A new house

May 27, 2010, 9:08AM

Buying an old dilapidated outdated house is a lot of work. I know i'll love it in the end though, because everyone I meet that has remodeled a house seems very excited for me. At this point I want to get the living room back together so I have somewhere to sit in my time off (the few hours I get).

I found a great way to anger Jeni. Just have her hang some drywall on the ceiling and poof - ANGER!

The best part is the studio. The one major rule to our new house was, it had to have space for me to explode sticky pigmentation all over everything I see.

The Family Photo Shoot

December 22, 2009, 12:00AM

What a nightmare to get the family together in one room.

I think every western family has at one point or another said "We should remember what Christmas is truely about' and shortly after buys gifts for everyone. This year I realised I had an opportunity, due to the recession, to keep the family gift giving to a minimum and celebrate the true meaning of Christmas. We made agreements with some of the family to find non-monetary ways of giving gifts and spending time together.

In response Jeni and I arranged a bizaar photo shoot for the family (sorry Michelle, you live in Cali). To prepare, a month and a half ago, two weeks ago, a week ago and last weekend we discussed our plans with a photographer. An hour before the shoot, the photography called to cancel and accuse us of not giving adiquate notice. He was a bit of a butt head on the phone.

So the day of the shoot people started to show up, and no camera was available. Previously I bought Jeni a camera for Christmas which was currently wrapped up and sitting under the tree. No camera and a full Shirley family appearance meant that by default she had to open her gift early.

We set our sites on doing a chef theme with hats, approns, utinciles, frosting, flour, silly string and cake. After smearing chocolate frosting and flour all over ourselves we assembled in the kitchen. The message didn't get to Patrick to wear something that can get dirty and I accidentally ruined his brand new white dress shirt.

Eventually a food fight erupted, as diabolically hoped for, and the kitched got a brand new coat of chocolate cake. Amber received the worst of it. The photos look great. Now I just need to print and frame. Ta da, family gifts.

Thank you to everyone that showed up. I'm glad you could give up a few hours of your week to be with the family.

New Scoot

November 25, 2009, 12:00AM

We bought our third Stella scooter. After getting run over, All State insurance was polite enough to follow Utah law and give us just enough money to shut up. With All State's check and some of our own money we were able to replace the previous brand new scoot with another brand new scooter.

Fortunately, because of the recession, scooters are selling for really cheep.

Good News Bad News

October 4, 2009, 12:00AM

The Good News

Last night we went to see Inglorious Basterds. We had the large plate of Nachos. Delicious, entertaining.

The Bad News

On the way home, another car accidentally turned into our lane, head on in front of us. I slammed on the brakes (of our 2008 Stella Scooter) but not soon enough. We hit the car front to front and I got the opportunity to fully learn the expression 'flew over the hood of the car.' Jeni didn't get the full experience. She only landed on top of the hood, and missed the 'on the hood, off the hood, onto the pavement' experience. She does not feel left out though.

Immediately after impact my knee was in incredible pain, 'incredible' being the operative word. Suddenly those days as a kid falling off a bike and scraping my knee seemed so trivial. Shortly after the human emotion of 'shock' came to visit and the knee momentarily calmed down. Why does shock make you shiver? It's not even cold!

After getting up I examined the scooter and discovered why my knee hurt so bad. Originally I assumed I rammed my knee into the hood of the Trail Blazer. Assumptions can be incorrect. What actually happened was my knee managed to completely fold the glove box in on itself. The front fender looks like a crumpled up wad of aluminum foil. The front wind shield is bent out of shape. The Trail Blazer has a scratch.

Kind of ironic that I have a grudge with SUV's and this one tried to run me down. Assassination? Probably not. It was an accident and I know the other driver didn't mean to kill our beloved scooter which we named 'Bond.' It wasn't named after the secret agent. It was paid for by a bond that we cashed in.

To sum it up, Jeni is fine and I'll be hobbling on a bruised knee for a bit. Don't worry about us. Hopefully I'll get a really exciting and colorful bruise that I post pictures of. What is the fun of barely escaping death if you don't have a few cuts and scrapes to show for it?