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April 1, 2009 4:51 PM Look up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's ...  ... a fish? I took this picture with my Blackberry the other day as we were driving around. Does that not look like a fish in the sky? Right down to the colors on the fin. Somehow it seems like something appropriately placed on a journal entry for April Fools' day, but sadly - I've had nothing this year. One of the girls fooled me this morning though... She phoned and told me that there was a monkey, a kitty, a dog and a hippo behind me. I looked behind me and did not see any such beasts, so I told her so and she gleefully laughed and announced, "Ha ha, I fooled you!" Not bad for a four-year-old... I almost bought a new camera the other week... It's occurred to me that I would be much more inclined to write on my web site if I had a camera with which to take pictures to accompany (or remind me of) the things I encounter throughout my day. So often I'll see things that stand out as noteworthy in some form or another, and yet without any proper means to capture the image, it makes it more difficult to retell. When I take a good picture though, I usually feel much more inclined and therefore motivated to share it with the world. Bo and I put in a muchly needed new fire pit over the weekend. The ground had thawed out in an 8" radius from our old firepit, but outside that circle of fire-induced thawing lay frozen dirt as solid as rock. We implanted a base of sidewalk blocks several inches beneath the grade, and then built up the ring of cinderblocks from there. The dirt was back-filled to surround the pit and it looks fantastic. We had a celebratory fire over which was cooked several fat, juicy smokies and thus we christen'd our new firepit. It's so nice to have a proper pit after all those years of the old one. Brick by brick it's blocks broke down until we didn't even have enough whole bricks left to make a circle. Not so anymore, and I look forward to getting much use out of it this summer. Speaking of summer, these last few warming days have been nudging the spring nerve in me. It seems like even though we've had several valiant attempts by Old Man Winter at retaining his grip of white reign over the land of late, the sun's warming power cannot be repealed and invariably the bare ground shows through. My new Venus Fly Trap even got it's first taste of earth worm the other day, as our firepit installation unearthed a number of the creatures. It happily chomped down on the worm which I watch wiggle it's way around inside the closed Flytrap's mouth for about a day or so before giving up in the shape of the top half of a question mark... Maybe it was asking, "Why?" Whatever the why, my four dollar plant is starting to thrive and has put up four new mouths since I bought it several months ago, a promising sign. Truth be told, one of the milestones to mark of spring's arrival this year will be the startup of my underground sprinkler system! I'm very interested to see how it has fared through it's first winter. I blew out all the lines so I doubt any water had a chance to build up anywhere and crack any of the pipes, but it is possible that some of the heads near the curb were driven over as the lines between road and curb area often erased by a decent snowfall, of which we've had many this year... So I might need to replace a couple of the spray heads near the curb, but how exciting will that be to see lawn sprinklers at work again? I know, a rather strange thing to get excited about. I make no appologies. Bring on the warm weather. April 2, 2009 12:22 AM Quote Of The Day Lucky to be alive... April 19, 2009 11:32 PM A Change Of Plans  Life continues to race along at an astonishing pace. Since last I wrote here, many things have come to pass, including the marriage of my own dear little brother. I was to be part of the wedding party until my flight got cancelled less than 24 hours before it was scheduled to depart for Wichita, but from what I heard their hitching went off without a hitch. Needless to say, I am very proud of my little brother. Would anyone have believed it a year ago? They grow up so fast...    Kristi and the girls came over this afternoon and the girls played while Kristi and I got quite a bit of spring cleaning done in the yard. Saturday Bo and I did some major yard work in the back, including a new concrete slab patio around our new fire pit. It looks fantastic. Pictures to follow.  Speaking of which, I got a new camera in anticipation of the wedding, even though that fell through, but it should provide much most sustinance for your visual consumption if and when I find time to update this site. It doesn't look like things are going to let up any time soon.  I've often wondered why companies didn't set completion dates on a more realistic schedule. It seems that every single construction project runs into some crazy last minute rush, and after decades of planning and executing, you'd think there would be some better formula for calculating how long it takes, realistically, to build something. Yet instead, there is almost always that last minute push to get things done. While pondering this, it occurred to me that if there was no short (impossible?) deadlines set, perhaps the work would not even get as far as it does in the allotted time. Sometimes a deadline is a necessary evil to spur others on to work, to push people to accomplish great things that they would otherwise fail to accomplish for the wins of procrastination or laziness. Without a goal to work towards, we are lost. Void of purpose, we lack fulfillment, and in the absense of fulfillment we seek that which we cannot attain in vain. Events have been set into motion now that are spurring me on to activity. The push is on as it were, to get certain things done and to move into the next stage of my life. Pulling out the stops, no holds barred, go big or go home - call it what you will, this is go time. It is decision time. It is action time. And life will never be the same.  BACK to Journal Index |