2016 in a nutshell followed by March 2016 in Detail.
Sadly 2016 brought an end to both of Mike's parents. We left Gold Canyon and headed to Tucson for March. Then we went to San Antonio, Covington, La. and Panama City, Fl. We drove up through Alabama to Michigan in time for Mother's Day. We visited friends and family in Kentucky and North Carolina and spent a week at Myrtle Beach, SC.
While leaving Prince Gallitzin State Park near Dulcie on our way to Gettysburg emergency calls reported Mike's mother's stroke. We headed back to Michigan. After her funeral we headed through Ontario to Quebec, then Essex Junction, Vt. Escapade and then down through western Massachusetts to Lake Waramaug, Ct. State Park. My sister Billie, her husband Bob and my mom celebrated my 60th birthday. We visited NYC briefly. We visited Bald Eagle State Park and Dubois, Pa. and Pa. family. We visited a dear friend in Des Moines and then a timeshare in Winter Park, Colorado before going to Santa Fe followed by the Albuquerque Balloon Festival.
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We hike 4-5 miles most Wednesdays in Gold Canyon RV&G. Leader is a Dutch Canadian Rokus Broere
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| January 2016 was Gold Canyon's Pirates of the Caribbean Party |
3 Birdies : Mike's golf has improved!
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| Sunset with RVs and Park Models |
Our reservation in Gold Canyon, Az ended on Feb. 29, 2016. We booked RCW (Rincon Country West) RV Park in Tucson. As we age our reluctance to leave Gold Canyon to see other nearby places will only increase so I did not reserve Gold Canyon for March. When I had a second thought Gold Canyon told me that they were sold out for March. I chose RCW because their activities person told me that they have a pool tournament every Thursday but organized pool there ended when we arrived due to onset of dementia by the pool tournament organizer.
When I compare the 2 parks Gold Canyon looks greener than RCW in Tucson. I did not find a cheap fresh produce market in Tucson like the one in Mesa. Since Rincon West is closer to city of Tucson I encountered more internationals and liberals than in Gold Canyon. Tucson's airport was close by while Sky Harbor International Airport is a half hour from the light rail in Mesa. The light rail goes by ASU (Arizona State U), Sky Harbor, Phoenix with a link up to Scottsdale.
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| Richard A. Thelen |
Mike's father Richard Thelen was in and out of hospice. Mike was warned that Dad had stopped eating and drinking so we waited anxiously for Feb 29.
On Wednesday Feb. 24 Mike visited physician in Gold Canyon for an appointment made 2 months prior. Paradoxically his lab results showed his heart normal but he felt terrible with onset of a cold. Physician's assistant prescribed Tamiflu to mitigate onset. By Monday I had the virus. It circulated in Gold Canyon. I had it for over 3 weeks but Mike got over it in a week with the help of Tamiflu, adrenalin and the acute need of his family.
RCW said that our reserved site would be vacated by Feb 26 so we knew that we could move there on Feb 26. Mike had booked service for our new-to-us 2013 Crossroads Cruiser 5th wheel. Mike is very cautious about wheel bearings so we got them packed. He also added a fresh wire from the truck to the 5th wheel so that the truck charges the battery. (Break in wire somewhere so he set it up so that we can dry camp in New Mexico.)
Mike flew from the nearby Tucson Airport to Detroit and then due to snow storm he took the Michigan Flyer bus and canceled car rental. His six children assembled along with his 4 siblings and their progeny. The family is very large so I was not needed nor missed. Mike spent Tuesday night in hospice with his father and brother Fred and sister-in-law Pat. His father died early Wednesday morning. They waited with him until an ambulance crew arrived at 11 am. They were in meetings with funeral home and priests making arrangements the rest of the day. Mike stayed in Lansing 8 days and then flew back to Tucson. He really loved the party with his children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews at his parents' house after the funeral.
We followed RV park recommended to-do list for Tucson like it was a job, our occupation. Add a little golf on municipal course and time flew. We did not see all the sites near Tucson like Patagonia State Park near Nogales so I look forward to returning. Friends plan to sell their house in Montessa, a housing development next to Gold Canyon RV and Golf and move to a Del Webb community in the Oro Valley, north of Tucson. It comes with everything on their wish list like low HOA (Home Owners' Association) fee and weekly vegan pot lucks. Since Del Webb was not only a huge real estate developer but also a 7th Day Adventist with vegetarian tenets, offering a vegan potluck makes sense. It follows 7th Day Adventist faith and current nutrition findings. Del Webb's bio is interesting. His opening of Sun City in 1960 drew 100,000, 10 times more than expected and put him on the cover of Time.
Loma Linda, California is the only "Blue Zone" in North America. Del Webb's name is on their medical library. People in Blue Zones live measurably longer lives.
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Saguaro National Park
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| Spring in Sonoran Desert |
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Saguaro National Park is the most important destination in Tucson followed by the Sonoran Desert Museum. I would spend a whole day at each if/when I return.
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| We visit Saguaro National Park |
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| Raptor Show at Sonoran Desert Museum |
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| Raptor Show Cont. |
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| Vulture Lesson |
The annual Festival of Books weekend at University of Arizona in Tucson draws fine authors and features new works. It is great. We biked 10 miles to the UA campus from Rincon West RV park. We sat behind a pillar to hear but not-hardly see author Jared Diamond. First question audience member asked was "What do we do about people who refuse to believe/accept the truth?" We had no idea that this would dominate the post-election analysis. This was 9 months before addition of "post-truth" to Oxford dictionary.
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Jared Diamond, author of Guns, Germs and Steel at the Az. Festival of Books.
I hope and expect that his next book due in 2019 will discuss nutrition.
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| Kitts Peak |
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| Welcome to Kitts Peak juxtaposes Native people to high tech. |
Volunteers from
Kitts Peak Observatory gave us a great tour of property and its telescopes. Established in 1964 it is a national optical astronomy observatory.
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| The World's Largest Non-Government Funded Aerospace Museum |
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| One of 300 Aircraft. |
We gave Pima Air and Space Museum 2 days. We took an extensive tour of the aircraft on the grounds of Davis-Monthan (DM) Air Base. Pima Air & Space bus tour costs $14 at 2pm. Avionics is shielded by white due to heat in desert. Planes outside are "spraywrapped" for preservation. Open carefully. Rattlesnakes like shade.
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| One of 125,000 Artifacts |
When we drove through the gate of the air base they asked us to put down our cameras since air forces bases are supposed to be secure. But once on the property photography was OK.
I like lists. Here is a list of aircraft we saw with notes. Frankly this stuff bores me so I listed what I heard while I sat on the tour bus.
560 F16
600 Cargo planes refurbished for Coast Guard
B52 backups. 95 on hand. NCIS exists.
C135 eg. Regeneration 4 times. Final VIP transport.
C5 Galaxy is largest.
T38 Talon. Advanced training.
J Star Advanced surveillance
C-145 Sky
C-120 backup com for AF1
Neptune
Patrol planes 179 from Boeing
F-35
F-15 Eagle 50000 ft. per minute. Fighter Can go supersonic in seconds
John McCain shot down.
Stealth Nighthawk Stealth Fighter undercover
DC-9 People mover
Iran had 70 F-14s.
B-57 Canberra
F-16A foreign sales Tom Cruise?
F-8 Crusader
A-10 Thunderbolt
FA-18 Hornet Navy Blue Angels
F-101 took 1st photos of missiles in Cuba
Gulfstream with prowler nose EA-68
C-23C Smoke jumpers use it.
YC-14 short take offs but too expensive compared to C130.
Helicopters
Cobras for fire watching
Huey - Vietnam era
T-39 Saberliner
Amphibious helicopter H-3
Marine helicopter for President
SH-60F Seahawk
Viking
OV-1
Lots of engines for recycling.
3 military personnel. Everyone else is contract.
Target Drone Program
Test pilot program.
Area 51? Janet Airlines carried passengers there.
KC-135
5 allied countries fly F-4s.
Viking Aircraft from 1st Gulf War.
Harriers.
A10s lumber along but they are neat.
F-111.
Museum storage and rocket parts working into restoration. Scrap to do.
Forest service Sherpas.
Digital crews in an analog world. B-52 is example.
Movies filmed here. Lots of agency airplanes. FBI. NASA.
P
3-51 Mustang carrying nurses WWII. Landing island captured.
6th hangar to open in May.
Adding P-38.
Snow fell on parts of Mount Lemmon in contrast to lower elevation. We downloaded the Mount Lemmon app and enjoyed a drive up 9000+'. We pack sandwiches for our day trips but followed a Jaguar car club at Mount Lemmon's Iron Door Restaurant. Mike favorite Jaguar is C-Type from late 1940's.
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| Looking down while going up Mount Lemmon |
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| View from atop Mount Lemmon, March 17, 2016. |
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| Snow outside of Tucson |
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| Jaguar Car Club met on Mount Lemmon. |
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| Mike loves Jags. |
Old Tucson Movie Studios are fun! Good actors rob a store and have a shoot-out. Lots to see.
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| Our Movie Studio Tour Guide. |
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| Actors wrestled and rolled practicing their movie stunts. |
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| Mike likes the cannons. |
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| Costumes from Westerns |
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| Lasso Show for the whole family. People from the world over visit Tucson! |
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| Cancan dancing in saloon in Old Tucson Movie Studios. |
We shortened our visit to Old Tucson Movie Studio for Bernie Sanders' rally. Too bad since the movie studio deserves a whole day and tickets (even with 2 for 1) are not cheap. RV friends Bob and Benita Pipes happened to be a few seats away from us at the rally. Later we met them at Govinda's for delicious vegan buffet in Indian ashram atmosphere. Govinda's charges a flat fee as a "charity" and diners bus their own tables.
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| Bernie Sanders in Tucson on March 18, 2016 |
We toured a ballistic missile silo, Titan Missile Museum.
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ICBM: Inter Continental Ballistic Missile.
(My mother's initials are Irmgard Christine Bloomer Miller.) |
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| Deep underground and never used to launch nuclear weapons. |
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They chose me and another female to role play of launch commanders.
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View above Titan Missile Base.
The Biosphere tour is an odyssey.
www.britannica.com/topic/Biosphere-2
Biosphere 2, scientific research facility located in Oracle, Arizona, U.S., designed to emulate Earth ’s environment (Biosphere 1) that was perhaps best known for ...
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| Inside The Biosphere |
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| Touring Biosphere 2 |
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| Outside Biosphere 2 is an Arab influence. Arabs are interested in water preservation. |
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| Liz in the Biosphere. |
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| Tucson's El Rio Municipal Golf Course |
We visited Tombstone and saw OK Corral reenactment.
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| Cowboy Actors in Tombstone |
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| Tombstone humor |
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| OK Corral with Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday |
We visited Arizona State Park, Kartchner Caverns, a limestone cave discovered in November 1974 and opened in November 1999. The cave is pristine due to care of the explorers and the original land owning family. No photos to show.
We visited this Jesuit Spanish mission very near our RV park.
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| Mission San Xavier Del Bac |
I recall a 1996 or so New Yorker Magazine's detailed article about the Tohono O'odham Indians,
The Fattest People on Earth. Children are often diabetic by age 5 and many lose their mothers due to diabetes. Their counterpart tribe in Mexico was healthy then due to no fast food, physical labor for most of the day and homes without central heat. We bought an interesting bag of mixed beans with a from the natives at this mission since corn, rice, beans and potatoes are central to our diet. If any group knows how to watch their blood sugar after all their diabetic suffering it's hopefully the Tohono O'odham.
Wikipedia backed me up as follows:
"They have the highest prevalence of
type 2 diabetes in the world, much more than is observed in other U.S. populations. While they do not have a greater risk than other tribes, the Pima people have been the subject of intensive study of diabetes, in part because they form a homogeneous group.
[13]
The general increased diabetes prevalence among Native Americans has been hypothesized as the result of the interaction of genetic predisposition (the
thrifty phenotype or thrifty genotype), as suggested by anthropologist Robert Ferrell in 1984)
[13] and a sudden shift in diet during the last century from traditional agricultural crops to processed foods, together with a decline in physical activity. For comparison, genetically similar O'odham in Mexico have only a slighter higher prevalence of type 2 diabetes than non-O'odham Mexicans.
[14]"
We had time to kill before the symposium on Privacy so we visited the Arizona State Museum. We lucked into a private behind-the-scene tour of their amazing archeology collection.
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| How Old? |
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| Arrowheads Under Glass |
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| Director showed us collection behind the scenes. |
We enjoyed a University of Arizona symposium on privacy with guests Noam Chomsky and Glen Greenwald in person and Edward Snowden appearing via skype from a secret location.
Notes:
Many people live constantly under the threat of terrorism. ISIS said that as long as you bomb us then we will attack you. We have been fighting terror 15 years. Invasion of Iraq increased terrorism 7 fold. Why do people turn to terrorism? Root cause is hopelessness. A cause provides dignity.
In 1993 Northern Ireland's war zone was settled by negotiations.
Terrorism v. Surveillance.
No one argues that surveillance is wrong.
Issue is massive and invasive surveillance that spies on economies and governments.
With billions of bits of data to filter what is the real purpose?
Remarkable is intensity of cable TV news coverage of Brussels attack. What is motive of the terrorists? Terrorists hate US for policies like support of Israel and multiple wars. Refer Rumsfeld Report. Does US wage a campaign of hatred? The US supports brutal dictators and thwarts democracy.
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| Noam Chomsky discussing Privacy |
Snowden says that we are safer now. Paid TV industry analysts carry on about terrorism when more accidents occur in bathtubs. Mass surveillance has not prevented a single attack. Russians told us that Tamerlin Tsarniev was dangerous. He bombed Boston Marathon.
When investigators look at everything then they can find nothing. What is the actual use?
Is it to spy on human rights organization and journalists?
If we are to be political police for the world then that role needs to be publicly debated.
Greenwald :
Come to terms with common people having hard secrets? Take least sympathetic, eg. Fred Phelps (Westboro Baptist Church) or KKK or San Bernardino murders. Greenwald was attorney.
Motto of NSA is collect it all.
Cliché is Orwellian. If you live in a society where you are always being watched then you have to act as if you could be being watched. Refer to FBI request for Apple to open San Bernardino shooter's phone.
Private citizens v. Public officials has now reversed to Public citizens and Private officials.
What happens when a culture of unaccountability occurs? Public officials' actions are unknown to the public while online digital means that they know all about us.
Tumacácori National Historic Park.
Website says "Tumacácori sits at a cultural crossroads in the Santa Cruz River valley. Here O’odham, Yaqui, and Apache people met and mingled with European Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries, settlers, and soldiers, sometimes in conflict and sometimes in cooperation. Follow the timeworn paths and discover stories that connect us to enduring relationships."
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| Historic Tumacácori |
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| When I was a little girl our dinette set had red vinyl padding. |
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| What was once modern is now in a museum. |
We hiked down from shuttle in Sabino Canyon. We visited the southeast side of Saguaro National park. We spent a very active March 2016 in Tucson and did not see it all. What we did see we did not see well enough and would happily revisit.
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| Sabino Canyon |
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| More Sabino Canyon |
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| Flowers in Saguaro. |
Good bye Tucson. Next New Mexico and Spaceport America.
After a brief stop at the White Sands National Monument Visitor's Center we drove to Alamogordo's New Mexico Museum of Space History, camping nearby. 
