Little Hunters Beach

Yesterday I was scheduled to go on a whale watching trip but it got canceled because of high seas caused by off shore winds ... so I went to Little Hunters Beach instead. It is a tiny cobblestone beach in a cove surrounded by, of course, the rock bound coast of Maine. I found out from a guide book that this area's rocks are considered part of the "Shatter Zone", an area where underground magma came in contact with the bed rock layer above it causing it to shatter. The shattered pieces of this bedrock remained as large chunks in the magma which eventually cooled forming granite. The call the rocks "plum pudding" rocks. It is a really cool formation!

This is a great example of the "plum pudding"

Another great example of "plum pudding"

Wounderful weather in Utah

Look at all that white stuff behind me. It started snowing about noon and is still at it almost six hours later. I've been out three times to knock the snow off the trees so they won't break and cause a mess(they still have leaves). Hope your weather is better than ours!
Dad

Diamondbacks in the playoffs

At last! At last! The Diamondbacks are in the playoffs ... all they need is one more win and they win the NL West but even without another win, they would enter the playoffs as a wild card. Oh happy day!

Clay's 14th

Look at all those candles ... Grandma and I love to host the grand kids on their 14Th birthdays. So far they all have come to Arizona to enjoy the sunshine. We've had 8 celebrations so far and have at least 12 more to go. Happy days!

Maryland Wanderson Update

Hello All -
many apologizes for having been long silent. I was a heck of a lot sicker than I thought I was and am only now beginning to feel human again. This has been a long and frustrating road for this little piggy, but also a tremendous gift. I'm sure mom can attest to the fact that laying around getting better is an ideal time to count your blessings. I found out that I had good friends and an amazing family. Part of the frustration is still not being able to think, work or move as fast as i'm used to doing. Sick as I was time didn't stand still, so I'll give you a quick update and the promise that we'll post pics as events unfold ...

Jay and Jaqui are on "any day now" status with little Jaylin Rosario Anderson. Jaqui is dilated to 2 centimeters and the doctor doubts she'll make it to the 10/6/07 due date. Little Jaylin is going to have to work hard to find her "own" birthday in October .... we think it would be ok for her to become a birthday buddy with any of the fabulous Libras that abound in our family, including her pretty libra mom (10/9) or the about to be Grandpa Great (10/4).

Ms. Emilia sprained her left ankle on the football field and has been grounded for two weeks. She saw the doc this afternoon and is cleared to play. She'll be on the field for this Saturdays game. Check out her schedule at http://www.mcps.k12.md.us/schools/watkinsmillhs/sports/fall/football_jv.shtm

Josh left for boot camp and we all cried a bucket just in time to have him come home again. The USMC got him up to the processing center and told him that his chosen MOS (i.e., career choice) wasn't available then gave him several other options. They don't know that when Joshie makes up his mind he isn't kidding. He decided to wait for an open position and keep his MOS ... he will now be leaving on 10/15/07. To ease his, "can't hit the road blues" he'll be running in the Baltimore Running Festival 5K with his mother (ok I'll be walking in the 5K, but Josh will make sure no one laughs at me) on his BIRTHDAY (10/13). we both think it is worth the entrance fee to have a t-shirt with joshie's birthday on it!

Clay, Jayson and Nate all helped to make Bill Gates more wealthy on 9/25 by purchasing Halo III along with several million other Americans. However, none of them (I'm proud to report) came down with the Halo Flu, which caused record absenteeism from local schools and businesses (yes, I'm still rolling my eyes). Still, they are all champion players and having a big blast playing with each other online.

Joe's football team is 2 and 1 for the season. He's starting at Right Guard, but ironically still stinks after the game. He's lost two baby teeth in the past two weeks. one was knocked out during football and the other came out at school and was barely rescued before going down the drain on the playground. Good old Joe - anything but ordinary! ALL his older siblings complain about the rate of inflation where the tooth fairy is concerned.

Olive Juice to you all - and promise to write more and send pics soon.

d

Shelby is 13

I must be old I now have a teenager! Shelby made it to the big 13. She is already planing on what kind of car she will get, and where is will be going to School. BYU Provo 1st choice, BYU Hawaii 2nd choice, or BYU Idaho last choice. I kind of like the cost of a community college. She is a great kid who has brought lots of joy to our life's

I spent tonight at her Middle school. Going from class to class getting to see how she spends her day. She has 3 honors classes so she will have to work hard this year. It brought back memories of JR high for me. Loud crowed halls, chairs hooked to the desk, The gym even had the peg boards that we had to climb.

Pine View Tri

I think Shelby was telling her dad "you can do it, you can do it" but he doesn't look convinced. One of these triathletes beat the other two, can you guess who?

Labor Day 2003

My favorite mountain with the Oxbow in the foreground just at sunset ... I never get tired looking at it.

Standing high on top of the Grand

I came across this picture while I was looking for something else so I decided to share it with all of you. Kristi was on the other side of the camera and if it hadn't been for the Montana fires and the smoke they caused we could have seen forever ... but even with the smoke it was still a great view. I do cherish the two times I climbed the Grand.
Dad

Brain Damage

Last night I took Katie to soccer practice. I am not her coach this year (she actually gets someone who understands the game!) so I was just watching. They were doing a drill that ended up with a shot on goal. I walked behind the goal to pop the ball back out of the net so the girls would not have to get in the net and get hit by a teammate's shot. One ball was a little out of reach so I stuck my toes through the netting to push it out to the girl. As I pulled my foot back my running shoes got caught in the net and I completely lost my balance and made a spectacular fall. I ended up landing on my back and head. No major damage except to my pride! I woke up this morning with an extremely sore spot on the back of my head, a big scab on my elbow but no lasting damage.

I have a question

So ... is there a way to be notified when someone puts up a new posting to the blog or writes a comment to the blog? I feel like I am missing comments that people post because I don't always go back and check older posts for comments.

Thanks!

A view from the top

I took a look at Goggle to see the new Eden. I thought you all might enjoy.

I put a pin where Wolf Creek is to give a perspective of where the property is located.

Don't give away your money to the car dealership

I threw my keys away last week(long frazzled story). Anyway, it has the sensor key and key fob(automatic door slider, etc). I went straight to the dealership and was quoted $50 for the key and $125 for two fobs. Plus, a minimum service charge of 79.95 for programming.

Out of desperation, I went to the websites "keylessride.com" and "keyandfob.com". I ordered a new key and new fob for $46.33. They arrived in the mail 4 days later. Both came with programming instructions. I contacted "autoforum.com" to confirm their instructions. I didn't want to screw up my van.

Happy to report: My key and fob both work and took 4 minutes to program. I put an already programmed key in the ignition and put in the unprogrammed one in the ignition within 5 seconds-instantly programmed. To program the fob, I pulled the program fuse in the panel, turned the ignition on, held down the unlock/lock buttons for 14 seconds-programmed! Try not to throw away keys in the first place, but it really does save to consult the internet. Lana

The Eden "Cabin".

BigPig wanted me to post this picture of the cabin in Eden, Ut.

The Beehive

One of the nurses I work with has invited me to go hiking a couple of times. This is one of the hikes that she showed me. It is really fun. They call it a ladder hike because you have to hold onto these steel bars cemented to the mountain in order to get to the top. In the picuture to the left you can see one of the bars on the granite if you look carefully. The view is looking down on "sand beach" in Acadia NP which is one of the very few sandy beaches on the whole island.

This is the monument at the top of The Beehive. The island that you can see off the coast is one of the porcupine islands. The big mass of land that you can see beyond that is actually the mainland. The very tip of it is part of Acadia National Park (the only part of Acadia that is attached to the mainland) but it is probably 1- 1 1/2 hours away even though as the crow flies it is probably less than 20 miles away.

Happy Birthday Dan

Today is Dans 34 birthday if my math is correct. We should all call him and wish him a happy birthday and thank him for setting up this blog so we can tell on each other on such days as this. This is his last year in his early 30's. Next year he will have to move onto his mid 30's.

Houston....

I spent the last week in Houston on business. This is my third trip to Houston and I always come away underwhelmed. It has to be the hottest place in the country when you factor in the humidity. (Florida is hot as well but there seems to be enough of a breeze there to mitigate the heat.) This is coming from someone who has spent most of his adult life living in the 'deep' south and knows what heat and humidity mean! I went out Geocaching on tuesday evening and then went over to the Houston Temple to take some pictures. I did two caches, then quit because I was burning up. Then went to Dinner for an hour to cool down and then went to take the pictures. It was so hot and muggy after the sun went down that I had to quit taking pictures because I was so miserable. Having said all that Houston has some of the best seafood that I have ever eaten. I went to a mexican place and had Scallops fajita style and they were amazing. Another night I went to Laundry's seafood house which is my favorite place in the world to have seafood. This is a gulf coast chain but it is good eating! On the plane ride home yesterday I sat next to a Delta flight attendent who lives in Houston. She says she loves living there. The thought I kept to myself was 'sure, because you get to leave every week!'

Anyway here are the pictures I took:

This is the Houston Temple. It is a very beautiful building. I hope they have good Air conditioning inside!

This is the first cache I found. It was right next to the freeway. It is by far the most 'urban' cache I have ever found. You can see the cache next to the pampas grass on the ground. It is the first cache I have ever found that was painted purple with pink lettering on it!

New Yellow Belts

We have two new Tae Kwon Do yellow belts in the family! Chas and Katie have worked very hard to master the requirements for this belt and did a great job tonight in showing off their expertise. Emma and I are still working diligently on our next belt(green) but it is getting harder and harder to advance as the techniques become more complex. We are shooting for October before Emma's surgery. We like wise Mr. Miagi's reply to Danielson's question "what kind of belt do you have?" He replied "K-Mart...$7.99"

I am including a video of my sparring match! Go ahead and laugh, I did! I think I held my own against a much stronger opponent. I am scared to death this guy is really going to land a kick one day and break one of my flimsy little ribs! Thanks to LaRee for sitting on the hard chairs and cheering us on and thanks to Doug for taking the pictures. He braved the I-285 parking lot tonight to be there for the kids' test. What a Grandpa!

(FYI-I'm wearing the black helmet.)

It Never Hurts to ask

Saturday night Lana and I had gone out to eat to celebrate Lana passing her Insurance exam. After dinner the casino had a concert just about to start so Lana walked over to the ticket office and asked them if they were making a deal because the show was about to start. The lady said that someone had donated tickets and just gave us some. So we got to see the Beach Boys for free. They were even good seats would have cost us $120.00 They sang all there hits, even Sloop John B. Most of the original beach boys are dead, but the few they had and the band they put together was fun to watch, and hey the price was right.

Airport Boredom

Snapped this picture from C terminal in the Atlanta Airport on monday morning. I was supposed to fly out sunday night but I got there 57 minutes before departure instead of the required 60. I got put on the next mornings flight so I got to go through all the joy of visiting the airport again! The one silver lining was that I got to see the sunrise today over the airport. Since there are no trees around you can acutally see the sun set and rise from here.

Geo caching out west

Dan was out here last weekend for a little work and some visiting. While he was here I made us all some fantastic eggplant bake (I modified it with a few layers of fresh out of the garden toamtoes) and did some geocaching. I did not take any pictures of the bake I did get a few of the caching in. Dan, Little Dave and I headed out to to find a cache or two up Spanish Fork Canyon.

I had been to this cache before but there were people fishing there that day and I did not want to give it away so I only looked for a little while before moving along. All three of us went down to look for it, but only Dan was brave enough to withstand the ants and get the cache, I guess these western ants have nothing on the fire ants of the east. Dan just pushed through until he found the cache for us.

Dan, Dave and I found this one without a lot of effort, it was in great container that you can see at Dans knee's. It appears to be a leather case from WWI that appeared to look like an old money case from the 1800's. The theme of the cache was Butch Cassidy robing a train nearby of a payroll for a local coal mine. It was very well done and a lot of fun to find.

I spotted this on the way to the 5000 foot Kokopelli, just snaking his/her way along a seldom used trail when we drove by. I think this was the highlight of Dave's day.

Dave named this frog rock....it was not too hard to see it at the time, but now its rather hard to see it. I am sure if you look at it long enough you will see it. Look for the snake, he is up there somewhere as well.

This is one of my favorites, The Blue Anasazi Rain Deer. I had been here before. This was one of my firsts and one that Kristy had giving me with bugs in it. It kind of funny but this is still hard to see from a distance even though it is huge and blue!

We had a great time getting 6 caches for Dan and Dave and 3 new ones for me. Its always great when family comes around and we get to do fun things like this.

Thanks Dan and Little Dave for an afternoon of caching.

PS I think I cook a lot like Grandma Larsen, none of my cooking follow my recipes, the only one that really does is THE BEANS, I would hate to mess those up.

Last Tomato Rodeo

One of the negative side effects of planting tomotaoes in March is that the plants are dead and dieing by labor day. My plants have been on intensive care the last two weeks. I am throwing more rotten tomatoes away than I am harvesting. I started to pull up my mater plants today and throw them in the burn pile where they will contribute to next years crop.

I did the last bit of tomato canning for the summer today. I managed to get six quarts of soup put away. This is a good soup base. When it is time to eat the soup we can just add some pasta and a choice of meat, beans etc and dinner is ready. Each quart makes a meal for our family.

Next year when I brag about having my tomatoes in, will someone please remind me that I need to plant a couple of plants in May so I will have fresh tomatoes in October. I make this same mistake every year. I have grown a garden every year since I got married, save two summers and every time I never make a second planting. Some year I will figure it out.

You gotta love the rain to love Maine!!

I took this picture earlier this week. I discovered when I lived in Maine before that you have to be able to love a day like this in order to love Maine ... because there are a lot of them!! Today was another wet day. When I was in Bangor it was a little disheartening but once I was back on the island it was its own kinds of beautiful.

Fun at the park

In North Carolina we lived in the middle of nowhere. It was 25 minute drive to church, work was 45 minutes away, grocery stores were an 8 mile drive down the road. Getting to parks and libraries was the same hassle.


So when we had the opportunity to relocate to GA our mantra was "close to a park, library, work, schools and shopping. This point was repeated at each house we looked at. We were fortunate to find a house close to all those things. Mountain Park Park (redundant I know) is less than a mile down the road. Our county has great parks. An old swimming pool was closed at the park and for the past year this part of the park was under renovation. Tonight we went out and enjoyed the new part of the park. The county put in climbing boulders with lots of good hand holds, a big grass lawn, a skate park and four big kid swings. I thought the kids would really like the rock climbing boulders but they spent more time on the swings. It was a good, fun(and free!!) friday night with the family.


We also checked out the skate park but didn't stay very long as we suspected the skaters were smoking something illegal.

We had rain storms all day on friday but the Rain finally broke and the remaining clouds acted as a giant reflector at dusk creating a beautiful evening for photography. The last picture of the kids shows the results. I'm seldom seen on the log but Crystal took a fun picture of me jumping off the swing. Don't worry dad. I repaired my divot.

FIRE!

I have been in Nampa this past week for work. I installed a server up there. After I was done I drove back to Utah to fly home. As my co-worker and I were driving down I-15 from tremonton we could see smoke rising. By the time we got to Odgen the fire was all the way up the mountain and really going. There were three airplanes overhead and one helicopter was dropping water on the fire. It was amazing to see how fast that fire moved up the mountain. The fire looks like it started at the mouth of Odgen Canyon and then burned up the mountain.

I also saw Grandma while I was in Odgen. She seemed really down. It might be good to give her a call.

Happy Day

Today was my six-weeks check-up. Happy day--no more sleeping in the sling and big pillow thing! I plan on sleeping all night and all day tomorrow. AND I drove to the grocery store. What a thrill. (Dad wasn't too thrilled--he drove home!) I am progressing nicely. I can not lift anything heavier than a spoon, push, pull, or wipe. Other than that I can do anything. In two weeks I can start lifting the equivelant of a half-gallon of milk. It is beginning to feel and look like autumn here and "my hill" is starting to turn red and gold. That's all my news. I love all of you. Mom

Fall on bike ride

It was a nothing special super beautiful day here. I thought that I would share a picture of the changing leaves that caught my fancy as I was on a bike ride today.

M

so i just got off the phone with emilia anderson. she likes to text message and send me myspace comments, or more especially, random myspace bulletin posts (which are basically email which you send to your entire address book, also known as SPAM). i get on average about 5 messages a day... quite a bit of chatting. we don't usually talk on the phone, i mean with all that electronic information what's there to talk about? anyway, i called her yesterday and left her a message to call back; and so she calls back, and the conversation is something like this...

(cell phone rings)
charlie: hello?
emilia: hey.
C: emilia?
M: yea?
C: what are you doing?
M: nothing.
C: i guess you're calling me back?
M: uh-huh.
C: where are you?
M: in the car.
C: are you driving?
M: no.
C: so, you're in a car and you're not driving, and i assume that that noise is the sound of the car moving, so someone else is driving?
M: uh, yea.
C: so.
M: (nothing)
C: so who's driving.
M: um. my dad.
C: your dad's driving you somewhere? how's he?
M: (dead air)
C: are you there?
M: (nothing)
C: M?
M: yea?
C: you're with your dad? how's he.
M: good.
C: that's good.
M: uh-huh.
C: so how's your mom?
M: good.
C: she's good?
M: yea i guess.
C: You guess? When was the last time you checked?
M: um, friday. (it's tuesday)
C: i heard she's sick.
M: yea she is.
C: but she's ok?
M: i guess.
C: well, i guess if you're not too worried about her then i shouldn't worry either. does that sound right?
M: well she's pretty sick.
C: that's what i heard.
M: (nothing)

i'm laughing… she's so nonchaloir about everything

C: tell your dad "hi" and check in on your mom for me?
M: k
C: love you m!
M: yea, you too.

meningitis

Hello Family

As most of you know, after a week of being very ill my boss sent me to the ER after recognizing the symptoms of meningitis through an instant message conversation (I know better than to go to the office when I feel yucky). I was pretty impressed with his insight after the diagnosis and asked him how it was that he was so smart, "I have three kids" was his cheeky reply. Well, I have six, you'd think I'd know a thing or two. But I didn't.

I'm fine. The meningitis I have is viral; same symptoms - much lower risk of death, brain damage or disabling after-effects than the bacterial or fungal forms of meningitis. Getting better requires rest, good food and SLOWING down (not my specialty). Jaqui and Mom also know that prayer is also a good idea and I'm happy to have as many of those and/or good energy via kind wishes and love. The only other thing I really want is Grandma L's turkey noodle soup and Grandma W's tapioca. Clay got me some tappi from the store, but hmph, it aint Gram's!

THE REASON for this post is not to elicit sympathy, but to make sure that each one of you is better educated than I was. My symptoms were classic and if the infection had been bacterial I would have been dead before I made it to the hospital (six days post symptom onset). Please, even if you and your children have been immunized - there are several forms of the disease not covered by the immunization, learn about the symptoms of this disease and what to do when symptoms present. This site is a good place to start http://www.meningitis.org/ Hopefully this experience will make all of us wiser and safer.

Back to School Spokane

I am a little slow in posting this. We start school in Spokane the day after labor day. Shelby bought all her own school outfits this year. She had a babysitting job all summer and used her money to buy a laptop, new cell phone, and school stuff. Matthew who refused to buy anything new for school, also would not stand still long enough to have a back to school photo taken.

Jesup Memorial Library

I have found living on this island to be a bit difficult. When I asked a co-worker where to buy socks in town she laughed and told me that he husband had just commented the other day that there is no place on the island to buy socks and underwear. When I asked another co-worker if she knew of a good mechanic she told me that everyone on the island overcharged because they expected that you are a tourist. The mechanic she referred me to was over an hour away in Bangor! I also have very poor cell phone reception and I have spent a lot of my time here trying to find a spot where I can use my phone. I checked out of my motel this morning and I have been worried that I wouldn't have Internet access but I just got a library card and although the library closes at 5:00 I at least have a place to keep up on the blog and upload my photos!!!!

The library is absolutely gorgeous!!! I can't wait for it to snow. I think that the huge window in the back with two big chairs will be a great place to sit and watch the snow while reading a good book!

This is where I am sitting right now =) In the chair on the left. I feel like I am in the waiting room of a dignitary waiting for a meeting.

Big Game

We went to lots of the Spokane Indians game this year this was the last one. Liberty and Matthew got to go on the field to sing take me out to the ball park.

Liberty's Sunflower

Have you ever gone to one of those events that they give the kids a seed in a cup and tell them to take it home and water it and it will grow. Liberty did this spring and this is what it turned in to. Liberty is very happy with what it grew. It is just outside her room and she gets to see it every morning. The other moms in our neighbourhood wish they had not tossed out their seeds. We may have to try and save some the seeds to eat. Anyone ever make sunflower seeds?

Holiday

Hey everybody!
Breck and I spent the labor day holiday weekend in San Francisco, CA. It's a beautiful city, and I've finally fallen in love. We went there previousely, 10 years ago, and I swore I'd never go back (or fly Delta) but more on that later.

The photos are: ... me 1) on the pier seeing "my ship come in", 2) watching bamboo grow and 2) hiking a moon bridge at the Japanese Tea Gardens...



... 4) us waiting for a light rail ride after walking 10 miles through the worst part of town to see a new garden store (it wasn't worth the blisters), 5) Fog rolling through downtown, 6) a favorite Japanese tea gardens garden...



...more of us at 7) at the Marcone Center fountain (the Marcone Center is a big complex of wonderful museums, parks, and convention halls, and 8 & 9) the new de Young Museum (very cool).



So what about our last trip? SF being like Mecca (for folks like us), I was BEYOND excited plus it was one of my first real vacactions as an adult. I left the return airplane tickets (remember paper tickets?) on the plane. When I realized what I had done, I called Delta informed them. They told me that I'd have to pay to have the return tickets reissued. We couldn't come up with enough money to pay for a hotel AND new tickets for the flight back. It was late at night and since we were in a new scary big city, we choose the hotel. Luckily Breck had an old friend driving back to Utah the next day. Needless to say, it wasn't the dream vacation I had envisioned. This trip was MUCH better!

We had a GREAT time. My favorite things about San Francisco is architecture, parks, theater and FOOD! I don't know why we can't get food in Utah like they have seem to have in the bigger cities. Are our tounges desensititezed by all the Jell-o? I blame it on Chuck-o-rama, and other buffet restaurants. I had Oysters at nearly every meal, WOW they were fresh! I ate lots of fish and especially loved the French style restaurants. They flash cook their fish, so the outside is hot and crisp with the inside is cool and tender, YUM!

My Favorites? Plouf (what the French say to imitate the sound of water drops), and Foreign Cinema.