Free Manga!

Well it's been a while for anyone to update the family blog, so I figure why not me. As some might remember way back in Noverber, I won the 365 Days of Manga contest on suvudu.com! Basically, just sign up every day in the sidebar and if you're persistent enough Jason Thompson, the biggest manga expert out there, will send you 5 manga for free! Then if you take a picture with it and post it somewhere, he'll send you 5 more. What a nice guy, right?

So I went out a took a picture almost the next day right before I went to the Imogen Heap concert. But of course I'm a procrastinator. A girl can change a lot in 233 days, so I took a way better updated one. And the last pic is me with my friend Andrew who also won, thanks to me telling him all about it.

It took me 40 tries to win, and considering there's a good 80 days left you're odds are pretty good to still win. Sure, some 2000 manga of Jason's vast collection is already gone, but I'm sure there's some great gems yet to be had.

I have to mention how awesome Song of the Hanging Sky is! It has a beautiful setting full of in-depth characters and the simple plot of survival. Right now it's in my top 5 manga of all time, and I've read a lot. I still haven't read how volume 2 will fair, but with Go! Comi's departure I fear future volumes will never see the light of day in North America. I only hope to see more from Toriko Gin.

A final thanks to you, Jason. I've had a chance to get King of RPGs and I'll always love more. Hope to meet you some day.

First Track Meet of This Year

What was that blurr that flashed across the camera. One neat part about track is not only do you compete against others, you also compete against yourself. Samuel has improved his times over last year's times.

Vlog from Elder William C Urban

Sam goes to a town meeting

So, mom finally got Sam to go to a town meeting for his Community something or other merit badge thingie. He didn't have violin lessons today (for like the 10934057 week in a row!) and mom thought the town meetings were held on Mondays. She called and sure enough, they were! So instead of violin lessons, Sam was off to the North Strabane Township Planning Commission meeting. "Lucky me", said Sam.

I told him to bring a book to "write" on, which was supposed to be code for "hey Sammy, bring a book so you can READ it for when things get really, really, really boring cause I heard on NPR this morning (or somewhere, maybe it was Wait, Wait....Don't Tell Me) that people who are bored a lot in life lose more years off of their lives than people who are constantly amused (or at least not bored)". I don't think he brought a book, because my code was not quite deciphered and instead he brought a notebook. (Never mind, I have just learned that he did in fact bring a book. It was the Hitchhicker's Guide anthology I got him for Christmas.)

Upon returning home from the meeting, I asked Sam how things went. He showed me his notes. He's asked me to tell you all that the notes on the opinions he took down he wrote while in the car on the way home. I think he was deftly able to boil down the salient details in a way I hope other meetings may adopt in the future so that we may no longer be bored and live longer (according to Wait, Wait).

Sam wishes I would have boiled this email down into a simple sentiment: "Wow, I really had to go to this meeting today? Well, there was talking mostly about land areas, um, roll call 'yes, yes, yes, yes' something about oil and gas drilling, uh, a cooking place, and, ah...building and destroying: construction stuff. And now, I think Mary's typing everything I say. Mom asked a question during the meeting, something about entrances or whatever. I forgot the question, just ask mom. Mom was good, yeah. I'm glad she was nice enough to take me there and take me back. This seems really long, Mary."

Mom's side of the story: "we walked into the room. At first, I thought it was just going to be the zoning board and those who took records, but there were actually people there sitting in chairs.There was a group that wanted an Italian Cooking School/Restaurant/Drive-Through on a corner where a traffic light would be appreciated, but PENDOT has not approved it yet. As the discussion happened, I had a question (all comments were to be made into the microphones, this is how the proceedings are recorded). So, I got in the microphone and asked for an explanation of an entrance that had been commented on that was close to this intersection, and dangerously so, as I understood it. So, it was explained to me that they didn't have to change the construction because it was "grandfathered in".

Interesting procedures. The woman in charge wasn't called a chair. Motions would be expressed, seconds would be required and the gal in charge would say "roll call" and the other woman would say the name of each on the board, and they in turn would say "yes" or "no" and they all said "yes' to every one. The last item had the most discussion. One woman was highly concerned about a neighbor's water, because the town wanted to drill a natural gas pipeline. The neighbor would have six months to say if there was a problem with the water. If there's a problem, the gas people would drill a new well. This woman was adamant with her concern. This is a precedent case. They allowed it. When the meeting was all finished, then the woman in charge said: "is there anything to be addressed by those remaining?" Sam was the only one who hadn't said anything. Sam looked up "huh?" and gets eye contact with the woman. Sam said "Boy Scout Requirement". "oh, those merit badges". There were big smiles all around."

Now, all Sam has to do is choose one of the issues discussed at the meeting and talk to his BSA counselor about which side he's on for one of them and he will have (finally) earned this badge. He tells me the number of badges he has left to complete is classified information.

I gotta say, most of the time it's worth it to ride along with our family's adventures and experience them first hand. Once in a while, though, it's more entertaining to get the report after the fact.

Snow Storm of the decade - 2010 -

"what a mess," several people exclaimed. 17" to 30" inches of snow in the surrounding area, the Pittburgh area. Here are some photos of our house. A tree bowed over with snow and almost broke our power line. We had a harrowing experience bringing Mary home from work last night, 2/5/2010.

Meet Thurl Bailey

 

Samuel, Elaine and Charles went to a church fireside on 1/31/2010. Thurl Bailey was the speaker. He was a star basketball player for North Carolina State, the Utah Jazz and Minnesota Timber-wolves among other teams. He married a Mormon girl from Richfield, a place where Elder Urban served.

Our grand-daughter trying to turn over