Catching UP (Coming home early and the death of a blog-friend)

Last Friday night…

There is nothing sadder than coming home to a house that you’d left earlier in the day, all closed up for a ten day trip. The dog that’s normally at the front door, wagging his tail, so happy to see you, is at the kennel. The air inside is already stuffy as the air conditioning is off. There’s no ice tea made as the last was poured down the drain, knowing that it would only stain the pitcher if left that long. Furthermore, nothing good left in the fridge as what little was left had been given to a neighbor. I’m thirsty and thankfully there are still a few bottles of beer. This is an all too familiar situation when flying out of a Midwest airport late on a hot summer afternoon. I should have known as much when I got up in the morning and took the dog out. It was already warm and the air still and very heavy. We’d had violent weather Thursday afternoon, under a tornado watch for a short while in the late afternoon with a watch that extended till 3 AM. I was hopefully that we were going to be heading out west, but that’ll have to wait till tomorrow…

Tuesday morning…

We finally made it to Las Vegas late Saturday afternoon, a day later than planned, but also late enough that required a change in plans. Instead of going to Virginia City, we went to Death Valley. I had to get out of Vegas ASAP. That’s right, my daughter wanted to go to Death Valley and although I've been in the valley six times, all my trips have been between December and April. So, why not. It was only in the low 120s (for those on the Celsius scale, that’s around 46 or 47 degrees, which sounds cooler, until you realize that’s almost ½ way to the boiling point). The experience will give me some more stories to write about as we travel around the west and see friends. As I don’t write about family stuff here, I’ll also get to spare you the details of the wedding we’re attending next Saturday in Las Vegas.

As we haven't always had cell phone service, I haven’t been reading blogs while traveling. (I'll catch up this weekend when parked in a Vegas hotel), but one headline caught my attention this morning and I clicked over and learned of the unexpected death of guy who often commented here and on some of your blogs. Richard (Buffalodick) had a food blog and I’d enjoyed a number of his recipes. I was hoping we’d be at one of the same chili cookoffs, but I was never able to make any. Condolences to his family. Although I never got to meet him, I’ll miss his comments and insights.