This morning’s destination…. Silver City New Mexico. But how can you go through an entire day driving down the road, without changing the target a few times? We considered Las Vegas, decided to go to City of Rocks, ultimately ending up in Lordsburg. Normally, a person wouldn’t spend the night in Lordsburg on purpose. Lordsburg is the place you stop for the night when you can’t make it all the way to the place you really meant to go. Except for us. We’re still in New Mexico, but within perfect striking distance of the Chiricahua Mountains in Arizona, a “sky island” in the desert. It is perfectly isolated in Arizona, but within the range of several Mexican species of birds that are found nowhere else in the United States. Tomorrow’s target birds are: Mexican chickadee, juniper titmouse, and yellow eyed junco. We covered a lot of thermometer today. We went from twenty-five degrees this morning to seventy-five degrees this afternoon. We don’t have to unhook the hoses tonight. It won’t go below freezing.
Santa fe
We like it here in Santa Fe. We like the altitude, the weather, and the sunsets. We like the adobe architecture. We like the way the streets wander around through town instead of being laid out on a grid, even though the terrain doesn’t require they do that. It’s interesting. We like the birds. This morning, from the coach, we saw mountain bluebird, western bluebird, curve billed thrasher, pink sided dark eyed junco, scrub jay, white crowned sparrow, house finch, common raven, canyon towhee, mockingbird, and a hummingbird. We got to watch the wooing ritual of the curve billed thrasher. The female ran all around acting interested and unattainable, while the male crouched on the ground in a full-body puff, flexing his wings and tail while he flicked the dirt and twigs with his bill. Who could resist that? Poor Annie got sick and had to go to the vet. Bladder infection. She has been on antibiotics since Tuesday and feels a lot better now. Back to her charming happy self. The job here was a pleasure. Had the exit conference today. Tomorrow is a travel day. We get to drive from the north of New Mexico to the south of New Mexico. Next stop, Silver City.
Racquetball
Remember how I was always telling you how good I was at racquetball? Well, nevermind. Now I suck at racquetball. Up till now, my game hadn’t changed at all. I hadn’t been on a court in months, but hadn’t missed a day in my head. I recently went on a court, expecting to play that game that was still in my head. It didn’t happen. My body wasn’t ready for it. It hurt my elbow to follow through on the backhand stroke. I think I hyperextended it. I had no wind. Apparently two mile slow jogs on the beach at sea level aren’t much preparation for the bursts required for racquetball at five thousand feet. I thought at least I’d be able to hit the ball with some pace, but noooo. No timing. Popups. Line drives into the dirt. Wasn’t much there. It got better after I found someone to play, but it never got good. I guess I can’t preserve the game by just thinking about it.
Clinic
Funny thing, that trip to the clinic. I’ve had this background burning pain in my bladder the last couple days that worked its way to the foreground. Bladder infection? Something going on, thought I’d better get it checked. Totally asymptomatic, except for that burning, not while I pee, but before and after. Feels like I have to pee, even when I’ve just finished. The clinic doctor couldn’t figure it out. No bladder infection. Might be some kind of urinary tract infection, but didn’t present properly for that. Blood in the urine. Might have something to do with my enlarged prostate. She told me to take antibiotics if I got a fever and to go back to my doctor to get my prostate checked again. Aha! Took a while to connect, but, there it is. Blood in the urine. Uneasy bladder. Been there. It has been fifteen years, but been there. Kidney stone. That’s what this feels like! Blood in the urine. Vague pain. Here it comes. Nothing serious. Serious pain, but not like having some debilitating disease. Most likely resolution, I’ll suddenly be overcome with pain, Judy will rush me to the hospital, they will give me morphine and squeeze as much fluid through me as fast as they can until the stone passes. Last time, they didn’t even have to check me in. They flushed it through, then sent me home to sleep off the rest of the morphine. Shouldn’t take more than a couple days from whenever it starts, really starts. Maybe in an hour, or a day, or a month…..
Santa fe
A misty morning; nice for a bird walk. Saw some snow geese, redheads, canvasbacks, scaups, a hooded merganser, mourning doves, collared doves, kestrels, shrikes, harriers, robins, an American pipit, a spotted towhee, tons of white crowned sparrows, tons of juncos (Oregon and pink sided). I love the dark-eyed juncos; don’t see nearly enough of them, plus all the other usual suspects like house sparrow, starlings, rock doves, ravens, etc. The fog lifted to scattered clouds for a cool easy drive to Santa Fe. Know how some freeways are trucker’s freeways and some aren’t? Some freeways are mostly just cars driving along, but some freeways, like Interstate 80 and Interstate 40 are clogged with trucks. There are likely to be at least as many trucks as cars. Guess those routes get them where they need to go over the terrain of least resistance. Anyway, we drove highway 60 across New Mexico and discovered it is a railroad highway. Know how you’ll drive along and see a train or two all day? Highway 60 parallels east/west railroad tracks, side-by-side tracks, and you can generally see two or three trains at any time. These trains, out in the open country, travel sixty-five miles per hour, exactly the same speed we were traveling. We could drive for twenty minutes right next to the same train. Trains loaded with trucks. Arrived in Santa Fe at the same time as the snow flurries. Perfect timing. Checked in to the RV Park, Santa Fe Skies, a quick trip to a clinic for some minor repairs, drive by Monday’s client’s office to locate it, a stop for some Mexican food (not hard to find Mexican food in Santa Fe), and a drive past the rec center with the racquetball court to make sure they really were closed late on a Sunday night. They were. Home safe and sound and warm inside the house. Let it snow. (We hear they’re gearing up for the blizzard of ’06 in Denver).