Knife sharpener

Tyler brought home a knife sharpener from work last night. We’ve been smashing tomatoes, and other delicate produce for some time, and I wanted to enjoy a sandwich with more than just tomato skins.

I don’t know how to sharpen knives. My dad used to take all of the kitchen knives downstairs, set up the wet stone on the reach-in freezer, and methodically sharpen them all on a regular basis. The front door of my room opens to this spot in my parents home.

Sometimes I’d be in my room reading, listening to music, or doing my high school homework when he’d start his TLC for the knives. I’d usually embrace this distraction from my high school studies, lean against my door frame and blather with him for a bit.

“You know, you’ll have to get yourself your own a knife sharpener someday,” he told me.

I told him that I probably didn’t need a lot of kitchen knives in my dorm room for the coming fall, so I could probably do without a sharpener for a while.

He sighed.

“That’s not what I meant,” he said.

I didn’t get right away what he was saying. I just let the comment pass and continued on with the conversation by taking it in a different direction.

But now watching Tyler set up the sharpening stone, placing the knives next to it, and hearing that steady scrape improve the blades one stroke at a time — I understand what my dad was trying to tell back then.

I’m happy to have my own knife sharpener.

Moab

To get away from the winter weather, Tyler and I packed up the dogs and took a camping trip. Instead of heading immediately west to the warm weather in Moab, we decided to check out Gunnison National Forest. We didn't want to be around a lot of people (Moab was site host for Jeep Week), so we decided to brave the chances of a camp site being thawed out already.

We found a spot down a Forest Service Road outside the mining town Somerset — which is along 133. We had the river right next to our campsite, a nice fire, and plenty of space for the dogs to explore. It was so nice we thought we'd stay there the whole time.

I woke up to raindrops hitting the tent. When we finally worked up the courage to leave the warm shelter — mostly because we had to relieve ourselves — we discovered that it was sleeting, so our tent was covered with snow. For the record, Tyler can move pretty fast in the early hours of the morning with the right kind of motivation.We threw everything in the back of the truck and took off to Moab to dry off.

We stopped in Delta to repack, and grab a hot breakfast at the Stockyard. Did you know Delta is the city of murals? At least two buildings on every block along main street have a mural painted on the side.

When we arrived in Moab, the first thing we did was set up the tent, and in less than 45 minutes all of our stuff was dry.

After setting up camp, we took a long walk down the road to check everything out since I had never camped there before. Here are some pictures from our hike.

Later on we cooked some burgers for dinner. We were a little overzealous with the amount of toppings, so once you wrapped your hands around the burger, there was no setting it down again. It's always amazing how great simple food tastes when you've been camping. Tyler declared our burgers the best camping burgers ever. Here are some pictures showing his excitement.

The next morning we picked up and headed back home to winter. Hopefully summer will decided to join is here in the Vail Valley sooner than later.

A cold blooded killer

Moses says hello to a cat

For those of you who’ve met Moses know he is all talk. His ferocious bark combined with his size makes him look intimidating to any potential intruders, but once you offer him love he melts like butter.

So you can imagine my surprise when he tried to kill something yesterday.

We were walking on the trail by our home, when he began sniffing furiously around in the snow. A vole suddenly popped out of the snow and began scurrying across the winter landscape. Usually when a similar circumstance has arose, Moses tilts his head with curiosity and passively follows the unidentified critter around. Whether it was ants, bees, squirrels or chipmunks, he just wanted to say hello and figure out what he was encountering.

I thought this would play out the same way as always, but this time he wanted something more.

All of the sudden he pounced after the vole and actually caught it! Moses is a lot of things, but coordination is not traditionally associated with him. I heard the vole squeal and I knew its life was probably close to over within a matter of seconds. Miraculously when I commanded Moses to drop the rodent, he did.

But then Aspen finished the job.

Did I mention I don't like heights?

Standing on top of the world’s highest suspension bridge, I suddenly realized I was scared of heights. At 1,053 feet above the Royal Gorge, I could see the Arkansas river flowing under me through the cracks in the wood planks. The old boards creaked a little too much for my liking, and I began picturing the scene from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where Thuggee cult members fall to their deaths after Dr. Jones compromises the structural integrity of the bridge.

Your all probably wondering how I got into this situation. Tyler and I were sitting at Gohan-Ya, which is the Asian noodle place by our house, and decided we should get out of town for our weekend. After lunch, I packed and he found a place for us to visit. We took off for Cañon City soon after.

When we arrived, we had dinner at small french restaurant called Le Petit Chablis. It was in an old house, and the menu was written on a chalkboard because it changed everyday. The Chef Daniel Petit (who was from Chablis) came out and explained the menu to us. We had a wonderful meal, and were ready to conquer any adventures awaiting us the next day.

Or so I thought.

In the morning we drove to the Royal Gorge Bridge and Park to check out the scenic wonder. After debating the price of admission, we paid the old park ranger and went on in. It was shortly after this that I decided I didn’t want to walk any further across the bridge, and insisted Tyler go on without me.

At first he thought I was joking, probably because it was April Fool’s Day and all — but then he saw the look of panic spreading across my face.

“Come on, you’ll be a stronger person for doing this,” he said.

Like a good husband, he held my hand the whole time we were on the bridge — even though my palm was as sweaty as a seventh grader on a first date.

After letting my heart rate return to normal, we took the incline railway to the bottom of the gorge to look up at the bridge. I appreciated this view a lot more, probably because I had time to check things out without an overwhelming knot in my stomach.

But more importantly, we had an Amish sighting! There were three families altogether, and Tyler and I wondered how they got there. We didn’t pass any horse and buggies on the way to the park, or see any in the parking lot.

Upon further investigation, I found that the Amish do travel by bus, train or vans driven by others to go on vacation. They use cars, but do not own them, because that would disrupt their social structure. Since only wealthy individuals could afford a car, it would bring inequality to their community.

We then left the park, and meandered our way back up to Vail, stopping in Salida for lunch. We found an awesome pizza place and brewery called Amicas. We will definitely be stopping there again to fill up our growlers and grab some grub.