Rocky Mountain High......

9/11 A day that will be in our nation’s psyche forever. I said a little prayer for the families of those victim’s that will have even more vivid memories then the rest of us. My parents remember where they were Pearl Harbor was announced. I remember where I was when Kennedy was shot. My children will tell their kids where they were when they heard the planes had flown into the “Twin Towers.” God help us for the stories there children will have.

However, today I am glad to be alive and traveling in the beautiful Rocky Mountains with my wife Caren, and pokey, the dog. We spent the night in a 24 hour, Super Walmart, parking lot, with about 12 other “covered wagons.” I mean R.V.’s

Right before my last entry we had heard my sister-in-law, Donna was given 1-2 weeks to live. (Final stages of cancer, and now kidney failure, & lungs filling with fluids) We were scheduled to go on vacation this Thursday to British Columbia in the RV.
Some creative thinking produced, a let’s jump in the RV tonight, leave early, vacation as long as we can in Colorado, and then drive to Chicago for my brother and his children when Donna dies.

So Friday night, while I threw things in the R.V. and asked the neighbors to get our mail, and move our 2nd car around on the street so it wouldn’t be ticketed, Caren was cleaning house, & making lists. She ran back to work and worked till 8 p.m. preparing her staff for her to be gone that long. Then we worked till midnight doing everything else that showed up on a list. The next morning we were on the road with a two hour stop in “Hillcrest” for Caren to have her done. I don’t like to stereotype, but for you women readers. no explanation is necessary. And for you men, no explanation would be sufficient. (grin)

Well, Saturday found us driving up the I15, making cell phone calls to our friends and families to let them know where we were going. One of the person’s we had called, passed us a few miles later heading for her mother’s home in Hemet. (lol) We turned right at Riverside, and headed toward Palm Springs. It was the weekend and I didn’t want to deal with the traffic on the way to Vegas, but I did want to play a little poker tonight. So, we took the back way, through Amboy, on country roads, through the desert and went to Laughlin for our first night’s stop.

9 P.M. found me sitting at a 2-6 Texas Hold-em game at the Riverside Casino. I asked one of the dealers if Felicia & Glenn had been in tonight. I was really hoping to meet them. Her poker blog is one I read every day, and I wanted to tell them in person how much it meant to me and probably many others. But, alas, they had already been there for the tournament and had already left for the night.

My commitment and promise to Caren, was to play until about midnight and then get a good night sleep for the drive tomorrow. I bought in for $80. At the table were two maniacs, one desert rock, about three tourists, and me. (The other two seats were like revolving doors, people came bought in for 20-30 dollars and left as they busted.)



By eleven I had re-bought for $40 more and had seen 3 open-ended straights and two flushes never make it. I was down to my last $25 when I played a K7 suited, just for the heck of it. As usual, the table capped it, and I was half-in by the time the flop came. (7, Q,A,) rainbow. I checked, the rock bet out, everybody else folded, and I against my better judgment called. It was just me, and him, when the 4 came on the turn. I checked, he bet, and I called with only six chips left. The river was another 7, I bet, he grimaced, called, my final six. As I turned over my suck-out of three sevens, his A,Q hit the table. I think I saw his “trigger finger”, twitching, imagining, emptying every chamber of his six-gun into me.

I managed to get back up to $115 in chips, by the time the “stroke of midnight” came. Because, I lecture my daughter, on keeping her inner promises, I was compelled to get up and keep mine, even though I wanted to stay. This was a table I could triple up on, when I “catch” some cards.

It still must have been 90 degrees out when I walked to the RV at midnight. It was quite warm inside even with the fans going and windows open. After an uncomfortable night sleep, 8 a.m. found us getting up and getting the RV ready to roll, because the sun was beginning to “cook the contents” of the metal box , (which is us) that is our RV .

We crossed the “mighty Colorado river” and turned left to drive through Golden Valley, (Where Felicia & Glenn live) to catch Interstate 40 at Kingman, Arizona. With due respect to F&G & anybody else who doesn’t deserve it, Kingman seems to me, to be filled with only Truckers, Bikers, Drug Dealers, and anybody else who doesn’t want to found by the authorities. However, for me, the one redeeming thing about Kingman, is they have cheap gas, compared to California, so I always stop, and fill up keeping a vigilant look out for the local chapter of “The Hell’s angels” or another biker gang filled with criminal, trucker, drug-dealers. (grin)

Well, after safely, leaving Kingman, we drove the Interstate to Flagstaff, Arizona. I think Flagstaff is beautiful and is so unlike the rest of Arizona. (Not to say the desert isn’t beautiful, it has it’s own kind of beauty, but I am a Ocean, and Forested, Mountains kind of guy.)

We drove through Flagstaff, and stopped for lunch at Taco Bell, and filled up the RV with provisions at a Safeway store. Then hours of driving across some unique countryside that was a Navaho, and then an Apache reservation. We drove across, the “Grand Canyon” near the start of it, where it was only about 100 feet across. Then angled our way up the foothills, and the start of what will become the western slope of the Rocky Mountains. Then it came to me, like a flash of insight!!. “I am hundred’s of miles from home, but if I walk outside and take a pee, it will wash into a creek, and then the Colorado, through the Grand Canyon, past Laughlin, under the “London Bridge”, through a series of conduits, and then come out of my tap in San Diego when I fill a glass of water to drink”. “Talk about, your circle of life!! (I think I will stick to bottled water, like Caren does.)

The sun is setting, but we want to make it to see the “Four Corner’s monument” before dark.

So we push on for the top of the Rockies.......