Westward Ho!

We recently returned from a nice trip to Utah. It was both a snowboarding trip and a family visit trip (and for me a business trip also). Nice to have it be so multi-functional.

We went snowboarding twice, one full day at Beaver Mountain and one full day at Snowbasin. They were such different experiences. At Beaver, there were a few inches of new snow and we spent a good portion of the day off the beaten path enjoying the powder. At Snowbasin, there was pretty much no new snow and the groomed trails were a bit hard, but we had such a large group with us and were less familiar with the terrain so it we stayed on the trails so it didn't matter that there wasn't fresh snow. Considering what snow conditions have been this season, I'd say we got pretty lucky on this trip!

Lunch break at Snowbasin

We snowboarded (and some skiied) with lots of Jeran's extended family at Snowbasin. It was so fun!

We visited Temple Square and toured the Conference Center with friends.

We got to some good quality time with family and visit with friends and relatives.We played lots of fun games, shoveled snow (some of us...), and forgot to take many wonderful pictures. As always, it went by way too quickly, but it's good to be home!

Diving

Jeran and I just finished the first two class sessions in our scuba diving certification training. All I can say is that it is awesome! There are six classes total and then five open water dives.

It is amazing how much more comfortable I was with the diving during the second class than the first. Although part of that may be better equipment - my mask in the first class was killing my forehead but I used a different one last time - they say that one of the most important parts of their class is the repetition so you are comfortable doing those things. With all of us (eight students and one instructor) sitting at the bottom of the pool, we practice skills that may not have been entirely comfortable the first time or two, like removing your regulator (what you breath through) and tossing it behind you and then locating it and breathing through it again, or removing your mask and putting it back on repeatedly, or even removing your whole tank and everything and carrying it in your arms while you swim.

Anyways, we have really been enjoying it.  We have gotten home pretty late from class (around midnight) so we've been a bit tired and I've pretty much given up on my hair looking nice for three weeks. I feel more and more confident with each class that it is something we will both love and something fun that we can enjoy doing together.

O Christmas Tree!

Our Christmas decorations are pretty simple this year. We have three very diverse trees and our stockings hanging from the mantle and that's it. Actually, the stockings are still on the ground waiting to be hung from the mantle...

Last spring, I found a nice Christmas tree at a garage sale around the corner from us for $10. Score! We had thought about getting an artificial tree for the last few years, but they are a pretty expensive storage hog.

We didn't avoid the storage hog problem, but at least we didn't pay much for it!

I decided to make some ornaments for our tree this year. I crocheted some snowflakes and those two red hearts and I made the three white yarn balls. I intended to make more yarn balls but you go through the adhesive for them much quicker than expected.

My favorite part of putting up the Christmas tree is watching Jeran put the lights on each year. :) Actually, I really enjoy hanging the ornaments, but I am grateful every year when Jeran puts the lights on the tree.

This is a Christmas tree that I made in Achievement Days when I was 10 or something. It's made of glass baby food jars hot-glued together and then drill 2-3 holes in each lid (enough total for your strand of lights). Put a sprig of tinsel in each and stick a bulb from your Christmas lights into each hole. I have to reglue some of it each year when I take it out of the box, but I like hot glue so I'm never too sad. It's very cheery!

And Jeran's awesome fiber optic Christmas tree. It changes colors and rotates. Sweet!

Merry Christmas!

Weekday Camping

Last night we went camping overnight. It was really wonderful. We went to Jordan Lake's Poplar Point camping area. It was right on the lake with trees all around and a sandy beach right by our campsite. There was only one other tent campsite in use in the campground (according to the ranger) and we never even saw them, so it was very quiet and peaceful.

We set up our tent and started a fire and then made our traditional camping dinner: a creamy Bear Creek Soup cooked over our awesome Brunton Raptor camp stove, and a loaf of french bread. Actually this time we got an artisan rosemary peasant loaf (or something...) because it was on sale, but usually it's a loaf of french bread and we pull off chunks to dip in the soup. Mmmmm.  Then I carved a stick and ate a lot of marshmallows and Jeran ate some more jerky. Hard to say which is better.

Then we sat in silence (mostly) and watched the fire and the stars. It was just cool enough that a fire felt really nice but warm enough not to have one side of you freezing at any time. We saw some shooting stars and waited for our wood to run out and the fire to burn down and just had a wonderfully peaceful evening.

As always, we were wakened slightly earlier than desired by the substitute Tobys, which were crows today (the squirrels must have been too busy). We cleaned up some, made hot chocolate, ate powdered donuts, and sat by the lake watching the fish jump, an egret wading, and the sun rising. All in all, a practically perfect campout. We decided we should have been doing this more often: work a later day from 11 AM until 8-9 PM so we could go camping on a weekday.

One Year

September 9, 2011 has just passed. It has been one year. And how fast that year has gone!

On September 9, 2010 I received a radioactive iodine treatment that killed any remnants of thyroid tissue that were left in me after my complete thyroidectomy. This was the last step in treating the thyroid cancer that was discovered a few months previously. Now, one year later, I have officially been deemed cancer free!  Hooray!

I don't really have any other comments on this besides that I feel great, my thyroid hormone replacement medication is adjusted nicely, and I'm excited to have a "normal" year! Thank you doctors, family and friends! Go me!

July and August Books

Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind. ~James Russell Lowell

I read a lot in July, perhaps too much:

Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernières

I have mixed feelings about this book. I loved the first two pages so I was excited to continue reading it. Before long, though, you get to interspersed chapters that are just Mussolini or some Italian general shouting and ranting and talking tactics and bureaucracy. All in all, it got more interesting past the middle of the book and had very interesting history about the Greek island of Cephallonia during World War II. I ended up liking it quite well. 4 stars

The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan

This is a YA distopian book about a world were there are few people left because someone was trying to make people live forever (or something) and all they ended up doing was making people turn into zombies that just want to attack the living. There is a small population left a few generations later trying desperately to stay alive and learn if there is anyone/thing else out there. It was pretty good - good enough to read the sequel but not awesome. 3 stars

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

I had to listen to this again with the last movie coming out. I was a little foggy on the whole how and why there at the end, but this time I understood much better. It's a great book. Obviously 5 stars

Into the Forest by Jean Hegland

This book is about two sisters surviving in their home after some huge disaster and the government and everything shuts down. There is no gas, no power, etc. and they have to become self-reliant. I didn't love it, but it made me think. 3.5 stars

The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel

Innnteresting. A Cro-Magnon girl is raised by a Neanderthal tribe, in which she must learn to contain her differences or be outcast. 4 stars.

The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan

The sequel/companion to The Forest of Hands and Teeth, this book just explores some different people and how they have survived, but it ties back in to the past and the other book. 3 stars

The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan

At last all the pieces of this zombie-pocalypse series come together. Yet another character (still related to all the others in the series) and what life is like for them. 3 stars

Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell

This was an interesting book that talked about decision making and how our mind analyzes information and how unconscious thoughts are revealed. It discussed many studies that really made me think. 4 stars

The Valley of the Horses by Jean M. Auel

The girl, Ayla, is now a young woman and goes to seek out her own kind of people. If I'd know what this book was like, I wouldn't have read it. It's the sequel to The Clan of the Bear Cave, but this book made me decide not to read any more of the series. Too much sex - I think that is ultimately what this book is about. I wouldn't recommend it. 2 stars

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley

This book was great. It is about an 11-year-old aspiring chemist who tries to solve a murder that her father is suspected of. It's just a fun read and I really enjoyed it. 4.5 stars

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

I could not finish this book. It also had way too much graphic sex and was pretty gross. Again, I don't recommend this.

The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents by Terry Pratchett

From his apparently famous Discworld series. It is about a talking cat, Maurice who leads a boy and a group of talking rats to scam money from poor unsuspecting villagers. It was entertaining, but I'm not left with a big desire to go read any more of his books. 3.5 stars

The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy

I love the BBC movie of this and I love the musical but I had never read the book. It is a good short historical fiction piece about that most beloved of topics, the French Revolution. I liked the book, but I think I like the movie better still. 4 stars

The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster

A little short story about a futuristic world where people don't have to leave their rooms for anything. Then the main woman's son desires to get out and asks what she would do if the machine (that is running the food, entertainment, life support, etc.) stopped? There's not much to this book but it makes you think. 3.5 stars

In August:

The Stolen Child By Keith Donohue

Based on a Yeats poem, this book is about a group of fairy changeling children who steal children from their homes and substitute themselves in their place. 3 stars

The Road by Cormac McArthur

Another futuristic or distopian book about a father and son traveling through the land after some firey disaster left most dead. They must survive the weather, starvation, but mostly road bandits. The style is different but fits the story very well. 4.5 stars

The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot

Quite a bit different from the movie, this is a silly and pointless book. I liked it anyways. 4 stars

Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach

"I know every book of mine by its smell, and I have but to put my nose between the pages to be reminded of all sorts of things." ~George Robert Gissing

I got this book from the library and I think someone spilled vanilla on it. It smelled awesome when you opened the book. I may do that to all my books. This is a fable, meaning it has a moral, I detected many possible morals, so you can pick whichever one you want. Jeran has always been shocked that I wasn't familiar with Jonathan Livingston Seagull, so I figured I'd better figure out what it was about. It was just okay as a book, but I suppose it is the message rather than the delivery that are important here. 4 stars

Columbine by Dave Cullen

Wow. I was 14 when this event occurred and now I don't remember the details too clearly. This book is absorbing, taking you into the lives of the killers, the victims, the parents, the investigators, and the community. While there is a fair amount of bad language (quoted from the killers journals and videos) and some pretty grim crime scene descriptions, this book really looked at all aspects of the situation in as much of an unbiased way as possible. It examines what, how, and most importantly, why. 4 stars

It feels kind of wrong to give a book like The Princess Diaries the same number of stars as a book that was really serious and contemplative, but it is what it is. You can like things that are completely different the same amount without comparing them. Also, it's not always just the book itself that influences your opinion of it - how you're feeling, time when you read it, etc. play some role too.

Just life

Hello again. I have thought about blogging a few times in the last month but every time I sat down to start writing, I thought Nah, I'm not going to do that. So here's an all at once recap of what we've been up to.

Jeran has been working hard at science and on reassembling his motorcycle. It's been amazing to watch (and very occasionally participate) the bike come together. It's going to look so good. It might even run! This is not a very recent picture, but we'll save that for later.

I've been working a lot the last few weeks, which is great because I can stay busy and make money at the same time (amazing how "work" does that). Unfortunately I've been working on a difficult project which has meant waking up around 5:30 AM many mornings thinking about it. Oh well. The days are so much longer and more productive this way!

I made one of those neck coolers (aka cool ties, cooling scarves) that you put absorbent polymer crystals into and they soak up water and keep you cool via evaporative cooling. I overfilled it a bit so I'll have to try again on another. Good thing they are super easy and cheap. It's too bad I didn't make them months ago because we sure could have used them all summer long, especially on our waterfalls trip and Jeran working on his motorcycle. We've been scorching hot here - when 95 degrees sounds like a reasonably nice temperature you know it's been hot.

Our garden is not doing too great. We have had trouble with deer eating our tomato and pepper plants. We did get three little cayenne peppers and a few little green tomatoes have been on the plants all summer without changing at all. Regardless of the heat, our carrots seem to be doing quite well. I didn't think they would because I think they like sandy soil better than clay, but I pulled one up yesterday and it's the cutest little carrot ever!

A while ago we went on a quest to picnic at "Research Triangle Park". We knew there was a good chance that there was no real "park" park, but we picked up a pizza and drove around looking for parkish places in Research Triangle Park. We found the actual RTP headquarters and it seemed as parklike as anything we were bound to find so we ate there. It was deserted and they have a large grassy field and bushes and stuff. The sky looked amazing. We picnicked on pizza and took a little snooze on our blanket. It was a very nice evening. I'm still convinced there must be a park SOMEwhere there, but maybe not...

And now for three things that are super amazing/cool/brilliant:

1. Opposable thumbs. Think about it. Look at your hand - it's that bottom thumb joint down by your wrist that is opposable. Now try doing things without rotating that joint. VERY difficult. Yesiree, opposition is amazing. We can grab stuff, write, play the piano, create a cup with our hand, etc. I do love my opposable thumbs.

2. That we can turn electrical charges into mechanical motion. After watching the clock spin around and around the other day, I researched this and learned a lot! At first I was surprised when I Googled this and Wikipedia's "Engine" article was a top result but now it makes better sense (see particularly the electric motor section). And now my engineer dad and brother are probably rolling their eyes.

3. Wikipedia. Lame, I know but it is pretty amazing and I've read some really interesting articles, like the Waste Management, Engine, Laudanum, HeLa, Petabyte, Eden Project, etc.