Chris Millard's World

Here is Caroline Grace Taylor.

Caroline is Uncle Mac and Aunt Alice's granddaughter, born to Jami and Jon Taylor. Welcome to our family, little one!

I like to go to the pedicure shop. The lady there is from Vietnam and I love to talk with her. Here she is doing her thing.

She has the cutest little 2 year old (will be 2 in 6 weeks) who comes to work with her. The funniest thing is that now the baby insists on being a pedicure lady too. It is hilarious.

If we thought about this long enough we would have to say there is something against the law here.

Here are the 5 Hoferitza girls: Rachel, Clara, Megan, Emily and Abby.

Abby

Rachel

The 4 Millard Children: This is the best we could do with Reed. He decided that this was a screaming day.

Max and Connor Millard

Did you know that in infected root canal can kill you? I learned this in 2001 during one week in the hospital, where I had some gruesome surgery where I lost some jaw bone and teeth, and suffered an infection that spread into my head and came to understand that it would have killed me except for Dr. Todd L. See why I like him so much? Nine dental implants later, he and I are BFF. At his house he has a huge garage full of every tool imaginable. He loves tools. So, when I decided to put Grandpa's radial arm saw up for adoption, Dr. Todd really wanted the thing. Go figure. It's part of my crusade to dejunk the house (Grandpa isn't even fighting this anymore). We hauled it to his house and he was tickled to have it. Somewhere we heard that he goes to Mexico and builds houses for poor people and takes tools and leaves them there. I don't know what he is thinking. Frankly, I think someone with such talented hands should not go around saws--ever. If he cuts off a finger, that's fine for him, but what about me? I'm ready for dental implant number 10 and how can an oral surgeon missing fingers do the job? Here he is being goofy.

Notice the missing fingers. Very funny, Todd! Eight years later he is still doing implants and bone grafts for me. In about 5 more years I'll be all fixed up! Unless, of course, he chops off his hands.

The Daily Universe.

I constantly remind my students not to rely on the spell check function or grammar check as the final word. Here would be a good reason. The article says that the Daily Universe sees no humor here, but I think it is hilarious.

Here are the cousins around the cake. We are missing Emily who is at basic training.

Had to have a little help blowing out the candle.

Jillian and Reed

Jeff and Sophie

We now have to keep our eye on Max who wants to open the door and get away! He would be down the street in one minute.

1. Rick (preferably having him in America).
2. My Nikon camera.
3. Taking pictures with my Nikon camera, the Sony Cybershot, or in a pinch, my cell phone).
4. Blogging.
5. Breakfast Club (they know who they are).
6. Going to work in the morning.
7. Seeing the grandchildren.
8. Amended: my beautiful, spectacular, 3 children who gave me the 11 grandchildren (there--how's that?}.
9. Getting on a plane.
10. The first day of the semester.
11. The last day of the semester.
12. Cemeteries.
13. Reading a good book.
14. Nieces and nephews and their babies.
15. Going on a cruise (haven’t done this in a long time).
16. Rice pudding.
17. M.V.
18. Shoes.
19. Traveling with Joan.
20. All things purple.
21. John Milton.
22. Scrubbed floors.
23. Taking junk to the dump (this is very cathartic).
24. Everything Chinese (love China, love my adopted Chinese daughters).
25. Dr. Todd Liston for saving my life (I owe every day with my grandbabies to him).
26. My jewelry (good stuff and the junk).
27. Time with my few good friends.
28. Cleaning out closets.
29. New babies (anybody’s babies).
30. Movies in the theater room at John or Mac’s house.
31. Diet Dr. Pepper with Krispy Krème donuts (I know—something is inconsistent here).
32. When someone says something absurdly foolish in Church.
33. Coconut Pineapple ice cream in Maui (at a particular ice cream shop).
34. Lean Cuisines.
35. All my sisters-in-law.
36. Desperate Housewives.
37. My Toyota 4-Runner (ok, I hated to get rid of the van but the Toyota has grown on me).
38. Pedicures.
39. Anything with little buttons and lights (i.e. my iPhone, iPod, and iTouch—yes, it is greedy to have all 3 but I don’t care).
40. KSL Classifieds (I have gotten rid of lots of junk and furniture here).
41. Clean sheets.
42. Coldwater Creek.
43. Scrapbooking (I might go back to it someday).
44. Warm weather (75 degrees).
45. Fresh tomatoes—right off the vine.
46. Crocheting.
47. Getting up at quarter to 6 in the morning (instead of 4:30 am).
48. Miguel who does everything for me that Rick won’t do.
49. Frozen custard.
50. The size of my family room—it is huge (Rick built this for me with his own two hands).

Amber and Cami from Senator Bennett's office came to visit Weber State University and see what we are doing in the College of Health Professions.

Cami and Amber

Senator Bennett has done so much for Weber, especially the College of Health Professions and the nursing program. We visited the SIM lab and saw students training to take care of a computerized baby. It was awesome.

Then we saw the lab where all the SIM people were in hospital beds. There is a device to move people who are unable to move themselves. It is sort of like a sling that goes under the person on the bed and hooks to a bar and track system in the ceiling. The sling can move down the hall to different therapy rooms. A generous donor (with a daughter who is a Weber grad) made this system possible for us.

Spencer demonstrated how it works.

It is sort of like a ride at Lagoon. Notice Brad and I did not volunteer for this demonstration. Now I'm sorry!

We just can't seem to get spring in Utah. Yesterday was a record-breaking low temperature for April 15th. I'm weary of this.

Click Here: Susan Boyle Rocks!

Apparently, she spent the last 10 years caring for an aged mother, who had encouraged her to try out for the talent show. The mother passed away before seeing Susan make her dream come true. She never got up the courage until now.

When she comes out on stage, she looks like a little, frumpy, old lady. Then, she begins to sing and it is magnificent. Click on the link and listen to this amazing talent. I'm in line to buy her first CD!

She says she's never been kissed. Bet that's about to change in the future.

I snagged this from Kristin's Facebook page.

Jillian, Sophie, Reed, Ellie

I don't know about Kristin's side, but on Rick's ancestry there are many from Norway and I'm wondering if that light coloring comes from those genes. I don't see a lot of blondies in my genealogy. As a baby, Jeff always had that white-blond hair. When we lived in Africa, the Africans begged me to let them touch it. :)

We had dinner at the Country Club tonight. Kathy and I have given up cooking under any circumstances. It is just one of the things we have given up. There are more. Anyway, it was an opportunity for me to meet Colleen's very cute new boyfriend, Nick.

And here is the thing I noticed the most: how incredibly happy our little Colleen seemed! This is the old Colleen that we haven't seen for a few years. She is fairly bubbling and I'm thrilled to see her so happy now.

They have a lot in common since they are both lawyers. They talk lots about lawyer stuff like plaintiffs and defendants and we just agree and act like we get it. There was another lawyer at the next table who heard us, and just couldn't help himself, and he had to come tell us that 4 hours ago he got a judgment of $3.2 million, and lawyers just feast on that stuff. He introduced himself and I forget his first name because I liked his last name so much: Wiener. That would be Mr. Wiener, Esq., who got a huge award when he didn't settle for a paltry offer. He invited Nick and Colleen to some lawyer bash on Friday where there would be a beer truck in the parking lot. This means that there will be, oh I don't know, hundreds of drunken lawyers. Kathy is going to show up and take a picture of the little BYU girl in this scene. It should be good. Kathy and I were fascinated with the idea of a beer truck. He said it was a big truck like a keg with a spigot on the side. We have never seen this. Apparently we haven't been going to the right parties, and maybe that's because we aren't invited since we go to bed at 9:00 now. Never mind all of that.

Nick is President of "Young Lawyers" (I hope I have this straight). I think that means he is going places. As long as he makes Colleen happy, I'm happy.

On the way out the door John gave the newly rich Mr. Wiener Esq. one of his business cards in case they can do business someday. You gotta love it.

John found an old picture of our father. He is holding me and I look to be about 7 months old. This is one of the very few photos of him that exist.

He was born on Nov. 9, 1913, and this would have been taken in late 1947, making him 34 years old.

I have the original and I'm taking it to Inkley's to get some copies made. If any members of our extended family would like a copy, just let me know.

In 1998 I published a short list of hints for proposal writing at Utah State University as I worked with professors who were writing for federal grants (in my former life at USU). This was part of a big workshop that I repeated endlessly. To my surprise, this still lives on their website! Check it out here. Cruising through the text, I am amazed at how much of this is still relevant! The important thing is to follow the instructions. I think I will point out some of this to my English 2010 students who are struggling with their research papers now that it is the end of the semester. They find it difficult to follow the rules and that is half the battle. If the MLA Nazis say it has to look like this, then it has to look like this. If the federal government says you can only write 20 pages, then it is only 20 pages. No matter what you are doing, you have to follow the rules. But I digress.

Meanwhile, I am in Washington DC writing stuff of my own, which is basically making up junk and throwing it at the federal government program officers, then having endless discussions. I am representing Weber State University in this effort. The conversation goes something like this:

Me: Give us some of that Obama money for stimulus.
Program Officer: Yeah, we have lots of it, but we don't know how we are going to deal with it.
Me: What are the rules?
Program Officer: Someone is making up some rules as we speak.
Me: If you tell me the rules I will play by them whatever they are.
Program Officer: Are you from a red state or a blue state?
Me: We bleed purple.
Program Office: Huh?
Me: Just give me the money.
Program Officer: I think we are supposed to give money to people who already have some of our money. We are just going to give them more.
Me: So, none for the ones who don't already have some?
Program Officer: I didn't really say that.
Me: What exactly did you say?
Program Officer: Someone is going to put out some guidelines on grants.gov next week.
Me: Have any idea what those guidelines might be?
Program Officer: Someone is making up some guidelines as we speak.
Me: I'm not going away quietly. I'll be back.

Twenty-five years ago we moved to North Ogden. Our friends and neighbors, Jim and Debbie Erickson, raised their children along with us and it was a treat to watch Debbie chase her kids around with a broom. No kidding: she would call me and say, "I'm getting out the broom so come watch!" She was an amazing mother (did a much better job than me) and now that all our kids are grown, the 4 of us are simply grandparents. Their son Isaac and his wife, Sara, adopted a new baby two days ago and they have announced it on a blog that is absolutely beautiful. I wanted to share it with anyone who is interested. I remember Isaac when he was a little snot, but he has grown up to be amazing. And, now he is a dad. I can't wait to see if he gets out the broom.

Hazel Ann Erickson, Born: April 2, 2009, 5:47 am, 9 lbs 12 oz
Adopted: April 6, 2009

Spencer took me to my brother, John's house Friday night. Here we are in the car, Spencer's very cool 1980 (I think) Cadillac. He had to wait for some guy to die so he could steal it from the widow. In Washington DC, this is a very cool ride. Spencer neglected to license the thing, so everywhere we went we got tickets, and one threat to tow. We zoomed away from there really fast. Once, we blocked the intersection and a very nice lady cop told Spencer that the next time it was going to cost him $250.00. We wondered if she was going to recognize us next time, because there would certainly be a next time.

Notice that Spencer has his iPhone in one hand, the Magellan in the other hand, and what you cannot see is his Blackberry between his knees. And, we were doing about 65 mph. I think there is something illegal here, but I'm not sure.

We hit a magnificent milestone on the old Caddy: Check out the odometer. Cool, huh? This happened in Clifton, Virginia. Notice that Spencer slowed down to 35 mph to take this picture without dropping any of his other electronics. We had enough stuff to launch the space shuttle in that car!

Traveling with Spencer involves a lot of dodging cops.

Here I am with Senator Orrin Hatch. He is wearing his Weber tie and proud of it! He says if I bring Weber ties he will make sure that everyone in the office wears a Weber tie. We are standing in front of a giant portrait of the Senator and notice that right above his head we have the Weber pendent. This is awesome! Now I have to go home and dig up a bunch of Weber ties.

We went to the other offices too. Spencer makes sure that Weber is welcome everywhere.

Spencer and I are off to Washington DC to do business. Here we are in the airplane, and Spencer got me bumped up to first class.

Me and Spencer

Of course I do not always ride first class so this was a real treat. However, Spencer explained that we were on the Greyhound version of first class on Delta because this flight goes in to Baltimore, Maryland, because Delta has canceled the evening flight to Dulles (Spencer doesn't like this at all). To prove his point, he noted that the flight attendants do not speak English on this flight. He was right. We couldn't understand the announcements.

Flight Attendant

Here comes the flight attendant who looks perfectly normal to me, until she asked what we would like to eat. Our options were "something I couldn't understand," and "schicken and shringbeenz." We could at least sort of understand the schicken and shringbeenz, so we chose that. She was very cute.

Actually, we agreed that the food tasted pretty good. And, in first class you get dishes and everything! This certainly beats the cattle car where I typically travel.

Spencer likes his first class to be really first class. This just didn't make the grade. Spencer says when you are going to Baltimore, they put the fat flight attendants on duty too. This guy's jacket was so tight that the middle button popped off and he really didn't care.

I thought he was great anyway. He gave me a little wet towel to wash my hands. Spencer was bummed that it wasn't hot like it was supposed to be. Spencer doesn't travel in coach where we have to sit by the rest room and I won't even say how bad that is. As for me, I was in heaven.