Calexico

Thursday's child

Yesterday was a long day. I have suddenly developed an old man's prostate and I went to see a doctor to see what we could do about it.

I am not going to bitch too much about the interminable wait, it is a public hospital of course and some people had obviously been waiting longer than I had.

I was subjected to all sorts of gross bodily violations mostly seen in grody gay porn flicks but managed to finish up by peeing in this cone and getting the heck out of there while I still had my self respect and virtue intact.

Due to the particular physiognomy of my prostate I am in line for an old fashioned TURP, looks like beginning of December.

After the procedure yesterday I decided that I was close to my late sister Amie's grave and would pay her and my grandmother a visit down at the Home of Peace on Imperial Avenue.

It will be her birthday tomorrow.

Mine was today.

My routine after these sorts of medical events is to go get Chinese on Convoy but I thought that I would mix it up yesterday.

I had heard about a place in Chula Vista with the best tacos in San Diego and food far different than the normal fare Aqui es Texcoco.

It was only seven miles from the cemetery.

After a short cry I made my way down the five.

The restaurant is very clean and located in a newish strip center.

The menu is pretty amazing, dedicated to lamb barbacoa but I noticed rabbit, pork and chicken also on the menu.

Let's get real, where else around town can you find a whole lamb's head on a menu?

I asked them what they would recommend to a newbie and they emphatically suggested the basic lamb plate.

I decide to be extra daring and also order a huitlacoche quesadilla.

Huitlacoche Mycosarcoma maydis, or corn smut, is a fungus that grows on corn and tastes somewhat like a truffle.

It is a delicacy. Particularly served with cheese.

What the hell...

My food arrived with five condiment bowls of sauces, onions and limes.

In addition were fresh tortillas and a cup of a lamb consommé with chickpeas which I poured on the taco and then drank like a soup.

The food here was truly incredible for me, a lamb lover.

I was full after the lamb plate and looked at the quesadilla with dread and foreboding.

Could I take another bite?

But it was truly different and totally out of my gustatory experience and I am glad that I ordered it.

Washed everything down with a Jarritos Mandarin.

It is no wonder they have received so many rave reviews, including Zagat's best taco in San Diego award. 

Yo me gusto mucho y quiero regreso pronto.

Aqui es Texcoco

520 Broadway 5 & 6 Ste 5 & 6 Chula Vista, CA 91910

Monday I get my stints.

Jack of diamonds always gets his way.

Milo grabbed the gold...

My bobblehead from BigDave

I got back from Texas yesterday afternoon. I was gone for a while, left on October 19th, you do the math, I'm too tired.

It was a long show but a good show, I sold fairly steadily and met some nice people and new clients. Weather was near perfect with just one day of rain that I remember. Driving home was a different story but not too terrible.

I got to Round Top on a Wednesday and drove over and picked up a lovely germantown Navajo blanket that I had purchased from a friend. I love germantown eyedazzlers, they were made between 1865 and 1915 and were some of the most lovely and unusual native weavings.

Here is a picture of it on a bed in my motel room. Mint condition, with corner tassels and fringe and a very unusual yellow border color.

The wool was imported from a suburb of Philadelphia, the brightly colored commercial yard had four times the normal knot per inch count and allowed the Navajo to weave some of the most optically and visually interesting patterns that have ever been created.

I started setting up Thursday morning. 

For the last couple years I have favored a buff or sandstone backdrop paper but signals were crossed and I was instead given a bright yellow forsythia.

I thought that I would hate it but my stuff actually looked great on it so it was a happy accident and I will probably do it again.

I had about three days to setup, which is way more than enough so I had time to shop the other dealers and make some good buys including a room size Navajo that I sold to a California client.

Buying is always way more fun than selling in my line of work.

I also bought the two most beautiful aesthetic pieces of silver I have ever owned, sterling and mixed metal, replete with bugs, fish and turtle ornamentation.

Sold to a client instantly!

Steve and I also partnered a nice numbered lithograph by the latin artist Roberto Matta.

Booth turned out fine, I have gone from eighty foot of walls, to forty to thirty and now twenty but I think this size is perfect.

They threw in an outside wall which really helps.

I wasn't sure about the dealer across from me but he turned out to be as toxic, abrasive and sarcastic as I am and we ended up being a great fit together.

The show is more decoratively oriented than collector based so my inexpensive paintings sold first but I sold high end as well.

You have to bring a mix.

I have heard Roundtop referred to as the Texas Catwalk and it seems somewhat accurate.

Many of the women in Texas are stunningly beautiful and they parade through the show in similar dress.

I noticed much less ink than I see in California and far fewer full Ferdinand the bull style nose rings.

Breasts are not as augmented and eyebrows tend to be fuller and less plucked. 

There were less prairie dresses this year and possibly more plunging backlines. 

All in all, quite lovely and entertaining.

Found a great barbecue nearby in Burton, Truth Barbecue, their second location. 

One of the big Texas magazines calls them third best in the state.

I had ribs and brisket, potato salad and a root beer. 

Brisket was good but honestly the ribs were the best I have ever had.

I chatted with the owner, Leonard, for a few minutes.

Really nice guy.

I'm not going to talk to much about the food, was good and bad, ate too much beef and had some mediocre seafood.

Had two good meals at Las Patronas, quail and ribs.

Went to all my old haunts.

Did have a great steak and lobster meal at Burton Steak and Seafood with a bunch of friends and my sister Laurie, who drove up from Corpus Christie.

I love and admire my little sister.

I didn't take many pictures, was too busy, only when compelled.

Barry thought I was remiss in not including a picture of this colorful young woman who wandered into my booth. 

A lawyer no less.

We exchanged instagram addresses. Hmmm.

Room for all of god's creatures.  

Think she might have benefitted from an older fellow's wisdom and guidance.

Of course I was there on Halloween and there were some other clever if less revealing costumes walking around.

Unfortunately the show was mired in tragedy. A dealer I had known for over thirty years was murdered in a strange love triangle scenario. I think I know what actually went down but won't speculate publicly here.

He may have said something to the wrong guy at the wrong time, in the company of the wrong woman.

The deceased owed me thousands of dollars for many years, finally paid up but stiffed a good friend of mine for several thousand dollars in show fees at Napa. 

My last interaction with him was not very pleasant in Santa Barbara, he was jealous of me for some reason and decided to be an asshole.

Still it was a shame. He was finally finding his footing and building up a clientele in Texas and was robbed of his life just as he was coming into his own. Had a son and a mom who loved him and he didn't deserve to die, for sure.

I left Sunday morning, drove into a small rainstorm. I stopped at Van Horn for a night and then Tucson where I bought a lovely Kawaiisu bottleneck basket from Mark. Then on to Phoenix to spend the last night at Steve's before the relatively short third day drive home. 

Sue made a delicious ox tail beef pie with cinnamon and coriander from a recipe of Chef Ahmed, the owner of Jambo in Santa Fe.

So delicious!

Long trip, good to be home.

Bingo

 I think conservative commentator Erick Erickson said it best.

I could add a few things but why rub it in?

Remember the cowards

I am not foolish enough to make election predictions in our deeply divided nation. We will all know the eventual outcomes soon enough.

But I do predict a heaping amount of one metric in our near future, historical revisionism. The amount of Republicans who will try to tell you that they had thwarted their great leader at every turn during his tenure will be sky high.

Of course, they did it all covertly so no one on the outside would be able to tell.

The truth is that with the exception of a few outgoing retirees or lame ducks like Tillis, Cornyn and Cassidy the GOP has been conspicuously silent on all matters Trump.

People that should have stood for something, people like Mike Johnson and Thune, stood by and let the Orange monstrosity do his worst with nary a peep. Cowards.

Let's not forget.

The Rapper

Paxton Blues

I landed in my destination in Texas this afternoon after three full days of driving. I have been watching the political signage both in Texas and Arizona, saw nothing in New Mexico.

Trump's name appeared in Andy Biggs signage as Trump endorsed. Not many places where that is broadcast with Trump's abysmal polling numbers but I guess he still shines in Tucson.

I saw very little Trump signage in Texas but a lot of signs endorsing Paxton for Senate. Two for Talarico. 

Keep waiting to see one that reads "I'm voting for the adulterer."

Newen Afrobeat plays Fela Kuti

My favorite worldbeat band.

The Sirens of Elon

The world's richest man wants congressional democrats to know that he is keeping a list and they better not go after him or risk holy hell.

Elon Musk vowed to push back on Democratic lawmakers who may seek to use oversight powers against him if they're able to gain control of one or both chambers of Congress.

Musk responded to a story by Politico that detailed how Democrats have considered ways in which they could investigate the billionaire and his businesses like Tesla and SpaceX.

"Live by the sword, die by the sword," Musk wrote in a post on his X platform.

"Those who pick fights with me should understand that I will find out who is really pulling the strings and come for them, not just their puppets."

On the heels of being caught lying to the world about throttling Ukraine's Starlink connection, one would be a fool not to believe that the man would do anything to destroy his perceived enemies. Think of his immense power. who could stand up to it?  That is why we should never allow such power to be controlled by a private citizen. It ended up killing a bunch of Ukrainian children last week.

Think Trump is vindictive? This man will take it to a new level, he is quite deranged. Remember when he labelled the people who rescued the Thai children trapped in caves pedophiles. Something is just not right with this guy. And he has some rather peculiar habits, to say the least.

Elon Musk refers to the mothers of his 14 known children as “breeders” and is fixated with procreation, according to a new documentary on the world’s richest man.

The film Musk, directed by the Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney, was filmed over three years and charts his rise to becoming the world’s first trillionaire.

After the four-hour documentary premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday, reviewers described it as a “lacerating portrait” that depicts Musk as “petty, narcissistic, megalomaniacal, cruel”.

Perhaps he will reseed the galaxy with a host of his own divine offspring?

There has been talk the DOGE illegally sucked up a lot of very private and personal data from American citizens. I sure would like to know what the extent of his involvement was and if he kept anything he should not have.

The man seemingly has no boundaries, financially or morally.

I was thinking about Musk today and my mind kept going back to the 1959 Kurt Vonnegut book, The Sirens of Titan. 

It was never my favorite, some loved it, but there is a very Musk like character in the book named Malachi Constant.

A man who had it all and ultimately went to space.

Malachi Constant is the richest man in a future North America. He possesses extraordinary luck that he attributes to divine favor which he has used to build upon his father's fortune. He becomes the centerpoint of a journey that takes him from Earth to Mars in preparation for an interplanetary war, to Mercury with another Martian survivor of that war, back to Earth to be pilloried as a sign of Man's displeasure with his arrogance, and finally to Titan where he again meets the man ostensibly responsible for the turn of events that have befallen him, Winston Niles Rumfoord.

Rumfoord comes from a wealthy New England background. His private fortune was large enough to fund the construction of a personal spacecraft, and he became a space explorer. Traveling between Earth and Mars, his ship—carrying Rumfoord and his dog, Kazak—entered a phenomenon known as a chrono-synclastic infundibulum, which is defined in the novel as "those places ... where all the different kinds of truths fit together."

I would not trade places with either Musk or Bezos. Life seems to lose its moral equilibrium when a person has it all and those surrounding them often become collateral, ancillary figures.

Shuggie Otis

Living large

As we all know the rich are getting richer. 

But the actual numbers are staggering. 

One man, Elon Musk, now has more money than the bottom fifty percent of the American public. 

It would be one thing if it was a square game but we all know that it is rigged.

Here is an interesting article on income inequality. 

...wealth inequality continues to grow. The top 1% saw their share of wealth increase from 31.7% to 32.5% just between the first and second quarters of 2026, a jump of over $8.5 trillion. That caps a steady climb from 30.9% in the last quarter of 2024 – and from 27.4% in 1999.

These recent gains come at the expense of the middle class – the 40% between the bottom half and the top 10% – who hold only 28.8% of all wealth despite being a group that’s 40 times larger than the top 1%. And the middle’s share is shrinking, down from 32.9% in 1999 and 30.2% at the end of 2024, according to the data.

But the ultra-wealthy, those in the top 0.1%, are pulling away even from the rest of the rich, the data shows. This tiny elite owns 15% of all wealth – almost half of all the wealth of the top 1%. Both the top 0.1% and the next 0.9% saw their share of wealth increase, but the top 0.1% captured two-thirds of the gains between the first and second quarters of 2026.

Even within the highest echelons of wealth concentration, these two groups are on different trajectories.

Crucially, the wealth of the top 0.1% is disproportionately boosted by corporate profits, which are up sharply overall. The top 0.1% reap the most from this growth because their portfolios’ value has soared on the promise of future increased profitability that’s driving up stock prices – especially thanks to the tech and artificial intelligence boom.

I wrestled with prop 40 but ended up voting for it. If you are a billionaire, giving 5% back should not kill you. And if you want to leave California and move to Florida to hang out with your Mar a Lago cronies, well be my guest.

*

Shawn sent this graphic over.

Always blows me away how disproportionate the distribution of Private Jet traffic around the World is! This is from a 'live' feed called the "Apocalypse Early Warning System"! 😂

https://ews.kylemcdonald.net/

S.

John Prine

Devil is in the details.

Donald Trump proposed yet another $8 billion dollar farmer bailout for diesel fuels. Two weeks before the election.Somebody getting nervous?

"Tonight I'm also pleased to announce that the Department of Agriculture will be launching a new Harvest Fuel Relief program, providing our farmers with $8 billion in support to offset diesel costs during this harvest season," Mr. Trump said at a rally in Kansas Monday night.

What he doesn't tell them is that the program has no funding and will have to be taken from other government spending programs. 

..the internal USDA taxpayer-funded account Trump is tapping for the payments doesn’t actually have enough money in it right now to make the payments, meaning Congress will have to approve the new funds or the administration will have to take it from another program, according to three Trump officials who were granted anonymity to discuss private conversations.

And not all farmers are exactly giddy with the announcement.

"As a farmer of 50 years, this is embarrassing," said former GOP Chair Christopher Gibbs in response to the announcement. "This year one third of US farm income will have come from the taxpayers. The SAME taxpayers who are struggling at their own kitchen tables. I can't afford it, but however this comes, I'm pushing half to my local shelter and food bank."

The GOP is nervous about losing their heartland farm base after tariffs, diesel and fertilizer costs have skyrocketed. Nice bribe, might work. I saw one figure that this makes 47 billion in farm aid in 2026 alone. Socialism anybody?