We have a new rug

I’ve posted lots of pictures and videos lately. But back to typing. There’s lots of drama here at our place. Each neighbor has something going on. Our new downstairs neighbors are stinky, jobless, donkey sex making, smoking, creepy people. The second newest neighbor is already gone. She couldn’t pay second months rent. She spent her one month here mooching off of everyone. Especially her closest neighbor, oldest neighbor. After 3 days, she decided that his house was hers and she should make herself at home there. She walked in, helped herself to the fridge and cigarettes, and even took spoonfuls of things that were still cooking to taste them. She tried to make friends with the locals and apparently has bad judgement. According to oldest neighbor and landlord, the people she was brining home were people that were not wanted here. Including a lesbian girl who spent the night and was disappointed when she tried to put the moves on her and was rejected. This was immediately followed by a brawl. But like, I said, this neighbor is gone already. I just hope the jobless, stinky neighbors follow suit. As for oldest neighbor, he’s been pretty cool lately and isn’t an issue. He smokes, but does so in front of his unit which is in the front of the house away from us. Even when I sit and chat with him, he stands a good 4 to 5 feet away to smoke because he is actually aware of surrounding people. Unlike certain jobless, stinky neighbors. But anyway, he’s pretty cool. He’s been out of work for a few weeks because he’s got some pretty severe pinched nerves in his back and randomly goes into convulsions. So he sits at home and smokes pot and plays guitar. He’s a good cook though. When he is working, he is a cook at the Hana hotel. We get along pretty good.

So yesterday, I managed to buckle Leif’s face into his car seat. πŸ™ I feel so bad. He started to cry immediately. I thought maybe I pinched his finger and was surprised when a small oval white spot appeared on his cheek. Poor kid. I now know what his I’m-desperately-in-pain cry sounds like. Sad to say, I thought I knew what it was already.

I’m making my 3rd batch of beer tonight. It is the same as the last batch I made, only slightly different. I messed up the previous batch a little. You know, too much hops added at the wrong time, too much yeast, boiled to hot, etc. So I’m making it again. It won’t be exactly like the recipe says, but if it is close the the last one, it will be nice. The last batch (as well as this one) is an Irish Porter. It was quite delicious. It is really hoppy and a bit bitter, but it was really good. A real meat pie kind of beer. Yum yum. Next I make a hefeweizen.

Gavin is in Tai Kwon Do now. It’s actually been good for all of us I think. It’s a lot more involved and less “kids” oriented than his karate class in Bakersfield. We do kicks and sit-ups and push-ups almost nightly. Holly and I both do them with him. I’ve been back to using my door gym. Just a few every day. Might not get me crazy buff, but it will help keep from going flab. πŸ™‚

So this past weekend when we went to Oahu so Mary and Holly could go to the opera, I got sick. Bleh. My tooth had been killing me from the root canal and it somehow migrated into swollen glands to fever to lightheadedness to no energy to a 5 hour mid-day nap. It was horrible. It sucked so bad. I was freezing all day long. Even if I was under blankets. I shook at night. I tried to fight it on Friday night while watching Leif and Gavin. I had to walk Leif every 45 minutes to get him back to sleep. And it wore me out so much. Saturday, we went to breakfast at the new restaurant across the street. It sucked. Not just that I was sick. The restaurant. It sucked. My waffle was delivered cold. Mary’s sausage and eggs and home fries were also cold. And the wheat toast they sent us was buttered with a knife that was covered in onion. Ick. I was sick and not feeling all happy and forgiving like, so I sent my waffle back. I wanted a warm one damn it. The rest of the day I was pretty useless. They all went shopping while I slept for 5 hours and then laid on the couch for another 2 hours.

Saturday night we decided to go out to eat at our favorite wanton restaurant, the Kin Wah. It is so good. And this was the night to go. We tried two new dishes; stuffed eggplant and honey-garlic chicken. The chicken was so yum. Right up there with their orange chicken. MMmmmm. On the way in, Gavin made me stop in the parking lot and admire some chinese drums and costumes and what not that was sitting in the back of a truck there. It was cool. I told Gavin that we’d have to see if we can show him a video or something of them in action. But I didn’t have to. Towards the end of dinner, our attention was brought to to just outside the doors by firecrackers and smoke. Then every few seconds we would see dragon heads pop up above a car. It was someone’s birthday and these dragons along with the drums and gong and other instruments made their way inside the Kin Wah and through the crowd towards the back where people from the party started stuffing little money envelopes into their mouths. It was really cool. Gavin wanted to put money in it’s mouth. So granny took him inside and let him stuff a dollar in. He was happy about that. I covered Leif’s ears to block from the noise a bit, but he was annoyed at me for trying to cover his ears. He wanted to see where the noise was coming from and didn’t seem to care about the cool costumes. But he didn’t cry or make a fuss. That was the best dinner at Kin Wah I think I’ve ever had. And we didn’t even have the mongolian beef. πŸ™‚

Ok so I think I dragged on a bit. I’ll let you soak that in while I go get my wort into the fermenter. Good night all.

We should make popcorn every night.

Good times, good times. On this particular evening, Gavin’s favorite show came on. Star Wars the Clone Wars. It was also our night for Battlestar Galactica. So the plan was to bath the boys, get them in pajamas, then we would make us some home made popcorn for the shows. Leif loved his bath. We just had to record the cuteness. How could we not. He was a splashin’ and a playin’ and just releasing complete and utter cuteness. After bathing and changing, we put on some popcorn. That in itself was quite fun. πŸ™‚ I thoroughly enjoyed the show. Take a look for yourself. Best popcorn ever. Anyway, after the popcorn was made all was good. Gavin watched his Star Wars, Leif fell asleep easily and quickly and then we got to watch Battlestar. All is well in the world. Enjoy the videos.

This text will be replaced

After Christmas visit with granny

Here are a few pictures from just after christmas when I came to pick Gavin up from Mary’s. He had a good time playing with the new kitten Tattoo. How cute are they?

Ok, so the last two aren’t from that same weekend, but they were all taken on a trip to see granny. πŸ™‚

It’s teeth time

Leif cut his first tooth two days ago. Directly followed by a second tooth yesterday. Both bottom, front teeth. Needless to say this has been a rough two days for me. He won’t eat because his gums hurt. Therefore, he cries when he’s hungry and when he’s in pain. On top of it, he’s having a little bit of a hard time with filling his diaper. Poor kid. He’s having such a hard time. Poor dad. He’s having such a hard time.

Aloha Winter Workshop

It was a fine weekend filled with dancing, food, dancing, sake, dancing, scotch, dancing, and loads of fun. We had visitors from Washington, Scotland, Japan, and I think Texas. I met a lot of really neat people. I met one guy who was an engineer for Boeing. He also owns his own farm and grows apples, peaches, plums, almonds and a bunch more. He was a neat guy. Anyway, here are a few pictures from the weekend.