James and Kristin Whitt’s Corner

James and Kristin as Simpsons

Kristin found a site called Simpsonizeme where you upload a picture of yourself and it generates what you would look like in the Simpson’s world.  We went ahead and did it and came out with some funny pictures, which can be seen below.

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GMAT Preparation

I was thinking about how Kristin is going to be finishing up her masters next summer and all of the sudden I realized, it will be my turn to go back to school.  I’m planning on continuing my education and getting an MBA.  So, with that realization, I have signed up for a GMAT preparation class at the University of Cincinnati.  Starting 9/22/2007, I will take 6 classes total that occur on Saturday to prepare me for the GMAT.

I also noticed a class I was really interested in called Starting and managing a successful small business.  It wasn’t too expensive, so I also signed up for that.  That one starts up in October.

‘99 GS Jet Ski Repair

Looks like the repair on our ‘99 Sea-Doo GS is going to happen now instead of this fall.  Last Sunday when we went out, the cable from the negative on the battery to the starter broke off at the starter.  To get that back on, it required taking off the entire exhaust.  Taking the exhaust off was only a 2 hour process, but I had to order new gaskets which took 5 days to get in.  It wasn’t a hard fix and once the gaskets came in it only took another 2 hours.  I also had to get a rock out of the jet which somehow got sucked up into it.

We took it to the river yesterday and realized that I could not turn right at all.  The jet ski was also taking on a water really fast.  Turns out that where the steering cable goes into the jet ski, the twist on clamp broke.  I had to order a new pump support plate (the entire back plate on the jet ski) and a new clamp.  This will probably take a week or more to get in.  I also had to pull the jet pump out to work on it.  Decided since I’m going to be waiting for the parts to come in, I might as well rebuild the jet pump, put a new wear ring on, get a refurbished prop from SBT (rebuilt so it’s a good price), and if I have time rebuild the carb.

Of course Kristin’s ‘94 SPX is running great still.  If we go out until mine is repairs, we’ll just be taking hers to the beach.  We won’t go to the river unless both are working.

Praxis and East Fork Race

Just a quick update…
I am working on certification so that I can teach language arts and science as well as math and social studies. One of the things I have to do is pass a test for each subject. In the past few months, I took the language arts and science Praxis tests and I passed both!! So now all I have to do is finish a few classes I’m already signed up for and apply for my license.

I have also started running again (I used to run a lot in high school). Today I ran in the East Fork Backpack Race with a friend. It was a 4.8 mile trail race through the woods at East Fork. James and Gavin went with Christie and I. The race started off well, but almost half way in Christie and I (and another runner) took a wrong turn. There was no race official there to tell us where to go. We all ended up running another mile to mile and a half on the wrong trail until a biker on the trail saw us and told us! Long story short, we ended up running around 8 miles during this 4.8 mile race and we ended up last! It was tough but it was a major accomplishment for me.

Waterproof Digital Camera

We picked up a digital camera off of eBay last week.  We wanted to have a camera that we could take jet skiing with us.  Always seemed to be a time when we wanted to stop and take a picture, but didn’t want to risk dropping our digital camera in the water.  It’s a 5.0 megapixel off brand camera.  We took it out to the Ohio River with us this past Sunday and we took some pictures.  The gallery is located here.

House Colors

We’re repainting and touching up parts of the house and I realized that we have no centralized place of keeping track of which colors each room is.

Not another tree

Kristin and I have finally removed all the branches that we had cut down last year from our yard.  This was a very large task still because at the end of the year, the side yard was still completely filled.  Slowly we got the branches wrapped up and put out to the curb.  We finished this last week.

So wouldn’t you know it, during the last storm half of a tree in our backyard came crashing down into our back yard.  I had to borrow the chain saw again and we spent about 5 hours out back cutting the tree up and putting it out on the curb.  The garbage man is really going to hate us.  Here are some pictures of what it looked like

Work on basement and ceiling fan

In case everybody hasn’t heard yet, we are currently trying to finish our basement. Things are coming along pretty good. The basement is almost completely framed (the walls have been put up). I’m currently running the electricity and other wires (ethernet, phone, cat5, speaker wire). We decided to wire it for surround sound while we are at it. I’ve added a photo gallery with some photos of the progress of the basement.

Also decided to install my ceiling fan last night. The first thing that I needed to do was install a new ceiling fan box. I took the old one out, but while doing it a big chunk of plaster fell out of the ceiling. Doh. So now that needs to be fixed too. Finally got the box in, but since the ceiling needs repaired, I’m going to wait to put it up until the ceiling has been patched and painted. I also think I’m going to add more support for the box also.

Moby’s Birthday

Today is Moby’s first birthday!! Yeah!!

Moby has Giardia (Beaver Fever)

Looks like Moby is a little sick. We took him to the vet yesterday and had some tests ran on him. Talked to the vet today and at this point they know that he has Giardia. They are also having some more tests done, which we won’t get the results until Thursday on the rest of the tests. Moby is starting medication tomorrow for the next 10 days.