Pre-Christmas Delights

Here's some random things from this wonderful breather week between when school is out and Christmas Day.

Any Remote Will Do
We got a little evergreen-in-a-pot this year for our apartment-sized Christmas tree (and plan to plant it in our yard when we get a house here someday (yes, we're tree-rescuing this year instead of tree-cutting (very California of us says Al Fuller))) and when we were putting the string of lights on it, we discovered something fun. The lights have a control box with a button so you can have your choice between seven light modes - slow fade, flashing, twinkle, etc. Well, the lights kept changing modes and I wasn't pressing the button. I saw Stephen playing with the remote control for his big, walking dinosaur and said, "Wait, do that again," and watched the lights. Sure enough, when he pressed the control button on his remote, the tree lights changed. We had great giggling for several minutes aiming the dinosaur remote at the tree and messing with the lights. We later found (when engineer husband came home) that any remote in our living room would have the same light-changing effect. He informs us that any infrared source will work. So, we hopped around some more doing the remote control light changing dance with the TV remote, DVD, airplane, etc. Who knew? Try it at your house.

Winter = Green
Surprise, surprise, it rained three days straight here this week. I had no idea that could actually happen here. You might have heard about the snow in Las Vegas. Same storm. In the midwest, wintertime means everything turns brown and dies. In San Diego, wintertime means rain and that makes everything green. Whole areas of waist-high dead brush now have leaves. Brown mountains look like they're covered with moss. Pretty cool.

Bigger = Belts
I was helping skinny Stephen put a belt on his pants Friday morning getting ready for school. He hasn't had to wear a belt very often, but he keeps getting taller and remaining the same weight, so we've had to resort to one. I've tried avoiding this extra accessory as long as possible. But to get tall-enough pants for his long legs means they're too big in the waist, even if we get the slim size, even with adjustable waistband. He had been kinda quiet, then seriously said, "I'm getting so big (sigh)." Not thinking much I simply replied, "Yup. You are." Then he shook his head and added with consternation, "I'm wearing a belt, last night I got my yellow stripe, I'm just bigger all the time!" I was so tickled, but worked to suppress totally bursting out, looked in his big brown eyes, and just hugged my big boy. With all his belts. (Allen and Stephen both tested for the next level in Taekwondo Thursday night and both passed, earning a yellow stripe on their white belts, the step in-between white and yellow belts.)









Arizona beauty
As mentioned in our previous post, we drove to Phoenix to spend Thanksgiving with my sister. Along the way was some natural beauty in the rock formations that we enjoyed seeing for the first time, live from the highway. Stephen enjoys the cactuses on the walking trail in cousin Phoebe's neighborhood.

Goodbye, Dad.

On Saturday, November 29, 2008, Henry Allen Priest, my dad, passed away. He had struggled with numerous physical issues for the last few years and had been getting weaker. On Nov 23, Dad apparently experienced a massive stroke which left him somewhat incoherent. He was taken to the hospital and admitted. He appeared to be improving and, on Wednesday, the doctors said they were going to move him to rehab. However, on the evening of Thanksgiving, Dad had a high fever and was incoherent again, not being able to recognize people that he knew. The doctors started some IV's of antibiotics to fight off whatever infection was causing the fever. The next day, the fever remained. A spinal tap failed to show what was causing the fever. On Saturday, Nov 29, they thought he might have West Nile virus. When the nurse came in to do the test, my dad's blood pressure began dropping. Mom was there at the time, having spent the entire week at the hospital - day and night. She called my brothers in to the hospital but before anyone could get there, Dad's heart slowed down and then stopped. There was nothing that could be done.

Becky, Stephen and I were in Phoenix celebrating Thanksgiving with Becky's sister, Cathy, and her family. My brother, Thomas, had been keeping me informed about Dad all week long. Saturday morning, I got the call that Dad was gone. That was really hard to hear. I immediately went to the internet and began looking for a flight home. Delta Airlines was very sympathetic and helped me find a great direct flight from Phoenix to Little Rock on Northwest Airlines. Within an hour, I was on a plane heading home.

I wanted to be there so bad. I wanted to be there for mom but I also wished I could see my dad alive one last time. I had not gone home earlier because it appeared that Dad was improving and would be going into rehab. The sudden onset of fever was unexpected. I guess, perhaps, it is better that I can remember Dad as he was the last time I saw him - at the lake this past summer or, the previous year, riding in the boat and tubing with his grand kids.

I hold a lot of great memories of my dad. One memory that I really love is of Dad in his younger years, down on the floor wrestling with the three of us boys. We'd climb all over him trying to overpower him, which of course we could not. He had some sort of immunity to even our tickling attacks. That was a long time ago.

I also remember our many summer vacations at the lake. Dad once owned a ski boat that we'd ride around the lake at high speed (30 MPH?). I remember seeing my dad and my brother, Thomas, skiing behind that boat. I remember sitting around the camper at the end of the day, eating burgers Mom had cooked on the gas grill. I think, perhaps, it was at the lake on those dark summer nights that I really began to love looking at the stars.

I remember one time when the delivery men for my dad's company went on strike. Dad worked selling building materials such as doors and windows. Dad would work with the contractors and write up the orders for what they needed. Then, the delivery trucks would take the goods to the work site. With the delivery drivers on strike, the goods did not get delivered. Since dad did not get paid until the stuff was delivered and paid for, dad was not getting much pay. As I remember it, Dad went to Memphis, got a truck and delivered the stuff himself. I have a vivid memory of seeing that truck in front of the house and seeing my dad climbing down from the cab. I was very proud of him.

I remember my dad as Chief of the Reserve Police force from 1969 to 1975 - age 5 to 11 for me. Dad would go out every couple of weeks and ride with some of the regular police officers and, occasionally, the reserve police and my dad, would be called in when there was a threat of tornadoes or other bad weather. While the rest of us were safe in our storm cellar in the back yard, Dad would be out driving around watching for storms and helping people whose homes were damaged by storms. One time, Dad was called out to search a lake to find a missing boy. Dad was the one who found him and I imagine that was a little hard on him. I remember holding my dad's gold police badge which read "Police Chief" on it and thinking, "My dad's the chief of the policemen." I was so proud of him.

I remember the many sacrifices my dad made for us. Like when he bought me my clarinet. I knew that it was a lot of money and that it would be a struggle for my dad to do. However, I also knew that my dad was proud of me and my musical abilities and wanted to do whatever he could do to help me. Somehow, he came up with the money. Then, there was college. I was the first one in my immediate family to attend a four year college. I had always done well in school and I wanted to be able to go to a high quality engineering school. Again, it was a big sacrifice for Dad to be able to pay for college, but with help from my brother Marshall, and with a fair amount of scholarships and student aid, I was able to go to one of the top 25 engineering schools in the country and got a very high quality of education. I know how proud my mom and dad were on the day they came to St Louis to see me graduate with my B.S.E.E. and then, two years later, to see me graduate again with my M.S.E.E. It was a real sacrifice for Dad and I'm incredibly grateful.

A lot of what's in me comes from my dad. Dad was an engineer of sorts. Although he was a salesman by profession, there was engineering inside of him. He knew how to build things, fix things, make things work... Dad loved woodworking and building things from wood. After dad retired from his job, he began building custom fireplace mantels for some of the builders he had worked for. I think dad retired from that business 3 times - he kept getting called back to the work by builders who loved what he did.

I could go on and on, but I will spare you all that. Dad was a great man who loved his family a lot. Dad had 6 kids, Rhonda, Marshall, Ann, Thomas, Charles, and me, Allen. He had 5 grandchildren and 2 great grandchildren. He was married to my mom for 53 years. He died at the age of 77. He is, and will be, greatly missed.

For Dad's funeral, my brother and I put together a video slide show of photos of my dad. I've included it below.

Allen

In memory of my dad...

Ahhhh... Nitro - the smell of speed!

"Dad, what would you do if you won a million dollars in the lottery?", my nephew asked.

My brother answered, "I'd take my two sons, fly to California and watch the 2008 National Hot Rod Association Drag Racing Finals at Pomona!"

Well, he didn't win the lottery but on Nov 15, my brother Thomas and his two sons, Luke and Gabriel, boarded an airplane and flew to sunny San Diego to see the races at Pomona... oh, and visit with Becky, Stephen and I. It was quite a surprise for us all. Thomas and I talked about it briefly on the phone and found that it might be possible. With the low gas prices, airfare had dropped pretty dramatically. So, the decision was made!

Unfortunately, travel plans seldom seem to go as smoothly as they should. Thomas and the boys had to drive about 2 hours to the airport in Little Rock. When they arrived, they were notified that their flight had been canceled because of mechanical problems. Thomas called and told me that they might not be able to come. Delta was saying they could not get them on a flight until the next day - bad news. Well, I got on the computer here and searched for alternative flights. We found a couple of alternatives on other airlines and Delta was willing to switch them over to one of these flights. So, at 10:00PM, Stephen and I picked them up at the San Diego airport. Whew... that was close.

As it turned out, SoCal was experiencing Santa Anna winds that weekend, so there was lots of sunshine and temperatures in the upper 80's all weekend. A pleasant change from the winter temps in Arkansas at this time of the year.

On Saturday, Thomas, Luke, Gabriel, Stephen and myself bid farewell to Becky and went to the races. This was my first time to the drag races but I had been warned. Stephen and I had 2 pairs of noise blocking ear-muffs and a whole box of in-ear foam earplugs. For the Stock Cars and the Comp Eliminators (gas burning cars), the noise wasn't too bad. Then there was a break and we went to grab some lunch. When we returned to the stands they were just about to run the top-fuel, nitro-burning funny cars. Stephen put his earphones on and I had the earplugs in. WOW! I never new something could be that loud! My ears were hurting, my chest was vibrating and I think my hair was probably flying back from the noise! Boy, did they accelerate! My brother told me that they burn through 16 gallons of fuel in a 1/4 mile stretch reaching speeds exceeding 300 MPH. It was impressive. Stephen, however, thought it was way too loud and scary. We stayed for a couple more heats and Stephen wanted to go. Reluctantly, I agreed and we went to watch Veggie Tales in the car until the noisy cars were done. That was round one of two qualifying rounds.

My brother had recently bought a new lens for his Nikon camera - a big one. For those who understand, it is a 80-200mm zoom lens with an aperture of f/2.8. That's pretty good for a zoom lens. He was able to take pictures of the cars with a shutter speed of 1/3200 of a second - that's a little more than 300 microseconds exposure time. That's fast enough to read the letters on the tires of a dragster traveling at 300 MPH. We know because we zoomed in on the photos. You could even see the wrinkles in the sidewalls of the tires as they strain to keep traction on the raceway. It was pretty impressive. The pictures I've included here are from my camera, not his, so they're not quite so great.

A special treat for Stephen came when we were avoiding the noise during qualifying round two. We walked around and looked at some of the cars in the pit areas. We came up on one car where the team was rebuilding the engine. I exhausted my entire body of knowledge about engines trying to show Stephen how the pistons move in the cylinders and turn the crankshaft which drives the driveshaft which turns the tires. As we were talking, one of the mechanics came over and gave Stephen one of the pistons out of the engine telling him it was his to keep. Wow, how nice. A souvenir directly from the engine of a top-fuel funny car that we had seen racing that day. I asked the guy if there was something wrong with this particular piston. He explained that they could not use it anymore because the top of the piston was non-flat by as much as 0.005 inches. My calibrated eyes can't quite discern that small of a tolerance so I took his word for it. I've included, to the left, a picture of the car it came from.

On Sunday, Stephen stayed at home while the rest of use went back for the championship races. We had a great time! We saw several engines blow out and a couple catch fire. We saw a car break off an entire wheel. To top it off, the last race of the day was the top-fuel dragsters. These are the baddest of the bad in drag racing. As the two cars raced down the track, pushing their engines for all they had, we watched as the winner crossed the finish line just as his engine exploded into flames and a giant fireball! No one was hurt and it was a pretty spectacular ending.

On Monday, Becky took Thomas, Luke and Gabriel to the ocean and to Point Loma. As they stood by the tide pools looking around, the ocean brought up a big wave that crashed on the rocks and drenched them all (never turn your back on the Pacific Ocean). I think they all had a good time visiting California for the first time and I expect they'll be back soon. It was great having them visit. Thanks, Thomas. Come again real soon.

Allen

GRANDMA!!

That says it all, right? My (Becky's) mom was here visiting last week, and we had a great time, of course. She was on the newly appointed Grandma Tour, which we can probably expect will be a regular circuit a few times a year. She began with five days in Phoenix for Grandma time with Phoebe, and then flew over to San Diego for 5 days with Stephen. Oh, and her daughters and sons-in law got a little Mom time, as well. Not so much text to type, but we did lots of stuff, so we'll show some pictures. She went to Taekwondo with Stephen and Allen (who, did enroll, by the way). We stopped off at the famous Torrey Pines Golf Course where we oohed and aahed over the lush greens with the ocean behind them. Grandma bought a Torrey Pines hat and a nice gentleman gave one to Stephen. Then we took her to Point Loma, our quickly rising favorite-so-far spot (we've still got lots more places to explore) where we were dazzled with views from the top of this penninsula of San Diego Bay and downtown to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. (Note the matching golf caps for Stephen and Grandma.) We made our way down to the tidepools and walked along the cliffs. It was a beautiful time and we could have easily spent more hours there.

The next day was Legoland. Lots of rides that would have impressed 5-year olds, but Lego sculptures to impress all ages, including scale models of many national monuments and famous buildings. We hung out, played mini-golf and ate at our favorite-so-far restaurant finds, and Monday, Grandma closed out her tour with a visit to Stephen's first-grade classroom and read during Grandma Story time.
Happy Birthday, Mom! We love you!

Smile, it Rained

I know this is old news, all of a week, but I took this picture for a reason. See, it rained here last Tuesday, which was also election day, you might remember. This is the first time since we've been here (July 28) that it's really rained. There have been 2 or 3 times where it barely drizzled and I had to turn on my wipers for a few swipes. But on Tuesday, it rained for a couple of hours. This is significant. I wanted to dance, and I could almost sense that in others, too. You know the old saying, "you don't realize how much you miss something until it's gone"? Well, it is definitely true of rain. There's this water allocation processs over here and southern California petitions whatever water agency makes these important decisions for their share of water that's allowed to come down here. There was an article in the paper about how if rainfall doesn't exceed expectations this winter that San Diego will get only 15% of what they petitioned the agency for. Fifteen percent. I know flooded St. Louis finds that hard to imagine. That means farmers will not plant and water will be rationed, said Governor Arnold. Not something anyone is looking forward to, I'm sure. So, with it also being election day, I smiled contentedly and told my friends at bible study how it felt like a true, autumn election day back in the midwest. One lady cocked her head sideways and asked, "Really?" I smiled and put on my education hat, feeling sorry for all these people that have never experienced a chilly, rainy, fall day, and explained, to amazed learners, how it typically rains in November in the midwest, and it can actually be dreary and cloudy for an entire day or three and how newspeople always wonder if the weather will affect voter turnout. In a spiritual sense, rain is usually the metaphor for blessings, which also made me smile. Pour out more, Lord!

BFF...

...in our 6th grade memories. Last week, I learned of the death of my best friend growing up, Stacy Davis. I've been flooded with lots of childhood memories, thinking of things I haven't thought of in years, all the stuff we did together - which seems like it surely must have been everything! I don't remember exactly how we became friends. My parents moved and I started 4th grade at a new school, Rose Acres Elementary, and it wasn't long till we were best buds. My memory snapshots are the classic growing up stuff of late-70s/early-80s suburbia. We were always at each other's houses, doing one-legged spins on our swing sets, playing hours of Clue and Monopoly, being mean to our little sisters, listening to 45s and dancing to Shaun Cassidy, Andy Gibb, and the soundtrack from Grease. She loved the Bay City Rollers, horses and video games. Her family was one of the first to have cable and Atari and we watched the first MTV and spent hours playing Breakout and Asteroids. We rode our bikes everywhere, including the woods and creek in the Wesglen Estates park. I still remember her birthday and phone number - we were the reason our parents got the new invention of call waiting! Her family always took me with them to Pantera's Pizza, skating at Coachlite, and countless hours at the Maryland Heights ballpark watching her brother's and sisters' softball games and spending scrounged-up quarters on candy at the quick shop. I loved cinnamon Jolly Ranchers; she, giant Sweetarts. I, who have no drawing ability, was jealous in 6th grade when she wrote this cute kids book about tadpoles and even illustrated it. In the summers, we candystriped together at my mom's hospital, walked to the arcade and spent all our babysitting money playing Ms. Pac Man (and she was better than me), had suntanning contests (she won those too) and listened to music on our Walkmans, although tastes had now changed to Journey, Def Leppard and Billy Squier. In junior high and high school, her artistic talents and athletic abilities really came out. She ran cross-country and racewalked on the high school track team. In 10th grade, our friendship went separate paths after we both experimented with things we were too young to handle, things that eventually took their toll on her. I never saw her after high school, but I wish we could have reconnected and shared with each other the things that are important in our lives now that we are adults and so much has changed.

Stacy is more than just someone from my past. She was my best friend and part of who I am. We were good for each other back then, pulling each other along and doing life together for six great growing-up years. I was blessed to have her as a friend.

Birthday Boy

Stephen is the big SEVEN! His birthday was last week, and we had a party for him in the park, since the weather always allows for outdoor activities, and it worked better than our apartment. We invited the boys from his school class. We designed a pretty easy scavenger hunt, with picture clues leading to the next item. The guise was that a cake bandit had come and stolen the birthday cake, but left clues as to where to find it. Eventually, all the clues led to the trunk of our car! It was fun to watch the two teams race from one end of the park to the other and delight in being able to recognize and find the next clue. Stephen opted for chocolate cake, decorated with Scooby Doo. (Yes, a few of you are thinking this sounds an awful lot like last year's party. Same party plan, different city, different friends - hey, recycled ideas work!) We went to the party store to get Scooby Doo plates, but they didn't have any, so we ended up with a mixed theme of Scooby, other cute dogs, and camouflage. They actually make bouncy balls in camo - pretty cool to a bunch of first grade boys.





In other Stephen news....some of you remember for Halloween last year, Stephen was a loon. As in, the actual bird. The craft in his Big Backyard nature magazine was a loon costume, and Stephen really latched onto it. "THAT'S what I'm going to be for Halloween, Mom." It was July. I thought for sure he would forget by October. Nope. Good thing I kept that magazine, just in case. It wasn't hard to make - just a paper plate, some paint, and a few pieces of craft foam. Allen really delved in and made it happen last year. Top it off with Stephen learning the actual loon call and you've got one crazy night of trick-or-treating. (Thanks again to the Speichers for putting up with that!) So, this year, we thought, hey, no one here has seen this costume, or had the chance to be wowed by the loon call, so let's....RECYCLE this idea, too! Today at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, there was a costume contest. We thought it would be a great Saturday to spend at the park, and why not get out the loon and let him strut his stuff. Well, can we brag a little? Stephen won the GRAND PRIZE in the 7-12 age group - a safari caravan for four, which we'll promptly use when Grandma comes to visit in two weeks. It was his loon call that put the judges over the top. We hit the right crowd - a bunch of zookeepers couldn't help but be a little biased for a loon over Ariels and Darth Vaders.



Video of Stephen doing his loon call...

And the Winner Is....

...Denny Sivcovich. Not that any of the rest of you knew there was a contest, but we've been wondering who would be the first person to visit us from St. Louis, since everyone has told us how they want to come see us in beautiful San Diego. Denny was here in southern CA for a business trip and he called and asked if we could get together. So, on breezy September 10, we met him in Oceanside and had a delicious barbeque dinner 2 blocks from the ocean. (We'll take you there if you come see us, too!) This meant a lot to us, especially since Denny bravely fought his way through an hour and a half of infamous CA traffic from Los Angeles just to meet us. Now, I know it's been 5 or 6 weeks since that evening, but today is Denny's birthday so we thought it fitting to finally get this posted. Happy Birthday, Denny! You're a good friend.


On a totally unrelated note, I know you're waiting to hear about our rat adventures. (Ok, ok, some of you are laughing that we would write about Denny and the rat in the same post...c'mon, get ahold of yourself. Really.) We think our houseguest has bitten the dust. After placing the snap traps, he successfully ate the peanut butter off it twice without getting snapped. Smart rat. No wonder they're used as lab animals. I told this to the maintenance man and he said it was time to resort to poison, which he doesn't like to use, because the rat could crawl off anywhere and die, and, well, you know what a decaying carcass brings. He bought these poison packets and threw them up onto the roof, hoping the rat would eat them. So, Sunday we came home from church and saw what was most likely our rat laying unmoving in the corner of the rock garden under our stairs. I didn't stick around for the next part, but apparently, he wasn't quite dead yet. He crawled over, barely breathing, insisting "I'm not quite dead yet," (apologies to Monty Python) where Stephen and the two boys downstairs (so, we've got three boys, ages 7, 9, & 11) watched him with great fascination. Some weird sympathy reflex kicked in and the boys felt bad that the rat was going to die, so they decided to FEED him. Irony, anyone? Raisins for his last meal. "At least he'll die with a full stomach, Mom." We didn't see his body again, so hopefully, the poison won out over the energy from the raisins. Our neighbor said the racoons probably got the rat during the night. Racoons, rats, anything else? All you people visitors are welcome to come see us. You small rodentia, find your own hotel.

Becky

Of Mice and Men

And in other fascinating news this week, while Allen writes to you from Taekwondo Monday night, I’m at home with….a rat. No kidding. Like, the actual rodent. And this is NOT one we acquired at a pet store. Seriously, we’ve never dealt with pests on this level this before. We know it happens. But to other people, right?

We first saw evidence of this animal a couple of weeks ago when I noticed a hole had been chewed in my bag of potting soil in the laundry closet on our balcony. I called the apartment office and the leasing agent is our downstairs neighbor, and she had experienced the very same thing with her potting soil. So, friendly maintenance man Tim brought over some sticky goo traps, and we all put them out, but the only thing we caught in the two weeks was my foot as I stepped back into it while getting laundry out of the dryer. (And that goo was hard to wash off my foot, I might add.) We’re thinking we have just a little mouse, as we have a wooded area right next to our building. Makes sense.

In the middle of the night Saturday, I am awakened by loud clawing and biting noises in our KITCHEN. I wake up Allen, and he heads off into the kitchen, turning on lights, expecting to see a little mouse. Now, I’m thinking, “Do you have a plan? If you see something, what are you going to do? This isn’t exactly like killing a spider. Can you actually bring yourself to conk it on the head?” (Drat Disney and Pixar for personifying and cutifying small furry vermins.) Well, of course, he doesn’t see anything cuz the animal goes and hides. He comes back to bed, we fall asleep, only to be woken up 10 minutes later by the same noise. This goes on a couple more times till it finally stops. We get up Sunday morning to see small bits of kitchen cabinet on the floor. I mention this to my friend Margaret who informs me we have something more than a mouse, because mice don’t eat/chew cabinets. Great.

Then, Sunday night, after Stephen is in bed and Allen and I have settled down to check out the latest campaign garbage on TV (why we torture ourselves watching this stuff, I don’t know) we hear loud scratching and clawing noises in the kitchen again, this time from under the dishwasher. This goes on for about 30 minutes, escalating into loud ripping noises. Whatever it is, it’s having fun making a cozy nest under there. We bring the goo traps in from the laundry room and put them on the kitchen floor. Allen goes to bed. I’m sitting at the table working on bills, all is quiet, and THEN, a dark gray, 6-inch rodent darts across the living room floor, under the TV. This ain’t no mouse. I get Allen (not calmly, either), and we try to make a chute by putting our (still) unpacked boxes around the TV in such a manner that if he decides to come out, the only direction he can get out is the front door. But it’s 50 degrees outside and 70 under the TV. Would you come out? He pokes his little nose out from under the TV a couple of times, scampers around behind there and tells us we’re crazy if we think he’s going outside. Thirty minutes later, we defeatedly go to bed, but not before putting a goo trap around our setup, with pieces of macaroni from dinner on it.

Monday morning we wake up to find…..not a rodent stuck on a trap, but all the pieces of macaroni gone. Uh huh, he’s laughing at us now, all cuddled up in his dishwasher-insulation nest, thanking us for dinner, wondering what we’ll serve tomorrow night. I tell my downstairs neighbor leasing agent about our adventures, she agrees it’s a rat (and shivers as she says “ulgh”) and sends Tim over to set a snap trap. Now, regular mouse traps are what, 1” X 3”? This thing is the size of a small book, and it goes under the kitchen cabinet near the dishwasher hose hole, loaded up with peanut butter. So, now we wait. Of course, after all this brouhaha, we’ve heard nor seen nothing of Mr. Ratatouille since Monday and it’s now Wednesday. Did he go out the door, adventuring into the big world, visiting friends in a van down by the river? Is he traipsing around to all his penthouse nests in other apartments? Will he return when we least expect it? We’ll let you know. But for now, I guess we can add having a rat in our apartment to our “New Experiences in California” list.

Becky

Taekwondo Lessons

It's Monday evening at 6:45PM. That means I'm sitting here at the Escondido Community Center watching Stephen in one of his Taekwondo lessons. He has these 2 times per week - Monday and Thursday and has been doing this for several weeks now. When we were in St Louis, Stephen expressed an interest in learning Karate and we found a place where he could take very early introductory lessons. He really seemed to enjoy it. When we found ourselves in Escondido, we began looking for a place where he could continue learning martial arts. The Karate classes were somewhat expensive but we found this Taekwondo class which is pretty good and not too costly.

There are 25-30 people in this class ranging from very young 5-6 year olds up to gray-haired adults in their late 50-60s. This works pretty well, actually, because there are plenty of young people who are learning the very basics and there are also older folks who make pretty good role models for them. They do alot of the same exercises for everyone from the white belts up to the black belts. Stephen has plenty of people to watch and model after. Sometimes, it gets a bit confusing for Stephen and some of the other young ones, but the teacher, Master Leonard, provides written instructions to the parents so we can work with our kids outside of class. I appreciate this because it lets Stephen and I spend time together learning which I really enjoy.

Taekwondo is a Korean martial arts form. The name literally means 'foot and hand fighting'. This means that it consists of various fighting forms incorporating kicking with the feet and punches, jabs, and holds done with the hands. There are several 'forms' which are basically just different stances and patterns of movement which allow for both defensive and offensive maneuvers. Some of these forms can be complicated but with a little slow-motion practice, they can be learned fairly well.

Perhaps the most difficult part of the process - at least thus far - is learning to speak Korean. All the moves and commands are given in Korean and all counting is done in Korean. This can be tough because it's just memorization. However, since they're doing it twice a week and are pretty repetitive with it, I think Stephen is starting to pick it up pretty well. I, on the other hand, need to spend some time with my notes. Stephen can count to 10 in Korean now and he's pretty proud of that. A few days ago, we talked on the phone with Andy Gilman and his wife Jenna in Taegu, South Korea. Stephen was pretty excited to show Jenna how he could count in Korean. She said that he did, "Perfectly." That made him pretty happy.

I think another really exciting thing for Stephen is that he has a Taekwondo uniform now. They did not get uniforms in his class back in St Louis. It wasn't important then because all the kids in the class were at about the same skill level. In this class, since they have people at all levels up to Black Belt, the uniform is pretty important. Stephen really likes his uniform. He can't wait to get his yellow belt.

The pictures I've included are from the night that they used sticks in their class. Occasionally, the teacher will incorporate lessons from other martial arts forms and the fighting sticks was one of those things. Stephen really liked working with the sticks but some of the forms were a little difficult (not to mention dangerous). He was a little frustrated but I promised him that we'd practice and he'd get it pretty well. The next day, I went on the web to look for a place to get a set of these sticks. It's amazing how much they can charge for a couple of 28 inch long sticks. Instead, I went to Home Depot where, for about $5, I was able to get 2 complete sets of fighting sticks (3/4" dowel rods) cut to the right length. Stephen was pretty excited when I came home with those. We began working with these and, within about 30-45 minutes, he had it down and was doing a great job. It really was a lot of fun.

Last week, a funny coincidence took place. On the way to the lesson, Stephen was talking to me about some older boys in his school who we making fun of him and being pretty mean to. One of them even pushed him and made him fall. Stephen was pretty upset, as you can imagine, and we talked about the right way to deal with this situation - I mean, talking with his teachers about it. Well, when class started, the instructor started out by saying that they would be learning about how to deal with a bully who might knock you down and sit on you. All the moves were about how to deal with a situation where someone is holding you down or trying to hurt you. He specifically talked about bullies on the playground. I thought, "Oh, no. Tomorrow Stephen's going to be suspended for using Taekwondo on some older kids at school." We talked it over and discussed the proper thing to do and the proper way to use or not use Taekwondo. Luckily, no one was injured the next day. :-)

The class runs for about 3 months. If Stephen chooses to continue, and I hope that he does, I might decide to join him in the class. It'd be fun to do it together and I think he wants me to join in. Well, we'll see.

Allen

Why Life Part Two?

You may have noticed the title of our little blog here. I chose this name during the 10 weeks or so between when we accepted the job and when we moved. We have moved five times in our marriage, but they have all been mostly local moves, and we keep carrying around all these boxes of really old junk that accumulated the last 20 years or so, some even from before we were married. You know, the kind of stuff you're not quite ready to get rid of, yet doesn't have a function in daily life, so it just gets put in a box. And when it's time to move, those boxes stay packed up and just get moved, and then stored at the new place. Well, with this move to San Diego, we knew it was time to go through our stuff. Maybe it's the distance, the lack of storage (houses here don't have basements), who knows, but we felt the need to really do some cleaning out (cleansing?). So, the week before Allen left, he went through many boxes and we thre away stuff that made us feel...really old. For example, two things of note were class notes, handouts and exams from college. College stuff? No big deal right? Except for the fact that some of these had been reproduced on a mimeograph machine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mimeograph_machine). When we saw the telltale purple ink, we just laughed. We realize some of you don't even know what a mimeograph is. Well, just know it's what people used before copy machines and desktop printers. We also threw away loads of 5.25" floppy disks. Does anyone even have a 5.25" drive anymore?! We threw away job offer letters and resignation letters from the last couple of jobs. There was a memo from Allen's first job out of college at McDonnell Douglas. It was addressed to some of the very same people Allen is (was) still working with in the St. Louis laser field today. The same guys have been together in many ways and forms for the last 20 years. All these things put together made us reflect on the fact that we now have over 2 decades of adult life under our belts....and well, it made us feel...mmm, like we're in our forties. Sigh. Plus, embarking on this move to California, leaving everything comfortable and all we know, it feels like we're setting out on a new adventure. In many ways, kinda the same feeling as when you leave home to begin college...a fresh start...big unknowns...empty slate in front of you...open hands of trust in the Maker of our Path. Life, Part Two.

Becky

Sweet the Moments, Rich in Blessing

Okay, okay, I guess my dreams of having all this free time after our move have gone down the pipes as you can tell by our apparent inability to make a post to our blog every once in a while. Our apologies please. Thanks for hanging in there with us. I’m in my 6th week of being in lovely San Diego (this is Becky writing) and I have so many paragraphs backed up in my head that it’s hard to know where to begin. So, I will start back at the end of the St. Louis part, our final weeks there.

I have wanted to write about that time and how deeply the goodbye process impacted us ever since then. To say it was hard leaving friends we’ve known for decades, and family we’ve known for, well, all our lives, would be an understatement. Yet, even through double goodbyes in many cases (once before Allen left, and then again before Stephen and I left) I was frustrated with myself at my lack of emotion after just a few evenings of these departures. I guess the reality of saying goodbye happened for us mentally during the time of wrestling with whether to move, so when the time came to say goodbye face-to-face, we were weeks gone already.

However, one evening it all hit, the Friday the movers came to pack our house. Christy Fuller had kept Stephen all day for me and I went over to pick him up and stayed for dinner. It was late when Stephen and I finally left and as we drove away the cd that was in the player picked up with the next track. Already a reflective moment after saying goodbye, the acoustic guitar just added to it. Then the first line of words began: “Sweet the moments, rich in blessing…” and I lost it. Those words encapsulated how I’d felt thinking about all the sweet and rich moments spent together with them and others, the sweeping reality of closure of this part of our lives. Even though I was applying those words to my friends, the song is really about the sweet time spent with our Savior. But that’s where it all came together beautifully for me, as I worshiped through tears and praised the caring, guiding hand of God over all our lives, the intersection of this weaving together of our paths, the story He’s writing, all for His glory, as we’re on this daily journey of faith with open hands. We have lived and served and worshiped together in the sweet moments of His love, near the cross. The rest of verse one and the chorus say:
Sweet the moments, rich in blessing,
Which before the cross I spend.
Life, and health, and peace possessing
From the sinner’s dying friend.

Oh that, near the cross abiding,
I may to the Savior cleave;
Naught with Him my heart dividing,
All for Him content to leave.

One particular goodbye that demands special attention is that with our friend, Vic Huber. We’ve known Vic through church the last 16 years, and even more specially as we became his neighbors when we moved to Greendale 3 years ago. We’ve spent countless hours with this man of God the last few years, riding together to church (each time he’d have some little trinket or sticker or candy to share with Stephen), him in our home for UMSL ministry, small group and other occasions, one of which was his 91st birthday celebration last year. Vic gradually became weaker over this last year, homebound since about Christmas, and bedbound shortly thereafter. As we could see his body deteriorate with each visit these last few months, I selfishly hoped he would die before we moved to San Diego; we wanted to see his suffering relieved. Vic went to be with Jesus on July 20. We moved July 25. We honor this man who was like a great-grandpa to Stephen and a role model of faith and godliness to all of us. He is indeed now living countless sweet moments rich in blessing. All for Him, content to leave.

Becky

Getting Settled...

We're getting somewhat settled into our apartment in Escondido. Becky chose some of our stuff to be put into long term storage and some to come to the apartment. I think we're finding that more stuff should have gone into storage. Our house in St Louis had a great deal of space. Our apartment in Escondido does not. Moving is always an eye opening experience - finding out how much stuff you have accumulated - a lot of which you could probably do without. Anyhow, the picture to the right is Stephen standing on the deck at the entrance to our 2nd story apartment. The fact that it's on the 2nd story is significant as I'll explain later.

The moving truck arrived promptly at 8AM to bring our stuff. It was one of those really big 18-wheeler rigs. The moving company had called ahead and asked if they would be able to get the truck to our apartment. The lady in the apartment office assured me that they have trucks like that come through all the time and there shouldn't be a problem. Well... she was wrong. The truck could not even make it through the entrance to the complex, much less make it down to where our apartment is at the back of the complex. So, the movers decided they would need to bring a second, smaller moving truck to ferry our stuff from the big truck, to the small truck, to our apartment.

Since I needed to get to work, they went ahead and unloaded my car while awaiting the smaller truck. That went just fine and around 10AM, I left for work. I had a meeting at 11 so I couldn't wait any longer. At 12:30, after my meeting ended, I called Becky. They were still waiting for the small truck to arrive so they could start unloading. I'm sure they must have been getting frustrated. Eventually, they were able to get everything moved in. When I came home from work that night, the scene to the left is what greeted me. The apartment which, the day before, seemed to have lots of open space, now had walking trails winding through stacks and stacks of boxes. All except for one rather large item.

Remember how I said that the apartment was on the 2nd floor? Well, that was not our preference. In fact, Becky had told me to make sure we got one on the ground floor. Things don't always go as you would want. No first floor apartments were available so, 2nd floor it is. The movers took a look at the steps and the landing leading up to the deck and said, in no uncertain terms, that they were not going to move Becky's piano into the apartment. It was going to go into storage unless we wanted to pay a piano mover to bring out a crane and lift the piano up to the deck. We called the movers and they were not at all encouraging about the prospects of success, so we resigned ourselves to having the piano stored away.

Below are some pictures from our apartment. From these, you can get a picture of where we live.


We've made some progress unpacking, but not a lot. There are more important things than unpacking boxes - like going to Sea World, BBQ's on the beach, Six Flags Magic Mountain, surfing, and taking Stephen camping. But, hey, that's stuff for another blog entry - maybe.

I keep hoping that the realtor will call us and say, "Hey! Good news! I sold your house today!" So far, that hasn't happened. We're praying and trusting God and waiting on Him. I'm certain His timing will be perfect. Please, keep us in your prayers.

Allen

Something new on the blog...

Hi, everyone. I've added something new to the 'Life Part Two' blog. As you may remember, Becky and I wanted this blog to keep connected with our friends and family all around the world. And that has been happening. To date, people have read our blog from 6 countries including China, Boliva, South Africa, St Vincent/Barbados, Kazakhstan and, of course, the United States.

I have added a feature to the blog which will, hopefully, make this thing work even better. On the left side of the screen, you'll see a place to register your email so that you will automatically be notified of updates. This is a totally free thing and really easy to do. All you have to do is enter your email address and click 'Submit'. Feedburner will then ask you to confirm that you are a real person who wants to subscribe. A window will open with a series of letters. Enter the correct letters in the entry space and Feedburner will then send you an email to request confirmation that your address is correct and that you are actually the person who is subscribing. Once you receive the email, click on the provided link and you're done.

Feedburner assures me that you will not be receiving any spam or other unwanted emails. This is a reputable company providing a real service. Many other blogs use them for this same service and it seems to work well. You'll only receive emails when we update the blog. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Give it a try.

By the way, I also have the blog setup to automatically notify me by email whenever any of you posts a comment. Feel free to write whatever and keep in touch. Be assured that we will receive your input and be glad to hear from you. At the same time, anyone else who reads the blog will be able to see your input as well, so we all stay connected. Pretty cool, huh?

And finally, yes, a new blog entry is coming soon. I hope...

Allen

Driving back to San Diego…

So, after our weekend in Phoenix, we made the drive back through Yuma and into San Diego. The part of the drive from Phoenix to Yuma is... well… pretty plain. It’s mostly just mile after mile of desert dotted with cactus, sage brush, and lots and lots of sand, oh, and lots of “Land for Sale” signs. Just after you leave Yuma, however, it starts to get interesting. There is an area called the Imperial Sand Dunes. This area is only a 3 or 4 miles wide but is several miles long. It’s just big mountains of sand as far as you can see. There is a scene in the 3rd Star Wars movie where Jabba the Hut takes Luke and Leia into the desert to feed Luke to the sand worms, or something like that. This scene was filmed in these sand dunes just outside Yuma. That's Jabba's ship in the photo. The Star Wars team wanted to donate the $2-million dollar prop to the city of Yuma, but the city didn't want it. So, they chopped it up and burned it.

Anyway, when we got to the sand dunes, Stephen and I couldn’t resist stopping to play a little. In fact, I told him, when we left Phoenix, that we'd stop to play in a really, really BIG sand box. He was excited.

It was HOT, but it was a dry heat so it wasn’t so bad. We started climbing up one of the dunes and found it very hard going. 3 steps forward, one step back. We played around, running down massive hills of sand, making sand avalanches by stomping on the ground, and generally just being silly. At one point, I ran down into a valley and didn't know if I'd be able to walk back up one of the walls to get back it. With Stephen's help ("Come on, Dad. Get up here!"), I was able to make it back out, short of breath and sweating like a... well... alot.

Becky and her mom waited for us back at the car. At one point, the border patrol honked and blew their siren but I don’t think they meant us. Whether they did or not, we just kept going and they didn’t come arrest us, so I guess all is well. Here are a couple of pictures of Stephen and I on one of the large dunes.


After the dunes, there is a fairly large stretch of road flanked on both sides by farmland – lush green farmland. That’s right – farmland in the desert. Farmers grow a lot of crops there because they can get in 3 full growing seasons each year. They actually like the fact that it seldom rains, because they can better control the irrigation of their fields for efficiency and crop growth. They grow such things as soybeans, barley, cauliflower, lettuce, cabbage, rapeseed (from which we get canola oil), and even some melons. I’ve been told that the Imperial Valley, as this area is known, actually produces 80-90% of the lettuce consumed in this country.

After the farmlands, we come to my favorite part of the trip - the Laguna Mountains at the eastern edge of San Diego County. Heading into these mountains, you start out actually below sea level. In a few miles, however, you will be almost 5000 feet above sea level driving among boulders as big as houses. The mountains are covered in rocks of all sizes – millions of them. One of my favorite things in this stretch of roads is a highway sign that says, “Watch for Rocks”. Not “Watch for Falling Rocks” but just “Watch for Rocks”. Stephen and I had fun pointing out the windows saying, “There’s one. There’s another, and another over there.” Ok, maybe a bad joke but when you're driving through these mountains, you’d have a hard time missing the rocks. Check out the pictures I’ve included.
When you first start to enter the mountains, from the desert on the east side, it could be 100 degrees outside. When you get out of the mountains, on the San Diego side, however, you’re back into the lower 70s. It’s a very dramatic climate change right there and you can clearly see it on a Google Map satellite image.

Well, we made it to San Diego later than we had planned so we did not make it to the new apartment in Escondido. We stopped at my company-provided temporary housing and rested. In the morning, on July 28, a big 18-wheeler carrying our household goods would arrive promptly at 8AM to start unloading... but that's another story coming soon.

Allen