I could not post this before, due to a TV blackout, but I was on a reality show, asa  groomsmen, in Andy and Shirley’s wedding!

It was almost too fancy to comprehend.

If you want a good account of what happened, why not check out the show?

http://www.wetv.com/shows/my-fair-wedding/episodes/season-3/belly-dancing-bride

You can also buy it on iTunes.  How to describe this?  It was as surreal as it was extravagant.  Most importantly, two of the best people I know are now wed, and their kids are going to literally take over this world with their combined powers of attractiveness, tenacity, and intelligence.

 

While in LA, I also got to do some other things, like buy two suits (something I’ve been avoiding but needed)

But most importantly, got to go to my first UCLA basketball game since graduation.  Wow, I really missed that.  A win over $c and a singing of “Rover”… football can not compete with that, in my mind.

 

This past weekend, we went to Vegas to celebrate our two year (Love you!) and plan our less extravagant wedding.  One place, at least to me, shines like a beacon, pointing us toward our future together… any guesses?

I know, it has been FOREVER since I posted.  There are some reasons for that.

1. Camera is missing a charger; hard to take pictures

2. I have not done very many exciting things lately.

3. The exciting things I have done have had poor photos or are prohibited from being posted (you’ll see eventually).

Despite all that, I have to post today to show this:

Shawn and I are engaged!  As she put it, our dogs will no longer be bastards.

Last week(end) was a work break for me and a trip to Moab, Utah for the National Land Rover rally.

In case you are unaware, Shawn runs a specialty Land Rover upgrade business for her dad, so these types of events are a mix between work and play.  My truck hauled more parts than I care to mention.

The whole trip was not off-roading… we did plenty of on-road trips, like my first trip to Needles Overlook of Canyonlands NP.

Here you can see the Island in the sky from a whole new angle.

There were some great xbeds in the Navajo to see too.

The dogs, on this trip and the other trips, had some fun… mostly sitting in the car, which they generally got tired of, but also got to run wild, which they very much enjoyed.  Hopefully it was worth it for them.

Onyx was VERY happy at times.

This was mostly at off-leash times, like in this rec canyon called the Millcreek area.  They actually played in the water… a little… no swimming, but splashing.

One day was a geo trip I lead for Land Rover folks that went really well, besides the weather.  By the way, this is Landscape Arch, and it is so fragile, it could fall tomorrow.  You NEED to visit me and see this before it does fall.  Pictures do not do it justice.

We did Canyonlands and Upheaval Dome, hoping for better weather…

But it was ridiculous.  In a place made for long vistas, this is a FAIL if I’ve ever seen one!

I did actually go on only one trail, called Chicken Corners.  No crazy climbs, no trucks tipping or breaking, just a long, long off-road trail, but the end was so worth it.

A view of the Colorado below Dead Horse Point…

…and Island in the Sky would be worth twice the drive!

All in all, a great trip, a great week, lots of new friends, but over too quick.  Next trip: hopefully Oregon, with a Dolphins/Raiders game for good measure.

I know, another vastly-delayed post, but here it goes:  Fern, his buddy Tony, and I flew out to Austin to see the UCLA v. Texas game on Sept 25.  Out there, we met up with their buddy Dennis (front row).

To put it mildly, the trip was EPIC!  Maybe the highlight happened right away: a private, backroom tour of the facilities… thank you Dennis!

Of course, all the emphasis on a certain game in which a certain team lost was great.  We could easily agree on that.

The stuffed former mascots was a little creepy…

The facilities were unbelievable… hard to describe the decadence.  As a pure coincidence, former Bruin and NFL first-rounder Robert Thomas was there, and he said some NFL facilities were not as good!

They take every game VERY seriously.

Easily the highlight of this highlight was a certain office we got to go in:

None other than Mack Brown!  Sure, there were Heismans and autographed memorabilia lying around, but the crown jewel (literally) took the cake:

Yes, that is Mack Brown’s 2005 championship ring on Fernando’s finger.  Awesome!

OK, that was cool too…

That night we hit the infamous Austin 6th street… craziness ensued, including: meeting UCLA blogger Jon Gold, cage dancing, getting kicked out of a place because I was wearing shorts and skater shoes (that’s in the place with cage dancing… classy…), crying drunks, puking drunks, public urinations, asian invasions, and $3 breast sucks.  Don’t ask.

The game itself was honestly, a letdown.  We DOMINATED, and the crowd was not nearly as intense, organized, or loud as Knoxville.  Oh well, maybe Lincoln will compete (in 2013… save up now!).

The rest of the time was more mellow, hanging out, and touring, including the LBJ library, which was pretty cool.

All in all, right up there with the Tenn trip.  We are planning Corvallis next year (assuming the still go with the schedule changing), so don’t miss out, just go next time!

Last week was my bday extravaganza!  I felt really touched and honored by everyone’s thoughts and well-wishes.  The best present I received was my best friend Fernando’s visit.  It was much more pleasant and successful than past Utah trips.

At the party (really the only one I ever remember having), the highlight was Vickie’s LEGO head cake she made me.  How cool is that?

Vickie, by the way, is Shawn’s best friend since high school.

After the party, and a Saturday of College Football, I talked Fern into a SW Utah trip.

He had never really been to any NP, and he was blown away!

It was quite the trip, but, in a way, only the first half.  Friday, I meet him in Austin to see UCLA vs. Texas.  Wish us luck!

Well, it’s thirtysomething eve.  Did I get everything done in my 20s I needed?  Naw, not even close.  Am I better off?  I certainly am older, fatter, unhealthier.  Am I happier?  That I can say with a big YES.  Maybe it is the fact that I just ended a 26 (twenty-six!!!) day stint at work, maybe its the fact that football is seconds away, but I am much happier now than I have been in many segemnts of my 20s.  And anything beets the teens.

I am happy for my family… which just got bigger…

 

This is a crazy picture of Libby, our new dog. She’s a mutt, rescued from a shelter.

Onyx was getting restless, so we went, let her play with dogs, and she picked Libby out herself by her actions.  Besides the occasional slip-up, thing are going great!

So, it is my birthday, and Shawn gave me my early present: LEGOs, of course.  Now I have 4 castles, each with 2 of the primary colors the LEGO uses.  Fernando comes tomorrow to start off a fun-filled birthday week, which should have great football, trips to NPs, and partying.  Will post picks from that soon.  By the way, my present to myself:

iPhone!

Sorry for the VAST delay in this post… my three week on/one week off work schedule is getting to me, so I’ve been putting this off.

First things first: THE PICKS.

http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com/pickem/ id:8074

also survival: http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com/survival, id:3450

password on both is: sylmar

Please join!  This is the 16th year, let’s make it sweet!

Shawn and I did a trip to Cali, mainly for Armando’s wedding.  First, we surprised my mom, then we headed to PV to meet the last of Shawn’s immediate family, her Uncle John.

Next, we headed to Ridgecrest.  Onyx and Queenie got along GREAT!

On our way to nocal, I got to show Shawn some awesome places in my old stomping grounds, like Mono Lake…

…and Yosemite.  Like usual, a whirlwind tour, but it was nice, if short.

Next, it was to Lisa and Scott’s, and there place, with new work, was amazing!

It was like a whole new house… big, modern, beautiful.

Onyx got some playtime in with a friend’s puppy… she was so tired one night after playing all day, she wouldn’t even get up to say hello, just turn her head toward you and wag her tail.

The wedding was in the hills north of Berkeley at a beautiful property.

It was really nice to get the ol’ UCLA/Sylmar group together.

The ceremony was nice… a fun mix of Indian and Mexican and American culture.

Probably the highlight was the caricature artist… a great form of entertainment I’d recommend for ANY event!  It was really fun.

It was generally agreed that mine was the best… in fact, the artist put me on his blog.  All in all, it was a fun trip.

P.S. On the way back, we stopped for dinner at this diner, I got offered weed, and other shady folks were all over the place.  But, all of that fails in comparison to seeing this famous FAIL in real life.

I don’t know why, but this makes me laugh every time.

I have a new goal in life: I want to see half the National Parks before I turn 30. So, I’ve seen 23… 6 to go in 3 months. Probably not going to happen, but my latest trip to Colorado confirmed my love for national parks. Shawn and I did our first whirlwind NP tour, seeing 2 parks and several other cool things.

This was Onyx’s first road trip, and she was less than thrilled. The first day in the car was rough.

Our first night was in Colorado NM, a cool bluff Wingate ss.

It had many cool rock formations and vistas and impressive views of Grand Valley and the Grand Junction area.

Onyx still was not impressed.

Next stop was suburbia Denver. I think it is neat, but I’ll take the smaller SLC, thank you. We hung with Shawn’s friend Jeff and did all things Rover.

Highlighted by XORRA buggy racing!

Sure, it was hot, dusty, and loud, but worth seeing… Shawn and Jeff had a friend in the race, but he broke his car… I would have met him, but he was frantically welding it back together for the next race.

Next was Florissant NM, a great fossil bed with lots of bugs, plants, and even coastal-type Redwoods, including the cloned three in the background of this pic.

Onyx finally started to come around, thanks to friends like this Spitz/Chow mix at this really nice rock shop.

No pics from our arrival to Rocky Mountain NP, because Shawn had to finish homework and we didn’t get there until 2 AM! You can see that we woke up to a beauty!

Rocky Mountain NP was spectacular; full of meadows, flowers,

tundra, cirques,

critters,

bigger critters,

and even a friend for Onyx.

By this point, she was really getting into the road trip thing.

The next stop was the Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP.

Maybe the best place on the trip.

Especially the Painted Wall, a 1.7-1.4 Ga metamorphic complex cut by many pegmatite dikes.

All and all, we did a lot in 4 days… I could have used a week more. Next up: a quick CA trip for Armando’s wedding. Oh, and if anyone wants to see if I make the next 6 parks in person, I got a 30th bday celebration: Wendover and Great Basin NP this Labor Day… be there or be square!

P.S. Quick story to add: I was in a second rock shop near Black Canyon. We go in, and I see a big basket of blue/purple/red metallic shiny rocks labeled “Chalcopyrite”. Considering it is my new JOB to identify copper minerals, I new this was wrong. So a brief conversation started.

Me: I hate to be a stickler, but that basket, over there, the one labeled ‘Chalcopyrite’, it is actually Bornite.
Lady: Nope. A lot of people say that. It’s actually Chalcopyrite.
(I made sure to grab a piece that actually had a vein of chalcopyrite)
Me: No, this is chalcopyrite (yellow one), this is bornite (purple/blue).
Lady: Nope, common mistake. That (referring to the yellow one) is iron pyrite.
Me: You know, I do work for a copper mining company.
Lady: Well, I’m not changing it.

I should have left that moment… how ungrateful. I did wind up reluctantly patronizing her. Later, I saw Moqui Marbles (Fe concretions) labeled as clam fossils. I didn’t bring it up, but it reconfirmed how dumb this lady was.

First things first: I am employed! I am working full-time (but in a non-perminent) position with a large mining company in the Salt Lake area (guess who). The hours are long, and the schedule (21 days on, 7 off, give or take) is brutal, but the pay is good and certainly better than unemployment. I am still looking for real, permeant full-time work, and have an interview tomorrow (wish me luck!), had to turn down another consulting job, and found a perfect teaching job if they’d have me.

This is belated, but at the beginning of the month, my Mom was in town to complete the Utah National Park tour after the SW Utah trip last year. We started in Capitol Reef.

We then did Island in the Sky district of Canyonlands,

Arches,

Needles district of Canyonlands (so cool that you can see the ‘Island’ of Island in the Sky from there!)

And the place my mom had wanted to go for decades: Monument Valley. All in all, it was a much better trip with less flat tires, more rain, and I think quite the Mother’s Day trip!

P.S. Last weekend, I went to a Barbershop Quartet chorus concert, and it was great! I bought a CD of this Alberquerque-based group called The Summit… I will have to play it for you all one day!

We had our housewarming party this past weekend, but I forgot to take pics. But now that the house is all ready and made up, I can at least show you the house. These flowers grow outside for some reason.

Here’s the living room.

The cats prefer the cat condo.

Here’s the bedroom, complete with LEGOs, of course. We are worried about how hot this place will be in the summer, but hopefully the window fan/dark curtains will help.

Here’s the kitchen ,which is quite big and nice.

Here’s my little corner with my computron.

Oh, and I brought my Cycad from Cali now that I don’t live in a basement (first time in 2 years).

-Some other notes: just passed 1,500 edits on Wikipedia!
-I go to Moab with my Mom Thursday!
-I got a job! It is a summer job with a large local mining company. Could it turn into more? We’ll see.

Now, the real reason to post: two great YouTube videos that are must see:

This is the best case of premature celebration I’ve ever seen.

This is a animated parody video of the Black Eyed Peas’ ridiculous video “Imma Be” or “I’m a bee”. The song is campy-catchy, but the animation makes the watch very worth it.