The whole world’s watching, even Darth Sidious

Posted on May 18, 2012 by Kristine| Leave a comment

Since moving to the corner of Hoosierland ensconced in “Greater Chicago” – I’ve been fascinated by the news reports of plans for the NATO Summit this weekend. Much of the coverage has been about protecting the city from terrorists and activists, ranging from members of Al Queda to pie-throwing clowns. Security forces, business, residents are planning for the worst. Finally, this week I’m hearing about the significance of this particular international assembly. It’s big folks, really big.

In fact, it’s being heralded as the “biggest NATO Summit ever,” according to NATO’s Assistant Secretary General, Ambassador Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic, with 60 world leaders – including Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Their agenda includes a long-term partnership with Afghanistan, strengthening NATO partnerships, funding. With a shift in focus from the north Atlantic, perhaps in 2020 NATO will stand for the New Asian Treaty Organization.

Even Senator Palpatine from Naboo is in town. Star Wars fans will remember his underlying character, Darth Sidious. Okay, the Sith Lord is not in town. It’s actor Ian McDiamid, who brought Sidious to the screen, appearing in “Timon of Athens” at Chicago’s Shakespeare Theatre.) I wonder about the ” real characters” underlying the faces of our world leaders. Putin’s not coming. Apparently he Continue reading →

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My friend the Knit Doctor

Posted on May 10, 2012 by Kristine| Leave a comment

Sheep would be pleased to know the magic Paula Strietlemeier creates with their wool.

Meet Paula Strietelmeier, aka, the Knit Doctor. The perfect moniker for a woman who, I’m told, can fix any broken knit or crochet project, doing whatever it takes to make mends meet. My guess is this one-time physics major turned humanities scholar is more left-brained than most of us crafters. She recently used something resembling a quadratic formula to adjust a garment pattern to my 4.5 stitches-per-inch knitting gauge. “Thanks for this,” I said. “Someday I’ll have to ask you about that equation you used.” She smiled.

Paula is my first Valparaiso connection. Even before exploring Northwest Indiana for possible new nests, I found Paula’s store  – Sheep’s Clothing – online and was compelled to visit.

“As a young child I was a person who liked to make things,” Paula said during an interview, “but I actively avoided knitting till I was in my 20s.”

Growing up on the northwest side of Chicago, Paula spent summers on a farm in Wisconsin. “Farm ladies were always crocheting … not working with patterns but with formulas in their heads, increasing and decreasing to make things. They Continue reading →

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Leaving Las Cruces

Posted on May 4, 2012 by Kristine| 1 Comment

I’m grieving. And it’s about damn time.

SoNewMex, where the skies are not cloudy all day.

Last May 4, I was readying house and hound for a 1,600-mile drive to visit family in Indiana. I’d made that trip before but last May my house was on the market and I was planning to leave Las Cruces. Now I realize I can’t leave. SoNewMex is a part of me. Thinking about it now makes me cry such that my dog comes over and leans on me. (Awww.)

I miss friends in my kitchen, First Friday Art Rambles, the Organ Mountains – alive with natural wonders, sand in my house, rocks in my yard, the pond, the cactus, goldfinches against a glorious blue sky, the view of the western sky from my kitchen window. The moon rising over the house across the street.

I miss long walks in the desert. When it got too hot, my dog flopped under a creosote bush to cool his belly on the sand. We’d walk to the desert near Memorial Park where Aw’gy would tear through the mesquite chasing jackrabbits. Or through the new Desert Trails Park, past the sign that warned us of snakes. Continue reading →

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Taco torture: Mexican food causes heartache

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Kristine| 4 Comments

This writer's tastebuds crave the best Mexican food in the country, made in Las Cruces, New Mexico. (Thanks to La Posta's website for this mouth-watering photo of red enchiladas, flat, with egg.)

A couple of things this week made me homesick for Las Cruces, New Mexico.

It began with a call from  journalism colleague and friend William about his fabulous summer marketing internship with Ford Motor Company. Later, through email, he wished he, his parents and I could meet for dinner to celebrate. Impossible, since his folks live in SoNewMex, William is at Northwestern and I’m back home again in Indiana. His dad jokingly wrote we should all meet that night at Chope’s.

My mind wandered. I’m driving south on US28 toward this very unassuming establishment in La Mesa, about 20 minutes from Las Cruces. The road winds through acres of alfalfa, cotton and pecans. Irrigation ditches carved into the land carry water from the Rio Grande to the fields. And off to the left, the craggy, sometimes purple Organ Mountains sit atop desert foothills filled with juniper, sage, snakes … I miss all of it.

My New Mexico friends know the history but as I recall Chope’s has been there for eons. (There is great irony in Chope’s being listed on urbanspoon, by the way.) First it was just the tavern about 50 yards north of the restaurant.

Chope's, La Mesa, NM. Simple on the outside - hot and spicy on the inside.

Folks would walk from the bar to the kitchen to buy relanos to go with their cerveza fria. Now the restaurant bustles with diners  downing homemade Mexican dishes from tacos to red or green enchiladas.

For my tastebuds, the best Mexican food in the country is homemade in New Mexico. In the first few months, I tried flautas at several restaurants in search of the best. As my palate adjusted to red or green chile sauces, I switched to green chicken enchiladas. I’m tellin’ ya folks, this is good eaten’. I was ruined. Continue reading →

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Earth Day Trash Talk

Posted on April 20, 2012 by Kristine| Leave a comment

Let’s see a show of hands: how many remember Earth Day, 1970? I do and I still have the patch to prove it. But the patch is nothing. I don’t know if I would chain myself to a tree to save it from destruction.

In fact I cringed this week to see a guy nailing a birdhouse to a tree in a city park. Something odd about that. Putting holes in the bark to feed the birds. Yet I said nothing. What would you have done? Walk by and say nothing as I did, or stop and talk about the irony?

But I do what I can. By now we are all recycling, using low energy bulbs, turning down the heat, turning up the AC. Sometimes I get down and dirty and pick up trash – usually just the small stuff here and there. Especially if I spot a trashcan or have a plastic bag with me. When I lived in New Mexico and walked my dog in the neighborhood desert, I once carried out the dead carcass of a computer terminal. There were clothes, plastic bags, rope.

Worse is the plastic I see on the Dunes beach – and it’s from us. Ribbons, balloons, the inside of baseball caps, pieces of plates, spoons, Frisbees, toothpaste tubes, you-name-it. Honestly, who do we think we are?

If nothing else, that first Earth Day made me aware. So have “Please Don’t Litter” campaigns, photos of waterfowl with six-pack rings around their necks, birds eating french fries – they’re not good for us, imagine what they do to animals. I thought I was giving my dog a treat this week by giving him some people food and he was sick for two days. Sorry, Aw’gy.

Each of us can do a few extra things to take better care of the only planet we’ll ever know. I like the idea of a “A Billion Acts of Green.” Go to this website act.earthday.org and pledge to do one more green thing. I’m going to start riding my bike to the Y. It will be part of my cardio warm-up I need.

Just think if each of us commits to a new “act of green” – what will yours be?

 

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