turkey day

Thanks giving a time to remember. Remembering my vacation with Alexi down at "the Port" (the beach house of Papa and Sharron on the Lagonna Madre just outside Port Mansfield, TX)."Wow, the ocean," Alexi was so thrilled and interest in the water. Had to keep a watchful eye on him because he kept trying to crawl over the edge. Into the rough and choppy waters.

Standing at the edge facing into the bay, time for introspection. Time slowed nicely in the Port.

Now it is thanksgiving day. I wait, Alexi naps, the Bird cooks. Soon friends will show and a party will begin. Not quite the family gathering though, only Christy's mom is here. My Dad and Sharron remained in the Port. They too enjoy a mellow holiday. Same with my Mom and Rob. Neither parent making the turkey feast, just keeping it mellow.

Mellow has been our approach, bird went in early and is just on low heat now. Christy's squash-mushroom soup made and gently stewing. Judy's fruit salad slowly blending flavors in the fridge. Time for introspection and rest.

Soon though, the guests will show. The bird will be carved. Food served. The party will begin.

The Electronic Miracle, sort of

Suppose one could say it was bound to happen.

There I was a fishing from the dock catch the "specks." Below is a pic made from the iphone of me papa, tossing the plastic for the salt water trout. The "plastic" are glow in the dark shrimp mimics and they are hot for the hooking when used under the green floodlight in the late evening.
I was out on the pier, chatting with the papa and we got pretty worked up in some conversation that I am now forgetting. Was it lamenting the big one that got away? or was it the discussing the principle of green (490 nm) wavelength radiation maximally stimulating aquatic photoreceptors horizontally throughout the foodchain? Not sure,.... never the less, I was on the pier and was stepping back as part of a rod casting to stick the plastic out into the sweet zone. As my back foot was going down it just clipped off the back edge of the deck. realizing I was going to take a drink, I sprung backwards with the front leg that was still on the deck. This was a rather reflexive action that would allowing me to land on my feet out in the water. But the jump also gave me time to think. In the air, I realized my cell phone was in my pants pocket.

Let me ask you a question:

Do you think a cell phone and salt water are a good mix?

Is 310 osmolarity of charged electroltes a good thing for electronic devices?

....NO! being the obvious answer, I splashed down into mid thigh deep water. Quickly grabbing for the phone, I had trouble releasing it from its now dripping wet, zippered pants pocket. Many explicatives later, I finally freed the phone, but it was too late, the iphone was dripping with salt water. After running to the house to splash with fresh water and then frentic flinging out any residual liquid, I tried to shut the phone off. It refused to switch off because it auto restarted after powering down. About 10 trys latter it finally succeed in switching off (...or did it just give up the ghost and die?). I became emotionally drained from the subsiding adrenaline rush, so we decided to go to bed and I would deal with it in the AM.

The next morning hooked it up to data transfer to my laptop. I wanted to see if I could extract my photos off first, because they were the only items not automatically backed up. It fired up and I was able to get the pics. Even more miraculously it still surfed the internet and did email. Audio was dead upon attempting to use for a phone call, but I was quite surprised it had any functionality at all. The next day though was another surprise as it took a phone call and the audio had started working again. Now the only thing still not working is the camera. I have not tried the ipod functionality yet, but that would be unlikely to be impaired if memory access functions are still alive.

This has been a mixed blessing though,. The phone has retained enough functionality so that I no longer have a good excuse to get the new "3G" iphone !!!????#@$#.

christy reports from china

Back in SLC now. As I mentioned in an earlier post, part of the reason I snuck out down to Texas was Christy joining a Medical Ambassador exchange program to China for two weeks. Here are some pic she sent that need posting. Below we have the obligate photo-op at the Great Wall of China.
Here we have exotic cuisine (yes those really are scorpions). She did not send a photo of split duck head soup (thank goodness).
and here is amazing shots of the acrobatic troupe.
christy thinks this is where they get those amazing gymnast (or is it where they go after gymnastics?)

Gma NaNa n Doodle enjoy readtime

Alexi n da YaYa

Bug was bonding with g-pa while lazing in sun.

Patch clamping

The dog (patches) and alexi are good buddies. That's papa in bkgrd.

Beachhouse hanging

Booger digs the AM action on the deck. Been swiming. Now napping.

New place does not have Internet yet so blogging from phone.

Flying alexi

Terracotta Army of Mischief

Just dropped Christy and her mom, Judy, at the airport. As part of a national medical ambassador program, she and her fellow doctors are going over to China for a cultural exchange of medical information. Her itinerary is Hong Kong, Bejing, Shanghi, and a stop in the interior at Xi'an where the terracotta army was found. This is the clay army of 8000 that the first emperor had burried with him when he died. Guess he was being a nice guy, bucking the tradition of having all his army, women, and slaves to be buried with him when he kicked the bucket.

With the many cultural trips planed, it sound like a once in a lifetime opportunity for Christy and her Mom. I am jealous and I gave some serious thought to going, but traveling with Alexi at 16 months on a 15 hrs flight was just too intimidating. I like to think of their trip as a reconnaissance mission. Go get a taste of what interesting things travel to China can offer us in the future.

To test the travel waters with Alexi, I have scheduled a get-out-of-town while Christy is gone. I head of to the Texas gulf coast for a week to visit my dad in his second home at "The Port." Papa, the avid (or is it rabbid) windsurfer, got himself a waterfront property on the Lagona Madre outside of Port Mansfield. He and Sharron head down to the gulf regularly. Fishing (Sharron's passion now rubbing off on Papa) and windsurfing (crazy Papa only), are two very fine activities down there.

To join them in two days will require a 3 hr flight to Houston then 1 hr to Harlingen. I am a bit fearful/dreadful towards this travel. Alexi is an active little spazz, but he does not comprehend self restraint. Keeping him happy and out of mischief is likely to be a difficult/impossible task.

I hope my fellow passengers will be understanding.

Scary green dinosaur

Geared up Alexi in a dinosaur outfit for Halloween. The significance of the holiday escapes him, but he sure likes the attention from mom and dad laughing at his cute get up.Took him over to Chris and Em's, as their street in the Avenues is prime harvesting the candy. Up and down the street in the radioflyer was just about right for him.
The major concept in Halloween was a bit confusing at first. We'd put the bucket in his hands, he like that. But then he would cry, when we tried to hold out his bucket for him to receive his treat. Took a few houses to realize that we were collecting things in his bucket.

Nearing the end, it turned out a rather meager harvest for him, what with parental food inspection/tax and all.But hey, give the kid a break. At 16 months, this was pretty much just a practice run for latter in life. He will have plenty more years to reach that professional status. Remember? when we would score huge hauls by the time we were 8 or 10.

Being a "practice run" Alexi grew tired very quickly.
And he was not sure what to think of the crowds of scary, ghoulish kids that pass him by.