Crabby, Crabby, Crabs

We headed over to Newport/Yaquina Bay on Sunday, hoping to score some fantastic Fall Crab. Hubby was delighted to get out his big boat and get us all in.This Little Crabby Crab tried to make an escape and hide. He dropped into one of the cup holders and worked his way down as deep as possible.
I picked him up and dumped him into the drink. Silly Crabby Crab. Don't you know you can't hide there?

My Granddaughter (yes...that's right...um...she's my step-granddaughter) had never been crabbing before, so she enjoyed the challenge of grabbing Crabby Crabs.

View from the frontof the boat, looking West. toward the Pacific Ocean. The Yaquina Bay Bridge was very beautiful and the bay water was calm. Ahhh.

Rocky Moutain High...in Colorado

Flew to Colorado for a long weekend with my beautiful daughter, Malory. She's attending CSU in Ft. Collins. We buzzed all over, doing as much as possible in 4 days as we could! RMNP was on our list of to-dos. Malory ran in a 5K race while I was in CO. It was great to see her run competitively, as it'd been almost a year since she'd competed.This is her new boyfriend, Bobby. He's MUCH cuter than he appears in this photo, and I SWEAR Malory is being an absolute dork. She hates when I take her picture.
The squirrels were very friendly on campus.
The dorm food is nothing like when we were in college! Fresh fruit, huge salad bar, Mongolian grill, pasta bar, wraps, Mexican bar....

Malory (right) with her new friend, Jane. Jane is from Philadelphia and she and Mal hit it off instantly in the dorms.Alberta Falls, up in Glacier Gorge. It was only a 1 mile hike in, so we were doing fine...except that we were at 8800 feet and quite winded.Looking up a ridge during one of our hikes. We had driven along a high road to get here. You can see a road sign at the bottom.On the plane, flying home. The Rockies were covered with snow as I left. A storm had hit while we were out there!

I cried while I slept in my hotel room that last night, knowing it'd been quite awhile before I'd see her again.

Oh, man! What a Debate!

Maybe it's because I'm old enough, now, to understand many of the issues that are a part of our everyday, American lives.
I'm having a hard time grasping all of the worry over the bail-out/stock market issues, as I'm just a lowly educator with few investments. No matter what, I realize that I will still always get up in the morning, drink my coffee, read my local paper, care for my teens, drive to work, feed my dogs, ride my bike, geocache, and plan on small vacations with my Wonderful Husband...regardless of who is in office.
But, my passion keeps me from staying quiet.
I ABSOLUTELY love Barack Obama.
I love his voice.
I love his ideas.
I love his youth.
I love his background.
I love his views.
After tonight's debate, I truly see that my feelings and passions are viable.
I think I hear a man speaking who GETS IT and will make life better, somehow.
When I think of Grandpa McCain in office, I get a few weird thoughts running through my head, such as:
Is it OK to have a president who cannot raise his hands above his head?
Can I stand to listen to his crackly voice?
At what point will I scream when I hear Sarah Palin's whiny, stupid words?
How can Americans elect a man who is slightly vicious? (I really do believe there is a deep evil lurking below the surface.)

My son is now 16. He and I had an interesting discussion this morning on the way into town. I said, "Do you realize that G.W. Bush has been president for 1/2 of your life and W.J.Clinton was president for the other 1/2 of you life?"
He replied, "Wow. I guess I have very little memory of Bill Clinton as president. I've just grown accustomed to hearing how stupid the American president is. I haven't known anything different."
I said, "Hopefully, that will change..."

Heading to Colorado!

I can't wait to see my Beautiful Daughter next week! It's been about 7 weeks, maybe 8, since we last hugged and I'm missing her SO MUCH!

I've loaded 300 geocaches into my GPSr and am hoping a friend will come and show me how to load information onto my Palm so that I can go completely freely, with no worries! I know there will be significant amounts of "down-time" while I'm visiting, as I've opted out of registering for all of the campus events set up for "Parents Weekend." It's not only too darned expensive, but it's also just not us. We'll travel around, hike, bike, and eat some fantastic foods...and then, I'll hit some geocaches and take a lot of photos!