I am so grateful to YaYa for her YouTube videos showing me easy hairdos. I tried this hairdo: Heat Free Dolly Curls in Five Minutes.

I followed the directions and it really only took about five minutes and it turned out pretty well. I used Biosilk for my anti-frizz serum.

Sleeping in the curls was just as easy as sleeping without anything in my hair. I was surprised how easy it was to toss and turn at night. The curls basically held, but this morning, I wasn’t so sure they would turn out as well as YaYa’s.

They ended up looking pretty good and it took almost NO effort:

I can’t wait to try her other hairdos!

Update 12-03-11: I still absolutely ADORE this hairstyle. I can do it much better now than that first day and I’ve learned to adapt it for my hair.

• I use hairspray: When I used this technique, the curls looked stunning when I first took them out, but within a couple of hours they would straighten and look messy. Now, I spray down my hair to make it moist, but then I add two spritzes of hairspray to each curl before I roll it up and then a third to the outside of the curl. The hair stays curly all day long and after sleeping on it all night, it’s not crunchy and stiff like it would be if I spray my hair with hairspray right after I take out my curls. I use Aussie Catch the Wave Sprunch Hair Spray.

• I curl the top curl backwards: In the video, she curls the top curl away from her face. My hair works better if I curl towards my face.

• TUCK IN THE ENDS: She says it in the video, but I can’t stress enough how important it is to tuck in the ends. The curls stay nice and tight if you make sure that the ends are tucked in. If you look in that first photo, I didn’t get my ends tucked in properly. I get much better results when I do.

• Sleeping is easy: Since the curls are positioned at the sides under my ears and the top, I have absolutely NO trouble sleeping in them. Unlike other curlers, I have no neck pain in the morning.

• I wash my bangs every morning: If I don’t wash my bangs every day, they look REALLY greasy, so I put on a shower cap over the sock curls in the morning and wash just my bangs in the shower. The rest of my hair gets really dry, so it doesn’t need to be washed every day, but my bangs are different. Wearing a shower cap makes me feel like a total dork, but I have a really cute shower cap, so that helps a bit.

• Biosilk is your friend: I use a dime-sized dollop of Biosilk for each curl when I untie the socks in the morning. It makes my hair shiny and keeps the fly aways from flying away.

I love this hairstyle and in five years, I’m sure I’ll look at all the photos from this time and laugh at the constant presence of dolly curls, but I don’t care. I’ve never had a hairstyle look this good and take such little time. I’m sticking with it until it becomes so reviled that it’s like wearing a mullet.

And even then, I might still wear it…

This makes me sad:

• Tevatron atom smasher’s close in Illinois ends era of big science – The Washington Post

Now, I’m feeling REALLY sad that we didn’t fund and house the LHC. Why should the French and Swiss have all the fun smashing atoms?

I just started a new two year storyline set in Merriton again. You can read it here:

• Merriton – 35 Minutes from Home

I have been planning this story ever since I ended Merriton: Twelve Hours from San Francisco, but it took me a while to get it set in my mind. Plus, I was working on another book, The Secret Heart of Charlotte Lucas, which I only finished a few months ago.

All three of these books will be available in the Kindle store and when they are, I’ll post links to them here.

I absolutely love this forced perspective video by June Bum Park showing hands manipulating cars:

It was so realistic and the hands moving the people and cars reminded me of playing with cars at my grandma’s house. My cousin, Larry, loved the cars and obsessively lined them up in one big, long traffic jam. I always wondered why he would do that when he had the great expanse of carpeting available to him. Of course, I always wondered why he would clap after knocking down the towers we built.

I don’t think I ever understood Larry.

Via: Reality is the ultimate God game – Boing Boing

This advertisement from Swatch from 1987 is pretty impressive.

Rodney Mullen is the skateboard dude at the end of the ad. The music in the background is Jewel by Propaganda.

Here’s one for the Aqua Love Swatches:

Here’s one that features my beloved Sir Swatch right at the end:

Here’s another commercial for the same collection. It’s poor quality, but so was television in The Eighties:

Here is a commercial featuring The Fat Boys for the Limelight Limited Edition Christmas Swatches:

Apparently, The Fat Boys were with Swatch way before my time. Here is a commercial from 1983:

This one features the very popular and elusive X-Rated Swatch:

This commercial from 1989 is beautiful. I don’t think I ever saw it back in the day.

Seeing old ads like these brings such a nostalgia for the Eighties for me. The bright colors, the X-sports, the lipstick-heavy girls and the Swatches all mix in a flux of the past.

I wouldn’t want to go back there, but it feels nice to remember.

Major Harry Potter Spoiler Alert!

If you haven’t read/watched the Harry Potter series by now, it’s really not my fault if I ruin the ending for you. (Continue Reading…)

DJ Tim Hood made this awesome video of the first day of the UTA TRAX coming to Daybreak. Very cool!

TRAX from Timothy Hood on Vimeo.

I’ve been using TRAX to get downtown when Mike has the car and it’s quite efficient. Since we are a one-car family, it’s such a blessing to have the train “take me where I’m going and take me home again.”

I absolutely LOVE this video from Weird Al:

I literally LOL’d it!

I love this little video from Improv Everywhere. They set up a podium and a megaphone with a sign reading,

Say Something Nice

This is what happened:

Sometimes I need to be reminded that people are basically nice.

Via: Improv Everywhere’s “Say Something Nice” megaphone – Boing Boing

I am the mayor of Soda Row on FourSquare because Nina and I walk through it EVERY morning. I see it in the early hours when Swirly Girls is the only shop open, offering coffee and pastries to the Old Biddy Committee who sit outside, judging me every morning.

This morning, I had the audacity to wear curlers in my hair as I walked Nina. I watched one of the old ladies point at me and the other two turned to look. I pretended I didn’t know what they were pointing at and looked behind me as if wearing brightly colored curlers in my hair while walking the dog was the most natural thing to do. They embarrassedly turned away from me, and when I got close enough to them to look them in the eye, I cheerfully said, “Good morning.”

I’ve seen more shoes abandoned at Soda Row, near the splash fountain than at any other spot in Daybreak. The Abandoned Shoe Phenomena is more understandable there because the fountain is a veritable cry to everyone to throw off their flip flops and take a run in the water. In the early mornings, however, the fountain is quiet and dry. There are no children playing in it because they are in school or maybe even still sleeping.

Late at night, the music from the outdoor speakers seems very loud without the din of traffic and voices to drown it out. It plays easy listening music all night long, despite the fact that Mike and I are the only wanderers through its abandoned walkways. Lamphead Man, the huge metal sculpture in the middle of Soda Row, creaks and squeaks eerily, keeping his eye on us as we walk past him in a desperate attempt to get Nina to go potty so we can finally go to bed.

This video advertising Soda Row features the noisy and happy times during the day when children splash in the water and San Gelato serves up iced confections. Strangely, it’s missing any reference to Tio’s, my favorite restaurant at the shops.

Watching this video is strange to me because I usually experience Soda Row at its most quiet times. The serene peace that I feel when I walk through it every morning and evening is a stark contrast to the fun activity that I see there at other times of the day. There are two personalities to Soda Row: Outgoing Fun and Serene Peace. I urge you to visit it for the Outgoing Fun, but if you truly want to take a breath of fresh air, come in the early morning or late evening and experience the Serene Peace.

WIL WHEATON must have been a huge Swatch fan back in the Eighties. Here’s what he said about this photo:

Only five watches? I must have left the house in a hurry that day.

Only one of the watches is a Swatch. It’s the one on the right (his left wrist). It’s called Big Eclipse. I have a perfect one that I posted on Flickr long ago:

I also took a different Big Eclipse and made it into a faux Velvet Underground:

I love seeing these old Swatches in celebrity photos. It just makes me so happy!

My daily walks on the Daybreak trails have found me noticing that others are strangely unaware of simple trail etiquette, so I thought I would make a compilation of the general rules and politenesses of sharing the trails.

Stay on the right and take no more than half the trail

Just like on a road, walk on the right side of the path so that you are not in the way of oncoming traffic and so that others can pass you. If you are pushing a stroller with a friend, it is VERY impolite to walk side by side, taking up the entire trail. If you are walking with a group, taking up more than half the trail is rude as well. If you are bike-riding with friends, you should go single-file so that there is room to get around you.

Pass on the left and announce your presence

You are bound to encounter people who are going slower than you, so a few seconds before it’s time to pass them, announce in a loud voice, “Passing on the left.” That way you won’t surprise them when you come from behind. If you are on a bike or skating, announce yourself earlier and slow down, or, even better, ring your bike bell. If there is more than one person in your group, advise those who are passing how many more people will be passing them soon. i.e. “Passing on the left. There are two others behind me.”

Greet oncoming traffic politely

Look the person in oncoming traffic right in the eye and say, “Good morning (afternoon, or evening).” If the oncoming people are engaged in a conversation and are not polite enough to stop talking to greet you, just look one or the other of them in the eye and nod your head. If the oncoming person is wearing headphones, you can just look at them and mouth the greeting with a smile. The second time you pass an individual, it’s usually polite to say, “Hello, again!” The third time, however, you do not need to greet them again. Just nod politely as you pass.

Watch out for blind turns

There are many turns (especially under the bridges) in which you cannot see ahead of you. Slow down when you approach these turns and announce your presence. If you’re on a bike, ringing a bell before you speed through the turn will warn the people walking that a fast moving traveler is coming. If you are walking, make sure that you only take half the trail, even if your group is big. You cannot see what might be speeding toward your crowd of people, so make sure you don’t get hit.

Watch your kids and pets

The Daybreak trails are not your personal backyard. There are others on the roads, so you must keep your children and pets near you and leashed. There have been so many times when I’ve tried to pass a family on my bike and their toddler has jumped out in front of me. I’ve never hit a child with my bike because I’m notoriously cautious, but relying on others to be cautious around your children or pets is stupidity in action. Additionally, make sure your animals or children are not tormenting the wildlife.

Pick up after your kids and pets

If your child throws their milk bottle (cereal, shoes, etc.) on the trail, it is your responsibility to pick it up. The garbage cans are scattered across the trails for a reason. The same goes for your dog excrement. When you pass the Dogi-Pot station, tear off an extra doggie poo bag and tie it to your leash or stuff it in your pocket. There is NO excuse for leaving dog mess on the side of the trails for others to step in. It is your responsibility to have a plan in place to clean up after your children and pets.

Move off the trail when you stop

Whether you need to rest or you’re enjoying the beautiful views Daybreak has to offer, get out of the way. Others are trying to ride, skate, bike, run or walk on the trail and you stopping on it without moving to the side is incredibly rude.

Be Aware of Your Surroundings

If your headphones are so loud that you cannot hear a person when they announce that they are passing you, then TURN THEM DOWN. I understand that music is very helpful when exercising, but you have a responsibility to be aware of what is going on around you. Additionally, it is impolite to act as if you’re the only person on the trail. If your family is too large to watch each child, then you need to enlist help from other adults or take walks in smaller groups. If you are riding your bike and find that the walkers on the trail are slowing you down, it’s time to find a different route that is more suited to your fitness level. Speeding past walkers without even a warning is inconsiderate and dangerous.

I compiled this list of etiquette rules from various lists on the Internet. These are general rules that have been recognized over the years and work well in other communities. I love walking on the Daybreak trails every day and, for the most part, people are friendly and considerate. There are only a few people who seem oblivious to general trail etiquette and a little education can go a long way.

I am posting this video just so that I’ll be able to find it when I need it. This baby kitten is having a nightmare and the mommy cat gives him a hug.

Sometimes the nightmares come for me and seeing this video will make me feel better. So CUTE!

I can’t stop laughing at this animated GIF:

I just keep watching that turtle bite that cat’s butt and coming away with a mouth full of fur. It makes me laugh over and over!

GIF Via: GIF: Interspecies Love Bites! – Lolcats ‘n’ Funny Pictures of Cats – I Can Has Cheezburger?

Walking around Daybreak so often has left me noticing a strange phenomenon. At least once a week, I find a pair of abandoned shoes.

Once abandoned, they stay there a couple of days until, presumably, they are removed by the lawn care employees.

When I was a kid, my mom would have made me return to wherever I had lost my shoes and retrieve them that very day, yet these shoes stand unclaimed for two or three days before disappearing. Have shoes lost their value over the years? Are they now disposable?

Just last week, however, I found myself walking Nina in the grassy area of Founders Park. It was so wet that my ballerina slippers were getting soaked, so I took them off, shaking off the droplets of water and letting the cool grass soak between my toes. I set my shoes on the stone seat and let Nina run around the grass for a bit. After a few minutes of looking at the scenery, it was time for us to leave.

I laughed to myself as I realized that I almost left, abandoning my shoes…

I love this advertisement from Swatch.

It came out of magazine this month, but it looks so much like something from 1987 that I just had to keep it. The colors are so bright and her hair is spiked so high that it made me feel like I was seventeen years old again.

Nina doesn’t like to play fetch or tug-of-war. She doesn’t chase Elvis around the house or even like to chew on a Kong toy with a treat inside. The only thing she likes to do is take a walk.

This short video of her was taken while walking near the Daybreak Community Center. Almost every day, she likes to bound through the weeds with a smiling joy.

I wished for a dog like Nina and I’m so glad that the two of us can have these quiet happy times every morning.

Sometimes a house is more lovely for how it smells than how it looks. That’s the case with this month’s Daybreak Lovely Home at 11187 Topview Road.

The scent of the flowers flanking the front of this house drew me from across the street. I was walking Nina and we were both particularly tired, but I eagerly went the few extra feet to enjoy the smell of the flowers in the yard.

I also liked the vinyl lettering on the door:

It reads:

Welcome

No Solicitors

The sign is so beautiful that I want to find out where it came from for my own door. Does anyone have any ideas?

I am so excited about the new TRAX line that is coming to Daybreak. Mike and I only have one car, and there are times when we need to be in two places at once. Now that the TRAX line is here, I can go almost anywhere in the city without a car.

Here is a video of the new line from the point of view of the driver:

This will also be handy when I have to leave the car at the mechanic’s to get maintenance. I can just take TRAX home and back when they’re done because they are right on the TRAX line.

Every time I feel a little bored with Daybreak, they add something new to the neighborhood to make it better for me. I’m so grateful to be living here.

I know it’s not the proper response to the death of someone I didn’t even know personally, but I’m seriously pissed off at Amy Winehouse for dying. No matter how I look at it, I’m mad at her.

Maybe she just overdosed and she was a “victim” to the “tragic” disease of addiction. I know how hard it is to fight an addiction, waking every morning just thinking about the next time I can eat. Giving in to it just makes it worse. I’m pretty pissed off at her if she gave in to it.

Maybe she committed suicide so she could be a member of the 27 Club. If she did, then I’m pretty pissed off at her for not living longer and making more albums.

The only way I can think about the death of Amy Winehouse without being angry at her is to think that she was murdered. If I pretend that her handlers, managers and maybe even her family realized that she wasn’t going to produce any more great music, maybe they helped her along the path to death in an effort to capitalize on her 27 Club status, then I don’t have to be angry at her for dying so young.

Stupid, stupid girl.

I was looking at a lovely photo of Wil Wheaton and his wife on his Tumblr blog. My mom looked over my shoulder and asked, “Are they friends of yours?”

I crinkled my brow and answered, “No, Mom.” I held up my iPad so she could see better, “This is Wil Wheaton and his wife. Isn’t she beautiful?”

“Wil Wheaton?” Her voice was confused, so I pointed at him. “Remember? He played Wesley Crusher on Star Trek. We used to watch that show every week together.” Her confused face looked at my iPad, so I added, “He’s an actor.”

Something clicked and her face changed, “Is he the guy who is so mean to Sheldon?” She had made a connection and I smiled. “Yes, Mom! He also plays Evil Wil Wheaton on The Big Bang Theory. And, I think he’s on a show called Eureka on the SyFy channel, but I don’t have cable, so I haven’t seen it.”

My mom looked at the photo again. “He shouldn’t be so mean to Sheldon.” We both nodded and I tried my best to defend Wil Wheaton. “That’s not Wil Wheaton, Mom. That’s EVIL Wil Wheaton. You can tell he’s evil because he has a beard.”

She nodded as if I had said something profound and looked at the picture again. “She IS very pretty.”

You can’t imagine the panic in my throat when I received the email from Daybreak Daily telling me that a home in Daybreak had burned down. Mike and I were in St. George for the Independence Day weekend and we had just seen the news on KUTV showing us a fiery explosion in South Jordan. Daybreak Daily mentioned the specifics about the family, so I knew it wasn’t my house, but we had suffered through nightly fireworks displays of illegal fireworks from our neighbor for the last six months. He had been selling fireworks out of his garage at the Daybreak Community Garage Sale. Was it his house that burned down? He’s so close to us, is our home in danger as well?

Within seconds, Mike found the videos of the burning home on YouTube. The most informative video of the fire has been pulled from YouTube, but has resurfaced here. It showed exactly WHERE the house was (close to Soda Row) and verified that, yes, it WAS our irritating neighbor who set his house on fire. It also proved to us that our home was safe. The fire was horrific, but it didn’t spread to the neighboring homes.

The local bishop and two other ward members discuss the fire as it burns. It’s obvious that the man had a garage full of fireworks. Amazingly, the fire department showed up within three minutes. The homes are so close in this neighborhood that this fire could have been just as devastating as we imagined.

At the 5:45 minute mark, two witnesses talk about it. The speaker in bold saw what happened.

He must have had his garage open.

He did. He had it open.

He did? Well, anyway, I was way over here when that fire hit and this exploded. There was [unintelligible]. And then apparently, some of this must have tipped over or something.

Yeah, one of them hit there, hit over there, hit a guy who was… he went to the hospital.

Oh did he?

Yeah, I don’t know if it was his pants or something caught on fire. He was in bad shape.

Was it one of the guys who was running it?

No, it was one of the guys who was there. There were two: my van and his van. It just deflected off my roof and it hit him on the leg.

According to ABC 4 News, the man who was hit by the fireworks was Ryan Fischer:

“I could hear my wife screaming at me that my pants were on fire, but at the same time I could see the blood going down my legs from my cuts,” Fisher said.

Fragments of the fireworks pierced his legs and was taken to a local hospital.

KSL has yet another video here: ksl.com – Illegal fireworks the cause of 2 Utah fires

FOX 13 actually gave the address to the house: FIRE: Illegal fireworks displays set home ablaze – KSTU That would have been very helpful if we had found it before the YouTube video.

This video was filming the end of the amateur fireworks show when they realize that one of the fireworks had gone into the garage full of fireworks.

Is there anybody in the house?

No.

Fuckin’ kitchen’s on fire. Fuck! Crap!

This next video is the iPhone video that KUTV showed and it has the most coherent explanation of what happened at the 1:23 minute mark:

The guy who was putting on a fireworks show out here, one of ‘em tipped over and shot into the garage [unintelligible] with the rest of ‘em.

At the 1:44 minute mark, you see a grief-stricken woman approach the fire and is pulled away by the firemen.

So, it was just like… and he musta had a lot, I mean, ’cause you can see all these.

At the three minute mark, you can see the fireman approach the house and start to spray it down with water. The fire keeps sparking up over and over with new fireworks igniting despite the gallons of water.

Fireworks are restricted in Daybreak because we have so many dry grass (wild) areas nearby. This guy was doing a fireworks show in a dry field right next to his garage FULL of fireworks. I immediately felt guilty for not calling the police on this guy because people were hurt and an entire home went up in flames, but apparently, had we called the police, we would have gotten the same reception as others did. Here is an excerpt from the discussion on the LiveDaybreak Community Council Facebook Page:

LiveDAYBREAK Community Council This is a solemn reminder of why fireworks aren’t allowed at Daybreak. Our thoughts are with those who were injured and lost their home. Please be safe over the holidays.

Dean Derhak It was a great fireworks show until it went into the garage. Maybe if Daybreak did a community fireworks show residents wouldn’t feel the urge to do this on their own. Sunday at 10:47am

Lonnie Steinke Well then why does DayBreak not enforce their own rules? We have had fireworks going off for 2 days and everyone knows we are not supposed to use it in DayBreak. We will see it through the 24th so just enforce the convenience’s we all agreed to. No reason to have them if you do not have the means to enforce them! Sunday at 11:02am

Lonnie Steinke @Dean…If you want to see fireworks just come to Eastlake and sit on the East hills and you can see the entire valley. Much better show. DayBreak does not even have enough money to enforce their own convenience’s let alone buy fireworks. Sunday at 11:04am

Wendy Memmott That is right Lonnie. I live in the townhomes and had an incident on Friday night. When calling the afterhours line, it is an answering service and they refered me to the police department. I called them, an off duty officer called me back and said, the only reason he was calling me is because he was doing security in daybreak. It is legal to light fireworks in South Jordan and I would need to take it up with my HOA. What good is having so called security if they are not going to enforce Daybreak rules?? Where they were being lit on Friday night, there is NO water sources available so if one of them would have gone awry, more than one family could have been displaced because of one person breaking the rules. Sunday at 11:09am

Wendy Memmott Jo,I tried to alert the HOA office and all I got was an answering service that had no clue. I then called the non emergency police and was told it is not illegal to light fireworks in South Jordan but he wwould go talk to them. I think there needs to be more communication between our HOA and our security. Sunday at 3:12pm

Now, they are talking about taking donations to help this family after the fire and I can’t bring myself to agree with that. Timothy Hood said it best on Daybreak Daily:

Timothy Hood on 03-07-2011 23:48

So, to clarify… The family living in the home where the garage burned:

1. Was renting

2. Did not bother to purchase renter’s insurance

3. Set off fireworks, which is not allowed in Daybreak

4. Set off fireworks which are illegal in the state of Utah

5. Set off fireworks in a crowd of homes next to a field of dry grass

Wants others to pay for their irresponsible acts? How do we know they would use the donations/money responsibly if they prioritize purchasing illegal fireworks over renter’s insurance. The amount spent on those fireworks would have paid for more than one year’s worth of insurance.

As a renter, I am incredibly angry at this guy for giving us a bad name. While, I don’t believe that this guy petitioned for donations, I’m not willing to donate.

In the end, I’m incredibly grateful to all the people who posted the videos to YouTube and discussed things on Daybreak Daily and Facebook. Even though we were miles away, we could ascertain what happened that night and verify that our own homes were safe. There was a horrific fire in Daybreak over the Fourth of July weekend and I hope that everyone will take it to heart when they consider lighting fireworks in our neighborhood.

Update 07-06-11 3:01 pm: This is a video of the NYPD destroying 5,000 pounds of fireworks. I wonder how much that guy had in his garage.

Via: Make: Online | Happy Fourth of July!

Update 01-01-2012:

The house has been rebuilt enough that it looks like the family is back in the home. Oh, and did I fail to mention? The idiot was doing fireworks at midnight for New Year’s Eve. It’s legal in Utah to do fireworks, but it’s STILL against Daybreak regulations.

You’d think that a trip to the hospital for both him and his son would have scared him off fireworks for the rest of his life, but apparently, it didn’t. I think we have a pyromaniac on our hands.

While Mike and I were taking Nina for a walk this afternoon, we came upon the aftermath of an awe inspiring accident on the corner of Daybreak Parkway and Kestrel Rise Road.

I talked to Marcie Hennessy, who works at Nine Salon, and had a front row seat to the accident. She said that the gray minivan was crossing Daybreak Parkway and clipped the Blue Tahoe on the rear, flipping it over.

Considering that the Tahoe flipped TWICE, I asked Marcie if she thought the Tahoe might have been going over the speed limit and she said probably.

They saw children and the drivers of both cars taken away in the ambulance, so all our thoughts are with them right now, hoping that everyone escaped from the accident without injuries.

When I heard that Extreme Makeover: Home Edition was coming to Daybreak, the first thing I thought was, “This is the LAST neighborhood that needs an extreme makeover!” All the homes here are less than ten years old, what could they POSSIBLY makeover?!

Instead of demolishing and fixing an old house, they built a new house from scratch in ONE week! I couldn’t believe it! I really thought they would cheat a little by pouring the foundation early since they take so long to cure, but NO! They didn’t start pouring the foundation until the first day. They used a quick cure concrete that set up in two hours, so they were able to move ahead far quicker than a normal contractor. Heck, my patio took twenty-four hours to firm up and that was on a hot summer day, so two hours is AMAZING!

The security is high in that area. Mike’s brother, Matt, lives on the same street and he needs to have a special pass just to get home every night. Police are manning it day and night to keep gawkers out. They do, however, have a place where spectators can watch the work that’s going on and the Daybreak Facebook account has been asking for volunteers and snacks.

Holmes Homes is building the house and Rio Tinto donated the land for the project. The family has a son with two rare blood disorders and taking care of him has been a burden. Today, they receive the house after a mere week. And it looks like it’s ready to go!

I’ve never watched Extreme Home Makeover, but I’m programming my Tivo to record it now. I’m pretty curious to see how they portray my neighborhood!

I love finding Swatches in the wild. Here is a teen photo of Wil Wheaton wearing a Tonga Swatch from the 1986 Spring/Summer Collection.

I have a nearly pristine version of this watch. I photographed it and posted the photos on Flicker here:

• Tonga | Flickr – Photo Sharing!

I sometimes forget how ubiquitous Swatches were during the Eighties. When I see a Swatch in an advertisement now, I’m completely surprised and it has been years since I’ve seen a celebrity wear a Swatch in a paparazzi photograph.

Photo via: Wil Wheaton SuperTeen, Submitted by lesliecrusher. 

One of the hazards of living in Daybreak is the tourists. We have MANY visitors to our community because of our fantastic amenities, so there are drivers on the road who are gawking at the homes or lake without paying attention to pedestrians or stop signs.

Even worse, when they come to one of our many traffic circles, they don’t know what to do. I have dodged cars going the wrong way on the traffic circle three times in the last two years I’ve lived here and I’m sure I’m not the only one.

For all you beginners, here is how you should drive in a traffic circle.

• You don’t need to stop at the traffic circle: If the traffic circle is empty, you don’t need to stop at the intersection unless there is a stop sign posted. If there is a yield sign, it applies to the cars ENTERING the circle, not the cars within it.

• Traffic circles are ONE WAY: When you enter the circle, you should turn right. If you want to go to the road to your left, you must follow the circle until you reach that road.

• Stay moving within the circle: Too many times, I’ve seen cars stopped dead in the traffic circle, waiting to for an easy merge out of it when they should continue moving and merge out the next time around. This is especially true in the traffic circle by The District.

• Pay attention to the lanes: Many of our traffic circles are multiple lanes. On most of them, the outer lane will be required to exit the traffic circle on the next turn, so if you want to exit the circle later, you should be in an inner lane. On four separate occasions, I have nearly been hit by someone in a lane that was supposed to exit and they have suddenly merged into my lane.

Traffic circles are supposed to be better than stoplights because they slow the flow of traffic. I can agree with that idea, but in practice, they have been a hazard every time Daybreak enjoys a flux of visitors, for example, during the Parade of Homes, summer weekends, and even during the recent Extreme Home Makeover we’ve had here.

If you are still confused, here is a driving video explaining traffic circles:

This video explains it with diagrams, but the rules are for India (they drive on the left side of the road), so the rules are different than in Utah, especially the signaling rules.

Rules of the road via: Roundabout – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ernie says: DO YOU SEE WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU LIVE IN A COUNTRY WITH TWENTY HOURS OF SUNLIGHT A DAY? THIS. THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS.

I couldn’t stop watching it! What is the matter with me?!

I found this photo among my grandmother’s things and I thought it was just beautiful.

I don’t know who it’s a picture of. It’s not any of my grandmother’s three husbands. It doesn’t look like her brother or any of the other men in her life. In fact, it’s so entirely NOT posed that I wonder if she snapped it of a stranger.

Hello, Military Man. What are you doing here among the photos of babies and grandfathers? Who are you? Are you still alive today or have you joined the rest of the faces in this old book?

Our new dog, Nina, is scared and jealous of Elvis, our cat. Elvis just wants to play, but Nina’s having none of it!

I’ve never seen a dog so unwilling to play in my life. She doesn’t like toys and just ignores them. She doesn’t want to play fetch, tug-o-war, or even chew the toys. Elvis has tried in vain to get her to play with him, but she just avoids him or retreats to her bed. Mike and I got her to play with some bubbles a couple of nights ago, but she refused to even look at them last night.

The only thing that makes her smile is a walk. She loves to run in the park and is always surprised when the leash runs out of slack and she’s pulled back. She loves to smell every plant and post along the way.

How can it be that the only play she is interested in is a walk? Is this common?

I love Lady Gaga and I love Weird Al, but I’m strangely disturbed by this video.

You can buy his album here:

• Alpocalypse (Deluxe Version) CD by Weird Al Yankovic at Amazon.com
• Alpocalypse (Deluxe Version) MP3 Download by Weird Al Yankovic at Amazon.com
• Alpocalypse (Deluxe Version) iTunes Download- “Weird Al” Yankovic

The best part of living in Daybreak is seeing the lovely homes in the neighborhood. I was particularly struck with this home this morning.

Many homes have beautiful red doors, but this homeowner matched the door to their park bench.

Few people would think to match the little birdhouse to the color of the door, but it ties everything together.

Even the glass left on the table from last night’s picnic matched. I really felt like I was looking at a house featured in Better Homes and Gardens.

Thank you, Daybreak Homeowner, for having such a beautiful yard. Your home made my morning walk a joy.

I found this article about watches in O Magazine October 2010. It’s basically an advertisement posing as content, but it was nice to see a Swatch in there with all the others:

“I know of a black lab puppy if you would like one.” NakedJen was sitting across from the table from Mike and me at lunch this Friday. Mike surprised me with the answer, “A black lab is too big for us. We’re looking for something smaller.” I had no idea that we had been looking for a dog, but I suddenly realized that I was perfectly okay with the idea. I tried to recover. “You know, the other day, I saw a couple walking their dogs and I really missed having a dog. Not that I was able to walk Sid or anything, but seeing them made me wish I could have a dog that I could take on a walk.”

We talked some more about Jack Russel Terriers and Australian Shepherds before the conversation turned to something different, but something had changed. Mike and I were looking for a dog. As of Friday afternoon, we started looking. We lost a lovely Australian Shepherd named Disco to a family with two kids, but I really think that was for the best because yesterday, we found Nina.

She’s a Chihuahua/Dachshund mix, so she’s bigger than a Chihuahua and much more calm. Here is her picture from the Humane Society:

They also made a video of her to try to get her adopted:

I’m surprised that she had to come all the way from Los Angeles to find us. I imagine she was originally owned by a woman who enjoyed carrying her around the posh places in L.A. When she grew up, however, her Dachshund side made her a tad too big to carry around everywhere, so she was sent away for a different trendy pet. She wasn’t treated badly, she just became too large for the flighty woman’s purse.

Well, she’s EXACTLY the right size for us. I took her for a walk this morning around Daybreak. She was good when we passed other dogs, joggers and bicycles.

She’s never been taught the basics like sit and stay, much less the litany of tricks we are planning on teaching her, but she does know come. Most importantly, she loves a treat, so we’ll be able to teach her how to be a perfect dog for us.

Right now, she’s passed out on the couch after her three mile walk with me. It’s good to have a dog in the house again.

Update 06-20-11: Dr. Lynette verified that Nina is approximately four years old, so we’re considering her birthday to be June 12, 2007. She also got a clean bill of health, so we are so happy we will be having her in our lives for a long time.

It’s dark and stormy again today. We are nearing the end of May and we have yet to have a perfectly sunny day. Sure, we’ve seen the sun come and go behind the clouds every couple of days, but the pure blue skies of a Utah May day have eluded us.

I’m beginning to think that we are to have a year without summer.

Although it’s the first time in my life, this wouldn’t be the first time this had happened. In 1816, the northern hemisphere experienced the year without a summer. The poor crop harvest killed thousands and the endless days indoors spawned such great works as Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, the paintings of J. M. W. Turner, the horseless carriage, and surprisingly even the Book of Mormon.

The last year without summer was caused by volcanic eruptions, but the earth itself is not responsible for our change in climate this time. Let’s just hope we don’t get so bored this year that we spawn yet another new religion. I don’t really think that will help anything.

Update 06-27-11: For the record, summer came, just a little late. It’s sunny, warm and lovely in Utah now. I’m glad we weren’t stuck indoors with rain all season long. I don’t think I could have faced a winter after a year without summer.

A special thank you to Michael Verdi for reminding me of Bill Viola.

Long ago, Mike and I went to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. There was a video installation there and one of the videos was called The Greeting by Bill Viola. In super slow motion, it recreated the Visitation, which is a series of famous paintings depicting the Virgin Mary visiting her cousin Elizabeth. Each woman has wonderful news. Mary is pregnant with the son of God and Elizabeth is pregnant with John the Baptist.

Here is one of my favorites representations of The Visitation by Jacopo da Pontormo:

Here is Bill Viola’s video representation (it’s best if you watch it full screen):

I stood in front of that video screen for so long that my party (Mike, Cory and Kathleen) left me to look at other things. When they came back and I was still watching this same video over and over, they were amazed that I was still standing there.

The focus of the video is Mary and Elizabeth, of course, but I felt such a connection to the woman in the background. She is not pregnant. She is left behind while the cousins share their news. She struck such a chord with me. That brief look of pain that flashed across her face was stretched out in the slow motion and really showed how it felt to be a woman who is childless in a world full of pregnant friends. Even right to the end, you can see the frown of the woman who has been left behind between the cousins.

If I were to point to any one thing that portrays how it feels to be childless when all the world around me has pumped out enough puppies to replenish the Earth, it would be Bill Viola’s The Greeting.

I’m so sad that I can’t really talk about it, but I wanted you to know that Sid died yesterday night.

We came home yesterday at about 4pm and Sid was acting groggy, ashamed and lethargic. There was a tiny amount of slobbery puke on the floor under the kitchen table. He was so changed that we immediately took him to the vet. They checked him out and said that he looked fine, but to watch him over the evening. We took him home and he lay next to us the whole time. After a couple of hours, we tried to wake him up, but he was so loopy that he barely noticed us, so we drove him back to the vet’s. They took his blood and gave him a few X-rays, but while he was on the X-ray table, he had a gran mal seizure that stopped his heart. They tried CPR to revive him, but he was gone that quick.

The doctor did what he could to find out what went wrong. The blood work came back almost perfect. He was slightly anemic, but everything else looked great. The X-rays looked pretty good as well. There was a slight growth on his liver, but a death of liver failure would have taken about three days, not three hours. The slobbery puke on the floor indicates that he must have had a seizure at our home while we were out. The doctor was able to rule out poison and other toxins. Considering the two seizures and lack of other indicators, the vet thinks that it was a brain tumor.

I know we took the best care of him while he was alive. I had Dr. Lynette’s office fax over all his records to the emergency vet and we were able to compare all of his blood work every year for his whole life. We took really good care of him and we rushed him to the vet the second we noticed there was something off about him. He died quickly and without pain, so I’m grateful for that.

I’ve been looking at all my old videos of Sid. Here are my favorites.

On the drive home from California, I snapped this photo of the snow that hit St. George last weekend.

It’s hard to drive from the sunny warmth of California back home to the snowy cold of Utah. The temptation to stay there all winter was hard to surmount this time.

Just a quick note to wish you a happy new year! May 2011 be a better year, by far! Here’s some Death Cab For Cutie, performing The New Year, to ring out the old year and ring in the new!

This video has everything I want for my new year: a nice ride on a bike and a meal with my loved one.

I hope you have a lovely Christmas this year!

Photo Via: Christmas Image by marycafferty on Photobucket

I saw this typewriter at the DI yesterday. I really wanted to buy it, but I really don’t need that sort of antiquated technology cluttering up my house right now, so I left it for someone else to buy. I did, however, take some photos of it with my iPhone.

It made me want to write a story called Hunter Thompson’s Last Typewriter, but I really can’t write something that depressing right now. It will just have to be the title for the photograph for now and maybe someone else will write that story…