Blog

Monti checks out the furs on display at the park while wearing her
leopard coat. She said she was embarrassed because she always wears
that coat when she goes to the zoo. At the park I read about highly
profitable market of black bear poaching. I was surprised to find out
that black bears are killed for their gall bladders and their paws. In
Asia they make soup from the paws and the gall bladders are used for
medicinal purposes. A bowl of bear paw soup can sell for around $1000.
One black bear gall bladder can fetch up to $10,000 in east Asia. This
is 20 times the street price of cocaine per ounce. It makes me wonder
about that black bear that was recently killed in the Smokey Mountains
after it attacked a small boy. Did they sell any of those bear parts
to help the National Park Service?

It is rut season for the elk in the area which means it is time for them to breed. They warned parents before riding through the park that all explanations of strange elk behavior would be in the hands of the parents. As you can see they were just chilling out when we saw them. Our tour guide explained that the wildlife and plant life in the area are already changing for winter. It is happening much earlier than normally seen. She told everyone if they are debating buying a season pass for skiing they should do it. I hate seeing summer slip away from us. We debated turning on the heat Sunday morning because it was 67 degrees in the house.

The four of us went on a Northwest safari at a park an hour and twenty
minutes south of us called Northwest Trek. At the park they take you
on an hour tram ride through their property. Within the open living
area they have bison, elk, black-tailed dear, moose, and more.

I found this picture and liked it of Dahlia and my mom. I like seeing
Dahlia's hands all bunched up in fists. This is something I do when I
get tense.

Friday night we came home from dinner to find that my machine had “kernel panic’ed”. After a restart my machine displayed that ominous folder with the flashing question mark. My hard drive was absolutely dead. Assuming the worst I was devastated thinking I had lost all my pictures and video from my summer trip. They were only on my machine. I had been getting Time Machine error messages I carelessly ignored so I thought I was doomed. I was thrilled to find out from Joe that Time Machine (Apple’s backup utility) completely saved all my data including the photos I had downloaded only hours before my hard drive failed (including this one of Monti). Everyone really should invest the time into setting up Time Machine for their Macs. It will totally be worth it someday for as they say it is not if your hard drive will fail it is when.

Dahlia will start a ballet and tap class in the fall. In addition to
getting the postcard with her teacher info in the mail she also
received a package with her new dance outfit in it. Her class and age
group is required to wear lavender leotard with pink tights. We will
also need to figure out a way to put her hair up for class.

Monti had her first official sleepover with a friend at our house.
Samantha, Monti, and Dahlia all slept in the same room together. They
seemed to have a great time and they actually got some sleep too. Of
course I had to sit in the room with my computer so they would stop
giggling and fall to sleep. They spent the next morning attending to a
ladybug they had captured as their pet. A good hour was spent setting
up the perfect ladybug home and another 20 minutes was spent trying to
capture a spider to feed to the ladybug.

On Friday kids in Issaquah received postcards in the mail telling them
what teacher they will have for school this year. Of course at Monti's
age she is really more concerned with what other kids will be in her
class. She waited off and on for several hours waiting to see the mail
truck. When it came she found out she had Ms. Burton for a teacher and
Dahlia will have Ms. Howard. Monti was excited to have her friend
Samantha in her class but also disappointed that Milena and Knicole
would not be in her class this year. There were several phone calls
between her friends trying to figure out what girls got what teachers.

The girls saw Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull movie. They have
been dressing up as if they were Indiana Jones ever since. This
reminded me of myself when I first saw Star Wars as a little girl. I
came home and played Star Wars dress-up for days. The funny thing is
that I didn't choose Princess Leia or Luke Skywalker as my role model.
I dreamt of being Obi-Wan Kenobi. I definitely know if people think
Monti is weird it is all because I myself am a little strange.

The rain started coming down during the last hour of the concert. You
could tell we were in the Northwest because there was little reaction
to the rain. It was amazing how many people stayed for the entire
concert. The girls thought the rain just added to the overall ambience
of the music. You can tell Monti's mind was totally into the music.