Wednesday, December 15th

Todays Goal.....

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Welcome to the Good Ole USA.........

where speaking English appears to be optional......... Case in point, stop by your local motor vehicle department to pick up a learners manual so that your teen can study for their permit, only to be told..... sorry they don't currently have any manuals available in English, they only have Spanish available.

I am at a loss for words!

Walk cautiously and carry a big stick...........

yes I have taken some liberties with Teddy Roosevelt's phrase "speak softly and carry a big stick" but when you read this little tale I believe you will forgive me.

Last night I had to take my oldest up to Phoenix to start his training for his new job. He was only scheduled to be there for a few hours so I stayed in the city. Some time during the evening I received a text from my oldest daughter. The message was something roughly like this "MOM, little sis just saw a snake in the house". Ok! That really got my attention, but really don't you think that was deserving of a phone call rather than a text?

I really, really, really wish I had a picture to add to this post, but the bad news is, hubby couldn't find the snake. Daughter saw it slither under the furnace door. So my ever creative hubby stuffed books around the opening of the furnace door in hopes of blocking it from coming out (shaking my head in awe, wonder, confusion, laughter).

Look What We Put Together.........

The spiritline at the local highschool has a new coach this year. She was actually they coach most of last year but she took over from the previous coach so she didn't get much of an opportunity to bring in her fresh new ideas. One of her fund raising ideas is for a boutique/party with a silent auction. All of the cheerleaders create a gift basket and bring to the event where they will be silently bid on. When I first heard of the event I jumped on the idea of chocolate and luckily when it came time for the cheerleaders to choose an idea from the list chocolate was still available.

CHOCOLATE DREAMOOPS Please don't notice the extra bits of chocolate on my face, conveniently there wasn't enough room for everything I bought.

A Trip to the Zoo..........

On the day when we went on our trip to the mission we were finished much sooner than we planned so we decided to make a quick side trip to the Tucson zoo. Tucson has a very nice zoo. It isn't too large so you don't get exhausted from the walking. It also has beautiful landscaping creating a very nice atmosphere. I took a lot of shots that I am happy with so today's post is picture heavy.

Wait, wait...... let me turn so you get my good side!

The Capybara is the worlds largest rodent. That would take one very big mouse trap.
Just striking a pose.......

A Trip to a Mission......................................

Over the weekend we took a trip down past Tucson to take a look at a mission. San Xavier del Bac is a fascinating building. It is over 300 years old and when built was in a very secluded area. Over time Tucson has crept closer to the mission. It is a very eerie feeling to be in a building that old. Your mind comes up with all kinds of thoughts of things that could have happened there. I am pretty sure that as I stood there taking pictures the ghost of a cowboy stumbled past me, blood dripping from his gunshot wound, seeking help from the inhabitants of the mission. Ok, Ok, I have probably read too many western Harlequins, but ya get my drift.

Link to the mission's website... http://www.sanxaviermission.org/Index.html

Link to a lot more of my pictures of the mission... http://travel.webshots.com/album/570040761IXRpLC

Amazing Hail Storm............

This is seriously the heaviest hail I have ever seen here.

A very confused flower bed

Dangerous steps
Piled high on hubby's truck

A pummeled garden
Girls out taking a beating

Son headed home trying to dodge the painful hail
Daughter's makeshift snowman

A Sad Event in our Neighborhood........

This happened four houses away from us last night. Luckily the whole family escaped safely. The family had just moved in over the last couple weeks, daddy, momma, and four young children. The father had been trying to start a fire in the fireplace and sadly things went terribly wrong. the fire started about 7:30 and the last fire truck didn't get out of there until almost 1 AM.

This picture shows how dense the smoke was in the neighborhood.

Morning view, standing in exactly the same place I was last night.

I am amazed that this tree survived. This is pretty much all that remains of the house, the rest completely collapsed.

Kind of hard to tell what this picture is. There is a travel trailer to the side of the house that survived. I walked around to the side and crouched down to take this shot of some debris still smouldering this morning.

Christmas Day in the Desert 2008.....................

I hope the term "better late than never' is acceptable for this blog post.

On Christmas Day I went out to the desert with hubby and son. We were amazed at the wildlife and tracks we came across that day.

A hawk

A hawk in flight with it's breakfast (look close at it's tallons)

Pack of wild dogs

Coyote fleeing across field

Same coyote fleeing into miloGoose, very rare sight

(sigh...... I must share a funny tale with you. Imagine a middle aged, non slender woman trying to creep up cautiously and get a shot of this beautiful goose without scaring it away. Heavy camera around my neck, focus is the least of my worries. I just don't want to scare it way. But there is no way on earth I am crawling up that embankment. My hands will not touch dirt unless I have a sink with nice warm water, soap and a bottle of hand lotion at my disposal. So we must all settle for this very blurry picture of the beautiful goose.)CranePossibly baby hawkHawk in flightDucks in canalWhen we got to the riverbed we spotted a lot of tracks..........

DeerCoyote

Another Coyote track......

(my son was walking a little ways from us and says that he saw a mama coyote and her two pups run off, not sure if that is a fish story or not)

And the thrill of the day................ either a very large bobcat or possibly a mountain lion. I wish I had placed a dollar bill next to this print to show the size.

And a tale about another type of Coyote and not the animal type.

Coyotes are people who transport illegal aliens up from the border. If you will notice on the next picture there is a lot of heavy trees and brush towards the right hand side. This is the route we took as we were walking away from the river.

We came across this man made bench. Hubby says possibly a lookout point for coyotes.
And sure enough just a while later a police officer stopped by and talked to us and told us to be very careful in this area. He said it is a known location for coyotes to stop with immigrants and wait for their pickup vehicles. He told us that the week before they had picked up over 20 illegals in this area but the coyotes escaped. He also mentioned that the coyotes were heavily armed... yikes!


And now for a few random scenery shots...................

Some shots deserve black and white

My very favorite scenic shot of the day which I will probably have printed and put on my wall.