2-18-04

After the fall I didn’t feel that great, but loaded up e dog and we went to town. Boy, I was a bird with a hurtin’ wing for sure. I couldn’t shift the truck unless I had my arm resting on the center consol and then only could I move my wrist. To get it in reverse took two hands. A few other sore spots showed up later as well. No dang mail, so the trip was for nothing other than I got my laundry done and got the oil changed in the truck. (Attention Mike and Gary—the guy I met at the oil change place lives at the resort at Roosevelt Lake, he said that the last couple of weeks they have been really rolling the crappie. Twenty and thirty a day, he said that now they are starting to spawn and the males are getting black. He didn’t think they would be biting much longer. Sex takes preference to food, at certain times.J )

When I made it back to camp it was hotter than hell in the pod even with the windows open. My shoulder was really hurting so I took a small handful of ibuprofen, which helped immensely. Great stuff, those over the counter drugs. I was about to dig out my pain pills if that didn’t work.

2-19-04

A storm front came through last night as was predicted and wow, was it a blast from the west. The pod was really rockin’ and fortunately not roll’n. I actually thought about connecting up the trailer to the pod or at least attaching the safety chain, but decided to ride it out. I had to gather up some laundry I had hanging out on my work bench otherwise we made it through it fine. It never did rain but it smelled like it or at least I could feel the moisture. The clouds were still quite high and I would imagine five thousand feet or so as they were hitting the mountain tops. Camp is a little over two thousand here on the ridge.

I went in this morning and finally got my mail. There wasn’t anything terribly important other than tax stuff that I need to get to the accountant. I got that stuff copied at the bank, which is really nice, since there is no copy place in town I was told. That may not be true, as I saw some sort of place next to the Napa store that said something about copy, will have to check that place out. The bank charges ten cents a copy so for small copy jobs it is real handy and close to the PO.

I’m still packing a wing, but it is much better and I am down to only taking a couple of pills at a time now and I can sleep much better.

I made it back to camp and had a little lunch and nap. The pig hunter are starting to file in for the weekend again. I think some guys my be taking three day hunting weekends. I hear a camp up the road from me. I worked on silver this afternoon until e dog decided it was time for a break. I am not riding the bike for a few days so we took a hike up the hill for the place where she found her pig foot. Lucky dog found another one! They left the pig head stuck on a broken off limb. It is a camp site right on the edge of the ridge and it is really nice with trees and a couple of fire rings of stones as modern campers are so fond of making. It must come from boy scout camp where they always had these enormous fires with big rock rings around. Archeologist will find these years from now and  determine that they were some sort of monuments to the fire gods or something. The only thing really wrong with the camp is that people have thrashed or trashed the place. There are beer bottles and old rug pieces and lots of broken glass. There is quite a bit of trash thrown under a cholla that will be almost impossible to get out. I may take it upon myself to go up there and clean the place up. I need to hang out here for a few more days as I had any mail that has come in for me to be forwarded to me at Globe. I sure hope he doesn’t screw it up again.

2-20-04

it was nice and cloudy today and it was perfect for working out. I even got the camera out and figured out how to set the time delay and got a photo of me at the bench. Sometime before noon I went down to wind sprit to see if I could find out about the satellite internet connection that they had. I was in luck and had a good talk with Don who runs the computer room. There are three or four computers and they are all hooked to the satellite somehow. There is one computer that I think is acting as the server. I forget the exact name of their system but it was something like WebStar and their start up system including the guy who comes out to position the dish cost around $800 plus $55 a month. Oh, he said that he has a line up to his place and one other guys place so that must be five or six computers hooked in. he said that the uplink is slow but the down link is screaming fast. This is  similar to  the system that I was using in Quartzite as it was slow up and fast down. I asked about possibly using the system to hook up my laptop and he said that he would have to run it by the group but he thought it would be ok, but he had to check with them before he could let me. There has been a major shake up in the group lately and it sounds like they are really getting their act together after many years of slow decline. Don said that he set up the group as a corporation and they official in 1996. Don had a business as a security specialist and he had several big companies that hired him to sweep their offices, planes, ect. as well as doing security interviews on people with voice analyzers ($10,000 machine) and other sleuth work. He got tired of the rat race and bailed out to the desert and just loves it here. I think he said he has been here on and off since the late 80’s.  He is buying and selling over the internet and is a major ebay user. He was telling me about one gal on ebay that was selling wire wrapped jewelry who he was tracking for several weeks. He said that she was doing $800 a week in business!!! He has tried to get some of the hippies that have been here to  do jewelry and  sell over ebay, but has not had any luck. I told him about me trying to give the felted hat business to someone and how no one will take it and run with it. I will have to check back with him first of next week and see if I can get on their line. He said that he has a plug in left just for the situation where someone would hook in a laptop. It would surly be nice to be able to go down there a half mile rather than twenty miles over that steep pass to Globe.

I had a visit from a game and  fish warden this afternoon. He wanted to know if I was hunting or camping. Pig season is still open and there are more hunters moving in this afternoon. He said that they open the season on pigs at varying times across the state and they run archery, muzzle loader and rifle hunts in different parts so that they can get more wardens concentrated where the hunting is. He is from Phoenix and is glad to get out of there for a while. I don’t blame him one bit.

I finally decided to light a fire tonight and  burn up  part of the pile of wood that was left here. The forecast is for rain by Sunday and while it is really dry and it is nice out I would fire it up. So,  I am out in the smoke of the fire and enjoying the company of the fire with e dog. She rolled through another big bowl of nibbles and I definitely do believe she is putting on a little weight. I will get here some big dog chow next bag as I think those puppy nibbles are just too tasty. Every one in a while today she would go to the edge of camp and stick here nose in the air and smell and  smell. I think she must be smelling pigs as they say they are really smelly. The ridge we are on must draft up the smell from down in the big wash below.

My shoulder is getting better and I can now pick up my teacup with that hand. It still isn’t comfortable at night, but I can certainly live with it. Oh, oh, it is starting to sprinkle so I think I’ll  head for the pod.

2-21-04

I got a lot of work done today. I just kept my nose down and kept at it. I didn’t make anything really spectacular, just fancy to simple clips with no animals. I came up with some really nice designs that turned out well after they were polished. It always surprises me how different they are after they are polished. They mostly all look better after they are polished, but it sure shows up problems too.

About  the only thing out of the ordinary that happened is that e dog took a hike on me. She has been told to ‘stick close’ and she has been really good to stay within fifty yards of camp. When I noticed she was gone and  I called her in she came from the direction of the place where she  found her pig feet. She is hanging out on her chain now and hopefully considering how it wasn’t a good idea to not ‘stick close’.

The game warden came by again to ask if I had heard any shooting. He said that he found a dead mountain lion. I told him that I had heard a bunch of shooting and it was in the next canyon over, but it was just 22 shooting. I asked him how pig hunting was coming along and he said that he knew of two that were bagged but a lot of the hunters were not seeing any.  There was supposed to be a thirty percent chance of rain, but there was hardly a cloud in the sky. The rain drops that ran me inside last night stopped after I went inside. Tomorrow my be different as the forecast was for ninety percent and I hear there is snow up north. The guy I talked with at the oil changing station said that there was grass almost a foot high in the hills around Roosevelt. He thought there might be a good quail hatch this spring, maybe even two. If you have ever seen baby quail, they can fly an hour and a half after hatching, my dad told me. The are just like little bumble bees.

2-22-04

 It never did rain today and it was sunny and nice most of the day with a few scattered high clouds. The radio said that it was raining in scattered areas in Phoenix, but I guess they got all rained out by the  time they got over here. The barometric pressure must have changed rapidly as I got a pretty good sinus headache out of it. I had a hard time working at the bench and had to lay down a couple of times. I only got a couple of clips made but they came out well and I made earrings to match each of them. I haven’t been making earrings for the others and as it happened, the drop off from these clips made great earrings to match the hair clip. I probably should make more earrings to match the clips. I guess I have been so focused on the clips I haven’t even thought about earrings. Maybe I should be doing pins to match as well? Or is that too much, having the clip, earrings and pin that match? Help anyone?

The pig hunters have been pretty thick around here today. I think this is the last day of pig season, at least around here. I took a walk up the road this afternoon with e dog and checked out one of the campsites up higher on the ridge. The boys that were up there left a huge pile of firewood and the campsite is clean. I think I will move camp up there tomorrow as it is a lot more private than the one I am at now.

I went down and got a five-gallon jug of water from Lowell. I sure do like visiting with him and I know he enjoys it when I come down. He is very personable and I can see how he did well working with the public as a salesman. His wife doesn’t care for me at all, although she is always nice to me. I remember back before I was married, women didn’t like me talking with their man. They feel very threatened by a single man doing what ever he wants, whenever he wants.

I’m going into town tomorrow so I should get this off to all. I hope I get my mail that is being forwarded and pick up some groceries.