Desert Rats.....

Well, the "dawg dayz" of summer have already arrived here in the high desert. Hubby nicknamed us desert rats a while back seeing as that is how we are gonna be living for a while. Yesterday it was brought up that this is not an easy life....and it is NOT!!!!!! We aren't sure what the hell we were thinking lolol. 

The weather here changes quite abruptly! Granted you can count on the heat and the sun being hot!! The other day a sudden rain shower happened upon us and it felt good, mainly cuz the clouds covered up the sun. You can usually count on the winds, breezes coming thru here. At night after we have to kick off the generator which supplies our a/c, the breezes coming thru are awesome and they feel sooo good. During the day the winds can whip thru here and tear up an awning that you have out for shade....it seems every time we put ours out, the winds pick up and if we aren't very vigilant we could have a tore up awning!!  There was a big gust of wind yesterday and it knocked over our solar panel we had connected to the battery.....that was $100 shot to hell! So today we have to get another one, cuz we have to keep the battery charged when the generator isn't on. 

In preparing meals, I decided to walk up to the camp's kitchen and bake in their ovens from now on, heat up there vacant kitchen instead of my whole house! I get the dish in our ever faithful truck and something isn't right when I pull out....drove a little ways up to their kitchen, let it run, cuz I thought maybe the neat....ummm no.....got it back to the campsite and a friggin desert rat had crawled up in the engine, apparently got stuck and when I started the engine, it killed him....hubby pulled him out and he was friggin huge....tip to tail, maybe 12"!! 

Every 4 days or so we have to drain our gray & black water tanks and get fresh water. Now those of you who don't know, gray water is like from dishes, hand washing, etc. and blk. water is the poo & pee. When we first decided to do this, we thought it would be better to walk up and use their bathrooms in the morning, so we wouldn't have a whole lot of ick to drain lol. Then hubby goes and gets fresh water for us to drink and use, then we put it in our camper. After about an hour's worth of work we are set for about 4 more days. 

We go thru about a tank of gas daily now in the generator cuz of the heat and still have to shut the a/c down right after sunset and for about an hour or so, it is pretty damn warm in here and since we retire early...we get up about 5:15 am....it doesn't cool off until later! 

Then there are the biting, flying little friggin gnats...lil bastards...get right by your ear and buzz! And there are the snakes....have seen 2 now! The bees, wasps, hornets....but NO mosquitoes!! The jack rabbits, regular rabbits, butterflies, road runners, skenks, lizards, coyotes...are all fun to watch!! 

Yes, we have chosen it seems a tougher life than what we had back in Oklahoma....do we wanna go back to live?? No way jose....Arizona seems to be where our hearts are....heat and all!!

Trials and Tests

I know it has been a while since I posted, I do apologize for that just in case anybody is keeping up. This last week...well maybe 10 days or so....have put our relationship and this whole notion to the test.

This camp is 95% male and when we had the cookout over Memorial Day, these men were like a bunch of ol' hens cacklin' lolol. All about one guy too and I thought that was kinda sad, especially when it went on & on!! I told hubby I would be interested in hearing the other guy's side of the story, cuz there is always 3 sides to every story ya know!! Well as things happened, we did get a chance to hear his side and lo & behold, it wuz very different!! As we get to know some of these other "prospectors", we realize we don't wanna get to know them at all....not much different than what we left behind us. But our eyes were clearly open, no rose colored glases here!! There are the prospectors and there are the metal detector guys and from what I have heard, the metal detector guys find more than the prospectors, but it is kinda like the Hatfields and McCoys....some make it more difficult for the others and alot of discontent! Sad really!! Their way is best and they are satisfied with a pittance they get for all their hard work! Whereas the metal detector guys find more and big nuggets with alot less work, so maybe it is jealousy, I dunno! What I do know is it is very ridiculous and sad, cuz aren't we all here for the same purpose...for that elusive gold!!

Yes, we were disillusioned by all of this, no we weren't told just how hard a work it is! We surely thought we would have found a significant amount by now, cuz gee whizz it has been almost 2 whole months!! Maybe we should just pack it all in and go back to okieland with the floods and mosquitoes! But isn't this where we belong? Do we have to fight & argue about the same shit every single friggin day? Isn't this what we have dreamed of....a kind of freedom we can't find other places? Are we ever gonna find enough to help with the finances or maybe pay something off? Yep, that is how it has been the last couple weeks? Well we are working thru it all and decided hell NO we ain't going back to okieland to live! We will proceed and forge ahead with our plans and our dreams!! We will make it thru this rough patch cuz that is what we do and how our love survives! We know we belong here! We may be a 2 state citizen for a while, but eventually AZ will be our permanent home!

There are downsides to most any place one chooses to live, but I believe u have to at least like where u live. I do love it here, even tho there are flying gnat thingies that get around your face, etc. and there are snakes amd scorpions! But every morning as I watch the sun come up over the mountains and cast different shadows on the other mtns., I watch the bunnies, the road runners, the skenks and the other wildlife and it kinda put things back into perspective a bit. 

So there it is in a nutshell so to speak, things are looking up and we shall overcome and find that peace that we felt when we first arrived!!