A post on lucky 12/12/12

Well I know it’s been a while since I posted anything here, and to remind you how long ago it was I was on here, I'll start with a few words about my marathon!

That was way back at the beginning of October, and it was a pretty incredible weekend. It was the weekend of the Miami game at Soldier Field. The part I think you all would be most proud of is how Jon and I spent our Saturday, the day before I ran 26.2 miles. We went to the marathon expo, of course, to get my packet and try all kinds of nutrition bars and goos and sports drinks. Then we went to Union Station to check out something at least as exciting: BEER!

The marathon went even better than I'd hoped. My goal time was 9 min miles, and I ended up averaging 8:40/mile. The weather was cooler than the weather I trained in, but I was really hesitant to wear too many layers, meaning I was a bit cold until the race was almost over. But everything about it was worth it. It was so awesome to get to about mile 20, and look at my watch, and realize that I was on track and that I was going to stay on track, and I was going to actually do this. 

Less than a mile to go at this point! (photo credit to Jon)

After the race, with (L to R) my mom's college roommate, my mom, my godmother, and my sister Alison, who came from Chicago's west suburbs, St. Louis, and Peoria to watch me run.

The sign Jon made to cheer me on. Reading the signs along the way was very entertaining.

So, an awesome experience. Thanks for listening. :)

Since then, I've stayed on the west coast. Gone to some concerts, some holiday parties, and yoga twice a week. I'll be going home to St. Louis for about ten days around Christmas, but until them I'm staying in a pleasant, temperate climate. Jon came out here for Thanksgiving, and we succeeded in cooking a whole Thanksgiving dinner without burning any food or my apartment. We watched the USC game from a downtown SF bar with other ND alums, and we had a great time yelling and cheering and making fun of Lane Kiffin for calling that timeout. It's still unbelievable to me that we are actually undefeated. We all had to sit through two years of football before we saw 12 wins. I tried looking at flights to Miami, then I realized that San Francisco is really far away from Florida. 

Work is going well. I think I'm getting better at my job, which is exciting. But you guys have heard a little about my job already...I want to hear more about you all! Anyone have any trips planned over Christmas time? Will you all still be where you are now in six months? 

Or, if you don't know what to say just answer this question for now: where will everyone watch the national championship?

Ok wtf?

Seriously? The football team doesn't lose a single game the year we graduate? Sure there is still that pesky team from the depths of hell BUT even if they choke at this point they will still go to a BCS bowl (which lets be real is pretty amazing from what we all witnessed last year). I've been very excited for the team to do this well and to mentally say "suck it" every time Mark May says something but I just cant get over why it had to be the very year we graduated. Seeing the highlights from Ireland, Oklahoma, and soon to be highlights from the Rosebowl or the National Championship game makes me wish that I was still in the band. I know I'm not alone in this feeling with you guys. However, I will say that seeing my bank account fill with money despite my best efforts to spend it takes the edge off that feeling (Sorry to those of you still in school....at least you're not 55k in the hole). Here's to all the alumni....

tl;dr I'm jealous that the football team is amazing and having a season with no heatbreak and only awesome but being an adult has its perks.

Jimmy "I am the "Notre Dame guy" at work, come January I'm going to be the "Crazy Notre Dame guy"" Johns

Law School and Fun with Numbers!

Law School in One Number: 15,000 => The approximate word count of the notes that I have taken in the past week

Some numbers for comparison:

455,125 – The Lord of the Rings

47,094 – The Great Gatsby

24,476 – All of the blog posts I wrote while in London

13,082 – My senior thesis combined with my Independent Study project

7,924 – My senior thesis alone

If you convert between photos and words at a rate of 1000 words/photo, I arguably saved myself 480,000 words while studying abroad by switching from blogging to posting pictures to Facebook. Sadly, that option is not available in Law School.

Joel "I spend a lot of time at my computer." Graczyk

Grad Schooling it up in Boulder

I love living in Boulder! I bike everywhere (there isn't a TBG though), I can go on a hike before (or after) school, it is sunny pretty much all the time, and I see mountains every day.

I am settling into graduate school and starting to get really busy. It is hard to juggle classes and starting research; I already cannot wait until I no longer have to take classes so I can just play around with my rocks and water from Oman. I am also a TA for the Intro to Geology lab, which is fun to teach, but grading is the worst. Especially when people write in sparkly purple pen...It is strange being a TA because I am essentially the same age as the people I am teaching (I have freshmen through seniors in the lab), but they know next to nothing about geology, so I win there. About half of our labs are field trips to sites of local geology around Boulder, which is a blast. Two weeks ago, we drove up into the mountains to look at glacial features, and the aspens were so beautiful!

The beautiful Flatirons, I see these every day!

Indian Peaks Wilderness, great hiking nearby

I have been on some great hikes, although I have yet to climb a 14,000 foot mountain (14er for you cool kids out there); that is on the docket for this weekend. There is already a dusting of snow in the mountains, which gets me excited for ski season, but first I need to buy some skis...too bad I don't have a real job, but that is what Craigslist is for.

First Med School Interview!

So as I may have alluded to on fb, I had my first Medical School interview this Wednesday at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine. It was...very interesting, my first interviewer was an older Irish (Not a typo literally from Ireland) Doctor, she was nice and i thought it went well. The second interviewer though, if any of you watch or have even just seen the show "Chuck" well my interviewer was basically Captain Awesome. He was a total bro, he used phrases like "Yeah and with good STEP 1"s you can get into a kickass residency" also called me a dude a couple time, but overall that interview went fantastic so...!!!! I've got interviews at Marion and UIC coming up so I'll see how those compare. In the mean time I've sort of just been killing time, mixing paint and tutoring for $ and playing a quite frankly LARGE amount of L4D2. In more cultured new, Joel you will be happy to know I FINALLY read "The Great Gatsby". I'm still in the West Illinois/Iowa Quad Cities area so if any of you are rocking I-80 and want to stop for lunch well hit me up.

Wyatt "Working on not being a complete bum" Verplaetse

I have a job now!

As some might have heard, I signed my employment contract with an engineering firm close by. The firm is Baxter & Woodman and I will be doing transportation engineering in the Crystal Lake office. I start the Monday after the Michigan game so, I've been cramming in leisurely activities for the bast week. Most notably is starting (and finishing) the Lord of the Rings in both book form and newly purchased extended edition blu-ray. I have now completed my LOTR fandom and can geek out with the best of them. I'm also getting pretty serious in my beer brewing and if people are curious about the batches I'm brewing or wants to talk about beer, I'm all for it. I'll be working around my home so if any of you are in the Chicago area and want a day out in the suburbs, chances are I'll be around.

Jon "I'm naming my dog Strider...whenever I get him" Miller

One Month on the West Coast

Part I - The Journey

As Mo mentioned in her post, I am already leaving my job in the great state of California to work in Colorado for the next two months. In fact, as I write this I'm looking out of an airplane window at the Sierra Nevadas. Since I haven't had a chance to post anything since I left home a month ago, I'm going to include a bit on my trip out to California as well as my first 3 weeks of work. Of course, I'll throw in a few of my favorite pictures along the way.

On August 4th, I set out from Silver Bay with a fully loaded car, a tent, and a vague plan to take Highway 2 as far as I could and get to Sacramento about a week later. The first day was filled with a lot of nothing…I mean North Dakota…until I finally stopped driving at 2am and set up my tent at a city park in Montana. The next day I packed up quickly and hit the road, destination Glacier National Park. Not only was the drive several hours shorter the second day, but the scenery also became much more interesting as I approached the Rockies.

After arriving in Glacier, I spent the next 46 hours driving the Going-to-the-Sun Road, hiking as many of the trails as I could, and taking over 1000 pictures. To say that Glacier is a photographer's paradise is a severe understatement. Rather than write an entire blog post on those two days, I'll just say that Glacier is one of the most amazing places I have ever been and I would go back in a heartbeat. Now for some pictures:

St. Mary's Lake

View from the Going-to-the-Sun Road in the early morning light.

Hidden Lake from the lookout near Logan's Pass.

Apgar Lake at dawn.

After leaving Glacier, I spent two more days on the road to Eugene, OR, where Kirsten Adam (former clarinet and bio major) is now going to grad school. We spent a day exploring the city and wine tasting in South Willamette, making great use of the wine-tasting techniques I learned from our very own Jon Miller. The final day of my trip took me down I-5 all the way to Sacramento and thus ended my 7 day, 2500 mile journey.

Part II - The Job

Several days after I arrived in Sacramento, the West regional fellowship training for Environment America began. The training included 3 second year fellows and 3 other first year fellows besides myself, along with a rotation of mentors including the regional director, the political director from DC, and the state director for Environment California. The first week of the training consisted of intensive classroom training encompassing every facet of the organization and the work that we'll all be doing for the next two years. Following that we did a week of door-to-door canvassing to sign up new members and gather public support for a statewide ban on plastic grocery bags, which was awaiting a vote in the state senate. After that, our official training ended and most of the fellows went back to their home states to start working on their own state campaigns. 

However, the Californians had a more interesting adventure in the works. Three of us set out with a 25 foot inflatable turtle and a goal of setting up four press conferences in four days at four famous California beaches in support of the bag ban. I don't think we could have been less prepared when we started out, but somehow we made it work and had a lot of success getting press at all of our events and finding great coalition partners to work with. There were certainly incredibly frustrating times during the week, but just as many times when it seemed like we were having way too much fun to possibly be getting paid. In the end, the bill we were supporting did not pass through the senate, but in every other way our press conference tour was a great success as well as a great learning experience! Plus, after the whirlwind of activity it took to get those press conferences set up, organizing one with the normal three weeks of prep time should be a walk in the park.

Myself and other Environment California supporters with the giant turtle!

Part III - The Weekend

After being back in Sacramento for only a day, I took advantage of my first break from work to visit Mo in the bay area. I stand by her synopsis of the weekend and so I'll end this post with a few pictures from our hike.

Water slide at Big Basin State Park.

Waterfall at Big Basin.

Waterfall pool at Big Basin.

Kitesurfers on the Pacific Ocean.

A month in unorganized pictures

I thought I'd post an update before heading home to the Dome this weekend, where I'll get to see at least a couple of you friends I think. August was a busy month for me, which was definitely a good thing because I didn't really have time to get bored. I do feel like I'm still settling in, although I've been here for almost two months already (how did that happen?). But at the same time I'm learning my routine and finding ways to have fun, and making my apartment feel a little more like home with every Target trip.

So I'll focus on my weekends, because what I do during the week probably doesn't sound that exciting. I mean, if you really love data or attorney calls then shoot me an email and I'll give you a play-by-play. But for the rest of you, here are my weekends with plenty of pictures. The pictures are not always related to the paragraphs around them so it's like a game!

My welcome gift for my first day of real work. 

First weekend in August I got to visit one of our favorite rising sophomores, the esteemed Mr. Hagwood himself. He and his family spend a few days in Santa Cruz every summer, so I took a day trip to visit them. I spent the Saturday walking the boardwalk and the pier in Santa Cruz with Austin and his brother Garrett, eating brats, riding an old roller coaster, and watching the Dark Knight Rises. It was lovely meeting his mom and overall an excellent Saturday. It was so nice to see someone familiar (this sentence will reappear later..) and talk about mutual friends (aka all of you). Plus we saw tons of seals hanging out under the pier.

Seal! Challenge: guess which end is the head.

The next weekend, the 11th, I decided to be brave and go to an ND Alumni Club event. We took a Google bus to Napa and visited a winery with ND ties, a winery with a great picnic area for lunch, and another winery just for funsies. I figure if my day starts by making new friends who offer me mimosas on the bus at 9am, then it's a good day. Everyone was super friendly, surprise, and I met a few girls from the class of 2011 so yay maybe I'm making friends.

When Christina visited we enjoyed some gold ole 'Merican beer at an Oakland A's game and watched the Yankees lose to the A's so Christina was happy. The ballpark was strangely shaped.

Also sometime in August I went to an SF Giants game with work.
The Giants' ballpark is beautiful. The score was not. 'Nuff said.

On the 18th of August I abandoned the polished landscapes of wine country for the rugged terrain of the American River to go white water rafting with my company. The water was very cold. Since I was in the front I was constantly reminded of the temperature because I received copious amounts of water in the face every time we went through a rapid. It made me feel alive. And hypothermic. But mostly alive. 

This is a real picture. My dad, brother, and the guys in the family went on a big fishing trip in MI at the end of July. I later learned this was one of their boats. How awesome? Very.

This past Labor Day weekend may have been one of the best weekends yet. Full disclosure, I kind of have to say that since I spent it with one of the fine authors of this blog. Of course, Erik may be too busy getting ready to live in Denver for two months to read this. We'll see. I offered at first to visit him in Sacramento, but after a few plan changes it ended up that he would come down to me on Saturday afternoon. I did a training run, 19 miles, that morning. Then when Erik arrived we walked around my neighborhood, made guacamole, made more pasta than my skillets and Dutch oven could handle, and had some local beer at a brewing company within walking distance of my place. Sunday we went biking/hiking in Big Basin State Park, and saw some fantastic waterfalls. Erik used his new tripod to get some great pictures.

The photographer at work.

Hopefully this overexposed photo will both give you an idea of the amazing waterfalls we saw, and encourage Erik to post his own, better pictures.

Till next time!

                                                                              

2012 Football season!

Hey I just got my tickets in the mail and I was wondering what games everyone is going to?

I'm going to:
Purdue (9/8)
Michigan (9/22)
Stanford (10/13)

I'll also be around for the Miami game in Chicago on October 6th but I don't have tickets to the game.

Jon "I don't really know how I'll feel going back" Miller

A Final Summer at ND

Hey everyone!

I've really enjoyed hearing about what all of you have been up to this summer! I guess its about time I contribute as well, though my summer is not nearly as exciting as many of yours. 

On June 12, I headed back to Notre Dame to work as a "Master Mentor" for the ND Vision program. In case you guys aren't familiar with the program, Vision is basically 4 week-long retreats for high school students from all over the country (about 350 kids a week). There's lots of singing and being generally goofy but also some really awesome keynote presentations and witness talks given by the college mentors. As mentors, our main job is to lead small groups of 8 or 9 kids. The small groups meet 8 times over the course of the week to discuss the big group activities and basically to give the kids to opportunity to talk about their faith and their own lives in a safe and judgement-free setting. (The difference between Master Mentors and regular Mentors is that it is the Master Mentors' second time working for Vision and we also lead discussion groups for the Mentors to decompress at the end of the week). 

The job sounds simple enough, sit and listen to high school kids talk about themselves. I think the best way I've ever heard the job described though is that it is the most physically and emotionally exhausting experience, but the most spiritually fulfilling. Its physically exhausting because you don't get a whole lot of sleep. We were basically on duty from the moment the kids get there until the moment they leave, serving as RAs as well as counselors. I found the emotional exhaustion to come from hearing kids talk about the really difficult aspects of their lives, eating disorders, cutting, abuse etc., and knowing there is very little that you can do to fix it because once they go home, you can't help anymore. 

So now it sounds depressing. Why do it twice? Any answer that I have will sound incredibly cheesy but I'll try anyway. There's something about seeing the turnaround at some point during the week. Sometimes its the kids who's parents made them come finally deciding to sing along. Sometimes its the quiet kid in the group opening up and talking. Sometimes its seeing a group of complete strangers become friends in just a week. Sometimes the turnaround comes weeks or months later, when you get an email from a kid who was unresponsive or unpleasant for the entire week but who finally started processing everything that they had heard that week.

On Friday mornings, just before the kids leave, the small groups have affirmation sessions. Basically, each member of the small group writes letters to every other group member saying the gifts they saw in them that week and their hopes for each other. Then, they take turns reading them to each other. I'm sure this sounds ridiculous, but for high school students who spend so much time dwelling on their negative qualities, the compliments they receive in these sessions mean a lot and it is often the most emotional part of the week. Its also often the most rewarding to witness. 

Aside from the actual work part of the summer, we had a few other adventures. The first was the opening staff retreat, which was held at a high ropes course. The highlight of the day was climbing and jumping off of what is basically a 30-foot telephone pole while your team holds the safety cables.

The next adventure was our break week trip. The week of the 4th of July, 17 of the mentors went down to Columbus, OH to stay at our friend Mike's house. Luckily, he is one of 11 so his parents weren't too overwhelmed by the number of kids staying at their house. We took day trips to go hiking in the state park (see below) as well as Cedar Point, narrowly escaped the beginning of a gang fight in downtown Columbus after the fireworks and spent a lot of time relaxing and jamming around the fire pit.

Finally, the weekend between the third and fourth sessions brought 2 adventures: Vision Olympics and Vision Prom Proposals. Vision Olympics involves splitting the mentors into 6 teams, each captain by a master mentor, and competing in events like the Opening Skit, Scavenger Hunt, Facebook Stalking Challenge and Relay Races. I am proud to say that my team, the Sunburned Penguins placed in every event but one (there was no all-around winner). Vision Prom is an event that happens on Saturday after week 4. The weekend before week 4, all of the guys draw names out of a hat for their date. They then have to come up with a creative way to ask said girl before Saturday without letting the kids know what is going on. I've included a picture of my proposal, which happened during the Opening Skit of the Olympics.

So after an amazing 6 weeks of meeting new people (and hanging out with awesome old friends like Sammy, Jake and Paul K. (who is in Keough next year, by the way)), spending time with some cool high school kids and generally being goofy, I bid a much-procrastinated farewell to Notre Dame. I am now at home with an awkward amount of time to kill before I move to Chicago on September 10. 

(Wow, I guess I had a lot to say about my not-so-interesting summer haha).

I hope you all continue to have amazing adventures and I look forward to seeing all of you sometime in the not-too-distant future!

SF Trivia

I'll open this post up with a Hello from the Golden State! California has been treating me well so far, and things should only get better once Erik gets himself out here and thus increases the number of 2012 trumpets in California by 100% (a constricting statistic, I know).

So, I have started my job, and have definitely entered the workforce...parts of it are still very strange (like how little time I have between getting home in the evening and bedtime) but overall I'm very happy to be here and excited about what's to come. This week has been, and next week will continue to be, full time training. For training, my company brings the six new full-timers from our two bay area offices and the LA office into downtown SF. I'll normally be working in Silicon Valley, in our Menlo Park office, with a 30 min commute, but for training my commute's about an hour because I have to head downtown. However the downtown office have a gorgeous view, because it's on the 20th floor in the financial district, and so that kinda makes up for it.

Most of what I've been doing is not worth reading...HR stuff, going over benefits, nine hours of Excel training (seven of those hours in one day)...but I'm getting to know people and feeling much better about being here. Sunday night I could hardly sleep; I tossed and turned all night and could hardly eat all day. I know, and you thought I was unflappable (yeah right). But my nervousness has abated as the week went on. We initiated a happy hour today that some of the senior analysts joined us for, and the bar had trivia which was slower than Legend's but infinitely more high tech, because the sound system was decent and, get this: THEY USED A SPREADSHEET FOR SCOREKEEPING. The crazy things they do out here!

Christina (C-Squeezy) has been in LA all summer working in an archive or something, and she's flying up to visit me this weekend. Since she is finally old enough to be allowed to drink I am looking forward to buying her what I'm sure must be her first drink ever (lolz). Since I'm missing out on all the Midwest Trumpet Reunions, whether planned or spontaneous, this will help give me some of that camaraderie I've been missing. I'm glad to hear so many trips are overlapping and people are visiting!

Wish I had a more interesting way to end this...but I don't. How about I end with a promise: I promise next time I'll have pictures (so that people will actually skim through what I write)!

Mountains and Marriages

As you probably already know, hiking is one of my favorite things to do, especially when I don't fall and break my body...

This picture is of Fifes Ridge in the South Cascades. We also had lots of fun being 5 year olds once we got to the top of this rocky point and threw rocks off the cliff. It is hard to describe how much fun it is to throw a rock and then count 5 seconds before you hear it hit the bottom. Or to throw rocks at other pieces of rock to break them. 

Two weeks ago, I climbed my first peak of the season, and encouraged my 2 hiking partners to the top of their first mountain! Mountain peaks are amazing because you have an unobstructed 360 degree view of mountains for miles on end. The fun thing about hiking in Washington is you can always see Mt. Rainier in the distance too, oh I love Rainier. There were so many ladybugs on top of the mountain. And a summit log! They are usually inside a waterproof capsule and are little booklets of people who logged when they climbed the peak, along with a little message. I enjoy reading other entries, and it is fun to write your name and short message. 

On top of Earl Peak, 7036 feet.

This past Saturday, my sister got married! I flew back to the good old Midwest, she got married in Madison, WI, and discovered that there is a huge drought going on. I live in the desert, but our grass is greener than Madison's. The ceremony was beautiful, and it was great seeing all my family. Some of you may have met my sister, Katie, she was a clarinet in the band. Although she married a Michigan Tech grad, she invited many of her Notre Dame friends to the wedding, and you would be proud to know the trumpets held the greatest contingent among her friends. Naturally, I requested the Fight Song, and we had a good time singing along (one emphatic trumpet, Spiderman, shouted Thunder quite loudly at certain parts, but thankfully he kept it PG).

Alex and Abby (on the right) were both ND trumpets, that means there two little kids (bottom) are destined to join the legacy! 

I was also reminiscient of the Backer when the DJ played classics like Sweet Caroline and Don't Stop Believing and seeing drunk relatives dancing. They even had a Kegerator at the reception! Good to know we have weddings to relive our college days.  So, someone get married in a year or so, it will make for a good reunion...

Trumpets in Minneapolis

As I read through the posts on here, I notice that my test post included a promise to write more about the adventures of the Trumpets on the Concert Band tour in Europe. However, since last year I bored many of you with 25000 excruciatingly detailed words about London and Paris, I will refrain from doing so on this blog, too. Instead, I will say that the trumpets didn’t drink and followed many of the rules and leave you with this picture taken after our midnight snack of wine and bread on the Seine, featuring a cameo by Mike Carter.

Trumpets in Front of Notre Dame

With the exception of the week of the Fourth of July, I’ve had a fairly quiet summer. Like previous years, I am working with people with disabilities during the day and fairly free most of the rest of the time, so the holiday week brought an enjoyable burst of socialization with Notre Dame friends. The week began with a round of golf for Tim O’Brien, his father, and myself, and – after a full, 45-hour trip to Exira, Iowa to join Michelle Letourneau, Cat Samson, and Brett Ensor for Michelle’s family Fourth of July celebration – I got to spend most of the following weekend with trumpets!

When we last left our hero, Erik and his father went their separate ways somewhere in the vicinity of the Twin Cities at an indeterminate date near the Fourth of July. On the evening of the fifth, Erik arrived at my house for the weekend. Fortunately, the front door was unlocked and Erik isn’t shy, so he let himself in when I didn’t hear the doorbell in the basement. After a late dinner, we spent the rest of the night relaxing in the basement, geeking out over photography/Apple products, and watching the second quarter of Mad Men, Season Five.

Friday afternoon we took Erik’s new car into downtown to pickup Tim O’Brien and Kevin Kelly at the U of M before heading to Hal Melia’s apartment to meet up with him, David Bratton, Kelsey Auten, and some guy that they met the night before. The whole group then walked a couple of blocks to attend the 2012 Cities97 Basilica Block Party, an annual two-night charity concert hosted by a local radio station to raise money to repair and maintain the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis. This year’s Friday night headliners included Train, Cake, and Mat Kearney.

It was a hot and humid day, similar to the first part of the day of the South Florida game this year. By the time that we got through the entrance and found our way to the main stage, Mat Kearney was about 15 minutes into his set. Within minutes, we got caught in a heavy rain, but the show continued. After no more than about fifteen minutes, though, Mat Kearney seemed to stop his song short and walk off the stage. Moments later a bolt of lighting in the distance confirmed that he had, in fact, left the stage. Despite the fact that organizers did not have the courtesy to request the presence of Usher 800, an official delay was obviously in effect, so we attempted to quickly make our way to an overpass to avoid the rain. Unfortunately, thousands of other people were trying to do the same thing, so we got as far as the edge of the bridge. Unable to find shelter and already soaking wet, we decided that there was only one thing left to do. We bought beer.

Trumpets During the Rain Delay

Eventually the rain stopped, the beer ran dry (or, at least, our bottles did), the temperature dropped by 25 degrees, and the concert resumed, so we roamed the grounds for the middle part of the evening, catching a few songs each from Imagine Dragons and The Head and the Heart. For the final acts of the evening, our group split, Tim and Kevin going to see Cake while the rest of us went to see Train. Although Kevin and Tim raved about Cake afterwards, I was a bit disappointed by Train. Their musical talent was obvious (there was no quality drop-off compared to their studio recordings, which I always find relieving), but a late start and an early finish due to additional inclement weather made for a frustratingly short show. We took advantage of the early release to get back to the car only moments ahead of a second downpour and then proceeded to spend the next half-hour in traffic downtown. After returning Tim and Kevin to the U, Erik and I went back to my house for pizza and another quarter season of Mad Men.

Saturday night brought even more time together when Hal brought not only Kevin and Tim but also Tommy Mitchell for a bonfire at my house with Erik and me in addition to a couple of my friends from high school. We ate fewer hotdogs and drank far more beer than I expected, and everyone seemed to have a good time (I recognize that I’m venturing into conjecture here, so I’ll leave it up to the others to refute that statement). The night ended with three games of Mafia. When everyone else left, Erik and I finished the last quarter of the season of Mad Men.

Those have really been the highlights of my summer. I received word this week that Jon may be up here (more time in the car after all?) the first weekend in August, so hopefully we’ll both have more to share then.

Joel “I kept it under 1000 words!” Graczyk

Learning to drive. Again.

Here it is, the unofficial sequel to BOXES! by Maureen Vigland. Join me for another exciting tale of a car bound for California.

As some of you know, for the past several years I've been the "proud" owner of a 1994 Chevrolet Lumina van (aka the Dustbuster). While this vehicle had its pluses, like being able to haul all of my stuff and a decent portion of Joel's from MN to ND, its likelihood of making it to Sacramento was deemed questionable at best. Then there's the consideration of my willingness to be seen with it ever again and well, long story short, this summer seemed like a good time to find a different car.

After two long weekends of driving around half the state of MN (along with a side trip into Wisconsin) and using up my entire cellular data plan on used car ads on Craigslist, my dad and I found a keeper. The car: a 2001 VW Golf 4-door hatchback, 98k miles, prior accident resulting in a new front end and a very reasonable price. The seller: a Russian guy with a small used car dealership selling this car on the side for his friend Sergy. We gave him the money, he gave us the key, and we went on our merry way. After leaving the car at a mechanic to get it looked over, my dad and I made one more trip down to Minneapolis (about 4 hours from my home) to pick it up on the 4th. That's where the fun began!

You see, this car had one catch...I didn't know how to drive it. Before the 4th, I knew approximately how a manual transmission worked, but had never actually driven one. After a few circles around a parking lot and some deserted side streets, I started to get a feel for it. At this point my dad and I went our separate ways, as he headed back home and I stuck around to visit relatives and trumpets. The first few days with the car were probably the most stressful days of driving I've had since I was 15. Highway driving was great, but city driving was a bit terrifying, as I had a bad habit of stalling the car whenever I wanted to start moving and there were cars waiting behind me. Our very own Tim O'Brien saved me by driving the one day we had to venture into downtown Minneapolis and slowly but surely I got the hang of driving again over the long weekend. It's amazing how quickly you can learn something new when you know that it's your only way of getting home.

Since getting back, the car has been keeping me entertained by fixing all the little things that are wrong with an 11-year old car.
Objective #1: Fix broken rear sit latch. Status: Accomplished with drill and tennis racquet stringing equipment (see photo). Why buy a new latch for $6 when you have extra tennis string lying around?

Objective #2: Replace burned out lights. Status: 2/3...side markers aren't that important anyway. This also led me to discover that the front end of my car was painted red in a former life. Too bad they matched it to the silver of the rest of the car. A two tone car would be a way better conversation piece at the very least.

This entire post would be rather silly without a picture of the car and since I've been a big fan of VW's advertising style for quite awhile, I decided to try my hand at making an ad:

And now for the happy ending: I haven't failed at driving in public any time in the last week and have already reached the conclusion that I will never own an automatic vehicle by choice. Hopefully I still feel that way after I drive it to California at the start of August!

Thanks for reading! (or at least skimming to see if there was anything good at the end)

3089 + 620 miles

Hey friends! My summer which was supposed to be filled with things like job hunting and general boring-ness turned out to be more exciting. This is an account of my adventure driving across the country at a moments notice. 

So on June 14th I get a text from my friend Richard and he asks me if I'd be interested in helping him drive his car from ND to his home outside of LA. I find out that he was leaving ND the following evening after work, which put him in Marengo to pick me up at around 10:00pm. Since I have not yet secured a job I have nothing to do and accept.

Immediately the route you have pictured in your head is taking off due west until we hit the Rockies and go south to LA somewhere around there. You have just picked the most sensible route. We however, would not be going that way exactly. From Marengo we would head south to New Orleans and then drive through the American Southwest. Why New Orleans? because it's a cool city and we felt like taking a more interesting route.

Back to the driving, we left my house at 10pm and the goal was New Orleans. We drove in four hour shifts all through the night until we arrived in New Orleans at 1pm the following day. Naturally we were pretty tired but it's Saturday in NOLA and we wanted to enjoy ourselves. We got a late lunch (I had one of my favorites, red beans and rice) and a beer that's never tasted better. The next stop was Cafe Du Monde for their world famous beignets and chicory coffee (French doughnuts and weak coffee essentially). We wandered the French Quarter until we reached Pat O'Briens. For those unfamiliar, this is where the hurricane cocktail was invented. We found a place in their courtyard and enjoyed the sweet red drink for quite some time. During this time I had suggested that we find some gumbo to make our trip to the Big Easy complete and what do you know? the place next door serves a mean gumbo. It was delicious and by the time we had finished our meal the party was just getting started on Bourbon Street. Granted it was like 8 or 9 pm but it's always a party down there. After a few drinks and listening to a few bands we decided it is time to turn in for the night. It's Saturday night and the last time I slept in a bed was Thursday night. We made it to the hotel around 11pm and I have never slept better than that night.

From here the story is less exciting because it is just driving. We left New Orleans at 10am or so after eating some hotel breakfast. Our goal was Las Cruces New Mexico, which is really far away....you know, all of Louisiana and Texas. Dinner was in a dive bar close to the Almo in San Antonio around 7pm. There was an incident where we almost ran out of gas somewhere in West Texas but after driving pretty far off the highway we found a gas station in a very small town. We filled up and eventually made Las Crices by 4am. Quick nap and shower in a motel then we were back on the road by 9am. The drive to LA was uneventful but lunch in Tucson was pretty good. We make it to LA by 11pm Monday night and celebrated with some In 'n Out (a California burger chain that makes amazing burgers. Ask for a Double Double Animal Style if you're ever in California). I hung out in Orange County, where Richard lives, until Friday the 22nd. I then boarded a plane for Chicago.

That was my 3089 miles of driving but what about the 620? Well I had already planned to visit Mo in St Louis because she was having a going away party on the 24th. So from this adventure I woke up Saturday morning and drove down the same route I had driven a week earlier. The five hours it took seemed like nothing after the drive cross country. I will admit I was going a little car crazy by then. After a fun few days in the southern heat, I drove back from St Louis on Wednesday and have stayed put since then. Hopefully I will not be driving any more long distances this summer. 

BOXES!

Hello from the Show Me State, friends!

I don't have much to say yet but I couldn't resist writing a post that I can pretend you all read. I was up in Chicago visiting Jon and his family Sunday/Monday, and now I'm back home, and in the middle of unpacking/repacking all my stuff right now--wait, who am I kidding? I've done practically everything on my to-do list except touch the boxes and suitcases that currently cover every formerly inhabitable inch of my floor. That's my project for as soon as I finish this post.

My most exciting news of the moment is that I am officially the owner of a vehicle, for the first time in my life. My grandpa just bought a new car, so I bought his 2005 Ford Five Hundred with 62k miles. I am pretty stoked to be the owner of a very ordinary looking vehicle. As of this morning it even has license plates!

See? I wasn't lying about the license plates

Other than that, with our return from Europe I started my marathon training...for those of you who might not know or remember I decided to do the Chicago Marathon on Oct. 7. It's the same weekend as the Soldier Field game so if any of you go to that, and your hangover is gone by noon that Sunday, you can watch the end of my marathon!

Can't wait to hear what the rest of you are up to. Hannah, glad you made it out west! I'm looking forward to pictures of mountains. I'll try for a more exciting picture myself next time.

Mo

Layout Test Post

I am working on editing the layout of the blog, so I am sorry to say that this is only a test post. Ideally, I will remove the white background that is currently behind Hannah's post.

However, in keeping with the spirit of the blog, I've included a picture of those of us who were on the Europe tour. (I'm sorry Bobby, I don't have a good picture of the six of us from when we were in London). I promise to write more about those adventures at a later date.

Edit:

I have now updated the design and layout of the blog. Please let me know if you have any issues with it. The way that my post appears should be a better approximation than Hannah's post (it must have something to do with the way she posted it).

Joel "I think we should include sign-off's with our posts" Graczyk

1921 miles

I completed my drive from Aurora, IL to Richland, WA! I have an internship working at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory this summer, same place I worked last summer. My dad helped me navigate the boring grasslands that are North Dakota and eastern Montana - I literally drove for 3 hours without once touching my brake or accelerator. Cruise control is a wonderful invention. 

My little Toyota Corolla was filled up with lots and lots of stuff, including a bike strapped to the back (which was a cause of great stress for me, I would compulsively look at it in the rearview mirror making sure it didn't fly off my car at 75mph. Plus it is a new bike, so I didn't want to expose it to the elements of half the country in its virgin form, but such is life, now it is nicely seasoned).

We stopped the first night in lovely Jamestown, North Dakota. I knew I was in North Dakota when I saw a woman in cowboy boots and a hat in the rest stop. Also, buffalo abounded!

Creepy albino buffalo, apparently it is sacred to the local Native Americans

Beautiful Montana!

Now I am settled in my home for the summer, a basement, but do not fear, it is not as grim as it sounds, it is quite homey.

I start saving the soil from radionuclides and heavy metals tomorrow! Yay science!