Exodus Afore the Storm

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Midwest and Northeast friends: Heads Up! By noon on Friday, this is what it looked like from the porch and it's probably heading your way. This storm was a little colder and snowier than our last one. I'm burning the wicks low tonight and, just before midnight, it's 13 degrees Fahrenheit outside but a reasonable 63 degrees inside the cozy Rat.
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Today was the big day to finally move the drilling rig out. The trucks started to roll by well before dawn and went without a break until late afternoon. What an amazing and pricey collection of 'stuff'. And I didn't bother to record the scores of pick-up trucks.
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The enlarged versions are 350 to 400K so be advised before you click.

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There were trucks everywhere, including in our front yard and up our new driveway. The furious pace was partially explained when the snow clouds began to loiter threateningly and later unleash their icy spawn.

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And so ends phase one of our entertainment. Of course, I had to finish up the collage with a photo of my favorite big toy, the Cat D8R and then the triumphal exit of the King and Queen thrones. It's quiet out there, beautifully quiet for now..
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Humor (from Ken)

A man wrote a letter to a small hotel in a Midwest town that he planned to visit on his vacation. He wrote: "I would very much like to bring my dog with me. He is well-groomed and very well behaved. Would you be willing to permit me to keep him in my room with me at night?"

An immediate reply came from the hotel owner:

"I've been operating this hotel for many years. In all that time, I've never had a dog steal towels, bedclothes, silverware or pictures off the walls. I've never had to evict a dog in the middle of the night for being drunk and disorderly. And I've never had a dog run out on a hotel bill. Yes, indeed, your dog is welcomed at my hotel. And, if your dog will vouch for you, you're welcomed to stay here, too."
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An Update of Sorts

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My sincere apologies; a good funk takes my desire and abilities to write reasonably well right out the window with it and I do not wish to subject anyone to filler dribble. From what I have sensed in a few blogs so far is that sometimes a blog writer comes under the pressure to produce volume at predictable or demanded intervals. I simply cannot do this, it is the antithesis of why we are out here to begin with; to shed frivolous (to us at least) societal expectations. So please bear with me here over the next few weeks.

First off, I wish to thank my blog friends for their support (and even the occasional loving threat) in their comments on my last entry. Believe it or not, your thoughts have made all the difference and I thank you in the most sincere way possible. It helped immensely and I will let those wonderful comments on the previous post through when I am done with this trudging effort of mine here.

All is fairly quiet here right now. The spirit of Nature has left the new well across the street in an expensive limbo (to the tune of $45K a day for just sitting there). The rig is down and unmanned but the big diesel generators are still running around the clock with only occasional visits to check for a pulse now and then. The roads are horrendous according to all seasoned hands and the BLM is teetering on the brink of closing them down to heavy equipment traffic. Some folks are likening this mess to the onset of conditions a few years ago when the roads were officially closed down for over a month. We are reasonably well-stocked on all fronts and can probably wait it out.

What will take a hit is our new buildings project. Yes, this is a cause for part of my blues since I have been waiting to resurrect my shop and creative life for over two years now. Such a thing may not mean much to most people but it is my worldly passion on hold until even further notice. I have learned an uncharacteristic amount of patience from this but this long-awaited sight of the finish line and then its taunting retreat has been a challenge of late. Mark finally made the hard call to the builders this morning to let them know that delivery out here was all but impossible for the foreseeable future. My solace is that the builder was greatly relieved since another customer had been hounding him furiously to build him something before the year was out. Somehow my personal disappointment was greatly salved by knowing that both the builders and a stranger out there somewhere would both be much happier as a result of our misfortune.

The new Honda 3000EU generator died suddenly yesterday. Thankfully, we had the older one ready to hook-up. Mark took a look at the dead one today and, as I had suspected, it had simply developed a carbon bridge in the spark plug. The rejetting downwards of the main jet seems to be holding since the plug color was still a reasonable light brownish shade (presuming that you can still partially trust a color read from modern lead-free fuels). We didn't want to run the old one longer than necessary since we haven't rejetted it yet. While the procedure is not an end-of-the-world event, it is still irritating enough that I don't care to deal with it in this weather unless all else fails. Yep, you know THAT will happen soon enough.

Hondo, another of our favorite gas field regulars, dropped by today. His infrequent visits are always a welcome break in our day and I can't help but think that our Virgil was somehow responsible for his stop since he knew I was in this deep funk. I will write more about Hondo down the line since he is another delightful character out here worth noting.

This funk can't last forever, especially knowing that you are with me and pushing me uphill. Thank you all, I love ya.

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Humor of the day

(at least I can share some humor that has been kindly coming my way lately) this one from my Katlady:


WHITE LIE CAKE

Have you ever told a white lie? You are going to love this, especially all of those who bake for church events.

Alice Grayson was to bake a cake for the Baptist Church Ladies' Group in Tuscaloosa but forgot to do it until the last minute. She remembered the morning of the bake sale and after rummaging through cabinets, found an angel food cake mix and quickly made it while drying her hair, dressing and helping her son pack for Scout camp. When Alice took the cake from the oven, the center had dropped flat and the cake was horribly disfigured. She thought, "Oh dear, there's no time to bake another cake."

This cake was important to Alice because she did so want to fit in at her new church and in her new community of friends. So, being inventive, she looked around the house for something to build up the center of the cake. Alice found it in the bathroom - a roll of toilet paper. She plunked it in and covered it with icing. Not only did the finished product look beautiful, it looked perfect. Before she left the house to drop the cake by the church and head for work, Alice woke her daughter Amanda and gave her some money and specific instructions to be at the bake sale the moment it opened at 9:30 and to buy the cake and bring it home.

When Amanda arrived at the sale, she found the beautiful, perfect cake had already been sold. She grabbed her cell phone and called her mom. Alice was horrified - she was beside herself. Everyone would know! What would they think? She would be ostracized, talked about and ridiculed! All night, Alice lay awake in bed thinking about people pointing fingers at her and talking about her behind her back.

The next day, Alice promised herself she would try not to think about the cake and would attend the fancy luncheon/bridal shower at the home of a fellow church member and try to have a good time. Alice did not want to attend because the hostess was a snob who more than once had looked down her nose at Alice because she was not from the founding families of Tuscaloosa. But, having already RSVP'd, she couldn't think of a believable excuse to stay home.

The meal was elegant, the company was definitely upper crust old South and, to Alice 's horror, the cake in question was presented for dessert! Alice felt the blood drain from her body when she saw the cake. She started out of her chair to tell the hostess all about it, but before she could get to her feet, the Mayor's wife said, "What a beautiful cake!"

Alice, still stunned, sat back in her chair when she heard the hostess say, "Thank you, I baked it myself."

Alice smiled and thought to herself, "God is good."
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Parting Shots

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Here are photos of a group of petroglyphs that we viewed on a neighbor's place the day we took Red for a tour of the ranch. They were clustered within a range of maybe 400 feet.
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I have taken the carved area from the photos above and below and tried to enhance the figures but I wanted you to see the broader settings in which they were found. It gives you an idea of how worn and subtle they can appear as you search for them. You can drive by some of these tens of times and not notice them. After a while, you begin to recognize the tints of rocks which encouraged etching but you must still alight from the truck and examine the rocks more closely. Even then, some are so faded that only the right shadows from the sunlight will reveal them.
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Now it's your turn to discern the images on your own. You will have to click on these to see the details but I have reduced them all to under 160K to speed up your download time .
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I saved my favorite for last (see below). You will clearly see a couple etchings of Kokopelli, a snake handler, dancers and much, much more if you look closely.
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This is your big Christmas finale from me. I really am not sure if I will be posting anything from now until 2008 since I am slipping into my holiday depression earlier than normal. It occurred to me this year that this blog is of interest or help to so few people that I might discontinue writing it all together. This is obviously not the time to make any permanent decision on the matter so I will simply withdraw until this season of many, many sad and unpleasant memories passes. Who knows, I might pop up with something in the interim but don't be surprised if that doesn't happen either. I thank all my regular supporters/buds and hope that you still find great enjoyment in this coming holiday season. Again, don't feel obliged to post a comment since I may or may not reply as I have in the past and I may not be making the rounds of my usual favorite blogs as much. Hey, I will shake it off by mid-January at the latest so not to worry.
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Ready, Aim ... Duck

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Yes, I know, I'm throwing everyone off with a post so soon after the last one. Thing is, I heard Mark laughing as we checked our e-mails and I had to investigate. He had been watching a video clip of a guy "Watch this" moment which I couldn't resist posting right now while I am still chuckling. It made my morning.

This all ties in with the plinking fest which occurred when Red and Sally were here. I think I probably never got around to elaborating on why there was such a disincentive to hitting the bullseye in the homemade target that Mark had set up just before their arrival.
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Here is the infamous impromptu range target. This happened to be the top off an old 55 gallon oil drum which Mark found in the junk pile across the road. If you look closely, it has a very nice and heavy cast iron plug in the center. Being older and wiser than most, they all decided that hitting this plug square-on was a sure invitation to our ol' Irish friend, Rick O'Shea, to come visit. He was a welcome walk-in to every old Western movie but just not someone we wanted to deal with.

Now go see "We're not doing THAT again". It's classic guy stuff at its best and it will explain a lot without any need for further in depth analysis on my part. Okay, so maybe the caliber they were using wasn't quite .50BMG but the principle is the same.

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The Rigs Up, Pal

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Less wordy, mo' piccy today.
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This dawn sky above greeted us this morning in a heartening way. Hopefully the next storm will hold off until Mark returns from today's big supply run after three weeks of waiting out the weather, construction and bad road conditions.
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Mark had reminded me to catch a photo of the rig from the first mesa bench. I brought the cats along since it was only going to be a short hike up there and back. They had been very miffed at their confinement during the heavy construction traffic. The dogs joined us and it soon became apparent that all parties were up to a much longer hike than I had planned. I should have known.
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We headed east along the first bench as usual and Dave found this amazing sandstone boulder. As old as the sandstone is, this one appears to be encasing even older rocks. These black rocks appealed to my imagination and reminded me of huge Anasazi pots. Dave is giving us his best vicious wildcat look.
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Beyond the second spring, the dogs found a new deer trail heading up to the second bench and it looked more knee friendly than our other trails so we all followed it upwards. The photo above shows Ming on the right, investigating these new rock formations and the high view.
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Here is the rig, a small town unto itself in the mud. While it hadn't rained in a few days, there were no winds or beaming sun to dry anything out.
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Oops! As I just said, the mud was still alive and well and helped this very large rig slide off into the ditch as he left the well site. All traffic came to a stop for a couple of hours until its companion rig with tire chains returned to drag him back to the main road. You can see the condition of the access road (the white patches are ruts full of standing water).

And to think that Mark is now still out there after dusk without chains after so many monsters like these have chain-gouged ruts in the road today nearly as deep as their tall axles.
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Here is the drilling rig right after the first heavy rainfall. The rainbow had an easy guess this time as to where the pot of gold lay. I missed the perfect shot due to camera problems AGAIN but the rainbow's base had been clearly resting at the foot of the rig just moments before.
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Next up: What it was like living with a drilling rig next door 24/7 and a report on if it really will leave at o:dark early tomorrow morning. We won't have to set any alarms for this event. Don't get too excited for us yet - we've heard that the next stage could be a wee bit more obnoxious.

Update: 7:00PM - Mark made it back home. It was warm enough that the mud did not freeze last night so he couldn't travel out "on the frost" this morning but he made it into town without too much misery. He noticed that our five mile road was by far the worst of any out here. He was not at all happy about the greatly deteriorated conditions he met this evening, despite gas field talk yesterday about grading the road today in preparation for the rig move. I guess they say what you hope to hear but do what they darned well please in the end. Unfortunately, it looks like another frost free night and it will be too dark for me to take photos of the rig getting stuck later. Oh, and those round-the-clock back-up beepers are starting to give me a serious migraine attitude.
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For All You Do, This Mud's For You

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Our invasion took a pleasant turn when Slim showed up last Wednesday. I swear, his company could take the horror out of a nuclear winter. I started one of my long simmer spaghetti sauces that morning and we gorged ourselves silly on that and the French bread he picked up before heading into the canyon. He's very good about calling ahead to see if we might need something. As usual, we kept that dear cowboy up far later than he is used to and he headed out late the next morning to do his pasture planning for the coming winter graze and some needed maintenance around his headquarters 'up top'. He came back the next evening and I had marinated and slow-roasted a big chuck roast from his own private beef supply. His reaction was absolutely worth all that fussing around the oven all day. Again we stayed up way too late but you make the most of good company when it shows up here in the boonies.
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It was probably a good thing that we had mentioned Brou's new profound talent with flatulence since Brou decided to bunk in with him in the guest room. You could have predicted Slim's exclamation in the morning; "Well, you weren't kidding about that fartin' hound, were you? I woke up in the middle of the night thinkin' that a couple of your batteries had blown up or something. I mean the hairs in my nose were burning, know what I'm saying? Gawdamighty, it was THAT bad! I almost booted his butt right out the front door right then and there!" I have to admit that we fell asleep at night chuckling about it and glad that Brou had given us those aromatic evenings off for a change.
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We all woke up to the sound of heavy rains hitting the Rat's steel roof. Mark had the coffee on early and we all lounged around over steaming cups before Slim wisely headed back up to his place. Knowing these roads as we do, we were concerned that he had several options for getting stuck in that slick, thick clay mud. He was very good about letting me know when he was eventually back on pavement (I take after my mother when it comes to pacing and worrying).
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The next day brought even more rain and we saw the roads turn to a clinging, viscous slurry. We didn't have to go anywhere so we just sat back and watched the mud bog show. Semis were still coming in and, towards the end, a few of them slid off the road rink and rode the deep bar ditch at an alarming 45 degree angle with their top-heavy loads until the wheels hunted themselves back out. They must have been butt-puckering themselves senseless during that whole process. The truck above (look to the immediate right of the semi cab exhaust stack) fell prey to those inverse railroad tracks into the muck. It was a while before the rescue came in the form of a 'SKYTRAK' which also fish-tailed precariously down the road. The semi cab just happened to be following along close behind. These 'SKYTRAK' type machines are definitely a very versatile little machine and very much fun to watch under skilled operation. You can also see them at work in the photos below.
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Yesterday's entertainment was some poor sod trying to deliver a replacement SKYTRAK. He got stuck BIG TIME in the site access road. The irony was that the replacement unit on the trailer and the existing unit had to both come to the semi's aid, several times. There was a point when the semi made it all the way down to the intersection of the access road and main road (third segment of photo above) before getting mired again and I will admit that I almost hoped that it would stay there, blocking all further ingress and egress. Shame on me ... well, perhaps, kind of, sort of.

By the time the precipitation had stopped on Sunday, our gauge had registered over an inch of rain and we got to see the ongoing mud drags as the ruts got deeper, the fish-tailing more frantic and the plumes of mud getting higher and higher. It helped our viewing pleasure to know that a couple of trucks worth of rig people had blown by one of our regular field guys while he was mired in the creek crossing that they had messed up. This despite his attempts to wave them down. You don't cross 'our boys', period. The downside? We have to get into town soon for a number of overdue reasons, including bringing our supply of windows and antique doors into the people who are constructing our two new buildings. In the meantime, it sure was great to watch God and Nature administer a little poetic justice.
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I Love a Parade!

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I'm not kidding, this was a parade of the first order and it all took place in one working day. We now have a fair idea of what it would be like to be invaded by an army division when it decides to go visiting, at least as far as tonnage.

Apparently real guys have to have serious 'stuff' around and these fellows knew how to drag it all with them. You will have to click on the photos to see any sort of detail but I have kept each file size under 120K for all you slow downloaders like us.
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First came this Mad Max arrangement in the upper left corner and then a never-ending onslaught of semis with strange cargo. At this point, I was at a loss to figure out what most of it would be used for.
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I did recognize the trailer in the upper left as their command central and the truck in the lower right as the garbage hauler though. Some of these tilted loads were rearranged at the well site immediately to our west and dragged in to the new site at these most curious angles, perhaps due to the cramped nature of the new well pad by that time.

But still no rig. We found ourselves expectantly waiting and ever peeking out the windows as though we might miss the arrival of the Queen if we relaxed our guard. The suspense was killing us but no drilling rig was in sight yet, just more and more STUFF.
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The view of the parade in the upper right hand corner tipped me off that the rig was not far behind. See that flat-bed pick up in the center? It is carrying two portable outhouses. If I have learned anything about the gas field, it is that they are not serious about anything until the two gender-separate johns arrive. I squealed when I saw this one as though it was the advance color guard. "Look, look, the plastic johns are here! The rig can't be far behind!" Sure enough, you will see the rig at the head of the parade in the lower left corner above.

Believe it or not, I have only captured images of maybe 50% of the parade thanks to my ongoing camera and battery wars.

Next up, I will be posting on the rig in place at the end of that long day and report on the most amusing turn of weather out here (hint - ya like mud-sports, do ya?). I will post that installment either late Monday or Tuesday night and then we can get back to our regular off-the-grid tales for the next two weeks.
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Twenty Four Little Hours

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If this computer obliges and limps along with me a little while longer, I will be updating the well construction notes every other day until I catch up. The majority of activity took place in barely 12 hours. If you have ever been amazed by a trail of determined and organized ants on a mission, you will be equally impressed by this process.

I missed the chance to photograph the next step after the bulldozing and grading of the construction site which was the placement of a liner in the very large reserve pit and the construction of a fence around the perimeter. My camera let me down again.
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Then the tanks arrived one by one (first segment above) followed by a steady procession of tankers to fill them up with what is either water or chemicals or perhaps both.
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The next major items to arrive were the rig stairs and the mats aboard a flat bed as seen in the top two segments of the photo above. These mats will provide a more stable base for the rig and work area. Bottom segment of this photo: This is the part I enjoyed. On the far right side, you will see an articulated Volvo loader. He was required to unload the stacked mats and then take them in bundles of three to place down in front of a foot crew of roughly five men waiting to put them into place manually. Even from our distance, it was a joy to watch this operator move his machine so fast, so accurately and so deftly. He would take the mats and shake the dirt and snow off them, jockey into position, set them down and be off for the next set in one fluid motion, his machine bending nearly in half to accommodate his wishes. I was completely captivated and unable to miss a moment of this stunning machine ballet.

Don't feel obliged to comment - I'll be back by late Sunday night with more photos if the computer and camera hold up!
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Paradise Lost

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So the history hunter and I finished our exploration of the canyon inlet and joined the survey team. Their task had not been as fruitful and it became obvious that the proposed site was not practical. In the midst of the proposed new well pad, there was a 20' deep arroyo which became quite violent and unpredictable when the rains come.

A week later, I stepped out to the end of the porch to observe my favorite view across to the far mesa. It was not without great upset that I now saw an expanse of fluttering markers. For me, the impact was as disturbing as the sea of white crosses at Flanders Field, standing so discordantly against nature's backdrop. Their new location was obviously going to be 'in our faces'. Since this is part of the land which we lease for grazing, we would have no input on the matter. All we could do was wait and hope for the least impact possible. I can't say that their activity on our private land is going to be any more magnanimous yet.
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Late last week saw the first activity at their new well site. The big D8R was the first to invade. What amazed me was that it first simply ran rough-shod over the entire area without use of the blade, trampling down anything in its path. It returned later to start leveling out the pad and forming large banks of dirt. It seemed outrageous and offensive that such a large area of history be disturbed but I will show the reasons later.
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In this photo taken from the first mesa bench up, you can see the final area that they claimed. This report is truly a challenge for me in that I love to watch the big toys at work and, at the same time, hate to see it make such a deep and permanent cut into this wilderness. This photo also shows the proximity of our new and uninvited guests for the next month. Given our recent dealings with the big gas player out here, I can only presume that this is their little Christmas present for us.

On the other hand, as I alluded, this is a fascinating process and I will bring you along on the rudimentary aspects of making of a new gas well from our observation deck. LOTS of big toys and guy stuff to follow.
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Hiking with the History Man

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Retrospect: Late Summer 2007

I looked out the large Rat window late morning and saw several pick-up trucks lined up on the road leading out of our canyon. That's an unusual sight and I decided to go investigate. My hunch was right; it was the gas field doing more poking around for potential new gas well sites. Better still, as I had hoped, they brought along a professional archaeologist as part of their team.

I always had a love for archaeology as a very small child and he kindly let me follow along. I promised that I would not interfere in his efficient survey strides and complied, for the most part. In the mean time, the rest of the team had set out with survey equipment to overlay the ideas of some engineer back in the office over the reality of this terrain. Along the way, the history hunter showed me a pit house dating back to the 9th century. I hope my disappointment didn't insult him TOO badly as I looked down and mentally glazed over. "Uhm, right here you say? Really?" I stared down at the ground trying my best to see a vanished people's history. What I saw was just another patch of ground just like any other in this vast wilderness except for a few anomalous rocks and a pottery shard or two. I began to realize that my childhood passions lay in discovering recognizable feats of man, cavernous repositories of megalithic statues and other incredible feats of art and craftsmanship. Somehow, this vague hint of man's presence just didn't fulfill my expectations.
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This is the first area we covered and where I found this very unusual patch of cactus growing in a tight cluster. I am now relying on my cactus-savvy readers to identify this species. This colony of very spiky plants stood quite low, no more than shin-high at best, but so tightly grouped that the surrounding thick grass had no opportunity to invade it. This plant was still rich with unshed yellow fruits, even though this photo was taken much later (just last week). The arms were not spatulate like a prickly pear but rather long and slender and very much restrained to within its low group profile.

Here is a close-up of the cactus cluster.

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He plodded on through the tall sage and I eventually got distracted by my current passion; desert plants. He was likely grateful that he had lost his ersatz student to the colorful blooms beckoning away from his grid. I would occasionally look up and head in his general direction but eventually found myself utterly distracted by the flora and well beyond his survey area. It was a gaggle (or whatever a plural of these is called) of military helicopters tightly hugging the terrain which caught my attention and made me realize that I had wondered too far into the inlet by myself. I back-tracked quickly and rejoined the history man on a roadward leg of his mission. About five minutes later, after we had separated again, I heard the familiar unfettered roar of a military plane and looked up. I ran down the separating hill towards the history hunter, yelling excitedly as I went "Is that a BUF? Oh yes, yes, LOOK, it's a BUF! It's a BUF!! " It then occurred to me that he might not have a clue what a BUF is. He dutifully looked up just as a low flying B52 crossed over his head and climbed up to clear the mesa in front of him. As it turned out, he had grown up in Texas near the development area of the B52 and shared some of his recollections of the plane with me. All in all, it was a rather fabulous way to spend an impromptu romp in the sage.

I only wish that I had brought the camera along. Within one of the shallow caverns created by the immense boulders, we had discovered a slab with the deeply etched inscription "Greer" on it plus an indecipherable date of possibly '08'. I was determined to find it again last week to show you. I looked. And I looked. Nothing. That is the amazing thing about this part of the world; you can see something once and probably never find it again despite your best efforts to remember the locale as you leave it behind. So many of the treasure tales I hear are about people who found something once and meant to return to investigate it further. And some have been trying to do so for over 30 years since.
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I looked though acres of rock formations for that inscription last week with Brou and Daisy's help, all to no avail. The consolation was being able to admire the bizarre rock formations left behind by Mother Nature. The photo above shows some of nature's curious carving work. Erosion had left but one tall column to support this precariously balanced massive rock roof.
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. In this photo is another boulder of harder material left on a pedestal of softer sandstone, all perched atop the massive boulder occupying the majority of the photo. If you enjoy geology, this is a continual trove of awe.

I never did return home with the photos I wanted but I eventually will, even if it takes me a few decades to find the spot again.

This is all leading somewhere, unfortunately.
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First Snow - We Got It All Right

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We had plenty of advanced warning all right. Red e-mailed and asked us what we thought of the snow storm warning - ??? Well, it hit. Prior to this morning, we had one odd afternoon several weeks ago where snowflakes fell lightly in a half-hearted manner and died before hitting the ground.

Last night brought the first of this year's real snow, followed by many low and long murmurs of rolling thunder. We are still not used to snow being chaperoned by thunder but it seems common place out here. I was already in bed and counted patiently to 50 last night before the first long growl of rolling thunder ceased.
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This morning, we awoke to the scene above, well not quite. We awoke to a pristine mantle of snow but by the time I got the camera out fifteen minutes later, Brou and Daisy had already embossed the landscape irrevocably once they remembered that this white stuff was delightful. Daisy was the least inclined to try it and this probably hearkened back to her previous life of solo confinement outside. When Mark tried to get her to join Brou, she politely declined, turned tail immediately and went back to her bed. After some coaxing, she finally discovered the joys of running free in the snow with Brou and cavorting in their usual summer-long manner. It feels wonderful to see her slowly shedding some of her over-shadowing memories.
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The above photo was taken around lunch time. The clouds had become sparse and a generous amount of clear blue sky was reigning above them but the clouds were moving in noticeably fast fashion - you didn't have to find a fixed point and wait patiently to discern which direction they were moving today.
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Barely ten minutes later, I snapped this photo. Any hint of the blue sky had disappeared. The far juts of mesas were rapidly disappearing and the snow began to fall lavishly once more. Nature was not done with her venting by any means. By the time it was all done, we had picked up about four inches of snow.
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About an hour later, I took this photo. Sporadic patches of blue skies had returned and we sensed that the heaviest assault had passed. The temperatures climbed a little, enough for the accumulated snow to start melting and running off the roof of the Rat in a frequent and steady "tap, tap, tap". Not a single vehicle passed by to disturb the wide, white band of snow which had been the road just yesterday. This whiteness without blemish and the silence was a heady elixir of pure peacefulness.

Tonight it's going to be a few tasty chicken club sandwiches on broiler-toasted French bread with real live French fries after my Thanksgiving folly. That's the thing about living out here without the never-ending onslaught of media hype; I thought that TG was still at least a week or more away and didn't put a turkey down on last week's shopping list. We certainly had stuffing out the wazoo though. If you are going to live this far out and have so few supply runs, you need to plan efficiently for them. Well, we are obviously still working on that aspect. Don't want to hear any smug snickering either - try a supply run only twice a month with absolutely NO little cheat stops at the local quick mart - I would dare you to try it in fact. It might tell you things about yourself that you didn't know or care to acknowledge.
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Stove Top Stuffing Doctored Up

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There, you happy now with that title, Google? I got the biggest kick out of Buck over at Exile in Portales taking offense at some of the word searches that had Google directing people to his site. So how boring is my blog that I usually only get hit up to explain what happens when the creek 'do' rise up and for doctored up Stove Top Stuffing anyway? I mean I'm thinking that I should be a little incensed some how, like a flare or two of the nostrils and a good indignant snort might be in order here.

So, with Thanksgiving coming up for the hopelessly culinary inept like myself, by George, I will now share my own hapless approach to turkey stuffing (you never get complaints from the recently dearly departed - remember this always):

Yep, buy a box of Stove Top because it gives you some vague idea of what to start with and how long to cook it. Like everything else, I usually don't read the destructions until something starts to smell like burning cow paddies but I suggest that you do if you are not a seasoned blunderer like myself. Hey, I usually don't have these problems with mechanical situations, okay?

.Turkey petroglyph

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Anyway, Stove Top Stuffing is pretty much some itty-bitty morsels of dried bread with some herbs, spices, dried veggies and poultry bouillon powder thrown together. So ... I take some leftover pumpernickel and other breads which have been around far too long and let them dry in my gas oven with the pilot light. Forget them for a couple of days; who cares (as long as you don't forget and preheat the oven for something else like a 400 degree pizza). Been there - don't do it. If you don't have an oven with a pilot light, dry these pieces on a VERY low oven setting or place them out of reach of the cats to air dry; maybe on the top of the fridge (if you have gimpy or ancient, arthritic cats). For owner's of young and vigorous cats, take a 35' ladder (readily available by rental if you don't have one) and place the bread pieces on a pan on any sunny part of your roof from where you have never had to rescue your cats. If you have raccoons in the neighborhood, that's a whole other story. I don't.

While eternity is taking its sweet time drying out the bread, take a nice big pot, add some water, maybe a dash of white dry vermouth or whatever else is clear and taking up needed cupboard space, lob in a couple of bouillon cubes, throw in that impossible to open packet of 'seasoning' stuff that comes with the Stove Top and place on a simmer heat setting and cover. If you get the burning possum smell, you have forgotten to add more water as the whole mess steeps and matures divinely because you picked up a magazine or went on-line and got pleasantly side-tracked. Or maybe you just got all too involved with the rest of that white vermouth or whatever else was taking up far too much space in your cupboard.

BEFORE you are distracted by this aroma of something beyond burning carrion, take one onion and dice it up into dainty pieces (none of this crude proletariat chunking, please, it's a holiday after all) . Abuse at least three celery stalks in the same fashion. Now take some walnuts and whack the snot out of them with the same chopping knife. You can substitute some mostly cooked wild rice but the stuff is price-e-e-y! If you can handle the budget abuse, you can add both - being a special event and all, I won't judge you on this shameful lavishness. It's a mystery melange on a good day so go for it if you feel embarrassingly flush. After the bouillon pot has been simmering along for a while, toss in those aforementioned veggies. Throw in several chunks of REAL butter (NO cheap petroleum by-products for this event, please), a little dried parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme (and remember me to the one who lives there), maybe some caraway or celery seed, pepper, a speck of garlic powder or whatever else blows your dress up at the moment (as long as you can read the spice labels clearly). I cannot stress the importance of that last disclaimer enough.

Now try to remember where you stashed your dried bread morsels. If you are over 50 or in the Boomer category at all, this step might take a while. If nothing animate has moved in with the dried bread, take the whole works and dump it into the pot of previous ingredients along with the mystery bread from the Stove Top box and bash it around furiously with a spoon before any one particular bit of bread becomes too saturated. There! Are you good or what?! Take this whole indiscernible mess and either stuff it or lay it out in a suitable pan for baking.

As always, let your olfactory senses be your guide. Bon appetit!
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Wish Lists and Daydreams ...

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Okay, I admit it, I am wandering away from the journal for the moment. We found a phone message today from Slim (our favorite cowboy and grazing tenant) that he is heading this way from Colorado tomorrow and will bunk in with us. TWO visitors in the same month?! Yeowee! He'll flip when he sees that he gets a real bed this time instead of an old canvas army cot. In the meantime, the clean-up and food planning thoughts along with some symptoms of a possible cold/flu ailment coming on have thrown me off track with the blog so I am posting some terrible scans of old pen and inks that I had done quite some time ago. I came across them tonight while looking for something else.

I have been looking at these mesas lately with a growing desire to consign them to black on white paper someday. Goddess' comment about her things to do "Before I die" list has stirred up these inclinations. I remember my mother mentioning her wish that I would take up the pen and brush again. This was just a day before she died unexpectedly and so her comment bore a very permanent weight to it.

I had worked from my own photographs propped on my cherry and butternut art table back then since I always felt too conspicuous and too shy to ever sketch and ink on site. Now even that art table is gone for good after this last move. It had survived my many relocations for almost 30 years. I wish I could rant and vent some angst here but I won't.
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You should see FOUR drawings. If you don't, hit "Reload" or "Refresh". It's just the usual Blogger quirks.
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This was a photo taken near the Thames. A group of schoolboys in kilts heading home in the afternoon. What stuck me so deeply was the cheerful man trying very hard to console a young boy about something which had brought him to sobbing tears. What? I will always wonder. c.'77
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Of course I had to capture the defiant Boudica in her chariot below Big Ben. c.'77
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The portrait of an old New England barn for a neighbor's friend. c.'80
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Despite my eyes already starting to fail, I was able to provide another building portrait 20 years later. This was my last pen and ink. c.'97

Will my eyes still allow me to take up the tiny pen again? I don't know but it's high on my "Before I die" wish list. In the meantime, we will have a year or two of work left on this homestead which will eventually include a place for me to work on what I enjoy once more.
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It Sure is Dark in Here

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One thing we all take for granted: a reliable source of light.
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Fortunately, I rarely have to get up in the blackness of night for a nature call. This morning was not one of those fortunate times. I woke up to the call and tried desperately to ignore it, to roll back over and resume my zzzzzs. It was Not to be denied, however, and I knew that any delay could cause dire consequences - something far worse to deal with in half light. I leapt out of bed, grabbed the flashlight off the nightstand on my side and clicked it on. It emitted a meager yellow haze for a second and then dimmed completely out. Lovely ... there was no time left to stumble around for Mark's lantern by now. But that was okay, I would rely on my excellent memory and my cat-like ability to wander around in the dark. I was computing all this on the move in the dark with an increasingly more desperate mission at the forefront. It was about that time that I tripped over a box of burn trash in the hall which I swore was not there when I retired to bed. And it was about that time that I realized in my sleep-groggy state that my cat-like senses had guided me into the storage room and that there was little chance of relief in there.
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On high alert by now, I frantically bashed my way through a maze of pinball flippers which are normally boxes, walls and doors in daylight. Oh God, please let this be the right door and NOT the one to the pantry because I don't have time to back track by now! Yes, yes, these walls all feel familiar in a good way! Now if only I can find the loo (which is the repository for liquids only, really no more than a five gallon plastic bucket with a molded seat-type lid). It wasn't where I expected but I found it accidentally with the back of my heel while I was flailing around blindly in the wrong place with my hands. Close enough! I am now beyond desperate! Luckily I guessed the right position of the loo and was able to flip the lid up, drop my britches and sink down to the seat below creaky knee level. That's how you spell relief - a true disaster diverted. And a great, satisfying sense of victory washed over me there in the dark. Life was not only good but stellar at that moment.
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I'll admit it, I sat there enjoying this sense of victory over darkness for far longer than was necessary to simply finish the initial mission. Out here, you tend to seize upon such moments when they present themselves and savor them fully. But the night's chill began to dissolve my reverie and it was time to move on. As the old British shop manuals were infamously wont to say "Assembly is the reverse of disassembly" and I began the process. It was into about step 2 or 3 when I realized that I had missed part of the disassembly process in my frantic rush. The cold, wet sensation on my backside made me realize that my drawers had not adequately cleared the area of operation. The previous fleeting moments of victory vanished as though they had never existed.
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By now, every other living creature in the Rat was awake and listening to my laments. A sleepy offer from Mark to use his lantern was not exactly a salve at that point. Yours truly, the adrenaline-filled human pinball, made the reverse trek back down the hall to the bedroom. I fumbled around in what was hopefully the right dresser drawers to find a dry replacement for my folly. Mark finally roused enough to fumble around and click on his lantern. In this sudden burst of real light, I saw many pairs of glowing eyes nervously watching my every move and I asked that the stage lights be extinguished to preserve some minor part of my remaining dignity, thank you.
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As I dropped back into bed and the night's misery concluded itself, my eyes snapped open again as I became aware of a cinching tightness around my lower torso. In this last dance in the dark, I had somehow managed to put my underpants on askew with one leg hole now tightly around my waist. S-I-G-H! I then heard one of the cats deftly, merrily and noisily using their litter box in the Rat's pitch black as if to thumb his nose at this irritated mere mortal.
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While you have it, don't ever, EVER cease to appreciate light on demand 24/7, I'm just tellin' ya, okay?
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Humor of the Day (from Ken):
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One day my wife and I were discussing anger management. I asked her, "When I get mad at you, you never fight back. How do you control your anger?"

She said, "I clean the toilet bowl."

I asked, "How does that help?"

She said, "I use your toothbrush."
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Brou and the Stink Bug

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One thing I really enjoy about having young animals around is sharing in their insatiable curiosity about everything that moves, unless it is something dangerous like a rattlesnake, of course. Brou came to us as a puppy and I followed him on his new life discoveries with great amusement. This post is really for Goddess who loves dogs and had also asked if we had strange bugs out here . This is a tale about both.
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Say hello to Mr. Stink Bug. He is a common sight around the Rat and pretty benign ... if you don't annoy him. He's a comical soul, bumbling along on whatever mission he has chosen for the day. This stance is his defensive posture which he is willing to assume at the slightest disturbance. He stands on his head and positions the tip of his abdomen upwards, ready to emit a stream of obnoxious scent. Once the threat has passed, he continues on his merry way, usually without any dire measures taken. Add a curious young pup and you have quite another story.
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Here he is from a side view. You can now see how he tripods himself into firing position with his rear legs and head.
.Now add the curious Brou. He was fascinated by the bug's awkward waddling movement and took a flying coyote pounce at him, knocking him over in mid stride. The stink bug uprighted himself immediately and let loose a flatulent burst most vile to a young dog's nose.
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If I have ever seen Brou truly offended, it was at that moment and he learned the consequences of his rough puppy socializing with such bugs forever. But not to be dissuaded, he leaped back to a safe distance to avoid another olfactory blast and to rethink the next attack.
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The stink bug repositioned himself for another round and Brou obliged, still outraged by the initial blast and heading in for revenge, teeth bared.
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He administered another flying coyote stomp which fully buried the stink bug for the moment. "There! How dare you try THAT again, infidel!!!" The bug finally dug himself out of the sand and continued on his way long after the young Brou had lost interest in pursuit of the next new thrill.
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Another geeko test

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Please bear with me again. I want to see if Blogger has improved and will now accommodate animated .gif files. A while back, I had spent quite a fews hours making the animation A Thank You from Brou only to find that, within a few weeks, it would no longer play on the main page and that you had to click on the image for it to play on another screen.

So here is an eye-teaser sent to me by Alphonse Da Moose. I happen to love eye and brain teasers and I think you will enjoy this one as well. I even examined it frame by frame in an animation program to make sure that it was genuine.

Read the instructions and the commentary on what you willing be 'seeing' and then click on the image if it doesn't function on this page.
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If your eyes follow the movement of the rotating pink dot, the dots will remain only one color, pink.

However if you stare at the black " + " in the center, the moving dot turns to green.

Now, concentrate on the black " + " in the center of the picture. After a short period, all the pink dots will slowly disappear, and you will only see only a single rotating green dot.

It's amazing how our brain works. There really is no green dot, and the pink ones really don't disappear. This is proof that we don't always see what we think we see.
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Hiking Ms. Daisy

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Here is the conclusion to Just Daisy and Me Hiking where I discovered the Spanish rock inscriptions. I figured that you wouldn't mind less talk and more photos for a change. This is as much to let you know that we haven't fallen into a bottomless sinkhole yet. We're just both running tired with the growing 'To Do' list before the REALLY cold weather sets in. We have been enjoying high 60s daytime temps and balmy overnight temps of high 20s and low 30s i.e. no further pipe freeze-ups (touch wood!). Great sleeping weather with just the pilot lights burning on two of the propane wall heaters for the most part. The extra Rat insulation is paying off nicely.

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These cacti are the first of their kind which I have come across here. Don't ask me what they are (Belle - any ideas?) but I have noticed that so many desert plants out here may only grow in one small area. This is why I was so upset with the new well location up top when they failed to give us notice and time to survey and salvage any unique plant specimens per our agreement. I'd rather take a chance on transplanting them than having them dozed under with absolutely no chance of survival.
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Here is another view of the creek. Hard to believe that a creek which spends most of its time sleeping in this deep, dry state can inflict such damage when it awakes.
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At one point, the sandstone wall rises dramatically straight upwards to the first bench. For one exhilarating moment, I thought I had found the eerie of an eagle. Follow the yellow arrow and notice the accumulation of white bird dropping just below a dark hole (you might have to click to enlarge to follow this). The crow who showed up and circled above it quite vocally told me that it was probably his nest though.
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Here is a view of Rat City from our hike. It gives you a better idea of the scale of the mesa behind us. Compare this view to the view in The Rock of Damocles. The rock is resting at the very top of that mesa.
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Above is the last inscription treasure that we found that day. This one had survived the weather better by its location under the shelter of the much larger rock shown in the initial account. There were some fainter, intriguing inscriptions above it to the right but the shadow hides them completely. Wait 'til you see the petroglyphs we discovered yesterday though! Woo-hah!
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