mouse_rants

(or however that song goes).  and it's also nice to be back to a full-size screen and keyboard.

spent most of the morning at the tucson botanical garden - really, a gem of a little place.  AND they told me where to find sonora dogs, so had two of those for lunch (and now i can try to duplicate them myself!).

and then there was the trip home.  had about the only scary bit after i got back to CA - bit of a dust storm, sand blowing across the road and occasional poor visibility, and some pretty strong cross winds.  but i made it home, and the cats were (eventually) glad to see me - fred's response to my arrival was more or less "oh, you're back - can i go out now?" - but angelina purred and purred at me.  i did let them both out while i unloaded the car, and now that i have sat down and fred remembers that's _his_ lap, he's pretty glad to see me too.

maxed out the photo card, that's downloading now - and the pizza just got here.  once i eat, and sort through all the pics, i'll post some.

...where things are pretty darn quiet, and the internet connectivity, even by broadband, is sporadic.  AND i can't remember how to check my wok email, after carefully figuring out how to do it before i left.

anyway.  my aunt's birthday was lovely, and it was great getting to know the cousins i hadn't seen since childhood....but since then, it's been pretty quiet.  i was hoping i could talk people into going to the OKC zoo with me, but that seems unlikely to happen - although everyone was interested when i first mentioned it, now it seems my cousin is working, and she's going to call my aunt at noon, to arrange a time to meet for dinner...which seems like it will mean another day siting around the house.  well, i am making great progress on my vest, and friday i head out to the station, and there should be things to do there.  and then home!

coming to you from beautiful downtown tusayan, just south of the grand canyon.  and i have remembered something i should have brought - some sort of recording device.  most of the road trips i've done, someone else has been along, and that person can make notes as we go....a bit hard to do when one is driving.  so i'll just have to try to remember the things that struck me:
-those domed tops on semi-truck roofs look the the crests of some dinosaurs.  particularly when they are brightly colored.
-which makes driving i-40 rather like being in the middle of a dinosaur migration.
-the state of arizona really needs to put in a scenic viewpoint just after you cross the border from needles.  you cross over the colorado river, there is a rather nice (railroad?) bridge you can see from the highway, and a set of dramatically-crested dark-red mountains.  i would have loved to have stopped there, enjoyed the view and eaten my lunch.
-the state of arizona also needs to put in a few rest stops.  if they have any, i haven't seen them.

no pictures today (just some really blurry ones taken on the fly through the window.  drove all day with the top up - i knew i was going to be passing through riverside, and it entirely met my expectations with a layer of smog so thick it hid a small mountain.  by the time i cleared that, the tempeature was over 90 (and the car was nearly there) - so figured i would just keep the protection up, and the wind resistance down.  still, a lovely drive....but i really need to make the trip again with a roadside geology book.  i am determined to learn how all those different mountain ranges were formed - so many different-looking ones, sometimes right next to each other.

actually, i need to do the trip again with more time - then i would have time to investigate such things as london bridge (which i had forgotten is now at lake havisu), and that thing that looked like a giant sparkly golf bowl.