Happy Birthday!

It's October and birthday month is here for many of the Turks.

But how could I forget to post for my best-est buddy Joel.  The dude turned 20 years old on Sunday.  20.  No matter how often I say it I am still not right with it.  It was just a few years ago he was playing Thomas the train, or was it legos and then baseball and he was in High School.  Now he's a man on his own.

It's hard to say happy birthday for some ages and its even harder when the are 1900 miles away.  We have not had him blow candles out or pictures of him of the last 2 years.  It's bittersweet.

So here are a few birthday pics to remember him by.

Little Joel says Thumbs up let the pictures roll!

Who knew he picked his college when he was 12?  

Ha how fitting to end on the little sad pumpkin he made when he was in pre school.

By the way candy bars  do not travel well to Arizona this time of year.  Even Priority Mail, even with ice packs...just saying..

Lets see travel post and a car post,  now combine them?  Well not really.

While Mom is off gallivanting in Europe,  I 'borrowed' her car and gave it some TLC.  At first I thought I had Jenny's car.  With all the car seats, toys, blankets and kids clothes in the car.  Checked again, nope this is Mom's car, I am pretty sure.

Started early  - You know pre winter stuff, wash and wax..

Had lots of scuffs and scrapes and scratches.  I will suggest she parks away from people from now on.  I removed quite a bit of  paint that wan't hers on the doors, obvious door dings.  

I am not amused at these scuffs.....That means buffing.

Some more....

Ok, I can fix this.

Yea this is better

Ready to go.  So after claybar and washing and polishing and waxing we have the final product.  I then 'unborrowed' and brought it back home.  

24,901 and 238,900
Just numbers I suppose.

What I f I told you that one was the miles to the moon and the other around the earth at the equator. Then if I told you that Tracys Subaru went more than 12 times around the world or is one third the way back from the moon?
Well it would be the truth as that little wagon, er truck hit 300,000 miles today.

I think I went through the numbers a while ago, but that's 37 oil changes, over 11,800 gallons of gasoline for a total cost of $31,423.27. That's $6000 more than what we paid for the car.  24 tires.... you get the idea.  

I think that's pretty remarkable.  And it's still going.

  

Mama Mia!

Hey , Mom finally worked up the courage and bought her European vacation.

Fast forward a few months to the date of departure.

I stopped by to take her to the place where the coach would pick her up to take her to the airport.  We chatted for a while and made sure she had everything.   Just about ready to leave, she kiddingly  said, "I should go to the bathroom an throw up before I leave".  Yes she still was quite nervous.  Can you blame her?  When was the last time she traveled any distance without someone with her; family or friends and this was to a whole different continent.  Well I got her off to the bus, like I was sending one of my kids off to school for the first time.  Waves and kisses from the bus and off she went.   

Got a text a few hours later that she was already having a good time (only at the airport) and she should be fine with her group.  Ahh they grow up so fast don't they?  Haven't heard from her since, and I think that is a good thing.  

Can't wait to hear the stories and see the pictures when she gets back.  Wonder if she will do it again?

Bikes

I used to believe in a lot of things and as I get older, I have become more jaded and skeptical. Karma, one of the last things I hoped really existed has left the building for me.

Why? Well, maybe chalk it up to bad luck or bad timing or who knows what else, but it seems like this household doesn't catch too many breaks. We pretty much earn everything we have, and its sucks when things go wrong.

3 weeks after we left Joel, on 9/11, his bike was stolen; lock cut and bike gone. People really suck. Now he has to hump it an extra 25 minutes on foot to classes for now. We will watch Craigslist and ebay and check with the police and campus police but I think it's never going to be found. Hopefully the claim I put in on the credit card I used to purchase it will will be approved and we will have some money to get a new one. I doubt it will be as nice, but hey thats life. Maybe I should steal one back. Enforce my own Karma.

Anyway, I took my bike out for a ride yesterday. Gorgeous day, low 60's sunny. No bugs.

 I drove to New Fane only to find a bike race going on. So I drove the extra 20 minutes to Greenbush instead. I had never been here before,  I had no idea what to expect. I knew it was more difficult than New Fane, but by how much?

There are 4 loops on them system and to do them all will be about 9 miles. I did 1, 2 and 3. When I came up on the option to start four or loop back on 3, it was a no brainer. I was not ready for 3 more miles of this. I had already used all 24oz of water and was sucking wind pretty hard. I would say that this trail was at least twice as difficult. Why? Well it wasn't for elevation gain, but the technicality of the trail, it was harsh. So many rocks and small boulders and mostly on ascents and descents following hairpin turns. It was hard to stay upright. I did, but there were a few moments where I wasn't too sure about that.

Difficulty aside it was a nice set of trails. Lots of narrow in between trees and 98% under tree cover. The trails were marked better than New Fane too. I will have to build up my stamina more before I hit this again. Oh I forgot to mention the occasional tree down in the trail. 3 out of 4 I was able to jump over. This last one, not so much.

Its hard to see the scale in this picture but that 'log' almost came up to my waist.  Not going to bunny hop or climb over this one.  

After the ride was over, I realized how close I was to the Parnell Tower.  Never have been there,  I said what the heck,  it is on the way home.  The Parnell Tower is a state park with a 60' high observation tower on top of a 1300' hill.  You can see Sheboygan, Lake Michigan and Holy Hill (35 miles away) from here.  Pretty cool, we should come back in about 2-3 weeks to see the fall colors.

Anyway, if you want to see the trail ride I did, the next post (below) has a link to the trail and the details behind it (like my avg heart rate of over 150!)  Click view details and also choose satellite maps .

Greenbush trails

Pumpkin Rant

You know how we (the royal we) all get sick of the Department stores shoving Christmas down our throats well before Thanksgiving?  It seems that Halloween (fall in general) is getting in on the act.  

Halloween express stores are starting to open.  Starbucks is already shilling Pumpkin Spice lattes and even what used to only be a 2-3 week occurrence in October is now a already on the shelves.  Ima talking about pumpkin beer.

Seriously, the leaves are still green, the kids barely went back to school, there has been no frost on the ground or even the specter of chilly nights. The NFL has not even played one regular season game.  Where do these places get the pumpkin from already?  C'mon folks lets ease up a bit,  Fall will be here in good time, summer is still hanging around and really if we push fall so fast, what is after that?  That's right, winter.

Ain't nobody got time for that.

Back to school

Long weekends are good, they could have been a bit more sunny. 

This after a storm rolled through Sunday.

Alas, that just means school is right around the corner.  Time to put all that time of preparation to good use.  Clothes, supplies, attitudes...all come in to play today.  

Kiki had the early bus 6:40 am.... She was up and ready to roll, today.  Tomorrow may be another story.  First day is always the easiest.  

And of course Tracy made Joel take a picture of his first day of classes last week.  

4 time zones in 3 days

After getting back from Arizona late Friday night, I had to head to New York on Monday.  That's basically PST to EST.  or 4 time zones and 3 hours.

So I had some time the night I got into NYC and had Mets tickets.  Rode the E and 7 trains to Willets point where I was completely floored to find out that it is also the same stop as the US Open!  Wish I had Open tickets instead, but I doubt they were the same $10 as I paid for the baseball tickets.

Waterslide Hi-jinks

Here is just one with a few more to come!

Start to another year

I write this from poolside at the resort in Arizona.   It's a bit warm. 99 or so.  This is a nice resort. Right at the base of the mountains. Yesterday we dropped the girls off to shop and Joel and I played another 9 holes of golf. Club rentals are included with our room so it was only $15 to play and that included a cart. Really beautiful course.

 But enough about me (humblebrag).

We moved Joel into his apartment this morning. Met 2 of his 3 roommates. Seem pretty nice. We still have a few things to do before we leave him again tomorrow for good.

Not sure where this summer went. Again its a mix of emotions. Happy for him but a little sad as he gets that much closer to leaving the nest for good... 

I tell you what. The apartment may be cheaper than the dorm but there is quite a bit to buy to get ready for this type of living. Extra stuff you don't think about:  kitchen items, cleaning supplies, etc.

Oh and because he is a bit further off campus we got him a bike too. Really got a sweet deal on that. I debated getting a cheapo Walmart bike for 160.00.  But we got a much nicer one, lighter, better fitting and with much better warrant for only  about $100 more. The bike store had a leftover clearance bike that would only fit some one Joel's size or bigger. Half off.  I was a bit jealous. 

We finished off the day with some swimming and pizza. I will have pictures and videos up soon. We had free reign of the water slide so we broke some rules. 

Dirty Girls

Tracy and few friends all hit the Dirty Girl mud run on Saturday.  Looks like they had a good time?

What do you think?

Looked like fun to me.