National Park Diary: Yep, It's a Full Moon All Right!

Last night was the full/blood moon. New co-camphosts, Kenn & Linda and I sat out on lawn chairs and counted 3 shooting stars in addition to seeing the whole lunar eclipse against the grandeur of Casa Grande. I just heard from Stephanie and Steve and they made it home just fine. Stef did not say whether her nerves were shot, but hopefully she can enjoy a nice little bottle of wine and relax a little now. Steve is set for a doctor appointment later this week. Whew!

I've had the last couple of days off, so I enjoyed catching up on some sleep, a hike up the mountain to do my wash, luxuriated in another employee dinner at the Lodge, lunch & grocery shopping in Study Butte and volunteered a few hours today putting up more animal safety signs on bear boxes at the Rio Grande Campground with Stacy and Raymond. Very enjoyable!

Thinking of home always as my sister continues to recover slowly from back surgery and having a hard time dealing with my brother's passing. Love to my mom who deals with everything without being mobile and for sending me a phone card!! Whoo hoo, what a lifeline that phone card has been, allowing me to stay in touch with friends and family.

If Jaye reads this, Jaye - I had to put away my dinkly little wind chimes, too, because they were too raucous for the solitude of this campground. The kitties always wake me up about 5:30 a.m. to be fed and even then I have to tiptoe around the RV and not slam cupboards or let the microwave go "beep, beep, beep" when it heats up my food.

In this campground we seem to have had more than our share of hippies, plant people, enjoyers of pot, and rowdies! It makes life interesting when we find drug paraphernalia and have to call the rangers, or ask some really bad singers & tambourine players to pipe down a bit, or survey all the plants people bring to make sure they are not poached from the park. Never a dull moment!

Imagine my surprise when I saw Zuni's picture in the park newspaper! It must have been taken when I was a camphost at RGV a couple of years ago. Poor kitty was asleep when I saw it and held the photo up, comparing it bit by bit to make sure it really was Zuni.

A local praying mantis fills in as camphost last week. Note his watchful eyes in the photo below.

Stephanie's 'Heart-shaped" prickly pear at one of our campsites.

Mom, this is the Egg-saster that resulted when I used the "as seen on TV" Egg Stractor the other day. It is going into my white elephant gift box!! Notice it even blew the yolk right out of one of the eggs.

Remember vinegaroons from the Gila Cliff Dwellings?? Well they live in Big Bend, too. Everyone thinks they are scorpions but they do not have the stinger on their tail ends. These guys squirt a yukky vinegar-smelling substance from their tail end when threatened.