Sorrel River Ranch

Here are some pictures of the Ranch where I interviewed for the job, as well as some of the surrounding area. Talk about beautiful; these pictures hardly do the area justice! We're looking forward to going wherever it may be we're going next.

Road Trips and Job Interviews

Tom and I got to take a little road trip down to Moab this week for a job interview. I guess we've finally decided that since we're not tied down to any one spot, we might as well have some adventures before we leave Utah. I interviewed for a job at a spa at Sorrel River Ranch just southeast of Arches National Park. We would be able to save a little more in going down there than we already are, and besides--who wouldn't want to work in a beautiful paradise overlooking the Colorado River?

The interview went well and my prospects look good (the spa manager's biggest concern seemed to be that Tom and I might decide we didn't want to move to Moab), but since there were a couple more applicants still to be interviewed I won't get a sure up or down until at least mid-February. I'm keeping my fingers crossed as we start looking at prospective rentals down in the area.

Time Flying and New Year's Resolutions

Wow--is it just me, or did a month just come and go without me noticing?

Holy cow has this ever been a crazy month for us! We didn't end up making it to Seattle like we had planned for Christmas since the weather was so rotten both here and there, but we had a nice time here with my family. We got to talk to Ryan on the phone on Christmas Eve from Mozambique, which was a highlight of the week. It's funny, because most of our gifts ended up getting sent up to Seattle initially, so we're still getting things trickling in every day or two. It feels like we got married all over again, lol.

We're planning on spending a quiet evening doing a whole lot of nothing but being lazy for New Year's Eve tomorrow, and that should be really enjoyable. My first goal for the new year will be to get a short story I'm working on finished up this week and submit it to a magazine. We'll see how that goes; I've been recording audio notes via my mp3 player (thanks Janet and Grandma Fawcett, that's where the b-day money you sent me went to!) and I'm trying to do the drafting in the evenings when I get home, but it's proving more time-consuming than I would have expected to knock out a 7500 word story. Oh, well.

So do any of you out there have any new year's resolutions you want to share? Feel free to comment.

Getting settled and ready to party!

Moving was rather a fiasco, but we're finally here trying to get settled in. We couldn't seem to clean anything at the apartment good enough for management (although most of it was cleaner than when we found it), so we're going to end up paying for it, but it just got to the point where we don't even care. We're really glad to get out of there and not have to deal with the management anymore. Just as a quick public announcement, don't ever live in Brighton Place Apartments in Midvale. They're old and rundown, which means things are breaking all the time. We were able to paint our place up and make it look nice, but living in a third-world crime-filled neighborhood was a little less than preferable. We had people trying to break into our third floor apartment at least once that we know of, and there are always people around casing the buildings out. Over the last couple of months alone a bunch of apartments were destroyed in a fire, the swat team had to come break someone's door down, and there were a few of what appeared to be drug busts in the neighborhood. Fun times....

Anyway, we have a pretty sweet setup now, especially for being at my folks' house. We have a little kitchenette in our bedroom and part of a family room and library as well. Ash is having a great time running up and down the stairs all day (don't ask me why, but she loves it!). Most of our stuff is in storage for now up in Salt Lake. When we're ready to head up to the Northwest in a handful of months, we'll probably do a u-pack and have all our stuff just shipped up there for us (I really don't want to be driving a U-Haul truck through the Cascades; feel free to call me a chicken).

Jeff and Crystal and their kids are due here in the next couple of hours, and since it's Leo's birthday we're going to have a little party (complete with gluten-free cake for him). We're really looking forward to Thanksgiving tomorrow. I hope we can locate the camera to get some pics up of both that and Leo's party :P.

Thanks to those of you who helped us with the move, even though it took longer than we hoped it would. Thank you to all of you friends and family for your love and support. Thank you for helping us reach for our dreams.

The joys of moving

Well, we're getting ready to close out our apartment on Saturday. We're really looking forward to getting out of this complex--the crime has really gone up this past few months. Ash will be happy to get to run around at Spaulding Manor for a few months while we stay with the fam as we get ready to move up to Washington (hopefully in June--keeping our fingers crossed!).

We're looking forward to having Thanksgiving with my family this year down in Sanpete. Merrill and John are going to join us down there along with the family, so a good time should be had by all. Thank goodness for the holidays!!

Indiana Jones and the Dissappointing Audio Book

This was pretty disappointing. I got the audio book, reasoning that it might be fun to able to listen to the movie for road trips and the like. I really enjoyed the movie, but this is one of the weakest adaptations I've read, and I've read a few. Ok, not they're usually all that great. This is competently written, but the author really fails to communicate the spirit of the film, which is what I was going for.

It starts promising enough, showing a scene with Oreana that wasn't in the film and a different opening sequence. I suppose it's interesting enough and sets up the relationship better between Mac and Indy.

The actor sounds kind of ludicrous, like he belongs on a silly Saturday morning cartoon. Sadly, he kind of makes it feel like a silly Saturday morning cartoon. Rollin's cheezy additions to some of the chase scenes don't help either. It's actually kind of embarrassing.

I guess what I learned from this one is how much Harrison Ford's roughed up, aging, reliable image did for that film. The movie works because they remade Indy in the image of his hat and jacket. They fit better now than they ever did. But you won't find that Indy in this book. Save your money and just enjoy the DVD.

Halloween 2008

Okay, I realize I'm really late in getting this up, but with how busy we've been lately I'm pleased I'm only about 3 weeks behind. :S

Here are some pictures from Jon and Jenny Cuevas' party on November 1. The face paint got really old, but we all had a good time.















Star Wars themed costumes for us, of course :D






























Jenny posing for the camera :P


















Rosa as a fairy




















Tom Stafford and Terry Fawsom