We moved into our house 10 years ago this coming weekend. It was new construction. When we bought the house we were assured that our siding (Omniwood) was not defective like L-P siding. Turns out it had similar problems. Our neighborhood got together and went after the manufacturer. We got a $14k settlement, which was almost enough to put cedar siding up. Experts said that as long as the Omniwood was installed and painted correctly, it would last forever. Ours seemed to be in decent shape, so we left it on the house. As neighbors have moved, they have replaced the siding with HardiPlank or cedar. Two neighbors put up vinyl. Our Omniwood has held up fine. We painted about 5 years ago and now it’s due again. We are doing it ourselves. It has been light gray, we are going to try a dark gray with white trim.

RockStar:INXS should be great tonight. Jordis is singing “Imagine” and Suzie is singing “Bohemian Rhapsody.” One of the guys is doing “Wish You Were Here”.

Today is my brother-in-law Jim’s birthday.

Camping was fun. The kids had a blast. Especially Grace. She had 4-5 little girls her age to run around with all day. Since she doesn’t have a sister, this was a special treat. I put a bike computer on Dylan’s bike so he can see how fast he is going. He has logged 30+ miles in the last two days around the campground. I borrowed a friend’s Kawasaki KLR 650 to commute to work from the campsite. Loved it. Long, windy and empty country roads to fly down.

Dylan wakeboarded for the first time this morning. Gavin got up on the wakeboard, but promptly bailed off. Saw a bald eagle. We are off to a church campout until Saturday. Shannon made a few batches of delicious wild blackberry jam.

My nephew Jake turns 16 today. He’s been bitten hard by the cycle bug, too. Here is a picture of Jake (dark helmet) and his brother JT (light helmet) riding a 105 miles around Utah Lake.

Another day on the boat another lesson. The boat will only go for 5 hours at full throttle with 10 people, food and beach stuff on board. We thought we would have to drop some people off on a beach while we took others out to play. Turns out we managed OK with everyone staying on the boat, but it burns gas faster and we ran out 400 yards from the dock. Once again we were saved by some kind hearted people who pulled us to the dock. Lake Merwin is about 25 miles from Mt St Helens. Beautiful lake, gorgeous day, just needed another 15 gallons of gas.

Great afternoon/ evening on the river last night. We went back to Sauvie Island. It’s time to get a map…we keep getting lost and spending too long driving around looking for the boat launch. Each time we go out we learn new things, sometimes the hard way. Things we’ve learned: our boat will never plane with 6 adults in the back, the outdrive needs to be all the way up when taking the boat out of the water, 3 hours on the boat is just enough time to get warmed up…kids can easily go all day and wet towels on the floor stay wet. Once we were on the river it was all good. Finally got my own wakeboard on Craig’s List. Now I can give back the one I’ve been borrowing all summer from Dave. Got Grace, Gavin (1st time for him), Dylan and Gracie’s friend Emma up on skiis. Saturday we’ll finally get in an all day boat trip. We are hoping to go to Lake Merwin near Mt St Helens.

I’m now 1 1/2 steps closer to getting a motorcycle. We got a 4 piece sofa, loveseat, chair and ottoman set from Costco. It came while Shannon was gone. We can now get rid of the aging blue sofabed. Tonight we picked up an area rug at Costco. Next on the list is hardwood floors. That’ll take a while.

Jordis continues to impress on RockStar:INXS. It was “unplugged”. Tonight she did “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door”. Her cover of “The Man Who Sold The World” (breathtaking!) was #1 on MSN’s music store list. They don’t sell to Macs, so I’m “borrowing” it. Mig killed with Peter Frampton’s “Baby I Love Your Way”.

If you go to a regular pharmacy and they give you the wrong antibiotic, you may never know. However, if your radiopharmaceutical injection has sulfur colloid in it instead of Choletec, your spleen lights up instead of your gallbladder. It used to be called a “misadministration” now it’s called a “dispensing error”. One of my staff pharmacists made this mistake yesterday.

Grace is 3 ft nothing and weighs 40 pounds, but she held her own as the one girl with the six boys under 9 years old. She gets up on waterskis, does flips off the diving board, made it half way up the 30′ climbing wall and goes head first down the waterslides. Usually she went and did it after the brothers and cousins had given up, forcing them to try again. I’ll put some pictures up when Shannon gets back next weekend.

Canada was great. The weather was about the best we’ve ever had up there: sunny and 85-90 degrees. Saw lots of seals, tons of cantalope sized jellyfish in huge schools, just under the surface, but no bears this time. Gas was $1.08 per liter…almost $4/ gallon US.

Finished “Long Way Down” and “A Short History of Nearly Everything”. Both excellent.

Check out Rockstar:INXS on CBS Tuesday night.

July 31, 2005 Happy Birthday, Dylan!!

On Dylan’s day he chose floating around Lake Cultus on our raft as the day’s activity. It was a gorgeous day and a beautiful setting. For lunch Dylan chose White Spot (“B.C.’s favourite neighbourhood restaurant”). Dylan got a cool bike for his birthday a few months early.