The fish died

Our lame fish died. I think he costs us about a dollar a day. I think we murdered it by feeding it too much. But that is just a guess. He will best be known for eating really loudly and sitting underneath the toy bridge. I've attached a picture of his tombstone.

In other news we had a real funeral to attend. It was for Rachel's cousin Jeff. You may remember that Rachel wrote about him on this blog a long time ago. When somebody has lived a good life, funerals are such spiritual experiences. Jeff's family was so strong and amazing.

Today Rachel and I went to the park and played catch with a baseball. Rachel did take two off the leg, possibly leaving bruises, but she caught most of them. The hard part is she tells me to throw her pop flies, but I know she's going to get smashed in the face with it. But I do as I'm told and more often than not it works out. The most impressive is how she would throw the ball a quarter mile. She almost threw it over them mountains. She's got a cannon on her.

Our New Baby

Coming up on our one year anniversary, we decided to add a new member to the family. His name is Mr. Sprinkles. He is an Oranda Goldfish. For you non-fish people that means he was not as expensive as the $14.95 fish but more durable than the $.23 cent fish.

He is the perfect addition. He is not grumpy, and doesn't seem to have any expectations that his life will get better.

I wanted to name him "Puppy" or "The Dog" but Brett wasn't to keen on that. So Mr. Sprinkles suits him well enough.

Welcome home Mr. Sprinkles.

broken streak

I hate to write an entry and lose my streak of pretending like I don't have a blog, but alas, time moves on & I need to make changes. And as graduation approaches - I come to a realization. I need a job. So since we are not planted anywhere so I might get a regular teaching job (and the fact I secretly hate teaching- no offense to Bubs who I will eternally respect and admire for being good at it/liking it) I have been looking for a job.

That was probably the worst idea I've ever had. Over spring break I contacted someone who I thought would be a pleasing retired old fella to help "spring clean" at $8/hour. It seemed like a good rate, that is, until I got into the 4th hour of pine needle raking. You see, that was after I was prancing on top of his roof with a rope tied around me, sweeping the pine needles off. As dangerous as it was, I thought it was fun. I didn't know at that point I would be raking the needles up after I pushed them off. Oh my nieve ways are always my downfall.

Anyways, I don't mean to complain... however I do want to clear up one crucial item. Cleaning chimneys IS NOTHING like they show on Mary Poppins. Unless of course if by using brushes they really meant using a 20 foot rope with 40-50lbs of chains at the end, and by dancing and singing they mean crowched into the top of the chimney and choking on carcinogenic dust - THEN YES- its just like on Mary Poppins.

But on the bright side I think I got a job with a man who prunes trees. He doesn't believe in bucket trucks or machinery so he repels in the tree. All I do for now is watch him from the ground, pass up tools to him, and read propoganda he wrote about being a vegetarian and a hippie. Just kidding, but not really.

The picture at the top is what I will look like at my new job.

Windy City

I spent a few days with some of my friends in Chicago. We did a pretty good job of packing in the sights and sounds. One of the most impressive things is that despite not being any sort of video game player, I ended up the champ in both Tiger Woods Golf, and whatever the NBA basketball game is called.

I also was able to go on the world's fastest elevator to the top of the Hancock building. The poor man's Sears tower. I looked across Lake Michigan and saw Michigan City, my former mission area. We then looked down upon a helicopter hovering over traffic.
We got caught in some wind and some snow, but were still able to pretty much own the city. We bought a city pass, it had 5 activities for $50, so we had those activities going for us. Second City comedy club didn't disappoint, neither did the deep dish pizza, or the art museum. I saw that painting that is on the cover of the old Masterpiece board game, turns out is was painted by Rembrandt. Who knew?

Last night Rachel and I really treated ourselves. We drove about 40 minutes west, out to Helmer, and enjoyed a famous Helmerburger. It is in a town without even a stop light, and it is the best hamburger in the world. If you are lucky you will have one.

Battleship luck?

Rachel made s'mores the other day. They were off the hizzle. I was eating them constantly for 4 days.
I don't know how Rachel beats me in Battleship so often. I don't get it. She says she reads me like a book. I find it completely lucky, but I can't explain the 7-game winning streak.
The amount of basketball I play has picked up over the last few weeks. I'm headed out the door right now. We like to play at the Staples Center. It's the perfect place. It's the new stake center behind Staples, hence Staples Center (also the name of the place the Lakers and Clippers play).
I'm headed to Chicago with some friends in a couple of weeks. It's with the Federalist Society, which I am not apart of, but I hurried and joined when I saw that we could go on a trip for cheap. It'll be me and 3 of my other friends from here. It'll be a 5 day adventure.

Dirty Street Slush

Matt - you need to official change the link on your blog from "Rachel's blog" to "Rachel never writes, but sometimes Brett will blog".
The weather has finally stopped spazzing out. I do not die instantly anymore everytime I go outside.
Rachel is stuck in the other room with the visiting teachers...They are officially wrapping up because I heard the famous phrase, "Is there anything we can do for you?" Don't think I don't say that everytime I go (which by the way is 100% for this whole school year).
Since I don't have anything interesting to report, I tried to post a file that Fox News did on my friend Charles' crew. But I couldn't figure it out. If anybody knows how I can put that on this blog let me know.
The only other thing that I can think of is how I beat Rachel at Hokey Golf by like 80 stokes.