Our clean house, and if you don't think I'm also going to post this on the other blog to maximize the exposure of how that one time our house was realreal clean, then you don't know me very well. 
My cute sister Justine, who's single, fellas. 
My angel mother made me the Pumpkin Spice Cake, and it was superb. And observe the totally respectable amount of candles! 
Pinga and I are really getting into it. It's my turdy-turd birthday on Thursday! I have been waiting almost thirty-three years to say that. There will be cake. I'm weighing Italian Cream Cake against Best Birthday Cake, but I'll be honest, that Best Birthday Cake looks suspiciously dry, which I WILL NOT PERMIT. And maybe the Italian Cream Cake will be nasty, since I'm usually not a fan of nutty inclusions. Carrot cake? Pumpkin Spice Cake? Chocolate Blackout Cake? The decisions!
Anyway, please come to our modified rubbish tip and celebrate with us on Thursday night at about six, if you wish. We welcome visitors.
We had good times at the Herd Family Reunion, aside from me probably infecting everyone with strep throat. There was shooting and fishing and riding of motorized vehicles and eating and singing and dancing and Muddy Buddies (sorry we ate all your treats, Myerses) and playing in the dirt and general merriment. The kids all got along really well and formed their own little Lord of the Flies colony before we were done. So resourceful!
In other news, Pinga ate a banana.
And Superman came running up to John and said, "Dad! Dad! Look at my hooker!"
Context is everything.
Our Anniversary of Telling King George Where He Can Shove It was pretty low-key, because we were busy refinishing the office floor, so we can turn it into Pinga's bedroom. It's such a beautiful room with huge windows that it seems a pity to have it be the Shame Hiding Hole. No, far better to have the shame hole out where everyone can see it all the time! And then we can have the computer in a public place and keep better tabs on how well our children are doing at stealing identities and hacking into the CIA's database.
Friday night we hit the tail end of a cookout at John's parents' with the most amazing salmon ever that I made a disgusting pig of myself about. Then we watched the LAMEST fireworks show I've ever seen outside of my own driveway. Boo, Fireworks West! How is it that Neil Diamond isn't good enough to get his whole song played, but redneck after redneck after redneck got to wax on about how this country is just real nice? I'm still mad about it. No Tchaikovsky, no Copeland? WHO IS RUNNING THIS PLACE? Saturday morning we got together at Kelly's house and had a scrumptious breakfast with fruit, two pork products, and THREE kinds of fried batter. To make sure we were celebrating America we made enough food to send us all into a diabetic coma. Woo!
Here are the pictures from the Hyrum parade, at which John saw a 2-year-old baby get clocked by a thrown punch bottle from Ridley's Market. Sweet!
