The 4th

Following tradition we headed up to Evanston Wyoming for the 4th. For those unaware, the residents of Evanston take the 4th as an open challenge. Almost as if someone told them that they thought they (the residents of Evanston) could not set the sky on fire. And the residents of Evanston responded by raising their fists into the air and replying with an exuberant "Oh yeah!" and so they try... and make a pretty good run at it.

We started the evening while it was still light by launching water rockets. It is important to warm up to events such as lighting up the midnight sky with pyrotechnic wonderment. launching water rockets stretches the neck muscles used to stare skyward at your bombs bursting in air. It also improves your trajectory tracking response. very necessary for admiring the rocketing tinders of Hell attempting propel themselves into heaven.

Ultimately the best metric for judging a home firework display is the "oooohhhh!" to "Oh SH!#!!!" ratio. and we did have a handful of them. You see, I made the mistake of buying the cheap fireworks from Jolly Roger's firework emporium and used tire shack. And My nephew Riley made the mistake of lighting fireworks that were beyond their expiration. We started with the expired firework. When you can't light a the fuse on a mortar, there is probably a reason... a good reason, probably divine intervention even. With much tribulation we finally got the fuse to light. The mortar shot about 5 feet in the air and blew up right in front of us. our first "Oh SH!#!!" Then I tested a bargain basement mortar that allegedly launched a parachute with a strobe. It launched about 30 feet in the air, took a look around, found a target and when the strobe parachute "deployed" it launched itself in a straight line for the trampoline in my brother's back yard. Shawn has cat-like reactions and almost ethereal intuition when it comes to fireworks. He moved so fast he nearly met the firework at the trampoline. He kicked it off before it could do any damage.
Later my nephew Trevor placed a "cake" a battery of mortars on a bucket and lit the fuse. We were thoroughly impressed by the show, but even more so when it fell off of the bucket. Once again Shawn was on the double and willing to risk setting himself on fire for the sake of our safety. The blur in the picture is Shawn.




And finally, I tried another cheap-o parachute mortar. this time it shot perhaps 10 feet in the air, spied another target, this time a homemade blanket, that had been completed the previous day and shot directly toward the blanket and set immediate fire to it. The Blur shown in the picture is Mandy and I rushing to extinguish the fire.




My final observation of the evening was my brother-in-law who is usually a flurry of activity, fluttering from one activity to the next. He usually has 20 irons in the fire and is tending to all of them. I watched him walk to the crest of the hill that overlooked town and stand there motionless and simply say "Wow!!!" You will notice in all of the pictures that there are fireworks exploding in the background. That is because any direction the camera was pointed, there were fireworks exploding... in a daft attempt to light the sky sans solar, Evanston style.

Done!

I am done! I finally finished this evening with my project. The salty taste of sweat and sweet after taste of victory still lingers on my lips. I had offered my abilities on a side job re-shingling a house in Salt Lake. When I bid on it, I had no idea the rainy monsoon weather was barrelling down the pipeline right for us. At least it was kind enough to not start raining until we had removed the all of the shingles.
Shinglinng stinks in the heat. It is just as miserable in the rain, with the exeptioin of being much more demoralizing. How was I supposed to know spring was on its way... in June?
As a sad result of my attention being drawn into the roof job, I haven't done anything exciting, accomplished anything noteworthy or really seen my family in about a month. So, I am going to go say hello to them... see if I can figure out what their names are again.

Let's get out of here!

I am slumped, blurry eyed in front of the computer holding my stomach with one hand. I caught something that is making me feel a bit ill.

Mandy and I went to Houston over the weekend to celebrate our 10 year anniversary. We didn't know where to go. We tossed thousands of ideas around, and I insisted that we go somewhere new. We found a cheap 4 star hotel in Houston, so I booked the hotel, the flight and the car and we were off. So, if you are concerned that I might have the swine flu. Don't worry, I have done the math and statistically, I have more probability of a dyslexic albino with grape colored hair to come running out of the forest and chop my nose off with a 13th century samurai sword made by a guy named "Jon Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt" whilst screaming "ooga chuga, ooga chuga, I got a feeling!..." and then run off again never to be seen or heard from again. So, I am fine. Really! I am fine. Besides that is not the reason I post.

Yesterday Mandy and I took the kids shopping to Maceys. We also decided to eat there. I can't think of anywhere where we can all eat for $8. After our meal we all got ice cream cones. We all ordered small cones. They are only 57 cents, so I was expecting a tiny cone with a small dab of ice cream on top. Instead, we all got these towering columns of dripping ice cream perched on a regular cone. They were all about 4 feet tall. When you pile that much ice cream on a cone, it instantly becomes an eating challenge. In order to preserve your hands from a heavy, sticky coating, you must maintain a constant vigil for rogue drips. I kept a heavy patrol around my ice cream and survived without any public humility.

I expected the kids to fare much worse. They did good. Walker finished his and Shelby got all of the way down to the cone when she handed it over to me and said "I am done" By this time the cone was soggy and had melted into the napkin wrapped around the cone, so that it was a single gooey form. I was feeling full and was not up to a new ice cream challenge. As The ice cream started to drip around the edges, I frantically searched around for a garbage can. Walker said "I'm going with dad." and followed behind me searching for a garbage. Finally we reached the front of the store. "AHA!" I thought "Bathrooms! They have garbages" By this time, the situation was dire, the structure of the cone was beginning to fail. It was caving in and toppling over. I thought "I must act quick!" and I darted into the bathroom. Before I entered, I turned around to open the door with my back. Walker looked at me and said "Uh, dad... What are you doing?" I didn't have time to explain "I just said "Bathroom has a garbage can!" and I disappeared in the bathroom. He stood outside in vigil.

I dropped the cone in the garbage can and washed my hands. As I stood there, I thought "Well, since I am here, I might as well use the bathroom" (are all of my blogs about peeing?) I turned around and inspected my choices "Hmm, no urinals. Well that is weird!" I chose the one on the end, closest to the door and began peeing. As I was standing there I noticed something else strange about the Macey's bathroom. They had small metal garbage cans attached to the stall walls.

Do you ever have a realization that aligns a series of strange events? I did. The metal garbage cans, the lack of urinals. Walker's horrified wonderment about what I was doing. I had gone into the women's restroom! "At least no one else is in here!" I thought. "If I can run out of here with no other bathroom attendees, there is no foul done." No sooner had the thought crossed my mind, then the door burst open and someone entered. I froze with my hand on the door latch of the stall. I waited. The person entered the stall next to me. No sooner did I hear the door stall close than I made an expedient exit, this being the best excuse I could ever think of for not washing my hands. Walker was still waiting. I said "Walker! I just went into the Women's bathroom!" He looked at me and laughed and said "I know! I was thinking 'does he even realize that he went in the wrong bathroom?' " Then he said "Oh man! You HAVE to blog about this one!" So, despite the repercussions of confessing to such a blunder, I offer this story for your entertainment. Enjoy!

Ancestral insight

Every so often I have a moment of insight. Granted those moments are spread far apart and happen so infrequently I can barely mention they happen with any regularity without feeling a bit dishonest. For the interest of this story, let's just say it happens a lot.

As I was mowing our lawn I started pondering my ancestral line. Somewhere along the line I am related to Luke Johnson, one of the early leaders of the church. Yeah, the relationship is quite distant as you can easily determine.

I thought about the statement I have often heard thrown around that the early pioneers of the church would not trade their struggles with ours despite our seemingly endless supply of luxuries and advances in technology. I came to an understanding regarding this. I imagined myself leaning over the lawnmower detaching the bag and preparing to dump it in my green waste garbage can. my attention is drawn to a small bright light gathering in the middle of the air, near my driveway. The light grows brighter. bursts of light rays begin shooting out as if testing the area around. Small sparks emerge and flutter around and fade out. The light grows and opens up revealing a figure dressed in old style clothes. He steps out of the light as it closes behind him with thump, like a cork stopping up a bottle "thoomp!" The figure walks briskly toward me with a warm smile and offers his hand.

"Greetings! I am Jedediah, I am from the past. I have come here to inspect the doings of my children's, children's, children's, children's, children's... er what people of the future do to earn their keep"

Me: Welcome to the future! feel free to look around and ask me anything you want!" I wipe the grass off on my shorts and offer him my hand.

Jeb: Very well! May I ask sir, what you are doing?

Me: I am cutting my lawn

I explain proudly

Jeb: Your... lawn? You mean this lush grass?

Me: Yes. I use my lawnmower to cut it

Jeb: How do you keep it so green?

Me: I apply fertilizer and fluids that choke out weeds. I water it and pull weeds. I trim it back and gather up all of the clippings and aerate it.

Jeb: I am rendered nearly speechless! how do you water it?

I show him the sprinklers and show him how I turn them on. He jumps back like he has seen an evil apparition.

Jeb: You can make rain whenever you want?

Me: Well... yes, except it turns itself on at night with this timer, except I have to tell it how long I want it to stay on.

Jeb: Marvellous! And you use this Lawn harvester to "cut" it?

Me: Yup.

I start the lawn mower and he hides behind me in fear.

Jeb: Are you not frightened of this machine that howls like a thousand angry bears?

Me: No, it is just the engine... it's the exhaust... because the gasoline is burn... It is magic.

Jeb: This is astonishing! where do you find this fertilizer?

Me: I just go down to the garden store and buy it. It only costs $15-$30 a bag.

Jeb: Great gopher goblins! That is more money than I made selling my house when I moved out west!

Me: Ha! Ha! Ha! good one! Oh... you were serious. I was... never mind. Perhaps you would be interested in seeing my horseless carriage. It can go as fast as 2 miles per minute. Some of these are built to go 5, 6, 7 and some as much as 8 miles per minute.

Jeb is now speechless, his mouth is now dangling wide open, his jaw slowly moving up and down. His eyes wide open like he was staring at death right in the eyes.

Me: You like that huh? Well remember that trip you made across the plains. Took you 6 months, you lost most of your family and you lost all of your possessions on your trip? Yeah, I can go back East in less time than it would take you to walk from one end of this valley to the other in a mechanized tube that shoots through the air 30,000 feet above the surface of the earth.

Jeb, still speechless and growing pale.

Me: Pretty neat huh?

Jeb: Indeed! So amazing in fact, I nearly soiled my trousers! Next you are going to tell me that you have some sort of machine that can automatically clean those! But I digress. Do tell me kind sir, if you spend so much time away from your family and money that you have labored so diligently for to produce such a marvellous crop of grass. Surely, you have some wonderful purpose and design for your harvest. Do tell me what you do with this grass that you have gathered so curiously into this bin?

Me: Well, I put it in this can, that is called a garbage can and it gets hauled away. Probably gets used as compost or something.

Jeb: Hauled away? garbage? Compost? Surely you don't mean discarded as refuse?

Me: Well, sort of. I mean, I have to pay for them to come take it away. And I think they use it for... compost.

Jeb: You pay to have it removed?

Me: Oh yeah! some people pay other people to come and cut their lawn and take it away so they don't have to. Well, if you don't the city will fine you.

Jeb: The city will fine you? What about the poor, the elderly, the widowed, the infirm?

Me: Yeah, they have to keep their lawn green and cut too... or they get fined.

Jeb: If you will please excuse me, I think I have grown ill. I must go back to where I came from so that I can destroy the time machine that I invented so that no one will ever know of how deranged and maniacal the people of the future have become! Please! Speak to me no more of your magic harvesters, your devil drawn carriages your mystical flying tubes in the heavens! Your damned green lawns! Cease your crazy talk!

and with that he disappeared with a giant flash of light.

It was then that I realized the carb on the lawn mower was leaking fuel and I was catching huge gasps of raw gas. I really need to fix that.

Blood host and butt scratches

Yesterday during sacrament meeting Walker is laying on the bench next to me, when suddenly he says "Ooo!" I looked at him confused and shoosh him. He looks back at me with a creeped out look in his eyes and says "There was a spider in my hair! There it is!" and he points on the bench. I could see a little insect that wasn't a spider, so I pick it up. It was a tick. I frantically shook it off and resisted the urge to stand up on the bench and do the pee-pee dance, shake and wring my hands and scream like a frightened little girl "Oh my gosh! ohmagosh-umagosh-umigosh! OH-MY-GOSH!!!" By now it was waddling around on the ground and I smashed that little bastard with the heel of my foot down to Hell where it undoubtedly came from. Yick! It's OK to smash ticks into the carpet at church, just not glitter.

I forgot about it and life went on. Then this morning I am standing in front of the toilet evacuating my bladder and while I am doing so, scratching my lower back and hind quarters, when suddenly I feel this funny little flap on my back right in the middle of my waistline. "What the heck is this?" Is it a skin tag??? so I yank on it and bring it around front to inspect. A TICK!!!!! YIKES!!!! This time, being in the privacy of my own home, I violently shake it off my fingers, do the freak out dance and and wring my hands as I scream like a frightened school girl. That thing was sucking my blood! I felt violated like I had been robbed or something. In general I just felt freaked out about the whole experience. I stood there retracing my actions over what I had done by just plucking it off my back and it dawned on me. I think I stand in front of the toilet every morning relieving myself and scratch my back. I think I always do this. Why? Is this abnormal? Is it bred of generations of man sleeping in tick infested grass matts? Who does this and why? As Seinfeld would say "What is up with that?"

I love you radio!

Yesterday when Mandy was getting ready for work, she turned on the radio. It was the Jim Brickman show. I had a question for anyone that has had the chance or listens regularly to Jim Brickman show. Does Jim Brickman ever turn on the mic without saying "Jim Brickman" less than three times?

"Hi! I'm Jim Brickman! You are listening to Jim Brickman, stay with us after these words from our Jim Brickman sponsors. I'm Jim Brickman"

I sort of wonder if he doesn't use his name like a smurf does. Smurfs were often saying things like "smurfy" in replacement of "good".

I am picturing Jim Brickman sitting in his house at the dinner table and sampling a plate of pasta. He sits up straight, smiles and claps his hands together in giddy delight. "Mmmmm! This pasta is so Jim Brickmany! I'm Jim Brickman. And this is is Jim Brickman's Jim Brickmany pasta!"

On that note, I had another question. Is Dalilah and Dr. Laura Schlezinger the same person? I can't tell the difference between their voices. Other than Dr. Laura's voice is full of angst and impatience and Dalilah sounds like she is riding on high from a fistful of relaxers.

I imagine Dr. Laura finishing her show, sighing, throwing back a large glass of wine and gulping down a handful of percocet, and saying "Mmm! Those percocet are so Jim Brickmany!" Sighing again. Melting into her chair and with a wry smile and half mast eyes saying into the mic "Hi you are listening to the Delilah show..."

My sweet precious little angel

My little girl is the epitome of girliness. She likes to dance and sing and play with her dolls. Pink and purple are her two favorite colors.

Sometimes she just looks at me and for no apparent reason you can see the joy and giddiness surge up inside her that causes her to beam a giant grin, tilt her head to one side, do a little jig dance and then run up as fast as she can and give me a big hug.

One of her favorite past times is drawing. She has a magnadoodle pad that she draws on. She likes to take post-it notes and draw on them. When it is warm she takes chalk out and draws on the sidewalk. Many of her drawings are done so well, they do not even warrant the question "That's beautiful! Um... what is it?"

Her subject material stays in the realm of things she loves. Her family, flowers, unicorns. Girly stuff.

A few Saturdays ago she came inside and was very proud of her last drawing. "Come see what I drew dad!" she said. I stepped out on the porch and looked at what she had drawn. "Who is that?" I said. "It's a dead guy. He's bleeding!" she said proudly.

I am thinking her brother just gave her his first art lesson.