Grant's Farm Halloween Shindig

creepy hanna's costume was perfect for the saturday evening festivities. we decided to hit the grant's farm halloween bash. those red contacts were crazy.
the other kids were ready, too. this time, eli was able to wear his darth vader mask. tyson was decked out in harry potter garb.
this scary guy greeted us at grant's station. there were as many people at grant's farm for the night time festivities as there are on a normal summer saturday.
the beautiful mrs k tried darkening her hair a bit, but it was still red. hanna looks very sad, but she was not.
frankenstein was there.
tyson grew bored of the evening, and not even the stocks could make him happy. oh, well.
the stocks made eli VERY happy, even though he could hardly reach.
....and so did the dance party. they were belting out tunes and eli was scorching the dance floor (ground) with his signature moves.

eli's school halloween party

eli's preschool had their halloween party today. although eli couldn't wear the mask to his darth vader outfit, he was still quite pleased with the whole deal. here, he chose the hot seat right next to the cute chick. score!
there was quite the crowd standing around, parents and family. here, eli is grinning ear to ear because everyone was laughing at him for singing so loud. he would really belt out the lyrics to such hits as "i'm a little witch".
then, they took a little parade walk around the school. again, he scored holding the hand of the hot chick. he appears to be silently telling me to get lost and quit crushing his groove.

ford freestyle 100,000 miles

today the stinkenbagen turned over 100,000 miles. i caught it just in time, with some adept camera phone maneuvering. the bad part? oh, i mean besides having 100k. the bad part is that i lost my decimal point. the read-out used to have 5 places, a decimal point, then the tenths. when it hit 100k, i lost the decimal point to the six place!

i know, it's a tragedy, but i'll have to live with it. until i trad it in, that is.

eeeewwww, stomach flu

horrible last few days. eli was sick earlier in the week. on friday i was feeling awful and then got a call from the beautiful mrs k that she needed me to come get her from work. she was very ill, and even ended up at urgent care later in the evening. thank god for grandma and grandpa, as they took care of the boys. i'm feeling ok today, yet deanna is still a bit down. and tyson just came home sick. great.

the good thing is, the stomach bug usually only comes around once every year or two.

volleyball girl

we took the first part of the weekend to watch hanna play in several volleyball games. she's getting really good and has taken it quite seriously. on friday night, she played a great game. isn't she sporty?? on saturday, she had a big tournament and played 3 separate games, and on sunday she had another tournament. whew! way to go, hanna!!
friday night was parents night, so i was chosen to run the scoreboard. i felt pressure.
this little device has the power to provoke a riot in the gymnasium. lucky for me, i did not make any mistakes. seriously, i had anxiety over it. i was SURE that i was going to screw something up and have a gym full of people screaming at me to get the score right. i exited the building unscathed.

a day out with eli

grandma and grandpa have been on vacation for a while, so that meant that deanna and i had to do some creative scheduling to take care of the boys. on thursday, eli and i hit the local park. he is a tenacious parkophile, and can spot a playground from a mile away. here, he was pointing at the bobcat.
our local park has a little creek. or maybe it's just a drainage ditch. whatever it is, this visit had a surprising look. i was perplexed at the neon green water in the creek/ditch. at first i was really bummed, thinking it may be anti-freeze from the local rednecks pick up truck. then i realized that there was no smell, so i'm going with the idea that it might be a mosquito control thing.
after running me ragged on the playground, we stopped to watch a daredevil bobcat driver working on the road. he had a 6 foot pile of dirt to move into the dump truck. he was bounding over the top of it, looking almost like he was trying to jump it. eli and i both laughed in amazement every time he did it.
i missed the photos of the jumping, but eli wanted more photos of the bobcat.

i'm not sure what to call this one

charlie

hanna has this ventriloquist dummy named charlie. she really wanted him. i can understand the novelty factor. however, i still think of all of the bad 70's and 80's horror movies that have dummies in them. and last summer, i watched an old episode of the twilight zone (1962, i think) with a dummy as the main spook.

creepy, i tell you.

i'm growing my grill

last week i went to the dentist again, this time to get a temporary crown. my dentist preferred it using gold. i asked him if he might consider something a little less gold. he says gold works great. i asked him if he might considered something that wasn't, you know, gold. he said that the gold holds up better. i sat momentarily and thought.

then i asked him if there wasn't something less....gold.

he said no.

built strong

i built the strong custom blend up today and took it for a spin. it's smooth as butta. it needs a couple of finishing touches. it needs a black seat post. and it's sporting the fork from the fastback. and i think i want to get rid of king kong's big drop handlebar. in good time. until then, i'll just enjoy it.

a trip to the dentist

a few weeks back, i broke a tooth. one of my molars shed a large chunk of itself. it was really quite traumatic. oddly, it did not hurt.

so i waited a few days. hmmm. no pain. but darn it, i said i was going to the dentist to fix it. but a few days turned into a few weeks.

then another piece of it broke off, this time a nice, sharp dagger-like chunk. i could not put it off any more. today i went to see the dentist.

when i was 8, 9, and 10 years old, i had a flurry of really awful dental visits. i still have all of the silver in my mouth from those visits. big, nasty hunks of silver for fillings. the dentist explained to me that those silver fillings are really stiff, while the tooth is flexible, and over time the tooth can pull away from the filling and decay can start in spots around the edges. and mine did.

lucky for me, after much drilling and building, i have a somewhat normal molar again. i'll have to go back next week for a crown, but i'm glad i avoided a root canal.

damn. it sucks getting old.

strong frames custom blend

after 3 months, my custom road frame has arrived. no, it's not some uber exotic carbon wunder frame. it's actually a very modern steel steed. it's made by Strong Frames, from Bozeman, Montana. i talked to him a bit, sent him my beloved fastback frame, and he took it from there. it was really that easy.
it's made from true temper, columbus, and reynolds. a nice "custom blend" of tubes to make it something special.
really simplistic graphics, nice black paint, and a very elegant look.
i dig the chainstays.
it turned out very nice. it weighs in at 3 pounds, 3 ounces. i plan on using most of the parts from the fastback, but it will eventually get an Edge Composites fork.

an apple a day

the coolest bike in the house

there are some pretty cool bikes in my house right now, but i think the coolest is the beautiful mrs k's bike. it's a 2001 homegrown pro. i rescued the bike from a life of livingroom queenery from my friend doug. it's a lightly used example. yes, that's a manitou mars fork and it still works!
i ended up swapping on some different parts (naturally) that i had from other projects. the crossmax ust wheels are vintage 2000, from the keyser. avid ti v-brakes. syncros ti post. bontrager xxx carbon bars. it already came with xtr 952 rear derailleur, race face turbine square taper cranks, and shimano 747 pedals.
i love the mostly all-black look with the subtle bass boat blue. i have black posts, but i thought the syncros was a nice touch. i'll have to swap out the white saddle eventually.