This is my first time contributing to the blog, so here it goes...
It was awesome to be able to spend my mother's birthday with my two favorite women. No matter how old I am, I never cease to be amazed at my mother's wisdom. She has taught me numerous valuable lessons such as:
1. All the toe wrinkling and flicking will not help when frustrated!
2. Failing is okay if you tried your hardest and examined every avenue and learned something along the way.
3. Not all buttons were made for pushing or pulling ( I still kinda doubt this one).
The list could go on for days and days with all of the valuable things she has taught me, but I can sum all of them up with simple Thank You Mom!!
I hope you had a wonderful Birthday -- I loved it. I thought it was perfect!! I could not have picked two better people to spend a weekend with!
Love Chad
Monday, September 29, 2008
More Birthday Festivities!
After last weekend's birthday festivities in Phoenix, we were able to just keep the party going this past weekend with Chad's Mom who had a birthday on Saturday.
For her birthday, we had decided to take her down to Hollywood to see Wicked on Friday night. We had gone in February and LOVED it and knew she would love it too, and we were all very excited to go.
We had a wonderful evening on Friday. First we went and ate WAY too much yummy food at Bubba Gump's at the Universal Studios Citywalk. Then we headed over to the Pantages, which is an amazing old art deco theater right on Hollywood Blvd and Vine. Here is a cool pic of the inside (which, sadly enough, I did not take):
The show was AMAZING (as we knew it would be). For any of you out there that ever have a chance to see it, you should take it. It truly is one of the best musicals I've ever seen (and I've seen a few). Our seats were pretty good too -- row G off to stage left, and they got better after intermission when we took possession of some seats even closer to the center. Awesome!!
After the show, we had decided to stay over in Los Angeles so we could go to the temple for a session on Saturday. We had a very lovely hotel in West Hollywood. In fact, it was so lovely that we had a bit of a lazy morning on Saturday and ended up, once we found some yummy breakfast in Brentwood, not even being able to attend a session. Turns out, the last session on Saturday was at 11:30 and we missed it. While a little disappointing, none of us were sad, because the whole point had been just to spend some time together and we enjoyed every minute of it.
It was a great little mini-vacation and we loved it.
Happy Birthday Mom! We love you!!
For her birthday, we had decided to take her down to Hollywood to see Wicked on Friday night. We had gone in February and LOVED it and knew she would love it too, and we were all very excited to go.
We had a wonderful evening on Friday. First we went and ate WAY too much yummy food at Bubba Gump's at the Universal Studios Citywalk. Then we headed over to the Pantages, which is an amazing old art deco theater right on Hollywood Blvd and Vine. Here is a cool pic of the inside (which, sadly enough, I did not take):
The show was AMAZING (as we knew it would be). For any of you out there that ever have a chance to see it, you should take it. It truly is one of the best musicals I've ever seen (and I've seen a few). Our seats were pretty good too -- row G off to stage left, and they got better after intermission when we took possession of some seats even closer to the center. Awesome!!
After the show, we had decided to stay over in Los Angeles so we could go to the temple for a session on Saturday. We had a very lovely hotel in West Hollywood. In fact, it was so lovely that we had a bit of a lazy morning on Saturday and ended up, once we found some yummy breakfast in Brentwood, not even being able to attend a session. Turns out, the last session on Saturday was at 11:30 and we missed it. While a little disappointing, none of us were sad, because the whole point had been just to spend some time together and we enjoyed every minute of it.
It was a great little mini-vacation and we loved it.
Happy Birthday Mom! We love you!!
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
The Day the Music Died
For all of you who were planning that road trip out here just to experience the wacky 'musical road', I'm sad to report that you're too late.
They paved over the road yesterday, due to complaints from the locals about the 'noise'. Apparently there are some very light sleepers in our neighboring subdivision and they kept being awakened by the 'horrible' cocophony coming from the road. Honestly, we could hear it and we're almost a mile away. But it wasn't anything horrible or even annoying. Just sorta entertaining..
Oh well.. it was fun while it lasted.. although it was less than a month. It did put us on the map. There was even a news story on the BBC about it (Complete with video)! If you'd like to check out some of the coverage:
Musical Road Hits Sour Note With Neighbors
US 'Musical Road' Hits Bum Note
They paved over the road yesterday, due to complaints from the locals about the 'noise'. Apparently there are some very light sleepers in our neighboring subdivision and they kept being awakened by the 'horrible' cocophony coming from the road. Honestly, we could hear it and we're almost a mile away. But it wasn't anything horrible or even annoying. Just sorta entertaining..
Oh well.. it was fun while it lasted.. although it was less than a month. It did put us on the map. There was even a news story on the BBC about it (Complete with video)! If you'd like to check out some of the coverage:
Musical Road Hits Sour Note With Neighbors
US 'Musical Road' Hits Bum Note
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Happy Birthday Mom!
Saturday was Mom's 70th Birthday. In order to properly celebrate this significant milestone, Chad & I drove to Phoenix to surprise her (and boy did we surprise her!). We had a big family dinner at Mike's house and everyone made it aside from those who live out of state. We had yummy food and were able to spend some good quality time with the whole family. It was a great weekend and we had a lot of fun (aside from the heat! Ick!!)
As part of her present, we called friends and family and had them contribute letters that we put into a book. I spent all last week assembling the messages and pictures. As I did so and was able to share in some of those sentiments, I was overwhelmed by the example of friendship, service, love and faith that she has been to me and all those around her in these many years. (Truth be told, I cried for hours one morning as I cut/pasted them all together and read segments here and there..) She is an amazing person and I am so lucky to be able to call her 'Mom'.
Happy Birthday Mom!! We love you!!
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
A Musical Road to Nowhere
I know this is going to sound completely insane, but the Japanese have done it again. Avenue K just west of our house plays the William Tell Overture when you drive over it at 60 mph.
I know, I know it sounds crazy and impossible. My coworker at work told me about it yesterday and I wasn't sure whether to believe him or not, and Chad was convinced he wasn't serious. But it showed up in the paper today, and, if it's in print it has to be true, right? So we went on a little trip after work to verify that it was, indeed true .. and sure enough.. it worked!
They filmed a Honda commercial out here and the Japanese (who have done this on a few roads in Japan and Korea) cut grooves in the road at just the right intervals / frequency to produce music. It uses your car as the 'tuning fork' and you can hear the music by simply driving over it.
It is, by far, one of the wackiest things I've seen/experienced in a while. The funniest part? It's out in the middle of nowhere.. our housing tract is pretty much the west end of town and Avenue K just stretches from here out into the desolate desert beyond. Just begs the questions.. why here?
But.. I guess we needed another tourist attraction, right?? See.. more of you want to come and visit us now.. don't you? Hmm.. perhaps it's working. :-)
Here is the audio we recorded on Chad's phone on our 'musical journey'
share your files at box.net
If you're totally fascinated (how could you not be?) Here is the youtube link for a video of someone on the road in Korea that plays "Mary Had a Little Lamb": Anyang Singing Road
I know, I know it sounds crazy and impossible. My coworker at work told me about it yesterday and I wasn't sure whether to believe him or not, and Chad was convinced he wasn't serious. But it showed up in the paper today, and, if it's in print it has to be true, right? So we went on a little trip after work to verify that it was, indeed true .. and sure enough.. it worked!
They filmed a Honda commercial out here and the Japanese (who have done this on a few roads in Japan and Korea) cut grooves in the road at just the right intervals / frequency to produce music. It uses your car as the 'tuning fork' and you can hear the music by simply driving over it.
It is, by far, one of the wackiest things I've seen/experienced in a while. The funniest part? It's out in the middle of nowhere.. our housing tract is pretty much the west end of town and Avenue K just stretches from here out into the desolate desert beyond. Just begs the questions.. why here?
But.. I guess we needed another tourist attraction, right?? See.. more of you want to come and visit us now.. don't you? Hmm.. perhaps it's working. :-)
Here is the audio we recorded on Chad's phone on our 'musical journey'
share your files at box.net
If you're totally fascinated (how could you not be?) Here is the youtube link for a video of someone on the road in Korea that plays "Mary Had a Little Lamb": Anyang Singing Road
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Huntington Lake (aka The Fuel Pump Saga)
Because we had some time off for Labor Day, we decided to take advantage of it and go on a little camping trip up in the Sierra Nevadas. We looked at maps for weeks and finally settled on Huntington Lake -- about 70 miles due east of Fresno and about 50 miles from Yosemite (as the crow flies).
We set off on our trek on Friday morning in the Excursion with our quads and mountain bikes towing on the trailer behind. By the time we got to our campground and set camp (after a few stops in Fresno), it was 5:00 in the evening. We went on a pleasant little ride around the lake on our bikes and then settled down for the evening.
On Saturday we got up and went on a quad ride up in the higher parts of the mountains for the better part of the day. Aside from some annoyances because the state of California doesn't really allow you to ride on many of the perfectly good quad roads, and I'm a bit of a wuss so the more challenging trails weren't really an option, it was a beautiful ride.
On Sunday we went in search of showers in the morning (and, luckily were successful 20 miles down the road at Shaver Lake), attended the Auberry Ward sacrament meeting (terribly friendly group) at the base of the mountains and then came back via Shaver Lake where we had a picnic and watched all the crazy people who had come out for Labor Day weekend. We took the scenic route back to camp, stopping by some geocaches and then took a little hike up to Rancheria Falls. Beautiful. Here are some pics from the first half of the trip:
Monday morning was COLD.. but we started out early and loaded the Mountain Bikes into the back of the Excursion, planning to drive up over Kaiser Pass to check out the scenery and hopefully find some trails to ride. When we started the car that morning we immediately knew that something wasn't right. We started down the road anyway, but as soon as we turned to go up the mountain, we both felt like we should turn around and head back to the little 'village' and check out the car. We parked across from the 'general' store and decided to first change the fuel filter to see if that was what was causing us grief (we just happened to have a spare). We got that done, started the car and pulled right in front of the store. Chad was idling while I went in to buy some wet wipes to rid our hands of the smell of diesel when the car just died. And then refused to start.
We tried starting it over and over and over again. Nothing. You could tell that no fuel was getting to the engine, but we had no idea why. After several minutes (possibly hours) and help from several of the locals who were hanging out at the bar next to the general store, we finally determined that the fuel pump was not turning on. We had no idea if it was an electrical problem or if something was stuck in it, or if it was dead. We found a listing for the local Napa dealer (20 miles down the road at Shaver Lake), and called to see if he happened to have a pump in stock. He said no.. but he could have someone bring it from the distribution center.. $290... ouch.
But.. since we didn't even know if it really was the pump, we decided to hike back to camp (1.5 miles up the road), get some tools and return to do more troubleshooting. Sure enough, Chad removed the pump and put voltage straight to it from the battery (thanks to some wire we bought at the store), and it was dead. Not even a spark.
One of the terribly helpful locals, Niles, had been listening to our troubles earlier and had spent the afternoon locating a small fuel pump he had 'in the back'. He broght it out and we figured.. why not try it? Even if it just gets us off the mountain and into town where we can buy a new fuel pump (for less than $300). We insalled it (with the help of some random fittings and clamps from the general store) and it worked like a champ -- it just wasn't big enough to actually push the fuel into that big diesel motor. So.. here it was.. 5:00.. all the parts stores were closed.. we knew we had a 'bad' pump but couldn't do anything about it. So.. we hiked back to camp, made dinner and ate smores and tried to figure out what to do next.
Tuesday morning, we called the Napa guy in Shaver.. yes he could get us the part.. but it was an extra $50 to get it that day and he could only go as far as Shaver. We had talked to the local boat mechanic, Mike, the night previous and he said he'd run and get the part for us for $20. We called AAA and they said we only had 7 free miles of towing and it would be an additional $7/mile after that, which didn't help much. So.. we ordered the now $340 part and packed up to hike back to the car.
Mike agreed to pick it up and Glen (the guy in Shaver Lake) promised it there by noon. Mike said he'd deliver it to our car around 1:00. It was 10:30 at the time.. so we had some time to kill. We hiked down to the lake and just hung out in a small meadow/beach area. It was definitely a beautiful day.. and all the tourists had left on Monday, so it was nice and peaceful. We hung out there until about 12:30 when we went back to the car to prepare it for the new part.
We took out the little pump that Niles had given us and then were just waiting around for the new part with nothing better to do. So.. we started messing with the broken pump just to see if we could figure out what was wrong with it. We banged it around a bit, etc. Nothing too specific. Then decided to put the wires to it again just to see. The thing sprang to life, shot out a bunch of diesel and seemed to be running fine.
So.. we put it back on. Yep.. the same 'ol part that had come off of it. Installed it.. the car started right back up and after a few minutes of driving around the block.. seemed good as new. We waited for our over-priced and now possibly unnecessary part.. and then headed back to camp:
Having had enough drama for a while and not wanting to chance getting stuck anywhere, we hung out in camp for the rest of the afternoon and took a nice walk down by the lake:
We packed up and drove home the next day without a hitch. We were tired and dirty, but we made it, which we were grateful for. It was not the best experience, but it was definitely another sign that Heavenly Father is taking care of us. We could have broken down way back in where we would have had to hike out just to flag someone down to get back to camp. We could have broken down on Tuesday when there was no one around and no store open to help us out. We could have broken down on the way back home and had to change that pump on the side of the highway. But we didn't, and thanks to Niles, Dave, Glen and all the other nice folks up in Huntington Lake, we were able to get back home in one piece!
Besides.. at least it was in a nice, cool, beautiful place. :-)
P.S. We were driving yesterday around here when the thing started going again. So.. last night we changed it out for the lovely overpriced one that we couldn't return anywhere. We truly were blessed that it even lasted as long as it did..
We set off on our trek on Friday morning in the Excursion with our quads and mountain bikes towing on the trailer behind. By the time we got to our campground and set camp (after a few stops in Fresno), it was 5:00 in the evening. We went on a pleasant little ride around the lake on our bikes and then settled down for the evening.
On Saturday we got up and went on a quad ride up in the higher parts of the mountains for the better part of the day. Aside from some annoyances because the state of California doesn't really allow you to ride on many of the perfectly good quad roads, and I'm a bit of a wuss so the more challenging trails weren't really an option, it was a beautiful ride.
On Sunday we went in search of showers in the morning (and, luckily were successful 20 miles down the road at Shaver Lake), attended the Auberry Ward sacrament meeting (terribly friendly group) at the base of the mountains and then came back via Shaver Lake where we had a picnic and watched all the crazy people who had come out for Labor Day weekend. We took the scenic route back to camp, stopping by some geocaches and then took a little hike up to Rancheria Falls. Beautiful. Here are some pics from the first half of the trip:
Monday morning was COLD.. but we started out early and loaded the Mountain Bikes into the back of the Excursion, planning to drive up over Kaiser Pass to check out the scenery and hopefully find some trails to ride. When we started the car that morning we immediately knew that something wasn't right. We started down the road anyway, but as soon as we turned to go up the mountain, we both felt like we should turn around and head back to the little 'village' and check out the car. We parked across from the 'general' store and decided to first change the fuel filter to see if that was what was causing us grief (we just happened to have a spare). We got that done, started the car and pulled right in front of the store. Chad was idling while I went in to buy some wet wipes to rid our hands of the smell of diesel when the car just died. And then refused to start.
We tried starting it over and over and over again. Nothing. You could tell that no fuel was getting to the engine, but we had no idea why. After several minutes (possibly hours) and help from several of the locals who were hanging out at the bar next to the general store, we finally determined that the fuel pump was not turning on. We had no idea if it was an electrical problem or if something was stuck in it, or if it was dead. We found a listing for the local Napa dealer (20 miles down the road at Shaver Lake), and called to see if he happened to have a pump in stock. He said no.. but he could have someone bring it from the distribution center.. $290... ouch.
But.. since we didn't even know if it really was the pump, we decided to hike back to camp (1.5 miles up the road), get some tools and return to do more troubleshooting. Sure enough, Chad removed the pump and put voltage straight to it from the battery (thanks to some wire we bought at the store), and it was dead. Not even a spark.
One of the terribly helpful locals, Niles, had been listening to our troubles earlier and had spent the afternoon locating a small fuel pump he had 'in the back'. He broght it out and we figured.. why not try it? Even if it just gets us off the mountain and into town where we can buy a new fuel pump (for less than $300). We insalled it (with the help of some random fittings and clamps from the general store) and it worked like a champ -- it just wasn't big enough to actually push the fuel into that big diesel motor. So.. here it was.. 5:00.. all the parts stores were closed.. we knew we had a 'bad' pump but couldn't do anything about it. So.. we hiked back to camp, made dinner and ate smores and tried to figure out what to do next.
Tuesday morning, we called the Napa guy in Shaver.. yes he could get us the part.. but it was an extra $50 to get it that day and he could only go as far as Shaver. We had talked to the local boat mechanic, Mike, the night previous and he said he'd run and get the part for us for $20. We called AAA and they said we only had 7 free miles of towing and it would be an additional $7/mile after that, which didn't help much. So.. we ordered the now $340 part and packed up to hike back to the car.
Mike agreed to pick it up and Glen (the guy in Shaver Lake) promised it there by noon. Mike said he'd deliver it to our car around 1:00. It was 10:30 at the time.. so we had some time to kill. We hiked down to the lake and just hung out in a small meadow/beach area. It was definitely a beautiful day.. and all the tourists had left on Monday, so it was nice and peaceful. We hung out there until about 12:30 when we went back to the car to prepare it for the new part.
We took out the little pump that Niles had given us and then were just waiting around for the new part with nothing better to do. So.. we started messing with the broken pump just to see if we could figure out what was wrong with it. We banged it around a bit, etc. Nothing too specific. Then decided to put the wires to it again just to see. The thing sprang to life, shot out a bunch of diesel and seemed to be running fine.
So.. we put it back on. Yep.. the same 'ol part that had come off of it. Installed it.. the car started right back up and after a few minutes of driving around the block.. seemed good as new. We waited for our over-priced and now possibly unnecessary part.. and then headed back to camp:
Having had enough drama for a while and not wanting to chance getting stuck anywhere, we hung out in camp for the rest of the afternoon and took a nice walk down by the lake:
We packed up and drove home the next day without a hitch. We were tired and dirty, but we made it, which we were grateful for. It was not the best experience, but it was definitely another sign that Heavenly Father is taking care of us. We could have broken down way back in where we would have had to hike out just to flag someone down to get back to camp. We could have broken down on Tuesday when there was no one around and no store open to help us out. We could have broken down on the way back home and had to change that pump on the side of the highway. But we didn't, and thanks to Niles, Dave, Glen and all the other nice folks up in Huntington Lake, we were able to get back home in one piece!
Besides.. at least it was in a nice, cool, beautiful place. :-)
P.S. We were driving yesterday around here when the thing started going again. So.. last night we changed it out for the lovely overpriced one that we couldn't return anywhere. We truly were blessed that it even lasted as long as it did..
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Oops...
Every now and again I do something just to prove to the world how stupid I really am. Previous feats have included flooding my first apartment by thinking I could hang a hanger on the fire sprinklers in my laundry room; sitting down while holding a yard stick in my mouth (long ways) and almost puncturing the roof of my mouth when it hit the ground on my way down; removing several inches of skin off my arms the morning I was flying to NC for an interview because I climbed on what turned out to be a VERY unstable piece of furniture in the bathroom to close the vent (I was cold..).
Luckily my most recent 'incident' was not nearly as painful as any of my previous ones (perhaps getting wiser with age?), but it was still just about as stupid.
I was packing my camping stuff last week, preparing for our Labor Day Weekend Camping trip and all of my camping pots / pans / utensils/ dishes were covered in a thin film of dishwashing soap that had broken open and leaked all over my kitchen tote. I looked at all that stuff, and since I was limited on time, decided to just throw them into the dishwasher to run for a cycle. Then they'd be all clean and happy so I could repack them into my brand new clean tote.
As I was putting them into the dishwasher, I had a fleeting thought that warned me it might not really be that great of an idea to put liquid dish soap residue into the dishwasher. However, I quickly rationalized that it wasn't THAT much soap so it shouldn't hurt anything.. right???
Um.. well.. about 20 minutes later I was rushing around the kitchen trying to get everything else packed when I stepped into a nice, wet, suddsy mess that was pouring out of my dishwasher:
Nice, eh?
Three towels, three dishwasher cycles, and a bunch of salt (which apparently breaks down suds) later, my dishes were, in fact, clean.
Someday, perhaps, I'll learn...
Luckily my most recent 'incident' was not nearly as painful as any of my previous ones (perhaps getting wiser with age?), but it was still just about as stupid.
I was packing my camping stuff last week, preparing for our Labor Day Weekend Camping trip and all of my camping pots / pans / utensils/ dishes were covered in a thin film of dishwashing soap that had broken open and leaked all over my kitchen tote. I looked at all that stuff, and since I was limited on time, decided to just throw them into the dishwasher to run for a cycle. Then they'd be all clean and happy so I could repack them into my brand new clean tote.
As I was putting them into the dishwasher, I had a fleeting thought that warned me it might not really be that great of an idea to put liquid dish soap residue into the dishwasher. However, I quickly rationalized that it wasn't THAT much soap so it shouldn't hurt anything.. right???
Um.. well.. about 20 minutes later I was rushing around the kitchen trying to get everything else packed when I stepped into a nice, wet, suddsy mess that was pouring out of my dishwasher:
Nice, eh?
Three towels, three dishwasher cycles, and a bunch of salt (which apparently breaks down suds) later, my dishes were, in fact, clean.
Someday, perhaps, I'll learn...
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