Spontaneous combustion!

Man... If I could pick one word to describe today, what would it be? ShazZam! KaBAM! BOOM! Wow! Something like that. It started out normal enough. Fairly slow and not bad. I got called into work about one, since my other client was supposed to be there and I was supposed to meet her. But... she didn't come, so I put a few gallons in my pickup and went home.

After that, I was sitting around painting when I got a phone call. It was from Greg, my ex-boyfriend. He was bored and at Walmart and wanted to see if I would hang out. I said "sure," and gave him directions. Anyway, Greg kept telling me about his favorite mud-hole and how much fun it was to go "muddin'" in his blazer. So, he headed down to the mud-hole, and got stuck halfway through. That mud was wacko. It was hard enough to walk on, but underneath the surface, it was like thick pudding. Nutso. Anyway, Greg tried to push, dig, and drive us out, but it looked like we were going nowhere. He tried to call like a zillion people, but none of them answered.

Finally, he got ahold of one of his buddies, Pat, who came down with a huge, 4-wheel-drive Chevy and pulled us out. Then he got a call back from his friend Jared, who also wanted to come play in the mud. Once he got there, Greg the ever-determined, decided that he'd have one more shot at trying to go across the mud-hole. Obviously, he got stuck again, and this time, Pat and Jared had to hook their trucks together to haul him forth from the mud. Needless to say, I wasn't too impressed after that little display.

Anyway, suddenly, Jared decided he wanted to go see the "C" on the mountain. He asked if we wanted to go too. I did, and I guess Greg did, so we took Jared's Ford Ranger up Cedar Mountain to go see the "C." The view was incredible. Jared, who is from Arkansas, was very interested in the local plantlife. Me, being slightly experienced in such things, endeavored to explain things. It was cool. Anyway, we saw the "C," and I happened to mention my ambition to climb the mountain next to the Canyon Creek Park.

"Why don't you?" Jared wanted to know. That kinda got me to thinking... why didn't I? So we decided we were going to climb the mountain. So we left the "C" headed toward the mountain. We were just hitting the valley floor when Jared noticed Coal Creek. He's only been in town a few months, so he hadn't seen it before. So we stopped and played in Coal Creek for a while. Jared also likes cool rocks, so we picked up some river rocks and stuff. We headed off to the mountain just when the sun was going down.

It was so scary to climb! It was very steep and covered with shale and loose rocks and things. We found a lot of awesome rocks that we stuffed our pockets with. I found a piece of obsidian that was transparent except for an orange streak and black-lacy looking markings on it. It was quite thin. Jared said he'd never seen any rock so awesome, so I gave it to him. Anyway. We made it to the top of the mountain and looked down at the view. Not as high as the "C," but it was incredibly gorgeous. We watched the sun set from on high and breathed the fresh mountain air. I taught Jared about Mormon Tea and we climbed back down. It was so scary being so high... half the ridges on that mountain were more like sheer cliffs that we had to walk along the top of, but we conquered it, by George!

Just when it was starting to get dark, Greg got a phone call telling him somewhere he could get a bunch of old, dead microwaves and things behind a resteraunt that had been closed for a few years. Greg's comment was, "dude! Let's go blow them up!" So we headed down to the resteraunt picked up old pieces of junk - no microwaves, but some old tubs and containers and an old soap holder - stuck them in the back of Jared's truck, and took off for Jared's house. I went with Jared and Greg followed us.

Jared lives with his aunt, who has positively the biggest house I've ever been in. There was a theatre in the basement, a bar, and a pool room. Super cool. Anyway. Jared mixed up a few home-made poppers (for security sake, I won't disclose the ingredients) and we headed out in the middle of the desert to finish off the night with a bang. Five of them, to be exact. They were quite fun - small enough to be harmless and large enough to make noise and blow the targets to pieces. I had the honor of lighting a few fuses. It was great. Anyway...

We got done with our fun about quarter after eleven, decided that we're definitely gonna go have some more fun in the future - swimming at Cross-Hollows, for one, and Greg drove me home. Awesome day.

Anyway, there is one worry I have. And that's Greg. Greg's a great friend. But... just a friend. He kept making remarks to me - asking me if I'd been dating lately, kind of hinting about him and I "hanging out" in the future - that kind of thing. I'm kind of worried that he might be trying to get me to go out with him again. He just broke up with his fiancee, so that might have something to do with it. Honestly, I could be jumping at shadows. But there were a great many shadows. Greg is my ex for a reason... But that Jared... He's somebody I could be interested in...

So today was awesome. Here's looking forward to more mountain-conquering, mud-bogging days!
--Anna Grace