I think the site has been way overdue for a facelift. Yani is in Reno this week on a business trip and I am having a hard time sleeping. Lat night I went to sleep at 5:00AM and woke up at 6:00. So instead of sleeping, I am taking the time at night to not only redesign (or design it in the first place) the site, but to dynamicize it as well. If I'm not carefull, I may even attempt making it database driven. I did do one smart thing this time though, I actually got some work done on it before stopping to write this posting.

Seven Years. I put on a coat today that is six years and eleven months old. I have a Nephew that is five. Jonathan will be turning four in a few months. This is the third year we have been in this house. My car has been paid off for two years. Cari is one. You know, it seems like a short time really, but I can't really remember what it was like before. I don't think I want to remember. When I look at the whole picture, seven years isn't that long. So many things happened before the seven years. How is it that ninty-three percent of my memory (according to a recent survey of myself) is occupied by the last seven? Makes me wonder what will happen to these seven in seven more. I figure that ninty-three will be somewhere around forty.

I got into my first art show this week. I entered two black and white gelatin sivler prints and they are both now on display in the UVSC library art gallery. Now I am thinking "What was I thinking?" I didn't scan them before I took them to the art show. If I had, I would put some of them up here so you all could see them. One was an aspen tree and the other was an old manure spreader. Of course I called it a tractor because who wants an old manure spreader on thier gallery wall? I got some neat pictures of a little boy this week. Congratulations guys. Like a friend of mine says regarding first children, "Real men have boys". I also finished up working on the new Webstat site. I did the new logo and the layout design for the new site. Too bad they didn't have me optimize thier images, it would load a lot faster.

Follow Up
I got some scans of the stuff in the art show. Don't ask how I got them if they are hanging on a gallery wall.

Well, I've been to busy to write any new stuff for my site for a while I guess. There have been a ton of things happen though. Paul and I put in a new floor in my living room, dining room and kitchen. I couldn't find the right size base board to match the floor so I had to buy some plain wood and stain it to match. Looks good though finally. Fall symester started. Paul and Tiffany moved to Arizona. I joined AIGA. I picked up some contracting work from WebSTAT (my favorite website tracking tool). The new site should be up some time in the next few weeks. Jonathan started Preschool at Lusche's school for gifted children. I cracked my wrist scooping ice cream. Dave and Marie sent me some Docs from England. Thanks guys! Right now, I'm going to go take a roll of photos. Seems like that's all I do now-a-days with two Photography classes. I think it's fun though. I learned how to do some really cool stuff in my darkroom class. I'll put some of those up here soon.

I got my financial aid for Fall symester done today. I was all done with registration too, or so I thought. I am getting my Associates in Photography and I needed to take a certain class that wouldn't be offered again til next summer but it was all full. So I had gone ahead and filled up my schedule with other classes thinking I wouldn't be able to get into it and therefor not finish with my associates by the end of next summer. Well, Today after finishing up the financial aid stuff, I just thought, well lets look and see if there isn't just one more class I can add to my schedule. Looks like one person had either dropped that photography class or forgotten to pay thier tuition on time because there was one seat available. Whooooeeeee. That means I get to take all the classes I want and if I'm not careful, finish my associates by this time next year.

Jonathan and I finally went fishing today. He has been begging me to take him ever since he discovered that you can throw a line in the water and a fish will come out of the water. So I bought him one of those cheap-o $10.00 kids pole reel and tackle sets. Wouldn't you know it, He caught two fish and I caught none. He was pretty pleased with himself. He couldn't quite figure out why we didn't catch any more than that though. I took a picture of his first fish. As soon as I develop the film, I will try to remember to put it up here. It was a 16 inch small mouth bass. Not bad for a first fish. Seems like everyone always gets one of those 3 or 4 inch fish that would definitely get thrown back had it not been a first fish. The kind that only a parent could be proud of.

Yesterday was the end of the summer semester for me. There are still classes going but mine were only the first 7 weeks. I tried to sign up for another photography class but they canceled it because only three people had signed up. I finished up everything for my photography class last week so I just spent the last three days of class blowing up big pictures of different shots that I liked. We did some 11 x 14 portraits of the kids to go in the living room. Last Friday was my last day at SCO as a 40 hour/week consultant. Now I am just doing projects for them bid out one at a time. I like that better cause I can work from home and charge normal contractor rates for them. The drawback is that I don't have vacation or health benefits. Oh yeah, one other thing. I turned thirty.

So far I have shot five rolls of film for my photography class. I don't think I have ever had this much fun with any class that I have taken. I got my new camera. Then I got a camera bag for it because it didn't come with any kind of case. I also got a mini-flexi-tripod. It's neat. Of course, I still have my old tripod. I can't imagine trying to take pictures without a tripod. I still have Pauls camera too. I like having two cameras in my camera bag. It makes people assume that I am a professional photographer. I went and took picture of the eclipse last night. It was neat. I would have liked to have a stronger telephoto though. The lense that came with the camera is only a 28 to 90 mm autofocus. Next I think I need a 100 to 400 mm zoom lense.

Holy Cow! I have never been this busy in my life. Here's a little look into what my daily schedule is like. 6:00 wake up and get ready for school. Eat on the way to school. 7:00 start Math class. 10:15 Get out of Photography class. 10:30 Arrive at work. 5:00, Go home so Yani can go to work and leave me with the kids (which is alot of work by it's self). While I am taking care of the kids, I try to do about 2 hours of Math homework and several times a week, I go shoot a roll of film before it gets dark. 8:00 put Cari to bed. Work on Math because the kids didn't let me get very far earlier. 8:30 - 9:00 Put Jonathan to bed. Go finish my homework. Make sure my auctions are doing ok. Get any shipments ready for the next day. Pay bills and stuff. 11:00 Go to sleep. OK, I really don't get to sleep until more like 11:30 or 12:00.

I started school yesterday. Again. This is the first time I have sat in a classroom with a bunch of students in over 9 years. It's kinda weird now though. In my math class, there are only two other people my age, and one of them is the teacher. In my photography class, there are a few older guys but I think they are just taking the class for fun, not because they are students. Taking math during summer semester may be a little too much though. It has never been my strong subject and we are cramming a full symesters worth into 7 weeks. That wouldn't be that bad if I wasn't working full time and didn't have kids to take care of in the evening. Who knows, maybe this way I'll actually do my homework.

When I was in high school I had an art class where we were required to buy and use an India ink, Tombow roller ball pen for our pen and ink assignment. I liked those pens so much that I started using them for every class even though they cost like $1.85 each and only lasted a couple months. By the time I got married, I could only find one place that still carried them. It was way out of the way so when I would go get some, I would clean them out. One day, they went out of production and I was crushed, so crushed that I emailed the company to whine. They rounded up whatever they had left (like 6 pens of all colors) and sent them to me for free. That was like 3 years ago. I finally found a new pen that I like. It has a nice metal case and takes rollerball refills. I traded a video card for it. Well, I ran out of ink and couldn't find any reference to what to refill it with. So I went to Office Max and busted open a package to try it out because there is no other way to see if it will work. Found it on the first try. It's a Cross Gel Rolling Ball Refill Item 8523. Peace at last. I just hope they don't discontinue these now.

We have finally done it. (by "we" I mean me and my wife) We now own both our cars outright. I was begining to think that we would never actually be without a car payment. We made our last payment a few days ago and should be getting the title in the mail sometime in May. It's funny, my dad would rather go pay cash for an older car that is going to need irregular and costly maintenence than have a car payment on a reliable newer car. Until now, I couldn't quite understand his perspective. Now, I am hoping I can just save up enough money to go pay cash for a newer one that won't need to be in the shop several times a year before my current cars get to that point. All I have to say about that is "Sure am glad my car is a Honda."

Well, I've been contracting for two and a half weeks now. It's funny, I haven't really noticed any real difference in what I do here except that I don't have to spend an hour a day managing my email from the OSG (my former department). Everyone still sends their requests to me for the website. I don't mind, I get to do what I really like to do and don't have to waste my time with harebrained ideas on how to force a square hole (the website) through a round hole (SCObiz). I have decided to go back to school too. I'm not exactly sure what I am going to get my degree in but I have a meeting with my adviser this week to talk about it. Who knows, I may even get a degree in a field I plan to work in. That would be a novel idea.

The other day I was thinking about running a marathon after I get in shape and I mentioned it to Jon. Somehow we ended up looking at a little local triathlon website and we decided that we are going to do one. A full triathlon is a three mile swim, 26 mile run, and 112 mile bike. This one will not be quite that long. I don't want to have a heart attack on my first triathlon. I got laid off Friday. That was kind of a surprise. Apparently, my boss wanted to hire a DBA. Why? Who knows, our group doesn't even have a database to administrate. Well, they wouldn't give her an additional headcount so she laid me off to make room for the new guy. (Probably one of her little rag-head friends that needed a job) What a load of crap. Well, that's OK. Now I am on contract for the marketing dept. doing the same thing I was before. But I also got some severance to add to the annual tax refund bank account growth spurt.

Last week was my last dentist visit in my recent "Reconstruct My Whole Freakin Mouth" project. At the end of the visit, the receptionist says "Well, I guess we won't see you again until your 6 month checkup." It's a good thing too, I had actually considered bringing pictures of my family to hang up in my dedicated room at the dentists office. So she looks at her schedule book and says, "Let's see here, so six months... that'll be some time early next month it looks like." "What the crap?!? Have I been coming here that long?!" I should just bring a laptop with a decent wireless connection and set up my office at the dentists office. Well, I guess I shouldn't be that surprised. I have only spent like $2000 there. I am still waiting for some generous soul to come along and help me pay off my dentist bill. Maybe I will have to actually setup a site dedicated to cyberbegging. Who knows. Maybe I've missed the cyberbegging boat. Just in case though...

For about... mmmm lets see here.... six and a half years, Yani has been trying to get me to go to the gym. I have always said that I would like to but for some reason, I never had quite enough inspiration to go. Until now that is. When the doctor told me that I had a hernia, a bunch of things went through my mind. "Did I lift something that was too heavy? Is it because I am getting too overweight? Was I abducted by hernia causing aliens?" Since I can't remember lifting anything heavier than Jonathan in the last year, (Except a suitcase full of rocks. But that was after I already had it.) and I haven't had any mysterious disappearances, I must be a little too fat. So I have been going to the gym for a little over a week now. The first two days sucked. Then the third day, I maxed out on upper body and pulled a muscle in my back. That sucked worse. Now I seem to have convinced my body that the gym is OK. Now I just have to keep getting up on time.

For Yani's birthday, I told her we were going to go to Leatherby's and get ice cream like we did last year. So as we get it the car and are getting on the freeway, I think to myself "Ya know self, that sure is kinda cheap." Then I thought, "Hey, why don't I take her to McGrath's Fish House." That's where she tried to take me for Valentines but the wait was two hours and we had the kids with us. Needless to say, we didn't end up eating there for Valentines. So we get off the freeway like we are going to get ice cream and I casually pull into the fish house. That was pretty funny. Then as we are finishing dinner, I mention that it was her birthday to the server. So they bring out this birthday sundae and this great fish hat. I have never laughed so hard in a restaurant and Yani actually thought it was funny too.

I can almost walk like a normal person now. Towards the end of the day I start to hobble a bit though. Saturday, I went grocery shopping and it took me two hours to bring everything in from the car. I got another crown. Only one more dental visit. That'll be nice to be done and stop shelling out the dough. I have charged about half of my dentist visits. I read about some people that have started cyberbegging on their websites and I thought "hmmm, maybe I should see if anyone wants to help me pay my dentist bills off." So how bout it? If anyone out there wants to donate money to a good cause (my dentist bill) you can paypal me money at zutroy@zutroy.net. If anyone actually donates, I will put a running tally on here somewhere.

My stitches are located right under my belt line. Hence, I have a real hard time wearing all my pants. I actually had to go out and buy some big sweat pants that fit up around my big belly. Well, I got tired of wearing those (Must be why I didn't have any sweats in the first place) and today decided to wear normal jeans. Boy that was a mistake. My gut is killing me now and it's only 1:00 in the afternoon. How am I supposed to make it til 5:00. Hmmmm, maybe I won't. Maybe.. I'll have to... go home early! yeah, that's not a bad idea. Hans called to see if I wanted to go to the zoo with them tomorrow. He is gunna call the zoo to see if they have a wheel chair I can cruise about in. That would be cool. It's not everyday that you get the chance to run around the zoo like a madman in a wheel chair.

When I was a kid, I had a pretty low tolerance for pain. Ok, I was a little cry baby. So recently, after having so much dental work done and not having all that much pain to deal with, I was thinking, "Hey, maybe I have just gotten a lot higher pain threshold and this surgery will be a piece of cake". Well all I have to say about that is "HOOO-LEEE CRAAAAP". When I came to in the recovery room, I actually remember telling the nurse to shoot me and being quite serious about it. They had already given me as much pain killer as they could and couldn't put me back on the gas for some reason. So they were scrambling to find something else they could give me. Meanwhile, I'm laying over here going into convulsions with my teeth chattering so hard that I thought I was going to break them all. And all the shaking didn't help the pain go away either. I don't know what they finally gave me but the pain started to die down and I got something to hold in my mouth to stop my teeth. Then the doctor comes in and tells me that I have to come into his office the next day. I wasn't too happy about that.

A few months ago, I started having this sharp pain in my lower abdomen. After our trip It still hadn't gone away so I finally went to the doctor to see what was going on. Turns out I have a hernia. I always wondered what it would be like to have one. It's funny, now that I know what it is and that I can push my guts back in where they go, It's a lot easier to deal with. I got a surgery scheduled for next week. I told the doctor that I didn't want to miss any work and he looked at me like " you do realize that we are going to cut a big hole in your belly don't you?" So I am going to take 2 to 3 days off. I wanted to do it on a Friday and stay in bed all weekend. Well, I guess that just means that I won't have any time off left.

Well Christmas was pretty good. We made our own Christmas dinner this year. I think that's only the second time we've done our own. We also invented this really really yummy pumpkin cheese cake. It was so good that I made another one last night and I will probably make another one tonight just to cover for the one that I'm sure is going to get all eaten before anyone else gets to try it. I got a DVD player for Christmas. Too bad the only DVD we have so far is Thomas and Friends - Make Someone Happy. But now I know all the names of all those crazy trains. Thomas, Edward, Gordon, James, Percy, Oliver, Henry, Toby, Donald, Douglas, Ben, Bill, Duck, Diesel, Daisy, Boco, Herald the Helicopter, and Terence the Tractor. Jonathan knows how to get through the menu on the DVD and start it over when it finishes. So we watch it at least 6 times a day.