6 MORE WEEKS OF SUMMER

NO TRUST

Trouble in River City - Measuring Trust
According to the latest American Pulse Survey by BIGresearch, only 2.6% of the 3,978 respondents say members of Congress are trustworthy and 2.2% say the same for the Senate.

Even though only 14.2% say the President was trustworthy, relative to the Lawmakers, the gap is huge. The distrust of elected members of Congress and Senate is consistent among both sexes and all age groups. 70.7% don't trust any of the choices. Surprisingly, more people say bloggers are more trustworthy than the media.

SANTA FE PICTURES

Rather than post them with the initial story below, where regular visitors might not dig deeper, here they are. I think they pretty much explain themselves. I was taking special notice of the many doors and windows, so you'll see some examples. And the vase/art thing lured us on the last day. Firmly hooked, we bought it.

On the way past Los Alamos to Bandiera Monument we saw an interesting sign. This monument takes you back to when indigenous people lived in the caves. The church is the oldest in North America, dating into the 1600s. They've had 235 collections since its building for a new roof.

BLOG GUILT

I feel the weight of Sante Fe pictures to process to stick down below. Since then we went back to Gruene, Texas, where I got more good shots. Here's the problem... since you CAN adjust and crop, you do, then you resize the huge picture to fit the small size on the blog, and it eats time. I've been busy - with guests - and with business.

I have Blog-guilt: the pressure to post daily! Great. Another tic.

I am afraid to look at the visit counter - bet I am down to zero.

I have a review coming out in Ultra Audio on October 1st if you are an audiophile. Look for the AUDIENCE equipment review. (That's a brand.) www.ultraaudio.com At least you can see I am still writing.

By the way, politicos, I believe BUSH just snuck a free pardon for himself and admin officials post term just in case. It's deep within a bill. We are SO screwed. The Constitution is being shredded by this clown and his circus.

NOT IN THE NICK OF TIME

We've become huge fans of UT Football! We prefer to TiVo the games to cut out the commercials, halftime 'sportsdesk' blather, etc. The only hard part is avoiding the score till we watch. You'd be suprised how hard it is. In the case of UT vs UCF, we succeeded, and watched a few hours later aka post-actual-game-time. Having been burned before, I know that games run long and so I tack an extra hour onto the scheduled stop time.

Yesterday's contest was close - too close for comfort! But fun to watch. Then they had a 15 minute lightning (in the area) delay. No problem! I've got a whole hour buffer.

I kept track of the game time vs. recording time. Almost a constant, I had 4 times the remaining game time recorded. That ratio held nicely... until...

Remember the clock stops on incomplete passes, etc.

UT went ahead, built up a cushion, and it seemed they had wrapped it up, but then UCF came back uncomfortably strong... and my recording ran out with 50 seconds (and I believe 2 UCF timeouts) remaining.

No orgasm of winning! All doubtful unknowing. Luckily we were two minutes away from live TV sports in local news... and UT held on for another win.

Our team must improve seriously or there are some big troubles coming our way.

If they could just keep the players from being arrested, that'd help!

Thanks to Ryan Morris for correcting me - initially I had the wrong competitors as you can read in his comment. Sorry, Ryan! The followup comment confuses me. Never could handle 3 initials anyway. Is Miami of Ohio MOO?

AMAZIN' PAINTIN'

The paintcheros did a great job. The only mishap was when a picture fell off the wall and into the nest of computer wires after they had gone. Chopsy! Luckily, even though the guillotine travelled 4 feet, it didn't scrape the wall. Culprit: failed nail. I rewired the broken connections and all appears fine.

They did it all in one long day, too, so my computer-withdrawal symptoms weren't as bad as I had thought. I spent the day listening to music in my music room. Very nice. A little jet-lag still has me.

Back to Santa Fe before I forget - it's supposed to be the number two tourist destination city behind San Francisco. Don't know if I believe that. It IS a town of art and artists, and the altitude gives off wonderful colors and shades. We hoofed it through almost every gallery. Many $19,000 to $40,000 pieces. Cough. But the winner and champion was a painting of a woman... sorry, don't know who she or the artist was - actually the picture looked almost unfinished... shows what I know: ready? SIX HUNDRED FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS!!!! Take it home with you!

Seems the streets are loaded with motorcycles and the guys like to rev 'em. So it's noisy.

We took a trip which brought us very close to Los Alamos, and there was a sense of government all over the place... signs warning of explosions and fragments! And guard gate houses, barriers, etc. Apparently there's a place called the black hole where the labs throw out stuff they don't want anymore. I found this out in a shoe store which had some very odd looking super wire mesh hose in the corner - the salesgirl said they use it to show off shoes as they make little stands of it. Taxmoney at work!

I've got to download hundreds of pictures so if you have interest, come back after I've added a few of the best.

We went to Bandero National Monument where there are caves in the rocks once occupied by natives. There were ladders to climb up and in... very National Geographic! Supposedly there are petroglyphs (caveman art), but we missed them. I did see some recent stuff: "Joe and Donna '05" and the like carved into the historic caves' smoke scarred walls.

They warn you to stay on the trail and watch out for snakes and bears. If you come upon a bear, they say to scare it away by making loud noises. Happily we saw neither.

This is a land of pteroducktiles, large ancient billed flying beasties. We didn't see them either.

I believe my picture-taking ability has ramped way up with all the digital practise plus no waste... take several, erase the losers. Experiment.

We passed the oldest church in the US which was built pre-US, obviously. Over 400 years old. And the oldest house in the US. Two more mortgage payments to go!

I took many shots of windows and doors. Some are pretty funky. I thought I might make a collage or something. I am also trying to snap grizzled guys wearing cowboy hats, but that's not very easy as they look at Ralph Lauren T-Shirted guys with disdain. More grizzle seems to indicate more disdain.

Perfect weather - great food - Terri was super and her arrangements wonderful... we even lucked into the owners suite at the hotel.

We flew ExpressJet which left ON TIME and EVEN SERVED FOOD. Glory glory.

COMPUTER WITHDRAWAL

I want to tell you about our trip to Santa Fe. But the painters are about to arrive to give me computer withdrawal since they are painting this room - the office - and will have to remove the plugs to the world and cover everything in plastic, or worse, move it all out of here. If plastic, then this evening when they are gone, I might be able to sneak under it and have enough oxygen to log on if I can extend the cords.

Having strangers in the house makes me very nervous anyway, so add to that the stress of staying offline; it might just finish me as a non-drooling web citizen.

If I could simply find a use for drool.

Sad news: we looked everywhere but could not find Santa in Santa Fe. I had a list.

We almost escaped without buying art. The last store we visited... and we went to every gallery we could find... had bowls inlaid with turquoise. The one we wanted was marked down JUST FOR US ON THE SPOT to $6700! No! We didn't. But there WERE others, smaller, and now there's one missing.

Turquoise is ubiquitous in Santa Fe. They have signs "Help Us Conserve Water - This Is The High Desert - But Take All The Turquoise You Want, And Don't Forget The Neighbors!"

We were lucky to be in Santa Fe for Fiesta which goes back many years. In a town that dates over 400 years old, you'd think they have this celebration DOWN. Police were all over the place - even the SWAT team, a huge mobile command post, EMS guys on bikes... no incidents we could see, but I've never seen such a heavy police presence. No Turquoise on the cops though. They should change the license plates which are yellow to Turquoise and then change the slogan to NEW MEXICO - THE POLICE STATE.

I must now vacate the room. Soon it will be LOWE'S BRS7 "Buried Treasure" brushed suede. Wait - the painters just called - they'll be here at 10. That's Hispanic for 11.

Back to Santa Fe - if you buy a home with its own water well, you have to have radiological testing done on the water. Drink it without knowing and 1- you'll have the whitest smile in town and 2- people will be able to see your teeth even when your lips are closed.

Santa Fe is about 40 miles from Los Alamos, where they built the first atomic bomb. Did you know it was encased in turquoise?

I took hundreds of pictures. I'll post a few of the best when I get the room back.

SELLING ON AUDIOGON

Once again I am selling a piece of electronica over the internet. Naaa, not ebay. Audiogon. I have used it many times in the past and haven't been burned yet.

One time a pilot from Mexico flew his boss to Atlanta or somewhere close (nice private jet) then took a commercial flight, rented a car and came to see what he was buying from me. That's dedication. He is a super nice guy and I pimp him from time to time for a free jet ride... which hasn't happened and probably won't. It's not a toy.

Recently we had dinner with our mayor of this here community and her husband, a pilot for one of the airlines. It's a bit of a stretch but he's a John Wayne man. Squinting into the horizon. Strong handshake. A character.