6710 Grand

I'm always optimistic about camping.  I love the idea of disconnecting for the weekend.  I love the thought of slowing down, enjoying nature, exploring the outdoors.  Mostly I love the fire.  The satisfaction of building it, of stoking it, bringing it to life and watching it consume log after log.  Cooking over it is fun too.  It makes me nostalgic for my days in the Girl Scouts.  We camped a lot and I always loved the romance of it.  Sleeping outside (sort of), foraging for wood (in addition to what we brought with us), being one with nature (ok, not really, but you get the idea). The girls love it too and for all of the same reasons (maybe not so much the fire or the being disconnected).  We camped a few times in Phoenix and had many disasters, including Iris's first camping trip which ended maybe six hours after it started but that's for another post.  It was harder there because you couldn't reserve a space and the drive to where t...

January. 2018 Another year.  Another fresh start.  I really love New Year’s.  I love the purge.  I love the beginning.  What I don’t love is January.   January.   It’s awful.  Especially in Philadelphia.  It’s like a Phoenix April—not the worst month but rather, a painful, depressing reminder that things will get worse.  It’s cold.  Frigid in fact.  The temperature has dipped below 30 degrees and promises to remain there for at least a week, hovering occasionally in the 40s and then back down.  We did get one day of 60 but it was just a tease.  There’s more snow than I’d care for in the forecast and that’s just the next fifteen days.  And then, comes February.  The shortest long month in the calendar. I’ve become a weather wimp.  The dessert and the west coast have made me soft.  I may have never acclimated to the Arizona heat but I have most definitely not acclimated to t...