Tarot Cards

Tonight was Gallery Stroll night at the local art galleries, so I decided to head downtown to see what's up in the art word this month. My favorite gallery stroll stop is Artspace, where there's not only a gallery, but artist studios that are open to public on Gallery Stroll nights.

Linda Dalton Walker is one of the studio artists who's work I like. She does alot of portraits, big vibrant portraits. Normally portraiture isn't really my thing, but I really like hers. It's been interesting to see where she works, and to get to talk with her, and learn a little about her artistic process.

Her recent work includes a series of Tarot Cards that I think are pretty cool. It's been fun to stop by and see her progress on the set. Tonight we chatted a bit about tarot, a subject I really know nothing about. Discussing the fortune telling got me thinking about my future. A number of years ago I had an idea about what my future would be like, but after having my life turned upside down by divorce I realize I have no idea what my future holds anymore. On one hand that is a kind of depressing thought, on the other it is kind of intriguing. I have no idea what adventures, good or bad the future holds. It could be really intersting, it certainly will be different. But would I want to know? Right now, I don't think so. For some reason the thought of predicting my future is a little scary to me. I think I will have to be patient and just see what happens. I don't know if I even believe in tarot, but I'd be hestitant to dabble in it right now anyway. I may, however, be interested in buying a set of Linda's cards when she has them made. Maybe then I will be brave and find someone to read them for me.

So would you want to have your cards read?

More from the trail...

November has come and gone without enough snow to give us an early ski season. No big Thanksgiving opener, hopefully we'll get dumped on by Christmas. So instead of hitting the slopes I've been trying to get up in th mountains for a hike every weekend. This weekend I joined the Sunday Hikers Meetup Group for a trek up the Burch Hollow Trail in Millcreek Canyon.

I think we hiked about 3 miles up, and as all the Millcreek Canyon trails go, up means up! We were approaching a nice ridgeline in the distance, which seemed like a good goal, until one of the guys explained to us that while it seems like we should be able to hike to it, it never really get any closer. He appeares to be correct about that, so eventually we decided we needed to turn around and save the ridge for another, longer day.


Turning around was probably a good thing, because sometimes the downhill trek is as hard or harder (especially in the knees) than the uphill one. This time of year the trail conditions range from dry, to snowy, to icy, to thick and muddy. Slip sliding down the icy and muddy sections was a little bit challenging at times, but I'm proud to say I mangaged to stay upright the whole way.

And Daisy of course had a great time. This trail would have done her in during the heat of the summer, but this time of year it was perfect for her.

Belated Holiday Greetings!

I meant to post Thanksgiving Day greetings on Thanksgiving, but somehow it didn't happen... probably because I was too busy cooking. I thought it was going to be a low key dinner, just me and my kids and friend of mine. Then the day before the holiday Matt mentioned that 3 of his friends from college decided to road trip up for the weekend. They have friends here and apparently think Salt Lake is a hip place to come party. So of course I told Matt he could invite them to dinner if they had no other plans, which they didn't, so we ended up with a full house for dinner. After pouring the wine and sitting down I looked at Matts friend who was sitting at the end of the table and said "I guess you have to say grace". The look on his face was positively priceless, he thought I was serious and totally didn't know what to do... until Matt, Sarah and I burst out laughting because we all knew I was kidding. Being the non-religious types we skipped grace and had a nice toast to thankfulness instead. I really enjoyed having all the "boys" over for dinner. It nice to get a glimpse into Matt's college life.

I had a great Black Friday as well. Did I go shopping? Hell no!!! A few friends and I headed up to Crystal Hot Springs for an afternoom of soaking and sunning, followed by a nice dinner at Jeremiahs on the way home. That's my idea of a perfect Black Friday!

Question of the day....

Why would men bother with high maintenance hairdos? Or really, that was my question last night. I went with some friends out to a club to hear a band, and was dumbfounded by the number of guys with high maintenance do's. Not just a little hair gel, but how about a full mohawk that must have stood a foot straight up in the air. It was kind of golden in color and looked interesting when back lit just right. Then there was the guy who sported the "crown". He has a wide, crown like headband, and his hair was styled onto lots of three inch spikes sticking straight up from. How about a short fluffy mohawk colored magenta red. Even the guys with more "normal" styles seemed had hair styles much more fussy than most guys I know. Lot of hair gel or mousse or "product" of somesort. I can't deal with fussy, high maintenance hairdos for myself it's hard to pictures guys wanting to deal with hair hassle, but apparently it's hip, at least with the younger guys!

On the trail...

Yesterday I decided that I should try to take Daisy on more hike up to Dog Lake before the the end of the season. The Big Water Trail is at the very end of of the Millcreek Canyon road, and the upper half of the canyon closes for winter at the end of the month. Sure enough winter has already started up there, with the exception of a couple of west facing dry spots, and some chocolate pudding like wet spots, most of the trail was snow packed from the parking lot up to the lake. It was a tiny bit slippery for me in my hiking boots, but heavenly for Daisy who just loves frolicking in the snow. She must be showing her age (she's 9), for the first time ever she didn't play in the water at lake. It was pretty cold, maybe she's a smart dog after all. We hiked the three miles up ad the three miles down, but it wasn't until I was about 30 feet from the parking lot that I slipped on the ice and landed on my rear...
I'm not sure but I think Daisy laughed at me....

Ebay....

Ta da, after a long hiatus, I started listing some beads on ebay again... hopefully someone will find them and like them. Sometime early in the summer my friends wanted to go on bike ride on the night I normally did ebay listings... so I skipped one night. And then it happened again, and again... and the next thing you know I've taken the summer off from ebay. But now it's time to let some beads go... they are kind of weighing down the south side of my house again....

The Utah Roller Coaster

From my deck...

Wednesday night, from Olympus hills

My backyard, Thursday morning

The other Utah Roller Coaster.... the weather. We get beautiful fall weather and beautiful sunsets. I wish I had brought my camera when I went out to the Park City farmers market (Park Silly) last weekend, the fall colors the blue skies, it was so beautiful. My friend, who drove that day, owns a convertible, and it was positively perfect top down weather. But being Utah things change quickly. Tuesday it was 80 degrees, Wednesday my daughter called me at work, all excited because it was snowing. Thursday we awoke to snow in the yard, and had to scrape the car windshields. The weather coaster is always interesting here.

Friday was my annual pants-a-phobia day.... after only wearing shorts and skirts all summer, the advent of the cold weather meant it was time to put on long pants - for the first time since May. After so long without wearing pants I'm almost phobic about puttingthem on again, thus the first time I wear then is my pants-a-phobia day... the day I have to get over my pants phobia.