A trip to Arizona

No you're not hallucinating, I actually am posting an update. This week I had something worth posting about. Ok, I'll let you decide if it was worth posting about. And if you post a comment I'll assume you came by and survived the heart attack of seeing an update.

Anyway, if you hadn't already guessed by reading the title I'm in Arizona this week, on a business trip no less. Unfortunately as business trips oftentimes go Murphy's law was in full effect and our first day onsite was a 14 hour day. Thankfully I was able to get about 9 hours of sleep last night so I'm feeling much better today. One thing I will say about Arizona, the scenery is much prettier than California. (though not quite as pretty as Colorado) So without further adieu here are a couple of pictures we were able to take...


Here's an example of that beauty, you can kind of see the red in the soil with the mesa in the background. We actually did see a sign on this trip for an exit called Table Mesa, talk about redundant. :)


A picture taken at daybreak, unfortunately I didn't catch it while the sun was on the horizon, which was much prettier. This picture still doesn't do it justice though.


Our handy GPS, which kept us from getting lost when we were driving in the middle of nowhere.


Yes there was snow, at least at the higher elevations, there was quite a bit in Flagstaff actually. Hopefully the storm they're predicting won't cause a problem friday when driving back to the airport.


Beyond the stop sign warning sign you can see a lovely horizon with the National Forest in the middle. We are working in the Apache-Sitgreave National Forest and it is actually quite beautiful.


Our destination at last, the Black Mesa ranger station. This was our view when we arrived.


A lovely view of the forest near the ranger station.


A typical information center like you often see at rest stops and ranger stations off of major interstate highways.


And I thought they only had these in the Northeast, like in Vermont.


A view of the entire tree. (almost)


A very nice tribute to a man with a very good name. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to ask about who he was.


The only "fast food" in town. I guess maybe that's why Subway is the largest fast food chain in the US. (that's our Infiniti M35 parked out front by the way, it's a very fast car!)


Why does my co-worker JT look so happy? Perhaps it's because we're getting ready to leave at a little after 4 instead of a little after 11 like the night before.


Here's a little better view of the stuffed bear in the lobby of the ranger station.


I couldn't resist getting my picture taken with it. :)


A double warning about the ice.


The name says it all, though I think perhaps trimming is in order here.


A lovely view of the ranger station as we leave.


As we drove back through Holbrook on our way to Winslow I snapped a shot of this place. Don't see too many of these anymore.





A couple pictures of the clouds, though again, the pictures don't do that sunset justice.

Now just in case some of you took offense at what I said about Arizona not being as pretty as Colorado; here are a couple of pictures that I did take while in Colorado that will hopefully give you somewhat of an idea of why I said that.



Ok, so two pictures may not seem like much proof, so I guess you'll have to take my word for it.

With that I'll conclude this post. Until next time, (hopefully in less than 2 months) thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed it!

A Saturday in San Diego

Ok, I realize I've been really bad about posting, given the fact I haven't posted anything for over 2 months, but hopefully this one will kind of make up for it.

Last Saturday (11/3) we went down to San Diego for the day to practice brass for Nov 18th, when we are going back down to play on a Sunday. While we were there we also had a fun day at the park, (see pictures below) playing volleyball and football. After that we went back and practiced our Men's Chorus singing, also in preperation for the 18th. If you need any further detail on what we will be playing/singing my brother Justin has it all outlined in one of his previous posts. A link to his blog is located on the right, in case you don't already know how to get there.

And with that we will start with the pictures, I apologize that they aren't the greatest quality but I'm still getting used to my new camera. Also I didn't take all of them, as evidenced by the fact you can actually see me in a couple of them. (Andrew, where are you when I need you!) :)

Right after lunch some of the guys started out by throwing the football around for a little bit. Here's Jonathan getting ready to throw the ball to somebody.

Here's Kyle launching one.

And another one of Kyle as he gets ready to launch one.

I think Justin had a little too much too eat for lunch. But then I can't blame him, I did too, it was really good!

Jonathan gets ready to launch one.

Justin catching the football.

Kyle looks so relieved to catch this one. :)

Jonathan celebrating ... something.

The frowning photographer.

And here's a couple of shots while we were getting ready to play volleyball.

And finally the game starts, I think...

Ok, those last several pictures weren't that interesting, but here you can see where I just crushed the ball. (at least that's what I think happened) :)

And here's a different angle on the action.

And that'll do it for this post. In case you're wondering, the date listed is the date I started the post, talk about procrastination! Almost three weeks later I finished it. Well, the upload process for the pictures was very time consuming and I had problems with it a few times. Hopefully I'll have something new to post soon. Until then, thanks for stopping by.