I'D RATHER BE A RISING APE THAN A FALLEN ANGEL...

Quote by Terry Pratchett

Rob and family left for CA today for Chrissie, leaving me all alone, alone, alone...
This will be my first ever Xmas I have been alone, I think I'm old enough to cope, but It is nice to think that my previous 36 I have been surrounded by loved ones (and loot). In a way I'm still surrounded by loved ones but I tend to trip over them and gag at their poop a lot more.
Alone with 6 dogs and 2 ferrets. I'm the only one left to stem the tide of crap. The thin brown line.
The house is quiet...mostly...if you don't count the pitter patter of 32 tiny feet.

We had a break from fostering since Heidi, who is doing wonderfully. She is on her first CA road trip and will spread doggy love whence she goes.
There were no pups that needed it in the last few months. This month has been different.
I took Samantha and Friday home just for a week because they were looking sickly. A day at home and they were totally fine. They got adopted within days.

Samantha and Friday, foster pups

Last week at work, someone drove in dropped off a box in the carpark and drove away. Inside was four tiny Rotteweiler mix pups. Somehow, despite my rule of only 2 pups at once, Jedi mind trick were played upon me and I ended up with all four. Santa Vaca!

The four amigos

I set up a big pen in the middle of our kitchen, which despite it being in the middle of our kitchen is working out rather well. They are small enough that sleeping, eating and pooping are their main interests so they don't mind being cooped up a lot of the time. Plus the icky bits are mostly confined.
I gave them a bath today. Very cute puppies under all that grime.

Bath Time

I have one on my lap as I type so trying to avoid hand nibbles.
She has fallen asleep now...dang how to reach the wine?!

Onto non related dog news...don't look so shocked.

Rob turned 40 last week...still as gorgeous as ever.

Us camping at Fossil Creek

Rob and lovely Leala...Hopi Salt Trail, Grand Canyon.

He has been mostly unemployed all year, been working on and off for Mike as a construction monkey which I must say has done rather pleasant things for his abs.

The best pressie he got was a offer of a job at the Uni starting in Jan. Yeehaaaa..
We are all very happy. If he hadn't gotten this job then we would have had to seriously think about moving to a bigger city with better opportunities. Neither of us wants to move just yet, and the places we would want to move to are exactly like here, the smaller places with no jobs. So despite the fact its awesome he has been home to walk the dogs and cook me dinner, a reasonable paid job is a great thing right now.

Kate and Co have booked their tickets for Feb for a month. I'm sooooooo happy. They will spend some time here, a week in the Yucatan climbing Mayan pyramids and then off to New York. It will be 2 years since I've seen them (except once on webcam ..omg Hal's voice has broken!..) so I'm very much looking forward to this.
Hal will be staying with us (if all goes well with visa's and such) for 3 months on a school exchange. It will be a great opportunity for him and us. Though I have no idea what to do with a 15 year boy in my house... ummm buy lots of food, NetNanny the computer, insert a GPS chip. Any suggestions welcome.

SNOW DAY PART THE SECOND

It dawned bright, blue and sunny, and ohh sooo dazzling to my eyes..my eyes I tell you.
Not having to go anywhere by car, which was good because the road wasn't plowed and we have sharp steep corners at either end of our road, which can add extra fun to the driving experience.



Instead we forged forth up the hill onto the mesa. The snow was past my knees and occasionally up to my butt.



Always a delight to watch the dogs bound, swim and burrow through it. It is so pretty, everything was clean and untouched, until we came through stumbling around and laughing.


After our walk we came home to thaw out for a hour or so, when the family came over to go sledding. They couldn't get the ute up our hill so parked it below and walked up with sleds and pizza.


We have a awesome hill right by our house so we went and threw ourselves down it for a while. A couple of times went down so fast I got brain chill from the outside in.



The dogs most favourite yet annoying game is chasing the sledder down the hill barking all the way. Good exercise for them running up and down the hill a squillion times, as well as dodging the snowballs and sleds that got thrown at them.



Little Heidi did great for her first real snow, her legs aren't very long so she gets buried and sinks. But kept up with the big dogs and people pretty well.
After we all had sledded out we retired to home for hot drinks, pizza and games.

SNOW DAY

That's what's it's called round these parts when it snows so much the schools and brothels are shut.
The schools have a certain number of days that they can close due to the snow, if they go over them then they have to make up the days and shorten the Spring break...the brothels I can't speak for...

A snow storm, nay blizzard has moved in. It has not stopped snowing all day and will continue off and on for the rest of the week. I'm very glad I had today and have tomorrow off work. Wednesday i need to go to work, see if I can get off our hill to potter through town. Our street is a loop and sharp turns at either side...can be scary when icey, but there isn't too much to hit when sliding out...one hopes.
I said this before, many many times. Snow is really really beautiful. Like the magic seductive apple...bite it and everything is sparkly and your throat get all tingly...even when sliding the car out uncontrollably down the hill, its still pretty and you yearn for it.
Snowboarding.
And silent, almost too silent.
With rain you hear the gurgle, drum, splash, erosion and thank the gods the moisture has arrived.
Here we just get the latter.
Our street has maybe 2 street lights which are orange, so normally when you go out at night its totally dark with a fairly good look at the stars. Part of the Dark Skies community.
Tonight, its 8:30pm and its like dawn out there. All the lights from the town are reflecting off the clouds turning the landscape a dull yet visionary orange ... the most quiet of post apocalyptic nights.

We shoveled the driveway 3 times today...we had no plans to go anywhere but its way easier to do it every few hours than try and move 3 foot of snow at once. And plus its fun. Yes fun, the dogs go crazy, good exercise, little if no traffic and I'd rather work in the snow than the rain any day.
Plus a central heated house and mulled wine is feet away.


More snow posts to come...you can't stop this.

37...NOT THE MOST EXCITING NUMBER BUT HAS IT'S HIGHLIGHTS

According to wiki 37 bc was the year that Caligula was proclaimed Emperor and made himself God. That guy knew how to party. One of my enduring images in the last 37 years was watching as a youngster (10-14 maybe?...Mum do you remember?) the BBC show ' I Claudius' (it came out in '76 i would have been 4 so probably didn't get the first showing) was the scene where Caligula cuts out his child from the womb of his sister (that image has never left my head)...ohh and the horse as senator and even then i has a crush on Derek Jacobi.
37... what else...Nero was born that dirty fiddler, and a earthquake destroyed Antioch.

The source of Fossil Creek

It is a prime number, the fifth lucky prime, the first irregular prime, the third unique prime and the third cuban prime of the form

Sounds exciting....I guess if you are into that kind of thing.
Lucky Prime is that like Optimus's slightly lamer sibling

Rubidium atomic number 37, sounds special huh?
Something that would power wormholes and cybernetics.

Rubidium is very soft and highly reactive
Rubidium is not known to be necessary for any living organisms.
hmmmm

Anyhoo Happy Birthday to me. I made it to another one.
YAY!

It's a dogs life. Old Fossil creek dam, now waterfall

Things are all good here. Nothing dramatic to report just cruising along happily.
We went camping just before Thanksgiving for two nights. Hiked down to Fossil Creek, one of the prettiest places I been to for a while. I think its a mad house in summer but we had the whole place pretty much to ourselves, apart from the odd raccoon invading the camp.
The creek burbles out of the ground and is surprisingly not toe numbing cold.
It used to be damned but now is allowed to flow free and wild once again.

Not to give him a big head, but he is rather a large part of why life is wonderful.

My big sis Kate and family are visiting in February. Excited much...ohh yeah! It will have been 2 years since I've seen them and Snowpea will be turning 12 and Hal is 15. Its going to be sooo much fun, I may not let them leave.
We are planning on a week or so exploring the Yucatan, Mexico. I was there a few years ago with my American family and nothing beats climbing Mayan pyramids and sipping Margaritas on the beach.
Can get flights and a all inclusive beach resort for $600-$1000 per person for a week. Will avoid Cancun except for the airport and head south to the much nicer Tulum area.

Raccoon attempting Jedi mind tricks on us to step away from the backpacks full of tucker. It only made me want to go catch fish with my hands.