My blog has moved!

You should be automatically redirected in 6 seconds. If not, visit
http://clickthegoodnews.com
and update your bookmarks.

Sunday, September 30, 2007

FLYING OVER MY HOUSE



I flew out to Vegas for work on Thursday and had an awesome trip. Not only did I get to almost finish reading Barack Obama's Audacity of Hope book, I was rewarded with some great sightseeing from the plane. First we flew right over my part of town. Check out the horse-track above, only about 5 miles from my house.

With my super-dooper zoom and some cropping, I could also see the office. The white square in the middle is our 'shop', and the building with the orange roof at about 11 o'clock (from the white square) is my office. We are very close to the freeway, and there is a DPS building out my window. The tower is for their helicopter.

Not great photos today because of the haze, but I did the best I could with this photo of my neighborhood. My better Google Earth photos of my Small World. You can see the lake, around which the jogging trail winds, and the bayou that separates my neighborhood (above the bayou) from my parents house (below the bayou).

I could also zoom in on the construction site that sits behind my house. * so depressing! *
We quickly left Houston and were off to Vegas....

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: I'm so amused by the little things, like flying over place I *know*.

HAPPY (BELATED) BIRTHDAY GRANDPA



My grandpa turned 80 this past Wednesday. Quite an amazing thing. I went to his assisted living place to visit him and take him a card & some cupcakes.




It's been really difficult to see both my grandfather and grandmother these past few years, as their health declines rapidly and they are no longer the merry-grandparents of my childhood. I have great memories of the times he's let me "fish" in his tiny fishpond, of all the delicious BBQ he cooked and the great vegetables he'd grow in his garden. They would save all their cans so I could recycle them, and then use the money when the ice cream man came down the street.




My grandmother has been in and out of hospitals since July of 2006 with complications (a Staph infection) from her knee replacement surgery. Just a few weeks ago she had it replaced again and is under-going physical therapy in hope that she can walk again on her own. My grandpa has been living (mostly by himself) at this assisted living place very close to our house.




He loves all the little old ladies and all the great food they feed him, but he misses grandma very much. He's always a bit confused about which hospital or rehab place shes in, but I too am confused by her ever-increasing medical history and complications. I try to visit him and my grandma at least once a week. Although the visits make me sad, I try to remember how important and special any company that they receive is to them.


GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: I'm so blessed to have had a such a wonderful grandfather growing up.

Saturday, September 29, 2007

CROCKPOT CREATION



I usually try to do as little cooking as possible when making diner. I've found that I fell in love with my crock-pot off my registry. The guilt of not using a gift finally motivated me to give it a whirl.


The makers of the Slow Cooker Liner are genius! Not only do I not have to cook, I also don't really have to clean!




I also personally LOVE the way a crock pot's slow simmer spread a tasty aroma through the whole house.



Of course, our first crock pot meal with pot roast. It was SOOOO yummy with all the potatoes and carrots. What's everybody's favorite thing to put in the slower cooker? I need more good recipes ;)

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Handy kitchen gadgets let me faking cooking quite well.

CONSTRUCTION UPDATE


We've tried to plant as much as possible in our backyard to cover up the freeway. I knew we were in trouble when they cut down the few trees on the other side of our fence back in early August. By the end of August, they'd cleared all the grass and had leveled the land.


On August 10th, I left to go running at 5AM and I could hear the concrete trucks pouring. They have pretty much been pouring constantly since then.


We're still trying to decide which concrete is going to be the building and what's going to be the parking lot.


We were worried that these square things below that they had framed out would be bright lights pouring into our backyard. We were very relieved when we figured out they were just drains.


The picture below is hard to figure out, but the left edge is the top of the concrete wall that I peek over. The board on the ground is how close (I assume) the parking lot will get to our wall.

:((




GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: We're off to float the River today!

Friday, September 28, 2007

CARNIVAL AT NIGHT


I'm getting waaaay behind on blogging, with another jam-packed weekend coming up, so I'll throw out a 3rd Fair post, after the rodeo, cows and sunset.

One of the things I was most looking forward to at the fair was taking some fun night photos at the carnival with all the lights.


It was great to see so many people- young and old, black and white, country and trendy all enjoying some good old fashioned fun.



The absolute most fun of all was the Ferris wheel. Although we didn't get to ride, I had tons of fun taking photos.


There was several rides that had great lights. I have not rode any carni-rides in years. I don't think I have the stomach for it anymore.




Oh yea....this would be a barf-machine for me.



Before the fun starts!



This ride reminded me of my whirlwind weekend.




This one made me neauous just looking at it.


Who knew carnival rides could be so fun, even without riding?


GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: I'm back from Vegas with some great photos.

COUNTRY SUNSET


Slightly out of order, but these were captured right before the big Rode and as we were watching the opening festivities.


I hated being stuck in the stands and I was dying to get some sunset shots framed by a few cool things. Alas- I was resigned to sitting on a metal bench, watching a young obnoxious girl with a glittery, spandex outfit prance around with a shooting sparkler fireworks display.

After the sunsets, the sky and clouds turn fanciful shades of pink.

Yea...gotta love the wonderful arena lights that I was resigned to have in every shot.


Hurry up and get dark already- I want to go to the carnival at night!
GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: There's always something just a little bit better about a sunset in the country.

SMALL TOWN RODEO

Not the best photos ever, but the best I could do in the very low-light and the fast-action. I grew up going to the Rodeo, and EVERY fair has a rodeo- no matter how big or small.

Frankly, the old I get, the less I enjoy the rodeo. I *get* that it's a SPORT and I *get* that it represents a profession of a mostly by-gone era in American history. I guess I just watched 8 Seconds too many times and I've heard too many sad country songs about the rough life of a rodeo cowboy. I question why anybody in their right mind would choose to do it.

For those of you unfamiliar with a standard rodeo, it usually opens with some big show by girls on horses with the flags. Following the national anthem and a prayer, the actual cowboy events kick off. The timed events include calf-wresting (cowboy on horse chases calf and jumps off to wrestle & tie it up), individual calf roping, team roping (2 cowboys on horses where 1 ropes the head and one ropes the heals) and barrel racing (the only women's event). Scored events include bareback bronc riding and bull riding (always the *BIG* final event).

Of course, the BEST part is the children's event called a calf-scramble. It involves up to several dozen young calves being turned loose in the arena with about half the number of FFA students attempting to chase them down and bring them back to a center square. The kids usually win a scholarship for their fruitful efforts, and the crowd is treated to riotously funny event.

After seeing dozens of rodeos in my time, I quickly grew board with this one. The bright carnival, with all it's enchanting lights was calling my name and begging me to take me camera out to play.....
GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: I wouldn't last one day as a real-cowboy (or girl)!

Thursday, September 27, 2007

SOME COOL COWS

Our fun at the fair continued with the livestock show, where kids from the local FFA chapters were showing their cows.

Late in the afternoon of the last day, it was down to final judging. All the kids were so cute bringing their cows into the ring to compete in its respective class. The cows seemed pretty excited- at least by all the drooling and foaming and other bodily functions going on.

This particular cow kept licking his lips, and then finally let out a loud "MOOOOOOO".


We stayed for a while watching the cow beauty pageant, and in the end the most adorable girl with her gigantic cow, and his perfectly poofed tail won the grand prize.
GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: The FFA programs that teach kids to raise an animal are so awesome for instilling great values into our younger generation.

FUN AT THE FAIR




The first part of our big outting to the Washington County Fair & Rodeo was the animal portion of the event. The cows at the livestock show are getting their own post ;) They had lots of educational things for the kids and a petting area. I don't think I've even seen a deer this close before. Poor little thing! It was so tired and just wanted to sleep.





This goat was doing the typical goat thing and eating everything and anything.



As any fair regular knows, you are really going only for the food. The choices here were outstanding and I was consuming some awesome food in minutes!



Look how happy I get when I have a Texas Tator Twister and steak-on-a-stick. Soon to be followed by the world famous Blue Bell icec ream- Oreo flavor none the less.


There was a cool exhibition of tractors at the fair too. They had several hundred tractors of all vintages and makes. Some were from around 1900 and still functional. The engineer in me was fascinated by this.


H & my step-dad wanted to check out the rabbits, chickens and turkeys. I can't even imagine what their conversation entailed.



Next up- the cows, rodeo, sunset and carnival at night.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Small town Americana still exists.

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

H's HISTORY




I want to take some blog time to start telling my husband's history. It's complicated and many parts of it read like a novel made for TV. I want to know him and his history more. I want our (very distant future) children do know where their parents came from. A tiny bit of background to get us started. H's mother lost her parents when she was a teenager, and she got pregnant with H when she was 16. She started working after H was born, and H was raised by his great-grandmother.



After playing around downtown last Saturday, he wanted to show me where he grew up- just outside of downtown. His whole family lived on a street in (what's now) Houston's 1st Ward. There was a row of houses that he would migrate between. Those houses are all now gone and replaced with Houston yuppie 3-level homes- bleh!






They eventually all moved to this block of Shearn. The top photo is the house where is great-grandma lived for a while. He has memories of family gatherings out on the porch and break-dancing in street. The now empty property next to the blue house was where the Cantina stood that his grandmother managed. He's got many very *interesting* stories about growing up in a Mexican cantina, and how his mother forbid him to go there as a child.

Above is where the bakery made fresh bread everyday when he lived there. He said his (great) grandmother also lived there for a while too. The old sign still hangs, but it's been many years since any bread baked. The great thing about this neighborhood is that it has an amazing view of downtown Houston.




This little abandoned building is where H remembers getting some of his early haircuts. Shortly to be an Italian restaurant.


Thought I'd throw in a Google Earth map. I'm not sure what date the photo was taken, but 1st street where he lives looks like the houses have been torn down already. The new construction hadn't been built when the photo was taken.


This outing really makes me want to go back and visit my childhood places- homes, school and parks where I spent my formidable years.


GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: My husband overcame much diversity to be an amazing man.