Early Birthday Present

The first post in quite a while I know. Truth be told, I'm not a very exciting guy. (Don't tell anyone.) You could have expected a post when I got back from the coast because we got to go to Monterey and to conference and my birthday, but you get an extra treat because I was surprised with an early birthday present last night. Taa Daaa! I got a Shuffle!!!!! I am firmly convinced that the iPod is an amazing machine. They are far superior to other music players. Since Lauri's Pod was recharging, I used a Mp3/Cd player (a thing that played CD's with Mp3's on them) and I stuck the big old thing in my cargo pocket on my shorts and the big ole headphones. I was stylin' let me tell you. It's sooo great! Here's a picture:
I haven't listened to it yet but I'll have it for the ten hour drive to the coast.
Did any of you know that Dr. Pepper changed their logo? It looks pretty cool.
In other news we watched Temple of Doom today. I was expecting a little gross and nasty but other than that a good flick. What others had not told us was that this was one of the lamest movies this side of Time Bandits. It was awful. Horribly, horribly lame, corny, and just poorly done. What were Steven and George thinking? I'm ashamed of them. Here are some reviews from others in the family:
"On a scale from 1 to 10, it'd be hard to bring this one above a two." Dad
"Whew." Mom
"How much longer is it?" Lauri
I would not recommend this movie or even watch it again. It is amazing that Raiders and The Last Crusade were such great movies and this one was a bomb.
Another news, only three more sleeps 'til the coast!!!!!! Yay! It'll be great. I have probably twenty geocaches in the areas that we'll be in. We're planning on doing some caches with our friends from conference on the Friday after conference ends, my birthday. In sadder news, I have to drive some of the way to the coast and driving is almost as bad as the Temple of Doom. Almost.

Well, What do I want to talk about?

By a show of hands, how many of you have seen Minnesota Cuke? Now put your hands down and tell me how many of you have seen the Indiana Jones trilogy. Now tell me which one is your favorite. Thank you. This having been said, I'm on an Indiana Jones binge (is that the word I'm looking for?) right now. The Indiana Jones ride was mine favorite of all of the rides at Disneyland and we just got the Indiana Jones trilogy on DVD!!! And there was much rejoicing. Technically it was a Father's Day present but Dad decided to buy it early so we just told him it was one. None of us have seen the second one before and none of us have had the desire to. But now that we have the DVD's, we're going to have to. Since all of the hubbub about Indiana Jones, the video game for Xbox has climbed to near the top of my birthday list. I had forgotten that George Lucas had produced these movies and that John Williams did the music. I noticed that the love themes for both movies were very similar. I'll change my song to something else soon probably cause I don't want the songs to get stale.
In other news, (sorry, no gnus today) Dad and Mom have to go to a NARFE (National Active and Retired Federal Employees) meetings and Dad has to "give a prayer." We don't really know when they'll get home. There are plenty of questions in this post so in case you claim that you have nothing to comment on, here's one more: Have any of you been to the Indiana Jones thing in DisneyWorld?

Disneyland & Other Gnus

Disneyland was great! We all had so much fun and it was just a blast! I won't give you a time schedule seeing as how that concept has kind of been used by others in the WEBNET a lot recently. We spent the first day in Disneyland Yay!!!! Well, that is only half true. When we first got there, we went to Downtown Disney to take a quick look at the park and the shops. I really liked one of the shops but it was too big and I didn't really know what stuff I wanted to look at. My favorite shop was not Disney at all but rather a Lego shop. However, Legos are not what this post is about so I will stop.
When we first got into the park, we rushed over to Indiana Jones per Granddad's request, (even though he had printed out a nice schedule for us that didn't have Indiana Jones first.) I was more than a little nervous at first because I don't like any drops. They tested it out for me and loved it and told me that I would and what do you know? I loved it. It turned out to be my favorite ride in the entire park. Pirates was closed because of remodeling and that was a bum. Grandmom and Granddad had us go on Haunted Mansion and it was better than I was expecting. We went on some other rides but no pictures taken with characters, (sorry Brenda, but we did get this We went on some other rides and I didn't quite work up the courage to go on Star Tours yet. Then came my favorite part of the day by far: the fireworks. They were amazing. I enjoyed them so much that it's hard to write about them. So I won't try too hard.
Next day was California Adventure. We first went to Soarin' Over California. Better known by Dad as, California Adventure. Don't ask me why, I don't know. I loved it. It was all that it was cracked up to be and more. But if I loved it, Dad was crazy about it. After we had ridden it three times or so, we finally convinced his to see some of the rest of the park. We really enjoyed the 3D Muppets and were kind of let down by all of the hype of Monsters Inc. the new ride. Lauri and Mom loved Screaming. I, obviously, didn't go. We did wait in a ridiculously long line for the Ferris Wheel. We did get a picture from the top of the world: It's kind of creepy I'll admit, but it was fun. Another really fun thing we did was to see the Aladdin real life play. It was excellently done and we enjoyed it so much that we started to watch the video last night. Then we watched the fireworks again, man they were awesome.
On the third day I finally did work up the courage to go on Star Tours and I did enjoy it. Granddad and Zachary said that it made them sick and I started to get motion sick but it didn't get too bad. I forgot to mention that the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blaster ride was among my favorites too. It was great but I think those guns cheated me.
Here's another picture, this time from the 50th Anniversary display: I really like that one.
Souvenir wise I did very well. I walked off with three shot glasses, one deck of cards, and seventeen, count 'em, seventeen smashed pennies. And a penny display case to boot!
I have to say that, between the two parks, I enjoyed Disneyland more. It was more happiest-place-on-earth-y.
In other news, we're back to school and this week are those retarded tests that come once a year. At least we don't have to take them at the mormon church. Oh, and guess how many smashed pennies I have but not those of you who already know, that kink of goes without saying.
A couple more pictures:
And a gnu:

Just a Quick Little One

Okay, okay. Since I recieved 9 comments, I figured I should update before Disneyland. As most of you probably already know, we get to spend an extra day in Disneyland. Yeah!! I'm excited. I haven't gotten a clear cut answer about Star Tours yet. Is it fun? Will I get sick? Will I go on it anyway because it is about Star Wars?!?!? Okay, Indiana Jones, Pirates of the Carribean, Buzz Lightyear, sorry, no teacups for me, and I might go crazy and try space mountain. Apparently there is a raft ridish thing in California Adventure. Is that as fun as, say, the one in Six Flags Marine World? That's for those of you who been there obviously. For you others, (the majority), how is it anyway? For something not about Disneyland, we did Easter Eggs with the awesome Star Wars kit that was a Target exclusive. It had Star Wars stickers, those wrap around things that you submerge in hot water to make them go onto the egg, some of those same wrap around things with faces of Star Wars people on them and little stands that looked like the character's bodies. Anyway, I'd probably put some pictures on here if I weren't so lazy and church didn't start in fifteenish minutes. Well, technically, it doesn't start till 9:30 and we're going to brakefast anyway with a Sunday School teacher who is usually late. Oh well, I guess it wasn't so short.

Happy Easter!!!

I guess I just start without too much of an introduction. Today went well. We got up at five o'clock and went to the sunrise service. The sun rose while the service was going. Dad sang the Watch the Lamb song and everybody cried and it was good. Attendance was really low and besides us, there was only one other person in Sunday School! We've hung out this afternoon, had some folks over for Easter dinner, played Super Mario Sunshine and read. We technically don't get a Easter Vacation but we had a half day on Friday and we get tomorrow off. The reason that we don't get a technical Easter Break is because, in nine days, and you ready for this? Drumroll please, bum,budda,bum,budda, bum, bum,,, We're going to Disneyland!!!!! On Tuesday after next, we are going, with Grandmom and Grandad to spend Wednesday at either Disneyland proper or at California Adventure, and on Thursday it'll be the other one. Can you believe that Anaheim is only four and a-half hours from our house? Anyway, that's exciting. It's not spur of the moment, it's been around for a while, we just weren't sure till a couple of days or so ago. If nothing else, respond commentwise with recommendations about rides and especially a response to my traditional Easter greeting: He is Risen!!!!!!!!

The Saga is Complete. Well, not really.

Actually a new saga has pushed it's way (rather beginning) onto special edition dvd. The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe was released today making cinematic history. Or maybe making ye old BBC version mesh with history. We went to Wal-Mart with much anticipation. Usually there's a display of new movies at the front of the store. Sure enough. However, all that I saw was the regular dvd and some Wal-Mart special including a book or something. No special edition. I then went back to the electronics and found what I was looking for. It was a lot more expensive but it was like five times better than the pansy version. The pansy version had four special features: two commentaries and some bloopers and some trivia. The special edition dvd had a whole nother (like how I worked that in there) disc with special features. Not to even mention the fact that compared to the Special Edition, the pansy version just looked, physical appearance this time, like junk. Needless to say, I'm excited. If any of you have not yet seen The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, you should see it.
Besides that, the only really cool thing that has happened is the fact that Mom's home from Valwood's 50th anniversary shindig. Pretty much just school. To give you something to say on your comment, (for those of you who have seen it) who was your favorite character or what was your favorite part of the movie. For those of you who haven't seen it, why not?

Fur Justin and Lauri

It's interesting that Elise was never found......
How has everyone been? I don't know if you know but my Mom's aunt passed away on Monday early so we went down there on Tuesday and came back today. I don't really enjoy funerals. They're overrated. Two t's? Or maybe overmiced? On to happier stuff: We get to do school again on Monday!!!!! Wait. Tomorrow is three services. Count 'em. Three. I think that that's kind of dumb but we don't want people leaving 'cause there's no place to sit. Lauri and Mom are both of the verge of being sick. Mom's pushing it a little closer than Lauri. I still need help on my buttons Lauri. Somebody, I can't mention any names, I can say that he still hasn't seen Episode III, needs to help me on that. Has anyone ever heard of Berries and Cream Dr. Pepper? It's weird. It's about four in the afternoon on my mental clock and only one o' two on the 'puter. I hope we get to go to Walskees this afternoon. To wrap this post up, I'll ask: How many bananas does a banana slug eat daily. So, how many bananas does a banana slug eat daily?

Monday!!!!

Don't you love 'em? Actually for me it hasn't been that bad. We got back from Redding after having a fun time and an uneventful drive. We picked Daisy up last night and gave her one of those toothbrushes to chew on. Kind of like a treatish thing you know. On the package it said edible. This morning, we woke up, Mom fed her and she didn't eat. She was being very sluggish and suffice to say, she's at the vet to see if she's okay. I wish vets weren't so expensive. Another Mondayish (another one of those words for you Uncle Randy) thing is that Lauri's sick. So that's a bummer. On the bright side, we are home and Dad is going to be back in the states again tonight so hopefully we'll get to talk to him this evening. I really don't have any questions for you so that I can rack up the comments but I thought that I'd post because I've been held to my eight comment rule. I hope work went well for all of you and Uncle Randy, I guess I wasn't specific, how were those books? Merry 13rd of March!

The Caped Crusader Strikes Again

I don't know, I couldn't come up with a title. Well, old pap's gone to Haiti. He is offically in Haiti today after having spent a day in West Palm Beach. We on the other hand are stuck here doing school. However, only for three days this week.... On Thursday, we're going to Redding to see Zachary and Brenda and their new house! Let's see: Sibling's new house to school. Which one will win out? Yeah, so we figure it'll rain and we'll enjoy that with them and probably Chuck. At least I think we'll see him. Things have been pretty normalish around here with the possible exception of Laurie and her painted room. We're excited about that trip and I think that I'll probably buy Nintendogs for the ten hours. The only bummer about the drive is that I'll probably have to drive seeing as how I now have my permit. And no, it doesn't derserve it's own post because that's bad news instead of good. So, to end my post I have two questions for you. You may answer one or the other, preferably both. Firstly: Have any of you read C.S. Lewis' science fiction trilogy? The second is, of all of the Star Wars movies, which character is your favorite. Scrap the only answering one of the questions, answer both. Please.

I'm told that people actually enjoy my posts

So I guess that I'll just fill you in on my wild and crazy life. We got finished with school early today so I had time to post. As most of you know we went to the Mt. Charleston Lodge and stayed there Sunday night. That was really fun. There was some snow up there and we got to mess around in that. One time we got out of the car to play in the snow while Dad and Mom rested. And boy, they rested. We got some snowballs and, as is our common practice, we threw them at the car. They both almost keeled over and breathed very heavily the next couple of minutes.
Totally new subject, I got my first issue of Star Wars Insider in the mail today!!!!!!!! It has this really awesome article that pretty much all of you couldn't care less about. It is all about the clone troopers of Episode III and the EU books surrounding it. I'm very excited.
Another totally new subject....... nope, that's about it. But I guess I'll put a picture on here to appease you I'll let you try to figure out what it is and there is plenty of stuff to comment on this time so have at it.

And Now, For the Moment You've All Been Waiting For.....

But first a word from our sponsers: Oh wait, I don't have any sponsers yet. Many pictures have been put on blogs of many things close to the hearts of my family. Most notably, a dog that is most of the time very loud and annoying, however cute she is. So, I know that yall like pictures on posts so I put the picture of the best thing since sliced bread, nay, the best thing in the world!!!!!!!!!!!!! So here it comes: I present to you, OUTBOUND FLIGHT!!!!!!!!!! Admire it in all of its hardcover goodness. Now, not to demerit my book any but you'll probably notice that I have a new song. We kind of have a history together. Back in the old country, Mom and Lauri always made me accompany them to Mervyns and this song played every time I was in the trying on room, the worst part of it all. Hope you like it and don't feel obligated to unmute it after the first time. I'll change it after a while. Just to make sure that you don't for get what this post is about:

I'm Overwhelmed

Man, talk about my admiring public! Dad and Mom got home yesterday and today we went to the Sparks-O-Rama. It was really weird, they had five participating teams and didn't want to have three teams competing or only two, so they invented the AWANA pentagon. It was really weird and our Sparks team received fourth place ribbons. I don't know why, we were beat by all of the other teams and one of our kids got a second place ribbon. I don't think the AWANA of the greater Las Vegas area can quite handle a pentagon. The weekend is nice. I'm glad about the lack of school even though we had to get up at 6:30ish to be at the church at 7:00 to leave "promptly" at 7:15. We didn't get gone 'til 7:31. Not that I was constantly checking my watch or anything. The AWANA is almost kind of organized here. Someone found our new geocache. Ok, I'm scraping for things to say here. I'm not into things continuing on after it's already lost it's coolness. Sooo, whenever you want an update about my wild and crazy life, just push the eight comment line. :) Here's your chemistry question for the day: Without cheating, what is a more common name for Magnesium Sulfate or MgSO4?

We're all alone, there's no one here besiiiiide us.

Normally, I try to let my post accumulate at least eight comments before my next post. But I understand that commenting on a tag might be hard.
So, as my title suggests, and for those of you who frequent Lauri's blog, Dad and Mom are gone on a mini-conference and we're stuck here doing school. Last night at the Suttons (who picked us up terribly early) we watched a "Monk" episode and started "The gods must be crazy". It's a pretty weird movie but I guess is Mr. Sutton's favorite. Apparently he likes the slapstick. Oh well...
I got Star Wars monopoly saga edition. Lauri and I played it today and it was great! (Did you like that exclamation point I put in there for you Zachary?) It was good stuff.
Pictures of dogs merit comments, and so do questions about shelves, so what do I do? I don't know. Ummmmm... Feel free to express your feelings on anything in my post or something else having something to do with......dihydrogen.........monoxide?

Fine

I'm sorry that I couldn't make it bigger or more readable. What can I say? I'm no Zachary. Anyway, this is what I thought of when I heard of tagging. Soooo, to please Lauri, Katie, and Zachary, here it is:

4 jeeooorrrbs that I've had in my life:

Yeah, I'm gonna go for the job that I am currently doing: Cleaning the Church on Fridays
I guess that feeding cats on a semi-regular basis constitutes as a job

6 movies that I could watch over and over:
The Hunt for Red October
Jerimiah Johnson
The Music Man
Kuzcooooooooo (that's his name)
I don't really know if I could stand Mark Hamill over and over again, but the thought
of any Star Wars movie should be in there
Alex and Emma

4 places that I've lived:
Blanca, Colorado (I was born there and lived there for a year and a halfish)
Worthing, South Dakota (six yearsish)
Anderson, California (eight yearsish)
Pahrump, Nevada (what must be at least fifty years)

4 tv shows that I love to watch:
Whose Line is it Anyway?
Mythbusters
The Fairly Odd Parents
The Dick Van Dyke Show

4 places that I've been on vacation:
Four Faces (although I was relatively young)
The Northern Coast of California
San Diego
The Grand Canyon

4 websites that I visit daily(ish):
www.homestarrunner.com
www.starwars.com
www.ebay.com
For my forth (you can scold me if you wish) I'll just put blogs 'cause those three
are it and then not much else

4 of my favorite foods:
Way up there, high above all else: Leftover Pizza
Baked Potatoes with bacon bits and butter
Astro Pops, the best popsicle in the world
I do love my sweet cherry peppers

4 places that I'd rather right now:
Skiing (I don't mean to be a copy-cat but that sure comes to mind)
On the coast
With all my family
Certainly not at Olive Garden
Ouray

Some of my friends called (and still do to my knowledge) the game of tag, chase. So I'm going to chase the two who never check blogs or post but are both due for their two month check up: Ben and Jay. I hope you enjoyed my ridiculous post.

Long Live the Schnez!

Schnezoslovakia is one of the coolest countries to date. I'm sure that there's a lot of cool stuff about it but the only thing that I know about it is the name. Schnez. It has a nice ring to it, don't you think? Surprisingly, everyone does not pronounce it like I do. It's real name is Czechoslovakia. When I saw the word Czech as a young boy, I read it Schnez. Face it, which sounds cooler: Schnez... or check. That's what I thought. The reason for this post is the fact that there is a Schnez store between Dallas and San Antonio and Katie and Justin stopped by there on their way back from Nanny's house and got me some souvenirs. They looked and looked and finally decided on these: They are awesome. Thanks Justin and Katie. Also, there is a www.czechstop.net that looks pretty cool.

A Whole lot of Nothing

I didn't really have anything new to update about,but I kind of needed to update. I've been told that pictures really enhance your blog. However, as I was going through iphoto, the only picture that caught my eye was a picture of the whale at Marine World. I kind of thought that that wouldn't be a good blog-type picture. I watched Kronk's New Groove. It was ok except for one thing, the girl that Kronk hooked up with was a stinkin' Brit. (The first Kuzco was awesome for those of you who don't know. You should see it.) The funniest parts of this one were the very few scenes with Kuzco actually in them. I'm sure that nobody really cares about my review of this movie, but if I don't add ramblings, my posts would be incredibly short. By the way, y'all should really check out Grand-mom's blog and encourage her to post more often, or should I say again.

Happy New Year!

Is there an "s" on New Year? Some places have on their signs: Happy New Years'. Happy New Years' what? Happy New Years' potted plant? Maybe not. Anyway, I'm very unup to date on blogage. Not to be mispronounced as rhyming with montage unless of course you are a mom. The trip was great. It was great to see everybody, everybody doesn't include those whom I didn't see. But I had a great visit with those that I did. If you can make any sense of those two last sentences, you get extra points. On our trip, the number of geocaches we've done topped two hundred. Thank you, thank you. Harvest Moon was all that I wished for and more. Lauri might like it more than me but it's great. I got some good farming advice from Aunt Carey. I hope that everyone elses vacation went well to. In short, it has been a great Christmas vacation and even though it's hard to get back to the old grind, it's the grind that God gave me. And I'll grind it 'til it's good and ground. Or would that be grunded?

Merry Christmas (Eve)!

The reason the Eve is in parentheses is because today is our Christmas but for everyone else it's an Eve. Many of you were confused about my last post. That was the desired effect. Tomorrow we embark on a perilous journey. Well maybe it's not perilous but it sure will be dang long. Thankfully we will have many distractions. Dad got a thing (I forget the technical name for it right now Zachary) so that we can watch movies on his compy during the drive tomorrow and Monday. As you know, unless you don't read my blog, I have a couple of games for the drive as well as six new books. I got Kronk's New Groove for Christmas so maybe we'll watch it on the drive. I haven't ever seen it before but it looks fun. Now, I talked before about how to end a post. I still don't know, but my posts always seem like they don't really require comments. I suppose to end I should ask a question: How much ground, Could a ground hog hound, If a ground hog could hound ground?

The Figures

These were the diagrams:
Eating one Battery

Eating five batteries

A well thought out post

Normally, I'm not the one to post two time so close together, but I will make an exception today. If you haven't read my last post yet, I strongly suggest that you read that one as well. I wrote a paper and I thought that you might enjoy it.




“A Well Thought-Out Englilsh Paper”
by: Kyle “The Yellow Dart” Smith



Since maybe like the Middle Ages, there have been many differing opinions about


hustle and bustle. This cannot be denied. It is my intention to sit down and play video


games for several hours.



First, moving around quickly, and with purpose, is a true sign of character.


Secondarily, bustle(e.g. hustle) yields more product for the working types. “Hustle and


bustle are like my right and left arms,” said Li’l Spicy in his famous “Hustle and Bustle


Are Like My Right and Left Arms” speech. Webster’s defines bustle as “excited and


often noisy activity; a stir.” A stir, indeed. Finally, sometimes gross stuff can be funny.



In conclusion, I, “The Yellow Dart,” think I have done a great job illustrating the


many differing opinions about hustle and bustle, may they both rest in peace. Also, I


think Strong Bad should decrease The Cheat’s allowance.





“Eating One Battery”

fig. 1


“Eating Five Batteries”
fig. 2
I'm really sorry if the diagrams don't show up. They're great and if you ask I'll tell you where to see them.