Episode 15: New Mexico - “Crescit eundo”

Dear and wonderful listeners, we owe you and the state of Kentucky a correction.

A correction and an apology, I dare say.

We were joking around about the bluegrass state and its mottos and its bluegrasses and so forth.

And along the way, I may have given you the impression that I thought Kentucky was a Confederate state during the Civil War, which I did think, but I was wrong.

Obviously, there was Confederate sentiment in Kentucky and a lot of states, but it was in fact a Union state.

And I am sorry that I got that wrong.

Well, and I want to thank our wonderful listeners for thoughtfully and very kindly sending us some emails.

It was just something that slipped past because it was a complicated history, but it absolutely was a union state.

We want to get that correction in there.

And we know that those of you in Kentucky are very proud of the fact that you were a union state.

And so you deserve to have that pride and to hear this correction.

And we thank you, Nolan, Jonathan, Steve, especially.

Thank you.

And maybe more by the time this airs thank you for letting us know about that error and thank you for having some what i would term delightful email exchanges with me the delightful side was on your part so and by the way that little piece in there uh in the episode has been removed so people downloading it afresh will not be subject to the that particular line

Yay, like a Confederate statue, we have removed it.

It belongs in a podcast museum, not in the public square.

Oh my God, is there a podcast museum?

No.

Okay.

Well, you know what?

There probably is, but we're not in it yet.

We're going to get into it with this episode.

That's how confident I am about the beautiful state that we are covering this week.

Let us stop looking backwards and now look forwards to the land of enchantment.

We're moving on to New Mexico.

Hello, I'm John Hodgman.

And I'm Janet Varney.

Welcome to eBlurbus Motto, the show that celebrates the official state mottos, flags, mammals, lighter-than-air aircraft, and even state smells of every state, district, territory, and commonwealth in these, so far for now, United States.

This week we visit a neighbor of Janet Varney's home state.

Oh, we'll get to you one day, Arizona.

But not today.

Okay, that felt like a threat.

Today, Arizona.

I'm not gonna.

I'm not.

Arizona and I did not connive together to

fit its.

Well, I mean, we are already talking about it, even just by not talking about it.

We're talking about it.

Hey, hey,

not to get thee behind me, Arizona, because this episode is all about the land of enchantment, new Mexico.

And I am very excited, Janet, and I know you are as well.

You are wearing a lapel pin, even.

That's the level of excitement.

I can see, listeners, you cannot see, but I can see that Janet is wearing a lapel pin featuring a flag we will discuss at length.

But not only is New Mexico a state that I love,

I have learned today it is the only state that has an official state question.

Oh, I didn't know that.

No, you have to say, what is it?

Oh, no,

I don't need to know.

Let's just leave that.

No, no, no.

I need you to say, what is it?

Leave all of this in.

I'm the only state that has an official state question in.

I'm not knowing.

You know what I mean?

I just think I, you know what?

I'll sleep on it.

Let's meet back here.

Janet, I need you to say, what is it?

John, what is the state question of nature?

Wrong.

That's not the state question.

Damn it.

I walked right eventually into that.

You really refused to

take the hint on this dumb joke.

Because you're a person of principle.

That's right.

Thank you for seeing that.

Some people call it obstinate.

I call it principled.

The question was not, what is the state question?

But we will get to the state question, as well as the affliction.

After all that, you're not even going to tell me what it is right now.

No, because I'm a professional podcaster.

It's a tease.

My lord, this is very frustrating.

We will get into the state question as well as that official state smell.

But first, Janet, as we always discuss at the top of every episode, what do you think about when you think about New Mexico?

I have given this think some thought.

And my concern is I have so many personal thoughts about New Mexico because it is not just my my neighbor to the east

as

a native Arizona.

We're not talking about the United States.

Coming from Arizona, which is the state, again, just directly to the rest.

To the rest.

To the rest.

The rest of New Mexico.

Just directly to the right.

You've seen the best now.

Directly to the rest.

Were you going to say directly to the right?

I think I was going to say directly to the west, but I did say directly to the rest.

The question is, do I have time to eat this Taos Bakes protein bar?

Whoa, you brought a snack to the podcast recording?

Well, it's just, it's a New Mexico-based snack.

What is it?

It's called Taos Bakes.

So this is a gluten-free, soy-free, vegan bar that is absolutely delicious.

Yeah, full of THC, I betcha.

And

it comes from Taos Mountain Foods, LLC, based in, not Taos, but Cuesta, New Mexico, close by.

This is not an intoxicating snack.

It's not an intoxicating snack.

It's not what they call a snack of enchantment.

It's not a check it's not a snack of enchantment, but it is that's sort of the protein hippie protein bar world where you see it's got a little bicycle and a mountain on it, which is like that's you know, very, very rudimentary code for nature enthusiasts to go, oh, I love biking.

I love mountains and I love Taos, New Mexico.

Of course I'm gonna pick this little guy up and enjoy PB chocolate and butterscotch on my presumably respectful and loving and appreciative hike in either the New Mexico mountains or elsewhere.

I looked around at my home, John Hodgman.

This does take us back to the original question you asked me.

Not the original question about the original question.

That's not the question.

But the question about what I think about.

I looked around my home and thought, oh my, I have a lot of visual representations of New Mexico, even down to a protein bar, because I do love the state rate.

How much, can I ask, this is not the state question, but this is a personal question.

How much money is this company giving you?

Talk about this bar?

To be honest with you, I've only eaten one before in my life.

Oh, okay.

It just, but it was quite literally sitting on the counter.

You got it.

It was just, you just have New Mexico lying around your life because you love it.

And I looked around and then I said, oh, let me put my lapel pin on, which I usually keep on my little winter kind of hunting hat.

Not that I'm a hunter, but my ears get cold.

So I just, I feel like I'm going to need to do more of a sprinkle.

I don't want to mess up the presentation because there was a lot I do not know about New Mexico, but I feel more like maybe I should sort of try to sprinkle and integrate some of my New Mexico experiences and feelings

where it feels appropriate.

Again, without derailing you, by the way, there are a lot of

great and beautiful, great, great and beautiful old railroads.

Yeah, that's right.

Rails to trails.

The Santa Fe, Topeka, and the, what is it?

The Atchison Topeka and the the Santa Fe.

The Santa Fe.

Yeah, there we go.

So we'll see.

We'll see how this all shakes out.

But I'm excited.

This is a state I love.

This is a state I have spent a fair amount of time in, certainly when I was a child, for reasons that will become clear.

But I have.

Now, now who's the podcast teaser?

I know.

I'll just use this as an example.

When I say I have a lot of

New Mexico representation in my home, part of it is because back in 2011, my friend Jessica and I put together a sort of immersive art exhibition at Tin Lark Gallery here in Los Angeles on Sunset Boulevard.

We had this idea while we were traveling together that we wanted to do some kind of like you can sort of you can buy everything that is there, but it almost feels like you're being immersed into someone's

home or this sort of like

a place that has a very specific flavor.

And we knew all these artists and were fans of a bunch of artists and said, let's come up with a sort of theme.

So the theme.

Are you Meow Wolf?

I kind of am Meow Wolf.

Meow Wolf before Meow Wolf?

Yeah, I'm not sure.

Actually, I'm not sure when the first Meow Wolf created in Santa Fe, New Mexico in an old bowling alley.

I'm not sure when it was founded, but this was 2011.

I think it was somewhere around then.

It was.

It was definitely after that.

Oh, well, then we preceded it.

We preceded it.

I was in Santa Fe when it was, when it before it, before it officially opened.

Oh, well, there you go.

So, oh, no, I'm sorry.

This is 2010.

I apologize.

September 17th through

25th, 2010, at the Tinlark Gallery, Fleeting Immersion, a pop-up installation and concept shop celebrating art, handmade, vintage, and more.

Inaugural theme.

Guess how many we did after this?

That's right.

Zero.

It was a lot of work.

Santa Fe Astronaut.

So the idea was that we were sort of taking Retro Future and the Southwest, because we're both from Arizona, but we love New Mexico more.

And incorporated it, and we had all of these different artists

create out from Arizona, the state directly to the rest of Santa Fe.

Santa Fe, not even New Mexico.

All of these different artists and

curated.

A bunch of original artwork and hung it and then also did consignment with a really great mid-century modern warehouse that's here and created a whole house inside this gallery.

And the house belonged to this santa fe astronaut character so there was like an astronaut suit hanging on a coat rack and

whoa it was a whole thing well a house we'll post some pictures on social media we'll put i'll post pictures on social media all right so for those of you who didn't know what we were talking about before meow wolf is an arts collective that began in santa fe

um doing these huge immersive art

installations basically that are fun they're like a game there's a story that you follow and indeed in that bowling alley the meow wolf first did their meow wolf in.

Yeah.

They built a house inside the bowling alley.

They did.

I don't want to say that they ripped you off here, Janet, but come on.

Well, they did a really good job by scaling up because

I love meow.

We'll post some.

Well, I do too.

I've been to all of them except for the one that just opened in Houston, which I got to get to.

I've only ever been to the one in Santa Fe and I've only ever been to the one in Denver.

I love the one in Denver.

That's my favorite.

Yeah.

If you don't know what we're talking about, it's impossible to explain.

Just go check it out.

And also, we shouldn't explain it to you because you don't want to know anything going in all i think the less you know the better is that it was janet's original idea

i guess it i guess it was not intentional uh but there it is um and oh yeah we'll post some pictures of the we have a bunch of pictures from the installation uh that we can post on our social media so if you're curious you can see that but because of that i have things like this poster that i was holding up uh you guys didn't see but that was what i was reading from um it's an astronaut standing uh on some sort of southwestern turf with beautiful mountains in the background and a New Mexico flag planted as if it's a planet that this astronaut was visiting.

Have you ever go to Double Take Consignment Shop in Santa Fe?

I'm sure I've been there, but I don't know it by name.

It's a very, very big compound of vintage clothes.

Oh, okay.

Yep.

And then

there's sort of a more goodwill store

section of sort of like...

housewares that people are getting rid of.

And then there's high-end, as you can imagine, turquoise jewelry,

beautiful Navajo rugs.

Yeah, very nice collection of bake light.

Yes, yes, I know exactly what you're talking about.

I was there, and I happened to be there at the same time Patty Smith was there.

Oh, how cool.

The famous singer, songwriter, author, Patty Smith,

the muse of Robert Maplethorpe, and the world.

Yeah.

So, and I, and I stepped out to find a public restroom.

And when I came back, I discovered sitting outside Double Take, they had arrayed a bunch of old furniture that was for sale.

A lot of like 50s-era dinette sets.

Yeah, what would go with Bakelite?

Yeah.

And as the sun was setting, Patty Smith was sitting by herself at this 50s dinette set,

just kind of staring into the middle distance.

And I said, Patty,

could I call you a cab or something?

Like, everything okay?

She said, I'm just sitting here.

And I've forever in my life tried to channel that Patty Smith energy

of being perfectly comfortable sitting in silence.

Yeah.

Just sitting here.

There's no reason.

I'm not going anywhere.

I'm not coming from anywhere.

When it's time for me to move on, I will take care of myself.

But right now, sitting here, obviously not on a phone or even reading a book.

Just sitting here.

Loved it.

That's what I think about when I think about Santa Fe.

That's a great story.

It's a great story.

I don't get wrapped up in all these stories about how Meow Wolf ripped me off.

I'm clearly very upset about it, having just found out that that happened as a fan of Meow Wolf.

They call it the land of enchantment because someone decided that's what they should call it once.

But it is very enchanting.

It's a magical place.

It's very enchanting.

It is.

And I've only been, you know, I've been to Santa Fe.

I've been to a couple of other spots.

Not as much as I'd like.

I would like to go back.

But look, we're here because this is E-Player of his motto.

Let's get to the boring stuff.

Oh, good.

Janet, do you happen to know the motto of New Mexico?

I don't, unless it's, we are the land of enchantment.

Is that not that?

It's not that.

Okay.

It is

a Latin motto.

Okay.

Crescent undo.

Crescent undo.

Crescent.

Dead language.

I don't know how you pronounce it.

C-R-E-S-C-I-T space, second word.

E-U-N-D-O.

And it translates to it grows as it goes.

Oh, that is groovy as hell.

That might as well be on the back of this protein bar.

It might as well be, if it's yellow, let it mellow.

Mellow yellow is not a state slogan.

Take a penny, leave a penny.

But I mean, it sounds like something you might see on a dorm room poster circa 1975.

Yeah.

Right next to a groovy poster that says, everybody is somebody, which is in fact the state slogan of New Mexico since 1975.

And just have a nice day with a smiley face.

But even though it sounds like it comes from the hippie-dippy 60s, it doesn't.

I interrupted you.

You were going to say something?

No, it's okay.

I just, I'm, UENO feels like it's the second half of innuendo.

So I was just curious, like, how, do you know what I mean?

Like, I don't know.

I'm not a Latin person.

You can let us know at email pluribusmato at maximumfund.org.

But it translates to it grows as it goes, and it is not from the hippie-dippy 60s or 70s.

It is from somewhere between 99 and 55 BC.

Oh, my.

Because it comes direct from that famous Roman poet, Lucretius.

Oh.

Specifically, his philosophical poem, De Rirum Natura on the Nature of Things.

And in that poem, he uses the term cresset

undo.

to refer to how a thunderbolt, a bolt of lightning, increases in power as it crosses the sky, which I'm not really sure how that's how bolts of lightning work.

Well, it was a lot of fun.

That's a little fast.

It's not like it's not a slow burn.

But anyway, that's what Wikipedia says, that it translates to.

But more apt, perhaps, than these two words is the fact that it does come from this poem, De Re Rum Natura.

It's a long philosophical poem on the nature of things.

And it's his best-known poem.

But if you were to guess, Janet, how many poems did Lucretius write?

I'm going to say that.

He lived from 99 BC to 55 BC.

Okay.

So he was a young man when he died.

I'm going to guess

99 poems.

No, one this long.

Is it as long as 99 short poems?

He had 99 poems, but this was the only one.

No.

Yeah, he only wrote the one.

It was unum et factum for Lucretius, one and done.

Oh, well done.

Oh, please remember that for when we say what our motto is.

But believe me, I'm not going to be able to do that.

No, we are not one and done.

If you are going to tell you, but if you're going to write one long poem about philosophy,

De Rhrum is a banger.

And the goal of the poem is to introduce Roman audiences to the Greek philosophy of Epicurus, Epicureanism.

And Epicurus, who lived much earlier on in even more ancient Greece,

that the purpose of life is to seek pleasure and happiness without worrying too much about the favor or wrath of the gods, which is what a lot of people were worried about a lot of the time.

Because according to Epicurus, the world is material and governed by natural laws.

And if gods actually exist, they are too busy partying on Olympus to give a flying Hermes foot about us.

And so we should emulate those party gods and pursue, whatever possible,

two states of being at the same time.

One is ataraxia,

which is tranquility and absence of fear, and aponia,

which is tranquility and absence of bodily pain.

And as someone who just turned 54 yesterday, I can say,

there's no chance I'm going to get aponia, but I'm still working on ataraxia.

Same, same, same.

Yeah, so is this sort of an eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die kind of thing?

Or is it not hedonistic per se in the sense that I think when we talk about hedonism, we talk about people think about extremes, but this isn't about extremes.

This is just about like, hey, stop worrying about what's going on outside of your purview and just be in the moment and enjoy what's lovely in the world.

Based on the mental

research that I did into Epicureanism.

And of course, you know, when you speak in contemporary phraseology about an epicure, you're talking about someone who likes to eat good food.

Right.

And it is technically a hedonist philosophy in that it is involved in self-pleasure, but it is not involved in, let's say, pleasuring oneself.

It is more involved.

It is more about being tranquil

and free from fear.

And it is based in a very early form of humanism and religious skepticism that didn't really exist.

Like, no, the world is made.

I mean, you know, basically

Epicurus rather posited an...

what's called an atomist theory, which is that the world is made up of physical particles, not supernatural stuff.

Yeah.

And it is governed, as I say, by natural laws.

And there are,

he did believe in gods, but he didn't believe that they had their divine thumbs on any scales.

They truly were.

It was more of a deist philosophy where the gods are like, we don't care.

You do your thing.

And so this religiously skeptical and very humanist sort of free-to-be, you and me mindset is,

you know, forget about this bad thunderbolt metaphor, crested UENO or whatever.

This whole poem is pretty appropriate for New Mexico because, as you know, during the 20th century and now into the 21st, particularly Santa Fe and New Mexico emerged as a haven for artists like George O'Keefe and Meow Wolf and activists like the suffragist and Hispanic American folklorist Aurora Lucera White Lee, authors,

Cormac McCarthy, Tony Hillerman, George R.

R.

Martin, pizza-loving hedonists, again, George R.

R.

Martin, among countless other free thinkers, oddballs, and hot air balloonists.

Wonderful.

And here's a little bit of history, because of course, New Mexico is older than the 20th century.

The earliest residents of what is now New Mexico are the ancestral Pueblo people, as well as the ancestors of the Utes, plus later migrations of Navajo and Apache people in the 15th century.

And then the region became part of the Comancheria, which is the vast territory of Comanche influence in the 18th century.

Now, by the 18th century, of course, the region was also, shall we say, influenced by Spanish invasion and colonization.

After conquering the Aztec lands to the south, Spanish missionaries and conquerors headed north.

They were searching up in the New Mexico region for the fabled seven cities of gold.

Spoiler, I guess, did not find seven cities of gold.

They did find one city of turquoise and hatched chilies,

which they called La Villa Real de la Santa Fe de San Francisco de Assis,

now known as that state capital, Santa Fe, 1610.

Most elevated state capital in the United States.

That surprises me.

And I love being up in that high desert, but

it did not occur to me that that would be the highest elevation.

Almost 7,000 feet up there.

Yeah, it's the air is a little bit,

when I go up there, I tend to forget because it is, it doesn't look like a place where you would expect a high elevation.

And this is coming from someone who lived in Flatstaff for.

Oh, you got St.

Bernard's running around with whiskey barrels.

Well, that's right.

That's right.

And I lived, I went to school for my first three and a half years in Flagstaff, Arizona, which is also 7,000 feet.

And you are looking at snow-capped peaks.

You are living amongst pines.

So you feel like, oh, yes, I'm in the mountains, of course.

And you don't necessarily feel that in Santa Fe.

So I always over, and I do love hiking and cycling and stuff like that.

And so whenever I go to Santa Fe, I always overdo it and then wonder why I'm so incredibly winded and lightheaded.

And I never drink alcohol when I'm in Santa Fe because I see what happens to my friends when they drink whatever normal amount they drink.

Okay, great.

Perfect.

As a person, as an Epicurean, who's been carting around a pair of asthmatic lungs since birth.

Yeah.

The American Southwest giveth.

Tucson is the place in your home state of Arizona.

We're not talking about it.

Tucson is a place where I've breathed the best in my life.

My hometown.

But then it also taketh away because you go up to 7,000 feet, you better be packing an inhaler with you.

That's true.

That's true.

Spanish rule in New Mexico was interrupted briefly by the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, led by the charismatic Tewa Pueblo religious leader Pope.

You can see his statue.

He's the only Native American statue in the Capitol Statuary Gallery.

and the only statue by a Native American sculptor whose name is Cliff Fragua.

I don't know if I'm pronouncing that correctly, F-R-A-G-U-A.

Thank you, Cliff.

It's a beautiful statue.

Pope was a religious leader, and he led an indigenous alliance, not just Pueblo people, but mostly, to kick the Spanish out of Santa Fe in 1680.

It was the first successful anti-colonial rebellion in the Western hemisphere.

Take that, American Revolution.

Yes, indeed.

Pope, upon capturing Santa Fe, said, the God of the Christians is dead.

And then he goes on to say, he was made of rotten wood.

Oh, sick burn.

I love it.

But then he died eight years later.

But they kept the Spanish out for another four years.

For 12 years, the Spanish were out of power in New Mexico.

That's phenomenal.

Pretty extremely.

Yeah, that's wonderful.

And, you know, hopefully he died, even if he died just eight years later.

That's a person who can probably die feeling like they did something important and worthy and in service of his community.

Yeah, that's how I want to go, kicking out the colonial government of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Yeah, good luck.

Santa Fe eventually was retaken by the Spanish, but after the rebellion, relations between the Pueblos and the Spanish invaders were changed forever.

The encomenienda was, the forced labor was prohibited.

Pueblo religious ceremonies that used to be persecuted were no longer persecuted.

And in general, you know, obviously with tension and friction of all kinds, but over time, the syncretic, indigenous, Hispanic, and later Anglo-culture developed in New Mexico that is somewhat unique to New Mexico, to the point that New Mexico's magazine, which is the magazine of New Mexico, has for decades run a feature in the back called One of Our 50 is Missing, in which readers supply endless, endless anecdotes.

It's going on for decades

of dealing with people who don't understand that New Mexico is in the United States.

So, what?

Oh, yeah.

Oh, my.

Oh, my rotten wood.

Yeah, I won't give an example because I don't have one here and we don't have time, but it's just like

this is like, yeah, I went to the train station to buy a ticket to Albuquerque and they're like, do you have a passport?

Like, people just don't know.

Because we live in a country where it's like, well, Mexico's in the name, so it's got to be.

Oh, that's that gives me chagrin.

New Mexico is older than old Mexico, at least name-wise.

New Mexico was named New Mexico in the 16th century by the Spanish after the

Jica people in the Mexico Valley in the south.

But Mexico as a nation wouldn't take that name until it gained independence in 1821.

And at that point, New Mexico was part of the Mexican Empire of independent Mexico.

It was granted autonomy within the quote-unquote Mexican Empire, but that autonomy was tested again and again.

And culturally and politically and economically, it was already divided from old, you know, Mexico, what we call Mexico now.

Yeah, we don't call it old Mexico, just in case anyone.

No, I don't call it old Mexico.

I'm just.

Santa Fe, in particular, became quite cosmopolitan because it was an important stop along the Santa Fe Trail, the East-West Trade Route, bringing a lot of different settlers from all over the country.

That obviously increased once the railroad came in.

After the Mexican-American War ended in 1848, New Mexico was claimed by three different countries.

Everybody wanted a piece.

Can you guess what countries wanted New Mexico for themselves?

I'll give you a hint.

None of them are countries anymore.

Oh,

okay.

Then help me.

Republic of Texas.

Oh, boy.

The Republic of California.

Oh, sure.

And the state of Deseret.

Oh, Deseret.

But the Fed stepped in and said, no, you can't have it.

New Mexico would more or less keep its territory as it is now under a compromise in 1850 in which all three of these countries gave up their claim.

And in return, the Republic of California would become a state.

And in return, the state of Deseret would become a territory called Utah.

Correct.

And Texas got $10 million.

Really?

Yep.

Paid them right off.

They were like, we don't want to tangle with Texas.

Don't mess with Texas.

Right.

New Mexico itself would become a state finally in 1912.

It had been eligible for 60 years.

But because of its large Hispanic and native populations, it was considered to be too alien by some in Washington, D.C.

to admit to the good old bigoted USA.

But that changed in World War I when some 17,000 of those non-white New Mexicans volunteered to fight in World War I.

And basically, the U.S.

was shamed into admitting New Mexico as a state.

It was the 47th state to be admitted behind only Hawaii, Alaska, and can you name the third?

Do you want me to?

Because my understanding is that we are not discussing that state.

Go ahead and say it.

Arizona.

Arizona.

But we're not talking about that.

Damn.

Geez.

Okay.

Instead, let's talk about the shape of this state.

Okay.

Janet, look at this state, New Mexico.

Yeah.

It's got Colorado to the north, a little bit of Oklahoma, Panhandle to the east, mostly Texas to the east and southeast.

It's got

Mexico to the southwest.

And then to the west,

over there to the rest of New Mexico, you find.

that's going to catch on.

Just you wait.

Arizona.

Yeah.

And what does it look like to you?

Well, Hodgman, this might be the only time that I can ever do this.

But I am going to say that New Mexico to me looks like this plate in the shape of New Mexico that was made for cleaning immersion, Santa Fe Astronaut.

I commissioned an artist.

Oh my God, I wish I could remember her name.

She, of course, did not sign it.

I commissioned an artist to create the Four Corner States in plate form yeah it's got a little round backing handmade pottery hand thrown uh and it looks a lot like the state of new mexico that's right so that is what it looks like

yeah it's a square basically yeah there's a little jog down in the in the yeah in the southwest corner And a little nubbin up by the four corners.

Oh, just the tiniest little nubbin.

A little tiny nubbin.

And by the four corners, though, I mean, this is, we're getting some pretty boring state shapes at this point because once they were mapping out these territories, they were basically those grid marks.

Right.

They're squares, but that allows us to have

what you call the four corners.

What are the four corners?

The four corners,

and I now kind of wish I wouldn't have said it because I could have surprised everyone by saying that the state of Utah, the state of New Mexico, and the state of Colorado also look like plates I have.

When we get to them, hopefully everyone will just forget.

Is

this perfect crossing where you can go and stand

if you like?

If you want to get down and do kind of Twister style, the game Twister, you can put a hand in one state, a hand in another state, a foot in one state, and a foot in the other state, and be in four states at once.

Twister, of course, is being invented in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

Shut the front door.

I shall because I'm lying.

Oh, that's cool.

But that is the cool.

What if the Four Corners is what incepted Twister?

Like, wait a minute, this could be a game.

Las Cruces is the hometown of my writing teacher, the late and beloved Lee K.

Abbott, who was a New Mexican himself.

But the Four Corners, yes, it's, I think, the only place in the United States

where you can stand in four states at once because they all meet in four corners.

Yeah.

Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico to go around the clock counterclockwise.

And yet it is under the jurisdiction.

of six different governments.

The states of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah, as well as the tribal governments of the Navajo Nation and the Ute

mountain Ute tribe.

Yeah.

Because we're in a part of the world now where Native life is much more entwined with everyday life of Americans than, let's say, it is in Maine.

Well, I mean, we do, I think.

For sure.

We do have Native Americans in Maine, of course.

But the Navajo Nation, I think people at this point mostly know that the Navajo Nation is vast.

It is a huge swath of land.

And

rest assured, that doesn't mean that they have infinite resources or that they're taking care of it any way, shape, or form by the federal government.

But in fact, even less so now, as of just a few weeks ago.

Less so now than ever.

Maybe not ever, but certainly less so now than before some funding got cut for a lot of different stuff that matters.

Yeah, and by the way, I don't mean to erase the Native Americans in Maine.

Shout out to the Wabanaki Confederacy,

specifically the Penobscots, the Passamaquoddies, the Maliseets, the Mi'kmaq's and the Abenaki.

But

the Four Corners also

is a very important supply of helium.

Did you know that?

Helium is incredibly rare.

That's a big deal.

Is that why there's so many hot air balloons in, I'm sorry, but Arizona and New Mexico?

I don't think that they fill them up with helium.

I was wondering about that myself.

I think they just heat up the air.

Oh, yeah, it's just hot air.

I guess I don't know much about it.

I guess I'm full of hot air.

Apparently, the Four Corners region is noted for its abundance of high-grade green helium.

Don't know what that is?

Green helium.

You can look it up.

And of course, it was featured in episode four, season six of that great saga of Albuquerque Breaking Bad, the episode called Cornered.

Shout out to Albuquerque.

You don't get a lot of love.

Some people just sort of graze past you quickly and on their way to Santa Fe.

It is certainly a lower altitude

area.

So it's more deserty.

It gets hotter.

It is sort of a sister city to Tucson, Arizona, the state that I come from, Arizona, just to the rest of Missouri.

Oh, gosh, I keep bringing it up for some reason.

But I have a love of Albuquerque as well.

And, you know, it's one of those desert cities where I think people who aren't fans of the desert, who are just, who think of it as being kind of on the way to somewhere else, like you would go through Albuquerque or skirt Albuquerque if you're making a drive somewhere in Texas to somewhere in Texas.

Which, by the way, don't complain about Albuquerque when you have just days of desolate nothing in Texas if you're driving towards a city there.

Days of desolate nothing is the official state motto of Texas.

See?

Oh, I can't wait to get there.

Don't mess with it.

But I, but it reminds me of Tucson in that there's, yeah,

it doesn't come off as a wealthy city.

You might see a lot of strip malls.

You might see some neighborhoods with some broken down cars in the front yard.

It's everywhere.

But, like, I love it.

So, and it's wonderful and it's beautiful and it has its own enchantments.

So, I do want to shout out Albuquerque and many, many other places in New Mexico, including places that used to be thriving towns, but are now simply ghost towns.

You've spent time

more than I have.

Do they say in Albuquerque, Albuquerque is Albuquerque?

Moving on.

One thing that is rectangular,

just like the shape of the state, but is not boring, is the state flag.

Janet,

what's your guess?

New Mexico state flag, number one, yes or no?

Of all the flags we've seen or will see?

Sure.

I mean, it's possible.

I love this flag so very much.

I'll tell you what, we'll decide after the break.

Keep listening to E Plurbis Motto when we come back.

The state flag.

Hi, so I'm from northern New Mexico and while I don't have a very strong accent, there's certain words where I really have a New Mexican accent.

And in particular, that's where the I's turn into E's.

So words like pillow

or milk in particular,

I have a story where my

I had some friends from the Netherlands and I was trying to explain to them how to pronounce the word milk.

And I said, oh, it doesn't rhyme with silk.

It rhymes with elk.

And obviously, that's not correct for most of the United States, but it is for a lot of places in New Mexico.

So yeah,

I's turn into E's.

Pillow.

Milk.

That's it.

Bye.

All right, we're over 70 episodes into our show.

Let's learn everything.

So let's do a quick progress check.

Have we learned about quantum physics?

Yes, episode 59.

We haven't learned about the history of gossip yet, have we?

Yes, we have.

Same episode, actually.

Have we talked to Tom Scott about his love of roller coasters?

Episode 64.

So, how close are we to learning everything?

Bad news.

We still haven't learned everything yet.

Oh, we're ruined!

No, no, no, it's good news as well.

There is still a lot to learn.

Woo!

I'm Dr.

Ella Hubber.

I'm regular Tom Lum.

I'm Caroline Roper, and on Let's Learn Everything, we learn about science and a bit of everything else too.

And although we haven't learned everything yet, I've got a pretty good feeling about this next episode.

Join us every other Thursday on Maximum Fun.

Welcome back to Eplurvis Motto.

I'm Janet Varney.

Yeah, I'm John Hodgman.

We're talking about New Mexico.

And Janet Varney's got some kind of like a flea market going on in her house of New Mexico-themed items.

You had mentioned ghost tables.

You wish I were going to get rid of any of this.

You wish I were.

It's all part of your large-scale art installation.

It is.

It is.

I'm a little bit a Santa Fe astronaut myself now.

But before we talk more about the flag, I just wanted to, because I just realized randomly, I just happened to extemporaneously mention ghost towns right before we went to our break.

Yeah, I noticed that.

I was like, how extemporaneous?

Yeah.

I want to give a little more love to it.

And if I just had to speak off the cuff, without reading, just speaking right off the cuff, this is coming straight from a Varney's brain.

I would say the ghosts of northern New Mexico are a diverse lot.

They run the gamut from remnants of lost civilizations to once prosperous gold mining towns nestled against snow-covered peaks and Spanish colonial outposts in desert sands, with numerous quaint, centuries-old villages, pueblos that are even older, and colonial settlements that are now cities in between.

Add some of the most beautiful and breathtaking scenery in the country, and hunting for ghost towns easily becomes a series of unforgettable vacations.

It is also an excellent introduction to discover why New Mexico is known as the land of enchantment.

Now, that's again, just right off the top of my head.

Just right off the top of my head.

I said it came right out of a Varney's brain.

Oh, it came out of my dad, Philip Varney's brain.

Oh,

your dad wrote a book?

My dad has written many books about ghost towns and mining camps.

Janet, I had no idea about this part of your personal history.

Did I have?

I never brought this up.

Oh, my lord.

I can't believe I've left this to.

If you have,

I forgot or I wasn't paying attention.

So far,

we have not hit a state that my dad has written a book about, but New Mexico is certainly one.

So what I was looking for before we started recording was his New Mexico's best ghost towns book, which is now out of print.

And I feel that I lent it to someone.

And obviously, I'm sure my dad has a copy for me, but and I haven't, and I don't have it.

So instead, I pulled his Ghost Towns of the West book, which is sort of a compendium of...

It's not state-specific.

It's not state-specific.

So

this book contains information about California, Nevada, Idaho, Washington, Arizona, Montana, Oregon, New Mexico, Wyoming, Utah, and Colorado.

Wow.

So chapter 10 is New Mexico.

And there is a favorite ghost town.

I have a favorite ghost town.

So when I was little, my dad was writing this book, and I would go with him on all these road trips to New Mexico to write.

And what he did was create these kind of practical guides to seeing these ghost towns and being respectful towards the environment and being mindful and not going and like, I'm going to take this old rusty cup that I found so that gradually there's nothing left for anyone else to discover or see.

Very mindful and very stern about that kind of thing.

But there, my favorite ghost town that I've been to in New Mexico.

You're saying your father's not a grave robber?

He's not a grave robber, is called Shakespeare, New Mexico.

And it was,

Shakespeare was home to mining silver, gold, diamonds, and rubies.

And this is back in 1868.

But long story short, when I visited Shakespeare,

it was being looked over by a woman and her daughter,

Rita and her daughter, Janalu Hill.

And

she was a ballerina in New York.

She like had this extraordinary life.

My dream is to like make a movie about Janalu.

Just a super cool, like,

you're a dynamite.

You better be careful because Meow Wolf might be listening to this.

They'll steal you.

Oh, no, you're still nice from you too.

They'll take us there.

They'll take us there.

I love you, Meow Wolf.

I'm just joking.

Yeah, we love you, Meow Wolf.

But also, make sure you're paying your artists enough.

Anyway, so anyway, this was

a very cool ghost town that for many, many, many, many years was taken care of by this family.

And Jana Lou was, she wore kind of pioneer type clothing and like had to carry a shot, you know, had a shotgun on hand in case somebody was coming to loot or pillage or set fire to the little town of Shakespeare.

And she has since passed away, but just a very cool, lot of really cool places that have been cared for and preserved by people who are keeping it from being demolished.

And that's true of many ghost towns in the American West.

But shout out to Shakespeare, New Mexico.

So there are people who are guarding these ghost towns from looting and pillaging.

Yeah, I mean, their property, they sort of own the property, but instead of developing it or doing anything like that, they preserve the history of it.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah, but she was such a cool lady.

I got a chance to spend time with her, and I kind of wanted to be her when I grew up for a while because she's so cool.

Well, you know what?

You're not grown up yet.

You still can do it.

Yeah.

And I'm a long way towards Apollonian and Apoprixia or whatever those terms were.

Apollonia and the Vanity 3, I think is what it is.

That's correct.

You know, two different bands.

So, but where can people get your dad's books?

I think if you just look online, you can straight up order them.

Tell me his name, Dad.

Philip Varney.

Philip.

One L.

Varney.

H-I-L-I-P.

My dad's the coolest.

Yeah, that's very cool to have a dad who write books about ghost towns.

It's one of the daddest things there could be.

I know.

So I'm going to name a date to you, and I'm going to ask you what you think of when you hear this date.

Okay.

March 19.

Two days days after St.

Patrick's Day, a holiday I could care less about.

Nope.

Couldn't care less about.

Four days after the Ides of March.

It's Idesis.

Four days after the IDEDS.

You guys partying for four days after Ides?

No.

If you're like me, you probably think about the birthday of Matthew Raymond Harry, aka the Swiss American rapper Young Gravy.

But

did you know?

March 19th is also the birthday of the flag of New Mexico?

Happy birthday birthday a couple months ago.

A couple months ago, it turned 100 years old.

It was adopted in 1990.

I bet they had such a cool 25.

And I'm going to tell you right now,

I'm not going to podcast to ease this.

Okay.

This is the number one flag.

Okay.

This is it.

Number one.

Great.

Listeners, pull over in your cars.

Stop walking on that treadmill or that stair master.

Yeah.

So you can safely get a look at this beauty, call it up, look at this beautiful flag.

Yeah.

Now, you want to describe what we're looking at here?

Okay, so this is a beautiful, like the color of yellow that you just really love.

It's rich.

It's ochrey.

Don't tell me the yellow I really love.

No, I'm going to.

If it's the number one flag, I am telling you everyone loves this color of yellow.

I mean, if it's mellow, then I do let it yellow.

You know what I mean?

No, I mean, if it's me.

Let it yellow.

Let it yellow.

Let that flag yellow and yellow some more.

No, I guess if it's an old newspaper that I consider to be mellow, I will let that yellow.

Okay.

Stupid.

But if it's a bowl of my urine, I will let that mellow.

But this is not a urine-colored flag.

No, it's just a rich golden.

It's beautiful.

I love it.

I love the, I mean, it's just, if you're a person that's into color or color theory, I am not in any way like a painter or anything like that.

But I just have to imagine that this is one of those like just beautiful prime yellows that everyone would want to use.

You love it.

You all love it, right?

In the middle of it, this beautiful

beautiful open red circle

that has

four lines of varying lengths, two longer in the middle, two shorter on the sides, creating,

I would say, I guess a cross shape.

But

so you've got up, down, and side to side.

And

that's it, guys.

That's it.

It's very simple.

It is technically

a cross shape, but it is not a Christian cross.

Yeah, for sure I want that to be very clear.

This is the Zia banner.

And that symbol is the sacred sun symbol of the Zia Pueblo people.

Yes.

It is a red symbol on a field of gold, the red and gold being a nod to the Spanish heritage of the state.

And the symbol is dominated by the number four.

There are four sets of four rays.

emanating from that central shining circle, aka the sun.

And in Zia culture, the number four is very meaningful.

It represents the four points of the compass, north, south, east, and rest, I guess is the one we're talking about, right?

Correct.

Four seasons of the year, spring, summer, autumn, winter, four periods of the day, morning, noon, evening, and night, the four seasons of life, childhood, youth, middle years, and old age, and the four sacred obligations that one must develop a strong body, a clear mind, a pure spirit, and a devotion to the welfare of others.

This flag.

Perfect.

It is getting better and better.

Yeah, it's a perfect flag.

This flag is one of only two to feature indigenous iconography in the United States.

The other we will get to eventually.

That's in Oklahoma.

But the fact that the Zia sun symbol is used on the flag is not without some controversy.

So for 13 years

after the state was founded, there had been no official state flag at all.

A rough draft had been cobbled together for display at the San Diego World's Fair of 1915.

And if you want to look at it now, Janet, you will agree with me.

It is hilarious.

Oh, no.

It's like a terrible,

like

pre-Photoshop.

It's a lovely.

It looks like one of the early websites where you just look at everything and you're like, what a hot mess.

Like, oh, no.

I hope we get better at this than that.

It was designed by the third mayor of Santa Fe.

Oh, it's so bad.

And I, you know, this guy was doing his best.

He's got a fucking.

Joe.

It looks like a joke.

It's a joke flag.

Why don't you describe it while I look up this poor guy's name again?

Because I forgot it.

Okay.

Well, normally I don't mind this color that I will call, as a compliment to this flag, I will call this color gunmetal gray

with a pinch of blue in it.

But this is a don't, this is not a gray that you need on a flag, especially not when you tuck a United States flag up in the upper left corner,

And then you have a

across the gray in the center is the word New Mexico, which is

a different font size.

It's a different font size.

I think it's shrinking down.

Like the new is bigger than the Mexico, but the O in the Mexico is smaller than the M in Mexico.

Then in a totally different font,

up in the upper right-hand corner, there's a 47.

Which, by the way, is a number that is very triggering to me these days.

I don't like seeing it, but it's in reference to the 47th state.

And then down below, and it's not a huge photo, but I can see that it says the sunshine state, which is false.

And then it looks like maybe like the image that's on the back of an original quarter or something.

I can't really see that.

It looks like a snake and an eagle.

Yeah, that's the state seal.

And it's the current state seal still.

And the state seal.

is fine.

I'm a little over state seals, to be honest with you, but this was notable for including both the American bald eagle, as well as the golden and or

quote-unquote Mexican eagle, okay, holding a serpent in its mouth, which is a standard of Mexican Aztec iconography.

So, you know, again, it's a multicultural seal.

And then the seal is surrounded, as you say, by the words the sunset, the sunshine state, which is Florida.

I don't know how that got in there.

Yeah.

Obviously.

Insane.

This is a prank.

It looks like a prank.

This was not.

Look, and look,

Good Work, Ralph Emerson Twitchell.

Third.

I mean, it looks Twitchell, Twitchell made something that looks more modern than you would think.

So if it's a World's Fair and it's all about celebrating the future of the world and modernism and invention, good job.

You anticipated the rudimentary invention of early awful websites when you created that.

Look, Twitchell was an attorney, a historian, the third mayor of Santa Fe.

He wasn't a graphic designer, but he did.

No, he wasn't.

He had to put something up there at that San Diego World's Fair.

So in 1923, the state had a contest.

Anyone could submit a design for a new flag.

And Harry Mira of Santa Fe, who was a physician and an archaeologist, apparently, he had seen the Zia Pueblo sun symbol on some early Zia pottery.

And he, well, appropriated it.

as his and his wife Reba's winning submission.

He designed it.

She sewed it.

They won.

It's a beautiful flag.

It was not until 2012 that New Mexico finally acknowledged the Zia people were not fans necessarily of having their thing just.

Of course, I understand.

That was, but there's a difference between, I don't know.

I'm not going to, I don't want to get into a whole debate about this because I certainly don't disagree.

But, you know, there have been a lot of times where people who, and I don't know these people.

I don't know the, what's his name?

Mira.

I don't know Mira.

I don't know Harry.

I would be surprised.

But if he was, if he was, if he was an archaeologist in the sense of having a deep and abiding respect for history and an admiration of what I assume was an admiration of

a grave robber like your dad.

Like my dad.

Those are ongoing conversations, right?

Is the idea of like having the best of intentions, wanting to honor something that you have deep respect for, but not having the presence of mind or the experience and the ignorance, and instead having the ignorance of just assuming like, well, this is cool because this is honoring this ancient people and it's a beautiful symbol and I love what it symbolizes, not thinking like this could be, this is, it could be a sacred symbol and also it may prove to represent, you know, the taking away of something.

And, you know, those are conversations that are ongoing too.

One suspects, perhaps, well, look, we don't know, but one suspects that intentions were more or less good.

Yeah.

In 2012, New Mexico did acknowledge that the symbol had been appropriated without permission and apologized.

Rightly so.

You know, it's not as bad as Madison, Wisconsin, which used the same symbol for its city flag until 2018.

The Zia Pueblo people have nothing to do with Wisconsin, I dare say.

That's wild.

I know.

But it's such a pretty symbol.

People are getting tattoos of it apparently all over New Mexico.

Oh, yeah, for sure.

One wonders, you know, whether you want to do that or not.

But even though this is an ongoing conversation, to be sure,

we can say for sure that the provenance of this symbol symbol as a sacred symbol of the Zilla Pueblo people is not erased from the flag and its understanding

within the state.

And indeed,

in the pledge, there is an alternate pledge of allegiance to this flag that is recited or has been recited, at least in New Mexico schools, and it is bilingual.

It goes, saludo la bandera del estado de nuevo, México, el symbolosía de amistad perfecta antre el culturas unidas.

I haven't spoken Spanish in a long time, so forgive me.

The translation is: I salute the flag of the state of New Mexico, the ZIA symbol of perfect friendship among united cultures.

I would say there's some good intentions there.

I agree.

Janet, do you remember how much I love saying the word vexillological?

I do, very much so.

Well, it will not surprise you to know that I'm about to say it again, and that in the year 2001, the North American Vexillological Association of Boston, Massachusetts, ranked the ZIA banner, the New Mexico state flag,

as the number one flag.

Oh, I didn't know it was official, according to one organization.

According to one organization, the number one flag in both the United States and Canada.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

That was in 2001.

And after that, they shut down the contest.

Never again.

Number one for life.

I don't know if that part's true, but as far as I'm concerned, it's number one for life.

Here's a hint to the state question: one possible answer is Christmas.

What?

Janet Varney, can you name the state bird of New Mexico?

Is this where I pretend like I don't know what the state bird is?

Come on, Janet.

Hats on, hats on.

I, of course, give me one.

I, of course, know that because I live in Arizona, I lived in Arizona.

I, of course, know that the state bird is Christmas.

No.

That's not the state question either.

Here, I'll give you a hint.

Meet, me.

Is it the Roadrunner?

Roadrunner.

Meet, meep.

The greater Roadrunner is the state road, Arizona.

Scientific name, of course, is Accelerate Incredibilis, or also known as Velocitus Tremendus, or Tastius Supersonicus.

That's not true.

Wait a minute.

Wait a minute.

Slow down.

Slow down.

I got a lot of problems with everything I just heard after a certain point.

That's how you identified.

That's how Chuck Jones identified the Roadrunner and the Roadrunner's cartoons.

There it is.

In reality, it's Linnaeus classification is Geococcyx Californianus.

Ironically, it says California in the name.

I know.

That translates to California Earth cuckoo.

Great.

I'm just going to say that again.

California Earth cuckoo.

I think some people would call me a California Earth cuckoo.

Oh, absolutely they would.

Yeah, thanks.

I don't mean, I don't think it's to differentiate it from the space cuckoo.

We'll get to Roswell, New Mexico later.

I think that the geo and the geococcyx means that this cuckoo lives on land as opposed to in trees.

Got it.

It's also known as the chaparral cock,

the ground cuckoo, and the snake killer.

I love a roadrunner.

I love roadrunners.

Tell me about roadrunners you have known.

Well, I just, you know, we have a lot of Roadrunners in Arizona as well.

I saw a lot of Roadrunners in

New Mexico.

I think it's hilarious that the Looney Tunes Roadrunner looks pretty much nothing at all like any Roadrunner that has ever been seen by human eyes.

No, it's a brown bird.

It's a brown bird.

Yeah, everything about that Roadrunner, I'm not sure.

I'm not sure where that came from, but it's hilarious.

But yeah, it's just a cool, it's a cool bird.

They are truly very fast.

They're very fast runners.

They really zing in and out of sight.

But I find them to be very beautiful, and they're tough.

They're tough birds.

I was surprised.

I think there was a fight with one?

Oh, yeah.

Look at this.

Look at these claw marks.

Doesn't it look like it's in the shape of a Zia?

That's not my fault.

That's not my fault.

The bird did it.

The bird did it.

No, but

I thought that the Roadrunner must be the state bird of a state that is not to be named.

And it is, in fact, not.

but I really thought, I don't like, because there's so much Roadrunner iconography in the state that's not to be named, especially in the southern part in Arizona, that I was just sure, like, oh, no, we must be the red.

And we'll, well, I will save what that is until we get to Arizona's state bird.

But I'm so proud and happy that the Roadrunner is, in fact, the state bird of New Mexico, a very deserving state of just a cool bird.

Now, you said that when you were, and this is a fiction, I trust, that when you were attacked by a roadrunner, it left a mark on your face in the shape of of a Z.

An utter lie.

Well, I should say so, because according to the Secretary of State's website for Arizona, where they list a lot of state stuff, and boy, does Arizona have a lot of state stuff, Janet.

Yeah.

But they explained that the actual footprint of the roadrunner, it looks like an X.

And because it looks like an X, it doesn't show which direction the bird is traveling.

So great.

And that is why, according to the Secretary of State website, Hopi tribes use the X on kachina figures to confuse evil spirits because the X,

much like the Roadrunner, it evades detection.

Yeah.

You said that they run fast.

Do you know how fast you know the top speed of a greater roadrunner?

Tell me.

20 miles per hour.

That's fast.

Yeah.

That's really fast.

Yeah.

You know the top speed, you know, top speed of a coyote?

Tell me.

40 miles an hour.

Yeah, they're pretty fast.

Yeah.

Sorry.

Sorry, Roadrunner.

One piece of advice I would have for Wily Coyote is, why out on two feet all the time?

You're not,

you could run 40 miles per hour.

Instead, you're running on two human-like feet out off of a clifftop.

You're not even looking where you're going.

You're still running, even though you're out in open space.

Yeah.

And only then do you realize I've run too far.

And then you fall.

You got to a place where you're for no feet are going to help you.

And frankly, you rely too much on human technology.

Wiley, why are you leaning on those anvils so hard?

Do you know?

Look, I tried to figure out, obviously, the landscape of the Roadrunner cartoons are beautifully drawn.

Yeah.

And, you know, obviously deep, deeply, some, someone, Chuck Jones, was deeply moved by the landscape of the American Southwest.

I don't know if it was New Mexico specifically, but I did find Chuck Jones had nine rules for the Roadrunner cartoons.

Oh, nine principles.

Okay.

Principles.

I'm so sorry.

Let me just let that sink in.

Okay.

Rule number one, the Roadrunner cannot harm the coyote except by going, meet, meet.

And that is humiliating.

Yeah.

It's humiliating.

That is harmful.

Rule number two, no outside force can harm the coyote, only his own ineptitude or the failure of acne products.

Rule number three, the coyote.

Sounds like an outside force.

Yeah, go ahead.

Rule number three, but he ordered them.

They're all part of his scheme.

Yes.

Rule number three, the coyote could stop at any time if you were not a fanatic.

And then Chuck Jones.

what i'm hearing is he's addicted to the all of this behavior chuck jones quotes a fanatic is one who redoubles his effort when he has forgotten his aim george santayana oh my well that is a principle yeah uh rule number four no dialogue ever except for me

rule number five the roadrunner must stay on the road otherwise he would not be called roadrunner rule number six all action must be confined to the natural environment of the two characters the southwest american desert rule number seven all materials, tools, that's why you never have the Roadrunner and Coyote, you know, go to Europe.

Right.

I'd see it.

Missed opportunity.

On the Audubon?

Come on.

Yeah.

I love the idea that I hope everyone knows that Roadrunners themselves aren't like, well, got to stay on the road.

No, they don't care.

Rule number seven, all materials, tools, weapons, or mechanical conveniences must be obtained from the Acme Corporation.

Rule number eight, whenever possible, make gravity the coyote's greatest enemy.

Yes, science.

And rule number nine, the coyote is always more humiliated than harmed by his failures.

I appreciate those principles and I accept them as principles, even though it sounded very lofty when you first said it.

The coyote is a mammal, but it is not the state mammal of New Mexico.

That would be the American black bear.

Got it.

But more specific than even that, the state mammal is a one creature

named Smoky Bear.

Also controversial.

Really?

Why?

It has to do with, surprise, surprise, because we are very good at creating controversy around indigenous cultures.

It has to do with controlled burns.

It has to do with forest fires, controlled burns, and the long, long history of Native Americans who, Indigenous people, who

managed forest lands more responsibly and prevented more forest fires by doing controlled burns.

Then

when Smokey came in, it became this huge thing, and it kind of, for them, represents this idea of the federal government saying like,

no, no, like we'll tell you how best to manage natural resources.

But anyway, that's, but Smokey, Smokey is, Smokey is very ubiquitous.

Well, Smokey bear is a cultural phenomenon for good or ill.

But I'm not even talking about...

Good intentions for the most part from people.

I'm not even talking about that character.

I'm talking about an actual bear.

This is just Smokey.

One black bear in New Mexico is named Smokey.

Tell me more.

The living embodiment of the U.S.

Forest Service Fire Prevention Mascot, who had been created in 1944.

Smokey Bear, real bear,

not a cartoon character.

Not an illustration, not an idea.

Smokey Bear, real bear, was a five-pound, three-month-old American black bear cub who was found in the spring of 1950.

after the Capitan Gap Fire, a wildfire that burned in the Capitan Mountains of New Mexico.

Smokey had climbed up a tree to escape the blaze, but but his paws and his hind legs had been burned, and that's why they originally called him Hot Foot Teddy.

True.

That sounds like a drink I might order on a cold winter day.

Yeah, I'll have a Hot Foot Teddy.

But Smokey, the bear, for good or ill, had already become very popular, and they renamed this bear Smokey after the character.

And he was cared for in Santa Fe before he was brought to the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., where he lived for 26 years.

And he was very popular.

And he received so many letters

that Smokey Bear, aka Hatfootedi, got his own zip code.

What?

20252 is the designated zip code for letters to Smokey Bear.

There's only two individuals who ever got their own zip code in the United States.

Smokey Bear and the President of the United States.

And that's not even one person.

Yeah.

It's many people.

Oh, how about that?

All right.

That's a great.

That's great.

That's great.

20252.

I'm going to send a letter there.

Yeah.

In fact, you should all send your letters to us there.

That's probably for the best.

Janet, there's a lot

of state stuff in Arizona.

You want to pick something from the list that's that's interesting?

No, you said state of Arizona.

Now I have,

I have crept into.

Oh, you got me.

Oh, this is bad.

I, I, do Arizona and New Mexico have

any kind of rivalry?

Or like, you know, like Vermont and New Hampshire are two geographically very similar states, and yet they have two very different political philosophies.

You know, traditionally, Vermont, which is literally on the left, if you're looking at a map, Mercator Protection, is a little more left-leaning.

New Hampshire is a little bit more right, libertarian-leaning.

There are no taxes in New Hampshire or, you know, fewer taxes in Vermont.

They actually have roads, for example.

No, no.

But

is there any kind of like friction between these neighboring states of Arizona?

Friends

in New Mexico.

Yeah, I'll say this.

Not for me or my upbringing in any way, shape, or form.

And I, again, have traveled extensively in Arizona and New Mexico with me, Papa, speaking to a lot of people who were both...

more cosmopolitan and very, very rural.

I've never heard anything like that, but that does not mean that it doesn't exist.

Friends listening in the states of New Mexico or Arizona, feel free to write us at email pluribusmato at maximumfund.org or send us a voicemail.

Keep it short, even though it might be a long story.

Truncate it for us at speakpipe.com/slash e pluribus motto.

I want to know if maybe there's some rivalry I missed, but that is not my, that was not my experience.

But it's not, it's not like, no, I'm actually from Arizona.

I'm not from New Mexico.

None of that.

No, I've never heard anything like that.

There's a state bolo tie.

I appreciate that.

I got to tell you something.

I.

There's not even a state tie.

It's a state bolo tie specifically.

Yeah.

Let's not, let's not pretend that people are walking around wearing a lot of suits and ties in New Mexico.

Why bother?

Right, exactly.

Enjoy yourself.

Enjoy your life.

Don't wear, don't feel like you need to do that.

I looked up the state insect just now of New Mexico, and I'm uncomfortable.

Oh, no.

This is the thing:

I love and appreciate bugs.

I just am so creeped out by, in general, many wasps.

But this wasp in particular is just an un, it's just one of those things that I appreciate its evolution.

It's very successful in what it does and is.

And yet, I would not,

I personally would not make this the state insect.

This is the tarantula hawk wasp.

And what I will tell you about what makes me uncomfortable about it.

I'm not going to be able to get scary

That's correct.

What I will say is, I will simply read it.

It's got a great description of how pretty and smoky the orange wings are near the margins.

Yes, don't worry.

This came out of an initiative from a classroom in Edgewood, New Mexico, an elementary class, and their teacher research states, which has selected state insects and then selected three insects for the students around the state to vote for.

Students,

I don't,

I've got to talk to you.

Let's meet up in, well, I guess we'll go to Edgewood, we'll go to Edgewood.

I got to talk to you about this because you selected an insect that burrows into the ground, forming branching tunnels.

Females hunt for large spiders, they sting them, and then they drag their paralyzed prey.

This is, I'm adding some color

colour commentary.

And you're avoiding plagiarism.

They drag that paralyzed prey into their lair where an egg is attached to the spider.

And when the larva hatches from that egg, it feeds on the paralyzed spider.

Not cool.

I get it.

It's nature.

It's neither good nor bad.

And this, again, is a successful creature, but it freaks me out.

Yeah.

I don't like it.

And it reminds me that, uh, as it reminds me of the the fact that I myself am an idiot.

Okay.

Because one time I realized there was a wasp's nest right above, like near our front door.

Yeah.

And I waited for the wasp to leave.

I'm not that stupid.

No.

I waited for the wasp to leave.

I chunked a broom handle up to knock the nest off.

And a quick breeze blew in right as I was doing that.

And it blew a series of paralyzed spiders

onto me.

Yeah.

And I screamed and shook, and then I looked down.

And as soon as the fear was over, I looked down.

I was like, huh, it really selected like five different types of spiders.

None of them look alike.

You really made a cool assortment.

I'm impressed.

But it was horrible.

So

I'm not a huge wasp person.

That's all.

And this is one where the argument for banning elementary school classes from suggesting state stuff is

because if they were given a list of New Mexican bugs to choose from,

they're not going to go for the aphid or the arrow-shaped mica-thana spider or the arched hooktip.

Like, if there's a,

what's the name of this one again?

The tarantula hawkwas.

Every fifth grader in the world is going to be like, yeah, tarantula hawkwas.

Obviously, that's if we get to the point.

I'm going to circle that one.

I just want to go down the list to see if there might be like a lion cougar piranha on the list.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay, so I don't approve of that.

However, I do greatly approve of the state tree, which I looked up.

That wasn't one you wanted to talk that you had pulled, right?

No, no, it's good.

Okay, so I'll just say this and then we can move on.

But I do want to shout out the pinion pine,

pinus aedulis or penis aedulus.

It can't be penis.

It can't be penis.

It simply can't be penis.

It simply cannot be penis aedulis.

It It is also

sometimes called the two-needle pinyon.

Sometimes I'm called the two-needle pinyon.

The whole pine, I learned about pine trees on a nature walk with an expert, and it's cool.

And of course, I then immediately forgot, but you can identify different pines based on how many needles they have and all this.

The two-needle pinion,

it grows very slowly.

It's a state tree.

And seeds, aka pine nuts of this plant were collected by Native Americans for centuries.

Every few years, it produces a bumper crop.

And this is a wonderful meal for so many different species.

It's a delicious meal for humans, but hopefully, before you steal them all, they'll also be enjoyed by bears and birds and other wildlife and certainly squirrels.

Because I think there's an issue with, you know, when people are actually growing them for crops,

very smart creatures like birds and squirrels are like, I'll have that.

Thank you.

So there's a whole, they have to design like intricate systems to keep the creatures from harvesting on these beautiful, nutty, tasty, wonderful.

I mean, I love a pine nut, y'all.

I love a pine nut.

I'll say aedulus in Latin means eat or edible.

There you go.

Which is another reason why I think it's not pronounced penis.

Just another context glitter.

I've been to a few stores like Spencer's Gift where you can buy edible penises.

Check me out in the Chesnut Hill Mall in 1982.

I'm getting a real education at Spencer's.

Okay, tell me more about some other state symbols.

All right, are you ready for the state aroma now?

I

might have a theory, but I don't know if you want me to say what it is.

First, I'll just give you the context.

March 28th, 2023,

then-Governor Michelle Luhan Grisham signed Senate Bill 188,

the first state to have a state aroma.

Yeah.

What is your guess of what the aroma is?

My guess is, and this is a true guess.

I have not scrolled down to it, but my guess.

And this is very Santa Fe-centric.

So if I'm wrong, I apologize because I feel like Santa Fe is often the center of the world, vis-a-vis people's conversations about New Mexico.

And that's why I wanted to give a shout out.

Two places.

Thank you for Roswell.

I'm sure you're going the right with Santa Fe.

I think you're going in the right direction.

It's the smell of affluent art collectors.

And that's what I thought.

And that's what I thought.

But might as well be.

But no, when you go to Santa Fe, almost every place you eat

has some version of a green chili that you can get.

And it is a wonderful, wonderful chili.

It smells great.

You can do all kinds of things with it.

It just works as as a savory addition to so many different dishes.

I love a scrambled egg with

chili, with green chili.

And anyway, so that's what I would guess.

You're absolutely right.

It is

an aroma.

I got it.

Not just of green chilies, but of green chilies being roasted.

Yeah,

I should have probably said that.

And not even that.

Specifically, green chilies roasting in the fall.

Okay.

Well, I would not have guessed that.

I guess that must be chili season, right?

I mean, fall must be chili season.

It must be.

That's usually when I start wearing a sweater anyway.

I hate and love you more every day.

Chilies, green chilies

and beans, free jolles, are the two state vegetables of New Mexico.

Chilies, both red and green variety,

are very, very, very common in New Mexico, which leads us to the state question.

Oh, those are related.

Okay.

Yeah.

The state question

is this:

red or green?

Wait a minute.

I need to go back for a second.

No, you don't.

Everything's perfectly understandable.

Did you say that a potential answer to the state question was Christmas?

Yes.

Great.

Because red or green.

When you go into a restaurant in New Mexico

and you order enchiladas or anything that might have salsa on it, they will ask

red or green chili sauce.

Or chili sauce.

If you want both, it's called Christmas.

Christmas.

I didn't know that.

I've never, I don't, if I've, if I have had that offered up to me, I didn't, I don't remember it being called Christmas.

That is very one of my favorite places in the world is the Santa Fe Municipal Airport.

It's a tiny little airport with ceramic tile floor.

It looks like a bus station from the 1920s.

It does.

Can I tell you the story?

They had a little cafe there, and they had great breakfast burritos that they made themselves.

Yeah, of course.

And when I ordered them, they said red or green.

And luckily, I had been trained by no less an aficionado than George R.

R.

Martin.

Santa Fe resident of many, many years and the beneficent owner of the John Cocteau Repertory Cinema, as well as the guy guy who bought the bowling alley for Meow Wolf originally.

There you go.

He taught me about red, green, or Christmas, and I said Christmas, and the young woman said, great.

And I went down and I ate it, and it was delicious.

And while I was eating there,

this is a very small airport.

It only has one gate.

One of the two TSA agents walked over to the young woman to gossip, basically,

because there was downtime between flights.

And the TSA agent was an older woman, and she and the young woman were chatting for a while.

And then the TSA agent, the older woman, looks at her watch and goes, Well, I got to go.

The flight's coming in.

And the young woman says, Okay.

So the older woman goes, All right, I'll see you later.

I love you.

And the young woman said, I love you too, mom.

They're working there together at the airport.

That's the best thing I've ever heard.

It was also that I was sitting there in that same booth when the one luggage handler, who was

a very muscular woman,

who, by handling the luggage, she would grab it it off the plane and throw it through a hole in the wall

for people to get it.

Yeah.

Unloaded a whole bunch of gossip about Cormac McCarthy's ex-wife.

Oh, great.

I got to get back to Santa Fe.

Great, great airport.

Yeah.

It's such a great city.

It's a great state.

It's a great state.

I got to order Christmas next time.

Although I am, I mean, when I'm asked red or green, I usually say green because it's New Mexico and I associate it more with green chilies as well as Arizona.

But there's a lot of really good red chilies out there.

I like chili in general.

How hot can you go as far as a chili?

I can go pretty hot.

Yeah.

I can go pretty hot.

I can handle up to

like ghost pepper, which is very hot.

Ghost pepper used to be the hottest and now

they're just making now even more so than ever.

These guys are just like,

you know,

these chilies are like 10 gazillion scoval units now.

And they're like, like, ha ha ha.

It's all just feeding.

It's all just for hot ones.

They're all just doing it for hot ones.

Yeah, that's right.

State aircraft

is a hot air balloon.

I'm so glad.

Okay, I would have been crushed.

Officially, since 2005, have you been in a hot air balloon?

I have, but I have not been in one like where I've been soaring over peaks.

I've been in the, I've been, when I was a kid, there's also a hot air balloon.

There's a great hot air balloon festival in, I'm sure maybe there's more than one, but there's one

in New Mexico.

There's also one in Arizona.

Sorry.

And

as a child, I was taken, we got to go out and watch all the balloons being filled up, and then we got to go up.

But they tether, you know, they've tethered you.

So you go up a certain height, but there's still

ropes.

You're not free ballooning.

I've never free ballooned.

I've done that a couple of times, but I've never free ballooned.

Have you?

No, no.

I was just thinking.

It's loud.

Oh, because of the sound of the.

Yeah, it's louder than you would think, but yeah.

Because the sound of the, of the, of the propane fire that they need to heat up the air.

Yeah.

Sounds like this.

Yeah, they're going to get some of that great green helium.

Yeah.

It's like Darth Vader hawking a loogie.

Yeah, it is.

I've never been in a hot air balloon, and I am someone who, for whom,

sort of altitude sports has never been my thing.

Yeah.

I'm not terrified of heights, but certainly as I've gotten older, like there was never

maybe there was a thought that I might skydive when I was maybe 19.

Now I would never do it.

Yeah.

But a hot air balloon, I feel pretty good about.

I would like to do that in my life.

And if I'm not sure, it's a bigger space.

It's a bigger space than you think, than you imagine, because I think we all kind of grew up imagining like two people snuggle up in a small basket.

Yeah, like there's more space.

Yeah.

There's more space to walk, to sort of walk and and be than

you would necessarily think.

And I presume there's

a thing.

Whatever that word is that I always forget, and I'm kind of glad that I always forget, which is that human instinct.

Not an instinct, but that impulse to like the thought is, what if I accidentally throw myself over this?

It's not even like, what if I tumble out?

It's like, what if I act, what if I accidentally commit

self-harm by throwing myself over this?

I've always heard that described as the imp of the perverse, an Edgar Allan Poe term but there's another term for it too no yeah I think there's a medical term maybe for it but that's anyway uh that is that is definitely something that I feel more as I age it's a fairly big basket is what you're saying well it helps I think for if if you if part of your feeling about heights it is also a feeling of maybe claustrophobia like because I think that's a weird thing that happens it's this weird combination of feeling claustrophobic like if you're in a plane like feeling claustrophobic but also feeling the reality of being,

you know, tens of thousands of feet up.

Yeah, it's sort of a one-two punch.

So, I, for me, pull down the window shade, right, so I can watch the bear on my iPad.

Of course, you can.

Okay, of course, and you can chuckle away at that comedy's jokes.

Is there a first-class section?

Because otherwise,

oh, yes, yes, yes, there's a first-class section.

If I were to ever go hot air ballooning, I'll tell you one place I would not go:

Arizona.

Sorry, rude.

Well,

yeah, they have hot air balloon festivals in Arizona, but do they have the biggest in the world?

Absolutely not.

No, we're talking about the International Balloon Fiesta of Albuquerque, a nine-day festival that is the biggest in the world for hot air ballooning since 1977.

And the reason that it's so popular, aside from New Mexico's just free-floating hippie-dippyism to begin with, is the Albuquerque box.

The Albuquerque Box is a set of predictable wind patterns.

Ah, the box.

That exist in a certain region of Albuquerque.

One terminus of the Albuquerque box is the Balloon Fiesta Park.

Okay.

And I'm just going to go ahead and quote this because I can't really understand it.

But

this comes from Wikipedia, I suppose.

The quote-unquote box is a set of predictable wind patterns.

that can be exploited to navigate the balloons because these aren't tethered.

These are free-floating.

Yeah, for sure.

At low elevations, the winds tend to be northerly, but at higher elevations, they tend to be southerly.

So balloonists can use these winds to navigate more or less predictably, at least more predictably than in other places.

Start off and ascend from balloon Fiesta Park.

The wind is coming out of the north, so that means they are blown south.

As they go higher and higher and higher,

the wind starts coming out of the south, so they are blown back.

Ah.

So it's a predictable thing.

It's the Albuquerque box.

I hope that at some point.

You can do it over and over and over again.

Yeah, someone has said, like,

as they are very, very calmly in a very low voice narrating what's happening

at a hot air balloon festival.

You could just hear them saying, like, and so begins the

dance of the hot air balloon, the box step of the hot air balloon festival here in Albuquerque.

Oh, man.

As the

steps of the wind.

I do not enjoy sports, but I love taking a nap to baseball or golf commentary.

Oh, golf is what's news.

I'm going to look on YouTube after this to see if there's someone doing color commentary on the

box.

That'd be great.

One beautiful,

this is Pat Reagan's beautiful hot air balloon.

It is a goldenrod yellow with a design of a porcupine.

A little comedy there.

They do say that if it is yellow, they should let it mellow.

All right, we got to get out of here.

So I'm just going to say quickly it's a big topic but we can only cover it a little bit here because it's too big to cover which is a state cryptid and it's not actually a cryptid okay it is a it is a mysterious being okay a cryptid of course specifically means a bigfoot or a nessie or whatever a potentially a lost species that has been not that is potentially but from earth capable of right but from earth good point janet because

the largest balloon festival in the world is held in albuquerque but where was the first hot air balloon rally held in 1973?

The only reason I'm going to say this, because I have no idea, is because you just talked about Ecryptid.

I'm going to guess Roswell.

Roswell, New Mexico is correct.

And it's not just a hot spot for civilian ballooning, also a great spot for military high-altitude spy ballooning,

such as was being tested at Alamogordo Air Force Base as part of Project Mogul.

when one of these high-altitude spy balloons crashed on June 4th, 1947, littering a ranch near Roswell, New Mexico with metallic and rubber debris.

And that's the end of the story.

And no one had any questions about what happened, except it wasn't, because for some reason that is still mysterious,

the U.S.

Army just went ahead and said that the debris that was found was in fact remnants of a down-flying saucer.

It was so fascinating.

On the front

of the Roswell Daily Record on July 8th, 1947.

Already there was saucer mania throughout the the United States.

This kicked it up into fever pitch.

It was internationally reported before the Army retracted the story within a day.

And they said, no, no, no, no, no.

Sorry, our mistake.

That was a hot air balloon.

That's great.

Our official state aircraft.

And everyone believed them, and that was the end of that story.

Yeah.

No.

Obviously, Roswell is

a node of so much

ufology, but just sort of paranormal and popular cultural obsession that we can't really get through it.

If you want to know more about it, there are many books to read.

You can go listen to our friend Dave Foley's podcast, Really with Tom and Dave, which is all about UFOs.

There you go.

Have you been to Roswell, New Mexico?

I have, but my dad is, uh,

he does not care for anything like that.

He's a ghost guy, not an alien guy?

Yeah, and he's not a ghost guy.

He doesn't believe in any of that.

I mean, it's called a ghost town, but that's not.

Oh, he's an Epicurean.

a he's a materialist.

He's a

skeptic.

He's a, well, he's a historian.

It's part of history.

It was in.

It was in the newspaper.

No, I understand that.

He certainly has no hatred for the thing that happened, but he has no patience for ufologists or ghost hunters or anything that is looking for the paranormal within

what he would consider to be true events.

So he, so in my, I have never gone to Roswell and like experienced the, to have, had the experience that one goes to Roswell for, which is like to just, you know, geek out on like all the, you know, little green men.

As far as I can tell, the alien junk is like 90% of Roswell's economy.

I know.

That's what I'm saying.

It was like a real, it was a real, it was a real pass-through.

Jennifer, I just walked through there with hand over your eyes and a big, uh, a big stopped sign and and going, nope, nope, nope.

I don't even know if we stopped anywhere.

Wow.

90,000 tourists a year flock to alien festivals, museums, and roadside junk stands.

That's why I'm going to say, officially or unofficially, the gray, the little gray, not green, little gray.

I'm sorry.

You're right.

It is the gray.

It is the gray.

You know, look, there are a lot.

Look, this is a point of

dispute within

ufology circles or ufology circles.

I don't know how you say it.

Yeah.

There are those who believe that life out here began out there.

That's the beginning of Battle Sar Galactica.

But what I want to say is there are those who believe.

Oh, ancient astronaut theorists?

Yes, exactly.

I'm going to say the gray,

that's what people in paranormal circles call the little the little aliens that you see, like in close encounters.

The gray is the

unofficial state cryptid of Newman.

Accepted.

Accepted.

Let's take a break.

When we come back, we're going to read a couple of emails from some lovely listeners, perhaps just like you.

Perhaps it is what you is.

Perhaps it's both of our listeners.

And we will rate the state motto and then we'll get out of here.

Eplurbus Motto will be back after this.

Welcome back to ePluribus Motto.

I'm Janet Varney.

I'm John Hodgman.

We love hearing from you, the listeners, both of you, or more.

So as always, please drop us a line line and email pluribusmot at maximumfund.org.

Or you can leave us a voicemail at speakpipe.com/slash epluribusmoto.

We will repeat those wonderfully easy-to-remembered addresses in a moment.

But first, Janet, we have a couple of letters from New Mexico, including one from a listener named, and I don't know if I'm pronouncing this correctly, so forgive me, Teen Ang.

This letter says, Hi, Janet and John.

As you know, the state nickname for New Mexico is the land of enchantment, coined by journalist Lillian Whiting in 1906.

But there's a joke that the nickname should be Land of Entrapment, but for a better reason than you might fear, because so many out-of-staters fall in love with it.

My own parents moved to New Mexico for better jobs.

They didn't plan to stay, but they fell in love with the state and they did stay.

And that was 30 years ago.

I love it.

I can see it.

It makes perfect sense to me that you would go there and go, you know what?

Why would I go anywhere else?

And fun fact about this letter writer's parents, they're from another planet.

They're actually, oh, that's interesting.

They crashed.

They're like, I love it here.

I'm going to stay.

Who could blame him?

Who could blame him?

I have here a letter from Gabby in Albuquerque.

It's Albuquerque, who recently was on the Judge John Otto podcast with her lovely husband, Mike.

You can take a listen to that if you want.

Crossover alerts.

Yeah, that's a plug.

But meanwhile, Gabby writes this.

In 1989, New Mexico became the first state to adopt a state cookie, the biso cheeto.

Well, that has kiss in the name.

I know what a biso is.

Yeah, it's just a little kiss of cheeto.

Oh, wonderful.

It's an Anise flavored cookie with a pecan sandy-like texture.

Okay.

Love these cookies.

But I can't eat these cookies, but I love these cookies because I love Anise.

I love that flavor.

I love pecan sandies.

I'll love any kind of shortbread.

Like, I'm not a sweets person, but I do like a savory shortbready cookie.

And I think that Gabby's really got my number here because Gabby goes on to say, it's a...

It's anise-flavored, pecan sandy-like texture, and it's made with lard.

This is the John Hodgman special.

Yeah, okay.

John Hodgman, I know you love lard,

but please don't buy these cookies.

The ones that get sold and shipped overstate or interstate via mail are lardy garbage.

Instead,

it would be my singular honor to bake a batch for you both.

Oh my gosh, Gabby, can you just, can you use gluten-free flour?

That's the question because I will get sick otherwise.

But I, I mean, the lard I could probably, I could probably take.

I'm not a vegetarian, although I don't do a lot of lard.

But

if you can,

you know what?

I don't care if they're gluten-free garbage.

I don't care if they fall apart because they're so crumbly without the gluten that it's basically just powder.

I will open the cookies, I will stick my tongue out, and I will press my tongue into the crumbled powder of what remains of the cookie without gluten, and that will be fine with me.

I heartily accept all of your gluten-y, lardy goodness.

Gabby.

Yeah.

Gabby.

And I have your email, so I'll write back to to you with our address and our

single zip code that's been given to us by Max C.

Okay, now it's time to rate the state motto on a scale of one to ten lard cookies.

What was this motto again?

I think it was: it's a grower and a shower.

You're not going to explain that for the young people listening.

Don't even worry about it.

Cresset iundo.

Cresset iundo.

It grows as it goes as it goes.

On a scale of one to ten lard cookies.

Piso cheetos.

What do you give it?

Well,

you definitely, I mean, you pretty, you skimmed over the idea of this lightning bolt theory, which may or may not be true because I'm not a scientist.

It's true.

But I, but I, but I will say, because of the wonderful monsoon seasons in the American Southwest, uh, there, the lightning bolt of it does resonate for me because lightning is a spectacular, uh, if dangerous, but beautiful part of those monsoons.

And

so,

look, I don't have a problem with it.

Do I think it's like uber dynamic?

I don't know.

I don't feel like a passion about it, but I definitely don't have a problem with it.

And I have such positive associations with everything else about New Mexico that it's hard not to just kind of pile it in

and just give it up like a, you know, give it an eight, a nine.

I mean, I don't, I just don't mind.

I don't mind.

You know what I mean?

I don't mind it.

Yeah, I don't mind either.

Now that you kind of describe, now I can see maybe a little bit of what it's going for, because it's true that a bolt of lightning doesn't have a lot of time to go or grow, just happens and it's over.

But I mean, if you, if maybe what, was it Lucretius?

I don't know.

I don't know whether that's an ancient Roman poet or a Skexes from the

Dark Crystal.

I want to get back there and make sure I'm saying this person's name correctly.

Oh, you know, it sounds like Lucutius of Borg.

Maybe that's what I'm thinking of.

Lucretius.

I don't know exactly what Lucretius is going for.

I've not read the entire poem.

But if what he's describing is that the way that a bolt of lightning branches,

in other words, as it goes, it branches and branches and branches and branches again.

Maybe there's something there.

I mean, I think that it's,

I don't love it as a motto.

I don't know that it quite captures the spirit of New Mexico as I've come to understand it and love it, you know, which is that it's not like a, it doesn't present itself as like an economic powerhouse.

It's going and growing.

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And even the branching idea doesn't quite track for me because so much of what's interesting about New Mexico's history is the idea of,

you know, not always and not exclusively, but it's baked into the

pledge of allegiance to this wonderful flag, this concept of perfect friendship, of difference and unity within difference.

Do you know what I mean?

So the branch, I don't get how that tracks, but I sure did love learning about Epicureanism.

Yeah.

And I love, and I do feel that that.

that way of life that is described of searching for tranquility

in a fear of in a an absence of pain both emotional and physical, that is something to really aspire to.

No, that's true.

I forgot.

I had already forgotten about that very specific phrase's connection to that whole

way of life.

What makes New Mexico feel like such a refuge to so many people?

Because, you know, we are living in late-stage capitalism.

So much of our culture is organized around the worship of wealth and violence and

growth for its own sake.

Do you know what I mean?

Whereas I think the vibe in New Mexico is more Epicurean of like, maybe what we should be trying to achieve is peace of mind for ourselves and everyone.

Yeah.

So insofar as it introduced me to that concept,

I'm going to go ahead and give it an eight.

Okay, great.

So we both kind of got to the same place, but now you've justified my eight

firmly.

I feel very good about it.

Eights are justified all around.

Great.

So it grows.

So it goes.

That's it for New Mexico.

Obviously, we couldn't cover everything in the state.

If you have a New Mexico story that you would like to share, or if you have any important intel on our upcoming states, let us know.

Won't you at email pluribusmato at maximumfund.org or send us a voicemail?

A reminder: we have Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington, you see Iowa, and Nevada coming up.

If you've got a memory song, a regional accent for many of these places, go to www.speakpipe.com/slash epluribusmato.

That's speakpipe.com/slash slash epluribus motto.

The show is hosted by Janet Varney over there, along with me over here, John Hodgman.

The show is produced and edited by Julian Burrell.

Senior producer at Maximum Fun is Laura Swisher.

Our theme music was composed by Zach Berba.

Our show Art was created by Paul G.

Hammond.

And you can also find us on TikTok and Instagram to tell us more about the states we've talked about so far.

Janet, where are we headed next time on ePluribus Motto?

Oh, I'm so excited to report that this time we are headed all the way up to the Pacific Northwest.

It's time to put put the spotlight on Oregon.

Oregon, home of the other Portland.

I look forward to it.

Until then, remember our motto, si flavum est mitisere sinus.

If it's yellow, let it mellow.

That's correct.

I just want to give Janet the credit for coming up with that as our motto for this episode.

I will reluctantly accept that credit.

I was a little faster on the Latin translator to get it.

That's right.

That's right.

I was going to say unum et factum, which is one and done, but of course, we're not done.

That's true.

We're not done.

That's true.

We'll see you right back here with more.

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