Triumph

Last weekend we split our family up. Rachel & Emily went with Grandma & Grandpa Christensen to Utah for Liz & Cameron's reception there. Kaitlin stayed with the Chapman's. And we took our boys to visit our friends, Brett & Rachel and their kids in SoCal. We had a most excellent time enjoying their company and home, good food, and a fun trip to Knott's Berry Farm. After our Knotts trip we went to Chili's. Christopher fell asleep on the way and didn't wake up at the restaurant or until the next morning.

Mark (Ruth's borther) hitched a ride with for the trip south. We dropped him off at San Diego State University on Friday morning at the start of the weekend heatwave. Mark and I climbed the eight flights of stairs to his apartment on the first trip up because the lines for the elevators were so long. Once up the stairs was enough.

Sunday we went to church with our friends. All three boys fell asleep in sacrament. I wish that happened every week! One of not-so-enjoyable moments was the third hour of church when Christopher refused, including a few minutes of screaming, to go to class. This was becoming a common occurrence (without the screaming) so I made the entire hour as unpleasant as possible for him by making him stand against a wall with his arms folded or following me with his arms folded if I wanted to walk the halls. I was really hoping he would remember this for the next Sunday. On this particular day I had mistakenly taken him to my Sunday School class for the second hour, which reinforced in his mind that he would get his way.

All in all it was a great trip and we look forward to visiting our friends again.

Last Friday night I drove up to Goat Mountain to go deer hunting. It takes about 2.5 hours to get to the campsite. But nearing the top I noticed my car was making a noise in the driver side front wheel. It was a grinding/rubbing noise that seemed to occur with every revolution of the tire. I was kind of worried that the bearings were ruined. Being at the top of the mountain there wasn't anything I could do so I threw my bedroll out and slept under the stars.

I don't sleep very well under the stars. Stars keep my awake. And unless I have an air matress I don't sleep well in the outdoors. So I woke fairly often with a cold breeze blowing on my face and not very comfortable. I had a makeshift pillow that served me very well though.

My alarm clock woke me at 5:45 and I got up and had a quick breakfast of hot granola with milk. I drove back down the mountain a couple hundred yards to where I found a place where I could begin hiking and hunting. There are quite a few old logging trails on Goat mountain that I found and wandered around. At some point I got tired of hearing trail-riding motorcycles near me and went back to my car. Upon inspection of the wheel on my car I found the brake caliper had lost the lower bolt! I guess Honda Accords aren't meant for climbing mountains in. I found a small bolt in my car that fit in the hole enough to keep the caliper in position. With a wet swim diaper from my car I washed off the caliper and duct-taped the bolt in place. Driving back down the mountain I was glad to not hear the rubbing noise anymore! Once off the mountain I stopped at the first store I could to get a bolt that would actually thread into the hole.

So I headed towards home. I had to other places that I could stop and hunt at. So I stopped at about 1pm where our family had hiked before in the Cache Creek Wilderness. No rattlesnakes this time. It was a beautiful day and I walked several miles hunting and exploring since I had never seen most of the area except from Google Earth. Around 5pm I was heading back to my car, still a couple miles away. I knew I had a few more hours of daylight and was thinking to myself: This would be a good time to get a deer. I'm not exhausted yet and there's still plenty of light. In the next minute I stopped as looking down into a gully to my left I saw a grey body that looked a little too smooth to be a rock. I watched for a second, checked through the scope, and then moved a little closer. I again checked through the scope and saw a deer raise its head. I am a little disappointed because I can't tell if its a buck or not. Its standing in the shadows and keeping very still. It sees me but does not move right away. After half a minute it finally turns its head and I shoot. The mortally wounded dirt behind the deer didn't scream in pain or fall, and the apparently still-healthy deer took off running into the cover, never to be seen again, into the next county. I reflected on this on my walk back and realized there were several things I could have done differently. But then, I'm still learning. I'm glad I got a chance to shoot. It made my day and made the walk back to the car a little easier. Five months of office work and no exercise aren't a good work-up to the walk I took. I've got two more Saturdays. I'll go out again and stay close to home next time.