All I want for Christmas...

Tank worked really hard and got one of his front teeth out just before Christmas.

Of course, once it was out, he didn't like it at all. He was really upset and wanted it put back in. I asked him to let me take a picture, but he really didn't want to. You may not know this, but my boys know that I am a mean dad and insist on pictures even when the kids are mad. It was really hard for him, but tank really tried to smile. After all of the pain and suffering, we ended up with this cute series of pictures, with C-dog "helping" by sticking his head in front of the camera.

































This was the cutest. The other tooth is sooo loose and could fall out at any time.

Read More......

Halloween!

Halloween was great fun. This was probably the best Halloween I've had a quite a few years. We had a bunch of family over and the weather was great. The kids are a bit older and not quite as whiny. Plus Halloween in AZ (or at least where we live in AZ) is a social holiday where everybody gets outside and has a good time.


By the way, sorry that I'm posting about Halloween 2 months late!


This is a photo of the twin cousins next to this creepy guy that came to our party. I told them to stay away, but they wanted a picture!





In our neighborhood, the neighbors get together and have driveway get-togethers. So a lot of houses are dark and empty, but the people are over at the neighbors. It's fun to see everyone, and it's really warm outside still. The witch's brew on the table is homemade rootbeer. Thanks, Brad!




The kids had a blast carving their pumpkins. Do you see any resemblance between the jack-o-lanterns and the carvers?






Mouth wanted to be some sort of death-demon. He looked pretty scary, even though the face paint gave him a rash.





Mouth really loves Star Wars (who dosen't?). He had a blast being a clone trooper (do not call him a storm trooper, or face his wrath!). It was really hard finding a star wars blaster in the stores. We had to order one from amazon.



C-dog was an Arizona Cardinals football player. He's really into football. It was funny how much heckling he got from the neighbors. I guess 30 years of the Cardinals sucking has turned some people off of them. This year they're pretty good 8-6 so far and they clinched their division for the first time since 1975.


Oh the horror! can't you hear the screams as the pumpkins melt into the earth!

Read More......

Fun Family Visits: Kristi

You thought I was kidding about a lot of visits this fall, didn't you. Well, it was awesome. Kristi, Kelly and Chase came for Halloween.

Fortunately, I had recently switched to DirecTV, so I finally can watch BYU football on the Mountain channel. I haven't been able to watch football ever since some genius decided it would be a good idea to broadcast mountain west football on a channel no one gets. But I digress. It is germane that I discuss the acquisition of the mountain channel (DirecTV channel 616), because there was no way that Kelly was going to come down unless we had it ;). The game was really exciting and it was sweet for me to have the expert on the couch to answer all my questions. Thanks, Kelly!



We went to the zoo, which is always a good time. It was really hot that day and everyone was looking for some shade. So we hit the stingray exhibit( I apologize to any marine biologists out there if these are not stingrays, maybe they are some other kind of ray). It was really neat, and we all got to pet and feed the rays. There were also some sort of bottom feeding sharks in there and some other icky creatures. The kids loved it.
The funnest part was, of course, Halloween. Halloween is really fun here because it's not freezing so people can go outside and par-tay. The kids can also show off their costumes, because they don't have to wear coats. Most people get some friends and neighbors and sit in their driveways and chow as the kids go by. We went trick-or-treating for a hour or so until the kids were done, then just sat around and talked. It was really fun. I'll post some more Halloween pictures and details in another post, because this one has too many pictures already.

Thanks for coming Kelly, Kristi and Buzz Lightyear!

Read More......

My Complaint List

Mouth handed me a sheet of paper during church last Sunday. It was titled:

My Complaint List December 7 2008.


My dad is a big fat meanie and this is why. He made me pick up the dog poop with my crazy brother. And my other crazy brother yelled at me while I was getting dressed. And my mom she had to leave at 6:45 AM in the morning. So now at church my dad forgot something so he had to go home to get it. So now my brothers and I are all alone. And now my scout leader is telling us about the Gospel being true and all. And now a lady is talking about something tender about the Savior. Oh and I forgot when we came to church we had to sit on the hard chairs all of them are so hard and not comfortable at all. And that's all my complaints.

Here was my response. It was titled:

Complaint list of a 9 year old African boy.

My dad is dead
My mom is dead
I live with my grandmother in a one-room shack with 12 of my cousins
I sleep on dirt with no blanket
I have to get up at 6:45 AM to go out and try to find a bug to eat before the other kids eat them all.

Read More......

Don't read this post...

...if you have a sensitive nature and do not like salty language.

So tank came up to me the other day and said:

Tank: Dad, I know a bad word
Dad: Oh?
Tank: Should I tell it to you?
Dad: Well, sure, if you want to.
Tank: OK, I don't want to say it, I want to spell it
Dad: That's probably better anyway
Tank: It's A-S-S-O

Read More......

Fun Family Visits: Angie

The next to visit us was Angie and her two oldest boys. (She has not yet begun to blog, so I cannot provide a link. Here's how to sign up, Ang!). Her daughter was so upset to be left behind- I hope she's forgiven you Angie. Thanks to Tyler for watching the other kids so Angie and the boys could visit.




They came in the middle of October, so we were able to go with them to the Schnepf farms fall activities. We went last year as well. It's a fun working farm with a mini carnival and hay ride and pig races and chili cookout and pedal carts and so forth. It's really a lot of fun.




















We also went on a nature hike with them to show them the unique desert landscape (and to get the wiggles out!)








Homies in the house!

Read More......

Fun Family Visits: Bucket Heads

I went through a blogging slump recently, if you haven't noticed, and quite a few important events were not immortalized in this historical record. One of the reasons for my slump was that as the number of missed posts grew, it became daunting to even think about starting again and catching up.

In order to catch up, I'm going to briefly review the amazing amount of family visits we've had here this fall. Thanks everyone- it really makes us feel less isolated when we live so far away!


The first to visit were the Bucket Heads, minus the main bucket, John, who had to stay home and work. It was really fun to see them! The kids had SO much fun running around, screaming and singing with the girls. I'm not sure that "Lucille" was supposed to be running around, as she had just barely suffered a horrible accident that cut her leg badly and severed most of the important bits in there. But she apparently cannot be stopped from loving life!

I don't know why I don't have any good pictures of their visit. I think we were enjoying chatting with Laura and Jill too much to remember. These shots do capture the insanity of dancing to the radio.

Read More......

Soda Pop by Any Other Name...

Delicious Soda Pop. I love the fizz that fills the air with moist aroma when you first pop open a can. I love how that first big drink burns as it cleans off the back of your throat. Dee-licious!

I grew up always calling it Pop. It wasn't until college that I noticed that some people call it Soda. Then I started getting a complex that it was supposed to be called Soda, and only redneck-hicks-from-the-hills ever called it Pop. I've tried switching to using the word "Soda", but it always felt foreign to me. Like saying "tomatoe" instead of "tomato".

I was thrilled to find this map showing that a large portion of the country uses the term Pop as a generic name for soft drinks. Only the southwest, northeast, and a strange cluster around St. Louis commonly use the term Soda.

Oddly enough, the south seems to use the term Coke. Doesn't that seem confusing? It seems to me that a lot of Abbott-and-Costello-style "who's on first" conversations go on at restaurants in the South.

Southern Waitress: Howdy, y'all. Wouldja like summat to drink?
Yankee Customer: How about a Coke?
Waitress: Sure, hun. Whatja like?
Yankee: Uhh, a Coke please.
Waitress: Well, dumplin', of course we have Coke here. Wouldja like a sprite?
Confused Yankee: No, no, a Coke!
Waitress: Now puddin', don't get all riled up. How about a nice Grape Nehi?
Disconcerted Yankee: Never mind, just get me some ice water.

Is this really true? Can anyone out there confirm it?

Read More......

We forgot to have a concert!

When school started in August, C-dog had to choose between the dance/theater/video production class group or band for the year. He really wanted to do video production, but there was no way he was going to do dance! So it was band. He picked the trumpet because it was small and only has three valves. (he thought it would be easy, Ha!)

He's been playing trumpet for 4 months now. The first few months were pretty rough, but he persevered and in the last couple of weeks, he's starting to sound pretty good.

He was really upset that we forgot to have a concert for the cousins who were just here (more about the many visitors soon). So I agreed to post a video for them to watch of him "in concert". Enjoy!

Read More......

Arizona Winter Boots

 

Even in Arizona you need some furry boots in the winter!

Read More......

It's blowing my mind!

I just read a fascinating book called "The Drunkard's Walk" by Leonard Mlodinow. It's about randomness and chance and how our brains are not wired correctly to comprehend chance. It was on the "new book" shelf at the library and I thought, "It might be boring, but I'll give it a try."

It was not boring. I learned a lot, and really had my eyes opened to my lack of understanding. One example he cited has really stuck with me. It's blowing my mind!

It's called the "let's make a deal" problem. Bear with me: I realize that this might be a bit dry, but I'll try to keep it interesting.

Monty Hall had a game show called Let's Make a Deal. One of the games involved him showing three doors, or curtains, or boxes. Behind one of the doors was a fabulous prize! Like a moped, or a vacation for 2 to Des Moines, Iowa, or something. The other two doors hid goats, or something of equal un-value.

Let's pretend that you are the contestant. You must pick one of the three doors. You have a 1 in 3 chance of winning. So you pick one.

Monte, who knows what's behind all the doors, opens one of the two doors you didn't pick, and he always picks one that is an anti-prize; a goat door. So now there are only two doors remaining. You are given a choice: you may either stick with your original choice of door, or switch to the other unopened door.

Well, there are only two doors left, so its a 1 in 2 chance of winning, right? So either door has an equal chance of sending you and a friend on that all expense paid trip to Iowa.




I'd like you to stop reading for a moment and think about this. Is there any advantage to switching to the other door? Close your eyes and hum some classical music so you'll be smarter. When you're sure come back.

I could not think of any reason to switch. I racked my brain, but it always came back to a 50/50 chance. However, during the run of the show, and in computer simulations it can be shown that you're twice as likely to win if you switch to the other door.

No way! Two doors, one prize. It has to be 50%.

This is what blows my mind.

It comes down to breaking the random chance with an all-knowing observer. OK, you started with a 33.3% chance of being right, and a 66.7% chance of being wrong. The observer, who knows what is behind all the doors, opens one of the bad doors. He doesn't select a random door, he purposefully selects one of the two bad doors.

What this means is that you still have a 33.3% chance that you picked the wrong door, and a 66.7% chance that one of the other two doors is right. You're not going to pick the door that Monte showed you, because you now know it's wrong. In effect, the other door has absorbed all of the % chance of both doors. If you switch to the other door, you now have a 66.7% chance of having the right door.

It really works that way, here's a link to a page where you can try it. Just make sure you try each case enough times to be valid. (no, once is not enough. Try 30 or 40)

Does that hurt your brain? I can explain it, but do I truly understand it?

Read More......

Rush hour fun

My new job is only close to my house in the same way that diet soda tastes close to regular soda. Not close at all. Yes, I'm back commuting. It's not all bad. I have time to listen to my podcasts and some tunes and enjoy the top down on my sweet Wrangler. I've had a (surprisingly) pretty good attitude about it.

I've been enjoying open-air driving a lot. Even when it's pretty hot out, it's worth it to let the air run her fingers through my hair (just don't tell Allie!) :)

I discovered one downside to being exposed to the air last week on my way to work.

My drive is mostly on the freeway, and about half of it is stop-and-go. During the stop-and-go time, there's nothing really you can do but breathe deeply and not think about it.

Well, last week I was sitting there breathing deeply, when something unpleasant entered my personal space. A giant semi ended up next to me and boy did it stink! The trailer had an open top and it was filled to overflowing with rank garbage. The smell quickly became overpowering. My honey nut cheerios were in serious danger of coming up.

Normally in this sort of scenario, I'd just close the windows and put the AC on recirc, but that won't work in the Wrangler! We stop-and-goed together for 5 or 6 minutes until his lane slowly pulled ahead of me. I could still smell it, but I wasn't gagging anymore.

Why would you drive a semi full of trash on the freeway during rush hour anyway? Couldn't the garbage wait an hour? By leaving later and missing all the delays, you could probably get your rush trash delivery to the dump at almost the same time!

Read More......

Stupid dog

As I've written about before, we are trying again with a new dog. Why? I dunno. I guess we're gluttons for punishment. Our dog, Max, is the closest thing I've seen to the perfect pet for us. He mostly sleeps and lays around. Every now and then, though, his dog-ish nature comes out and look what happens!

Allie has started horseback riding lessons. I was all for it, but I wondered why you need lessons. I mean, you just sit on the horse and he carries you around, right? Wrong. Apparently it takes quite a bit of skill. Anyway, I'm trying to get her to post about it, so I won't comment on it too much here.

Suffice it to say, she is having a blast. We had to go out and buy her some cowgirl boots. They have all sort of fancy ones now, and we found some comfortable ones that were oh so cute!

Last week, Allie went to her lesson and then had to rush home, change, and get to work. She threw her boots down and rushed off.

She had a stressful day at work(boy, I wish I could blog about that!) Then she got home and found this! Not good. Why did he do this? He'll barely eat dog treats. He won't chew on chew toys. He barely plays at all. Why did he decide to ingest a boot? Your guess is as good as mine. My guess is that it smelled of horse, and that set something off in his microscopic dog brain.

The funnest part was finding pieces of green boot in his smelly dog piles all week long.

Read More......

The Financial Crisis

It has been all over the news: The Financial Crisis. There are lots of news stories covering small pieces of the story. What I haven't seen is any good coverage of the whole big story. This is the best article I've found that really explains the history of what happened, why the bailout plan might work, and what might happen next. It's a good read, but it's scary stuff.

Here's the scariest part:

Note that the outstanding overhang of credit default swaps alone is estimated to be between $45 and $60 trillion – three to four times the size of our annual gross domestic product. The requested $700 billion, although the single biggest appropriation request in U.S. history, was miniscule when compared with the toxic waste problem as a whole. Mr. Paulson’s proposed solution was to cost just 1% of the size of the problem and was aimed only at a small part of that problem. (It is unnerving to realize that the U.S. government – the “beast” we have been starving for so long – may now lack the borrowing capacity to solve the problem as a whole. We need to get our financial house in order.)

Read More......

He's very sweet

Tank loves to share every bit of his homework with me after school. This is a new thing for me, as the older 2 have to be forced to show any of their classwork. It's pretty fun, and he loves to show me every single part of his work.

Today, he also shared a fun song they learned. I wanted to post it, but then he became shy. So I had to bribe him with his new favorite treat, a Klondike bar. (thanks Jill!) He'll do anything for a Klondike bar.

Read More......

Inconsistencies

Tank has been doing really well on his spelling tests lately. Well, not the challenge words.

Here's a sampling of some of the standard words from his spelling tests lately:
pen
men
ten
get
it
you
ox
box
got

pretty standard first grade material. Here's a sampling of some of the challenge words from the same tests:

sentence
enthusiastic
friend
approximately
oxygen
forgotten

Huh?? Does that make sense to you? I thought challenge words for first grade would be something with four letters like "jump" or "home". This is how he spelled them on the Monday pre-test.

sentintis
enfyoselastick
frend
appromtae
ochgyin
forgotin (pretty close!)

At least they only count as extra credit.

Read More......

What's in a name

I've decided to start using the boy's nicknames when I refer to them here in blogland. The 11yo will now be called "C-dog". The 9yo is called "Mouth". And we call the 6yo "Tank".

Read More......

122 to 49: AZ wins!

The horrible summer temperatures are starting to ease here in AZ, and going outside is no longer feels like you're a Big Mac under a heat lamp. Before I moved here, I imagined AZ as a year round death valley, with withering temperatures and never any rain.

Well, it turns out that it does rain, and hard. And it turns out that the temperatures here are wonderful most of the time. Let me prove it to you.

We moved here from a cooler climate, where there really isn't the baking heat in the summer. There is, however, a long horrible freezing winter. Which climate is "better", you ask? Lets look at that question.

How do you measure "goodness" of climate? There are a lot of factors: wind, storms, snow, rain, temperature, humidity, and so forth.

Because AZ gets such a bad rap for the heat, let me focus purely on temperature. My ideal temperature range is 65-85 degrees Fahrenheit. Colder or hotter than that is less than ideal. I like it warm during the day and cool at night. (This corresponds well to UT in July and August, and AZ in May and October. It also corresponds to Maui pretty much all year.) You may have a different "ideal" range, but let's use my range for the purposes of this discussion. For me, anything over 100 degrees, or under 32 degrees is unacceptable and very uncomfortable. This is the "horrible" range. These ranges will form boundaries for grading the temperatures in UT and AZ.

Using the magic of the internet, I was able to find the average high and low temperatures for both where I live in AZ and where I used to live in UT. These numbers are the average highs and lows for the last 20 or so years, so any individual year will vary from these numbers.

In Chart 1, you can see that the blue colored lines are the average monthly high and low temperatures for UT. The red colored lines are the average monthly high and low temperatures for AZ. The ideal temperature range is shown in green, and the horrible temperature range are shown in red. An interesting observation about the two: The difference between the average high temperatures is about 30 degrees in the winter and about 10 degrees in the summer. In other words, UT is much colder than AZ in the winter, and almost as hot in the summer months. Interesting.

Now, to measure the "goodness' of the temperatures. I decided that any time the average temperature range for a state moves into the ideal range, it will earn points for how much of the range is covered. The parts of the monthly temps that are outside the ideal range get no points. When the monthly temps enter the horrible range they get negative points. The points received equal the area of the temperature range within the ideal or horrible ranges. The most points that a month can earn is 20, as the ideal range covers 20 degrees. This means that the best possible yearly score that could be given to an area is 240.

Some examples, if the average monthly temperature range is 65-85 degrees, it matches exactly to the ideal range, and will receive a full 20 points for that month. If the temp range was 45-75, it covers 10 degrees of the ideal range, and would only receive 10 of the possible 20 points. If the range was 90-100, it would receive 0 points for that month. If the range was 100-110, it covers 10 degrees of the horrible range and would be given a score of -10. Note that a monthly temp range could include part of the ideal range and part of the horrible range.

Chart 2 shows the temperature goodness points earned by the two states for each month. Note that AZ gets pushed down hard for high temps in the summer, but UT gets creamed in the winter. This is because even in the heat of summer, the average lows in AZ still touch the ideal range. In the winter in UT, the entire average temp range is below the ideal range, and often enters the horrible range.

So, what's the final score? AZ gets 122 weather goodness points, and UT gets a meager 49. This just means that most of the time the temperatures in AZ are closer to my ideal than UT.

For comparison's sake I added Maui and Washington. (Is is really that cold in WA? I had no idea.) Maui scored an amazing 204, and WA a pathetic 30. "That's not really fair to WA", you say. "It's cooler there and people like it cool." OK, let's check that. Let's suppose that our ideal temps are cooler say 55-75 degrees. You'd need to be a polar bear to like it colder than that. I'll even lower the high "horrible" range to 95 to hurt Arizona's score (although 95 in AZ feels pretty nice).

Chart 4 shows those results. The results? Even with those preferred temperature ranges, AZ wins with 107, HI is second with 103, WA achieves an 89, and UT falls to last with 74. One sign that this "ideal" temperature range is wrong? Any test that says that Maui doesn't have the best weather is messed up. Maui is perfect.

All I'm trying to say with this post is that AZ has really wonderful weather most of the year. Don't be hatin' just cuz you don't understand.

Read More......

It's all Jill's fault

A while back we discovered that our 11yo is left-eyed. What is "left-eyed", you ask?

It turns out that, as with hands, we tend to favor the use of one eye. Almost everyone is right-eyed. Which are you? Pretend that you are a pirate, and your lookout in the crow's nest has just sounded the alert of a heavily loaded merchant vessel. Make a pretend telescope with your hand by curling your fingers and touching your thumb. Put your (pretend) telescope up to your eye to look at the other ship for yourself. Which eye are you using? That is likely your dominant eye. It only seems to matter if you are left-eyed when it comes to rifle shooting. It can be awkward to sight down the barrel with your left eye.

The 11yo, has overcome this disability by aiming with his right eve. At one point on our Labor Day outing, hit 5 soda cans in a row at 30 feet. I think he'll be OK even with his left-eyed disability. If not, maybe he can get government assistance. At least he's not left handed, or heaven forbid, color-blind!!!

Anyway, on our Labor day trip, I discovered that Jill is left-eyed! So the 11yo must have inherited it from her!

Read More......

Really not a redneck

I sat down to write up a post about our labor day outing, but I noticed that Jill beat me to it. She did a much better job than I could have done, so I'll just let you read hers.

I will say that she makes me sound like Jethro from the hills, which I am not.


I do enjoy an occasional jaunt into the hills, and I do enjoy the gentlemanly art of marksmanship. I do not, however, say "get-er-done", nor do I line dance, and I am quite certain that I've never tasted road kill. I'm really not a redneck (although my neck is currently a bright shade of red from a sunburn from the trip). And even if you believe Jill's post and think that I am such a creature, look at this picture- see, she's one too! Look how much the boys have grown up in the last year!


On a related topic- I really like my Wrangler. It's so much fun. I made Jill get out and take some pictures, and even a video. Sorry, Jill! One interesting thing about pictures and video, is that hills never look as big as they actually are in real life.



Here's another good picture from the trip. Parker has been learning about erosion at school, an look! A perfect example.





Here's a video of the valley we were exploring. Isn't it beautiful? It's such a foreign beauty to what I am accustomed.

Read More......

The Storm

It's the monsoon season here. That means that every so often a crazy huge storm dumps the equivalent of a small lake on us over a few hours time. There haven't been any storms at our house this season, and I was beginning to wonder if it was ever going to rain. Well, the storm hit on Monday last week.

It was about 2:45 and I was getting ready to leave to pick up the kids. They get out of school at 3:00 and walk over to our meeting spot by 3:10. I noticed that the sky suddenly got a lot darker and then, boom, the lake started falling. I got into the jeep and headed over a bit early so I arrived at 2:58. I could barely see. The roads were flooded and the wind was blowing like you see on TV when a hurricane hits. Some poor kids were trying to walk or bike home, but they were soaked and the wind was blowing them around.


I got to the parking lot and looked around for the kids. I wasn't really expecting to see them, because I thought that maybe the teachers would hold the kids inside for a few minutes to see if the storm would blow over.

Then I saw them. They came running from behind a building trying to make their way to the jeep through the storm. They made it to me, soaked through and through and climbed into the car. I really wish I would have had a camera, because they looked like they'd just climbed out of a pool with their clothes, backpacks, and instrument cases. It turns out that the teachers let all the kids out 10 minutes early, so the teachers could go help manage traffic. My kids were out huddling behind a building for 10 minutes in a huge thunderstorm. Hmmm. I find it interesting that the school didn't have a plan to deal with a rainstorm at the end of the day. This is a very likely occurrence, and they didn't even consider it. It makes me wonder if they have a plan for things like armed gunmen at the school, or fighting at recess ;)

When we got home, our neighbor's tree had blown over, fortunately into her yard, not mine.

Read More......

The Man Cold

I'm sick. I think it may be a man cold. I'm a poor little bunny!

Read More......

The latest project

I don't really like doing home improvement projects. I think that it's because I'm worried that I'll mess it up. But sometimes you've just got to do it.

Summer is coming to an end here in AZ, and it's going to start cooling off (yes it cools off here!). I'd like to be able to remove the hard-top from my jeep so I can enjoy the wonderful winter with the breeze running her fingers through my hair. The photo shows the desired result. To accomplish this, I ordered a winch/hoist system so I can get the hard-top off whenever I want.

The project started, as they usually do, with me thinking it will be easy.


The first step was to move all of the shelving and storage from one side of the garage to the other. Why can't they just have basements in AZ? Anyway, that took three hours last Saturday.

The rest of the project (in my mind) was supposed to go as follows: drill 4 or 5 holes and plug in the winch- done! Wrong. First I had to assemble the frame that holds the hardtop. It wasn't too hard, but it took some time, mostly because the instructions they mailed me were wrong.

Then I had to attach the anchor eye-bolts to the ceiling. Hoping that there was a nice strong 2x6 right in the spot where I wanted to screw it in, I peeked up into my attic space. No dice. Where I wanted to attach was between two joists, and of course the joists were the wrong direction. The instructions warned that if you pull on the lag bolt sideways (transverse to the direction of the joist) it could rip out through the side of the 2x4. Is that true? I dunno, but it sounds bad. I also didn't have a lot of room to change the lift location, my garage is pretty tight. It would have probably been OK to attach the hoist the way it was, but I figured better safe than sorry.

So I decided to put a cross member between the joints in the right location and attach to that. I bought a 2x4 and some joist hangars to attach between the joists. There was an access panel for the attic space in the garage, and I thought I could just crawl up in there and work. Then I tried it- no go, too small. So I had to cut a new access panel over in the work area. That ended up being really hard and messy. When I pulled out the piece of drywall, I discovered that it was two sheets thick, no wonder it was so hard to cut. I climbed up in there and nailed in the hangars and cross-member. If this seems wrong to any of you experienced builder-types, please let me know! Then I climbed down and drilled the holes for the lag-bolts, and screwed them in.

The next task was to attach the winch to the wall. It was simple, but the instructions were funny- they told me to 'get a strong friend to hold the winch while tightening the bolts.' Well- I don't need a strong friend! I only almost dropped the winch once!


After that it was pretty easy. I just had to attach the pulleys and run the cable through. Then I hooked the frame to the pulley.

The last steps were to back in the jeep, remove the bolts that hold the top to the jeep, attach the frame to the top, and hoist away! It works great! Here is the final result.

Read More......

Braces Suck!

Dad was wrong, it hurt a lot. Poor 11yo! Anyone have words of advice or encouragement for a sad boy who wants to die?

Read More......

It won't hurt very much

The 11yo is getting braces today. We were discussing the process at breakfast.

"Is it going to hurt, dad?", He asked.

"Not very much", I replied, "It's not pain free, but there are things in life that hurt a lot more."

The 9yo jumped in, "Like getting married?"
(9yolds don't think much of girls or marriage)

Read More......

The next chapter...

I received a job offer from Intel today. It will be doing simulation and process improvement work similar to what I did at Daifuku. It looks like a great job. I'll start sometime in September. Thanks to all of you who were concerned for us and prayed for us.

Read More......

The Faces of Terror

Here are a couple of shots from our February trip to Disneyland. They're a bit late, I admit, but they're still funny. Enjoy!



This one is funny because of the personalities. The 9yo was terrified of losing his glases, so he had to keep hold of them. The 11yo actually is scared, despite his fake-scared face. The 6yo was terrified, even though he only looks mildly concerned. This was one of his first "grown-up" rides.






This is the true gem. You can't deny the terror on everyone's face. This is clearly the scarier of the two rides.

Read More......

Who is that masked man?

So I'm trying out a new look.













I don't know why, but every few years I'm tempted to grow a beard. Usually it gets itchy right away and I give up. This year I've been growing it for 9 days, which is a record. One new thing this time is the vast amount of whiteness. More evidence that I'm not in my 20s any more.

I've been trying to avoid putting photographs of me on the blog, but I need your help. I'm not sure what to do- should the hair stay or should it go? I've put a poll over on the left. Let me know what you think.

I asked the sunbeams and the vote was 5 to 2 against the hair.

Read More......

First Day of School 2008

School starts early here in the heat.

The 11yo is starting 6th grade and he was SO nervous. All the teachers and different classrooms is all very intimidating. Despite the nerves, after the first day was all over he said that it was SO boring- the teachers just went over rules. They apparently have a lot of rules. None of his friends are in his classes- except one boy in band. More about band later.

The 9yo is in 4th grade and he claimed to not be nervous. He got the teacher that Connor had, so that's OK. The real tragedy is that none of his friends are in his class :(

The 6yo is in first 1st grade! He's so excited to stay at school all day and eat school lunch. It's fun when they like things that they'll hate later.

The first day went great and everyone came home happy.

Read More......