Happy Halloween!

Went out Trick or Treating with Rece, Sam, and Anna (Sam's friend) earlier tonight. It was a lot of fun and because I had dressed up for work, I was already in costume. Some people went out of their way to really create some spooky scenes in their yards.

My only gripe about the evening is about those people who decorate for the occasion, but don't pass out candy. The worst offenders are those who decorate AND leave a porch light on, but don't answer their door (come on, we can see the light from the TV!!). In my day, that would have been an open invitation for having their carved pumpkins smashed, their door egged (or worse), and other "Tricks" played on them. I just think it's rude. At least turn off the light - or leave a note on the door letting the kids know you're not passing out candy. Is that too much to ask?

The festivities at work were a lot of fun. This was definitely the best participation received for an event since I've started working there. A lot of the staff dressed up and it was entertaining to see the various ideas that people came up with.

My costume was Count Sporkula. Basically it was a vampire outfit with a large spork behind the head, like a high collar. I would plant sporks on the chairs of people when they weren't looking, causing a bit of a mystery until I revealed my character at the potluck lunch. I'll post some pictures to my Flickr account within the next couple of days. I'm tired from all the walking! Good night!

This entry doesn't have much of a sweet tooth, but loves Nerds,
Peanut M&Ms, and Reese's Mini Peanut Butter Cups!

Hopeful Wishing

Sometimes I surprise myself by the lengths I'll go in order to keep myself entertained. A few weeks ago I was home sick and bored to death - daytime TV is just awful. I tried to sleep more (to no avail), did a little tidying around the house, stumbled upon a nearly flat helium balloon and came up with this...

This entry needs something to do when he's home sick.

Draw, think, play, discard

We (Christine, Sam, Rece, & I) made a trip to the desert this weekend for some camping. It was just one night, but the whole trip was a lot of fun.

We started off at a corn maze in Temecula. I've never been to one of these and we ended up trying our best to get lost in it - which I was having trouble doing with my incredible sense of direction. I always knew exactly where I was. It was fun to be running around through a corn field trying to lose one another and then to try and find them again.

We drove to Anza-Borrego State Park through some peaceful mountains. At one point we were treated to a fantastic view of the Salton Sea from a turnout on the windy mountain road. Sadly we didn't think of getting out our cameras at this point. Oh well, we saw it - sucks to be you!

We were able to set up camp very quickly. Having had camped twice earlier this year, we had plenty of practice! We toured the campground area and park, plus the visitor center. They've recently put a lot of time (and money) into the park and visitor center - and it really shows. This was a well-designed and modern center. Lots of excellent information about local plants, wildlife, and history. We enjoyed the slideshow presentation and exhibits.

The remainder of the afternoon and evening we spent relaxing by the campfire roasting hot dogs, playing cards, and laughing a lot. Later that night, when the fire had almost gone out, I turned off our lantern and we all sat back in our chairs and just stared up into the star-filled night sky. Being so far away from the city, we were able to see the Milky Way and many shooting stars. For Christine it was the first time in her life she had seen either.

The girls (Christine & Sam) were up bright and early the next morning. They took some fabulous pictures and checked out the tracks left by the coyotes we had heard throughout the night. Christine & I took off for town to pick up coffee and, letting our laziness get the best of us, bought breakfast burritos so we wouldn't have to cook.

Camp was broken down about as fast as it had been set up and we went back to the visitor center to check out the things we missed the previous day (they closed before we could finish our visit). We then hopped into the car and headed for the Salton Sea.

Driving through the desert is rather interesting. At first glance, there doesn't seem to be much going on. But if you pay attention, you'll notice subtle changes in the terrain, a wide variety of very hearty plants, and a lot of geological formations. We had turned off the radio because of the poor reception and this helped us enjoy the drive even more, I think.

The Salton Sea is very large. It is also very stinky. We didn't want to stay for long because of the smell. We snapped a few pictures and were right back out on our way along highway 86.

Christine really likes palm trees. Such an odd thing to bring up at this point, no? I mention this because along the sides of highway 86 you'll find a lot of them... in fact they're set out in large tracts... some might even go so far as to call them palm tree orchards. An orchard? Isn't that for apples? Well, for lack of a better term (and because I'm too lazy to look up the proper word for it) these palm tree 'orchards' are where they grow dates.

After seeing so many of them, we decided to drive closer so Christine could check out the palm trees from a closer perspective. Lo and behold, we ended up at Oasis Date Gardens (I still prefer to call them 'orchards' thankyouverymuch). We toured the palm tree arboretum (orchard) and saw a variety of different dates and interesting ways of serving/preparing them. Christine's mom conventiently loves to eat dates, so she picked up a package of the "Medjool" variety for her. I opted for a date shake - it was delicious!

After the excitement of the palm trees and dates we were back on the road. Our path brought us to the palm desert, where you'll find fields of windmill generators... I call them windmill orchards. These machines are a curiosity, and since Christine is as fascinated with them as I am, we left the highway to check them out up close. You had to be there, really. They're big, they're spinning, they're humming, they're whining, they're generating electricity, they're cool. Shut up.

Back to the highway, with a planned lunch stop in Redlands. This is a must-do lunch place. Why? Because it's cool. Shut up.

We ate at Long John Silver's and ended up creating something funny and very cool: Scuttlebutt, the Hushpupper Fish antenna ball. Check out the pictures.

Scuttlebutt is a tough little fella. He survived the drive home and still rests atop my antenna - completely intact. I'm thinking of getting him shellacked - no, not with rum! - so he'll last longer.

So there you have it. Another long blog about my weekend camping adventures. If you're still awake, be sure to check out the Flickr photogallery from the trip.

This entry thinks playing rummy is cool. Shut up.

Eggs with flippers

Now listening to: 39 - The Cure

For the last couple of days I've been in the mood to listen to The Cure. I have over 10.5 hours worth of it, so I just play it on shuffle and let it go.

It's been a rather stressful week, I must say. A good portion of it is self-inflicted, which doesn't help with my mood much.

Christine talked with me for awhile last night and helped me work through some of it. While I'm still a bit worried about some things, I think that things are going to be a lot less trouble than I've worked them up to be in my mind.

I read an article today that made me ponder. It's about how the Earth will eventually recover from our presence. It fit into my gloomy view rather well, I must say.

This entry realizes that we're just a tiny blip in the span of time.

Nutritional value

This morning I decided to stop by Del Taco to pick up 2 breakfast burritos (with French fries inside) and a Macho-sized Diet Coke. I brought these items to work and ate at my desk. I then decided to take a vitamin - washed down by the Diet Coke. What's wrong with this scenario?

This entry is only half-assed healthy.

The Bridge to Nowhere

This weekend's bungee jumping excursion took place in the Los Angeles National Forest, above Azuza, CA. We met up with the folks from Bungee America in the parking lot of a nearby supermarket and then drove up the mountain to the trail we'd be hiking. Our destination was The Bridge to Nowhere.

As soon as I can get hold of the footage taken by others from our hiking/jumping group, I'll be putting together a video of the actual bungee jumping. I have only about 4 minutes of unedited video of myself and a few others jumping off the bridge. But in the meantime, check out the picture gallery I uploaded to Flickr...

Hike to and from the Bridge to Nowhere

This entry is still a little sore from the hike!

I'm still alive!

I just realized that I mentioned that I was going bungee jumping this weekend, then failed to post again afterwards. Sorry about that!

This is just a quick note to say that I had a FANTASTIC time hiking 5 miles up to the "Bridge to Nowhere" (and then back down) where I jumped off it attached to a large rubber band. I've got a little bit of video footage (battery problems) and a lot of pictures to put together into something. I'm also trying to get in contact with some of the others that were filming video and taking pictures so I can incorporate their stuff into a video.

Okie dokes, back to work!

This entry is still sore from the hike!

Sorry, son...

Seven silly simians simply sang songs & sonnets subjecting someone solely to slumber. Suddenly smoke seeped in, similar to the smoldering scent of a cigarette. Symbolically the cymbals sounded & the strong smell of sweet sage sent centuries of souls soaring skyward.

This entry said it swiftly, so sue me.

Men riding dragons, throwing wolves at maggots

So yeah... the drums... they're calling me. I really want to get out and practice, but work, fatherhood, and various social engagements have kept me from actually getting the chance to do so. That's an absolute cop-out, I know. See, if I say it enough, I'm hoping that I'll actually start to place some amount of priority on it and eventually make it happen. The weather is cooling down, which is what I was waiting for, right? Yeah... gotta do it!

In other news: I'm going bungee jumping this weekend. It's one of those things I've said that I'd like to try some day and the opportunity came up and I took it. I'm really looking forward to it, even if it is rather scary. It will be 2 jumps. My boss said that I could borrow one of his many digital video cameras to document the journey - so look for an eventual YouTube link of it here, hopefully within a week after I take the plunge.

This entry felt the need to ramble on longer, but sadly it was already past bedtime.

Pickle me Elmo

So far, my life seems to be rather tame since the divorce. I've worked towards simplifying things in my life: finances, relationships, etc. since my divorce. Most of it has been good, which is all I can really hope for.

What I'm now working on seems to be something of a quandary. In the past I would tend to fall back on what I know works for me. This means repeating some habits, good or bad, because they were known or at least manageable for me. At this point in my life I'm doing what I can to turn away from the habits that I know, especially the ones that seem to eventually cause me trouble. I have a couple of friends that really understand me and who, to a great degree, I can trust to tell me things that they observe about me - even if I might not want to hear it. This is a good thing, since they have my best interests at heart.

Of course at the risk of sounding rather vague, right now I'm focusing on the relationships part of my life and trying to break the usual patterns I've adopted over the years. This means having to prune my list of friends a bit and only focus on those that are either like the ones I mentioned above, or those that are a stretch for me - people that I wouldn't ordinarily gravitate towards (probably from my own insecurities or preconceptions) so I can find new people that I might have missed along the way. So far it's been interesting, to say the least. Things seem to be coming to a head with a couple of them and I'm at a point where I'll need ascertain if the relationship is ultimately positive or negative to my life.

Mostly what means the most to me revolves around inclusion and the intentional pursuit of being a friend. Being that I tend to be a giver in most regards (aside from material things) it can sometimes mean that I can get used by others. Either by not seeming to find me worthy enough to be included in their lives - not just sectioned off as just a little piece of it, sorta off-set and in a box only to be pulled out when the need arises or a one-sided deal where I'm there for them, but they're not really there for me when I could use a friend.

A good friendship means a reciprocal exchange where value is placed upon the person enough to include them and bring them into the mainstream of their existence. You talk about and introduce them to some of the other friends you have. You encourage them to join you in the fun activities you share. You engage them in conversation and try to really know them, working towards building trust and rapport in as much of a balanced way as possible.

Not all relationships will fall within this, which can be just fine. This probably means more of them being a loose friendship but not really a bonding one... possibly just an aquaintance that you may see or talk to on occasion, but it's more of a superficial type of thing. There is a place for these people in one's life, but it should probably be to a lesser extent than those who truly place a priority on being a friend to you.

So this is where I am right now. Some of my relationships seem to be defining themselves rather clearly. The pruning has begun, so we'll see who sticks around and who I have to let go of in order to open up room to allow time for me to find other friends who care about me as much as I care about them.

This entry doesn't like to lose friends but knows that those who
don't seem to make an effort at being one, really aren't one.