Day: January 20, 2005

Help!?

Does $4 a square foot (for carpet, pad, installation, moving furniture and removing old carpet) sound like a good value?

Update: Apparently so, for good quality. I’ll let you know once it’s installed.

Another extraordinary film

Maria Full of Grace, starring Catalina Sandino Moreno in the title role, is a moving, dramatic film.

A Colombian, Maria swallows pellets of drugs to bring them to New York. She is, in drug parlance, a mule. She does this simply enough for money — and to escape a loser boyfriend (the father of her unborn child), a demanding mother, an irritating sister and a degrading job.

Maria Full of Grace is almost documentary in style. But it is Maria’s story, not the story of drugs or the drug cartel that is documented. And it is Maria’s story that you should see.

The film is in Spanish with English subtitles.

Five ristras on NewMexiKen’s scale of one-to-five (five being best).

(In the beginning of the film Maria works at a flower plantation trimming the torns from roses. I’d never thought about it before, but I guess the florist doesn’t just snip them out back in his little green house anymore.)

Carmen San Diego in Albuquerque

The Christmas package is on a truck for delivery. I’m so excited and I’ve put my Christmas decorations back up.

Update: The package arrived this afternoon. FYI It is a wonderful framed, panoramic photograph of the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta during inflation and mass ascension. A true delight. And well-traveled.

Inauguration Day

Today’s is the 55th presidential inauguration.

The 20th Amendment to the Constitution states that the “terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January.” The Amendment was ratified in 1933 — the first inauguration on the new date was January 20, 1937.

Before the 20th Amendment, the Constitution did not provide the date when the terms began and ended. The terms of the first President and Vice President were fixed by an act of the Continental Congress adopted September 13, 1788. That act called for “the first Wednesday in March next to be the time for commencing proceedings under the Constitution.” It happened that the first Wednesday in March was the 4th day of March, and hence the terms of the President and Vice President and Members of Congress began on March 4, 1789. (Washington did not take the oath of office until April 30, 1789, but technically his term began March 4th.)

The Constitution set the terms of the President and Vice President at four years. Any change from March 4th then required an Amendment because a date change would mean that the incumbents would not serve exactly four years. Indeed, Franklin Roosevelt’s and John Nance Garner’s first terms were 43 days less than four years — March 4, 1933 – January 20, 1937.

Oops!

According to the Kitsap Sun, a 22-year-old man from Vancouver held up a local gas station at knifepoint last week. The unnamed robber then sped off in a red Honda, leading police from four towns on a wild 100-mph chase. Thanks to the winding back roads of the area, the robber managed to lose his pursuers. Unfortunately, he became lost on the rural roads and had to pull into a gas station to ask for directions to nearby Seattle. Even more unfortunately, he had gone in circles and ended up at the exact same gas station he had just robbed.

Reported by the Albuquerque Alibi.