224

My last post of 2007. Post number 224 this year.

I debated for a while this morning what I would write about. I have a few things to tell you but I'm not sure I should end the year with a post picking on Cari.

I also have a video to put together for you titled, "WAGON OF DOOM!"

There just won't be time to get that together today.

Maybe I should tell you about taking pictures during church.

I think I'll just start 2008 with those ideas.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Cow Milk

Did you know that a cow has to give birth to produce milk?

You probably did. Not me. For some reason, I always thought that cows just produced milk. It was one of their jobs. Just an endless supply of milk.

Recently, I was talking to a former dairy farmer and he was talking about constantly breeding the cows to keep them producing. I didn't let on to my ignorance. I just nodded my head as if I was saying, "of course!" The farmer talked about keeping very careful records about pregnancy, birth, and milk production. Due to the aggressiveness of bulls, they impregnated their cows artificially.

I got home and Cari was breastfeeding the baby. I shared my new knowledge with her. "Did you know cows work like people? They have to give birth to produce milk too."

She just stared at me. Either she just learned something new or she couldn't believe I just figured it out. I'm not sure which one it was and I wasn't going to ask.

Christmas morning

Here's the house at 2am when I went to bed:

Here's a photo of Christmas exploding:

Here's a photo from 9am Christmas morning:

Kinda reminds me of last year. Do you see the trend?

Randy was the first one up, he's always the first one up. It was around 5:30am. Cari sent him back to bed. Around six, he was back up and walking around. I got up with him. We went down to examine what Santa left in the house. Around 6:30 he went up and got the rest of the house up.

Cari always does a good job of trying to pace us while we unwrap gifts. She sits at the tree, guarding the presents. Holding back the ravaging claws of the kids. Through her careful shopping, she has ensured each child will open the EXACT same number of presents. She hands one to each. They tear it open in about two seconds, show off their newest prize possession, then prepare themselves for the next box.

The rest of our day was spent together playing games, watching movies, and eating the great meal Cari prepared. I also tried to cut my finger off while opening some toys.

By that evening, I could tell Cari was ready to move on from Christmas, but she was too tired. When I got home from work yesterday, it was all gone. The toy Santas, the Nativity, the tree.

Things are mostly back to normal today. Everyone like normal, right?

Christmas games

I'll write about Christmas morning in the next post or two. I'm too tired tonight.

One of the games we opened this morning was Jenga.

Here's a few photos of us playing.

As you can see, Amanda knocked over our record breaking tower. The girl in that 2nd photo doesn't belong to me, but she had fun playing.

25

What's the number 25 mean to you? What does it make you think of?

A quarter?

The atomic number of Manganese?

The size of the full roster on a major league baseball team?

The number of days your sister in law is staying with you?

Yeah, that's right. She's here for 25 days. That is by far the longest anyone, except our kids, has stayed with us. She's already been here almost a week.

This really isn't a problem for us. So far she has been very helpful with the baby. She has also helped Cari finish Christmas shopping. That kept me from having to brave the mall the other day.

The only problem I have had with her so far is her camera. She always has that camera on her. When I am tempted to do something stupid, I have to stop and check for her. Like the day I was tasting some breast milk from the baby's bottle. With Amanda's laptop, that kind of thing shows up on Facebook within the hour.

For now, I'm camping out in my office.

Cari just knocked on the door. Someone tell her I'll be out in 19 days.

Not that I'm counting.

Explore!

I was inspired by The Rake and his trip last weekend. So, yesterday I went out to do some exploring. Here's a map of my trip:


I'm finishing my map in Google maps. When I'm done, I'll put a link up. If you are interested, you will be able to view my route in more detail and see the photos on the map. You can also turn on satellite view in Google maps.

My first stop was to the town of Central. Central was founded by the railroad when they set their headquarters there in the late 1800's. It is 133 miles to Atlanta and 133 miles to Charlotte. They have a museum in the building of an old Victorian house. It is only open on Sunday's, so I walked through their gardens. There are a lot of statues, fountains, and benches. Most of the statues were wearing scarves and hats.

My next stop was across town to the Central Roller Mill. I'm sure this building used to be a center of economic activity. Today it is a safety hazard. I walked around the building and took some pictures. You can see inside through all the broken windows that there is still a lot of equipment inside. In a couple of places you can see the original wood framed windows and support beams. In all the wood, you could see that it was roughly milled lumber. It almost seemed as if they milled it with an axe and got "close enough".
After I left the mill, I went down Gaines street toward a bridge I had seen before. It is one of the scariest bridges to drive on around here. It is an all wood construction that crosses a double set of rails. Up close you can see that the boards were coated with a tar or oil. The bridge is barely wide enough for two cars.
Across the street from the bridge is the New Olive Grove Missionary Baptist church. Like many old churches in this area, there is a cemetery next to the building.

Up keep at the cemetery didn't seem very high. There were a lot of over turned flower pots, a large tree that had fallen and not been picked up, and an entire section of tomb stones I could not reach because they were located in a dense stand of trees.
One of the most interesting things I found were several stones that were hand carved. The spelling was way off on these. Obviously written by an uneducated person. This one says:

Roada (can't read last name) Died June 26, 1918

You can see how they wrote it

There were also a few of these stones. It looks like a hub from a wheel or a part of a pulley. The center was filled with concrete and the message carved in. I could not make out many words on any of these. The last word on this one appears to be some form of Johnson.
The cemetery obviously belonged to a group of poor, uneducated people. There are some more modern looking stones and even some recently placed stones. It was very interesting walking through there.

On my way to Six Mile, I turned off at the community of Cateechee. I found this brick building there:

There were lots of signs warning trespassers. Next door to this was a trailer home that looked occupied. I stayed in the car. The community is mostly old mill homes and trailers. The streets were narrow, and I started to wonder if I should be out there. Once I got home I learned there is a large mill along a creek in Cateechee. The mill is the reason the community was formed. I'll go back someday and check out the mill and get some photos. I believe the building has been demolished and just the ruble and foundation are left. The name Cateechee is named for a woman from the Choctaw tribe. She was kidnapped by the Cherokee during a battle and kept as a slave. In her tribe of Choctaw her name was Issaqueena. A white man that did a lot of trading with the Cherokee fell in love with Cateechee. When she over heard the indians planning an attack on Fort Cambridge she snuck out and traveled 96 miles to warn the settlers. She ended up marrying that man.

That is the story told in tradition. The men building the mill named the town for her. The neighboring town on the railway is named Norris. Named for the owner of the mill.

On my way home I had an emergency. Marked by the red triangle in my map. It was at that point that I had to go to the bathroom REALLY bad. So bad, that it hurt. There obviously is nothing but a few homes and cattle out where I was. I started feeling around the backseat for a bottle as I drove. I couldn't find one suitable. I looked down at my bottle of Gatoraid that I was drinking. I hadn't drank even half of it. As bad as I had to go, I didn't want to waste my drink.

I barely made it home. When I pulled into the driveway, I left the car door open and rushed inside.

After such a great trip, it was almost ruined by those painful last ten minutes.

Favorite Video of the Week

Here's my favorite video of the week. I could watch this over and over... at least the first fifteen seconds. They use some bad language, so don't have your volume up if kids are nearby.

via videosift.com

What I love the most is the sincere concern from the cameraman.

SIX DEGREES

Pain shoots through my body

With his help, I put together a basketball goal for Randy a few days back. It wasn't overly complicated to do, but did require about one hundred nuts and bolts. Some of the Chinese directions didn't make any sense and I had to rely on common sense for some of it. That means I had to do some parts twice.

The next morning at work my arms were killing me. It was all in the wrist and forearm. Had I only tightened one hundred nuts it would have been ok. It was undoing and redoing my mistakes that killed me.

That night at work I was taking apart some cardboard displays. I had to flatten them and decided not to use my sore arms. I stepped into the large box and started kicking the corners out until flat.

About ten minutes later I knew something wasn't right. I sat in the car to drive home and my shins were in great pain. I thought about the drive home, holding my foot on the gas pedal. OUCH!

I think I'm going to just take today to rest.

Not Lost Yet

I went out driving around the other day with my camera. It was one of those times that as I went, I would make random turns. I ended up finding some really pretty country. A lot of horse pastures and a few big houses. After about thirty minutes I decided I had to stop because I was beginning to forget which roads I had taken. I figured I would eventually make it back to the main road, but I didn't want to end up on the other side of the county when I did.

I didn't find too many opportunities to take photos. One time I stopped in the middle of the road to check out an OLD barn that was down in the woods. As I got my camera out, I looked in the rear view and saw a guy standing in the road watching me. He was about a quarter mile back. I kept getting my stuff ready until a car approached from behind me. This was a small road with no shoulder, so I decided to skip the photo and moved on.

The one shot I did take was of this horse pasture:When I got home I didn't think this was a great shot. So I started playing with it in Adobe Lightroom. First I cropped it. I didn't want as much sky in the shot and the house on the left was distracting. I kept the horse off to the right third of the shot.

Next, I played with the idea of black and white for this. I didn't like the complete black and white, so I went back to color and started to de-saturate all colors one by one. I took all the color out except for red and orange. Next I went to a section called split tone. It allows me to change the light area tone separate from the dark area tone and then adjust the balance of each. I played with it to get the look I wanted. Although the day I took this was unseasonably warm, in the 70's, I wanted this to have a very winter feel. This process took about fifteen to twenty minutes. Here's what I ended up with.

I was pleased with the results. I believe this shot is a lot more interesting compared to the original. With the software that is available, you can change a photo in endless ways. Sometimes, changing a photo can be as much fun as taking it.

A nice dinner

Last night we went to dinner with my group from work. We had all decided to get our spouses and go out for a nice dinner.

I admit, this is not a comfort setting for me. I was on my best behavior. Our salads were brought out and I didn't take a bite until everyone had been served. I was really watching the details to keep my manners.

As the dinner went on I began to relax a bit. As I took a sip of my sweet tea through the little black straw, someone asked one of my coworkers a question about work. It was a simple question about something that happened only an hour earlier. The coworker shrugged her shoulders like she didn't know.

That's when I spit sweet tea on the guy across the table from me.

Not on purpose. It's just what happens when you try and take me out.

I didn't think that the girl shrugging her shoulders was that funny. I think I just had a small cough that I couldn't suppress fast enough. With tea in mouth, and hands down by my plate, I started to turn my head. I wasn't fast enough. The tea sprayed out between my lips as if I was a sprinkler.

Everyone started chuckling. Everyone except for the guy across from me. I apologized and explained that it's hard taking me anywhere nice. That's a good way to make an impression on my coworkers' families.

"So who was the freak spitting tea?" That's what they were saying as they drove home.

"MAN! That was stupid!" That's what I was saying on the way home.

HA!

Guess what I played last night on the Wii. What's that? Did you say Mario Galaxy? If you did, you would be correct!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. . . ha!

Cari decided to play hide and seek with the game. If I could find it within five minutes, then I could have it. She laid on the bed with a smirk and started an actual timer. I ran into the closet and searched a couple of places. Then I climbed up the the attic stairs. I glanced around the attic without getting off the ladder. I came back down and looked in her dresser.
"45 seconds!", she said. I went back to the closet and moved some clothes around.
She started laughing and said time was up. I went over to the bed to beg for another chance. She told me I was a horrible seeker. I didn't overturn anything. I hardly looked UNDER anything.

As we talked she told me it was not in the attic. Finally, she agreed to show me where it was, with the idea that she was going to re hide it. She was really liking my unsuccessful attempt at seeking. I pulled it out of the bottom of her jewelry box and handed her the white box.

I left the room and stood in the hallway. She closed the bedroom door for about a minute. When she came back to the door she was holding the timer. "Two minutes."
I couldn't do this in two minutes. I negotiated it up to three.

The timer started and I went straight to the baby's crib. Tucked inside the liner was Mario Galaxy. I held it up victoriously and laughed an evil laugh. When I stood in the hallway, I listened very intently. I didn't hear the closet door or any dresser drawers move. I was able to eliminate most of the hiding spots before I even went into the room.

Cari was very disappointed that I found it. She wanted to continue the hide and seek game. She also did not want to appear that she gave in by giving me the game early. We agreed that we would still hold off from showing the kids another week or so.

Last night, when everyone was asleep, I played. For those that have a Wii, this is a great game. It's got to be one of the most creative Mario games ever. It was about 1:30am as I sat in the living room playing last night when someone came and sat next to me. Randy asked what I was playing. OH MAN!

He said he got up to use the bathroom and heard me playing something. I told him I was going to surprise him with the game in the morning. He said, "If you wanted to surprise me you should have not been playing it so loud." He went back to bed, but it was the first thing he mentioned this morning.

If you are wondering what I'll be doing later today, I'll be saving the princess.

Ugh.

Tried to take some Christmas photos of the kids tonight. It didn't really work out and I was getting frustrated. We'll try again this weekend.

I ate it

Have you ever had someone offer a unique food that you've never had before?

First, they offer it to you and extend a handful of the substance your way. You look at the food and then up at the person. You don't take any and you don't say anything. You're probably thinking of ways to politely refuse.

Next the person eats some of the food to show you it won't induce vomiting and it won't kill you instantly. They normally will over exaggerate their enjoyment of this substance. In my case, it was cheese curds. He stood in front of me squeaking his cheese curds with a big smile. It really looked like he was having fun eating them.

Then his hand, holding a bag of curds, came my way again. I took one into my hand. Immediately, he says, "No, you have to take a handful. That's the way to eat curds."

I don't know. I'm already on the edge of even tasting them, and he's asking me to fill my mouth with them. I took two pieces.

Cheese curds are created during the cheddar cheese making process. It's my understanding you will only find good cheese curds in Wisconsin or near a cheese producing facility. Cheddar cheese is aged from thirty days to a year depending on the sharpness. Curds are not aged. They are taken straight off the vat. They don't age and don't have that sharpness at all.
One of the other differences from cheese that I noted is the texture.
Most cheese has a clay like texture. Curds are shiny. They are irregular hunks of cheese with a high gloss. A rubbery texture. They squeak against your teeth. Also, you eat curds warm or room temperature. AFTER I ate some of these curds he told me they had sat on his kitchen counter since the previous day. I don't know how I feel about leaving cheese lay out for a day before eating it.

The final stage of receiving a new food happens as soon as you pop one in your mouth. The person offering this new food, wants to ensure that you also enjoy it. A lot of times, they will let you chew it and swallow it before they ask if you like it. Most likely they will stare at you with interest while they wait.

I finished my first bite and thought about it. Cheese curds are good! I took a few more out of the bag and squeaked them in my mouth. When I got home I asked Cari if she wanted me to try and get some for her. She said, "Absolutely not."

So for those that haven't had any, I recommend you try them if they are ever offered to you.
For the five or so that have had them, did you like your curds?

I ate CURDS

The other day I ate some cheese curds. Most likely, YOU never have. I posted a poll. Take a second and answer the poll. My guess is I won't have more than three "yes" answers. I know Michelle will most likely be a yes on this. There might be a few others.

By Tuesday, I'll tell you how all this happened and what I thought of my curds.
Eating a strange new food is worth a blog story.

Found under the couch

STOLEN!

MARIO HAS BEEN STOLEN!

I didn't have to work yesterday, so I thought it would be a great time to open the new Mario game and try it out while the kids were at school. Cari shut down my idea and said I should wait until my birthday or Christmas. She suggested I go play one of the games I haven't finished yet.

I went and played another game for about an hour. Cari had a doctor appointment and was gone during that time. When she got home, she went upstairs to feed the baby. I followed her up there and suggested we get the new Mario game going. She again told me we were going to wait. She asked what happened to the game I was just playing.

"Yeah, it is fun, but it's not Mario Galaxy", I told her.

I walked over to my dresser and opened the top drawer. An EMPTY Toys-R-Us bag was inside. I pulled the bag out and looked in the drawer. I quickly turned back toward the bed, holding the bag. I didn't even have to ask, Cari's expression told me she had stolen the game. Then she busted out in laughter.

"Where's my game?", I demanded. She was laughing.

"What game?", she asked.

I walked into the closet to begin my search. I closed the closet door behind me and Cari shouted for me to stop looking. Turns out she did know what game I was looking for.

Honestly, I don't know how long ago she took it. I was holding it until I had these days off. I told her that she stole my game. She denied the charge and said that it was a Christmas present.

AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

Right now I believe the game to be in the attic. The attic is a maze of boxes and bags. It probably is not hidden up there, just placed. If she DID hide it, I would be up there until Christmas.

Cari is very entertained at her prank and believes I am enjoying this nonsense as well. In reality, I just want to play Mario Galaxy.

work

Sometimes I feel like a well paid baby sitter. Why is it that when I ask an employee to do something, then check back in an hour, they have made little or no progress? These are adults! Some of them are complete idiots. My eight year old can follow directions better. We don't do anything complicated at the store. The basics is this: stock shelves with stuff, help customers, sell stuff, repeat.

Sometimes the customers can be a pain. Lately, the customers haven't been bad, it's the employees. When my boss asks me to do something, I do it. So, when I ask someone to do something, I expect it done. Most of them do a great job. For the others, I have threatened once or twice to bring my son in and show them how to do their job.

There are lots of blog worthy stories from work. Sometimes I wish they could bring in a camera crew and shoot a reality show there. I could just about guarantee a hit. For now, I'm nervous to say too much about work. There are always stories about a blogger getting fired for writing about work. I do not need to become a statistic. So I just stick to writing about myself and my family. Hopefully they won't fire me.

I did have a work related scare on the blog one time.

I came home from work and checked my email. I had a comment on my blog from a familiar name. When I read the comment, I froze. Sitting in silence, staring at the screen. I read it four times at least. The person is a corporate executive for the company I work for. To me, his words were cryptic. They had double meaning.

I loaded up my blog and did some searches for things related to the company. Nothing was showing up. I DON'T WRITE ABOUT WORK. How did he find me?

I emailed a good friend of mine. He's really the only one I work with that knows about the blog. He logged on and read the comment. Then he called me. I think he was a little nervous for me at first. As we talked it over, I started to see how I probably read too much into the executives comment. I think he was just out reading random blogs and was inspired to leave a comment. I doubt he still reads this. If he does still read it, that's ok too.

My heart was beating fast that day. It didn't matter that I hadn't written anything about work. It made me realize that literally anyone can read this. I'm not an idiot, I always knew that to be the case. I just didn't think it would be someone from work. Who will it be next?

Picture of the day!

First, let's talk about work. Working the day after Thanksgiving at a retail store is actually kind of fun. I can be part of the excitement of it all without spending all my money. Don't get the impression that I didn't spend ANY money. I just didn't spend ALL my money. Saturday starts to get back to normal a bit as the specials wind down. I expect tomorrow to be pretty boring. I don't write about work very often, but I am working on something I started writing the other night about work. I hope to have it done in the next few days.

Here's a shot from the leaves. As far as I know, there were no slugs in the leaves. Then again, I wasn't the one begging to be buried in them. You'd have to ask them about the bugs.

One of Cari's favorite things about this time of year is the smell.

The smell of dirty, rotting, molding, leaves.I'd have to agree with her.

Thanksgiving day

My parents drove up for Thanksgiving and we all had a good day. Cari made a great meal and we put up some Christmas decorations. We also made a leaf pile to play in. Here's a few shots from the day. I'd write more but its been a long day at work and I have to be back in the morning.

It's late....or it's early

Ok. It's getting near two in the morning. I'm going to bed. I'm up late tonight because I had to work late. Didn't get home until midnight. When you go shopping on Friday after Thanksgiving and you see all the displays and piles of merchandise at the store. Remember that people had to work late setting that up so you could tear it down in an hour of shopping.

I started a different blog post a few minutes ago. I must be too tired. I couldn't focus long enough to finish it. I'll get it to you by Friday night.

Have a great Thanksgiving.

Can't Wait

I can't remember the last time I purchased something and didn't immediately open it. The other day I stopped at Toys-R-Us to buy Mario Galaxy for the Wii. I was wanting the try the game, but thought I would wait until Christmas to get it. Saturday was the last day of the sale, so I went ahead and picked it up. When I brought it home, I held it up and asked Cari, "Wait for Christmas?" She said yes, and I took it upstairs.



After twelve hours I still had not opened it. I don't want to wait! I jokingly told Cari four times Sunday morning that I was going to go play Mario. She asked me where I hid it so she could re-hide it . . . from me.



I'm not so sure this game will stay wrapped until December 25th. I'll let you know.

No Secrets

This morning the pastor called the children up front for their regular children's time. They talked about Thanksgiving and being thankful. The pastor shared a funny story about a Thanksgiving dinner at his house. That's when Meredith had something to say. I always get a bit nervous when Meredith starts talking up there. She's unpredictable. Today she said, "My dad called the butter people".

What she was trying to announce to the entire church was about a time that I made a phone call during dinner.

The tub of Land-O-Lakes was on the table. I noticed on the lid the words, "contains: milk". It struck me kind of funny so I pulled out my cell phone and put it on speaker as I dialed the 1-800 number from the container. The kids thought this was great. When the automated menu came on, I started talking like it was a real person. "Why is there milk in my butter?", "Did the Indian woman wash her hands before making this butter?", "Can you come over and clean my room?", "Did you make the Indian woman milk a cow to get the milk?" Some of the questions were coming from the kids. We were all laughing pretty good about it.

A few nights later, the kids were prompting me to call again. This time I called the Heinz ketchup people. "Are you friends with the butter people?", "You don't put any milk in your ketchup, do you?", "Do you wash your feet before stomping on the tomatoes?" I had a whole conversation with the Heinz automated system because it tries to recognize voice commands of their menu. When it would say it didn't recognize my choice, I would say it louder and act like they were dumb. Then they transferred me to a representative. I got scared and hung up.

A few nights went by and I was asked to call more food vendors during dinner. This time Cari grabbed a Sharpie and blacked out all the phone numbers that were on the table that night.

That all happened a few months back, but it is still one of Meredith's favorite things to tell people. One night, we had guests over for dinner and when I asked someone to pass the butter, Meredith started laughing and said, "Don't give it to him, he'll call the butter people!"

After service this morning, I found myself telling this story as friends came up and asked what Meredith was talking about.

That's why I always put my head down when the children go to the front.

New Rule

Cari set a new rule last night.

No photographs during feeding time.

Wisdom

When I made my sunrise trip to the mountains last week, I couldn't help but to pay a visit to Pretty Place. I've written about it before and showed you pictures. I have one more to share with you. Every pillar of this outdoor chapel has plaques on each side. Each one with a prayer, bible verse, or quote.

I took some time to read a few more of these while there. Here was one of my favorites.

It says:

"We can only see a little of the ocean.
Just a few miles distant from the rocky shore;
But out there - Far beyond our eyes' horizon,
There's more - Immeasurably more.
We can only see a little of God's Loving - A few rich treasures from his mighty store;
But out there - Far beyond our eyes' horizon, there's more - Immeasurably more."
- Author Unknown

Father / Son hike

On Saturday I took Randy out hiking. We traveled up to Rainbow falls near the N. Carolina border inside YMCA camp property. I couldn’t remember for certain, but I thought the hike would take about an hour to reach the falls.

We stopped in at the office to sign in and the guy looked at me like Randy wasn’t going to make it. I told him I had hiked it twice before and we’d see how far we could get.

We started out at 11am. At 12:30pm we came to a crossing of a creek. There was no obvious way to cross. This was not the hike I remembered. It also was taking way too long. Randy was complaining that it was too dangerous and his legs were too tired. It was dangerous because of the steep edges the trail followed in some areas. He even told me it was the worst day of his life ever. I took a line from the Simpson’s movie, which he liked, “worst day of your life SO FAR”. He did get a bit of a laugh out of that. I told him we would turn around and head back up the hill. We took a few breaks going back up. Once we were half way or more back we found a small trail that split off and went through some mud. We took that small trail and within five minutes, we were at the falls.

I had taken a wrong turn on this unmarked trail and took us forty five minutes out of the way. That was an hour and a half of hiking I could have saved us. Randy reminded me that it was my fault we went the wrong way. I reminded him it was his fault we ran out of food. Before we left, he was smearing peanut butter on some celery sticks. He made six. I asked if he only wanted three each. He shrugged his shoulders. He just didn’t want to smear any more peanut butter. I emphasized that it didn’t sound like much food.

At the waterfall, Randy’s attitude improved greatly. We even took some pictures together. From then on, we had a great time together. I’m not sure he really appreciates these long hikes. He asked several times if they would ever install an elevator. He said they could make it out of wood to keep it more “in nature”.

Baby's first trip out

Early last week I was really dying to get out and do some hiking. The baby is not old enough for a hike yet. As soon as she can hold her head up well enough, then I will carry her on the hikes. We're not there yet. So, we took a drive over to the Hartwell Dam.

The dam was completed in 1962 by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It provides some hydro power and also acts as flood control downstream of the Savannah. We parked under the highway and looked around the river area for a bit. Baby did a great job sleeping during this.

We drove up closer to the dam and I was able to walk along the top of it. In the picture from a few days ago, you can see the trail leading onto the dam. About a third of the way across, they have a fence preventing you from going further. I think this is more about keeping people from Georgia trying to make their way into our state, than keeping me off the dam. Here's a photo looking down the river from standing on the dam.

We sat down at at the side of the river for a few minutes for me to take some pictures. I used the opportunity to get the flash out and play with some of my equipment.

Next we drove over the bridge into Georgia. That's where the visitor center is located. It's true that I warned Cari as she got out of the car, "Watch your back, you're in Georgia now". I don't really know what that meant, but I looked back at the car as I went inside as a precaution. Inside they had maps and photographs. The most interesting thing we saw was a display showing some of the wildlife from the area. They had a bear, fox, beaver, and a few other specimen in the display. Have you ever seen a beaver? THESE THINGS ARE MUCH BIGGER THAN I WOULD HAVE GUESSED. The size of a small dog. I don't know what I was expecting, but somehow, I thought a beaver would be the size of a large cat. Certainly no larger than a groundhog.

Brenna did a good job going out with us. It was windy and cold on top of the dam, but she didn't complain one bit. Neither did Cari.

Dam Again!

Dang! I'm getting out of order. Before I had taken the time to tell you about Cari, baby, and I's trip the other day, I've taken another trip. I'll still get the non-interesting story from Hartwell Dam posted with a few more photos. But for now, read this:
I had to drive into Georgia for work today. Last night, when I was getting my map, I noticed a dam near my route. All thanks to Google maps and satellite view. On may way back home, I stopped at the J Stom Thurmond Lake and Dam for lunch. It's about 55 miles downstream from the Hartwell dam (the one I posted two days ago) on the Savannah river.

Two things about this site. If you look, you will see a small fishing boat near the center of the photo. A few minutes earlier, he was right along side of the dam wall. I was thinking they should open the gates just a bit a give him a scare, but they didn't. There are signs all over that warn about being close, but maybe the fishing is better up there.

The other thing is that the highway is the top of the dam. The top is about the width of a bridge, one lane each way. I walked more than half way out and took some photos of the river. A few times, a truck drove by at 55+mph and made me pretty nervous. I got up close to the railing and held it. It probably wasn't that close, but it was a bit scary.

Here's a few views from the top.

Dam!

Is there a story to go with this shot? You bet there is. I hope to write it up tomorrow evening for you.

I'll tell you that this is the Hartwell Dam on the Savannah river. The Savannah forms the border between South Carolina and Georgia. This shot was from the SC side. Later, we went to the visitor center on the Ga side.

As we got out of the car I said, "Watch your back, you're in Georgia now"!

The Song

A few weeks ago I used "Praise You in the Storm" as a blog title. It is currently the title of my favorite song. It is a great song performed by Casting Crowns.

I've been thinking about writing this for a week now. I still don't know how to express the message I want to get out. I've written this twenty minutes ago. I've read and re-read it. I'm not satisfied with my ability to express the meaning of this song to me. I don't want to wait any longer to get this posted.
Read the song. Listen to the song. I don't need to say much more than that. Here's the lyrics followed with some of my thoughts.
---------------------------------------
I was sure by now
God you would have reached down
And wiped our tears away
Stepped in and saved the day
But once again, I say “Amen”, and it’s still raining

As the thunder rolls
I barely hear Your whisper through the rain
“I’m with you”
And as Your mercy falls
I raise my hands and praise the God who gives
And takes away

I'll praise You in this storm
And I will lift my hands
For You are who You are
No matter where I am
Every tear I've cried
You hold in Your hand
You never left my side
And though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm

I remember when
I stumbled in the wind
You heard my cry
You raised me up again
My strength is almost gone
How can I carry on
If I can't find You

As the thunder rolls
I barely hear You whisper through the rain
"I'm with you"
And as Your mercy falls
I raise my hands and praise the God who gives
And takes away

I lift my eyes unto the hills
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord
The Maker of Heaven and Earth
------------------------------------------------
I think what moves me about this song is that it takes effort to do the things they are singing.
The thunder rolls. Everything is going wrong. Maybe you feel the world is coming down on you. Perhaps you lost a loved one or a friend is sick. Imagine you lost your home to a natural disaster. Haven't you heard people say "I'm mad at God"? I have.

At times like that, it takes an amount of conscious effort to praise God. It's easier to be focused on blaming God for the wrong that has been done to you. Through all your pain, you can barely hear God whispering to you, "I am with you". The song tells us that God has never left us. He is holding EVERY tear you have cried.

How much strength does it take to lift your hands and praise God at times like this? Where does my help (strength) come from? My help (strength) comes from the Lord.

The maker of Heaven and Earth.

There are several good videos people have put together of this song on YouTube. One of my favorites is the band performing the song live.

make a decision

I almost always take my lunch to work. The few days that I don't, I like to go to Chick-fil-A.

Today, Sunday, I didn't take my lunch to work. Chick-fil-A is closed on Sunday. I decided to go to Publix (grocery store) and get some bread. That's all, just bread. They have some of the best breads.

Once inside, I was nervous that just bread wouldn't fill me up for long. I walked to the Deli section and got in line for a sub. Then I thought I didn't want to spend that much money. Back to the bakery. I picked up the bread I wanted and started to walk off. I was going to get a drink and some chips. Getting a sub instead of the bread wouldn't cost that much more.

I put the bread back and got back in line for the sub. After I got the sub, I went searching for a drink. I wanted Gatorade. It wasn't near the Pepsi. Once I found Gatorade, I decided I didn't want to spend that much for a large container. There weren't any smaller containers sold individually. I walked back to the Pepsi, but didn't really want that. I decided just to spend the money. Back to the Gatorade where I had to decide on flavor.

A full twenty minutes passed from the time I entered, until I was back in my car.

I drove back to work. I was going to sit in the car and listen to the radio during the rest of my lunch. I parked in my normal spot, but decided there were too many people around. I drove over to the park where I ALWAYS eat lunch. Why didn't I just go there to begin with? I DON'T KNOW.

Once at the park, I unpacked my sub, chips, and Gatorade. I looked at the clock. More than half of my lunch time was already gone. All because I couldn't make a few SIMPLE decisions.

I called Cari to complain about myself. I told her that is why I have to take my lunch everyday. I would go crazy if I had to make decisions like that everyday.

Good Morning. . . law breaker

I got up at six this morning. I showered and dressed quickly. I poured my coffee to go and grabbed a bagel without toasting it. I was about ten minutes late. I wasn't going to work this morning, I was headed up into the mountains to take some photos of the sunrise. I felt like I was cutting it close.

I pulled into Caesars Head State Park at 7:30am. The gate to the overlook was locked. A sign was bolted to the front of the gate. "Unlawful to go beyond this point". The ranger station/gift shop had a sign that said the building opened at 9. NINE!! Sunrise was going to be just a bit before eight. I jumped the fence and went to the overlook. It was still pretty dark. I took a few test shots and then I got nervous.

If I was caught, I didn't know what they would do. I'd imagine I would receive a fine. This hobby is not worth a ticket. I went back to the car to think about the situation. There was about thirty minutes until the sun would be high enough to reach the mountain.

After about five minutes, a white truck pulled in and a man got out. He went to the back of his truck and put a jacket on. I was across the parking lot in my car, watching him. "Please be a photographer", I thought. If it was, we could break the law together. Safety in numbers, right?

He pulled a tripod out of his truck. A photographer! I gave him another minute, then I grabbed my gear and walked toward him.

After our good mornings, I asked him, "Do you know what time they open this gate? Do you know how serious they are about this sign?" I pointed to the gate.

He told me that he didn't know what time it opened and he said they are very serious about the sign. Then he told me he worked for the state as a photographer. He made arrangements with the ranger for this morning. I noticed his government license plate. He said he was in no authority to give me permission. He kinda said I would be jumping the gate at my own risk.

I was still considering if I should leave. I was disappointed.

We talked for another minute, then he invited me to jump the fence with him. He said that if they asked, I was with him. THANK YOU, PERRY!

We spent about an hour at the observation area shooting. As we talked, I realized that Perry is a really cool guy.

At a time that I was debating leaving or breaking the law on this random Friday morning, Perry pulled into the parking lot and changed my morning. How amazing is that?

You have to click and see this one enlarged.

Another photo, lighter than this one, is on my Flickr account.

Squash

Have I ever told you the story of Squash?

This story came about while having dinner with some friends. Debbie had prepared a great meal that included squash. I was not about to eat any of the squash. She and Cari tried to convince me to put some of the mash into my mouth. So, I created the following story to distract them of their goal.

It's called squash for a reason. The Indians named it. They planted it, cared for the plants, and carefully harvested the vegetable.

So much work went into getting this nutrition. The women cooked it and served it to the men proudly.

It tasted so nasty the men threw it to the ground and stomped on it to show their displeasure with this new item. The men went into the field and squashed the rest of the vegetable.

Ever since that day, the women called it "Squash". For some reason, only women can enjoy it.

I don't think anyone was believing my story as I told it. It did save me from tasting squash for another five minutes. After my story I did force down one bite. That was my last bite of squash.

Halloween Rules

I like Halloween because I like to eat candy. I like to send my children out to the streets and have them gather candy for me.

Tonight, they went out three times with Cari and some neighbors. I stayed home with Brenna. She and I handed out candy to the visitors. I also ate a lot of candy between visitors.

The kids came back with piles of candy that I started looking through after they went to bed. Yum.

This year we had a soldierand a ballerina

The Revolving Door

One of our favorite things to do at Greenville Memorial was to watch the revolving door.

It's an automatic revolving door. You don't need to push it around. I was extremely entertained by this. The door has several sensors on it. If someone does not seem to be following the rules, an automated message is announced, "Please step forward". It is amazing the number of people that are confused by this door. There are two large openings, one on each side. You jump in when you can and walk slowly around to the inside of the building. How hard can it be?
Several times, while Cari and I were mid-journey to the inside, the door stopped. We were trapped. The voice told the idiots to please step forward.

Maybe they thought the floor was rotating and they wouldn't have to walk. As the back side of the opening hit their shoes, it stopped. Children that were not paying attention were the worst offenders of stopping the door.

Cari came to hate the door. It was annoying when you would enter with an idiot. Or if you were entering while an idiot tried to escape the hospital. These situations did not cause me to hate the door. I actually enjoyed watching the idiot get confused as the voice prodded them along.

On Cari's last day at Greenville, I was at work. She called me around lunch time laughing. She said that she was sitting out front after lunch and saw forty people get trapped in the door. She told me the door stopped with a handful of people in it. It announced for the idiot to step forward. Before the door started moving again, more people got in. This happened twice. Cari said both sides of the door were full of people. To the point that nobody could step forward. She said one old man started knocking on the glass wall. He could see the outside, but the door wasn't getting him there. It took a minute before some of the people got out of the revolving door to make room for the others to get the door going again. I wish I could have seen that.

HOME!

15 days ago, Brenna was born at 12:54 pm.

Today she came home.

Shake this guy!

I've talked about the show Man vs Wild before. The crazy man, Bear, gets dropped in remote locations and goes crazy. I just happen to come across this segment on TV tonight. I recorded it on Tivo because I didn't want Cari to miss it. We laughed for a good five minutes at how crazy he looks.



Wow! I was on YouTube looking for that clip to share with you and came across this one. I think this second video would win this guy a crazy award.



After watching the first video, and laughing so hard, I told Cari someone needs to shake that guy. Maybe the cameraman could do it. The camera guy should have put the equipment down, walked over to Bear, and started shaking him. "What's wrong with you, man"? "Snap out of it"! This guy obviously gets a bit nutty. They should just pack him a lunch for the next shoot.

So SWEET!

Over the past week I asked you to participate in a poll. How do you eat poptarts?
The majority of you said you eat them frosting side up. Two of you said you don't know what poptarts are. Where have the two of you been? Over 2 billion poptarts are sold each year!

This poll was prompted after a discussion Cari and I had last week. There were plenty of blog worthy discussions last week as we sat in a hospital staring at each other every day.

Cari bit into her poptart, frosting side up.
"You're doing that backwards," I told her. "Your taste buds are in your tongue. Why would you put the frosting furthest away from it? It's such a waste". For the record, there are some taste buds on the roof of your mouth, but it is believed that the areas that recognize sweet tastes are on the tongue. (Wiki)

Cari continued chomping on the sugared breakfast. She didn't say anything, but gave me the look. The look that says, "You're crazy".

I explained to her that if you flip the poptart frosting side down you will maximize the amount of sweetness you taste in the frosting. Plus the frosting is so smooth on your tongue. It's kinda relaxing. Like licking a silk shirt.

Eating a poptart frosting side up is like licking your jeans. No taste and rough on the tongue.

As I gave Cari her science lesson, her expression remained blank. After she took her last bite, still frosting side up, I asked her how it tasted.

Without smiling she said, "Why don't you lick your jeans and find out".

One more step

Yesterday, Brenna got moved back to the first hospital. It's about half the travel time compared to being at Greenville Memorial. I went up and saw her last night. The quality of the facility going from a NICU to a normal nursery setup is amazing. As I held her last night, I was looking around and watching things happen. Instead of the forty babies we saw in the NICU, this nursery had Brenna and one other. The nurses were all great last night and I am sure she is great there. The place just gives a different impression. Had I not been to Greenville everyday last week, I would never have realized what a hospital can be.

Cari got some photos for me yesterday as she left Greenville. I'll share some of those tonight and tomorrow. I'm headed to work now.

For those that asked, Scrappy Gal did delete her blog. There is not a replacement.

Here's Brenna strapped in and ready for a ride in an ambulance yesterday: