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Today is Day 2 of the annual Schroeder Brothers Backpacking Trip. We skipped Day 1 because the weather forecast for the Grand Teton area called for chilly temperatures and snow all day Wednesday and most of Thursday. Sure enough, as we drove through western Wyoming today on the approach to Jackson, there was a lot of snow at higher elevations, and a dusting on the highway.

So most of today was basically a travel day, with a few highlights.

The famous Lone Tree monument in south central Wyoming!

This is a little “point of interest” in the median between the eastbound and westbound stretches of I-80. I’ve driven past it countless times with Laralee, and every time I wonder aloud what could possibly be interesting about a tree growing out of some rocks in the middle of the highway median. And every time she tells me that we don’t have time to stop and see. Well, Thom acquiesced and we pulled over to learn about the mystery. As it turns out, it’s a pretty cool story.

We arrived in Jackson around dinner time, which of course meant pizza.

And we wandered around the main part of town (the “tourist-ey” area), and that led, inevitably, to me sitting in the lap of a large wooden grizzly bear.

Now we’re relaxing in the Super 8– clearly a little bit superior to the Motel 6 next door (because 8 is better than 6). Thom is reading the latest issue of GQ for reasons beyond my ken, since his style of clothing is hardly what they showcase in that magazine.

Tomorrow we’re heading to Yellowstone, and then into the wilderness of the Tetons for the rest of the weekend.

Last night Zack joined his Scout troop down in Denver– they visited Channel 7 News studio to learn about the weather. They met with Mike Nelson, the long-time forecaster there, and he took them on a tour of the station and then they watched the evening news program live.

Zack is such a ham.

Today me, Laralee, and the boys headed down to Niwot to help some people clean up their basement and yard. They had a really nice house that backed to Left Hand Creek. Normally it’s maybe three feet across this time of year; today it was probably thirty feet of raging muddy water. (Where does that water keep coming from? It hasn’t rained in days.)

It’s heartbreaking to see basements that had six or seven feet of water in them. They’re just destroyed.

So Alex and I hauled mud (of course) that had washed up into the yard while Laralee and Zack cleaned inside the house in an attempt to get rid of the mud and other debris.

Just down the street, Alex and I were theorizing about whether the neighbors’ car had been sitting there when the floods came across the road, or if it had actually been washed there in the water.

There were all kinds of people helping in the neighborhood today– inspiring as always. On our way out, we noticed that someone had written “HOLD HOPE” in the sand and mud by the riverbank.

Cool.

The other evening I was driving home, and the moon was rising in the east. It was a full moon and low to the horizon, so it was a brilliant orange. It was amazing, as in Disney’s The Kid screaming “Holy smokes! Holy Moses! Look at the moon!”

Okay, maybe you had to be there.

Regardless, it was really cool so I thought I’d snap a picture. I pulled over to the side of the road (safety first!) and used the only camera I had at hand: my HTC phone. The results were… underwhelming.

Taking shots of the full moon requires some specialized equipment anyway because of the contrast between the moon and the rest of the dark scene. And apparently mobile phones aren’t “specialized equipment” in that way.

Check out this cool bug that Zack and I saw on the screen door the other day. I don’t even know what it is, but it looks amazingly like a leaf.

It’s a big sucker, too.

We ran out of macaroni noodles the other day and I was in the mood for some mac and cheese, so I went to the basement and cracked open one of our old #10 cans. We’d canned a bunch of macaroni and spaghetti a few years ago.

Well, maybe more than a few.

As it turned out, ten-year-old macaroni noodles aren’t too bad.

Ha! Cool.

This is a new one. One of my clients just challenged me to some iOS game called Battle Camp.

I’ve never heard of it, but apparently I can “experience the AWESOME” and do amazing things like “crush bosses”. Uhh.

Too bad I’m an Android guy.

Thom and I are planning to head up to the Tetons next Wednesday for our annual backpacking trip. Last night Dad sent me this weather map, which shows the high temperatures expected that day:

Notice the tiny little cold spot in northwest Wyoming? Yep, that’s where we’ll be. Dad delivered more good news with this analysis of the forecast:

Whee! I don’t mind a little rain while I’m hiking, or an evening in a tent while it rains outside, but it’s not much fun to spend three days in the wilderness while it’s grey, cold, and either raining or snowing. I mean, it’s September!

So, we’ll see how things develop… fingers crossed.

Today JPMorgan Chase bank was ordered to refund $309 million to customers, and pay an $80 million fine, due to unfair credit card billing practices.

They were also ordered to pay $920 million in fines over the “London Whale” scandal.

Oh yeah, and in July they settled for $410 million over accusations they’d been manipulating electricity markets in California and the Midwest.

And let’s not forget the $6 billion the Federal Housing Finance Agency is suing for due to bad mortgage security practices.

The good news is at least some of these greedy and unscrupulous activities are being brought to light, and the bank is being forced to cough up some dough. The bad news is these fines are only a tiny fraction of the bank’s overall profit… small enough that they’re probably just considered the “cost of doing business”. It reminds me of chemical companies who intentionally broke EPA laws by dumping toxins into rivers because the fines were less than the cost of proper disposal. Banks operate on the same principle: they cheat and rob, and then pay some pesky fine, because the profits from their shenanigans far outweigh whatever hand-slap they receive.

Sigh.