Sunday August 19 2007

Packed up and Ready to Go Home

Look at Sparky, he absolutely loves Clayton.

He just sits by him all the time and gazes into Clayton's eyes.
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My family left for home today and were gone by about 7 a.m. I'm always very sorry to see them go. I get to see them so seldom and they are so far away. Debbie called about 6 p.m. and said they were just getting in to Vegas so they made pretty good time and got back home safely. She said it was 47 degrees when they left here and was 104 down there.

I got all the sheets washed in the morning. Then decided to take the day off, so turned on one of the movie channels and caught up my reading. Never thought I'd get through them all, but did go through all my back art and other magazines. I clipped out the pictures I wanted to keep and file, and saved some of the more serious reading for later. I felt obligated to read about a year and a half of Reader's Digest and stacked them up on my desk for several days. THEN..... threw them all into the recycling bag. I was pretty proud of myself that I was able not to be obsessive about thinking I had to read them all from cover to cover, since I'd only bought the subscription to help Clay with a fund raiser project at school. It was a big relief to let go of them all. Joe also took it easy today, and mostly just sat and watched sports.

The power went out for several hours in the afternoon until 7:30 or so. There were severe thunderstorm warnings and high wind up to about 60 mph. I don't remember that we got much rain here out of it, but they did get flooding in the northern part of the county. I fixed hamburger mushroom onion gravy over rice for dinner and luckily it was done early.

Saturday August 18 2007

Aubrey and Clay at Dollar Lake

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Buck Deer

Fisher Kid

Clay and Debbie at Green River Lake

Cow Moose

Debbie has always loved to fish.
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The kids were going fishing again today, and I decided I'd better work at home or I'd end up way too tired. Aubrey called several days ago to invite us to dinner next Thursday. He fishes all the time, so I asked him if he knew a good place for them to go where Clayton might be sure to catch a fish. And he said he would take them. We all jumped at the chance for that, because Aubrey always knows where to catch fish. I called him back this morning as asked if he could go today and he said yes, he would meet them at Faler's parking lot where they met about 10:30. They went back to the Upper Green - Beverly drove up the rough road again. They only got one fish and Debbie caught it. Then they got rained out. Another thunderstorm came along with lots of lightning cracking around close by so they quit. They got back to town and had dinner at the Mexican restaurant and back home maybe about 7 p.m. The good thing is that Clayton will probably have more fishing trips to try for his badge. They seemed to have a wonderful day out in Wyoming's back country. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR BEING SO KIND AND HELPFUL, AUBREY.

Beverly sent some of her photos to me for the blog, since I didn't go along to get any that day.

So I caught housework up at home, got unpacked, organized and did some laundry. Joe wanted more weedeating done so he could work at the septic field, so I spent another 3 or 4 hours weedeating. Sheral and Dick came over in the middle of the afternoon and brought some nice clothes from her sister Noleen's closet purge for Beverly to try. She had a lot of barely worn or even new things. So I took a break for an hour or so and we had a nice visit. Then went back to weedeating for a while longer. I had another shower and Joe and I had leftover Chinese food. That used the five doggie boxes of leftovers that had been filling up the fridge. It was pretty good, and I was glad it was an easy meal just to heat up.

We looked at the clothes after dinner, and Beverly decided it would be best to take them home to try them, and maybe she knew some other friends that size to try them too. I wished I was smaller and would have been able to use some of them. We started to watch The Weatherman with Nicholas Cage (I usually like movies with him), and shortly came up an entirely outrageous inappropriate scene for Clay to watch. It was so embarrasing and that about ruined our movie night. I never thought to look at the rating first.

It showered off and on all night, but still not enough here to make those puddles. We seem to miss all the heavy downpours and could sure use some of it.

Friday August 17 2007

Clayton Idaho

Idaho Farmland - Whatever that huge thing is, I like it.

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Wheat? Field Near the Snake River- Lots of Potato Fields There Too

Stopped for Roadwork


Debbie Drives

Clay shows us his new belt.

During the night I did my often usual thing of being awake most of the night. About 3 a.m. I sat watching TV, worrying and contemplating what to do about the darn computer, as I was very close to just leaving it there until they got it fixed. But finally came to the conclusion to go pick it up and take it to Pinedale after all. Then at least it wouldn't be 4 hours away when I had no hope of Best Buy bringing it to me later.

This morning we had what was left at the motel's continental breakfast, which got us by until lunch.

It was only about 160 miles from Salmon to Idaho Falls. We had a really lovely drive through remote-feeling country and ranch lands up the Lemhi River. We were paralleling the Montana border a short distance east. There were only about 4 tiny towns and a pretty large campground that we passed through until we got closer to Id. Falls. About half way it started to pour down rain, and I thought we'd have to pull over until it let up, but we eventually drove out of it. It was a real deluge for a while. As we came out of the mountains we could see the craters/buttes, blue in the distance, that Butte County is named for near Craters of the Moon and felt we had completed the circle.

Near Idaho Falls we got onto I-15 on in to town, and stopped at Smitty's for lunch. Then out to Best Buy to pick up the computer. We stopped at Roberts Crafts and Beverly got some scrapbooking supplies and I found some brushes and a paper pallette I needed. Then Beverly and Clayton got off at the big mall to shop for school clothes for him, and Debbie and I went to Best Buy just across the parking lot.

When I got in the store I went right to customer service and said I wanted to see the store manager.....demanded actually. Of course he wasn't there, and again I wasn't surprised....but she got another manager named Mark. Debbie had warned me not to get too feisty because this was the guy that would help me. I didn't believe her. I started pouring out my story of all the electronic woes and tech support misery and that I wanted my money back for the service plans they obviously didn't intend to honor, and I'd take my computer back unrepaired. But darned if he didn't listen, and when I came to the TV he said wait a minute, how did a TV get into this conversation? To make a very long story short, he said they would fix my computer and if they had to fix it three times I would get a new one (not counting twice I had to take it to Pinedale already because the geek squad wouldn't respond). And for me to go pick out a new TV. Brandon would deliver them both next Friday. In fact Mark said he had never heard of anyone ever getting a reconditioned TV.

The time in the store amounted to about an hour, but I felt like problems had all taken a turn for the better. We picked up Clayton and Beverly at Dillards door, and went to Cold "Whatever" for an ice cream. I got one way too big, but ate it all anyway. We still were wondering if we should go over Teton Pass to see Virginia and Calvin as it was probably the only chance they would get. But we decided to just go on home.

The rain continued to follow us past the Palisades, but at the time it was just showering off and on. It turns out it was very fortunate we didn't go over Teton Pass and spend that time in Jackson, because later that evening it rained about 3" in a short time and caused disastrous mud slides through the Hoback Canyon between 7 and 9 p.m.. We must have just missed it all by only an hour or so by getting through when we did.

Well....that isn't the end of the story. We had been hearing a noise in the back left wheel. I had heard this loud sound since Round Hill which has a long stretch coming out downhill on a dirt road - and often in the past I had heard a small squeaking - what I always call dust in the brakes. But this sounded like rocks in the hubcaps, or else something really going bad wrong. When we got to Alpine Junction the girls wanted to listen to it again and convinced me that something was wrong and we'd better get it taken care of. We rolled the car and listened to the sound. It was about 10 minutes to five. I remembered when my car had broken down in that same exact spot 3 years earlier and said maybe we could call the place that fixed it in Afton about 30 miles south of there. I called Robinson Motors and Bobby answered and told her we might be having trouble with a wheel. She even remembered me from that other time.

She said there was an underbody shop at Etna, about 5 miles down the road and maybe those guys were still there, but Robinson would close and all the help be gone at 5. So she called the underbody guys and we drove down there. I rapped on all the doors and finally at the last door a face appeared in the garage door window, startling me. He opened the door and two young guys came out. They looked at the wheel and we all talked, and they told us the brakes were nearly gone and if we slammed on the brakes for a deer they would fail, etc. etc. But concluded if I was really careful I could get home and then back to Pinedale to get it fixed on Monday (nothing is open anywhere on the weekend, and not likely to get in in Jackson either (and lucky we didn't take that option - who knows how long we would have been stuck there!). It came to mind all that curvy mountain driving we'd just done the last two days and it occurred to me maybe it was lucky we hadn't plunged into the river somewhere.

I drove about 45 to 55, slowed down on curves by just taking my foot off the accelerator and gearing down, and only touched the brakes three times between there and Pinedale - and that's all the way through Snake River Canyon, the Hoback Canyon and over the Rim. Sometimes I had a line of traffic behind me, but that was their problem.

So we just gently drove on toward home with no inkling of what was to come along behind us. We stopped for dinner at the Chinese restaurant, and when we came out of there it was pouring down rain again, like dumping buckets, with lots of thunder and lightning. The streets were flooding full with water. We had to dash for the car so not to get wet. We also stopped and filled up with gas. The road was so covered with water I had to judge where to drive by the reflector marker posts. At about Boulder the rain nearly quit. It had only barely sprinkled at home, but did rain most of the night.

Now I had another seriously broken thing to worry about. Every functional thing we have is broken.....remember starting with the well problem last spring.

Here is a copy of the news release from Friday, August 17, 9:00 PM Update: The Sublette County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO) is alerting the public to four separate mudslides that have closed the Hoback Canyon between Bondurant and Alpine Junction on US 191 north of Pinedale. Thunderstorms are bringing heavy rain and intense lightning this evening. Three slides were reported around 7:45 PM. A fourth slide occurred between 8:30 and 9:00 PM. These are separate slides within a five mile stretch of US 191 in the canyon around the Granite Creek area between mile markers 151 and 156. The slides are in both Teton and Sublette County and crews from both counties are responding to work to clear the slides from both ends of the canyon. One of the slides on the southern end was described as at least 70 feet across and around six feet deep. Another account said one slide was 300 feet across. The slides dumped mud and rocks all the way down into the Hoback River in several places nearly blocking the river. US 191 is closed until further notice. WYDOT crews estimate the road may be closed until 3:00 AM or later into Saturday morning. There had also been reports of funnel clouds on Wednesday in Sublette County as thunderstorms went through on the day we left home.

Melita had an awful story, as Friday was the day they went up to pick up one of her daughters from the plane in Jackson. The road closed and they had to go over Teton Pass down through Alpine and Afton to Kemmerer and all the way back to Pinedale. They got home at 3 a.m. I also heard that after the road opened the highway was very slick with the mud from the slides for some time. I'm curious to go see the changes there now.

Thursday August 16 2007

STANLEY BASIN PHOTOS:

Headwaters of the Salmon River just over Galena Pass

Redfish Lake Beach

Redfish Lake and the Sawtooth Mountains



Redfish Marina in front of the Lodge

Stanley Basin

SUN VALLEY PHOTOS:

Sun Valley Ski Hill

Lynn At Ernest Hemingway Monument - He wrote in Stanley and Sun Valley a lot.

Outdoor Cafe/Bakery for Breakfast

Deb Bev Mom - Taken by Clay

Sun Valley Inn

Caution!! Swans are Dangerous.

Ice Skating Rink - Middle of August!!

Sun Valley Hotel Granny, Debbie and Clay

Thursday Morning we didn't get out of the motel until almost 10 a.m. I had wanted to see the Ernest Hemingway monument and make a circle drive from Ketchum around through Sun Valley and end back up in Ketchum before heading on to Stanley and Redfish Lake. We found the small, and quite obscure monument and then with just a turn into a parking lot we were in the midst of luxury at the Sun Valley Inn area where we found an outdoor restaurant to have a nice breakfast under yellow umbrellas. Breakfast was wonderful, and after some encouragement to walk around after Beverly and Clayton took a walk, I could see what a beautiful area it was.

There were some shops we went into. I saw a sale for 60% off and checked that out. One sweater I liked was originally $475, so I didn't buy it, but did feel everything. I think they must have been cashmere. We went in to both big hotels just to gawk, and used the luxurious restrooms - marble walls floor to ceiling in the stalls even, with fruit wood doors on each. There were several small lakes with swans swimming on them. There was an outdoor ice skating rink where skaters were being coached. There were very huge expensive homes, many next to the several golf courses. Lots of money there. All the landscaping was exquisite and beautifully manicured. Flowers were massively abundant and colorful. We couldn't agree on how to get on the right roads to make that short circle drive, so just came back out the way we went in. I have another bunch of photos, and will try to pick a few of the best and most interesting to show our day.

From there we went over Galena Summit and immediately were at the headwaters of the Salmon River and an historical gold mining area. Here the mighty River of No Return is the size of a small creek. It wasn't far to go on to see Redfish Lake with the Sawtooth Mountains as a backdrop. We were in the Sawtooth National Recreation Area where I missed getting a stamp for my book, and the White Cloud Peaks. We drove along the lake shore and campgrounds and got rained on, with thunderstorms rumbling all around, and actually saw where lightning struck a hill to start a fire that wasn't there when we arrived. They had a helicopter with a big bucket dumping water on it right away.

We went to the lodge and marina to check that out. There were lots of people on the beach or in paddle boats and a pretty big boat harbor there. We decided to have lunch. The food was not good. I ordered salmon potato chowder I thought would be wonderful but it was so solid and bad tasting I couldn't eat it (made with canned salmon with the bones in it if you can believe that). It was the worst thing I'd ever been served in my life, and I think you can tell by looking that I'm not very picky. When the waitress asked if I didn't like the soup, I told her what I thought of it, and she took it very personally. The kids were saying "MAA,,,,OMMMMM!" Anyway I didn't have any lunch, but didn't have to pay for it at least.

By now it was about 3 p.m. and we still had to get to Salmon where we did have a reservation this time, and not much to stop at between Stanley and there. The roads we had been on were scenic drives, so it was really pretty. Now we were driving down the Salmon River, and it wasn't too much up and down but very curvy and slow with lots of cliffs and other colorful formations. I didn't get any photos along this part because there was no place to pull over, so was sorry about that. We passed a small town named Clayton.

Late in the afternoon we called Best Buy to see if the computer had been repaired. No....it hadn't even been looked at and the repairman had 50 computers in front of mine. Now another quandary to figure out....what to do now! And why am I not surprised? We discussed going home over Teton Pass instead of through Idaho Falls to see Virginia and Calvin (relatives in Jackson) and that was an option for tomorrow. The other thing was to go get the computer from Best Buy and take it to the repairman in Pinedale and pay for him to fix it. Also we could go to Idaho Falls, get the computer and still go see Virginia and Calvin. It would just make a very long day. Decisions Decisions.

We got to Salmon maybe close to sunset. I thought I had been there on a trip with Joe and that it was in a pine forest, but I didn't recognize a thing and no pine trees either so I guess I'd never been there before. He and I had driven along the Salmon River though, just not this part. I had been to Stanley when I drove sightseeing across Idaho to Seattle to get on the plane there when we went to Alaska several years ago.

We got settled in our motel and toured around the town looking for a place for dinner. We found a supper club called The Shady Nook that had pretty good food for a nice dinner. I hesitated when I saw their sign "Welcome Bikers", and the kids said "Oh Maoom", but it was a fine place. It was about 10 p.m. again before we got back to the motel for the night. Debbie had asked for a rollaway, but it was sitting in the hall and there was no place in the room to put it, so she got her money back. They had a pretty dorky young guy for a clerk. Probably all he does is play games on the computer.

Wednesday August 15 2007

Craters of the Moon National Monument

Lynn and Debbie

Lava

More Lava

Beverly at a Cinder Cone

Fixed Joe's breakfast, packed suitcases, and we had my SUV loaded up and heading out about 9 a.m. We passed Bob's Honey Truck coming to pump out our septic tank about 5 miles from home. We drove through the Hoback and Snake River Canyon and over to Idaho Falls. When we got there we had lunch at Garcia's (Mexican food), then took the computer over to Best Buy right nearby. I went to the geek squad desk and talked to the clerk. The girls helped me talk to him and see that they were going to do something for me. He happened to be the same Dustin I had talked to the day before, and he told me he remembered the phone call and yes of course if it was the network card they could diagnose the computer and have the card installed by the time we came back through on Friday, that it would only take about ten minutes. We said we'd call on Thursday to see if it would be ready Friday......to be continued.

We happily went on our way, heading toward Sun Valley. Clayton is so good to travel with. He enjoys the scenery or has a DVD player and watches movies, which on this trip was mostly Harry Potter. On the way we passed Craters of the Moon National Monument and stopped there so I could get my National Parks Passport book stamped with their cache. (Dang....I didn't realize there were several more places to get stamps along the way on our trip until after I got back home., so missed those - that means I just have to go back there again, right?) We took the 7 mile scenic drive and I wish I could send you all the photos I took, they are so different and lovely. Craters of the Moon is a small National Monument and all volcanic - many shades of black, gray and dark purpley colors. You should see the place where the campground is - on a jumbled lava flow with black cinders- a minimum of any vegetation. There is a small white plant or lichen growing on the black, which was very unusual. I'm glad we took the drive and really enjoyed it.

Then we went on through desolate desert country, actually I think that area is called the Snake River Plains - the river being to the south, and talked about how hard it would have been for the pioneer wagon trains to travel through here. The scenery changed to ranch lands on toward Picabo where the skier Picabo Street is from, and the mountains where we found a motel in Ketchum for the night. We hadn't made a reservation but turned down the first room we looked at, and took the second one. We had two queen beds and Debbie and I slept together and Clayton and Beverly slept together. Otherwise to get two rooms would have been about $350. We all like to be together anyway.

Town was pretty full with the tourist season. We walked downtown and after looking at several options found an Italian place with outdoor seating, Rico's Pizza and Pasta. It was pretty late by the time we ate, almost 10 p.m. by now and kind of late for dinner, but I ordered salad and fettuccine and it was very rich, fairly good. Walked back to the motel.

Tuesday August 14 2007

Sunset at Ranch Buildings in Daniel Coming Home From RHR on Saturday

Today Bev, Deb and Clay took their lunch and went fishing on the Upper Green. Clayton needs to catch two fish in order to get a fishing badge in Boy Scouts. He's enthused about working to earn Eagle Scout. Debbie really enjoys fishing so she got the license. We got the fishing rods and tackle box out of storage in the garage for them to use. They went to Dollar Lake and all the way up to Green River Lakes. But they didn't have any luck catching fish. The road up there is very rough and Beverly didn't like taking their truck up there. (She said her air conditioning fan went out when they got back and she wonders if the road shook it to pieces. Of course they need the air in Nevada so she got it fixed right away.) They didn't get any fish either, but I think they had a nice day. They saw 3 or 4 moose and some deer. I would have loved to go fishing, but stayed home to catch things up. The house needed to be shoveled out, and there was a lot of laundry to be done. Just to have some quiet time to myself I went out and straightened up the Art Show in the Barn a little bit and played with the horses. (The ad for the show I ordered two weeks ago didn't come out in the paper again, so I haven't had any calls and summer is almost over.)

First thing in the morning Joe was out digging up the septic tank access. Joe asked me to clear away the tall weeks and thick grass there so he could get in and work on the drain field. That afternoon I spent about 3 hours weed eating out in the fenced off section next to the septic drain field. The Heningers came over in the afternoon and I quit for a while to take a break while they were here, then went back to it. I got it about half done and that was plenty for one day. That grass is horrible, very tall and strong. You could make rope out of it. I like to clear that section out every year, for one thing in case of fire. But it doesn't get mowed with the yard or the hayfield and the horses don't graze there, so it needed to be done. Joe called Bob to bring his Honey Truck and clean out the tank. Bob said he could come the next day. I'm positive the problem was just too many people all at once overwhelmed the system. You could see that it seemed to be draining out pretty well when he got in there working, so I think things were basically o.k. It just had been a long time since any maintenance had been done and it was time to take care of that.

I called the Best Buy store in Idaho Falls to ask about bringing the computer in and talked to a kid named Dustin. He assured me that they could get it fixed to bring home by Friday afternoon, so I decided to take it there and use the warranty to fix it.

It rained again later that day accompanied by another rainbow in the evening. The kids decided to eat dinner in town after their day fishing and went to the Chinese restaurant. They got home about dark. We enjoyed visiting for a while before bed. And also began to get things together for our trip to Idaho. We would leave in the morning, and I planned to take the computer to Best Buy.

Monday August 13 2007

Reminiscing the Olden Days

The Dogs Love to Have Company Too - They are a Pack

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Loading The Truck

Today was another round of visiting, about like yesterday. Everyone had been taking lots of walks which the dogs loved. Debbie vacuumed for me and everyone helped out with meals etc. Gig worked more on the computer. And he put on my keyboard drawer on the new desk which I have procrastinated doing for so long. THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR HELP, GIG!! It was decided there were three options for the fate of the computer, take it to the repairman in Pinedale to see if it needed the network card and pay to have him install it, take it back to Best Buy on our trip and ask for my money back, or ask Best Buy to repair it on the warranty and deliver it back to me (which by now I held no hope for that to happen).

Gig and Janet were going to leave in the afternoon. - Gig had been sent by his company for a job in California near where they had lived. They were taking a truckload of their things from storage in California- where it had been stored for the last 3 years or so - back to their new home in Texas. They had unloaded it all into Joe's shop so they could use their truck up at Big Sandy and now had to reload it all, and hook up a small motorcycle trailer they had also brought and left here. (Gig races motorcycles, or used to.) But when they had packed up their stuff and were ready to leave they found out their battery was dead. They had left one of those plug-into-the lighter-socket refrigerators plugged in overnight. Joe was able to recharge the battery. So they didn't get away until after dinner. I made some different kinds of homemade pizzas and salad for dinner with watermelon for dessert. By then the battery was charged up and they took off. Janet called the next day and said they had gotten as far as Craig CO before they got a motel. And probably got to Austin the next day. They are long distance driving champions.

Well.....at some point in all this hullabulloo, Beverly came and asked for the plunger and said the toilet wasn't flushing down like it should. When Joe saw the plunger and wanted to know what it was for he knew the septic system was on big time overload with so many using the facilities.
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