Little Stuff

Well, no new pictures, but lots of little updates. First, we sold the car I never get to ride in - yep, the Mazda is gone. So, Dad and Mom got a shell for the pickup truck, so Blockhead, I mean Schultz and I, can ride in the back with lots of room to move around in.

Dad and Mom are home a lot more now too - the Farmer's Market cut down on their hours, so they're working a lot less. That's good for me! Dad's applied for a new part-time job with a local non-profit, and Mom's applied to be an adjunct faculty member for the University of Montana. We'll let you know if they get the jobs!

It's really hot now too, so sometimes we go to the Bitterroot river to go swimming. I don't like to swim, and neither does Schultz, but it's nice to walk in the water and cool off. Sometimes Mom and Dad dive under the water and that makes Schultz really nervous - he whines really loud!

Dad and Mom got to cut up cars for the Fire Dept again last week - which is really hard when it's 90 degrees, the "Jaws of Life" weigh 70 lbs, and you're wearing full firefighter gear! But it's important to know how to do this. Since we had a lot of rain this summer, they haven't had to fight many fires, which is good, but there have been a lot of medical calls which keep them busy. I hate the pager!

We'll post more pictures and another update soon! Hope everyone's having as good a summer as we are!

More Hiking finally!

Sorry it's been so long since I posted anything - the weather here has been kind of crazy and Mom and Dad's jobs have been eating up more time than they'd like. The weather has been either miserably hot (upper 90s) or unseasonably cool and rainy, which makes it really hard to go hiking and do other fun stuff. On the other hand, all the rain has meant Dad and Mom don't have to fight fire very much, which is a really good thing!

Mom has finally caught up with technology to some extent, and has started a web album. See our latest hiking pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/Daphne.ItchyDog/AugustHiking?feat=directlink

We went to Canyon Lake with part-time pack member Bob - he goes to Church and sings with Mom. It was a really long and hard hike! 9 miles, and 2200 feet of elevation gain, with over half of the elevation gain in the last half mile - it was really steep. But the lake was cool and windy so we recovered well.

We went up Bear Creek yesterday - at the 2.6 mile point you have to ford Bear Creek - there's no bridge - so we finally went across yesterday. Dad brought his Crocs, but Mom forgot and went barefoot! It was pretty cold water, but it was in the mid 70s, so we were fine. We went another mile and half up the canyon, which was OK, but nothing spectacular. On the way back, Mom thought she found a way to cross the creek without getting her paws wet, which worked fine, but there was no trail on the other side of the creek, so we had to do about an hour of bushwacking through really thick brush and downed trees. I also had to endure a lot of screaming from Schultz - he can't seem to walk on the top side of downed trees, so he panics, then screeches like a little baby, then bashes his way through, around, under or over the trees and other obstacles in his way. Mom keeps trying to teach him how to walk on trees, but I think he's afraid of heights - I know he's a really big baby! The things I have to put up with - it just isn't fair!