February 23, 2004
Rained all night, still raining (8:40 am). Lots of company this weekend. Kathy and I cooked all morning on Saturday making a big batch of green chile and another of red chile. Also made cowboy style pinto beans, a la my mama’s recipe. All three batches came out great. Had two sets of neighbors over on Saturday night and Bill and Jeanie McClelland from Fort Collns, Colorado over last night. Solved life, laughed and laughed (see quote, below).

Lots of interesting fallout and input regarding what exactly I’m doing here, and where it’s all going. Mark Curtright e-mailed me to say he thinks I’m doing an “autoblography.” Mark may have coined a new word, adding, “I haven't heard it before from anyone else. I may be able to claim authorship on this one, so I will gladly accept and cash all large royalty checks resulting from mass usage of the new word. Of course, that would involve the standard agent's commission for you if this thing really takes off.”

Mark also weighs in on the Mexican Food War:
Re: the whole New Mexican vs. other versions of Mexican food; I would have to agree with the point made by one of your contributors that New Mexican food isn't really Mexican, but stands as it's own style of cooking. So, I think it's ok to like both Mexican and New Mexican food at the same time. But I say keep the war going about it just for kicks.

Dan Buck, who refers to himself as a “Cyber Duffer,” thinks we would be well served to expand the blog to include more links and voices to make this site THE source for all things Old West. He expands on this slant:
“You could gather a collection of bloggers under a TW banner, e.g., on topics such as guns, photographs, women in the west, Native Americans, each blog run by someone well-versed in the field. (Some bloggers are paid, e.g., at SLATE, others are volunteers, e.g., ArtsJournal.com.) Or perhaps rather than by topics, have several people (writers,academics,collectors) who are good in a variety of fields who would, well, blog away to their hearts' content— link to stories in the media or to other bloggers, limelight new developments in academia, field questions, provoke debate, whatever. The best blogs—I think—are interactive, that is, they solicit info and comments from the reader.”

One of the blogger sites Dan recommended had this to say about the direction of the “blogosphere”:
“What Napster did for MP3s, blogs are doing for news -- or, at
least for rumors. They are eliminating the gatekeepers and all barriers to entry.”

On a more personal note, here’s a comment from Wendy:
I am currently in a twelve-step program for those addicted to blogs. Okay. Not really, but something like—at one point I was basically living an entire vicarious life through other people's blogs. I like to think this gives me some well-founded opinions on the subject (I'd have them anyway, but I like to base them on—something). In my experience, a blog is an online journal or diary. Some people do in fact use them as a dumping ground for their stream-of-consciousness output, but most do things like "went to town today, saw a movie. Spent too much money. Saw a guy in a funny fur hat on my way home.." What draws me to your blog (which is now one of the three remaining blogs that I can't stay away from) and others like it are the glimpses into a real life. Makes the world seem a little friendlier.
What's funniest to me is finding, upon reading some of my own
pen-and-ink journal entries the other day, that I subconsciously picked
up the dollar inclusion habit from you: "Had lunch at [restaurant X]
today, had the special ($6.00 including tip)." *grin*

I think all of this is going somewhere, I’m not sure exactly where, but I want to go there. On some level, it’s all just for grins, on another, there is something very big happening, it just hasn’t taken a recognizable shape yet. Or, has it?

”That is the best—to laugh with someone because you both think the same things are funny.”
—Gloria Vanderbilt