Christmas time is here

Merry Christmas everyone!

Yes, I know, it's only Christmas eve, but I forgot to post anything on Christmas Adam, and I'll be busy on Christmas day, so who knows if I'll post tomorrow or not.

For those of you with children, you may enjoy the Norad Santa tracker. As you can tell by the tracker, he's already started delivering toys in the Australia, Japan, New Zealand area of the world.

Another fun spot is Northpole.com which has some games and other stuff. It also links to the Norad Santa tracker, but it keeps it in a window that I personally don't care for.

And while I hope you have a great time with friends and family this year, I want you to remember that Jesus is the real reason for this season. Jesus was the first gift given. And we choose to celebrate his coming here a Christmas time. So in the hustle and bustle of your Christmas activities, pause and thank God for the true meaning.

Ice Storm Continued

I talked yesterday about the ice storm we had. Well, it got worse. We were very blessed that we didn't lose our electric till about 9:30 Sunday night. So, we lit the candles, turned on the oven and opened the door for heat. I double checked the carbon-monoxide detector just to make sure it was working since we were heating the house with the oven. I also closed off the doors to a couple of the rooms.

As we set in the candle lit room, we listened to cracking and breaking and crashing of tree branches hitting all sorts of things. It sounded like a war zone with all the noise and flashes of light I saw out the window.

I'd hear large crashes several times through the night, and I'd go to check, but couldn't really see anything. Once I'd decide I'd stop checking, something very large would hit again, so I'd get up and check again. It was a very nerve wracking night.

Yesterday, we moved the vehicles because a tree branch fell about 5 to 10 feet from the car. Here was a picture of that tree limb down.
After the night, we woke up to this:
Here is a picture of where the cars were parked before we moved them.

With some help of some people from church (and their chainsaw) we did some cleanup today, and we can now park one of the vehicles back in the driveway.

I estimate we'll loose between 2 and 5 trees when it's all said and done.

Ice Storm

I woke up last night to no power. I could hear the wind and rain and thunder. Every once and awhile, I'd hear the cracking of ice and wood.

I woke up to this:

Winter is on it's way!

I just heard that we are now in a Winter Storm Watch through Tuesday at 6:00 A.M. Freezing rain is possible, and the temperatures aren't expected to get above 35.

My main reason to post this is for my cousin who currently lives in Guam. I'm sure she'll go to the beach that day just to say she did.

Christmas Card

I got my first Christmas Card in the mail today, and it traveled father than probably any other card I will get. It came from Guam!

Thanks Laura!

Space Derby

It's was again time for the Cub Scout Space Derby.

We were a bit slow getting my boys space craft ready for the race tonight, but we got it finished. The design is much different than last years.

Last night was the big race. I ended up helping out with the race, which was a lot of fun. We ran the Tigers first. Then the Wolves! When they hung my boys rocket, he was as excited as could be. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, GO!!!!!!

He came in last. He was the very picture of crestfallen. It broke my heart. We took a walk out into the hall so we could talk in private, and he could shed the tears that were already forming in his eyes.

He was so upset that he came in last (last year he came in third for his division). I explained to him how proud I was of him for designing his rocket, and doing the majority of the work himself. I also explained to him that there was nothing wrong with coming in last. The talk seemed to help, but then he said, with tears welling up in his eyes again, but I wont get a stand to hang it on. I told him they had some stands for sell, and we'll see about getting him one, which we did.

He and my wife came home early to finish up on homework while I stayed to finish the race. When I got home I asked him if he had fun, and I got a resounding YES!

Like I said, I was very proud of the work he did on his rocket. It was the most unusual unique design I saw all night.

Highway 169 widening?

On my way home from work today, I saw a channel 2 and I think a channel 8 news truck out on 169. Well, I decided to try to find out what was happening, so I hit channel 8's web page, and searched for Owasso. And what do I find? This article. Here is a small quote from the story.

Tulsa's fastest growing suburb now wants to expand the city's busiest highway.
Owasso is asking for millions of dollars in federal money to put the plan on the fast track.

I would welcome the expansion, but would dread the months of construction it would take. The road can be a huge head ache, and as the article says, if a wreck happens? You're dead in the water.

I expect this to happen... eventually, just not sure it will happen soon... I hope so.

Hairy!

Back in September, I decided to grow a beard for the winter, and except for trimming it once to tie in the goatee into my beard, I didn't trim it at all. Needless to say, I was a bit hairy.

Then, to be funny one day, I combed my beard UP instead of down, and well, other than not as much gray, I looked a lot like Santa.

This weekend, after my Black Friday shopping trip, I trimmed up my beard and got a hair cut, much to the relief of my wife I think.

BEFORE Normal:

Before combed up:

AFTER:

Christmas Time

Christmas time is here!

I love Christmas. I always have, and I think missing a Christmas really makes me appreciate it more!

As I said earlier, I got the tree up on Friday, but we didn't decorate it till Saturday when my boy came home. We now have the winter village on the entertainment center, the nativity is both in the yard, the old nativity that my wife grew up with is on the shelf all lit up.

The tree is decorated with about 95% home made gifts that makes my wife smile.

Here are some pictures for your enjoyment...



This Nativity is one of my wifes favorites. This was the one they had while she was growing up, and she loves this very much!


This ugly lovely tree toper is just like the one she had when she was growing up. She went through a lot last year to get this. It isn't the exact same one as her brother has it, but it means a lot to her. Takes her back to those Christmas's of years past.

And here is our tree with presents and all.

Christmas Shopping

After having a great Thanksgiving and my parents and looking through all the sales catalogs, I decided I really didn't need to wake up at 3 to go get in line. I did end up waking up around 5:45 or so, so I went ahead and went shopping.

So I ventured the cold and the crowds and went shopping Friday.

I had a good time, and got about 98% of my shopping done. I ended up only hitting 4 different stores, but I did go to one twice.

Afterwards, I came home, put up the tree and wrapped some presents before my wife came home and could see what I got her. (she's sneaky like that)

It was a really good day!

Happy Thanksgiving

I just wanted to wish everyone a very Happy Thanksgiving!

I'll be spending today with my family in a long standing tradition of eating and then going through the sales ads planning tomorrows Shopping extravaganza.

I actually had planned to get up this morning and hit a store, but, I set my alarm for 4:45 PM instead of AM. The alarm went off at the second setting of 7:00 which was when the store opened.
Oh well.

Anyway, with all the craziness of the holidays, remember to take the time to thank God for everything he's given you. (Even that crazy relative you may only see once in a while.)

Caliber update

A year ago May, we bought a new car. Well, over the weekend (11/17), we broke the 30,000 mile mark on it.

Took a little less than 18 months to put that many miles on it.

The car is still working great! I enjoy it, still getting between 27 and 30 mpg, so that's not to bad.

I'm just glad I don't drive a lot, or that 30K could easily be much, much more.

Ouch

Ouch is actually an understatement.

My wife tells me I can be hurt doing the most ordinary things, and Friday was no exception!

I went to my grandparents to mow their yard. Not so much for the grass, but for the leaves. So I get there, get me a Dr. Pepper, and we talk for a while. I then go out, set my Dr. Pepper on the deep freeze, and proceed to mow.

I get finished up, and my grandpa went out for burgers, and anyone know me, knows I love burgers! Anyway, I go inside (with my Dr. Pepper) and sit and talk to my grandma.

While we were talking, I finished up my Dr. Pepper, and I tilted my head all the way back and tapped out the last few drops when something fell into my mouth. I wasn't sure what it was, but it was something that didn't go in a Dr. Pepper, so I make an eww type sound as I sit up in my chair to get rid of this intruder into my mouth.

Now, for those that don't know, my grandmother has always had a nice clean house. Always. So instead of just spitting out my pop all over her new wood floors, I try to spit it back into my can. And for the most part, I'm successful, but I did make a mess, which I felt really bad about. I rush into the kitchen and dump out the pop to see what was in it. And some of you may already know, but it was a BEE!!!! It must have flown into my pop while I was outside.

It was disgusting, but at least it wasn't a finger or something else.... wait.... ouch.... my tongue... it hurts... THAT BEE STUNG MY TONGUE!!!!

We've all been stung my bees I'm sure, but never in the tongue. This brings new meaning to the word pain. It made my ears hurt. Where I was stung swelled up a bit (but not chokingly big) I went to the bathroom to look at my tongue, not because of I needed a mirror, I could look on just about any flat surface at my grandmothers house and find a mirror, but for lighting. Anyway, what is that I see? That don't look right. Is it the stinger? So I ask

gra-ma, dhu you ave some twethers? (I told you my tongue hurt)

Well, we finally find some tweezers, and yep! It was the stinger, so I got it out about 5 minutes or so after getting stung! Well, my grandmother is now officially freaking out. She's ready for me to go to the hospital. I kept telling her I was going to be fine, but she knew I was just going to swell right up and die in front of her. So, to calm her down, I decided to call my wife... strike that, I'll call my mom, my wife would just laugh at me.

Well, I couldn't get my mom, so I call my wife. When she answered I started off with, don't laugh till we are done. And she confirmed what I told grandma, I would be alright. And my wife didn't dissappoint me either, before we hung up the phone, she was laughing!

And as an update, its been 29 hours since I got stung, and my tongue is still sore. Not real bad, but sore.

Happy Birthday Oklahoma!

Today is officially Oklahoma's 100th Birthday.

Oklahoma became the 46th State on November 16th 1907.

Weather

You know, there are days that I find the weather really amusing.

Like last night.

We had a Freeze Warning and a Fire Weather Watch.

Something just not right about that.

Happy Birthday Baby Girl

Today is my baby girl's birthday. She turned 19 today.

My how the time has flown by.

Walk Score

Over at Roemerman on Record, I learned a an interesting site called Walk Score.

Long story short, it tells you how walkable the location you enter.

My house got a Walk Score of 77 out of 100. What this score means is it is Very Walkable. It's possible to get by without owning a car.

Noodling

Ok, I'm sitting here this evening and doing some channel surfing to find something to watch. I stumbled upon a show on PBS on noodling.

PBS. Public Broadcasting... Noodling.

Something wrong about that having a show on PBS on noodling.

Did I mention its and hour long show?!?!?

Oh, and the name of the show? Okie Noodling

Breaks!

100_6519
Originally uploaded by jarrard@swbell.net

OK. So I went to change the front breaks on the truck. This is the same truck we just took to Arkansas and then drove through the mountains in. Well, here is one of the break pads. The top one is the new one. See how thick that is? The bottom one was what I took off the truck. All 4 of them looked that way.

That there is what we call metal on metal... Not a good thing.

I got them all fixed up, and took it for a spin. Works real nice.

Funny thing is, last night I was working on computers, this morning, I was working on cars.

Computers

Tonight, I did some computer work for a mother of one of my friends. She got a new computer (Windows Vista) and was having problems with her printer. It was an old printer and a new computer. She'd gone to Best Buy and got a LPT to USB converter, and had it working once, but kept going and got it messed up. I had it mostly working once, but had problems, so I stopped messing with it after a while.

Then her biggest problem was that she couldn't get some games from Pogo.com to work. So, I looked at all the usual suspects. Virus scanner, fire wall, spyware blocker, IE settings. Nothing I changed seemed to help. Then I tracked it down to the version of Java she was using. So, I upgraded her java. No dice. Ended up removing java and installing an older version. That finally did it.

Of course it was going to take 40 minutes to download version 1.4 over her dialup, so I left, came home, downloaded it and put it on my USB drive, and went back to her house in about 15 minutes.

Did a few other misc items, but on the bright side, it'll pay for the brakes I'm planning on putting on the truck Friday.