StraightAhead

I drove up to the Grand Canyon today through Flagstaff.  I ran through some ice and snow on the roads up here but it didn’t last too long.  It is definitely colder up here and is supposed to snow tonight maybe 7 inches, so I will find out in the morning when I wake up.  I’m staying here in the bright angel lodge and it is really old and neat.  I will hike part of the South Kaibab trail tomorrow and have lunch down in the canyon and walk back out.  It will probably be cold and snowy.  I drove through some really beautiful scenery today and it took me about four hours to drive up.  I’m sixty two now so instead of costing me 25 dollars to get in the park it only cost me 10 and that buys me a lifelong pass to every national park in the country.  That was a pleasant surprise.  Anyway, I’ve been having a great time at my Nephew’s with him and his family.  more later.

I’m writing this on my fourth day of the trip, but I will tell you about yesterday.  Not much to tell, really. I did work out and take a long walk and drive around the area seeing where the starbucks were, there are two or three of them, cool.  Today Andrew, myself and Dave, Andrew and Allison’s other Granpa are going on a good hike up in the mountains.  It is a gorgeous blue sky day and I will be posting some pictures to flikr before too much longer. I’ll find some picture to post on this today too.  We had some really good pizza last night.  I was up kindof late in my room talking to a friend of mine so I stayed in bed this morning until about 9am. Jayme has been telling me about the church they go to now and I am looking forward to going with them Sunday.  We are going over to Janice and Trey’s Saturday night to eat. They were over here for a while last night and was really good to see them.  Trey is going to cook something on the grill Sat. evening.  Andrew only has to go to school half a day today so that is how he is getting to go on the hike with us today.  More later.

Toby in his Crate

My second day of driving was good, but longer than the first.  I didn’t go through anymore dust storms and that’s good.  I encountered one traffic/safety camera but I wasn’t speeding..  They were nice enough to let me know that I was entering a safety camera zone so I slowed down to 75 after I saw the sign.  I’m sure glad I saw the sign.  I hate those things.  This one was a mobile one too so it wasn’t in the data base of my radar detector.  no good. It was in Arizona.   Any way I got to my nephews about 6:30 or so in the evening.  This place is beautiful , surrounded by desert mountains and cool and clear.  Bluest sky you ever saw.  I went for a long walk this morning after my workout.  It felt very good to give my butt a break and actually use my legs after two days of driving. In Tucson, I tried looking up my cousin who is there helping her boy friend set up for the big gem show they are having.  It’s bigger than I thought it would be, there was really no chance of finding her.  Once I left Elpaso it didn’t take long to get through New Mexico and into Arizona.  Anyway it’s good to be here and not driving long distances for a little while.  I’m communicating with friends and Family on facebook while on my trip.  that’s about it for this installment.

I left home about 10 am and got to Fort Stockton about 5:15 pm. Pretty uneventful day except for the dust storm I got into after Ozona Texas.  It lasted all the way to Fort Stockton and the temperature dropped about 20 degrees really quickly.  My front end on my car is still pulling a little bit to the right, it’s enough to bug me after a while.  There’s a little bit of a balance problem starting at about 95 mph too.  The speed limit being 80 mph is great out here.  I feel ok setting it on 85 and am pretty satisfied with that speed.  I just hope they don’t have a no tolerance policy on this speed limit.  Anyway it was a good day.  The Garmin is great.  I did exactly what it said to get through San Antonio even though I didn’t want to a couple of times,  but I didn’t really know where I was for sure so I just went with it.  It was great.  The Roadway inn in Ft. Stockton is ok.  FS itself is pretty bleak looking though.  Until next time.

I will be leaving tomorrow for points west.  I hope to surprise my cousin in Tucson when I pop in at the gem show which is right on the way to Anthem where my Nephew and his family live. I will use my blog for updates on the trip so anybody that might be interested can see where I am and what I am doing.  I will put links to maps etc. to let everybody see my progress.  I should be in Anthem by the weekend. I just have to do a few things here at home today and finish packing. Later

This is pretty cool or at least interesting, especially if he could somehow keep it.

My wife of 38 years died a week ago today. We’ve already had the memorial service and it was beautiful. I just heard a voice mail from her when she was in the hospital this last time after she had had two brain surgeries. She had just gotten to where she could actually use her cell phone again to call out. I know I should delete it so I never hear it again because it is so sad. Her voice was no where near what it used to be, it was very weak. She is asking for Milk of Mag because she had trouble getting the nurses to bring it. We had trouble getting most of the nurses to do anything in a timely manner. I was up there at the hospital everyday with her for over four weeks and I stayed pissed off most of the time dealing with the people that work on the floors and elsewhere. Don’t get me wrong, there were exceptions, nurses who had compassion and were really trying to do their job. The compassion is what mattered.
My wife kept getting infections and her blood pressure was fluctuating badly the whole stay. They didn’t stay on top of her platelets and blood pressure in icu, they didn’t keep it under control and I think that is why she had the blood clot that they had to go back in for.
She said to me after 4 weeks of this “please don’t make me stay here anymore”, broken heart. She decided on coming home into hospice care and lasted two nights at home before passing away. I and my kids were there. I have a broken heart because I keep seeing her cry which she did so often after the first surgery when she could no longer use her left arm or walk very well. She got a little better with the crying after a while, I don’t know why. I have a very sick feeling in the pit of my stomach too. I’m finally getting to where I can put some of these feelings into words. I miss her so much it’s impossible to say. It feels like punishment right now for offenses I have done. I was not a great husband in my own eyes now, but she always said I was. I have so many mixed emotions it is overwhelming. I’m really glad my kids are across the street. Most of the time I’m just fine but I haven’t been without her very long yet. I think it gets worse then slowly gets better. She was my little girl in that bed, not my wife, or she was both. Broken heart.

I hear this a lot.  I also hear that all things work for good for those that love the lord.  I also hear that the prayers of a righteous man availeth much.  Or , We can’t see the big picture of what God has in mind for us because we are mere humans, but it will be good if we believe and have faith.  I think that if all of this, the suffering and death that we must go through, is because of the fall of Adam and Eve, then there are any number of ways that God, if he’s the man, could have remedied all of this very long ago.  He decided that man should suffer and that the devil should have power in this world throughout the ages.  The last thing I want to do is discount the death of his only Son, our hope of eternal life, and I know that as Christians we believe that is how he remedied the fall of man.  I know all this, yet in the middle of something so bad that is happening to somebody you love, it’s little consolation at times.  There had to be another way if God is in charge that we didn’t have to suffer in this life.  Write it off as a bad experiment or something and try something else that doesn’t entail mankind suffering until, through faith, we do the right thing while we are alive and believe something we can’t see or understand and achieve through grace, of course, eternal life where we sing and worship that God for all eternity.  I know, my faith is low this morning because my wife can’t move her left arm and the left side of her face is drooping despite all the doctors saying that this would not be happening because of where the tumor was and that it was sooooo easy to get to. 

     I really do appreciate all my friends and family thinking about us and praying for us.  It does lift my spirits.  It’s always good to have that support.  I love you all

I took this great picture of a banana spider and it’s mate.  It’s going to be in wikipedia sometime.  My son is helping me with that.

Come into my Parlor

We have the biggest land based fireworks display in the country, sponsored by Chevy.  I’ll either have to watch it on TV or raise the aerial ladder here at the station and watch it from 20 miles away.  Of course we have  a pretty good one here in La Porte that’s closer.  I can see about 7 or 8 displays at the same time if I go up in the ladder, but if I get a call while I’m up in there it could take a while to get down and get out of the station.  Hmm, what to do?