Zoo Trip

While Dad was fulfilling a life long dream, Dillon and company went to the San Francisco Zoo.


From left to right: Carolyn, Christina, Michelle, Warner, and Dillon.


Dillon really loved the zebras and giraffes. He is also an expert in the sounds of bears and lions.


"Mom, this thing is uglier than Otis." Dillon was the only toddler brave enough to hand feed the goats.


He must like his tractor at home a lot better.


Aunt Michelle and Dillon in front of the polar bear pen.

----------------
Now playing: Colbie Caillat - Battle
via FoxyTunes

Mission Accomplished

Dillon, Christina, and I went to the Bay Area this weekend. James was able to snag four free tickets to the Reds-Giants game. We were able to convince the Cranchs to also come over because Paul had never gone to a baseball game before. James also invited one of his old small group guys.
Here we are after the game. From left to right: James, David, me, Paul. It was fan appreciation day at AT&T Park, which is why there is a Toyota truck parked at second base.


After the game it was announced that all fans were allowed to run the bases. This is the first time I had ever heard of adults being allowed to participate. Normally, it is only children that is allowed to have the joy of pretending to be a major leaguer.

James went ahead of me to set up shop with the camera. The ushers standing by all the bases kept repeating, "No sliding!" My goal was simple: ignore the ushers and do something every baseball fan dreams of, sliding into home plate. As I rounded third, an opening was created. This was my chance. I could slide into home and not disrupt the other fans.






Team Nixon 1. Giants 0.


----------------
Now playing: Mat Kearney - Crashing Down
via FoxyTunes

Railtown 1897

Last weekend Grandma Sharon and Papa came to visit Dillon. Grandma Sharon has always wanted to go to Railtown 1897 in Jamestown. Grandpa Mike and Grandma Ginni decided to join us for our trip. The historic park is home to an old steam engine that takes visitors on a 40 minute trip. Here is our journey in pictures.


Dillon is anxious for the train to start moving.

Papa taught Dillon that the train goes "Choo Choo."

Of course when the train really did go "Choo Choo" Dillon got scared.

Dillon on one of the cabooses used on the set of Back to the Future III. Most of the movie was filmed up near Sonora. Here is a good scene that shows the part of the train tracks we were on. (We have another connection to the Back to the Future trilogy. Christina went to school with the kid who hands Marty McFly his guns in Part III. She also babysat the baby that played Marty's grandpa.) Railtown has been used in many other movies and tv shows. The famous water tower in "Petticoat Junction" is one of the first things passed on the tour.


Father and son working together.


This cuteness could stop a locomotive dead in it's tracks.

The Office Game

It appears The Office has created a fun online game. It allows for groups of fans to run a branch for Dunder Mifflin and earn Schrute Bucks.

Here is what you do: Go to DunderMifflinInfinity.com and sign up for an account. Apply as a regular worker in the Upland, CA branch. Use the worker code htokuksnn2 to get into the group I set up. If we are the first group to get 15 workers then we will run the branch.

Go now and sign up. And get as many people as you can to join.

Click this

I've been absent for the past few days because my parents left today. They have been here since Thursday. If there was one thing my mom taught me it was to "never blog when you have company." I will post pictures of their visit later in the week. For now I have some awesome links.

***

Can you find the 38 Seinfeld references in this picture?

***

Another awesome robot.

***

Homer meets Darth Vader.



***

When I hear "In the Air Tonight" by Phil Collins I previously thought of Vice City, now I think of an guerrilla.

***

Internet People! I think I may have only seen half of the references in this song.

Internet People! - The Meth Minute 39

Add to My Profile | More Videos

***

Here is a clever site in response to Miss Teen South Carolina, and such.

***

Today I found this awesome Firefox add-on called FoxyTunes. It allow you to control your music through your browser. It's much better than toggling back and forth between the internet and iTunes. I can even show what song is playing as I blog (see below.)

----------------
Now playing: Jack Johnson - F-Stop Blues [2000]
via FoxyTunes

A First Time For Everything

On Saturday my buddy Tyler took me and Paul out on his Sea Doo. He has an awesome three seater that is great for tubing and wake boarding. (I know what you are thinking. Three guys stuck on one Sea Doo, gross. It really isn't that bad. The key is being the driver or the guy on the back because he has to face backwards. You don't want to be the one in the middle of the manwich.)

Many times in my life I have gone out on a lake with the intentions of learning how to water ski, wake board, or knee board. Many times in my life I have wasted hours of everyone's time trying to get up and out of the water. But Saturday was different. Saturday I go up on my third attempt. I was stunned.

I didn't want to bring my camera out on the lake so I don't have any pictures. However, there was a guy standing on the shore filming me.





Update. Paul got upset because I didn't mention that it was also his first time to wake board. He wasn't quite as graceful as me.

Labor Day

Christina, Dillon, and I joined the Cummings, Evans, and Cranchs at Pinecrest Lake Monday for a Labor Day picnic. Grandma couldn't resist sharing her icecream with Dillon.

Summertime at The Office

My buddy Paul pointed me to this new video for The Office. (I would embed the video but I am having trouble with YouTube.)

Picture Show

Pictures of Dillon's trip to Shafter last week.

Dillon sure loves his little cousin. And Kaleb loved watching Dillon and Taylor run around Grandma's house.

His first trip to the beach.


Grandma Sharon walking Dillon out to the ocean. Christina said he loved it so much that he threw the biggest fit when they tried to leave.

Before his first haircut.


During his first haircut.

After his first haircut. Papa insisted on taking Dillon to get his first haircut because his grandpa took all of his grandsons to get their first haircuts. Soon enough Kaleb will be sitting in the barber's chair.

This picture was taken after he returned home. Dillon thought it was funny to put this over his face and walk blindly into the couch. I guess he spent too much time with Pops.

No Link Left Behind

A couple of links I left out of my last post.

***

For those of you who don't have cable but love Star Wars, I give you Robot Chicken.

***

Pugs with attitude.



***

I will be back soon with pictures from the trip to Shafter.

Links - Home Alone Edition

Christina and Dillon have left me home alone for the week so I thought I would spend some of my free time passing along links I found interesting.

***

I heard Dana already has tickets for this baseball game.

***

Speaking of baseball, here is a cool map of the United Countries of Baseball.

***

Here is a list of 52 influential photographs. (Warning: some photos are graphic.)

***

Ed was the one who rickrolled me first but I thought I would show the video side by side with the hilarious Family Guy clip.





***

Maybe I can get Dillon a role on Lost when we go to Hawaii in November.

***

Finally, it took me a couple of tries to conquer this maze. You definitely want your sound on because once you beat it they have a pretty humorous clip.

Weekend Fun

Last night I sat down intending to blog about our trip to the Bay Area. Instead I encountered a crashed computer. After an hour or so of hassling, I figured out how to fix it. But it looks like someone already beat me to the weekend rundown blog post (by the way 1,000 times in smashball is only possible if you are counting by tens). Oh well, here is what we did.

The weekend started on Wednesday for Dillon and Christina as they headed to Menlo Park while I stayed at home to work. Actually, I didn't even get to stay at home. My Thursday and Friday was spent in Sacramende sitting in meetings all day.

Friday after work, Mike and I drove over to a house Michelle and James were house sitting. We arrive to find Dillon pigging out on some watermelon.

Saturday was spent relaxing by the pool and playing tennis. Dillon loved swimming in the pool and dunking on the basketball hoop. (Warning the following picture contains a bare baby butt.)


On Sunday we got up and went to church. Then James and I played some wiffle ball at the local park with a couple of his friends. They weren't ready for the knuckleball, riser, and sinker as I had Gagne-like eight strikeouts in three innings pitched. We then loaded up in the car and started the two and half hour trek back up the hill.

This upcoming weekend will be spent in Shafter where hopefully I can continue my dominant stretch over Dana and John in wiffle ball. Oh yeah and see my family.

Dillon and Otis

Dillon has learned that he is just the right size to ride Otis. Most of the time Otis just runs away. Every once in a while Otis is too tired to move. This was one of those times.

We turn our head for one second and Dillon has put Otis in his cage and climbed on top. I'm telling you, this kid is a little monkey. He is constantly trying to climb on the couch, barstools, Otis' cage, or someone's back.

Strike a pose!

A Wii Bit of Fun

This weekend we got a Wii. I know what most of you are thinking, "Jimmie, you have a PS3 why did you buy a Wii?" The answer is simple: I got a great deal on it. You see, I had $205 worth of Best Buy gift cards that needed to be spent by the end of October. I was able to talk Christina in to it by telling her you can download classic Nintendo games, like Super Mario Brothers and Zelda, onto it. She also liked the idea of me only spending $45.

I would have bought it sooner than this weekend except Best Buy never had them in stock. Finally, I was able to track one down in Merced. We spent the weekend with our friends Paul and Caroline playing tennis, baseball, golf, bowling and boxing. Good times.

For now I only have Wii Sports and Wii Play (I only bought this one for the extra controller). For those of you with a Wii (or have played one) please leave me any suggestions on games to rent or buy.

How do you like them apples?

Dana tried to make a joke about the best Dodger manager of my life so I will take it one step further and present this headline from The Onion to prove to him that at least my favorite coaches can stay alive: "Pallbearers Move Bill Walsh's Coffin Down Church Aisle In Series of Short, Precise Passes."