Holiday Pics

I got on the blog tonight to share some of our holiday-time photos but realized that most of the pics that I wanted to share are on Erin's camera. Unfortunately she is in New York visiting her family and I'm pretty sure she has her camera with her. I found some other pictures that are worth sharing though. You'll just have to deal with the fact that they are a little bit random.



This is from Bozeman's Christmas Stroll; it's a big deal around here and I wanted to go to it more to see the spectacle than to really participate much. Main Street is closed down and insanity rules for a few hours. One of the jewelry stores downtown had college-aged girls dressed as Elves (or something) dancing and posing in the front display window. Kind of reminded me of the Calvin Kline weird dancing billboard deal in Time's Square.



Erin hard at work for school. She didn't know I was taking this but I love the way the picture turned out. I can't wait until she's done with school; though she'll probably just find something else to keep her busy whe we get to that point.

This last one I took at the top of the hill next to our house where I walk Kaya every morning. I typically walk her between 5:45 and 6:30 and it's completely dark, but this is on a Saturday not long after snow.



I can't wait to get Erin's camera. I'll give you a little teaser for photos to come: Christmas Turtlenecks.

HS Reunion

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine from High School (Taylor, I know many of you know him) organized a get-together of a group of guys that knew each other in high school. We went up to McCall (9 hours from Bozeman!)for a long-weekend (long describing the time driving, not the time relaxing).

I had a great time (aside from the driving) and really thought that the whole thing was interesting. I can't say that all of the guys that were there were my closest friends from high school, but a couple of them were (Trevor, Taylor, Bryce) and they were all guys that I considered friends. I've kept up with Trevor and Taylor the best, though thats not saying much, but I was really struck by how much they all seemed to be pretty much the same. I wonder how much of that was real and how much is the result of reverting to old social roles? While each person's chosen life path has definately taken them in a different direction than my own, their choice of life path seemed quite fitting. But maybe I'm just fitting my observations to my theory. Do I sound like a dorky scientist or what?

P.S. It's crazy how I start a blog out meaning to tell one story, and end up telling another.

Camera Recovery

Hi, everybody. I finally found a cord that I could use to download photos from my camera. Thought I would share one or two.


Erin, Kaya, and I went fishing on the Madison River over a month ago. I was really jonesing to go and managed to drag Erin away from her homework long enought to join me. After driving about 45 minutes we got out of the car and stepped into a frickin' tornado. For those of you who have gone fly-fishing, you know that this is about the time that you turn the car around and go watch a movie or something.

Well, I was pretty exited to go and wanted Erin to get a feel for what it's all about; so we suited up and waded into the river. The picture with Kaya is pretty deceiving; she was nothing close to well-behaved. I swear she knew where I was going to cast before I did. Time and again she would barrel into the river right to where I was headed. It was OK because the whole thing was an exercise in futility from the outset, but I might hesitate before taking her with me when I'm serious about catching fish.

The highlight was watching Kaya trying to get to the opposite shore in places where it got deep. She loves the water but hates swimming in it. She would get close enough to the shore to taste it, but would get swept back just before getting there. She would look back at us frantically and then struggle to the banks. It was really funny. I'm excited about the winter but not a huge fan of working during the few hours of daylight.


How’s that for 16 words, Mom?

LET'S GO ROCKIES, YOU CAN DO IT!

There. Including this sentence that makes fifteen words.

GO ROCKIES!

Been A While

I just noticed that I haven't really posted anything for a bit. Just wanted to say that I/we are healthy and happy. I'm loving that it's cooling down, we've had a scorching hot summer (for Bozeman). I'll try to write something more soon.

Cliff Lake, MT

Erin and I rented a canoe this past weekend to do a little "relaxed" camping. I thought the canoe would be a good way to get away from the crowds of car camping while having the comforts of decent food and gear that is too heavy to carry in a backpack. We actually fit all the gear, ourselves, and Kaya in the Canoe all at once; which was good because the campsite I was told to paddle to was a mile into a 20mph wind and I didn't want to do it twice. Kaya didn't love the boat ride too much. I don't know why, she didn't have to paddle.


After setting up camp we went down to the lake to set up the hammock so Erin could take a nap while I tried to fly-fish in a tropical storm. While I was looking for the two trees of ideal separation for hammocking, Erin was alert enough to notice that the boat was no longer where we left it.


I started running down the shoreline, knowing very well that the most likely stopping place of the canoe in the now 30mph wind was at least back at the car where we started, if not further down valley. As I was turning around to tell Erin that I would be back to camp in July some nice people yelled from down the shoreline that they had intercepted an unmanned, quickly moving canoe. I was greatful.

I did get a few minutes of sort-of calm to fish after the 75+mph winds.

Kaya ended up helping out around camp.


But it took a lot out of her (that and her staying up all night defending us from every grizzly bear and squirrel in a 10-mile radius).


All in all it was fun. Windy. But fun.