So, I know I am stunningly behind on posts. I’ll try to do some catching up over the next few weekends. This post should get us up to when we went to Europe or close. Like many of my in the middle posts it will be a bit unstructured, kind of like our lives.
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| Dog sweater (we had no heat fro 12 hrs.) |
One of our friends that went with us to Antarctica bought us these way cool pens that write upside down, under water, on the moon, and in freezing cold weather. Unfortunately they came after we got home. The box for the pen has a rocket on it. But the rocket looks like a sword also. So when we opened our mail and saw the boxes my writing book nerd child said “the pen is mightier than the sword.”
The same child was excited about dissolving peanuts that came in another package. They are fun to play with. Said child also made me pencil holders out of duct tape rolls for my office space when I can work from home. She set up a few other things for me as well that were good ideas. She turned a container like you carry cleaning supplies in, the ones with a handle in the middle, on its side to make a little shelf to hold lotion, charging cords etc. It was very sweet.
We spent New Years Eve at the beach in Bolivar with friends. I went for a nice run with Stormy and then took Stormy and Sidney to swim in the very cold water. The next morning when we got up Stormy wouldn’t wag her tail or sit and it you touched her tail she yelped. I thought she had somehow broken her tail so I packed her and Sidney and my friend into the car and took her to the emergency vet because no other vet was open. It wasn’t broken she had just over used it and had limber tail. Yes seriously. It was much better with pain meds and rest. However, she was grumpy and got in a fight with another dog. I was dumb and got in the middle and got bit on my arm. Man did that ever hurt and I admit I shocked a bit. It took a long time to heal because they couldn’t be sutured. Really bad move on my part. That was the third worst New Years Eve on record. We may skip celebrating in future years.
We continue to swim with our favorite Coach and team, Coach Dean and the Sharks. He says some pretty funny things when he is coaching. One evening he was talking about his tombstone and the things it would say about coaching like “Eyeballs” and methods of teaching the kids techniques. He also comes up with some special training for them that isn’t just swimming. So for example he has them lay on thief backs and flutter kick, then tells them a stroke and blows the whistle. They have to swim that stroke to the other side as fast as they can and then go back to flutter kick position. The next day their cores cry. He has them swim with drag also. Leggings, shorts, t-shirts, etc. on over their suits. And then one day he told Sidney that she had been given the gift of legs. My thought was how. She didn’t get them from me or Kirk.
Some other miscellaneous is that we have seen a guy riding up Kyle Seale, the more major road leading to our subdivision and which is significantly hilly, with his golf bag. Impressive. I also did a half marathon kind of. I was supposed to do it as a relay with a friend where I would run a 10k and he would. But he was injured so I ran my half and walked his half with him. It was actually a well organized and enjoyable event.We took a trip up to Colorado to visit my folks and family over spring break. We left Friday night and drove part way. It was pretty cool being up in the windmill part of Texas at night. There were windmills as far as you could see in any direction. All of the lights for making sure they aren’t struck by aircraft were synchronized. It was pretty surreal to see all the lights turn on slowly together and then off, after dark, as far as you could see.
We spent the night in a nasty Best Western. I’ll likely never stay at one again. I had been looking for a hotel that would allow Stormy and not cost an arm and a leg and be about where we wanted to stop. Bad move. It was dirty, run down, noisy and generally miserable. We got up very early to get out and on the road.
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| Looking through dome on Bishop Castle |
As we went through Texas towards New Mexico we saw a lot of cotton of course but also Sand Cranes in the fields where they were resting on their way north for the summer. They are always a treat to see. Once we got into the deep valleys on the interstate in Colorado we encountered crazy wind. There were 50 and above gusts as a cross wind on the highway. It required some work to keep any car moving straight. When we were only maybe 25 miles from my folks we saw thousands of Volkswagens that were part of the recall. That location was one of 5 in the US where all the recalled VWs were collected before being sent for repairs or to be scrapped. It is estimated there were 15,000 cars staged there. It was impressive. |
| Bishop Castle |
We did a few things while we were visiting my folks. First we did a lot of chores. I fixed the iPad, washed all the windows inside and out, mopped the kitchen twice, replaced two faucets and three outlets, cleaned the porch, did laundry for mom, and replaced the innards of a really old faucet. I ran a few times and Sidney and I walked through the nature park and along a trail near a prairie dog colony.
We also went to the zoo. Colorado Springs has a really nice zoo, or they did before the recent devastating hail. We watched a couple of elephants entertain themselves by stripping all the bark off of some logs with their tusks and trunks. We also nearly got peed on by a lion. He was able to shoot outside of his enclosure a solid 15 feet, well into the viewing area. We also fed the giraffes and fed a rhino. That was really cool.
After the zoo we went up the road through the zoo and then past it to the Will Rogers Shrine. I had never been there and it was neat. It is way up Cheyenne Mountain with a spectacular view of the city. The shrine was built in the late 1930’s by Spencer Penrose, one of the most important men in Colorado Springs ever. He named the commemorated the shrine to his friend, Will Rogers, who died in Alaska in a plane crash. Spencer and his wife and two friends are interred in the chapel connected to a 5 story tower. The floors of the tower hold a photographic history of Will Rogers and murals depicting historical people and events of the area.
On another day we drove up to Bishop Castle. This is a castle that Jim Bishop has been building for nearly 60 years. There are interior rooms, high towers and bridges and a fire breathing dragon. It is located in the San Isabel National Forest. Jim is an iron worker by trade and started the castle as a one room rock cottage. The castle is always open and free. Sidney and I covered nearly ever inch while my dad waited. Some of the inches felt terrifyingly unstable. After that we drove up to a cabin that we used to own. Sidney and Stormy played in a stream and we saw a lot of wildlife including big horned sheep, turkeys, and bluebirds. It was truly a beautiful drive and pretty day. |
| Panorama from Will Rogers Shrine |
We made a quick trip to Florida in March as well for the wedding of the young lady who was the flower girl in Kirk’s and my wedding. While we were there but not at the wedding we went for a walk along the board walk in St. Petersburg and also visited the Salvador Dali museum which celebrates the life and work of Dali. The collection includes over 2100 works from all stages of Dali’s career, including from when he was a boy. The museum holds much of the work collected privately by a couple who were also friends of Dali. The work displayed was unique and utterly amazing in quality and quantity. He has to have been a brilliant man. The museum itself is also something impressive. The building has a helical staircase and part of the walls are the Enigma. The Enigma is made of 1062 pieces of triangular glass formed into bubble shapes. It was a really neat opportunity to see some amazing art (and get some A/C for a while).
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| Dali Museum |
Our walk on the board walk was entertaining. There was a woman riding a skate board with her dog on a leash running beside. We saw a horseshoe crab scooting along in some shallow water and a seahorse hanging out nearby. And there were pelicans, plenty of them. I love pelicans and Sidney had to drag me away. I would have watched them fish all day. They were landing within 10 feet of us
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| My favorite bird, Pelican |
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| Brave |
In early March the swim team moved to an outdoor pool at a UTSA. The Monday after our return from the wedding in late March, there was a parakeet drinking from the pool. It was still pretty cold at night and windy and rainy a lot and I didn’t know how long it could survive outdoors here. So I caught it. It took maybe 4 tries with me trying to throw a lightweight towel over it. I succeeded and put it into Sidney’s mesh swim bag. I took bag and bird to Petsmart while she swam to get a cage, food, etc. I am walking around Petsmart with this chirping bag looking for supplies. The Petsmart employee said the bird was a he so one of the swimmers called him Sir Tweety the Brave and it stuck.
We took him to the vet for a wing trim and checkup. The vet informed us he was a she. So we changed her name to Miss Tweety the Brave. We got her trimmed, wings and nails, and took her home. But not before we got to listen to her heartbeat. It was so fast you couldn’t possibly count it. And she breathes once a second. Sadly Tweety died for some unknown reason while we were in Europe this summer. To say the least we were devastated. Even though we had her for only a few months we were very fond of our street bird.
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| My "Homemade" Home Sign |
There have been a few more moments of fun. There was a fly in my coffee that I didn’t know about and drank. I was a bit surprised and almost gagged when I spit him out. I went to a sign making party that a friend won at an auction and we made a sign that says Home and the “O” is a small wreath. It can be changed with holidays and seasons. We also went to Natural Bridge Cavern with a friend and Sidney rescued a three legged stick bug. He was still pretty mobile with three lags but was in a walking path so she moved him to a pile of sticks off of the path.
Our cat catches a critter every once in a while when she is out on the back porch. That is as much outside as she gets. When I see she has a critter I go try to rescue the critter outside. Sidney just opens the door and chases. So cat runs into the house with the lizard. Cat is running through house with lizard, I am chasing cat, Sidney is chasing me and the dog is chasing us all in happy confusion. Cat runs to my room under the bed. Sidney tries to get lizard out of cats mouth and lizard drops its tail. Lizard tail wiggles around on the floor like a dying worm. I catch cat who finally drops lizard who is now tailless. Cat gets thrown in bathroom and lizard captured to take outside. Mom has to talk to herself to get blood pressure and pulse down……Not really that funny…… |
| Feeding the Rhino |
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| Piano Awards |
Sidney graduated from Middle School in June. She received the President’s Award for Academic Excellence. She also was published as a young author and received two piano awards, one for theory and one for playing, at the end of the school year. Proud momma.
I think that catches us up to Europe which will be the next post.
