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I'm back! Not only am I back, but I'm really back. For the first time in over 9 months, I will be home for over a week. This was quite the trip I just returned from, but one constant made it very awesome:
With a twinkle in her eye, I had Lulu for a whole two weeks, and we went all over.
My biggest worry for the trip was driving in bad weather. As I left the SLC, I was less than encoraged.
Cedar was not much better, but Lulu and Susie didn't mind! Hanging with Andrew was really fun. Andrew and his hot female friends kicked my ass in Cranium.
Yeah, they get along REAL well. In all honesty, Lulu doesn't like to play with her; but when we I got back and I dropped her off, she was so excited to see her! They played like I've never seen before.
From Cedar, I drove to Ridgecrest to see my dad. His cactus garden is only getting bigger.
On of the highlights was a walk to my cousin's house with Star (my dad's dog). It's less than a mile, but the dogs had a blast with lots of smelling.
One of the first things we did was check out the snow in Kennedy Meadows, because it's just never enough. Here Star and Googie run along together, though they normally ignored each other as much as possible.
So, the snow had a layer of ice frozen on top, and the dogs did something I never knew dogs could do: they spread out their toes web-like to stop (or at least limit) the sinking into the snow below. Crazy, eh?
We also checked out the semi-frozen south fork of the Kern. We tried to stop them, and were worried, but the dogs ran out across the ice.
The ice remained solid, but that did not stop Star from jumping the water anyways..
On Xmas we made a turkey in a old roaster that blonged to his parents. It cooked the meat really well!
It was really good with cloves of garlic randomly shoved into the meat... Mmmm...
Next, we went to LA to visit family and friends. This is what we mainly did.
Fernando was a gracious host, and as you can see, Lulu and Fernando got along very well. In fact, she may have convinced him and the roommates to get a dog of their own.
One of the highlights of the LA portion was the mini-(replacement) HS reunion. Anthony, Paulina, Richard, Angie, myself, and Jeff all got togther. Gabe and Esteban (not our class, but fellow Spartans) also joined us. I had not seen these folks in too long, it was great! At the end of the night, we took a cool walk around UCLA. Extra thanks to Angie for coordinateing and suggesting this.
Last but far from least on the trip was Super Fantastic Weekend II: The Tale of Joshua Tree. See Andy's post for more details and pics.
Lulu got to see her deaf counterpart: Patch. Like Star, they tried their best to ignore each other.
We stayed at Black Rock campground, which was nice.
The biggest problem was the weather. It was very cold, with wind the first night. Tents were not optimal.
Luckily, Googie and I slept in the back of Carl (my truck).
I had to leave Lulu's harness on most of the time in LA and JTNP. She hates it, but there was no other choice. When I did let her free, she tended to get in trouble. Only when I was far from others would I let her free, like here next to this mylonitized granitoid.
The littleist geologist, Pat and Kelly's baby Meghan was starting to walk and talk/sign. Here, she amuses us all with her Xmas Maggie Simpson impression.
Kelly kept saying she liked the dogs, but I'm not so sure...
The best, er..., only hike we did was Hidden Valley.
There are three main units: The Sevier-aged intrusive Monzogranite which makes up the unique, rounded formations in the park, the 1.7 (Vishnu equ?) Pinto Gneiss, and a recent (<2 Ma?) hypabyssal basalt that is undated. Hey, if you are a Baddeleyite expert, date this already!
The last thing we saw was Keys View, arguably the highlight of the park. It's a beutiful view of Imperial Valley and even the Salton Sea. The linear hills at the base of the range are the Indio Hills, which (if I'm not mistaken) are a small transpressional feature on the San Andreas fault. From here, you can actually see the end of the fault, which begins at Cape Mendicino, far north of San Fransisco.
Yeah, in case you can't tell, it was damn cold! Can you tell?
The best part of the drive home that really made things come full circle was a drive past Amboy crater of ESS 103A fame on my way back to the SLC.
All and all, another great trip and hopefully just the second in a long list of SFW's and high school mini-reunions. Most of all, I had loads of fun with Googie burrito, and I can't wait to see her again, because it can never come soon enough.
Quick other random thoughts:
I can not say Utah is the #1 team, but like Jim Rome said today, they have to at least be in the conversations and they should at least have a shot. I will be royally pissed is $c is ranked higher at the end of the year.
This guy look familiar? His name is François Affolter, and he's a soccer player for the BSC Young Boys of the Swiss National League. Cool, eh?
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