So I went to Las Vegas on the weekend of St. Patrick’s Day. It was fun. A few of my friends from Hawaii went for spring break, so I met them there. It was a very cold and mildly wet 4 hour drive out there through the mountains and across the dessert. It was a good experience though. It was my first time in Las Vegas. I played about $10 in slot machines before deciding that they are just no good. Unless of course you drop in like $50. Then you can play for hours. But in the end, you still end up losing money. Did you know you can play “War” at a casino table in Las Vegas? It was awesome. All that playing War with Jean payed off. Well, no it didn’t. I lost like $20 overall. But it was fun. And if I had walked away a little earlier (isn’t that always the case), I could have won about 175 bucks. Oh well. It was a good trip anyway. We saw “Mamma Mia” while we were there. So that was my fill of Abba for a good long while. Wasn’t too bad though. Not as good as Hawaii Oprah Theatre I might add. We saw Klingons and the Borg. I even went to a buffet dinner while I was there. I think I covered a lot while there. I had a good time. The worse part was the drive back. I left Monday morning (St. Patrick’s day). About 30-40 minutes out, my motorcycle started making an extremely loud noise. At first I thought it was another motorcycle, possibly two, passing me by. But when I realized it was me, I headed for the nearest exit to check it out. As I got off my bike and checked it out I realized one of my mufflers had fallen off. It just up and rattled off. WTF? Right then and there I took the following photo and called Yamaha to make an appointment to get it fixed.

So it was a very loud rest of the drive home. I scared the poor sheep on the side of the highway.

I have a new muffler now. After some hassle with the warrenty people, they replaced it free of charge. Apparently muffler bolts are something that are supposed to be checked at around 4,000 miles. My motorcycle has 2,800 miles on it. Hmmmm. Sounds like their fault to me. Anyway, I have my bike back. It’s shiny. It runs great. It’s fast. And I love to ride it. 🙂 Happy days are here again.

Good old February. One month later. Yesterday was 77? outside and Gavin decided he wanted to try to go in the pool. Of course it was too cold, but he walked around in the kiddy pool for 5 minutes or so anyway. Then we fell back to the hot tub which, in my opinion, was now too hot for the current weather. Gavin didn’t think so. My mom was here visiting last week. My mom, Gavin, and myself went down to Disney on Tuesday and Wednesday. Gavin fought off sleep hard that day. With so much to do in Disneyland, who would want to sleep right? He rode the Star Tours ride twice, watched a Jedi training session, rode the Runaway train, went in a haunted mansion, discovered churros, met Mickey, Goofey, Mary Poppins, Flick, Mr. Incredible, Darth Vader and Darth Maul, watched a Muppets show, flew over California, nearly avoided getting blown up by cannons from the Black Pearl, and a whole bunch more. He had a blast. As did my mom and I. It was really nice seeing Gavin so happy.

After my mom’s departure, I took another drive down to LA for a RSCDS dance. That is when I had my first real encounter with a tubleweed. lol.

It came at me at about 90 mph (my speed plus it’s speed). The wind was incredibly strong and it was advised that trailers and campers not go through the mountain. This created a lard dust storm that lowered visibilitiy no about 20 feet. Yet, people (including trailers and campers) were still traveling along at about 70 mph. Crazy california drivers. 🙂

Gavin is going to have his first playdate today. We received a letter from one of Gavins school mates. It was from his parents and it explained how Gavin and Jeep arranged to get together some weekend to play. So we finally called them and made the arrangements. We’ll see how it goes.

The days creep along quickly.?¿ Hmmm. As we wait for each day to slowly pass to get that letter or wait for that appointment or get that phone call, we suddenly realize that time has moved a bit quicker than we thought and then panic. Then we do it again the next day. lol. It’s funny how something can be around everyday and still seem like a surprise each day. 🙂

Happy 2008! Already this is promising to be a good year. I am happy and there is much to look forward to. Mary has been here for the holidays and it’s been nice. Gavin is loving having her here and we dread the time when he must say goodbye. Holly witnessed the prior parting of them and said it’s a hard thing to bear.

My mom comes to visit in just over a month. It will be a little hectic. I was worried when she first bought her ticket knowing that she would be here practically the week before my lease ends. At which time, Holly will have her apt packed and crammed into mine and will be living with me for the month until we can find a new apt for the both of us. But doing some research and asking questions has made me feel much better about how easy it will be to resolve the living situation. So hopefully by the time my mom comes, we’ll have a place set up already and possibly have stuff moved in. We have a bit more of a plan now. And plans are good. Holly functions much better with them, and they make me stress a little less.

So yeah. Things are going well between Holly and I. And this year will be a good one. Now if I can just get back to open mic night.

The weather peoples predicted rain. Then amazingly, it rained. I couldn’t believe it. And on my way to pick up Gavin from pre-school, I witnessed a Bakersfield rarity. Check it out.

I think I need to sleep now.

No. Really. He fell asleep like that.