I got into the office this morning and went to make coffee as I'm usually one of the first people in. When I got to the coffee pot, the burner was still on from the previous day. The pot contained only burnt remains of coffee and a stench that was wholey unpleasant. In order to help with this issue, I drafted the following email and sent it out to the whole company. The message had a favorable response.

Thoughts?

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From: Hogan Haake [mailto:hhaake@xxxxxxxxxxxxx.com]
Sent: Friday, February 17, 2012 8:11 AM
To: ALL EMPLOYEES
Subject: Please resolve your personal issues!

Many years ago, during the childhood of one of our fine employees, they were struggling to grow up. Part of their resolution to grow up and be a "big" person was to drink coffee like grownups did. But that employee didn't realize that coffee was hot, and seriously burned their mouth. 

Fast forward to yesterday, that said employee had a flashback of their childhood and got very mad. So they got even with coffee by leaving the burner on for the coffee all night into this morning. That said coffee pot and what was left of the coffee was quite burnt and smelly this morning. Now that you have your revenge on coffee, please turn off the burner in the afternoon when you're done with the coffee. I think you made your point and coffee will never burn you again!

Race for the rivers is an annual canoe race/event benefiting the Greenway Network. They host two canoe/kayak races and a bike race during the event. At the end of the race, there is a festival. It focuses on environmental sustainability and other earthy things. This year, I was slated to participate in the 20 mile race in a dragon boat with 10 other people. I was really looking forward to this boat. I did a practice run and the boat was extremely fast.

Unfortunately for myself and the rest of the racers, the canoe race was cancelled due to the river being above flood stage. They still had the biking events and the festival. While I was sad that we weren't racing, the family still went out to the festival and enjoyed what they had prepared.

The kids played with the pirates that had a spot at the event. Corvin tried his hand at sword fighting! This is a great event that we plan on being part of for many years to come.

The River Des Peres watershed coalition held a series of events this year called "Bike With Your Boots On" (First Page). These events are designed to get the community involved and interested in water quality monitoring. The format is to start somewhere along a river/creek and bike a bit, then stop and monitor the water. We decided to have the whole family participate in this event.

The trip included 6 stops to sample the water. We sampled the Meramec river before the biking started. This was probably the last time the group was together, but I'll get to that later. After sampling, the riding started. Since all four of us were together, Danelle and Corvin took off together. They had similar speed and energy. Sonora and I were significantly slower. I rode my unicycle for the trip and Sonora her bike with training wheels. Sonora was slightly faster than me, but stopped often, making it more even. I spent about half the time pushing my unicycle and my daughter.

This was a great event to teach about the watershed and get people out and in the community.

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Danelle and I went to the annual Stream Team picnic held at Meramec State Park. Its always held on the last Saturday in July. This year, the temperature was quite warm. Danelle's parents were worried about the kids with the excessive heat, so they kept the kids at their house. Danelle and I were just a couple heading to a party. We were looking forward to hanging out in the heat. Danelle was slightly worried that I was going to be bored in the morning. The party part didn't really get started until around lunch time, but she was to be there around 9:30am for some training. I told her not to worry as I packed our canoe on top of the van. I had a plan to be paddling all morning while she was in class.

I went a couple miles upstream during the morning. Since I was by myself, I used my kayak paddle and sat in the middle of the boat. This made it easy to control and balance the boat. I had the perfect amount of water for a hard upstream paddle and a potentially casual paddle back downstream. I passed many people two times that morning, once going upstream, and once coming back down!

When I got back to where I started, the Stream Team people had a tent set up with bugs in it. They were demonstrating to anybody interested different bugs in the stream. I spent a few minutes at the tent before I moved all my equipment up to the parking lot to pack it all away.

At the celebration, there were tons of door prizes to help raise money for Stream Teams.

Lots of fun things happen at this event every year. There are several canoe races of which, Danelle and I brought home 2 first place trophies and one second place. The food and company were great.

A more official report of the event.

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Danelle works hard each year planting and managing our home garden. One of the more successful plants this year were cucumbers. They grew on a trellis made from Hogan's bamboo. The harvest was so plentiful, that she was having trouble figuring out what to do with all of the cucumbers. After a bit of thought, she decided to try her hand at pickling. 

The process started out with her cutting and slicing up each of the cucumbers, followed by a nice soak in a brine solution.

Then they were boiled in a vinegar solution and placed in sterile jars and sealed with heat. She placed them in different size jars to fit different occasions.

Of all the canning/jarring that Danelle did this year, this was the most successful and easy process to complete. Compared to the effort that went into making the salsa, this was a very quick and rewarding process.

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