Merry Christmas 2005 

Merry Christmas

Each year we send a Christmas card, letter, and picture to friends and family all over the world. For the past few years we have done an A-Z letter listing some of the highlights of the Davis year. Here is this years:

Happy Holidays 2005!
Here’s the scoop from A to Z:

Arden B – Marcella’s favorite store
Backyard – We finally have backyard grass!
Challenger school – Olivia started school this year
Drapers – What would we do without them
Emergency Room – Jake managed to roll a 4-wheeler on him
Freakin’ Frozen Tundra – We still live here.
Great Barrier Reef – Jeff took the ultimate dive
Hockey – Jake started living his dream.
Ipods – We all have ‘em.
Jr. Jazz – both JJ and Jake had great seasons in basketball
Kitchen (as in My Girlfriend’s Kitchen) Marcella’s
lifesaver for dinners for the family.
Lasik – Marcella is free from contacts and glasses forever!!!
Motorcycle – JJ learned how to ride at Sandpoint
Nice and clean – We still LOVE Thursdays after Luci and company come to clean.
Orlando – We surprised the kids in April.
Patio furniture – We finally have our patio
Quick feet – JJ finished his first track season
Respiratory disease – Olivia became child #2 with asthma
Sandpoint – Where we spent our summer vacation
Tinkerbell – Olivia changed her name this year
Utrecht – Jeff and Marcella had a wonderful time in Holland (including Shaving cream)
Viajes – Jeff racked up plenty of FF miles working in Europe, India, Australia, and New Zealand
Washington D.C. – Marcella went back twice this year, once for Ryan’s graduation and the second time to decorate his new house
Xenophile – That’s Marcella and Jeff
Year – Another year has passed and we cannot believe it
Zero more Davis children (guaranteed)

We hope this Holiday Season finds all of you well!

Love,
Jeff, Marcella, JJ, Jake and Olivia

Does anyone know what happens when you put a cheap pillow in the washer? Ka-boom! 

Happy Birthday (39), skinny guy! 

Like Father like Son. Jake is following in his father's footsteps (albeit he's starting much earlier) 

Rakaia Gorge 

JJ's climbing heaven (Kura Tawhiti conservation area) 

Franz Josef glacier 

Christchurch Stake Center 

One of the many one lane bridges (on the road from Christchurch to the West Coast) 

New Zealand Alps (South Island) 

Rangitoto Island (the largest and youngest volcano in Auckland) 

View from Mt Eden (domant volcano). Gee, what a skinny guy! 

View overlooking the city of Auckland from the Sky Tower 

Sunday Church and Sunday Drive

Aren’t Sundays made for going to church and then for a drive? They are if you’re a Davis. When I first got into Christchurch I drove by what was obviously an LDS church. I looked online to see what time the service started and showed up a few minutes early. There were tons of chairs set up and then someone told me that it was Stake conference. There was a visiting authority, the mission president, temple president, and lots of missionaries. It was a great meeting and I was glad I went. I have had many opportunities to worship with saints from all across the globe. It really is a strength to my testimony. After church, I left for my drive. I started for Arthur’s Pass again because I wanted to get some more pictures of the mountains and beautiful flowers. I came across this unique rock area and I stopped to have a look around. Most of the sites like this are Maori sacred areas. I climbed to the top of one of the hills to have a look around. It was so amazing. My ride continued along the Canterbury plains. Much of the LOTR scenes were shot in this area. I stopped at one of the big rivers to climb down to the banks and take more pictures. From there I headed back east to the East coast. I wandered through little towns, lots of pastures and fields of crops and lots of sheep and moo cows. I got to the coast and drove through the main port city east of Christchurch then up to the top of an old volcano. A spectacular view of the Pacific ocean, Christchurch, and the beaches along the coast. The top of the volcano is a very popular place to hang glide from. I drove down the other side to the beaches. Pretty lame beaches if you ask me. Little surf and lots of shells, wood, and other material washed up on the shore. There was a pretty cool rock formation that the waves had carved lots of holes and caves in. This was quite popular for the children. Well, that was about it for my Sunday drive. The rest of the time was spent working with a couple of different groups in Christchurch. For the most part, I really enjoyed the food. Good seafood, good lamb. The Kiwis are big on ice cream and that suits me just fine. I had Thai food one night and that was also quite good. Most nights I would eat by myself and that is one of the pitiful parts of being on the road. I often would just take my book and sit there and read.

Well, after several hours on the plane, I left the nice warm, sunny Southern Hemisphere for the FFT (Freakin’ Frozen Tundra).

The Long and Winding Road......

Well, I didn’t get a chance to finish my trip details here in Kiwiland so since I have an hour or so here in Auckland, I might as well finish. I think in my last post I pretty much covered my North Island activities. I do need to post a picture or two. I had some pretty good meals in Auckland mostly seafood or lamb.

Now on to the South Island. If you are a fan of the LOTR movies, you’ll know that all three movies were filmed mostly on the South Island. The Hobbitville was on the North Island (kind of in the middle of the island, and the volcano scenes (can’t remember where the place is called in the book) were also filmed on the south side of the North Island. Everything else was on the South Island. I got there on the weekend so I had a little bit of time to look around. I went to the West Coast which was beautiful. From Christchurch it is a couple of hours drive. You go over Arthur’s Pass and through the Alps. It is quite incredible. The only thing that I can liken it to are the Canadian Rockies up by Banff and Jasper. The sand on the beaches is black. As you drive south it is all bush (which I would call rainforest). I was going to title this blog entry as “The road of a thousand one lane bridges”. Every few miles (or “K”s as they say here) you have this narrow bridge. Usually they alternate on what direction yields. I’ll have to post some pictures. The only disappointing part of the whole trip was that it was raining the entire time. It is no wonder because you can look at the surrounding area to see how much rain they get. They say that it rains pretty much EVERY day. I stopped in a couple of the small towns to have a look around. The highlight was my stop in Franz Josef. There are two large glaciers here (one in Franz and the other in Fox Glacier). I was excited to see this even though it was raining. So I switched my sandals for my running shoes and set off. It was raining pretty hard but I didn’t mind (at that point). Beautiful, large waterfalls all along were fascinating. The hike to the terminal face of the glacier was a couple of miles up. By the time I reached it, I was SOAKED. There were a number of “smart” people that were part of a tour. They were decked out in their rain/snow gear. Next time I go, I’ll try one of those tours. They actually take you up ON to the glacier. It looks pretty cool. Well, I couldn’t take it anymore and I headed back. Here I was, the stupid American in shorts, walking along with people with either umbrellas or at least winter type gear. Oh well. On to the next site. Close to the next glacier is Lake Matheson. The reason that I went there is this is “supposed” to be one of the picture perfect places in all of New Zealand. From the lake you are “supposed” to be able to see Mt. Cook and Mt. Tasman the two highest peaks in New Zealand. Well, you can imagine all I saw was clouds and rain. Not a problem. It was so beautiful, there was no one around and I had nothing better to do. I had dinner back in Franz Josef. By the time I made it all the way back to Christchurch, it was pretty late.

Kiwiland

Okay, it is the night before I go home, and I thought I would maybe blog a bit about my trip here in New Zealand. Right now, I just want to get home. I've been on the road for pretty much the last two months and I'm looking forward to being home for a while.

Because of a scheduling oversight on my part, I had to leave on Thanksgiving for my trip here. Dinner (and pumpkin pie) was awesome and we had a houseful of people to join us this year. The trip was uneventful except for the fact that Air New Zealand lost my bags for 2 days. Luckily, I had an extra shirt and change of underwear to get me through it.

I spent my first day in Auckland (the biggest city in New Zealand). It is a port city on the northern part of the North Island. I went up the Sky Tower which is the highest tower in the Southern Hemisphere. It was quite pretty to see the entire city and surroundings. I taught for a couple of days, attended a decent conference, and met a number of good people. One of my new friends, Trevor Pilar, was there with his wife and I spent a couple of evenings and an afternoon with them. We went on a field trip which included many of the dormant volcanoes that dot the area. I also took a boat trip out to Rangitoto which is Auckland's youngest volcano.

After spending almost a week in Auckland (a fairly big city), I flew to Christchurch. This is the largest city on the South Island and is situated just about in the middle on the East coast. The South Island is quite a bit different than the area around Auckland. It is pretty amazing. There are parts that remind me of Banff and the Swiss Alps, but there are beautiful coasts, incredible bush (I would call them rainforests or jungles), and miles and miles (okay kilometers and kilometers) of Canterbury fields/ranges/pastures/farmland.

I'll try to posts some pictures in the morning and continue on. I hate reading long posts so I'm stopping here.

The Church in Auckland

Okay, so I did a quick "meeting house locator" for where the Church is here in Auckland. I told the guy I met earlier today that there must be 2 or 3 here in Auckland. I was WRONG. There are 30! Geez, am I in Utah County? I had NO idea.

It's all in Auckland......Bananas

Well, I'll write more about Auckland later (hopefully). I had pretty much finished up doing some work/checking e-mail and I decided to venture out looking for bananas. I find if I'm biking/running/swimming every day, a couple of bananas each day keeps the muscles feeling well. So I went up the street to the gas station I went to the other night looking for juice and water. No bananas. So I kept walking. I eventually found some and bought three. I just ate one and it was actually pretty nasty. I wish I would have waited since I found much better ones at the next store I went to. Oh well. Who wants to waste $2.40. Anyhow, the walk back was just down and out strange. A couple of two very tall transvestites came in the store as I was leaving. I don't know why but they really gave me the creeps. There were tons of young Oriental people out on the streets. A number of Karaoke joints. a few bars, a few seedy dance places, and of course a number or Turkish fast food places. My favorite place I came across was "The White House". It was a really nice place with a US flag on top. I wasn't quite sure what it was but I didn't venture in. Was it a hotel? What? So when I came back to my room I just did a Google search. This is what I discovered: The White House Yikes!!!! Well so much for wondering about the city. You know what they say, "The Holy Ghost goes to bed at midnight (or in my case 11:30).

On a more positive note, I had a great chat with the guy in the booth next to me this afternoon about geneology and the Church. I look forward to talked to him again tomorrow. I gave him the LDS.ORG link and told him that he could find out about the PAF program and where a local church here in Auckland where he could do some family history work. He has seen the New Zealand temple in Hamiton. Cool!

Jake the Snake

My son, Jake had to do an autobiography for school. It was so precious so I couldn't resist posting it here:

My autobiography
By: Jake Davis

I was born in Payson, Utah on October 26, 1994. I was born earlier than I should have been. When I was born, I was in the Payson Hospital longer than I should have been. Later my parents found out I had asthma. I currently had one sibling his name was JJ it was he who chose my name. I have 1 sister. I always love to make my sister cry for some reason. I am the type of kid who loves to make chaos everywhere. I love confusing people who live in my house. I also like to sneak around my house and sneak up on people.
I was really energetic when I was two to four years old. My language wasn't too good. I loved hockey as I do know. When I was about 4-and-a-half years old I encouraged my dad to play hockey, and he's ever since then.
I went to kindergarten when I was only four years old. It was really fun because I went to a private school. I moved for the first time in 1999.
The two years I lived there I had lots of friends. I met my true best friend in the year 2000. His name was Steven Richardson. I only see Steven once a year but if I'm lucky two to five times a year. I would always like to play with him but he lives in Sandy, Utah.
On September 15, 2003, I stared to go to Highland Elementary. I had a few friends there. I also had a lot of fun there. On October 3, 2003, I finally moved to Highland, Utah where I currently live. On October 5, 2003, I met William Brooksby. If I am unhappy William will try to get me happy again. I am really fun if you know me real well. I can also help anyone with getting them happy.I always try to cheer people up who are down in their spirits by making them laugh. I have wonderful friends one of them saved my life.
On April 20, 2004, it happened I was hit by a bus. From that moment on for about ten to twenty minute's chaos spread like a wildfire. My next door neighbor was in a car and saw my hair and left to tell my mom. At the moment I was trying to get out from under the bus. Then the vice-principle saw me and came to help me. Then the ambulance came. They helped get me out of there, after they strapped me down in a stretcher. About a minute later my mom came. My mom was told not to look at the bike because it was the scariest part
of the whole thing. My mom was just as shocked as I was from the .
At the age of ten I didn't do much, but I did play soccer. I love to play hockey so at the age of eleven I started playing hockey. It is harder than I thought it would be. If you hold something that has to do with hockey, and take hockey away from me I will tear you apart to get it. I need hockey to survive life. I absolutely would die if there was no hockey on this planet.I love to do any sport nowadays.
I have multiple nicknames my favorite is Jake-the-Snake. I am the type of person who loves school, math, reading, math tests. If you make me sit still for more than seven hours I will explode.
I am an eleven-year-old scout just getting out of Webelos. I have made many friends in scouts because of how nice I am. I will always invite people who don't have anyone to play with to play with me.
I love to go on vacation, My favorite place to go is Las Vegas,
Nevada.It has a lot of cool stuff like this pirates of the carribean show. I
also love to go to St. George, Utah. It has some really fascinating monuments like Zions National Park.
So far my life has been really good. I hope to be nicer to my little sister Olivia. I am going to be a straight A student and a better hockey player. I can't wait to see what the future brings.

Oh, Lord, how long must we suffer these afflictions? 

I'm in Hell........no, it's just Sydney

Well, what a day. I was sitting on the plane from Brisbane to LA minding my own business for several hours and I thought I'd get up and stretch my legs and go potty. While in the lavoratory I heard the announcement that did NOT make me happy. One of our engines had some trouble and so they had to shut it down. They had no alternative but to turn around and return to Australia. We were just shy of being half way. Why we couldn't go to Hawaii, I don't know but we turned around and came back to Sydney. What a disappointment. So I've been traveling ALL day long and I didn't go anywhere. How's that for fun. After going through customs and immigration and all that crap, and waiting to get our luggage, then waiting to get on a bus, I'm now sitting in an airport hotel. I ordered room service and ate my fish and chips. Now I need to call the wife before trying to get some shuteye. So all of you "jealous" folks out there can be thankful that you are home with your wife and children instead of in Hell (I mean Sydney).

Back in Brisbane

This week I went back to Brisbane to do some work with a local engineering firm. Alan from the lab along with several of his students came over to learn about a surface water model and to give a bunch of presentations on stuff that they have worked on. One of my employees, Steve, came with them. He and I have been running and swimming in the mornings. Really not much else to tell. On Wednesday there was a big protest here in Australia. The government has recently passed some laws that are perceived as being anti union. So all of these blue collared people were gathering to protest. My running/swimming area was flooded by thousands of these people. It was interesting to see and then read about in the local media. I had dinner last night with the WBM folks at a decent restaurant. I had the BEST dumplings desert. We also went upstairs to watch the penalty kicks for the Australia vs Uruguay futbol match. The winner qualified for the World Cup in Germany next year. It was a great finish and Australia won. Unless, something else exciting happens that is about all I will write from Oz. Tonight I’m going to John’s house for dinner. I was invited to go with the BYU guys out for a “barbie” but I declined. Cheers!

GBR

Great Britain? The Good-Bad-and Retarded? Nope, GBR is the Great Barrier Reef. This is the King of all dive locations in the world. Norm and I flew to Cairns and then drove to Port Douglas. I did the driving. I was a bit nervous but it actually turned out to be quite easy. You just have to pay attention. The hardest thing was I always found myself trying to get in on the left side. Everything is backwards. The turn signal is on the right side and you shift with the left hand. It also is funny to see yellow road signs warning drivers of kangaroos on the road.

We stayed in this apartment-style place and the hospitality was great. We went out on the Reef on both Saturday and Sunday. It takes about an hour and a half to get out there. The weather was beautiful. We rode on these big catamaran and went to the Agincourt Reef both days. All I can say it that diving was incredible. I thought about buying an underwater camera but I didn’t. I did 3 dives on Saturday and another 3 dives on Sunday. Tons of fish and beautiful coral. I say a few sharks. The biggest was a 12 foot Reef shark. I saw a number of Nemos (clown fish). On one dive we went to Triggerfish City. These big Trigger fish had laid their eggs and were very protective. You would be bitten if you got within a meter or two of the fish. There are these gigantic clams with beautiful purple and green colors inside. You can move your hand close to it and watch it close.

Most of the coral is very sharp and lots of it has a type of poison that if you scraped up against it you would quickly get a good rash. I could go on and on but unless you’ve been there, it’s hard to describe. It is quite a thrill to come around a large coral or over the top of one and you are surrounded by literally thousands of fish.

We had good food their (namely those small bananas that I thought were called apple bananas). You have to be careful along the beaches because of presence of jellyfish. The locals call them “stingers”. If you go swimming at the beach you have to be in one of the net protected areas where there are no jellyfish. Otherwise, you pay.

After dropping off Norm at the airport on Monday, I spent part of the day walking around downtown Cairns and shopping for my wife and children. I bought my wife a number of nice jewelry pieces. After the shopping I went to this crocodile farm. It was quite entertaining. We went out on this boat and watched these big crocs just completely out of the water to get a piece of chicken. Then I got a tour of the farm. It was quite interesting. I finished the visit off with a tasty croc sandwich. Yum yum.

That was my trip to Cairns/Port Douglas.

Bonkers in Brisbane

Okay, it would be really lame if I posted my events of the past couple of weeks AFTER my trip. I have a few minutes so I might as well get it done. The flight was pretty long to get “Down Under”. I thought my 14+ hour flight from JFK to J-berg was long. This one wasn’t quite 15 hours. I flew first to Sydney and then on to Brisbane. The best part of the trip was that Qantas lost both my bags. Darn! I travel enough that I wasn’t worried about it. The Qantas folks were VERY nice about it and besides give me a toiletry kit (complete with underwear) they also gave me $100 for the trouble. My bags eventually showed up the next day.

I spent the first afternoon in Brisbane at Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary . This is the world’s largest and oldest koala sanctuary. It was pretty cool to feed the kangaroos and hold a koala. I hung out with my good friend, John Doherty. He is THE king of automated parameter estimation.

The next 4 days were spent teaching a groundwater modeling class to students mostly from Australia. It was a big group and the course went really well. I stayed in a hotel overlooking the Brisbane River. The city is quite beautiful and so is the climate. I would normally wake up around 5 in the morning and would exercise for an hour or so. There are VERY nice jogging/ridding paths along both sides of the river. I am amazed at how many people are up and about at 5:00 in the morning. Lots of runners and bikers. Who can blame them, however. Soon I discovered South Bank Beach. This is a fake beach that the city has built right next to the river. It is a great place to swim. I even went and purchased a nice pair of Speedo goggles. So most days I would run a couple of miles and swim a ½ mile or so. So nice!

One morning, Norm and I ran over to the Brisbane LDS Temple. A small but very nice temple overlooking the city. I’m sure that the Church paid a pretty penny for that piece of property. I was actually hoping to attend a temple session but I got too busy and I didn’t make it a priority. Funny, while writing this post, I happened to check the official Church site and I read that clothing rental is NOT available. So, my intentions were good but I wouldn’t have been able to attend either way. I brought my running shoes and my scuba mask but I did not bring my temple clothes.

The breakfasts have been similar to what you would find in Europe: lots of breads, cheeses, cereals, fruits, and yogurt. I found a great smoothie place called Oasis. I am addicted to the Bahama Banana (Bananas, Honey, and Passion fruit). Dinners have been most excellent with lots of seafood. The best is a local fish called Barramundi.

Well this is the first post. Instead of writing one big long thing, I’ll break it up. My first week in Brisbane. Not bad. Snowy, cold, and crappy weather in Utah but nice here.

Is this an amazing picture or what? I believe credit goes to Nicki Williams. 

Do you have "female troubles"? Take a soak in the Suwanee Springs. 

Way down upon the Suwanee River...

Live Oak?

Okay, this week I made my first trip to Northern Florida. I flew into Jacksonville and drove for about an hour west to Lake City (where I'm staying). The radio had dozens of channels but only offered two things: country music or bible bashing religious spew. I have finally found a place where there are more churches than Happy Valley. This area seems quite removed from the rest of the hustle and bustle of city/town, USA. For starters, there are few places to eat which tells me that people don't eat out much. For lunch the other day we went to this cafe where I was told that the old timers meet EVERY morning at dawn to discuss any and all issues related to Live Oak. People are really nice here and very down to earth.

My days are pretty predicable; I get up, drive to the Water District, work, find a place to eat dinner, call the family, exercise for a while and go to bed.

Today during the lunch hour the folks that I'm working with took me to the Suwanee River. Very pretty and serene. Do you know who Steven Foster is? He is the author of the famous song "The Swanee River (Old Folks at Home). Looking for the words of the song, I found another interesting thing. The song is THE official song of Florida. Well, here you go:

The Swanee River
(Old Folks at Home)
Written by Stephen C. Foster

Way down upon de Swanee Ribber,
Far, far away,
Dere's wha my heart is turning ebber,
Dere's wha de old folks stay.
All up and down de whole creation
Sadly I roam,
Still longing for de old plantation,
And for de old folks at home.

Chorus

All de world am sad and dreary,
Eb-rywhere I roam;
Oh, darkeys, how my heart grows weary,
Far from de old folks at home!

2nd verse

All round de little farm I wandered
When I was young,
Den many happy days I squandered,
Many de songs I sung.
When I was playing wid my brudder
Happy was I;
Oh, take me to my kind old mudder!
Dere let me live and die.

3rd Verse

One little hut among de bushes,
One dat I love
Still sadly to my memory rushes,
No matter where I rove.
When will I see de bees a-humming
All round de comb?
When will I hear de banjo strumming,
Down in my good old home?

World's tallest and largest volume chocolate fountain

Lost Vegas

After the advanced course in Utah, it was off to Lost Wages. The hotel where we have held courses in the past was under renovation. It's converting to a Hooter's hotel. Sweet! So we went with a nearby hotel. Not very good. The attendees had NOTHING good to say about it. Probably the two highlights of the week was 1) spending the week with a longtime colleague, Mike Kennard. He and I have had a handful of trianing experiences, including our trip to Cairo several years ago. The other highlight was visiting worlds tallest and largest volume chocolate fountain. This is located in the Belagio hotel. Yum yum!

No New Orleans

After the damage of Katrina, we had to move our GMS advanced course somewhere else. I was disappointed that I wouldn't be taking my wife to all of my favorite eating establishments in NO. I don't know of a better place for good food and good music. I decided to have the class near our office. That was nice since I would be traveling quite a bit over the next several weeks. It is always good to see friends come back for additional training and help. One of these friends is my friend Alan from Pennsylvania. He brought his wife out to Utah for the first time. After the course, Marcella and I had the pleasure of taking the two of them downtown SLC. We walked around Temple Square and the visitors centers. The tabernacle is under construction right now but they loved the Christus statue.

The highlight of the evening was taking a tour of the LDS conference center. What a marvelous building. One of (if not the largest auditorium) in the US. Although I've been in the building several times I've never taken a tour. What a treat. What an opportunity for Marcella and I to share the gospel with Alan and Leslie.

What the &#%$

Sheryl Swoopes is gay?????

Working hard in Florida

Stingrays, shells, shrimp, and pottery

Okay, I am determined to keep writing. I've been up past midnight working for the past three nights. I'm making plans to go to Australia and trying to get a bunch of work stuff done. I know that I have to log my Holland trip, my Hawaii trip AND also say something about our family trip to Sandpoint. Oh well.

This week I'm back in Panama City, FL. Before I came here I told the townsfolk to get out their Tiki gods and make sure no hurricanes would show up here. Things looked good until today. Now Wilma, the 12th hurricane and 21st named storm, is now heading up the Gulf still unsure of its path. No worries here.

At any rate, I've been working with a consulting group here this week and this afternoon we set out on Joel's boat to do some field work. I'm bugged that I left my camera at home. I could have taken some very cool pictures. Well, we never actually made it to the project site but we did do some cool things. First they took me to Shell Island. Guess where it got its name? I gathered several shells to take home and give to people at the office. Next we drove across the bay (East Bay). Beautiful sunny day. Then Joel took us to the back side of Tyndall Air Force Base. We anchored the boat in about 3 feet of water. We then got out and walked close to the shore. In this warm water, there was lots to see and lots to be VERY careful about. First there were the stingrays. There were enough of them to keep you on your toes. They are fun to watch but don't step on them. Next, there were the shrimp. TONS of them. All over the place. They swim around your feet and are so fast. Really the only way to catch them is with a net. There are also dangerous oyster clusters on the sand that will rip your feet open if you happen to step on them. I had a nice sized jellyfish between my legs. I didn't see any aligators but they are around in plenty of numbers. So why come here? Besides the pristine nature, and beautiful scenery what we were searching for was pottery. Pottery? Huh? Because of the recent hurricanes, the shore and beach fronts have been greatly eroded. So we started digging and found several pieces. Now, how old are these pieces? It's hard to say. The pieces are attributed to the Woodland Phase Indians. I know very little about this group of people but it was cool to find pieces of pottery that was hundreds (if not thousands of years old).

At any rate, what an interesting afternoon. Thanks, Joel.

Lost my SMF

Okay, I am finally writing about my trip to Sacramento. Just a few months late but I was thinking about it the other day and I completely forgot about the highlight of the trip. First off, I went there to teach a bunch of regulators about groundwater modeling. The course was set up by a third-party organization. I knew that I was off on the wrong foot when I kept thinking the course was in Seattle. I was excited to go because a good friend of mine (at least I thought he was a good friend) lived just outside of Sactown (at least I thought it was just outside). The course went well. I had a nice lunch in Old Town sitting next to these two old ladies. I ate at this Japanese place a couple of times and it was scrumptious. I do NOT recommend staying in the downtown Holiday Inn Express. Although they had a decent gym and bananas and juice for breakfast, they did NOT have curtains over the windows so that it was light in my room ALL NIGHT LONG. Anyhow, a couple of nights I went to see my buddy, Sean Kelly who lives in Lodi. Lodi is in the freakin' middle of nowhere. I'm told that they now have an In-n-Out. It was good to see him and his family and I even brought my basketball gear and played one night at his Church. It was fun.

Okay, here is the most memorable part of the trip. On Saturday it was time to go to the airport. I start driving and I'm just about there when I start looking around for the terminal and car return place. There are very little cars around and I think it very strange. I then saw a plane fly over so I knew it must be close. I drove around the airstrip looking for the terminal. I would say after about 20 minutes or so, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I WAS AT THE WRONG AIRPORT!!!! I had driven to some freight type airport (UPS, DHL, etc). I had NO idea where the airport was? How was that possible???? Anyhow, I called my Skymiles rep and explained the small problem. She was based out of SLC and she quickly changed my flight to the next one out (luckily it was only about an hour and half later) and gave me directions to the airport. I just couldn't beleive that I had done that? I called my wife and explained that I'd be home a bit later. She just laughed.

Anyhow, hopefully the next time I'm in Sactown, I'll pay more attention to where I'm going.

Orvil and Maxine Davis

My aunts are putting together this book to give my Grandma. I've been putting off the requested materials for several months now. This weekend I finally sent the family picture, I helped my son put together the family group sheet, and last night I wrote down some of my memories of them. Afterwards, I thought that it would be a good thing to post here. So.....

Being the oldest grandson of Orvil and Maxine Davis, I have close to 39 years of fond memories of my grandparents. More importantly, besides the memories I have lots of life's lessons that I an attribute to both of them.

Since for the first several year of my life, my family lived in Southern California. I remember any visits from Grandma and Grandpa for birthdays, baptisms and blessings. When they weren't coming down to visit we would be traveling to Utah to visit them.

Christmas time was especially memorable. Everything about their home spoke of Christmas time. The window paintings, the gingerbread houses, and all of the other decorations. Of course there was always the tradition of doing the nativity scene in Grandma's living room.

One of my most memorable visits is when I got to spend a few weeks one summer at Grandma and Grandpa's home. I think I was probably 9 or 10 and it was such a memorable time. I spent many hours irrigating the pasture and yard with Grandpa. The big black boots barely stayed on. I was fascinated how this whole irrigating thing worked. I can really say that to some extent, those days spent with Grandpa created that desire to become and engineer (a water engineer no less). It wasn't easy (irrigating) and I learned to work hard. Pulling the pipe around, hooking things up, and moving the boards ONLY when Grandpa said it was time. Grandpa taught me the value of work.

Besides playing in the water, I also had "fun" weeding the garden, picking fruit, snipping beans, and canning everything you could think of. I am just amazed at how much we did and how much we could accomplish when we all worked together. It is just something my children will never know or understand. Today seems so far distant from those days of canning and bottling.

Grandpa is THE person that taught me how to milk a cow, how to feed the farm animals, and what it meant to have a farm. No one else taught me that.

Grandma did her share of teaching too. From her I learned how to make yummy bread, yummy strawberry jam, and of course the best homemade ice cream. Like I said before, it just seems so far in the past the days of skimming the cream off the gallon jars of milk (that you helped milk earlier in the day).

Another fond memory that I have of my Grandpa is that every time we visited, he would give me and my sister some kind of notebook. You know those red spelling tablets or maybe one of those green stenographer books. My grandparents always wanted us to study hard and learn and do our best. I bet Grandpa handed out hundreds if not thousands of those spelling tablets. I loved the cool unit conversions and facts that the tablets had on the backs of them.

Family was always so important to Grandma and Grandpa. We got together often. Birthdays, Easter, Memorial Day, 4th of July, 24th of July, and of course Thanksgiving and Christmas.
I learned the tradition of visiting the graves on Memorial Day of all of these relatives (many of whom I had never met). Grandpa and Grandma would tell stories about these people because they thought it was important that we knew about it. That had an impact on my life and now I continue that with my own family and tell stories to my children about my relatives that have passed on. Get togethers weren't just limited to just cousins, aunts and uncles. At least twice a year we would get together with Grandpa and Grandma's extended family. This usually was on the morning of the 24th of July (up at Canyon Glen park for breakfast) and then on the 26th of December at some school. Grandma and Grandpa taught me the importance of family and remembering our ancestors.

Another fond memory that I had with Grandma and Grandpa is spending the week of the 4th of July down at Clear Creek. Last year I had the opportunity to spend a couple of days at the same Alpine School District with my son, Jake. Boy, a flood of memories came back. Each family would stay in a cabin. I usually got to bring a friend. There were games, lots of crafts (like shrinky-dinks) and of course the campfires and weenie roasts. None of this wouldn't have happened without Grandpa and Grandma. After several years of going to Clear Creek we started going up above Heber City. This was more of the camping experience and there were lots of fond memories those years as well. When I close me eyes I can easily picture everyone gathered around Grandpa and Grandma with everyone wearing their Camp Davis t-shirt.

The last memory that I wanted to recount (I think I have gone on long enough) is the famous Easter tree story. One Easter weekend, we had gone up to the foothills about Grandpa's house for a weenie roast. After eating and playing around in the hills, the teenagers wanted to go back to the house. So we walked down the hill. On the way, we found an old dried up Christmas tree someone had dumped in the fields. I got the great idea of taking it to the house. I thought it would be so funny to put the tree up in Grandma's living room and decorate it. So we did. It became a lovely Easter tree. Imagine Grandma's face when she returned to see this dried up tree in her living room. We laughed so hard and we will always remember that Easter. I do not believe there has ever been such a tree. There were probably many other pranks pulled over the years but I will always remember that one.

Grandpa and Grandma, I love you and I'm grateful for all that you have taught me.

Jeff

Happy Birthday, Kevin! 

Black Saturday

Well, last night Marcella and I were invited to celebrate the big 40 of Kevin Gregory Carter. All week long I thought about the many memories that we have shared over the years. I got to share a few of those stories. I remember that Kevin (and Darren) were two of the first kids I met when my family moved from Huntington Beach to Sandy. Over the next few years there were many fun (and maybe stupid) times shared with my Ida Lane friends. We LOVED playing with fire. We pretty much figured out what was flamable. One day after playing in Kevin's garage lighting everything we opened up the garage door and all of this smoke piled out. I told the story when I lit the field on fire behind our neighborhood while Kevin and Scott were trying to light a model rocket. I remember the countless times we would sleep over at Kevin's house and then go down to the Centre theater. We would clean the theater and then going exploring. We would spend the entire Saturday running around downtown SLC. I CANNOT imagine letting my kids do that. Then we would ride the UTA bus back to Sandy for a whopping 10 cents. Kevin loved Spyra Gyra and the Doobie Brothers. I found him a Best of CD at target and a box of matches. I went to Kevin's mom's funeral, I was there at his wedding (just a day or two before mine) and I'm glad that he's back here in Utah County. His son, KJ, and JJ go to the same junior high school. Last year Kevin decided to leave the corporate world to start Inspiricpics. Happy Birthday, friend.

My daughter! Olivia Pilar Armenta Chavez Davis Gracie Bohemia currently known as Tinkerbell 

Random Thoughts

Well, I've been thinking about a bunch of things that I should blog about. I get excited to write in the morning but then I get too busy and then it's late at night and I'm tired. I should write more but at least I'm writing.

These thoughts are not in any specific order.

Thought 1:
Since I went on my diet/exercise kick 7 months ago I have lost over 30 pounds. I need to post another picture showing the much slimmer/trimmer me. Oh, someday.

Thought 2:
I STILL need to blog about my Sacramento trip, Holland, and Hawaii. Dang! It's been so long I wonder if it's even worth it.

Thought 3:
My buddy, Norm, sent me this link the other day about some guy in Germany that powers his car using dead cats. So all week long while driving to work, every time I see a dead cat on the road I've thought, "Dang, gas is so expensive!" The German needs to come here because there are 4 or 5 cats on the way to work splattered on the road.

Thought 4:
So I'm thinking about these roadside cats-for-fuel thing and then I seem something which to me seems pretty strange. Near the onramp for the Alpine/Highland exit they have been doing lots of construction for the past several months. Most of it has been for the Cabelas that just opened up. Anyhow, as I was passing this big bulldozer the driver stepped out of the cab. It was a young, blonde, tight t-shirt wearing woman. I thought that was pretty strange. I bet she is pretty popular at work.

Thought 5:
This is really why I wanted to blog this morning. Since my lovely wife had been confined to the bed/couch (she calls me the prison warden btw), Olive and I have had good quality time this week traveling back and forth from Highland to South Jordan. She is such a sweetheart. Each
morning and afternoon we rock out to various songs on daddy's iPod. She can pick out the song usually within a note or two. It doesn't matter what it is, she loves to sing with daddy. We listen to Big & Rich, Enrique, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Everclear, LeAnn Rimes, you name it. What a treat. I tried to play some Billy Squier this morning. She didn't like it.

Well that's it. No more thoughts (except ones that involve my pillow)

Traverse Mountain: For the past few Saturdays this has been my challenge. First I ran to the top and back (about 8 miles or so) and the next Saturday, my buddy, Tim, took me up the top by riding our bikes and then once on top we rode trail after trail. It was beautiful but I was dang tired (and sore) after the 3+ hour trek. I wonder how long we will be able to enjoy such beautiful country. 

Robert Tracinski revisited

A few days ago I sent an article by Robert Tracinski. I was very interested in the responses from all of you and so I thought I would share with all of you some of the responses. I really do
appreciate the thought and sentiment you all expressed.

Here they are:

*********************************

Amen (I actually got several responses like this)

*********************************

What do you want me to say? Another right-wing bigot flaps his gums. This was my favorite quote:

"But what about criminals and welfare parasites? Do they worry about saving their houses and property? They don't, because they don't own anything. Do they worry about what is going to happen to their businesses or how they are going to make a living? They never worried about those things before. Do they worry about crime and looting? But living off of stolen wealth is a way of life for them."

Sheesh. Nice stereotyping. And way to rub salt in the wounds of the victims in the darkest hour. In any case, this nazi should be happy. I suspect he feels vindicated that God hates poor black people as much as he does.

*********************************

Well, I think it is way too early to make generalities about what exactly went wrong (if you can even pinpoint it to a certain thing)--but I think that when all is said and done, there will be plenty of blame to go around as far as whose at fault. I'm not sure I agree with the author's assertion that the welfare state is ultimately at fault, and his intimation that most people on welfare are parasites sucking the system dry... I actually think that's a bit of a crass generalization. The more I read about some of these people who were caught down there, the more I think about how much they're caught up in a cruel cycle... it's easy for us to say "well, if you work hard enough, you can accomplish anything"--partticularly those of us that have had the relative comfort of a middle class up bringing... but if the more I read some of these people's stories, the more I wonder if that sentiment is applicable across the spectrum. I think there are some true barriers for some of these people to improve their stations in life...whether it be a child being born into an environment that makes it inconducive to actually getting a decent education, or the fact that their parents are unable to make a sufficiently decent living to provide such conducive environment.

That said, do I think the answer is the welfare state the author derides? Not necessarily... but I think that saying the welfare state is the end-all of the problem is trite and dogmatic... see the below article for some of the stories of people that didn't make it out... they don't really sound like welfare parasites to me...they just sound like people who were trying to get by and didn't have any other choice but to hang out.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/03/AR2005090301508.html

I will agree that there is a definite link between poverty and crime rates, but to say that the government shouldn't step in and help because such help feeds dependency, which is tied to a tendency toward criminality, seems bogus to me.

*********************************

In my humble opinion, Robert here has it dead on, and political correctness is not allowing for an honest discussion of what truly went wrong.

Furthermore those who choose to stay behind have no right to expect help to be brought to them. Help should be offered to those who have evacuated first. Those who stayed behind have to except the reward or consequences of their actions. It's a hard truth, but they choose to stay behind.

We should take advantage of the opportunity to remove from our society the dirt bags who are acting like barbarians (raping, robbing, and murdering) presently in New Orleans. We don't need them. They bring nothing to our country, and they are taxing the city they live in.

I hate welfare. It ruins lives.

*********************************

Re article, there may be an element of truth to the main message. Its no secret the NO has been a magnet for criminal activity for years, but it most likely presents an inaccurate picture to paint the general populace with the same brush as a few hundred/thousand criminals.

Besides, even normal or otherwise well adjusted people will do the unexpected when under tress or in shock. Its really ugly there, but your profession has been telling people for a long time that NO was a disaster waiting to happen.

*********************************

Robert Tracinski

Until tonight, I have never heard of this guy. My Aunt sent me his article which I post (and hopefully properly credit) in its entirety. I want this somewhere where I can read it again:

An Unnatural Disaster: A Hurricane Exposes the Man-Made Disaster of the Welfare State

An Objectivist Review

by Robert Tracinski | The Intellectual Activist

September 2, 2005

It has taken four long days for state and federal officials to figure out how to deal with the disaster in New Orleans. I can't blame them, because it has also taken me four long days to figure out what is going on there. The reason is that the events there make no sense if you think that we are confronting a natural disaster.

If this is just a natural disaster, the response for public officials is
obvious: you bring in food, water, and doctors; you send transportation to evacuate refugees to temporary shelters; you send engineers to stop the flooding and rebuild the city's infrastructure. For journalists, natural disasters also have a familiar pattern: the heroism of ordinary people pulling together to survive; the hard work and dedication of doctors, nurses, and rescue workers; the steps being taken to clean up and rebuild.

Public officials did not expect that the first thing they would have to do is to send thousands of armed troops in armored vehicle, as if they are suppressing an enemy insurgency. And journalists--myself included--did not expect that the story would not be about rain, wind, and flooding, but about rape, murder, and looting.

But this is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made disaster.

The man-made disaster is not an inadequate or incompetent response by federal relief agencies, and it was not directly caused by Hurricane Katrina. This is where just about every newspaper and television channel has gotten the story wrong.

The man-made disaster we are now witnessing in New Orleans did not happen over the past four days. It happened over the past four decades. Hurricane Katrina merely exposed it to public view.

The man-made disaster is the welfare state.

For the past few days, I have found the news from New Orleans to be confusing. People were not behaving as you would expect them to behave in an emergency--indeed, they were not behaving as they have behaved in other emergencies. That is what has shocked so many people: they have been saying that this is not what we expect from America. In fact, it is not even what we expect from a Third World country.

When confronted with a disaster, people usually rise to the occasion. They work together to rescue people in danger, and they spontaneously organize to keep order and solve problems. This is especially true in America. We are an enterprising people, used to relying on our own initiative rather than waiting around for the government to take care of us. I have seen this a hundred times, in small examples (a small town whose main traffic light had gone out, causing ordinary citizens to get out of their cars and serve as impromptu traffic cops, directing cars through the intersection) and large ones (the spontaneous response of New Yorkers to September 11).

So what explains the chaos in New Orleans?

To give you an idea of the magnitude of what is going on, here is a description from a Washington Times story:

"Storm victims are raped and beaten; fights erupt with flying fists, knives and guns; fires are breaking out; corpses litter the streets; and police and rescue helicopters are repeatedly fired on.

"The plea from Mayor C. Ray Nagin came even as National Guardsmen poured in to restore order and stop the looting, carjackings and gunfire....

"Last night, Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said 300 Iraq-hardened Arkansas National Guard members were inside New Orleans with shoot-to-kill orders.

"'These troops are...under my orders to restore order in the streets,' she said. 'They have M-16s, and they are locked and loaded. These troops know how to shoot and kill and they are more than willing to do so if necessary and I expect they will.' "

The reference to Iraq is eerie. The photo that accompanies this article shows National Guard troops, with rifles and armored vests, riding on an armored vehicle through trash-strewn streets lined by a rabble of squalid, listless people, one of whom appears to be yelling at them. It looks exactly like a scene from Sadr City in Baghdad.

What explains bands of thugs using a natural disaster as an excuse for an orgy of looting, armed robbery, and rape? What causes unruly mobs to storm the very buses that have arrived to evacuate them, causing the drivers to drive away, frightened for their lives? What causes people to attack the doctors trying to treat patients at the Super Dome?

Why are people responding to natural destruction by causing further destruction? Why are they attacking the people who are trying to help them?

My wife, Sherri, figured it out first, and she figured it out on a sense-of-life level. While watching the coverage last night on Fox News Channel, she told me that she was getting a familiar feeling. She studied architecture at the Illinois Institute of Chicago, which is located in the South Side of Chicago just blocks away from the Robert Taylor Homes, one of the largest high-rise public housing projects in America. "The projects," as they were known, were infamous for uncontrollable crime and irremediable squalor. (They have since, mercifully, been demolished.)

What Sherri was getting from last night's television coverage was a whiff of the sense of life of "the projects." Then the "crawl"--the informational phrases flashed at the bottom of the screen on most news channels--gave some vital statistics to confirm this sense: 75% of the residents of New Orleans had already evacuated before the hurricane, and of the 300,000 or so who remained, a large number were from the city's public housing projects. Jack Wakeland then gave me an additional, crucial fact: early reports from CNN and Fox indicated that the city had no plan for evacuating all of the prisoners in the city's jails--so they just let many of them loose. There is no doubt a significant overlap between these two populations--that is, a large number of people in the jails used to live in the housing projects, and vice versa.

There were many decent, innocent people trapped in New Orleans when the deluge hit--but they were trapped alongside large numbers of people from two
groups: criminals--and wards of the welfare state, people selected, over decades, for their lack of initiative and self-induced helplessness. The welfare wards were a mass of sheep--on whom the incompetent administration of New Orleans unleashed a pack of wolves.

All of this is related, incidentally, to the apparent incompetence of the city government, which failed to plan for a total evacuation of the city, despite the knowledge that this might be necessary. But in a city corrupted by the welfare state, the job of city officials is to ensure the flow of handouts to welfare recipients and patronage to political supporters--not to ensure a lawful, orderly evacuation in case of emergency.

No one has really reported this story, as far as I can tell. In fact, some are already actively distorting it, blaming President Bush, for example, for failing to personally ensure that the Mayor of New Orleans had drafted an adequate evacuation plan. The worst example is an execrable piece from the Toronto Globe and Mail, by a supercilious Canadian who blames the chaos on American "individualism." But the truth is precisely the opposite: the chaos was caused by a system that was the exact opposite of individualism.

What Hurricane Katrina exposed was the psychological consequences of the welfare state. What we consider "normal" behavior in an emergency is behavior that is normal for people who have values and take the responsibility to pursue and protect them. People with values respond to a disaster by fighting against it and doing whatever it takes to overcome the difficulties they face. They don't sit around and complain that the government hasn't taken care of them. They don't use the chaos of a disaster as an opportunity to prey on their fellow men.

But what about criminals and welfare parasites? Do they worry about saving their houses and property? They don't, because they don't own anything. Do they worry about what is going to happen to their businesses or how they are going to make a living? They never worried about those things before. Do they worry about crime and looting? But living off of stolen wealth is a way of life for them.

The welfare state--and the brutish, uncivilized mentality it sustains and encourages--is the man-made disaster that explains the moral ugliness that has swamped New Orleans. And that is the story that no one is reporting.

Disaster relief

I've been searching the WWW all morning looking for news of other countries pledging to help with the disaster relief for the people suffering in the United States due to Hurricane Katrina. I'm not finding anything (nor do I expect to find squat).

Milk vs. Steroids

Recently a batboy for the Florida Marlins was suspended by the organization for 6 games for accepting a dare from an LA Dodger picture (Brad Penny). The dare was the old "I bet you can't drink a gallon of milk in less than an hour and note puke". Penny is quoted as saying "It's kind of ridiculous that you get a 10-game suspension for steroids and a 6-game suspension for milk".

I have to agree.

BTW, the batboy did drink all of the milk, didn't puke but didn't finish in the alloted 1 hour.

Olivia's first day of school. Boy are we in trouble! 

JJ and the Discovery space shuttle