That One Blog

My Wife and Daughters Are Too Good to Me

2010-12-30T00:10:00.000-07:00

So I had a really bad night tonight due to some circumstances, and my poor wife sweetly listened as I ranted about it... before leaving for an event I was helping with.

She felt bad about it and discussed it with my daughters while I was away, and they immediately took action and check out what I came home to...

Chocolate chip cookies and milk, and two of the cutest notes ever from my daughters.

I love you, ladies of my life! Thanks for bringing smiles to my face, tears to my eyes, and love to my heart.

I'm not worthy of you.

Santa is Cool as Ice

2010-12-26T09:06:00.000-07:00

Check out the amazing snow sculpture made by the art teacher that lives by my friend Tyler!

(click to see full-size)

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas. :)

Knights of the Rectangle Table

2010-11-30T08:00:00.001-07:00

It was an afternoon much like 12 November, when the Riverton Raccoons and the Willow Springs Wildcats faced off in Mandi's first chess tournament.

Eagerly anticipating her next challenge...

Mandi has been involved in chess clubs at school for the past couple of years, and this year decided she wanted to compete in a tournament.

Mandi carefully trying to trap her opponent.

The yellow queen Mandi is holding in her left hand is a prize she won during a raffle at the tournament.
It has become one of her most prized possessions.

She did very well, playing three games and winning her last two. She took 5th place for her grade and helped her school win the tournament.

Mandi showing off her 5th place trophy.
Congrats!!!

It was a great time, and fun to watch Mandi play. She has since challenged me several times at home, where I've been able to squeak by with a few wins.

Tonight (28 November 2010) was a different story... We played twice and she put me in checkmate both times; one of them being what we thought was "Fool's Mate"... but it took her five moves, not two (I'm not THAT dumb... ok, that's subjective.) I guess I'd better get practicing!

Welcome Home Sagers!

2010-11-28T23:31:00.000-07:00

I had the honor and privilege today of seeing President Richard K. Sager and his wonderful wife Lois; who served as my Mission President and Mission Mom 17 years ago when I served in the Tennessee Knoxville Mission (TKM). The occasion was their report after returning home from another mission in Tennessee, this time as Temple President and Matron of the Nashville temple.

It was so wonderful to see them and to be inspired by their talks. It was even better to get a few moments to visit with them after the meeting.

Left to right:
Lois Sager, Elder "Dead Cow" Litster, President Richard K. Sager

As a special bonus, President Thomas S. Monson, our beloved prophet and special friend of the Sagers, was in attendance. I had the honor of shaking his hand and exchanging some pleasantries for a brief moment. He's an amazing man, and it was wonderful to be in his presence for a short time.

The Sagers have had such a profound impact on my life. They are two of the most selfless, Christ-like people I've ever met and were an incredible support while I was away from home for 2 years serving the Lord. I appreciate our friendship that has lasted all these years. Seeing them today, it was as if no time had passed since our last opportunity to be together.

And speaking of getting together, we're all very excited to start putting together a TKM reunion next Spring... so all of you that served with me under the Sagers in the Knoxville mission, keep watch. We want all of you to be attendance, so please join our facebook group. (If that link doesn't work, try this one)

Reunions are so awesome... I've been able to keep in touch with some of my missionary friends over the years, sometimes in person, but mostly through the blessing of electronic communications (instant messaging, email, social networking sites, etc.) Having in-person reunions can't be beat though, and I hope all of my fellow TKMers will be able to attend ours.

Anyway, welcome home Sagers! We love you and have missed you!

17 Cents Away From 25 Dollars (And we're feeling pretty Lowe's about it...)

2010-11-20T16:32:00.001-07:00

Let me start out by mentioning that the reason I've dropped off the face of the blog long ago, is because we've been working like mad to finish our basement this year. On top of family, normal work, church and other things, I've had a moonlighting job, and it has all eaten up 20 hours/day or more.

This weekend was particularly interesting. We're about 98% complete with finishing the basement (finishing, not furnishing -- that's next year... heh) and we needed to pick up some hardware this weekend for some of the little things that are left for us to do.

This required a trip to Lowe's.

We packed up the crew and headed over, hoping to get out of there in $300 or less. We met our goal, and started the voyage home. Before pulling in the driveway, Gwen asked me to stop at the mailbox so we could get today's mail on our way in.

As Murphy's Law would have it, in the stack of mail is an insert from Lowe's. Can you guess what it had in it?

Trying to remember what we were set back as we walked out of the store, the number $294.xx came to mind. Gwen and I smirked at each other, said "Ain't that always the way?!" and had a good laugh.

Then the thought struck, "Maybe they'll still honor it even though the sale is completed." So we rushed in the house and I grabbed the phone... pulled the receipt out of my pocket, found Lowe's number and started to dial.

While doing so, my eyes scanned down the receipt so I'd be ready to tell the employee how much we'd spent so I could justify using this discount card. As I was about to press the last digit to dial, and to add insult to injury... this is what I saw:

Needless to say, I hung up the phone, with a big fat, "Are you KIDDING ME?!!?!?"
I guess I'm getting dyslexic, because I could have sworn it was $294...

What makes this story even more humorous is, at the end of our adventure, when it was time to pay the piper (er... the cashier); of course the kids are bugging to buy everything on the end caps. Ok, actually they just wanted Gatorade.

We told Brennan, Mandi and Kimmie they could get one, but Kimmie opted out in favor of having a tall glass of Chocolate Milk when we arrived home. Curse that chocolate love... that extra buck would have saved us $24!!! It would been the most valuable Gatorade we ever purchased.

Moral of the story... check your mailbox before you head to the hardware store.
And now you know...

Kim Possible DVD Box Sets for USA Are Finally Here!!!

2010-11-01T06:00:00.013-07:00

BOOYA!!! You heard right folks... I'm not sure why it took Disney so dang long (Germany has had them for quite some time) but they finally have USA versions available of the Kim Possible Season 1 and Season 2 DVD box sets! That's the good news...

The bad news... Here's the sitch: only 2 seasons are available at this point and they're only available through the Disney Movie Club.

New KP DVD Box Set Listing on Disney Movie Club

If we want the other sets, we need to get ordering these as soon as possible. I know it sucks that you have to be a member of the club, but hey, if you join, I believe you get your first several movies at a deep discount; I just don't know if the box set DVDs are included in what you can select for those first few.

(Will one of you out there new-to-the-club that joins and purchases the KP box sets please report back here and let us know if you get them at discount or have to buy from the catalog after the initial order, please and thank you?!)

Feel free to let me refer you so I can get some free movies too! :)

What's so funny about the timing of all this, is that I'd waited and waited and waited after finding out Disney had released these in Germany so long ago; in hopes they'd finally hit the USA. I'd even checked the Disney Movie Club catalog several times in the past, but to no avail.

Two or three weeks ago, I finally broke down and bought the Region 2 versions from Amazon Germany, only to get an email from the ultra-cool peeps at Save Disney Shows that informed me the boxed sets were now available to USA customers via the Disney Movie Club. Looks like I'll own both copies. heh

So don't delay, go join the club if you haven't already and get your Kim Possible boxed sets today... I want the other two sets!

(As of this writing, I didn't see them available on Blu-Ray, but I'm not worried about it, since they're probably not planning on re-mastering in a higher resolution. I'll take what I can get.

I've already ordered mine!!! Go get yours today.

Google's April Fools Joke Today

2010-04-01T07:13:00.001-07:00

Google is always a hoot on April Fools, and today they got CNN in on the gag.
The only thing that would have made it better, is if CNN's pic of the new Google, Kansas sign had said
"Population 122,000 out of 2,802,134."

*CACKLE!*

To start your April Fools' Fun... head over to ~~Google~~ Topeka now! (Remember this will only work today, 01 April 2010)

Edit: More fun to be had on the GMail blog and GMail homepage.

Random Pictures

2009-10-25T13:43:00.005-07:00

I've had a friend bug me to put some recent pictures of my kids up for her to see. Here you go, Emilie!

Here's Brennan at his 5th grade State Fair. We had fun learning about his state and trying to figure out what to put on his float. It was hard to make a clay mountain that looks like Mount Rushmore!

Here's Mandi and Kimmie at Author's Night. Mandi's 2nd grade teacher asked Mandi to submit a poem for a writing contest. Mandi's poem was printed in a book with all the winners' writings!

Kimmie loves the camera. She asks me all the time to take her picture just because. This is one such time. What a cutie!

Here are my twin rug rats. Ryan is on the left. Andrew is on the right. They keep me more than busy and always on my toes!

I had to put in this picture of Brennan and Jeff. This is Brennan's first real suit. He was so excited to become a deacon! (Check out how tall he is compared to Jeff.)

Kids are So Much Fun!

2009-10-16T09:21:00.004-07:00

My twin boys are so ingenious! They love to climb, so all our kitchen chairs stay in the laundry room until they are ready to be occupied at the table. That does not stop Ryan and Andrew! They pulled out the dish drainer, turned it over, and used it as a stool to pull the rolls and muffins down from off the counter. Then Andrew pushed it over to the fridge to try and get himself a drink of water! (And I would have had a picture of Andrew at the fridge, but Kimmie had too much fun with the camera earlier in the day--the camera shut off before I could snap the shutter!)

Going Back to the 80's

2009-08-25T22:26:00.004-07:00

With all the talk lately about Def Leppard, Poison, Depeche Mode concerts and more... I couldn't resist throwing up my own little throwback to the 80's:

This one goes out to my good friend Russ Peacock. Remember when, my friend?! Good times... good times... :)

(Oh, and yes, that's me with a mullet; and yes, that's my gargantuan tongue; and yes, I'm proud of it!)

For those that don't know, Photon was the first laser tag arena in Utah. It was located across the street from The Sports Park (remember that?) just West of I-15 near the 9000 South exit. Its building has since been several other things, including Paintball Planet, but I'll always remember it as the place Russ and I used to go kick trash and take names as laser tag champions; or so we thought... til the one day we got ganged up on! I know you remember that one, Russ.

Thoughts About Life

2009-08-09T22:27:00.004-07:00

The past few months have been quite a whirlwind for me. I've been MIA from the blog due to being way tied up in 2 jobs, my 11-year-old scout leader calling and spending time with my family.

This past week has been an especially "high category" storm, if you will, because on top of all that, my mother was admitted to the hospital. Without divulging details, we almost lost her this week, but she's made some drastic improvements and hopefully she'll be pulling through very soon and will recover as well as possible over the next few weeks.

During this, I also had the blessed opportunity of attending the memorial service of a good friend of mine from high school, and true American Hero, Jeremy Clawson. The words spoken in honor of this great man moved me deeply.

Both of these experiences have caused me to stop at times in deep reflection on my own life; and how I live it.

If I were to suddenly be gone, what would people say about me? Would I have made the effort to make the difference in others' lives to deserve the same honor? I wouldn't be trying to make that difference for that reason, of course, but would I have succeeded in making that difference?

I've also been seriously reminded at how much our relationships should mean to us. Life's too short to let the little things get in the way. I need to make more time to visit my loved ones.

Most of you that know me know I do alright keeping in touch with friends. I thank the Lord for blessing me with knowledge of technology and a passion for staying in touch, as the internet and its many tools allow me to do so quite easily. It still consumes time, but it's worth every minute.

I got to talking with my friend Aaron from Jordan High at the reception following our friend Jer's memorial service. We conversed about how sad it is that some our friends feel like they can't attend reunions for various reasons.

I have to say something about this... I've attended a lot of reunions, many of which have not been my own (thanks to being a part of the Jordan Alumni Association), and I've yet to see someone come to a reunion and regret that they did. There is always someone (or several someones) they haven't thought about that they reunite with and are so glad they did.

My cry out to the rest of the world is to please not let one bad relationship from your past, or even a handful, keep you from enjoying the sweet reunions you could be having with the tons of other friends you did still cherish back then. Instead of letting that keep you from going, go with the attitude in mind that you'll either reconcile the differences if you chance to encounter that person, or that you'll avoid them and interact with the others you wish to. But make the effort to go, you'll be glad you did.

My challenge to those who aren't so excited to go their reunions: Make the effort to go to the next one you're invited to, and give it at least 10 minutes of your time with a positive attitude. I guarantee you'll find someone in that time that will make the whole thing worth it (assuming you haven't arrived before everyone else... heh... make sure the 10-minute timer doesn't start until the majority of the guests have arrived.)

A few weeks ago, a Utah's PRIDE reunion was put together by my good friend Mary Pearson and others from her group. It was for the final two years of the program, 1994-1996. Since my years were 1989-1991 and I'd only spent time with the groups until I left on my mission in 1993, I figured I wouldn't know enough of the attendees to justify my going.

Since I had other things going that day as well, I assumed my wife would prefer to have me home to help with the kids. Well, the reunion was broken into two parts that day; an informal lunch in the park that all family members were invited to, and a dinner that night that only the PRIDEsters and their significant others were invited to.

After the lunch event, some had requested that I come to the dinner... I was called by my good friend Jarin who convinced me to go. Gwen gave me the green light, so I went; again nervous that it wouldn't be rewarding for me because I thought I wouldn't know anyone.

I was happy to see that I knew at least half of the people there! I hadn't realized that many of them were people I hooked up with from running the PRIDE site, or knew them from being friends with their older siblings who were also involved in PRIDE.

The reunion was very enjoyable for me, and even though I hadn't experienced things with their group; I still loved watching their slideshow and felt the same feelings remembering the experiences I had with my own groups (and the few years after I was still involved with.) True, the situations were different, but the feelings fostered and cherished as happy memories as a result of those situations is exactly the same; and it carries on exactly the same... because those are the things that shape our character going forward.

I may have mentioned this in a prior post, but it's worht saying again... When it came time for me to leave this particular reunion, I'd already become emotional about how wonderful it is to reunite with old friends... no matter how often I do it, the same intense happiness is there, it never dulls and never goes away. I found myself inclined to stand up and say a few words to the group, despite the fact that I wasn't technically a part of it.

I asked the group to raise hands for all who had attended this reunion from out-of-town. I don't remember how many there were, but it seems like it was 1/3 to 1/2 of them, if not more. I was amazed to see that many hands, as it was a testament to me at how important those relationships were/are to those great people. It literally brought tears to my eyes, and I had a hard time expressing my thoughts/feelings to them. I hope whatever I said came across right and they got the spirit of what I really wanted to say. I think they did.

The point was that these are the things we take with us. These are things that mold who we are. Our relationships define us; and they're too important to take for granted... because we never know when these loved ones will be called to return to their Maker, and we won't have the opportunity anymore on this Earth at this time to enjoy those sweet reunions.

Make the time and the effort to get out of your comfort zone and take advantage of those opportunities. Don't worry about forgetting people's names... we're all in the same boat, we all understand... ask them to remind you, and after the 30-seconds of awkweirdness, you'll be laughing and smiling about old times again. Getting over that first awkward moment is the hardest part... but PLEASE don't let those kinds of things stop you from going. Again, life's too short; it's not worth it.

I've veered off into reunions, and typically those are usually big family or high school reunions... but they don't have to be.

I'm known for trying to find out when friends are in town from out-of-town, or I've discovered someone in-town that I haven't seen forever, and then trying to throw something informal together to get a bunch of common friends together to see that friend. It's probably selfish of me, but it's a dang good excuse to get together, and I don't always want to keep it to myself. I cherish these get-togethers so very much... you can probably see it in my face when I post the pics.

I keep telling people, I wish I could bottle those feelings up, and share them with all of you individually. I know that if I could, there probably wouldn't be a one of you that would resist an opportunity to get-together with an old friend again. But I can't, so the best I can do is try to convince through posts like this... yes it's a soapbox, but one I'm more than happy to get on from time-to-time; it's that important to me.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. This life is all about people... and life is too short to let these opportunities to enhance/embrace/reunite these relationships pass us by. Make the time/effort to rekindle relationships with those you love, and to reconcile any differences that might keep you from doing so.

He/she who dies with the most friends, wins. :)

I love you all... thanks for being my friends.

What An AWESOME Birthday!

2009-06-07T15:12:00.003-07:00

I just had an awesome birthday and had to blog about it. It all started with a breakfast of ham, egg and cheese omelets, toast, grapes and milk--made by Jeff! Anyone who knows Jeff knows what a great feat that is. It was wonderful! The rest of the morning went on normally with Jeff heading off to work and the kids enjoying another off-track day of playing. Then there came a knock at the door around noon. It was the florist delivery guy with a delivery for me. He let me sign his log, then ran back to the truck to get the delivery. My mouth dropped open when he returned to the door with this! (The picture still doesn't do it justice. You really had to see it in person to behold it's greatness.)

I was breathless from the sight of this gorgeous vase of roses--then I read the card. "One rose for every year this world has been blessed with your presence. Thanks for letting me share 40% of your life so far!" Happy tears followed. The day ended with dinner at Village Inn with family and french silk pie! I have a wonderful husband. Thanks again, Jeffie, for an awesome day of love and surprises!

Walmart Fail - Disney Channel Original Movie gets R-Rating warning during pre-order

2009-06-04T07:03:00.003-07:00

This had me laughing so hard... I had to share. :) I was trying to pre-order this for the family on Walmart.com

Of Mice and Jedi - Disneyland Vacation: Day 3 (Return of the Jedi)

2009-05-24T12:44:00.010-07:00

We were pretty wiped out after visiting the entire Disneyland park during our first two days. We originally planned to hit California Adventure the third day, but opted to just casually stroll around Disneyland and ride any rides we'd missed and repeat any rides the kids wanted to ride. We ended up back in Fantasyland where we rode the Snow White and Pinocchio rides, then headed back to Tomorrowland for one more Buzz Lightyear ride and some souvenir shopping.

So you've probably been wondering why I entitled this series of posts "Of Mice and Jedi"... today it will finally make sense.

Brennan really wanted to see the Jedi Training Academy show in Tomorrowland, and we saw the end of it before the Space Mountain trauma on the first day; so we decided to catch the whole thing.

Mandi and Kimmie both really wanted to get trained, so Brennan and I tried to hold them up to get noticed in the crowds of screaming kids all trying to get their chance to master the ways of the Force.

Finally, on the Master Jedi's third pass, he called on our "levitating princess" (Mandi) to join them. Unfortunately, Kimmie didn't get picked, and there was much weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth. I'm surprised she didn't go full Sith before the show was over.

Nevertheless, the rest of us had a great time watching as Mandi and her fellow Padawan younglings learned how to use a lightsaber.

In the middle of their training, two Stormtroopers invaded the scene, and raised a platform with Darth Maul and Darth Vader on it. After Lord Vader failed to convince the strong minds of the young Jedi to come over to the Dark Side, each Padawan had the opportunity to engage one of the Sith Lords.

Mandi engaged in a duel with Darth Maul and successfully executed her training, rivaling the sabersmanship (is that a word?) of the red-faced Sith.

(High Quality ~49MB) Right-click .. Save-As

After successfully defeating the Sith and inviting those of the Empire to leave the training grounds, the younglings all went up on the stage and were pronounced official Jedi. Go Mandi!

Afterwards, the kids just HAD to have a lightsaber, so we went to the nearby souvenir shop and let them build their own. We bought a few more items, then headed to Downtown Disney on our way back to the hotel, so we could rest up for Fantasmic later that night.

We stopped in the Lego store in Downtown Disney and had fun seeing all of the huge creations they made from legos, including a 15-foot tall (maybe taller) giraffe. The kids favorite, of course, was the Lego Darth Vader, in front of which they proudly activated their lightsabers and posed for a picture.

We took the long walk back to the hotel, and were glad we did, because we saw another cool Disney structure and some fun Disney gardening on the way back. When we returned to the Hotel, the kids watched Disney Channel while mom and dad took a nap. (We're old...)

The highlight of our day/night was seeing Fantasmic. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it on your next trip to Disneyland; it's amazing and magical. They do some fun effects with water, fire, lasers and more; and have a really fun scene with the Jolly Roger floating around the riverbend of the Rivers of America, loaded with characters from Peter Pan... including a fight scene with Peter Pan and Captain Hook up in the sails. It ends with a fantastic curtain call of a boat-load of Disney characters. It's literally a boat-load, as it is the Mark Twain Riverboat, piloted by Steamboat Willie Mickey. I tried to capture a good picture of it, but failed miserably, so you're stuck with the best one out of the bunch.

The music lived up to its name, fantasmic. I loved it so much I came home and ordered the CD (which included the Main Street Electrical Parade music... double bonus!)

Not only was Fantasmic enjoyable, but we paid the ghastly fee to get preferred seating, which offered us the ability to not have to waste several hours holding our spot for the show, as well as treats and free drinks through the production. The treats were some of the tastiest gourmet goodies I've ever eaten. Soooooo yummy!

Near the end of the show, Gwen had to take the girls to the restroom, and they weren't back when the fireworks were finished. Brennan and I hit the restrooms after and started looking for them. It took us all about a half-hour or more of searching for and missing each other before we finally reunited. We're thankful that was the only bit of "lost" drama we had during the trip... It wouldn't have been a problem, 'cept Gwen's cell phone had been left in her purse (which was still with me) instead of being in her pocket. Lesson learned. heh

Pooped again, we headed home to rest up for our Character Breakfast in the PCH Grill on the main floor of the Paradise Pier the next morning. We thought that would be a fun way to end the trip and still have a little of the Disney experience before our return home.

I'll post those pictures in the next entry... along with our final thoughts of our first-ever big family vacation.

Of Mice and Jedi - Disneyland Vacation: Day 2 (Magical Morning - Meet the Characters)

2009-05-24T02:12:00.014-07:00

After an exhausting first day at Disneyland, we had a pleasant night's sleep at the hotel (which is rare) and woke up early and had breakfast delivered to our room so we could hit the park the instant they let the "Magical Morning" guests in.

Despite the fact that we already covered the two sections of the park that were open early, we still got to maximize the extra hour.

We weren't first in line to get into the park, but it actually served advantageous. The minute we stepped into the park and were came around to Main Street, we saw 6-8 Disney characters coming out to sign autographs and let people take pictures with them. We happened to be right there when Minnie Mouse came out and were 2nd in line to see her. Likewise, as soon as we were finished with her, we were able to get autographs and pictures with Pluto, Goofy, Chip and Dale.

The characters were a blast. Pluto signed all of the kids' books on his nose; and Goofy, well, he was true-to-form.

Brennan handed his book to Goofy. He promptly put it on Brennan's head and began signing. Then it was Mandi's turn, so she handed her book over. Mandi was wearing her Mickey ears that morning, so for Goofy to sign the book on her head, naturally he would need the ears removed. With great finesse, he swiftly knocked her ears down over her face... then straightway put Mandi's book on BRENNAN'S head and commenced signing. *CACKLE!* It was hilarious and the kids loved it.

After the autographs, we headed over to TomorrowLand again to let the kids ride the Buzz Lightyear ride and the rockets again. Then we realized we had a shot at being first in the Princess Faire line, so we hauled butt over in that direction. Crew members were standing guard near "It's a Small World" to keep guests from going further into the park since they hadn't opened those sections yet. There was already a plethora of people present, so we were bummed that we missed that boat. However, we soon discovered that some were there for the Small World ride, and others were there for Toon Town. The crew member asked us to form distinct lines and we were fortunate enough to be third or fourth in the Princess Faire line. Booya!

This was one of the most important factors in our Disneyland adventure, as Mandi and Kimmie are quite fond of the Princesses. You'll remember from Day 1 that we were told the line was a 2.5 to 3 hour wait, so we averted that crisis. The other catch was to get there when the "right" princesses were present. They rotate Disney Princesses every 45 minutes. We were hoping that Mandi and Kimmie's favorites were there, cause there was no way in a-place-very-much-opposite-of-the-Magical-Kingdom we were going to torture ourselves with a return trip to the longest line in Disneyland.

The heavens were smiling down on us that day... As the girls got to visit Snow White, Aurora and Cinderella; their three favorites. This was the most magical of the character encounters for us, because it wasn't as rushed as the other autograph/photo moments with other characters. They actually got to chit-chat with each princess for a couple of minutes before moving on to the next. Magical.

We ran back to ToonTown (since it's next-door to the Princess Fantasy Faire) to get Mickey's autograph, since we hadn't had books the day before; and we wanted to beat the crowds there. Of course he had to hug on Gwen, because, you know, she is his 2nd-to-Minnie. After ToonTown, we stopped for a treat near the Princess Faire and made our plan-of-attack for the rest of the day, as we still had a lot of park to cover.

We headed over to New Orleans Square where the Pirates of the Carribean is. That is one of my favorite rides and it was cooler than I remembered it. For those that don't know (or don't remember...) it's a boat ride, and it starts by floating you around the back of the Blue Bayou restaurant, then up a hill and down into the main parts of the ride, what feels like deep below New Orleans square. The ride was longer and cooler than I remember, and has been updated to reflect characters from the movies.

My favorite part was when we rode past the pirate ship attacking the fort, cannon fire being exchanged back-and-forth. I was sitting in just the right seat, as I felt a cannon blast whoosh through my hair! That, by itself, made the whole trip worth it... dang that was a cool effect. :)

We were fairly close to the Indiana Jones ride at that point, so I dragged the family in that direction, and we made a short stop through Tarzan's Treehouse. When we got to the Indiana Jones ride, Brennan and Mandi were too jaded to ride (Space Mountain trauma from Day 1), and we found out Kimmie was too short. So I was denied the ride I wanted to ride most while we were there; as it wasn't there when I was a kid.

Disneyland does a special pass for parents that have to stay behind with kids to be able to immediately board the ride after the other parent goes first... Unfortunately, we learned about this AFTER we came home... anger ensues.

In my angered state... we wandered over near Aladdin's Oasis, and happened to see Aladdin and Jasmine signing autographs, so we jumped in line. We fortunately were the last to get autographs/pictures before they had to leave... but unfortunately, they were very apparently in a hurried state and rushed the kids' signing and picture. That was the only thing close to a bad experience our entire trip (and it wasn't even a bad experience, really) so I was very thankful for that.

Since the kids weren't too into wanting to rides in Adventureland, we decided to head over to Critter Country and nabbed some lunch. After lunch, we hit Splash Mountain. Dang that is a cool ride. It was much longer than I remembered it and just as fun. We hit it just before the line got REALLY long. The kids said they enjoyed it, but when I recommended using the Fast Pass to do it again, they're all "no, my tummy needs a rest... blah blah blah." Repeat goodness denied.

We saw Winnie the Pooh and Rabbit signing autographs, so we figured that was something mellow the kids could handle... besides, we were on an autograph frenzy today, so why not fill the books! We jumped in line; and met a cast member from Salt Lake City who had fun talking to the crowd as they waited in line. He was a walking databank of Disney trivia. Meanwhile, in the not-so-hundred-acre-wood, time came for the characters to rotate, so instead of getting a picture of Winnie-the-Pooh with Gwennie-the-Pooh, we got to meet and take pics with Tigger and Eeyore. Not a bad trade.

We wandered over to Frontierland, where any hope of riding any "scary" rides for Brennan and Mandi had past. Gwen and I both wanted to hit "Big Thunder Railroad", but Kimmie was the only child brave enough to ride it. Gwen told me to take Kimmie and she'd go after me (wish I'd known about the "No Parent Left-Behind" pass! Anger ensues again...) By the time Kimmie and I got off the ride, Gwen, Brennan and Mandi had wandered over by the Mark Twain Riverboat. When we met up with them, who was to appear, but Woody and Jessie from Toy Story 2! More autographs, more pics... uh booya!

By then we were getting tired, and I wanted to have the kids see Disneyland lit up at night, so we decided to return to the hotel for some rest. I, of course, was half-tempted to let the kids stay at the hotel and watch Disney Channel while Gwen and I returned to the park ourselves and rode the rides we were denied earlier. :) But, being a good parent, we brought them back with us... heh.

Now, the first night we were there, we heard the fireworks show, but hadn't seen it... and I figured, "It's just another fireworks show, so I won't have my feelings hurt if we don't see it; plus, we'll see it after Fantasmic tomorrow..." So the original plan was not to worry about making sure we saw it. However, one of the cast members told us that if we wanted to see the fireworks show, we had to do it from Main Street, or we would miss some of the effects and fun of the show.

Well, we happened to re-enter the park just-in-time for the fireworks show; so we decided to stay with the masses gathered in front of the Castle. We're glad we did; the show is amazing. Narrated by Julie Andrews, the fireworks are put to music and the narration walks through some of the history of Disney and his vision for creating magical memories for all. There are also tie-ins with George Lucas stuff that appears at Disneyland (like Indiana Jones and Star Wars.) At one point we saw Tinkerbell fly around the castle and wave her wand to make fireworks, see huge flames shoot out the tops of the Castle during the Indiana Jones part, and see green lasers firing all around you during the Star Wars part. It's quite cool, and I'm glad we didn't miss that.

It was wonderful way to end Day 2... (except getting out of the park, carrying a sleeping 4-year-old.)

Stay tuned for Day 3!!! (And my apologies for no pics of the rides... I wish I'd snapped some of Pirates, but I was having too much fun to think about it.)

Of Mice and Jedi - Disneyland Vacation: Day 1

2009-04-30T23:23:00.008-07:00

The second week of March was a memorable one for our family. It was so special, because it was the week of our first-ever official family vacation.

We decided to leave the twins home, so we could focus on the older kids; since they have at many times gotten the shaft since the twins demand so much time and attention right now, being so small. The older kids really wanted to go to Disneyland; and since Gwen and I hadn't been since we were kids, we were excited to go too.

We booked our vacation through a travel agency, and since Disneyland was our focus for this trip, we arranged it so we would be shuttled from the airport to the hotel (and back) so we wouldn't have to rent a car. We also opted to do two of the three days during the week, so we could hit most everything without the super-busy crowds and let Friday be a more casual day, with its big focus being on Fantasmic. We also flew out Tuesday evening, so I could take one less day off from work. That all worked out very well.

That is, until we landed in Cali and we almost missed the shuttle due to our checked bags being taken off the baggage claim carousel before we got to it... so we thought they were lost. Fortunately one of the information desk employees pointed me in the right direction and we caught the last bus to the Paradise Pier Hotel where we stayed during our trip.

Now I have to say something here... there is a reason they call it the Happiest Place on Earth. Every employee, pardon me, "crew member" we encountered during our stay at Disneyland was incredibly friendly; and not just in the park, but the hotels as well. I don't know how many employees Disney has, but to have everyone of us treat us so well was no less than an amazing feat. And I know we only interacted with a tiny percentage of the whole. Needless to say, we were VERY impressed; so one huge shout-out to Disneyland for their incredible crew. Even a groundskeeper we stopped to ask for directions dropped what he was doing to walk us near a block and point out the rest of the way for us; as well as answer a few questions for several minutes. It was awesome. I'll share more about the killer customer service in a bit.

On to the good stuff... (Forgive me... I'm a month-and-a-half late posting this... so the details and timeline may get a little sketchy)

DAY ONE:

We started our first day in the Magical Kingdom a little late due to arriving so late the night before and not being able to awaken as early as we'd have liked to (good thing it wasn't the day of our "Magical Morning") :) We walked all the way across to the other end of the park and hit Denny's for breakfast, then walked back to Disneyland and entered the park.

Right as we walked into the gate, memories of my first visit to Disneyland came flooding back, and I instantly recognized the flowers on display as you enter the park.

We then went under the railroad bridge and onto Main Street. It was just as I remembered it, and I was so excited to be there. The kids were ecstatic. The first ride they wanted to go on was Autopia, since they could drive the cars. Mandi was especially excited for that one. Her dreams were nearly dashed when we got in line and she didn't meet the height requirement to drive by herself. We misinterpreted and thought that meant she'd have to be a passenger with an adult driver; but I decided to ask one of the ride attendants and they corrected us, letting us know Mandi could drive, but had to have an adult passenger. Kimmie was stoked too, because she also got to drive... (I had to push the gas, but hey...)

I didn't get a good picture of Brennan, but here are Mandi and Kimmie driving their cars... Lesson One, Mandi: Keep your hands on the wheel, and your eyes on the road!!!

The kids were pretty stoked to get their Autopia drivers licenses after (can you say "money sucker," neighbor?)...

Since we started at the back of TomorrowLand, I figured we might as well hit everything we wanted to there to make the best use of our time. That was a big mistake, as Space Mountain was our second ride, and it pretty much ruined Mandi and Brennan for any other more intense rides for the rest of our stay. :) I guess I didn't remember it being that bad as a kid.

We hit the Buzz Lightyear ride (which ended up being a family favorite and the most ridden ride for us during our stay.) We then rode the rockets, and decided to move on to FantasyLand.

It also was just how I remembered it. We walked through the story of Sleeping Beauty in the castle. Then we made sure to hit Peter Pan (one of my favorite rides, and now Kimmie's also.) After that, the Magic Carousel, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, the Tea Cups and Alice in Wonderland rides then got some lunch.

Interestingly enough, riding the rides in Fantasyland reminded me that the old-school Disney movies really had a contrast of good and evil, and how dark the evil was. The corresponding rides contained the same contrast.

After lunch, we hit the ride that no one can miss when visiting Disneyland... It's a Small World.

It has been upgraded some since I went, with relevant Disney characters added in their respective cultures. That was really fun, as was watching Gwen mad-snapping pictures throughout the ride. I asked her when we finished if she even got to enjoy the ride (heh.) But what I loved most was the very end of the ride. And not because I was sick of hearing the song over and over and OVER AND OVER... but because of the coolness of the last room before you exit the ride.

What makes it so cool?

Well, when you go through the ride, you get to see all kinds of cultures from around the world, displayed in splendid and vivid color, and it is wonderful. When you get to the end, they re-present the cultures all together in a huge final room. But the really neat thing is that they display them all in white... which to me represented equality for all mankind, regardless of culture. It was very VERY cool. Kudos again, Disneyland; very well done.

After Small World, we made our way up near ToonTown, and noticed a spectacular medieval-looking stage where the Disney Princess Fantasy Faire appeared on the park map. We ventured there since that was going to be the highlight of Mandi's and Kimmie's sojourn in the Magic Kingdom. I asked the crew member managing the 2-mile-long winding line to the Princess Faire how long the wait was. She replied with a smile, "2 1/2 to 3 hours."

I replied, "Wow, so I guess the only real way to handle this attraction is to get here first thing in the morning?" She confirmed, so we decided that would be one of our plans-of-attack for our remaining two mornings.

We made a quick run through ToonTown with the intent of coming back the next morning for our "Magical Morning", because we thought we got to meet the characters there first thing in the morning and what not. While there we snapped a picture with Mickey, but didn't have anything to get his autograph with, so we figured we'd need another encounter before we headed home.

ToonTown has this cool fireworks building with a detonator out front that the kids can play with to make things explode in the building. We watched a kid set them off. Brennan was intrigued and had to go give it a shot...

Brennan went to the detonator and tried a couple of times to get it to work. When he couldn't, I went over to him and tried to offer assistance, telling him he needed to put more "oomph" in his push on the detonator. It failed for me too... so I left him to try again. Another fail.

What happened next was hilarious... watch and enjoy (make sure to click on the HQ if you can.)

By now, we were pretty tired (legs hurt from walking around all day), hungry (dinner time was fast approaching) and the kids were dying to get Mickey-Ear hats. So we made a stop to let them pick their personalized hats, took one more ride on the carousel in Fantasyland, then headed out of the park to Downtown Disney for some dinner before heading back to the hotel for a break.

Brennan is infatuated with Wizard's Apprentice Mickey lately, so he was euphoric when he found out he could get a Wizard's Apprentice Mickey-Ear hat. Mandi and Kimmie picked cute hats too (Kimmie's has a cute princess train flowing off the back):

We were planning on heading back to the park after dark, to see it while all lit up, but found ourselves so tuckered out that we decided to crash for the night. Besides, the next day was our "Magical Morning" and we wanted to take full advantage.

To make sure we could do so, I talked with Guest Services in the lobby of our hotel, the Paradise Pier. I discovered a misunderstanding I'd had about our vacation package: the "Magical Morning" isn't the same deal as the ToonTown special ceremony; that's a separate additional purchase. So I asked what the "Magical Morning" entailed, and he kindly told me that we got to enter the park and hour early, and that only Tomorrowland and Fantasyland were open at that time.

"Well crap!!!" I thought out loud, "... Those are the two areas of the park we focused on today! We would have saved them for tomorrow had we known that!"

Bless the good man's heart, he took pity on me, apologized profusely, despite the fact that it wasn't at all his fault, and asked me for the names of a couple of rides we were really wanting to go on, so he could give us unconditional fast passes for those rides. I told him we really wanted to hit Splash Mountain and the Indiana Jones ride (the Indiana Jones ride being my most anticipated ride, as I'd never been on it; and I thought the kids would love it, since they've been so into the movies lately. Remember this later when we get to that part of the park...)

Now, if you're not familiar with Disneyland's Fast Pass system, many of the more popular/crowded rides have a mechanism where you can use your ticket to get a special pass for a certain time block where you can return during that time block and advance to near the head of the line, regardless of its length. The pass is only good for your time block and you can only have one in your possession per ticket at-a-time, if I understand correctly.

Well, this fine gentleman gave us a super pass that we could use whenever we wanted (no time constraints.) It was an incredibly nice gesture and was more than appreciated with this newb failure on my part. You'll see how everything worked out better-than-planned when I recount entering the park for our "Magical Morning" in the next post.

Stay tuned for Day Two of our Disneyland Adventures...

As Sisters in Zion

2009-04-06T23:59:00.012-07:00

I had the blessed opportunity to live in a little piece of heaven known as Big Stone Gap, VA and Wise, Virginia (southwest corner) for about 6 months of my life while serving in the Tennessee Knoxville Mission (TKM) during the latter-half of 1993.

While there, I fell in love with the people there, including Bishop Yates' family. We had some special times while I served there and I miss them dearly. They and their extended family "adopted" me while I was there. I spent 6 months in their ward, and for 3 of them, kept guessing I would get transferred the next month. My final month there, some of the members joked that if I didn't get transferred that time, I would become the ward's next Bishop. Too funny.

In this post, I'll be focusing on the Yates' oldest daughter, Courtney and her youngest sister, Kristen.

Kristen was 4-5 years old at the time, and one of the cutest little girls I'd ever met. As you can see from the back of the picture of me holding Kristen, her family (including extended family) and I used to joke around about Kristen being my future wife. :)

At the risk of embarassing them (bless their hearts, nothin' but love!!!) this is what we all looked like back then:

Kristen Yates and Elder Litster - Fall 1993

Courtney Yates - Christmas 1993

So I'd tried and failed twice to hook up with their family while they made two sojourns to Utah for weddings of sisters between Courtney and Kristen.

Luckily, I found Kristen on Facebook a couple of months ago (thank heavens for modern technology!) As we started catching up with each other, I discovered she is currently at BYU. Of course, I had to invite her for dinner, so I could catch-up in person, being as I haven't seen her in 15 years, not to mention I'd like to pay back at least a small inkling of what her parents did for me while I was serving my missin in Wise!

We planned a "dinner appointment" and I brought her to my home on 22 March. The cutie I knew back then has blossomed into a beautiful young woman her parents can be proud of. I was so happy to see her, to hear that she's strong in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and happy.

We talked, looked through some of my mission pictures, ate dinner, played Apples-to-Apples with the fmaily, watched "It's Latter-Day Night" (well, most of it... it locked up on us during the last act) and had a wonderful time. Talking with her, hearing that Southern accent, took me "home" to my mission long ago; so many dear friends that I long terribly to see more now, than ever. (Now, there is more to the story of this night, but I have to wait until later to tell it; for reasons that will reveal themselves then.)

After taking Kristen home, I wanted to detour to the airport and fly out to Virginia. I was hoping to see her again soon, and got my wish earlier than I thought would happen. I learned that Courtney (who now lives in Arizona) was coming up two weekends later to go to General Conference with Kristen. Selfishly, I begged them to come to my homs for Sunday dinner again, so I could see Kristen again and Courtney for my first time in 15 years.

Oh, the trip we took down memory lane; sweet nostalgic goodness. We laughed about all the goofy things we used to do when I got to spend time with their family (I had an electronic whoopee cushion, we played fun mind games with the kids, etc.) There was one time they reminded me of when I was with their "mamaw" (grandma) who happens to be a germaphobe and I love to life (which, for the record, is a bit better than loving someone to death.)

I put a big glob of lotion into some tissue when she wasn't looking. I then pretended to sneeze into it when she was looking, and showed it to her afterward. I'm rotten to the core; but what can I say? Boys will be boys. Good times.

Back to the story. I got to catch up with Courtney, hear about her awesome adoption of a beautiful baby from the Ukraine, learn of her family in Arizona where she is also strong in the Gospel. I was happy to hear about friends back in the Powell Valley ward, sad to hear about some unfortunate things that happened in some of their lives, but overall wanting even more to return and spend more time with those wonderful friends.

We ate gabbed and gabbed, ate dinner, played Phase 10 with the family, feasted on Gwen's world-famous chocolate-chip cookies, and re-watched a new copy of "It's Latter-Day Night" that wouldn't freeze up on us.

I was sad to see it end, but again, the night drew to a close and Courtney and Kristen had to head for home. They either had a good time, or would good sports and humored me when it was time for pictures.

So you've seen the before, here is the after (Note the Celestial glow beaming from the ladies; I'm not worthy to be that close to any of them...):

Kristen, Jeff, Gwen - March 2009

Courtney and Kristen - April 2009

Gwen, Jeff, Courtney and Kristen - April 2009

I'm grateful Courtney and Kristen were kind enough to bless me and my family with their presence, sacrificing their short time together to come patronize my need for nostalgia. :) I sure hope I'll get to see the rest of the family soon *NUDGE NUDGE*

I'm seriously tempted to buy airline tickets to fly out there for a weekend soon. I'm dying to visit!

This was another one of those times where I'm reminded that this life is all about people. We don't get to take anything with us but the knowledge we gain here and the relationships we build with people.

Tread lightly and handle those relationships with care. Don't waste a moment, because you'll treasure them later, even some of the bad moments. I'll never forget those I left in that small corner of Virginia. As Courtney and Kristen were in my home, we repeatedly said how floods of memories came back, as if it were yesterday. It's amazing what a few minutes with someone you haven't seen in years will do for you. So much happiness filled my heart. It always does with reunions like these.

Keep that in mind next time your High School, Mission or other reunion comes around. Too many times, I talk with friends who have no interest in going, but don't know what you're missing. Try it, you'll be glad you did.

Thanks, Courtney and Kristenl "Ah love ye!" And thanks Mom and Dad Yates for raising such a wonderful family, and sharing yourselves with me! You've officially stolen a part of my heart, and I send my love to you. God bless!

The Cake is NOT a Lie

2009-03-30T23:54:00.002-07:00

I wished for a Portal cake, and my beautiful wife and three youngest delivered it to my work today.

Aperture Science and GLaDOS have nothing over you, sweetheart. Thanks for a wonderful gift; you rock my world!

Andrew the Bon-Diggity Dancer

2009-03-26T08:00:00.000-07:00

Andrew inherited Gwen's dancer genes. And it shows... as before he reached 18 months, he was bustin' some serious dance moves in our living room, to the beat of the Cheetah Girls.

Pay special attention to the part where the Cheetah Girls kick in some a cappella; he drops to all fours and gets his groove on! Very impressive!

Go Drew... Go Drew... Go Drew...

You'll see my daughters dancing in here too... Kimmie is a little Diva and I think her jamming-out skills have rubbed off on Andrew a little too.

Enjoy!

Not-So-Happy New Year

2009-03-25T08:00:00.001-07:00

I had to return to make my return to blogging a happy one by posting about Mandi's baptism. This post is out of order some, but that's ok... cause this one wasn't as happy.

During the Christmas season, Ryan decided to play Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer all through December. He started by falling and scraping the top layer of skin off a nice chunk of his nose. Everytime it was about to heal completely, he'd fall again to reinjure it. The worst of the three episodes that made him suffer this symptom throughout December was when he was standing on a little toy basket we keep beside our couch. He was standing up to the arm of the couch on this basket, when he lost his footing and fell face first into the heater vent grate. All I can say is: "Ryan with your nose so bright... won't you guide my sleigh tonight?!"

It was all a precursor to a health nightmare that would begin on, you guessed it, New Year's Day. Why waste time when you can get an immediate start on the first day of the year, after all?

It began with Kimmie waking up on New Year's Day with Croup. After two visits to the instacare for Kimmie, we started getting her on the downhill; but Ryan and Andrew caught it before we could get Kimmie over hers.

If that wasn't bad enough, Ryan contracted an ear infection on top of it... so when we took the twins to the doctor, we were given Amoxicillin for both... a stronger dose for Ryan since he had the ear infection, and Andrew got his lower dosage just to make sure he didn't contract an infection too.

Well, when it rains, it pours. If that weren't enough, Ryan's little body decided to have an awful allergic reaction to the antibioitics.

Needless to say, Gwen and I rarely got sleep for the first three weeks of the new year, and it took its toll on our bodies. I ended up with Bronchitis bad enough to knock me out of work for three days, inducing some Pleurisy afterward, from which I was given steroids to try to make it go away faster, but that just started wigging my body out, so I immediately stopped taking that. Happy Happy, Joy Joy Joy!

Anyway, we're hoping we've had our fair share of illness for at least this half of the year. We're hoping for smooth sailing for a while, especially with Spring around the corner; cause we're sick of being sick. :)

Mandi's Beautiful Baptism Day

2009-03-23T23:13:00.004-07:00

There aren't many blessings more wonderful in a father's life, than that of baptizing his children. Mandi reached the age of accountability and decided she wanted to be baptized.

It was all she could talk about for about a month-and-a-half. All she wanted was to reach her birthday, so she could get baptized. She wanted to have it happen on her birthday, but she, as patiently as she could, had to wait until January to do it. It couldn't come fast enough. :)

She invited everyone dear to her, including family, friends and Primary teachers. It was such a special day for her and she was beaming from ear-to-ear the entire weekend. Mandi was baptized, confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and received the Gift of the Holy Ghost on Saturday; and it was beautiful.

Sunday was fast and testimony meeting and Mandi decided on her own that she wanted to get up and bear her testimony to the congregation. In Matthew 21, Jesus said, "Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?"

I think that anyone in our ward that day would attest that her testimony was that. Normally young children require the assistance of parents to help them get their feelings expressed, but Mandi walked right up to the microphone and shared the tender feelings of her heart.

I really wish that I could've entered this blog entry back then while the words were fresh in my mind, because I was brought to tears it touched me so. Alas, my crazy busy life kept me away and now I must rely on the now-somewhat-faded memory of a couple months ago.

She expressed how warm and wonderful she felt inside as she got baptized and received the gift of the Holy Ghost, and how it made her want to do good and live her life as best she could to please her Heavenly Father. She mentioned how grateful she is that Jesus Christ gave His life for us that we might be forgiven of our sins and return to live with He and Heavenly Father again someday. She said it makes her really happy inside to know that she can be forgiven when she makes mistakes and can have the Holy Ghost help her feel happy again.

I really can't do it justice; her words were inspired.

I also had decided to bear my testimony and we had walked to the pulpit together to share them. A little cute sidenote I have to share... Our good friends Nathan and Jen Horner, who lived across the hall from our West Jordan apartment years ago, live in our current ward and their awesome son Timothy had also come up to bear his testimony. He sat down to wait his turn before Mandi and I had, but was trying to insist that we go first. He's so awesome. :) I had to keep convincing him to go first, because I wanted to follow-up after the kids so he wouldn't have to wait for my long-windedness. He kept insisting... but finally gave in. What a cutie...

Anyway, I found myself a little speechless (hard to believe, I know) after Mandi's spiritual edification and I had to pause, choked up, for a moment before I could share mine. It was definitely a "Parent Payoff" day, and I count myself blessed to have been a part of it. God certainly saved his choicest for this generation.

I'm grateful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ in my own life. And while I'm far from perfect, as you all know, I'm glad to know that my elder brother loves me enough to have suffered for all of my imperfections and has the patience to endure while I learn how to live as He did. I still have a long way to go, but I know He's with me all the way, especially through hard times; and I'm thankful he has blessed us with the Holy Ghost to help comfort us while we get through those.

Luckily the hardest things we're dealing with right now is trying to juggle our demanding schedules with the twins and everything else going on with the rest of the kids. My children are so precious... I don't know how the Lord saw me fit to entrust with five of his valiant spirits, and I hope that one day I'll live up to the expectations.

And moments like Mandi's baptism sure make it all worth it. You're beautiful Mandi! Mommy and I love you so much. We couldn't be more proud of you. Keep choosing the right!

Baaaad to the Bone - Shear Goodness

2009-03-23T23:03:00.005-07:00

Don't be "sheep"ish, ewe must watch this. (I'm assuming no sheep were harmed during the filming of this YouTube video.)

Seriously though, this video is a must-see. Thank heavens for YouTube. It keeps life enjoyable.
Thanks, Russ for the link! It reminds me of the video game "Sheep" I played years ago on PC. Good times.

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Addendum: I know, I know... I've been gone for months, and this is the first post I could do?! I know many have been waiting for some other entries (like a pic of Mandi's baptism; coming next) ... but this was a quick post I could throw up here quick, so enjoy whilst I get my othe catch-up posts drafted. More to come...

The Daughters of December Delight in Their Birthday Celebrations

2008-12-12T00:01:00.020-07:00

This month, my two princesses celebrated their birthdays. I, without bias, have the cutest daughters in the entire world.

Kimmie awoke on her birthday to find a makeshift "throne" awaiting her. I got to perform the coronation as we placed tiara on her head, with matching earrings and "royal insignia ring."

Here "wii" see our Princess (Peach?) in her royal throne, proudly holding her royal wand and wii remote; all ready to play Enchanted Journey or Hannah Montana.

Incidentally, as part of the passage-to-princesshood, Kimmie decided she was old enough and too big for her binky and burpcloth (which were the "security blanket" for going to sleep.) She promptly threw them in the garbage birthday morning, never to be seen again. We're proud of our princess.

Later, Kimmie was presented with her palace (which "ruled" because she got to eat it after!) And what's this?! Disney Princess toys to keep and play with after? Uh-BOOYA!

This castle cake was freakin' cute; especially her her royal-higness' picture on top in a fun stand-up frame.

She wasn't proud of her cake at all. Heck, skip the cake; Kimmie's cute enough to nibble in this picture. :)

And what birthday would be complete without a microphone that lets you sing with FM radio?! That's right... it's Hannah Kimtana! :) Princess and Pop-Star... Pop-Star Princess; it truly was 'the best of both worlds.'

... Then came Mandi's Birthday ...

Mandi received a new addition to her Littlest Pet Shop collection when she awoke on her birthday.

... She wasn't at all excited ... Mandi and Kimmie immediately began playing with it; and it must've been some kind of crazy cool, because Brennan even got in on the action for a few minutes. (No I don't have incriminating pictures... and if I did, they'd be saved for his dates when he comes of age.) ;)

Our family has been really into the original Knight Rider show. It has become a family tradition as we watch through the entire collection (we're in the middle of season 3 currently) and all the kids eagerly anticipate the next episode. They nag us on a nightly basis to watch another "new" episode (which I don't mind... I'm loving going back through the show; but that's another story for another day.)

Needless to say, Mandi included the Knight Rider video game on her birthday wish list. We, thanks to Amazon were able to deliver!

This is Mandi after receiving her game... with myself being silly and exchanging giggles with Ryan. Proof that being a Daddy sure has its moments and is completely worth it.

Mandi's "cake" was comprised of pumpkin-chocolate-chip cookies stacked together with frosting between for "mortar." It was tasty and we had a good time enjoying it. Mandi's bowling birthday party is this weekend with her friends; and she'll have a cool cake that she picked out for it. I haven't seen it yet, so I look forward to it; especially if it's cool like Kimmie's!

I caught a fun shot of Mandi blowing out her candles. The smoke from the candles came flying at me and I started coughing directly after... but was able to snap the shot before that happened.

I hope you get your wish, Mandi!

And finally, Mandi enjoying her "cake" ... Mommy's food is always so yummy!

For the record, Kimmie took this picture. I'm thinking she has a bright future in photography if she wants.

Happy Birthday Mandi and Kimmie! I love you my sweet darling princesses!

Thoughts About This Year's Election

2008-10-30T04:29:00.004-07:00

1. Educate Yourself
2. Pick Your Candidate
3. Vote

1. Educate Yourself
When I say "Educate Yourself" I'm not talking about watching TV and learning about things through that medium alone. As you may or may not know, they only give the limelight to the two "major" parties.

There are 7 sets of candidates running for President/Vice President this year. You need to know about each and every one of them to truly be an "informed voter."

I'm providing links to all of their websites so you can go find out what they're about on your own without media influence (well, unless you find YouTube videos or other places with these candidates on television programs, etc.)

The Presidential/Vice-Presidential Candidates: (in alphabetical order by Presidential candidate's last name; list comes from the 2008 Utah Voter Information Pamphlet)

Constitution Party
Charles O. "Chuck" Baldwin (President)
Darrel Castle (Vice President)
Constitution Party Website
Baldwin/Castle Campaign Website

Libertarian Party
Bob Barr (President)
Wayne A. Root (Vice President)
Libertarian Party Website
Bob Barr Presidential Campaign Website

Party for Socialism and Liberation
Gloria La Riva (President)
Eugene Puryear (Vice President)
Party for Socialism and Liberation Website
La Riva/Puryear Campaign Website

Republican Party
John McCain (President)
Sarah Palin (Vice President)
Republican National Committee Website
McCain/Palin Campaign Website

Green Party of the United States
Cynthia McKinney (President)
Rosa Clemente (Vice President)
Green Party of the United States Website
Cynthia McKinney Campaign Website

Peace and Freedom Party
Ralph Nader (President)
Matt Gonzalez (Vice President)
Peace and Freedom Party Website
Nader/Gonzalez Campaign Website

Democratic Party
Barack Obama (President)
Joe Biden (Vice President)
Democratic Party Website
Barack Obama Campaign Website

Remember, there are SEVEN candidates, not TWO... learn about them all, then:

2. Pick a Candidate
When I say "Pick a Candidate" I don't mean for you to fall under this bullcrap notion that I've heard all year long that "Well, I really like one of the 'third party' candidates, but they'll never win, so I have to vote for the 'lesser of two evils'..."

I've heard this from more people than I've actually heard people wanting to vote for John McCain or Barack Obama. Think about it, people... if everyone voted for the person they really think should be President (including write-ins) this attitude wouldn't exist and the elections would go MUCH differently than they do now; they'd go how they were MEANT to...

If you truly want to make your voice heard, vote for the candidate you really think should be President; especially if they are third party! So, again, educate yourself and pick the candidate you feel is best suited for this election... (and that's fine if you think McCain or Obama is best-suited... but please DON'T vote for them if you like another candidate better; VOTE FOR YOUR CANDIDATE!)

3. Vote
The one thing the media-at-large has done RIGHT this year, is to portray how important this year's election is. I don't need to spell out for anyone how many interesting (and scary) things are going on in our society right now. If we truly want "change" we need to shout out the message by voting for the APPROPRIATE candidate (see section 2 above.)

Remember, "If you don't get in line, you'd better not whine..." and "If you don't make a choice, you don't have a voice."

I'm not going to tell you who to vote for; and I'm not going to reveal who I'm voting for... because you need to educate yourself and make that choice. I'm actually still in the process of making mine... I'm about 90% sure about a couple of people I'd like to vote for, but am still making sure I read up on everyone and make a truly informed decision. I exhort everyone else to do the same...

... and not just for Presdiential/Vice-Presidential candidates; but for everyone you'll be voting for on 04 November.

God bless the United States of America... get out there and vote!

High School Musical 3 - Senior Year

2008-10-18T08:28:00.003-07:00

Our family is a huge fan of the High School Musical series. We're excited to be taking the kids to the first showing on 24 October 2008.

For those of you unfamiliar, High School Musical is a series of films (the first two made for Disney Channel) by director and choreographer Kenny Ortega. We've been a fan of his work since Newsies. If you haven't seen anything he's done, we'd highly recommend checking out Newsies, any of the High School Musical movies, and/or The Cheetah Girls 2. He does an amazing job taking huge groups of young talent and making them shine. The dance numbers in all of these movies are incredible.

The films are extra special to us because the films have been made here in Utah.

So go see the Wildcats' final year together and the end of a fun film franchise. And if you haven't seen the first two, we'll be happy to show them to you. :)

State of the Art Tech-hot-ogy

2008-09-20T13:30:00.002-07:00

Techotogy: That One Gwen; She's tech-savvy, she's hot and she's a blog prodigy.

Welcome to the world of blogging, honey.

Shopping by Kimmie

2008-09-19T18:14:00.004-07:00

Jeff said I have to introduce myself. I'm Gwen. I'm the supermom Jeff tells you all about. I'm the mom of the Q-T-Pie kids in all the pictures. I don't have as much time as Jeff does to blog, and I'm not as great at writing as Jeff is either. But I'm trying my hand at it anyway!

Today, my cute little Kimmie announced she wanted to go shopping. She grabbed her purse, put on her slippers and invited me to go with her.

At the moment I was changing one of the twins, so I asked Kimmie what she was shopping for.

She simply replied, "Shopping."

I realized I had to explain myself. "Are you shopping for food? Are you shopping for clothes? Are you shopping for tools? What are you shopping for, Kimmie?" I asked.

"Dress-up" was Kimmie's response.

I asked where she planned on doing this shopping.

"My room."

Before I was even done changing one on the boys, Kimmie went to her room, gathered up her spoils, and returned with an armful of too-big clothes she had shopped for! My cute little Kimmie is a true girl.

The Sons of September Slip into Celebration Mode

2008-09-17T22:04:00.016-07:00

Part I - Brennan's Birthday

So all three of my sons were born in September. We couldn't break the mold no matter how hard we tried. Whether we liked it or not, we got all our boys in September and our girls in December.

So Brennan's birthday came first... He got breakfast of his choice (pancakes and muffins), a wireless Playstation 2 controller, homemade Oreo cookies for his birthday cake, lunch with Dad and the family (thanks to work being so close to home now!) and some presents that are awaiting shipping from overseas (Kingdom Hearts 2 collectibles.) It was a fun day.

That weekend, we threw Brennan's party at NickelMania. 10 kids and 4 adults, and it was a riot! Though I have to say, I wonder if the adults had more fun than the kids. They say youth is wasted on the young... well, many of the kids blew most of their 40 nickels in about 20 minutes due to throwing them into the "ticket" games trying to win prizes. Brennan and his friend Bryson put 20 of them each into a Simpsons arcade game so they could have 60 lives each. heh.

They certainly don't appreciate the concept of arcades as the adults remember it from our youth (said in the voice of Grumpy Old Man: "Back in my day, video games cost $0.25 and we LIKED IT!!! Oh how we LOVED IT!!!") See, when we hit arcades as kids, the goal was to see how long you could go on one or two quarters on a game.

And these nickel arcades are packed with games we used to play as kids. The really fun ones, like Frogger, Q*bert, TRON, Joust, Donkey Kong (and all sequels), Super Mario Bros, BurgerTime, Defender, etc. they're all there and more. One wall is lined with old-school pinball games. They have some newer ones too, so there is pretty much something for everyone there. The adults talked a lot about ditching the kids some time and having an adults night there. I think we will.

Anyway, everyone had a great time; and it was wonderful to see Brennan have such fun with his friends.

Part II - Ryan's and Andrew's Birthdays

Congrats, Gwennie!!! You survived the twins' first year! You are more than Mom-of-the-Year material, trust me... And we still need to do some kick-butt bash for you and your achievements! Since I didn't have time to do anything cool around their birthdays, we'll have to see about something special come Anniversary time. ;)

So Ryan and Andrew celebrated their first birthday on Sunday with my family gathered round (we had six birthdays to celebrate amongst my siblings' famlies and mine; my own family accounting for three of them. heh)

As is tradition, we like to give large pieces of cake to the children (Brennan got an entire small cake for his first birthday) and enjoy their reaction to it after being placed in front of them. We must not like getting sleep.

Needless to say, Ryan and Andrew didn't delay in devouring their chocolate goodness that tastes infinitely better than that nasty-smelling formula they've been forced to consume throughout their first year.

It was a well-received right-of-passage into toddlerhood, and they accepted it gleefully. The pictures and video will tell all; but for a cliff-notes explanation, Ryan dropped a large portion of his cake down in his lap just before I started taking video of the event. So when his tray already looks empty when you watch the video, that's why. You'll chuckle when he finds it again during the video. Enjoy!

And now our feature presentation...

click play on the video below

And finally, the aftermath... Way to get in to your work guys! Y'all really cleaned house (rather made a mess of it...)

Happy Birthday, the boys! I love you!

Tender Moments with My Family

2008-09-02T19:00:00.000-07:00

Gwen's grandmother passed away last week and we headed to St. George for the funeral. It was a wonderful and honorable tribute to a great woman that has influenced all of our lives for good and we'll miss her. We're grateful she's returned home to her Heavenly Father and husband who passed a few years back; away from her suffering.

Gwen's family did something very special at both her grandfather's and grandmother's funerals; something I've never seen done before, but would love to see at more in the future.

Each of the grandchildren and great-grandchildren wrote down something special they remember about Grandma on a paper heart. The paper hearts were then affixed to a balloon (one heart per balloon) and we all released them together after the dedication of the grave, while a special song played on the loud-speaker. It was a very precious and tender moment.

As we watched the balloons fly high into the sky, my sweet compassionate Mandi burst into tears. As my loving wife brought Mandi into her arms to console her, my youngest daughter Kimmie cuddled in and my son Brennan came close to lend his support. I feared ruining such a tender moment, but felt compelled to capture it on camera as I was so moved by it myself.

Family is what it's all about, my friends... and it's times like these that are poignant reminders. So draw in your little ones... hug them, tell them how much you love them. Because no matter what life throws at you, they're what you always have, no matter what.

And cherish the special moments like this... they're what stay with you through time while the other things fade away.

I Saw an Arrow of Light... (the a-"Bridge"d Version)

2008-09-01T22:12:00.007-07:00

This month Brennan will graduate from being a Cub Scout to being an 11-year old Scout. His leaders, especially Nic Hales, have worked extremely hard to ensure he met the goal of achieving his "Arrow of Light" award before he moved on.

Now the Arrow of Light is the highest honor a Cub Scout can earn. From the Boy Scouts of America site: "The pinnacle of Cub Scouting is the Arrow of Light Award. The requirements for this badge include developing outdoor skills, gaining an understanding of the values of Scouting, and preparing to become a Boy Scout."

Sadly, I myself never earned this award; and it probably means Brennan is a better outdoorsman than I am. Those of you that know me will testify this is true.

Back to the story...

Last Tuesday was Brennan's final Cub Pack Meeting. He was presented with his arrow of light. As you can see he was proud of himself; and well he should be. We're pretty proud of him too.

After the award was presented, Brennan got to pick which cheer we would do for him in honor of earning this prestigous award. As you can see, he picked one that would make a good shot to make mom and dad look not-so-presigous in the picture (props to Shanette for catching us at the opportune moment!); the "watermelon" cheer.

... And of course, the best part about being a dad ... the hugs of appreciation afterwards (though I must say I didn't do much... Mom on the other hand... she got two hugs; one from Brennan and one from me.) Congratulations, Brennan!

Next came the Bridging Ceremony, symbolic of their crossing over from Cub Scouts to Boy Scouts. Brennan got to tell the Pack what his most memorable experiences were going through Cub Scouts, which included Flag Football and a really fun overnight campout at Uncle Keith's in Tooele; where Brennan got to ride a horse and more.

We're all looking forward to the adventures Brennan will have in the Boy Scouts and hope his enthusiasm will continue on.

Our many thanks go out to all of his leaders over the years. You've all been wonderful.

Congratulations, again, Brennan! We love you and are so proud of you! :)

The Return of Abe and Oddworld!!!

2008-08-29T00:57:00.004-07:00

I posted about this on the Friday Night Gamers blog; but I have to talk about it here too.

Abe is a part of my past. A part I almost recently revived when I was cleaning up my office some and ran into my Abe's Exoddus CD. These games will have you in stitches as you help Abe rescue his friends from slavery and impending doom.

Failures in the game are almost as fun as successes; and you'll find yourself repeating them for laughs as you go through the game. You interact with the friends to get them to team up to help you past obstacles. Depending on your actions... your friends will react in different ways (including getting into slap fights...)

The slap is useful when your friends seem "punch-drunk" from happy gas ... and speaking of gas... the games are loaded with farts.

Demos are available for both Oddworld games, so get downloading now... then go buy it, play them and come back and tell us what you think!
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee (demo)
Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus (demo)

Kimmie Rocks Out to Camp Rock Game

2008-08-24T08:15:00.002-07:00

Mandi and Kimmie like to play a "Guitar Hero-esque" game based on Disney Channel's "Camp Rock" movie.

Here, Kimmie is watching Mandi play and jamming out to the beat of the music. You'll have to listen very closely and tune out the background noise, but if you can pick out the music, you'll see that she nails a lot of the hard hitting stuff at the beginning of the end of this short clip.

It was an absolute hoot to watch... enjoy!

The Friends We Leave Behind

2008-08-23T08:33:00.010-07:00

Friday was a bittersweet day. I am leaving ProPay to start new adventures at LANDesk.

If you want to see the soul of ProPay, this is IT! (Information Technology that is... swimmin' pools... movie stars...) Anyway... this is one of the finest conglomerations of talent ever "compiled" and I'm proud to call them my friends.

I'll miss you all... but I won't have to if you'll stop playing WoW and start playing TrackMania!!! (And don't forget to start watching Kim Possible... did I mention it's the BEST SHOW EVER MADE?!)

So, the friends I'm leaving behind...

From left-to-right:

Top Row:

^{Robin Shinkle,} _{Scott Maxfield,} ^{Jim Austin,} Wayne Peck, _{Nathan Younger,} ^{Marv White}

Middle Row:

Rob Lish, Anthony Clayson, Jonathan Godfrey, ^{Lloyd Dison, Rob Sabey,}
Stuart Nelson, Ryan Jackson, ^{Nathan Holman,} Jason Gifford, _{Joe Hargadon,}

Miguel Jimenez

Bottom Row:

Patrick Cahill

You'll also notice (behind Jim) Nate Younger's styrofoam Space Invaders... excellent!

Clint Lord was in a meeting, so I had to capture him later... I still missed Dave Jensen, McKay Salisbury, Cris Zamora and Danielle Sargent, for which I am bummed... y'all will have to send me your own pictures... heh! (I also missed alumni like Tyler Jensen and Dan Jarvis.)

There are others from other departments I'll miss too... a company full of good people to be sure.

Thanks for the good times, guys (and gals!)

Where a Kid Can Be a Kid

2008-08-20T22:17:00.004-07:00

So I'm driving out of my neighborhood this morning; heading to Bangerter Highway so I can get to I-15 and head to Happy Valley to my place of employment.

Along the way, I see two young girls walking to school. Well, one of them was walking. The other was stopped in somewhat of a crouching stance, periodically jumping as if she were practicing ollies on a virtual skateboard.

As I approached and past, I watched her jump a couple of times... one being right as I passed her.

Curious, I checked back in my rear-view mirror a couple seconds as I continued down the road... to see the girl hop a couple more times. Then it dawned on me why she was doing this.

Remember when you were young and you used to do really cool things like floating popsicle sticks down the gutter after a big rainstorm, pretending they were boats? Remember walking home from school on a cold winter day and taking 20 minutes at the end of your street to have contests with your friends to see who could slide the farthest on the ice? Remember walking to school on a spring/summer day and stopping to jump over shadows as if letting them touch you would induce a fate-worse-than-death?

That's the game this little girl was playing, my friends; and I was jealous. I remember hopping car shadows on my way to school... having to try to jump extra high on the ones that drove past slow or were extra big (like garbage trucks or semis with trailers...) Ah, good times... good times!

As if that wasn't enough to sweep me away, all the music cycling through on my mp3 player was stuff I loved in high school. That took me back to memories I have of other dorky things I'd do with friends from that era of my life, like: toilet papering someone's house, driving past a girl's house that I liked half-way across the valley (we won't mention any names... *Gina*), going for slurpees at 1:00am, coming up with silly "insider" code words for discussing things with your friends at school in public, but making sure only you understood them (donut gems and gold chains... *Ben*) :)

Why does life have to get so freaking complicated and laden with responsibilities when we "grow up?" Ok, let me rephrase that... when we get older and are labelled an "adult."

I've become this crotchety, ornery old fart (emphasis on the word "fart") and I want to go back to being the care-free, fun-loving, people-actually-liked-to-be-around-me guy that I was back in the days of pre-adult times... if not for anything else than to have my wonderful children see who I REALLY am deep-down.

My poor kids, they just see this man who is hustling in the morning just trying to get ready for work and with whatever spare time is left, trying to help Gwen get the kids ready for and off to school. Then I go to work all day (and sometimes night) and when I do get to come home before bedtime... am stuck just rushing to get dinner over with, homework finished, kids in pajamas, teeth brushed and whisked away to bed. It doesn't seem like much of a life with "Dad."

Of course, if I tried to go back to care-free with no responsibilities like I was back then, we'd have no house, food on the table, and most importantly to the kids... no video games/computers/TV... Dad becomes more of a loser.

So how do we win in this game called "Parenthood?" How does one "keep the child inside alive" whilst meeting financial obligations and other responsibilities?

I'd love to hear from my other friends in the same sitch and see what successes/failures you've had in trying to find the happy medium of having fun and staying responsible, without dying of ulcers, muscle tension and migraines from the stresses of the latter... because this kid wants to be a kid again!

I think I'm going to start by taking my kids on a walk... and we'll try jumping car shadows.

Old School RPG Gaming

2008-08-18T23:59:00.002-07:00

Going through some pictures today, I discovered some pictures I had taken of some maps I'd drawn up while playing through a couple of Role Playing Games (RPGs) I was into right after I married Gwen.

It's a fun kayak trip down the Nostalgia Nile... and I tell you, it's certainly not like it used to be anymore. In the old days, half the fun of the game was drawing up these things while you played through. Sure, walkthroughs were available on Bulletin Board Systems (BBSes) but the maps weren't.

The map above is of a game called Times of Lore. Incidentally, while looking around for links to the game, I found these maps... puts my maps to shame, but I still think mine are cool (no matter how inaccurate they might be compared... Hey, they got me through the game, so they're good for something!)

The map below is of an area of Phantasie III (screenshots), a game I used to play tons in high school with my friend Russ.

Now with the advent of Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs), especially World of Warcraft (WoW)... there is such a wealth of information online about the game (including character stats, guild forums, etc.) that the "world" of the game involves much more than actually playing the game. It's much more involved (and costs a lot more money) than I'd care to indulge in... but it's enough for millions of others.

For the record, I don't care what anyone says, I had some mad map-making skillz back then. :)

Celebrating the Release of "Camp Rock" and Kimmie - Our Rock Star

2008-08-18T22:26:00.003-07:00

On Tuesday, 19 August 2008, Disney Channel will release "Camp Rock" on DVD.

Weeks before the movie's debut on Disney Channel, Kimmie would frequent the web site, listen to and memorize the music.

Gwen captured Kimmie in the moment while belting out the lyrics from one of the songs! I didn't get to witness it first-hand until we watched the movie on ABC the night after the debut. During the final two songs of the movie, Kimmie jumped up and started dancing around singing with the movie. She rocked. We enjoyed.

And now we'll get to do it again with the DVD.

If you (and/or your kids) enjoy the Jonas Brothers, you'll have fun with this movie. The music is catchy and the message is about being true to yourself and your friends. Give it a shot if you haven't.

TrackMania United Forever only $20.00 This Weekend on Steam!!!

2008-08-16T13:21:00.002-07:00

Buy TrackMania United Forever on Steam this weekend for 50% off!

If you like TrackMania Nations at all, you'll not want to miss this offer! Get one of the greatest racing games ever made for only $19.99 this weekend only!

What are you waiting for...?! Stop reading and start downloading! Then come race with the Friday Night Gamers!!!

KP DVD Boxed Sets... Mission Possible

2008-08-01T06:37:00.002-07:00

For some wild reason last night, I decided to start checking around Disney websites and Googling for Kim Possible DVD boxed sets again to see if there was any news about the possibility of Disney releasing any in the near future.

What I first discovered was a forum post at the beginning of this year talking about a release in Germany of Season One; including a YouTube link for a trailer talking about the DVD.

Doing further investigation turned up links on Amazon and Target (provided by Amazon) that talk list a USA version as a future item (if you click on the Amazon link, you can sign up for an e-mail notification when it becomes available.)

So get stoked, Kim Possible fans... hopefully the wait is almost over. I would prefer an entire series boxed sets; but I'll settle for invdividual seasons if that's what we get! Booya! It's bon-diggity...

For Those That Waited So Patiently For Updated Pictures...

2008-08-01T01:16:00.004-07:00

I posted a page of updated pictures and movies of everyone but Gwen and Brennan (we'll dig some of those up later too.) There is a really funny movie of Mandi and Kimmie doing sit-ups. Check it out!

Here's a preview:

Why I Dropped Off the Face of the Earth

2008-07-06T20:52:00.003-07:00

I got sick of blogging...

... No, seriously, for those that haven't already heard the story ...

On Saturday, 12 April, I went to the baptism of my nephew Morgan Hansen. It was a wonderful service and our family met together at Iggy's near South Towne Mall for lunch afterward.

The food was alright; nothing to blog about... but we went home and that evening I started getting achy all over my body and nauseous. My first reaction was, "Crap, I got food poisoning from Iggy's!" ... and I took it easy the entire night hoping to ride out the effects with minimal discomfort/damage.

I woke up Sunday with the nausea gone, but the aches remained. I went to Church and decided I was just going to roll with the aches in hopes they'd go away soon.

I reported to work Monday still aching. I started developing a cough; which at first seemed harmless, but with each passing day got worse until I was sounding like a chain smoker.

By Wednesday, I was aching and coughing so bad, I decided mid-afternoon that I'd go to the Instacare after work and find out what on Earth was wrong with me. By the time I made it home, I slumped down on the couch and started feeling cold.

It turns out I'd now developed a fever to compliment the aches and cough. Gwen called her parents (thank you so much!) to come watch the kids while she drove me to the Instacare.

The doctor was very kind and quickly discovered that I had Bronchitis induced by Influenza Type-B.

Now, let me the explain the irony here, cause it's a kicker... I have refused to get flu shots for years, because the first time I got one, I got dang sick from it. I swore I'd never do one again. However, this past year was different. I was so worried about our twins being delivered near RSV season, that I got one in hopes of protecting them some through their first winter.

So... we made it through the winter with no apparent signs of flu... but come April, I was screwed. The other kicker... the shot for that year didn't cover Influenza Type-B; so it didn't matter anyway!!! (Anger ensues...)

It gets worse. The doctor told me that had I come in within 72 hours of feeling symptoms, they could have killed the Influenza with "Tamiflu." Well, I WOULD HAVE gone in, but doctors always tell you to wait like 10 days before coming to see them when you have a cough. Here I had just missed the 72 hour mark, so was forced to ride it out.

So that was Wednesday night. By the next Tuesday, it evolved into full-blown Pneumonia in my right-lung, lower lobe. All I could do was breathe shallow to try to avoid incessant cough attacks that I swear were going to invert my torso structure. Many times I was near meeting my lungs and intestines. I coughed so hard, I pulled muscles I never knew I had.

When I went to my real doctor and was diagnosed with the Pneumonia; by the end of the visit, I had to just sit on the bed with hands on my knees, head bowed barely able to hold myself up. The doctor said, "Are you going to be alright?" and felt quite bad for my condition.

He monitored me very closely and did all he could to make this the least of an uncomfortable ride as possible (which is pretty much IMPOSSIBLE.) He was very good, though and I'm grateful for his help.

So, I continued to work, but via telecommuting for the rest of the week. While at home, I avoided everyone (especially the twins) and pretty much stayed in bed when I wasn't sitting at the computer working. The next week, I was in such bad shape, I couldn't even get out of bed. I would muster up enough strength to shower on some days, but by the time I was finished, my day's energy was spent and it was all I could do to get dressed again and get back to the bed.

Needless to say, I took that entire week off work.

The next week I decided to try the telecommuting thing again, still very weak and coughing up the lungs. We had a deadline to hit, so I felt obligated and didn't want to leave my buddies hanging any longer than I had to. I was an idiot and pushed myself too hard... working til 10:00pm on the Monday at home, then trying to go in to the office the next day for our demo. By 2:00pm my head was swimming, I was short of breath and thought I would soon pass out. I drove home and was forced to work the rest of the week at home.

Even after I finally made it back to work permanently, it took another several weeks to get my voice back (for which I was mocked profusely) and the cough lingered for about as long.

I'm still not conditioned for anything very aerobic and get winded very easily. I have a slight residual cough that aggravates when the allergies are in full swing and on rare occasions my voice starts to go out around bedtime; but for the most part, I'm "back to normal."

I've never been so sick in my entire life; and I hope I never get that sick again. During the climax of what my doctor's intern referred to as a "lung injury" - I coughed so hard it not only sapped all my energy, but felt like it strained every muscle in my torso. Just when I thought I couldn't possibly cough anymore... my body was spastically seize into a frenzy. It hurt so bad, I was near praying for death.

Bless Gwen's heart... she informed me I wouldn't be able to leave the Earth at this time. She was so patient and understanding; and tackled a family of seven on her own the entire time, including our infant twins.

I'm so not worthy of her, nor deserve her; but am sincerely grateful the Lord saw fit to bless me to be with her. I now need to get some free time so I can plan a really killer date for her to get away from everything and escape to fun for some time. Heaven knows she more than deserves it.

Thankfully, none of the rest of my family got nailed with it either. The twins had an ear infection near the end of my bout, but it seems non-related.

So that's the state of my union. I've become so backed up on everything that I'll probably never catch up. My goal for the next post is to get some pics and potentially some video up of the kids.

Talk to you soon; and thanks for not giving up on me completely! :)

TrackMania Forever!!!

2008-04-16T00:20:00.008-07:00

TrackMania United Forever - Quiet Ride Down a Country Road at Night

Many people dread April 15th (at least if they live in the United States and they owe the Government taxes...) but not me.

No way, April 15th 2008 (April 16th in France) was one of the best days in video-gaming history for me.

That's right... TrackMania United Forever (TMUF) and TrackMania Nations Forever (TNF) were released today; the latter being the free version.

Nadeo, the game's creator, took the United engine for the Stadium environment and put it into TMNF. Basically, Nations Forever is like taking Stadium straight out of United and put in a standalone game. What makes this great is that owners of TMUF (which contains an additional 6 environments spanning the entire TrackMania series) can connect to TMNF servers without having Nations Forever installed (prior to this release, one had to install both TrackMania United (TMU) and TrackMania Nations (TMN) to play both.)

That's the first really exciting piece of goodness I discovered when I updated my game to TrackMania United Forever... but wait, there's more!!!

Some of my favorite additions:

Easier Player/Server search functionality

The TrackMania Original (TMO) environments have all had major graphics engine revamps done to them and they're incredibly beautiful. I'll post pics when I get some time.

We can now change video settings in-game; which we've been dying for!

Rumor is there are two new block types: a blue block in Stadium that makes it easier to carve a turn; and a "rainbow turbo" that is timed to be 100% power for 1 second, then amp up to 150% for 1 second, then 200% for 1 second, then cycle back to 100%, etc. I haven't seen these yet, but am looking forward to them. An "Engine Killer" block was added to TMU and it added a whole new dynamic to the gameplay; so I look forward to these two new blocks.

Tracks seem to load faster (though that might be due to the new hardware some too...)

All environments seem to play smoother and look prettier (even the ones that didn't get the face-lift seem to have better lighting, etc.)

I'm sure this is just the tip of the iceberg; as I only got to play for a couple of hours tonight.

I will say this: Nadeo has put a TON of time and effort into enhancing this game and it shines like the sun. I can't believe they made it a free upgrade. I'd pay for it... in fact, I'm considering making a donation to the cause anyway; the enhancements are more than worth it.

I can't wait to see what else lies ahead as we play TrackMania Forever... you know where you'll find me late Friday Night! (Dang I need to get some time to update that site... holy old...)

Rumor was that the people in the USA that bought TrackMania United from Steam wouldn't be able to get the Forever update yet... but I pointed the update installer at my "Program Files\TrackMania United" folder and it worked fine... then when trying to launch TrackMania United from Steam after I played TMUF from the manual update, Steam decided to update the game automatically in its install folder... I just hope it didn't overwrite my car skins and gamepad configuration :)

See you at the races...

(By the way, if you're interested in getting into the world of TrackMania; contact me first... TMUF has a feature where I can invite friends to get the game... and if you get it from the invite using the same email for your account, I can be your sponsor. I'm not sure what that means, but I'd like to find out... so let me know.)

The Night I Nearly Burned My House to the Ground

2008-03-26T00:48:00.004-07:00

It's now been over a month-and-a-half since I've blogged... there is good reason; most of which I've been busting my butt at work trying to help fix problems after a major data-center changeover and trying to meet a deadline for some software we're working on.

Nevertheless, the wait will be worth it I promise... look at the title after all!

So I'm having a LAN party this weekend. I have one every year around this time; it's been a tradition for several years.

As fate would have it, last Friday during Friday Night Gaming, I was playing a game of Starcraft with Jarin. Right around midnight my computer took a dump and I saw the first Blue Screen of Death I've had on my computer in 3 years. Unfortunately, Death is the keyword in this sitch.

After rebooting several times, I found my computer auto-rebooting itself every time after reaching the agp440.sys file (a video driver) during Windows initial loading process.

Not knowing what caused it (it could've been anything: bad hard drive, bad hard drive controller on the motherboard, bad CPU, etc. etc.) and not really having any time or resources to troubleshoot it right now; and needing to have my computer running wonderfully for my LAN party this weekend... I pursued looking at what it would cost to snag a new motherboard, CPU and memory (I already have a new video card and hard drive to throw in there.)

This would eliminate the major potential failure points, allow me to REALLY enjoy the LAN party and provide a machine that will meet all of my requirements until we finish our basement, yard and fence.

Gwen agreed and I purchased the product. It arrived yesterday and I spent the late hours of the night gutting my old parts out and replacing with the shiny new ones.

All was going well (all things considered) thought it was taking quite a bit of time since I'm out of practice with this sort of thing (for those that don't know I was a professional technician for a Utah distributor for around 5 years and got to the point I could build 10-15 new computers in a work day.) That's not to mention I really enjoy the rare times I get to play with new hardware now to really try to make the inside of my computer a work of art.

I made it a work of something this morning.

I completed the rebuild of the hardware a little after midnight this morning. I brought it upstairs, hooked it up and turned it on.

BEEP!

Huzzah! Successful post on the first try - we always like that. So I happily go into the BIOS and look through the settings to make sure I have them to my liking. Through the process I'm getting stoked to see what my computer that now has 4 brains built onto one CPU core can do with my shiny new 8800GT video card.

While starting the Windows XP Pro installation process, I stuck a floppy disk in to provide drivers for my hard drives. I noticed that the floppy light was on constantly which usually meant it wasn't going to read disks for you because it wasn't hooked up correctly.

"Minor setback," I thought to myself as I shut down the computer, flipped the power switch on the back and walked around the side of my desk to start making the changes.

This is where I earn my spot on the Darwin awards nominations for 2008. Instead of being the smart technician I used to be and getting a flashlight for my office which doesn't have adequate lighting in that part of the room at that time of night... I decide to just go ahead and "feel it out" to get it plugged in correctly.

After my switcharoo, I walked back to my seat, flipped the power switch on the back of the power supply, and hit the power button on the computer to fire it up, literally.

BEEP!

Huzzah! Happy post again! I rock...

The POST information starts appearing on my monitor, but for some reason it looks a little hazy on the monitor. Looking over to my left, I see smoke coming out every crevice of my case; especially around the DVD-Rom drive that sits above my floppy.

Immediately I start taking every possible step to disconnect power to the machine before it sends me to oblivion and takes my family along with it.

Thankfully, the Lord blessed me, even in my moment of stupidity, and I was able to avoid flames... barely.

Praise the lord that whoever makes these cables does so in a way that the melting that takes place when you plug the wrong pins together stops at the next power connector point (at least, if they don't work that way, I must've powered down fast enough to not let it spread further.) Here's the results of my not taking 2 minutes to go hunt down a flashlight because I was so in a hurry to see what this new kick-butt hardware was going to do... (click the image to see it close-up)

Look at the cable and the connection point on the back of the floppy drive. Yes, they're toast. Part of the power cable is completely gone... char spread partly on my desk, partly in my computer case, and partly outside where I promptly took the computer to blow the crap out.

Needless to say, it's now 2:14am here and I sit basking in the sweet sweet smell of burnt electrical wiring and melted plastic, blogging about my mayhem instead of the ten-thousand cooler things I've wanted to blog about for the last month-and-a-half. Hopefully I'll get to those soon because I have some REALLY cute pictures of my family that we had done on President's Day.

Anyway, I digress... so now, instead of getting XP loaded tonight and being able to set all my games up Wednesday night so I could be more than prepped for this weekend... I get to now spend Wednesday night re-gutting the computer to make sure it's cleared of all burnt debris; and I can confirm that no other damage was done (remember, my computer was still booting up, desptie the fact that the floppy drive didn't like where I'd plugged the power in and was deciding to get smoking mad about it...)

So yes, I'm quite confident the new hardware will kick butt (barring that I haven't singed anything else and caused permanent damage to my XION power supply.)

I certainly hope I didn't do other damage... I don't have money to replace what I just replaced. heh.

This happened once before when I was with Supercom. When the first motherboards that provided SMB (System Management Bus) arrived and we were building our first computers with them... they had a pin set on the motherboard identical to the pin sets for external USB port brackets that had been coming with motherboards for several months prior.

Recognizing the familiar pin set, and not paying attention to what this particular pin set was labelled, I ended up plugging the USB bracket into the SMB pin set. Their power pin configurations were different, so when I fired that sucker up, it smoked like my computer tonight.

Again, we thankfully caught it before the damage spread to more than just the cable. We were able to simply grab a new USB bracket and plug it into the correct place and the system worked flawlessly.

Pray for me that the same happens with my new hardware. I'm really not in the mood to have more mayhem than I already have.

And I hope you've been able to laugh as hard at this entry as I hope to be laughing at it on Friday when I re-tell it to my LAN party guests that haven't already heard the story. Right now it's not very funny...

Moral of the story... go find the flashlight! Shortcuts never were happiness (except in TrackMania)

Faith Can Move Mountains...

2008-02-04T00:20:00.000-07:00

... Apparently, so can a snow shovel ...

Our mountain is almost as tall as Brennan! Let me show you how we got to this point today...

We woke up at 7:15am this morning and saw that the snow was coming down. We proceeded to get the three older kids ready for church while the snow continued to fall. A little after 9:00am when it was past time to leave for Church, I decided to devise my plan of attack for getting myself, Brennan, Mandi and Kimmie without getting ourselves killed or ultra-wet from the snow. (The funny thing about that is, the Church building we attend is right behind the house across the street from us.)

Anyway, I went into the garage and opened the door to see about taking the kids in our minivan. The photos above and below show that the snow had drifted up against the garage door nearly as high as our minivan bumper...

So, time for "plan B"; we'll *gulp* try to WALK to church. So I open the front door and see that we have a lovely foot-and-a-half of snow drifted up against it.

This is around 9:15am; mind you it snowed continuously the entire 2 hours we'd been awake... and who knows how long prior?! All I know is that it looked like the photo below when it was time to leave for Church.

I knew I couldn't take the van because, not only would it not make it out of my driveway, but even if it could, it WOULDN'T make it out of the cul-de-sac.

So we waited it out more, and it finally subsided around 11:45am. By then we saw most of our neighbors out trying to shovel/snowblow/plow their sidewalks and driveways. We learned that Church had been cancelled after Sacrament Meeting so that everyone could dig themselves out; then help unbury any neighbors that were unable to do so.

We made our way out to start the moving of the mountain. We let the kids come out with us. It was up to their knees/waist and it was amusing to watch them try to traverse the fluffy white obstacle course that was our sloped driveway.

3.5 hours after starting the shoveling process, we reached the result you see at the top of this entry.

Fortunately while we were accomplishing this goal, the good city we live in sent their plows out to clear our cul-de-sac. The fine gentleman driving the plow not only pushed the snow out of the cul-de-sac; but helped us clear the end of our driveway, so our cars could actually get out into the circle.

When he finished, he stopped to talk with us for a couple minutes; letting us know that Riverton will always send a plow to handle our cul-de-sac on the days we get 6 inches or more of snow. Kudos! I might actually be able to get to work now...

In Honor of Our Beloved Prophet, President Gordon B. Hinckley

2008-01-29T23:20:00.000-07:00

For those who don't already know, God's most recent Prophet, Gordon B. Hinckley, President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, passed away Sunday evening around 7:00pm Mountain Time.

I know there are thousands of tributes to this great man in many forms out there; and I would be entirely ungrateful to not post one of my own.

This great man has been an inspiration in my life for as long as I can remember; even before he became the Prophet. I could always relate to President Hinckley when he would address the Church in whatever capacity he served in.

I think part of it had to do with his quick wit and fun sense of humor. He was always good for a one-liner at the most opportune of times. He always made us feel good about ourselves, even when he needed to call us to repentance. :)

There was one experience I'll never forget; one that affirmed to me of his divine calling as the Lord's chosen mouthpiece. I had prayed about President Hinckley when he was called to be Prophet and knew from the promptings of the Holy Spirit that he is a Prophet of God. I'd also had subsequent re-affirmations that this was true when I'd hear him speak and felt the same feelings.

Our Church schedules conferences at different geographical levels at different intervals. As many of you know, there are Worldwide General Conferences held bi-annually. We also hold Stake Conferences (more localized) and Ward Conferences (even more localized) bi-annually.

Every three years there is a Region Conference where several Wards/Stakes are invited to attend and this particular one was held in Downtown Salt Lake City; in the beautiful LDS Conference Center.

We obtained tickets to the Conference and had seating near the back row of the Conference Center. We arrived around an hour early to make sure we were ready to go when the conference began. While we waited for it to start, we chatted about various things.

My wife and I wondered if maybe President Hinckley would appear at our Regional Conference; but that seemed silly to me as there are tons of these for many different regions held every year; I was sure the Prophet didn't make it to all of them in-person. He wasn't scheduled to be at this one; but, of course, we thought that would be really cool.

About 15 minutes later, I felt the Spirit extremely strong and wondered if he really was there. The next thing I knew, a reverent hush fell over the entire Conference Center and slowly, the crowd started to rise to their feet. Several seconds later, President Hinckley stepped in a side door near the front of the Conference Center auditorium.

I don't mean to be irreverent here, but I can't think of any other way to describe it. It was as if someone had hooked the feelings the Holy Spirit brings up to a Gigawatt amplifier and blared it throughout the entire Conference Center. I knew I was truly in the presence of a man of God.

He took the liberty of addressing us in that conference, and to be honest, I don't recall what was said that day; but the feeling will always be remembered every time I remember that experience.

I hope to be half-the-man President Hinckley was. In his late 90's, he exhibited more energy than I have; travelling the world and spreading the love and message of the resurrected Savior of the World to all that had the blessed opportunity of interacting with him.

He feared no man, stood steadfast and true to the principles he taught and lived; yet was gentle, down-to-earth and made all who interacted with him feel welcome and at-ease.

So I pay my tribute to you President Hinckley, legendary servant of God and the legacy you leave behind. Thanks for being such an inspiration to me; I will miss you greatly, and am happy you get to be reunited with your sweet wife, other family members, past Prophets and most importantly, our Heavenly Father and His only begotten son, Jesus Christ.

God bless...

My Children Are Picture Purrfect...

2008-01-24T01:15:00.000-07:00

... at least, Mandi is. We had our friends Mike and Jessica over for dinner and before they left (around the kids' bedtime...) Jessica discovered Mandi nearly zonked out at the top of the stairs to the office, wrapped up in kite string. She's our little Mandi-kitten.

I almost caught Ryan and Andrew smiling together, but coupling our camera's shutter-stutter and their quick grins, it's nearly impossible to catch them both at the same time. One day... :)
(Can you tell which is which?)

Here is Kimmie playing with Ryan. I can't believe how big and grown-up my baby girl looks compared to my baby boy.

Big Brother Brennan and his two little bros. Now THAT'S a size difference. 10 years does a body good.

The World of TrackMania Just Keeps Getting Better and Better!

2008-01-18T00:19:00.000-07:00

Nadeo announced, in an interview with TMX that they will be releasing upgrades for their popular TrackMania Nations and TrackMania United franchises; called TrackMania Nations: Forever and TrackMania United: Forever.

Nations lovers will be happy to know that the Forever upgrade will still be free; though the ladder will be reset (which has been needed for a long time anyway.) Nations players will also look forward to getting the updated Stadium engine enjoyed in TrackMania United.

United lovers will enjoy some enhancements as well; one of the majors being a truly No-CD system without the 3-install crap we had to deal with through the online distribution apparatus so many of us have come to know and not love. Steam resolved this for players in the USA thankfully, as well as provided an inexpensive license to the game.

United lovers will also be happy to note that the TrackMania United: Forever (TMU-F) upgrade will also be free.

Nadeo also mentioned they had originally planned two new environments called "Toy" and "Moon"; and holy crap how fun would those be?! My mind starts racing when I think of what kind of tracks those would bring.

Sadly, they need to use the talent that would've been putting those together in other arenas for now and there is no scheduled plans of making these come to fruition. We'll just have to keep begging for them to still be born in a future release; I'd so love to see them!

United lovers that enjoy Stunts mode will enjoy knowing that there will be a Single-Player Stunt campaign (and hopefully an easier way to launch Stunt tracks in multiplayer when starting a server from in-game; as opposed to a dedicated server.)

There is a buttload of information on the upcoming changes in the interview, so I'll leave you to go research on your own. I'm stoked for the new releases and will continue to enjoy TrackMania in all forms until then.

Read the Interview

CrackMania Forever... ;)

Portal - Energy Ball Fireworks

2008-01-12T13:01:00.000-07:00

It's 4th of July time at the Aperture Science Enrichment Center! (Note: No Weighted Companion Cubes were harmed during the making of this film...)

BTW, this film brought to you by the ultra-cool custom level for Portal called "Weighted Companion Cube Map" by MrCow (hosted by myApertureLabs.com)

The map contains some anti-gravity beams that are part of the puzzles of the level - it's really quite cool. Download it and enjoy - I highly recommend it!

Portal: First Slice - Free Demo for nVidia Gamers

2008-01-11T01:46:00.001-07:00

I can't believe this is my first post about Portal since the game's release... probably because what little free time I finally get in the middle of the night is spent playing it. :)

Portal is a unique game where you run an android through a test center course armed with only a gun that shoots blue and orange portals. When you enter one portal, you're ejected out the other; and you must use these to navigate your way through interesting puzzles in order to advance to the next level.

Portal is based on a fabulous free game created by Nuclear Monkey Software called "Narbacular Drop" which I raved about last March.

For those that own nVidia graphics cards, Steam will detect your card when you click the image above and confirm you have nVidia, then allow you to download FOR FREE: Portal: First Slice demo, Half-Life 2: DeathMatch, Peggle Extreme and Half-Life 2: Lost Coast. Pretty generous (and good bait to get you sucked into buying Half-Life 2 as well...) :) Smart move, Valve.

The full Portal game (only $19.95 on Steam or comes with the various versions of The Orange Box that Valve sells...) comes complete with the Source SDK which means custom levels can be made.

I found some cool sites for obtaining custom Portal maps, but the best one I've seen so far is myApertureLabs.com

The game is highly addicting and has gained quite the following. People everywhere are chanting "The cake is a lie..." and mimicking cool female computer voices that remind you that the companion cube cannot speak; but if it does, the Enrichment Center urges you to disregard its advice.

Give it a shot, then buy it, play through it, and hit up myAperatureLabs for more Portal goodness.

And remember: "There's no use crying over every mistake; you just keep on trying til you run out of cake... and the science gets done and you make a neat gun for the people who are still alive."

EDIT: It looks like Portal: First Slice is the first 10 levels of the real game. You don't get to play with the Orange Portals, but you get enough of a taste for how the game works to want to play through the rest of the fully enjoyable levels. I highly recommend purchasing the game as it unlocks 9 more levels (the last being quite a bit longer than the rest) as well as challenge versions of the original levels, and the ability to import custom maps made by other players. Start thinking with Portals!

TrackMania United Only $22.45 Until 02 January 2008!

2007-12-30T10:08:00.000-07:00

Buy TrackMania United on Steam before 02 January 2008 and get it for only $22.45!

This (along with Motocross Madness 2) is the coolest PC racing game made-to-date. Nadeo has done a fantastic job bringing unlimited replay value by creating an easy-to-learn track editor with really cool features.

They even include a Puzzle mode that allows you to have fun while learning how to build tracks.

I highly recommend this game. Go buy it and join FNG for some high-flying, fast-driving, non-stop good times!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

2007-12-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

Wow, what a year. The Lord truly has blessed us this year and owe everything to Him who's birth we celebrate during this season.

As I type this, I'm holding one of my beautiful infant twin boys who are such a wonderful and amazing blessing in our lives. They're becoming quite interactive; their communication manifested by many smiles, giggles and coos. (Darn "shutter stutter"... hard to catch them in full-smile mode!)

Andrew is especially interactive; wanting always to be in the middle of the action. His eyes are big and always trying to absorb everything that is going on around him. His eyes will melt your heart into a dreamy puddle of that ever-so-tasty sugary-goodness sauce that is drizzled over the Asian Star's walnut shrimp dish (in their own words: "Shrimp prepared in an exquisite sauce worthy of an emperor.") - So will Ryan's eyes. Did I mention... Crazy Delicious?!

We were blessed with an amazing new home that came equipped with awesome new friends/neighbors; a fabulous new job which also came equipped with awesome new friends.

While all of it happened in a very short time and was incredibly stressful, we have no regrets; only thanks... thanks again to all who helped make it possible. Gwen wouldn't have survived her nearly 4 months of bedrest and bringing our twins into this world without the help of so many loved ones.

We love you all and hope your Christmas was the best ever. Ours was wonderful because of all of you; and most importantly, our Savior Jesus Christ.

So, let's talk about the New Year. The twins are finally starting to sleep through the night some and we hope this will be a steady pattern. If so, my resolutions for this year are to:

Lose some weight and get my cholesterol back down like I did a couple years ago. I slacked off and not only went back to where I was; but got worse. :) I have no willpowa...
Blog more (not Trogdor... Blog more) - I've had so much I've wanted to share and have hated not having the time to do so. I'm really hoping I can manage my time such to start posting more here.
Beat Super Mario Galaxy (I have to have ONE goal I can make sure happens... heh!)

Happy New Year everyone; we hope yours is awesome as you are.

Wii Rock!

2007-12-27T08:27:00.000-07:00

Brennan and Kimmie have excelled at Bowling on the Wii.

Below is a picture of Brennan's 278 game; it won't be long before he bowls a perfect game! Congrats, Brennan!

Here is Kimmie's latest record for "Power Throws." Power throws mode is a mode where you start with a set of 10 pins and get one throw at them. It goes through several rounds, providing more pins to throw at each time (21, 34, and so on until 91.)

For each pin you knock down, you get a point. If you get a strike, you get double the points for that round.

Kimmie earned her gold medal and now holds the family record for highest score on "Power Throws." Did I mention she's three?!!?

Newb Daddy hopes he can catch up... :) Way to go kids!

Reason #42 Why I Hate Windows Vista - Some CDs appear blank to Vista's Windows Explorer, but read fine when done from a Command Prompt window

2007-11-30T21:45:00.000-07:00

Ok, most of you have heard my gripes about Windows Vista verbally, so the title doesn't make sense to those of you that haven't.

I've decided I'm going to start ranting about the problems I run into with Vista here in hopes that if enough people do the same (and believe me there are plenty out there...) Microsoft will get some of this crap fixed.

I have two older video games that I've tried to get to work with Vista that have previously worked with older Windows operating systems.

Two of them exploit a very interesting anomaly in Vista. If I put the CD in, it's name won't show up in the Vista Windows Explorer interface; though it will show the size used on it. If I try to Open/Explore the CD, I get the blank CD dialog that asks how you want to format the disc.

If I open a Command Prompt Window, on-the-other-hand, and do a "dir" command; I can see the files just fine. I can then proceed to launch the install of the game.

How did I find out about this? Luck of the draw... does it mean the given game will work? That I'm not sure... I'm installing one as we speak (Star Wars: Jedi Academy.)

The other I've tried is Titan Quest. Titan Quest works until I click on a merchant. Once I do that, I get booted out of the game and to the Windows Desktop without warning or reason why it did so. I'm not sure if that is a related bug, but I can reproduce it consistently on my laptop and find it equally annoying.

I'd love to hear from others who have had similar experiences; and to hear from those that don't have the same issue with their Jedi Academy and Titan Quest discs.
I have an Asus G2S-A1 laptop with Vista Home Premium.

Incidentally, both games work without these issues in Windows XP Pro and Windows 98SE (Jedi Academy) on multiple desktops in my home.

EDIT: Looks like Jedi Academy seems to work fine so far... I played some multiplayer with Brennan and had good luck... we'll find out later how Single Player fares.

Behold Our Little Ones; Blessed are the Children

2007-11-11T10:12:00.001-07:00

We had the wonderful opportunity of blessing our twins in Church last Sunday. It was a very spiritual and amazing day; filled with family and friends who have been supporting us through the months of trial we went though to get them here.

And look at what a blessing they are; glowing, radiant, wonderful. Newborn babies are an interesting phenomenon. They can send you to relaxville simply by cuddling them (which is a problem when it's time for a late-night-feeding... they turn me into Jello-Head Bob); can bring so much peace and joy by their quirky smiles and cute cooing.

We're extremely grateful to have Ryan and Andrew in our lives; and to have strengthened so many bonds with so many people who have sacrificed of themselves to help us out. We hope you'll ever feel of our gratitude for you and your friendships.

It's like the scriptures say: "And thus we see that by small means the Lord can bring about great things."

Halloweenies 2007

2007-11-05T06:30:00.000-07:00

Halloween 2007 was fun this year... though we were cramped for time in getting anything done for it (for obvious reasons.) Gwennie was a clown, Mandi was Tinkerbell, Kimmie was the Great Pumpkin, Brennan was the Ninja of the Dark Dragon and I was the Father of Twins...

Yeah, imagine that... hard costume to put together; wake up in the morning after a night of taking care of two infants and the costume makes itself. Any excuse to wear pajamas to work...

Kim had some "Christmas Story" moments where she'd fall and kick her little legs, unable to pick herself up again. It was quite humorous (bless her heart.)

Thankfully, this year was devoid of any
"Chocolate Incidents."

The pumpkin carving had to be done in two shifts; the first being our Family Home Evening a couple days before Halloween, in which we basically had time to gut the suckers.

Gwen finished them Halloween day with the kids; and the Sonic the Hedgehog ROCKED! I wish we'd had time to finish that one on Monday, because I could've won our ProPay pumpkin carving contest... Oh well, it was still fun to wear pajamas wo work.

Here are the works of art:

Sonic the Hedgehog

Freaky Frog

Spooky-Eyed-Triangle-Nosed-Weird-Shaped-Mouth-That-Didn't-Want-To-Show-The-Glow-Much-For-The-Camera Pumpkin

Some Catching Up To Do...

2007-10-29T23:28:00.000-07:00

Some things that happened before our time became consumed with taking care of infant twins and are other children:

August 2007: Mandi loses her first tooth! She was so elated it's hard to describe. It all happened during some daddy/daughter time at McDonalds. She had a blast calling Nanny and Oma to share the good news. Fortunately, we were aware of the tooth coming out and weren't suddenly notified of it by finding the thing in her cheeseburger.

Brennan celebrated his 10th Birthday with the family just days before Ryan and Andrew joined our clan.

The day before the delivery of the twins, Gwen and I were sitting down to breakfast when Kimmie approached; binky and burp-cloth (security blankie) in hand. She then proceeded to drape said burp-cloth on Mommy's now perfectly round "pillow," and laid her head on it to snuggle. It truly was a picture moment.

Nearly two weeks after the birth of our fabulous twins, Andrew woke up one evening looking for some crazy delicious (if you can call formula "Crazy Delicious"...) tummy-filling action. He must have remembered the Binky Fight the day we came home from the hospital, because by the time I reached him to take care of that need; he commenced latching on to Ryan and sucking on him instead. It was quite amusing to behold.

September 2007: Crazy Hair Day at the kids' elementary school. Crazy as in "Crazy Delicious."

Brennan's birthday party; which we had to postpone until the end of September... It was ok, though, cause dad picked up a Voltron / Optimus Prime cake. Go dad... :)

Kimmie takes her first turn feeding Andrew... feel the love!

Hopefully now that we're finally starting to settle in with the new "schedule" I'll be able to get back to some blogging... I'm quite back-logged and will hopefully get to make the entries I've been wanting to make for weeks.

Stay tuned!

Gotta Be Prudent at this Juncture...

2007-10-17T20:37:00.000-07:00

Stay the course... a thousand points of light... Those of you that knew me in high school will especially appreciate this one. :)

Mommy's Laughing On Me...

2007-09-23T22:57:00.001-07:00

I so love my Drama Queen youngest daughter. She's really at a cute age right now (when she's not copping 'tude.) She'll use any and every word that comes across her path, whether she understands it or not.

She's actually becoming quite the versed communicator for the most part, excepting the times where direction the communique is supposed to go gets reversed or incorrect prepositions are used.

Here are a few examples:
Kimmie talking on the phone:
"Can I talk to Daddy?" ... means ... "Would you like to talk to my Daddy?"

When asked if Kimmie would like to say a prayer on the food:
"Daddy help you?" ... means ... "Will Daddy help Kimmie?"

But nothing beats the one that happened today...

My ever-so-beautiful-and-on-the-road-to-C-Section-recovery wife and I were feeding our newborn twins this afternoon; when out of the blue Kimmie starts going spastica all over our bed.

Mind you, this is the daughter named after Kim Possible, so naturally, "She can do anything..." She tries to prove this using our bed as a prop in frequent, random splendor. Yesterday, for example... she commenced bouncing from the head of the bed to the foot with a foot-to-knee bounce right at the foot of the bed, topped off with an aerial-twist to the floor; landing her on the bum and rolling backward over her head to a stop just before smacking her head into a dresser resting against the opposite wall. (This, of course, whilst Mom and Dad are busy feeding babies and can't rush to the rescue in any quick fashion.)

Today's near-heart attack started with some rehearsal for the X-Games that we weren't expecting. As Gwen and I were feeding the twins, Kim climbed up on our bed and commenced to start Donkey-Kicking her legs up in the air... then letting her body fall to the ground, gracefully landing on her feet. This was repeated several times, much to the delight and gut-busting (almost literally for Gwen) laughter of her audience.

She was laughing with us at first too, or so we thought. She must have been so engrossed with her own glee that she hadn't noticed the audience watching and enjoying too. After about 10 rounds of "climb, kick, drop", Kim turned to see if we were paying attention.

We apparently were paying with the wrong currency as Kim immediately stopped, pulled the biggest pout I've ever seen... dramatically paused for a few seconds, then started to cry the most heart-wrenching, "Dad and Mom what kind of parents ARE you?!" cry I've ever heard... it seriously broke both our hearts.

That is, until she explained why she was crying...

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! Mommy is laughing on me.... WAAAAAAAA!!!"

Then commenced the bladder-emptying try-as-you-might-there's-no-way-on-Earth-you-can-hold-it-in laughter that is the worst thing you can do to a child whose feelings you've already hurt because they think you've been making fun of them. Yes, the twins weren't the only ones who needed changing; and to make matters worse, we worried if Gwen had popped the incision made when giving birth to said change-needing infants. Luckily the incision wound is still in proper order.

Oh, from the mouth of the babes... I wish I could communicate half as well (and fully as entertaining) as my precious baby girl. She truly is an inspiration.

So remember... laugh WITH your children, not ON them.

Ryan and Andrew's First Fight

2007-09-19T23:56:00.001-07:00

They didn't even make it home from the hospital before they had their first fight...

We had just changed them into their first outfits to bring them home from the hospital. Andrew had taken a pacifier for the first time since being there and Ryan hadn't. Andrew smacked Ryan in the face with it, and of course, he thought it was something to eat... so they commenced fighting for it.

Too cute...

An Ode to the Cottonwood Hospital Staff

2007-09-19T22:55:00.000-07:00

Everyone knows that going to the hospital is a traumatic, sometimes horrific experience. You're away from home, out of your zone; and if you're the patient, not living in the most "wireless" world (IVs, monitors, blood-pressure cuffs, oh my.)

Well, we knew Gwen was in for that ride when it was time to deliver our twins via C-Section. While we were anxiously awaiting the arrival of our twins and looking forward to holding and caring for them; we weren't looking forward to the things that make hospital stay something that isn't often equated with the excitement of, say, going on vacation.

But I have to admit, as hard as it is to sleep in those insane recliner/beds the fathers have the privilege of sleeping in whilst staying by the bedsides of their beautiful wives who have just visited the Valley of Death after sacrificing the past 30-40 weeks of their lives carrying and delivering their children... Cottonwood Hospital has always rocked at making the stay as pleasant as possible with the deliveries of all our children.

This time was no exception. In fact, it was the most memorable hospital stay I've ever been involved with, and a fitting last delivery for my wife and I. It makes the impending closing of Cottonwood even more bittersweet (heh, almost the same feeling I felt when Jordan High was torn down to build a newer, bigger, better one.)

Anyway, I have to blog about our stay there because the staff was so incredible. Our world never hesitates to point out the negative things we observe; but how often do we give positive feedback when it's most certainly due?

This entry singing praises and shouting accolades is completely dedicated to the amazing staff that was involved in the final stages of our bringing our blessed twin babies into the world.

This includes Gwen's OB-GYN, Doctor Lloyd - who has been with us throughout the entire growth of our little family. He's an incredible man we know, love and trust; who has always been professional, compassionate, skillful and accurate. Thank you for all that you have done and will continue to do for my wife.

Next, our pediatrician, Doctor Bean. Oh my heavens were we blessed with Doctor Bean. She is the greatest pediatrician to grace the Earth. We have complete faith, confidence and trust throughout the ten years we've worked with her... and have absolutely loved our association with her. We're not alone... as we talked to many of the nurses in the Women's Center at Cottonwood during our stay there; and they too couldn't stop bragging her up. She's an incredible woman and we thank her for all she has done and will continue to do for our family.

Now Doctor Lloyd and Doctor Bean, as mentioned before have been our friends for over 10 years... we also had the wonderful opportunity of making new friends and associating with old friends that happen to work at the Cottonwood Women's Center during the delivery and post-partum stay there.

They made us feel so at home and welcome and took such good care of us, that Gwen and I actually looked forward to each of our four days there. It was such a special experience, I finally started making the nurses take pictures with us so we could keep them in our baby books to save the memories. Thanks for being good sports about it (including Gwen)! (And if any of you hate having your picture in this entry, let me know and I'll promptly remove it. hehe!)

I wish we would've caught all of the names of the many nurses that assisted us during our stay there; we appreciate every one of you... but I will list the ones we spent the most time with recorded after I wisened up to doing so. :)

Thanks and praises go out to:
Shelley
Kristen
Trisha
Tami
Elsha
Susan
Renee
Vicki
Becky
Cheryl
Amy
Erica
Megan
Natalie
Lisa
Kira
Amanda
Marsha
Gigi
... and everyone else that helped us that I missed in the Labor & Delivery, Maternity Ward, Nursery and even Housekeeping staff!

Yes, I said housekeeping staff... Everyone that served us at Cottonwood was friendly, professional and loved their jobs... and we as patients could feel it as they worked with us.

It was nice to come home, but hard to leave a plethora of friends, many of which we know we won't see again, as they will either be going to the new IHC hospital, going to LDS Hospital or joining a "float pool" which will have them serving at a few different IHC hospitals after Cottonwood closes its doors.

I hope the same spirit of compassion and kindness will follow you all wherever you go. What you do means so much and it definitely left a lasting impression on us. I certainly hope that your administration will notice and appreciate the hard work you put into taking care of your patients and reward accordingly.

Incidentally, we're writing a similar letter to the Cottonwood staff; but feel the world should hear about the positive things that happen in our lives... especially ones that leave lasting impressions.

Again, thanks to all the fine staff at Cottonwood Hospital. We love you... and appreciate you helping bring our new angels into the world.

God bless as you all move into the next chapter in IHC history.

And Then There Were Seven...

2007-09-14T21:35:00.000-07:00

That's right... the twins finally made their Earth debut early Friday evening; and praise God, they're beautiful... have all 10 fingers and all 10 toes and are doing fine. Mommy isn't doing too bad either considering she had to go through all of the body trauma that is a C-Section.

She and the boys are resting now so I figured I'd hurry and post some pictures of our newest angel additions to our family.

Ryan Timothy made his arrival at 5:17pm and weighed in at 5 lbs. 5 oz.
Andrew Jameson made his arrival a minute later at 5:18pm and weighed in at 6 lbs. 7 oz.
Both are about 20 inches long; and were expert trained in the art of kicking the crap out of their mother whilst still in the womb.

Both screamed the instant they were removed from the womb, which we were incredibly grateful for. Andrew had a little trouble breathing after that for the first hour or so, but seems to be getting enough oxygen to his body now.

We'd like to thank the incredibly talented staff at the hospital and especially Gwen's doctor for how wonderfully the procedure went. We also had the added blessing of having Shelley, a friend of mine I grew up with assisting the doctor with the delivery of our new babies. I forgot to get a pic with her without the mask, dang it... I'll be back for you. :)

We'd also like to express much humble gratitude for the countless people who have had our backs, fronts and all sides during the past 3 months. You've helped us through getting a house ready to sell, moving to a new home and getting our twins here without us stressing out so bad we'd meet our demise. You're all wonderful and we wouldn't have made it this far without you. God bless all of you.

And welcome, Ryan and Andrew, to the world and to our family. Of course, you know that you'll be called "Jim and Tim" and/or the "Tweebs" by your siblings, due to the nature of "the prophecy," and the fact that you're younger twin brothers to our own Kimberly Anne... We're so excited to have you in our lives and look forward to the adventures ahead.

Please don't follow after your father and stay up late EVERY night... ;)

Stay tuned... more pics to follow... the hospital's Wi-Fi connection blocks about every port known to man, so getting pics uploaded has been a harder chore than delivering the babies themselves... I'll post more when I get home... :)

Delivery Starts With the Letter "C"

2007-09-10T14:49:00.000-07:00

... as in Cesarean ...

That's right, we found out today that if an Amniocentesis shows the twins are mature enough to make their debut into the world; we'll be delivering via C-Section this week.

My lovely wife, after what will end up being 12 weeks of bedrest is, needless to say, ecstatic to see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Stay tuned, and hopefully by the end of the week, we'll have some good news and a small photo album to go with it! We're stoked and scared at the same time; but looking forward to the new adventures that await our family.

"Farewell Kim Possible!!! We'll meet again... in time!!!"

2007-09-08T01:58:00.001-07:00

(All images © Disney Channel)

And thus, after the biggest marathon event in cable history... we shed a tear at the closing of the greatest animated series ever to grace the television... Kim Possible.

Getting past my immense anger at not being able to participate in said marathon (Disney you'd BETTER be releasing DVD box sets like NOW!!!!) and missing the finale at initial air-time... props goes to iTunes peeps for making it available to me shortly after midnight, so the torture only lasted a few short hours...

What a great end to a fantastic series. Nearly every character that ever made an appearance in the series was present in this hour-long final episode (actually, come to think of it, I don't recall seeing Motor Ed, but I digress.) Talk about taking a fantastic nostalgic trip down memory lane while enjoying the action packed goodness that was my final new episode of Kim Possible. (Disney, that super-secret KP project Steve Loter talked about on his blog BETTER be a theatrical release!!!)

This show was nothing short of art... Fan-freaking-tastic creative genius. Never met an episode I didn't like... and this one was no exception; and a very interesting way of involving the arch-enemies in this one. Very cool indeed.

And Ron, wow... talk about opening up a can of... well, you'll just have to go see it for yourself. He does try to have a "heart-to-heart" chat with Shego during the episode; that's pretty funny too. Stay tuned to the credits at the end, as they showcase many of the villains that appeared in the series too; like Adrenna Lynne, who I hoped they would've brought back for a revenge episode, but that never happened. And the over-the-top Professor Dementor, one of my favorites was there too... too bad he wasn't worked into this final episode. (He was in the 2nd to the last and it was a sweet one, so I'm alright.)

I'm terribly sad that I have no more future episodes to look forward to; but what a great collection of the "Four Seasons" to keep me company for years to come... Like Motocross Madness 2 and TrackMania, I'll never tire of this one.

Thank you Mark McCorkle, Bob Schooley, Steve Loter, Christy Carlson Romano, Will Friedle and so many others that devoted their time and talents to bringing me (and so many other incredible fans) a one-of-a-kind treasure we'll all cherish forever. I've got one word that I think will sum it up for all of us...

Booya!!!

Farewell Kim Possible... You know you are all that... the BEST SHOW EVER MADE... EVER!!!

Now if my "tweebs" would just deliver we can move on to the next adventure... Stay tuned, we're having them next week regardless of if the process has to be "helped." :)

-----------------

By the way, has anyone discovered yet what the super-secret KP Project Steve Loter mentioned in the final entry of his "So the Finale" blog is? I'd love to find out... when I do, I'll be sure to post it here. Did I mention... DISNEY!!!! IT BETTER BE A THEATRICAL RELEASE!!! Just wanted to make sure I had... Uh Double Booya!

Denial Ain't Just a River in Egypt

2007-09-04T01:02:00.000-07:00

It's my current state of mind for several reasons:

In under two weeks, I'll be holding brand new twin baby boys in my arms, welcoming them into the world, then freaking out not knowing what to do with them... oh wait, I've done this before with 3 others newborns, just one-at-a-time. Reality is finally setting in and I'm already losing sleep over it (note time of this post...)
Still dealing with the Guiness record of life-altering events my family and I have gone through over the last couple of months.
Disney Channel has the nerve to end two of my favorite animated series ever during this time of great stress and uneasiness.

Let's start with number one...

Twin baby boys... who seem to have as much stubborn-ness and high-spirit as my already living son who will turn 10 next week, potentially on the day his younger brothers will be born (as if there wasn't enough stress surrounding twins... hehe) If the gray hairs weren't already here, they're certainly going to be here soon! We're going to buckle in and enjoy the ride... Come get us boys!

Number two... In the past few months, we've: learned we were pregnant with twins, prepped our home to sell, sold said home, purchased a new home, changed jobs, moved and are now preparing to nearly double the number of children we're used to having in our home... whew! I know I'll have plenty to talk about with the twins in the next week or so, so I'll save those chapters for the very near future.

In the midst of all this, we've lost what was our lifeline to the televised world... The Disney Channel. For nearly four years in our previous home, it was all our family watched when it came to viewing television programs. Now I didn't get to watch a ton, but as most of you know, I ALWAYS made time for the best show EVER made, Kim Possible.

There were a few others we watched much more casually, but have still kept a vested interest in; namely Phil of the Future, Hannah Montana and American Dragon: Jake Long.

Disney Channel cut Phil of the Future off way before its time, but at least ended it with a really cool episode; and did us the favor of teasing us with an open ending, in case they decide to bring it back (go SaveDisneyShows crew... it can be done, you've proven it with Kim Possible!)

Now they have the gall to pull the plug on Jake Long, in the midst of the raging hurricane that is my life right now... Last Saturday, the first of September, marked the final series finale ... which I'm quite perturbed about since it only got a half hour. The least they could've done was an hour long episode.... {Insert immense anger here} - But I do have to give them credit. The talented writers that work for Disney know how to send shows off in style; and the Am-Drag was no exception. I won't give any away, and you won't appreciate it much if you haven't been following the show... but if you're interested... check it out on iTunes. It's worth the watch.

Now, a week later, and with my luck the day we deliver our babies... they're bringing Kim Possible to an end for the second (and most likely final) time. I knew this was coming; but as mentioned before, I'm in a state of denial. It's been such a fun show to follow, I just don't want it to end.

However, the creators of the series have left Disney for new adventures with Nickelodeon, so there's really not much more I can do about that; 'cept help the SaveDisneyShows crew convince Disney Channel to release the DVD box sets... I'm still harboring hope that there will one day be a theatrical release for Kim Possible; we'll see... :)

I will admit, I'm pleased with the way they've planned to send Kim on her farewell voyage; with a spankin' hour-long episode, and they're pulling the coolest thing they could ever do for the series finale... they're running a marathon-to-end-all-marathons...

Disney Channel introduces, the "Kim Possible: Every Possible Episode Ever" marathon (click to see the full schedule - starting 05 September 2007!):

Ok, so it's not a straight-through marathon; they're stopping to allow Playhouse Disney they're normal programming time... but the rest of the time will so wonderfully be dominated by the creative genius that is Kim Possible. It will be the best 54 hours in a 3 day period the Disney Channel has ever aired... EVER.

Much anticipation has built up by fans across the globe over how they're going to end it... and I can't wait to see it, but at the same time... I'll go into a state of depression that there will be no more new episodes. *sigh*

Those babies better get here fast to counteract this most serious of letdowns... :) Stay tuned... to this blog AND to Disney Channel! :)

High School Musical 2 Review

2007-08-23T07:48:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I'm a little late getting my review in... what can I say? I'm trying to play mommy and daddy at home and still uphold my employment. Let's just say I have renewed respect for my wonderful wife, and no free time anymore. Well, except for a couple of minutes here and there in the which I have pecked away at this quasi-novel.

My kids and I saw High School Musical 2 on premier night and loved it. As mentioned in the previous post, we were familiar with the soundtrack, so we knew some of what was coming, but it was fun to see how Kenny Ortega crafted the dance scenes to go with the musical numbers.

Kenny never ceases to amaze me; how he can take huge groups of kids and get them all doing really cool dances, looking completely polished and professional. I tip my hat to the mastermind there. Did I mention the use of props in the dances? In the first High School Musical, we were impressed by the number "Getcha Head in the Game" where the Wildcats basketball team danced with basketballs. We see that again in High School Musical 2 in the opening number "What Time is It?" and then see more props in other numbers such as kitchen utensils and baseball bats. It's awesome.

One of my favorite numbers, aside from the two full-cast ones at the beginning and end of the movie, was the kitchen scene... "Work This Out." Many of the Wildcats get hired on at Sharpay's parents country club and the boss comes across as a major hemmorhoid their first day there (thanks to Sharpay.)

The song focuses on everyone's distress having second thought about what would otherwise have been a cool summer job. Troy, of course, tries to rally the troops and help them see if they work together they can still have fun and save the summer.

In the middle of the number they get a little STOMP-esque, banging on pots, pans and glassware to go along with the song. It's quite a fun number.

One number I didn't so much care for was Sharpay's "Fabulous" which happened when the crew was all arriving at the country club. The bathing suits were a little on the skimpy side. One thing that most impressed me about the original High School Musical was that they proved to filmmakers everywhere that a movie can be done completely wholesome (void of any sex, drugs, violence, vulgarity, etc.) and still be one of the most popular movies of the year. I feel like this number was a little of a "sellout" though I'm sure with today's fashions, it would've been hard to find things more modest. Still, I feel that those things don't need to be in movies... I appreciated the "breath of fresh air" the original High School Musical was.

That said, I'll be writing Disney to express my feelings and hope that they take it to heart... I'll be utilizing the Save Disney Shows emailer to do so and encourage others to do the same.

Without giving too much away, the premise behind the movie is about the Wildcats' summer vacation, centering on Troy and Gabriella's summer romance which the evil Sharpay tries to bring to an end. Disney's teen start Miley Cyrus (Hannah Montana) also makes a very brief non-speaking part cameo in High School Musical 2. It's a sort of "Where's Waldo" deal where you have to be paying attention to see her there. I think I also caught a glimpse of Moises Arias (Rico from Hannah Montana) earlier in the film for a split second, but I'll have to wait til I see the movie again to confirm. Who knows, maybe they slipped a few others in there that I missed. It'll be fun to try to spot them next round.

I enjoyed the story and the numbers; it was a great continuation from the first and I look forward to the third. Rumor was it would have a haunted theme but some of the stars have recently revealed otherwise; though I understand none of them had read the script at the time of their interviews Instead it will most likely deal with Senior Prom and Graduation; which would be a fitting end to the trilogy.

If you haven't seen the movie, I highly recommend it; just make sure you watch the original High School Musical first if you haven't seen it already.

Thanks again Disney for all the fun that is High School Musical.

(And my apologies for the sketchiness of this review... I'm working on little to no sleep and have had to write this over several settings; needless to say, the train of thought derailed several times over the course of this writing. But don't worry no animals were harmed during the writing of this post.)

What Time Is It? Time for High School Musical 2!!!

2007-08-14T23:03:00.000-07:00

Last year, Disney Channel introduced the worldwide hit, "High School Musical." I don't think anyone really had any idea what a huge impact this fantastic film would have...

My family and I fell in love with it and are ecstatic and full of anticipation for the sequel, which debuts on Disney Channel this Friday.

The soundtrack for "High School Musical 2" was released today in stores, online through various avenues including Amazon and iTunes. We pre-ordered through iTunes so we could score some bonus stuff like a music video and two digital booklets including lyrics (some/all of these are available through some of the other purchasing avenues as well...) I downloaded my copy after midnight so my family and I could enjoy it all day today.

Needless to say, the music has permeated the walls of our home, my car and my headphones at work. It has us even more excited for the movie.

The music from both films is catchy; and watching the films make the music have emotional attachment on top of the desire to hear it simply because it jams.

The movie has an incredibly talented and lovable crew (well, 'cept Sharpay... you want to hate her; because the talented Ashley Tisdale plays a very believable snob.) that has wormed their way into the hearts of people everywhere.

If you don't have access to Disney Channel this Friday, find someone that does and hook up your High School Musical party. You'll be glad you did.

Oh yeah, if you haven't seen the original, I'd HIGHLY recommend you do that first. Did I mention, you'll be glad you did?!

Be warned, the songs will get stuck in your head, and soon you'll find your money disappearing into the revenue machine that is High School Musical media. :)

Kudos to Kenny Ortega (Director/Choreographer - also known for Newsies and The Cheetah Girls 2), Zac Efron, Vanessa Anne Hudgens, Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel, Corbin Bleu, Monique Coleman, Olesya Rulin (a Utah local!) and a plethora of other wonderful cast members for making this such a special phenomenon!

Rumor was that a High School Musical 3 was being planned for a theatrical release on the big screen. I found out tonight from the IMDB that its been officially announced! Looking forward to that...

Well, you all know where I'll be on Friday (assuming we're not at the hospital delivering twins!) :)

More Than Meets the Eye...

2007-08-11T23:31:00.000-07:00

Most of you that know me know that I've got mad love for the original Transformers cartoon series and the theatrical release that followed in 1987. I own the original VHS and DVD releases of the movie as well as the original soundtrack.

This year, they released 20th Anniversary editions of the DVD and Soundtrack; I know own both of those two. Most mock me profusely for it, but it was a special phenomenon that I hold dear to my heart; as do many others... others that take things to much farther extremes than I. I tip my hat to them, because they're involved in some cool action, like BotCon that happens once a year and had Vince DiCola and Stan Bush (the major players on the Transformers the Movie soundtrack do a special concert for; which resulted in a limited edition collector's CD "Til All Are One" (which I'd love to get my hands on sometime in my life...)

They're also involved in cool things like this YouTube video my cool sister "Tat" emailed me. I'm not going to tell you what it's about, you'll have to click and watch for yourself (worth the watch - trust me,) but I will tell you that it contains some Constructicons, StarScream, Optimus Prime and more. It is accompanied by the "Transformers theme" from the animated movie soundtrack (1987), performed by Lion.

Go on, hit the ol' play button then let me know what you thought. I'm giving full points for creativity on this one... freakin' genius. Kudos to all that participated in this.

Fun Motocross Madness 2 Screenshot

2007-08-08T02:00:00.000-07:00

I was looking through some old FNG (Friday Night Gaming) screenshots this morning and had to post this one. It's from Roswell stunt quarry. Close Encounters of the Nac-Nac Kind

Yes, there was a crash... the UFO didn't fly away quick enough.

Do Try This at Home...

2007-08-04T01:36:00.001-07:00

Oh yeah, there's not much better than a good hour-or-two long round of high-flying, speed-rushing, nausea-inducing TrackMania United action!

If you haven't tried it yet, you're seriously missing out. It's on Steam now for only $29.95!

Kim Possible - So the Finale

2007-08-02T00:41:00.000-07:00

The rumors have been confirmed. The creators of Kim Possible, Mr. Mark McCorkle and Mr. Robert Schooley have left Disney to pursue other projects with Nickelodeon.

While I knew that the best show EVER made... (EVER!!!!) was coming to an end (again), I can't help but get choked up and reminisce about the amazing memories this show has in my heart of hearts.

I've been into a lot of shows in my life, and more importantly, animated shows (Transformers, GIJoe, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to name a few) and never has one gripped me quite as hard-core as Kim Possible. It was master-crafted art from in every respect; the dialogue was snappy, the voice-talent perfectly cast, the characters lovable and the continuity of the story too much fun. I could go on and on (as I have in the past both here and to the dread of any who have ears that can hear me...)

Before I continue, I want to tell you how my insatiable addiction for this show came-to-be.

My family and I moved into our first home in July 2003. There we had subscribed to Comcast for high-speed internet and basic cable. The owners before us had a higher-level package than we ordered, but Comcast apparently forgot to put the block on. (We later called Comcast to let them know and confirm we were subscribed to the lower package and wouldn't be charged more... they said they'd come block it... took them 3 years...)

Our first weekend in the house involved much rest after the big move. We surfed through the channels to see what we had at our disposal. We came across Disney Channel and was inundated all weekend with Kim Possible episodes. I immediately fell in love with the show, and when life stopped and I had my kids sit down and watch it with me every time a new episode aired, they quickly followed suit. This was in the beginning of Season One...

As we continued our merry KP-filled lives, mid-Season 3, my third child was born; a daughter we named Kimberly Anne (whom my wife now lovingly calls Kimberly Anne Possible whenever she's in trouble.) She, too, is a Kim Possible junkie.

We followed the series faithfully to its first end after "So the Drama" and the airing of the remaining episodes (strategically saved for after So the Drama for reasons understood by those that follow the show.)

And now we find that the series is again coming to an end, after what has already been an incredible encore season.

So many fun, dramatic and pivotal moments were brought to life during that time between "So the Drama" and now... Wade finally emerging from his room in non-holographic/robotic form, Kim and Ron finally becoming boyfriend/girlfriend, Shego and Kim becoming friends in an episode (due to whacked out circumstances), Ron's pants-falling-down blunders having significance and a bunch of others.

Steve Loter, director of a majority of the episodes has put up a blog in which he discusses the last days of production on Season 4 of Kim Possible. His 14 July post is tear-jerking and heart-warming. I can only imagine what it would've been like to be a part of the team that created something that has consumed the last several years of my life. I know they enjoyed what they were doing, because it showed in their work.

I'm sad to see it go, and I'm going to continue to push Disney to release DVD box sets... and I'm still hoping that there may be an animated theatrical release, but with the creators leaving, I'm not holding my breath; and if it happens, I hope that it will still hold the same heart that every single episode in all 4 series held, thanks to the entire KP staff; from the creators, to the directors, to the animators, to the voice talent, to the fans.

Yes, the fans.

The fans have been absolutely amazing. There is an excellent website for Disney show fans called "Save Disney Shows" that has helped fan-blast campaigns to make Disney hear how much this fan-community loves their KP. I'll never get enough of this show... even after it's completely over. I will watch with glee for the remainder of my sojourn on Earth. :) I want to send a huge kudos out to the fans, that inspired the creative talent that made Kim Possible to continue the masterpiece.

I want to thank everyone that has ever been a part of the Kim Possible staff for making the best show EVER made. And thanks Steve and others who have kept in touch with the fans via websites, blogs, online chats, etc.

According to Steve's blog, "Graduation" is the name of the final episode. I'm stoked to see how they decide to end it this time, because the last time they ended the series, they ended it perfect. I have no doubt they won't disappoint this time either.

Good luck to the entire KP staff in whatever direction they're all taking after this. You certainly will be missed by a huge fan base, and I look forward to see what other fun projects arise in the future from these people.

Thanks again. Kim Possible has been everything I've hoped for and more.

BTW - Steve says on his site:
"... After that, I packed up my last box and headed off to my final meeting at another building regarding a Kim Possible project that is being worked on (and has been worked on for a while). I can not speak about it, but I think some of you clever guys will figure it out."

Dude, you're such a tease... you'd better be talking about some seriously cool DVD box sets full of buttloads of extra stuff, or a killer top secret animated theatrical release y'all already finished before the team dispersed. If so, I will pee and crap my pants, do a happy dance, and of course, be back here to blog about it. Whatever it is, I can't wait to find out!

Stay tuned... Uh Booya!

Our New Piece of Heaven

2007-07-25T23:06:00.000-07:00

Here is our new slice of Heaven on Earth. Our new home, a south-facing home in a cul-de-sac of Riverton, Utah. Riverton is a phase-II UTOPIA city, so in a few years, I'll have my long-awaited, much-anticipated daily fiber dose to solve my internet constipation. It's a fantastic place to house our little family of seven and we're more than ecstatic to finally be here!

It didn't come without some hitches; but it came with so many other blessings that we can't complain - (see my previous post with a plethora of praises for all the family and friends that have helped us in this endeavor.)

We moved in on Friday the 13th, and for the superstitious, it was a fantastic good-luck day. In the morning/afternoon, we were able to haul 3 van-loads of stuff over to the house, and we'd already hauled a van and truckload before we listed the house to "declutter" for showing... so when it was time to load the truck, we were down to mostly the big furniture and a small amount of boxes left.

The big stuff move was completed in about 3 hours (from loading the remains of our old home into the truck, to the complete unloading of the truck in the new home.) We had an incredible crew of friends and neighbors that helped not only us, but my wonderful friends and prior next-door neighbors who were also moving that day. It truly was a sight to behold, and a magnificent display of goodwill and service. Both families are eternally grateful.

A good friend of ours (whose name will be withheld to protect said friend from being taken advantage of by others later) graciously surprised us with front-yard landscaping as a gift to celebrate our getting this new home. The "Friday the 13th" luck struck when Riverton decided (not long after the yard was landscaped) to turn off our secondary water for 2.5 days without prior warning. Luckily we're back to soaking the snot out of it (cause we all know grass doesn't grow well when snot is present...) and I think it's going to survive. I'll share pics when it's in good shape again.

We were promptly welcomed into the neighborhood by our wonderful new friends in the cul-de-sac; every one of them a jewel. We're so excited to spend time with them after we graduate from our current hermit status. :)

The house fits us quite comfortably, and we hope to finish a bedroom or two in the basement by the time the twins are 1-year old.

We really feel that some special things are going to happen in our new neighborhood; things we're supposed to be a part of. I'll take and share some photos of the home when we get settled more.

How Much Farther Now, Papa Smurf?

2007-07-25T22:50:00.000-07:00

30 weeks and all is well... er, at least as well as could be expected for a very lovely and beautiful pregnant woman that is expecting twins.

That's right, we hit 30 weeks last Saturday. Gwen had a check-up on Monday and an ultrasound two weeks prior. We found out the boys are both growing at the same rate still and are both measuring on time for where we're at in the pregnancy.

Gwen has been handling herself EXTREMELY well (or doing an incredible job putting on a front) considering the circumstances.

In the last 6 months, we've:

Found out we are pregnant
Fount out the baby is really babies
Changed jobs
Sold our house
Bought a new house
Moved into the new house
Prayed everyday that the twins will stay in the Newborn Nook (womb) until at least 34 weeks so we won't have to do additional hospital stay.

Needless to say, fast life changes throw one through a loop. In this case, our whole family has ridden the life-change roller coaster for a few months now...

Thankfully, we haven't killed over from stress, thanks to a load of absolutely amazing people in our lives... namely my mother-in-law, my mom, two of my sisters and incredible neighbors and friends in both our old neighborhood and new neighborhood.

So many people have sacrificed their time, talents and all with which the Lord has blessed them with to help us keep our heads above water during these changes and their various stages. Wonderful friends from our prior neighborhood helped us pack our home while I was making the transition to my new place of employment and the 120-degree sun-bake commute home after the workday ended (that's right, I have no A/C in my car; but hey... it's paid for so sacrifices must be made. *cackle!*)

We had folks bringing meals every other weeknight to help with the lack of time to keep on top of handling dinner, getting the kids ready for bed, taking care of my beautiful pregnant wife's needs, getting ready for a move, etc.

Without the help of the village pulling together in our behalf, we would never have survived Hurricane Ka-Change-a... so to all that have and continue to help us...

WE CAN'T THANK YOU ENOUGH!!!

May the Lord bless all of you for your infinite kindness and charity on our behalf. We hope we can someday repay all the kindness and/or pay-it-forward as we always try to do. You're wonderful and we're so grateful to have you as family and friends forever.

Here's to holding out for 4 more weeks! We'll keep you posted.

TrackMania United - Released on Steam

2007-06-30T01:01:00.001-07:00

Ok, I know I'm late posting about this... but did I mention, I'm on hiatus?!

After playing the wild-goose chase for months checking GameSpot's website and all other vendors it lists as USA distributors for Nadeo's fan-freaking-tastic game, "TrackMania United" - I finally find out on the TrackMania Forums that it's been released to the USA via Valve Software's Steam engine.

Steam is Valve's way of offering their games through online distribution. What's really cool about this is that anyone can download the game for $29.95 US Dollars. What sucks, is that I've been waiting to get my 2nd copy in DVD format. So here I sit, still going insane, with no news in sight about when the DVD version will come out.

Get TrackMania United (TMU) on Steam Now!

I can still get the TrackMania United (TMU) English UK DVD via GoGamer.com but it's $37.90; so I'll wait a little longer and see if an official DVD version is released in the USA.

If you haven't read it before... I HIGHLY recommend this game. (did I mention fan-freaking-tastic?!)

That One Hiatus Guy - Not By Choice

2007-06-15T00:45:00.000-07:00

Why oh why have I had to neglect you, blog? So much has gone on, and for over two weeks, I've had so much to tell you. Alas, because so much has gone on, I haven't had time to poop much less blog about what's happened.

Here's the really long condensed version (I love oxymorons):
Well over a month ago, I'd scheduled to have work off for a week before Memorial Day to do all the final work in getting my house ready to sell, so we could find a larger abode to house our upcoming adventures. Well, when the time finally hit, this is what happened...

Day 1: I get approached by my excellent friend Clint, who referred me to a company he used to work for, touting an exciting opportunity in Software Development. I was compelled to go check it out... so I did so on Day 2; after busting butt to try to get stuff done on the house, and spend some quality time with the fam.

Day 2: Interviewed with ProPay and had a ball. I interviewed with four people, and luckily knew two of them from previous work experience and common friends. This made the interview much less intimdating (one against four - those odds are intimidating) and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Day 3: Worked more on the house... helped Brennan's third-grade teacher with a dance party for their class. The festivities included an intense game of musical chairs, the chicken dance and treats with much sugar content. Fun was had by all.

Day 4: ProPay makes an offer I can't refuse. The offer puts me on my friend Wayne's development team working with new Microsoft .NET technologies which has me giddy. The salary increase will help me afford a house in Utah. The feelings at this point are bittersweet; as I already had a killer job with StayWell Interactive in downtown SLC. I now had the ever-so-opposite-of-anything-remotely-close-to-fun responsibility to turn in my letter of resignation.

I will digress now and discuss how painful this is, since I've never had to leave a job I've liked without being forced to due to lay-offs, etc. Leaving a job you don't like is easy... leaving one you do like is torture. I have some really great friends at StayWell and enjoyed my two years with them very much; and learned a lot. They will be missed. Thank heavens for instant messenger.

Back to the story...

Day 5: We find our next home. A too good to be true house in Riverton that's way bigger than we were planning on buying... whose story has to be told in another post, because it's a story of its own. It will suffice to say that we had to jump on trying to land this place or someone else was going to scoop it up. However, at this moment in time, the planets weren't aligned but we tried for it anyway.

Memorial Day (the Monday after the week off): We list our house and put our offer in on the home we felt should be our next stomping grounds. We were basically asked to come back when we had a more serious offer and didn't have a house to sale still.

Tuesday - 29 May: I drive to work with heavy heart and a letter of resignation... head still spinning from all the mayhem that took place the week before. Mustering up all the courage I had, I slowly walked the Green Mile into my boss' (friend's) office and said, "I have some bad news." He said, "I don't think I like the paper that's in your hand." We discussed things and as I returned to my other friends and had to drop the bomb there too.

Note to self: avoid doing that where possible... it's a very difficult thing to do. (Did I mention, thank heaven for instant messenger?)

Back to house stuff... and I need to digress and mention that I'll probably be writing a supplemental post regarding the spiritual aspects of this whole crazy whirlwind that has been our lives over the past month or so... that part of it has been really neat. To illustrate a little in this post, we listed our house at what seemed to be against the odds.

Our agent (and excellent friend) Trent looked up comps in our area, and while one like ours had sold in 3 days, it had been gutted and completely remodeled. Ours has had some remodeling done, but nothing like this other house. The other comps around us were still on the market and had been for 27-45 days; still not sold.

Gwen and I had both always had the feeling that our house would go quick when it was time to sell, so we listed it anyway with that in mind and still went for the house in Riverton. Well, our first sets of people came through the house on Tuesday.

Wednesday: More work on the house, more people coming to see it.

Thursday: More people checking out the house, one set being a couple that had checked it out on the first day and were making a second visit.

Friday: An offer is made on our home by said 2nd walkthrough family.

Saturday: We go under contract on our home and make a second offer on the home in Riverton we wanted.

Monday (4 June): Phone negotiations start between agents on the Riverton home and by the end of the week finally get it under contract.

Friday (8 June): StayWell Interactive graciously takes me to PF Changs for my final lunch with them... That day really sucked... it's always hard to part knowing you won't hang out with those same friends everyday anymore. I wish them the greatest of success and more good times in my absence. I know this wil be dififcult since they won't have the dry humor pun guy there making them groan with 1/2 courtesy-laughs, 1/2 gagging reflex from reaction to the jokes. They also will lack the entertainment of me sitting at my computer trying to play a video one of the other guys sent via hyperlink in an instant message and freaking out about my sound not working; only to find it was because I was instant messaging in a Remote Desktop session on my secondary monitor -- both machine's Windows Taskbars in plain sight on the monitors... good times. They will be missed.

Monday (11 June): I start my job at ProPay. The drive tanks, except for the fact that I'm driving in Orem and that means I get to see lots of UTOPIA trucks and vans around laying fiber optic lines. I've driven past apartment complexes with signs touting their being connected to UTOPIA and my heart skips a beat... then gets extremely jealous and covetous. One day... one day in my Riverton (Phase II UTOPIA City) home... I so can't wait... but I digress (imagine that.)

I've only been at ProPay 4 days so far, but what a cool crew they have over there. I've enjoyed my associations with everyone I've met so far - a very family-friendly company and the work is going to be very enjoyable.

Now we move on to the house inspections, fixing stuff up to prep for the move and all that other fun stuff.

In the meantime, I've started planning (with some neighbors) a block party for my current neighborhood. We put one on last year and it was a ball. We want to do "one more for the road" as a farewell party to have one last huzzah with all our friends before we start a new adventures in Riverton; as well as help integrate the new family into the neighborhood.

Dreyers does this really cool thing every year called "Neighborhood Salute"; where they bring free ice-cream to several block parties. We were fortunate to be selected this year as one of the lucky block parties to have Dreyers' tasty goodness to share with the friends/neighbors. It should be a riot, and we're excited (and grateful!)

In the midst of all this mayhem... I've also been running around like a head-with-its-chicken-cut-off (yes, you heard me right...) trying to finish some side work and keep the Jordan Alumni Association website up-to-date with information on the Centennial Celebration happening in less than three weeks. My latest project on it was to add a Collector Pins database to the site. Shamless plug: some of those pins are the bizzomb. I'll be trying to scrounge up money so I can see about trying to put together a set... :)

Amongst all this, we've discovered this sickening cancerous looking mass growing on my tongue.
WARNING: Clicking on the link isn't for the weak-stomachs out there... for the rest of you, I know how much you want to see my tongue, so click away. :)

I'm getting that looked at by an ENT on Monday and will, I'm sure, be getting it cut off shortly thereafter. That's a pleasant thought... knives in my mouth gouging the tool that allows me to communicate with others... and taste Dryers ice-cream.

I'm sure it's stress-invoked... but dang, kinda freaky. I'll keep y'all posted on that one as I know you're fascinated *barf* -- it merits its own post, so it will most likely get one.

Like I've told everyone else, before I've shared it with you, blog... but I'm obviously a psycho masochist who always seems to find some exposed portion of the plate to slap something else on. My family is going for the Guiness record of most life altering events in a year (or rather six-month period. Crock, we might already have it just from the last month. I take that back, we have to wait til the twins are born so we can count that... three months. Most life altering events in three months.)

I just hope I can finally poop after the 14th of July. The Centennial will be over by then, we'll be moved into our new home (assuming the planets ARE aligned now and things go smoothly.) The job transition is over and the work on getting the house sold is done (again assuming nothing goes wrong there.) -- finally Gwen and I will be able to take a breath for two seconds before the two babies arrive and make our lives crazier than they have been for the past month.

Buckle your seatbelts folks, it's going to be a crazy ride. And now blog, you understand why I've neglected you.

Obviously I'll have more later, until then... nothin' but love.

And thus I end my epistle.

Google Toolbar's Popup Blocker - Ever Notice...

2007-05-30T08:51:00.000-07:00

... that the Google Toolbar's Popup Blocker makes sure to alert you that it's doing its job the first time it intercepts a Popup ... by displaying a Popup?!

Go figure...

Viva UTOPIA!!!

2007-05-20T10:20:00.001-07:00

This screenshot brought to you by a business client on UTOPIA with Xmission as a provider and a 30Mbit/30Mbit package for $125/mo. (Residential clients get 15Mbit/15Mbit for $39.99/mo - see below; and notice that it's ~1MB faster in both directions than what the package states.)

Both pictures are courtesy of two of my friends located in Murray, Utah.

I'd like to see Qwest and Comcast even ATTEMPT to make that happen on their current systems as they exist today. It's time to ride the light, folks... the light that runs on FIBER OPTICS!!! You know what they say: 9/10 doctors recommend fiber for relieving internet constipation.

Notice the upload speed is nearly 10.8Mbit faster than what the package states they'll get... 10.8Mbit alone isn't even available on Qwest's or Comcast's networks...

Qwest offers a 7Mbit down package, but it's ridiculously overpriced and only available to people that live within spitting distance of one of their "COs." Then you must hope and pray that the planets are aligned and the moon is full to be able to get that kind of connection. Otherwise, it's 256k-ville or 1.5Mbit-land for you; still at the skyrocketed price compared to pricing on UTOPIA providers.

Comcast cranks their download connections up more - to around 8-9Mbit for over 1.5 times the cost of UTOPIA providers... and their uploads are only around 1Mbit... so 15x LESS the speed for more money... hmmm, that's smarts. But what do you do when you don't have a choice?!

Did I mention that all of my neighbors are also on Comcast, because our only other option in my neighborhood is a lousy 256k connection. After all, that's all Qwest promised the city of Taylorsville in 2004 when they convinced the City Council to pull out of UTOPIA... no kudos to the short-sighted Taylorsville City Council that somehow lost the vision they once had.

That said, I only achieve the full speeds listed above on the Comcast system when I'm using it at 3:00am after all the neighbors have gone to bed and aren't using theirs.

Ah to have the splendid best of both worlds... where I could have a dedicated line like Qwest provides (not shared with neighbors) - and speeds much greater than Comcast offers and for a lot less money... That's why I'm moving out of Taylorsville and seeking residence in UTOPIA cities.

Remember folks, it's not just about faster internet... it's about the future of all your communications: phone, TV and internet (even though phone and TV are even now being handled over internet as well); and it's about competition and options... something the Qwest and Comcast monopolies haven't had, nor provided. Instead they continue to charge us premium prices for lackluster services... and provide little to nothing in terms of customer support... Don't believe me?

Read my story about dealings with Qwest during my fight to keep Taylorsville in UTOPIA.

Read about another friend's unfortunate experiences with Comcast.

I really hope that Qwest and Comcast will either start bringing their systems up to handle the technology we need to get our state and our country back in the technology race; and enchance our quality of information connectivity... or get onboard and start providing on UTOPIA so they can give their customers the same speeds they're currently charging for.

Want to know more? Check out UTOPIA's web site and then start hounding your City Council to help them understand the benefits of getting it in your area.

Wish me luck in my quest for UTOPIA. Start your own and help grow the list of cities I can look for homes in!

Boy oh Boys

2007-05-20T09:49:00.000-07:00

I'm slothful. We had our twins' ultrasound last Tuesday and I'm just now getting around to scanning in the ultrasound pictures. I was hoping to video capture some of the video we got, but that's going to take much more time than I have right now; so it'll have to wait.

Anyway, we found out that the twins will be strapping young men (much like their father... er...)

We got to see them both very well and I'm happy to report that all appendages are present and the babies look completely healthy. God willing, they'll stay that way through delivery and beyond. We're grateful He's blessed them to be such thus far.

Baby B, lovingly known as Thing 2 (the one on the top bunk this round) was moving around like a cow in a tornado. We almost didn't get to discover his gender; but the skilled and cunning ultrasound technician outsmarted him. At one point, it looked like Thing 2 was trying to taunt us with a "Neener neener, you can't catch me and find out what I am!!!" His hand was up by his ear with mouth wide open in a mocking fashion." He must get his sense of humor from mom. :) The same shot also makes it look like he's a pirate... The screen captures don't quite do it justice, but you'll get the idea. And Thing 2 must've been prodding Thing 1, because it appears he was doing the same thing when we got his face shot from the front.

We thank everyone for their excitement for our new adventures. We'll keep you posted on how things are going. Until then, keep the name suggestions coming... the ones in the comments on the "Womb Raider" post were a hoot!

Starcraft II Announced

2007-05-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, I'd heard Blizzard Entertainment was going to be making a huge announcement in Korea.

Korea, incidentally, is where the still popular video game Starcraft is massively played. It's so popular there, they televise tournaments for it.

Naturally, it was my hope that being the 10-year anniversary of the release of the original Starcraft the announcement would be about a Starcraft II.

I'm happy to announce that Starcraft II is indeed a reality; and it looks to be incredibly cool.

One thing I'm really excited about is the fact that Blizzard states in their FAQ that they're shooting for a "T" rating on the game. Morals seem to be decaying with increasing speed in the entertainment industries, so I'm hoping this will be kept relatively kid-friendly.

I don't care for the swearing (Starcraft had it too) but I can handle it if it's kept to a minimum.

There is a picture on the artwork page that has me slightly worried, and I hope that kind of thing doesn't make it into the game; a picture of Kerrigan (a genetically manipulated Terran "Ghost" woman that was assimilated by an alien race called the "Zerg") and became the "Queen of Blades."

What the picture depicts is interesting though. I was hoping that if Blizzard did a sequel that the plot would offer a way that the Terrans find a way to reclaim and return Kerrigan her former self. The picture suggests this may very well happen in the game. I just hope they depict it in a more tasteful way that doesn't involve mostly nude shots with strategically covered parts... it's really not necessary.

Aside from that, the game looks incredibly cool and I can't wait to see what all they're going to do to the game.

Our Friday Night Gaming crew still enjoys the original game on several occasions; it's a classic.

Kudos, Blizzard for not solely dumping all your eggs into the World of Warcraft basket and leaving them there. Hopefully you'll resurrect the Starcraft: Ghost project that got shelved a time ago too.

Mourning the Passing of a Dear Friend

2007-04-30T20:48:00.000-07:00

My faithful boombox. You've been with me for almost 20 years. You've gone through everything with me: high school, parties, dances, sports, dates, my mission, work; anywhere I went in my youth, you were right there with me.

You were made superior to the rest, and none have surpassed you since. With your built in Hyper-Bass 3D subwoofer of boom, you delivered hi-fidelity, crazy-delicious sound that brought enjoyment to many; and hours of musical solitude to this big fan of music.

I kept you with me as long as I could. Those that knew me, knew you... we were inseparable. But now the time has come that we must part. Parting is such sweet sorrow. I'll never forget the smooth remixes you helped me create from my CD collection, and how much joy those creations brought me. We were a great team, you and I.

You've touched many lives... many love song compilations and "pick me up" compilations given to friends of the female persuasion. (You also helped me contribute to piracy, you naughty fiend... but we've since repented and are mending our ways...) :)

You've more than fulfilled your function as an emitter of audio; and have made many friends along the way. If any device had audio outputs, you were interfaced with it at some point... VCRs, DVD players, computers, video game consoles, even an old turntable.

Thank you for all the joy that you've brought. You will be sorely missed.

... A moment of silence ...

Being a Software Developer Versus Being a Child Developer

2007-04-28T17:41:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I wonder if I picked the wrong profession.

Think about it. I spend all my work day trying to teach a computer what to do and how to behave. I come home from work and have to do the same thing with my children.

The difference is... a computer must blindly obey with exactness; a child gets to choose whether to accept your instructions and perform them, and can choose whether or not they'll follow some, all or none of them.

When the computer doesn't produce the desired outcome I can't give it a timeout, scold it or punish it (trust me, I've tried... it doesn't get me anywhere.) Instead I reword the instructions until it learns the correct way to produce that outcome. The cool thing about that is; I always know I've taught it wrong until I see the desired outcome.

When a child doesn't produce the desired outcome, I have to perform some analysis; decide whether or not I gave the instructions incorrectly or the child didn't perform the instructions correctly.

In Software Development, there are different types of errors... in compiled languages, you can get compile errors and run-time errors.

Compile errors are those that happen when the computer tries to analyze your instructions to see if it can even do what you've asked. If you've given instructions in a way the computer can't understand; it lets you know right away if your instructions have been such that it can't understand them, much less execute them. It's very handy. I wish God would've installed that feature in my children; it would save much time, contention and frustration.

Run-time errors occur when you've given instructions in a format the computer can understand, but there is a flaw in the logic/flow of execution. These errors rear their ugly heads when the computer is in the middle of executing your instructions and can't complete the task. Again, with computers, it's very easy to recognize that when the computer can't complete it's task, it's usually because the Software Developer failed to instruct the computer successfully.

As a Child Devleoper, I don't get that luxury... I can't know when my child displays a run-time error that it's the fault of the Developer. Of course, because of pride, I assume first that the child has encountered a "Memory Fault" error and commence and immediately execute the Child.Chastise(), Child.Scorn() or Child.Discipline() subroutines.

Instead, I should get smart and think like my Software Developer side... assume it's my fault first and look to reword my instructions. Maybe I'll have more and quicker success with reaching desired outcomes from my children.

Maybe I DID pick the right profession...

Wiijected

2007-04-27T10:36:00.000-07:00

Curse you Sam's Club employee that lied to me!!! Curse you!!!! I now have a broken-hearted child on my hands with shattered dreams of interactive goodness.

My wife was informed a few days ago that the Sam's Club near our home would be receiving a shipment of Nintendo Wii's. We were instructed to call in each day to see if they'd come in yet.

Every day we're reminded about as many times as my son takes breaths to call Sam's and find out if the shipment came in.

Last night when I returned home from my sojourn on the "Trail to MCPD" - I was immediately inundated with requests to make that day's status call. I called and was told they were in... I asked how many they had. "We still have a lot left."

There was much rejoicing...

... That is, until I got to Sam's Club and picked up 2 cardboard "tickets" to use to purchase a couple.

I decided to ask one of the helpful Sam's Club employees if they also carried any games for the system. "Let me go look, but you're aware we don't have any of the systems yet, aren't you?"

"Umm, no... I called an hour ago and one of your co-workers told me you were stocked."

"We were supposed to get a shipment today, but we didn't... we've had people lingering around the store all day waiting for them."

What was I to tell my son?! So I asked, "Well, I can go pay for them, and just pick them up when they arrive, correct?" (hoping this would ease the blow when I arrived home sans-new-game-system.)

"No, you can't purchase them until we physically have them here."

Great...

Well, we needed to make a trip to Lowe's (who has somehow attached a siphon hose to my bank account recently) ... I decided to call and give my wife advanced warning of the pending doom that would befall our home when my son found out I couldn't deliver.

My son, being faster than the speed of light (only when the phone rings) and knowing how to read Caller Id... hit the talk button at the same time my wife did; but didn't say a word... just listened in hopes I was calling to ask what game(s) I should purchase with our newfound treasure.

Needless to say, when the sounds of discontent emitted through the phone, I realized advanced warning was not to be. Dang it! (Did I metion, "CURSE YOU, SAM'S CLUB LIAR EMPLOYEE?!")

So the hunt begins again... if you hear of any hitting the Salt Lake area anytime soon, hook a brutha up!!!

The Trail to MCPD - 1 Down, 2 to Go

2007-04-27T10:31:00.000-07:00

As mentioned in my last epistle, I'm studying to take three Microsoft certification exams. I took the first of three yesterday and PASSED!!!! Needless to say, I'm stoked to have 1/3 less of a stress to worry about.

Unfortunately, it was probably the easiest of the three tests and I studied like a mad-man for it. It takes 700 points to pass and I got 771. While happy about it, I'm still worried about passing the other two.

Here's to hopin'...

Blog Clog - Dude, Where's my Plunger?

2007-04-24T23:57:00.000-07:00

So it's been about a month. I dropped off the face of the Earth and apparently fell into a cess pool of masochist mayhem.

I've managed to get myself piled on with so many things, I don't have time to think, sleep or poop. That's right, it's not just the blog that's clogged. Nevertheless, I digress.

I haven't done much in way of lists on this thing, so let's do one tonight... this is what I have on my plate right now, so my "absence" from this digi-journal (digornio?) will feel somewhat justified: (These are definitely NOT listed in priority order.)

Microsoft Exams: My employer has challenged me (and graciously paid for a 5-day "boot camp" of training) to take and pass 3 Microsoft certification exams to become a "Microsoft Certified Professional Developer" (or something to that effect; I hate acronyms...) I take my first test on Thursday.
Side Job Project: A friend referred me to a company he works for to do a little data-entry piece of software over the next couple months. It's a fun ASP.net project that I get to use a cool new ORM/Data Access Layer library called SubSonic. So far it's really cool, and if I can get that time to poop, I may just also make the time to blog about SubSonic. Wow, I just used the terms SubSonic and poop in the same sentence. Dangerous. I'm a little excited (and frightened) for the comments on this post now.
Jordan High Centennial - For 4 years, the Jordan Alumni Association has been working hard to set up this once-in-a-lifetime celebration. Now it's less than 80 days away and the action surrounding it is picking up momentum like a speeding freight train.
Prepping the house to sell. Yep, with the news of twins on the way, our humble abode just won't accomodate us; so it's time to pack up and re-shack up in a newer, shinier, bigger adobe. Wow, I just used abode and adobe in the same sentence; say those ten times fast.
Finding a new house. We started this venture before, but realized we need to finish paying off a couple more debts first; and finish prepping our home to sell. We'll start hitting it hard again in a few weeks, but are still putting out feelers and getting other balls in motion (talking to realtors/lenders/etc.) as we get closer to that goal.
Work - Ah yes, the real job... the family away from family (since one spends more waking hours with them then your own family.) Can't forget that one. :)
Church - Sunday actually FEELS like a day of rest, even though it's as busy as any of the other days in my week. It's nice to take a day of the week and devote it to the Lord and do something different to take one's mind off the incredibly fast-paced, quadruple overbooked lifestyle one lives the other six days of the week. Thank you, God, for the Sabbath.
Family - Yes, I actually try to squeeze time in for my darling wife and beautiful children; who have been so very patient with me amidst all my stress. I thank God again that they have'n't killed or disowned me yet. They truly are a blessing. And I enjoy the time I get to spend with them; even if it's short lately. Voltron has become a fun nightly ritual for us...
I've probably forgotten something, but it doesn't matter... that list is long enough.

I want to talk more about Voltron for a moment. For my birthday, I picked up the Season One DVD set of Voltron: Defender of the Universe. If you're not familiar with Voltron, it's a catroon from 1984 that had 5 Space Explorers who encountered a nasty bad guy on the Planet Arus. Planet Arus had a mighty robot named Voltron that was split into 5 parts... mechanical lions that could me piloted individually, then flown into formation and formed into the mighty robot Voltron. This, of course is the climax of the show... Voltron is formed, he whips out the blazing sword, and opens up a can on some robot beast sent by before mentioned nasty bad guy (who happens to be known as Zarkon.)

Anyway, I popped the DVD in and instantly had a smile permeate my face as I watched and rode the flood stream that was the nostalgia river in my head. Soon, the kids flocked around me to see what the cool "new" cartoon was. It has entered the ranks of, dare I say, "Kim Possible" in the Litster household. We've been watching an episode or two everynight for bedtime stories; and recently finished the first season.

It only took three days of neverending groveling of my cuties to get me to the store to purchase Season Two. Good times... and at least I have them still amidst the Chaos. I again thank the Lord for the time I get to spend with my family. It's definitely cherished.

Except for those times when 'tudes are copped and voices are raised. Those aren't so fun. My poor kids and wife; they feel the stress and have been affected by it as much as I have; despite my efforts to shield them from it.

The consolation is that, by July 8th - much of that list will be accomplished and moved to the past; and I can focus on slowing things down so I can take care of my wife who will be moving into the "you may be confined to bedrest soon" zone.

So for now, the blincoln blogs may be few, but my thoughts are with my family and friends always... enjoy the silence - you'll be hit with my onslaughts of long-windedness again soon enough.

And thanks for reading! My family and friends mean the world to me. I'm glad you're one of them.

Now I must be off to mind-meld with a Microsoft manual. Say that ten times fast and you'll win cupie doll; but only if you forward this to ten of your best friends in the next 5 minutes. Oh, and I almost forgot... close your eyes and make a wish too, and something cool will pop up on your screen. I didn't believe it either when I first read it, but trust me; it works!

The Gateway to Customer Service

2007-03-30T16:55:00.001-07:00

I bought a killer 21" Gateway Monitor (FPD2185W) last August. It's been fantastic, with swivel action on both axes, height adjustment and rotation. It's got all the video hookups under the sun and a powered 4-port USB hub. It's been a fantastic ride for the last several months.

I had the monitor in a dual-monitor configuration. I had a lan party last weekend that required me to unhook it and use it in a single-monitor configuration. After hooking it back up in my office after the lan party, I went to re-enable my multi-monitor configuration.

Mind you it was still in single-monitor mode at the time; and the display was showing up on my killer Gateway monitor. When I re-enabled the multi-monitor... the screen blinked, but the other monitor didn't come on. The display was still solely on my LCD (my other monitor is a CRT.)

So I thought to myself, "Self, you should reboot the computer and see if it will go back to normal." I did so, and when it restarted... the display now came up on my CRT and NOT on my LCD anymore.

Playing with settings and uninstalling/reinstalling drivers for an hour didn't resolve anything. All display was stuck on my CRT with no hint of going elsewhere.

So I unhooked the LCD from my computer and hooked it up to Gwen's computer... no DVI love there either... so I swapped cables and still no love...

I decided to check the VGA port instead on the monitor to see if it was the DVI port that was the problem, or the whole monitor had given up the ghost. Well, the VGA worked, so I decided the DVI port was bad.

Enter Gateway support. I got on their website and figured out how to email support. Their first response came in hours and they asked me a few questions. We exchanged emails over the next several hours. I received one from them that agreed the monitor was defective and that they had already scheduled a replacement to ship to my home.

They cross-shipped the monitor to my home (on their bill) through Fed-Ex 2nd Day Air (I'll rant about Fed Ex' LACK OF SERVICE in another post) -- with an extra box to ship my defective monitor back in (also on their bill and also FedEx 2nd day.)

It was incredible... my monitor's DVI port went out on Saturday; I had the new monitor on Wednesday ... the defective monitor will be back to them by Tuesday.

One word... heavenly.

I wish all big companies would learn a lesson from Gateway... This is the way you build loyalty!!!!

I didn't receive any two emails from the same Gateway employee; but every email was signed with their name and badge number; and they were all intelligent, competent and professional; and all were sincerely concerned with getting me taken care of.

If that kind of service keeps up, I'll be recommending Gateway to others for a long time... Thanks Gateway!

Jordan High Centennial Tickets Go On Sale - 03 April 2007 at 10:00am (Mountain Time)

2007-03-28T00:45:00.000-07:00

The time has come for the most excellent and biggest celebration the 100-year old Jordan High School in Sandy, Utah has ever seen.

Friendships will be rekindled, history will be re-lived... history will be made. Classmates will not only reunite with each other; but with their friends from surrounding years that they don't normally see at their class reunions.

Friday July 6th and Saturday July 7th, the Jordan High Centennial Committee and the Jordan Alumni Association present the Jordan High 100-Year Celebration of Life.

I have the wonderful privilege of working with these committees as a member of the Alumni Association Board and part of the Centennial Committee. Hundreds of volunteers are working around the clock to arrange this amazing event.

We're seeking anyone that has ever been involved with Jordan High; teachers, administration, students and all. Please help us spread the word. All of my classmates from the Class of 1991 need to get on our Class Site and make sure if your name is on our missing list that you update your contact information with us...

Tickets go on sale April 3rd at 10:00am (Mountain Time) and will be handled through the LDS Conference Center and the same ticket will be used for admission to both events.

For more details, please visit the Jordan Alumni Association website.

For all the hard work that everyone has put in, I want to say thank you! The Centennial will be a smashing success and all that participate in this special weekend will be so glad they did.

Here's to 100 years of Dear Ol' Jordan High and here's to 100 more! The Beet lives on...

The Prayer of the Children

2007-03-25T21:08:00.000-07:00

Listening to children pray is one of life's greater pleasures.

My youngest, Kimmie is very thankful in her prayers. She always makes it a point to thank Heavenly Father for everyone in our family (as of late, this occurs multiple times in the same prayer...) and then commences with speaking in tongues. Some sort of ultra-cool jibberish starts flowing from her mouth for a few seconds and then a pause, a sly grin, and then more thanking for family members. I don't know if she's just trying to emulate mommy and daddy's long-winded and boring-for-kids prayers, but whatever it is, it rocks.

Mandi, my second oldest who caught on to our prayers for protection started a tradition in the children's prayers to say, "Please keep us safe from harm and accident (and purposes)..."

Yes, the prayer of the children is glorious to be a part of. Most of the time they end up sounding like vain repetition, but kids are innocent and have no clue what that even means; so I'm convinced they really mean it everyday... that is until they're saying that same prayer so fast it sounds like they're speaking in tongues as well. Maybe that's where Kimmie gets it from.

The best is, those quiet moments during family prayer, when you know they really have some concerns on their mind; they pause for a moment during their prayer and then ask for something completely unexpected that touches your heart for good. It's those moments where you feel the Spirit touch your soul, and you know that Heavenly Father is hearing them.

Thank God for kids... (you never know, next time you're trying to have one, He'll give you an added bonus like He has with us!)

Womb Raider - Two Much Fun

2007-03-21T21:13:00.000-07:00

It's official! They're twins, and they're housed in a bunk-bed equipped womb.
When this picture was being taken; the top baby (lovingly referred to by the radiologist as "Baby A") had a hiccup and we got to watch its body flail up-and-down in a "break dancing/worm" like movement for a brief second. "Baby B" was just casually kicking it on the bottom bunk (literally kicking the side wall)

They're fraternal and healthy and happy; as are we! We're grateful to know they're growing healthy and strong; and already sapping my dear sweetheart of all her energy ... and food consumption.

You'll note that it appears "Baby A" (aka "Thing 1") is looking face-down at the "bottom bunk" where "Thing 2" is crouched in fetal position, kicking the wall to your left. "Thing 1" looks to have a highlighted jawbone, but I can't tell for sure... this is why I'm a software developer and not a radiologist. "Thing 2" has a jawbone, it appears, as well; but not near as bright as "Thing 1."

Nothing like Dr. Seuss nicknames while they're preparing to enter into their journey into the world. Speaking of names, everyone has been having a ball coming up with what we should name them.

Among the top are:
(If they're boys...)
Jim & Tim (the "Tweebs" from Kim Possible)
Bill & Ted
Wayne & Garth
Mario & Luigi
Smith & Wesson
Bacon & Cheese

(If they're girls...)
Thelma & Louise
Blossom & Buttercup

(If they're a mixed bag)
Pat & Terry
Chris & Kelly

What names do YOU want to suggest?

Getting Back the Green

2007-03-17T15:32:00.000-07:00

So it's St. Patrick's Day... and with the focus being on the color green, I figured I'd share some of our good news.

See, when we first moved into our current home, we were almost debt-free (all we had were Gwen's school loans and a car payment besides the house payment.) It felt nice. As we all experience, things happen sometimes and some forced debt ensues. That stuff is a nasty evil demon bugger to pay off... but I'm happy to announce that, thanks to a generous bonus from work... we nailed down almost all of the rest of our remaining debt. Next month its gone except for our minivan payment and the house and we're doing a Little Green Happy Dance!

For the sake of not making you sick, I'll spare the video clips of said dance. Nevertheless, there is much rejoicing *yaaaaaaaay*

Becoming debt free is an invigorating and wonderful feeling, with emphasis on the word free.

Of course this is just in time to go plunge into bigger house debt, so the dance is again cut short. hehe!

Still, it's quite a feeling of accomplishment to get that crap out of your hair and know that money can go towards the home and children (especially now that we're going from 3 to 5 children!)

So, enjoy the day of green... I know we will. :)

Confessions of a Father in Training

2007-03-14T00:45:00.000-07:00

Why is it that parenting doesn't come with a manual? It's because every child is different; their personality, their needs, employable tactics to help them understand that doing your bidding is best for their well-being (and yours...)

My son is a joy and a delight. He's a bright and clever young man with an incredibly creative imagination and sometimes an insatiable appetite for destruction. This demon side usually comes out when he's involved in an accident that inflicts pain on his person.

As with most children, the knee-jerk reaction is to get uncontrollably angry at the inanimate object that somehow reached out and tripped, punched, slapped, or otherwise committed a felony in attempting to inflict injury on said child. With my son (and now my youngest daughter who is the epitome of older sibling emulation) this is first conveyed by very loudly yelling and/or screaming at the inanimate object with phrases riddled with expletives like "stupid piece of crap" or "fetchin' bastage" -- of course none of which, he learned from me.

Once the yelling ceases and the child realizes there is no reactin from said inanimate object; realizing the purposes have not been fulfilled and that feeling of sweet revenge not yet achieved... he, like many, will commence clobbering the inanimate object in order to achieve that feeling.

Quickly the child learns that this only nets them more pain which then cycles into more anger, which is then... you get the idea.

In this particular instance, I was upstairs talking with a friend of mine after excusing my son to bed for the evening. I start hearing banging sounds emanating from the basement; and realizing we need to sell the house in order to acquire more room for our child count which is about to almost double its size in a few months, I immediately want to panic.

Excusing myself and heading downstairs, my son realizes I'm entering the room and stops cold and looks at me like he knows he's in trouble. Now, my knee-jerk reaction is to start laying into him about how he's destroying the abode that we happen to need to sell in the not-so-distant future and how that needs to stop before I'm forced to remove a potential line of future posterity for my family name.

In the midst of the yelling match that ensused neither I, nor my son, listened to a word the other was saying... except the cutting ones I heard about my son wanting to move out becuase I didn't give a crap about him and didn't care to listen to what he had to say.

Little did I know that he'd been bonked on the head by the ladder up to the bunk he sleeps on and was having a reactionary episode in light of that fact. I told my son I wasn't about to listen to him until he calmed down. My lovely, beautiful, nurturing, much more intelligent than I and wonderful wife had entered the scene by this time.

Despite her asking me to mellow out with him, I angrily then left the room to say goodbyes to my friend so I could focus on remedying the screamfest that my wife was now enjoying at several decibels above that of a jet engine. I have to imagine my neighbors were enjoying it too.

After my friend left, I calmly went down into my son's room - where he still esteemed me as his enemy. My wife must have said some special prayers, because my whole demeanor changed as I took a deep breath, climbed up on the bunk and laid down beside my son; and started to talk in a calm voice to him.

It's amazing how much more can be accomplished when both parties involved in the discussion are calm. And it's amazing how much love and forgiveness a child and parent can feel for each other during the calm after the storm.

I think the Gospel of Jesus Christ puts it best:
Doctrine and Covenants: Section 121 - Verse 43
"40 Hence many are called, but afew are chosen.
41 No power or influence can or ought to be maintained by virtue of the priesthood, only by persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned;
42 By kindness, and pure knowledge, which shall greatly enlarge the soul without hypocrisy, and without guile—
43 Reproving betimes with sharpness, when moved upon by the Holy Ghost; and then showing forth afterwards an increase of love toward him whom thou hast reproved, lest he esteem thee to be his enemy;
44 That he may know that thy faithfulness is stronger than the cords of death."

I wasn't moved upon by the Holy Ghost to reprove with sharpness - but I did reprove with sharpness... too much sharpness.

Luckily, like I forgave my son, the Lord will forgive me as I repent for yelling at my son and not taking the time to listen to and address his concerns the right way.

Thankfully, my son decided he doesn't want to move out after all, and that I'm still his bud... we had a wonderful chat about multiplication tables and other cool things he's doing at school. I even got to teach him the cool trick with the number 11 when multiplying by 10, 11 or 12.

It's those moments that make parenting worth it... when I can learn a lesson, my son learns a lesson and it's taught in the spirit of love, not anger. I'm just grateful my Heavenly Father is wiser than I and doesn't smite me everytime I make a dumb mistake... cause I make a lot of 'em...

And I'm grateful He has given us manuals to help us in our quest to become better parents to our wonderful children.

It seems children are here more to teach us than we are to teach them at times... God bless the children.

"Narbacular Drop": Predecessor to "Portal: The Video Game"

2007-03-10T01:53:00.000-07:00

I'm really excited about a new puzzle game in the works by Valve Software called Portal.

I found out today from my friend Rich that the game is based on an earlier game made by Nuclear Monkey Software called Narbacular Drop.

The game is incredible and so much fun. Download it, get addicted, then curse the fact that Portal won't be released until late September of this year (or later if the deadline gets moved back.)

The good news... The nice folks at Nuclear Monkey Software have given us a level editor, and their site contains links to a bunch of already created ones for your enjoyment to help tide over until Portal is released.

I highly recommend this and thank those that have put a lot of hard work, heart and soul into such a simple yet incredibly complex game.

Check out the Portal Trailer:

What If...

2007-03-08T00:24:00.000-07:00

"What if there were no hypothetical situations?"

Kim Possible Season Pass - Why My Life Just Got Better With iTunes

2007-02-23T00:59:00.000-07:00

The internet is changing the way we do things...

I gave up Disney Channel when Comcast came to finally block it after three-and-a-half years of neglect just before Christmas 2006. This was a hard choice to make since the Best Show Ever Made (yes, that would be Kim Possible...) was about to start its long-awaited fourth season.

Well, this morning (1:00am) when I locked my computer and was heading up for some sleep ... I had the feeling to go check iTunes and see if they'd put any of the four new episodes from the season kickoff up for download yet.

So I came back to my computer, fired up iTunes, browsed to KP and lo-and-behold... for less than one month of Comcast, iTunes offered me the option to purchase a "Season Pass" for Season 4 of Kim Possible.

As I type, I'm downloading all five of the already aired episodes and as new ones are released, they'll be automatically downloaded to my machine... the only thing better would be for Disney to start releasing the DVD boxed sets we've been begging for years to have.

If you're interested, and you know you are... make sure you've watched "So the Drama" and then go hook yourself up with the Season Pass at the Kim Possible page on iTunes. Enjoy!!! I know I will!

So... who needs cable TV -- we've got Internet... Viva le UTOPIA! I so need to get a house in Riverton... since my current city Taylorsville went all dorkwad and pulled out of UTOPIA -- but that's another story for another blog... but the moral of the story: Internet - the way we do things now -- embrace it, fear it... love it, download it...

Twinnerpated

2007-02-22T22:48:00.000-07:00

Gwen went to her first doctor appointment today since finding out we're pregnant.

This of course is to make it "official" since, while rare, the home tests can sometimes be inaccurate. Well, we not only found out we are for-sure pregnant; but we found out we've doubled our order! So my former post is now incorrectly titled... it should now read "And then there were five..." Here's to a full mini-van... :)

Needless to say, we're way excited and way nervous! Luckily we have a lot of family and friends who have been blessed with twins before us; so we'll be looking for advice from them all!

We thank our Heavenly Father for this wonderful blessing and new adventure in our family and hope that we'll be up to the challenge.

We've been looking for a new home, knowing that with the new addition we'd need more room than we currently have. My eye has been drawn to somewhat large homes... and now I know why! :) The house hunt is a different story and I'll blog about that soon.

Why TrackMania Will Never Get Old

2007-02-12T01:22:00.000-07:00

Yes, that is a track ... yes, it's a commode ... and yes, it's really made with TrackMania United track pieces. For more info, check out the track at the TMX (TrackMania Exchange) website.

Kim Possible - Still the Best Show EVER Made

2007-02-12T00:58:00.000-07:00

When I first heard about Kim Possible coming back for a fourth season after being shutdown at the end of the third, I was skeptical.

Disney has had a really bad habit with their movies of getting really killer voice talent for the first movie; then releasing a sequel where none of the famous voice talent returns - and it usually makes for a horrible show, even in the rare times the sequel's story is good.

But after fans blasted Disney with the help of the Save Disney Shows website, they announced that Kim Possible would be returning for a fourth season.

While I was ecstatic to get more shows, I was worried that now that the team was on to other projects, their heart wouldn't be into it like it was with the first three seasons and that they wouldn't be able to get the ultra-cool voice talents back for this new season.

I'm so very happy to say I was wrong on both counts. I found out early on that the voice talents were returning and it appears the same writers/producers are back as well.

To celebrate the start of Season Four - Disney Channel aired four new episodes on 10 February - and they all ROCKED! The crew is having as much or more fun with this new season than they did with the first three. There were several dialogue references to past episodes, Wade came out of his room again and found himself crushing on Monique, Ashley Tisdale (from Disney Channels' smash hit "High School Musical and the Suite Life of Zack & Cody) makes a cameo as a superstar villain and we got to see the returns of several other classic villains: (Dr. Dementor, Shego, the Senor Seniors and cameos by Doctor Drakken and Frugal Lucre (who called it?!) who happen to be prison cell-mates.) Kim finds herself with a new souped-up car that her twin little bros, the Tweebs will be enhancing throughout the season.

Next Saturday promises another new episode with Motor Ed - should be a lot of fun.

So, many thanks and kudos to the folks at Disney Channel for bringing us another season of fun with Ron, Kim, Wade and Rufus! And hopefully the Save Disney Shows crew will help bring about the DVD boxed sets and a theatrical release as well.

FNG Turkey Bowl 2006 (happened in 2007)

2007-02-12T00:48:00.000-07:00

My Friday Night Gaming crew held our annual Turkey Bowl for 2006 a little later than normal (had to postpone twice from the original scheduled date in 2006.)

It was a fun time despite only having three of the seven committed riders there. Hopefully we'll be able to do a rematch later; especially on the Accelerate track.

The Accelerate track is a figure eight that goes very fast and has a high probability of collision with a bunch of players riding at the same time. There were a couple other tracks with a lot of crossover points as well.

"Bail Jumper" has some high-flying fun to it and despite its horrible spline (the method used for determining the track's boundaries so people stay on the track and don't take cuts...) was deemed the FNG favorite new track for this year's bowl.

We definitely had better luck with connectivity this year... which is good considering the first bowls had many people failing to connect or dropping out of the game prematurely due to connection issues and game crashes. Maybe having the Turkey Bowl on a weekend other than Thanksgiving weekend is a good idea. :) We'll have to rename it.

Anyway, check out the recap over at the Friday Night Gaming site.

Sneak Peek at the Season Premiere of Kim Possible Season Four

2007-02-06T22:33:00.000-07:00

I was snooping around Disney Channel last night getting the schedule of the new Kim Possible episodes for my buddy Chris; when I tripped on the Season Re-opener episode posted on their site to stream down!!!

It rocked so hard!!! It is a perfect way to bring back the series. I enjoyed it so much I watched it twice.

To get to it... click the following:
Disney XD Beta
Once it's loaded... a TV screen will appear with a sidebar on the right that has three arrows pointing right. Click it to expand the play list. Click on the episode entitled "Ill-Suited." Enjoy!

Be warned, a lot of fans have learned of its existence so there servers are pretty slammed during peak times. If it doesn't stream well for you, wait for a less-traffic time... or tune in Saturday night for 4 new episodes!

If you haven't seen "So the Drama" -- you'll want to watch it first before you see the new episodes. "Ill Suited" plays off "So the Drama" a TON! It rules. "So the Drama" can be seen on the link above as well.

Boo... and uh... YA!!!

FNG - Motocross Madness 2 - Pepsi Max to the extreme

2007-02-01T09:46:00.000-07:00

This was one of the most fun and exciting races we've had on this track in FNG history. Despite several stupid mistakes resulting in big wrecks, I still almost took Tsam ... until my last fatal mistake near the end of the third lap.

The spring-loaded jump through the finish is phenomenal ... the best one I've ever pulled on that part of the track.

Good times!!!

And then there were four...

2007-01-29T23:16:00.000-07:00

My radiant and extremely beautiful wife took a test Saturday that she couldn't study for... and passed with flying colors! The reward from this test should arrive sometime in September and our family is incredibly excited!

When we sprang the good news on the kids, we said, "Kimmie is going to be a big sister; do you know what that means?" Brennan quickly replied, "It means that mommy is going to have another baby?!" Kids rock.

It will be fun to see what adventures this new (and I'm sure high-spirited) addition to our family will bring. Each new child bringing their own individuality in the world, expressed through all their cute-isms (like Kimmie calling lemonade "mermade", Mandi's incredible ability to read nearly everything placed in front of her and Brennan's mad dance skills.)

We thank our Father in Heaven for blessing us with each and every one of these beautiful miracles in our lives... even when they test our patience limits on a daily basis; they're wonderful and teach us so much.

Attention all Multi-Level Marketers... I'm NOT Interested!!!

2007-01-26T08:47:00.000-07:00

It never ceases to amaze me the tactics Multi-Level-Marketers (or Pyramid Schemers, or Scamwayers or whatever other terms you're familiar with -- it's all the same... yes, MLMers, IT'S ALL THE SAME!!!) use to try to get people on-board to make them money.

I get a phone call last night from a guy who was referred to me by a friend. It was a friend that knows I'm not now, nor ever will be, interested in MLMs because they asked to remain anonymous; or the guy on the phone lied to me.

What I love is that they act like they already know you and are sure you're the one to get involved in this highly (and quickly) profitable company and that I just MUST get on board with all the benefits that these programs have to offer.

I love the claims they make...

"I was sick of making other people money..."

What do you think you're doing now? You're under someone else and your cha-ching is trickling into their pockets... not to mention you're busy trying to get me under you so I can do the same for you... hello?!?!?!!!

"I was tired of not having time with my family..."

Um... you're calling me at night which means you're not spending time with your family - you're busy bothering me on the phone trying to get me to sell-out my friends and family in the pursuit of the green.

"You sound like the perfect person for this..."

Dude, you've spoken to me for a total of 2 minutes on the phone... if you're able to make that kind of accurate judgment call - YOU'RE in the wrong line of work...

"The person that referred you wishes to be anonymous..."

That tells me they truly believe in what you're doing... that or they couldn't get you off their case until they gave you some names; so they gave you some to get you to leave them alone... Either way, I'm still not interested...

Friends, I love you. I love keeping in touch with you. I don't love keeping in touch if your only motive of doing so is to get me in your MLM projects. I hate MLM projects... I hate the tension they put into relationships that were otherwise solid... I hate how pushy people are with them, I hate the fact that I've built websites for some and they've been crooked, corrupt, evil companies that only like to take money from their downline suckers and don't like to pay their own bills.

Also, if the person calling me about the MLM IS my friend... don't pull an ACN groveling technique saying you need a favor. Groveling tells people you don't truly believe in the product/program you're selling, so why on Earth would they join?!

Please don't refer me anymore to MLMs... If you're doing it to get them to leave you alone, that's one thing -- but don't "remain anonymous" ... contact me and warn me before they call so I know what's coming.

If you're referring because you think I'll get hooked up... I NEVER WILL - so please stop referring.

-- End of Rant --