Montana Plate - Liberty and Justice for All

Montana Plate - Liberty and Justice for All
Originally uploaded by Spappy.joneS

I was able to work on my plate collection this week, I like the picture on the right due to the accidental reflection in the chrome of the grill.

I am at nearly 60 unique plates out of who knows. This state must have well over a 100 right now. I am thinking about making one for all the great casinos in the 7-11s, libraries, and daycare centers .

My first quick mock up is below, I think it would look great on a plate. The proceeds could all be donated to the MT small business administration to seed more tiny casinos and some to Bad Company (one of my favorite 70s bands) since I am ripping off their album cover of Straight Shooter. The mock up is below:

Happy Hour on the Deck aka Beating the Heat + Montana Movie Summer 2007

Happy Hour on the Deck
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

It has been hot hot hot here since we have arrived. Today is the first day it has not broke 90. To be outside you needed to be in the shade or water or next to a bowl of water, so you can drink it with your lego blocks.

Today it has been threatening rain, which is why it is cooler. As I look outside now it is actually raining. The state needs it, there are fires all over the place. The sky is filled with smoke, the sun rises red for the first 90 minutes of the day and the moon is a deep yellow at night. It is actually pretty cool looking.


Video: 7-23-2007 Montana Summer Vacation 2007

Wallingford Children's Parade

Wallingford Childrens Parade
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

Just came across some footage of the Wallingford Children's Parade when I was capturing or whatever it is called when you take the footage from the camcoder to the PC. Anywazes it was a nice find, Ben was pretty good and the Grand Marshall for the back of his section of PEPS Local 968.

The footage stops when I had to run and and get him out of the way of another group that was marching. the Children's Center Loc. 295 or something, they are some bruziers that you don't want to mess with when they are on march, they all had been drinking in the parade assembly area and were getting pretty keyed up by the time it was our turn to march.


Video: 7-22-2007 Wallingford Children's Parade

forest fire sunrise + movie of museum of flight

forest fire sunrise
Originally uploaded by Spappy.joneS

It has been a hot\dry week out here. When that happens in MT it starts to burn. The good news is there aren't any huge fires threatening cities but there are a lot of small scattered fires (lightning started) through out the area.

We have been laying low in the house during the day due to the heat. I have been watching the 1975 World Series - Red Sox vs. Reds. I got the dvds of the original telecasts from netflix. I know I am getting old but watching how Curt Gowdy and Joe Garagiola called the game and spoke about the players was so much more interesting and entertaining than listening to Joe Buck and the other stuffed shirt pretty boys of today. If you want to see what I mean rent one of the best games ever played of the world series. Game 6 of the '75 WS, you will not be disappointed even if you are not a big fan of the sport, this is 2 hours of historic baseball. It was like seeing Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock.

Oh yeah, here is one last movie in my backlog, this one is of the Albrechts and the Swifts going to the Museum of Flight at Boeing Field.


Video: 7-8-2007 Fam and the Grands @ the flight museum

Q400 Horizon to Montana

Q400 Horizon
Originally uploaded by Spappy.joneS

As usual Horizon somehow stooped to a 2 out of 5 for an overall rating. Rather than make this a big bitch session I will just make a quick list on the pluses and minuses.

First the positive:

• Great friendly service from Horizon
• TSA agents were very very kind and helpfull getting our dog, two kids, double stroller and all of my electronic gear through the screen in under 15 minutes.
• The Bombardier Q400 is a favorite aircraft of mine
  
• We choose asile seats across from each other hoping the window seats would stay vacant. We got lucky. Both kids are under 2 and were "lap kids"
• Aircraft landed on its wheels, stopped and was not on fire or in pieces.
  
• Luggage made it to Helena

Now the negitive:

• We sat on the tarmac for more than 30 minutes after boarding.
• To save fuel they don't power cabin HVAC while sitting on the tarmac which results in a cabin with depleted oxygen, high relative humidity and an ambient temp over 90 degrees.
• Sat extra long in Great Falls because they counted 2 extra people on board after the Great Falls folks got off the aircraft and we were ready to leave. This took at least 15 additional minutes at 12:15 am and yes with out the HVAC running and all children in the cabin were pretty pissed off they were not in a climate controlled bed. Adults were wishing they had some stiff drinks and some pain killers, at least some of those ear muff things the ground crew use, and a fan.

Long story short we needed to be picked up in 2 rigs last night. Thanks Barb and Tom for staying up so late, once home it took a couple hours to settle everyone down including myself, couldn't sleep. I am reading a book about baseball called The Five Seasons by Roger Angel.
The part about the 1975 season is so good I can't put it down. More on that next post.

Silver stairs and red hairs + (new movie)

Silver stairs
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

My folks have been in town for the last week. I dropped them off this raining morning (yeah free water). Tonight we, all 5 of us fly out to Helena (Digger, Ben, eLaine, Shawn, big Jeff) on the 8:30 flight. We have friend staying here and watching the place. We have air conditioning which makes us a very popular place on the block.

update as requested by Jill on my paternity leave. I miss my 8 hours off spent in Redmond daily when not on paternity. People all react to how sweet it is to "have a month's vacation". I just look at them and laugh. What a vacation, I would love to be able to charge vacation seekers looking for this unique vacation experience.

Our house was painted by a crew. It looks great. I still need to bust out the gutters myself when I get back. Here is an update on my original list.

1. Nap, catch up on rest if that is possible with our current situation.
2. Tune up the '71 VW Bus - valve adjustment, suspension lube, timing, points, belt, etc
3. Visit with my folks that are coming out from NH
4. Visit Helena MT
5. Take Ben to his 8am Saturday swim lessons (ouch) already missed last weeks
6. Police the painting crew working on our house
7. Take the kids to see the sockeye running in the locks
8. Dev. some site items for the WSC (I am the new webmaster)
9. Finish a bio I am reading on Einstein
10. Find the cure for Colic
11. Tear off the wooden gutters and facia board on the house and garage -> replace somehow.
12. This one should probably be first - start exercising again and start eating things other than sugar and things with sugar as the main nutritional ingredient
13. Get real about what can actually be done on this list.

I would write more and I will once we are in Montana. I have to start packing and do a bunch of other things before we leave for the airport tonight.

Still working through the back log of movies, this one is from July 4th. It is short, Ben is playing with the hose out back, it is pretty funny.


Video: 7-4-2007 Ben loves the hose

She is on my list!

She is on my list!
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

Ben has been going to a preschool twice a week and he seems to be adjusting very well. At first he would cry and wail when we left him in his classroom. I would usually hang out until he was deeply distracted or I just had to get going. One thing is for sure he comes home absolutely filthy. Last night Shawn stripped him outside and he went straight to the bath.

Currently it is 7:43 am. 71 F. Not a good sign this early in the morning. I have some outdoor work to do today to prep for the painters arriving on Thursday to finally paint our exterior. I had every intention of painting it myself but it would not have been done very soon or the orderly efficient fashion I demand of all my projects.

Ben goes to his 4 hour day camp today with some of his PEP friends.

Time to release my next backlogged movie to the world. Not sure which one it will be, I think I have 3 more shorts left for the public.


Video: 7-5-2007 the day after the forth of july

Heat Wave

Starting Tuesday, the Seattle-area temperature is expected to soar to around 90 degrees and climb to the mid-90s on Wednesday and Thursday, the National Weather Service in Seattle says. Lower temperatures won't return until Friday.

"We live in an old craftsman with no (air conditioning) and I can barely take it now," Billings said in his shorts, echoing many Seattleites' sentiments. "It's going to be tough to be in the car, to sleep at night -- just bearing it. We're not going to be able to escape."

Temperatures are expected to be 15 to 20 degrees higher than normal, and record highs could either be matched or broken, a Weather Service spokesman said.

Children's Museum - Seattle with the whole Fam

Moneyville: where you can play the stock market, pre-date options
buy and sell on insider info, learn how to margin your house, learn how to
"buy" a mortgage from WaMu, how to extend the equitiy on your house
for SUV purchases and vacations. Learn how to
obtain, manage, and lose credit through a series of fun debt to
income ratio games. Next month the museum is proud to present
Casino Daze sponsored by the Washington State Gambling
Commission and the Skagit Casino and Adult entertainment resort

Here is the next installment of the video backlog. All four of us went to the children's museum a week ago.

This morning Ben and I are going to some swim lessons over at the ProClub in Bellevue, I think I have all ready written about these in my list for the month post. We need to leave in about 15 minutes so I am out of here. Enjoy the flick if you watch it.

Children's Museum '07 (23.1 MB .wmv)

A cool summer morning in Wallingford (a movie)

Food Scrub
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

Yesterday we had a visit from one of the PEP's mothers (Clarissa). She brought over some herbs for Laine to see if they may help her through the cyclical bouts of colic. So far so good, little Lainey slept well last night.

The cold that ripped into every but me last week may be taking hold on my nose and throat. I am going to mega dose the airborne to try to squash it early. I need to do some siding work on the house today before the painters start next week.

Ben goes to school today and is watching curious george with this breakies.

There is some backlog of short flix that I had on the handicam that are now almost all produced and ready for public consumption. There are about 4 in all and this is the start of them. It is a little montage from June when Grandma Babs was out solo. The mornings were down in the high 40's and it was appropriate to have a fire for heat.

A Cool Summer Morning in Wallingford (4.8 MB .wmv)

4th of July backyard bingo

tthe 2 most beautiful women in my life
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

We stuck around the neighborhood yesterday for the most part. Ben and I made one errand on foot to the PCC but other than that we were 100% carbon neutral to borrow the term from big Al Gore.

We live about 4 blocks from Gasworks were the main firework display is held. We are at ground zero. They estimate that 60,000 people attend the event every year, so on street parking is at a premium for the people that are not carbon neutral that day. Therefore our cars don't move all day.

Lainey was up for 17 hours straight, no sleep and it wasn't because of the bombs going off, I think it was because of Salmon.

Ben and I enjoyed some Yukon River Chinook in the afternoon after he woke up from a short nap. We think his 2 yr molars are pushing there way up. He is rubbing his nose and mouth a lot.

After the fish we all went out back and watch Ben water the plants (play with the hose).

The girls are upstairs sleeping in, they both need it. Ben and I are downstairs to keep things quiet for them. We are watching some ondemand Comcast, the line up you ask? 1. Telletubbies 2. Bob the Builder 3. Barney and friends. Bob is the best by far, Telletubbies is interesting but very odd as if there is something evil going on under the hood, barney is just lame, it is the 1st time ben has seen it.

Laine and Lavender

Laine and Lavender
Originally uploaded by Spappy_joneS

Little Lainey has been doing pretty well since last Friday night - Saturday morn. I cut a bunch of Lavender while the family was out on an inspection walk of the Gasworks 4th preparations. Not sure if it really helps but it sure does smell like it would. That flower must be one of my favorite smells, so is burning alder under Chinook, or burning jet fuel, or unleaded gas, or the smell of a wet spring morning in sweet grass country aka Montana, or the smell of snowfall. With a nose the size of mine you smell a lot. Anyway go cut some lavender in the morning soon, it is in bloom and take it into your bedroom and put it on your night stand. It may bring sweet dreams.

ICL (infant care leave)

Digger looking both ways before the intersection.
Originally uploaded by Spappy.joneS

My paternity leave begins tomorrow for a month. I think it is one of the coolest things that Microsoft does for its employees. Wether you adopt or roll your own kid every employee qualifies. It will be really nice to help off load Shawn with the daily requirements of our two little ones. I hope to also get a few other things down over the month:

1. Nap, catch up on rest if that is possible with our current situation.
2. Tune up the '71 VW Bus - valve adjustment, suspension lube, timing, points, belt, etc
3. Visit with my folks that are coming out from NH
4. Visit Helena MT
5. Take Ben to his 8am Saturday swim lessons (ouch) already missed last weeks
6. Police the painting crew working on our house
7. Take the kids to see the sockeye running in the locks
8. Dev. some site items for the WSC (I am the new webmaster)
9. Finish a bio I am reading on Einstein
10. Find the cure for Colic
11. Tear off the wooden gutters and facia board on the house and garage -> replace somehow.
12. This one should probably be first - start exercising again and start eating things other than sugar and things with sugar as the main nutritional ingredient
13. Get real about what can actually be done on this list.

That list has about a 7% chance of 100% completion. I like the nap item, I can do that one. The trip to the locks isn't that out of reach. 8 am swim lessons with little B is not bad, we both like water but neither of us are morning people, we will need caffine for sure. Not sure about the read a book one and the sugar one, well I doubt I will have any time to focus on that.