Happy August 27th!

Well nothing new really. Just thought I would share some pics with you. I went to Dubuque on Tuesday to go find some new bed spreads. I choose to take the Great River Road to Dubuque and you can get there in 45 minutes. They have so many places to shop. The picture is on the Great River Road where you can see the Mississippi River valley. Up here in NE Iowa there is lots of farmland, but lots of hills and bluffs, you can also see for many miles.

Today, I finished up a small painting project, so you can see me in action. I also pulled some weeds, but no one needs to see my hind side bent over pullin out some weeds. The flowers that we planted were over grown with weeds, really sad. This weed take over only happened in the top planter, so the bottom planter looks great. Josh and I planted over 250 petunias in the spring.

Tomorrow I will travel back home to Iowa City, where I have to work at the gym. Then Saturday is the first Iowa football game, woohoo, tailgating season, check out my toes, I am prepared. Then Sunday there is nothing, and Monday we are going to host the Franklin St. block party.

Josh has been busy taking care of Kona and he mowed the lawn. He is also preparing for the first home football game. There is so much prep for the game that he is not going to be reffing a high school football game this week, however he will get in some junior high games during the next week.

Give the dog a bone...

Well, Ang here...I am back in Guttenberg until Thursday, with Halen. Josh is back home with Kona, and getting ready for the start of Iowa football.

We had a good weekend. We went to a party to kickoff the tailgating season, Josh and I went bowling and we tag teamed the mowing at some property in WB for my dad. As for the bowling goes, we each won a game. I think Josh had a problem going over the fault line though in the game he won.

Also, in true blog fashion I have a gripe. I went to the Iowa City Post Office before I left for the Gutt. There was already a line forming, and there were 3 postal workers. Then all the sudden 2 of them dissapear. Like they couldn't handle the stress of weighing packages and operating a computer. So there is one guy helping a line full of people. I rolled my eyes and the lady in line in front of me noticed. She was like this is ridiculous, you have to pay to park here and you don't even know how long you will be inside. She went on the emphasize that she just hates to pay for parking. I hate to pay to park as well, but if the parking was not metered, there would be no parking as students would park there all day. I did respond to this lady by saying you can go to the post office at Hy-Vee, but you may not get your package out the same day. She replied with I don't like to drive that far either. What a whiner!!! Also where did this lady live that she wasn't at least a 5 minute drive from Hy-vee, and that the downtown post office was so close that she needed to drive and not walk. Anyways, we continued in line and 2 more employees came back to help people. Then one of the workers left again like she needed another break, even her facial expression was "I am above those people that need to drop off their package and be on their way." This experience made me miss the little ol post office in WB. The ladies there are friendly and usually help with no problems. However they do think any package weighing over 10 pounds is heavy, and if the postmaster is there at the same time as the helper, the post master will not do any work. Oh well, anyone else with post office problems?

A night at home!!

It was very weird tonight...a night at home without any meetings or games, or for that matter, any place to go! Okay, so I did run some errands in Coralville and ate at Panera at Coral Ridge Mall...big excitement, for sure. At home it's been an evening of studying some football rules and positioning in preparation for my first game this Friday night. It's an 8-man game at Springville, just east of Cedar Rapids. Eight-man football...arena football on grass...it's faaaaan-tastic!! Or something like that...

Kona has been very well-behaved today, especially with having to be kenneled as much as she has been. Now she's chewing a bone and playing with a water bottle, and I'm watching the Olympics. Am I the only one that thinks the Chinese are a bunch of cheats? Even in beach volleyball, where their team is losing near the end of the gold medal match, they're bending the rules to try and stall things. Add what seems like the 11-year-old gymnasts and the pathetic judging in several sports, and it at least gives some fodder for conspiracy theorists like me.

I was excited to hear Ang was inspired to start back up with her running program, then, boom! Her ankle rolls yet again... Unbelievable!! It's been pretty dull and boring without her around, so I can't wait for her to come home, even though she may be gone again next week.

Two days until high school football...10 days until Hawkeye football...

inspired

So I am up in Guttenberg for a little while. I was inspired by the weekends triathlon, so I thought maybe I should start running again. I pulled up some information about training for a 5K race, since I have done a couple in the past.

I was all set to go this morning, I started fine. However I was about a half mile in, when I stepped off the road, snap, pop!!! There went my ankle. AHHHH!!! So I had to walk the half mile back to the motel. I pop my ankle all the time, so it is just stiff and sore. I guess this puts a damper on the running, or someone is giving me a message "Stay fat and don't run!"

Other than that, not much new going on here. I took Halen with me, and Kona is at home keeping Josh awake. I will be back at home tomorrow, I will get to spend a weekend at home. Seems like I have been on the go for a while now.

Back to the grindstone

Whoa, Josh finally learned to post on here, I am excited, then I don't have to post all the time. It will also offer a different perspective on things, and he has a background in journalism, so his typing and wording will be better.

Well my friend Kate survived her first triathlon. Actually there were 4 people we were cheering on and they all made it. Talk about a great accomplishment. They had to do a 1/2 mile swim, 12 mile bike ride and then a 5k run. I am tired just thinking about it.

I rode up with Kate's mom Deb on Friday night to help Kate prepare for the race on Sunday. Saturday we kicked back at the one of Minnesota's 10,000 lakes. Then headed to a BBQ that night.

Sunday morning at 4:25 am I was awake. We had set 3 alarms, that was so nice. Kate started her pre-race things and we packed up the bike and were off. We picked up some more friends and bikes and arrived at the St. Paul Lake Phalen race course at 6 am. Looked like it was going to be a great day.

Everyone got started on the race, they started in waves so all 900 participants didn't drown in the swim at the same time. Deb and I then began our cheering, we had 4 people to keep an eye on. We missed one of them coming out of the Lake, and after worrying that Kate may have drowned, she popped out of the lake. So we trekked over to the transistion area to cheer her on, next was the bike race. Everyone got stretched out so far it was hard to keep track, and they all looked the same. We had to keep on top if it all. I thank we sat down for a minute during the compeition. Finally they were all coming in across the finish line, ahhh it was a good time.

Talk about a lot of hardwork, and most of them said they would probably do it again. After we packed up everything again, we were off to a post race BBQ. Then Deb and I had to come back home. It was a good weekend!

As in the previous post, Josh got to stay home and man the Iowa Football scrimmage and go to a High School football meeting.

Finally...time to relax!!

Okay, so I don't normally post, especially since I didn't figure out how to do it until tonight. So that's only been, what, two months? I'm not very big on a lot of computer things, but I think most of it is just mental thinking I can't do it. Anyway, it's pretty quiet on the homestead tonight, with Halen just lying around, Kona running around like normal, and the Cubs on the tube. Today's football scrimmage wasn't particularly exciting...lackluster offense, stifling defense, and not many people showed up.

I can't believe how quickly this summer has gone, between the floods, camps, and baseball. About the latter, with all that went on, I've not enjoyed a sport as I enjoyed umpiring baseball this year since the football season during the 9/11 crisis. It was the perfect diversion from all the devastation and chaos from earlier in the summer, and I was really fortunate to work as deep in the playoffs as I did. But now, it's on to football season, hard to believe. Just six days from the start of high school, and two weeks until the Hawks kick off.

It sounds like Ang had a great day in Minneapolis, and is looking forward to tomorrow's triathlon. As for me, it will be another football clinic tomorrow in Waverly, but before that, a relaxing night at home.

MPLS!

This weekend I am going to visit my friend Kate in MPLS. She will be running a triathalon, I am traveling with her mom to cheer her on. Should be a good time. She is pictured above as the hostess with the mostess, she loves it when I post pictures of her.

Josh is staying home to watch the dogs, and man a football scrimmage at Kinnick.

However I am not sure how I will get in all the Olympics, I am addicted. I will need to find a TV.

The Ohio House

It's hard to believe but the Ohio House still exists. You may all wonder what the hey I am talkin about. Well here is the story....

In high school Kate's mom was kind enough to take a group of girls to Chicago. Our accomodations were at the Ohio House. A "motel" in the downtown of Chicago. It was more like a Motel 6. This is a 2 story building surrounded by skyscrapers.

We only needed to stay here for about 10 hours, just a place to sleep. Well during those 10 hours we got to experience some excitement. In the middle of the night, we heard some glass shattering. We were on the ground level too, so it was a little scary. The next morning when we woke up, one of the giant windows was broken out and covered with a sheet of plywood.

On Josh and mine recent trip to Chicago, we drove right by the Ohio House, located on Ohio St. The office looked the same, but the motel building looked as if there had been some worl done, and there was no boarded up windows. Josh and I should have stayed there.

I am only 28, and have experienced some of life's greatest things...

Sucked In, like a straw

Well the olympics have sucked me in, which is why there is a lack of posting. The live coverage is on during my prime time, around midnight. I don't care what the sport is, I am addicted.

We had a good time in Chicago, I think we forget how close it actually is. That is the great part about living where we live, so many cities within 5 hour travel time.

We went up to Wrigleyville on Saturday, but the cheapest ticket for one person was $150, so we passed and went to a nearby bar, which was flying Iowa Hawkeye flags. (They had a fund rasier for the hawkeyes and flood releif a few nights before we were there) We just walked right in, got a table, and ordered some food, while watching the Cubs on the TV. The Cubs managed to lose, so we hoped the train and headed back to downtown where our hotel was.

Chicago is easy to navigate, since it is on an easy block system and the train takes you wherever you need to go. We managed to get into the Rain Forest Cafe for supper, that place is wild. There is so many things going on, elephants trumpeting, apes pounding their chests, and tunderstorms.

We called it a night and made it back to our hotel. I think traveling around Chicago at night is safer that walking Iowa City at night.

On Sunday we knew we were going to go watch the Red Sox at the White Sox ball park, US Cellular Field. We checked out of the hotel and hoped the train to the ballpark. We did not have tickets, so we tried the legal way at the ticket office. They had $50 tickets, but on the highest deck with obstructed view. So we found a scalper, who had tickets next to the right feild foul pole, for only $60 bucks, great tickets.

There were so many Red Sox fans in town. Most of them were from Boston, it was fun riding the train with them, seems as if there were more of them on the train than white sox fans. It might be because you can park around their stadium. This is a newer ball park, so it really lacks in the atmosphere, no street vendors, no bars, hard to find scalpers.

Well we managed to sit near some rude White Sox fans. When the Red Sox pitchers left the game they sang "Na Na, Hey, Hey, Goodbye" but when it was time for their pitcher to leave, they booed the Red Sox singing of the song. Then when we were leaving, the red sox lost 6-5, one of the White Sox fans said, Go Tampa Bay (as they are leading the league) Um can't they cheer for their own team? Oh well we had a good time, we snagged a Nick Swisher bobble head doll and had some steak sandwhiches and peanuts.

After the game it was time to go find the car and drive back home.

So that leads me to today, nothing new really going on. Just working and it is not as hot as it has been, which is nice. Then when work is done I can go home and watch some more of the Olympics, that Micheal Phelps is fun to watch.

Chicago or bust!

This week has flown by, seems as if we were just preparing for a party. Tonight we are preparing for a trip to Chicago. We were originally going with some friends, but something came up and they can't make it. We are still going to go as the Red Sox are in town. This is a lot cheaper than going to Boston. Hopefully we will be able to get a ticket to see the Red Sox take on the White Sox. Also in town is the Cubs vs Cards baseball game, that ticket is pricey, so unsure if we will be able to afford that. Instead I think we will watch the game from a bar in the Wrigleyville area, who knows maybe we can catch a ball that flies over the outfield wall. Either way it should be a good weekend, there are lots of things to do in Chicago.

Have a good one!

10 years older

Well, it has been officially 10 years since high school. Or those 10 years have been celebrated. The activites started at our house for a little get together before the actual events. We had a great time, but then it was time to leave and go to the actual reunion. We all piled in some cars and arrive at the bar. It was similar to high school, my classmates all sat in the same groups they ran around with at high school. So I guess it takes 20 years for everyone to get along? Who really knows, and does it really matter?

To finish the reunion activites we went to a picnic at a classmates housee. After finally finding a path to the house, we made our appearance. It too was the same as high school, everyone sitting in their little groups, with a little mingling going on. Maybe it was the activity or something, I think we should skip the 15 and plan a kick arse 20 year reunion. Oh well all of that is over for now.

The good part of the whole weekend is that all my friends were in town at the same time, which is super rare. I guess it was a good weekend in general.

So that gets me to now. Josh is in Indianapolis for work. Iowa will be hosting part of the women's NCAA tournament in the future so he went to a conference about that. I am in the Gutt until Thursday. There is a gentleman that travels from Texas every year to stay with us for about 10 days. So I am on motel duty, however other than him it is rather quiet up here.

I am having trouble loading pictures, so I will add some later.

August...already!!

Wow the year has really flew by, can't believe the year is half over. Wish this heat wave was more than half over. Supposed to be in the 90's this weekend, with all the strange weather related things that have happened this year, why not have a hot and super humid summer too?

Josh and I have been frantically cleaning and throwing out for a party we are having this weekend. It is my 10 year high school reunion. So we are having a little get together with my friends before the actual reunion stuff. Should be a good time, grilling and having smores. However the cleaning has come to a halt, you can only do so much before it wont look any better. We also said goodbye to Halen's couch, yes the dog had her own couch. However when we got Kona she thought it was a chew toy, so it just got more disgusting. So our decreasing furniture pattern continues. Someday we need to get some more, or we will be sitting on the floor, especially if the dogs keep up their pattern of destruction.

That is really all that is new, besides the sweltering heat, the shop has been around 89 degrees the last couple of days, it is just great! Also I was searching for a picture to post from the high school years, but my friend kate has banned me from posting unattractive pictures. Let's just say high school was not my peak or anyone's.