A few more words on this Count of New Mexico.

The Count’s first name is Alonso. His last name is unknown, intentionally so. A few people over the years have figured it out but it’s useless. He changes his last name every few months and burns all of his mail, both incoming and outgoing.

The Count is a tall man, at least 6′ 5″. He loves cherry ice cream. In fact, he’s got a partial stake in an ice cream company out of Taos. It’s said he visits there at least once every three months and has workmen pile huge, freezer-ready cases of ice cream atop his chest in order to calm his mind and “flatten out the bad thoughts.” These workers claim he hands them something he calls Indian Money, then orders them to face the wall as he adjusts his hat and exits.

Count Alonso wears a neatly cropped white mustache and balbo style beard. He never married but has lived with a woman named Sheila for the last 17 years. Rumor has it she’s addicted to plastic surgery and has replaced at least two fingernails and one ear lobe with solid gold prosthetics. The Count pays for all of this as well as a professional photographer to come to the house and capture the couple in portrait at least once a year. The photographer is also obliged to photograph the Count separately, displaying his guns and helicopter.

The Count acts severely, but not without thought. He plans everything out on paper first, writing and drawing out elaborate schematics and includes a minimum of three escape hatches and back ups with each project. He never signs his name to any of them. Once a year he chews up and digests a desert rock just to make sure he still can.

Once, when the Count was a boy, he witnessed a cow escape from a downtown slaughter house and run loose through the city, evading capture for 72 hours. It was the Count who alerted the authorities to the cow’s location out behind his father’s garage. It is said that to this day, the Count locks himself up for three days of crying each year on the anniversary of this betrayal.

The wikipedia entry ended there. I’m still not certain how or why he became the Count of New Mexico. But I have already mailed a handwritten letter of apology for our misunderstanding on the phone earlier today. It was never my place to discuss the Count’s wardrobe.

I understand that now.

Chris Weagel

Chris Weagel writes about the intersection of technology and parenting for Wired Magazine. No he doesn't. He can't stand that shit.

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