I'M NOT DEAD!

Bad blogger.. bad! I know, I know.. as many of my blog readers have so carefully pointed out in e-mails or phone calls.. "YOU HAVEN'T UPDATED YOUR BLOG FOR ALMOST 3 MONTHS!! ARE YOU STILL ALIVE?!"

I can definitely answer "Yes!" to that question.. that is.. unless everyone else that I deal with on a daily basis is also dead and no one has bothered to tell me. Hmmmmm. Nope.. not dead yet (I'm NOT DEEEAADD! I feel happy!) I have just had an extremely busy spring. Between constant work demands and working to take care of the family as my wife's arm recovers, life has been busier than normal and most of my typical blogging time just seems to get sucked away.

I have still been doing a lot of mental blogging, figuring out things to write about, mapping them out, normally while on my evening runs. But by the time I stumble through the door, the last thing I want to do is start typing. So I'll save those ideas for another time. Instead, I'll do a quick recap of various events of the last 3 months. That way I can still share the news, and then be caught up for my future blogging. So here's a quick summary of the highlights of the last few months.

Let's start... back in April. Dawn's arm now securely in a black snazzy brace, she began to return to normal life once again. And one of the first things on the agenda.. the girls weekend away to Utah for the NCAA Gymnastics Tournament. Blog readers may remember the origin of this trip, as described here. Suffice it to say, Dawn and Amanda won tickets to this years championship, while going to last years championship held near us, in Corvallis. The girls saved their extra pennies all year and finally bought their plane tickets to head East.

Joining then for the weekend tournament was my Mom, flying over from Colorado. I guess she just couldn't pass up a good "Girl's Weekend". Also joining then, at least for a morning of exploring downtown Salt Lake City was the girls of Dawn's family.

Needless to say, the girls had a ball. Their assigned seats at the event happened to be right in the middle of the Florida State fans section, and so to prevent them from cheering on other teams, the FSU crowd made them all "Honorary Gators", complete with t-shirts, pom poms, signs, pins.. the works. This just added to the excitement, although it was weird for me to watch my family, decked out in Florida gear, during the camera pans across their section during the CBS television coverage..

Next up.. Work. Been a busy few months having just inherited several new websites to manage with new products to learn. I am used to the luxury RV markets, but horse trailers, cargo trailers, and small towables are all a bit new to me. But challenges help us all to grow. I also got to help, as a "behind the scenes" photgrapher, on the production of a new video for one of my newer websites. And this wasn't just a basic "put camera on tripod and do some interviews" kind of shoot. This was a $50 grand, week long shoot, flying crew in from all over the country.... shoot.

It was educational to say the least, what with my fairly small sized films, to see the size of production this turned out to be. It was an insanely coordinated thing, much more than I was used to with gear, cameras, lighting all stung out as the crew slowly worked through the script.

The video all came together nicely, and premiered on one of my sites... well... this morning. You can watch it here..

Spring slowly began to turn to summer, beginning with Memorial Day. This year, there was just too much going on to justify a full weekend trip. And so we did a fun "mini-vacation". We headed up to Portland on a Sunday afternoon with the five of us, stayed in a family suites hotel, went out to dinner and then spent the evening playing in the hotel pool (an activity that just seems to get more and more violent the older the kids get). I have no idea why there seems to be such an obsession with "drowning dad".. who knows.. maybe they are just protecting themselves.. but things get pretty hairy. And then there is the "attempt to empty the pool cannon-ball style" contest. Yeah.. the hotel staff love our family... Best, most random line of the day came from Little Calvin with his "Dad, can I call you Larry?"

The next day, it was off to the zoo to see an assortment of animals. A few interesting sights.. Well, there was the large baboon that was.. ahem... let's just say... very HAPPY to be there that morning. There was the very large gorilla that threw a temper tantrum, swinging on his vine at a high rate of speed so that he could hit the cage glass feet first, making a huge noise and sending a dozen freaked out guests screaming in several directions. And then there was poor little Calvin complaining that his stomach hurt. We passed it off as just being tired from our previous night's exertions and eating too much breakfast buffet.

But after a busy day of zoo walking, he proved that he was serious, when were were just pulling on the freeway when he announced that he really was feeling bad, then .5 seconds later proceeded to throw up all over himself and the van. Needless to say... it was a long trip home.. and a long evening as he kept it up late into the night. Where does a kid HOLD that much stuff in that small of body? Yikes!

Next up.. Little Calvin got to finish his school year at camp. The entire school spends the second to last week at a day camp in the woods. It gives the kids a fun, new environment to learn new skills they just can't get in a classroom. It also helps them get to know kids in other grades that they may not have interacted with during the year. One of our biggest surprises of the week... Little Calvin actually had the guts to do a fairly tall and long zip line.

We worried he may be a little freaked out at the idea, as he typically has not been one for thrills like that. But not only did he do it, he was one of only 2 kids, who didn't sit down on the edge and scootch himself off the edge. Nope, he grabbed hold of the rope and just jumped for it. All week long he asked to go again, but sadly his group didn't have time to return to that station. But he still loved canoeing, archery, craft making and spent the weekend singing camp songs. (Pictured below are Little Calvin, his teacher and Abbie, on of his best friends)

One final event.. then I'm all caught up.. The Prefontaine Classic. For the track uninitiated, this is one of the premier professional track meets in the world, held each year here at Eugene's (Track Town) Hayward Field. This year, it was a good test run, as our little town will be hosting the track and field Olympic Trials next year, and this gave some of the elite runners more experience on our track before that meet.

What made this fun was the opportunity to meet several of the athletes the day before, shake their hands, and get their autographs. This year we got to meet "The World's Fastest Man", Asafa Powell, who is the current world record for the 100 meter dash, and Sanya Richards, the 400 Meter gold medalist from the last Olympics.

Having actually met the athletes and talked to them about their races for a few minutes made the meet all the more fun for the kids, as they rooted on their new favorites. All in all, a fun day watching a Kenyan runner Paul Koech, win the steeple chase by almost half a lap, Maria Mutola win the Woman's 800 meter for the 15th consecutive year, Matt Tegenkamp break the 2-mile American Record (while still coming in 3rd), and the 4 top one-mile runner's squaring of against each other in a brutal race.

And so.. there you are.. some of the big events of the last few months. Now I am finally caught up and have plans to continue to blog this summer. No more blog slacking for me. More to come... very soon!