Archive for 2009
Last week Pete and I went to Las Vegas to celebrate our 10 year anniversary. (Wow, it’s still hard to believe that he and I have been together that long!) We went all out and got a suite at the Bellagio on the 29th floor in the newer Spa Tower. The room was in front of the famous fountains, and we had a great view of the Eiffel Tower across the street at hotel Paris Las Vegas. It was fabulous! We has some incredible food while we were there, did lots of walking around at the hotel shops and on the Strip, took the scenic drive through Red Rock Canyon, and (of course) did a little gambling. I have to sort through the photos we took so I grabbed an image of the world famous Las Vegas sign for this post; plus I definitely will be writing more about the food that we enjoyed while we were there – that was the primary reason we chose Las Vegas for our trip. We are total foodies, so what better place to go than Las Vegas? There was not enough time to go to all the restaurants on our list, which was almost a page long, but we did our best and ate as much as we could. Not ones to give up, we’re already planning which places to eat at on our next trip!
It’s hard to believe that Pete and I adopted Max nine years ago. He’s my best-est pal, so I was very concerned when he started losing weight rather quickly a couple of months ago. He had all but lost his appetite, and was very lethargic and quiet – very un-like his normal self. We took him to the vet and ran a blood test, and they also checked his teeth. It turned out that he had an abscessed tooth and needed his teeth cleaned pretty badly. So we made an appointment for a cleaning and for the tooth to be removed. A few days later we heard back from the vet about the blood tests, and thankfully everything is fine. No kidney or liver problems for my Beastie, hooray! A few more days and it was time for the surgery, which went fine except that he wound up losing four teeth instead of just one. It’s been just over two weeks since the surgery and he is doing so much better. He’s talkative and energetic, and as of yesterday is allowed to eat whatever he wants again. Some people would say he is just a cat, but I couldn’t disagree more. Max has more personality than a lot of people I know, and I love spending my days with him. He is worth every penny that it took to make him better, and now my Max is back to his old self again and I couldn’t be happier.
Last Friday we took off for a couple days of camping before I headed back to Grand Junction for two more weeks of work. Pete bought a new tent for us while I was away working and had found a really pretty camping area near Big Meadow up on Wolf Creek Pass. It’s called Park Creek and is in the Rio Grande National Forest. The camp site sits along the headwaters of the Rio Grande River, which was running just behind our tent. The weather was perfect, and the scenery was absolutely gorgeous. We spent a day relaxing at the camp site then we headed out for a scenic drive up to an old mining town called Summitville, which was just eighteen miles farther up the mountain from the camp site. It’s a ghost town, but a few of the old buildings are still standing. Summitville is at about 12,000 feet elevation, which makes for some incredible scenery. There are beautiful alpine flowers, deep green meadows, and awesome mountain vistas. The temperature was 84 degrees when we left the Park Creek camp ground and dropped to 46 degrees at Summitville, it was unbelievable. Just one more reason why the state’s tourism motto is “Colorado Wild”!
The photo of the bison sculpture is from the trip and was taken in front of Wells Fargo Bank on Main Street in downtown Grand Junction, CO. The group I was with, a bunch of gearheads, was geeking out on this because it is made entirely of old bumpers. How cool! We walked around and marveled at it for at least ten minutes, it is very impressive – and large. By the time I returned on July 1st the trip had lasted 19 days, a bit longer than expected. Pete picked me up from the airport and we went directly to East By Southwest for sushi. We got to try something new, Pacific Blue Marlin, and wow was that ever terrific! Very similar to Walu, a light colored flesh with a mild flavor and very “meaty” in texture. It was presented sashimi style (my favorite) with a balsamic fig sauce and peppery micro greens, delicious! Before picking me up at the airport Pete had stopped at Wal-Mart for some new shirts and also picked up a huge lodge-style tent so we can go camping. He set the tent up yesterday, all 11’ x 20’ feet of it and boy is it great! We’re planning on going camping for a couple days next week in nearby South Fork along the Rio Grande river. It’s really pretty over there, and it’s only a little more than an hour away. I have a lot of data entry to do before we go, but there has to be time for fun with all the work I’ve done over the past three weeks. I haven’t worked this many hours in years. Oh well, feast or famine as they say. One thing is for certain though, it is so nice to be home and to be with my honey and all our kitty kids. I missed them all so much!
I don’t leave home very often, and I like it that way. I can’t remember the last time I stayed in a hotel, so being away from home in a strange place is weird to say the least. The hardest thing for me the first night away was staying in a hotel in a city, next to a highway with traffic so loud I barely got any sleep. I’m so spoiled from living in B.F.C., where we rarely hear a car go by so it makes it very difficult to fall asleep when there is lot of ambient noise. The hotel was kind enough to move me across the hall, to the side of the hotel that overlooks a golf course. At least I should be able to get some much needed sleep tonight. I miss my honey and all my kitty kids so much, and I’ve only been gone 36 hours. Only 156 to go. But since I’m in a place that has much better internet service I figured I’d take the opportunity to upload a bunch of pictures that have been stacking up in the queue. First up is more pics added to the Spring 2009 gallery, and I’m working on galleries for the rest of the kitty kids to get posted before I head back home. Being away is hard, but it also makes me grateful for being able to live where I do. It may be inconvenient sometimes, but it is so beautiful and peaceful and there isn’t anywhere else I’d rather be.
Changed the site theme today for summer, it reminds me of Hawaii with the beautiful hibiscus flowers. The weather here in B.F.C. has been just gorgeous, all the new Aspen leaves are bright neon green and the wildflowers range from purple-blue to bright yellow. It’s quite a sight to say the least! I did take some more photos but forgot to transfer them to the computer before I came into town today. Our internet is still unusable at the house, so we’ve been coming to the coffee house almost every day this past week to get online. I’ll try to get those up next time I get online.
Short post today as I have another busy week ahead. The weather has been absolutely gorgeous with temperatures in the mid-seventies, which is perfect at our altitude because it feels ten degrees warmer than it actually is. We’ve been spending a lot of time outside getting this year’s projects underway. Everything is so green right now, and the wild flowers have started their annual display which makes it difficult to focus on the work at hand. The barn patio project is almost done, we just need to move a little more dirt before I can start laying the stones. Frequent work breaks are necessary during this beautiful weather, and here are a few photos I took while out on a walk the other day. I hope you enjoy them.
