My New Blog

I have decided to start a new blog. I have a lot of opinions about sports and in particular the NBA. But I know that people who check in on this blog aren't always interested in them. So I have created a blog dedicated to my rants on sports. It can be found at:

http://belthighdribble.blogspot.com/

Christmas Eve 2008

Like most parents Kate and I wish that the kids would go to bed at a decent hour on Christmas Eve, so that Santa Claus can come before it gets really late. This year I decided to take the kids sledding during the day in an attempt to wear them out. It didn't work. But we still had a great time. Cousin Warren, who lives in Las Vegas had a chance to take in some good snow while here. Here are some of the things that we learned while sledding:

-Filming while sledding is not a good idea.

-If you are going down and Bean is coming up and you buzz her, she will take a swipe at you.

-Sometimes the camera man, while attempting to get a good shot, gets too close the the action, and gets plowed.

-When a 200 pound man sledding at full speed hits a tree, it hurts. A lot.

Mr. C

Kate found the following letter, which was addressed on the outside to 'Mr. C'. I am pretty sure that Mr. C will write her back.

A Couple of Real Performers

Tonight we attended a dance recital for Samantha and Bean. There were 46 numbers in the program, and Samantha's was 38th. It made for a long night. But Bean managed to steal the show. When you see the video, you'll understand. This was to be her dancing debut. It may also have been her finale.

Sums me up pretty well

The following document was found in Whitney's backpack this week. I don't know what the parameters of the assignment were, but it paints an interesting picture of me...

Shooting My Mouth Off Again

The following ran in the Sunday Sports section of the Salt Lake Tribune this week.

If you can't see it very well, go here

Using the wrong bowl!

I realize that I post about Patrick quite a bit. Probably more often than the other kids. But it should be noted that not all of the posts about Patrick are always positive. Case in point, an incident that happened this morning. It should also be noted that this post may qualify under TMI: Too much information.

So here is what happened. I was being lazy and didn't want to make lunch. I told the kids that if they wanted to have cereal for lunch they could. Patrick and Whitney were the last two to eat, and before long I heard Whitney running up the stairs calling for me. "Patrick just peed in Bean's cereal bowl!" she cried.

"I had to go!" Patrick expalined when confronted. "And I wasn't going to make it to the bathroom!"

Looking on the bright side, I am glad that Bean was done with her cereal.

The incident reminded me of several things:
1. When I was a kid it was popular to ask of someone who was grumpy "Who pissed in your Cheerios this morning?"
2. A line from the movie Steel Magnolias where a woman says of her friend's husband "I'm sure he's a real gentleman. He probably clears the dishes from the sink before pissing in it."
3. A story that one of my mother's co-workers shared with her about when she was potty training her son, and he woke up in the middle of the night, went to the kitchen, opened the refirgerator and pooped in the salad crisper. The best part of that story was a week after the woman told it, they had a pot luck lunch, where the woman brought a green salad, which no one ate of course...

Eat up!

Guitar-zan

I haven't uploaded a video recently, so I thought I'd share this one about Kate and the kids rocking out. I love Guitar Hero. Everyone at our house loves it, except Bean, who prefers her Jonas Brothers. I especially love Patrick's stance while jamming and how he dances while the star power is on. What I don't love is that Kate kicks my butt every time we duel. But I guess I shouldn't feel bad. She kicks everyone's butts.

Miles to Go

This coming Saturday Patrick starts his first season of Junior Jazz. I hope he enjoys it more than he liked soccer. Being a person who was born and raised with basketball, I am very excited that he wanted to play.

For those who are not familiar with Junior Jazz, I can tell you that one of the things they do is, when teams are organized, each coach is given jerseys for each player. The numbers on each of the jerseys correspond to players currently on the Jazz roster. So you can imagine that mothers all across the state are signing kids up to play in the hopes that their child will draw the #26 jersey. So whose number did Patrick’s coach give him? Deron Williams’ #8? Memo’s number 13? Boozer’s #5? How about Andrei’s #47? Nope…


Number 34: CJ freaking Miles! Oh the humanity! Are you kidding me? Maybe the coach knew that Patrick is left handed and wanted him to feel comfortable in a fellow south paw’s number. I must look on the bright side, though: At least the coach didn’t dole out the #31 to my son…

P.S. When you Google search for pictures of CJ Miles, you get more than shots of basketballs. Apparently there is a young woman with the same name, and she doesn’t like to wear clothes…

The Space Shuttle Extravagance


When I woke up that morning I wasn’t planning on buying a new vehicle. And I sure as hell wasn’t aware that I was about to be without 4 wheel drive. But when Kate took the Durango in to the shop we found out that the strange noise it was making was a big problem. Weighing the options we decided not to put more money into repairs on the old beast than the old beast was worth.

So now we have a Space Shuttle (Chrysler Town and Country). I’ve been criticized for buying a new car during these times of economic recession, but really, I found it was a good time to buy. You can all but name your own price.

I’ve also been criticized for getting all the extras: 20 gig hard drive in the dash, a removable table in the middle, dual DVD players with wireless headsets, rear camera, leather seats, cold drink dispenser. But I have only one thing to say to all you complainers: you don’t have to drive it…

The Blushing Bean

Thanksgiving was pretty uneventful until Scott noticed that Lauren's neck and face were really rosy. We stripped off her clothes to find her whole body covered in hives. We dosed her up with Benadryl and Cortizone, and were about ten minutes away from taking her to Primary's for treatment when the rash seemed to subside. She's doing fine now, but we still have no inkling of what caused the rash as well as the cough she had had the night before. It had to have been really uncomfortable for her, but she weathered it like a real trooper.

Rivalry Shenanigans

3 months ago I stepped in to the University Bookstore to gather my school supplies and found a great deal on a University of Utah flag. Patrick had been asking me if he could hang a flag on the playground for some time, so I decided to pick it up. He helped me to mount the pole on the playground and was quite proud. He even asked me if he can get a pirate flag some time.

The flag has been flowing in the breeze all fall, but tonight I got home from work to find that taken the flag down, wadded it up, and thrown it under the playground. I thought that it was the high winds we've been having at first, until I found the heap tucked away underneath. No way it got there by itself. And no way it came down accidentally. It was bolted to the pole.

To be honest I am amazed that it took this long for someone to monkey with it. You hear jokes about people bearing their testimony of BYU football from the pulpit, but in my neighborhood it can happen. What kills me is that when rivalry week comes around each year, the BYU honks give it to me by saying that Utah fans are nasty, dirty and take low shots, but that BYU fans are more dignified and would never lower themselves to some of the things that Ute fans do. To that I now say, "Hi. Kettle? This is the Pot..."

Speaking of the rivalry, I got a text message from Chas on Saturday that read "6 days to BYU victory" I told Pat about it, and she decided she wanted in on the smack talk. She sent Chas a text that read, "I can't wait to see BYU get their butts kicked on Saturday. BYU! BYU! Where girls are girls and boys are too." (I know, very mature). He didn't respond, so she sent another a few hours later that read, "I take it from your silence that you agree with me." "Who is this?" he responded. "God" was Pat's response. We let him wonder for a couple of days before I told him who it really was. He hasn't responded. I think he's really pissed.

Sammi Shurtz

We celebrated Samantha's 5th Birthday on Monday. She chose to have her party at Jungle Jim's Playland.

Bean wanted to ride the bumper cars, but was too small to go alone...

So I took one for the team. I drove with one hand and pushed the floor petal with the other. That steering wheel is murder on the old package...

I finally figured out that Bean could ride with Samantha. Here Bean, like most Utah drivers, uses the one fingered salute to express how she feels about the kid who just rammed them.

Samantha is a pretty good driver and could avoid getting hit by any other driver. But she never passed the opportunity to T-Bone her brother.

Whitney was gracious enough to act as Maddi's escort on the rides.

Bean also wanted to go on the 'spinning' ride with Patrick and Samanth...

...and quickly decided that it was a bad idea. Then she thought that if she went by herself that she would like it better, since she wouldn't be smooshed. She was wrong.

Patrick earned enough tickets from the games to buy a pair of Chinese fingercuffs. He's been stuck in them for 4 days now. It's been great.

Out with the Old...

Six years ago we bought several goldfish for the tank we kept in the office. All but one died, and that one little goldfish survived a solitary existence in the cold dark office for a long time unharmed. Last week Kate took Patrick and Samantha to buy a couple of fish to add to the tank. P wanted the tank in his room, so we moved it up. Within 24 hours of moving from the basement, Goldie was dead, along with Patrick and Samantha's new fish, having been overfed by an unnamed Shirley child. Sometimes when you're forgotten in the basement, it is best to be left there. Ask Omnibot...

But we did replace the new fish that had been killed, and on Sunday we added a hamster when Grandpa Stretch brought over his birthday present for Whitney. She has determined to name the hamster 'Blackie' because of the color of his fur. I am struggling to get her to understand that she needs to pick a different name...

Halloweenies

The big scary holiday went off without a hitch. Annie, Sandy, Cinderella and Batman hauled in a ton of candy for me to take to work. It should be noted that Bean dressed as Sandy only because her first costume (A High School Musical Cheerleader, of course) got barfed on.

In case you're wondering, the answer is yes, we do let the kids cut their own jack-o-lantern faces...

...and if you're wondering how I get such perfect round circles cut in the faces, it is a 1 1/2 inch drill bit...

Kate still wasn't feeling well, so she took the easy road to carving pumpkins and just backed over it with the Durango.

The End of a Streak

Last year Patrick finished his first year of school with a perfect record of attendance. But today the streak ended. The poor little guy slept in the hallway last night so that he could be closer to the toilet. Often when everyone else gets sick, Patrick doesn't. He rarely gets ill. But he has slept all day, so we know he is in pretty rough shape. But the school Halloween party is tomorrow (since the kids don't have class on Friday) so you know that P-Man will sack up and go to school come hell or high water tomorrow. A little Zofran and Immodium and he'll be fine...

Doesn't Make Scents

While exploring the streets of Madison, Wisconsin this week I ran across the following sign in the window of a sub shop:

How wonderful is that? How often have you found yourself walking down the street thinking 'I sure could go for a good smell right now' only to dig into your pocket to find that you have no money. I always say that the only thing better than a smell is a free smell. There may be no such thing as a free lunch, but now we know that there is such a thing as a free smell. And to top it all off, not only do they offer free smells, they throw in extremely fast delivery. Because who wants to wait for their smells? The question begs: What does it 'smell' like? Teen Spirit? I realize that a free smell is free, and it's better than no smell at all. I wanted to step inside and get my free smell, but I just couldn't do it. I was already too full. I had been smelling the scent of dairy that permeates all of Wisconsin all week long, and just couldn't take one more smell. Maybe next time.

Voyager

My training session is being held on the Epic campus, which is larger than some colleges. We are in a building called Voyager Hall. Epic has worked hard to make their campus a lot of fun. They have a tree house that is larger than my home. Each auditorium has its own theme. I am in the ‘Greatest Show on Earth’ wing, in the ‘Acrobats’ room. Other rooms have themes such as ‘Indiana Jones’, ‘Middle Earth’, ‘James Bond’, ‘Shakespeare’ and ‘Superheroes’. During break time we explored some of the other rooms.

'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players...'

Hanging out with Jake and Elwood. Note my Levis. Like I said, they promote a laid back work environment.

After we took this picture I realized that Tasha and I picked the wrong 'horses'. Can you tell why?

Please take your hand off of my sword!

I took this picture for my mother. She loves clowns...

When I first walked around the corner and saw this little girl I was startled. We named her Madison Verona. She's very lifelike. And quite creepy.

What is she looking at?

She's staring into space: The final frontier...