Old people

I've never seen more old people in wheelchairs than at the Cleveland airport.

Buick

Can I just say how much Buicks drive me crazy? Every time someone on the road bugs me it seems they're driving a Buick. I'd worry about offending someone but if you're a friend of mine on the West coast, I'm pretty sure you're not driving one. And if you're a friend of mine in the Buckeye state, well sorry. I'm starting to think that Buick must put in a speed governor that tops out at around 35 mph. It's a real tragedy.

backyard friends

I know this isn't a big deal for my Atlanta family members, nor for my Utah friends, but I thought it was kind of cool to come home from church today to find these guys in the back yard.

The "Beeline"

So whoever posted recently that I'm getting sappy in my old age is right. I really think this upcoming move has me starting to get all sentimental and stuff. For starters, on Thursday of last week, I was sitting in my office meeting with someone. As she was talking, I looked over at my monitor as I had noticed a new email came in. It was a notification email that Mike Zaharis had posted a comment (on the Historic Day) post. The email contained the comment. I quickly read it as this girl was still sitting in my office. I started to get teary eyed. As I read his top 5 Powell moments I started to get really emotional.

That gets me to the "Beeline". I'm guessing most people reading this blog know what the Beeline Highway is. This morning we woke up to go to Roosevelt Lake with some friends. Pictures of that trip by the way can be seen here. As I was driving on the Beeline highway, listening to "I Like You" by Morrissey, I saw Four Peaks off in the distance, (see picture above) I once again started to get emotional. For starters, "I Like You" is a great song. And anything Morrissey is pretty much a spiritual experience for me. (yeah yeah, I know...I don't want to hear it) But I started thinking about the significance of the Beeline highway. It's pretty much the gateway to all things recreational in Arizona. With the exception of I-17 going north to Flagstaff and Lake Powell, it seems like I've driven up the Beeline thousands of times whether I'm going up on the Rim, Pinetop, Roosevelt Lake, Saquaro Lake, Pine, Strawberry, Sycamore Creek, Happy Jack, Forest Lakes, Heber, Snowflake...the list goes on and on. As I looked ahead, earphones snugly fit in my ears and seeing Four Peaks ahead, I got very emotional. I pulled over to take a picture. It seems like I'm doing everything I can to savor all things Arizona these days. I was recounting the experience (although not in this much detail) to Cody Hatch once we got to the lake. He made an interesting comment. He said, "It's almost as if these things (Four Peaks, Beeline etc) feel as if they are yours alone". That's exactly how I feel.

Anyway, I know this all really gay and I can't even believe I'm blogging about this. But the reality of me not being in Arizona is starting to really hit me. There is lots here that will be terribly missed.

Historic Day

Yesterday was a historic and monumental day for me. I sold my boat. That may sound silly, but that boat was part of me. It may sound silly, vain or worldly. Our boat represented great family time spent together, and even more, it was part of one of my favorite pasttimes---Lake Powell.

Most of you probably know that Lake Powell is my favorite place in the whole world. I've been going there since 1979. Most of the people I care about have accompanied me at some point or another on a trip to Powell. With us moving to Ohio, it just didn't make sense to keep it. We sold our houseboat last year, and now I've sold the Tige as well.

If there's any comfort to be had in this whole ordeal, it's that the boat is now in caring, capable hands. I sold it to my friend David Darling. He took the Tige to Lake Powell last week. These pictures are from his trip. I can't decide if I'm more sad about the boat, or the fact that the Lake Powell chapter in my life is definitely closed for now. I think it's both. At the end of the day, a boat is a boat, and we can buy another one. I think the hard part now that I'm pondering it, really is the Lake Powell thing. I think about all the good times we've had their with family and friends. Hopefully we'll do it again. Or maybe we'll just do new things. It's hard to beat family time at the lake though. We'll see how it goes this summer in Ohio and how bad we miss it. In the meantime, please pardon the melancholy mood for the next few days/weeks.

My public apology

On our way home from Idaho, we decide to extend our trip an extra day and spend some time with our good friends the Zaharis'. They moved up to Utah last year from Gilbert. Amy is from Utah and has been wanting to move back ever since her and Mike got married. Mike finally gave in and found a business up there that was for sale and they moved. It was very sad to have them leave. But it was so sweet to be able to see them again. Let me say right here and now, that for the past 10 or 15 years or how ever long it has been that they have lived in Arizona, I have always sparred with Amy over Arizona versus Utah. I want to publicly apologize to Amy and Nichole Barney and any others that I used to rip on Utah to. It really is beautiful. I think all my time in Ohio has made me appreciate the seasons and the green much much more than I ever did. I told Amy I was going to offer a public apology and here it is. Utah is very very pretty. Our drive through Logan canyon coming home from Jackson Hole was one of the prettiest drives I've been on in a long time. So Amy, Nichole, and any others (but mainly Amy) I'M SORRY-----YOU WERE RIGHT!!!

Soon after they got to Utah, Mike broke his ankle really bad (I think in like 14 places) but I won't go into the details because I'll probably get them wrong and then Mike will have to correct me. Maybe if he would regularly keep their blog up I could just point a link over to it so you could read all about it yourself.... but we're not that fortunate to have Mike updating his blog that often. Anyway, sorry for digressing. Mike is still dealing with his ankle and in fact just a couple days before we showed up, he had been back in the hospital because some of his screws had broken. They did a bone graft at the same time. Needless to say he wasn't in the best of shape and we felt bad barging into their home so soon after. But it was great to see them. The kids all had fun signing his cast and playing in the basement. Oh and did I mention Amy is about to give birth any day? They really were sports to let us come hang with them. They really are good friends. Having friends like them really makes us sad to leave Arizona. We have so many good friends like the Z's. We're going to miss them all.