grinNberrett

Halloween is probably the only commercialized holiday that I like. I like to go "somewhat" out in my decorations for Halloween. I say go "somewhat" out because whatever I do would pale in comparison to this house that is about 8 blocks away.

I left work early to watch T-y and Brielle in the school Halloween parade. T-y was some zombie and Brielle was a Power Ranger. My parents showed up last minute and surprise the kids.

After the parade I went home and started setting up my yard for the seekers of corn syrup. I try not to make it to scary. I don't like to scare the kids, or let anyone else scare the kids at my place. I like to keep my house a scare free zone. Why? Cause I was scared poopless when I was a young candy seeker. That night at the Castleton's will always be etched in my memory. Frankenstein popped out a their bushes and chased me down the street. I never went back to the house and always walked on the opposite side of the street from their house. I have since taken up a solemn oath with the Great Pumpkin to always make my house a scare free zone; but only on Halloween. Every other day of the year is "scare" play.

I don't have any pictures of Amanda cause I left before she got up, and she came home after I had gone to bed. I think she was "Sexy" Mini Mouse. She says that her friends took some pictures of her, so I will post them if I ever get a copy of them.

Welcome to Colorful Colorado!

We took a trip to see my grandmother in Colorado over the UEA break. Shantell and Amanda haven't seen Grandma K since her stroke. We left Wednesday night around 4 and got there around 10. The kids spent most of the 6 hour drive glued to the DVD screens watching movies. That is until Amanda broke one of the screens. Good thing there were two other screens to watch movies on. Otherwise the 6 hour drive would have seem like 87 hours.

T-y and I are early risers, so we were up at the crack of dawn, 6:00, and went out exploring the ranch. We saw a beautiful sunrise, countless wild ducks, a fox, some pheasants, two bucks, an eagle, and three does. The only thing that we didn't see was a partridge in a pear tree.

Grandma K wasn't aware that we were coming, so it was fun surprising her at breakfast. She still doesn't have the use of her right side, but her mind is as sharp as ever. We talked about a lot of things, especially of my childhood memories at the ranch. It boosted my spirits to talk to her and to see that she is doing better then the last time that I saw her.

After breakfast the kids and I went exploring the ranch. Amanda didn't want me taking any pictures of her because she didn't have her makeup on. I told her Max Factor doesn't make her pretty. Needless to say, I was only allowed to post this one picture.

The kids were going a little stir crazy after lunch, so we took them to the city park. Amanda was content sitting on the park bench checking out a number of boys that were playing at the park.

The next day I had to take my Aunt and Uncle Galbraith to the airport in Montrose. On my way home I stopped at a yard sale and found a very nice orange jump suit. An orange jump suit that prisoners wear in jail. So I bought it. I bought it with one mission in mind; To wear it while hitchhiking. I knew the perfect spot to wear it. More on that latter....

The gentlemen that rents out grandmas pasture let us use his four wheeler to ride around in grandmas pastures. It was a hit. I think the kids and I spent just under 2 hours riding around on it. The only mistake I made was to let Bre, aka "Speed Deamon", drive. I don't think it went fast enough for her. T-y now wants to buy some and keep them at the ranch so we can ride them when we go over there. He figures that he will inherit the ranch when I die. Here is a blurb of the conversation we had about it.

Later that night we went out to dinner at Aspen Trails. The food isn't anything fancy, but they have a "Tony Scoop". Grandma and I talked while we were waiting for the food. During the course of the conversation Grandma smiled and laughed out loud. This nearly made me cry. I was able to catch a fleeting moment of what she used to be like before her stroke. According to mom, getting her to laugh was a rare treat. In fact, my mom couldn't remember the last time that she heard her mother laugh.

A Tony Scoop is a quart of ice cream packed on a cone. After dinner I got the family single and double scoop cones, and I ordered the Tony Scoop. There are about 15 giant scoops of ice cream on a itty bitty ice cream cone. T-y wanted one, but I think the cone weighs more then him.

We had a great time at Grandma K's. On the way home I stopped the car, put on the orange jump suit and snapped the following picture. The faces of of the people driving by were priceless.

BYU Game

Johnny had 4 tickets to the BYU game today. Only Reese wanted to go with him, so he asked T-y and I if we would like to go. Being that it was such a beautiful day, T-y and I decided to go. The game was fantastically boring. We sat on the 50 yard line in section 105 Row 10. Pretty decent seats. The score at halftime was BYU 7 New Mexico 3. The score at the end of the game was BYU 21 New Mexico 3. The temperature at the end of the game was 39. T-y had a good old time and didn't complain about how cold it was.

'Cause this Is Thriller, Diller Night

For Thursday Stretch Your Legs Night, we took the family to see Odyssey Dance Theatre Thriller show. The Owens and us have seen at Kingsbury Hall in SLC. Ever since we saw it, we have been wanting to take the kids to the show. I was reading the newspaper this morning and noticed that they are performing at the Covey Center for the Arts October 9th-11th. Shantell just about jumped out of her skin when I told her this. She called Andrea and they had purchased the tickets by 8:30am.

Some of the members of the cast were dressed as zombies and wandered throughout the auditorium before and after the show. These zombies would do their darnedest to scare the digested food waste out of you. This is something that Brielle really didn't like.

The stage wasn't as big as the one in Kingsbury Hall, so they weren't able to use some of their props. The lack of props is probably my only complaint about the show. My favorite dace was "Dem Bones". In the dance, the stage is lit up by black lights and the dancers, dressed in black jumpsuits and maskes, dance around the stage in white shoes. Some of the shoes even appear to be dancing in the air. After a bit, the dancers take off the jumpsuits which reveals their skeleton costume. So now it appears as if skeletons are dancing on the stage. It is very cool. Brielle liked the "River Dance of Blood" and T-y liked the "Sugar Plum Fairy" dance. I can't remember what dance Amanda and Shantell said they liked. The only dance that wasn't well liked by any of us was "Lost Boys".

Don't waste your money on haunted houses this Halloween; waste it on Thriller!!!

P.S. Amanda is available to babysit for those that want to go see this without your kids.

Hangover Pills

I heard a commercial for a hangover pill while driving to church today. It made me chuckle when I heard it. Apparently the company that makes the pill figures that there are a lot of people with hangovers driving to church listening to FM 102.7.

Happy Birthday Roy!

I listen to the Radio From Hell show on the way into work each morning. One of the segments that I especially like, is called things that must go. I was thinking about this when the friends, family, and employees of Chuck-A-Rama starting singing happy birthday to Roy. I decided to make the best of the situation and walked over to Roy's table and joined in the celebration. After all, they are including everyone within ear shot in the celebration.
I sure hope that my singing helped Roy have a better birthday!

Where is the mine?

When we got back home we checked Johnny's map of where the mine was. The mine was in the direct vicinity of where we had stopped for lunch. It was a little disappointing that we were right there but couldn't find it. Johnny called the BLM to ask how hard the mine was to find. The BLM agent stated that it was located about 20 feet above the ground. This is why we couldn't find it. We were looking for the opening at the ground level. Apparently I am blind when looking for mines, but have 20/20 vision when spotting scorpions. Drat! Oh well. There are lots of places unexplored in the area, so we will definitely be returning; perhaps even this weekend.

I should have done more due diligence in checking out the area before we left. The trail is pretty visible when zooming in using the Satellite view in Google Maps. Just chalk this up to yet another learning experience. Here is the route we took to get there.
Red - The established trail.
Purple - The trail we blazed.
Orange - The established trail we took hiking out.
Green - The established trail we followed after lunch looking for the mine.

San Rafeal is Swell

Johnny invited me to go on a search for gold this weekend. He has been wanting to backpack part of the the San Rafael Swell since the beginning of summer. He wanted to hike to an abandoned mine called the "Sorrel Mule Mine" and camp there. The hike to the mine is about 3 miles downstream from Fullers Bottom and the trail crosses the river 3 times. So fish, fish he got his wish.

We setup camp and discussed the plan for the next day. We decided not to backpack into the mine. We decided instead to do a day hike to the mine. The kids liked that idea better. Johnny dug a pit for the fire. Soon after T-y started digging a hole. I wasn't sure why until he started a fire in it. Brielle wasn't going to be shown up by T-y so she built one too. T-y has built a fire all by himself before, but Brielle hadn't. She was pretty proud of her accomplishment.

Our scouting report, Baylor, stated that the road seem to go on and on and was leading away from the the river. So we decided to blaze our own trail.

The land is open range, so there were a zillion dried cow pies. I happen to kick one over and found this hiding under it.

It's a good thing that Dr. Jones recently gave us some advice about scorpions.

When it comes to scorpions, the bigger the better. Small one bites ya, don't keep it to yourself.

Thanks to this advice, we left the scorpion alone.

We blazed our own trail for about a mile and took a rest. For the more part it was easy walking. Walking across the desert landscape is pretty easy. We just had to watch out for those prickly rocks.

We crossed the river, fought through the brush and stumbled upon the trail.

We traveled another mile and stopped for lunch. The mine wasn't marked on the map I brought, so we only had a general idea where the mine was located. Johnny left the map with the mine marked on it at home. We thought we were in the right location, so Johnny went off looking around for it. The kids went off and played in the river.

Johnny didn't find the mine, so we set off down the trail hoping to find it within the next 45 minutes. The stars were not aligned for us today. We were unable to find the mine. The kids complained that they hiked all that way for nothing. I asked them if they had fun and they said yes. So we hiked for fun.

We were able to follow the trail all the way back to the the jeep road. The current was really slow, so Reese, T-y , and Baylor walked up the river. They had to eventually get out of the river, as it became deeper T-y's head. It turned out that the trail head was just off the jeep road. It was about a 1/2 mile up the road from where we decided to blaze our own trail. It took us about 3.5 hours to hike in and 2.5 hours to hike out. It was a fun trip and the kids really enjoyed walking in the river and building their own fires. It is definitely worth a return trip.

:: Posted by brb
:: Filed under /daily_journal

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Wed, 27 Aug 2008

Just You Watch the Best.

Floyd Robert Berrett, aka "Dad", was on Fox 13 "Good Day Utah" this morning. Cottonwood was nominated to be Fox 13's "Cool School of the Week". He coaches the girls volleyball team and Big Budda got some pointers on how to play the game from him. The ending of the video is the best. (Sorry dad, but it is!)

When he called to talk to me today, I said that he should have ended the segment by saying, "Now back to Ron and Mary in the studio". Now that would have been funny.

*Ron and Mary are the co-hosts of a rival TV morning show.

:: Posted by brb
:: Filed under /daily_journal

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Sat, 23 Aug 2008

Give Blood, Play Water Polo

T-y and I tuned into the Olympics this morning. They were broadcasting the US vs Serbia water polo match live, but it was really the day after it had been played. T-y knew that I had played water polo in high school, so he started asking a bunch of questions about the game.

T-y: Can the players touch the bottom of the pool?
Me: No.
T-y: How deep is the pool?
Me: About 10 feet deep.
T-y: So the players can't touch the bottom and have to swim the entire time?
Me: Yep.
T-y: That would be a tough sport to play.
Me: Yes it is.

My photo scrapbooks were already out from looking for pictures of Rus, so I looked for some pictures of me playing water polo. It turns out that I was number 12 on the team. T-y choose to be number 12 on his baseball team. He had no clue that I was number 12 on the water polo team.

The US went on to beat the Croatia team 10-5. It was a fun game to watch. Especially since the US wasn't supposed to beat the Croatia team. In fact, the US team hasn't medaled in the sport for 20 years. Now they will be playing Hungary, ranked #1 in the world, for the gold medal.

:: Posted by brb
:: Filed under /daily_journal

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