Treedom, Freedom

Freedom for me is the property my brothers and I own up by Duchesne (Dew-shane).  And there are a bunch of trees there.  Trees take a long time to grow in the desert, even up the side of a mountain.  We have some pretty big trees that must be years and years old.  We’ve got some pretty new trees that I’ve watched grow over the 15 years we’ve owned the property.  We’ve also got a lot, quite a lot, of downed trees that were felled during the days the property was used for logging purposes.  Or ones that just died of age or lack of water.  Either way, we figure there’s enough dead wood on our property that we could burn a fire 24/7 for the rest of our lives and never consume all the wood.  So that’s my first picture; Trees are good for: firewood.

Trees are good for (if you can call it good): wildfires.

Trees are good for: looking cozy in the fog.

Trees are good for: surrounding your bathtub so (theoretically) no one can see nekked in there.

Trees are good for: climbing.

Trees are good for: attracting lightning.

Trees are good for: hiding in.

One small step for feline…

First I want to start out with – No, this blog will not become just one big ode to the cats.  These two cat posts came about because today was the first day of Spring Break for me, and the day I decided I’d let the cats out of the house for the first time.

The plan worked perfectly.  I unblocked the outer cat door and then just went outside to do some work on the car.  It took about 30 minutes before Alan finally realized there was a new thing to discover and started poking at the door.

We had a few false starts, poke the head out, pull it back in, ohhhh, it’s big and scary out there, but I just gotta see how big and scary it really is.  Finally after about 5 minutes of this game he stuck his first paw on Terra Firma.

It was another half hour or so before Alan realized big brother (I discovered watching them outside that Denny is bigger than Alan.  Not a whole lot, but enough to be noticeable) was missing and figure out where he may have gone.

They immediately went to stalking some unknown creature that only they saw.  Might have been just a leaf in the wind, but they certainly looked serious.

Then Alan had to take a nap.  After all, he had been outside a whole half longer than Denny.

And finally go back for a little more stalking.

This was all somewhere between noon and 2:00, it’s now 5:00.  My biggest fear was that they would get turned around and not be able to figure out how to get back in the house.  This doesn’t seem to be a problem, I’ve seen them several times out in the front yard, and then back inside the house.  It’s obvious they know how to get back in, which is what I had hoped for when I let them discover their door rather than bringing just them outside.

Cats

These guys are getting HUGE!  They are already bigger than my last cat ever got, and they are not even 6 months old yet.  Holy cow, I don’t think I’m going to have to worry about any neighborhood cats wandering into the house through the cat door.  With two of them, as big as they are going to be, they will make no bones about letting any other feline know this is their territory.

Anyways, they are still kittens, and as such are getting into everything.  Here are some pictures of the crazy things that I have caught them doing.

This isn’t all that crazy, but this is one of them gazing out my front window watching the birds go by.  I think it’s Alan, but without being able to see the nose I can’t be positive.

This is Denny, lounging in the dish rack.  I think he has a thing for dishes.

Here’s the two of them in a fruit crate.  It’s only about a foot by a foot, I really don’t think the two of them could fit into it anymore.

I can’t tell if Alan is reading about the people hoping to take over retiring Senator Buttars seat, or if he’s looking for a good used car, but he seems to like the newspaper.

Denny, in the background, looks kind of pissed.  The two of them still like to sleep on top of the fridge, using my old camera case as a bed.

Denny is trying to pull down a helium balloon I let go in the house.

Cats love paper bags.  They just need to know what is inside, and the one left outside just has to attack movements inside the bag.

Ohhh, tons of newspaper!  Here they are rummaging around in my recycle bin one day when I was cleaning the house. 

Um, seriously, aren’t you guys supposed to be afraid of water?  Guess not, they were playing in the sink right after I got done doing dishes.

Denny again, taking a nap on the dishwasher door.

Well, tomorrow they get to meet the great outdoors.  I’m sure to get some more good pictures of them, and you are bound to see them on here.  Right now, though, it’s time for me to go to bed. 

T’was a happy birthday.

First I want to thank everyone who wasn’t at my school and still took the time to wish me a happy birthday.  I got bunch of texts, emails and phone calls from family and friends.
I love ya all tons!

In 18 years of teaching I think my birthday has fallen on a school day 5 or 6 times.  It being close to Easter and spring break it normally falls on a day we have off.   My 40^th fell on a school day, as did today.  On my 40^th the vice principal and a few students took my lunch period to decorate my classroom in black, with drawings of me as a decrepit old man, tombstones and other “over the hill” epitaphs on the black butcher paper.  Certainly a memorable one.

This year will be too.  It actually started yesterday when the teacher who shares Stage Crew with me brought this cake to class:

We shared it with the whole class, so we had very small pieces, but I still was taken totally by surprise on this one.

Then today I opened my door up to this:

And this:

A little later, before school started, the three students involved in the decorating, (while I was in a meeting right after school yesterday, they got another teacher to open the door and keep watch for them) came in with a cupcake and a card for me.  They had planned on smearing the cupcake in my face, but since I was wearing a nice shirt that they were afraid would stain, they said they wouldn’t.   I, wanting to relieve their disappointment, told them to come back at the end of school, I’d take off the good shirt (I had a T shirt under it) and then they could smear it all over my face without worry.   Gotta reward the fact that they thought enough to cancel their plans so as not to ruin a nice shirt.

The P.E. teacher had to sing “Happy Birthday" to me during the announcements, so after them a couple students came in from another class with paper and tape in hand and decided to wrap me up.  Here I am trying to “Hulk” my way out of it.

The three students who brought the cupcake were all in my last class of the day.  They brought a cake to class, since they had planned on smearing the cupcake in my face and didn’t want me to miss out on cake.  <sarcastic font>I can’t imagine why they thought of getting a cake with a car on it, but somehow they knew.<end sarcastic font>   It came with a little VW Bug on top, a real metal one with doors that open.

During the last few minutes of the period I got the cupcake smeared in my face.  You may recognize the student holding my arms behind my back as the one who got cake smeared in his face in an earlier post.  I guess it was poetic justice that he got to be involved in this.

So, that was my day, a pretty great one.  And as Alexia said in a comment on my last post; “You can ignore 'em, but you can't escape 'em”.  All in all, I guess I’m glad I couldn’t.

Me