First of all, I want to make it very clear that I DO NOT WATCH THIS SHOW!!! Why don’t I watch it? Hopefully that will all be made clear after reading this.
Second, why am I blogging about it if I don’t watch it? That’s a great question. For some unknown reason my otherwise completely sane, normal, beautiful, intelligent wife made me watch the finale last night. Literally, she had me bound and gagged with toothpicks keeping my eyes open, sitting in front of the TV watching. I had no choice in the matter.
After watching perhaps 30 minutes of the show I predicted the rest of the entire nights events. That’s why I don’t watch the show. It’s always the same and it’s always very, very lame. Also, I think the entire premise of the show is flawed from the very beginning. I absolutely do not believe that the proper way to go about finding someone with which to spend the rest of your life is to make out with as many strangers as possible. It just doesn’t work like that. I also believe that if a person is truly honest with themselves, deep down they will know that you can’t love two different people as much as they (the contestants) always say they do at the same time. Over the course of a lifetime you may in fact love several different people with the same intensity and passion as to want to spend the rest of your life with them. But to do so at the same time is impossible. You will always prefer one person over the other. That’s why I think this shows a complete crock of crap.
Anyway, back to last night. Let me first explain my background knowledge on this season, what little there is, before seeing last night’s episode. And let me also explain that the only reason I know any of this is because that idiot is from Seattle so he’s been all over the news everywhere up here, such that I couldn’t escape him no matter where I went. Prior to last night I knew that he was down to two girls and I knew that they decided to shoot the “After the Rose” show in private because of the extreme drama and emotions it would be causing. I had also seen the commercial showing his complete meltdown after telling Molly goodbye, although in the commercial it wasn’t divulged yet over whom he was crying.
That’s it. That’s the extent of the knowledge I had about the show. As soon as I saw the dates with Melissa and Molly, I knew exactly what was going to happen. I knew he was going to choose Melissa. I knew that his major breakdown from the commercial would be when he told Molly that he hadn’t chosen her. I knew things wouldn’t work out with Melissa. And I knew that the “After the Rose” segment would be devoted to the breakup with Melissa and the subsequent attempt to mend things with Molly. It was all so obvious and thus all the more painful to actually sit through and watch. Not emotionally painful, but physically painful, as in torturous.
Here’s the politically incorrect portion of my ranting. Right about now you’re asking yourself, how did I know all this? Well, I have seen one prior season of the show, and, as a reality show fan, I’ve seen plenty of other reality dating shows, and they all end the same way. They always, ALWAYS choose the “hot” girl and never the “beautiful” girl. It doesn’t take long, a couple of weeks in this case, to realize that you don’t really want to marry the “hot” girl. You might think you want to, but you don’t. You just want to fool around with her for a while, show her off to your friends, and perhaps even your family a time or two. But that soon wanes, and you quickly realize that you actually want to marry the “beautiful” girl. And deep down, this is something you’ve always known, you just weren’t honest enough to admit it (e.g. compare his reaction to letting Molly go where he was doubled over in pain, tears, and sorrow to his reaction when he dumped Melissa where it seemed like he couldn’t have cared less). Time will tell if Molly really is a “beautiful” girl, because, as I also contend, anyone who would go on a show like that isn’t really looking to get married and settle down for life, but rather some face time on camera, but in this scenario where each has to play one of the roles, Molly was definitely the “beautiful” girl and thus the better choice. It was all so very, very predictable.
For what it’s worth, I think Molly should’ve kicked him to the curb too, after what he did to her! Not that they’re showing their real feelings anyway, after all, it’s just a show right?
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Monday, March 2, 2009
Is That a Banana in Your Pocket?
We were out and about this weekend running some errands. Austin had informed me that McDonald’s now had Spiderman toys and that he definitely needed to go there and get one. So we made a deal. If he was good during all of Mom and Dad’s errands, we would stop for lunch at McDonald’s and he could get a Spiderman toy.
As it turned out, the errands didn’t take quite as long as expected so we had some time to kill. So off to DI we went (that’s Deseret Industries for those who don’t know, and it’s roughly equivalent to Goodwill, only this one’s run by Mormons). At any rate, there’s a DI in Federal Way that’s only about 15 minutes from our house, and we sometimes go there to kill some time. Our trips there usually end up with a new board game coming home with us. They cost at most $2, and we’ve come home from DI with some of our most often played and entertaining games. Austin gets to pick the game, and I enjoy picking through the book section where paperbacks are $0.50 and hardbacks are $3-$4.
This particular trip we ended up with an armload of books and the game Jumpin’ Monkeys (for a total cost of $13 – YEAH!). Austin couldn’t wait to get home and play it, after McDonald’s of course. Upon arriving home we put the game together. It’s a simple 4 piece tree with holes for the monkey’s to swing on. You simply place a monkey on your launcher and flip them up onto the tree, hoping one of their arms will catch in one of the holes. 4 players, 4 monkeys each, the first to get all their monkeys on the tree wins. This is the part of the game Austin loves. I found this picture of the game online which shows perfectly how it works:
“Mom, look. Is that a banana in my pocket?” he exclaimed. Sure enough, it was. A whole bunch of them!
As it turned out, the errands didn’t take quite as long as expected so we had some time to kill. So off to DI we went (that’s Deseret Industries for those who don’t know, and it’s roughly equivalent to Goodwill, only this one’s run by Mormons). At any rate, there’s a DI in Federal Way that’s only about 15 minutes from our house, and we sometimes go there to kill some time. Our trips there usually end up with a new board game coming home with us. They cost at most $2, and we’ve come home from DI with some of our most often played and entertaining games. Austin gets to pick the game, and I enjoy picking through the book section where paperbacks are $0.50 and hardbacks are $3-$4.
This particular trip we ended up with an armload of books and the game Jumpin’ Monkeys (for a total cost of $13 – YEAH!). Austin couldn’t wait to get home and play it, after McDonald’s of course. Upon arriving home we put the game together. It’s a simple 4 piece tree with holes for the monkey’s to swing on. You simply place a monkey on your launcher and flip them up onto the tree, hoping one of their arms will catch in one of the holes. 4 players, 4 monkeys each, the first to get all their monkeys on the tree wins. This is the part of the game Austin loves. I found this picture of the game online which shows perfectly how it works:
The part that Luke loves is the bananas. Aside from flipping the monkeys onto the tree, every time you successfully land one, you get a cardboard banana. Thus, whoever lands all their monkeys in the tree and collects all their bananas wins the game. Luke could care less about the monkeys, but loves playing with the bananas. And this weekend he was wearing a little hoodie that has a pouch in the front. He loves to put things in his pouch and then show off what he has. He soon had all the bananas in his pouch and went running into the kitchen to show Angie.
“Mom, look. Is that a banana in my pocket?” he exclaimed. Sure enough, it was. A whole bunch of them!
Friday, February 20, 2009
Skate Connection
The last time I went roller-skating was the best day of my life. I didn’t know it then. I didn’t even know it shortly thereafter. In fact, one could argue that to this day I still do not yet fully appreciate that day. What day was it? I have no idea! Boys don’t remember silly little things like that. What I can tell you is that it was 2001…I think. Okay, what I can definitely tell you is that it was late October. That much I know for sure. Because the last time I went roller-skating was on a blind date. Yeah, that’s right, I said it. It was a blind date. And the theme of that blind date was Halloween which inherently tells me it must have been late October…I think. At any rate I was set up by a girl in my FHE group in my singles ward in Provo, UT whilst I was attending BYU. That’s Family Home Evening for all you who don’t speak “Mormon-ese”. There was a group of at least 10, and we all met at this girl’s house. That’s the day I met this nice young lady named Angie. She was taken with me right away, I could tell. I must admit though, I did have an unfair advantage, but that’s another story entirely. Hint – it had something to do with a retro 70’s shirt I had procured from a friend for the evening (cut me some slack it was Disco Night at the rink…but then, isn’t every night Disco Night at the roller-rink?). At any rate, I’ll leave that story for Angie to tell, but don’t let her fool you, she was hooked from day one.
Let’s bring this full circle now. It’s been just over 7 years since that first night. We’ve since been through 2 graduations, 2 job promotions, 1 job retirement, 5 moves (1 really big one), 3 apartments, 1 condo, 1 home, 2 kids thrown in there somewhere…oh and there was a wedding in there somewhere too. And finally, last night we got back to where it all began, at the roller-rink.
It was a Ward Activity so that was fun, and by fun I mean free. And it was obviously the first skating experience for both Austin and Luke. Well, not so much Luke, but we’ll get to that. We had our neighbor kid, Peter, with us as well. Here’s Austin and Peter with their skates on:
After they walked me around a little bit…
I was ready to be on my own, thus freeing them up to go have fun. I was really surprised how quickly both of them caught on. Much quicker than me, I can tell you that much.
Here’s another one of Austin’s friends. His name is Jared:
And finally, here’s what Luke did all night:
Notice that he has no skates on. He wanted absolutely nothing to do with the skates. The closest we ever got was getting him to take his shoes off (notice no shoes either). Now, herein lies the problem. Having no skates on actually made him the fastest one in the entire building. No one could catch him because we were all in skates. And once he realized this, he had a fantastic time running all over the building, from the video games, to the middle of the rink, and back again. His favorite thing to do was run the length of the rink (right down the middle that is) with his head flopped back, looking up into all the flashing lights, and cutting off countless skaters as they tried not to plow over him. Luckily everyone there was in our ward so no one really cared.
So there you have it. That was our first family roller-skating adventure. Who knew so many years ago that one little blind date would result in all the fun we’ve had. Happy 7th Rink Anniversary Angie! Now go blog about that awesome shirt I was wearing. Everyone’s dying to hear the story now. Don’t forget the part where you totally fell for it!
Let’s bring this full circle now. It’s been just over 7 years since that first night. We’ve since been through 2 graduations, 2 job promotions, 1 job retirement, 5 moves (1 really big one), 3 apartments, 1 condo, 1 home, 2 kids thrown in there somewhere…oh and there was a wedding in there somewhere too. And finally, last night we got back to where it all began, at the roller-rink.
It was a Ward Activity so that was fun, and by fun I mean free. And it was obviously the first skating experience for both Austin and Luke. Well, not so much Luke, but we’ll get to that. We had our neighbor kid, Peter, with us as well. Here’s Austin and Peter with their skates on:
After they walked me around a little bit…
I was ready to be on my own, thus freeing them up to go have fun. I was really surprised how quickly both of them caught on. Much quicker than me, I can tell you that much.
Here’s another one of Austin’s friends. His name is Jared:
And finally, here’s what Luke did all night:
Notice that he has no skates on. He wanted absolutely nothing to do with the skates. The closest we ever got was getting him to take his shoes off (notice no shoes either). Now, herein lies the problem. Having no skates on actually made him the fastest one in the entire building. No one could catch him because we were all in skates. And once he realized this, he had a fantastic time running all over the building, from the video games, to the middle of the rink, and back again. His favorite thing to do was run the length of the rink (right down the middle that is) with his head flopped back, looking up into all the flashing lights, and cutting off countless skaters as they tried not to plow over him. Luckily everyone there was in our ward so no one really cared.
So there you have it. That was our first family roller-skating adventure. Who knew so many years ago that one little blind date would result in all the fun we’ve had. Happy 7th Rink Anniversary Angie! Now go blog about that awesome shirt I was wearing. Everyone’s dying to hear the story now. Don’t forget the part where you totally fell for it!
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Anyone Have a Spare Ark?
You ever get to the point where you have so many emails in your inbox that you just delete them all and resolve to do better? Is that called email critical mass? Well, as you all know, I have a bad case of blog critical mass. It’s just too much to try to really go back and catch up on. So you all get the following update on the past 2 months of our lives:
Austin turned 4 – Happy Birthday!
Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!
Luke turned 2 – Happy Birthday!
Merry Christmas Everyone!
Happy New Year Everyone!
Happy Birthday Myr!
Happy Birthday to Me!
See, you didn’t miss much. And now we’re back to today, or rather last night, which prompted the post today. Seriously, does anyone out there have an extra Ark your not using? We could use one in our house.
By my calculations we pumped out 1,260 gallons of water from our basement last night between the hours of 5 PM and 3 AM. And, as you all know, when I say “we” I really mean Angie. She’s amazing. I had a late night at work last night and didn’t get home until 10 PM. By then she had been sucking up water for 5 hours while watching the boys and cooking dinner for them, only taking a break to call a friend to see if we could borrow their shop-vac to use in conjuction with ours. Again, have I told you she’s amazing?
We had our 14 gallon shop-vac and our friends 20 gallon shop-vac running constantly from 7 PM to about 1:30 AM. That’s when it stopped raining (FINALLY) and we were able to keep up with just the one shop-vac running. From 5 PM to 1:30 AM each shop-vac took 5 minutes to fill up and it took us about 1 minute to empty it outside down our driveway. Thus, we were making 10 trips an hour with both shop-vacs and still just maintaining with the incoming water. We knew immediately when it stopped raining because we didn’t get wet when we went outside (ha ha – that was a joke if you didn’t catch it). But honestly, we could tell when it stopped raining because we finally started making progress on the water. Over the next hour and a half the seepage slowed dramatically, until finally the last bucket took 25 minutes to fill and after another 20 minutes there was no visible puddle of water under our stairs. So at 3 AM we finally called it quits and went to bed.
Cross your fingers, knock on wood, say Hail Mary’s, whatever it is you do, we need no rain for a while. We have 2 spots along the edge where the basement floor meets the wall in the unfinished portion of our basement that allow seepage to come up. The one in the back of the house isn’t too bad, a slow trickle that if left unchecked will produce a decent sized puddle overnight. The one in the front of the house, just under our stairs at the front door, is like a lake. When we’d shut off the shop-vacs to empty them, you could sit there and literally watch the water level rise in seconds. It seeps in along an 8 foot section of wall right in that area. There’s not just one noticeable spot that clearly lets the water in, it just kind of oozes inside all along that section.
So there you have it. By the way, the boys were awake that entire time. With two shop-vacs running there was no way they were going to sleep. They were wide awake eating ice cream at 2 AM watching Kung Fu Panda and loving it. Of course they had to sit in the bean bag directly in front of the TV with the volume cranked way up to even hear the movie.
Now, about that Ark. Anyone?
Austin turned 4 – Happy Birthday!
Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!
Luke turned 2 – Happy Birthday!
Merry Christmas Everyone!
Happy New Year Everyone!
Happy Birthday Myr!
Happy Birthday to Me!
See, you didn’t miss much. And now we’re back to today, or rather last night, which prompted the post today. Seriously, does anyone out there have an extra Ark your not using? We could use one in our house.
By my calculations we pumped out 1,260 gallons of water from our basement last night between the hours of 5 PM and 3 AM. And, as you all know, when I say “we” I really mean Angie. She’s amazing. I had a late night at work last night and didn’t get home until 10 PM. By then she had been sucking up water for 5 hours while watching the boys and cooking dinner for them, only taking a break to call a friend to see if we could borrow their shop-vac to use in conjuction with ours. Again, have I told you she’s amazing?
We had our 14 gallon shop-vac and our friends 20 gallon shop-vac running constantly from 7 PM to about 1:30 AM. That’s when it stopped raining (FINALLY) and we were able to keep up with just the one shop-vac running. From 5 PM to 1:30 AM each shop-vac took 5 minutes to fill up and it took us about 1 minute to empty it outside down our driveway. Thus, we were making 10 trips an hour with both shop-vacs and still just maintaining with the incoming water. We knew immediately when it stopped raining because we didn’t get wet when we went outside (ha ha – that was a joke if you didn’t catch it). But honestly, we could tell when it stopped raining because we finally started making progress on the water. Over the next hour and a half the seepage slowed dramatically, until finally the last bucket took 25 minutes to fill and after another 20 minutes there was no visible puddle of water under our stairs. So at 3 AM we finally called it quits and went to bed.
Cross your fingers, knock on wood, say Hail Mary’s, whatever it is you do, we need no rain for a while. We have 2 spots along the edge where the basement floor meets the wall in the unfinished portion of our basement that allow seepage to come up. The one in the back of the house isn’t too bad, a slow trickle that if left unchecked will produce a decent sized puddle overnight. The one in the front of the house, just under our stairs at the front door, is like a lake. When we’d shut off the shop-vacs to empty them, you could sit there and literally watch the water level rise in seconds. It seeps in along an 8 foot section of wall right in that area. There’s not just one noticeable spot that clearly lets the water in, it just kind of oozes inside all along that section.
So there you have it. By the way, the boys were awake that entire time. With two shop-vacs running there was no way they were going to sleep. They were wide awake eating ice cream at 2 AM watching Kung Fu Panda and loving it. Of course they had to sit in the bean bag directly in front of the TV with the volume cranked way up to even hear the movie.
Now, about that Ark. Anyone?
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Health and Wellness…and Emergency Response Fair?
Today my company hosted a Health and Wellness Fair. They brought in a dozen or so vendors relating to, what else, health and wellness, all offering free testing, special offers, etc. One of the offers was for free flu shots. I thought, heck, why not go get a free shot. I’m fairly certain I’ve never had a flu shot before and the price is never going to be better, right? So I went over with a co-worker and we both got shots. Since this was my first shot I was asked to remain in the area for at least 10 minutes and check back in with the nurse before leaving. No problem.
Shots don’t bother me, and the same held true for this occasion as well. I got my shot, and since I had to hang around for a while I talked to some of the vendors. I got a complimentary toothbrush, dental floss, 5 minute massage, even a bone density scan (ha ha for those of you who know what my current favorite commercial is right now – my bone density is fine by the way). I checked back in with the nurse, she signed me out, and I was good to go.
I made the short walk back to my building and was joined in the elevator by 2 other co-workers and a couple of other gentlemen. One co-worker was directly in front of me, the other on the other side of the elevator with the other guys between. We made a couple of stops and all that remained were myself, 2 co-workers, and another gentleman, each in our respective corners of the elevator. All of a sudden my co-worker who was directly in front of me face planted against the front of the elevator. No one did anything. Perhaps he just lost his balance right? No need to embarrass the guy, just let him collect himself and be on with it. He remained upright, adjusted his glasses, but I noticed he had a death grip on the hand-rail. All of a sudden, he face plants again. At that point I step up behind him and ask if he’s alright. He mumbles something about getting a flu shot and collapses against me. For a brief moment I was supporting most of his weight, and then my other co-worker jumps in and takes one side of the now passed out guy. Meanwhile the elevator stops on the 17th floor and opens up. The 4th guy props the door open while we attempt to carry him out of the elevator. We don’t make it far at first, we seem to be stuck on something. I realize at that point that he still has a death grip on the hand rail. So while the two of us are supporting him I simultaneously am attempting to pry his hand off of the hand rail. Finally his hand is free and we drag him out of the elevator and sit him down on the floor against the far wall. He’s still completely out at this point. We ask some passersby to call 911 at which point the guy wakes up. He’s really out of it, but says he’ll be alright, just needs to remain sitting for a while. No one had left to call 911 yet, so we changed it to have someone call security. No one knows how to do that so the 4th guy goes back down to the lobby to get building security. Meanwhile someone has brought water which really helped bring the guy around. He was really pale and sweating heavily, but was a lot more alert. He maintained that he would be alright, but we all continued to stay there while he rested and sipped on water. Security showed up and cancelled any and all calls for 911 after verifying everyone was alright. A few minutes later I accompanied the guy back to his cubicle on the 18th floor and made sure his cube-mates knew what happened so they could keep an eye on him. We encouraged him to go home if he continued feeling ill effects. Nothing’s so important here that can’t wait for his return tomorrow. He said that he’s passed out a couple of times from shots before and that he’ll be fine with some rest. He said he felt fine after he got the shot and as he walked back to our building, but the elevator motion just got to him.
So there you have it. That’s what my last couple of hours has been like. My arm is a little tender. Go figure.
Shots don’t bother me, and the same held true for this occasion as well. I got my shot, and since I had to hang around for a while I talked to some of the vendors. I got a complimentary toothbrush, dental floss, 5 minute massage, even a bone density scan (ha ha for those of you who know what my current favorite commercial is right now – my bone density is fine by the way). I checked back in with the nurse, she signed me out, and I was good to go.
I made the short walk back to my building and was joined in the elevator by 2 other co-workers and a couple of other gentlemen. One co-worker was directly in front of me, the other on the other side of the elevator with the other guys between. We made a couple of stops and all that remained were myself, 2 co-workers, and another gentleman, each in our respective corners of the elevator. All of a sudden my co-worker who was directly in front of me face planted against the front of the elevator. No one did anything. Perhaps he just lost his balance right? No need to embarrass the guy, just let him collect himself and be on with it. He remained upright, adjusted his glasses, but I noticed he had a death grip on the hand-rail. All of a sudden, he face plants again. At that point I step up behind him and ask if he’s alright. He mumbles something about getting a flu shot and collapses against me. For a brief moment I was supporting most of his weight, and then my other co-worker jumps in and takes one side of the now passed out guy. Meanwhile the elevator stops on the 17th floor and opens up. The 4th guy props the door open while we attempt to carry him out of the elevator. We don’t make it far at first, we seem to be stuck on something. I realize at that point that he still has a death grip on the hand rail. So while the two of us are supporting him I simultaneously am attempting to pry his hand off of the hand rail. Finally his hand is free and we drag him out of the elevator and sit him down on the floor against the far wall. He’s still completely out at this point. We ask some passersby to call 911 at which point the guy wakes up. He’s really out of it, but says he’ll be alright, just needs to remain sitting for a while. No one had left to call 911 yet, so we changed it to have someone call security. No one knows how to do that so the 4th guy goes back down to the lobby to get building security. Meanwhile someone has brought water which really helped bring the guy around. He was really pale and sweating heavily, but was a lot more alert. He maintained that he would be alright, but we all continued to stay there while he rested and sipped on water. Security showed up and cancelled any and all calls for 911 after verifying everyone was alright. A few minutes later I accompanied the guy back to his cubicle on the 18th floor and made sure his cube-mates knew what happened so they could keep an eye on him. We encouraged him to go home if he continued feeling ill effects. Nothing’s so important here that can’t wait for his return tomorrow. He said that he’s passed out a couple of times from shots before and that he’ll be fine with some rest. He said he felt fine after he got the shot and as he walked back to our building, but the elevator motion just got to him.
So there you have it. That’s what my last couple of hours has been like. My arm is a little tender. Go figure.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Welcome Eva
We have a new niece! YEAH!!!!!
Her name is Eva Elizabeth Dobesh.
Birth Date: November 13, 2008 at 8:08 AM
Weight: 6 lbs.
Length: 19 inches
Eva comes to us via Angie's sister Lisa and proud papa Jeff.
Her name is Eva Elizabeth Dobesh.
Birth Date: November 13, 2008 at 8:08 AM
Weight: 6 lbs.
Length: 19 inches
Eva comes to us via Angie's sister Lisa and proud papa Jeff.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Superheroes!
We have some more pics on the camera of Halloween, but we’ve not downloaded those ones yet. So you’re stuck with this one, taken at the Trunk-or-Treat. Austin wanted to be Batman which worked out nicely because we already had the costume. Angie put together a Robin costume for Luke. There were some more details on the front of his shirt, but by this time they’d all fallen off. Still, didn’t she do a fantastic job? The part of Spiderman was played by our neighbor Peter.
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