We want to point out to our very longtime dentist friend, Dr. Bob, that Annie takes her health seriously. She brushes every day.
The adventure
We’re back in Mesa. Tomorrow, we turn over the motorhome for repairs. We have to move out of it for a week. What to do with ourselves in the meantime? We’ve decided to rent a motorhome and go on a trip! We called Cruise America and rented a 30 foot Class C. We’re off to explore Arizona.
Organ pipe
All the usual suspects (quail, curve-bill thrasher, cactus wrens) swarming the campsite. A couple tiny verdin flit about the bushes. A small flock of house finches. A cardinal outside the window. A raven croaks past. A shiny black phainopepla. Mourning doves fly on whistling wings. A gila woodpecker peers down off the top of the nearest saguaro. A rock wren, a black-tailed gnatcatcher, a yellow-rumped warbler, and finally, a single canyon towhee. There are not a large number of different kinds of birds here, but there are birds everywhere.
The incident
Annie seems to have recovered from the great “cinnamon roll” incident. Three weeks ago, in a weak moment as we were checking in to Dakota Ridge, I bought a giant cinnamon roll to eat in the afternoon. I took a few bites, then went outside to hook up the coach utilities. Next time I came back inside, there was no cinnamon roll to be found. There was a dog, and some crumbs on the floor, but nothing more. I immediately suspected the worst, and my suspicions were confirmed when Annie started barfing up cinnamon roll. Her stomach was a mess for days.At first, I thought she was a bad dog for eating my guilty pleasure: a cinnamon roll the size of a small dog. But the more she barfed, the more my understanding evolved. She isn’t a bad dog! She is a hero! She saw what was going to happen to me. She fell on the pastry grenade, and absorbed the explosion; aftershocks to be felt for a week. She protected me from myself.Thanks Annie. My hero.
A challenge
Can you spot the mule deer in this picture?