Aurora

The puppies are now over 8 weeks old and oh so cute. As you can imagine, seven growing pups indoors can create quite a mess that is hard to keep on top of. On top of that, any time you step into their room, they all mob you for attention. So, as spring weather has descended upon the Palouse, we found scrap lumber and fencing and built an outdoor playpen for the dogs. So far it is doing the job. It’s also giving the pups some much needed fresh air and sunshine, which in turn tires them out so all…

[map style=”width: auto; height:400px; margin:20px 0px 20px 0px; border: 1px solid black;” maptype=”ROADMAP” gpx=”http://www.mineral2.com/wp-content/uploads/Flights.GPX”] If you don’t already know me, I have a thing for maps and geography. It’s an absolute delight to see the landscape from the air. I’ve been bringing my GPS with me when I fly, mostly to keep track of flight progress and to identify what I’m seeing out the window. But it’s also interesting to see how the FAA routes flights. Spoiler Alert: it’s not a direct path between cities. The two tracks above show the flight path between Phoenix and Cancun in both directions….

Last night was full of bad-assery. Yeah, that’s right, it was so bad-ass that I made up a word to describe it. After a cold spell, temperatures quickly rose into the 80’s yesterday making for a hot and somewhat muggy day. The conditions were ripe for evening thunderstorms. As I arrived home, I heard reports on the radio that there were some severe storms just west of Orofino. But looking around, all I saw was sunshine and blue skies. The storms were passing to the south of us. As I was washing my car, dark clouds crept in over the…

This week’s snowshoeing adventure takes us on the Potlatch Canyon loop trail (Clearwater NF #765). If the view above looks familiar, it’s because I have hiked this loop many times in the summer, and first posted about it two years ago. This time, armed with snowshoes, we had a very successful winter hike through the woods. Despite the rising temperatures this past week, the Potlatch Canyon was still a veritable winter wonderland. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the temperatures down by the water never rose above freeziing all day. That’s because we have been having some inversions the…

One of the properties of Moscow is a wet winter and spring. We’re close enough to the coast to get the rainy weather patterns, yet far enough inland to incur the effects of the Cascades rain shadow. Though I suppose being at the foothills of the next major mountain divide, it’s only natural for the moisture to build up and then drop before passing into Montana. The rain here is more of a constant drizzle than the short, hard rains we’d get in the summer in the Appalachians. The drizzle will last all day. It’s the sort of grey rain…