YOU KNOW YOU LIVE IN ARIZONA WHEN....

My husband emailed me this as part of a much longer joke this morning:

You can retire to Phoenix AZ where…

- You are willing to park 3 blocks away because you found shade.

- You have over 100 Mexican recipes

- The 4 seasons are tolerable, hot, really hot & ARE YOU KIDDING ME??!!

 

I live as far away from Phoenix as I possibly can and still be in Arizona, and as far away from a city as my husband's daily commute to Ft. Huachuca will allow (and believe me, if gas was cheaper it would be further still).

 

And as a 'rural" resident of Southern Arizona, I'd like to add a couple for being down here:

 

You can live in rural Arizona when you are willing to...

-- Drive ten miles for a gallon of milk.

-- Sleep through Border Patrol arrests in your front yard at 2 a.m.

-- Dust your bookcases and furniture each and every day (honestly) and then the very next day and the next...

-- Learn to take 45 second showers when your well gets really really low

 

And I need to add one more.

 

-- When you call 911 for a coyote.

 

I like coyotes - the animal type - they keep the rabbit population down, as long as I keep the garbage bagged and covered, they don't bother me or mine.

(It also may be because my dog Murray strongly resembles a coyote)

But there are certain behaviors you can count on with a coyote:

-- You won't see them in broad daylight unless there is a very, VERY long period of drought.

- Coyotes will run away as soon as they spot you.

So when you see a coyote, late morning, standing in the middle of a fairly busy (by rural Arizona standards at least) highway acting extremely confused and befuddled, it's a good idea to take note.

I chased him off the highway, at least, and called 911 to warn of a potential rabid coyote.

Can you think of any way I can call in more of the human coyotes we have down here?

CRYING WOLF

My oldest daughter has olfactory senses that reach far beyond the level of paranormal. She can smell a digestive action at 500 meters, or a body that has not been showered, powdered and deodorized within the last 6 minutes at 2 miles.

I can only smell a litter-box-beyond-the-necessary-time-to-empty when I want to. Through the years of small children in diapers, numerous canines/felines/equines, and foreign military assignments in areas where elevated standards of personal hygiene were not part of the culture, I think I have learned to eradicate many sensory susceptibilities.

Or simply come to like them.

I love the smell of my dog - and he smells exactly like a dog should (i.e. furry, outdoorsy, and doggy breath). I absolutely ADORE the smell of my horses - if it could be packaged as an indoor deodorizer (which would rather defeat the original purpose, I realize), I would buy it in bulk.

And after living in Arizona high chaparral for ten years, I still take a deep breath almost every time I step outside to inhale the scent of mesquite, sand and simple clear air coming down from the Huachuca Mountains.

With one MAJOR exception.

Fire.

I live surrounded by wide, open grasslands which, for 93.06% of the year are brown, sun-bleached and extremely flammable.

I live within clear sight of Mexico, which does not try in anyway at all to contain their wildfires - they just let them burn out on their own.

After sunset, it's not that bad - I can walk the perimeter of my property with my dog, and it's fairly easy to see fire of any noticeable size burning. And in the daytime, smoke is usually present.

And since I detest beyond reasonable cause the smell of burning flesh, I can normally deduce if it is simply a family barbecue upwind.

So what do you do at night when you smell smoke, but can't locate the source?

I can't phone our local volunteer fire department direct without waking someone up - I can't call 911 because it's not an emergency (at least not yet).

Out of sheer desperation, I call the non-emergency county sheriff's office.

Now to just put this in proportion, our county is 6,219 square miles in size - that's larger than the state of Connecticut, and just slightly smaller than the state of New Jersey.

Lotta area to cover.

So I was extremely grateful to get a polite, courteous gentleman to took the time to calm this old woman's fears of being burned to death in her sleep - which because of recent events is more than slightly elevated.

I'm not afraid of dying - but I am extremely anxious about being burned.

YOU JUST KEEP ON PUSHING MY LOVE OVER THE BORDER LINE

My youngest daughter cannot drive, so I end up being her primary mode of transportation.

I usually end up driving her any place further than three blocks from her apartment that the city bus doesn't drive to.

We drive up to Tucson to a specialist in pain management usually once a month - but at least we pass a Costco, so I can 'catch two pigeons with one bean' (isn't that kinder than 'killing two birds with one stone'? It's Italian).
And today it was Douglas; which is only about 45 miles.

But I have to drive back to pick her up about 23 miles - then past where I live, and on to Douglas - then past my home again the 23 miles to her apartment - and then 23 miles back to my home.

So round-trip, about 136 miles.

Of not really wonderful scenery.

Do you see why I have a headache tonight?

I do love driving. Long-distance driving. I've been from Maryland to Oregon - Michigan to California - Arizona to Hawaii.... no, wait a minute, I guess I didn't drive that, did I?

But it's been not quite three days since I was been slammed to the hard ground by a hungry 900+ lbs. horse, bruised my kidneys and am still aching incredibly across my shoulders, back of my neck and the back of my head....

Whine, whine, whine. But it wasn't quite a pleasure drive this time.


Add to this the fact that it was to Douglas. Douglas is... well, it's a border time, adjoining to Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico, which is... well, it's one of those places you've heard about in the news lately. A lot of bodies. People kidnapped. Mayors and police chiefs who have either disappeared or came over to the U.S. requesting asylum.

So after two hours plus at the place, we headed back home... only to be turned around by the Border Patrol on the only direct highway back home. There was an ambulance with sirens on - couple of autos smashed - a helicopter flying overhead - bunches of Border Patrol, Cochise County Sheriffs and unmarked vans....

Well, I think you can guess that it wasn't a elementary school outing.

So we turned back - hung out at the local Pizza Hut for 45 minutes - and then drove back when the highway was re-opened.


I need to take three more Tylenol extra strength now just from writing about it.