Spring Flowers 2019

The Reata Wash trail is an 8 mile out and back from my house, with about 500 vf and enough rocks to make it a good hour-long workout. Its outside the Preserve, and not a lot of people, so I can ride it anytime and usually have Dia offleash. Every color of wildflower comes out, sometimes entire fields of yellow brittlebrush.

Spotted a penstemon, which I’ve never seen here before. And a globemallow at the takeoff for this natural channel. This channel changes constantly, sometimes its too sketchy to jump into and too chunky to ride. Today it was in great shape.

 

 

 

 

Next day Beckie and I took our friend Jennifer Mac out to pose for her amazing new camera.

Couldnt get enough flowers after 2 days of riding, so I drug G out for a loop around Granite Mountain after school on Monday.

Sunday we motivated to Tom’s Thumb for the show.

 

Dumb Summer Remodel

We got the house exterior painted this summer, top to bottom and all the folds. It necessitated a peel-down, contraction, cleansing, and renew of everything outside. Our dwelling’s kombucha, wash and facial. The entire house looks 10 years younger!

Next came the lawn. I’m so glad that’s gone, constant maintenance of the sprinkler heads  hopelessly spraying alkaline water and surviving direct sunlight in AZ. Grass is not meant to thrive here, weeds and ants are. I got pleasure shutting off the system for two months until our install date.

We had this fountain out front that we turned off after a year in the house. It became the porch’s version of the covered pool table: a dumping ground for injured cactus. We filled the spaces sloppily with rip-rap and 10 years of shell collecting in Mexico. It all got emptied one hot afternoon when Alana and I were home during the teachers’ strike.

An idea emerged…

We needed some elevated bases. We had a lot of leftover paint, and a spill-welcoming back yard!! This took G and ‘lana hours under an EZ-Up and old t-shirts. Dirtbag Dadcamp.

The scorpion was mine. We’ll never see him again, but it pleases me to know he’s down in there.

We also had this concrete fish. Since 2000, when we moved into our Mesa house, which also had a ridiculous fountain. Our first month in Mesa, a heron stood lazily in the fountain and gobbled up the koy fish one-by-one. Then the pond rotted, inexorably grinding down Beckie’s patience for rebuilding pumps and mucking. We finally filled it in to secure a tenant during the Great Recession in 2010. I don’t know how the fish survived that purge. He’s really really heavy, he sat unpainted in a corner for another 7 years.

And was reborn. It took me as long as the cinder blocks did the girls; I was constantly consumed with curtailing their creation of a SuperFund site. Painting during triple digits is a dumb summer remodel. Fine brushes gum up, paint skims sticking become colored landmines. ead grass wafts into an actual image-filter gumming up fine brushes. My parenting skills validated by Alana voluntarily cleaning the continuum of gummy brushes, without being asked even twice. Can you open and seal 10 cans, prep a workspace,  and not get spattered? We went 13 days without a workplace accident.  When I do with the girls where they don’t know, and come away more knowing, is good parenting.

And this claw. One Monday morning there was a big dinosaur skeleton along the highway median. Still there Tuesday and Wed. Wednesday night Alana and I detoured home from soccer practice, only to find it was gone! Scavenged by a wayward paleontologist!! Thursday I retrieved the only remaining fossil half a mile further south.

welcome home, claw!

Our house is finally xeriscaped!

Saguaro Fruit Harvest

I met Bluebird 10 years ago, on a group ride from Crown King to Lake Pleasant. He drove the shuttle bus. I re-met him recently through the NoDDC efforts. This should be declared as a campaign donation, its been so cool.

Two weeks ago Bluebird hosted me, G and ‘lana on a walk through the State Land off Pima and Dynamite. He’s a naturalist, a survivalist, and otherwise a normal guy with an iphone. He showed us how to eat palo verde seeds, and mesquite pods. How to see mice trails in the ground, and hair and bones in coyote poo. The hands-on training had all 3 of us stoked about our 5am wake-up, and what we learned.

Two weeks later Bluebird hosted a saguaro harvest. G and I were both fired up to go! So, we are going to use some dried saguaro ribs, wrapped together, and whack the fruit off the top.

Split it open. No needles on the fruit, but fetching them off the ground G and I were constantly pulling needles out of our gloves. Everything in the desert bites, and everything that fell bounced down into a crack that had collected needles and burs

Respect to our place in the world prior to kickoff! No one kneeled for this national anthem. In our group of 6 we had 4 generations, a couple hippies, a couple kids, an ex-cop, a solid Republican or 2, and a hooligan. NoDDC has brought me together with all these people to find what we have in common.

so many barfing jokes.

This was so sweet and full of seeds, it was a natural goo shot. Fruity, freshy, but mild. It snuck up on us 1000 calories later when we all felt grossly full once the jelly and seeds broke down.

Next day breakfast, G needed flavor for plain yogurt on her pancakes. I too started my day with some scoops. We held a few and cut a few to see what the fridge and porch did to them. And will keep at this for a few more days. Yay Food!

I have a thing about not wasting food, co-influenced by knowing nothing about hunting or fishing. I can grow a plant, harvest it, use it to lure meat. This session was very empowering.

Bluebird showed us how to make a rope out of aloe spears. This is the next thing I need to learn from him!

Actual battle of non-stop bickering sisters proving the power of this rope.  Because, they couldnt even stop bickering enough to pose. They just had to fight.

That’s cool but if my friends ask where you are I’m gonna say

This kind of goodness has gotten so easy the family is bored and wants to go to Italy. #FWP.

Cinder blocks are not something ever known to be in short supply in Rocky Point?

Little tailgate before watching the Eagles. I appreciate the sports bar and the Sam’s Club more than any other americanization

I named the DH runs. This one is Speckles

And this is Spots; it has four booters

Low tide brought a 6-ft shelf in the estuary

Hard to see, but this bird’s beak was as big as its body

i dont know what this was, but I’m glad it didn’t eat me

butterflies everywhere

Soy es Alejandro

We have this new family psyche song

and we went up to Flagstaff to prove it

Bear Jaw – Abineau Loop

do you see the Grand Canyon?

Drove down Oak Creek Canyon the next day, to show everyone Hangover. Beckie and the kids have never seen anything like this masterpiece. The awe motivated all of our tired legs, mostly enough balance. Alana and I both were getting woozy on the backside. Can’t believe I cleaned as much of this as I did last time in about 2010, I’ve ridden so little gnar since my knee surgery.


To keep the hiking small after yesterday, we crawled the truck 3 miles up Schnebly Hill to the Cow Pies lot in the background, and after I hiked back up the road for the vehicle. That sucked.

Dip in Oak Creek under Midgley Bridge

Gorgeous Boys

Living with Cheeto is dysfunctional, like working in a cube farm with a stripper. You’re just trying to go to work, respect everyone, and leave. But she’s in stilettos and stripper clothes next to you, pole dancing up to standup meetings, pole dancing down to get coffee, flipping hair and arching her back every time she runs the debugger. It would be maddening. You’re not allowed to touch, cause that’s wrong, as it should be. But its awkward, staring so much. Cheeto is 20lbs of squishy cheddar cat magnificence.  He will mess you up with his sharp parts if you even look at him too close. Then he eats his neurosis away. Here’s a dollar bill kitty.

Kirby loves life and inappropriatenesses. He joins my B double E double R U N. He wants ham. He tolerates anything, for ham.

Mor’easter

A weekend without soccer or swim,  I will fill that void or die trying.

Trail 4 in Cave Creek. I think they wore the same clothes.

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We were just past the wildflower peak; this place must have been mind-numbing last month.

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Easter Eggs, we did that like pros, neat and efficient. Drank some coffee and made some pancakes, rolled around in our jammies til mid-afternoon, let the muse settle in. The snowboarder was some of my finest work.

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the wildflower field was way better up close.

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I put together a biking course in 45 min  – left chalk arrows out the door and back 3 miles later with our eggs in place.  The got every turn, with a little effort, ending at ‘our trailhead behind the school‘.  They dont have time to use their thinkers it goes so fast trying to keep 3 riders and 1 cattledog together. The last cue was some stacked rocks and a beer can.

They know this in the trail means stop.

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ready, set!

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the accounting

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Alana ended up with 58 total balls and G 59. I split the course along the path 75 yards out with a $5 ball at the end of each line, then shoved Alana off to the north before she could fixate on fighting with her sister going south. Dungeon-masterly, couldn’t have moved  it better with a couple killer hummingbirds and a coyote.

Faces of Elf Death

Killed by KitchedAid, 12.05.16
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Smoothies, 12.06.16
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Bury-Go-Round, 12.07.16

Dragon’s Lair, 12.08.16
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Cement Loafers, 12.09.16
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Fury Road, 12.10.16
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Silence of the Lambs, 12.11.16
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Every Rose Has Its Thorn, 12.12.16
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Xmas Sniper: Elf Obsession, 12.13.16
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Rat Hole, 12.14.16
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Dinner Time, 12.15.16
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The Bonnie Situation, 12.16.16
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Lighting Strikes Twice, 12.17.16
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Aliens, 12.18.16
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Shelob, 12.19.16
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Unicorns and Rainbows, 12.20.16
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Slushy, 12.21.16
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Ice Age, 12.22.16
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Forest in Winter, 12.23.24
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Silent Suffocation, 12.24.26
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Prison Shower Shanking, 12.25.16
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The Revenant, 12.26.16
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The Elf – Derrick Zoolander, performing all his own stunts.

Supgrade

I tried a friend’s fancy board this summer, and it opened my mind to my bumpkinism about SUPs. Our first board is an intro POS, heavy board heavy paddle, that I could trade on a good day for a midrange EZ UP or a couple pairs of nice kids-sized cleats. The table-stakes at the sport give you a taste of the stoke, but  you quickly tire of losing. Our board rides the water like an earthquake, gradually and inexorably tilting you into a swim. I tracks like a leaf and slogs even down current.

Beckie loves it, and I like it enough to lend her my ability to close. 3 days later, we had a new toy.

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Putting the money into it was never in doubt – I’ll keep my shitty truck for a few more years to redirect fundage into toys like this! The best part about outdoor toys (other than road bikes)  is that doubling costs have immense, performance-value sweetspot benefits still 10x cheaper than cars. I’m pleased to see I’ve gotten better and better at this meta-transaction, evidence by *ahem* a new board in 3 days!!!

NoSnow is at the Hawes’ trailhead, and we were not aimlessly driving out there. l It was a full morning. Beckie took G on a loop through TRW. Alana and I did the Canal trail and Tour De Backyards, for 4 miles of dirt and almost an hour of spin time!!!!
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Sunday, we drove the truck down into Bartlett Flats and pushed off into the lake, first time, and it was so fun! 2015_0927_Bartlett_Lake_01_blog

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It is so responsive, stable and fast! I could steer both directions from both sides, even the children were killing it.

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DirtBag DadCamp: Skating

“I wound up having to join AA. I don’t even drink. Just needed the stage time.”
–Bob Nickman

Allowing the girls to buy rollerblades made me complicit in their impending fractured ulnas. Despite what  Wayne LaPierre would have you believe, most people think giving a gun to your kid without training is foolish.

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Way back in March I signed them up for a free series of summer hockey lessons at the Ice Den, knowing they’d thank me when it was 110. Amazing choice for 12:30pm in June, it was almost too cold watching. Said no one in AZ, ever, at 12:30pm in June.

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A couple Wednesdays we went to free-admission at Skateland. If you snicker at going into the Mesa ghetto, you need to try it and get godsmacked at how much fun you had in the 80’s.

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Finally they were good enough to skate all the way to the high school, around and back! They didn’t exactly have fun, the reality of 1 degree downhill and uphill and brick sidewalks.

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