Out and about

We're on the road to see relatives and friends, and to get the heck out of Dodge for a little while. The Emperor and I have parked ourselves at a bookstore cafe to use the wifi and catch up with the rest of the world, just a little bit. We're in Arizona -- the weather is crisp and almost cold, and the sky is clear as a bell and simply gorgeous.

On the drive over we cruised through a part of Arizona that I'd never seen. I'll put up some pictures of it later. We also enjoyed a perfect sunset -- the sunsets in our part of 'Way Out West just don't hold a candle to the ones we had here in AZ, almost every day. And the nights are so clear here that you can see almost every single star. I've seen nights when the stars were so bright and numerous that you cast a starlight shadow. Oh, gosh, I miss that.

Yesterday we stumbled onto a couple of gems that you only get when you really need them, or really deserve them, and they reminded me very painfully of why it was so hard to leave Arizona eight years ago. Well, I left physically, but a little part of me stays here all the time no matter where my body is. Anyway, we took the car in to the Honda dealership because it was time for an oil change and overall checkup, and since it's new we wanted to make sure we didn't pass the mileage deadline. So we dropped the car off and strolled down the hill to the health food store to grab a cup of coffee. To our delight, it was "Barbecue and Bluegrass" day and they had a tiny band playing in the cafe. The fiddler was a 10-year-old girl who had won the state old-time fiddle championship that year, and oh my gosh she was good. The whole band was good. The coffee was good, and we indulged by sharing a goat-cheese-and-fig tart.

When we had had as much music as our hearts could stand, we picked up the car (Yoshi received a clean bill of health) and popped over to the museum where I used to work, and where I had met the Emperor nine years ago. A couple of our dear old colleagues and friends were there, so we had a happy reunion and great gab-fest that was good for the soul.

What a day. I could do with another one like that soon. We're off in a minute, abandoning this cafe and taking a drive out to the sticks to enjoy that turquoise sky and clean wind.