Walk For Life

What an eventful day. It started this morning at 4:15am. That's right, read that as three hours before people should start their days. It didn't matter that I put Norah down an hour later last night to hopefully get her to sleep past 5:30. But she spited me by getting up an hour and half earlier.

After the early start, we went up to Como Park for the New Life fundraiser. It started out overcast, but turned out to be a great day (if you consider 85 degrees, 90% humidity, and no cloud cover great). We met Norah's birth mom there, as well as an uncle, 2 aunts, and 2 cousins. We had an absolute blast walking around the lake for the Walk For Life. Norah spent the first half in the stroller, but finished out strong walking probably the last half mile all by herself.

After the walk we spent about an hour just sitting and talking with Sarah and her family. It was fun to get to know them. And they got to see Norah running all over the park and playing with two cousins she had never met. Speaking of which, Norah has a pretty sweet setup. She's got grandma's, grandpa's, aunts, uncles, and cousins on Jamie and my side of the family. But she also has all those from her birth mom's family. Like I said, pretty sweet deal.

After all that fun, we all went to Snuffy's. I had never heard of it before, but it was great. It was an old-style malt and burger shop. After that, we headed back to Rochester. Only problem is that we got home and starting about 6:30 tonight Norah started puking her guts out. Luckily Jamie was in the leather chair, so no major damage, just don't plan on sniffing the carpet in front of the chair :-)

Norah and her "new" cousin Luke

Sitting with Sarah after the walk.

Her new cousin Olivia.

Giving cousin Olivia a good-bye kisses.

Diaper Wearing Baseball Star

We found out yesterday that some wanker(s) stole the baseball bag out of my truck. It had two bats, my glove, cleats and all baseball related equipment. I was not real happy yesterday. Luckily, the $275 glove I bought when I played at Taylor was in the house so I still have that one. Buts its an infielders glove and doesn't do so well with softballs. So yesterday we headed down to Dick's Sporting Goods. I told Jamie, at the very least, I need to buy a cup before our game on Monday. So I got my much needed cup and a new pair of cleats. I was proud of myself though, they were the cheapest pair of baseball shoes I've bought in my entire life. They cost the same as what my Walter Payton kangeroos cost when I was in the 3rd grade... $35. The difference, I think I just scored a sweet deal, but I remember my mom nearly flipping out when I asked for $30 shoes 25 years ago.

Then we decided to have some fun:

Surviving the Storm

Well, we just experienced probably the worst storm I've ever been in last night and lived to tell about it. Luckily Norah was asleep and, amazingly, never woke up. It showed up around 9pm last night and brought with it torrential rains and unbelievable winds. It was raining so hard you really couldn't even see the neighbors house across the street. Then, almost instantly, the winds came. The reports are that winds topped out around 78mph in NW Rochester, and I believe it. The rain was going straight sideways... thats when we decided to head to the basemment ASAP.

We didn't sustain any house damage that I can see, which is amazing. There are numerous trees in our neighborhood that snapped like toothpicks, the biggest one was probably about 10" in diameter. We did loose the canopy on our deck though. The wind was so strong it snapped the 4 straps holding it down and tossed if off the upper deck. When we assessed the damage this morning there was no chance for a recovery. I pronounced it dead at the scene.

At about 10pm I headed over to the Kelm househould to help out. They faired much worse. All the front windows were blown out, and a couple in the back as well. Not to mention their garage door now looks like a fruit roll-up. It was incredible the damage in their neighborhood. The house behind them was missing its roof!!! From the looks of the soffet in front, their roof was closing to getting ripped off as well.

I already took the canopy off, but here's one leg.

Side view, with canopy laying in the back.

Where it came from and where it ended up.

RIP beloved canopy (2008-2010), you served us well.

Tilt your head 90 degrees left to see the 3 branches destroyed on our neighbors tree.

Wide angle view of the huge branch that snapped off this huge oak.