PFC Kevin Barnes' Mailing Address

Hey guys! Here's a pic of me at the firing range in Kuwait. Not only was it hot that day, but my body armor is really heavy and annoying. Just in case you feel the urge to send me a letter or care package, here's my mailing address. It's changed at least 3 times so far, but they tell us this is the correct one.



PFC Barnes, Kevin
Dco. 2-285th AVN
Unit # 072
APO, AE 09374

If you have any questions on what to send in care packages just let me know. I'm not even sure what I could use. Over time I'll let you know what I miss from good old Utah. Some good ideas home made goods like cookies, I'm trying to get into shape, so don't really need any snacks. I guess pictures, anything that would remind me of home would be good, you know things I can hang on the wall, spice the place up a bit. Oh, Spitz brand Dill Pickle Seeds are good because, not only do I like em, but the pilots do too, and if the pilots and officers are happy, then I'm happy.

Thanks guys! You're the best. Love you all. Kevy.

kevin.michael.barnes@gmail.com

It's "Student Doctor" to you...

Well I know most of you saw pix on facebook, but i thought it was time for someone to add something new to our little blog (even though i don't think dave has even looked at it and i was the last to post anything). My white coat ceremony was Oct 9th and basically is meant to symbolize the start of our professional career--more i think its a nice commemoration saying "yay you got into med school, here's a short white coat so you almost look like doctors (real drs wear long white coats)--nonetheless it was kinda exciting and i must say I look good in white;)

The two featured blondes are Betsy and Kristina, two of my better friends from school. They are fun and I am actually hoping Kristina will get baptized--its been a slow process but i have given her a Book of Mormon and she has very high standards for a non-member.

Come on to my house, my house I'm gonna make you candy....

I bought a house! Well its been two weeks and i'm all settled into my new house (except that my lawn is a mess)...things have been pretty exciting for me as a proud new home owner and i am now officially a "student doctor"--crazy!

So far I quite like arizona--except that its wicked hot! My first week of classes went well and hopefully that holds true when i take my first test tomorrow.

please enjoy as i take you on a little tour of my house:)

So, Marie and I went to Fairfield, California to attend her brother's wedding. All went well. My father-in-law enjoys restoring Volkswagen Karmann Ghias. These four now belong to his four children. The red one on the right is mine/Marie's. We were planning on towing it back with us because although it runs, it would be a very long trip. We ran into problems installing a hitch on my car because the kit U-Haul sold me came with the wrong bolts. I got my money back. We'll try again when we visit for Thanksgiving. Tomorrow, Marie and I will fly to Seattle for an extended family reunion on her father's side. We'll spend one day in the city itself, then a few days in a wilderness area to the north. We'll fly back on Sunday. Life is great. In other news, Marie passed her test to be a licensed practical nurse, or LPN. It's a step below an RN, which she'll be after she graduates in April. She's now looking for a job at a nursing home or hospital. Wish her luck.

Cami's address!

Here are my addresses. . . I'm only in the MTC for 3 weeks so until the first week of August this is my address. . .

Texas Dallas Mission
Provo MTC2005 N. 900 E.
Provo UT 84604

THe rest of the time you can get me things by sending them to the Mission home.
Texas Dallas Mission
13747 Montfort Dr. Ste 120
Dallas, TX 75240-4454

I love you all!! Thanks for being friends with me all these years! I look forward to hearing from you. And I look forward to our christmas party next year. . . I can't make it this year. :)

Love you guys!

For Parker

Happy Birthday to Parker!!!! Your favorite color is purple right? Above are some of the best pictures I could find of Parker. All from his proudest moments of senior year.

1. At prom. I think Karen ran off somewhere and I found Parker sitting alone so I thought I'd be nice and take a picture with him.

2. In St. George. I believe we were supposed to be in a work shop class at the time. This was taken when Park realized he'd left his snack in the classroom.

3. New Years 2002 on Ryan Button's driveway. Parker was trying to be cool, and totally succeded!!

4. The bus ride home from California. I told Parker that his dreams of becoming an archeologist were unrealistic. . . I may have been wrong.

Love you Park!

Yay! Well I have a House! well, technically, I haven't "closed" the deal, but my offer has been accepted! 3 bed/2.5 bath and only 5 min. from school--I'm so happy

Mike and Colin climbing the Pfieferhorn (Little Matterhorn)

I'm getting better at posting, but I didn't put these pictures up chronologically and I'm too lazy to fix it. In fact, these pictures are in reverse chronological order, so this is on the way down. This is me sliding down the bowl above Red Pines Lake. Mike would throw boulders off the top of the mountain to try and trigger these mini avalanches. Eventually we decided to ride these avalanches down the bowl ... it was pretty much the coolest thing ever. The snow would make this 'sluffing' noise as it broke loose from the steep slope and slide down the bowl like a river.

I wish I had a better camera than just the one on my phone. This is the view looking south from the top of Mt. Pfieferhorn. The peak in the back left is Mt. Timpanogos.
Mike perched on the edge of the summit. Lone Peak is in the distance. The valley to the left is Lehi.
I'm pretty sure we were the first people to summit for the season. If you notice, there are no footsteps in front of me. The peak in the background is the Pfieferhorn. It's an optical illusion, because it doesn't really look all that big ... but it was huge.
Mike was the trailblazer for most of the ascent ... what a badass.
It was clear weather when we started hiking, we saw a storm roll in as we made our way above the lakes. It snowed on us pretty lightly.

The Long Board Adventurers

Looking for Adventure? Have a board ? how long is it ? pretty long? cause its got to be a decent length. If you answered yes to some of these questions then you may want to consider thinking about, one day, possibly joining THE LONG BOARD ADVENTURERS. Where ever theres danger and adventure and a pretty smooth path near by, with not too many big rocks and at least some hills to go down, you'll find THE LONG BOARD ADVENTURERS.

Heres some examples of one such Adventure:

Tail Grabs and Hip Swivels

That sign behind Brian read " No Being Awesome." But Brian covered it with a garbage bag we brought, and then continued on doing what he does best.

In the World of Long Boarding. Higher is better. Thanks Camera Guy.

Fellow Adventurer meets her Arch Nemesis for the first time: " Tiny Bridge"

I'm a Blogging. Just wanted to let everyone know, i'm ready to go. and I also wanted to see where this post ends up, when i push the "publish" button.

So this is a blog... hmmm... Thanks Landes for inviting me!

p.s. Lame Layout!

Seeing as you guys are new to the blogging world I just thought I'd let you know there are a ton of layouts out there that are much cooler than this one. . . . .

I'm honored!

I know that I put up a fuss but I'm honored to be included in The Alliance!! I will do my best to contribute. . . Once I figure out my stupid camera I will post some awesome pictures of us soon!

The Alliance

Bowing to popular opinion (as I rarely do), I have changed the title of the blog to "The Alliance." The URL is still http://ournetworkoffriends.blogspot.com, though. I've granted everyone admin privileges.

I concur...

...with Brian and Colin. I think "The Alliance" would be a fantastic blog name.

The Alliance

I vote for "The Alliance." It took me nearly an hour to figure out how to post, haha! I am completely unfamiliar with blogging, but I look forward to a long and successful experience with y'all. Thanks, Landes, for actually getting this going. I probably never would have.

Name...

I say we keep it as you set it up landes...for the name, i liked colin's idea of "the alliance."  I would maybe suggest that we extend it to be, "the BIC Alliance" but that's debatable since only Colin, Dave, Parker and I were there when BIC clique started but all of those cool enough to hang out with us consistently since the formation were inherently adopted in.

thanks Landes for starting it up...I think like most of us, I really don't know what to do with blogs...

Our Network of Friends?

Okay, who left Landes in charge of naming our blog? I can count on one finger and one thumb the number of blogs I have read before, but experience is unnecessary in understanding the importance of a decent blog name. Below I'll list a few examples of some good and some pretty terrible blog names - I'm not telling which are which to avoid accountability for saying so, but you guys get the idea.

Go Fug Yourself
Textual Relations
Peanunt Buddha and Jesus
Nurse King of the Pleasurable Drool
Victoria's Secretions
Troll Baby
Half Dead and Dancing
Salt Lake City; Hallowed Ground (a blog by a Utahn about heavy metal and the paranormal)
Tattooed Mountain Women and Spoon Boxes of Daghestan
How Green Were the Nazis? (Not kidding; look it up on Amazon.com)
Our Network of Friends

So... let's Christen this thing, huh?

Begin

We've been talking about starting a group blog for some time, so I finally set one up. I have it set so that only we can post to it and read it, which we can change if so desired. Have fun.