The 23rd Epistle of Benicus Grenarius to the Blogarians (a.k.a. Of Moving From One Basement to Another, 10-Year Class Reunions, Emmett and da Pug, Cow Racing, and Blood-Curdling Skeletal Mona Lisas)

Peace be unto you. It's a lovely Sunday afternoon here in West Jordan. Yes, it's true. We've moved into a basement apartment just off of 13th West. Goodbye free room and board. Goodbye private theater room in Alyssa's parents' basement. Hello, self-respect. So good to finally see you again! So yeah, we're still pretty much in the middle of getting everything situated--we've got boxes from here to Canada (well...not...really...), but at least just about everything has been moved now.

We recently returned from a Labor Day trip to St. George so we could attend my 10-year class reunion. Lovely times were had by all. It was good to finally see my parents again since the first time since May, not to mention li'l Emmett (see the accompanying photo) and crazy old Pug, who kept running away from me, her bestest buddy for about six years back in the day. Dang her. And Alyssa had quite the time playing my parents' Wii for hours on end. She's gotten to the point where she can pretty much waste my trash in all of the games, including the one where you're racing on a cow. Not to mention all of the sports games. My reunion was all right--it was great talking to people I haven't seen in many a year and the food was a definite step up from the Sloppy Joes, salad from a bag, and Kool-Aid they provided at the five-year reunion--but I felt like it could have been so much more. For example, aren't fake trophies usually given out to people who've met certain criteria? You know, like to the person who traveled the shortest distance to get to the reunion? (That would have been Jen Shaw, in our case.) And there wasn't any kind of program, which was fairly disappointing. Also, I'll bet there were only somewhere between 30 and 40 people at the dinner, out of a graduating class of 366. (And only 2 of those people were jocks! Pretty weird when you consider that our graduating class was the biggest jockocracy in the history of public school.) But I was still glad to have attended, just the same.

Besides the reunion, Alyssa and I had an enjoyable time in St. George. We invited Paul and Danielle to dinner one night and Alyssa cooked up some ever-so-loverly Japanese food. Also, we went shopping one day and bought the awesomest Halloween decoration you ever did see--a holographic rendition of the Mona Lisa that turns creepy and skeletal-like depending on the angle you're facing. Yeah, we're weird. But it's a good kind of weird.

Of Basement Apartments, Rad Racer Style Driving, Private Media Rooms, and Making the Most of my Downtime at Work

Got ourselves a l'il old basement apartment last night. For serious! It's off of 13th Street at about 7400 South. And it really looks like a steal--it's ginormous, with washer and dryer hookups, dishwasher, and internet. In fact, we were literally in a race against another couple to deliver our deposit check first. But, due to my insane Rad Racer-esque driving, we made it there in the nick of time and beat out the other couple. Poor saps. But they committed a classic blunder by going in against Greens when there was a ginormous basement apartment on the line. Anyway, we can't move in until September 1st, but since we'll be in St. George until Wednesday of that week for my class reunion (10 years--can you believe what a geezer I am?), we probably won't start moving our stuff until the 4th.

Laura, Eric, and Trey-Lor also moved out this week, to the old lady-style house Alyssa and I were thinking about moving into a while back. We spent several evenings this past week helping them load and unload all their hud. So far they seem really happy there, so that's good. Come September, Alyssa's parents will FINALLY be empty-nesters. And I don't think Calvin likes that thought at all; in fact, last night he was trying to convince us to stay until we can afford a down payment on a house. I said thanks, but I'm a firm believer in not living with one's in-laws when one is 28 years of age. By the way, since the downstairs bedroom is now vacant, Alyssa and I have temporarily turned it into our private movie theater by hooking up the DVD player and projector. We watched Hidalgo and The Net this week, and it was sa-WEET. I must say. I'll miss this new development tremendously when we move.

Yesterday when I was bored at work (yes, it happens), I found the awesomest website EVER--http://www.babynamewizard.com/voyager. I could mess with this puppy for hours (and yes, I did). It graphically shows naming trends from the 1880s to the present. Here's a fun one--type in CLINTON or HILLARY and watch where the graph takes a dive.