an Earth Day message
From University of New Mexico Water Resources Program student Kirena Tsosie:
Archive of entries posted by jfleck
Searching for The Birds
It’s been increasingly difficult to maintain a “social distance” at our neighborhood park, so the afternoon walks have begun to range. I guess, adapting my friend Maria Lane’s hashtag, we could call it #geographybyfoot. Headed north across the freeway last week, I found this in the flood control channel: It appears to be either an …
Las Vegas abandons proposal to pump rural Nevada groundwater
When I was writing Water is For Fighting Over five years ago, I built a little analytical model of Las Vegas water – projections of per capita demand and population growth, current patterns of water use and banking, risk to Colorado River water supply. At the time, the Southern Nevada Water Authority was aggressively pursuing …
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Thinking about rural water
In the time of pandemic, I’ve been thinking a lot about small rural community water systems. This is in part because of work one of our University of New Mexico graduate students was doing in the Time Before, which seems super relevant now. Tucker Colvin just defended his thesis in UNM’s Geography and Environmental Studies …
“hooligan” in the time of pandemic
My current favorite word is “hooligan”. It’s origins are murky, but the authors of the Oxford English Dictionary say it first appeared in newspaper stories in 1898, to whit: 1898 Daily News 8 Aug. 9/3 The constable said the prisoner belonged to a gang of young roughs, calling themselves ‘Hooligans’. The story behind its emergence …
Albuquerque’s Rio Grande Oxbow
I was talking last week with one of my collaborators about the challenge of working. All the things that so fully occupied my time and brain seem so inconsequential right now. I envy friends filling the quiet with productive work. Me? I ride my bike. In the Time Before (was it just two months ago?) …
Bud Light empties in the time of pandemic
My friend and former student Kevin Carns is a truly gifted Bud Light can photographer. Cabezon Peak, the bike, the can – a compositional masterpiece. Some years ago when we were out riding, my friend Scot pointed out that the empties we saw a long the roadside were almost invariably Bud Lights. So we began …
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Water flowing in the Colorado River Delta
UNM Water Resources Program student Annalise Porter tipped me off to this, from Audubon’s Jennifer Pitt: At a time when the world feels bleak and uncertain, I want to share a sign of hope: it has been raining, and the Colorado River is flowing in its delta #CORiver ?@RaiseRiver? pic.twitter.com/6W8iRcvm3r — Jennifer Pitt (@JnPitt) …
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I Miss My Students
When I emerged from my office at home after recording my first university lecture of the pandemic era, Lissa told me I’d been using my radio voice. As a young journalist – before newspapers, before books, before my crazy new career as a university professor – I did radio. It’s been nearly forty years, but …
Dragons Love Tacos
In a Zoom meeting with a colleague yesterday (running a university in the time of pandemic) I learned that dragons love tacos. This was unsurprising, though it was surprising to learn that dragons do not like hot, spicy salsa: Dragons Love Tacos