More on the Great Unconformity

My husband has emailed at least 50 individuals about our visit to the Great Unconformity Interpretive Site a couple of days ago. He sent them this link as well.

He has received many responses from people whose interests range from actually having initiated and carried through with work on the site to Boy Scout leaders who have organized and taken part in countless cleanups. In the words of George Knapp of Channel 8 News "We’ve been reporting on the vandalism at the Great Unconformity for the past two years. You can still see the story scripts on our website. Our stories inspired a couple of cleanup efforts but the vandals keep returning. No agency has the budget for 24 hour surveillance of the area, unfortunately".

Most have responded with genuine thanks and encouragement to contact additional resources--they gave him information on more people and organizations to contact, and also passed his email along to others. In all, we've seen that many folks want to clean up and then continue to help keep the place nice.

As we understand it so far, unless the area can be secured, it's just going to continue to be a problem (We were afraid to leave the car there that day!). We were told that the Metropolitan Police Department does not have jurisdiction there. Does this mean that it would take a Federal Marshal to be able to arrest vandals?

The vandalism really makes me wonder about the bad in some people, but the good in most others is very heartening. It's a good feeling to know that so many want to take care of this amazing area...it was so heartbreaking a couple of days ago.

The Great Unconformity

For quite some time, I've been wanting to visit this geological wonder, the Great Unconformity. It's only eleven or so miles from our house, yet we hadn't ventured out there yet, until today. I was very excited. I've been studying the Frenchman Mountain Great Unconformity website . I loved reading about how the community, the BLM, the Boy Scouts, and Stephen Rowland, Professor of Geology at UNLV worked so hard to make this highly interesting place an inviting one to visit and learn from.

What my husband and I found there was, to say the least, disheartening. I know the website told of problems of beer bottles and graffiti, but I wasn't ready for what we saw. People (should I really call them that?) have completely destroyed thousands of dollars and many precious hours worth of hard work. What's up with that? There are exclusive neighborhoods nearby, yet this seems to be a place to park, build campfires and drink. You would think that the police would be able to check this place out once in a while. There's so much trash and graffiti that it's unreal!

Please click on my flickr page or the flickr box in the right column of this page to see today's pictures. They are in the "Friends, Trips, Etc." set of photos. Also today we went up the road a little to Rainbow Gardens and took the Lava Butte trail behind Frenchman Mountain. It was a wild ride at times, but it was gorgeous! There are photos from that as well on flickr.

The area itself, all in all, is still beautiful. It's amazing to actually walk on Precambrian granite and schist that formed deep within the earth's crust 1.7 billion years ago.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Here's a Maxine cartoon that a friend shared with me--I must admit that it's SO me:


I'm extremely lucky to live with people who love to cook, and what's more, they're good at it, too! I'm thankful for my family and friends and miss all of you that I'm far away from, very much. I wish you all a wonderful, happy Thanksgiving Day!

To Reassure Natalie

Elbie and Mr. Nothing were catnapping and looked cute, so I bothered them with the little flashing box thingy.

Shoulder Surgery

Dang it! My shoulder's been hurting for a while, and I now know why. There's a tear in the rotator cuff. So...no more using the right arm for much until it's better. The surgery will be on December 7. I'm not exactly sure how the injury happened, but maybe it was too much of this:



Maybe not... :-)

On Vacation!

It's been a LONG TIME since I've blogged. So much has happened, and I have many pictures to prove it! I'll post those at a future time, but soon.

Here are some for now:
The first one is from my trip yesterday to the Ethel M's Candy Factory and Cactus Garden. I've put pictures of this place from 2 years ago on this blog, but I took these yesterday morning. I think they're kind of interesting because they have the Christmas lights strung on them already. I especially liked the skeletons of the saguaro catcus. We saw the lights two years ago when E, my eldest, was here. Maybe we'll go this year again.
The second is from when I arrived home from Ethel M's. The flowers that Hubby has been watering and feeding ever since last Valentine's Day are now blooming beautifully! He's become quite the cactus and aloe vera gardener, as well. Henry the Dog was in the courtyard, smiling for his photos. There's also one of Hubby, on the phone with some sort of work business as he makes his way towards the office (like that place that I'm on vacation from!)


Since I'm on vacation and spending it at home, I'm going to do some things that I don't normally get to do. Things like, well, blog, for one. Also, I've been catching up on email accounts that I've forgotten to check. That's been fun.

I've also been thinking about how long it's been since I've been back to Texas--almost 2 years! We were planning to go during this vacation time, but have since decided to wait until the spring--maybe during Fiesta! That would be fun. There are so many things like that--where I want Hubby to see and/or experience. I miss my son who is living in San Antonio now. My mom and stepdad, and my sister and nephew are all there, as well. My other sister and her family are still in New Braunfels, but they spend a lot of time in SA because of little J's doctor visits.

We also plan to go to Arkansas during our springtime trip. I'm excited to meet Hubby's mom, his sister and her family, as well as other friends and family there. I know he has places and things to show me, too.

Uh oh, Hubby has some dinner ready--smells good--gotta go!