The Bigger News...

Wes told all of you about our exciting new job starting July of 2010 at ExxonMobil in Houston, but we both agree that the bigger news is...that we're having a BABY!!!  We were holding off to make the announcement until after my first trimester, but there have been leaks via Facebook and other people's blogs (I still love you Shelby, Dad, Sabrina, Aunt Belinda).  So, who wants to hold off on such exciting news anyway!  I am due March 27, which will be 4 days before our 4 year anniversary.  We are ecstatic to finally be expanding our family!

Here are our baby pics...I wonder which one the baby will resemble more?  Either way, it's going to be a cute baby!

The Houston-Internship Summer Snapshot

I realized two things tonight--yes, two things in one night. First, I haven't posted anything for a while and second I haven't posted any pictures from my internship with ExxonMobil's Gas and Power Marketing group in Houston. So here are a few random pictures from the experience.

Jennifer drove down with me (1600 miles) and dropped me off, only to fly back to Utah to finish teaching school. The long distance was helped by playing Peggle (a great game) with Jennifer over Xbox live--made possible by Spencer Wilde (thanks for the Xbox loan) and frequent phone conversations.

Here I am about to enter the Exxon building. I worked on the 35th floor.

After I was made official, I headed up to my office.

Yay for my office...which lasted three weeks and then I was moved out to a general work area with about 50 other people. I got to talk to more people there and I got a window, actually there were windows on all three sides of the open floor.

So I wasn't right by the window but I was fairly close. Houston is home to some great restaurants (Barbecue, Cajun, Vietnamese, Mexican, Crepes, et cetera).



I had never eaten a spring roll before but it was good. One restaurant I went to several times called Bourays served Vietnamese food and Mexican food. 'Yes, I'd like the Egg Roll Vermicelli and the quesadilla please...no wait, let's just go with the pork burrito and a fortune cookie.'

This was one of my tougher days at work. Nothing like a grueling day at a charity golf tournament.

I did Meals on Wheels (bringing food to people) during work hours as well with fellow interns, Jenny from BYU and Alex from Missouri.

Finally Jennifer came down (Yay!!!) and we had a lot of fun. I won us free Astros tickets from an Exxon drawing that put us five seats behind the dugout. The Astros won and they did fireworks. After the game I saw a baseball player carry a three foot snake in from the field and scare one of the officials.

And we worked over the Museum of Natural Science...lots of butterflies, dinosaurs, diamonds, and Terra Cotta warriors. This is an Allosaurus from Wyoming.

Anyways, another 1600 miles later and we are back in Utah. Jennifer is already teaching school and I am spending every waking second working on my graduate thesis...or, well...I'm about to. My final year of MBA classes starts on August 31st, yay! Oh yeah, Exxon offered me a job (double yay)!!!

Awkward Family Photos

I have discovered the most fabulous website.  It is called AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com.  It is hil-ar-i-ous!  I have clocked many hours scrolling through the pictures and the comments.  The readers of AFP.com are some pretty witty people.  To accompany this post I would love to post some of my own awkward family photos, but I am still in Texas, so those will have to come later.  Take a moment to stroll over to the site and see a few funny pics.  They'll make you laugh.

Below, is an example picture from the site.  This one is kind of bitter-sweet...poor girl.  Although, I love that the frog legs are straight up in the air.  They get even better.

Maybe a McWorld would be better than I thought...

On our recent trip out to Houston, Wes and I drove through some of the ugliest and most boring parts of our country.  One of the worst was Southern Wyoming...okay THE worst was southern Wyoming.  That is some dry and ugly and brown land.  I'm sorry to any Wyomingites who are reading this.  There really are some pretty parts, just not where Interstate 80 runs through.  Denver had never looked so beautiful to me.  Anyway, I am straying from my point...McDonalds.  While we were in the dusty state of Wyoming, we came across the coolest McDonalds I have ever seen.  Allow me to demonstrate.

This is the first thing we noticed upon walking in.  I don't know if you can tell but this is a rock waterfall.  This McDonalds had 5 installed in their dining area.

They also had 5 flat screen TVs around their dining area...as well as somewhere else...

They did NOT have flat screen TVs in the women's restroom, I checked.

Not only did the kid's play area have these adorable miniature "saddle seats" that are apparently equally fun for kids and 29 year old men alike.  They also had...wait for it...4 stations of X-boxes.

This was the definite high point of our drive through Wyoming.  Oh, and last but not least, the lovely little fireplace and sofas in the McDonalds.

Texas pictures coming soon...  

O Broadband, Broadband! Wherefore Art Thou Broadband?

I didn't have internet yesterday. It was horrible. It was like I lost an appendage or something. In one day these were my problems, I couldn't:

• See my wife's IM on Skype
• Listen to Pandora Radio
• Check my e-mail
• Set-up an appointment with my thesis advisor
• Distract myself with the online Halo community via Xbox Live
• Watch a movie on Netflix
• Check to see if X-men was coming to the I-Max this weekend
• Set-up my cable installation appointment in Houston (online only discounts)
• Look up some equations I needed for my thesis
• Find a good creative writing book using Amazon's rating system
• Download a writing program I needed
• Check out blogs

Like I said it was awful. I was reduced to being productive, working on my thesis all day (minus the equations I needed), with the bright spot to my workday being a Wendy's run and an episode of the animated Batman(on a disc) for lunch.

Today

I am happily connected to the internet and used it to:

• Chat with Rodolfo from India to schedule my internet/cable installation in Houston taking advantage of online only coupons
• Check my e-mail (Hey Babe, thanks for that Crate & Barrel spam)
• Cancel my unsolicited subscription from Crate & Barrel
• Use my online only bank to cut a check to Comcast
• Send an e-mail to my future apt. manager to make sure I'm sending everybody to the right address
• Not do thesis (don't worry I will)
• I just got a response, I did send the right address
• And OF COURSE, chat with my sweetheart on Skype
• and the day is still young...

I know you would all be devastated without the internet because you wouldn't be able to read this non-whiney, non-materialistic post.