Sunday, December 30, 2007

Happy New Year!

Freaks... over there!






Yes, she is giving you the bird...

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

GG and I baking cookies.
Last year the wife attempted to make Christmas cookies with mixed success. This year I gave it a try with GG as my "assistant". As a Chef she fails, but she is pretty good as a taster, and in making a huge mess.









Wednesday, December 19, 2007

GG Dancin'

GG Eating the Christmas Tree.









Friday, November 30, 2007

Damn, Evel is Dead!

Monday, October 15, 2007

GG at the Park

Yesterday was unusually nice out so I took GG to the park. Here are some videos.

GG Swinging


GG climbs the ladder




GG Climbs the Slide

Sunday, October 07, 2007

Sister vs. Sister

Ninja!

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

GG with some Shakers!

I made some home made shakers with some old easter eggs and fruit flavored cheerios for GG to play with. She loves them.

Monday, August 20, 2007

Me Shooting...



A pretty cool shot of me shooting the hell out of cardboard a few weeks ago...

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Some of my ancestors...

Maine is quite literally littered with graveyards. Every few miles you come along a new graveyard. The interesting thing is that many of these graveyard seem to be placed on hills. Maybe so they wouldn't take up usable farm land or something. We stopped at the East Bethel Cemetary to look at a few of my relatives gravestones.



Here is my Grandfather William Straw Hastings. Straw was not his given middle name. I will update the story of why he took the middle name Straw in my next post. He and a good friend of his drown in a boating accident when my dad was nine.



My Grandmother, Ruth Linnie Cole Hastings. Raised 3 children by herself by working as a teacher. Completed her college degree late in life. I remember very little about her except that she sewed us boys a ton of clothes, and when she died, we inherited her Ford Grenada.



My Great Grandfather, George Kimball Hastings. He committed suicide a few months after my Grandfather died. He was depressed about the death of his son, had some health problems, and a great hatred for hospitals due to his feelings that hospitals led to his wife's death. He was a big time hunter and worked with his uncle Gideon to trap capture wild animals. A deer George caught was sold to Central Park in 1890.



My Great Grandmother, May L Hastings. To put her two sons through college, May went into the egg producing business.



My Uncle...He was a Marine, and the quintessential outdoors guy. Worked in the woods of New Hampshire all of his life and specialized in underwater rescue / recovery.



And finally, my dad and step mom. It is a little weird to stand next to your father looking down on his grave stone. He made sure to tell us that he doesn't want to be buried there...he wants to be cremated and scattered over Montana. The stone is for letting people know that he exited.

My next post will be on the 3 Hastings houses in Bethel. One of them is a museum, one a private residence (but maintained as a museum)and the third is a bed and breakfast complete with an Italian restaurant and martini bar.

Sunday, August 05, 2007

Hastings Farm.

I'm still up in the woods of Maine and have only a very sketchy Internet connection but here are a few pictures of my trip down Hastings Lane.



The Hastings Farm. It has been in the family since 1792. My Dad's cousin Sonny has a dairy operation set up, and raises corn and hay. In Minnesota, they have a bunch of "Century Farms", farms that have been in the same family for 100 years. This one has been in the same family for over 200 years.

Right below the Hastings Farm sign is a large granite boulder with a metal sign attached. Here is a picture.



The sign says,


Non Historical Marker. On this spot February 29, 1776 Absolutely Nothing Happened.

We were at the family farm to celebrate the birthday of my Dad's Aunt. She is 103 years old... and very alert. She made sure that we all went out to look at her cows.

Here is a picture of the house build in 1792. I have pictures of my great great grandfather and his family sitting right out front these very same doors.



In 1923, my Grandpa build his family a house across the driveway from this house. My Dad and his brother and sister were all born in this house. In the basement, my grandma set up a chicken operation and incubated chickens to sell the eggs and broilers. My dad said he always hated having to go down to work in the chicken coop in the basement. Here is a picture of the house:



Here was my grandparent's room, and the room my dad was born in.



It is a little strange to travel 3,000 miles across the country and stand in the exact room your father was born in 73 years ago. Anyway, I'll post more later. Tomorrow we are taking a train up the tallest mountain east of the Mississippi - Mount Washington. I've got a bunch of shots of the old gravestone of my ancestors, and some really cool pictures of some of my ancestors houses that are now museums, and in one case a martini bar...

Monday, July 30, 2007

Emirie Directing Traffic!

GG's Injury.
Here are a couple of pictures of GG's injury. The cut is in the shape of a perfect "J" on her lip...



Friday, July 27, 2007

GG's trip to the ER

The Hastings proclivity for facial scars takes another victim. My body is marred by any number of scars, from the "Big One" the six inch long, 1/2 inch wide scar down the back of my ankle to the strange backward "Y" Harry Potter like scar on my forehead. I have a "new" scar on the left side of my nose from striking my face on an open bathroom vanity drawer, and an old 2" long football scar on the back of my right arm. Last night, GG proved her Hastingsness by slicing her lip open.

We were planning on attending a "Sammamish City Nights" concert last night, and as I came home from work, everything was fine. GG was upstairs with Mama, and as she often does when I get home, she said "Dadda?" I said hi GG, then heard the double thud of an excited GG tumbling down the stairs.

GG immediately started crying, and as I went up the stairs to get her, she looked scared but fine. All of a sudden in a split second, there was blood everywhere. She was lying on her back on the middle portion of the stairs and blood was running from her mouth all over her face and into her eyes. I grabbed her, took her down to the kitchen, and began to wipe away the blood. Just my luck I happened to be wearing a crisp white dress shirt that was now soaked in blood.

After wiping away most of the blood, the injury didn't appear too bad. About a 1/2 inch gash on the right side of her lip. The gash was a gaping gash and was bleeding pretty good. I looked and it didn't go all the way through and her teeth were all present and accounted for. Naarah took a look, and after vetoing my trip to the ER when I cut my face open six months earlier, declared we need to go to the Emergency room.

By the time we packed up GG, she was in a pretty good mood and excited to go on an adventure with Momma and Dadda. At the emergency room, we waited in the lobby for about 2 hours and GG had a good time running around looking at the fish tanks, and pretty much having a great time. Naarah and I talked about just going home, but a nurse said that we really should get the gash sown up, so that she wouldn't be horribly scarred for life.

After seeing the doctor and being told that she would need stitches, we sat around in the ER room for another hour and tried to get GG to hold a topical anesthetic to her lip. The doctor said that if we could get her to numb up her lip, we wouldn't have to restrain her when she got stitches. - GG didn't really like to hold the anesthetic to her lip, so we went with plan #2 restrain a toddler.

Naarah left because she didn't want to see what was going to happen, as the male nurse came in with the restraints (1 pillow case and a few blankets.) The nurse told GG that he was going to make her a superman cape and proceeded to tuck GG's arms into a pillow case behind her body. After GG got her cape on, we laid her down, and stretched a blanket across her upper torso. The doctor came by and said, "you better restrain her legs too, you really don't want to be kicked in the head by a toddler..." So the nurse stretched a sheet across her legs.

As soon as the Doctor poked her lip with the syringe GG yelled out "All Done" and began to scream and thrash around. She continue to yell "All Done" and the Doctor said "I bet". GG is strong like bull, it took two grown men, the nurse and myself to restrain her. The nurse laid across her upper torso and I was responsible for laying across her legs. GG is super strong, and I started to sweat trying to keep her from kicking the crap out of all three of us.

It took about ten minutes for the Doctor to give GG 5 stitches and through the whole thing she kept crying and saying "All Done". When the stitching was over, we let GG get up and she was drenched in sweat. Her hair was sticking straight out and she looked like the mug shot of Nick Nolte after he was arrested for a 3 day bender. GG recovered pretty quickly and as we drove home 4 hours after she fell down the stairs, she spend the car ride home pointing out the moon to us.
GG continues her singing career.

Last weekend our friend Anthony brought over his projector and karaoke game and we set it up in our newly created Rumpus Room. The projector gives us about an 8' by 12' screen, and the surround soound really seems to help with the singing. As you can see by the clip bellow, GG has added crowd interaction to her singing repertoire.

enjoy--

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Update on House Work...

Since the wife and kids are off having their "Summer of Fun" I've taken my bachelorhood time to do a lot of the things that I don't have the time or energy to do when the house is full.

Jobs completed so far...
Used the blower to blow all dirt, leaves, and what not off of the roof.
Used the blower to clean the deck and driveway.
Purchased a power washer and powerwashed the deck both front and back.
Power washed the driveway and retaining walls.
Stained the front deck - the wrong color.
Stained a large portion of the back deck.
Picked up and assembled new bedroom furniture.
Partially cleaned out the rumpous room.
Partially clean out the downstairs storage room.
Purchased a new gas weed wacker and weed wacked the yard.

Here are some pictures:







A classic GG Video.

I recently learned that there are a lot of GG Haters out there. Poor Jealous Bastards! I learned at a young age that being a super genius has both benefits and drawbacks. It was a hard lesson to learn and I'm not looking forward to the day that it dawns on GG that most people are not as bright or cute as she is....You can't show pity to these people because even with their reduced intelligence, they seem to resent your pity.

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Guy's Weekend.



A couple of weeks ago I went down to my brother's inlaw's cabin by Mount Ranier. We drank, fished, and shot the hell out of just about everything. So why do I have a picture of daisies to kick off the guy's weekend post? Because while we we shooting everything and anything, we noticed this:



That's right, Albino frickin' Spider....
Beat that Sally!

Monday, June 11, 2007

Wild Animal Sighting!

I was walking around my yard yesterday and had a wild animal sighting. Luckily, I had by camera phone with me and was able to snap a photo. The good news is that the animal appears to be a herbivore.

Thursday, June 07, 2007

GG Off to School!


Picture of GG going off to school. There was a tense moment or two when she sneezed and lost her binky. I successfully located said binky under the front seat of the car and disaster was averted.

Monday, June 04, 2007

I've Got Two Words!

HELL'S KITCHEN!

It's back baby. The first episode of the season and five people have already cried. I'm betting on the only guy who looks like a winner, Eddie!

Sunday, May 27, 2007

Japanese Tourist Watch!

Back in the days before I had a blog and when I was working at Microsoft, I used to see a ton of Japanese Tourists on the Microsoft Campus. I don't know why anyone would visit a corporate office park on vacation, but the Japanese are a little different. The interesting thing is that these tourists don't even get to go into any buildings -- they pretty much just get to look at the outsides of a nondescript office park. Everyone of them does get their photo taken next to one of the Microsoft signs.

In honor of my return, I present a new series: What the goofy Japanese Tourists are Wearing!



Excuse the bad photo, I took it with my phone's camera as I was driving by. This guy is wearing black tennis shoes with pulled up white tube socks. The sock have the excellent racing stripes. He is wearing white clamdiggers, a belt and to top it all off, he has a black t-shirt with the Playboy bunny in white on the front. Expect to see everyone in America sporting this outfit in like five years...

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Sisters

Here is a quick shot of GG holding Emirie. GG really likes her. She get mad when you grab try to take her away.

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Emirie Reagan Hastings!
This kid has a ton of black curly hair.




Wednesday, May 02, 2007

New Post!

I got a new job, so I've been a bit too busy to blog for a while, but the latest issue of my home town rag, The Sammamish Review's police blotter is way to good this week.

The Sammamish Review doesn't post the police blotter online, so no link. Here we go.

Misplaced Rage

A 19-year-old male was arrested after causing a disturbance in his family's home in the 200 block of 222nd Avenue Northeast at 8 a.m. April 15. the suspect alleged that a member of his family had stolen a $5 bill that the suspect had left on the couch in the house. In his rage, he smashed a plate in the kitchen and began to empty out the refrigerator. Police responded and arrested the suspect. While booking him into jail, an officer found a $5 bill to be in the suspect's possession.


The cops had to be laughing their ass off at this moron.

Sunday, April 22, 2007

GG puts on some Shoes.

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

A Quick question for you.....

Do all teachers wear novelty teeth?

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Lady Grooming

My mother-in-law has a post on Lady Grooming. Don't ask me why, she just does. This freaking Internets thing is really something. Any who, here are some ideas for when Jan loses her eyebrows.


No Eyebrow Jan.


Angry Jan.


Surprised Jan.


Ernie Jan.


Old Lady Jan.