Sunset on the way back to Zuni. The whole sky was pink.

Tom and Roxie wait patiently while I take photos.

We passed by this area - but one weekend we are going to explore it  - there are writings and drawings on the rock that are over 700 years old. 

While searching for the main gate into Kirkland Air force base we came across two of these rocky snakes. You are only seeing the first third of the snake.

Tom Bender has really been busy sine he arrived. The back yard is  now completely clear of the waist high weeeds. He has actually planted some grass seed in the dirt that was left. He has put up all my posters and pictures, put up all the curtains, and got us some groceries - lots of groceries. I believe he thinks he is still in Alaska and buying for four months at a time! We took a little trip to Alberquerque yesterday to get our tv set. I took a couple of photos along the way.

Finally posting a few photos. The prairie dogs are the best. Looking forward to seeing Roxie's reaction to these little creatures.


Okay, here is the famous mesa or mountain here. At various angles it looks completely different.

Below is the apartment complex where I live - built and maintained by the school. Each builing you see houses two large apartments. They are twice as big as the ones we had in Chevak. And only $417 a month.

Mary - here is some kind of bird house - there are hundreds of bird in this thing. They harvest the feathers, I believe. It is the brown structure. When I get my permit I'll take a better photo. I was taking these out of the truck window today.

And now we come to these precious little creatures - the prairie dogs at my school.

These guys must be big eaters.

These guys stayed still for the longest - like they were frozen.

I finished inventorying the fiction books today. It takes three times as long to inventory because the bar code might be on the back, it might be on the front, it might be inside the back cover, it might be on the title page and it might not be there at all. I would say at least half of the books so far have those yellowed smelly pages - many are paperbacks or bound paperbacks. i think one of my main goals will be to get lots of new books and many replacements for what we have there now. I discarded about 300 books today.

My reference books are inventoried and all have new bar code labels - on the bottom left of the front cover. I have started replacing the ones on the fiction, but it will take months.

The folks in our apartment complex are having a block party tomorrow afternoon. It is right outside my door so I guess I better go. It will be nice to see who lives here cause frankly I seldom see anyone around here period. I did go over to eat with a fellow teacher at my middle school the other night. Her apartment looked so homey and she has lots of comfy furniture. I think Tom and I are going to live lean this year till we know we are staying - well at least till Christms.

Speaking of Tom - he should be leaving Georiga tomorrow morning in my new used Corolla that I bought from Elizabeth. I just realized I have bought that car twice now - once when it was new and we bought it for her and now when it is used and we have bought it from her.......something is wrong here.

Elizabeth called me like six times today - she was at her library working on Saturday and I was at mine working on Saturday. Like mother like daughter. She found a card catalog in the office and was a little concerned. She is sure the library is automated though. I believe the high school has had major renovations this summer and was only opened for teachers this past Friday, the first day of work.

On Monday I am going to get my photo permit so I can take some photos of the Zuni area. They are very strict about photos.

The kids at school are great.

My office is finally cleaned out. We had open house tonight. Four of my libary assistants came in with their parents. I was so glad they dropped by.

Tom is flying home as I type this entry. I hope all his connections work and that he gets home safely. Elizabeth is having a great time. I believe she is full of excitement and anticipation. Her new principal is a former principal from Hart County - so she feels like she knows him already.

I am so looking forward to Tom's arrival. I have never missed him so much.

I am going to get some photos but you have to get a permit before you take any photos and I can't get out of school early enough. I think I might leave on time tomorrow, get the permit and then go back to school. I went to Gallup on both Saturday and Sunday this past weekend to pick up stuff we needed for our apartment. The drive is just lovely. I must get some photos soon.

I am about to finish my third day here and I am about to drop. I have finally cleaned out my office enough so that the custodian can actually vacuum. I don't know how I would have done it without my wonderful student library assistants. They have really been helpful. Next week I start on the library workroom which has hundreds of videos, and the equipment room. I just want everything in place, in order and it is going to be a job. For those of you who are interested in this sort of thing, here are some of the issues:

1. They had changed almost (to the 800's) all of the Dewey Numbers to only three digits so the kids could shelve the books easier. No more 598.2 or 599.97 or 796.35.
2. Only certain sections of the books are in order. I mean the 800's are just on the shelves in any order, and also the 900's.
3. This is the best! There are 39,000+ items in the Alexandria database. There are no more than 10,000 books on the shelves.
4. The librarian got marc records but did not load them. Instead the aide did brief cataloging on the new books. By brief, she entered the title and the bar code.
5. Many of the bar codes on the books and the computer do not match. For example, on the computer a bar code will match one title, but that exact same bar code will be on an entirely different book.
Mary, RoseMary and Elizabeth, you guys will understand my frustration and also the job ahead of me. I want to do an immediate inventory - but we cannot locate the handheld scanner.

There are hundreds of little prairie dogs around the school. They make holes in the ground and just pop up everywhere. Roxie will go nuts.

Tom and Elizabeth are in Alaska. They bought a 2007 Subaru Outback today. I imagine they will drive to Delta Junction tomorrow. I hope Tom comes on back soon. Well, I hope he comes back period...

I have put in a total of 11 work orders for the technology department.

My aide lived in Anchorage for nine years. What a small world.

I love this very small school - except I have bus duty morning and afternoon with the principal. I like her a lot. She is shorter than Elizabeth.

We arrived in Zuni yesterday and it seems like two weeks ago. Our apartment in "to die for"! Brand new, twice the size of the apartment we had in Chevak. The grounds are landscaped and there is even an automatic sprinkler system. The air conditioner is a little funky. We turn on the pump fist to get some straw wet on the roof, and then five minutes later we turn on the air. It works.

It is so hot here. Hot like in "Larence of Arabia" hot. We are totally exhausted from the heat. My only relief is that it is going to get cooler in about a month. Today a Zuni man asked us to come watch the dancing in the square. Then he told Tom that since we were not Zuni that we would have to go up on the roof to watch. Uhh - it would be too hot for me on the roof and besides that, how are we going to get up there. We decided to wait till a cooler day. The roof....

My library clerk is fabulous. The library is beautiful. The principal took me to every classroom to meet the teachers and kids this morning. We have our checking account, our post office box, our keys and we are set. If only I could get my computer to print.

The track youngsters were running and exercising in the heat afterschool today. I don't know the temp but it is crazy hot here.

Internet might not be much of an option here. The school intranet is severely structured and my favorite sites are all blocked. I haven't tried Netflx yet - but if it is blocked I might start crying. There is internet available in housing but it is expensive and hardly ever works. So, I don't want to put money out for something that isn't usable and available. Then, and here is the worst - I cannot use my laptop to log onto the internet at school. UMPH! MY frustration level has been reached with the technology here.

Our apartment was not furnished so we had to drive to Gallup yesterday - our first day here - to get a new mattress. We then went to Goodwill and found a couch and two chairs and two endtables. Tom went back this morning (the mornings are cool like air conditioning) and picked up a few necessary items from Wal Mart.

Tomorrow I will drive Tom to Gallup where he will catch the train to Albuqerque - I will learn to spell that. He will then fly to Phoenix to meet Elizabeth and they will fly together up to Anchorage. He will be back in about a week. I'll miss them both.

Maybe I can get some photos loaded tomorrow. I have been swamped with stuff to do.

It is August 8th and we are spending the night at the Route 66 Motel on Route 66 in Tucumcari NM. We travel to Albequerque tomorrow and then on to Gallup tomorrow afternoon. We will be around an hour from Zuni and will head there Monday morning. I'll check in at the district office for some paperwork and then hopefully we will get into our apartment. Tom leaves Wednesday afternoon.

It has been hot and super windy. The trees in Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle actually lean toward the Northeast because of the wind. I would open the car door and my "literature" would start blowing everywhere and on a couple times the door of the truck would slam shut. It was 98º today.

Our route was - Atlanta, Montgomery, Memphis, Little Rock, Oklahoma City, Amarillo and now to Tucumcari. We are not making and unnecessary stops so I have no photos yet. I expect to get a few tomorrow. Our trip has really been uneventful. There was a major traffice jam in Memphis - two insterstates were intersecting and they were working on both at the same time and it was 5:30pm when we were traveling through. Traffic was at a standstill. I guess it took us over 45 minutes to go about 10 miles.

The transfer trucks on I 40 must number in the millions.

So, I have a little event to write about. Last night at our motel, Tom went out to the car to get toothpaste and another time to get a bag. Well, he was gone a long time both times. I mean a good 20 minutes. I just figured he was fooling around with the truck. Then this morning, he went to get coffee at the motel breakfast. He was gone a long time again - enough time for me to get a second snooze. Now, let me back up here to about four years ago , when I was discussing finances with my brother Mike, I told Mike that if I could keep Tom from drawing cash out of the ATM machine, that I believed we could save some money. I had no idea what he did with the money he drew out. Then Mike said " He may have him a girlfriend somewhere!" I'm lying there in the bed now, remembering that conversation and realizing that once again Tom has left and is simply not returning. I started imagining all the things that could be going on and started to get out of the bed, but then he returned. I told him my concerns and we got a good laugh out of it. Turns out he had been gassing the car, repacking the truck, etc.

 We have seen a dead armadillo and a very still huge turtle on the side of the road. We have seen over a million cows.

I'm going to change the photo on my blog - I'll have to take just the right photo.