OMG, Not Another Wedding!!

This new wedding thing kind of snuck up on me.  I knew that Sherry was planning to let a couple of her friends get married in her back yard.  They were a bit low on funds and couldn't afford much else.  That was comepletely off my radar because it was at Sherry's.  I must be a bit slow because I didn't realize the full implications of the following conversation till I had already agreed to it.  Becky mentioned that maybe we should offer to let the couple get married at our house instead because "everything is already set up at our house from the party last week."  Hmmm,  how is it then that Becky and Sherry have been shopping ever since and dragging boxes of decorations from Sherry's garage back to our house.  I was hoping that the boxes of decorations from Chrissy's wedding would stay forgotten in Sherry's garage.

They're putting together lists (of what! I thought everything was ready!) and discussing whether we have enough chairs.  How many chairs can you need?  Well it turns out that the guest list has grown past twenty.  Good grief!

Oh well, what the hell.  I took a little hike today. The weather is nice and cool.  We've finally turned off the AC.  The picture was taken looking east up the Salt River Canyon.  The first of the lakes is not very far into the canyon.  In the summer the river would be full of kids floating on inner tubes.  There's a bus service that picks them up and drops them off along the river. It's pretty popular with ASU students.  They tie their tubes together into rafts, tie on coolers and boom boxes then spend the day floating down the river.

The local businesses do pretty well selling tubes, beach balls, coolers, beer, rope, sunscreen and hats.

Adios

Halloween & Becky B-Day

I've been so busy with work that I haven't had much time to write.  We're into the normal end of year rush.  Everyone that had been ignoring their project for the last 6 months is now wanting to finish before the end of the year.  


We had a birthday party for Becky Friday night.  Several of her friends from work pitched in with food and we had a great time.  There was lots of good Mexican food and plenty of beer, wine and margaritas.  I sampled all of it and was feeling pretty cocky by the end of the evening.


Halloween passed a few weeks ago.  The kids were wearing costumes for several days.  Cheyanne dressed as an angel, Kikki as a pizza cook and Bubby as Darth Vader.  Becky, Sherry and the kids went to a friend of Sherry's neighborhood to beg candy.  I stayed here to pass out candy in our neighborhood.  I might as well of gone with them.   It was pretty quiet around here.

Darth Vader cutting the grass with the new push mower.  The kids think that their cheapskate Grandpa buys some pretty nifty stuff.

Becky and Sherry are shopping this afternoon and I'm killing time around the house.  I put new inner tubes in a small bike that we bought Bubby at the thrift store. The garage looks like a used bicycle shop.  There are three bikes and a tricycle in there now.  I need to thin them out some.


I'm feeling lazy now and I'll probably sit around and read after I post this.


Adios

Tight Fit

Oh, there's plenty of room.   I'm sure the dog will move over.

Yardwork

We've finally had a cool weekend (less than 100) and we went to work on the backyard. I'd pretty much let it go all summer. The first step had to be a load of junk to the dump (landfill is the politically correct term for a hole in the ground filled with trash). I love the dump. I feel like I'm directly contributing something to a future archeology dig. Someday a grad student will be carefully digging out a bunch of metal struts that appear to be related but have been rather crudely cut apart. They may eventually figure out that one of their primitive smaller brained cousins had lost patience with trying to fold it up and had instead used a power saw to dismantle it.

The other nice thing about the dump is being able to get up close to heavy machinery. There's dump trucks, end loaders, massive bulldozers and even giant mulching machines. All of these things are working within the same small area where you are trying to throw away a $2.50 load of trash. They've opened a new pit at the Salt River Pima Dump. Now instead of driving up a hill, you drive down into a 100 foot pit lined with heavy duty rubber. If someone opened a bar with an observation deck overlooking the dump they'd make a fortune. This would be way better than sitting inside watching sports on a dozen tv sets.

Oh well, back to yard work. With all of the old junk removed we could get around and trim up plants and replace old yard lights. The lights ere powered by a transformer and were on a timer that was always out of whack. I'd adjust the timer every once in a while but eventually the GFI would trip or we'd have a power outage and the timer would get out of adjustment. It wasn't surprising to see them come on at 10pm or in the morning. The dogs have dug most of the original yard lights anyway I'm going wireless now. The solar yard lights have gotten pretty cheap and I'm going to start using them.

As you can see from the pictures, there's a lot left to do today. We need to clean up the corner under the neighbors pine tree and finish the lights. We went to Goodwill yesterday afternoon and traded a bag of old clothes, a girls bicycle and $37 dollars for 2 outdoor chairs, 4 folding chairs and 2 books. They probably came out ahead. That reminds me, I still need to unload the chairs.

I got sidetracked a bit yesterday and decided to insulate the hot tub. I bought some fiberglass insulation from Home Depot and stuffed it around the sides. The new controller is still being a little touchy but I think I'm getting it figured out.

We closed out the day at Sherry's. She had a little Halloween party for some friends. Becky and I went over to have a couple of drinks and take her dog (actually Al's dog) back to our house before she sampled the appetizers.

I'd better get to work.

Oh, I forgot to show off my art collection. I don't really need sun screen on these windows anymore. Light can hardly get into the room.

Adios

Sunshine Acres

Becky and I just got back from Sunshine Acres. It's a home for kids in our area. It was founded by a couple who felt called upon to take care of kids. They started out in 1954 with 2 kids and ended up with a facility for over 50. They ran the place themselves for several years without asking for anything from anyone. However, as people visited and heard about it they volunteered and contributed money and services. The actor Ben Johnson lived nearby and asked to visit. He was being shown the kids 4-H animals and asked where the barn was. The said that they didn't have a barn. Mr. Johnson wrote them a check for a barn on the spot. I'm kinda proud of the guy. I've always enjoyed in him in the movies and it's nice to see someone you like live up to their reputation.

The facility has several very nice d0rmitories that are set up like large family homes with lots of bedrooms. There are 2 kids per bedroom and each house has a married couple that act as parents. It's a pretty amazing place. The kids seem happy. I'm a bit envious. They have goats, horses, donkeys and Ben Johnsons's barn. What's not to like. The food is great too.

We got through Crissy's wedding this weekend. It was a busy day. We set up decorations in the morning. Becky took Kikki to get her hair fixed around 1:30 then we went back to finish setting up for the wedding around 3:00. The wedding took place at 4:30 and was presided over by a reportedly tipsy pastor who rode up to the lectern on a Segway unicycle.

The kids had a ball dancing and running around playing. I had a few beers and Becky wandered around making sure that everything was going according to plan. By 10:30 the kids were ready to collapse so Becky and I loaded up the truck with kids and decorations and headed home. Becky's been on the verge of a nervous breakdown worrying about this wedding. Well she's rested for a day or two and now she's planning Halloween decorations at Sherry's house and a party for her friends at work. I've given up trying to figure her out.

Sherry and Becky just snuck out to go to the Dollar Store. They left the kids here to watch me. Chey and Bubby are in the bedroom watching space videos and Kikki is loafing here in the office with me.

Maybe its time to look in on them.

Adios

Visit With Flat Stanley

Tawney asked us to guide her friend "Flat Stanley" around Arizona for a school project. As always, I'm happy to support dimensionally challenged folks like Flat Stanley.

We went for a drive along the Lower Salt River and discussed Arizona. We put together a presentation to send back to Tawney's school with some pictures and facts about Arizona.

The kids and Becky are out of school this week. Becky has been kidnapped by Gina for a couple of days. She and Aubrey picked her up yesterday after telling her to pack a bag, a good book and some walking shoes. She called yesterday afternoon after visiting a local zoo. I still don't know where they're staying. Bubby is keeping me company today. He's in on the kids laptop surfing through Star Wars videos and playing kids video games (Disco Alien Safari).

I turned the AC off last night and have the doors open. It's nice hearing the birds outside. Unfortunately, we have another heat wave coming this weekend.

I was in Ontario CA last week for work. It wasn't my best trip. The waitress at Denny's didn't get the cover on my take-out coffee and I spilled the whole thing down my shirt front. Then the rental car wouldn't start as we were leaving the facility and we had to take a cab to the airport.

I'll be driving to Flagstaff tomorrow morning. I need to remember to take a coat. It's getting down into the 30's up in the mountains.

Adios

It's slowly getting a bit cooler out here. This weekend was really nice. The mornings were in the mid-60's and the afternoon temp was in the low 90's. I guess that might seem pretty warm to the folks in the Midwest but it feels nice here.

It's too bad the golfing side of the family isn't out here. Bubby could use some help. He likes to knock golf balls around but he doesn't get much useful help from me. Since he enjoys the putting green at Bass Pro Shops so much, I bought some old putters and balls from Goodwill and took them camping with us last week. Bubby and the girls enjoyed hitting the balls and trying to get them in cup. Bubby is pretty enthusiastic but not very accurate (sometimes dangerously so).

Becky and I went out to eat with some friends on Friday night and went to a movie afterward. We've just messed around the house most of the weekend. I've worked for a few hours in the morning and Becky''s been doing wash. We went to a local produce store this morning to get some veggies and fruit. The produce store stocks mostly "seconds" but you can get some very good buys on good quality produce. Some of their produce is better than what you find in the chain stores. The chili peppers are usually my favorite. I was lucky enough to find some fresh roasted peppers the other day at a Basha's (I froze them) but I like to have some fresh ones too. I usually grill them and have them as a vegetable with meat. There's not much competition for them. I seem to be the only one in the family that likes them.

I bought a few pounds of Fava beans just to see what they taste like. I was just reading some recipes and it sounds like getting to eat them may involve some work. They have to be shelled from the pods and then it sounds like you have to skin the bean. This sounds like something best done sitting in front of the tv with a beer.

While I'm on the subject of food, I like to go to the food section of the Big Lots store (Odd Lots to you Midwesterners). They carry a lot of discontinued stuff that you can't always find in the chain stores. I've bought discontinued salsa, hot sauce, soups, olives, rice mixes and lot's other good stuff. It seems like the chain stores are getting more and more bland. I maintain that its because of the shopper cards that they scan. I figure that they keep track of what we buy and narrow their stock down to the last common denominator. Before long all you'll find at Frys or Krogers will be coffee, hamburger, white bread, chicken soup and diet soda. Everything else will be considered too exotic to handle.

Adios