Change of plans, prairie dogs, SB 1070

I was planning to participate in the march and rally against 1070 yesterday but ended up spending the day in hospital waiting room chairs while Grumpy had a quadruple bypass. Gee, just when something finally aggravated me enough to get my ass out of this chair and show up at something political!

In Groom, Texas, on my way home from Oklahoma, I read in an Amarillo paper that the state of Texas has approved (no, urged & implemented) Bible teaching in public schools. Am I missing something here? Hasn't teaching religion in public schools been illegal for a long time now? They seem to have clothed it as the impact of the Bible on culture via history and literature, which I might approve of if they also included the Koran and the Bhagavad Gita, but no. Of course not. C'mon, are they fooling anybody? By the way, if you pass through Groom hungry, try The Grill (the only restaurant I saw besides Dairy Queen). I had two good meals there. For breakfast I got the usual bacon and eggs, but really, that was the best bacon I've had in years. And the toast! Thick and flavorful, like homemade bread. Was it? I don't know. The night before, they had just run out of homemade bread, so maybe that was it.

I made it from Groom TX to Gallup NM in one long day. The Super 8 in Gallup claimed to be pet friendly, though I do not consider wall-to-wall concrete pet friendly. On either side of the motel's lot, raggedy paths led into the wasteland behind the motel strip along business-40. There was no grass, of course. I'm not sure Gallup has grass at all. Stickery plants decorated with plastic bags, irregular ground stirred up for what reason I cannot fathom, and so much broken glass I pictured an endless timestream of beer parties followed by bottle shootings -- and throughout this creepy wasteland what did we find? A prairie dog town! Wow. That was kind of exciting. Cheered me up, and Lady.

Crossing into Arizona at last, I gratefully turned south at Holbrook. Not only was I-40 shut down for dust storms, but I was goddamed sick of that fucking go-on-forever-never-stop wind. At Payson I got an awesome slice of berry pie ("homemade"!) at Cafe 260 and glanced through the Phoenix paper to get the latest on the SB 1070 curfluffle (spelling?) It seems it's not all bad, as it will no longer be necessary to charge migrants as "conspirators to human smuggling" in order to throw them in jail. Now they can do it just for being here illegally. :( I do get some peace of mind from Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley's declared intention to focus on cartels and criminal syndicates. He has plans to cooperate with three other border states to "come up with standardized approaches to immigration-related crime." Naturally, our beloved Sheriff Joe hates Romley and spews vitriol at this diversion from immigrants in general to immigration-related crime. I bless the intrusion of sanity but don't expect it to last long in this cowboy-mentality, gun-culture state. If Romley sticks around, I'll be shocked. (His opponent for August primaries is an Arapaio clone.) Romley is quoted as saying that "an immigration policy that focused on neighborhood crime sweeps where people were pulled over for cracked windshields as probable cause to check their immigration status...created a diversion that allowed organized crime to flourish." He actually opposed SB 1070, but now that it's a reality he at least may be expected to use it with some intelligence. This puts him at war with not only Sheriff Joe but also his predecessor, Thomas, who is now state attorney general. So, it's showdown time in Arizona. AZ corral?

Anyhow, I misssed the rally, but Grumpy is doing fine. He swears he has no modesty issues, so maybe I can get away with posting this cute photo of him with all his tubes, first time out of bed sitting in a chair (about 6 hours post-op).