Scan-a-palooza 5, 10, 16 & 55 years ago

Ten years sure seems like a long time to us. More than 10 years ago, we had already announced that we planned to retire from the Verde NRCD in January 2001.  The day before my birthday 10 years ago, the County Board of Supervisors invited me to one of their meetings in Cottonwood.  They gave me this nice certificate that day.  Reporter Joanna Dodder wrote a nice story and the paper put me on the front page holding my certificate.  It was a real "rite of passage" experience, one I'll never forget.  I was going through stuff and chanced up this photo.  Frankly, even though I won't forget the experience, I had forgotten it was the 10th anniversary coming up next week.  So, what the heck, here it is.

Meanwhile, we realized that the photo below was taken in 1955, and that's 55 years ago.  it has a real nice Western theme to it, don't ya think?  Every kid back then had to have a two-gun cowboy outfit.  I'll always wonder how many bad guys I shot with those magical pistols.  Seems there were bad guys behind every bush back then so there were plenty bad guys to take pot shots at.  Heck, if you missed one of them, there'd be 13 others behind that neighbor's maple tree.  Little Ralpie ("A Christmas Story") and I can relate.

Here's another great photo we found. It was taken in 1994.  Lora, Deano, Dexter, Jodi and John & Susun relax after another hard day of work on the straw house.

Check this photo from a little more than 5 years ago.  It's The Goatherder and Son Joshua atop Cathedral Rock.  Gee, something tells me Josh has grown a little bit since then!

Finally, here's one that's not quite 5 years old.  Little Johnny officiates at Marsha & Hugh's wedding, December 21, 2005.  Hopefully, we can help celebrate their 5th Anniversary next month.  You'd be happy to know that Marsha & Hugh may be the only people who's wedding site is known only by the longitude and latitude recorded as they were "out standing in their field" at Montezuma Well National Monument!

Wrappin' it up

Work continues as we "wrap it up."  We made great strides again yesterday, including yet another session with the leaves.  The big truck is mostly packed and we're simply going through the motions to get all the little nit-picky stuff done.  Even though we've moved our tentative departure to Wednesday, we're going to be prepared to leave Tuesday "just in case."

The graphic above explains the terminology we use in preparing for a major trip.  Everything leading up to our departure is put in terms of a landing.  The departure itself is a take off.  When an aircraft has turned out of the base leg and is on its final approach, it's also on what is known as "the glide path."  I'm sure you've all felt that phenomena when you've traveled on a commercial jetliner.  There's a final banking turn and then you can feel the turbines lessen their power as the pilots skillfully execute the equivalent of a powered glide onto the runway.  To continue the analogy, we're basically turning out of our base leg and preparing for the our "glide path" here in the next couple of days. Then the lingo reverses as we prepare for take off on Wednesday morning.  Corny?  You betcha.  But it works for us and helps us keep things in perspective.  It's fun.

Our other Leafy Neighbors--Kenyon & Kids--put on a real show yesterday. Even though none of the snow in their yard melted, the family trudged out with snow shovels in hand and plowed their entire lawn.  All of their huge deposit of leaves was pushed into the street as a combination snowbank/leaf pile.  It took them most of the day.  Why do people put leaves in the streets?  Good question.  The city comes around and sucks up the leaves with a giant industrial vacuum truck.  Why does the city suck leaves?  Good question.  The city sucks leaves so they won't clog the storm drains which would in turn create enormous ice sheets at intersections.  It's basically a public safety issue.  The city's scheduled to do our street this week.  We've bagged our leaves simply because we want to make CERTAIN they are gone--not wait and hope that the weather will permit the city's crews to arrive as planned.  We suspect there's one more chapter in our leafy saga but we're finally nearing the end of this story.

It was actually quite cold all day yesterday.  In the middle of winter here, temps in the 30's would be a "heat wave."  However, yesterday's temps in the low 30's just seemed downright cold to both of us.  We see it's supposed  to be 75 at Montezuma Well on Thursday.  Maybe that's why 30-35 degrees seemed so cold.

In case any of you are wondering what happened to our "Saturday Night Specials" posted here late yesterday evening, they all picked themselves up and boogied over to the Y2Ten companion website.  Remember the little used acronym GEEE? Well, all three posts last night clearly qualified for the "GEEE Factor."  Now, gee, they're gone!

More of the same today--pack and then pack some more.

Have a great day & Many Cheers, jp

PS Added a short time later--Well, It's Wednesday for sure.  Here is the relevant portion of this morning's Pocatello NWS Discussion:

MONDAY NIGHT INTO
 TUESDAY EXPECT A BIG CHANGE FOR THE AREA WITH A COLD FRONT PASSING
 THROUGH. LOOK FOR 2 TO 5 INCHES OF SNOW ACROSS THE CENTRAL
 MOUNTAINS. ADDITIONALLY...EXPECT ADVISORY AMOUNTS OF 6 TO 10
 INCHES OF SNOW ACROSS THE UPPER SNAKE HIGHLANDS...CARIBOU
 HIGHLANDS AND WASATCH MOUNTAINS MONDAY NIGHT THROUGH TUESDAY. WITH
 A 130 KNOT JET PASSING OVER SOUTHEAST IDAHO ON TUESDAY EXPECT
 GUSTY WINDS ACROSS THE AREA WITH ADVISORY WINDS OF 35 TO 40 MPH
 OVER THE SNAKE RIVER PLAIN AND SOUTHERN HIGHLANDS. WINDS WILL BE
 EVALUATED TO SEE IF A WIND WARNING WILL BE NEEDED. WEDNESDAY UPPER
 LEVEL RIDGING TAKES BACK OVER WITH DRY CONDITIONS RETURNING.

Departure Date Delayed

Looks like we're gonna be leaving River City on the Wednesday the 17th instead of Tuesday.  There are just far too many uncertainties about Tuesday travel.  There's one thing about Tuesday that sends shudders down our spines--the thought of driving through The Belly of The Beast (AKA: The 100 Mile Salt Lake Metroplex) in the R-A-I-N!  Ouch. No way José and no way Hose B.  Wednesday looks to be a much better choice and a whole lot safer and with far less White Knuckle potential.  On the plus side that gives us an extra day to get our act together.

Yesterday was a real nice productive day.  We spent the morning messing around online with all the usual suspects.  Next we organized our basement workshop in the best manner it's ever been since we converted the old coalroom to a mid-winter man cave.  Then we went out and half-heartedly messed around with some of our remaining leaves.  That's when we noticed our neighbor, Chuck, attempting to do his leaves all by himself.  Talk about a truly insurmountable task!  I went in and asked Susun to come help and we both went over and took charge of Chuck's impossible challenge.  Within a couple of hours, all his leaves were out in the street and his yard looked like new again.  It was a huge amount of work both of us hoped we wouldn't have to do but, hey, a neighbor in need calls for a good deed to be done.  One thing that made it somewhat easier was all the snow mixed in with the leaves.  We could use our snow shovels to move the leaves.  The snow made each shovel heavier, of course, but it also kept the leaves together.  Ying-yang kinda stuff.

Our weather here has been flatlined for days.  It doesn't seem like the temp has varied at all between the upper 20's and the low 30's and today appears to be no exception.

Here's a typical "good news, bad news" story.  First, the bad news:  We pay truly exorbitant property taxes on our place at Montezuma Well.  We need a defibrillator standing by when we open the envelope containing each year's damage.  This isn't a political statement--it's a simple fact.  Anyway, sixty percent of our property taxes are billed by only two organizations: the school and the fire department.  Each year, they shoot up by leaps and bounds, usually double digit increases.  You'd think in these tight economic times that the school would be hunkered down simply trying to educate kids. (Old-fashioned idea, eh?)  But nooooo.....you'd be WRONG!  Our tiny little school is now building a genuine Taj Mahal Community Center for what surely must be hundreds of thousands of dollars.  That's it's architect's rendition atop this blog post.  Buildings like that don't come cheap.  Now wonder our school property taxes just went through the roof this year.  WOW.

OK, now the good news.  It's another ying-yang thing.  This new building will contain a full-fledged community library run by the awesome Yavapai County library system!  Now, that's really, really GOOD news in a major way.  Most of you know that we are Big Time Library Fans.  This is about the best news we've heard for our little community in 25+ years.  Right off the bat, it suddenly makes me happy to pay the school property taxes.  There's FINALLY something in it for us!  WOW!  Let's put this in even better terms:  it means that we will be able to actually WALK to the library from our home at Montezuma Well.  In a county where the proximity of stuff is measured in multiple miles or driving times that are rounded to the nearest half hour, this is intergalactic news.  Walk to a real library from our home?  Surely you jest. But, nope, by the time we go back down next year it will be true.  Amazing Good News.

Have a Great Saturday and Many Cheers!  jp

Backseat blog

The blog has taken a backseat this morning to another project.  First, though, we must digress.  As everyone knows, we both love to volunteer--it's in our DNA.  In the nearly 10 years since we began volunteering, we've learned a few things well.  One of our top lessons is twofold: A)You enjoy volunteering more if you create your own volunteer opportunities, and, 2)You have to work far in advance to create a volunteer opportunity.  In other words, you simply can't waltz into any given place and say, "Hey, I wanna volunteer for you."  Nope, it don't really work that way unless you wanna stuff envelopes or set up chairs at a Senior Center.  The good stuff takes a long time to incubate.

Take that BLM river project we did this summer--that was about 2 years in the making.  The list goes on and on.  Some volunteer opportunities can be created fairly quickly.  Others take time and lots of thought and tinkering.  That's why this blog took a backseat this morning--we've been working on creating a volunteer opportunity for ourselves.

What's it all about?  In a nutshell, we're trying to sign on as a volunteer for the National park Service to help Montezuma Castle, Montezuma Well and Tuzigoot plan and implement the usage of online social media. (AKA: Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc.)  Any time you deal with the Good Ol' NPS, you've got a tough nut to crack.  You simply can't smile and say, "Hey, you need social media and I can help."  Nope, it don't work that way.  It's pretty much they that have to adopt an idea and then turn to you to help them flesh it out.

So far, I'd reckon I've spent 15 hours on this project, probably more but at least 15 that I can think of.  Most of my time now is being spent working on a blog called "Social Media Usage by NPS."  This morning, I created a Twitter account solely to find all the NPS Twitter accounts in existence.  I found 161 of them.
It's turning out to be quite the education experience for me.  Even if I don't wind up getting this volunteer gig, it will have been worth the effort.  Why's that?

Well, it turns out that totally unbeknown-st to us, the NPS now actually considers Virtual Visitors on the same par as real physical visitors to a National Park.  Surprised?  Yeah, we were, too.  That seems to be a huge sea change for the staid Ol' NPS.  But there it is in black and white in their main Policy Manual.  Amazing.

There's a teeny, tiny little unit of the NPS sitting out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  it's called the Pu'ukohola Heiau NHS. Ranger Greg C. operates the Twitter there.  The place is less than 100 acres, a mere flyspeck to the huge NPS parks elsewhere.  Greg has shown what Twitter can do for an obscure park--his Twitter now has more followers than another other park in the Nation, including places such as Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Canyon and the Tetons!  He's bringing an incredible new level of attention to his park and he deserves a huge round of applause for doing so.  This is a classic example of the benefits of social media in marketing a place or a product.  We feel the same phenomena could happen to the NPS units in the Verde Valley.  Heaven knows they need all the help they can get!  Anyway, that's why the blog has taken a back seat this morning.  Greg and I swapped numerous emails last night.  He's a great guy and he put us at the top of his Twitter overnight.  That's the screen shot from Greg's Twitter atop this blog post.  THANKS, GREG!


You can click here to read the Social Media blog.  And you can click here for the new Twitter we created this morning.

OK, moving right along.  Yesterday after a few hours on the above project, we packed up half of the Nissan.  For the first time in Modern Memory, we actually have all our clothes packed days before departure.  Normally, we don't bother packing clothes until about 60 minutes before we leave, oftentimes far less than that.  We can now see that everything we wish to take south will actually fit in our vehicles.  The NWS Wonks have changed their tune once again--now it looks like Tuesday's weather might be dicey.  Ah, who cares?  We're leaving no matter what (unless it's a blizzard, of course).


Today's more of the same--pack and pack some more.

As part of packing our clothes yesterday, we actually sorted out about 70 items to donate to Deseret Industries (Dee-Eye).  Dee-Eye has huge industrial washing machines and all clothes they chose to resell have been thoroughly cleaned prior to display.  I like that about buying clothes from them--you don't have to worry about somebody else's cooties.  Anyway, believe it or not, 100% of my clothes are totally organized.  yeah, I know, it's a scary thought.  Geeze, ALL of my socks are even sorted and correctly matched and folded.  Is there no end to this Type A stuff?


Susun's really getting into her new laptop--she even gave it a name, Lilly.  She's delighted to have it and she's a real fast learner.  Pretty soon, we'll bet she will be giving lessons to her friends.  No kidding.


Well, that's about all there is to report from these parts.  Have a great day & Cheers, jp

Wonky Words

WARNING: Your eyes will glaze over and your brain will turn freeze if you read any farther.  Read at your own risk!  Protect your forehead in case you pass out and your head smacks hard down on your desk. WONKY WORDS AHEAD!

Normally, we'd put this stuff over on the Geek Weather blog.  People who read the Geek Weather thing are, well...Geeks, what can I say?  Geeks don't mind Wonky Words.  In fact, they actually love them.  But, I digress.

When it comes time to travel anywhere, we become glued to weather forecasts and tea leaves, not necessarily in that order.  We cling to the belief that we can somehow gaze into our crystal ball and see the future, at least if the crystal ball isn't suffering from an occluded front or perhaps a sudden squall.

So, here's this morning's Wonky Word Whazzup from various NWS Offices around our Neck O' Da West.  We will put our assessment of their words below the ALL CAPS writing.  Remember, only truly professional geeky wonks get PAID to type in ALL CAPS!

Pocatello

.LONG TERM...SUNDAY NIGHT THROUGH THURSDAY. MEDIUM RANGE MODELS IN
 GOOD AGREEMENT SUNDAY NIGHT THROUGH WEDNESDAY WITH RIDGE OFF PACIFIC
 COAST AND GREAT BASIN UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF NORTHWESTERLY FLOW.
 MULTIPLE WEAK SHORTWAVES RIDGE THROUGH THE FLOW TO KEEP CONTINUED
 INSTANCES OF LIGHT SNOW SHOWERS MAINLY OVER HIGHER ELEVATIONS. BY
 LATE WEDNESDAY THE MODELS BREAK DOWN WITH THE ECMWF AND THE
 OPERATIONAL GFS DROPPING A STRONG LOW DOWN THE BC CANADA COAST TO
 NEAR SEATTLE.

Salt Lake

 A COOL NORTH TO NORTHWEST FLOW ALOFT WILL RESIDE ACROSS THE REGION
 THROUGH THE UPCOMING WEEKEND AND INTO EARLY NEXT WEEK. THIS WILL
 LEAVE PRIMARILY NORTHERN UT SUSCEPTIBLE TO EMBEDDED SHORTWAVES
 PROGRESSING THROUGH THE MEAN FLOW. MODELS HAVE BEEN SOMEWHAT
 CONSISTENT DROPPING ONE SUCH WAVE THROUGH THE NORTHERN ROCKIES AND
 GRAZING NORTHERN UT LATE FRIDAY INTO SATURDAY...WITH A SECONDARY
 FEATURE DROPPING SOUTH THROUGH THE AREA SUNDAY. NEITHER OF THESE
 FEATURES LOOK TO BRING MUCH MORE THAN LIGHT SNOWFALL TO THE HIGHER
 TERRAIN. AS SUCH HAVE MAINTAINED LOW POPS ACROSS THE NORTHERN
 THIRD OF UTAH DURING THIS TIMEFRAME.

Flagstaff

 A LARGE AREA OF HIGH PRESSURE WEST OF 130W SHOULD KEEP THE JET 
  STREAM NORTHEAST OF ARIZONA FROM WEDNESDAY THROUGH THURSDAY OF NEXT 
  WEEK AND HAVE REMOVE POPS.

Las Vegas

AFTER MONDAY SEE NO SIGNIFICANT CONCERNS AS PATTERN
 TRANSITIONS FROM NORTHWEST FLOW TO ZONAL WITH MODELS DIFFERING AS TO
 THE EXACT FINAL CONFIGURATION. TEMPERATURES WILL EASE UP TO NEAR
 NORMAL LEVELS BY WEDNESDAY AND PRECIPITATION CHANGES ARE ABOUT NIL.

Boise

.LONG TERM...FRIDAY NIGHT THROUGH THURSDAY...MODEL AGREEMENT REMAINS
 ABOVE AVERAGE WITH A LONGWAVE RIDGE OFFSHORE AND A BROAD LONGWAVE
 TROUGH OVER THE PLAINS AND MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. THE FLOW AROUND THE
 RIDGE APPEARS MOIST ENOUGH FOR A CHANCE OF PRECIPITATION OVER THE
 MOUNTAINS AND A SLIGHT CHANCE OF SHOWERS IN THE VALLEYS THROUGH THE
 PERIOD. MODELS DO NOT PICK UP ANY SIGNIFICANT FEATURES HEADING
 TOWARD OUR AREA UNTIL THE END OF THE PERIOD...WHEN A DEEP COLD UPPER
 LEVEL LOW FROM THE GULF OF ALASKA ARRIVES OVER THE NORTHWEST COAST.
 DESPITE NORTHWEST FLOW THROUGH MOST OF THE PERIOD THICKNESSES WILL
 BE HIGH ENOUGH TO KEEP TEMPERATURES NORMAL.

Missoula

THE NORTHERN ROCKIES WILL THEN FALL UNDER UNSETTLED AND MOIST
 NORTHWEST FLOW FOR THE DURATION OF THE WEEKEND INTO THE EARLY PART
 OF NEXT WEEK. WHAT THIS MEANS FOR THE AREA WILL BE THE POTENTIAL
 FOR SEVERAL DAYS OF ISOLATED RAIN SHOWERS IN THE VALLEYS WITH
 SNOW SHOWERS IN THE MOUNTAINS.

Grand Junction

BY MONDAY...MODELS BEGIN TO DIFFER WITH GFS SHOWING MINOR LULL
BEFORE NEXT ROUND OF PRECIP MOVES INTO UT/CO WHILE EUROPEAN KEEPS
PRECIP ACROSS CWA THRU REMAINDER OF LONG-TERM.  TOO MANY
DISCREPANCIES ATTM SO HEDGING BET AND KEPT SLT CHC SNOW OVER NRN MTNS
AND UINTAS THRU WED NIGHT.  TEMPS IN LONG-TERM WILL BE SEVERAL DEGREES BELOW SEASONAL NORMS AS CLOUD COVER AND NLY FLOW KEEPS COOL AIR POURING INTO REGION.

Elko

SHORTWAVE RIDGE EXPECTED MONDAY WITH ATTENDANT MODEST THICKNESS
 INCREASES AND WARMING...WITH LOWER ELEVATIONS APPROACHING 50 BY
 AFTERNOON. 00Z ECMWF SUGGESTS ACTIVE STORM TRACK WILL STAY NORTH OF
 NEVADA TUESDAY AND WEDNESDAY...AND TRIMMED DOWN POP VALUES
 ACCORDINGLY. DRY AND RELATIVELY MILDER WEATHER WITH AFTERNOON HIGHS
 NEAR 50 FOR THE VALLEYS...EVEN SOME MID 50S FOR THE WESTERN/SOUTHERN
 CWA.

OK, if you have survived to read this far, you know you're a GEEK AT HEART!  Hooray!  All of the above jibberish tells us one thing:  It's going to be a mighty fine travel day next Tuesday.  We're no longer worried about either having to leave early or being delayed because of a semi-major storm.  Nope, that ain't gonna happen.  Yeah, there might be a few flakes in the vicinity. (Hey, this IS Idaho, ya know, flakes flourish here, especially potato flakes.)  Anyway, just in case at least some stray LBR was wondering how we arrive at our travel decision(s), this is how it's done.

You can see the GFS computer model's "take" on next Tuesday in the top graphic.  Even the five day Quantative Precipitation Forecast leaves our travel route largely unmolested.  Looks all clear.  We'll keep an eye on it but, by and large, this type of jibberish says we've got a GREEN LIGHT TO GO!  Yippee!

Cheers, jp

The Straw House Slide Show

Here's the slide show comprised of all those photos I scanned the other night. There's 112 photos in the show--probably at least 15 are duplicates scanned at a higher resolution. I think there's actually 95 unique individual photos. I scanned at low resolution so you can't really gain much by clicking on any individual photo. They are meant to be representational scenes depicting the process. This morning, I actually wrote captions for ALL of them! Whew, it seems like I have been stuck at this computer for half my life this week. If you don't have Adobe Flash, you can click here to go through the photos one-by-one.

This has been a MOST interesting exercise and certainly puts us both in the mood to return to our little, much-beloved Straw House. Last year, as you know, we showed up to mayhem. This year is going to be a lot different and we are looking forward to it. Thanks for your interest in this show--without your various comments, I doubt that I would have taken the time to write all those captions this morning.

Cheers, jp

Snowbird Economics 101 (SE 101)

We actually realized the essence of SE 101 many, many years ago, perhaps even back in the 1990's in Rocky Point. The lessons of SE 101 became even more clear after spending our first summer or two in Idaho. Now, of course, we live by the Rules of SE 101.

Here's the underlying principle of SE 101: "It costs a lot of money to heat a house during winter in Snow Country." Heat ain't cheap--it comes at a stiff price. Meanwhile, there are a lot of other expenses piling up, water, sewer, garbage, electricity, cable TV, and so forth.

So, by leaving Snow Country, one avoids paying all of the above expenses. Yep, it's true. Before moving to Idaho Falls, one of our first questions was about "vacation suspend" for the utilities. In this city, you pay NOTHING while you are gone--zip, zilch, zero, nada, nothing. They turn everything off and, poof, it's free. For a five month sojourn in Arizona, that means we will save at least $600 and probably more on city utilities and natural gas bills.

The way it is often stated by other Snowbirds is thus: "What we save by not heating our house pays for most of our winter vacation." In other words, it's cheaper to flee than to stay and fight the cold and snow. Pretty cool, huh?

We've been very astute users of our natural gas and our "easy pay" is a mere $16 a month now but that's destined to go much lower after subtracting last year's January-February billings. It wouldn't surprise us if our new annual bill (calculated every summer) would be less than ten bucks a month. The kids who lived here before us had an average monthly bill of $70!

Meanwhile, it gets better. By leaving one vehicle here, it can drop totally off the insurance for up to six months. It's sits in the garage Scot free. That saves at least $125. Cable One gladly suspends the internet at no cost, too. Chalk up another $300 savings. DISH charges a mere $5 a month to suspend the TV. Gee, there's another $250 in savings.

The sum of our annual fixed expenses for the Arizona property are roughly $1250. The approximate savings realized by heading south are $1275. For all practical purposes, we're almost making money by heading south. The only net difference in out-of-pocket cash flow is the round trip gas costs.

Not a lot of people reflect on Snowbird Economics 101 until they near the Snowbird Age Range. Once they grasp the true economics of the situation, they eagerly jump on board--it's danged near a no brainer.

Cheers, jp

'Twas an interesting storm

The season's first winter storm was very interesting.  As predicted it started in the wee hours of early Monday morning.  Those "wannabe snowflakes" turned into the real thing as Monday wore on.  By late afternoon it was snowing heavily.  The rate of snowfall picked up after dark and continued into the wee hours of Tuesday morning.  We awoke yesterday to six inches in the backyard.

There wasn't any time to write a blog post yesterday.  The trash guys drive our alley about 8 am sharp each Tuesday.  We took one look at all those leaf bags buried in heavy, wet snow and knew perfectly well the trash guys wouldn't touch them in that condition.  So, we hot-footed it out there and cleaned off all the leaf bags and garbage containers.  Then we helped "the runner" load them into the back of the truck and, poof, there were gone.  (The runner is that guy who follow the truck on foot tossing in all manner of trash.)  It's amazing the stuff they will pick up here in this city.

Next on the agenda was firing up the snowblower to clean our sidewalks.  The snow was so heavy and wet that it took quite a bit longer than normal.  Much of the cleaner was hand work with various shovels.  When the snow is as wet as this batch was, you can't really life a normal snow shovel--it's too heavy--you have to use a square point short handled shovel.  If you use a long handled square point shovel, you will wrench your back for sure.

Meanwhile, both vehicles were basically buried.  The sharply cold early morning temps turned the wet snow on the vehicles into hard ice.  We had to wait until later in the day to dig them out.  Naturally, the big truck was "stuck-in-place" and wouldn't budge.  So, we had to fire up the snowblower once again to clear an open path to the street for it.  Since the camper shell seam leaks, we also had to clean off all the snow piled on top of it, too.

Freeing the Nissan was pretty straightforward.  However, the snow that fell off the roof into the driveway had sealed shut the garage door with a mini-avalanche of snow that resembled a summertime shaved ice drink.  Digging out that part of the driveway was a tiresome and lengthy proposition.

Despite all the heavy lifting and multiple sessions, we were the lucky ones.  None of our neighbors had jumped on their leaves so they couldn't even think of clearing their sidewalks.  If the snow doesn't melt clean away before the next storm, their leaves could easily remain entombed until spring.  Chuck and Lynn are facing a real mess with their leaves.  Kenyon's son actually had a chance to rid their place of leaves on Saturday but instead blew them into a giant pile in the middle of the yard so kids could romp in the pile.  Dumb. Very dumb.  Now that pile is a giant sodden mess and we have no clue how they will ever move it until sometime in 2011.
We were also real lucky in that our maple tree shed all of its leaves in a very short time period.  In a frenzy of leaf sucking this weekend, we were able to capture 99% of the leaves from this tree.  So, somehow, we came out of this one OK. (NOTE: The tree photo up top was taken Monday pm before the brunt of the snow arrived.)

It's still quite cold and odds are 50-50 as to whether the snow will melt away before the next storm hits.  It probably won't  according to the forecast.  Our travel plans are totally up in the air (pun intended).  This morning's Pokeymon Prediction sez one of their main computer models is DEPICTING A DEEP TROF EXTENDING ALONG THE CANADIAN BORDER FROM A LOW NEAR LAKE WINNEPEG. THIS PUSHES THE JET OVER SRN ID WITH HIGHER CHANCES FOR PRECIP AND COLDER TEMPS MONDAY AND TUESDAY.   This isn't good news.  We've made a deal not to purposely travel in bad weather.  There's no need to do so and what's the point?  We will just have to sit tight and wait it out.  Trouble is that the seasonal weather pattern has obviously changed and La Nina is now firmly in charge.  Even a cursory glance out in El Pacifico shows ample water vapor, lots of low pressure systems and a jet stream more than willing to wreck havoc here.  (HELP!  We're trapped on 12th Street!)


Not much else to report.  Thanks for all the recent blog comments.  They are much appreciated.  Susun went off to her last evening soiree with her girlfriends last night.  She baked a really spiffy spinach-jack cheese appetizer. YUM!  She also made up really beautiful little gifts of garam masala for each of her friends. Don't know WTH about garam masala? You're not alone.  Click here for the wiki on garam masala.

Cheers, jp

Taking a blog break

Sorry we haven't posted today.  It's been a strenuous day what with the six inches of heavy wet cement-style snow.  Snow chores kept me busy all day. I know I have a big backlog of blog stuff to do and I will try to get it done tomorrow.  We're tired tonight and planning to be prone pretty pronto.  Thanks for your patience.  Cheers, jp

Yer not gonna believe this

Yep, it's true! Susun has her own computer!  (Cue gasps and speechlessness.)  Yes, she sitting out at the kitchen table surfing happily away.  I took a photo at 6:45 pm to prove it.

I knew she was ready for her own machine.  She's SOOO happy to have it. You should see her smile glow.  I told her a moment ago that she made tonight almost like Christmas.  Well, heck, if it was Christmas, it sure would be a WHITE Christmas!  Man, it's been snowing all day long.  And it long ago blew far past what the Pokemon NWS wonks thought it would do. I reckon we're pushing six inches of true snowfall right now and there's no let up in sight.  (Click here, do the math and see for yourself--all that precip has been snow.)

You know what this means, don't you?  Yep, I'm gonna have to break out the snowblower tomorrow morning and go from sucking leaves to blowing snow.  How ironically weird is that?  Very ironically weird, lemme tell ya.  The upshot of the past few days is simple:  If we wouldn't have bought the Monster Leaf Sucker, we'd be in deep doo-doo right now.  As it is, we're sittin' pretty and laughing at the snow.  We've got all the Right Stuff here in Eye-Dee-Hoe!  It took us a few years to figger it out but we're danged proud we finally got it right.

Today was the perfect day to hunker down and do something unusual.  I just spent the last 2.5 hours scanning our Straw Bale House photo album. I can't tell ya how many times it's been lost and how many times it's been found.  Every time it's lost, a part of each of us is lost, too. The last time it was lost, it really hurt my heart. I decided no more never again ever.  So, I toughed it out and scanned everyone of the 95 photos.  For good measure, I scanned some of then two or three times so I reckon I scanned roughly 120 photo views in 150 minutes. Do the math, that's about one a minute.  WHEW!  Later on tonight or maybe tomorrow between 5-6 am we will put them up on a Picasa web album.  My favorite single photo of that epic process is at the top of this post.  Some others are below. (Historical note: All these photos are from Summer 1994.)

I'm running right now on my old beater HP laptop that's going on 6 years old--it's the only one that runs a scanner worth a dang--figured I might as well blog on it, too.

Twitter continues to amaze.  I think I learned more today than any other single day of surfing since the dawn of the internet back in the 1990's. Meanwhile The Goatherder (Yes, that's him at right in the photo up top holding a straw bale hook in triumph) put up a really fine wine post on his blog.
http://verdevalleywines.net

OK, we're back on the same time Arizona. It's a little after 6 pm as I write this.  Wish Harry Olson well, think good thoughts for him.  He's doing a Tweetup in Cornville--it started at 6 pm. Let's all hope it works out for this guy.  GO HARRY!

Gotta run, Happy Hour beckons, Cheers,jp

Wannabe Snowflakes

This morning, the water up in the sky is trying to be snowflakes.  They can't quite get their act together so that's why we are calling them "wannabes."  It started raining right on cue in the middle of the night and it's brrrr cold out right now.  Our big maple tree is 99% stripped of its leaves.  Luckily, we captured 99% of the ones that fell and they are bagged and ready to go bye-bye with tomorrow's trash collection.  Meanwhile, of course, our neighbors' leaves are not remotely "under control."  It doesn't matter to us at this point, we're leaving here a week from tomorrow not matter what.

Hey, I gotta tell ya a fun Twitter story.  So, I get up anywhere from 5-6 am and roam El Net each morning.  Lately, I've been looking for high quality Twitter accounts to "follow."  I found a great account from the Northeat Regional Office of the National Park Service.  It's located in the Old Custom House in the historic section of Philadelphia, PA. Whoever is doing their Twitter is doing an outstanding job.  I was mesmerized by the account and spent well over an hour clicking off to various links I found there.  By and by, as time passed, I became ever more intrigued by the "who" of whoever is doing that particular Twitter.  So, I decided to track them down in person (via cell phone).  It took quite awhile but I eventually actually got the real person who does their Twitter on the other end of the line!  Naturally, he was shocked that a real person had somehow found him in his little office in some old building in Philly.  He was cordial and we had a very nice conversation.  It's the first time I have ever tracked down the author of a blog or Twitter.  It was quite fun!

The big truck is mostly packed.  Only a few more things will fit into the back.  We're basically almost ready to go.  There's lot of odds and ends kind of stuff to finish this week but it should be a real smooth departure as we taxi out onto Runway Eye-One-Fiver South and await clearance for take off.

More soon, Cheers, jp

"Here's Your Sign"

Think Christmas is still pretty far in the future?  Well, "Here's Your Sign" that it's right around the corner.  Whenever the Infamous Leg Lamp makes its annual appearance, we know it's time to light a pine tree, have a Santa smackdown or perhaps begin noshing nuts, cheese balls, and sugar cookies shaped like fat reindeer.
Anybody say "Turkey?"  Black Friday, here we come!

They pulled the semi-annual switcheroo on us this morning.  I hate it when that happens.  Just when a guy gets used to thinking it's 6 am, all of a sudden it's 5 am.  Talk about scrambling my brains.  Geeze, why can't they stop messing around with the clock twice a year?  Arizona doesn't bother changing time.  That's probably because they think that DST and MST are some sort of chemicals for the cotton crop down there.
Anyway, our bedside atomic clock changed automatically so I thought I was getting up at 5 am and then became totally confused when I stumbled into the office, rubbed my eyes and the clock said six am.  Oh, wel, we will get used to just about the time they do it again next March.

Leave us alone!  Yes, it's us alone that will be going hand-to-hand with the colorful carpet bombs falling from the trees.  We love trees, don't get us wrong.  But trees come with a steep price each year.  And they leave no option.  One MUST dispose of the tree leaves.  Today is our last day of dry weather.  The wind is supposed to pick up this afternoon and that means we will be ready to charge into action just before nightfall.  Depending on how the weather shakes out between now and November 15, this could be our last chance to to put the leaves into their place.

Not much else is going on--we spend a goodly amount of time updating our Twitter account.  We changed its background to something truly spiffy last night.  Maintaining that Twitter is helping us learn a lot of stuff we'd never know otherwise.  http://twitter.com/thesnowbirds

Have a great Sunday and Many Cheers!  jp

Spectacular Sunset...(even from 12th Street!)

As the sun goes down we normally get little hints of what might be a "real corker."  However, normally, we can't really see anything, we have to INFER the sunset by the hints in the colors of the last light.  We often debate what those colors mean.  But, whatever, I digress....

Tonight there was absolutely NO DOUBT that it was a Spectacular Sunset.  Even from our lowly vantage point at 12th & Holmes, the evening sky put on what we like to call The Show.  Geeze, it was really wonderful.  We're certain Roger will show us what it really looked like spread out in grandeur across the full sweep of the Snake River Plain.  We can hardly wait.  Susun took the photo.  We will do a separate post for Roger's upcoming shots.

Note added @ 7:38 pm.  Um....well, it didn't quite work out the way we thought it would.  At 6:55 pm, we received a note from Roger that said simply, "We saw it from the Lowe's parking lot ..."  Oops.  Well, hey, at least the thought was there.

Leaves leaving

The leaves started coming down today.  Finally.  We're gonna have to work two-a-day shifts on the leaves for as long as we can now.  Luckily, we have a reprieve for Sunday--the precip isn't gonna hit until after dark tomorrow.  We're probably gonna log 6 bags today and maybe another 6 tomorrow.  Bear in mind that would at least as many as 48 under the old way of doing leaves--maybe as high as 60 bags!  This Monster Leaf Sucker is sure paying dividends now! 

We're gonna jam down on as many leaves as possible before last light Sunday.  There's no doubt it's gonna get wet Sunday night and Monday.  They're already talking about a "convergence" event which basically says it would snow a lot more than expected if the right stuff converges on the right spot. 

Meanwhile, the NWS people issued a great prognostication from one of their FAVE computer models--the GFS--check this prose:  "BY THURSDAY...GFS IS BRINGING IN MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF PRECIPITATION FOR THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST." 

Real encouraging, huh?

Sidekick goes bye-bye

We finally sold our trusty Sidekick.  Yep, it drove away yesterday afternoon in the hands of a Very Happy Woman!  I didn't get her name.  She lives at our local House of Ruth.  Sometimes anonymity is a good thing.
If you don't know about House of Ruth, it's all about breaking the cycle of domestic violence and empowering victims to a brighter future.  The Sidekick's buyer didn't even have a bank account and had to wait a few days before House of Ruth administrators helped her get the money.  Now she's going to have to wait until she gets her driver's license.  She was SO Happy to get the Sidekick--a friend helped her drive it away.  I gave it a fresh oil change before they picked it up.  I wished her well in her future and told her we both felt the Sidekick was destined for her all along.  I've sold a lot of vehicles in my life but I have to say yesterday's sale was a very touching moment.  I hope to see her driving it to a new life as our paths cross here in Idaho Falls.  One thing's certain--that vehicle isn't going to let her down.

We closed out our golf season yesterday when all the golf stuff was pulled out of the Sidekick.  No more smacking little white balls around big stretches of grass.  The clubs and paraphernalia will get stored away for the better part of a year.  There's lot of other stuff on our plate now golf goes to the far back burner.

Susun received news that her Pop Don's health is taking a turn for the worse.  We may have to leave earlier than planned so we've decided to pack everything this weekend.  We will be ready to leave on a moment's notice if need be.  Our prayers are with the Family now.

The onset of our bad weather is coming a day late but not a dollar short tomorrow.  How do you like this snippet from the morning NWS AFD?  "SNOW LEVELS ARE EXPECTED TO DROP DRASTICALLY SUNDAY NIGHT AND EARLY MONDAY AS MUCH COLDER AIR ARRIVES."  We will definitely be waking up to a white lawn Monday morning.

DF & LBR Wayne R. received a national award for one of his signature books, "Sedona Through Time."  Congratulations, Wayne, you sure deserve that award!  Click here to read all about it.

We used the proceeds of the Sidekick sale to pay our full year property taxes here in Idaho Falls.  This is the first place we've ever lived where we actually ENJOY paying property taxes.  They are so low and we get so much in return.  Imagine, our taxes here are much lower than those in Rimrock, Arizona, where we get virtually nothing in return for the expense. (NOTE: That's not a political commentary, just a statement of financial fact.)

Our Twitter continues to entertain us immensely.  When we revived that dormant account, we were following a mere four other Twitter accounts.  Now we follow 208!  Likewise, we had 11 followers a few days ago and now we have 61.  We're learning a lot of fun (and useful) stuff and, as long as it continues to be fun, we will plan to Tweet many times each day.  If you haven't perused our Twitter, we suspect you will find its content quite interesting:  http://twitter.com/thesnowbirds

Today's going to be a "work day."  It's all about packing and getting the house ready for extended hibernation.  Time to bear down and "git 'er dun."

Cheers, jp

Whazzup with a "Bonus Day?"

Roger called yesterday a "Bonus Day" primarily because of the amazing weather.  Believe it or not, our high temp reached 70!  (That's not a typo--that's seventy degrees.)  That's a full 16 degrees above normal.  There wasn't a trace of a breath of wind either. The blades of the nearby ridgeline wind turbines hung limp all day.
That alone made it a Bonus Day for tens of thousands of Eastern Idaho residents.

We enjoyed several other bonuses yesterday.  In the early evening, we received a visit from The Tamale Lady and her daughter.  We never know when she's going to wheel her Red Flyer wagon up to our home.  It's always a Bonus Day when The Tamale Lady pays a call.  How can you beat six piping hot, perfectly done tamales for six bucks?  They are easily the very best tamales we've ever had the pleasure of tasting.  Susun and neighbor Danielle are all smiles about their Bonus Day culinary rewards.

Meanwhile, the awesome weather helped us get a jump start on packing the big truck.  We worked until about 1 pm.  The toughest and biggest parts of packing for the Arizona Trip are now behind us.  That's a genuine Bonus.

Houn' Dawg and I enjoyed a spirited round of golf on the short course.  I bet him five bucks on the outcome of the game.  Naturally, HD elevated his game to a much higher level and we were tied stroke for stroke for the first few holes.  I led by one after the fourth hole and he led by one after the fifth.  It all came down to the final sixth hole.  I reached the green on my tee-shot and HD was forced to chip onto the green in two.  I blew my putting in the clutch and HD came through to win by two strokes.  He scored a 23 and I a 25.  It was my second lowest score there since resuming this arcane, so-called sport after a 45-year absence.  We both agreed we each played our best golf of this fall season and that was a Great Bonus for the day. (In the photo at left, HD barely misses an eagle on #3.  His putt came with an inch of dropping in!)


And to top it all off, we had several great phone conversations with Gary G. in Stanley, Idaho.  Gary is easily the single most energetic volunteer we've ever met.  There's simply nothing Gary won't tackle as a volunteer.  He's fearless.  He's also the most multi-talented, multi-tasker we know.  From law enforcement to EMT skills to Ham radio to historic preservation, non-profit management, antique vehicle restoration, winter survival skills, and so much more, Gary's a Shining Star of Sawtooth Country.  Gary put the icing on our Bonus Day Cake by sending one of his great photos to us.  He's a lifelong accomplished photographer and his sunrise view of Williams Peak showcases his skill.  If you look closely, you can see extraordinary detail in the photo.  It makes you feel like you are almost actually there enjoying the same spectacular view.  These days, Gary's main passion is the Sawtooth Interpretive & Historical Association (SIHA--pronounced "see-hah").  You can click here for SIHA's website.  We spent some real quality time talking with Gary yesterday to provide ideas on how he can find a volunteer to run SIHA's superb historical museum and de facto Stanley Visitor Center alongside the headwaters of the fabled Salmon River.  You can click here to read Gary's splendid Fall 2010 SIHA newsletter.  Our life paths first crossed Gary's back in 2004 during our first season out at Bowery. We feel very fortunate to know Gary and we are honored to be able to provide assistance to him and SIHA.  Working with Gary made yesterday a Double Bonus Day!

And, finally, to complete our Bonus Day, we baked a four pound pork roast to perfection in the cook shack.  Susun thinks I've finally "got it right" and those three words of approval were as sweet a bonus as we could hope to have!

Have a great day and Many Cheers!  jp

PS--Here are the Site Stats for the prior week.  We upticked in daily users and the avg. time per visit took a pretty good jump, too.  (Stats cumulative since 6/19--not since blog's beginning on 01/01/10)

Visits

            Total ........................ 2,534            
            Average per Day ................. 21            
            Average Visit Length .......... 4:48            
            This Week ...................... 148            

          Page Views

            Total ........................ 4,702            
            Average per Day ................. 41            
            Average per Visit .............. 1.9            
            This Week ...................... 287 

Bonus Day

As Roger said, today was a "Bonus Day."  Roger captured this sunset tonight (November 4th--believe it or not) and posted it straight-away to his World Famous Sunset Blog!  It was once again one of those evenings where we both closely watched the Western Sky.  We were roasting a 4 pound pork loin out in the cook shack and playing all of John Prine's "Fair & Square" album, too.  The light play on the foreface of the cook shack was outstanding.  We both knew Roger could and would deliver and he did.

What can you say about a guy who takes pictures of sunsets?  We wish we had all the right words to give him massive kudos and so forth. All we know what and how to say it is, "THANKS, ROGER!"

Stay tuned for tomorrow's blog post on just why this really WAS a "Bonus Day!"

Click here for Roger's Sunset Blog.

Have a Great Evening & Cheers!  jp

Ah, The Glory of It All!

We have a Buddy in Stanley, Idaho.  Perhaps you've heard of the place.  It's one of the Coldest Places in the Lower 48.  NOBODY lives there in the winter.  Well, there's maybe 50 people who do (on a good day). 
Our Buddy sent us this photo late today.  We cherish this picture and we will tell you why we do tomorrow.  In the meantime, CHEERS! jp

The Sixties

No, not that Vaunted Decade--we're talking temperatures.  Yesterday's high was 62, a full 13 degrees above normal.  Today will probably be the same but tomorrow is supposed to really pop a cork on the thermometer--it's gonna be 64 degrees!  Obviously, what with the Pacific Pitchfork (shown above) stabbing into the Snake River Plain, it's the Last Hurrah.

We made the best of it yesterday.  We finally put engine oil and gasoline into the MLS and fired it up.  It's well worth the almost $500 we paid for this machine.  It leaves nothing behind (pun intended).  They say the compression ratio is 8:1.  That's a joke, it's more like 4:1 or 5:1 but, hey, that means each bag we fill would have been four or five bags of leaves.  Yesterday was the first time in either of our lives when dealing with leaves was painless and almost downright fun.  It was over almost before it seemed we got started.  Shucks. Of course, there will be many more episodes of sucking leaves up from the lawn.  This was just Round One.

We did get lucky with our closest neighbor's leaves.  In the fading light of Tuesday evening, the 11th Ward's LDS Young Men and Young Women showed up at Chuck and Lynn's house and raked and bagged all of their leaves.  Lynn was positively beaming when she told me the story yesterday.

Yesterday was another good day at the Ten-Cent Stores.  We scored a brand new, name-brand 4x6 American flag for $2.  Also got a 50-quart igloo cooler to match our favorite all-time camping cooler. This particular cooler keeps ice intact longer than any other cooler of the same size.  This summer, we tried to entice someone on Craigs List to sell us a used one.  We offered to pay as much as $30 for a used one of this brand and type.  We even considerd buying a new one on eBay for $65!  We scored this one yesterday for $10.  Patience DOES pay!

There were two highlights of the day yesterday--one public and one private.  The public highlight was a real Shining Moment.  The city dedicated the new renovation of the ice hockey rink.  There were perhaps 60-70 people on hand.  One of the main speakers became so emotional she couldn't talk.  The Mayor called it a "really good day for Idaho Falls."  The project cost way over a million bucks.  It's a Superb project and a point of pride for the community.  This community really believes strongly about investing in recreational facilities.  Twenty five years ago this week, voters approved a $1.65 million bond for the city's magnificent indoor swimming pool. When we first laid eyes on it back in 2005, we were awestruck.  It remains a fabulous facility and it's one of the Top Ten reasons we moved here in the first place.  Parks & Recreation here ROX!

The other highlight was receiving a cell phone call from my Minute Man Doctor while driving out to Freddie.  He reported the results of my blood work.  Of greatest importance to a Happy Hour Practitioner was the news that both my kidney and liver functions were very good for a soon-to-be-63-year-old!  YIPPEE!  All of the other readings were fine, too, and the baddie cholesterol was very low so Life is Indeed Good.

We are having a LOT of fun with our Twitter account.  It's helping us get back in sync with "all things Arizona."  We really want to be Good Snowbirds, smiling when we're supposed to and cooing compliments left and right.  Nary a discouraging word should ever fall from the lips of a Good Snowbird.  "By the time we get to Phoenix," we'll have enough Pollyanna stuff to talk about to bore the Natives right out of their skulls!
We know some people who have a downright aversion to Twitter.  Call it a mental block or something.  When they discuss it, it's usually in terms of something like, "I can't keep up with all this stuff."  Their plaintive protestations always remind me of Earl and Opal below.  Have a great day & Cheers!  jp

Dawn of a New Sundown

As each day dawns and then dwindles back down to dark, one moment or two each evening defines a particular and often peculiar character of each day.  It's called simply, "the sunset."  We all know it as that time when we pause to reflect and ponder the lessons of each day gone by.

As we have often noted here, we are fortunate to have the gift of a  "remote sunset sensor."  Yea, verily, his name is Roger, and he lives in yonder foothills.  With the gift of his lens and photographical acumen, he captures each of those Special Specimens we wish we could see for ourselves.  Tonight was no exception.

Susun once again lamented, "WOW, there's a HOT sunset going on tonight, I sure wish I could see it."  For my part, I said, "Well, if it's worth a hoot (sic), Roger's all over it and we'll see it soon."

Sure enough, very little time passed before this masterpiece came home to roost here on our blog.  We simply can't thank Roger enough for allowing us to "reprint" his creative talents here.  (NOTE:  It's not technically a "reprint" since this is the digital age.  You have to use some creative license here to make that connection. You get the picture, so to speak.)

It's been a great day and we wish you Many Cheers!  jp

Endless Summer ending

The Beach Boys hot 1960's tune from their "Sounds of Summer" album echoes in our head this morning.  You can click the YouTube video embedded below to listen to it while you read the rest of this blog post.  Ah, summer's last glow is finally fading into winter's first snow.  Within mere days, the winds will howl and it'll be time for us to throw in the towel.  By this time next week, overnight lows will be in the mid-teens and daytime highs will struggle to get above freezing.

Meanwhile, though, we're gonna have "fun, fun fun until Daddy takes the T-bird away!"  Yesterday's high was 61, a full 12 degrees above normal.  Today is progged at 62, tomorrow at 63 and Friday's probably gonna clear 60 as well.  Daddy takes the T-Bird away this weekend and it all comes crashing down next week.  Even before we read the news, oh, boy, we made plans yesterday for our OAZ departure.  We're leaving November 16 or 17, depending on the travel weather forecast, of course.

We still want to squeeze in the last vestiges of our "fun, fun, fun" before the T-Bird goes bye-bye but we also realize this week's golden weather offers a unique opportunity to pack and rig in the warm, windless sunshine.  To play or pack?  Ah, that is the question!  Maybe we can do both.

Yesterday was a Play Day for me.  I voted to play golf pretty much all day starting at 11 and ending near 5.  "The Golf Dude" photo is below and comes complete with searing commentary by The Goatherder.  The word "Dude" is used in context of the original 19th Century definition as detailed on our blog Glossary.  My eyes are narrowed because I was looking into the low angle morning sunlight.  However, it reminded me of what I suppose must pass for a "golf hustler" so that's how I spun it out on the blog last night.  Heck, it even prompted me to challenge Houn' Dawg to a $5 bet on our next round of Kiddie Golf.

Actually, my reincarnation as a golfer has been a lot of fun and I'm glad it happened.  I'm enjoying the game as it's played on a tiny chip and putt short course.  I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to play real golf on a real regulation course.  Playing the little $3.25 short course is a lot like extreme croquet only longer and with major air balls!  It's been a fun ride but by Friday the clubs will be packed away until next fall.  It's highly unlikely (as well as illogical and irrational) that we would play golf during the summer camping and boating season.

The photos above say it all: The Porch Project is Complete!  YEA!  Three cheers!  (Cue holiday noise makers and confetti floating in air.)  Wright Roofing's pro team swooped in yesterday and waved their magic wands over the porch and, voila, it's a genuine gem now.  Mike, Wright's Main Man, has been doing metal roofs for over 20 years and his skills really shine.  Susun and I are very happy with the final product.  It turned out far better than either of us imagined it could or hoped it would.  Now, we can live in Arizona all winter content in the knowledge that the inside of our home is accessible in case there's an emergency and someone absolutely MUST get inside.  Without the porch roof, there were be a permanent impassable ice dam in front of that door until sometime in April.  (We totally seal the front door from the inside so that it can't be opened with anything short of a battering ram.)

We think we'll begin packing the big truck today and spend part of each day this week adding stuff that's already boxed and prepped to go. It's going to be a busy time once again here at our Idahome.  We've had the luxury of leisure times here since we ended our camping season September 9th, 54 days ago. It's been great but now it's time to pack up and get ready to migrate.

Here are a couple of items in closing this morning.  We had a major life milestone last night.  We paid no attention whatsoever to election returns.  We didn't once check Google News (or any other online news); we didn't watch TV and we didn't listen to XM Radio!  That marks the first time since childhood that we didn't pay attention to election returns.  One of our earliest memories is watching fuzzy black and white TV election returns in the 1950's.  Well, no more.  Those days are history.  We didn't have a clue how it turned out until we read our morning newspaper.  Believe me, in this day and age ignorance really IS Bliss!

Second, we really cranked up our Snowbirds Twitter account yesterday.  We put some serious juice into it.  We're adding followers rather rapidly, going from 11 earlier this week to 41 as of this morning.  Frankly, we are very proud of what we're doing with this particular Twitter.  We not putting a speck of our own personal activities on it--it's all about events, places, people and real news you can use.  In the coming months ahead, we suspect this particular Twitter is going to be one VERY popular place for people to visit.  If you haven't checked it out, we suspect you might find it rather interesting:  http://twitter.com/thesnowbirds

Have a great day & Many Cheers!  jp

The Golf Dude

Wanna Play Some Golf?

We're NOT voting today

What?  Not voting?  Are you serious? 

Yep, we voted absentee on Thursday!  Gotcha! 

Absentee voting is really the way to go these days, especially with flu season lurking in the wings.  It's SOOOO much more painless than going to our regular polling place in the Teresa Bunker Elementary School.  It's nice that Idaho lets us vote absentee for any reason whatsoever such as "The sky is blue today so I felt like voting."  OK, so we voted.

Speaking of voting and the flu--we also got our flu shots on Saturday.  Naturally, "The Deal Dude," as Spudboater calls us, shopped until he nearly dropped to get the best deal on the shots.  The grand total for the two of us came to $30.  It could have easily been $60 or more here in Idaho Falls.  A couple of unsuspecting types who waltz into Walgreens would have been relieved of sixty bucks pretty pronto.  What was also fun about the flu shot gig was that we got poked at an urgent care clinic.  We figured they give shots all day long so it would be painless and it was.  Both of us had to ask them if they really gave us the shots since we felt nothing.  They laughed and showed us the needles.

Well, we got spammed last night in the wee hours.  Yep, someone sneaked through Google's SPAM engines and posted their tripe on this blog.  Actually there were two SPAMs.  Google caught one but the other one eluded containment.  We don't think the offender was egregious enough to warrant resumption of comment moderation.  If the situation changes, of course, we will have to return to a pre-post review of each comment.

Speaking of sneaking, we managed to sneak out to the Sand Creek driving range yesterday afternoon to test out two newly acquired clubs.  We did real well with the new #3 metal driver and the #6 iron.  Not so well with the new Big Bertha-style #1 metal driver and the #3 iron.  We are looking forward to playing a round of golf out there today on the short course. It's supposed to clear 60 degrees today.

There's nothing new to report about the leaves--they aren't leaving.  I checked some of them yesterday and they are still so tightly attached to the tree you have to yank hard on them to get them to separate.  Unwittingly last week, we did something that guarantees us a departure date for OAZ. We booked Miss Susun on a Southwest Airlines flight to San Diego December 9th out of Phoenix.  Soooo....long story short: we'll humming that Glen Campbell melody from "By The Time I Get to Phoenix" at least several days prior to December 9th.  Bottom Line:  We're outta here within no more than 30 days.

Susun is back to beading.  She made several ear rings sets yesterday.  She's organized all her beading supplies and she's clearly got "bead fever" once again.  It's great.  I love it when she's beading and giving gifts of jewelry to her friends.  She innovated a great little long distance tradition last fall.  Daughter Stasea learned about it yesterday and wants in on the tradition, too.  Susun found these truly cool Lady Bug beads and she started making Lady Bug ear rings.  Most of you know that the Lady Bug and Susun go back a long time together.  Anyway, Susun gave out a lot of the Lady Bug ear rings last fall to her Dear Friends in Arizona.  Here's how the plan works--the first Monday of each month, everyone wears their Lady Bug ear rings and thinks of everyone else.  Most of the time, they all call each other while they are wearing their Lady Bug ear rings and it's a joyful little thing for each of them to do.

Today marks nearly one full week without glancing even once at Google News!  I haven't felt any "news withdrawal" pangs whatsoever.  I haven't even been tempted to click over to Google News.  We're sure glad that phase is over.

Well, that's about all this morning.  No mas chit chat.  CHEERS!  jp

A Real Life Story

Well, this story can't wait until tomorrow.  It has to be told tonight.

OK, here is how it unfolds.  Naturally, I am inside the Big Ten-Cent Store. (AKA: Dee-Eye).  I have found two items I can't live without and a third that I might be able to live without.  The sum of the first two items is $3.50 and with tax the total is 3.71.  Listen carefully because these numbers are part of this Real Life Story.

OK, so I take all three items to the checkout.  Meanwhile, the clerk and I get ourselves all jumbled up in a hopeless tangle of verbal misunderstandings.  We have to repeat stuff to each other two or three times before both of us understand what the other one said.  (No, it wasn't because of my poor hearing.  It was Monday, remember?)  I joked that it was Math Mayhem Monday and she laughed.

Meanwhile, I paid $10.75 and all I got as change was $2.04.

Um...I smiled and said, "I gave you a ten dollar bill."

Um...she smiled and pulled out another five but immediately summoned the Manager Matt. 

They whispered back and forth between themselves and I said, "Excuse Me, is this something I need to know?"  At which time Matt walks around the counter and leans over me and says, "You paid with a $5 bill!"

OK, now, at that point I had two choices: A) Get real defensive or B) Play Dumb.  I chose Option B.  I opened my wallet and pointed to the other ten dollar bill there and said, "Well, gee, moments ago there were two of them and now there's only one!"  That line didn't do anything to help the situation.  So, there ensued a "let's play a game" kind of thing.  Finally, Matt decides the only way to prove or disprove my assertion was to balance the cashier's cash register drawer against the tape.  I agreed. Matt meanwhile agreed to give me a "get out of jail free" pass if I would give him my vital statistics--name, rank and serial number.  No problem, I willingly obliged.  Afterall, I had willingly chosen Option B.

After Matt left, I chit-chatted with the Clerk and told her how it was undoubtedly my fault since it was a Monday and I was a Math Dunce.  She was gracious and we departed the store with our two items while the third was put on hold for an hour.

Meanwhile, I went home and Googled up the third item.  It's called a "gate wheel."  Yeah, I know that's so totally esoteric that anyone who's still reading at this point is rolling their eyes past the point of no return.  But, hey, a guy's gotta have a gate wheel once in awhile, ya know?  So, I determined the gate wheel sells retail on Amazon and Northern Equipment for $40 plus maybe $10-12 in shipping.  That's pretty pricey when I could get it for a mere ten bucks back down at Dee-Eye.

So, I drive back to Dee-Eye to buy the gate wheel.  When I get there, Matt is near the registers.  So I go over and say, "Hey, Matt, I've been thinking about all of this and I've decided it HAS to be MY mistake.  It couldn't POSSIBLY be your clerk's mistake because she handles money all day long and doesn't make mistakes.  So, here's $5 bucks and let's forget about it, OK?"

Well, Matt is obviously taken aback by this turn of events.  And he says, "Well, gee, OK, I will put this in a separate place and we will balance the cash drawer against the tape--do you want me to call you?"  And I magnanimously said, "Oh, heck, Matt, I already know I was wrong so don't bother, you have so much to do anyway."  He smiled.  I smiled.  Our paths diverged.  I departed with my gate wheel.

Meanwhile, time passed.  By and by this evening my cell phone rings and it's a number I don't recognize.  I answer it.  It's Matt from Dee-Eye.  I am thinking, "Now what?"  He's nice and he says, "Well, John, we balanced the drawer and you were right, she was wrong and we owe you five dollars, I'm sorry for the inconvenience."  Frankly, I was stunned.  I had convinced myself that it was my error.  I can be a real airhead on Mondays.  But it was THEIR mistake.  Amazing.  I was gracious and told him how much I appreciated his call and said all of the rest of the things polite people say.

Then I hung up shaking my head.  What just happened there?  It's making me LOL as I type this blog post.
I had myself completely talked into being an airhead and passing a $5 bill as a $10 bill.  Meanwhile, it really had been a $10 bill and somehow the clerk convinced herself it was a $5 bill.  It's quite comical, actually, but it's a Real Life Story and I'm sticking to it!

Cheers, jp

Oh, This is Rich Stuff!

This is Rich Stuff.  I just adopted a word.  It's: "Ten-cent store."  Yeah, doncha think that's a cool word?  Heck, I think I'll start calling t-stores "Ten-cent stores."  Well, it's a noble cause, folks, because I'm helping SAVE the word "ten-cent store" from extinction.

Did you know that some words are becoming extinct?  That's right. If nobody uses some word, it becomes extinct and instead of being listed as an endangered species it gets DELISTED from the Oxford English Dictionary!  Who knew?

So, The Oxford people have started a "Save The Word" campaign.  It's a lot like Save The Whales, only different.  What you do is go to teh savetheword.org website and decide on which word you want to adopt.  Yeah, I know, who thought you could adopt a word?  It's a lot like walking through the Humane Society Kennels with all the barking dogs and mewing cats.  These words are quite literally crying out for your help to save them from obliteration.  It's really touching and truly tugs at your heartstrings.  Once again, who knew?

So, I was mousing around all these words and this "ten-cent store" put on the full court press for me to adopt it and, gee, what could I say.  I mean it's like right down my alley and how could I resist.  All I had to do was sign an online pledge to use the word as much as possible in normal conversation.  Heck, that's a piece of cake for me.  I mean I practically LIVE in Ten-Cent Stores!  I mean I would practically write a Lonely Planet Guidebook to the Ten-Cent Stores of The West!  If not me to adopt this poor wayward word, then who?  And when?  Now, I have a new pet--the Ten-Cent Store.  It's mine.  I adopted it.  I own it.

So how do you like them apples?

OK, OK, I know you are all clambering for YOUR own chance to adopt YOUR very own word.  Calm down, you're only a few clicks away!  First you have to be prepared for some on-screen chaos.  When you click on this link, look out!  There's total chaos ahead--there's a huge mass of lonely words waiting for your attention.  Stay strong and stand tall, Buckaroos!  Mouse over as many as you can handle before you find your very own neglected word.

And, GOOD LUCK!

Like I said--The is Rich Stuff!

OK, here's the link:  http://www.savethewords.org/

Cheers, jp

PS--Susun got immediately hooked and picked this word.

Still in The Game

Hey, we're still in The Game.  We got a resounding, if informal vote of confidence from members and Staff at the Parks & Recreation Commission.  It was very gratifying and heart warming.  I just threw it out there and said I was going to be gone until May 2011 and if the Commission felt I should resign, then I would.

The Big Man Dave said some real nice things about me and then the Chairman Bill--a laywer no less--chimed in with some real nice comments and compliments.  A few of the others verbalized nice things, too, and nobody said they wanted me to leave.  So I get to stay  YIPPEE!

They might even figure out a way for me to participate by conference call at each meeting.

To tell you the truth, I had no idea what to expect at today's meeting but it turned out far better than I could have ever expected.  Terry M. was so supportive and I appreciated it so very much.  Geeze, it felt great.

Susun was really happy and proud when I broke the good news to her.

I am very honored to serve on that Commission and very humbled that they want me to continue even if I won't be able to attend meetings for many months.  That's really welcome news and makes today a Very Good Day!

Cheers, jp

"What's it's name" is here again

Maybe we should spell Monday out loud to the tune of the Mickey Mouse Theme Song.  M-O-N-D-A-Y...You get the picture.

This Monday promises some serious fun and games.  Since it's the first Monday of November, it's time once again for the monthly Parks & Recreation Commission meeting at High Noon over on yonder Skyline at the OK Activity Center Corral.

After today we will know one thing for sure.....whether we will still actually be ON the Commission or not.  As you know, we're soon heading down to OAZ. (Acronym Alert!  See Glossary.) That means we will miss at least 5 P&R Commission meetings.  A couple of weeks ago, I asked The Big Man Dave for an official item on the November Agenda so the Commission could discuss whether they want me to remain as a member or resign.  Well, naturally, this opened the proverbial can of worms.  It's becoming quite the story and we won't go into all the gory details here as doing so would broach on politics and, as you know, we're loathe to have anything remotely political on this blog.  Suffice to say that it's going to be a quite interesting meeting.

This morning has been real busy.  We spent a long time posting up various email, blog and Twitter stuff relating to Harry''s Hideaway restaurant in Cornville.  That's a long story, too, but you can read about "Why We Promote Harry's Hideaway" on the Snowbirds blog.

We had a really fun thing happen with our Snowbirds Twitter account this morning.  Twitter's computers automatically suggest other accounts you may wish to follow.  Most of the time, such suggestions are "right on."  So we shuffled over to a suggested twitter called "thetraveltweet" and became intrigued.  Then we visited the author's blog and found an interesting idea to send postcards to ourselves.  Sounds goofy but, trust me, it could be a lot of fun in the right hands.  So, one thing led to another and, lo and behold, we got retweeted for our Montezuma Well post on this person's Twitter account!  Considering she has over 3,200 followers, that's a Big Deal for us.  You can visit her Twitter by clicking here.

Terry M. gave us a book to read the other day and today's the day we have to give it back.  Luckily, yesterday was blustery and almost cold so we read the book instead of doing stuff outside.  It's entitled "Indian Creek Chronicles," by Pete Fromm.  You can click here to read the various Amazon reviews about it.  Overall, I agree with someone who rated it a "3" and used the word "mundane" in his review.  But it was a good Sunday read and that's what really counts.  It's great to have a fast book you can gobble down in a single day.  Thanks, Terry!

Another item of Big News-The Lost Lost Straw Bale House Photo Album is ALIVE!  Both of us would be lost with the pictures of the building of our straw bale house.  The album disappeared in May and wasn't discovered again until yesterday. It was cause for much celebration.  Whew!  Hopefully, we'll be able to scan in all those priceless pix before we depart to OAZ so they can be preserved without any future angst.

Ye Ol' Sidekick hasn't sold--nobody's biting on my "smelly, noisy, ugly" ad.  Dang.  So, instead of giving the poor thing away, we're going to put it to bed in its own custom built Okie-style lean-to alongside the cook shack.  We spent a goodly part of the day designing a cheapo arrangement using old 2x4 remnants and a single sheet of flimsy OSB.  It should rank right up there with some of our Best Hillbilly Designs.

Goatherder got some good wine news yesterday.  You can read about it on his blog by clicking here.  CONGRATS, GH! 

Roger delivered yet another stunning sunset as seen on Halloween Night from his perch high above the Snake River Plain.  It's so fun to wake up and check out Roger's blog.  Last night Susun was saying, "WOW, the light is SOOO awesome outside right now."  Well, from the looks of Roger's fabulous foto, Susun sure got that right!  Thanks, Roger. (Click here for Roger's Sunset Blog.)

Well, there's not a heck of a lot happening 'round these parts, as you can easily tell.  So, we're signing off once again this morning by wishing you MANY CHEERS!  jp