On a whim, I decided to take off last Thursday & Friday and call it an extra-long weekend.  It worked out for the better, although for whatever reason I don’t really feel ready to work again.  I’m sure I’ll hit my groove soon.  Yeah, soon.

Despite the extended break, we didn’t do anything too crazy.  For one thing, Donette was still working so she couldn’t join me.  I took a short mountain bike ride on Friday…  Besides that I mostly binge-watched Gunsmoke on the back patio.  I spent my day Thursday smoking a few pork butts, which was pretty exciting as my life goes.  We had a bunch of people over and tore up one of them, and threw the other in the freezer.

Sunday we headed across town and joined some friends for a post-cabo-trip party.  Granted, our Cabo trip was some time ago, but we sorta needed a reason to get together for a fiesta I guess.  Apparently it was a little cool for swimming because nobody got in the pool, but we had a fine time just sitting around enjoying the day, not to mention 5 pounds of delicious carne asada.  And it enjoy it we did, we actually stretched things out well into the evening.

For the holiday, we joined a group out at a trail in Auburn for some light hiking.  In retrospect, the whole plan was a little flawed.  A) Don’t go to a state park on a holiday, they’re crazy-crowded, and B) Why drive 45 minutes to go on a 30 minute hike?  Hey, it was a cool hike though.  And, despite the insane amount of cars parked up and down both sides of the road, the trail itself wasn’t really that crowded.  We took Teagan with us and she thoroughly enjoyed herself as well.  We passed several dogs and even a few horses without any of her little fits, so she seems to be improving her manners.  After getting in our little bit of exercise, we drove a bit further and enjoyed a pint at my favorite brewery, Knee Deep.  After that it was back to the patio at home, where I endured my first Fantasy Football draft in a longgggg time.  I’ll admit I’ve sort of missed it, we’ll see how this year goes.  I managed to put together what several other members hailed as “The Best FF Team In The History Of The League” so I’m off to a good start.  Or, maybe I just clicked the “auto-draft” button and watched things go by.  One of those.

We didn’t do that much this past weekend, which is good because I don’t feel like typing anyway.  We started things off strong on Friday with a nice happy hour.  Somewhere along the way, more people joined in the fun and it turned into happy hours.  Never a good idea for the old folk.  Oh well, it was fun and we even got to go to a new place.

Saturday I got up early to get ready to go mountain biking with a buddy.  Actually I just paced around the house hoping he’d either A) forgotten about it, or B) changed his mind and didn’t want to go.  He showed up though, right on time.  It was a great idea on paper:  I wanted to know what trails to take to get from our house to Folsom and I’m just not familiar enough with the routes to figure it out.  So we took off from the house, and after about 3 miles on the road we got into some nice easy trails.  And, for the most part, we stayed on “nice easy trails.”  I am just not a very good rider, I get overwhelmed by these trails out here pretty easily.  Towards the end of the 17 mile ride things got a little dicey and I somehow managed to fly over my handlebars and bounce myself off a big boulder.  Pretty easy to see why they call the area Granite Bay, there’s a lot of it.  The boulder definitely came out on the better side of the confrontation, it didn’t look any worse for wear.  I, on the other hand, was flat on my back, scared to move because I was pretty sure I’d broken multiple bones.  (Not to mention, my head was facing down the steep hill and I literally couldn’t sit up.)  Turns out I was relatively unscathed.  Ticked off, a little bloody, and very dirty, but no permanent damage this time.  We’ll see if I wise up and give up the sport.  (My buddy mercifully took me on pavement the rest of the ride, I was too shaken for more obstacles.)

Sunday we headed over to a friends house in Sacramento for a bbq.  I was feeling pretty banged up from my “incident” but the lure of ribs was too strong.  Wise choice, they were delicious and it was a great day to sit outside and enjoy them.  Matter of fact, we ended up sitting in their back yard all day, snacking and cooking.  I’m a lot better at that than mountain biking apparently.

We stayed a little closer to home this weekend, mostly because we spent too much money the last few.  We did get out and enjoy a new place though.  Now that we’ve lived here nearly 3 years we thought perhaps we should try a few different places, instead of just making the same trips over and over.  (OK we just went to a new place two weeks ago, I guess that was the start of this new plan.)  So, for our revered “Sunday Funday” this week, we joined another couple at nearby Sly Park, aka Jenkinson Lake.  All in all, a great facility, we thoroughly enjoyed our afternoon there.  We took our inflatable kayak, they rented a few, and we paddled around the lake for a little picnic lunch.  As a matter of fact, we are considering going back this coming weekend and doing a little camping, but who knows if that will come together.  I only had a few quibbles, most of which related to price.  Yes, I know that seems to be a recurring theme… hmmm.  And, not so much last weekend, but as we look towards camping there.  They got us for $11 entry fee last weekend;  Fair enough.  There were 4 of us and we had a good day of entertainment.  Checking out the campgrounds though, good grief.  Granted, I haven’t tent-camped in a long time, but their tent-only sites are $35 to $55?  And that only allows one car, we’ll need two.  (cha-ching.)  Want to bring Teagan?  Five bucks a day.  (cha-ching.)  Load of firewood? (double cha-ching.)  At the end of the day we’d be better off staying at the Holiday Inn by our house.  Speaking of Teagan, they don’t allow dogs in the water, which I’ll have an awfully hard time explaining to her.  I get it, it’s the drinking water source for the area, but I’d be a lot more concerned with what all those little kids swimming are doing in the water than dogs.  Oh well, we’ll see what comes together.

We escaped the triple-digit heat for the second weekend in a row, we’re on a roll.  On seeing it was going to be another hot weekend, we made the last-minute call to take the 1.5 hour drive up to Tahoe for a few nights.  Since we couldn’t find a pup-sitter on such short notice, we loaded her up and took her with us too.  It all worked out just fine!  We ended up in a resort we hadn’t stayed at before, and it was not quite as nice as others we’ve stayed at, but it was all good.

We got there Friday night and were sort of worn out from the last-minute packing, the drive, and the work week.  We didn’t really have any desire to go anywhere, and that was a good thing because Teagan made it known she did not want to be left alone in the strange room.  That sort of caught us off-guard, as she doesn’t usually seem to care where she is.  As long as there is a couch and a chew toy, she’s pretty laid back.  Oh well, we adjusted our plans accordingly and just hung out in the room with her and played cards.

Saturday we had a full itinerary.  We kicked things off with a shopping trip to set Teagan up with some hiking boots.  We’ve always wanted to take her out hiking with us, but the trails up there are usually covered with sharp rocks.  It might have been a bit over the top, who knows.  I’ll grant you, there are plenty of dogs out there without boots, but I know I wouldn’t want to walk over those rocks barefoot.  We already knew the store that carried them, so we headed straight there.  They did a great job fitting her, it was pretty amazing how much of a difference the right size made.  We actually already have boots she wears sometimes, but they’re too big and you can tell she doesn’t like them.  When they found the right size for her, she walked around in them like they weren’t there at all.  After that we made the long, slow drive to the trailhead.  It was over by Emerald Bay, and the drive there is always stop-and-go the whole way.  Parking is no treat either, we had to circle around a few times before we got lucky and a spot opened up.  It was definitely worth it though, the hike was great and Teagan loved it.  As an added bonus, she was absolutely wiped out for the rest of the day.  We headed down to the casinos for the evening, and I don’t think she even raised her head when we left.  Doni had a big night at the games, I think she paid for our entire weekend!  (Granted, we weren’t out much but few pints and a tank of gas.  The room was paid for long ago and we brought our own food.)

Sunday we got up early and tried to beat the traffic back down the hill.  Apparently everyone else had the same idea, it didn’t work out so hot.  Oh well, we made it eventually.  We spent the day over at our friend Harper’s house celebrating her 3rd birthday.  It was quite the party;  Cake, ice cream, and nacho cheese, pretty much all the things a good party are made of.

Yup, still hot here.  Better, but still well into the roasting range.  It’s starting to wear on us a little bit, so when we got the chance to escape the heat for the weekend we jumped on it.  A group was heading down to the coast for a little camping trip, and we got the added bonus of seeing an area we hadn’t been to before.  The area was called Duncans Mills, which at a 3 hour drive was a bit further than we usually care to travel.  I’d say it was well worth it though.  The trip got us some fantastic scenery, and it was a good 30 degrees cooler.  As a matter of fact, sleeping in the tent at night was downright chilly, but I’ll take that over being hot any time.  While we were there, we explored a few new wineries, and made the short trip to nearby Bodega Bay to see the ocean.

We got back Saturday evening, pretty well worn out.  Sunday was spent on the couch, but at least it was the back yard couch.  We brought a little cooler weather back with us!  I’ve got a lot of pics to post this week, so I’ll go with those instead of actual content.  Bonus.