Jenky Halloween Decorations from the House of Steeze

I put this crap up for the kids. I hope that my neighbors like it because it will probably stay up until Christmas.

Happy Halloween!

Jenky Halloween Decorations from the House of Steeze
by santafesteeze

email me: Teezy

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Look Everyone, I found an Asshole Boyfriend!

So every once in a while I check StatCounter and Google Analytics just for kicks and this site called Asshole  Boyfriend  showed up as a referring site (sorry mom, that really is the name of the site, and yes, I did get your email about how the dirty-talk on my blog makes me appear uneducated).

Anyway, I checked out the site and realized that although there really wasn't any reference to my blog, it was an entertaining read.

Asshole seems to be quite into Halloween and has some great posts—from creepy stories and wierd witchy-sex vids (no nudity, just seriously WTF narrative), to good music and links to funky internet finds.

One of the Halloweeny highlights was this:

I don't feel so bad about posting the video here since it is from The Onion, but there is a lot of obscure strangeness on Asshole Boyfriend to get anyone in the mood for Halloween.

Unfortunately, Asshole's blog was pulled from a Halloween countdown site by some hillbilly hate-freaks.

So, if you need to get into the mood for Halloween, check this out, and show Asshole a little of the steezy Halloween spirit.

email me:  Teezy

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How Teezy Gets All Spooky for the Kids

I have found that the best way, and, in my opinion, the most civilized way to deal with large quantities of other peoples children is to drink. So, in preparation for tomorrow nights Halloween festivities, I have decided to partake of one of my favorite seasonal libations—the apple cider martini.

The kids never seem to mind, although to them I am just another one of the creepy-olds. Sometimes I do get a little side-eye from a few of the adults. This obvious display of indignation is quite helpful actually, it enables me to determine which neighbors to be friendly with and which to avoid. I think that these side-eye neighbors are the same ones that interrupt my Saturdays in the courtyard (I have got to get a gate that locks) trying to get me to buy their religion and that magazine The Watchpost, or The Lamptower, or whatever the hell it is called. There is supposed to be no soliciting in my neighborhood but that doesn't seem to stop the hooked-on-Jesus freaks from trying to sell me their crap. Don't get me wrong, I am Christian, I just don't believe in pushing my beliefs on others. There are many paths to God.

Wait a minute, I digress and all this hate-speak is killing my buzz. Back to my martini...

One of my favorite memories of fall is drinking apple cider. I mean the real stuff, not that weird apple juice junk that a lot of the grocery stores sell in the regular juice isle. Here in New Mexico we have a locally famous orchard named Dixon's Apples that produces great apples and cider, but you can find real apple cider this time of year just about everywhere.

So I begin with my cocktail shaker:

This photo makes me sad. The longing, the abject loneliness. My cocktail shaker needs his friends and this Saturday we are having a sleep-over:

Now this is what I consider welcome house guests. Making an apple cider martini is quite simple. You will need the following:

1 jigger of Vodka

1/2 jigger of De Kuyper cinnamon liqueur (or less, you know that all that De Kuyper stuff is pretty nasty—unless you are a sixteen year old girl trying to get drunk for the first time)

2 jiggers of apple cider

Ground Cinnamon

Sugar

Fill your cocktail shaker with ice. Add the Vodka, the cinnamon liqueur and a dash of ground cinnamon. I use the cinnamon powder that comes in a jar. You can grind yours fresh if you want to be all Martha Stewart. While you are at it, why don't you sell out to Macys and turn your television show into a glorified Home Shopping Network for "Martha Stewart" shit that other people designed (blarf!).

Oops, I am getting sidetracked again...

So, you probably know the rest—shake the stuff in you cocktail shaker. Wait, I forgot, you also add the apple cider to the shaker (unfortunately you have to add the cider or you will just come across as some nasty drunk) and pour it into a martini glass that has a rim of cinnamon-sugar (you can skip the cinnamon-sugar part later in the evening when your groove becomes more important than pretension).

And Voila...

The perfect apple cider martini.

So, if you are trick-or-treating in Santa Fe tomorrow and you knock on a door and some seriously spooky dude answers with a martini glass and slurs "Havvy Halmoveen!!!" to your children with that charming look of inebriation, you have stumbled upon my house.

Please feel free to stay for a while—unless you are one of those self-righteous side-eye looking neighbors.

If you are one of the D-list neighbors, you will need to get the hell off my property and be thankful that although I did answer the door drunk, I at least had my pants on.

email me: Teezy

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Should I be Dreaming of a White Halloween?

This is what I woke up to this morning. I took the photos (above) on my way to work downtown. Just a few days ago the same spot looked like this:

I blogged about it here.

There are still leaves on the trees!

I usually get quite a few trick-or-treaters at my house so I will be feeding sugar to the kids this Saturday—hopefully their costumes will be warm because I sure as hell don't want to be giving candy to kids who are just wearing coats.

But I also don't want to give any candy to kids dressed like Michael Jackson, Kate Gosslin (sp?—I don't watch the show) or the balloon boy either.

Once when I was a kid, but too old to go trick-or-treating, I decided at the last moment that free candy was too good a deal to pass up and decided to go trick-or-treating in spite of the fact the I was significantly taller than the other "children". I improvised a costume by cutting a neck hole and two arm holes in a large green trash bag. I wore it with pride and actually received some extra candy from people who thought that I was just too poor to afford a real costume.

I learned a couple of great lessons that year:

Nothing in life is actually free, and getting most of the good stuff like candy requires that you to do something humiliating like wearing a trash bag.

And, although not always, pity can often get you some extra junk.

Live and learn...

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Early Morning Snow in my Courtyard

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Santa Fe Smells...

Piñon incense (L) and Horno burner on the mantle of my kiva fireplace (R)

Santa Fe is known for the fresh clean mountain air that our altitude (7000ft+) and our relatively small population density provides. It is a luxury that I sometimes take for granted until I have to travel to a large metropolitan area and am reminded that as Santa Feans, we are for the most part pollution-free.

That being said, Santa Fe does have unique odors that come and go with each season. Spring brings us the scent of broom, lilac and lavender. Summer the air is heavy with sweetgrass and sage, especially after a monsoon rain. Late summer and fall brings the distinctive aroma of roasting green chile.

Late fall and winter days and nights are filled with the scent of piñon.

Piñon is a pine tree that grows throughout the mountains of the southwest and is a primary component of the Santa Fe National Forest. Piñon has traditionally been used in New Mexico for building material, arts and crafts and, of course firewood in the winter. We also use the Piñon pine nuts in many New Mexico recipes.

Piñon Trees outside Santa Fe

Every year, (usually in mid October), when the evening temperatures start to dip, people begin to light their fireplaces all over town—and the wood of choice to burn is Piñon. Piñon has a distinct scent that blankets Santa Fe all winter.

Just about everyone that visits me during the winter months comments about the way Santa Fe smells.

Fortunately, if you would like to smell like Santa Fe this winter, Incense of the West has a solution. They offer many types of wood incense, including piñon.

Box of piñon incense from Incense of the West

One of the cool things about the incense is that you don't have to build a fire, although lighting piñon incense can be a little tricky.

The incense comes in small blocks (pictured at the top of this post) instead of cones or sticks and is basically compressed piñon sawdust. The block must remain in the flame until the sawdust begins to glow.

Once the incense is lit, you can place it on any surface that won't burn, but here in Santa Fe, we have special incense burners specifically for piñon.

These burners are shaped like mini hornos. Incense of the West makes a kind of cheesy rendition for the tourists, but you can find hand-made (and much nicer) horno incense burners at many of the pueblos.

My horno incense burner

My horno incense burner was a gift that I received before I moved to Santa Fe. It is made of micaceous clay and was purchased at the Taos pueblo. It is one of my favorite things because when I start to get bummed about the passing of summer, I can light a little piñon, sit back and look forward to another great Santa Fe winter—maybe this year I will learn to ski.

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First Snow in Santa Fe

Snow in the Mountains of Santa Fe

Fall is a strange time in Santa Fe. The weather is a roller coaster, fluctuating from warm and sunny to cold and rainy on a daily basis—always with a chance for snow.

I took the photos above on my way to work this morning. As I drove, I was watching the clouds roll over the tops of the mountains and saw the snow begin to fall.

As I am sitting here at my desk looking out the window, it is sunshine and blue skies, and other than a few fallen leaves on the ground, it looks like a typical summer day.

Sunny and snowy—bizarre.

Looking out my office window in Santa Fe

I am trying to look forward to winter but I am still holding on to summer.

Everything always changes...

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