Mona cleans and sorts some wild spinach on the front porch.

We went up to the ranch for a short visit Sunday, and saw my niece Serena and her fiancé Cole. Serena made a pork chili dish, I made elk chili with beans, and Mona made pozole, so it was the usual food overindulgance. Serena also made a cherry pie from scratch, and Mona made the family recipe Texas chocolate sheet cake to celebrate Pat and her husband Clark's birthdays this week.


Serena and Cole shuck peas from Mona's spring garden.


Bill From The Hill arrives just in time for dinner (no coincidence) riding Buddy.

We had a few neighbors over to share the food, and asked them to vote for their favorite dish. Serena had planned on showing off her dish at the Chugwater Chile Cook-off, but as Mona didn't really want to get caught up in that this year we had a friendly competition at the ranch instead. Serena won - I sure voted for her delicious sweet-smoky pork chili colorado. One neighbor arrived on horseback - he offered his horse Buddy up to anyone who wanted to ride him, but only Clark took him up on his offer.


Clark figures out Buddy while Buddy figures out Clark...


Mona and Serena shmooze over dinner as the sun sets.

On the way home from the ranch on Monday afternoon, we drove around Cheyenne a bit, trying to imagine what it might be like to live there. Before we left Cheyenne, I pulled up outside the gate to Warren Air Force Base, from which a bunch of nearby ICBM silos are manned and operated. They have a missile 'garden' there I always wanted to photograph as we saw them in passing from the freeway heading North and South. As I handed Pat the camera, a guard hurried up, and asked if I had photographed the gate near the missiles. I assured him I had not, and he made me play back images in the camera to demonstrate this. He said if I had or did photograph anything other than the missile display they would confiscate the camera. Meanwhile, a large ominous Ford sedan with civilian plates and little antennas sprouting from it pulled up a short distance away, and the big burly driver was speaking discretely into a hand microphone. Pat took my tourist shot, and we left.


R-L, an old Minuteman, a bigger newer Minuteman, and a (I'm not making this up) Peacekeeper. Yes, there must be many megatons of Peacekeeping tucked away under that little white bonnet....

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