The New Ride(s)

Our car broke down - Boo!

We went to Indy to buy a new car - Yay!

A guy in my hometown buys cars at dealer auctions for rather low prices and then simply charges a small fee for himself. I had been talking to the guy for a while. One day he called to tell me he was at a auction and they were just about to bid on the exact car I was looking for - did he want me to buy it and for how much. I said "oh yeah" told him my highest price, and in an hour I got a call telling me the car was mine!

Meet ... well we haven't been able to decide on a name ... our new 2012 5-door Ford Focus! YAY!

We've also been looking for another new ride of late. It's cheaper than the car but was a bit of a difficult find.

But finally it all worked out ...

Beautiful, isn't she?

Photoshop is for Sissies

Can't believe I haven't posted this yet... oops! Actually, I have QUITE a few on the back burner. Get ready for some blog-tastic madness!

We took a little trip to Indiana to see Mandy before she went back to Utah and our Aunt and Uncle who were in town for the weekend.

Last time we went to Indy we taught Mandy's friend Jake how to plank. This time, we jumped.

Aw yes, the classic jumping picture. Mandy and Jake, being jpv's (that's jumping picture virgins), needed to be taught the art of the aerial photo shoot.

Let the jumping ensue!!!!!

We began our tutelage with a few horizontal shots, just for fun. Not typical, but still interesting none the less.

But after realizing the front yard had minimal acrobatic resources, we found a place more equipped for our needs - Memorial Park!

We took a few minutes to test the equipment, but then got back to what was really important - THE JUMPING!

And we jumped off everything ...

And just for good measure, because they make me laugh ...

Blueberry Picking

In the town of Dexter near where we live there is an amazing you-pick blueberry field. You pay by the pound for as many blueberries as your little fingers can pick.

For some reason, this years blueberry crop was AMAZING! So many berries. You could spend hours picking one bush. Best part is, you can eat while you pick. We might have gotten a little carried away on the munching.

James and I went a few times this year, especially when they started giving them away for free. All in all, we probably picked over 20 pounds of blueberries!

Ecuador 2012

Its been a crazy summer. I spent about 3 weeks in Ecuador during July, mostly mapping roads. What does that have to do with public health, you ask? Its a long story. We work in some pretty isolated communities, where good roads are few and far between. A lot of the villages are only accessible by river. So my task this summer was to map the roads in the area, and comment on the quality, etc.

Here is in an interactive map (thanks to ArcGIS online!), that shows where I was. The dots are the villages where we work, and the lines are the roads that I mapped.

View Larger Map

I asked about when roads were built, and when the surface changes (for example, from dirt to gravel). So I was able to create a time lapse of roads being built and changed over the past 60 or so years.

Enough with the boring stuff...

I spent a lot of time in a pickup truck, wandering down dirt roads that seemingly lead to nowhere...

some that led to mud...

   

Others led to beautiful rivers...

or quaint little towns.

All in all, it was a great summer, except for the toilets.