Yup, two posts in one day from me. We got home Monday from a 10 day, 3400+ mile road trip. We went up to Grand Forks, ND to see Matt, then to Medora, ND for the musical, then to Miles City, MT where I checked off state #48, then to Sturgis, SD to check out a cemetery where some of Sherry’s relatives are buried (I have geo-tagged photos of the tombstones that she’ll probably put up on ancestry.com soon), then to Rapid City, SD, then Mt. Rushmore, then over to Sioux Falls to pick up my mother, back to Mitchell for a family reunion, then down across Iowa to the Amana Colony, to Galesburg, IL and on home. It was a lot of driving, but we had a good time and it was great to spend time with Matt and my aunts, uncles, and cousins. As a result, I have now been in all of the contiguous 48 states. The only remaining ones to accomplish 50@50 are, of course, Alaska and Hawaii.
Category: travel
Yes, I’m still alive
I really did have every intention of posting more frequently, but now I see it has been 1.5 months since my last one. I’ve had lots of things I wanted to talk about (and I’ve posted many of the links to facebook), but I just haven’t had the time/motivation/energy to make myself post here. I’m on vacation this week and spending it with my parents. A nice change of pace. Watching lots of football and college hoops. Tonight, I get to see my niece’s band concert. BTW, Happy Birthday, Mom!! It has turned into another month of putting miles on the car, though not quite as many as in July. I was out to visit my sister (and work in NJ) the week before Thanksgiving and now the drive down here. It won’t be the 5K+ of July, but easily more miles than I normally put on the vehicle. Thanksgiving was good, I hope you had good ones, too. None of the kids were actually around on Thursday, Shane and Jen went to her parents’ and Erin had to work (and, of course, Matt was in ND). Shane and Jen, along with Sherry’s Mom, sister, brother-in-law, and their 2 kids were all out the house for a second Thanksgiving meal on that Saturday though. I do truly have much to be thankful for this year. I’m debating what to do for my holiday letter this year. I’ll probably only actually mail it to folks that I don’t have e-mail addresses for (or folks that I’m not friends with on FB, I haven’t entirely decided yet). Oh, and I really need to work on that magazine/journal article I’m supposed to be writing. I’ll probably do that this afternoon while Dad gets his hair cut.
Home for a while
Well, my car has travelled 5,118 miles in the last 30 days. It has been a busy month and I have one more little visit (though I intend to fly that one rather than drive) to make sometime this month, but otherwise I think I’ll be a homebody for a while. The week after the holiday, I visited my youngest sister for a couple of days and got to see my nephew play some baseball, then went on to NJ to get in some face-time with the boss and team. While there, I also got to visit with some good friends from back when I lived out that way. Then it was back to my sister’s for another day and on home. After a week at home, it was down to NC to spend time with Mom and Dad and celebrate Dad’s 75th birthday. While there, I set up wireless networking so I can use the laptop down there. I also was able to have lunch with a very dear friend from college that I hadn’t seen in over 25 years. Then I came home, but my car went on another road trip with Matt. He went to Memphis to visit a friend from basic training (I think) then to visit with George (his old boss, the one who took him to Japan a few years back). After he brought my car back, I traveled back over to my sister’s for my nephew’s belated graduation party. Lots of miles on the car, but lots of good visits with friends and family. There has also been some bad news in the extended family, but I don’t really want to talk about that right now. It looks like the weather probably won’t allow the flying I was hoping to do. I really need to find some time to get instrument current again.