Today's Hike

There was rain in the forecast for today so we decided to do a quick hike and hopefully not get caught in it. We hiked the Merkle/Vista Trail and stayed dry. The rain earlier had cleared the air so the views were pretty good from the top of the hill.

	The Superstition Mountains in the distance.
	Something we don't see very often here in the Valley of the Sun - clouds!
	The ocotillos have started getting leaves and will soon be in bloom. We'll make sure to get pictures when they do.

s/v Attitudes Original Blog

When we were traveling around in our sailboat, Attitudes, and then in our first RV we created a site at geocities to track our adventure. We didn't know it at the time but we had created an early blog although we don't think the term existed then. Ross spent several hours this evening posting a copy of that original blog to a blogspot blog. The problem with geocities is that they limit bandwidth so you could only look at a few pages before they cut you off. Now it can be viewed whenever desired. We hope you get a chance to look at it if you haven't seen it before, and if you have then we hope you enjoy it again!

Original s/v Attitudes blog

Minute Clinic

Last week Karen came down with a sinus infection. She's had a lot of them over the years so she knew exactly what it was. All she needed was a prescription for some antibiotics. Rather than try to get in to see her doctor, and pay several hundred dollars for that privilege, we decided to try the Minute Clinic at CVS. It was only $59 to see a nurse practitioner and get the prescription. All in all a good value, the only problem was that we were there for 2 1/2 hours! "Several Hour Clinic" would have been a more honest name. Ross waited outside (how long can you look around in a CVS?) and read. When sitting on the concrete got too cold he stood. At one point he was leaning against a trash can when a guy who had just left CVS came up to him and asked "how are you doing?" Ross replied "Fine" and then the guy told said "there's a half-way house near here where you can get a bed and they can fix you up with a job." Apparently he thought Ross was homeless! Too funny! The really funny part was that he was playing with his iPhone when the guy approached him. Guess lots of homeless people have iPhones.

"You're Sick...We're Quick!" Not this time you weren't!

End Of An Era

The problems of the US auto industry have trickled down to us. Last week I found out that Visteon was not renewing my contract. For the past almost 8 years I've provided Unix, web and programming support to the Utica Plant remotely. Before that I worked there on site for several years. It's pretty amazing to recall all the different locations from which I have worked. Literally coast to coast to coast and even offshore of some of those coasts on our sailboats. I've connected using telephone lines, cell phones, DSL, cable modems, wifi and wireless broadband cards. I've done my work while sitting in our boat's cockpit, at picnic tables in RV parks and in hotel rooms all around the country and even traveling down the highway at 60+ mph. It's been a real "trip" :) I'm sad that it's over but all good things must eventually come to an end. And I've always kept in mind that my original agreement to provide remote support was supposed to only last for 9 months. That stretched into almost 8 years so I can't complain!

Ross

Today's Hike

We've had some really great weather here in Mesa the last few days, sunny and low to mid 70's. Today we went to Usery Park and hiked the Cat Peaks/Pass Trail. This trail is a loop about 3 miles long that's fairly flat with several wash crossings and one short but steep section to the top of the pass. We can tell that the desert is getting ready to bloom. The ocotillos have leaves on them and the ground is covered with small green plants that look like grass. We'll make sure to get out and take some pictures when the bloom begins and post them. The trail was crowded today. Of course on this trail that means we saw about a dozen other hikers, 3 mountain bikers and 6 people on horseback. A regular traffic jam it was ;)

Karen and an ocotillo. You can see people on horseback rounding a bend behind her. Click here to read about the ocotillo.

New Hike

Today we did a new hike in a new area. In the city of Scottsdale is the McDowell Sonoran Preserve. There are several trails in the Preserve with the longest almost 5 miles each way. We parked at the Lost Dog Wash Access Area and hiked up the Lost Dog Wash Trail to the intersection with the Ringtail Trail. From there we hiked up to the Lost Dog Overlook. In all the hike was about 3 miles with about 300' of elevation gain. Next time there we'll probably try one of the more aggressive trails.

	Karen leaving the Lost Dog Overlook and continuing a short way up the Ringtail Trail.
	Teddy Bear or Jumping Cholla. You don't want to mess with any cactus but these are particularly nasty! Ross knows this from a couple of too-close encounters over the years. Click here to read about Teddy Bear Cholla.

Apple Does It Again!

Another success (in my humble opinion) for Apple! On Saturday I finally got around to updating the firmware on my iPhone. OK, the upgrade came out several months ago - I've been busy. Besides taking a LONG time, almost 1 1/2 hours, the upgrade went smoothly. After the phone rebooted I had a new icon - the App Store. This is an online store where you can buy applications for the iPhone. They have tons of games and applications that you can download instantly to your iPhone. And many of the applications are free! I've downloaded several free applications and actually paid for 2 others - 99 cents each. The variety of offerings is impressive! Strangely, given this universe of offerings, currently the most popular application is one called iFart which is described as "The world's most popular digital fart machine!" That aside, the App Store makes the arguably best smart phone even better!

Ross

Disclaimer: I don't get anything for saying nice things about Apple and their products :)

Movie Theater

Good and bad news to report. Our favorite movie theater, the Super Saver Cinemas at the Superstition Springs mall, is gone! Their listings quit showing up online a couple of days ago and when we called their phone number it just rang and rang. Yesterday we went to the mall to see what was going on. The marquee was empty and there was a "thanks for the business but we're gone" sign hanging in the box office window. It was our favorite because they only charged $2.00 general admission with $1.50 Tuesdays. Yes, they showed second run movies but we've gotten used to waiting to see most movies. $4 to see a movie second run is much more attractive to us than $14 for a first run movie... in most cases.

Now the good news. We found another second run movie theater in Tempe (that didn't take very long, did it?) It's more expensive ($3.00 general admission and $2.00 Tuesdays) and it's almost a 20 minute drive but the seats are MUCH more comfortable! To say the seats at the Super Saver were "uncomfortable" is being very charitable! A good imitation of a medieval torture device is a better description.

Our sadly departed former favorite movie theater.