PART THREE — THE WEDDING

Our other reason for going to Arkansas was to attend my older sisters wedding. It was a casual affair with mostly friends and family on her new husbands side and I offered to photograph as much as possible. Unfortunately, I used my sisters camera and couldn't' get any of the images onto my own computer. D'oh! Oh well. C'est la vie.

Overall, a beautiful ceremony where the torrents of rain let up for exactly the right amount of time. Congratulations to the new bride and groom!

The grooms' cake

The wedding cake and center stage

Goofy chihuahua Cocoa playing in the yard

The flowers for decoration

PART TWO — THE GRADUATION

Our number one reason for our trip to Arkansas, was to see my nephew graduate high school. He is the eldest of my nephew's and nieces and I remember well taking care of him at a young age while his mom—my sister—had to work. He'll be entering the Armed Forces this summer, going to boot camp for the Army. He follows in his mother's footsteps doing this at a time when many are trying to get out of the military. If he plays his cards right he can make a career out of this decision. But I digress…

I only vaguely remember my own high school graduation. It was early in the morning and I really didn't like high school. The only reason I went or did well was to get into college. I knew from a very young age that I was going to attend university. My nephew's graduation was fairly short, held indoors in the evening due to heavy rains, and had at least 3 prayers throughout. Not sure how I feel about this. It is a public school and I had though separation of church and state was law? On one hand, I'm sure they still have Halloween and Christmas parties, on the other, it was weird to hear so many prayers. Different part of the world I guess…

After graduation, we headed to Chilies for the graduation dinner. We had a party of 8 to seat and my sister called ahead twice; once to see if they took reservations and a second time to tell them we were on our way, which is what they asked us to do to prepare (because, no, they didn't take reservations). We pile into the restaurant and take a seat in the waiting area. Will we seperate into sepeart tables? No, we won't. Ok, there'll be a table just as soon as possible. We wait. And wait. And wait some more. Hey, aren't those people getting seated before us? Aren't there about 7 people in that group? What's going on here. The host finally stops by and says completley deadpan, "I'm sorry, I compleelty forgot all about you." It's been about 30-40 minutes now. OK… manager comes out, "We'll really take care of you." So, now another 30-40 minutes after the original host says for at least the third time "are you sure you won't do two seperate tables?" we finally are seated. The taking care of came in the form of free chips. Whoopdie friggin doo. Oh well. Both L and I are patient people and we had no where to be that evening. L was looking forward to a Presidente Margaritta. Uh oh. This is a dry county. Whoops! That's OK, he gets enough Margarittas at home.

Overall, the graduation was nice and I'm happy to see my nephew moving on from High School. I wish him the best as he moves forward with his life.

Up next, a wedding.

A childhood revealed, a wedding and a graduation

PART ONE — CHILDHOOD’S END

This past weekend I had the great fortune of seeing firsthand L’s childhood home and haunts in Hot Springs Arkansas. As part of a weekend adventure to a fellow A-state—we being in the A-state of Arizona of course—I learned of the myriad schools and adventures my husband had as a young child.

The morning after arriving in Little Rock, we spent the morning visiting his granddads house, which was unfortunately now in ruins. It seems, no one has spent time in the house since his death nearly 10 years ago, and the forest primeval is all too eager to gobble up the house as soon as it can.


We then headed to Hot Springs. After the morning just outside of Little Rock, I was unsure of what to expect of the city L grew up in. It's hilly, forested and beautiful in Hot Springs. I immediately fell in love with the history of the city, the wonderful forest trails and the surrounding lakes. I somehow felt even more connected to my husband of 12 years, understanding more of where he came from. We saw… no we stalked his old house; a house he is positive is haunted. I was seriously worried the neighborhood watch was going to call on us—“what are these two youngsters doing at this house!”

After both driving and walking around town for a few hours we finally had some real southern Barbecue at a famous place in Hot Springs called McClard's. We could seriously not stop joking about the name–pronouncing it Mac Lards—but boy was it good food. Vegetarians may want to look away at this time.


One of the main attractions in Hot Springs is the 'Gator Farm, a place with over 200 alligators and other various animals, and some of the biggest darned Cougars I have ever seen. Unfortunately, I got no good pictures of them. The highlight of the trip was the petting zoo full of adorable baby goats and lambs.



After a long day, we stayed the night in the famous Arlington Hotel and Spa. After a latenight drink at the bar we tucked in for the night watching the city go by 10 floors below.

Up next, a graduation.

Had a busy weekend…

A couple weekends ago I finally got L to Disneyland. In his 35 years he has never been to a Disney park. I prepared him for the worst—“it's crazy, crowded, ultra clean and nary a vice to be found!” A couple of new things I learned while on this trip:

• You have to pay extra for parking. Wait, that $70 ticket can't cover parking?
• I got completely overwhelmed by the entrance—there are so many points of entry I couldn't hardly figure out how to get in and almost tried to go in the California Adventure side—oops!
• The fast-pass. Blessed be the fast-pass.
• Wear good shoes and trim your toenails. Seriously. I bruised my toes because of this issue and it's not pretty.
• Bring more snacks.
• L really does not like heights or roller-coasters. At all.
  

Before we really got into the park, we checked out a few of the shops and picked up some trading pins. I also got a few pictures of L in front of Disney and the mouse.



Our first ride was Pirates of the Caribbean. Somehow, I had worked myself up so much during this trip, I got really sick immediately after getting off that ride. So, a trip on the train around the park and a quick stop to "It's a Small World." That one is actually one of my favorite rides—but L was not amused. I actually think he had a look of abject terror on his face about 3/4 of the way through—“it just won't stop!” Our next stop took us to the Tea Cups and to be honest, I think I had more fun on those than just about anything. Initially, I was worried about my sinus problems making me very dizzy, but nothing happened.



We were able to get onto every ride we wanted to except the Indiana Jones ride. We had a fast-pass for Splash Mountain, but it was 4 hours out. At the end of the night that was one of our last rides and I warned L, “this one is really steep and long” and at the end of the ride, you keep going and he kept asking, panicky, “is there another slide?”



On our way out we tried to get into Indiana Jones, but the wait was an hour, and by that time, we were so exhausted we just said forget it.

The fireworks really are excellent at Disneyland, but unfortunately, those coincided with us trekking across the park to make our fast-pass ticket. The crowds that formed were nearly overwhelming, and though the employees make good way-finding directors, very few people actually listed to them. If you want to watch the fireworks, sit down, but please; get out of the lanes of movement. Really, my only down point for the entire adventure.

Overall, L's feedback on each ride:

1. Pirates of the Caribbean: lame. He thought they had really cheesy animatronics, though I liked the smoke induced Davey Jones.
2. The Disney Train: fun, but that's not the Grand Canyon. Hey, that dinosaur didn't exist with that therapod.
3. It's a Small World: weird, but really cool engineering. Personally, it's one of my favorite, and I love the updates to the ride.
4. Tea Cups: weeee. Did this one twice and the second time nearly made us sick.
   
5. Mr. Toad's Wild Ride: Awesome! I thought we were going to actually hit that train. And the "going to hell" portion reminded me of a motorcycle ride we took once, where we had to drive through a portion of a forest fire. Creepy.
6. Alice in Wonderland: really cool.
7. Rockets: His response; too high, too fast. I personally had a blast and am glad we took separate rocket ships.
8. Haunted Mansion. Those trees are creeping me out! So fun we did it twice.
9. River Tour: our tour guide, what can I say but it was clearly a long day for him. What a weird-o!
10. Autopia: No way am I standing in line to drive little cars that get in traffic jams—let's get out of here.
11. Splash Mountain: holy cow that was fast, steep, long, thought I was going to pass out.
12. Roger Rabbits Spin-Out: fun, but we had to wait nearly an hour and that was just too long. Couldn't get our car to spin very fast.
    
13. Gadgets Go-Coaster: L: “I don't like roller coasters.” I personally loved it. It's only 30 seconds long but it was fun.
14. Innoventions: Kind of lame, but we got to see an ASIMO demo. That was really fun.

Sunday, we drove to San Diego in the hopes of having lunch at one of our favorite restaurants, but not remembering it was Valentine's Day, we ended up searching for nearly 2.5 hours until we just decided to head down the Silver Strand and have lunch at one of our other favorite places.

All in all, it was a great trip, the cats behaved themselves at home and it took us a bit to recover—foot wise. I'm still bruised on my toes.

Mt. Lemmon, Arizona

Looking out at the valley and mountains beyond.
Here you can see Thimble Peak, the Tucson Mountains in the
background and the "Center of the Universe" Baboquivari Peak.

Mt. Lemmon is our little mountain to the north—OK, it's over 9,000 feet at its height—which is a pretty sizable mountain for a town that sits around 2,000 feet. Over the course of the 10 years we've lived in Arizona, we have been making the trek up the mountain numerous times, usually on the motorcycles, but this time in the Miata. Up top is a little Café, the Mt. Lemmon Café. A few years ago, Mt. Lemmon and its city Summerhaven had a terrible forest fire that destroyed many homes, structures and acres of the mountainside. It was front page news at the time that the little Mt. Lemmon Café—who serve some of the best pies in this area of the country—was not demolished by the fires.

We had headed up the mountain with visions of strawberry rhubarb pie on our minds, stopping along each overlook for me to shoot a few pictures. When we got into town, the café was no more. Not only was it closed, but it had been bulldozed for future structures. Turns out, the little lady that made the pies had passed away and her husband no longer had the drive to run the business. RIP Mt. Lemmon Café and little pie maker. We will miss you.

I took a bunch of photos of the mountain-scape and provide these for your viewing pleasure!

Starting up the mountain looking into the valley of Tucson.
The saguaros are very discerning where they can grow, and only a few
more feet in elevation, it is too cold to support the delicate cacatai.

Looking out over the ridge of the mountain.
I love the way the clouds shadows play on the moutains.
I sepia toned this image a bit for a little play on the colors.

Looking up at one of the many jutting ridges of Mt. Lemmon.

Some pretty mountain flowers along the roadside.

Tucson below, looking out over one of the mountains many ridges.

Tombstone, Arizona

One of the many printing plates found at the
Tombstone Epitaph, the newspaper of the old west.
Note: This picture was flipped for legibility purposes!

One of the great things about living in Arizona is that every day you can take a step back into the Old West—while enjoying the amenities of the future, like air conditioning, penicillin, and modern vehicles. Tombstone, Arizona was our destination for a day of buffalo burgers—OK, I had a BLT; no beef—and a walk along the wooden boardwalks of old Arizona.

The boardwalk and lovely "old timey" signs.
I love this style and walking along the boardwalk
in a nice pair of boots elicits a magical sound.

For those not familiar with the place, Tombstone is where the historic gunfight between the Earp brothers and "Doc" Holiday versus Frank McLaury, Tom McLaury, Billy Claiborne, Ike Clanton, and Billy Clanton—the lawless villains of the old west—on Wednesday, October 26, 1881. In reality it's hard to tell the difference between those on the right side of the law and those on the wrong side.

"Walk Where They Fell"—that's a little morbid, right?
They have closed off the original lot where the shootout occured
because—I can only guess—they can make money by putting on a show?

Tombstone is a city very well aware of its own kitsch value, and it plays up to this fact with great effect. Don't go there looking for the real west—if that's what you are after I suggest old Bisbee, some of the old mines like Winkelman and Christmas; which are mostly ghost towns in this era. Outside every doorway is a man or woman in full western wear soliciting you to see their show, stop by for goods or just enjoy a drink on this fine hot afternoon. It feels like being solicited by prostitutes in Vegas; i.e. a little weird.

While in Tombstone you can visit famous Boot Hill, the original cemetery where so many of the west's famous names were buried. It's a little strange, and very fake feeling to me for most of the markers, but there are a couple of genuine burial sites within. It also allows a nice view of the valley down into Mexico behind the city.

Take a ride in one of the many stage coaches around
town and learn about the way the west was.

Don't stop too long, Big Nose Kates' might employ you in their house of burlesque!

Below is the slideshow of the rest of the pictures I took on our little mini vacation.

Hometown Tourist…

This past week L and I celebrated my birthday by spending the day in downtown Tucson. It gave me a great opportunity to be a tourist in my own town, snapping pictures with my new digital SLR camera. Our first stop was the famous Hotel Congress, where John Dillinger stayed shortly before being caught by the local police without a single bullet being shot.

The sign, as seen from the southern side of the hotel.

One of the coolest things about the bar area, where we had breakfast is the penny floor.

A close-up of the Hotel Congress penny floor.

I enjoyed the repetition of forms in the bar chairs. I also really like the
convenience of the little hooks for your handbag underneath the bar.

I had the Eggs and Gunpowder breakfast, which is a big bowl of roasted potatoes,
two poached eggs, cheese and turkey chorizo.

L had the Eggs Chipotle & Borracho Pork. Both breakfasts were excellent.

After breakfast we drove up A-Mountain, which really is not very large compared to the mountains in the background of this image. But it provides a great vantage point of my little town. In this picture you can see the downtown metropolitan area and the U of A campus in the background. The mountains on the far side are the Catalina Mountains, which are about 9,000 feet high.

Finally, L treated me to an ice cream birthday cake, and yes, put all 34 candles on there. Wow! That was pretty crazy.

A Week in the Mile High State…Part IV

— THE TRIP HOME —

The plane trip home.

Oh yeah. I forgot to finish my trip. I flew home. THE END!

A Week in the Mile High State…Part III

— ESTES PARK, CO. —

Outside the cabin, Thursday morning.

Wednesday evening we drove up to Estes Park—a place I haven't visited since around the time I moved to Arizona 10 years ago. It's almost exactly like I remember with only a little bit of new developments along the route up there.

Sister and I treated Mom to a day in the mountains, and we cooked pasta with the Brady Street Cheese Sprinkle from Peneys Spices, garlic toast, a green salad with avocado and a couple bottles of wine. Let me tell you about those! When we got to the cabin, we found the corkscrew provided was broken and had no way of opening the wine bottles. In my good mood, I decided to ask our neighbors—whom we could see through the window—if we might be able to borrow theirs. I trotted over to the cabin, knocked on the door and got a very vocal

“THIS ISN’T THE OFFICE!!”
“Uh…yeah, I know…just wanted to see if I could borrow a corkscrew?”
“Oh, oh, OK.”

When I brought the thing back—nearly immediately after borrowing—as I started saying "thanks!" the guy at the door goes, "You're welcome"—really rude family, I tell you. Sometimes altitude does strange things to people.

Mr. Happy, after watching an evening of American Idle.

Next day, we went into town to do a little window shopping. We sat and watched an entire presentation at the glass blowers, where I snapped a picture of these as of yet unopened poppies.


And on our way out of town we all stopped by the famous Stanley Hotel, one of the many sets used in Stephen King's "The Shining". Though they say it's haunted, I saw no evidence of that whatsoever.


Next up: The end of the week.

A Week in the Mile High State…Part II

— PENZEYS SPICES —

Tuesday started out a rainy and dreary–albeit hot—day and Sister, Mom and I went to Arvada to go to the retail store for Penzeys Spices. I'm kind of a spice nut as I really don't like using salt and feel almost any meal can be made better with the right spice. I had my eye on getting really good cinnamon and found the Extra Fancy Vietnamese Cassia (not a true cinnamon by the way). I enjoy it so much I put it in my coffee as well as breakfast smoothies.


I would definitely recommend going to this store if you have the time. My family each bought a number of bags, then divided them up into the jars, which they sell at the shop. I walked away with about 15 new spices to try out.

— WHAT I MADE —

Fresh gingerbread. This recipe is super moist, but now that I've made it I'll be changing up some of the ingredients. First, I'll be substituting most of the butter with applesauce, doubling the cinnamon and ginger and serving it with hot coffee. Delicious! The recipe as modified is below.

Ingredients

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• Scant 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup applesauce
• 2 tablespoons softened butter
  
• 3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup mild molasses (not robust or blackstrap)
• 3/4 cup well-shaken buttermilk (I used 3/4 Tbsp lemon juice and 1%milk to make 3/4 cup)
• 1/2 cup hot water

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350ºF with rack in middle. Butter a 9-inch square baking pan.
• Whisk together flour, ginger, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl. Beat applesauce, butter and sugar with an electric mixer at medium speed until pale and fluffy. Beat in egg until blended, then beat in molasses and buttermilk. Mix in flour mixture on low speed until smooth, then add hot water and beat 1 minute (batter may look curdled.)
• Spread batter evenly in pan and bake until a wooded pick inserted into center comes out clean, 40 to 45 minutes. Cool in pan on a rack.

Next up: Estes Park, CO.

A week in the Mile High State…Part I

The week started off with a trip to the Butterfly Pavillion just outside of Denver. I had read on their front door that this was an invertebrate museum, and knew fully well that all species of insects would be found here. I had already made up my mind, that no way, no how am I letting a tarantula touch my hand—I don't care if they are fuzzy and light and don't bite or are not poisonous. Yikes! No way! We walked into the main building and of course, this is where all the spiders, scorpions and cockroaches are. I actually had to leave the room for a few minutes after seeing this guy! I don't know exactly how big this was, but if memory serves me right it was something like 10 feet across.


After leaving the room for a bit, I finally worked up the nerve to let Rosie walk across my hand. I was literally shaking from SpiderFreakoutis™, but let her walk across me. Light, fuzzy and not that bad. I still don't want one in my house, but not the most horrifying experience in the world. Of course, Mom didn't get my camera to work so all I have is a sticker for proof and a picture of the insect walking on her hand. I will admit, my camera does funny things sometimes.


Next up were the cockroaches. They don't bother me nearly as much as the spiders and what is even weirder still, I had butterflies land on me left and right and had no problem at all with them. The top image is the Madagascar Hissing Cockroach and for the life of me, I cannot remember the name of the roaches on the bottom image. They're actually quite pretty in person.



After visiting the Arthropods, you get to see a few creatures of the ocean—starfish and horseshoe crabs. I didn't take any pictures of them as I was still getting my shaking hands under control after "petting" Rosie. After all the interior sections, you get to go out into a huge arboretum where all the butterflies and plants are. All of them were quite pretty and very active as the day was rather warm.

"MOTHRA… MOTHRA…"

Up next… Penzies Spice Company in Arvada Colorado.

Thanks Giving

Lindsay and I got to fly out to Birmingham for Thanks Giving this year. Neither of us are happy fliers; he doesn't like takeoffs, landings or pretty much anything else and I really don't like takeoffs. I get so wired up just before we start – sort of like a build up of anticipation. I used to get the same way before riding my motorcycle too – but once I got going, everything was fine.

Anyway, after a long day of travel we arrived in Birmingham to a nice pizza dinner at Lindsay's parent's house. That was followed up with Thanks Giving pie and a movie for the night. Thanks Giving day, Lindsay and I slept in until 10:30! I couldn't believe it. We never sleep that long at home. I helped in the kitchen with all the sides while the boys watched movies (I think it was Godfather of all things!) in the other room.

Friday we got to go flying out at the R/C field with Lindsay's dad. Lindsay crashed a plane in the pond beyond the airfield and I could barely control mine. I swear I'm not that dumb, but those controls are pretty difficult for me. I kept turning my control the wrong way. Luckily though, we were hooked up to a trainer with his dad and I never crashed my plane. We spent Friday and Saturday night at his brothers house. That was fun.


Saturday, we went to the Barber's Vintage Motorsports Museum to see all the bikes. There wasn't a lot of new things to see, but it's always a cool place to visit. Saturday night we went out to eat in Five-Points which is a downtown intersection in Birmingham. It's a neat place with a lot of neat little shops and stores. We're not much of "clubbers" though, so we kind of just called it a night before 10.






We caught a matinee of the new James Bond flick Sunday; excellent movie, though I do have one complaint. Too much close-ups of the action. I would have liked to see the camera pull back a little here and there as the herky-jerky camera messes with my equilibrium a bit. Also, much of it took place in the desert, and since I live in the desert it didn't feel as exotic as the last one.

Monday we headed home and just like every trip I take, Tuesday saw me laid out with a big strong head-cold! Darnit! Also, I completely forgot to take Mr. Happy on our trip – I was so mad at myself all week about that one.

Happy Thanks Giving all and thanks for a great vacation!