a Geographer's Place

I've moved, on average, once per year since I was 23 years old. That’s a lot. I have a cousin who LOVES to move. “It’s like Christmas,” she told me once. “I get to open boxes and boxes of stuff! And if I forget to label them, it’s like a huge surprise!” She’s an optimist. Moving every year or so certainly keeps down the clutter: how many folks who’ve collected stuff for 12 years can fit everything they own in a 6 x 12 U-Haul trailer? But then, I'm also rather minimal when it comes to material things. Whether that’s been by choice or circumstance, who knows…I like to think it’s by choice. I am looking forward to being “stable” for a while. You know, put down some roots. Live in one place for more than a couple years. Get involved in the community without knowing I'll be leaving shortly. Although that will have to wait, since I'll just be moving to another, temporary apartment until I have time to find the home and location I want. Until then I’ll just pretend...

This is St. Francis Basilica in Santa Fe, New Mexico (at night). On the way back from finding a place to live in Denver , I spent a day here. While the surrounding suburbs are becoming more modern, the old downtown area remains charming. Surrounding the plaza and kiosko , are old Spanish churches and cute shops. The shops have everything from clothes and indigenous handicrafts to bronze sculptures and a plethora of different chile peppers. A few blocks off the plaza is San Miguel church (sign below), and interesting piece of Southwestern history... After wandering around the old town for a while, I ate a wonderful dinner at Los Mayas —a three-generation-old restaurant complete with live music (an old Spanish guitarist who was a really great entertainer). Santa Fe makes a nice getaway. Not as loud and citified as say, San Antonio or Tucson. Just a nice place to relax and wander. There are also lots of nice, easy day trips available. And several Clint Eastwood westerns were filmed in th...

For those who don’t know it, one of my interests is the US-Mexico border. Last weekend, a professor and myself took some students to investigate the towns of Sasabe, Arizona and Sasabe, Mexico in the Altar Valley. (Go find it on a map…pic below). In Sasabe, AZ, there are maybe a few dozen residents with a single store (that has EVERYthing—literally…mattresses, shoes, pork & beans, curling irons, Fruit Loops, you name it!) and post office; ranching is the main form of livelihood. In Sasabe, Mexico we estimated the population to be 3,000 to 4,000 people. The main form of livelihood in Sasabe, MX is anyone’s guess...the town is not much to speak of, as this photo shows. One thing that IS present? The ever-watchful eye of “Big Brother”. The US Border patrol has a real, on-the-ground fence (see pic), mobile watchtowers (see pic), and a virtual fence that looks like a radio tower but is actually a sophisticated surveillance system, complete with 24/7 Pinkerton security! The US-Mexico...

I have a friend who says, “Laughing: it’s like jogging for your insides.” Indeed! Few things are better than a good guffaw. While there are many different types of laughs, any laugh is a good sign of happiness. Take the song I Love to Laugh from the Disney version of Mary Poppins . It outlines many of the various ways people laugh: through their noses, hissing, blasting, fast, “twitter like birds”, and a myriad of other ways. I've seen people laugh with their entire body! Have you ever laughed until you’re crying? How about laughing so much your stomach hurts? See…laughing like that is a workout! I’ve laughed so much that I’ve been sore the following morning. What a great feeling! And a couple years ago health scientists at Vanderbilt University found that 10 to 15 minutes of hearty laughing per day can burn up to 50 calories! That’s about 1.5 calories per minute (in comparison, jogging burns 10 calories per minute). That means, if you laugh 15 minutes a day, you lose the calori...

One of my longer blogs, but intriguing nonetheless… A marvelous person sent me this article from the NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/14/books/14dumb.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5087&em&en=2c9bff2541865fdc&ex=1203570000 It got me thinking…One of my eccentricities is people-watching. For example, I can spend hours sitting at the food court in a mall—or any other place—just watching people. In all my time people-watching and observing, and spurred on by this article, it occurred to me that for years I have been classifying people based on what I call “brain power”. Hey, it’s what scientists love to do: classify things! I categorize brain power into six types: Intelligent, Smart, Clever, Ingenious, Unaware, and Naïve. Now, by “brain power”, I mean the way people attain and use knowledge. In a thesaurus, intelligent & smart are synonyms; so are clever & ingenious and unaware & naïve, respectively. But when I say someone is “smart”, I mean something differ...

After returning to the States after more than two months in the Middle East, I remember going through US Customs at JFK (New York) airport. Here’s how it went:   “Where have you been?” the Customs Officer asked me. “Umm, let’s see…Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Cyprus, Greece, and Turkey—I loved Turkey,” I gushed. “How long have you been out of the country?” he said in a stern tone. “Oh, a few months,” I responded. “Where’s your luggage?” “Right here on my back, sir,” I replied. “Bringing back any trinkets? Any souvenirs?” he said, eyeing me. “Just pictures, memories, and my travel journal,” I said. He waved me through, but I had a sneaking suspicion he thought I was trying to sneak something illicit into the country. How could someone spend two months traveling without buying a single souvenir? Easy: travel light and make memories your souvenirs rather than material possessions. Now, I’ll admit every once in while I purchase something overseas (usually for someone else). But there...

Today I successfully defended my dissertation. That means I now have the “privilege” of a title and a moniker. Sexy. The question looming in front of me now is, “Which do I use”? Titles precede a name and monikers go after it. So, do I use “Dr. Allen” or “Dr. Case” or “Dr. A” (that sort of sounds kewl), or should it be “Casey Allen, PhD” or “C.D. Allen, PhD”? Or should I even exercise the privilege? For me, it means little either way…Titles often seem arrogant to me, even if they can denote valuable accomplishments. But just because someone has a title, does that make them “special” or better than people without one? Does it endow them with privilege? Well, perhaps in a way it does, since society tends to place value on such things. Most diplomas from the Powers That Be (PTB) have a little phrase like, “…with all rights, powers, and privilege as set forth by those in authority…” But what does that actually mean? Just because I’ve achieved a certain level of education—jumped through a ...