Author: Ron

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Here’s Something New!

I hadn’t checked the blog in a while, and when I did, I noticed there hadn’t been any new postings in quite a while either.  So I figured I would contribute a posting with some of the latest things going on in this Fall family.

I’m working in downtown Chicago now.  As you may know, United has moved their headquarters from the suburbs (Elk Grove) to the Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower).  The commute isn’t as bad as I had thought it was going to be.  The worst part is that you are always at the mercy of the train schedule.  From the moment the alarm goes off in the morning at 5:25 AM, I’ve got one eye on the clock until I get to the train station at around 6:25.  The ride on the train is decent enough, as I can read or just relax if I want.  And I manage to catch an express that only makes three stops before arriving downtown.  The walk from the station to the office is only about four blocks and I’m at my desk by 7:35.

If you’re wondering what the view is like, I can see the building across the street just fine!  I’m only on the fifth floor and since I’ve been down there highest floor I’ve been on is the 28th.  It’s actually good being on the 5th floor as we avoid some of the hassles with the elevators that people on the upper floors have to deal with.

The commute home is pretty much the same in reverse.  I’m out of the office by 4:30 to catch the 4:45 that only makes one stop before I get off at Barrington at 5:28.  I’m walking in the door between 5:46 and 5:49.

In other news, Veronica is studying in Germany this semester.  She left about three weeks ago and has been really enjoying herself, although I don’t think she’s a big fan of German food.  For you facebook users, check out her facebook page for lots of photos.  She should be adding a bunch in the next few days as she’s just getting back to Reutlingen where she’s attending school from about ten days of travels to Berlin, Potssam, Dresden, and Hamburg.

Veronica is doing quite well at school.  Check this out!

Eric has completed one semester at the University of Dayton with a 3.5 GPA, so he is doing well, too.  He’s made a good group of friends and appears to be quite happy there.  We were a little surprised that he selected a school six hours away, but he’s very happy with his decision to go there.  You can also find him on facebook if you want to know what else is going on with him.

Mary Ann is still teaching math at the local high school.  We’re just adjusting to the two of us being the only ones around here.  It’s both good and bad.  It’s nice and quite, but then again it can be boring and we miss the kids.

That’s about it!

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Eric is a Flyer!

No, not a Philadelphia Flyer (he’s a big Blackhawks’ fan and has me watching more hockey this year than anytime in my life), but a Dayton Flyer!

He will be attending the University of Dayton in Dayton, Ohio starting in the fall and will be majoring in Engineering. 

As you may remember, Dayton won the NIT basketball tournament this past spring.

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Here’s Our Anniversary Present from the Kids

Veronica and Eric secretly purchased the two tickets to the Cubs game for our 20th anniversary a few weeks bag.  It ends up it looks like today is going to be the day the Cubbies clinch.  Even though I’m a Sox fan (can you tell which one of us gets more respect), I’m really looking forward to it.  We’re leaving in just a little bit. 

Hopefully, it’ll be as exciting as we anticipate.  We’ll keep you updated.

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Eric’s Tennis Experience

So Eric decided he was going to try out for the tennis team at high school this year.  Tryouts were scheduled for last Saturday evening.  At about noon, a friend of his from school called to ask him if he wanted to play that afternoon as a “tune-up” before the tryout.  He asked me if I could take him there for a 2:00 appointment at a tennis club in Lincolnshire, about 30 minutes from our house.  So I said OK.

We arrived shortly before 2:00, but his friend never showed.  At about 2:15, we left the tennis club and headed home.  Just as we pulled out of the parking lot, we saw about 4 or 5 police cars on the side of the road headed the other direction.  Didn’t really think much about it.

That night when we picked up Eric from the tryout, he asked, “Remember those police cars we saw this afternoon after leaving the tennis club?”  We said, “yeah, why?”  He said that’s why Isaac couldn’t make it.  They were running late, so rather than driving, they flew their airplane and landed it on the golf course across the street from the tennis club and the police arrested them.

Mary Ann and I told him that we doubt that very much, and we think his friend is making up excuses.  We started to wonder just what kind of kid this was, because we had never met him.

This afternoon, I came across the following story in the news.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-golf-course-landing-storymar04,0,5960746.story

It ends up the kid seems OK, but I’m not so sure of the father!

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I’m Trying to Get in Shape, too!

Over the past month or so, I’ve been trying to get back into shape by running on a regular basis.  It was actually quite timely, because my first day of running was actually July 4th.  It was the following day that Larry posted his entry about getting serious about doing something about his weight.  BTW, Larry, let’s see some updated figures!

 I had decided I had to get serious too because a few weeks prior when I was packing for our Battle Creek golf trip I tried on some of my golf shorts, and most of them didn’t fit because I had gotten too fat.  I didn’t start running at that time because back in mid-May, I was playing basketball in our driveway with Eric and was attempting to save a ball going out of bounds.  I was right on the edge of the driveway and rolled my right ankle and went down like a pile of bricks.  I was in maybe more pain then I’ve ever felt in my life.  I didn’t see stars, but I did see one bright sun.  Eric was to later say that that was probably the stupidest thing he’s ever seen me do.  The kids are at the age where they show us no sympathy.

 It ends up that I not only sprained my ankle, but several days later I realized that I had strained my achilles.  So due to that injury I wasn’t able to start running until it had healed significantly.  It still is a little tender, but it actually gives me no problems when I’m running.  It’s more bothersome in the morning when I wake up and everything has tightened up.

After a few weeks of running, I decided to start a log of my runs, so I’ve posted it here.  Sorry, no time to make any graphs, but maybe on my next update.

Date Distance Time Min/Mile Comment

I usually run at Moraine Hills State Park a few miles from home.  They’ve got 3 interconnected loops of cinder trails that are great for running.  I usually do the 3.73 mile loop, but have occasionally added a second for a 6.2 mile run.

I haven’t lost much weight, maybe 4 pounds, but my clothes are fitting much better. My goal is to first run the 6.2 mile run in under an hour.  I should be able to do that relatively soon.  As soon as the weather cools down a bit, I’ll give it a go.  My other goal is to see if I can do the 3.73 mile loop in under 30 minutes.  That’s going to be the tough one, but hopefully with another couple of months of serious running and some 50 degree weather and low humidity (as opposed to the 80’s and high humidity I’ve been running in, I just may have a shot of doing it.

 I’ll work on getting my stats to publish a little better, but right now I’ve got to run.  Not literally, I already ran today and it was tough.  I hate running in the morning.  My times are always slower because my body just isn’t ready to perform and I think it goes into shock.

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Congrats to Veronica


We just received notification today that Veronica has been accepted to attend IMSA, the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy in Aurora, Illinois, starting in the fall. We are just floating on air after getting this news!

IMSA is a very unique high school in that it is a public high school funded by the state. Each year they accept the top 225 applicants from around the state. The students specialize in math and science and over their three years get to study and research at places like FermiLab, Argonne Lab, the Museum of Science and Industry, etc.. Most graduates go on to study at universities such as Stanford, MIT, Harvard, Northwestern, etc..

If you want to get a better understanding of just how unique IMSA is and how much of an accomplishment this is for Veronica, go to:

http://www.imsa.edu/

Way to go, Veronica!

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Me and the World Series Trophy

The White Sox World Series Trophy Tour was at work today. So I waited in line for about 10 – 15 minutes and they snapped a polaroid.

Here I am! Pretty cool except they move you out of there in about 5 seconds to get the next person in.

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I’m Losing Weight!

In an effort to continue with the truly mundane postings, I’d thought I’d let everyone know of my recent weight loss. It’ll also help to keep me motivated in continuing to lose weight.

Every year from Thanksgiving through New Year’s, I just pig out way too much. I just go nuts at all the big meals and with the holiday cookies. So I was at home New Year’s day, having just had steak and lobster tail (actually two and a half lobster tails) the night before, feeling uncomfortable because my pants were too tight. The kids were watching “The Biggest Loser” on some cable channel where these people were losing 40% or more of their body weight over many months. So I felt a little guilty and figured, “If these people can lose over a hundred pounds, I could show a little will power and knock off twenty pounds or so.”

So Eric challenged me to lose twenty pounds by the Ides of March. (He just read “Julius Ceasar” at school.) So I decided too take him up on the challange!

I got on the scale and I’m was 190 pounds. I’m not really sure how accurate our scale is, so I’ll re-phrase that and say it indicated 190 pounds. I thought it was going to be more than that! When I graduated college 25 years ago, I was 155, just to give you an idea.

So I pretty much just stopped pigging out. Didn’t really starve myself, just ate more sensibly. Veronica has limited me to only one box of Peanut Butter Tandy Takes a week (six packs of two in each box). Mary Ann got me a case of 24 for Christmas, so I still have a lot of those I can eat. Veronica has hidden the case somewhere in the house, I’m not sure where!

So after one week, I lost 6 pounds. Sunday morning is my official weigh-in time.

Yesterday, another 3 pounds. 9 out of 20 pounds in two weeks is making me feel pretty good about things with another 2 months until the Ides of March!

I haven’t even begun exercising yet. I hope to throw that into the mix this week.

I’ll update the blog on a weekly basis to let you know how it’s going. I hope everyone finds this mundane enough.

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Smashmouth ain’t nothin

This is in response to Gary’s Smashmouth posting. I couldn’t post a picture as a comment so I had to start a new entry.

I’ve posted a picture here of our friend Mel’s snowblower. Many of you know Mel. He owns his own auto repair shop and I get out there every once in a while because I help him with his computers. I was actually just there this morning and had his partner send me this picture of the snowblower Mel created. It’s got a V8 engine and dual exhaust stacks. He said he managed to clear his entire lot of 6 inches of snow in about 15 minutes after last week’s storm.

As Mel said, Gary, “Don’t try to compete with professionals.”