More Train Pictures

These from Christmas in Albuquerque.

I had a whirlwind three day visit home. Going to the old abandoned train shop with my great friend Summer was the best part.

The pictures, of course, are on my Flickr page.

Those Anarcho-Punks are Mysterious…

or, What I’ll Be Eating This Week

So I’m biking home from callback #2 of the day, and I pass these anarchist hobo kids on the corner of Damen and Milwaukee. I guess they didn’t get the memo that there’a a Bank of America moving in and the whole neighborhood is overrun with douchebag hipsters (as distinguishable from ordinary hipsters, which are fun).

They had a hat out for cash money donations, and were doing some seriously off-kilter numbers on what seemed like a washboard, a guitar, and something that loosely correlated to my idea of a banjo. There was a girl with a tallbike, and another doing headstands. They were filthy, rotten hooligans dancing around in the middle of the street, obstructing pedestrian traffic. They mostly seemed like hey were hanging out, though. Unmistakably trainhoppers.

So I stopped. I hung around and listened for a minute, hoping one of them would engage me in lively conversation and I could bust out my harp and we could all sing songs of reconciliation and adventure until early in the morning, when they’d roll their headstandy-tallbikey-ragmatag operation onto the closest boxcar, with promises to raise my children if I should be eaten by wolves.

This of course did not happen.

I looked at them. They looked back. And I could see in their eyes that I looked like The Enemy to them.

Crushing. So I hoped on the bike, rolling down to the local grocery store, thinking I could make them the offer of a lifetime: “Hey. I passed by and I was really glad that you guys are in the world, so I bought you apples.” They’d dig on that. They’d appreciate the spontaneous, anarchic generosity, and we’d all Break Bread together and so on right down to the wolf insurance.

But naturally they were gone when I got back with the apples.

Which means now I got like ten apples to eat before they go all leathery. Story of my life.

Albuquerque’s Abandoned Train Depot (in pictures)

I finally posted my pictures of what can only be described as one of the world’s most beautiful places. These are from early Spring 07.

Summer, don’t look, we still have to go there. Or, just go.

My flickr will one day be organized, and hopefully soon. I finally got my act together and sent in my camera for repairs. For now, just go.