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Ironwood National Monument (Weekend Coffee Share #27)
For the second week in a row, I haven’t been anywhere more interesting than my kitchen, so we’re going to relive a trip from last May to Ironwood Forest National Monument (and, of course, engage in the usual silliness). But first: welcome to the Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Natalie the Explorer! Grab a drink, take a seat, and let’s catch up.
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Sentinel Peak, Enchanted Hills, and Valentine’s Day nonsense (Weekend Coffee Share #25)
Good morning, and happy Friday! This week we’re going to trek to the west side of Tucson for a visit to Sentinel Peak (also known as “A” Mountain) and Enchanted Hills Trails Park, then complain about Valentine’s Day. But first: Welcome to the Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Natalie the Explorer! If you have a blog and want to interact with some cool people, join us!
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Survivors of the first frost
Winter has finally arrived in Tucson. As I write this post, it’s 32F outside, and there’s frost on most of the plants. Goodbye, rose in bloom. Goodbye, New Guinea impatiens. Goodbye, sunny orange zinnias. Fortunately, the tomatoes and basil are planted against the side of our brick house and appear to be unfrozen. The citrus trees look irritated, but they should be fine. We even harvested our first lemon! And nothing seems to stop the orange bells (the pretty flowers in the header pic). They bloomed almost all year, though they too look a little irritated at being so cold. Here’s what remains of the fruits (literally) of our labor:…
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I got a story accepted! Plus other news and a few local laughs (Weekend Coffee Share #17)
Good morning, happy Friday, and welcome to the Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Natalie the Explorer (whose pics are always gorgeous, but this week’s are *incredible*). I’m going to kick off this week’s post with: Writing news A couple of weeks ago, I was grousing about my lack of writing news. I had several pieces on submission plus a pending application to a writing retreat, and I was getting just a tad impatient (if you consider refreshing GMail every 1.3 seconds, “a tad impatient”). Well, I still have a bunch of things pending, but: My Christmas horror story got accepted! It will be published in the 2021 Deathlehem anthology, which…
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Tucson Botanical Gardens and a few laughs (Weekend Coffee Share #15)
Good morning! Writing and work have kept me busy this week, so I’m a little late getting the Weekend Coffee Share (hosted by Natalie the Explorer) up for this week. Today I’ll share a few pics from my visit last weekend to the Tucson Botanical Gardens as well as the usual funnies at the end. But first: This Week’s Writing Update, Brought to You By Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers The writing update for this week is that there isn’t much of an update. I’ve heard exactly nothing about any of my pending submissions, including the story I submitted for the Christmas horror anthology that was supposed to be published…
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The desert is in the details: Tucson Mountain Park (Weekend Coffee Share #11)
Good morning, and happy Saturday! Welcome to the Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Natalie the Explorer. Today we’ll visit the rough, rugged, and prickly scenery of Tucson Mountain Park. I wish we could have coffee in person, maybe sit out on the patio (it’s cool–55F–and sunny this morning) and talk and share and laugh. Dang, I miss doing that. But, as with so many other activities in these plague times, virtual will have to do. So pull up a seat, and let’s share our weeks with each other. As I mentioned in last week’s post, husband and I drove to Flagstaff last weekend. We weren’t there long, just a night…
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Pincushion cactus flower in Sabino Canyon outside Tucson, Arizona (#FOTD)
Sharing another photo from hubs’ and my attempt to hike in Sabino Canyon a week or so ago (see a few more pix from that aborted hike here). Note to self: do not hike at midday in Tucson in the summer. Sad that I have to leave myself notes about something that should be obvious to anyone with an IQ higher than a cactus, but here we are. Before we slogged back to the car to avoid heatstroke, we snapped a few pix of the local flora, including this adorable pincushion cactus. It’s just a phone pic, and taken in the bright midday sun (see aforementioned note to self), so…
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Photos from Sabino Canyon Recreation Area (#FOTD)
Hubs and I visited Sabino Canyon for the first time yesterday. We only made it about a half mile on the trail before the heat sent us scurrying (OK, plodding) back to our air-conditioned car. I hear tell there’s a lake and running water further up the trail, but we’ll see that another time, when it isn’t in the 90s and monsoon-humid. Hot or not, it was lovely out in the desert. We’ve had tons of rain–the wettest July on record–so the desert is lush and green and smells of fresh rain and creosote. The cacti are plumped up, and we even saw tadpoles in a puddle along the trail.…
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#SoCS: In which your intrepid blogger whines about the Arizona heat
This post is part of the Stream of Consciousness Saturday blog hop. Linda Hill posts a prompt every Friday; this week’s prompt is, “hat/het/hit/hot/hut.” Me, about an hour ago: I haven’t participated in SoCS for awhile. I’m tired and sleep-deprived, and I really don’t feel like revising my novel, so I’ll hop over to Linda Hill’s blog and see what today’s prompt is. Maybe it’ll be something I can relate to. It includes the word, “hot.” There’s a massive heat wave in the Western U.S. And I live in Arizona. Yeah, I can relate. We’re on about day 6 of temperatures over 110. It was 113 yesterday here in Tucson,…
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#FOTD: Blooming saguaros
If you’re a regular here in my little corner of the interwebs, you probably know I’ve become smitten with cacti and especially our enormous, whimsical, and occasionally ridiculous-looking saguaros (see this post and this other post for examples). Well, now my favorite form of desert flora is floriferous, or, to put it less pretentiously, the saguaros are blooming! When they bloom, they look even more whimsical/ridiculous. I think the blooms, especially the ones on the main part of the plant, make them look like characters on The Simpsons. See? Or maybe like they’re carrying multiple bridal bouquets. And maybe I’ve lost my mind. Want to see lots of pretty flowers?…
Suspense | Horror | Romance
