Things Are Heating Up ...

... in Formula 1. Schumi wins the German Gran Prix at Hockenheim today, and pulls within 11 points of Fernando Alonso in the Drivers' Championship. With Felipe Massa taking 2nd for Ferrari as well, Scuderia Ferrari pulls within 10 of Renault for the Constructors' Championship. BOO-YAH! Go Schumi, at the Hungaroring, two weeks from now! Add a fourth to the streak!

I know you NASCAR fans don't appreciate it, but there is more to racing than banked left turns.

A Productive Saturday (And A Thank You)

First, the "Thank You". We enjoyed our time with you all at the house in Corolla ... it's always good to renew our family ties, and I've been thinking that Mom and Dad would have really enjoyed that. I'm also thinking that Mom might have overtaken the kitchen and all the "Brookhart Women" would have marched to her beat. Dad would have enjoyed sitting in the living room, watching CNN or probably Fox News, and would have LOVED having the smaller grandkids sitting on his lap.

I can close my eyes and almost see it. It's a good "vision".

Sandi, John, Jane, or Marion ... here's another thing to think about. Next trip down there, or to wherever, I'd like to add two names to the list of candidates. Janice and I had talked about it for this year, but didn't think Liz and Rhys would be all that interested in it ... turns out they expressed a lot more interest in it that I had expected. Mea culpa.

In other news, we had a very productive day. There were a few things that we needed for the house and had some good coupons for those, picked up some dry cleaning, I did several loads of laundry to catch up, we established a "house bank account" (jeez, only after what ... 8 years?), and have hopefully picked up the winning group of numbers for tonight's Powerball drawing.

We can hope, anyway ... yes? LOL

This Weekend

Well ... we now have 100% of our worldly possessions at home, although not exactly as we had planned.

Even though I got a good charge out of the car-starter/air compressor combo unit and it gave the battery a good boost, there is apparently something wrong with the starter on the motorcycle. We spent about an hour and a half Saturday afternoon trying to get it started, to no avail. Finally we called AAA and took advantage of our AAA + RV membership and had it towed home. Clearly, after not having ridden it for two years, the bike needs a lot of work. And cleaning.

On a better note, we took advantage of a 10% coupon from Lowe's we had received as part of a "Welcome Neighbor" package and got our patio furniture Saturday evening. I spent the majority of the morning putting the tables and umbrella / umbrella stand together, then Janice did a lot of work on the outdoor plants this afternoon. I think everything worked out really well (see below).There is plenty of room for siblings whenever they decide to visit. The table is 54" in diameter, and we have six chairs with the set. There's a lazy susan built into the middle of the table, so we can all share salt and pepper, butter, etc. Two of the chairs are swivel rockers - but all of them are really comfortable.
We're happy with the results, and are looking forward to hosting some outdoor meals!

Straw! (and other news)

I agree with Lori - the kids were all well behaved. I can see how Olivia and Ross might be a little bored, with such a whirlwind of activity over the week and the weekend.

Congratulations on your new place, Lori and Brad ... it's a great place for those kids to grow up in. Great choice!

I also want to thank John & Sandi for their great hospitality over our stay, and for the awesome party on Sunday. As usual, you guys put on a terrific meal and Liz and Rhys had a great time.

It was good for them to get some time with the Brookhart clan. We're really looking forward to them coming out for some 1-on-1 time with us later this summer and fall. We've planned to have them out around each of their birthdays. We're thinking we might have them join the crowd for the next Outer Banks trip.

They also had a good time over in St. Peters with the Cronin clan. I'm proud of them - they are growing up and seeming to come into their own.

We're back to the drudgery of unpacking and settling in. I picked up a pretty neat little tool yesterday at Sam's Club that I will need for getting the motorcycle out of the parking garage - it's a combination AC-rechargeable 12-volt 450 amp car-starter / 260-PSI air compressor. It even has a little trouble light built into it. Pretty nice little unit and it was $5 cheaper than I remembered seeing it there before. I read the instructions that it needs to charge for 48 hours before the first use, so I have it charging at the office (free electricity there ... LOL).

The back yard is really overgrown. We got more rain yesterday morning, so I'm letting it dry out a little more today - it's beautiful here this morning - and I'll get the grass cut when I get home tonight (provided I can find the John Deere in the garage ... LOL).

We got notice in yesterday's mail that all the hard work making the spackling repairs and tidying up the apartment paid off - we'll get 100% of our security deposit back from the Velvet Mill - that will be a nice little check. I figured we would. There were some additions I had made as far as wire shelving, etc., over the years that really made a lot of sense and improved the place - they really should have given us 110% of our security deposit back but things don't work that way ... LOL.

We're looking forward to seeing everyone in the Outer Banks - it's just around the corner!