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For a four day period in February Nathen attended a conference in San Diego, and took Terra with him. Barbara and I got to stay at their house and tend to their kids.
It was my distinct impression that Terra wasn't totally comfortable with that arrangement as she telephoned multiple times daily to verify that the homicide count was still in single digits. After about the second day the kids were really happy to talk to her.
None-the-less, life went on pretty much as usual and I enjoyed again watching the interpersonal dynamics of children. Little people can be very entertaining when you have the time to watch.
One of the small problems we had involved the canine that inhabits our front yard. He is, without a doubt, the whiningest animal I have ever met, and after listening to him complain for most of the night, I stretched a cable across the back yard and gave him a bit more freedom. Given that his range was limited, Bella coexisted with him quite amicably.
The older boys seemed to enjoy spending time honing their basketball skills. Swish! Ethen shows some talent, but his vaguely defined injuries worry me. (I am, after all, my mothers' son and as a worrier she was world class.)
When, near the dawn of recorded history, I worked for Carnation company, I learned about controlling insect infestations by fumigation. Mine was all "book learning" and I never participated in the actual event. But while in Benson, I got to watch. Workers covered the house across the fence with brightly colored material, sealed the edges to the ground, set off the fumigant containers inside, and went home. The next day, they opened it up, aired it out, took the covering away, and called it good. I was unable to learn the identity of the chemical agent used, but I trust that the insects inside died, and didn't just migrate across the fence.
It has always been a source of amusement to me that there exists an inverse relationship between a childs' desire to help and their ability to do so. In retrospect, I suppose it might be analogous to me hiking a mile on a trail I've never seen before or walking down to the post office to get the mail.
I handed my camera to various kids with instructions to take pictures of "interesting" things. What I found most interesting was their response.
I was impressed at how proficient the kids in that household were when it came to preparing food. Perhaps I am more particularly impressionable in that area because imparting cooking skills was one of the goals I set for myself in raising my set of house-apes.
To my delight, Barbara held up quite well, and seemed to enjoy the experience almost as much as I.
This image was captured by one of Ethens' siblings. I'm pretty sure I would not have been able to elicit that response. It is pretty obvious Ethen is a teenager. If you are prepared, quick, and lucky, you might be able to ask him three questions (that require an answer of one word or less) in the time it takes him to walk from the front door to his room.
Both Rachel and Ethen spent a significant amount of time reading. I was tempted to recommend that they consider perusing weightier subject matter, but then Ecclesiastes (To every thing there is a season...) brought me back to reality.
It is not terribly surprising, but I encountered a significant amount of musical talent there. In retrospect, I suspect "practicing" in that household normally consists of more than playing one song one time, but sometimes grandparents can be easily fooled.
I guess it is all in what you are used to, but Janelle was trampled multiple times by howling banshees (otherwise known as siblings) and it didn't seem perturb her naps in the slightest. I can't even remember being able to sleep like that. For a fleeting instant I thought maybe she had passed...
Much of the time Janelle was exuberance personified! Can you remember when everything was exciting?
Lindella (who is my double first cousin [my mothers' sister married my fathers' brother], meaning we share all four grandparents) and her husband Jared Frenzel stopped by for a brief visit after attending the funeral of LeGrand Turley. Parenthetically, Nathen, Ethen and I, attempted to attend that funeral only to be turned back by snow covered roads that the (apparently not all-weather) tires on my car were unable to navigate. Lindella and Jared must have enjoyed that visit, as a couple of weeks later they returned for another, this time two weeks in length. AJ helped me pick them up at Sky Harbor airport. Somehow I managed to get appointed to be their social director. I put together this calendar: 
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| Tuesday, Karren was working, so we left her to her money grubbing and went to the Arizona Historical Society Museum. My camera must have gotten stuck in my pocket, as I did not get any photos. I have visited this museum multiple times over the past 40 years, and it is interesting to see hows the exhibits change. Incidents involving indian tribes native to this area longer involve pillage, plunder, and massacres, but have now morphed into cultural conflicts. History happens, but is viewed through the lens of contemporary mores. |
| Wednesday we drove over to Wilcox to visit Gary Hatch, his sister Julie Nolan, and their spouses. Again my camera got stuck to my pocket and I have no images to share. |
Thursday we drove over to Sun City (and learned just how far away it is) to visit Janell and Gerald Ferguson. Janell is the last surviving sibling of my father. I think the visit was enjoyed by all. On the way home we encountered rush hour traffic, exacerbated by an accident, but still managed to make it to the Dairy Queen in Picacho at 6:50 pm, ten minutes prior to closing time.
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Friday, while Karren was again working, Fred and Laura joined us for a trip to the airport in Kearny to examine my ultralight aircraft. This excursion turned into a bit of an adventure.
We played with the ultralight a bit and made a few adjustments. The users manual suggested that a check on the airworthiness of the machine should be made by making several taxi runs. When these are uneventful, the craft should then be flown to an altitude of about two feet, then landed.
I tried the "altitude of two feet" maneuver three times and each time my two feet ballooned into twenty and I drifted off the runway. A factor that made these hops more exciting was that I didn't know there was a lag time between advancing the throttle and the engine developing power. This image is a far distant shot of my first (unintentional) flight.
After my heart rate returned to normal, both Fred and Lindella tried their hand at taxi runs. I need make a few more adjustments (align the rudder and the front wheel, tighten the throttle linkage such that it doesn't move on its own, adjust the brakes so that they actually work, etc.) and after a few more practice landings I should be good to go.
| The Monday and Tuesday activities of the air and missile museums were scrubbed in favor of sitting around and talking. Wednesday, Lindella, Jared, and Karren went north to visit Joan Turley, in addition to one (or more) of Lindellas' siblings. They returned Thursday. I begged off this trip, so my knowledge of the details of this adventure is sketchy. |
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Friday Karren was working again, so Lindella, Jared, and I went rock hunting with Laura. Since we were in the area, we decided to see the sights around Clifton and Morenci.
I have always found the open pit overlook to be a very impressive panorama. At this point, I am wishing I had documented it photographically each of the many times I visited it (starting probably in the 50's). That series of photos would undoubtedly show an interesting progression.
Jared allow as how he (being from Washington State) didn't need a coat, but I noticed that he ended up in the lee of the wheel with the rest of us to get out of that 20 mph wind.
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Saturday was our attempt to get a kite out on a mile of string. My intuition suggests that many (if not most) of the participants at first thought this was kind of a juvenile activity not worthy of serious effort. After wrestling with the (circa 30 pound) pull of the kite string, a few of them may have changed their mind.
We had a fairly large group to witness the "mile of string" attempt. Lindella and Jared, Fred and Laura, Karren and Jim, Nathen and Terra (plus their five), AJ and Brittney (plus their one) and myself were in attendance.
We started by unrolling the string and marking it (by attaching a length of flagging) every tenth of a mile.
We then retraced our steps (or tire tracks, as the case may be) and wound the string onto our large reel. It is surprising how many turns of a bicycle wheel it takes to go a mile.
Assembling the kites went pretty quickly.
They only require one rod inserted into a pocket on both ends.
Attaching the streamers was probably the most difficult part...
The most difficult part that is, if you don't count trying to convince some of the younger generation that it really wasn't "their turn" to fly the kite.
In a group activity like this there are people who enjoy it, and those who don't. Can you spot the individual in this image who belongs to the latter group?
After a couple of false starts, the wind picked up and we were undeniably successful in our attempt to get a mile of string connecting the ground to furthermost kite. Measuring the angle above the horizon to that top kite yielded a reading of about 50°. Assuming that the string was straight (which it was not) and that I can still preform calculations pertaining to geometry (also doubtful), the top kite was about 4040 feet (or roughly ¾ of a mile) above the ground.
Unfortunately, we didn't have much time to savior this accomplishment, because about 15 seconds after we achieving that goal, the string broke.
When that happened, I was pretty sure I would never see the kites again. But just so I could say we had, I suggested we drive along the gas line road that ran roughly parallel to the wind direction (and hence path of the kites) in the off chance that we might locate them.
After driving about a mile, someone (I think it was AJ) yelled, "There they are!" The line had become tangled in a bush, and all three kites were still very much aloft.
In fact,they were still flying on a little more than 0.9 mile of string.
It took anther 45 minutes of semi-arduous labor to get them down, but in the end we accomplished the improbable. All in all, it was a successful day.
On Monday, Lindella and Jared, along with Karren and Jim, drove out to Oracle to play in our lapidary shop. Jared cut up the piece of fire agate that he found while we were rock hunting near Clifton, and Lindella polished a cabochon out of it. I neglected to photograph the finished product, bit it turned out to be a very nice piece.
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 Tuesday was another day of visiting, then Wednesday Barbara and I drove the vacationers to San Tan Valley, where AJ took over and delivered them to the airport. One small, juicy, second-hand tidbit: Karren gave Lindella a small amount of food grade citric acid. Room constraints precluded the use of a rigid container, so Lindella put the granular solid in a baggy, stuffed the baggy into the toe of a shoe, and placed the shoe in her luggage. The airport security personnel noticed this during their Xray examination and became abundantly interested. I regret I wasn't there to hear the explanations... |