The Great Outdoors is really dirty and full of bugs

Back from camping in the desert with only slightly fewer body parts than what I left with. Digital cameras have spoiled me and I have shot over 300 photos. Three hundred. So many, that after the first day, I had to dump my card (thank you iPaq, kiss, kiss), which was only 1Gb, so really, that was my fault for going so puny.

Monkey, who'd gone along by special request, was a real trouper and didn't cry once even though she fell about four times including a four-foot drop straight down onto some jagged rocks where she landed with a sickening "craaaaack!" She'll not be going on anymore outings like that as she has now retired.

That will teach me to take a limited doll with six changes of clothing on a camping trip. This has also taught me to not go hiking in flip-flops.

We did see coyotes, quail, scrub jays, roadrunners, mourning doves, jackrabbits, cottontail rabbits, chipmunks, bats and assorted lizards. Oddly, I saw no spiders except for a giant metal one made from a VW bug.



Only 299 more photos to go.