Happy Birthday, Dad

We miss you!!

Rest In Peace

Ronny P. Kinney

1934 - 2006

Happy Birthday Dad!

In Memory of
Ronny P. Kinney
November 1, 1934 - April 26, 2006

Love and miss you always!

Kids R Weird!

We hung out today with our 4-year-old great-niece, Summer. She kept us entertained all day doing wacky things like this:

Anyone remember the days of the Unknown Comic on The Gong Show? So funny. Oh and I think she is going to grow up to be a waitress. Her favorite thing to do all day long was take our order for food and drink. She'd ask us "What would you like?" Whatever we'd ask for she'd say, "Sorry, we don't have that." When we'd ask her what exactly the "restaurant" did have, she'd phhfftt! and say "Read the menu!!" Uhhhh. . .oKAY!

Another 5k

We ran another 5k. It was called the High Plains Purse-Suit 5K/10K put on by the Women's Leadership Council, part of the United Way I believe. Anyhoo, the funds go towards dressing less fortunate women in suits to help them obtain better jobs hence the play-on-words in the name of the race: Purse-Suite (Pursuit). I thought that was pretty cool. I still didn't run the entire race but I did run 10 times better this time than in November. I am in better shape. I am more conditioned. I still feel bad for holding J back from his race, but he says what fun would it be running it if he weren't running it with me. What a doll! Love him for that. I was so slow that he was actually running the course backwards and taking pictures! One volunteer thought he was running the entire race this way! He probably could have still beat me back. Oh and my stupid shoes kept coming untied. I didn't "get" why. We will get our official times soon, but for now, here are a couple of pictures of me dying. Enjoy.

At least I am ahead of the "walkers"

Still chuggin' along

This hill was very challenging and only 1/2 way thru the course.

We hope they hold this race next year. This was the inaugural race, so hopefully if not next year, then in 5 years from now I can possibly run the entire way. I am pleased that I just finished.

The Elfeetee Story

My mom & sisters recount a story about me when I was nary 18 months old. They've told this story so many times that I swear the tale is my own worn memory. But it's not. The story I remember my family sharing goes like this:

While driving with my mother & sisters in and around Cheyenne, there was always one particular place where my face would light up, I'd point excitedly and exclaim loudly "Elfeetee, Elfeetee, Elfeetee!" My mom & sister not understanding my baby-ese would chide and act as though they knew what I was saying would condescend me by saying "yes, elfeetee, yes baby that's nice." Realizing they did not understand and seeing the opportunity for a positive visual passing us by, I'd urgently repeat "NO!! Elfeetee, elfeetee, elfeetee" pointing all the while surely making my message crystal clear this time around. To my disappointment, they still did not understand. They just repeat that ridiculous, non-sensical sound "elfeetee. Yes, baby, yes." Me again, "NOOOOOO! ELFEETEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!"

Frustrated and exhausted by the unsuccessful attempt to communicate with these ignorant, big people, I'd give up. Until the next time we drove in that part of town. The entire scenario would play over and over like a broken record. The elfeetee, the misunderstanding and frustration ensued yet again and again.

One day came when we drove by the particular area in town, I pointed & half-heartedly recited my obligatory line "elfeetee" not expecting any new breakthroughs in the communication barrier. But then, FINALLY! Oh my goodness could it be true?!? A flicker of understanding lit one of my sister's eyes ablaze! "Elephant?" One of them asked with only half uncertainy. "YES! YES!" I rejoiced, "Elfeetee! Elfeetee! Elfeetee!" Elated as they finally realized that I was talking about the animatronic, pink elephant that stood on the DT's Liquor sign as an appropriate mascot heralding all those who drove down East Lincolnway! The nostalgic pachyderm is operational and running still to this day. I think there was a few years it did not run. But it's running now. Check out the video:

I bought a new shirt recently. Not that I need any new clothes whatsoever but I just *had* to buy this particular shirt! The measly $10 was nothing. What does this have to do with the price of tea in China or this post for that matter, you might ask? Well the T-Shirt is relevant as illustrated in the photo documentation below:

I just wish it read: "I see pink ELFEETEES!"

The End!

In Memory Of Dad

Ronny P. Kinney

November 1, 1934 - April 26, 2006

Christmas 2005 with granddaughter Shelby

Warmer Thoughts

Holy Buckets of Rice! Are we EVER going to get warmer weather? I am so sick of the spring snow. I know I shouldn't complain, but I just want to get outside and start hiking, walking & jogging. I wanna be warm. The whole of JAKL is feeling mighty cooped up and cabin-fevered out.

Our backyard at 6:00 p.m. ~sigh~

I don't like to sound all complainy and stuff so I'll just write about a nice warm road trip we took at the end of February that I've been meaning to blog about anyway. Maybe the telling of this trip will conjure warm thoughts and remind me that spring and summer are just around the corner for us here and I'll be complaining about how it's so hot that I can't sleep at night.

On Feb 26th, JAKL loaded up our Saturn Vue (named Leon, btw) and took a 12.5 hour drive down to the blue skies, dry climate and warm sun-filled days of Phoenix, AZ. We were surprising J's parents who snowbird down in them parts during the rough Wyoming winter and had no idea we were coming to visit them. This was really cool for me too because I had never been to Arizona before. w00t! Exciting. I love going to new places and we love adding new states to our geocaching repetoire.

See Phoenix. Right there! Says so on the mountain!

Phoenix provided us some much loved (and needed after that long drive) hiking. We were able to enjoy two long hikes, one for each day we were there. The scenery was spectacular. I had never laid eyes on a saguaro cactus and was amazed at how gigantic they were. I thought they were around 7 to 10 feet tall tops. . .wow! I think some of them were at least 30 to 40 feet tall. I also thought they only sported two arms. The status quo seemed to be 4 or more. It takes them 90 years to sprout an arm apparently. What word to use? Wonderful....Warm! I spent my youth watching those old western movies with my dad and now I felt as though I had a walk-on part on the set of one of those hot, dusty films.

Saguaro with the Superstition Mtns in background.


More scenery.


J takes way better shots than K does.


Saguaro Silouettes (my personal fav by J)


J's mom, me & one of the pups each tangoed with one of these
ouchy succulents. Can't remember the name of 'em, but they'd reach out and grab ya!
They were alive. . .ALIVE!!!

So the first day we were there, everyone kept talking about Tortilla Flat out beyond the Superstition Mtns. They weren't real specific in their rantings about it other than "we went out to Tortilla Flats. .." "Tortilla Flat is out that-a-way. .." and pointed in the direction out past the desolation beyond the mountains. *I* thought Tortilla Flat was this wonderful, oasis destination out in the wilderness where one could immerse oneself in the isolation of the hot, desert plains and become centered at last shaking away the hubbub and hustle of the city. I begged to go to Tortilla Flat with this naive expectation in mind. So, after 12.5 hours of driving, we got back IN Leon for a 40 minute drive up to Tortilla Flat. Was it the oasis I had hoped for? Well, it was an oasis, but much to my dismay, TF was just a restaurant with tons of tourists. Ugh. I braced myself for the worst!

The place was actually kind of cool. Barring the fact that there were scads of people milling around, traffic jams in the parking lot and rudeness abound, it wasn't 1/2 bad. The history is interesting. . .used to be the mining town for that area. But now, it's not. It's a gift shop/restauranty thingamahootie.

The first thing I noticed is that the walls & ceilings were covered in $1 bills signed by the person put it there. Now I had seen this before at other venues, but not to this extent. The coverage was phenomenal! Our friend Salamander is a Where's Georger (isn't that what you'd be called)? Anyway, he's obsessed with tracking his Federal Reserve Notes, so I immediately thought of him and took some shots. A couple extreme close-ups too with my still fairly new camera! So, these are for you, Sal!

This was the ceiling. We liked this colorful patch made up of foreign moola.


How bout a Hot George?


or a Goth George!? Jessicaca really rocked the Red Sharpie.

Oh and there were many more cool, defaced dollar bills and I could go on and on, but these two were my favorites really.

J's mom had a good time showing me all the kitchy stuff around the area. She made me pose for tons of goofy pictures, but I settled on this obligitory touristy photo op to share with you all. Go ahead . . .laugh.

Sort of sums it all up, huh?

The long weekend of 75 - 90 degree weather was fantastic and spoiling. Getting warm to the bone felt dreamy & all the hiking got our blood flowing in the right direction again. With all the hiking and eating and visiting; the puppies were happy, we were happy, J's parents were happy. We were all happy freaks.

JAKL headed back home on Sunday afternoon and decided to stop to sleep in a hotel in Alburqurque for a good night's rest instead of driving straight through. When we finally reached Cheyenne on Monday, the temp was a balmy 34 degrees F. Oh, what a tease that weekend turned out to be. And now tonight brings us Spring snow that is yet another reminder that the Cold has not yet quite let us out of her icy grip.

You betcher bottom dollar I'll be dreaming about those warm bones of our Phoenix trip tonight!

Happy Birthday to J

Happy Birthday, my love! I absolutely ADORE you today and every day!

Here's to another wonderful year full of everything you wished, hoped and dreamed for and more!

Kisses!

And now for a serious birthday poem:

"Don't kiss your honey

When your nose is runny

You may think it's funny

But it's snot." ~anon

The birthday boy & his faithful dog enjoying the outdoors.

New Traditions

This is the first Christmas that my mom has lived out of state and J's mom and dad have snow birded. This is also the first Christmas as a married couple. Since times seem like they are a changin', we decided to do something completely and utterly different this year on Christmas Day.

We decided to rent snow machines up in the Snowy Range area and drive up to the cabin! Sounds like a great adventure, doesn't it?! Well, it was one of the best Christmases I've had as an adult, I must say.

We woke up and were ready to roll at 730 on Christmas morning. The couple we usually travel with met us at our house for the ride over to Albany. We rented two touring snow machines at the fun and friendly Albany Lodge which is located about 30 miles south of Centennial, Wyo where we were married.

We started our snow machining trip from Albany and took the trail that led us past Rob Roy Reservoir and headed to Hwy 130 via the Libby Flats trail. The trek across this icy tundra was the coldest and most windy part of the trip (2 hrs one-way). I was a little peeved because I thought my snow boots broke because my dang feet were FREEZING! I had 3 layers on underneath my coat, but the wind easily cut through the fabric and iced up my skin. Also, this was the bumpiest (did I spell that right) part of any of the trails. I almost got bucked off plenty of times. Later when I asked J if he heard me screaming for dear life, he said he thought I was just having a good time. NOT!!! Well, it *was* fun, but it wrecked havoc on me poor back.

Here we are taking a break right in the middle of Libby Flats' icy tundra wind tunnel! Don't ask me why we stopped in this god-forsaken area or what I was doing with my arms! Heh, heh, I think I was adjusting my balaclava between my helmet & coat:

Once we got past the Libby Flats Lookout and turned left on Hwy 130, we saw the Range in all her glory. ((GASP, GASP!!)) She looks more lovely, larger & closer to the road and more foreboding in the winter than when seeing her in the summer. I was amazed to see one of my favorite places in the world wearing a different season than I was used seeing. She wears winter like a royal majestic cloak and reigns supreme through the stormy clouds. I love this place.

The drive to the cabin took a couple hours and couple trails (5 different trails to be exact) to complete. For an area I know so well, the surroundings looked so different that we drove right past the entrance to the cabin. Do you realize how hard it is to flip a U-turn on a snow machine on a tiny trail? Oy. Very.

We backtracked to the entrance of the cabin "neighborhood" and snow shooed about 1 mile in to our humble abode. Man, was that hard breaking trail in waist-deep snow! Thank goodness for our good friend Jeanne who did most of the breaking! What a trooper! We got to the cabin exhausted but warmed up from the work out that trompin through the snow provided. My feet finally warmed up so my boots weren't broken after all :), but I did get into my stash of clothes I left up at the cabin this past fall, donned on an extra pair of socks and two extra layers of shirts (1 thermal long-sleeved & a fleece hoodie) for the ride home. Jeanne had made & packed in some awesome turkey noodle soup and hot schnocolate (hot chocolate with schnapps & brandy. . .yuuuuuummm!) that hit the spot.

Here's me at the entrance to the cabin! Whew, I had never been so glad to reach a destination in my entire life:

Since the trek in took us longer than we expected, we had to hurry and close up cabin and get our booties back to the snow machines that we left on the side of the trail. Funny thing is that the trip back only took 1/4 of the time as going in because the trail had already been broken and we had some brandy running through our veins. We were good to go.

I took this picture from inside the cabin before I locked up as J was making his way back down the snowshoe trail:

We got back to the machines about 3:10 p.m. which was perfect timing since we had to be back at the lodge by 5:00 p.m. The air in the area had warmed up so the trip back found us enveloped in a light snow storm which was kinda scary but spectacular at the same time. Libby Flats mogul tundra pretty much sucked as much as it did on the first leg of the trip, but we made it through and got back to Albany Lodge at exact 5:00! We all had a beer in the lodge and reminisced about our day's journey before setting off to make the drive home.

Our round trip mileage ended up being 100 miles which is like driving a snow machine from Cheyenne to Denver. Pretty daunting task when you think about it. What an awesome day!! I hope we do this every year for Christmas. What a fun, adventuresome and invigorating way to spend the holiday. Come join us next time :) Kisses.

Although it's been said. . .

many times, many ways. . .

Merry Christmas to you!!

Love, Santa & the boys

JAKL in the XBOX

Well, we finally broke down and got a game system. XBOX 360 Arcade Package. A few weeks ago, we woke up BRIGHT & early on Black Friday morning to brave the Wal-Mart crowd to purchase the XBOX 360 with guitar hero, but not much to our surprise. . .they ran out of them before we even got there. The store probably only had one on hand and 500 people wanting it, you know that's the way it goes with all those high-demand items.

Anyway, we came home and decided we'd get the console quicker if we bought it on-line and bought it from Target instead of Wally World. We put in our on-line order and we waited and waited and waited some more. Waited days. Nothing. Weeks. Nothing. Our game that we purchased with the console finally arrived, but we had no player to play it on. After checking the status of our order, I found out that the item wouldn't even be shipping until Jan 2 - 30th!!! WTF?!?! Okay, well, we've waited this long, what's another couple weeks, right?!?! We could live with that shipping schedule. Until. . .

The other day we were shopping and were peeved to find the same package we ordered on line sitting there with three other exact packages behind the locked glass case at our local Target just begging for us to take one home. We decided that we'd need to wait until we got the console in the mail from the on-line purchase so as not tie up more money on our credit card or complicate issues. We waited another week to get the console thinking that it would be shipped early since there was stock in the store and again NOTHING!!! We finally gave in and cancelled the on-line order went directly to Target and bought the package in store!! YAY!

We are pretty excited to have something new to play with in the house. However, with the Grand Theft Auto IV game, we don't even know how to control the character or drive the cars or even buy a hot dog from the street vendor!! We have been playing the game back and forth for the last 4 hours! Talk about massive time suckage!!! This will be very interesting to try to figure out how this game operates. But for now, it's fun just crashing the car into walls, light poles and people as well as picking fights with the homeless on the street!

Here's J in all his suckiness but entertaining nonetheless. Believe me, I am no better:

I hope this isn't a copyright violation by posting this here. :) Frankie, if you're still reading this blog, let me know if that is the case and I will fix before I'm arrested.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Good day! I hope everyone is having a great time so far. J & I woke up at 6:30 a.m., drove down to Greeley Colo to run our 1st annual tradition of running a race on Thanksgiving. We had a good time. We ran the 2k but wished we would have run the 5k (even if we had to alternate walking & running). The weather was gorgeous and perfect for running. No wind and not too cold, once you got moving, at just above freezing 36°F.

Here are some pictures to capture the moment:

Before picture K getting psyched up:

The crowd. There were 2,016 participants this year:

K in an action photo toward the end of the race:


After picture not much more than 10 minutes after we started:

This was really fun for us. We are planning to do one next year as well. We also are looking at running a real 5k for Christmas weather permitting!

Have a nice day and don't eat too much. . .you'll regret it!!! :)

Happy Birthday, Dad!

In Memory of

Ronny P. Kinney

November 1, 1934 - April 26, 2006

We love you, miss you and never will forget you.