exhaustion

i haven't posted because i've been just utterly swamped. life isn't meant to be this way, but i'm scrambling to make ends meet a bit, and trying to finish some major projects. i have one article on top of another due, plus one trip after another. i love to travel but i'm honestly ready to slow down for a while. trying to figure out a way to make that happen a bit better.

so, just to update - i finished a website i'm very proud of - the spring creek greenway - www.springcreekgreenway.org - (screen shot to right of the main page, and below of the subpages - the fawn photo and the lizardtail are my images and some others on the site). i helped montgomery county get a grant from the texas forest service earlier and then got the gig to create the website, a brochure and - get this - a video! i wrote the script and produced my first video.

i really enjoyed doing it. i put on the site a 1974 booklet called Papa Stahl's Wild Stuff Cookbook there (go to The Creek tab, then you'll see the link) and it has recipes for all these native edible plants, most are found throughout the nation.

i really respect and like the author Carmine Stahl - you'll see his photo there with his wife of 56 years!!!! he is 80 i think and is sharp as a tack and so kind and i really appreciate his life experiences. at around age 56, i think, he retired as a methodist minister, and then worked for another 20-some years as a naturalist at our local harris county jesse jones park - a beautiful forested preserve along spring creek (hence the website). however i had done some biological surveys with him before, and recently completed an article profiling him as a conservation legend for texas parks & wildlife magazine. he said recently i must get exhuasted with all i do, and i was like, uh huh, yep that is exactly the word!! absolutely buggered, as they say in australia. so i'm trying to just slog through a bit and hopefully i'll get to a bright spot again.

wednesday i fly to burlington, vt for the society of environmental journalists (sej) conference, and i'm really excited about that. i made some good friends last year and it will be good to see them, and also to network with some editors from magazines i write for, and want to write for like national geographic!! it is also my first ever trip to the NE, and i hope there is some remnant fall color.

when i get back, two days later i jet off to west texas with my girlfriends. i'm so excited! i'm writing an article and will need to climb the tallest peak in texas, guadalupe peak! we'll also get out to see the mcdonald observatory in the davis mountains. i've never been to either of these places. should be very cool. but i'm really excited that my dear friends paige (who i just visited in LA) and laurie who i roomed with for a 3-week program at texas a&m a few years back (and who makes me laugh so much) are probably flying out to go on the trip with me!! good friends close by make so much difference. i need my girls right now, been soooo stressed. i hate stress!

i'll post some more later. gotta get back to work!