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My two favorite 2008 Christmas Memories are indicative of the awesome life I lead, one in which I have family who are interesting and constantly coming up with something else to challenge your concept of "normal"
Lets start with this young man. This is Kevin. Kevin is now seven
. Kevin speaks the truth. After we opened more presents Christmas afternoon at the Morgan's, he was standing in the middle of the floor, gyrating like some of sort of excited atomic particles you see in animations. I looked him in the eye and asked him, "Whats so exciting???!!" He looked me right back in the eye, took both my hands, pulled me close and yelled, " I HAVE NO IDEA!!!! HAHAHAHA" Remember in The Shining when Jack busts through the door? That was the same gleam Kevin had. Pure, unadulterated madness and glee. But not the insane kind. Thanks Kevin for reminding me what being a kid at Christmas is all about!
And here is my dad. He explores his world much the same way infants do, by putting things in his mouth. When they were here in CA last, he wandered down the street and found this Mexican place called Pon
cho's, where he had goat soup and menudo, and NEVER shut up about it. We finally lied to him and told him that Poncho died of Tuberculosis just so he'd stop asking us if we'd been there yet. After Christmas we told him his last present was that Poncho was, indeed, alive and well so far as we knew. Dad and I strolled the 8 blocks down Stockton Blvd., where much to our gustatory glee, the goat soup was hot, and the beer cold. I had a a burrito, but dad (seen here gnawing on a goat knuckle) had the soup. Viva la intestinal parasites!
Hi there blog-o-nauts. I am going to make a better effort at blogging during this new year. I am hoping to follow my sister-in-laws example, check out her blog at the Week Weekly, and blog with some sort of regularity.
With that in mind, here's a few of the pictures from the rest of our Yosemite trip a couple of weeks ago! The second day we went hiking it started snowing like mad! The weather was reasonably warm however, so we pressed on. Just as we started off on the 7 mile loop trail around Mirror lake, we spot not one, but TWO bobcats! They were wicked hard to photograph, but here's a couple.
The lighting was terrible, so these were the best ones I got... they were big and fluffy, and not much concerned with our presence. The rest of the hike was punctuated by heavy bouts of giant flakes and short breaks of blue sky. Here are a few pictures... I was getting all artsy fartsy with a couple.
And finally, here is Sarah & I, the happy hiking couple, enjoying the snow and fresh air and time together. I love my wife, especially when she takes me on super fun birthday trips to Yosemite!
So very sorry for the blog hiatus. After Obama got elected I basically was having a joygasm.
Well my 33rd birthday has come and gone, and Sarah took me to Yosemite for three days to celebrate. Neither of us had been there before. At least I have the excuse of not growing up here... We made reservations for three nights at the Yosemite Lodge, which lies at one end of the Valley floor. Our room was right next to the bar, and underneath Yosemite falls, the best of both worlds!
The whole hotel was done up Christmas style, and Sarah's wishes were granted when the snow finally came and made it a super winter wonderland! We enjoyed coming back to the bar for hot alcoholic drinks and Scrabble battles by the roaring fire. How fun! There was also some slight misunderstanding involving snow and Sarah's face. 
Our first day in the park found us taking the shuttle bus to the trail head for Vernal and Nevada falls. It was a brisk 40 degrees and the skies were clear, though I knew something was up when the shuttle driver wished us good luck, mumbling something about the "Agony of da feet..." *hahaha* This trail starts right off heading up up up! The views were amazing though, and only a few people hiking that day!
The pictures above are of the Vernal Falls, the top of which was a mere 600 steps from the base, at one point crawling along the wall on this totally awesome bit of trail.... 
The climb was totally worth it however, though it turned out we were a mere halfway towards our ultimate goal, the top of Nevada Falls! At this point we'd climbed about 1000 ft, with another 1200 to go! EEP! The next couple of pictures from the top of the Vernal Falls.
This next picture is Nevada Falls.... seems close enough, right?
WRONG! Man alive, getting up to the top of this thing was BRUTAL. But totally worth it... the next 1200 feet of climbing occurred in just a mile or so. OUCH! It might have been the low oxygen levels in my brain playing tricks on me, but this whole Yosemite park place really did live up to the hype!
We did finally make it to the top, where the sun was shining, and we had the whole place to ourselves. It was warm enough to wear only our tshirts, after requiring hats, mittens and a couple layers of fleece in the morning. We enjoyed the scenery and had some tasty snacks! 
That last picture is of Liberty Cap.... I guess if you were insane you could climb up that too, but we decided to call it a day and descend back to the valley floor for dinner and drinks! We were about halfway to Half Dome too.... but these pictures that follow was about as close as we were going to get on this trip!
More in the next post... including Bobcats, reflecting lakes, and SNOW!!!
. Kevin speaks the truth. After we opened more presents Christmas afternoon at the Morgan's, he was standing in the middle of the floor, gyrating like some of sort of excited atomic particles you see in animations. I looked him in the eye and asked him, "Whats so exciting???!!" He looked me right back in the eye, took both my hands, pulled me close and yelled, " I HAVE NO IDEA!!!! HAHAHAHA" Remember in The Shining when Jack busts through the door? That was the same gleam Kevin had. Pure, unadulterated madness and glee. But not the insane kind. Thanks Kevin for reminding me what being a kid at Christmas is all about! 
cho's, where he had goat soup and menudo, and NEVER shut up about it. We finally lied to him and told him that Poncho died of Tuberculosis just so he'd stop asking us if we'd been there yet. After Christmas we told him his last present was that Poncho was, indeed, alive and well so far as we knew. Dad and I strolled the 8 blocks down Stockton Blvd., where much to our gustatory glee, the goat soup was hot, and the beer cold. I had a a burrito, but dad (seen here gnawing on a goat knuckle) had the soup. Viva la intestinal parasites!
