Just a little (less) Bitter

Good News...

2009-11-24T22:24:00.002-07:00

In case you haven't heard already, I have received a promotion and will be changing jobs. This will also include me changing job locations, but I believe it can only lead to bigger and better things. I will somehow have to get use to a normal working schedule and hanging out with my family every night after work. But I'm pretty sure I can handle the change. The best part of it is that overtime will pretty much be a thing of past. (unless something major happens). Well that is all for now. I have some homework to take care of.

Thanksgiving to remember...

2009-11-23T20:59:00.002-07:00

Each year when the holidays roll around. I am reminded of a Thanksgiving when I was a lot younger then I am now. I remember it being a very hard year for our family. (I am still amazed at the fact that my parents survived all of us brats). It was an early snow fall like it has been this year and the temperatures outside were really cold. It was the night before Thanksgiving and we were having a terrible storm pass through. I remember the East wind was blowing snow around like mad. I was watching the trees sway back and forth. Each time I was wondering when the next strong gust of wind would knock the tree over onto our house. This had been a fear of mine since we did have a very large tree that was blown over in the front yard just a year or two before. So as a young boy, I would watch the trees with great anxiety wondering which one was the next to fall. For those who do not know about the East winds of Kaysville, they are very strong winds that blow down from the canyons and easily top 100mph. It use to amaze me at the force of these winds.
Anyway, as I was saying the wind was blowing fiercely, we had the back door of the house blocked shut because the wind kept blowing the door open. Because of my fear, I was staying up listening to the wind and the snow hitting the East facing windows. All of a sudden there was a loud CRASH coming from the kitchen. You could hear the snap of the glass and the whistle of the wind. I ran out to the kitchen to find the main window to have been broken. At the same time, the dog in the backyard was barking like crazy, the dog on the front porch was going crazy as well. I though for sure that a tree had fallen on the house, luckily the window had just be struck by a branch. Because the window was now broken and the temperatures outside where in the teens, my parents had to find a quick way to repair the window. After a search around the house as the temperatures continued to drop. Someone was able to find some masking tape. It wasn't the easiest job taping up a cracked window with the wind blowing fiercely against it.
After a while, the window was finally taped up as best as it could be. It was a little scary watching the window flexing back and forth just waiting to fall out of the window frame.
It was now about 4 am and we all tried to get a little sleep. That morning we woke up and it felt like we were locked into the house. The backdoor was blocked shut, and I don't remember why but the front door wouldn't open. There was a sort of depressed feeling around the house. I knew things were tight for my parents, but there is not much I could do at that age. While we were hanging out in the living room of the house, I happened to notice something out on the front sidewalk. It was a big dark lump in the snow. For some reason I decided to go out and see what it was. Since the house was locked down like Fort Knox, I put on a coat over my pajamas and climbed out the little window that was located on the back porch. When I made my way around to the front yard, I arrived at the big lump of snow. As I uncovered it, I realized it was a box that was full of food for the holiday. There was a turkey and a bunch of other great food. To me this was a great gift. When we brought it into the house, it sure lifted the glum mood from the room. I was amazed then that someone would have the heart to leave this great gift for our family.
I still wonder to this day who might have left this for our family. It might not have been the most expensive turkey or the most expensive fixing, but it sure left an impact on my life.
To whom ever left this gift for my family during a time of need, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Story time....

2009-10-24T10:17:00.003-06:00

A Noble Journey

On a calm mid-after noon, in the southern northeast, is where we find Jonathan, your typical all American boy who finds himself at a crossroads in his life. Jonathan, while lounging in his favorite plush orange beanbag chair, realizes his instinctive cravings for a cheeseburger, creamy shake, and the gooey goodness of golden cheese french-fries. As Jonathan sits, he contemplates how delightful he would feel after eating such tasty morsels of food. He reaches into the back pocket of his black denim shorts and retrieves his light blue Velcro-clasped wallet. Upon opening the wallet, his eye gazed the vast emptiness and he realizes his quest had begun.

As Jonathan’s quest began, he reluctantly climbed out of his warm Styrofoam-bean filed sanctuary and made his way to the plush carpeted Family Room. As he entered to tan walls with the corresponding white crown molding, he spotted the white with blue pinstriped sofa. He automatically was drawn in to the crevasses of the couch and began foraging under the spotless seat cushions, in search for his treasure. Scavenging over lint and small food particles, Jonathan was one by one multiplying his net worth, silver, copper, all shapes, and sizes, yet this was not enough. While Jonathan was taking a momentary break from his quest, his mind was still racing toward accomplishing his savory satisfaction.

As if it were a bolt of lightening striking his mind, Jonathan’s memory of a long forgotten card that was given in celebration for the day of his birth, shocked him back into service. He again sprung to life with the vigor of a young child on Christmas morning awaiting their chance to catch a glance of old St. Nick. Jonathan burst into his dimly lit bedroom and through a mass of clutter found the infamous greeting card. With quivering anticipation, he opens the blue envelope, removed the green card with a picture of a yellow dog which had the handwritten inscription inside “Happy Birthday, Son.” Looking past this with a determination, he saw the crisp green and white American twenty-dollar bill, which was screaming at him to release it back into circulation. Jonathan wasted no time as he scrambled for his maroon Chevy Citation. As the engine began its bitter struggle to start, it eventually overcame the struggle and roared to life. Jonathan immediately forced the Citation into gear; the vehicle lurched forwarded like a beast that had just awakened from a long slumber. The aged mechanical monster attacked the pavement with the fervor that matched Jonathon’s need to quench his biological hunger.

With his quests completion almost insight, Jonathan’s drive was slowly building. He makes the final change in his course of direction, and in his view is the rainbow colored, multi-choice menu of delight. On his final approach, he hears a magical voice welcoming him to his ultimate destination. As Jonathan slowly makes his way, the time seems to slow to an almost frightening pace. All he can think about is the tantalizing morsels he has prepared all his life to consume. He stops the vehicle, as a figure appears in a rectangle framed opening; a small exchange is made with no outside interference. Jonathan is focused on a medium brown and white paper bag, with small patches of dark areas from the preparation of its contents. In that moment, the air causes a small chill to run up Jonathan’s spine as his prize is lowered to his waiting hands. Jonathan drives only a short distance before he finally gives into his animal instincts, when faced with starvation. As his taste buds are enticed by the multitudes of flavors as they entertained his pallet, Jonathan basks in the satisfaction of knowing that he will survive to live another day.

By Keith Pears

Its Official...

2009-10-16T12:46:00.002-06:00

Well, I am officially back in school. So I guess I will have something to bog about again besides my lawn. Maybe if everyone is luckily I can post a picture of whatever "lunch" I decided to buy while I am at class. I know I use to receive tons of fan mail with questions of what I might or might not be eating that day. So prepare yourselves. Also in case anyone was wondering what the real reason for me going back to school was....Well...it's a little bit of sibling rivalry. As everyone knows my little sister has been going to school to finish her BS degree. The last I heard, she was making some decent progress towards the completion of said degree. Well, me going back to school is a way to "one-up" her again. lol Anyway, sis you know what this means, now YOU have to get your Masters... So as Webster once said.
"In your eye hoopie"

I guess it's that time...

2009-10-14T21:40:00.001-06:00

After about a year and a half, I have decided to go back to school. I have to admit, I am still sometimes surprised at the fact that I have had as much schooling as I have. I never really was a big fan of it while I was growing up. Yet, it seems kind of strange not having a paper or two due at the end of the week. Once again, I really don't have a ton of "extra" time that I am trying to fill. I figure with as busy as I am still, I might as well cram something else into my schedule.
With everything else that has been going on around this place, I need to get my schooling out of the way before things get worse. If you haven’t heard, I survived the latest layoffs at my work. Unfortunately, 550 other people weren’t quite as lucky. I still might not be completely out of the woods yet, we will see how things go in Dec. Either way, with my work again paying for school, I would be kind of crazy not to take them up on the offer.
Speaking of work, I spent Monday trying to chop down one of the old dead trees at the parents’ house. A lot of progress was made. I even survived the day of climbing with a chainsaw and dodging HUGE branches as they fell. The only really tragedy of the day was when I backed into a large section of the tree and dented my Bronco. It was very sad indeed. That Bronco survived since 1991 with only a bent bumper, but now it has a real dent. Oh such a travesty of justice. I can hear her crying out in the driveway now. (tear, tear, sniff)
For those who are interested, the Awesome Fam is doing pretty darn well considering the circumstances. The baby is getting bigger and bigger. I am surprised I haven’t lost any of my (sympathy) baby weight from chasing her around the house. It's a good thing that her mom is here to help keep this little tornado in check. “A” and “K” are also doing well. The only other big news is that we have managed to “rescue” 26 little frogs out of our window wells. We now have them housed in a little 10 gallon fish tank that sits in the kitchens window sill. Scratz has been spending her time catching spiders and bugs with the help of a cassette case and feeding the frogs. Every week we have been heading to the pet store to buy about 30 crickets for the frogs to eat. This might sound like a lot of crickets; however, the frogs eat all of them in about 30 seconds. It’s quite fun listening to the little frogs croak in the evening and at night. Normally, I believe they would be hibernating this time of year, but since it’s nice and warm in the house they are very entertaining.
That is all for now, I have decided to give myself a migraine today, so I will have to call it a day.

We're Gunna Rock This SPIRAL!!!

2009-10-08T09:44:00.004-06:00

Removed on request by Ryan...sorry folks

All good things....

2009-08-17T15:52:00.002-06:00

...Must come to an end.
Unfortunately unless some miracle happens in the next hour, we will be join the ranks of many other Americans in the unemployment line. Hopefully we will be able to turn things around before we end up homeless as well.

On a lighter note, baby z can now say "mom-ma." She is growing so fast, pretty soon she will asking to borrow the car keys....

The changing view...

2009-08-14T12:31:00.003-06:00

Well, they have been getting ready to install new power lines in the area next to our property and today we have the new "bottom" part of the pole. Its not as ominous as I thought it would have been.

Also there is no good news as of yet to update at this time on the scrat situation...crap

Things might be looking up...

2009-08-12T20:21:00.003-06:00

Well, I can't discuss the latest news yet, but things look like they might be looking better. We should find out tomorrow, so lets all keep our fingers crossed for some good news tomorrow.

SOD: Day 2

2009-08-11T02:09:00.005-06:00

Well if you remember, I commented about the great night sleep I planned on getting after working in the yard for the day. Well that didn’t happen. My back ached from bending over, my knees hurt from crawling on the ground, and my arm/hands hurt from carrying the sod. I pretty much ached all over, so I couldn’t get comfortable at all. I tossed and turned all night long, while the whole time all I could think about was laying sod. AAARRGG.

One of the times I got up to head to the bathroom, I happened to notice someone or something in the kitchen area of my house. At first, I thought how did jersey get out of his kennel and climb on the table. I thought my mind was playing tricks on me. The more I looked; I thought…maybe that is one of the kids sitting at the kitchen table doing something strange. That really didn’t make sense and then it hit me, THERE IS SOMEONE IN MY HOUSE!!!. In a matter of seconds, I was locked, loaded and ready to go. I let scratz know what was going on as I left the bedroom to find out what was going on. As I tactically moved from the bedroom, noticed that the individual wasn’t sitting at the table as I had originally thought. They were actually standing outside in a location that their head and shoulders were only visible over the kitchen table. As I made my way around the house, I turned on a few lights which must have scared them away. I did a quick sweep inside of the house, then I did a quick check outside. Luckily for them, I didn’t see anyone. I then got a drink of milk and headed back to bed. This is where I was informed by scrat that I should let her know that everything is safe and secure BEFORE I decide to get a drink. I went back to bed to attempt to get some rest. Needless to say, 7am came around pretty early the next morning.
Once I pulled myself out of bed, I got ready to head back out to the dirt patch with the intent of getting finished as soon as we could. While scratz was getting the kids up so they could help watch the baby, I went outside to check if I could see anything evidence of the “visitor”. All I found was a large pile of dog poop, where apparently the “visitor” must have been walking his dog and decided the new sod would make a great place to leave his load. I’m not sure if they will come back or not but I will be ready for them next time.
Back to the sod. Once we woke the kids up and got them fed, scratz and I began working on the yard. We worked for a good 4-5 hours, slowly making progress, when we realized that we had to much sod. With our calculations, we figured we would have an extra 3-4 pallets of sod. That’s roughly 2000 sqft of sod, more sod then it took to complete the front yard.
Here are few pictures of the sod problem we ended up having…

Luckily as we were running out of steam again, the same neighbor that helped on day 1, returned to help again. He only helped for a few hours, but it really allowed us to get more done then we had planned. Also the guy that delivered the sod showed up to pick up the pallets that the sod came on and since we weren’t quite done yet, he also helped lay some sod with us. With this extra help we were able to finish soding the yard 2-3 days ahead of the schedule I had planned on.

Once the sod was all on the ground, scratz and I sat on the back deck and took in the sight of grass in the backyard.

It has been many months of dirt, weeds, and hard work to get to where we are today. The best part is that we finished 3 days ahead of schedule. This extra time was put to good use in doing nothing at all. It has been months since I haven’t had a “to-do” list that had to be completed. I was nice knowing that I didn’t have to go dig in the yard or install some sprinkler system. Yet it was also slightly awkward not having something that had to be completed by the end of the day. I even found some time to play a quick game of Guitar Hero: World Tour.
Now I have 2 weeks that I don’t have to do anything with the yard, beside watering it. Simple pleasures are sometimes the best medicine.

Next project: clean garage

SOD: Day 1

2009-08-10T23:14:00.002-06:00

So after weeks of preparation and grading of the yard, it became time to have the sod delivered. I contacted the company who was delivering the sod and was informed they would deliver it between 9am and 1pm. I figured this would allow for me to get a few hours of sleep since I would be working the grave shift the night before. Scratz and I planned on me coming home and going directly to bed, then I would get up when the sod was delivered .; However, the best laid plans often fail…On my way home from working a long 12hr shift, I had just made the turn into our neighborhood when I saw in my rearview mirror…the sod truck. AARRRGGG. I promptly called scratz who was trying to get a few things done before the sod got there and informed her of the pending delivery. This completely changed any plans we might have had. After making a fresh pot of coffee, we started the fun process of installing the sod.

We started in the front yard and were making pretty good time. We installed approximately 1600sqft worth of sod in less than three hours.

I thought we were doing great, until I realized, we had a little over 13,000sqft to go. By time we had completed the front yard, my energy had been quickly depleted. I had been up since noon of the previous day, so what little energy I did have was quickly melting away. However, we carried on. I should have taken more pictures on the install process but I was more concerned about getting everything installed as quickly as possible. I originally planned on completing the sod over a period of 4 days and took off an extra day from work just incase we didn’t get it completed.

After a short break, scratz and I started working on the backyard. As we were laying the sod, we quickly found out that as we progressed, the large pallets of sod became immovable obstacles in our progress. This was an ongoing problem. Each time we tried to finish an area, the pallets of sod were in the way so we had to carry the sod to a different location. Moving sod sucks, but it you think it is any more exciting to move it 3 or 4 times you are WRONG! Anyway, as we were working in the yard a neighbor stopped by and gave us a hand. The three of us were able to lay a large section of the sod in about 4 hours. Luckily after that, it was time for a lunch break because I was dying from the lack of sleep.

Once the much needed food break was over, scratz and I continued the exciting task of laying more sod. A few hours after we began working again, my brother and sister-in-law showed up to help out. My Mom and Dad also dropped by to see how things were going. By this time we were no longer going at the break-neck pace as earlier, but we were still making good time. When the sun was heading over the horizon for the night, we had finished about 70% of the yard. I was excited about this because it meant we were ahead of schedule.

With all this work behind us, I was looking forward to going to bed to get a nice long night sleep…

It's been a few...

2009-07-17T21:54:00.003-06:00

A few days have passed since I last gave an update on my yard stuff. So, I guess I will put all the wondering minds to rest tonight. The past few weeks all I have really been doing is trying to get my yard leveled out so I can lay sod. To do this, I bought an awesome garden tractor and a box blade attachment. Scratz helped out and drove the tractor around the yard for a few hours and made pretty easy work of the un-level ground. We are still waiting for a sleeve hitch to allow us to do a final grade on the yard, but I dont know if that will be here before the sod it. I ordered it a while ago but haven't been updated by the seller to whether or not it has been shipped. Anyway, today I spent a few hours placing heads on the sprinklers and adjusting the patterns of others. One thing I did find out was that 2 of the wires that were installed to control the automatic valves, had shorted out. It took me a few hours to make a work around so I didn't have to un-bury the cable or some other ghastly thing. Once everything was connected, I did a quick test for the system and everything functioned as it should.
I still need to level out the front yard before the 5th of August because that is when the sod magically appears on my driveway. I know this blog isn't very exciting lately, but if there is not excitement in my life, it is very hard to write about it.
Ok, that is all. Now go read something else more exciting.

Hey...

2009-07-12T20:55:00.002-06:00

How YOU doing?

The rant....

2009-07-12T20:49:00.000-06:00

After a bunch of busy days off, I am back to work. I have already completed all the important tasks that go on at this place, which include counting down the days left to work, looking for alternative places to work, and the obligatory chewing off all my fingernails. I don’t know what it is about going to work, but without fail, I have the deep desire to chew off my nails. I know it is a terrible habit, but I do not chew on them unless I am at work. If for some reason, I take a week off of work, I also take the week off of nail biting. One would think that the nail biting is caused by stress. Well in my case, I don’t see how this is possible. The most stress I have in a typical day at work is whether or not I have enough DVD’s to watch. Sure there are days when I really do have to work, but this is a rare occasion. For the most part, I just sit here and wait for the clock to say it is time to go home.
Now, I shouldn’t complain because I do get paid very well for the “work” that I do, However, I have come to the conclusion that I have died and NOT gone to heaven. Some say Hell is what just a place in your mind where you relieve the bad part of your life over and over again. This causing you to relive the agony over and over, which confines you to an eternity of despair and torcher. That describes my “work-life” completely. I sit here doing the same thing day in and day out, nothing changes. I still get annoyed at the same people for doing the same stupid things every day I work. No matter how many times I ask people to do a task a certain way, the less chance that task will be completed correctly. The sound of the telephone ringing causes solicits visions of me throwing the phone across the room. It is like I am working with a bunch of people who have no common sense or anything that might resemble intelligence at all. No water what I do or what I say, I continue to be stuck here wasting my life away for what? Nothing.
This job has turned into my own private hell, continually sucking me dry of any feeling of achievement. I remember having jobs, where at the end of the day, I could actually look back at what I had done and felt as if I had made a difference in the world and accomplished something. In this job, the most I have to look back on is the number of movies I had successfully watched in the 12 hours I was at work. Or I guess I could count it as an achievement that I didn’t choke someone over their inability to follow simple directions. Either way, if I did go to hell, I think this is exactly what it would be like. The consistent, reoccurring-nothingness that this job has been over the last 7 years is numbing to the soul. No matter what individual actions I take to get me out of this place, I continue to return day after day after day after day. The mind-numbing boredom of the non-stop repetitive-doldrums is enough to make anyone go insane. Clickity-clank clickity-clank clickity-clank Clickity-clank clickity-clank clickity-clank Clickity-clank clickity-clank clickity-clank.

Another one bites the dust...

2009-06-28T14:01:00.002-06:00

Billy Mays here, I have a once in a lifetime opportunity here. it's called death!

I believe it's the week of the 50 year old dying. I wonder if he will get as much TV coverage as Mike has?

Full story here

Are you ok Annie???

2009-06-27T11:48:00.001-06:00

Oh and the baco-bits I ate yesterday keep reminding me that I ate them. Thanks

Another long day...and then MJ died...

2009-06-25T21:10:00.002-06:00

Today I spent the majority of the day trying to till the backyard. The ground it a lot more solid then I thought. I ended up breaking the drive belt after only three long runs in the back. Then I spent the next 2 hours driving from store to store trying to find a replacement belt. I finally found one at the local hardware store. The only problem is, I wasnt sure of the correct size so I ended up buying the wrong one. After getting home and installing the belt, I was only able to make one pass in the backyard before the belt I just bought snapped. CRAP... So after Scratz got home from work, I headed back to the hardware store to find another replacement. However this time, I bought 2 of them just incase. That is about as far I got today. Tomorrow we are going to Lagoon, so no yardwork for me.

And for all of those Michael Jackson fans, here is a video in his memory.

Yard update, 4-billion and 10...

2009-06-21T22:02:00.007-06:00

Well today was pretty much a waste of a day again. The sun was out for the first part of the day, but the ground was still kind of soft. I decided I would try and move some of the gravel from off of the newly poured concrete and stick it out in the far end of the yard where we might have a sitting area on year. Well, I managed to get one load out to the fence line without much of a problem...UNTIL I tried turning around to head back to the house. The left side of the bobcat sunk all the way up to the frame. I couldn't turn, all I could do was go forward and backwards about 3 feet. With each attempt, the bobcat sunk deeper into the mud and I inched closer and closer to the fence. I then decided to use the front bucket to try and push or pull my way out. I was not making and progress forward, but was slowly going backwards. Remember I am literally 2-3 inches away from the fence. At one point the front bucket actually snagged on the fence, but I stopped in time not to completely destroy it. Since that wasnt working so well, I did the old trick that you do if you get stuck in the snow. I started rocking that bobcat like it was a 1982 Chev Scooter. I figured it at the rate I was going I was going to be buying a new fence for the farmer when I was done anyway, so I put the throttle up and went for broke. Somehow I bounced that bobcat up and out of the hole and I ended up getting high centered on a wooden pallet. I again used the front bucked and was able to work myself off of the pallet. Since I was no longer stuck I figured I ran out all my luck for the day, so I parked the bobcat and moved on to a different project.

By this time I was already pretty frustrated, then so I decided to wire the valves for the sprinkler system. I got everything wired up, and luckily I took this picture of the wires I needed because I almost cut the wrong ones when I made it over to the other set of valves.

Well as I was doing playing with wires, Scratz had been digging in the area of the mud puddle to see if she could find where the water was coming from. She ended up diging a little hole where you could actually see the water flowing from either under the cement pad or coming up from the ground. The water was draining out pretty quickly so we ended up making a trench that headed from the cement pad to the middle of the yard.

The point of the trench was to see if we could drain enough water off to either have it all gone or to find out where it might be coming from. Well the water kept flowing for hours. We even turned off the sprinkler system to see if that might have been the source for the leak. After many hours of waiting for it to stop, we think it might have tapered off but I am not really sure since it started raining again.
After just a few minutes, there where puddles of rain everywhere again.

I continued to play in the yard, while Scratz took the time to clean the house and watch the baby. While I was outside I was able to complete all the wiring to the sprinkler vavles, mount the controller, and do a quick test of the system just before it started raining again. Since I ran into about a million stupid problems while installing the controller, frustration won out and I called it a day. Shortly after that my brother called to tell my Happy Fathers day, which I actually pretty much forgot about with all the B.S. going on with my yard project. Anyway, I talked to him for a few minutes and then decided to go out to dinner with the baby and Scratz.
We went to one of our favorite places to go, Lorena's. It is a small Mexican Resturant where the food it good and the price is even better. I figured the rain would start again while we were in eating dinner, however the rain never came. When we got home, I happened to take a walk out into the backyard and noticed that the ground was firmer then it was earlier in the day. I decided to take another try and moving the gravel since I did pay a hefty amount to rent the bobcat for the weekend. Luckily I was able to move one load of gravel without any problems, tried a second load and was successful with that as well. Then I figured, since the ground wasn't just a big mud pit, I would flatten out a few of the tire ruts I had made earlier.
I was able to avoid the extra soft spots for the most part and re-flatten out a large amount of the backyard. Scratz was outside helping me spot mud zones and sprinkler heads so I wouldn't cause any more damaged then needed to be made. While I was flattening out large sections, Scratz was filling in the big ruts I couldn't get to with her shovel. We only had about an hour and a half of day light, but we did a pretty fair amount of work in that short time. That is a good thing, because now I dont feel that I rented the bobcat for nothing.

Well, it's getting pretty late and we both have to work in the morning. Hopefully by the time we get off work tomorrow, I will be able to tell if we still have a water leak in the backyard or if it is just drainage from around the house. This will require the rain to stop for a the rest of the day at least.

Happy Fathers Day!!!

2009-06-21T22:02:00.002-06:00

Seriously....Stop it...

2009-06-20T16:26:00.007-06:00

Yesterday the bobcat was delivered to the house. They wouldn't let me tow it with Big Red, but instead allowed me to pay them an additional $80 to have it dropped off. Grrrr. However, once I got going I was able to get quite a bit accomplished. I think I need to buy me one just to have. It is a blast. I do have to say, I am quit at home sitting in the drivers seat working the controls. Maybe I can get me one and spend my time off digging holes in the backyard or just driving in circles.
Anyway, the first project I did was clearing out some dirt and moving the gravel into place in the front yard. There is a ton of extra gravel that will have to be moved to the backyard someplace once we get most everything else finished. I would have taken pictures last night but I didn't want to get out of the bobcat and waste time just to take a picture. ;)
Once I completed the gravel, I headed to the backyard to spread out the road base in the location of where we plan on putting the shed. By time I got this completed, it was time to take a break to eat dinner since Scratz got home.

The dogs spent the next 10 minutes barking at the thing.

I took today and tomorrow off work just so I could make some progress on the yard. This morning, we got up early to get a jump on the day. I started by leveling out the dirt on the north side of the house, then I made my way to the front yard to do a little leveling out there. While I was working the bobcat, Scratz manned the shovel and was re-digging out the area where the first sprinkler box is located. The box gets covered in dirt and mud every time it rains. Once we get the decorative gravel in there, I don't think we will have this issue.
One thing we did notice last night was there is one area out by our new cement work that was really wet. I started to dig at it today, only to find even more water. I don't know if there is a leak or if that is just where the water has been collecting. I guess we will be digging up that area once we get most everything else taken care of.
Since we found that nice wetland, I took a few minutes to walk around the yard to see what needed to be flattened out or whatever when I found a little mud spot that had water bubbling up out of it. I dug down to find a connection in the pipe that had not been secured. I was getting ready to fix that when it started sprinkling. I figured that it would be a quick little storm, so Scratz and I decided to go get some food and head to Lowes for a few parts that we needed. Well, the storm didn't just pass by in a few minutes, it is currently still raining. It has been raining for about 4 hours now. I cant believe how much it has rained. I dont know how I am ever going to get this yard finished at this rate. The yard is now a muddy mess and the sky doesn't seem to be finished falling as of yet.

Here is what my mud pit looks like now.

This is craptastic.

Rocks...

2009-06-19T08:21:00.001-06:00

Yesterday, I had the day off and was able to do a little work in the yard. Scratz arranged to have the cobble stone rock

delivered at the house since I was going to be home. The guy showed

up to drop the rock off around 11am and I had him dump it off onto the park strip, to try and

keep it off the street.

Since I was already out shoveling dirt, I decided to fill in a small section of the park strip to see how it would look.

I don’t plan on doing a lot by hand because today I am getting off early to pick up the bobcat. I have a big day today. Hopefully the ground has had the time to dry out a little bit since the rain has stopped for a little while. It isn’t suppose to rain at all today, but there is suppose to be a little scattered showers later in the day tomorrow. If I can figure out how to work the bobcat without many problems, I believe I can get most of the items on my “to-do” list done before it rains. As far as driving the bobcat, I have only driven one a long time ago when I use to work construction. However, I was able to find a driving simulation online where you can hone your skills. If you want to practice yourself you can go to http://static.howstuffworks.com/gif/skidsteer-sim/skidsteer.htm

The biggest thing about getting the bobcat is whether or not they will let me tow it with Big Red.

I have called a few times and depending on how I talk to the service person says I can or I can’t tow it. I really don’t see why I wouldn’t be able to tow it. After all I am paying for insurance on the bobcat and the worst that can happen is Big Red will fall apart on the way home.

That is all for now, look forward to the update of the bobcat action.

Sprinklers...Day 16

2009-06-17T20:49:00.002-06:00

As you read in the previous blog about sprinklers, I had finished installing all of them only to find out we had ZERO water pressure. I spent the whole night wondering how I would go about finding the blocked or broken pipe. Well the next morning scratz made a call to the city and found out the problem was on thier side of the system. Apperently they had a break in the main line in our area and were working to repair the problem. This was the biggest relief to me, so yesterday was the day that the water was turned back on. I went and checked my system and the only problem I found is it appears I forgot to make the little hole in the main pipe where one of the heads connects. Out of 30+ heads only having 1 to fix isnt that bad at all.

Tomorrow we get to move onto a little more land scaping fun. Scratz ordered 3.5 tons of cobble stone that will go into the parking strip in the front of the house. From a co-worker, She got the name of a guy who gets and delivers the rock for a great price. So tomorrow around noon, I will have a ton of rocks in front of the house. This gets the rocks here just in time for me to have the bobcat on Friday. I am hoping the sun will come out and stay out for most of the day tomorrow and then is out for the rest of the weekend. If not I am going to have a heck of a time trying to drive that bobcat without causing more damage to my yard then it already has.

I have a secret...

2009-06-14T10:57:00.002-06:00

Since I am at work today and extremely tired, I decided to take a slight detour from the sprinklers posts and post something a little more interesting for the masses. I have decided to pass along a little known secret that I have. I have been keeping this secret to myself for a few months now and so far my fellow co-workers haven’t figure it out. What is the secret? Well the secret is that when they replaced our 1980’s microwave, they replaced it with a microwave/convection oven. You might wonder how no one else knows this secret…Well I was here when they delivered it and the delivery guy handed me the manual. So in my boredom on that day, I read it. That is where I found out the microwave has a darker side.

It is the coolest thing ever. (Don’t worry I hid the manual.) The best part about it is this allows me to have a wider variety of foods to eat at work. I don’t get stuck with the typical microwave meals any longer.
For instance, today I am having a Tonino’s cheese pizza.

Mind you, this couldn’t pass for gourmet cuisine, but it sure beats the pants off of Hot Pockets.

Anyway, I am typing this up while my pizza cooks in the oven. Soon it will be nice and crispy and not that soggy mush you would normally get if you tried cooking a regular pizza in the microwave.
Well that is all for this minute, it’s time for me to eat my pizza.

Sprinklers...Day 15

2009-06-13T20:14:00.002-06:00

Half of a month gone and we have 90% of the sprinkler system completed. Today Scratz and I spent most of the day filling in the trenches in the front yard. We had most everything re-buried before it started raining again. We took a little break and then decided to go check out the system. I went to the water main and turned that on. Then I had Scratz turn on one of the hose bibs to see if the water made it all the way around to that side. Well, she turned it on and NOTHING... There was a little time before a slow stream of water came out. I checked all the valves and checked the other hose bibs and still the water pressure was nothing to write home about. I don't know what is going on. If you remember for previous blogs, Sprinklers Day-3 I did have water flowing to the first manifold without any issues. I even tested the sprinklers out on Sprinklers Day 7 and everything in the first 5 zones worked perfectly. Then by
Sprinklers Day-8 I didn't have all the valves closed. There was so much water pressure it created a major sink hole in a matter of seconds. So I know I at least had good water pressure to both manifolds by that date.
I am very perplexed on what could be the problem. We walked all the hose lines to see if there was a bubbling up of water indicating a break in the line or something, but nothing was found. Maybe the city decided to stop pumping water today. Either way, I now have a completely sprinkler filled yard and no water pressure to feed the sprinklers. I guess I will have to hope that something magically fixes the problem because I don't have the slightest clue on what to look for. Xeroscaping anyone?

Sprinklers...Day 14

2009-06-13T10:28:00.002-06:00

Well we are in the final stretches of the sprinklers. I was able to finish running all the pipe and installing all the sprinkler bodies for the whole yard. I had the Parents come over during the morning to help watch the kids, while I spent the majority of the day outside. I had to make a few trips out to Durk's Plumbing to get a few supplies, but once Scratz came home, it only took few more hours to complete.
Now that all the pipe is laid out I just need to put all the dirt back into the holes. This means I should be on schedule for when the bobcat gets here to help get everything ready so we can sod.

I WON, I WON, I WON

2009-06-11T20:12:00.003-06:00

I hit it big on the slots today. I have been trying for something big for a really long time, and finally I have. With this win, I won 500 coins. That is 500 coins of pure awesomeness. Since I have hit the jackpot, I am think I am going to go on a vacation or buy a new house or something awesome like that. So as all of you feel jealous of this awesomeness, I will be basking in the delight of becoming today's first $25 winner. SWEET

Sprinklers...Day 13 update

2009-06-10T20:15:00.007-06:00

I know everyone was on the edge of their seats waiting and wondering how much I accomplished today. Well, I am proud to announce that I was able to complete both of the tasks I set out to today. I did run in to some problems digging the extra trench. Even though it has rained for the last few days, the ground is still solid and rocky about 3-4 inches down. It probably took me close to an hour to dig a 5ft section of trench.
When I originally planed on the front yards, we were going to put the secondary manifold in the area between the garage and the porch. However, with all the concrete in the driveway, I didn't want to try and figure out how to get the pipe run under 30ft of concrete. So we put the box all the way on the other side of the house, which turned out that we didn't have all the trenches connected to run all the pipe. Luckily it was only a few feet that needed to be trenched by hand.

Here is the final trench.

The second item on the list was running pipe underneight the sidewalk. This was pretty simple. I purchased 3 - 2ft lengths of 3/4in PVC pipe and connected them together with couplings with a hose attachment at the end. I didn't glue any of the pieces together so I could add to the length as needed during the process. All that I had to do is turn on the faucet and slowly work the PVC under the sidewalk. It was pretty quick and other then all the mud, it was pretty painless.
Here is the final product.

With in minutes of finishing, the real rainstorm began. Luckily I didn't have to try and work in the downpour.

The neighbor to the south of me, however, was getting concrete poured today. Even though the neighbor told us that we couldn't drive over his property any longer, the other neighbor still had the trucks running through. :)

Sprinklers..Day 12 &13

2009-06-10T09:39:00.003-06:00

It's still raining and muddy, so I didnt even attempt to do any yard work yesterday after I got off of work. It even rained enough to make the nieghbors fancy rockwork in the front of their yard go for a little strol.

The bolder is at least 4 foot around and who knows how much that thing wieghs. The nieghbor seems to have problem after problem with his new house. I have come to the conclusion that his house must be possessed by the worker that fell of the roof and died when it was being built.
Anyway, I do still plan on going out to work in the yard today. I have all 3 kids home with me, so I should be able to arrange for one of them to watch the baby while I dig in the mud for a little while. I really dont plan on getting a lot accomplished today, however I do need to dig one 8 foot trench and figure out how to run a few pipes under the front walk.
That is all for now, I will update with my progress...if there is any.

Sprinklers...Day 11

2009-06-08T20:59:00.001-06:00

Nothing to report. I didn't even make it outside to even think about getting anything accomplished. Maybe tomorrow?

Sprinklers...Day.. um..10

2009-06-07T20:27:00.002-06:00

Rain, Rain go away, come again another day. That is what I have been thinking all day long. If I thought the muddy mess from yesterday was a treat, well good old Mother Nature showed me what fun really is. The neighbor was also kind enough to move the downspouts from his rain gutters over the property marker line and drain everything into my trenches, so his didn't get as wet. Got to love the caring nature of your neighbors. As you can guess, I didn't accomplish anything beside seeing that my new mud boots fit. I also realized that my arm really hurts, I must have pulled something while I was moving dirt around yesterday. That is all for now, I think I am calling it a night. One of these days the sun will shine and I can have a real update.

Sprinklers...Day 8

2009-06-06T20:48:00.003-06:00

Holy crap I am tired. I have been working on sprinklers all day long with only a little to show for it. I finally got the second sprinkler manifold all connected and attached to the mainline. However, when I went to check to make sure everything was tight and I didn't have any leaks, my fairly successful day went down the tubes. One of the automatic valves did not turn off. Almost instantly, this turned the hole, where the manifold was located, into a major mud-infested swimming-pit. The majority of all the surrounding dirt walls crumbled into the water making the hole even bigger and muddier then I could have ever wanted. By time I turned off the water, which is all the way on the other side of the property, I had successfully filled all the trenches in the area with about 4 inches of water. This didn't include the foot of water in the hole where the manifold was.
In trying to unbury the valves, more dirt fell into the hole, making the water the consistency of cold oatmeal. And if any of you have tried digging in oatmeal, you know it isn't very easy. Because mudslide buried the valves, I was unable to hook up any of the sprinkler zones directly to the manifold.
After a good hour or so, I was able to get the manifold out of the mud and propped it up above the ground so the mud could have a chance to dry.
Since I couldn't attach any additional zones to the manifold, I decided to try and run the pipe backwards. So instead of running from the manifold out, I ran the pipe from the final destination back to the manifold. This doesn't sound so difficult, but right before I got to this point, my help had to go take care of the screaming baby. We had the baby out with us while we were working on the pipes, but she soon got bored and needed more attention. This changed the relatively simple task of rolling out the pipe into a major job. Usually you have one person roll the pipe, while the other person makes sure the pipe is going into the hole. All the time trying no to knock the dirt that is on the side of the trenches back into the trench. However, trying to hold the awkward role of 400ft of black poly pipe that has to weigh close to 50lbs makes for a big challenge.
Anyway, after all the fun I had today, I only completed 2 of the 5 zones. I guess this is a little bit of progress, but I still have 3 zones to go. Once that is completed, I still need to run the sprinkler control wire and finish burying the pipe in the ground. I was hoping to be done with all the zones today, that obviously didn't happen. So I will be slowly working at it again every night when I get home from work. FUN FUN FUN...

Sprinklers...Day 7

2009-06-06T09:02:00.002-06:00

Today(Friday) wasn't as productive as I would have liked. I did get the big hole dug where I have to put the sprinkler box and manifold. That was a fun task. It rained on and off during the day, so each time it did, I happened to find an excuse to go inside. Another item that was limiting my productivity was my back and arms were sore. This made it an extra chore to do any digging in the ground. I had the parents come over to tend the baby while I was messing with the sprinklers but decided to let them head home, since I wasn't planing on doing much more after the first few hours. On Saturday, I plan on getting the majority of the sprinklers done if not all of it. The neighbor to the North of me is doing a bunch of leveling of their yard, so I need to get the side closest to him done before he takes the dirt that goes in my trenches and moves it someplace else. So all of you can look forward to the progress made tomorrow.

Sprinklers...Day 7

2009-06-04T22:47:00.006-06:00

Today was a decent day for a little yard work. It wasn't as hot as it has been and it also didn't rain like it has for the few nights. Before I let you know what happened with the sprinklers today, it is time for a concrete update. Last time I posted I was saying how late the concrete guys were staying. Well the reason they were so late is because they miscalculated how much concrete they needed for the job so they had to get a second truck out to make up the difference. All-in-all they used 20 yards of concrete and finished it in one day. I haven't been around the construction business for a long time, however I was still impressed that they were able to finish it all in one day. If any of you need concrete work done, let me know and I will get you this guys number.
Here are some of the pictures of the final results.

Now onto the sprinklers. Today I spent most of the day installing sprinkler heads in the back yard. It wasn't to hard of a task, but it sure was time consuming. I installed 30 sprinkler heads and was able to complete 5 of the 10 zones completed.
Here is a before and after of the sprinkler heads.

Here is the yard almost looking "normal" again

I still need to setup the second bank of auto valves for the front yard area. Hopefully I will have the time to complete a good portion of the front yard as well. Once that is completed, I will be able to finish filling in the trenches and starting the next project of getting the ground ready to lay sod.

Speaking of getting the ground, I received the new tiller blades in the mail today, so I will be able to till the entire yard as soon as everything is buried. I have a big day tomorrow, so I will leave you with a final thought. If tree's and butter are natural and good, why can both of them kill you in the end?

Sprinklers...Day 6...Postponed

2009-06-03T20:25:00.004-06:00

Postponed the sprinklers install for today to hang out with the baby. Well actually that was just an extra benefit of today. Really what happened today was the concrete guy showed up to frame everything and decided that he was going to poor today instead of tomorrow. So I just made sure I was here with the checkbook to pay for the gravel truck and the cement guys. I am having a lot of concrete poured today. It is just after 9pm and they are still working. Here are a few pictures from earlier today.

Sprinklers...Day 5

2009-06-02T20:45:00.003-06:00

Arrg, yet another long day. Today started with a full day at work. Since it had been raining on and off most of the day, I let my help know that I wouldn't be doing sprinklers today. However when I got home, I figured I better get as much done as possible since the cement guy was coming bright and early in the morning. It was to late to cancel him. So I came home, changed clothes, ate a few Ritz crackers, and started working. It sprinkled on and off for the first 30 or so minutes, but I was making decent progress. The only major problem I had was I kept forgetting to cut the little hole in the poly tube before attaching the fittings. After I was out working for a little while, scratz came out to assist. With her filling in the trenches, I finished putting the fittings on the pipe. Once that was done I helped with the trenches. In the last 10-20 minutes before were "finished", it started raining pretty heavily. I hope the hole back yard isnt pure mud by time the guy get here in the morning. I really dont have much to say because I am pretty exhausted. My hands dont hurt as much any more but they sure are ruff and dry. I will take some pictures and add to the blog for tomorrow. I think I will be working on the front yard sprinklers during the day because the concrete guy will be taking up all the space in the back yard.
Anyway, as always just because they are called cat tails, it doesn't mean you can shoot them with a shotgun.

4 in one...

2009-06-01T22:30:00.002-06:00

I just wanted to show everyone my awesome find. I was eating peanuts at work today and I happened upon a peanut with 4 nuts in one shell. ( I'm not really supposed to be eating peanuts because I believe I have developed a food allergy because of them)
I was excited to see this. so I am sharing it with everyone else.
Enjoy

Sprinklers...Day 4

2009-06-01T22:00:00.002-06:00

On the forth day of the sprinkler project, I had to take back the trench digger to the rental store by 7am. When I took it back to United Rental, the guy who recieves the equipment back tried telling me I didn't fill up the gas tank for the trencher. This was absolute B.S. I thought he was joking at first but he was serious. He tried to say that unless the gas tank is almost overflowing then the tank wasn't full. I was so pissed off because they charge like $10 per gallon of gas there. When he walked me into the service area he told the sales guy that the tank was a 1/4 tank empty. I told him he was full of it and told the sales guy that if he charged me for the 1/4 tank, I would cancel my next rental which is in two weeks. The sales guy made a smart choice, however because of the one guy I think I am going to cancel my rental anyway and go some place else. So if anyone reading this wants to rent from United Rental, I would recommend going someplace else because the employees who receive the equipment back must make a percentage on the amount of gas they have to replace in the rentals.

Back to the sprinklers, last night we found out that the neighbor to the north of us has decided to block access across his property beginning Friday. This causes us a major problem because if we cant get a cement truck in that way, we will have to pump the cement over the house which is quite a bit more expensive. This limited access also causes a problem for other neighbors on the street because they have also been doing yard construction. Anyway, since we are facing a possible non-access situation, we are trying to get all the pipe in the backyard in and buried inorder to have our cement guy come and do his job on Thursday. This is kind of pushing our schedule but I hope we can do it.
Luckily my brother and his wife came over to assist with the mess again. With their help we were able to get 90% of all the pipe work for the backyard completed. The storm that was coming in from the West force us to call it a night earlier then I had hoped, but with the wind and the blowing dirt there wasnt much that we could even do. We still need to bury most of the pipe so that the cement and other trucks can drive in the backyard to get the cement work done. However we are a lot closer then we were this morning. I think by tomorrow we should have the dirt covering the pipe in all the major areas of the back yard. Once the cement has been completed, then I can finish installing the sprinkler heads in the backyard. We still have a lot of pipe to lay to finish the entire yard, but I think we are slowly making progress. I only have to work 2 days this week, which will help in getting a little more completed.
So until next time, If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then you could probably eat it for dinner.

Sprinklers...Day 3

2009-05-31T20:01:00.005-06:00

Is it over yet? Wow this is a lot of work installing the sprinkler system. Scratz and I have been working all day long, with not much to show for it. We were able to get the first of 2 manifolds in and we finished one of the 10 zones.

Also was able to put in one of the two hose bibs.

When I went to test the first system, all the sprinklers in that zone came on execpt one. I forgot to cut the hole on the pipe where the sprinkler attached. Duh... Anyway, I also found out that the water would not turn off. So I had a ton of mud to deal with while I tried to figure out what I did wrong.
After about 40 minutes and a lot of mud, I found that one of the automatic valves was broken. I had to borrow one from the other manifold in order to make things work. Currently I do have a few leaks, but I will take care of them once I get a little more time to get things together. The other problem I had was when I was running a long pipe out to the end of the yard to allow for a hose bib. After getting the pipe ran, I realized that the company had send the wrong fitting to connect the metal pipe to the poly pipe. Darn it.
At about that time the storm started rolling in, so we cleaned up our pipe and tools. Once the tools where put away, we had to re-install the dog kennel so the dogs will have a place to stay when we head back to work. I hope the tarp that blocks the rain and sun stays in place because the wind was blowing pretty fiercely when I was finishing getting it all back together.
That was the end of the project for today, I forgot to mention scratz and I did spend about thirty minutes chatting with the neighbors who live two houses to the south of us. They too have been doing house projects all weekend long.
Tomorrow I believe my brother is heading over to help out a little. If he cant, then I will be working away at it myself and hopefully I can make some progress.

Until next time, remember the bear isn't the only thing that S***'s in the woods, so watch your step.

Sprinklers...Day 2

2009-05-30T21:45:00.006-06:00

Today was a very exhausting day. I was able to finish the trenches for the yard. What a pain. I can't even imagine doing this by hand. The shoveling is bad enough just to clean out the corners or crosses where trenches meet.

My brother and his wife showed up to help out. We still didnt make much of a dent in the overall system but their help was appreciated. I didnt think it would be this much of a hassle to get a sprinkler system in the ground. My brother and I spend a large portion of the day trying to figure out where and how to place the sprinkler boxes that house the manifolds. One of the things we were able to complete was connecting to the main city water and installing a mainline filter for the sprinkler system.
As far as actual pipe, we were able to run 1 main line all the way out to the end of the property which will feed a hose bib. We also were able to dig the location for the first bank of 5-manifolds for the backyard sprinkler zones. We ran into the problem of location due to how the sprinkler plan was written up. The sprinkler box was going to run from East to West. When we tried it in that orientation, it was found that we wouldn't be able to connect the main line to it. Therefore we had to dig an even bigger hole to get the box turned correctly. The part about digging which really sucks is that the ground has spots of clay which is not very fun to try and dig through. With my hands killing me from yesterdays excitement, shoveling proved to be even more painful.
Anyway, at about 4:30pm my help had to go home and get ready for a party that was being held at my place at 6pm. This is why if you notice that scratz wasn't mentioned as to helping out, she was busy cleaning the house and running errands to get ready for the party. I did a few minor things to the sprinkler system before I too had to go get cleaned up for the party.

The party was a combined Birthday party for the Parents. It was a nice little get together and even the infamous flat mate of my sister showed up. The only downside was that I am completely exhausted from the two days of working in the yard. This was probably a nice change for the rest of the family because I wasnt as loud and rambunctious as I normally am. All-in-all I had a pretty nice day.

Tomorrow, I took the day off with the hopes of getting a little more completed on the sprinkler system. I hope to finish the section of the system which is located where the dog kennel usually sits. This way I will have a place to put the dogs when we head back to work on Monday.

That's all for tonight, it is past my bedtime and I can hardly think. So if this post doesn't make much sense, I will correct my errors tomorrow. until then, remember rabies isn't the worse thing you can catch.

Long time coming...Sprinkler install...Day 1

2009-05-29T21:37:00.014-06:00

Hello to all of you faithful fans. (in case you were wondering I am not dead, just busy) Today I decided I would start with some of the home improvement updates as I get my lawn ready for the year. I keep thinking of things to blog about then another part of live takes center stage, so I forget what I wanted to blog about. Hopefully this project will allow me to have something to post about.

I finally had the chance to get a start on the "house to-do" list. The top thing on the list is getting the yard ready for the sprinkler system. A few weeks ago I reserved a trenching machine to help speed up the process of digging the trenches in the yard. Part of the reason I scheduled the trencher was to insure that I would actually start the work.

Once I made the reservation, I drew up a plot map of the yard and took it to the local sprinkler supply store for them to design my sprinkler system.

Here is a photo of the map I drew.

With the plan made, it was time to move forward with the project. A few days ago we paid for and had all the parts for the sprinkler system delivered. For the main piping, we are using black poly pipe instead of PVC. Due to the location, we had to buy pipe that is rated to 125psi.

Once the supplies were delivered, scratz and I placed fancy red flags all over the yard to show the location of where the sprinkler heads are to be placed. This took a couple of days because of work schedule and because the baby needs to be played with as well. :)

Front yard with hard to see flags

Backyard flags

Which brings us to today...Today was the day to pickup the trencher from the rental store and to start the fun work. I had my mother come over to watch the baby while I went to get the trencher at about 2:30pm. I finally got started trenching at about 3:30pm. Since it took me a little time deciding on my game plan, but once I got started it wasn't to bad.

Here I am just getting started for the day.

Shot of me making the first of many long trenches with this beast.

This think is like 800lbs if not more. It takes my whole body weight forcing against this beast to try and keep it on the path I want it to be on.

Making a little progress...Had to stop to text.

Here is one of the long runs.

This continued on for about 6 hours and I had to stop because it was getting to dark to see what I was doing. I only have a little more to go in the front yard. That should mean tomorrow I will finish up the rest of the trenching. I do need to figure out a few more things about main valve placement and which is the best way to run the pipe.

As for tonight, after many hours of trying to force that beast where I wanted it to go, my hands are killing me. When I was younger and worked construction, I don't think this would have made my hands this tender and sore. However because I work a desk job now, the most physical labor I have done recently is falling of my chair...I do have it on video but I think I would be in trouble if I posted it.

Anyway here is a shot a of my hand, both of them are this bright red.

So that is all for today, tomorrow we are going to see about getting some of the pipe in the ground.

Until then, don't get arrested.

I want nominated...

2009-03-19T12:55:00.000-06:00

Obsessed...

2009-03-05T04:22:00.004-07:00

For those of you that believe I am obsessed with my fish. I would like to submit this gentleman for consideration.
Dakota Reef Live Fish Cam

I don't look so crazy now do I?
(However, I would like to admit that I do check out his site quite often because I am a fish geek)

Stimulis plan...

2009-03-04T18:40:00.001-07:00

Three contractors are bidding to fix a broken fence at the White House. One is from Chicago , another is from Tennessee , and the third is from Minnesota .All three go with a White House official to examine the fence.
The Minnesota contractor takes out a tape measure and does some measuring,then works some figures with a pencil. "Well," he says, "I figure the job will run about $900: $400 for materials, $400 for my crew and $100profit for me."

The Tennessee contractor also does some measuring and figuring, then says, "I can do this job for $700: $300 for materials, $300 for my crew and $100 profit for me."

The Chicago contractor doesn't measure or figure, but leans over to the White House official and whispers, "$2,700."

The official, incredulous, says, "You didn't even measure like the other guys! How did you come up with such a high figure?"

The Chicago contractor whispers back, "$1000 for me, $1000 for you,and we hire the guy from Tennessee to fix the fence.""

Done!" replies the government official.

.....

I love politics

Quote of the day...

2009-03-01T05:28:00.000-07:00

"Remember the grass is always greener on the other side....unless you sneak out after dark and burn it."

Another week gone...

2009-03-01T04:49:00.004-07:00

I have read many different posts about what other individuals have accomplished in the weeks gone by and I wanted to add my own list in to the fray. I am sure I could come up with one or two actual accomplishments, however, I am going list the accomplishments that I have not made over the past few weeks. One of my un-accomplishments would be performing oil changes on both scratz and my vehicles. This auto maintenance task can be added to the fact that I am yet to replace the shocks on my car and to the task of fixing big red's strange noise that makes it sound like a tank. All of these things are "must do's" but I still haven't completed them.
Another thing that I have not accomplished is listing a few items I need to sell on either the local classifieds or on eBay. I have had a few things I was going to list about 2 months ago, but again I have not completed that task either. I was able to take the pictures of the items, but I failed to transfer them to a computer from the camera. Even though I am closer then I was, I still came up short on that task.
If you were to come over to the house you would quickly seem multiple projects that I have failed to complete. These would include moving all the junk from the 3rd car garage to the basement, finish connecting the stereo equipment in the living room, moving miscellaneous items to the basement from the rest of the house, and organizing my "junk" drawer in the kitchen. All of these lead to even more things I have not accomplished. For instance, I still need to organize the basement, but in order to do this I need to move all the stuff from around my house to the basement so I can organize it all at the same time.
Next on my list of un-accomplishment, I have yet to unpack from the trip to Cancun. So I still have a suitcase sitting in the walkway of the living room. This is a nice addition when you have visitors because they have to walk around it just to enter/leave the main living area.
also haven't given the dogs a bath or cut their nails in the last 3 weeks. Luckily for me, they are locked in their kennel area most of the day and night so they don't get their dog stink everywhere.
Now that I have listed my un-accomplishments, I will list a few things I was able to complete off of my "to-do" list. One thing that was on my list is loose weight. Luckily I was able to get food poisoning the other day which helped me loose 10 pounds. Next, I was able to kick and hurt my toe almost every single day since I have been home from the trip, therefore it still isn't healed. And for the final accomplishment this week, I was able to write a new "to-do" list of everything I still need to accomplish for next week. By adding "make a to-do list" to my "to-do" list allows me to have at least one item I can cross out before the next day arrives.
I hope everyone finds this post as uninformative as I have. I figured I needed to write something since I have been slacking off again. Pretty soon here I am going to start posting about how long it takes me to get ready for work since I am running out of time to do anything really exciting to post about.

Back again....

2009-02-22T01:27:00.002-07:00

Well after a nice few days in the sun, here I am. The first part of the trip was pretty much uneventful, which is the way I wanted it to go. However on the middle of the second day, I happened to kick a rock on the bottom of the ocean. And of course, I kicked my "almost walkable" toe, so now I am back to limping like an old man who lost his toe in a terrible lawn mowing accident. I wonder, do they make bionic toes yet? I mean, a man has walked on the Moon so there has to be hope for a replacement toe so I might be able to walk again, right??? Anyway, on the 3rd day it was cloudy so of course I ended up getting super sun burnt, which is a blast any time of year. I think there should be a national holiday for the sun burnt. That way we all could enjoy this pleasant experience. I did spend quite a bit of time digging in the sand and looking for sea creatures. I found a ton of amazing things that I wish I could put in my fish tank, but unfortunately it is against the law to bring anything back into the USA. Then for the last day, we actually switched hotels because the hotel we were at over booked our room so they offered us 3 free nights at their hotel if we stayed at a hotel across the street. Since we only had one day left we decided to take the offer which we could use later in the year. The entire trip was great except for the trip home. Our plane from Cancun was late which made us miss our connecting flight from Denver, so we ended up having to stand in a line for almost 2 hours for UNITED AIRLINES to tell us they couldnt help us and that we would have to just get the next available flight to our destination. This really sucked. So after that crappy delay we finally made it home at 12:30am. Now it is almost time for me to go to sleep.

I would like to thank "the parents" and the "Creator" and Liz for taking care of the baby for us while we were gone. Thanks again

Copying everyone else....

2009-02-15T03:57:00.005-07:00

To show that I am still just as gnarly as the rest of the "Myspace" crowd out there, I am going to fill out this post like about 10 million others have done since early 2001. Here goes

1. Color? If I have to pick one, then blue or maybe silver...Hmmm that's hard
2. Movie? Im gunna say Billy Madison....Hoooray for schooool!
3. Band? The Stiff Leggers
4. Song? By them? I'm afraid of the Great Salt Lake
5. Car? Truck? BMW 6 series (scart can I buy mine yet?)
6. Food? Yes, please
7. TV show? who has time to watch TV???
8. Animal? Fish, that does count right?
9. Sport? sports are for jocks (which I am not)
10. Dessert? I'll take two
11. Item of clothing? hair net
12. Accessory? gun, Santa always has one with him
13. Number? 46
14. Past time? killing.....on video games I swear
15. Season? not too much garlic
16. Holiday? My birthday since I have 2 each month :/
17. Shape? currently round
18. Drink? Strawberry daiquiri or bloody mary
19. Gum? None, it all looses its flavor within 10 seconds and it gets stuck in my hair
20. Candy? a gallon of milk
21. Day? nope its nighttime right now
22. Actress? hmm...none I think all the ones I liked are in jail
23. Piece of Jewelry? a hammock
24. Restaurant? the homeless shelter because the food is FREE
25. CD? the audio version of the holy bible in Arabic
26. Store? I store all sorts of crap, you should see my basement.
27. Hair product? I dont like hair in my food
28. Time of day? 4:09AM ( I'm really a vampire)
29. Vacation spot? any where there is sun, a beach, and I can run around naked singing my favorite songs from the Westside Story
30. Actor? Not any more, I have retired since my staring role in the hit movie "Losers"
31. Are you Awesome? Why Yes I am, I am a member of the Awesome Family. Thanks for asking

The Cancun Curse...

2009-02-14T21:14:00.004-07:00

Two and a half years ago, we were planing a trip to Cancun and some how as I was walking out of my old house I stepped on the side of the sidewalk and broke my ankle. I just had lunch with scrat at my house and she was headed back to work for the day. She had just driven out of view as I stepped on the edge of the sidewalk. As I did this, I heard a loud "POP" and instantly felt the excruciating pain in my ankle. When I fell, I also managed to toss my cell phone about 10ft away from where I was laying there dying. When I finally got up enough straight to drag myself to my phone, I tried calling my mother for help but she wasn't home. This resulted in scrat having to leave work because I couldn't get a hold of anyone else to help me. I even had neighbors drive by without stopping to see why I was laying in the dirt in front of my house. So because of my great talent, I got to wear a walking cast to our first trip to Cancun.
What does this story have to do with anything...Well again I have injured myself just weeks before leaving for Cancun. This injury is almost as grand as the previous one. I was walking to my car after work and I stepped in a rut left in the snow by a car. Someone in the process, I snapped my big toe. On top of that, I am sick as a dog sitting her at work. We have 3 days to go before bording a plane and flying to Mexico. I really hope that I can at least get rid of this cold before we leave. But because of this is making me wonder if there is a curse trying to keep me from Cancun. I guess we will only find out if I break something else next time we decided to head out there.

That's Craptastic....

2009-02-13T14:14:00.002-07:00

I managed to hurt my foot again...So I am cripple today. I haven't been able to do much because I cant walk. Therefore, getting anything done today is out of the question. The only thing I did do is pick up K from school. She apperently missed the bus and called her mother crying. Luckily I was able to hobble out the door and into the car to get the sad little girl. Then she made fun of me because I wore my slippers out of the house. So I made her walk home instead. That will teach her. HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA.

Have you ever noticed...

2009-02-09T22:57:00.002-07:00

In the imortal words of Andy Runey (is he dead yet?) " Have you ever noticed..." that when you have an injured part of your body, like a hand, a foot, or a finger that no matter how hard you try to protect it, it is the first thing that gets kicked, hit, or bumped? I am currently in that pardicument right now. I broke my toe probably a month ago, and no matter how hard I try to avoid bumping my toe, I can never make it a day without hurting it again. I know you have all had a simular experince. The most common way I re-injur my toe is when taking care of the baby. I have kicked a center bar thing on her crib about a thousand times. This is great way to make an already anoying day even better. The next most common way is by baby k herself. Somehow when I lay her on the ground when I am sitting by her, she LOVES to kick my toe. Obviously there isnt much I can to about this except for curse to myself while baby k is grinning from ear to ear. The worst part about my sore toe is that we have our trip we are going on in less then 2 weeks. I am not looking forward to walking around the endless miles of airports, while tring to get to the beach. Some days it is all I can do to make it from my bed to the bathroom without my toe just killing me. I guess I will just try to focus on how nice it will be sitting on the beach and basking in the sun.

We're back...

2009-02-09T02:34:00.003-07:00

OK, after a terrifying 2 months without Internet, I am back. We had to go with a different ISP because of where the new place is located, they do not have any cable lines ran out her yet. Maybe one year we will have cable Internet again, but until that day comes, at least we have something. I don't know how the world ever functioned without the Internet, I did have access to it at work to help with the withdrawal symptoms I was having. The problem with that is my work blocks everything except for a few random sites, luckily for me they still do not block eBay. This way I was still able to feed that habit as well.
So in the past 2 months of not posting, there have been a lot of interesting happenings going on. Unfortunately I don't remember them, so I wont be writing about them. I do want everyone to know, that if you have never had a baby and worked the graveyard shift, you are missing out!!! I think everyone out there should have the opportunity to work 12 hours, have a drive time of almost 1 hour each way from work, and be the day care provider for a new baby. I just want to say that is it a complete test of patients which should be shared with as many people as possible. Luckily for the parents, they get to "share" this experience at least 2 days a week. And coming up shortly, Liz and the "Creator" will also be able to bask in the excitement we like to call baby k. I know the rest of you are probably feeling like you are missing out on a great opportunity, well don't stress to much because I am sure there will be many opportunities for each and everyone of you to take a turn. As a matter of fact, if for some reason you would like to try your hand at the baby sitting gig between the hours of 8am and 3pm just let me know. (I am sure the current baby sitter would appreciate the sleep. )
Oh and while I remember, I will be doing an update on my fish here shortly for all of those fish fans I have out there. There have been some exciting additions to the maintain, I am sure EVERYONE is sitting on the edge of their computer chairs waiting for that update.
Until next time, drive slow because you never know when a watermelon might be watching.

Lighten Up...

2008-11-21T23:39:00.007-07:00

Here are the pictures of the lights in the house as promised....but before we get the the lights, here are a few pictures of the arch and the trim work being completed.

Here is the entry view...

Now on to the lights...

New Diet...

2008-11-21T22:55:00.003-07:00

If you ever needed to loose a few extra pounds, I have a great product for you. It is the new and improved Wonder Sauna Hot Pants! They are AMAZING!!! Just inflate and wait! and soon you too can look just like the models in the photo....

More House Pics....

2008-11-21T15:48:00.008-07:00

In the down time of my blog, I have still had the chance to go look at the house. Here are some pictures for those who are interested.
for those who are not interested, you can move on.
11-19-08
Here is the kitchen,

Master Bathroom area

The Entry and Banister

And here is the workers finishing up the exterior trim..

They started putting in the lights today, I only took one picture but we are heading back up there (at about 4:30 if anyone wants to meet us) to take more...

Waiter....check please...

2008-11-21T15:40:00.003-07:00

So after some very strange happenings around this place, I believe we (me, myself, and I) are back up and running. Im not sure of the real cause behind everything but if I find out, I will be sure to let everyone know. As for now I am keeping this blog locked down for the most part, but it will still be here. So until next time....

Na Na Hey Hey Goodbye

2008-11-18T17:03:00.000-07:00

Are you at risk?

2008-11-17T02:37:00.002-07:00

Use Google's new flu tracker to see if you're at risk. This is a great tool for all you hypochondriacs out there

Flu Trends

House Update...

2008-11-16T00:11:00.006-07:00

Well we got a chance to drop by the house, therefore here are some pictures of the progress. The builders have completed the stone work...

and installed the garage doors...

Also the Power company has installed the powermain on to the house. (didnt get a picture.) And they have begun painting the inside of the house. Here is a shot of the stained banister.

I believe the cabinets will be going in in about 7 days from now and we are currently still looking for a completion in the first part of December. So make sure you have time saved up at work in order to take the time off to help move.

Can't stop KILLING!!!

2008-11-13T16:09:00.003-07:00

I can't stop and I won't stop.....

If any of you are wondering if Fallout 3 is any good, the answer is yes....

Obama's hiding change....

2008-11-09T18:12:00.003-07:00

The information I will be posting is from the President-Elect's website for change. For all of you that believe in the right to bare arms, this should worry you a little. Also this infomation has been removed from their website as of today, luckily everyting on the internet lasts forever.

"Address Gun Violence in Cities: As president, Barack Obama would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment, which restricts the ability of local law enforcement to access important gun trace information, and give police officers across the nation the tools they need to solve gun crimes and fight the illegal arms trade. Obama and Biden also favor commonsense measures that respect the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, while keeping guns away from children and from criminals who shouldn't have them. They support closing the gun show loophole and making guns in this country childproof. They also support making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent, as such weapons belong on foreign battlefields and not on our streets."

Original site info...
http://change.gov/agenda/

and this is all that is left on the current page...
http://change.gov/agenda/

Why are they hiding their agenda now?

Tile is going down...

2008-11-09T14:27:00.002-07:00

Just a quick shot of the interior. Could not get many other pictures because I was in their way. But here is the kitchen tile. I think the room looks a lot larger with the tile.

All Points Bulletin....

2008-11-07T23:06:00.003-07:00

Be on the lookout for this suspicious character. Last seen in the optical department of Shopko. He is known to carry large amounts of candy in plastic bags.

Donations....

2008-10-30T22:07:00.002-06:00

Baby K wants to thank her favorite aunts for donating to her cause. She was able to get 4 new outfits!!!

More to see....

2008-10-30T21:36:00.009-06:00

I haven't had much time to blog since I have now officially gone back to work. So between work and all the girls, my time is again limited. However scratz and I did have the change to run out the new place to get a few pictures.
On the 29th, they were pouring the driveway and the sidewalks.

Also, they had sheetrocked most of the inside, just need to do a little mud and taping.

They also had completed the stucko on the backside of the house (looks great)

Then today (the 30th), we dropped by and the crews were doing the mud and tape inside and the front of the house is ready for the rock.

Fancy vent, this will be the color of the exterior trim

I guess they don't need the lot marker sign any longer.

Now, here is our house and the neighbors house. It's hard to believe that they started building our neighbors house the day before ours.

Completing the Arch...

2008-10-24T22:35:00.006-06:00

When Scratz and I decided to go with the model of home that we asked if it would be possible to have the arch stained to a darker color then what came standard. You might think to yourself that we would receive a simple Yes or No answer in a short amount of time...well if you thought that you would be wrong. It has taken since August for us to receive the first real response, apparently with all the houses that Ivory Homes has built they have never had anyone ask to have the arch stained. Once they contacted basically everyone in the company, they decided they would let us stain the arch ourselves. So scratz and I had to sign some additional paperwork that gave us permission to be on the job site to complete the staining. Once this was singed, duplicated, and processed by Ivory Homes, we headed to Home Depot to buy some stain and then drove over to the new place to get to work.

We got there sometime after 11am and began getting everything ready to paint. Here is a picture during the process.

Everything was going well until I spilled half of the stain in the container I was holding down onto the porch. Luckily most of it landed on the tarp that we had placed down so we didnt have to clean up much. The problem with this was that we originally bought enough stain to complete the job. Therefore, off to Home Depot we went again to buy more stain. This took longer than we thought.We worked on the arch until 4pm when we had to leave so I could make it to a work meeting.
This is what it looked like after 1 coat. However since according to the instructions it stated we needed at least 2 coats of paint.

Once I got out of the work meeting, I headed from Magna back to our condo to pick up scratz and then drove out to the new place to finish the job. By the time we got to the new place it was already past 9pm and the sun had gone down hours earlier. We had gone to the storage shed and picked up the flood light and an extension cord so we could see as we painted. By the time we finished staining the wood it was after 11pm. Luckily we had left baby k at the grandparents house while we stood outside for the whole time. I am sure the neighbors already think we are insane, but they might as well find out now because they are sure to find out after we move in.

Anyway, today we headed back to the house to see how the "painting in the dark" project turned out. I was impressed with how nicely it turned out for not being able to see what the heck we were doing and this is what we found.

Also, they have stocked the house with Sheetrock and will be completing the mud and tape very soon. We have also received noticed that we are to start getting all the paperwork together which will be needed at closing. Hopefully we can have the house done by the end of November.

Well I was....

2008-10-24T22:15:00.005-06:00

I was going to post a funny story about how we decided to put socks on Jersey and took pictures of him. However, someone who will remain un-named stole a picture and has already posted it on their blog. The world is full of savages I tell you.

We were going through some of baby K's clothes and decided that a few of the pairs of socks no longer fit her anymore since she now weighs in at a hefty 11.6lbs. While gathering the socks, Jersey walked into the room and he became the subject of our entertainment. It was quite humorous to watch Jersey try to walk around the house without having any of his feet touch the ground for more than a brief moment. After a short time we took the socks off because you could see the pure humiliation in his eyes.
Here are the pics
.
.

The Mrs. Obama tape?

2008-10-22T15:42:00.003-06:00

Have any of you heard about the supposed recording of Mrs. Obama from when she contacted a foreign media outlet to complain that they (API) was trying to make it so her husband wouldn't win the election?
We'll these tapes are suppose to have Mrs. Obama talking about how even though her husband was adopted by his step-father who is a citizen of Indonesia, this can't stop him from being president. These sites state that IF these tapes do exist and they really do have Mrs. Obama on them, and Barak is really adopted by his foreign born father, Barak cannot be president of the United States.
I am wondering if the truth about these tapes will come out before the election.

here are a few links
http://www.worldnetdaily.com Mrs. Obama tapes

and the original link
API's artical about the tapes

The Legacy...

2008-10-20T22:29:00.006-06:00

I don't know how many of you have had the chance to drive on the Legacy Parkway, but I wonder if the Legacy it will leave behind is the amount of dead Raccoons on the side of the road. You cant drive more that 100 meters without seeing dead Raccoons. When the question about the number of Raccoons being killed in the area, the environmentalists just said the Raccoons are Feral animals and they only really were interested in protecting the waterfowl and wetland animals. This idea makes me wonder, why do so many people get upset if someone goes out an kills cats (which could also be considered feral animals). I don't think you can go anyplace without seeing homeless cats wandering around. But if someone decided to go out an run them over with their cars, I think PETA would be camped out protesting them as well as the cops showing up to press charges for animal cruelty.
But apparently this doesn't occur for the Raccoons. Apparently cats have a better PR director than the Raccoons.
I don't see PETA going out of their way to protest the Legacy Parkway over the Raccoon experiment. I wonder who decides what animals to protect and which animals not to protect.
All I know is this little guy might be riding your bumper on Legacy Parkway before the end of the week.

As I sit here...

2008-10-20T21:54:00.002-06:00

I really want to blog. The problem is that I don't have anything to blog about. There is nothing new in the news, nothing new in the house building, and we still live in a condo. Now I don't know how many of you have had the opportunity to live with 5 people in a 800sqft to 900sqft condo. Well it isn't pretty. You would think I might be use to it because when I was growing up it was common for people to have a 1000sqft house with 8-10 people. In my childhood there were the 8 of us living in a 3 bedroom house with only one bathroom.
Obviously, I survived the living arrangements from when I was a kid, but I do have the battle wounds from the conflicts with my brothers and sisters. There was no way to have any alone time at my childhood house unless you went outside. Luckily what we lacked in space in the house, it was made up by the room to run around outside. But while in the house, it was only a matter of minutes before you were being annoyed by a brother or sister or you were annoying a brother or sister as your form of entertainment. I can't count the number of battles I have had with my siblings over the years while I was younger. Luckily for each of our sakes we all moved out and away from each other. My experience of living to closely with everyone has manifested itself again in the condo. The only real difference is that we have 2 bathrooms, but when you live with as many girls as I do, that is barely enough. So I am looking forward to moving into the new house so we all can have some breathing room and a backyard to hang out in. We just need to figure out a way to prevent us from getting the West Nile virus from all the mosquitoes which seem to infest the area.

* Oh by the way, if you actually read that whole blog, you really must find something better to do with your free time. :)

Everyone else is doing it...

2008-10-17T21:10:00.003-06:00

Have you ever received the email from a friend or family member to join Facebook? Well, if you have ever contemplated joining, this is the type of crazy's that you will be able to keep in touch with.

Happy Facebooking!!!

Husband hacked wife to death...after she changed Facebook status...

Baby k and me...

2008-10-17T14:20:00.002-06:00

I decided I better post an updated picture. We took this earlier today....isn't she cute???

Choices....

2008-10-10T21:05:00.005-06:00

More house pics.

2008-10-10T19:10:00.006-06:00

Here are some more progress pictures of the "Pears Place" for all my fans.
10-08-08

Our view of the neighbors house threw our bathroom window.

The distance between the two houses

The sunset that night

10-10-08
From down the street

Almost completely Framed.

The fancy entrance way is now in place.

There is no ♥ on the internet

2008-10-08T21:28:00.002-06:00

Well this proves it, There is no ♥ on the internet.....

.....Don't worry, I will never give up until I find ♥!

Quote of the day....

2008-10-08T17:20:00.003-06:00

"A Mother is a Mother, but a Father will never be(..a Mother)"

Easy come, easy go.....

2008-10-07T23:47:00.003-06:00

After seeing me in this picture.

I figured it was time for a change.

It's getting there...

2008-10-07T23:07:00.012-06:00

It has been a little while since I have been able to update the status of the new "Pears Place."

While we were out driving on the Legacy Parkway we happened to see a new Ivory Homes subdivision. In that subdivision we found a house being build that is going the the same model as ours. Since we have never even seen what our house is going to look like when it is done, besides in pictures, we decided to head over and take a look. Luckily the people at Ivory are very helpful and they gave us a key to the home so we could go walk through it. Since there were workers in the home putting down the carpet, we didn't take any pictures of the inside of the home, but here is a picture of the exterior. Other than a few colors, this is pretty much what the "Pears Place" will look like.

So here are some pictures to give my faithful viewers an idea of how everything is going.

10-02-09

10-03-08

10-06-07 (apparently we forgot to take more pics)

10-07-08 (forgot to take real pictures)

That's all for this blog

It's getting bigger....

2008-10-07T22:03:00.002-06:00

These last few days have been completely exhausting. I once thought I had a fairly busy life until baby k came into the picture. I am truly luckily that I have scrat around to help out.

The other night at about midnight, I had the opportunity to change baby k's diaper. For anyone who has not had the chance to do this, you are really not missing out on anything. I had previously changed one diaper so you would thing I would have this process down. (me and scrat have a deal, I pick up the dog poop and she changes the baby diapers.) Well the previous diaper I changed was during the day and it wasn't to bad. Well, this time it was completely different...baby k was very very awry, tired, hungry...all with a dirty diaper. At first, under the dimly lit night light, everything seemed to be going fine. I got the messy diaper almost off, then baby k started to rebel...kicking and screaming like a baby possessed. I couldn't keep a hold of her. She was kicking the old diaper, kicking the new diaper. It was making a mess EVERYWHERE. Scratz offered to help but by dammit, I was bound and determined to accomplish this diaper change. I was finally able to get the old diaper out of the way of the flailing feet. Just as I think I start to have everything under control, I reached for the baby powered...which I assumed was already open...and nothing came out. Trying to hold the baby's feet, while turning the top of a baby power bottle (in the dark) is a disaster in the making. Without going into all the details, in that 5 minute period I swore off changing any diapers or having any other children as long I live (or until scratz tricks me again)

For Geoffy-boy...

2008-10-06T18:56:00.003-06:00

I remember reading a while back on Geoffrey's blog about his preferred way to have his toilet paper. Seeing this today reminded me of his blog.
So Geoffy-boy enjoy

Back to work...

2008-09-28T23:58:00.002-06:00

Today scratz and I are starting to really feel the effects of having an additional member of our family. Baby k apparently has 3 mothers in addition to scratz herself. Both A. and K. can't seem to get enough of the baby, however this can be somewhat of a over abundance of hands when scratz needs to really tend to the baby. You might have noticed I said 3 mothers but only listed two of them. Well, the third individual that believes they are the baby's mother is JERSEY!!! That silly dog has decided that he needs to be around the baby at all times and if Precious even walks by the baby's bassinet, he growls at her and forces her away. I have never seen a dog that has decided to "own" a baby like this. As all of you can guess, this new protective act by Jersey doesn’t sit well with scrat. I don’t know how long this battle with last, but I have my money on scrat.
Antie Jess dropped into today to spend time with the baby. She also was treated to some entertainment by K. and A. K. was putting on a crazy show and A. was practicing her typing skills for school. I'm sure Jess can testify to the fact that there is not a lack of luxury at the condo.
Scrat had a pretty draining day today with taking care of the baby. She has been on the go basically since 2pm of the day she was released from the hospital. Today, I could tell that all the running around and caring for the 2 kids and the baby were starting to take their toll on her. I tried my best to take some of the pressure off of her but there are only certain things that I can do to help her out. The things that are the most draining are things that I have no physical way of doing them for her. As I said today has been a little more draining since I headed back to work, leaving her to take care of the 3 kids and 2 dogs without the limited assistance that I can give. Luckily I will be off work for the next month to help out with what I can. (I probably just get in the way anyways. Lol)

First day out...

2008-09-26T20:06:00.004-06:00

Today the family loaded into the car and went on a few errands. We went and bought some more stuff for the baby. Mom and baby are doing great, we happen to have 2 little mom's that try so hard to be the one that gets to handle the baby. Sometime this extra "help" can be a little to much. Anyway's on the first day out, baby k did really well. She only cried for a few times and only for a minute or two. Mom is a real trooper, however, she hasn't complained about how much pain she is in or how tired she must be. Oh, one thing we decided today was that baby k has my nose (sorry baby k), other than that I think she has more of scratz features than mine. (thank goodness!!)

So we drove by the dirt to see how much progress they have made. The seem to be moving along decently. Here are some pics. If you look closely you can see scratz and the baby...

Clocks a tickin'....

2008-09-24T08:47:00.001-06:00

Well, the process has been started. We are just waiting on the baby now. Everything is going smooth so far. I will keep everyone posted.

Quick Update...

2008-09-23T18:25:00.003-06:00

House:
They are steadily moving along on the house. Here are a few pics (courtesy of aNon) of the progress.

Baby K:
well still nothing to report. I work tonight from 6pm to 6am, then it's time to rush home and take the dogs outside, pick up the the pregnant lady that I know and take her to the hospital by 7:15. I tried to make it to work early today so I could leave early, but like always everything that could happen to keep me from arriving early...did. I hope things happen fairly quickly tomorrow so we can get a little rest. Thats all for now, I will update when I can.

Countdown begins....

2008-09-23T06:47:00.002-06:00

The 24-hour clock begins as of this minute until baby k's adventure begins.

It's 4am...

2008-09-22T04:58:00.002-06:00

Do you know where your kids are?

Well for me this is an easy question....baby k won't get out of scratz belly. Another day gone and baby k has yet to make an appearance. I guess she is going to be more like her father after all. Hopefully she will have more patience than I do.

Movie Review...

2008-09-22T04:44:00.002-06:00

The cat-lady is always posting movie reviews of movies so I decided I would post one myself. So in case anyone wanted to know, Hitch is still a great movie. It's great for date night, great for hanging out with friends, and great for watching while at work. The plot is simple, guy wants to meet girl, he's a dork and needs help in meeting girl. Guy helps other guy meet girl, the laughter then follows. That's it!!! Romantic comedy at it's best, the only other movie that compares is 300.

I think I have watched it almost 50 times while at work but I am still entertained by it. I give it a rating of "broccoli and cheese salad". Thanks

A sound footing...

2008-09-19T12:31:00.006-06:00

Here are the latest pics from the house build. It is slowly coming along. Hopefully they will get a head of schedule and we can start seeing the shape of the house shortly.
This picture was taken a day ago.

The only discuraging thing we did find out is that the land next to us is building their house at the same time. The problem with this is...they are right on top of us. It appears the back of their house will be directly next to the side of ours. Here is the dirt island between the two.

We rolled out to the dirt again today after the Dr. appointment. (by the way the baby could be here at any moment so watch for that update).
As of today they have poured the footings for the house.

here is a larger shot of the footings as you can clearly see, scratz is not as big as a house yet.

Once again here is a shot of the lovely scratz on the island between the houses. I still cant believe they decided to put their house so close to the property line. As you can see in the large shot there is a string that runs parallel to the holes which marks the property line, their hole is inches from this line. what a pain. (I guess on a positive light I will be able to look in their house all I want and I hope they have naked Thursdays!!!)

Wouldn't want to forget Pirate Day....

2008-09-19T12:31:00.005-06:00

You can't have pirate day without some good old fashion Pirate rap!

And for the one person out there that wants to buy the ablum.
Captain Dan & the Scurvy Crew

or you can even visit Captain Dan & the Scurvy Crew on MySpace.com
(http://www.myspace.com/captaindan)

My Garden...

2008-09-17T07:07:00.002-06:00

So when we moved out of the Magna place, I decided to take my favorite plants with me. Since the new buyers wanted to be so cheap, I decided they could by their own plants for their garden.

Don't worry I didn't take everything, I left them the weeds and the dog poop.

The Carwash...

2008-09-16T23:02:00.002-06:00

Experience the new carwash with me.

(this does mean that there is a 90% chance of it raining tomorrow.)

It all begin's today....

2008-09-16T01:08:00.003-06:00

The long awaited day began today (or should I say yesterday)... The construction of the new Pears Place has begun. There was suppose to be a pre-dig meeting at 10am, however working graveyards and getting to bed by 8am make it a little difficult to go to such things. I did drag myself out of bed at noon, took the dogs outside, and then headed up to my dirt patch.
When I got there, this is what I found.

Here is the so called “dead-dog”

And here is one of my new neighbors.

So there is the start. I have my fingers crossed that they stick to schedule and we will be able to move in before Christmas.

Back to work...

2008-09-14T20:40:00.002-06:00

Since I haven’t done any really updates, I will do a few quick ones to cover the latest and greatest. Unfortunately I had a very short weekend and the majority of my time was filled by me trying to fix the computer. Just before we moved from the Magna house, I believe we had some type of electrical event. Whether it was a power outage or gremlins paling around, either way, because of this the motherboard on my Media Center died as well as a 500gb hard drive. The process of repairing the system after the motherboard was replaced has been a nightmare. All the while I kept being asked if the computer worked yet so the kids could watch a movie. Nothing helps the process go as smoothly without the continual question if it was fixed yet or not. Finally by this morning, the computer slightly worked enough for the kids to watch a movie so they are as “bored” as they have been. I will need to try and fix it again on my days off because it only kind of works.
-On further news, scratz keeps trying to have baby k before the pre-planned date. Hopefully baby k can learn a little patience and just stay put for another 10 days. If not, then she will be running the chance that I won’t be there when she is born. Luckily I hear that these days baby’s arrive potty trained and able to use an ipod at birth.

-We dropped by the “dirt patch” on Saturday to see if the construction people had started anything. Well there were 3 or 4 big tractors and they had knocked down all the weeds. They also had repainted all the markings on the ground for water, power, and sewer as well. ( we took pics, but I don’t have them downloaded yet) Scratz also picked a bunch of wildflowers from the backyard that she was going to keep. However, she left them in my car and they wilted (or melted) depending on how you look at it.
-Dogs and a condo…this is something I would not recommend to anyone, It is a major hassle every single day. I cant believe how time consuming it is. The dogs think they need to go outside to use the bathroom, however, once outside they find everything else to do besides go to the bathroom. This process can take up to 30 minutes a time for them to remember that they needed to use the bathroom. ARRRGGG. Luckily we will be in a big house with a big yard soon so I won’t have to deal with the condo anymore.
-I know a lot of you have wondered about the fish situation; well they are doing good for the most part. I have lost a few of my favorite corals, my favorite fish, and a tulip anemone. The fish don’t seem to like the little tanks very much because there is no place to swim or hid. Hopefully they will survive until I can get the big tank set back up.
- the last topic for today is, dead people/people in different dimensions. Lately I have been seeing a lot of “people.” Maybe it is because of the number of times I have to take the dogs out, but I see at least 2-3 per day. They really don’t do anything, some sit on rocks, some walk-up stairs, some just stand there.

I told scratz the other day that luckily none of them visit me in the shower. Can you imagine that, you close your eyes to wash your hair and when you open them again there is someone standing in front of you…it’s bad enough that I have to see myself naked but I wouldn’t want a ghost seeing me like that. I figure they must be here for the grand opening of the Legacy Highway.
-The Legacy Highway or it should be called the Lamemacy Highway. I can’t believe how much money was spent on a two lane highway with a speed limit of 55mpg. Me and scratz just happened to drive on it minutes after it had opened. They have brown painted sign poles, lots of fancy overpasses, and a nice view of the junk in businesses backyards, it’s great. I can’t believe they didn’t make the companies clean up the mess if they are trying to promote all the “scenic views” the highway offers. I also drove it into work today. I don’t really see how it will benefit most people, but we will see if there is an impact on the Monday morning commute. I personally will still take I-15 to work and maybe the Legacy on the way home. It took me 10min longer to get to work today on the new highway then my regular route.

Lunch time...

2008-09-13T12:02:00.000-06:00

What did you bring me?

Spiderman Updated...

2008-09-11T23:54:00.002-06:00

As per scratz request, the spiderman has been updated.

I love super Hero's...

2008-09-11T13:33:00.004-06:00

I will save you!!!! (right after I catch my breath)

I think spidey needs to lay off the Ho-Ho's

Rumor has it....

2008-09-11T12:34:00.002-06:00

...that they will be breaking ground Monday morning. IF everything goes as planned there will be a party at aNon's house in 3 months. ok, time to go back to bed, the lack of sleep is killing me.

Water Bear...

2008-09-09T18:16:00.003-06:00

They are so cute....almost as cute as Bingo.

http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn14690-water-bears-are-first-animal-to-survive-vacuum-of-space.html?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=news4_head_dn14690

Finally...

2008-09-09T16:36:00.001-06:00

well, I just signed the papers so that the Magna house now belongs to someone else. WOOOO-WHOOO!!! That is one less thing I will need to worry about. However, we are on the 2 week countdown to baby-K. Hopefully scratz doesnt have the baby before then. I have to run to work, so that is it for now.

New Car...TOTAL HIGH TECH

2008-09-05T15:09:00.003-06:00

well, I was forced to sell my prelude due to the fact that there is no room in the car for more than 2 people (unless you have to people that have no legs to sit in the back). So I listed an ad and my car sold the same day. Luckily the guy who bought my car wanted to meet me in Kaysville. So I had him drive me over to mom's and drop me off. I really wasnt planing on selling it so quickly, but since I had a buyer let it go even though I didnt have a replacement. Then after scrat got off work, we went to look at a couple of cars. The one we ended up getting is top of the line HIGH TECH. It even has a built in carphone.

SWEET, now I can talk on the phone and drive down State Street and pick up on the babes.

Unfortunately, scratz found out about my sinister plan and figured with such and awesome piece of hardware that she wanted it for herself. So she tore it out of my car.

However, I dont feel that a pregnant lady should have such a SWEET piece of technology, so I am going to box it up and give it away at the next x-mas party. You better start being nice to me just in case I get your name in the annual drawing.

Ugly Betty....

2008-09-03T21:22:00.003-06:00

if you didnt get the opertunity to check out the post of on Ugly Betty, I recommend it for a good laugh. It is funny enough to almost cause scratz into early labor... Here's the proof.