Ryan's 5...

Well today Ryan turns 5 and as such is eligible to go to kindergarten this year--he starts on Aug 30th. Ryan is a fun kid. He seems to have a constant twinkle in his eyes and an infectious smile on his face, but when he is mad or sad his whole face changes. His current mood is readily apparent in his face and countenance. He has an easy going personality that allows him to work his way into any play group without problems. He is a good brother and regularly provides the comfort his little sister needs (though in many cases he is the cause of her needing the comfort in the first place).

He is a mischievous, happy, fun loving kid, and I am proud to be his Dad. Happy 5th Birthday Ryan.

Gotta Fix the Roof...

It will probably not come as any surprise that I have been putting off fixing the roof for some time, at least since last summer. During a wind storm several shingles were blown off and I just didn't want to get up on the roof to fix them. Well this morning I woke up to find that some of the tar paper had blown off as well. Looks like my delay has ended.

Called up my neighbor and borrowed his roofing nail gun, and then went up to Interstate Roofing Supply to get a couple bundles of shingles for the repair. While there I also purchased a few Whirlybird Turbine vents that are supposed to help remove the heat and moisture from your attic and thus reduce energy bills. I figured since I had to be on the roof anyway, might as well try it out.

After I ripped back the damaged shingles and replaced the damaged tar paper I set about installing the turbine. The installation was relatively easy, nothing complicated about it. Once I got it installed I finished up the shingles to the ridge. When I got to the ridge I pulled out the ridge shingles only to find them too narrow to blend with the existing ridge shingles. I installed a couple thinking that it would be fine, but decided that it didn't look to good--a little half-baked. Since I had a full bundle of ridge shingles I ripped off all the ridge shingles and re-did them with the new ones. The repair took me about 4 hours, but having my neighbor's roofing gun helped out greatly.

I think I need to lay down...

So with the family out of town this week and next (see here), I figure it is time to work on the various odds and ends that I left undone when we remodled the upstairs a couple years ago (yes, things were left uncompleted for a couple of years, and yes I have a patient wife). Needless to say I figure it was a good time to get things tied up.

I completed the molding around the windows yesterday and today began tearing off the baseboards that I incorrectly installed, and subsequently didn't complete. In order to remove it without damaging the drywall and paint you have to cut the caulking that seals the top of the baseboard to the wall, then pry the baseboard off the wall. Things were going pretty good, and was on the second to last piece of baseboard that I needed to remove when, while cutting the caulking with the utility knife, the knife released unexpectedly and cut a nice half-inch gash on my left ring finger. Blood quickly spurted out.

I grabbed the nearest cloth, and pressed hard on the open wound--the bleeding wouldn't stop. Dang, looks like I needed stiches. Rather than going to the ER, I went to the local "InstaCare" located 5 minutes from the house. This is an community type emergency like clinic that doesn't deal with the major emergency situations. Basically you go there for non-emergency situations that you can't get to your normal doctor for. I was able to get to see a doctor rather quickly.

Now whenever I am home alone for any extended period of time I eat like crap, and today was no different. I ate breakfast at 6:30 am and then ate a bowl of ramen noodles at around 3:30 pm. It was now 5:30pm and the hunger pains were coming on fierce, which is what I expected since I was planning on eating dinner around now rather than stting in the doctor's office.

Now understand I have a BS in Zoology with an emphasis in Human Biology. I took an anatomy class in college, I dissected various animals for one of my classes, I am very inquisitive when it comes to open wounds, and have been on hand to witness all of my childrens' births via c-section (I even watched them as they made the various incisions and removed my kids from their mother's womb). Not once have I ever been light headed, nor queasy. But today as they were getting ready to numb my finger for the stiches the room began to spin. I remember saying "I think I need to lay down" and the doctor responding that I could just lay down on the exam table behind me. The next thing I remember I am dreaming that Jen is cleaning the pots and pans in the kitchen and I am suddenly waken from what seemed like a very deep sleep.

"You okay?" said the doctor. "Not to scare you but you appeared to have a seizure. Where are you? What was the last thing you remember before passing out?"

I answered the questions quite easily.

"What is your name? Who is the current President?"

"Mark Berrett. Unfortunately it is George W. Bush." I responded. To which we all shared a laugh.

"Though it appeared you had a seizure, you are too coherent and aware of your surroundings to have had one." said the doctor. "But we are going to give you a shot just in case."

I was still trying to get everything straight in my head. How could this be? I had passed out. This had never happened before. I tried to explain everything away. It must have been the low blood sugar coupled with a drop in blood pressure resulting from the cut and my preparing myself for the needle prick. The doctor even agreed with me on this, but yet it seemed he was more consoling my whimpish nature than offering up a legitimate reason for having passed out. Dang that was embarassing. Why couldn't I have passed out earlier or later. Why did I have to pass out at all, particularly just as they were about to poke me with a needle. I looked so whimpy, so unmanly. No! This can't be. I watched my wife's c-sections without a hint of light-headedness or queasiness. IT WASN'T THE SIGHT OF A NEEDLE. Alas I am not sure the doctor or the nurse believes me.

Licensed!

I am now officially licensed to teach biological science in Junior (Middle), and High School. Now if only I can find that pesky first job.

Strike Two...

Well got an email today letting me know that I didn't get the Hunter High School biology position that I interviewed for on July 31st. Somewhat disappointing in that I still don't have a position for the coming school year, but okay since it would have been a 40 minute commute.

So that makes strike two. I had previously interviewed with Lone Peak High School in June but didn't get that job either. But as everyone tells me positions begin to open up in August. Sitting, waiting, wishing.... I'll let you know.

Going on vacation...

well at least the family is. I am told that during the month of August more teaching positions will open up. Couple that promising opportunity with my lack of vacation time upon returning to Verio and the familiy will be spending 2, yes two, wonderful weeks in San Diego while I remain at home working and hopefully finding employment with a local school. As in the past I will drive them down this weekend, fly back on Sunday and then fly back to San Diego on the 17th to drive the family back on the 19th (happy Birthday Rus!). So from Sunday night the 6th to the 17th I will be home alone. Wonder what I'll do.

I'm so Glad...

Today Heather didn't go down for her nap until around 4pm and then slept until 7pm. After we put the boys to bed Heather kept us company as we watched TV. About 9pm I took Heather for a walk around the neighborhood and then tucked her in bed. As I walked out the door and blew her a kiss, she blew one back and then began singing:

Nice way to end the evening.

Me and 13

Of course this is all coincidental but me, the number 13, and girls all seem to go hand in hand. As you may have read previously the coming child is grandchild #13 for both sides of the family. Also worth noting is that Heather was born on the 13th. So in someways it is no surprise that grandchild number 13 would be born a girl.

Oh, by the way the name we are leaning heavily towards is.............

at least for now. Perhaps something better will spring to mind and replace Hailey as the first name.

The Fourth

I like fireworks, preferably ones that I light myself. Fireworks in the sky are nice and all, but unfortunately the displays that I have viewed in Utah are rather poor small productions that always leave me asking "Is that all?" As a result I like lighting off my own at home, rather than fighting the crowds only to be disappointed by an underwhelming public display.

So again this year I got a bunch of TNT fireworks and lit them off for the family. The kids seem to by far like the parachute men the best. They love chasing them down the street as they drift to the ground. Me I like the crackle and strobe type fireworks. My least favorite are the whistlers so I avoid buying them as much as possible. Perhaps it is the pyro in me but there is nothing better than lighting the fireworks and watching them burn in all their colors and glory. What makes it better is watching the reaction from the kids, and this year didn't disappoint.

Free Gas Card

As I entered Costco today my attention was drawn to a sign giving away a free gas card, all you had to do was sign up for an American Express card. This seemed like a good offer until a verified the amount of the gas card. You see I originally read the sign to be for a $50 gas card, but alas it was only $5. You think that Costco and American express could offer something more than 1.75 gallons of gas....sheesh.

Doooooooooooooooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnnneeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Well after 18 months working towards my teaching certification I completed my last task today at 4:51pm.

I guess not it's time to really begin looking for a teaching job.

11 Years

In some ways it doesn't seem that Jen and I have been married for 11 years, but in other ways I wonder, "Is that all?" We had a pretty low key day, mainly just kicking around the day, taking it easy in preparation for Jen's big surgery on Monday. To get the house in order Jen cleaned the kitchen while I did the laundry.

Dinner was at home, I made steaks and potatoes. Jen made a great chocolate cream pie. Other than that not much else happened.

Eleven years ago was an interesting day--fun and surprising. Surprising in that when we went back for pictures prior to the reception, Jen's mom had the dress and didn't get back until shortly before the reception. So by the time pictures were done all the guests had arrived and gave us a standing ovation upon entrance. Fun...well you understand why.

The past 11 years have been enjoyable, and have gone by rather quickly. I am reminded daily as to why I married Jen...mainly by people telling me how lucky I am. It is hard to put into words my feelings and thoughts on the 11 years, so rather then try and fail, I'll simply say...Love you more.

Broken

Three weeks or so ago, Jen was playing softball when a bad hop smacked into her right hand, and apparently jamming her pinkie and ring finger. A couple days later when she went to the doctor they suspected that one of her tendons broke free, but because of her pregnancy could not x-ray her hand. They recommended that she go see a hand specialist in 10 days, when the baby was more developed, and they would be able to perform an x-ray.

Well she went to the doctor today and she didn't pop a tendon...she broke the bottom bone in her pinkie diagonally along the length. As a result she will need surgery to have 3 screws put in. She can't have general anesthesia, so will have to have her entire hand numbed with a wrist or hand block. The surgery is planned for the 12th (next Monday).

Fun.

Pinewood Derby

Pinewood derby was today. Jen has made it very clear that I am only there to assist Ky with his car--he is to do as much as he can. So this last week Ky designed his car, and then I cut out and did the rough sanding. Ky then primed and did the final sanding of the car, and then we began laying down the base red coats. Once the coats were dry, Ky hand painted the rest of the designs while I focused on the wheels and axles. I sanded the wheels smooth and removed any barbs on the axle. I also did Dad's trick of using finger paint where the wheel may rub against the car so that the graphite would stick.

At race time, Ky one the first race, pretty dominantly. I noticed several turn and mouth "Fast car" to their wives. Hmm. Then he won the second, and then his final race (3/3). Wow!!! Wasn't expecting that. They then did a race off of the 5 fastest cars. Won the first, and second. The third pitted the three fastest cars, Ky's and his 2 best friends--Ky won. His night record was (6/6), and took first place by 5/100ths of a second. The Berrett pinewood tradition did well tonight.

Last Day of School

The last day of school has come and gone--it is officially summer. With the final day, also comes the final grades for the year. Both Ky, Taylor, and Ryan have done a great job this year.

Of the 3 times Ky has gotten grades he has gotten all "A"s with a couple "A-"s. Taylor does not get letter grades, but has "Mastered" every subject he was taught. Ryan can now read rather well for a 4 year-old.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!

I am not sure what clicked, but over the last several weeks Ky has been working harder and harder at his sports. I will regularly see him working on his karate at home, he will more frequently bring out his baseball mitt to play catch, and is more involved at the games. It is a lot of fun to watch.

Well today at his soccer game, Ky had a nice affirmation to all his work. He was playing midfield, running up and down the field, staying in position, and working and running after balls. Prior to this game he typically will take a wait and see approach--wait to see if someone else is going to go after the ball, and if not make a weak attempt to get it. Well today that was not the case. He was aggressive--chasing after balls and putting himself in positions where he could and frequently would get knocked down. He would chase the ball, and yes he even slid a couple times. Well in the second half a rebound came right to him and, without hesitation, GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!

The man standing next to me may have been a little shocked when I raised both of my hands in the air in jubilation and gave a mighty yawp, or shout; needless to say I am not sure whose grin was bigger, mine or Ky's. He was pretty excited, Jen was near tears, and the crowd was exuberant.

Pretty cool.

NSA

Was it really that surprising that the NSA has compiled a huge database of calls made by Americans to other Americans? Come on, really? It really wasn't. Nothing that President Bush does surprises me anymore. He is so paranoid and fearful that he will push and authorize just about anything, so long as someone "deems" it legal.

No, the biggest surprise wasn't that it happened. The biggest surprise was the announcement that the the only major phone carrier not to comply with the NSA's "request" for access to these phone records was Qwest (see here, here, and here.) And why did they not participate? Because they "questioned the legality of the government program." (Deseret News) And no one else did?

The most abhorrent thing that was said about this whole affair was one of Bush's responses on the issue, "Our intelligence activities strictly target al-Qaida and their known affiliates," Bush said. He added assurances that the privacy of Americans is being "fiercely protected . . . We're not mining or trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans." Well all righty then. All you AT&T customers, SBC customers, and customers of those other carriers who complied with the NSA, YOU ARE TERRORRISTS! Now git to Guantanamo.

Books?

Each night, after we have had family prayer and scriptures, we read to each of the kids individually. As soon as I close the Book of Mormon the kids, sometimes in unison, ask

Books?

90% of the time the answer is yes, but occasionally it is no, as to the late hour.

Heather, however, is not one to listen for the answer to the question. Once the scriptures are closed she jumps up and runs to get a book, repeating all the while "Books! Books!". It is pretty fun to see her, and her brothers, enjoyment with books.

Last night, however, was a no books night as we were late getting home from Taylor's baseball game, and so after scriptures the kids went right to bed. Heather, though, immediately ran and got a book and brought it back to our bedroom. As Jen picked her and was taking her to her bed, Heather kept pleading for books, and then very earnestly said (the first time she has said it):

Read to me.

Jen and I were completely caught of guard. What else could we do? Jen read to her.

Charter School Protests

The funniest thing about the protest signs going up around Alpine against Mountainville academy (see here) is that they are actually supporting the school. How?

Say you want to create a picture indicating a no-smoking, no-left turn, no-parking, or no-whatever area, how do you do it? Well for smoking you put a picture of a lit cigarette with a circle around it and a diagonal slash through it, right? What ever you surround by a circle with a slash through it indicates it is not allowed, or the opposite of the picture is the desired behavior.

So to voice their displeasure over the charter school in "their backyard", they created bright yellow campaign signs with the word "NO" circled with a slash through it. Thus the signs say "NO (circle/slash) to charter school on Healy Blvd". Now perhaps I am wrong, but wouldn't that mean "Yes to charter school on Healy Blvd"?

Great statement, which does more to perhaps underscore the need for charter schools than anything charter school proponents could do.

Charter Schools Run Amok?

Seems that way. Every where I look it seems that a new charter school is forming. The most recent is here in Alpine--Mountainville Academy (nice use of Alpine's original city name). Advertisements for this charter school have been in the Alpine newsletter for several months, and Jen has been approached on numerous occasions by various neighbors inquiring if we are going to send our kids to it. Charter schools seem to be all the craze now a days.

Some of you may have heard of this particular charter school as it has been in the news lately, mainly for trying to build their school in a flood plain (see here). Now they have relocated to another area in Alpine (a very poor one in my opinion) which has resulted in upset residents of Alpine (see here. Is it really that big of a deal?

The main issue is that the new location is in a terrible location from a traffic standpoint. Alpine has three roads in/out of the city. Each of those roads is at most a 35 MPH zoned road. The new location for this new charter school is just off the road that leads to Lone Peak High School, and is the second busiest road in Alpine, and is very busy during school commute hours. By building at this new location, this charter school of 675 students will increase car traffic on this main thoroughfare during the highest congestion time by more than 200 cars. All roads are two laned. What will make matters worse is the side road upon which the charter school will be located T's into the main road. Stop signs will be a terrible solution for the amount of traffic this school will add to the roads, during the already busy times, thus the only solution would be to install traffic lights. Another concern is parking for extracurricular school functions. They will obviously only build enough parking for normal school functions, just as every public school does, but where are they going to park when this fills? The surrounding streets can't accommodate it, but that of course won't stop them from parking on them.

Needless to say, the surrounding neighbors are not happy. Signs have gone up, petitions are being signed. I am personally against the school (50,000 sq ft) for the above traffic concerns. Will it happen? Don't know. How a charter school can afford to pay $300k+ per acre of land, and then build a 50,000 square foot school is beyond me. We'll have to wait and see.

The Perfect Pizza

The Perfect Pizza, is there such a thing? The answer really depends upon who you ask. For me, commercially, the perfect pizza is Round Table Pizza, but alas they are no longer in Utah, which is really too bad. But is it the perfect pizza? To me it is. Why?

I guess it really depends. Some will argue with me as to whether Round Table Pizza is the perfect pizza, and their arguments will be completely valid. The pizza they argue as being the most perfect, may indeed be the most perfect pizza...for them. Can this be so? Can this be possible? Can their be two perfect pizzas? Sure, there can be an infinitesimal number of perfect pizzas, it all depends upon who you ask.

When I was laid-off from Verio in 2004, one of the first things I wanted to do was to find recipes that were as close as possible to Round Tables's recipes. I looked all over the place. Nothing. During my search I found a sauce recipe that approximated what I remembered, and a pretty good dough recipe. The sauce recipe I have modified pretty significantly, and the dough recipe I don't use anymore, but they both scratched the itch. But with many an itch, it came back.

While searching Amazon I came across a book by Peter Reinhart--American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza. This book seemed to be about the exact same thing I was doing--searching for the perfect pizza. It was receiving 5 stars at Amazon, so I took the plunge and bought it. I don't regret it a minute.

In the first hundred pages of the book it discusses what lead him to search the U.S. and Italy for the perfect pizza--a childhood pizza not living up to his memory. He discusses his visits to his hometown pizzeria as well as to various other pizzerias around the U.S. and in Italy in search of the perfect pizza, and as a result comes to the following realizations. There are two types of perfect pizzas: the contextually perfect, and the perfectly executed pizza.

The contextually perfect pizza, for me, is Round Table Pizza. It is perfect because it was a pizza that was enjoyed with friends, with fabricated names, drinking rootbeer, in the summer afternoons of my childhood. I remember eating it, playing video games, and eating some more. I remember spit-wadding the picture above the table opposite, and hiding sausages in the booth, that to my knowledge have petrified and remain in the pizzeria that replaced Round Table to this day. Round Table is a perfect pizza--contextually.

The perfectly executed pizza will never exist, because to get a consensus on perfection is impossible, because everyone carries contextual baggage that will prevent them from neutrally evaluating perfection. On top of that, what is perfect? Thin crust? Deep dish? Chicago deep dish? Hand tossed? Pan? And the list of crusts can go on. Then you need to evaluate the sauce, the cheese, the toppings, and on and on. So from a sheer consortium, consensus perspective, the perfectly executed pizza does not exist.

So where does that leave me. Round Table isn't in Utah. Domino's and their ilk really aren't that great, so what to do? Every time I go to California, Round Table is an essential stop. I get Domino's now and again, but I can't stomach it much any more. Now I make my own using modifications to the sauce recipe above and the recipes in Reinhart's book. Is it perfect? No, but it is close--give me a little while.

Names

Over on his blog, my brother Rus is having a discussion concerning the names he would like to name his coming daughter. Kristy likes Olivia, whereas Rus doesn't (due to its "obscene" popularity) and is now campaigning for Adelaide Lucille. Not a fan of either, but then again it isn't my kid.

Jen and I have been discussing names since we decided to have additional kids. It takes me awhile to warm to names, particularly boys names. The only name that I was completely sold on prior to our kids' births has been Kiser (my first born). Oddly enough this was the name Jen had the most difficult time accepting, even after Ky's birth (she called him little one for a couple days, unable to use Ky--quite funny). Anyway, Jen has been throwing names at me every once in a while. So far these are the ones that we are looking at:

Boy: Luke (maybe Josh) Allen

Girl: Haley Suzanne

Allen is from Jen's side of the family, Suzanne is from my side. The girl name is pretty well decided, I just have difficulty on boys names particularly the first name (Allen is certain).

13...Such a Lucky Number

Well, well, well. Our next child (due Nov/Dec) will be my parent's 13th grandchild. All the more interesting is that it will also be Jen's parent's 13th grandchild.

To me this is pretty cool--I like the number 13. When we were given the option of having Heather on the 12th or 13th, I immediately said the 13th, and somewhat surprisingly Jen agreed especially considering it was also a Friday.

So I am pretty happy that our next will also be associated with the number 13.

//edited 04/26/06 for clarity and grammar.//

San Diego

Despite expectations, we did end up taking a trip last week to San Diego. It was a quick one--really only spent one full day there, but it was enjoyable. Why you say did we go down?

On Tuesday (April 18) as Jen and I were watching House, Jen received a call from her Aunt. It has been a call that I had been expecting for numerous months--that her Grandma had passed away. But that is not what the call was about. The call was to inform Jen (and to have Jen inform her siblings) that Grandma's health was failing, and that if they wanted to see her prior to her passing, they should do so in the next couple days. The reason being is that Grandma had not eaten or drunken anything for several days, and had been lying listless in bed for the past 3 days.

After Jen talked with her Aunt, and then with her siblings, she concluded that her last visit with Grandma was a good one, and was how she wanted to remember her. The next morning that sentiment changed--Jen did indeed want to see her Grandma one last time, but didn't know how to do it. Flying would cost too much, and I needed to be at work (being that I just started back again).

Didn't think much of it, but in a casual conversation with the local HR rep about it, she told me to take the time off, there wasn't a problem. Okay then. Couple requests later, and I was home packing the car on Wednesday. We stayed over night in Vegas, arrived in San Diego on Thursday and stopped to see Grandma on the way in. Spent a relaxing day on Friday, and then began driving back on Saturday. Stayed Saturday night in St. George, and dined at, where else, Ruby River, and then got home Sunday afternoon.

Not much of a vacation, but the kids had fun, Jen enjoyed her visits with her Grandma (who seems to have made a recovery from the dire conditions described by Jen's Aunt), and I got to relax all while being paid by Verio. Not too bad; however I am now out of personal days, and will need to wait for vacation to accrue prior to any other fine days out. But oh well, Jen needed it.

//edited 04/26/06 for spelling.//

I'll learn myself

When I got home from work tonight, Ryan's "Tiger" bike was missing some very prominent side attachments--his training wheels. The following is the conversation that Ryan and Jen had, as recounted by Jen.

"Mom, take the training wheels off my tiger bike," asked Ryan. (Ryan seems to always phrase his questions as demands, despite our efforts to correct it.)

"If I do that I won't be able to help you learn to ride your two-wheeler until my hand gets better," said Jen.

"I can learn myself," stated Ryan.

With that Jen went into the garage, removed the training wheels, held the bike while Ryan got on the bike, and then off Ryan went riding around the neighborhood.

When I got home, Ryan demonstrated his sudden prowess of balancing on two wheels, complete with skids. I guess he can learn himself.

Verio...week 1

Well week 1 was rather uneventful, other than a gentle reminder that I don't remember as much as I anticipated. Fortunately it will come back, rather quickly I hope.

The funniest thing that happened was when a couple coworkers came over to ask when the real Mark is going to show up.

"The real Mark?", I inquired.

"Yeah, the obnoxious, loud, practical jokester.", they replied.

Hmmmm. Funny thing is I don't think that "Mark" will ever make a return, primarily because that "Mark" relied upon his position, seniority, and available time to plan, develop, and execute the masterpieces that he rained down upon the unsuspecting victims...not really, they weren't all that masterpiece-ful. But needless to say, my return to Verio brings nothing with it--not the title; not the seniority; and definitely not the time. Ah well. I guess I can always sneak up behind someone and bark, but then again the HR manager has told me that I can't do that to any of the admin staff--which removes all the best victims.

Ohhh, oh, Verio

I'm back. When I left Verio 17 months ago, I never figured I'd be back--but I am. It is somewhat odd that I would go back, only to managed by those whom I hired and promoted into their supervisory roles. Very odd experience indeed.

Most of the day technical support group is completely unknown to me. I quite regularly look up to see someone whose name is completely unknown to me. Here is a group that I spent 6+ years as a member/manager, and after only 17 months I recognize very few.

It was a good day, overall. It is nice to be back amongst what appears to be a good group of people.

It's Not That Bad

One of the girls in my class came in complaining. Turns out she was asked out by, as she put it, "WHOAA!!!" (I'll take that to mean a very good looking young man?!) but instead of being able to go out, she has to stay home and watch 7 kids while her parents go out. Got me laughing, which then resulted in her pulling me into the conversation.

Despite me trying to assuage her fears and disappointment she continued to complain that it "sucked" and how the house was going to burn down and she was going to starve. Now before you get the wrong impression of this girl, she is a very thoughtful, considerate girl--quite intelligent as well. So this whole conversation seemed somewhat out of place.

After about a minute, one of her friends (Sarah we'll call her) came into class and began to talk to this girl and the other girl who sat at her table. Hugs where shared, emotional sighs were heard. I knew what was up.

You see about 2 weeks ago Sarah was sitting in class and then suddenly announced, casually enough that it probably happened before, that she could no longer see out of her right eye. Okay. Despite trying to send her to the office so that she could call her mom and go to the hospital, she stayed in class stating that it has happened before and will go away shortly.

Two days later it still hadn't and she had to go to the optometrist who referred her to neurologist, and subsequently scheduled her for a cat scan.

So to make a long story short Sarah informed her two friends that she needed to have the tumor that was pressing on her optic nerve removed next week. After hearing this I walked to the front of the class, and as I passed by the first girl, she quite humbly stated "I guess babysitting her brothers and sisters wasn't that bad."

I guess not. Amazing how perceptions can quickly change.

5

Boston Legal

One of my guilty pleasures is Boston Legal. For those of you who may not know, it is a continuation, if you will, of the Alan Shore character from the television show "The Practice"--another series that I enjoyed. Between the two, Boston Legal and The Practice, I prefer Boston Legal. Rather than being a serious melodrama, Boston Legal is a dark comedy playing on many societal ills--much as "The Simpsons" does.

At the same time, however, it does address some very serious issues, and does so with tact and seriousness. One such was in the episode "Stick It", where Alan Shore (played by James Spader) defends one of the women who work at the firm from tax evasion charges. During closing arguments he makes an impassioned plea for his client, which addresses the ills facing the United States as a result of the war in Iraq and the fight against terrorism. You can see a clip from the episode here. In the greater context of the show, it had a far more dramatic affect then what you see in the short clip, but nonetheless it is a very well presented oratory.

500,000....Wow!!

All I can say is WOW!!!

Whirlpool Duet Dryer

Back when we remodeled our kitchen, we remodeled our laundry room and decided to go with a front-loading washer and dryer. After checking the reviews on the Internet and checking with Consumer Reports we decided to go with the Whirlpool Duet.

Both the washer and the dryer have worked well. The clothes are cleaned and dried rather quickly. Some heavier loads take a little longer to dry then others, and sometimes the heavier loads were a little damp (minimal) when the dryer said they were dry. Overall we have been very happy with the setup...until recently.

I have always figured Whirlpool to be a high-end name brand, that made products that lasted. So when the thermostat and now the console board went out, I was a bit surprised. In checking the literature I unfortunately found the dryer out of warranty by six months. A little surprising that it was only a one year full warranty on the dryer, with a two year limited warranty on the circuitry, and a five year warranty on the porcelain top (so the lovely Whirlpool support person stated). Interesting that they warranty the porcelain top for more years than the circuitry...you know the stuff that makes it work. But oh well, the warranty was better than the one that is currently offered--a one year limited warranty. I guess more stuff went out in the second year of operation than they expected and had to cut the warranty as their profits weren't as high.

Needless to say I was disappointed to find myself out of warranty. It really would have been nice if Whirlpool would have covered it since I was only six months out of warranty, but what should I have expected...the new models they sell now only have a one year limited warranty. I guess the profits weren't high enough once you calculated in the warranty work.

Fortunately the refrigerator we are thinking about getting next is a Maytag.

Pics Server

Well that was a pain. After longer than anticipated delays, the pics.berrett.org server is back online.

Back when I initially built the machine and brought it behind my DSL line I installed Gentoo Linux. I did this primarily because I had used Gentoo at work on my desktop and loved its ease of use, and particularly its portage program (program installation system). It was very configurable and easy to maintain. So when the pics server went down, I figured I would stay with it and upgrade the kernel to 2.6.

Man I am totally out of practice. I had a pickle of a time trying to get that machine installed and running properly. On top of that I had problems getting Apache to compile the way I needed.

So after much hassle, I switched back to what I know best--FreeBSD. Just like riding a bike--it all came back to me. Good thing or else those 7 years of working on BSDi and FreeBSD would have all been a waste. The install went quick. The only problem I ran into was that the kernel needed to be recompiled to read the SCSI disks that were formatted under Linux. Once that happened I got all the content off, reformatted the SCSI drives, and voila everything back to normal with minimal additional tinkering.

Should have run FreeBSD from the beginning. Simple, easy, great server. We had to tinker with Apache a bit, but that was relatively painless--much easier than Gentoo's install.

Computers

The Berrett Family pics server is slowly dying. The hard drive is having problems on reboot--marking one of the partitions as bad. Every time I try to fix it, it gets marked clean but when I reboot the home partition fails to mount on boot up. Once it boots, however, I can mount it just fine and everything appears to be working fine. Needless to say I am holding my breath. Makes me remember why I don't like computers a whole lot.

Speaking of computers, I have been (near) Windows free for over a year now. Back in January or so of last year my last regularly used Windows computer crapped out. My wife's genealogy laptop is the last computer I have that runs windows, and that is nearly never used. So for the past 14 months I have had the blissful life of being Windows-less. Oh sure I get the occasional freeze, and am required to force quit an application and the very rare force reboot, but on the whole I have been enjoying up-time results on my computers that are very nice--usually only have to reboot when a system upgrade occurs. When people say that Apple computers just work, they aren't kidding.

Number 9

Well, well, well. Nine years. Nine years ago my life changed dramatically. Jen and I were sitting in the doctor's office anticipating the birth of our first child three weeks later, oblivious to the shock we would shortly get. I can still picture the doctor's look of astonishment when he dumbfoundedly asked,

"Are you having any contractions?"

When Jen responded in the negative he looked more astonished and stated flatly, "You're having the baby today."

Jaws hit the floor. I was quickly ushered to the pharmacy downstairs to check out a wheelchair, and took my wife to the hospital next door. I can still picture the nurses when they asked me if I had a camera looking quite nasty at me for being unprepared for the birth of the child. They acted like it was my fault that we didn't have anything at all prepared for the birth. Like anyone is prepared 3 weeks ahead of time. Needless to say it went well. Though Ky may have come into the world as a surprise, he has been a wonderful kid since.

He is a wonderful son, and a great older brother. He always seeks to help his brothers and tries his hardest to share and do what's right. He is very conscientious of others' feelings, and works hard to involve everyone. This of course leads to some emotional breakdowns over sometimes trivial things, but he recovers well.

From a school standpoint Ky is excelling. In most of the standardized test categories he is scoring in the top 90%. He is also reading well above his age group, and we will regularly find him curled up on a couch or bed reading. His favorite right now are the "Charlie Bones" series. A couple weekends ago he read a 400 page book over the weekend. Grandpa Berrett seemed pretty proud when I related that to him.

Happy Birthday Ky.

Berrett Birthday Time

Today in celebration of Ky and Tyler's (Ky's cousin) birthday we had the Utah family over to celebrate both Ky's and his cousin's (Tyler) birthday. Tyler was born on Ky's one year birthday, so every year of his life he has been sharing the day with his cousin. His first birthday night was spent in the hospital waiting for the birth of Tyler, so from birthday one they have spent them together.

As with any Berrett get together, particularly with Brent attending, it was loud and chaotic. All the cousins had fun, and it was enjoyable from an adult standpoint. There were a couple episodes where several of the kids began crying, once because in testing the glow in the dark feature of Tyler's Nerf dart gun Ryan's dad accidentally shot Ryan in the eye. In his defense he really couldn't see Ryan in the dark. Other then a couple hurt feelings and a little blood, nothing major happened with the kids. No real harm, no foul.

Yeah....I know

Why I expected to be able to keep up on this, I don't know. Every time something fun or interesting happens I tell myself to remember and write this on my blog, and then I forget to do it.

Some of the things that I found interesting since I last wrote:

How Heather calls Ryan "Seesan", even if you properly pronounce it for her before she says it.

How things are moving quickly and going quite well with the student teaching.

More on Heather's birthday.

The ten days we watched Jen's sister's kids while she and her husband were in the Caribbean.

The start of indoor soccer...yes I still play goalie (a little slower, but still pretty good). Most likely due to the physics involved in the gravitational attraction of larger objects on smaller ones.

My Grandma falling and cracking her ankle.

There have been numerous things I would have liked to talk about but have failed to do. Someday, someway, I will hopefully get better.

Ky's Party

Today was Ky's friend party, and since Ky is Ky he invited 13 people to the party. I am not sure how Ky decides to invite the people that he does. On the periphery it look like he is inviting the people he does in hopes of getting good presents. But on the other hand in watching the dynamics of the group, and Ky's general disposition, it seems that he invites based upon not hurting people's feelings. I am leaning towards the later.

In all the party was a great success. Ky wanted Dad's pizza, so that is what I spent most of the afternoon getting ready, and then cooking during the first 30 minutes of the party. It was good pizza (usually is when I make the dough the night before).

The kid's seemed to enjoy everything. They played "ghost in the graveyard" at the end, and many kids complained to their parents that they didn't want to go when they were picked up--good sign.

Needless to say it was not as chaotic as Taylor's Party, but it did have its moments of frustration.

It's a Golden Ticket

Well at least one of the copies of the ticket I received is golden--or maybe they call it canary. Either way my copy was green. Got caught speeding--45 in a 25. Of course they only wrote it for going 9 miles over the limit. Ticks me off. I rarely speed more than 5 mph over the limit, particularly in a residential area. So to be going 16 mph over is irritating. My only excuse is that my brother-in-law was in the car with me (and since he will never read this) so it must be his fault. He distracted me. Crap. Gotta go to traffic school to remove it from my record. Don't want my insurance rates to go up since we just got them reduced. Oh well.

13 is Such a Lucky Number

She's two. Wonderful day. She had her cake, and an overall enjoyable day. She is a fun little girl.

You Say It's Your Birthday!

33. Not much there really. Easier to write maybe. 33 may have some special meaning but really it is just another year. Perhaps it is my cynical side, but a birthday is really not that big of a deal anymore.

Spent the day teaching DNA replication, and RNA transcription. Came home and worked on tomorrow's lesson plan, and later tonight I have young men's. The big family celebration will be on Sunday, so perhaps it will mean something then. Who knows.

Taylor's Birthday Party

Chaos. That was the sight of Taylor's birthday party. Although chaos may sound like a good name for a birthday joint for 7 year olds, chaos and bedlam seemed to be apt descriptors of my kitchen and family room this evening.

Sure 9 seven year-olds sounded like a good idea at the time, but man you would think that the volume would eventually decrease when they realized that no one was listening to you yell. But in the mind of a 7 year-old, if they aren't listening then you obviously aren't talking (yelling) loud enough. And thus we had decible levels in the house that seemed to challenge my rememberence of the Oingo Boingo concert I went to in '89.

The evening appeared to be a smashing success. Though a word of warning, keep the little dingos on a leash when you have a piniata. The minute that thing cracked and spilled its hidden goods, the candy was quickly covered by a mass of scratching, clawing, territorial seven year olds--each clawing and scavenging for the last bit of candy covering the floor. One of the kids quickly amassed at least half the candy and was guarding it verociously, swatting every hand that reached for there share. I finally had to inspect everyone's bag and divide up the candy so that everyone got something. I can chuckle about it now, but at the time I was about to explode as a result of all the "that's mine" that I heard. Wow.

Taylor's 7^th Birthday

Seven years ago today, Taylor joined our little family. It was a rather interesting delivery. He gave us a little scare, but has been a delight from then on.

He has a natural curiosity that is refreshing. His brain seems to always be on. From the time he was three when he began listening to Ky learn to read, and thus taught himself to read, to today he is naturally curious. He is quick to laugh, to tell a joke, to enjoy life. But he is still as stubborn as all get out--he is very much a Berrett in that regard. He is always willing to express his ideas, even when that ends up correcting Mom or Dad's misspoken word.

Knock, Knock!

Who's There?

I don't know.

I don't know who?

I don't know either.

That is Taylor's favorite joke. He's a little nut.

Taylor has a zest for life. It is rare to see him down--well except when he is stuck in the music room because he won't practice. Outside of that room, his joy for life is contagious.

Happy Birthday Taylor. Seven years ago today was a good day, and you have made each day better for being a part of my life.

--Dad

Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

The current day of 24 is great. Am greatly enjoying watching it.

Evolution and the Flood

A friend of mine recently sent a letter to a group mailing list I am on asking for opinions on evolution and the flood. My friends question follows and being that it goes along with the other recent postings, I thought I would post and comment on it.

If the flood is taken literally, all the beasts and fowls on the earth were killed except those he gathered into the ark, which would be a fairly small number compared to the number of species today. So how do you explain the millions of critters on the earth now? The debate about what happened before Noah seems silly, since everything was wiped out during the flood. A debate on the occurrence of evolution would focus on the time from the flood until now. As anyone ever thought this over?

Here are my thoughts:

First in talking of the flood, there are several possibilities:

1--The flood literally occurred and covered the entire earth.

2--The flood was a localized event and only impacted a region of the earth.

3--The flood was only an allegory intended to show the compassion of God and the distance wise and faithful stewards should go in following the word of God.

I am sure there can be others--those were off the top of my head.

Now, as far as I know, the official position of the church is that the flood is a real event. Official may be too heavy, but I believe that reflects the beliefs and the doctrinal stance of the church. So from an LDS doctrine perspective, the only option is 1.

Now as a side note, there is no scientific evidence that a flood occurred. Studies have also shown that there is not enough available water on, above or below the earth to account for the amounts needed to cover the entire earth. A recent discovery channel series discussing the science of the bible came to that conclusion as well, and asserted that the story of Noah may have merely been a story passed from generation to generation that was embellished along the way. End of side note.

In regards to the other 2 positions evolution doesn't really apply after the flood since all animals on the earth were not killed in the flood. So in those cases the discussion reverts back to the time of creation. And for the record I see no reason not to believe that 1) the creative period was longer then a period of 6 24 hour periods, or even 6 1000 year periods, and 2) evolution played a key in the creation of the plants and animals on the earth. We discussed creation / evolution in church a couple weeks ago and my feelings on the discussion are here, so I won't go into them in this post.

Now as for option 1 either Noah had a very large boat, God went through another creation process and "placed" all of the animals back on the Earth, or evolution occurred. The first I find pragmatically doubtful, and Noah would also have to live in a locale where he could gather all of the species of animals on the earth. This would also seem an impossible task, considering the number of species.

So the only two options appear to be another creative process, or evolution. Now I don't believe this is an either or position that one needs to take. Just as with the creative process, I don't believe that the creative process after the flood and evolution are mutually exclusive. Both can readily explain the current diversification of plant and animal life on the earth.

Substitutions for the Real Thing

While at school today I walked past an office that had a rather animated conversation going on. I didn't overhear the whole conversation, as I didn't stop to listen, but the volume the speaker was using made it impossible for me to not hear a portion of the conversation. The portion I did hear was rather humorous, and is most likely taken wildly out of context--which may explain the humor.

Anyway the speaker said:

If you need your caffeine, just drink the GD real thing

So here is a person harping on someone else for not drinking coffee to get their caffeine fix, but in doing so refrained from verbalizing what GD represented.

I guess what is good for the goose, is not necessarily good for the gander. Anyway I got a nice chuckle out of the whole affair.

First Day Teaching

Well today was my first day teaching. For the past week I have been observing my host teacher and reading over the chapters scheduled to be taught while I am in his class. The lesson was on meiosis.

The topic of my lesson was meiosis--the process of sperm and egg formation. It is actually a rather interesting and fun topic. The second period (first period is a prep period) things went pretty well, got through the lesson in pretty good order. I made some general mistakes, which I will fix before teaching the second period, but all-in-all not a bad start. My host teacher was also pretty happy with it as well.

The third period went really well. Made the slight modifications to the lesson that I found were needed in second period, and things went much better. More fluidity to the lesson, and most importantly more clarity. After this period we broke from lunch.

After lunch was the last period of the day. This may sound odd to some of you but Alpine School District has their high schools on the block schedule. Each student takes 8 classes a term, with 4 classes meeting every other day. Took a little getting used to, but all in all I like it.

Needless to say it appears that I felt a little too confident with how things were going and I deviated slightly from how I taught it in third period, and all hell broke loose. The structure of the lesson fell apart and there was much confusion. I got it back on track, but not without more effort and time that the other class didn't need.

Overall it was a good experience. My host teacher was extremely pleased with how things went. Even went so far as to say that was the best first day any of his previous student teachers had. I apparently avoided the novice mistake of over-teaching, or teaching myself into a corner. Good to hear. Hopefully tomorrow will go smoother.

Week One of Student Teaching
Well the first week has come and gone, and for all intents and purposes it was rather uneventful. It is rather funny that I was a little nervous to be going into these classes since they are the same classes I monitored an exam for and caught a couple people cheating. I was a little nervous because of that and how well I would be accepted. Fortunately I am beginning my student teaching at the beginning of a new semester, and those I was nervous to be teaching have transfered out of the classes.

This entire week I have been monitoring and observing how the regular teacher teaches, and handles the class. Perhaps I am being a little arrogant, but it doesn't appear to be all that difficult. But like I said I haven't really taught anything--only watched. So it will be interesting to see what happens when I actually teach my first lesson next week. Perhaps it will be as easy as I think, perhaps I am merely full of myself and will crash and burn. Will let you know.

Running Wire
For the past couple days I have been helping a contractor friend of mine wire one of the houses he is building. It is a pretty fun experience. I really don't know why I enjoy it as much as I do. Perhaps it is simply the solitude of the experience, or possibly the sarcastic banter that this friend and I enjoy when we cross paths. Not sure.

The Clock is Ticking
24 is for all intents and purposes my favorite show. Tonight a new "day" started with two hours being shown--tomorrow another two hours will be showed. To say that I am happy that a new day will be shown complete with Jack Bauer is probably an understatement. After the last day ended, with the faked death of Jack Bauer, I was a little disappointed that it apparently signaled the end of a novel concept of a television series.

While up at the parents for dinner I was able to catch the first hour of the day, and without saying I am more excited for this season than I was for any of the previous four. Unfortunately I had to leave the folks prior to being able to watch the second hour. What makes it worse is that it is unavailable on iTunes for purchase. So I will have to search my friends and various other locations for the second hour.

Now before anyone tells me that it is unrealistic and that there is no way that all this could happen in a day, all I can say is relax, kick back, and enjoy. That is the fun of 24--the suspension of reality. The emphasis on Apple computers, in previous seasons, wasn't too bad either (this season they appear to be using Dells or some other generic PC systems).

Heather's Sick
Heather has been under the weather for the past couple days, which has resulted in not much sleep for Jen or me. Sunday night she got up multiple times from 2-5 am, at one point every 20 minutes. Finally tried to get her to sleep some by bringing her into our bed, which didn't work (never has). She tossed and turned for a couple hours, until we put her back in her bed, whereupon she slept the rest of the night.

Last night the same thing happened, but this time it started around midnight. Rather then getting up every 20 minutes or so with her, we brought her in to bed straight away. She nearly jumped out of Jen's arms and crawled over and snuggled up to me (made me happy, almost a little prideful). She fell quickly to sleep and slept the entire night. The only problem was that any time I rolled to my side, she (through gravity) rolled to meet me. At the end of the night I was relegated to the rightside of the bed. Now by rightside I am not talking about the right half, nor the right quarter of a king sized bed. I am talking about no more then the furthest one foot of the right side of the bed. In some ways I am sure Jen is glad that I have such a gravitational pull on our kids when they happen into our bed for the night--her half remains hers.

The Next Jimi

Okay maybe not the next Jimi, but Ky is getting pretty good at the guitar. Right now I am sitting in the recital hall of The Music School here in American Fork. It is kind of funny, in a way, as he likes it fast and loud. Fortunately he only has an acoustic guitar. The day he gets an amp and an electric, look out the walls may start coming down.