To get these posts out every night is quite an ordeal. The cold saps battery power so quickly you can watch the meter tick away. Every piece of electronics needs to be warmed against the body to restore power, then used quickly. We generally collaborate on our posts then, just before dinner, we will hook up all the various devices and start the long process of uploading our posts. I have to admit it is a pain, but something we both look forward to every night in our tent. I believe Mike is going to write about the noise we heard last night so I won't go into great detail, but I will tel ...continued...

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Kissee Mills, MO. 1979 This is a story I tell over and over to my kids and grandkids. It's the story of a young man we met while camping in Missouri a long time ago. Kissee Mills is in Taney County and part of the Branson community. It was summer and we were looking for a new camp site. We stopped at a fork in the road that had a little shack that sold bait. A young boy probably about 12 or so asked us if we wanted a busy camp or a not busy camp. We said we wanted the not busy camp. He said to go down the road to the left. So we did. We set up camp and were sitting around the concret ...continued...

The first thing in that I can remember is sitting on a stool in my grandfather's house. We were gathered around the fireplace. The stool was a homemade affair, built square and a bout 24 inches tall. Which was about the same height as I was. The room was lit with kerosene lamps whose soft glow competed with the fireplace to light the room. It was about an even match. I was playing with a piece of kindleing about two feet long and about a half inch square. It had been split from a fat pine stump and was hard as iron. For what ever reason I decided to hit him on the head a ...continued...

I was born into a world that was unfit and hopeless. My first memory is of me in my grandmother picking berries in the field. I was the first child born to my mother and was the least important thing in her life. She met a guy and start having kids by him but I didn't like him. he use to call me dumb and stupid and beat the shit out of my mom. I tried to help her but i would get thrown like a feather. One night he decided to teach me a lesson. my mom had went to bed and on his way to the bath room he would slip in to my bedroom to play a game called " don't tell mommy& ...continued...

This story involves a number of ficticous characters most of whom you will recognize on site if you are part of the group. As I pulled out of the driveway and headed for CHWC a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) community development corporation dedicated to improving the quality of life in downtown KCK which is located in Fire Station No. 9 that’s at 2 South 14th Street in Kansas City, Kansas and was built by Willian E. Harris over 100 years ago and declared a <a href="http://en.wikip ...continued...

Today we woke up to more of the same. A howling wind and violently flapping tent walls. We discovered that the wind, which is from the north, is rapidly pushing us back to our start location from yesterday. We call it a hamster wheel when the ice beneath our feet moves as quickly south as we move north. Since we are tent bound I have felt a survival mode kick in with both of us. I found myself hoarding the last of my Pop-Tarts as I secretly tried to eat them inside my sleeping bag, denying their very existence when questioned by Mike over the noisy wrappers giving me up. From the crunching ...continued...

👀 WRITE LIFE STORIES and SELL MORE BOOKS Five years ago after attending one of my book signings and a Lewis & Clark monologue presentation an administrator at Johnson Country Library, Overland Park, Kansas suggested I create a workshop that would assist those who wanted to write their life story. Since the launch of that program I have made over (50) presentations to a variety of organizations. One that added a new dimension to my effort occurred when I encountered a class of (80) 3rd grade students at an elementary school in Kansas City, Kansas. At the end of the c ...continued...

I always think about my past, and what my past brought me that woud trap me up inside, surround and remind me of fear, disappointments, and hopelessness. Once it would help me with struggles so many things I done. Like the song said to me, “There’s always tomorrow..,” but the past was monopolizing my present today. So what do I do with all that baggage inside of me? How did I sort it all out? I know that my troubles and lack of resolution with my past affects important relationships. The peopl ...continued...

11 is a very important number in my life. Let me tell you why. I was born at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of the year, the 11th child of the 12 that my mother and father had in total. Of the 10 that had been born before me, only four were still living when I was born; four of the six who had died had not reached their first birthday. Of the four then alive, only two survive to this day. So out of 12 children, only the last four , including me, are,as at the time of starting writing this story in 2013, still living. And, as with most births at that time a ...continued...

Our blog is full of lots of posts about how Mark and I joke around to pass time on the dogsled. Not today. Today was brutal. Coldest day yet. It was at least minus 30 Fahrenheit and the wind was howling. There was very little talking other than to confirm that all of our fingers and toes were working. The ice was flat but if you rode the sled, you frooze. Our boots are rated to negative 145 degrees. It did not help. The cold brought a cease fire to the war for limited space on the sled because we had to take turns running next to the sled all day to stay warm. We covered 12 miles. It ...continued...

My Great Escape 4/20/15-email from agent after reading my whole The Color Eater manuscript. I’m super excited because I know an email like this means I’m getting close. There’s merit in my writing. Includes the phrase “I really liked a lot about it; the writing was excellent, the action was well-executed, and the different powers people had were super cool.” Followed by lengthy suggestions where the story could be fleshed out in addition to an invitation to resubmit once re-writes are done. 4/22/15-Panic attack at the ide ...continued...

Last night after we made the blog post we had CP and Maher to our tent for some freeze dried dinner. It is quiet here at night when the dogs are sleeping. Suddenly we hear a massive noise. It sounded to me like a building being demolished. Mark says with an alarmed voice that he thinks he hears water rushing. We agree. The guides move fast and head outside the tent. Mark and I sit awaiting news. We suspect at the time that a massive lead opened up. The guides returned to report that they could not see anything but it was definitely the ice moving. We finish dinner and go to bed. We woke ...continued...

In November of 1997 at the age of 24, I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. Several months before I was diagnosed, I had given birth to my third child, a son. I was excited and so happy to have a full term and happy bouncing baby boy. One day I was lying down on my couch relaxing while my baby was having his nap, when I looked down upon my chest and noticed a lump protruding out on the left side of my breast. It was hard and not moveable. I asked my boyfriend at the time to look at it. He said should see the doctor right away. So called my gynecologist to sched ...continued...

Once again it's “Deja vu all over again.” Never ending white entitlement, delusional history and the usual threats of violence are now playing out at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Eastern Oregon, one of the more important bird and wildlife sanctuaries in the country and located in an isolated corner of Oregon. Malheur is being occupied by a handful of white (Christian?) terrorists with the apparent and enthusiastic support of ISIS no less. The Refuge, however, happens to belong to all the people of the United States. But like a shopworn moral ...continued...