And there that goes... Part 2

Once upon a time 1 or 2 summers ago I was out working with my dad.  He had me at the time nailing some 1 inch boards onto some stickers (Scrap pieces of wood that you nail wood onto and separate wood with.  Not the pretty pieces of paper that stick onto things.)  At the time the wood was about three feet high just high enough for me to put my left foot onto the boards to keep them from moving while I nailed.  At least that was the plan.  At the apex of my left leg lift I simultaneously heard a RIP, felt the release of tension on my backside, and felt the beginnings of a nice healthy breeze round my underpants.

Panicked I looked around checked to see if anyone was openly mocking then cautiously felt the large tear in my pants.  Unfortunately for my coworkers and myself this was like at 10:30, six and a half hours from quitting time at 5.

Nobody said anything to me about my incident the rest of the day, so either they were to embarrassed for my sake or they just didn't notice.  Needless to say I'm hoping that it was the latter option.  I do have high hopes though because at the lunch hour I showed my dad and asked how visible it was.  He said it wan't very noticeable but he may or may not have been lying to give me a false sense of security.  I hope he wasn't.  (Note: This is not the same pair of pants that was ripped in the previous post.)

And there that goes...

One Saturday long ago my family agreed to chop down a tree for my neighbor.  Coincidentally the missionaries also happened to be over at her house doing their own little service project.     

Because of the crowded environment and the desire of avoiding power lines, fences and houses it was necessary to tie a guide rope in the upper part of the tree to help direct it’s fall.  Because I am truly a kid at heart I volunteered to shimmy up that tree and attach the rope.  So I climbed up, secured myself in the branches, tied the rope on and slid down the rope to safety.

Almost thirty minutes later, after the missionaries left, when we were still cleaning up the branches my mom suddenly said “Freddy you have a hole in your pants!”  I thought “Silly mom you already patched a hole in these pants.” but said “Really? Where?”  Lo and behold it was also in the region of my gluteus maximus! Poor missionaries, after seeing my striped underpants for nigh on twenty minutes (I probably ripped them climbing up the tree) they were so intimidated/embarrassed/Idon’tknowwhat that they left.  On top of that, they weren’t even that friendly. (I told my mom to blame my accident.  She wasn’t happy.  She then saw them later at DI and came home saying how they were much nicer and how she was much more impressed.  I decided not to gloat publically to her face.  Probably a smart idea…)

The Loose Cannon

After doing a service project and procuring a mattress to take to the dump, we decided to ride it down the runoff swollen creek in our backyard before we took it to the dump. After getting all dressed up (or down) and putting on our too small life jackets (safety first...) we were ready (ill-prepared) to ride our boat, The Loose Cannon down our creek.

Yeah, we were pretty much legit.

Our first plan was to take it up to the end of the block and ride it down to our house. My dad told us that our mattress would not float and convinced us to start at our neighbor’s house as a trial run.

I thought my brother was right behind me.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t.

At our bridge he rejoined me to help bring the mattress home.

It didn’t quite work out.

We chased it down to the local park where we tried to corral it.

Unfortunately it ended up taking me out. Again.

Once it started going into unfamiliar residential areas we gave up.

My dad even joined in on the chase! We think that he’s ashamed to be seen with us.

After we went home we got into our minivan and checked out all the bridges the creek went under. We never found the mattress so we assume that it is floating happily down the Box Elder Creek to the Bear River and then to the Great Salt Lake!

Unfortunately our dad’s prophecy that it would sink was not fulfilled and it 
obviously worked way too well.  
As evidenced by the yellow line (bottom to top) we chased it across two roads 
through a park and past several bewildered bystanders for .4 miles.

(shout out to Emily for the photos and video)