Influenza

It's sweeping through the local geography and gentry; next year I get a flu shot! Ihad to get out of bed to post this. As if any of world at large gave a damn about our lost little community.

But it is not just the clues to a treasure, it is also clues to some of the other mysteries locally. I think I must be feverish, the Elephant Graveyard?

Getting out of hand

"Dynamite, is that what you said? Isn’t that very difficult to get? Who’s getting it?"

"Yep. It isn’t as tough as you’d think. Clem Williams."

"The principal?"

"Yep him and some of the other guys."

"What on earth are they going to do with dynamite?"

"I think that just want to be ready."

"This is getting out of hand. Does the mayor know?"

"She’s trying to put the paper to bed."

"Does the sheriff know?"

"Not yet but he will. What are you worried about? It’s clear outside of town... Off the subject do you think those internet matchmaking sites are any good?"

"I have no idea. The internet is an interesting place, but I never give out any personal information. Are you gonna move if you meet mister right? Becasue I can guarantee he isn’t coming here, well, maybe to pick you up.., if you are already packed..."

"It’s not me..!"

"Not yet."

Blogs in General

Most blogs start with the earliest material at the front, Which means furthereset in the past. So it will be helpful to take a look at the older portions.

UFOs

"What are you doing here?", Mr Chas.

"I am looking for people that have seen UFOs and for people that have., seen the inside of UFOs...", Fed?

"I think the treasure is beginning to sound reasonable. Why are you really here", Mr Chas.

"Really, from the debunking side of things. I really don’t want anyone to know that last part yet, makes it harder to get their stories. If a guy is a researcher, that just wants the facts, I get a whole lot more detail. And as you know the devil is in the details." Fed?

"What organization do you work with? If you don’t mind my asking?" Mr Chas.

"Not at all. James Journey University and most of the funding, believe it or not is coming from an insurance industry consortium, that would rather not be discussed, but here is my card and you can check with the university if you like."

Quivira

"People need to come to their senses, this is not Quivira.", Mr Chas.

"What?", Biddy, Breezy, and Happy.

"One of the seven cities of gold, the Spanish looked for, Cibolla, El Dorado...", the Fed?.

Liz looks over at him briefly, and asks, "What else?"

"About 1150 CE, seven bishops fleeing the Moors from Merida Spain went West, to as yet undiscovered lands and each bishop built a city.. Wealthy lands, fabulously so, such that the cities themselves were built of gold and adorned with jewels... This was the tale told, to the credulous, anyway. So kings and governors over the years sent searchers out...

"Never with any concrete results and yet the stories grew up around it,: "It was a near thing, sire, we could see it but not come to it, Satan himself barred our way." They looked for it in Florida, then up through places with names like Llano Estacado -the staked plains and Jornado del Muerte -journey of the deadman. They even looked around in what one day would be known as Kansas...", Fed?"

"Many reports of it , but nothing real? Correct?", Liz.

"That’s right. So I suppose., to give the devil his due, it still could be out there.."

"SEE!" , Biddy, Breezy and Happy.

Liz said, "You’re not helping.", and thought, ‘I was getting to like you, maybe I still am.’ and thought again, with and inner snort, ‘better start packing’. .:.:.:.

Second Opinion

http://travel.nytimes.com/2008/01/11/travel/escapes/11crestone.html

A Fed?

Breezy is at the office door, wide eyed. She bangs on the door as she enters. "Guess what I heard?"

"What?"

"Can you two talk about this somewhere ..."

"There is a federal agent checking into the bed and breakfast."

"Which one?"

"The one downtown, Mountain Inn."

Liz asks, "Did she see a badge? Did he say he was an agent?"

"She runs a hotel. She says she can tell."

"She is a retired bookkeeper that bought the Inn two years ago. By the way have we decided how long you have to have lived here to get a share of the treasure?"

"Ten years for a full share, five for a half share and anything less a quarter share."

"The only federal agents likely to visit here are looking for UFOs."

Start of the spike

"Happy does the cleaning, splits Wednesdays between the firehouse during the afternoon and the library after they close. We’ll get her to let us in, you'll distract her and I’ll have a look at the books."

"Why don’t I get to look at the books while you distract her?"

"My dear, do you remember the xrays at the denstist office, when we had a dentist? You’re better at distractions and I’m better with details. What does it matter since we both share the details?"

Later halfway home, in the library. "Where’s Grams?"

"That’s not her name."

"Where is she?"

"Probably in the little girls’s room. Can I check my email or not?.. I just know he is going to be a match for me... Please?"

"This matchmaker service, is it free?"

"Yes, why do you ask?"
"Aehh, couldn’t possibly work. I got to finish the vacuming. Hurry up."

She’s like a pigeon on a ledge. She’s there but she’s not comfortable.

School Daze

"Volume of a Cone equals Pi x r² x h over 3 .
Pyramid V = A x h over 3.
Sphere V = 4 x Pi x r³ over 3.
Does anyone see any similarities?" The air in the classroom had been scooped out of a million yawns. The dust motes languid as the afternoon strolled on.

"Over three., that’s correct..", though no one had replied, out of the stupor induced by lunch. The door swept the worn but raised arc of the carpet as Breezy came in, her eyes wide open. Mr. Chas said, "Go ahead and put your heads down on your desks and just relax for a few minutes. He walked over to the door, stepped through and pulled it mostly too. "What’s up?"

She draws him closer, whispering, "There’s a map for the treasure, really. They’ve got it over at the library. I can’t believe it, You know how rich we’re gonna be?! I can finally get a new car, and a new wardrobe, a vacation.."

Mr Chas was hearing small giggles and rustlings, they were comatose just thirty seconds ago.
"Okay, Breezy, thanks for the news. Duty calls.."

"The principal wants to see you in his office. Like now.. I’m supposed to watch your class for you..."

"Alright, but first, I don’t want you to let them get to worked up. This is science not circus. And don’t tell them about the treasure. Let them find out at home..? Right?"
She nods and they go in to explain the change in schedule.

In the office.
The principal is standing looking out the north window looking at the peak in question. He had pulled the blinds to the ceiling, letting his words bounce off the glass. Mr Chas, who now felt the soporific of afternoon seated, he shook himself as he heard the tone, question, first part missed..
"Well? How much do you think it’s worth?"

"That would be difficult to say since we haven’t found it."

"Yet, Yet, Not Yet!" Mr Chas thought the principal sounded like a cheerleader on steroids, in a losing cause.

"Alright., not yet. Shall we cancel school until we do?"

"No, no of course not..."

"What’s the rest of it Clem?"

"Well I thought I might.. Well, I might take a few days off.. I mean if you thought you guys could get along without me..? I’ll make it up to you..."

"Alright.", is what Mr Chas said, and behind his neutral visiage, thinking, "at last a break" and I should really give poker a try.

"What do you mean alright?"

"Alright. You can make it up to me.."

The principal was headed out the door, saying, "I will, I’ll make it up to you. If my wife calls tell her I got called across the valley on district business. See ya next week."

When Mr Chas got back to his rowdy classroom the first question they asked him was, "What are you gonna buy?"

"Okay Breezy, you had better get back to the office. Somebody is going to need to monitor the phone. Alright Class! You can all hunt treasure in one hour and forty seven minutes, at three o’clock. Back to volumes..."

San Isabel Peak, aka Gibson

Sphinx kneed, renamed and rarely visited, She was invisible from town, too close to see. Most always first crowned She stood farthes west; She hid the north and the south. Without thinking it She was the headland you steered for coming across the huge valley, like a cat middle of the tree, looking out under the boughs and limbs of heaven.

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=38.066068,-105.705471&spn=0.029868,0.055876&t=p&z=14&om=0

Mallow

"What are those?", had stopped the argument, that had burst into her office and continued at her desk. Biddy and Martha stared at the hand tooled leather covers all a different shade covering the spectrum, Cordovan pastels..

"Theyare from.., my mother, she is getting on and she wanted me to have them before she passed, in case I had any questions after reading them... Family stuff.."

"Mind if I look?" Biddy started around the desk, same old arguments forgotten..

"Yes, I DO! And how dare you two just pop in here without knocking first..."

"We never knock.."

"Yes I know and I am tired of it! Back out front!" barked Liz, as she rose from her desk and herded the ladies out of her office.

Well you know how small towns are. The Too Much Time On Our Hands Detective Agency was soon full time on the case. AKA, Martha and Biddy against all others. "No she hasn't got any packages lately... I shouldn't be discussing this, postmaster have my ass..." No mail.

"An apple pie? For me?"

"Oh go on Horace! It's not like we haven't done nice things for you before..."

"When you want something."

"Shame on on you! Biddy let's go.."

"Homemade, right, crust and fillin?"

"Shame on you again! Let's go Martha.."

"Come on in.." And he swings open the screen door.

"I'm telling you, no callers, no visitors, no UPS or Fedex. She just lives across the street not down the block. Mabel on the next block, she's hard to keep track of.. This certainly is good pie. I'm just gonna slip it into some tupperware, so you can take this dish right on home.."

Out on the sidewalk, "He didn't even rinse this out." No deliveries...

Center Cross

The last way to the treasure had been a historical portal, found in a small library just outside town, due to the leaving of many people. But the clues had remained, bound in the spines of old journals. Each had a pressed flower just inside the cover; there were eleven of them.

The librarian had read them and feared the results of others doing the same. She was not tempted by gold hidden in the mountains above the dying town. She was at home here in the aisles of her little kingdom. And heaven help the town, where no consensus could be formed, that was to get a treasure map; which you had to believe in.

All this trouble in an unlikely and unexpected bequest from the matriarch of the town upon her passing three months ago. The old woman had never given away even a penny, except to the 'churchs', which she had supported in their building programs, honing the competition among the salvations. Even had everyone gone to the same service the sanctuaries would not be filled.

Anyway, Liz, had her doubts about the leather bound books on the shelf in her office. For now the rest of the collection she had categorized, labeled, and recorded in her pinched hand. She had never had so many people in to check out books and for the first time in her tenure anyway, she had a waitng list, actually dozens and dozens of waiting lists. Liz had had the sense to limit the checkout preiod using the new book rule: one week no exceptions, double fines. Years to go.

Happy Trails

It was a licensed deal. Telling a story from end to front and offering no devotions. So that you return to the point of origin. And in telling it backwards, combat the swiftness of Time, gathering our travels.

An antenna singing in the hollow desert filled with Sun and loneliness. Canyons that are galleries capped in Wind, filled with sentries that were all bayonets. Centuries come and go with precision; the religion of Spring, the mysteries, all denied here. Bloodles lizards with wise eyes and patient smiles, watch as the devils go by...

Flatness Problem

There are spots where the Earth is flat, but not many and not often.
Then there is the flatness of the universe, while a big problem, not necessarily solveable today.
It was a wild world, than a wide world, now it's a wired world. The problem with this is its fragility, and its control. How many options do you really have, I couldn't answer for myself.

The day is fast approaching when control will be out of our hands entirely. The rumors are darker than strong coffee and the money's no good...

testing again the subject

the body is here