Monthly Archives: August 2012

Hughes Family: August 20th – 26th

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School started this past week. One in kindergarten, one in second grade and one in third. Not too bad! On Sunday Fran said “Ahhhh! I wish they could go to school every day!” (we can say this stuff since our kids don’t read the blog). These are a few pics and a video from the kids’ first trip to school. Cam is taking them most days- helps him get his butt out of bed.

We’re trying a new parenting method. We used to give the kids beads each time they did their chores. Beads could them be redeemed for money. However, this past week we switched to the “fear of loss” method. Each month the kids start out with a glass filled with quarters. We remove quarters when they don’t do do chores. Effectiveness is TBA. And some sad news: The other day Mike rode Claire’s bike off a ramp. Didn’t go well. Mike landed badly (on his face). He made it home but with some gaps in his memory. “What happened to me?” He had no recollection of the crash. Fran popped him in bed and he would periodically wake up and ask where he was. Poor kid. Except for the fact that he has forgotten how to stay clean he’s doing fine now.

The Scouts have a lot of fun activities like racing vegetables down a water filled ditch (this fulfills part of the “Nutrition” and “Orphan Games” merit badge requirements). Mike used an avocado (technically a fruit, but it was sanctioned by the racing coordinator). While light, the avocado boat didn’t fare well when it took in water. It’s erratic maneuvering patterns lead many to believe the captain of the small vessel was intoxicated. In the end it was a cucumber which proved the most sea worthy.

On Saturday we went out to celebrate Greg’s 27th birthday. Per Greg’s request Mom & Dad took us all to P.F. Chang’s (thank you guys!). This birthday was especially significant because we didn’t know if Greg would make it this long.

Look at all these happy people eating [what some may call] Chinese food!

Fran is trying to help the kids develop some skills in the kitchen. Each week she tries to work with at least one of them. Sometimes it can be trying though. On Sunday they all wanted to help. “How long until dinner is ready?” Cam asked. “Well, now that I have help it will be longer.” It took two hours. But you could totally taste the love.

Hughes Family: August 13th – August 19th

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I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something is amiss. There is a dearth of time these days. Maybe it’s because school restarted, maybe it’s because of a leak in space-time… hard to say. But I’ll forgo the more complex entry and do something simpler this week (and maybe I’ve gotten a little crazy… does anyone really care about fried eggplant?).

 

Fran and the kids decided to go camp in the Alpine Loop w/ Fran’s sister and some cousins. Their goal: Hike Mount Timp (well, most of it). Gabe stayed at home w/ Cam since he was too small to make the hike.

Up they went! Fran carried Chloe on her back and the kids helped carry supplies.

Fran said the hike was beautiful. They made it all the way to Emerald Lake. Mike wasn’t a very happy camper, but the promise of two Krispy Cream donuts kept him going. All told they hiked over 13 miles and even made it back alive. Not bad for kids as young six, and a mom with a baby on her back!

Double Take Vehicles. August 2012 Edition.

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Once in awhile I see some cool cars that make me a do a double take. Cars like this deserve to be memorialized in some way. In an effort to preserve some of our automotive history I have made this record.

No one really knows what the new Corvette C7 will look like. This talented group took publicly available images, artist renderings and speculation and merged them into this awesome conceptual video rendering. Not perfect (in my opinion), but ii’s on the right track. When they made the C6 they nailed it. I will be very curious to see how the C7 improves on the design (and if it actually can).

Dad of the year away probably goes to this guy. Anyone willing to trick out a Power Wheels like this is committed to a good and righteous cause. And it looks like his son is very appreciative.

My buddy pointed this truck out. It was on KSL a week or so ago (it’s not there now, which is too bad because I didn’t grab anything besides the pictures). It’s a 2003 Checy Silverado SS. It’s got less than 8,000 miles and runs the quarter in about 11 seconds (super fast for a truck). The seller said it was in showroom condition. I admit I’m tempted by a truck like this. Truck + Fast = Extra Awesome.

And finally (and most importantly) I ran across this: The Chuck Norris Corvette. Somehow I missed this growing up. If Chuck Norris drove a Corvette that says something… something incredible. My cup runneth over.

Hughes Family: August 6th – August 12th

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We’re a little bit behind with the posts. Hopefully we’ll be able to get caught up in the next couple of weeks.


Fran and the kids went to Lagoon and had a lot of fun. With the exception of Chloe the kids can go on almost every ride. Chloe still went on her fair share though.

Lagoon: The Disney Land of Utah. Rides, food and fun. They stayed until the park closed at 11:00pm.

Cam’s is working on some major car modifications (new engine, transmission, drive shaft, differential and maybe bigger turbos and upgraded fuel system). This will probably be a 3-4 week project.

The kids and Grandpa look forward to the Alpine Days parade each year.

After gaining back a good deal of weight Cam is starting his diet and exercise program again. So far so good (except that he is really grumpy).

Sometimes kids do really weird stuff…

Nothing beats the Lindon pool on a hot summer day.

Claire went to her cousin’s birthday party. Gabe stayed home with Dad and they made cookies and watched cartoons (Mike was off with his friends). [The picture from this post was lost in the blog consolidation and, alas, it cannot be found]

Francoise is still trying to make eggplant taste good (this has been an ongoing battle). As it turns out fried eggplant is actually pretty good. On Sunday the family played Richess du Monde (a French game which is similar to Monopoly). Cam thought there may have been some cheating and would like a rematch. [The picture from this post was lost in the blog consolidation and, alas, it cannot be found]

Hughes Family: July 30th – August 5th

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This was an odd week. Sort of slow, but really really stressful. All of life seemed to catch up with us at once (sort of like a mass expiration of warranties). A lot of us were sick too.  There’s not a lot of report, but we’ll post what we have.

The only activity the family really did this week was take a trip to Seven Peaks waterpark. It’s hot out here in Utah and this is a great way to cool off.

Cam decided to consolidate all his blogs into one over at CamHughes.com. He’s run a lot of blogs for a long time- I guess he deserves a break. Will he roll this blog into his blog? He doesn’t know quite yet. Any suggestions?
October 14, 2012 Udpate: He did!

Fran discovered a mobile application to help her post from her phone. FrancoiseHughes.com has a couple of new posts. Will her blogging efforts last? Here’s hoping!

Cam started dieting again. He gained back fifty pounds (“of muscle” he said) and now he’s losing it again. Look for weekly updates on his progress. Dieting and working out makes Cam grumpy- be warned!

Shocking. Solution? Shocks.

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I was zipping through the Alpine Loop and the back of my car dropped too quickly as I was coming around a corner (I might have been going a wee bit too fast). I heard a scrape and I knew what I’d done. The turbo piping on the bottom of the car is one of the lowest protruding parts and this is the second time I’ve knocked the silicons hoses off. As you can see the damage this time was fairly substantial. Not to worry- plenty of slack (I bet this will happen again…). Maybe my car simply sits too low to the ground.

Pretty soon here I’m going to add another 120+ pounds to the front (LSX block) and that won’t help. I’ve decided it’s time to upgrade the shocks. To be fair, the Z06 shocks have been great- good ride and response. But with the extra weight and power I’m planning on I need something that will get that power to the ground. And something adjustable. So, I picked up a set of PFADT’s Feather Light Single Adjustable Coilover shocks. It’s possible that with these coilovers it may free up some room to reroute the turbo pipes. Probably not with my luck…

The nice thing about these shocks (well, one of the nice things) is that it should be pretty easy to adjust the height on the car. So, I think I’ll bump it up a half inch or so.

Games I’m Playing… The Page

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I added a new page to the blog- Games I’m Playing. Ha, no… I don’t think that I’m so fascinating that you actually care what games I’m playing.  But I did think it might give people ideas if they are looking for something to pass the time (and maybe prevent people from making some mistakes).  Sometimes people ask me, “Are you planing anything fun on your iPhone?’ Now they don’t have to ask me, which I think is awesome since I really just want everyone to shut up. Plus this is a way to catalog yet more of my existence. When the historians look back on the great degenerates of American history they will want to know what iPhones games we played.

The Great Divide & Closing the Gap

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Update 9: Okay, I think I’m done. DoomCloud.com, Utah Corvette.com, UtahCamaro.com, CamOnCommerce.com and ZoobaBean.com have all been migrated, shuttered and redirected. I have decided not to close Hughes Family. I think it will be good to have another blog specifically about family things (and we may opt to make it private at some point  so it will be nice to have it separated). I guess that’s that. Let the blogging resume!

Update 8: Well… the last thing to do it shutter the other blogs. I’m having a really hard time with the idea of closing down HughesFamily.com. Maybe I will leave them separate. Two blogs would still be okay. Maybe. No… that’s how this whole mess started to begin with. I’ll just have to write Hughes Family posts in the first person instead of the second (or is it third?). It doesn’t help that I’m sick today and my mental capacity is impaired… even more than usual. Probably only one more update after this one. Wonder what I’ll do?

Update 7: Dark or Light colors for the website… Hmm…. decisions, decisions (this is the fun part kids- you grow up and do whatever you want… if you know you know what you want to do). I think I’ll stick w/ dark for now. I might actually like the lighter color scheme better, but since when have I done what I liked? Eh? Yeah? Can I get an Amen!?

Update 6: I have started the process of shuttering some of my older blogs. I disabled comments, hid some of the pages and redirected the root domain to the corresponding section of this blog. So far so good. I’m now in the process of rebuilding my links. It’s sort of sad to see how many people have stopped blogging. Links to blogs that haven’t been updated in the last few months will be omitted from the new blogroll. There’s only so much room, after all 🙂

Update 5: Overall, pretty happy with the results so far. I think I have the blog set up the way I want it (with a few minor exceptions). Now I need to decide if I pull the trigger and shut the other blogs down. I did a few redirect experiments but I’m not having much luck deciding how to set things up (and for some reason my wildcard redirects aren’t working properly- probably a server configuration issue). Decisions, decisions…

Update 4: I played around with some plugins that got me closer to where I wanted to be. Categories have different headers now (making the graphics took a bit of time). I’m also working on some custom menus so I can manage content better. My next step here is post category blurbs and info. I also wish there was a simple way to change the format of “pages.” As I get further into this I’m not even sure that I’m actually going to do it (shutter the other blogs). We’ll see, I guess.

Update 3: All the content is moved over. I’m having trouble figuring out how to consolidate all the info though. I wanted to separate it out by the original blogs, but it would need to be further subdivided by category. I can’t think of a way to do this (well, within the confines of the blog template I’d like to use). Also, as unreal as this sounds – I think there might simply be too many posts for one blog. A lot of the info is going to get lost if I can’t find a good way to sort this out.

Update 2: I have the website looking like I want (mostly) and configured the way it should be. I have successfully imported a second blog (no issues). At this point it’s just a matter of relocating content. Here I go!

Update 1: Making some good progress now. I have www.DoomCloud.com mostly moved over (posts, comments, pages, and images). I need to set up a redirect and shut the old website down now (that will feel really really sad…). Before I do that though I need to format this blog a bit and then make sure that merging in a second blog goes smoothly. Tally Ho!

Too many blogs. So, I think I’ll merge them all into one blog and put it under my name. I don’t care about traffic or rankings, really (my only fear is that I will somehow affect websites that I link to w/ all my blogs). To be honest, I’m just tired of managing five blogs, and I’d rather have them under one roof, so to speak. Let’s see if we can get this done…