Sunday, April 27, 2008

18 years...

Today Denise and I celebrated our 18 year wedding anniversary. I bought her a new necklace that we picked out together. My plan was to do all that last week but events threw me for a loop plus Denise's brother Brian came up to visit before he headed back to Missouri. So today we drove into town for some lunch and to hit the jewelry store. I would like to say it was a wonderful trip but it was pretty much one disaster after another and was pretty frustrating all the way around. The only high part of the trip was Denise finding something that she liked that we were able to get.

I REALLY wanted to make some photographs this weekend and for the most part everything fell apart on that too. So, on the way back when the sun was going down we pulled off the freeway to make some late afternoon portraits. The sun is a bit harsh but I liked the shots...

On the previous topic - there is no information on services for Rosie. It appears that her husband is reluctant to have any and considering the circumstances I can only imaging how hard it must be for him. Everyone that knew her is VERY upset with the entire situation. The only good thing, if you can call it that, is that the guy was booked for murder 1 and has a $1M bail. So hopefully he will stay in jail and can be tried for a potential death penalty case. Although it does seem like the guy was a mental patient and it will probably go down that way... I am still VERY angry about this...

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Rosie Newman...

This was a pretty odd day and started off badly. Early in the day a co-worked notified me that Rosie Newman one of our Spectrum Managers who retired in Oct 2005 was brutally murdered in her Boron apartment by a new neighbor last night around 2230 hrs. As soon as I heard I called Rob to see if he had heard anything, which he had not, and then got confirmation that it was in fact true. It is really hard to express the range of emotions one goes through when a scentless act like this occurs. There is a news paper article about the incident here.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

Coffee shoot...

I have been thinking of doing a studio shoot of coffee. It has been one of those things that has been on the list but I have not been able to get to. With my mom and Max here (and Max with her new Canon 5D) I thought I would go ahead and set up the shoot so Max and I could play. Denise was good enough to be the hand model for the shoot.  So I was able to work through some ideas that I had and I am happy with the results.

So they packed up their stuff and headed back home today.  Although it was a quick visit it still was good!

Saturday, April 19, 2008

Poppy Festival...

Even with all the drama of work schedules, bad backs, etc we still made it to the Antelope Valley Poppy Festival today. This is an annual event that Denise looks forward to every year. Nana and Max also came down to go to it. The last time they went Desirae was just a baby and Devin wasn't too mobile. Although it was a long day and very windy we had a pretty good time down there. Denise found the tied-dyed shirts she was looking for and other than the whining that the kids generally do it was pretty cool. Afterward we went to Famous Dave's for dinner which was awesome (as usual) and left everyone feeling like they wanted to explode. The one funny part of the day was when Deanna decided to be a street bum and laid down on the sidewalk to take a rest. It was really cute.

The original plan was that we would stay in the trailer at the Antelope Valley Fair Ground RV Park but with Denise's back and such we decided that wasn't a good idea. I drove back down there on Friday to pick it up and instead just ended up crashing down there for the night. Today, on our way back, my Mom stayed back with me to connect up the trailer and bring it home. Having the power jack and such makes it much easier to it wasn't too bad. Now it is just a matter of wait and see how everyone feels tomorrow!

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Deanna playing in garden


Saturday, April 12, 2008

In town...

Well, we were all feeling a little bit better today and decided to drive into Bakersfield for lunch/dinner and to hit a couple of stores. I really wanted to get some information about audio/video receivers and see if there was a realistic solution that would enable us to run everything through on device instead of having to switch everything around.

For lunch we ended up going to The Red Lobster and it was pretty good. Devin really wanted crab legs but we were not sure how well he would do with them so we had him punt on that and just give it a try with one of Denise's. He actually did pretty good so next time it is crab leg central for the little guy. I was actually surprised because those things are a major pain...

The A/V receiver search went pretty good and as it turned out the one I really wanted to get was on sale and about the price i was willing to pay for a less-feature-rich one. Since the store (Circuit City) has a pretty good return policy (30 days) I went ahead and got a Denon 888. It was pretty easy to set up and seems to be working pretty good. I think it also has more power than our old unit (Onkyo) but the main goal was to have a method to switch everything to the right mode. With the Onkyo we had to always switch modes on the TV and the receiver. It was a major pain. So this should alleviate that problem. Like I said we also have 30 days to make up our minds so that is cool.

Friday, April 11, 2008

Do you ever have...

One of those days where everything just seems to go wrong? Well that was my Friday. It started out okay enough, if you call the alarm going off a good start. So I jump into the show, like I always do, and proceed to go through my morning ritual. Now, the one difference for this morning, is that I was pretty darn tired. So as I was finishing in the shower I started to shave, again like I always do, every morning, every day. But this morning I "missed" and shaved a little section off the corner of my nose. You know, in one of those areas where you can't put a bandage and that bleeds like a stuck pig. Fortunately when I did it it didn't really hurt too bad. So I finished up and got out of the shower to survey the damage. Like I said I was bleeding pretty good.

I decided to move on with the morning to see if it would stop bleeding (ya right) and after a little while I called Rodney (our Deputy Squadron Commander) and let him know I was going to be running a bit late because I tried to CUT MY NOSE OFF... Anyway after a couple of hours the bleeding finally did stop and I got to a point that I could get ready to head off to work.

Well, just as I was getting ready to walk out the door the telephone rang... The school was calling because Devin fell and bent his hand backward and they were not sure how bad it was. At this point Denise decided she would go check on him while I stay a bit longer a watch Deanna. Since there was a chance that she might have to take him to urgent care. Just to set the record straight he was okay just a little bruise on the top of his middle finger on his left hand. So Denise sent him back to his classroom.

Okay, so here is the best part. While I am home with Deanna she does "the deed" and needs a diaper change. Well sometimes I carry her around with one hand while she grabs my hand with both of her hands. So I am carrying her back to the changing table (with one hand) and as I get in there I twist and - POP - my back goes and I come down like a sack of potatoes... So there I am laying in the middle of the floor with Deanna hanging around my face with the sweet aroma of Deanna's dirty diaper wafting through the air as I lay there wanting to just die.

So, after a couple of minutes I get back up (at least I was able to move) and have Deanna climb herself up on the changing table. I go through the motions of changing her (which wasn't fun, well it wasn't fun for different reasons this time) and discard the offending aroma generator and head straight to bed.

Denise came home a few minutes later and brought me the appropriate medication (thank god we still hand some) and the telephone. So I call work back and tell them (Rodney) that I'm done for the day. Fortunately we have a better idea of how to deal with this so immediately (when Denise got home) I got ice on my back and the right drugs. So today (Saturday) I am VERY stiff but I can at least move around. I still feel like I have a knot in the middle of my back but it is not as bad as it normally would be.

Anyway, I hope everyone got a good laugh at my misfortune... I think maybe when I read about this (a year from now) I will just laugh and laugh about this... Ah, then again maybe not!

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Deanna's turn...


Deanna wanted to play in front of the video camera today. So, with Denise and Desirae out at Girl Scouts and Devin - eh - playing video games, I set up the camera and played with Deanna for a bit. She wanted to spend more time trying to look behind the camera but she was still cute...

Saturday, April 05, 2008

Devin's book...


As many of you know Devin has been working on a "book". Every once in a while he decides that he wants to take a break from playing video games to work on his book. Today was one of those days and he agreed to let me video him while doing it. He actually worked on it for about an hour (he types slow) so it is really cool that he sticks with it and keeps going back to it.

Other than that it was a pretty quite day around the house. Denise's back is still not doing great. She had another appointment on Friday where another doctor decided to give her some muscle relaxers. I am not sure how well they are helping but at least she is on something different. They also x-rayed her back and will give her the results of that sometime next week. Hopefully everything will go back to normal soon though!

Friday, April 04, 2008

First Friday...

As I have mentioned before every "First Friday" of the month we have a Squadron event. This Friday was no different. The one thing that was different is that it was the first - First Friday where Caleb was back. It is hard to believe that he left in Oct of 2006. So I had the chance to re-introduce him to all the folks here and talk a bit about what he was doing for the last year and a half. Col Austin also gave out a couple of certificates but other than that it was a pretty low key event. My section had the "appetizers" and we ended up bringing 6 home made chilies, 2 meatballs and spaghetti. It was really good and I think we all had a good time. The different chilies were really good too - and Denise made an outstanding batch as well! The rest of the photographs can be found here!

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Thursday, April 03, 2008

Desirae talking...


Desirae really wanted to make a video this evening. We couldn't really come up with an idea so we just set the camera up and let her play to it. I then edited the video together and made the clip above.

For those concerned about Denise's back... It is still giving her a bunch of problems. She is going to her appointment tomorrow - the one she almost canceled - so hopefully they will give her better medications and a better idea of what is going on...