Casting Calls: Alamagordo, San Juan Pueblo, Truth or Consequences
BAM CASTING, L.L.C., IS NOW CASTING EXTRAS FOR THE FEATURE FILM
Starring: JACK BLACK / MICHAEL CERA & DIRECTED BY HAROLD RAMIS
ALAMOGORDO, NEW MEXICO
WHERE:
HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS
100 KERRY AVENUE
ALAMOGORDO, NEW MEXICO, 88310
(IN THE CONFERENCE ROOM)
(505) 434 - 9773
WHEN:
SATURDAY, MARCH 15th, 2008
11AM – 6PM (OPEN CALL IS FREE!)
SEEKING EXTRAS OF ALL AGES, RACES AND ETHNICITIES, in particular:
*** HISPANIC, MEXICAN, PUERTO RICAN, INDIAN, DARK AFRICAN AMERICANS, ASIAN, CHINESE, EGYPTIAN, HEBREW, JEWISH, & CAUCASIAN ETHNICITIES/DECENTS
ALL APPLICANTS SHOULD BRING A SELF-PHOTOGRAPH NO LARGER THAN 4X6 (if you have one)
SAN JUAN PUEBLO, NEW MEXICO
WHERE:
OHKAY CASINO & RESORT
HIGHWAY 68
SAN JUAN PUEBLO, NEW MEXICO, 87566
(IN CONFERENCE ROOM)
(505) 747 - 1668
WHEN:
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 19th, 2008
11AM – 6PM (OPEN CALL IS FREE!)
SEEKING EXTRAS OF HEBREW, JEWISH, & CAUCASIAN DECENT, in particular:
*** Men/Women – 20’s to 50’s
*** Dancers (Girls) – 18 to 21 years old (or you look this young)
*** Girls and Boys – 6 months old to 15 years old
*** HEBREW, JEWISH, & CAUCASIAN ETHNICITIES/DECENTS
ALL APPLICANTS SHOULD BRING A SELF-PHOTOGRAPH NO LARGER THAN 4X6 (if you have one)
TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES, NEW MEXICO
WHERE:
SIERRA GRANDE LODGE & SPA CONFERENCE CENTER
(THE VERA) – RIGHT NEXT TO THE SIERRA GRANDE
500 MAIN STREET
TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES, NEW MEXICO, 87901
(575) 894 - 6976
WHEN:
SUNDAY, MARCH 16th, 2008
11AM – 6PM (OPEN CALL IS FREE!)
SEEKING EXTRAS OF ALL AGES, RACES AND ETHNICITIES, in particular:
*** HISPANIC, MEXICAN, PUERTO RICAN, INDIAN, DARK AFRICAN AMERICANS, ASIAN, CHINESE, EGYPTIAN, HEBREW, JEWISH, & CAUCASIAN ETHNICITIES/DECENTS
*** REAL JUGGLERS, METALSMITHS, & ARTISANS
*** BOYS & GIRLS – 5 TO 15 YEARS OLD
ALL APPLICANTS SHOULD BRING A SELF-PHOTOGRAPH NO LARGER THAN 4X6 (if you have one)
Jennifer Hoffman
jenniferh@ballantinespr.com
Tel: 505-216-0889
Cell: 505-603-8643
Ballantines PR
http://www.ballantinespr.com
If you would rather not receive future email messages from Ballantines PR, let us know by clicking here.
Ballantines PR, 60 East San Francisco Street, Sante Fe, NM 87504 United States
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Hanging with newsroom supermodels
LAS CRUCES — America really is still the land of opportunity, I was thinking the other day, while hanging out in the newsroom with my fellow supermodels, including cover girl Tracy Patrick and video vixen Jenn Kistler.
This is kind of a Clark Kent-Superman situation, though in this case, you may know our superstars more by their not-so-secret journalistic identities: Jenn is Pulse editor and Tracy is our online editor.
While doing a story about what it takes to make a music video, Jenn had a running role in a Jared Sagal video … literally. She was shown running with her co-stars and as fate would have it, she’s also a marathoner who has chronicled her runs and training regimen in her own blog.
And Tracy, of course, is staring at you at sites all over the Mesilla Valley, from the cover of this month’s Healthy U magazine. That’s Tracy’s beautiful, supersized aqua eyeball over the “Saving Your Vision” headline.
“I’m not sure my eyes are really that blue,” Tracy said last week, when I asked her about her first cover gig.
It’s true that the really great newsroom supermodels are modest … and often anonymous.
Modeling, even newsroom modeling, is generally regarded as a young woman’s game, and I must admit that after a long career, I’m happy to turn things over to a new generation.
But I do keep my hand in, now and again — literally. That was my hand you saw modeling Dracula and skeleton rings in a Halloween feature last fall. Usually the glam hand gigs go to my supermodel colleague Amanda Husson. Amanda’s not only a great singer, fine writer and one of the best editors I’ve ever worked with, she also has very pretty hands.
It might be nice to say my experienced, expressive appendages won out after a spirited hand-to-hand competition, but the truth is, deadlines were looming and it was Amanda’s day off, so I was recruited.
If it were generally known how easy it is to get in print, I suspect newsrooms everywhere would be prime gathering spots for models.
It’s not that we manufacture news, I stress … these are feature photos, often secondary shots, as we call them in the trade, when deadline desperation can be the mother of invention and opportunity, and the parts are usually more important than the sum of one’s pulchritude.
I’ve had a long and rewarding career that started in Michigan, when I got my first professional newspaper gig at age 13, reporting school news for the Muskegon Chronicle, and the occasional pick-up modeling assignments that came with the job.
If I remember right, my first, last and only real fashion shot as an identifiable person came during my teens, when I was asked to wear a paper dress for a day to see if a prospective fad of the late 1960s had any potential. I recall that the dress was kind of cute, but had the texture of a fast-food napkin and developed some pretty revealing rips after a few hours.
As a journalist in Portland, Ore., I covered a lot of assignments with an arty photographer, so I had several years of steady extra “modeling” work, casting ethereal shadows on various breaking news scenes and as an anonymous bystander in the fog and rain.
When I defected briefly to public relations and advertising in South Florida, my modeling career suffered almost as much as my soul. There was too much competition from the pros. Still, I managed, even in my 40s, to get my foot in the door. One of my feet, in a chic sandal, entering a gilded door, appeared in a proposed ad for an upscale gated community.
It was only a stunt-foot gig, as it turned out. They called in a professional foot for the real shoot.
But with the Halloween hand, I figure I’m already in the company of Lauren Hutton, at least in terms of career longevity.
It’s quite an accomplishment, I think, for someone who never soared much higher that 5 feet, 5 inches (and lately, have been shrinking, alas) or managed to get skinnier than a size 7 (and lately have shown no signs of shrinking in girth, alas).
Still, experimenting with video cams recently, I accidentally shot my feet and noticed my toes are holding up rather well. My focus these days remains on mentoring younger newsroom models, but I think I’ll keep my pedicure current, just in case.
This is kind of a Clark Kent-Superman situation, though in this case, you may know our superstars more by their not-so-secret journalistic identities: Jenn is Pulse editor and Tracy is our online editor.
While doing a story about what it takes to make a music video, Jenn had a running role in a Jared Sagal video … literally. She was shown running with her co-stars and as fate would have it, she’s also a marathoner who has chronicled her runs and training regimen in her own blog.
And Tracy, of course, is staring at you at sites all over the Mesilla Valley, from the cover of this month’s Healthy U magazine. That’s Tracy’s beautiful, supersized aqua eyeball over the “Saving Your Vision” headline.
“I’m not sure my eyes are really that blue,” Tracy said last week, when I asked her about her first cover gig.
It’s true that the really great newsroom supermodels are modest … and often anonymous.
Modeling, even newsroom modeling, is generally regarded as a young woman’s game, and I must admit that after a long career, I’m happy to turn things over to a new generation.
But I do keep my hand in, now and again — literally. That was my hand you saw modeling Dracula and skeleton rings in a Halloween feature last fall. Usually the glam hand gigs go to my supermodel colleague Amanda Husson. Amanda’s not only a great singer, fine writer and one of the best editors I’ve ever worked with, she also has very pretty hands.
It might be nice to say my experienced, expressive appendages won out after a spirited hand-to-hand competition, but the truth is, deadlines were looming and it was Amanda’s day off, so I was recruited.
If it were generally known how easy it is to get in print, I suspect newsrooms everywhere would be prime gathering spots for models.
It’s not that we manufacture news, I stress … these are feature photos, often secondary shots, as we call them in the trade, when deadline desperation can be the mother of invention and opportunity, and the parts are usually more important than the sum of one’s pulchritude.
I’ve had a long and rewarding career that started in Michigan, when I got my first professional newspaper gig at age 13, reporting school news for the Muskegon Chronicle, and the occasional pick-up modeling assignments that came with the job.
If I remember right, my first, last and only real fashion shot as an identifiable person came during my teens, when I was asked to wear a paper dress for a day to see if a prospective fad of the late 1960s had any potential. I recall that the dress was kind of cute, but had the texture of a fast-food napkin and developed some pretty revealing rips after a few hours.
As a journalist in Portland, Ore., I covered a lot of assignments with an arty photographer, so I had several years of steady extra “modeling” work, casting ethereal shadows on various breaking news scenes and as an anonymous bystander in the fog and rain.
When I defected briefly to public relations and advertising in South Florida, my modeling career suffered almost as much as my soul. There was too much competition from the pros. Still, I managed, even in my 40s, to get my foot in the door. One of my feet, in a chic sandal, entering a gilded door, appeared in a proposed ad for an upscale gated community.
It was only a stunt-foot gig, as it turned out. They called in a professional foot for the real shoot.
But with the Halloween hand, I figure I’m already in the company of Lauren Hutton, at least in terms of career longevity.
It’s quite an accomplishment, I think, for someone who never soared much higher that 5 feet, 5 inches (and lately, have been shrinking, alas) or managed to get skinnier than a size 7 (and lately have shown no signs of shrinking in girth, alas).
Still, experimenting with video cams recently, I accidentally shot my feet and noticed my toes are holding up rather well. My focus these days remains on mentoring younger newsroom models, but I think I’ll keep my pedicure current, just in case.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
From fission-fusion societies to Cosmic Cowboys
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — One of my favorite lines from the late, great series, “The Gilmore Girls” came when Loreli Gilmore’s aunt cautioned her that you can’t leave WASPs (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants) alone without anything to do for long, “or they’ll start forming clubs.”
Actually, the clubbing urge affects every ethnicity and group of like-minded souls on the planet, and has since the days of the cavemen and women, who probably formed the first clubs to compare clubs. Maybe that’s where the name came from, in fact.
New incarnations of clubs seem to be burgeoning these days. I spent a recent Sunday with more than 100 women in red hats and pajamas, judging a Red Hat Society (RHS) talent contest. I was amazed to find out how much the RHS has grown in the decade since its formation, and since I wrote about the first Las Cruces chapters a few years back. The RHS now has a million members worldwide, including 14 chapters with intriguing names in Las Cruces alone.
“Although we have a lot of silly fun, we know that we play a special part in bringing joy to many lives, and by association, to our own as well,” e-mailed Carolyn Martinez, Queen Mum of the Vivacious Viejas and a member of the Las Cruces Queens’ Council.
One member joked that the group is in quest of world domination. Another explained that good times are the real agenda for women of a certain age who have juggled children, careers and charitable work, and now feel it’s time for some seriously frivolous fun.
With its free-floating FUNventions and offers for anyone to start their own “dis-organization’s” without rules, dues or red tape, I think the Red Hat Society is another sign of new millennium trend toward different ways of gathering; supplementing, and maybe eventually even replacing, the entrenched institutions, secret societies and old boys’ clubs that have dominated the world for centuries.
I call it the fission-fusion society model, named for something I heard about when I lived in Florida in the 1990s. Dolphin researchers were studying the migratory habits of dolphins and discovered the sociable cetaceans had a kind of international club of their own. Every now and again, a few dolphins would break off from the local pod and head out to hang with another pod. There, they’d pick up a few dolphins in the mood to have some new adventures, maybe leave a couple of the visitors behind and set off for yet another adventure.
I observed the Red Hatters in their natural habitat, noting the Lavish Ladies of Las Cruces seem to feel fine about forming conga lines with the Red Hot Roadrunners from Silver City and the Meadowland Matriarchs of Rio Rancho. Many diverse groups happily joined for a can-can at the Hotel Encanto, before heading back to their home pods, maybe making plans to get together later with the Butte Beauts from Elephant Butte, the Hot Toddy Doo Dahs to El Paso, the Sombreros Colorado Scarlets of Alamogordo, or ... well, you get the idea.
There’s a lot of synchronicity involved in all this, whether you call your group a club, a fission-fusion society, a pod, or nothing at all. I was thinking about Jean McDonnell of Tularosa, who is involved with a truly international fission-fusion society with members in Tibet and India, when I ran into a new art gallery owner from Tularosa at one of my favorite pods in Mesilla. When I got back to the office, I found an e-mail from Las Cruces artist Debbie Levy, who told me she and her amigas Karen Currier, Brenda Parish and Nancy Bergman were planning “a fun adventure time” in — you guessed it — Tularosa. Their group has been christened the “Sisterhood of the Tallulah Rose” and they already have a clubhouse (actually a family cabin) and a motto: “What happens in Tulie stays in Tulie.”
I thought about all the ad-hoc clubs and societies I’ve been a part of in my life.
The Scorpio-Aquarian Birthday Club, with Ginger Ness and Carolyn Bunch, has met formally (i.e. with birthday candles) only twice in 14 years.
The Cosmic Cheerleaders spring up all over the planet, usually with a different cast each time, for secret missions as needed. It’s a co-ed group, but the guys usually won’t wear their T-shirts, so you may not know you’ve had a CC encounter. I don’t think the Millennium Blondes or Cosmic Cowgirls and Cowboys have ever had an official meeting, though artist Sallie Ritter and I address correspondence to each other with one or both club references and I believe we agree that we sense we have a discreet but dedicated membership throughout the world, and perhaps the universe.
Search your souls, Millennium Blondes and Cosmic Cowboys and Cowgirls: You know who you are.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — One of my favorite lines from the late, great series, “The Gilmore Girls” came when Loreli Gilmore’s aunt cautioned her that you can’t leave WASPs (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants) alone without anything to do for long, “or they’ll start forming clubs.”
Actually, the clubbing urge affects every ethnicity and group of like-minded souls on the planet, and has since the days of the cavemen and women, who probably formed the first clubs to compare clubs. Maybe that’s where the name came from, in fact.
New incarnations of clubs seem to be burgeoning these days. I spent a recent Sunday with more than 100 women in red hats and pajamas, judging a Red Hat Society (RHS) talent contest. I was amazed to find out how much the RHS has grown in the decade since its formation, and since I wrote about the first Las Cruces chapters a few years back. The RHS now has a million members worldwide, including 14 chapters with intriguing names in Las Cruces alone.
“Although we have a lot of silly fun, we know that we play a special part in bringing joy to many lives, and by association, to our own as well,” e-mailed Carolyn Martinez, Queen Mum of the Vivacious Viejas and a member of the Las Cruces Queens’ Council.
One member joked that the group is in quest of world domination. Another explained that good times are the real agenda for women of a certain age who have juggled children, careers and charitable work, and now feel it’s time for some seriously frivolous fun.
With its free-floating FUNventions and offers for anyone to start their own “dis-organization’s” without rules, dues or red tape, I think the Red Hat Society is another sign of new millennium trend toward different ways of gathering; supplementing, and maybe eventually even replacing, the entrenched institutions, secret societies and old boys’ clubs that have dominated the world for centuries.
I call it the fission-fusion society model, named for something I heard about when I lived in Florida in the 1990s. Dolphin researchers were studying the migratory habits of dolphins and discovered the sociable cetaceans had a kind of international club of their own. Every now and again, a few dolphins would break off from the local pod and head out to hang with another pod. There, they’d pick up a few dolphins in the mood to have some new adventures, maybe leave a couple of the visitors behind and set off for yet another adventure.
I observed the Red Hatters in their natural habitat, noting the Lavish Ladies of Las Cruces seem to feel fine about forming conga lines with the Red Hot Roadrunners from Silver City and the Meadowland Matriarchs of Rio Rancho. Many diverse groups happily joined for a can-can at the Hotel Encanto, before heading back to their home pods, maybe making plans to get together later with the Butte Beauts from Elephant Butte, the Hot Toddy Doo Dahs to El Paso, the Sombreros Colorado Scarlets of Alamogordo, or ... well, you get the idea.
There’s a lot of synchronicity involved in all this, whether you call your group a club, a fission-fusion society, a pod, or nothing at all. I was thinking about Jean McDonnell of Tularosa, who is involved with a truly international fission-fusion society with members in Tibet and India, when I ran into a new art gallery owner from Tularosa at one of my favorite pods in Mesilla. When I got back to the office, I found an e-mail from Las Cruces artist Debbie Levy, who told me she and her amigas Karen Currier, Brenda Parish and Nancy Bergman were planning “a fun adventure time” in — you guessed it — Tularosa. Their group has been christened the “Sisterhood of the Tallulah Rose” and they already have a clubhouse (actually a family cabin) and a motto: “What happens in Tulie stays in Tulie.”
I thought about all the ad-hoc clubs and societies I’ve been a part of in my life.
The Scorpio-Aquarian Birthday Club, with Ginger Ness and Carolyn Bunch, has met formally (i.e. with birthday candles) only twice in 14 years.
The Cosmic Cheerleaders spring up all over the planet, usually with a different cast each time, for secret missions as needed. It’s a co-ed group, but the guys usually won’t wear their T-shirts, so you may not know you’ve had a CC encounter. I don’t think the Millennium Blondes or Cosmic Cowgirls and Cowboys have ever had an official meeting, though artist Sallie Ritter and I address correspondence to each other with one or both club references and I believe we agree that we sense we have a discreet but dedicated membership throughout the world, and perhaps the universe.
Search your souls, Millennium Blondes and Cosmic Cowboys and Cowgirls: You know who you are.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
When Doña Anas blow, it’s prime time to go fly a kite
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — I opened the garage door during high winds and was attacked by an eagle, a giant fish, a Navy jet and a ship with red and black sails.
It was my kite collection, jumping off their hooks, wagging their tails, raring to fly.
I can sympathize. This is the time of year when a young man’s fancy allegedly turns to spring thoughts of love. Many of us are just ready for winter to be over.
Even here in high desert country, where the February snow that finally frosted my backyard was bracketed between two 70 degree days and only lasted from about 2 to 3 a.m. If my ancient Michigan snow-alert genes had not activated and awoken me, I would have entirely missed the big blizzard of ’08.
I feel embarrassed even mentioning it to anyone but my Florida relatives.
Loved ones in the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest tell me sad tales of being snowed in for days, in an inaccessible Iowa cabin the snow plows can’t reach, or e-mail photos of a blue VW almost totally buried in the icy Idaho drifts.
Here, all we have to contend with are the blustery Doña Anas, but that’s enough. They may seem refreshing at first, especially since we know they are the dues we must pay for full-tilt spring. But it doesn’t take long to wear us down. We go from being delicately air-brushed to feeling brutally sand-blasted.
We go out to investigate the state of the yard and notice the peeling paint we should do something about, the cracks in the stucco and adobe.
Then there are the piles of debris, organic and manmade, all democratically windblown into my previously neat little courtyard. It’s mostly yucca and evergreens, red rock and bark mulch. There’s nothing much to shed or blow away.
Maybe it’s a matter of balance. I don’t know if it’s true that nature abhors a vacuum, but nature in my neighborhood seems inclined to vacuum up everybody else’s leaves, twigs, leftover Halloween candy, Styrofoam and plastic and airlift it into my yard.
I’ve already done one autumn run with the leaf blower and was saving the next blitz for the end of the worst siege of Doña Anas. But when will that be? Quién sabe? Who knows?
No, I should probably stay indoors, build bookcases to replace the ones that collapsed and organize the closets and throw things away. Then I would finally have room to stash away those holiday and birthday gifts and display the For the Love of Art Month purchases I swore I would not make this year.
But after watching dozens of happy ladies in red and purple doing the can-can and forming a conga line to dance through Hotel Encanto, I found I did not feel guilty at all about lingering with a friend over Sunday brunch and cool jazz at the wonderful new incarnation of Meson de Mesilla.
When I got home, I contemplated spring cleaning, but decided the eagle, fish, jet and ship have the right idea.
Maybe I should just go with the air flow. I think I’ll go fly some kites.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — I opened the garage door during high winds and was attacked by an eagle, a giant fish, a Navy jet and a ship with red and black sails.
It was my kite collection, jumping off their hooks, wagging their tails, raring to fly.
I can sympathize. This is the time of year when a young man’s fancy allegedly turns to spring thoughts of love. Many of us are just ready for winter to be over.
Even here in high desert country, where the February snow that finally frosted my backyard was bracketed between two 70 degree days and only lasted from about 2 to 3 a.m. If my ancient Michigan snow-alert genes had not activated and awoken me, I would have entirely missed the big blizzard of ’08.
I feel embarrassed even mentioning it to anyone but my Florida relatives.
Loved ones in the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest tell me sad tales of being snowed in for days, in an inaccessible Iowa cabin the snow plows can’t reach, or e-mail photos of a blue VW almost totally buried in the icy Idaho drifts.
Here, all we have to contend with are the blustery Doña Anas, but that’s enough. They may seem refreshing at first, especially since we know they are the dues we must pay for full-tilt spring. But it doesn’t take long to wear us down. We go from being delicately air-brushed to feeling brutally sand-blasted.
We go out to investigate the state of the yard and notice the peeling paint we should do something about, the cracks in the stucco and adobe.
Then there are the piles of debris, organic and manmade, all democratically windblown into my previously neat little courtyard. It’s mostly yucca and evergreens, red rock and bark mulch. There’s nothing much to shed or blow away.
Maybe it’s a matter of balance. I don’t know if it’s true that nature abhors a vacuum, but nature in my neighborhood seems inclined to vacuum up everybody else’s leaves, twigs, leftover Halloween candy, Styrofoam and plastic and airlift it into my yard.
I’ve already done one autumn run with the leaf blower and was saving the next blitz for the end of the worst siege of Doña Anas. But when will that be? Quién sabe? Who knows?
No, I should probably stay indoors, build bookcases to replace the ones that collapsed and organize the closets and throw things away. Then I would finally have room to stash away those holiday and birthday gifts and display the For the Love of Art Month purchases I swore I would not make this year.
But after watching dozens of happy ladies in red and purple doing the can-can and forming a conga line to dance through Hotel Encanto, I found I did not feel guilty at all about lingering with a friend over Sunday brunch and cool jazz at the wonderful new incarnation of Meson de Mesilla.
When I got home, I contemplated spring cleaning, but decided the eagle, fish, jet and ship have the right idea.
Maybe I should just go with the air flow. I think I’ll go fly some kites.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Top 5 Ways To Celebrate Valentine's Day
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — How will you celebrate Valentine’s Day this year?
Sometimes, the best things in life — like love —are conveyed in the simplest ways. Here ‘s a list of top five ways to brighten someone’s day, including your own, on Thursday, Feb. 14.
5. Start the day with a V-Day breakfast. Serve red foods: strawberries or raspberries, red juice (or mix a little cranberry juice with the kids’ milk to rosy things up), scrambled eggs with fiery red chile salsa, and toast or scones with red fruit preserves.
4. Leave anonymous Valentines for your colleagues at work. Make your own or get a kids’ school pack. If you have a mentor at work, honor him or her with a “thank you, teacher” Valentine.
3. Write little love notes and stick them in the kids’ lunch bags, or the pockets or purses of significant others.
2. Wear red, including at least one unexpected accessory: red socks, a red hat or a red rose or carnation in your lapel.
And the No. 1 way to celebrate Valentine’s Day: Say “I Love You” to at least one person.
+ + +
Need more ideas? Here are some romantic events coming up. For more, check For the Love of Art Month listings in this week’s Sun Life section or online at www.lcsun-news.com
• “Love Letters” at the Black Box Theatre: Eighth annual No Strings Theatre Company production, starring Toni Marie and Mike Cook. Performances on Valentine’s Day will be at 5 and 8 p.m. Tickets are $10 for regular admission, $9 for students and seniors over 65. Info: (575) 523-1223, nstcbbt@zianet.com or http://www.no-strings.org
• Treat your Valentine to tea. Las Cruces Friends of Chamber Music Tea at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Victorian Tea Room, 1605 S. Main St. will feature music by Madera Wind Duo, scones, sandwiches and sweets plus a silent auction. Tickets are $30 and must be purchased in advance at the tea room or call (575) 523-7714.
• “Amour, a Multilingual Love Poetry Reading” at Border Book Festival: Multilingual love poetry readings and love songs will be at 7 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Cultural Center de Mesilla, 2231-A Calle de Parian in Mesilla. Sudeshua Sengupta reads and sings the poems of Nobel Laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore in Bengali. Others will read in French, German, Spanish and Urdu. Also featured are photos by Daniel Zolinsky from the Border Book Festival archives. The readings will be with emcee Claude Fouillade, French professor and poet from NMSU. Donations accepted. Info: Border Book Festival at (575) 523-3988.
• Wayne Crawford hosts a Valentine Day open Mic at the Bean Coffeehouse, Avenida de Mesilla. Sign in starts at 7:30 p.m. “ Love and love-lost poems are especially welcome on this holiday reading,” Crawford said.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — How will you celebrate Valentine’s Day this year?
Sometimes, the best things in life — like love —are conveyed in the simplest ways. Here ‘s a list of top five ways to brighten someone’s day, including your own, on Thursday, Feb. 14.
5. Start the day with a V-Day breakfast. Serve red foods: strawberries or raspberries, red juice (or mix a little cranberry juice with the kids’ milk to rosy things up), scrambled eggs with fiery red chile salsa, and toast or scones with red fruit preserves.
4. Leave anonymous Valentines for your colleagues at work. Make your own or get a kids’ school pack. If you have a mentor at work, honor him or her with a “thank you, teacher” Valentine.
3. Write little love notes and stick them in the kids’ lunch bags, or the pockets or purses of significant others.
2. Wear red, including at least one unexpected accessory: red socks, a red hat or a red rose or carnation in your lapel.
And the No. 1 way to celebrate Valentine’s Day: Say “I Love You” to at least one person.
+ + +
Need more ideas? Here are some romantic events coming up. For more, check For the Love of Art Month listings in this week’s Sun Life section or online at www.lcsun-news.com
• “Love Letters” at the Black Box Theatre: Eighth annual No Strings Theatre Company production, starring Toni Marie and Mike Cook. Performances on Valentine’s Day will be at 5 and 8 p.m. Tickets are $10 for regular admission, $9 for students and seniors over 65. Info: (575) 523-1223, nstcbbt@zianet.com or http://www.no-strings.org
• Treat your Valentine to tea. Las Cruces Friends of Chamber Music Tea at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Victorian Tea Room, 1605 S. Main St. will feature music by Madera Wind Duo, scones, sandwiches and sweets plus a silent auction. Tickets are $30 and must be purchased in advance at the tea room or call (575) 523-7714.
• “Amour, a Multilingual Love Poetry Reading” at Border Book Festival: Multilingual love poetry readings and love songs will be at 7 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Cultural Center de Mesilla, 2231-A Calle de Parian in Mesilla. Sudeshua Sengupta reads and sings the poems of Nobel Laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore in Bengali. Others will read in French, German, Spanish and Urdu. Also featured are photos by Daniel Zolinsky from the Border Book Festival archives. The readings will be with emcee Claude Fouillade, French professor and poet from NMSU. Donations accepted. Info: Border Book Festival at (575) 523-3988.
• Wayne Crawford hosts a Valentine Day open Mic at the Bean Coffeehouse, Avenida de Mesilla. Sign in starts at 7:30 p.m. “ Love and love-lost poems are especially welcome on this holiday reading,” Crawford said.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Friday, January 25, 2008
Hot times & full-tilt February fiestas
LAS CRUCES — Why is February our most romantic and festive month?
Maybe after lackluster January, which is usually our coldest winter month, we can all use some extra warmth wherever we can find it, and there’s nothing like Valentines and declarations of love to encourage some extra cuddling.
Perhaps surprisingly for a snow-hating person who grew up in frigid Northern climes, February has always been a favorite time of year.
It may be a matter of comparison with January, a month full of my least favorite things. It started when I was a kid, when I first decided that as long as things were cold and miserable, I might as well get all the odious chores over and done with.
So January is the month when I get the tax stuff together, take stock of what went right or wrong in the previous year, schedule household repairs, clean up the yard, visit the doctor to renew prescriptions, weigh in and face the ravages of the holidays, get my teeth and carpets cleaned. Then it’s time to figure out how much home and personal physical repair and maintenance will cut into funds for vacations.
And maybe, research getaways to tropical climes. Because you have to have some fun, or at least some prospect of fun. Even in a month full of my least favorite things.
But then comes February. Red hot with romance and the promise of spring (especially if you’re smart enough to move south from Michigan).
February includes Valentine’s Day and my birthday and thus the start of a new year for me personally, and in 2008, for 1.3 billion Chinese, since Chinese New Year falls on my birthday this year.
February goes by in a flash because it’s filled with things to commemorate and celebrate, all packed into our shortest month.
It’s also the weirdest and wildest and, some might say, the most creative, spiritual and charmingly inventive and delightfully eccentric month, being the native territory of Aquarians. There are more of us in the hall of fame, it is said, than any other sign of the zodiac, and it’s the dawning of our age, as we’ve been reminding you since the harbinger 1960s.
And even in the shortest month there are some surprise bonuses, with a few days left over to welcome the birthdays of our ethereal neighbors, the Pisceans, who may be even more deeply weird and wonderful than Aquarians.
February is, after all, the only month that gets an extra day every four years, and it happens in Pisces season.
We are fortunate to live very close to the “Leap Year Capital of the World” in Anthony, which straddles the New Mexico-Texas border but has always seemed to have its true corazon in the Land of Enchantment. It’s all thanks to Mary Ann Brown, a Leap Year baby who had the delightfully wacky Piscean vision to create a full-tilt fiesta to celebrate those rarest of milagro birthday kids.
February has lots of other special treats and reasons to celebrate in addition to Valentines, Day, Presidents’ Day, Lincoln’s and Washington’s birthdays, Groundhog Day, Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Mardi Gras and Mexico’s Dia de la Bandera (Flag Day) and Dia de la Candaleria.
It’s Black History Month in America, with traditional local observances that have included everything from lectures and films to art exhibitions and music and other cultural events and performances.
And, of course, it’s also For the Love of Art Month in Las Cruces and Mesilla, week after week devoted to enthusiastic celebrations of what too many of us may take for granted: life in one of the richest, most culturally diverse and artistically blessed communities our size in the world.
It’s a great month to look around and enjoy something new. Go to the symphony or one of our many theaters or museums. Catch an art exhibit at galleries or special art month venues all over town. Or consider putting together your own show at the office. Ask everyone to bring in a work of art or sing a song together during lunch hour. Make your own Valentines.
Imagine something artistic and make it happen.
Be creative. Go wild. It’s almost February, the shortest, richest, most action-packed full-tilt fiesta month!
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Maybe after lackluster January, which is usually our coldest winter month, we can all use some extra warmth wherever we can find it, and there’s nothing like Valentines and declarations of love to encourage some extra cuddling.
Perhaps surprisingly for a snow-hating person who grew up in frigid Northern climes, February has always been a favorite time of year.
It may be a matter of comparison with January, a month full of my least favorite things. It started when I was a kid, when I first decided that as long as things were cold and miserable, I might as well get all the odious chores over and done with.
So January is the month when I get the tax stuff together, take stock of what went right or wrong in the previous year, schedule household repairs, clean up the yard, visit the doctor to renew prescriptions, weigh in and face the ravages of the holidays, get my teeth and carpets cleaned. Then it’s time to figure out how much home and personal physical repair and maintenance will cut into funds for vacations.
And maybe, research getaways to tropical climes. Because you have to have some fun, or at least some prospect of fun. Even in a month full of my least favorite things.
But then comes February. Red hot with romance and the promise of spring (especially if you’re smart enough to move south from Michigan).
February includes Valentine’s Day and my birthday and thus the start of a new year for me personally, and in 2008, for 1.3 billion Chinese, since Chinese New Year falls on my birthday this year.
February goes by in a flash because it’s filled with things to commemorate and celebrate, all packed into our shortest month.
It’s also the weirdest and wildest and, some might say, the most creative, spiritual and charmingly inventive and delightfully eccentric month, being the native territory of Aquarians. There are more of us in the hall of fame, it is said, than any other sign of the zodiac, and it’s the dawning of our age, as we’ve been reminding you since the harbinger 1960s.
And even in the shortest month there are some surprise bonuses, with a few days left over to welcome the birthdays of our ethereal neighbors, the Pisceans, who may be even more deeply weird and wonderful than Aquarians.
February is, after all, the only month that gets an extra day every four years, and it happens in Pisces season.
We are fortunate to live very close to the “Leap Year Capital of the World” in Anthony, which straddles the New Mexico-Texas border but has always seemed to have its true corazon in the Land of Enchantment. It’s all thanks to Mary Ann Brown, a Leap Year baby who had the delightfully wacky Piscean vision to create a full-tilt fiesta to celebrate those rarest of milagro birthday kids.
February has lots of other special treats and reasons to celebrate in addition to Valentines, Day, Presidents’ Day, Lincoln’s and Washington’s birthdays, Groundhog Day, Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Mardi Gras and Mexico’s Dia de la Bandera (Flag Day) and Dia de la Candaleria.
It’s Black History Month in America, with traditional local observances that have included everything from lectures and films to art exhibitions and music and other cultural events and performances.
And, of course, it’s also For the Love of Art Month in Las Cruces and Mesilla, week after week devoted to enthusiastic celebrations of what too many of us may take for granted: life in one of the richest, most culturally diverse and artistically blessed communities our size in the world.
It’s a great month to look around and enjoy something new. Go to the symphony or one of our many theaters or museums. Catch an art exhibit at galleries or special art month venues all over town. Or consider putting together your own show at the office. Ask everyone to bring in a work of art or sing a song together during lunch hour. Make your own Valentines.
Imagine something artistic and make it happen.
Be creative. Go wild. It’s almost February, the shortest, richest, most action-packed full-tilt fiesta month!
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Dancing with roadrunners
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — The forms of my world are fading away…or going full-tilt surreal. Almost every week, it seems, there is something new and strange in the ‘hood.
Nationwide recessions and housing crises are finally having their trickle-down effect on our rampant development, but now that the construction dust is settling, and the winter dust storms are blowing stuff up, up and away, and we’re packing up the last of the distracting holiday decorations, you, too, may look around and notice how much things are changing in your neighborhood.
And there are a few things that don’t seem to be changing enough, due to another force that transcends our fronteras and control: global warming.
It’s January and anything can happen, but by the middle of the month, things were still blooming in my yard that shouldn’t be.
Most of the verbena and lantana bushes have dropped their green leaves and colorful little flowers and gone into hibernation, but two stubborn desperado bushes, one in the front yard and one in the back, are still producing lacy bits of green and bright purple blooms.
And every now and again, I notice a confused looking housefly or butterfly making pseudo-spring rounds.
A lot of the jackrabbits have moved on to wilder desert climes, but I have a new paisano. I’ve christened him Errol Jr. because, like his first roadrunner namesake, he’s a dashing soul. Errol the First established his own cozy condo in the eaves of an isolated home on acreage in Picacho Peak where I lived a decade ago. He was an elegant, laid-back gentleman bird who would complain subtly if I disturbed him at his slumber too early in the morning, but was always in the mood for a fiesta if he smelled albondigas simmering through the kitchen window. He earned his keep snacking on rattlesnakes and sometimes joined me for walks down mountain trails.
Errol Jr. showed up a few months ago. Strangely enough, the first roadrunner to establish regular routes through my neighborhood, turned up after another recent wave of development and human traffic escalation. Not surprisingly, he’s more of a streetwise, hip urban guy than the courtly rural gentleman who was my first serious roadrunner amigo. E-Jay (Errol Jr.’s rap name) seems a lot more hyper, too. Maybe the neighborhood Starbucks is on his rounds and he’s running on a contact caffeine high.
He’ll look me in the eye, but doesn’t seem inclined to share a leisurely amble with me at this stage in our relationship. It’s true that I haven’t wooed him with albondigas. I’m not much into red meat these days and somehow, Boca Burger meatballs just don’t have the same allure. I’ve noticed that his route includes a rock fence that runs through my lot, and if I position a slice of toast there, before E-Jay’s morning rounds, he gratefully snaps it up.
Then he’s off, in a cloud of dust on the sandy trail behind my patio. Without a word. Those of us who have spent quality time with roadrunners know they are more likely to mutter something that sounds like a rachety Louis Armstrong riff, rather than the “beep-beep” of the famed cartoon character.
While I’m hanging with my peeps in the ‘hood, E-Jay may be off to rally with his posse of roadrunner beeps at some as-yet-undisclosed hideaway, maybe one of the last stands of mesquite on this side of the newest subdivision, or a highway underpass.
I just remembered that this is Mesilla Valley Balloon Rally weekend and the fates have been known to stage a landing or two nearby. This could be the perfect Sunday morning to head out to the patio with a camera. With a little luck, I might be able to get a shot that includes E-Jay munching on seven-grain toast in a rock garden full of enthusiastically flowering things that shouldn’t be blooming in the winter, with a few ethereal hot air balloons floating toward the Organ Mountains in the background.
It’s another surreal January in Las Cruces.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — The forms of my world are fading away…or going full-tilt surreal. Almost every week, it seems, there is something new and strange in the ‘hood.
Nationwide recessions and housing crises are finally having their trickle-down effect on our rampant development, but now that the construction dust is settling, and the winter dust storms are blowing stuff up, up and away, and we’re packing up the last of the distracting holiday decorations, you, too, may look around and notice how much things are changing in your neighborhood.
And there are a few things that don’t seem to be changing enough, due to another force that transcends our fronteras and control: global warming.
It’s January and anything can happen, but by the middle of the month, things were still blooming in my yard that shouldn’t be.
Most of the verbena and lantana bushes have dropped their green leaves and colorful little flowers and gone into hibernation, but two stubborn desperado bushes, one in the front yard and one in the back, are still producing lacy bits of green and bright purple blooms.
And every now and again, I notice a confused looking housefly or butterfly making pseudo-spring rounds.
A lot of the jackrabbits have moved on to wilder desert climes, but I have a new paisano. I’ve christened him Errol Jr. because, like his first roadrunner namesake, he’s a dashing soul. Errol the First established his own cozy condo in the eaves of an isolated home on acreage in Picacho Peak where I lived a decade ago. He was an elegant, laid-back gentleman bird who would complain subtly if I disturbed him at his slumber too early in the morning, but was always in the mood for a fiesta if he smelled albondigas simmering through the kitchen window. He earned his keep snacking on rattlesnakes and sometimes joined me for walks down mountain trails.
Errol Jr. showed up a few months ago. Strangely enough, the first roadrunner to establish regular routes through my neighborhood, turned up after another recent wave of development and human traffic escalation. Not surprisingly, he’s more of a streetwise, hip urban guy than the courtly rural gentleman who was my first serious roadrunner amigo. E-Jay (Errol Jr.’s rap name) seems a lot more hyper, too. Maybe the neighborhood Starbucks is on his rounds and he’s running on a contact caffeine high.
He’ll look me in the eye, but doesn’t seem inclined to share a leisurely amble with me at this stage in our relationship. It’s true that I haven’t wooed him with albondigas. I’m not much into red meat these days and somehow, Boca Burger meatballs just don’t have the same allure. I’ve noticed that his route includes a rock fence that runs through my lot, and if I position a slice of toast there, before E-Jay’s morning rounds, he gratefully snaps it up.
Then he’s off, in a cloud of dust on the sandy trail behind my patio. Without a word. Those of us who have spent quality time with roadrunners know they are more likely to mutter something that sounds like a rachety Louis Armstrong riff, rather than the “beep-beep” of the famed cartoon character.
While I’m hanging with my peeps in the ‘hood, E-Jay may be off to rally with his posse of roadrunner beeps at some as-yet-undisclosed hideaway, maybe one of the last stands of mesquite on this side of the newest subdivision, or a highway underpass.
I just remembered that this is Mesilla Valley Balloon Rally weekend and the fates have been known to stage a landing or two nearby. This could be the perfect Sunday morning to head out to the patio with a camera. With a little luck, I might be able to get a shot that includes E-Jay munching on seven-grain toast in a rock garden full of enthusiastically flowering things that shouldn’t be blooming in the winter, with a few ethereal hot air balloons floating toward the Organ Mountains in the background.
It’s another surreal January in Las Cruces.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
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