How You Know You're in California

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A New Frontier

To all my rabid fans:

Some of you may know this already, but for those of you who have been kept in the dark, I am posting this blog, today. I’ve been unemployed since October. Not a fact that I’m terribly proud of, hence the seeming secrecy. The reason I’m coming out to admit it now is because I’m on my way to begin a new opportunity, a new job, and in many ways a new life.

The same day I lost my job, I started taking classes at Salt Lake Community College’s School of Applied Technology. That was nothing more than a coincidence. I’d been planning to start school on the 19th of October for several weeks… but the timing was still impeccable.

My “Technology?”: Professional Truck Driver. I took the 280 hour course, night classes. 5 hours per day, 5 days per week. Less time for holidays. On December 17 I received my Class A (commercial) driver license, with hazmat, tanker, and doubles-triples endorsements. I continued going to class, earning additional experience, until my 280 hours were up on Monday, January 25, 2010.

Several weeks ago I received a job offer from Werner Enterprises, and they scheduled me for Orientation starting on January 29. I’m currently sitting in the Greyhound bus terminal in Salt Lake City. It’s 5:39 PM, January 27. My bus leaves at 6:30, I have 15 minute layover/transfer in Las Vegas at 1:15 AM. I’ll arrive at the San Bernardino terminal at 6:05 AM. This is per my itinerary, though with the recent weather, anything is possible.

Tomorrow I’ll check in to the La Quinta Inn, and begin orientation on Friday. If all goes well (and let us all pray that it does), I’ll pass my physical exam and begin driving for Werner on January 31. I’ll have 6-8 weeks of training (300 driving hours – with a driver trainer), during which I’ll make peanuts, but I’ll get very necessary experience. Once I’ve completed my 300 hours, I’ll become a solo driver. At that point I’ll start making real money.

Because this blog is intended for family events, and this is a huge family experience, I’m posting it here. However, I am planning on posting my daily experiences on a different blog: The Trucker Diaries.

For the time being, I really want to express my love for my wife and my daughter. I know they know I love them, and I know that they love me. I am going to miss them terribly over the next few weeks when I cannot see them in person. I am extremely grateful to my Heavenly Father, however, for the blessings of cell phones, internet, and wi-fi. because of these wonderful inventions, I will be able to speak to my wife on a nearly-daily basis, and should be able to Skype-Video phone both her and my little girl on a relatively frequent basis.

I don’t know how fathers of old could leave their families for months and even years at a time with nothing more than the mail system to help them keep in touch. And I admire them for their fortitude, and their families for their resilience. God bless them for their sacrifices.

A New Video Craze

It's been a while since I posted any videos, so I'm going to take this opportunity to post a couple. I have lots, but they tend to be a bit long, and... well... the longer they are, the more closely related you have to be in order to thoroughly love them.

So, I'm only going to post two short ones.

First: The Pirate Triker Chick


Second: Does this make me a good father, or a bad one?

As Promised

Cordelia, like her mother, suffers from "Pose Face," which is to say, when she poses for a picture, she looks completely uncomfortable, unhappy, and insincere.  Sometimes getting her to smile naturally is a real chore.  I'll let you guys decide which of these is obvious pose-face and which is pose-face with an actual smile getting through as daddy made silly sounds.

No More Makebelieve

As is common, I'm sure, among children whose parents both wear glasses, my darling little angel-monkey loves to put on her parents' glasses, or Mr. Potato Head's glasses, or anything that looks like it might be glasses, and pretend they are hers.

As of yesterday, she no longer needs to pretend.

Several weeks ago, we had her evaluated for preschool placement, and one of the tests they did was a very rudimentary vision exam.  Whereas she did fine when using both eyes and when using only her left eye, her right eye was extremely weak.  Weak enough that the examiner couldn't say exactly what Cordy's vision in that eye was, so she simply put down 20/80 and advised us to see an optometrist.

Tammy and I happen to have a very good optometrist who also examines children, so we scheduled an appointment with him.  Two weeks ago I took my princess to see him.  He confirmed that her left eye was strong and needed scarcely any correction, if any at all.  However, he could not determine anything better than 20/200 in her right-eye.

Based on refraction and other tests he was able to do on his end, he had a good idea of what prescription she needed, but because she was tired and angry from the dilation drops he'd given her earlier, she wasn't in the mood to cooperate with the actual "look at the picture and tell us what you see" exam any more.

Yesterday, we picked up the new glasses, and she seems to like them.  Wore them all day yesterday without a complaint (until just before bed - she came to me and said, "Gasses off now?"  To which I replied, "Of course, but we have to brush our teeth and put on pajamas, now").

She wasn't happy about that.  But she agreed, eventually, and she also agreed to wear the glasses again today.

Another thing:  She is supposed to wear an eye patch over her strong eye for 2 hours each day, to help force her weak eye to work, and strengthen.  She has a cute pink eye-patch for that.  I'll try to get a picture of it and post it later.

Anyway, that's what's up for now.