Or… Why you shouldn’t own oil based air fresheners.

Last weekend the girls decided they wanted to use their free rental card from Hollywood Video so Emily took them down and they rented the new straight to DVD Disney “Princess” movie about Tinker Bell and her fairy friends. I didn’t watch it myself, but from what I saw while walking through the front room it seemed to be on par with the slew of Barbie movies the girls have in their collection. Which is fine I guess. They enjoy them.

Anyway, before we had a chance to return Tinker Bell and friends to the land of Hollywood, she had a bit of an accident. In an effort to hide all of the less-than-inviting smells floating around our house these days (twin babies if you forgot), Emily has tried multiple air freshening systems. Her latest attempt was these little bottles of scented oil with sticks hanging out of them. I’m not positive what the purpose of the sticks was (maybe to soak up the oil and make them smellier), but the bottles themselves were open at the top. This designed proved to be less than ideal when one of the girls decided to put a book on top of the entertainment center. We’re not sure which daughter decided that the entertainment center was her personal book shelf, but whoever it was couldn’t see where the book was going when she shoved it up there and it ended up knocking the bottle of oil over. I discovered the spill when I grabbed the channel changer and started clicking. It took me a minute to figure out what the goo all over the remote was, but once I identified the consistency (it could have been anything around here), I started to notice that the plastic of the remote wasn’t just oily, but was in fact melting.

We did some quick oil spill cleanup, but by the time we found it, the oil had covered both the Tinker Bell dvd as well as a Netflix dvd on top of the entertainment center. The book that caused the incident also got covered, but didn’t seem to be effected too badly. Unfortunately though, both dvd’s were beyond rescue. I have no idea what’s in that oil, but it doesn’t like plastic much. We tried wiping off the dvd’s, but the oil had literally eaten into the bottom of the discs. The remote suffered some melting damage as well, but its already so near its deathbed that it didn’t matter much. In the end we had to buy Tinker Bell in all her melted glory and even after getting the disc resurfaced at Hollywood, the dvd still doesn’t work. So the lesson here is, don’t buy oil based air fresheners (or any air fresheners in my opinion) if you value any property they might chance to leak on. Apparently the oil they put in those things is made from a mixture between Alien saliva and Basilisk venom. Consider yourself warned.

I don’t typically use this space for movie reviews, but I just wanted to share my thoughts on the latest Indiana Jones movie. As with most movies now days, I waited until it came out on dvd to see it. This has the effect of making the movie experience much cheaper, but it also means that there’s pretty much no way to avoid plot spoilers until I’ve seen it. As was the case with this movie. Over the last few months I had heard all the negative reviews and had heard at least the one major plot spoiler and because of that fact, I had pretty low expectations. And maybe that’s why I was surprised to find that I quite enjoyed it.

Against all odds (and critics), I actually liked Indy 4. I admit that there were some pretty unbelievable scenes, and the plot got a little “hokey” in places, but I think a lot of people conveniently forget that the previous three weren’t any less “hokey”. I mean, c’mon… faces being melted off by the Arc of the Covenant. A heart liberating shaman from a secret mystic cult. Not to mention Henry Jones senior being saved from a fatal bullet wound by drinking from the Holy Grail. Maybe it’s just because the plot involved aliens and people weren’t ready for it, but Indy 4 wasn’t based on any more reality than the others. In fact, I thought they did a pretty decent job working the story around existing myths and legends. Don’t get me wrong, I think Lucas is way past his prime and most everything he touches now days is crap (is it just me or did Episode III contain some of the worst dialog EVAR?) I think it’s a testament to Harrison Ford’s ability to act, but I thought this one turned out ok.

NOT WINTER!!!

Just wanted to let y’all know. Don’t get me wrong, I do like certain aspects of winter such as skiing (when I can afford to go)… and… umm… uhhh… well, I guess that’s about it. Other than skiing, winter is pretty crappy. Snow is crappy, cold is crappy, icy roads are crappy, shoveling walks is crappy and the list goes on. Not to mention the fact that the mood of winter is just dreary in general. It’s like all the color in the world has been washed down the drain. A fresh snowfall is beautiful for about 20 minutes until you realize that the whole landscape has been covered in a big fat freezing blanket of gray and depressing. The funny thing is that every year I seem to forget how much I hate winter until the first snow falls and the first bitter cold wind bites at my ears and then it all comes crashing back to me. Call me a wuss, but I much prefer being able to wear sandals every day and being able to lounge outside in shorts and not having to freeze my butt off just to grill hamburgers. So I guess what I’m trying to say is that winter blows! Nuff said.

I don’t think that I could consider myself to be “well traveled”, but this week I had the opportunity to visit Los Angeles again for business. The last time I was in southern California was a couple years ago for my brothers wedding and the time before that was several years ago to go diving. I don’t get to visit California that often but when I do I’m always struck by how much I love the ocean.

Utah will always be at the top of my “places I’d like to live” list, but if there was a way to deal with the downsides of southern California (too many people, polution, cost of living, gang violence, traffic, etc.), I could easily see myself living there. I love the moderate weather and the semi-tropical plant life. And most of all I love the ocean. I love the sound. I love the smell. I love to play in the surf. I love the plant and animal life it holds. While standing on the beach this week looking out over the waves as the sun went down (through an orange haze of smog) I could feel the wind picking up and I could see storm clouds on the horizon. I know what’s on the other side of that “big blue wet thing”, but I couldn’t help but look out and see the end of the world. Now, I’m not talking about the end of the world in an apocalyptic sense, but in a more mid-evil sense of looking out over a gigantic road block. A thing that is mysterious and scary and that demands my respect. A thing that, no matter how I might try, I can never cross. This ancient thing that holds secrets so old and deep that I could never hope to understand them.

There are a few things in life that truly inspire awe and for me, the ocean is one of those things (along with mountains, airplanes and most of all my children). It was a bit heart wrenching to think that I only had a few short hours to walk along in the the Santa Monica surf as the tide came in. It was the highlight of my trip though and I can’t wait to get back and spend some more time at the beach next month when we head down to visit Disney Land. I doubt that I’ll ever live in So Cal, but maybe someday when the west coast falls into the the ocean I’ll move to St George and buy up some beach front property.

 This post is dedicated to Christopher………

A few months ago I posted about finding the perfect strawberry.  Well I have had nothing but teasing from Christopher about it. I think he is just jealous because he didn’t find it or get to eat it!  So the joke is on him!

I found a batch of strawberries at Costco and I could not believe how big they were! So here is an update…..The Perfect Strawberry!  And no, I didn’t save any for Christopher. Maybe if he is nice I will give him some of the jam I made with them. But it is hard to tell how perfect they looked when they are mushed up in jam!