Yay for July! I especially have liked this month since moving to Utah because here we have discovered a clever way to get 2 holidays with fireworks into the same month! The first holiday I’m certain you’re all familiar with–Independence Day…a.k.a. The 4th of July. The second holiday Utah has snuck into July is “Pioneer Day”…a.k.a. The July 24th Holiday. Brilliant! Pioneer Day is the celebration of when the Mormon pioneers first reached the Salt Lake valley after being kicked out of Illinois. Depending on who you ask, Pioneer Day is actually bigger here than the 4th of July, complete with fireworks, rodeos, parades, etc. As an example, my company–Intermountain Healthcare–employs over 32,000 people in and around Utah, and gives us holiday pay for the 24th of July. Because July 24th falls on Sunday this year, we will be observing the holiday on Monday, July 25th…2days of fireworks and Hooray! No work for Steph! Bless you Utah. On a side-note, one of my non-Mormon coworkers told me last week they also celebrate July 24th in Illinois and California, because “the Mormons left Illinois, and didn’t make it far enough west to get to California. There’s my one religious joke for the year.
- Congrats again Jesse and Rachel!
In other news, we had an excellent 4th of July weekend spent first in Logan for cousin Rachel and Jesse’s wedding and then in Salt Lake to watch fireworks with cousin Heather. It was good to catch up with cousins and we even got to see Misty, Curtis, and niece Lia for awhile at the ranch. It was an excellent weekend.
We haven’t gotten much done in the yard lately. It’s been pretty hot and Jason has been spending every available weekend making trips out to Vernal to finish up this summer’s hiking contract. I have been working mornings and available weekends at the restaurant. This will only go on for another 2 weeks, and then I will be back to having one job full-time running our office at TOSH. I love my managers at the restaurant, so it is a little sad to leave, but I’ve decided I’ve got more important things to do than work 55 hours per week. It will be nice however, when the first payment from the hiking contract comes . So far we’re both working harder than ever before, and still losing money. My mom would say it’s a lot like farming, and at least we don’t have cows.
We also bought Jason a new vehicle at the beginning of July. He is now the proud owner of a 2004 Honda Pilot. It has already survived its inaugural trip to Vernal and it didn’t even come back too dirty! I think he likes it more than the Blazer already. As an added benefit it didn’t come with a check engine light that’s permanently illuminated, the 4wheel drive works, and the wiper motor on the driver’s side isn’t burned out! Additionally it has 3rd row seats (should we ever need them) and excellent visibility. I already like it more than the blazer because I don’t think I’ll get car-sick quite as easy riding in it. The Pilot also went for its first extended car-trip this week to the NSS (National Speleological Society) convention in Colorado. It was a good chance for Jason to test out the gas mileage on a nice long drive. For all of you non-NSS members like me, feel free to call it the national caver-geek convention. This is the first year in recent memory that the convention has been held within driving distance so Jason decided to go, and I think he’s glad he did. Actually from the descriptions I’ve gotten, most of the presentations sounded fairly interesting. Jason is basically camping for a week at the high school in Glenwood Springs, CO and attending daily presentations. He actually gets back today, and hopefully when he’s fully recovered he’ll have the energy to do a nice write-up about his adventures on his blog and I will post a link.
Recent weather events in the Midwest (namely the heat and record breaking humidity) has made me not miss living back east. Earlier this week we had 25% humidity and the forecasters commented this was “double our normal amount” for July. Single digit humidity is nice, especially when it’s hot. Especially since my clothes get dry, I don’t start to sweat immediately after showering, and my hair behaves itself. Hang in there Midwestern friends!! 
A big thanks this month to my mom, who had already printed out a hard copy of my original blog post before it was tragically lost in cyber-space due to some server maintenance. Thanks mom!