Intelligent Grapevine?

This is almost scary. You've heard the whole "no straight lines in nature" bit. There's a potted plant here on our deck about 3 or 4 feet from the wild grape vine. And darned if this picture doesn't show that it is specifically reaching for the plant. It hasn't actually REACHED the plant yet, there's about an inch to spare. But there's no droop in that branch. It has a purpose. It knows it's there.

How????

Gratuitous Baby Post

Sigh

That's all I have to say today.

39 and a Whole

It's true. Cami is 40. She made it. Life can now begin.

Or shall we say, "Cami-Cami"? Cami is wife of my college friend, adopted brother, and all around best friend, Mark. Mother of our God-Children. And responsible for introducing me to TikiBar TV.

Mark and Cami put on a big bash, working their little tails off to entertain ~40 people. Friends, family, their kids. Mark smoked up two huge briskets and a bunch of chicken, beans, cake, and beer, beer, beer, booze. Tiki lights, tiki lamp, tiki totem, and swank swingin' Rat Pack music.

They had the foresight to put up a rain pavillion over the deck, which was a good thing because rain developed about 3:00 and just kept coming, off and on, through the evening.

If anyone had told me in college that we'd have access to doppler radar in our kitchens, zoomable to street level, even -- in 25 years, I wouldn't have believed them. But it let us know when to bring things in.

Lots of people from Irish Fest, Cami's mother and friends from work, Mark's cousin Kelly and her boyfriend, some neighbors, several kids.

Vicki's party outfit turned out really nice, but what really made it was the shoes :-)

There was much laughter, lots of visiting, a little guitar played, and by about 3:00 am, I looked like this.

13,000

Wow. Statcounter says I've had 13,000 hits as of just a few minutes ago on this blog. Since ... 2003, I think?

Who knew I was that interesting?

This One's for Vicki

Well I'll be dippy dappered!

Just got back from a week in Vegas.

Well... not excactly. We went to visit Vicki's cousin Jim and his wife Carol. They live in the Spring Mountains just to the northwest of Las Vegas. Home of Mt. Charleston. Mt. Charleston is the highest peak on southern Nevada, coming in at 82 feet under 12,000.



So of course I wanted to climb it. Jim even had a parter lined up for me to make the trek -- a local woman who's lived there for a bunch of years... 23? and had never done the peak. But as she had a doctor appointment that day and it rained the rest of the week except for friday (thunderstorms we apparently brought from Missouri), I never made that trip.

But that didn't keep us from doing lots of other hiking in the mountains.

The flight in was interesting enough. There were lots of clouds along the way, but I did get to see some of the high peaks flying over southern and southwestern Colorado, and Marble Canyon, the Grand Canyon, and Lake Mead on the way in.

The bathtub ring around Lake Mead is distinct, impressive, and sobering. We've got too many people living in the desert for the water resources. I'm thinking desalinization is the only way out of this for the Southwest.

According to Jim, "Las Vegas" means "The Springs", and in fact there were springs in the hot valley when the city was established back in the early 1900's. The surrounding mountain ranges collected snow in the winter and rain in the summer. Jim says the streams rarely run because the ground is so porus the water just perks down into the ground right away, and goes directly to the water table. Since the surrounding mountains are up to almost 10,000 feet above the valley floor, the hydrostatic pressure pushed the water table above ground level in places in the valley. Neat.

But no more. There are about 1.2 million people slorking it out of the ground -- some of it to water palm trees and lawns.

A week or so before we got there a tragedy occurred in their neighborhood. A small plane with two couples celebrating a mutual wedding anniversary flew up the box canyon and couldn't get enough altitude in time to get out. It crashed, killing all four of them. They left 7 children behind between the four of them. The firefighters kept the fire to a minimum, but there is a char scar across the road from their neighborhood.

It was 100-110 degrees in the city during the week for highs. But 7,600 ft up in the mountains the first few days never made it out of the 60's due to clouds and thundershowers. Later in the week it made it to ... 75 on t Friday and 81 on Saturday -- the only days it didn't rain. We apparently brought it with us from Missouri. And they like it out there, as you might imagine. The water table in the Spring Mountains is at capacity right now. There are even ... springs flowing ... from high in the mountains. They crash down solid rock and disappear into the carbonite ... er ... "soil". There were even seeps along some of the trails.

Tuesday we climbed Cathedral Rock ... a good 1,000 foot rise from the trail head not far down Kyle Canyon from their neighborhood. I mean really not far, like we hiked 1/8 mile or so down to the trail head from the lower street in the development.

Wednesday we actually drove into Vegas where we went to three of the major casinos. They look impressive. The people watching was the best part about it. I'm not much into shopping for things I can't afford, and though I have nothing against gambling itself, I have something against me doing it. I look around at all the over-the-top excess and think, "where do people think all this comes from?"

Speaking of the excess ... Jim tells me the apparently elaborate facades are made of foam ... made to look like concrete or limestone or stucco and sometimes have proven quite flamable. So keep that in mind when lighting up -- which you can apparently do anywhere.

We even saw a couple getting married on a gondola in the Venetian.

Thursday we hiked up Fletcher Canyon until we were chased out of it by the sound of thunder. It is a box canyon that gets narrower and narrower as you go up it -- perfect flash-flood scenario. I could imagine the wall of water powering down the canyon.

And by friday Jim had twisted my arm out of attempting Charleston Peak and going on the Deer Creek trail hike with them through the Bristlecone Pines on a trail that topped out on a ridge at 9,800 feet with a nice view of Charleston.

I have to admit, seeing the tundra above the treeline from this relatively close vantage point gave me a pang of summit-fever-induced remorse.

The bristlecones were breathtaking, and there is one called "the Rain Tree" ... supposedly the largest on the mountain (rumor has it there may be one larger) ... to give you an idea of the size... here's a shot of Vicki "hugging" it. Yes, she is in the shot, on the left side of the trunk.

And Saturday we packed and hung around the house until it was time to go to the airport.

But of course, that's not the whole story. A lot of the hiking took place in the morning and early afternoon. There were wonderful dinners which Vicki helped Carol make. And happy hour in the late afternoons -- a few times down at the normal gathering place down in Old Town maybe a mile down the road at Rosie's. Ah, Rosie. Quite a character (and the source of the title of this post).. and there's nothing that'll tell you more about people than the company they keep and how they interact with it. Jim & Carol are 100% solid human being in my book. These impromtu get-togethers ... dinners, parties, nebulous gatherings are a great attestment to the health of a neighborhood.

Included in that crowd was Aimee, the lady who was supposed to make the peak with me but couldn't. I was expecting somebody around, say, 65... but this lady was much closer to my age. Cute. Fit. I probably would have had to hustle to keep up with her especially with my perpetual camera. She works with the local youth camp for ... kids who've been sentenced for stuff. If they've been good, they get to go maintain the trails on the mountains. Her S.O. Dan is retired from there. Nice guy, from what I can tell.

Jim & Carol's bing cherry tree was overflowing with ripe cherries. There were so many there were plenty for everyone AND the birds, who were feeding off of them in a frenzy. We made some "Cherry Bounce" ... ok, Carol & Vicki made some Cherry Bounce ... cherries, brandy (or bourbon) sugar, and cloves ... you let it sit for two months... or in our case, two days. It's really good on ice cream. Especially the home made stuff Carol made.

We also listened to some of Jim's and Carol's performances (they're both musicians) on CD, and Carol played a few tunes on the piano on Saturday before we left. They've both performed professionally and were in the music dept at UNLV (Jim was the chair for a while). Heard a nice recording of "Misty" with Jim taking the lead on trombone. Always loved that one.

As we were leaving, I thought what the heck, they have slot machines at the airport. You can't put a quarter in anymore. To me that really takes any fun out of it. You can put a dollar in and buy credits, and it spits out a ticket at the end for you to cash in. Bleah. Your credits would go down, then you'd win some, then they'd go down. I figured when the dollar was gone, the dollar was gone. I completely expected to lose it. I was doing it just for the "experience".

Well I got bored with it and Vicki took over, betting the whole pot every time trying to lose it all. After a few minutes it rang up to $5.25, so I said "hey, cash it out. We're winners!" So we did. We made $4.25. That and a quarter will buy you two small bags of potato chips at the airport. So that's what we did.

The flight home made it back 25 minutes early, probably due to a nice tailwind at 39,000 feet. I was giving geology and meteorology lessons to the woman in the seat behind me as we looked out the window and Vicki read a book. She is so kind to let me sit by the window so I can look out. But I think she's getting a bit of window envy. Next time we fly she may have to sit there and I'll be stuck with a book. The drive home from Kansas City took almost as long as the flight. We got in at 1:30 am.

Jim had a home weather station of which I became jealous, and I bought one when we got back. It does inside and outside temperature and humidity, heat index, dewpoint, windchill, and wind speed and direction. I have wireless rain guage to go with it. Pretty rainy today. We got well over 3" overnight and this morning.

(the last photo is a shot of my favorite plant in the mountains, Indian Paintbrush)

Working on a post

But it's going to take a little while. We were gone for a week. And no, this is not the Rockies. I'll leave you with this while I finish it.

Leilani Gets a Makeover

My bobble-hula doll Leilani has been in the back of my car for a few years now. She came with a cheap plastic skirt, which I replaced with a home-made embroidery thread skirt.

Which doesn't make me any less of a man. ;-)

The sun bleached out her skin in several areas, and the combed out embroidery threads were falling off her waist band. She needed a make over.

I didn't take any "before" pictures, but I got some craft paints and re-did her skin and hair -- and the grass, which had turned from green to blue. I also used some fringe border for the skirt. It gave a nicer waist band, since it was built in to the border. I cut it off to an appropriate length. The thread has more weight and actually swishes some ... which the last one didn't.

So my University of Margaritaville car has it's "masthead" figure refreshed and restored and, frankly, looking better than ever.

It's Raining Again

Ha! That one's for Chrissy.

For the longest time most of my posts had song references in them, if not in the title. And they were often in the title.

But the point here is that this has been the wettest first 6 months of the year on record here. Which hasn't been a problem for us, as we're at least 60' above the nearest creek.

However, we've had some water leak into the basement. Which is finished. So it gets in the carpeting.

It's not huge amounts. But man, it takes forever to dry, even after you suck as much water up as you can with the carpet cleaner vac. Last time (like 2 weeks ago) it took about 5 days to dry completely. The smell's not good. Musty. It really bothers Vicki. I'm not elated about it myself.

This only happens when it rains A LOT. But I think I've figured out what is causing the "pressure" that's findint the weak spot. Could be a combination. The discharge from the sump pump is probably too close to the house. And this morning I found that back gutter full of pine needles. The gutter ends right where the backslope from the front of the house meets the hip that makes up the roof for the back of the house. The gutter runs along that hip. And the leak... the leak in the basement is pretty much right below that junction. Since the gutter isn't taking the water my guess is that it's gushing down that valley and dropping on the ground right below that, leaving a LOT of water that needs to drain away from the house ... but apparently can't do it fast enough.

I must've missed that back gutter when I cleaned them last fall.

So we've got fans going full blast down here drying it out. I'm going to make an underground discharge pipe for the sump pump outside this weekend, and also make a PVC riser... so we don't have to use so much flimsy sump pump hose. It wiggles and vibrates and gets holes in it to easily, and the weight tends to pull the hose back into the area under the house, drawing the end of the hose closer and closer to the house over time. It's been known to get pulled all the way inside. And that's not good.

Trenton Shot!

Vicki bought Trenton a "Baby Einstein" playmat. With animals and a big blinky sun that plays songs and all kinds of things to look at. He's not to the point of actually playing with things yet, but things catch his attention. Hasn't quite figured out the "I can control things outside of myself" yet. Well, other than adults. Who feed and comfort. You get to wish which one he wants at any given time. The women are better at telling the difference. Mommy & Daddy have a different mat that has different stuff. He loves them.

We went out to dinner (adults only!) with Brian and Kristin (Mommy & Daddy) to D. Rowe's last night. Three of us had the fish and chips. I always get the malt vinegar with it. Brian had the cob salad. It's important, I think, for parents to get a few moments of adult time from time to time -- especially moms who are basically with the baby ALL. THE. TIME.

Good dinner. Ok, one more pic. Nice to just talk to them about ... whatever. Norway. Swimming pool management.

Summer Float 08

The Hard-Core Four went on the summer float last weekend. Left Friday morning for the Alley Spring Campground, and filled Skyler (Molly's replacement -- that's Kristie's car) to the gills with the grammy bags on top. They hold most of the actual camping equipment.

We were there by 1:00 or so in the afternoon, got camp set up, and then went down to sit in the Jack's Fork River in the shade with a few brewskies on a beautiful, hot, sunny afternoon.

By 3:30 or so, a thunderstorm peeked over the ridge and we headed back to the campsite. It started to rain shortly before we got there. The rainfall was moderate, but we were able to avoid most of the raindrops by staying under the larger trees and didn't have to retreat to a tent. The lightning stayed distant.

We started a fire to make a good bed of coals for cooking, and Kristie got busy doing BBQ chicken after the bed developed. We just stuck the cans of beans on the grill, open, to heat up. She had also brought a lovely potato salad. Needless to say, dinner was very good.

We had paid for the canoes when we got in to Eminence, and picked up some ice. I also got a sized pair of river shoes -- the ones I'd gotten back in Columbia were merely "large" and too big.

In the morning we had Kristie's traditional pancakes along with bacon and Vicki's boiled eggs. I boiled water with my Heinekeg alcohol stove for coffee, and we went to get picked up for our river dropoff at 8:30 am -- our earliest pickup since we've been going with them.

We were on the river a little after 9:00 am and headed for "the chute" which is only a half mile down the river. It's a sharp bend with a "chute" of water that starts at the bend that you can float on your noodles and ride the current. Then you get out... and do it again. Kind of like a dog chasing a ball. We'd brought the springfloat floaty things for the girls, but it turned out they preferred the noodles and Ryan and I liked the spring floaty things.
After several runs Ryan noticed a Midland Water Snake sunning on a willow root in the water at the beginning of the chute. They're non-venomous ... but at that point Vicki was done with the chute. She's ... not a snake person. I had to do one more run past the formidible 12" monster just because. We continued down river to a gravel bank with a nice swimming hole on the outside bend and just settled down to be outside on the beautiful river, in the shade ... swim ... whatever.

A few groups went by. Nobody was obnoxious. There was a buzzing coming from the woods behind us ... it was a bunch of bees pollinating wild grape vines. And about 11:30 we got a fire going using flint & steel & the vasaline-cottonball method. Got the grilliput out and cooked some dogs about noon. And of course, chips. And cheese cubes.

We headed out again after another dip (we didn't wait an hour, either. shhhhhh!!!!) and found other gravel banks and swimming holes. Float. Swim. Dry. Swim. Float. Later in the afternoon we ran across some paddlefish -- a little unexpected -- in a deep hole maybe 10-15 feet deep. Two of them were about 4-5 feet long, and the other three were 2-3 feet. There were some people jumping off of a large rock by the pool. It didn't seem to bother the fish. We got the noodles and the floaty things out and cruised over the fish and just generally relaxed and talked. Eventually I had to jump off the rock before moving on. I cannonballed in to the 7' hole and we continued to the next inviting gravel bar.

We dragged bottom a few times, but only had to get out once where a tree had completely blocked all but a very shallow portion of the river and it was JUST shallow enough that you couldn't make it through.

I think this was the most fun we've had on the actual float. Part of it was because we got to spend more of the day on it. I think part of it was because we were able to plan the day better. I'd brought the GPS and just left it on the whole time, so we knew where we were on the river at all times. It's only a 7 mile float (6.8, to be more accurate) and our moving time worked out to be 2 and a half hours. Meaning you can basically fiddle-fart around on that float and as long as you've made some progress you're not far from the end if you're really just "done" and want to go back to camp. We stretched the day out well.

Went back to camp and Kristie & Vicki made up the poor boy packs and threw them on the coals of the fire. Dinner was good. Then when it got dark, s'mores. Ryan & Kristie crashed a bit after nine. Vicki and I made it to about 10:00.

Then in the morning the sad breakdown and breakfast at Ruby's T&T. And off to home.

The drive back is always quieter than the drive there. But we talked off and on. And then took the wet stuff out, cleaned the tent footprint tarp. And it was all over.

Praise Mary

I got off work today, got to my bike, and the rear tire was flat. Because this has happened before, I carry a can that has "fix a flat" stuff in it that at least partially inflates the tire. I dug it out, and it worked to some extent. It was pretty messy. The tire wasn't fully inflated. But it was enough to get home.

When I got home, I needed to run to the store. I changed out of my biking clothes and looked for my wallett. It wasn't there. It wasn't in my pants. It wasn't in my bag. I remembered it wasn't in my pocket earlier in the day.

I searched the bedroom, took a cursory glance around the kitchen where my stuff would've been this morning when I was getting ready to go. Down by the computer. On the coffee table. Nothing.

Dang. Did it pop out of my bag on the way home? I didn't zip it back up after I got the fix a flat stuff out. Maybe it came out at work when I was loading the bag.

I drove back to work ... most of the driving route is the same as my riding route. I didn't see it. Looked in my office. Not there.

I drove home through the part of my route that goes through campus. Nada. Vicki called. "Did you find it?"

"No."

I got home. We looked fairly thoroughly all over the house. Still no sign of it.

The phone rang.

It was a lady named Mary who had found my wallett by the Newman Center on campus.

Dumb me.

I drove to her place, where she gave me my wallett and I thanked her profusely and handed her a $20 out of it. It didn't seem like enough.

Thank the Lord there are honest people like Mary in the world.

I really need to be more careful.

I went to Walmart to get a few things, including some real anti-flat goo for my tire.

I ran into Gary Godsy. Hadn't seen him in a while. We stood and gabbed for a while. Discussed the midnight fireworks from the Laurie Wedding saturday night (thought that was a bit rude ... couldn't they have done it at 10? Woke us from a dead sleep, and we heard continuous explosions. I didn't know what was going on until I went outside, sans assault rifle, and talked to the neighbors while we saw fireworks over the trees at the end of Bluegrass Ct. Daryl said it was probalby Paige Laurie's wedding. We'd read something about her being registered somewhere in the newspaper so we knew she was getting married sometime soon. Made sense.

I went back to bed and waited for the display of wealth to subside.

We went to Ray & Charlotte's 50th anniversary party Friday evening out at the Elks (I have to wonder how long Paige's marriage will last). There were no pyrotechnics. A few fireworks in their eyes, though. They are a very loved couple. 200 people there. A slideshow of well over 600 photos chronicling their life together played.

The DJ had a mixing board that was made for, and had -- two IPods plugged into it. How times have changed since my Bro Mark used to DJ events with vinyl records.

Saturday we cleaned house a bit ... I applied fungicide to a wet spot on the basement carpet in the basement that got wet due to a sump pump drain malfunction. It's still not dry, and I really sucked it dry with the carpet cleaner and have had a fan on it ever since. It's getting there. Anyway, we went to an annual BBQ picnic/party out at the Coats' place in the evening. It was a very, very pretty evening. They have a nice place out toward the river where they raise and board horses in a large barn (we were also at the barn-raising party) and raise alpacas and make things out of alpaca fur.

The zoysia plugs finally got here. I planted them thursday evening before the last rain. A few of them are starting to wake up. I'm putting it in the area between the sidewalk and the street where nothing will grow. There are a few clumps of grass, some lespedesia, and a lot of dirt. Later in the summer it'll be hard, cracked dirt with clumps of dried grass. In the winter, it's mud.

Hopefully the zoysia will take over and thrive in the heat. If it's brown in the winter, who cares? At least it won't be mud. And it should look nice in the summer from now on.

It's been raining a lot this spring -- it's been the wettest 6 months here on record since January. I have the veggies out in the garden, but they haven't done much yet due to the wet and clouds... and the shade from the trees in the yard.

Went out to dinner at Angelo's with Kristin, Pam, and Trenton Monday evening. Trenton was in a good mood and well behaved. Brian's in Norway with the Marines.

He loves Norway.

Grass

It's been a very wet spring.

We have this strip of ... well, supposedly "lawn" between the sidewalk and the curb that gets baked in the afternoon sun. It has a few patchy bits of bluegrass in it, and what looks like some lespedesia. And dirt. Mostly, it's the dirt.

In the wintertime when it's wet and above freezing, it's mud. In the summertime, it's depressing hard baked dirt with a few clumps of dried grass and weeds sticking up from it.

So for a few years I've been threatening to plant zoysia grass there. It digs heat. Sun. Does well in drought. grows to choke out everything in its path, and generally forms a nice carpet of green in the summertime no matter how hot and dry it gets.

From November through early May it's likely to be straw-colored. But big deal. It's mud colored now. How is that any better?

I ordered some back on April 21, and it showed up yesterday. If it had shown up a month ago, it'd be quite well established, as -- and I mentioned this at the beginning -- we've had a wet spring.

Fortunately for me, the forecast for last night and today was for rain, and rain all day today. (It's not so fortunate for farmers who are having trouble getting into their fields this year to plant -- or people who live along the river). Anyway, I planted the strip out front last night with plugs, and the rain has come, as promised. Hopefully, that'll settle it in nicely and it'll start taking off over the next few weeks.

I'll be interested to see how it turns out.

The Latest Trenton

Just 'cause ... you know... cute and all.

A Short Sprint

Now where was I?

Oh, yes, Aunt Pat and Kaity came to visit ... they got here a couple of Monday nights ago ... so it's been quite some time since I've posted, eh? They stayed for a couple of days and we did a lot of visiting and they went off to Uncle Eddie's.

Usually it's Tom & Betty who put together some ethnic themed dinner for Mothers'/Fathers' day. This time Jeff, Joel, and I put it together. Tom & Betty had their 25th anniversary that week, and Mom thought it would be nice if we did a Hawaii theme for them as they had planned to go there for their 25th but couldn't.

I cooked a pork butt for the Luau party at Mom & Dad's, and a big loin on Friday night. Made pulled pork and a peach/ginger bbq loin. Jeff whipped up Hawaiian fried rice in the wok right out on the porch on saturday. And Joel and Dawn brought a tropical fruit salad and The Margarator™ and made Piña Coladas. Uncle Eddie & "Aunt Pat 'Missouri'" came with cousin Cierra, Aunt Pat and Kaity were there, as well as Julie and Guy. Quite a crowd. Jeff and I helped re-attach some flashing that had blown off the side of the house during a storm. I got to shoot Jeff's Mighty .22 and his tiny .22 magnum. We also popped a few rounds off with the Kel-Tek and the Walther .22.

Then we took off Sunday to get the Godchildren Cassie & Q from Kim's mom who was babysitting them until then while Mark & Cami went to get Cami's mom from California to move her to KC.

I took them to the YouZeum on Monday. I thought they might be a little bored. I'd never been there. It just opened. But we got there around 1:30 and they closed it down. We were there until 5:00, and I would have left any time they were ready. It was an interesting place.

Monday night we found out that Mark & Cami had done some long haul driving and gotten back two days earlier than expected. We had originally planned to have the kids until Friday. I took them to the pool on Tuesday. But when they talked tuesday night to Mark & Cami it was clear that Nathanial (Q) missed them terribly and couldn't stand the fact that they were home and he was not and he hadn't seen them in almost a week. Cassie wanted to stay until Friday, but she gave in to her little brother and I took them back today. Mark met me in Concordia, making my drive about two and a half hours shorter. That was nice of him, especially after having driven 4.000 miles in the last week.

And now its back to us two.

Home Maintenance

It's spring. Just about summer. And we've actually done some cleaning. I did some carpet cleaning last weekend. Also re-stained the deck, and converted the bird bath over to the summer configuration. In the summertime, I have a modified trash can with a filter basket sitting in a hole in the top ... there's a water pump in the bottom, and I have an overflow with a chute from the bird bath that empties into it. This keeps the water moving in the bird bath to keep mosquitoes from breeding in it, plus it keeps the water filtered and increases the effective volume of water in the bird bath. I even have it hooked up to the automatic watering system on the deck to keep the reservoir full.

I got some hanging plants from Strawberry Hill Nursery, and put the plants from last summer that have been kept alive in "the cave" over the winter out there, plus those that wintered in the living room. Oh, and I got the vegetable garden planted and tarpapered over to keep the weeds down. I need to get the auto-irrigation system all hooked up yet for both the garden and the deck plants.

This weekend we put a sil on the top of the half-wall at the top of the stairs. Vicki touched up paint all over the hallway and kitchen. I repaired one of the hanging lamps in the kitchen, and hacked back the grape vine.

We also managed to squeeze in dinner at Murry's this week with the Williams, and babysat for Trenton Friday night. I think we'll be seeing him again tomorrow. Hopefully he'll be a little happier than he was friday night. The kid was tired but he refused to go to sleep until physiolgoy gave him no choice.

Looking forward to Aunt Pat and Kaity coming to visit tomorrow evening. Going out to Mom & Dad's on Saturday for the Mothers/Fathers day shindig and a general family get-together with Aunt Pat and Kaity. Then Sunday go pick up Cassie & Q to stay here a few days while Mama & Papa go get Grandma Lee from California and move her to Kansas City.

Yeah, it's busy around here.

Which of the Four Seasons?

Heard some folks joking around on the radio... someone asking what "Cumin" was, and the reply was "it's a seasoning". "Well which of the four seasons is it?"

Because I'm a bit twisted, I thought "Was it Frankie Valli, Tommy DiVito, Nick Massi, or Bob Gaudio?

I know. Baaaad pun. Shhh. Hey, "C". Big girls don't cry!

Liquid Nails for Shoes

I have repaired shoes many times over the years using lots of different adhesives, including the famous "Shoe Goo".

I repair lots of stuff. I have kind of a McGyver reputation. I hate buying new stuff if the old stuff will do, especially if replacing the old stuff with new stuff requires a significant amount of money.

I have a nice pair of shoes I like, but the sole material kept coming loose, beginning to peel off the softer sole material at the toe. And I cleaned it with alcohol and used Shoe Goo three times trying to fix it.

Each time, within a few days the bond broke down and the peeling started again.

I don't know when I first discovered Liquid Nails for Subflooring. The name itself has a high grunt factor. Subflooring. Something that contractors talk about. It's tough. It's strong. It's not pretty. We cover the sub-floor with pretty stuff like carpet and Pergo and linoleum. (I'll give hardwood a break... it's about as tough as subflooring. But not quite as rough and rugged.)

I've used it to glue boards to a concrete wall to hang tools from. I even used it to attach a board to a concrete wall to attach a hand rail for a staircase. That's what kind of bond you can get with this stuff.

And each time I tried repairing the shoe, I thought "I should be using Liquid Nails for Subflooring."

I'd even looked at Lowes for it, but I couldn't find it.

Well it turns out I couldn't find it 'cause I'm a guy. And guys look for key shapes and colors when they're looking for things. Since all of it is the same shape, I was looking for a color. Not reading the words on the label, really, unless I thought the color was close enough.

Turns out they changed the color on the lablel for the Sub-Flooring mixture to green. I found it last time I looked (after ALMOST giving up).

I bought it. Cleaned the rubber on the shoes again. And applied it.

After it dried, I colored it with a black permanent marker to make it blend in with the rest of the rubber.

That da*ned rubber ain't goin' nowhere. In 10 million years, after the rest of the shoe has rotted away... the Liquid Nails for Sub-Flooring will probably still be there.

Heat Pumpage

The heat pump is officially replaced. I also had a whole house humidifier added. 13 SEER, non-freon, and q-u-i-e-t. Vicki's going to love that last part.

House still smells a little like chemicals. I know it's wierd to get excited about HVAC. But I guess that's part of being an adult. :-/ Hey, it's GOOD to be excited about something you just dropped six and a half grand on.