Gymnastics

Kaiya is signed up for a gymnastics class, so Steph decided to take her to a Ute's meet to show her what it's all about, and very kindly invited me along. First we met Mickel at The Pie for dinner, after a bit of confusion about the location since The Pie actually has two locations, one right around the corner from the other. Great pizza - but VERY crowded and noisy! You know - typical college hang-out. Teague sure liked it. Then we went to the Utah/Arizona State meet, where it was very apparent that the Lady Utes would dominate the night. They are FANTASTIC! Kaiya was very intrigued by what they were doing, although I'm not sure she quite made the connection to what she does in her gymnastics class. And she didn't want me to clap ... not sure what that was about.

However, I think she was a bit more entertained by the people around us, the stairs, the seats, and Grandma's camera. In case you can't tell, the picture below is a self-portrait of Kaiya's legs, by photographer Kaiya Jane.

When we were driving back to Steph & Mickel's house, along 1300 East, we could see an orange glow. As we got closer, it was apparent that it was a HUGE fire. A house right on 1300 East was FULLY engulfed in flames, and apparently it had just happened because there were no fire crews there yet. We stopped to look (and Mickel had already called it in - he was in front of us in the Mazda). The heat was so intesnse we could feel it in the truck. The flames were so high, the trees in the neighboring yard were begining to catch fire. It just looked like one huge fireball. We were so dumbfounded, I didn't have the presense of mind to to take a picture, and it was starting to freak out Kaiya so we had to leave. But I was in the neighborhood again today so I thought I'd take one of what it looks like now.

This isn't the best picture, but if you can zoom in you might be able to see that there is absolutely nothing left of the inside - it's just a shell. What I don't understand, though, is why it appears white and clean on the outside. I mean, those flames last night engulfed everything - why isn't it charred-looking? At any rate, it was sobering to realize how fast it got to that point, and how deadly fire can be.