Cooking Disaster

Okay, so sometimes I can be pretty dumb, and this was one of the dumber times. Bethany and I were getting dinner ready (some kind of cheesy potato stuff in a casserole dish). The potato stuff called for boiling water and so I started up a burner (or whatever they're called when they're electric). Well, it seems that I started the wrong burner by accident, and it was the burner under our glass casserole dish. I noticed my mistake after about a minute, and promptly removed the casserole dish and put it on another empty burner. About ten seconds later, it exploded all over the place! I don't have a picture of the point of explosion, but I think this will help illustrate:

I did manage to get a picture of the aftermath of the explosion. Shards of glass were all over the place. We're lucky we didn't get any in us. It was pretty crazy.

I guess there's a lesson to be learned here. For me, it's to always make doubly sure that I'm starting up the right burner. I think the other thing I'll take from this is to be careful not to rapidly change temperatures on glass cookware (that, or completely avoid glass cookware).

Ant Weirdness

Okay, so I've gotten really lazy with this whole blogging thing. It's a good thing nobody reads this right? Anyway, we had this really weird thing happen to us this Sunday. On Saturday night I had noticed a couple ants crawling around my computer area (one was on my laptop). "Uh oh, I must have left something out!" I couldn't find anything though.
Well, the next day, before church, I noticed even more ants. I decided to do a little more detective work and found a very small line of ants, but I couldn't see were they were going. "What random half-eaten snack could they be munching on?" I thought to myself for dramatic effect.

It was dark in that small nook where I found their line, so it was hard to make out the odd shape that I saw on top of my external hard drive power supply (say that three times fast!). What was it, a small mound of dirt? Had they moved all the yummy snackage to this one convenient spot? Well, in a way, they did (that is, if you like that sort of thing--and some people do!).

On closer inspection (by which I mean taking a photo of it with my camera) -- I'd like to take a moment here to increase the dramatic effect of my story, and to point out how I could have told this in like two sentences, were it not for my need to keep you from seeing the pictures below, so as to increase the suspense -- I found that the yummy snackage was in fact ant larva. Yes, yummy, yummy ant larva. Behold:

Apparently, the ants, desperate to get out of the chilling cold of the St. George climate (yes it does get cold here, and no, I am not a baby!), had discovered a wonderfully consistent heat source for incubating their little hatchlings. Who knew that whenever I turned on that hard drive to transfer all our Tivo recordings, I was actually creating life?! Seriously, they're kinda cute aren't they? You can even see their widdow biddy baby eyeses! Pretty cute, right?

Of course, it was not to last--we had nowhere to keep them, and how were we supposed to feed all those mouths? So, we promptly sprayed the whole thing with raid before scooping all their baby corpses into a box to be picked up with the trash tomorrow morning. :)

The end. Until next time (or whatever).

Trip to Lehman Caves

This year we all went to the Great Bason National Park. We had an incredible experience on the way there, however, and that's what this particular post is about.

There was a sever weather alert for Southern Utah for strong wind. We get those all the time, so we thought nothing of it really; but half way to our destination, just past Milford, UT, we ran into the largest sandstorm I've ever been in (I don't know that I've been in too many, though).







The storm went on for miles, and there were several times that visibility went down to zero and we had to stop completely. About half-way through, Neal and Janet came upon two bikers whose bike had tipped over in the wind. They were getting sand blasted really bad. Unfortunately, neither Neal, or us, had room for them in our cars. Ryan and Brandy, though, had their mini-van, and when they came up to the bikers (Stevi and Craig), they were able to get them to safety.

We stayed with them for about an hour. I helped Stevi call the police to see if they would be able to get the bike out of the storm. Ultimately, we needed to get going to our campsite, so I loaned Stevi my phone, so she could keep in touch with the police, etc.

Shortly after returning home from our 3 day trip, Stevi sent my phone back to me in the mail with this letter attached. I am posting it here for the Cramer family to see it.

Awesome St. George Lightning Storm

The storm tonight was awesome, so I just had to get some photos of it. Most of my photos turned out blurry (sadly), but I had the good sense to get my little tripod out for these shots, enjoy:

Two Additions to the Family

For Bethany's birthday (July 4th), we went out and got her some pets (she's been pet-less for far too long).

We originally intended to get a frog (since we both love frogs), but Bethany really wanted something cuddly (and the thought of feeding live crickets to a frog didn't really excite me much). So we got her a couple of female rats instead (she's had a few rats before).

I've never been a huge rat fan, myself, but when you get used to the tails, they're actually pretty cute (especially when they're little). We named the larger, more energetic one Tai Lee, and the smaller, more sedentary one, Mei (we're both pretty big Avatar fans).

So, I now present the "girls" to you:

For a little while, we had to put them in this smaller cage until a new bigger cage came in the mail. Their first cage had too much spacing between the bars, and they could squeeze out.

Somebody's being cute.

They love sleeping in their hammock.

P.S. I'll post some better pictures when we get some.

"Do you have a flag?"

From this time, hence-forth, Bethany and I claim this parking spot (the one on the left) under this tree at the Bloomington Wall-Mart. In fact we claim this tree too. We like that tree; it helps us find our spot, among other things ;]

Seriously, guys, that's our spot. How come we haven't been able to park there for the last 3 months? How inconsiderate!

Sea World (a world of cold, wet fun)

Okay, so Sea World was a little less spectacular (and a whole lot colder! who wants to get wet when its 65 degrees outside?).

This is the only decent shot I got of Bethany during the whole Sea World thing (no shots at all of me). I'm sure she appreciates this picture spreading across the blogosphere. :] What can I say, I like what I see.

Everyone, all together now...!

What's the point of going to Sea World without getting any pictures of sea life? Here we see the native delphinidae in his natural habitat, where he jumps for fish (and for people to watch).

Such a rare shot. Here we have the never before seen Orcinus Ryaniscus using his built-in sonar (and map) to navigate to the next fun (and freezing) wet experience.

Disney Trip

Okay, so it's about time that I blog about something, right? Well, I guess this is something... /:]
We went on a trip to Disney Land and Sea World recently. What about Sea World, you ask? Geez, one thing at a time, seriously!

Such a magical place

Bethany got into the magic a little bit too ;)

What happend to the magic? I think I lost it somewhere back at the laughin' place. Somebody, please get me off this ride!

Shoe Swap

Bethany was moving my shoes for me whilst I was working on something in the kitchen. She had a unique way of moving them though...

Nice Shoes

Dog Park Fun

We took my mom's dogs to the dog park today (it's something that Bethany really gets a kick out of--plus, I get to test my picture taking skills out). These are some of the better pictures from today's romp.

Pirate is always hyper-excited to be at the dog park.

Even Cassie was enjoying herself.

Wylie feels a disturbance in the force...

Group shot :)

Avatar: The Last Air Bender (Soundtrack)

I just got done watching a few choice episodes of one of my favorite shows, and I thought to myself, "It'd be awesome if I had the soundtrack for this show."

To my dismay, a search on both Amazon and iTunes revealed that they don't care at all about us Avatar fans. /:[

I did, however, find somebody who posted a streaming version of it online. Better than nothing, I guess. So here you go (if you even care -- Apple and Amazon don't).

*update* It seems that the stream I was linking to has been taken down. Here's a better version.

I Did It!

I finally got that darn ball at work onto the peg!
Gold Stars all-around!
All that boredom has finally paid off. :]

Vicious Little Wylie

My mom's little dog, Wylie, has always been the most timid dog we knew; however, we hadn't ever seen him with any dogs he didn't know.

Well, a few weeks ago, we got to see what he's really like. Our little Cringer became the mighty Battle Dog. /:]

Just for reference, here's what he's normally like (uber-cute):

So much not going on!

I decided that since we had so much stuff not going on, I'd better post about it.
Well, that's about it.
Until next time . . .

MAN's Work!

Bethany and I were watching "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" this last Christmas, and we saw this part that I never remembered. From then on, we have been joking about my "man's work."

• Need that bottle open? Step aside! This is man's work!
• Need to reach something really high up? Step aside, woman! This is man's work!
• Is that thing you're lifting heavy? Step aside! This is man's work!
• Garbage . . . um, what garbage?

Just as I take pride in winning "gold stars," I take great pride in my manly man stuff that only us men can do (cause we're men). We're men for a reason, and that is to do man's work--pure and simple. I look up to Donner, and all those like him, who are not afraid to spread their manly, manny, manish work across the globe. Cause, seriously, who else is gonna do man's work but men? Women? Paaaleeeze! Step aside, little woman, and let this manly man work his magic on that there pickle jar.

What? Oh, don't care about the jar? You want me to clean the kitchen . . . um, that doesn't sound like man's work . . .

Google Maps for Dixie State College

I'm currently working on a new map of campus for the college. This is what I've come up with so far.

I think this will be good for students (and anyone else who's interested). For instance, most students still don't know where the new Taylor Health Science building is.

If you want the see the real live version that I have posted on the college's website (since I can't really fit it very well on this blog), you can go here.

I originally got this idea from this blog. He did an awesome map for University of Alabama.

I Win the Gold Star!

Ever have a really dumb argument about nothing or proved something to your wife for no reason other than to prove it? Well, in our house, on such occasions, the "winner" of said conversation earns the coveted "gold star" award.

"Actually, hun, the moon takes 23.5 days to revolve around the Earth, not exactly a month." The great thing is that the stuff you say doesn't actually have to be true. For instance, I really have no idea how long the moon actually takes. All that matters is that the other person doesn't know either, and I sounded really smart saying it. Gold star!

Despite being fictional, these gold stars are a great motivator for me to win at even more pointless stuff than usual. In fact, I think I have the most gold stars in this family! Yeah, that's yet another gold star for me!

I think eventually, it might be fun to actually give each other real gold star stickers. That would be awesome. Of course, I'd get the most, you know, cause I'm so awesome.