Away Too Long

Since my last post, 10,000 lifetimes ago, a great deal has changed.  Some of it good, some of it bad, but I have been away from the blogosphere more than I care to admit.

Here is a quick recap:
  - Read two books
  - Visited Dad, Winston and Shiho
  - Watched the local football team slowly dissolve
  - The great fall weather has turned in the last two weeks.  My days on a bike have been clipped by a big snow storm on the thirteenth and an ice storm this weekend.
  - There is of course more, but it is the memory thing at this point

I will do the books this weekend.

This is the Seventh & Eighth grade football team that took second place in the "A" bracket.  We lost to a good Brooklyn Center team on October 30th at Blake.  There are some great athletes on this team, but we never were very good on offense.  This was a fun year to coach.

 During the weekend of November 13 & 14, Karyl and I flew to DC to give Shiho and Winston a few hours off duty.  This is supposed to be a picture of the world's smallest jalapeno pepper plant.  In this shot the pepper actually looks decent but it was closer to fingernail size.

Here is a shot of Dad and I before Karyl and I head back to the Twin Cities.  It is hard to believe that a man who was so alive, active and curious has gotten to this point.  Dad spends his day in this room watching television and not really tracking much of a story line, as far as I can tell.  Like so much in life, I didn't see this coming.  I never imagined the story ending in this fashion.  Dad can barely stand up these days, which raises all kinds of questions that I don't want to think about.  This fall he started calling me "Byron" again for the first time in 100 years.  Sigh.

Sunday morning I got up to head over to Dunn Brothers to meet with the guys, but after putting one foot on the back step and slipping on the ice, I bagged the trip.  This is too bad, as the Greek leaves for Hawaii this week, and now I have missed him until next spring.  I don't like that.  It is mornings like this that make me wonder why I live in a spot where I can't ride year around.  I know  people do, but on ice?  Really?  

Later that same Sunday I watched the 100th Packer vs. Viking game.  You can just barely read the score in the top left of the screen.  Green Bay 31, Minnesota 3.  There were fights between players and between coaches and players.  The Vikings are 3-7 and today they let go of the coach.  This is bittersweet for me.  I guess Childress wasn't that well liked, but I hate to see him go.  I am, however, excited to see Leslie Frazier get his shot at being an NFL coach.  My fingers are crossed that the team responds and that we begin to move forward once again.

Well, that helps a little bit.  Not so much to carry around.