Badlands Residency Day 50

Today was supposed to be my last school program, but in the end it fell through.  Disappointing, but sometimes that how things work out.  On the bright side, I was able to attend dinner and bingo at the fire hall in Interior.  Delicious Indian Tacos, and many, many bingo wins for my small group of friends.  The prizes were desserts, and there were so many desserts there that it took three hours to finish playing bingo.  The three of us had an enormous plethora of baked goods to bring home, enough to feed a small army for several days.  

There was tragedy this evening: a local 9th grader was fatally injured in a roller accident by the park border.  A sweet girl, she was in my classes at Interior School during my first residency.  This is her painting of the Badlands landscape from April 2012.

Badlands Residency Day 49

Slept in a little today, first time in ages.  Worked on preparing for tomorrow's field trip/education program, caught up on photographs, blog maintenance, phone calls, emails.  My plans for the week have shifted since the park staff opted to cancel the public scoping meetings regarding the bison reintroduction proposal for the South Unit.  I don't know many details yet, but Monday's meetings were apparently so contentious and argumentative as to prove completely unproductive to the purpose.  I'm not sure whether it factored into what transpired, but there is some general confusion over the Tribal National Park and bison reintroduction proposals.  Many people don't realize that these are unrelated topics, one is managerial, the other operational.  Each are on their own path, serve independent purposes, and are not dependent upon each other to proceed.  Nonetheless, many who are upset about one are now linking the two and causing more confusion over both topics.  I was planning to attend a few of the meetings, so now have a little extra time for other endeavors.  Today I used the time to catch up a little.  I also took a long walk around the park, and with some decent lighting this afternoon, was able to get most of the rest of the photographs I need for my project with the regional NPS office.  Now to find the time to do two more watercolors and about eleven more sketches.  Probably will have to wait until I go back home at this point.  Dinner was with friends, followed by a game of trivia, which my team lost, spectacularly.  Never play trivia against someone who knows a bit about everything and is a generation older than you.  Doesn't end well.

Midday storminess, out my back door.

Evening clouds.

  

Evening storms out my front door.

Sunset from the housing area.