in_the_blue | How 'bout that.

First things first: it seems almost too stupid to wish a happy birthday to my #1 alter ego, my internal partner-in-crime, but it's June 26 and it's Spike's official birthday, so I have to wish him a happy birthday. He deserves it. I can't believe I've been playing him for almost three years. I could get all maudlin and thank the people who created Bebop for giving me such a beautiful character to work with, but... enough's enough.

HI HONEY I'M HOME! We got back this afternoon and while it was hot here -- about 85 degrees -- that's still 25 degrees cooler than where we were in the desert. Desert, desert, Mojave desert: it's beautiful there. Spectacularly beautiful.

But it's too hot, and that means we didn't buy the timeshare, which was how we ended up there to start with. It was one of those come-stay-with-us-four-days-for-the-price-of-one deals, and all we had to do was sit through the (very low-key) timeshare presentation. That was all. But I already gave a pretty thorough trip report for the first couple of days. Missed last night because packing and catching up on threads and all that stuff, so.

SUNDAY

Ta-daa. We woke up kind of early because man, it gets hot in the desert, and went to the Living Desert Wildlife and Botanical Park (sorry, the site is noisy!) before it got too hot. In fact, this time of year they close at 1:30. Already, by the time we got there around 10, most of the big animals were in hiding but I did see a roadrunner skulking behind the red-tail hawk exhibit (all their birds are rescue birds and can't be released due to the extent of the injuries that brought them there, much like the Oregon Zoo where I used to volunteer). Oh, and also, this might bore the pants off those of you who aren't birders, but cactus wrens are so lovely! They really are! The Living Desert is a very cool place; if I lived there, I'd be a member in a heartbeat. Probably volunteer there too.

Anyway. It was hot. The cheetahs were running around, though, and of course, cheetahs are such breathtaking animals, I could have watched them for hours. But I didn't; we went back and did our little timeshare duty and then, since it was (did I mention yet) hot, we did take the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway to the top of Mount San Jacinto which is... oh, man... so beautiful (not to mention about 30 degrees cooler). The tram ride up was wild: you go from the desert floor to 8400 feet in ten minutes, and the tram has a rotating floor so you get to see the view before you and behind you and to either side twice on the way up and on the way down. It looks a lot scarier than it is, but it's still an amazing engineering feat. But up at the top was the real payoff; we did one of the self-guided nature hikes. Saw ourselves some usual suspects, but also a first for me in a white-headed woodpecker. The trail up there was gorgeous. Hannah was a total trooper, doing everything with us without a single complaint. Well, all right, there was maybe one complaint. But who cares?

After we got back (and the ride down the tram was as fun as the ride up), we played "confuse the hell out of Mitch's GPS system" by taking our own route back to Palm Desert, where we decided a swim would be a wonderful thing. The property was absolutely littered with desert cottontails, all alive and kicking, of course. We stayed at the pool as the sun set, then meandered back and packed and voila, here we are. Oh, by the way, one of the more impressive sights on the drive is the Palm Springs Wind Farm. It really is pretty amazing.

The ride to LAX was... a ride to LAX, and I wasn't looking for celebs in the airport (sorry guys). We made our flight in plenty of time and now we're home, and that's the update and that's that! Now, to see if we have anything to eat around here.

Catch you later.