Randoms

Sorry about the picture overload, and they are all from Elaine's phone so they are a little blurry but our camera's batteries are dead and we keep forgetting to buy new batteries.


A waterfall on the way to Gilbert from Pima, notice the dirty window?

They seriously swim everyday but Sunday


Carly in her new swimsuit and her hair all curly from the curlers her Aunt Mandy gave her. She loves them


Carly and Riley's Easter getup's

Riley with our bird buddy. He finally wanted to hold him and Buddy actually let him.
Well we just wanted to post some pictures for you guys to see the kids hope everybody is doing well we love and miss you all. Oh and hope you had a good birthday yesterday Natasha.

Our Famous Uncle

Did any of you know that we have a famous uncle? We never knew because he was using a fake name 'Tom Skerritt'

Which one is Uncle Dan? I thought it was hard to tell the difference!

what it means to be a burdett...

it is a very important point to consider that as burdetts we are naturally driven to do our best. whether it's guarding prisoners, cleaning hospital rooms, driving administrative processes to assure labels for cosmetics are accurate and available on time, or even doing whatever the hell it was that adam did at toys r us, we do the best that we possibly can. and, more often than not, our best is right up there with the best. we do not do it to feel superior, or even to be superior. we do it because it is what we do. we are burdetts.

as i spend hour after hour folding pants, i have had plenty of time to ponder the significance of my work. i am not pioneering a new in vitro surgery that will save the lives of unborn children, nor am i litigating a case at the world court in the hague that will bring forth everlasting world peace. curing cancer? unifying quantum mechanics and classical physics? studying ancient texts to uncover hidden secrets to the current location of the ark of the covenant? no, no, and no. i am a star and i receive constant praise and approval for mastery in the field of folding pants. champagne and cigars all around.


if mommy has done her diligence, all of you should have heard that i was recently nominated and voted by my peers to be the kohl's superstar of the month. (this is a slight departure from the times i was department head of the month at the home depot as those awards were given by my managers, not my peers.) kohl's is really great and tries to make a big fuss over this, although it is a bit misguided in some regards.

it all begins with a lovely card and certificate. the card has written on it a few of the things that were written by your peers on the nomination ballots. mine were kind, but non-specific. "he is very friendly," "he helps out in lots of areas," and "he is really good at 5-basics." (5-basics, for those of you not familiar with kohl's, is the term used to refer to what are considered to be the five most important aspects of keeping the appearance of our store at top level. i imagine one of them is folding pants, although i do not actually know what they are. my job right now, by the way, is to spend all day every day working on nothing but 5-basics. i'm assuming that once i finish folding every single pair of pants on the face of the earth, they will tell me what number two is so that i can move on to that. i'm secretly hoping it's "wash the car" or "paint the fence" so that when i'm finished i will know karate. i don't, however, recall mr. miyagi every using "fold the pants" to teach any moves.)

the card also contains a few other items, one of them being a little form to fill out to pick a free prize (i picked the messenger bag). there is also a little place on the form to name someone who helped you succeed and then they get an extra five bucks on their pay check (i named the one person that told me they voted for me). last, and certainly not least, the card contains a sticker that you can apply to your name tag to show everyone that you were named superstar. i took a picture of mine next to a penny to show scale.

being really good at five basics, i have used my zeal to convince my manager to make me a custom name tag. i believe i am the only person in the store with a name tag that says anything except my name.

so, having received such a prestigious award, i wanted to make full use of it to show people that i am not just the 5-basics king of the world, but i am also a superstar. here is the glamorous result:

this feels very much like going to blue alert on starbug.

but we mustn't forget the parking space. i'm thinking of taking some patio furniture and using my space as an outdoor break area so that it doesn't totally go to waste. this would only be an option during the times when a customer has not ignored the sign and parked in these premium spaces.

here is a shot of two fixtures, one of which i have finished, the other i have not. i leave it to you to distinguish which is which.

i guess the point that i am trying to make is that although i am wasting my life doing something a monkey could do, i still take pride in my work because i am a burdett. and that is what we do. (it wouldn't need to be a very smart monkey, either. if we established a ranking system from one to ten, with ten being the astronaut monkeys that have actually travelled into outer space and returned safely, and one being the monkey from that youtube video that fell out of a tree after smelling the finger he used to pick his butt, folding pants would require a monkey from grades three through seven. i have ruled out anything below a three only because nobody wants pants that smell like monkey butt and anything over a seven because they would find the work to be far too tedious and a total waste of their space shuttle pilot training.)

Quite possibly the Best story ever Written

Ok So I stumbled upon this story today. Thought I should share it. To me this represents a lot of group projects I have done in school. Also I smell some kind of writing award for this.

A Creative Writing Professor told his class one day: "Today we will experiment with a new form called the tandem story. The Process is simple. Each person will pair off with the persons sitting next to his or her desk. As homework tonight, one of you will write the first paragraph of a short story. you will email your partner that paragraph and send another copy to me. The partner will read the first paragraph and then add another paragraph to the story and send it back, also sending another copy to me. The first person will then add a third paragraph, and so on back and forth.
There is to be absolutely NO talking outside of the emails and anything you wish to say must be written in the email. The story is over when both agree a conclusion has been reached."

The following was actually turned in by two of his students
Rebecca(Pink)
Bill( Blue)

First paragraph by rebbeca

At first, laurie couldn't decide which kind of tea she wanted. The Chamomile, which used to be her favorite for lazy evenings at home, now reminded her too much of Carl, who once said, in happier times, that he liked chamomile. But she felt she must now, at all costs, keep her mind off Carl. His possessiveness was suffocating, and if she thought about him too much her asthma started acting up again. so chamomile was out of the question.

Second paragraph by Bill

Meanwhile, Advance Sergeant Carl Harris, leader fo the attack squadron now in orbit over Skylon 4, had more important things to think about than the neuroses of an air headed asthmatic bimbo named Laurie with whom he had spent one seaty night over a year ago. "A.A. Harris to Geastation 17," he said into his transgalactic communicator." Polar orbit established. No sign of resistance so far..." But before he could sign off a bluish particle beam flashed out of nowhere and blasted a hole through his ship's cargo bay. The jolt from the direct hit sent him flying out of his seat and across the cockpit.

He bumped his head and died almost immediately, but not before he felt one last pang of regret for psychically brutalizing the one woman who had ever had feelings for him. Soon afterwards, Earth stopped its pointless hostilities towards the peaceful farmers of skylon 4. "Congress Passes Law Permanently Abolishing War and Space Travel," Laurie read in her newspaper one morning. The news simultaneously excited her and bored her she stared out the window, dreaming of her youth, when the days had passed unhurriedly and carefree, with no newspaper to read, no television to distract her from her sense of innocent wonder at all the beautiful things around her. "Why must on lose one's innocence to become a woman?" she pondered wistfully.

Little did she know, but she had less than 10 seconds to live. Thousands of miles above the city, the Anu'udrian mothership launched the first of its litium fusion missiles. The dimwitted wimpy peaceniks who pushed the Unilateral Aerospace disarmament Treaty through the Congress had left Earth a defenseless target for the hostile alien empires who were determined to destroy the human race. Within two hours after the passage of the treaty the Anu'udrian ships were on course for Earth, carrying enough firepower to pulverize the entire planet. With no one to stop them, they swiftly initiated their diabolical plan. The lithium fusion missile entered the atmosphere unimpeded. The President, in his top secret mobile submarine headquarters on the ocean floor off th coast of Guam, felt the inconceivably massive explosion, which vaporized even poor, stupid Laurie.

This is absurd. I refuse to continue this mockery of literature. My writing partneris a violent, chauvinistic semi-literate adolescent.

Yeah? Well, my writing partner is a self centered tedious neurotic whose attempts at writing are the literary equivalent of Valium. "Oh, shall I have chamomile tea? Or shall I have some other sort of F@#!ing TEA??? Oh no, what am I to do? I'm such an air headed bimbo. I guess I've read too many Danielle Steele novels!"

A$$h@le.

B*tch!

F*** YOU-YOU NEANDERTHAL!

In your dreams, HO. Go drink some tea.

At some point here the teacher probably should have stepped in or something. But I think like me he wanted to see where the masterpiece was heading. I just wish they had finished the story It would have Ben Legen.... wait for it..... Dary. That's right L E G E N D A R Y.

"It's a BOY!!!"

The doctor didn't exactly use those words, but we gathered from the picture that it is definately a Baby. I still maintain that it is a boy. .... I mean look at it!!! I added an arrow for those of you that have not had an anatomy course at the college level. "It" is right there!

Adam's photography pictures

Adam is taking a Photography class at UVU and has taken some pretty cool pictures. Here are just a couple of our favorites:

Picture of Peggy. Adam used this one for a low key picture and got a 20/20.
Here is what his teacher said: Interesting low key. Good use & understanding of side lighting. Great focus on the eye, that's key in a portrait. Great contrast in tones while still barely holding onto texture in the highlights. Good Job!
This is one of my favorites, its a picture of my mothers anniversary roses.
This is one of the first things Adam did in his class. I think he was very creative in how he made this. First he placed the drawing of the mechanical hand down and put his hand over it, then after letting the light come through for a couple of seconds moved his hand and let the light come with only the drawing.

A DAY WITH THE BOYS!!! (two anyway...)

On Saturday I went shopping with Nathan to Kohls in American Fork, because Orem Kohls didn't have his shoes in his size. I got Mark two jeans "urban Up Relaxed fit" size 32-30 in the indigo blue color.  they were on sale for $13.99 in the early bird sale, then it was friends and family discount, plus Nathan got the employee discount so they were only 10.00 each.
Nathan got a really sweet deal on all the things he bought. Jacob refused to come because he was not on his meds and he was certain that he would make a scene in the store on account of his extreme dislike for shopping.
        Afterwards I went with Jacob to Skippers and had the Fish and Chips. Jacob had gotten a buy one get one free coupon for skippers and he knew that I love to eat fish! We really enjoyed ourselves! After much thought we both decided that the fish and chips that Natasha made were much better than those found at Skippers. Jacob also showed me how to eat french fries with Malt Vinegar. (that must be an acquired taste)  He purports that they really love to eat french fries like this in Canada, but he is unsure about other countries. After the day was finished I have decide that I highly recommend spending a meal with Jacob!! He is Simply a breath of fresh air! you should all make arrangements to go eat with him some time soon!!! (Just make sure you get plenty of napkins for when he spills and/or drops something.)
(Guess who helped me post this blog.  I can't work the downloads)

Easter!

Happy Easter to everyone hope you all had a good Day! Here are some pictures from our day! The first one is my favorite. I love it.

UVU donor pays $20,000 for the naming rights to restrooms

  It's not unusual for a big university donor to have a chair at the school named in his honor, but Ron Lindorf will get his name on a throne.
The Utah County venture capitalist has agreed to pay Utah Valley University $20,000 for the naming rights to the men's and women's restroom in the school's planned science building.
Lindorf said he got the idea from an article he read in Forbes magazine last year. Venture capitalist Brad Feld had agreed to pay $25,000 to put his name on bathrooms in a new building at University of Colorado at Boulder.
"It made me laugh, and I thought if anybody ever asked me for money for a building, then I'm going to propose we name the bathrooms after my wife and I," he said.
When UVU contacted him asking for help with its new science building, they offered a sort of menu of classrooms and laboratories with the suggested donations that would earn the naming rights.
Lindorf made his own offer: If a comparably sized laboratory was going for $10,000, "well, how about a lavatory?"
"It is unusual, to say the least," said Val Hale, UVU vice president for institutional advancement. "Initially we thought he was joking so we kind of bantered back and forth by e-mail and before long he said, 'No, I'm dead serious. This is what I want to do.' "
Last week, the school's board of trustees signed off on the proposal.
Remi Barron, spokesman for the University of Utah, said it's a common practice to sell the naming rights for buildings or even classrooms.
"I've never heard of it for a bathroom. At least not yet," he said. "Given the budget times, I can understand why they're doing it, but I have yet to hear of an actual program like that up here."

http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_14794552