Spider Poop

Owning and operating a lodge can have some disgusting chores.  Today, I took an old broom and spent several hours outside sweeping spider webs off rafters, wood log siding, light fixtures, and railings.  Summer time is spider time and there is nothing they won't spin their death traps on. Several victims dangled from torn webbing.  As I reached up with the broom from my ladder, I tried to dodge the falling debris.  I'm sure I will be itching the rest of the day.
As I was working today, I noticed little spots on the wood siding and all over my newly painted front porch that wouldn't brush off.  I wondered if it was spider poop or diarrhea from terrified victims. Thanks to google, I know it is spider poop and that it is very hard to clean up. Now, I just find that rude to poop all over someone's property.  I hope I don't have to do this job again until next year.
I really hope I don't dream about being trapped in a spider web tonight.

Is Your GPS Making You Stupid?

Those GPS devices or mapping apps can be quite helpful, unless they tell you to drive off a cliff to get to your destination.  When Jim and I were in Germany last year, our GPS led us off road, but thanks to Jim's sense of direction found an alternative route to get us where we needed to go, no thanks to modern technology.
We find it amusing and somewhat alarming, when people stop at our lodge and insist that this must be where they are lodging because their GPS directed them here.  Just yesterday, as I was out emptying trash, a car pulled up to me and asked if this was the motel.  This was a new one!  I wanted to ask him if this looked like a motel, but I bridled my tongue and asked him where they had reservations.  They were supposed to check in with Kevin.  No Kevin here.  Finally, the wife, face glued to her GPS, said they were looking for the Greer Lodge check in and this MUST be it because her device told her so.  I lost a bit of tethering on my tongue and responded that this was the White Mountain Lodge, just as the large sign says, pointing to the huge sign they passed driving on to the property.  I instructed the driver how to get to their destination while the navigator continued staring at her device that could not be wrong.

Catch of the Day

Our nearly 4 month old lab loves her walks on forest trails and dirt roads.  Every walk is an adventure and you never know what her keen senses will find.  Some days it's a new stick, a pine cone to shred, a discarded water bottle to crunch on, a squirrel to chase up a tree.  The other finds I can do without: the dead snake in the road, proudly carried all the way home; dead birds, dead field mice....basically anything dead.  It's such a struggle getting it out of her mouth, so I've decided she's part vulture and I'm just letting her eat the dead thing.  I'm disappointed she has such poor taste and standards in food.

Jim's SRP

We love the wildlife, but some of it we don't want in our backyard, nesting in the woodpile, digging up the new lawn, etc.  So I bought this friendly trap (is that a contradiction of terms?) called "Have a Heart".  Jim puts a big blob of peanut butter on the trigger mechanism and when the critter begins eating, the doors close.  Then, Jim drives out about 5 miles and releases it.  I have named this the SRP (for you Phoenix folks, this does not stand for the Salt River Project), the Squirrel Relocation Program.  We've relocated 8 over the past month.  We're hoping it's not the same squirrel making it back to our place for the peanut butter.  If it is, I think we should try squirrel stew.
Game and Fish recently stocked the streams with trout and Jim has been having fun catching and releasing, catching and eating, or now catching and relocating....another wildlife program called TRP; Trout Relocation Program.  There's a pool Jim has discovered that, after stocking, has a large number of fish.  Jim thinks it would be better for the fish if they were dispersed more evenly through out the stream, so he takes along a bucket, catches them and relocates them along other parts of the stream.

a Grand View

From the top of the ski lift at Sunrise is a stunning panoramic view of hills and valleys, trees and lakes, clouds and rain showers miles away.  The ski resort has a host of summer activities, one of them being a chair lift pass for the day.  Some people ride up, get off, look around, take a few photos and head back down.  Others ride up, and after the photo ops choose a run or a trail to hike back to the bottom.  The truly adventurous, bring or rent a mountain bike and put it on the bike rack on the back of the chairlift.  Some friends and I watched several groups of adventurers disembark.  All had helmets, most with chin guards, most had shin or knee pads, and elbow pads, and my personal favorite had a football jersey on over full pads.  There are 10 or more trails to choose from that range from easy to black diamond.  On our way down the mountain on the chair lift, we watched a couple bikers traverse the black diamond run beneath us.  It was impressive to say the least.  That is not on my bucket list!  However....a zip line is coming this fall and I plan to be back to cross that off my list!

Fabulous Flowers

Greer has had so much rain this summer that locals say it is the greenest they've seen it.  It truly is lovely here and wildflowers of every color are making a grand show.  I love the intricate design of every flower.  I would show you a photo of my first rose that bloomed that I planted this spring, but it never had a photo opportunity.  As I leaned down to ooh and aah over the pure white petals, Zella, the now 30 pound lab puppy, pounced and ripped it off the stem.  Today, on our walk she attacked a big fuzzy dandelion and wasn't as happy to have a mouth full of fuzz as she appeared with my rose petals.  And I thought I was going to have to be concerned about all the wild critters eating my flowers...oh, wait...a 3 month old puppy named Zella is a wild critter!