Monday, October 31, 2005

Almost Home

Did I mention how much I really hate moving? Oh, well.

The living room is finally a living room instead of a temporary storage area. The basement however, is still a disaster along with our bedroom and the office.

The kids' room is always a disaster area by the afternoon, but it is finally put together. Actually, it was the first room finished. The girls needed at least one room that was kid-safe.

Tonight the girls are going trick-or-treating. I think I am more excited now than they are, but I know that will change once they realize that everyone is giving away free candy.

The new house is located in a really great neighborhood so we don't even have to drive around this year.

I plan on videotaping the whole thing, but I bet it'll be too dark for my camera phone.

I was watching Bill Maher the other day (we got HBO again!!!!) and he said that 90% of all parents loot from their kids' candy bags. hehe.

I forgot how much I missed watching Real Time. Bill Maher is the one guy on TV I pretty much agree with on everything. A scary idea for some of you, but it could be worse. I could be one of those idiots watching Sean Hannity. Of course, since he is one of Satan's minions that won't be happening.

Well, I gotta go. More cleaning to do.

Song Of The Day

ROB ZOMBIE
Halloween, Halloween

Sunday, October 30, 2005

Finally Moved

Well, my back hurts really bad and my butt is cramping. The old house is clean and the new one is a mess.

More work to do, but first I am going to go watch the rest of Tedi Bruschi's first game back since his stroke.

I'll be back to full speed tomorrow.
Here's a shot of the new house from the front.

Song Of The Day

COLDPLAY
Twisted Logic

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

The Last Day In Grandview

Well, I am making the last post from Grandview tonight. Tomorrow is the big day.

After tomorrow I don't plan on ever returning here again except when we drive through on our way to Seattle.

We got a much larger moving truck this time, so I don't forsee any trips in the car.

Speaking of trips, after getting around to pricing airfare for Christmas, we've discovered it would cost us $2800 to fly down to OKC. And that's booking ahead now.

Renting a full size car from Avis would cost about $500, plus $300 for gas, around $160 for hotel stays, and that doesn't include food or drinks. Since our little car is so little, I didn't really want to try and make it there and back with presents. Not to mention it doesn't have cruise control.

My leg still aches from driving it up here in the first place.

Robin will get a Christmas bonus on the 22nd, which would help tremendously with travel costs. Getting behind because of Robin's lack of work hours has put us in a bad situation financially and I don't see us recovering in time to do Christmas right for the kids and making a trip down south.

Given that there are four of us here and eight down there we planned on spending the holiday with (assuming Amanda and Sheldon are there), it doesn't look good for a family reunion.

Well, I better run. E-Ring is coming on and the Tivo isn't working at this house anymore.

Song Of The Day

SOUNDGARDEN
Slaves and Bulldozers
Playing around with my phone earlier today I noticed that it has a record of everything I have ever uploaded. Here are some highlights I found from just before the move from Oklahoma.
Mason
Happy grandparents and frisky kids
Mikayla looks happy watching TV with Papa.
Here's another good one.
I love this pic
Before I tear this down and repaint I needed to at least take a picture of the girls' "tower" since it was the first thing I built for them by hand.
Uh oh, busted!
The aftermath of Hurricane Chloe

Wine Country Road

Living in the area of Washington known for its wine, Robin and I decided to try one of the local vintages a while back. The bottle then sat in the fridge for at least two months.

Until tonight.

Cooking up some seafood stir-fry before Robin arrives home from work, I decided that tonight would be the night to pop the cork.

Well, Robin only drank a small glass. Since I can't stand to let good alcohol, especially $20 a bottle, go to waste, the rest was up to me.

Can you say tipsy? Ok well, drunk.

Good stuff.

Anyway, the only show I was able to watch as a consequence was Commander-In-Chief. I diddn't think I was going to like the show when I saw the previews a few weeks ago, but I haven't missed an episode.

The rest of the night was spent singing along to Audioslave and playing XBox (When I wasn't playing Daddy, of course. No matter what you have going on, the girls don't care).

Robin has been increasingly dissatisfied with current working situations and spent most of the night looking at the options for new employment.

Some good stuff open here in Washington. I don't know what else she saw though.

I sent my package to a radio station in the Grand Caymans.

I'm hoping that if we do end up with a job offer, it's at the beach.

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Song Of The Day

AUDIOSLAVE
Doesn't Remind Me

Casual Mondays

After slaving Sunday to get the old place clean enough to show prospective renters, Robin and I were really exhausted today.

While we assumed that she would be heading to the office to start a report on a new drilling contract this morning, red tape kept her home until tomorrow.

Since I was a bit hungover this morning after drinking until the wee hours of the morning while I finished up with the stove, I appreciated the lazy day instead. Robin let me sleep until noon. When finally convinced myself to get out of bed I came downstairs to find that she had made breakfast burritos. REALLY FRIGGIN GOOD burritos, too.

The girls were pretty content to watch their new Cinderella DVD upstairs and Robin and I ordered a couple of PPVs.

First we watched Monster-In-Law with J-Lo and J-Fo, which was a typically generic J-Lo date movie. All her movies are the same. Wanda Sykes stole to movie out from the two though and was hillarious.

Then we watched the highly touted Crash. It's one of those movies Hollwood makes from time to time that has such an intriguing script that every actor in town wants in the movie and a ot of them make it in. Everyone from Sandra Bullock (a racist housewife) to Tony Danza (a racially biased TV producer) to Don Cheadle ( good detective) to Ludacris (car jacker) is in this movie.

Instead of tripping over itself trying to get the message accross, the plots are intertwined in a brilliantly subtle way. Robin hates these kind of movies, though she won't openly admit it, because there is no closure at the end. Well there is closure of sorts, but open ended closure. (It'll make sense after you watch it)

Which I think with a movie like this is the point of the whole thing anyway. Without giving too much away, everything comes together to make a circular view of these peoples' lives. Some things have an ending, or beginning.

It's such a real picture of America today. It's takes your perceptions about yourself and makes you think about how you really feel internally about other types of people.

I love movies like this, you know the ones that make you think. I don't mean to be Mr. Movie Critic today, but this one made me think.

I mean, I watched Kung-Fu Hustle yesterday and you didn't get an hour-long diatribe about Asian filmakers having too much time and money on their hands.

Monday, October 24, 2005

Robin says hello

Song Of The Day

COLDPLAY
Square One

Cleaning Day

I hate moving. Not only do you have to lift everything you own and put it on a truck, drive a big moving truck to the new place and then pick everything up again, but you also have to clean up both your old house and the new one.

No matter how clean you find a place, you can't trust that it's clean enough. So why am I cleaning so much when I know that whoever moves into this place is just going to do it again anyway?

The guilt of breaking a lease? Not really, this place is an electrical fire waiting to happen. There are some light switches that actually get hot while the light is on. Others work at their own convenience.

This place is not worth the rent we pay. The new place is beautiful and cheaper. A smart move in the end, but man I hate moving. Three addresses, one year. That doesn't look good on a credit report. Not that I really have to worry about my credit report looking good because there's no chance of that happening until I win the lottery.

Anyway, I didn't set out to talk about cleaning when I turned on the computer. It just bugged me when I started to type my fingers hurt from all the scrubbing I did under the stove.

I don't think that thing has been cleaned thoroughly in over ten years. DISGUSTING. And a pain. I had to dismantle the damn thing by taking out a dozen different screws and bolts just to get the lid up.

Then I had to disassemble each burner individually to put new drip pans on because the things didn't just pull off like the new ones do. This stove was made around 1970 I bet. It has to be older than me. Everything else in this house is. I don't know what we were thinking to begin with by moving in here.

I don't have that worry about the new place. The place is VERY clean, and nice. Since it is a duplex, it is cheaper than a house. And I don't have to do any yard work.

On a closer inspection the other day I found three new fishing rods in the basement, one not ever having been used. One is small enough for Chloe, but big enough to do real fishing. Very cool for when we go fishing for Blue Gill or Crappie or even trout up at Tucannon.

That's another big plus about the new place. We are moving back to the Tri-Cities and out of the country. We hated commuting from Shawnee to OKC, so I don't know why I thought we would enjoy doing it from Grandview to Richland.

Song Of The Day

THE SEVEN DWARFS
Whistle While You Work

Sunday, October 23, 2005

Robin and her catfish

I may have caught one bigger, but Robin still gets the photo bragging rights.
Robin with a sucker fish
One of my favorite views on the Yakima River. Posted by Picasa
Upstream Posted by Picasa
Hello. Posted by Picasa
Some rapids near the Prosser Dam Posted by Picasa

See You Next Year

Waking up today was no problem. Someone kept beating on the door... or so we thought. I went downstairs and opened the door.

Nobody there.

I went to the other front door to find the same. I looked out the back door. Nothing. I head back to bed a little peeved. I'm almost back asleep when the knocking starts again. Robin hears it this time. I go back downstairs, but the street seems very quiet.

Well, I'm glad we're moving.

Since it is 7:30 am, that means College Gameday is starting the broadcast from Austin. I turn on the TV and snooze off and on until 9:30.

Kickoff... 21 to 3... WOOOHOOO!!!

24 to 24... OOOOOHHH SHHHIITTT!!!!

41 to 24!!!!! M-I-Z!!! Z-O-U!!!!

I'm out the door and on the water for the last day of the salmon run by 2:00 pm. Later than I wanted, but I think the wait was worth it.

I walk down the path to the prime spot on our little stretch of the Yakima and a group of 7 people are packing up and leaving empty handed. Not a promising sign.

"Been here since sunrise," one of them says as they walk away. "The spot is yours. We're headed to Horn Rapids."

Although the fishing is supposed to be better there as well as other places, I am content not to use that much gas. Besides, I just got the primo spot on the whole damn river to myself. I wade on out.

I notice my buddy Joe upstream on another good spot that sits at the mouth of a creek. I wonder how he has done today. When we first met, he had not caught any this run either. Then I took two weeks off... he caught six.

Behind me I notice that someone from downstream noticed the others leaving and made his way to "the pipe spot" where I am.

Great. I got five minutes alone.

I cast my line for the second time.

When you are salmon fishing with bait on a river of this size, you cast upstream and let your bait drift through deep water until the line is just about as far away as you can let it go before setting the hook gets too difficult if you get a bite. Not easy to do if you are next to someone that lacks the edicate necassary not to tangle both your lines. When done right, you can get four or five people within just a few steps from each other.

The guy says his name is John and he doesn't get right in. He drinks a couple of beers.

About 20 minutes go by and he decides it's time to throw out a rattle trap lure. Not cool. This will cut my drift in half. What an ass.

On about my fifth cast my bobber disappears and I rip my pole up to set the hook. NAILED IT.

BOOM! This salmon is pissed and runs hard. I'm not using my $60 salmon/steelhead rod because the reel has been sticking. I'm using Robin's bass rod.

Since I am using 30 pound Spiderwire with a 30 pound test leader, I'm not too worried about the line snapping. I've seen idiots come out here with 10 pound test and pull in 20 pounders.

John watches me battle for 15 minutes and shouts advice at me. "Take your time," he says, "Don't force it. We'll get your first one in."

At this point I notice he has put his pole down on the bank. I assume he is grabbing a net. Since I don't have one, I'm glad. As I walk closer to the bank, others arrive to see me battle what we can now see is at least a 40 inch hen weighing 35 pounds easy, if not more. The other guys stand where they are, engrossed I suppose because I'm using a bass rod.

I get the hen on the grass, which is a good five feet from the dry bank still so my work is not done. Now, John has no net I notice as he has been getting in my way. Not cool.

I begin to drag the fish over the grass toward shore and John steps right next to the fish and spooks it. He steps again almost stepping on it. It tries to run, but I've got the drag on the reel closed since I have it halfway out of the water.

I mean, I should be home free. 25 minutes on the river and I got my first salmon and it's a monster.

SNAP.

The leader is clipped. The salmon is out of my reach because asshole John, whom I have never met before, is in between me and MY FRIGGING FISH. Needless to say, it slips by him and disappears.

I don't know what exactly I said to this guy, but I can tell you it envolved words I've never used before. I was making them up as I ranted. I'm trying not to kill this man and I throw the pole down next to the rest of my gear and walk away.

I call Robin and she talks me down. I gather myself as I walk to the car and back. I have to get my head back in the game because this push will end soon.

The others that came in all nail and bank one. By the time I get reset, the push is over.

John gets one half way to shore and says, "This one is yours."

Just then his boober pops back out of the water. He hadn't set the hook good enough.

I am angry, heartbroken and spent. But I'm not leaving this spot until I get my one.

About 5:00 pm my bobber takes a dive. I feel the roll of a 20 pounder just on the other side of this huge rock. He immediately snags my line against the rock.

Whif.

Another broken line. This time I don't know what happened, there is no sign of my tackle on the end of my line. I guess I didn't tie the knot good enough. Tying Spiderwire is a pain in the ass, especially when you're in a hurry. I should have been more careful.

I see my bobber pop up down river.

My buddy Joe comes by after he uses the last of his bait. Nine for the year. "Not bad," everyone says.

"Where's she at?" he asks.

I am unsure to whom he is referring. Then I am revisited by the pain of earlier in the day.

"Ask the dipshit over there," I respond.

I wade back to shore and tell Joe what happened. I can see John listening to the story.

Since Joe is done for the year, everyone says their goodbyes.

"See you next year."

About a dozen others I have spent the last couple of months with come and go. Not me. Not John.

He stays the rest of the day as well trying to make up for his... whatever.

I don't get one. He doesn't get one.

He finally decides to leave at sunset.

"That's too bad, man. I'm really sorry," he says as he leaves. "See you next year."

"Yeah, probably. But your next one is still mine."

I leave at 7:00 pm, which is well past sunset. I couldn't see the bobber anymore.

I had planned on this being the last day of the year for me. Most of the rivers are closed. If I want to get one, I'm gonna have to do some driving.

Guess I'll have to wait and see if I get over coming up empty handed locally first.

Song Of The Day

LIMP BIZKIT
Break Stuff
Fishing isn't supposed to be a source of violence. Posted by Picasa

Saturday, October 22, 2005

Just before you get on the elevator to head to the top of the Space Needle in Seattle, they take a picture of you. (for a fee, of course) Posted by Picasa

Friday, October 21, 2005

Song of the Day

I plan on doing a song of the day every day from now on, which is why there was one left a few days ago. Since we are in the middle of moving to the Richland house, I haven't been on top of things lately.

After finding out about the passing of my old friend Andy Wolfe, I was really bummed at the beginning of the week. I've never dealt with someone that close commiting suicide.

There was a lot of guilt I didn't expect. Some from being so far away. Some from the way we left things the last time we talked.

I will probably talk more about this later, but for now I'll just say that today's song of the day was actually Monday's because I was reminded of Andy when I heard it.

SYSTEM OF A DOWN
Question!

Sweet berries ready for two
Ghosts are no different than you
Ghosts are now waiting for you
Are you

Sweet berries ready for two
Ghosts are no different than you
Ghosts are now waiting for you
Are You Dreaming

Dreaming the night
Dreaming all right

Do we, do we know
When we fly

When we, when we go
Do we die

Sweet berries ready for two
Ghosts are no different than you
Ghosts are now waiting for you
Are you

Sweet berries ready for two
Ghosts are no different than you
Ghosts are now waiting for you
Are You Dreaming

Dreaming the night
Dreaming all right

Do we, do we know
When we fly

When we, when we go
Do we die
On our first trip to Seattle all we took with us was the camera phone. Sorry about the quality. They looked really good on the phone. Posted by Picasa
The world's biggest guitar. Posted by Picasa
Outside the Pacific Science Center. Posted by Picasa
Taking a break from all the walking.  Posted by Picasa
The Tower. Posted by Picasa
The Sound. Posted by Picasa
Seattle Skyline. Posted by Picasa
The Olympic Mountains are just across the Puget Sound from Seattle. Posted by Picasa
Chloe takes a shot at photography. Posted by Picasa
On our first night ever in Seattle, we came across a huge parade that happens every year downtown. Posted by Picasa
The girls really liked these old guys and thier funny suits. Posted by Picasa
Chloe. Posted by Picasa