Of course it’s spring now, and horribly windy, but I won’t be in the Duke City much longer, so I braved the itchy, watery eyes and wheezy lungs to bring you all a look at one of my favorite intimate places to spend time and exercise.

When the weather’s good, I used to call this my 30-minute walk. Down the path, across the back of the field to the gate — which I would tag and then walk back home.

Here’s a way for you to join me, and for me to remember it — through a few pictures and videos:

The ditch behind my house

Starting down the trail

Horses in a North Valley backyard

Ditch water close-up

Cottonwood tree

More cottonwoods lining the back of Anderson Field

Tagging the gate

Thanks for walking with me.

Cheers,
-SueVo

Closing Up Shop

I have no idea why closing my New Mexico Educators Federal Credit Union account today and moving it to my new, more national bank makes me sort of sad, but there it is.

Maybe I’ll just miss the convenience of having an office pretty much right in my back yard – which apparently in my mind is down the street in Smith’s parking lot.

The Credit Union

The Credit Union has been my bank since I was a student at the University of New Mexico, so I suppose leaving it makes me vaguely nostalgic. Still, it had to be done.

Besides, I’m not nostalgic for my old student loan payments, which are thankfully long gone.

With the invention of online bill paying services and other digital goodies that have made snail mail somewhat obsolete, I think the paperwork side of moving is going to be much easier for me than it ever has been in the past.

I’ll still have to fill out one of those post office moving things once I find a new place in Portland, but at least I won’t have to snail mail all my account providers the new address — I can just fix it in a few places on the computer and be done with it.

And this is a happy sight — soon it will be complete with a SOLD sign attached to it:

My 'For Sale' sign

Before it’s a completely done deal though, I have to pass the inspections. But my realtor thinks that should go pretty smoothly.

My beach awaits, after all.

Cheers,
-SueVo

Update: Looks like the real estate stealth ninjas updated the sign when I turned my back… here it is now:

Spring in Albuquerque

In the things I won’t miss category, here’s a little shot of windy spring in Albuquerque. You know what’s hidden in those blowing leaves?
Pollen. And lots of it. Yuck.