My Strange New Mexico

NM Holds the Key to All Life

Posted on Sunday, August 3, 2008 at 11:16PM by Mike Smith in Daily Strange | 2 Comments | Email | Print

Oh, New Mexico, you inscrutable paradox, you salty dog. What mysteries you hide beneath your sere and rugged exterior! We’ve puzzled over space rocks. We’ve been shocked by Satan’s skull. We’ve heard about behemoth catfish. But your riddles never abate, do they?

Now, locked deep within your salty crystals found 650 meters below the surface of the Saldado Formation near Carlsbad, scientists have discovered physical evidence of life on earth that’s about 200 million years older than any previous discovery.

I admire your restraint, New Mexico. You’re not showing off. The oldest evidence of biological material we previously had came from Tyrannosaurus Rex protein samples and was dated at 68 million years. How can your rich vein of halite, more commonly known as rock salt, compare to dinosaur DNA? Yet watery pockets within the unimposing halite have been shown to contain 253-million-year-old microscopic treasures in the form of everyday cellulose. In other words, tiny spaces in the rock salt retain bits of organic matter that are hundreds of millions of years old.

Cellulose is one of the most abundant biological substances on earth. Plants, algae, and bacteria may generate as much as 100 gigatons of the stuff each year. Slightly altered, in the form of chitin, it’s what insects use for their exoskeletons. As Science Daily explains,

Prehistoric forms of cellulose were made by cyanobacteria, the blue-green algae and bacteria still found in almost every conceivable habitat on land and in the oceans, which is known to have been present on Earth 2.8 billion years ago.

Using transmission electron microscopy, scientists were able to examine largely intact cellulose microfibers found inside halite at the US Department of Energy’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) at the Saldado Formation, where radioactive waste left over from nuclear weapons research and production is stored.

You’re amazing, New Mexico! Not only have you been cradling this secret physical evidence of biological life for over 250 million years, a discovery that displays in a geological timeframe the evolutionary history of our earth, but you’re now providing what may be our best bet for uncovering life elsewhere in our solar system.

The study’s lead author, Dr. Jack Griffith, says,

So in looking for evidence of life on Mars, for bacteria or higher plants that existed on Mars or other planets in the solar system, then looking for cellulose in salt deposits is probably a very good way to go. Cellulose appears to be highly stable and more resistant to ionizing radiation than DNA. And if it is relatively resistant to harsh conditions such as those found in space, it may provide the ideal 'paper trail' in the search for life on other planets.

With the March 2008 discovery of salt deposits pointing to places where water was once abundant on Mars, you’ve shown us what to look for. You've provided us with a beacon for life in the universe.  Thank you, New Mexico, thank you. You truly are an enchanting land.

—Lisa Barrow

New Mexico Tax Holiday

Posted on Tuesday, July 29, 2008 at 06:48PM by Mike Smith in Daily Strange | 2 Comments | 2 References | Email | Print

Ah, back to school. That one time a year when, well, actually for most of you it doesn't really mean anything. For the rest of us, me included, all it means is that we're going to have to get back to work soon and stop sitting around playing online poker all day.

Bummer.

However, our fine state government has stepped in and given us something to brighten the season. This next weekend is the back to school tax holiday. Which, while being the most boring "holiday" ever, also allows us to save almost seven percent on all applicable items.

And what items are applicable you ask? Clothing, shoes, computers, monitors, speakers, printers, keyboards, microphones, mice, notebooks, paper, writing instruments, crayons, art supplies, staplers, paper clips, rulers, bookbags, backpacks, calculators, maps and globes are all on the discount list.

This coming from the government there are, of course, rules. The shoes and clothes must be under a $100 a piece, the computer must be under $1000, the computer accessory has to cost less then $500, bookbags, backpacks, calculators, maps and globes have to be under $100 each, and everything else is limited to $15.

But wait! There is more. Knowing what kind of conniving little bastards we, the public, are they have issued another technicality. Items normally sold together may not be broken up for this deal. For example, a shoe store can't sell a $180 pair of shoes as two individual $90 shoes just to qualify for the deal.

If you're still interested after all of that there is one cool part. No student ID will be needed to get the items tax free, so if any of you need a new globe or computer or whatever this weekend might be the time to buy it.

—Nicholas Rutkaus

RosFest 08 a Success

Posted on Monday, July 28, 2008 at 11:56PM by Mike Smith in Daily Strange | 3 Comments | Email | Print

Apparently Roswell has still got it. According to both the city and the International UFO Museum and Research Center the 2008 Roswell UFO Festival was a “big success.”

On the IUFOMRC front attendance for their Roswelalien Experience went up 25% this year. A rather phenomenal feat considering attendance is generally higher for milestone years ending in fives or zeros, and this was the 61^st Anniversary. IUFOMRC director Julie Shuster said in the Roswell Daily Record that 7,216 people attended this year’s festival and that she would have been happy just to meet last year’s stellar results, let alone exceed them. Shuster is already planning the 2009 Roswalien Experience.

The city’s numbers apparently won’t be officially tallied until another month or so, but the city said the attendance for this year’s festival surpassed their expectations and the city is very pleased with the results. While it is still unknown whether more people attended the 60^th Anniversary than the 61^st it has been confirmed that Roswell hotels had an increase in occupancy rates compared to last year’s event.

Since the festival was free to the public there is no sure fire way to determine how many people actually showed up, but is for certain that 9,500 people visited the vendor exhibit, more than 5,000 people came to watch the parade, and 3,000 came to visit the alien village. City Marketing Director and Festival Chairwoman Renee Roach says the city committee will work on ways to better track attendance next year.

All in all this summer in Roswell, it seems, can officially be deemed a success and the festival will certainly continue next summer.

— John LeMay

Paging Doctor Woe!

Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 at 11:00PM by Mike Smith in Daily Strange | 1 Comment | Email | Print

Let’s play a game. I’ll start. What do infectious waste, MRSA, unions, data entry errors, and bees all have in common?

Nothing good, I’ll tell you that. They’re all part of a continuing series of confusing, frustrating, and disgusting setbacks that have rocked the New Mexico medical community in recent weeks.

Ha ha. Isn’t this fun?

The New Mexico Environment Department has issued an administrative compliance order to the Los Alamos Medical Center and levied a fine of $51,250 against the facility. At issue is the fact that the medical center violated Solid Waste Management Regulations by disposing of infectious waste at the Los Alamos County Landfill in 2006 and 2007.

Better a museum than the dump, no?

According to a NMED press release,

The violations stem from waste screening inspections that determined the hospital disposed of infectious waste -- including two human placentas with attached umbilical cords, vials of blood and needles.

In addition,

The department’s Solid Waste Bureau determined during three waste screening inspections between October and December 2006 and in January 2007 that three truckloads from the hospital contained infectious waste. That waste, which was contaminated or saturated with blood or bloody liquids, also included gauze, bedding, plastic tubing and a vacuum pump.

So, you know, that’s not good. Let’s certainly hope that better procedures are in place at the Roosevelt General Hospital, where MRSA infections are on the rise. These staph infections, resistant to penicillin and related antibiotics, pose a risk to those working in healthcare facilities or with compromised immune systems. Whether it’s because of the local agricultural population (touching all that manure and whatnot), or some other reason, you may or may not take comfort in knowing

[Director of Patient Care Gayle] Richerson said the hospital is working on improved hand hygiene as its first line of defense. She said monitoring programs have shown increased compliance on hand washing policy among staff.

Whew, that was a close one. But I think we can all rest well, knowing that our well being is protected by such extraordinary safeguards as “increased compliance on hand washing policy.”

Not all threats to our medical care facilities are infectious in nature. For Alta Vista Regional Hospital in Las Vegas, the menace has come FROM WITHIN. In response to a complaint filed by District 1199 of the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees, the private hospital has been ordered to bargain with a union by the National Labor Relations Board. Not only that, but they must also post a notice describing employees’ rights and informing them that the hospital has broken federal labor law. Ouch!

Apparently, the union was approved by a large majority of the hospital’s workers last summer, but because the election “started a minute late and…some Spanish speaking employees didn't understand what they were voting on,” the whole thing was bogus in the eyes of hospital administration. The objections were overruled in March, but the hospital has maintained its refusal to negotiate.

Alta Vista now plans to contest the NLRB’s ruling in court. With their obvious sensitivity to their employees’ desires, they have no idea why hospital workers can’t just talk to their superiors without a third-party organization. They also claim that a union would create discord, thus disturbing the current utopian working environment.

New Mexico's neurosurgical future?

The gubmint has also been messing with southern New Mexico’s only neurosurgeon, Dr. Brett R. Henderson of Southern New Mexico Neurosurgery, LLC. It seems that he was nearly forced to close his practice in Las Cruces and relocate after Medicare failed to pay him in more than 50 days for clients he’d treated. With 85 to 90 percent of his clients using Medicare to pay, this meant he was trying to run a business with almost no money coming in.

According to Erik Khan, who handles the practices business operations, the problem

stemmed from data entry error on the part of a contracted company, TrailBlazer Health Enterprises, that handles payment to doctors on behalf of the federal government. In January, Henderson's practice, along with physicians across the country, was assigned a new type of identifying number.

Khan said Henderson's number was entered incorrectly. But the problem didn't become apparent until several weeks ago, when the new numbers were put into use for the first time.

Though partial payment from Medicare has finally been received by Henderson’s practice, the exasperating experience has left a sour taste in everyone’s mouth. Thanks to someone’s typo, New Mexico nearly lost its only practicing neurosurgeon south of Albuquerque. Tremble before the power of the data entry clerk!

And speaking of small things making big news--New Mexico’s apian nightmare, previously reported right here by Nicholas Rutkaus, continues.

That’s right, a colony of bees was discovered by staff members at Portales Medical Clinic last week. The entrance, along with the front portion of the office, was closed off at about 8 a.m. on July 21st. Because of the possibility that the bees were Africanized, general terror swept the facility.

Encounters with a swarm of Africanized bees can be deadly, according to officials

the Portales News-Tribune helpfully, and not very specifically, informs us.

How did the clinic deal with this frightening situation? Did they have emergency procedures in place? Were they prepared to deal with the potential chaos? Did they have a plan?

Indeed they did.

Clinic office manager Leisha Beickham said patients of the clinic were contacted Monday morning and told of the situation. The patients were asked to use a side entrance.

Lewis Hightower, owner of the company that eliminated the bee menace, told the Portales News-Tribune,

There is a 99 percent chance that these bees are collecting honey looking to make a home and will be docile.

So, although no one had any particular reason to think these bees were Africanized or likely to be much of a danger to anyone, the colony was destroyed. As one astute commenter on the newspaper’s website pointed out, the recent worldwide reduction of the bee population, critical to agriculture, was apparently not a concern.

Too bad this kind of comprehensive rigor can’t be applied to the elimination of medical waste or MRSA.  Or employee rights.  But the bees.  We're safe from the bees.

—Lisa Barrow

Radiation Patrol

Posted on Friday, July 25, 2008 at 01:58PM by Mike Smith | 1 Comment | Email | Print

In a land filled with many unique and often threatening denizens including Giant Owls, Bigfoot, Religious Fanatics, Cabbits, Ghosts, Aliens and Grandfathers who punish you for being bad, it would only be natural to become more observant, more aware of your surroundings and the creatures that inhabit your world. And when your own eyes aren’t enough to give you warning you might employ the use of a device that would notify you of trouble and help keep you safe. A device such as a radiation detector…

Radiation Detectors = Fruit, Flowers & Happiness!According to the Las Cruces Sun-News, Border Patrolmen in New Mexico wear “personal protection devices to let them know if something is radioactive.” For Alamogordo Native Bud Hertzner it meant a shocking interview when returning home from a doctor’s visit in El Paso. Hertzner said, “I pulled up in the station at 70, and the guy had a thing on (his) belt like a cell phone. It was blinking.”

He was immediately asked to provide paperwork that he had been to a doctor as well as identification. “Sharon and I looked at each other like, ‘What’s going on here?’” His medical stress test in El Paso had used nuclear medicine. As a result Hertzner was actually just a little bit radioactive and he had set off the Border Patrolman’s radiation detection device. Although his car warranted a glance, after handing over the appropriate documents, Hertzner was waved along. “I’m glad they are searching… just a shocker for me… a first time experience.”

As explained by Regional Border Patrol public information officer Joe Romero officially one of the Border Patrol’s “…goals is to detect or apprehend potential weapons of terror.” But perhaps in this land filled with such mysterious and strange creatures, the devices may unofficially be protecting their officers against the ravages of the unknown.

—Megan Walker