Egg-static Saturday

The sun made a cameo appearance today in the PMA.  Hip-hop-hooray!  Last year, we struggled to find an appropriate Easter egg hunt for the boy.  It ended up with him only getting one (real, hard-boiled) egg, which he promptly threw and later curb-stomped to show his disapproval.  That experience kind of soured me on doing the Easter egg thing.  Parents elbowing you and scooping up all the eggs for their 3 month old napping in their Baby Bjorns.  All the while, the kids who are actually trying to grab some egg are left with nearly empty baskets and equally empty tear ducts.  If I'd known the parents were going to have at it, I'd check your fanny pack into the bushes.

This year, the wife spent a few days trying to get me hyped for an even more local egg hunt in my old stomping grounds.  The second she said, "Brentwood Park" I kind of internally groaned.  I spent three years of my youth at the adjacent Lane Middle School.  They were good years but I vividly remember the surrounding neighborhood and the less than savory folks that live in the immediate area.  "But there's going to be a helicopter that drops eggs!"  Ok, honey, you've piqued my interest. 

A beautiful day it was in the ol' 'hood.  The smell of fresh-cut grass was in the air.  After we found parking (place was stuffed) we walked to one of the orange tents to register our kid.  Everything seemed pretty great.  The registration line was semi-long, but moved pretty rapidly.  We got squared away with the registration people and had 45 minutes to burn.  Face-painting?  He'd freak out and rub it off.  Easter bunny?  The line was re-donk.  Let's just wait for the helicopter to arrive. 

Putting on his best mommy cheeser face

They relegated the 0-2 year-old kids to the tennis courts for safety.  Good idea, except the wind blew the eggs to the large crack in between the two tennis courts and to the fences.  The organizers fixed this by picking up the eggs and dropping them as they let the kids loose.  Now this group of kids was allowed one parent to help them grab eggs.  I wasn't sure if my boy, who is pretty bright when it comes to getting what he wants, would get the whole, "when I grab the eggs they go in my basket and they are mine now" concept.  Turns out, he had absolutely no problem figuring it out after a few pre-hunt freak outs.

Turns out the whole thing was being put on by Hopecity Church.  Apparently they meet on Sundays at the middle school.  I don't know if I could go to church in the same place I used to kiss girls and beat up foreigners.

Examining the loot

He scooped up about 20 eggs.  It was super cute.  We all had a good time.  We turned over our egg loot for candy loot and were on our way. 

We then went for a little after-hunt brunch at McCrae's cafe.  I then proceeded to eat a 12-egg omelet, hashbrowns, toast, and 3/4 of a giant pancake the kid would finish.  I'm still full and it's 10PM.

A Week Under the Stars

This post will be a narration without pictures since I forgot my camera on my camping trip to the Prineville Reservoir State Park in Prineville, Oregon.

Day One: Nikki and I were supposed to leave on Saturday the 11th, but couldn't work up the gumption to get off of our asses and actually pack some clothes (mostly because our clothes still needed to be washed) and clean the house since American Carli was watching our pad and keeping after our cats while we were out. We ended up shopping and leaving around 3:30pm on Sunday the 12th. I drove over Mt. Hood while Nikki played DJ. We only went the wrong way once as I had never driven to Prineville before and really didn't know where I was going. Although I led us astray, we ended up making it there in just over 2 1/2 hours (Google's directions gave something like 3 hours and 35 minutes for a travel time). This may be due to the fact that I was passing people on the two lane highway like I was Tony Stewart and averaging a speed of 85mph (I got that Nissan up to 102mph at one point). Anyways, we arrived and set up camp before it got dark and proceeded to play cards for most of the night.

Day two started early as Nikki woke up with an urge to relieve herself and then she couldn't fall back asleep after I walked her to the bathroom. "Are you going back to sleep?" she asked at one point, to which I said (with my eyes closed), "Nope." It was a little light outside (it turned out to be before 6am) and we played cards while keeping quiet. My mom woke up and we watched a deer eat whatever was left of a loaf of bread that Nikki and I brought.
Note: When camping, don't leave any type of food in any type of container that can be chewed through. The animals will find it, and eat it!)

The rest of the trip I spent getting burnt, swimming, pulled behind a boat, eating, sleeping, drinking and gabbing. I learned that camping really isn't fun unless you have lots of alcohol around. Nikki spent day four polishing off a bottle of Evan Williams. She drank the whole fuckin' thing!! Needless to say, she was pretty well shit-faced when we decided to go to bed and became the second person on the trip (my brother-in-law being the first) to succumb to an alcohol-induced yak-fest. She felt like shit the next day (the hangover plus an earache and sore throat) so we left on Friday to deal with life once again. I was glad to be home, in my own bed, but didn't want to deal with bills or work again. My vacation ends on Tuesday, when the bitch that is Fred Meyer calls me back to slave again at 9am.

Guess that means the end of my pathetic attempt at growing a beard (I haven't shaved since August 8th). Maybe I'll put a picture up before I shave it off. It was a great time. We saw stuff we normally don't see in the city (shooting stars, deer, lizards, giant toads, snakes), we battled the pathetic beings that call themselves park rangers. It was good times, indeed!

My United States of Whatever

No, this won't be a list of "My USA" where I list the people and ideas that come from the USA that make me proud to be an American. Maybe later Carly.

It's hard to imagine what it would be like to live in such a time when the country was united together to kick British ass. If you asked your average American today, they probably couldn't tell you why we celebrate the Fourth of July. Would they know who we gained our independence from? Probably not. We here south of the border just like to blow off appendages and make craters in the ground. God Bless the USA!

Why is everybody an expert pyrotechnician on the Fourth of July? My favorite event that happens during any fireworks celebration is the dud. You lit that explosive device and nothing happened...yet. Nobody wants to go near it because you never know what might happen. Most people will kick the dud to make sure it isn't going to explode. That really shows you how much people value their feet. I'd much rather blow off a hand than a foot. At least I'd be able to walk myself into the emergency room.

Our forefathers would probably be appalled to learn that even though they put their lives on the line to get away from the British, we take their crappy shows and turn them into our own crappy shows like American Idol. And now we have to live with Ryan Seacrest? Fuck that man, I'd rather pay taxes every time I took a sip of tea than watch Ryan Seacrest. Not to mention we have a British guy judging American talent? No offense, Simon, but I believe George Washington would kick you in the mouth if you told him he was a lousy singer.

We should be celebrating not only our independence, but the lives of three U.S. Presidents who have died on this glorious day in history. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both died on America's 50th Birthday, July 4th, 1826. Five years later, James Monroe would make three Presidents to croak on our nation's proudest day. So, Mr. Clinton, Mr. H.W. Bush, Mr. Carter, be careful this Wednesday. I wouldn't worry about Dubya, nothing will end his term soon enough.