Take a Hike, Part 1

On Friday, Travis and I went to a concert in Phoenix with his church group (which will be its own post), and on the way down there we went to Badger Springs to go for a hike (we drove separately from everyone else). It was pretty awesome, and of course, I brought the camera, so here are some pix for your viewing enjoyment...





Our "butterfly porn," lol. We caught them in the act.




Petroglyphs...it's so completely awesome that these are still around. And that we can just go for a hike and see them (versus having to go to a museum).


We thought this one looked like Saturn.






Wading through the ice-cold creek.






He made it!


Wiping the gooey mud off my feet. It's that kind of mud that sticks to your skin really well. It was difficult, because the water was too cold for me to slosh my foot around in it long enough to rinse the mud off, so I resorted to wiping it on the rock.

"We're gonna take a walk outside today...Gonna see what we can find today..."

Since I've been up here, I've made it a point to consistently take Sadie (the dog) for a walk every day. It's been pretty successful, I've only missed a few days in the month I've been here. Almost every day, I see something that makes me wish I'd brought the camera...well, yesterday, I did! So, enjoy the pix...







The setup of these mailboxes really weirds me out...I've never seen it done this way, and I'm not sure why they did it.








The inevitable golf course










I want my house (someday) to have a red door. It just looks so awesome.


A very old mailbox...really cool.

ROAD TRIP!!

Okay, so I've vaguely mentioned this (like once), but I wanted to dedicate an entire post to it, so here it goes...

Travis (my brother), Matt (his best friend), and I are going on a road trip for a little over two weeks in May. It's one of those things that was always sort of a "we'll talk about it, and keep planning for it, but deep down we know it's never going to happen because we don't have the money, or the scheduling doesn't work out" type of thing that we've talked about for a long time (5 years, maybe?). Well, my brother decided to really make it happen, and for months (possibly an entire year) he's been planning out this trip. He's hammered together pretty much every single detail on his own, which totally amazes me and fills me with gratitude at having such an awesome brother. So, our destinations are as follows (in order):

Big Bear City (by Big Bear Lake), CA

Our aunt, uncle, and two cousins live there, so we'll be staying with them while visiting. Which is pretty cool, since almost all of the rest of the trip we'll be camping out. It'll be really fun to visit them (don't tell anybody, but this uncle is probably my favorite out of all of them in both our parents' families...which is saying a lot, cuz we have ten uncles total between the two).

Monterey Bay, CA

Of course, beach/ocean/etc.=badass (soooo!!! many picture opportunities!!!!!! it blows my mind!)...but the main attraction here will be the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

I think it's probably one of the greatest (if not THE greatest) of all the aquariums in the U.S.

Big Sur, CA

Miles upon miles of absolutely gorgeous coastline. I seriously am going to be taking hundreds (thousands? maybe?) of pictures during this trip, I won't be able to help myself.

San Francisco, CA

Dude, the bridge...do we honestly need another reason to visit there?!? So very cool. But, we do have another reason...

Alcatraz (island in San Francisco Bay that was previously used as high-security jail, now is a tourist attraction)

We're going here, which creeps me out but is also very interesting at the same time.

Yosemite National Park, CA

I love nature and animals, etc. so I'm psyched to go here. Words cannot describe my feelings.

Las Vegas, NV

As weird as it may sound, Travis and I have quite a few childhood memories of the hotel/casino places in Las Vegas. We lived in Bullhead City, AZ for six years, and Las Vegas is (I think) about an hour away from Bullhead, so we went there quite a bit (with our dad...I don't think our mom ever took us...which is definitive to their opposite natures). We watched the moving statues in Caesar's Palace, saw the "volcano" at the Mirage, went on a boat ride (inside!) at the Luxor, etc. etc. Pretty awesome stuff. I never really thought of it as 'Sin City' as a kid, probably because I had no clue what actually went on there. To me, it was like a permanent circus/carnival or something. So we're going to go there and sight-see (not gamble).

Zion National Park, UT

I don't know much about this one, but it looks very pretty, and will be fun to hike around and take pictures of it.

Bryce Canyon National Park, UT

This one's the same as Zion...beautiful, and I look forward to seeing it, but I don't have much to say about it as I don't know a lot about it.

Grand Canyon, AZ

This one's not definite, we'll go there if we end up with extra time at the end of the trip (Travis left a few random extra days that aren't scheduled anywhere specific, so that we can have the flexibility to do more in one place or another if we feel like it). We've all three been there before, that's why it's kind of up in the air. If we do go, that's great since it's so pretty and all, but if not, I'm happy to put the other places in priority since we haven't seen any of them before.

And that's that! Our road trip in a nutshell. Travis has things planned out extremely well, with driving time, money, etc. I'm impressed by how much time and effort he's put into this. It's going to pay off big time for all three of us.

Blogeroo

This is the first blog I’ve ever done where I’ve actually written it out ahead of time. I’m very proud of myself for taking the initiative. I want to know…do you guys read blogs of people you don’t know? Like, you’ve never met them, talked to them, etc.? I do, it’s actually the majority of my blog-reading (which is sadly a very long list, as apparently reading about strangers’ lives is more interesting than living my own). Travis seems to think it’s weird that I find such interest in people I don’t even know. Maybe it’s just that he’s not involved in the “bloggy world.” I don’t think I’ll ever convince him to get his own blog, so it could possibly just be a lost cause. Anyway, I just wanted to share a couple of my favorites.

Whatever- I love the pictures! This woman has an insane amount of awesome colors, everywhere on her site, and it’s extremely inspiring every time I visit. It makes me want to go do something artistic. I love that feeling.

Money Saving Mom- Okay, so I’m not a mom. But who doesn’t like to save money? This site definitely helps me be more frugal, and makes me feel good about myself for finding that next great bargain.

Click Chick- Several random links each day. Easily my primary source for game sites (she calls them “timewasters”), which of course I rarely go onto, since it’s unproductive (lol…just kidding…I love being unproductive!).

Today

I made homemade mac'n'cheese...and pecan pie. And last night I made spinach enchiladas. Now I'm going to go make chocolate chip cookies. Mmm!

Paul Harvey

Paul Harvey passed away this past Saturday (February 28,2009). I promise not to post about different icons (Dr.Seuss, now Paul Harvey) forever, it's just that both of these two that I'm posting on have had a significant effect on my life.

You know how, when you traditionally do something with a particular person (or, in my case, people), who you care about, in your mind that feeling gets associated with that particular action? Whether you're doing it with them or not? Well, that's how I feel about Paul Harvey.

My mom was a single parent from the time I was six until I was fourteen. Because of this, we visited my grandparents (mom's parents) quite often (in spite of the fact that they lived 2-3 hours away from us for a big chunk of that time period). And with them, the never-fail lunch staple was sandwiches. We never had anything else for lunch. I always had PB&J, passing up the ham/bologna/cheese/etc. they always had available (my vegetarianism, taking root early on?? Possibly!). I don't remember what time it was, but it must've been around noon, that Paul Harvey News came on the radio. We'd always start early, so as to have the sandwiches made before he came on, and then we'd all sit down at the table and my grandfather (Grandaddy, who passed away last November) would turn on the radio. Sometimes we'd have to listen to a few commercials, or a bit of the previous show, before he came on, but you could tell the second he came on. His voice was very recognizable, but his trademark opening phrase was the main thing that alerted me to start listening: "Hello, America, this is Paul Harvey...stand by for NEWS!" I don't know how they picked exactly which news he'd cover, since he only had half an hour (I think), and part of that was taken by commercials. He usually just had top news for the world, the U.S., and then a random story (a section of the show called "The Rest of the Story"). I never cared about the news as a kid, but when Paul Harvey was giving it, I listened closely to every word. Listening to it now (on youtube! How technology has changed...), I naturally want a PB&J sandwich. And I miss Grandaddy.

So, thank you, Paul Harvey, for giving me such wonderful memories and being such a wonderful radio personality.

Happy Birthday, Dr.Seuss!!

Today, if you didn't know, is Dr.Seuss' birthday. If he were still alive, he'd be 105 (notice the rhyme? totally intentional.). Dr.Seuss, or Ted Geisel (yes, he had a real name!), is by far my favorite author/illustrator. Of course I love children, so the fact that his books are aimed towards children gives them a certain appeal, but mainly I love the messages he sends with his stories...not your average pointless kids' stories, but stories that actually have meaning behind them. My favorites (narrowed down quite a bit, as I have many) are:

The Butter Battle Book,



Green Eggs and Ham (which he wrote in response to a bet that he couldn't write a book using 50 words or less...bet you didn't know that, huh?),



The Lorax,



Horton Hears a Who (which wasn't done justice in the movie),



and The Cat in the Hat (I have tattoos of Thing 1 and Thing 2...it doesn't get much better than that!)



Check out his website for a bigraphy, games, and a store where you can by Dr.Seuss books. And as my one last tribute to him, for today...a poem:

I just moved to the country club [the redneck version of one]
So I can give my brother lots of hugs.
Where after I write on my blog,
I can go outside and walk the dog.
Today I'll find out if I have a job,
Though my boss' name won't be Bob.
And I'm happy to say,
This could be a great day!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DR.SEUSS!


PS-Check out Google's tribute to him, as well!

Catch-up

So, I know I've been kind of slow with posting...I really want to post, I just lack the motivation for some reason (that must be a side effect of unemployment). I really have no excuse, either...I have all day, every day, to do pretty much anything and everything I want to. And I have a computer with internet right here in the house. Yea. I'm a lazy butt.

Anyways, I might have a job! I'm going in tomorrow to interview for it, but my potential boss pretty much told me today (less than 5 minutes after I'd met him) that I should be ready to work when I go in there tomorrow for the interview. Meaning, he's already offering me the job, in so many words. I'm really grateful for how it all worked out, too: Travis (my brother) works at Subway. His boss (the owner of his franchise location) has a whole group of friends who all own their own businesses. So, basically, Travis just told his boss I was looking for a job, and that was it! Easy-peasy. I'm lucky to have a brother who has connections. So anyway, this morning Trav's boss told us that his friend who owns a hotel just lost a receptionist, which left him SOL. He's desperate to get someone hired ASAP (do you like all of these abbreviations I'm using?), and Trav's boss referred him to me...or me to him. Whatever. So I met with him today, he wants to do an interview tomorrow (since his wife will be there tomorrow, and she takes notes for him during interviews), and then he basically explained everything as far as duties, pay, and such, as if I was already hired. Yay!

Soooo...I'll keep you posted!