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..is always fun.

So some of our friends went to Hawaii for two weeks, and we told them we’d babysit for them while they’re gone.

No, not a child.

We’ve been watching their West Highland Terrier, Snowy.

She’s been a great dog to watch, though.  And it turns out they don’t bother my allergies very much, which is great.

While they were away, I created a new website, snowythedog.com, which was a ‘blog’ that the dog made.  Their kids really thought it was cute.

Other than that, not a lot going on.  It’s now pretty much over 100 degrees here until the end of Summer, so it’s nice and hot.

This week (6/10) is our 8th wedding anniversary.  Crazy!

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This has been quite a week.

First, it was off to Houston.  Good times, noodle salad.  It was exciting, it was relaxing, it was cool.

Then, once we got back, we made the drive down to Tucson to relax and go to a few spring training baseball games.  We saw the Texas Rangers, and the Dodgers.  (We beat the Dodgers, so that was cool.)  This was from the Dodgers game, where we had to have grass outfield tickets:

That was a lot of fun, but it was a tad toasty.

We were able to stay at the JW Mariott Starr Pass Resort.  Thanks to a great deal on Priceline, it was very cheap.  They gave us a great room, too, with a balcony and a few of the mountains.

I highly recommend it.

We were also able to check out the Titan 2 Missile Museum south of Tucson.  All I can saw, is wow.  The engineering on the site is incredible.  It’s also a scary thought that this was pointing at Russia, and if it was ever launched, pretty much meaned the end of the world as we know it.

You just can’t get a feel for the size of the missile unless you check it out yourself:

You can check out more pictures of it on my Flickr page here.

Then, today, I get a call from someone that I really didn’t expect to hear from.  I really haven’t talked to my Dad in awhile, and he called.  Have mixed feelings abou that, but it’s probably a good thing.

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So this last weekend we decided to head to the great white North, otherwise known in Arizona as Flagstaff.

Yep, it was fun. We decided to stay at a hotel for Saturday night, instead of trying to drive back after sledding all day, and it was a good idea. We stayed at the Flagstaff Radisson, and upgraded to their “Sleep Number” bed:

While it was a nice bed, when we first arrived, it didn’t work. You could select your ‘number’. Actually, the remote wouldn’t work at all. So, I couldn’t tell what ’sleep number’ it was on. But I can tell you it was whatever ’sleep number’ equals ‘hard as a friggin board’. So after calling the front desk, they promised to send someone right up, and we went off to go buy sledding equipment and, well, sled.

Yes, we tried to buy sledding equipment here in the valley before going up. But guess what? Nobody in the valley sells it. Not anyone we checked, at least. (Walmart, a few sporting goods stores, etc.)

And, of course, Walmart and Target IN Flagstaff were also sold out. But we did find some great deals at a sporting goods store, and off we go.

Got some great shots from the camera:

After all that, we headed back to the hotel to get cleaned up. And guess what? They didn’t fix the bed. After complaining, they finally sent someone up to fix it, and he basically had to take the bed apart. Nice. Oh well. (And as far as ’sleep number’ is concerned? Ehh. it’s okay. Don’t think I’ll ever pay extra for it again in a hotel, or buy one.)

Dinner at the Teppenyaki restaurant conveniently located in the lobby, and it’s off to peaceful slumber.

The next morning, it’s breakfast at, well, where else? Mike and Rhonda’s The Place, as if you would even ask!? And back to Phoenix.

All and all, a great trip, and good times.

You can check out all the photos here on Flickr.

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… I was.  And after some Googling, I came up with this.

1. Take a cheesy picture of yourself.
2. ‘Soften’ it in an image editor, and blur the borders for that “Sears Photo Center” look.
3. Print it in 8×10 format.
4. Find the cheaptest frame you can get.
5. Optionally,  sign the picture, with your favorite message. (I used “Be cool, stay in school!”)
6. Enjoy in the fact that your beautiful face will be hanging in someone else’s house for all to see. (Or in the garage, or maybe even the bathroom.)

And here is the finished product:

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I’ve uploaded the pictures to my gallery, so now you can see the damage.  A few highlights:

Enjoying the Mazda Miata

It’s TRON!

Halloween Mickey at Disneyland

Haunted Mansion Holiday at Disneyland.  Good ride.

Good times, and some good pictures.

Of course, if you’re looking for pictures of, say, The Price is Right experience, well, unfortunately, they don’t allow photos, so we don’t have any of that.

Check it out.

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It’s been busy.

Super-busy.

As you can see from my pictures lately,  I was in beautiful Las Vegas at the Riviera Hotel.

First off, I think Vegas is really beautiful only at night.  And only if you squint.

Then add the Riviera Hotel on top of that, and, well, it wasn’t the greatest.

But then again, I was there for DEFCON.  DEFCON 15 to be specific.   The last DEFCON I was at was DEFCON 5, so it’s been awhile.

It was definitely much larger than it was back then.  I guess they had over 6000 people, including one hidden NBC reporter.

I learned quite a bit, and picked up some cool stuff.  One of my happiest purchases was something that I’ve wanted since I was in college.

The Apple Newton MessagePad 120

This was one of the first PDA’s out on the market, back in the mid 1990’s.  I heard about them while I was working at the college I attended, and thought that since I was making ‘the big bucks’, I’d head on down to Compusa and pick one up.

That’s when I found out that they ran over $500; a little too much for a college student/employee.

It would be a few more years before I picked up a Palm Personal, one of the cheaptest/greatest PDA’s ever released. I think I paid $200 for it, then, years later, still a lot, but it was a splurge.

Okay, back to the Newton.

What made the Newton so cool was the fact that it actually read your handwriting.   Not well, sometimes, but yeah, it did.

I picked it up for only $15.  Quite a difference than the $500 it originally ran for.

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Tom getting the TomTom read..

..for the trip to Las Vegas.

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Purchasing a new showerhead.

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So we had this contest in Physics class in high school about how much weight a bridge, which is made out of straws and Shoe Goo could hold.

We broke the record. Well, I don’t remember what the record was, but we won. Yeah. We loved Shoe Goo.

Looking for pictures for my other website, I found this picture I took. Since I was also in photos class, I had access to a lot of black and white film.

That is the infamous Mark Gaspar and Kim Gilliland, bowing to the awesomeness that was our bridge.

How do I know it’s Mark Gaspar?  He’s wearing a Swatch.  Wait, I wore one too.  Well, you’ll just have to trust me.

(Click for larger image.)

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Yes.

I went camping.

Was it fun?

Well, yeah.

We actually went up to the White Montains outside of Springerville, to Big Lake.

First off, we drove up on July 4th morning, getting into camp about 3pm. My wife’s parents were up there since the Saturday before, so they already scoped out a camp and set everything up.  Here is an overview of our camp:

It was a great site; since it was off the beaten path, there was absolutely nobody around us.  The only thing we saw was an occasional ATV driving by.  That’s about it.

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(Our camp was overlooking a large meadow.)

Of course, you first have to setup your camp, and Cassie did most of the tent:

We did a lot of activities, of course.  One of the coolest was geocaching.  Cassie and I have done it a few times in valley with some caches, but this was my in-laws first time.  We did three different caches that I looked up:

We even left our own cache at the campsite we stayed at, for other people to find.

We also went fishing on Big Lake, and while it was good fishing conditions (cold and cloudy), we didn’t catch anything.  Cassie did have a couple of nibbles, though, but that was about it.  Still, it was a good time.

And of course, what would camping be without horseshoes:

Or foot-dragging:

..or seeing some wildlife.  And no, these are not moose:

And always carry your knife:

All in all, it was a good time.  The weather was nice, and we even had a few afternoon thunderstorms:

You can check out the rest of the pictures in my gallery.

Monday means back to work, unfortunately.

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