Five weeks since my last post. Sigh, I wish in a way that LJ didn't keep track. I'm procrastinating right now. Writing a paper about Irish Travelers. It's, they're, a fascinating subject, but I'm tired. I'm done with my grading though so all I need to do now is write. That makes it easier. Less stress. I just did my morning Haggis Hunt (on the Scotsman newspaper site.) One of the "hunting sites" is Belushi's Bar in Edinburgh. And there, working away, amidst a scattering of books and paper is some other student. Solidarity.
Back to Ireland now.

One of my friends on face book had this video posted. It came from the College Humor site as "What English Sounds Like to Non-English Speakers" but it was actually a music video from Italy in, well, 1972. It is kind of early rap. I took this from You Tube. I love it. Enjoy.

With due respect to the solemn nature of this blog, I have to share the following. I’m teaching a marriage and family course this term and we talking about the various forms that marriages that can take. I talked about the various forms of contractual marriage under brehon law, jumping the broom in several cultures and ended up with handfasting. A couple of minutes later I heard snorts and giggles coming from one side of the room from one of my non-traditional students, a thirty something woman and a couple of the other students next to her. She is usually very sober, a really good student so I was intrigued. I looked at her and she just broke out laughing. One of her cohort, another non-trad, a vet, was laughing and said, “She was wondering whether handfasting was when you took a vow to stop masturbating for a while?” Needless to say, it was fortunate that the class period was almost over because the class certainly was.
Sigh, I’m never going to be able to teach that section of the book with a straight face again.

chilly rain outside, the kid asleep. Dog at my feet, cat on the hassock. Listening to the soundtrack of The Big Chill. Something about the harmony on "Wouldn't it be nice" gives you a reason for living.

Sitting on the front porch on my “new” porch furniture. It is very sixties/seventies. and I’m not entirely certain that it was intended to be outdoor furniture but the front porch is protected from everything from but a Nor’easter and we don’t get many of those. It’s fun and comfy and it cost me all of 35$ at a yard sale. They told me it was outdoor furniture so...
Sunday morning, sun is rising over the pines and making it hard to see the screen, good thing I can touch type! Shadow pup is running around and Ty is exhibiting typical cat behavior, in,out, in, out,. After all, I’m sitting here, it is my privilege to open the door for him as he requires.
The weeds have won. I have flowers I have planted and flowers the Goddess planted and hers are very noticeable, and although I don’t know if my neighbors think so, I kind of like the goldenrod and queen annes lace. I think the baby maple has to go though. It most likely is not good for the foundation. Ah well, it is tough to weed when you’re gone to fair from six in the morning until ten at night. The butterfly bush is gorgeous,and the butterflies and the hummingbirds love it, and the hummers love my fuschias. There are bees humming all over, it is such an active little garden. I decided that i am definitely going to be planting monarda, lots of monarda in here next spring. It would be perfect. It’s a cool morning, even my Hogwarts mug is having a hard time keeping my coffee warm this morning, ah well, just means I have to drink it faster.
I think it’s okay to leave the weeds in the porch garden but I do want to clear out the tomato garden and my one empty box garden so I can plant some spinach and chard. It’s cool enough now that it shouldn’t bolt. The mint has spread again as well so I think I may pull and freeze or dry that.
Have to do some school work too. The semester started and this first week was a whirlwind. My classes, all of them, are the largest they have ever been. I don’t know why. I really don’t think it is just because enrollment is up, although perhaps that may have something to do with it. I know I’ve picked up a couple of psych students who have been very turned off by the new psych prof, she seems to be turning out to be one of those professors that students can work with or with whom they absolutely can’t get along. That is too bad. Fortunately, there are more students who can work with her than not, but I have never been a fan of cults of personality. I don’t think they do anyone any good. I’ll be happy if my students remember me fondly... you know, thank me at their Nobel Prize ceremony. ☺ (Ahhhh, the joy of working outside, ;a hummer at the fuschia.) Hah, a fuschia blossom just dropped off one of the plants and attacked Ty. He was not pleased. He killed it. That will teach it.
Well enough maundering. Time for a second cup of coffee, to read a couple of papers and then go talk to the tomatoes and see how they are doing.

I must have been feeling conservative tonight... usually I'm down in the far lower left corner. Or, oh, no, maybe I'm getting old.

My Political Views
I am a left moderate social libertarian
Left: 5.94, Libertarian: 2.68

Political Spectrum Quiz


My Foreign Policy Views
Score: -5.95

Political Spectrum Quiz


My Culture War Stance
Score: -7.26

Political Spectrum Quiz


Just got back from the annual girls mini Kaiserslautern American High School reunion. Three days of great talk, great food, great wine and beer (Deutsch naturlich) and staying up way too late. We started a Facebook page for our "group" and within about 13 hours had 6 sign ups. You have to understand, these are folks who are scattered all over the states, hell, all over the globe. It is very cool to hear from people you last saw across a table in a gasthaus in Ramstein.
Oh well, now I can't sleep because it's "not time yet." Sheesh.

We celebrated Lughnasadh properly yesterday. We thanked those who deserve thanks with the first of the harvest festivals with an incredible feast of salads and steak. You've never seen zucchini in so many different manifestations, Michigan sweet cherries, fresh bread, pasta salad with veggies, chocolate zucchini cake, beefalo raised by my friend Tom the Farmer... all locally grown. Then, the weather, true Lughnasadh weather. Started off hot, about 80 then we had a little rain and by evening we were down to about 65. Lugh of the Long Arm shot his arrow and the transition begins.
Other things begins the Farmer and the Artists oldest, he's 14 has a girlfried, who came along with him last night. They spent most of the night on the swing then wanted to sit in the van to "listen to music". Farmer said no but they could take a walk. I told them they could walk Shadow, my not-such a puppy- puppy and they did. Heh Heh Heh. He is hyper dog. There will be little canoodling there. What am saying? There is always a way. Well, in any event, Shadow got a walk down to the lake.
Preparatory to the feast I took another step into the 21st century and bought a gas grill. It looks like an alien, but it is a friendly alien. I was able to cook steaks for 13 people on that alien. Different taste than charcoal but all you do is turn a knob. I've been getting so many wonderful veggies from my CSA and I want to grill them but it takes a half hour to grill for five minutes. So, grilling delight. Esox and Farmer, my grilling gurus were total mensches last night. I asked them for advice and they kept hands off and talked me through firing it up and how to use it. They told me that it ran counter to every Y chromosome in their body but they did it. They also gave me and my research skills the greatest compliment. Yes research, geek that I am, I did the whole Consume Reports, web search, best grill for x amount search thing. Farmer told me that it was a really bad grill and he'd be really glad to toss it in the truck and haul it away for me and Esox told me had grill envy. So, I must have done good. My musician just kept shaking his head and saying it's going to blow up and kill us all. I noticed however, as the evening went on, that he began to encroach on my cooking space. The Y chromosome began to take over.
Well time for more coffee and the construction of essay questions of mass destruction for my on line students. Off to Cinci tomorrow for the Midwest Girls Mini Kaiserslautern American HIgh School Reunion. German beer, wine, food and much discussion of past and present.

So, I got sidetracked by the lurking writer's block prompt and impinging exhaustion. Tonight I had one of those random cerebral synaptic firings and started thinking about my favorite piece of wall art ever and wishing I still had it and thinking how great it would be to have it in my office and...well. It was Lynda Barry's, "Poodle with a Mohawk, You'll Never Call Him FiFi Again" and it was just one of the funniest, most absurd pieces of art I ever owned. I would look at it and I would just start laughing. My husband on the other hand, hated it. He never got it, ever, and when we moved out here to the great corn/soy field I think he disappeared it. He won't admit or deny, he just shrugs and says, "gee, I dunno. I haven't seen it in a long time." Sigh. For some strange reason, and I am NOT going to begin to deconstruct it right now, that poster sort of represented the 80's for me.
You'll never call me FiFi again.

Whew, yeah, I always have tried to. Primarily because I figured I'd invested all that energy into developing a relationship and it seemed a shame to waste it. I always thought there was something wrong with me because I was very rarely ever passionate enough about anyone enough to want to write them out of my life. Usually the rational part of me remembered that I liked them before I "loved" or "lusted" them and that those qualities usually weren't negatively affected by whatever caused the break-up. As a military brat, I never knew many people that long to be able to throw them away just because we weren't "going out" together anymore. Case in point, my ex-husband and I sort of just grew apart and agreed that married was not what we were. By that time, he'd known me longer than anyone outside my family. How do you get rid of someone with that kind of connection? Why would you want to unless it was too hurtful? The only exceptions to this rule were the two times I saw the person as having betrayed me/us by lying. I could handle just about anything but lying.

So, did a bit of construction, finally, on one of the bookshelves from IKEA. The Exepedit. I love that name. I had to bang one of the sides into place and somehow managed to bring the side of my fist down on the hex wrench (or whatever it is called) that the Swedes so nicely give us. I impaled my hand and did this really interesting CSI number with blood spraying across the the top of the shelf. You could see direction and everything. It was all very cool except for the fact of course that it hurt like hell and was really bleeding quite stupendously. My spouse was not amused at all. It wasn't as bad as it looked and as long as it doesn't get infected and turn green and .... well, you get the picture, it should be okay, the band aid is working. I think the husband thinks that I have a rather skewed perspective on life but I figure, "hey, If you're going to hurt yourself you might as well get something educational and/or amusing out of it." My child, I'm proud to say, was right there with me. Poor spouse.
See my ouchie?
Okay, I'm definitely off the high caffeine coffee from now on. Today has just been too very, very weird.

Shatner does Palin.
Conan had Shatner do Palin's speech and suddenly, it was actually pretty, and, at the same time, even more absurd. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/28/william-shatner-makes-pal_n_246034.html
Oh, this is so much fun. So much fun.

A friend sent me this from Grist. Go to http://www.grist.org/article/2009-07-27-so-long-sarah I wasn't able to copy the image but it is well worth the trip. Be sure to click on the image after you've enjoyed it for a while.

Newest first
For any who know me (and those who don’t) and may have occasionally doubted my hippie credentials (although Lady knows all you have to do is really take one look...) my beloved found some old photos when we were doing some de-cluttering. I posted them at http://gallery.me.com/oakselkie#100017 I still look like that, in some alternate universe.

Went to the Olivet Fireman’s Festival yesterday. Small town America at its best and its worst. Everyone goes there. I mean everyone. it is a lot of fun to people watch. You see everyone you know and everyone you don’t know. There is the prerequisite elephant ear vendor, the firemen serve up a chicken dinner (donation only so it’s free if you don’t have any money) and the evening ends with the best fireworks display you’ll see anywhere. At one point there must have been about 500 folks on the baseball field (an old mill pond) doing that silly chicken dance. Little kids run around like they’ll never run out of energy and the teens all slouch about being cool. It is funny. A couple of the teens will be uncool enough to go down to the field to dance and some of the really cool ones will make the proper sneering faces and sounds and all but then you watch their feet and their butts and you know they just want to go down there so badly... The love of Blitzy’s life was there. He got up the courage to talk to her, didn’t trip or fall, didn’t act too cool. She, unfortunately likes an “older” man, a senior. Poor Blitzy. He gets to tutor her but not dance with her. At the same time, he’s got this intellectual, sardonic awareness of the irony of the whole thing so he makes all this commentary about it on the side that keeps me in stitches. We talk about it in the car and since our trip out west have a new saying, “what’s said in the Tostr, stays in the Tostr”. His friend the wild child was with us last night and finally started talking about his crush. He liked the idea of the confessional Tostr.

Blitzy is set for Fair. Found him a silk tweed western jacket that is just gorgeous. First one we saw walking in the store, on sale and fit him well. A tiny bit big but unless he grows four inches in the next year it will work for next year. Since I’ll have get chaps and boots next year that will be nice.

I’m loving this summer. I worked hard but I actually have some “stuff” to show for it. A new stove, some repairs, I learned how to put in a faucet to the outside. I’m actually pretending it is summer and I’m doing summer things like taking walks, working in the garden,, spending time with my family. Who knew that relaxing a bit could be fun. I could get used to this. Watching the sun rise with a cup of coffee in the morning, watching the sun set with a glass of wine in the evening. Canning veggies, cleaning and finally unpacking stuff and throwing away stuff. Sheesh. I feel like a real human being and not just a wind up worker. I guess I should take a vacation more often.

It’s early, one might say a bit too early but I’ve got a cup of coffee, its quiet except for bird song out the window and morning edition in the background. Took the trash out and let Shadow “help”. Dog help is so interesting, it involves much sniffing and peeing and loping and jumping around. I think he took 4 roundtrips down the driveway for my one.
Going to a new place in Michigan today, Ovid. I love that name. It sounds so literate. Got to get Blitzy a western jacket for fair. He is now considered old enough to have to dress up a bit for some of his events. Speaking of Blitzy, I’m considering changing his name to Trog, short for troglodyte. He’s spending so much time down in the basement raiding in Olduwar and such like places that I swear I’ll be able to harvest mushrooms soon. In reality, I limit his time but it seems that way.
Started the second summer term. I’m teaching a class in the geography of North Africa and the Middle East. I loved my students in the first semester. They got engaged, they did their work, and, even though I was overloaded because of a mistake in the registrars office, all of the classes went well and it was fun. I thought this class would be the same! I set it up for some really interesting stuff to do. Made sure that all the directions for the work I was asking for was clear, and so far have gotten a resounding PHTTTTTTT in terms of response. I sent out notices to students about the books a week before the class started, got an email on Thursday after the class started “we just ordered the book do we have to do the first assignment?” (My answer, yes. The books are available in the college bookstore and, while the course is on line I know these students live in town.) I’ve sent out four emails explaining how to get on to live journal and how to post and another four about how to do a weekly analysis and briefing exercise, on top of having really clear instructions in the syllabus, only to get, today, “Oh, I didn’t realize that was what you wanted.”
Ah well. there are two students who, so far, exceed expectations and one woman who is bravely facing her self admitted Luddism to try the class (but really, really, doesn’t seem to like anything cyber.) I’m going to focus on them and keep chivvying the others along. If anyone cares, here’s the syllabus http://saturn.olivetcollege.edu/noyes/geography_exp_summer.htm and, if you think something does need clarifying, please let me know. I had colleagues do the “does this make sense” analysis and they’re good but they’re also not third year students any longer. By the by, it is “numbered” EXP as it is experimental. It will be added into our curriculum as a 300 level course.
Well, time to get dressed, get the kid up, go let my friends dogs out, pick up my other friends, go to Ovid, etc. It has a “maybe it could rain” feel to it outside today. I wish it would, a nice, long soaky, rain. The corn leaves are curling up, the soy is stunted and about the only good thing is that the straw dried.
Happy Trails

Jedi died. His heart just gave out on him. He was the nicest, sweetest dog I’ve ever had. He was smart and funny and a real friend and I’ll miss him. He was twelve, which is old for a dog as big as he was, but he was still my puppy. I’ll miss him. I’ll miss him a lot. He was Jedi Knight Xochi, zen master and companion.

Poor husband, he had to deal with it all but he did for me what I wish I could have done. He stayed with Jedi as he went to sleep. He emailed me (I'm on the road) because he couldn't tell me over the phone. I'll miss that puppy.

As a totally off the wall thing I just want to document the following before my swiss cheese brain forgets it. As Blitzy and I drove through Iowa, not the most visually compelling state, we heard an advertisment on a radio station we were listening to. It was a first for me (and I hope for my kid!). The ad was for a weekend special. “Two for the price of one Lap Dances” at the Lumberyard. Yep.

This little intro is actually newer than the rest of this. I’ve had spotty wifi and uploading has been difficult, which is rather a pain so rather than mess around, I’ve just been compiling my notes. Sorry about the length of this post.
June 18
We got to my sister’s (MaCher’s) house after a long ride across the flat land of Nebraska. The land changes as you get towards the Rockies, it starts to roll again (like northern Nebraska.) Northern Nebraska was interesting. It was the Badlands with “clothes” on. The Badlands of South Dakota (which were just a bit to the north of us there) are incredible. The top cover of vegetation has been stripped away and the land carved out so that it is looking at the bare bones of the earth. You see all the layers and layers of soil and you know you are looking at a book of time. That layer was a shallow sea, that layer came from the eruption of a volcano, that layer is soil washing down from the Black Hills. Well, the northern part of Nebraska shows that here and there but it is all covered with grass and other vegetation.
As you drive towards the Rockies, you begin to see them on the horizon. At first you want to think they are clouds on the horizon you can see them from so far away. Your brain doesn’t want to think about the size and wants to make it something easy to process. I pointed them out to Blitzy, who kept saying they were clouds even when Pike’s Peak stood there as massive as anything could ever be.
MaCher’s house is incredible. It is like something out of a story about Georgia O’Keefe. It stands on top of a mesa, a couple of hundred feet above the surrounding area. To the west you have a view of the Rockies running north and south, with Pike’s Peak dominating the near view. To the east you see a high plain with other mesas erupting from the plain. In all actuality, the area is volcanic so the mesas are all just spots that haven’t worn down.
MaCher had a great surprise for me. My nephew the helicopter pilot had come up from where he is stationed in Albuquerque and my niece (who is currently living in Japan) were both there together with the twin who is living with my sister. The only one missing was my niece from Alaska, and I got to talk to her on the phone. I also got to meet my grandnephew who is three and a very funny, bright and active kid. He took to his cousin Blitzy and poor Blitzy, who is an only child, discovered the joys of being the object of a toddler’s attention. It was a zoo but a lot of fun,
June 19
MaCher wants to get rid of us (which we knew.) She is catering a big wedding on the 20th and is in the throes of cooking. I can help out with that but she also has other house guests who will be coming to stay (the wedding is that of a friend’s) and Blitzy and I will be two faces too many. That is why we decided to go to the Grand Canyon now and return to MaCher’s after. Gives her a chance to finish cooking and focus on her friends. Keeps me from having to be pleasant and all to folks I don’t know. It works for all of us.
We drove down to Cortez, NM today. What a ride! I missed the Rt. 24 exit so we ended up following the Arkansas river down. What fantastic scenery. The roads are steep and winding and I hated that I was driving. I would rather have been riding with my nose stuck to the window. The mountains are incredible and I’m so glad that so much of them are public land. I would hate for them to be developed. This land is really a treasure. It is so different from Michigan. I know that that is a “duh” statement but the beauty is overwhelming. There are deep canyons with fast, roiling creeks running through them. The vegetation is so different, aspen and pine and cactus and yucca and some of the most beautiful flowers. This has been a wetter summer than usual and we’re reaping the benefit. I grew up around mountains, the White Mountains in New England and the Alps in Germany, and the Rockies are are as different from them as they are from each other. The Rockies seem newer. The White Mountains are so old that time has rounded them down. They are there, but they meld into the environment, you notice them but they fit in. The Alps are newer than the White Mountains. They have that craggy beauty and they rise above the surrounding plains but humans have touched them and they aren’t so mysterious. They are prepossessing but familiar. The Rockies haven’t had the time to wear themselves into our experience the way the Alps have. They are massive, they give you the sense that they are still settling into the environment, that changes are still occurring and that there is more to come. In Europe, you work your way up to the Alps through foothills and valleys that were carved by glaciars. The Rockies are just suddenly there, rising out of the plains.
We came down out of the mountains into the high plains, a huge valley between two sets of mountains that rolled on and on. The land was spotted with cattle and here and there with small homes. The houses were all scattered and looked run down. I think that life out here is tough. It is a world bounded on all sides by mountains.
Back into the mountains but with a sense that we were heading south, and with real differences beginning to show in the vegetation. We came into high desert. It was drier and the plants showed it. We now see pinon and lots of yucca an other less hydrophilic plants. The trees are shorter and the plants more scattered.
June 20
Mesa Verde. We stayed in Cortez last night, first grungy hotel. Yechh. But Mesa Verde! To get to the cliff houses you drive twenty miles back up onto high mesas. I mean mountain size mesas. There were times when I was driving on a road that was a thousand feet higher than the ground below. It was incredible scenery, and because of it being a wetter than usual season there are wild flowers everywhere. This is high desert. Mesa Verde has been hit with lightning numerous times in the past ten years and there is a lot of fire damage. You see the charred skeletons of pine and oak everywhere, and everywhere you see the grasses and transitional scrub coming back in. The ranger said they’d had about 5 major wild fires in the past decade, all started by lightning.
We went to Spruce House. It is the most accessible but even then you have to climb down into a deep canyon. The house was built right into a cave in the wall of the mesa. Kiva’s were carved out and I went down into one. It is a round chamber with a ledge running around it. There was only one other person down there when I went down and the quiet was incredible. I understood why they were places where one communed with the gods. For me, as an anthropologist, I always wonder why; why did the folks who populated these mountains and built these incredible dwelling places do so? They started out on top of the mesas, and even when they moved down into the canyons they continued to farm and harvest the mesa tops. How did they come to this place and why? Where did they start out from? We know so little about the people who lived here. I know that we have the material remnants of their lives, their pottery and toys and tools. But we can never know why they left where they were and why they moved down into the canyons and why they then left.
We spent the morning wandering around Mesa Verde (and driving in and out of the site!) then drove down to Flagstaff. It is amazing to me how familiar Flagstaff, and most of the large towns/cities we’ve been through are. You see all the same stores everywhere. Strip malls and suburbia every where. Even when the scenery is different, the lay out is the same.
On a less thoughtful note... we lucked out and are benefitting from President Obama’s stimulus package. This is a free weekend at all National Parks. No entry fees. In retrospect, I guess I’m surprised there weren’t more people there. it was surprisingly uncrowded at Mesa Verde today.
June 21
Summer Solstice today. An auspicious day to visit the Grand Canyon. Blitzy is grumpy. “Why are we doing this? It’s just a big ditch” “Lets just go home”.
I’m so glad we went to the Grand Canyon. Wow. I had to laugh at the kid. He did one of those lightning fast attitude changes when we go to the edge of the Canyon and he looked down, and down, and down. It is amazing to think that all of this is as “recent” as it is. I don’t have words to describe the Canyon. I took some photos, and I’ll post them but they won’t even convey the grandeur. I can’t imagine ever being jaded to the point where the Canyon would loose it’s magnificence and become mundane. Our day was good. The sun was out, it wasn’t rising or setting, there were no phenomenal plays of light across the Canyon. The lighting was regular and even and still the view was awe inspiring. We looked down on birds flying below us, way below us and we could make out some of the trails that lead down into the Canyon. I think I would like to someday take one of the tours of the Canyon bottom. Wow.
June 22.
Drove to Santa Fe today. Stopped at Thoreau where I went to third grade and took a picture of the mission school. It looks different (1960 was a while ago) and tried to get up into the mountains where we lived but the access road is closed off. A utility company has control of the land there and the road up into the mountains is closed. The base we lived on was at 8600 feet so we lived a ways off the highway (then 66,now 40). I took pictures of the mesas beyond Thoreau. I remembered them as soon as I saw them. The base was called Continental Divide (not to be confused with the town a little west and north of the site) and it was my favorite of all the places we ever lived (even Europe.) I wish I could of gone back into the mountains and seen it again, even if all the buildings are gone. As a side note. We drove south first this morning. Sedona and the red rocks are just a little south of Flagstaff and, being the new age, woo woo person I am I wanted to see Sedona. I wish I hadn’t. I had this romanticized vision of this small, quiet, town in the middle of red rocks and mountains that lend themselves to peaceful meditation and tranquility. I found a place that puts Cape Cod to shame for touristy bull****. I had to laugh. There were signs everywhere for this therapy and that therapy and expensive cars and stores selling chotzkis everywhere. Sigh, another dream dies. I did get a great latte though.
June 23
I’m moving to Santa Fe. Georgia O’Keefe had the right of it. Speaking of whom, her museum is wonderful. I’m in love with Santa Fe and the land around it. See ya. I don’t want to leave.
June 24-26
Back at MaCher’s. Sitting still for a couple of days. Family stuff, usual family discussions, at least in our family. I’m liberal, they’re all conservative. You do the math. It’s fun and stimulating and I’m so glad to be with family. Left on the 26th and got into Kansas. I love my colleague from Kansas (at OC) but I have to say that Kansas just seems to stretch on, and on, and on, and...
June 27
Got to Topeka. We stopped at the Brown v. Board of Education historic site. it is part of the National Park System and it is a great site. The site is the old school that was the center of the Brown law suit. The Park Service has used the facility and worked exhibits into the building rather than redo the building to suit the exhibits. They have a great series of multi-media presentations on discrimination and segregation in the old gym and the standing exhibits are well done and convey a sense of what was going on in the 50’s vis a vis segregation. Blitzy was really impressed. I could tell because he took a great deal of time going through the exhibits, asking questions and talking to the park “rangers”. I remembered going to school in 1959 in Mississippi. I was very clearly from New England. I sounded different and acted different I remember getting in “trouble” because I hung out with the only other kid who was a much an outsider as I was. She was black and I didn’t know that I wasn’t “supposed” to play with her. The other kids called us names and my teachers tried to get me to play with my “own kind”. Bless my folks. They explained (or tried to) what was going on and told me to play with whomever I wanted to play with. It was the same when we moved to New Mexico for the fourth grade. I evidently wasn’t supposed to play with the Navajo kids there either. I hope things have changed.

I’m sitting watching the rain pelt down and listening to the hail hitting the air conditioner outside the room. We’re in Grand Island, Nebraska and there is a tornado watch on. There actually was a tornado a bit north of here so... The weather here is so mid-continental. Well, the tornado siren just went off again. Got to go out in the hall. The northern sky looks clear but the southern sky sure doesn’t. Okay, they are off again. In the hallway, out of the hallway. It’s supposed to calm down tonight. I hope so. I wish I had a video camera that worked well, I’d do a video clip for my Physical Geography class. I should have expected it. This morning when we were heading north on 20 there was a convoy of five vehicles with storm tracking equipment on the roofs of each car. It was very Hollywood.
Ashfalls fossil bed was extremely interesting. It is an ash layer from volcanic explosion from the Yellowstone hot spot. I believe the volcano was in what is now Idaho when it blew. It happened about 12 million years ago. It caught all sorts of mammals grazing in the savanna that was then Nebraska. It didn’t kill them right away, instead, it killed them gradually by ruining their lungs. The site now has a barn like structure covering the excavation. It’s a really interesting place. There are all sorts of different mammals there. The Barrel Rhino is their star (they have a lot of them.) It has a Rhino head on a Hippo body and, fully grown was about 10 feet long and 10 feet around. There were also several different types of horses. http://www.ashfall.unl.edu/ashfallanimals.html Blitzy really liked the Rhino and the horses. I was totally enamored of the fact that there were tiggywinkles (hedgehogs) there, then. (Too much Beatrix Potter as a child I guess.) The hedgehogs evidently provided sustenance for one of the crane like birds.
South Dakota and the Badlands aren’t too much further north than where we were and, as you drive through the area you can see the Badlands under the grasses that cover the layers of rock, chalk, ash and other sedimentary structures. The land rolls with deep valleys and rounded hills. There are cattle and cornfields everywhere. We passed the Dixon County Feedlot and there must have been at least a thousand cows in the lot, and, it wasn’t even close to getting crowded. As we came down one of the hills there were two Mourning doves, young ones, in the road. They flew up as I came driving down. One flew off to the side but the other flew straight into the car. I slowed down and stopped and walked around front. It had flown into the grill and its tail was sticking straight out. I feel terrible about killing it but it looked really silly. I wanted to take a picture but Blitzy said “what happens in Nebraska, stays in Nebraska.” Between the dumb bird and my kid, I was laughing for the next thirty miles or so.
I tend to forget that Nebraska was part of the Wild West, but when you get out into those hills you can imagine how overwhelming it must have been.
I can’t imaging going up and down that terrain in a Connestoga. I have to say, I didn’t really feel like we were in the west until we crossed the Missouri this morning.

Well, this is day two of the trip. As a caveat, because a couple of folks read my “teaching” journal, I’m doubling up here and repeating myself. It's morning in Missouri Valley, Iowa. We didn't get here until 11PM local time last night (midnight at home) because the start of the trip was like a three stooges comedy. We finally got on the road at 10:30, only because I had to do this and that and...oh yeah, bring the degu food to the college so farsarian can feed Diegu, and then, we were off, to the grocery store, because we hadn't gotten any road food. So while I was there, getting olives and carrots and pears and apples and stringcheese and....I remembered something that was absolutely critical. So, call to my husband, who is staying home (does NOT like road trips, especially marathon road trips) who drove it down to Marshall.
Okay so NOON, and we're on the road. Next stop, Battle Creek, "Mom! Please? Sweetwater Donuts for the trip?"
Okay so then we were on our way, and we were. We drove across Michigan, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa, 636 miles. It is amazing how similar in some ways the geography is and how different in others. As you get to the west of Illinois the land changes, you begin to see a lot of glacial remnants as you go along. At one point, we drove between the two halves of a glacial esker. You can see drumlins and moraines as you look out at the land. It's easier to see at this time of year because the crops are still "short" and you can see differences in the topography you can't see when the corn and soy are high.
As you get to the Mississippi, the land starts to get very hilly and as we came across northern Iowa (where I've never been) I was amazed at how the hilly the land is. We drove by one valley, very small, but you could see the most incredible example of a river meander I've ever seen. It is "new" geologically speaking and it was a creek that is cutting through some of the richest, loamiest, looking soil I've ever seen. The creek meandered through this valley, cutting through the soil, it looked to be about 6 feet deep and maybe 6 feet across and the meander cut was straight down. None of the sides were collapsed, It just went straight down. I wanted to stop and take pictures but as traffic was barreling along that wasn't going to happen.
As night came on we started to get to the windmills. Did you know they are doing a lot with wind farming here in Iowa. At first we saw one or two, then groups of five or six and finally, for fifteen minutes (at seventy mph, you do the math) all that we could see were the blinking red lights and spinning propellers of these incredibly huge machines. At night, like that, they looked like something from "Mars invaders". It was incredible. Check out the numbers of turbines here http://www.iowalifechanging.com/Business/downloads/IA_WindTurbine.pdf

We got to the Missouri River and Council Bluffs in full dark. I was bummed out because I really wanted to be able to see the vista but it was difficult in the dark. So, made it to the hotel, got some sleep and now, time to get on the road, earlier than yesterday. I made my coffee (how bad is this? I carried my own Cafe Feminino and half and half, maybe it is time to admit that I have a coffee problem.) Time to drink the caffeine, pry the 15 year old (my son, aka Blitzy) out of bed, and hit the road. Blitzy is in severe World of Warcraft withdrawal. Next stop, Ashfall Fossil Beds, Nebraska.

So, sitting here, getting ready to log in and see what my students are up to, like the two who got added into my Civ Studies class 'cause their face to face class didn't run (too few students) and who don't realize that online means online, "no, we don't meet in a classroom".
Reading email and the most recent missive from Geek Overlords, one of the few "catalogs" I don't junk because, well, they are just plain amusing. So, went to Geeky web place and found this in their random "here's what our customers have to say " page:

The Silmarillion - in 1,000 words
Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age

ELVES: Wonder what's going on over the ocean. This crafting deal is pretty sweet, though!
DWARVES: Yeah, seriously.
ANNATAR: Hi, elves! Wanna learn some cool stuff?
ELVES: Okay!
SAURON: They fell for it.
SEVEN DWARVES: Thanks for the rings! . . oooh, GOLD! MUST HAVE GOLD!
NINE MEN: Neat rings. . . Hey, didn't Mom die like six hundred years ago?
CELEBRIMBOR: Okay, how about we do three more and call it a wrap?
SAURON: How about I do one more and claim them ALL?
ELVES: AUGH!
SAURON: Bwa ha ha!
LAST ALLIANCE OF ELVES AND MEN: Push off.
SAURON: Make me.
ISILDUR: Whack.
SAURON: Ow.
ELROND: Hey, you got his ring. Let's ditch it.
ISILDUR: No.
ELROND: This sucks.
ISILDUR: Tell me about it. *dies*
GONDORIANS: *change calendar*
CIRDAN: Hi, wizards! You in the grey, catch!
SAURON: Okay, that's long enough. Movin' into Dol Guldur.
SARUMAN: It's not him. Also the ring's lost at sea.
RING: No I'm not.
THE WISE: Augh.
THE WEAK: Bad ring! Volcano for you!
RING: *melts*
SAURON: AUGH!
MORDOR: BOOM.
GONDORIANS: *change calendar*
ELROND, GALADRIEL: Road trip!
GANDALF: Hi Cirdan! Still got your ring!
CIRDAN: Cool. Let's go to Valinor!

by J. the Honourary Canadian
posted by someone else.
The End.

And to think I read the whole cycle 48 times. I coulda just found this. (But then I'd miss "my precious" so...)

I'm forging ahead on plans to take vacation. Yep. I'm getting out of here. Can I afford it? Not really, it will eat into any financial padding I have. Can I afford not to? No, absolutely not. It has been a really tough past couple of years. My beloved's bipolarness has been present and accounted for and I am just tired of coping all the time. Blitzy and I are going to take it on the road. Deliver some china to my sister in Colorado (for my niece in Japan) by way of Ashfalls Fossil Bed State Park, NE. Then to CO. Then to the Grand Canyon. I've never been. I'm so jazzed. Then home by way of sister's again then to Brown v. Board of Education National Hist. Site in Topeka, St. Louis Gateway, Cahokia Mounds and home.
My spousal unit is going to stay home and take care of the home front and attendant animals. He doesn't travel well. He has to eat at regular times, and does not do well at all when his schedule is disrupted. Road trips are, by nature disruptive and after some discussion he noted that he probably should stay home. I'm glad he noted that, please don't think ill of me, but I need some time when I'm not aware of and trying not to disrupt someone's psychological state all the time. I don't "enable" and I don't really make my life to suit his, but, when he is always on the edge of one extreme or another, and he is very needy, it can be very draining.
After we had our talk about the trip, he checked himself into the hospital for a week. I think I was supposed to relent and decide not to go on the trip but I'm not going to do so. I need a vacation and I can't check into the hospital for a week (he said it was relaxing and he enjoyed this stay.) So, I'm doing what I love to do and I am hitting the road.
Ah you say, what about the classes you're teaching. That's the beauty part of online. I can stop at Starbucks, all the hotels have highspeed internet. Hey, a friend did a class from Ireland, I'll still be on the same continent at least.
Well time to go see if the two students I haven't heard from have "shown" up.