New Mexico Mercury

El Machete: Israel & NM

Israel & NM

Explosive art: something new under the sun

Ever since Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel invented dynamite 150 years ago, people have been trying to make lemonade out of his lemons. The most famous example is Nobel himself, who created the Nobel Prizes, rewarding peacemaking and sundry civilized achievements in literature and science, to atone for the murderous violence he unleashed on the world.

The effort to find useful, even pleasant employment for explosives continues today in New Mexico, home of the biggest explosive of them all, the atomic bomb.

A new book published by the University of New Mexico Press, Detonography: The Explosive Art of Evelyn Rosenberg, parses and celebrates this current effort...

From Section K: Why Cullen Must Play

This season Cullen Neal has caused you anxiety. You’ve held your breath when he started to drive. You’ve cringed when he shot. You’ve put your face in your hands when he turned it over. You’ve wondered to yourself if he belongs. You’ve heard that he receives special treatment because his dad’s the coach. Some have whispered profanities about his play and the situation. Others have shouted them.

I can’t remember an individual in Lobo history who has been such a polarizing figure as Cullen in just his first season...

Farming in the New Age of Drought

“Record rainfall in September brought most us nearly up to ‘normal’ annual precipitation levels, greened up the rangeland, but the rain came so hard and fast that much of it ran off,” reads part of the introduction to the upcoming New Mexico Organic Farming Conference.

“Acequias were damaged and fields were buried in sediment.  And we’re still desperately short of water in the rivers and dams.  Without good snowpack this winter, we face exceptional irrigation shortages in 2014.”

The above words set the tone for the 2014 conference, which is scheduled for the weekend of February 14-15 at the Marriott Pyramid North hotel in Albuquerque...

Weekly Poem: Taken by Storm

Up near the northern border of North Dakota
the third day of an arctic blizzard, a social worker
loads her hatchback with jackets and coats
and drives the frontage road beside a frozen river.
She comes to a man wrapped in a hospital blanket
seated on cardboard on top of a bed of snow.
He doesn’t want the jacket she offers.
“Then I can take you to shelter,” she says...

Rebranding Enchantment

Some months ago, I was lucky enough to attend a reading by Scott Momaday. He spoke like a man in the middle of a great love affair with the New Mexican landscape. The land was tied to his life; together their narrative extended thousands of years into the past. After the reading, I longed for a walk in the mortally beautiful mountains.

I live in the Scott Momaday New Mexico. The Rudolfo Anaya New Mexico. The Georgia O’Keeffe New Mexico. The Fred Harvey Company New Mexico. I do not live in newly rebranded “New Mexico True” setting that our tourism department has begun selling...

El Machete: The heart of I.C.E.

The heart of I.C.E.

Susana’s Other Grading System

Good morning Case 3520. We are here to discuss your uh differently abled son.

Can you stand a pleasant little surprise this morning? Good, because the Administration wishes to discuss some wonderful news with you, Case 3520, news that will doubtless change your life forever! I can see the excitement behind the tears in your narrow, beady eyes. Good...

“Nebraska:” The Changed Face of the Land

The movie “Nebraska” is described as a character-driven road movie. It strikes me as that and something more, a meditation on the decline of the part of America alternatively dismissed as “flyover country” or valorized as “the heartland.” In 50 years, the film may be a favorite of college professors, to be screened alongside Orson Welles’ adaptation of Booth Tarkington’s The Magnificent Ambersons.  Both films explore the transformation of America as fueled by the gasoline-powered engine...

Lobo Fanatics Suffering from Memory Loss

Dear Lobo Basketball Fans,

Seemingly every conference season, I become deeply concerned about some of you. I worry that Lobo fans have changed allegiances or simply forgotten who they are supporting.

The fans I worry about are usually decked out in cherry memorabilia. Sometimes they even have layers of lobo gear: the t-shirt with the new logo, the sweater with the classic logo, the jacket and matching limited-edition rally towel. They cheer when the Lobos make buckets to increase their leads and bask in their victories. These people look like Lobo fans and act like them--well, most of the time...