Adoption day

Becky at Geyer German Shepherds and the "U Litter."

Nannette and Fabian (Lucifer's canine parents)

To see the blogspot for my signature column, inside my shoes, click here: http://insidemyshoes-tm.blogspot.com/

It's a boy !!!

We got a photo of the soon-to-be newest member of our family

Shooting by moonlight

Although I'm not a sports reporter, last year I had a good time covering a football game.  Umatilla was in a playoff game in Coos Bay against Gold Beach and I offered to cover it. (It was a good excuse to surprise my mom for her birthday).

It was a fun experience, so I offered to take some photos of the Vikings season opener Friday night in Umatilla. Well, I found out rather quickly it was MUCH easier to take photos in the bright sun (the game I covered last year was in the afternoon) than moonlight.

Anyway, I got a few decent shots, (one ran in the East Oregonian on Sept. 5 and another is supposed to run in The Hermiston Herald on Sept. 9), but 

these two I just took for the heck of it because I thought they would be pretty cool.

Aracnophobia alert

Spiders are said to be small, inconspicuous and harmless to humans — like I wrote in a recent column, (East Oregonian , Sept. 3, 2009 Spiders: friend or foe?) whatever.

The webs formed a canopy — they were EVERYWHERE!!!

Up, down, all around.

Just looking at the photos makes me tense up.

Our 12 Days of Moab

Not only was Moab on my mind for the past few months, it was on my travel itinerary.

Here's a few photos from 12 Days of Moab - Malgesini-style, taken during our recent trip to the beautiful southeastern Utah town that seems to keep drawing us back.

While John took his early morning jaunt to Slickrock Bike Trial, I headed out with my camera and took photos - a number of times at Arches National Park. And being there as long as we were, we had a chance to do mega-exploring on our ATV.

Practically a backroads Bible, an ATV trail book written by Charles A. Wells was my constant companion while riding.

When we'd head out to a trailhead and ride, usually it was in total solitude. With the exception of our ride out Potash Road to the point where Thelma and Louise drove their car off the cliff, we never ran into a soul while riding. And I gotta tell ya, Charles rates each trail based on difficulty and he does a great job in describing how to get to the trailhead, what to expect and mileage and GPS readings - very thorough and quite useful.

We experienced some cool stuff, including an old mining encampment, climbing into a cave at Lone Rock and eating lunch, riding across dozens of water crossings on Onion Creek and rip-snorting through the red dirt sand dunes at White Wash Sand Dunes.

Of course we'd return back to the room with socks with rings of red on them that required laundry pre-treatment - a small price to pay for a grand time in the land of red dirt and rocks.

For a slide show of photos, click here

There might be a teenie, weenie, little distraction that could possibly delay your ability to continue doing what you .........

Where do you go to school to specialize in a job to come up with the text for error messages on computer programs?

I seriously need to visit those classes. Hopefully, error messages aren't something you'll see often, but if you do, well, then the message should be direct and to the point.

We got some updated software recently and I've seen my share of error messages that appear to have been developed by someone who didn't want to be too direct or commital. Instead of the "OK" I think it should say "ah shucks"

And the heartbeat ?!? The Tin Man didn't have a heart - neither does my computer. But I must say, if my computer does have a heart, then it needs to see a cardiologist.

And here's something that makes me scratch my head. When the "heartbeat" problem results in being disconnected, I then have to click out, so I can log in again. When I do this, I get a box that states, "Are you sure you want to quit?" ------- what's that all about?

Ain't that America

I was driving down the road with the top down on my Camaro. I had just grabbed a quick hot dog and as I drove through town, I noticed some kids playing baseball in the field.

Then the ditty from old TV commercials popped into my head, "I love baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet."

Now, it's stuck in my brain - I want some apple pie. It's funny how things like that stick in your head.

Another soundbite that I've been blasted by lately is, "High fashion hair with a home town style, that's what you'll find at Shear Illusions. Get the look that you've been looking for ..." (the video and audio clip plays for 31 seconds each time I navigate onto the East Oregonian Web site - which is quite often during any given work day).


I was getting my hair done the other day by Loretta Lowrance, owner of Shear Illusions, and she said she hasn't gotten a chance to hear or see it much. I pretty much recited it for her.

Anyway, I often wonder the impact of advertising. Before Christmas another video/audio clip played on the EO Web site about diamonds. The funny thing is, now six months later I can't remember who the advertisement was for - yet I heard it a multitude of times during the holiday season.

Although the ditty from the 70s commercial was to boost sales of Chevy vehicles, all I'm thinking about right now is wanting some apple pie. Anyone reading this can feel free to bring a piece to the East Oregonian office at 333 E. Main St., Hermiston.