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Everyday Avenger

Things You Should Know Thursdays – Pedicures. Always.

Pedicures. Always. Things You Should Know Thursdays

Pedicures are essential. Always. I don’t care if my fingernails are polished, but toenails must be polished at all times — and I refuse to do it myself.

I even got a pedicure in North Dakota before I went camping in Montana this summer.

My favorite colors these days are dark purples, or rich reds kiwigambling. A blue red, not a cherry red. Yesterday I went with the manicure as well – so everything is a lovely dark purple. Essie’s Sexy Divide, for those who are curious.

Things You Should Know Thursdays – #TYSKT – is inspired by the journal posts that are part of Vivid & Brave. Join us and share something we should know about you!

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Everyday Avenger

A New Look For Avenger of Sexiness!

As I’m prepping everything for Camp Mighty next week, I decided it was time for an all new look for Avenger of Sexiness, and new business cards as well!

Christine Tremoulet - Avenger of Sexiness business card.

Christine Tremoulet Avenger of Sexiness Business Cards - Back. Gray background with the words "You Are Enough" in white.

What do you think? Everything look good and work ok for you? Poke around. Let me know if it works ok on your phone or tablet, or your giant computer screen.

(Oops! I discovered a little issue with the comments cutting off the text, so I’ll fix that CSS tonight.)

Meanwhile, I’m heading south to San Francisco today! Can’t wait to see California again!

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BlahBlahBabble Everyday Avenger Travel Notes

Get Out and Go For a Drive…

Get Out and Go For a Drive

Sometimes, you just have to step away from the computer, get out, and go for a drive. To achieve a pleasant road trip, these are the best  driving schools in Colorado Springs.

Today was one of those days. The sky was blue, the air was crisp and cold, and while I had work I wanted to do, I felt like I just couldn’t think clearly anymore. After months of limited internet access, I was spending entirely too much time on Facebook. Too much time online. It was time to get in the car and go.

Originally, I had wanted to go to Crater of the Moon. Thanks to the Government Shutdown, the park is closed. I asked at my hotel if there was anything to see outside of the park. The manager said yes, but it just isn’t the same. You don’t get the sense of being on a huge lava flow from outside of the park gates.

Stumped for where I should go, I knew I didn’t want to return to the room. Not yet. My head was whirling with ideas, things I want to build, and I needed to step back and think about it, letting the dust storm settle in my mind. I asked the receptionist if there was anything in Idaho Falls that I really must see, and she said that I should head to the Swan Valley.

Damn, she was so right.

Wild Chokecherries

On the way to Swan Valley you reach a scenic viewpoint with a rest area. I stopped to take photographs, and after watching the man gathering something from the bushes at the edge of the sidewalk. I went over to ask him what he was gathering — and it was chokecherries. He showed me what the ripe ones look like, and what they look like when they have passed the point of being ripe. Then we talked about different places to see in the area, roads off the main road I should take for great views, and our love of the mountains.

Bald Eagle in Flight - Idaho

While we were talking, I saw my first pair of bald eagles in flight! We also saw what we thought was a raven at first, but as he left the parking lot he stopped to tell me he was pretty sure it was a young eagle. Did you know their head is not white until they reach sexual maturity?

Young Eagle in Tree - Snake River, Idaho

Over and over, I’m reminded just how good people truly are. He was so delightful to talk to, and I learned so much!

Fall Color in Idaho

I drove on to Swan Valley, and then on to the Idaho / Wyoming state line, at the edge of Teton Pass to Jackson. I didn’t cross over the pass, I turned around at the border. As I was driving back I kept stopping to take photos, including these fields just outside of Victor, Idaho. That black cow was very curious about why I had stopped on the side of the road!

Cows in a Field outside Victor, Idaho

Idaho Barn outside Victor, Idaho

I stopped at a closed campground on the Targhee National Forest. Damn the man! You can’t keep me out of the campgrounds! (Well, you can, because there was no way in HELL that I was going to camp there alone at night, in the mountains, with bears, in the snow. I was still in the campground though!)

Targhee National Forest Campground

This was the treat awaiting me by the time I got back to Swan Valley. I was so overwhelmed with the amazing beauty of nature that I suddenly found myself in tears.

Mountain View in Swan Valley, Idaho

I stayed in the area to watch the sunset reflecting on the mountains, seen in the photo at the top of this post. After I soaked it all in, I headed back to Idaho Falls. Refreshed, I am now plowing through work. That drive was exactly what I needed.

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Everyday Avenger Travel Notes

Dear Government, Thanks For Ruining My Road Trip Plans…

Closing the National Parks for the Government ShutdownI realize it is trivial in the grand scheme of things, but this Government shutdown? It is completely messing up my road trip plans, and I am NOT happy about it.

I don’t like writing grumpy posts, but at the moment it is all I can think about. I wanted to return to Mt St Helens next week and take time to explore the visitor’s center – a long time dream of mine – and it looks like it won’t happen right now. Then there are the parks in California that I wanted to stop at before heading to Camp Mighty, and that doesn’t look like it will happen either.

It leaves me wondering too what other places will be closed or impacted — I’m assuming that the highways that pass through National Forests are still open, but maybe they aren’t? Wouldn’t that be a lovely surprise. Oh, and I can’t look on the National Park Service website for information for future planning (after Camp Mighty) because they shut the website down.

The whole thing just makes me angry. It makes me even more angry when I think about all the park staff who aren’t able to work right now – and all the others who are currently not being paid because of it.

I’m still going to go out there and see the beauty that this country has to offer. I finally have a plan forming of where I will go instead. There is a lot to see, and I’m going to make the most of it. I’m just sad that the National Parks can’t be a part of it.

Photograph above taken at Yellowstone National Park. Last weekend, before they closed.

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Everyday Avenger Living My Life List

My Life List…

My Life List

I’ve thought about this whole Life List thing for a long time. I’ve talked about creating one. I’ve helped document friends crossing items off of theirs. I set one up on the Go Mighty site. Somehow, I never got around to setting one up here. We are going to change that today.

What is a Life List? You might think of it as a bucket list. Only better, because we are going to celebrate what I want to do in my life. It is all about the spin.

The first part of this list is alphabetical not because I’m that OCD, but because that is how they are sorted on the Go Mighty site. In case you wondered. Everything at the end will be added as I think of it, and it will be haphazard. Eventually that will make me crazy, so I’ll make it all haphazard – but for today? I’m just writing the list.

Items in italics are completed.

  1. Create a Life List – DONE! Score! First thing marked off!
  2. Attend a Jewish High Holy Days Service
  3. Be published in a national magazine
  4. Breakfast at Tiffany & Co in New York
  5. Create & plan the You Are Enough Project
  6. Create a mission plan for Avenger of Sexiness
  7. Develop a coaching program for women focused on journaling & personal projects – Done! Launched 9/30/13 – Vivid & Brave
  8. Drive the Beartooth Scenic Highway in Wyoming & Montana – Done! August 2013, I looked over the edge
  9. Drive the Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park – Done! August 2013
  10. Finish decorating my house in its entirety
  11. Get a tattoo – “You Are Enough” – in my own handwriting – Done! September 2013
  12. Go camping for a week with Mike
  13. Go on a road trip of 10,000 miles – it ended up being over 19,000 miles. June 30, 2013 – November 7, 2013
  14. Go to a Broadway show in New York
  15. Go to the Kentucky Derby, wearing the essential big hat
  16. Hike a portion of the Appalachian Trail
  17. Help someone else with a life list item
  18. Knit a cowl to wear in the winter
  19. Knit a sweater for myself
  20. Learn to grill
  21. Live on the road for one summer – Done! June 30 – November 7, 2013
  22. Live for a year in another country
  23. Make my bedroom a relaxing retreat
  24. Night photography of the Milky Way at Crater Lake, Oregon – Done! July 2013
  25. Night photography of Old Faithful in Yellowstone – Done! September 28, 2013 – Old Faithful at night, complete with a perfect Big Dipper
  26. Night photography of the Milky Way in Banff, Alberta, Canada – Done! Near Lake Louise, September 2013 with red trees
  27. Paint the whole interior of the house – no more yellow and green!
  28. Photograph 20 women for the You Are Enough Project
  29. Photograph a boudoir session outdoors in the rain
  30. Photograph the Aurora Borealis in Alaska
  31. Photograph the Milky Way in Jasper National Park, Canada
  32. Plant a garden in our garden plot
  33. Raise $440 for the Camp Mighty drive for Charity:Water for my 44th Birthday – Done! September 2013
  34. Read one book a month for a year. Audiobooks count.
  35. Send 10 friends something special on a random day
  36. Set up an annual physical for myself
  37. Sit outside and read a book
  38. Speak at TEDx Houston about the Avenger of Sexiness mission
  39. Spend a weekend in silence, offline
  40. Stay at the inn at Moraine Lake, Banff National Park in Canada
  41. Take a trip with Jason to somewhere he wants to go and has never been
  42. Take the Chicago Architect Foundation River Tour – Done! July 2013
  43. Update my entire yarn stash on Ravelry
  44. Visit Alaska by my 45th Birthday
  45. Visit the region of Austria where my mother’s family is from
  46. Walk across the Brooklyn Bridge – both directions
  47. Walk across the Golden Gate Bridge – done! October, 2013
  48. Walk on a glacier
  49. Write about my epic road trip in my Mini – the Avenger of Sexiness Tour – Started! Have Gear Will Travel
  50. Write a book
  51. Photograph a Traveling Red Dress for someone
  52. Exercise routinely
  53. Have a gigantic yard sale to get rid of everything we don’t use
  54. Learn to make pottery
  55. Have my mom teach me how to sew and make something
  56. Visit all 59 National Parks in the USA: Acadia, American Samoa, Arches, Badlands, Big Bend, Biscayne, Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Carlsbad Caverns, Channel Islands, Congaree, Crater Lake, Cuyahoga Valley, Death Valley, Denali, Dry Tortugas, Everglades, Gates of the Arctic, Glacier, Glacier Bay, Grand Canyon, Grand Teton, Great Basin, Great Sand Dunes, Great Smoky Mountains, Guadalupe Mountains, Haleakala, Hawaii Volcanoes, Hot Springs, Isle Royale, Joshua Tree, Katmai, Kenai Fjords, Kings Canyon, Kobuk Valley, Lake Clark, Lassen Volcanic, Mammoth Cave, Mesa Verde, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Olympic, Petrified Forest, Pinnacles, Redwood, Rocky Mountain, Saguaro, Sequoia, Shenandoah, Theodore Roosevelt, Virgin Islands, Voyageurs, Wind Cave, Wrangell Saint Elias, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Zion (Thanks for the inspiration, Laura!)
  57. Visit Fallingwater – Done! June 1, 2014
  58. Visit the Museum of Science & Industry in Chicago with my Dad, like when I was a kid
  59. Create a YouTube Channel and post regularly
  60. Leaf Peeping in Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts

(Last updated on June 5, 2014)