Aach...ye speak like a poet, but ye punch like one too...

PUNCH LIKE A POET

Monday, June 27, 2005
  


Downtown San Francisco the next day.

# posted by Daniel at 11:07 AM.



In San Francisco we stayed at the fabulous Green Tortoise hostel. Lots of character--a bunch of hippies and backpackers crammed into a turn-of-the-century house. Here's the chandelier from our room. Much, much cheaper than any traditional lodging in the city, for sure.

# posted by Daniel at 11:06 AM.



...and the highest point of the day, just under 10k feet. This was about five hours after Death Valley.

# posted by Daniel at 11:02 AM.



The Sierra Nevada, headed towards Lone Pine after coming out of the desert. The drive between this point and the other side of Sonora Pass a few hours later was probably my favorite stretch of road on the trip. We don't have much in the way of photographic documentation, which is ok, as pictures would only fail to do justice to the High Sierra.

# posted by Daniel at 11:01 AM.



One of the lower points of the day...

# posted by Daniel at 10:58 AM.



Looking back towards Panamint Springs from Father Crowley point in Death Valley National Park. We stopped here to give Max a breather after several thousand feet of unanticipated climb and descent.

# posted by Daniel at 10:57 AM.



After waking up in Vegas the next morning we headed west towards Death Valley. This shot's from the descent to sea level.

We stopped in Pahrump, a suburb of Las Vegas (shudder), to gas up on the way out of town. A guy behind me at the pump noticed the Texas plates. Turns out he was from Texas as well. Asked me where I was from, told me he was from Bastrop. Came to Vegas in '86 for a one year contract, ended up staying twenty years for the money (he said with a disgusted look on his face...). Still, nice to see someone else from the homeland.

# posted by Daniel at 10:46 AM.



We stayed at Circus Circus in Vegas. Since then we've been told that this was not the right hotel at which to stay. Be that as it may, Vegas remains one of the most depressing places I've ever visited. Walking around on the casino floor alone was enough to ruin my mood. "Give us your money! Let us entertain you! Your life will have meaning if you win lots of cash!" After eating downstairs, dropping a couple of dollars in slot machines (speaking of which--addiction? I can understand getting addicted to heroin or cigarettes. Possibly even something like poker. But slot machines?), and catching five minutes of lame circus performers we were ready to call it a night. Rather than check out the Strip we went back to our room and watched Spiderman.

Please Lord, don't let me go to Vegas when I die.

# posted by Daniel at 9:57 AM.

Saturday, June 25, 2005
  


Hoover Dam at the Arizona/Nevada border.

I've always had a certain fascination with dams. Don't know why, but I'm the guy who watches the History Channel programs on their construction, etc. So I was thrilled to be traveling over the archetype of all dams, Hoover Dam. We didn't get to stop and do the tourist thing (they've got a pretty impressive visitor center), although if we'd known how much Las Vegas was going to suck we might've sacrificed some time there for a trip down into the dam. My excitement over this particular landmark earned me the nickname "Dam Dork" from my traveling companion.

# posted by Daniel at 2:32 PM.



Fanny with branches and blue sky. One of my favorite shots of the trip.

# posted by Daniel at 2:29 PM.



"Well, do you want to eat it?"

This one comes from our campsite at the canyon that night. When we got there I took my bike off Max (my car) for a ride around the campground, and didn't realize until later that I had been wearing my cowboy hat. Cut quite a singular figure according to Fanny, who was much amused.

# posted by Daniel at 2:27 PM.



Last one, I promise. (Believe me, this is the much-edited version of the canyon shots.)

# posted by Daniel at 2:21 PM.



Fanny and myself, blocking another killer view of the canyon.

# posted by Daniel at 2:21 PM.



...and more.

# posted by Daniel at 2:16 PM.



More canyon.

# posted by Daniel at 2:16 PM.



Dead tree at the Grand Canyon.

# posted by Daniel at 2:15 PM.



For some reason it wasn't until we started seeing signs for Los Angeles that I realized on a gut level how far I was from home, and that I wasn't going back.

# posted by Daniel at 2:14 PM.



Shot of the mountains in Flagstaff, Arizona. Prior to this trip I hadn't realized Arizona had mountains--just assumed it was all flat desert.

# posted by Daniel at 2:13 PM.



Dirt devil in Arizona, one of several we saw.

# posted by Daniel at 2:09 PM.



Gas station at the Painted Desert in Arizona, on old Route 66 (the first cross country US highway, if I'm remembering correctly). We didn't get a chance to visit the Desert, unfortunately, as we were pressed for time.

# posted by Daniel at 2:04 PM.

Thursday, June 23, 2005
  
The Supreme Court screws up

I'm going to interrupt my belated travelogue to kvetch about the Supreme Court. This is very bad news indeed. First read about this case a few months ago, and thought to myself "There's no way the Supremes will go for that." It appears, however, that I was wrong.

As I understand it, the court has given the go-ahead to a municipality in Connecticut to seize residents' property not for some clearly public use (roads, for example), but instead for use by a private developer, on the grounds that the likely economic benefit to the community justifies the seizure.

In other words, your city can make you sell your house to Wal-Mart (or any other private developer or company) if they think it'll be good for the city. And when do municipal governments not think that new business & developments are going to do good for the city?

My only-slightly-educated first reaction is that this has the potential to turn privately held property into another easily bulldozed obstruction facing developers. Just like trees on an unimproved lot. Send the lawyers in with their backhoes, and in a few months we'll be ready to build.

I will, however, temper my alarmism with a couple of observations:

1) It's a 5-4 decision, which means one can realistically hope for a reversal in the not-too-distant future.

2) I find it highly unlikely that this will go unchallenged for very long. The ruling in this Connecticut case, while still absolutely the wrong call, is not nearly as extreme as most of the cases in which this ruling will be cited (i.e. it's more understandable to sacrifice private property to a beachfront developer to save a poverty-stricken town than it is to force homeowners to sell to Wal-Mart). And I expect we'll see a challenge on a case more resembling the latter.

Thoughts from any of my newly hooded lawyer friends would be appreciated.

# posted by Daniel at 6:43 PM.



Taken from Interstate 40 in northwestern New Mexico sometime Sunday afternoon (after leaving Abilene on Friday). Everything after Santa Fe was new territory for me. Gorgeous, broken red landscape. We stopped for Indian Fry Bread (advertised in capital letters all along the interstate) somewhere around Gallup; turned out to be the same sort of thing as a sopapilla (for those of you with a little Mexican food experience).

# posted by Daniel at 11:08 AM.



Back on the road, headed for the Grand Canyon. Fanny took this shot; I rather like it.

# posted by Daniel at 11:04 AM.



Our Lady of the Blurry Flowers.

# posted by Daniel at 11:02 AM.



Yellow rose at the feet of St. Francis.

# posted by Daniel at 11:02 AM.



Statue of the patron saint of the St. Francis Cathedral. There's a nice little garden here beside the cathedral with a bird fountain. We sat there for twenty minutes getting a couple of good shots of birds stopping to drink.

# posted by Daniel at 11:01 AM.



Native jewelry artists at the Palace of the Governors.

# posted by Daniel at 10:59 AM.



Characteristic Santa Fe architecture. Nearly everything in the city is built to look like adobe. Sometimes it looks cool and authentic, sometimes it looks absurd (there's no way a four story office building can pull it off, for instance). It looks nice here, though.

# posted by Daniel at 10:57 AM.



A little illustration on the wall of our room at the Santa Fe hostel.

# posted by Daniel at 10:52 AM.



After leaving Carlsbad we drove north to Santa Fe. After checking into the hostel, we visited the Georgia O'Keeffe museum. I'd only seen her flower paintings, and was surprised and impressed by her landscapes. Reminded me a great deal of Marsden Hartley's New Mexico Recollections series.

# posted by Daniel at 10:51 AM.

Wednesday, June 22, 2005
  


Swimming pool-become-garden at our motel in Carlsbad. I especially liked the hand rail. So you don't slip as you step into the garden.

# posted by Daniel at 6:36 PM.


Sign outside Andrews, Texas. Good for Andrews.

# posted by Daniel at 6:34 PM.


Here's Fanny at the restaurant where we ate in Carlsbad. This place served a fantastic red chili asado. She's talking on the phone (in French) to her mom in Quebec, which made for an interesting coincidence. The couple at the next table over was speaking German. How often are that many European languages represented in an evening in downtown Carlsbad? Not very often, I'm guessing. Posted by Hello

# posted by Daniel at 6:21 PM.


We'll start this off with a couple of shots related to the most recent poem. Here's a yucca in southeastern New Mexico north of Carlsbad, where we stayed our first night after leaving Texas. Note the blue, possible distance in the background. Posted by Hello

# posted by Daniel at 6:18 PM.

Pictures on the way

I'm in the process of figuring out how to put pictures from our trip up. Using Picasa/Hello, so expect a lot of individual pictures with long captions over the next day or two.

# posted by Daniel at 5:36 PM.

Friday, June 03, 2005
  
A quick update

Thought I'd take this opportunity to update everyone while Fanny's out shoe shopping with my sister (Katie, bar the door). We're about to leave Abilene for points north. Things are fantastic. She's been in Texas exactly one week, and has gotten a taste of all things Texas (and I do mean a taste--Mexican food, barbeque, chicken fried steak & okra). She's also been something of a hit among all my friends and loved ones--as was entirely expected. I'm more sure than ever that this is precisely the woman with whom I want to spend the rest of my life. Could not be happier.

So--to those friends we're leaving behind in Texas--we miss you terribly and can't wait to see you again. To those friends in Canada--we'll be there in a week. Take care of yourselves, and if you get the chance say a short little prayer of thankfulness on our behalf.

# posted by Daniel at 9:18 AM.