Well this has certainly been an interesting week on Beth's side of the family.  First, on Wednesday in the early morning, Beth's aunt Lisa gathered some fame for herself when she drove into a wash.  In Tucson at this time of year, it can be completely dry around town but rain from the mountains can still flash flood the washes.  It was about 3:30 am and Lisa was driving to work when she tried to drive through an area that was apparently flooded.  Usually the roads have barricades up when the washes are flooded, but these weren't up at the time.  Probably because it wasn't raining.  Anyway, she was on the news.

 

Here's the news story:

Woman rescued from Rillito River
Posted: July 23, 2008 06:36 PM

It's an area all too familiar for rescuers, the Rillito River near River Road and Camino de La Tierra.

Almost every monsoon drivers try to get across but have to be fished out which is exactly what happened this morning.

And for firefighters a textbook rescue

Her car, then floated about a half-mile down stream.

In the 911 call obtained by News 4, a dispatcher asks "you're stuck in the wash? Are you in a vehicle?" She responds "yes I'm sitting on the door."

Tucson fire says it makes about six rescues each year here.

"On a typical year we probably have twenty rescues. So six in the grand scheme of things at this wash could be a lot," says TFD Capt. Norm Carlton.

The city says 5,000 cars a day travel this stretch of road. For comparison, 25,000 cars a day cross at La Canada. 25,000 cross at La Cholla. 52,000 cross at Oracle. A bridge at Camino de La Tierra would cost $6 million. The city says it isn't cost effective. They don't consider permanent barricades an option, and haven't priced them out.

"Bottom line is don't get in this predicament," Carlton says.

Then, we had a funeral for Beth's step-grandfather Lindy.  We had heard rumors about him getting into a fight with his roommate at the rest home, but didn't realize that it was generating a full-blown investigation. Now they are talking about homicide!  Crazy.

Video of Lindy's news story

Elderly Man Dies Following a Fight at his Rest Home

Posted: July 24, 2008 04:56 PM
Updated: July 24, 2008 09:43 PM

By Dan Marries and J.D. Wallace KOLD News 13

An 88 year old man is dead following a fight at a local rest home.  Investigators say 88 year old Orval Lindell got into a fight at Desert Life Rehabilitation And Care near Orange Grove and La Cholla with his elderly room mate on June 12.  Lindell fell on the floor and began to complain of neck and back pain.  He was taken to the VA Hospital and for the next several days his condition deteriorated.  Lindell died June 24th in a hospice center.

Following an autopsy the Pima County Medical Examiner ruled Lindell's death a homicide as a result of his fall during the fight.  Initially, the Elder Abuse Task Force was working the case but it has now been taken over by homicide detectives from the Pima County Sheriff's Department.

Desert Life released a statement saying: "This is a sad and unfortunate situation. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family members of Mr. Lindell. The facility responded immediately to the incident and called emergency services.  The incident was reported to the proper authorities and we are cooperating with the ongoing investigation. Due to resident confidentiality we cannot comment further."

No word yet on whether or not the roommate will be charged in this case.

I didn't know Lindy too well, but I did talk to him quite a bit when he was a little younger and could still hear fairly well.  He was stationed on the USS California during the Pearl Harbor attack.  He told me stories about that day.  Some of the things I remember:

 

• He said when the attack started, he was below deck in his quarters and that it sounded like it was raining. He was hearing the sound of bullets hitting the ship.
• He worked as a radio operator on the California, and relayed the command to the Nevada to beach herself. If the Nevada had sunk where it was, it would have blocked the channel.  I thought it was cool to hear that piece of history.
• His worst memories were after the battle when he was working on small boats helping pull victims out of the water.  He said many were covered with oil and on some their skin was peeling away.

 

Pictures of the USS California (left) and the USS Nevada (right) after the Pearl Harbor attack.

Rest in Peace Lindy.

We attended our first baby class on Thursday - the first of 5 weekly sessions.  I begrudgingly attended - I'm not a big fan of spending time with other couples in a pregnancy classroom environment, but Beth wants to go and how can I say no to that?  Our instructor Wanda didn't waste any time.  She immediately showed us a video of a woman giving birth.  I think the thing that surprised me most was she wasn't giving birth in the traditional "legs in stirrups" position - it was standing up bent over.  I think it goes to show how much we absorb from movies and pop culture, and how often that information can be wrong.  Not that I'm saying people don't give birth the old fashioned way, but Wanda says that some other positions are actually easier.  As a guy, I had no idea that concept existed.  Maybe women know about it and I'm just catching up to the game.

Actually the class wasn't too bad, just a little long.  At one point, she had a couple of men volunteer to wear what I would best describe as a pregnancy simulator.  They strapped on a big backpack to their stomachs that weighed about the same as what women carry before giving birth - about 28 pounds if I remember right.  I think the point of it was to show how uncomfortable it was carrying that around, but the guys didn't complain as much as I think Wanda was hoping for.  However, it was funny watching them try to sit down or pick up something off the floor.

Next week we discuss the actual childbirth process. That should be a fun one.

Our mastiff turned two years old on July 3rd, which is supposed to mark the finish line of his growth spurt. Right now I believe he weighs in around 150 pounds or so, which is still a little on the light side for a full grown American Mastiff.  Conan has always been on the lean side...which is either due to his grazing eating habits or maybe he's genetically gifted that way.  In any case, his height seems to have tapered off but he is still slowly bulking up.  We'll see if he packs on some more poundage :)

Along with being two years old, his chewing habits seemed to have dropped off as well, so Beth and I thought we would try leaving him outside of his crate while we are at work. I have to admit, I was a little nervous about it.  The dogs are so used to going into the crates in the morning - they normally get a delicious chicken chewy - that Conan was very confused the first couple of times.  He ran to his crate in the morning (as usual) to find the cage door was locked. He was still looking at me when I locked the door...apparently wondering what was going on.  I crossed my fingers and left for work. We'll see how the experiment goes.

Ten hours later - we came home and the house was fine! It looks like he can be the house watchdog now. Scaring away magazine salesmen and other solicitors (that's one nice thing about having giant dogs). Moka on the other hand may never get out of her crate...she isn't 100% housebroken.

Beth insists that I can't start a home improvement project without getting distracted without starting three other projects to distract me...which is a nice way of saying that it takes me a year to finish anything I start. So I've set my mind to completing our backyard (or at least the lawn part of it) before our 4th of July party.  What's involved with installing a lawn? Apparently a lot more than I thought:

• Design the lawn layout

Easy enough.  I used Google Sketchup to create a backyard design, complete with garden, rock walls, lawn, gravel, drainage.  If you haven't used Sketchup, I highly recommend it - it's easy to use and FREE.

• Design the sprinkler system

This turned out to be a LOT more work than I anticipated. You have to make sure that every sprinkler head overlaps the sprinklers next to it ("head to head coverage"). If I didn't do this, then there would be brown spots on the lawn where it wasn't getting enough water. This is a simple matter with nice rectangular lawns, but my design has a lot of curves in it. Then you have to make sure the flow rates and dynamic pressure of the system gets enough water to each of your sprinkler heads. Luckily, there is a website that goes into excruciating detail on designing a good sprinkler system. We'll see if it works or not.

• Measure and layout the design in the backyard with stakes and string

Which my dog promptly dug up, ate, tore...and otherwise destroyed.

• Spray paint the layout on the backyard

Using my trusty tape measure and a special can of spray paint (it sprays upside down - genius idea!), I painted my design on the backyard.  Let's see the dog eat this!

• Repaint the layout in the areas where my dog dug up the paint or covered the paint with dirt expelled from other holes the dog was digging at the time.

Apparently I underestimated the dedication of my dog in this respect.

• Install plastic construction fence to keep the dogs confined to a small area of our yard. Ha!

With the dogs now under control, I can continue on with my layout. Note the construction fence on the right:

Now I can finally see what the design looks like in real life. And decide that I don't like it. And Beth wants more grass. Back to the drawing board, I move things around a little bit (or a lot). The bad part...I have to redo the entire sprinkler system design.  SIGH.

• REDESIGN, REDO, CORRECT, etc. etc.

Now for the fun part...

• Rent massive power tool called a trencher to dig (what else) trenches for the irrigation lines.
• Install irrigation lines

Will Jim finish it before the 4th of July and redeem his reputation? Or will Beth once again be proved right? Tune in next week to find out more!

With the onset of Memorial Day, Beth and I are starting our first summer in our new home.  Which means one thing to me...GRILL SEASON.  There is nothing I enjoy more than (and read this with a cockney accent) "grillin on me ol' weber" in the backyard.  My weber charcoal grill has served me well these past 7 or 8 years, and it appears to have built up substantial "flavor deposits" on the grill itself (other people might call it crud, but what do they know).  This year I'm going to try something new on the grill - plank grilling.  Basically you take a piece of wood and soak it overnight, then roast your food on it.  For my first try, I'm making chicken stuffed with gorgonzola and spinach.  Should be DELICIOUS.  Or a disaster.

We've completed our first home improvement project, a new entertainment center.  Now I could say that I put it in myself because none of the pictures can't prove I didn't, but really it is a local company that usually does custom closet designs.  Now we have some place to put all of our crap...err I mean CDs, DVDs and games ;)

We've spotted some more wildlife in our backyard.  The latest has been a family of quail.  Today they brought along their brood of baby chicks which is a rare sight to see.

We've also seen a bunch of other animals which you can check out on our Picasa web album, Beth and Jim's Wild Kingdom.  There are some animals I don't have pictures of yet, like the little chipmunks that eat the birdseed too.  Well, actually I found out they aren't chipmunks even though they look exactly like them; they're called antelope squirrels.  Who knew.  Now you do.

I would like to say I have a good reason for not updating our blog...like an eagle bit my hand, making it impossible for me to type.  Or maybe I was too busy finding a cure for road rage (Beth needs a cure for that if anyone has a magic pill she can take).  But in truth there isn't really a good reason other than I've been pretty lazy about it.

So it takes some major event to make me update our blog once every few months.  So, I'll risk using a dull cliche like a "picture is worth a thousand words" when I show you this:

No, it isn't a UFO sighting - although sometimes I think it looks like an alien.  My beautiful wife is now with child!  We went to her first doctor appointment last week to get through the first barrage of tests, which included an ultrasound.  The baby is near the top of the picture and looks like two ovals.  A still picture doesn't do it much justice though...the baby was moving all over the place.  Moving its little arms, turning its head...it was amazing for both of us to watch.  It's about 3 inches long right now.

First of all, we were stunned to learn that the baby was much further along than we expected.  Back in February, Beth had a medical emergency where she needed surgery.  Before the surgery, the pregnancy test came back negative.  When the nurse did ultrasound measurements last week though, we found out that she was probably 3 or 4 weeks pregnant at the time of the surgery!

Anyway, she's been feeling tired and nauseated pretty often so we've been sticking around the house most of the time.  That's cool though, it gives me some time to start working on the backyard.  My friend Ryan used to do landscape work, so he offered me a lot of advice.  The biggest recommendation was to have a plan sketched out.  I ended up using this tool from google called Sketchup.  Check out the layout:

Using Sketchup, I created the sprinkler layout, lighting layout, garden, lawn and firepit.  Since we won't have the money to do everything at once, the plan should make it fairly easy to put in the landscape in stages.  The first stage is the lawn and gravel so that the dogs stop tracking dirt into the house and leaving a thin layer of dust on EVERYTHING :)  This will be important when the summer monsoons arrive because the backyard becomes a giant mudpit, which isn't fun to clean up when the dogs track mud in the house.

Last weekend I rented a 400lb trencher which I used to dig trenches for the wiring and sprinklers.  I'll post some pix of that soon.

This morning I woke up to an unusual sound that seemed very close to our bedroom.  Since we live in the desert, I've heard the sound once or twice before, but never quite this close.  So I quietly opened the door to our balcony, crept outside as silently as I could and looked up on our roof.  About 8 feet away from me was a great horned owl.  He looked down at me with his big yellow eyes before deciding it was better if he immediately flew away.

Our wedding was on a Saturday, and our honeymoon started on the following Wednesday.  It was a jam-packed week of flying, walking, and driving.  In hindsight, we probably should have tried to do less stuff but we figured it would be a while before we could travel again, especially with the new house and plans for a family.

We started at 5am at Tucson Airport, a short drive from Lynne's house (we've been staying with Beth's parents for the past several months while our house is being built).  We fly to Houston, where we enjoy some Starbucks coffee and yogurt while we wait for our next flight to NYC.  Houston's airport has some pretty wild architecture, so I took some photos with our new camera.

The flight to New York takes about 4 hours from Houston, so we got into Laguardia in the middle of the afternoon.  The Big Apple at last!  Flying over the city makes quite an impression...the sheer size and number of buildings in Manhattan is much grander in scale than I ever realized.  There's a LOT of people here.

After gathering our bags, Beth and I take a taxi over the river and through Manhattan to the Wyman House, our bed and breakfast for the next three days.  It's in Manhattan's Upper West Side.  We wanted to get away from the 'touristy' areas and into a real New York neighborhood.  We meet with Pam (one of the owners) and she gives us a tour of our room.  We have a kitchen, bed, bathroom, and a view of the garden in the back.  She also gives us a little care package with bagels and yogurt - very nice!

After cleaning up, we have an hour or two before our dinner reservations, so we head out to a local Irish pub.  We start out with a couple of glasses of beer, but when our waitress (or was she the owner?) stops by, she talks us into sharing a pitcher that's on sale.  Just a couple of bucks more...we're on vacation...why not!?  Hmm...well one reason might be that we haven't eaten all day.  We end up smashed before heading over to our sushi dinner.

It may be the beer, but Jim gets brave and tries some REAL sushi.  Normally he sticks to california rolls, which aren't exactly the most exotic item on the menu.  This restaurant is one of the better places we've been to (according to Beth anyway).  The owner is more than happy to take our picture.

We notice the restaurant has some interesting items on the menu...

After dinner we head back to the B&B to get some rest.  Tomorrow is going to be a long day :)

Beth and I drove up to Phoenix for a rare treat...Stevie Wonder in concert.  The show started a little late, but he did play a lot of hits for us.  We ended up getting home around 2am...the drive from Glendale (the far side of Phoenix) to the southwest side of Tucson is a little longer than I'm used to.  The next morning - following a scant 3 hours of sleep - I woke up with a cold.  But it was worth it!

A review of Stevie Wonder's concert in Glendale

I can't stop laughing at this one.

Alas, it has been many moons since my last post here in late August.  What's been going on:

• Our wedding
• Honeymoon in NYC and New England
• Trip to Rocky Point, Mexico with friends
• Business trip to New Mexico
• Construction of our new house

I want to post on these other topics soon, but for now I thought I would talk about our new house.  What better way than with pictures?  Every time I visited the house, I would take a picture of our house from the same spot.

	May 11th, 2007 Beth and I picked out a lot at the end of a culdesac with a gorgeous view of Pusch Ridge and the Catalinas.  At the time, we did not even have our old house (by UofA) on the market.  I spent the next month working night and day doing a remodel so it would sell quickly.  I think we must have been insane to sell a house, buy a house, and plan a wedding all at the same time.
	August 4th, 2007 You can see the foundation forms being set up here.  If I remember right, our old house was on the market and had an offer.  We thought they would wait until we actually closed on our first house, but having an offer was good enough for our builder to start (and scary for us!)
	August 11th, 2007 The foundation was poured right in the middle of monsoon season...they had to wait for a couple of dry days before they could do the pour.
	August 19th, 2007 Holy crap!  When I pulled up the next weekend to our culdesac I was confused...where was our lot?  This wasn't here last week?!
	August 28th, 2007 And one week later...the 2nd story is up.  These guys work fast!  Beth and I get our first peek at the view from our balcony which is my favorite part of the house :)  Oh, and our old house on 9th street is SOLD.  Part of me is sad because we spent about 10 years there, but the other part of me is tired of living in 900 square feet with 3 cats and a giant dog (actually 2 giant dogs now).
	September 8th, 2007 Some of the windows are installed.  Meanwhile, wedding plans are going into motion.  Beth has her bridal shower, we are finalizing flowers, hotels, and a ton of other crap that needs to be taken care of.
	September 24th, 2007 Installation of the roof is starting, and you can see some of the stucco prep work on the right side of the garage.  Inside, electrical and plumbing work begins.  Our wedding is in one week...
	September 30th, 2007 The day after the wedding, we visit the house with my mom.  Beth and I are pretty tired from the late night before, then brunch that morning with family and friends.
	October 13th, 2007 We're back from our honeymoon in NYC and New England.  Most of the work on the house is on the interior...electrical is mostly finished and the drywall and insulation is up.  Oh and one other little item...on the garage you can see our address!
	November 3rd, 2007 Since the last time, I've gone to Rocky Point with Beth then a business trip to New Mexico.  Stucco is up, and the drywall is being textured inside.
	November 17th, 2007 Paint is up on the inside and outside and the cabinets are in.  The stair railing is installed now too.
	November 24th, 2007 The house really looks stunning on the inside.  The tile Beth and her Mom picked out (I wasn't so sure about it) look absolutely fantastic.  Even our construction manager said it is his favorite tile so far in all the houses he's done.  Cool!
	December 1st, 2007 After some heavy rains, we visit the house to find a big pool of water in the backyard...so we'll have to get the drainage fixed.  On the plus side, the carpet is in.  On the front of the house, you can see the trim blocks under the eaves and the light fixtures installed.  Our loan paperwork is underway and we close on the 18th.  We get the keys in the late afternoon of December 24th.  Merry Christmas!

 

Jim

I must apologize for the utter lack of updates lately.  We've been incredibly busy with wedding plans (I never realized how much work goes into organizing a wedding!)  We're going to have about 100+ people there, so we've been working on the guest list, invites, the cake, menu, music, hotel arrangments, flowers, and photography.  If all that wasn't enough, we've decided to buy a new house too.  Yep, after nine years in our current place, we feel a little constricted in our 900sf of floor space.  I guess it's about the right time to do that (getting married and all), but it sure is a lot of work.

We'll keep you updated when we can, hopefully more often than we've been doing.  In the meantime, enjoy this picture of Conan enjoying a baseball game ("Bark in the Park"):

I went on another business trip to Florida last week, and while I was there I found out an interesting story about one of the PhD guys there.  His name is Jeff, and apparently he is from a backwater town in Florida where you wouldn't expect anyone to get a doctorate.  On the other hand, you might expect for him to have some backwoods skills like the one I'm going to share right now.

If you've ever been to Florida, you know that there are ponds literally everywhere you go.  Florida is very flat, and it you get torrential downpours fairly often, so as a result everything is green and there are puddles and ponds along the sides of roads.  In fact, there is a sizeable pond in front of the business I went to visit last week.  Now I've been there a few times and I've seen all kinds of birds - herons and all sort of water fowl.  I've also seen turtles.  What I haven't seen in that pond are alligators.  In fact, I've been to Florida about a dozen times, and in all those visits I've never seen an alligator in that pond, or in any other pond for that matter.

While we were working during the week, we get to talking with one of the engineers and she tells us that a few months back there was actually an alligator in that pond right next to the parking lot.  About ten feet from where I parked my car.  Back when it happened, she didn't believe it when she heard about this alligator, so she went out to check it out.  She didn't see any alligators, but Jeff was there and said he "could call it".  Yeah right.  He then started making this goofy sound with his mouth and sure enough this alligator roars out of the water.

I didn't believe the story either, but then I found this website about alligator calls.  I'm not sure which sound he used, but they do talk to each other.  I considered making one of the sounds my phone ringtone, but I better to remember to take it off in Florida or I might get attacked by ALLIGATORS!