Real Winter Storm Blasts Southern California

Friday, December 19th 2008--

This week we were hit by an actual winter storm. After this weeks rain, we accrued almost three inches of rain and had some of the coldest temperatures in a while. When I woke up Thursday morning and looked out the window, I was amazed at how much snow had fallen on our local Santa Ana Mountains. Usually the snow melts quickly or the Mountain is covered by clouds, but not today. Saddleback Mountain was blanketed with a layer of snow. So much so, that I went out and snapped a few shots. Most of the time, when snow falls on Saddleback, it's gone in a day or so. But the temperatures here are still really cold...at least for Southern California standards. The last few nights low temperatures were in the upper 30's and the temperatures during the day struggled to get out of the 40's. Not only is it really cold for us, but we also got some much need rain. So far this '08 season, we've received 4.66 inches of rain. All last year we received 11.12 inches of rain. Currently we are 1.67 inches ahead of last year at the same time. And we are expecting more next week.

This last shot I took looking out our window facing north. It over-looks Redrock Canyon in the foreground, and the Santa Ana Mountains in the background.

Have a blessed and Happy Holiday Season!

Our Dog Amber (Born July 9th 2008)

On September 5th, 2008 our dog's foster mom brought Amber to our house for a house check. Amber is now 9 weeks old and loves to get into things. When we first got her home, we let her have the run of the house. That quickly ended when Amber left her deposits in every room possible. We decided to only let her have use of the family room, so we could keep an eye on her. Since she was so small, she could easily get under the baby gate. She even made it through some of the vertical slats. (Please hurry up and get bigger!) I put some cardboard up so she couldn't get through...but the little devil made it out anyway. I think we've finally got it so she can't really get out.

It's been some time since we've done potty training with a dog. Pups at this age just love to pee and poop everywhere. We've been told by just about everybody that crate training is the only way to go. Instinctively, they won't potty in their den/crate. I didn't like the idea at first, but now I'm glad we did it. The first night was probably the hardest. Amber missed her brothers and sisters and this was a whole new place to get used to. She cried for a while, but when the light went out, she went down and fell right asleep. I think we got up 6 times that night. Since the second night, (knock on wood) she hasn't had an accident in her den. But I've been getting up with her 2-4 times a night to take her potty. She still will have an accident in the family room, if we lose track of time, but I think she's starting to get it.

During part of the day, she will sleep behind the small of my back in my chair. (I wonder how long that will last??) Every couple of hours I take a break and go outside to get a little exercise. By the end of the day, she's tired of sleeping and starts getting into trouble. What ever wires or things she can chew on she will. She has plenty of toys, but the good stuff is connected to computers.

Other than being a little tired from getting up during the night, she's a blast to have around. She and the boys just love playing with each other. Be sure to scroll down a few posts to see what she looked like at 5 weeks old. Anyway, that's enough for now, I hope you enjoyed the pics.

Mini Vacation to Laramie, Wyoming

It was time to show the boys our 40 acres in Laramie, Wyoming. They've been asking about it for so long. We got into Denver, rented a car, and headed off to Laramie. We got in about 9p local time. We had been traveling all day, so we all hit the hay. That morning we got breakfast and headed off to see our ranch. Yes, right now, it's just wide open ranch land, but someday we plan to build on it. We jumped in our rented jeep and journeyed the 20 minutes to the property. The boys loved running around checking everything out. We spent a few hours there, before our planned meeting with one of my storm chasing partners (Paul) and his girl friend. Paul wanted to see the land, so he followed me to our destination. After the ranch, Paul promised the boys he would take them fishing.

We grabbed his equipment and went fishing along the Laramie river that runs right through town. This was the boys first try at fishing. I thought they would be bored after the first hour. But, they couldn't get enough. Zack caught his first fish that day. I had to pull the plug on our fishing expedition about 4 hours later. They just couldn't get enough fishing. Paul thinks they have fishing in their blood. The next morning was a busy one. After breakfast, we visited the beautiful University Of Wyoming campus. It was truly a site to see. We had planned to go fishing again with Paul before he left. Once again, we met up at the river and fished for while. Zack caught 2 more fish(rainbow and brown trout.) They were not big enough to keep, but they really enjoyed the excitement. Since we didn't have any sun lotion, and it was almost mid-day, we decided to get out of the sun. We said good bye to Paul and got in the car headed on long driving loop around the County. We headed up to the ski resort area of Centennial. Before reaching Centennial, we stopped at one of the Overland Trail Markers. These markers help settlers get across the plains before the Trans Continental Railroad was built. This was some of the prettiest areas I have seen. Once in the mountains, there were plenty of rivers and lakes to fish in. We fished for about 15 minutes at two lakes at 12,000 feet of elevation. The wind was blowing and it was pretty cold. We tried our luck at some more fishing for a while, but then decided to move on to the rest of our adventure. We headed down the other side of the mountain towards Saratoga, where they have the natural hot springs. We witnesses a lot of the Wyoming countryside, which as you can imagine was green, open and very hilly. We all really wanted to see the dinosaur museum at Como Bluffs. Como Bluffs is a National site that claims to have one of the largest dinosaur grave yards in the world. It also has a house made out of dinosaur bones. (Believe it or not) When we got out there, 1.5 hours later, we found the site to be closed and for sale. We looked around the property for a while, but nothing was open and not a whole lot to see. At least we got to see the house of bones. We headed back home. On the way we stopped at a old town called Bosler. It's a town mostly deserted with old houses that somehow stay standing in the big Laramie winds. When we got back into town we decided to head back to the ranch. The boys spent the next 3 or 4 hours having a blast on the ranch. There are thousands of different types rocks to sift though. We continued to build the Mowers large rock formation. (Top picture) The boys built their own rock formations. We played around the ranch until sunset. What a day! The next day we had to start heading back to Denver. On the way back we stopped and saw the Ames Monument. These two brothers were instrumental in creating and building the Trans Continental Railroad. Right across the road from the Ames Monument was the highlight of our day, Vedauwoo National Park. This is a beautiful camp ground with hiking trails and huge rock formations. We spent about 3 or 4 hours hiking through the trails and bouldering on some huge rocks. The trail eventually led us to a large pond covered with green reeds, tall pine trees and tall grass. We travelled on, looking at all the beautiful sites for a while, but then had to turn back. Some of these rock formations were 80-100 feet tall. Some even taller. We had a lot of fun on our hike, but now it was time for our journey home. We got back to Denver with out any problems. We all had a fun trip.

To see my photo show, please click on the following link: http://www.dotphoto.com/Go.asp?l=jackmowers&P=&SID=225068&Show=Y Or you can go to my "My Picture Shows" on the top right of this blog, and click on "Laramie, Wyoming Mini-Trip."


Check out a couple video clips:

Vedauwoo:

Lot 87: Wild Horse Ranch

Santiago Peak Hike

August 16th, 2008--Zack and I got on the trail to the top of Saddleback Mountain at 8am. A few months back Zack, Trent, and I made it to the upper Holy Jim Trail head. At the time, Zack wanted to summit. I told him, we didn't have enough food or water. He continued to ask about the peak, so we planned a bid for the top. We brought along enough energy bars and energy gels for a bid and half. The problem, for me, was the all important fluid. We each brought a water pack full of water and couple extra large bottles. I was also bringing along a back pack for all the food and extra water. With everything we were taking, the packs were very heavy, especially for Zack. Although the Holy Jim trail is very beautiful, I would have preferred the Maple Springs trail up Silverado Canyon, but it's still closed due to October 2007 fires. I also, would have preferred to get on the trail earlier, but since I knew we would be hiking pretty slowly, we would be hiking during the heat day anyway. It took us about 3 hours to arrive at the upper Holy Jim trail head on the main divide. We took a little break and then we're off up the main divide. This trail, up the Main Divide, is a wide fire road climbing steeply in places. While hiking up, we occasionally benefit from the forest canopy. As we were hiking in the heat of the day, we would often take short breaks in the shade of the mountain. Often we would benefit from cool pockets of air that felt wonderful against our sweating t-shirts. At time I felt my steps becoming shorter and more difficult. This was mostly due to the steep grade and the thinning air. As we started to head over the mountain, we could see over into the Corona area. We could see Lake Matthews and good part of the Inland Empire. It wasn't a totally clear day, but we could make out a lot of land marks like the 15 freeway. It seemed as though we had our second wind by now. The repeaters on the top of the mountain were close now. The air was much cooler now. Finally, we rounded what ended up being the last switch back. Somehow out of the corner of my eye, I spotted something in the road moving. I looked up and saw a snake. In fact, it was a rattlesnake dragging it's lunch to it's lair. As we walked by, giving it a wide berth, the snake looked at us just to be sure we were not interested in it's meal. That was cool to see. Another 300 yards and we were at the top. It was just like I remembered. It took me a second to get my bearing and I took Zack over to the point over-looking Orange County and I snapped a few photos. We took a break in some shade under one of the repeater towers. We filled up the last of our water, and we were off down the mountain. It had taken us 5 hours to reach Santiago Peak, so we wanted to get moving. We blazed down the mountain, but our quads were screaming with each pounding step down the mountain. We reached the upper Holy Jim Trail head in little more than an hour. Now down Holy Jim trail to the car. By this time, this 43 year old Dad was having difficulty keeping up with 8 year old. We were both really tired, but it seemed like he could have climbed the whole thing again. Finally, we got to the trail head and back to the car. It took us 5 hours to get up, 3 hours down, and almost 1 hour at the top. Now the dirt road back to the paved road. Before we even got to the paved road Zack was asleep. I guess he was tired after all. We made the successful summit of Santiago Peak. Now it's time for this old man to recover.

Our Reserved Adopted Puppy

Well, we finally decided to start looking for a puppy. This time I did a lot of online research and found a couple of shelters that had puppies. The shelter we decided on is called the Friends of Orange County's Homeless Pets. In the beginning, I was looking at a couple of pups, but they were quickly adopted out. The person in charge informed me that she just got a momma in with 5 pups. The only problem was they were only 2 weeks old. She said at 5 weeks, we could come take a look and put in a reservation on one that we liked. So yesterday we went over to see the pups. The fostered pups were conveniently housed a stones throw from my Mom's house in Tustin. When we walked in the back yard, 5 of the smallest little puppies you've ever seen came to greet us. I don't ever remember seeing pups so young. You can imagine how hard it was, at 5 weeks, to try and decide on one. They were all so cute. The Momma is an American Staffordshire Terrier, and we don't know what the dad was. The great thing about this foster home is that both humans are animal control officers, so they have a lot of experience working with animals and especially dogs. They have a young child and they have adopted other American Staffordshire Terriers. The benefit of this is the puppies are socialized with other dogs and children. This breed is already great with children, families, and other dogs...as long as you bring them up right. Here is a link to the breed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Staffordshire_Terrier Anyway, the foster home is going to deliver our pup in about 3 weeks. She will have most all of her shots, spayed, and microchiped. We don't have a name yet, but we are working on that. We are all really excited!

Cabo Azul--Cabo, Mexico--2008

If you are interested in renting this spot, please see my email at bottom of this post:

We just got back from Cabo. Once we got out of the airport "time share" adventure, our vacation was a blast. We stayed just north of Cabo San Lucas in the town of Cabo Del San Jose. San Jose is a little more quaint than San Lucas, however, both towns are definitely worth seeing. The resort we were staying at was beautiful. Five star with all the amenities...however it wasn't as family friendly as I would have liked. For example, out by the pool, was a lot of polished limestone or travertine. It looked beautiful, but Matt had a couple of falls. I even saw a few adults slip on these areas. The inside was beautiful too. However, the all white couch's and polished travertine was not the most family friendly. Anyway, it was a beautiful room.

We spent most of our time at the pool, however we took a couple of day trips. We rented a car and traveled north on a small two lane highway through the desert to a small town called Buena Vista. Here there were no waves, so the kids had a blast swimming with the fish. We thought we'd get some lunch since it was a little after 11:30. Since this is a fishing village, lunch is not served until after 1:30 and you needed a reservation. It seemed strange at the time since there was not a sole on the beach or at the resort. Any we decided to move on to our second destination...Cabo Pulmo. Pulmo is South of Buena Vista. There are not a whole lot of signs in this area, so you have to go on your instinct, what you can translate from the locals, and your map. We ended up heading down a single lane dirt road...it probably would have got us there...but it didn't feel right.

We ended up backing tracking and getting on another road. Everything seemed right until we ran into another dirt road. This one was a two way road and there were some cars coming the other way. We figured we must be on the right track??? However, there were no signs, so we still didn't know if we were even heading in the right direction...finally we arrived some 10-15 miles later. Pulmo was worth it though. It was a National Marine Reserve that had all the views you would expect from this beautiful untouched area. It probably looked just like it did 100's of years ago.

We also took some shorter trips into San Jose (above) where we had great food and great sunsets. This was taken from Shooter's overlooking the town. This was a great place to get some good Mexican food as well as some kid friendly hamburgers.

We also took a water taxi from Cabo San Lucas out to see the famous arch and Lover's Beach. We stayed at the beach and had a blast. While the boys were playing in the small surf, and Stef was watching Matt, I swam around a small point to small cave. It was fun to see the cave up close. At least I got a little exercise.

If interested in renting for a week, please contact me by email: jackmowers@hotmail.com

Anyway, it's back to real life...talk to you soon. Jack

Laker Finals Game 4

Thursday, June 12, 2008 my friend Marc Harris calls and says..."let's go to the Laker game tonight." How much are tickets, and where are we sitting I ask. He informed me that this is a tough market to buy tickets due to the nature of the game. If the Laker's win, the series will be tied 2-2. If not, the Laker's will be down 3-1. He told me the tickets are too expensive right now, but we should be able to do better at the Staples Center. So he picked me up at 3:30 pm and we headed to Staples. A couple hours later we found ourselves in compeititon with 1000 other Laker fans looking for tickets. They were sold out every where. The scalpers didn't even have any tickets. We were getting desperate. We went into a ticket broker next to Staples...none...all sold out. We couldn't even get in the door. We kept asking everybody...and there were no tickets anywhere. By this time the game had already started. Luckily, the Lakers' were winning. I was watching the score on my BlackBerry. Marc wasn't listening to my updates. He was just focusing on our situation. Did we drive all the way to LA for no reason?? We thought we would try one ticket broker next to Staples. We walked in and of course, we heard the same response. "no tickets." As we were about to leave, thinking we had lost, we saw a man walk in with 4 tickets. He was selling them on consignment to the broker. Luckily, Marc saw this and went right up to the counter. The person behind the counter and Marc were talking and then I saw Marc handing over our money so I knew something good was happening. He said we're in the door for $500 each. We were very lucky. This is the first time I been on an adventure like this, but not Marc...he's done this before. The tickets were in a suite...which at least gives us a good starting point. From the very start, Marc said we would find better seats. He always finds his way down to better seats. Something, that I'm not very comfortable with nor know how to do. He told me not to make any eye contact, follow him, and look like you know what you are doing. After a quick pit stop, we check in on the game. We went into the first tunnel and snapped a couple pictures. The first quarter was half way over and the Lakers were up over 10 points. This was a very good sign. We hopped on the VIP elevator to head up to our third level suite. The door opened at the first level (not our floor) and Marc jumped off at the last second. I quickly followed. We walked around restaurant and found another tunnel down to some pretty good seats. Of course the usher stopped Marc as he tried to talk her into letting us sit for a while. She didn't say no and Marc didn't wait for answer, he just sat down in an open seat. We were sitting in some pretty good seats in the lower bowl level 2. We watched the game for about the rest of the quarter. Then I looked up and saw the usher. She was signaling us out. Marc said, "you didn't make eye contact did you?" My bad...Marc said don't worry, we'll find some better seats. We moved closer to midcourt and made our way down to the Premier Seats. The usher stopped us, but said we couldn't go down until the action went the other way. As soon as the possession changed, we headed down. We found two open seats, with the menu's for the waitress service which was still rolled up in the beverage holder. This was a good sign. Marc reminded me that these seats were going for over $3,500 a seat late in the day. These seats would be our home for the remainder of the game. No one came to kick us out they were teriffic seats. As you know, if you are a Laker fan, (or Celtic fan) the Lakers made history this night. No, they did not win the game and tie the series, they were the first team ever to lose a 24 point lead after leading the first quarter by more than 10 points. Yes, we witnessed the biggest melt down in Finals history. The crowd was absolutely stunned. It was so quite leaving Stapes, all you could hear were the cheers of Celtic fans and the grumbles of Laker fans. No team in Finals history has ever come back from a 3-1 deficit. Kobe and Phil say it's not over...today we will see what the Lakers are made of. Will they fold for summer vacation, or rise like champions...??? I can only give the Laker's one small bit of advise..."Never Give Up" Take it one game at a time and keep surviving. You never know what might happen...look at what Marc and I did on our adventure. Our backs were up agaist the wall, we had no tickets and really no way of getting any. But somehow, we got in to the game. Some how the Lakers must find a way to win three in a row and two of them in Boston!

Video: Kobe to the Rack

ME: