Ahhh, the holidays are nearly complete and another new year with new opportunities to make a fool of myself is at hand. While I enjoy the many 4 day weeks with breaks in the middle of the week I get to suffer through (kinda feels like I'm driving with a really bad clutch, vroooom, stall, vroooom, stall, vroooom, die) I really love the weekends when my myspace inbox fills with notes of "Hey, I'm in town, let's get together."

It's a funny dynamic I have with many of my old classmates…

as my little one still worries that Santa Claus won't find our house. We have decorated a tree outside, mommy made a call the "Santa Claus Mommy Hotline", I have assured her that his GPS and Night Vision Goggles are in tact and still worry, worry, worry. It was Christmas Eve we were coming home from Grandmas house where the green chili stew and posole smells are still wafering in my nose. Little one worries and says I hope we have done enough mommy. I remind her she has to get right to bed.…

Sometimes it takes having dinner with a friend to remind you of something so amazing it's hard to believe you could ever forget. I don't particularly like TVs in restaurants, but in this particular restaurant, on this particular night, my friend looked up and made a comment about what was on the screen. The fact that a women's billiard competition was on made me remember a very wonderful day.

My parent's house is cool. My mother designed it…

• Two ABQ Planned Parenthood offices targets of Christmas vandalism. One office burned, the other left with smashed windows. Vandals strike weeks after a local abortion clinic is torched.
• Imagine your Christmas tree as fertilizer.
• ABQ…

NOB HILL-- But if you have come to the DCF today searching for excitement with a holiday theme, you might want to try this recycled tale from the sidewalks of Central Ave. It's a trip back to The Archives...to a time when The Book Stop was still located next door to the Flying Star, and Christmas seemed to have a dark side. I called it…

• Chile pepper growers turn to mechanized pickers.
• Savor those Christmas tamales -- as prices are spiking.
• Area ski areas up their environmental cred.
• Rio Rancho Observer…

The Luminarias Are Brightly Shining.

Merry Christmas To…

• State eyes $30 million to build more capitol building and screw over highway construction.
• Shoplifting rounds out holiday stories.
• Cockfighting continues. Authorities raid Otero County cock…

I'm so bored. I know, "if you're bored then you're boring" and all that. But I'm bored. Holidays are boring. What do people do in Albuquerque? I used to know. But I have become nearly comatose in the last year.

For instance, if I were to go out right now on a Sunday night would there be any place to go?

Ok, I'm done.

If Martha Stewart made Christmas Eve luminarias with those guys from Hey Jhonny, this could be her user guide.

Supplies

• paper lunch bags
  
  
• sand (or kitty litter)
• votive candles (not tea candles)

Assembling

1. Ply your holiday guests with brewski and start folding.
2. Each bag gets folded…

The Rooster on Atlantic Avenue

I don’t know if Barelas has ever been without roosters. In my imagination, chickens arrived here shortly after Don Pedro de Varela put roots into this soil in 1662 and have maintained a presence in Barelas ever since.

When we moved here 11 years ago, members of my family mentioned hearing roosters crowing every morning. (Even…

Last year someone left a Holiday display in the park. I snapped some photos before someone else took it down/home. I know there are better ways to spread the Holiday Cheer but this one cracked me up.