BOOK OF MORMON RUINS IN UPSTATE NEW YORK

How come we never hear of these ruins in contemporary history? This is some great history:

The historian O. Turner wrote extensively of the region, with one passage worth repeating:

We are surrounded by evidence that a race preceded them (speaking of the Indians) farther advanced in civilization and the arts, and far more numerous. Here and there upon the brows of our hills, at the head of our ravines, are the fortifications; their locations selected with skill, adapted to refuge, subsistence and defense. The uprooted trees of our forest, that are the growth of centuries expose their mouldering remains; the uncovered mounds masses of their skeletons promiscuously heaped one upon the other, as if they were gathered and hurriedly entombed of well contested battle fields. In our valleys, upon our hillsides, the plough and the spade discover their rude implements, adapted to war, the chase, and domestic use. All these are dumb but eloquent chronicles of by-gone ages. We ask the red man to tell us from whence they came and whither they went: and he either amuse us with a wild and extravagant traditionary legend or acknowledges himself as ignorant as his interrogators. He and his progenitors have gazed upon these ancient relics for centuries. As we do now, wondered and consulted their wise men, and yet he is unable to aid our inquires. We invoke the aid of revelation, turn over the pages of history, trace the origin and dispersion of the races of mankind from the earliest period of the worlds existence, and yet we gather only enough to form the basis of vague surmise and conjecture. The crumbling walls the ruins overgrown by the gigantic forests of Central America, are not involved in impenetrable obscurity, than are the more humble, but equally interesting mounds and relics that abound in our region. ⁹

Montana Trip--Part 2-- Baby Robin

We were on I-90 East for about six hours. On the way, we stopped at a Rest Stop in Eastern, WA. I was stunned by the beauty of the steppe climate.
From there we went to St. Regis, Montana and had a Pit stop-- literally. The place is known for the cherries, and we bought a couple pounds. All the way to our property, we were spitting cherry pits out the windows, and the guy behind us--well, he's gonna find some interesting stuff in his grill.
We arrived at the property late, about 1 or2 at night. The first couple days we got set up.

We didn't find any turkeys this time, but Neal and I cornered a deer. It was a doe, which Neal and I chased around the hill above our house. I almost had it, but then it disapeered on me.

The next day on our way in from town, we discovered a baby robin on the side of the road. It's wing was slightly hurt, so we took it back to camp. When we got there, we pulled out some bugs that had drowned in the cheap Walmart plastic pool we bought, and fed them to the bird. I discovered how to feed him when I stuck my hand in the top of the cracker-box house we made to handle him. He thought I was going to feed him and chirped his head off and opened his mouth wide. So I grabbed a fly and dangled it over his mouth, and tried my best to imitate the whistle the parent makes. He opened his mouth wide and I dropped a fly into it. He wouldn't always hold still during feeding time, so I missed his gaping beak by a long shot. We put his home (made out of a fishy-cracker box with a whole in the top and a closable door on the side) in the middle of a tomato crate, so he could wander around. He crapped all over the place, especially when you tried to pick him up. He HATED being handled.

typically, when you find a hurt bird, the morale is low and they don't care if they live or die. They often don't eat because of the trauma. It wasn't the case with this little guy. He had so much energy, he tried to jump over the crate walls to escape.

I tried to go to sleep and he slept pretty good with an occasional chirp, but at about six or so in the morning, he didn't hesitate to let us know he was hungry. I hurried and took him out of the trailer before he woke anyone up and fed him breakfast.

It's amazing how much food it takes to keep this guy going. Though out the day, we'd hear robin calls, but angry or startled calls. There is a BIG difference between a friendly, good morning whistle, and a worried chirp. We figured out that this must be the parents, and that they weren't afar off. So we put him in his crate in a clearing where his parents could easily see and hear him. Not long after, Siberia shows up. When he sees the robin, he sees a fun toy to play with. I had to rescue the poor thing from the dog. Siberia actually got his snout stuck in the cracker box, thinking the robin was in there.

Siberia kept following us when we tried to take the robin somewhere else, so we threw him a sausage and made a break for it. We took the robin back to where we found him, which, we hoped, wasn't far from the nest. I set the little guy up on the ledge where we could see him, but also, far enough away so the parents did n't see us as a threat.
After waiting half an hour, we were about to give up, when we heard a hawk call. Knowing the poor robin would make fine dining for Mr. Red-tail, I ran up to where the robin was. I picked him up, and (he hates being handled) chirped his bloody head off like I was going to murder him or something. Within ten seconds, mama and daddy show up, and land on a tree just three feet from us. They look like they want to dive bomb me, so I slowly back away.

Finally, I realized that the robin was safe with his parents, and Neal and I trotted back up the hill.

Montana Trip-- Part 1 -- the Funeral

So... here is the update on our Montana trip.

As we headed out on the road, we went to a funeral of an old friend. His name was Josh Ward, and we had gone to church together as little kids. He was two years older than I and had died in a car accident only a few days before school got out.
The scary part about this is he wasn't the average kid. Typically, when you hear about this, its a kid who was the school goof-off and when you hear about it, its like "no wonder it happened." With Josh, it was not the case. This incident has woken me up about how some things in life we have no control over. I have always thought I had complete control of my life, but now I'm not so sure. He was a lot like me, High Honor student, excellent athlete, and liked by others around him. God works in mysterious ways, that's for sure, and I realize now that it is useless to resist God's will. I like to think of those gone as not dead, but as living somewhere else. Death doesn't seem so frightening, when you think of it that way. We may suffer the pain of longing for them, but I know they are in a better place, and that they are only returning home.

More Summer Pics

Cuddles is napping on her "Fluffy"












Cuddles is walking around the yard














Eliza at her Kindergarten class

Welcome to Our New Socialist Healthcare System

Here is a link to an excellent video made by someone who went to clinics in Canada and filmed actual, realistic life as a victim of their Government HealthCare system. It shows the poor quality of healthcare, the poor urgent medical attention, the long waits of clinics, and how it is the middle class that suffers from the system, and the sky-rocketing prices of the extra, private medical care affordable only for the richest of society.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2jijuj1ysw

My Promotion Pics

Me and Becca

Noelle and I

Me with some of my friends

Me--domewher in the crowd

Me showing off my awards--

My Summer So Far (and what's to come)

We left for my grandma's house in Oregon once traffic was over the very day school got out. It's a five hour drive here, and would cost a boatload of cash to drive in either of the Dodges, and my mom decided to take the puny forgeign peice of junk (I hate any car that not American made-- don't ask me why) the Jetta. My dad bought it off Craigslist for 5,000 or something wrecked where it might cost our family 20,000 new. My dad remodeled the thing and its road-worthy now. The interior isn't done, though.

Anyways, the trip here is a pain. Neal, Eliza and Annelise were killing each other in the backseats while Mom an I had the easy ride up front. The minute I heard we were taking the Jetta I immediately called dibs on the front seat Being stuck back in the back with two sniveling brats (I know that sounds harsh, but spend a vacation with them and by the end of the roadtrip, you'll wanna whack off their heads, trust me.) is a headache, and an ear-splitting one at that.

We got here and Neal kissed the solid ground, and then found his GameCube console and made himself at home. The best part of the trip has either been the swimming pool in the neighborhood, or watching the Fox News with my grandma and talking about many of the idiot politicians in our Senate who think steriods in baseball is more important than Pelosi and torture and the CIA.

Anyways we'll be visiting Uncle Joe's kids an hour north of here on Monday before we leave. His two oldest, me, Neal and jeremiah like to play World War on their magnificent HUGE (I think its about ten acres) property in the woods. We use pinecones in the woods as grenades. THey have plenty of toy squirt guns to use. I pretended mine was an M16 last time, but I think I'll pick a Mark12 sniper rifle. I'm trying to fathom what we could use as an RPG, but the only thing I can come up with is a homemade slingshot to launch pinecones with.


After we get home we'll leave for our property in Montana. We'll have to find someone to feed my babies, daniel and cuddles while we're gone. Last summer Neal and I chased turkeys around with our bare hands and I nearly got him but he dove into the bushes. This time I'm bringing weaponry, like a stick to club him with. Maybe dad'll let me use the shotgun. I doubt Dad will let me kill it since I don't have the guts to look at the turkey's organs as I de-feather him, and he doesn't want to get stuck with the dirty job.

We'll head to the Kunz reunion which is on my mom's side, but it's my great-grandma's side, so I won't know anybody. The reuinion is on my relatives' vast acreage in Southern Idaho.
From there we'll drive to Montana and build the house for nearly two weeks. We might get a YMCA membership there and shower there and work out or swim and then go back home (I mean the other home-- our property) We'll put up the frame this summer and plant a small garden there.
Then we'll head to the Wood reunion @ Yellowstone National Park. This is the most fun because my uncles and aunts are so cool. I don't know my cousins on this side very well, but its fun to listen to my relatives tell stories around the campfire. My relatives are crazy, in a fun, cool way, and BOY! have they got stories to tell. The eight siblings grew up on a ten-acre farm with cows, rabbits, and a barrage of other farm animals. They got into a trunk-load of trouble, from burning down the barn, and peeing on electric fences, to jumping on dead cow carcasses and hiding in a cranky neighbors' corn fields.
At Yellowstone our family will camp in our lame tents while our cousins get their fancy RVs and are safe from the Grizzly Bears that the eco-freaks have introduced to the area while they are not hugging trees. Our family will end up as bear bait, but since I can outrun everybody I'll be the last to be eaten.

Sometime between July 20th and 30th we'll spend a few days in Twisp, WA and riverraft. Aunt Erin and Uncle Joe will be there with their kids and we'll have an awesome time there. Twisp is a remote cowboy town in Eastern Washington (thankfully!!! I love the weather there. I swear I'm either gonna move here or the southwest).

Then I'll be at our church's Girl's Camp for the first week in August.

Then on August 19th is my surgery. Dang, I'm so scared. I can't believe some doctor is gonna cut me open, clean me out and then tear me open in another spot and tear out a tendon to sow in where my ACL should be and then I'll be out of sports for six-nine months. Then he'll sow me back up and I'll be in a half-body cast for a week. The cast will go from hip to ankle. After that week I'll use crutches for about a month and have to wear a smaller metal brace. I might have to hobble around high school in crutches, and it'll be a lot easier for the seniors to can me (JK- let them try. I could still beat them in a foot race with my cast and all!)

After that is soccer tryouts, which I will lament over because I won't even be able to try out. Doc's orders is NO exercize for the lower half of the body for two complete months. Just seeing a soccer ball might make me break into tears.

Then High school starts and the summer ends. I hoped I picked some good classes.