Arizona Day #2

Bottlebrush


Figs on palm


Roadrunner




Copper mines


Crested Saguaro






Saguaro that fell recently

Sunsets and more

Pearce Cemetary + The Thing

After the festival, we walked over to the old cemetary to hear tales of men long ago. Jim Olsen has lived in the area for 40 years and actually know quite a bit about the individuals marked. The rock with lots of holes was used by miners to test their drilling tools.



Headstones were marked by all kinds of interesting shapes including pipes and old hitches for crosses.





This headstone marked Adam Wade Kidd "murdered." Unfortunately for this poor soul, his wife convinced him to pick up a hitchhiker who turned out to be his wife's lover. They had conspired against him and killed him. The wife's lover ran off and was never punished for the crime.



While I checked for each of you, I only found one Careerian with long lost, heroic relatives from Pearce, Arizona. Markus, who exactly were these Schafer's and what did he do in WWII?



Billboards across AZ promoted a site called "The Thing." I, being the sucker that I am, paid my $1 to peruse the museum with The Thing. I followed the yellow footprints....saw artifacts from around the world....and left wondering what was The Thing? I think it was some unlabeled artifact that looked like a mummified Chinese man.

Pearce, AZ

Pearce is an old ghostown formerly populated by people who came to mine for gold, silver, and other precious minerals. History goes that a young man found a rock and thought it was heavy so he took it to a friend who found gold inside.
Pearce was having their annual festival with music, goods, and historical items galore.












This is the old Commonwealth mine. If you make it to the top, there's box to leave your name. It eventually caved in killing many and ending an era.


This building is the interior of the church's old rectory complete with 1970's decor.








Jim and Evelyn showed us an old church they purchased to preserve as a historical site. Jim plans to fix it up and turn it into a resale clothing shop for a battered women's shelter.


Sue was prepared for Sweet Evangelism. She's packaging cookies with tracks to pass out at the Pearce festival.

Arizona Day #1

Sunrise in Green Valley was beautiful...Low lying clouds enveloping the mountains as the sun was rising.

It's that time of year...let the sunshine appear....

So while the rest of you may be listening to Christmas music blaring over speakers in overcrowded malls while you are stuffed with turkey and....well...clearly...stuffing, I'll be singing a different tune. Instead of "It's that time of year" followed by all kinds of Christmasy musings, I'll be singing "Let the sunshine appear!" For some reason, this fall has been extra fallish. Too few days of clear blue sky and not enough sparkling rays to illuminate the shades of brown. I'm ready to escape the drab Indiana fields for warm, sunny Arizona! Now mind you, I've yet to be in AZ for Thanksgiving. I've done AZ in Feb, April, and Christmas. Plus this trip will be extra special since we're traveling up to northern Arizona and I may get my first peek at the Grand Canyon! WoooHooo!!!! So think of me on Thanksgiving day while you enjoy your stuffing. I'll be flying from Indy to Dallas to Tucson complete with Faith sermons and Third Day for good company. Ahhhh....Vacation! No court, no staff to manage, no crisis calls!!! Just me and my hiking shoes! You'll have to stay tuned as I hope to update the blog with pics from my adventures with the AZ parents.
In other news, let my tell you about my preparations for AZ travel. As all of you are aware, I am of the white variety. Yes, and by white, I mean could be mistaken for albino easily at times. I travel complete with water babies 60+ and cover to avoid the tomato paste effect after being in sun all of 15 minutes. Well, this year, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I decided to prepare for the trip to enjoy the outdoors all the more without fear of sunburn. I signed myself up for a tanning package at a reputable place in town and experienced my first ever tanning time. I have to say, it was quite the experience. I got the "cyclone" which basically means you stand in a glowing room for 9 minutes while swirling air keeps you cool and you feel as if in the midst of a ....well...cyclone. Actually it feels quite wonderful....I think part of the wonderful was knowing that for 9 minutes I couldn't hear my phone ring and could enjoy 9 minutes of uninterrupted blissful warmth.
So first session went well. They set me for 6 minutes. No burn. I returned a few days later and agreed they could up me to 7 minutes. Ummm....not so good. Turns out 6 minutes to 7 minutes is huge in distinguishing between a little less than white results and tomato paste results. Lance got to see my blazing burn. Basically I learned tanning means I can burn before then trip or not tanning means I can burn on the trip. My bad! Totally thought I could create an option "c" but clearly I was wrong!
As the weeks have continued, I am pleased to say I have secured several other tomato paste days but now yield a somewhat glowing tan. Compared to the rest of the world, I am still of the whitest variety but there is some satisfaction I am less white than 3 weeks ago. Only time will tell if my plan will mean no burning while on vacation or not.
Well...I'm now done checking one more "never done it before" off my list....Tanning...check....mental note: tanning in Abby world still = burning to gain desired results.

-isms

Apparently I have some -isms. You know, those things that make you, you but you tell yourself maybe you don't have. The roommie can totally identify who I'm talking to on the phone by my phone answering -isms of "Hey girl!" She reported I answer said way to several girlfriends and she accurately predicted who I spoke with tonight so I think she may be on to something.
Does anyone else have any -isms about myself or others they'd like to share? I find this topic quite fascinating.

Dr. Candidate Celebrity Status

Kudos to my roommie for her BIG accomplishment on Monday! She conquered the 1.5 hour grilling by major professors at Purdue to pass the Masters kick out point. She's now an official Doctoral Candidate for Chemistry.
WooHoo!

I've been goosed!

Friday was the Careerian Costume party at the Rockin Refuge. Jonelly was so excited she carved her rendition of "Pumpkin Pie," which you need to look at closely and think scientifically to get. I was excited to have some porch decorations to promote the festivities.

Needless to say, the party was alot of fun and several people I had not seen in a long while dropped by (Yeah!). At some point in the evening, I was passing out candy and realized I had a new porch decoration in the form of a goose. When questioning those around me, no one seemed to know where or how the goose landed at my homestead. I think the goose needs a name to really capture the spirit of Octoberdom, so I've christened her Greta.

I also decided that Greta may be cute but she really isn't Rockin Refuge mascot material so I predict Greta will fly away to another home in the future. I did finally hunt down that Greta left many other statuesque animal friends to land at my home. My mom had the funniest comment which she left in a note for me which read, "I think the goose needs a sign reading, 'I'm just glad I'm not a turkey.'" Ha Ha! Good one Mom!