What I did on My Vacation

We were on vacation this week and it didn’t come a moment too soon. I was in desperate need of some de-stressing. Our original vacation plans were to drive to Washington State and go on a serious week long wine tasting trek with some scenic vistas thrown in. But after going over the vacation budget and the cost estimates, we were a bit short and I am loathe to running up a huge credit card debt for a week of drinking and debauchery. Even though I am always up for debauchery and of course, drinking, I do have some limits.

After plan A tanked, we decided on plan B, a driving trip to New Mexico, going the NRA shooting center in Roton, New Mexico then driving on to Taos and tasting some of New Mexico’s wines. New Mexico is half the distance to Washington so I figured half the cost. Logical right? So that is what we decided on, drive to New Mexico, shoot up a bunch of ammunition, drive some wine and eat spicy food, what could be better?

Well fate decided that she had a better plan and evidently a sense of humor too. Not something I saw any humor in but I guess someone else might. There is a homeowner in this tiny burg that had let her property fall into extreme disrepair and the neighbors had been complaining. Original plans were made to condemn the property and tear it down. At the eleven hour the property owner showed up to a city meeting last fall to plead her case and of course our soft hearted codes enforcement officer, Mitch, fell for it. The city ended up giving her time to clean up the property and guess what, nothing was done. After many months of fruitless efforts to contact the owner, Mitch was finally able to serve her with a summons to come to court and guess what, the court date was smack dab in the middle of our vacation. There went plan B, straight down the tubes.

That left us with a very short window for any time away. We ended up with plan C, a quick sashay to other end of the state for a couple of days with Mitch and my camera. The two hooligans went to a pet spa to corrupt many new dogs and we got to sleep in hotel beds by ourselves, something very novel. We found out that we could sleep in a much smaller bed when it was just the two of us. We tasted a few Missouri wines though, I am not a fan of the wines here but I did buy an awesome t-shirt.

We found a few places to hike and got lost a couple of times hiking. You would think that being at a nature sanctuary with marked trails one would not get lost, but then one has never hiked with us. The nice lady at the Wildcat Nature Sanctuary even gave us a trail map and told us the direction to take and we still made the wrong turn, took the course backwards and ended up on the wrong side of the highway in the middle of a dry creek bed totally lost. Thank god we are smarter than most or you would be reading about a couple of idiots lost in the woods in southern Missouri.

All in all though the time away was short, we had fun just being away and hopefully my mental health has improved. By the way, here is the t-shirt I bought. It fits me don’t you think?

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Water Pictures

I am a water nut. I love taking photos of water. Lakes, rivers, oceans, even little creeks are a favorite of mine to capture frame by frame. There is just something about water that moves me. So today I am sharing a bunch of photos I took on our little mini vacation this week. We started off at a place in St. James, MO called Maramac Spring Park, a private and state conservation combination park that is a trout hatchery. We don’t fish, but the view was very idyllic, quiet and still in the morning mists.

Tomorrow I’ll share photos of a couple of other places we stopped at, a nature sanctuary and a waterfall. See, I can’t help myself.

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Photos by Susan Kelly taken on my Canon Rebel

Dragonflies, Herons and Daisies

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Wild Flower

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Blue Heron fishing

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Blue Heron flying away after he spotted me

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Dragonfly

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Dragonfly

Photos taken with my Canon Rebel

Our Resident Herons

We have a Blue Heron that stays at the lake every summer and this year we have a newcomer, a White Heron is summering here too. These two were fishing for their lunch when the dogs and I were out on a stroll.
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Photos of Our Morning Stroll

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Grass Seeds
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Morning Dew
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Reflections
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Early morning calm

Photos taken with my Canon Rebel

The Day That Shall Remain Nameless

My Monday started off okay, nothing spectacular one way or the other. The dogs actually behaved themselves on the walk. They did their business sniffing and peeing on everything, but acted like perfect little canine gentlemen. I showered, put on my makeup and tamed my crazy, curly hair. My hair hates me and generally does its’ own thing, but I got it to look presentable. So far so good, no sign of impending doom.

If I had any inkling as to how my day would turn out, I would have crawled back into my bed, pulled the covers up over my head… and I would have stayed there for the rest of the day.

On my drive to work, I apparently forgot to remove the target on the back of my car. I had three different morons think that my lane was their lane too. I try to play nice but I draw the line at sharing an eight foot wide space with an idiot driving a pickup truck who was too busy drinking his coffee AND talking on his phone. I have no idea how he was steering and I’m not sure I want to know. I’m a little protective of my 2002 Pontiac Firebird. Even though it’s eleven years old, it is the first car I bought off the showroom floor. It’s too bad I don’t have a bazooka… I wonder if I can get one online.

Walked into work, climbed the stairs to my Department and sat down at my desk. I poured a cup of coffee from my thermos. I’m all by myself in the mornings, so I get a calm moment before everyone else gets in and the crazy starts.

At nine, my boss called me and asked that I come into his office. A project I had worked on for weeks had become a top priority and was needed for a big meeting in half an hour. Super. The spreadsheets won’t work properly on his computer. Double super. So I did what any sane person would do, I called a friend and coworker for help. Crisis averted with a few minutes to spare, keeping me from spending the morning in ladies room crying.

The meeting was almost two hours of looking at spreadsheets on the big overhead screen. Long meetings are a death knell for me, my eyes glazed over and I started to nod off. I can’t sit still that long without falling asleep. So I sat there scribbling on my note pad, wiggling my feet and fidgeting like a six year old, trying to stay awake.

The final blow to the day was when I slammed the middle finger on my right hand in the door to the ladies room. Granted most bathroom stall doors aren’t very menacing, but the bathrooms were built European style with each stall designed as a sort of closet with floor to ceiling doors, just like a regular interior door with sharp corners. I slammed it so hard that the door cut my finger on one side and produced a giant blood blister on the other side. I stood in the stall squeezing my finger that sent throbbing pain all the up my arm and to the pit of my stomach. I thought I was going to get sick. It took a minute for the finger to start bleeding but when it did I had drips all over the floor. I had a nice blood trail going and, with my loud epitaphs, a body would think that someone had been murdered.

I’ve come to the conclusion that Monday’s suck. No beating around the bush on this, no sugar coating it. Monday’s just suck. So, I have decided that I am no longer going to refer to Monday as Monday. From now on Monday shall be called “The Day That Shall Remain Nameless!”.

To quote Yul Brynner in The King and I, “So shall it be written so shall it be done, etc. etc. etc.,”. Great movie, I bet it wasn’t filmed on a Monday.

Spider Webs, Dragonflies and Butterflies

This morning was a beautiful morning, perfect for the camera. I got some great shots of the morning dew, nature and of course, Charlie and Orso.

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I found a few ground webs still wet with the morning dew. I couldn’t see the resident and didn’t want to get too close anyway.

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This web had a small grasshopper on a blade of grass above it. I couldn’t tell if the little guy was stuck or not.

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This was a beautiful dragonfly that landed for a brief moment.

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Another shot of the dragonfly.

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A small butterfly landed on a Black-Eyed Susan for some nectar.

I have a lot more to share this week. These were taken with my Canon Rebel and EFF 55-250mm telephoto lens.

A Day at the Lake

Orso is not especially fond of swimming, but he really loves boat rides.

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“Look a boat!”

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“Hey guys there’s a boat out there.”

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“Can we go, huh can we?”

It’s Hot and We Need a Pool!

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“If we hang our tongues out far enough can we get a pool?”

Photos taken with my Canon Rebel

Summer Photos

A game of tug o’ war is always great fun
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Charlie looking quite dashing
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Orso is just Orso
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