Ok, here we go... photos galore!

Finally home and catching up on everything! First album... moose, moose, moose!
The fox, "Boots", outside of the Bears Den in Grand Lake, taken by my camera phone at night.

Always running errands... gets in the way of fun!

Quick! Go online and order plane tickets to visit me!

I got a Farewatcher alert from Travelocity - $175 round trip tickets to Denver! I don't know what the restrictions are or how long it will last... Do it! Do it! Do it!

It's absolutely beautiful outside right now; Joe is on his way to REALLY go for a hike this time. I'm online trying to catch up with everything I can't do while I am on the West side.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MATT! It's my little bro's 14th today!

Usually I work four 10 hour days... This week, since we have so much going on, I stayed in Grand Lake through yesterday (Friday). Even though it's always much colder and snowier on that side of the continental divide, I am really enjoying my time over there. Of course, I just had to go and get an overuse injury from tearing at those logs and slash with a little too much enthusiasm... So I spent the week mostly flagging trees to be sprayed or for pheromone packets to repel the beetles. By the time I get done flagging everything, I will have marked about 2,000 trees. Phew.

We also got this thing called an Air Curtain Burner - it's a big dumpster that blows air and incinerates logs - so I got to help out on that a bit. Also got a little bit of overtime checking on it in the middle of the night to make sure it didn't start a forest fire. 52 hours of work this week, yippee!

... And all that money is going to my new used vehicle I hope to purchase in the next few weeks. Probably a Toyota pickup, since that's THE vehicle of choice out here. I was accelerating in Focus today, and the engine just SHUT DOWN. I restarted the car and it was fine... but yeah, methinks it's time to move on.

The West side is just one big sleep-deprived party - we eat out every night (don't feel like hauling our cooking utensils back and forth) and usually end up at the Lariat Saloon to play pool or trivia (we formed our own team, The East Siders... and lost, but not by a lot! Next week is our week!!), and pet the wolf-dog Otis and everybody else's mutts. One evening, Sandy and Doug hosted a Mai Tai Party in honor of a former coworker, and also in honor of their friend Susie who used to work for Rocky... she went to Haleakala NP in Hawaii and died when a rock fell off a cliff while she was clearing a road. It was also a little tribute to Jeff Christensen, the ranger who died in 2005.  They went to visit their friend who actually got the job that their deceased friend Susie had... Very strange. Anyway, they showed home videos of their trip out there and served up the best Mai Tais ever! There were quite a few people there; of course, Ron, Cisco, Travis and I were feeling pretty good by the end of the night!

Oh, and Sandy and Doug invited me to Hawaii with them in February... the only thing I have to pay for is airfare (~$600 or less from Denver!) and food and drinks!  Heck, maybe I'll even try to get a job there. Why not?! I heard it's relatively easy to get a seasonal job there... but near impossible to stay. I'm up for a challenge! ;)

Scott, whom I worked with in 2003, and Dayle came over from the East side to help us out, so those two, Mark and I took over the pool table (and I adopted the juke box) and the bowling alley... and the story ends with Mark standing outside the truck with a frozen trout in his hand, decided whether we would go back to the bar or cook turkey-dogs over the fire at the Air Burner. It doesn't sound that funny, but it was.

Anyway gotta jet before Joe gets here! So much going on, I know I am forgetting a bunch. Probably getting my own apartment, since it looks like I will be getting a roommate in June. Yuck!

Oh, lots and lots of moose pics to add later. Also saw a pine marten but the little bugger was too fast for me!

Here is the obituary for Dick Ingalls:

"Age 45 of Redford. May 4, 2006. Loving brother of Kathleen Hefni (Mohamed), Joanne Ingalls McKay, Paula McCue (Mike), William (Kathy Taves), Thomas (Donell), Mary, John, and Barbara. Preceeded in death by his loving wife Robin, father Richard, mother Mary, and sister Shirley. Also survived by 14 nephews and nieces. Visitation will be at Harry J. Will Funeral Home, at 34567 Michigan Ave, Wayne, MI on May 7, 2006 from 2-7 p.m. Internment after cremation at United Memorial Gardens, Curtis Rd, Plymouth Township. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the American Cancer Society of Michigan in honor of Dick's wife Robin Ingalls."

Sad news about an O.P. coworker

Joe just called to tell me that one of our O.P. coworkers died of a heart attack at work yesterday. I was on the tree crew with Dick for a few weeks; he was a quiet, laid-back guy who always managed to keep his head above the negativity and crap at work. His dad had just passed away earlier this winter; a few days later, his wife died - she had cancer but was expected to live at least 6 months. Right before I left for Colorado, he came up to me and said "Want to see a picture of my girlfriend?" and handed me a photo of his 1940-something Indian motorcycle - a very sweet bike.

Wow, I am really glad him and I had a chance to talk a little bit before I left. He was just so quiet, but one day we just started talking. He was trying to get money to go to HVAC school and move up north. I kept trying to convince him to move to Colorado, because it's the place to be!

Very sad. :(  And just shocked. I have lots to type and pics to put up, but not really in the mood right now. He didn't have any kids, but 2 dogs. Those poor puppers. Yeah, don't know what else to say, just shocked. Dick was such a good guy...

Trail log and photos from Susan's Birthday

Fern Falls breaking through the snow

The photo album for today is from Susan's birthday back in March. We went to Friday's... and I guess when you tell them it's somebody's birthday, they come by all throughout dinner and tie balloons all over the person. Needless to say, anybody that knows Sue can imagine that she wasn't too keen with people trying to tie balloons to her arms and her head... She put a stop to that very quickly, but it sure was funny to watch her get ticked off!

I am going to keep track of the trails I hike this year. I had done it in 2003 but I can't remember how many gazillion miles I logged that year.

Today's Trail: Fern Falls, 6.6 miles round trip (trailhead was closed so added 1.6 miles to distance). Originally planned on hiking to Fern Lake but the weather kept changing from blue sky and fluffy white clouds, to total cloud cover and light rain, then nice again. There is still some snow along the trail when you get near the falls (and probably all the way to the Lake), but was firm enough that I didn't post-hole at all (which would have sucked, since I was wearing shorts!) By the time I returned to my car, the mountains were enclosed by clouds - good thing I turned around!

I had planned on doing this hike yesterday with Joe, but he forgot his hiking boots! GOSH! He's not a very good mountain man, ha ha! I gave him the grand tour of the Park and we did some hiking around Lumpy Ridge... where he found a dead elk, which was kindof neat in its own morbid way. Coincidentally, we were eating deep-fried ice cream at Ed's when the bartender introduced us to the guy right next to us... who owns the only official tree company in town, Mike's (and the guy's name was not Mike, but Adam... he just bought the company). It's a small world up here!

...Now, I'm talking to a few bikers here in the coffee shop about winter here - guess it's really really windy, but they ride every month of the year up here too. Don't really get snow accumulation either. It's great talking to locals! Don, Marcy and Steve. Need to remember that!

That's all for now, I've got my Sunday routine to follow - Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy tonite, pack up my stuff so I can head West again for the week, catch up on email, blah blah blah.

Enjoying the peace and quiet while it lasts...

I have a little bit of  time this morning to not only catch up a little better on this journal, but also call everybody that has been great enough to try to get ahold of me lately - been so busy with work, play, and life in general, time just flies when you have phone calls to return! So I'm back in the coffee shop, drinking a mexican mocha (with cayenne pepper)! Can you tell I'm having fun?

A little tidbit of Rocky Mt. National Park information:  They just released the Elk Management Proposal for public review this past week. It might not seem like a big deal, but the day they released it to the press, the park was swarming with news reporters and video cameras. There's just too many elk in the park, plain and simple. Hunting is not allowed and they have no real natural predators here (though I've heard the coyotes sometimes hunt in packs like wolves and have taken a rare sick or young elk down), so the population has exploded and taken quite a toll on the vegetation and resources in the park. The park has been working on this before I worked here in 2003, and their recommended action is to cull the herd through hunting - not just for the general public, but by rangers and/or other private individuals doing it at night, as not to disturb people. The scientists and employees in general, including myself, all favor this choice. A few of us are really into the idea of reintroducing wolves... but that's a bit more complicated.

Unfortunately, the general public doesn't want to see Bambi get shot, so to speak. It doesn't help when the news plasters personified images of "baby elk sticking its tongue out to catch snowflakes" and portreys hunting as murder. It will be interesting to see what happens. I'm pro-wolf in general, but there's gotta be good science and good management to deal with the complications of human-wolf interaction. The park needs that natural balance of predator-prey, and until/if ever wolves are "welcome" here, hunting is the best choice. Read it yourself if you feel so inclinded and see what you think! It's out there for public comment, and if you have an option, let them know! Unless you don't favor hunting. Ha ha just kidding. :)  The National Parks belong to everybody, and we all have a say in how they are managed.

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Didn't plan on spouting off dorky science stuff, but I love this place. The park is so central to this community, my livelihood, my social life, and my hobbies... it gets a little personal sometimes. :)

I think I was briefly explaning what I've been up to and why I've been so busy. Cisco and I are the only people devoted to Mountain Pine Beetle (MPB) and hazard tree work... and since the problem is so severe, we have our work cut out for us. We are given a lot of freedom and not much supervision to accomplish our tasks, because we just have SO MUCH to do - it feels good to be important and trusted enough to have say in how and when things get done, despite that we are both only seasonal.

The next couple weeks are hectic. We have until mid-June at the latest to accomplish any active MPB work - that's when the beetles fly, and once they spread to new trees there isn't much that we can do. We are getting this huge dumpster-like bin called an "air curtain burner" on Monday on the West side, where we will be burning the mass quantity of beetle-killed trees for the next month. And we all know how much I enjoy a good bonfire! Next week, the pesticide contractors are coming to spray the trees we have been marking to protect them... we've been so busy though that as of right now, we still have 700 trees to mark. Not sure how that is going to work out, with the Air Curtain Burner going on, plus we need to supervise the contractors on both the East and the West sides... Then, there's always hazard tree work that pops up unexpectedly.

Oh, and it makes it a lot harder when the park goes from being relatively quiet in April (~67,000 in April last year) to busy (I think ~117k in May) to insane (~600k+ in July??) and we have to shut down roads or work in campground areas. It makes it that much harder. Should be fun! :)

For 4-5 days a week, I live in an apartment in Granby and party with the laid back, great folks on that side. Met a lot of cool people - Mark, Keith, Doug and Sandy, the trivia team - drank a few and watched too much Denver sports... I miss the Wings! On the weekends, I live in Estes at my "real" apartment, you know the one with all my stuff. This weekend, a lot of people are moving in and starting on Monday, so our housing area will no longer be as quiet as it as been. Probably the weekly/nightly bonfires and too many parties will start up. As if I'm not already sleep deprived! And I mean that in a good way! :)

Speaking of sleep deprived, I finally got to hang out with one of the former crew leaders, Lonnie. It was a pleasant surprise to find out that he is still around. Him, Cisco and I tore it up until 4 am Thursday night, watching the Nuggets and catching up at Kelli's Dance Club (real hoppin' place too, with like 6 of us there, ha ha!)... I left my car downtown because I don't drink and drive, so Cisco drove us all home. Of course, the next morning when I biked the few miles from my apartment to my car, it decided to get cold and snowy again. That's what I get for being a responsible drunk I guess! Anyway, Lonnie is big into running so if I get up to speed I'll have somebody to train with. It will be a while before I can keep up with him though!  

Now I'm just hanging out, waiting for Joe to show up so I can introduce him to "real" mountain living up here! The weather is cold but I think we're going to go for my first hike in the park since I arrived. Hell, I haven't even driven all the way up Trail Ridge Road to where it is closed yet either... probably do that too!

Speaking of TRR, I met the guys that drive those HUGE plows and rotor-snowplow thing (I need to get a picture of it on here) and they said they are 4 miles from the Alpine Visitor Center - the top of the road. At this point, the snow is SO DEEP that it's a matter of how many FEET closer they get per day - 25+ ft. snow banks, a little at a time. I am going up there and if I am VERY nice, Doug might let me operate some of the equipment. They hope to open the road by Memorial Day, like usual.

Oh yeah, one more cool funny thing (at least to me) - I got trained how to operate a 13 speed dump truck last week! The ones at my last job were all automatic, and I never drive standard CARS... so it was quite a treat to learn how to deal with that split-speed transmission, old school beast! Jake brake and everything! I gave poor Ron whiplash at least a couple times but picked up on it pretty quick I suppose. Let me say this - it is honestly a work out to double clutch and shift through all those gears!

Off to adventure into the wilderness! Miss you all! And I have to give a big thank you to the people that helped me through my last week in Michigan - Linda, for driving out to help me move and drive back and forth too many times, my stepdad for his last minute life-saving help fitting everything in storage and cleaning my apartment, and a certain somebody who took off work to help me chill out and relax while playing Grand Theft Auto... That was a rough week and without them, I would have never gotten everything done and kept my sanity. And of course everybody else who took me out for my birthday and all those going away parties and for understanding when I just left without really saying goodbye... Thanks for being so awesome!

Snow makes for fantastic photo opps...

I am exhausted from my week on the West Side of the park again, and this coffee shop is closing shortly... But I had some GREAT photo opps this week!

I'll post some nice sized ones on here of my favs, but I'll put them all in the photo album for this entry.

I love 4 day work weeks... but it makes for a LONG DAY of dragging brush!

Muley Deer!

Mule deer in my front yard, elk in the back yard. A few more photos, because everybody loves pictures!

I'm bribing Cisco with beer and/or tequila to let me watch Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy tonite. Cheers to that!

 

What to do with all this SUNSHINE?!

Yesterday morning, I woke up and decided I would kick my workout routine into high gear so I can climb those mountains and bike some mean single track. I'm still running on "Michigan Time", so I keep waking up at 5-6 am (I would be 7-8 am in MI) and going to bed around 9-10 pm (11-midnite MI time). What could be better than an early morning run in the mountains?!

Ends up, a whole lot of things are better than that when you aren't used to the elevation!

There is a trail in the park that is right outside my apartment. I get cold induced asthma as it is but I was stubborn and ignored the fact that it was still only 40-45 degrees outside... and that running at 8,600 ft for the first time is like trying to breathe through a pillow... I ran for about, ohhhh maybe a minute or two... And had to stop before my lungs exploded!

Frustrating, but now I remember that's how it was the last time I was here. It took me about 2 months to run more than 3 miles. Fortunately, by the end of the summer I was one lean mean mountain running machine! Ok, maybe not that intense... but much better than I was before!

Anyway, my "run" ended up being a 25 minute hike with a couple minutes of labored jogging and much panting. I'll get there again. I'm too stubborn not to. :)

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Joe moved into an apartment about 1 1/2-2 hours south-east of me, outside of Denver, and I offered to help him move some of his stuff... Which meant I had volunteered to carry his stuff up 3 flights of stairs of course. He's in a pretty suburban area, so once the work got done we went to play in the foothills and wound up in the mountain town of Evergreen for dinner. There is a bar there called the Little Bear, and we paid $4 cover each to listen to some old hippies sing a song that went, "Arf arf arf arf arf arf arf..... WOOF!"  The band was a little goofy but the bar was cool, with upstairs wooden bleachers and live music.

And now today, I'm in Boulder at the Folsom St. Coffee Shop, catching up with the rest of the world and doing some shopping. I think I will take a hike before I try to do any more running. :)

Hope to have some more photos to share soon!

Vagabond Vixen

I'm sitting in a coffee shop in Estes Park, drinking coffee and taking advantage of free wireless internet! Woo hoo!

I started work on my birthday, and my hazard tree partner Cisco was nice enough to take me out... and I ran into a bunch of people that I had worked with in 2003. People either never leave this place, or they leave and come back! I think Cisco and I are going to have too much fun running around the Park with chainsaws and minimal supervision!

Looks like I'll be staying on the West side of the park (a 3-4 hour drive while Trail Ridge Road is closed) for 4-5 days a week on and off for a couple months. The folks over there are great and I guess it's tradition (8 years and going!) to hit up trivia night at some bar every Wednesday. Of course our team, "The People By the Back Door", won - free drinks! I'm gonna have to watch it around those crazy kids... did I mention they're all probably 40 yrs+??

What are we doing on the West side? Here's some dorky science and forestry stuff: There is this insect called the Mountain Pine Beetle, and it does its little life cycle thing inside Ponderosa and Lodgepole pines, as well as a few other evergreens. It's a natural occurrence and usually isn't a problem; however, due to the continuing drought (and I think also in part to fire suppression, so the forest is too thick in some places), the trees are overly stressed and the MPB (beetle) is wreaking havoc on the trees. If you ever go over there, you'll see miles of dead, red pines - all due to the beetle.

What that translates to is that the trees are screwed. Part of our job is to find "high value trees" and mark them to be sprayed with insecticide to protect them from the beetle. This is proving to be harder than we thought - the beetles have hit most of the trees 8" and up and we can't do anything about it. So we run around places in the park and put tape around trees. Another part of our job is to remove hazardous trees - which there are plenty of, because of the beetle. Later on, I will be on rotation to fight fires and hopefully get to see some action!!

It's great to be back here! The sun shines even when it's nasty out, and I forgot how bizarre the weather can be living in themountains - sunny and warm one minute, a blizzard the next... repeat 5-6x in a day, and that's how Tuesday was. :)  Today is looking to be fantastic and I am either going to go hiking, trail running, or find some mountain biking trails that won't kill me!

I've got my work cut out for me this summer, but these 3 day weekends are always fantastic for enjoying my new home!

Here's a photo of a moose on the West side. Hope to have lots more photos, especially since I have a digital camera this time around.

... And I can't wait to either get my motorcycle out here, or get a HARLEY!

 

The Notebook

I'm watching The Notebook... I avoided seeing it because I thought it was one of those popular movies that everybody sees just because everybody else has seen it. But it's really good! It's making me feel all girly. Here's a quote I really like:

"The best love is the kind that awakens the soul, that makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds..."

Awe... :)

Fall Colors Driving Tour

I uploaded pictures from my photo safari up to Traverse City/Northport/Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes/Charlevoix/Petoskey to my Trekshare website.

Here's just a few of my favorites.

OT

I worked today. Nine ash trees down in 7 hours. And if dragging brush wasn't exercise enough, I decided to go for my 4 mile run when I got home. Now, I think I deserve a cold Molson while I watch some hockey. Dinner was gourmet - grilled cheese sandwich, with Havarte cheese, and spinach in brown butter. Mmm mmm.

Now I'm just hanging out waiting for Jeff to get out here so we can tear it up in downtown Royal Oak. The catch is that he won't even get out here til 10. Hope I can stay up that late, I don't party the way I used to!

So here are some pictures from work today. I'll get my up north pictures on here when I feel like it. OH! Bad news. My dad might get rid of AOL, which means I'll lose my whole journal! I have no idea what to do, I have 2 years of crap on here and I can't just transfer it. #%&^%#@!*^&

 

I'm back!

Glen Lake from the top of some dunes at Sleeping Bear  

I'm watching a movie right now, but thought I'd post a few pics. My trip was short but worthwhile - I was itching for a road trip. I'm going to New York for the fire academy next weekend, but that doesn't count - I'm doing 20 hours of driving round trip for an 8 hour class. Ugh. More later.

Farm near Glen Lake

Gone.

Screw this place, I'm outta here.

Left work early today, got my crap together, and now I'm going up north to the Traverse area. Be back tomorrow night.

Gonna enjoy some fall colors and some much needed R & R!

Maple roasted apples and hockey

First thing first: I know I might be thinking ahead, but the fact that I-70 is currently shut down in Colorado because of that wicked snowstorm has thoughts of snowboarding and winter fun careening down the powder-covered mountains in my head.  I should probably feel sorry for those people stranded in the snowstorm... Oh who am I kidding, I don't feel sorry for them! Anybody who is stuck in Colorado and has a PROBLEM with it can kiss my butt, I WISH I were stuck in that beautiful state... working lots and lots of snowplow overtime, so I can spend all my money on ski passes!

Anyway, back to the present. October is my favorite month. Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. I love cooler weather and changing leaves and apples. APPLES! I'm apple-mad right now. Plus, I have this urge to cook. Now, I'm not reknowned for my cooking ability, but give me a recipe and I'll give you a meal. ;) With my apple-madness came the inspiration to cook up some Maple Roasted Apples tonite. Did I mention I made tortellini for dinner? LOL! Not exactly a complimentary pair, but I am a woman and can have ridiculous cravings. They turned out pretty good, but here are my comments: I used Fuji apples - it was all I had - but I think they might be better with more tart apples, like Granny Smith. I also added some nutmeg for subtle flavor. Overall, they're pretty darn good! One more mental note: When stealing cinnamon from my parent's house, make sure it's PURE, like the bottle says... and not mixed with sugar. Woops. So my Maple Apples might be a bit sweeter than they should be, but they're still mighty tasty and perfect for...

Watching hockey! I know, another mismatch - baked apples, tortellini, and hockey. This is why I am a bachelorette - so I can do ridiculous things like that and not care what anybody else thinks!

Oh, and so I can also do all of this while wearing only shorts and a bra. :P Hee hee!

That website I got the recipe from - the State of Michigan - has a lot of other delicious sounding dishes that I'll probably try out once I buy some groceries. Check it out!

Wings lost but that's ok. I love hockey. In fact, I am probably going to play again this winter. It's been two years since the women's hockey team I was on won the "Cup" - a mounted men's jock strap - and I found a great Adult Beginner's hockey program that sounds just what I need - it's not a team, but an actual class where you work on those fundamental skills that make you a good player. I can PLAY but during a game, it moves so quickly it is hard to work on technique (which I have none, hee hee).

Wilson kept me company this weekend and we had a romantic and wonderful time together. He was afraid of my hallway for some reason (??) and slept on the couch (we sound like a feuding married couple!) but we was good to snuggle with for a mid-day nap on Saturday. I love cider mills and Wilson loves being outside, so I took him up to Yates and we hiked along the river. He made friends with a pug, a pit bull, and some old blind mutt, and I just strolled along in my cowgirl shirt and cordouroys looking cute. ;)  I thought dogs were a good way to pick up guys, but apparently I was a good way for him to pick up other dogs! Hmmph!

The party Saturday night was... interesting. I'd rather not recap. It wasn't pretty.

Sunday was absolutely beautiful, and I had my typical dilemma - it was so nice outside, I couldn't decide what I wanted to do! It always comes down to: running, mountain biking, going for a motorcycle ride, or hiking. I wanted to see Jenna but she's a busy lass so we had to postpone, but she helped me narrow it down to "something on wheels". Motorized, or non? My Honda won over my Raleigh, so I put on my new leather jacket, my warm gloves, and hit the road on that beautiful, sunny, cool day!

I had grand plans - go up Rochester Road, take Orion Road to Lake Orion, then up to Oxford,head east to Romeo, and eventually take Mound Road back down and eventually make my way home. What really happened was that I was mildly cold because I don't have chaps, so I was going to head up Rochester... and didn't realize it was dirt road. I backtracked and went to Orion Rd, to downtown Lake Orion... and came home. It was still 60-70 miles, and it was BEAUTIFUL! I think Orion Rd. beats Dixboro as my favorite ride so far. I used to work in Oakland Township and forgot that road goes right by my old work. It's winding and hilly, the blue sky was pure and crisp, leaves just starting to change to orange, yellow, and red, the smell of leaves and wood burning, cool wind blowing through my hair... I am so glad I bought that motorcycle!

I am now working five 8 hour days instead of four 10 hour days... Gosh it doesn't seem like we get anything done. I'm not complaining - I'm burnt out. We busted ASH (hee hee, get it? Ash, as in ash trees with the ash borer... ok stupid forestry humor) all summer and I'm exhausted.

Enough for now. Guess I was feeling conversational with my computer tonite. :)

Here's some pictures. Enjoy.

Song that's in my head lately:

Ryan Adams - Touch, Feel and Lose

I knew I was never gonna talk to you tomorrow
And oh, the birds how they sing
If you were a bird could you sing me a song of sorrow
'Cause all I know from you is grief
But I never wanted to be your rolling train

I never wanted to be your dancin' shoes
I just wanted you to love me
I just wanted you to love me
Touch, feel & lose
And cry, cry, cry

I thought maybe I could be some kind of shelter
But oh, your storm how it raged
You know your kisses, they like lightnin' and thunder
And your smile is sweet and come down like rain

I never wanted to be your dancin' shoes
I just wanted you to love me
I just wanted you to love me
Touch, feel & lose
And cry, cry, cry

Leaves and Pumpkins!

With my allergies running rampant, I'm sitting here watching Wyatt Earp, chatting with my friend Tara online, and hanging out with my main man of my life, Wilson.

Yes, Wilson is my family's Scotty dog. But he's as good as it gets right now. ;)  Yeah, I just took him for the evening to give him a little vacation, and give me a little canine companionship so maybe I won't go out and get Munchkin (aka Darby) tomorrow. Having a puppy when leaf and snow seasons come up, with all that overtime and not being home a lot, would be very hard to do.

So now, instead of a puppy, I might buy a truck. Focus is getting to that point where I either need to fix some things, or get a new car. Toyota Tacoma or Chevy Silverado, 4x4 and extended cab, for those rugged Montana and Colorado roads when I go back out there!

Some guy's dad just bought Key Largo, a bar on Walled Lake, so they are having a big party tomorrow. My Novi boys and I are going to be there tomorrow to tear it up! Should be fun. Besides that, I plan on taking a scenic tour of the fall colors - hopefully on my motorcycle if the weather is kind. Michigan's travel website has a few good routes: Mackinaw City - Charlevoix - Petosky, or Jackson - Ann Arbor - Monroe, or Detroit - Algonac - Lake Orion - Port Huron.

My sister Linda and I have decided (more accurately: I ORDERED her, and she agreed) to go on a vacation some time after April next year. It's either going to be Alaska, Utah, or, if we both save our money diligently (not gonna happen), New Zealand. I told her she must go mountain biking in Moab and explore the slot canyons in Zion if she goes with me to Utah, hiking and camping in New Zealand, or watching grizzlies and getting lost in Denali if we go to Alaska - and she will love it. No ifs, ands, or buts.

For once, I don't think she minded me telling her what to do. ;)

Well, back to my movie and my man Wilson!

amazing discovery!

I discovered something fantastic today:

I can hook up my little-but-powerful speakers and subwoofer to my little dinky TV to get surround sound! So much sound out of a little TV!

This would have been nice to have when Matt, my friend from Virginia, visited me - we sat around drinking PBR and MGD while watching a bad French film, Le Femme Nikita, and we couldn't hear what they were saying and kept turning it up... but we realized how silly it was to turn it up, because we couldn't understand it anyway.  ;)

It was great to see him though, and after I went to Kevin's for his and Jeff's birthday celebration, I went with him and his friend to a party at some Fisheries grad students' condo... And they probably had at least 10 aquariums, ranging from full salt-water reefs, to lungfish from around to world, to an assortment of gars. We played flip cup with Labatt Blue Light, and I figured out that for the life of me, I just can't get even a mere BUZZ off of Light, just simply felt very FULL. At least there were fewer empty calories than I would have had otherwise! hee hee.

I ended up sleeping on Matt's friend's couch, in the company of two cats... which I am allergic to. Needless to say, it took a strong cup of coffee and some strong allergy pills to get me going the next morning.

Last night, I watched a show on the Discovery Channel called "Heart of a Lioness". It was about this lone lioness, whos entire pride had probably been killed by the locals when she was young. A lion's social structure is so important, that it traumatized her and caused her to act in a very strang way. She found a baby oryx - like an antelope - and the baby was so scared, it didn't run away. This can throw off a predator sometimes, when it doesn't run, it doesn't always trigger the predator's kill instinct... in this lioness' case, she started licking the baby... following the baby... She adopted the baby oryx! Which was all cute and all, but the baby couldn't feed from the lioness, and was too young to eat solid foods by itself. The lioness adopted the baby and cuddled it and followed it for over 2 weeks, and neither one of them ate. The locals tried to feed the lioness, but she wouldn't even eat the meat thrown to her. So this naturalist chic is driving along following lioness and oryx when suddenly, out of nowhere - GROWL! - A male lion comes out of the bushes and has the baby's throat in his mouth! The baby was still alive, but lioness was too starved and weak to do anything about it! She had to simply watch as "her" oryx was eaten. She even behaved as if a lion had just killed a real cub. It ends up she adopted 5 more oryxs before she disappeared - probably because she had the instinct to raise babies, but no means to do it. The look on the naturalist's face when the lion snatched up the baby was horrific! It was so sad, I could have cried if I was more girlie. :P

And one last thing before I hop in the shower and then watch Lost... MSN has an article on some good places to live to be out-of-doors. I'd live in any of these cities... except I have no idea how Grand Rapids, MI got on the same list as Missoula, MT and Laramie, WY!! Anybody wanna move with me?

Ok I lied, THIS is the last thing before I watch Lost... Looks like Montana and Wyoming got dumped on by a snowstorm! I remember when I was out there last year, Matt was visiting and we got our first accumulation on Sept. 18th, if I remember correctly... driving that 1 1/2 hrs between Yellowstone and Red Rocks was definitely a trip, with my Focus sliding all over the dirt road. Ahh, I miss it out there. There I go again... reminicing on the past. ;)

I was looking through some photos on my computer and found something funny that I didn't even know I had.

I'm going to be a bridesmaid in Donna's wedding... but at least I won't have to swat deer flies off of her like I did for Tara! ;)

Happy Birthday Kevin and Jeff!

Spending the weekend hanging with my random-adventure friend Matt and drinking enough Labatt Lite to last a life time. Oh, and the Lions just lost, of course.

What's wrong with this picture?

We're training a guy at work on how to limb out a tree from the bucket. What's wrong with this picture?

If you can't tell, that's a CHAINSAW stuck in the tree, probably 30 feet in the air. He was trying to cut this one limb so that it would go in a certain direction... and as he was finishing the cut, a gust of wind blew the limb back, causing it to pinch down on the saw - and he couldn't get it out! They ended up attaching a lanyard from the saw to the tree, and were about to push the limb in the other direction when the wind changed... and the branch nearly fell on Tim's head. Never a dull moment.

I just got news that a friend from Virginia might be coming up this weekend - haven't seen him since I invited myself over when I escaped from South Carolina in the middle of the night! Plus, the Michigan-Michigan State game is this weekend, Sponge is playing at 5th Avenue in Novi, and I wanna go mountain biking!