2008 August: Bates

August: Bermuda Triangle of Weirdness.

Where to start. I guess I'll start with the Normal stuff.

Orianna has been growing great (I know, I need to post all my new photos... I will get to it soon). She is a very happy baby that loves to laugh and she is very smart. Every time she figures something out you can see it in her eyes. She just recently realized that she can affect other objects when she touches them. So she has been hitting her toys, and pulling blankets, and laughs her head off that she can move things. But, she does get very angry at all the things that are out of reach.

Tamara and I have been fixing up our house. We painted the living room and have started to paint the kitchen (but we still have many holes in the ceiling to patch first).

Ok, now for the weird stuff.

So, as many of you know, Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT) was planning to build a road on top of our home. Our city council fought it, and the decision was postponed until 2010 or 2011 (depending on when they complete the 1st 2 phases of their "master plan"). All of our neighbors received constant letters from UDOT informing them of what was going on (since August of last year). We never received a single letter. Then (quite suddenly) all of our neighbors sold their houses to UDOT (literally, all our neighbors. Our closest neighbor is now 4 houses away). We still hadn't heard from UDOT.

Well, the other day I was doing dishes and looked out the window at a man taking pictures of my house. I went to the window and stared at him as if to say, "Are you really on my property taking pictures of my house?" He seemed shocked that there was someone in the house, so he came to the door, knocked, and in essence asked, "Why are you squatting in a UDOT-owned house?" He said that UDOT owned all the houses on this street up to a certain house.

I informed him that we owned the house, UDOT had never contacted us, and that we were a little miffed at the whole situation. While telling him to tell his superiors to contact us, I looked over his shoulder at his documents. Our house doesn't exist on his map. They skipped right over it. Wow... that's quite the oversight. I can just see them wheeling in the demolition-mobile into our front lawn, not realizing that they don't own it!

Anywho... that was weird.

Then, the other night at about 10 PM someone knocked on the door. I threw on a robe, answered it, and was confronted with a young man (probably 20) who wanted me to give him my car because he needs one to help his roommate go to the hospital frequently for dialysis. He was quite coherent. He wasn't intoxicated. He just thought he could swindle someone without being a very good liar. He wouldn't take "no" for an answer. I offered him rides, etc... Eventually I just had to tell him that I was convinced that he was lying and listed the reasons why. I wished him better luck on his next attempt, and bid him good-night.

There were some other weird things this month, but I can't remember them right now.

So, till next month: Cheers,
Rob & Tamara & Orianna