It’s been 3+ weeks since our last visit and much has happened (which seems correlated as we look at the past evidence). Shall we take a trip?

Halloween time
Last night I celebrated my friend, Angela’s, birthday at the local Vala’s pumpkin patch. Was so much fun feeding goats (see pics for “2-headed” goat), haunted house, running through the corn-field maze, wandering a pumpkin field and riding/singing on a hay-rack ride. Regressed 20 years, easily. In the maze, which was huge!, I had a habit of running ahead, hiding around corners and surprising the group. One time I ran ahead without my partner in crime, Merinda, and found the perfect hiding spot. But the group wasn’t coming by. Smaller groups did, and none of them saw me. Once a staff person was making the rounds with a bright flashlight, so I jumped out and acted innocent. Went back to hiding... more people passed, still no group. Then a kid run up the path and crawled backwards right in front of me. She wasn’t going to do the same thing as me. So I decided to scare the crap out of her, first. Boo! She about messed her pants, but she held it together so she could scare her kids (yes, apparently she was much older, just acted young... hmm, sounds familiar). She pointed to the husband at me, and he made the comment, “yeah, that looks like a good place to hide” as he didn’t even see me as I was further in the corn. Then when she pointed me out again, the whole group started to freak out. Still, I waited... after 15 minutes I gave up. I ran through the rest of the maze and found the group waiting for me on a bench. Apparently they went backwards and back the way we came in! Ugh! My perfect plan failed. Still, so much silliness and fun!

Hosted several more game & movie nights, played some new rock band 2 (new drums rock!), and have gotten my share of football games watched (could the Chiefs be any worse?). Finished the final pieces of my basement rec room (last curtains, pictures), too, so soon there will be a post of what I actually did on it.

I taught two 3-hour lectures on health outcomes (focused on physical measures and quality of life) in this new graduate-level public health class. It has been so long since I taught! And I really enjoyed it! (no real surprise) May have to revisit this thing again in the future...

There will be tree...
Apparently my tree, that was split down the middle, will go on to live several more years. It will cost me $1100 to have it completely removed or $300 to have it trimmed nicely. The arborist said that it won’t look good and I’ll have to watch for beetles/infections, but it should last a while. I was so happy as the leaves have come back in deep green and the inside of it has started to grey as if trying to grow new bark (or it’s just dirty).

Trip to Sweden
I took my first official vacation trip in Sept to Stockholm. I spent a week visiting a new friend, Marie, making new ones, and catching up with old ones, too. It didn’t all go the way I had hoped (it was cold!), but I made the most of seeing the many sights (see picture section). Notably, watched Marie’s brother play in the championship American Football game. His team only had 16 players including a girl (see pics), while the other team had 40+. What impressed me was that they were winning until the 2nd half when they were just worn out (he played both offense & defensive lineman - EVERY play!). Though they lost, her brother won MVP - for only age 19, he’s very impressive. I had fun watching, cheering and explaining to worried mothers around me what was happening. Was hard when one son got injured - his mom ran to the end of the of the stadium to help, but resisted when he started limping off the field. New perspective for me. Went to many museums, areas of note, got familiar with the subway system, ate way too much high-fat butter & yogurt, lots of breads, and got a supply of Coke Zero going (again, fairly popular there, too). Took lots of pictures of the great scientific designs on one of the subway stops, and other pictures of random dogs, babies and other notable signs. Note, it’s hard to get pictures of people’s babies! Why was I doing this? Well, a friend in Omaha challenged me with this task - I got a lot, but I’m sure some thought about calling me out. I was very smooth - like a secret agent.

Rant about age
While in Stockholm I befriended an attractive stranger (Natasha) on my way to the National Swedish Museum. Even though she was from Moscow and had a thick accent, we hit it off well. Near the end she asked me how old I was - apparently she thought I was 27 (not so uncommon with my baby face, it seems). The issue was, I thought she was near 30 (I said 26), but she was actually 21. Not like I was looking to date, but apparently that wigged her out and put an end to our plans to meet up again. OH well. Back in the US I asked a 24-yr old PhD student out, and while she was flattered, she said I was too old (again, fair enough as 24 is my lower limit on the “creepiness” scale). The same day, I’m buying a bunch of liquor and at this point I’m chanting in my head “You better not ask, you better not ask...” - the guy, of course, asks to see my ID. I grunt. Get it out and ask how old I had to look for him to ask. He said “27 or younger”. Crap! OK, so while many people think it’s a blessing to look young (and I agree), it has not been kind to me in the social arena!

For something cute, be sure to see the latest TB picture in the cat section. I have more trips coming again soon, but that’s it for the year. Plus I’ve been working on the new murder mystery party - a jungle themed event!
Until the next time...