Honors

GP made it to the Honors Convocation (again!) this week due to his excellent grades. His best friends did, too. The three of them have been friends for years - it's so cool to see them all do well.

Medal

CP Finished 5th overall at last weekend's speech tournament. He has a whole drawer full of medals from 

Last Year of Speech

This week CP had his last showcase event at LSW. This is where all the parents and family are treated to a smattering of all the types of events in which the speech team competes.

On Saturdays, CP comes downstairs at 6:30 fully dressed and ready to compete. He's a wiz at tying his tie (and shoes, too!). He looks like a business man that's ready to take on the world. His experience with speech has given him such a useful lifelong skill.

NYC & the New WTC

After Connecticut, it was on to NYC for a day of sightseeing. It was a perfect day: 60-something degrees, no wind, no snow, blue sky, and great visibility. We drove in from CT and parked at the northwest end of central park. From there we took the subway down to the south end of Manhattan. I love public transportation!

I tried to convince JP to go on this trip, but she refused. Something about us just buying new carpet and a new roof and sofas and CP starting college this year and us being out of money. Turns out it was a good thing that she didn't go - NYC was hit with a full-on blizzard twelve hours after I left. 

The new World Trade Center is awesome, as is the view from the top. The funky white building in the foreground is the new Occulus transit station. It's really cool inside.

The memorial park is very moving and depressing. It's hard to believe that 2900 people and the old buildings were taken out by a couple of fools that were able to hijack airliners with boxcutters.

St. Paul's Episcopal Church is only a block away from the WTC. It escaped the collapses unscathed and with its 250 year old tombstones intact. It's straight out of an H.P. Lovecraft story. 

Connecticut

One of the benefits of work is a bit of travel to new places. This time I went to Connecticut (never been there before) to visit a supplier. We stayed at the owner's house in Greenwich. It sits on a dammed up river/estuary next to the coast.

TPs BDay

This year, my birthday fell on a Sunday. It was a beautiful day to stay home and do nothing.

Improvised Cat Traps

We all know that the fastest way to round up cats is to put out a cat trap. Any time of day, just set out an open box and within minutes it will contain a cat, even if they don't quite fit.

What if you don't have a box? No problem - just make a fake one with tape on the floor.

The tape trap isn't as fast as the box, but it's still effective. This trap caught GP before the cat. He walked thru the room and stood in the center of the trap and asked what it was for.

If you're out of boxes and tape, then you can use your knitting project. Just set it down for a minute or two, and you will be sure to attract a cat.

JPs BDay

The Gs smoked a pork butt for JP's birthday. We all ate way too much pork, baked mac & cheese, twice baked spuds, and slaw. 

MB sent some beautiful flowers that the cat knows would help her hack up a hairball.

Icy Monday

We had an ice storm come through Sunday night. It stayed at 32° and rained all night and day. The boys already had MLK day off. The prediction was that Tuesday would be just as bad, so school was called and the boys had a free day @ home.

Overall, it was melting as fast as it was sticking. We only maybe a 1/4" on everything. Just enough to make it pretty without tearing down all the trees.

Gibson!

The $350 I made from selling the Dig Dug arcade game has been burning a hole through my pocket like a pound of thermite. I was going to get a fretless bass, but instead found a sweet used Gibson LPJ Pro. It has a couple of scratches and I had to install a new nut, but it's a solid player. The body is all mahogany with a carved mahogany top (usually they're maple) and a maple neck (usually they're mahogany). It's not an actual Les Paul, but it's close enough for me!

It plays like a dream.

Lamppost vs Car

Last week someone lost control (or was playing on their phone) and ran off the road and hit our streetlight post dead on. I didn't realize the posts are fiberglass. Ours is now listing to the north and it's smashed where the car hit it. I'm glad it was this and not our tree. Two years ago the same thing happened to one of the trees across the street, except that it was summertime and the road was dry.

Dishwasher Helper

When it comes to working the dishwasher, JP refuses help from the boys and me. Something to do with incompetence or something. However, she does welcome help from the animals. M usually does the pre-wash cleaning, and L helps with the loading.

Montecristo Guitar

Over Christmas, I picked up a 3-string electric cigar box guitar. It's a short scale, tuned to an open-G and it has no frets (just lines), so it's played with a slide. Last weekend I replaced the fake cigar box with a real one that our next door neighbor gave us. It's much more authentic now. Just need to learn how to play it.

New Carpet

Once the holidays cleared out, we bit the bullet and upgraded our carpet. This gave us the opportunity to get rid of the squeaky floor by CP's door. Turns out the noise was coming from the floor moving relative to the wall. We sunk some huge screws in along with some glue that have taken care of the problem.

We did the installation in two parts so that we didn't have to move everything downstairs. Of course, we had helpers all the way. We took the old Marshall Fields sofa and the computer hutch from Woodstock to the homeless shelter. What a bear it was to get the sofa out! Despite taking the door off, JP will have to repaint the door frame.

Old on the left, new on the right.

Thermal Expansion

Since our A/C (and heat pump) died this fall, we've been running on gas heat, which puts out much warmer air. During our last cold spell, it was 5° outside and a lot warmer than that at the ceiling in the living room. We heard what sounded like a bird smashing into the window - it was the inner pane breaking on its own due to the temperature gradient between in and outside. A few years ago, the lower window did the same thing and we fixed it ourselves. Lesson learned. This time, we'll hire someone.

Fast XMas

This year, we went to Nana's for Christmas. Drive to IL on Friday, stay two days, drive home on Monday. It went fast! W the cat loved all the attention he got from the boys.

On the way there, we started off with frozen rain until we got to Omaha. The radar looked awful, but the air was so dry, nothing was hitting the ground. An hour north of Des Moines, I-35 was shut down due to ice. Good thing we weren't going to Minneapolis. We skirted the storm and had no snow and no traffic the whole way. Ten minutes after we arrived, it started snowing and continued all night. On Christmas Day, a fast-moving Texas-to-Canada cold front dropped down a tornado less than an hour from Lincoln. Kinda glad we missed out on that, too.

Puzzled

One of our new holiday traditions is to put together a puzzle. This one we picked up in NYC at the library gift shop. 

The cats LOVE to help. There are so many pieces on the table that need to be knocked to the floor.

Even when all the pieces are snapped together, V can't help herself.

Downsizing

Dig Dug has gone the way of Pole Position. The arcade is down to two machines.

We still have one too many arcade cabinets in the garage. Can't decide which one will be next. Tempest is the all time greatest game, but the Omega Race cabinet is just so cool...

Shanghai Video

Finally! I got the video uploaded from the Shanghai trip. It's in HD, so it should look OK on full-screen. Check it out here: Shanghai Video

2016 LSW Wreath Auction

This was JP's 3rd year as chairperson for the LSW Speech/Debate Team Wreath Auction. This year it was much less hectic in the weeks before than the last two times. 

We had a good turnout at the Lodge at Wilderness Ridge. I think of the 140 tickets sold, 90+ showed up for yummy hors d'ouvres.

Madame Chairperson

It's all in the name of supporting these kids and their teammates.