Surprisuary

February should officially change it's name to Surprisuary. There are several reasons why this name change should take place. First, Both of the words "surprise" and "February" contain the letter R twice, and the first R in both words is silent. think it's a coincidence? It's not. Ok, maybe it is, but there are other reasons to call February Surprisuary. First and foremost, February will sometimes throw in an extra day. It doesn't happen every year, but it's happening this year! February will tack on an extra suprise day at the end of the month as if to say, "Suprise! This year I have 29 days!" Of course we will all be shocked and amazed by this surprise day, knowing that once again, February has surprised us.

Another reason to call February Surprisuary, is the fact that our good friend Austin got married. Now, I'm not surprised that he actually found someone to marry so much as I am surprised that someone found him to marry! Just kidding. I don't even know if that makes sense or what it really means, I just thought it was a good reason for February to change it's name. By the way, congratulations Austin and Marianne!

February is also the month that is home to Valentines Day. A day that can hold many surprises, such as this one,

For Valentine's Day this year, Shayla gave me a 2004 Toyota Tacoma! This is the best Valentines Day gift ever! It really wasn't a surprise though, as I saw it a couple weeks ago, test drove it, researched it, price-matched it, and talked her into letting me buy it. It is a very nice truck and comes with a very nice debt! We are glad that we can finally load Max into the back seat of the truck now when we go camping or exploring through the deserts and mountains.

Oh yeah, if anyone reading this needs (or knows someone who needs) a 1992 Toyota pickup. I know someone who is selling a dark gray one that is in pretty decent condition!

And finally, February should forever be known as Surprisuary because on this one last surprise...

As we were driving home from Austin's wedding in northern Utah, we got a phone call informing us that the wall behind our house had fallen down! As you can see in the picture, a stretch of the wall from our backyard over to the middle of our neighbor's back yard failed sending tons of dirt and boulders over with it. I guess that's what happens when you try to build a retaining wall out of cinder block! Many of us knew this was a potential disaster waiting to happen (I have had a number of conversations about this very wall with many in Shayla's family) and I guess that disaster decided to suprise us now. Here are a few more pictures of the action,

The top left section of the failed wall is still standing on top of the real retaining wall. If this section would have fell, it would have smashed another tree (in addition to the two more that were smashed) and possibly damaged the shed right behind where I am standing while taking this picture. The large boulder at the bottom of the picture was not there before the wall fell. There is another boulder of similar size about six inches away from the shed.

This is a good shot of all the damage. The rock wall you see in the foreground used to extend about another twenty feet. There is a chain link fence that you can see at the end of the property line that is completely trashed. You can see the fence post against the retaining wall directly to the right of the pine tree. The fence rail is buried under dirt and rock and appears again in the right side of the photo. The sheets of plywood you see were set up to help protect the shed in case any further rocks and/or dirt fell.

This picture shows the fence better, and you can also see the part of the cinder block wall that didn't fall.

So that is why February should now be called Surprisuary! We are only 17 days into the month and we have been surprised more than we could have hoped for! At least we have an extra day to clean up the mess left behind from that wall!


BOSHMA Book!
The BOSHMA Blog is now in book form! I know many of you like to blog, and so I thought you might like to blurb! Blurb is the greatest thing since cinder block walls! You can take your blog a publish it in a book. For those of you (like us) that don't like to write in your journals but do like to blog, this is a great alternative! Check it out.