Autumn? I've heard others talk of such a thing.

Last Friday (9/23) was apparently the first day of Fall. Some people called it the beginning of "Autumn". Here in Phoenix we called it... Friday. When it's 100+ degrees outside the last thing you think about is "fall".

If you live in the Valley of the Sun long enough though you get accustomed to our seasons. We don't have 4 like most of the country, I mean why would you need four of them? That's really twice as many as is necessary. In Phoenix we have two. The first season is known as "Extreme Summer" and it lasts from May until September, sometimes longer. It's a fascinating season. You can do things during that time of year that you can do at no other time. Like what you ask? Well, let me just tell you. If you would like you can bake cookies in your car. You can fry an egg on your hood. You can make sun tea in 3 minutes. If you want to test your inner strength you can get the mail barefoot. It's the same as one of those coal walks without the pesky need for chopping wood and waiting hooooours for it to burn down to coals. And while you're doing the "grab the mail" coal walk you can kill another bird by getting an instant tan at the same time. The great thing about all these is that they are all huge money savers! It's like extreme couponing without the paper cuts! Win-win really.

The description or name of the other season is a little more ambiguous. It just sort of creeps up on you without any fanfare. You realize that last Thursday it was hot and this Thursday, well it's not quite as hot. And before you know it it's 71 and you're looking for a long sleeve hoody because it's "freezing" outside. At least that's what I do.

The other main difference between Extreme Summer and the rest of the year, other than the less hotness of it, is the light. The light is different in the non-extreme part of the year. During the summer the sun beats down mercilessly directly overhead and then all of a sudden one day it's still 108 but the sun is shinning in through your side window in your car and your left thigh feels like it's melting. That's when you know it's fall. Not when the temperature changes. No that's not a good test at all. The real difference comes down to the light and shadows. The fact that you actually have a shadow is the real key.

Maybe instead of Groundhog Day we need another holiday around the end of September. Something with a coyote or a snake or something. We'll take the coyote (or the snake) and shove it out a door into the sun. If the unsuspecting creature sees his shadow then we know the season has changed. If he instantly bursts into flames then it's still Extreme Summer.

I guess that's what it boils down to when it comes to seasons here. Either it's coyotes-burst-into-flames-in-the-sun season or it's not.

I'm glad we're moving into the non creature burning season. It's my favorite.

Better Than Jason Bourne

What weighs roughly 15 pounds, is basically immobile and could be used to break a suspected terrorist into admitting his next attack? You're probably thinking, "That's easy, it's a loudspeaker playing Celine Dion endlessly." Well, you would be close but it's actually a 3 month old baby!

Forget water boarding suspected spies or terrorists to get info, just force them to care for an infant for about two days. After a couple of days of that I bet they would be willing to sell out their sweet, old grandmother and her famous hummus recipe for a few hours of uninterrupted sleep! That, or they would be so delirious from the lack of sleep that they would tell you the secret knock to get into their fancy terrorist cave in the mountains of Afghanistan without a second thought. That's assuming that terrorist caves have some sort of door. Maybe they don't, having never been to the middle east I'm not really sure what they do. Maybe it's just a beaded curtain or a burlap sack or something. Whatever it is, I'm pretty certain you need a secret password of some sort to get in and a terrorist having to sleep with an infant nearby will give that up in a heartbeat.

Heck, if you catch me or my wife at the right moment we'd probably give up our bank account and social security numbers without even knowing we did it!

By the way, I was up early again this morning when our very own rooster known as Baby J woke us up and I was thinking about this email I received from the deposed prince of Namibia. He told me he needs somebody to send him some money to get out of the country. He promised once he was out and had access to the royal family fortune he would return the favor. I think it's a really great opportunity and how often to you hear from royalty? Does anybody know where you go to wire money to Namibia?

Anyway, all that being said, I don't want to give the wrong impression. Our son is amazing and I wouldn't trade him for anything...maybe that's sleep deprivation talking.

So This Is It

Ok, so here it is my first real post. I have exactly 20 minutes before my lunch ends and I'm functioning on very little sleep so I think in hindsight I'm going to look back and wish this wasn't my first real entry! I'm new to this whole blogging thing but I would think you would want your first entry to be something really profound, witty or insightful. Unfortunately what I'm going to have is a rushed/sleep deprived attempt at...something.

Anyway, to get to the point. I was talking to somebody this morning about the whole idea of keeping a blog and what the point of it is. And we both sort of came to the conclusion that it seems the overall intent is to try to get a whole bunch of "followers" to read whatever it is you have to say. Which is exactly why I've been so hesitant to start one because on the surface that seems like an incredibly conceited thing to do. I know that's not the case for a lot of people but to me it almost seems like you think so highly of what you have to say or of your writing skills that you assume people will want to read it on a regular basis. It appears so self-promoting and having had issues in the past with my own arrogance and pride I always worried that this would just be feeding those negative aspects of my personality. Of course, I have a wonderful wife who I'm sure will point it out to me if I start venturing too far in that direction. At least I hope she will!

With that being said, when I logged in a few moments ago I saw this little notice on my dashboard that indicated I had one new follower! It was the weirdest thing to see that because I actually got kind of excited. Wow, somebody actually wants to read what I have to say! It is a really cool feeling and incredibly humbling at the same time. Of course it may only take a few entries for my one follower to become no followers so we'll see how it all goes.

Anyway, I want to say very special thank you to my very first follower. Thanks CLR, and thanks for your encouragement to get me writing again.

That's Strange

Well, if you've stumbled upon this post than that's mighty strange because nobody knows about this place yet. Anyway, if you're here I might as well tell you that I'm currently in the construction phase of this page. Which basically means I don't know how to use it yet and I'm still tinkering with settings. It probably also means that I haven't actually written anything yet. Other than this. So since you stumbled along to this space by accident I imagine you'll want to stumble away now. Hope you enjoyed your stay.