Luna, A Glorified Country Dog?

November 28, 2009

Well, to be honest, I don\u2019t know if we can officially call Luna a \u2018country dog\u2019 quite yet. During this Thanksgiving week, we traveled 4+ hours through the beautiful Cascade Mountains to visit with my parents in their newly retired home of Omak, Washington. Now Omak is certainly not an unfamiliar city to our family, as my father spent most of his youth growing up in the small quiet town. Farms, cowboy boots, and desert-like scenery\u2026? It\u2019s honestly hard for me to explain what the city is like, even though I spent many summers as a child visiting my Grandparents. Omak is located in the Okanagan Valley, at the foot of the Okanagan Highlands, along the Okanagan River (that\u2019s a lot of Okanagans, no?) as it wends its way down toward the Columbia. Omak is also known for it\u2019s famous Omak Stampede and World Famous Suicide Race.

Besides enjoying the typical Thanksgiving traditions, Luna spent many hours galloping freely in the crisp mountain air. With no care in the world, she just ran and ran, and ran.

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$\"\"$ Of course, once the cooking started, Luna had to resort to her usual begging routine.

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She even managed to locate all of the doorstops in my parents house, and amused herself almost as much as she amused us.

Elizabeth & Luna

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Well, to be honest, I don’t know if we can officially call Luna a ‘country dog’ quite yet. During this Thanksgiving week, we traveled 4+ hours through the beautiful Cascade Mountains to visit with my parents in their newly retired home of Omak, Washington. Now Omak is certainly not an unfamiliar city to our family, as my father spent most of his youth growing up in the small quiet town. Farms, cowboy boots, and desert-like scenery…? It’s honestly hard for me to explain what the city is like, even though I spent many summers as a child visiting my Grandparents. Omak is located in the Okanagan Valley, at the foot of the Okanagan Highlands, along the Okanagan River (that’s a lot of Okanagans, no?) as it wends its way down toward the Columbia. Omak is also known for it’s famous Omak Stampede and World Famous Suicide Race.

Besides enjoying the typical Thanksgiving traditions, Luna spent many hours galloping freely in the crisp mountain air. With no care in the world, she just ran and ran, and ran.

Of course, once the cooking started, Luna had to resort to her usual begging routine.

She even managed to locate all of the doorstops in my parents house, and amused herself almost as much as she amused us.

Elizabeth & Luna

The Pacific Coast Highway & Dog- Eating Squirrels

October 26, 2009

Yes, the Pacific Coast Highway and Dog-Eating Squirrels - what an interesting title don’t you think? Driving up (or down) the Pacific Coast Highway (HWY 1) is an experience I wish everyone could enjoy in their lifetime. Anyone who loves the beautiful blue ocean, steep cliffs, sweeping scenic views, and winding switchback roads would love this drive. I have had the good fortunate to experience the PCH twice; once in 2005 (as a passenger about to be proposed to) and the other this year driving with Mother and Luna. I don’t know quite how to describe this drive, other than ‘truly amazing.’ As if words didn’t fail, no picture can do it justice either.

“Great – so the drive is covered,” you might say, “but what about the dog-eating squirrels?” The dog-eating squirrels were everywhere. Every time we pulled over to snap pictures, there seemed to be colonies of them living about. And these squirrels were certainly not shy. I do not recommend jokingly holding out a hand to see what they might do – at one point I did, and I ended up being chased back into my car by these hunger-driven beasts for fear that I would lose a toe. We left poor little Luna sitting in the car for who knows what might happen - it would either be Squirrel a la mode or Golden Retriever for breakfast.

The hungry little fellows

They showed no shame

Luna was left in the car salivating while we took our pictures

Disneyland

October 19, 2009

The next stop along our drive across the country was in Pasadena, California to visit my little sister Lindsey and her husband Louis. It had been over two years since I had seen Lindsey, so I was excited to be spending some sister time with her. Since Disneyland was just a mere forty-five minutes away, we decided to do our bonding time there.