I’ve hiked Squaw many times, but only on Friday did I see the baby arch up on the cliffside for the first time. It’s so little that there is only a small window of opportunity to see the sky through it on the hike. For this reason, unless you happen to be looking up at that cliff during that minute-long window, it’s easy to miss.

Haley and I journeyed to the arch on Sunday, and to other equally excellent overlooks all the other times. You can look south over town, or north over the Grand Staircase, or east or west to more towering red rock cliffs. Squaw is nice. I dig it. Haley likes it too.

I signed Haley’s adoption papers this morning. It’s funny how things work out. The same day Misty dies, Haley officially becomes a member of the household. It reminds me of a cat I had growing up (who we had since before I was born and who made it until a month shy of my 18th birthday). A few weeks before he died, we took in another cat, and she ended up being exactly like the one who died in so many ways. And though they were never particularly close, she stayed with him and snuggled him the night he died. I hope one of the other cats did that to Misty last night. When I found her dead in her cat bed this morning, she was covered by a poster that had fallen off the wall. At first I was mortified and felt horrible that it had fallen on her, but then I began to see it as the world’s way of covering her up. Like she spent her last few hours, she died with her eyes open. And I’m kind of glad that poster, which had never fallen before, decided to fall last night and blanket her in her death.

Molly brought along her camera, so all the following photos are by her (except the one of her, which I obviously took). And no, I don’t usually hike in dresses and flip-flops (though it has happened before), but we just came from an artist’s reception.

Delano Peak is the highest point in the Tushar Mountains, which is the third highest mountain range in Utah behind the Uintas and La Sal (take that Wasatch!). Delano, while not a rocky peak, reaches 12,173 feet. There is no trail up the mountain, which made it a little interesting, but it was pretty straight-forward. You could see a false summit just in front of it, so it was easy to tell where I was going. It was very steep though, and with no trail (and therefore no switchbacks), I was huffing and puffing. I had to resort to making my own switchbacks and stopping often to make it even remotely bearable. Altitude may have played a role in this. I haven’t hiked this high in I don’t even know when, and I was ridiculously sluggish from the very get-go… more so than not hiking in a month should make me. The dog kept me going though, and although it was quite miserable for me, it was well worth it when we finally reached the top. It was rather windy up there, which made it a little cool, but with temps around 100 in the valleys below, it was still pleasant. We didn’t stay on top for too long. I was looking forward to the hike down, because the hike up was so miserable, but as I should have known, going down will always be just as bad if not worse. And indeed it was. Oh well. We survived.

More photos are posted here.

I met Haley at work last week. I have never fallen for a dog, or even a cat here (at least not in the sense that I must bring them home), but something was different with Haley, from the moment I met her. When I left, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. Her caregiver, Mileen, told me I should come back and walk her whenever I want. Even if I couldn’t adopt her, all the socializing would be good for her. I knew I would take her up on this offer.

I didn’t think I could consider taking her home though, because well, I have so many cats now and they’d never get along. While talking to one of our trainers today about my love of Haley, she told me Haley is great with cats. We wandered over to Haley’s area for a little visit, which turned into a little walk, which turned into a trip to my house. I had to pick up the bloody puke cat and bring it home at lunch, so I did… and Haley came with. We walked in, and as stated, she is great with cats. She knows her boundaries and won’t bother them. She looks away if she knows they’re uncomfortable. She’s met all of them and already made friends with a few. We went back up to work, and a few hours later, I picked her up again to come spend the night. It’s just a sleepover, but it’s a sleepover that may turn into me fostering her, which could possibly turn into adoption. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

When Mileen found out today that Haley visited my house over lunch and was coming back tonight, she said she wasn’t surprised at all. She told me she knew the minute she introduced us last week that I’d be taking her home. I guess deep down, I kind of knew too. I had all sorts of reasons why I shouldn’t get a dog, but it’s funny how they become non-issues when the right dog comes along.

Haley is perfect. She’s the perfect size, not too big, not too small. She’s great with cats… and other dogs, and horses, and everything except maybe squirrels. She’s great off-lead (a necessity for a hiker such as myself). When on-lead, she doesn’t tug. She’s very mellow, except when under the influence of hyperactive dogs, and even then it’s not over the top. She sits before any door is opened. Her kisses aren’t sloppy. She’s perfect! So she is sleeping over. And we will see how it goes.

It’s incredible how wonderful and well-adjusted she is, considering her background. Haley has a heart-breaking story that will shock you just as much as it shocked me. Haley is from Ethiopia. I knew the situation must have been bad to warrant such a long-distance rescue, but I had no idea it was as bad as it was. Haley, and her buddy Hana (also at Best Friends, and also great), were two of four surviving dogs found in a pit in Addis Ababa - a pit containing an estimated 6,000 dead dogs. This pit is where people threw unwanted dogs… a pit they couldn’t get out of. No one knows how long she was in there, but what we do know is that she is out now, and sleeping comfortably on my arm as I type this.

So while I can’t tell you the outcome of her story yet, whether I will adopt her or not, or even foster her, I will tell you that for now at least, there is another roommate in this animal house. Her name is Haley, and she’s perfect.

If you’re wondering why there is so much puke, most of it is hairball puke. My two cats have never had a hairball in their life, so this is all very new to me. And if you’re worried about why one cat is puking blood, that is also probably hairball-related, and he is in the kitty hospital up at work right now.

And then of course, there’s the cat hair that’s not in the form of puke. I feel I have this aspect fairly well managed though. I have a Furminator (hallelujah!) and use it often (hopefully often enough to cause a cessation in hairballing all together). I sweep a lot, and pick up random furballs, so the only hair is that on my bed and futon. I keep both covered with an extra blanket now.

And what cat lady would be complete without potty problems? Aside from the occasional randomly placed turd, one cat has decided they prefer cat beds to litter boxes when it comes to doing number one. And sometimes rugs. Hallelujah for my own personal washer and dryer! And again, for tiled floors. AMEN. You’d think six litter boxes would be enough, but I guess it’s not good enough for them. And if I don’t clean the litter ten times a day, I tend to get overwhelmed with piss and crap, in and out of the litter box.

So… who wants to come over to my house?!

However, if I have learned anything during this experience (aside from retarded amounts of coma-inducing XML), it is this: always embed your captions into your file info. I didn’t have captions on my previous photo section because their placement looked awkward. Now, with the new system, I have more control, and I wanted them back. But well, it was pretty impossible to find a lot of my newspaper captions… because I am dumb and did not embed them into the file info. At my last job, I simply had to write the captions down on paper and hand them to whoever types them into the computer (and yes, a mess if they lost the piece of paper). And that is all I did. I thought I saved hard copies of editions that had photos I liked, but when I searched my storage shed in the backyard, I found that I didn’t save too many copies at all (that may be because the printing press at that paper made every edition worth throwing away). And so, without the captions, I try to remember as much as I can, which is enough in most cases. Some photos I’m at a complete loss for. I had to take out some photos. The internet helps in some cases, but not many. I looked up some old sports brackets, rosters, etc. I dug up info for photos I had no knowledge of before. And thank god, there was one very important photo that I was smart enough to email the names to myself when I quit my job. Of course, I didn’t remember that until like half an hour after I began my epic quest to find the names in a stack of papers. I have all my notepads, every single one of them, from forever, but I’d rather shoot myself before I try to dig through 20,000 names, a thousand of which probably have the note “blue shirt” next to them.

So anyway, if you check out the humans and sports sections and are wondering why there are some captions with a missing name, or a whole missing caption, this is why. It’s not that I’m a bad journalist who forgot to get them, it’s that I’m a bad journalist that didn’t archive her photos properly.

Nowadays, all my critter photos are renamed to the animal’s names within a few hours of taking them, so that’s all the info I really need to know. Most of my old work photos (except the last job of course) have the file info embedded, but are buried on totally unorganized CDs that I will try to get to when my brain isn’t so fried. And I will probably do more internet research later in the week to get the remaining sports captions. There are a few photos that I remember where I took them and can email someone there, and I just may do that a year or two later. You non-photographers are probably wondering what the big deal is, but other photographers will understand. I’m not even sure why I care so much (I don’t even work at newspapers anymore), but well, I just do… and I must have the captions. The end.

Moral of the story: photographers, be not stupid like me. Always embed your captions! ALWAYS!