April 28, 2014

 

Great Day. To beat the 80% of rain that never came, I went mtn biking in Greensboro as soon as Sam was off to school. The trail was in great shape, empty and the weather was perfect, cool and cloudy. I negative split 3 laps just having fun! A fresh Breuggers Bagel, and home for a nap. The old Tamron 300 f2.8 with 1.4x convertor was still on the camera from the bat photo, so I played while waiting for Sam to come home. Then homemade Buffalo Chicken pizza and Top Gear re-runs. Time for bed!

April 27, 2014

Uncle Ray from New Hampshire gave Sam a new guitar as he passed through North Carolina. What a difference, it sounded so much better than her current one.

April 26, 2014

Kay was standing on the back porch and said, there is a bat. I said yep, we have them flying around, she said nope, in the tree, over there, 50 yards away.  Sure enough, it was roosted in the tree looking for all the world like a dead leaf.... how she spotted it, I will never know.

No we didn't spend the rest of the evening shooting at it! But we did play.

April 25, 2014

Tennis Balls.

April 24, 2014

A nice thing about small town newspapers... they will run a press release.

April 23, 2014

Post tennis ice cream. Us, not her.

April 22, 2014

All in camera.

April 21, 2014

Saying goodbye before 6am : (

April 20, 2014

 

Easter portraits.

April 20, 2014 (Part 2)

So I zone out for a while and next thing I know, they are trying on Deb's wedding dress....

April 19, 2014

Baby.

April 18, 2014

Dogwood.

April 17, 2014

Steph shoots Sam's .22 - notice the water filled things fly!

Loaded....

April 16, 2014

This was the end, too cold, too windy. Time to head home.

April 15, 2014

We knew day 2 would be cold and rainy, so we planned indoor stuff. The morning was dry so we went lighthouse hunting. Oak Island is the nations second newest, finished in the 1950s. We also wanted to visit Bald Island Lighthouse, but the private ferry was over $25 per person, plus $8 to park, plus an admission... so well over $100 to see a lighthouse = nope. After a state ferry ride over to Southport and back, we visit teh NC aquarium.

April 14, 2014

Another vacation and weather issues. We were supposed to camp on the Outer Banks, but cold temperatures and high winds,  forced us to look for another venue.

We redirected to Carolina Beach, it's protected state camp ground and hopefully less wind.

A family tradition when Steph visits....

April 13, 2014

Sisters.

April 12, 2014

A quick test of Monday's Lunar eclipse - Not bad for a 1989 Tamron 300mm f2.8 with 1.4x convertor.
(the first of the Tetrad - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gzgSuJM5O8)

Sadly, I think we are going to be clouded out Monday (Tuesday) at 3am

April 11, 2014

A story of bosses. My boss sets up a light for a group photo of the staff under his boss who is retiring this summer. The photo was going to be a surprise for her except.... she saw my truck in the parking lot and came in just to say hello to me.... That is just the kind of person she is... I am glad I got to work with her and remember there are some just nice people out there.... PS the surprise was ruined.... who would have thought I had to hide my truck ; )

April 10, 2014

Both washed and ready for pollen.....

April 9, 2014

 

I couldn't choose. Shadow vs meeting of two tails. 

April 8, 2014

On the way in for parent night/early report card. Another strong report for Sam, lots of As and except high Bs in Math and Language Arts.

April 7, 2014

Rainy and cold day, all the cats are inside, watching the birds build a nest in our eaves.

April 6, 2014

The overnight temps were in the low 40s, so I thought  nice hot cinnamon rolls would be good in our "new to us" oven. It worked GREAT!

Just like at home, stand in front of the oven when you are cold....

Back on the water - hunting alligators.....

Skunked again.

April 5, 2014

A quick overnight getaway. Merchants Millpond State Park- from the brochure - An "enchanted forest," primitive species of fish relatively unchanged over millions of years, towering bald cypress trees with massive trunks, luxuriant growths of Spanish moss?this is Merchants Millpond State Park. Here, coastal pond and southern swamp forest mingle, creating one of North Carolina's rarest ecological communities. Together with upland forests, these environments create a haven for wildlife and humanity alike.

What it doesn't mention is alligators....  some of the further north in the US. We struck out, but did see, turtles, a goose nest, turtles, a water snake and a bunch of moss.

April 4, 2014

Another one....

April 3, 2014

One of the many sad things about selling the camper was the loss of an awesome kitchen space. Luckily a friend (Clay) gave me this chuck box after he found it didn't work for him. I loaded it up and plan to test it soon... the odd part: A Coleman stove doesn't fit? If you are building and selling a camping chuck box, don't you think the classic 4xx series Coleman stoves would be a measurement you used?

April 2, 2014

The Land Cruiser was impressive today, front and rear locked in 4 Low, it pulled two large logs and two stumps into "my forest" and never even slipped.

One more to go.....

April 1, 2014

I love the fact that Land Cruiser parts still have the "teq" stamped on them. Some days I am easier to please.   - For the non-Land Cruiser viewers - "teq" is the Japanese katakana letters/symbols for Toyota or Toyoda (not misspelled) the founder of Toyota. Another legend is: "The way Marv from Spectre tells it, their family name was Toyoda. Apparently it was considered good luck if when your name was written, in whatever dialect, it was done with 7 pen strokes. So they changed it to Toyota, which gave them 7 strokes. Apparently that was a story he picked up while visiting the Toyota Corp. offices in Japan."

March 31, 2014

I guess I got all the life out of those pads ; )

My first brake job on the 80, inside the rotor is a drum brake for the parking brake.