Kaylie's 6th Birthday

This past Tuesday, the 23rd, was Kaylie's 6th birthday. Here she is with her sister Kiehra and brother Kaleb. Party on!!

If they look like they have makeup on, it's because they do. Kaylie got a Bratz purse filled with makeup for her birthday...from someone else, not me. I got her a stable with a horse and rider that came complete with wheelbarrow, shovel and poop.

Wheel'n in Effie

Here we are atop a huge rock. It was our mission. Our destination. It was about 10 miles from camp. It took us about six hours to get there and back. It was worth it. It was beautiful up there. It was a little scary climbing the big rock, especially on my bald tires. But I made it up there.

As you can see, fashion is not a consideration for myself while riding. But it's always a good day when I can drag out the old red rubba boots. Gitty up! On the contrary for my friend Robin. She always looks good!

Makita found himself in a bit of a situation. There was plenty of mud to get into. Kurt is winding out Makita's winch to hook to his machine to get him out of there. The rest of us had just gone through this same spot. Even I made it through there on Dora the Explorer.

Here's a common sight. The entire road is under water. Makita is out there scouting in his waders. If he sinks like a rock we won't drive through there.

This was the hairiest part of the trial. This was taken on the way to the rock. On the way out we had to rebuild a portion of the bridge before we could go over it.

I had a great time. The weather was good. The campground was quiet. But camping is done now for the year. Our only camping left for this year will be this upcoming weekend in Atlanta for the Nascar race.

Jeff Wins AGAIN! YEAH!!

After a late spinout by Ryan Newman and a nerve-racking green-white-checkered finish because of fuel concerns, Jeff Gordon won for the second straight week and sixth time this season to move 68 points ahead of HMS teammate Jimmie Johnson in his quest for a fifth championship.

As Jeff prepares for the final five races of the Chase (Martinsville, Atlanta, Texas, Phoenix and Homestead/Miami), I prepare to go to Atlanta to see that race. Things are shaping nicely for that event. Tickets are in place. Jerry Katz, so generously, bought me my ticket for my birthday based on a promise he's been making me for years. I also suspect he had no idea what they cost ($115.00 buck-a-roo's each). Thanks Jerry! Love ya!

Makita and I are driving Makita's truck and pickup camper, Anderson, to Atlanta next week and camping at the track. It should prove to be quite the adventure. Jerry has a wedding to go to on Saturday, so he won't be able to join us until Sunday for the big race. I'm really looking forward to this! Happy Birthday To Me!

Room Service Please

This ain’t no shit. I drive back to St Louis Friday night. The traffic is horrendous. I find myself in five, sometimes six, lanes of high speed traffic in the Avis Ford Rollerskate. I arrived at the airport around 7:45 PM. I gassed the car for the low low price of $2.60 per gallon. Back by Columbia I had actually seen gas for only $2.45. I thought that was the lowest I’ve seen it for a long time. It’s pretty bad when we think two and a half dollars a gallon is a bargain. I looked at the dash to see which side of the car the gas take is on. If you look where the fuel gauge is on the dash of the new Rollerskates, as well as other models, you can see a little arrow pointing to the side of the vehicle that receives fuel. I would guess it’s because I travel and rent cars frequently that everyone on the planet has felt compelled to email me this tidbit. If you are reading this and haven’t emailed me this info, I got it. I know about the little gas pump and the arrow.

After gassing the Rollerskate I drove over to the Hilton where I’d be staying the night. The Hilton is very conveniently located at the airport and right next door to the Avis rental center. So I pulled up to the hotel and unloaded my bags. I went and checked in. They want $10 for me to park the car overnight. I ask them if they have a shuttle that runs 24 hours and they say “yes, every 20 minutes on the hour”. Perfect I reply, I will take the car back now and ride your shuttle in the morning. She asks if I’ll be “joining them for breakfast”. Sorry no. I have a 6:00 AM flight.

I lug my bags up to the 9th floor, throw on some jeans, strap on my tennies and go back down to return the car. The walk back from Avis was a little scary in the dark but I made it across the two big parking lots and I was back in the Hilton and situated in my room. First thing I was planning on doing was to check my email that I hadn’t looked at all day. I see the sign on the desk that informs me that for the low price of $9.95 for 24 hours I could have internet service. Sorry…that’s rape and I was resisting.

After all this I’m hungry. So after consulting the Guest Guide I dial up room service. I talked to Matisha or Maresha or Manfeasta or some damn thing. I told her to send up some Maui Maui with Mango Chutney and a house salad please. She said it would be about a half hour. That was at 8:15 PM. So tick tock tick tock I wait. I watch some of the Busch race. Jimmy Johnson crashes. I’m glad. I look, it’s 8:35 PM. I watch some of the Boston game (awesome 10 to 3 win). It’s now 8:50 PM. Tick tock. 9:05 PM I call Marvelesha again. She says “you haven’t got your food yet”? Nope, not here. She’ll check on it. I hold on to find out what she finds out. Dial tone. It would seem that Melantina has hung up on me. Okay…. She’s going to find out what happened and get back to me. NOT. I watch an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Funny funny show. I’m laughing right out loud. Another half hour goes by. I call again. Murillemeansha answers again. I explain that I’m still waiting for my food and we’re creeping up on an hour and a half. She seems surprised. She asked me if I ordered the Maui Maui. Yep. And the salad? Yes with ranch. And three Heinekens? No Heinekens. Just some water would be nice. Room 963? Yes ma’am. Well she’ll fix this and the food will be right up. She said they had a mix up on room numbers. I told her I was getting pissed, not to mention starved half to death. I also threatened her if it arrived cold I would be additionally pissed. I hang up. The phone rings. It’s Mirtrisha. She’s just checking to see if she had the right room to send my food too. Then a couple minutes later the phone rings again and this time it’s a nice white fellow with the name Paul. I can say Paul. I can spell Paul. I like Paul. He apologizes for the problems and offers to bring me a glass of wine with my dinner as a peace offering. I accept. Red, please. I watch a second episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm. This one’s better than the first. I’m laughing my ass off. Larry David is the funniest, stupidest, creativist (not a real word) guy ever. Finally at 10:00 PM Paul arrives with the loot. Yes Maui Maui. The chutney is pineapple not mango. I’ll pretend. The rice is not done. Hard little mouse turds actually. The salad is big and wilted but I dig in. There’s warm hard rolls. I tear off a piece and slather it with butter and chow down. And there’s the wine. It’s not half bad. And then there’s a huge piece of chocolate cake with whipped cream as an additional reward for my patience. The bill was only $37.80. What the hell. Good thing I saved twenty bucks with parking and internet. Finally at 10:30 PM I tuck myself into bed for a nap. My alarm is set for 3:00 AM.

Ring ring. Time to get up. I get ready and leave my room a little after 4:00 AM. When I arrive downstairs, prepared to ride the 4:20 AM shuttle I find out that this time of day the shuttle doesn’t run on any set schedule. What? Where’s my little girlfriend that reassured me that the shuttle ran on schedule 24 hours a day? Don’t worry, they’ll call me one. Sure enough within a few minutes a shuttle came and picked me up. I was in the airport and at the ticket counter by 4:20 AM. Ah but they don’t open until 4:30 AM. So while waiting for an agent, the gentleman beside me strikes up a conversation. He’s a military man. Does recruiting now but has been in the service all his life. He’s on his way to Anchorage to visit 4 of his 5 grandchildren. His wife is already there. Blah blah blah. He feels bad recruiting kids and sending them to Iraq. Not bad for sending them but bad that he doesn’t go with them. He said sometimes they come back wounded. But that some of them consider war wounds badges of honor. And then they have a war story to tell. Then he asks me, “Do you know the difference between a fairy tale and a war story?” “No sir”. “Well a fairy tale starts with Once Upon A Time and a war story starts with “This ain’t no shit”.

Nascar "SuperBowl" is underway

Race #4, out of 10, in the Race for the Chase was concluded with an amazing finish. Jeff Gordon pushes by team mate Jimmy Johnson to win in Taladega this past Sunday. This gives Jeff Gordon 80 wins in his Cup Career. It also meant sweeping both races at Talladega Super Speedway this race season. Gordon scores his 12th career restrictor plate win making him the all time leader in Plate Race wins. It also put him back in the points lead. Still on for the Drive for Five.

Jeff is seen here in the Winners Circle with his daughter Ella Sophia after the race.

Travel to Missouri

Sometimes traveling is seamless. Other times it's a huge pain. Seems like if one thing goes wrong more problems will follow. Such as this past Monday. I was scheduled to fly out of Brainerd at 11:30 AM. I would have reached Minneapolis by 12:30 PM would have a two hour layover. At 2:30 PM I would have gotten on a plane to St. Louis Missouri, arriving at 4:00 PM. Then I would drive the 120 miles to Columbia. Sounds easy enough. Well that's how it should have gone.

Here's how it actually went: 9:30 AM Northwest emails me to inform me the 11:30 AM flight is delayed until 12:30 PM. So I went to the airport at 11:00AM. Then at 12:00 PM they said the plane was delayed until 1:30 PM. Did I mention the plane was there? If not, allow me to tell you, the plane was there when I got there at 11AM. But because of air traffic in Minneapolis we would be delayed until Minneapolis released us to fly. Well we finally got out of there around 2:15 PM. In the meantime I've missed my 2:30 PM. But that's okay they've re-booked me on the 3:40 PM. Which ends up to be delayed until 5:00 PM. Thank goodness it's only an hour and 10 minute flight to St Louis.

About 45 minutes into the Minneapolis to St Louis flight the flight attendant is asking for medical help. She's got oxygen tanks and she continues to ask from time to time for medical help. Evidently there is no one willing to save Mr. Stroke. Well thank goodness I'm in the front row. 1B to be exact. Isle seat. Front and center. I can't see the commotion behind me (thank goodness....being a last responder I think this is very good). Well by now you would think we would be getting close to St Louis. But no...we don't go to St Louis. We go to......wait for it....Cedar Rapids I-o-stink'en-wa. At, what I am going to guess, was around 5 billion miles per hour, we decend at a rate of 3000 miles a second, and blam we were on the ground in Iowa.

Well this could be okay. Let's get Mr. Stroke off the plane while he's still breathing and let's get our butts to St. Louis. The cops and ambulance folks come on board. Big day for Cedar Rapids. Barney actually got to put on his lights and run full steam ahead down the tarmac. They are finally ready to remove Mr. Stroke and asked the gentleman in the seat next to me (yes I said next to me) to move so they could move Mr. Stroke up there. 1C. OMG. I'm not liking this. I don't need to see half dead people. In the meantime Barney brought some kind of chair thing on board and they're going to eventually put Mr. Stoke into that chair and carry him off. So here they come with Mr. Stroke. They don't put him into the seat next to me. They instead put him in the chair they're going to carry him off in. You would think this would relieve me. But it does not. It does not, because Mr. Stroke is now sitting there facing me. His right knee is touching my right knee. This is not good. I try not to jerk away. He's all pasty white and dead looking.

Well finally they hauled him out of there. Now can we get to St Louis? Not until our total time on the ground amounts to one hour. Now we leave. We get to St Louis at 8:00 PM. By the time I get my luggage (can you believe it was there? I can't) and get on the Avis bus it's 8:30 PM. Now I find out they've given up my car reservation because I'm four hours late. But don't worry. When I got to the Preferred kiosk they found my reservation for a sub-compact. The guy started laughing. He said they don't even have such a car. I asked what it was, a sub-compact? Was it a bike, I asked? He said "no it's a Rick-Shaw". Funny guy. He ended up upgrading me to a miniature vehicle they call a Ford Focus. It's pitch dark now and I'm driving 80 miles an hour in a roller skate. I finally got to Columbia at 10:15 PM. Wow...what a day. I can't hardly wait to see what Saturday holds for me when I try to get back home. At least when I get there I'll have a vehicle I can see out off.

So anyway I'm in Columbia working at the University of Missour Columbia. I was here back in April 2007. You can find out more info by looking at my archives for that month.

Medora North Dakota

Last weekend we went to Medora ND. Lorrie and Brad drove there also. We spent Saturday in the Badlands.

There were lots of Prarie Dogs. I had a special turkey call I tried using to get their attention.

There were quite a few Mule Deer too. Actually there were almost as many Mule Deer as there was Prairie Dogs.

Here's a nice bull Elk. He actually ran across the road up ahead of us. He had a huge rack.

Wild TaTonka still roam the fruited plains.

The cowboy hat is widely used in the Dakota's.

I can't even explain this one.....

We had a picnic lunch in Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Dad Celebrates his 70th

Last night a group of us surprised Dad with a little gathering on his 70th.

At one point he turned into Willie Nelson.

Birthday at Thor

Last weekend my cousin Jodi and myself celebrated our 44th birthdays with Dave and Ellie at Thor (notice Ellie was very smart and put 88 on our cake).

We (that would be mainly Dave) built a roof for Dave's deerstand. Here's a picture of Ellie in that stand before the roof is put up there.

Kaylie and Jazz

Kaylie is now taking riding lessons on Saturdays. Here she is with her new friend Jazz.

Off to St Cloud

FYI...I'm driving down to St Cloud this morning to work at KCLD for a couple of days and won't be back home until tomorrow (Wednesday) night. If anyone needs me or needs anything from the "big city", give me a call.

Wisconsin Wedding

We were in Wisconsin for this past weekend. Makita was DJ'ing our friend Bill Cynor's (aka Brian Moon) sister's wedding. As you can see by the photo below Bill was well into the sauce. I believe this is an air guitar solo???

The newly weds...Willy and Sally Manor.

Miles Elk

My boss Miles, from Hailey Idaho, bagged this cow elk this past sunday with his bow.

Talk like a Pirate Day

Arrgh, mateys, today be Talk Like a Pirate Day! You too can learn how to talk like a pirate:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cKCkbWDGwE

My friend Jerry Katz is a partial pirate.

I'm in love with a pirate =

Pheasants Forever Youth Day

This past weekend we volenteered to help with the Aitkin Chapter of Pheasants Forever Youth Day. Here's a photo of Makita helping out on the rifle range. Dave Boeckermann ran the archery simulator. Ellie and I helped with registration and serving lunch. There was also a hunting dog demonstration. The kids really seemed to enjoy the day.

First Day of School

Here's the grandkids that went off to school this past Tuesday. Kaylie's headed to Kindergarden, Kyle to 3rd grade and Kiehra to 2nd.

Labor Day Weekend at Thor

It was a fun weekend at Thor. We worked a little and played a lot. We celebrated Labor Day.

We celebrated Dave's birthday.

We built a couple trails.

And celebrated those.

Remainder of my St Thomas stay

Here's a photo from my lounge chair last Saturday. I went to Mehgans Beach. The Travel Channel named it one of the worlds top 10 beaches to visit. And it was perfect. But bring the sunscreen! Or if you forgot it, you can buy a small bottle of it for $15.00. The water was very warm for bobbing around in. They had a bar very nearby my chair. They made a pretty good bloody mary. The food bar had great burgers and fries (even if I spilled my fries and the seagull's ended up with them). The taxi rides around the island were interesting. Saturday night I went to the hotel tiki hut bar and they had some musicians playing for tips. These guys all claimed to play with one famous musician or another. One claimed to play with John Mellencamp but I can't find any record of that. And the night ended with a big drunk'n brawl. Time to find my way back to the states.

Here's a photo of myself and Heather Ackley. Heather is the General Sales Manager of the radio stations I was working at during the week. Her Father owns them all. On Thursday he sold all his towers and was celebrating. So Heather and I decided to go out with him, his friends and family and "kick it up a notch". We visited several of the local watering holes.

Hello from St Thomas

Pictures from just outside my room here in St. Thomas.

I'm right on the beach. This afternoon I went for a swim. I'm staying an extra day tomorrow to hang out and enjoy the ocean.