Archives September 2014

Wow today was some day.  After eating another free breakfast in the crowded hotel lobby Cindy and I pushed out for a nearby local park.  We wanted to see if we could hike Smelter Mountain which was behind it.  It turned out parking at the park wasn’t the best spot to get on the other side of the Animas River.  We had to walk close to 3/4 of a mile to get to the bridge that crosses it.

So we had done no research on what Smelter Mountain held for hiking.  Luckily we quickly spotted a defined trail that looked like it was used by both mountain bikers and hikers.  We headed upward with a loose goal of reaching the top, even though it looked like there were sheer vertical rock formations at various spots.

Early on the hike was ok with some spots that were catch your breath steep.  The higher we got the more difficult it was to distinguish the path.  There were also various trenches going up the mountain that must be where the water flows during heavy rain.  Eventually we ran out of distinguishable path.  If we wanted to continue higher our only option was the more treacherous drainage trench. I wanted to keep going.

So up the trench we went.  The higher we got, the steeper and more treacherous the terrain became.  We were not hiking at this point, we were doing a combo of crawling and rock climbing.  You had to be EXTREMELY aware of what you were placing your foot on and you wanted to supplement each upward movement with a firm hand hold on something else.

We had on no safety gear of course.  The higher and higher we got I became increasingly aware of just how dangerous of a spot we were putting ourselves in.  The areas that were difficult to ascend were going to be even more difficult if we have to come back down the same way.  My initial hope was we could reach the top and then walk over to a face that was not so steep.

The higher we got the more nervous Cindy was getting.  Some spots required some very precise and careful movements to get past. Literally in some areas one misstep could have been disastrous.  I felt pretty confident in my ability to handle the obstacles but I felt bad to drag Cindy into my tunnel vision goal to get to the top.

So after a very difficult last 100 feet we were at the base of a sheer rock face.  As I surveyed it I saw potential ways to navigate my way to the top.  I did not see a way to have Cindy do it.  She was really scared at this point.  I considered and re-considered trying to scale the rocks above me.  In the end the old man in me won out, realizing the stupidity of trying that climb with no safety gear, no knowledge of the stability of the rocks, and no guarantee that there was something above what I could see that I could manage.  Even if I could get up there, it was far too risky to have Cindy try to do the same.

So that left us with one option, go back down the way we came.  It was very, very challenging.  For the most part I stayed below Cindy so I could help guide her foot placements and be a human safety net if need be.  To maintain yourself on the trail you had to do a basically do a bear crawl in reverse.  Trying to judge the stability of foot holds while looking down and back is not very easy.

Finally after what felt like a very long time we got back down to where the trail met up.  By the time we got back down to the bottom of the mountain we were pretty exhausted and beat up.  As we looked up at the terrain we climbed and the spot where we stopped it was bitter sweet. When we saw the angle of ascent we climbed and how close we got to the top it felt good.  There was just a small tinge of regret I didn’t test if I could handle that final rock formation, despite knowing how foolish it would be.

I flew my Phantom around some more after the hike in the nearby park.  Here is where you can see the video.

We headed back to the hotel and had one of what has been a small number of annoyances including the 4:15 check in, a hair dryer that only runs for 30 seconds at a time, pubic hair in the tub and more.  This time both of our room key cards stopped working.  When we went to the front desk they said that their cards are very sensitive and are easily broken if they are kept in a wallet with other credit cards or if it is too close to a phone.  That is sort of dumb.

So after taking a shower we decided to try the other edible THC we bought, granola bars.  They were little squares, each one supposedly including 10 milligrams of THC, just like the fish.  At this point I had tried what should have been a 15mg and 20mg dosing with the fish and felt nothing of consequence.  So to me it seemed reasonable to down three of the squares and let Cindy have the other two.  They did not taste good at all, requiring water to help wash down the marijuana taste.  We figured like the fish, if you felt anything it would be after a couple hours.  I was confident I still wouldn’t be affected significantly based on my reaction to the gummy fish.  We figured we could go eat some lunch and then maybe just walk around downtown Durango feeling “happy”.

We stopped at a Mexican restaurant.  By the time we got there Cindy was really feeling the effects of the bars it was hitting her much harder than the fish did.  As we were sitting at the table she would bust out laughing at anything.  She had a difficult time speaking and when the food arrived, using a fork and knife to cut her chimichanga was at the absolute limit of her current motor skills ability.

I still felt normal, maybe just a little sillier than normal.  I was making fun of Cindy as she tried to function.  We decided that we should just go back to the hotel.  As time went on my symptoms intensified.  My vision at one point became like a 2D video screen.  Then after awhile the 2D images got beveled edges.  Finally the entire picture was at an angle.

I had a lot of confusion going on, my thoughts were all over the place. There were gaps in my recent memory. My body started to feel like I had a lead blanket on me and my skin felt warm.  As we laid down in the bed we were both just feeling whacked out.  Before you knew it we were both passed out for 3 hours in the middle of the afternoon.  I just had my first confirmed THC high.

After we woke up I still didn’t feel like getting up.  It took a lot of prodding from Cindy.  I now understand why regular pot smokers are generally lazy.  I just didn’t feel like moving at all.  Eventually the cobwebs cleared and we headed to town.  After a trip to Starbucks for some coffee we had a nice Italian dinner at a place recommended by both of the baristas at Starbucks.

Tomorrow it is alarm clock time again.  We have over 500 miles to cover tomorrow with a visit to White Sands mixed in there.  Our time in Durango has felt very quick but we both have enjoyed our time here a bunch.  After today we return to drive, drive, drive mode.

So Thursday night we decided to just chill at the hotel while we did another run with the THC gummy fish,  both Cindy and I ingested two fish instead of the one and a half we tried the night before.  We also had less food in our stomachs this time although I don’t know that it matters or not.  After eating the fish we worked out in the hotel gym, and sat in the sauna for a few minutes.  Cindy appeared to have some noticeable effects as she was slurring her words now and then.  She said she was feeling “loopy”.

I really could not feel anything noticeable except getting really tired again.  Cindy says my speech slowed down but if it did I did not notice it.  I think I will have to try the granola next.  Needless to say my exposure to legal recreational marijuana has been a flop so far.

We got up with the alarm since we had to be at the train station by 7:30.  We took advantage of the hotels free continental breakfast.  We entered the dining area which was flooded with a sea of old people.  It looked like Cindy and I were the only ones there that were not currently collecting social security benefits.  Old people are very serious about their food so trying to break into the wall of them to grab a single item here and there was difficult.  While Cindy and I were sitting at our table eating we were inundated by the background noise of old women complaining about various ailments.  We only hung around the bare minimum amount of time required to shove food down. I don’t really enjoy seeing a fast forward of what life could be like in 25 years.

The weather yesterday morning was quite chilly, in the mid 40’s, however I ventured out in just shorts and my new USA Curling t-shirt.  I figured I could deal with some cold early as I was counting on the warmer temps forecast for later in the day.  Of course Cindy encouraged me to dress warmer which I declined.  Of course that meant I couldn’t complain about being cold later, which I was.

We boarded the train and found our seat in coach.  They had several different type of cars in the train, coach, an enclosed cab with windows, open air where there are no windows and then first class where you have more room and a full time narrator along the way.  With the temps I was quite glad to be in coach and pitied those in the open air cars.

The train was very cool because it’s very old, literally more than 100 years old in fact.  The bench seats had enough room for two average sized people although as in most things from 100 years ago, they weren’t all that comfortable.  Our cab was pretty full, almost every seat had somebody in it.  It didn’t take long to pick out the people that would be the focal point on the ride like the mini-Santa Claus looking guy who talked nearly non-stop and had a child-like sense of wonder about everything.  There was also the guy with the older style digital camera who hadn’t learn how to turn off the confirmation beep for everything.  As he flipped through a hundred or more pictures he had already taken it got a bit annoying.  There was the all American family with two teenage girls and a teenage son who spent most of the ride with his face in a book.

So the train pulled out a few minutes late.  The powerful blasts of the steam whistle were quite cool and added to the anticipation for the ride.  As we started to make our way through town I thought it was odd that we were going so slow but I attributed it to being cautious in a more populated area.  It turned out that I was actually seeing what was pretty much top speed.

As we were heading north a bike path ran parallel to the tracks.  A biker on the path had no problem keeping up with and even pulling ahead of the train.  Before we left we saw they actually have a road bike versus train race where the goal is to beat the train from Durango to Silverton on a bike.  I realized that winning this race on bike would not be very difficult at all, the train was slooooow, at times the train was going at a fast walking pace.  To slow things down further we had to make a couple water stops on the route where they refill the boiler on the steam engine.

The ride was also incredibly rough.  There was non-stop rocking back and forth.  Walking the aisles required a firm grip on something unless you wanted to end up in somebody’s lap.  The noises the train made consisted of random banging, slamming, and grinding.  It made me wonder how both the train and the track could hold up for all these years.

For most of the ride up I was fine.  The scenery was stunning as we carved through canyons.  We took advantage of the on board concessions car, I grabbed a hot chocolate to warm my chilled bones while Cindy got a warm cider which she really liked.  Towards the end of the ride to Silverton my ass had reached it’s limit of sitting on the thinly padded bench, I was very glad to get off the damn train after the over three and a half hour ride.

Well Silverton made Durango look like a huge city, it was so small.  In Durango there is a historic district that has a lot of old original buildings from the late 1800’s however it is nestled inside of a modern city.  Silverton is just the old original buildings with no fluff.  It’s very charming.

We ate lunch at a cool place called the Pickle Barrel.  The owner, who was doing EVERYTHING from hosting, to waiting tables to bussing tables was very busy due to being severely understaffed.  Despite being pulled a million directions at once he somehow managed to still deliver a a very friendly and warm interaction with each and every customer.  He was great.  Cindy and I both enjoyed our meals.

After eating we only had about 45 minutes left to walk around before the train headed out.  We saw so many cool buildings.  We browsed a few gift shops and snagged a piece of pecan pie that we split as we walked around.  Man it was good.

As we headed back to the train I regretted my decision to take the train both to and from Silverton.  There is an option where you only take the train for one leg of the trip and hop on a bus for the other.  After the long ride up, a much quicker bus ride back would have been welcomed.  We piled back on the train and creeped out of town.

On the ride back the train was much emptier since a lot of the smart people opted for the bus ride.  As a result Cindy and I moved around and wound up out in one of the open air cars for a good portion of the ride.  The temps had warmed enough at that point that I was ok.  The open air cars had a big tradefoff.  The windowless environment allowed for a spectacular, unobstructed view of the scenery as it slowly passed by.  Unfortunately it also allowed all of the soot from the engine to coat your body.  I had a thin layer of soot on me in little time.

While we were out there we talked with a lifelong Army guy.  He started off in the Rangers but has been serving as a chaplain for quite awhile.  He talked about various aspects of his life in the service, including some very scary recollections of the year he served in Iraq when IED destruction was at it’s highest.  He had such a calm and peaceful demeanor about him.

The already slow ride was made even slower due to some mechanical issues that were described as “not being able to close a fire grate”.  The way I understood it was this meant there was a risk of hot stuff falling out of the engine and possible causing a fire on the tracks.  As a precaution they had an auxiliary vehicle behind the train making sure nothing was smoking.  In total the problem added more than a half hour onto the return trip.

I was on the edge of losing my mind by the end of the ride.  After tiring of being pelted with soot we moved back into coach.  By this time I was so damn tired of sitting I couldn’t take it.  When we finally, finally, FINALLY emerged from the train I was incredibly relieved.  If anyone would ask my opinion of doing the train I would only recommend it if they did the bus/train hybrid trip.  Going the entire loop cooped up almost 8 hours in a 100 year old train just is not my good idea of a good time.  Considering we spent almost $200 to do it just adds to the annoyance factor.  Despite my griping, make no mistake, the views the ride offers are some of the best I have ever seen in my life.

We stayed in town and ate dinner at the Strater Hotel, a very old Victorian style hotel.  Evidently it is famous for it’s saloon style dining area complete with a full time piano player.  Cindy and I were jammed into a small space by a window but it turned out to be a good seat.  At 7PM each night they do a funny skit where the local sheriff takes on some bad guys.  The entire staff is dressed in attire appropriate with the time period the bar is from.  It was all very entertaining.

Today for our last full day in Durango we plan to hit the outdoors and try to find some hill/mountain to conquer.  Should be fun.

The picture collection from the trip is getting quite large.  See it here.

So last night Cindy and I stayed up almost 3 hours after ingesting our THC gummy fish and did not experience anything out of the ordinary.  The only thing at all I can report is I slept slightly better last night than other nights on the trip thus far and I recall having some odd imagery in my head as I was falling asleep.  We are doing another experiment tonight, we each downed two fish and we are doing so earlier in the day.

We pulled out of Colorado Springs pretty early so we could get to Durango at a reasonable time.  The 315 miles we had to travel was by far our shortest driving day in the trip but it took awhile.  The reason is the terrain we were covering was very mountainous.  We noticed the Prius sounded like it was really struggling towards the top of a series of inclines.  I already knew from previous road trips that vehicles that spend most of their lives at sea level do very poorly when forced to suck in the thinner air at elevation.

However when I flipped over to the real time power monitoring screen I was concerned when I saw the power meter for the battery be completely empty.  I never saw it show as being fully depleted before.  Cindy was freaked about it and looked it up online.  She quickly found other Prius owners reporting the same thing when driving inclines for prolonged periods of time.

The odd thing was once we crested a big incline and were going down an equally long downhill, the battery meter went from empty to full green in less than 10 minutes.  Despite the numerous mountains we crossed, overall the Prius got fantastic mileage due to it sucking in additional power on the declines.  We averaged over 55 mpg for the 175 miles we traveled after our last fill up, amazing.

The drive of course was very scenic.  Last year when we came into Durango it was dark so we saw very little in terms of scenery.  Today we saw everything in brilliant sunshine, it was beautiful. We stopped for lunch at a place we actually stopped at late at night last year.  Last year they had no food available since it was close to closing time.  This year we scored a mixed bag lunch of grilled cheese, fish sandwich, waffle fries, cottage cheese, and cole slaw.  Cindy and I split all of it.

The GPS had a brain fart and told us our hotel in Durango was where an open field is located.  Luckily it was close enough that we saw the hotel from the highway.  We pulled in around 2:15 local time.  We were surprised when the clerk said the room was still being cleaned and that check in wasn’t until 3 PM.  Um ok, we said we would head into town a bit and be back after three.

On the drive into Durango we stopped at a self serve car wash to blast off the 2400+ miles of road grime and smashed bugs that coated the Prius.  We then parked downtown near the train station.  We wanted to get our tickets for the Durango-Silverton train ride tomorrow.  Since the ride consumes most of the day I thought it would be better to get it out of the way on our first full day in town instead of the second.  The woman that was working the ticket window appeared to be new on the job.

We stood in what was a relatively short line for a very long time because of the snail’s pace this woman handled the transactions.  It was pretty painful.  I swear to handle the two people in front of us took her 15 minutes.  We finally scored the tickets and headed back to the hotel.

By the time we got back it was something like 3:30 so we assumed the room was ready to go.  We assumed incorrectly.  We went up to the room and saw it was still being worked on, wtf?  Cindy asked the cleaning lady what was up.  She said it just had to be vacuumed yet.  We left some of our stuff in the room and walked around checking out the hotel amenities to waste time.  We didn’t get the all clear till almost 4:15, lame.

Besides the slow cleaning crew, the hotel itself seems really nice.  It’s new with free breakfast, an indoor pool, sauna and a decent fitness center.  It’s so nice that we don’t mind chilling out here tonight eating our special gummy fish.

Tomorrow will be all about the train ride.  I am a little worried that the novelty of riding on an old fashioned train will wear off after a total of 5-6 hours on board.

Unfortunately I didn’t have a chance to blog this morning before we headed out so I am being forced to regurgitate two days of the trip instead of one.   This will be more interesting since I just ingested my first ever 10mg THC red gummy fish, although from our research it could be up to two hours until it kicks in.

So the drive from Kansas City to Colorado Springs was long.  We got on the road around 7:15 and didn’t get here until close to 5.  The drive didn’t have a ton of highlights other than a random stop in a town named Quinter in Kansas.  From the highway we say that Quinter supposedly had an old style soda fountain.  That sounded cool to us and since we didn’t have lunch yet we thought it would be fun.

Quinter was a ridiculously small town literally in the middle of nowhere.  As we pulled onto Main Street I could count the amount of cars parked on one hand.   We parked in what was marked as the hardware store parking lot.  We walked down the sidewalk to the front of the soda fountain shop next door.

Well once we walked on we saw what looked like pharmacy shelves to our left.  WTF?  Well when we talked to one of the two employees that were there we were told this building had three things in it that didn’t seem to really go together, a pharmacy, a hardware store and a soda fountain. Funny.

The bar of the soda fountain was incredible.  It was from the early 1900’s.  The business owner bought it on EBAY and had it brought in, wow.  The women told us how the building has been many things over the years including a car dealership, a movie theater and a big warehouse.  I think it’s current configuration is the coolest.

Now unfortunately the food menu was rather slim if you are a pescatarian.  Cindy and I both ordered side salads with a side of macaroni salad.  It was not the most nutritious lunch but it tasted good and handled our hunger.  Now of course we had to have some sort of ice cream treat while we were there.  I opted for a delicious old style chocolate milk shake and Cindy had something called a Blondie.  Both of us enjoyed our respective treats a lot.

I had forgot a nut I need for the GoPro rig on my Phantom.  I figured I was going to have to track down a Best Buy or someplace like that which sold GoPro accessories.  Well instead I was able to buy a small nut and lockwasher at the hardware part of the place for exactly 14 cents.  Sweet.  Both Cindy and I enjoyed just hanging out and talking with the two ladies that were working all three sections of the business.  The lifestyle in Quinter Kansas is just so different and slow paced it felt like I stepped into a time machine that instantly shot me back to 1965.  I appreciated and in some ways was envious of the simple life these people choose to lead.

When we pulled into Colorado Springs we were checked in by a guy that simply seemed perturbed that he was a desk clerk at a hotel.  He made no effort to make us feel welcome, a skill that most people in his position are instructed to do.  Luckily our check in was possibly the shortest in history.  In the span of 90 seconds we were in and out of the lobby.  Maybe the guy ran out of weed.

Our room was acceptable based on what I paid for it.  I am always nervous when we stay in a room with exterior facing doors.  The room was clean enough.  The biggest complaints I have are the neck high shower head with hot and cold water controls that require the precision of a safecracker to get dialed in to a temperature that is not too hot or cold.  The toilet may be the weakest flushing unit I have ever seen.  You have to flush it twice just to get pee to go down.

On Tuesday night we were looking at various food options.  We stumbled across a place called Trinity Brewing Company.  Cindy saw online that they had a pretty big vegetarian menu and it was close by.  The place also brewed their own beer which was cool.

Cindy and I sat down at the bar and we were greeted by a young guy bartender that immediately gave us a good vibe about the place.  Cindy sampled a few beers before ordering herself a Pale Ale.  I went with some dark pumpkin beer with a very high alcohol content.  I typically hate dark beers but this particular variety actually went down pretty smoothly.

For our meal Cindy had a quinoa burger that she said was fantastic and I had some crab cakes that I really enjoyed as well.  I also had two additional beers, by the end of which I was feeling quite, happy.  We wound up the meal by splitting some raspberry cheesecake which was good as well.

While we were sitting there we asked one of the female bartenders advice on where to go if we wanted to try some of the marijuana edible products that are now legal in Colorado.  She advised us to check out a place called Maggie Farms.  She said that despite marijuana being legalized for recreational use, certain areas have actually continued to restrict the recreational use of it.  Colorado Springs  just got on board a few months ago, the place we were directed to only opened up in July. Cindy and I figured we would check it out sometime on Wednesday.

We received some bad news, the Manitou Incline, which was supposed to be the athletic accomplishment for this trip has been shut down since mid-August and will continue to be shut down until December for repairs.  I had no idea just how popular this climb has become.  I saw on the news that in the span of roughly a year there have over 200,000 people that have made the climb, HOLY SHIT.  Well evidently all of these feet combined with some severe flooding has really screwed up certain sections of the climb.  The closure is to allow them to make a number of improvements which will make the incline safer long term, good news for others, not so good for us.  Oh well.

So we woke up this morning from our 3rd consecutive night of poor sleep.  I fall asleep easily enough but later I start waking up time and again which leaves me just feeling like shit.  That feeling was amplified by those three pumpkin beers.  I was tired, had a headache and felt horribly dehydrated.

Cindy and I hit the free continental breakfast.  Luckily, Mr Pissed in my Cheerios was no longer behind the desk, replaced by two staff that had a better disposition.  After breakfast we folded the laundry we started and then headed out.  The weather was overcast, rainy and cool.  We decided it would be best to start our day with an indoor activity.  We chose to head over to the US Olympic Training Center, I saw in a brochure that they offered tours to the public, sweet.

As we pulled into the center we had to wait several minutes while a tour bus of old people very slowly unloaded.  Well since they only do the tours once an hour that meant that we would be stuck in this group.  The guy that was running the tour warned us ahead of time that we would be stuck with the old people and was nice enough to tell Cindy and I to stop back at the desk afterward and he would give us some free totes for hanging in there.

The tour was cool.  It was interesting seeing the training facilities our athletes prepare in.  The coolest parts of the tour were when we watched a few gymnasts go through practice and a few dozen swimmers doing their training in the 1 million gallon Olympic indoor training pool.

I picked up a cool souvenir while I was there, a USA Curling Team shirt.  I have some sort of weird fascination with the “sport”.

The weather had improved so we decided we would head into Manitou to do our hiking/sight seeing, but before there we had a pit stop to make at Maggie’s Farms.  The second we pulled into the parking lot we were directed to another further away lot, they said there were no spots in the main lot even though I am pretty sure I saw a couple.  They had a rent a cop directing us up to the upper lot and when we parked up there, another rent a cop was watching the lot.  There was a sign posted in that lot saying it was illegal to actual consume marijuana products on the premises.

Going into the trip I had what turns out to be a very big misconception about how available recreational marijuana products were going to be.  I thought you could practically walk into any store and pick some up.  Wow, was I wrong.  We stepped in the door of what looked to be an old store and are greeted by yet another rent a cop.  He hands a pull tag with a number on it like we were walking into a deli.  We are told to have a seat until we are called.  There is another hallway to our right behind a door with a line of chairs along the wall that are filled with more people, weird.

As we sat there we got a handle on the process.  You get called up to the desk in the main waiting room.  You are then asked for your id, there are different rules if you are from Colorado versus somewhere else.  If you live here you are limited to a total of one ounce of product per person per day.  If you are an out of stater the limit is much stricter, only 1/4 ounce per person per day.  I also found it interesting it was an all cash business, no credit cards allowed.  Damn they must be rolling in cash, no pun intended.

So once we showed our id’s we were directed into the narrow hallway.  There were maybe 25 people in there, all on chairs.  Ever minute or two a guy who totally looked like he should work at a marijuana shop, would poke his head out the door and tell the next person to come in.  Each time a person was called in the rest of the people would all shift their rear ends down one chair at a time, it was pretty funny.

To me it was an odd feeling sitting there.  I almost felt dirty.  I didn’t really look around at the other people much, I just felt a bit weird being there.  Finally after waiting at least 30 minutes we got inside the magic door.  We were again asked for our ids and again told of the restrictions on out of staters.  We explained that neither of us were marijuana users and we were just interested in trying out a couple of edible products.  Our clerk was very consultative, explaining our options and stressing the importance of using small doses since we aren’t sure how sensitive we will be to it.

Cindy and I hoped they would have pot brownies or cookies there but they didn’t, perhaps because they are too perishable.  Instead our options were various THC infused candies and granola products.  We decided to get 10 – 10 milligram red gummy fish and one 100 milligram granola bar.  That added up to the 1/4 ounce allowed for one person.  We could have doubled up our order but figured we should just try it out and see how it goes.  Plus, this stuff was damn expensive, $68 cash.

We were directed around a corner where a woman fulfilled our order like a pharmacist at CVS.  She told us to keep the bag sealed and stapled shut until we were at someplace “safe”.  Cindy and I walked out with our score, unsure of how it will affect us. We found a hole in the wall pizza/sandwich shop to eat lunch at.  We split a small pizza which was pretty good.

We then hit the Manitou Cliff Dwellings, something Cindy had found online that she thought looked interesting.  It’s very old caves that were crafted by indians some 700 years ago.  The pictures looked cool and seeing them in person was kind of cool too.  The main problem I had with it is there isn’t much to see.  You can see everything in 15 minutes if you are going slow, not really worth the $10 a head admission price if you ask me. We spent longer in the gift shop tahn we did in the caves.

We had decided that since we couldn’t hike the Manitou Incline that we would instead hike some of the Barr Trail which eventually leads up to Pike’s Peak.  We figured it would be a good compromise.  We certainly were not prepared for any huge hike, we had a couple bottles of water and Cindy brought her rain coat.  The temp in the 60’s with mostly overcast skies were pretty great for hiking.

When we got started Cindy was struggling more than I expected.  The high altitude, we were starting at 6700 feet, was making it hard for her to breathe.  The trail itself was nicely maintained and easy to follow.  It was also quite challenging, rated as “difficult” in the rating guide I saw earlier.  I thought that if Cindy and I would have done the Manitou Incline it would have taken us maybe an hour to trek the .8 mile, 2000 foot trail.  I applied that to our Barr Trail hike, figuring we would hike upward for that same hour and see where it gets us.

The one hour of hiking time got us to 8000 feet of elevation and 2 miles into the 12.1 mile trail.  It was plenty far for both of us, it was some pretty strenuous climbing, especially since neither Cindy or I are at a high level with our cardio endurance right now.

The hike was beautiful with plentiful views of the glory of nature all around us.  I commented to Cindy that it felt like we had been on our trip for much longer than 4 days.  We have already seen and done so many things.  The good news is there is much more to come.

We made it back to the parking lot after a little more than two hours on the mountainside.  Before we left I put my Phantom up in the air for two unique aerial video sessions.  It was a bit windy but nothing I couldn’t control.  I look forward to getting the footage online.

After the hike we decided to walk around down in Manitou Springs.  We stopped in a number of unique shops and then had dinner at a cool little place on a corner.  The corner also apparently is a big hang out spot for young kids that seem to be avid drug users.  Watching them out the window was better than most reality tv.

When we got back to the room, as I mentioned, we tried the red gummy THC fish, each doing one fish per person as advised.  20 minutes later we decided to do another half a fish each since we didn’t feel anything.  At this point we crossed the two hour mark and neither of us feel any serious effects from the stuff.  We are both tired but that is more from our poor sleep I am sure.  For about 30 seconds I had a weird sensation float through my brain that went as quickly as it came.  Cindy said she has had a few weird feelings in her chest almost like palpitations but other than that she is just tired too.

Maybe tomorrow we need to up our intake.

Our drive to St Louis went smoothly right until the point where we had the arch in view. As we were crossing the bridge over the Missouri River we saw signs saying the exit the GPS was advising us to take was under repair and closed. Ok no problem, the GPS is normally smart enough to handle something like this. Well that was not the case this time.

We began a 15-20 minute ordeal where the GPS was literally sending us in circles. When it started taking us away from the arch back across the river we decided to switch over to Cindy’s phone temporarily for navigation. The route we eventually took to get to the parking garage near the arch was very obtuse but at least we got there.

The last bit of aggravation was the way we approached the parking garage was through the nearby restaurant/entertainment district. The main street there is an ANCIENT looking brick street. It looks like it was never ever touched since it was installed 100 years ago. The “road” looks more like rolling hills with all sorts of hills and valleys. I was expecting the Prius to bottom out several times as we creeped across it.

Finally we got parked and started walking towards the arch which is located inside of a beautiful park area. The weather was beautiful with the temps in the 70’s with what felt like no humidity. Cindy was amazed at the visual as we approached the massive arch. It was just so visually impressive with the smooth, clean lines of the arch cutting into the clear blue sky.

The arch visitor center is a HUGE underground facility under the monument. After clearing the metal detectors we headed down into the main lobby. Luckily a Monday afternoon in September is a decent time to visit the arch, there weren’t a ton of people there.

I bought us tickets to ride to the top of the arch. While we were waiting for our time slot to be called for loading we walked around and checked some stuff out. As we were, an interesting couple was standing in front of one of the displays. The woman, who was in good shape and obviously did not have English as her native language, asked me if I could take a picture of her and her boyfriend/husband. The man was short but powerfully built. Cindy and I speculated on their nationality. She guessed maybe Greek or Albanian. I personally had no idea.

Well ironically we wound up getting paired up with this same couple in the cramped car on the ride to the top. On the ride we discovered the couple were Italians from Rome, I never would have guessed that.

The cars you ride in are not only cramped but very old looking. The reason is they are by my math almost 50 years old since the arch opened back in 1965. At least they apparently keep them maintained. In fact the north tower trams were closed for repair/renovations for several months. We found out from a park ranger up top that the entire arch grounds are undergoing renovations.

After the roughly four minute ride to the observation area we emerged. The triangular area looks odd if you never saw it before. Basically you lay across the angled, carpeted area to peer out the small windows on either side. The views from 600 plus feet up are really beautiful. It wasn’t windy yesterday unlike my first time to the arch where I could feel a slight sway at the top. Cindy thought being up at the top of the arch was very, very, cool.

After spending maybe 15-20 minutes up there we lined up to head back down. In the car this time we were paired with some people from Boston that Cindy good naturedly ribbed about the Patriots losing to the Dolphins on Sunday. Once we got down we walked through a large museum that was about the early days of westward expansion and how St. Louis was an integral part of it. After a stop in the gift shop we headed back up to ground level.

Before leaving I had Cindy take a picture of me doing an elbow lever in front of the arch. It feels like an elbow lever will be the bodyweight exercise pose for this trip. You may recall that during one of my western trips years ago I was doing L-sits along the way.

After the arch we ate lunch in the bumpy road area that we drove through. The place we ate was called Show Me’s. It looked like a big drinking/party place if you visit it later in the day. At lunch however it was nearly empty. We sat in the outdoor beergarten overlooking the Missouri River and had it entirely to ourselves. The place evidently has a tradition of people writing odd things on dollar bills and then sticking them to the walls and ceiling. There literally had to be several thousand dollars stuck all over the place.

We still had something like 260 miles to drive to get to our final destination of Kansas City. It’s an odd thing when you use sentences like “we only have 250 miles to go” like that is a drop in the bucket. The reality was by the time we got later in the day the drive was feeling long. By the time we stopped we had logged something like 1450 miles in the span of two days. We had already seen and done enough that it felt like we had been on the road for much longer, it was weird.

There was no sight seeing needed last night although we did walk up to the top of the hill and take some cool sunset pictures of the Royals and Chief’s stadiums which were practically next door. We stayed at a Sheraton which was nice except for some odd annoyances like missing a hair dryer in the room and only three pillows for a king sized bed.

When we were eating dinner last night we were reviewing our itinerary. I was glad we did. Cindy had misread the trip plan I made. She did not realize we were staying two nights in Colorado Springs and three nights in Durango. She thought it was one night at the one place and two nights at the other.   As a result she misbooked the hotel in Durango. Luckily a quick phone call shifted and extended our Durango stay.

We are in the midst of a long drive on I-70 across Kansas with Colorado Springs in our sights. The plan is to get a good nights rest and fill our Wednesday with the challenging Manitou Springs climb followed by more site seeing.

Cindy and I rolled out of bed after our 3:15 AM alarm Sunday morning bleary eyed but ready to start our latest road trip adventure. Before we pushed out we went out and checked on the chickens one last time, we were still both concerned about them not being attended to the way that we have accustomed them to.

We buttoned up the Prius with our stuff. At the last minute I decided I wanted to take my Phantom with to get some cool aerial video during the trip. I wasn’t sure if the case would fit but we found a nice spot in the trunk where it fit without obstructing our view.

I was the driver to start. Normally when a road trip begins I am pretty alert despite the normally early time of day. Well that was not the case this time, I felt exhausted, almost dangerously so at certain points. Luckily I kept us on the road until our first Dunkin Donuts stop around the Sarasota area. I did two cups of coffee in the morning to help battle drowsiness.

I did some experimentation with the speed/mileage equation with the Prius. I found that 3mph in cruise control speed made a big difference in mileage. When I had the cruise set at 77mph my mileage was dipping down to around 42mpg on average. Later in the day setting the cruise at 74mph resulted in an incredible average mpg of 48.5 for the second tank of gas.

Speaking of gas, it’s so pleasant to pull into a gas station almost empty, after travelling around 400 miles and only spend $30 to fill it. A full tank in the party van would get us roughly the same 400 mile range, the big difference is it would cost close to $100 to top it back off.

The big trade off we made was the smaller amount of space we have available to us. I was worried that driving 875 miles in a sub-compact Prius would be incredibly uncomfortable. Luckily it hasn’t been bad. At first we thought that folding the rear seat down would be the way to go so we could use that area as a pseudo bed. After test fitting my 6’3” frame in the back I realized that wouldn’t work. Instead we let the seats in their normal configuration. Cindy can lay across the back seats. I found if I fully recline the passenger seat I can actually nap a little bit with an assist from the pillows we brought along. I also find the passenger seat acceptable for typing the blog entry as I am right now or playing some Plants vs Zombies. Despite a total of 14 hours on the road yesterday, which should be our longest travel day, comfort was not a major issue which is great.

As usual I saw some interesting people and places along the drive. When I stopped for gas in Jasper, Tennessee I found my curiosity turned to annoyance. For some reason half of the gas pumps were not working. Every tank that was working had a vehicle parked in front of it with nobody pumping gas, what the fck?

As I saw some very “interesting” people walking back out to their vehicle I assumed that either these people had not mastered the skill of paying for your gas at the pump with a credit card or they don’t qualify for a credit card. I saw one particularly odd man walk into the store to presumably pay for his gas walk back out to the car to pump it and then once again return inside for some unknown reason. Finally I found an open pump, gassed up and got the hell out of there.

Sunday afternoon we listened to the Eagles game on my Sirius radio that I brought along. Listening to the broadcast was frustrating at times. The satellite radio uses a short range FM transmitter to broadcast to the car radio. This normally works fine. However if there is a strong local radio station on the same frequency it makes listening pretty miserable. During the game we had varying levels of interference.

Early on it was just as good that we couldn’t hear it, the Eagles were playing like shit against the Jaguars, whom they were favored to beat pretty easily. The first half ended with the Birds down 17-0. Both the defense and offense was playing rotten.

In the second half the team did something I am not accustomed to for the Eagles, they made adjustments. They dominated the second half, scoring 34 unanswered points to win the game 34-17. It was great to listen to, I’m sure it would have been even better to see.

We pulled into our hotel in Nashville at 5:15 CST, meaning we covered the 875 miles in almost exactly 14 hours. We didn’t stay in the room long at all, just long enough to unload our stuff and freshen up a bit. Although Nashville wasn’t a focal point of the trip we figured we should go downtown to check stuff out.

The drive to town was less than 10 miles. Once we got into downtown Nashville I swung into the first open parking lot I found. It was one of those self service deals where you pay for your parking ahead of time with a credit card. I was not pleased with the pay schedule.

The machine for the first spot we parked in was locked up and not working. I had Cindy drive to the adjacent lot where the machine was working. So I started the process of paying for spot number 50 that we were parked in. I was presented three and only three options, one hour for $8, two hours for $15 or 24 hours for $32. WTF???!!! What a crock of shit. The purposeful removal of any options between 2 and 24 hours was ridiculous. If you are going downtown to hang out they know that two hours is probably not going to be long enough. Not allowing a per hour rate is a blatant rip off. Fckers.

Walking down Broadway in Nashville reminded me somewhat of Bourbon Street in New Orleans. There were small bars every couple of doors, most of which had live music playing and various street performers. We had dinner at a nice sports bar kind of place that was doing 2 for 1 draft beers. We sat in the open air part of the place next to the sidewalk. We both enjoyed our meals, I cleaned my plate completely of the two fish tacos, rice and beans.

The two Angry Orchard draft beers that Cindy drank hit her pretty hard, she was in full silly mode. We walked up and down Broadway for awhile. We saw a number of those human powered rolling bars. Basically there are 10-12 patrons at the bar, seated on stools with a set of pedals underneath them. There is one person that steers the rolling bar. I am not sure if the whole deal is powered exclusively by pedal power or if it is backed up by a battery propulsion system. Regardless it looks pretty fun.

Cindy and I went into a number of souvenir stores as well as scoring some local homemade ice cream before we headed out. We both were quite tired obviously. Sleep last night was very welcomed.

Today we were up and back on the road by 7:15 AM. When we stopped at a rest stop we both were greeted by a refreshing cool air. The local humidity free temperature of 63 degrees felt refreshing and crisp after trudging through another sweaty, hot Florida summer since April.

We are on route to the St Louis Arch which we should get to around lunch time. Although I saw it before, Cindy never has. It is an amazing structure and well worth revisiting. After that we have several more hours on the road until we reach our sleeping destination for the day, Kansas City. So far so good.

The online and growing photo album is here.

So this morning I dropped off Nicki at the vet that is going to perform the eyelid surgery.  Nicki gets very scared when she is in a foreign environment without someone she knows to offer comfort.  It was very tough for me to try to coax her into the back room as she kept trying to go the other direction.  In addition to getting her folded eyelids surgically corrected she also will be getting her teeth cleaned.  Ali is nervous because Nicki has not been under anesthesia her entire adult life, the only time she was under when she was fixed as a puppy.  I am confident everything will be fine.

Offering Nicki relief from what had to be a maddening irritation of her eyes is what I am focused on.  Post op she will be required to wear a cone for around two weeks to allow the eyelids to heal.  I am sure she will hate the cone for those two weeks but it’s better than feeling like you have something in your eyes 24/7.

Last night I did some predictive mowing.  What is predictive mowing you ask?  In my case it is mowing areas that I predict will once again be under water if we get another downpour.  By mowing these areas, even if it does rain, I will be able to still finish up the mowing on Saturday without issue. It’s a brilliant plan.

Yesterday Joan Rivers passed away after having some sort of complication during vocal chord surgery.  If you are younger you may know Joan primarily for her self admitted odd physical appearance from extensive plastic surgery backed up by a steady drip of botox.  However if you are my age you have more appreciation for her comedy brilliance.  For 50 years she has harvested endless laughs from audiences around the world.

Her work ethic, energy and non-stop drive at her age was truly amazing.  The only other famous person I can recall that was her age with that sort of energy was Jack Lalanne.  Much like Jack, I just sort of thought Joan would live forever.   To have her pass away is just the latest pinch of reality I have felt.

So tomorrow Cindy and I will be working on a very long checklist I made last night of pre-trip to do’s.  We need to make sure we dot all of our I’s and cross every T.  The main pushpins of the trip will be visiting the arch in St Louis, Maintou Springs, Durango and White Sands.  Of course the beauty of a road trip is the random events that happen in between during 4500 miles of driving.

Although I am looking forward to the trip, Cindy is REALLY excited.  She never had a chance to do much  traveling most of her life.  She has discovered she loves road trips as much as I do.

As I did last year I will be trying to document while I am on the road, both from hotel rooms and highway courtesy of my wi-fi hotspot.  The wildcard is just how difficult this will be in the much smaller confines of the Prius.

Day one will be brutal, with us hopefully pulling out around 4AM Sunday to get a head start on the roughly 875 miles of road we want to digest on Sunday.

I forgot to mention yesterday that now two of our three chickens are laying eggs.  Wilma laid her first egg on Tuesday, joining Betty as one of our laying hens.  Pebbles, our third chicken is starting to show some of the preliminary signs of getting into egg laying shape as well.  It’s quite funny how 5 minutes with the chickens can lighten your mood.  I have some anxiety about leaving the chickens in someone else’s care while we are on the road trip.

So Ali took Nicki to the vet that handles eyelid issues yesterday, an appointment I made while wasting my time at the other vet on Tuesday.  The vet said that Nicki’s eyelids are indeed turned under.  Ali said she was just surprised how bad it was, almost half of the eyelid was folded on top of itself.  No wonder the poor thing has been pawing at them.

So I was happy to hear that they were able to schedule her to have eyelid surgery on Friday morning.  In addition while she is out they are going to clean her teeth, something we haven’t had done professionally on her ever.  Sadie has had her teeth done a few times.  We are hoping the surgery finally offers Nicki some relief as well as making it much easier for her to see.  Yes it is going to be pricey, Ali and I are hoping the equally pricey pet insurance that we pay a couple hundred bucks a month for covers at least some of the expense.

So last night before heading to bed I finally deactivated my mom’s Facebook account.  I figured since both of the memorial services my siblings and I did were over, which we used mom’s fb account to help disperse information about, there wasn’t much reason to keep it open.  Prior to shutting it down last night, on Tuesday I posted one final message on mom’s wall letting her circle of friends know I was shutting it down.

When I signed into Fb as my mom and clicked the DEACTIVATE NOW link I had to give a reason for deactivation.  I had to select OTHER as evidently FB does not include death as a prefilled option.  When I clicked the last button to finalize the process it felt very final and somber, almost like closing the lid of a casket.  An instant wave of emotion made my eyes moist as I turned off the computer, I suppose it’s because actions like this make mom’s death feel more real.

So yesterday I had several small successes in different areas.  I finally got one of my two fires at work put out, recovering from a two drive failure in one of our Network Area Storage devices.  When it first happened I thought I was dead in the water but thanks to some determination, a hardware disk duplicator and good support from Netgear, we got the unit back up and running.  I have to say the Seagate 3TB drives that we populated the unit with seem to be pieces of shit.  I have had at least 6 of them fail within the warranty period.

At home I  finally found a spot to utilize my mom’s old house phone.  It had been just sitting by the front door plugged into the wall.  Much like her old cell phone I don’t feel like throwing it away.  I had a phone in pretty much every room of the house except the hobby room so that is where I set it up.  I’ll try to make sure I use it now and then.

When I first got the Xfinity X1 hardware in my house you may recall that the guy that took a 15 minute dump in my house did not set up the remote correctly so it could also control the tv.  I had wanted to set it up but thought it would be sort of pointless since it wouldn’t be able to adjust the tv volume which is piped through my Yamaha surround sound system.  Well it turns out I was wrong..

The second generation X1 remote control does indeed allow you to control your TV AND your auxiliary sound system.  With about 5 minutes of work I had it all working correctly.  This means I should only need to use the more complicated Logitech Harmony remote when I am using the TV to display non-X1 content which isn’t that often.

My final success of the day was virtual in nature.  I finally 100% completed the Curse of Naxxaramas, the first expansion pack for Hearthstone, which is a turn based card game based on WoW. 

Inside the game there are around 11 bosses you have to defeat.  There are two levels of difficulty, normal and heroic.  For the last 5 or 6 days I have been stuck trying to beat one last boss on heroic level.  The bosses all have unique mechanics to them, most of them I have been able to take down after a few tries after looking up recommended decks and strategies online.  Well this one boss, Sapphiron, has been unbeatable for me, despite multiple trips to the internet looking for help.

I was so frustrated, after 60-70 losses in a row over those 5-6 days I was teetering on the edge of giving up.  Yesterday I did one more tweak to my mage deck and FINALLY, FINALLY beat the boss.  I expressed my relief at finally succeeding out loud.  Cindy congratulated me. She didn’t know just how many times I failed before.  Of course a 46 year old man crowing about a video game accomplishment may seem stupid. I prefer to focus on the mindset required to continue to try after failing time and time and time again, no matter what the task is at hand.

The rest of this week is going to involve getting things aligned for our road trip.  Cindy has been extensively researching affordable lodging options along the route which is very helpful.

If you are interested in taking place in my “Shave Your Nugget” challenge, a spin off of the thoroughly lemming-ized “Ice Bucket Challenge”, take a look below.  My challenge has more lasting impact than a brief chill and some wet clothes.

Saturday morning the alarm clock fired off at 3:20 AM. It was the start of what felt like a 3 day weekend meat grinder.  I am almost glad to be back at work today so I can rest to some degree.

Saturday was the 5K I was timing.  Not only was I timing it, I was also bringing the equipment truck on site and making sure that stuff got where it needed to be.  The race had a huge surge in numbers the last several days, including over 100 people the day of the race.  Those situations are always stressful.  I had someone there that I am hopefully going to be teaching to be my timing back up in the future.  Trying to do that in the middle of a busy race day is not easy.

Timing the event, despite all of the last minute entries went well.  This was the first race where I tested a new feature that maps finishing results to a finish line video I shot with my GoPro.  I basically upload the video to YouTube, tell RunSignUp how long it is until the first finisher crosses and I’m done.  RSU will then automatically create a link for each runner that will jump ahead in the video to 5 seconds before they cross and play it back, pretty cool.

After the race I had to stick around to get everything loaded on the equipment truck as well.  By that time the sun was well into the sky, totally soaking my shirt with sweat.  I was quite relieved when I finally pulled out.

So while I was at the race Ali told me that she had Nicki at the 24 hour vet again for what she assumed was a bladder infection.  She also reminded me that I agreed to watch the dogs overnight because of some party she was having at her place.  I had totally forgotten about being asked about it.  So after attending to all of the post race work we went out to run some errands which included picking up the dogs.  I was concerned about how Nicki would be since she was given a shot of antibiotics and a shot of pain meds.  My concerns appeared well founded.

Nicki was not acting well.  As soon as we picked her up she kept trying to scratch at her eyes.  She also was obviously having problems seeing and seemed disoriented as a result.  Nicki has had lifelong issues with her ears and allergies.  In the past year or so she has started to go after her eyes as well.  She will just use her paw to rub them downward.

Ali had taken Nicki to a dog eye doctor.  She was told that spaniels (Nicki is part spaniel) have an issue where their eye lashes can curl under and irritate the eye.  At that time Ali was given just drops and some sort of lubrication ointment.  Well it hasn’t helped as much as you would hope as Nicki has continued to periodically rub her eyes.  Well all of the rubbing has now distorted the area around her eye.  She has actually managed to pull the skin around there down to the point where they are sagging badly.  It seemed on Saturday they were sagging so badly that she could not see at all.  The poor girl is not only almost totally deaf, now she can’t see.

While we were out I picked up supplies to do my first ever oil change on Cindy’s Prius.  It definitely needed to get done before we embark on our 4500-5000 mile road trip next week.  While I was at it I changed the air filter and wiper blades.  Of course I videoed everything as my auto maintenance video series has proven to be one of my most popular in my YouTube channel.  Here it is.

Saturday evening I was really worried about Nicki.  She was literally running into things because she couldn’t see.  She refused to eat as well.  I was worried enough that I called Ali in the middle of her party to fill her in.  The two shots that she was given were probably the cause of the lack of appetite but the vision problem was really scary.  I talked to Ali about options.  After an inappropriate and unexpected side bar argument, we decided to make an appointment with a vet that deals with dog eyelid issues. Cindy was Nicki’s personal nurse over the weekend, feeding her some chicken broth with a syringe, giving her medicine, as well as giving her a bath.

My primary goal on Sunday, thanks to Cindy taking on most of the regular chores herself, was to get some pressure washing done.  The pool area and sheds both had excessive amounts of the green scuzz that accompanies wet season.  I pulled the pressure washer out of the shed as well as the extensions that I use to blast the high sections of the pool cage.  I started to put the extension together and realized what I had was not right.  I had the tubes but it looked like I was missing one adapter.  I put together and took apart the extensions multiple times, thinking maybe this was just my memory failing me.  Nope, it would not work.

So then I assumed I was just missing a piece.  I triple checked both sheds looking for the magical part and came up empty , wtf???  I even called Cindy out to be my second set of eyes, I still came up empty.  I was quite annoyed to have to run out to Home Depot to get a part that I already knew I had somewhere.  Doing so also retarded my pressure washing schedule, making me start a good two hours later than I hoped originally. Oh the best part?  I later found the missing adapter on Monday, it was sitting on my workbench in the garage for reasons that escape me.

Pressure washing was miserable as it always is.  The pool cage is the worst part of it which is why I always do that part first.  By the time I am done my hands, forearms and shoulders are pretty much shot.  I pressure washed the cage, the pool deck, the pad with the water equipment, the large and small shed as well as Tuki’s cage.  During part of it the skies let loose, drenching me from head to toe.  I sought no shelter, I just kept blasting away in the rain, fck it.  In total I probably spent close to 5 hours doing nothing but pressure washing.  If I didn’t already have enough aggravation, the hose on the pressure washer sprung a leak.

I also had agreed to take a look at my neighbors laptop which was loaded down with tons of malware.  Throughout the day I was working on it, uninstalling shit and running various scans.  I finally got all of the junk off of it by Sunday night.  I also returned the dogs to Ali’s place on Sunday evening.

Sunday night we watched Two Guns, with Marky Mark and Denziel Washington.  I thought it was ok, I dozed off again during a part of it later on.  It’s a fine B rental, nothing great but not bad either.

So our Labor Day started with the 20 mile DD bike ride, something neither of us has taken on in quite awhile.  Because of Cindy’s injured foot we haven’t been pressing the envelope speed wise to minimize the stress on her foot.  Even so we averaged 18+ mph on the way there and 16-17 on the way back into a steady headwind.  I was glad we got out the door around 7AM to minimize the heat index numbers.

It poured out at the house for a good portion of the day, once again turning my property into a soggy mess.  We once again headed out to do some errands which included getting a new pressure washer hose and a few other things at Home Depot.  We also met up with my mom’s former landlord to drop off all of the keys I had as well as collect mom’s security deposit.  All details with her apartment should now be settled, at least that is one thing to cross off the list.

During the afternoon Cindy’s daughter and her boyfriend stopped out for a visit along with Tank, their high energy french bulldog.  As with his last visit, Tank was a maniac, pulling out almost every dog toy I had.  He just wants to play and play and play, it’s funny.  I also spent some time playing Call of Duty with Daniel.  He is quite adept at the console FPS genre while I am pretty much a stumbling noob.  Despite this, we actually managed to win some team deathmatch games.  I was consistently at the bottom of the scoreboard and Daniel was number 1 or 2.  I discovered the best way I could help the team was to simply die slower.  Daniel is also a big WOW player although he plays exclusively Arena and PvP , stuff that I rarely play and when I do I generally suck at as well.  It was fun to play with Daniel regardless.

I also did work yesterday creating a chicken care manual to be used by the guy that will be chicken sitting for us.  I also finally mapped out our intended trip route.  If all goes as planned we will take 11 days this time.  The trip is going to have two monster driving days of 800+ miles and a few others that are going to suck.  On the positive side the trip is allocating an over night stay in the Colorado Springs area as well as 3 days and two nights in Durango which will be awesome.

Here is what I came up with:

Day 1 – Naples to Nashville –(13.25) 864 Miles
Day 2 – Nashville to St Louis – (4:28) 310 miles – St Louis to Kansas City – (3:37) 249 miles
Day 3 – Kansas City to Colorado Springs – (8:15) 585 miles
Day 4 – Manitou Springs
Day 5 – Colorado Springs to Durango – (5:20) 313 miles
Day 6 – Durango
Day 7 – Durango
Day 8 – Durango to White Sands – (6:47) 437 miles – White Sands to El Paso – (1:29) 98 miles
Day 9 – El Paso to Beaumont – (11:25) 834 miles
Day 10 – Beaumont to Tallahassee – (8:54) 625 miles
Day 11 – Tallahassee to Naples – (6:07) 432 miles

This morning I picked up Nicki to go to the vet.  Ali said that when she went to the dog eye doctor they recommended we see a dermatologist that also deals with eyelid issues.  I thought this didn’t sound right but Alison assured me that the dermatologist also dealt with eyelids.  Her energy level and alertness seemed better today although she is still refusing food conventionally. (Ali syringed more into her on Monday)  She could once again see at least to some degree and Ali said she had not been going after her eyes as much on Monday which is good.

I picked Nicki up in mom’s Rav 4. Since I got the AC working I figured driving it now and then will be a good thing until I have the legal right to sell it.  I lifted Nicki up and let her ride in the rear cargo area.  The vet I was taking Nicki to was one that Ali has taken her to numerous times since they are a 24 hour business and Nicki seems to make a habit of having issues outside of normal business hours.

I had a negative impression the second I stepped in the door.  There were two clerks behind the desk and no customers in front of them.  Both the man and the woman were looking at their computer screens.  I said hello, which was returned by the woman without glancing my way.  I told them I was there for a 9 am appointment.  The guy said in an annoyed tone “We will be with you in a minute”.  I mean what the fck, you are a clerk, your job is to wait on customers, there are two of you and no customers at the desk and you give me attitude?  Needless to say it got the visit off on the wrong foot.

Actually the bad experience started the day before when I talked to whom I assume is the same guy on the phone about setting up the appointment.  Even though this was supposed to be a consult about Nicki’s eyes, he said that she needed to fast the night before.  I didn’t follow the logic and asked why if this was just a consult.  He said in the now familiar annoyed tone “because that is our procedure”.

I again was annoyed when I was given a two page questionnaire to fill out about Nicki’s history.  Like I said she has been there many times, why I am filling out a form like she is a first timer?  The form was also asking questions that Ali would be much better suited to answer so I was taking ballpark guesses for some of it.  By the time I was lead back to an exam room my mood was not good.

So the dermatologist comes in and I start explaining what Ali told me.  The dog eye doctor said that her eyelashes could be rubbing against her eyes and causing irritation, they said that we should see you.  The dermatologist stops me and looks confused.  She said she has nothing to do with eyelid surgery. WTF.  Evidently what the eye doctor meant was she recommended looking into the allergy side of things next.  I sighed out loud.  The dermatologist said that all the itching and scratching could just be allergic reactions.  She did a swab of Nicki’s ears and eyes.  She mentioned very quickly it would be “180 to check them out under the microscope”  Great.

So while she was out looking at stuff I made a call to the place that Cindy recommended that does eyelid procedures on dogs.  I talked to the doctor and he was very nice on the phone.  Unlike the place I was sitting at, I immediately got a very good first impression from this guy.  I made an appointment for Nicki to see him tomorrow at 9.

After making the appointment I was more annoyed I was sitting in the exam room.  When the dermatologist came back in she started to outline her recommended treatment plan.  She basically wanted to do a 3 month diet change where Nicki would be fed nothing but kangaroo or rabbit meat dog food that of course is only available through vets.  The purpose of this is to eliminate food allergies as a cause.  For environmental allergies she was recommending some expensive medication that supposedly does more than the Benadryl we give her.  This time I stopped her.  I told her that Nicki has had extensive allergy testing done and we actually had her on a hypoallergenic vet food for quite awhile.  The dermatologist said “if it wasn’t kangaroo or rabbit it means nothing to me”  She was obviously not happy that I wasn’t wagging my tail at her very expensive and difficult to enact treatment plan .

With all of the meds Nicki has been on, the idea of doing another complete 3 month reboot just did not sound feasible to me.  I told her that I was not going to agree to any sort of treatment plan until I talked to my ex-wife about it since she is the primary care giver for the dogs.  Again I could see the dermatologists expression stiffen, I’m sure she thought I was an idiot for not accepting her recommendation as gospel.  They did give me some stuff to help both Nicki’s eyes and ears short term.

When I was at the counter to check out the guy that was annoyed to greet me was much happier to swipe my credit card for $380.  When I looked at the itemized bill I wanted to throw up.  Each swab costs $60 a pop and I paid $115 for the privilege of talking to a specialist.  Thankfully the pet insurance that Ali and I pay for should reimburse a good portion of the expense but that doesn’t make those charges any more legitimate in my eyes.  I left the vet with no desire to ever return there.

I drove Nicki all the way back to Ali’s place and dropped her off before reversing direction and driving all the way back to town.  Was it an efficient use of time, money or gas? Nope.  I am hoping the office visit tomorrow proves to be more worthwhile for Nicki.

This latest unexpected bill added to my already existing concern about the dollars and sense for our upcoming road trip.  If we were not taking the Prius I would have already cancelled it.  The only thing allowing it to go forward is the 66% savings in gas we should reap this time around.   My budget book has some red ink in it for the first time in a long time, not exactly ideal when you are shoving off cross country.   Since I have been fronting all of the expenses for my mom’s estate up until this point it has put an unexpected dent in my bottom line.  Of course I can move some numbers around to make it all work in the end but without a doubt frugality will be one aspect of the trip which will be of high importance.

Did I mention that I had a dream last week where I was speaking to my mom?  I was speaking to her in a post death scenario, she knew she had died and we were talking about various things.  Unfortunately I don’t recall any substantial detail other than it occurred.