BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

As promised, I am throwing together a few blogs about our adventures on vacation. Please make note that they won’t necessarily be in chronological order as far as the vacation itself went. They are actually in “transcribed jotted down note order,” which makes sense to me, but not really everyone else. At any rate, this is number one in the series…

Wednesday. Fourth day of vacation. Evil Kat has now tortured us all mercilessly with “pre-hikes” leading up to her plan for today – The Death March. Seriously. She actually had it on the itinerary. She didn’t call it a death march because she didn’t want us to know that’s what it was, but hey, we figured it out right quick…

After a quick breakfast at the restaurant for Colter Bay Village in the Grand Tetons, where we had been staying in a cabin, we were packed and ready to set off to West Yellowstone, Montana, which would become our base camp for the rest of the vacation. That way we would have a place to crash and be able to make excursions into Yellowstone National Park. Good plan, but as I mentioned, there was this death march with which we needed to contend.

Before heading north to West Yellowstone, E K wanted to hike the “Hidden Falls Trail” at Jenny Lake. Some of you may remember my status update:

At Jenny Lake. Forest is here too… JEH-NAYYY! 10:59 AM 6/15

On Death March at Jenny Lake. Help ME!

That was more or less my “Blair Witch Project” swan song. By that I mean, less than twenty minutes later, Her Supreme Redheaded Evilness had us on the trail. Thing about it is this – we were already at high altitude, so next thing you know we were going up the side of a mountain, then down the side of a mountain, then around a lake, back up, back down, along the lake, switched back, up, down, around, down, up, up, up, around, down, up, up, UP, and then we came to the washed out bridge. Yeah. So then we had to go up some more – through two feet of snow. Melting snow. The kind where you take a step and then one leg crashes through and you end up doing the splits and having deadly pine needle infused snow crystals all up in your BVD’s. No, I’m not kidding. Yes, I ended up with deadly pine needle infused snow crystals all up in my BVD’s. Well, actually it was my Fruit of the Looms, but you get the idea. (BTW – Make note of the “do rag” I’m wearing in the picture above… It comes into play later.)

Hidden Falls. Not so hidden once you get there...

Anywho, on with the story… After seeing The Hidden Falls, and playing photographer for other folks who wanted their family photo taken in front of it (I really should have set up a concession stand, I’m tellin’ ya’…) we hiked up, up, down, down, down, around, through, up, down, up, down, through, around, down, down, DOWN until we came to the dock. What dock? The dock on the other side of the lake where the boat met us and took us back to where we started. Then it was back into the rental vehicle and off to West Yellowstone.

Now… To get to West Yellowstone coming from where we were, one had to pass through Yellowstone proper. Well… not just one… all of us, actually. But that’s not my point. My point is that we had to go through Yellowstone, so why not take some time to stop, look at Old Somewhat Faithful, and walk at least a portion of the loop before heading on into Montana. I mean, after all, it’s not like we had done any walking yet for the day, right? <– [Gratuitous Sarcasm]

However… There had to be some shopping too. After all, when you have a tween o-spring, she will be all about the souvenir thing.

Something you might not know about me – unless E K and I are out doing the “Pretty Woman” thing, I don’t shop. I hate to shop. When I go to the store I know what I want, I get it, and then I get out. ‘Nuff said.

But on with the show… We arrived at the “Mercantile” or whatever they call it there in the Old Somewhat Faithful area of the upper geyser basin. They want to go shopping. I want to sit. Fortunately, someone at the “Mercantile” already knew I was coming, because there were 409,345 rocking chairs lined up along the boardwalk in front of the place. I found one and I sat in it.

Here’s where the importance of the “do rag” comes in…

The motor-sickles showed up. Apparently all these dudes and dudettes on said motor-sickles took my “do rag” to mean I might possibly be of the two-wheel ilk myself, so instead of sitting in any of the other rocking chairs, they joined me in my row. They introduced themselves. The chatted with me like I was a long lost pal. They showed me their tattoos. Of course, when they asked me what sort of bike I rode I couldn’t lie, so I told them, “Well, I used to have a Schwinn, but now I’ve just got a K-Mart Special 10-speed.”

I figured they’d probably decide I wasn’t all that cool at that point, but apparently they thought it was funny. Not sure how much comedy they get to see out on the open road, so I was glad to at least give them a laugh. At any rate, instead of running off, they hung around and we commiserated about the fact that I was stuck there waiting for my “old lady” while she shopped, and all that good stuff. I mean, we had ourselves a grand ol’ time there on the Group Motor-Sickle Boardwalk.

Schwinn, K-Mart Special, or not… And it was all good.

Fear This!

But that, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with “Yes, Dear…”

You see, that part finally happened after all of my newly found friends with the motor-sickles headed up and moved out, offering to take me with them since my “old lady” was still on a spending spree.

It was tempting. I mean, touring Yellowstone on a Motor-Sickle and all… But since they were my new friends I didn’t want them to get hurt. So, I explained to them that they really had no idea what they would be getting into if I came along, then mentioned the name “Evil Kat.” They all suddenly became very nervous, and then said that, as much as they liked me, I was on my own. Seems they were familiar with The Supreme Evil Redhead’s reputation.

But back to the “Yes, Dear…”

A nice young couple came out of the ice cream shop and settled themselves into chairs next to me. As friendly tourists will do, we struck up a conversation, talking about the scenery, geo-thermal events, and ice cream. Eventually, when things reached a lull I simply stared off into space, or parking lot, or whatever. Suddenly I heard a sharp, “MURV!”

When my name is said in such a way by Her Supreme Evilness that generally means she has now had to repeat herself.

I instantly responded, without even looking in her direction, “YES, DEAR!”

The couple next to me chuckled.

“We’re ready to go,” E K barked.

“I’m glad somebody is…” I mumbled.

The couple next to me chuckled again.

I pushed myself up out of the chair, and with all of the camera equipment, water bottles, and other necessary hiking about items for three people strapped to my person, began to trudge away, following the one of red hair.

I glanced back over my shoulder at the couple and said, “Y’all enjoy those chairs for me, okay?”

This, of course, elicited yet another chuckle from the pair.

But, let’s face it… I mean, it’s not like THEY were going to save me. The bikers had hauled a$$ out of there at the mere mention of “The E K,” so an ice cream eating couple from some small town in east wherever definitely wasn’t about to mount a rescue op.

Oh well, judging from their chuckles at least I entertained them for a few seconds… I wonder if they blog…

More to come…

Murv

Well, maybe not “carnage” so much, but our Red Bud tree took some damage from the freak March snowstorm that struck overnight here in Saint Louis. Only a few inches of the white stuff fell, but it was in a very, very short period of time. Plus, it was the heavy, wet snow that tends to weigh things down.

It was around 4:45 – 5:00 AM when I heard the sickening sound of cracking lumber. In my half sleep I actually felt a bit of panic because there used to be a large oak right outside our back door, and it had been dying for years. I finally had it taken out summer before last, but in the past it had dropped limbs and exacted a toll on both our house and that of our neighbor.  However, up until I had it removed I had harbored a fear that it would some day send one of the larger branches through our roof, and if that happened, our bedroom would be right in the damage path.  Still in a semi-dream state, this was my muddied brain’s first thought. I hooked an arm around E K as I rolled to the right, but before I could push her off the bed and out of harm’s way, I heard the heavy thud of the branch hitting the ground outside instead of coming through the roof on top of us. My brain woke just a bit more and in that instant I remembered that the oak was gone.

Good thing too…

E K was still asleep, but if I had pushed her off onto the floor, I’m betting she wouldn’t have been for long.

I crawled out of the bed and looked out the back window of our bedroom. Snow covered the landscape in an uneven, spotty blanket. And there, in the middle of the yard, was a major branch of our Red Bud tree. At that point, I pretty much sighed and then muttered, “This ain’t good.”

Since it had been in the 70’s and 80’s for the past couple of weeks, trees were budding and sprouts were sprouting. If you are familiar with the Red Bud, you know that in the spring it is covered with tiny reddish-magenta flowering buds for a week or two. Unfortunately, those miniscule flowers formed enough of a lattice to capture and hold the snow, making the weight on the branch too much to bear.

This particular Red Bud was one I had given E K as a birthday gift around 15 years ago. Actually, I gave her a stake with an orange flag on it and told her to go stick it in the yard wherever she wanted a tree. And, no, before you ask, I didn’t make her water it or anything … Two days after she stabbed it into the ground like a Van Helsing disciple offing a vampire – (and she looked pretty damn hot doing it too, as I recall) – the nursery arrived while we were at work and planted the tree she had been telling me she wanted.

At any rate, as promised in my “tweets” early this morning, below are a couple of pictures of the tree…

This would be the view from our bedroom window on the second floor. It was taken by E K early this morning while it was still extremely overcast, so I had to adjust it a bit in Photoshop. (click photo to enlarge.)

From the back of the yard, later in the day. As you can see, the snow disappeared within a matter of a scant few hours, and the sun was brightly shining. What isn’t obvious is that the ground is saturated (it rained all day before the snow arrived) and there is even standing water in the depressions throughout the lawn. (click photo to enlarge)

There you have it. Our backyard carnage. Looks like I am going to be pulling out the chainsaw in the next day or two before I have to jet off to Nebraska.

More to come…

Murv