It's quite an incredible feeling to be holding in your hands, the fossils of creatures that lived 9000 or more years ago. I'm pretty sure that the fish fossils are Nevada Sticklebacks (Gasterosteus Doryssus). In the second photo, it looks as though the fish had been eaten by a large clam.
The third photo shows three of the clams that I found. The large one, in particular, has a lot of detail. I'm going to try cleaning it up a little with sandpaper.
Meesha, as can be seen by the photos, had quite a ball and actually found at least one clam. :-)
Realised last night, that I'd forgotten to do my 'Weighty Matters Monday' post.
We went fossil hunting, on Sunday, in the bed of what was once Lake Lahontan, which was a large lake that covered much of Northern Nevada over 9000 years ago.
I was pretty tired and actually slept in till 9:27, Monday morning. Probably fortunate that I didn't have school and wasn't scheduled to pick up Taylor till 3pm. :-)
Finally remembered to weigh myself, sometime in the afternoon. I remained the same as last week.
Wasn't too surprised, as I got pretty dehydrated on Sunday.
There ain't no toilets out there in the desert, baby, and my injured knee doesn't do to well with the squatting thing, so I wasn't sure how I was going to manage the peeing thing. Men certainly have an advantage, in that department !! :-)
I've noticed that whenever I get dehydrated, I retain water like crazy the next day ... so hopefully, that will come off in the next day or so and I'll have a good weight loss next week..
Okay ... now to the title of my post and a quick explanation about the accompanying video.
The first part of the video, shows my feet crunching through gypsum flakes, as I walk back up a slope, after taking photos of an old ruin.
Then I realise that Sparky, one of my dogs, was not right at my heels, like he's been all day.
Look back down the slope and there he sits, looking all forlorn. Poor thing was really pooped out and obviously decided he was going to not climb up that slope !
Sent Taylor down after him. She gets down there and starts yelling up at me to take a picture. You can hear her faintly on the video if you turn it up.
I couldn't figure out why my stupid camera would not take a photo. You can hear me on the video, telling everybody that it wouldn't 'take'.
In the meantime, Taylor's yelling at me to 'Take a picture' and Sparky's just sitting there, obviously wondering why someone didn't just pick him up and carry him up the slope!
Finally I give up and turn the camera off. Once I turn it back on, it takes photos fine :-)
It wasn't till I got home and found this video, that I realised, I must have accidentally hit the record button, when I started up the slope ...
So I had video evidence of one of my, what I like to call, 'menopausal moments' !!
Sorry about the choppiness and wild swinging and the views of my feet, but when you don't know you're filming then that stuff happens! :-)
Sparky, watching me trying to figure out why my camera won't fire, decides he may as well take a short nap. :-)
Haven't had much time to post this week. Been getting back into the swing of things at school,so been a bit tired.Plus, allergies have been kicking my butt. The scotch broom is in bloom:-(
These are photos from about 8 years ago.
We took my granddaughter,Sacha, skating for the first time....
Sadly,the photos aren't very good quality .... however, I think the sheer excitement on that little girl's face, absolutely shines through.:-)
Can't believe she's almost 12 now!!!
Skates on and already to get out on that ice !!! Look at that grin !!
Hanging on tight to Grandma's hand...
Still hanging on....
Bit braver now and hanging onto the side on her own. Mum (my daughter Christina)is keeping a watchful eye though....
Getting ready to let go of Mum.....
OOPS !!! This is a favourite photo of mine.I love the laughter on both their faces...
Have a great weekend!!
*Update*.... Off on a field trip,this morning, with 100+ second graders. Wish me luck !!! :-)
I think I need to eventually buy a better scale though .. as this one weighs in .5 of a lb increments. The other scale that I have, which weighs in .2 of a lb increments, is wildly inaccurate.
I did better this week at tracking what I ate and I think that made a big difference.
I've also worked at keeping my fluid intake up. I've notice that staying hydrated makes a huge difference in my energy levels. Now that the hot weather is upon us, staying hydrated becomes really important.
Back at school this past week, after a month long Spring Break.
A little bit nervous, as a number of our kids went down to visit relatives in Mexico during the holiday.
As you've probably heard on the news, there has been an outbreak of Swine Flu in Mexico.
Needless to say, I am washing my hands well !!!
Aims for this week, other than losing weight :-) .... keep on with the food tracking, water intake and getting exercise in !
And ...to answer that million dollar question that Americans keep asking me..
Yes, there are McDonald's fast food joints, in New Zealand ... :-)
And ... like here in the US, they are not good for your diet..
However, they do have the McDonald's Kiwiburger, which you won't get here. :-)
I have a love/hate relationship with the little city that I currently live in.
There are parts of the city that I love and enjoy spending time in. The Truckee River is one such area.
There is a trail beside the river, that enables you to walk or bike from Reno through to Sparks and beyond. Eventually, they are hoping to extend the trail from Pyramid Lake through to Lake Tahoe. That will make for a wonderful ride or hike..
The river in downtown Reno, also has a Kayak park and there are areas for people to picnic and swim. In Summer. it's a very popular place..
This is a view along the Truckee River, looking towards downtown Reno.
It's from a roll of black & white film I shot a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure what the camera shop did to it, when they were developing it, but the originals ended up all washed out. You could not make out the mountains in the background or the details of the clouds..
I played around with the photo, with some editing software and ended up with a sort of blue-grey tint to the photo. I rather like it, as it sort of gives a moody look to the photo, illustrating the transition from late winter to early spring..
Part of the River walk in downtown Reno.
Clicking on any of the photos in this post, will give you clearer detail. In this one, partially hidden by the trees, are a couple of the homeless characters that spend their days along the river, waiting for the shelter to open at night. When I walked past, they were sharing their food with some of the myriad bird life that also live along the river..
Reno is a city of contrasts in other ways. At one end of a street you can have a million dollar house and at the other end you can find a mobile home park..
Another thing that has always fascinated and repelled, at the same time, me about Reno is the way that you can very quickly move from a very pretty area to a drab, dirty, run down stretch.
Our city fathers have been wondering why we are losing conventions and why the tourist trade is dropping.
This photo might be one of the answers.
This is an old motel and bar, directly across from one of our big Casinos. It's been in various states of disrepair for years. At one point, many years ago, it was a well known motel, where some of the rich and famous were rumoured to have stayed while waiting for their quickie Reno divorces.
Then it became one of the 'weekly' motels for the homeless and the bar became a biker type hang out.
In more recent years it has been boarded up. There was a tragic fire there about two years ago, in which two homeless men, who had broken into it seeking shelter, died.
They finally pulled it down last week, but the resulting vacant lot is almost just as much an eyesore..
Like this goose, do you like to just sit and watch the world go by...
I also like to people watch ...
Do you ?
The photo was taken down at the Truckee River in Reno. One of my first attempts at playing around with a type of Black & White 35mm film. It's not quite true B&W.
The scales are still going in the correct direction ...that being ... down.
However, again it was only a .4 loss. Better that nothing..
Spring Break is over, so I'm back into normal routine this week, which means back at school three days a week, plus picking Taylor up, taking her to Karate, etc.
I'm going to walk there and back, most days. It's about a 2 mile (3.2 km) walk, one way, so that will give me a bit of a work out !! :-)
I've also been a little slack about tracking my food intake. So my goal this week, is to journal everything that I eat.
I'll use the WW points system, as that tends to be a little easier than working out calories.
The clip below really has nothing to do with weight loss, though I sometimes feel like reacting, just the way the kid does, when I see a bag of chippies. :-)
Also, I figure the amount of giggling I do, when I watch this commercial, must count for something in the weight loss department.
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