Car, Deconstructed

Thought this was a neat way of looking at a modern vehicle.

Return To Avalon

Actually, I'd never been to Avalon before (a village on Catalina Island), but I thought that was a pretty cool title. But I did recently return to Torrance for a quick fishing weekend with Steve and Dave.

After a long week of 'business' in Palm Springs, I drove to Torrance late Thursday night. We had originally planned to fish Friday, overnight at Catalina, then fish Saturday as well, but the boys were having a shiny new Evinrude E-Tec 200 put on the boat that week, and the mechanic was a day late getting it done. So we picked up the boat Friday night and drove straight to the launch with the intention of crossing in the dark to be in the perfect spot at pre-dawn (the best time to catch the elusive White Sea Bass). But the wind had picked up by then, it was pitch dark, we were getting soaked, and then discovered that neither the VHF radio or the GPS was working. Dave has handheld backups to both, but it was the final straw of ambition. So we decided to go back to the apartment, fix the broken stuff, and try again in the morning.

Two hours of sleep later, we got up and stumbled into the truck for attempt #2. This time was fantastically successful, and we were fishing in no time. Mostly small stuff for a while until a big ole' sumpin sumpin grabbed a live mackerel off the bottom and headed out to the open ocean. Took quite a while to get it in, so we were highly dissappointed to see a big sting ray come up and have to cut him loose.

Sometime afterward, while trolling live mackerel along the edge of the kelp patties, one of the rods went buzzz and then BUZZBUZZZZZZ and wouldn't you know it, we had a white sea bass on the end. A great fight, unique in feel with a lot of head shaking (this was my first wsb), and a beautiful 28lb fish. I gave it the whoop, Steve gave it the gaff, and Dave gave us all high five. What a great way to break in the new boat, motor and my first trip to Catalina.

Thanks again to Steve and Dave for their hospitality and top quality tackle.

Quick trip to meet Aunt Sally

Last weekend, we made a quick trip down to Southern California to surprise Aunt Sally when she got off the airplane. We got to stay with Steve, and then Gary and Judy, and had a great time all around. The weather was a little chilly, but that didn't stop the kids from playing in the surf! It sure is nice to have her home safe and sound.....or at least now the girls can talk on the phone for somewhat less than $1/min!

The 'whoa time flies' catch-up post.

I was unloading my camera today after Cooper's soccer game and I notice a bunch of different things I hadn't put on the blog yet. So I figured I'd just put some random stuff together to try and get caught up!

Pandemonium cousins came to visit for the holidays. And then, for Paxton's birthday party - LOTS of cousins. Was great to see the extended family!

Snow time up at the hot springs.

Grandpa gets busy fixing a pair of glasses.....by cannibalizing other innocent victims.

Kathleen's cute little penguin olives.

Paxton turns one, with a little help from his friends.

The whole pile.

Spring soccer has started again, and I am helping as assistant *gasp*. The weather has been inclement to say the least. Miserable is more like it. Our team is doing great though, and everbody's skills are improving every week.

Last weekend we didn't have a game, so we went fishing at Brownlee instead. Just fishing, no catching. Apparently 43F water is a little too cold for ole' Mr.Bass.

There was an Idaho Bassmasters tournament the same day, and about half of the boats somehow scraped up at least one fish though. Hmmm...HOW?

That's it for now!

Retrograde Widget

For those of you out there that use Yahoo Widgets, I gotten a kick out of this one called Retrograde3. It's worth installing just to see why the hour numbers on the dial are not in order....

Hawaiian Holidays

This year, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, Shanna and I took the kids to the Big Island of Hawaii for a wonderful [re: warm] vacation. The weather cooperated the entire time with just enough sun every day, and no rain until the day we left.

We stayed at the Hilton Waikoloa Village just north of Kona about 30 minutes. It was a great resort for the kids with multiple pools, a protected saltwater lagoon and seemingly endless pathways through palm trees and lizard-laden vegetation.

The Island of Hawaii is quite large, and we ended up putting over 500 miles on the rental Jeep driving to and fro and all the way around. The terrain and the subsequent amount of annual rainfall varies wildly from area to area, so the island is full of contrasts. Barren lava fields to snowy high mountaintops to rainforest to volcano, all surrounded by some really sweet beaches.
Overall, aside from a little motion sickness puking and a lot of sticker shock after each meal, we had a fantastic time and plan to return ASAP.

The thumbnail below will link to an album of lots of pictures, and I'll put some of my favorites further down below as well.

Long flights, sleepy kids

Water, water and more water

Some nighttime shots

Mr.Pig went to a Luau

Jeep hair

Jeeping lava everywhere

It wouldn't be vacation without a little fishing now would it?

This one's for Aunt Sally

At the Botanical Gardens

This one's for Gramma Linda

My Shorty showing off her guns

Stricken with volcanic fumage

Waiting and waiting, in the rain, for a late night flight back home :(