N.I.M.B.Y.

A phrase that is frequently used in my line of work (environmental engineering) is often referred to as "N.I.M.B.Y." or "Not In My Back Yard." Basically when it comes time to site a new water or wastewater plant, a new landfill, or some other type of "environmental" infrastructure, well, frankly, no one wants it around or NIMBY. Sure, we all NEED drinking water, wastewater treatment, etc. But please, NIMBY!

Today, however, I'm using NIMBY to describe the fires that are currently burning around the state of New Mexico. I don't want ANY of these in MY backyard! NIMBY! NIMBY! NIMBY!

Starting around 2 yesterday afternoon, a fire started near the town of Los Alamos, NM. By the time I went to bed, it had grown to nearly 5000 acres. When I woke up, it was almost 10,000 acres. 24 hours later, officials called for mandatory evacuations for the area since it had grown to nearly 50,000 acres!!! [And just so you know, that's bigger than their last fire, the El Cerro Grande Fire in 2000 - it was only 47,000 acres...]

I have friends that live there, I have co-workers who grew up there, and I have projects currently underway in Los Alamos. I swiped this photo from MSNBC so you can see the view from last night. You can google to find more horrific imagery of this Las Conchas fire. HORRIBLE...
While Los Alamos (or "LA" as some of us say) is still an hour and half north of Albuquerque, the smoke is very visible here. With the crazy winds we keep getting, the voracious heat, it's horrible. The air will be putrid and smoky; it already is. I can't imagine even being NEAR LA at this time...ick!

Here's another photo from KRQE news so you can see some of the smoke (just to the left of this picture, around the corner from the hospital, is the entrance to Los Alamos National Labs):
As of June 27, 2011, I can name a dozen cities that have wildfires burning in New Mexico without even looking it up on the local news. It's a total change of pace for me, since I grew up in the flooding town of Shawnee, Kansas.

With that said, can we please start our monsoon season now?! That'd be great, Mother Nature, thanks!

Stay safe out there and please, please don't light any stupid fireworks in the middle of a tinderbox! I'd like to keep my house in one, standing piece, thank you.

Seriously, be safe this fourth of July!
~kerrie

Zebras! FIVE Zebras!

Yes, still catching up on the blog... I've made it to Memorial Day weekend, so I'm not THAT far behind :)

We'll start with the Saturday before Memorial Day, ok? Decided that since the weather was amazingly great (not windy!), we should have a picnic at the zoo. A group of pals joined us for lunch on the lawn. We met up with Shawn, Amelia, Liam, and Greta (Amelia's in my book club); Jennifer and Brett (Jennifer is also in my book club - and they've been around this blog many times); and Kristin and Justin (Kristin's in my book club too, plus they're our neighbors). Here we are chowing under the huge cottonwood trees:
(And I need to credit Jennifer and Brett for a few of these photos - I stole some from their camera since they're MUCH better photographers than Matt and I are...)

Just off the edge of the lawn is a stage with a little lake around it. They do concerts at the zoo (which is amazing to hear the animals singing along with the symphony!) and the fish/ducks in the lake are well fed during normal and concert hours. Carter LOVED feeding the fish and ducks and I'm actually surprised we were able to even see other exhibits that day. He's STILL talking about the fish ("Fish, swimming!")...
Shawn and Liam also feeding the fish:
And that's Greta on the left:
From there we took off to see the exhibits. Our favorite, the polar bears (they were sleeping - not playing, not swimming, not pacing, not doing anything cool...):
Family shot in front of the polar bear exhibit (and that's Kristin and Justin to our left):
The tigers (one behind me on the left):
The train AND the peacock (which was making all sorts of racket) - VERY cool!
The elephant exhibit (and that's Amelia, Shawn, Liam and Greta behind us):
One of the new zoo babies in Albuquerque - Daisy, the elephant:
And now, the best part of all. The zebras. FIVE zebras! They were eating grass! It was SOOOOO exciting! Can you believe it?! FIVE zebras! I think we stayed here for about 30 minutes and Carter was in zebra heaven!
And for fun, three short videos of Carter imitating the zebras (basically you just need to purse your lips together and blow):











Since we left the zoo about a month ago, Carter has been talking about the FIVE zebras pretty much every single day! Not just one zebra, folks, FIVE! Eating grass!

Hope you get the opportunity to see FIVE zebras too!
~kerrie

Visit from Uncle Jason

Back in May my brother, Jason, came out to Albuquerque for a short little vacation. Only happy to oblige his whim (and take a couple of days off myself!), we decided that it would be best to complete the following tasks:

A. Drink Plenty of Beer
B. Drive Go-Karts
C. Drink Plenty of Beer
D. Go Bowling
and
E. Drink Plenty of Beer

So that's what we did! Have to say that we had a blast acting like goof balls, especially on the go-kart track! But who knew that go-karts would make us so dang car sick?! Perhaps it was because it was an indoor track and we were breathing too many exhaust fumes, but when we got done with our 5 or 6 laps, we were both a tad ill.

To remedy that, we drank some beer...

:)

We also did a little bowling and I gotta say, we are indeed pros! Just look at our form!

(To be fair, we both had bowling lessons when we were kids... I don't think it helped any, just look at these scores...)

I am an "arc" bowler. Which means my first game is pretty good and then I go downhill REALLY fast. Matt, on the other hand, gets BETTER as he drinks and bowls more. Go figure...

GAME 1:
Kerrie (aka "Stryker"): 143
Jason (aka "Trucker"): 102
GAME 4:
Stryker: 126
Trucker: 142

The rest of Jason's mini-vacation was spent hanging out around the house and back porch. I think he came for the coldest days of Spring, so it's a shame that he didn't get to see the great weather that we usually get. Oh well, next time...

I'll end with a few parting shots of Jason and Carter (*tears up a little*). A month later and Carter is STILL talking about Jason. "Jason's bed?" (where Jason slept in our guest room), "Jason goes home?" (he had to head back to Kansas), "Jason's puppy" (Ellie, the Basset Hound, who is "silly" and gives "lots of kisses"), etc.
(next one is a little fuzzy, but it's still a great pic!)
And a quick photo before I took Carter to school, Jason to the airport, and myself back to work:
Had a great time, Jason, let's do it again soon! Love ya, bro!
~kerrie

PS And yes, we drank plenty of beer in 2 and half days :)

The Reverse Method

Now that the weather is warmer (read: HOT!), we've been eating some icy desserts in the evenings to cool off. You also may have heard that there's a HUGE wildfire in Arizona (google some "Wallow Fire" images and you'll be blown away!)...anyway, it's REALLY smokey over here in Albuquerque (yes, nearly 200 miles east of the fire), so we've been enjoying our meals and desserts indoors. With my weak lungs, it's been a bit rough (read: inhalers, inhalers, inhalers!), but I've managed. I've also found that ice cream really helps :)

Carter tends to agree with me that it's not really the ice cream that is the tasty part, it's the cone. Even the weird bright green (or red or yellow) ones that taste like styrofoam... Maybe it's because we're both lactose intolerant, but it's just more fun to wolf down the cone than it is to eat the actual ice cream (or orange sherbet, as shown here).

Carter's "Reverse Method" seems to be just the ticket - see?
Perhaps it's even better if you shove the whole thing in your mouth?
Nope...that's REALLY cold!
Oh well, back for more:
I'm slowing trying to catch up on the blog, but it may be a month of so before I get my act together... :) In the meantime, stay cool and grab a cone!
~kerrie