Riding out of this ol'town

on our (me and Russ) bikes yesterday was quite an experience. Firstly, the suburban metropolis area on the edge of Tucson is clearly not frequently visited for some of the signs and roads were pure comedy.

At a junction with a poorly tarmac'd road: "This road is not maintained by the city!"

You don't say!

On a busy road outside a school: "Warning! Deaf AND blind children crossing"

God help them!

On the same road adjacent to a golf course: "Warning, killer golf balls!"

Ok, so the last one might have said something slightly different but you get the jist of it. Besides the fits of laughter at various forms of bureaucractic stupidity, it was an awesome ride. We gained quite a lot of height heading into the mountains completely surrounded by Saguaro (a type of cacti unique to this area) covered desert with nothing for miles and awesome views back down to Tucson.

On friday night, the geology department decided to throw a welcome party for everyone which we dulely attended for the free food if nothing else. although i must say i under-estimated the affair. It was at the lovely setting of the Tucson Botanical Gardens with a traditional hot mexican buffet. We also had a new experience of a private performance from a Mariachis band (a type of noisy music with violins, horn things and silly little acoustic guitars). I was well impressed to start off with but soon joined the locals in considering it annoying and intrusive. You simply can't hold a conversation with that racket going on!

Kind of like this but bigger and noisier: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDtJmMWbDd0

Aside from that, it was a good night. Met a local Tucsonian from the department with whom we discussed at great length Anglo-American issues and the like. You'll be glad to know he isnt George Bush's biggest fan either! He did, however, let himself down on a simple fact regarding the television drama, 'House'. It is unfortunately the case that a lot of American's don't know that Hugh Laurie is English! Well he is, so get used to it!!!

The only other thing of note from this weekend is another encounter with local wildlife. Upon leaving the Botanical Gardens quite late at night (we were the last to leave, literally!) our path was blocked by a mini-plague of enormous cockroaches (i kid you not!). They were red in colour and easily 3 - 5cm across and since i didnt really want to get one on the underside of my shoe, the normally mundane path was turned into an assault course.