Gone a Hikin'

Robert is going hiking again this weekend...except this time it's for the whole weekend.

He's heading to northwestern Alabama to a place called the Sipsey Wilderness. It looks like fun, but not in the weather that's predicted. Apparently, the weather channel is calling for highs in the 70's, lows in the 50's and 40% chance of thunderstorms on Fri & Sat. Yea, I'll be at home under a nice waterproof roof.

So, I'll be at home working this weekend, while Robert is out playing. Such is life.

An Easter Hike

It was such a wonderful day, that it would have been a crime to stay indoors. Bethany had to do some writing to finish her thesis, so while she was doing that, the dogs and I went out on an afternoon day hike...

The weather was in the mid 50s to low 60s with a slight breeze coming though occasionally; perfect for an afternoon out. I decided to take the two dogs, Java and Red, out for an afternoon day hike around Oak Mountain State Park.

The three of us arrived at the North Trailhead right around 4:15 for some quick hiking. We decided to hike the Red bike trail out past some of the interesting points, and then return back via the yellow trail. The total loop would be right around 6miles. Hopefully this would be completed within the three hours of remaining daylight.

As soon as we started along the trails, we noticed that the recent rains had helped out the drought and there was now water along the trail; unlike the last hike a few months back.

The dogs, anxious to be outside, were walking shoulder to shoulder out in front as we pushed on. At the creek crossings, they would wade in the water, cool off, and drink freely. However, the water was still just a tad cold for them. They wouldn’t stay in it very long! Afterwards, they’d leash up and we’d move on along.

Following along on the Red, we approached the old Chimney’s within the park. I’m unsure what once was there, but now it’s simply one complete standing chimney and what looks like a building foundation. It was quite neat to see it them standing. It was a neat attraction along the trail.

As we pushed on, we approached the halfway mark in a little over an hour. Good, I had almost two full hours to make it back up the yellow, through Maggie’s Glen, and home. All of this, hopefully before dark.

We finally ran into some bikers making their way north toward the trailhead. At their pace, they were sure to beat us back. It was nice seeing someone out on the trails, but even nicer to know me and the dogs were alone and had the peace and quiet to ourselves. We began North on the yellow intersection heading for home. Within the first few miles we starting noticing more and more water in the side ditches and the sounds were ever increasing. The closer we came to the lake, the louder the water became. Shortly, we came upon the backside of the Lake Tranquility dam. The most interesting part was the flat bottomed jon boat at the bottom.

After scaling the sides to the top of the dam, we learned that we were to stay off of the dam. To the right of the trail, up the hill, overlooking the lake is a series of old abandoned cabins that sit pretty empty now. Not too much worth looking at, but neat to explore.

Further on, we started our long climb up the ridge toward Maggie’s Glen. With the temperature dropping some, we decided to pick up the pace to make sure we got out before dark. I was a little unprepared to spend the night out without a shelter.

Most of the trail from this point is easily distinguished with a well worn path and hard packed ground. Lots of pine needles scatter the ground and very little blooms are showing right now. This made for some easy traveling as we moved toward Maggie’s Glen.

Once we approached the glen, I unleashed the dogs, and they took their time cooling off in the water while I traded the batteries out in the camera. Before I had finished, they were walking around waiting for me to lead them back to the car.

From here, it was a mere 1.5 miles to the trailhead, however, most of it was uphill, until we came within eyesight of the trailhead. We pushed on up, through a long string of blowdowns which looked fairly recent. Someone has recently cleaned the trail out though and it was not a hard travel. This made for a pretty quick hike back to beat the nightfall. Not too bad.

Once seeing the car, the dogs went into overdrive to get us back and they too realized we were right there. All in all, we made it back to the car nearing 6:45. We finished the trails and covered the 6mi with nearly 30mins of daylight remaining. We did well. One we got to the car, the dogs jumped into the back and were ready to get home.

It was definitely a great day for getting outside.

Free the Hops

Ok, so we're not beer drinkers....we're really not alcohol consumers either, so this probably doesn't affect us that much. It's just interesting.

Free the Hops is an organization that is pushing for to help bring quality beers, from around the country and parts of the world, to Alabama. Some actually refer to them as specialty or gourmet beers.

The current problem with getting these beers here into Alabama, is their restriction of the alcohol by volume (abv) law.

The Current ABV Law
The 6% limit appears once in The Code of Alabama, in §28-3-1(3), addressing the regulation of alcoholic beverages. That section contains the following definition:
"BEER, or MALT OR BREWED BEVERAGES. Any beer, lager beer, ale, porter, malt or brewed beverage, or similar fermented malt liquor containing one-half of one percent or more of alcohol by volume and not in excess of five percent alcohol by weight and six percent by volume, by whatever name the same may be called."

The Gourmet Beer Bill
For the 2008 Legistative Session, FTH has proposed the following Gourmet Beer Bill which would change the limit on beer to just below that of table wine.
"BEER, or MALT OR BREWED BEVERAGES. Any beer, lager beer, ale, porter, malt or brewed beverage, or similar fermented malt liquor containing one-half of one percent or more of alcohol by volume and not in excess of five percent alcohol by weight and six thirteen and nine-tenths percent by volume, by whatever name the same may be called."

Now, the best part is the video below that actually has some information regarding the bill while in the House. Several of our wonderful representatives made their points and comments regarding the passing/declining of this bill. If you have a moment, listen and see what our great leaders think. (I really like Alvin Holmes from Montgomery)



Whether or not the bill passes, I seriously doubt it will have a direct impact on us. I just think it's interesting and can have the potential of increasing the beer isle in your nearest grocery store. If passed it could also allow for more opportunites for current and upcoming breweries. Either way, the points for and against are both interesting.

This makes no sense

This bothers me. I had no idea who Lauren was, but this really bothers me.

For those that don't know...Lauren Burk was an 18 year old freshman at Auburn University. She did nothing wrong, but go to school. A person created a harsh act of violence and took this young girls life.

Now, this group Westboro Baptist Church has decided to protest her memorial service. This is the group that normally protest funerals of the armed forces, but for some sad reason, they are protesting Lauren's funeral.

I think some of them have the wrong ideas of what their beliefs are.

Like I said, this bothers me. This really bothers me.

Busy Week

So..we have lots of updates, but I'm going to have to postpone those till later :). On the other hand, both Robert and I have a pretty busy week going on.

Robert is spending the week in the New Orleans/Mississippi area for work---checking railroad crossings for the Department of Transportation. There is probably a lot more to it, but that is the big picture :). It is hard being gone for home 3 days/2 nights a week and not seeing Robert, but it is even harder when he is gone for the entire week....especially with limited computer access for him. But as usual....we will get through it :). At least I have a few things going on in Auburn to keep me occupied this week.

Because Robert is gone all week, it is my responsibility to take care of the dogs....not an easy task when I can't really bring them to Auburn. Thank goodness my parents were willing to keep an eye on our squirrel chasing monsters. And hopefully they won't pull any arms out of the sockets while being let out :). Thanks guys!!

So here I am....working late at the office on my thesis and successfully procrastinating by updating. I wish writing research papers wasn't so hard, and it doesn't help that I absolutely HATE writing. I can't complain too much though because my graduate career has afforded me some great opportunities. This week I and the other top 13 students from the state competition in Hawaii will be recognized for our achievements at the state house. We will be given an opportunity to talk about our research on the floor of the Congress as well as the Senate during legislative meetings.....kind of scary, but definitely a great opportunity. I was also notified today that I have been chosen as the department's nomination for the Outstanding (Master's) Graduate Student of the Year award. I have a few things to get together for this, but it's definitely an honor to be recognized for my graduate work.

Well....guess I better get back to writing if I'm ever going to finish. Hope everyone has a great week!!

Leave No Trace

Ok, so this is just a litte smidge of what's coming up.

As most of you know, I am a pretty avid backpacker, camper, and hiker. This weekend, Feb 9-10, will be our annual Leave No Trace Trainers Course in which, yours truly will be helping teach. It's a fun event, it's short notice, anyone is welcome. You know, we'll even teach you how to dig your very own cathole :)

So, that's where I'll be this weekend. How about you?

Update

So, it's been a while...40 days to be exact. We need to update.

We'll work on posting some photos and tidbits soon.

Sorry to keep everyone waiting in such suspense. :)

A little inspiration for you today

If you're feeling a little down and defeated, I may can help. You just need a little bit of inspiration and I have just the person that could help. Meet Bob Coomber.

Bob Coomber is a young 52yrs. old, lives in California and is the perfect example of someone that doesn’t let the curves that life throws, us hold him back. After being an active individual in his youth and young adulthood, he was diagnosed with diabetes, osteoporosis and became wheelchair bound at the age of 31. Through all of this and more, Bob has remained a positive person who not only pushes himself beyond the limit but also goes out of his way to help and inspire others.

He recently became the became the first person in a wheelchair to summit 14,246-foot White Mountain, which is California's third-highest peak.

Just recently he was also inducted into the California Outdoors Hall of Fame. His mantra is “No excuses. No excuses. No excuses.” He is an excellent example to inspire you when you decide that you just "can't get it done".

Take the time to check out this individual and let him share his enthusiasm for life with you. If you want more, you can read his blog here: http://www.4wheelbob.com/

There, hopefully that can serve as a little inspiration for you today!

For Phil

I didn't know Phil, personally. I knew of him. Phil was one of those folks that I associated with through an online backpacking community, and just never got to meet. I read of him, read about some of his trips, and debated with him from time to time. Over the last few years, I learned a good bit about him from our online community. He was a good guy.

Phil was diagnosed with Hodgkins lymphoma in 2005. He didn't play the "cancer card" or make pity on himself. He was determined to beat it. Through all of his problems, trials, and drugs, he won. He says he won because he had an awesome wife, life was good, he had many friends, and he beat cancer. He always said he could and would beat it. Way to go Phil.

Unfortunatly, he didn't stay in remission long, and had to fight the fight again. He was determined to defeat it again. However, this time he wasn't so lucky. During treatment, he developed bacterial pneumonia and was admitted to ICU on 12/4/07. Word came out in the online community that he lost the fight yesterday morning, 12/13/07. He will be missed.

If you'd like to read about his fight, he shared his progress on his blog - Bear Thoughts.

So, Phil. This is to you good buddy.

-Robert

Sick

Blah....uugh....Blah...uugh.

Just a measely update. Bethany is sick. She's been home in bed so far all week with a fever and just an overall nauseous feeling. Last night her feever was nearly 102F. As of this morning it was breaking.

She'll be back soon. I'm sure everyone has been missing her!

Hawaii!!

So, I've been a really terrible blogger lately, but things have been busy with travel for the holidays and then travel for work. Travel for work wasn't too bad though because I was able to go to Hawaii for free!!! I was gone for about five days, and two and a half of those were for traveling to and from the Big Island of Hawaii. Our first stop was in Honolulu before we hopped on a little plane to Kona. Of course, it just happened to be raining in Honolulu when we landed and then it was dark by the time we reached Kona. Here are a couple of pictures of the Honolulu airport and a sunset through the airplane window.

There was a four hour time change that was a little tough to get used to, but it was nice getting the day started early with a quick jog before anyone else was really awake. By the time I made it back to the room to shower, this was the view I saw from our baclony:

And around the corner of the balcony:

We stayed in a pretty nice resort, but the resort was pretty much all we were able to see for the short amount of time that we were there. But the pool was nice to hang out in for a little while. And of course the view was fantastic!!

Too bad we didn't get to stay at the Hilton.....it seemed like it was its own village on the island and you even had the option of swimming with the dolphins within the resort.

Everything there is pretty open, so for lunch we had a couple of visitors that were hoping to get a snack.

And last, because we were pretty much staying on a volcanic island, there was lava rock everywhere. Instead of people spray painting the sides of the lava rock, they used bleached or dead coral as their "grafitti". For those that like to take natural souveniers this was a big "no-no" on the island of Hawaii. Apparently, if you take anything made by the island such as a lava rock, you would be cursed by their gods. Bad things have happened to people who take lava rocks home.....such as their house burns down. Every day the post office recieves hundreds of pounds of natural souveniers that people send back because they had been cursed :). Because I didn't want to find out if this curse was true or not, I just took a couple of pictures and called it good.

And they're off!!

Bethany's dad and I decided we would run in the Vulcan 10k on Saturday in downtown Birmingham. It was definatly fun! If you're looking for a great place with wonderful scenery, I highly recommend it. The course starts at Boutwell Auditorium, runs along 2nd Ave., down by the Highland Golf Course, and back to the auditorium. Of course there's a good long uphill in the middle followed by a quite fast downhill. Excellent. For those of you unsure, the 10k is equivelent to 6.2 miles.

The necessary pre-race photo inside the auditorium. I told Bethany to take lots of pictures so she did. Of course we need the pre-race photos. I had a little case of jitters, but they went away rather quickly, right after the first mile.

And they're off. We were several minutes behind the leaders, but it's all good. We had timing chips on our shoes (provided by the race) that kept up with everything.
Bethany took some pretty good pictures of us coming into the finishing chute. Mr. C finished in just under an hour and I finished in a little over an hour. Not too bad. The winner finished in 29 mins though.

The typical post race photo. I was pretty excited about it. I definatly have plans to keep it up. The next race is either the Turkey Burner 5k (3.1mi) or the Jingle Bell Run 5k (3.1mi). The next big one though will be Feb 10, 2008, which will be the Mercedes Half Marathon (13.1mi). If you want to come out and cheer us on, feel free to do so. We'll make a day out of it!

Halloween & Such...

So we decided to go to Baker's Farm out in Harpersville,Al to gather some pumpkins for Halloween. It was the same place we went last year, but it was just as fun. There was the cotton pen, the corn maze, small animal zoo, the hayride, pumpkin picking, and the lemonade stand. Quite fun. Robert took some pictures and of course shared in the fun with everyone else.

Bethany finally found a horse to ride. The great thing was that you didn't have to clean up after this little guy. I think we may even be able to put one of these in our backyard without breaking the housing rules.There were lots of pumpkins. Last year we saw short flat pumpkins, white pumpkins, and even the large pumpkins. This year, well it was still the flat pumpkins, but also knobby little pumpkins. There were lots to choose from either way!

Bethany says, "I think I found one....but I need to keep looking."Actually, she found more than one. She found two. It seemed like she would find one, like it, hold on to it, fine another, make a pile, and keep going. Eventually we talked her down to just two. I'm sure she would have been happy with more.

Well, now that we have them, it's time to carve them. Bethany stopped by and picked up some templates for us to use...Pretty good idea. I carved a weird looking half jack-o-lantern, half face on mine. It was the largest pumpkin we had and sadly, the design was still almost too big.

I took another picture, but I tried to get fancy and it didn’t quite work. I was hoping to zoom in during the shot to get a scarier picture, and it didn’t turn out as I had hoped. Here’s to trying anyways.

The second pumpkin I carved (left) and Bethany’s little knobby guy (right).It’s kind of cool if you ask me. Under the light, the knobs really stood out in some of the pictures.Her knobby gremlin, all by himself. Also, it was time to make cookies. Bethany and her mom baked and iced cookies for the holiday. I think there was somewhere around 5-6 dozen cookies made. Since I was out of town until Sunday, they did most of the icing…but it still turned out pretty good without my helpWell, tomorrow is the big day. We’ve heard reports that folks in our neighborhood have spent nearly $200 on candy and still ran out. We’ll see how far our bag gets us. We’re planning on sitting outside, dressed up somehow, passing out candy. Hopefully it won’t be as hectic as they make it sound!

Why so cheap?!?

So how much would your body be worth to the Medical field? Apparently, mine isn't too much.


$4875.00The Cadaver Calculator - Find out how much your body is worth.

-Robert

I'm not worth too much dead either :).


$4190.00The Cadaver Calculator - Find out how much your body is worth.

-Bethany

Baby Shower Cookies

This past Saturday, my mom and I went to Tamara's baby shower. It was a lot of fun, and Tamara and Dallas went home with TONS of stuff for their new baby. Tamara's mom asked mine to make her famous cut out cookies for the shower.....the theme was under the sea. My mom and I had a good time hanging out decorating cookies.
While we were finishing up cookies, my dad and Robert went for a run. They are working towards a 10k in November. They were able to spend the day watching football.....yay for Alabama and Auburn winning!! When my mom and I got home we went out to the Santa Fe Cattle Company for dinner....it was really good. Overall we had a good Saturday afternoon :).