Retailers Flailing

Another Christmas season dies aborning:

In an attempt to keep shoppers coming, retailers are extending their Black Friday promotions into December — a tactic rarely employed to this extent. To avoid being caught in January with excess inventory from 2013, many are choosing to sacrifice profit margins by preemptively discounting this month.

Cohen said the type of bargains normally reserved for the week after Christmas are "now available a month in advance."

"This is the drowning man phenomenon — some retailers appear to be flailing around desperately trying to keep their heads above water," he said.

Meeting John Wright In Concord

John Wright, wearing his Fuji-brand bicycle windbreaker.  Along with the mythical Mr. Farouk, John owns the Pro Bike shop in Oklahoma City.  He was in San Francisco for business, and to visit family.  He came out to Concord on BART, and I drove down from Sacramento to meet him.

We had some pastries at Alpine Pastry in Concord.  Later, we ended up at a diner, and shared conversation about old times, and new. 

I remember coming to Concord in 2003, during the Gubernatorial Recall Election, and saw the massive demonstrations of IT workers outraged that their jobs had been outsourced en masse to the Philippines.  Today, the glass towers where those IT workers worked appear mostly empty, and downtown Concord has edged towards ghost-town status.  Thank you, Masters of the Universe.

Nearby was the Command Center.  'For Lease' signs festooned the building.  The Command Center seems to have been abandoned.  Which probably explains a lot.

Passing through Fairfield on the way back to Sacramento on Interstate-80, there was a fire in a neighborhood near the freeway.  Was this?  Yes it was!  The very same neighborhood that saw a massive fire on August 31st! Why is this neighborhood always on fire?  Does Katniss Everdeen, the 'Girl on Fire' live here?

This Just In

Via Dependable Renegade:

Crank The Fear Level Down A Notch

Looks like my employers want me around for at least a bit longer.

It's Cold Outside

(Phone rings at 7:30 a.m. Outside temperature at Sacramento Executive Airport National Weather Service station: 25 degrees F.)

M.: Mmmphello?

E.: MMMMMAAAAARRRRCCCCC! It's Erlynda! The pipes here are FROZEN! It's so cold! I flush the toilet, and there's no water coming through the pipes! Chris says use the Hair Dryer to warm up the pipes!

M.: It's colder where you are than it is here. I'm not too worried. And besides, that's a trailer you guys are in, which is vulnerable to frozen pipes, and....

E.: MMMMAAAARRRRCCCC! Chris says it's a mobile home, and not a trailer. Anyway, be careful with the Hair Dryer and don't electrocute yourself! Bye!

Amusing Video Of Tyehimba Serving Food On A Train

Tyehimba has training as a clown, and it shows in Richard's amusing video from Old Sacramento.

Archaeology By Internet - Socorro Example

I recently contacted an archaeologist named Michael Bletzer. Back when we were young college students at New Mexico Tech in Socorro, about 1975, we visited two places of archaeological interest. The first site was a short distance from Socorro; the second site was considerably farther away. (Site names have been redacted to preserve antiquities.)

We collected pottery shards and related debris. I always wanted to find someone who might have a better understanding of what we were looking at. I wondered whether the first site was a remnant of the Piro Indians, who were once common in the Socorro area.

There was an interesting recent article in New Mexico Historical Review ("The First Province of that Kingdom": Notes on the Colonial History of the Piro Area) written by Michael Bletzer, whose specialty is the archaeology of Piro Indian ruins in Socorro. It sounded like he might be the guy to contact.

Bletzer looked at my photos of pottery shards and thinks they are older than what he was looking at near Socorro: pre-1300, for sure.

I thought it was an interesting exchange (enclosed below):

Dear Mr. Bletzer:

I read with interest your article on the Piros in NMHR, and was curious whether you had any information regarding (the ruins at site 1). Do they date from the chaotic times of the 1690's, or are they older?

He replied:

Hello,

The main structures at (Socorro) appear to be much older than the Revolt Period. Some of the ceramics indicate at least a 14th-century occupation. Doubtless, however, the area was used until the abandonment, in 1680, of Pilabo/Socorro Pueblo.

There are also scattered about the foothills small sites with slag, 17th-century ceramics, and Spanish artifacts, which indicate prospecting by the Spanish. Nothing big came of this; there was never any large-scale mining during the colonial period.

Regards,
Michael

I replied:

Thanks, Michael!

It's fun revisiting memories of when I was a freshman at NM Tech (1974-1976).

I'm attaching a few photos of some of the stuff we gathered (at Site 1).

Ceramic fragments, plus projectile point.

Closeup of projectile point.

Take a look at the ceramic fragments picture and see if you can make anything from them.

The ruins of these structures seemed strange to me. They didn't look like Puebloan structures, and so I thought maybe they were seasonal shelters of some sort, whether by Piro Indians, or others.

We also visited another interesting site (Site 2). An arroyo was actively eating through what had been a buried pit. It was a perfect, pre-cut profile, custom-made for the archaeologist in mind, but unfortunately it was in the process of being destroyed by the arroyo. Who knows how much of it lingers? There was also ruins of a European house on a nearby hilltop there.

Carbonized wood (around 1982, I gave these to the Tree Ring Lab at U of A in Tucson to see if they could date them, but they returned them, I think without looking at them).

Collected debris, including glass bottle debris.

He replied:

Hello Marc,

It seems I misread your original question - somehow I was thinking of (another location) - an interesting site in itself but not the one you are referring to.

Now, the site you actually describe I haven't seen. I'll look at the ceramics and let you know what I think (whatever that may be worth, haha...)

Regards,
Michael

And indeed, he rendered a verdict:

Marc,

As far as I can tell from the photos, your ceramics are old, pre-1300s definitely. Older by at least 200 years than most of the glazewares I'm dealing with on the sites I'm working on around Socorro.

(Regarding site 2) I did a site inventory with some colleagues, but other than limited survey no work has ever been done on any of those sites. They are out in the middle of nowhere, very cool locations! No wonder people are seeing aliens down there....

Cheers,
Michael

That's great!

The trouble with archaeology, of course, is that there is so much work to do, and the ruins are so vulnerable to damage.

Meanwhile, to learn more about the later history of the area, I'm starting to read more about the consolidation of Comanche power in the mid-18th Century, and their explusion of the Apache, which hit Spanish colonial New Mexico so very, very hard.

10th Annual Nuts And Berries Fundraiser For The Wildlife Care Association (WCA)

Special guests included the Leucistic (albino) Crow.

Screech Owl.

Barn Owl.

Lots of silent auction bidding for gift baskets.  My damage: $107 + $20 for bicycle raffle (which I missed winning by one) + $10 entrance fee = $137.00.

Charlotte.

Great Horned Owl.

Yellow-Billed Magpie

Burrowing Owl.

"Schoolhouse Rock, Live!" - DMTC YPT

"A Christmas Carol" - Stockton Civic Theatre

On Saturday evening, we went down to Stockton to see the musical version of "A Christmas Carol" (the same version we performed last year at DMTC), and to cheer on Scott Minor, who was playing Scrooge.

Scott played the lead role well, with lots of character, as did Vince Peralta (Ghost of Christmas Past), and Jesse Beltran (Ghost of Christmas Past).

Liked the costumes.

Puzzled by the multiplatform set, which didn't remind me of Victorian London, but instead reminded me of the Mayan-inspired, neo-Egyptian-looking set of The Time Machine (1960). Then again, Scrooge is a kind of time traveler, so maybe it's apropos.

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

Awesome show, as expected for the second part of the trilogy. Maybe not quite as good as the first part - it starts in the middle and ends in the middle - but still, awesome. It reminds me in a way of "Dune", but aimed at teenage girls rather than boys.

Jennifer Lawrence is the quintessential Katniss Everdeen: the role of a lifetime!

The Emu Tango

New Mexico 1940s

Things that influenced my mother to move to New Mexico in the early 50's.

Crazy People Talk To Me

C.P.: (looking wistful) I just saw my daughter on the street! She walked right past! She was with her boyfriend. She's pregnant too. She didn't look well. Put on too much weight. She should go to the gym. You know how people begin to look like the people they hang around with? She looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger! I said 'hello!' from across the street, but she didn't respond. (with a pixie-like shoulder-shrug) Maybe she didn't hear me? She walked right past! I'm her mother. It's good she's pregnant. She should get married. She just walked right past!

M.: Maybe you should follow her?

C.P.: Maybe I should!

Trying To Get A Better Sense Of Gran Quivira

This week, I've been thinking about Indian ruins in New Mexico. Among my thoughts has been - why Gran Quivira? I mean, why is it there? It was a salt trading center, true, but it's a little removed from the salt itself. There's very limited irrigation potential in the area - like, nearly zero - and it's cold too, at 6,500 ft. above sea level. Reminds me of other unlikely places for settlement, like Chaco Canyon, but that was a religious center of great overarching importance. Gran Quivira's religious function was important to the Spanish, but I don't think anyone has argued it had similar religious importance to the Jumanos and others who lived there.

The geography is odd. Was it astride a trade route to the south? Would turquoise traders have passed through? How about trade routes east and west? Not immediately evident. (Then again, the function of modern trading centers like Albuquerque aren't evident either. Albuquerque's importance resulted partly by historical accident).

Gran Quivira appears to have been a polyglot kind of place, mixing Pueblo and Plains Indians, among others. Was it tolerant too? Or just the opposite?

Gran Quivira just strikes me as detached from the world in some way. Like an Indian Pueblo designed by Star Wars fans.

Why was it there? Why was it as important as it was? What did it do? And most importantly to me, who lived AROUND it?

SCAQMD Near-Road Mitigation Measures and Technologies Forum

Frank went down to LA and made our presentation to the SCAQMD Near-Road Mitigation Measures and Technologies Forum on November 21, 2013. The presentations and video recording of the symposium are now available. Frank writes:

My 15 minute presentation for Sierra starts at 3hr:25min:15sec, and the short Q/A for this session begins immediately after my presentation at 3:40:24.

Fun! Thanks for Frank's kudos at 3:45:20!

Baby A.K.A Birdman - Do That (feat. P. Diddy)

Part of the Aerobics soundtrack over at Pepper Von's. Infectious dance tune.

Can't Get Enough Of 2003 House Music!

I've never listened to this Remix (I usually listen to the Gabriel & Dresden Remix), but the photos in this video are beautiful, and comes with lyrics.

And for a song that is likely to be about marriage!

The Car Is Vibrating So Violently Now I Need Ear Protection To Drive It

I wonder when it will fail?

Made This Week's Best QOTW Page

I'm surprised the B3ta folks liked my story! This week's question:

Self-Inflicted injuries

Spanishfly asks: Ever injured yourself in a moment of frustration? When have you ever done something stupid or sensible that has ended up with you injured? Punched an Asda sign because they didn't have tiger bread? Yeah, us too

My answer:

Tiny cable car across the river

Driving along, we noticed a cable across a river. There was a little cable car too. I guess they used it to measure water depth. We stopped and found it wasn't secured. We sat in the two tiny seats below the two wheels that rode on the cable, and rolled down the cable until we were halfway across the river. Then we stopped. It was uphill on both sides now, so if we wanted to get back to safety, we'd have to do some work. So, we put our hands on the cable to pull ourselves along. And one of the wheels promptly rode into my hand and ripped the skin off my thumb and fingertips, thrashing every sensitive nerve. Hurt like crazy, and we still had the entire distance to haul ourselves. Bled all over that cable on the journey back. Left unique scars on the fingertips too, so goodbye to any hope of a life of crime.