A Facial Hair Affair

This is me and my friend Oliver right before I moved to "hotter-than-the-devil’s-sweatpants" Arizona. Oliver is an awesome guy, and also happens to be brilliant. In fact, I once heard rumor that the other day his brain exploded. Twice.

Oliver and I recently participated in a school quiz show that was designed to be kind of like Jeopardy. In addition to winning a laminated skin sample from Alex Trebek’s bicep, we could win a free trip to Seattle to participate in the much-coveted "Optometry Super Bowl". It's a lot like the real Superbowl, except the “football” is actually “questions” that are “fielded” by a bunch of guys that have the athletic prowess of Steve Erkel.

Seattle seemed like a lot of fun to me, so Oliver and I decided that our chances of winning were greatly enhanced by sporting our new, fuzzy lady-killers. I mean, just look at my manliness! It's like I'm wearing a sexy black caterpillar that’s just waiting to be caressed. (Sheri loved it by the way. She is constantly begging me to bring it back. I told her I wouldn’t do it because too many people mistook me as the human version of Luigi)

Unfortunately, my plan had a drawback: While trying to answer the questions, I didn't anticipate that brain would spontaneously turn into nougat. I just couldn’t come up with the answers fast enough. I felt like the fat kid trying to fit into his old Osh-Kosh-B’Goshs: I knew that I should be able to do it, but something was going terribly wrong.

In the end, I took 4th out of 8. I don't think that's too bad - I ended up beating a drunk guy, two chimps, and a jar of marmalade. Don’t get too sad, though, because I’ll compete again soon. By this time next year you’ll all be reading my new book: “The Red Fury: Dave’s path to victory through the power of the mullet”.

Ghost Town Hijinx!!

That's right - a ghost town! On our way to hike Big Scary Tarantula Mountain, we stopped by this horrifyingly quaint city of the undead. It was pretty much the coolest thing ever. Just to be on the safe side, Sheri and I brought my plastic ghostbusters backpack and trapper that I had gotten as a college graduation present. Fortunately we only needed to use it once and ended up catching a rather surly tumbleweed. --Sheri and I would love to set up an optometry practice here. For fun on the weekends we can dress up as rattlesnakes and scare all the neighborhood kiddies.

--I don't know what is more scary about this picture: the "I-just-beat-up-your-mom" look on Sheri's face, or the fact that my knees look like I should have been a Ninja Turtle.

--There's just something about Arizona that yearns to be deeply respected - as deep as the infectious puncture wounds that we gladly embrace.



--I suddenly realized why Sheri had agreed to marry me


--This is exactly the type of thing I wish I had room to store (the cart, not the wife). I can think of at least 87 ways this would come in handy. Think about it: if you simultaneously broke both your legs, wanted to hitch a ride on a Winnebago, or needed protection from nuclear fallout, what other option do you have?

--This picture is entitled, "I really, really miss Disneyland"

--Come to think of it, this reminds me of some of the rides at Disneyland. Except, of course, for the fact the ride moves, there are singing animals, and you usually don't get tetanus afterwards.

--They always say, "The only way to tame a woman is to give her your heart." I think a giant bird cage is a simpler option.

--At the end of the day, we did the only logical thing to properly wish the ghosts farewell: riot! Say goodbye to your little ghost house, Spooky!

An Adventure to Remember

What do you do when the temperature outside makes a sauna sound cool and refreshing? The answer: stay inside with the A/C blasting and only venture outside once the ball of fire in the sky says goodnight! I'm not complaining about the heat but it has made us change our lifestyle quite a bit. I'm pretty sure we have degenerated into some form of caveman that only sees the light of day from a window. We try to limit the amount of time our skin is in contact with the scorching environment for fear of total body evaporation. However, we love to be active people and thrive on having numerous adventures so we tried to outsmart Mother Nature and go on a night hike this weekend. 116 degrees, no shade, and wind that feels like its coming from an oven? HA!!! We'll just wait for the sun to go down and skip the thrill of heat exhaustion.

We chose a hike that was in Tonto National Forest in Apache Junction Arizona. Haven't heard of it? I don't think Mapquest had either because it took us a lot of digging around the Internet to find it (Thanks Bryan!).

Crosscut trail is 6.5 miles one way and "well marked" ...r i g h t! The parking lot was well marked. The trail head on the other hand was a guessing game. About an hour and a half into the hike, we discovered that we had guessed wrong when the trail abruptly disappeared into a vast expanse of cacti and sage brush.

I stayed put on the end of the trail enjoying a sky full of beautiful stars while Dave dove over bushes and wrestled cacti trying to find some form of a trail. Unfortunately his efforts were unsuccessful and he returned to me slightly disappointed and transformed into a tumble weed with stickers and weeds stuck into every inch of clothing. Knowing we would have to turn back, we took a few minutes just enjoying the peacefulness of the still and tranquil desert, overlooking the city lights and feeling so relaxed and happy to be together. It was just us for miles. Not even the moon was intruding on our special moment together.

After we had soaked up all the serenity we could, we started the trek back to the car. Somehow we took a slightly different path and low and behold, ran into the real trail! By then in was after 10pm and we felt we better just continue in the direction toward the car and call it a night. When we made it back to the car we realized that we had made one wrong turn at the very beginning and that is why we never saw the real trail.

I guess it is amazing we made it as far as we did on what I will call the Meyer trail because not 10 minutes into the hike we met up with an unwelcome stranger. It was bright enough so we didn't have the flashlight on and Dave was hiking in front of me when all of the sudden he stopped dead in his tracks, flipped the flashlight onto the trail and said as he backed away, " Get back. Get back. Get back!" As he backed toward me, I saw this tarantula scurry off the edge of the trail and into a hole. Yikes! That spider was as big as my palm! I was a little spooked I admit but I didn't want it to stop me from going on. We pressed forward and just made sure we kept the trail illuminated by the flashlight from then on.

Overall, it was so much fun that we are resolved to go back. Crosscut trail has not gotten the best of us yet. We will return, and we will succeed!! Oh yes, we will...

--This post was written by Sheri. Yay for her first contribution! (The taratula really was this big, and so were my guns)

Living in Disneyland

Recently Sheri and I did something really fun. And no, I'm not talking about last week when Sheri knitted me a Superman onesie. We decided to write our own song! Yep, everything from the music, lyrics, and the backup dancing bears are all original. Take a look (sorry about the bad quality. Our classmate filmed it on her camera, but it's the only copy we've got. It's kind of like wearing the same socks two days in a row. They kind of stink, but what other choice do you have?):

We're waiting for Disney to call any minute and demand that they pay us $13 million to buy the rights to the song. So if you call and we don't answer, just realize that we are probably doing something really important with the most powerful company in the world. We'll get back to you as soon as we get settled in our solid gold castle overlooking you and your family.

You live...where?

The answer is: Sacaton, Arizona. Never heard of it? Well, I say you'd better change your attitude pretty quick or the Popularity Train is going to leave without you. We would like you to pay a little visit to our home on "The Res", which is Navajo for, "The Res", which means, "The Reservation".

--This is Vanna Whitefeather, showing off our lovely summer home. As you can see, the bars on the windows are from a celebrity prison in Paris, and the landscaping was done by a group of Swedish groundhogs.

-- During the cool twilight, the city comes alive with bustling shoppers, laughing children frolicking in the streets, and friendly neighbors filling your wheelbarrow full of sunshine and lemon drops.

--Take a refreshing dip in Lake Su-Pu-Kum-Kee, the purest freshwater south of Phoenix. You'll love the way the tranquil water seems to suck all the stress out of you - of course, the leeches help.

--No vacation would be complete without spending time doing the things that are the most important.

Well, I hope you enjoyed the brief tour. In all seriousness, we love it here. The heat is tough to bear (today it was 113), but we are having the experience of a lifetime. The people here have been extremely nice, and there are some very beautiful areas around here. As Glen Meyer always used to say with that special twinkle in his eye, "the desert is neat." You said it, Pops!

The Best 5K...EVER!!!!!

Yesterday morning we met at a community center to run a 5K! Cool, eh? Well, let me tell you, it was hilarious. By the time 7:00am rolled around, there were a whopping 25 people there. It was a free race and so we were very interested in what we were in for. A lady gathered us all together and through the megaphone explained the route of the course. It went something like this, “turn at this dirt road here, then turn left at that dirt road there…” I knew it was going to be an awesome race. I then found out that they were missing one small detail…they weren’t going to time us!


The lady asked how many people were running the 5K, and about 10 of us raised our hands (and that included Sheri, Doreen (a classmate), and myself). I took a picture of the group and started walking back to the car to take the camera back. About midway there, the lady yelled, “Okay, GOOOO!” They had started the race! So I ran to the car, threw the camera in, then booked it to catch up with everyone else. Here are some highlights of what I call, “The Best 5K…EVER!”

- While I was in second place, the guy in front of me was…and I’m not kidding here…attacked by 4 wild dogs! They ran towards him with a vengeance, ready to make him their next human sacrifice. He started screaming and kicking at them, and eventually they ran off. A part of me deep inside had secretly hoped they would have bit his legs off so that they would be too occupied with their lunch to pay any attention to me. Either way, made me glad to be in second!

--Several optometry students were eaten to get you this picture

- Apparently this was a big event. They had a few cop cars along the way flashing their lights showing the way to go. It made me feel relieved that the cops were standing around watching us run instead of preventing the dozens of murders that were occurring throughout the city.

- During a stretch along a very dusty road (all of the roads look like this), a big truck drove by next to us, sending a huge cloud of dust over the group. We were covered in dust and couldn’t even see the runners in front of us through the dirty fog. Wow, a free 5K and Black Lung? Has Christmas come early in Arizona?

- An ambulance was there and was following the last two runners, who happened to be two girls no older than 8. So they were trotting along, looking around and enjoying themselves, while this ambulance was trailing close behind at a breakneck speed of 3 miles per hour. Tax dollars at work, baby!

- I was passed by an Indian who was very old. I mean, he was so old he probably knew Geronimo personally. I decided that he was either a 30 year-old man who had had too much sun exposure, or (and I tend to believe this one), that he was none other than The Great Spirit trying to break my manly ego. Either way, he passed me and I fell to a distant third.

- At the end of the race, we ended up getting a free pedometer, trail mix, and a grapefruit. They only had a few to give because they figured that the stragglers would be devoured by the wild dogs.

-Since I didn’t bring my stupid watch, Sheri figured that we finished between 20 and 25 minutes. I’m sure starting late and getting lost didn’t help our time.

-Did I mention that it was the best 5K ever?

Our Blog Baby is Born!

After being so resistant to entering the blogosphere, we have finally (and cautiously) entered. Believe it or not, I, Dave, was the main instigator of starting it. We figure since we are living in the craziest place in the nation and are completely isolated from civilization as we know it, we ought to start blogging!
Now whenever anybody asks us the address of our blog, they won't look at us with utter disgust when we tell them we don't have one. We have officially become "cool", if you will. So buckle up, strap your helmets on, grab a bagful of sunshine and fun, and enjoy the ride!