Brad's

We went to our friend Brad's place out in Lincoln county yesterday after church. We got a load of firewood and spent the afternoon and evening with him and had a nice visit. We went for a walk in the woods and he showed us a big cave/waterfall that's on his property. When we first met Brad about 17 years ago he grew tomatoes for a living on his place (he doesn't do that now). Not just a few. He would set out 10,000 plants a year and about 5,000 pepper plants. Talk about a worker, he is one. He sells about 30 truck loads of firewood a year, all split by hand. No log splitter. He has a regular full time job and several part-time ones. It makes me tired just thinkin' about how hard he works. He also turned one of his tomato fields into a Christmas tree farm. They're getting really nice lookin'. That's where we got our tree last year. He's got a super nice place but it's out in the middle. It's only about 38 miles from our house but it takes us about an hour and a half to get there, but it's worth it.

Lions vs. Wildcats

The Teays Valley Christian School Lions middle school volleyball team traveled to Wood county today to play the Wood County Christian School Wildcats. The Wildcats won 2 out of 3.

Third Stage of a Saturn V

I was looking at Rick Lee's blog this morning and he has a cool photo of a Saturn V Rocket. I've got a couple that I like so I thought I'd be a copycat and put up one of mine. This is the third stage of the Saturn V. It's on display at the Davidson Center for Space Exploration in Huntsville, AL. I had this photo as my blog header for a while. I like it because it just looks like it floating.

A delicious...

...birthday cookie.

Another Friday Evening

2 shot panorama. Click on image for a better view. The previous one is a 2 shot pano also. It's 2 horizontal shots stitched vertically.

Friday Evening

Firefighter Self Rescue

The Saint Albans Fire Department started 3 days of intensive training yesterday. The training committee acquired 2 house that are going to be torn down Monday to make room for a new Little Caesar's Pizza. Whenever we get houses like that we try to do the most realistic training we can with them. Yesterday one of the training evolutions was to self rescue from a basement window using only the tools we carry with us. Normally when we try going through an opening this narrow we have to take our SCBA pack off and shove it out before us. We all came through the window with no problem without the SCBA on, but Mike Lively wanted to try and go through with his pack on. He made it but it took a lot longer and was much harder. Good job Mike.

SAFD Training

Matt and Mike getting ready to do some training.
Jeremy and Nate coolin' off.

Rainbow over the Chilton House

Welcome to the...

...gun show.

Path to Driftwood Beach

Jekyll Island, GA

Saturday Morning

The Sands at Port Royal

Parris Island is right across the water from here. Click on the top one for a better view. It's a 4 shot panorama.

Hunting Island Lighthouse

Hanna Park

Jacksonville, FL

Boogie Boardin' Gals

Newcastle Street, Brunswick, GA

Grinnin' like...

...a racoon eating bird seed.

Dragonfly Copters

The girls and I went for a helicopter ride this morning over St. Simon's and Sea Island. Our pilot (also the owner) was Angie Griffin of Dragonfly Copters. We spotted one pretty good sized shark and a pod of dolphins. She also told us about the hangar where she keeps her aircraft. She said it was built just for the G8 Summit that was hosted on Sea Island in 2004. She said that while it was used for the G8 it was filled with cubicles used by the Secret Service, CIA, FBI, KGB and a bunch of other alphabet intelligence agencies. It was also used by all the dignitaries and diplomats that flew into St. Simon's, so it is an exceptional building, especially the bathrooms. Very nice. Probably the most posh I've seen. Just think, maybe President Bush... Well, never mind. Anywho, we had a great ride and it was nice to meet Angie.

Jacksonville Beaches

Yesterday we went to Jacksonville, FL to Hanna Park Beach. Kim's cousin was driving so I was just sittin' lookin' out the window when we parked. All of a sudden something black jumped out of the water. It was huge. I thought it was a whale. Molly, Allie and I were the only ones that saw it the first time. Then it jumped again and everybody saw it. We then noticed nobody was in the water, they were just standing along the beach. We asked the life guard what it was and he said it was a Giant Manta. He didn't have people out of the water because of the Manta (they're harmless) but because he had seen a large shark out there too. I did some research and found that the Giant or Atlantic Manta can grow to a wingspan of around 20 feet and can weigh as much as 3000 pounds and that one of the things they like to do is jump out of the water. Sadly I don't have any pictures of it, so you're just gonna have to take my word for it. We did get some pretty big waves that made for some great boogie boardin'.

Mustang

I took this while we were waiting to go on our helicopter ride.

Skinny People

We were lookin' through some pictures on my camera last night when we came across these. Bonnie said, "man, Kim looks skinny". Then she saw hers and she thought she looked skinny too. They asked me what kind of setting I used for that and I told 'em I used the "fun house setting". Man, I crack myself up.