first rain

We've been around 100, humidity in the single digits, and not a cloud in the sky, and the whole time wondering when the monsoon would come, if it comes at all, to give us some relief. There have been some devastating fires around New Mexico and up in Colorado.

On Sunday afternoon, we took the train up to Santa Fe for $20 round trip for the family, watching the land from the top in airconditioning while the boys played with some new "plushies" on the train. They even filmed their play.

There's no shuttle between the depot and the plaza on Sundays, and many of our favorite New Mexican restaurants are closed on Sundays. We did a lot of walking. We skipped REI, since it was so late in the day already and went to the plaza. The plaza seemed so lackluster. It was hot and humid. There just wasn't the usual bustle around the plaza. Jackson took us into a bead shop. Cyndi did her JCrew, which seemed vacant of merchandise, and the boys and I went to our favorite toy store nearby, only to find it had closed and combined with a children's clothes store. When we found the new location, there was nothing in the budget range I had set and the boys were very disappointed. We ducked into the new history museum, free to residents on Sundays. We had seen one of the exhibits before and were very impressed, but this time the other exhibits just weren't interesting at all. We strolled into other shops. Jackson decided he wanted an obsidian arrow point, which we could not find, and Rylee wanted to find a superhero comic book. He and I finally found where our favorite bookstore had moved to, but there were no comic books. (A nice new location, however.) Meanwhile, Cyndi and Jack found a really nice clothing boutique with colorful dresses from Nepal just when the rain started.

You could smell the rain first. When it began to fall we ducked under awnings, or stayed along the edges of the shops, and even watched it sitting under the covered porch of the Hotel St. Francis. People cheered when the rain began and stood in the streets to feel the rain. We went to Del Charro just a bit down the street for a meal in the covered patio. We've been there before and stayed at the hotel. Then we went to get ice cream on the plaza before heading back to the depot. Jackson got served a mix of chocolate and peanut butter instead of chocolate, and we freaked out about that. Jackson was very concerned, and will never go back, but he was fine.

The boys and I started swimming during lunch time. We've only done a few, but it's worked out well. I get some laps in; the boys play. It breaks up their day. This was an unusual weekend because we ended up packing a lot in. On Friday, the boys and I went to 5 Star Burgers on Friday. Later that evening, Ry and I went swimming. He loved that. Saturday, Ry and I went to the skateboard park. He's working on landing on top of the half pipe. I worked on the lawn and garden, fixed some posts along the porch, repainted them and a patch of the porch ceiling, hung some outdoor lights Cyndi got a long time ago, repaired a slat on the bench, and the boys and I went to Whole Hog on Saturday while Cyndi went to a friend's birthday. When Ry and I went to get apple fritters and donuts Sunday morning, that's when we first thought to look for comic books. He loves to read, he loves all the superheroes, and it just seemed like a good idea. After the skateboard park, we stopped to get some lawn sprinklers and looked in vain again for comic books next door to the DIY. Cyndi had breakfast ready for us when we got back. After she went to body pump at the gym and I installed the new sprinklers, that's when we thought about going to Santa Fe for the rest of the day.

Meanwhile, Jackson is having a series of little computer problems and he really wants to get more equipment and software to make his videos. He knows exactly what software he wants, what camera he wants, and he's desperate for a "green screen." (He's thinking ahead for his birthday and being very diplomatic and reasonable about it.) The computer problems may be related to the amount of memory his videos are taking up on his computer. We tried to get a flash drive to help, but now we are having problems with that, too.

On Monday after work I went to the Barnes and Noble, about the only bookstore left, and found a big selection of comic books. The ones I'm sure Ry wanted were rated for teens, but I found two--Sonic and Scooby Doo--that I thought were more age appropriate. He loved them. He read them both when I brought them home and wants more. He fell asleep as I read The Secret Garden to him. He stopped reading it himself a week ago as the chapters became longer and one of the new characters had a strong Yorkshire dialect.

Before he fell asleep, we got our first rain. We opened our doors. The high humidity made our swamp cooler ineffective. The weather pundits say the monsoon season is starting, the highs should drop as more moisture flows from the south and we get the late afternoon thunderstorms for the next month or so. Slim chances for local rains the next couple of days, maybe even Fourth of July on Wednesday, and maybe some serious rain next week.