The Last of Hurricane Ike

Not as clearly delineated as Gustav, the outer threads of Hurricane Ike arrived almost gently. It joined a cold front already working its way through the state and dropped a steady pouring of warm rain, punctuated by an occasional burst of wind.

Then again, it's time for the State Fair, so the rain arrived just in time.

Emily's Dog Pictures

While I was uploading the color guard pictures in the post below, I came across a series of dog pictures that Emily had taken of Pepper and Lucky. She did quite a good job. Let's just post'em and step back and let Emily and her dog pictures speak for themselves, okay?

Westmoore vs Southmoore

Friday night so that means another football game and another chance to see what Rachel and her color guard cohorts can do.

Emily went with us, and patiently awaited the beginning of the game:

Sure it looks cloudy and there was the threat of rain but that threat never materialized.

Clara did her band booster volunteer gig, passing out water:

Band work is thirsty work.

But we're here to catch a glimpse of Rachel, aren't we? Look, here she comes, passing right in front of us!

Drat. Nothing but a blur. I'll be ready next time, though. Just gotta bide my time.

Southmoore put a pretty good team on the field. By half time they had a sizable lead, though it wasn't insurmountable.

Half time mean show time, though. The band took there field and there was the color guard. Rachel's the one with the blue flag.

Yeah, I know.

(The young people lined up in uniform in the foreground are the Southmoore band. They entertained us pre-game and they did a pretty good job.)

The band did well, and so did Rachel, from what we could tell and -

Oh, look, here comes Rachel again! Quick, get a picture!

D'oh! The girl's just too fast. (Or I'm too slow.)

We lost, 28-20.

Finished!

Finished with the last of the vacation posts. (Scroll down to see for yourself.) Both a relief and a great sadness. Relief to have finished what I set out to do and sadness because that wonderful time is two months in the past.

But!

That means there's only 9 months to go for the next one!

And much to post about, meanwhile. So now we're back in current time. Time to move ahead.

Fun With Google Maps

I've been using Google Earth to help with re-tracing our route in some of the vacation posts below and I've discovered a new vice: virtual travel using street view. I haven't been able to master the trick of embedding a street view scene in a blog post yet but Google Maps has an embed feature that was working a while ago. This is supposed to be a view of our house but for right now, the post preview isn't showing the picture. (It was when I first tried it.)

Let's post it and see what happens.


View Larger Map

Nothing. If you click on the blank image or the View Larger Map, you'll go to the page, but I want the image here, in the post.

Let me try embedding it again:


View Larger Map
Well, dang. I'll try some re-jiggering and see if I can't make it work.

Update: It's working!

9/11

You can't let the date pass without some kind of remembrance of seven years ago. It marked the beginning of profound change, not only for this country, for our family. It was the start of this life we're living now: I would soon step down from my position at the IRS, my grandmother would fall and break her hip and begin her two year decline to her eventual death. Unrelated to the events of the day, in some ways, but marked by that time, nonetheless.

What sticks in my mind most of those days are the images that would eventually come of those people trapped in the towers who chose to meet their fate and jump. What they would think of those who believe our fight on terror is somehow not worth it? About oil. About getting elected. The victims of 9/11 weren't asked to make the sacrifice they did but they somehow managed. Can we do less?

Lileks, of course, is far better at this sort of thing, and though his piece is now five years old, it's no less powerful and says all that really needs to be said:

Two years later I take a certain grim comfort in some people’s disinterest in the war; if you’d told me two years ago that people would be piling on the President and bitching about slow progress in Iraq, I would have known in a second that the nation hadn’t suffered another attack. When the precise location of Madonna’s tongue is big news, you can bet the hospitals aren’t full of smallpox victims. Of course some people are impatient with those who still recall the shock of 9/11; the same people were crowding the message boards of internet sites on the afternoon of the attacks, eager to blame everyone but the hijackers. They hate this nation. In their hearts, they hate humanity. They would rather cheer the perfect devils than come to the aid of a compromised angel. They can talk for hours about how wrong it was to kill babies, busboys, businessmen, receptionists, janitors, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers - and then they lean towards you, eyes wide, and they say the fatal word:

But.

And then you realize that the eulogy is just a preface. All that concern for the dead is nothing more than the knuckle-cracking of an organist who’s going to play an E minor chord until we all agree we had it coming.

Let's not end on that note. While Lileks goes on, I found this the best, most hopeful of his piece:

The world will not end. It will roll around in its orbit until Sol expires of famine or indigestion. In the end we’re all ash anyway - but even as ash, we matter.

Yep, More Posting Progress

Posted the Grandpop Pete and Nana visit but don't take my word for it: scroll down and see for yourself.

That means I'm on the downside of the trip. Only a few more days left and that project will be complete. Then I'll start posting in contemporary time.

Even More Posting Progress

Three more vacation posts - scroll down to read 'em. We're up to our visit with Grandpop Pete and Nana.

My, how the time flew.

And continues to fly. Can't hardly believe we're already weeks into the new school year.

Time to enjoy the days while we can.

More Posting Progress

The summer vacation posts are coming along fine - got a big chunk done last night and this morning. It's good to re-visit that time and those places and it's hard to believe that it's already three months in the past. That seems to be the way things go - things move so fast it's hard to grab hold. Well, all the more reason for this blog, then. Let's see what I can grab and put under glass as we roll along.

Dog Walking 2

We've been having some wonderful pre-Fall weather so what better way to spend it than taking the dogs for a walk in the park? So we - we being Emily, Clara and me since Rachel had a babysitting gig - did just that.

I'd looked back and could only see Emily and Clara in silhouette so I purposefully shot into the sun. Didn't quite capture what I saw but you get the idea. If I'd had time - and something besides my Blackberry - maybe I'd do better. But the charm of the shot is capturing it on the fly. Besides, I've gotta be quick. When Emily sees me trying to take her picture, she dodges out of the way. Like here:


For the post-walk cool-down, it went pretty much like here.

Sonic afterwards. Shakes and cheddar cheese bits while the dogs hoped for a crumb to fall but, alas, no. A good outing for everyone.