Takin' a Break. A Cold One.

And NO the break will not involve cracking open a crisp cool can of beer and laying back in a lawn chair to watch the sunset over the California hills. Our "cold one" will involve cracking into the world of sub zero wind chills and face freezing temperatures. We are not going to Siberia.... but close.... we are going to visit my hometown in Illinois. Since we have been enjoying the beautiful weather, beaches and scenery here in Cali for almost 6 months we thought what better way to shake it up than a road trip to Rockford in January and February?! Yee Haw!

We have not visited with my family for almost a year and a half so it is high time we make a pit stop. Even though the pit stop is over 2000 miles away. Lucky for us Hwy 80 is right outside our trailer door and it will take us about 1,950 of the necessary miles to get there. Now that is an easy route. I think we are going to head out this weekend (sans the trailer, it will stay here) and take about 4 days to drive across. As soon as we make it over the pass in Tahoe we kiss the warm weather goodbye! I love a good old school cross country peel out fully saturated with truck stop seediness, loud music on the highway and the novelty of staying in a hotel room. I can't wait to hit the road. Our route takes us through Nevada, Wyoming, Nebraska and Iowa. We have seen most all of it before but not in winter.

We will spend about a month in Illinois before heading back out here to pull the trailer back down to Carmel Valley and ready ourselves for the Spring and Summer seasons there. Even though the economy is lower than snake shit Billy is hoping to get a foothold in the Carmel art market for the future. Rudy has not yet had his fill of Dog City and I have not had my fill of knowing that I am living within miles of Clint Eastwood.

We did make it through our date at the Airstream repair shop and hopefully our leak is fixed. They caulked it up and tightened everything down. We also found out there was a recall on a part in our Dometic refrigerator and they replaced that. If you have a newer AS you should check to see if your fridge needs the fix too. It is an easy fix... only takes about 5 minutes for the tech to do it. We are going to deal with the bed platform ourselves. I did not have the patience or energy to battle out trying to get the thing replaced at the dealership. We are going to clean the whole area again and leave it set up with dehumidifiers while we are gone to totally dry it out. If the problem arises again we will have to replace the wood. And we do plan to get the mattress up and off the platform with either a box spring or some kind of foam insulation. So hopefully it will be all set.

I am off to begin the packing process. Let's see.... Eskimo Parka? Check. Ice Scraper? Check! Moon Boots? Dammit. Anyone have a pair they can loan me?

Cooooold

These are the days of crunchy cold dog walks. Since I try to get Rudy out twice a day for at least a mile or two long walk it seems like the cold is ruling my world. Our new house is toasty warm so it is a pleasure to return to after a walk but at least twice a day I have a good long session of frozen face. Today we got a light dusting of snow and it always makes town so much prettier.






These shots were taken on the plaza in late afternoon light. The light in Santa Fe is my favorite. The way it warms up an adobe wall against the blue sky and the way the trees seem to glow with it. This is a really quiet time of the year to wander downtown. The plaza is nearly deserted on on a day like this.




Once Spring and Summer hit there is barely a quiet moment to be had down there unless you head down before 8 a.m. But that is the fun of living downtown. There will be art fairs and festivals pretty much every single weekend come July.

I have been trying to land a little part time job for our time here. What a stupid, frustrating and degrading experience that is. People really do get some weird ideas about how to conduct an interview and my absolute favorite thing is when they hand you one of the ridiculous applications that asks you things like where did you go to elementary school. Because who I was as a person in the second grade obviously should have great bearing on whether or not they hire me now at age 35. I have also been asked repeatedly for a resume. People.... nobody wants to see or would understand any kind of resume I could put together. It would be like trying to solve the DaVinci Code to make any sense of it. So I will continue my search for the right niche to work in to. This is a goofy time of year here to try to find work here anyway. There is a whole lot of nothin' goin' on. If anyone reading this has an interesting business within one mile of the plaza, is not crazy or bitchy, wants to pay me a fabulous wage, needs a competent worker for 20 hours a week and does not care how I performed in 4th grade gym class... feel free to call me up. I'm yours.

I'll leave you with a shot of the Museum of Fine Art in the warm 4:30 sunlight. I love the way the adobe looks like suede or even velvet. I still need to get pics of the house that don't look like we are just squatting here to keep out of the cold. I'll post once I have some good ones.

We Tried.

Well...we made an attempt at hanging out in the trailer today and had big plans to move some stuff into it and see how everything will fit and all that. Yah. For the record, 9 degrees is still not quite where it needs to be for leisurely trailer set up. We were in there just long enough to slop the new quilt on the bed and snap a pic or two before we peeled out. The inside of an aluminum tube is very cold in 9 degree weather. It has now officially been confirmed in case there was ever any question there.
It is looking more and more like set up will have to wait until we can reach greener, warmer pastures...or until we stop being big pussies about the cold. I think the green and warm will come much sooner than the cessation of pussy-ness.

I am off to purchase a much needed chicken rug for the wee bit of kitchen floor area we have from fabulous wrapables.com. I still have not decided between the black chicken or the orange one. I really, truly feel I need BOTH chickens...but I must control and resist the urge to go down that road. There are not enough funds in the poultry rug kitty to maintain such a rich style of living.

I swear on my mittens and chapstick... the first day we hit 30 degrees I am in there for some serious set up. Until then, we remain somewhat defeated in the brutal grip of February 2007.