Blog-O-Plenty

Got this in the mail today. This must be the type of thing you start getting delivered to your door when you turn 34.



And to make matters worse, my wife let me take my shirt off at the pool last night during the church VBS kick off party. First, it's a wonder that my farmers tan didn't blind anyone. And second, it's any wonder I'm getting cremation offers in the mail given my apparent physical appearance. Check out the watch line, that's probably the icing on the pasty fat man cake.

Well, at least I won't die of skin cancer of the torso.

Man, it just keeps getting worse. Pay close attention to our daughter, who enjoyed the pool very much.

Here's the best picture, my wife wisely cropped me out.

Moving right along to non-pasty things. Brenna got a cool puzzle set from Grandma and Grandpa H today. She thoroughly enjoyed putting the pieces into the doggie below.

Hey, it finally dipped below 110 today... I think. The highest my thermometer showed was 105, although that was a reading in the shade. The car showed 107 on the way home from church at sunset, so I'd like to think it didn't go over 110. My streak for avoiding the treadmill in the garage is equivalent to the number of days over 110, go figure.

Saturday

Below are a few pictures of Brenna from earlier today. She woke up this morning at 6am, hoped out of bed and came into the living room on her own, waking me up out of my sleep (by saying "Hi Daddy" repeatedly until I acknowledged her. We played in the yard, walked around the neighborhood, watched some TV, read, ate some Pop Tarts, and some other assorted things, until Emily got up at 9. She then promptly went back to sleep for an hour. Now she's taking her afternoon nap, tis been an odd day of sleeping for her.

It's 114 here today, 8th day in a row over 110. However, it's actually raining in parts of Arizona today. Wondering where? Check out the Hoes blog for more info on that.

Cheers.

34

I turned 34 yesterday. Whoopie.

For my birthday I hung a 10 foot strip of guttering (is that a word?) on the north side of the house, and connected four rain barrels to collect the rainwater that I hope to see pouring off our roof in about, oh, two weeks. I think I stayed outside way too long while working on this, I came back in dizzy and nauseous. It was great (not).

My day ended on a positive note, however. Emily had to go to a meeting at the church, so I got to spend a few hours on my own with Brenna. That was perhaps the best birthday gift of all. I have no pictures to commemorate the occasion, as I was busy entertaining her, but I did take some video of her playing with her National Park wildlife blocks, and wondering around the house a bit, so I'll upload that as the mood strikes me.

I squeezed another 6 ounces of Calomonden juice off our tree yesterday (salvaging the fruit before it bursts into flames on the tree from the heat). We now officially have enough to make two more pies! Yum.

Let's see, what else. I haven't stepped foot in the garage to run and/or walk on our treadmill since Monday or Tuesday of this week. For the lack of a better phrase, it's simply too freakin' hot out there to do much of anything. Even after the sun sets everything out there is hot to the touch. Our grill that sits on the back porch, which has a built in temperature gauge, has been reading between WARM and HOT, just from the sun beating on it. I suspect I could slow cook some meat out there without any charcoal if I felt so inclined. But hey, it's Arizona and it's June, what do ya expect?

Album of the day: Minutemen's "Double Nickels On The Dime". What a great CD that I don't listen to nearly enough. Perfect for a Friday afternoon. If you're familiar with the theme song to that MTV show "Jackass", that's the Minutemen.

The Good Guy

Brenna decided to step up to the next level of reading tonight, having conquered all of her Dora and Diego adventures. She also figured out how to pull herself up on the couch by herself, and did this repeatedly tonight with a big grin on her face.

Optimistically I'd like to think it stayed under 110 today, but I doubt it.

After searching high and low for gutters for the house, it was suggested to Emily that I try Home Depot. I could have sworn I had searched there a number of times with no luck, but this afternoon there they were, like a shining beacon. I have already assembled what I plan on hanging on the north side of the house, and hope to hang them tomorrow afternoon, if I don't spontaneously combust from the heat first.

Another Day In The

Here are some pictures of Brenna eating dinner tonight.

It was 112 here today, no telling how hot it was in Phoenix. We're supposed to be over 110 through Thursday, and it won't get much better after that. I'll be posting some pictures on the Hoes site soon of some of the leaves on my bushes turning brown and black from the intensity of the sun, real nice.

At Her Majesty's Request

Here are a few pictures of a new princess towel that Brenna got for bath time. It seems to be a hit, as you can see from the last picture of her looking at herself in the mirror.

I hope everyone had a good Father's Day, Emily's family came over for a little bit after church and we consumed mass quantities of Mexican delicacies (I'm glad to report to Emily's mom that I have laid complete and utter waste to the humus she left here that was to expire tomorrow, and it was fantastic). We cooked a calomonden pie from fruit picked off our tree, and it honestly was about as good as any Key Lime pie I've ever eaten, so good in fact, that I ate two slices and have squeezed enough juice to make a second pie very soon.

On the running front, I've managed two squeak out two runs at a mile and a half in 14 minutes each time. Today was a LOT harder than Friday, it was probably 110 degrees at the time I was in the garage, and it must have taken 30 minutes after I had showered and sat down with some ice cream to cool off, before I finally stopped sweating. Something tells me I need to try and get out there in the morning or later in the evening. I think if the conditions were better, I could easily run two miles, and would like to get to three eventually.

It's All About The Fit And Finish

Hello there, been a while. With Brenna not feeling well this week, and myself suffering from anal glaucoma (ask us about our inside joke), the posts have been fewer and far between.

Here are a few shots of Brenna from tonight, playing with her Plah Doh. If we leave her in her chair for too long, things start getting chucked off of her tray. This was at the pre-chucking stage.

You may be wondering, "Gee, what have you guys been up too lately?". Well, here we go:

- Effective in August, Emily will no longer be paid staff at our church, she'll be doing volunteer work there, and watching children at her mom's house during this upcoming school year. No need to explain in too much detail WHY this happened, but needless to say Emily is being a trooper about the pending change

- After a two week break from running on the treadmill (tweaked my knee pretty good), I finally got back on it yesterday, and with decent results. I slowed things down to a 10 minute mile, thinking I'd run for distance, but into my 2nd mile I managed to find another muscle to pull, and came up lame on that effort. Today I went with Emily to see the new Indiana Jones movie before we picked up Brenna from daycare, so I'll have to give the distance thing another go tomorrow. And since it's supposed to be 110 here, what better time to shed those ten pounds I've been wanting to drop... instantly

- Speaking of, the new Indiana Jones movie, in my humble opinion, was not nearly as mediocre as the movie "critics" made it out to be. I was expecting to see two hours of going through the motions with recycled story lines, gimmicks, stunts, etc, but was pleasantly surprised with how it all played out. Not the best in the four, but worth the matinee prices to see it on the big screen before it ends up at the crappy dollar theater where everything smells like armpits

- Did I mention it's hot? Well, not as hot as it could be, about 105 today, a little warmer this weekend, and a slight cool off heading into next week. The monsoons should be starting in about two weeks, which leaves me holding the bag on trying to get gutters up on the house to collect that precious rainfall for my jungle of a yard

This blog is subject to change, thank you and goodnight.

This Wicked Tongue

You wouldn't think from these two videos that our little girl has been alternating most of the day between violent pooping and throwing up. We thought something was wrong yesterday when Brenna was telling us that her tummy hurt, but she also likes to play this game with us where she tells us numerous parts of her body hurts, so we weren't positive. This morning she woke up throwing up and has been having issues since then. Right now (evening) she's asleep, and we're hoping she has a restful night.

I hope you get a kick out of these two videos, I was too lazy to break out the best parts, but you'll see Brenna:

- Effectively working her shapes ball, naming off a number of the shapes as she goes along (circle, oval, triangle, star - breaking into twinkle twinkle little star when she gets to this one). She also corrected me when I tried to tell her that one of her shapes was a pentagon (it was actually a trapezoid, and I couldn't remember what it was, she called me out on trying to pull the wool over her eyes on that one. Yes, Emily has taught her what a trapezoid is. Sorry, you won't see that on the video, I had stopped filming).

- Singing various parts of the Grumpy Old Troll song, which goes

I'm the grumpy old troll, who lives under the bridge

I'm the grumpy old troll, who lives under the bridge

If you want to come over, all you have to do is this

All you have to do is this

Solve my riddle!

- Singing the Taxi song repeatedly, including an up close and personal version on the last film.

To refresh your memories:

Taxi, taxi, riding in the backseat

Roll the window up, roll the window down

Put the money in the slot, see you later, thanks a lot

Sure beats walking cross town

Among The Living

Anyone remember this nasty thing that showed up on our doorstep this past summer? I've never screamed so much like a little girl in my life when it snapped at me. I've also never caught so much air jumping in my life.

Anyway, I don't know what it is with me and the front porch, but tonight I was coming back to the front door with a load of overflowing Wal Mart shopping bags in my hands, when out of the corner of my eye I spotted perhaps the largest spider I've ever seen outside of a zoo, following me up to the door. I'm guessing it was a juvenile tarantula, given it's size (the body was about the size of a child's rubber ball), and it's fuzziness (and no, that sure as heck didn't qualify it as "cute"). Just so you know, I'm walking my wife out the door in the morning with a broom in my hand, and will be taking no prisoners.

Since I have nothing better to do tonight, I flipped through the remainder of Beth's fabulous New Mexico pictures, and came across a few more jewels that tickled my fancy.

You can add this next picture to the Brenna nose-picking archives. She actually appears to be deep in thought about the koala she was viewing here... except for the finger up and/or near the nasal passages.

Speaking of Grandma Becky, I'll probably never be allowed back in her house after posting this, but after what Emily and I have been through lately with work (well, 99% Emily, stay tuned for more news on that next week), I had a nice chortle over this one.

I thought to myself, boy, this picture seems familiar in some shape, form, or fashion.

And then it hit me.

Ah, yes, stay young kids, stay young. Don't let the man get you down, fight the establishment, pass the pistachios.

(Check out the Art Gallery, I finally posted something new there)

Something New

Here are a few new Brenna videos, one where she's dancing and another where she's wondering around being Brenna.

Water Table Fun

Grandma and Grandpa H got Brenna a Dora and Diego water table. Here are a few pictures of her enjoying it out in the back yard this morning. Yes, it's still nice enough to be out there, at least until the sun comes over the house.



Brenna is happily pouring water on me here, I'm thrilled at that. I like the startlingly enormous gray hair poking out and saying hello in this picture.





Contemplating putting Dora in the boat (I was about to say contemplating the engine room, but that's a Mike Watt album).




Ah yes, she has learned well and much from the grizzled master.

Sandy boat inspection.

Here we are on the couch, I was about to say after our water table play, but I just noticed that I'm wearing a totally different shirt here. Hmm, well, it's a nice enough picture even if it has nothing to do with this storyline.

Beth's Pictures

Aunt Beth took some great pictures of our little girl during the trip to Albuquerque. Here are a few of them.

Here is Brenna entertaining herself by coloring on the table at a restaurant we went to.

Outside of the same place, on the patio.

Brenna and Rachel dancing on the same patio. Tyler is enthralled.

The whole gang posing for a picture in the square in Old Town Albuquerque.

Back home with another random picture of Brenna hanging out on her Dora sofa. She's sporting a neat pink shirt from Grandma and Grandpa H here.

It's A Put On

Earlier today I had this elaborate blog prepared for you, including the video below of Brenna reading with Emily, and a story about a man in New Zealand arrested for assaulting someone with a hedgehog, but this site went down and my post was lost forever.

I can but apologize as that brief moment of brilliance on my part is long since lost, probably never to be captured again.

Anyway, in this video you'll see me offering to read to Brenna, and then it cuts to Emily doing it. For starters, I did indeed read with her, but can't film and read at the same time. Brenna was getting antsy on the second read through, but it's still fun seeing her interact with the story.

If you're intrigued about the hedgehog assault, look it up on MSN.com, I'm sure it's still there in their archives, it was a fine read.

Albuquerque - Part Four

Here's the home stretch post of our recent trip to New Mexico. On the way home on Monday we stopped off at El Morro National Monument, which is about 40 miles south of Gallup, out in the middle of nowhere.

In a nutshell, at the base of the huge rock formation you'll see in the pictures below, there resides a year round pool of water formed by snow runoff and sporadic rainfall. The base off this foundation is covered with petroglyphs, and inscriptions from Spanish explorers, US infantry, etc, passing through to other parts of the west.

Here's a view of the surrounding area from the top of the butte. If you look closely you can see the roof of the visitor center.

At the top there were a few pueblo ruins, I took a picture of the plaque at the top, for those of you interested in reading more about this area.



A kiva located at the same site where the ruins are.

Here are Emily and Brenna, both humoring me on this sidetrip.

Behind Brenna and Emily here is the aforementioned pool, which was at about eight feet deep, according to a measuring "stick" in the middle of it. Supposedly it can run as deep at twelve feet, depending on the time of year.



Here is a far away shot of Emily and Brenna at the same pool. You get a better sense of how sheltered that pool is and how it would have been a welcoming oasis for those passing through, especially in the hotter summer months (the park is located at slightly over 7000 feet in elevation).

This next shot is a sampling of some of the petroglyphs found at the base of the rock.

A shot of the oldest Spanish inscription found on the rock, from 1605, if memory serves. Amazing how well preserved a lot of these were. There were literally hundreds of similar messages spanning across hundreds of feet of this rock.

More recent inscriptions found in one area of the rock.

A more elaborate inscription of someone in the US military that headed up an expiriment involving using camels shipped from Egypt as an alternative to using horses or mules for moving heavy loads across the country. After this program was disbanded in the 1860s, apparently some of the camels escaped from wherever they were sold (circuses, etc), and their ancestors are still roaming free range from Arkansas to Mexico.

One more sample, another one from the 1600 or 1700s.

And finally, a couple of shots of the rock itself.

Back home, Brenna is playing with some discovery stacking blocks from the Visitors Center. While I was killing myself running up the rock to view the pueblo ruins, these blocks kept her occupied.