Max and His Adventures

Max was riding his bike to go see a friend that lives down the street. He was riding on the sidewalk, which is a good idea on our street since there is so much traffic, and the sun was getting low on the horizon behind him and creating terrible glare for drivers coming up our street.

At the same time a real estate agent was turning onto our street to show a house at the end of our block.

Max went into the shadows of big tree next to the driveway and the driver never saw him.

He tried like hell to stop and even had the presence of mind to take evasive action, swerving into the driveway to try and avoid her car, and he ALMOST made it. She hit him in the pedal and knocked him off his bike and on to the driveway.

One of Max's friends came running up the street to tell us that he had been hit, as she and her babysitter had seen the whole thing. The abject terror that I felt when she yelled up our stairs is not something I'll ever forget, nor are the thoughts that were flashing through my mind as I was sprinting down the street to the scene with Amy and Tycho chasing me.

Annika, on the other hand, stayed at the table and finished her yummy brownie.

Max got scrapes on his elbows and knees, but is otherwise OK. He learned something important about speeding on sidewalks and always being aware of your surroundings.

I'd like to go to bed now, but sleep is not coming easy tonight...

Because It's There

Kamiak Butte Aug. 2009

Lopez Island is the place...

Surfin' Bird

Planes of Priest Lake

Yes, I define the word...

Priest Lake 2009

There are days in which this is a struggle

...and I'll call those 'weekdays'...My goal in the near term is to write in this space every couple of days, with random thoughts and what not. Longer term, I would like to write at least a couple hundred words a day here, if for no other reason than to get my creative blood flowing, I have the aspiration of writing a book about my experience with cancer and fatherhood and this might help with that. One thing I have been ruminating on is the veritable twitsplosion we have seen lately. I have a long diatribe/rant fulminating in my brain pan but something about a long online rant about an online phenomenon isn't clicking just yet. We had a good weekend of playing around, soccer, and just being a family.

Amy and I got out to see a movie this afternoon and took in The Soloist. It was an excellent film. The acting was top notch, I have to say that Jamie Foxx walked all over Robert Downey Jr. in their shared scenes. Which is saying something because Mr. Downey Jr. was in very good form in this film. But what stood out to me was the direction and the cinematography. The director took a very good human interest story and made it very visually interesting as well. The movie would have been good with just the actors on screen, but the director made the visuals of LA a big part of the story telling as well. We really enjoyed it and I highly recommend it.

Nice Weather and Sunburns

We spent the weekend in Pasco for and 110 year birthday party. It was a combination deal and a good time was had by all. Max and I stayed in Pullman for the morning on Saturday to play in his game. The team is playing pretty good soccer and doing a lot of the right things, but there is still a lot to learn and to teach to the kids. Gary has built the kids a tree house down by their garden and they absolutely love it. So do the neighbor kids, especially the ones that are right at our kids ages and there are no other kids in the neighborhood. These are the kids that come over to Peggy and Gary's house asking when the boys will be back to play with them. They are really nice kids and they all get along really well. The best thing is that they have a battery powered John Deere Gator that they load all their toys in and drive over to the house once they know the kids are there. It's a sweet ride.