Arizona outdoor Expo

I'm so tired I can't even click a pic.

I woke up this morning to a bevy of hot air balloons lifting off. This gave my morning a feeling of excitement that good things were going to happen today.

I wrote before in my blog about how it's taking time for me to get used to having my home on my back like a turtle, and this morning was a good example of that. I had planned on taking a shuttle bus from the campground where I'm at to the Expo, but I was sitting here this morning at about 7 o'clock, and I said to myself, self, the Expo starts at 9 o'clock why don't you drive over there right now, get a parking spot close to the event, sit in the camper until things get going, and then if I get tired of walking around today I can go back to the camper and take a break, because the camper will be nearby.

That made a lot of sense to me, even though it was an idea I came up with, and ideas I come up with usually lead to an explosion or a financial meltdown. But driving over there never occurred to me because I keep forgetting all of the benefits of having my home with me, wherever I go.

Before I figured out it made more sense to drive over there, I was already getting stuff together that I was going to need to carry around the Expo with me. But if I'm parked right next to the Expo I don't need to carry anything around with me except my camera. If I need anything else I can just walk over to the camper and get it, so I don't have to carry things around with me that I might not even use. There's no chance I'll leave things behind that I need, because everything I need is in the camper five minutes away, so no planning is needed. And without plans there's less stress and more freedom. And anytime I can trade stress for freedom.... I'm there.

I got a parking place as close as I could get to the Expo without working there. You can see the top of the Lance in the middle of the picture. This is the line half-hour before opening time and it looked like this for the whole morning. But it didn't affect me, I was cooking breakfast in the camper while they were waiting in line.

In a matter of minutes after opening the gate people were pouring in.

I beat most of the people over to the big tents and got to walk through them before the crowds got there and it got hard to move.

 I hauled buggy over to what I wanted to see which was the big tents, and the Mounted Shooters. These are some folks waiting for the mounted shooters to start shooting. It was gonna take a little while so I went over to some more tents.

Here's a place I didn't beat the crowds. This is a little backyard swimming pool where kids can fish. This is put on by the Arizona game and fish department to get kids interested in fishing.

I came back a little later thinking I could get a better picture, but the crowds were worse. Everyone you see here is waiting in line so their kids can fish for a few minutes.

The kids were so excited, they were jumping around and would scream every time they caught a 7 inch long trout fingerling, and it broke my heart to see those kids that wanted to fish so bad. Why doesn't their dad take them fishing, that's what they're supposed to do. My dad took me fishing, I took my kids fishing, these kids need to be at a lake, not a little backyard swimming pool! What's wrong with their parents?

This is what I enjoyed the most, watching the mounted shooters shooting at balloons as they ride by at full gallop, and the fastest time wins.

Since I grew up watching cowboys and Indian movies, I reckon pictures like this are burned into my soul.

I've been on my feet for most of the day, so I'm beat, but I'll have some more Outdoor Expo pictures tomorrow.