Found: Puppy

We had a puppy hangin' around our house yesterday and it was really hot (and cute) so we gave it some water. While the dog was chillin' out getting hydrated, Mel and Caleb knocked on doors in the neighborhood trying to reunite the puppy with it's owner, but to no avail.

We decided that it was probably hungary and would be able to find it's way home, so we released him in the front yard and he took off with a purpose. We figured he was homeward bound for puppy grub. We didn't see the puppy for hours after that, so all was well, right? No.

Around 8pm we get a knock on the door... "Are you guys missing a puppy?" the couple asked. We recounted the day to the concerned couple and they listened as they released the puppy in our yard and slowly backed away.

Without going into gory detail, there's a dog that roams free in our neighborhood that has been known to kill a small animal or three. So, we decided to put the puppy in our backyard and give some food and a safe place to sleep. We are going to the store soon for sign-making supplies in effort to find it's owner. However, we don't feel too positive given that we didn't see/hear anyone looking for their lost dog yesterday.

So, long story short... does anyone want this beautiful puppy? I reckon it's about 3-4 months old, but that's an uneducated guess. It seems really healthy and has a wonderful temperament. We would be interested in keeping the dog ourselves, but we have long been making plans to get a pug and that may happen as early as next weekend. Please checkout the pics and pass them along if you know anyone that may be interested. I may put a listing up on craigslist today, too. If so, I will add the link to this posting.

Thanks for reading.

mlf jr.

Today, I plumbed.

So, last weekend I'm outside playing with my new air compressor and Mel comes outside to tell me water is leaking out of the back of our house. There are two pipes that come out the back of our house that I know are drains, but to be honest, I hadn't thought much about. Turns out that one of them is the drain pipe to the leak-pan of our gas water heater and the other is the drain pipe connected to the Pressure Relief Valve of said water heater. The valve is pretty important, because it prevents the pressure in the water heater from building up and pushing hot water/steam through your pipes and exploding.

So after some diligent research (read: I called my dad) I came to the conclusion that my Pressure Relief Valve was bad and needed replacement. Just as I always do with a house emergency... I quickly went out to the local Lowe's and bought the wrong part. Then I promptly went to work and didn't see daylight for three days. My next step was to go to Home Depot and buy the correct part and a pipe wrench, because chicks dig pipe wrenches (and my dad told me I would probably need one).

Today I finally got the opportunity to tackle the water heater. It really wasn't too bad. I made a watery mess in my attic, which I hear is not a good idea, but I did it anyway. And I only used a swear word once (out loud). The valve came off without much problem (thank you pipe wrench) and I was able to replace it fairly easily.

So... today I plumbed and conquered.

mlf jr.

yummy. delicious.

As I sit here at work... importing, rendering... I have time to reflect on some of the finer things I enjoy in life. Family... friends... sandwiches. Usually in that order.

I really dig sandwiches. They're special. Like a little slice of heaven (with cheese, of course). Today for lunch I had a kick-butt pastrami sandwich. It was simple and delicious. It was so tasty that it inspired me to write this haiku:

Pastrami so good,
With sauerkraut a reuben.
Soft bread, delicious.


goodnight.

mlf jr.

Corn Maze Field Trip

Thursday, I took the day off work and Mel and I chaperoned the kids' field trip to the Corn Maze in Port Allen, LA.  Nine acres of corn fields with a maze all through it.  It was a lot of fun.  There were games for the kids and even pig races.  We all had a great time and we couldn't have asked for better weather.  I put some pics up on our Flickr page, so check them out if you would like to.

mlf jr.

Oh, yeah... and you may have noticed that I changed the name and address of this site.  Due to a mix up with my domain registration co. I lost mikefreyder.com.  I like this one more anyway.  ;-)

Viva la Futbol!

Yesterday, Kailey and Caleb played their first organized soccer match. It was hot as Hades, but they were very excited and played very well. MawMaw and PawPaw came to watch and we all had a great time. Here are some photos...

mlf jr

Galactic Sunday

IMG_0116.JPG, originally uploaded by mfreyder.

Today we took the kids to the Louisiana Art and Science Museum to see the planetarium show... Coral Reef Adventure. It was a good movie and we also spent some time exploring the museum. Fun for all.

mlf jr.

For Adoption...

For Adoption..., originally uploaded by mfreyder.

... at Sherwood South Animal Hospital... if you dare!

mlf jr.

Sent from my iPhone

iCat

iCat, originally uploaded by mfreyder.

I got this nice, soft mat so I won't scratch my new iPhone on my desk as it charges.. It looks uncannily like our cat Isis.

mlf jr.

Sent from my iPhone

Vacation Photos

I've been meaning to post this now for a couple weeks, so here we go...

Last month, as soon as the kids got out of school, my wife's parents took us on a great vacation to Disney World in Orlando, FL. We all had a really fantastic time and as you can probably guess... took tons of pictures. The weather was perfect, we ate some good food and even met some new people. It was really great. Check out the photos and see for yourself.

mlf jr

Happy Mother's Day (long post)

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there. I'm not the 'mother' of this household, but I think we had a pretty good day. Caleb woke up early this morning to prepare a special Mother's Day breakfast. This breakfast consisted of Applejacks and Cookie Crisps cereals, a Shrek rice krispie treat, some Nerds candy, a 'Go-Tart,' Cheeze-It crackers, Milk Duds and peanut butter cheese crackers... all in a ziplock freezer bag. It was quite the morning treat. Kailey gave Mel some 'treasures' from her toy collection and some drawings all collected together in a makeup bag and I gave her a brand new set of knives, nicer and sharper then we've ever owned. I know, I know... You're not supposed to give your wife something for her kitchen for Mother's Day. However, she has been asking for a nice set of knives and it was better than her other request... A new dust buster. I wasn't going to be the guy that gave his wife a vacuum for Mother's Day (bad, bad husband).

We didn't really have any plans for the rest of the day except to go out to eat, so she also wanted to finally plant some sunflowers we've had growing in pots. The kids got the sunflower seeds from the LSU Ag Center Garden Show in March and we've been watching them quickly outgrow their containers ever since. We wanted to make a nice little sunflower garden in the backyard and today was good as any to do just that. Needless to say, it was much harder work than I anticipated and it wore us out. We were, though, happy with the outcome. It was a small project, but our first attempt at gardening since we moved into our house over four years ago. Only time will tell if it was a success, but we enjoyed ourselves. Here are some pictures of the new garden (before and after pics).

After our gardening experience we cleaned up and went out to eat. I wanted to take Mel and the kids to a new Japanese restaurant that I had an opportunity to try recently. She and the kids agreed, so we went to the Tokyo Cafe in Baton Rouge (Bluebonnet at Perkins). They're primarily a sushi and hibachi restaurant and not being sushi connoisseurs, we were there for the hibachi experience. It was a great meal. Entertaining to watch them prepare and delicious to eat. The service there is very friendly and the prices are good (relative to other hibachi meals). The kids really enjoyed watching the hibachi chef work his magic. Though, if I were to recommend a visit to the Tokyo Cafe, I would suggest going for lunch. The lunch menu is less than half the price, but the portions were comparable to dinner.

After a quick trip to the bookstore, we're back at the house and enjoying the Incredibles on DVD and some buttery popcorn. All-in-all, I think it was a good day.

mlf jr.

Kids Graduation

This past Thursday, Caleb and Kailey each graduated from their Kindergarten classes (click link and scroll down for a couple photos). I took the day off work to be with Mel and the kids and attend the ceremonies and my parents drove in to town to be there, too. It was a great day for all of us. It really seems like just a few weeks ago we were in that same cafeteria for Kindergarten orientation! The year has really flown by. We've got some exciting things coming up this summer, so I'll keep you guys updated with tons of pictures and stories.

mlf jr.

Kickball Update

Alright, so we're five games into our six game season and our record is 3 wins, 2 ties and 0 losses. UNDEFEATED! One of the ties came against the two-time defending league champions, the Drunken Tigers, so I'll take that tie anyday. I did some pitching in this last game against the Drunken Tigers and it was the first time I did any pitching since early last season. I pitched the last two innings, the first of which I pitched to three kickers and all three got out without reaching first base. The last inning, though, I loaded the bases with only one out and our team had to play some great defense to escape with the tie. Phew! That was a close one! We play our last game of the season this Tuesday against the #1 Teabaggers and I believe that if we come away with either a win or a tie that we will lock up the #1 seed for our division. Wish us luck.

mlf jr.

Catchup Post

We've been pretty busy lately. Just in the past month, my cousin Dana got married (Congratulations, Dana & Charlie! Sorry we missed it!), our kids turned 6 years old, we had a visit from our parents from Reno, we visited the Audubon Zoo, did the St. Patrick's Day parade, took the kids to the LSU Garden Show/Chili Cook-Off and wrecked our new Toyota minivan (not necessarily all in that order). Now we have Easter coming up, two birthday parties, another cousin's wedding ('tis the season) and some crawfish to be boilin'.

Oh yeah, and kickball season has started! At first, our season was in jeopardy when BREC had notified our league commissioner that we had been blacklisted by the park commission for 'misbehaving'. However, the commish met with and compromised on a deal to get the league back in action just in time to start the season (only one week late). Just like last season, we (the Super Atomic Monkey Balls) started off with a big win, emerging victorious (4-2) against the proven Bayou Ball Busters. Next week, another formidable opponent... Team America. I'll let you know how we do (hopefully with pictures this time).

mlf jr.

Link to new pictures.

Some New Pics...

I know it's been awhile since my last post and I don't have much to say today, except that we've been busy. I have a few new (and some not so new) pics to share...

Trystin celebrating Mardi Gras at school.

Lisa's Birthday Party.

My youngest cousin, Kaitlyn.

Morgan & Megyn's Birthday Carnival.

View all my pics...

Later.

mlf jr.

New Year's Eve

I know these are a little late, but here are photos from our New Year's Eve...
New Year's Eve Photos

mlf jr.

Merry Christmas

IMG_7058.JPG
Originally uploaded by mfreyder.

By the looks of this photo you could never tell we had a great Christmas, but we did. Hope all of you did, too.

Happy holidays!

mlf jr & family.

Minor Updates...

I've made a couple minor updates to our site. The first of which you'll notice is the new pic in the main banner. You will also notice a few new things in the sidebar on the right. I added a link to our Flickr photo gallery (in the 'Outer Links' category), as well as a small window where I can add a quick update to whatever I'm doing at that moment without adding a new post. And last, but not least, I've started using Google Reader as my RSS feed gatherer. This gives me the ability to add links to my site to share some stories that I thought to be interesting. So, I'm trying to do a little more with the site without cluttering it up too much. If you have any thoughts please let me know.

mlf jr.

Christmas Party Time

This past weekend was my office's annual Christmas party. We shared a great dinner and many cocktails with a lot of great people. Thanks to Meg & Kurt for watching the kids for us while feeling under the weather (understatement).

Also, Mel and I were invited to attend the kids' kindergarten Christmas party at school today. So, I took the day off work to spend time with Mel before we went to the elementary school. However, I woke up feeling very sick myself and spent most of the day in bed. When it was time to get ready to go I took a big dose of medicine to hold me over for the party.

We all had lots of fun. One of the things that was sad to me when the kids started school was that there is this whole part of their day that I miss out on. I only get to hear their interpretation of it when I get home (and let me tell you, most days they even forget what they ate for lunch). So, it was great to see them in their element with all the friends they tell me about everyday.

Here's the breakdown of how the party went:

• Asked by a kindergartener who I was = 8 times
• Gave out high fives = 15 times
• Nearly tackled to the ground by a large group of kids = 4 times
• Spanked = Lost count (Don't tell me parents no longer spank their kids. These kids were pros at it.)
• Punched in a very sensitive area = 1 time and that was enough.
• Photos
  

This evening we took the kids out to dinner (Chinese food) for being so good this past week (plus Mel and I were too tired to cook). So, all in all it was a great day. No work and lots of fun makes me happy. :-)

mlf jr.