Mette went camping with her friend Violet on Wednesday, and she's coming back today.  Julie and Patty have been sending me updates along the way.  My favorite one so far:

Mette's quote of the day:

These pancakes taste like popcorn, and I don't like popcorn.

Annelis is kind of enjoying her time alone with us.  We stayed up late last night dancing to Saturday Night Fever.

This morning, we picked up where we left off yesterday.  We started with this:

And had it knocked down in a couple hours:

A lot of it fell into the pool itself:

...So we spent the rest of the day tearing things apart and throwing it in the dumpster.  We ran out of room, so we'll have to get another one soon.  Regardless, it looks better now:

And yup, don't know if anyone noticed, but It was hot out there again...

We had another dumpster delivered on Friday, this one jumbo sized.  I could park our mini-van in that thing.  The weekend plan: tear down the pool house!  It was long overdue. 

The pool house, a horribly nasty shack adjacent to our horribly nasty pool, was not safe.  The floors were rotten, and it was full of all kinds of junk.  It had to go.

Step one was to clear out the inside.  There were plenty of gems in there, but the best find has to have been this:

Under a tarp, we found 30 (yes, 30) containers of 20 year old muratic acid.  What in the hell am I going to do with this?  Metro's toxic waste disposal only takes a limited number, so it will take a while.  Anyone want some acid?  ;)

Once the junk was cleared out, things started coming down.  The inside walls were partially covered with cedar paneling, and in very good shape.  We are going to try to recycle that wood in some way, maybe lining closets with it or something.  The other walls were full of squirrel nests and huge spiders.  As it turns out, these are not very fun to find when doing demolition. 

The highlight of my day:  Holding a 4x8 sheet of plywood and falling through a rotten deck board.  It just doesn't get any better than that.

We got pretty far today, but we're not done yet.  At the end of day one, the pool house is empty.  The roof and walls are gone, inside and out.  All that remains is the framework, soon to be just an unpleasant memory.

Here's a before shot:

And after:

Also, I don't know if anyone noticed, but it was really hot out there today.  108?  What???

My girls (Annelis and Mette) got into a little argument last night.  Mette decided to record her feelings on a white board.  For those who don't read kindergarten writing, it says:

Saturday, June 21, 2008
Annelis hurt my feelings by saying you are the rudest sister in the world

Also note the depiction of Annelis, green skin and all.  This is my favorite part.

Happy Fathers Day to all the dads out there.

Being a father of two, I had a pretty good day today.  Woke up to breakfast in bed, a huge baked pancake (a favorite dish at our house).  The kids gave me some hand painted coffee mug things that are pretty cute, too.  Got lots of love.

I was happy to go and race at Mt. Tabor today.  That's a pretty interesting course.  You go up, it hurts, you go down, rest up.  Rinse, and repeat.  Only 12 times for the lowly Cat 3's, but by lap 12, I was getting pretty tired.  Cat 1/2s did 30 laps.  Ouch.

Donna and the girls came out to catch the end of the race today.  That doesn't happen very often, and I wish I'd gotten a podium position.  Hills aren't exactly my thing, unless they are pointing down.  I'd like another shot at this course, though.

After all that, we went and picked up a cool gas grill for my dad.  My lil' sisters met up to deliver it, and we all went out for dinner.  Annelis drew portraits of everyone while we waited for our food.  We had a nice time.

Finally home, I went for a little walk with Annelis and the dog.  We found Velonew's 2008 Tour de France issue in the mailbox, and previewed all of the 21 stages at story time.  By the time we got to the alps, my girls were expressing how painful the HC climbs were looking, Mette noting how fun the descents must be.  I wonder if they'll watch the Tour with me this year...

Yup, it was a pretty good day for me :)

The kids school had a talent show last Friday.  Our neighbor, little Julia Novoa, along with her dad Dennis on guitar sang Bubbly and totally nailed it.  The crowd was shocked and went nuts when she finished.  Amazing.  I was so happy for the two of them.  Congrats, Novoas!  I'll try to steal a video, because it was pretty good.

We've started removing an ugly concrete fence from around the "pool."  Our friend and neighbor Dennis even showed up to help out, which proves he is nuts because this was not fun work.  Thanks, Dennis.

We're not done, but it's coming along.

Before:

After:

Annelis turned NINE today.  NINE!  My little baby is getting so grown up.

To all the moms out there, happy Mother's Day!

My mom taught me, among other things, how to cook, have faith, eat vegetables, love, and be strong.  I'm sure none of it was easy, especially the vegetables.  Thanks, mom.

God could not be everywhere, so he created mothers. 

-Jewish Proverb

A man loves his sweetheart the most, his wife the best, but his mother the longest. 

-Irish Proverb

An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. 

-Spanish Proverb

Thou art thy mother's glass, and she in thee
Calls back the lovely April of her prime.

-William Shakespeare

We had some hard to beat weather here in Portland this weekend.  I think it almost hit 80 on Saturday!  The rain is coming back now, but what a great break from it all.

We spent Saturday at the beach.  Lelu the dog's first beach trip with us, and she loved it.  Everyone had a great time.  The water's a bit colder than Maui, but we still had to go in.  None of us went in over our legs, except Mette, who decided to take a dive for old times sake.  It took us 30 minutes to stop her shivering.  She never complained, but she was curled up in a cute little shivering ball in the sand.

I watched a couple movies this weekend.  The first was Stardust, which is kind of a fairy tale-ish movie.  Not too bad, I enjoyed it.  The other was one of my all-time favorites, The Life Aquatic.  Great movie, I love it.

Ah, and what nice weather weekend would be complete without a big bike ride?  I went on the BBC team ride today.  Since I took some time off in Hawaii, I've been feeling very sluggish on the bike.  A four hour leg killer was just what I needed today.  Had a great climb up Pumpkin Ridge and all the back hills in North Plains.  I got in some good efforts, and started to feel like a bike rider again. 

And speaking of bike riding, Paris Roubaix, one of my favorite bike races, took place today.  I was bummed it wasn't televised, because the articles I've read illustrate a spectacular race.  Boonen, Cancellara and Ballan riding into the velodrome together???  I don't know if I could have sat down while watching.  Good stuff.  Good for Boonen for his W.  You can tell he really wanted it by the huge gap he had in the sprint.  Wow.