Photos WA & UT

The sad man with the broken board, Beth, andy and charlie in a timer shot on the olympic coast, a sideways seastack, and the Fish Brewing Company in Olympia.

Trip Data

I forgot to say that the total trip was 9366.6 miles on 196 gallons of gas for an average of 46 mpg, I think....  I ought to do some web search to quantify the environmental consequences of the trip and comparisons to other modes of travel, but i am not doing it, it is time to get back to earning and coping with everyday issues, like taxes.

In closing, i quote Graham Watanabe, U.S. snowboarder at the Olympics:  "Try to imagine Pegasus mating with a unicorn and the creature that they birth.  I somehow tame it and ride it into the sky in the clouds and sunshine and rainbows.  That's what it feels like." 

Home at Last

Well, here i am back in the Springs, Trying to recover from 2 days of driving back from  Colorado, not to mention 2 months on the road.  I got in 2 days of snowboarding at Copper Mountain, CO.  It was great!  The second day we had 6" or so of fresh powder.  My new snowboard behaved very well.  In fact, me and my new board were awesome, except, of course, when we weren't. 

On my way thru St. Louis i decided it was time to visit the arch.  I did, and it is very impressive, both from the base and from the observation platform, although "platform" doesn't seem right for such a curvy space.  It seems the arch was designed by the same guy, Eero Saarinen, who designed the Antioch School!  The elevators, or "trams," were amazing.

Final Beer Report, at least for now: Dam Straight Lager, from the Dillon Dam Brewery, Dillon, CO.  Honestly, i can't remember what to say about it, but with my standards, "Good" is a pretty good bet.  I still have a few here in the fridge, so if anyone wants to come check it out...   and if it is not good i will update you.  Lucky U IPA from the Breckinridge Brewery.  Good and Hoppy.  For those of you who have been wondering how i can drink all that beer and not put on weight, the answer is that i cannot.  Just weighed myself, have gained at least 5 pounds.  Not feeling fat yet, but it is time to go back to the  "Jim Ryan One Beer A Day" regimen.  That's all (for now), folks.

Pass Time

The Pass Time Beer was too light for my taste.  Okay, i guess, for a third beer of the evening when i didn't want to overdo it.

Colorado

Sitting here drinking.  Singletrack Copper Ale from Boulder Beer Company.  Good, very.  Chocolate Stout from Fort Collins Brewery.  Good and rich.  Pass Time Pale Ale from Boulder Beer.  I haven't tried it yet, Doug is drinking the first of the six that he brought, i will report on it soon.....

Salt Lake City ultimate page

Forgive me, all you loyal readers, if any, and people to whom I was supposed to respond about one thing and another.  I have been sorely distracted, snowboarding for five days with Bruce Morgan and Mark White.  It was tough!  We had to get up at dawn to be on the lift chair when it opened at nine.  Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday we went to Brighton, twenty minutes up to the end of Big Cottonwood Canyon from our motel.  Monday we went to Solitude, just down the canyon from Brighton.  Wednesday we went to Snowbird, a bit further south, in Little Cottonwood Canyon.  We liked Brighton best, as you might guess.  Solitude and Snowbird were a bit steep.  Not as much fun when it is really steep.   

At Snowbird we took the tram (gondola) to the top, where it turned out visibility was really bad and I snowboarded over a lip and broke my board.  In order to get down off the mountain, as Bruce pointed out, it payed off for me being skilled at riding “switch,” that is leading with the other foot, so that the broken tip of the board didn’t get caught in the snow.  I just knew there was a reason to practice riding switch so much, other than to be better than Bruce.  I had to go to REI and buy a new board Wednesday nite because a snowstorm was coming.  I got a Beautiful 159cm K2 called Darkstar.  I got a very good deal on it, because the season is winding down.  

On Thursday we had to put the chains on the car to get to the resort.  There was at least 6" of fresh powder and a lot more in some places.  My new board performed very well!  We saw a white weasel.  It ran across the hard snow and dove under where it was soft, popping up occasionally to look around.

In Utah, to get full-strength beer you need to go to the State Store, so we did.  To pay off my Super Bowl bet I bought Bruce a six of Mirror Pond Ale from  Deschutes Brewing of Bend, Oregon,  Good.  We also had: Thunderhead IPA from Pyramid Brewing of Seattle, Good.  Winterfest Seasonal Ale from Wasatch Beers, Utah Brewers Cooperative, Salt Lake City, not my favorite but 7.1% alcohol.  The Devastator Double Bock, also from Wasatch, 8.0% alcohol.  Good.    Hop Rising Double IPA from Squatters Beers, also of the Utah Brewers Coop, 9.0% alcohol.  Good and Strong!  Squatters IPA.  Also Good.  

Tonight I stay again with Wayne and Colleen, and head for Copper Mountain, Colorado, tomorrow morning.  Should take ten or eleven hours...

Salt Lake City page2

beer report:  Scuttlebutt brewing of Everett, Gale Force IPA.  good.  Uinta Brewing of Salt Lake City, Angler's Pale Ale.  Nice label, but too bitey.  

We survived our first day of snowboarding/skiing, in fine style.  Now it is definately hot tub time!

Salt Lake City 2nd time around

I have successfully driven to Salt Lake City.  Slept in the car in a truck stop parking lot in Idaho.  Picked up Bruce and Mark at the airport.  Paid off my Super Bowl bet.  Tomorrow we head for a ski resort, maybe Brighton.

Olympia Page 2

I am sorry to report that i was wrong.  The sun does not necessarily show every day here.  I don't think they saw it here on Thursday.  I did, because i went to Crystal Mt. to snowboard, and we were above the clouds there.  I got in on a group bus thing out of the Tacoma Country Club.  They were very nice, but i was a bit out of place, being the only snowboarder (I am not sure any of them had ever spoken to one before, other than to complain about being run over), and the only non-regular, and the only one who could not talk at length about golf.

 The weather has been warm and dismal, but is supposed to start clearing tomorrow, just in time for our 3 day excursion to the Olympic Peninsula.

I have been trying so many Fish Tale Ales and Levenworth Biers, both brewed by Fish Brewing Co. here in Olympia, that i cannot keep track.  The four of us had dinner at the brew pub last nite, i had a glass of "cask of the day."  It was, of course, good.  So was the ale that followed it, but my mind has gone mysteriously blank as to the name.  Sorry about the sloppy reporting, i am slipping in my commitment to detail.

Olympia

Nothing to report here except beer! Fish Tale Organic Wild Salmon Pale Ale from the Fish Brewing Co., Olympia. Very good., but that's not why i drink it. I drink it because it's good for me: it's organic! We already finished the Whistling Pig Hefeweizen from Leavenworth Biers, also by the Fish Brewing Co. It was good, too.

One other thing to report, the trees are quite large here, and the sun is seen at least once every day.

Super Bowl Losses

I have been watching the big game with brother Nick in Seattle, drinking of course.  Bridgeport Hop Czar Imperial India Pale Ale, Portland, OR.  Good, very hoppy.  Lagunitas IPA, Petaluma, CA.  Also good.  Bad that i bet a six pack on indy with Bruce Morgan and another with Alban.  Thats a swing of a case of beer.  But they are both like keeping it in the family, and i hope and pray they both will share. Plus, i had a great time  one-ringing Bruce when my team was doing well, and he didn't have a clue,i guess, or he would have returned the non-favor.  Maybe if the guy whose chain you pull doesn't know his chain is being pulled, it is wasted.....   oh well, i gave it my best shot. 

Yellowstone 4

Us in front of our snow coach and a repeat of  two mountain pics in Montana, I think, that i cannot figure out how to delete....

Yellowstone 3

More yellowstone pics

Yellowstone 2

all pictures of Yellowstone except the windmills

Rockies

These are  various views of Montana and Idaho

the Road to Seattle

We got a pretty late start from West Yellowstone, on account of the snow coach ride out of the park and returning my rented skis and the lunch at Running Bear Pancakes, so it was late in the afternoon when we got to Missoula, MT.  I did not know that Missoula was large enuf to have a rush hour.  We got stuck in it because we got off the highway to look for a campground.  All the campgrounds in Montana close for the winter, it seems.  Surprise, surprise.  We found a very secluded closed campground near Lolo Hot Springs, parked in the snowmobiler’s plowed parking area and tent-camped in the snow nearby.  Nobody ever knew we were there, we turned off our headlamps whenever a vehicle went by on the main road.  The snow under the tent was ice in the morning, but we stayed warm. Actually, the night was not as cold as the times we camped in South Carolina and Florida.  The stars were incredible.

            Next morning we drove on thru a light snow to the hot springs, but they didn’t open till ten am and we didn’t want to wait two hours.  Drove all day to get to Nick and Karen’s in Seattle.  Got to see a lot of big beautiful mountains and the lights of Seattle at dusk and had the luck to hit Seattle’s rush hour, also.  Made Missoula’s look pretty tame.           

            Bought a six of Moose Drool by Big Sky Brewing of Missoula as a gift for our hosts (hey, they’re family, they don’t need no stinkin gift?!).  Gave the gift, asked for a beer.  A little sweet, but good.  Just like Moose Turd Pie!  Anyone who doesn’t  get the references to “don’t need no stinkin…..” or Moose Turd Pie, raise your hand and I will get back to you.

Yellowstone

Okay, where to start with Yellowstone?  At the beginning?  We took the snow coach from West Yellowstone to Old Faithful.  The snow coach has "Caterpillar" tracks under the back and skis at the front.  It carries up to about 10 people and has a luggage rack up top, and some hatches for popping out the top for better views and photos.  It is very noisy at top speed, which may have been 30 mph.  We felt lucky to have Zac as our driver all three times we used the snow coach, but since we never had a different driver, we may be wrong.  Zac was very friendly and knowledgeable, and we got to see three coyotes fighting over a mouse with him (i worded it that way special for the grammar police!) plus he was happy to stop and sight-see plus he gave us a water bottle when he dropped us for our cross-country skiing adventure.  After our 10 mile ski, which kicked our butts to the extreme, we were sitting in the lodge and felt a small earthquake, of which they have had many, recently.  We also saw plenty bison, and were trying to stay the required 25 yards from them, but they were in our way, damn it.  I felt like the soccer players setting up the wall in front of the free kick, pretending they don't know what 10 yards is.  So we may have been a bit closer than 25 yards, but not enuf to be dangerous, or in trouble with the law.

We saw lots of impressive geysers and colorful pools and steamy things.  Beth kept dragging me thru the steam with her because the guy at the hot spring spa in Pagosa Springs told her such stuff has health benefits.  We saw some Bald Eagles on their nest, we saw lots of Elk, and we just missed seeing three wolfs at an elk kill.

I had a Bent Nail IPA from the Red Lodge Ales Brewing Company of Red Lodge, MT., in the dining room, and it was good, but it cost $4.50, so after that we made do with our stash of Santa Fe, which i discovered i could keep cool and safe by putting it in the crawl space under our cabin thru the access hole in the bathroom floor.  I thought long and hard about leaving a beer down there for the next person to think of it,  but my thrifty nature got the better of me, and the next visitor to the crawl space will find an empty six-pack and an apology for it being empty.

Almost West Yellowstone

We stopped for groceries an hour short of West Yellowstone.  It said LAST CHANCE and it also said Beer.  It did not seem prudent to continue.  I asked the store woman if she had any recommendations for good, cheap, locally owned motels in West Yellowstone.  We stared that in Pagosa Springs, asking for locally owned businesses - It's an extension of the local beer thing.  We are the tourists who are all local all the time!  She told us we should stay at the Anglers Lodge right across the street because the motel views in West Yellowstone are of other motels.   So we did.  The room does have a great view and a back door onto a back porch; looks like in summer you can fish in the river from your seat on the porch.  It has occurred to me that maybe this fuss about fly fishing is warranted; you get to mess about in pristine river settings and you don't have to mess with nasty bait or poke any poor little worms.  If you are lucky, you won't even hurt/hook any fish, unless you are hungry, and then you do want to snag em.

Message to Gilah: the rest of you don't need to read this.  I had a band dream last nite.  Never had one before.  It was a concert, and the director (Clair Miller?) pulled a fast one on us, started with some weird Cage type piece called Ode to New Mexico that we had looked at once. The music (what is the name for  our copy of the music?) said we were supposed to whisper and say things and we were lost right from the beginning - the audience up in the bleachers was doing it better than us.  I am not sure if it was you, but I was on the end, and we were looking at each other whispering "Where the hell are we?" so it sure seemed like you....

BEER REPORT!  youall can start reading again.  Pale Ale from Snake River Brewing in Jackson Hole.  I like it.  You would think it might have been expensive being brewed in a hotsy-totsy place like Jackson Hole, but it was the usual or a dollar cheaper at $7.99.  However, I am suspicious about the name.  The Snake River flows to the Columbia, and i thought Jackson Hole would be on the eastern side of the continental divide.  I am probably wrong.  

We tried the chains on the car in the snowy parking lot.  Well, technically, I put the chains on only one wheel, but now I feel sure they will both fit, and i won't need to read the stinkin directions.  The sign on the motel says to park back from the building 10 -15 feet because if snow sliding off the roof, and there is a lot up there, maybe 2 feet.  Makes you think twice about walking underneath it.  Today we take the snocat to the motel cabins at Old Faithful! 

Salt Lake City

Here we are in Salt Lake City, spending the nite with Colleen Smith and Wayne Bingham.  They are strawbale builders & authors & photographers.  Check out their website at SmithBinghamPhoto.com    for way better pictures than mine.

Today's beer report:  turns out they DO brew beer in utah.  Had a Pale Ale from Desert Edge Brewery of SLC.  Very Good.  Speaking of recommendations,  Kip's in Pagosa Springs, CO makes a very good elk burger.  Wagon Wheel Pizza in Monticello, UT makes a Very Very good Mexican Pizza.  And Butte Cafe in SLC makes a fine portabello sandwich.  

Mesa Verde cliff dwellings, Colorado snowy view from car, view southwest from Trudy's at dawn.  

Monticello, Utah

Motellin it for the second nite in a row.  

Beer Report!  Two on tap at Kip's in Pagosa Springs:  Pinstripe Red Ale, SKA Brewing, Durango.  Lucky U IPA, from Breckinridge.  Both good.  Pevious to that, i bought two sixpacks in Taos brewed by the Santa Fe Brewing Co.  Pale Ale and Nut Brown Ale.  I liked the Nut Brown better.

Today i learned to use a dinner knife to break into a motel room!  Management TOLD me to do it!  Turns out we weren't supposed to lock the knob from the inside side as we closed the door.  They could have warned us....    

As we left town this morning (no, the cops were Not after us) we took a side trip into the National Forest for some fine Cross-country skiing.  My poles worked fine this time, but we both agreed that our 20+ year-old equipment need upgrading.

In the afternoon we side-tripped to Mesa Verde and were rewarded with a private tour of the Spruce Tree Cliff Dwelling.  It was very cool.

Now that we are in Utah, microbrews may be hard to find, but our motel room has 3 copies of the book of Mormon.  i have started reading it!  While drinking beer, of course.  

Pagosa Springs, Colorado

It is the 28th of January, and i have never ever seen my legs and feet so so very very PINK.  We are in Pagosa Springs, CO, which is a hot springs town and we cooked ourselves in a rooftop hot tub.  Our tub-mate happened to be a local straw-baler.  We had a very interesting conversation.  She said they had had a slow year but that things are picking up.  She said she was using crushed recycled glass instead of sand in their plaster mix.

I don't believe i have mentioned our visit to the "earthship visitor center."  That's the tire house people, they have their headquarters north of Taos; it is called "the Greater World Community," i think.  It was pretty darn cool and inspiring but we don't like the name. We will try to incorporate some of their ideas.   

Snowboarding Santa Fe

Jeez, i forgot to report the best day, until i read Kathi's comment of a few days ago.  Speaking of comments, i just changed the settings so that anyone can comment, i think.  I didn't know they couldn't, and i don't know if it matters.  

Monday i drove up to Ski Santa Fe.  I got in about 4 hours of snowboarding, talked to lots of people on the lift, did about 5 runs with a boarder about my age.  Great guy, took me through some moderate bumps, that was fun to do a few times but kind of hard work.  The snow was good.  Everyone told me my timing was right, they had been short of snow until last week.  I wished i had been there right after the storms but i didn't want to complain.  I stayed on the groomers pretty much, and they stayed smooth and predictable thru the day.  I  wiped out twice, but not badly.  I was on the blue runs mostly, started looking for greens at the end, so as to prolong my day safely.  I had to make sure to get my $60 worth.  The locals told me the deal was to buy the January pass for under $200 i think, and come a whole bunch, and then be entitled to $40 lift tickets for the rest of the season.  Probably did 20 runs of 1000 vertical feet each, but as Kathi knows, i may err on the plus side.

Talked strawbale with a guy from Albuquerque,  and i told him about our friend Eric's former house in Rio Rancho, and he actually could tell from my description that he had seen it.  Small World!

Taos

We are now just outside Taos, at Trudy Abrams, formerly of Yellow Springs.  The directions to her house were just as circuitous as the ones to Shel's.  She has a great new house, of which she told us all the problems and disappointments, but overall i think she is happy with it, as she should be.  I had been thinking we would split today, but Trudy has convinced us that Taos requires a closer look.  I should not be in such a hurry.  Who knows, Trudy may be right; perhaps Taos is Yellow Springs West.

  I have said that i want to find a small town with a liberal, worldly population that has a definable downtown and a feeling of community.  A public radio station and a local newspaper would help a lot.  A good supply of water, clean air and being able to see a lot of stars (in the sky) are important, too.  Last, but not least, there needs to be a quality ski resort!  The Taos ski resort just started allowing snowboards last year, so Taos can now be considered.  I will keep you informed.  

The Road to Taos

On our way from Santa Fe to Taos, we visited Shel, the ceramicist who led the workshop to tile the bench at Xenia and Corry.  We pulled off the side of the two-lane, had to use our ski poles to maneuver our way down the switch-back path to the rickety suspension bridge across the river, followed a very circuitous semi-path past fences, a very curious hog and an irrigation ditch, and found ourselves at the most delightful little house, with a whimsical wall around it.  Shel showed us around the house, his studio and his 4? room cave carved into the sandstone hillside.  With multiple skylights.  It was all pretty damn amazing and my pictures don't do it justice.  There was so much and i failed to get pictures of a lot of it, such as his current work; slumped glass.  I am inspired, but to do what?

Purple prickly pear in the canyon.  View from the canyon rim.  Bales of cotton, LARGE, in texas.  In front of Tris's

Moonrise near Taos.  Nook next to the entry to Shel's cave, sideways.  Cadillac Ranch, Amarillo.  Our cabin in the canyon.

Sorry about the sideways picture of Beth coming out of Shel's sandstone cave. The bas relief of nudes is in the cave also.  The bathtub in in Shel's house.  Shel is a potter, led the workshop for the tile bench at the xenia/corry corner.  The snowy picture is Beth cross-country skiing near Santa Fe.

Santa Fe

Packing up after three nights on the outskirts of Santa Fe.  Very Comfortable accomadations, courtesy Bob & Kathi's house swap.  It is hard to call them Luxurious, being only one room with attached bath, but it is close.  I would tell you all about the Japanese toilet seat/bidet, but it is not suitable breakfast conversation.  Suffice it to say, i want one.  

Okay, to the important stuff:  Beer!  We bought a variety pack from the Marble Brewery of Albuquerque, plus they gave us samples of two others.  India Pale Ale, Red Ale, Oatmeal Stout, Double Pale Ale.  All Good.  Wildflower Wheat, not so much, but Beth liked it.  I am pretty damn easy to please, aren't i?

Our first day here we went crosscountry skiing.  As we started out on the skis for the first time after lugging them 3000 miles, it seemed to call for thanking of the sponsors.  Thank you, Sponsors!  You know who you are?  So i whip out my new REI collapsible trekking poles and they were too short.  I have to go back to the car and get my old poles.  Later in the day we went to the REI store,  i returned the poles and went to pick out a brand that would be long enuf.  I found a different model that wasn't much more expensive, then tried the same model that i has just returned and discovered that i am an idiot and that i had failed to open the second slider.  So i had to go up to the counter and buy back the poles i had just returned.  How embarrassing.

Road Trip Page 7

We didn't leave austin till 1 or 2 pm, so i got a lot done!  Got the outside outlet all squared away (figured out why the other kitchen outlets weren't working: as usual, it was not a coincidence, it was my fault from the previous work).  Got up on the roof and cleaned it off a bit.

Yesterday at sunset near Sweetwater, Texas we saw the most amazing number of wind turbines.  The BIG kind.  As it went to dusk and then dark we were surrounded by hundreds of  slowly spinning blades and blinking red lights.  We were surprised that we didn’t know about such a large wind farm.  We camped on the shore of Colorado City Lake, and every time I awoke  I saw hundreds of blinking red lights across the water and a shit load of stars.

            Today it got super windy from the Southwest.  They were talking about gusts to 40 mph, but it felt like a steady 40 mph to me.  Our mileage improved dramatically due to the tailwind when we turned north.  We had seen mention of Texas’s Grand Canyon, Palo Duro Canyon, we thought we better check it out,  thought we might get out of the wind at the bottom of the canyon.  It is still windy down here but it sounds nice from inside the state park cabin we are renting for the night.  Very Spartan, but cosy.

            We saw numerous groups of wild turkeys on the road in the canyon.  They weren’t exactly begging for handouts, but I think they wanted us to know that they were available if we had any extra food.  We also saw two coyotes.  Well, Beth saw two, I only saw the slow one.

            It is now the next day, Saturday, Jan. 23.  We finally made it out of Texas, not there was anything wrong with Texas, except it’s too damn big, and the sign Beth saw that said: “Babies are God’s stimulus package.” 

            Yesterday in Texas we were making 50 mpg with the wind.  Today we are driving into the wind and making less than 37 mpg.  The car has other excuses for today’s bad mileage – we are going uphill, we are at higher elevation and it is cooler: 46 degrees at 2pm.  Plus Beth is driving  and she is not as compulsive as I when it comes to maximizing mileage. After a week without, the long underwear is coming back out real soon.  Tonite we plan to stay at a house in Santa Fe, courtesy Kathi & Bob’s house swap. Too complicated to explain.  Tomorrow some snow sports, I hope.

            We have used up our  book on tape and listened to all our music at least once and now we are in the middle of  No Good Stations Land.  To make matters worse, it looks like we won’t be seeing a Cracker Barrel ( for books on cd) for a thousand miles.  That’s poor planning….  oh, I forgot that i have an ipod, i better stop complaining.

Road Trip Page 6

It's Wednesday nite, Jan. 20, one whole year without George W.  I miss our national idiot, but  I am thankful.  

We are spending our last nite at Tristan's in Austin.  Today we had lunch at Green Mesquite Barbecue.  Excellent.  We had dinner at the Hyde Park Bar & Grill, where Tris waits tables.  That was excellent, too.  During the past few days i have had Lone Star Beer, Lone Star Brewing, Fort Worth.  Cheap and lite.  I had three more brews from the Real Ale Co.: Brewhouse Brown Ale (very good), Full Moon Pale Rye Ale (good), and Rio Blanco Pale Ale (good). At Tris's resturant i had Live Oak Pilsner on tap, brewed in the Austin area (good enuf to have two). At some point in there i also had a Sierra Nevada from Chico, CA.  No, i did not make a quick trip to CA, it was all we had.  It was good, though.  

Played disc golf twice.  I hope nobody noticed my butt getting kicked.  I got to make more throws than anybody else and got to see the most remote areas of the course, and even got a bit of a wash in the creek, so it wasn't a complete loss.

No surprise, after many days of doing nothing constructive, i was jonesin' to do some home improvement here.  My projects so far: tighten the toilet seat, advise Tris on putting back up the SECOND coat rack i have pulled off the wall this trip, repair two Venetian blinds.  I have talked a really good game about putting in an outside GFCI outlet for the electric fence, but all i have done is replace the inside outlet with the GFCI and determine that the electric pence doesn't trip it.  Tomorrow morning i have to choose, do i go back to the disc golf course to find the disc i threw into the woods just as it got dark, or do i commit to the outside outlet project.  I don't have a lot of time, we want to leave before noon.  

The Real Ale Co.

I forgot to post this beer report!  Rio Blanco Pale Ale by the Real Ale Co. of Blanco, Texas.  Good hoppy beer.  Hey, i also forgot to tell about visiting Seaside, Florida.  It's a planned community on the Florida coast, started around 1980, i think.  they did a nice job of high-density, visually pleasing and walkable.  Lots of vegetation, walkways between the backyards, like alleys for the non-motorized.  

photos FL & AL

Oil rig in Mobile Bay.                         Beth with  a big bird near florida alabama line.  Sunrise at Big Lagoon State Park.  Breakfast

Road Trip Page 5

We have arrived at Tristan's in Austin, TX.  It is Sunday nite, the 17th.   A few beers (I froze our beer supply in the motel mini-fridge the other nite, but they didn't break and only one leaked and they all still fizzed and then Firemans's Blonde from the Real Ale Co., Blanco, TX.  Good)  and a really quick viewing of the Jets/Chargers game.  If you are going to waste time watching football, you may as well waste much less by skipping not only the ads but also the time between plays. You have to watch it later than it was broadcast, of course. The downside is no downtime for multitasking, like blogging, or brushing teeth.  

On the subject of spicing up this blog, I am remembering the words of Jerome K. Jerome (well, his parents may be cruel, but it's easy to remember: even i can).  He wrote Three Men in a Boat.  He also wrote "It is always the best policy to tell the truth, unless, of course, you are an exceptionally good liar."  I, unfortunately, am not, at least in person.  However, the printed medium does open up some possibilities. 

We were walking to our car in Huntsville, Texas, which is the home of amazing builder remodeler (google phoenix commotion)  who thinks well outside the box of a typical building.  So, we're almost to the corner of a glass storefront and thru the corner of the store Beth sees a guy coming the other way who we are about to bump into.  Common usage, all you grammar police.  CU for short.  So, anyway, Beth recognizes him from a utube video before we even meet at the corner and the next thing i know we are deep into a conversation about buildings and vibrations and aliens and frequencies  and he takes us around to meet people and see way cool building projects but his parents showed up coming from church i think and they drove us back to our car and gave us some fine little bananas from the store that we never see in Ohio but are not ripe yet and i made an unfortunate comment about it is good to have your son have a job so that you don't need to send him money and that was an awkward thing to say to our new friend Eric's parent's because Eric had already told us he didn't have a job right now but Eric's mom agreed that you should pray for your son to find the lord but that you should also pray that he find a job while waiting to find the lord and we shouted out Amen to that and then they disappeared.  I had to bring that true account to a close cause Beth said i should keep my posts short.  Now we have to decide if it is worth it and possible to stay in East Texas for a whole week in order to take a proper tour of the houses in Huntsville next Saturday.  I think not, Beth may think not not.  Tristan and his Housemate/landlord may think not. Hey, I got snowboarding to do.

It is Martin Luther King Day.  Why are all roads named after him "boulevards?"  Not that I have a problem with that...   andy 

photos GA & FL

Andy reading at Bald Point, FL.   Campsite at Sopchoppy, FL.  Mark, Bert & Zoey.   Beth running on the trail near Savannah.

These are pics from a sculpture garden called Brookhaven, just south of myrtle beach.