Life on the High Plains

36 years ago in a little chapel on the campus of the University of New Mexico I chose to love, honor, and cherish my best friend til death parts us. 36 years later I still love this man more than life itself.  He's working nights this week so we aren't going to celebrate until this weekend.  He has planned a wonderful weekend getaway in Denver which is going to be especially nice since I don't have to worry about homework and can just enjoy myself. Me?  I didn't do anything special (except order him a really great gift that is late arriving). Happy Anniversary Darlin!  You make me so indescribably happy!

One of the best (and also one of the worst) things about visiting family is the food.  I'm on a low-fat, five small meals a day plan to help combat the pain that SOD causes.  However, when you're in Albuquerque you have to have Mexican food and lots of it. My favorite restaurant in Albuquerque is Gardunos.  During our last visit there I was told they had all closed, but since I had a hard time believing this, I looked it up myself.  Yes, it is true that a couple of their locations have closed, but two were still open.  With a little prodding, we convinced Irv's mom and dad and his sister and brother-in-law to join us. Of course no Mexican food dinner is complete without a margarita. Irv had a burrito. I had my favorite--cheese enchiladas with green chili sauce.  Yummy!  (So much for making wise low-fat food choices.) In New Mexico no m...

I just submitted the final research paper as a Colorado State University Global Campus undergraduate.  After nearly four years I am done!  Assuming I pass this final class I will soon graduate with honors. It feels really good.  I must admit that I am very proud of myself!  It's been hard at times, but it's well worth it. My final paper is entitled "Module 8 Final Portfolio Project: SQL Server 2012 Proposal".  It's extremely interesting.  Let me know if you'd like a copy for your library. My favorite class during the last two years?  Environmental Conservation.  I loved that class and because of it I've become more aware of my environment and what I can do to preserve it for the future.  If I were 30 years younger that is definitely the career route I would have pursued.  Instead, I'm a complete computer geek with both a Computer Science degree and a Information Technology degree. My second favorite class?  Art ...

Could those be rain clouds on the horizon?  Or is this just another tease? Spring has yet to arrive in Colorado as you can tell by the brown, dry landscape. I'm doing my rain dance.  Happy Skywatch Friday !

This weekend we're hanging out in Albuquerque with Irv's family. We had a fantastic family dinner at The Cooperage to celebrate some family birthdays and our 36th anniversary.  Yes, I said 36.  Can you believe it?  Funny thing is that Irv and I celebrated our 1st anniversary at The Cooperage 35 years ago.     This morning we had a fantastic breakfast at the Route 66 Diner on Central Ave. near UNM. I finally got my fill of green chili with "half a pile".  It had potatoes, cheese, bacon, eggs, and lots of green chili.  Yum!  I ate about half of my half pile.  Next time I'm going to see if I can get a quarter pile. The best part is hanging out with mom and dad.

  Oh, how I wish we were still at the Magic Kingdom.  What a great time we had with Mr. Beans!       Happy Skywatch Friday!

Well, it's April 17th and it's still snowing and the wind is still blowing.  13 degrees for the low tonight.  The only good thing about this weather is that my boss insists I go home early just in case the roads are bad. I should be thinking about planting my veggie garden in a couple weeks, but that seems unlikely at this point. Now I'm going to complain about my pain again.  Sorry.  I've had a rough few days.  I thought if I could just make it until my surgery on May 6th that all would be good, but today I had to call my favorite doc, Dr. M.  I've had a familiar pain the last few days...could I have a kidney stone now?  Dr. M told his nurse to send me straight over to have a CT scan and then come see him.  Of course there's an insurance approval that has to occur so it's not that easy, hopefully tomorrow I can get in for the scan.  Then I go see Dr. M next Wednesday...that's seven days from now, but I had to wait until then ...

This has been an unusually windy spring.  I don't think I've ever seen so many tumbleweeds.  I guess that's what happens when you live on the prairie.  Almost everyday I'm out there clearing the tumbleweeds out of the geese's pen.  Do you think they're appreciative?  No, they still try to bite me on the back of the legs whenever I turn my back. Everything is still brown and winter-like here.  It's the middle of April, is spring going to arrive anytime soon?  Not this week--we're expecting rain and snow showers. This is an example of a recent especially windy day.  Garbage can went flying with the tumbleweeds. Maybe spring will arrive next week!

Update:  Diesel has been found and is at home!  Thank you Lord!

My grand dog, Diesel, has gone missing.  This makes me so unbelievably sad that I can't stand to think about it.  This dog loves his "Grammy". Luckily, my boss is a dog lover so she told me to do what I needed to do today to find Diesel.  Jillian and I searched all day and we made two trips to the Humane Society.  The second trip was when it was reported that a German Shepard mix had been found.  It wasn't him. Please keep Diesel and Jillian in your prayers.  It's hard enough that her husband is deployed to Afghanistan...now she has lost her baby. Diesel is a very timid and shy dog--it's going to be especially hard for someone to catch him, but we need all the dog lovers in Colorado Springs to be on the lookout for him. He's part of our family and we miss him.

So this is what goes on at the house during a blizzard warning while I'm at work.  Although this particular blizzard did not produce any snow, just wind.  So much for a snow day this year. Hmmm...this is not right.

We've had the nicest few days of spring lately.  I have even seen signs of life in the yard--green grass and my lilac bushes have buds on them.  Finally, winter is over. Or maybe not....here's our forecast for the next couple days. Really?  Snow and a high of 22 tomorrow?  Ugh!  Time to cover the lilacs and hope they survive a mid-April blast of winter. In other news...this morning I requested a consultation with the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale.  I have grown very discouraged with my doctors here and in Denver, especially this last specialist I saw who won't return my phone calls even when I tell him that I am in severe pain and the drugs he prescribed aren't working.  If I were 30 years younger I would go to medical school and become the world's most caring, thorough doctor who actually follows up with her patients.  Irv says they'll accept me because I'm an interesting case.  I think the real truth is that I'm a nut case.  It w...

We found a new favorite restaurant during our trip to Disney World.  The Rainforest Cafe is right outside the entrance to The Animal Kingdom.  We had dinner there the night we were at the Animal Kingdom and then we went back again the next night for dinner. There is one reason we liked the Rainforest Cafe so much.  It wasn't because of the impressive fish tanks or jungle themed decor.     It wasn't even because of the fabulous entrees (yes, that is a gigantic bacon hamburger--no cheese, no veggies, no mustard, no ketchup...just meat and bacon).     Yes, we indulged ourselves with steak, ribs, and shrimp.  Yum!   What made us really love the Rainforest Cafe was dessert--The Volcano!  We had one each night we were there.  I think this is one more reason why I'm Mr. Beans' favorite Grammy.   The closest Rainforest Cafe to where we live is in Tempe, Arizona.  Dana and Adam,...

The Magic Kingdom...my favorite place on earth! My two favorite boys driving their cars.  (This is one of Mr. Beans favorite attractions.) Mr. Beans with his hands up on Thunder Mountain.  This is a major accomplishment for Mr. Beans.  You see, he inherited his grammy's roller coaster gene (or lack thereof).  We don't like roller coasters, however, Thunder Mountain is OK.   We did manage to get Mr. Beans on Magic Mountain this trip even though he tried his hardest to escape right at the last minute.  When my girls were small there weren't even seat belts on Magic Mountain.  My how things have changed over the years.  One trip on Magic Mountain was more than sufficient for Mr. Beans and I.     Here we are in line for Thunder Mountain a second time.  This time they closed the coaster right before we were about to load up.  Thunderstorm warning, high wind warning, and tornado warning!  ...

The first park we visited on our recent Grandson Mystery Trip was EPCOT which originally stood for Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow.  Walt Disney's plan was for Epcot to be an actual working city, but it never really became what he envisioned.  It has changed considerably since it opened in 1982.  It has been several years since I've been to Epcot.  I was thrilled to see that Journey into Imagination was still there--Figment is one of my favorite characters. Epcot is the largest of the WDW parks and we walked our legs off. Our favorite ride--Test Track.  It is a simulated test car that goes up to 65 mph and 50 degree banks.  Fun, fun, fun!  Mr. Beans was a little worried at first, but I think he loved it too.  We also enjoyed the Sum of All Thrills where we got to design our own roller coaster ride.  Mr. Beans designed a ride that went upside down twice and then we got to try it out in a robotic simulator.  That's my ki...