Wild, Wild West

After starting with a relatively serene view of Yosemite’s Half Dome,

our journey through the desert revealed some elements of the untamed west.

In eastern Nevada we drove past many “dust devils”,

and a bit later spied this intense gateway arch that was completely covered with deer antlers, a sight quite unlike any we’ve seen before.

It was a very pleasant day for driving, with high scattered clouds and light traffic out on US 6. The desert was much more green than expected; turns out that recent rains accounted for the nice surprise, which makes sense. Desert life responds well to water :-).

(Larger versions and closeups will be posted when I get more bandwidth than the 24K I get from this hotel room.)

We’re on the road again! Tomorrow takes us through Yosemite on 120, and after skirting Mono Lake we’re in for a long day’s drive through the desert, passing through Tonopah and Ely on our way to western Utah. We’ll visit Arches National Park on Sunday, and points beyond as the week progresses. Updates and photos as bandwidth allows.

While I would never be mistaken as a supporter of the late Senator Strom Thurmond, I did find some of these facts from the Strom Watch site worth noting:

* As of mid-2003 he was one of the few living politicians to have received votes from Civil War veterans

* Mark Twain was still writing when Strom was born

* He had been alive for almost half of the entire history of the United States

Follow the link to the Strom Watch to read a description of the depths to which our democracy has sunk, as evidenced by the sham of a mostly unaware, barely functioning human being allowed to vote in the United States Senate.

And it seems the White House might reconfigure their web servers with a new error page. Yes, the 404 page, displayed when a requested page cannot be found, may be updated to reflect the latest news from Iraq.

A while ago we were privy to an instant message interchange between the shrub and his North Korean counterpart, and much hilarity ensued.

Well, as we know, no secrets are safe on the internet. From an anonymous source comes news that a copy of gw’s mailbox is available at this super secret website. Check it out!