And with that, kids around the world decided they don't want to be astronauts anymore

Hmm... even knowing a little bit about wastewater reclamation, this just sounds wrong:

BBC NEWS Science & Environment Urine passes Nasa taste test

Sky diving... oh and a wedding.

We just got back from Dan and Wendy's wedding. It was an incredible vacation, and probably one of the best we've had since we've been married.

The ceremony was simple and beautiful. It was the most touching profession of love I have ever seen. I stood in as the groom's witness/best man. I was so honored to be there. Of course I wish someone had given me a head's up about when to genuflect, and how ;)

My brother and sister-in-law went out of their way to fill the days with fun activities, from Dan teaching the boys how to shoot (and buying them their first rifle), to launching rockets, and jumping on the trampoline. Kate loved her shopping trip with her mom and aunt.

Of course the big kids had fun too. My brother took me on my first tandem skydive. It was SO AWESOME. We jumped from about 14,000 feet, giving about 1 minute of freefall. Of course there were nervous moments. Hanging your feet out of the door of a moving airplane was definitely interesting, and it weirds you out a bit when the instructor starts adjusting the harness (and unclipping a couple of things) after the canopy opens. The first second as you have the sensation of falling, after that it's just a thrill ride.

Bending the tandem rules a little bit, my brother and I met up in the air, "bumped" knuckles, and spent a moment grinning at each other. Per her request, we also dispersed my mom's ashes. They were folded up in Dan's chute. My tandem instructor timed our canopy opening so I got to see my brother deploy his chute and release the ashes. It was an incredible addition to an already thrilling moment. I hope mom was watching, and enjoyed it as much as we did.

I'll post pics later...

My wife has only killed me in Mob Wars

For those of you fervent Facebookers, you might want to remove your homicidal estranged spouse from your friends list before making profile changes. See link below:

BBC NEWS UK England London Man killed wife in Facebook row

Not dead yet...

Amaryllis has been nagging me that I haven't posted in a while. It's been pretty crazy at home and at work. We had a family member in the hospital, and election season has practically made City Hall a "Stop!" "Go!" "WAIT!" war zone. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go in tomorrow to find out that bathroom trips need to be vetted through the mayor's office.



We took the boys to a tae-kwon-do tournament a couple of weeks ago. Jonathan took third place in the patterns competition for white belts. It was really cool, except he beat his older brother to do it. There were some tears, but in the end everyone enjoyed themselves. They test for their next belt in a couple of weeks. It will be nice to see a little color in their uniforms. They started sparring last week, and I sewar Gabe has been wearing his mouth guard to school.



Kate is doing ballet (a consolation prize for being too young to do tae-kwon-do, which is what she really wanted). She goes with one of her little friends. It has some tumbling and body awareness thrown in so every once in a while you will see her drop and do a forward roll. Every once in a while she asks me to pick her up so she can practice "jumping." Perhaps someday she will be the only member of the American Ballet Theater with a knowledge of lightsaber combat.

The world, and Brazil, is full of surprises

I know its three posts in a day, but this one was too cool to pass up:

BBC NEWS Science/Nature 'Lost towns' discovered in Amazon

Basically scientists have discovered evidence of "urban" human habitation that predates European settlement in what was thought to be virgin rainforest. Just think of what you'll know tomorrow...

Flyman might have kicked Spiderman's butt.

For those of you knocking down the last of these before fall sets in (well those of us north of Colorado) the following is interesting:

BBC NEWS Science/Nature Fly's brain 'senses swat threat'

Forget "spider sense" the article indicates that a flys brain and reflexs kick into gear pretty much instantly. No wonder spiders use webs. Even they would tire of chasing the little guys.

Quick update

The trip tot he University of Utah wa snice. It was a chance to spend some time with the wife as well. My father came along, and was able to see the grandkids when we got back. For right now no news is good news. The EMG came back as normal. The next step will be for me to get a muscle biopsy to fully rule out a metabolic muscle disease. From there we are following the inflammatory disease route for the time being. I see a rheumatologist in October. I wish I got two months to give an answer on development proposals :)