When it rains it pours

This week has really sucked so far. It has been a really expensive week. It started off with us shelling out $100 for a new windshield on our van. Then Tuesday one of the tires blew out on the van while on the freeway. I knew my van needed two new tires but I was hoping that they would make it another month. But they didn't. So we had to spend another $237 for tires. Then on Wed. Leona got a speeding ticket for going 35 in a 35 zone. Unfortunately there was construction and they posted the speed limit at 25. Fortunately the officer didn't cite her for the construction zone so the fine isn't double. I just hope that the rest of the week doesn't have any unexpected expenses. I can't afford that. I am already broke.

Here is hoping for a nice, expense free weekend.

Camping

We managed to go camping this weekend.  It was nice.  I took a couple days off work and we went to South Fork for a couple nights. I love to camp.  I could camp every weekend if I was able to.  We didn't get to go to Yellowstone this year (much to my kids - and my - disappointment) but we managed to get some camping in.  I am hoping to go camping again before the snow falls.

One funny thing to point out is that the campground we were in (Upper Meadows) only has outhouses. After two days Star was saying that she wanted to go home because home has toilets that flush. The funny thing about that is she has a bad habit of not flushing the toilets.  So I don't know why an outhouse was such a big deal for her. It isn't like she is doing anything different at home most of the time.  I just thought that was kinda funny.

Despite the heat (it was really hot in the afternoon because our campsite didn't have much shade in the afternoon hours) we had a good time.  I am the only one that got sunburned (and it wasn't much of a burn).  We had no major injuries.  Star only tripped over our canopy cords and fell once.  No one else did surprisingly (in Yellowstone last year we all tripped over the cords at least once). All in all it was a good trip.  We made a point of not taking any electronic devices with us. I know that is a big thing for me because most of my day is spent on a computer of some kind.  But when I am in the mountains I don't need anything but a good book and some shade to enjoy myself.  Getting away from all the fast paced craziness of my normal life is a real battery recharger.  I need to go camping more often.

Not only was this our first camping trip this year it was Leona and my 11th anniversary.  Last year we were in Yellowstone for our anniversary.  I think it would be nice to make it a tradition to be camping for our anniversary.  Leona would disagree with that but it has worked out the last 2 years.  I am hoping for more :)

Our friend, Karen, and her kids went up with us for the first night.  Her kids and my kids all get along really well and they all had a lot of fun.  My kids were bored to death after Karen and her kids left.  Eventually they found ways to entertain themselves but next time Karens kids are going to have to stay the whole time so my kids don't drive me crazy when they get bored.

If you want to see pictures of our trip check out Leona's blog.

Having a bad day at work?

If you don't laugh out loud after you read this you are in a coma! This is even funnier when you realize it's real! Next time you have a bad day at work think of this guy...

Rob is a commercial saturation diver for Global Divers in   Louisiana . He performs underwater repairs on offshore drilling rigs. Below is an E-mail he sent to his sister. She then sent it to radio station 103.2   FM in  Ft. Wayne ,   Indiana , who was sponsoring a worst job experience contest. Needless to say, she won.

 Hi Sue,
Just another note from your bottom-dwelling brother.

 Last week I had a bad day at the office. I know you've been feeling    down lately at work, so I thought I would share my dilemma with you to make you realize it's not so bad after all.

 Before I can tell you what happened to me, I first must bore you with a few technicalities of my job.

As you know, my office lies at the bottom of the sea. I wear a suit to the office. It's a wet suit. This time of year the water is quite cool.

So what we do to keep warm is this: We have a diesel powered industrial water heater. This $20,000 piece of equipment sucks the water out of the sea. It heats it to a delightful temperature. It then pumps it down to the diver through a garden hose, which is taped to the air hose.

Now this sounds like a darn good plan, and I've used it several times with no complaints.

What I do, when I get to the bottom and start working, is take the hose  and stuff it down the back of my wet suit. This floods my whole suit with warm water. It's like working in a Jacuzzi.

Everything was going well until all of a sudden, my butt started to itch. So, of course, I scratched it. This only made things worse. With in a few seconds my butt started to burn.  I pulled the hose out from my back, but the damage was done. In agony, I realized what had happened.

The hot water machine   had sucked up a jellyfish and pumped it into my suit. Now, since I don't have any hair on my back, the jellyfish couldn't stick to it. However, the crack of my butt was not as fortunate.

When I scratched what I thought was an itch, I was actually grinding the jellyfish into the crack of my butt.

I informed the dive supervisor of my dilemma over the communicator. His instructions were unclear due to the fact that he, along with five other divers, were all laughing hysterically.

Needless to say I aborted the dive. I was instructed to make three agonizing in-water decompression stops totaling thirty-five minutes before I could reach the surface to begin my chamber dry decompression.

When I arrived at the surface, I was wearing nothing but my brass helmet. As I climbed out of the water, the medic, with tears of laughter running down his face, handed me a tube of cream and told me to rub it on my butt as soon as I got in the chamber.

The cream put the fire out, but I couldn't poop for two days because my butt was swollen shut.

So, next time you're having a bad day at work, think about how much worse it would be if you had a jellyfish shoved up your butt.

Now repeat to yourself, 'I love my job, I love my job, I love my job.'

Now whenever you have a bad day, ask yourself, is this a jellyfish bad day?

May you NEVER have a jellyfish bad day...!

Utah Drivers

Here is an article that pretty much sums up Utah drivers. http://www.carbibles.com/utahdrivers.html