A Big Texas Farwell

Last week's Van horn excursion brought us to the Tortilleria once again for the weekly snack of bean burritos and our pick up of fresh tortillas for the week. This time though we were accompanied by the hack site girls from the Baeza site. We took the biggest table in the little joint and chatted with one another about our sites and home life while gorging ourselves on the savory Mexican cuisine.

After our day in town, which always feels like a luxury, I felt the need to get out on the ranch again to take in the beauty of my surroundings. I decided to take the loop we had once taken our first week here, the one that never seemed to end and we happened to lack all of the necessary replenishing fluids. Well, this time I made sure to have a full, ice cold water bottle because I would be embarking on this journey alone.

I left Halley in her sleepy state and wrote a not just in case she wished to meet up with me from the other direction; or you know she could at least find my corpse frying somewhere along the road when I never returned. The first past of my walk, my eyes were glued to the ground looking for arrowheads and other interesting minerals along the way. As the sun rose up and its rays reached into the 100s much of my energy was expelled by simply bending down and looking at a stone. It wasn't until I found a perfectly preserved frog that had been dried out by the intense heat that I looked back and realized that I had barely made any progress from the door of the tin shack. I dropped the petrified frog into the pocket of my shit and told myself that if I wanted make it all the way I was going to have to pick up the pace, keep my eyes up and ration what water I had left. So I continued on what, like last time, felt like the longest journey ever; I was on some weird pilgrimage that would never end.

After pushing myself to go on, I finally made it to the water tank at the top of the hill. I could see the house from there, but having traveled this road before I knew that although my destination was in sight, I was still a few miles away. I took a big swig of my now close to boiling water, the metal bottle cooking my fingers as I held it up to my lips. Halley wasn't in site, I would have to mike back on my own. In order to boost my morale in the the blistering heat I began to sing some songs; and if anyone knows me well enough they know that the only songs that I know all the words to are Disney tunes. So there I was, stumbling along with my tube top ties around my head like a turban, my cotton button up tied up under my chest like a cowgirl and songs like "Once Upon a December," "Kiss the Girl" and "A Whole New World" came flying from my lips with what seemed like an alcoholic induced manner.

When my voice became too parched to sing any longer, I heard a "Hey there" and I looked up to see Halley in front of me; and no it wasn't a mirage. She had woken up to do some yoga and then headed out to join up with me. Man was I glad to see her; it definitely made the last mile or so seem to pass on by much faster. When we returned , I placed my frog friend with my treasured rock collection on the front porch and headed for bed.

After a quick snooze we were off to the site again to see what Brian had set up for us that morning. Our young falcons yet again were being put to the test. The adult pair that showed up last year and somewhat adopted the young falcons were back again this year but doing just the opposite. The adults were showing up at the site to feed and then scaring away the only two falcons we had left. Brian suggested that the most likely cause for this change of heart was that last year, the young falcons outnumbered the adults and now that there were only two they could take advantage of them, bully them. In order to coax the young falcons into returning to the towers Brian put up movable hack boards behind our blind. We would start zip tying quail in these hack boards in hopes that maybe RZ and AU would come back to feed. If not though, the site would close. It was like that horror movie "The Ring." Brian told us (imagine a creepy voice), "You have seven days." Okay, well he told use that we had eight days to see the falcons, but seven sounds more like the movie.

The next morning we woke up and started to pack the car for the early shift at the site when I saw something hopping in the grass right by the porch. It was big green speckled frog. I picked him up to get a better look and then for some reason my eyes glanced at the porch to where my rock collection stood, but there was something missing... the dried frog! He had come back to life and I was holding the magical creature in my hands right then. Well, in all seriousness, something probably took it in the middle of the night and then I happened to come across different frog the next morning; but the other way sounds much cooler. I hope the coyote leg we have on our porch doesn't suddenly start hopping around; that would be weird.

All magical happenings aside, we were off to the site to sit for hours watching the adult pair feed on the towers and then linger around as if guarding the queen. It was only day seven but we were already a tad bit worried that the young falcons would never show up, especially with such relentless bullies on guard. So that afternoon we headed to the ranch house to make some calls home in warning of our possible hasty upheaval. We had both already bought our plane tickets by then so the new wasn't too exciting to each party on either end.

After feeling a little down about the whole situation, we headed back over the dusty roads and cattle guards to the tin shack. in passing a large bush on our way, just after closing a gate, a bird frantically flew out in front of us. not just any bird though, one of our falcons! We were so thrilled to see him that we called Brian that night with our exciting news. Man, what a magical day - right out of Harry Potter, well not quite.

That night it was like mother nature wanted to whip all the magic right out of us. the winds were whirling so strongly around our house that Halley was convinced there was tornado. The shutters covering the window (on the inside) by here bed just wouldn't stay closed; a big gust would come by and rip them open again and again. In her sleepy state, it didn't come to here to just close the actual window, so the next thing I knew there was a high pitched screeching sound beside me because she was dragging her metal bed across the concrete floor to hold the shutters closed. Halley's bed was on an adventure ride all night.

With little sleep we woke the next day to move crazy weather. We watched from our truck at lightning bolts filled the skies above the site striking in every which way you could imagine. When it seemed like things were dying down a bit we cautiously stumbled out of the truck to grab the two moveable hack boards Brian had put up (which were now toppled over) and threw them in the bed. We propped up the hack boards near the siting we had that previous day. We tied some food up and hoped for the best.

Another night of raging winds and another day of no falcons. I began to spend the majority of my time working on the training video I was supposed to be creating, and now knew there might be very little time left to complete it. Jose and Artemeo got a kick out of watching me follow Halley around with the camera. I wanted to get a shot of her driving off and they stood there giggling to themselves as I ran after Halley telling her to stop.

It had been a few days since we had seen the young falcon and it had been over a week since we had seen either one feed. Brian dropped by the site to deliver the news that they were going to shut down the site. What a bummer. It was hard for me to believe this was all happening. Last year Christine and I had released 26 birds and had 18 success stories; this year we were left with not one. I guess it's all part of being in this field. Projects like this are a struggle, and it takes lots of time and lots of losses to bring a population back.

Well, Brian gave us a few days to write up our reports and pack up the site and our belongings so we figured we'd make the most of it.

We took a trip over to the Baeza site so that I could get some taping of actual birds. We left a not for the girls and then spent an hour or so tryign to get out to the highway from the back of their site. Well, it didn't work and by the time we back tracked our steps the girls were back and we were able to say our good-byes in person. With all of the experimental driving, we somehow got a nail lodged in the tire so we couldn't stay long. We headed off to Van Horn where we found Mike's Tire Shop and our new dear friend Popeye. At first Popeye looked like a terrifying fellow... teeth missing, leathery skin crinkled all around, clothes covered in oil and grime; but once we got to taking to him (from what we could understand) he was a endearing jokester. He told us they called him Popeye because of this voice but I think he sounded more like that kid from "The Little Rascals;" Froggy I believe. Well, we headed off promising to honk and yell "Popeye" every time we passed.

Today we're off to the Guatalupe Mountains and Carlsbad Caverns; where I hope this time I can see the bats whirl their way out in a big smoke stack. I'm sorry that the blog is ending early this year, but I hope you've enjoyed reading as much as I've enjoyed writing. Although my time in West Texas this time around was shourt, it was no less rewarding. Until my next adventure... Adios Texas! See you soon everyone!

The Simple Things

I hope I'm not too much of a snore this week, but life has been quite simple.

The night of returning home from our weekly Van Horn outing brought about one of our most beloved friends at the tin shack. Hector, our friendly neighborhood bull snake, was hanging out on the porch about to muscle his way into one of his favorite spots; the underside of our window pane. Well, we heard what sounded like a hissing sound and then saw hector flinch and retreat. The culprit then stuck its head out. A bull snake much smaller than hector had already claimed his special place. We dubbed her Sylvia. Sylvia we believe was really in love with Hector, but just playing hard to get. she chased him around the front porch, while he attempted a variety of ways to ascend the building most likely just to get away from her. All of his approaches were futile and were punctuated with a big thud upon the cement floor. Poor Hector, I'll let you know more about his whereabouts a little later on.

Usually snakes aren't in the forefront of someones mind when you think about the word "entertainment." Maybe the radio seems to fit more appropriately. Well, we don't like to think about that too much down here. Halley and I receive one station; NPR. now it is nice to know what's going on in the world, but because of the segment called "All Things Considered" we have memorized everything that's going on. You can only listen about Obama's one-day trip to Ghana so many times.

Without luxuries like a radio (or you know, electricity), we have found pleasure in the simple things. Like for instance, the mouse that keeps us up all night ate a small hole in our bag of garlic pepper. Normally one might be angry at an act like this and just throw the bad away, but not us; we put the idea of contracting a disease in the back of our minds and instead use the hole as a shaker. See, if the mouse hadn't been so kind to nibble on everything we wouldn't be able to have the perfect amount of garlic pepper sprinkled on top of every meal.

Besides the happenings inside the house and inside our tummies, we have taken up a great enjoyment in star gazing. We had just one of the most beautiful nights sitting in the back of the pick up. It was as if someone had taken a bucket of glitter and tossed it across the night sky; every star seemed to twinkle with more veracity than the next. Maybe a taste of wine enhanced the experience, but even without, it was still magical.

Later that night, while I was fast asleep, Halley woke up to the sound of an owl call. The next morning we feared the worse when neither of our two remaining birds showed up for their feeding. We ended up calling Brian to let him know the status, and we all decided that we'd wait until that night's feeding before we made any assumptions.

To take our mind off our reign of bad luck, we took a trip over to the Baeza site. After stopping at the Means and getting a handful of confusing directions, we headed off, with watermelon in tow, to find the dirt roads connecting the two sites. Even though we ended up ditching the directions, and making a few eany-meany-miney-mo's to pick which way to turn, we finally made it to the Baeza hack site.

Charlie came to greet us and introduced us to her two partners, Blaire from Washington and Kelly from I believe Missouri. We hung around at the site, had a few sloppy mouth fulls of watermelon, and chit-chatted about how they were enjoying their site thus far. It wasn't too long before we started hearing horror stories about their hous which made our shack seem like a four star hotel. Thanks to Artemeo, our little tin shack was fummigated before we arrived to cut down on the amount of creepy cralies popping in and out of our many cracks. Well, I guess they weren't so lucky. I would take no electricity any day in comparison to what they've been sleeping in. It seems that the Baeza house has an infestation of spiders and scorpions. These are well equiped little bugs and they have been showing these girls whose boss. Charlie has been bitten by a large spider, and Blaire has been stung by a scorpion. She even felt another scorpion crawling up her arm when she was sleeping. My goodness, and only within the first couple of days at her site.

On a good note, after making our way home on the maze of dirt roads connecting the two sites, we heaved a big sigh of relief when RZ and AU returned for their night feeding. Brian was just as pleased as we were.

Our hearts were filled with bliss once again, this time in the form of another real shower at the Means' guest house. Clean and ellated, we headed off home like any other night. Halley drove because it was dark by that time and my one contact focus isn't that great when the sun is no more. So we were riding along, cautious as always but at a pretty decent speed, showing our knowledge of each turn and bump. Then, "Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhhhh!" Halley slammed on the breaks and I went flying into the windshield, plastering my face upon the glass like the bugs on the other side. Then a little tap against what seemed like nothing until I peeled my face off the window and my eyes re-entered my skull to see the two glowing eyes of the cow parked right in front of us. Wow, that was a close call, but I guess the cow didn't think so. She stood there for a moment and walked off casually as if to say, "Gosh, wait a second. I'm movin'. I'm movin'."

So after that cool night (temperature wise) we had a scorcher awaiting us. The past few days had indeed been hot, very hot, with thermometer readings of 100 degrees Farenheit and above. This day though took the cake. Without rain for over a week, the air filled with dust with the slightest breeze. The breeze itself wasn't welcoming either; it was like opening up an oven to check on something and letting the warmth blow on your face. Even walking to the bathroom was no small feat.

The next day matched the previous and bathroom trips became a tortureous routine. This time was slightly different; let me just say that I never knew I would spend so much time in a blistering hot port-a-potty. And no, not for the many possible scenarioes that just entered your head. Remember Hector? Well, Hector decided to move to the crapper. And so the story goes...

I had already made the walk of doom for the day, when Halley called for me across the way. I guess when she was about to mount the seat, she heard something move beneath her feet. We made our yells through the smells, but Hector didn't care because he had a home there. We took a little walk to find a yucca stalk, then we made our way back to try a second attack. We gave Hector a nudge but he just wouldn't budge. Well Halley just had ate and could no longer wait. So she just had to grit her teeth and bear, and drop a new house warming gift into Hector's new lair.

Well, no snake bites on the bum yet. I hope I didn't gross anyone out too much. Enjoy your snake free bathrooms and I'll talk to you again soon. Sssssssssssee ya later.

Mice, Owls and Bulls... Oh my!

So after we dropped Charlie off last time we were in town, Halley and I finally began our own, true Texas adventure.

And it began with a malady off creatures. Halley had seen a large avian silhouette soar around and land in the tree of life when we were out for our nightly facial scrubs, so we decided it might be a good idea to take a stroll around the trunk of the big 'ole tree and take a gander up at the branches above...

Now lets take a moment here to back track to last week's entry when I mentioned an extremely consistent king bird whom decided it was best to wake us up in the very early hours of the morning. I can't count how many awful thoughts and words were thrown at this bird and even a few stones were literally thrown in his direction on a few occasions, but none of those actions were meant full-heartily but more or less out of lack of sleep and frustration...

Well, back to the stroll around the tree looking for a large bird from beneath, and there he was; just lying there as if the gods had answered our prayers and yet my worse nightmare. The poor, helpless little king bird lay motionless beneath the tree of life. I shall held my tongue next time when thinking such ill thoughts of another. Putting aside my guilt for a moment, the bird's death also brought about some questions: how exactly did he die? An owl? The windmill? Who knows, but I definitely felt like I had some input.

From the flying to the feasting. I don't remember if I have mentioned our little friend whom once made our propane stove his humble home, but we thought that his eviction would send him packing. I guess he's one of the chain yourself to a tree sort of fellas' because he's not leaving anytime soon. If you haven't guessed yet, we've got a mouse problem, but he's such a tiny, cute little mousy. And if you couldn't tell, he's one of those animals that just immediately evokes baby-talk whenever you see him. Well, we haven't been able to figure out his escape routes until the other night. I don't know if anyone has watched "Snake woman" on YouTube, because this is the mouse version. He is the king of contortionists among his fellow mice mates. Halley watched him, while she was lying in bed, make his way out of the most minuscule crack in the wall. His body just distorting itself in all which ways to squeeze through. We were very impressed until he b-lined it to the slightly opened lid of a large Tupperware container encasing all of our food. Well I'll tell you, that mouse sure does put on a show and then steals the seat right out from under your bum.

With our guilty king bird-killing consciences and late-night mouse shooing, the next release came before we could even put our feet back on the ground. Another release, just a few days after having our first one, we knew it was going to be rough but it proved to be brutal. the only incentives pushing us through the day were an offer from Brian to have the following night off for the 4Th of July festivities, and a real shower head, tile floored, electricity lit shower at the ranch house. What a way to spend a 21st birthday huh? Poor Halley, we were so exhausted by the time we got home that night we didn't even have the energy for a glass of wine.

It was the 4Th of July and we were hoping to finally celebrate Halley's 21st in style. After the morning shift at the site, we rushed home to put on some clean clothes for the out side world. (Well, cleaner than the rest.) We hopped in our truck and headed off in a hurry, making sure we didn't miss anything exciting on the itinerary. The drive seemed to take forever, but we finally arrived to Fort Davis to find the town bustling with people. We wanted to watch the bank robbery reenactment but were too late to see much of anything than the backs of people's heads, so we decided to hit all of the booths first.

Half of the booths were food and the lines were outrageous so that was our of the question, but I don't think I would really want a fried pickle spear anyhow. We then did a loop around all of the other tents which mostly consisted of extremely large, gaudy jewelry and lots of crosses. Crosses out of wood, metal... crosses on hats, shirts; I think you get the picture. I think we did more people watching than merchandise browsing.

There were quite a few people to watch, lost of interesting folk attracted to this event whom all seemed to be constantly eating, so we built up quite an appetite. We got some take out pizza and downed the entire thing and then thought we should explore some more. As we walked down the street we couldn't help but to stop and get a little ice cream. By the time we walked back out the front doors of the store we realized that there's no such thing as "a little" here. I guess that's where the phrase "Every thing's bigger in Texas" comes from. There had to have been a pint's worth of ice cream on those cones; incredible!

After eating ourselves to the state of nausea, we drove around in the sudden down pour to see if there was anything indoors of interest. We saw a little museum that said, "Poisonous snakes and other reptiles" and immediately pulled in. We walked in the run-down little structure to find two men at the desk in front. One, with weathered skin and a torn up old cowboy hat, stood up, smiled a toothless grin and pointed up with an ET finger at a sign above him which listed costs of admissions. We politely smiled and booked it out of there as fast as we could. I felt like I was in one of those Chevy Chase family vacation movies.

We deserted the reptile museum and we deserted the town as well. We ended up calling Brian, as we stopped for gas, letting him know that we would be back for the evening shift so he didn't need to fill in for us. He told us that he would stop by anyways just to check on the birds since we hadn't seen many of them lately.

Later that night Brian showed up and did a walk around the site. We cringed when we saw him bend down to pick up something because believe me, it's usually not a good sign. When he reached us we both took a sigh of relief seeing that he wasn't carrying anything, but our breath was soon swept away again when he dipped his hand in his pocket and pulled out a small metal piece. It was a band of one of our birds; 9S to be exact. She hadn't even made it through her first night out of the box. At that moment it was confirmed, we had owl problems.

Brian was just as upset as we were. He decided to stay the night to see what he could do about the current situation.

As we drove away from the site we started noticing a bunch of storm clouds rolling in from all around us. Lightning was already striking down back at the site and we worried a bit for Brian's safety; we knew that he was too strong-willed to have a little bit of life threatening lightning get in his way. We went to sleep that night, mourning over the falcons we had lost and hoping the ones we had left would be okay.

At about four in the morning my eyelids flicked open to a huge crack of thunder that seemed to consume our little house. I said "Halleeeey?" seeing if she was awake. A quick response of "A hunhhh?" "Let's go to the truck." I don't think anyone could have responded any quicker; Halley sprung out of her bed like a catapult and flew to the door.

We ended up spending about an hour in the truck occasionally being temporarily blinded by flashed of lightning that were so close we couldn't even pinpoint their whereabouts. I was eventually exhausted and decided it was probably mostly done with by then, so we returned to our beds. About an hour later there was another huge crack of thunder to wake me from my slumber, and this time Halley asked if we should head for the truck again. I feel bad about this now, but I think I said something of the sort that I would rather just die because I'm too tired. I managed to pass out right after, leaving Halley stuck in her bed, trembling with her sheets pulled up over her head.

The storms lasted until about eleven that morning; I don't think Halley thought they would ever end while on the other hand I enjoyed the extra hours of shut eye. When Brian turned up again that afternoon; we found out that he had been there, through the storms and all, until four A.M. He also said that he was sorry to tell us that he most definitely heard a falcon being killed during the chaos of the night. This would mark the beginning of the owl hunt.

Not too long after we bid good luck to Brian that two more white trucks pulled around the bend. It was Angel and Paul to join in on the hunt. When Halley and I went to the site that evening there weren't too many falcons to watch so the three biologists became our main source of entertainment.

We would watch them through our scope as they descended a rocky slope and returned to their individual pick ups. All three trucks in a line and all three men in the beds, postured in their own personal way. Then they corralled together for a bit, grabbed their weaponry and the three amigos were off yet again to hike up another rocky slope. As we took the quail down off of one of the towers we heard a POP! POP! POP! The deed was done.

Over the next few days the biologists were still abound. They spent nights calling for other possible owls, and morning scaling new territories where they might be skulking. Halley and I spend more time at site hoping more falcons would return but were only left with two males; seven falcons were assumed dead.

Our site visits are long and depressing; the only thing that seems to lift our spirits now is when the cows test out our electric fence.

Speaking of cows, I have one last short story that will hopefully lift your spirits. I was walking to the site alone because Halley had gone to the ranch house to make a few calls and pick up some more quail. It was muy caliente that day and I hoped I was hallucinating when I saw a massive black blur in the road up ahead of me. As I walked on, the blur morphed into probably the largest, bulkiest bull I had ever seen. We started playing a weird game of red light, green light. If I walked a few steps he would stop and stare, but if I stopped he would then start muscling his way towards me. It was sort of silly and laughable until he was about 20 feet from me and we were still playing. I strapped my chacos a bit tighter, just in case there was a need for escape, and started yelling at him. For a moment we both stood there and I pictured my own version of running with the bulls, which should in my mind be referred to as running from the bulls. Finally, after what seemed like forever, the big fella moaned and groaned, and stepped off the road making his way around me to once again return to the path of least resistance. What a bull.

Thanks for tuning in everyone. Hope you're enjoying the trees, the swimming spots and the nice long showers because I know we're already missing them. We'll catch up again real soon. I send my love.

Falcon Fever

Well, I guess I just can't get enough. Here I am back again for another season, and of course for your entertainment.

Our flight in the morning went by pretty smoothly form Bradley to Atlanta, then I woke up on our trip to El Paso looking at lightning through the plane's windows. We were greeted by Paul at the airport and started heading off to our site, or what we thought was going to be our site. After some small talk, Paul brought up, "So, did you hear about the site situation?" Our answer, "Um, no?" Paul began telling us that Brian had gone over to the Miller Ranch to finish setting up everything and saw an adult nesting pair; the site therefore had to be closed. I kept my composure as much as I could but I felt like a loony toons character, my jaw plummeting to the floor. Paul continued on, "So you're going to be back at your old spot." "What the $*&%^?" That actually didn't come out, but it was definitely what I was thinking. I could imagine what Halley was thinking, as we both were receiving this startling news, because she had been my number one pen pal the previous summer. I attempted to provide her with some reassuring words, but I could tell by her nervous smiles it wasn't working much. The Peregrine Fund is definitely a master of surprise!

We continued our ride down the oh so familiar roads of the past until we came to the non-existent town of Van Horn where another surprise awaited us. We were there to pick up a hack site attendant who would be staying with us for a week until her site opened on the Baeza Ranch. Her site was initially supposed to have been the Means but her partner decided to quit right before coming out. Anyone see a trend here? I wonder why no one wants to be at the Means site? Hm... So, we met Charlene, or otherwise known as Charlie, and headed off to the ranch.

We met Brian at Clay and Barbie Miller's house to pick up our pick up, then headed off in a caravan of trucks down the familiar 20 miles of dirt road to our hack site. Once we turned a sharp corner hugging the bottom of a rocky hill protruding out of the goldish grasslands, the "tree of life" and the little tin shack came into view, and a warm feeling filled by heart; how could I have wanted to be anywhere else? We stopped by our hack site to drop off our first group of five Aplomados, three males and two females: PD, HV, AU, 6C and 7E. The moment was just as heart throbbing as the rest. Seeing them for the first time just never gets old.

After heading down the road and dropping off our luggage, we drove out to the ranch house to say a quick hello to the Means. It was great to greet them with warm embraces; neither of us could have guessed we would see one another again but both parties I believe were pleasantly pleased to see a familiar face. After a few cold drinks and some catching up, we bid our farewells. As we were headed out, they asked if we had ever seen a rodeo because there was one in town (in "town" as in Pecos, two hours away). We all said nope and then the next thing we knew we had box tickets for the next day! I had forgotten how immensely kind and generous the Means family is. If you ever want to know where that phrase "Southern hospitality" comes from, they're it.

The next day we woke up to feed our falcons bright and early and then decided to go for a walk. I had remembered a small loop from the year before, but I guess I didn't realize how long it was until Charlie and Halley were wondering when it would ever end. The rocky five miles took us three hours and only Charlie had brought water. Oops!

After taking a few naps during the day and introducing the girls to Artemeo who was passing by to check the water tanks, we were eager to head off to the rodeo. We fed our falcons a little early so we could start the long hall. Before heading into what looked like an already chaotic even, we pulled in across the street from the stadium to grab a bite to eat. Now I'll tell you, a freshly made tortilla makes all the difference; it can make a simple bean and cheese burrito just mouth-watering.

So after our scrumptious meals we headed on back across the street; little did we know we were crossing into a different world. Surrounding the stadium area were booths selling clothes and food; a mix of banners reading, "I Rope for Jesus" and "Lemonada." Finding our seats was a doosey, after embarrassingly walking around aimlessly for a bit, we had toask for help.

The rodeo opened up to some praising of America and Jesus, in which Halley and I had to flip our sun glasses down over our eyes and hold back our smirks. Then the rodeo began! The first event was kind of like bull riding but instead with maniac horses. The next event was lassoing some small steers. Two riders would shoot out of the gates; the first would lasso the steer's horns and then the second would somehow get its back legs. After that it was more crazy horse riding but this time with a saddle, I don't know which hurt worse with or without but I definitely know it hurt us to watch the cowboys being tossed back and forth like rag dolls. Next was more steer roping but this time it was just one rider who would lasso the horns but at the perfect angle so the steer would flip over, landing on its side so the cowboy could hop off his horse and tie up three legs of this concussed steer.

By this time I asked Halley what time it was and we were all surprised to find out that it was already ten, so we decided to just stay for one more event. This one was the most absurd yet. A steer was let out of the gate and then a cowboy soon followed; we were wondering what was going to happen next because he had no lasso. So the cowboy then suddenly flung himself into the air grabbing the horns of the steer and flipped him over. Why in the world would anyone want to do this? I felt like I was watching a really bad MTV show where they do really stupid and painful things for entertainment. Well, I guess they pulled it off because it was entertaining.

We couldn't believe that we were going to miss the infamous bull riding, but it was the last event on the roster and we had to head back to the ranch for another early morning. All in all, it was quite the experience.

We returned to the house late that night to be greeted by a few old friends; a couple black widows made their homes right next to our door. They are gorgeous spiders so killing them wasn't exactly what I wanted to do but I figured it was a good idea to do it now before they had egg sacs. So, I bid them ado and smashed them with a shovel.

We had a difficult time getting up the next morning, but somehow forced our way out of bed. We returned home from our morning feeding to find a calf in our fenced off yard. There must've been a hole in the fencing or this cow was one amazing magician. we didn't know what else to do but corrale him out through the gate. If you had already guessed, it didn't work so we lazily gave up.

A little while later we heard a truck driving up to the gate. It was Jose and he had brought a horse! We went out to say hello and pointed to the calf. Jose nodded and said something long and wordy in Spanish; then he mounted his horse and began corralling the little calf. We watched him as he struggled to get the calf to realize that the gate was open and gave him a standing ovation when the calf finally exited the premises.

After another night of sleep was cut short due to a bird perched right outside our house deciding to sing like clockwork at around four or five each morning, we fed the falcons and were off to Fort Davis to have the truck worked on. The drive was a bit sketchy, but beautiful. A long, straight and then windy road with absolutely no shoulder brought us through the rocky, cactus and tee-covered (yer, trees!) Davis Mountains. Arriving in Fort Davis after an hour and a half drive, which is what seems to be a rather short trip around here, we dropped off the truck and began walking around the quaint, little Texas town.

There wasn't too much to do in Fort Davis, and I believe we managed to hit all the little shops; both the ridiculously over priced tourist traps and the thrift shops, or what I would refer to as "want some crap?" shops. After unpleasantly biting into a bacon-filled bean and cheese burrito and capping off our tummies with expensive but delicious milkshakes, our truck was finally ready to be picked up. Everything's slower here in Texas, that's for sure; and to boot they hadn't even fixed what we had brought it in for (our four wheel drive). Note to self, "everything has to be ordered in Texas." The story doesn't end just yet...

The truck still needed a new sticker saying that it had it's check up. Next was another long wait at the gas station finding out that we needed a new horn; I guess they can't let you drive around honking something that sounds like a clown's nose. We had wondered why the cows had been looking, almost to laugh at us, as we tooted at them to move on out of the way. After another hour and a half dive home, with the birds still needing to be fed, we were delighted to have some good propane cookin', a tasty glass of wine and a gorgeous view of captivating mountains off in the distance.

Another day with lots of sleep, sweltering heat, and little to eat rolled along. Still no rain since we arrived. Out for a stroll and a little gem hunting we thought might do us some good, so we headed off with water bottles at hand. Out in the early sun for hours, water bottles empty but the shack close in sight, we saw a golf cart pulling up to the house. "Oh no!" Halley and I said out loud thinking about our currently "barely there" wardrobe. "Who could it be? As long as it's not John Means, that would be awful." As the golf cart turned from the shack, realizing its residents' absences, it continued on up the dusty path towards us. as it got closer I thought to myself, " I think I rather it had been John Means."

The cart pulled up with five attractive young men with shotguns casually resting on their knees. They hopped on out of the golf cart and the first one to introduce himself was John Means' nephew. These were his friends from the Marines and they had driven down for the weekend to get in some huntin'. He and the others were very sweet and I apologized for our dress code, although I'm sure they enjoyed it. What they must think of New England girls now?! Well, we took part in a little awkward small talk, which hopefully overshadowed how mortified we were, and bid them farewell.

After all that excitement I passed right out, but was woken abruptly from a nice deep sleep when Halley began screaming, "Angie! Come here! Snake!" A snake had snuck behind them as they were lounging on the perch and was making itself a comfortable little spot right up against the house, between the front two doors. Having both heard stories of rattle snakes, I think they were both a bit hyped up at the sight of a snake. So hyped up that they were calling me out of bed for a tiny, harmless little bull snake (which I would normally say looked more terrified of us, than us of him). Soon after, we watched as it made its way up and under our window pane. We ran inside to see assuming to see it there, but nothing. Poisonous or not, we didn't really want it slithering on us in the middle of the night., but we tried to put the thought out of our minds.

Speaking of night; Halley and I were resting in our bed having a quick read before gently drifting away to dream land, when Charlie walks in saying in a very stressed out and loud voice, "Oh crap guys!" Halley and I, so abruptly awaken from our slumbers said, "What?" with a grumpy/groggy aer in our tones. "I've locked my keys, all of them, in my car!"

Now Charlie, having done this before had made several copies of keys in hopes to not repeat the unlucky move out in the middle of nowhere, but I guess it doesn't help when you keep all of those five copies in the vehicle itself. See everyone! I'm not the only one who makes these imbasile mistakes!

Well, the sotry goes as such that we spent a few dark hours of the night attepting to open it by prying the door open with a few pairs of scissors and manuevering an old piece of wire down through to hit the unlock button. As you might have guessed, our method of maddness didn't end up working (the wire was just too weak to push the button), so Charlie ended up smashing a windo in the next morning (concidering everything she had was in that car).

Another day or so went by and Brian showed up with another group of falcons. This time it was four; one female and three males: 9S, KB, AP, and RZ. This group seemed to be a bit more roudy than the previous one possibly because they were a few days older than the others.

The placement of these birds at this point in time was a bit awkward becasue we were about to have the release for the first group. Usually during the release period the towers are not approached in order to not force fledge the young falcons, but in this case we would have to sneak up somehow to feed this new group that was still in the box.

Well, the problem of feedin gropu two didn't end up being too difficult. We got cackled at from a few members of group one on a nearby bush and the young falcons from gorup two vocalized back seeming to say, "They're coming; the aliens are here! Help us!" Besides our unwanted welcome it went by rather smoothly.

I believe that's all I have for this week; I hope to keep this up again throughout the summer. I send my love back home to everyone! Miss you all.