Sunday, March 13…You’ll Never Walk Alone (Marcus Mumford)

   First clock I looked to this morning was the wall clock…7:50 a.m.  Instead of trying to stay quiet because Kim was still sleeping, I went outside to read for a while. Eventually looked at my Fitbit and was surprised to see that it was almost 10.  Whoa! Have I been out here for 2 hours already?  Sure doesn’t seem like it. Just to be sure I checked my phone and computer also…yep, almost 10 a.m.  I was amazed but losing track of time is not uncommon for me.

   I went in the camper just as Kim was getting out of bed.  He asked what time it was and I said, “Maybe 10:30.”  He was surprised that he slept that long…and then he looked at the wall clock. It was only 9:30!  What?!  

   Kim and I had talked about the time change last night but knew it wasn’t an issue for us because Arizona doesn’t do Daylight Saving Time.  It’s in Mountain Time from November to March and in line with Pacific Time from March to November. Only they don’t say it that way…it’s just considered Arizona time. So our only adjustment would be remembering that we’re now three hours behind Michigan in case we want to video call the grandkiddos.  

   And I thought, I thought, I thought that I had disabled all automatic time change settings on my phone and computer but obviously not because they had changed. And since my Fitbit syncs with my phone they were all conspiring against me this morning. Agh!! Decided that the battery operated clock on the wall with no connection to technology is the go-to time keeper when we’re out here during the time change because it doesn’t take it upon itself to jump forward or backward.  Human intervention is necessary to make that hourly leap and we know better than to do that. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock…

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   Today was a day off:  no walking, no riding, no yoga, no tourist stuff…just doing mundane things like cleaning the truck and getting groceries.  Getting groceries was planned and necessary…cleaning the truck wasn’t planned or really necessary, it was just a result of me getting off course when taking the garbage up to the dumpster.    

   I believe the temperature made it to 80o which made it nice just to veg out in the camper with the ramp down and all the windows open.   So…it was a low key day and just what my legs needed after two days of keeping up with Kim on 5K time trials.

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   Caught a lizard enjoying the warm sunshine on the tree today.  The temperature has been pleasant for us Michiganders but maybe a bit cool for a cold blooded reptile.  Kim says our tree lizards are in the Ornate family.  Still haven't been able to identify the lizards we saw on our desert hikes.  
  
   We've been getting a lot of hummingbird action back in our corner of the campground. Flitting around, sitting in the trees and bushes, and soaking up the nectar. All fun to watch. I'm not up front much so I don't know how busy the office feeders are.     

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   We did go down Picacho Hwy to check the trail cams and trade out cards.  The one farthest down had nothing...zero, zip, zilch, nada.  Not even a pack rat.    

   The culvert trail cam, which had meat and smoked fish skin as ‘bait’, did have an early morning visitor…a skunk.  And the video was good quality, better than some of the pictures which can be blurry if the animal is moving.  The meat appeared to be untouched so we surprised to see that something had been in.  I never thought about what a skunk eats but according to everything I found on Google, the answer to that is pretty much anything.   

   We left some meat, potatoes and fruit peels so maybe tomorrow we’ll see the elusive javelina.  We know they’re in the area because we’ve seen them crossing Picacho Hwy…just a matter of luring them into the path of the trail cam.

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   We didn’t go to the cell cam to trade out SD cards…Kim wants to wait another day or two because he doesn’t want to stress the owl.  I wanted to do it today but I can get behind his reasoning.  The cost of diesel is the main reason I didn’t just drive over on my own when we got back from town.  Since fuel prices jumped we’ve been trying to limit our truck use. But I haven’t ruled out a trip over there on the bike tomorrow.

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   Ha! Kim just came in from his telescope and let an expletive fly after realizing that it was 9:02 instead of 10:02 as his phone indicated.  Same story as my phone and computer this morning…his phone changed time and he didn’t realize it when he went to do an alignment and set up his target.  His phone is one of the instruments he uses in aligning his scope.  Using the correct time is essential for a quick, easy alignment but he was asking the mount to find the 9:30 p.m. position of a star at 8:30.  That leads to a bit of frustration and using the phrase ‘what the hell’ a lot.  He managed to make it work despite not understanding what was going on until he came in the trailer and saw the clock on the wall. That was his ‘Aha’ moment.

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   So today’s 40 Days of Lent challenge was one of charity…give to someone in need.  It didn’t say what to give: time, money, or resources…just give. 

   I thought on this one for the better part of the morning.  Who and what were the questions.  Since we don’t know anybody in the community to offer our time to or to help in some way that left money.  Okay, so that answers the ‘what’, now how do we figure out the ‘who’?

   It’s always a little dicey to assume someone is in need just from appearances; those assumptions are usually judgements made based on my perceptions and can be offensive. Since I’m not interested in offending that leaves giving to those who stand on the corner asking for help, with or without signs.  Since Kim met a man last year who admitted that he made out pretty good moneywise by playing on people’s sympathy, I’m skeptical of whether those on the corners asking for money have an actual need or not.  But I’m also mindful of the verse that says: ‘whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’  A conundrum to be sure.  

   Well, it’s embarrassing that it took so long but it finally hit me: Ukraine. Community Reformed has set up a way to provide extra financial support to the mission organizations that CRC already supports and has been in contact with since the invasion.  Ukraine certainly fits the bill of being in need.  Glad that we could help out. 

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