Franklinsanity

4:45 pm, Gallup, NM – so we’ve covered a lot today, but the blog has fallen behind!  So let’s catch up:

• We stayed in Flagstaff last night. GREAT town; we’ll have to come back and spend more time there. Diablo Burger was as good as advertised, and, man, was the IPA welcome. Over a hundred degrees in he desert…Flagstaff was a cool, Marin-like 76 degrees. 
• Our first Airbnb:  win. Slightly rando ex-urb community outside Flagstaff:  huge yards, surrounded by mountains, modest ranch-style houses. We stayed in a two-bedroom outbuilding next to the main house. Very pleasant, somewhat stoner dude greeted us and the dogs, then retreated to build a massive bonfire in a 15-foot firepit about 100 yards from the houses. He had other guests too – staying on a trampoline in his large yard. Wonder if that was Airbnb’d too?
• Regardless of the burners in the yard, the house was beautifully equipped and crazy inexpensive. Kudos to HHW. 
• Starting day this morning at 6 am, the dogs, Quinn and I discovered a ton of gopher holes in the yard. The dogs hunted hard, but no gopher love. Fun. Maybe next time. 
• We then hit the Grand Canyon. This blog can’t possibly do it justice. Suffice to say it silenced and captivated Teddy – who is thus struck only by sports – to such an extent that, when asked if he wanted to climb a tower and see a gift shop, he said he just wanted to stay outside and look. Just a shockingly awesome site. Unlike the Mona Lisa, it makes the tourists look small, rather than vice versa. 
• 3 con calls and many connectivity problems – and a creepy encounter with some sort of panhandling crackhead outside a Safeway Starbucks – later, we’re  heading hard for Santa Fe. HHW is once again driving. 
• Enjoyed the welcome to AZ sign:  a nice big starburst. Enjoyed the welcome to NM  sign much more, as it declared this state a land of “enchantment.”  Minus the crackhead, couldn’t agree more – the buttes and desert, the clouds and cloud shadows, amazing. 

Other fun parts of the day so far?  Listening to Teddy laugh hysterically at funny parts in Harry Potter; encouraging HHW to get aggressive passing a maniacally bad driver, and not getting my head cut off, and walking to the top of the fake Native American tower with Quinn to look over the GC. 

Oh, and the 75 mph speed limit. 

We’ve moved the dogs into the backseat with the kids. We’ll see how that goes!