All together it took Joel about 2.5 weeks to complete this monster. I probably put in a few handfuls along the way. He said, “Your Dad would be proud!” I agree and I am proud that I didn’t lose any pieces when I took apart what Dad had completed when they moved. Natalie – all pieces present and accounted for and it will be heading your way soon!

Last week we had the opportunity to go over to Ogden Nordic on some fresh snow. It promised to get a little warm so we wanted to get on the trail no later than sunrise. It was spectacular!

The first part of the trail was groomed and easy hiking, then we left the trodden trail and slogged through the snow up to the Observation Point – about a 5 mile round trip – quick workout. The tiny little fir tree up on the hill is where we usually head up to (at end of blue arrow.)

I went back a couple of days later by myself and basically had the trail to myself.

Then, I went out a couple days after that and again was basically the only one on the trail. It was after another snowfall, so I was basically breaking trail the whole time.

Several years ago, Dad was given a 4000 piece puzzle (Larina and Bob?)

When Mom and Dad downsized, he no longer had the square footage/tabletop to assemble this monster. He made a good go of it in his office and was able to put together about 40% of it. When his “treasures” got divided, we ended up with the puzzle, which I had painstakingly taken apart.

Joel took it out and started it on December 4th. Seemingly overnight, he had the borders and corners done.

He has taken several days “off” since the 4th, but as of last night, the progress is amazing. I can say that I have contributed but on a very small scale – probably only 5 – 10 pieces every couple of days.

One thing for sure is that we are getting a great geography refresher!

Natalie, get a table ready!

After our brief visit to Mom, it was time to head home – basically a backtrack of the same route. Although we didn’t have another scheduled 9 hour layover in Sacramento, with the delays, it was pretty close to the same 44 hours it took us to get there.

At one of the “fresh air” breaks I wandered up to the front of the train. Looks like this poor engine has seen a few hazards on the tracks! Not much of a cow catcher on the front.

We found a fun coffee shop a few blocks away from the Sacramento station. The Sacramento station was nice in that if you paid for a sleeper room you could sit on couches in a “lounge” in the waiting area and they provided snacks and drinks.

Beautiful sunset heading through Nevada.

All in all I think the trip was a success. Joel rated it a 5/10 because he could never seem to get comfortable – long legs and achy knees seem to be the theme on any kind of extended trip for him now. But it was nice that we could leave the room and walk up to the observation car to stretch our legs. I would give it an 8/10. It was so much more relaxing and carefree than driving or flying and as long as you weren’t in any type of hurry it is a great way to travel. I ended up with a bit of motion sickness after the last part of the trip, which was odd because on the two legs up to Seattle, I was fine. I didn’t like the dining situation but understood that they were completely full for the holiday. Maybe if we took a trip in the “off” season we wouldn’t be forced to dine with strangers. Joel has a couple of stamp shows in Denver and San Francisco he wants to go to – maybe another train trip?

We had a lot of options to have Thanksgiving Dinner in Bellevue with Mom but opted to try something new this year. We ordered the entire meal from Williams-Sonoma and it arrived frozen. Although the cooking directions were not stellar and I had to microwave some of the raw turkey roast (after 90 minutes in the oven,) I think everyone was pretty happy with the outcome. Luckily Mom made some of her stuffing and had some homemade cranberry sauce, which we devoured. The pumpkin pie that came with the meal was excellent.

After watching a few football games and probably an episode of Law & Order or two, Joel and I wandered next door to the hotel for the evening. The next morning we hit the gym- HAHA!

We headed over to pick up Mom the next morning (and have some leftover pumpkin pie for breakfast – YAY!) before running some errands. We also stopped at St. Andrews and visited Dad’s cubbie hole – or whatever they call it!

We then had a few hours to kill before dinner so Joel and Mom devoured a couple cans of sardines – and paid the price of full food comas, which they both denied … so weird …

Once I was able to rouse the two out of their food comas, we headed to Dukes for seafood and a window-side view of the Bellevue Snowflake Parade.

All in all a very short trip but a great time – and it didn’t rain!

We decided to visit Mom in Seattle for Thanksgiving but a big debate ensued on how to get there … Joel won’t fly (2 hours each way), I didn’t want to drive (13 hours each way) after multiple trips by car up to the PNW over the last year, so we thought the train (44 hours each way) might be fun/interesting. Yes, with delays, stops, transfers and a less than direct route to Seattle with a train change in Sacramento, it took us almost 2 days to get there.

Before we left I told my friends and family, in hopes of justifying the length of the trip, that a long distance train ride would be something we had never done. Well, apparently I lied! Grandpa Muecke was a train engineer.

As I was pulling together information for the blog I started looking for photos of Grandpa Muecke and lo and behold in 1968, me, Mom and Ross took the train out to visit relatives in North Dakota. HMMM don’t remember that at all but the photos do not lie! I am 6 in these photos and Ross is 3.

For our trip to Seattle I booked a private room on the Amtrak sleeper car. There was a small bathroom, a chair and table, and a couch. At night one bed dropped down from the ceiling and the couch converted into another bed. Unfortunately, due to the holiday, on one of the legs we ended up in a roomette – basically only as wide as the two seats and no private bathroom. Our train left Salt Lake City at midnight so we basically fell asleep soon after we boarded – well, at least tried to sleep! We really didn’t see much of Nevada although we were awake as we went up over Donner Pass and saw quite a bit of snow in the Sierras.

As we paid $$$ for the private room, the meals were included and they varied depending on what time we were on the train – on some of the legs we didn’t get breakfast and the others we didn’t get dinner. But the meals that we had were quite good. The dining was pretty well orchestrated and most of the meals were timed on a reservation system. The only “downside” was that, because the train was so full, we had to sit with another couple for all the lunches and dinners. As an introvert, forced socialization is not my favorite and small talk is a waste of time. With that said, I think most people were sort of shocked to have to sit with strangers, too and we did end up with a few decent conversations.

As it looks like in 1968 Dad, didn’t accompany us, I am sure Mom was a bit frazzled by dinner time!

Once we made it to Sacramento, we ended up with a 9 hour layover and I had researched ahead of time things to do. I was hoping for a sports event – Sacramento Kings? or a movie but nothing worked with our timing. What I did find was a “Dine and Paint” event. We arrived early had had a great meal. Then the instructor introduced her 12 budding artists to acrylic painting. Joel was a great sport – he was afraid that he was going to be the only guy but eventually two more showed up.

We were back on the train to Seattle and awoke the next morning to an amazing sunrise on Mt. Shasta.

Most of the rest of the trip up to Seattle was uneventful. There were a couple of scheduled “fresh air” stops where we could get out and stretch our legs for a few minutes. What we discovered was that the passenger trains are basically low priority and end up having to sit at sidings sporadically while freight and fuel trains pass by. My cousin Janet had told me that anywhere form 1 – 6 hours delay was typical. The Amtrak trains we were on were 1 – 2 hours late, each segment. But, since we weren’t on a strict timeline, it was certainly worth not having to deal with the stress of driving in inclement weather or dealing with the airport chaos! Yes, it was a very relaxing way to travel!

The last couple of times that I ran in the Monument Valley Veterans 1/2 Marathon (2019 & 2021,) Joel was unable to join me as he was hunting. This time, his luck was not good and the MN Whitetails eluded him, so he ended up coming along.

We had a cabin on the edge of the mesa in the Monument Valley Tribal Park that looks down into the valley. I was able to get one of the few, unobstructed view cabins as I thought Joel might enjoy a photo op from the deck of the cabin.

We had the cabin for two nights and had an extra day to spend before the race. We got up to an amazing sunrise, and a resident “rez” dog that was looking for handouts.

We decided to take a 4 mile hike on the Wildcat Trail which wraps all the way around Merrick Butte.

After the hike I did a little reading and Joel pretended to read! There are no tvs and spotty WiFi so I was glad to have a book along. Joel’s book on precision shooting must not have been that interesting!

Then we ate dinner at the restaurant in the adjacent hotel and watched the moon come up as we ate.

The entire event is a huge weekend gathering and the NavajoYES (Navajo Youth Empowerment Services) organization gets hundreds of kudos from me – it is very well organized and a lot of fun! At the start, the Women’s Veteran Color Guard posted the flags and a local Navajo recording artist sang the Star-Spangled Banner in Navajo (photos courtesy NavajoYES.) Pretty special and impactful.

In the past, they had one of the last remaining Navajo Code Talkers as a guest of honor. Unfortunately there are only two remaining Navajo Code Talkers as John Kinsel passed away October 21, 2024 at 107 years old. The two remaining are Former Navajo Chairman Peter MacDonald and Thomas H. Begay and I imagine that their health is not good enough to be out and about.

The pre-race meeting was held and then off we ran (or jogged, in my case!)

At every Aid Station and at the start of the race there were bands playing all sorts of inspirational Rock n Roll songs – great atmosphere!

I felt good for the run but started to get a bit tired at about mile 12 so I sort of walked/jogged for the last mile. The course is rutted, sandy and the last 2 miles are a climb back up from the valley floor. Come to find out, if I would have been just a little bit more “SERIOUS” about the entire race, I would have placed first in the 60 – 69 Women’s Age Group. Instead because I fiddle-farted around, I got 2nd place by a mere 19 seconds … OOPS! No big deal, I think the 2nd Place prize was better anyways!

Aside from the run, Joel had an excellent couple of days and nights with photography!

We seemed to time our departure just right, as we were leaving Monument Valley, a short storm moved in and it started snowing! Glad I was warm and cozy in the car and not still out on the race course>

Some time ago Joel announced that he wanted to make lasagna. I thought to myself, “WOW, Just WOW.” Making lasagna is a multi-tasking nightmare but I was excited to see what he would come up with. I think it has been 5 – 10 years since I made lasagna – not that I don’t REALLY like it, but just that it is so labor-intensive.

Unfortunately, Joel had to leave the next morning to drive to MN to go hunting and he left me with two trays of it, assuming that I would put the rest in the freezer.

There was only one piece left after a couple of days. Why go through all the effort of wrapping it up to put it in the freezer? It ended up in my belly! Thanks Joel!

In a recent WSU Alumni Magazine, there was an interesting article on aging, memory loss, and dementia. All joking aside, it made me wonder about why I would walk into a room and totally forget why I did that. At the end of the article, there was a call for study participants.

I contacted the WSU Neuropsychology Lab, and they had me go through an initial 1-hour phone assessment.  Apparently, my answers to the memory questions were bad enough that I got in! 🤭

The study entailed two 3-hour Zoom testing sessions, filling out 20+ online surveys and wearing an Apple smart watch formatted for memory testing for two weeks. Between the immediate brain overload of having 3 hours of continuous memory testing on the Zoom calls and having to respond to 4 tests on the smart watch at random times each day, it was actually quite stressful!

I finished the testing and got my $100 stipend last week. Now, all I have to do is wait for my cognitive assessment in the mail. The one thing that gives me hope is that as a partner/spouse, Joel filled out some surveys about my memory. When he was done, he said he answered “No” to almost all the questions and wondered how I got in the study. Note that this glowing review comes from the guy who put the bag of cheese curds into the storage cabinet next to the refrigerator last week. I discovered them two days later.

After I participated in the study, I walked into a bookstore one day during my recent farmsitting job, and the first book I saw was this:

I started reading it, and within the first few pages, I was hooked…

It is not an easy book to read, so I am attacking it in small pieces. Hopefully, I’ll remember what I read!

The Peak Challenge awards event was last night. Lots of surprised faces when an old grey hair took the top prize.