Our pets, interesting details

Ah. Finally I update the blog eh? School is nearing a grueling end. We only have one more week and then finals til the semester's end and the beginning of our 2nd honeymoon in Rock Springs. I have done slightly better on my tests than the last ones. Hopefully enough to keep my GPA up so my scholarship is still in effect. Sara's job is not turning out as amazing as we had hoped. She is always scheduled for 20 hours a week but rarely is able to get more than 8 or 9. She goes to work on time and everything but then a few hours into the shift they send everyone home. So to make up for it, I've been trying to work extra hours whenever I can. We're lucky to be in a position where that is possible. Last weekend Sara saw twilight with some friends and I stayed here to do homework with a short break in between for a ping pong tournament. Sara enjoyed Twilight, homework was awesome as usual for me, but the ping pong was terrible. I got beat so severely by a kid that it looked as though I had never played ping pong in my life. Then on Saturday I went fishing on Bear Lake with my friend Kade. We borrowed Uncle Bob's boat in Fish Haven and had a blast. No fish though. On our trip up to get the boat we saw a huge flock of grouse. I can't hunt them in Idaho but it was enough to inspire me to take time off tomorrow to go hunting at temple flat. Thanksgiving will be a nice break for us and a good time to relax and forget about school before we get worked over by finals week.

And here are some random pictures that I took and/or edited of some of our more mundane experiences. We have discovered that we have a lot of creatures lurking around our house. You may remember the ducks I spotted back in July or something. Now we have 2 pheasants, a cat, and a few squirrels too.




Once upon a time we were chilling in the living room. Sara was immersed in Twilight, I was sitting on the couch when I found a scrunchee. Being fececious I thought I would fling the scrunchee up in the air so it would land on the pillow by Sara's head. Well that didn't work because the scrunchee got so high up in the air that it got scared and hung onto the ceiling instead as shown in this photo. Some may argue that I was in fact aiming to land the scrunchee on Sara's head but as the picture shows if the scrunchee had followed its desired and expected parabolic trajectory then it would land 4 inches away from her head. Sometimes you just can't count on physics. The scrunchees are still hanging there too.

And lastly when it rains here the roof and gutter system isn't so hot so we have setup a system to catch most of the water. We call it "The 3 bucket system" Unique huh? They range in size from an ice cream bucket to a dish detergent bucket to a 5 gallon bucket. I'm still considering using the grill. Enjoy!

down with the sickness

Monday this week I got some sickness that has been working me over all week. Monday afternoon and Tuesday I only went to the classes I absolutely had to and the rest of the week I've been weak or achy. I still have it but it's not half as bad as it was. We also registered for classes for Spring semester. Last semester I worked my schedule to have every thursday off so I could go to Wyoming to do on-site work but I have to take a class before I can continue in my major and it's only offered 10:30 on Tuesday and Thursday. If it was at 7:30 I could do both but not 10:30. And that's the only class I have on Tuesday and Thursday. I may have to retake a couple classes too. We had a test in one of my classes and when I left the test I was feeling pretty good about it but then I got the worst score I ever have in that class. I had the same experience with my last math test too but I think I will probably pass that one. Which brings up another problem. If my grades aren't so good I lose my scholarship and have to fork out an extra $700 a semester. Sweet. Work has been really slow this week for me. The architectural firm didn't call me back on Tuesday as they supposedly "promised". I wil try one more time then give up on them. I finally got some work to do today. The only reason I did okay last week was because I got work from when I went on-site. So I'm not sure what's going to happen next semester when I don't have that work to fall back on. We will get a bonus over Christmas break. If one of the on-site companies I work at gets a bid for a new project they are planning to use us for their drafting work and that will happen over the break. We will pretty much live in Rock Springs for 2 weeks. One week before and one after Christmas. Sara will work 1 or 2 days Monday -Tuesday, then come up with me the rest of the week. But, again, that's all dependent on whether this company gets the contract. I will still try to work full time over the break but there's never a guarantee that 40 hrs will be a possibility.

The Adventures of Fred and Sara

A lot has happened since the last update. Mostly positive. We got the Honda back from the transmission place and to our joy it goes in reverse..... and forward! It wasn't half as expensive as it would've been if the dealer had done it and I think we got a good deal. My work became extremeley busy over the past 2 weeks -- so much that I ened up having enough overtime that my paycheck coming this week will be the equivalent to how much we would get if we were both working. So it's like we're not even missing a beat with our income(s). Definitely a blessing of paying tithing. I also made a sales call this week to an architectural firm based out of Logan and I think we have a really good chance of getting the job. It would be so nice to not have to always go to Wyoming to do drafting work. And, having more customers decreases the likelihood of company "slow time". It will still occur, though. If this firm decides to use us for their drafting work then I will get a lovely commission check which makes it well worth all the time I spend soliciting to companies. Today Sara got an interview with a call center that does surveys out of North Logan and got hired starting Tuesday. I think this job will be a lot better for her personality. Payday loan companies make their employees into a different animal. You either have to be really agressive (or mean) or quit. Whereas asking someone to take a survey is a friendly conversation. She also won't have commission hanging over her head. And from initial appearance it seems as though she sets her own schedule. She has to work 4-10 but she can pick 2 of the 3 or 4 days she works (reason: if you work 3 days a week one of the days has to be Saturday -- not so if you work 4 days). She never has to work Sundays either

Tomorrow we are going to the Augustana concert at Weber as soon as I get out of my test at 3:30. We figured we ought to do something fun together while Sara isn't working. Woo hoo!