Storms in Burnsville

Diary Entry For July 13, 2008

The Shortarmguy Family had a relatively lame week.  We didn’t do much, although we did get a chance to go and swim in Grandma’s pool on Tuesday night.  We all like to wear goggles to help us see under the water.    It’s just amazing how many incredibly nasty things are floating around us that we wouldn’t even notice if we didn’t have such clear vision!

Avery and I are working on perfecting a trick where he stands on my shoulders, then does a back flip, and finally lands on my shoulders again in the exact same position.  This is as far as we’ve gotten.

Work is very busy this summer.  The Nor-Tech tech room is building machines as fast as they possibly can and yet the orders keep piling up outside.  For as much doom and gloom there is in the media about an economic slowdown, we’re certainly not seeing it lately.

Our manufacturing did have to take a brief break on Thursday when a massive storm suddenly rolled through Burnsville.  Here’s a video on Startribune.com that was taken nearby Nor-Tech.  We lost power for several hours and ended up having to close down for the day!  The lead time for computers just got a little bit longer!  Sorry to my customers!

I’m not sure how much rain fell, but we had a river going down the street in front and the rear of our parking lot became a pond for a short time.  These photos were taken by my old buddy, Steve “Cuds” Cuddihy.  He has more pictures here and here on his website, Twin Cities Daily Photo.com.

On Saturday, we made a trip to the Minnesota Zoo again to visit our newest friends, the Grizzly Bears.  At first, I thought they appeared a lot more gold and metallic then I remembered from our previous visit.

Avery snapped this shot of the three bears in various positions as they all attempted fishing for large trout swimming in the pool around them.  It was fun watching them swim around trying to catch fish with their massive paws.  Unfortunately, they didn’t catch any while we were there so we didn’t get to see them feast.

After the zoo, we went to see the new movie, Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D.  I give the movie one Big Thumb Up as I found it to be a quite enjoyable family film.  The 3D effects are very cool and the plot is simple, pleasant, and somewhat engaging.  Don’t get me wrong.  If it wasn’t in 3D, I’d say to skip it because there’s not that much to it.  But when you see the piranha and dinosaur flying out of the screen at you, it makes for a fun afternoon!  Although I did catch Luke and Avery sneaking their glasses off at some of the more intense scenes in the movie!

Shortarmguy.com reached a milestone this week when the Shortarmguy Store had it’s first sale of the Official Shortarmguy Thong!  Some lucky girl in Arizona is going to be able to walk around in comfort knowing that her most private parts are well protected by a replica of the Shortarmguy Tattoo!  Hopefully this is the beginning of a trend!

The Crashed UFO

The Awareness Test

The Farmer’s Daughter

Just in time for Father’s Day, the new DeWalt nail gun. It can drive a 6-D nail thru a 2 X 4 at 200 yards.

This makes construction a real breeze; you can sit in your lawn chair and build a fence.  Just get the wife and kids or mother-in-law to hold the fence boards in place while you sit back, relax with a cold beer, and when they have the board in the right place, just fire away. Wit h the hundred round magazine, you can build a fence with a minimum of reloading. After a day of fence building with the new Dewalt Rapid  Fire Nail Gun, the wife will not ask you to fix or build anything else ever again.

Best argument I’ve heard Yet!

Hope you don’t change you mind on your tattoo design!

This tattoo is much more subtle!

Don’t kiss frogs!

Now that’s a heck of a way to dry your clothes!

Gotta wonder what happened here!

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Quote of the Week

“The secret of getting things done is to act!”

– Dante Alighieri, poet
 

Joke of the Week

My five-year old students, are learning to read. 
 
Yesterday one of them pointed at a picture in a zoo book and said,

“Look at this!  It’s a frickin’ elephant!”

I took a deep breath, then asked…”What did you call it?”

“It’s a frickin’ elephant!    It says so on the picture!”  


 And so it does…

“A f r i c a n  Elephant “

 Hooked on phonics!    Ain’t it wonderful?

Nice Emails of The Week

Your appearance on Miami ink was awesome…..saw it last night, I’m in Australia so I think we are a bit behind the times in regards to Miami Ink.

Great to see what you have done with the site… 

Keep rockin!

Michael “Piky” White

G’day Shortarm guy :),

 

My name is Peter and I live in the Northern Territory of Australia. I also seen your episode of Miami ink and getting the tattoo of your arm.

I just want to say that I think you are a fantastic very motivational person who in the little time I saw on t/v inspired me to go out and just do something nice for whoever needed it. Mare ,Buddy, Pal I honestly wish you all the best in life and hope to meet you some day.

 

Live free my friend…

 

Peter

Some nice comments recently left on my Miami Ink Page:

saw the miami ink episode you were on yesterday and i just had to stop by your page and say how super touched i was/am by your story and the great attitude you have towards life. i swear, humor can get you through some major life stuff. thanks for being an inspiration and sharing your story and i’ll keep checking in on your page–great page by the way. aloha from hawaii!!!

 

I met you at Silver Dollar City in Branson, MO last week. I had just seen your Miami Ink episode so I recognized you right away. I wish I could have talked to you longer, but the show was starting & I didn’t want to disturb you. I called my husband right away & told him I met you & even got to shake your hand & your wife took our picture. It was so cool to meet a celebrity!

Shortarmguy’s Favorite Websites

July 13, 2008

Pickens Plan — Oil Man T. Boone Pickens has some interesting ideas on how the US can reduce our dependence on foreign oil.  Sounds good to me!

Lawnmower DUI — This guy lost his license to mow his lawn!

Danity Kane – Damaged

Pussycat Dolls- When I Grow Up

Shortarmguy’s Emails To Make You Think

Email Shortarmguy at Shortarmguy@aol.com

July 13, 2008

I got these pictures today. Apparently they were taken in British Columbia. We’ve been seeing a pair of swans on our lake this summer and often see eagles hunting, usually for ducks or fish but one had set his sights on a loon last summer. These pictures are amazing.

So here is the swan photo.

What a beautiful bird, so graceful and majestic.

Here comes the Eagle!!!

You can actually see feathers flying from the swan.

This one is so amazing to see the actual eagle wing span beside the swan.  The poor swan must be scared to death …

It is attempting to actually escape death in the air!

The eagle is losing his grip on the swan in this picture.

Now the eagle has just lost his grip on the swan completely.

At this point the swan starts falling straight down.

The swan falls into the water below, swims away and the eagle just looks on at his ‘lost’ prey. I am amazed at these pictures because I have NEVER seen an eagle attack or tackle something so big in mid-air before.