Cedar creek pool

Wow! We're at the pool at Star Valley Ranch. Perfect day for a swim!

                     Contemplating a jump

Max spent at least 1 1/2 hours in the water. He particularly loves standing at the edge and doing a somersault into the water. He can swim from one side to the other unaided. 

There was a little cafe at the pool and we had supper there. Had another nice stroll tonight. Tomorrow we're going to take a raft trip! 

Reading program party

Max has been participating in a summer reading program at the Alpine Library. They exceeded their goals for participation and won the right from Lincoln County to have a bouncy house for their party. Yay Alpine!

                                   Arriving at the party

Max had a free root beer float and then bounced. (Hope it doesn't work out that it should have been the other way around!)

                             Max bouncing! 

                        What a marvelous setting for a party !

Jackson fun

Today we went to Jackson, taking Max and Olivia. I read aloud from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in the car on the way to Jackson. We met Paul at  MacDonald's for lunch. Purely by chance, Olivia's dad was there too, standing outside when we got there. He and Olivia were both amazed. "I never eat here!" he said. We allowed that was true for us all. It was a secret and spontaneous meeting of the  "organic foodies club," spying out the enemy!

                                Paul and Max at MacDonalds. 

After lunch Ellen and the kids went to the rec center and I to the library. But we met at about 3:45 and went to downtown Jackson for ice cream (this time I had apricot sorbet - yum!). It was a beautiful, cool, cloudless day. We ate our ice cream in the park and while there, I called John to wish him and Cynthia well in their "Bernie Sanders event" they hosted tonight. They were expecting a dozen people or so. Similar events were taking place all over the country. Go Bernie! 

                    The long line at the ice cream shop

                                    Cone-eating time

Across the street from the ice cream shop is a little plaza with several life-sized bronze statues of famous people, sitting on benches. Perfect photo-op place for tourists. Here we go:

                            Olivia and Max with Abe

                  Max with George - he liked the sword 

                       In the lap of Einstein

I read Harry Potter on the way back too. It makes the miles go by very quickly - we were in Alpine in no time. 

Ellen and I got in another walk - this time we took the long way to the very top of the Trailridge development: 

                                       View from the top

A bit of everything

Today I wrote cover letters for my beneficiary forms in the morning, went to the Alpine library to print them out and got everything in the mail before the counter at the PO closed at 1:30 (yes, it closes that early in Alpine). Then Ellen, Max and I went to Afton, which is about 30 miles south. Along the way we passed a cattle drive on the highway-not an uncommon sight here in the West.

                  Cattle drive by our car window

In Afton we went first to a bowling alley/arcade. We didn't bowl - I wish we had. I like bowling. I'm not very good at it but I like it. But Max is at an age in which he is powerfully drawn to arcade games. I was too at his age - or a little older. That was in Minneapolis. But I'll have to say, arcades are different today. I remember arcade games being simple and entertaining - and cheap. Penny arcade was not a joke. There were things you could do for a penny, and most things you could do for a nickel. Today the arcade games are more like video games, and mostly cost $.50. And I find them too fast and frustrating. Hard to figure out. To become skilled at them would take a lot of quarters. But there was a car racing one that was sort of reminiscent of one I played which I remember as quite exciting. It gave me, a  ten-year old boy, a simulated experience of driving. Today's version is way too fast for Max or even an adult like Ellen or me to really control, but Ellen and Max had some thrills racing side by side.

                             Car racing thrills

Then we went to the movies. We saw Antman, which is based on a Marvel comics super-hero who has the power to change himself instantaneously from human size, to ant size and back again, and uses that power to fight the bad guys effectively - with the help of a lot of real ants, who are on the good guys side (fortunately!). It mixes human actors with animation and the latter is incredible. In the course of events, some other things get blown to huge size and maybe one of the most enduring scenes is seeing a humungous Thomas the Tank Engine being blown out of a house and falling on a police cruiser and crushing it  (the police have conveniently gotten outside first), and then lying there on its side smiling at us! All in good fun of course. Max loved it. 

We came home and had supper, watched the PBS Newshour, and then i watched a special on the history of the atomic bomb, which made Antman look like a Sunday School picnic, as they say. It is amazing what was going on during my teens and early twenties that I was only dimly aware of, if at all. It's something of a miracle that we still exist. But we are not out of the woods yet. 

Oh, I also read an article today in the New Yorker about the possibility of a nine-point plus earthquake in the Northwest that makes the bomb pale by comparison! What a day! Puts those beneficiary forms I started the day with in a whole new perspective!

Brrr!

Hey, what's going on! It's July 27, for Pete's sake, and it's cold! It's 50 right now, with a strong wind making it feel colder. But it's forecast to get down to 35  tonight! Ellen and I just took our stroll and we had to bundle up!

                   It's chilly out there!

I wished I had gloves; my hands were freezing by the time we got back to the house.

But, it was beautiful. We had heavy rain earlier today; the air was sparkling clean and the light was especially golden. We took our usual road up the hill, but this time, when we took the footpath at the end of the road, at the top we turned left instead of right, and that opens up a whole new vista and a new mountain range.

                             A whole new vista

The trail continues through a big field and eventually comes out at a fence where you have to go through barbed wire and that brings you out to the very top of the sub-division Paul's house is in. We've done that before, but tonight we saved it for another day, because it was late and we were getting cold. Ellen picked a bouquet of wild flowers and I took some pictures. 

                        Another lovely vista

                     Wild flowers galore

          Ellen glimpsed through an aspen tree

Max was at Olivia's house today, so Ellen and I had a day to ourselves. Ellen read and I worked on my Tolles introduction. I went to the Library to send emails and Ellen went to market. I also completed all my beneficiary forms and got them notarized by Jenny! Another task off my plate. 

We did learn from Rob today that Betsey will probably need our help through August 22nd. So we'll be in Boulder almost three weeks after we leave Alpine. 

Sunday

Paul, Jenny and Max got home from camping by about 9 a.m. this morning. They had a good night and an overall good time, but taking down the camper this morning proved to be "cumbersome." The problem is that age has put the camper somewhat out of square, so what should be a fairly simple operation requires some wrestling. But probably the more they do it, the easier it will get.

Max stayed home while P&J went to get some breakfast and then Ellen and I went to church at Star Valley United. We had missed church last Sunday and I needed it to get into a better place. Pastor Alan's sermon was more "off the cuff" than usual, but it had a basic, simple message (based on the miracle of the loaves and fishes) that God's love can take our small efforts into surprisingly large results beyond our imagining. I had slept very poorly last night, so I basically took it easy this afternoon, reading and doing some writing and just resting. Paul and Jenny took a hike and Ellen read a book she is enthralled by: Anthony Doerr's All the Light We Cannot See.

I talked with John on the phone and learned of his disappointment over a "Bird language leader" workshop he took yesterday that he had hoped would be inspirational, but it wasn't. It was based on the very interesting work of Jon Young, who believes that we can learn a great deal about nature by listening to birds, but the workshop didn't involve much listening, and Jon Young himself, who was supposed to be leading it, wasn't very involved in it. Sigh! 

We just had another lovely supper on the deck, and I took my turn cleaning up. Ellen and I just had our normal evening stroll.  I'm hoping for a good night's sleep tonight. 

A camping we will go!

Well, not Ellen and me, but Paul, Jenny and Max. We went along for the afternoon and evening and then came back to the house to sleep.

You see, last summer, Paul bought a used fold-up camper trailor, and he has put in scores of hours refurbishing it.  I think he is ambivalent about whether it was a good idea. He's put a lot of time and money into it and it's still an old camper trailor with some problems. But it's cute and it works (and a new one would cost 3 or 4 times as much) and he decided today that he would do some finishing touches and go on a short camping expedition to try it out.  It's been sitting in the garage for ages waiting for a chance to show its stuff. 

                                       Here's the camper in the garage

So everybody got to work. The old foam mattresses had to be covered with new foam and fresh batting and we learned the miracle of spray adhesive which made quick work of that. Paul had to do some last minute repairs and hook up the trailer tail-lights (only the one on the right side worked. Wouldn't you know!) I helped him fold up the camper and then I sat on the "roof" to hold it down tight while he screwed in the last brackets. Jenny packed the camping equipment and food and we were off! Ellen and I followed in our car. 

We took what is normally a " back road" - it's unpaved - the Gray's River Road. But there were a lot of people on it today doing what we were doing. The dust roiled up by trucks was terrible. The road was badly washboarded. The road goes into National Forest where you can pull off into a rustic, unimproved campsite with no facilities, free of charge. It was Saturday afternoon, about 3p.m., and everybody had gotten there ahead of us. We passed at least 10 full campsites. We pulled onto Little Gray's River Road and went a distance on that. Same thing. Finally Paul found a spot. It was right by the River. A fisherman was parked there but he wasn't camping. He eventually left. We opened up the camper, got it set up and leveled with jacks, set up chairs, a table, stove, got out the cooler, and settled into a good time. The air was sweet with the scent of willows. The scenery was gorgeous. It was sunny but cool. What more could we ask? Paul did some fishing and gave Max a lesson with the fly rod. Max did well. We sat and talked. I collected wood for a fire. We had chips and hummus, and then a lovely stir fry Jenny prepared on the Coleman stove. No one remembered to bring bug spray, but the mosquitoes weren't too bad. It was really nice. We came back at about 8:30 and left PJ&M to spend the night in the camper - the inaugeral event. We 'll hear all about it tomorrow. I just had a nice hot shower and boy did that feel good! 

                                     The camper set up at the camp site

         Paul trying out his fly rod (he caught a small trout but put it back)

                  Giving Max a chance with the fly rod

                           Jenny and Ellen by the stream

                        Max helping with the fire

                     A happy camping family

Sort of uneventful

Today was a relatively uneventful day. Though I will say that yesterday evening and again this evening, Ellen's and my stroll took us into new territory. Not radically new, but yesterday we went up our usual way to the top of the hill that overlooks Paul's house (from which vantage I have taken many photos posted on this blog) but instead of retracing our steps as we usually do (because the road dead ends at the top) we followed a foot trail a ways to a road we had not ventured on before, followed it down to the main highway, and then walked along the highway back to the house. Tonight we went directly across the highway and walked into a development we had never explored before -  one that had sat forlorn with huge, empty "spec" houses during the housing collapse, but now is at least  partially occupied. That took us past some very nice ponds that seem to have been created by the developer, but are now surrounded by willows which are full of birds, and we enjoyed their singing. Eventually we came to the Rocking M Camp, a cluster of rental log cabins, where several of us stayed 10 years ago for Paul and Jenny's wedding. They are located close to the Salt River, and we explored that a bit and then returned by the main road. It was almost dark by the time we got back - about 9:30p.m.

During the day today, Max was at Laura's, a day care provider in nearby Etna. So Ellen and I pursued our interests. Ellen did read aloud to Max this morning and this evening, then read on her own and did some shopping and cooking while he was away. I slept very late, and then after breakfast,  I worked on a project that has been on the back burner for some time but which I have just this week moved to the front burner  -  finishing my introduction to the Frederick Tolles MS. You may recall that last year, Ellen and I traveled to Austin, TX, to the Alfred A Knopf archive at the Harry Ransome Center. Well, I never got the chance to incorporate what we learned there into my introduction to the MS (which you may recall is an unfinished history of colonial history, written by Ellen's father, that was to be published by Knopf). So that's what I'm working on. That and getting my TIAA-CREF beneficiaries in order. So there's the day. Forgot to take the iPhone on both walks, so - no photos. Sorry! 

Wonderful news!

Betsey got an unexpectedly good report at her doctor's appointment today. First, her surgeon was able to aspirate 2.3cc's of fluid from her cyst - far more than expected. Dr. Lillehei was very pleased. 2nd, the tumor cells continue to die. That is great news. 3rd, they are going to reduce the steroids dose- that makes. Betsey very happy. She hates the steroids, and learned today that they have actually been interfering with muscle development. So there may be a reversal there in a good direction. 4 th, her protein is low, so low-fat, low cholesterol meat is being added to her diet. When I talked with her tonight, she was very happy. That was so wonderful to hear! Hallelujah!

Today, Max had a great time at the pool at the rec center in Jackson. I didn't get photos because I was at the library taking advantage of WiFi to set up my online TIAA-CREF account - something I have been procrastinating. It was time-consuming, complicated and frustrating, but I did it. But afterward we went to Moo's for ice cream and Ellen and Max ate their cones in the park. 

      Ice cream in the park

 In the center of Jackson - you can get a glimpse of one of the famous "antler arches" in the background over Max's head. 

Tonight Ellen and I took turns reading aloud vol. I of Harry Potter to Max. What fun to go back to the beginning and enjoy discovering the magic of Harry Potter with Max. 

Evening strolls

Ellen and I have gotten into the habit of a daily stroll after supper, usually as the sun is setting. The sunsets were particularly nice last night and tonight. Yesterday evening I experimented a bit taking photos of wild flowers in the dusky light with the flash on, thus highlighting the flower against a darker background. I liked the results. It even enhanced grasses and sage. This evening we took a longer-than-usual stroll that gave us a little variety in scenery. Very, very nice.

The following flower photos were all taken with flash:

                                Fireworks flowers

                                   Salsify seed globe

                                           Cluster of asters

                                  Sage 

                                  Grasses

And lovely sunsets: 

                         Last evening, overlooking Paul's house

                         Special lingering color in the southern sky

                 This evening with the Palisades Reservoir in the distance.

Joseph Altsheler and Vardis Fisher

Chance has brought two lesser-known authors to my attention within the past week: Joseph Altsheler (1862-1919) and Vardis Fisher (1895-1968). Altsheler I knew from my youth and I just happened to run across one of his books at the Humane Society thrift shop in Salem.

I paid $4.50 for it - more than I thought it would be (the sign said $2 for books on Thursdays, but I overlooked the fine print that made an exception of books with a green tag, which this one had). But this book online costs much more. 

V. Fisher I had never heard of until I saw a memorial to him yesterday at a rest area east of Idaho Falls. It's sort of odd to have someone buried at a rest area (but on second thought, what could be more appropriate? Rest in peace!) It turns out he was born nearby in Rigby, ID, and lived and wrote most of his books not too far away in Hagerman, ID. He is perhaps Idaho's best-known native author. (Hemingway lived in Idaho for a while but was not a native. Ezra Pound was born in Idaho Territory but left the state at age 18 months, never to return, so his connection with Idaho is tenuous at best). I was a bit surprised to find that the Alpine Library had only one book by Vardis Fisher, considering he is a "local" author. That book is Mountain Man, which is, at least in part, the basis for the film Jeremiah Johnston, starring Robert Redford. 

In an odd sort of way, these two authors have some things in common. While born 33 years apart, they both wrote about "the Old West," and did so in a way that glorified a certain kind of maleness - a very physical, independent, resourceful, survivalist type  - the epitome of the "rugged individualist." Sam Minard, the protagonist of Mountain Man, and Henry Ware, protagonist of The Scouts of the
Valley are both superb specimens of manhood, very much capable of taking care of themselves in dicey situations. E.g., in just the opening pages I have read of each book, Henry Ware easily dispatches a black bear he encounters, quickly dresses it and feasts on its roasted meat; Sam Minard encounters a grizzly bear and watches with fascination as the grizzly is attacked by a badger and becomes enraged (and the badger almost wins!). 

Both these authors are outrageously politically un-correct by today's standards. Altsheler is racist in his attitudes toward Native Americans and Mexicans (though perhaps no more so than Donald Trump!). In the current book, "Indians" (regularly referred to as "the redman" and as "savages") are portrayed as inherently cruel, violent and brutal  (with some exceptions ) whereas the white young men like Henry Ware are only violent in self-defense and even then with a sense of tragic necessity. The colonists generally are portrayed as victims, fighting in self-defense.

Fisher is more complicated. He was, and still is, highly controversial in his portrayal of women, and he appears to have been almost obsessed by gender issues, but I haven't had a chance to figure him out yet. He obviously was something of an eccentric. But a fascinating one! His monumental work was a series of twelve novels, called The Testament of Man, which traced the history of mankind from Cro-Magnon times to the present. His portrayal of Jesus in this series was considered so blasphemous that most publishers refused to print it. More on all this later.

Boise/Alpine

Yesterday and today have been split between Boise and Alpine. Yesterday afternoon we went to the Boise Farmer's Market which is extremely popular. There are actually two separate markets, more or less side by side, which run concurrently. One turns several blocks of a downtown street into a pedestrian mall lined with booths:

                                             Boise Farmers' Market

It has every conceivable stand: produce, meat, nuts, baked goods, scores of food stands and arts and crafts. And lots of people! 

                               Pottery at the Farmers market 

Then we went to a tea shop located just a block off the market. All kinds of loose teas. 

                                         

                          Ellen is looking over the variety of teas offered

We went back to S&C's house - Ellen and I picked up walnuts- and we had a lovely meal outside on the patio, and then off again, this time to the Idaho Shakespeare Festival. The production was a musical based on the book The Secret Garden. Not an obvious book to turn into a musical, I must say, but it was actually quite affecting, and the children who played Mary and Colin were excellent. 

                                        Pre-showtime at the ISF

                                                       

                              Taking a bow at the end of The Secret Garden

Sunday morning we had breakfast with S&C and got off at about 9:30a.m. Another beautiful, sunny, cool day! Every day this week has been like that! The trip back to Alpine was lovely. We stopped this time in Picabo at the Silver Creek store.

I had picked up a book by Joseph A. Altsheler at the thrift store in Salem, and I read a couple of chapters from it to Ellen. Altsheler was a favorite author from my boyhood, and when I saw one of his books, I picked it up on a whim. This one is from his "Forest Runners" series which is set in 19th century Ohio on the frontier. The protagonist is a young Henry Ware, early twenties, a fine specimen of manhood, utterly fearless and resourceful  in the wilderness, pitted against the Indian, the foe of the white settlers. Altsheler was a strong proponent of manifest destiny and white supremacy, I'm afraid. I must have read at least 20 or more of his 50 novels - all juvenile fiction. It's a wonder my mind was not corrupted! (Oh no! Maybe it was!)

When we entered the Swan Valley east of Idaho Falls, we stopped at the Clark Hill Rest Area overlooking the Snake River. Lovely. There was a memorial there to an Idaho author, Vardis Fisher, who wrote many novels about the Old West. Maybe not too different from Altsheler in his outlook and attitudes. 

  

                          The Snake River Valley: up and down

                                              Vardis Fisher memorial

We're back in Alpine now - got in about 5:30p.m. Just had a nice supper on the deck (again!). We'll be taking care of Max this week. Betsey and Rob have returned from their trip to Columbia, MO. Betsey posted on Facebook a wonderful picture of herself with her running friends there. She looked really happy! 

English Walnuts

Christian and Susan have a small back yard with a very large walnut tree.

                        The walnut tree

This year it is producing a bumper crop of walnuts. They look like this: 

                                                      Walnuts

Squirrels are understandably attracted to this tree. At any given moment, there are quite a few of them up on the tree eating walnuts. Look carefully and you'll see one here:

                           Squirrel eating a walnut

The result is that the ground under the tree - which is most of the yard - is completely littered with walnuts and pieces of walnuts. When you sit outside it sounds like it's raining. That's how steady is the stream of falling walnut fragments. This is what it look like: 

                            Walnut litter in the yard

This is not just unsightly and slightly dangerous - you could turn an ankle stepping on a walnut - an enzyme in the walnuts is killing the grass. Ellen and I decided that one way we could express thanks for S&C's hospitality was by picking up walnuts. We picked and raked and bagged probably a half-dozen or so bags of walnut litter. 

                        Bagging walnut litter

We ate supper outside on the patio tonight and it looked nice. Unfortunately, it won't stay that way. The squirrels will see to that!