HAIR CUT HAIR CUT HAIR CUT

OK, so 6 months to the day of my agreement with Jaren about our hair, I finally caved in. The beard was shorn to a quite short length, and the hair was cut quite drastically. I spent UEA weekend with the scouts down at Goblin Valley and when I came home and when I went to wash my beard and usually when I wash it is just soap and water. This time it was soap, water, and tons and tons of sand. Also my hair, it was atrocious. I couldn't take it anymore so Sunday night IT ALL CAME OFF.
So last week I took the scouts to Goblin Valley. We left on Wednesday at around 4, it was my dad bringing his motor home, the 2ND counselor in the bishopric from one of the wards in the stake, then two Venturers from my ward and then one more boy from the 25Th ward. We arrived in Goblin Valley later Wednesday night we all set up tents, well the boys and I, my dad and Guy Marler slept in the motor home. Thursday we got up and had breakfast and then asked my dad where Little Wild Horse Canyon was. He was sure that it was directly north of us. After walking for about 30 to 45 minutes my dad realized that Little Wild Horse was more to the west of us. We returned to the motor home and drove down the road and finally found the trail head. It was amazing there were three parking lots and bathrooms and a big old information board and a guest registration book. We hiked up the slot canyon to the top where it turns into Bell Canyon which isn't a slot canyon. It was really cool I haven't been there for a long time so it was really nice to be able to returned and hike all the way to the top. We came back and started making dinner, they were aluminum foil dinners. Then we went to the Valley of the Goblins at night. I had never been there at night that I can remember so it was really cool to see everything all lit up from the full moon.
Friday we woke up and went over to the Goblins again. We spent all day roaming around the valley. My dad went down a few years ago with Jaren, my brother, and they found another valley of goblins and so we went down and found it again then we kept going south and we hiked up on one of the taller plateaus to get a better look and found that there were four different valleys. I was impressed with how many different locations there were and how different they all looked. After quite a few hours of climbing and sliding and throwing sand clods at each other we went back and started making dinner. Tonight we were having little smokies in barbecue sauce. We cooked them in a dutch oven and then started peach cobbler. Since my dad brought the motor home we had vanilla ice cream as well. It was a really good meal. Saturday we woke up and went out search for some old Uranium mines. Most of them were cemented in but the boys found one that wasn't, so we climbed in and started exploring. After an hour or so we turned back and found our way back out. We then returned home. We had a really good time and so did the boys.

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NEW LAWN NEW LAWN NEW LAWN NEW LAWN

So, we have lived in this house in Kearns now for 20 months now. We moved in in December so everything was covered in snow and couldn't really tell what the yard looked like. When spring came around I didn't really focus on the yard a whole lot because I wanted to try and use what was already there, which really wasn't a lot. Most of it was weeds and a bit of lawn. Well after hearing about and changing my degree to Horticulture and studying lawns and getting my job at Western Gardens I got fed up with trying to seed and water and seed and water. I took a different approach this year. I started with trying to kill everything off and start over. I then left it for a while to grow and what was killed let deteriorate away. A week ago I sprayed again and down a big killing. I ordered 4 pallets of sod from work and took the opportunity of Lauren being gone camping with her mom to lay the sod. Lauren came home a day early, because of rain and snow up in the High Uintahs, to a new lawn. It is an amazing feeling to go from dead weeds and dirt to a brand spanking new spread of lawn. I love it so much. I now can have people over to hang out and not feel so dumb with my dead front yard. I only need to get a fence on my east side and then my front yard will be done for the year. Next year I will put down a hedge and some flowers and my yard will be worthy of being called the house of a Landscape Designer.
My classes from USU are really interesting. I have a four hour soil class that should be very interesting. I already have homework for every week it's quite extensive. My chemistry class is going to be a breeze. I only need to keep on top of everything with homework and the readings. My Horticulture class is going to be awesome. It is on a Wednesday night and so every fourth Wednesday there is a Bonsai Club meeting and I explained this to him and he was extremely cool. He was all for the missing of classes. I really hope that I can stay on top of everything. Well I'm off for now hopefully I can get some pictures of my new yard.

Man I Suck At This Game

Well I guess that my dad was right. I am not very good at trying to keep up with me life on the web. It's just so hard though with life and everything going on. I work everyday but Thursday and Sunday from 930 to 630 (I know that for some of you reading this that that is not early or anything) Then Mondays is family night. Tuesdays is Scouts, Wednesday is Racquetball with the Ol' Man, Thursday Friday and Saturday are date nights with Lauren. Somehow I always seem to be filled with random crap that shouldn't really take up that much time. Tonight I actually got some planting done that needed to be done. Lauren is starting to learn how to do the planting and things so she helps with the yard. She pulled all of the weeds along the Chain link fence, so now I just need to find a Vine that would go good there to fill in because the fence is so unwelcoming. We are starting to get some plans together for the house. Lauren is trying to get some plans for the bathroom, while I am trying to plan the garage. I have a buddy that is going to help me so it should be quite nice. CHEAP too. So this past week has been sort of a high school reunion for me. I go to lunch most days with Jake Shafizadeh, one of my good buddies from school. He is in contact with some other people that we went to high school with and so slowly they are joining for lunch every once in a while. I had lunch with my good buddy, Matt Taylor, he has joined the Marines and is scheduled to go to Iraq in March so we spent the hour talking about how "AWESOME" it was. haha. I warned him about things and me being in the Army we talked about how the, hate between services, really is. I told him that there is some fun making but when it comes down to it we all get along.
It has been really good seeing all of these guys it is interesting to see what they are up too and how everyone has changed. When the High School reunion comes around it will be funny to go. Hopefully everyone is out of their clicks and is just into life. The 5 year was kind of bogus. Everyone was still in their own little clicks still and what kind of cars they had and what their jobs were it really made me feel dumb because a lot of everyone had graduated from college with some type of degree and here I am, been married for a year or so and not even started college. It was really kind of depressing that people still make those kinds of judgmental decisions. Well until next time Keep your stick on the ice.

Beard Growing.

This is the before picture.
Ok so When Jaren left to go on his mission I made a deal with him. If he would obey the haircut rule on hims mission and keep it short, he has never had short hair he doesn't like it, I would grow mine out for him for the two years he is gone. so one month has gone by and so far it hasn't grown too much.
This is the after picture.
This is one month into the deal.

Ok so maybe a little growth but nothing huge. Well my Xbox is supposed to have HDMI capabilities, true HD, but the other day when I bought all the cords and things that go to it, I hooked it all up and nothing. So I took it back to Best Buy and they gave me Microsoft's number so I called them. I send in the Xbox and they looked at it and then today I got an email that says they are finished and sending it back to me. It should be here by Wednesday. Then I can have True HD capabilities. HAHAHA
Well my yard is coming along. I let all the weeds grow out for about two months they got about 2 feet tall then last week I butchered them all down to about an inch. I then sprayed them with weed killer and then I only have a few more things to do before I can reseed and plant my flowers and shrubs. One good thing about working in a plant shop is that I can watch certain plants and see if they are going to be a good choice or if they are weaklings. My garden got all planted I did it last Thursday. We have 11 different tomatoes, 10 peppers, 4 potatoes, 5 squash, 2 pumpkins, 4 different kinds of corn, there are quite a bit of veggies and what not in there. We even have two Artichokes. I don't think that they will grow to be very big but I might have to dig them up and bring them inside during the winter so that they can ripen, but they are supposed to do best in warm weather so hopefully our WARM weather will help them grow.
Tonight I saw one of the guys that I went to Iraq with. It was really weird I couldn't really decide if I was scared or nervous or what but I guess that it wasn't too bad because he wasn't really with me on any of the missions that we went on. He was the company clerk. He is filing his claim for the V.A. and he said that he has ringing in his ears from the generators. Honestly I can't remember the generators being that close and the only thing that I can think of were the A.C. units and they weren't too terribly loud. I have heard a few of the soldiers complaining of that ringing in the ears though so I guess it's not a completely bogus charge. I sure don't have a prolonged affect from it though, maybe a tiny one every once in a while but nothing horrible.
Saturday night Lauren and I rode our bikes out to our parents house from our house. We went down 7800 south and it wasn't even ten miles and it took us around 40 minutes, it was pretty fun Lauren got nervous about me riding in the middle of the road but if there isn't a bike lane then the road becomes my lane. I guess drivers will have to learn that the hard way, or hit me and find out that they are in the wrong. Either way they will find out. Summer keeps plodding along. The planting season is almost over for gardens and things any longer and you'll have to be planting some short maturing plants like beets and peas, or something like that. I want to move somewhere where tomatoes are perennials. That would cool.
Well the priests have decided to go to the Tetons in August instead of Lake Powell, too many problems with the one. They want to do a bit of biking and hiking and canoeing. There is a bike loop that goes through Yellowstone so that should be fun. Hopefully I don't kill any of the boys, or myself. It should be loads of fun. They sounds like they are excited. Hopefully they keep the fire.

Well Hello

Ok Ok So I really suck at this whole blog thing. The truth is, I don't really have a whole heck of a lot that goes on in my life. I go to work I come home and usually watch a couple television shows and then go to sleep. My life is kind of boring.
Something interesting did happen the other day. So, Lauren and I went out to dinner and afterwards we went to see a movie at Jordan Landing. Well last fall we did the same thing and parked on the sidewalk behind one of the stores to keep my bike out of the way and so that it wouldn't get crushed in the parking stalls by some moron who shouldn't be driving abyway. So when we were finished with the movie, it was now 12:30 in the morning, the last time it was in the afternoon. We came out and there was a boot, well not really a boot but it was a lock that went through my tire preventing me from moving and the last time this happened it was a bike lock which I almost broke through trying to drive away, I couldn't see that I was locked up. Well i called the number on the little sticker that they gave me. The whole time while I was waiting for this little pimple popper to come and unlock my bike I tried to keep a cool head. So sure enough 2 minutes later some little dork turns the corner and I could just see it is his face, "Oh crap, why did I have to lock up that bike." He came over and looked at him and said, "So do you wanna unlock my bike." He looked back and told me that it would be 50 dollars to unlock it and I said that it was illegal for him to lock up my bike without having a sign that states that I cannot park there. He kind of looked at me and tried to make up some more excuses and I shot them down with more LAW quoting, it's really funny to quote laws to people they don't know how to react. Well, in the end he started to fumble and then said, "Well, I wasn't really gonna charge you anyway I am just doing what I'm told to do. Then he tried to be my buddy and talk about the Jazz. Funny little goof. Lauren was very irritated at me. I just laughed th whole way home, and yes I will continue to park on the sidewalks until the make me a motorcycle parking, which technically they have to or they can't tell me I can't park on the sidewalk, kind of a double bladed sword. Or, the tow my bike, which I have yet to see happen.
I started to ride my bike to work today. It is in some bad shape. Tires out of alignment and gears not shifting correctly. It works though and I have some of the those egg beater clipless pedals. That's kind of funny, Clipless pedals that are clipped into, ha ha ha. Well it is about 2 and a half miles from work and takes me about 10 minutes to get there, about the same in a car. It's also downhill, which makes the ride home even worse. It's nice to be out and getting exercise though my pulse rate has gone down and so has my blood pressure, so now my heart might not blow up. I am also wearing shorts for the first time in years. My legs should get really tan, hopefully.
The garden is coming along all I have to do now is rake in some nitrogen and make rows then I can plant. I am so ready to get this whole thing started so that I can get my yard going. It needs some severe help. Ok now I am not really talking about anything important so i guess I am finished.

For the Longest Time!!!!

Ok so I'm not doing as well as I would have hoped to be doing with this whole blog thing. Ok quick recap. Finals are over, although it was extremely pointless to even attempt to take the classes over. I am sure that I failed them the second time around. This school thing is very difficult especially not being able to fully be in the classroom. Most of the time my body is there but my mind takes a vacation. hopefully my teachers can understand all of this and maybe help me out. I have started full time at the Western Gardens, I love it there it is so nice to be able to do what I want and fully comprehend what is going on. I understand the whys and the whats it's amazing. I am starting to get a little worried that with working all the time I won't have time to accomplish the things around my house that I want to accomplish. I need to kill off the grass and then put in a sprinkling system. THEN I need to reseed the grass and do all the landscaping in the yard. It's quite a bit of work but hopefully I can find the time.
The garden work really starts this week. I am going to go over and start to REALLY clean up the plot. Then I will plow it all and add the amendments. Then I need to dig the trenches and get everything ready to plant, all before Memorial Day. My knowledge is beginning to grow by leaps and bounds, while working there. I have learned so much and I just can't seem to get enough. I have started to come up with more ideas for my yard as well. I think that I have finalized all of the plans in my head, now I just need to put the ideas into full use. I am hoping that my ideas will turn out cool. I am starting a Bonsai Club and our first meeting will be this Saturday at my house. Hopefully everyone coming over can overlook my yard and focus. Well when you go for so long without writing everything begins to get all jumbled together so when you try to write about it later you can't seem to get everything together. So I will end for now and hopefully get better at the whole typing thing.

En el Jardin!!!!!!

So today I had my last test for the units in my math class and now all I have left is the final. It makes me a bit nervous but I think that I should be able to do alright, if I can keep under control and not get so nervous that I forget everything. I went over to Western Gardens and picked up some things that they were going to throw away, I got two 75 gallon fish tanks along with two 55 gallon fish tanks. Now I don't have enough room to put everything. hahahaha. After that I went down to Dorothy Brim's house, the lady that has the land that my dad and I are doing the garden in.
I spent about 3 hours raking and picking up weeds and tree limbs and things so that I could spray down the land before we go ahead and plant it all. I am almost ready to start tilling hopefully we can find a big tractor that has a tiller on it because 5200 square feet is a lot of land to till by hand and shovel. The soil is mostly sand though so it should be a cinch and that means more watering as well, sandy soils aren't the greatest for planting in.
After I was done spraying the land down to kill everything on it my dad showed up and we talked a bit and I told him what I wanted to do with the trees and the land and everything else. I think that I want to plant some trees in a few of the rows and then sell them or a pretty penny. I want to get some Japanese Black and White Pines to grow. A 4 year old Japanese Pine sells for about 150 to 200 dollars, so there is a little motivation.
I love working in the garden it is so relaxing just me out there with all of nature and growing living things. It's like they are talking to me and I am communing with them through feelings and thoughts. They know that I am there to take care of them and help them to grow up big and strong. hahaha.
Tonight was my third try at some homemade ice cream. I'm telling you, I am getting pretty good at this thing. I made some raspberry cheese cake and it was absolutely amazing. It was like a little party in my mouth. Hopefully I can reproduce the effects of this and do it again. Now I just need to remember how I did it all.

Another day another dollar

Well today was quite fun. I went to work and rearranged all of the trees that people have tried, in vain to arrange. Sometimes I wonder how people can function through their lives and not know how to use the alphabet or simple shape recognition. It's quite simple, the trees go in alphabetical order, we have a book that tells us, and then from smallest to biggest. I started organizing the Japanese Maples and someone had left out entire stocks of trees, so irritating.
So I have been working in the backyard to try to get it nice to sit in, and tonight Lauren and I were able to sit down and enjoy the sounds of the birds feeding on my seven feeders. I don't even like birds yet I have become obsessed with them. I have different feeders for different varieties and hopefully I can even get some Orioles. We have two kinds in Utah. The days are getting warmer and so all of the birds are coming around so if you want any birds at your house put out your feeders now to start to attract them.
School is starting to wrap up I only have a few weeks left and then I am done until fall semester. This semester has been kind of difficult only because I was taken for a ride with the good ol' V.A. Now they do take good care of me and I can thank them for quite a bit but where the school gives me a year to make up an incomplete class the V.A. only gives me one semester so it's been a big joke to get through it.
My Bonsai Club at SLCC is starting to make some headway. Next week I plan on getting a booth and setting it out so that i can attract some hands on kind of people.
Not a whole lot going on in my life yet. Lauren wants to build some box planters and have a garden of our own, so I am going to hopefully get that taken care of this week.

Day Off

Today was an interesting one. I only had class from 10 to 12 and then I was off the rest of the day. Yesterday I went golfing with Uncle Buck (Dan) and Jaren, we went to Mulligan's, Jaren doesn't like to golf on REAL courses, but I was horrible. Today after I got out of class I called up Golf Galaxy and got a lesson time. I went in and apparently EVERYTHING I was doing was wrong. Glen Spencer, the teacher, spent the whole time restructuring my entire golf game. After we were finished he talked to me a bit about practice and keeping up on the technique and I asked when I should return and I kid you not he looked at me and said, "This may be the only lesson you need." I was stunned not only to hear him say that but to hear his explanation why. He proceeded to tell me that most people come in and don't listen but I absorbed every little detail he said. Took it to heart and put it to good use. He said that he has almost never seen this dramatic of a change in that little of time. Well I stopped at another golf store to find a club and took a few swings and the teacher/salesman that was watching said the he hasn't seen an amateur with that impressive of a stance that has not been in the tour before. I am quite excited. I will practice and then in a week or two I'll go back and, even if it's for him to tell me that I am good and I don't need anything more, I will be proud to have said that I have cleaned up my game.
Now my goal is to get my 18 hole game down under 95 and then I can join the amateur tour. This year will be practice and then next year I will be on it. ha ha ha.
There hasn't been a whole lot going on lately. I was on my bike the other day and car back fired then I let the throttle go and the bike backfired right after the car and I almost fell over it scared me so bad. Most of the time I can keep control and stay on top of most of my surroundings and not let things get to me like that however, every once in a while I will get caught off guard and then "BAM" I get hit with something that sends me reeling for cover. School is almost over and hopefully I can change my major so that I can attempt to create a title for myself through the skills that I already have. Summer is almost and with that the neighborhood children are becoming less of inside bodies and more of the outside type. The other day I came out of the house to see the next door neighbor kids climbing up on my shed and jumping off onto their trampoline. I flipped out and I'm sure that as soon as I got in the car and drove away they went right back to doing it but that just made me a little nervous about them being stupid and killing themselves and then the parents yell at me because, "I allowed them to do it because the shed is in my yard." Sometimes I wonder how the world functioned without being able to sue everyone. Oh yea now I remember, Doctors could actually practice medicine, McDonald's could have HOT coffee, and people could have other people over for some fun and games rather than having some lawsuits and pains.

Last Day

Well Tonight was my last night working at the good ol' Spaghetti Factory. I am not sad even a little bit to be gone either, it took up way to much time that could be spent in more deserving areas. My last night was pretty good, it was really slow and boring, and everyone would come in and say, "Is tonight REALLY your last night?" I would look at most of the people that asked and just stare at them like they were handicapped. There was a couple people that were sad and one that was upset saying, "Now work is going to suck and it's not going to be fun anymore." I don't care I thought at it was odd that people would get that attached to other people that they work with.
Math is starting to get a little easier now that I am comprehending most of what is going on. I have also found out that there is only ONE Landscape Architecture Design, in all of Utah, and it's at Utah State. There are a few extension programs around but the only thing that they offer is a Horticulture degree. That degree would be extremely helpful and the only difference between the two is the Landscape Design also gets into computer software and business running skills. After running my own little business, when I was but a young lad, I think that I can figure that part out and, with a few books, I'll be able to figure out the software thing as well.
So my dad went over to look at the little bit of land that he has used to do a garden in the past and I would like to use this year. It is covered in weeds and in some severe need of prunage on the trees. I want to get some Asparagus and strawberries. I love Asparagus.

Longest Time

Well I realized last night that I hadn't written for a while.

I put my two weeks in at The Old Spaghetti Factory, so my last day will be on Wednesday. I am happy to have my nights back again. Working during the night is rough especially when my wife works the days so we didn't ever see each other. Now we will be able to see each other every night except those that I have scouts. Speaking of scouts that is going well. We have planned out most of our trip to Lake Powell and are preparing as much as we can for being so far ahead. This next Tuesday we are going shooting down at the Lee Kay shooting range to see how well these little goofs can shoot. I remember the first time that I ever went down to the Lee Kay range, it was for Hunter's Safety, and Ron took me down in his Fiat. He had only been home from his mission for a week or so. It was kind of fun but I didn't do very, well that's what I remember most.
So, Lauren said that for the most part I can type fairly well. However, she said that I have quite a few mistakes like run on sentences and things like that. I don't know how I can get better besides becoming an English major like she did. So, if you don't like my punctuation then tell me where I screwed up and I'll try Harder.
I am slowly becoming the king landscape and tree man around Western Gardens. The other day there was a lady that came in looking for a tree and Melissa was out where I was and I started talking to the lady and after I answered all of the lady's questions and she lift Melissa came up to me and said that she was impressed with all that I was able to tell this lady. That made quite proud and more confident in my abilities. So now my reputation has jumped a bit from "Dumb High School Dork" to "Dumb College Dork." Hopefully one day I will be elevated to just "College Dork," that is my goal.
My services as a landscape artist are starting to be tested and tried as my services have been employed to design and landscape a yard. This will be the first yard, besides my own, that I will have full responsibility for. I am going to take pictures throughout the project and use them for showing people that I am not just a moron, and that I know a little bit about the whole thing. Thanks to my dad and the guy down at the sprinkler wholesale store, sprinkling systems are starting to become a lot easier for me. I think that with that knowledge and the knowledge from the books I have read I should be OK.
Today I was down at the Student Center trying to find out how to start a club at SLCC, and I have found all of the resources I need to start one. Now all I need is five students and a faculty member to head this new "Bonsai Club at SLCC" I know that name sounds funny but that's all I could come up with at such short notice. This club will be a SLCC chapter of the already established Bonsai Club of Utah. My involvement will be a lot more along the lines of what I want to see happen with the club and go in a direction that I think would be more helpful. The people who head up the Utah club are all in their own little tight knit group of friends that all studied under Ben Skillary, the original Bonsai Ben. Any attempt to violate their circle of trust is not met very nicely. So unless you are brought into the group by a long time member then you are treated like an outcast and an outsider, even if you know a bit more than some of the other people. Then they all come to you when they need someone to go and sit at their little functions and answer questions. Kind of irritating but such as life.
My yard is coming along, I am at a standstill however. I called the Water District of Kearns and talked to the head Honcho dude about code and what not. He told me that in order to meet code that will be state wide in two years, MANDATORY AND FINE ABLE, I need to install an RPZ valve. A 200 dollar valve that prevents irrigation water from getting into your culinary water lines. The sprinklers with the valves already on them wont work apparently. I am a bit bummed out about the whole thing but hey if my yard looks awesome and is done right the first time with the right parts then I guess I don't have to worry to much about the whole thing. I would hate to have to do it with the wrong parts and then do it again in 5 years.
Well life goes on and I keep trucking along so live well and BE FAMOUS.

Tons of Yard Now.

Well today I was in the yard all day. At the beginning of the week my intentions were to cut down the Elm trees in the back yard on Monday and then on Wednesday I was going to plan the Sprinkling system then on Friday I was going to put that punk in the ground. Well Monday I did manage to get one and a half of the trees cut down. Then on Wednesday I can't remember what I did, that happens a bit I will lose time in my life and not remember a thing. Thursday night my old man came over and helped me plan a bit of sprinkling system. The more I read and talked to my dad the more I realized that no matter how much I wanted this to be a two day job there is no way on this green earth that one person, with as little knowledge as I had, could accomplish that task.



After my dad helped me plan out a bit and the more that I thought it all out I went to the good ol' Home Depot, Lowes staff is more knowlegdable sometimes but they are also more explensive. After about 5 minutes of walking around in the plumbing I finally found someone that knew quite a but about the whole sprinkler thing, having done 5 yards himself he says. Well I picked at his brain and got ideas and knowledge and prices and more ideas and more knowledge and realized that unless this is all I did for a couple days, it was going to take me about a week to get everything all planned out and measured and dug out and hooked up and running corectly.



During this process I am going to be landscaping my front yard as well so it is a bit more involved than sticking a tube in the ground and the fact that there has never been an automatic sprinkling system or a system that is connected to the main line, I have to connect everything from the main water line all the way to the sprinklers and everything in between. I spent an hour at Home Depot and got some manuals and things and wrote some information down and then went over to Walgreen's for some graph paper and a compass and ruler. This project needed to be quite a bit more thought out than my attempt at a covered parking, which my dad, two brothers and I did in a day planning and everything. That was interesting to say the least.



Today I started in the wannabe flower bed in the front yard digging it all up pulling out all the bricks and rocks and two massive stumps and then finding the original line and pulling up about 20 feet of that. I leveled out the ground pulled out all the horrible Irises that were allowed to grow for so long that they looked more like a weed rather than a semi decent flower. I checked my yard and took note of all of the different kinds of weeds that have accumlulated there, which problably make about 60-70 percent of the yard cover. Hopefully by next week I will have all of my plans drawn out and sprinklers planned and then I can start the process of slapping this system together.



Although this is all pretty extensive work and sometimes labor intensive, I find it very relaxing and mind easing. The yard puts me at peace and I feel safer and more relaxed then any other place that I have ever been in a long time. I don't lose track of time I don't forget where I am or what I am doing. It really makes me feel like the world is a decent place, as opposed to the rest of the time I am wondering around feeling like something aweful is about to happen and there is nothing that I can do to stop it, not a good feeling to have.
Lauren comes home from Moab with her mom tomorrow and I am really excited to see her. She has kept in touch with text messages and let me know that she is doing ok and having fun but, she misses me and that's good because I miss her quite a bit as well. Hopefully things with my yard will bloom this year and then I can focus on other areas of the house like the back yard and cleaning that all up or maybe an east fence, it looks like poop and in the back yard there are two fences running side by side, my neighbors chain link fence and my wood slat fence. It leaves a two foot gap between the fences and cutting our yard down and is just a mess.
So this year my landscaping abiblities will be tested with the formation of my yard, there will be pictures so that the transformation will be documented. When I am finished I will have one of the nicer yards on the street if everthing turns out as nice as it looks in my mind, and we know how those kinds of things work just perfectly out to what we think of. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha.

WORK WORK WORK!!!!!!!!

Well today I worked all day and it wasn't all that bad. They've hired a new bloke, Karston, he's 21 and waiting for his background check to pass so then he can go back to working as a cook at a retirement home. Melissa, my manager, is looking to me more and more for help. Her go to man, Jake, he is going on a mission the end of March. She is almost as neurotic and obsessive as I am. She has taken to giving me the more important thinking jobs and has started to give the more labor intensive jobs to Karston. Of course, I help him however she is kind of putting me in charge of things. I like being the one who does the thinking and is able to make things happen.
We got all of these stone garden fixtures in last week and I spent the day unpacking and putting together the fountains and statues. Melissa was quite happy with how I arranged everything. Then she gave me permission to arrange the Asian section. My idea was to put all of the Asian Decor over by the Koi ponds. She liked the idea and said that tomorrow they would put all of the stone over there and let me arrange it all when I come back on Thursday. I am hoping that I can help them to see that there is a need for a Bonsai section along with the Asian Decorations. The more I look around the store the more I find that they have a few of the tools and a lot of the soils and amenities that are used or sought after.
The Venturers are slowly planning out some of the activities that they want to do for the rest of the summer. We are getting the Lake Powell trip all thrown together and all planned out and they seem to be excited and we talked a bit about a fundraiser. The boys have seemed to stick around the idea of tree care and maintenance. They liked the idea of cutting down trees, I don't know how fun the clean up will be but I guess we will jump that hurdle when we get to it.

TIMBER!!!!!!!!!!

Well today I spent the day outside cutting down the ugliest tree in the entire world, well actually it was a spawn of a bigger tree so I guess that would make a spawn of the ugliest tree in the world. The tree is on the property line of my neighbor and ours. I told them last year that i was going to cut it down so in the fall I went over there with a drill and a 10 inch drill bit and some killzall. I drilled a few holes in the tree and then today I chopped that punk down. With the help of my Old Man's tree cutting utensils, chainsaw and axes, I was able to cut down 1 and 1/2 Chinese Elms that stood over 50 foot. It was quite fun. If you would have been there to see me you all probably would have been sick with the thought of me killing myself with all of the stupid things that I was doing. Swinging the chainsaw through the branches like a mad man. After I was all done cutting it down the neighbor kid had come home from school and so I paid him ten bucks to help me clean up all the branches.
I kept some of the bigger branches intact so that I could attempt to make some patio furniture with them. I went and talked to my neighbor after I got home from my couples PTSD clinic, and let him know what I was planning on doing with the other tree and that I wasn't going to put up the fence until I was ready to build a whole new fence, after I take out the hindrances on the fence line it should be a breeze.
Even though I spent the whole day doing hard labor it was refreshing to know that I was actually accomplishing something on the house to make it more along the lines of the ideas i have for it. My next goal is the front yard and the sprinkling system. I have read quite a few books on the whole thing and so I am confident in my abilities in being able to accomplish the task. I only have to wait for the Blue Stake people to come out and mark out all of the utilities so that I don't go chopping through anything that I'm not supposed to be chopping.
I have some pretty grand ideas for this little house of ours. Hopefully my body continues to work with me and allow me to work on all of my ideas. After the trees are cut down there shouldn't be too many other things that are quite so labor intensive, until I start on the garage. My neighbor also told me that he wants to lop down the Satan Tree that all these little spawnlings have come from. That will be a treat let me tell you. This monster of a tree is about 6 feet in diameter at the base. That is going to be awesome, but after i have that tree cut then I will have a table top and some chair seats for my patio furniture. Completely weather proof and durable for anything.
Moving from an apartment to a house has had some real eye openers for me. The fact that whenever something would break in the apartment you would have to go and tell the management that it was broken and then would have to get the lazy duffers that are supposed to be fixing these things to come over and fix it. That could be a lengthy process. One time imparticular I remember that it took those goofballs about 3 days to come and fix the light fixture that all they had to do was replace the plastic cover.
In a house it is all up to me to fix things so it only takes as long for the problem to get fixed as it does for me to get fed up with the problem and haul out to the good ol' Home Depot or Lowe's to get the parts I need and fix whatever it is that needs fixing. I am lucky that I have a dad like mine that knows how to take care of most of the things that I have problems with and can't figure out by myself. I would like to believe that I am Superman and can do anything without the help of anyone and that there are no limits to the things that I can do. There is some truth to that but sometimes even Superman needs a little help from The Justice League.
I am starting to really take off in the yard, finding out that any yard work puts me at ease. Even if it is cutting down a giant of a tree. Being able to make things into the visions that I have and be the cause of those visions coming true is really exhilarating. If everyone in the world could find something that makes them feel at ease no matter the circumstances and figure out a way to get paid for that. The world would be a lot happier of a place.

Ha Ha I'm keeping it going!!!!!!!!

John Steinbeck eat your heart out. I told my parents that I started a blog and because of my inability to even write letters when I was in Iraq or on my mission, my dad chuckled and said, "That won't last." Well very true that I have struggled in my days to keep a record of anything. Even on my mission when on Sunday mornings an hour was set aside for the writing of journals I still failed to do so more than a handful of times. I like to think of myself not as a lazy person but rather, not having the words to express my life and feelings. Well, whatever the reasons I have had in the past for not writing I haven't seemed to run into a big problem yet with this.
Lauren's dad spent the last few days with us, and let me say that it was not nearly as bad as I had originally thought it was going to be. I spent Friday going a bit obsessive over our spare bedroom, taking 3 hours to place some footlockers with some quilts covering them so they look more like a shelf rather than footlockers. Then I had to go out a buy some shutters for the room because, and this is what my mind saw, the room looked more like an old world hut with a leather flap in the window to keep the wind out. So, after making myself sick over the whole ordeal we managed to get the room done and then make some ice cream in time for the our ward's ice cream social, being put on by the Young Women & Young Men.
This was my very first attempt at ice cream making. My dad has made ice cream for 20 some odd years and I recently, after having my dad poke fun at the fact that I didn't own an ice cream maker, bought one from the D.I. I then proceeded to make some flavors that I thought might be really good. The first flavor I came up with was Lime Margarita, I bought some margarita base from work and mixed that with cream and some sugar. It turned out really really good. It wasn't to tart, well for a margarita. It was really creamy and I thought that I had really done well with it.
The second ice cream idea came from my dad. He told me to do a cheese cake and then put out some raspberries for the topping. He did give me a couple of tips on how to make ice cream however, I failed to ask the specifics on how to make a GOOD ice cream. I whipped the cream cheese with some sugar and then added the cream. Some where in my adding the sugar and the cream something went horribly wrong, the cream separated into the lipid molecules and the sugars adhered to the cream and cheese molecules making a very very BUTTERY tasting ice cream. The fats all stuck together in big globs and the rest was a milky goo, and all together you got a buttery ice cream that was very interesting. I ate two bowls mixed with raspberries and then laughed at those that didn't like it. In my mind it wasn't very good either, but I made it so I had to stand by it.
The last kind I made was peach. I bought fresh peaches from Smith's, that was expensive 3 bucks a pound. Again, not knowing how and the little secrets you learn from years of practice with making ice cream.I didn't peal the peaches, I put them in at the begining and the all sunk to the bottom. All in all I think that I did pretty good for not knowing what I was doing. I did win three awards from the guest judges, our stake presidency and their wives. The Margarita got the, "I can't get enough" award, the Cheese cake got the "Did you buy it from the store" award, i think they were poking fun at me, and the Peach got the "Creamiest" award. I think that they just had to give an award to EVERYONE that made something. I had a fun time making the ice cream and I think that I will make a habit of making ice cream. Watch out old man I'm gonna make an ice cream that even you won't be able to touch.
Well the rest of the weekend came and went fairly uneventful. I went shooting Saturday morning with my little brother Jaren, J Dawg is what he like to be called, and Skyler, a kid that I work with at the Old Spaghetti Factory. I kind of sighted in my 7mm Mag. at least now you can see the shot on the target. The two boys didn't seem to like the 7 though I think it was a little too painful to really be lots of fun. Then we went down to the 50 yard range where we shot my Russian 9mm x 18mm Makarov. I love that gun, and apparently so did J Dawg and Skyler. We also took out my targeting .22 caliber rifle. That's a neat little gun. One of the most accurate guns I have ever shot.
After about 3 hours we were done, and almost out of ammunition. I worked that night while Mike and Lauren went to her nieces birthday party. From what I heard it was a bit over the TOP. Then we slept in a bit and went to church, Lauren had sharing time. Then after church it was time for Mike to go home. Not too bad of a weekend. We finished the night off over at Lauren's mom's house for dinner. Zach, Hilary and Cassidy were there along with Eric and Heather and Ella. Eric and Heather aren't in town a whole ton so we take all the opportunities we can to get together.
This week is going to be very fun. It is my Spring Break and so I have lots of things planned. Hopefully I can get everything finished. I will post pictures of everything that I can accomplish, if the weather agrees with me.

FUN FUN FUN

So this is the second day that I have managed to keep this going. I really wonder how long I am going to be able to keep the fire going. Well this week has been kind of boring, not a whole lot going on in my life at this p[articular moment. Last night, Tuesday, we took the scouts to the swimming pool to get the swim check passed off, so we can go to Lake Powell later this year. When we were getting ready to leave a Boy Scout came up to me, because they have put me in charge, and who are they you ask, THEY are the all powerful presence that keep the world turning. THEY are responsible for making all of the most important descisions in life that make the world make even less sense than it already does. THEY are in charge of putting plans into files and leaving them somewhere and losing them so that little peons, like me, have to return and come up with whole new plans.

Anyhow they have put me in charge of the Venturing Scouts. So, a Boy Scout came up to me and asked if he could go with us to the pool so that he could work on his swimming merit badge, seeing as how he has already passed off his lifetime fitness requirements that the other Boy Scouts were doing. I said, "Sure why not. That sounds like a good idea." So we all piled into the two cars of the other two leaders, there are supposed to be six in attendance, but again THEY have left it up to me to carry this scouting program. So, the two other leaders load up their cars and low and behold, one lone scout still remains and me as well. I, however, have ridden my motorcycle so I only have room for one more person other than myself.

After putting on the extra helmet that I had strapped to the back of the bike, we went, and i got to listen to, "Don't go to fast, slow down, don't tip over, this is cold, it's too loud." the whole way there. When we got to the pool we all went in and the other two leaders and I waited for about 5 minutes for the boys to get all changed and come to the pool. We had a total of 5 boys in attendance and out of those 5, two were not Venturing age. Out of the remaining three however, only two passed off their swim checks, and not because they tried and couldn't do it, but because they didn't want to do it right now. They wanted to wait until a later date to pass it off. It never ceases to amaze me at how, when everything is placed in front of some people and they don't even really have to think about the choices to make, they still seem to goof up and not get things done in a timely manner and make things difficult for the rest of us who would like to live fairly simple lives.
Sweet so my computer shut down last night while I was typing and I thought that I lost all of what I had typed, however this thing saves it so that I didn't have to type the whole thing again. Well I think that for the most part I was finished anyway.

First Day

Well I have never been any good at writing anything ever in my life. When I went into the Army I wasn't very good at writing letters and then when I went on my mission I was even worse, if that is possible. When I went to Iraq it would be days before anyone even knew where I was or what I was doing. I came home and all my family knew was that I was hurt while in Iraq. Then they heard I was in Germany. Then they got a call from me while I was hopping flights across the U.S. trying to get back to Washington. Well needless to say I don't do very well with the whole writing, I have never even kept a consistent journal. This will probably go the way of all my other endeavors, short-lived and boring. However, we will give it a try to see what may come out of this. If nothing else at least I will learn to type a lot better than I do right now.
First, I should allow myself to, uh, introduce myself. I am Ben Hubert. I am 26 years old living in Utah, with my wife, whom I have known for 21 years now. I will will also tell a brief history, at least a little bit that I didn't cover in my introduction. I was born and raised in Utah. I have spent most of life in Utah. However, over the last ten years i have spent more time out of Utah than I have in it. At age 17, I enlisted in the service of the great Army of the United States. After a brief stint of training in Oklahoma, I returned to finish out my high school senior year. Then after graduation I was shipped to Missouri where they taught me how to not die while driving a truck. Very, very, exhilarating, I would recommend this to anyone who is bored of their own life. After completing my training I then took a leave of absence from the service to a service of another kind. This time my service would be to the Lord and to the blessed people of New Jersey, a wonderful state full of rich beautiful heritage and, uh, smokestacks, I guess.
I served my time in New Jersey even against many forces compelling me to other loftier goals of the flesh. When I returned home I was able to spend a few months at home while trying to readjust to normal civilian life. Although I never really got the chance to change from the military to the civilian world before going to New Jersey, but i was going to try. Before I could do much transitioning of anything I was then called to serve in the Great War of the Middle East, my dramatic attempt to make it sound AWESOME. I served for 6 months in Iraq from April of 03' to September of 03' whereupon I tore up my shoulder and was sent back to the states to recuperate. I then spent the next year and couple months in physical rehabilitation, which reminded me a lot of some of the torture methods used in the Middle East. Ha Ha.
After all of my time healing back to 60% of what I once was the Army thanked me for my service by releasing me with no chance of reenlisting. So thank you so very much for leaving me half a person with no chance of returning to the really the only thing I had ever really done. I moved to Idaho to be with my wife whom I had married in January of 04' and then lived with for three months before she returned to Idaho to finish her schooling. So we lived in Idaho, Rexburg that nice little town in Idaho, after she graduated we moved back to Utah. She got a job as a substitute teacher, which pays you just over minimum wage, IF, you have a college degree. I worked as a waiter at a restaurant, while waiting for Lauren to decide if she wanted to stay here or go to Las Vegas to get a job. We decided to stay in Utah so we moved out to the west side of the valley and have stayed here. Lauren now teaches 8th grade English and I am currently going to school at SLCC, yea for me, and working two jobs. I keep a job as a waiter because I like people, and I landed my, almost, dream job. I am working at Western Gardens on 41st south and 40th west. I have gained a live of plants from somewhere. I like the feeling of helping something so delicate as a seedling growing into something as awesome and powerful as a Giant Redwood.
I have many lofty goals and delusions of grandeur for what I want in life and I think that even though I need to let some of these things go, like becoming Superman or being able to name my first born Kal-El. I am studying a Biology degree and hopefully one day will be able to complete and then apply to Medical School and be able to continue on with my learnings. But, my dream would be to be granted an apprenticeship as a Bonsai Learner to one of the great Masters in Japan. Then I would live the rest of my life in a tiny forest of giant trees.
Hopefully this has given you the reader some insight as to who I am and how I think. Let's see how long I can keep this going.