Google Treasure Maps - Happy April Fools Day!

Google is known for making April Fools Day extra fun with a lot of their sites.  Today is no exception.  Below is a look at their Treasure Map action for Google Maps...

Street View through the Looking Glass, mixed with the Treasure Map

Zoomed in Street View through the Looking Glass
(you can zoom in too!)

Be sure to check out Google Nose too!

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

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...

Google's April Fools Joke Today

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.

Kids are So Much Fun!

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

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.

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

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

The Cake is NOT a Lie

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

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!

Baaaad to the Bone - Shear Goodness

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...

Gotta Be Prudent at this Juncture...

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

Childlike Wonder

My kids rule.

No really, they do. I know... every parent says that about their kids; and they're absolutely right. They're always doing humourous and wonderful things; often times to the causing of pain in a parent's gut from laughing long and loud with youthful abandon.

Here are some recent antecdotes of cool and funny things my children have done (another can be read here...):

• Mandi, our Kindergartener tested at a 3rd grade level plus 3 months in reading - Those of you that know her probably aren't surprised. She rocks.


• Brennan is excelling in mathematics and spelling - Those of you that know him wouldn't be surprised either. He rolls.


• Kimmie, well... let's just say she's been up to some very interesting things:

First, I came home from work the other day and Gwen told me that Kimmie had spoken her first four-word sentence. Can you guess what it was?!
"Go away now, Mommy."

The other night we were at the dinner table. You know those burps that just sneak attack you and their out (barely managing to refrain from extra projectile surprise) by the time you've realized it hit? Yeah, you know the ones I'm talking about. Well, my beautiful, gorgeous, wonderful, sweet, prim and proper wife had the joy of belting one of those out that night.
Kimmie's response...
"Good girl!" *clapping as she says it.*

Last night we were saying our family prayers together. When we gather for family prayers, we usually let all of the kids have a turn, followed by Mommy or Daddy wrapping it up with a prayer of our own.

Nearing the end of our prayers, we got a phone call. It was a call I needed to take. As I left the room to answer the phone, Kimmie knelt down on the floor to offer a prayer of her own.

Kimmie is a very thankful sort:
"... thank you for Mommy, for Daddy, for Brennan, and Mandi, and Kimmie ... and TV, aaaaand hawk-a-let (chocolate), and [insert favorite cute non-articulate jabbering] here ... aaaaand for nose, and ear, and belly button... aaaaand diaper, and poop."

It's the little things that make us happy... and what a good lesson in being grateful. We should all be grateful for our poop, really... cause you know, if you couldn't, well, let's just say our insides ... it wouldn't be pretty.

Trick or Treat

The ladies in my life: my beautiful wife, Gwen; my soon-to-be 6-year old Mandi; and my soon-to-be 2-year old daughter Kimmie are all chocolate freaks.

Kimmie is especially known for spreading her chocolate love all over the place when she consumes it; especially all over her hands and face.

After the jubilee, she comes to flaunt it in my face by showing me her chocolate hands... usually getting some on me, which is alright because then I get to share in yummy goodness too.

That is, until tonight. Being as it is only two days after Halloween night and having buttloads of chocolate all over my home, it's natural to see Kimmie with chocolate fingers all-day-long.

Tonight is extra special. I'm sitting at my computer, checking some email and talking a friend through getting two computers networked together so he can play some network video games with his buddy.

Kimmie comes down in her usual flaunt style... chocolate all over her cute little hands... waving them at me to pick her up and help her get cleaned up. She gets the usual dab of it on my fingers and as I go to lick it off; I don't taste the sweet sensation I'm used to tasting.

Needless to say, the friend was immediately and without warning put on hold (phone dropped to the floor;) my toddler and I make the world's fastest dash upstairs where I promptly unload her on my wife (giving her the 10-second cliff notes summary of how my adorable angel-baby has stuffed her hands down her diaper to find treasure... and then haul my sorry tainted mouth to the bathroom for an emergency "chocolate" evac (otherwise known as a good toothbrushing.)

Needless to say, I won't be using that toothbrush ever again. Nor will I be licking the chocolate off my hands that my ever-so-sweet and cuter-than-cute daughter so lovingly shares with me... EVER... AGAIN.

Moral of the story: Next time someone tells you to eat $#!Z... I don't recommend it.