This was taken on my last day working in PA. The colleague with me wanted to get her picture taken on the log and after I shot a few of her I thought that perhaps I should go. I was leery at first because Chris will tell you that I am accident prone. It runs in my immediate family; we drop things, fall, slip, trip all the time. I just saw myself getting on this log and sliding right off and into the creek and subsequently being soaking wet for the hike back to the car. So since this is the year of possible for me and now that I’ve…

I need some slow motion…. +A weekend off. I feel like I’ve been going a million miles an hour for the last few weeks. Been very busy at work and then we had another project sprung on us at the last minute, or so it seemed, and now I am going to Pennsylvania for a month. I was thinking two weeks sounded nice but a month is pushing my limits. I’m becoming a homebody again. Apparently there’s this thing called snow that we’re racing against. +I’m starting to like not checking FB often and only being on about once a week. The only downside is that it seems the only…

+Summer is gone. Well, not officially, the autumnal equinox is still a week or so away. But, the lighting is different, it gets dark earlier and light later. I don’t like the light later thing, rather I don’t like either one. I’d prefer if it got light at about 5:30am daily and got dark at about 10pm. Year round. At the very least, in the winter it should get dark only at about 8pm, no earlier. +Working on some posts for next week. I’ve got a list of adventure books that I’m writing about, plus I’ll have a post about a week of our pre-planned meals and how they work…

Yesterday we were all ready to go to DFW for the weekend, it was about 2:30 pm. We were heading into town to return a RedBox before heading out and as we approached town we’d noticed that the fires were flaring up. It had been a peaceful morning with no smoke and we’d decided that it was probably ok to venture out. However, once we arrived in town, it was chaos with everyone standing at the intersections, in the gas station and grocery store parking lots, some with chairs, many with smart phone or cameras to take videos. Several fire engines from around the state arrived within minutes, probably moving…

+It’s the end of a weird week. Started off with a holiday on Monday, which was wonderful and we got a 13+ mile hike in at the Sam Houston National Forest. Tuesday was busy at work and then yesterday I was in the field and had a very long day, not returning home until well after 8pm. Then the smoke from the nearby fires lingered in the air causing our office to let everyone work from home on Thursday if they had something to work on. Feeling a little disjointed after having some semblance of routine. +Excited to see the family this weekend as we go up to get the…

Yesterday, Labor Day here in the U.S., we had stopped in at the McDonald’s in our town to get some recipes so we could go grocery shopping for the week. When we left to drive across the street to the store we noticed a fire to our north west that had just started within thirty minutes. By the time we left the store thirty minutes later it was flaring up even more. We didn’t think anything of it, not that it would get bad or even come closer to our house which would be several miles away by now. We went home and I took a nap and while we…

It is our first full weekend here in our new town. The first weekend we went back home, last weekend we went to the beach to visit with friends and this weekend while we are doing some things in various greater Houston areas, we are sticking to local. This morning we got up at our normal work-week time and went over to the Kleb Woods Nature Center. Chris purchased a book 60 Hikes within 60 Miles of Houston and it was listed in there as one of the places to go, plus it is relatively close to our house. We weren’t sure what we would see or if it would…

Leo and Samson came home with us last weekend. They’d been at my parents’ house for a year and a half, far longer than I’d initially imagined. Since then they’d eased into life with my folks, and had been a good fill in for when Red, my parents’ cat, lost his sister Yoda last year. I think it helped ease the loneliness. And Leo, the most rascally of the two cats, came to not whack my parents unless especially spooked or ready to rough house. He also learned to give them head butts, something we are mostly able to do on command with him by making kissing noises at him.…