HALLOWEEN! YAAAAAY

Halloween time again. This year was fairly simple. Obviously Halloween was on Sunday so we had a tri-ward trunk or treat on Saturday. It was a lot of fun and we had a lot of participation, which I have to say is pretty common for our ward. I love it. Sunday our kids handed out candy. I can't decide which one they liked better, dressing up and going trick or treating or handing out candy? It was pretty funny to listen in, "hurry get ready, here comes another customer . . ." Seriously, they would block off the sidewalk, nobody was getting by without getting some candy! I eventually had to go down and regulate to make sure they weren't giving away all the candy. They all wanted to hand out candy and so they ended up each giving a candy to each kid. What a mess. :-) BUT, they had lots of fun. Anyway, here are some pics. Enjoy.

Haddli (butterfly Fairy), Hannah (Pirate), Hallie (Witch), Hayydn (hand me down Lumpy).

Now including Harrli (hand me down Eeyore), and Mama (nurse). An interesting note, everyone of our kids was in that Eeyore costume and some point. Honestly, the only way we can tell who is who is by looking at the date. :-)
Harrli.
Haddli.
Hallie.
Harrli and Mama.
Lookin' at something cool. Nice bump-it by the way.
Pandemonium.
Hayydn in his gay costume. (But he still pulled it off). :-)
PUMPKINS. Most of the girls need some coaxing to dig into the pumpkins but Hayydn was all over it - thus all the photos of him.



Hannah, being the big sister and helping out.



Hallie. eeeeeewwww (is what she is saying). But she wanted to collect all the seeds for pumpkins next year. Mama just cooked them instead. They were pretty good actually. Good job Mama.
Hannah getting into the action.
Me helping out. Sorry about exposing my sexy body. What can I say? I like to be naked . . . .
. . . . and greasy. :-)
All the Pumpkins. left to right, Haddli, Hallie, Hannah, Hayydn and Dad.
This is Haddli's pumpkin. She carved it all by herself.
Most impressive pumpkin was by Hallie, again all by herself. Impressive.
Hannah went simple - but effective.
Finally the pumpkin belonging to myself and Hayydn.




Well, that is about it. Until next year, that is about all I have to say about Halloween this year.

The Super Computer

So, our desktop computer was about ten years old and not running to hot. That is OK because Lisa and I have both gotten a laptop over the years. I purchased mine right before law school about 5 years ago. Wow, that was a long time ago - life sure goes by fast. Anyway, needless to say my laptop is now ill equipped to run the new CS5 software. I had to completely re-image my laptop just to get through the last season of soccer photos. So, I combined the income from by business ventures throughout the year and decided to build a new computer. I decided to build rather than buy because I was sick and tired of getting commercial fluff and garbage. I want a lean mean operating machine!

So, my specs are as follows: (for those of you who actually care)

Case:

Cooler Master HAF X

MOBO:

Asus P6X58D-E LGA 1366 Intel X58 SATA 6gb/s USB 3.0 ATX INTEL MOBO

Memory:

Corsair Dominator 6GB (3x2gb) 240pin DDR3 (x2) = 12GB total

Graphics:

EVGA GeForce GTX 470 (Fermi) Superclocked 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x 16 DDCP Ready SLI

PSU:

Cooler Master Silent Pro Gold Series 800W ATX 12V SLI Readt CrossFire Ready

HD:

2 samsung Spinpouint F3 Desktop Class 1TB 7200rpm 300mbs

OS:
Windows 7 (64 bit)

I have to say that the most suprising thing about the new build is the ATX full tower. WOW, that thing is huge. Check out the Photo of Hallie standing next to it. I finished building it yesterday and fired it up. Perfection. In fact, I am updating this blog right now using my new super computer. :-)

Well, while I didn't fully document the build I took a few pictures along the way. Here are a few.

This is a pic of the MOBO in the HAF X Case.
A cool thing about this case is that you have a back wall to hide all your cords. That way it is cool and pretty. :-)
Hallie standing next to the case during the build, just to let you know how massive this thing is.
This is another pic of the MOBO with the CPU and CPU/cooler, Memory, video card, and fans installed.
And so on.
A pic of the back plugs.
EVGA GTX 470 = Sweet. Someday I will have two. :-)

Anyway, the build went almost perfectly. I honestly don't know why everybody doesn't just build their own computers?? (besides all the warnings about being a trained professional to proceed - which I of course disregarded :-)) ). No, but seriously, I look forward to many years of upgrading my computer as necessary rather than having to buy a new computer every few years.