Home for the weekend with the folks and the kittens

Obnoxious

Brindel

The Heiner homestead weather's in the storm.

Obnoxious doesn't know how to whisper secrets.

Leaping before the great snow explosion.

Me and Ma at the homefront.

Ma, Pa, an me at Heiner's hideout.

Pa and I in front of the ol' heat barrel.

Me and Obnoxious outside in the new snow.

My mighty snowball and I showing reverence for one another.

informative dialogue

Someone: What have you been doing lately?

Me: I've been climbing a whole lot lately and doing a bit of hiking. It's really been a lot of fun.

Someone: Oh.

Me: Do you want to see some pictures I've gathered?

Someone: I guess.

Me: Okay. I'll post them either above or below this conversation.

Someone: Uh.

Me: I did my first multi-pitch climb two days ago with my friend Joe in Big Cottonwood canyon.

Someone: Oh, cool.

Me: Do you know what a multi-pitch climb is?

Someone: No.

Me: It's a really high climb where your rope isn't long enough to get you to the top in one length so you have to have one person climb up a ways and then belay the person at the bottom up to them and you continue like that until you get to the top.

Someone: Neat-o.

Posts

A blog post is a lot like a fence post. Installing (if you will) each one requires that you do a bunch of crap that you don't really want to do. Fence post- dig a hole, make sure the hole is wide enough and deep enough, make sure there are no rocks in the hole, feed the hole, put the hole through college etc. etc. Once you have the hole all set up for a successful future you have to deal with the post itself. Combine the hole and the post, make sure they get along little dogie, make sure they complement one another. You have to see to it that the post is standing straight in the hole. You then get to start with the dirt and rocks and whatnot with the then refilling of the hole and accompanying post. Then you've got a blog post- dig up all of this crap to say, try to make it entertaining, maybe you should add a picture. Make sure the picture and the thoughts go together. Actually type out the thoughts into words. Use spell check a bunch because you never seem to remember how to spell the same words you always misspell. Actually upload a picture. Wait way way way way way way way way to long for that damn picture to upload and heaven forbid if you try to upload a video. Realize that you're probably still misspelling words because spell check doesn't seem to be on anymore. Discover a spell check at the top of the page and run it on the whole thing. And there you more or less have it. I could make this much longer and ridiculous but herein lies some of the reasons for my not posting more often. Also I'm lazy which may be what I'm saying anyway.

Boston Cream Pie for breakfast?! Uh huh!!

What will they think of next?!

Two months Later and back in SLC

I had high hopes for consistently posting. "This time" I thought but alas my habits oft repeat themselves. One of which is that I eventually write again so I suppose it all works out. I'm back in Holladay and I'm working for a non-profit organization called CCF (Cottonwood Canyon Foundation) that works in conjunction with the Forest Service to maintain the trails and wilderness areas around the wasatch. Keeping the watershed clean by keeping people out and away from it (by providing trail routes that are far enough away from it) is one of our primary goals. We are funded by grants, the majority of which comes from Snow Bird, one of the Ski resorts in Little Cottonwood Canyon. We operate with the help of lots of volunteers. Several of these are from eagle scout projects, others are members of different organizations that put the trails to good use and feel it important to give something back to them. I've really enjoyed working for CCF and am amazed at the vast beauty that is so close by and all around throughout all of the canyons and Mountains in this area. I keep intending to get out and do a lot of hiking on the trails around here (most of which I'm unfamiliar with) but have yet to do it. I did hike Mt. Timpanogos a couple weeks ago which was a great and beautiful hike and I'll be hiking Lone Peak on Labor day which is next Monday. I've also been able to get out climbing a few times since being back in the states and hope to keep that up at least a couple times a week. I'll be climbing in big cottonwood canyon tonight and might possibly even do a multi-pitch route which I have never done yet.


Other Biznass

playing Mario Brothers on my computer and getting very very angry at the game and it's constant insistence on cheating me.

Hanging out with Amy. She took me out for Sushi at Jasmine last night for a postponed birthday dinner (I turned 29 on August 21st) and then I sprung for the dollar fifty movie of Kung Fu Panda just because I'm really generous. Sushi was super exquisitely delicious as always and I really liked the movie.

Occasionally longboarding (usually with Amy and Chris and Jess also)

A bit o' swimming

Enjoyed watching Olympics when they were on

A little slack lining. I just set it up in Dax's back yard a couple nights ago and Amy and I had a BBQ with him and Heather and the kids.

More pics around the lavra

The beautiful Kiev Lavra

These are some of the awesome pictures that I took when several of us teachers went to a beautiful area in Kiev called the Lavra. The word lavra means underground monastery. This area of Kiev was founded around the 11th century by spiritual people who wanted seclusion from others. My knowledge of it is rather sketchy so even the small bit I do know can be questionable but this is the output from the small bit of information I was given and my poor memory. The area has several churches and cathedrals and as I was beginning to explain, several tunnels with rooms and small cubby holes. Several people considered highly spiritual or otherwise prestigious or deamed worthy are burried there (or rather mummified, but naturally, not by any chemical means) and can be seen in the tour. It's a really cool place. We carried bees wax candles for light. The women wear shawls and men are to have no head wear. We were only allowed in a small section of the tunnels and unfortunately I don't have any pictures of it because it wasn't allowed. I did however get a plethora of great pictures from elsewhere in the district (or whatever you'd call the area). These posted are just a small sampling but I'll post more. Everywhere I walked was entirely picturesque and I couldn't stop taking pictures and videos until I had used all of my memory card. This may have been fortunate because then I didn't have to feel guilty for not taking any more pictures of which were hundreds more to be taken. I loved all of the architecture, which was accompanied by beautiful paintings and perfect shades of greens, blues, reds, whites which aided in my inability to put my camera permanently in my pocket. I was just as intrigued with all of the people wandering around and tried to sneakily take pictures of countless others without being caught. You'll see that I didn't go entirely unnoticed by the revealing looks of some of those caught in the pictures.