Post: IFHE24335HNMNCIO763

Last week our neighbor was trying to get rid of a tree he had chopped down in his back yard. Rather than take it to the dump he decided it would be more economical to cut it up and burn in his backyard next to his house. Luckily, the wind blew the smoke and ashes directly over his fence into our yard leaving traces of ash as a souvenir on our vehicles. As he loaded more and more wood onto the bonfire it actually became quite sizable. He strategically placed the fire right in between his home and his fence. Maybe he had a sweet insurance policy and he was trying to burn his house down to cash in on it. Anyway, the smoke, ashes, and obvious fire hazard got Valerie a little upset. Okay, really upset. She called the police to find out if there was a law prohibiting burning fires in residential areas in hopes that someone might come out and tell him to stop burning trees in his backyard. Well, Valerie got her wish. The police department dispatched a fire truck immediately and sent a couple of firemen out. Just as our neighbor was throwing another pile of wood on the fire, the truck showed up and the fireman payed him a surprise visit. We aren't sure if any citations were issued, but at least they made him put the fire out. As you can see from the picture below, the guy had at least a five alarm fire going. Okay, so the picture actually looks more like the steam that comes out of the vent when you're using your dryer, but you'll have to take our word for it, it actually was big at one point. The lesson here is if you are going to have a fire on your property, do it inside where your nosy neighbors won't see it.

Moving on. Last week was also my graduation. Now that I have graduated I'm dedicating 95 percent of my time to this blog. The other five percent will be broken down into looking for work, finishing my latest album, and tyring to fix our broken cabinet in the kitchen.

So my graduation went well. We had great family support and at one time had about fifteen people packed into our tiny front room for a celebration. We had barbecue, cake, beverages of all types, and best of all a briefcase full of candy. As a gift I was given an amazing briefcase full of equally amazing treats, everything from Big League Chew to Circus Peanuts. For most people it might take months to eat all of the candy that was stuffed in there, but between Brendan and me it might be gone before I even finish this post.

The picture here shows me checking out some of my items while Brendan empties the briefcase as quickly as he can. Once it was emptied he filled it back up again as quickly as he could. Then he emptied it again, refilled it, emptied it, danced for 20 seconds and then refilled the briefcase again. Unfortunately the briefcase does not have a working lock so I have to be very careful who I show it to.

In conclusion, graduation was very neat. I would like to thank all of my friends and family for helping me get to this point. At this point I would welcome any tips on getting money from the government. Such as filing for unemployment and so forth.

In conclusion (again), I would like to mention that Valerie made a really cute pillow this week for some friends of hers that had a baby. I would post a picture, but we don't have one. I would draw a picture, but this blog doesn't have that function, at least not that I know of. So, I will describe it. It is square shaped with pointed corners (don't worry. The corners are pointed, but they are soft so they won't hurt the baby, hopefully). The edges of the pillow are made up up many different fabrics similar to a quilt. Some have flower designs, some don't. The middle square of the pillow is an oatmeal color I think and stitched onto it is the baby's name "Mia." The stitching is cool. It's kind of like braiding. That is all of the imagery I can come up with. If you or anyone you know would like to purchase a pillow of your own, please send a check or money order made payable to Chris for the amount of $49.95 plus shipping and handling (please add and extra $9.50 for out of state orders). Act now and we will throw in a garden weasel and something else that will probably be really nice.

This post is coming to an end. I hope all of our faithful readers have a good week and enjoy the warmer weather.