Finally. What a great day to be a rain dog.
Posts Tagged ‘rain’
Make it rain
June 16, 2018After the deluge
June 4, 2018
That pleasant little soaking we got yesterday soothed a scorched patch of grass in the back yard.
Herb swung by El Rancho Pendejo for a nosh and a nip after his museum-inspection tour of Fanta Se and asked if it had rained here.
Yup. Like a mad bastard, too, probably for a good 20 minutes.
But you’d never know it, because the sun came right back out, and there was nary a puddle to be seen.
This Chihuahuan Desert country drinks like a clerk-typist telling fake war stories at a VFW bar. And we’re a thousand feet above the Rio, so the parched earth just swallows and pisses and swallows and pisses and hollers “More! More! More!”
Thus yesterday’s downpour was already coursing through the Rio before we could say, “Hmm, smells like rain.”
“One never knows during a fine dinner when a bike ride will break out. Always Be Ready.”
Photo and caption by Herb C., who, like Herself, takes notice when a bicycle is parked where it shouldn’t oughta be.
Still, we’ll take whatever moisture comes our way. It must have been particularly welcome up north, where crews are still battling the 36,000-acre Ute Park fire.
Today we’re right back to hot and sunny, which is a good thing. For me, anyway. Those bicycles aren’t gonna review themselves.
A hard rain
May 22, 2018
The clouds over the Sandias look to be answering the bell for round two.
It rained and hailed like a mad bastard for a spell yesterday, the first moisture to make landfall here in the better part of quite some time. Fifty-four days, to be precise.
The trees lost a few leaves, and the Duke City lost at least one resident, who got swept to the next world via the North Diversion Channel. Firefighters rescued five other folks from various places they shouldn’t have oughta been. Water don’t play, yo.
We might get some more today, and we might not. Regardless, don’t expect to see me loading up the woody with my board inside, heading out and singing my song. I have other, drier diversions in mind.
Stewing
February 19, 2018
I had just about decided to step out for a run when the rain talked me out of it. Instead I’m making green chile stew. Manaña, baby.
Hoo-boy. It may be raining here, but I bet the actual water is landing at Hal’s place up Weirdcliffe way, because the wind is flat-out howling out of the south.
If you haven’t had a real beer for five years, a fake one tastes remarkably like beer.
Herself went back to work today and it’s just me and the cats here.
There’s a dog-shaped hole in the kitchen, which feels like an abandoned house.
But it’ll warm up a tad when I start making some green chile stew. It always gladdened The Boo’s hungry little heart to see me moving around and about in his living room, laying hands on knife, pot and cutting board.
And y’know what? I may even have a beer with it. Non-alcoholic, of course. Surely I must be training for something.
• Late update: From Esquire (where else?) comes this list of “tasty near beers that don’t suck.”
Like rain falling on the city
February 17, 2018
The sky is crying.
It was gloomy around here the past couple days, and not just for the obvious reason. The weather finally turned and we got something like a half-inch of rain; a long, steady soaking.
Something seems dreadfully wrong
with this picture.
Even the normally stoic Turk grew unsettled, first spending an unusual amount of time under the bed, and then following me around like bad news.
This morning he was finally back to his routine: yowling outside the bedroom door when he’s decided that I’ve logged enough shuteye; jumping into bed for a brief cuddle; and finally nodding off as the sun crept over the Sandias.
Herself is easing back into business as usual, hitting her workout classes and fencing with the taxman, whose clammy hand is even less welcome in our pockets than usual.
Mia performs her one-cat show “Sit Like a Cat,” based on a poem from the Ted Kooser-Jim Harrison collection “Braided Creek”:
We should
sit like a cat
and wait for the door
to open.
And the unflappable Miss Mia Sopaipilla, who came to us from the same shelter that gave us Mister Boo, continues to provide some much-needed comic relief. The other day it was zazen on my drawing stool; this morning it was mortal combat with a long-forgotten toy mouse.
Me? You’d think I should be chronicling some velo-business for fun and profit, what with CABDA just concluded and Frostbike, NAHBS and 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo ongoing.
But I’m not, so maybe I’ll go for a ride instead.
• Editor’s note: Gassho and deep bows to one and all for your condolences following the passing of Mister Boo. Sifting through the piles of photos and videos depicting the sprightly young Boo of days gone by, and seeing the pleasure his presence provided beyond our own household, helped us remember the good times, bright moments that often fade under the harsher light of day-to-day caregiving.
Agua fria
January 10, 2018
‘Twas but a dribble. But welcome nonetheless.
Hijo, madre. It finally rained.
Well, kinda, sorta. Still, it was enough for the National Weather Service to declare an end — or at least an intermission — to the fifth longest dry streak since 1891.
“All in all, it’s nothing to write home about,” said NWS meteorologist Randall Hergert.
Oh, I dunno. Maybe a quick email:
Dear Mom,
Not on fire. Yet. Please send fire-retardant jammies for my birthday.
Love,
Patrick
Elsewhere, I see Steve Bannon is at loose ends. Never fear, he’ll land on his feet. Just as soon as he pulls them out of his mouth.
And the Republicans aren’t waiting around to get tossed out like Sloppy Steve. They’re running — not for re-election, but for the exits. Even Obama’s bestie Darrell Issa has seen the light, the way a roach does right before it scuttles under the stove.
Meanwhile, what the fuck is it with The New York Times and its pix of elevator doors closing on fascists? Cut that shit out. Seriously. You can bring the concept back when it’s lids closing on coffins.
April showers (March edition)
March 28, 2017
‘Twas a fine soft day at El Rancho Pendejo.
Boy, can I pick a day for a birthday ride or what?
Yesterday, three hours of cycling in spring kit; today, 40 minutes of trail running in tights, long-sleeved polypro, rain jacket, tuque and woolen glove liners.
But hey, I’m not complaining. This is the upper Chihuahuan Desert and we’ll take all the aqua fria we can get and then some.
Plus I got to watch the neighbors’ 2-year-old splashing happily in the puddles, and heard the first hummingbird of 2017 while walking The Boo. It’s all good.
Rain and shine
January 17, 2017
It’s still colorfully humid for New Mexico, but you won’t see me complaining. The trails are marvelously tacky.
This past weekend’s precip’ was a record-breaker, according to the Albuquerque Journal.
We didn’t get any snow here at El Rancho Pendejo, just a daylong, soaking rain that had miraculously evaporated from the trails by the time I went running yesterday. Only a couple smallish puddles remained.
And warmer, drier weather is on the way, which is good news, as I have video to shoot.
Things are looking a little sunnier down Chelsea Manning’s way, too. The Crypto-Mooslim Kenyan Socialist Usurper has commuted the bulk of her sentence for leaking classified documents, and she will be a free bird in five months instead of 28 years.
Rainy day
January 15, 2017
A nice, daylong drizzle. Keeps the snakes slick and the cacti crisp.
Yesterday and today
December 22, 2016
From powdery to pouring.
So yesterday, I’m out for a bike ride, pulling off the arm warmers and glad of the sunscreen on my snoot … and today we got this whole other thing going on.
Hey, I’m not complaining. The trees like it, and I don’t have to to shovel it. It’s a Zappadan miracle!
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