I only now realized that there’s been a two-week lull in postings here at www.johnwise.com. It’s not that I’ve been lollygagging on the sidelines, enjoying our slightly cooler Arizona weather that’s seen torrents of rain. Yes, we’ve had a nice monsoon season, but that’s not what’s occupied my time.

Aside from the time I needed to catch up writing about all of those days out in the center of the United States with my daughter, I’ve been plugging away on some backfill duties that Caroline requested of me. Specifically, she asked that I examine the blog entries of January 10 – 18, 2009 when we made our first winter visit to Yellowstone National Park. Caroline was looking for something or other regarding a Yellowstone trip, and by the time she realized which one it was, she was aghast to find that our monumental visit in the snow only featured one image per day.

Well, that is now rectified, as after looking at the bulk of photos I shot over those eight days, I found some incredible images that just had to be put up here for posterity. The ironic thing is that they are buried maybe a thousand posts in the past and will likely never be seen by anyone other than us. No matter, we know that they are now part of a narrative that, at some time or other, when we are reminiscing about that journey, we’ll have access to some quick rediscovery. Should you be so inclined to share some of those moments with us, just click here to see the first post.

This effort followed the filling in of another road trip – again, because of an image Caroline had been looking for. I think it was the photo of us sitting in the cockpit of the Spruce Goose. Back while I was in Germany, she asked that when I got home, maybe I could consider adding something as there was zilch about that five-day September 2011 trip into Oregon (not even that iconic cockpit portrait).

Writing about the Oregon trip was a bummer because we had no notes and not even the briefest of descriptions of those days already online. Luckily, I still had the itinerary that listed the events of the days, and with Caroline and I rekindling our memories by looking at the sequence of images from each day along with the itinerary items, we were able to flesh out a fairly good narrative. That series of posts was finished before my daughter arrived. Again, should you have any interest in seeing what we did over those five days in the Pacific Northwest, click here.

Now we can catch up with the present. We recently had a major change of plans due to the rising COVID numbers thanks to the Delta variant, and we thought things were set. Well, if indecision is the key to flexibility, then what is waffling to the future? This will be explained early next week, as right now, my coffee break at the homeless shelter is over.

For clarification regarding my last statement, my morning coffee shop is not my late afternoon coffee shop, and I’m not sure how much longer my afternoon coffee can be taken at the specific location I’m visiting. I’m referring to the third Starbucks I’ll have to abandon as they become magnets to the homeless looking for free ice water, an air-conditioned space, WiFi, and a plug to charge their smartphones. Even after putting locks on the bathroom doors to control who can use them, the staff still allows the homeless in for sink baths and, on occasion, a safe place to catch up on their addictions.

If I’m completely honest, I suppose I am just about to be forced out of Starbucks anyway as we move into the fall and Christmas season when John Legend enters heavy rotation on their playlist.