Day 3: A slight change of plan

The original plan for today was to travel up to Dinosaur, Co but things didn't pan out quite as we expected, however let's recount things in chronological order.

We Breakfasted in Moab, Ut before returning to Arches National Park to continue yesterday's sightseeing. It is a truly beautiful and breathtaking place and we spent the morning driving through the park stopping frequently to walk out to the many viewpoints. In true US National Parks Service style most major sights are easily reached via well built paths only a short walk from the frequent roadside car parks. This is a boon as, although we enjoy a good walk, 30% is still recovering from her broken foot.


I amused myself giving new names to the rock formations and congratulated myself on "the proud sheep", "the dragon" and "the chameleon" but then things got out of hand and a ranger asked me to leave after a particularly prominent column was christened "mademoiselle's pleasurer"*.

After lunch we took our leave of Arches and started out for Dinosaur some 200 miles away. The I 70 soon took us out of Utah's canyons and desert and before long we were on route 139 taking in Colorado's farm lands, mountains and valleys.

We had planned to stay in Dinosaur and take a brief detour through the Dinosaur National Monument. The Dinosaur Quarry is closed until October 2011 when the new Visitor Centre will open so we knew that the main feature was "out of order". It was therefore a fairly easy decision to push on to Vernal when we found that both Dinosaur and Jensen had no accommodation available. Dinosaur incidentally is a rats arse of a place where the most attractive feature was a yard full of scrap cars. Talk about trading on a name, avoid it all costs!

So here we are in Vernal and tomorrow will see us drive nearly 250 miles to Jackson Wy; the entrance to the Grand Tetons National Park.
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* this may not be true

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Day 2: Bryce Canyon to Arches National Park

Today saw us head out on route 12 from Bryce Canyon National Park. Our first stop was only a few miles down the road where we took a brief detour to the Kodachrome Basin State Park before heading on to Escalante to take in the sights of the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument*.

This was one of the last areas of the USA to be mapped due to the remote and rugged terrain and the road we drove between Escalante and Boulder was not completed until the 1940s. Prior to this mail was brought in by mules. The views across the plateau are truly breathtaking.

Today has been a day away from the Interstate routes driving through some of the most beautiful canyon country. Our final destination of Arches National Park truly topped everything we have seen so far. The eroded red sandstone structures are truly awe inspiring to one more used to Britain's more conservative geography and geology.


Courthouse Towers


3,500 tons of Balanced Rock


North & South Windows

This evening we are staying in Moab which is positively cosmopolitan after yesterday's stop in Tropic where we were informed that the resident horse had left in search of adventure.
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* one of the wildlife highlights of the day was Humming Birds at Escalante. They were charming but I have decreed that my holiday will not be complete until I see a Mountain Lion and a Bear in death duel over the corpse of a Buffalo.

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Day 1: Las Vegas to Bryce Canyon

We arrived in Vegas last night at about 8pm local time and were shattered as our body clocks were saying 4 in the morning.

The reserved Pontiac G6 was not available from Avis and we were given a Subaru Impreza instead. TP and I expected a WRX. How wrong were we. It was about the size of a VW Golf and had a tiny boot. We used it to get to our hotel and then swapped it for a Nissan Maxima first thing this morning. "First thing" really was first thing as the aforementioned jet lag had us wide awake at a little after three a.m.

So We were heading North out of Vegas on the I15 before eight in the morning. We are headed for Bryce Canyon and will cover somewhere in the region of 220 miles to get there. Bryce is a US National Park best known for it's hoodoos. These are rock columns formed as a result of rain and snow melt erosion.



We had a great day taking in the splendour of America's Open vistas and took a short hike down into the canyon to get a different perspective on these fantastic structures.





It has been a great fist day only slightly marred by the fact that my Canon SLR has had a hissy fit and refuses to do anything but display an error 99 code. I am not best impressed that I am now hauling a very expensive/worthless bag of camera kit around !

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Heathrow

A Sunny Day at Heathrow T5 - Not!

Here's a thought; why do they have luggage shops at airports? I cannot think of very many situations that would necessitate the purchase of a new suitcase at an airport. I'll acknowledge that a last minute Samsonite malfunction might require a replacement to be bought at check-in but I doubt that this is the basis for a successful business model.

If anyone has any suggestions please let me know as I have never seen anyone in an airport car park with arms full of clothing that they plan to pack in the Departure Lounge.

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Other Stuff
Chippy Ian arrived this morning to start fitting our new windows. The first one was offered in to place before we left for the airport and it looks fantastic compared to the nasty double glazed units that are being replaced. By the time we get home he will have finished and that is the last major job that the house needs. As 30% glibly puts it "it's just decorating from here on in" ...

... "yes Dear"




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I'll be back...

... and so we reach Sunday.

The lawn has been mown, the bags have been packed, T&M have been taken to the kennels. 30%'s brother Stevie has been briefed and will take on house sitting duties for the next two weeks.

We are now ready to leave apart from those last minute items that need to be used on the day of departure. I must admit that I have a rather blasé approach to packing. I work on the principal that I need a credit card, my tickets, passport and insulin. So long as I have that I can work through most problems. It is therefore surprising that 30% always asks me to pack the cases. Apparently I am better at tucking objects in to cases than her ...

... mind you, having seen the state of the Dishwasher when she attempt to fill it, I shudder at the thought of what her case would look like!

I'm not sure whether there will be any Journal entries over the next couple of weeks. I have my i-Phone so they are a possibility but I make no promises.

So to anyone who reads this nonsense I will say "bye for now and I'll see you in a couple of weeks".

Cheerio

bad man

Don't ask me

So here we are. It is Friday and my last day at work for a couple of weeks.

The day started with the regular early morning chat with Tigger where much laughing took place and some work was apparently done. Tigger is running the show for the next couple of weeks and will start with a deserved trip to Boston where he will spend 5 days doing 45 minutes work :-)

Most of my day was spent tying up loose ends and ensuring key activities would be progressed. I did have an Executive escalation call that I was not looking forward to. I was presenting someone else's material and was concerned that I would get interrogated to a level deeper than my understanding. Fortunately the Gods smiled upon me and basically my working day ended there.

I took T&M out for an early walk as today is Bad Man Senior's 79th Birthday. We met up with BM Snr, Step Mum Sue and Brother for Dinner at a local hostelry. It was a lovely evening but was most definitely not a late one and we were back home well before the News at 10.

Another early start

Today was another five thirty start. This time I was down in London at Canary Wharf for a Customer meeting. I didn’t have to present and didn’t get any questions so had quite a pleasant couple of hours before we trundled in to the Central London Circle of Hell for another meeting with the Client.

This was less pink and fluffy and a lot more down in to the nitty gritty. It went very well but it rapidly became apparent that our American Colleagues, on both sides, have been a little economical with the truth and a little slapdash with the facts when we originally developed our Proposal…

… I see some challenging conversations will be held over the next few months but first we need them to sign our UK Contract - appropriate Executive pressure was applied.

I then had time for a couple of gins with a colleague before sampling the delights of the British Public Transport system**. With the 2012 Olympics only 12 months away I have this message for London Commuters and Olympic Ticket holders…

… YOU ARE ALL SO FUCKED*!

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* My Consumer advise would be to flog the tickets on e-Bay and use the proceeds to buy a “Fuck Off” big flat screen telly and watch them from the comfort of your own home

** Take the train, you can work, you can stretch your legs, there are refreshments.  So how come my experience mainly seems to be having my head repeatedly banged by a wide range of elbows and suitcases and being presented with a table flap that is not big enough to hold my laptop so that the screen is readable. Let's also not forget the oh, so smooth ride that means that every single word is mistyped as I am jolted from side to side.  Do not, I repeat DO NOT get me started on the toilets either. In summary the train is fine so long as you are not hungry, have emptied your bladder first and just want to sleep until you reach your destination. In fact the train is great if this is your plan as you invariably find you get to sleep for longer than planned due to convenient points failures or, in my case, a dead train blocking the platform at Oxford

I really needed another couple of hours ...

... for some strange reason I was very tired when the alarm went off at seven o’clock this morning. I think it was probably all down to dealing with the pressure of yesterday’s session and the trials we had to endure to actually reach the venue. I am sure this must be right as Tigger felt exactly the same.

The morning session was a quiet affair and we closed everything down at lunchtime. I then had a quick meeting with my Boss before we climbed back in the Land Rover and head back to the Sunny Shires.

It was nice to have a relatively relaxed day after the hassle of running this damned hand-over session. The actual presentation side of things was straightforward it is the buggering about arranging things that was a Grade A pain in the arse.

Other Stuff

30% has had a hectic couple of days as she has been running the house, looking after TP and had to prepare a Presentation in under 12 hours for an internal interview that was held this morning. She felt it went well so we wait with fingers crossed for news.

They say bad things happen in threes

Well Tigger and me really put that to the test this morning. Let me explain ….

… Today is the first day of our hand-over session. We have spent the past couple of weeks herding cats in an attempt to get this damned thing arranged and we must run the meeting so that the Delivery Guys understand what they are supposed to be doing.  The session was scheduled to start at ten o’clock in a Hampshire town that has nothing famous to brag about. *

I dutifully hauled my sorry arse out of bed at five thirty**, performed ablutions and got in the Defender to drive over to Tigger’s house. The plan was to drive down in Tigger’s car. I arrived at the hollowed out volcano to find Tigger outside shouting “Fuck” repeatedly at his car. On enquiring as to the nature of the problem he said “Fuck” some more and then advised that his immobilizer was working rather too well. This was obviously Bad Thing #1 and we rapidly decided that the Defender would be the car of choice to travel down to sunny Hampshire – problem solved.

As I loaded Tigger’s bag in to the capacious rear I had a moment of self doubt. This rapidly turned in to another “Oh Fuck” moment as a quick check revealed that, in the early morning rush, I had managed to leave my wallet thirty miles away on top of the microwave. I said “Fuck” a few more times and considered going back to get it but that would totally screw our start time. This was obviously Bad Thing #2. Tigger did the honourable thing and offered to fund my trip on his corporate card and I could sort refunds out when we got home – problem solved.

So off we started towards our destination and had a quite delightful trip across the Cotswolds. After a while we hit the M4 and then the M3 and I noticed a sign for our destination. I mentioned this to Tigger who was in the Navigator’s seat. He calmly said that we were fine on the Motorway and should not turn off. I followed his instructions as I was unfamiliar with the route but got very concerned when I recognised a roundabout and remonstrated that we were headed for an entirely different Circle of Hell to the one we were supposed to be at. This was obviously Bad Thing #3. Tigger then said “Fuck” some more and then put the correct location in to the Satellite Navigation app. We had gone about 20 miles out of our way but had plenty of time in reserve so wouldn’t be late – problem solved.

Now some people might think, that after that start, the day would have been a nightmare but we arrived in plenty of time, our Agenda was good and our presentations were well received. To be honest it couldn’t really have gone any better and by 4.30 were had finished the first day’s session and were headed back to the hotel.

Yes – this might be the start of Bad Thing #4. It was very hot, we were very tired and we had all managed to persuade the hotel receptionist that we were worthy of complimentary drinks vouchers. I did have to do the Shrek Cat Face as part of my plea but I did get a free pint of Stella. The more I think about this the less I remember but apparently we did have a very funny night and a great Thai meal and did stay up until two o’clock in the morning.

I did some subtle checking and there was no suggestion that I committed any crimes as I do have a tendency to get a little over excited when I’m drunk.

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* We Googled it and it really does have nothing of interest to see and nothing of interest has ever happened there. That probably makes it unique in the British Isles and I may mention that to the town council. They might like to use it in their next “Come to Best Soaking***” Town Promotional material.

** Please make a mental note of this early hour as it may help explain later events

*** This is an anagram

5 Days to go ...

... the Count Down has officially started. I have just five days left at work before we head off to America for our Summer Holiday. It is going to be a very busy week and I have a few significant meetings to get through before I can click "Enable" on my Out Of Office message.

I've made a start

Sometimes I have Polos in my pocket

Sometimes I have dog biscuits in my pocket

Sometimes I have both

Sometimes Polos undergo a packaging malfunction

Sometimes the dogs get minty gravy bones

Sometimes I get gravy flavoured mints

Sometimes worse things happen!

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DIY News

After an extended period of procrastination I finally made a start on the preparation work needed on the Stairs and Landing.  There was an abortive attempt to fit the final piece of skirting board last week but I quickly discovered that one of the radiators needs to be removed and repositioned to achieve this. As this will involve the local Plumber I have put this off until we get back from our holiday...

... so what did I do today? I stripped the paint from the Bannisters and am quite pleased with the result. I am aware that there is a huge amount of work to do before we are ready for the painters but at least I have now made a start.

Haircuts all round

I had an early start today to make an 8.15 appointment for a haircut. Fortunately the coiffeuse is only a 5 minute walk from home so at least there was no need to schlep in to town, park etc. By 9 o'clock I was back home; shorn and drinking coffee.

I had nothing major planned for the rest of the day when 30% came up with a stroke of genius...

... Yesterdays walk with T&M involved an encounter with a cat. They spotted it patrolling a hedgerow and charged off to investigate. The cat scarpered leaving the dogs frantically circling searching for it. I appreciate that this seems like an odd  diversion but I will get to the point. You see, once the dogs have got in to "chasing mode" that is it. Every rustle, every squeak is, in their minds, something that must be pursued and caught. So most of the walk was spent charging in and out of hedges and careering along the edges of fields in search of imaginary beasts. The end result was that they returned home with their coats filled to maximum capacity with grass seeds.

So faced with the effort of dragging grass seeds from 3" long poodle fur plus a weather forecast predicting very hot weather plus them facing two weeks in kennels 30% suggested that we give them an all over clip. I found the clippers, plugged them in and soon had two very skinny looking dogs.

I really fancy having a go at a sheep next. 

No, don't worry, I've got nothing else to do ...

Today it appeared that I got mistaken for MS Office Service Desk Support Specialist*.

First I may need to explain that I work with Professional IT Services Specialists. I therefore have a perfectly reasonable expectation that they can use Office software products to a proficient standard.  I'm not talking about them being Tools Gurus** or anything like that but they should be able to create a document or use a spreadsheet to manipulate data at the very least ...

... or that's what I thought. This morning I received a mail from our Contracts Guy. Let's call him Slippery Pete. Now over the past few weeks I have had a few e-mail exchanges with Slippery where he seems to want me to do his job. The communications go along the lines of "Badman, have you reviewed Section A of the Contract to ensure our Services are appropriately described?". I then have to trawl though Contracts so that I can point the aforementioned Legal Specialist at sub-sections and turn the question around to ask him if they meet his requirements.

In a less cynical moment I once assumed that he had a lot on his plate and was just to busy to deal with these enquiries but this moments is long gone. I now think that he is a lazy Inadequate, especially after today's e-mail. It went like this ...

"Bad man, is there any way you could convert your table in to MS Word document so I can then cut and paste it in to the Contract"

The table in question was a very simple, very small matrix created in MS Excel. I was somewhat flabbergasted by the request as it probably took longer to draft the email than it would have to highlight the cells in the spreadsheet, press Ctrl + c to copy them and then position the cursor at the required point in the Contract document and press Ctrl + v to paste them in as a table.

After a minor rant to Tigger about the lazy fuckwit I drafted a suitably informative reply. I'm guessing that the sarcasm was too subtle as he replied with "Thanks!!!".

Is it me?

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* Now there is a fabricated Job Title if ever there was one. I see quite a few in my line of work and one of my favourites is a chap across the Pond who describes himself as "Executive I/T Architect - Solution Integration Architect". That sounds like Lord High God, chief of all Wizards but he actually appears to be a "Gopher", as in go for this, go for that.
** mind you, if I drop the "Guru" I'm bang on in this case

Black Clouds?

A bit of an odd title considering that today was absolutely beautiful.

The title references a senior Daemon at Dante's who feels that his opinion and demands may have not been fully considered during the frantic two weeks when Tigger and I were working every hour god sent in order to catch us a nelifunt.

He has a bee in his bonnet about a Delivery issue and it appears that he is trying to use our Project to publicise his concerns. It therefore looks like I am going to be his whipping boy for a couple of hours next week while he has his little rant. I have encountered him before and he is one of those people that are always in transmit mode. It doesn't matter what I say or do, he is right and anything I say is going to be wrong.

I have therefore assembled some carefully worded slides and suggested appropriate Subject Matter Experts. I will read from my slides and direct any questions to the SMEs that he may, or may not, have invited. I'm going with the approach of "the less I say, the less he has to latch on to".

Don't get me wrong, his concern is valid and the issue is real but my project is a symptom not the cause and he needs to bark up a very different tree to put things right. My managers share this view so at least I know that I am not being hung out to dry here.

The call is scheduled for the afternoon of Friday 5th August and he has a flight to catch immediately afterwards. At worst this limits the amount of ranting I have to endure and at best he may be distracted by whether he has packed his passport or not.*

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* If any members of UK HM Revenue & Customers are reading this they should keep a close eye on wheezing Americans Execs leaving the country on Friday next. The chances are that their cases are filled with contraband. If you can't find any in the case you know where to look next lads ....

Quote of the Day

Today Golfy and I met up down in The Village to assemble a piece of reusable Intellectual Capital...

... we threw together a PowerPoint Presentation that we would both be using over the next couple of weeks in an attempt to disengage from the Project.

During this escapade a fairly obvious statement was presented as a question and it earned the natural response of "Does the Pope shit in the woods". A brief discussion followed and I have now managed to argue myself in to a position where I have denied the existence of bears. As evidence of that I am presenting a photo of a Pope that I took - I nearly said shot - in San Diego in 2006.

A Pope, relaxing

Horses for Courses

Tuesday evening saw a ride out with Chippy Ian, Mick, Cheryl and Steve. TP is away at his Grandma's so I contemplated taking the Ducati. I mentioned this to Ian when he called and he thought that the loosely planned route would suit it ...

... Cheers Ian.

I had ridden her on Sunday and most of the 40 or 50 miles had been a nightmare. She is designed to win races and consequently is suited to fast twisting roads with series of bends. Junctions and Traffic Lights, country lanes and pot holes are not her natural territory. My Sunday route avoided the narrow lanes but instead found horse boxes, caravans and open top tourers every where. It was a hot sweaty grind of crunched gear changes and bridled power. There were moments of pleasure when the road opened up, over taking was feasible and 3rd, 4th or even 5th gear could be selected but these were few. They do however make up for the general frustration JUST!

Back to Tuesday evening, Ian's rout took us out through Pershore and over to Upton-on-Severn before climbing up to British Camp on the Malverns, so far, so good. We headed out towards Ledbury and were now in to Herefordshire, famous for its country lanes ...

... yep COUNTRY LANES. I now had several miles riding a race bike in first and second gear, forced in to a race crouch with most of my upper body weight borne by my forearms. This was not fun. The company was great, the stop at the Pub for coffee was welcome and I had a great evening. I was just glad to bear off at Pershore and find a few open roads that allowed me to up the pace somewhat and use her at her optimum revs and pace rather than trundle her past a hop yard.

Ho Hum.

Hello, anybody there ?

I've not blogged for a few days ...

... the reason why is probably laziness, or is it? Every time I write something I get two or three sentences in and then scrub it out. The reason for this is that within a couple of sentences I mention "The Project" - You see, I did it again - and a few words later I find myself yawning.

I think that it has become "all encompassing" and now it has signed I just want to be rid of it and move on to something else. I also want to re-balance my focus so it is less "work" and more "nonsense". I am very conscious that the deal has taken over a large part of my thoughts and I want them back  ....

... yep, I want my thoughts back right NOW. Yes, all you little sparks of consciousness about PC baselines and cost case adjustments can just piss off back to where you came from and let me get back to the mental state where I can devote my time to seeing whether varieties of soup is a good theme to use when you name your cats ...

... For example :-

• Gazpacho - a perfect name for any fat cat
• Mulligatawny - what a great name for a Tabby
• Tomato - any ginger cat
• Tom Yum - a slender Siamese Tom Cat perhaps
• Vichyssoise - definitely an  elegant feline name, if ever there was one

Is it just me that thinks that there seems to be some strange link between soup and cats? Think about it, Wonton, Borscht, Chowder, they are all great cat names. I admit that cream of mushroom is never going to work but there are plenty of soup names that would suit your cat. Thinking about it sadly departed Potato, who was really called Spud, is actually a soup name too. If you need hard evidence that I'm on to something that is it.

Moving back to a slightly saner plane of consciousness some other stuff did happen over the past few days.

30% discovered that she actually broke a bone in her foot when she tripped a few weeks ago. This late diagnosis was made when she went for some Physio for a completely different ailment. The good news is that it is healing nicely and she needs no plaster or additional support and should just carry on "as is". Needless to say, she is somewhat peeved that she didn't visit A&E at the time of the injury and benefit from a few days off sick.

I was invited to attend a series of meetings in the States during the week of the 8th of August. This is actually the first week of our road trip to Yellowstone so I will be holidaying out West rather than sitting in an East Coast Office. I did manage to delegate this to Tigger who is now busy working out the route from the Boston Office to the nearest Apple Store.

On the home front, I completed the cure of the bacon I started ages ago and I now have 6 lbs of Black, Back Bacon in the freezer. There is also a tub of lardons in the fridge, chopped up from the leftovers. 30% threw a handful in to the frittata that was this evening's supper and I can confirm that I am very happy with the way this cure turned out.

TP has broken up from school and has started his holidays by seeing how much time he can spend as a guest in other people's houses. so far he has managed a night at Henry's before disappearing with his Mum down to his Grandma's for a week. Every time I look at the pile of recycling and the full, but clean, dishwasher I realise how much I miss him*.

Finally my younger brother called round this afternoon. He has recently graduated from Cardiff University as an Illustrator and we are all very proud of him. Back in January I gave him a little help with his Thesis and by way of thanks he agreed to update the Avatar that I use in The Journal. Today he came over and gave me the jpg file. I am absolutely delighted with it. See for yourself ...

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*I appreciate that I may have told that joke before but it is worth repeating in case you missed it first time around.

Apparently they did ...

... sign the contract but there have been no fanfares or ticker tape parades. It has all been very quiet and this is very unusual as Dante's Nine Circles of Hell do like to make an announcement on occasions such as this. There are promises of "announcements later in the week" once the client has completed its internal and external communications. So we shall see whether Tigger and me get a mention in the Supporting Cast.

If one knows what to look for, a quick Google search will rapidly confirm that the deal has been done and who is now in bed with whom. I have to admit that this stage of the deal is quite tedious. There is very little to do until the local contracts are signed and the Delivery Guys are ready to take on the project. So I sit on my branch in The Hundred Acre Wood listening telling stories I have told many times before and chasing Bunnies and Weasels  for long overdue deliverables.

Away from work, the weather was reasonably clear this evening so I had an early supper and took a ride out on the Honda with Chippy Ian, Mick and couple of other guys.

Rather than having to sit at home and scratch my head trying to remember where we had been, I used a satellite tracking application on my phone to log our route and it was then a fairly simple matter of extracting that route and presenting it as a map here in The Journal. So there you have it, 109 miles of twisty Cotswold lanes with some of the finest views. At one point the sky did turn a strange blue colour and a nasty bright object appeared in the sky but it didn't trouble us for long and we soon had that comforting grey cloud that has typified the weather for the past week or so. There was also a late evening stop at a Pub in Burford for coffee and we were able to sit and chat outside on that fine Cotswold High Street.

Waiting ...

Will they or won't they?

It seems that all the i's have been dotted and the t's crossed. The arguments have been settled * and today will be the day that the contract gets autographed. Backs will be slapped, hands will be shaken, there will be "high fives" ** and I am guessing that a few high end consumer goods will now be order for a few of the senior team members.

It will be late in the evening before I hear anything and it is obviously now too late for me to do anything but think about the next stage of the project and start to prepare to hand it over the the Transition and Delivery Teams.

There will still be a raft of Country Agreements to be signed and Project changes that will need to be progressed but today is the big hurdle. After the autograph session today we have it in the bag***

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* let's see how long that lasts 
** God Bless our Colonial Cousins, as they know not how to behave. A simple "well done, old chap"  is more than sufficient.

*** Tigger and me just need some sharp scissors to cut the head of the nelifunt and some good glue so we can stick it on the wall above the fireplace

Weekend Round Up

After Friday's intense series of calls and debates Saturday was a welcome blank on the calendar. TP was taken to a local carnival where he was playing Touch Rugby as part of a recruitment drive for his club. 30% was down at the workshop having her hair done so I was left to my own devices.

I am proud to say that I frittered away a good few hours drinking coffee, watching TV and reading the on-line edition of the New Scientist. After lunch I took T&M for a short walk. The weather was atrocious and there was no way that I would manage the Three Miler without a soaking so I did a much abbreviated route and managed to avoid anything more than a few drops of rain.

Later in the afternoon we both collected TP from the carnival and then returned home and finished our slothful day.

Sunday was marginally more productive. I extracted the two pork loins that I have been dry curing; soaked them for an hour and then liberally massaged them with black treacle before returning them to the fridge. In another six or seven days these will be fine pieces of Black, Back Bacon.

We also spent a couple of hours making preparations for our holiday. 30% booked our first night's stay in Las Vegas and I completed the on-line Visa waivers for TP and 30%. We then started to break up the long trip from Las Vegas up to Yellowstone in to reasonable chunks.

The chosen route will take us over to Bryce Canyon National Park and then on to The Arches National Park. We will then leave Utah and visit the Dinosaur National Monument which straddles the Utah / Colorado State Line. From there it is a long haul up to Jackson, Wyoming for the Grand Tetons National Park  which is at the Southern end of our destination; Yellowstone. This is in the region of 1150 miles, excluding any trips off the beaten track, and we have seven days to complete it. We have chalets booked in Yellowstone for four nights and then will take the more direct route down the I5 back to Vegas. This is around 800 miles and we have three days to reach Las Vegas for a final night on The Strip before we fly home...

... so that's the theory, lets see how it all pans out.

I also finally committed myself and ordered a new zoom lens for my digital SLR. I have been mulling this over for several weeks and have steered away from my "never to happen" fantasy of buying a Canon professional lens and went with the sensible option of the Canon EF 75-300mm f/4.0-5.6 III Lens at a very reasonable price.  I was tempted by the latest, image stabilised model but much of my photography nowadays is with a compact as I usually have two dogs which deter me from lugging an SLR camera around.  I decided that potential use would never justify the price of the latest model ...

... and I also have my eye on a fine carbon fibre Hugger that will sit nicely on the swinging arm of the Ducati.

That pretty much summarises the weekend; relaxation and holiday planning. Roll on August.