Steve and Judy's Travels!

There is a green heron.

On a nest.

With eggs.

At another nest, there is a little fluffy one already out of the nest wobbling around on the branches.

But this year we’re familiar with several of the college players so we’re going to tune in and see where they go.

Quinn Ewers, Quarterback, Texas

He has played well for several years and got the team to the semifinals of the college playoffs last year.  He tends to go out for a few games each season for injuries, so don’t know if he’ll be durable enough for the NFL.  Each time he was out last season though, we got to watch Arch Manning sub for him and that was always exciting.  We get to watch Manning every game this coming season, with game plans built around his skills.

Matthew Golden, Wide Receiver

Smooth.  Fast.  Seems to us like he misses more clutch catches than he should though.

Jaydon Blue, Running Back

Cool name.  Can break the big one.

Travis Hunter, Wide Receiver and Cornerback, Colorado

Awesome.  Plays almost every down in a game, both offense and defense.  Makes impact plays on both sides of the ball every game.  He’s the guy we get most excited about on the Colorado team.

Shedeur Sanders, Quarterback, Colorado

Looks smooth.  Good quarterback.  Gets sacked a lot.  Maybe that’s due to offensive line play or maybe he needs to work on his decision making.  He’s good like his dad was, and he’s got the glitter and attitude to go with it.  Deon might be teaching good life lessons in responsibility to the college team, but the gold chains, swagger and bluster are distracting for us, Judy and me.  Can Shedeur be a superstar for the team, or just a superstar?

Shilo Sanders, Safety, Colorado

Much lower key guy than dad and brother.  Makes plays.

Jimmy Horn, Wide Receiver, Colorado

Fast.  Dependable.

There are a bunch of other really good players on these two teams, mostly from Texas, that are going to get drafted, but they’re not as high-profile as the key players that stand out to us.  Offensive and defensive line players don’t get the same amount of airtime as quarterbacks, running backs, and wide receivers.  It cracks us up when announcers talk about skill players, implying that the linemen are all not very skilled.  I’m sure it takes a lot more skill than I can recognize to be good player at any position on a football team.

Of course, we know nothing compared to dedicated football fans.  We get to see what people that actually know football think about our guys when the NFL makes its choices starting tonight.

Usually, they look like this.  Slightly gray above.  Slightly yellow below.  Nondescript.

If they get really excited though, they can display an orange crown.  Or if they just get really wet.

This bird can be found almost anywhere in the U.S. at one time or another.  Mostly Alaska and Canada in the summer.  Southern states and Mexico in the winter.

Even if we’re 60 miles inland.

We don’t really need two cars.  Once in a while we use both at the same time, but we could easily work around that with minimal planning and cooperation.

Then the rains came.  The roads flooded.  We drove through some puddles.  Okay, more than puddles, we drove through some flooded roads.  We’ve been doing this for years with the Jeeps we’ve had.  No problem.  The van is high clearance.  No problem.

A couple days later, the two front wheels quit talking to each other.  The wheels are not independent of each other; the van has all-wheel drive, so there is a transfer case up there.  I noticed the problem while backing out of a parking space with the steering wheel turned.  It felt like the pavement was really rough, but it wasn’t that rough.  The two front wheels weren’t able to run at different speeds to accommodate the turning radius.  So the van has been in time-out at the Ford dealer for the last two weeks.  They diagnosed the problem and made repairs to the transfer case in front.  After a couple tries, they just replaced the whole thing and that took care of it.  We got the van back today.  New car warranty.  No charge.  It’s perfect.  And we’re sure glad we had the Mazda to drive while the van was out of service. 

The timing is great.  We leave on a trip to Arizona in two weeks.  For the last five months, the van has been configured as just an empty vehicle to do errands around town.  Now we have it back as a blank canvas inside.

We can reconfigure it with all our camping stuff and make sure everything is just right for our road trip.