weekend round-up

Here's some stuff that went down this past weekend...

We went to the drive-in to see Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Hotdogs, french fries, popcorn, and we're ready for the show. The movie was pretty silly, with some weird and funny parts. The kids seemed to like it. G.I. Joe was the double feature, and we had seen that one before, so we weren't sure we'd stay for it, but Duncan wanted to watch it, so we stayed. He, as well as everyone but me, fell asleep before it was half way through. Anyway, it was a fun night out, and for $16 for 6 of us, it's not a bad deal. The next movie we want to see is Where the Wild Things Are.



We watched General Conference this past weekend. We only missed the Saturday morning session due to karate and errands. Sunday, as we were watching the second session, somehow Duncan ended up wanting to brush Anna's hair, so she let him. It was pretty interesting to see how he thinks it's done. There were a couple times I thought for sure Anna was going to end up with a tangly mess, but luckily, that wasn't the case.

After a while, Jennan wanted in on the action, and got Anna's pick to help. Those kids love their mommy.

Later that day, Anna was determined to get Duncan's tooth out. They spent a bit of time aggressively wiggling the tooth. Duncan was game at first, but soon changed his mind. Anna convinced him to let her try the lasso method again. The first attempt Anna tugged, but the lasso came off. I think Duncan was not too happy with the lasso method anymore at that point, but Anna talked him into in again, and POW, out it came. After a couple moments to regain his composure, and some sweet talking from mom, Duncan emerged from the bathroom with his tooth in hand, and happy to show it off.

Hope your weekend was as fun filled as ours.

Lame Movie

Anna and I had the privilege of having a "day" date yesterday. My mom came out and watched the kids for us. (Thanks Mom.) We went to lunch at a breakfast only restaurant in Loma Linda called "Family Homestyle Cafe". It caught our eye because on the window it says "Home of the worlds largest pancake". The pancakes were huge; about 11 inches in diameter. Larger diameter than the plate. But each pancake was about 3/4 of an inch think as well. Anna ordered TWO! and a side of biscuits and gravy. I ordered their 6 egg "Meat Lovers" omelet which came with a side of biscuits and gravy. Long story short, the pancakes were normal pancakes, just huge in size. Nothing special. They didn't even have a variety of syrups- only maple. My "6" egg omelet wasn't even an omelet, it was more like a scrambled eggs with meat and cheese mixed in, and there's no way there were 6 eggs used to make it. It was big, but the bed of country potatoes it was served on made it that way. Verdict: No reason to go back.

After lunch, we chose to go to a movie. We wanted to see "500 days of Summer" but it's not playing anywhere near us. I think Ontario is the closest I found. So, of the movies that were available, we chose "Funny People". We watched the trailer, and it looked like it was about stand-up comedy, of which we are fans, so that's what we picked.



BIG mistake! There's not a whole lot of stand-up in it, and the parts that are stand-up, are VUUUULGAR! There's a lot of it in the beginning, then the story/plot develops, and it's people not being nice to each other, super sarcastic, unapologetic, and so on. It depicts cheating (adultery) as something everybody does, that no one likes, but that everyone needs to accept as no big deal. Did I mention it was vulgar? Now thinking about it, I can't believe we didn't get up and walk out and ask for our money back. Shame on us. It was a HUGE waste of our date time, and time in general.

Paul Blart Mall Cop was WAY funnier than "Funny People", and it really wasn't that funny. I rented it the other day, and put it in a couple days ago. Anna exclaimed, "I'm not even tired, I'll probably stay up for the whole thing!", and truly believed it. I said it didn't matter, she'd be asleep in 15 minutes. Well, she made it past 15... but was out at 25. She even, at one point, woke up and was quite alert. She asked about what she had missed, and I filled her in. Then guess what happened? Within 5 minutes of that, she was out again, not to wake again till the credits were rolling. I didn't think it was that funny, but it had humorous parts. But I would very much recommend it before ever recommending "Funny People".


Hope to see a good movie soon.

At The Drive In

Last Saturday night, we went to the drive-in with some friends of ours from our ward, the Bocanegras. We saw Monsters vs. Aliens and Hotel For Dogs.

It was a nice warm day, somewhere in low-mid 70s; but once the sun was down, the temp dropped into the low 50s. It was pretty chilly. Luckily, we thought to bring some nice warm fleece blankets, and our kids were fine.

The kids ate hot dogs, chips, and bananas for dinner, and had butter-free pop corn during the movie. Anna and I got Carl's Jr. Bourbon burgers (we had a buy 1 get 1 free coupon). They were actually quite tasty. The onion strings really make that burger.

Fun stuff. We'll definitely be doing that more drive-in movies when the nights are a little warmer (can't believe I would look forward to that).

RIP Don LaFontaine

Who's Don LaFontaine? Millions and millions of people have enjoyed his work. Here's a better hint...
(you can mute the blog music at the bottom of the page to hear the video clips)




Don LaFontaine is the "voice" of the movies. Not only movies; movie trailers, commercials, special events, etc.

Here's a commercial where you get to actually see him...



Lets learn a little more about Don...



Here is a list of some of Don LaFontaine's more memorable trailers(click the sentence).

Don Lafontaine died earlier this week. He was 68. The movies will never be the same again.

This guy does a pretty good impression though...



A sad week for movie trailer lovers everywhere.

Getting Caught Up...

We did some fun stuff last Saturday and Sunday, and I now have a little time to share that.

The fun thing we did on Saturday was take the family to a drive-in movie! We have some good friends in the ward that go pretty regularly, and they have encouraged us to go sometime. Kung Fu Panda was just released on Friday, so we thought we'd take the family to see it. We even invited our friends to come along. They eventually didn't go because one of their kids got sick, but we still went. The double feature was the new Indiana Jones movie. It's PG13, but we knew the kids would fall asleep, so we didn't worry about that (and yes they did).

One thing our friends said was to get there early. They like to get there by 6:30pm (the first movie starts at 8:20pm. Wow, two hours early? OK? I think we ended up getting there around 7:20, and indeed, most of the middle and closer spots were taken, but we found a good spot on the right side of the lot. We brought our camping chairs to sit in to watch the movies. I backed the van into our spot so we could open the back because there are speakers in the doors. We brought a couple $5 pizzas from Little Caesar's for dinner, as well as our own pre-popped pop corn and other goodies. After dinner we put the kids in pajamas so if they did fall asleep, they were good to go.

Kung Fu Panda was Excellent! Very Cool. There was no problem hearing the movie because most every one else there was also watching it out of their cars, and had their volumes way up too. We were parked next to some very nice people on the left, and the people on the right never got out of their car, but they were probably nice too.

As soon as Kung Fu Panda was over, Liam was really tired and went in the van and fell asleep in his seat. Jennan wasn't too far behind Liam in knocking out. Tegan had a bottle once Jennan was out, and she too fell asleep. That left Duncan. He stayed awake through probably the first third of the movie before his eyelids won their battle. Even Anna was knocked out for a time during Indiana Jones, but once she woke up, she stayed up for the rest of it. Indiana Jones ended a little before midnight. We packed up, headed home, and knew that we would be back. Good times.

Sunday:

Just before church started, I was told to speak to the bishop. Turns out they were calling me to be the scoutmaster in our ward. That was fine. I've been the Boy Scout Varsity Coach for a few years (though I never really worked that program, I generally acted as an assistant scoutmaster), and knew they didn't have anyone else to call. The bishop wanted to make sure I knew they were going forward with that change before it was announced over the pulpit. Other than that, church was pretty normal.

After church, we packed the van to head on out to the Foutz compound in El Monte. We were going to be doing a short birthday party for Tegan. Sunday, Tegan tuned one year old! My, how time flies. Anna made a cake (before we left to the movies the day before), we would have some ice cream, and that was about it. (Cal State L.A.'s Geology department was having their annual banquet that evening, and we were going to that. More about that later) We got their just after 2:30pm, and let the kids play a bit before we dished cake and ice cream. Tegan opened a few presents, the kids played some more, and then it was time to go. Short and sweet.

We took the kids up to Anna's folks' house to be babysat while we went to the Geology banquet. Anna has some very good friends from her time at CSULA, and it was nice to see and visit with them at the banquet. Time flies when you're having fun, and pretty soon, dinner was done, and awards for current students handed out, and it was time for us to go. There was a keynote speaker, but it was already 9pm, and we needed to get the kids and drive home, so we didn't stay for that.

Yesterday (Monday), the big thing was the faucet exploding, but that night, Duncan's tooth was really wiggly, and Anna convinced Duncan to let her try and pull it out. Yep, she used the ol' dental floss method again. Duncan was a bit more concerned this time, but still let mom do what she had to do. After a couple failed attempts to secure the floss around the tooth, Anna finally got it all set. She told Duncan "I'll count to 3; 1 - 2 - " and Duncan says "wait wait wait!" We chuckled. Then Anna told Duncan, "When you're ready, let me know. Are you ready?" Duncan nodded and Anna yanked without any warning. Duncan let out a small yell. And the tooth was out. Duncan rinsed his mouth, Anna got a baggie, and it was time for bed. Then this morning, Duncan was up doing his regular routine. I asked him if there was anything under his pillow? He said no. I said "Did the tooth fairy come?" His face totally changed, he ran back in his room where Liam was still in bed, and I can hear him telling Liam he thinks the tooth fairy came. He comes running back out of his room, hands behind his back. "Dad, I have some very, very, very, good news!" "You do?" I asked. He pulls the baggie from behind him, and shows me the dollar the tooth fairy left him. Fun stuff. He held onto that baggie till it was time to go to the bus stop.

I think that covers the main stuff from the past few fun days. Honorable mentions go to Anna, who put up a ceiling fan in our room, and put a new light fixture in the boys room Saturday morning. Also, Duncan tested for a rank advancement at Karate on Saturday, but I don't think he'll advance just yet. I'll have to work with him a little more. We'll find out this Saturday if he advances.