Memories...

I found this on a friend's blog, and thought it might generate some interesting thoughts...

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!
   
   
2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty cool (and funny) to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.

Helena Handbasket

I flew into Helena, MT for several days of document and drawing review for one of my large projects. The environmental consultant that is helping my company has an office here. Four co-workers also flew in with me for the review. Long hours of reading and editing technical documents is a lot of fun (lol).

As a side benefit, I have a brother that works in Helena, so I get to spend a bit of time with him during the off hours. This morning early we hiked to the top of Mt. Helena. It's about 2000 ft above the valley floor.

Considering the hot temperatures at home, the climate here is very nice. It's slightly brisk in the morning and evening, and just perfect all day long...

The Vampire Hunt and Back-Seat Madness

It's summer vacation time and we just had a good one - to the town of Forks made famous by the bestseller "Twilight." We had a family reunion near Mt. Saint Helens in Washington, and then we extended the trip by continuing west to the Olympic Peninsula. Now that we've been home several days, I can say that it was a good trip - there were moments during the long drives that I was ready for blood (I can say that since the book is about Vampires.) We fill every seat in the minivan, and the back seat mischief and problems had me at the edge of insanity a couple of times.

The boys like camping, so I think we got a lot of "mileage" out of this trip with them. (We actually camped four nights and spent three in motels.) We had two tents, and it helps to separate a couple of the boys off into the second tent. We all slept quite well, considering. I still prefer our Tempurpedic mattress at home.

As my lovely wife pointed out in her blog, we have a special nostalgic feeling for the Olympic Peninsula, as we spent some time in the area during our engagement. The dense forests of tall evergreens, the heavy undergrowth, and the rugged beaches with rock monoliths and literally thousands of tons of driftwood littering the shore - it's a scene from a fantasy. We have talked about moving up that way, but it might lose the nostalgia if it became too familiar.

We had a blast at several beaches. This is no Caribbean paradise, however. It has a completely different feel. The water is icy cold, the beach is not made up of perfect white sand, etc. But it is paradise for little boys who like to see cool chunks of driftwood, hop out onto rugged rocks in the water, look at sea critters in the tide pools, examine dead crabs along the beach, etc. They were surprisingly "immune" to the water temperature, although I have an image engrained in my mind of #3 crawling through a warmer patch of sand after he got particularly cold. He looked like Robinson Crusoe. Too bad I didn't capture that on film...

Haircut #2

My Queen had her hair lopped off today as well - I haven't seen it yet in person as I'm still in the office, but she sent me this photo. I think it looks really cute. A mother of five young princes certainly has every right to enjoy her hair shorter, anyway. The youngest one likes to pull it when it is long. I gave up years ago on pressuring her to keep it long because it was "prettier." She can do what she wants with it, and she's still the "bomb."

The Haircut

Well, it was time, due to the warming weather and the impracticality of the long curly hair, to cut it off. I began by shaving the beard and 'stache earlier in the day, and here I am sitting in the haircut chair - my wife is going to do the deed.

I really can't believe how long it has grown. I look a little too much like an 80's rock star or Weird Al Yankovich.

Well, we're committed now. My little flower has got the number four comb attached to the razor and she's attacking the 'fro with glee. Look at that crazy mop! It's going to get a lot easier to take care of now.

This is the mullet - there's absolutely no way that I'm going to keep it, but it sure looks great for a photo. Once again, welcome back to high school. I pulled it into a pony tail for a second - wow, we're really styling now.

We're headed back to the land of conservative hairstyles. She's done with the number four, and now she's taking the scissors to the top to taper things a bit. Notice how long her hair is - she also wants to get a pretty serious haircut very soon. Sometimes a little change is fun - you know, shake things up a bit.

Well, we're done with the cut and here is all my hair. What should I do with it? It's not quite long enough for "locks for love" so I guess I'll just throw it away. Funny how powerful a little hair can be.

And finally the self portrait in the bathroom mirror after the shower. I just dropped ten years in 30 minutes. And now nobody needs to worry about the dangers posed to my immortal soul by the evils of long hair.

And here is another picture of my little Mrs. She has something in mind about shoulder length - I gave up a long time ago maintaining that she should keep it long - she's beautiful just the same and it's fun for her to play around with different styles. Besides, it's hard with five young boys to maintain long hair, and it's always getting in the way.

The Chicken Tractor

We have increased our ability to engage in backyard farming - this is a "chicken tractor" that I built this week. It has wheels on one end - you lift the other end and roll it to a new spot on the lawn. It has a man-door at one end and an egg-gathering door on the other end. Chickens are great for keeping the bugs down, and they produce great fertilizer for the grass. We jsut have to remember to roll the tractor off of the grass the nights before the sprinklers come on! We have three little Bantams and two Auracanas. We also have some Rhode Island Reds, but they live one block over at a neighbor's house. The boys like the birds - we have to convince the oldest that he doesn't need to check in on them every fifteen minutes.

My Pirate Name...

Dale's Pirate Name Is...

Captain Wicked Willie

What's Your Pirate Name?