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AAAGHH! Big black ants, hundreds of them, all over my feet and ankles!

Yes, I know. Last week I started out by squashing a black widow spider, and this week I start out with ants. It's all true, no matter how it looks. There I was, standing on a pile of dirt to get a picture of the cows you see below, when all of a sudden I was attacked. Well, sort of. I was the invader, after all, having chosen a giant (and I do mean giant) anthill to mash my Doc Marten sandals down into. And I've stepped into quite a few anthills in my day, I'll have you know, but never have I seen so many of the little devils at one time.

I brushed them off my legs by the dozens. I stamped my feet to shake them out of the insides of my sandals. I brushed them off my arms where they'd run while I was trying to get them off my ankles. Somehow, miraculously, not a one of them bit me. Oops, there went another up my leg. Where had that one come from? And then I saw that the ones I'd brushed off into the dirt were coming back for more! Deciding that the cows weren't that photogenic anyway, I turned tail and walked back to the house. I must be thousands of times bigger and heavier than any ant I've ever encountered, but there's a time to go with the flow. I still couldn't believe I hadn't been stung, either. How very, very weird, but gratifying.

What does it all mean? Darned if I know.

I know you're lucky I just erased 10 paragraphs of ranting over how I actually watched the Sopranos on HBO for the first time in my life and turned it off after 30 minutes, more sad than disgusted. This is what America watches?! In 20 of those 30 minutes I saw three loveless sex acts, four assaults, and dreary, unparalleled misogyny. All this and 13 Emmy nominations, no less. I tried to wipe the ugly memories out of my mind, but they didn't come off as easily as the ants came off my legs, and I did get stung (not hooked!). After I turned it off, I felt I understood where the fundamentalist imams of the Muslim world were coming from. Western infidels, indeed.

One man's "normal" is another's vision of hell, in other words. Personally, I've never been normal. But what I've only recently discovered is how much damage being made to feel I should be has done over the years. This is a revelation of the highest order and unspeakably liberating, once you've processed the accumulated side-effects.

The high point of my summer took place just last Friday when I hosted a reading by Rudolfo Anaya and John Nichols here in Taos. This isn't the place to go into all the details, but I will say that Anaya in particular was completely spellbinding as a "shaman of words" and revealed himself to me as an elder of a tribe I didn't really know existed but find I am a member of. He isn't normal either, but still resists the truth and rails against his fate. That's part of the package, as are the things that send you on a ride you'd just as soon not take. The BIG THING, though, is learning that it's not my fault I can't be like the rest. What's more, there's gold in them thar hills, or valleys, or maybe mine shafts. Ignore the implied warnings at your peril. For that matter, follow them at your peril. (Isn't this fun?)

But I really did spend most the weekend letting Friday soak into my bones, and that's also when I took the photos on this page. I thought you'd like to see my immediate neighborhood, a place that's actually a minor hotbed of Mac users, believe it or not. By that I mean that the people on both sides of me wouldn't use anything else. None of them are "normal" in any usual sense of the word, either, for what that's worth. Here in Taos, not that much, I expect. The last time I drove to the ATM, I had to wait to turn because a dude in full vaquero gear was riding a horse down the sidewalk. (Yes, the sidewalk, not the shoulder, but then it was rush hour, after all.)

Just down the hill from where I got ant-swarmed taking pictures of the cows (and sheep: look closely) lives a guy who drives a souped-up '58 Oldsmobile. Does he use a Mac? I really don't care, frankly, as long as he rumbles past me once in a while and lets me listen. I'll bet there's not a primer-painted '58 Olds with glasspacks just around the corner from where you live. In Maryland they'd arrest you just for thinking that you wanted one. Most people don't, I guess, which is somewhat closer to the point.

Meanwhile in a vaguely related vein, the Santa Fe Mac User Group is having me drop in to give a little speech next week (Wednesday, Sept. 3rd). My working title is: "Mac Web Madness: How I Found My Day Job, Moved to New Mexico, and Lost My Shirt." My contact person assures me that they're not a bunch of geeks and maybe that's the truth, because he also said they'd like to take me out for a bite to eat afterwards (yay!), adding that he hoped I wasn't a vegetarian. Now that sounds promising, whether it portends steak and margaritas or a green chile cheeseburger. Mmmm.

Robin Williams, who wrote The Little Mac OS X Book and a whole lot more, is part of this crowd (I think). And Denise Kusel, columnist for the Santa Fe New Mexican, is as well. Williams just might be a geek compared to me and both of them have reputations. (No doubt by the time I'm finished, I will too, haha.) And did you know that Santa Fe is called "The City Different"? That's all right, I'm going anyway, or maybe just because.

(I have some catching up to do ... )

"Grack!"

Senior Applelinks editor and columnist John H. Farr invites your emails.

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(Beautiful land for sale here: "What It Is About El Rito,")

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