Moab

So as it turns out, I really SUCK at blogging. I'll admit it--it is really harder than it looks. I can never seem to find the time. But anyways...

Recently, Geoff and I went to Moab with some friends. For those of you who don't know, it's this rather hippie town surrounded by tons of cool desert spectacles, such as arches and canyons. You really should go there--it is beautiful (and I'll admit I don't even prefer the desert). Below are a few shots to give you an idea of what I mean. We went hiking and river rafting and more. In Moab itself, there are tons of cool shops to see with tons of Buddahs and Native American wares--it was kinda up my alley. I wish every weekend could be a Moab weekend, and I have decided that my husband and I must go on more river rafting trips--I love being in and on the water!

On our last day there, we hiked to the Delicate Arch (pictured above). This is the arch that appears on the Utah state license plate. The hike itself was a lot of fun, and more than a little bit of work. But the work all paid off when we reached the top of an incline (not sure I would call it a mountain per se) and suddenly we could see this huge arch free standing on the other side of a large rock basin. We saw people standing under the arch and excitedly made our way there. We had to pretty much climb up the face of a mountain to get there, which was very fun, but seemed surprisingly dangerous. I mean, we were RIGHT on the side of this mountain, so just one misstep and.... well you know where this is going. (The picture above was taken from ACROSS the basin, and we climbed up from behind the arch) I must admit that I was a bit nervous about going all the way up to the arch because coming down would be VERY tricky. I figured if everyone else was doing it, it must be alright (yeah, I know... if everyone were jumping off a bridge...). Once we got to the top of the mountain, we noticed that everyone ELSE was taking some EASY path around the basin. I don't know how we missed the entrance to that, but it was definitely more fun taking a walk on the wild side. Needless to say, we took the easy way back down, but we are still super hardcore.

Guard Dog Trixie

Last week, I was at my Mom's house again watching a movie. Trixie was walking around on the couches when suddenly, she noticed someone outside. She started barking and growling frantically. I looked out the window and there was nobody there. She was barking at her own reflection! My sister would let her own reflection in and out of the window, and this drove Trixie even more crazy. I think she barked at the "intruders" for ten to fifteen minutes before she got tired and gave it up.

So cute!

You know who else is a good guard dog?


Our Blondie. :)


(Perhaps a little too good though, if you know what I mean. She lets us know when even our neighbor has a visitor or the dog down the street is barking.)

I guess you could say that my husband is a pretty good guard dog, too.

Doggie Loves Froggie

Dogs are very funny creatures. This is my Blondie:

She is smart, social, and attentive. She keeps me company

when Geoff is out of the house. She loves to explore, bark, and follow people around the house. This anecdote is not about her.

Introducing her cousin and best friend, my sister's dog, Trixie.

Trixie is very brave (unless there is a vacuum around). She will jump up on pretty much anything she can manage to get on, and she can jump surprisingly high. Here is a picture of her on the automan. I have personally seen her achieve more impressive feats, but this is the best picture I have.

Today, she was on the couch with my mom. She suddenly noticed her Froggie sitting on top of a couple of boxes next to the couch. She remembered that she loves that Froggie (along with all of her other hundreds of toys)! She wanted to play with Froggie! But for whatever reason, she was scared of the two boxes Froggie was sitting on. So she spent the next five minutes leaning as far over the edge of the couch as she could, whining and trying to get us to fetch Froggie down for her. She jumped from the couch to the floor and back a few times, but she could not bring herself to jump onto the boxes. We tried to coax her onto the boxes, but she was too scared.

Eventually, she was distracted and forgot all about her Froggie.

:)

We are Invincible

Think back to grade school. What happened when a fire alarm went off? The teacher would automatically stop what he or she was doing to usher you and all of your classmates safely out of the building. Some teachers would discourage you from taking anything with you--a backpack and whatever was in it was not necessarily important should there really be a fire. Because, I must stress, there just might really be a fire or some other type of emergency. These regular drills were supposed to train us what to do in case of a real emergency in the schoolhouse and beyond. But guess what. IT DIDN'T STICK.

At the end of the work day today, the fire alarm went off. Out of nowhere, deafening cacophonous screeches filled the air. I did not see one concerned look in the entire building as I walked out of the office, through the hall, down the stairs, away from the building and to my car, the screeching ricocheting from wall to wall and pulsing painfully in my brain. I noticed nothing more than a scowl and a muttered "that's annoying" before everyone was back to what they were doing. And let me tell you, that alarm was LOUD. And OBNOXIOUS. Apparently these people would rather sit at their desks like deaf people and face death than be bothered to exit the building.

Two weeks ago, I was participating in a late night yoga class at the gym. Right in the middle of our Vinyasa flow, the fire alarm went off. I looked around and saw that nobody was altering their activity in the class or on the exercise machines. I looked to the teacher for guidance. Guess what the teacher did. She said, "Man, that's not very zen. Try to ignore that." Then she continued going through the workout. Mind you, this gym is notorious for always being far too packed with people for comfort. Should there be a real emergency, it would likely be difficult for everyone to get out quickly... and in one piece. For a moment I considered this reality and imagined people pushing and shoving each other all the way downstairs and toward the sole exit with flames and smoke all around. Then shrugged it off and I went right back to my workout.

Luckily, there were no real emergencies in either instance (at least I don't think there was one at work today--I suppose I left before I could really find out). But COME ON PEOPLE! What if there had been a real emergency?

I remember evacuating the pool TWICE due to real fires in the rec center while I was working as a Senior Lifeguard a few years ago. A friend of mine told me that once a fire alarm went off while she was at work, and nobody evacuated the building. Soon, SWAT officers entered her office and barked at them all to get out--there was some sort of violent hostage situation or something of the sort in the building. Real emergencies do happen. This is why we are trained all throughout grade school to get the heck OUT when the loud obnoxious alarm sounds.

Perhaps we subconsciously decided that all of those practices were nothing more than false alarms. We know that none of those other instances were real emergency situations, so what are the odds this one is?

Or maybe we have grown to believe we are invincible, and when push comes to shove, we are capable of outrunning bullets and leaping through sheets of flame to safety.

Long Time, No See

A lot has happened since the last time I posted.

For one thing.... I got married!

On Friday, the 13th of August, 2011, Geoff and I finally tied the knot. It was about time, and I must say that it was the best move I have ever made.

Since then life has been positively wonderful!

More later...

What are you doing now?

Yesterday, I was driving in my car (post yet to come detailing this), which has quickly become one of my favorite new places to me to think (AND pay attention to the road, of course). This trip in particular, I was wondering why in the world it is so hard to just be the person I want to become already! After quite some time of lamenting over this, I realized how preposterous that statement really is- to be the person one wants to become. One simply cannot be and become at the same time. Those words are referring to two completely different time periods: 'be' is present while 'become' refers to the future. I had a laugh over the absurdity of such a thing- as far as anyone will admit, one cannot be in more than one time period at the same time any more than one can be in more than one place at the same time. One will never be that which one is striving to become. What matters is that one is trying, and that one comes closer every day. Maybe you will share a laugh with me and stop being so hard on yourself too.

___________

It's, not, where you are, It's where you're going,
Where are you going?
And it's, not, about the things you've done, it's what you're doing, now,
What are you doing, now?

Everybody gets knocked down,
Everybody gets knocked down,
How quick are you gonna' get up?
How quick are you gonna' get up, now?

Like Ali in the jungle,
Like Nelson in jail,
Like Simpson on the mountain,
Well with odds like that, they were bound to fail
Like Keller in the darkness,
Like Adam's in the dark,
Like Ludwig Van, how I loved that man, well the guy went deaf and didn't give a ----, no.

-"Ali in the Jungle" by The Hours

Was blind but now I see...

My dog passed away last week after a rather agonizing few days of illness. It was one of the hardest experiences I have ever had. At the risk of sounding wimpy, I still have to hold back tears when I think of it. My dog has pretty much been my best friend since fifth grade and I never truly realized that one day she would no longer be there when I come home.

The other day, I was musing over how sporadic her sleep schedule was and I despondently thought to myself, "Well now she is eternally asleep." But then I caught myself. No, she is not eternally asleep. She is eternally awake. I don't believe she is eternally dead. She is eternally alive. It makes me smile just to think of it. :)