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CRF Mammoth for Memorial Day

While Bryan stayed around home to spend time climbing with David, Mandy and I made a trip to Kentucky to go caving.

We arrived around midnight and after signing us into the expedition, I poked my head into a few bunkhouse rooms before finding one with only one bed filled. Mandy and I threw down pillows and blankets and went to sleep. It occurred to me that in most places I’d feel pretty uncomfortable putting my daughter to bed in a darkened room with an unidentified man, but at Hamilton Valley I didn’t think twice about it. When she mumbled “I’m cold” in the middle of the night, he got up to turn on the heat for her. It turned out to be Tom Brucker. Continue reading “CRF Mammoth for Memorial Day”

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Lake Sylvia by Bike

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We met Gordon and Lois and the girls for a two-day trip from the Lake Sylvia area out to Forked Mountain to spend the night.  It was a great ride – about 35 miles almost entirely on gravel, with some swimming and camping in the middle.  It was peaceful and quiet and traffic just didn’t exist.  Some of the hills were steep, but I figure that’s what I have feet for.  The bombing downhills were scary fun, but so hard that I twisted the headset on the Voyageur once as I fishtailed through loose gravel.  We got sunburns and dirt in our eyes.  Three of our group bailed halfway through, but the rest of us had a fine time.

There’s more gravel-road touring in our future; I’m sure of it.

PS – The photo of Bryan’s bike up top doesn’t actually have anything to do with this trip.  But we didn’t have any decent photos from this weekend, so we’re pretending that it  belongs here.

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Chem2 is HISTORY

It’s been a difficult school year for me. I’ve only done seven hours for each semester, because Chemistry at UALR is very, very hard, apparently in order to discourage potential medical students. My advisor told me twice that most geology students take their chem classes at a nearby community college.

After the final, I went to Debbie Thompson’s house. We sat on her deck and watched the sun set and drank beer and burned all my chemistry notes.

I’m done. I ended up with high Cs in both chem 1 and chem 2. A year ago I’d never have believed I’d feel proud and relieved to see Cs on my transcript – I’m an A student! – but the fact is that these chemistry courses have bludgeoned my ego pretty thoroughly. Or maybe they’ve just taught me humility. I’m not good at everything. I’m learning to accept that.

I can go on to my other science courses now. I’ll never have to take another chemistry class again. This summer I’m taking an oceanography course, and next fall I’ll be doing physics and geology.

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Bike Tour to Leola

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Mandy and I met up with our friend Kathy this weekend for a quick bike trip to Leola. Forty-five miles or so one-way, camping next to a lake, a trip to a catfish restaurant for dinner… should be a good weekend.

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Our route was nice, mostly rural highways with a usable shoulder.  The roads weren’t flat but the hills were mostly doable.  Of course, even though the three of us rode up nearly every hill we came to, I have to post the one photo I have of Mandy and Kathy walking up a hill. Continue reading “Bike Tour to Leola”

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Backpacking with Hayduke and Isabel

Our friend Isabel just turned five, but she’s been outside a lot.  Her parents are both active, outdoor people – they both cave, and Amy runs and backpacks, and Spike hunts a lot – so Isi’s quite accustomed to sleeping in a tent, to eating noodles while sitting on rocks, to peeing in the woods.  No problem.  Isabel is comfortable in the big wide world.

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So it was no surprise that Isi’s first backpacking trip was a resounding success.  We’d been planning it for months.  We met up at Fairview campground on Friday night and did a quick car-shuttle before dropping into the Ozark Highlands Trail near Ben Hur. Continue reading “Backpacking with Hayduke and Isabel”

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SCBPC Bike Polo Tournament

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Bryan returned from the Flashbus workshop in Dallas late Thursday night, and got up on Friday to go to MacArthur Park to help set up for the Southeast Regional Bike Polo tournament and play a few games of pickup. Mandy’s out of town, so I joined the group right after work to help out.  To kick off the weekend’s activities, Vinnie organized a nighttime alleycat race. Participants left from MacArthur, and had to pick up packages and bike parts at various places in Little Rock. Bryan and I volunteered to staff the station atop the Big Dam Bridge. Before signing off on their ‘manifests’ we made the racers hula-hoop for us. Continue reading “SCBPC Bike Polo Tournament”

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Flashbus!

So… hell froze over and two photographers I admire (Joe McNally & David Hobby) teamed up to tour the country and lecture about off camera flash with small hotshoe flashes AND they were coming to Dallas AND it only cost $99.  Cha-ching, I’m there!

This isn’t a full on review or trip report and I didn’t take many photos but it was definitely worth the price of admission plus the air fare I spent to go to Dallas and back on the same day (slightly more expensive than driving myself and tons easier).  The photo above (click on it to see it bigger) shows about half ballroom that we were using at the Hilton Anatole, I believe there were 300+ people in attendance.

David shoots manual flash (mostly) and Joe shoots iTTL (mostly) and it was great to see them shoot while walking us through their thought process.  Seeing how they build up the lighting in the photo, how they control the shadows and background was really really useful.  You can only learn so much from books, seeing the process in person was the whole reason to attend.

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Adoption Announcement

It's a DOG

We’ve decided to keep the puppy.  He’s been trying to be a good boy, and has already learned some commands like ‘sit’ and ‘wait’ and ‘come.’  He’ll grow up to be big and strong enough to stay outside during the day, and he’ll like coming with us on backpacking and hiking trips.  We’re getting him at the perfect age to teach him to behave and cooperate.  And he really needs a home, so even if we aren’t perfect puppy parents, his life with us will be a lot better than just being out on the street, or stuck in a shelter, or chained in some guy’s backyard.

We’ve enjoyed having Hayduke underfoot the last couple of weeks. We’re looking forward to seeing what kind of dog he turns out to be.

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Nose bleed

For some reason, Mandy gets nosebleeds occasionally.  They’re usually not a big deal, with the exception of the one major self-inflicted crash into the red pickup in the McDonald’s parking lot.  But it seems that when she gets one, she gets several of them in a few days’ time. It doesn’t seem to bother her much – they’re messy, but usually easy to control and not much more than a yucky inconvenience.