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Tonight was a good one for my sons and I.  For Julie too, she got to rest a bit and went to the gym.  But for the boys and I it was great!

Max had some homework to do and was having a very difficult time getting through it.  It was a somewhat difficult assignment, and he had a mental block that was preventing him from concentrating.  It was a pretty severe ADD moment and he would avoid it at all costs, so I had to be firm with him and required him to stay on task.  He cried a lot and made excuses, but I explained how rewarding it would be for him to get through this difficult assignment and know that he’d conquered it.  He of course did get through it, it took a while and he had to go through a hard mental block to do it, but he did it and did indeed feel pretty good about himself.

Wyatt and Jake meanwhile helped me make oatmeal cookies.  They took turns adding ingredients to the bowl and stirring them up.  It was a lot of fun, and everyone got along great.  Just as the first batch of cookies came out of the oven Max finished his homework and the remains of his dinner and was thrilled to be able to eat the cookies with us.  While the cookies were baking Wyatt and Jake pulled up some bar chairs and Jake’s Lightning McQueen blanket and watched the timer count down to 0.  They even made space for their stuffed penguin.  It was very, very cute.

There were even enough cookies left over that they can now each take two cookies to school tomorrow.  Ah, good times!  I love these years with them, I never want them to end.  I am very proud of my sons and of who they are.  They’re great kids, very great.

What a weekend! It has been a fun adventure to say the least, notwithstanding the deceitful, malicious, and whiny people at the Westgate Resort in Park City Utah. I truly pity the people are conned by their lies. Well, with that introduction let me tell you about our great getaway last night.

My wife and I decided to accept an “invitation” (It wasn’t really an invitation… I called them) to the Westgate Resorts timeshare pitch in exchange for a night stay at their resort and a $50. voucher at their fancy restaurant. We heard from a friend who had gone that the resort was very cool, and they had almost bought a timeshare. What the hell, right? A free night stay and cheap dinner, and just maybe a reason to start traveling more often.

It started out really well, though the valet at the resort just pointed us to a parking garage and told us to find a spot. Yeah, high class right? So we go inside and register with the tour desk and sit down to wait. In front of us was a large room, nicely decorated with refreshments and a lot of little round tables. At each table was a tour (sales) person sitting with a couple, showing them the wonderful investment options that they could make by investing in the resort. Yeah, we expected this, it was a timeshare pitch after all though I imagined that it would be a little more professional. It reminded me immediately of a high class car dealership. So… what kind of monthly payment are you looking at, eh?

After a while we were greeted by what seemed to be a nice guy in a hawaiian tourist shirt who took us to a table and let us know very earnestly that this was a sales pitch, but not to worry – they take “NO” very graciously, no pressure – seriously. That was cool, except that he didn’t take “NO” very graciously at all. I hadn’t been to a timeshare presentation before, so I sat through his entire speech and let him show us around the resort. I guess since he’d put in so much time with us he figured that he had himself a sale, and after about an hour and a half discussing all of the features, prices, and options we had I decided that I wasn’t prepared to make a decision on the spot.

I have to tell you that I love to do this to sales people. I will never, NEVER buy anything that costs more than twenty bucks or so on the spot, and I will absolutely NEVER buy ANYTHING if the sales tactic is “now or never”. I’ll drag it out and waste their time, but I’ll never commit. I guess its my way of helping out the little guy… the unsuspecting other people who may be taken in by his con, but couldn’t because he was with me. That, and he gets no sale.

Well, after all the time he’d spent with us he finally realized that I wasn’t going to buy and he became extremely beligerent. He even started insulting me which I found quite amusing. I think my amusement made him even more upset. The breaking point for my wife though was when he insulted our friends who were at the same presentation. My wife went midieval on his ass and made quite the scene. It embarassed the hell out of him and he quickly left when all of the other potential suckers that were waiting in line started looking at him with their “what an ass” faces.

Unfortunately that wasn’t the last con we had to put up with. We went to collect on the promise they had made of a free night at the resort, but were met with a cold and indifferent “We are all booked”. What I saw next was a brilliant display of feminine power as my wife’s friend browbeat the hell out of these people until we finally had two rooms at the Best Western, and a $100 voucher for each of us at their fancy restaurant. Not the nicest hotel, but it was UEA weekend. Heh, it was awesome. We had an incredible dinner on them, and left the waiter (who was very cool to us) with a very, very nice tip – also on them.

Yeah Westgate, we’ll be seeing you again I hope. That pepper encrusted tenderloin is calling my name, and I would really like the chance to stick it in your ass again. Happy trails!

I’ve been considering a switch to Vonage from our current phone service with Qwest. One thing I like about Vonage is that the complete package is included and there are no hidden fees. I currently pay around $90. per month for Qwest which includes local, long distance, and DSL 1.5 Mb. I pay another $19. per month to Xmission for their ISP service, and $13. per month to Comcast for basic cable. Total current payments are around $122. per month.

Vonage offers all-in-one phone service for $25. per month. I can get broadband via Comcast for about $45. per month, but have to have their digital cable that costs approx. $35. per month as a prerequisite. Total projected payments would be around $105. per month.

Is it worth it for twenty bucks? If I could eliminate the need for digital cable it would be much easier to decide. All in all though, twenty bucks per month adds up to $240. per year. That’s about a quarter of our Christmas budget… not bad.

This past Saturday morning I took my oldest son Max to a karate tournament in Salt Lake City. It was a nationals competition and there were a lot of people there, which is why it was unfortunate that they decided to host the competition in the Marriot hotel ballroom. I felt like a rat trying to squeeze through the hoardes of other people with my son sitting on my shoulders…

Max was in three different competitions, and he did pretty well in two of them, but in the third – the flag sparring – he got first place for his age group! Man I was so proud, cheering and screaming I got so excited I fell of the chair I was standing on. It was a little embarrassing, I ended up with a couple of good bruises, but I got up and kept filming. He seemed pretty happy about it. The only downside to it all was that we had to wait around for another hour and a half for the grand championship flag-sparring match that he qualified for. During the wait we went down to get him photographed, and to pick up his trophy. He decided to do the Kung-Fu pose for the camera.

The grand championship finally came and Max was first up. Right away after the start he snagged the flag of the other kid and held it up. The next round the other kid got his flag and it was tied. Then it got fun. The third round the two of them just kept jumping and circling around for what seemed forever before the other kid fell down, and Max swooped in to snag the kid’s other flag. Everyone in the crowd was cheering, but the other kid just stood there crying – loud. I felt bad for him, but I was more excited for Max. I guess the judges felt bad too, because they discussed it for a while, then put the flag back on the kids belt and said something about not being a ground fight… whatever man, the kid fell down. Anyway Max lost after that, the other kid was pretty lucky. Max handled it like a champ, it didn’t even phase him. I think just being surrounded by all those people and competing in a grand championship match were enough to satisfy him, although I think he would have been satisfied with a participation medal without winning anything. He’s a very good sport.

When we got home Julie had bought a cake and put up a banner for him. He loved that, especially since the cake had The Incredibles on it. Man do I have the best family in the world!