英语博客(A cup of English):Murder on the beach

Beginners.

As you can see, I'm back from my trip to Lake Roosevelt. We were there from Wednesday until Friday, and the time flew. It took a lot of preparation to get there; typically I overpacked some things and underpacked other things. For example: I took enough food to feed an army, but I forgot to pack toys or coloring pens for the kids, which are essentials for the evening when we have all returned from the beach. When we arrived, I opened the trunck * door, and saw that my children had thrown in fishing poles and nets, which I would have forgotten, and which happened to be very useful. The journey took about three hours. We travelled through countryside that is unusual for me: huge, flat wheat lands that seemed to go on forever. Then we passed through a massive, dry, rocky gorge 1. It was the type of place you imagine dinosaurs 2 to be roaming around in. Finally, the countryside changed to more hilly and green. The trees were all pine as we approached the lake. It was beautiful, in a very Western, rugged 3 way. After we unpacked 4 everything, we went to the beach. The children ran and splashed, built sand castles and dug for pebbles 5 and anything interesting. It was towards the end of the first day that one of my boys pointed 6 to an unusual collection of objects piled in a shady area of the beach. Bones!

Grammar notes.

Preterite: fly (flew), forget (forgot), seem (seemed), go (went).

Exs:

The bird flew away from the hawk 7, and hid in a bush.

I forgot that I had left the car running. When I came out in the morning, the petrol and the battery had run out.

My uncle seemed tired last night. I think he has a lot on his mind.

I didn't want to go to the beach; it was too hot. So I went to the mall instead.

 Advanced.

Bones! What bones! I mean, what or who did they belong to? There weren't enough of them to reconstruct a complete skeleton, so my kids and I had to deduce whose they were, and what had happened. First of all, they were not human, thank goodness, so we weren't playing on a crime scene. Secondly 8, one of the bones had a certain kind of fur attached to it. Conclusion, it must have been a baby deer, a foal. The poor little thing could have died in a number of ways. The area of Lake Roosevelt is quite wild, really. There are not only lots of deer, but also moose, and the occasional predators 9, like coyotes. Also, the winters are very snowy, cold, and long. Unless deer come down to the human residences and eat up garden plants, their food sources can become quite limited. One of the neighbor ladies who was on the beach told me that it is difficult for the younger deer to survive the winter. Thankfully, there are so many of them, that future generations continue to thrive. But there is obviously a toll 10 every year. My kids were fascinated with all of this, so they decided 11 to bring the bones home. Oh great! Something else that's yucky in the house. Mind you, it could have been worse. The lady also told me that she was going for a walk one morning, and a moose walked right past her! Now, those bones would have been far too big for the car!

Grammar notes.

 Would have/ could have.

Exs:

If I'd have known that they were going to spend the night with us, I would have put clean linen 12 on the beds.

It could have been worse. They usually bring their dogs and insist that they also sleep in the beds!

I would have loved to have taken some photos of the wheat fields, but we didn't have time to stop the car.