Guest photographs

With J-ka's permission, I'm posting some of her Joshua Tree photos here -- I couldn't resist, as they so nicely complement my own (independent confirmation lends credence to claims of all sorts, even aesthetic ones, I think). We begin with the comedy: how many "taken by your right hand" pictures does it take to get three differently sized people looking ok in the same shot? Answer: clearly more than five.
At least you can feel the love.
Some more sunset shots:
This painful cholla attack shows that you should always listen to your sister.
Ocatillo lends itself to arty photographs,
as do cactus skeleteons.
J-ka also found herself taken with (bordering on obsessed with) this geologic formation she quickly dubbed the Miniature Wall of China (which came in various sizes of miniature: Mini, Medium Mini, etc.). Although it does look an awful lot like tiny, tiny people came and built a wee little wall running through the rock, it's actually apparently molten quartz and potassium that squeezed into rock fissures when still melted but then popped out some when solid again. A prosaic explanation, but still pretty cool.