Elk Season Begins (the measurement of my days currently)

Deer season is over, but good news is that it is now elk season - for those who want an OTC hunt about an hour east of Flagstaff amidst the brambles near the lone river or the desert surrounding. Aka Roger. So far, his BFF got one, but he and his brother are still on the hunt. 

Volleyball had a good turnout this week and Rog had a good shooting day at basketball. I'm still at the gym on the regs, but he has postponed it again until he gets his elk. I also had a great swim session on Saturday, and I thought it was going to be the last one in the outdoor pool, but apparently it will be in the 90s for the next week or two. 

Roger's mom was in town to help with his sick Grandma for a bit and we managed to make it (between work schedules) to Culver's with her. It's been a while since I've been there and I was impressed with the pricing compared to some other places we've eaten recently so it might be a repeat. Especially with their concrete mixers on the menu...

That was mostly our week. Saturday for Rog was spent hunting and seeing family (while I was swimming) and I was swimming and working on some projects. Including nearly finishing Michael Stackpole's DragonCrown War trilogy which is comparable to a much shorter Wheel of Time. And Sunday was our Primary Program with snacks afterwards, so our favorite Sunday of the year. 

No Deers

 Volleyball is back underway now that the teachers (who comprise a good chunk of our regular players) are adjusting to school again. Rog and I are both going to the gym (although separate gyms since he needs other men present to motivate him and I don't make the cut). We're still paying the same as we would to go to one gym so it's evening out. 

We just got a notice that our Mazda is in trouble for not being insured currently, which means Rog and his brother Stu have to actually go forward with the transfer, so hopefully that will happen next week. And the man who's been fixing our Ford has been really busy so Roger is planning to just take it to our normal car guy now that the engine issue is resolved. And that's all on the journey to have only 3, fully functioning vehicles. 

Keeps missing as an excuse to go hunting again.

The other news is that as of now, OTC hunting is closed. Essentially, if you don't get drawn in the lottery for a tag at a specific time in a specific unit, you can buy an over the counter tag that you can fill at the beginning or end of the season - but there's a quota. So if the quota's filled before you get your deer, you're out of luck. I think the first part of this hunt ended with 3 tags left, which means that there's a chance to get a deer still when it reopens in December. But for now, no deer. (Despite my help, aka company because I did nothing to contribute.) But that's been taking up all of Roger's mornings/evenings for the last 10 days or so. 

Love the new vid, despite the missing hot Satan.

Rog's friends Joe and Tonja both have elk tags in the area and Tonja shot her bull later in the week. So while I made a solo trip to the temple, Rog was helping cut up and haul out her elk. Just in time before the winds picked up and Tonja got sick. They're taking a few days off before they come back to get their second elk. We met up later in the day for some Oreganos - who has the best fried cheese curds and a decent pazookie. 

Kelloggius Sighting

 This visit from Kelly worked out for a few reasons - the first of which is that it was a holiday and my work is having a rough time so I have to use some of my vacation days anyways. The second of which is that it's birthday week in the Hutchins household and we got to celebrate all three birthdays. 

Sunflower Szn

We celebrated Mint with a trip downtown to Art in the Park (where they had some yummy honeys and cool displays) and the oil store. Unfortunately our buddy Scotty wasn't there as he usually runs the store out in Williams now so their college employees can work at the one in town. We gave him some elk last Christmas and wanted to know his wife's opinion. 

We celebrated Hannah at the Art Walk (with free pizza and not-free gelato & fudge) and some cool displays that always get me thinking business. We listened to live music and walked through several galleries, including the community center which usually has smaller, cheaper booths for local artists but actually had some political displays this time with elections coming up. 

Not a day over 60

We celebrated Trevor at the Prescott Farmer's market (with tons of fresh produce, bakeries, jams, and food trucks). We stocked up on Habanero Jam (Rog's favorite) and ate samosas with mint chutney sauce. We made a quick Costco run while in town before heading home and canning some things. 

We canned some fruit and salsa (by hand and in smaller quantities since the orchards were robbed). Luckily, people give us lots of bags of apples and other fruits that they won't eat from the food bank that are still good, so we canned those. We froze some veggies too. We did a bunch of other little projects like making Roger & I stockings (since my old one is falling apart and Roger has only used cheap non-custom ones). It cost under $10, which I was proud of. We took a nature walk in the wildflowers, which is always gorgeous this time of year. We made it to Rog's little cousin's birthday party.

pretty flagstaff

Other honorable mention activities included freezing off a wart and experimenting with dying parts of my eyebrows so they are more visible. Jury's still out on that one. 

From the sounds of it, Kelly made it home safely (after a questionable wait for the bus). We teased her for being a "lush" since she felt like she never got out of bed (which was our couch and the ONLY place to sit). Grateful for time to hang out with her since AZ is a little farther from CO than UT and with 9 less reasons to visit. 

Apples (or not)

 Started a new gym workout and it's got me sweating. Rog forewent the gym in favor of hunting, but since he goes with his 2 buddies, they take turns actually going after the deer and it takes 3x as long. But he did say he feels like he's lost ten pounds already (which may be true with his metabolism). 

The new priority project of the week was finishing my mythology book and planning out my Roald Dahl - esque poetry book on the subject. I did finish reading the book and now I can get to part 2. Still working on Articles of Faith in my spiritual study and am kind of disappointed that it's just straight facts and not more like Jesus the Christ with some different insights. 

We had dinner with Stu and Eve when they were in town for another eye appointment and then en route to another family reunion. It was a delicious ham and potato salad. 

I planned for Kelly's arrival this weekend and also for Roger's trip to Lake Powell to catch some fish for a presentation at his fish job this month. (This time, he's only missing a 2 days of Kelly's visit rather than the whole thing lol). 

Our gain. 

We picked her up on Saturday and spent part of Sunday trekking up to Page's Lonely Dell orchards where the free fruit is plentiful (with a park's pass) and Rog's dad said the apples are ready. So we brought our buckets and met up with Roger's sisters Linn and Hannah to get some apples to sauce together and were SORELY disappointed at the lack of apples. It looked like there had been some blight to the apples because several trees were significantly pruned and all apples and buds had been eliminated entirely. 

Hunting Szn

I am increasingly aware of the limits on free time as an adult and especially with intermittent cycles of brain fog & fatigue, that makes me a little more anxious to complete projects when I'm feeling good. Like now :)

No volleyball again this week, as most of our players are teachers in town and it's prep week for back to school. The gym is still good and Rog had his first week of gym going and has a new workout program to try courtesy of yours truly (and said he was dying after the first exercise). 

However his workouts are temporarily at an end due to opening day of over the counter deer season - which he convinced his brother/boss to buy tags for and then due to FOMO, convinced himself as well. This year is high stress since it's first come, first serve until a set number of deer are killed - and the mountain road in our unit is now open instead of requiring a 2-mile hike into hunting region. So the Phoenicians are all scouring the mountain for deer. 

Roger's smug tomato face

I finished a couple books this week from my TBR pile (that I'm working on). One was Hinckley's biography. He's a funny guy and was called "The Slave" by the Twelve when he worked in their office building as a young scrub. Grampy's name is mentioned in relation to the Boston Temple site story. I also finished a couple quick reads - The Peacemaker and Clayton Christensen's Missionary book. I just have one church book left and it's Talmage's Articles of Faith, so it might take a minute. 

Despite hunting season, Roger agreed to accompany me back to the pick-your-own farm for some berries and tomatoes and corn (which he has been raving about. We also had some delicious cinnamon rolls and fudge and bought year-passes so we can go for the next 364 days.