Marc.

Click Here For Marc's Caring Bridge Site.

The Cowboy Is 4.

I'm a little late on this post, but I have been driving a car for the last 4 days...the 13th was Brecken's birthday.  The little wild man is 4 years old now.

Many of you know he loves skateboarding, wakeboarding, playing hockey and being a cowboy...quite the combination of loves we know, and it makes for some interesting playtime.

I am not sure but I think every dad has been a "bull"  for their children to ride.  My dad did it for me and I do it for my boys as well, and lately Kolby wants in on the rodeos too.  Brecken and Grandpa share quite a bit of time on horseback, and with all the growing B-Wreck has been doing lately he didn't fit into many of his clothes, so for his birthday he got clothes, and he was pumped about it.  New cowboy jeans, a bullriding vest and brand new boots just like the High School kids are wearing.  He is pretty proud of his new duds and can't wait to go ride Juneau with his new boots on.

Here is the little picture I did to make him look like he was a real bullrider on the PBR tour.

Take Another Bow Maxim...

Maxim's Spring Speech Festival was on Friday and if you remember from last year, he was kind of the hit of the show as he did his speech and then took a bow.

(Click Here To Watch 2009's Performance)

In the back of my head I wondered if he would do that again this year....

RIP Noah the Fish

My dad took off for a meeting in Pierre yesterday and I asked him if he was staying at the Ramkota, he wasn't sure...so I said, "you know the one with the monster fish from the Amazon".  That jogged his memory and he said that was the spot.

He got into Pierre late last night and then texted me this AM that Noah the monster Pacu fish was dead.

I was stunned.  With all my travels to Pierre over the years that fish had become a friend of mine, ok an acquaintance...OK, OK I looked at him at least once every trip, but he was the mascot of the Ram.

Here is the story from KSFY...
A 41-year-old fish that entertained visitors to a Pierre hotel for nearly a quarter century has died.

Ramkota General Manager Rick Murray says Noah died Wednesday. The Pacu fish was born in 1969 in South America and was brought to the hotel in 1987, a few months after it opened.

During his time, Noah outgrew four fish tanks.
Murray says the hotel might have Noah stuffed and mounted.

I think mounting Noah is a great idea, but you have to make sure he can sing "Wild Thing" or something like that.

Hotels don't do things like that anymore, now they brag about their cool 153' water slides,some are known for gigantic waffles at their continental breakfast and some are know for their awesome shower heads.  I prefer super old fish that seem too big for their tank.

My friend Pam told me of the funny thing that happened when the hotel announced that Noah was dead on their outdoor sign...it read...We will miss you...then below that their Lenten special notice of "Fish Fry on Friday!"  Epic.

Brecken The Skype Monster

Skype is a wonderful tool for keeping up with relatives, conference calls with co-workers, or just getting to see your kids via a visual phone call when you are traveling.

Steph and I have actually Skyped with our kids while driving in a car...crazy to think you can video call your children in a moving object.

Well, it was bound to happen...Brecken (3 years old) figured out what buttons to click on to dial up daddy on Skype, and while a neighbor was visiting with Steph, Brecken decided to call me at work on Skype about 10 times.

So I was entertained for about the first 3 minutes, then I felt like I was babysitting him from a distance. Pretty funny actually...here is the photo of Brecken telling me about his baseball jersey, and how he wants all the baseball jerseys in the world, and football shoes with nails on them.

Kolby In Grandpa's Sleigh and James River Water Level

Christmas is a loooong time away...but...

all I want for Christmas is.....

Last Run...

My crew reffed our final games this weekend at the President's Cup in Rapid.  We did 8 games in about 36 hours of life.  Honestly, I have spent more time with these guys over the last 3 weekends than my wife, so I promise I will make it up to her.

I had a very good year, and only about a handful of calls that I would love to have back...don't kid yourself, every ref knows when they blew a call...although none of the calls were big-time game deciding mistakes. 

Yes, Brookings fans, there was 2 tenths of a second left on the clock when Huron scored the goal to send the semi-final JV state tourney game into overtime...blame it on DakTronics for inventing such a good scoreboard!

So I'll hang up the skates for another year, and I can say for all of my family, that we were ready for hockey season to be over this year.

H2O Overload.

I know the title of this blog is Living On Liquid, but this Spring is ridiclous. 

Our neighbors with low-lying houses are sandbagging, the ditches are full, it keeps raining and snowing, I saw a cow standing in mud up to it's belly the other day.

Knee-high rubber boots are high fashion, like we live in southeast Alaska.

If this keeps up I re-naming our kids Ham, Shem and Japeth.

A good day behind the camera...

4 Day Recovery

We went out snowmobiling with our friends last weekend; and today...Friday...is the first day I have felt "not super sore". My buddy is a great rider, and I learned a lot by just following him around in the deep powder.

I can't begin to tell you how much of a workout back country riding is...and we put on a lot of trail miles too. I didn't feel the need to lift a weight this week. I did run 2 times but that was to make sure that I still had some cardio ability for the weekend as I am reffing the State JV hockey tourney this weekend, the State Varsity hockey tourney next weekend and the President's Cup regional tourney the following weekend.

I guess when you need a 4 day recovery from riding a machine that goes through snow you are either getting old or you rode really hard and worked your body to it's limits. OR BOTH.

PICTURES FROM LAKEHAUS PRODUCTIONS - HIS SIGNATURE SERIES

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

USA Hockey

Blame it on the Olympics that I haven't been blogging...but I thought this picture summed up my olympic experience so far.

The win over Canada was not as epic as 1980, but still pretty big time stuff.

And it gives me fodder to hand it out to my Canadian friends.

Go USA.

Oh Canada...

The Olympics always captures my attention, I think it started in 1980 with the hockey team. My sister always made me watch figure skating too, which somehow gave me a guilty pleasure of liking dudes with better skating skills than mine.

Nonetheless, it is Olympic season again, and this year it is in Canada...our friends to the North. I love Canada...don't get me wrong, but lately on ESPN.com there has been a bit of fighting about Canada's inability to host and do well at the Olympics. Rick Reilly, who is one of my favorite sports writers posted this apology after writing this story.

The thing reminded me of a conversation I had with a Canadian hockey coach prior to a game a few months ago. He wondered if we were playing both anthems (not sure how that was going to affect his game plan) but I knew the PA announcer was going to play them both.

So off the cuff I said, "you mean the American National Anthem and our American National Anthem For Canada?"

He said, "what???"

I said, "Oh, Canada"..."it is really just a love song from a powerful, strong and protective man to his loving woman who needs him to take care of her."

Think of the words...Americans should really be singing Oh, Canada to Canadians.

O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

Yes Canada "WE", being America, stand on guard for thee...after all, if you were to not like us where else would all our really macho American men go fishing and elk hunting.

Big Birthdays and a tumble down the stairs.

I know I usually do something for birthdays around here and the 3 most important girls in my life are celebrating back to back to kind of back.

Steph turned 29 again last Saturday, and I had a bunch of surprises for her, I even bought her a dozen roses. Let's just say the price of roses has doubled since the last time I did that.

Grandma Penny is the Groundhog Day birthday and we kind of celebrated that on Sunday, and the boys sang to her on Tuesday morning.

Last but not least is Kolby. She is going to be 1 in a week. I can't wait to see her dive into her cake...because if it is anything like her fall down the stairs yesterday it will be epic.

Yeah, she took her first big tumble, but it was down the set of stairs in the house that are not tiled, so that was a good thing. The bad thing, they are the longest set of stairs in the house. If you have never seen your child fall down stairs it is very interesting, especially if you are chasing them.

I almost caught her at the top of the steps, but she went head over heels, then moved into a barrel roll for the rest of the way. I almost caught her at 2 points as I was running after her, but she was fast!

With the Winter X games still fresh in our minds and the Olympics coming up we named her fall The SLO-MO it consisted of a 1620 (body revolutions), a body varial to headstand to 10 minute cry session. I am buying her a helmet and some knee pads for her birthday.

Conversations you are in, but not really.

Do you ever have those conversations, let's say at work, the store, at a public gathering or church, where someone who you are talking to, or are forced to talk to, is completely talking about quite possibly the most boring thing in the world?

I had a 20 minute listen today about a totally random subject, I won't say where I was, but the conversation was dumb, and I felt trapped and I couldn't get out of it...my mind was wandering about this and that.

Then the thought, "does this person know I'm not listening" came into my head. I panicked and thought that I should ask a question about what the person was talking about to let them know I cared about their rambling...all I did was prolong the most boring conversation in my life.

You are probably thinking the same thing about my blog...but hey, you don't have to click here all the time to read my ramblings!

Ken Block and a Subaru.

Rally car driver Ken Block just announced that he is leaving Subaru for the Ford team, but this video of him driving a Subs will always be one of my favorite.

Music Formula Broken Down

One of my favorite bands of the past 8 or so years is a group called Falling Up out of Oregon. I met the guys a couple times thanks to my boy Dave. The sad news is the band is breaking up later this month, but I found a quote by Jessy the lead singer that I thought was so true, but I didn't realize it until I read it.

This is Jessy explaining the basic format of every song on most Christian Radio:

"The Christian radio structure is as follows: Heavy hitting intro, toned down into the first verse, short pre chorus, chorus. Then verse two, no second pre chorus ( that’s supposed to be tricky ), more intense second chorus. Then this is always my favorite- The bridge that’s “supposed to take you to a different place for a brief moment.” ( which really is just a slight key change and, for most of the listeners, their least favorite part of the song ) and then a musical pause with just the singer beginning the last chorus and into…the pay off chorus at the end, usually played twice, in which the climax then concludes with a ring out of feedback or a small drum loop." Jessy Ribordy - Falling Up

If you are not into music, this doesn't mean much to you, but if you do listen you are having an "Ahhh-haa moment". The reason he said this is because they were criticized for not having a radio friendly single on their last album...he also said, "I really don't want my creativity to be put in a box that makes executives happy." I wish I could say that sometimes...

Not much, just a great Jon Stewart quote...

I read this the other day...thought it was funny, since over the weekend a way under-powered North Dakota Jr. Gold hockey team played in a game I reffed, and I am pretty sure every mom of the players from North Dakota thought we lost the game for them, even though they got out shot 55 to 18, and lost 6 to 2.

Anyway I thought the quote fit.

"Korea, like Dakota, has two parts. A relatively friendly South... and a North that hates the world." - Jon Stewart, The Daily Show

Like We Didn't Know Already

http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/34809569/ns/sports-baseball/

The link above is Mark McGwire's admission of using roids...yeah, this is a thing that will be held against him forever, but I respect him way more than all the other guys who are still denying it.