StumpTown Blog

I’ve surely blogged about this before, so this may be more of a follow up than a new post, but oh well. Just in case this all sounds too familiar, I've added a bonus picture of my adorable children at no extra cost. I feel moved to say something about one of our more critical national debates. I have been working diligently with the Republican National Committee to hammer out the official party line for them on this subject so they will be properly prepared for the presidential elections next year. So, is it “on track” or “untracked”? All my life I have used the expression “on track.” In fact, when I was only 6 months old I spoke my first sentence which was “Mom, I know I haven’t been sleeping through the night lately, but tonight I’m going to get back on track.” Of course, to the untrained ears of adults it sounded more like two grunts and a belch, but any self respecting baby would have understood me perfectly to be using the expression “on track.” Until a few years ago, I h

Seems like time for an update on a few things. First, the deck project. As you may recall (and you can scroll down if you don’t), I have undertaken to repair/replace/resurrect my deck. It was a large two story monstrosity hurriedly cobbled together by a crew of blind men about 30 years ago. I discovered that the main support beams holding up the upper deck, which is on the same level as the main level of our daylight basement home had roughly the structural integrity of marshmallow cream. My father in law, who is an engineer and one of those guys who can build anything (I am decidedly not one of those guys) pointed out that I should probably not have his daughter and grandchildren frolicking (yes we’re big frolickers) about on a deck supported by large 4x10 sponges. So, he helped me develop a plan. The beams were supported by 16 foot 6x6 posts which we believed to be secure, so we planned to leave those in place. The joists under the upper deck also seemed to be mostly free of r

A couple people have asked me about #74 on my list of 100 below, so here is the brief, can’t do it justice in words but completely true, version of what happened. At Pepperdine, my dorm was located right above the track and soccer field. To get to my classes which I attended from time to time between pick up games, you could either curve around “dorm road” down to the main campus or you could cut down a steep hill that was never made for pedestrian traffic and cut across the track and the field and shave enough time off the trip to only be “cold stare from the teacher “ late instead of “why even bother at this point” late. The track was never empty and as far as I know Pepperdine did not have a track team. It was filled constantly with female students trying to work off that second trip to the cafeteria soft-serve machine, male students trying to attract those female students and, occasionally, TV, music and movie stars who would come up from Malibu to the campus to work out, not wan

100 Things. I’m stealing this from my buddy Ike who did this on his blog. Here are 100 things about me in no particular order. They are not the 100 most important or most interesting or most any other category. Just 100 things. 1. I believe the sandwich is nature’s perfect food 2. If I had half the charm of my youngest son or half the negotiating skills of my oldest, I would never lose another case 3. I hate the automatic, sensor driven faucets and soap and paper-towel dispensers. Mostly they just leave me standing in the bathroom waiving my hands like an idiot with nothing else happening. I prefer the days when we just got germs all over us and didn’t know it. The only thing worse are those real fabric towel loops. I’m sorry, but I’m not touching that. 4. Sometimes when I sit in my recliner with a football game on and chips, dip and diet Pepsi nearby on a Sunday afternoon I actually believe I am going to be bathed in light and hear angels singing in the background. 5. The Godfa