Sadly, I have not just this one but several elegies due for lost friends recently, some of whom I knew better than Burt, some still to write. But his death this week hit me strangely hard, perhaps because he was more than ten years younger than me. Burton was a member of the Alamo, our …
Tag: The West
Where houses burn…
(This was developed from my reply to Richard Anderson in the post on lions and hounds below). Earlier this year I had discussions with several friends about where houses burn in forest fires in the west, and several agreed that it is mostly– overwhelmingly– up in the woods, where new houses occupy sites where no …
Our culture…
As demonstrated in our social center, the Golden Spur Saloon (I have for the moment ignored ranchers and cowboys, though the Spur’s site doesn’t). Click or double to enlarge either photo. Below, my late mentor Floyd Mansell in our front yard in 1986, with son Brandon, who now has his own kids, and a morning’s …
Pigeon Pix and Apt Descriptions
I realize that not many readers are pigeon fanciers but I have been since I was eight, and pigeons are an integral part of life at Casa Q. Those who find them a bit low- class– I once reviewed a book for the TLS which was generally good, but which remarked that pigeons were unattractive, …
Viejo
James “Viejo” Trujillo is one of my best and oldest friends here (relatively- despite his nickname, given because he was gray- haired at 21, he is a decade younger than me). He is a horseman above all, a cowboy, and a farrier, a man who never spent much time indoors. Now he is laid up …
Night Out: Open Range
Our social life is limited when we are busy and broke, and with two books in the air you can bet we are both! So it was a treat when Libby’s friend and former employee Linda Hausler got in touch to tell us that her and her husband Ric Steinke’s old- time cowboy band, Open …
On the other hand
My yoga instructor is a (real not wannabe) cowgirl. Her bumper:
St Patrick’s at the Spur
Cowboy-Spanish St Paddy’s at the bar, with Montana’s excellent band “86’d Again”(thank God Linda at least did not have a green beard.) From top: Montana Pettis and Luke Martin (hat); Mary Jean Zamora Rains and Catherine Aragon tend bar; Chelsea Armstrong takes video as Bobby (Bad Dog) Contreras, owner Darryl Pettis (Montana’s father) and ranch …
Cheery Bar # 1: Querencia Country Part 4
John Carlson suggested Q Country is people too, and I heartily agree. More than one person has asked for pix from the Golden Spur, where as the song goes “everyone knows your name”. They have known mine for over 30 years, longer than the youngest staff has been alive. Sunset– let’s go in– back door. …
Querencia Country Part 2: Town
Casa Q, and just around the corner looking south to the Magdalenas, winter and early, dry summer:… and, looking west, a lurid monsoon sunset in July..All photos within a hundred yards from where I type.