portrait of a family

You gotta wonder if the parents really thought through all the extended long-term repercussions of having seven children. Who knew it would be like this?

Regardless, here we are in all our glory - sans Rick and Missy :-(

(Although Rick says he knows someone who could photoshop them both in...)



I love all the little kids on the bottom step. They are totally adorable.



And somehow we got away without a picture of all the little girls with their shoes on their hands. I think that was the best pose of all.

Hoffman girls rule! Of course, we missed Rick and Squid. It was quite a week-long adventure between the road-trip challenge, the snow, the family-hopping between Roy and SLC, and feeling a bit of our cultural diversity. Kind of like the story of the city mouse and the country mouse - only more like the PAC-NW blue river crabs and the Utah red desert crabs.

So here's the rest of the sibs, etc. (How did Lor and Jer escape these shots?)

Debbie, Brian, Hannah, Megan and Alex

Brad, Susan, Jonathan, Maggie, Katie, Ben and Matthew

Sandra, William, Amelia and Lilly

Amy, Seth, Sam, Ellie and Jayne

Scott, Amy and Susanna

(listed most logically by height)
Brad, Scott, Papa, Debbie, Amy, Sherri, Lori, Sandra and Grandma

We're already looking forward to the next family adventure.

Sherri

mirror, mirror

In Plato's Symposium, Aristophanes writes that humans originally consisted of four arms, four legs, and a single head made of two faces.

[Primeval man] could walk upright as men now do, backwards or forwards as he pleased, and he could also roll over and over at a great pace, turning on his four hands and four feet, eight in all, like tumblers going over and over with their legs in the air; this was when he wanted to run fast. Terrible was their might and strength, and the thoughts of their hearts were great, and they made an attack upon the gods...

The gods began to be afraid of their power, and Zeus was offended by their "insolence."

Doubt reigned in the celestial councils. Should they kill [man] and annihilate the race with thunderbolts, as they had done the giants, then there would be an end of the sacrifices and worship which men offered to them; but, on the other hand, the gods could not suffer their insolence to be unrestrained.

Zeus decided that instead of destroying them, he would simply cut them in half.

[Zeus] said: 'Methinks I have a plan which will humble their pride and improve their manners; men shall continue to exist, but I will cut them in two and then they will be diminished in strength and increased in numbers. . .'

So the gods were safe, but the separation condemned these split beings to spend their lives searching for their other half.

Aristophanes must have foreseen Missy and Simeon.


. . . . . . . Baby Missy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Baby Simeon . . . . . . .

The Momgoose

Did you feel that?

I did. Just a little 4.5, about 70 miles from here...but being that I'm on the 7th floor, I really felt it.

Good news: the teevees showed up today.
Bad news: the teevees showed up today.

I had an asthma attack last night. I can't remember the last time I had one (as evidence: the albuterol inhaler I dug out of my first aid kit and used last night expired 4 years ago), and I'd forgotten how physically draining they are. Then, my lungs were still a little sensitive when the teevees showed up this morning, so unloading the truck wasn't exactly what I'd call fun. Add the regular workload to that, and by the end of the day I was just wiped out. When the quake happened (7:49PM) I wasn't quite sure if the room was moving or if I was feeling woozy. Again.

This time, it was the room...

Good news: the teevees showed up today.
Bad news: the teevees showed up today.

Since they're here, I'll be done and home a week from this coming Saturday...barring some other unforseen fiasco. But I was looking forward to spending some time visiting my little sister (who lives less than 10 miles away), her husband, and their new baby boy, and now there's less time for that.


Good news: the teevees showed up today.
So now I can get away from this, and breathe easy...
literally.


Bad news: uhhhhhhhhh...what's bad about that?