Not a whole lot new since my last post, but what little bit there was, was awfully fun. Headed over to the dance a bit early last night. Wanted to get there early just in case it was difficult to find. Turns out that it was where it was the last time I attended, I thought it was going to be somewhere new for some reason.

   Arrived in time to meet up with a few friends whom I already knew. Had been a bit worried that there wouldn't be many people I had danced with since it had been two years since I had come to this dance. But my fears were unfounded as there were dozens of people who I already knew and could dance with.

   I had picked up a set of shoe inserts at the store yesterday while grocery shopping so tonight was going to be the Beta Test for wearing them. Turns out that I should have been wearing these things all along as I ended a night of hard dancing still on my feet without even needing to swallow a handful of aspirin. Even this morning my 'dogs' are still feeling okay, a little bit tired and sore, but I could actually get up and walk without hobbling around for 10-15 minutes. Yeah!

   The actual dance was sure a lot of fun. Elixir, the band, was so hot last night. I can't really describe what the music is like because it isn't like any other contra band out there right now. Most of the time it sounds like a really good big band or jazz band because of the trombone, trumpet and clarinet, but then you add in the fiddle and guitar and you have this wonderful mish-mash of styles that doesn't fit any known genre. I managed to dance every dance but one, as I sat out one of the 'squares' in order to get some much needed water. More dancing to do yet today, but I probably won't go over until later this afternoon. Tonight will be a Halloween costume party, but I think I'll stick to my usual black shirt and shorts... it works for me and has now become my costume of choice.

    Below are a few photo's from the last weekend dance trip I was on over in Jonesborough. My friend Rima and I ended up taking a short trip over to the nearby town of Gray to go through their Science/fossil Museum there. Built after a highway realignment project ran across some interesting fossils, it was discovered that they were 4.5 to 7 million years old. They were lucky enough to actually have the highway department realign the highway to miss the site and the result has been this wonderful little museum that is run in conjunction with the East Tennessee State University.

Grays Museum of Science - Oct 2013

A couple of really cool dioramas made up of some of the animals they found. Seems that most of the site was located around a large watering hole. It becomes evident that the climate was much different then as there were alligators and tapirs around at that time.

Another view. In addition to the tapirs and alligator in this scene they also discovered parts of several other unusual animals like shovel nosed elephants, short faced bears, a small rhino and a new type of red panda.

It doesn't seem like there has been much change in alligators in the past 7 million years or so.

 This is a type of Rhino that has been discovered in the sediments around the watering hole.

 At the entrance to the museum was this wonderful little fountain with brick sculptures of some of the animals that have been found in the area.

My friend Rima.... turns out that she is almost as big a geek as I am.

ps   Before I forget yet again.... several days ago, as I was cutting down trees and having to haul them up the hill a little piece at a time, it hit me that even though I wasn't back in Colorado or Nebraska helping my family pack out bits and pieces of deer or elk for a change, it seemed like I was still being used as a pack mule. That feeling was only increased later on as I had to remove dead and drowned squirrels out of the horse's watering trough. Seems like fall will always include some kind of hard physical labor joined with some type of interaction with some kind of dead animal. :)