Much Too Early

Two nights ago... a friend of mine and player on our City Sluggers softball team passed away while actually playing softball. Many of you know him as he was a 1985 (i believe) City High grad who owned the Heyns Ice Cream store on 1st Avenue in Iowa City. It was some really sad news and came as a complete shock. Paul was a really nice person and always seemed to have a good attitude about everything. The laid back way that he seemed to deal with things always made me a bit envious... it's a personality trait that I wish I showed more of. It seems cheesy and lame to express the same old things that everyone else is saying about him. Mainly what I know is that the world isn't as good a place without him in it. I'm sure things will really begin to settle in next year when he isn't around as the season begins.

His obituary can be found HERE

Times like this always make one reflect about things that they are thinking and doing at whatever point they might be at in their lives. I guess, simply, that's because we're all going to get to this point some day. Hopefully not as early and as tragically as Paul... but it's quite obviously inevitable.

The world is such and interesting and dangerous place right now. There is more apprehension and worry than I can ever remember... and probably more than many people far older than me can remember. People, economic markets, religions, governments, etc... are all in a state of flux, if not upheaval. It's hard not to feel like things are on a very dangerous precipice right now. Things like this, however unrelated, really make you think about all of these things.

I hope that Paul is in a better place and I hope that the ills of the world can slowly begin to right themselves and all of us can feel safer and more kinship to our fellow human beings.

My Daughter is Terrified of Herky!

For true effect, you'll need to blow the above picture up; but it pains me to say that my daughter is terrified of Herky! Eleanor attended her first Iowa Homecoming parade last Friday and it was fantastic. While she's not ready to gather bags full of candy yet (many other kids took care of that) she did enjoy herself for the most part. When it came time for the obligatory Herky photo shoot, however, she because quite terrified. It was sort of disturbing to see. As much as I love Herky, Eleanor finds him quite distasteful. Luckily, she finds tigerhawks and Herky images to be really interesting at home and enjoys pointing at them and saying Herky. That gives me hope for the future. The way that the football team is performing lately, I feel about like she does in this picture myself.

For most of the evening, she was looking around, checking everything out.

She even got to share some of Papa's chocolate chip cookies!

Another frightened shot.

We had makeshift dinners from the Co-Op.

Happy Anniversary

7 years, 2 days ago Carrie and I met. 3 years ago we were married. Here is a picture from our honeymoon shorty thereafter. This was taken at the tidepools where we used to play in Moss Beach, California (we meaning my siblings and I when we were kids.)

We are blessed with a wonderful life, a wonderful marriage and, best of all, a wonderful family and daughter.

XOXOXOXO

rotten to the core

ah yes, you know that the academic year has started up again when activity on this blog slows to a virtual standstill and blog rot sets in. i know i'm not alone in not being able to find the time to post once teaching starts up again, and like betsy, we keep this blog as a record of our little family for us as much as anyone else.
without any further ado, here's an update...

eleanor continues to grow bigger, cuter and smarter everyday (in our humble opinion). she enjoys getting into the cake pans and oven mitts that reside in the drawer under the stove.

she also likes feeding herself with her fingers. black beans and rice are a particular favorite...

this past weekend, betsy, henry and clara were in town. here are the girls with grammie.

rob, e, and henry horse around and are the very picture of inter-generational hawkeye fandom.
more love for the hawks on game day...

at the beginning of the month, rob and i traveled to edinburgh, scotland. it was our first trip without eleanor since she was born, which was sad, but we all did just fine. while i was at my conference/workshop, rob had time to do some sightseeing. he took many, many, many photos (this will not shock any who know him) and will likely post further about his adventures at a later date...
here he is at the top of arthur's seat in holyrood park at the end of the royal mile. it's quite a hike.
the lovely landscape at holyrood park. green urban spaces are pretty darn cool.

edinburgh castle was the main attraction for me when i visited for the first time in 1997 and rob spent most of a day there. this was our one sunny day...

an otter carved into a chair-arm in the thistle chapel at the high kirk of st. giles. the chapel is this amazingly, intricately carved space. you could spend hours there and still find new details to marvel over.

yes, we did enjoy some grown-up time in the pubs. this is deacon brodie's on the royal mile. check out the tartan carpet!

**Carrie forgot this pic!