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Big Pimpin in Mormon land

How much do you like your boss? Would you live with him? And work with him? All in the same day? Basically, this is the next two weeks of my life; chillin with the boss man 24/7. I hope I don't go insane. But it is probably going to be hard to go insane living an a castle! UAP got us a house just outside Zion NP that is a palace really. I am watching TV in front of the biggest non-theater screen I have ever seen. My bed has 11 pillows for god sakes! If that isn't a sign of luxury, I dont know what is. I'll put more pictures up soon, because Colleen, I know this house is pretty much your dream house.

Oh, and if you haven't already, I highly recommend statcounter. It lets you see all sorts of cool stuff about who is looking at your blog. I got over 30 hits on Tuesday fyi, with a number of them coming from New Zealand (Jake's friends I assume). Just random little factoids like that. And it is easier to put onto your blog now that the template function in blogger has been streamlined.

Photos from Nowhere, NM

Road Trippin












Apparently this is the place to be if you are a buzzard. There were a hundred or so.
















Here is what I get to watch all day. Kinda fun! I turned down the chance to ride in the hopper on the plane though.



These guys just roamed free around the airport.









Old style windmills are still very commonly used across the landscape.





We had to use a county road as a landing strip for a few days.

Hot New Mexico Nights

Dude, NM seriously sucks. I am going insane. There is no one to socialize with except for 8 smelly alcoholics who I work with on this project. Sorry guys, I really dont want to go to the secret society sausage fest that is the "Moose Lodge" (apparently some member only fraternal org). So, I sit here and bitch. I can't wait to get back to OR. First thing I am going to do is go on a several day climbing adventure (weather permitting) and hike in the oh so glorious trees. The weird thing about NM is that if there is a tree around, chances are it was planted by a human. Trees just dont grow here. How depressing for someone who majored in forestry. I just dont fit in here. 24 more hours and then at least I'll be in Zion NP where trees do grow.
Oh yea, last thing I have to do for this project is Monday I am meeting with a General in the US Army at white sands missile range. The pilots have to fly over the range for several of the BLM units and we have to go talk him into giving us permission. I dont think I have ever met a general before. How cool. NM still sucks. Maybe not Taos tho.

Espionage

Today, Colleen bought her wedding dress. And I know that it is customary that the groom doesn’t see the bride in the gown until wedding day, but you know me. I gotta see it. I have been plotting for weeks on how to get a peek at the dress, and I have been very forthcoming to Colleen about my desires to glimpse the dress. But I hadn’t yet figured out a way. Tailing her to the dress fitting shops wouldn’t work because they certainly wouldn’t let a man in there even if I was able to successfully follow her and Alyssa to a place.

So she calls me today to tell me that she just ordered the dress, and that she sent pictures of it to her mom and sis. Well, what is the easiest way to send photographs these days? EMAIL! ...And I have her login info. This was too easy! She buys the dress and I get to see the same day. And better yet, she is wearing it! But as I am weighing the options, the thought occurs to me that this was way too easy. Hardly even sporting. I didn’t have to work to get the coveted prewedding glance at all. She practically spoon fed me the dress pics. (which was a flag in itself that she might be throwing me a red herring) So over the phone I informed her of my plan and had her believing for a short while that I had indeed seen her wearing it. To my surprise, she really didn’t even seem to mad about it. Just surprised that my supposed coup had occurred so quickly and flawlessly. I eventually let her know that I would indeed see it, but under far more sporting circumstances. This was just too easy and I felt bad not having to fight tooth and nail for a glimpse of it. I’ll see it. Just you wait. *shit eating grin*

Damn dogs

I decided I would try running again because it is the easiest way to get out the energy that I have pent up which I cant get out at work. I ran down a street that we drive sometimes. Kinda rural, but it looked ok. Oh yea, and it was dark too. There were a few sets of scary dogs behind too short fences but just when I was coming back a dog found its way through a gate it's owner was trying to close and chased me. I got a nice little chomp on the calf by a PITBULL! I love dogs and all, but come on people!
Speaking of people, in Utah, Texas, and now New Mexico noone shops anywhere but WalMart. In all three states I have asked around patiently trying to find someone who knows of a non walmart grocery store, but no one does! "I think theres a walmart nearby" is all I got. Just being immersed in the culture of white trashiness down here makes me treasure the northwest so much. Even the trashy folks in Oregon are way cooler than trashy people down south. Oh, and the standard question when you order ANY food down here is "Do ya want da white gravy or da brown gavy?" I got asked if I wanted gravy for my halibut steak! WTF PEOPLE!

Roadtrip to no where

I have officially decided that Utah is one of my new favorite places. On the trip south I spent a lot of time on less traveled highways and random roads. The high country of southern utah is just amazing and I have to go back to explore it. All the diversity in that state and some of Arizona made the drive on Friday far more pleasureable than most endurance drives I have been on.
Along the way I noticed a funny little phemomenon. So you have seen the movie Super Troopers right? Ok, in the beginning one guy has a dummy in his squad car parked o the highway shoulder. Well, several towns in UT actually employ this tactic. Is that a little weird? Once I saw it was a dummy, I had to turn around and get a picture. Then I saw 3 more in the subsequent small towns along the highway.
Oh yea, and another weird thing about UT is that it seems that the cool thing to do is put the first letter of your town (or any random letter) in 100 ft tall white lettering on a hillside nearby. I tried to spot the whole alphabet, but only saw about half the letters.

The weather out in UT was classic desert thunderstorms while I was there and it gave me quite a show at every viewpoint. The pic left is of a massive rain, wind and cloud front swallowing a 1500 ft tall cliff band.

I managed to make it out to Hueco Tanks, TX today for a few hours of bouldering at the agreed upon "best" bouldering area in the world. The features are similar to Smith actually, but the rock

quality is much more uniform and solid. I didnt have much time to take pics but I snagged on e on this V3 that I worked for a while. I got it after a while, but I missed the pad from a ways up on one fall and sketched myself a bit. When bouldering, spotters are good to have around. I found some eventually who were local and hung out with them for a bit on a fun cave problem.