Vacuums are to floors as...

So Lianna and I came home the other day to make a shocking discovery... our entire house was INFESTED with these little red flour beetles. The discovery came over a few days. You see, we noticed these bugs, flying stupidly, all around our house. There was one here and one there, but nothing too big. I just thought that they had come from something that we put in the trash, and removing the trash would bring their slow demise in our home... but I was wrong. Their numbers did not wane, but grew stronger day by day. When I say they fly stupidly, I'm not kidding. These beetles seem to have no purpose in life. They fly, not in a straight, decisive path, but more like as if they are trying out new wings that have recently come to them via evolution. They fly this way and that, bumping clumsily into things and falling out of the air. Then they do the same things with their legs! They walk everywhere and nowhere at the same time! They seemed to have no purpose! We'd find them on the tables, T.V., curtains, bed, bath tub, window seal, computer, couch, phone, door, and any other possible place you could think of. But the day that we came home we realized that it was much worse than we thought. In the kitchen, on the window screen, there were about 157.5 of these bugs, just sitting there, as if they were sun bathing in the lazy, late-afternoon light. There were too many to kill by the hand, because using the hand would knock three or four onto the ground or into flight. So I grabbed the vacuum and started sucking the life out of them all, one by one. After the window screen, I swung my vacuum towards the wall, sucking them off the wall. Then Lianna said, "Look up at the ceiling." We have those dumb textured ceilings that if you touch them, it showers you and everything below with a thin blanket of white particles. Well, nearly every one of those crevasses housed a little bug. There were hundreds, all of them resting is a crevasse as if they had been put in time out. I armed myself with a chair and vacuum and hunted these bugs, hundreds of them, for about an hour. Vacuuming the ceiling, cupboards, food containers, everything. Then this lead us to the source. A box of oatmeal that had been ripped open by the beetles cohorts, the ants. We threw away quite a bit of food, even a bag of dried kidney beans that had been more or less reduced to dust from the massive horde of the beetle-ant army. After about two hours of cleaning, the death and destruction of the bugs stopped. It appeared that we were victorious. Now, after a few days, there are still a few lone survivors that we see once in a while, but for the most part, the invasion is over.

The end is coming!

O ye stalkers, prepare yourself. This blog shall soon be private. Or so I say... see, the problems are these: First, I don't know how to make it private. Second, I'm sure that it takes a lot of time to make it private. I don't have much time. Third, and most importantly, every once in a while someone informs me that they want to have access to our blog, and I am delighted. But the problem is, I really want these people to have access to our blog, and since I didn't think of them before, there must be others that I'm bound to forget. I just can't possibly think of everyone that would WANT to have access. Honestly, we're not terribly interesting people, but it is evident that SOME people out there love us, and occasionally want to know more about us... So I am faced with a dilemma... privatize or not? Oh well, if I keep saying I will, then more people will contact me, and the less I have to worry about forgetting someone. CHEERS!

Flower Power

Where to start

Yes, we have not blogged in a long while. Contrary to what you might think, it is not because we did not have anything to blog about, but rather, we've been quite busy. I don't even know where to start.

So I'll just type. First of all, we bought a wii. It has been quite a bit of fun, and is definitely a family oriented gaming console. Lianna and I can both play, and though we haven't played much with it, it is great fun when we do. Here is a picture of Lianna playing Wii... ( Notice that it is not ME playing, as most of the other gaming pictures are.)

Next, and my favorite event for the entire month, is that we had a Japanese exchange student live with us for two days. Her name is Masayo and she was such a delight to have in our home! So kind and gracious, so fun and interesting. Maybe we had so much fun because we made sure to do fun things with her, such as hiking to a lighthouse that over looks the ocean, a constant game of charades, and PCC night show, seeing turtles at turtle beach, the temple visitors center, family home evening, and much more. It is so funny how she became such a part of our family, and we still miss her today. We woke up after she left and our home just felt empty. But we will certainly keep in touch with her. Shes next to me in the picture.










Also, school started, but that isn't much fun or anything new. Im only a part-time student, taking 8 credits. Lianna is taking 14, and this is our last semester here... sad day. Oh well... Onward.

Lastly, I'm working a lot at dominos pizza. The main driver went on vacation.

And don't forget:

What the internet really is...

So I got online today, and was bored because my wife was at work, so I decided to google myself. Well, I found a few people with my same name... but then I found a link that took people to our blog... talk about creepy! lol. Anyway, I realized that besides being addicting, the internet is really a stalker net. So I have decided to make this blog private. You must now email me to have you put on "the list." If you don't email me, then you can't see it. If you don't have my email, call me. If you don't have my phone number, talk to me. If you can't do any of those, ARE YOU MY REAL FRIEND? =P Anyway, this post may be boring, but oh well. I'm bored.

P.S. The private-ification of our blog won't be immediate... but email me soon though.

And, the tag

1. Dream Vacation: Somewhere I haven't been before where we eat a lot of food and see a lot of cool things. Preferably somewhere we have to travel to.

2. Dream Car: It used to be a luxury vehicle, but I'm with J on this one. A car that doesn't use oil. I think the aptera is ugly, though.. So i searched on google and found the best of both worlds. The electric car, the Lightning GT from the UK. It's charged by an electric outlet, and may not solve the world's problems with energy.. but it sure is beautiful.

3. Favorite place to shop: Don't get me wrong, I love amazon.com and other online shopping places but I still like to browse and pick things up that I don't need, but want to touch anyway. So it's a close tie between the 99 cent store here at the mall and China Town. I don't go to China Town that often, but it has great food for very inexpensive.

4. Favorite flower: the Gladiola. It smells pretty, and it always reminds me of my Grandmother.

5. Guilty Pleasure: Eating too much, probably.. Oh, i know, eating or drinking something delicious while reading. For me, that does what a hot bath does for some. Yeah.

6. Fvorite Hobby: Reading. I like science fiction, fantasy, classic literature, Victorian literature.. I mostly just like a really good book. This requires the book to be well-written, at times humorous, and the author to spin a believable tale. If they make you believe in dragons and intergalactic travel, all the better.

7. Favorite Restaurant: The Golden Peony in Oakland, CA. It's a Dimsum place. Closely followed by an authentic Mexican place in Berkeley, that I can't remember the name of.

8. Favorite Actress: Still Audrey Hepburn after all these years. I think she's classy, cute, and a great actress too. Not to mention she's beautiful, and I'd love to have her eyebrows.

9. Favorite Actor: I'm with J, Will Smith. He HAS come a long way since Fresh Prince, and he was even funny in that. He's versatile, talented, and does a great job of really becoming each role he plays.

10. Birthplace: Richmond, CA.

11. Favorite Color: I usually say Orange, but in reality J totally stole mine. I also love the color of rainclouds over the mountains.. so that's what I'll say.

12. Dream Career: One in which I can really help a lot of people. Physical Therapy perhaps, or soup kitchen owner and chef.

I'm going to break the rules of tagging.. and not tag anyone. The people JD tagged work for me too ^_^.

Sister Henderdaughters

I will also respond to the tag, but I have a truly real blog first. =)

My sister, Debbie, came to visit with us for a few days this past week. I had fun, mostly just because it's been a long time since I've been able to hang out with her on a daily basis. I didn't take any pictures >_<, sorry. Also, probably because I hardly worked.

She slept on our couch, and we went to the beach a couple of times. Both times it was cold and cloudy, but she didn't seem to mind too much. =) At least no one got sunburned. (The day she left it was a gorgeous sunny day most of the afternoon.) Unfortunately she didn't get to hike at all, but we did all go camping with our ward. Tin foil dinners, s'mores, crabbing and eating! The ground was a little hard, but it was a really fun experience. I also took her to work with me a couple of times.
The crowning experience was probably feeding her malasadas, (or maybe the fresh crab..) and watching her world open up to a whole new side of delicious. We enjoyed having her here, and I wish I had some pictures to show for it, but just imagine someone who looks a little like me, but taller and thinner.
=)

We got tagged...

I think I now understand more about what a deer, bear or maybe even a whale feels like once they've been tagged for scientific tracking... We've been tagged on other's blogs, so I guess we gotta do that whole getting-to-know me thing. Truth be told, I usually just read to almost the very end of those kinds of posts in order to avoid reading my name (if its there) on the bottom... but alas, my wife continued reading and thus sealed our fate. Therefore, I respond:

Dream Vacation: New Caledonia, with lotsa time, money, and gas. We already went, but one week just wasn't enough... Need at least a month.This is New Caledonia, a picture I took. I love that place.

Dream Car: This is the Aptera... a very cool car. Basically I want a car that doesn't run on gas, so we can stop our dependence on other countries for our oil. This one is pretty freakin' awesome, but others are coming out too. Its just a matter of time (i hope). Check out the car at http://www.aptera.com/




Favorite Place to Shop: Amazon.com. Hands down. Go online shopping. But if Im going to go to a store, Best Buy, all the way. Best customer service, generally the best prices... can't go wrong.






Favorite Flower: You're kidding right? Lemme guess... a girl made up these questions. I like a flower that has an intoxicating aroma. Can't tell you what it is, nor do I have a picture, but its in New Caledonia. In a nutshell, it smells like Heaven.

Guilty Pleasure: Laziness. I love being lazy...or relaxing... whatever you want to call it. This can be playing computer games or xbox or something, possibly sleeping too much. You know, relaxing.




Favorite Hobby: Sleeping. Thats it.


Favorite Restaurant: I don't eat out much, but I'm probably gonna have to say Macaroni Grill.











Favorite Actress: Same as the Sis... Sandra Bullock. She's a classy movie star. Thats why.









Favorite Actor: Will Smith. He's come a LONG way from Fresh Prince of Belaire. And he's got talent. I thoroughly loved I Am Legend.

Birth Place: Yes, I'm Mormon and therefore Mormon = Born in Salt Lake City. I am no exception >.< Favorite Color: I don't know. My favorite color is sometime between dusk and night.










Dream Career: Any question here? Doctor.






Now for sweet revenge... tagging. I am going to tag Mikensi Gilbert, Sandra Atkinson, and... the next person that reads this sentence. Bwahaha.
And in case you didn't realize, this is a picture blog. You must have pictures with your comments... unless you don't have a picture of my magical and elusive mystery flower. Enjoy!