Parker Poseurs

We just spent a wonderful three days at Kim and Ed's house at the Colorado River near Parker Arizona. I am about six pounds heavier.

We had a heck of a time trying to leave Murray Tuesday night 22 Nov. I took a vacation day on Weds so we initially planned on leaving right after I got home from work. But, Ailsa had to work until 9:30pm. So, I set up some bishopric stuff since I was kinda behind. One of my appointments apparently didn't show. So, I left early to go gas up the Blue car. Lenore called me and told me I needed to go back. I met with a sister for about 45 minutes, during that time I must have had five or six phone calls. I think there were two or three more when I got home.

We picked up Ailsa about 9:50 and headed out. Only a couple of hours into the drive I was falling asleep so we stopped in Fillmore to pick up some goodies and a Mountain Dew. There was very little traffic for our whole trip down to Parker. The price of gas in Needles was $3 so we bought it in Parker for $2.15.

We weren't having our Thanksgiving meal until Friday because Sean and Tamsyn were arriving then. So, Thursday I went for a bike ride. I thought it would be a good chance to see the difference between my top condition and probably my lowest. It has been two months since I rode. The Ehrenburgh road is very flat and you can go a long way without stopping. I was pushing hard and not really loving it. So, I decided to limit myself to 20 miles. I reached 10 miles and turned around at 32 minutes. And I reached 20 miles at 1:04:00. So it must be pretty flat.

When I got back I sat on the dock and repeatedly helped Laney get in the water. She would swim to the beach, drifting slightly downstream, climb out and come back around to the dock. The water was very cold, probably no more than 55-60 degrees. During the winter they tend to let less water through the Parker Dam. So the level starts out quite low in the morning and then reaches an okay level in the evening. During the Summer late in the day the flow is quite strong and we have nightmares of somebody's kid getting in the water and drifting down to the Gulf of California before we realize it.

I didn't ride anymore because I am a fat lazy slob. We went shooting three of the days. We used the 32 caliber semi-automatic pistol that belonged to J.C. Lillywhite and the 22 revolver that belonged to Boone Wade (and perhaps even his father) and also a couple of 22 rifles. We probably went through a couple thousand rounds and shot up everything we could find including the kitchen sink. Well, actually a bathroom sink. I shot the drain out of it at 75 yards (after many attempts). We let Laney shoot the revolver and one of the rifles. When the clip on the rifle emptied she said, "I need more bullets."

On Thursday we had Prime Rib that was very good and throughout the weekend we had more food at our disposal than we really needed.

The drive back (stopping for the night chez Puggas in St. George) was relatively uneventful. But, there was a lot of Thanksgiving return traffic and a lot of people camping out in the passing lane.