One more notch on the 'busy' amp; it goes to 11!

I am doing too much. The house is a wreck - started putting up curtain rods in the living room (the sheer was very artfully tacked up with push pins) and the rods didn't fit so I launched out to get one that did - HOURS ago. We had been having beautiful weather; Monday it was sunny and 82 so I spent the whole day outdoors. Cold front hit so it was 60 and raining all day yesterday. Today when I set out on my errand, it started clearing up and I somehow found myself at my new fav coffee shop (thanks, Eric!) sitting on a sidewalk table reading the most Amazing Book.* Then I went to see Kathi, we had dinner, then back to her house for a bit. I got home around 9, the place is still a wreck and the paper fairy has laid down today's 4" on the dining room table but I made a beeline up to the football room with a pressing need to blog.

* Amazing book - Power Vs. Force (the hidden determinants of human behavior) by David Hawkins. I have seen the kinesis muscle testing done, believe it with all my being. And this book ties in morphogenetic fields, quantum physics, chaos theory, all great spiritual teachings into simple elegant observations such as "Force always moves against something. Power, in contrast, energizes, gives forth, supplies and supports." and "The universe holds its breath as we choose, instant by instant, which pathway to follow; for the universe, the very essence of life itself, is highly conscious." Yes, everything is one energy. Our bodies are constantly responding to our thoughts - which can be weaker power attractors, or negative. Repeated patterns of thought can cause the body to align with these - and cause disease. I'm annoting this book like crazy as it ties together other things I've read/learned, and experienced. I'm expanding exponentially to take this all in and want to be moving very fast. Trying to sit with it and let it sink in instead!

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Other stuff: making plans for my first trip to northern CA to visit in over 2 years and I want to see everyone, go all of my favorite places and take lots of pictures and start planning how to spend more time there! I'm slowly getting in touch with people to mooch spare rooms, get the party started (thanks, Nancy & Peri), cap it with a sublimely life-changing time and encounters on the Big Sur coast (thanks, Pat!) I've been trying to get on left coast time by staying up to 2 and sleeping to 9; it really makes the days seem shorter. But it's not too hard to do, I may have rediscovered my natural rhythm.

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What's kicking off this trip is another spirituality seminar - in Vegas of all places. The books I've been reading lately have been in preparation; and as you've read the books are blowing the top off my mind. I anticipate otherworldy great vibrations and huge personal growth from this. November 07 is going to be an amazing month in my life.

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A love note: to Incubus - how, how, where does your poetry come from? Best love song ever is 'Dig' on the Light Grenades CD. Your work has gotten me through some low spots and smiling out the other end. Thank you so much!

LBD happier now

And so am I. The Entrepreneurs Conference at RIT was fantastic for me, and it seems like all participants and attendees were happy with it. I have met a couple students who want advice re: their current projects/business plans. Hey look at me, I'm an 'elder stateswoman'! TFC!!!! And I know that of which I speak!

I also met people in 'the community' (as opposed to working at RIT) who are business owners, VCs, etc. What a great way to get plugged in. I'm still buzzing from the day.

Oh yes, LBD, she was sad . So I wore her out to an 'networking event' a couple weeks ago. Garnered rave reviews, as appropriate! Next, out to dinner.

Gettin plugged in!

So excited! Tomorrow I'm on a panel about marketing new ventures at RIT! Check out the Entrepreneurs Conference

I'm on the run tonight; more this weekend after the conference.

What does it mean to "be" Peace?

In the tumult that is currently my life, I have been digging deeper into me. Maybe that's stirring up some of the turbulence. Hmmm. Anyway, I have been working on meditating, and focusing on the sayings 'As within, so without' and 'Be the change you want to see in the world'.

So I have been thinking and feeling Peace. It amazes me the new level of comprehension of my self-dialog. Man, it's no wonder the world has troubles - I keep having arguments with people in my head. And about trivial stuff, too. Anyone who's had sucess in getting the brain to move out of this mode, please share. I'm making progress but all tips and advice are welcome!

Meanwhile, this is a most excellent resource: Attract World Peace

NASCAR!!!!

Here’s me at a NASCAR race, in the pit at Spencer Speedway. And I liked it! The sound the modified stock cars make as they fire up, as they are all in a pack taking a flight around the corner, rumbles through every cell in my body - in a good way. Beth’s husband has been doing racing forever. He is the crew chief for a car, goes to the races to set up the car and work with it on the weekends. He was helping out a crew at Spencer, not “his” car & driver. I took some picks of the cars and the light had fade before I realized I hadn’t taken a picture of me, so Beth obliged with her camera phone.





The car, Chuck's #4

The car that Bob crews for is closing in on the final 3 races for the season, and currently is in first place in points. Beth & I are planning to go to Connecticut to see the last race in October.

A couple weeks ago, I went over to Beth’s on a Friday night with a movie. 30 minutes in, her phone rang. “Yes. OK. OK. Sure.” She turned to me and said, “We have an active fire. I have to go!” Hilton Ladies Fire Auxiliary supports the firefighters with beverages at the scene, and food afterwards as desired. So we headed out to the fire hall, where the other ladies of the Auxiliary were gathering. There was some milling around, and Beth and I headed to the store to get bottles of water and headed out to the fire. We carried the water in past the trucks and hoses and the paramedics to the scene.

As we headed back to the fire hall, I told Beth that she has been the architect of several of my firsts this year. She said “whaat?’ I replied: “Working at the Carnival, Golfing, NASCAR, working a fire, watching a Drum Corps competition, eating a 'garbage plate' …” She said “I never thought my life was so interesting!” Maybe I can make a business out of this – I’ll jump into someone’s life and show them how interesting it really is. Hmmmm….

Final day at Yellowstone; on to the wedding!

July 19, our last in the park, we split up. John & Amy headed out to take a hike. Greg, Andrea, Gavin and I puttered our way through more geothermal areas and ended up at Yellowstone Lake.



Sapphire Spring




Yellowstone Lake

We picnicked, then swam for an hour. The lake is beautiful, cool and very clear. We headed out after the swim, got hot again quickly, and Gavin crashed in the way back seat. 30 minutes up the road, we saw an animal jam up ahead. Looked to the right and saw bison in the picnic area just off the road – so I quick pulled a Uturn and into the picnic area. And Gavin woke up nose to nose with a bison. He handled that pretty well.

The bison were all over the picnic area – rubbing their rumps on picnic tables, nudging down young saplings as they scratched their chins, rolling in the dust. We spent 30 minutes cruising very slowly through the area, snapping pics.







Back onto the main road and slowly cruised through the rest of the herd. Headed up to dinner at Canyon Village, which was pretty good.

Next awesome sight was the ‘grand canyon’ of Yellowstone. We spent an hour cruising through and gawking. On the way out, we saw someone else dive to the side of the road, so we followed – and saw a wolf running through the undergrowth. We think. It was gone so quickly. That night we wanted to get to the hotel before midnight, so we headed out of the park. Stopped for one major animal jam and saw an elk with full rack, and feasted our eyes on the glory of the park on the way out for the last night.

The next day was a zoom through Idaho back to Salt Lake, to get to the pre-wedding BBQ at the Alta Lodge out of Salt Lake. And we made it. It is a darn good thing that we’d been at 8000+ feet for the previous week. We hit Alta at 10,000 feet and felt woozy and weak all over again. Alta is in a beautiful spot. We enjoyed seeing more family again and the dinner was superb. There were 100+ guests staying at the lodge.



Greg & Andrea with the Alta backdrop

The next morning, all the guests scattered – the insanely fit ones like Zoe and her finance Peter, cousins Julie and Guy went for a run (and Guy lives in Australia at sea level!) We opted for a hike up to Cecret Lake. Beautiful spot, glad I went. But man, did I get out of breath!




High meadow – is there anything more beautiful?





The lake – no swimming, too bad.

I headed back to the lodge and Steve, Colette and their son Kayden did me the honor of coming up to visit. I had known them in San Jose, they moved to Salt Lake a year before I went to Germany. It was so great to see them. I was wondering how it would be, seeing parts of my previous life. It was great!

The Wedding was to start early evening. The plan was to hike up the hill – OK, mountain, across the road to a high meadow that Peter and Zoe wanted for their ceremony. Fortunately, the landowner objected (sorry, folks!) so we all went back to our rooms to put on our pretty shoes and headed to the lower patio for the ceremony. It was beautiful and with an incredible backdrop.







The wedding was great, the reception fun. We danced outdoors until the last possible moment and then humped out suitcases up to the van for our early morning departure. The flights home were fine. Gavin & I saw Shaun White (AKA the Flying Tomato) at O’Hara. He’s very cute in person – and tiny.

Got home at 5 p.m. At 8 a.m. the next day, I started a 1-month contract for work. 2 days later, my fridge died. I am so grateful that it waited until I was back, it didn’t have much food in it but it still would have been such a mess. So I slammed into work, working at a card table and folding chair, and having to put all my food in a cooler, and borrow a cooler, and replace my fridge. Thank goodness for American shopping – I bought a fridge at 8 a.m., for deliver the next day. Try that in Germany – no way. And my house got disordered all over again, and I spent time putting it together again. This seems to be a pattern! Of course, as Ilya Prigogene uncovered, a system comes to maximum disorder just before it reorganizes at a higher level. And the level it reorders at, I believe, has a lot to do with intent. Ya just can’t tell me that chaos theory and quantum physics don’t intersect!

Now we get to Yellowstone

Dining in Jackson

The next day of our trip, Tuesday July 17, we had a breakfast of sourdough pancakes at Jedidiah’s in Jackson, where they say their starter is over 100 years old. Various of us tried to explain that to Gavin. We left Jackson and headed up through the Tetons and took in the grand sights along the way. Saw a moose! We encountered a sudden, cold rain storm in the Tetons.



Beautiful scenery on the Snake river.



Yellowstone lake, and fire scar from the fires a decade ago.

We rolled in to Yellowstone through the south entrance and headed towards, of course Old Faithful.

Got there 40 minutes before she was set to blow again so we headed out on the boardwalk in that geothermal area. It was now a hot day, and we were walking where the steam and hot mud come spurting out of the ground, Andrea and I sought shade!

Greg, Amy, John & Gavin on the boardwalk.






Gavin, Greg, and Amy

After the geyser blew, we meandered back to the lodge, got ice cream. Headed to the Old Faithful Inn, as John & Amy wanted to make a dinner reservation. So we took in the grand log cabin that it is, and ended up sitting on the outside deck for Old Faithful’s next performance.

Along the way, John & Amy explained the ‘animal jams’ we’d see on the road: all the cars pulled over because someone saw something. Elk, Moose, Bison, Wolves, Coyotes: ‘CMF’ they called them, Charismatic Mega Fauna. So, if you see someone pulling over, make the dive too! The driving in the park is tricky – narrow 2 lane road with animal jams spring up out of nowhere, and the drivers are all distracted trying to spot an Elk, or a Bison.

We drove out of the park and got to our motel for the next three days. Lord, it was not good. If you’re ever in West Yellowstone (a town in Idaho just outside the western border of Yellowstone park), DO NOT stay at the Yellowstone Country Inn. My room was scary bad, including goopy stains on the wall, tacky splotches on the rug, and moldy food in the corners. I didn’t stay in the room that night. Instead, stay at the lovely Moose Creek Cabins, just next door. A world of difference. Clean, pretty, and nice innkeepers.

The next day we all got up, trooped across the street to Uncle Laurie’s for breakfast. Great place; insanely good coffee. Cold brewed, said Turtle. He grinds it medium fine, and steeps it in cold water for 16 hours. Takes the resulting tincture (or is it decoction?) and puts 2 ounces in a cup, heats it up with hot water. Absolutely wonderful coffee, no acidity or bitterness. I’m sure I ate breakfast but just remember the coffee. Afterwards, we headed in to the park. Stopped at more geothermal areas on the way.



Gavin in front of Beryl Spring



From the back, John, Greg, Andrea, Amy (maybe you can see Gavin down low)

Ended up at a picnic area for lunch (which the great folks at Uncle Lauries had packed up for us.)






The boys climbed the postpile

and then we all went swimming in the Gardner river.





Bathing Beauty

This was the first river swimming I’d done since my last camping in the Sierra – it was so great, I could feel my DNA unwinding. After we dried off, which took about 45 seconds in the 97 degree 15% humidity wind, we hit Mammoth Hot Springs on the way to the Lamar valley.




Mammoth Hot Springs Geothermal area



It’s not snow!



Lawn Elk at Roosevelt lodge.



Dinner that night was at Roosevelt Tower, and the worst in the park. Very boring, white lettuce kind of food. But the hours in the Lamar Valley afterwards more than made up for it. We drove for about 40 minutes after dinner into the valley, which kept opening up and up.





There were clouds and a distant thunderstorm. We pulled over after sharp eyes (not mine!) spotted a bison herd across the river bank. As our engines cut out and silence descended, we heard wolves calling. The left side of the valley, then an answer a few seconds later from the right. Some of us tried yipping to see if they'd answer, but they were not playing along that night.



Sunset lasts for hours there. We stood by the road as night gathered, watching the unconcerned bison browsing. John, Gavin and I walked down the bank to the river to see what we could see down there. Just an amazing view.

When it was full dark, we marveled at the stars and drank in the silence and night air for a while, then headed back to West Yellowstone as the rain started. It took 2 hours to get back to the hotel. This park is BIG.