Well once again I just walked into the cottage and it is 9:40 pm.

Today we went to Meeteetse, Wy, Population 327 to meet with a group of people for the annual trip to Kirwin,Wy.  It has a rich history of hardship with miners and ranchers trying to make a go of the place.  It once had a sawmill, a general store, homes, and a few mines.  None of the mines panned out and the winters were harsh.  One day there was a large snow slide that destroyed one side of town and rescuers came to take the others out.  They left with the clothes on their backs and what they could carry and never came back.  After the townsfolk left the property was sold and resold until the last owner bought it and donated it to the Park Service.  As an enterprise in some form or another it lasted 85 years. It is now a ghost town that locals go to and look around and hike.  It is beautiful.  We saw deer but nothing any larger but there must be other things around because at least half of the people carried bear spray and several had pistols strapped on their hips.  I felt very safe.  At one time the family that originally owned the land also ran a dude ranch a short distance away and many famous people stayed there.  One such person was Amelia Earhart.  She loved the area so much that she had the owner file a claim for her so she could build a cabin on the mountain for a summer home.  She sent some of her belongs out to the ranch to be stored until the cabin was finished.  It  was to be a log cabin and it was started and had 4 rows of logs in place just before she took her flight around the world. As we all know she did not survive that flight. We hiked out to the site and two rows of logs have fallen apart but you can see the remaining logs and it would have been a good size cabin.  It sits at about 9,500 feet elevation.  The Kirwin site sits at about 9,200 feet. 

I was disappointed yesterday when I was short of my 10,000 step goal but I guess I shouldn't worry as I walked 15,516 steps today and about 10,000 of those were at over 9,000 feet.  That's not bad for this marsh hen.

Breakfast - whole wheat toast w/peanut butter

lunch - half ham sandwich

dinner - half hamburger no bun

snack - grapes

exercise - walked 15,516 steps.

I'm tired now....going to bed.

Hello, everyone!

It's been a rough week for me in that I am in a "high pain phase" from my cancer meds, so I am not focusing much on writing. It is easier for me to soothe myself with artwork....naturally, NOT the artwork that NEEDS to be created, but rather, simply designing my own ideas for a few pieces.

Meanwhile, I watch my calorie intake. I have been thinking about Jeannie's post on WHY we eat at night or what we don't really want but eat it anyways. It seems to me almost OBSCENE that I could be BORED. Me who always has at least six windows open in the internet with a list a yard long of projects that have deadlines coming closer and closer.

However, I have found that having legitimate snacks available, even if I do not WANT any, it helps. Also, I carry a water bottle around everywhere  or drink alot of herbal teas. Right now I am drinking hot GINGER tea made with a piece of ginger root and boiling water plus a 1/2 tsp of natural honey. I do allow myself a square or two of dark chocolate daily...milk chocolate makes me nauseous. In retrospect, I find that the heat and humidity has really affected me so that I rarely feel any need for something to eat though I KNOW, mentally, that I must eat...this has been since my surgery and I get enormous glee at this fact, considering I once weighed 431 pounds. I am now between 285 and 290...back and forth this last two weeks. But now, people are REALLY noticing the changes. A male friend told me yesterday that my complexion even GLOWS...wow.I have thirty five more pounds to lose before I can get my knees replaced.

I had lunch out twice with friends.I order from the APPETIZER menu but after a few bites, I lose interest. I try to plan ahead.  On Saturday, I will be at another lunch appointment. I have already chosen the COBB SALAD which, naturally, I will not be able to finish..I usually just eat the meat, cheese & egg and that is more than enough for me.

Breakfast: ginger tea and a piece of hard cheddar cheese

Snack: a fresh local peach

Lunch: 1/2 cup of "chili"-baked assorted beans, lentils and lean ground beef

Snack: yogurt

Dinner: small green salad with cold leftover chicken breast, nuts and seeds

Bedtime Snack: peach

I am bouncing back and forth within five pounds of my lowest weight because I've been out all week and cannot take my fluid pills on a regular basis...frustrating but I do understand how this works for my body. I have to be patient (and I am NOT a patient person).

Our son Dan and his gang returned home this week...their small plane took eleven hours with three fuel fill-ups due to severe winds from Nova Scotia to Niagara, Ontario, but they got home safely (see my FaceBook page for photos if you wish).

I am so enjoying Eileen's postings too.

I am drinking coffee and looking at counter tops online.  I need to pick something out.  We are meeting the real estate lady today and we will see what's up on the house...  We are also going to look at one more house, but I want the old crappy house. LOL.

Breakfast for me today was an egg and toast.  

Lunch will probably be soup. I have some tomatoes about to go bad so I am cooking them into some cream of tomato soup.

Dinner: we are eating out but I plan on ordering fish. 

Snacks....I have got to finish off this watermelon so all snacking will contain watermelon. 

Ladies, I hope your day is good.   Later today, I may have a little surprise post.  Maybe. 

Addendum/update

After the concert I was 1,921 steps short so I grabbed my coat and a flashlight and walked a block north then two block east and made a rectangle back where I started.  I now have walked 10,448 steps.  I startled a few rabbits and birds roosting in the trees but luckily I did not startle any deer into leaping in front of me.  Of course they are so tame they probably would have just stared at me.  Well I am going to go to bed now and hope I can  sleep so I can get up early and go back to Yellowstone National Park.  The high tomorrow there is 65 degrees, perfect for as nice long walk.

My journalism journey Part 8

During my years in Montana, I went to many interesting places. Some involved stories to cover, some were just "exploring" on my own or with my friend Roxane, who came out to Montana to visit, or we'd meet somewhere out West and vacation together.

One of the first trips was to a National Guard camp to see our local National Guard unit in action. The idea was to spend the whole day with the Guard unit, eating with them, riding around with them in tanks or Jeeps or Armored Personnel Carriers (APC) and even spending the night. But I was the first woman to be on one of these camp trips, and the Guard didn't know what to do with me overnight. Obviously (to them) I couldn't stay with the unit. Heavens, one woman couldn't be alone with all these men! (I was 5-5, 250-plus pounds ... I certainly didn't consider myself attractive ... I found my fat was armor enough to repel any guy.)

So I was put up in a hotel. And considering it was 90-plus degrees in Boise, Idaho, I was probably fortunate. It was a great place to stay; I enjoyed myself there. I just didn't get the entire National Guard experience.

But the rest of the weekend was a real eye-opener. I was flown to Boise, and then taken by helicopter to the Guard site, then by Jeep to the camp. As we were going there, the driver noticed something slithering across the road. So he got out, shot the snake, and we continued on. We'd see more of those along the way.

At the camp, I was directed to the Anaconda guys while lunch was prepared. We had spaghetti with meat sauce. I interviewed Anaconda Guardsmen while we waited. One of the Anaconda guys was cooking, so I talked to him a little bit too.

After lunch, I was assigned to ride along in an APC with some of the Anaconda guys. It was a hot and bumpy ride but I got to get the feel of what the guys went through on training. Later, I got to go in a tank and if I remember, I had my photo taken in the tank (I don't know if I still have it).

As we were waiting for the helicopter to take us back, the Guard public relations person suddenly took out her gun and shot at the ground. "Rattlesnake," she said. "It's dead now."

I had dinner with the PR woman and some of the newspaper folk who weren't staying overnight, then was taken to my hotel room for the night. That was the end of the tour. Back on the airplane to Butte, then home to Anaconda.

There were trips with the Anaconda Sportsmen's Club, too. They often transplanted various wildlife species, with the help of the Montana Department of Fish and Wildlife, from one range to another. The first such exercise was moving bighorn sheep from Lost Creek State Park to a range that didn't have a bighorn population.

The Sportsmen chased the bighorn down the mountain, herding them into a chute. There, the men put bandanas around the sheep's heads to calm them so they couldn't see what was happening. Wildlife biologists sedated the sheep, and eventually herded them onto a truck. It was fascinating. I couldn't imagine a bandana would calm a big animal like that. That was the closest I got to the bighorn sheep. I also saw similar operations with elk.

My friend Roxane, who was my roommate in college and after college, went on a few trips with me, too. I had taken an archaeology class at Western Montana College. It was supposed to be a Saturday class, but the professor only had us meet a couple Saturdays in class and then a couple of times in the field. We were allowed to pick up actual artifacts in the field because these were sites that already had been excavated.

The last class was a weekend trip, and it happened to be a weekend when Roxane was visiting me. We went to Livingston, and along the way stopped at several spots. The professor said Roxane could come with the class. The group stayed overnight at Chico Hot Springs, an old resort built over a hot springs, with a top-rated restaurant. It also happened to be my birthday weekend.

Along the way, we stopped at several archaeological sites, where the professor explained what was found there and how things were found, and what was the significance of the site. We stopped for lunch at a picnic spot. Most of the members of the group were school teachers from Butte and they were a lot of fun. The big movie at the time was "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom." So they decided to make eyeball soup. They had tomato soup and plastic eyeballs and served it up for our archaeology professor. He had a good laugh on that one.

Later, at the hotel, we had a great dinner at the restaurant, and the professor offered to give a choice of grading: We could have a test back in the classroom, or we could answer one question over after-dinner drinks and dessert. Well, of course, we all took the second choice.

On the way back, we made a stop at a buffalo jump site. Roxane and several of the teachers decided to walk to the top of the site. One of the other teachers and I stayed back. The other teacher had binoculars and was watching them up on the mountain. "Hey, they just dropped their pants and mooned us," she said. Sure enough, they did.

There are many others, and I'm sure I will remember more.