From Cody, WY to Rapid City, SD is Fa-a-a-a-ar

Did you know that places are much farther apart out West than they are in the Midwest?  They must have run out of border lines or something when they drew the states out there because most of them are HUGE and square-ish, except where a river is the border, and what looks like a straight highway goes UP sometimes instead of forward.  From Cody I drove on state highways to Buffalo, WY.  We went through tiny towns, one of them had a sign that said the population was 10, and for a bit we drove on County Road 43-1/2!  No, really, there was a 1/2 on the sign.  See?  We drove through the Bighorn National Forest which, to me, looks a lot like mountains with a few trees sprinkled around but nobody asked me when they were naming stuff out there. On the outskirts of Buffalo (which looks like mostly outskirts) we came to I-90 so the speed of travel picked up and Wyoming leveled out, but it was still early evening before we got to our motel in Rapid City, South Dakota.  We had a nice big room with a palatial bathroom and free coffee in the office, but only stayed there one night.  Last time we went out west we spent 3 nights in Rapid City and felt like we'd exhausted the touristing we wanted to do there.
 







In the morning we dawdled in the room so that we arrived at the doorstep of Dakota Treasures Bead & Yarn Shop right at 10.  Durwood waited in the van while I checked it out.  Well.  Turns out she's getting out of the yarn biz so all the remaining yarn was 25% off and a little basket with a few skeins was 50% off (that basket was empty when I left).  I have to say that I went a little nuts, not as nuts as I could have gone, but fairly nuts.  Nuts enough that my supply of "mad" money was totally depleted when I exited the store with my 2 bags of yarn.  I am looking forward to knitting up each and every skein of it.  Isn't it pretty?  See?  Yarnyarnyarn!

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When I went out for the newspaper this morning I noticed that Dad's rose is budding again.  That's one of the things I like best about that rose, aside from the deep red color and strong sweet fragrance, it blooms again in the late summer/early autumn.  So pretty.  Every time I see that rose bush, blooming or not, I think of Dad.  That's a good thing.

September 3--Marquetry by Alexandre-Jean Oppenordt, Small Desk with Folding Top.  Brooke meant to put the ledger in the marquetry desk in the study but with one thing and another it didn't get there.  First Al needed his tie tied.  She was certain he could have done it himself but he seemed to like having her do it for him.  Then it was time for the twins to have breakfast.  Only a fool would leave such an important book anywhere near those sticky and destructive hands.  When they had gone off with Nanny Marie, Lulu joined her on a walk with the dogs.  She took a shower and dressed in what she called her "lady clothes," clothes that were unstained and actually matched.  They also had all their buttons.  By then the ledger was the last thing on her mind.  The lawyer, Mr. Minor, would not be amused when she confessed with a small chuckle that she seemed to have misplaced it.

Alrightly then, today is the first day I'm going to work in nearly 3 weeks.  I hope I remember the way, I hope I remember the security code, I hope I remember the safe combination.  Of course I remember all that, I'm not completely 'round the twist just yet.  Time to eat a toasted English muffin with huckleberry jam, then get showered and appropriately dressed and go to work.  Work!  And there's a paycheck waiting for me.  See, I always ask Mrs. Boss not to pay me for my last week of work before a vacation so there's one there when I get back tired and broke.  *taps temple craftily*  I'm no dummy.  Oh, and Durwood has a sinus infection.  He got some antibiotics from the doc yesterday so we're hoping he'll be on the upswing soon.  And I think my laptop's dying.  If it's not one thing, it's twelve others.  Three weeks from Saturday I leave for The Clearing.  I can not wait.
--Barbara