Lake Powell

(Twenty fathoms under in a milky green light the spectral cabins, the skeleton cottonwoods, the ghostly gas pumps of Hite, Utah, glow through the underwater mist, outlined and edges softened by the cumulative blur of slowly settling silt.  Hite has been submerged by Lake Powell for many years now, but Smith will not grant recognition to alien powers.)
– Edward Abbey, “The Monkey Wrench Gang”.

In 1966, the Glen Canyon Dam was finished and Lake Powell was born.  There’s been a lot of controversy over the flooding of Glen Canyon, Edward Abbey made his feelings clear in 1975 in the book “The Monkey Wrench Gang”;  their ultimate goal is to blow up the Glen Canyon Dam.  And there are still environmental groups advocating draining the lake and restoring Glen Canyon.

Personally, I don’t know how I would have felt about the destruction of such a beautiful area back in the 60’s when they were building the dam.  At the time I wasn’t even old enough to be in grade school, and I was living a couple thousand miles away.

But now I think fighting to drain the lake is a waste of energy. 

First off, it isn’t going to happen.  We need the water and electricity it provides too much. 

Second, it’s become a part of life in Utah.  I don’t think I know anyone who hasn’t spend a decent amount of time down there camping, fishing, boating and overall recreating.  It’s a beautiful lake, with amazing scenery everywhere you go.

And finally, after 46 years of settling silt from the the rivers that flow into it, even if you did drain the lake, it would not be the same.  It would take decades, if not centuries, before it was even close to what it was before.

Raindrops.

It rained (briefly) yesterday.  I got these pictures of the water coming off the gutter.

Adorable Alert! View With Caution.

If this post makes no sense, you need to read my previous post: “Denny goes to the doctor.”

Brothers are great.  Mine have never literally licked my wounds, like Alan is doing for Denny here, but figuratively speaking they have.  Always been there for me when I really needed them.

(P.S. – Sisters are great too.)

Denny goes to the doctor.

Yesterday afternoon I noticed a big ol’ bump on Denny’s forehead.  Methinks he was in a fight.

It was worse this morning so I brought him to the vet.  The doc said it looked like he was in a fight had an abscess and a temperature.  The poor cat had to stay there for a couple hours while they put him under and drained it.  And for a $20 difference they gave him a single shot of antibiotics that would slow release over 12 days, instead of pills that I would have to force him to swallow twice a day.  I’ve had to feed cats pills before, I’ll probably save $20 in band-aids alone.

He’s home now, just lounging around trying to sleep off his anesthesia high.  Cats make terrible drunks, usually so athletic and sleek, poor Denny tried jumping off the couch and fell right on his butt.  Hopefully it wears off soon, but at least he seems comfortable.

Night pictures.

In a comment on my last post, I said something about how daytime infrared pictures are more interesting than nighttime infrared pictures.  I said that my regular camera could take more interesting pictures.  Here are a couple sets of pictures that were taken side-by-side, to illustrate my comment.

What do you think?