After close to 4 weeks, I've finally gotten a job. It's entry level, but I think I'm going to like it. It's with Petsmart, which is located all over the US and Canada so once Cameron is done with school I can transfer to other locations. I'll be cashiering in the regular store and also working in the pet hotel part of it. I love the animals and the hotel lets me play with them and interact a lot. The starting pay isn't spectacular, but will get us through the year and then we'll see where his work takes us.
Other big news, Cameron got hired on as keyboard player for a local band. I think they're called The Eleventh Hour and they play a wide assortment of styles. Since they have a sax, horn, bass, drum, and keyboard players, they can handle just about anything. They have a woman doing vocals that has a beautiful, clear voice. When Cameron was auditioning, there was a guy auditioning for male vocalist, as well. He was great, but apparently they wanted someone with more experience doing duets and harmonizing. They practice every Sunday so I made myself available to work then, since we wouldn't be able to go on any long rides that day.
I'm seeing more of Phoenix, especially today, since the store I'm working at is located in an area called Paradise Valley. It's a 25 minute drive through a very nice part of town with custom homes and unusual restaurants/shops. It's on the other side of the hills (definitely not mountains like in Albuquerque) from where we live so I take surface streets that skirt around them. It would be a much shorter drive if not for the hills. The place where Cameron will be going to rehearse is in Gonzales, which is just south of Tempe. Tempe is south east of Phoenix. Everything runs together here, like LA, so it's hard to tell where one town ends and another begins. The skyline is much lower than LA. There aren't as many highrise buildings clumped together in a downtown area. They are mostly scattered and not nearly as tall, at least what I've seen so far. Most of the residential areas remind me of the San Fernando Valley with ranch-style homes and that non-descript look about them. That's why it was so nice to see the Paradise Valley area. It redeemed Phoenix a little, but I still miss Albuquerque a lot.
The people of Paradise Valley are nicer, friendlier than the area we live in. In our part of town, it's like LA with everyone just looking forward and not acknowleging anyone around them. It's very impersonal. When I was walking into the Petsmart store for my interview, someone said hello to me in the parking lot and another smiled and nodded at me when I went through the door. I even had a driver give me space to merge into her lane when the lane I was in was closing due to construction. It all sounds so minor and common place, but when it's not there, you miss it.
There is another MMI student living downstairs and to the back of us, that I met recently. He and his wife are here from someplace back east (the place escapes me at the moment), and they have 2 dogs. One is a small to medium german shepard type and the other is a miniature chihuahua. Both are very friendly (I am still amazed at the friendliness of the chihuahua) and anxious to meet Tuesday. Unfortunately, they were a little too anxious and scared her. I'm hoping she'll get used to them so she can have some friends. She's still so traumatized from the dogs in the neighborhood we were in, in Bakersfield. They were all so mean and would charge her when she tried to make friends. There was a very polite and easy-going poodle mix dog at our place in Albuquerque that she was beginning to make friends with so I know there is hope. It will just take some time and being with the properly behaved (ones that follow dog ettiquette such as all the sniffing and introductions before charging up to someone) ones that won't scare her away before she has a chance to get to know them.
Well, it's getting late so I'd better put this to bed so I can, as well. More later...
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Classes Start Monday!
Today was orientation day at MMI, Motorcycle Mechanics Institute. I hadn't been there before so it was interesting to see the campus and some of the staff. They did a good,professional, presentation, putting the parents in attendance at ease from the initial fears of leaving their "young ones" in Phoenix. I spoke with several that felt so much better about making their trips back home, wherever in the US that might be, next week.
It's fascinating to look over the variety of in-coming students, both their ages and style of dress. It ran the gamut, though the majority looked fresh out of high school; clean cut "all-American" mid-western to liberal facial piercings with, what looked like, self-cut hair. There were a few of us "significant others" and several pairs of parents. The rules, strict dress code included, were stated very directly and with no gray areas. I think that was the big deal-closer for those parents; high expectations and no-nonsense policies. I can hardly wait to see the changes in these kids after their 12-18 months of training is over.
After the presentation, while Cameron was going through the line of stations to pay his materials fee, and get an ID and shirts, I chatted with a couple of the student services people about employment-for me. They have a couple of openings at the school that sound like a good fit, and I was directed to apply on line. Cool! There was, also, a career fair at the school in the afternoon for students and their spouses.
Well, the career fair was really geared toward the students. Part-time jobs that utilized the male ability to lift heavy objects were the dominant options. Full-time with benefits? Hmm..."we'll take a copy of your resume and see if anything comes up." OK, at least I went and didn't spend the rest of the day wondering if that perfect job was sitting there, waiting for me.
Speaking of career fairs, there's one this Saturday at the community college. I've applied on line for 2 postions there, but was sent an email telling me it would take at least 4 weeks to process my application! That's before anyone even gives me a call for an interview. So, hopefully, this Saturday I can get some face-time in with the human resources department.
It's funny. Most of the job postings I have applied for have been through internet companies that host want ads. Of these ads, many specifically say to NOT call the company. So how do I pester them into hiring me? Phoenix is home to MANY call centers and corporate offices. It's getting past their initial "nets" that is posing a challenge for me. "We'll call you if your application meets our desired qualifications." Yes, can you tell I hate job hunting?
Ah, bringing my stress levels back down to a reasonable level, we are settling in nicely. There are still a few boxes unpacked, mostly for a lack of homes for the items they contain. This apartment is larger, but lacks some of the storage the other one had. I'll get creative one of these days and come up with a solution, but for now, they sit here and there and provide nice hiding places for the cats to nap in.
I've been watching the positioning of the sunlight on the balcony. I'd like to plant some vegetables out there, but the pots would need to be moveable in order to catch the light we get. I specifically asked for an apartment that would be out of the afternoon sun, so this one is more limited than many here. I'll probably look into the flat, wheeled, stands for pots. That way I can move them about to ensure adequate exposure. Since we're only planning on living in Phoenix for the length of his school time, I don't want to start any perrenials. It's highly frowned upon to take live plants across state lines as they can transmit insects. So, veggies it is! And maybe some annuals, who knows? Perhaps if I get some flowers going, the hummingbirds will start coming up to the feeder. I have yet to get any customers.
It's getting late and tomorrow's another day. I'll let you know if anything comes of my continued endeavors for employment. Good Night!
It's fascinating to look over the variety of in-coming students, both their ages and style of dress. It ran the gamut, though the majority looked fresh out of high school; clean cut "all-American" mid-western to liberal facial piercings with, what looked like, self-cut hair. There were a few of us "significant others" and several pairs of parents. The rules, strict dress code included, were stated very directly and with no gray areas. I think that was the big deal-closer for those parents; high expectations and no-nonsense policies. I can hardly wait to see the changes in these kids after their 12-18 months of training is over.
After the presentation, while Cameron was going through the line of stations to pay his materials fee, and get an ID and shirts, I chatted with a couple of the student services people about employment-for me. They have a couple of openings at the school that sound like a good fit, and I was directed to apply on line. Cool! There was, also, a career fair at the school in the afternoon for students and their spouses.
Well, the career fair was really geared toward the students. Part-time jobs that utilized the male ability to lift heavy objects were the dominant options. Full-time with benefits? Hmm..."we'll take a copy of your resume and see if anything comes up." OK, at least I went and didn't spend the rest of the day wondering if that perfect job was sitting there, waiting for me.
Speaking of career fairs, there's one this Saturday at the community college. I've applied on line for 2 postions there, but was sent an email telling me it would take at least 4 weeks to process my application! That's before anyone even gives me a call for an interview. So, hopefully, this Saturday I can get some face-time in with the human resources department.
It's funny. Most of the job postings I have applied for have been through internet companies that host want ads. Of these ads, many specifically say to NOT call the company. So how do I pester them into hiring me? Phoenix is home to MANY call centers and corporate offices. It's getting past their initial "nets" that is posing a challenge for me. "We'll call you if your application meets our desired qualifications." Yes, can you tell I hate job hunting?
Ah, bringing my stress levels back down to a reasonable level, we are settling in nicely. There are still a few boxes unpacked, mostly for a lack of homes for the items they contain. This apartment is larger, but lacks some of the storage the other one had. I'll get creative one of these days and come up with a solution, but for now, they sit here and there and provide nice hiding places for the cats to nap in.
I've been watching the positioning of the sunlight on the balcony. I'd like to plant some vegetables out there, but the pots would need to be moveable in order to catch the light we get. I specifically asked for an apartment that would be out of the afternoon sun, so this one is more limited than many here. I'll probably look into the flat, wheeled, stands for pots. That way I can move them about to ensure adequate exposure. Since we're only planning on living in Phoenix for the length of his school time, I don't want to start any perrenials. It's highly frowned upon to take live plants across state lines as they can transmit insects. So, veggies it is! And maybe some annuals, who knows? Perhaps if I get some flowers going, the hummingbirds will start coming up to the feeder. I have yet to get any customers.
It's getting late and tomorrow's another day. I'll let you know if anything comes of my continued endeavors for employment. Good Night!
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Settling In
It's taking a little time to get settled into life in Phoenix. The place is much like LA in terms of traffic, attitudes, and hungry, monster-like, engulfing of surrounding communities into one large rambling mega-city. It's hard to tell where one ends and another begins, but one thing becomes certain, the closer you get to Phoenix, proper, the more congested things get.
Cameron scored a part-time job doing small engine/appliance repair in an area that, as far as the map was concerned, was a nice 15 minute ride from home. Well... in the afternoon/evening-say around the hours of between 3 and 5 o'clock-it's actually closer to an hour from home. I experienced it first-hand yesterday when I paid him a visit to deliver a stool I found for him to sit on while he works. The business he's at is in a shopping center area so, in addition to the regular rush-hour traffic, there's the shopping traffic, as well. Luckily, I chatted it up with a guy at the pizza place next door and found out a way around the brunt of the snarl of traffic. It saved us about a half hour of travel time.
My job hunting results have not been so fruitful. Many, many applications/resumes have been put out there, but not so much interest. There have been a couple of phone interviews that put me on a waiting list until the next round of hiring occurs, though I have no idea when that will be-don't call us, we'll call you. To make it more difficult, most of the internet postings request no phone calls. OK...how am I supposed to follow-up? It's frustrating, but there are 2 job fairs next week, one at the school Cameron is attending, the other through Career Builder (one of the major employment listing services used in the area). Ah, a chance for some face time!
The high temperatures were a hard slam to the body for the first week. Going from the 80's of Albuquerque to the 105+ of Phoenix made it difficult to get motivated to do much. The last few days have cooled off a little-99 to 101-so it hasn't been quite so intense. The evenings are cooling down, now, too. Thank goodness for air conditioning!
The apartment complex we're in is huge! I don't remember how many building or units, but each building is 3 stories high, we're on the second floor. There have been quite a few things that need fixing and the maintenance guys are fantastic. Out of curiosity I asked one of them how old the complex is and they said it's 30 years old. No wonder there's so much to repair. The management is systematically refurbishing the place and bringing it up to current code. Our place has a great floor plan, but there are structural things about it that make me wonder if I'll wind up in the downstairs apartment one of these days. Small sags in the floor, here and there, and the amazing ability of little 12-pound Tuesday, running across the the livingroom floor, making the whole place shake, definitely makes one wonder. So...I spoke with one of the guys that is doing the refurbishing project and when I told him about the floors he strongly recommended that I inform the maintenance person. He said it's amazing what people have been living with and not reporting and the only way to get it fixed is to notify management. Very true, luckily, the woman in charge of maintenance is very understanding and offers immediate solutions. This conversation ocurred after office hours so I'll talk with her on Monday. It'll be interesting to see what transpires as a result.
Speaking of Tuesday, she's still having a hard time with taking walks around this place. First, there's the stairs. Her poor little legs can handle about 2, maybe 3, trips up and down and she's done. If I take her out more than 3 times, I can plan on carrying her up the stairs to come home. The other big problem is that there is no size limit on the dogs that live here. She's so afraid of anything much bigger than she is that if she even sees a large dog in the distance, she does an about-face and makes a bee-line in the opposite direction. That makes for anxious walks and many delays in "taking care of business". There's, also, lots of people around here so there's a lot of distractions and sudden noises to add to the situation. I'm sure she'll eventually get used to it, though.
We haven't taken any motorcycle trips yet-too hot for me. I'll go out one of these days and take a few pictures of the complex so you can see what it's like. They've done a wonderful job on the outside of it, I thought is was a pretty new development when we first got here. From our bedroom, looking out the big sliding door, it looks like we're in a treehouse. There's a large eucalyptus tree outside and we're at the midpoint of the branches. It gives a nice shady feel to the place. I put the hummingbird feeder up, but so far haven't had any guests. Perhaps I should put up a "free food" sign! I'm going to pass on the regular feeder while we're here. It would be pandemonium on the balcony with doves and pigeons trying to eat and the cats jumping up on the wall to get at them. Not a good situation!
Well, that's about it for now. We're continuing to do this one step at a time, so we'll see what the coming week has to offer.
Cameron scored a part-time job doing small engine/appliance repair in an area that, as far as the map was concerned, was a nice 15 minute ride from home. Well... in the afternoon/evening-say around the hours of between 3 and 5 o'clock-it's actually closer to an hour from home. I experienced it first-hand yesterday when I paid him a visit to deliver a stool I found for him to sit on while he works. The business he's at is in a shopping center area so, in addition to the regular rush-hour traffic, there's the shopping traffic, as well. Luckily, I chatted it up with a guy at the pizza place next door and found out a way around the brunt of the snarl of traffic. It saved us about a half hour of travel time.
My job hunting results have not been so fruitful. Many, many applications/resumes have been put out there, but not so much interest. There have been a couple of phone interviews that put me on a waiting list until the next round of hiring occurs, though I have no idea when that will be-don't call us, we'll call you. To make it more difficult, most of the internet postings request no phone calls. OK...how am I supposed to follow-up? It's frustrating, but there are 2 job fairs next week, one at the school Cameron is attending, the other through Career Builder (one of the major employment listing services used in the area). Ah, a chance for some face time!
The high temperatures were a hard slam to the body for the first week. Going from the 80's of Albuquerque to the 105+ of Phoenix made it difficult to get motivated to do much. The last few days have cooled off a little-99 to 101-so it hasn't been quite so intense. The evenings are cooling down, now, too. Thank goodness for air conditioning!
The apartment complex we're in is huge! I don't remember how many building or units, but each building is 3 stories high, we're on the second floor. There have been quite a few things that need fixing and the maintenance guys are fantastic. Out of curiosity I asked one of them how old the complex is and they said it's 30 years old. No wonder there's so much to repair. The management is systematically refurbishing the place and bringing it up to current code. Our place has a great floor plan, but there are structural things about it that make me wonder if I'll wind up in the downstairs apartment one of these days. Small sags in the floor, here and there, and the amazing ability of little 12-pound Tuesday, running across the the livingroom floor, making the whole place shake, definitely makes one wonder. So...I spoke with one of the guys that is doing the refurbishing project and when I told him about the floors he strongly recommended that I inform the maintenance person. He said it's amazing what people have been living with and not reporting and the only way to get it fixed is to notify management. Very true, luckily, the woman in charge of maintenance is very understanding and offers immediate solutions. This conversation ocurred after office hours so I'll talk with her on Monday. It'll be interesting to see what transpires as a result.
Speaking of Tuesday, she's still having a hard time with taking walks around this place. First, there's the stairs. Her poor little legs can handle about 2, maybe 3, trips up and down and she's done. If I take her out more than 3 times, I can plan on carrying her up the stairs to come home. The other big problem is that there is no size limit on the dogs that live here. She's so afraid of anything much bigger than she is that if she even sees a large dog in the distance, she does an about-face and makes a bee-line in the opposite direction. That makes for anxious walks and many delays in "taking care of business". There's, also, lots of people around here so there's a lot of distractions and sudden noises to add to the situation. I'm sure she'll eventually get used to it, though.
We haven't taken any motorcycle trips yet-too hot for me. I'll go out one of these days and take a few pictures of the complex so you can see what it's like. They've done a wonderful job on the outside of it, I thought is was a pretty new development when we first got here. From our bedroom, looking out the big sliding door, it looks like we're in a treehouse. There's a large eucalyptus tree outside and we're at the midpoint of the branches. It gives a nice shady feel to the place. I put the hummingbird feeder up, but so far haven't had any guests. Perhaps I should put up a "free food" sign! I'm going to pass on the regular feeder while we're here. It would be pandemonium on the balcony with doves and pigeons trying to eat and the cats jumping up on the wall to get at them. Not a good situation!
Well, that's about it for now. We're continuing to do this one step at a time, so we'll see what the coming week has to offer.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
As the Phoenix Rises...
Hello Phoenix!
And hello 106 degree days...
OK, thankfully there's air conditioning and a nice apartment to come home to.
Obviously, we made it here, despite the mechanical setback, and are slowly turning our warehouse-like abode into a home. I'd say about 1/3 of the boxes are gone and the rest are slowly finding their way into the appropriate areas to be unloaded and cast aside with the rest. Due to the sudden introduction of stairs to our daily routine (2nd floor apartments can be a pain, literally), our unpacking has been slow. Arthritis and past injuries made the moving-in process especially exhausting. We have lots of books, need I say more?
This coming week I will be contacting the many companies I've applied for jobs with and see what develops. I had a group interview with the Phoenix Art Institute, but it turned out to be just a sales job, with high quotas. Another company has interviewed me by phone for 2 positions and I am awaiting further contact for a face to face interview. Needless to say, job prospects are much better here, than Albuquerque.
Speaking of Albuquerque, I woke up in the middle of the night a couple of days ago, expecting to be back there. We've only been here a few days so it will take time to adjust to the new surroundings. I do miss the place, though, actually, both the place and the people.
So, here's to new places and more friends. Look out Arizona, the Weckerley's are here!
And hello 106 degree days...
OK, thankfully there's air conditioning and a nice apartment to come home to.
Obviously, we made it here, despite the mechanical setback, and are slowly turning our warehouse-like abode into a home. I'd say about 1/3 of the boxes are gone and the rest are slowly finding their way into the appropriate areas to be unloaded and cast aside with the rest. Due to the sudden introduction of stairs to our daily routine (2nd floor apartments can be a pain, literally), our unpacking has been slow. Arthritis and past injuries made the moving-in process especially exhausting. We have lots of books, need I say more?
This coming week I will be contacting the many companies I've applied for jobs with and see what develops. I had a group interview with the Phoenix Art Institute, but it turned out to be just a sales job, with high quotas. Another company has interviewed me by phone for 2 positions and I am awaiting further contact for a face to face interview. Needless to say, job prospects are much better here, than Albuquerque.
Speaking of Albuquerque, I woke up in the middle of the night a couple of days ago, expecting to be back there. We've only been here a few days so it will take time to adjust to the new surroundings. I do miss the place, though, actually, both the place and the people.
So, here's to new places and more friends. Look out Arizona, the Weckerley's are here!
Monday, September 1, 2008
Gallupping Toward Phoenix
Last week was a little insane, getting ready to move, both physically and emotionally. To take a break from all the tension, we decided to treat ourselves to a visit to the Albuquerque Bio Park.
The park is a combination of botanical gardens, aquarium, zoo, and a unique chain of very use-specific lakes. The lakes are designated for radio-controlled boats, children's fishing, adult fishing, catch and release fishing, etc. The aquarium is small, but interesting-they have some really nice jelly fish exhibits. A small train connects the aquarium and botanical gardens with the zoo and lakes.
Lacking the physical ability to see everything, we chose our favorites; the aquarium and the zoo. The aquarium took only about 30 minutes to walk through, though we could have taken longer if we had little kids to "experience" the exhibits. It was interesting to see a couple of real seagull-like birds perched at the end of the stingray/shark exhibit. I found it kind of strange that they had that exhibit in a shallow tank that was easily reached into by little hands, though it was not a hands-on display. There was a docent present at one end, but as the picture shows, a little girl was persistent about dipping her fingers in the cold salt water.
The aquarium and zoo are about 3 miles apart, so the 20 minute train ride made sense. Besides, how often do you get the chance to sit in a small-scale cattle car, pulled by a bio-fuel driven little engine?
The zoo is my personal favorite and so I took over the camera duties. It's a fairly small place, but was plenty for my knee to handle. (It was still a little sore from a previous, all-day ride to the Taos area.)
Check out the wrestling polar bears and the bizarre little snow-crested...somethings (I have got to start carrying a pad to write the names of animals, etc. on!)-they are a type of marsupial. Only about a foot or so tall, they look like some kind of fantasy warriors-really cool. We were, also, lucky enough to arrive just at giraffe feeding time, so I was able to get some good face shots. That's one advantage of the smaller zoos. Often the animals are closer and there's more hands-on activities.
Here's the link to the slide show from our little excursion.
A little bit rested, we resumed packing the following day. By Saturday night, our place looked like a warehouse and the animals were all freaked out. Their condition only worsened Sunday, as items were carried out to the u-haul, and the place was emptied of its familiar contents. We had a problem with the truck, though. Torn between which size to reserve, we, of course, chose one that was too small to hold all our stuff and both motorcycles. Being a holiday weekend, there wasn't another truck to be found, so it was decided that Cameron would ride his bike and I would drive the truck with the trailered car.
Cameron started loading the truck, first thing in the morning. It's funny how people seem to scatter when someone they know needs help moving. It looked like we might have to load the truck ourselves, something neither one of us was up to.
We've been so fortunate to have fantastic neighbors. (Tim and Kyla, both just starting to explore their lives, both as new parents of a rambunctious chocolate lab puppy, and as adults in the world of work and college.) They saved the day by helping us load the truck and keep an eye on Tuesday, who wanted to stay near all the activity; hanging out with the "pack".
It was an exhausting day, so the four of us wrapped it up with a delicious meal at a highly recommended steak house. Before the meal was over, we were invited to have dessert at Kyla's parent's place. I had wanted to meet her parents for a while, at least as long of a while as you can have when you've only been someplace for a couple of months! Well, her mom is just as friendly and warm as she is; it was a really nice evening-a much needed change of gears.
It's times like this that make it so hard to leave this place. Albuquerque has a warmth that is hard to describe. At every turn, there are people I want to pull into my life as friends and they quickly take root in my heart. Leaving her parent's place, that familiar knot caught in my throat and I had to pull myself back from the sadness of leaving all this. Hugs goodnight, and goodbye, since we were planning on leaving early in the morning, and the day was over.
This morning, we set about to finish the remaining odds and ends that needed to be taken care of before we vacated our apartment. Cleaning the refrigerator, stowing the last items in the truck, finding more that had been forgotten about, etc. took much longer than expected, of course. Thus, our early morning departure turned into an early afternoon one.
Since we didn't want to deal with the car trailer until the last minute, we picked it up on the way out of town-I drove the truck and Cameron drove the car, we had left his motorcycle at the rental store earlier. With the car loaded on the trailer, we started our new journey.
Our rocky start got a little rockier about 2 hours down the road. With Cameron following behind me, to make sure I had the trailer and truck under control, I looked in my rear-view mirror and saw him briefly waver on the freeway. Shortly after I looked again and he had pulled off to the side of the road, though was still moving. I continued a little further to a wider part of the shoulder and stopped, concerned about what was happening.
Well, his throttle cable had broken, causing him to lose any ability to accelerate. Luckily, we were only about a quarter of a mile from Gallup, NM, so I called the auto club for a tow truck (I'm so glad I opted for the motorcycle coverage) to take the bike to a nearby hotel parking lot so we could figure out what to do next.
That brings me to now. It's late and Cameron's asleep, but I needed to get this, "down on paper" so to speak, before there are any more additions to this adventure. The plan, so far, is to contact a BMW dealer in the morning to find out about getting a new cable. We'll probably leave the bike at the towing company's yard (they offered to store it for a minimal fee), go on to Phoenix to unload, then return for the bike once the part arrives. We're still 6 hours from our destination so that will entail at least an overnight trip to accomplish.
I will write more as things evolve.
The park is a combination of botanical gardens, aquarium, zoo, and a unique chain of very use-specific lakes. The lakes are designated for radio-controlled boats, children's fishing, adult fishing, catch and release fishing, etc. The aquarium is small, but interesting-they have some really nice jelly fish exhibits. A small train connects the aquarium and botanical gardens with the zoo and lakes.
Lacking the physical ability to see everything, we chose our favorites; the aquarium and the zoo. The aquarium took only about 30 minutes to walk through, though we could have taken longer if we had little kids to "experience" the exhibits. It was interesting to see a couple of real seagull-like birds perched at the end of the stingray/shark exhibit. I found it kind of strange that they had that exhibit in a shallow tank that was easily reached into by little hands, though it was not a hands-on display. There was a docent present at one end, but as the picture shows, a little girl was persistent about dipping her fingers in the cold salt water.
The aquarium and zoo are about 3 miles apart, so the 20 minute train ride made sense. Besides, how often do you get the chance to sit in a small-scale cattle car, pulled by a bio-fuel driven little engine?
The zoo is my personal favorite and so I took over the camera duties. It's a fairly small place, but was plenty for my knee to handle. (It was still a little sore from a previous, all-day ride to the Taos area.)
Check out the wrestling polar bears and the bizarre little snow-crested...somethings (I have got to start carrying a pad to write the names of animals, etc. on!)-they are a type of marsupial. Only about a foot or so tall, they look like some kind of fantasy warriors-really cool. We were, also, lucky enough to arrive just at giraffe feeding time, so I was able to get some good face shots. That's one advantage of the smaller zoos. Often the animals are closer and there's more hands-on activities.
Here's the link to the slide show from our little excursion.
A little bit rested, we resumed packing the following day. By Saturday night, our place looked like a warehouse and the animals were all freaked out. Their condition only worsened Sunday, as items were carried out to the u-haul, and the place was emptied of its familiar contents. We had a problem with the truck, though. Torn between which size to reserve, we, of course, chose one that was too small to hold all our stuff and both motorcycles. Being a holiday weekend, there wasn't another truck to be found, so it was decided that Cameron would ride his bike and I would drive the truck with the trailered car.
Cameron started loading the truck, first thing in the morning. It's funny how people seem to scatter when someone they know needs help moving. It looked like we might have to load the truck ourselves, something neither one of us was up to.
We've been so fortunate to have fantastic neighbors. (Tim and Kyla, both just starting to explore their lives, both as new parents of a rambunctious chocolate lab puppy, and as adults in the world of work and college.) They saved the day by helping us load the truck and keep an eye on Tuesday, who wanted to stay near all the activity; hanging out with the "pack".
It was an exhausting day, so the four of us wrapped it up with a delicious meal at a highly recommended steak house. Before the meal was over, we were invited to have dessert at Kyla's parent's place. I had wanted to meet her parents for a while, at least as long of a while as you can have when you've only been someplace for a couple of months! Well, her mom is just as friendly and warm as she is; it was a really nice evening-a much needed change of gears.
It's times like this that make it so hard to leave this place. Albuquerque has a warmth that is hard to describe. At every turn, there are people I want to pull into my life as friends and they quickly take root in my heart. Leaving her parent's place, that familiar knot caught in my throat and I had to pull myself back from the sadness of leaving all this. Hugs goodnight, and goodbye, since we were planning on leaving early in the morning, and the day was over.
This morning, we set about to finish the remaining odds and ends that needed to be taken care of before we vacated our apartment. Cleaning the refrigerator, stowing the last items in the truck, finding more that had been forgotten about, etc. took much longer than expected, of course. Thus, our early morning departure turned into an early afternoon one.
Since we didn't want to deal with the car trailer until the last minute, we picked it up on the way out of town-I drove the truck and Cameron drove the car, we had left his motorcycle at the rental store earlier. With the car loaded on the trailer, we started our new journey.
Our rocky start got a little rockier about 2 hours down the road. With Cameron following behind me, to make sure I had the trailer and truck under control, I looked in my rear-view mirror and saw him briefly waver on the freeway. Shortly after I looked again and he had pulled off to the side of the road, though was still moving. I continued a little further to a wider part of the shoulder and stopped, concerned about what was happening.
Well, his throttle cable had broken, causing him to lose any ability to accelerate. Luckily, we were only about a quarter of a mile from Gallup, NM, so I called the auto club for a tow truck (I'm so glad I opted for the motorcycle coverage) to take the bike to a nearby hotel parking lot so we could figure out what to do next.
That brings me to now. It's late and Cameron's asleep, but I needed to get this, "down on paper" so to speak, before there are any more additions to this adventure. The plan, so far, is to contact a BMW dealer in the morning to find out about getting a new cable. We'll probably leave the bike at the towing company's yard (they offered to store it for a minimal fee), go on to Phoenix to unload, then return for the bike once the part arrives. We're still 6 hours from our destination so that will entail at least an overnight trip to accomplish.
I will write more as things evolve.
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