The Asocial Unetwork

[Update: I do have a facebook account now, but that is only to advertise blog posts and such to the world.  I rarely look at what others post there.  Like me and be my friend knowing that I probably am not reading your stuff.]

I have just been regaled by the utterly thoughtless postings of several of my talkative extended family members on a "service" called "facebook".  My oldest daughter is an on-and-off member of this chronic exhibitionist collective, which is how I know anything about such things at all.  At the ripe age of 44, I am one of those "old farts" that avoids "texting", much less its more evolved cousins like twitter and a procession of social yammering spots.  I just never got interested.

The larger problem is that I decided long before this technology existed that it was far smarter and safer to keep your thoughts to yourself.  I can't say that I do a marvelous job of this, but I seemingly do far, far better than the typical youngish person.  In the distant past, people wanted their lives to be private and even went to far as to say that such a "right to privacy" existed or needed to be codified.  In our modern times, it seems no one even bothers to use the word "private", much less exercise privacy themselves.

I know all the tawdry gossip about the people around me because it is broadcasted to practically everyone through some social network.  The saddest thing of all is that these tidbits are not really gossip at all, these missives are actually posted by the person themselves.  Once upon a time, something unsavory such as an out-of-wedlock pregnancy was whispered around for weeks until the person finally admitted that the circumstances were true.  These days, the "mommy-to-be" uses something like twitter or facebook (does no one capitalize names anymore?) to inform everyone before the old-fashioned rumor mill even has a chance to warm up.  This must make "news agencies" infuriated as there seems to be very little "dirt" to dig about these days as starlets and CEOs just let their totally uncensored private parts "hang out" from moment to moment.  So much for "scooping" a story!

I only have a cell phone because my job requires it and I don't pay for a "texting" add-on, no matter how inexpensive it is.  I immediately saw that I would have what little concentration I can muster constantly interrupted by little non-sequitirs.  To think that I would invite further interruptions by signing up for a text message aggregator like twitter and the much more expansive social networks is just no where near my interests.  I have nothing to say at a moment's notice that would be proper and I doubt anyone else has useful things to say without some thought that an email would not improve.  I purposefully disabled commenting on my blog, which is the closest I will likely get to becoming electronically social - if you really want to say something to me, I prefer either an email or that you keep comments to yourself.  Rude, but true.

If you want to know what I do from minute to minute, I will say this:  I tend to breathe (and much more so now that I have discovered the Aveo TSD), I read various obscure texts, I ponder about life, talk incessantly at no one in particular, and write occasionally.  I blather on-and-on courtesy the podcast and I place the odd essay on my gopher server.  That is about all the "social networking" you are going to get from me!

Sabinoso Wilderness

A bit of the Canadian Escarpment nearby

As a hiker, I am excited about another public wilderness opening up very near where I live! If I cannot afford to move closer to hike-able places, it is just as good to have hike-able places move closer to me!

Of course, it is all very new and there is no access to the wilderness for now (might never be). I suppose you have to get airlifted in and out (or perhaps use an ultralight aircraft - there's an idea!)

Public Lands Information Center - Sabinoso Wilderness:

Press Release about the Sabinoso Wilderness

Don't Mourn For Us: An Epiphany

I was "teaching" at a high school in the spring on 2002 when I stumbled upon this webpage with an essay by Jim Sinclair that was just absolutely stunning. I think I was beginning to realize that I was autistic, just not at the same level as my son Matt, who was diagnosed just before his third birthday.

It seems I am on an autism jag today. Don't expect this to become an autism blog however. I got very tired of talking about it a while back, so I tend to hope I have moved on, but it is still there of course, that odd side of you that you can never escape.

I wish Lisa and I would have had this insight many years earlier, I think we would have done better as the parents of younger Matt. If your young child has autism, please read it and take it to heart.

The Essay: Don't Mourn For Us

My Short History of North-East New Mexico

I travel in north-eastern New Mexico a lot, as it is the territory of my job doing computer support for the New Mexico Cooperative Extension Service.  If you go to a website on New Mexico, it probably isn't really talking about this part of the state, as it is very lightly populated, and has no recreation areas or mountains (compared with Santa Fe and Taos).  It is a land of huge ranches and wide-open spaces, sandwiched between that fertile mid-western farmland, the scenic mountains, and the bleak "Great Southwest Desert" that early explorers warned travelers to avoid at all costs.  Apparently, most sane people listened to that advice!


North-east New Mexico was mostly the range-land of buffalo in the distant past.  Apache and Comanche tribes hunted here, but never made anything approaching settlements.  Water is scarce and seasonal at best and the tribes had sense enough to keep their families in more hospitable places.  The first settlers were Spaniards that were given land grants by the Spanish Government in the new acquisitions of Nuevo Mexico and Tejas.  Of course, this territory was always in the "no-man's-land" margins of both these Spanish possessions.  These settlers could only make a go of living in small settlements along the rather permanent Pecos and Canadian Rivers, which look like small streams to most "Easterners".  As the buffalo were eliminated, cattle were brought in to replace them, along with barbed wire, cowboys, the Catholic Church, and a bit of civilization.

This was part of some of the last territory in the US to be staked out for homesteading, as water is always a problem and nothing could be done about that until deep-drilled water wells were made possible at the turn of the 20th century.  Deceptive marketing and crowds of gullible fools came for "free land" that was being given away because it was essentially worthless as "farmland" at the paltry size of 160 acres a person.  With their experience of rich farms and plentiful water in the east, getting a "quarter-section" of land seemed a dream come true and tiny "boom towns" sprung up with the same regularity you would have expected for Virginia or Georgia.  It was the last great land rush and there seems to be a sucker at every corner post!

 My mother's family moved into the area in the early "naughts" and after the devastation of the Depression and the "Dust Bowl" droughts, they carved out a small ranch by buying out desperate homesteaders who didn't understand the meaning of the term "marginal rangeland".  Most of the small towns were gradually abandoned and the non-ranching people who didn't run off collected themselves into the larger settlements along the railroad tracks.  My great-grandparents were authentic ranchers, my grandparents moved into town for better pay but ranched "part-time", my parents lived in the ranch-house when times were hard and commuted to town for "typical" work, and I simply lacked the gumption to follow my cohorts off to the really big cities and "serious" employment.  This is how I got here.

I continue to live here because it is a very cheap place to live and get lightly educated, I was already around here when I became an adult, I prefer a bit of distance from others, and perhaps most of all, I have no real interest in traditional careerism or typical concepts of success.  In a short label, I am a societal "cockroach".

So, I while away my driving time between CES offices in the towns that grew up from those railroad settlements.  You can often catch me looking down dirt roads for old cemeteries and other evidence of our "prosperous" past.  If you get a kick out of ghost towns, we have them in abundance!

"The Family Man" Movie Makes a Splash for Me

I have a list of the "perfect" movies, which you can see in the Quasi-Indefatigable Xenolith Store, but this is not one of them.  Don't get me wrong, The Family Man is a wonderful movie and I cry a lot when watching it (actually I would cry in the middle of a horror movie if I actually watched horror movies, so this is not as big a thing as you might think).  In a previous post, I talked about being a lot like George Bailey from It's A Wonderful Life, which I think is true, but I am not Jack Campbell, the protagonist of this movie.  I'm George, not Jack.  Remember that.

Jack Campbell is coping
with the life he could have had.

If nothing else, The Family Man is an opposite of It's a Wonderful Life.  Where George Bailey had to almost lose his life to understand how to be grateful for what he had, Jack Campbell had to see what kind of life he could have had so that he could see that there was more to life than what he already had.  The first is about gratitude, the second is about regret.  I say that I am George because I haven't screwed it up yet and I can still look at my life and be grateful for what I have.  I am not Jack and I an so thankful that I am not - I haven't gone someplace or done something or made some large, seemingly irreversible choice that I actually regret.  It's a Wonderful Life makes me grateful for what I have, and The Family Man makes me grateful that I have not yet made a really big mistake.


I can tell you how I have avoided making a big mistake.  I don't remember consciously making my first covenant with God at the age of eight when I was baptized and when servants of God laid their hands on my head and gave me the supernal gift of the Holy Ghost, but I am grateful every day that those things happened to me.  It is the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost that I enjoy, courtesy of a kind and loving Heavenly Father, that I have been able to make the right decisions in my life.

Let me give you an example.

I am married to the most wonderful woman in the world, as far as I am concerned.  If I could only say one thing about Lisa, it would be that she helps me be my best self.  She (somewhat) patiently helps me to see what I should be doing and waits for me to figure things out, especially the important things.  She is my best friend, my deepest confidant, and my perfect compliment.  Every time I put her happiness ahead of my own, I have always been thankful for the outcome.  I love her with all my heart and my greatest desire is to be her husband not just for this life, but for all eternity.  I am so grateful that I asked her to marry me, that she said "yes", and that we made another covenant with God, in his holy temple, that we would do whatever it took to be together forever.

The Holy Ghost has been a daily participant in my life, as much as I can make him so, and that relationship has helped me see over the years how wonderful my life with Lisa has been and can continue to be.  Of course, I could say things about how grateful I am for my children and my parents as well, but I think this is enough to show you that I don't regret a thing (so far).

If you want to know more about covenants that you can make with God, visit http://www.mormon.org.  You can live the regret-free life starting today!

Oh, coincidently, The Family Man had a weird ending that really takes away from the experience, but if you can see past that, it is a wonderful movie that can change your life for the better!

Amazon Store Updates

I added a whole new section to my Amazon store just for Terry Gilliam films that I really like.

Someday, I want to go to a place or live in a neighborhood where everyone understands Gilliam.  I think I might be happy in a place like that!

I am Harry Tuttle as well

A while back, I talked about my George Bailey circumstances.  Of course, some people will get confused and say that I am some sort of altruistic credit union sort, which I can be on the odd Thursday.

Archibald (Harry) Tuttle

I am more like Archibald (Harry) Tuttle, the rogue heating engineer in the Terry Gilliam movie "Brazil".

Harry Tuttle: Listen, this old system of yours could be on fire and I couldn't even turn on the kitchen tap without filling out a 27b/6... Bloody paperwork.
Sam Lowry: I suppose one has to expect a certain amount.
Harry Tuttle: Why? I came into this game for the action, the excitement. Go anywhere, travel light, get in, get out, wherever there's trouble, a man alone. Now they got the whole country sectioned off, you can't make a move without a form.

Like me, he tends to be competent, efficient, quietly conspiratorial, and appropriately paranoid.  Harry understands how his world really works and has found his own ways to cope that work well enough, although against all social norms.  Above all else, Harry Tuttle seems to eek out happiness and authentic purpose in a stupid and superficial world!  What a great guy!