Happy New Year!

One more year gone to the history books. I could easily say "good riddance" but I did accomplish a few things in 2009. I managed to re-connect with more family and friends. (The much maligned FB gets a lot of credit for this one.) I have been notoriously lazy about keeping in touch. I believe I treasure my relationships more these days. (I must be getting old--LOL) I actually completed a 5K--walked but did it. I also managed to take a real vacation and see the Grand Canyon and eat my first In-N-Out burger. I also managed to lose some weight. Even though I have gained some of it back (see comment about In-N-Out). I did accomplish it.

I also realized that I got lost somewhere along the line. I've been really just getting by and that's no fun. I'm in the process of finding myself again. I'm going to do a lot of things that I enjoy but no longer do.

Now for 2010. I have actually made goals--not resolutions--actual goals. I refuse to post them here. I probably should but I'm just not ready for that. We'll see how that works.

Now let's see if I can get the Christmas decorations down by Monday. Wish me luck!!!

LOVE

That says it all. Christmas is LOVE!
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DFW BMW Club

One more S1000RR picture
http://www.bmwdfw.org/index.html

Black Friday

I cannot believe I'm not out on Black Friday. I'll have to admit it is fun but is there really anything that I need bad enough to fight the crowd? Besides, I have plenty to do here at home.

Happy Thanksgiving

I truly have a lot to be thankful for this year. Just looking at my blog brings to mind my wonderful vacation this year without a glitch! I also have wonderful family and friends who I enjoy and who are always there with love and support. I've really enjoyed re-connecting with so many people. I am notorious for not keeping in touch so I'm now having a blast doing that.

So many people have so little these days it really makes us look at the non-monetary things that have to be thankful for. Things like a beautiful Texas sunset or the gorgeous Arizona desert or that big beautiful hole in the ground in northern Arizona. It may be something as simple as waking up with a home, food, and a job or simply waking up period.

We all need to remember that Thanksgiving is about more than the food, more than the football....

Check out the Texas Pumpkin Pie. What a surprise treat!

NASCAR

Beautiful fall day at TMS. Love the infield. Missed the TV commentary. Learned to use Twitter for updates.

Mobile pictures

I am in the process of uploading my mobile phone photos. They might end up either here on the blog or on Picasa (Google's photo site). They just aren't looking good on Snapfish. I think the resolution is too small for Snapfish and they look awful there. We'll see....

California and Grand Canyon (211 photos), by e mullins

I'd like to share my Snapfish photos with you. Once you have checked out my photos you can order prints and upload your own photos to share.

Not yet

The pictures will be on Snapfish soon. Considering posting the top ten on the blog. I am in the process of organizing and adding captions. Note to self--next time take a laptop and upload photos daily!

The Road Home

The last leg of our trip began in Santa Rosa, NM. We stopped in Amarillo at The Big Texan. As a child growing up and traveling on I-40 I always wondered if it really existed. As an adult living in Texas I knew it was there and knew that I had to see it. It's really a funny tourist place. We didn't eat there so we didn't try to eat the huge steak and trimmings but it was a fun photo-op.

We also stopped and picked up barbecue at The Smokehouse in Lindsay. (Good ribs!) DH has customers who live in the area so we'll be back up there to visit and maybe try Deiter's next time.

Now we are home catching up on eight days of laundry and getting ready to re-enter the rat race.
We are so thankful to have had a great trip with some wonderful memories.

Home

Home safely. Too tired to blog about the final leg. I'll do that tomorrow. We're going to bed.
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More Route 66

Sorry if these are posted twice but remote locations don't always have consistent data connections.

We left the Canyon today. We chose to take the quick route to Flagstaff instead of the scenic route. The elk would have been cool to see but really didn't want to risk hitting one!

More desert and mountain landscape today. We did see some of the Petrified Forest and the Painted Desert. We managed to get that shot of the Continental Divide sign.(Do you remember your geography?) Also great mountains in New Mexico.

Most fun stop was "Standing on a corner in Winslow,Arizona." Does everyone know where they've heard that before? You can also"get you kicks on Route 66" in Winslow. All of the towns on remaining portions of Route 66 play it up for tourism dollars. It is fun for us baby-boomers.

We're staying in Santa Rosa instead of Albuquerque or Tucumcari. On the recommendation of our hotel desk clerk,we ate at a cute place called the Lake City Diner. Good, fresh, New Mexican food.

HOME TOMORROW (but we have to stop at The Big Texan first) Hook 'Em Horns!

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THE CANYON

BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!!
The air is clean; the sky was clear. At 7200 ft elevation the air is thin. Asthma sufferers might get a little short of breath with exertion. (I did use my inhaler before leaving the hotel.) When we got up the temp was 31 degrees but warmed up to a high of 71 degrees. Tomorrow it should be 34/74.

You can walk to the edge of the canyon. Some areas of the South Rim (Arizona side)can be only be reached by taking a free shuttle or hiking. Going down to the river would require hiking,mules or one of the jeep tours. Some of it can even be seen from one of the roads. You really don't have to pay for a tour. Unless you're daring and rich and would like a helicopter tour.

The skywalk is closer to Las Vegas and run by one of the Indian tribes. It is on tribal land and is 5 hours from Grand Canyon National Park.

Admission to the park is $25 per car. It would be cool to rent an RV and camp. There are lodges in the park but they are more expensive than staying in Tusayan--only 5 miles to the rim.

We have heard so many different languages--German,French,Japanese,Russian,Korean,Navaho,Spanish, Cajun and Texan LOL. We also met a couple from Alaska. They are Texas snowbirds. Can you believe they came to see The Canyon? They have Denali out their back door :-)

Tomorrow Albuquerque and Santa Rosa via Flagstaff (more Route 66!).
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Trip to the Canyon

After our breakfast with a couple of Razorbacks (One was even an ATU alumnus!) we headed for the canyon. After realizing our trip to The Canyon would be over 400 miles,we decided to skip the side trip to Vegas. We'll have to do that another time.

Of course it was raining when we left Ontario, but our first clue there would be a problem was the first "limited visibility possible in the pass" sign. To put it mildly it was pea soup. We could not see the mountains until we were right at them. I started to volunteer to drive but it would have bothered my DH even more than driving through it himself. Suddenly it was gone and the scene in front of us was amazing--truly heaven-sent. Another time on this trip that a scene could only be recreated on canvas. The colors of the southwest are truly amazing!

I drove the remainder of the trip to our hotel in Grand Canyon,AZ. For those of us who grew up on I-40, it is a magical moment when you take I-40 where it begins (I-15 goes on to Las Vegas). I-40 reminded me of a wide mountain road.

We saw more of Route 66 and stopped at Seligman,AZ. It's a cute little wide spot in the road and totally plays up the Route 66 history.

From Williams we took Hwy 64 up to the hotel. It's a 2-lane mountain road with occassional passind lanes. The limit is 65 and there aren't a lot of curves just a nice gradual climb to over 6000 ft elevation. The sky looks fake! It is so blue and the puffy clouds just don't look real. It looks close enough to touch. Once again a picture just will not capture this.

By the time we got checked in and settled in it was dinnertime and already dark so we'll start our visit to the South Rim tomorrow.

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Tuesday

I had a great visit with my cousin Pat. She and her boyfriend drove an hour to get out to Ontario. Quite a feat for someone who gets carsick very easily. I really appreciate it!

After Pat's visit I had a little time before Leo's class would be done so I decided to go out and look for Wal-Mart (of course I would need a Wal-Mart). One of these days I will realize that the rest of the world is not populated by Super Wal-Mart and Super Target. Why are they not all Superstores????

The good part is that my little excursion took me to old Route 66 and a nice shopping area called Victoria Gardens. OK I didn't do more shopping BUT I did eat myself silly. There was a Sees candy store--my favorite. I also found Pinkberry--the Pachugo of frozen yogurt--YUM. (Today's pictures are from that area--Foothills Blvd in Rancho Cucamonga.)

We had a great time visiting with our new friends from Houston and Anchorage. Praying for a safe trip home for everyone.

Today we're heading back east in the rain. Once we leave the area heading east I think we'll be out of the rain. They've had a lot of accidents in LA because of the rain. (See people in Dallas aren't the only people that can't drive in the rain:-)

I have to plan another trip just for fun. There are a lot of things I didn't get a chance to see and do. Guess I'd better start saving my money. We also have to take a trip to Nashville soon.

Anyway on to The Canyon!



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Shopping

The weather held so far. Nice, cool and cloudy,but late in the day the clouds broke enough to see the bottom of the mountain. I don't have a camera that can get a good shot of it but trust me it was awesome--God is good!

OMG!! The Coach store was packed. There were some great deals (some 50%). People had so many purses they had to use the huge canvas bags that the store gives you to carry everything while you're shopping. They were buying purses to sell in Japan/China where there is no Coach outlet. Too many purses not enough$$$

Ontario Mills is Grapevine Mills with Allen Premium Outlet thrown in there. My feet hurt so bad I had to wear tennis shoes to dinner.

Dinner at Chevy's. I was so busy shopping that I forgot to eat lunch but I made up for it at dinner and I have leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

We met a guy from Anchorage, Alaska who's here for the BMW classes. He and his wife rode their bikes from Indiana to Alaska 30 years ago and decided to relocate. There is one guy who rode his GS (one of the BMW motorcycles) from Albuquerque. There are two other guys and two girls from Texas so we are well represented.

Tomorrow I get to visit with my cousin Pat!

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Weather

Great weather until we finally make it to LA. Storms and mudslides in the forecast. At least we sat out by the pool yesterday. Leave it to me to get a few nice weather hours here before the forecast changes to drizzle and then storms--oh joy!
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We made it!

The Beverly Hillbillies finally made it to Cali.
We left Phoenix this morning and six hours and 350 miles of desert and mountains later we arrived in Ontario (and I drove most of it including the LA area traffic!) We traveled through some of the most beautiful parts of this country. I think the word in the car was just "WOW". If I were a better photographer I would still be out on that road taking pictures.
We finally got our first In-n-Out burger! Nobody warned me--it is a total zoo in there!!!!
Now we're resting up for tomorrow. Poor Leo has class for the next two days but I get to play! The hotel is adjacent to the mall so tomorrow is shopping for me.
(The pictures are One In-N-Out picture and one picture of the scenery from the hotel here in Ontario with a little smog included.)
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Chandler

We made it to Chandler,AZ (Phoenix). It took forever because we just played around, made lots of stops and just enjoyed the ride and the views. Love the desert and the mountains. Oh yeah I just gotta say it,"it's a dry heat!" LOL
Tomorrow Ontario (LA)....

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Middle of Nowhere

We are truly in the middle of nowhere. The last stop we made was the last gas stop for 40 miles. I asked the lady in Dairy Queen what was the next town. The next "big town" is Tucson--180 miles to the west! We truly feel sorry for the big rig that just blew a tire and did some damage to his truck out here in the middle of nowhere.
We have been taking our time this morning. We stopped at the world's largest Harley store--Barnett's in El Paso and a couple of souvenier shops.
We are truly enjoying the dry desert air.
Missed getting a picture at the Continental Divide. Maybe we'll get one on I-40 on the way back. The elevation was over 4000 ft!
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El Paso

We arrived in El Paso after a nice 11 hour drive. We saw big turbine farms and smelled the black gold (Texas Tea) LOL. There really is NOTHING after you leave Odessa except the beautiful Davis and Guadalupe Mountains. Totally different landscape. I really feel like I'm in the Southwest. I'll have to come back when I can go to Big Bend.
On to Phoenix...

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On the road

Beautiful weather in Midland--sunny,temp 65 degrees!
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Edit to add I can't reply to comments from my phone--stupid. Anywhoo, yes we're on our way to Ontario.

ROAD TRIP

Check back for details and updates!

The new BMW 1000 RR

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Proposed Medicare Cuts for 2010

Please check out this website regarding proposed Medicare cuts in 2010 and I hope you will contact your Senator and Congressmen. It's very important and very easy to do.

http://guardingheartsalliance.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=20&Itemid=6

Test

Test
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STOP SCREAMING

Read and STOP SCREAMING!!!!!!!!!

http://www.factcheck.org/

I am crazy

I must be crazy to do this. Does anyone really care what I think?