Houseboating on Lake Mead



We set up this trip last year in November for Kari and Dylan and the boys, and Kyle and Julie to join us on Lake Mead during late July for some fun in the sun.  Average temperature was 105 while we were there and unfortunately, Kyle and Julie did not get to make the trip (missed you guys!).  Oh and by the way, Kari and Dylan didn't live in Tennessee when we booked this bad boy either.  So they had a two-plus day drive to Henderson Nevada and we had a massive 4 hour drive from So. Cal.  I was hauling a boat  and they were hauling 4 dogs (another story) and two very active boys.

We arrived to find out our house boat was destroyed in a monsoon a few weeks earlier, but have no fear, the 50 footer we rented was now a 59 footer....nice upgrade Gramps!  Best part was no extra money!!  So we got our 'lesson' on the boat and where to beach it and not beach it and we were off!  On all of the houseboat trips we have been on, and I believe the count is 6, I have never driven the big boat. Well this was my chance....I even got a captain's hat for renting the boat!  Nice!  And the most expensive hat I now own!!  We found a decent cove about an hour away from the marina and beached the boat and tied off.  Dylan and his friend, who was with us for the day only, hammered in the stakes and Kim put her Montana knot skills to work on the left side of the boat and we were secure!  We swam, rode around in the little boat, and swam some more and ate.  Did I mention it was 105!!

The first two days went off without a hitch.  Life was good...until Saturday night, or actually Sunday morning about 1:30AM.  Kari woke us up from a dead sleep and said the boat's loose.  Apparently I sat straight up and shouted, "we're floating in the ocean?" or something profound like that.  Anyway, with two boys and four dogs sleeping, the four sleepy, tired adults tried with a pen light and no moon to figure out where we were.  According to whom you talk with, we were in one of four spots in our cove.  What we pieced together is that the left side stakes pulled up and were in the lake and the boat was being held by the right side stakes...we had flipped around completely (thank you monsoon wind) and the left side of the boat was banging against the shore.  Our little boat was also loose and up against the shore, but far enough away that we weren't going to crunch it with the big boat.  I started the engines (mistake) and tried to back us up into the cove and promptly broke a fin on the left hand outboard.  Nice!

Well, we had no idea about what we were going to do about the two 'lost stakes' that ended up in the lake. Enter Montana girl - remember the knots she put into the left side ropes....they held together and the stakes were at the bottom of the lake!  So we hammered in the stakes (way in...actually so far in that we couldn't get one of them out the next day) and retied the boat.  This wasn't before - Kari and her pen light slide down the hill about 20 feet; I cut his thumb open pretty good sliding down the hill and then splattered blood every time I swung the sledge hammer on the stake; Dylan was the man as we re-hammered in the stakes - doing about 2/3rds of the hammering at 3AM in the morning and Montana was shoving the bow of the houseboat down the shore as we tried to get it beached again.  Two and a-half hours after Kari woke us up....we were anchored again.

The next day, Sunday, we decided to move the boat to a better cove (you think?) and we found a beauty around the corner.  With one outboard working just fine, we made our way over and beached/tied off.  Here are a couple of shots off the back porch.

We had some great day trips in the little boat, traveling to other marina's (Temple Bar and Las Vegas Marina) to get lunch or just make our ice cream and gas run.  We did some skiing and a lot of floating in the middle of the lake.  Jaxon and Kazen did great and never once hesitated in jumping into the lake to swim, even way out in the middle!  Las Vegas Marina had huge fish near the docks and they loved to be fed any food.  The boys would throw in popcorn and the fish would go crazy....probably  50 fish just crawling over each other.  One trip we made was to Hoover Dam...not as impressive from the water side...

 

 Here is our little ski boat as we were getting ready...she's eleven years old and still plugging along!

I'll close with the story about our trip from our new beach spot on Monday to empty the holding tanks and top off the gas tank.  So we headed back to Calville Bay.  I decided to tell my death-defying story to Steve, the driver/mechanic who met us at the break water to take us into the dock.  I told him about the prop I broke and the fact that one of the two toilets on board was stopped up - both of which COST money to fix.  Prop = $130ish and $35+ for the toilet.  And probably more $$$ was what we were thinking.  So Steve pulls his mechanic boat up behind our houseboat and has the prop fixed under 5 minutes and in the meantime, the toilet was being repaired.  I asked Steve how I pay for the prop, and he said no problem - no charge.  Really - and the same story for the toilet - no charge!  Really nice! 

We had a great time!  We finished off the week and then, back off to the house - 4 hours for some and then two plus days for the Tennessee folks.

Fourth of July Party at Dodger Stadium!

I am becoming a Dodger Fan again with the new owners and Frankie gone (not soon enough!).  Anyway, we got a call to attend the game with some friends from Hilltop C of C and we jumped on it.  Left field pavilion seats...interesting place and I hadn't sat there since I was a raging Dodger fan at the ripe old age of 16!  Yes, I did crawl under the fence on opening day in 1976 to get some autographs!

We had a blast and the Dodgers won the game easily!  We then got to do what every fan dreams of....walk out onto the grass in the outfield!  Very cool!  Then it was time for some fireworks.  All in all, a great time at Chavez Ravine!!

 

 

 

Tennessee Part 2 (Mema)

Since several of you asked about Part 2, it's pretty simple from my vantage point. Mema stayed and I came home.  End of story. :)

Tennessee, Part 1 (Gramps)

As I type this, Part 1 is complete.  Part one is Gramps being in Tenn for 4 days and Mema (that would be part 2) is still there helping paint rooms and moving the kids into their new house.  We had fun getting there on our new favorite airline...however it took a run to Starbucks to get us motivated for the cattle call on Southwest!

Once we got there, it was non stop fun! We laughed and played with Jaxon and Kazen, ate at the Mexican with a fountain restaurant (Jaxon's favorite) and swam in the Scarbrough Pool part 2 (see Kari's blog for more details!).  We even went to a movie when the weather was not cooperating and saw the Avengers (great movie and that's not a Disney plug!!).  You'll notice that someone (KAZEN) was enjoying someone else's (GRAMPS) popcorn.  I didn't even get a bite!

Mema, Kari and Kazen are enjoying the pool.  And here are a couple of our super heroes (complete with Spidy outfits from Gramps and Mema).

To finish off the Part 1 of the visit, on Monday, Jaxon, Kazen and Gramps played baseball (for about 10 minutes....) and then Jaxon announced we were going to catch some 'ribbits'.  For those of you west of the Mississippi, that's frog hunting!  So off we went to the side of the cabin where Kari said it was target rich with ribbits.  She was right!  We have 4 in just under 10 minutes!  Gramps was then asked if we could go for a walk in the woods behind the cabin.  No problem....there was no tall grass and not a tick in sight!  We had a great walk and lots of fun.  Forty minutes later, we were back in the cabin getting ready to take me to the airport.  And then it happened....Jaxon had two ticks on his stomach.  Good move Gramps with the walk in the woods.  Kazen had 3 and we found 3 more on Jax. Now it was time for Gramps to get checked for Ticks...and yes, I set the Tennessee record for Paris at 8 ticks.  And now, thanks to Kari and Dylan, I am sporting this awesome t-shirt....

That's right....I'm a 'tick magnet'!  Well, it was off to the airport.  My friend in the back of the Tahoe helped get me there safely....

 And now, Minnie and I are waiting from Mema to come home.





Hanging out with my Best Friend

So, what to do on a Sunday after church, you ask? Kim looked at me as we drove home this last Sunday and said let's go to the beach!  San Clemente in fact!  So we went home, packed a small bag of goodies and off we went.  She told me she wanted to get a pair of Rainbow sandals and there was an outlet store down there that the kids had mentioned before.  We put the address in the NAV and ended up at the corporate offices of Rainbow sandals.  Luckily, there was another address available and we were off to continue our spontaneous adventure (after a quick stop at Carl's).

We found the store and did some shopping.  It just so happened that they had a little section of USC Trojan sandals....check out these bad boys! Notice the USC tabs!  We walked on the beach for about three miles and had a blast just visiting and watching the waves hit the sand.  Some surfers were trying to catch some rides and we saw a cool beach house (reminded us of the family beach house at Mussell Sholes).  Oh yeah, and we took a photo of some love birds.....

Later that day, we met Jo and Dave for dinner in Brea.  It was a great day!

Race Day

Last Sunday was the Pasadena Half Marathon.  Beautiful weather, 7000 runners and my under 2 hour streak on the line.  So far, every race I have run, I have been blessed to finish under 2 hours....not a lot under 2, but under 2 none the less (1.54, 1.59, 1.57....you get the picture). Not bad for a 52 year old who started running in 2009.  So I got the final number and, I made it by 84/100's.  1:59:16!  And not too bad in my age category - 20th out of 76 50-54 year-olds.  This is the 4th year the race has been held in Pasadena and I guess, it's the first year that there has been no RAIN!  I wore my usual USC shirt, and only got one shout out for the Trojans!  Then Kim reminded me that Pasadena is where the bruins play....really - how 'bout some love here!? 

Mother's Day

Today was Mother's Day.  As I sit here and type, it was a great day!  Matt hosted the family today and he is getting awesome on the smoker!  We enjoyed a great meal and had a great time together.

To my wife - You are the most creative, talented, wonderful person I know.  You are an awesome mother and grandmother!  Thanks for being my wife, best friend and partner of almost 30 years!  I love you!

To my Mom - Thank you for being one of the most positive people I know.  You are a great example to me and pillar of strength for our family.  Thanks for being my Mom (Carol - beat you to it!) - I love you!

With everything going on in all of our lives, I am really glad we stop and pause, to say thank you to our Mothers.  In fact, my goal is to not wait for May every year to stop, pause and be thankful!

Friends and Dogs...Or Dogs are friends...or...forget it

We are blessed to have some terrific friends!  Over time, some have moved or we have moved, but we do our best to stay in touch.  We have some very special friends from when we attended church at Upland, and Hilltop and Lakewood and La Habra....needless to say, we have moved a couple of times and we always get involved at a church.  Sooooo, lots of church friends!  One tradition we have with our Hilltopper buds (Fred and Cathy & Bob and Diane) are birthday get-togethers each year.  If I'm not mistaken, the guys all have birthdays within 30-days of each other and the girl's birthdays are close as well (all in late summer).  It's always a chance to try a new restaurant, maybe a new bottle of wine and most importantly, to catch up on what's been happening in each other's lives.  I love the fact that in about a 2-hour span of time, we can be completely caught up and feel even more connected and in tune with each other, even though we may not have seen each other for months.  By the way, here we are at Season's 52 - my favorite Orlando restaurant which has just landed in Costa Mesa!  I've only been there three times in three weeks, but hey, who's counting (Kim)?  The address is ....just kidding...but if you decide to go, tell Kristen and Parker hello for me! 

So you're asking what did Bill mean about dogs..?  By the way, there is no correlation between the friends and the story I'm about to share.  Purely coincidence and the fact is I missed posting to the blog last weekend...so a little mix-in here.  We are the proud "dog watchers" for Kyle and Julie, who are off enjoying their very late honeymoon in Europe.  And did I mention that Kim left me....well not left me but went to Tennessee to help Kari and Dylan work on the house (see Kari's Blog), so guess who's watching the hounds!?

So here are Minnie, Java and Rummy.  They aren't really digging Gramps taking off at 6AM and coming home at 6PM every day.  In fact, I felt so guilty, that when our neighbors across the street invited me to dinner last night (Friday) because Kim is gone, I told them that I needed to hang out with the dogs because I had been gone so much this week.  I bet that sounded pretty stupid!  Anyway, everyone is alive and well at the Partin house.  Kyle and Julie, if you're reading this, please come home!  Rummy and Java miss you!  Kim, if you're reading this, please come home! Bill and Minnie miss you!  I gotta go...it's time to cook dinner....which takes me a lot longer than when Kim does it!  I'll leave you with an exciting video of the dog days of Glendora!

ReMARKable

I just wanted to share the series of lessons we are enjoying at Christ's Church of the Valley (CCV) on the book of Mark.  Jeff Vines, our senior pastor, is an amazing speaker and he has the gift of challenging every member of the audience - seasoned vets of faith and those searching for an answer.  Check out this week's lesson we heard Sunday - CCV 4.22.12.

Great Neighbors

One thing you really don't have any control over is who your neighbors are and if you'll like them or they'll like you.  You can drive through a neighborhood at all times of the day and night before you 'make the offer' to buy that dream house.  You can check the stats for crime in the city and how the schools are ranked, but unless you go door to door and interview each and everyone, it's just a crap-shoot.  You kinda get what you get and try to make the best of it. 

So, let me fast forward to our street.  I did drive the neighborhood at all times of the day and night; checked the crime stats and tried to find out everything I could before we made the offer.  And when all is said and done, we lucked out!  We have great neighbors!  We got invited over to a birthday party last Saturday and just had a great time.  Except for one house on our cul-de-sac, our new friends are interesting, family focused and just fun to hang around.  We were only going to stay for an hour and ended up hanging out and visiting until almost midnight.  We talked about our kids and grandkids and our jobs and school and the economy....we almost solved world hunger!!

Here's to having some great luck and finding some new friends!

CMSO

So, what's a CMSO you ask?  Well, that's my work 'official' title.  Sounds impressive, doesn't it?  It stands for (okay, my kids don't even know this....) Chief Member Services Officer.  Since I work at the credit union, this means that I'm the guy responsible for what happens to our members in our branches, how we bring in new members, how we market to our members and also, how our wealth managers deal with our members.  I really enjoy my job and I try to give Partners my 100% effort.  But, when you work hard, you need to play hard too.  We try to have fun at the office and I wanted to share a video (see below) that started with an outrageous goal we set, followed by the team actually achieving the goal by the end of the year!  As for the background, we had been talking about working together to make the goal a reality, that we needed to be synchronized....hence the skit idea.  We told the team if you meet the new account goal for 2011, the senior managers would do a synchronized swimming skit.    Anyway, Kim created the costumes (except for the shorts...that was Mike's idea).

Another part of my job is to develop leaders.  This is very enjoyable and yet, challenging in that it takes a ton of energy to try to guide the growth of other leaders.  I have been blessed to be around some great leaders and mentors in my life.  Several of the business writers I enjoy are Jim Collins and John C. Maxwell.  The team at the office just finished reading Jim's new book "Great by Choice" and we are getting ready to read John's book "The Five Levels of Leadership".  I believe the old adage is true....Leaders are Readers!  Old school, I know, but it's true in my book.  Here are the links to more info on johnmaxwellonleadership.com and jimcollins.com .

Easter in Tennessee

Kim and I had a great 38 hours over the weekend!  We started off leaving Ontario airport on Friday afternoon and landed in Nashville around 11PM.  After getting some great (actually lousy) service at the DOLLAR rentacar (full body cavity search and blood test were optional), we were off to Buchanan (Paris) Tennessee. We arrived at 1:30am and we were up at 7ish in the morning to the noise of two awesome grandkids! We started our day with a great breakfast and then it was time to play cars and then go see the new house the kids are building.  NICE PLACE!  After a great lunch, we rode the three-wheeler around and Jaxon was able to ride by himself (in first gear).  But, first gear goes pretty fast, he was so cute with a huge motorcycle helmet on his head. So after a few talks from Dad, he slowed down (just a little).  He gave Mema and Gramps a ride - you can see one of Mema's thrill rides here -

We had dinner at a place called the Olive Pit (short for the Pitifully short of salmon and lasagna - which is only served on Monday).  We had some laughs....and a decent meal, with what little they had left on the menu!

Sunday was church and a great lesson on guardrails!  Then, we were off to Easter lunch, which was awesome, and the Tennessee version of the Easter egg hunt!  On a huge 'lawn' Jaxon and his cousin Nate went crazy finding eggs, while Kazen had to open each plastic egg he found and examine what was inside!  What a crack up!

We finished off the day with an Easter tradition by shooting guns!   A 9mm, AK47 and 12-guage were shot by all of us.  Funny story after that at the security checkpoint with the TSA agents.....just kidding!  Kim and I then left for our 2-hour drive back to the airport.  After having to switch planes at Nashville to another Southwest flight so we could beat the weather delay in Denver, we made our way to Las Vegas and then Ontario, landing at midnight.

What a great weekend....all 38 hours of it!  We are now trying to catch up on some missing sleep!

Mr. Saturday

So, while Kim was recouperating this weekend from her injections during the week, I was busy doing just a couple of things over the weekend.  My kids affectionately call me Mr. Saturday due to the fact I actually enjoy doing yard work.  It's kinda my therapy after a typical work week.  So, I'll mow and edge the yards, trim bushes, wash cars (sometimes) and have fun doing it all.  Weird, I know and so the nickname from the kids. 

This was an interesting weekend though.  I probably should have stayed home and spent time with Kim, but a long-time friend needed help moving.  So off to Uncle Ron's to pick up the trailer.  Off to Jerry's to help move him from one apartment to another.  Then, back to return the trailer and home.  Oh, did I mention I needed to do a training run for the Pasadena 1/2 marathon I am running in May....so I squeezed in an 8-miler.  Then to top off the day, it was off to do some grocery shopping, cook dinner for my on-the-mend wife and then I collapsed.  Mr. Saturday - done!

But wait....there's more!  There's Sunday! - Church and then a meeting for a very cool ministry I am hoping to serve in.  Did I mention I still needed to mow the lawns and wash the cars....on Sunday!  Mr. Saturday strikes again!

A couple of other fun facts from the weekend.  I decided to take a stroll down memory lane when I picked up the trailer.  I stopped by the house we lived in from 1986 to 1993 in La Mirada.  We moved in when Kari was 2 and Kyle was a newborn.  Believe it or not, in 2012, the house still has the same screen door we put on the house when we lived there!

And, lastly, for a laugh, here's the end of my 8-miler on video.  Notice the primo average time per mile!!  Enjoy your week and see you next Saturday!!

Mass Hysteria

We've got some great visitors here in So. Cal - Steve and Debbie, straight from Oklahoma!  It's been fun catching up, laughing, shopping and playing a little golf (with an emphasis on little!).  We are missing several hours of sleep, but for a good cause....family!  We sat around last night at Ryan's house and listened to story after story..I think Carol was learning some things as Ryan and Steve were talking about several car stories.

Church tomorrow and did I mention the eating?!  We've been doing a lot of the eating!!  All good though. 

Here are three of the 5 golfing amigos.  Other than the fun group behind us (ask Jerry), we had a blast golfing!





Getting Started

With our lives in a bit of flux right now, we are just returning from a great Eastern Caribbean cruise on the new Disney Fantasy!  We had a great time and enjoyed the "concierge" level of service while only paying Wal-mart prices thanks to the cruise ship being on a training run.  We stopped in four ports (Grand Caymans, Cozumel, Costa Maya and Disney's own Castaway Cay).  We swam with stingrays, visited some Mayan ruins and did a little shopping, along with lots of eating, reading our books and just relaxing.  Now that we're home, we're wondering who's going to make us breakfast and clean our room each day???

Here are a few photos from our trip!

On the deck of the Fantasy with Maxx and the Goof Man!

Dining with Bruce at the Animator's Palate

Kim with her Goofy Guys

Sunset at Sea

Kim and I are starting our family blog today.  Lot's more to follow!