I'm heartbroken!!!

Yesterday (not even knowing what was going to happen at midnight!!!) I had thoughts of TransIowa in my head... prompted primarily by a conversation D and I had at dinner on Tuesday, about our schedule and goals for the next six months or so...

he has a lot of different races lined up - both trail running and mountain biking (why he can't just use a road, I'll never understand :)... but I have only one. TransIowa (version 4).


So I went to the hole in the wall bike shop in DownTown yesterday to request the owner build me a front wheel for the bike I'll be riding for TI v4. I have a back wheel, but no front.


Well I forgot what it's like to try to get a hold of this guy... the only person in town whom I'd let build my wheel... his phone doesn't have an answering machine, and despite his shop hours being listed as 9am to 4pm - in reality they're usually more like 10am to 2pm. So I dropped by at 12:45. Door Locked.

I was distressed. I tried calling him later while I was running other errands DownTown - but the phone was never answered...


so - to quash my distress I decided to head over to my favorite Thrift Store and find some books with good pictures and photos (SelmaLee approved of the result) that I could use to create my own postcards for my TransIowa entry... last year they had a lottery system where you could send in as many postcards as you wanted for a random drawing - the more you sent in the more likely you were to be drawn. They had already mentioned postcards on the website this year - so it was something I could dwell on to lift my spirits... gotta love a craft project with a real purpose!!!

It happened the system wasn't needed last year - as they didn't reach their 100 person limit and all those who entered got to participate.

I spent two hours last night going through my new books (including the one at right, which is nothing but full page, color ads from the 60's - talk about a great find!!!) and cutting out choice pictures for use as/in postcards.

The TransIowa website was going to have a Big Surprise up at midnight on Halloween - but when I got back from the gym last night I was too tired and went straight to bed. When D got up this morning he woke me to say they'd opened registration!!! Perfect timing!!!

Except they've changed the rules.

No more lottery - no more multiple postcards. They're accepting one postcard per person on a first come first served basis for entry in the race :(


What are I supposed to do with all my extra pictures???


I think I might cry.

Better or Worse???

Not exactly Smoky the Bear...

I think the Victory Garden posters were a slightly better idea.

Out of action.

Selma Lee's temporary registrations have run out. I don't have all the paperwork back yet to get her properly registered - so for the moment she is illegal to drive :(

D's parents are in town for the week and came up with the great idea of having me "sell" the car to D and then maybe we could get another series of temporary registration tags... the Arizona DOT website has so far been unhelpful as to whether the alloted number of temporary registrations is limited to each owner or each car...

Sexism.

So why is it when a man comes home from a long day, grabs potato chips and plots down in front of a game on the tele and eats the whole bag without thinking about it, it's just "Oh, those boys will eat anything" but when a woman comes home, grabs a pint of ice cream and watches reruns of Sex In The City, it's "Oh, poor thing, she's such a wreck right now."

Why is women's emotive eating somehow a negative, but men's emotive eating isn't emotive eating, it's just "The way they are".

I'm calling all you men on it... you're just as bad as us!!!


(Now I'm going to the grocery store to buy some cookie dough...)

Discovering New music I've always had.

So we have two laptops (well three really, but the super old Apple- back when they were still Black- that was D's college computer is in another state and therefore doesn't count)... and they've been having fun making the rounds in and out of the local computer repair place. We only ever installed iTunes on the newer one (bought for a couple hundred dollars on eBay when JellyBean died) which D christened PooBean cause he doesn't like it as much.

Now PooBean is in the shop- and will be at least till the beginning of next week when the owner of the shop/the guy who does the soldering, returns from Haiti!!! where he's installing a solar panel project.

In the mean time- iTunes got installed on JellyBean so D could charge MoPo (his iPod Shuffle)- and apparently iTunes automatically integrates whatever music files are already on your computer, into your iTunes Library.


So way back in the day I allowed my brother to borrow JellyBean for a weekend roadtrip he was taking with a friend. Well his friend brought an external hard drive along with music and movies on it- to play on the laptop. My brother- liking a lot of the music- had his friend download his entire collection onto my computer... it was quite a bit of music, and knowing I liked a lot of it, I left it all on, thinking I'd eventually go through it and figure out what I wanted deleted.

The major problem with doing so- was the large number of files uploaded from CD's without any greater identification than Track 08 or Track 12, etc. No artist, no album, all it says is the length of the song and what track number it is. Some years ago I tried to go through some of these- but eventually lost interest- which now leaves a long list in my iTunes library of unidentified music which I'm slowly making sense of- by listening to the song till I can comprehend a length of fairly unique lyrics, I then Google said lyrics and relabel the file based on what I find.

The last four identified songs-

Time after Time by Cyndi Lauper

Shorty Wanna be a Thug by Tupac Shakur

LoveSong by The Cure

Warning by Incubus


What???

Scorpions!!!

A few days ago (D and I are debating which day exactly as neither of us is for sure)- D found a scorpion in the sink when he went to brush his teeth in the morning. He grabbed the boiling water he was using to make coffee with, and thought he drown the little guy as he washed him down the drain.

Last night- this is what I found in the same sink...


I got him to walk into a small box, took him outside and flung him off the deck...

we'll see if our friend makes it back this time.

I'll show You a fungal infestation...

but I already did some time ago-

for the past few weeks I've been purposely not topping off my tank... so that today I would have fewer then 10 gallons of diesel left (the capacity of my two fuel cans) and could re-siphon my baby's fuel tank to see how effective the previous flush and application of Bio-Bor were in eliminating the fungal/bacterial infestation.


Just look at that perfectly clear hose!!! Not one BIT of greenish brown sludge... no particles, no huge clumps, no residue on the end of the siphon hose after pushing it along the bottom of the tank looking for any hold-outs.

It's very difficult to get every bit of bacteria removed, and even after full flushes it's common for an infestation to return- I think that means that I have my very first example of Selma Lee being Lucky :)


Last time I siphoned the fuel- I only put a few gallons back in, then kept the rest in a fuel can in the trunk. I wanted to run out of diesel- to see whether my fuel gauge would be true right to the end- and to determine at what point my fuel light would come on. While at the same time having a stash of diesel ready, in the car, when it did happen. Well the light never came on- but the fuel gauge behaved as it should have.

Then last month I ran out of fuel, half way to work, when the gauge indicated about half a tank.

Today I siphoned out about eight gallons. I put five back in- which should be right at 1/4 of a tank... we'll see if that's indicated when I start her up later. The other three gallons are in the backseat for when I need them... we'll see how the experiment goes this time. I may be replacing my fuel sensor in the near future.


While I was waiting for all that fuel to siphon- I went at the windows again. Over the weekend I got most of the inside of the front windshield cleaned... today I tackled some of the door windows.

It's harder then you'd think-


I start by using Windex to clean off any dirt. Then I go over the window in three to four inch square sections- spraying Simple Green on the square being addressed, then wiping in 1 inch diameter circular motions till that one spot is dry- using a new, dry section of paper towel for each inch.

It's an oily residue- and the only way to address it is to get it caught up in large amounts of Simple Green and then use the dry towel to soak up the combined mixture. If you use a wet bit of towel you'll just smear the oily substance that's on the towel back onto the window. If you don't have enough Simple Green on the spot- then you just smear the oil into new patterns.

Each little circle must be dry before you more to the next inch- or residue will be left that will later be smeared onto other "clean" areas.

After that I come back with the Windex to remove any streaks left by the Simple Green.


This works for the inside of the windows... which I presume are in this state from when someone tried to remove the dark tint (clearly a cheap after-market job) that can still be found in some corners where it didn't all come off.

The outside of the windows however- are a little more difficult. I can't get a good picture of it- but it looks like there are little watermarks- like would be left over after rain, covering the windows... but it won't come off for anything- it almost seems like it's inside the glass...

investigations will commence.

Selma Lee made a friend

So D is going up to Moab this weekend for some cycling.

He'll be accompanied by a gentleman he's ridden with before, who drove up from Down South to meet at our house so they could travel in Josey together... he drove up in a 1982 Mercedes 300D named BioBertha. (Here's a hint- she runs on BioDiesel)

I would post a picture- but D has the camera.

Anyway- SelmaLee now has a friend in the drive way- and they're both blue...

they're so cute...


okady- that's enough.

The rest of the trip...

I strangled a Grizzly Bear.



Hiked in heals.



Dangled precariously over Lake Tahoe.



And read- what some people call Classics- but are really just turn of the century Romance Novels... oh fine- they have, like, poetic language and moral implications... I didn't say they were Trashy Romance Novels...



whatever.

Tenaya Canyon Happy Fun Time

So we drove up through California- avoiding Las Vegas. And got into the Owen's Valley Friday night and to Erik Schat's Bakery Saturday morning for breakfast and Energy Loaf, Almond Pound Cake and their super tasty 19 1/2 grain bread... okady- so I don't remember how many grains are in it, but there's a lot and they include whole lentils...

it's some serious, chunky, delicious bread.

So we sat out at their tables and ate breakfast about 10 minutes after they opened. On the edge of the main street through Bishop.



Then we drove the rest of the way to Tioga Pass and the Tuolumne Meadows side of Yosemite- which we had previously not been able to visit. We did a short hike Saturday afternoon before grabbing a camp site for the night.

Below is Tuolumne River- which we hiked down to and then followed back up for some time on the granite "slickrock" that channeled a long series of cascades.



After watching our neighbors teach their seven year old son how to throw knives (at a tree in the campground) we went to bed early for the Tenaya Canyon Happy Fun Time that was suppose to start bright and early the next morning.


We followed Tenaya Creek which, similar to Tuolumne River, has smooth Granite banks up in the meadow lands. We followed a feint trail through thick groves of trees, some grassy swamp lands, and along the exposed rock when possible. D decided to "Be the Rock" with a particularly round boulder which stranded itself along a stretch of granite bank.




Eventually we were forced to start moving Down. With the first major constriction of rock around the creek we headed to the left, climbed up into a talus slope and started the first of a lot of boulder hopping- or boulder slopping... as it isn't so much svelte stag leaps from boulder to boulder but some sloppy attempts at balancing and moving forward and down.



We were eventually treated to this view of Half Dome. See all those green trees down there... that's where we were going. From the point where this picture was taken we hiked along to the left for a bit and then descended (not roped yet) down a bit to the left of the center of this photo... don't worry it doesn't look quite so steep once you keep going... not quite.

The descent involved a fair bit of bushwhacking and careful treading down exposed slabs but we eventually got to the bottom (some 1500 vertical feet later) to continue hiking the stream bed till we reached another long drop and the first of three forced rappels (some people do more rappels, but we managed to down climb quite a few drops).

This is D setting up the first rap into a tighter slot (formed by that darker rock layer).



We knew we were right behind another group as we'd heard them celebrating when they'd managed to get down that long, steep descent. We caught up with them in the slot section and discovered a group of five twenty-somethings, several of whom worked as Naturalists in Yosemite. We reached the last rappel a bit ahead of the group of five, and discovered a couple from Colorado (who were spending three days backpacking through the canyon) sitting around a large and quite deep pool- that the last rappel went into. After we got across we sat around- watched the other group rappel down- and took pictures as everyone tried different methods of jumping in- most from a large boulder directly to the left of the picture below. The gentleman from Colorado however- swam back over to where we had just rappelled down, climbed up a bit and dove in from there-


he did manage to rotate fully forward and didn't belly-flop as it looks like he's about to in the picture.

My legs had taken a real beating doing all that rock-hopping and then the thousand plus feet of constant descending. (I mean- we went down This...


The rocks in the center of the picture make up the creek bed... we're going down the stuff in the bottom half of the photo- the top half of the picture is the opposing wall of the canyon... and there's D a bit ahead of me...)


I could tell I was going a bit slower through the bottom canyon- but after the extended rest we took around the pool I thought everything was fine when I stood up to continue the last section of creek walking before we reached the last two miles of flat and wide established Trail, around Mirror lake- which brought us into the Valley.

But it quickly hit me, and hard.

You ask- What hit you???

My own stupidity- pretty much.

I had eaten some of that delicious Almond Pound Cake for breakfast... and about half a granola bar. All day. Now I regularly go through canyons eating a lot less then I should... and drinking a lot less water too... I just don't need as much as D does. However- we had been in the sun, hiking an incredibly strenuous canyon for over seven hours.

I told D I needed to sit down again... he didn't understand. We had a few more miles of canyon- then two- some miles of flat trail- and then Dinner at the Pizza Place!!! Why on earth was I moving so slow??? So I meekly mentioned my food consumption- at which point he sat me down and started going through my pack, tossing over all the food he could find and demanding I eat something- NOW!!!

Well that pretty much lead to my vomiting along the trail. Which made me feel wonderful again. Wonderful meaning I could stand and slowly proceed. D helped as much as he could- took my pack- acted as my crutch during the steep downhill sections as that's when my legs most wanted to give out and drop me in the dirt.

Eventually I felt worse again- vomited again- felt a bit better and we trudged into Yosemite Valley at 1/3 to 1/4 out usual hiking pace. We checked into our tent cabin and D brought me Sprite and Saltines (I may or may not have thrown up twice more before the night was over) and I laid very still in bed for many hours before going to sleep.


The next morning D started up the trail we were suppose to hike together to return to our car- and I bought a one way ticket on a tour bus/hiker's shuttle to drive me out of the Valley, along the Tioga Road- back to Tuolumne Meadows and our car. The shuttle driver was quite informative and it was actually a pretty enjoyable ride as I chatted with a couple Park Employees who were hitching a ride on the start of several days off, and a small backpacking party who had missed their shuttle the day before.

I eventually got off a few stops before the trailhead where our car was parked and hiked the last couple miles to get a bit of exercise (though D had given me the larger and much heavier pack with the ropes and stuff that he wouldn't need on his hike that day- so it was a bit of a push... those two miles... bit pathetic).


Anyway... that was Yosemite.

Yosemite

Dave and I visited Yosemite way back in the days we were living in Josey. When we go to Tahoe next week our condo reservation starts on Monday night- which allows us to take the scenic route there over the weekend- via the East side of Yosemite- as in, not The Valley- which we didn't see on our last visit due to the snowed in pass to Tuolumne Meadows.

From the resurected Jelly Bean- a few photos of our last visit, looking down into Yosemite Valley proper.

Jelly Bean

Having Jelly Bean back is like glancing at a moment of my history. She malfunctioned not long after we moved to Prescott Valley.

At the time two different computer folks couldn't fix her and we bought another and set her aside. When the new computer needed attention (read D spilled beer on the keyboard) I found another place- and in the course of taking it back several times (after they failed to replace screws and funny things kept happening) I chatted up the owner about what was wrong with JellyBean and he thought he could fix her.

So that's why I finally decided last month to take her in and see if he was right. He was right- it just took him three weeks...


Now I look at the links I had bookmarked, the files prominently placed on the desktop, etc. And I have a reverse sneak peak at what my priorities were almost exactly one year ago. It's funny- it's not like they show huge treads or anything- just the little things that had me fascinated at the time- the sort of things you've forgotten about and replaced with new interests in a year.

Then there's the small matter of the following picture as the desktop wallpaper...

That's a carbon fiber Tea Cup, folks :) After converting currency- I believe it goes for about $250 for the set- spoon included of course.

As opposed to our other computer- which has the following as the Wallpaper. Which goes for about $490,000- and is our future home in Silverton, Colorado.


Details.

A bit o' sewing.

I showed D a few things about how to use one of the computerized sewing machines I have for The Business, the other day before I went to work. I came home to find this formless green ripstop blob. (Which Snad immediately crawled into.)



This morning D attempted to ellucidate what on earth he was doing.

Quick action on my behalf rescued the endeavor- and with D's wild gestures as to size and needs and my own adept skills at 3D modeling and flair- we managed the following piece.




Look at me slave away...


This is D examing the template and thinking- "Wow- my wife is way smarter then me." (Don't worry- this is a regular thought for him.)



I also just got Jelly Bean back!!! Umm- that's my old computer. Which appeared unfixable to several computer geeks in town- till I found someone new who thought they could handle it. After three weeks of absolutely NO communication- they called Friday at 4:20pm to say it was done (except they left a screw off and the keyboard isn't fully attached... I'll get it corrected on Monday). This computer place is better then the rest- but every time they've done something for me they're forgotten to replace screws inside or out of the laptops- leading to all sorts of odd behaviors on the computers' behaves. So far it appears to just be this minor screw on this occasion.

However- now Jelly Bean's back- I'm uploading to Flickr all the pictures we had on her from when we were living in Josey. Including these choice ones of Josey after I backed her off a pull-out just outside of Zion National Park while D was off hiking. At the time it was like driving our house over the edge.

D just realized!!!

When we go to Tahoe the first week of September- we'll be driving through the Owens Valley and Bishop- home of one of the best bakeries around- Schat's Bakery (pronounced Shot's).

They stopped doing mail orders a few years ago- so you have to go to Bishop or Holland to buy their products... this is their location in Bishop.

What on earth-

is wrong with these stupid people???

Complete idiocy.

My number-

So I had this 50 year old, drunk guy demand I give him my phone number at work tonight-

which would normally leave me slightly sketched, and muttering things about my husband.

However this occasion was slightly different- as he wanted my number so he could speak to said husband... not me. I made the mistake of getting too involved in a customer's conversation (and a drunk customer at that... I should know better) and it turns out this fine fellow has an elk hunting permit in the same zone and time as D's. At which point he demanded a way to discuss this with D- as we'll be neighbors in the middle of nowhere Arizona for several days in October.



Dave- his name is Steve, and I have his phone number written down in my book if you want it (I don't give my number out to customers for anything- elk included).

Primary Silliness-

What on earth is going on???


I've always maintained that if you have 50 states- in any relative evaluation- one of them has to be 50th.

However in our society- where one high school graduating class can have 4 or 8 or 12 valedictorians... cause no one wants to be second best- no state can stand being 50th, none the less 4th.

And now people are suggesting that Iowa will be forced to have their caucus in December if they want to be first. However- if there's one thing I know- it's that American Consumerism will out do Politics any day. No one will interrupt their Christmas Shopping for a Caucus- talk about a disaster waiting to happen.


I can't imagine a greater example of an institutional inferiority complex- and I think it's all the worse that the institutions in question are state governments.


What is wrong with you people???

La la la...

Monsoon!!!


This is looking off our deck on the front of the house- looking South, I suppose.



I like that in this picture all the prayer flags are flapping up...

Official Checks.

I have one- from my bank- made out for a large amount of money- to my old boss.

Tomorrow at 8am- D and I will pick up a cargo van and drive four hours to where my old boss now lives- and be done with this whole thing.

By which I mean we'll both sign a contract- I'll give her money- and she'll give me a great deal of property (hence the cargo can).


The check isn't for the largest amount of money I've ever held in one hand- but it certainly is the largest amount of money I've given over without some certain guarantee of equitable exchange.

While almost half of these funds are for concrete assets worth a certain amount of money- the other half is for things much less easily accounted. What is the value of a name- a web address- a design- a way of doing things- a reputation???

While I'm certain I've calculated its value, to me, accurately- I'm still exchanging certain money for uncertain certainties in my head.

I'm certain I can effectively run this business. I'm certain I have ideas that will grow it. That I can find others who will work with me- to do the things I can't all do myself. And that the less obvious assets that I'm buying can be put to uses, by me, the products of which will far exceed the value of what I'm paying.

But those certainties in my head- are still, in the larger world- certainly uncertainties.



I've now certainly used the derivatives of "certain" far too many times.

All I need to do now is sign my name and initial where indicated.

2:33 minutes

My brother called a short while ago.

Me- Hello
Brother- Hey- uh- is it your birthday today???
M-Yeah
B- Oh- uh- Happy Birthday then.
M- Thanks
B- Hey- I'm buying a Mercedes too


Then we discussed what kind- and that he was on his way to get plates for it. He asked if mine was "like drivable" (which it is). And then we parted ways.

It took an entire two minutes and 33 seconds.

It's the most I've talked to him in months- I felt special.

Secondly-

I forgot to mention- Crested Butte also had mad huge Alpine Columbine- on crack (aka Miracle-Grow)- no pictures though...


and the last Harry Potter book comes out in three days...


and the business purchase is on hold for the moment as I wait to see if the old owner can handle a reasonable non-compete.

Firstly-

Crested Butte was just as beautiful as I remember it. At first appearing quaint- until you realize all that charm is strategically staged- in a lot of new buildings being specifically built to coordinate with the older ones.

Still delightful- but a tidge out of our price range.

In comes Silverton. Everyone should move to Silverton- but only after I've moved there- so I'll still be able to afford a house.


As I explained it in an e-mail to a friend-

"There is nothing in Silverton- except some abandoned mines, pretty old buildings, and an extreme ski area (extreme mtn bike area a few months a year) and a few B and B's. The state of Colorado has actually declared it one of about a dozen "Enterprise Zones" where they'll give you tax breaks if you start a business there. It's the only town in the county- the county has a population of 540.

It's situated between two passes, both above 10,000 feet. So every once in a while you'll have a day or two between January-March where you can't leave the town in either direction. The average temperature in winter at night is negative 20 to 20 degrees. Winter day is negative 20 to 60 degrees. Summer night is 20 to 40 degrees and summer day is 20 to 80 degrees.

However- it's only 50 miles to Durango- which gives you someplace to buy groceries (tourists take an old narrow gauge train from Durango to Silverton- which supplies the town with tourists from 11:15 to 3:30 pm everyday during the summer months).

Oh wait I forgot!!! In good Colorado tradition- it does have it's own micro-brewery :)"


It also has a Barbershop Music Festival (Telluride's Bluegrass Festival can eat its heart out). And possibly best yet- its small newspaper has a snarky backpage called The Caboose where they quote articles from 1898 and the like.


So- why don't you all just e-mail what size place you're looking for and I'll start figuring out who's going to live where- and don't worry- there's no shortage of housing- 2/3 of the town is for sale. (Including their classic old stone hotel from 1882- the one on the corner, with shops on the ground floor- you know what I mean- there's one of these in every old frontier town... though not Crested Butte oddly enough... and it's only 3 million- What a Steal!!!)





Okady- well. Anyway- this is my favorite picture of the "War Council". We were sitting around camp- and all of a sudden one of the boys mentioned he was getting out a map to look at the race course- and next thing you know there are four ladies sitting by themselves, and five boys running giddy over to look at the map- this is the view the ladies had of the whole affair-

Humphreys

I'd like everyone to think really hard about just how large this flower is... my hands aren't tiny little girl hands...





They had superb bright yellow interior petals with stark, clean white outsides.

I think columbine are the only flowers that are as pretty from the back as they are from the front. Even when not talking about flowers- that's a hard statement to make about most things...


I liked the contrast of yellow and blue.

From our hike today.

Getting in gear-

Oh no- not in regards to Selma Lee- dear me- she's enjoying being neglected... I swear.

However- I did attend my first Spin class last night. Presumably the first of many as I begin my laze to blaze transformation for TransIowa. I guess since D outed me already there's no harm in admitting it... I intend to line up for TransIowa '08 or v4.0??? One of these days I'm going to have to start one of those insipid riding blogs, where I do nothing put talk about how much my legs hurt, and how my home trails are cooler than everybody else's- bonus points for pictures (but everyone who doesn't live in Alaska always losses the unannounced, but none-the-less important photo contests)... no really- neither are they insipid, nor am I going to start writing one :)


In more exciting news (does this demonstrate a bad priority list...) I've reached an agreement with my previous employer to purchase her business. There are some legalities that need to be worked out- but the price and assets have been settled on. Now to do the fun part- start the freakin' business.

Anyway- Dave can't make a joke of my non-existent company anymore- and I'm officially declaring myself Self-Employed- take that.



Thank you world- please come again.

Vacation-

we just returned from a week of vacation. Some plans changed in the end- but for the most part is was all good.

Above is myself in the bucket of a digger that was left around a bit of torn up earth on Chamberlain Ranch (we speculate they're subdividing and selling off some land for vacation homes)- just north of Zion National Park- you walk through a bit of the ranch to access the Virgin River just above where it enters the park and slots up into The Narrows. Which we through-hiked in just ender 8 hours (the norm being doing it in two days with 10-12 hours of hiking total. It's only 16 miles- but those are river miles, which have you rock hopping and sliding around crossing back and forth across the river from sand bar to sand bar in search of easier hiking.

There was some great red and yellow columbine in The Narrows. They grow out of the sheer walls, forming hanging gardens where various springs and seeps exit the canyon walls.
Unfortunately we didn't see any of the purple and white Rocky Mountain Columbine- which apparently haunt Boundary Canyon (around Zion)- the friends we visited, Ariel and Phillip, had pictures of some they saw when they did said canyon several weeks ago.

I'm pretty certain columbine are my favorite flower- you can't tell- but the ones in the picture are two and a half to three inches long from front to back with their long tails. They're intricate without being delicate- but they only grow in very wet places, the sides of stream beds, etc. so you don't often fine the density and profusion of them you do in The Narrows.

I'm also quite upset with Xanterra Parks and Resorts (the only concessionaires in many of the National Parks... I'm always upset with them about something- but this time even D thinks it's warranted) when we were at The North Rim Lodge- we quite clearly heard the hostess of their fine dining restaurant tell two twenty-something ladies that they had to have reservations (in the snottiest, drawn-out tone, I couldn't believe my ears). Then a thirty-something couple walked up not two minutes later and she told them she could seat them if they could dine immediately... (the ladies had not asked for a later time, they had simply inquired if they could be accommodated at all that evening)

excuse me???

I work in restaurants- I know how reservations work- and that sometimes someone gets up before you think they will, you can move a few things around, and seat someone on the spur of the moment that you wouldn't have thought you could... but this hostess didn't look around- didn't talk to any other staff between talking to these two pairs... if a table had opened up- she wouldn't have known- she was making a judgment based totally on what she thought they looked like.


Why must Xanterra make our parks cheap and trashy??? Why can't they step up their service and services to match the fact that they're located in some of the most beautiful, treasured, and historic places our country has???

Bah.

More...

I'm finally getting around to the point of these last two posts... which was to classify the different flowers. Some of these pictures are from much earlier in the season, they're not all blooming right now. First we had the primrose come out. Then half the side yard turned purple with these bundles of little flowers I couldn't photograph well. Now it's primarily pink and purple thistles and big patches of the orange globemallow. Always with a few other random flowers tossed in. We didn't manage to have any Indian Paintbrush though... there were plenty of them growing in the empty lot down the street- but none of their bright red blooms in our yard.




Gaura coccinea
Scarlet Guara,
also called scarlet beeblossom, or butterflyweed
You can see our mailbox post on the right side. These grew in a sizable patch by the drainage ditch that separates up from the street (note the row of dark colored rocks that parallel the road), and were only in bloom for about a week... now they have little specks of rose that are the withered up blossoms still hanging on. They stand almost two feet tall.



These are the giant dandelions (three to four feet tall), which known they're in the desert, as they grew in this very shady spot next to the evergreen bushes- and would also close back up during the worse heat of the day, then open in the mornings and evenings.



Erigeron divergens
Spreading Fleabane
One of the hardest to pin down- and I'm not entirely certain it's not Eastern Fleabane (which took federalism to heart and is not located in almost every state). I eventually ditched my Field Guide to The Plants of Arizona and started through the USDA's Plant Database- which is super interesting, includes pictures, and should be visited by everyone.




Tragopogon dubius
Yellow Salsify,
also called moonflower, meadow salsify, or yellow goatsbeard
This one wins the odd name award for both it's common and scientific names... it's actually an early European immigrant who's made itself quite at home.



Sphaeralcea ambigue
Desert Globemallow,
also called sore-eye poppy, desert hollyhock, mal de ojo and plantas muy malas
The hairs on the stem are an eye irritant- which explains most of it's alternative names. We have bunches and bunches of these in the yard right now. I might take another picture later- as it's hard to appreciate the perfectly round little orange disks that are the blossoms. Most plants have blooms all the way up the stem, creating swaths of orange in the yard.

Company...

some of the flowers that grow wild in our yard... they keep Selma Lee company while she's in the drive way.




Oenothera albicaulis
Prairie Evening Primrose
There are 21 species of Oenothera (primrose) found in Arizona- if you compare this to the last picture in this post- you have to look at the lobes on the leaves to see the difference (there's also a distinct difference in height if you could see a side profile of them).



Opuntia violacea
Purple Prickly Pear,
also called Blue Blade or Dollar Cactus (how appropriate)
We have maybe half a dozen of these on the sloping hill behind our apartment.



Cirsium neomaxicanum
New Mexican Thistle
We have two of these out front all by themselves- they're both about 3 1/2 feet tall, with such slender stems I don't see how they don't fall over.




Cirsium arizonicum
Airzona Thistle
There are many thistle species and sub-species in Arizona. The bloom on this is about four inches across- I think the picture makes it look smaller then it is. We have these all over the yard- this plant is now fully in bloom with five big pink flowers.



Oenothera caespitosa
Stemless Primrose,
also called Sandlily or Rockrose
We have seven railroad tie steps that go up the side of the building- for whatever reason these flowers love those steps- and earlier in the spring- probably early April- we had a dozen of these plants along the steps- which open up in the mornings, and by mid-day are closed and look like boring green weeds.

Terribly off topic...

Why do I read the BBC???

They managed to use the phrase "primed athletic beasts" in reference to laboratory rats...

oh- and British birders are called twitchers... did you know that???

I did- cause I read the BBC.