Dateline Glorieta

The good things about the trip to Glorieta I'm writing about here, the rant is at Greek Shadow.

Drove up after I finally got away from the classroom. Nice enough drive. Had a good meal. Rested a little in the room while Grinnygranny had a meeting on team building. We're staying in the Hall of States and it is really nice. Over the years I've stayed in private cabins, church cabins, college cabins, Oklahoma hall, Texas Hall, Thunderbird hall, and Chaparelle Hall. Chaparelle and Hall of States are the creme de la creme in Glorieta. The room was nice and the bed was comfortable, more than could be said of most Hotels and Motels across the country. It feels a little funny going into a room like that, though and not having a tv set. The campground is in a bowl surrounded by mountains and doesn't get reception. I kind of liked not having the idiot box as a distraction.
Around eight o'clock I went to where they are meeting as they had scheduled an hour of games. We played Pictionary and another game I can't think the name of right now, but it had a round plastice game piece with a lever on the side. You pressed in the lever and on a little screen would appear a word or phrase that you tried to get people to guess without using the word or words in the phrase. There was a timer and after the word or phrase was guessed you would hand the game piece to the person next to you, the person who was still holding the game piece when the buzzer sounded the other team got a point. It was fun, except when you've got the stupid game piece in your hand, the beeping is getting shorter warning that it's about to go off and no one can hear you give your clues because everyone is laughing from the answer before you!
Had a nice big breakfast, did I mention big breakfast. Full bowl of real, not instant, oatmeal with brown sugar and raisins, pears, scrambled eggs, hashbrown, salsa, extra thick cut bacon. Stuffed myself. As we are leaving the dining hall Grinnygranny says in all the years we've been coming here she's never been to the top of lookout mountain. So we drive behind the prayer gardens, park and start walking. There is a telephone pole with an arrow painted on it saying this is the start of the trail to lookout point. Behind the pole are huge bolders and you have to climb over them to get started up the trail. "You've got to be kidding?" is all could think, but up we go. More bolders, tree roots, actually the tree roots help act as steps. Up and up it went, from time to time I would stop to catch my breath and she would look at me with a hurry up. Hey I'm packing more that a hundred pounds around my middle than she has! We get to where they've installed cell phone towers (you can see cigatette butts all around the fenced off towers -- stupid stupid stupid with the fire danger the last four years. A miracle they didn't start a fire!) Anyway a little past the towers we made it to the top, huffing and puffing, but we got there. goind down was a lot easier on the lungs, but you really had to be careful not to twist an ankle or trip on the rocks and tree roots. We made it down and surprisingly enough I didn't leave that big breakfast on the side of the trail. I told grinnygranny that we should have done this twenty-eight years ago when we met, as I was in a lot better shape then than now.
Grinnygranny then went to her meeting and I took a fifteen minute nap in the room before packing everything up and putting it in the cars. At lunch Grinnygranny said she still hasn't caught her breath from that climb. That'll teach her.
I went to the bookstore to see if they would let me do a book signing this summer. They have to have Nashville's approval, We'll see. I told the publisher to have it listed under Historical fiction and Christian fiction. I'll just have to lobby Lifeway to add it to their booklist.
My cell phone died without me knowing about it yesterday, and grinnygranny left three messages telling me to bring the digital camera which I never got. Soooo I bought a disposable camera then walked around taking pictures. I'll get them developed over the weekend and post some of them. We're about two weeks too late for the aspens. Most of the leaves are off now, which is a shame because when they are all decked out in yellow they are gorgeous.