Reviews, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

i3 talk: Dr. Nancy Hayden gives a glimpse into the very crowded future of space

On Tuesday, A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched, “the company’s 12th rideshare mission to a sun-synchronous orbit. Onboard are a variety of customer satellites, including 35 satellites integrated by Exolaunch along with 36 SuperDoves and Pelican-2 from Planet Labs PBC.”

On Wednesday, SpaceX launches its “sixth, suborbital flight test of its fully integrated Starship rocket, a combination of the Ship upper stage (S33) and the Super Heavy booster (B14). SpaceX plans to catch the Super Heavy booster using the chopsticks on the launch tower, but will make a final determination on the catch following liftoff and stage separation.”

On Thursday, a Blue Origin New Glenn rocket will launch the company’s previously delayed Blue Ring spacecraft, which is capable of both hosting and deploying multiple payloads.

(Source: spaceflightnow.com See update at bottom of this page.)

Also on Tuesday, space and security expert Dr. Nancy K. Hayden discussed the future of outer space and the increasingly heavy and chaotic traffic that is shooting out of planet Earth like hair plugs out of Elon Musk’s head.

Her talk for the i3: ideas that inform and inspire‘s Conversations with Big Thinkers lecture series at La Casona Event Center was first promoted as “Space: Brave New World or Wild Wild West?”  Somewhere along the line, out of respect for the growing congestion on the extraterrestrial freeways surrounding Earth, she added a third possibility — “Close Encounters” — to that title.

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#smwc2025, Rants and raves, Reviews, San Miguel de Allende

Margaret Atwood has some thoughts on the future, and not just the one she envisioned in ‘Handmaid’s Tale’

Let’s just get right to the point that is on everyone’s minds: Are we barreling headlong into the dystopian patriarchy depicted by Margaret Atwood in “The Handmaid’s Tale”?

Says Atwood: “I don’t think we’ll get the uniforms.”

Ba-boom.

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Rants and raves, Reviews, San Miguel de Allende

Dominic Cheli in concert: Stop me if you’ve heard this one (I guarantee you have not)

A classical pianist walks into eight bars …

If you think there is a punchline,  the chaconne is on you.

Actually, it was the “Chaconne in G minor” by Thomaso Antonio Vitali and the pianist was Dominic Cheli in his return performance after two years away to San Miguel de Allende on Friday night at St. Paul’s Church.

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Reviews, San Miguel de Allende

Cellist Alexander Hersh returns to SMA

What’s a musician to do when his iPad goes blank in the middle of a concert?

I’ll tell you.

Because it happened last July at St. Paul’s Church in the midst of an audaciously good performance by cellist Alexander Hersh and pianist Evren Ozel.

I can’t recall if it was Debussy’s Cello Sonata, or Dohnanyni’s “Ruralia Hungarica,” or the Cello Sonata from Chopin.  

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Colonia San Antonio, San Miguel de Allende, The Week in SMA, Writings

Talk of the town: Lecturers, speakers, teachers, and authors all want a word with you

Update: Change of venue for San Miguel PEN Presents! Talks and times are the same, only the location has changed: Nectar at Camino Silvestre, Correo #43, Centro.

Talk is not cheap but it sure is plentiful in San Miguel de Allende during the first couple of months of 2025.

Intelligent, knowledgeable and often-times brilliant speakers will be stepping before podiums all over the city to offer enlightenment on topics like explaining the last U.S. election, explaining the current Mexico president, explaining the media, poetry, Artificial Intelligence, outer space, talking about their latest novels, the history of San Miguel, and so much more.

If you are looking for a modern-day Chautauqua Movement, look no further than San Miguel.

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photography, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

Sunset San Miguel

We were a few minutes late for our 6:30 p.m. reservation at Antonia Rooftop Bistro but just in time to catch the end of this glorious sunset.

The restaurant is about four heart-pounding flights above the Hotel Palomar at San Francisco #57 and I suspect sunset dinners are in demand. It does have an elevator, by the way.

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Rants and raves, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

A word, please: The poetic commerce of Fitterman’s pop-up shop

I forget where I first heard of it, but I can’t get Robert Fitterman’s storefront shop in the Bowery out of my mind. This is an old story, starting on May 5, 2010. And the shop didn’t last very long, by design. It closed on May 27. 

It was only open Tuesdays through Thursdays, and then, only from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Worse than banker’s hours.

Now that might not seem ambitious on the face of it, but it is really about what Fitterman was selling.

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San Miguel de Allende

The lesson from ‘Sweaters for ABBA’: Dream bigger because people will come through — and thanks

Or, to get out of the doghouse, try and do some good

It started when I accidentally gave away two boxes of warm clothing that was meant to go to ABBA House in Celaya. Long story short, the clothing went to a good cause albeit not the one Rose Alcantara envisioned when we filled the boxes with clothing.

Sure enough, I was in the doghouse, again. This one built all on my own.

I felt badly because I know Rose was thinking of the hundreds of immigrants who pass through Celaya en route to the United States. And the thousands who may very well be following the trail south after January 20.

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San Miguel de Allende

Sandra Cisneros has a lot to celebrate

Imagine getting to celebrate your 70th birthday and the 40th anniversary of your blockbuster debut novel in one night.

Sandra Cisneros did just that on Dec. 20th at Camino Silvestre and Nectar, Calle Correo #43.

And there was cake! Well, cupcakes. Delicious cupcakes. And paper party hats and singing, too.

The book is “The House on Mango Street,” the story of Esperanza Cordero, a young Mexican-American girl coming of age in Chicago. Everyman’s Library has just come out with a 40th anniversary edition – which was another reason to celebrate.

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San Miguel de Allende

SMA ‘psychologist’ extradited to the U.S. as a fugitive on pedophile charges

With a name like Jake Spade, you knew it was too good to be true. Too much out of the cheap and tawdry dime-store paperback mysteries to it.

Apparently, Jake Spade was all that more before he moved to San Miguel.

He is actually Glenn D. Bales, an Arizona fugitive wanted for child sexual exploitation of a minor, a felony in Maricopa County to where he was extradited and arraigned this month. The state asked for $75,000 bail. 

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