Saturday Night on the Ranch

I’m having a pretty exciting Saturday night watching the doubles finals of the Australian Open–at least Monte is happy– and knitting. I’ve finally started knitting the second sock. I’m not happy with the pattern, but will finish the pair. The next pair will have a heel in the them so they fit better. But I like the way the yarn works up and since this is my first pair, I’m ok with them.

I’m looking for knitting patterns for hats and have run across Queer Joe’s blog. He’s "a 40 something gay man who loves to knit." One of his patterns is for a Willie Warmer "a great gift for kilt wearers." Since I only know one Scottish fellow, and I don’t know him that well, I think I’ll pass on this site.

But I did find some hat patterns. I think I’ll try to make some for next fall.

We saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button last night. It’s very good. Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt are both good. The makeup is extraordinary. And when Blanchett is dancing, she's so graceful.

I also caved and bought the blue striped material I was longing for. Not sure what I will do with it yet. But it is really neat. Also picked up some material to recover two pillows for the camper. The mice ate the fringe off the pillows last year and it makes me mad every time I look at the pillows! I HATE MICE. So I will recover them so I don’t have to look at them.

We finished putting in the new carpeting in the camper today. Have a bit of cleaning to do yet. We haven’t decided where or when we will head out, but it will be in the next month. I want to get my quilt top done before we leave. Monte is ready to go now, so it will be a compromise. There don’t seem to be as many jobs out there this year. So we may just take off and work at Habitat for a while. Or we may just head south live oak country. We’d like to check out the Ninth Ward in New Orleans and see what has been done.

Pizza at 3 AM

We spent three days and nights with Whitney last week in Ann Arbor. People gave me flak about going to Michigan where it’s so cold. But we were in a cold spell here and the temps were the same–cold, damn cold. But Michigan was much prettier as they have about a foot of snow on the ground and it snowed all three days we were there. Ahh... heaven for me, being with my daughter and having snow falling.

We did what we do with our kids-- Monte fixed a cold air leak with rags, a trash bag and painter’s tape. I did laundry going down three sets of stairs into the creepy basement where the washer and dryer are. We also did a bit of shopping and opened all the forwards we received because we had access to high speed internet rather than slow dial up.

Whitney gave a tour to prospective students and we tagged along. Ross, Michigan’s business school, has a new building that just opened. Quite a nice facility. And, though we may be prejudiced, we thought Whitney gave a great tour, pointing out not only the educational aspects, but also the after hours networking possibilities.

We went out on Thursday night and met some of her friends. All Whit’s male friends seemed to be named Mark, Joe or Mike, but it may have been the pitchers of beer we drank at happy hour. Thursday was also the coldest night we had and we walked quickly the half mile to the Sportsman Bar and Grill. It’s the main hangout of the grad students in the early part of the evening. By 10 or so, the grad students leave as the undergrads invade. You can tell the undergrad females because they are all in high heels and skimpy tops. The grad females are in sweaters and boots. Another difference between grad and undergrad students is that grad students look at you when you talk. Undergrads look over your shoulder when they speak to you, searching for someone else... someone more interesting, someone better, some future friend or date.

On Friday night Whitney cooked dinner for us and a couple of her friends and then we went to a Michigan hockey game. While we don’t know a lot about hockey, it was fun to sit in the student section. The cheers have definitely gotten more explicit. After the game we headed back to Whitney’s for more "antifreeze," talk, and laughter. About midnight, when I thought we should probably head to bed, we took off for a house party, meeting more friends. We ended up at Happy Pizza chowing down on pizza and bread sticks at 3:30 AM! That’s right, Monte and Jane with no dozing in front of the TV before hand were out enjoying pizza and drunken laughter at 3:30 AM, keeping up with the kids.

I want to take this time to apologize to Whitney for outing her. She is a great cook and I jumped in when Mark was praising her meal, and said "She’s a great cook. She’s been cooking since she was 6 and did all the cooking when she was at home." The look that she gave me let me know that I’d let the cat out of the bag about her cooking. Then the next day, the high cost of home repairs came up, I again outed her, "Has Whitney told you about her tools?" She informed us that she’d kept her cooking and tools a secret, but yes, she did have a wide selection of tools in storage. So I apologize to you, Whit. But at least I didn’t have any pictures with me.

The Wolverine # 352

I'm in the land of snow and ice or as it's more commonly called Michigan. We took the train yesterday to avoid travel delays. Who knew, other than my father-in-law the trainman, that trains can be delayed because of snow on the tracks? We drove an hour and 45 minutes to Macomb, IL to catch the train to Chicago for a 7:00 AM ride. And no I still don't like mornings. Especially after 4 hours of sleep. The road was snow covered and at times we had to drive 40 because of slick roads.  But once on the train, the ride to Chicago was pretty uneventful and we felt pretty smug to not be on the highways.

The ride from Chicago to Ann Arbor was not so easy. First the train was an hour late. Then once we are on it, the conductors are apologizing for the delay by telling us the train had some "mechanical" problems that were now taken care of. Hey, I believe in truth but sometimes I'd just as soon not be told the whole truth. Tell me that the train had an extra inspection to make sure we are safe on this cold and snowy day.  

Then we are sitting on the train waiting for departure and the conductor once again comes on and tells us that we are ready to roll as soon as the engineer gets on. He's delayed because he had witnessed an infraction and is giving his statement. Now I'm wondering about the safety of the trip if one engineer is ratting on another engineer.  Where's the loyalty? The brotherhood? Us against the man? Man it must have been a huge infraction! 

Once we are on our way, we run into stops and delays because of snow on the tracks and meeting other trains. The trip that was to be 4 hours turned into over 6. Poor Whitney waited patiently by the phone to get updates as to when we were going to arrive. 

The first call was

 "I have no idea when we will leave, but they are saying at least an hour delay." 

Once we were on the way, the conductor had "no idea when we'll arrive. I'll be able to tell you after Battle Creek." 

So I'm back on the phone to Whit. 

"They can't tell us when we'll arrive. But I'll let you know as soon as we know." 

"Ok. I wonder when I should put the chicken pot pie in the oven? It even has home made crust." 

This was great news to Monte's ears. We had eaten depot sandwiches at 11 and it was now 6:15 and he was starving. 

The conductor did give us an update after Battle Creek. 

 "Sorry we are going so slow, but the signals are all yellow and we're proceeding with caution. " 

Yeah, 20 miles an hour.

 

Five minutes before Ann Arbor, we get the word--"Five minutes to Ann Arbor! Five minutes to Ann Arbor!"

So I'm back on the phone, which now has one bar of battery, to Whitney:

        "We're five minutes out."

"Oh! I'll put the chicken pot pie in and be on my way."

But we made it safe and sound. And if we would have been driving, we wouldn't have come. The roads were snow covered all the way and there was snow falling all day.  So despite the delays  it was a good trip. And what else do we have to do? The to-do lists are never ending and grow each week. 

The chicken pot pie? Very good! Very good indeed. 

how do they ever get anywhere?

The kids are home safe and sound and on to their next trips. I hope these trips are much better than the one we all took Friday home St. Louis.

On Friday Monte, Whitney, Lucy and I met Laef and Allison at 10:40 PM at the East Terminal. We hugged and kissed and laughed as we retrieved bags. We found the car right away in the parking garage and looking back that should have been a clue. We took off with Whitney in the co-pilots’s seat and me in the backseat. I should have reminded Whitney that it takes two of us to drive anywhere and that she would have to work to ride in the shotgun seat, but I was just happy to have my babies with me.

We were all talking at once and no one was paying any attention to where we were or where we were headed. We didn’t have Mr. Beep, (our GPS) on because St. Louis isn’t downloaded. Yes, I know the new ones have all the maps already loaded on them. Ours is old.

Monte saw a sign for I-70 and took it. Whitney didn't know she should check to see if it was I-70 East or West. In the first lull in our conversation, I looked out the window and said, "I’ve never seen that building before." Monte said, "It’s just dark out." And so we drove on.

In another couple of miles we come upon a red wall of tail lights. And for the next 45 minutes it was stop and go traffic. Which Monte hates and grumbles about anytime he encounters it. It was a hassle but we were all together and anytime we are all together I’m pretty content with whatever is going on around us and besides I’m not in the co-pilot seat. We continue on our slow way with Monte grumbling about traffic and Laef quipping that he feels like he’s at home on the 405. Laef checks for road conditions on his blackberry and informs us "There’s been an accident on 70 East and it’s closed." We still don't put two and two together. Someone remarks that it must be a bad wreck because the people on 70 West, which we think we are on, are really slowing down to look.

And so we creep on. Finally we come to where the road is closed and exit onto a side road. Once we are off the interstate, Monte looks at the compass on the rearview mirror and notices that we are headed east. East will take us downtown. We don’t want to go downtown. Of course, he doesn’t think we’ve been on 70 East because he knows we have to go west to get home and so the signs must be wrong. Or they weren’t there. Or who knows what he thinks when he gets behind the wheel.

So we all start to pay attention and find I-70 west and finally head home. The good thing is because of the wreck we have only gone 4 miles in 45 minutes and it doesn’t take long to regain our lost miles. But our 2 ½ hour trip is now a 4 hour trip.

Laef and Whitney are amazed that we ever manage to get anywhere. Monte and I are thinking it’s no big deal. We spend about a fourth of our time on the road lost or wondering if we are lost even when we have the GPS on. And we’re also thinking at least we didn’t have 30 feet of fifth wheel behind us.