Thanksgiving Week Part Two

This first picture is from Pam's Sorority House.  Yes, I visited a sorority house, it was nice to see the Greek ladies that were so important to my Pam.

Anyway, getting back to the story at hand.  We finally got to slowly make our way to Logan, we avoided Sardine Canyon all together and went via Tremonton.  We didn't have a lot of time when we came back, we were told not to see Grandma but to go straight home since we were on a strict time table.  We got back to the home in Smithfield where we had a total of fifteen minutes to eat lunch at which point Pam went with the girls to go wedding dress shopping and I went to babysit my nieces and nephews that I hadn't seen in a long time.

We both had a lot of fun.  The girls loved Pam and said it wasn't awkward or strange at all, like she had always been there.  Being at the Larsen house was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed it.

That night after the dress selection and children watching was over the missionaries came over to give the final lesson to my Pam so that she could be baptized.

Baptizing Pam in Smithfield instead of Pinon was extremely difficult.  It was a battle all the way.  Dad had gotten permission from the mission president in Utah but hadn't gotten it from the Farmington New Mexico Mission President since the Mission President here said that he would take care of that.  He didn't.  So, Thanksgiving Day I get a call that says that the Mission President is not pleased with what is going on mainly because he doesn't know what is going on.

I spent my Thanksgiving calling New Mexico trying to get through and resolve the matter.  Finally Dad was able to call him and explain a few things and apologize that things had not gone better.

Friday we had the baptismal interview and I did a phone relay between my Branch President and Dad's Bishop trying to get the proper permission to baptize Pam.

Saturday Night the baptism was beautiful.  I confused 120 S for 120 N, so we went in a little late.  We got in and got dressed and as we sat and sang the first song I felt so electrified and excited.  It was How Great Thou Art.  I pondered upon the words, how it spoke of creation, atonement, and the 2nd Coming. The whole Plan of Happiness was laid out, and our part in it as eternal companions.  It would all start for us that day with that baptism.  It was a beautiful spirit that I felt.

Dad spoke and then I performed the baptism.  I was very happy but also so nervous.  I kept having to remind myself that I needed to do the prayer in English - not Spanish.  I was so nervous that I put my hand in the wrong place so that I would plug her nose instead of having her do it herself.  Sean of course thinks this is hilarious.

Pam, when she looked up and saw the young faces of my nieces and a nephew she felt that it was truly meant to be that it was right for her to be baptized in Smithfield.

Jeff Fowles gave a good little talk about the Holy Ghost, Sean says he's me in 30 years.  After that the missionaries did a lovely musical number at which time my niece Emma decided she didn't like a painting hanging where it was.  She knocked it down and shattered the glass.  Despite the serious nature of the song the poor elders had a hard time keeping straight faces.  The song suffered a little and then recovered it for a strong finish.

Some other things that happened...

Quality time with puppies

Pam enjoyed the mountain views

And we got some great pictures of the temple, one of which I almost fell face first to get.

Thanksgiving Week Part One

Well, no pictures, my camera which had some great shots got lost, of course it was my 700 dollar camera and not my lesser super old digital camera from when digital cameras were a new concept.  We have no idea what happened to it, but that's life sometimes, at least I got four years of use out of it.
Yeah that didn't make me feel any better.
Anywho, the journey from Pinon to Price was nice and pretty much uneventful.  We were a little worried about the cloud cover possibly giving us some snow but it stayed clear.  We stopped at a hotel which allowed pets.  I had Bo and Angel in my room.  Dogs are way too hyper after being in carriers all day to just lay down and go to sleep.  So I indulged in Adult Swim cartoons as the dogs ran around the room jumping from bed to bed and on me.
The dogs and I decided to go to sleep at about the same time.  Angel went to sleep by my feet and I don't remember what Bo did.  What I do remember is that Bo felt that I should wake up at 4 in the morning to pet him and feed him.  I disagreed.
We drove the rest of the way to Salt Lake City and handed the dogs off to Dad at the airport.  Meeting Dad there made Pam feel a lot better about meeting my family.
The first plane we took was going to Atlanta, it was a very nice flight because it had screens that showed us where the plane was in the sky on a map.  I emailed Dad while we were flying over Kansas.  Another thing that was nice was that Google provided us with free internet as a holiday gift to all Delta flyers.
Columbus was warm.  It was warmer in Columbus while we were there than it was in LA.  Apparently we made it there just in time because currently they are having weather which ranges between five and eight degrees.
The car that picked us up from the airport was a surprise, her father has unique taste in transportation which is partially due to color blindness.  When I saw the car there was no indication to me whatsoever that it would belong to Pam's father.  I thought it was a teenage car.  The rims were bright lime green.  On the hood there was a metallic bulldog, which was downright cool.  A lot more original than the normal stuff that gets put there anyway.
Columbus is a beautiful city full of trees that were still green while we were there.  We went and saw the Columbus Temple after the viewing.  The temple was very special.  Pam and I walked around it and decided together that we were going to be sealed together for time and all eternity.
An interesting place we visited was a field of cement corn.  The neighborhood where Pam grew up was once a giant corn field.  The six foot tall cement ears of corn, all of which were different, were there as a monument to the town's history.
Here's a contradiction for you.  We went to a Jewish Bagel shop where they make kosher bagels.  I had one with bacon on it.  How does that work?  It was a very tasty contradiction if I do so myself though.  Breakfast sandwiches, should be their own food group.
I attended my first ever Catholic mass.  It was a very intriguing experience.  Pam was bored out of her mind, but I was fascinated, if only I could have been allowed to get up a few more times I could have been better to stay awake better.  I watched carefully at the progression of the ritual and could see why some people didn't care for it and others could be devoted to it.  I was a scholar watching another culture express itself.  I left feeling glad to be LDS.
Pam's family was very kind to us.  I met the Millers as well as her Mom's family.
On Tuesday we left Ohio for Utah.  Our plane landed ten minutes before a mammoth blizzard struck Salt Lake City and we were forbidden by Dad to travel.  Which was a good thing since we could barely even drive to our hotel which was only five or so blocks from the airport.
We struggled into the hotel in the blasting snow and were able to find a pizza delivery man brave enough to travel to us.

Preparing for Thanksgiving - The Week of the Inlaws

This week was uncommonly hard for me.  Saturday I woke up and declared I would not go to the all day meeting on my day off because I didn't feel like it.  I REALLY didn't feel like it because a few hours later I lost dinner from the night before.
Pam and I both missed that meeting since she had to leave it early.
I continued to not feel well into the night, the dogs of course wouldn't let me sleep since they had locked themselves in the laundry room, which was flooding of course, and wanted out.  I didn't want to get out of bed since I felt very sick and didn't want to leave the warmth of the many blankets I had wrapped around myself.
Finally I had it, I got up and stormed into the laundry room only to step into ICE water.  It was ice water because it was that cold in my laundry room.  I looked at the dogs and said the first thing that came to mind, "What did you do?"  And promptly kicked them out of the house, where it was still very cold, but at least it was dry.
The next morning, still feeling sick I discovered the ice lake had expanded quite a bit during the night.  I went into the laundry room and found the problem, a slight leak by the hose connection.  I turned off my hoses and fed the animals.  The Fowles and Pam stopped by to check on me and loaned me a mop.  Moving made me want to vomit more and gave me headaches so I spent the day, when I wasn't mopping up, blogging about happier things.
Lesson plans had to be turned in and I still hadn't done them.  Monday I made a sub plan and that night I wrote a plan for Tuesday and Friday before I couldn't do anything else.  My sub plan for Monday was a disaster so I went into work Tuesday, still almost completely unable to move without having the urge to show everyone what I'd been eating lately.
Wednesday I thankfully started feeling better but of course a cold was trying to attack my weakened immune system.
Pam left with the student council that day to go to Phoenix on Tuesday.  She would be gone for two days.  While she was gone she got the news that her grandfather had passed away.  She called me at about 3 am Thursday morning and I wasn't very talkative.
  Now I tried to figure out sub plans for the next week since Pam and I had planned to take a week off when the worst happened.  Well, I got a call from the other Pam, Jeff Fowles watched my room as I went and talked with the other Pam for a while.
Jeff Fowles and I were talking about the Pams and we couldn't quite figure out which was which.  So we decided to stop calling them Pam, at least for that conversation, and start referring to them by their middle names, which worked out really well for us.
Pam finally came home, my Pam that is, and we started planning our trip to Ohio.  Lots of phone calls and lots of conversations later Dad helped us find some good tickets so that we could fly from Salt Lake to Ohio on Saturday, and then from Ohio to Salt Lake on Tuesday, spend Thanksgiving as originally planned in Utah, and then Pam and I got Monday and Tuesday off work so that we didn't have to come in till Wednesday - which means almost a full week with my family!
Friday was rough.  The students had no interest in being there and I just wanted the day to end so that I could get packed, get into an SUV with the one I love, and drive!
It was stressful but we did it - and left an hour before we planned.  We made great time and we were able to get to Price and get the puppies settled in for the night.  It was a stressful day but we did it and now we are on a plane heading toward my future inlaws home.  In less than a week we will both meet our future inlaws who are separated by about 1700 miles.
Crazy week, but at least its over.  I told Pam that after all this I thought that meeting the families would be the easy part.

Veteran's Day - A Snowstorm, a Funeral, and a Wedding

This Veteran's Day was a little more eventful than normal.  Usually I take time to remember the wars of the past during this holiday, something that comes more naturally to me being a history teacher.  This Veteran's Day was different however.  We, Pam and I, had been invited to the wedding of our Branch President's daughter, which he would perform.
On Wednesday I met a woman, who with President Huxhold, asked me to do a grave dedication an hour before the wedding since he would not be able to be in both places.  I agreed to dedicate the grave and direct a memorial service for the man whom I had never met and for the family that I would meet during the ceremony.
That night Pinon had its first real snow storm of the year, there's been some snow before this, but no actual storms.  Due to the fact that the roads aren't paved Pam and I would have to leave pretty early in order to get there on time, which of course we didn't do.
You know me, getting out of bed is an all morning event.
The drive was extremely beautiful, snow gives Pinon and the surrounding area an aura of beauty that it typically doesn't have.
Luckily we still beat the body to the burial site, by a lot of time.  I got out of the SUV and was very worried to see a horse trailer near the grave with a very beautiful animal in it.  I talked with the family about what would happen during the ceremony and what would happen to the unfortunate animal.
In Navajo tradition a horse needs to be shot at the funeral so that the dead person can have it to ride in the afterlife.  The family really wanted this to happen and there was no way for me to stop it.  One family member laughingly told me of a time ten years ago when they tried to shoot a horse for a funeral and it ran away and is still alive.  I looked into the frightened eyes of the animals and silently told it to run.
The ceremony was very beautiful, the son gave a eulogy for his 93 year old father.  Granddaughters sang Christian hymns in the Navajo language, I offered some comforting words about the resurrection and explained the dedicatory prayer before dedicating the place for the body.
Even though I had never met the man; even though I would have never been able to understand him since he only spoke Navajo, I could not help but feel a sense of loss at his death.  The weeping and the sadness that surrounded me was intense.
Pam and I were invited to eat with them, but I decided that I wanted to eat with happier people.  We journeyed back into Pinon and ate at the wedding reception.
The wedding had started almost an hour late, Rez time works differently than everywhere else time.  It was good to see many of the branch members and a lot of my students were at the wedding, which was kind of cool to see them outside of the academic setting.
After the wedding Pam and I decided to relax, we had a big day, by then the snow had completely melted away (otherwise I'd have pictures of the snow) and we could have the rest of the day to just have a day off; even if the day was more than half over.

To be Pointy, or Not to be Pointy? That is the Question.

As you may or may not know, Angel was born with floppy ears.  The picture below was when she was still tiny and I was trying to get a picture of her with Bo.



When dogs get excited or curious they tend to lift up their ears like in this picture.  Normal dog behavior, seen just about every dog do it at one time or another.

Then one night, Angel sat up and her ears perked up and she stared out into the nothing for a long time as if concentrating on some sound or smell that I couldn't distinguish.  I thought it was strange after awhile that it held her attention for so long, but then her ears NEVER went back down.  In the picture below she is playing with her toys and her new perky ears.

A couple of days later I was watching her and I saw her perked up ears go all the way up.  There was just a small flappy section on her right ear and that was it.  I couldn't believe it, I had watched a floppy eared dog become a pointy eared dog.

Well, another crazy thing happened, her ears started to go floppy again!  One ear at a time as you can see below.  Most of the time now she is half way between pointy and floppy.  When she is excited and fully awake her ears are all the way pointy.  The more sleepy she is the more floppy her ears are.  In a day she will go from almost all the way floppy to all the way pointy and then back to floppy again.  It's pretty crazy.

 Another funny thing about this dog is as she's gotten older she has also gotten more spots.  At birth she had two very large spots on her back, like wings.  I was playing with her the other day and realized that those two spots had become one.  How else is this crazy dog going to change?  Will she be pointy eared, floopy eared, or inbetween?  Only time can tell.

Homecoming Week 2010!

Homecoming Week was a blast, but unfortunately discipline at the school has been lacking ever since.  But to focus more on the positive it was fun to have different days in which you could dress up as different things especially with how strict our dress code is here.  White, black, and grey are the only colors the students are allowed to wear.  Homecoming Week gave them freedom that they normally don't have, and I decided to have some fun as well.
Mr. Fowles and I decided that for Twin Day we would go together, which meant I needed to grow my beard.  I only had a week, so its not at its height, but it was enough to pull it off.  The kids called us all sorts of things from pimp daddies, Michael Jacksons, to Gangsters.  Jeff (Mr. Fowles) decided we were Blues Brothers and had a pretty good impression to go with it so we went with that.

My future wife can't stand the next two pictures.  For Multicolor Day I decided to come up with an outrageous and ugly outfit that would definitely fit the definition of Multicolor and then some.  She was on a trip to Ohio, when she heard me describe the outfit I was planning on wearing she insisted that I take pictures so that she could see it in all its horrible glory.  Now she won't look at them.  It comforts me to know that I am not the only one confused by women.

In sports news not only did the PHS football team win Homecoming (Overwhelmingly I might add) but it also had more wins this season than it has ever had in its entire history.  I went to two football games myself, one loss and one win.  Both games were extremely close and very exciting to watch.  The game we lost was an all out Hail Mary play, something that someone would make a movie about, it was truly awe inspiring except that it happened to the wrong team.

In other exciting news the Cross Country Team did very well in State.  The boys came in 3rd and the girls came in 5th, if I remember right.

Sisters

This is Angel's Sister Clara, the one that Pam adopted.  These two pups are virtually inseparable, they love playing together and causing mischief.  They are also super cute when they cuddle in these puppy beds together, sorry only pictures of that are on my phone and I don't know how to put those pics on the computer.

I got two of these beds, one for Angel and one for Bo.  Angel however decided that both beds belonged to her and she would chase Bo away from them when he tried to lay down.  I put one of them into Bo's house and kept Angel away for a few nights.  Angel had to deal with the loss of a bed, she was not happy about it.  She loves Bo, she likes playing with him and he watches out for her.  The fact that she won't share with him

but will share some things with Clara is just one way that the puppies have shown that they really do have a strong bond with each other.

One thing I will say for them though, they are both jealous little doggies.  Angel attacks Clara if she thinks Clara is getting more attention, for being named Angel, that dog can be an all out devil.  Clara on the other hand when she gets jealous she won't take it out on Angel, she'll jump and bite the person giving the attention.  We're working on training her not to bite.

I would feel sorry for Clara, Angel can be quite the bully, but Clara has began to hold more and more of her own.  Plus when Angel had an injured paw and couldn't defend herself Clara decided to take revenge every opportunity that she could get.  Of course when the paw healed Angel made Clara regret that.  But one of the things I love about dogs is their ability to forgive, a day later they were playmates again.

These pictures were taken awhile back, the puppies are at least twice that size now.

Being the thin sister Clara has been able to fit into places that weren't wide enough for Angel, and being the long sister she can also get things that are higher up, just because it is safe from Angel, doesn't mean that a puppy still won't get it and then fight over it with Angel.  Many times Angel will not know that something was important to her until she sees Clara with it.  Then, all of a sudden, its Puppy War!

On occasion their brother, a puppy named Granger, after the Harry Potter character (yes a male is named after the main lady of the story) will drop by and demand to be let into the kennel to play with his sisters.  The three siblings have played with Bo in the back yard a few times now, usually for several hours before Granger decides he wants to go back home.

Pictures of Pinon

This was taken in my backyard.  You may or may not see the fence that separates my yard from the other member of my duplex.

This is a shot of one of the dirt roads right here in the teacher housing.  It offers a nice short cut to school when I'm walking.  I twisted my ankle on it about a week ago though.

This SUV has helped me out a lot since I've been living down here, from mud to sand, dirt roads, shopping trips, and making my way out into the unknown, this car has been a great blessing.

This is the church house that I go to.  I have been made 1st counselor in the Branch Presidency and have both enjoyed and struggled with that calling.  The picture just above this one is what the view looks like from behind the church.



 This is what used to be left of the canopy I put up to provide Bo with some shade.  It's in much worse condition now.  The weather has been very harsh, it gets really windy here.  Not to mention that Angel and her sister Clara like to play in it and rip it.

Pinon sunsets, very beautiful.  One of the best ways to make Pinon seem prettier than it actually is.

The Engagement

This was the picture we took shortly after our engagement to show our families.

Well, here goes attempt number two to get this part of the blog up and going.  The site doesn't like to upload pictures for some reason.

Anyway, as I said before, when I came out here to Pinon I thought I might or might not meet someone special; I was coming more to work than to date anyway.  If I did find someone I imagined it would be a Navajo, Hopi, or Apache.  I was also open for the possibility of meeting someone special in Flagstaff.  The last thing I expected was to fall for an Irish girl from Ohio.

We met on the first day of work back in August.  They introduced the new teachers from each school and Pam was the new music director for the high school where I was the new history teacher.  After the meeting was over I introduced myself to her and we spent the afternoon exploring the building together.

The music department at Pinon High, was a mess.  Most instruments were broken, the last band teacher had made too stacks for them, Need Repair, and Beyond Repair/Hope.

Pam's job was to get a dysfunctional program out of being dysfunctional and into working well so that the school could have a band and choir it could be proud of.  My job was to teach the entire sophomore class about history.  Needless to say we both had and have our work cut out for us.

The next time we really hung out was about a week later when Pam came to visit me in my classroom after school.  Pam was already becoming more convinced that I was special, from the way that I introduced myself to the way that I talked about history.

Every now and then I would hang out with Pam, in a lot of our conversations the church would come up.  Pam, to put it lightly, hates being Catholic, and was looking for something else.

What really brought us together was the puppies.  We both adopted two adorable little puppies, Angel and Clara.  They were born under the porch of someone who works at district.  The puppies were still so small when we got them that they were able to fit through just about anything.  Making it impossible for us to leave them inside or outside while we were at work.  We found a wonderful puppy sitter and friend in Pam Fowles.  Yes, there are two Pams.  Yes, it does get confusing.

Taking the puppies there every day and then picking them up every evening meant that Pam and I would see each other almost every day.  The Fowles are both members of the church and Jeff is our Elders Quoarm President.  Pam's interest in the church and in me were increasing.  We invited her to watch General Conference with us and during one of the sessions she announced that she wanted to go to church with us the following week.

It was obvious to everyone but me that I was also growing more and more fond of Pam.  Pam and I started cooking for each other, taking care of each other during illnesses, helping each other with cleaning, and walking together.  Needless to say, when we actually started dating not a whole lot changed.  We spent even more time together, started kissing, and that's really about it.

I proposed on October 30th.  Pam calls it, "The best Halloween ever."

Speaking of Halloween there we are in costume.  I was a knight, most of my tin foil armor was blown away, there was a pretty big wind storm that day.  She was a lady and we came in her white stallion.  That was taken shortly after the Trunk or Treat was over.



Since getting engaged we've already done a lot of work.  We set a date that may or may not work out depending on whether we can get some time off, April 23rd.  We've also picked a location, the 1850's Guest House in Dallas, Illinois, which is about ten miles from Nauvoo.  The wedding colors are lavendar, yellow, and light blue.  We took the time to get registered at both Target and Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

The Wildlife

There are all sorts of strange and not so strange things out here.  The strangest things to see are definately the insects.  The most common of the oddities are what the Navajo refer to as Rain Bugs.  They look like these giant tanks of the insect world that have black and red bands going across their shells.  They are called Rain Bugs because according to tradition if you smash one it will cause rain.  This being a desert where people are very dependent on rain, well, lets just say I'm amazed they aren't extinct.

\

Other strange insects I've seen, but unfortunately I have no pictures of them, a Stick Bug, which was very fascinating, looked exactly like a normal stick, except for the fact that it walked.  There was one bug that I have no idea what it was.  It's head was like an ant's and its body was similar to a bee's.  That isn't that strange until you relize that its head was the size of my thumb.

For a while I had an enormous spider as a roommate.  Everytime I spotted him he would go into a room or closet and hide in the most hard places for a human to reach.  It took a combination of broom and foot to settle the issue of who lived here.

Insects and giant spiders aren't all that's out here.  I've seen a coyote right here in the teacher housing.  Many teachers have also had to deal with rattlesnakes this year.  I've been fortunate not to have had that problem, but I'm still careful.

Also the livestock in some ways are more like wild animals than they are like livestock.  They are allowed to wander free with just the sheep dogs to guide them from place to place.  They are trained to not like humans and to run from them.  One night there were several cows that made their way into teacher housing and I was determined to get a picture.  The cows did not like that at all and they ran the moment I would get close enough.  I finally caught up with one of the cows, keeping my distance I shot this video.

Pictures of Things Other than Dogs

Well, my family had their first look at the blog the other day and they liked it.  But their one complaint was that there were no pictures of anything but dogs and they wanted to know more about what the area looks like, unfortunately I just can't get the internet working fast enough to post any pictures at this time.
Leaving you in suspense,
Me

Bo and I go to Flagstaff

About two weeks ago I decided that Bo had to go to a groomer in Flagstaff.  I was going to drop him off in Petco and do my shopping while he was in there.  The road to Flag was interesting, a part of the road had been washed away, which made driving it a tad more exciting than what I had wanted for the trip.
Bo hated his carrier and decided to make the best of it by falling asleep for most of the trip, which didn't work well until we got to the paved roads, that poor boy was bouncing everywhere, despite the fact I didn't go over 30 mph.
It took about three hours for me to reach Flagstaff.  Bo, was uncontrollably hyper when he got to Petco, so many dogs, so many hours in the carrier, and so many food smells = disaster.  People thought that he wasn't really my dog which was embarrassing to say the least.  Bo has been very easy to control lately but when the dog is hyper, which is common for a spaniel to be, there is no control, there is the hyperactive mutt.
Once he claimed down shopping in Petco was easy.  I walked around the store with him as he smelled stuff and happily went from one place to another.  As I looked for toys for Angel, Bo climbed in with stuffed animal chew toys and excitedly started smelling them.  Apparently he isn't the first dog who has jumped into the toys.
The groomer however wouldn't see Bo because I didn't know to bring papers with me that said he had his shots taken care of.  That meant that the shopping trip was much slower than I had expected it to be.  It also meant that I left Flagstaff much later than what I had wanted.  Which meant driving back to Pinon in the dark.
Being dark and still not knowing the roads well, I decided to follow my GPS.
The GPS wanted me to go down a narrow road, since it was dark I was unable to find it.  If you drive far enough away, the GPS has a way of switching where it wants you to go.  So I drove away from that road, but no matter how far I drove the GPS kept leading me to that road and I couldn't see it for the life of me.
Finally I found the road.  At night it was a very dangerous and confusing road, when I went back later during the day it wasn't that bad.
After a very bumpy area that had two large cement columns I came to a hill, near the top of the hill the road becomes pure sand.  Sand has no traction, give me MUD over sand any day!  My car was defeated, defeated by SAND!  I called for help, it was 10:30.
My rescuers searched high and low and were convinced that they saw my hazard lights, in truth they were no where near me.  Those hazard lights were really a radio tower.
Finally the Navajo Nation Police were called into the search and it was them that found me.  The Fowles and Miss Miller then followed and having no choice due to the completely dead battery, we abandoned the car and went home.  I had left Flagstaff when the sun was setting and I had gotten into Pinon when the sun was rising.  I had not even been found until 4 am.
Being the desert, there isn't much heat at night.  I was glad to have Bo there with me as he provided a good source of warmth and companionship.  It has been about 15 years since anyone has used or maintained that road we got stuck on, so even people like Mr. Fowles who has lived here for ten years had no idea where I was at.  Moral of the story, GPS works great in Flag but never trust it in Pinon.

Horse in a Ditch

In the traditional Navajo way of herding animals, the animals are allowed to wander around and the Navajo will check up on them in certain locations where the animals know to be.  Very few people in Pinon have their animals behind a fence.  This enables the animals to roam free.
As I was out for a drive I saw a horse laying in a ditch.  The creature was motionless.  As the car sped nearer to the beast, I marvelled at how such a healthy and strong looking animal could just be laying there in the ditch, dead.  I wondered if some car had hit it since it didn't look as if it had been in bad shape in life.  It didn't even look old.
The car came nearer and the dead horse heard it and sat up.

Dogs

This is Bo, I finally discovered the secret of getting him to calm down.  He has to have his own chair.  He has always really loved jumping up on people and he has also really liked sitting in chairs next to people.  In Utah where we lived before, everytime I tried to sit down he would try to sit in the same place first.  Letting him have his own chair in the house lessened his need to jump on me and other furniture and kept him under control.  I don't know why but this dog LOVES chairs.

This little girl is Angel.  She was born shortly after or maybe even just before I arrived in Pinon.  Her mom is a stray who is house trained and a very well behaved and nice dog.  Pinon has a real stray dog problem, right now most of them are friendly, more or less, but in the winter from what I hear, they form packs that are dangerous.  My principal was the first one to suggest that I adopt one of the puppies.  From that moment on I couldn't get the idea out of my head, and she and I connected very quickly.  In the picture she is inside a tub that I made into a bed for her and she is using her chew toy as a pillow.

This was my attempt to get the two dogs in the same picture together.  Angel had grown tired of playing with Bo and decided to come into my lap and Bo moved at the last moment so that the picture just barely doesn't work.  Because Bo is so hyper I wondered how well he would get along with a puppy.  He has amazed me by how gentle he's been and just how well he is able to play with the puppy.  Angel has realized that he won't hurt her, now that she knows this she will charge him and chase him everywhere.

Shade for Bo

I moved into the house late July.  There were no trees or really any source of shade for Bo who I was determined should be an outside dog since he is shall we say, crazy beyond all reason.  Being monsoon season as the locals call it, when it wasn't pouring down rain it was burning hot, since it is after all Arizona.
When I got home from Gallup I was determined to get the canopy up immediately, despite the pounding rain, harsh winds, and lightning.  I soon discovered that doing any sort of building work in those conditions with a broken finger just doesn't work.
After my faliure with the canopy I decided that I should at least build the doghouse I had gotten in Gallup.  Again my broken finger was constantly in the way.  The doghouse was designed to be very difficult to put together and therefore impossible for the dog to take apart.  After two and a half hours of trying to build something, anything so that dog could be more comfortable outside, I gave up and let the dog sleep in the laundry room for the night.
I asked the missionaries in the area for help and I fed them a good meal for the trouble, the first meal I had cooked in Pinon.  The work with them was much easier, they had the canopy up and the doghouse built in no time.  One of the Elders was quite the handy man.
The winds in Pinon are a constant day to day thing and they are strong.  Once the canopy was up it wasn't difficult to set it back up when it fell down.  However, after setting it back up half a dozen times in a couple of days I decided that I was done.  I needed metal twist ties.
When my parents came to visit me Dad and I went out and tied three of the legs to the fence.  The fourth leg was buried almost a foot into the ground surrounded by rocks and packed dirt.  Not long after my parents left there was a big wind storm, the buried leg was ripped out of the ground and one of the legs that had been tied to the fence snapped.  I then bought a large pipe to go in the middle for even more support but the wind kept blowing so that I could not work on it.
Yesterday I set it back up again, replaced the broken parts and reburied the pole.  I then dug another hole and put in the middle pole.
Tonight I noticed that the supporting rods that make the arch in the canopy came undone during the storm and ripped a massive hole in the canopy.  I looked at it shook my head and wondered how I was going to fix that.  I looked at the buried fourth pole, it has moved around a lot, considering all the rocks I put down there.  The center pole however stood firm and strong.  At least I had done something right and its still standing!

The Never Ending Rain and Trails of Mud

When I first arrived in Pinon it was what the locals referred to as "Monsoon season," I had no idea that it would really rain that much since the weather website that I had looked up said that Pinon was typically very dry.
The rain would not be such an issue if it weren't for all the dirt roads.  Being on the rez, all roads in and out of Pinon are dirt.  Traditionally the people here have always let their livestock wander; paved roads mean faster cars which means they would need to build more fences and keep the livestock in one place.  It is an interesting thing though, to stop on the way back from the store to allow the horses and goats to cross.
The first evening when I arrived in Pinon I had the misfortune to make a wrong turn on an especially bad mud road while pulling my trailer with most of my earthly belongings in it.  I got a ways down there when I heard the bad news, and since my finger was broken and I could only use one hand, I had to stop the SUV in the mud to hear that I was going the wrong way, which provided enough time for the trailer and the SUV to sink in the mud and get stuck.
Any other car I have ever driven would have been done there at that moment.  I put it into 4 wheel drive and slowly maneuvered my way out of there.  I got stuck another four times but that Durango was tough enough to pull itself and the trailer out of the mud and get me safely to my new home in the teacher housing.  It was quite an adventure, though not one I am eager to repeat.
The next day after seeing the apartment for the first time and getting a feel for what was needed I set out for Gallup, NM to buy supplies.  With my trusty GPS guiding the way I was sure that I would get there and back without any problems.  HA.
GPS likes to take you on the short routes.  In an area where it has been raining heavily and that has a ton of dirt roads, shorter isn't always better.  BIA 25 through Apache County is quite the road when its wet.  I set out in the morning, though it wasn't raining everything was still muddy from the night before.  At one point in the journey I was climbing a mountain that had a dirt road, to one side of me there was the clif face, to the other side there was a small bank of dirt to prevent me from going off the drop and down several hundred feet.  In the middle was a massive puddle of mud.
Having conquered that mountain without putting myself in mortal danger I felt as though my SUV and I were invincible.  No other car I have driven could have done what this SUV did, and a less experienced driver would have gotten stuck even without the SUV.  I was unstoppable!
I continued down my trail until another car pulled up along side me with the news that I would have to turn back, the road up ahead was completely washed out, nothing could make it through.  I had traveled so far and conquered a mountain, I wanted to believe that I could handle the upcoming road easily.
The people insisted however that nothing could make it through and as I thought about it, I had no family down here to pull me out or to pick me up and being new in town I had no one to call.  My temptation to drive on bowed to the local wisdom and I turned around and looked at a map for an alternate route.  I had to begin my journey again almost from the very beginning.
The journey home however was much more dangerous than the detour on BIA 25.  The rain came back witha avengance.  Many vechiles that are supposed to be better than mine got stuck in the mud and the drivers stood stranded.  My car being full prevented me from picking anyone up, though I did stop once to help a family with a flat tire.
Next to the road going into Pinon there is a wash, or a small river.  When I had driven on that same road the night before it was about three feet across.  On that night coming back from Gallup, it was 20 to 30 feet across and it ran along side the dirt road.  I felt very happy that there was distance between it and the road, but not enough that I was overly comfortable at the sight of the furious rushing water.  I watched it for a moment and realized that I was looking at a flash flood.
After a lot of slip and sliding in my SUV I made it home safe to a dog that was drenched and very unhappy.  Despite the rain and hardship or perhaps because of it I felt exhilarated and grateful to have had the adventure and to have gotten home safe from it.  Even so I stayed off the roads after that, my next big trip was only last week; in one month I only used one tank of gas, the roads simply weren't safe enough to be worth the risk, the Navajo Nation declared a state of emergency because of how badly the flooding had effected a lot of areas.  I was fortunate enough to live on higher ground but I saw some of the devastation on a trip out to Chinle, a short trip where I was glad to be driven. 
I had plenty of work in Pinon, setting up a home, teaching school, attending meetings with other teachers, and doing service for the local church.
The rains have finally gone and the roads are now much better.  It has been good to get out of Pinon and see the surrounding country a bit.  It is also very beautiful here because of the rains.