Cleaning & Chef Ramsay makes a Grilled Cheese

We spent the morning cleaning. I did laundry and Becky helped the kids clean their room. It looked like a tornado went through it. Emily came downstairs to show me something she found in the room. "Dad, I found this piece of chicken on our shelf and it's been there since I was six," she told me. "Ok," I replied. But then I had to ask myself how she knew that the chicken had been there that long and then I wondered how she even knew that that thing was chicken?
After cleaning it was time to play!




Around 8pm Thomas & Sony came by. Sony played DS with the kids while Thomas and I traded Indiana Jones cards and then watched the scary episode of The Barty Crouch Show. It's great story telling, such a fantastic show. This is the third time I've seen that episode and I still don't understand what's going on.

After that we watched Kitchen Nightmares. In this episode Chef Ramsay was trying to teach the Chef of the Grilled Cheese Restaurant how to properly make a grilled cheese sandwich and cook potatoes.

First the chef deep fried the potatoes and tried to convince Gordon they were cooked in the oven.

Restaurant Manager: These taste bitter. Did you deep fry these potatoes?

Chef: No, dese hava not been deep fried.

Chef Ramsay: They are wrinkled, dehydrated and they have been in the deep fat fryer.

Chef: That's not de-hy-drated.

Chef Ramsay: You're talking to a chef and for as long as I've got a hole in my butt big boy those BLEEPING potatoes have been in the deep fat fryer. Don't BLEEPING lie.

Chef: Look, day went in dee ofen.

Gordon Ramsay: Don't BLEEPING lie.



Then it was time to make a grilled cheese sandwich. The chef would fill the pan with kerosene, throw in the bread and set it on fire. Once the bread was charred black he would throw on some cheese and a jar of mayonnaise.

Gordon Ramsay: What the BLEEP are you doing you BLEEP head? That's not how you BLEEPING make a BLEEPING grilled cheese sandwich. Are you BLEEPING kidding me? You call yourself a BLEEPING chef? Let me BLEEPING show you how to make a BLEEPING grilled cheese and... for as long as I have a hole in my butt, don't you ever make a BLEEPING grilled cheese your way EVER AGAIN!"

Strong Links

In the evening we spent time together decorating baskets and teaching the kids how we can be stronger and closer to each other. We each have a basket now to leave little notes when someone does something nice for someone. It was a really nice activity that Becky put together.

SHAFT gets SHAFTed

Tonight I drove out to the Megaplex 20 to deliver some more laminated 8x10 signs. Corina, Andy and Thomas love our laminated signs. They've become something like trading cards, because instead of throwing them away, they're collecting them.
While I was there Thomas gave me a cool Indiana Jones figure that Larry got for me while he was in Disneyland.

As soon as I got home he went up on my wall and Shaft had to come down. Shaft wasn't happy.

Bug Watchers

Before leaving for work today I found a bug in our house. Before setting it free outside I let the kids study it. They love watching bugs.

Oh look, a DiDi.

Too most this will probably make no sense but Becky & I laughed until it hurt and we were crying. Woah, I haven't laughed that hard in a long, long time.

Happy Birthday

Today was Becky's birthday. We had a good time, especially when she opened her Barty Crouch present.



If this doesn't make sense then you need to read about The Barty Crouch Show.

UP! One Second!

My latest addition to my collection of Thomas Posters all inspired by this photo.


Except that this poster is the first animated feature I've ever used. It just made me laugh when I saw it and it immediately made me think of Thomas. It's Thomas, Josh and his dog Tiger.

Lone tree in the fresh snow

This morning I drove over to the little tree I took a picture of on Friday. This time I took his picture in the snow. I had to keep my balance and slide down a little hill to get to him. That was fun. The hard part was getting back up the hill. I had to use my tripod as an ice pick since the ground was so steep and slippery.




I also took this picture which I entered into a contest. I came in 8th place out of 82 entries.

More snow!

It snowed today and I can't wait for tomorrow. It's going to be great for pictures I hope.

Before Wii Fit

Long before the Wii Fit was introduced, my kids, especially Parker, were already getting plenty of exercise while playing video games. Today we dusted off our original Nintendo and played some old games that I played in my teen years. It's funny to see how video games have changed since then. Even with these old games my kids get a full work out.

Watching movies with the kids

I'm up watching movies with Emily and Parker. It started with Ratatouille and after that it was Kindergarten Cop which the kids have never seen until now.

They had a lot of questions about the movie:
Who's the Kindergarten Cop?
Is he a good guy?
Why's he wearing that hat?
Does he like kids?
If he's a teacher why is his name Kindergarten Cop?
Why is he pretending to be a teacher?
Are the kids in danger?
Who's the bad guy?
Why is he after the Kindergarten Cop?
Is this movie scary?
Why does that kid have bruises?
Is Kindergarten Cop going to beat up the bad guy?
Kindergarten Cop is strong.
Who are those people in the bed?
What are they doing?
What's that guy wearing?
Why is Kindergarten Cop bringing that lady flowers?
Oooh, they're kissing.
Why can't he find the bathroom?
Does the boy live outside?
Is Kindergarten Cop going to protect the boy from the bad guys?
Why is the boy building lasers?
Why does the bad guy have a gun?
Does Kindergarten Cop have a gun?
Where did he get the gun from?
Why did the bad guy steal the race track?
Why is he all wet?
Is the bad guy going to die?
There sure are a lot of guns and kissing in this movie.
Is the bad guy dead?
Is Kindergarten Cop dead?
Is Kindergarten Cop going to get better?
"I liked the movie but there were too many guns," Emily said.

These are only a fraction of the questions they asked me.

The Lone Tree

On my lunch break I went for a drive. Today was overcast and a little foggy and I wanted to get out and shoot some pictures but by the time I took my lunch break most of the fog had lifted. Yet I found these trees and I love trees.

I love to color

I get to "color" every day as Thomas and Sean like to put it, but today I got to color something different from the norm and it was fun. My former boss and friend, Kristy, called me in the morning and asked for a favor. Some guy has been bugging her about his business banner on the Yellowpages website and I guess he hasn't been very nice about it. So I took his horrible photo of a vase and made a banner out of it.



That was ok. The fun part was coloring a Mustang Mach I for another website that needs help.




To say thank you she took me to Spaghetti Mama's where management has changed and now the bread sticks are a little crunchy instead of soft. It was nice to catch up and hear that she's doing good after all she's been through recently. Thanks again for lunch and if you need more banners just let me know.

Later Thomas and Josh called and Josh wanted to talk to me. His favorite Star Wars character is 2-2 and he was wearing a Star Wars shirt and something was licious. I couldn't figure out what he wanted to tell me because Thomas took the phone away even after I said, "One second."

Jamie & Axel came over

Jamie & Axel came over tonight to play. Jamie read yesterday's entry and said that she's never seen Indiana Jones. Jamie has never seen any of the Indiana Jones movies! Can you believe it?!
Oh, correction, she remembers a part of him walking through a cave and when the little chinese boy was walking around. "I've seen a few parts," she told me. Then she went on to say that Indiana Jones is like "The Goonies", like in Goonies when they had to run from a giant boulder. She's telling me that the giant boulder scene was in "The Goonies"! "No, that's Indiana Jones!", I told her and she was doubtful so I had to find this picture to show her that it's not Goonies. 


I had to ask her why she hasn't watched any of the Indiana Jones movies. In my opinion the Indiana Jones movies are some of the greatest movies ever made. Jamie doesn't like westerns or sci-fi movies. No horses, kutschen (carriage), spears, laser guns, people in futuristic latex suits, just to name a few things. So I ask her why she hasn't seen any of the movies and she turns to me and says, "I also don't like whips."

So the only reason why she's never seen Indiana Jones is because he has a whip.

I'm guessing she'd probably watch the movies if he used a grappling gun. Although Indiana Jones wouldn't be who he is without his hat and his whip. Maybe in the year 2020 when they remake Raiders of the Lost Ark they'll have Indiana use a grappling gun and then all the people who hate whips will go see it.

Obama and Indiana

Today was Inauguration Day and now Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States. Being the nostalgic person that I am I went and bought some more Obama trading cards to put in my book.
I also found some Indiana Jones cards. They're cool!

Becky started her NEW job

Becky started her new job today and it sounds like she likes it. I'm sure she'll talk about it in her blog.

Empire Sunrise

Sony's Birthday

I left work at 5:30pm today and hurried home to go out with Parker, Thomas & Sony. We drove around taking pictures.


We made a trip up to Richville. Most of the houses in Richville have between three and ten garages and solid gold doors with doorknobs that are a giant diamond.


After escaping Richville we drove over to the new Draper temple.



Parker and the rest of us were getting cold and a little hungry so we went to IHOP, but by the time we got there Parker was asleep and too tired to wake up.






Thomas & I shared a plate of Nutella crepes. Well... that's what the menu called them.
NEW! Nutella® Crepes
Three egg batter crepes filled with “the original creamy,
chocolaty hazelnut spread”™ Nutella® and fresh banana,
topped with cool strawberry topping and whipped topping.

I need to call the marketing department for IHOP and have them change the menu to:
NEW! Bucket o' Strawberries and Bananas Crepes
Three egg batter crepes with a smidgen of “the original creamy, chocolaty hazelnut spread”™ Nutella® and four fresh bananas,
topped with a gallon of cool strawberry topping and a twelve inch log of whipped topping.

Thomas packed the rest of Sony's chicken strips into a to-go box along with the last piece of our Speck of Nutella crepes.


Today was Sony's birthday so once we arrived home Becky had a cake waiting and some Obama trading cards.

We sang Happy Birthday and talked till 2am about being physically mell.