As gas prices zoomed up even faster than Exxon/Mobil executives can open new bank accounts to hold all their profits, we wondered who's hurting the most (and the--relatively--least) in our neck of the woods. Thankfully, there are sites like gasbuddy.com where people who must have nothing better to do with their time helpfully update local gas prices around the country, thus saving overworked journalists the trouble of leaving the office.
Gasbuddy.com lists Albuquerque prices separately from the rest of New Mexico, so with that caveat, when we looked the cheapest prices in the state were at the Sam's Club in Las Cruces. (We won't even bother to tell you what the price was, since it's no doubt 20 or 30 cents a gallon higher by the time you read this.) Most of the other 15 cheapest places to fill 'er up were in the Alamogordo area, but three other Cruces gas stations also made the list: Conoco at 3041 N. Main St., Fina at 2701 Elks Dr. and Diamond Shamrock at 3101 N. Main St. (Since these listings depend on volunteer reporters, they don't necessarily reflect the absolutely rock bottom. For example, Love's at the Motel Drive exit off I-10, where we usually fill up because the prices always seem lower, wasn't listed.)
The next time you start to complain about skyrocketing gas prices, just give thanks you don't live in Taos. When we checked, the seven most expensive places to buy gas were all in Taos, with the priciest being a whopping 42 cents higher than Sam's Club in Las Cruces on the same day (28 cents higher than the other three cheap Cruces locations, where you don't have to be a member to gas up).
If you always feel like you're paying more for gas in Silver City than in Las Cruces, you're right: The cheapest Silver City spot when we checked, the Shell station on Hwy. 180, was still a dime more than the three cheapest regular gas stations in Las Cruces.
Evidently folks in Deming, Bayard and Lordsburg all have better things to do, as no recent prices were reported for any of those locations. C'mon people, inquiring minds want to know! (Reporting a gas price is as easy as going to www.gasbuddy.com and making a few clicks.)
Overall, the average gas price in New Mexico was three cents lower than the US average, but up 70 cents from a year ago.
Two New Mexicans were included in Time magazine's recent list of 25 Hispanics to watch. Predictably, Gov. Bill Richardson was one: "It is no secret that Richardson, 57, is aiming for the White House in 2008 if he is re-elected governor next year. His name recognition may be low, but his resume is impressive," the magazine noted in a capsule writeup. The more surprising choice perhaps was Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, the Albuquerque-born author (of Cuban-Irish descent) the magazine called "the godmother of Chica Lit." The author of The Dirty Girls Social Club told Time, "I don't want this to be 'Oh, here we are with our mantilla, praying to the Virgin of Guadalupe. That's not my reality." Her book is in development to become a series on the Lifetime cable-TV network, according to the magazine.
While we appreciate Time's inclusion of a New Mexico author in its roster of "most influential" Hispanics, we wonder how the magazine overlooked Rudolfo Anaya. The Albuquerque author and UNM emeritus professor, widely known as the father of modern Chicano literature, won the National Medal of Arts for literature in 2001. Or what about Denise Chavez, director of the Border Book Festival in Las Cruces?
Guess you have to get a cable-TV deal to really be "influential" these days.
"I couldn't find my speech. In the spirit of bipartisanship, my good friend Senator Bingaman had it in his pocket."
--Sen. Pete Domenici, at the signing of
the national energy policy bill in Albuquerque
"I look like I'm from Mars."
--Sen. Domenici again, at the energy-bill signing,
after borrowing oversized plastic sunglasses
when he forget his own.
(Perhaps he should
have checked Jeff Bingaman's pocket?)
"The shuttle is a national asset, and we would look forward to participating in bringing it home."
--Larry Furrow, spokesman for White Sands Missile Range, on the possibility the shuttle Discovery might have to make an emergency landing there
"The sand is tough on the tiles."
--WSMR spokesman Furrow, explaining
why New Mexico was not NASA's first
choice as a backup shuttle landing site
"We just got a call to stand down. . . .They are definitely going to Edwards."
--Steve Nunez, manager of NASA's White Sands Test Facility, with the news that Discovery would land at Edwards Air Force Base in California instead
September 2005
