2? degrees of separation

There's a great article in The New Yorker about Lyle Lovett...with some great quotes from "his bootmaker" (a.k.a. my pals Lee and Carrlyn Miller).

This morning I've been sitting at my desk. I'm applying for a small California apprenticeship grant. I've got plans to apply with bootmaker, Melody Dawkins...I'm hoping the "girl-power" thing's gonna work in our favor.

Wish me luck. The application's due at the end of the month. I have until then to come up with answers to excellent questions like... "What role does this traditional art form play in your life?", "What do you expect to accomplish?, and "What are your plans for continuing work in this traditonal art form after the apprenticeship is completed?"

...oh yeah, then Melody's gotta tell them why she's picked me as an apprentice. I wonder what she'll say?

I don't usually think of myself as competitive, but when Boot Barn bumped me out of the number one Google spot a couple months back...I have to admit I was annoyed. Annoyed mostly because I have a sentence in my book proposal which says "The Cowboy Boot Web Page is currently ranked first on Google.com and Yahoo.com for the keywords 'cowboy boots'."

...some how figured it was gonna be easier to regain my number one spot...then it would be to rewrite the sentence. Anyway, while I was on the plane to El Paso I figured out a plan...a bit wacky, but it seems to have worked.

...better hurry up and finish that proposal.

Laura and I are packing our bags and heading home today. We're going home with door prizes...goody bags from Rocketbuster, hats from T.O. Stanley...and I got a pair of crimp boards from Joey Sanchez at Champion Attitude Boots.

I'm thrilled. The boards tall, and marked 10", 13", and 18"...they've got all kinds of "growing room" for my bootmaking. I wrapped them up in bubble wrap and stuck 'em in a big zipper bag I bought on El Paso Street last night while Laura and I went on an adventure.

Ya gotta love a travelling companion like Laura, one that comes with her own phillips screwdriver, duck tape and pocket knife (you know for all her camera cables and stuff).

My traveling partner Laura took the car to run some errands this morning. I stayed behind and watched the film clip she had taken of James Leddy a couple years ago. It is a small clip...but it was good to hear James' voice again...to hear him talking about his life making boots.

It's the kind of thing that makes you pay special attention to handshakes.

Today, El Paso's having a dust storm. I spent part of my growing up in Los Angeles County...I know what smog is...this is different...even the air inside the hotel and restaurants smells like dirt. It's not a bad thing, just different.

...or at least that's what I thought before I went to Austin-Hall Boots and heard Thomas Arditti's stories about old people blowing and tumbling across the streets of downtown.

Yikes! No kiddin'!

I've been to J.B. Hill and Austin-Hall today, with some yummy steak tacos stuck in between. Tonight Laura Neitzel and I are having dinner with Nevena Christi from Rocketbuster...should be all kinds of fun.

Tonight, I'm in El Paso. I got in a little later than expected, so I ran around to a few of the cowboy boot outlets...then back to the hotel to type out some html code. Hopefully, I'll get some field trip photos up soon.

Tomorrow...I'm off to South Cotton St. to see Joey and Pricilla Sanchez at Champion Attitude Boots.

It's been a busy day...spent almost all of it on the phone...mostly talking to El Paso bootmakers about my trip next week. Then Tyler Beard called, and we talked about my trip and everything else...musta been on the phone for an hour.