Wellness Exam Straight Ahead

I don't really have to see Dr. Thompson this morning, do I?

As brave as Becca is when she sees other people with dogs in the desert, this same bravado disappears when we make a trip to the vet for her annual wellness checkup.  As soon as we get inside the building and I weigh her (53 lbs.) she begins to tremble.  Sometimes she trembles so much she sheds fur.  Today she was trembling so much she was drooling a little.  And then--to add insult to injury--she was confronted by three Great Danes who were eager to interact with her.  Becca thought they were ponies.  I watched in amusement while the two women with the Danes (mother and daughter, I suspect) weighed each of them on the scale:  113 lbs., 112 lbs., 111 lbs.  And they had another, a male (presumably even larger), waiting in the van outside.

Once inside the examination room Becca had a thermometer stuck up her butt while I held her.  She never seems especially troubled by this act.  But the waiting for the vet to show is horrendous as she (Becca) moves around the room like a caged wildcat, also drooling in there, but panting like a dog who just ran a marathon.

When the inner door opened and Dr. Thompson entered, Becca calmed down a bit.  The doctor is a wonderful young woman--personable and professional--and she gave Becca an exam that lasted approximately ten minutes.  After pronouncing Becca fit, the doctor tried giving the ungrateful canine two treats, both of which Becca spat out.

When the exam was over, in order to prevent my left arm being ripped out at the socket, I took Becca to the car then went back to pay the bill.  Before leaving the parking lot at the vet's office I gave Becca the two treats she had spat out.  She promptly devoured them.  Then she looked belligerently around the area, perhaps hoping to start something with the big ponies who had intimidated her inside.

A Nice Long Hike

Heading west

Dr. K, Becca and I did a long hike around the back of Tortugas Mountain this morning.  We started at the Monte Vista parking area and headed east before looping around the south side of the mountain.  Then we struck due west before trekking northwest on the outer loop road.  We hiked two-thirds of the way around Tortugas before retracing our steps.  We saw only three other outdoor enthusiasts, two of them people with a dog--always a sight of immense interest to Becca.  We had no direct contact with anybody, though.

Back behind Tortugas

Tortugas Mountain and the Organs

The Tortoise

Organ Mountains from a distance

Tracking another dog and its humans

The way back

A Little Research

Almost to the sunlight

After exploring an arroyo with the Beckster we altered our return track to take a photo of the seismology shack.  Yesterday I contacted a seismology professor at the local university (NMSU) and asked about the shack and towers.  He told me that the shack hadn't been used in over thirty years, and the towers weren't related to it.  He thought the towers might have been part of an old laser experiment, but he wasn't sure.  Now I have to do further research.

Plato's analogy of Becca and Packrat

Looking back the way we came

Entering a huge arroyo

Soaptree Yucca

About midway to the Crosscut Trail

The seismology shack and its concomitant "artwork"

Experimental towers not related to seismology

The tall towers closest to Dripping Springs Road

Week in Review

Curve-billed Thrasher in a Cholla back at the ranch

Becca and I hiked near Tortugas Mountain here in the northern Chihuahuan Desert on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday mornings.  That's the week in review.  On our way back this morning we hooked up with JC and Shaque on the inbound leg of the inner loop trail, and we talked college basketball.  Well, the humans did.  College basketball is my favorite team sport, and I'm a big fan of the University of Arizona Wildcats and the University of Texas-El Paso Miners.  My favorite basketball movies are Hoosiers and Glory Road.  I like the color blue.  :)

Hedgehog Cactus catching the morning rays

Hewing to the trail

Why are you looking at me like that?

For the Birds

Old NMSU experimental tower (for seismology, I think)

The Curve-billed Thrasher and Cactus Wren pictured here were in the same Yucca together, often less than a foot apart.  They stayed pretty still for me, but the wren was especially jumpy about my presence.  I often notice back home at the ranch that animals easily identify potential enemies.  If I step out into the yard, the White-Winged Doves are out of there.  But if they're hanging around when a cottontail or jackrabbit streak in the doves hardly notice.  Watch how the rabbits flee and the doves scatter, though, when a coyote shows up for a drink at the watering hole. 

Curve-billed Thrasher

Cactus Wren

The same Cactus Wren

Enormous Torrey Yucca

On high alert

Jet contrails in an overcast sky

A little independent bushwhacking

Not a stealth fighter jet, but a Raven in flight

Road back to Tortugas

JC and Shaque

Midweek Meandering

On the Crosscut Trail

The B-girl and I got a little earlier start than usual so we extended our hike by about a mile.  It was far warmer this morning (38 F) than yesterday, so it felt relatively nice out there.  We're headed for a high of 58 degrees, with even higher temps expected by week's end.  We saw only one other hiker in the outback, but we ran into JC and Shaque down by the old shack on the road leading to the mountaintop.  A few other trekkers were just starting off from the parking area near the ramada as we wrapped up our hike.

An arroyo well traveled by critters

Becca hunting for critters

Becca galloping out of the arroyo

Loggerhead Shrike

A noble-looking bird

When is Cold not Cold?

Out of shadow into the sun

Although the real temperature this morning was 15 F (9.44 Celsius) when Becca and I left the house, the ambient temperature didn't feel too bad; that's because the wind was completely absent.  Had the wind been blowing at, say, 10 mph the temperature would have felt like it was 3 degrees Fahrenheit.  How do I know this?  I used the National Weather Service's wind chill calculator to do the math.  By the time we finished our hike with JC and Shaque it was feeling downright balmy out.  Not really.

Large Torrey Yucca

Revving her engine to get started

Blue sky over Tortugas Mountain

You can tell how early it is by the length of Becca's shadow