The time has come to end the Tuesday Tips. I just don't like giving advice. Who am I to tell other people what to do? So, I won't.
I can do that, you see, because here if nowhere else, I am Supreme Ruler.
So, what will I do instead? Who knows! I used to write every day--every. single. day--for years with no idea what I would write about the next day. I no longer write every day, but I think I can probably manage one free-wheeling day a week without short-circuiting my brain.
I think.
It'll be like those free-write assignments from school. Who can say what might come out of my keyboard?
Let's start now, with some fine randomness.
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I overheard one of my sons at school yesterday tell someone, "When I tell people in New York that I live in New Mexico, they always say, 'You live in Mexico?!' And when I tell people here that I'm from New York, they always say, 'Have you been to New York City?'"
It is amusing to me how often people mis-hear "New Mexico" as just "Mexico." It's as if the majority of the country forgets there is a New Mexico. We do generally fly under the radar here, which I actually appreciate.
Also amusing is how people outside of New York can't get past the idea that the entirety of the state is not New York City. It's a really big state, and no, none of my children ever made the six-hour drive to New York City.
I also have to note that I lived in the 50th, 49th, and 48th states* as a kid--in that descending order--and now I live in the 47th. There was a 15-year interruption in my progression there when I lived in New York (the 11th), but I still enjoy the orderliness of this. Which means to keep up the order, next I would have to live in Oklahoma. Stranger things have happened.
* Hawaii, Alaska, and Arizona, respectively.
12 comments:
Frantically Googling 48th state to enter the union....
What a variety of places you have lived! I lived in what we considered upstate NY for a few years as a kid- even 40 miles north of NYC seems like a different world.
Though my brother currently lives near the Canadian border in NY- definitely not NYC!
mbmom11: Most of our time in New York was in the central part of the state but for a couple of years, we lived almost exactly one mile from the Canadian border in NY, near Malone. Where does your brother live, if you don't mind saying?
He lives in Potsdam, NY. He's lived there since he completed grad school many moons ago. He worked there for a time and now lives in the country outside of town. It's cold in the winter, but he loves being out in nature. He and his dog walk miles every day. His idea of torture would be to live in NYC -or even Albany!
Cool info on the numbered state progression. I can’t even tell you where we were when so very impressive.
Albany is lovely, I hear. And I lived in the lower Hudson Valley area- near Bear Mountain. Gorgeous place! But my brother needs to live in the country far from most people- a modern hermit. So northern NY fits the bill nicely. He only leaves for weddings and funerals.
mbmom11: I lived in Potsdam for 14 years and taught at Clarkson University. A beautiful village indeed. Mary in MN
I give advice only when asked and that is not often. It is my struggle on what to write in a blog so I usually wait for something to happen or it is something I wish to remember.
I would love to see New York. I have been a citizen for 12 years and each time I move that direction, the Navy takes me farther away. Someday.
I will miss your tips (not exactly the same as advice IMO). I do enjoy randomness, though. As I string together places I've lived, I've noticed that starting with my undergrad years in Salt Lake City, I have always lived in or adjacent to a state capital including Albany (grad school). I have to cheat a little for my three years in California since Monterey is no longer its capital, but it was! When in Albany I had great fun with my Utah license plates. People really had no idea where it was--somewhere in the Midwest was the most common guess. I'd ask them what part of the country Colorado was in. "Oh--it's in the West!" My reply: "Well keep heading west and you'll find Utah."
Hey, tell him this has been going on for years. When I was a kid, I have distinct memories of writing letters, as about a second-grader, with a class in Colorado (many of whom have Mexican heritage) (and Colorado is ADJACENT to New Mexico!) — many of the kids wanted to know how things were in Mexico. Um, yeah. Can't speak to that.
It is also very true that people from big/younger states just assume that older states are not only more crowded and much smaller — which you gotta admit they definitely look that way on a map — there's also no rural places to speak of. And that's also not quite true.
Mental pictures are interesting.
Given your penchant for alliteration, I suppose Wednesday Woes would be possible, but I hope that there are none of those. How could there be, with a new washing machine?? MIL
A little late chiming in here, but I was born in Portales, New Mexico, and of course that's listed on my passport as my birthplace. I spent a year in Uruguay at the end of my college career, and I had a VERY difficult time convincing the Spanish speakers there that even though the (Spanish) word "Portales" and the word "Mexico" both appeared on my passport, I was NOT a Mexican ... I really am an American, guys. From the USA state of NEW Mexico. Yes. Having nothing at all to do with MEXICO Mexico at this point. Yes. NEW Mexico, a part of the USA, close to Mexico, but not part of Mexico. So yes, I'm an American. Really! Even pointing out that I travel on an American passport didn't make an impression. They saw only what they could read, and as a result, I really do think about half of the people I met there believed I was actually Mexican.
--Karen.'s sister
Randomness is always interesting.
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