I just finished the first college course I have taken in some six or seven years, and I just wanted to debrief. It was a one-credit class taken in eight weeks, so presumably it would be comparable to a two-credit class taken all semester. The class was called "Introduction to Database Microsoft Access 2003" I have some experience using Access databases at work because one of the applications I use has an integrated Access databases behind it and I have tried to create them in the past to make a Manufacturing Resource Planning program for us to use. I am however by no means proficient in it. One of the first things TRC asked me to do for them when I started working for them five and a half years ago was build them a database that would track business contacts as well as orders and parts. I never could get it to work. I learned a lot about databases in general but I never could get Access to do it. That has bothered me ever since. I guess I kind of pride myself in my ability to learn new software fast and well. I am considered the go to guy at work for a number of softwares including SolidWorks and Excel for which I have never had any formal training. Access was like the fish that got away. I have been wanting to start taking classes anyway so that I was at least working on a degree even it was fifteen years away, and so this seen like the place to start. I did ok grade wise with a 93.9. The cut off for an A was 93. That means that I just squeaked out a 4.0. That's right folks, I am holding down a 4.0 at the local college. I definitely learned a lot and I can now claim Access in my list of software proficiencies. It's probably enough of a foundation for me to get better on my own, but the thing is it was a lot of work. I think I could have learned more in two hours with someone next to me that I could just ask a question now and then as I tried to build a small database. Formal school, for me at any rate, is just such an inefficient way to learn things. It's expensive, time consuming, and hard, but only marginally effective. I think I will take another class next semester. They have a class on SQL that sounds fun, but I wont like it.
For the last several months Kelly and I have been blessed by the bounty of our garden. We have become accustom to just walking out to our humble patch to grab fresh veggies that are of a quality that one cannot buy. The last few week weather has put our garden out of business for the winter and last weekend we covered it in leaves we raked from the fount yard. For the first time in a while we have had to return to the dreary veggies available at the stores. Man! Winter store-bought tomatoes are just plain yucky. The "fresh" green beans are floppy and flavorless. It's funny how fast we became accustom to the luxury of Fresh food. Next year I'm thinking of planting twice as much.
For Thanksgiving this year Kelly and I took our big holiday trip. We drove to my sister Angela's house the day before Thanksgiving. The drive was uneventful and pleasant. The roads were dry the whole way. We got there just after dark, and had plenty of time to stay up and chat while eating pumpkin pie. The next morning we got up and spent the day enjoying some family time and cooking. I really didn't do any cooking but you know, moral support is important. Dinner was awesome. The turkey was just right and all the fixin's were really good. We topped it off with more pie. The next day we got an early start and loaded up all the kids, not to hit the big after thanksgiving sales, but to go to my favorite place on this green earth. A part that isn't so green. It's about a four and a half hour drive from Angela's house in West Jordan Utah to Moab Utah. I had planed out a day of adventuring for the whole family that included exploring a scenic canyon, finding several Geocaches, a visit to Dead Horse Point, and finally seeing one of Moab's coolest attractions Gemini Bridges. It was a tight schedule and we got started a bit late. We got to Moab and didn't even stop in town. We just turned left on 279 and headed up the Colorado River about 13.5 miles to the turnoff for Dead Horse Point Road. Now the easy way to get to Dead Horse Point contrary to what one might think is not on Dead Horse Point Road. You can take paved road all the way there on 313 but to do that would be to deprive yourself of a great adventure. We chose this rout for several reasons but one was that there are three Geocaches within a short hike from its course. I thought it would be good to let the kids get out of the cars for several short trips rather than one long hike. Our first stop after we turned off the pavement was for lunch. We just pulled off the dirt road and walked 10 yards down into a dry creek bed and had turkey sandwiches as the kids played on the rocks. Angela's three boys immediately started climbing up the steep side of the canyon. The youngest Levi was the first and only casualty of the day. A smallish rock fell from above and smashed one of his fingers. It was a deep cut and he was a tough kid. A few tears fell and it did require a Band-Aid and some kisses. (See the second picture) On up the canon we found all three Geocaches and took in some literally jaw dropping views. The little pictures do it no justice. The sites that you see in every direction in this part of the world look like they are from another world. By the time we reached the top of the canyon time was running short with the sun dipping for the horizon. We took in Dead Horse Point all to quickly. Dead Horse Point is a peninsula of cliff that protrudes into the air over a spot where the Colorado winds back and forth on itself. Words and even photographs completely fail to convey the experience of standing at the edge of a space that big and full of wonder. The last thing on the agenda was Gemini Bridges. This is a spot where erosion has left two parallel bridges of sand stone across from one cliff edge to another. Years ago Joe drove his jeep out on one of them. As you can imagine with all those kids it was a bit nerve racking but we were there as the sun set on a great day of fun. We took the pavement back to town. The plan was to eat at the famous Moab brewery the place was a zoo and though a bit disappointed we all agreed that we were to hungry to wait the 45 minutes for a table so we settled for the Moab Diner. We had to wait a bit but the food was great. I had the chicken fried steak and it was just the thing after a long day. After dinner Kelly and Angela took the youngest kids and set out on the long drive home. They taunted us that they would be sleeping in warm beds in a few hours and be sleeping-in in the morning. Our plan was to head out Cane creek road and camp on BLM land where Joe and I had camped so many times before. The exact spot where Joe and I liked to camp was taken so we just found another spot down by the creek. We built a small fire with wood we had brought. As it started to dwindle the boys were possessed by ancient mans longing for the companionship of fire. Of there own accord they started venturing into the dark to retrieve more wood to keep it going. My brother in law Mark and I set up the tent and one by one the boys decide that a sleeping bag sounded good. The weather had been great all day, warm at times and better than one has a right to expect this time of year, but nothing is as miserable as a night spent cold, so we had come prepared with every blanket and quilt we could find as well as our sleeping bags. We fell asleep warm and cozy listening to the sound of the coyotes yapping in the distance.
The rest of the trip was spent visiting with family. We saw Kelly's ant sissy and uncle Kirk and my ant Sue and uncle Jess as well as my cousin Kalub. We left Monday morning with the ominous weather forecast of a snowstorm that had already hit the sierras and would be moving into Salt Lake by the afternoon. There was nothing we could do but try to get over Donner Pass before the dark made the slippery roads even worse. It could have been much worse. We had to slow down a few times crossing Nevada where the snow started to pile up but most of the time the strong cross wind kept the snow blowing and the roads were not slippery. We rolled through Reno at about 3:00 on dry roads but CalTrans had R-2 chain restrictions up for the pass and as we started to climb the roads got bad quick. We were not required to chain up because we have all-wheel-drive but the backup from the check point cost us about thirty minutes and then we had to drive about 35mph to be safe on the snow covered roads. We got home about 6:00. It was a wonderful trip in all respects. Work on Tuesday was one of the longest days of my life.
So when I first thought about writing a blog I figured I really didn't have all that much to say that anyone would want to read. I was right. Those of you how do read this are a special subset of my close friends and family who in are it for something other then high class writing, cause let's face it… I can't even spell. So I realized that would be the way of it from the start and that is why I call it The Ambient Life of Mark and Kelly. My thinking was that I would just put my journal up here and if no one ever read it but me, well, at least I would be keeping a journal and maybe some day my kids would read it or something. The thing is I planed to just write about the plane old things I did on regular days. That last part is where things have strayed from the plan. It didn't take long for most of the entries to be about the more unusual part of our life. The brakes from the ambient if you will.
So I want to just tell you now what is going on in our lives today. It's a Saturday night. Kelly and I just got home from Folsom where we unsuccessfully looked for a new church bookstore that we had heard of, stopped by the jeep dealer briefly to see the new 07 wranglers that are out (We didn't even drive one). Then we went to McDonalds and World Market and then to Sam's Club. Sam's was the reason we left the house. We needed some rolls for after church tomorrow (more on that latter). The rest all just got added onto the agenda in the car on our way down the hill. So our bishop at church was new early last spring. His first official act was to cancel church because of snow. There really wasn't that much but as we are not generally prepared for snow I'm sure they were just erring of the side of caution. Any way, I think that is at least a substantial component of the reason we are having an emergency drill church tomorrow. Our very spread out ward has been broken up into 5 small congregations so that we can meet in designated homes rather than the normal church building that strangely isn't even in or all that near our ward boundaries. There are several reasons for this. It is thought that if there is some kind of general emergency, local travel may be restricted by heavy traffic of damage to infrastructure. Also our church buildings are committed to the Red Cross in the event of wide spread disaster as logistics centers. The only big disaster folks around here really worry about is wild fire. They say if you are evacuated for a fire the thing to do is grab your 72-hour kit and keepsakes and go see a movie. If your house is still standing when the movie ends your good to go, if not take it from there. So that doesn't take all that much planning I guess but the bigger threat is that there will be a big levy breech or other big disaster down in Sacramento and that we will get deluged by refuges from that, so our county's emergency plan is focused more on that kind scenario.
Anyway, there I go again straying from the ambient. So tomorrow is the emergency church meeting and afterwards there is going to be a potluck lunch dinner thing, and we were supposed to bring rolls, thus the trip to Folsom. This morning Kelly had to go to work at borders for the last time on a Saturday. She put in her two-week notice a week ago yesterday. But they talked her into staying on, on a limited basis so she could continue to be the story lady on Tuesdays. This is actually exactly what she wanted so I don't think it took much talkin' on there part. Anyway she has been working 7 hours a day at borders 4 or 5 days a week and then working 2 or 3 hours after that at her new job in a real-estate appraisal office pulse 8 hours there on her day off from borders. Somethin' had to give. Now my papa always told me that changing jobs is like swinging on vines Tarzan style. You have to make sure you have a good hold in the new vine before you let go of the old one. Kelly on the other hand was taking it to a new level. She just won't let go of that old vine.
I spent the morning at home by my self. I should have been fixing my jeep clutch but it was raining and I didn't want to. So instead I spent the morning reading about Vietnam because of Veterans Day and studying for the online database class I'm taking. So there you have it, a page full of remarks on an unremarkable day.
Joe and his family came down for a quick weekend to go camping with us. The seven of us pilled into my jeep pulling my new old trailer and my Subaru forester and went up into the Sierras north east of Truckee to drive a trail called Boca Springs road. Driving up Donner Pass on the way there the clutch hydraulics on my jeep went completely out. We stopped in Truckee to see if we could get it fixed at all and have lunch but we finally concluded that Truckee is just too small a town and we would not be able to get it fixed fast enough to continue on the trip. Several places said they could get the parts and do it Monday. "No thanks". I'm actually pretty good at driving with no clutch from my truckin' days and I did drive my jeep everyday for about 6 or 8 months with no clutch a few years ago while I was figuring out a tranny swap. So we decided to just keep going. Especially once on the trail not having a clutch is no big deal. In low range it will start in gear even on a steep uphill. Once we were on the trail we were absorbed into some really great country. The trail follows Boca Ridge. From the Verdi Peak fire lookout we could see way out into the sierras including Stampede Reservoir looking west and out over Verdi and Reno Nevada looking east. Then we dropped back down to Boca Springs to set up camp. We found a spot that looked really good but we kept getting a wif of something foul in the air. We finally tracked the smell to a really big pile of what we could only assume was bear poop. After burying it the air quality improved rapidly and we began to unpack the trailer and set up camp. Camping was probably the best part of the trip. We were right next to the road but not one car passed from the time we stopped till late the next morning. A steady light breeze kept the smoke from the campfire always blowing away from us and while it did get kinda cold after the sun set we had come prepared and everyone was warm enough at night. We ended up with an absolute ton of food and because of the bear sign we wanted to be sure that if the bear came back he would not get our food. Joe and I figured out how to get forty pounds of food in a big plastic box hoisted up into a tree to keep it out of reach. The bear never showed but every time someone had to get up to go the bathroom/bush the rest of us would get freaked out thinking it was a bear. The next morning Joe got the fire going again and we got up a sat around the fire for several hours eating a junk food breakfast and chatting. There is something primal about sittin' around a campfire. We finally got all packed up and ready to role and the kids wanted to ride on top of the packed trailer. The top layer of stuff was mostly blankets and that was all covered with a tarp and a bungee net. Joe rode up on the roof rack to keep an eye on them, and we just went really slow. It didn't last long but I think the kids had fun. The trailer was really incredible. Its springs seem to be just the right rate for this kind of use. It allowed us to have lots and lots of room in the cars, and bring a stupid amount of stuff. I couldn't have been more pleased with the way it preformed. On the way out toward Verdi we went over a pass between Beacon Point and Granite Peak where we stopped for awhile to enjoy the views and take a few pictures. The drive home was kind of stressful due to the clutch and to make thing worse at the gas station in Verdi the pump came out a sprayed Jessica all over including the eyes. When we got home Kelly and Jessica when to Ikea in Sacramento while Joe and the kids sacked out. We may have tried to pack to much action into two short days but for all its problems I think we managed to have a memorable time and have a lot of fun.
It has become a bit of a tradition for Kelly's parents and family to come up for Riverbank/Modesto and come with us to Apple Hill every year a few weeks before Halloween. This is the third year. Apple Hill is just an area about 20 miles east of us where there are a lot of apple orchards. The word on the street is that back in the 1840's members of the Mormon Battalion working there way back to rejoin their families in Salt Lake were the first to plant Apples in the area. This time of year most of the farms open up to the public and the whole area takes on a bit of a festival kind of atmosphere. There are craft vendors and live music as well as all manor of fresh apple related food. The apple fritters are to die for.
This year it was Kelly's parents, Kelly's sister Sandy and her daughter, and Kelly's brother David and his wife Nancy and their two sons. The first year we were just poking around, but this year we had it all figured out. The first place we hit has a nice apple orchard with grass growing around the trees and picnic tables and hay bails to sit on. It makes the perfect place to have a picnic lunch. Next up is a farm called Kids Inc. This is the place to get all your holiday pumpkins. They have a big you pick pumpkin patch as well as all kinds of pre picked pumpkins and gourds of every description and color. They also have really good pie and the last two years they have had a live band called Farm Fresh. The next stop is mostly for the kids. Two farms across the street form each other. One has pony rides and the other a mini train. While the kids rode the train I watched a guy carving a bare out of a log with a chain saw. At the last place we actually parked in the orchard amongst the trees. They have the fritters as well as really good apple juice. They have a fishing pond and some more craft both sans shops and a restaurant. By the time we finished up here we were all fairly tired and but well fed and happy.
I am now the proud owner of a rusty old utility/jeep trailer. While it ant much to look at, but it followed me home on the one hour drive at freeway speed without the slightest hint of sway or buck. I have wanted one for some time so that I could move stuff around. Like: I can now go get manure for the garden next year, and the other day I had to borrow a friend's truck so I could go pick up a dryer. But I have some not so secret plans to turn it into an expedition style off-road trailer like the Australians and Africans are fond of. We went to pick it up after the last session of conference today. 
I wanted to get it back home before dark because I didn't know what kind of light plug it used or whether the outlet on the back of my jeep even works for that matter. Anyway, I have been watching craigslist for about six months for a suitable trailer and this one has popped up several times. I even called the guy about it a few weeks back but gave up on it when he told me it had 6 lug nuts rather than 5 like my jeep. (I wanted interchangeable spares) but I finally decided that it would get me started and for only $150 it seemed like I couldn't go wrong. I'm not sure how much I want to do to try and fix this one up. While it is a very rugged design, there is very little there that I don't want to change in some way. That makes me think perhaps I should just use this one as is and kinda use it as an experiment to discover what I want when I finally have the recourses to build one just the way I want. We are planning a two-day trip into the high sierras for the middle of October and I am exited to pull it and see how it will do on a mild trail.
Kelly and I were married about two and a half years ago. For our first anniversary my parents gave us a print of a pencil drawing by Chad Hawkins, depicting the Oakland Temple where we were married. It was so nice that it demanded a nice frame, but it ended up in our spare room just sitting in its cardboard shipping case. When we were going through all the stuff in there for our recent remodel we found it. Since we expected my mother and sister Ruthie to come visit us in just over a week we took it downtown to get it framed and matted. We planed to have it hanging prominently when they came but we were informed that it would take two or three weeks to get it back. We were disappointed and a bit embarrassed to have forgotten about it for so long. My mom and sister have come and gone but we now have a very classy addition to our living room.
Today is the anniversary of the very first post in my blog. It's been a good trip around the sun. I spent some time looking back on the years record and I am amazed at how much there is. My rate of posting has tapered off a bit but I think I am at a sustainable level now. There have been a few holes in the record (like April) and there may continue to be. Even so, I now have a record of my life for the last year that is more comprehensive than any other part of my life. My goal was to keep a journal and through this medium I have been able to do so. I wanted to do it for myself and for my posterity but somehow having you all, as a live audience has been the motivation to make it work for me. Thank you for reading. I hope it has been fun for you.
Over the last week or so Kelly and I have been working on fixing up our extra room. The apartment we moved out of when we moved here had all kinds of closet space and nooks for storage. This place has almost none. It does have an extra bedroom that we didn't have before, so all the "Stuff" got piled in the extra room when we moved. Over the last year or so we have given a few halfhearted efforts to organize it. We got a bunch of Tupperware totes at one point, but none of our attempts netted us a room that we would actually want to use or be in. It turns out Ikea is the secret to all such problems. Kelly found a storage shelving system that they carry that is very low cost and versatile and as a bonus it fits our room almost exactly right. We also decided to get a variety of Ikea storage boxes so that everything would have a place. Along with the new organization we decide to brighten up the house be painting one wall in the extra room and one wall in our bedroom American traditions, semi-gloss, Afternoon Delight green. The pictures are of the room as it is today but it is not quite done. There are a few things that still need to find a home and we are working on labeling boxes. The roman shades need to be hemmed and some of the picture frames don't have pictures yet either. I can tell you thought that this is a big improvement. There was barley enough room for two people in here a week ago. I also plan to move my favorite chair and laptop station in there. The desk that you can see will be Kelly's workstation and I will claim the other corner. We have realized that this will actually allow for a possibly substantial change in our relationship. Up till now we have never had more than one usable living space. That means that now one of us could be watching TV in one room while the other in reading a book in the other room, or one of us might be knitting in one room while the other is using the internet in the other room. Kelly and I really enjoy being together even if we are not doing the same thing, so we will see how it goes. May be we will end up still in the same room even though we have options. Anyway it was fun to do the project together and even more fun to see it nearing completion.
Yesterday was the dedication of the Sacramento Temple that we have been waiting for for the past several years. The plan to build was announced way back in April of 2001 about the same time I moved out here, but it took three and a half years to get the details of that plan worked out and they didn't break ground till August 2004. At that time they were saying that it would open in the spring of 2006 but that date slipped and slipped again. Finally the dates for the open house and Dedication were set and we could start to count the days until we would have a temple in our midst.
Yesterday morning we attended a closed circuit broadcast of the first of four dedication sessions at our stake center. President Hinckley presided over and conducted the meeting. He spoke of the reasons for temple building and the blessings of them, as well as the history of the church in this area. Mormons have a long history in this area. Members of the Mormon Battalion first came to this area on their long march home form the Mexican American war. It was a member of this party that recorded the date gold was discovered and Coloma only a few miles for our home. A ship full of Mormons led by Sam Brannen also landed in San Francisco (then Yerba Buena) and more than doubled the population of that small outpost. There is a major highway near here called Mormon emigrant trail and an area called Mormon island. At one point during the meeting President Hinckley and others left the temple and went outside to perform the ceremonial sealing of the corner stone if front of a large crowd and the press. Hinckley talked about how in older times when temples were made of large stone the laying of the corner stones was an important event symbolizing Jesus Christ at the chief corner stone (Ephesians 2:20). He used a trowel and what looked like a really big butter knife to put mortar around a stone with the date on it and then invited several others to do the same including a few children. The dedicatory prayer was given and the meeting was concluded by Thomas S. Monson.
Because it is a smaller temple, appointments are required in order to attend. Kelly and I, as well as my mother a sister Ruthie, have an appointment to go on Saturday the 16th and are very exited to go for the first time.
Last night Kelly and I had our chance to volunteer at the open house for the new Sacramento temple that will be dedicated one week from now. We had attended training for our job as parking attendants months ago. Last night our shift was the last shift on the last day of the open house. The rumor at church today was that more people attended this open house that any other temple ever. It think they were saying something in the 170,000 neighborhood. It has been running for the last month and I have spoken to many non LDS-members who have been through. All of them commented among other things that the parking was extremely well organized. I stood at the head of one of three rows of parking and as one or two cars would pull out I would signal this to another guy who would direct the appropriate number of cars to my aisle. The goal was to keep the paved lot full to minimize having to send cars out to the dirt lot. Kelly was posted out in the dirt lot to keep cars as close to the temple as possible out there. I wouldn't go so far as to say it was fun but it was satisfying. Clearly people were coming from all different backgrounds but everyone I saw was polite and seemed to have a positive experience. We are so exited to have this temple open so near us. It has been under construction for so long. We will be going a broadcast of the dedication in lieu of church next week.
Kelly has had a nice bike as long as we have been married, but it has always had a broken front shifter that made it no fun to ride. She got it from her mom who used to ride it but it sat for some time it their garage before Kelly got it. It was a nice bike in it's day and was really in good shape overall. Except for the bum shifter it would have been a minor tune up away from good working order. After two years of Kelly bugging me now and then, and finally giving up on me ever getting around to it, and then threatening to take it down and have a shop do it, I was finally on the job. We went down last week and ordered up a pile of shiny new parts to bring it back to life. It only needed one new shifter but you know you can't just get one and it turned out that the brake levers are part of the shifter so we had to get new levers and the new levers only work with the new brakes so we had to get V-brakes as well and the saddle was kinda old so "what the heck" we got a nice new one just to top it all off. I put it all together in the living room and Thursday night we went for a great bike ride around the neighborhood. Kelly had a good time and we are looking forward to doing some fun biking as the weather cools off.
The last few weeks have been some of the most tumultuous of the two plus years Kelly and I have shared. They have been so filled with fear, sadness, anger and uncertainty that they have expanded the thresholds of my experience. Without going into detail, I will say that some resent days have brought to bear bad news and misfortune from multiple fronts; days so filled with anguish that they end with Kelly and I holding each other in exhaustion just wanting tomorrow to come wash over us. I do not consider myself to be acquainted with tears. As a whole my life has been one of joy and abundance. Some of these trials have already come to positive resolution, while others may continue to some degree for years to come. As I have struggled with these trials I am however constantly reminded of my blessings. I have had Kelly with me through it all. I have come home from a hard day at work and she has been my comfort. I draw great strength from my family. I have a good job that I enjoy for the most part. My mind is strong. I have plenty for my needs. I live in a beautiful and free part of the world. It is funny how it takes a bad day to generate a list like this. I guess that even the ability to see my present misfortunes thought the lens of my great blessings is a blessing of it's own.
We have a great well. The water from our well is so sweet that the bottled water at work tastes bad to me. On a normal day I barely give it a thought. Just flip on the tap and enjoy the cool sweet water. Our garden grows on the water from our well. In this hot weather we are having, I take at least one nice cool shower a day, without even giving it a thought.
Last night that all came to a startling halt. I was filling some pots with water for dinner and the water began to wane. At first it was just "Hu that's not much pressure" but by the end of the second pot it was clear that the pressure I was getting was coming from the hose that runs up the hill to our garden not our great well. I had spent the day working out in the heat of a 105-degree day and I had not had a shower yet. I have lost track of how many times I have flipped that faucet handle expecting to have water flow, only to remember that it is off. I got off the phone with a guy about getting the water fixed and immediately walked over and flipped the faucet to wash my hands. It's like my mind just can't understand. At this point I am assuming that we just lost a pump and that we will again be enjoying our well by the end of today. Obviously it is extremely inconvenient not to have the water that I have grown so accustom to. On the other hand I am starting to see it is an opportunity to recognize how blessed I am to have cool, clean water at my command at any time. It really is a miracle the level of luxury that we enjoy in our relatively humble home.
Every three years for as long as I can remember my mom's side of the family has had big reunion. They are always really well attended and well organized and they are always a really good week of fun. This year it was held in Park City Utah. We had one big Cabin and two very big condos rented for the group. Wonderful dinners were provided every night, and my mom made pancakes for everyone who showed up a 7:30 to get them every morning. We were well fed, well housed and surrounded by great family friends every day as we did all kinds of fun activities. The only problems we had were trying to decide which group to join for what activity. Most of the time there were several fun things going on and it was hard to pick which one to do.
We drove to my sister Angela's house. We got stuck in one of the worst traffic jams I have ever been in. After spending two and a half hours sitting we finally got diverted off the freeway onto a one-lane dirt road for about five miles before being put back on the freeway. We later learned that someone had run from the cops and ended up getting shot dead. Nice one!
We went to church with Angela and most of my immediate family who had assembled.
After helping Angela move a piano in the morning we set out for some one on one time to commemorate our anniversary. We had lunch at TGI Fridays before spending several hours enjoying the Red Butte Gardens on the eastern edge of Salt Lake. If you are into gardens this is not to be missed. Kelly and I both really liked the children's garden the best. The garden was very nice but we were fairly pooped after all that time in the sun. We headed on up the canyon toward Park City to unload some of our stuff at the reunion condos so we didn't have to take it all with us camping. Several years ago I went camping out east of Heber Utah and I figured it would be a good spot to spend some alone time with Kelly. We found a side road that dead-ended at a huge meadow full of wild flowers and spend a very nice night enjoying the nature and each other to celebrate two great years together.
In the morning we packed up camp and rejoined the already underway reunion festivities. Traditionally there has been a T shirt for each reunion with special art work on it. Last time I organized it and had shirts made for everyone. I can attest that it is no small job. This time around someone decided that the thing to do would be to let everyone tie-dye their own shirt. All of them turned out really fun but I think Kelly and I's were among the best if I do say so. In the evening we all went to the Oakley Rodeo. Now I'm here to tell ya, that it was a good time. I'm not real sure what is about a bunch a fellers of questionable intellect doin' crazy stuff to crazy animals that is so fun but watching it with a nice big group of your favorite family is just about as good as it gets. The rodeo was wrapped up by a nice fire works show.
This day was scheduled to check off two more great traditions associated with our family reunions: group pictures and the lamb roast. As you can imagine getting a group that big and with that many squirming kids to all look good at the same instant is right up there with Moses parting the Red Sea in the miracle department but Jessica did a great job of doing it fast and efficiently and I think that is one of the keys to success for large groups. Before and after pictures I spent the day helping Uncle Bill prepare and cook "The Lamb". My Grandfather who is the patriarch of this reunion was born in Croatia and immigrated to Chicago with his mother as a small child. They lived in an ethnic neighborhood in Chicago and on holidays the neighborhood would get together and roast dozens of lambs in the park. Uncle bill learned how to do it from grandpa Benac who learned it for his father who no doubt learned how as a youngster growing up in Croatia. The cleaned and gutted lamb is wired to the 5 foot long spit poll. Holes are poked all over him with and paring knife and then a clove of garlic is shoved into each one. As the lamb is slowly turned over the coals it is regularly basted with an olive oil, basil mixture. Six hour of watching and drooling later and after a few adjustments to keep the lamb on the spit, we started carving. Uncle Bill, cousin Spencer and myself cut every scrap of meet off the lamb as fast and we could and kept our mouths busy (in keeping with tradition) with some of the best bits. Uncle Bill said it was the biggest lamb he has done at sixty some pounds and we ate every juice, tender scrap. I am planning to make a spit of my own and carrying on the tradition for my generation.
|
|
The Candy launcher (See 6/27/06) was a hit with both kids and adults. |
While Kelly went on an outing into Park City with "the girls", us fellers when for a sweet mountain bike ride. I have not done any biking in far to long so I was worried that I wouldn't have "the flow" that makes a good ride great. My fears were short live. While my lungs lagged behind my ambitions, my skills were still on. Most of the ride was down hill and on the descents I was riding very well. For those of you who don't mountain bike it hard to describe but there is a feeling you get when you are one with the bike and you seem to flow over the trail, when you hit the corners just right and your tires just find the prefect line over and through the rock. It's what makes you look forward to the next ride.
After lunch the whole reunion went to a big indoor water park in the tiny town of Kamas. They had slides and play structures, a lazy river and a hot tub. I went down the slide with my niece Winter a bunch of times and down the river with Kelly a bunch and had a good soak in the hot tub to sooth my mountain bikin' bones. The kids loved it and I didn't hear any of the adults complaining either. We all got out in time to make it home to a catered dinner back at the main cabin.
This day was kinda set aside for Ashurst family activities; a mini reunion within a reunion if you will. We started off with a photo shoot. We stole Cousin Annie and she and Jessica took the photos. Jessica did a great job again but the kids were a bit less cooperative. When we looked at the pictures though it was mom with her closed eyes that put the most pictures on the scrap heap. 
Then it was off to the Utah Olympic Park, the venue of many events of the 2002 winter Olympics. Several other groups from the reunion had done this earlier in the week and had come back with glowing reports. Indeed it turned out to be one of the best parts of the trip. First we browsed thought the museum. It had exhibits of the special clothing and equipment that the Olympians used as well as artifacts from the opening and closing ceremonies and some of the metals that the best in each event won. Next we took a bus tour of the facility. We stopped at the top of the bobsled run and at the top of the tallest ski jump run where the guide explained some of the intricacy of each sport. For sixty five bucks they will put you in a special bobsled equipped with seat belts and a roll cage and piloted by a pro and give you a shove down the hill for a 70 miles per hour, 4G ride that drops you over 40-storys in just over a minute. In the summer they do it dry on the concrete with rollers on the sled but in the winter they do in of ice and the speeds are even a bit faster. $65 is a lot of clams but I would like to do it someday preferably in the winter. After the bus tour we rode the ultra zip-line and the quicksilver alpine slide. The zip-line lets you slide along the biggest ski jump in the park at 50 mph. They say it gives the same sensation as the ski jump but I think that is best left to the York peppermint pattie. It seemed like the sensation of a really big fast zip-line to me. Then the coolest part of the day was the quicksilver alpine slide. I have done alpine slides before but they were not quite like this. Apparently this is the only one like it in the US. Rather than the concreate that most slide are made of this one is stainless steal. The sleds are set up so that if you don't hold the brake off it comes on. This prevents you from giving yourself a push at the top but I figured out how to use my leg to hold the brake off so I could get a bit more speed at the top. Then I managed to make the rest of the run without having to use the brake. At times the sled felt quit unstable and felt like it wanted to dump me out. They definitely could have been lower to the trak. My brother in law Richard was right behind me in line at the top but after a long while my cousin Annie came down instead. What happened was that Richard had seen my leg trick and used it at the top too, but then I can only assume he lacked my amazing sledding skills and he rolled his sled half way down. He came down shortly after Ruth with some minor friction burns and laughing about the whole thing. After dinner we took Annie to the airport and then drove around Salt Lake a bit and walked around the closed Trolley Square shopping center.
At the very first Benac reunion I was just a little kid. One thing I remember was riding the Heber Creeper. It a steam train that winds down the Provo canyon from Heber and back. It was high on my list of things to do. Kelly and I took one of my cousin Allison's sons Will with us. He was a delight to have along. The ride starts out thought the farmland of the Heber Valley and the follows along the side of Deer Creek Reservoir before dropping down along the Provo River. I think it's at Vivian Park where they disconnect the engine and move it to the other end of the train for the return trip. The 618 engine that pulled us is a 1907 Baldwin steam locomotive. It really is an impressive piece of machinery.
My brother in law Mark led an expedition to the top Tri-County peak it was a little over 10,000 feet and it still had a big patch of snow on one side of it. Mark had been up there earlier in the week so he had come prepared with a bunch of Hefty bags for sliding down the snow on our butts. My nephew Sterling was kinda freakin' out so I put him on my lap and then my niece Winter wanted to come too so I put her on behind me. We had a great run but a bad landing. At the bottom of the snow one of sterling's legs got caught under me and I was trying to get it out as we slid off the end of the snow and on to the rocks. Sterling ended up with a sore leg and I hit a sharp rock that cut through my favorite pants and into my butt. Having a gaping bloody hole in my pants made the rest of the trip home a bit of a drag. I shoved what was left of my Hefty bag down the back of my pants to keep from mooning anyone and just walked back down the trail by my self.
We had to be out of the condos by 10:00am, so we got up, packed up and cleaned up. We said our final goodbyes to those who had stayed to the end and then we went over to Kelly's neglected Aunt's house. I say neglected because she lives literally within sight of the reunion cabin but we had been so busy with all the activities of the reunion that we had not been over to visit her. Once we got there and visited a bit we decided to go walk through the shop on Main Street in Park City. We had lunch at the Wasatch Brew Pub. I had a buffalo ranch burger. Kelly had the fish and chips, and Aunt Sissy had some really yummy (I tried one) coconut shrimp. After a bit more shopping we headed back to Sissy's house where we got to drive Uncle Kirk's freshly pained, red yard tractor before dinner. Kirk barbequed some of the best T-bone stakes I have ever had. They had tons of flavor and were as tender as anything. What a treat! After dinner we chatted on the porch as the sun fell behind the mountains and then we retired early to prepare for the long drive home.
One last thing on the to do list. Kelly likes to visit local yarn shops where ever we go to feed her knitting hobby. She knits all kind of stuff and it's fun to say this is made from the yarn we got on our trip to wherever. Kelly had found a couple of yarn shops in Salt lake on the internet but they didn't open till 10:00 I wanted to get an earlier start driving but in the end we took the opportunity to sleep in a bit and arrived at the first yarn shop at about quarter to 10. By 10:15 nobody had arrived to open the store so we gave up in frustration. We never located the second shop so we had to go home empty handed, at least in the yarn department. The rest of the trip was uneventful. We stopped again in Elko to have lunch at Wingers and then made the rest of the trip with only one stop for gas in Winnemucca. Mucca mucca mucca...
Three or four years ago I built a dry ice powered canon that would launch 2 pounds of candy (starburst are best) about 100 yards with my cub scouts. It was a big hit with the scouts as you can imagine, and won me a place among the best den leaders every. The launcher also had limited success at the 2003 triannual family reunion, where it had one or two final launches before a malfunction due to icing up on the valve caused it to crack. I never bothered to fix it as it had served its purposes and then some. Well this year is another reunion, and I decided to build a new canon using some of the old parts and design but with some changes. This canon relies on an air compressor for power rather than the finicky dry ice. While this is nowhere near as cool, it has a number of operational advantages. I have a nice big 12-volt air compressor that my brother Joe gave me. It runs off a car battery so it is as accessible as a car rather then having to find and store dry ice. Also the pressure in the reservoir (bigger) chamber is easier to control. Anyway, got it all together tonight and I'm getting exited to pop off a few rounds with it. It should prove endless fun at the reunion. Well… as long as the candy holds out.
Friday evening on our way up to check on our garden I spotted a gray creature out of the corner of my eye. It startled me and at first I thought it was a rat or something. It was a baby bird. He stared up at Kelly and I with a grumpy expression. He seemed so out of place and forlorn there on the ground by himself. Kelly was very concerned for him as was I. We looked in our book called Country Wisdom & Know-How. It gave us the basics. Mostly it said leave them alone. We tended our garden and reluctantly did nothing. We went back in the house and watched him for a while thought binoculars. We learned that his mother is staying nearby and taking care of him. Saturday morning I fed him several worms. As of tonight he seems to be doing fine though we remain worried that one of the many neighborhood cats will get him. At one point we made him a nest of weeds in a box and put it up in the tree but he soon jumped out and was back on the ground in peril form the cats. He moves around and we find him in different places but so far always within a 10-foot radius or so. We remain worried about him but resolved that he is following nature's pattern. Apparently, this in not out of the ordinary for young birds. I have concluded that he is a Western Blue (or Scrub) Jay by identifying his mother who seems to be getting more and more comfortable with me being near her young.
In order to facilitate watching our garden grow I have moved it to it's own page. I collected all the old posts on it and included them and from now on I will only be posting progress reports there. This will also allow me to post more pictures without diluting the journal. I have also added a link on my stuff page that will make it easy to find in the future as this post roles down.
I have talked about this before but they are building a temple very near us. It's called the Sacramento temple but it's really in Folsom, so it's very close to us. The open house will be July 29th through the 26th of August. This is where the pubic is given a rare opportunity to take a tour of the temple before it is dedicated. Once the temple is dedicated, on the 3rd of September it will be closed to the public. They are expecting more than 150,000 people to attend the open house and they have asked the members to serve in various capacities during the open house. Kelly and I have been assigned to be parking attendants and greeters. This morning there was a training session at the temple ground to fill us in on what we are supposed to do. In typical Mormon meeting fashion it was an hour and a half long meeting to pass along 20 minutes worth of information, but it was nice to go up and see the temple and see the excitement that everyone has for it. The building looks complete on the outside now, though the ground will need a lot of work before July 29th. It has been really fun to watch it all coming together over the last few years.
Thursday I took the day off work to take a bunch of the scouts up in the mountains. They were going up for a long weekend but I could only take one day off so I was just up Thursday. Everyone met up in the Safeway parking lot at 7 to buy three-days worth of food and then we loaded every one up. Once we got to the campsite and got everything set up the guys all wanted to go play paintball. All of them have there own gear and play all the time. Some of them are quite good. It was my first time and it showed. They all had camo, long pants, and sleeves even though it was warm. I was wearing a red T-shirt and shorts. We played three games where we broke into two teams and the team to annihilate everyone on the other team first won. The first round I stuck close to Eric (another guy on my team) and we covered each other and made our way into range of a group from the other team. Then he ran out of CO2 and had to give up. That left me pinned down behind a tree. I exchanged paint with two opponents for a while until I got bored and tried to fall back so I could make another advance where there was more cover. Just before reaching cover on my retreat I was hit in the ankle and was out. I walked back to the top of the hill where out player went to wait for the end of the game and found all but one of my teammates and no one from the other team. It was Brad against the entirety of the other team. At that point I figured the game would soon be over, but employing stealth and a snipers "never fire from the same location more than once" strategy, one by one Brad picked off the members of the other team. We played two or three more games and my performance was no more notable than in the first. The last round was punctuated by my goggles foggin up so bad that when a guy popped out of the brush I didn't know if he was on my team till he had drilled me in the forehead. It was really fun. The terrain was great! brush, boulders, creak beds, and trees as well as fairly large open areas. We went back to camp and spent the rest of the day hanging around in camp waiting for the ski boats to show up. When one finally did at about 7pm we all piled in and took it out. The boat was kinda overloaded and the water was cold so only a few of the guys did a bit of wake boarding. Mostly it was just fun to be out of the water. I helped get the boat out and then headed home to find Kelly already in bed. Sleep came fast and so did the sun.
As any of you who read here know. Kelly and I are growing a garden. It's starting to grow. There are definitely green things popping up. Disappointingly the tomatoes are not looking very good at all. I'm not sure why they are mad at me. The beans are the real performers. They are by far the biggest. A distant second are the radishes and then the carrots both of which we have now culled out a bit to let them grow. I'm worried though. I don't think our soil is very good and I'm afraid that as they get bigger they will not be able to get that they need to keep up the growth. I will be doing this kind of report from time to time at the request of one of my best readers. If anyone knows why we are doing wrong with the tomatoes let me know.
Kelly just had a birthday last month and I guess that is what has got me thinking about all this. I don't feel old… Most of the time I don't feel old. I don't recognize the names of many of the bands in the top 40 anymore. When I was a teenager or even in my early 20's I kinda thought of 30 as "Old". I was kinda fearful of being "Old"; or rather I was fearful of loosing my cool. It was like I was embarrassed for my future self. Now I'm coming up on 32 and I really am fine with my age. From where I stand now, I'm cooler then I have ever been. Would 19 year old me think so? I really don't care about silly old 19 year old me. I think the secret to all this lies in the very root of coolness its self. To teen me, cool was a person who had there own style and projected a confidence that it was cool. Now cool is more casual. I still think it's cool to have your own style but only if you are really comfortable with it. In other words, it's more important for it to be genuine than unique. The thing I keep coming back to is; why did teen me think thirty year olds were so un-hip. By my old definition I think I'm very cool. By my new definition I think I'm very cool. By my new definition thought the older you get the cooler you become. Take this as an example. When I was a teen my dad bought a pair or bright RED Nike shoes. At the time I did NOT think they were a wise fashion choose. They just plain looked silly to me. The thing is, now I look back and think, that man was way cooler then me. He had the nerve to wear those shoes because he liked them. They made him feel good for whatever reason and so he wore them. So as you grow… shall we say more mature. Cool becomes judged more by what we think of our selves and less by what we think other think of us. This is how we end up with middle aged men running around in bright red Nikes and minivans with bumper sticker that say "my kid's an honor student" so my advise to teen me is that, that kid who had his own style and had so much confidence that it was cool, was cool; as cool as you would be if you were worrying about what you thought was cool rather than what everyone else did. Believe you are cool and you are. In the words of Shakespeare: "To thine own self be true" In the words of Dr. Seuss: "there is no one alive who is you-er than you"
We just got back from a great trip to the lost coast. One of the guys from the Cherokee jeep club usually organizes this trip for Memorial Day weekend, and I have been on it several times in the past. This year he couldn't do it so I kinda volunteered to lead the trial run, which is a bit tricky navigationally speaking. 
I had the GPS track log from one of the past years when I did it. The group was a bit smaller than in past years but every one who came was really cool and it made for a good size.
Saturday morning we finished up packing and set out for Richardson Grove campground to meet up with the rest of the guys who had camped there Friday night. The drive was a bit long but the scenery just gets better the closer you get to the coast. You really cover California on this drive. We start out in the gold country in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada and then drop down into the green fields of the central valley and then back up into the winding roads of the coastal range and over into the redwood forests of the coast. All that in a drive that is less then 5 hours! We got to the campground and after conferring with the ranger at the gate and a bit of wandering around we located the group that went up Friday. It turned out that Friday was rainy and they had been kinda cold and stuff. I like camping even in the rain owing to my growing up camping in the rainy Seattle area. I can't say I'm bummed to have missed it but I wouldn't have minded.
In the past Kelly and I have always used the very small tent that I used when I was single. It's a very cozy fit for two but the problem is that we don't have any good sleeping pads. What we do have is the big blow up, battery powered, self-inflating, queen-size mattress that my boss gave us for a wedding gift. So for $30 Wal-Mart hooked us up with enough square feet to camp in comfort and sleep on luxurious air.
Having set up our sleeping arrangements it was time to participate in the obligatory yak-about-everyone's-jeep session. 
The only thing as fun as driving a jeep is talking about them with other jeepers. What's your final drive ratio? What is your lift? How do you like those rock rails? Is that a 4 to 1?… Kelly and the rest of the women just gave up and went for a nature walk in the big redwoods. That night Kelly served everyone her awesome homemade chilly which seemed to be appreciated by all. There was also a slug-kissing incident for which I have no explanation.
The next morning we broke camp and headed into Garberville for breakfast at the Waterwheel Restaurant, as is the tradition. There was one guy who had said he was coming but had yet to show and we hoped that he would meet us there. It turned out he had a steering problem that caused him to turn back. After gassing up we headed out of town with Kelly behind the wheel. She had agreed to drive because she would rather drive than take pictures and she did a great job. The trip starts off with about 20 miles of rough but paved road squiggling through the giant redwoods before finally reaching the road closed for winter sign that indicates it time to air down the tires and put it in low range. The road is not a jeep trail and far less capable vehicles could travel it with out trouble. In fact we were passed by a little Nissan pick up and a VW bus going the other way. Indeed the joy of this trail was not in its off road challenge but in the opportunity to enjoy a relaxing drive through some incredibly beautiful scenery. In many places the roadway is worn five or six feet into the forest floor, lending the impression that you are sneaking through the woods on a secret, ancient path that could have been there as long as the trees themselves. 
After several hours catching only the occasional distant glimpse of the ocean there is a spot where the trees finally part to reveal a surreal view out over a tree carpeted valley and the ocean beyond. From there it's hard not become inpatient to get the beach and feel the sand between the toes. The last few miles of the road drop down for the high bluff to a riverbed that leads to the ocean. The beach is such that most of it can only be reached by boat or by driving across a fairly deep river ford. This is the great draw of this beach. On Memorial Day weekend we had this beautiful beach almost entirely to our selves. That is the true joy of having a jeep for me. It's the poor man private island if you will. We drove our jeeps over some of the rock sticking up out of the sand and took a lot of poser pics with the sea as a backdrop. We barbequed hot dogs, steak and corn on the cob. We sat around a warm fire and told stores. And we fell asleep with the waves crashing only 30 feet away and a cool breeze blowing up the beach. If heaven isn't any better, I for one will not be disappointed.
We got a slow start in the morning. None of us were exited for the trip home. We all drove out together along another windy path thought the thick forest out to highway 1 were we aired back up. Then we drove down highway 1 and into Fort Bragg to have lunch together at a great fish and chips place Kelly and I remembered before we parted ways. Form there it was another four and a half hours to home.
Kelly and I have been working on our garden lately and it is finally starting to look like it. We ended up buying tomato plants because it got so late in the year. Our soil is all clay. So we dug really deep holes for each of the plants and mixed the clay with soil builder and then used it to fill the holes back in. It's almost like our tomato's are in clay pots. I have three basic motivations for growing (or attempting to grow) a garden. First and foremost, I love homegrown tomatos. As the saying goes, there are only two things that money cant buy… true love and homegrown tomatos. The second thing is that it's something that Kelly and I can do together and that makes it fun. The third thing is that I want to learn something about what it takes to live off the land. I hope to collect seeds from this year and plant them next year. I expect to have most of my crop fail. That's not necessarily a bad thing though. You have to do it to learn. So I will judge the operation a success if I get to spend some good time with Kelly, eat a few tomatoes and maybe learn a thing or two about growing food.
The other day Kelly and I both had a really rough day. When I got home we spent some time commiserating with each other. It's one of the nicest things about being married that when you have a tough day your spouse is always at home waiting for ya with a shoulder to cry on either literally or figuratively which ever is required. At any rate I asked Kelly finally what she wanted for dinner and she told me "I don't want to make any decisions". I told her "then put on some good sturdy shoes and lets go". I drove us up to Placerville and we went through the drive through at Jimboys and then ate in the car. After that we tried to drive up Mosquito road to a mountaintop where there are a bunch of antennas and you can see for miles. But the road had a sign saying it was closed. It is a twisting narrow road that goes way down into the American river gorge, crosses a depression era one lane suspension bridge and then climbs back up the other side. I figured that with all the heavy rain we had been having a few week earlier they had closed the bridge for some reason and maybe they just hadn't gotten around to taking the signs down, so I kept going all the way to the bottom where we finally ran into a gate. I was trying to make it to the top of the mountain in time to see the sun setting over Sacramento. There was another way but it was longer and we were at the bottom of a big canyon. Dang me and my foolishness. We turned around and raced back to Placerville and then went tearing up 49 and back out toward the peak. On the way out we crossed the bridge that I asked Kelly to marry me under just as our car rolled 100,000 miles. It had to be some kind of a sign. We got to the top at long last about 10 minutes after the sun had set. It was still a great view and both of us were feeling much better about life. As I drove back through the woods along the old narrow mountain road with Kelly pleasantly dozing next to me, I thought about how live is a convoluted unsure path. Sometimes you ignore the signs and as a result you waist time and energy driving to the bottom of a canyon. Other times it's filled with pleasant coincidences and beautiful views, but there seems to be a rhythm and a meaning to it all. The hard times make the good time that much better. Having descended to the bottom ignoring the warning, at least you know what you had to do to get back to the top and get back on track. Even the bad times are a wonderful part of life. The trick I guess would be to keep focus on the peeks and turn around as soon as you realize the road you have chosen wont get you were you want to go and then to just pay attention and enjoy the beautiful views along the way.
It's starting to get hot and allergy season has begun for me. The seasons are different here than anyplace I have ever lived. It rains a lot in the spring; like very day for weeks and then one day it just quits and it doesn't rain again till September. As a result of this all the plants have a short time to do there pollinating between the time its too rainy for the pollen to be floating around in the air and the time where they all dry up and turn brown. The good news is allergy season is short here. Kelly has started a new job at work. She has given up her beloved position as the head of the kids department at Borders in order to get more favorable scheduling. She now work a 6am to 3pm shift and only works 4 day a week. She is also working fewer Saturdays. I am really enjoying having here around at nights. We are planning a trip to the Lost Coast for Memorial day weekend. This is a trip that the NAXJA jeep club does every year and this year I volunteered to organize it. It is always a really fun time. I have done it twice. Once it was with Kelly when we were dating. We both have found memories of it. Last year we didn't go so we were really wanting to do it this year. As an added bonus Joe and his crew are coming down to join us in the fun. I'm sure the kids will love the ocean. I'm trying to get my jeep all fixed up before the trip. I just got the old safari rack fixed up with new and improved mounts and now I'm trying to get the transfer-case linkage all fixed so I won't have to climb underneath to shift it into four wheel drive.
My hard drive died on me. Indirectly that has been the cause of my resent lack of blogging. It died in kind of a slow and not so catastrophic way that gave me the opportunity to back up all my data. So I didn't lose anything. The thing is it kinda worked. If I put a fan under my laptop to keep it really cool and didn't do anything really taxing it would still work. So after realizing that something was wrong with it I backed up my date but then I didn't want to send it off to get it fixed. It is still under warranty so I needed to send it to Kentucky of all places and they were going to figure out what the problem was and fix it and send it back all within a day they clamed. They sent me a box to put it in with the address all ready on it and paid for. All I would have to do would be take it to work and give it to the UPS man. The problem is when it came right down to it the thing still worked and I didn't want to be without it. I realize that this is just plain sad. The thing is I use it every day. Without it I really feel cut off from the people I know, the things I like to do and the world in general. It's something that I didn't realize until now. I am so used to having the wealth of the internet at my disposal that having it missing for even a short time was disturbingly discomforting. After all I sit in front of another computer at work most of the day. If I really needed something I could have used that one. I think the internet and computing is an amazing tool. It makes me wonder though when I can't go a few day without it comfortably. One parallel that comes to mind is the small pocketknife I carry with me every day on my key ring. It's a tool I have come to rely on. Like my computer I use it very nearly every day for all kinds of things. When I have to fly I leave it home and find that I am constantly just a bit uncomfortable that it's not right there within ease reach. I'm not sure what this should be telling me. Is it good or bad? Using tools is one of the great hallmarks of humanity right? I guess something is telling me I should be more self reliant but I'm just not sure if that something is right.
Our ward bishop at church had been a bishop for longer than any other in the stake and even thought we have been in the ward less then a year we had grown to really love him. There had been rumors for the last several weeks that change may be in the works but last week was ward conference and so we figured if it was going to happen it would have been then. As the stake president stood up and announced that the bishop would be released I started to think who could they possibly get. There was no one I could think of that I could picture as the bishop. And then they announced it would be Brother Davidson who I have worked with in the priest quorum. Brilliant! The perfect choice. Why hadn't I thought of that. It is awesome how the church works. A beloved bishop who had served for many years steps down from the pulpit and takes his seat next to his wife and family and a new bishop nervously and humbly accepts the call that he did not seek to serve and try to fill his shoes. Our old bishop described himself last week in ward conference as being like "an old pair of socks that you just can't bring yourself to throw out", "Worn and comfortable". Our ward got a new bishop today, perhaps not quite as comfortable and certainly not as worn but an excellent fit and sure to keep our feet planted in the gospel.
After a 7 year hiatus from school I have decided it is time for me to move forward with my education. I think I will begin by studying for some CLEP tests that I can take before actually enrolling. This will give me a chance to get my feet wet and determine how much time I can commit to school in my already full life. Ironically next month I will pay off the last of my student loans. I feel extremely blessed to have my current job as operations and production manager of a small research and development company. For the last four years I have been involved with designing, testing, and producing locomotive parts for GE. I could not ask for a better job. I do what I have always wanted to do. My reasons for going back to school now are simple. I feel like at this time in my life I can fit it in financially and socially and I'm sure at some future point it will help me to continue to do what I love to do which is to make the world work better.
We live at about 1500 feet and I have never heard anyone talk about it snowing here. Oh sure a few hundred feet up. Even in Placerville maybe. Heck twenty minutes up the hill it snows every year. But it Never Ever snows here. Except this weekend it Did snow here. Friday night it snowed a good inch of real snow. Not 5 days before this picture was taken we sat at that table enjoying lunch in the sun and then had a nap on the lawn in the sun and now snow!
I have a mixed history with Valentines day. For starters not a few of my dating relationships ended just before valentines. Secondly, I failed to meet Kelly's expectations for our first valentines day. Possibly this was partly due to the first but was also largely due to my personal tendency to undervalue sentiment. Last year as our first V-day married and in an effort to mitigate damage done by my nonchalants the previous year I took Kelly back to the very nice restaurant where I took her on our first date. It was a very nice evening but also out of the question this year because of the associated expense. Basically I don't really like the idea of a day dedicated to loving our lovers. I love Kelly every day and I do nice things for her all the time. Having a day for it only adds a sense of obligation that overshadows the freewill nature of my baseline benevolence. For example if you buy your wife chocolates on a normal day you are the hero, bring them home of V-day and you get a check mark on you V-day expectations check list. That being said I do love a good date night and there is nothing I would rather do than spend an evening with Kelly. What we ended up doing this year may go into he books as my best Valentines Day ever. After work I came home and picked up Kelly and we went down to Folsom and placed an order for pizza at a take out place and then walked across the street to a garden center to kill the 45 min before it was ready browsing their selection of spring flowers. After picking up the hot pizza I took Kelly to one of Folsom's historic land marks to eat it. In Old town Folsom there is a large railroad turn table that was apparently used to turn locomotives around at the end of the line back in the day. It sits right in the middle of a parking lot for the modern commuter train but I though it would be a fun spot to enjoy the unseasonably warm evening and a pizza. After dinner we walked along historic Sutter street and popped into Snooks Candies to get a small box of chocolates. Then we rounded out the evening with a short walk down the bike path along the river. I think Kelly had as nice a time as I.
"The things that matter most are the things that last the longest". Kelly and I went to the temple Friday. The Oakland temple is a grueling two hour drive from here through heavy traffic. We hadn't been in a while and Kelly had prepared her grandmothers work to do. It was a wonderful relaxing and uplifting afternoon. We had the opportunity to do the sealing for her grandparents. This was an opportunity for us to remember our sealing and renew our marriage covenants. I love Kelly so much. She is the most important thing in all creation to me. To be sealed to her for time and eternity is the single greatest blessing in my life. We spend so much time and energy on the mundane things of daily life the temple is a rare opportunity to focus on the things that matter most.
Last night Kelly and I went up to Ice House Lake. The drive up makes the trip worth while even without the destination. The road is never straight and it follows a ridge line surrounded by excellent views for quite a while before cutting through the El Dorado National Forest to the lake. I love to drive on windy forest roads particularly when the views are great. The lake its self is a resent discovery of mine. I knew it was there but I also knew it was popular with the weekend crowds so I never bothered to check it out. In the winter however visitors are few and the lake is just as beautiful. The north side of the lake has several Geocaches on it. It seemed like a nice after church family activity to go walk along the lake shore to find this cache. Buy the time we got up there the sun was low and gleaming off the lake. We had intended to snowshoe but the snow was mostly just in patches so we opted to leave them. We poked along on the way out only half committed to finding the cache but when the sun was low enough that we should have been thinking about heading back we were so close that we couldn't. It took us a while to find the cache due to it being in a rather shadowed from the sky (bad GPS reception) spot behind the levy. I finally climbed back up the levy and walked along it with the GPS to find the line where it was closes to the cache and then we found it fairly quickly. By the time we got it signed and everything put back and started back to the car the sun was dipping behind the trees. We ended up walking back on a road that was covered in slick, uneven ice and snow in the dark. What a blessing it is to live so close to such abundant beauty. I'm not really a big fan of the sierra club but I can sure see where they get their inspiration.
My Cousin Billy recently had his car, a beloved Toyota stolen. Happily he has since reclaimed it. Though it is not without evidence of it's ordeal. Billy has been able to ascertain that at least one of his cars malevolent passengers at some point during it's misadventure is an "escort". An escort who uses Yahoo and CraigsList to get work. An escort who felt the need to carry in her purse an assortment of condoms and drug paraphernalia as well as bed-roll of sorts. The car-napers also removed from his car registration and insurance cards. He now fears he will be the target of identity theft. As I consider what the implications of this kind of event would be had it been my car I think that Billy is quite graceful. I would be furious a racked with desire for revenge. His actual loss is quite small he got his car back and the worst of the damage is that the thieves removed his "Peace is Patriotic" bumper sticker. The crime to me however would be greater than the sum of the damage. I own three automobiles a 79 VW bus that I can't get registered in California, an 87 Jeep Cherokee that I drive every day, and a 99 Subaru forester that Kelly drives every day and we take on most of our trips. I love each of these machines more than can be logically accounted for. To think of them being violated in the manner that Billy's car was makes my blood start to simmer. I just spent about six hours under the hood of my jeep installing a new power steering pump. I have spent countless other Saturdays working on both my other cars. They are part of my identity. I love to drive each one of them for there unique qualities. I miss the two cars that I have owned and due solely to financial pressures had to sell. I have many great memories that include each of them. I would hate to have to add to my memories the imagined adventures of my car in the hands of villains.
I lead a small group of boy scouts on an expedition to find a geocache today as part of a search and rescue drill. The cache just happened to be right in the area we were instructed to "get lost" in as artificial victims. We snowshoed from the main road along a side road for about a mile and a half and then cut through the trees about another half mile to the lake. The scouts found the cache after an initial "we will never find it" and a bit of cajoling. I had located it showing under some snow cover bark almost immediately. Unfortunately our search and rescue dog team never did find us. We finally ended up hiking back to the cars after several hours of boredom to find the Rescue team was standing around at our cars. "Base this is Rescue thirteen. We have located the subjects vehicle and after an exhaustive search of a 10 foot radius we have concluded from the tracks that the subjects have feet". I don't know what the deal was but I guess that's why they needed practice. They actually seemed kind of annoyed at us that we hadn't waited for them to find us. We had been out there from 9am and it was 12:30 when we got back to the cars. Despite not being found It was a good time. It snowed off and on all day and it was a very pretty area.
Kelly and I went to see the Narnia movie. It was a really fun story that I remember from my youth. I also thought that the acting was good considering children actors. I must say however I was really kinda disappointed in the "special effects". Some of the scenes were so obviously blue screen that it was a distraction. And the sword that the oldest brother was waving around appeared to be made of rubber as it could be seen flexing and jiggling. Now I'm not a big special effects guy. I don't go to a move because it's supposed to have sweet special effects but when I keep getting batted back to reality by the poor special effects that's where I draw the line. Anyway notwithstanding the poor technical aspects of the film we did have a very nice time. Kelly's sister had given us movie passes for Christmas and we used them. It is one of the best perks of being married that every time you go to the movies you know your date is going to snuggle with you and give you a little kiss when the protagonist makes it out of a tight spot.
| Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday |
| 29 We drove to Boise on dry roads. |
30 Winters Birthday Party at Carl's Jr. |
31 Josh and Ruth arrived and we partied till 2am to welcome the new year. |
1 Ginger was blessed in church. We took Josh to Angela's on dry roads. |
2 Josh Back to Hawaii. We hiked Ensign Peak and saw Joseph Smith exhibit at church museum. |
3 We went to park city to see Aunt Sissy and snowshoe. Then dinner at Wingers with Ang. |
4 We Drove Back home on dry roads. |
We ended up leaving a day early because Thursday was the calm before the storm. We got a later start than we like to because I had to swing by work and get some files and get things going, but we made record time due to good weather and surprisingly light traffic. So as an added bonus we got to go to Winter's birthday party on Friday. A half a dozen of Winter's friends showed up to eat burgers and cake and play on the big indoor playground. The next morning we all piled into Joe's mini van to go pick up Josh and Ruthie from the airport. We hadn't seen either of them in a really long time. Josh since our wedding in July 04 and Ruth since August 04. They were both looking very good. Josh had that Hawaiian tan and Ruth the post mission glow. We all stayed up and played games and ate junk waiting to welcome the new year. Then after it came nobody seemed to want to wind down. Josh and Joe and I just sat around chatting and sharing stories. It's so fun to just hang out with family. We all managed to make it to church in the morning at 11:00 for Ginger's blessing. Just as the Bishop started to announce the blessing the lights flickered for a second and then went totally out. The battery powered spotlights kicked on and Joe blessed Ginger in top form. There was one talk given by flashlight and then the rest of church was canceled. At about 3:00 Josh, Kelly and I loaded up Bella and took off for Angela's new place in Salt Lake. Josh left the next morning before we got up. It was really fun to get to spend time with him. It's really a bummer he is so far away. Kelly and Ang did some shopping while us boys watched the cleanflix version of Revenge of the Sith.Toward the evening we jumped into Angela's Mini van and headed for Salt Lake City to see what we could find to do. We didn't have a real solid plan but we ended up taking a hike to the top of Ensign Peak right before sundown. Kelly made it all the way to the top. Next we headed over to the church museum to see the Joseph Smith Exhibit showing there in celebration of his 200th birthday. I thought the coolest thing was a big maroon handkerchief that Joseph had given to Wilford Woodruff to use to heal two children. Tuesday morning we got a reasonably early start and went up to see Kelly's Aunt Sissy in Park City and try out Kelly's new snow shoes. It was the perfect day for it. There was a lot of fresh snow but the sun was out and it was a beautiful day. Kelly did very well for her first time on snow shoes. That night we had the obligatory dinner at Wingers. Kelly loves Wingers and truth be told I think it's really good too. We try to go every time we are out in Utah. The next day was the drive home. The endurance stretch from Salt Lake to Reno and then the hard part over the mountains and home. It always makes for a long day. Once again it was a fine trip. Kelly is a wonderful travel companion and makes these kind on trips so much fun.
