every other orange

I spent the entire day hiking today (nearly 9 miles of it!) First Beau and I went for a little jaunt down the end of Potash, but all of the factory waste stared to get to us, so we packed it up early. After dropping Beau back at home, I went to Arches National Park. I ending up hiking a pretty long loop trail in the Devil's Playground (?).


Unfortunately it was incredibly cold! The water in my camelbak froze twice and I couldn't stop for too long without starting to get cold. But the worst part was the wind! I almost turned back several times in the beginning, but once I remembered my hood I was in business again. My softshell, icebreaker wool and windstopper gloves kicked the butts of everyone elses get up. And I've never been happier to have trekking poles!

I went for another hike today, quite different from the last one. There was the constant sounds of children, and not a moment where I was along on the hike. It wasn't even that there were tons of people on the hike, but one group that I just couldn't seem to pass, no matter how many times I did! A the end of the hike I was met by the very large Corona Arch - it was gorgeous!

Beau and I went for a hike around Mineral Bottom today. There were a couple of amazing looking routes up this some what small tower. Including a protectable chimney that looked completely awesome! I hope that Josh and I can come back and see about trying some of them. The hike otherwise was pretty uneventful, snowy, quite and pretty.



I seem to not be quite as good at taking self portraits than some of my friends... but here you go :)

Despite having to work 6-2:30 today, it has been a pretty good Christmas. Work was slow enough at 7 that I was able to Skype my family and open presents with them. Mom made Josh, Beau and I all matching stockings and they are quite cute. You can see a close up of mine in the picture.
It was weird today. People kept coming on chat and saying that I shouldn't have to work on Christmas, but there they were, causing the demand that was making us work in the first place. I don't see why we couldn't just revert back to being a normal non-live chat site for just one day.
Ah well, I'm done now. Merry Christmas everyone!

I've had a pretty harsh couple weeks, mostly because of money. And as lame of a reason as that is, money really does rule my world. I have really been trying to at least eliminate one bill, but it seams like even that is beyond me. If it isn't things like an unexplainable check engine light or cracking a tooth in half (yeah yeah, there is still a hole and I have 3 more baby teeth without adults beneath them) it is things like my recent mishap.

I guess I can't really call it recent when it happened months (ss) ago... but when I was in Joe's last Spring (?...) I happened to take a fall, onto a soft pad. The pad was so soft that, although it tried, it did nothing to stop my tail bone from making direct contact with a big ole rock. Thankfully, after the 4 hour, excruciating drive home, I didn't really have to sit any more. I had thought that I had only severely bruised myself. It wasn't until after I accepted a sit down job that I discovered otherwise. Last month my insurance kicked in and an x-ray discovered that I had actually broken my tailbone. The unfortunate part, is that it is still at a funky angle, and is unable to heal.

If I were a guy, I could have it fused in a relatively safe procedure and say "hello new sitting world"... but I'm not. In an effort to have my would, could, maybe children (in 10 years) and not live in fear of work, travel and general relaxation time, I have decided to have the broken part removed. Although my doctor has explained that the surgery can be pretty dangerous (eek!), the above reasons seem pretty good to me. So, I am now preparing myself for a period of even greater debt. At least I will be able to sit after this one.

The weather has been pretty on and off here lately. The weekends especially have sucked, and since that is when we have the time to climb... climbing hasn't really been happening. Today Moab received 4-5 inches of snow and it is still on the ground!



I went for a couple hikes in Millcreek Canyon last week. It is an amazing place to explore! It has a couple great places to go for a swim (...if we are here in the summer) and is almost completely unused. Josh and I hiked out there most of the day last Saturday and only ran into 1 other person - it was great! Certainly not like the hikes that I used to do in Boulder.


I think that Beau is much happier with our forced hiatus from climbing. Hiking means that he actually gets to do something, instead of sit around waiting for us to finish climbing and hike back to the car. Not that he is ever very upset about being outside!


He is a pretty good boy :)