Circle of life (March 1)

We made our regular Saturday stop by the house to check on the progress. They had applied the first coat of stucco. It was still drying but it gave the walls a much more solid look that the Styrofoam.

There were guys on stilts walking around the basement taping up the drywall seams so we stayed upstairs. Nothing very dramatic at this stage but for one item.

Bathtubs. We actually had bathtubs.

I know this doesn’t sound that exciting. But just look at this….

Can you really tell me there is no merit in bathtub arrival?

We left for the apartment, secure in the knowledge that we had bathtubs and we would be able to keep clean after we move into our new home.

One the way to the apartment we saw a sign for the annual Chili Cook Off. We were hungry, chili sounded good and, what the hell, we had bathtubs for Pete’s sake. We could handle some chili.

The chili cook off was actually pretty cool. There were people from all over the southwest and a few from even farther away. They all drove up in their RVs, set up their propane cook-tops and got down to it. Some of them were there for the fun of it, some were very serious about it, and some were just odd.

One, however, descended on the event as if they were on Donald Trump's Apprentice show. They intended to win and I’d be surprised if they didn’t. They operated their “stand” with a military-like efficiency not seen outside of large manufacturing plants or the secret pentagon building at Redmond. They had the most people. They had the most vehicles. They had a band. They had uniforms.

I will admit that they had damn good chili. Their mind control devices directed us to vote for them as the best.

After all this chili and brainwashing we were craving something sweet. No doubt a result of collusion between the chili team and the ice cream people. Barb got an ice cream and I got a snow cone. Man, I forgot how good those things were.

Near the cook off there is local rodeo arena. We saw something was going on so we got in the car and headed over. A local team roping competition going on and so we hung out for a while watching the teams. It never occured to us to reflect on the fact that we were watching a sport that had evolved from the skills needed to raise the beef that they used to make our chili tasty. If we had it would have made the rodeo even cooler. It was a good way to enjoy the weather and the weekend.