Sandia Dog Obedience Club has a Howloween party for the dogs tonight. They are all dressed up (though none too happy about it). Chase is watching the wall around the yard just in case one of the neighbor’s cats decides to take a stroll.
Kip-the ghost, Chase-the skeleton, Inca-the witch
I promise, if you wear the costumes, you’ll get lots of treats and no tricks.
There’s gotta’ be a way out of this!
There are a number of readers (living where there are no lava beds) who are smitten with the contorted lava shapes. Here is yet another photo from Valley of Fires. This one clearly shows the folds of the lava as it crash-cooled when it spilled out onto the earth.
I think I’d promised a trip to the Village of San Luis Cabezon, but have decided instead that we would start along the Salt Mission Trail. The three missions, Abo, Quarai, and Gran Quivera are studies in texture and color. Each was built with the rock and stone on the land surrounding it. The structures amaze me every time I visit them. Can you imagine the manpower it required to haul all the materials to create these massive church-fortress buildings?
These were among the earliest missions in the southwest. The priests directed the construction. Each of the missions contained areas for meeting, for storing provisions (the harvest), and protected views so the structures could be used as fortresses. The missions and surrounding grounds are all federally protected. There are potshards scattered all around and after a rain, still more surface. Taking them is a violation of Federal law — though it’s certainly tempting.
I cannot imagine how difficult life must have been in these great stone structures which I believe were modeled after the castles of Europe.
Wow! 45,000 Obama supporters went to UNM last night to hear our next President speak. John McCain was in Albuquerque yesterday morning and 2,000 went to hear him. I am so relieved that the really nice people at the Albuquerque Academy permitted our VST (tracking) seminar to be at their facility on Saturday because it would have been impossible to park and then to work the dogs at UNM — with the faithful coming in. People parked miles from the campus and walked. When Johnson Field filled, people stood across the streets and into the neighborhoods to hear him.
Actually it gave us (tracking people) the opportunity to work at two splendid VST venues. Our seminar leader opined that we should submit both locations to AKC for approval for future tests. Great weekend — in so many ways.
It was a splendid 75 degree day spent in the center of the old UNM campus. It culminated with the fourteen working attendees trying Moment of Truth (MOT) turns. They are on concrete with nothing for the handlers to key on — it’s all up to the dogs. I now know so much more about how dogs scent, how the wind and curbs and stairs effect scent, why a tracking dog must have a strong article indication . . . amazing.
And after we finished the seminar at 4:30, I went home and grabbed Chase. We went to track with my friend Burt. Little Chase did a grass to landscape rock track with the single turn on the rock — and the little guy did it pretty well. My goal is to have him certified this winter so he can be entered in the El Paso TD test in January (maybe in ours, but since I always work the test, it would be hard to enter the two dogs there).
Our seminar instructor was Ed Presnall lured here from Wisconsin. Our main campus is large, with lots of buildings so Kip and I played “Sacajewa and dog” to guide him to the duck pond and surrounding grass, gravel, wooden bridge . . . We have lots of wide monument steps — he made good use of them. What that means is that Kip will sleep until Tuesday and I’m taking lots of Aleve. Sorry, I took no photos because I was thinking the entire time!
Bunky and Kip — Let’s Go Tracking!
Today was day one of the VST seminar. Bunky (a Pem with letters surrounding his name), is more than ten years old, already has his TDX and came close to earning his VST in Denver last weekend. Kip has his certification and is waiting to get into a TD test. The seminar has been enlightening in many ways. We’re working short tracks loaded with articles like junction box covers and wall switch plates.
The big surprise of the seminar (for us) was that the sprinklers came on over our first article track and Kip and I were soaked to the skin. (That’s why he isn’t wearing his harness in this photo — it’s hanging on the side of the Element drying) Since it (almost) never rains here, Kip kept asking if I was sure I wanted him to track through the falling water — of course I did, though many were fainter of heart. We spent the next five hours drying in the sun. Fortunately, it was in the low 70’s with brilliant sunshine.
Today we were at the Albuquerque Academy’s gorgeous campus. Tomorrow we’ll be at UNM’s main campus and will face some exciting new challenges. There will be far more building work, stairs, and sidewalks. I’ll try to remember to take photos.
This is my blog for the past week. www.wordle.net will scramble what you said and create a word cloud. Fun?
I have a sense of kinship with those little plants scratching it out in the rocks — and making it. This is another shot from the Valley of Fires in south central New Mexico.
We’ve had the first hard frost, so anything that might have been green no longer is. I love the myriad of reds and browns juxtaposed against the flowing water. I know there’s a sun spot in this photo, but this is the shot I wanted, and the sun just wouldn’t get out of my lens.
Some of the weeds can be dramatic, especially when shot with a macro lens setting. There is just a suggestion of the water behind them.
This weekend my high school class is celebrating its 45th reunion — the Class of ‘63 turns 63 – We have a cocktail party, a dinner-dance, and a breakfast, on Friday night, Saturday night, and Sunday morning. This weekend my dog training club is hosting a Variable Surface Tracking Seminar (on Saturday and Sunday). I’m sort of involved in both events. For the Tracking Seminar, we were granted use of The University of New Mexico’s main campus — tres kewl!
An hour or so ago, I received an invitation to hear Barack Obama speak at Johnson Field, on the main UNM campus at 7:00 PM on Saturday evening. I would think that the faithful will stream onto the campus from early Saturday morning to put down blankets or to set up lawn chairs in a comfy spot on Johnson Field. I would also think that they will be using every parking spot within a three mile radius of the campus.
When stars collide they seem to do it on my watch. So faithful readers, how are we going to hold a dog tracking seminar on main campus at the same time thousands are treking around to see our next President? How do I avoid the reunion dinner to hear our next President speak? I think I’m catching strep — cough, cough . . .
Sunset on October 19th
6:00 PM (MDST)
6:05 PM
6:12 PM
6:20 PM
6:28 PM
6:33 PM
6:38 PM – Goodnight
If you’d like to see the sky as others see it, visit www.skyley.blogspot.com.
When I arrived home yesterday, in my front yard, were three packages. One was a very light-weight tripod for my video camera, one was a new skirt, and the third was a FedEx package addressed to “Henry, Cynthia”, but at my address. I was tired last night and intended to call FedEx this morning to tell someone that this package had been mis-addressed.
However, this morning I looked at the return address on the FedEx envelope. It was HP–the power adaptor for my sick scanner-copier-fax-printer! That also means that “Henry, Cynthia” did not receive something he/she was expecting. A little while ago I received an email from HP Customer Care notifying me that I would be receiving a package. Perhaps I will receive a back up power adaptor. Monday’s five hours on the phone was definitely worthwhile.
The good news, my scanner-printer-fax-copier is working again!
Dear Red States:
We’ve decided we’re leaving. We intend to form our own country, and we’re taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren’t aware, that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, and all of the Northeast. It may even include Florida and Ohio — they are seriously considering it. We’ve given them until Nov. 4th to decide. We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the people of the new country. Since we’re dropping the middle states we’re calling it United America, or simply the U.A.
To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma, and all the slave states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood. You can take Ted Nugent. We’re keeping Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel. You get WorldCom. We get Intel and Microsoft. You get Ole’ Miss. We get Harvard and 85 percent of America’s venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama. We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red states pay their fair share.
Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition’s, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of single moms, and the highest concentration of pregnant unwed teenagers. Please be aware that the U.A. will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we’re going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they’re apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don’t care if you don’t show pictures of their children’s caskets coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq, and hope that the WMDs turn up, really we do, but we’re not willing to spend our resources in Bush’s Quagmire. We’d rather spend it on taking care of sick people, and educating our children.
With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country’s fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation’s fresh fruit, 95 percent of America’s quality wines, 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias, and condors, all the Ivy League and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia. We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.
Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red states believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred unless we’re discussing the war, the death penalty or gun laws, 44 percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11, and 61 percent of you crazy Redies believe you are people with higher morals then we Bluies.
Finally, we’re taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed they grow in Mexico.
Peace out,
Blue States
[This letter was received courtesy of my sister and brother-in-law who know a good deal when they spot one.]
I am past sixty-five and still practicing law. I have two terrific sons, they have lovely wives, and I have one truly special granddaughter. At home are three Cardigan Welsh Corgis that amuse and challenge me. We participate in lots of dog-related activities. I love my camera, writing, and roaming. I live in central New Mexico because it's where I want to be. Thanks for visiting my blog. Your (tasteful) comments are welcome.
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