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Órale, this month, we’re gonna focus on some Spanglish terms that have entered the Caló lexicon. Like all languages—maybe even moreso, Caló adapts to the times and takes in words that circulate around it and fits them into its internal logic and aesthetic. Some of these words have become so ubiquitous and ingrained that people come to think of them as Caló words. Of course, Caló is neither Spanish nor English, nor any other language for that matter, but it’s flexible enough that it easily takes in new words without causing much disruption or imbalance to its integrity. I’m sure that, when listeners hear the words, they’ll quickly agree they fit in Caló perfectly. Here they are, chiriár, troca, rite, dompe, and yonque. There are many others, but we’re gonna go with the obvious ones first.Also for this month, we’re gonna focus on a common setting that’s informed Caló for many generations; namely, the adventures of working in the farm fields—also going to and from them.The word for this episode is chiriár. It’s a verb that means to cheat. In the logic of Caló, the verb always attaches to the person who cheats, the chirión, and there’s no chiriada nor chiriadero, that is, the subjective version of the term.

Órale, the featured Caló word of the week is pocho. In Caló, it means alternatively Spanglish, a jumble of Spanish and English, or someone who can only speak Spanglish. It’s a contraction of the Spanish words poco (little or scant) and mocho (short of a whole). To be sure, you can be pocho as much to English speakers as Spanish speakers, but you can’t be a pocho if you speak either Spanish or English well.

Órale, the featured Caló word of the week is troca. It comes from the English word truck. Toca has become such a favored word that it’s used extensively outside of Caló. You hear it throughout Mexico and Central America, as well as the US side of the Rio Grande.

The garden’s namesake was a passionate advocate for our region’s plants. Manning, who passed away September 8th, managed the Sul Ross greenhouse for 18 years, worked as a teacher and consultant and, with her partner Cindi Wimberly, founded Twin Sisters Natives. That business offered plants Manning had cultivated, with careful expertise, from seeds she’d collected.

Grasshopper mice are fierce, if diminutive, predators, that routinely dine on scorpions, centipedes and other venomous prey. And as they set out on their nightly hunts, they emit a long, piercing cry. It’s been called “a wolf’s howl in miniature.” Listening closely to these desert mice reveals the surprising world of “bioacoustics.”

Visible in the park’s southeastern corner, near the hot springs and Boquillas Canyon, the Boquillas Formation is a series of limestones and shales, in white, tan, yellow and brown. These rocks were laid down in shallow ocean waters across 10 million years, and they abound in fossils, which capture the emergence and extinction of countless creatures.

Órale, the onda this week in Caló is the word grifo. In modern Spanish it means a tap or faucet. But in Caló it means someone who’s either sick with the gripa (flu) or deeply under the influence of drugs. The general idea is that flu and drugs lead to the same presentation. The drugs that may be causing someone to be grifo are called grifa, and there’s no distinction between any particular drug, that is, they’re all grifa. And when someone takes them and acts crazy, it’s said they’re engrifado or beyond being merely grifo.

Though it’s certainly the most famous dinosaur, much about T-Rex, and its broader tyrannosaur lineage, remain a mystery. Now, scientists are taking a fresh look at tyrannosaur fossils from Big Bend National Park.

They’re irresistible to children, but their flashes can enchant an observer of any age. Fireflies seem like magic. They’re mostly associated with sultry summer nights in the eastern U.S. But they are found in the arid West, including in our region.

Órale, the onda this week is the word picudo. It comes from the modern Spanish word pico (peak) and means beaked, peaked or pointed, as in a stork or mountain peak. In Caló, it means someone who’s eloquent or a quick-witted talker. When you have something to say and can’t articulate it yourself, you recruit a picudo to say it for you.