The Racetrack

In a Christmas letter we received last year, one of my old friends mentioned that something she'd done that year had been a "bucket list" item for her. And I thought, bucket list? When I was younger I had a long mental list of big things I wanted to do, and I did a lot of them, too. But right now I'm mainly living day to day. Oh sure, I've got some vague plans and dreams. For instance, when the boys are a little older (i.e., old enough to know what a state is), I'd like us to visit a few different states each summer, so they gradually get to know the country. Also, I'd like to have a novel or other book published someday, but even that is all wrapped up in just wanting to do lots of writing, make it better and better -- if I do publish something someday, I won't consider that item checked off, but rather only just begun.

But once in a while I remember that there are a few very specific things I really want to do.

We've been wanting to go to Death Valley for several weeks now, but it keeps getting put off. Finally we decided that yesterday was do or die, because very soon it's going to be too hot for us to go there again until next November. "Is there any place special you want to go?" Rocket Boy asked me, because Death Valley is a Really Big Place and you kind of have to decide what you want to do there.

"I want to go to the Racetrack," I said. Ding! Bucket list item.

The Racetrack is a dry lakebed in the northern section of Death Valley, and it's home to an interesting phenomenon -- rocks that move around the lakebed seemingly by themselves. When you read articles about Death Valley, the Racetrack is always mentioned, and it sounds so intriguing. I've always wanted to go. But what we learned when we moved here and started visiting Death Valley is that it's almost impossible to get to the Racetrack and the rangers don't really want you to try. Each time we've asked a ranger at Stovepipe Wells or Furnace Creek about going to the Racetrack, they've always told us we have the wrong type of car, the wrong type of wheels, the road is in worse shape than usual, try again some other time....

This time we were going. We just absolutely were. Nothing was going to stop us. We packed a picnic lunch, lots of water, extra clothes for the twins, sunscreen, money, everything we could think of. We even left the house really early (for us) -- we were out the door by 9 am.

Of course then we had to stop for gas, and put some air in the tires, and get Starbursts for the road, and that took half an hour. Then we drove to Stovepipe Wells, which is 100 miles. There we stopped and talked to the ranger. "We were thinking about going to the Racetrack," I said casually.

"Oh, you don't want to go in that car," the ranger told me immediately.

"It has really heavy duty tires," I pointed out. We had brought Rocket Boy's Ford Escape, which has huge thick tires.

The ranger took the time to actually look out the window at the car. "It does have high clearance," he admitted. "But you know, punctures are really a problem out there. The rocks on that road are chert, which is volcanic and very sharp."

"I'll talk to my husband about it," I told him, and we were off to the Racetrack.

First we had to drive the road to Scotty's Castle, which takes forever (about 45 miles), except that you turn off just before it and go to Ubehebe Crater instead. We got to the crater parking lot around 12:30 and decided to have lunch. I hadn't seen Ubehebe Crater before either and it's really something. Here are Rocket Boy and Baby B looking down into it.

 

We hiked around there a bit and then ate our nice picnic lunch. No picnic tables, but there's a ledge to sit on, which was an acceptable substitute. You can see our new picnic "basket" in the picture -- Rocket Boy got it from Blue Cross as a thank-you for attending one of their lunchtime wellness talks at the base.

So now it was 1:30 pm, time to drive to the Racetrack, which is 27 miles from Ubehebe Crater. Since we knew it was a bad road, we figured it would take us about an hour. Ha ha ha.

First you drive 20 miles to Teakettle Junction,

then 7 more miles to the Racetrack.On the Worst Road Ever. It took us just under 2 hours, which meant that we arrived at 3:30 -- yes, that's right, six and a half hours after leaving home. We did not get a flat tire, but we worried about it a lot. Each time we stopped, we checked all the tires, and we agreed that if we got a flat, after changing the tire we would turn around and drive straight back, no matter how far we'd gotten. It's not like there's anyone around to help you out if you get stuck. But we didn't get a flat. And we made it to the Racetrack.

Was it worth it? Yes and no. It's quite a sight, though not exactly what I was expecting. I did find a rock with a visible trail behind it (showing that it had mysteriously moved).

 

But what we also found was evidence that people have been doing what all the literature says you must NEVER do -- drive on the playa. That seemed sad. Maybe that's why the rangers try to keep people from visiting it.

The boys had fun climbing on the weird mass of rocks in the middle of the Racetrack, called the Grandstand. And Baby A and I walked way way out in the middle of the Racetrack, looking for rocks. And now I can say I was there.

And I suspect I will never go again. Because then we had to drive back. We only spent about 45 minutes at the Racetrack, leaving a little after 4 pm. We drove the bad road a little faster going out, but it was still slow. We stopped at Stovepipe Wells for a quick dinner, and then drove on toward home -- with just one little detour to Panamint Springs to buy fabulously expensive gas (almost $5.50/gallon) when we realized we didn't have enough to get to Ridgecrest (there's no gas in Trona right now). Got back to the house around 10:15 pm, the latest we've gotten home in just ages. It was an insane trip. But hey, I finally saw the Racetrack!

April Update

Where has the month gone? I just checked this blog and realized I'd only posted once in April. It's not as though we didn't do anything this month... gosh, there was Easter, and the Wildflower Festival, and we went to Los Angeles... I don't know! I can't explain it. Guess I just haven't felt like writing. Well anyway, here's a quick recap of this month before we move on to the next one.

The day before Easter we took a trip to the Desert Tortoise Natural Area, and actually SAW TORTOISES! First time ever (at least without the ranger's help). It was very hard to remember that they are wild and not to be touched! Here's one:

It was so dry and desolate there, though. Just nothing is blooming this year, because we didn't have rain in December/January. We've had several small rains in the last month or two, but it's too late.

 I can't post any Easter photos because this year the boos did what they do quite often these days -- they took their diapers off when they got up (yes they still wear diapers at night) and ran around in their pajama tops and nothing else. I finally got them to put on underpants, but every picture of them with their goodies is pretty much not ready for primetime. So instead I will post a photo from the park in Lone Pine, where we went Easter afternoon:

That really is a cool park -- wish we had something like that here. Of course, part of its appeal is that Lone Pine is in fact cool -- completely different climate from Ridgecrest.

So the next weekend was the Wildflower Festival, which was a bit lackluster, seeing as how there were no flowers. I did sit at booths for both the tortoise club and my writers club, and on Sunday we went to Short Canyon, where we were told there were flowers. Gosh, not many. One or two of each variety, in many cases. But it was something. Here's a photo of a coreopsis (I think):

I don't have a single photo of the boos from that trip, because they were soooo naughty that I didn't feel like recording their behavior. But here's one from around the same time. They're sitting on the back of the loveseat in their room, so you can see the view out their window. My cute, though impossible, boys:

The next weekend we went to Los Angeles for a birthday party for two of their cousins (actually first cousins once removed, but who's counting). Lots of fun. Here's a photo of the party, showing the racetrack cake and the tower of cupcakes:

And that pretty much sums up the month. We've had some very hot weather, learned that the air conditioner in the new house does work, so that's good, though we wish the swamp cooler did too. Boos have been playing with their water table, as they always do when it's hot. And tomorrow, if all goes well, we are planning to visit Death Valley -- because once it gets hot here, it's impossible there, and we feel that we haven't been there enough this year. Supposed to be 88 here tomorrow, 98 in Death Valley. We'll see. I'll blog about it if we do go, I promise. And I'll try to do better about posting in May...

Pie Bear lost and found

Last Saturday morning (NOT April Fool's Day, I should note, but the day before), the twins woke us up at some ungodly hour (OK, it might have been 7:30), and eventually we got up and everyone got dressed and had breakfast, and around about 8:30 am Rocket Boy said, "where's Pie?"

Pie Bear, you'll remember, is our big fat black cat, currently our only companion animal. He normally spends the last part of the night on our bed and wakes us up before the twins do, wanting his breakfast (so as to get even fatter). But that morning there was no sign of him.

Immediately RB and I were panic stricken. Pie Bear has a cat door to the garage and a hole in the garage wall leading to the front yard. He wanders in and out during the night, interacting with other cats and who knows what else. Anything could have happened to him. A car could have run him over. A coyote could have eaten him (though it would have to be a pretty ambitious coyote).

We looked under the bed and in the closet and on all the various chairs and sofas where he likes to sleep. No Pie Bear.

I put on my shoes and went out to see if his enormous black body was lying dead in the street. The twins went with me as we walked up and down the street. No Pie Bear, though we did find a garage sale.

When we got home again, Rocket Boy was in the backyard, where there is a locked gate leading to a sort of alley. He had taken the gate's hinges off and was exploring the alley. But no Pie Bear.

Rocket Boy was ready to take action. "I'm going to talk to the neighbors," he said.

"Wait," I said. "Let me make a flyer."

"OK, you do that, and I'll call the animal shelter." I hastily put together a Lost Cat flyer, while Rocket Boy phoned. However, it was only a little after 9 am and the shelter didn't open until 10. So, taking some flyers, he went out to tape them to things and talk to people.

"Be sure to ask the people having the garage sale," I told him.

"Why didn't you ask them?"

"I was shy."

Shaking his head, he grabbed his wallet and went out.

A while later he came back to drop off the items he'd purchased at the garage sale, to get more flyers, and to report on his progress. He'd met several neighbors to the east of us and given them copies of the flyer. No one had seen Pie Bear recently, in fact no one had EVER seen Pie Bear, but they promised to watch for him.

"Why don't you call the shelter again," I suggested. It was just after 10 am. So he called them and explained our plight. "Yes, a male cat, black with just one tiny white spot under his chin, about 20 pounds." The person at the shelter said they'd keep an eye out for him.

Rocket Boy went out to post more flyers and meet the neighbors to the west of us.

Finally he returned, having met and told at least eight of our neighbors. "I don't know what else I can do," he said in despair. "We shouldn't have moved to Ridgecrest. First Whiskers dies and now Pie. It's just not worth it!"

Just then, Pie Bear emerged from the guest room, yawning and stretching.

Screams, swearing. With great effort I picked Pie up and hugged him.

I took down the flyers and called the shelter, but I made Rocket Boy tell all the neighbors. At least now everyone knows us, though their opinion of us may not be very high.

On Monday, as it happened, Pie Bear had his yearly vet appointment. He now weighs 22 pounds.

My Painting House

When I was hoping to have children, one thing I looked forward to was imaginary friends. I can't remember ever having an imaginary friend of my own, but I thought it would be fun to observe my children having them. Sadly, Baby A and Baby B have shown no sign of having any make-believe buddies. However, they do have imaginary houses. These houses are known as painting houses.

When Baby B first started talking about his painting house, I thought he meant a house he had painted. And actually I think in the beginning maybe he did. Maybe he'd drawn a picture of a house at daycare, or on his Doodler (sort of like an etch-a-sketch) at home. I think it's significant that he started talking about this imaginary house around the time we were moving from one house to another. Baby A listened jealously and then declared that he too had a painting house. It's been a couple of months now, and the tales of the painting houses continue.

The painting houses are like our house, only better. "I have a toddler bed at my painting house," Baby B will tell me. "But it's blue."

"I have a GREEN toddler bed at my painting house," Baby A will say, not to be left out.

The painting houses also contain all the videos that the boos would like to own. "I have a video about Dora at my painting house," Baby B told me the other day.

"Oh, do you?" I said. I try not to argue with them about their painting houses, or ask too many questions, but it's hard. Once when Baby B was talking about sleeping over at his painting house, I asked whether he would sleep there all alone.

"No," he said calmly. "With my grandmother."

This seemed very sweet and sad, since boos do not have any grandmothers.

"I stay with my grandmother too," said Baby A.

"There's one for each of you," I agreed. One ghost grandmother apiece.

Sometimes I say I have a painting house too, but the boos think that's pretty ridiculous. It sounds nice to have a painting house, with everything you ever wanted inside. "At my painting house I have a cook and a housekeeper and eleven desert tortoises," I say.

"Huh," says Baby A, unimpressed.

Sometimes boos seem to get mixed up and think the painting houses are real. This week they were asking me to take them to their painting houses. "I don't know where they are," I said.

"Yes, you do," said Baby B, annoyed. Apparently I am in charge of everything, including their imaginations. Later, he mentioned that he lives at his painting house with his mom and dad.

"Oh," I said, "you mean your other mom and dad?"

"No," he said, as if I were an imbecile. "I only have ONE mom and dad."

"But I don't live at your painting house," I said. "I live here, at my house. It must be some other mom and dad at your painting house."

A look of terror and confusion crossed his face. Immediately I wished I hadn't introduced reality into the discussion. I'm being a bad mom, one who doesn't support her children's fantasy worlds. "Don't worry about it," I said. "I'm wherever you want me to be."

The conversation moved on to other topics, such as who got to hold whatever toy both of them wanted to hold at the exact same moment.

The next day we were making muffins. "I have a video about muffins at my painting house," said Baby B.

"That's nice," I said, and meant it.

Who do you love?

Having my sisters visit -- and then leave -- has reminded me once again of the puzzling contradiction that has been in my life since 1988, when I left northern California to go to graduate school in Michigan. I don't live close to the people I love the most.

OK, you're right, I live with my husband and children, and I love all three of them very much. But they aren't the only people I love. My former top favorite person in the entire world was my mother. She's gone now, but my two sisters are awfully high on the list. I dote on my little boys, but they're so difficult, so much work. Rocket Boy and I get along OK, but not as well as we did pre-twins. And after all, I've only known him for 12 years. Compare that to 51 years for one sister and 49 for the other.

Yet, since I don't live in the Bay Area, where my sisters live, I don't see either of them very often or for very long. When I was younger, I would stay with my mother for weeks at a time. Can't do that anymore, now that I'm a family of four. Most of the time I have to rent hotel rooms. I have to keep my husband and children entertained. I have to pay for a pet-sitter for Pie Bear.

The first summer we were in Ridgecrest, I did take the twins to the Bay Area for a month -- rented a condo and saw one or both of my sisters every day. But that was very expensive and rather a drain on everyone involved. The twins are no longer adorable babies, they're rowdy little boys, and I wouldn't inflict them on anyone for a month, even if I could afford to.

Fortunately there's email, and the phone.

When my sisters come to visit, or I visit them, I'm shocked by how little time we get to spend together. The twins demand so much of everyone's attention. When my sisters and I took the twins to the park on Saturday, Nancy and I couldn't even talk for five minutes without Baby A biting Baby B and causing a total meltdown.

How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives (Annie Dillard).

The people I spend my days with now are Rocket Boy and the twins -- especially the twins. I love you, I say to them, as we read stories or dig in the dirt. I know that for now, I'm probably the most important person in their lives.

Defining the middle of nowhere, or train cakes are HARD

The birthday weekend is drawing to a close -- the twins are now officially four years old -- and I am a wreck. Too much sugar, too much food in general, too much fretting, too much fun. We did have fun. Aunt Baba (Barbara) and Aunt Nonnie (Nancy) drove down from the Bay Area, arriving on Friday afternoon just in time to walk to daycare with me to pick up the twins. Boos were so amazed and delighted to see their aunts that they just lost it: covered their faces with their jackets, ran around in circles, refused to leave their daycare room and come home with us. They really love their aunts.

We went to John's Pizza for their birthday dinner, and for a change we ordered off the menu, just getting the buffet for the boos, who never eat anything anyway. The buffet is so awful, it was very special not to have to eat it, even though the wrap that I had instead was just average. We spent most of our time in the games room, spending $5 worth of tokens on skee-ball and the candy claw and the airplane you can ride on (if you're 4).

After the boos went to bed, we started putting together the train cake. That morning, the boos and I had baked two cake mixes (one chocolate, one lemon), in 6 loaf pans (two large, four small), and in the afternoon I had made a batch of buttercream frosting. Now came the moment (or rather the hours) of truth: assembly. I had some instructions and photos that I'd downloaded from the internet, and I'd even watched a Betty Crocker video. Unfortunately, I liked bits of one internet cake and bits of another and bits of still another, and I hadn't thought clearly about exactly how it would all work. Nor had I thought clearly about where I was going to PUT two train cakes. Nor had I made enough frosting. I had enough cake for each train to have several cars, but there really wasn't enough room on my largest cookie sheet for each train to have even two cars and a coal tender (though we squished them all on).

Fortunately, I had two willing helpers (my sisters). And I did not panic. I kept thinking: my only audience is two four-year-olds. They will not notice that the frosting has big gaps on it. They will not care that the engines are falling over. They will not care that it looks absolutely awful. And I was right, they didn't. Next morning, when they discovered the train cakes in the fridge, they were in awe.

When the aunts arrived on Saturday morning, we opened presents and then played with them. Nancy's stomp rocket launchers were great fun, and soon there were rockets in both front yard trees, as well as on the roof. Later we took a walk to the park, came home for lunch (mostly leftovers), and then it was time to go to Trona. What's a birthday weekend without a trip to Trona?

The trip to Trona was designed to accomplish two objectives: a nap for the twins and a viewing of the Trona Pinnacles for Nancy and Barbara. Baby A did take a nap (Baby B no), and we did see the Pinnacles. This was my third trip to the Pinnacles, and I guess I've gotten a bit blase about the bad road you have to drive on to get there, not to mention the otherworldliness of the whole scene.

Barbara and Nancy were horrified by the road, and I think mildly blown away by the whole experience. At one point, Barbara made some comment about this being the middle of nowhere. I said, "Oh come on, you can see Trona from here. It's not the middle of nowhere if you can see a town!" To which Barbara replied, "Trona is not a town." So then I came up with various reasons why Trona is too a town. But I can see how it's a debatable point. So OK, Baba, you're probably right: you were in the middle of nowhere.

Friday and Saturday were so busy, we just didn't have time to do the pinatas, so on Sunday morning, just before the aunts left, we finally did some whacking.

And now I must pack up ALL the leftover goodies -- and there are many many many of them -- and put them in Rocket Boy's car for him to take to work tomorrow morning. The twins don't even know most of them exist, so they won't miss them. Tomorrow we'll play with the stomp rocket launcher, make a puzzle, read a book, and have a nice morning together. In the afternoon I'll get a little peace and quiet. And on we go, into the beginning of their fifth year of life.

Living here now

Ridgecrest has been very Ridgecrestian the last few weeks -- in both good and bad ways.

The good: the night sky has been fabulous! Do you know that this month you can see, all at the same time, Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter? I've done it a few times now, just standing on the sidewalk out in front of our house. Supposedly you can also see Saturn, but not until later at night, and so far I haven't remembered to do that, plus by then Mercury wouldn't be visible.

The sky isn't as wonderful at our new house -- now, why is that? It's a narrower street, houses closer together. The night sky is still piercingly black with piercingly white stars, but you can't see as much of it, which makes me sad. Still, all those planets can be seen. Mercury to the west, Mars to the east, Venus and Jupiter above Mercury and somewhat to the south. Just fabulous.

The bad: The city is in terrible financial shape right now, something to do with the loss of RDA money (and don't ask me what that is, I don't understand it). Some residents took out an ad in the paper encouraging people to give money to the city, so it can continue to operate.

I thought maybe I wouldn't do that. It's not that I don't want the city to operate, it's that I completely, 100 percent, do not trust the city to spend my money wisely. And I'm not the sort of person who doesn't trust the government. I trust the federal and state governments to at least try to do the right thing. I trust the city of Boulder. I don't trust the city of Ridgecrest.

There have been the usual issues with local businesses. A while back we were in Denny's and I ordered a dish that had red-skinned potatoes in it. Waitress came back and told me they were out of red-skinned potatoes, so could I order something else? Can you imagine a Denny's running out of potatoes? It was odd. Then a couple of weeks ago I went to a local shop to have three posters laminated. Went to pick them up a few hours later and was given a rolled up cylinder with a rubber band around it. Should have opened it there to look at it, but didn't. Got it home to find that the laminated posters were all on one roll. What did they think, that I was going to put them on one really long wall? Rocket Boy had to take them to work to cut them apart with a paper cutter (scissors too messy).

Our landlord's handyman has been doing some little fixes on the house -- he's very good, but when he says he'll come right back, he never does, and we can usually only get him back by calling him 3 or 4 times. He was here today (after 2 weeks of calling him to remind him to come back) and fixed something. While he was here, he mentioned that he's trying to hire someone to help him with little fix-it stuff like this, but he's having trouble because most people in Ridgecrest who are interested in doing that sort of work have lost their drivers licenses for one reason or another.

Can you imagine living in Ridgecrest and not having a drivers license? You'd be stuck here forever. The mind boggles.

I've been freecycling again, and that's always irritating, but nothing new there. I've started asking my more reliable donatees if they want things, rather than post them on the boards and end up with some weirdo who says he's "coming right over" and then never shows up. Grrr. Anyway, I got rid of a ton of clothes that the kids have outgrown, two huge bags worth, and my old boppy pillow, so now we have room in their closet for new toys...

Then there's the wind, which I guess everyone in the west and southwest is getting right now. Out here, wind means DUST blowing up everywhere. This morning, the kids and I were watching from the front door for a freecycler to arrive. Then I saw the wind pick up a wave of dust from our "yard" and blow it in our direction, and I closed the door quickly.

The ugly: Two nights ago we were burglarized -- that is, our cars were. We don't usually lock our cars when we leave them on the driveway or in front of the house. At our old house there really wasn't any need. It turns out that at the new house, there is a need. We're just down the road from a mobile home park, and I suppose that's the problem. Anyway, they got into both my car and Rocket Boy's, left the doors open (fortunately didn't drain the batteries), and opened all the compartments in the front seat, tossing stuff around. I can't see that they took anything from my car (nothing to take!), but Rocket Boy lost some CDs and more importantly the garage door opener. We have another one, so he had to reprogram the garage door and the other opener (and my car, which has a built-in opener) so that the burglar couldn't come back and break into the house via the garage door. Very annoying. And now we have to lock our car doors, in fact I should go do that now. I suppose next they'll break the car windows (to steal the rest of Rocket Boy's CDs, plus the other garage door opener). Might as well be in Los Angeles.

We will be moving in forever

I remember when I used to live in apartments and co-ops, and moving took a weekend or so. Now that I live in houses it just goes on forever. We have TOO MUCH STUFF. No matter how much I give away on Freecycle, there is always more and more and more. And it all needs to be unpacked and arranged. Or hung. Tonight Rocket Boy hung six more pictures. I realize that we don't really need to hang all our pictures, but then what is the point of having pictures? We have hung 21 so far, not counting calendars and things I just taped to the wall, like the tortoise poster (see below).

In this photo, Rocket Boy is preparing to hang up a new light we bought at IKEA last weekend. It's designed to go over a changing table, but I thought it would work well over a puzzle/game table too. It seems to do the trick. (That's a screw sticking out of Baby A's mouth, by the way. Sigh.)

Of course that's the other trouble with moving in -- your stuff never seems to work exactly right in the new house and you have to buy new stuff to add to your stuff to make it work. Like that light.

Also, life moves on and people change. Little people, in particular, grow up and need new toddler beds. I decided it was FINALLY time to ditch the cribs, so we bought nice new toddler beds at IKEA too. Here's Daddy taking apart one of the cribs.

And here we are in our new beds.

The cribs and their mattresses are gone already -- I freecycled them on Tuesday. A young woman drove up with an old truck and took them away. She said she had foster kids. Sometimes I think half the kids in Ridgecrest are in foster care. I told Baby A that the cribs had gone to new babies who didn't have any mommies and daddies. That concept was alarming to him, and I probably shouldn't have mentioned it. But I wanted him to know that the cribs would be appreciated by their new owners.

We had the piano tuned this morning, I emptied a complicated box this afternoon (full of odd bits of paper, each one requiring a lot of thought as to whether it should be kept, and if so, where), and tonight, in addition to the six pictures, Rocket Boy rigged up a place in the garage for the exercise ball. Bit by bit it's all getting done.

More on moving

Little by little we are finding our way with this new house. A week and a half ago, we (i.e., Rocket Boy) got the TV working (we get our TV over the air -- you get quite good reception in Ridgecrest, though of course it's from a repeater, not direct). Here he is up on the roof. The roof of our new rental house, like many houses these days, was covered with satellite dishes and antennas when we moved in. We added our antenna to the mix, but actually ended up hooking up our TV to the one that was already there.

In the photo, Baby A is exploring the tortoise pens that we are starting to set up. I don't know if we're really going to have any tortoises at this house -- it depends on various things. I just think a bare Ridgecrestian backyard is so much nicer with tortoise pens in it.

Last weekend we took a break from unpacking and drove to Short Canyon, which is quite near here. Here's a photo from the parking lot looking back towards Ridgecrest:

Short Canyon is supposed to have fabulous wildflower displays in the spring. I don't know how we've managed not to go here before. We'll definitely go back in a month or two. There were even some wildflowers blooming already and I don't even know what they were. The twins thought it was a great place to run and play. Here are my big boys climbing on a rock:

I made Rocket Boy get them down from all the scary places they climbed. I'm afraid we're raising budding rock climbers. Well, maybe not. As a child, I was very fond of climbing both rocks and trees, and look at me now. But still.

I have this feeling we aren't going to be here much longer -- no more than a year or so, anyway -- and so the whole place is seeming very dear and soon to be lost.

Welcome once again to Ridgecrest

I don't know why it's taken me so long to start blogging again, but Valentine's Day night seemed like a good time to do it. We moved to Ridgecrest originally just a couple of days before Valentine's Day, three years ago.

That V-Day ranks as one of the worst Valentine's Days of my life, easily the worst since I've been married. Rocket Boy went out to get a pizza and came back nearly 2 hours later with a bizarre excuse (he'd wanted the pizza place to make a heart on the pizza out of a red bell pepper but they didn't have a red bell pepper, so he went to a grocery store and bought one and took it back to them.....). Meanwhile I was sure he was dead and when the doorbell rang (he'd forgotten his new key), I was sure it was the police coming to tell me that. I don't know where the twins were when all this was happening. Maybe I put them to bed. They were only 11 months old at the time. I don't know. I've forgotten. Wish I'd forget the whole episode!

Anyway, today was a better V-day, with cards and candy and homemade sugar cookies and a homemade dinner (baked apple french toast, which the twins wouldn't touch). But we've been living here a while now.

The movers showed up at our old house almost 3 weeks ago and moved all our furniture and whatever boxes I'd been able to pack. Then we spent almost another full week moving everything ELSE over to the new house by ourselves. It was nightmarish. But here's our old house, empty:

Of course, no Property Preservation Person has come to do anything about the house. I've emailed the lawyer who made us get out of it -- twice I've emailed her -- and she simply doesn't respond. We still have the keys and the garage door opener -- though it doesn't work because the electricity has been turned off -- and we've gone by the house a few more times to check on it. No break-ins or anything. It's just sitting there, ignored.

Anyway, so we're in our new house. Here's the dining area/living room, with a corner of the office showing:

Here's the guest room, all ready for visitors:

And here's the office:

The room we call the office is probably supposed to be the living room, and the room we call the living room is probably supposed to be a little family room, but that's OK. We need a big office, to accommodate all our desks and bookcases and file cabinets. And the piano. And the twins' table where they do puzzles. The living room can be smaller and cozier. We won't be able to have any big parties, but we weren't planning on doing that anyway.

These photos were taken about a week ago and it doesn't really look much better now. We've unpacked some of these boxes, but others have moved from the garage into the house. Certain items are refusing to show up: the board with coathooks on it that goes on an entryway wall, the eggbecker thingies (that you serve soft-boiled eggs in), Baby B's "Elmo in Grouchland" DVD. Other things show up that I can't understand why we brought with us: empty boxes, old magazines, broken bits of things.

And we all keep getting sick. Right now I'm either getting a cold or another bout of strep throat, not sure yet. My body is screaming at me: "Take a rest! Eat only fruits and vegetables! Get more sleep!" and maybe I need to pay more attention to it. So I'll sign off here and get ready for bed. More in a day or two.

Packing and packing and packing

Thought I'd check in to let everyone know we're still alive, packing, packing, packing. We have SO much stuff. So far we have packed about 70 boxes, and in most rooms it looks like we haven't even started yet. Very disheartening. It's now Tuesday night and the movers are coming at 8 am Thursday morning, so tomorrow is IT. I must frantically pack all afternoon. Can't pack in the morning because I have little helpers...

Boos are excited about the new house and want to visit it every day. Yesterday, most unusually, it rained, and in the morning the boos and I went over to the new house to deliver a few things. We sat at a card table in the kitchen eating muffins and watching the rain, and I taught them "It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring..." They were entranced and wanted to hear it over and over. (The other thing they want me to sing these days is "I'm gonna wash that man right out of my hair." I'm not sure why.)

One nice thing about the new house is that it's walking distance from a park. This weekend the boos actually rode to the park on their tricycles. I was a basket case by the time we got back, but they had fun.

Rocket Boy has been madly working on the garage (both our current one and the new one).

Here's the new garage with one wall of shelves about half done:

He's now finished that wall and also put up shelves on the wall across from it. Unfortunately all the shelves are full already. But our current garage is mostly empty, so that's good.

The new house really has a lot less space than this one, and more importantly, far fewer cupboards and cabinets. Our Boulder house has less square footage but it has cupboards and shelves tucked into every available nook. No one has thought to do that in our new Ridgecrest house. I keep telling Rocket Boy "we have to thin" and he keeps telling me "we don't have time" and we're both right.

Today I brought my clothes over to the new house (from my closet) and discovered that I have too many clothes for the new closet. So I did a massive "thinning" and came up with a huge pile to donate. Of course I didn't have time to go donate the huge pile, so now I'm driving around with it. I put the huge pile in the back of the Subaru and covered it with a blanket. I'm hoping it will just vanish. Along with about a third of our other stuff.

This too will pass, but not soon enough for me.

Dismantling

So we have a new house, papers are signed, money has changed hands, and we have a key and a garage door opener. Here's the house we chose:

Nothing too special, and a distinct lack of lawn, but it's pleasant inside and we think we'll be comfortable there. It's smaller than our current house -- smaller lot, smaller driveway, smaller square footage -- but I think we can learn to live in a small house again.

We now have two weeks to organize the move, so I've started packing books. Fortunately we saved all the boxes from our move 3 years ago. Spiders are living among them, so one can't just go out to the garage and grab a box -- one must gingerly grab a corner of a box and take it to the front yard to inspect it, then de-dust it, rubbing it on what's left of our front lawn, and only then bring it inside to be used.

Today I decided that it was time to dismantle the tortoise pens. Our landlord gave us the OK to set up new tortoise pens in our new backyard, which means we have to bring along all our cinder blocks. So I laboriously picked up each extremely heavy cinder block, knocked all the dirt and leaves and dead spiders out of it, and stacked it with the others next to the gate. Here I'm about one third done, with one pen mostly dismantled:

Here are some of the little critters that were living in one of the uncovered cinder blocks:

So THAT'S where cockroaches spend the winter!

And this is hard to see, but if you look at the inside corner in the foreground of this brick, you might be able to see a black shape with lots of legs and a little red hourglass? And it was very much alive. I decided to leave this one alone for now.

And here are two boos, helping me stack bricks.

Ha ha, helping, yeah right. See those two colored disks that Baby B is holding over his eyes? Those are toy "coins" that are supposed to go in his toy cash register. Instead, he dropped them into the stack of bricks, which meant that Mommy had to go get the picker-upper-thingie and manipulate it way down into the dark and grab the little toy coins and then DROP them just as I got them almost out of the cinder blocks...

Their little toy cash register was not my friend today -- earlier, when I was getting ready to go outside, the boos brought it to me and complained that it wasn't working. I inspected it and discovered that the slots where the toy coins are supposed to go were filled with all sorts of other stuff. Cursing, I tried tweezers, pliers, a letter opener, and finally a screwdriver, which I used to take the cash register apart and out popped all the stuff that they'd jammed it with: toy cars, pieces of a plastic toy fence, a marble... Grrrrr. Here they are, the little angels, having snack and making a puzzle, while the toy cash register watches over them serenely:

When we moved out here 3 years ago, boos were 11 months old and we couldn't do any of the packing ourselves -- just impossible. Now boos are 3 years and 10 months old and maybe packing is a little easier. Maybe.

House hunting

I'm not keeping up with any of my resolutions, minimalist though they were, but I'm going to cut myself some slack on that. In fact, I think that's going to be my #2 resolution for the month (#1 being a successful move): CUT SELF SOME SLACK. This is all just too stressful for me to also be critical of myself while it's happening.

So anyway, the last few days we've been looking at a lot of houses: eleven, to be exact. I think that makes a total of 17. Or something like that. They all blur together. If I didn't bring the camera along, I wouldn't remember anything about them at all. Actually, I'd remember lots of details, but I wouldn't remember which details belonged to which house. An hour after our jaunt this morning, when we looked at four houses, Rocket Boy was already getting them mixed up: "Wasn't the garage with all the shelves on Sherwood?" (It was on Rawhide.)

Certain aspects of Ridgecrest houses are a lot like houses anywhere in California. Other aspects are different. For instance, here is a fairly typical Ridgecrest backyard:

Isn't that lovely? Doesn't it make you want to move right in? I should note that inside this was a nice house. And it's in a very nice neighborhood.

Here's a backyard we saw yesterday evening, with Baby A running happily across it. It was associated with a very nice house, and a big back patio as you can see. Covered patios are popular in Ridgecrest. You can sit out there in the evenings and admire your dirt.

Another house we saw yesterday actually had a patch of astroturf in the front yard. We were not sure why.

Here's a yard we saw a few weeks ago, especially nice because it has that tree:

But we were iffy about the house, and while we dithered, someone else snapped it up.

The house I think we're going to apply for has absolutely nothing in the backyard, not even a weed. Just dirt. During windstorms, we'll really have to keep our windows shut tight.

It's so hard to keep plants and trees alive out here, and requires so much water, that a lot of people just don't try. Like they say, "Not xeriscaping, ZEROscaping."

We've always thought the backyard of our current house was odd, but man, it is a PARADISE compared to what we've been seeing. We're going to miss it.

Onward into January

Well, Ridgecrest is waking up after its long holiday sleep. I think a lot of people must leave town for the holidays -- if not for Christmas, then for the week after. But school started up again today and most of the boos' little friends seemed to be back at daycare.

The weather is very pleasant, not at all like winter. Highs in the 60s every day. On Sunday we drove out past Trona to Homewood Canyon and wandered through the old buildings associated with the old Ruth Mine, which was interesting. Perfectly beautiful day for it, even though my tummy was still unsettled.

January. Never my favorite month, even in years when I'm not being evicted. Four years ago in January my mother died. But even before that it wasn't my favorite month. It's always so hard to make the transition from colored lights and cookies to the cold clear light of a new year and all those resolutions.

I haven't made mine yet. I did write my list of accomplishments for 2011 and that's always cheering. Biggest success: potty trained the twins! Yeah baby! All else pales by comparison.

Number one on this year's resolution list will of course be a successful move, but once we're done with that I will need other goals. How many books do I want to read this year, what do I want to write, what else do I want to do with myself? Must give it some thought. Maybe I won't finalize the list until after we move.

For the month of January, my goals are to freecycle something every day, pack at least 2 boxes every day, finally get the holiday cards written and sent, and not let myself get too stressed out.

It's very cheering to spend time writing cards, fun to spend a few minutes thinking about each old friend.

Freecycling, on the other hand, is terribly irritating. Yesterday I successfully freecycled our original double stroller -- just about broke my heart to give it up, so many sweet memories of using it, but we don't use it anymore, so might as well pass it on to someone who will. Today, however, I spent several hours attempting to freecycle a dozen old baby sleepers, and I've still got someone coming tomorrow for some of them. It should make me feel good to (a) get rid of things we don't need, and (b) give them to people who do need them, but it's mostly just irritating.

And I didn't manage to pack any boxes today. Tomorrow for sure.