The first and second nights we camped in Oak Creek Campground. It was expensive and full of skunks but otherwise nice. The fire pits were so huge, i climbed in so i could light the damn thing. 

these are the San Francisco Peaks... a group of dormant volcanos. They contain the highest point in arizona.. well over 12,000 feet tall. 

The high country around Flagstaff was very green... 

So this last week me and Julie B spent almost a week roaming around the high parts of Arizona. This is a picture of the desert in California before we crossed the border. It was very green in places.. there have been lots of thunderstorms this year.  

blurry beer pong outside the dorm 

it was the last day for the SAMO Youth and they were in solstice doing interpretive stuff.. so i went down there and played them some songs on guitar. Then, one of them gave me this 'emo' hat. so emo! 

for those of you who wonder why i dislike Torrance so much...

from a list of the most 'conservative' cities (http://www.votingresearch.org/), Torrance ranked 66... well below Simi Valley and Orange, but above such free-thinking meccas as Fresno, CA, Mobile, AL, and Irvine, well known conservative haven.

ugh.

a grove of Bigcone Douglas Fir and Ponderosa (or Jeffrey) Pine. 

Looks like some mud came out of this canyon... but i missed it. It had to have been in the last 24 hours because it was still wet. 

I got to the very edge of the desert. It was nice to be out there although it was very hot. The storm was blowing away to the north so i just turned south towards the Angeles Forest. 

The thunderstorm got weaker and started blowing away... 

I got stuck in traffic... but by the time i got somewhere i could have turned around, I was past it. The traffic jam continued on the 5 so i took the 14 instead 

It turned into this strange tilted thunderstorm cloud... neat looking, but it didnt seem very intense. 

After an um... interesting night of witnessing some strange criminal activity in Josh's neighborhood, i left the city to go on a drive. Clouds were building to the north so i headed out that way 

for Dave... 'try my nuts' 

You expect me to wear all of that stuff at once?

We went to Pasadena to check it out and see if there were any hipsters, etc. As it turns out, there were only fascists. 

A storm over the San Gabriels as seen from Simi Valley 

A rare moment of beauty over LA as the sun sets in a smoggy sky of monsoonal clouds. I was on the 710 heading north. 

A turning point...

So, after the bad luck of june and mediocre luck of july, things are turning around. It really looks like August will be awesome.

good things:

-my new car. a crazy convergence of circumstances lead to me getting a brand new car for less than we paid for my old one, even though it is 4*4 and souped up quite a bit

-my job situation here. I was rather unhappy with it last month. However, it has gotten much better. If i choose to stay here, i will probably have funding for another year, and should be bumped back into being an 'official' NPS employee. I may even get a step increase (raise).

-new job prospects... today i got randomly called for an interview with a GS-9 job in the Angeles forest. (i am currently GS-7 and GS-9 is quite hard to get, especially without grad school). In addition, i may be interviewed for a job at Glacier National Park

-I went to a vegetation mapping conference where i met someone from our dorms freshman year of college who i have not seen in many years; it was neat. Also, i met a new girl who seems quite cool and hopefully will call or e mail me to go hiking some time in the next few weeks.

-My friends continue to be awesome. My friends and family are the reason i didnt go crazy when i am sad, and of course they are still around now. Judy will leave in a few weeks which will make me sad; but at about the time she leaves, Dave will be moving into town. Julie B is in town this weekend and in two weeks she is flying down to LA to take a road trip with me, possibly to northern Arizona or Utah, but possibly somewhere else... who knows?

Anyway, stuff is much better now... and has the potential to get even more amazing.