They’re My Rules I Can Change Them If I Want!

Can you name that tune?

That title makes me sound like such a brat. But really, I’m fudging one of my rules today because I’ve been ever so slightly under the weather. I tried an herbal supplement that I’d used years ago without any problems. Ah but years ago I was taking it with other vitamins, not a handful of morning drugs. Suffice it to say it doesn’t seem to play well with the medications I’m on. For the past three days my legs and back have been weaker than usual; a LOT weaker. The buzzing in my arms and hands has been greater too. Then last night it got better, almost like a fever breaking and I thought about it, I’ve been better at night, when I am usually weaker just from having been doing what I can all day. Hmm…. So I didn’t take the new supplement this morning and I feel great.

So, that rule I’m fudging? Today is June 8; one day past the first week of the month when I’m supposed to let go of any 2013 scrapping from last month and it gets finished this year if I finish all the June folders and have time to go back. Remember that any May before 2013 that’s not done has already been abandoned for now. This way of scrapping has been great so far. 2008 and 2009 are complete up to June! 2011 was already done through September. There are folders still in March and May for 2012 and I’ll probably be tackling those next year. I know I have more to catch up than I can finish in a year, but the commitment to doing it and the system of always doing the current month has helped a lot. When what I see out the window reflects the season I’m scrapping it really helps my creativity. I’ve spent way more time in my creative scrapping zone this year than not. 2013 gets a slight deviation on my rule that I get one week to finish up the month for the current year as I start the next month because I have the last folder open in Photoshop right now. It was left from yesterday. I’ve been slower at everything the past few days, so I’m giving myself a sick day allowance to finish up the last folder. I’m a benevolent boss, like that.

Now it’s time to address today’s prompt in the 30 Day Bog Challenge, hosted by Katie at So, Funny Story…

Talk about a great place you have travelled to.

I am truly fortunate in that I’ve been to a ton of great places. Now think, Nani…someplace great I haven’t talked about recently…

Oh, I got it!

Devil’s Tower, Wyoming

It was an unplanned side trip on our honeymoon. Letting the clouds influence our itinerary a little, as we usually do when we travel, we had a few places we really wanted to go on a list for "if we get there" and a couple of planned things that were definites. I absolutely wanted to see the World’s Largest Ball of Twine in Darwin, Minnesota because I wanted to see the campy attraction I’ve heard mentioned in TV shows, but also because how cool is it to say that you saw the World’s Largest Ball of Twine on your honeymoon?

Rainy weather in parts east kept us in South Dakota longer than we’d planned and after visiting Mount Rushmore we made the unscheduled dip into Wyoming to catch a couple of coal trains. We decided to venture further into Wyoming to see the iconic landmark we’d come to know in our childhoods from Close Encounters of The Third Kind.

Fun side note: We have jingles or cheers we say in the car when we enter a new state. For Wyoming we coined “It’s fun to visit the Y-O-M-ing” sung to the tune of YMCA by The Village People. We only crossed into Wyoming once, but our Wyoming song remains one we sing a lot when anything related to the state comes up.

Seeing Devil’s Tower from a distance was already cool, like being one of the extras, but the movie is real life so the extras have a Close Encounter story too.

As we drove into the park at the base of Devil's Tower there were prairie dog areas with appropriate “Beware, Prairie Dogs Bite” signs all over. Prairie dogs are cute but mean.

We circled all the way around the tower, singing the melody that calls the aliens all the while. The texture of the huge formation that sprouted up in an otherwise relatively flat area is pretty amazing. It’s no wonder the Native American tribes in the area told the legend about a bear chasing seven small girls who prayed that a 3-foot-high rock would save them. The rock grew into the sky saving the girls, but the great bear still tried to reach them, which is the explanation for the scratched grooves on the surface of the sides.

It was just a cool, cool place to visit and I’m so glad we took the side trip. In the souvenir store there were items with great photos of the tower, Native American themed things with the legend and artist representations of the seven girls and the great bear and plenty of movie items and alien things. We got an “alien crossing” magnet and I couldn’t resist lots of postcards with aliens on them!

It’s out of the mainstream of things, but Devil’s Tower is definitely a tourist area; on the road into the park there is a tourist trap, properly baited with ice cream! I’ve found that the existence of a very advertised ice cream parlor is sure sign that there are things for tourists to buy. It’s why we call ice cream tourist bait. Of course we stopped for our Devil’s Tower ice cream before we left like good tourists!

Oh, one last note! We drove all the way around the tower and there does NOT exist any way for people to have climbed up to the top to welcome a mothership without major climbing gear. That access and capability was totally Hollywood.