Quick Update

Summer school is flying by at breakneck speed. I'm taking the youth services class. Every class is an adventure. So far we've sung Shake My Sillies Out & the Noble Duke of York with actions, hummed Twinkle, Twinkle in a Hawaiian version complete with nose manipulation, danced the Hukilau, made a paper plate tambourine, gak, and an origami cube (which makes an excellent cat toy). Who says grad school is all boring papers and analysis? Okay, fine, we do have to discuss budgeting, mission statements and goals, too.

I am finishing up my beading project, which I had hoped to have done long before. It will be done this weekend, and then I'll post some pictures, along with pictures of the flowers and trees of Bloomington. It's very lush and green here, and I've seen some crazy plants I've never seen before. I might need some help with plant identification. That could be the next game we all play!

Pictures of McClay Flat and a Bald Eagle, from the Missoula Trip

And More Pictures... Of my gracious hosts

Becky at soccer practice

A picture of Denise taking a picture
I'm using the color accent feature on my camera - you accent a color (I'm using yellow), and everything else shows up black and white

Kevin after work (notice his eyes are closed, too - there's definitely a theme going on with my pictures

Ian "reading" in the car - yes, his eyes are closed, but because he's "resting" them (still, it fits into the eyes closed theme).

Adriana, Halen, and Ian

This is the night before I left, and they would be leaving very early in the moring for Helena for state music competition. I think they are trying to find/figure out directions from the internet.

Thanks for all the wonderful hospitality!

Finally Some Pictures As Promised

Craig and Boomer (notice they both have their eyes closed)

One of my favorite Missoula houses, and it belongs to Denise's aunt and uncle

A view of downtown Missoula from across the river

Kayaking the Clark Fork (taken from the Higgins St bridge)

The Boone and Crockett Club (taken from the Higgins St Bridge)

Not long enough

I got back to Bloomington Saturday night around midnight. Callie was very glad to see me.

It was wonderful to be in Missoula, and to get to see all the people and places I did. A week is not enough to fit everything in, though. I did not get to see everyone, and I didn't get to spend as much time with people as I would have liked. In spite of that, it was a great week.

Thanks to Craig and Boomer for picking me up, letting me crash there the first night, and providing driving service. Thanks to Adriana, Halen, and Ian, for all their hospitality - for feeding me, giving me rides, and for rearranging bedrooms to fit me in. Thanks to Denise, Becky, and Kevin, for putting up with me for a few nights, and for the tour de bead stores. Kerry, thanks for all your help and advice. Paul, the cake was delicious, and I'm very glad you didn't screw things up (sorry I can't be there in July). Thanks to Tom for the river walk, and for showing me the bald eagles' nest. Sorry if I'm forgetting any one or anything.

I'm going to try to get photos posted in the next few days, after I figure out the mysteries of getting them from the camera to the computer. Summer school starts this week, so it's back to the grind.

If things do happen in threes, then could this possibly be the next guest of my wildlife refuge?

And the newest member of the household is...

a bat. Yes, I woke up this morning, groggily from being up late fighting with APA format in a paper. I noticed something brown on the ceiling, seeming to hang there. I put on my glasses, and it was a bat. I'd thought I'd heard something in the ceiling early this morning. I thought it was my friend the squirrel. Perhaps it was our new friend the bat.

So I put Callie in the bathroom because it's the only room with a separate door. I opened the front door, and I tried to sort of push the bat out the door. It flew around the room and then behind the chair near the front door I kind of gently touched it with the broom to get it to move ouside. I had to do that a few times but it flattened itself under the door and then it flew off into the fog.

The thing that I could kick myself for is that I now have a digital camera, purchased yesterday. The battery had even finished charging, but did I think of that? No, of course not. Aak.

Bat gone. Callie liberated. I have no water, though. Apparently when I had no hot water, they'd had to replace the hot water heater. Of course, something has gone wrong with it. This is Indiana. So, I'm off to find coffee to drink in a place that has a bathroom in which I can wash my face. I already brushed my teeth without rinsing, so I'm minty fresh. Mwah mwah.