Halloween

Today was that fun day called Halloween. A few people at work dressed up and they had a contest for the best costumes. There was nothing out of the ordinary. They also had the annual soup contest for this day. What that means to me is that there are some great soups, chilis, and stews to be had by going downstairs at lunch time. Other than that, work was uneventful.

When I arrived home, my daughter was getting ready to go to a party. She dressed up in a dress that we had that was made for her Shakespearean play last year. My wife spent quite a long time helping her with her hair. She looked good when she left for the party.

As for my wife and I? We just watched TV and answered the door as a few people came around for this evening of fun. There weren't that many people that were out though. We have way too much candy (but we aren't going to complain about it till it goes to our waists). My daughter did come home so she could go out trick or treating with another of her friends, and my son went with them. They had a pretty good time being out there.

One of our neighbors has a very scary house. They put up a fence around a graveyard that they had made. They had many ghosts and ghouls around the gravestones as well. I am told (by the owner of the house) that they had some coffins and a bunch of other decorations that went inside of their house as well. We didn't get over there to look, but it sounds like they had quite a bit of fun.

Some people are going on about how Halloween is not a Christian holiday and we should not celebrate this holiday. I think it is the same as everything else. It all depends what you make of it (or don't). I find it to be a fun holiday where kids can dress up and make believe. It is a time of giving as all these kids come around to your house and you pass out the treats. I don't understand why people make such big deals out of these non-issues.

More Birthday

Work was kind of boring today. It does look like I am going to start working toward throwing away a bunch of work that I have done in the past. There is only one person that wants us to do things in a particular way, and she doesn't care about anything else. We should've been done with the project about 6 months ago, but I am waiting on Doug from Pinnacle to finish his part so I can do mine. As it sits, I will probably start (this week) to accomplish what he should've finished accomplishing 6 months ago. This has just been going on too long. We are hopefully going to get this accomplished by Thanksgiving.

I left work and came on home. We gathered up everybody and went to Chuck-A-Rama for dinner (that's where my son wanted to go for his birthday). Of course we took the cake from last night with us so we could also drop in on my parents for his birthday. We had some good conversation with my parents, ate cake and ice cream and then left for home. Really, there isn't much to say. I don't even know why I chose to write anything here today.

Birthday

Well, another couple of days have gone by. There really isn't too much going on though. The first thing of significance that happened would be starting with Friday evening. After my kids got home from school, we went and picked up my sons good friend, Craig. He was going to be sleeping over that night so we could celebrate my sons birthday on Saturday (even though the actual birth date would be this Monday).

After getting some food into them (we went with Chinese), we invited one of my daughters friends over and then watched Monster House. That was kind of a cute movie. I took the movie back and tried to find Hocus Pocus. It wasn't available (as we suspected it may not be). Instead, I picked up Flowers in the Attic (I enjoyed that move - along with the books - many years ago). The kids did some dance dance revolution for awhile and then ran outside to play some kind of game out there. It was some game that included hiding. When my daughter was hiding on the front porch, I poked my finger through the blinds and starting to do a slow tap, tap, tap... She looked around and tried to figure out what was going on. Not being able too, she ran out and got caught. When she found out it was me that made her get scared, thus making her get caught, she was kind of mad at me (well a mock kind of mad). We finally sent my daughters' friend (Camry) home. We told the boys not to stay up too late and went to bed ourselves.

Saturday morning, we got up and out by 10:00 AM. We all headed out to Boondocks (except for my wife) to play there. I had a three hour pass, and bought the kids all day passes. This went against what my wife and I had discussed (dealing with my free pass) and made it so one or the other of us would have to sit out. She was a bit angry with me for that.

At Boondocks, we started out on the miniature golf course, and then moved on to the Go-carts. We did the Go-carts a couple of times and then went in and played some arcade games. After that, it was Laser Tag. We went back and forth among some of this stuff and had a general good time. I had to quit at 1:00 because my three hours was up. The kids continued to play. We had some pizza, and then some more play. We got home around 3:30. I then ran to pick up some bread bowls I had ordered for my sons birthday party tomorrow.

After a little bit of time at home, we headed out for the Clavinova festival that my kids were both in. We wondered if we would be a little bit late because we realized that the place was kind of far from our home. I was in a little bit of trouble with that as well. We did make it on time, and talked with some of our friends there during the concert. It was a fun concert, and we enjoyed that. We decided that since we were so close to Pam and Annes house that we ought to go over there. They even gave us some dinner (which was quite good - as usual).

Well, today was another day. I got pulled over in priesthood meeting and asked what I thought about my son being the Teachers quorum president. I told them that I thought that was a good idea, and that it would be good for my son, and I think he will shine in the calling. I let my wife in on this too.

Deacons quorum was on testimony. Lance had Brother Russell and Mike stand up and tell of how they got their testimonies. I volunteered mine as well as I thought it had relevance to what was going on there. He ran out of time to do his lesson, so he will be giving it again next week. After talking with Lance and Mike for a bit, I found my wife and we headed home to take care of a few things for the party tonight.

Sacrament meeting was quite good today. It was a farewell as well as one other speaker (she took up almost the whole meeting time). I felt the spirit within me (despite my kids who were misbehaving).

In preparing for people to come over, I got in an argument with my wife. It was terrible. I lost my temper and said some things that I am ashamed of. I lost control. Anyway, I apologized as best I could to my wife as well as my kids (who of course heard me lose it) and hope that I will be forgiven by each of them.

My in-laws came over with Pam, and Anne brought her daughter Kiki (who wants to drive everywhere with that learners permit). They brought a wonderful cake for the party. We had bread bowls with either cheese soup or chili (each persons choice) and chatted around the table. My son, of course, was waiting to receive his gifts.

Finally, we went into the family room and started giving the gifts out. He got an airsoft rifle (along with a gun) from Pam and Anne. Money from his grandparents, and I gave him a cheap plane that I had bought for about eight dollars. He had mentioned that he wanted a remote control plane as one of his gift options. We let him wonder about that for a bit, and then I went and got the keyboard that we had bought him. It was a hit.

There was some general fooling around, and then all of them left. I took the dog for a walk to get out in the air because my asthma was threatening to overtake me. I walked slow because of that, and it seemed to help clear everything out with the cold night air.

Fear Factor

Work was kind of long and drawn out today. I had a few things to do, but not a whole lot. All of my stuff seems to be running pretty good and smoothly. I did have to add some new fields to the datawarehouse, and I even did the programming for those fields. The main problem with this is, I don't even have the data yet to put into those fields, so it is impossible to test. It's a pain waiting on others for things like this.

There was a little bit of snow coming down when I left work today. Nothing to write home about really, but it was there. Soon after arriving home we took our kids to their piano lessons. My wife had to get back in time to get a few things prepared for the combined activity in Young Men/ Young Women. I picked up the kids from their piano and we came home to have some hotdogs. Not much, but at least it was something.

My wife went over to the church early and we received some calls of my kids friends to see if they could get a ride over to the church. I picked them up and headed over. After arriving, I found that my wife had volunteered me to take over one of the booths (I guess that's the price you pay to have both of you in callings dealing with the youth). For this fear factor, there were six different booths set up. One was an obstacle course where you had a group (about six) who would pick a leader who would not be blindfolded to lead you through the course. It was a timed event. As part of the timing each individual had to put on the blindfolds, and then hold his or her hands out to get tied to both sides of him/her (unless you were on one of the two ends). Then, the leader would lead you through the course (which consisted of zigzagging between chairs, and then crawling under tables). At the end, they had to sit on a balloon and pop it. Fairly simple, but the bishop decided to get in the way. He interfered wherever he could (this was not part of the plan).

Another event was eating chocolate pudding mixed with olives (and being the first to complete this without using your hands). The event I was at had people bobbing for water balloons in a bowl of water with your mouth. I found that after each group (usually three people) I had to empty the water and get new water because it was getting disgusting. One group had some jello (green of course) mixed with rice and raisins, and another was some bubble gum that had been flavored with strawberry syrup (to give the gum a wormy look) that you had to eat and blow a bubble with. One of the events had nothing to do with fear, but was putting puzzles together. Each young man or young woman went and did each of the events. 100 grand bars were given out at the end of all of this.

Of course, lastly, they had the leaders do it all. The women were against the men. They told us that it was no fair to interfere with them when they were doing the obstacle course. Of course the bishop and a couple of boys chose too anyway. When the men had to do this, all the girls ended up interfering far worse than any of the guys interfered with the women. The women got through in 1:15, and the men finished in 57 seconds. I was able to get out of the rest because they wanted only four, so I was able to watch. I dare say that the adults were much worse behaved than any of the youth. At the bubble gum table their ended up being a war of worms being thrown about. Well, it was an interesting evening.

After leaving, I had to go back to the church to pick up some socks that my wife had left there. I talked to a couple of people and then left the building. There was a truck out in the parking lot and a girl in the ward kind of talked to the guy saying that she didn't know where the boys had run. I had my suspicions immediately as to who the boys were. I didn't even know their crime yet. I talked to him, and he told me that something had come over the fence and hit his house. I asked if it was waterballoons and was told that he did see a waterballoon on his property. He was really mad. I told him that I was pretty certain as to who the boys were. He told me that if I would take care of it, he would go home and check for cracks in his window. He did not want to know the name of the boys.

The reason I knew who had done it was because they were throwing the waterballoons at each other just before I left, and my son was one of them. My son left (with me) before the attack on this guys home. One of the boys has a personal dislike for this guy. We saw them in the park kind of running, and he had his headlights on the boys before he left. From this distance you could not accurately tell who they were. I went over and talked to them, telling them it wasn't too smart to do what they had done. They were sure it was a harmless prank, and it was, but I asked them what they would think if they were sitting in their home and all of a sudden heard a thunk, thunk, thunk on their home. As is common among boys, they had not thought about that. I told them that it was a dangerous game they were playing and that they should not do that in the future. One of the boys was concerned enough to ask me if I was going to tell his parents. I told them that I wouldn't, and I also did not want them doing anything like that again. Of course, they probably will, as they are young yet.

Customer Service

Today started out like any other work day. I headed into work and took care of some of the normal things that I take care of. I also had started to get to some issues when I got a phone call from my daughters school. It was her PE teacher. My daughter is on the All Star soccer team at school, and according to her teacher was running her little heart out. The problem comes up that there are other players who are also running their little hearts out. My daughter was right up to the ball when it was kicked up at her and hit her in the head. I guess it came pretty hard because it knocked her down. The teacher said that she was pretty certain that my daughter would have a major headache from the trauma. Anyway, they tried to call home but got no answer, so they called me instead so I could find my mom. I laughingly told her that was fine, but I didn't think my mom could or would do too much for this situation. I told them I would either find my wife or come in.

Not able to find my wife, I left work to pick up my daughter. After arriving home with her, I put her in bed and got a warm pack for her (she already had ice and her headaches seem to do better when she is given a little bit of heat). I then went into the den to work (thank goodness we got the computers all set up in there). As it was, I couldn't VPN into work. I had to call the helpdesk. I wish when they change profiles, they would let us know that they had done so. Instead, I wasted 20 minutes trying to figure out what was wrong. One little change and I was able to get in. It was pretty close to lunch time so I got my daughter some lunch and then grabbed some for myself. By the time my wife came home, we decided that it wasn't worth it to drive all the way back to work. Instead, I stayed home and worked from here.

After finishing up with work, my wife told me that I needed to get the wires up onto our roof. We have a particular area that ends up coming down onto our sidewalk and making it extra slick for anybody coming to see us (not that there are that many who come to see us). Not wanting to get sued, we need to get this up to heat up snow and ice and let it go down the proper place. When I bought the wire, I asked the advice of Lowes about how much I needed (explaining my whole situation). They told me to take the number of feet and multiply times three. That made about 60 feet. I got the 60 feet last Saturday. In looking over the instructions 3 times did not make sense to me. When you have a gutter (and I had given this information to them) you need to multiply by four. I called Lowes up and asked if they had an 80 foot one. They went and looked and said that there was an 80 foot one, but they did not carry it. I asked the guy again how much I needed and he gave me the three multiplier. I told him to look on the box, and he said, oh, you're right you need to multiply by four. Anyway, I called Home Depot to see if they had an 80 foot cable or not. They did.

I decided to go to Lowes first so I could get my money back on the one I had, and then was going to go to Home Depot. In the returns line, I was told that since I paid with a check they could not refund my money until 15 days was up (as you can clearly see printed on the back of the receipt), and I could receive a store credit. I asked if there was a way to override this, and was told no. I then asked to speak to a manager. I was told that there would be nothing the manager could do either. I asked again to see the manager, and was told that she would not be able to override this. I said, let me speak to the manager. I was told again there was nothing she could do. Now I was getting angry. LET ME SEE THE MANAGER. The clerk gets on the phone and tries to say quietly, that they have an angry customer that's going a little nuts. I didn't let on that I had heard. The poor manager didn't have too much of a chance with me because I was quite furious. She came and told me that they had tried to override one this morning and were unable to do so. I tell her my whole situation. That is, I need to get this up now and not wait for 15 days (the weather is turning, and I want to get it up before then). I bought this on the advice of your salesman (even though it was bad advice), and you don't carry the 80 foot cable I need. She informs me that it says right on the receipt that you can't get cash back with a check for 15 days. I should've known that from the time I bought it. I ask her when it was that I got that receipt. She says, huh? I asked, did I receive the receipt before or after I paid with a check. Well, it was after. So, how am I to know their policy? Besides, had the guy told me to multiply by 4, I would've gone elsewhere to buy this because you don't sell 80 foot cable. Now I am asked, if I am sure of this. I tell her no, I'm not sure, I only know what your salesman told me, but I have not checked out your inventory. She then informs me that I am therefore not sure. I agree. She calls somebody and asks about it. She is told that there are none of that size that is carried by Lowes. I felt like telling her that she wasn't sure either because she did not check herself. They still don't want to refund the money. I remind again, that it was bought in good faith, and a store credit will do me absolutely no good. Finally, she says condescendingly, Sir, you will get your money but you have to come around here and fill out some papers. I do so. They are complaint papers that she makes me fill out in order to get my money. Anyway, I received the money and said to her to have a good day. She just kind of grunts at me. I have not been that angry for quite awhile. I really must get my temper in check.

I leave and go to Home Depot. Find the product. Purchase it, and then get behind an old man who is chatty. He kept on going on and on with his story while the lady is asking him for his zipcode. He either doesn't hear the question or he ignores it. He continues with his story. After the third time (and yelling it out) he tells her he doesn't know his zipcode. She looks it up by city, and asks which it is. He says yeah, that's it. It's OK. This guy was probably about 75 or 80 years old, and I don't mind this kind of distraction.

After arriving home, I go to put the cable on the roof. That's a whole different story. Putting it on the way they say doesn't seem to go as far as they say it will on the box. I put it on a few times. It looks like I will have to tack it up some other way though, because the clips don't hold on so well. Maybe they would in warmer weather, but I don't have that opportunity. It was getting dark and I just wanted to get in the house.

Oh, my neighbor was walking by trying to get some people to go to a meeting tomorrow night with Kennecott about some Townhouses they are putting in close by me. There was other promises when we bought our home, so some of the neighbors are fighting with them. There was already the city council which didn't go in our favor, so now we are hoping that we can get something from Kennecott. This Daybreak community will suck the life out of you if you let it. It seems that they lied to the city council though. They told them that the townhouses would start in the $300K range. Well, some people in the neighborhood now have proof that they are starting in the $200K range. I don't know that we can do anything about that, but there it is.

Tonight, I wanted to watch a movie and just relax. My wife was trying to sleep, and there was too much noise. I fell asleep on the couch in an almost noiseless house. However, falling asleep made it so there was a lot of noise. Without that CPAP, my snoring is unbearable. I get woke up and told to go to bed proper.

Computer Desk

Nothing much has happened over the weekend. Saturday, we got a call from the Young Men president asking if my son would like to go to the BYU game. He was able to go with the priests and a few teachers. They had a good time. I had to get outside and mow the lawn since it has been two weeks since I last mowed it. While I was finishing that up, we got a phone call from Larry Lowder. He had a computer desk that he wanted to unload. We decided to take it even though he damaged it a little bit getting it taken apart. Thankfully, Larry also came over and helped me put the thing together. This avoided all kinds of cuss words from coming out of my mouth. Before we did that though, I had to take apart the two computer systems I had on my current desk. This is always a pain.

I had to go to Home Depot to get a couple of angle brackets so we could take care of the pieces that were broken. I have it altogether now, and it looks pretty good. My son helped me put the computers back together (he had to take on a bit more because I had another asthma attack). The room was still a mess though.

Today came and went. In the Deacons quorum, the president forgot that he was supposed to give the lesson. Lance talked a bit to us while his son (the president) hurried and looked through the lesson manual so he could give us a lesson. It was on every member a missionary. All in all it came out OK.

Our stake representative wanted to talk to us briefly (brief with this guy is never brief) and talked to us well into Sunday School. My wife poked her head in the door telling me to come into the marriage class. He said we would just be a few minutes. It was definitely more than a few minutes. I got to the last of the Sunday School class, which was maddening to me (and my wife) because I really wanted to be with her in this class. The lesson was on forgiveness.

The sacrament meeting talks were all given by the priests quorum. Of course, their advisor said a few words, and then the bishop said a few words. It's too bad, I was kind of looking forward to getting out early.

Not much was going on at home. We needed to get some things cleaned up from yesterday, so my son moved the TV onto a new table (part of my old computer desk) and we moved the TV stand downstairs (where it will likely collect dust). We got the den together and it is looking better than it has in a long time. Thank goodness that my son is so good about taking care of this kind of thing. Too bad he doesn't keep his room looking so clean. We still need to move the old desk into my sons room where he can put his TV and fish tank on, freeing up two more tables which will more than likely go downstairs (although one of them may go into our room for a nightstand). One of these days, I still need to clean out the third car garage as well as the basement. That will all have to happen some other day. I will definitely need a mask to try and keep the asthma from overtaking me.

Police Again!

Not too much has happened in the last couple of days. Wednesday, we had Young Men/ Young Women. We had to get our kids out of piano lessons about 10 minutes early to get my daughter to a costume party for Halloween there. She went as an M&M and my wife went as an M&M bag. I'm sure glad we didn't return my brothers costumes to him last year when we borrowed them.

My son went to a Doctors office for young men and we did some more on the Physical Fitness merit badge for our boys. It's a drag, but it's one of those things that has to get done.

Anyway, today was another boring day at work. I have one problem to look into tomorrow (and it is a small one) but other than that, it seems that I am just filling in time there (for now). That makes for long days at work.

Tonight, there wasn't too much going on. I told my wife that I was looking at citydeals.com (http://www.citydeals.com/deals/control/main) and had found a couple of hotels that we may be interested in for our anniversary. It is nice because we can get our own discount this way. I had been looking at the Armstrong mansion as a possibility because it looked nice and we could get a decent deal. Well, I went to look at Alaskan Inns as well as Anniversary Inn to see what could be done there. Of course no good deals came to fruition there. Armstong mansion was still my favorite place to try.

Well, we looked some more on city deals, and came up with a place called Johnson Mill. We were able to get coupons worth $100 for $80 (this wasn't as good as the Armstrong Mansion although there was only the possibility of using two coupons there instead of as many as you want). We decided that we want to stay for two nights there. The first night we will be staying in the RiverBottoms room. The second night will be in the Waterfall room. The rooms with taxes will cost us $430, but because we are able to get an $80 discount we will be there for the two nights for $350. That's not too bad of a deal (not great, but not too bad). It was kinda fun looking into this together and seeing what is available. Anyway, it is something for us to look forward too for our anniversary. We have tried to go to a hotel most of the years of our 17 years together.

After all of that, I decided to walk the dog. I was out there walking, and was getting close to home again, when I heard a car behind me. It sounded like it was speeding. I looked back and saw it (as well as heard) start to slow down. I figured they had seen me, and were maybe going to be turning on the street that I was about to cross. While crossing that street, I looked back and saw that they were getting to the side of the road, so I changed my mind and decided they were going to park behind a van that was sitting there. I walked a couple of steps and heard a good solid thunk, as the car hit the van. I went out in the road to take a look, and the car chose to back up. I started to look at the license plate (the lighting was bad). I got the first numbers on it and then the car started forward toward me. I moved to the side of the road and yelled at the guy that I had his license number (I didn't have the full thing yet) and he sped off. I did get the rest of the number as he left.

I ran to the house of the vehicle that got hit and was repeating the number over and over so I wouldn't forget it. I must've looked a bit crazy as I was doing that. I rang the doorbell and a guy yelled out wondering who I was. I told him that his vehicle had been hit and I needed to get the number written down. He hurriedly opened the door and got the information and then we went to look at the vehicle. It was only bumper damage, but that can cost a small fortune. I went home and let him call the police. Heaven knows, I have called them enough times for the small amount of time I have lived in my house. A little later the policeman was at my door to get my statement. I gave it, and hope they catch the guy. Of course, I also hope that I got all the numbers right on that plate. I hate it when people do this kind of thing and would love to see the guy prosecuted.

Anyway, that got my blood pumping, and it is hard for me to calm down enough to sleep. Sooner or later I will have to get to bed.

50th Birthday

Saturday, we woke up and messed around at the hotel (and went to get a Diet Coke) for a little bit and then decided to go to the cabin to see what was going on. We saw Pams car coming down from the cabin, so turned around and went to our hotel room again. They decided to stay there at the hotel for a little bit since everyone at the cabin was still asleep. They just watched some cable TV and my wife and I went to get some breakfast. There is a little restaurant in the convenience store so we thought we would try some breakfast there. We got there right at 11:00. We asked if we could have breakfast and were told yes. When we were getting ready to order, they yelled out "No more breakfasts". We tried to get them to change their minds and they told us no because there is always just one more (we were actually asking for two more). We said fine and started to leave, at which point they decided they could do it. We just waved at them and as we were leaving a guy in there told us that we didn't have time to wait for them to make the breakfast anyway.

We didn't know if we would find breakfast anywhere or not, but headed down to Heber City. We went to Chicks cafe and got our breakfast. The omelet I had wasn't the best (but it was OK) because it was made using some American cheese. I should've gotten the sausage and eggs breakfast that my wife got. Oh well, we got through that.

We then headed back to the Hotel, and then to the cabin. There were some games played, some walks walked, and then we were back at the Hotel to do some more swimming. It's an indoor pool with a little path that goes to the outdoor pool. The outdoor pool is only 2'10" in depth though. The indoor is about 5' in it's deepest spot. It's pretty good for just messing around in. There are also hottubs.

After all of that it was back to the cabin, and playing more games as well as dinner. Our kids decided that they would come back to the hotel with us because they wanted to watch Hocus Pocus on the disney channel (It was a misprint in both the Deseret News and the Tribune). We actually drove with one of them to the Hotel, and had to go back and pick up my daughter later. At least they would have a warm sleep.

Sunday morning, my son was upset because he didn't get to go out and have breakfast with us. Since my wife and I had gone out on Saturday, he assumed (wrongly) that we would also have breakfast out on Sunday. Instead, we headed to the cabin, where Anne made a wonderful omelet breakfast (this omelet exceeded, by far, the omelet I had at Chicks). We once again, played games, and walked the dogs (four dogs, hence the reason I couldn't stay at the cabin), and messed around a bit. We also went to the Hotel to try to get on the golf course (it is a putting course) but were told that it wasn't open yet even though we had seen others play on it. The owner had locked up the putters. Instead, we played some shuffle board (though none of us really know how) and then played chess on a big chess board they had outside with 2 foot high pieces. We did some resting and some relaxing, and then went back to the cabin for dinner. After all of that, it was back to the Hotel for some swimming in the evening. We were the only ones in the pools and that made it nice. We finished with that around 9:00 in the evening. I had to go back to the cabin to pick up a few things and Pam and Anne stayed at our Hotel for a bit to have some coffee. My son and daughter stayed with us for this night as well. I forgot to mention that the first night that my wife and I were there, there was hardly any sleep to be had. There was an airconditioning unit outside that went off about every 20 minutes and kept on waking us up. We got a bigger room with a couch that was a hideaway bed because we had mentioned this to them.

Anyway, we slept in this morning. We finally got up to the cabin at around 11:00 in the morning (just after we checked out of the Hotel). We had cold cereal for breakfast, and then hung around for a bit. I'm not sure if it was on Monday, or Sunday that my son made a couple of dollars from his grandpa for stacking wood and helping with some garbage that was too heavy for his grandpa to pick up, but my son did do that. We waited for Anne to get back from Salt Lake where she had a class so we could go to a coffee house and have some cake. We gave Pam our little cards for her birthday and then went for a walk. The walk wasn't the brightest of ideas. It had rained the entire night and the roads were muddy. That's not so bad, normally, but we had my wife and I, Pam, and my two kids. Along with that was four dogs. It was also raining a bit while we were out. We came back with muddy feet and muddy dogs. We took care of the dogs in a bath, as well as had our own shoes washed. It was after all of that, that we decided it was lunch time. We were starting to eat when Anne came back. We had lunch and then my wife packed up our car for the trip home. When we were piling into the car (we had already borrowed some shoes) my wife stepped into some dog crap. As if that wasn't bad enough, she had just cleaned off her shoes and she stepped into it again (she wasn't sure where it was the first time). She also bumped her head on the car door in trying to keep the dog in our vehicle, and she decided this was her Friday the 13th. The cake was good at this coffee house, and we had a Saint Jude candle lit for us. Of course happy birthday was sung to Pam and then we headed home.

The trip home was treacherous. It was snowing and we were in white out conditions coming home over Parleys Canyon. There was also a jerk driver in a commercial truck that figured he could drive just as fast as he wanted and in any way he chose. Of course we were guilty of letting him do so rather than getting in an accident. We made it home safe and sound.

After arriving home, I took my son out and we went to get some money back from a vacuum that I had bought at Home Depot (it was on sale now) and got an extra part for it so I don't have to bend so much when I use it to clean. We also went to a shoe store to get my son some shoes. Once home, my kids decided they wanted to eat cereal for dinner and I had to go pick up some milk. I finally got home from that and decided on Nachos for me.

After relaxing for a little while, I decided to go pick up our mail and newspapers from our neighbors. Before leaving our house, I looked out the window and saw a jeep and a person in our driveway. Whoever it was in the driveway turned back to talk to somebody in the jeep. I waited for them to knock on our door, but it was my daughter that saw them get in the jeep and drive slowly away. We were wondering what was going on, but I wasn't worried about it. When I came out of the house, I saw a woman walking down our driveway from our garage area. I wasn't quite sure what to make of that. She walked to the jeep. She had waved at me, and then drove slowly down the street. I walked across the street to pick up my stuff and while talking to those neighbors watched the jeep go up to the Clarks house and leave something on the doorstep. After arriving home, I told my wife that our garage door was open, and when we went to close it, we about tripped over our own package that was left on the doorstep. It was the phantom that visits at this time of year and now we need to go out and give it to three other people. As I thought about it, and what I had seen, I was pretty certain that it came to us from the Lowders. They gave us a call soon after that to invite us over to a costume party on the Friday before Halloween. He then confirmed my suspicion when he told me we may want to check our back door in the garage. I didn't let on to him that I had already figure it all out. Anyway, that's about it. My kids aren't excited to be going back to school tomorrow.

Friday the 13th

Part of Thursday was spent with me finding out if there was a place available to stay up in Midway that was reasonable. I did finally get to the Zermatt hotel. I was able to get the place for $99 a night. The decision was to stay Friday through Monday at noon. Of course there would be resort taxes and all of that on top of the $99. I also asked work for Monday off.

The kids were home from school both Thursday and Friday. My son stayed over at his friends house Thursday evening for his friends birthday. On Friday, we went out looking for a little portable dog house for a reasonable price. We finally found it at Target (where we had to go for a birthday gift card anyway). We grabbed a little bit of breakfast and then went to pick up our son. The trip up to Lime Canyon was uneventful, and nice.

We got to the cabin, and visited with my in-laws for a time. While my daughter was with her grandmother, she asked what happened to the diamond in her ring. It was (and remains) lost. My mother-in-law was in tears (and who could blame her). This was her second ring and was given to her by an aunt. The first ring was lost a long time ago when a son (and this was unknown to Margaret until just a few years ago) took her ring to elementary school to give to his girlfriend. The teacher saw it with the girl and took it away from the girl because she was too young to have a diamond ring. Unfortunately, the teacher kept the ring. Years later, Jeff tried to find the teacher to do something about the ring, but she was nowhere to be found. Anyway, my mother-in-law took this as a bad omen. We went to a little convenience store to buy some milk and a few other odds and ends, and the total came to $6.66. The clerk asked us to buy something else because the mix of the day and this amount didn't bode too well to her. We laughed it off and left. No other luck (good or bad) happened to us on today.

We got back to the cabin and called to see if Pam and Anne were going to come up today or tomorrow. It looked like they would come up tomorrow, so we went to the Zermatt hotel and went swimming. We stayed there for a little more than an hour and went back to the cabin. Pam and Anne were able to make it up later in the evening. My wife and I left our kids at the cabin (even though our daughter had a migraine and was throwing up) and went to our hotel room. My wife is worried about her tonight as we are getting ready to go to bed.

Migraines and such

Well, not a lot has gone on this week (so far). Work has calmed down somewhat, but I am chasing errors here and there that are being found. So far, the errors do not seem to be on the side of the data warehouse (I can only report back data that is in other areas). This has meant that I have had to find various people to fix things on the mainframe. It's getting to the point that they don't want to see me, and Amber flips me off every time I go to her (it's all in fun though).

Today I went to my parents house for lunch (I also had to return twelve chairs I had borrowed from them). We talked about some odds and ends that are going on, and I was getting ready to get back to work, when my wife gave a phone call to their place. She told me that her left eye had gone blank with kind of like a lightning going on and a backwards 'C'. It later, was cloudy and she said it was as if she was seeing the world from under water, and then it cleared up. She had called an ophthalmologist and had an appointment to get in but I would need to pick up the kids. I told her I would be OK with that, and left my parents home. I drove to my in-laws (which is right by my parents) to give them the stuff they had left at our home after the 80th birthday party, then drove to work. Not much was going on at work that needed immediate attention, so I left and headed home, hoping to find my wife still there. She wasn't.

When I got home, there was an open phonebook and I looked down the list until I found an ophthalmologist and got that number. I found that phone number written on another piece of paper so was pretty certain that I had the right one. I called them and they told me that my wife had not come in, but even if she did, because of HIPPAA regulations, they could not tell me if she had an appointment or not. I asked for them to have her call me when she came in. They told me they would do so IF she came in. This they did not do. I called again about half an hour later and they were not going to let me know if she came in or not. I finally got them to go to the room my wife was in and hand her the phone (of course, they could not let me know that she was there). I absolutely hate these regulations that make it almost impossible to find out anything. I understand the privacy act to a point, but it is getting toward ridiculous. My main concern was that she was able to drive there safely, and to know that she was safe. Anyway, she was told that this was something that happens with migraines. Later, at home, she told me she had a small headache. I told her to take some ibuprofen to head it off because if caught early enough, I have been able to avoid migraines.

Well, I picked up the kids, and then got some dinner for all of us (a little later). We all went to Young Men/ Young Women since my wife is now with the organization. I helped our boys with some of the requirements for the Physical Fitness merit badge, and we are trying to get them all set up with their exercise program (now I just need to get my son there as well).

That was pretty much our day.

Oh, I also saw an ad for an electric airplane for my sons birthday. Actually, it will be a gag gift (it's quite cheap). We are going to put it where he more than likely will find it, to keep him from finding his real gift (which I bought on Monday). The real gift is a keyboard that he has been wanting (he just wants a keyboard, I had to find the one that I thought best for him as well as my pocketbook). It's not an expensive one, but then it's not a cheap one either. I think he'll enjoy it.

80th Birthday Party

I failed to mention last week that we had received a phone call from the Executive Secretary from the ward inviting my wife to meet with the bishop on Tuesday evening. This had the effect of putting terror into my wife as to what it is that the bishop would want. Is it a new calling? What could it be? We talked a little bit about it, and it caused my wife to have a couple of days of very little sleep.

Nothing much happened Monday (at least worth reporting), but then Tuesday came along. We went in to meet with the bishop, and he called my wife to be the Young Women secretary (they still call it Young Womens which drives me nuts). My wife gave her concerns of not knowing how to turn on the computer let alone taking care of those kind of details. She has expressed a desire to take a class or two (if she must) to learn a few basics. Of course she would rather take a wood working class. I told her that I could probably teach her enough to get her by in her calling. We'll see if she will let me. She has been with the cubscouts for such a long time, I think it is a good time for a change such as this will be.

Wednesday came and went. Of course, we had Young Men, where we went over some of the requirements for the Physical Fitness merit badge. That didn't go down very well. The boys were restless and we had a bunch of them there. We barely kept control of them.

Thursday I picked up a bunch of chairs from my moms house as well as from my in-laws home. We had to get ready for the big 80th birthday party for my father-in-law on Saturday. I helped to set up the chairs and the tables in our home that night. My good wife has been busy cleaning and making sure that everything is set up just perfect. I have helped where I could, but have been lacking in some of that help.

Friday was a retreat for the IT department. We went out to Boondocks and had meetings from about 8:00 until around 2:00. At that time we were able to go into the arcade and out to play on the various things at boondocks. Most of us started out on the Go-carts. That was more fun than I thought it would be. They don't move very fast though. After a bit of that, I went in and tried out a flight simulator. It was harder to fly the plane than I thought it would be, and we had a good time doing barrel rolls and such. I also played some skee-ball, and had a good time. I let a little girl (probably around 2) try to throw some of the balls up the ramp. I left around 3:30 to get home and help my wife with some of the things that need to be done at home for this birthday party, after giving all of my tickets to some little guy.

I arrived home just in time to see my kids getting into the car for piano lessons. My wife couldn't find her shoes, so I took them to piano lessons. We took care of the shopping for the birthday party while our kids were in piano lessons (barely making it in time to pick them up). My wife did some cooking and preparing the dishes for the party. I had to go pick up a few more things at the store to keep things running smoothly.

Saturday came along, and there were some final preparations for everybody to come over at 1:00. My mother-in-law and father-in-law came early (as expected). They told us that Pam and Anne would also be early (they were actually about 15 minutes late) to take care of the drinks. Ray and Linda came as well as Gladys, Randy and Chelsea. We talked with them for a bit, and then finally started up the eating part. There was tons of food. A little later Stephanie came with her kids as well as Heather with her kids. Shane didn't come because he was out hunting, and Raymond didn't come because he is a workaholic. Time went on. People were eating, and chatting with each other. We finally got a call from my wife's uncle who was lost along with his daughter and her husband (in two separate cars). They weren't too far from my home and I directed them how to get to it. Some of these people had never seen our home and we had told our kids to have their rooms clean (and they were clean Friday night) so that some could look through it. To my wife's embarrassment, my sons room was a regular mess when she showed it. How can they do that in just a half a day? Oh well, life goes on.

People stayed at our home till around 6:00. Of course the balloons all got taken out with people making funny voices because of the helium. Rod got sung happy birthday to with munchkin type voices. Some helped me to clean up some of the chairs and tables in my home. I believe a good time was had by those who came.

My son and daughter locked themselves into Pams car so that they could go and stay with them for the night. We allowed that to happen. We put the house back into order (somewhat) and finally relaxed for a bit.

Today came along, and we slept in. We did need to get over to the church for Sacrament meeting for my wife's name to be read over the pulpit and have her sustained. It was a spiritual meeting today. The testimony meeting started off with a bunch of kids going up and bearing their testimonies. They were not your average kids testimonies (for the most part) but rather seemed to be from their hearts. Allie (a downs syndrome girl of about 12 or 13) got up and bore her testimony with her sister helping her. I didn't understand one word of what she said, but man alive, did I ever feel the spirit there during that testimony. It was the sweetest testimony of the day (in my opinion).

The Peeblers had a baby blessing today (at the beginning of the meeting) and because of this they put an interpreter up front to sign to them what was going on in the meeting (there were at least two hearing impaired or deaf people there). I have always thought it is interesting to see signing going on. During the passing of the sacrament there was a scream from a child sitting right in front of me, and then our autistic child did some more (from the back). I noticed that the interpreter told those who couldn't hear it about the yells. I also watched some in the family talking back and forth between themselves. The church was more quiet today than I have ever heard it be.

We went home from church and grabbed some stuff to eat. We then headed back to the church for my wife to be set apart in the bishops office. That was a nice experience and also was pretty darn spiritual.

Once again we went home, and then my wife had to go to a meeting about the Trek that they are all taking this coming summer in Wyoming. That should be a fun trip for the youth.

After my wife arrived home, we went out to Bountiful to pick up our kids and have dinner at Pam and Annes. My wife always worries about my allergies and my asthma when I am there with their two dogs. Nothing happened this time, and I was feeling quite good. We had a nice visit, grabbed our kids and came back home. The day is now done.

General Conference

Well, it looks like another week has come and gone. It's been really busy for me at work, and then home life has also taken its toll. My daughter has had too much homework, and I have had to help her where I can with some of her math.

We had parent-teacher conferences on Wednesday and Thursday. While my daughter was at the dentist, I went with my son to his parent teacher conferences (Wednesday) and then to piano. After that we finished up conferences just in time to get to Young Men/Young Women. I asked Lance if I was needed because if I wasn't, I needed to run to grab some paper so my daughter could print some of her stuff up on the computer for school. I got home just after my wife did, and then my daughter came through the door and had her homework to do.

Thursday evening, we went to my daughters parent-teacher conferences. I don't know how aware the teachers are of how long my daughter is doing homework, but they all said that she is doing great. Both of my kids are getting good grades, and that is a good thing. We took them to grandma and grandpa Wachs home for the rest of the weekend, since they were out of school on Friday.

Friday, I had my day off from work. I got to work around the house instead. I started out by mowing the lawn and then trimming the edges (they were getting really shabby). I also had to trim up around the garden areas. Since my weed whacker is no longer working, I trimmed them by hand. I got it all looking pretty good. Since this was all done, I grabbed a new blower that I have (it came with a vacuum I bought) and blew away some of the grass. Actually, I still collected a good portion of it because I am not going to blow it into a neighbors yard. It did make it all the easier.

I next had to put on a mask so I could vacuum out our two car garage (it's a three car garage but the third garage has all kinds of junk in it). That took some time, as it hadn't been cleaned quite like this before. In the long run, I'm going to have to do the other garage as well. It would also be nice to get the basement taken care of. My wife is making me wear the mask because she hates to go into Urgent Care when I have major asthma attacks. The one other thing I did was to fill up our 50 gallon drum with some water (we've had it, but I've never taken the time to fill it up).

My daughters furniture came this afternoon, so we had the people from Thomasville setting up her room with all of that. Her room looks beautiful and she is going to love it when she comes home. Hopefully, she'll be able to keep her room clean.

After all of this, I was quite stiff. I wasn't able to relax very long because there was a wedding reception to go over too. I had seen the neighbors preparing for it with five barbecues in their back yard. When we got to the church we saw the results of that. They had a beautiful reception. Decorations were exquisite, and the food was immense, and wonderful. There was everything from pork to chicken (as well as some sushi - it was made with rice though). There were desserts galore. I went away from there with a belly that was too full (and my belly is quite large). I couldn't even walk the dog, I was so full.

Saturday morning came and went. My wife and I went for a drive in the mountains to see the leaf changes. We went up into Brighton, and then over Guardsman pass. The trees seemed to be past their beautiful stage, and we just saw deadness (I don't know if that is a word, but it's the word I'm using). We headed toward Midway from there and got into some beautiful areas where the colors were vibrant. Continuing on, we headed to Cascade springs, where we wandered through the foliage there. One of the kids in front of us was scared because the burned trees reminded him of the haunted forest in The Wizard of Oz. Continuing on our path, we went through the Alpine loop, and then down into Provo. We then headed on home. We finished up General Conference at home (we had listened to it in the car) and then I called my in-laws to make sure my son would be going to General Priesthood meeting. I also asked if Grandpa Wach was going and was told that he would be. That was a surprise.

I headed over to pick up my son and my father-in-law, and then went to my dads house to pick him up for General Priesthood Meeting. Brig Wagstaff looked completely shocked to see my father-in-law there. He has never been to one of these in all of his 80 years (well he's turning 80 next Saturday). He also had his hand shaken by another person who is in his ward.

My son had to write down some of the things that was happening in conference for his seminary class. When the prophet talked he went to a song called "Rise up O' Man", and I told my son that was what he needed to write down. When I looked, he had written "Rise up Old Man". We had a great chuckle over that one.

After that session was over we headed over to Arctic Circle to pick up some shakes and malts. Our order was messed up a little bit, but we headed home with it that way anyway. Not too much was said and then I took my son and his grandfather on home.

Anne and Ashley were completely shocked that Rod had gone with us to conference. It was something they didn't think they would see. I guess my son had invited him to come again, and my daughter jumped on his bed and woke him up before conference as well as helped pick out his clothes to go. There really isn't much he won't do for those two kids of mine.

I helped Anne out a little bit with some of her Palm stuff, though I don't know why she wasn't able to see some pictures that she has put on her card. I may have to do some research on why that is happening.

On the way home from there, I had to pick up some Penne Pasta and a few other things for a Pasta Salad my wife wanted to make. It's quite good. You make up the Penne Pasta and then marinate it overnight in Italian dressing, then you add in some fresh zucchini, yellow squash, and broccoli (we forgot the broccoli but it was good anyway) and red onions. I think some more Italian dressing is poured over the whole thing. Anyway, I enjoyed eating it.

Moving onto today. I woke up, read the paper and then watched conference. My wife finished making the pasta salad, and got ready to go over to my parents house which is a tradition for general conference. My kids called and said they would walk on over to my parents house. Anyway, we weren't the first people to my parents house, which is quite unusual. Almost the whole family was there. Tyler announced his engagement that happened yesterday and introduced us all to his fiance' as well as her two sisters (who were there). Alan and Karen had their girlfriend and boyfriend (respectively) and there were just a lot of people there. We had a potluck dinner, cleaned up and were ready to watch conference. Since there are so many people there, I sat outside on the porch and listened to conference from there (it gets too hot in the house). I checked up on my son and daughter a few times, and we had a good time. My wife went to her moms house to watch conference because there is much less noise and confusion there than we have at my parents house because of all the people (especially the little ones).

We finally headed out of there, picked up the kids clothes and came on home. My daughter immediately announces that she has some homework (we're back to that again). She was excited to see her room and thought it was great. We all got involved in helping my daughter out with her homework rather than having a relaxing evening.