Wednesday at BU

Here we are, jammed into a cab to move from the Holiday Inn to BU.  It has been raining hard all morning, so we are quite happy to be in a cab.  

Here we are venturing down Babcock Street on our way to a new beginning.

After we pull up at the dorm Maura steps out and a local cob goes right after her for wearing a Yankee jacket and hat.  And so it begins....

The girls had to sign for their keys, and then it is up in the elevator.  Here we have just walked in to see how it all looks.

Really.  Only two toilets on the whole floor for the girls.  This seems a bit anachronistic, or just poor planning.

Next it was off to Target.  Takle was our cabbie and he was very patient with us.  He was also a star from coming back to the Watertown Mall to pick us up with our haul or lamps, towels, et al... Takle is a father of three who works at Seven Eleven in the morning and then drives a cab from 11:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.  He is trying to save money to bring his family of two girls and a boy here.

Here we are using the laundry cart to haul our Target purchases up to the dorm room.  Let the organizing begin...

Here is Grace, with bed made, getting her electronic purchases all set up.  I like the wood on the walls--much better than looking at cinder block brick.

All right girls, the ball is in your court.  Have fun, make good decisions, and "Go for it" (as we used to say way back in the 1970's...

Sixty Seven

This is a picture of Harriett when she was a young and defiant woman.  Today would have been her 67th birthday if my math is correct.  

Last night Karyl and Susan were talking about Madmen and the culture of the early 1960's.  At one point, Karyl pauses and says, "I still miss Harriett", and I think that pretty well sums up how we all feel.

I don't miss Harriett's interactions with Gaylord, as I think Harriett was pretty hard on Gaylord, but other than that - we miss her a lot.

Happy Birthday Harriett.

Beantown in the Rain...

Up at four in the morning, on the plane by 6:30 and wheels up by 7:12 a.m.  After circling Boston for quite awhile we landed and navigated our way to 1200 Beacon Street and the Holiday Inn.  We are already seeing lots of parents and kids around.  I don't know how busy tomorrow is going to be.

After we arrived Karyl and I braced the mist/light rain and walked up to Harvard street, where we had lunch at an artsy place called The Regal Begal.   Here is the beer I had for lunch.  Very good.
 Then it was across the street for good ice cream at J.P. Licks.  We then walked down Babcock street to the dorm Maura and Grace are going to stay in.  While I was showing Karyl the athletic field, we discovered this plaque.  The Boston Braves used to play baseball here.  How cool is that.  Outstanding.

After walking down Commonwealth to the bookstore and the back up Beacon to the hotel we collapsed and napped for an hour or so before taking off to Logan to meet the girls.  We had more than our fair share of trouble finding the girls; who knew that Terminal B had two parts.

We all made it back down to the hotel by 9:00 tonight and then we headed off to the Elephant Walk for some some gluten-free dinner.  The Cambodian food was solid to impressive.  And finally, another walk in the rain....thanks goodness for the new raincoat...

Fingers crossed that tomorrow goes as well.

A Real Saturday...

For the first time all summer, since school was out, I don't have to go work at the bike shop today.  I actually get to spend time at home and do something with Karyl.  As much as I love the bike shop, I am psyched to have a weekend at home to do some work around here.

Yesterday I spent three hours at the bike shop putting together a new bike.  Earlier this summer I bought a frame (huge mistake) and so I have been collecting parts for the last several weeks.  I came very close to finishing the project, but I need to get a different sized rotor for my back brake to work.  After all the work of collecting parts (and spending a touch more than I wanted) I now get to see if the new bike will be fun to ride or a "what-was-I-thinking" project.

This past week I have been working at school to get the new school year up and running.  It was a great feeling to get back to the classroom and start to fit the puzzle pieces together again.  It will be fun to see everyone on Monday, and then on Tuesday we head to Boston to get Maura and Grace all set for their first year of college.  Quite the week.

More later...

A Great Day of Pergola...

So, yesterday we decided to lop eight inches off the top of the posts because I had bought posts that were too big.  These means that we wasted two days putting up posts that turned out to be the wrong size.  Sigh.

Today we cut the top of the posts to hold the five by eights that run left to right.  Then we bolted on the five by eights, and then we put the old two by tens back on  It proved to be quite the challenge to drill through the new posts and hit the old holes, but Paul did a great job.

We got this far by early afternoon (after starting at 8:00 a.m. this morning).  We decided to keep going and two hours later we had the eleven two by fourteens back up.

So here is what it looks like now...

I am very happy with the end result.  I need to clean up the piles of dirt, stain the whole business and then put the bricks back in the patio.  But I am very happy with this result.  It is much more stable and solidly built.

Thanks to Paul who gave up a week of his time to come over here and work in ninety degree heat and humidity to get this beast put back together.

I can't wait to go outside and lounge under  the new structure.  Whew, we made it...

Death by Pergola...

So at the beginning of this summer, this is what the backyard pergola looked like.  Attractive, but not terribly stable.

Here is what the area looked like after the take-down phase.  Only managed to bounce one of the boards off of my head during this part.

The most challenging part of the whole enterprise was getting four 32" cement pillars out of the ground.  Lots of sweat equity was spent here.

Then came the next phase.  Dig the holes down to four feet deep, put a 16" cardboard tube in and add cement.  This part was not that bad.

With the help of my friend, Paul, we have the first two posts up for the new pergola.  This part was fairly challenging as the twelve foot long posts were a bear to handle.

Tuesday night we were treated to several inches of rain, which, as you can see, filled the holes with water.  Fortunately by breakfast time the water had receded and after scooping out a little mud, work could progress.

I wonder what my friends the vols do when it pours like this.  How to they stay dry in their underground homes?

So, this is where we were at lunch time yesterday.  After a bite to eat, and a chance to cool down in air conditioning, we came back to decide that we had build the posts too high.  Sigh.

So we either cut down the posts from the top, or we dig them up and cut off the bottoms so the top is at a better height.  No great choices there.

This pergola better be top-shelf when we are done.....

I Don't Get The Logic...

The nice folks at the Richfield City Hall called to tell me that my plans for a pergola had been approved for a Building Permit.  For only $105.25, I can go down to City Hall legally build a pergola.

The permit fee is going to be my largest expense in this whole project.  Now, I know that is misleading because I am using a lot of wood from the first time we built a pergola.  Perhaps the fees are designed to help pay for all the inspectors and their support staff.  I can't imagine what the fee would be if I was adding a chimney or a second floor.  Scary.

The fee is almost a disincentive to build using the permit system...

This hole is located near our back stoop.  So far during this project I have pulled two dead vols out of this bad boy.  There are two holes just above the form, on the bottom side of the photo, where the vols seem to have been traveling north and south.  This hole has interrupted their throughway and the poor vols climb up their tunnel and then fall into the hole.  Their holes are the size of a quarter, which I guess means the vol can climb out using his/her back to press against the tunnel as they climb.  Once they get in the big hole the vols apparently can't climb out.

I hope to get the posts for the holes today, so that I can put dirt back in the hole soon, and stop the demise of my earthly buddies.

Why?

If you were a professional musician why would you use an out-of-focus shot, especially with the "white man's overbite" (Billy Crystal quote from "When Harry Meets Sally").

Ouch.

The Call...

Yesterday, Maura and I headed off for St. Paul to cash in a gift-certificate that she had won as a result of some of her art work.  As is often the case these days when you are with Maura, we were listening to the Yankee's game.  As Alex Rodriguez came up to bat in the first inning the radio announcers (the Yankee's broadcast crew) was mentioning how he has been struggling (0 for his last 17).  I turned to Maura and said, "Okay, I making the call.  He is going to get #600."  Sure enough, not on the next pitch, but during that at bat, A-Rod hammered on to deep center field for #600.

Congratulations, but Hank Aaron is still my man.

All that for $140...

Yesterday I parted company with this old Trek.  I bought it last summer for $100, and I sold it for about that yesterday.  This frame was just a little too tall for me, and it made me a touch nervous riding it as my winter bike.

After selling it I am struck by how hollow I feel with a handful of cash compared to having had a bike.

The good news is there is a tiny bit more space in the garage, but an old friend has moved on.  (The young man who bought the bike collects old Treks.  He thought this one was from the 1970's.)

A Good Read from Iceland...Indridason Delivers

Reading is similar to watching movies in that context is everything.  My two previous reads this summer had been about grim subjects and I was searching for a story that didn't share such a bleak view of the human condition.  Based on a recommendation of a trusted friend (Thank you Gonzo) I picked up Arnaldur Indridason's Silence of the Grave.  I have to admit to being skeptical about this venture.  I thought this was another author riding on the coat tales of Steig Larsson and the Dragon Tattoo series (which I greatly enjoyed).

This book had me from the first sentence.  "He knew at once it was a human bone, when he took it from the baby who was sitting on the floor chewing it."  That piqued my interest, and while it took me a while to battle through Icelandic names, I enjoyed this story.

A bit ironic that a story about a wife beater would be the tale that I find redemptive in my quest for good summer reads.  Three and half paws up for this title.

The Green Glass Sea

I actually finished reading this fine book last week sometime, but I have been slow to get to the keyboard...

This is a story about two young girls who find themselves thrown together at Los Alamos in the last stages of World War Two.  The book does a nice job of weaving in history from that era without being too heavy handed, which can often be the case with historical fiction.

I read this story over a long period of time, finishing up the last two-thirds of the book last week.  I liked the unusual characters and, for the most part, how they behaved seemed believable.  I would have to give this book the three paws up on the Tex scale (four paws up is the best).