A while back I was contacted by a person who was browsing flickr for pictures to use in Westways Magazine (AAA’s Southern California Lifestyle Magazine). He had stumbled across a picture of Elk at Mammoth Village at Yellowstone. After signing a couple documents allowing them to print this picture in their magazine(s) and on their website(s) and a month later I received my copy of the magazine.

Above you see arrows pointing to my picture and my credit. I found it a bit odd as my name is nowhere near the picture and there is no indication of why my name is there, not that I’m complaining.

Almost a day and a half of digging from our friends at Hallford Excavating left us with about 600 ft of 3′ wide, 6-8′ deep trench in the back yard. Here you can see the trench closest to you which holds the two plastic pipes which exit the house and head towards the backyard behind the hedge. One of the pipes takes the liquid into the house, the other sends it out.

Below is a picture of the location of the manifold, the two pipes running to the house connect to the manifold and then the actual loops are connected to this manifold. The manifold was placed behind the hedge so that the loops could be laid in the back yard where there are no underground sprinklers.

Below a look at one of the three trenches dug to lay the loop, the three trenches are all just a bit under 200′ long each.

Below is a closeup of the pipe (loop) that is laid in these three trenches, this loop pulls about 4 degrees out of the ground and carries it into the house via a water / chemical mix running through these pipes;

and here is a shot taken from the back of our property showing the extent of the earth that was moved for this part of the project;

We have now started remodeling the guest room with the same hardwood floor as Dylan’s flooring. To give myself a break I rented a pneumatic floor nailer, much easier than the manual nailer although they really get you on the rental price. Dylan was present for this install and was excited about helping, it wasn’t long before he was installing the hardwood floor all by himself. Shortly after teaching how to hit the nailer and giving him the opportunity to hit it while I held it, Napolean was handling the nailer all by himself.

After teaching him how to nail the hardwood floor, I showed him how to select the correct piece of wood (quality of finish, warping, and the correct length [so that breaks are staggered]) and how to pound it into place.

He was then doing the job all by himself, yes, the pictures you are viewing are actual shots of him in action (using the sports mode of my camera) laying approximately 12 11′ 6″ long rows of Bellawood rustic maple 3/4″ hardwood flooring with a pneumatic floor nailer.

From the lost trail website: The beauty and uncrowded slopes of the Rocky Mountain’s hidden jewel.

… family skiing from the top of the Continental Divide.

… unbelievable powder …

… an excellent family facility that has been helping folks enjoy themselves for over 60 years

The brutal heat last summer was enough to push us over the edge, this long with the fact that pellets are costing us $2 a day and leaving the house with cold spots made this a no brainer. These are the house plans detailing the HVAC system, orange indicates ‘runs’ going upstairs, yellow indicates downstairs runs, blue indicates return duct, and yellow indicates supply duct. The red line towards the middle of the house details a wall to be put up, blocking off access from the garage to the downstairs, while the red line at the bottom details an addition which provides additional access to the downstairs from the room off of the garage.

(Click for larger view)

Before

(spare the comments about the paint job)

3 days later

The above was done mostly with a drywall [hand] saw, but partially with a circular saw. The circular saw did a GREAT job but kicked up so much dust. If you notice the top left of the picture you will notice a fan which shoots air into our open foyer and therefor the living room, dining room, kitchen, and upstairs [bedrooms], the house was full of dust, my son thought there was a fire. This cut out takes care of almost half of the trunkline, the rest being separated from the living area, will be done with the circular saw.

A couple problems encountered when cutting out the drywall;

Where the trunkline is to cut through the wall, its load bearing, also theres a pesky electrical wire. Luckily there is a wall 3ft in one direction and about 5ft in another direction which will help support the load when I take down a stud in the wall. The trunkline will have to move a bit to get around the wire though.

There are lights in the ceiling so what did you expect? Apparently I wasn’t thinking so I expected nothing. This will have to be cut and rerouted, hopefully without cutting down anymore drywall.

It has been recent brought to my attention that my previous post about the Mike Vick dog chew toy might be a scam, although the sources all seem to lead back to Kevin.  Shame on someone.

here are a couple references;

http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/285/ripoff0285579.htm

http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/messageview.php?catid=74&threadid=754849&lastpage=1

http://www.vickdogchewtoyscam.com/

Liberty Cap is a [now inactive] 37-foot hot spring cone located at the bottom of Lower Terraces, in the northern portion of Mammoth Hot Springs. Liberty Cap was created by a hot spring which remained in one location for a long time, depositing minerals which built the cone. Liberty Cap was thought to resemble caps worn during the French Revolution and that is how it got its name in 1871 from the Hayden Survey party.

Upon our arrival at Mammoth Village we were greeted by the site of several elk. You could find the elk in the center of the village, around the visitor center, and the hotel, they were hard to miss.

The elk weren’t afraid of the vehicles or people, nor were the people afraid of the elk. The park rangers were stationed around the elk and had to keep people a safe distance away, and the village had several signs warning of the danger. For some reason people felt no danger from these massive wild animals. We saw people walk right beside the elk without a second thought. We even saw a family park their car right next to the elk and get out of the car, the parents showed no concern when the barely walking toddler got out of the car and headed toward the elk, just feet away. No concern that is until the elk made took a couple aggressive steps toward the child.

Our two day trip to Yellowstone Park took us through the park’s only year round north entrance, boasting the historic Roosevelt Arch - dedicated by President Roosevelt on April 24th of 1903. From there it was a short drive and then a nights stay at Mammoth Hot Springs.

The next day consists of a slow drive through the park with many stops and pictures along the way to our last nights stay at the Old Faithful Inn, followed by our exit out of Yellowstone’s west entrance.

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The Museum of the Rockies was founded by Dr. Caronline McGill in 1957 and renowned paleontologist Jack Horner is the curator of paleontology at the museum. Known for its paleontological collections, the Museum contains the largest collection of dinosaur remains in the country, the largest Tyrannosaurus skull ever found and a Tyrannosaurus thigh bone containing soft tissue. The museum currently contains nearly 300,000 objects with collections in western history, textiles, Native American artifacts, and photography and details information spanning the earths 4 billion year history.

As an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution and a federal repository for fossils, the museum is not only a college-level division of Montana State University but it is also an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit institution. The Museum of the Rockies is approximately one of 750 museums accredited by the American Association of Museums. To put this in context there are more than 16,000 museums nationwide.

The Museum of the Rockies is located on the south edge of the Montana State University campus at 600 West Kagy Boulevard in Bozeman Montana.