Everybody Loves Mary

I was at the gym tonight and Mary showed up. Everybody at the gym loves Mary. She is probably late fifties or early sixties. She is in great shape and climbs well. She owns a cleaning business. These aren't the reason that everyone loves her though. Tonight when Mary showed up you could climb any route you wanted. Everyone quit climbing. You see, Mary is like the gym mom. Every couple of weeks Mary brings in a large meal and feeds everyone at the gym. That is usually at least fifty plus people. It's not like she brings in pizza. She brings in several dishes, dessert, plates, forks, and sometimes even milk. Tonight she brought in a potato sausage casserole, baked beans, string beans in a sauce, peach cobbler, and a cake. There was a couple of other things, but I didn't see what they were. Tonight I heard her say for the first time why she brings in food. She said "hungry kids need to eat". She does it to be kind, and because she cares about other people. I wonder what the world would be like if everyone acted like Mary.

Green Slabs

Saturday we spent a few hours climbing on Mount Lemon. The closer we got to the mountain the more it looked like rain. I had planned to go higher up on the mountain, but it looked like it was already raining up at Ridgeline so we went to Green Slabs. It is a short scramble (4th class) to get to the climbs. Here is the view of the pullout from "Missing in Action".

Philip on "MIA".

Amy top roping "Monkey Business".

Caitlin was in charge of my camera so I got some strange shots. Here is the rope I bought for my trip to the Tetons next month.

That's me leading gear on "Monkey Business". It was so much fun I lead it twice.

Finally a Sponsor

I will never have a sponsor (I did at one time though.... a long, long time ago). I'm just not good enough at the things I like to do to attract one. So I decided to sponsor myself. It is a full sponsorship too. I get room and board, food, clothing, and gear. I had some Team Brenton stickers made up and there are eight other members (their sponsorships vary from partial to full, partial meaning they got a sticker). Mike and Kent taught me you don't have to be the best at something to enjoy doing it. With that in mind I will continue to be the only middle of the pack guy who can't climb 5.13, (or even close), with a full sponsorship.

Meet Me at Maynards

The last couple of weeks Amy and I have been going to Maynards downtown for the "Meet Me at Maynards" fun run. It is located next door to the Railroad Museum. The first week we went I had intended to just run along with Amy and enjoy seeing downtown on foot. I ended up chasing a couple of fast guys, catching all but one of them, and then having another one of them pass me in the last 50 yards when I wasn't looking. I know it's supposed to be a fun run. Last Monday very few people showed up so Amy and I ran together, talked, and enjoyed the scenery.

An old Locomotive on display at the museum.

Amy with Doc Holiday and Wyatt Earp. They even have live music. These guys are pretty good if you like folk music (Irish, and American). I asked them to play "Whiskey in the Jar O", but they said they had already played it while we were out running. I felt like telling them that no one was listening and that they probably wouldn't notice anyway. I may buy their CD just because they seem like decent guys.

Name Dropper

I've been thinking lately, and have come up with a great new idea. My plan is to drop the names of my friends whenever discussing something they are good at and just pretend that the person I am talking to should know who they are if they are paying attention. If I pull it off convincingly I may come off looking well read and possibly even humble. An example might be "Wow you climbed the Grand Teton", and I can say "well I'm no Kent The Ironman Stevens, but I did flail my way to the top." Another scenario might be "I can't believe you ran a 50k". I would reply "Steve Bohrer I'm not, but I did slog to the finish." I might even use a couple of your names at once to add emphasis. "That was a great idea you had , Rik". "I like to take my inspiration from the truly exceptional ones like Brett Anderson, Mike Stevens, or Stayc Webb". I mostly want to see if anyone will call me on it, or if they will just go along with it and pretend they know who I'm talking about. I probably wouldn't ask for fear of looking ignorant. The only flaw I can see is having to keep track of who knows who, or I will just end up sounding like an idiot.

Bath and Burn

The other day while riding in my truck Amy noticed that water was dripping on the floor on the passenger's side. After figuring out that it was not antifreeze I immediately concluded that the drain tube from the evaporator housing was plugged. It is an easy fix so the next time I had a minute I climbed under the truck with the air hose from the air compressor to blow the line clear of the obstruction. The only way I could reach the line with the air nozzle was to lay directly underneath the drain. I figured I might get a little wet, but how much water could there really be? It has been very humid here. I severely underestimated the ability of my air conditioner to remove moisture from the air, and the amount of water the evaporator box would hold. I took a bath. That wasn't so bad. It was hot and it felt good. When I went to roll up the hose on the air compressor I laid my arm on the copper tubing (which gets very hot) that runs from the compressor to the air tank. I felt a quick sting, and then nothing. It looked bad, but I couldn't feel it anymore so I forgot about it. I remembered it later when it started to ooze. I had burned a dime sized hole in my arm and the skin just pealed off on it's own. I also had a quarter sized blister and that was what the clear liquid was coming from. Fortunately the burn was bad enough that it never hurt. I was talking to my friend Brett, and he couldn't believe that I had used my better judgement and had decided not to post the picture of the mysterious nearly headless dead bird (I named him Nick, if you don't understand ask your kids). I told him I didn't want to offend anyone. He said that if they were looking at my blog they should know what to expect. Afterward I felt like a pansy. So here it is. Now I feel like my blog is back to it's roots.

Strange but True

Philip was invited to join his Jr. High cross country team. Every Tuesday night they have a casual practice with the High School team. Everyone is invited to run. I decided I would go and run with Philip, and then run home from the park. It is monsoon season hear in the desert so on the way home I got caught out in the wind and blowing dust that precedes a rain storm. There was also some lightning, but it was pretty far off. As I was running the last few hundred yards to the house I heard a funny crackle. I looked up towards the noise and saw a dead dove heading towards me from the sky. It landed about two feet from me. I still can't figure out what happened to it. It's head was almost completely removed, but other than that I saw no sign of trauma. Usually if you hit one with a car there is a feather storm. It also fell from to high to have been hit by a car. The lightning was really far away for it to have been struck. I guess it will be an unsolved mystery. I went back later to take a picture of it, but I have decided not to post it. It just seems in bad taste. Remember to support bacteria. It's the only culture some people have.