Maxwell Street Days

This past weekend was the last one that everyone was free before the start of the school year.  Sarah originally thought that she had to dogsit for a friend, so we didn't make any plans, but then we come to find out that Sarah misunderstood and she only needed to watch their dog next Saturday.  So that left us with all day and nothing to do.  So we decided to head on down to Lake Geneva and check out Maxwell Street Days.

We had never been to Lake Geneva before so Kris and I thought it would be good to drive down and see what it was like there on a weekend.  We couldn't have asked for better weather, which meant that all the Illinois humps were up there for the day.  It was quite crowded and there wasn't a lot of parking in the downtown area.  We had to drive around for a bit, but I finally found a parking spot, though I still needed to pay a meter.  I was really hoping to find a free parking lot, but that would have meant walking at least a half a mile back to the shops and the lake.  

It was pretty much what we expected, except of course for all the rude, Illinois people. We walked around looking at all the little shops, and the girls each bought a bracelet, but that was about it.  And when we got back to the car this was parked next to us.

This was the first Delorean I have ever seen up close.  I don't know how anyone could drive one of them, because you are practically lying down inside of it.  All in all it was a relaxing day, though not quite how I would have wanted to spend our last free weekend of summer. 

End Of Summer Vacation

Well it is almost the end of summer vacation.  I know because we just spent an hour at the junior high yesterday standing in line, turning in forms, getting school photos taken, and trying out locker combinations.  So since vacation is almost over I figure it is about time to get caught up and start updating my blog again.  As Kris pointed out to me last week, I missed all the stuff I usually report on over the summer, the most important being the girls' birthdays.  But also in the mix was girl scout camp, the 4th of July parade, the start of cheer practice, and a few other things.

The summer was a hectic one, and with all the things going on with having the bathroom redone, we spent every single day for a month cleaning the house.  The dust and dirt generated was unbelievable.  But that is finally done so I am trying to get caught up on some other things around the house, most notably finishing up the details with the bathroom, like finishing some paint touch ups.  I also have to fix some holes in the walls of the hall where I had to rip out the baseboards and replace them.  I also have some yardwork to take care of that has been neglected.  And I have a ton of TV to get caught up on.  Hopefully things will start to settle down once school starts up again.    

Another Year Over

As of last week Thursday, another school year is on the books.  Well, actually as of Friday.  Friday Ali had a half a day of school and Sarah had to go take her final in PhyEd, which consisted of sitting on the bleachers for 90 minutes.  

Sarah will be a sophomore next year, and Ali will be starting middle school.  The ceremony that Ali had was nice, but I still liked Sarah's ceremony for completing 5th grade at Riverside better.  Maybe it was because I knew all the teachers and the principal by name there so it seemed more personal to me.  Ever since Alison got moved over to Shady Lane with the redistricting I just didn't really feel like a part of the school.  Ali's teachers were all very nice, and I think she learned a lot, but there was just something that didn't feel quite right.  But that's all over now, and on to 6th grade.  I think we have another week off before the girls start up with activities and cheer, so it'll be a short vacation.

And as always, I took the girls' picture on the final day of school.

Curse

I think that Kris's car is cursed.  We were loading up groceries a month or so ago and I noticed another small rust spot starting where is had been fixed three previous times.  The last time I took it in to get the dent fixed and the paint redone the body shop told me that they finally determined that the reason for the dent was a design flaw.  The sheet metal was too thin in the area about the hatch handle so they ended up building a support rib and welding it to the inside of the door, and that seems to have doe the trick.  However, they most not have rust proofed everything the last time, because the area of rust was starting just under the the corner of where the license plate light is.  

I had to take it in yesterday and they cleaned everything up and repainted it so it looks good as new again.  Luckily they didn't charge us for it.  I think that is the fourth time now that it has been in in the last three years to have the hatch fixed.  and Hopefully it'll be the last.

Indy Car 2013

This past weekend, we decided to take the girls to the IndyCar race at the Milwaukee Mile.  Kris and I wanted to to go, but we were holding off buying tickets because we wanted to take the girls, and they were hemming and hawing about whether they wanted to go.  I didn't want to pay for a ticket for them if they didn't want to go.  But a couple of days before the race we decided they would just have to deal with it.

Kris and I had gone years ago, and we sat in the bleachers coming out of turn four, right before the entrance to the pits.  This time I wanted to sit in the grandstand, and we ended up sitting right on the start finish line, though we were pretty low - in the fourth row.  We couldn't see the back stretch.  Our field of view was from turn four, down the front stretch and thru turn one into turn two.  And being so close we could really see the detail on the cars, or as much as you could see as they were flying by at 150 mph.  We also had a large video screen directly across the track from where we were sitting in the infield that was broadcasting the NBCSports feed, so from time to time, were were able to see what was happening on the other side of the track.

When we got there, the Indy Lights race was going on, and those cars were LOUD!  I was actually surprised because both Kris and I thought that the Indy cars were actually more quiet that the light versions.  Sarah apparently didn't even feel the need to use ear plugs for the main race.  I think that is mainly because her hearing is shot from always having ear buds in listening to her music.

Overall it was a pretty exciting race.  We saw a couple of spin-outs in turn four and Ana Beatriz cracked up her nose.  Marco Andretti was crushing things until he had a bad pit stop, then electrical problems put him out.  And right in front of where we were sitting there was a gate in the fencing that allowed access to the track.  About a half an hour before the race started, we saw someone in a fire suit come walking over, open the gate and climb through over to the grandstand.  I asked Kris if he looked like Arie Luyendyk, and she thought so.  He climbed up and was talking with some people in the front row.  Then he took a couple of pictures with them, signed a couple of things and then went back to the infield.  When he turned around the back of his fire suit said Arie Luyendyk.  He lived in Brookfield for about ten years before he had his success in IndyCar, and I remember one of my professors at Marquette saying he was friends with him.  He was the SAE car advisor and Luyendyk apparently helped out with it one year.  So it was pretty cool to see him up close.  

Unfortunately I left the camera at home, so we didn't get any pictures.  Kris tried taking some with her phone so maybe if I get them off of it I'll see what they look like.  I did find this picture online though on the autoweek website.

The girl in the hot pink shirt is Sarah and Kris is standing next to her.  Alison and I are behind the fence post.  I think the girls had fun, more than they thought they would.  This was the second year of a two year contract with Andretti Sports Marketing to put on the race, so hopefully they'll be back next year.  If they are, I think we'll be going again.

Post Office

Last month, Kris had to make a trip to our local post office.  There were some bills of her dad's that weren't being delivered, even though we changed the mailing address to ours.  For some reason our mail man took it upon himself to decide that her dad did not live with us and just returned his mail as not deliverable.  This is even after she had previously gone to the post office to tell the post master that since we take care of his bills, we have his mail delivered to us.  

So she first called and tried to take care of it over the phone.  But it was like speaking Greek to a Norwegian.  The result was an actual trip to the post office to try and explain the situation.  And that took 45 minutes to an hour.  Apparently telling someone that we take care of Kris's dad's bills, so we just have his mail delivered to us is so difficult to understand that it took talking to two or three different people.  This is your tax money at work.

Finally though, I think we have it ironed out.  it's only been about a month, and so far so good.

Back in the Game

Well it's been a little over a month since I posted anything, and that is mainly due to all the running around we had to do over the last month of the school year.  That and the fact that I was without a laptop since it crashed.  But things have calmed down a bit and I can do stuff from one of our other computers so I am going to try and get all caught up over the next few days.  Sorry about the absence.