My Babe! :)

Our Trip to Colorado!

Ok. Well Derek wins the fattest ballerina award for sure, but Noah and I win the prize for gregarious geeks! We celebrated Halloween as tourists--touring Colorado of course.

I carried a beach duffel bag filled with a map, a book of crossword puzzles, a broken umbrella, multi-vitamins, a comb, a bouncy ball, sunscreen, lipstick, an extra camera, playing cards, pens and pencils, two Colorado postcards, and a Colorado shot glass--one of those collectible items. And of course I wore a camera around my neck as well. You never know when you might run into a photographic moment. I wish we had a full body shot, because we both wore tall socks with sandals. My skirt was green with bright blue socks. Noah wore khaki shorts.

We ran around the party taking lots of pictures, telling strangers we were from Florida and that we loved the hills in Colorado. We asked for lots of directions and pulled out our map at every opportunity. After a while, we snuck into a corner and worked on a crossword puzzle. It was a dandy time.

Here's some of the locals we met:

King Kong and his sailor girl.

AWESOM-O the Robot and an elated tourist.

Freddy Cougar and wicked clown "It."

A weightlifter resembling Borat.

Napoleon campaigning for Pedro.

And some grouchy dude named Oscar.

It was really great to see Colorado! We hope all you can join us next year on our grand tour. Maybe we can rent an R.V. together. Wouldn't that be swell?

Why Men Fish-- An Old Wives Tale for Mom and Twila

It all began on a mostly sunny day in a mostly sunny region of the country when a mostly pink girl cocked her head to one side and said shadows. Today will be a day of shadows.

So she hollered to the Mafia and they came a-hobbling down from peak-peak mountain, wise and secretive at once, and oh-so invincible!

"Go forth!" said the girl in pink. "And take this great boat.

"Travel yonder this great lake, up and down, far and wide. Find me shadows."

What kind of kook is this?, thought the wise women, and they stared at her and away from her all at once, wondering why they always got these stupid jobs.

Nevertheless, they struck out and squoze their bodies into the one-man kayak, and set forth upon the open sea. Before long, however, the waves overwhelmed them and filled their boat with water. In a surge of panic, they reached for the nearest tree, (the only tree), and held tight as garbage in a hurricane.

They believed they had reached life's end, until along came Man. His name was Noah and he had a strangely familiar black dog. "I build boats," he said. "I will build you a boat that shall never sink, even if it rains for forty days and forty nights."

"This is Colorado, Man," said the sassy blonde. "It might rain forty minutes." Nevertheless, they accepted his offer and he built them an evergreen boat but didn't bother to remove the needles so the boat actually looked furry.

"How can we repay you?" asked the Mafia women, (although they didn't much look like the Mafia anymore because their sunglasses were stuck to the tree sap.)

"Here here," he said. "Take my shadow to the mostly pink girl and tell her of this story, so she might honor man for generations to come."

So the women took his shadow and the one shoved it in her back pocket. They boarded the boat and slowly floated across the great lake. But the boat, being so huge, knocked and pushed its way through the canyon, destroying everything in its path. When it finally stopped, the women peaked out a small window and saw a rainbow in the sky. "We've arrived," they said. "This is the land of shadows and they are in color."

In eager haste, they ran towards the rainbow. But the land was rough and rugged (due to Noah's big boat) and they had to climb boulders and crawl beneath felled trees and no matter how they hurried they could not catch the colored shadow. In sadness they stood, staring at the ground. "Well," said the one. "There's always us. Let's just give her our shadows."

So in resignation, they rolled their shadows up like sleeping bags and began their journey home to the mostly pink girl. Along the way, they came upon a pond of fish. These fish had shadows of blue and red, yellow, gold, and orange.

"Please, fish. Give us your shadows." The fish did not respond and the two women argued over how to speak Fish correctly.

Finally, a spotty old fish with holes in his shadow rose to the surface and said, "If we do this for you, what will you give us in return?"

The women frantically searched their bodies and the ground and their hair until the one cried, "Give them the man."

"Yes," said the other. And she pulled his crumpled, sweaty shadow from her pocket and tossed it toward the pond.

The fish, believing it to be a swarm of flies, jumped straight out of the water and snatched it from midair. They tore the man to tiny bits and scattered in a frenzy. The women, afraid of getting gypped, snagged a couple fish shadows and ran as fast as lizards to the base of peak peak mountain.

They did not even stop to talk with the mostly pink girl--simply threw the fish at her head and hobbled home.

And therefore, ever since the invasion of the Mafia, fish (forced to share shadows) swim in schools. And man, even when he's tired, travels up and down lakes, over boulders and through woods in search of the fish who swallowed his silhouette.

Why is it that we only take pictures when we go to Moab? Oh well. I needed an excuse to add more pictures to this blog. Same ol' happenings at our joint. I'm in search of a job and plucking my way through school. Noah's working towards his retirement. And Buddy's whining because he just wants to play, play, play. But hey, if you are lucky, I'll add my critical research papers to my next post. You all can't wait for that, I'm sure.

Hello everybody! I had so much fun looking at Sarah and Stef's blogs, that I decided to do one too. So thanks for the idea guys. Well, I start school again tomorrow. I only have three classes left in this 10-year bachelors degree. Hopefully I won't get the urge to fly to India half-way through. :) I just finished my seasonal job landscaping and now I have to find a new one. This will be my 4th job this year. Needless to say, I like change.

Noah just finished his softball season. His team, Beleza, took 2nd in the tourneys. Noah is a blast to watch. He's one of those scramblers who easily makes double, and sometimes, triple plays. He often played as pitcher and made 2 OUT OF THE PARK homeruns this season + 8 in-the-park homeruns. (He's standing behing me bragging right now.)

He's still busy with his job as a carpenter and also taking care of our yard. He has kept up on the garden and now it is filled with yellow squash, zucchini, a few strawberries, beans, snow peas, beets, spinach and lettuce, and tiny tiny carrots. He also planted grass in our yard to cover up the pile of dirt that was there previously.

And Buddy? He's deeply in love with his tennis balls and as handsome as ever. He's tired of going to work though and groans when Noah trys to get him out of bed. Many mornings he skips breakfast because he is so disgruntled with his 9 to 5 job.

Well. We'll have more news later! Stay tuned.