Primm Nevada Off Road Race

Shay hasn't been to a race with me in several years, mostly because it got too dangerous. He was little, and it was becoming very difficult to keep an eye on him while working with race trucks speeding by in the choking dirt and dust.

It's long hours. It gets hot. And there's thousands of numbers to keep right and keep in order.

Since Shay's birthday was a little less than stellar, I decided to take him along to the race in Primm, Nevada. I couldn't believe how excited he was, even after I told him we needed to get up at 4am.

Saturday, 4:30am. Shay says, "Hey, I'm not tired at all!" We took a photo of us out front of the casino that was hosting the race.



6:00am. The start/finish line is ready to go, and the race vehicles are firing up and getting in line to start.






9:00am. The race has been going for nearly three hours. Still lots of enthusiasm out there next to the race course:



10:00am. Nearly 100 vehicles have started the race, and the dust is as thick as a good fog. Shay wants to know when the race is over...



Skip forward to 9:00pm. Shay is truly astonished that I wasn't exaggerating when I said we'd be at the start/finish line for at least 15 hours.



He went inside to the casino where he decided to either wish Zoltan for a shorter race, or maybe he was wishing to be BIG...

Californians Ruin Everything!

Including our air. A couple of weeks ago the wildfires in California managed to blow their smoke over here to us.

Ruined our view.

Normally this:


Looked like this:



And the view that is usually this:



Was reduced to this:



And oh, boy, did it smell like smoke. Luckily the haze drifted away within 24 hours, but it certainly did a number on our air quality.

Shay's Not The Karate Kid

I entered Shay into martial arts classes to help with his self esteem. I saw him as a young Ralph Macchio (The Karate Kid) who wanted to learn the art but lacked the formal training.

What I realized a couple of weeks ago is Shay doesn't look just a little bit like Johnny the bad guy from The Karate Kid movie, he looks like him a LOT!!





Okay, maybe there's not much resemblance in that photo....

But how about this one...