Total Loss

The Subaru has been declared a total loss.

The insurance company left a message that they had received all of the paperwork from Ross Beakes Collision and would be contacting us in a few days to discuss the settlement. So we need to go shopping.

I would really like to get a new car for a change. Then you have no worries about getting a flood car, a hurricane car, or a previously smashed car. I would also really like to get a little bit bigger car - the Subaru was a bit of a tight fit. I would also dearly love to get an American made car, especially in these dark days for Michigan. How about a Ford Escape hybrid?

Dick, on the other hand, loved the Subaru, and trusts Wares Brothers. Can't argue about the safety aspects of the Subaru. Since 2003, it's had side airbags, and since 2006 it's even had a trunk release, which is not a safety feature but nice to have. So no doubt that we will once again go trucking off to Wares Brothers to look at the latest crop of discarded Subarus. Heavy sigh.

It was a beautiful day to drive home to TC. We were very glad to be heading home - the last week in Ann Arbor has been a week of recovery for us - and we were all a little subdued and listless. Luckily, the apartment was a nice place for recovering - we were warm and comfortable. We each had our laptops so we could all play WoW at the same time.

We ate lunch in Cadillac, got home around 3 p.m., unloaded the rental (a black Mercury Milan), returned it, picked up our mail, and drove downtown in time to see tons of kids trick or treating on Front Street.

Happy Halloween

Baby, Baby !

Adam announced today that he and Melanie are expecting!

That is such exciting news - the new band of cousins keeps growing and growing - Jackson, Dylan, Fay, Lauren, Autumn, Brooke, Lydia, Drew, Maya, and now a new Hardy baby!

How great that is.

Congratulations to Adam and Mel and Lydia!

The Secret Life of Steigers

Lunch and a movie seemed like a good way to celebrate Jan Snider's early birthday. We all went to lunch at TGI Friday's. Then Jan and I went to see The Secret Life of Bees, Jana went gallivanting with Molly, and Dick went geocaching.

The movie is a beautiful thing. It follows the book very closely. The actors are ideal for their characters, the setting is perfect, and the story is very bittersweet. I don't remember the book being so sad, but the movie is tremendously emotional. It's a terrific story, and I recommend the movie highly - take kleenex. It's probably more of a chick movie.

Things are going well. Jana is not having much difficulty walking around - she only has an occasional twinge. She's not even taking her pain meds anymore. I'm fine too. I've recovered from the shaken, anxious feeling, and I'm not in any physical pain. My body looks like I'm wearing a purple sash - bruising from the seatbelt.

Our car may be a total loss. The garage has not come up with the final numbers yet, but today they told us that the frame rails have buckled, which means that the whole frame of the car has been compromised.

We have a rental car which we're packing up tomorrow and driving to TC on Friday. Jana will be leaving on Friday also.
If the car is repaired we'll pick it up when we return in a couple of weeks for the Northwestern game. We have our Explorer at home so we won't be without a car. We'll be staying with Sniders for the Northwestern weekend.

Either way, we'll be getting rid of the Subaru and we'll get a new (used) car. Our kids have convinced us that driving the repaired Subaru to Florida and back is probably not a safe idea.

Normal

We are feeling almost back to normal. Jana is walking well with a walking stick, and I'm no longer quite so achy, although still very very bruised. We took a ride to campus. Jana and I visited the Alumni Center while Dick went in search of a cache which he didn't find.

We had a delightful late lunch at Zingerman's roadhouse.


We spent the rest of the day in front of our laptops. Jana went shopping at Linens and Things and found some good bargains. Dick found out that the frame bars on the Subaru were buckled, which will add quite a bit to the repair cost. We still don't know whether or not we will get it back.

Martha Cook Our Building

When the kids were little, we used to sing all kinds of songs together - current songs, Walt Disney songs, and songs from my past. (Such as "Beware, beware of pick-pocket furnace - pick pocket furnace can waste a lot of fuel and money, so if you care, replace it with a GE, a General Electric furnace, save, save save!") I guess you had to be there.

We loved to sing "Let's Go Fly a Kite", and "I Want to go to Chicago Town", not to mention the Superman song: (Though no one knows the secret of Superman's identity, he's really Clark Kent, the timid nonentity..." and so on and so on.

One of the songs we sang a lot was the Martha Cook song from my old residence hall in Ann Arbor. Jana was trying to remember the words once, and googled it. Lo and behold the lyrics are not on line! Google doesn't know the lyrics, and neither does the Martha Cook website. http://www.umich.edu/~mcaa/

So Jana asked me to put the lyrics on the blog so that future googlers can find it somewhere. (As if.) Anyway, here's the song:

Martha Cook our Building,
our dormitory dear,
We love you.

Martha Cook our Building,
0ur dormitory dear,
we love you.

With Portia o'er the doorway,
and Venus in the hall,
and Prexy in the Sparking Room,
where harm can ne'er befall,

Oh Martha Cook our Building,
our dormitory dear,
we love you!

The other dorm song that we sang was the Betsy Barbour song - evidently that one remains unrequested! It's a simpler song - "We're Barbour born and Barbour bred, and when we die we'll be Barbour dead, so hooray for Betsy Barbour, hooray for Betsy Barbour, Hooray for Barbour, Rah, Rah, Rah!!"

Some Better

Today we are feeling "some better" as Mother used to say. Jana is walking with a cane, which is a big improvement. I'm just bruisy and have a purple stripe on my bod.

Dick and I went to Meijer to pick up a new coffee pot - the apartment pot finally gasped its last gasp. It felt good to walk around for a while, but not so good after a few minutes. I was glad to get beck home.

This evening we went over to our neighborhood Joe's Crab Shack for dinner. Quite a spread - quite an entertaining staff - quite a good time.


Tomorrow will be even better.

Happy Birthday Tom!!

Today the three of us are sleepy, sore, and you might say...listless. I know this will pass, but right now we just want to sit here and take our Aleve.

Tom's iPhone out in San Diego is not working for some reason, so we haven't been able to talk to him on his birthday. He blames it on AT&T because he's never had any trouble with his Verizon account.

We had contact on our computer game, so we were able to text him that way, but that's about it. At least he knows we're thinking of him, and that we are all OK.

Happy Birthday - you are now officially middle-aged!

Our Own Personal Day From Hell

The bad stuff began when I went out to get sandwiches for lunch before the big game.

On the way home, the car in front of me stopped when the green changed to yellow, but the car behind me did not. I was rear-ended big time. I saw it coming, but there was nothing I could do - traffic was bumper to bumper on both sides of me, and I was stopped still. I was a sitting duck. The impact was more forceful than I could have imagined - the rear end of the Subaru was shoved forward quite forcefully.



The front end of the car behind me was totally smashed in and had to be towed away. The driver was a woman, but I don't know if she was injured or not. I hope she had a good airbag.

My airbag did not deploy, probably because it was a rear collision. I sat in my car for the longest time, but finally a police officer came to see if I was OK and asked me to move my car to the center left turn lane. I was OK - I knew nothing was broken or bleeding - I just felt a little bruised in the seat belt area, and I felt considerably shaky. Four police cars came, two amublances and two tow trucks.

I think I sat there for 40 minutes until the ambulance guy came to check me out. I declined any treatment and turned down the ride in the ambulance! The police officer took my info - license, registration and proof of insurance - and disappeared with it for a long time. It seems like I sat there forever.

Finally he told me I could leave, and I drove home. The engine was fine, but the rear end was very noisy with scraping and rattling, and it certainly didn't feel right, either. Thank goodness I didn't have far to go. Dick thinks the car may be a total loss, and that we may have to replace it. Tomorrow we'll see about renting a car.

I filed a claim online with Meemic because they woun't be answering phones until Monday morning.

Even though it was time to get over to the stadium, I was feeling a little too shaky and bruised and I decided I didn't want to try going. I convinced Dick and Jana to go ahead to the game. I told Jana that I would be very sad if she drove all the way from D.C. and then had to miss the game! So off they went.

On television, the game was just getting ready to start - they were lining up for the kick off, and the cell phone rang. It was Jana, and her opening words were "I broke myself." It seems that she fell down the stairs in the stadium, and had to be carried out and taken to first aid.

There, they told her that she should go in the ambulance to U Hospital for x-rays of her foot, ankle, knee and hip. She had the cell phone and the car keys with her, and she also wanted her Dad with her - so Dick was paged in the stadium to go to first aid.
Jana's "ambulance guys"


The next time I spoke to them she was in the ER, and Dick was with her, taking pictures. At that time she was still being examined and hadn't yet been x-rayed. She was in some pain, but seemed to be OK.



So I spent the rest of the afternoon listening for the phone to ring, talking to Laurie and Chip, and sporadically watching the game on TV.

Since I'm the only one of the three of us who has had a chance to watch the football game - here are some fleeting impressions that I found memorable: There were at least 3 plays reviewed that I know of. One of them was a Michigan touchdown that was kind of a phantom touchdown - I think that mistakes were made in the review booth upstairs. I'm sure it will be controversial forever. Michigan somehow managed to stay even with State up until the 4th quarter. The score was tied 14-14 at the half and 21-21 at the beginning of the 4th quarter. The State quarterback was sacked at least 3 times that I saw - although I must admit that I didn't watch continuously. Brandon Graham got all 3 sacks. It appears that State may be winning statistically - total yards, etc. State missed 2 fieldgoals - one was blocked and one was shanked. State easily got two touchdowns in the 4th quarter to win 35-21.

Losing the game doesn't seem like that much of a tragedy to us today. We have been preoccupied with our own personal stuff, and so to us, this time football is just a game.

U-M Loses to Spartans in Battle for Paul Bunyan Trophy
October 25, 2008

Site: Ann Arbor, Mich. (Michigan Stadium)
Score: Michigan State 35, Michigan 21
Records: U-M (2-6, 1-3 Big Ten), MSU (7-2, 4-1 Big Ten)
Attendance: 110,146
Next U-M Game: Saturday, Nov. 1 -- at Purdue (West Lafayette, Ind.), Noon

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The Paul Bunyan Trophy will reside in East Lansing for the first time in seven years as the University of Michigan football team fell 35-21 to the Michigan State Spartans on Saturday afternoon (Oct. 25) at Michigan Stadium in the 101st meeting between the programs.

MSU's big-play offense registered two of the four longest plays against U-M's defense all season, scoring touchdowns on a 64-yard rush and a 61-yard pass while rolling up 473 total yards of offense. Spartan quarterback Brian Hoyer completed passes of 61, 50 and 44 yards to finish with 282 yards through the air and three throwing scores. His most potent target, Blair White, caught passes of 61 and 50 yards, finishing with 143 yards and a touchdown.

UPDATE;
Here's a letter that I just wrote to Sharon with the update on our day from hell:

We are all fine. I have deep bruises where the seat belt goes, from my right hip to my left shoulder. All I have to say is Thank God for seatbelts!. I also have a lesser bruise on my left knee - I think it must have hit the steering wheel. So no big deal really. The car is a different story. We're glad that Jana's car is here.

Jana is OK - nothing is broken! She has crutches and an air cast on her ankle. She has bruises too, of course. We're just so relieved that she has no broken bones. She's limping around the apt. on one crutch. They got home from the ER around 9:40 p.m.
Limping around the apartment

At U Hospital ER, you have to go through security!


We're fine - just aches and 'bruisiness" and it's just a reminder of how lucky we are compared to what might have been. All's well that ends well, the the only real victim is our poor little Subaru.

Hi Sue!

Susan came to town to visit Molly, and so after the workout we met her for coffee.

It was nice to see her and we had a nice long conversation and solved most of the world's problems.. well maybe not. Anyway, it was lovely to have her in town.

We spent the rest of the day just hanging around the apartment - reading and playing WoW. Restful and pleasant.

Hi Sharon! Hi John!

We drove up to Lansing to visit with John and Sharon, and to see more pictures of baby Maya! We had a great visit - it's always fun to catch up on the family news. It was very special to hear about their trip to L.A. to visit their first grandchild, and to see the special pictures. You just can't get enough of baby pictures!

John treated us to lunch at the Red Robin - that's always enjoyable. Thank you John!
We had an interesting conversation, and we all enjoyed just sitting and talking after lunch.

On the way into the restaurant, Dick noticed that the gas price across the street was $2.81, and on the way out at the same station the price was $2.73 after just an hour or so! Of course we filled up.

On the way up and back to Ann Arbor we found nine caches. It was a beautiful drive - the fall colors are arriving in southern Michigan and the red maples in particular are just glowing.

Phooey on Phootball

We were out and about this morning, mostly over on campus trying to scout out clues for a difficult multi-cache. We think we have solved it now, but we haven't completed it yet. Dick did find a difficult one near Pioneer High School.

We felt obligated to watch the football game - I was on the computer and occasionally glanced at the TV - and occasionally was more than enough. We actually enjoyed the first 17 minutes of the game, and that's something.

Michigan Falls at No. 3 Penn State in Big Ten Clash
October 18, 2008

Site: University Park, Pa. (Beaver Stadium)
Score: #3 Penn State 46, Michigan 17
Records: U-M (2-5, 1-2 Big Ten), Penn State (8-0, 4-0 Big Ten)
Attendance: 110,017
Next U-M Game: Saturday, Oct. 25 -- vs. Michigan State (Michigan Stadium), 3:30 p.m.

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- No. 3-ranked Penn State University scored 39 unanswered points to end a nine-game losing streak to the University of Michigan football team with a 46-17 victory on Saturday evening (Oct. 18) at Beaver Stadium. The announced crowd of 110,017 fans was the fourth-largest in stadium history and the largest road crowd played in front of by the Wolverines in school history.

Lunch With Todd

Today we had a lovely lunch with my cousin Todd at the Olive Garden. It was fun to see him again, and we had lots to talk about. He's a good story teller, and we really enjoyed his company. The Olive Garden lunch is always a winner.

Afterward, armed with a hint from the cache owner, we went back downtown to find the pub micro that stumped us previously. Here's Dick's log of our successful search:

Found it 10/17/2008 You found Michigan Craft Brewing: Treetown (Traditional Cache)
A lot of the time when we go back and, aided by additional assistance from an owner or previous finder, find a cache we had missed on an earlier trip, we can't figure out how we missed it the first time. Not in this case. Both of us had searched the spot "thoroughly" on our first visit. We missed it because we flat out did not look carefully enough. Thanks for the help and thanks for the cache.

Jackson

It was a good day to drive over to Jackson.

We spent the day there - found 8 caches (and couldn't find two). It was a very pleasant day. It was fun to reminisce about some good times in the old days when the Mirzas lived there. I remember visiting there one time with the kids. Mrs. Mirza came to me and told me that my children were playing with matches in the garage! It turned out to be no big deal, but at the time I was embarrassed and horrified! We drove past Thompson Street and also past the Queen of the Miraculous Medals Church where Mrs. Mirza went every day.

Cascades Park is a beautiful place - well used by joggers, bikers, dog walkers, and some who actually walk without a dog. There were two caches to find in the park, and Dick did quite a bit of hiking around it - nice place.

We ate lunch a a sad little place called Ted's Firefighters Pub. They claimed to have more firefighter memorabilia than any place else in Southern Michigan. (Not a very wide ranging claim!)

We were touched by the waitress who lost her good job because of a back injury, is a single mom with two kids, and can't afford medical insurance. One of her kids has medicaid, and that's it. We were interested because of our past work with the Medicare/Medicaid Assistance program. She was appealing and friendly, but we still wouldn't recommend the pub!

Relaxing

After the Geezer Workout we went shopping at Kroger, which is a big, beautiful store. We were there because there was a micro hidden in a parking lot behind Kroger's. It was one in a series of micros hidden all around Ypsi/Ann Arbor. This one was Micro Madness #18.

After a tour of campus, we went home and relaxed - Dick by reading his book, and me by playing the game. I'm having a lot of fun completing the new achievement challenges. Right now I'm working on exploring all of the continents. It's just one of he many new achievementts available now on WoW...more fun than ever.

We also had a nice phone conversation with Dylan, who was staying home from school with a fever.

Round and Round

We went exploring in Ann Arbor, and found many interesting places. Bader Park is kind of a pocket park in a neighborhood off of Arlington St. It's really hard to locate, but Dick found it and even found a cache there.

We drove around the campus of Washtenaw Community College - it's quite an impressive layout - and it's beautifully maintained. We got a cache there, and also one across the way near the grounds of St. Joe's. It's always fun to tour Ann Arbor and today was no exception.

The most puzzling cache was at lunch time. There are a couple of brew pub caches downtown, and we ate lunch at one of the brew pubs, and then went searching. We both looked and looked, and searched and searched, and gave it a good go, with no luck. The other one was no problem.

We parked in a parking structure across the street from the pub - it was very convenient, but I'm not a big fan of parking structures. We always have to go round and round and round and park on level five. Well, at least that's what it seems like.

If It's Monday, This Must Be Manchester

Another beautiful day developed - perfect for road-tripping and geocaching, of course! Altogether we found six caches - two puzzles, three cemeteries and a clock tower. Most of them were in the area of Manchester (Home of the Famous Chicken Broil)!

One was in Chi-Bro, a village park named for the chicken broil - how would you pronounce that? That park had some great playscapes for kids, as you can see.



We had lunch at the Hungry Wolf. It was a really nice shiny new place with kind of a mediocre menu. The food didn't measure up to the really nice facility.

When we got home Dick went to the mall and found these trees that are blooming - in October! Those little blossoms are in for a big surprise!




Back home at Valley Ranch, a hummer and two other big SUVs were parked right in front of our apartment door. It seems that Homeland Security has moved in to the apartment next door - boy, do we ever feel safe!

Vibrant Town

After the tough disappointment of yesterday's game, we discovered that it's still fun just being in Ann Arbor.

We drove around the stadium, checking out all of the new contruction - it's extensive, and won't be completed until 2010.



My forecast as of today is that by 2010, if the football program doesn't improve tremendously, the beautiful, huge, expanded new stadium will be almost empty on game days!

Dick found these comments about the Michigan 2008 Football Program in the Ann Arbor News website. The first one is my favorite - I feel the same way:

Why should this coach get a pass? He's taking a winning program, turning it into a losing program, just to turn it into a winning one. If he was such a great coach, he would know how to evaluate talent, and devise a game plan with that talent. He needs to take responsibility instead of coming up with excuses (players are soft, I don't have the skill players I need, etc). I would expect him to be winning a National title by the 3rd year, otherwise, why was he hired? Michigan was already winning consistently and going to bowl games.

The next one is a little bit silly, except that we figured from the outset that if RR would walk away from West Virginia and his alma mater, he would certainly walk away from Michigan too.

Well, Michigan fans, you were all in such a hurry to push a classy guy like Lloyd Carr out the door in a knee jerk overreaction to App.State. All I can say is, enjoy your new girlfriend.....it's just a matter of time before you catch her in bed with someone else.

I must say that I agree with this next comment word for word. It seems that we have to look at this season in a philosophical way in order to live through it.

RR must stop making it about his coaching philosophy and the way he wants to do things and begin focusing on how he can equip his players and coaching staff with the tools they need to be successful. The focus must return to Michigan traditions and what has made this program the great program it is. Regardless of the current won-loss record, the unwise decisions of an AD or the total debacle of RR, none of these will negate what Michigan football is all about. However, all have contributed to this sad time in Michigan football history.

Downtown, tons of people were have a leisurely breakfast/brunch out on the street cafes because it's a gorgeous day. Ann Arbor is such a vibrant town. I wanted to have a German Sunday dinner because that's one of the things that AA is famous for. The Heidelburg wasn't open yet, so we went for a drive and wound up at Metzger's, which is now out on Zeeb Road after 75 years downtown.

Dick needed more books, so we went to the library - we got library cards last year and they just had to be renewed at the desk - no problem. We use the Pittsfield Branch of the Ann Arbor Library. It's a beautiful new building - unique architecture - and it's right on Oak Valley Drive, not very far away. We feel like it's "our" library.

A little shopping at Meijer, and then home to play World of Warcraft - it was so much fun - we finished a quest that's been bugging me for a year (the Jump-a-tron). Tom and Jana were playing too - it's always fun to "see" them.

Ouch

Today was another historic marker in the new Rich Rodriguez era of Michigan Football. Today we lost to Toledo, a member of the MAC. It was our first ever loss to a
MAC team. We had several chances to pull out a victory, but it wasn't to be. We were all very dispirited - especially poor Tony, who never in his wildest dreams imagined that such a thing could happen.

It was a beautiful day for a football game, warm and sunny. The stands were not as crowded as last week, so we were all comfortable and had plenty of room for a change. It was a noon start which we all prefer over the later starts. Everything was perfect except for the football team. I'm no expert, but I can only remember 3 or 4 plays that were well-executed and successful in the whole game. It was really a pathetic performance that we watched this afternoon. We are becoming discouraged, dejected, demoralized, disheartened and depressed. Next week these boys have to go to Happy Valley...OMG.

Site: Ann Arbor, Mich. (Michigan Stadium)
Score: Toledo 13, Michigan 10
Records: U-M (2-4), Toledo (2-4)
Attendance: 107,267
Next U-M Game: Saturday, Oct. 18 -- at Penn State (State College, Pa.), 4:30 p.m.


ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Trailing by three with eight seconds remaining in the game, fifth/senior kicker K.C. Lopata (Farmington, Mich./Farmington) missed a 26-yard field goal wide left as the University of Michigan football team fell 13-10 to the Toledo Rockets on Saturday afternoon (Oct. 11) at Michigan Stadium. U-M's loss is the first to a MAC school in program history.

Justin and Heather (Wolverine Warriors) sat with us today. I'm sure they thought they were guaranteed to see a victory against an opponent like Toledo. No such guarantees this year. This team is changing the meaning of "Blue". Instead of Go Blue, we go home blue.

Little to Offer

Neighbor Mary sent me this blog address: www.womenagainstsarahpalin.blogspot.com
It's a collection of entries by women venting about The Twit. Even for me, some of the entries seem a little vitriolic, but on the other hand some of them are right on the mark. My favorite thought or idea is the following one, comparing running for election with going for a job interview, and pointing out the Twit's total lack of ideas on major issues:

Sarah Palin's smear tactics do not represent me because I am a thinking woman. When I present myself for a job or for office, I present why I am the best person for the job. I explain why you need me. It is a waste of my time and yours for me to go on about why the other guy is bad—why the other guy is bad has no bearing on how good I am. It is completely irrelevant.

What Mrs Palin's mudslinging strategy does is show us that because she has so little to offer, she has to resort to the lowest tactics of all to win the race. She can't tell us why she is fit, because she's not fit. She can't tell us about her excellent ideas for the economy, immigration, crime, world peace, etc, because she has none. Her only option to win this race is to kneecap the other guy. Nancy U. age 44

Monty Python Strikes Again

Have you ever watched the old TV show Monty Python's Flying Circus? It was so sunny, funny, entertaining, memorable and a little bit strange, being British.

Have you ever watched Sean Hannity? Out of the adjectives used above, he is merely strange, being terminally and disturbingly conservative and egotistical.

Last night on TV, Keith Olbermann read this poem, which was written by John Cleese of Monty Python fame. Hearing it is probably funnier than reading it, but I thought it was so clever and funny that I couldn't pass it up:

ODE TO SEAN HANNITY
by John Cleese

Aping urbanity,

Oozing with vanity,

Plump as a manatee,

Faking humanity,

Journalistic calamity,

Intellectual inanity,

Fox Noise insanity,

You’re a profanity,

Hannity.

Talked to Laurie this morning - Dylan fell on his head and got a huge bump on his forehead, but he's OK - no harm done.

Dick and I went geocaching in a northerly direction - mostly in Livingston County. We had lunch in Hamburg, but we ate corned beef.

Nine caches were uncovered - one virtual and eight regular. Again, we had perfect weather - an absolutely beautiful day.

We had fun in the Hudson Mills Metropark - there was a large group of small children, wearing uniforms, together with several adults and the park naturalist. They walked around the park from place to place - when we first saw them they were examining little fish and water bugs in big tubs of water on picnic tables.

Some of the caches were in a new Metropark - so new that the entrance is down a dirt road. It's called Huron Meadows Metropark - but it's so rural, it takes the "metro" out of metropark! It's a terrific place, and seems to be popular - there was a lot of activity there today. It's near Brighton.

Breakfast With Lloyd

Gee, we had a good time. Lloyd is the same guy that he was 30 years ago. It was very comfortable and fun and interesting. I especially enjoyed hearing him tell about his trip to China. His stories about past football players were really enjoyable, too. We didn't spend anytime reminiscing about the old days in Belleville, but we did catch up on the kids and grandkids. He has 5 grandchildren - 2 boys and 3 girls.

We also discussed the current money crunch - but I'm afraid we didn't solve any of the nation's problems.

It was interesting to hear him talk about the difference in coaching today versus back in Bo's time. Back then there was no sports talk radio, no internet, no ESPN - so even though coaching is always stressful, it was less stressful at that time. He said that Bo often said that he wouldn't be able to coach these days - and Lloyd told him, "You'd be able to coach, but it wouldn't be as much fun!"

We had breakfast at The Broken Egg - it's a cute little shop on Main Street decorated with every possible University of Michigan item that was ever made - no kidding. He says that at certain times of the day you can't get into it because it's full of students.

Dick thinks that Lloyd is glad to be out of the pressure cooker, and that he likes his new job - mostly public relations - and that Lloyd has a good working relationship with Mrs. Coleman, President of the University.

Afterwards we went geocaching and found 12 caches - That's a lot for us. Well, OK, most of them were the easy parking lot type of caches, but still. It was the perfect day to do it, and our excursion took us very near our old stomping ground. We ate lunch at La Fuente Authentic Mexican Restaurant in Ypsi Township. It was great - we would go back there.

Maya Grace

Our family keeps growing...hooray for babies! Sharon and John are now grandparents!

Congratulations to everybody.

We are very excited to let you know that our granddaughter arrived at 4:22 am this morning.

Name: Maya Grace Washington
Weight: 6 lbs, 6 ozs.
Height: 19 inches

Maya and Amy are doing fine. Kevin is too!

There Must Be Something....

Well, let's see...there must be some positive things about today....umm...let me think.

OK - the weather was great for football...um...I had a good tuna sandwich for lunch, and...and...um...George and Alice came to the game for the first time this season and it was good to see them...um...Dylan called this morning and we talked for at least and hour - mostly about his Spore game...I had a nice chat with Kim about the new computer game called Spore that Holden and Dylan like so much...I felt good physically at the game today - I think because of the moderate temperature...um...the stadium was colorful...the band was fun to watch...Michigan had the lead for a while in the first quarter...I like our colors better than Illinois'...we saw some cute kids at the stadium...um...

Ah, yes, halftime was enjoyable...
It's Homecoming and the alumni band played with the big band...we had a chance to sing the Alma Mater...they played an old Michigan song from the distant past...

I want to go back to Michigan,
To dear Ann Arbor town,
Back to Joe's and the Orient,
Back to some of the money we spent,
I want to go back to Michigan,
To dear Ann Arbor town,
I want to go back, I gotta go back
To Mich-i-gan. Ohhhh,
Father and Mother paid all the bills
And we had all the fun
In the friendly rivalry of college life
Hooray and we have to figure a hell of a lot
To tell what we have done,
With the coin we blew at
Mich-i-gan!

Give me a minute here...um...oh yes...it was nice coming home to our apartment. I'm glad to be here, away from the scoreboard.

Site: Ann Arbor, Mich. (Michigan Stadium)
Score: Illinois 45, Michigan 20
Records: U-M (2-3, 1-1 Big Ten), Illinois (3-2, 1-1 Big Ten)
Attendance: 109,750
Next U-M Game: Saturday, Oct. 11 -- vs. Toledo (Michigan Stadium), Noon

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The University of Michigan football team looked in control with a 14-3 lead in the first quarter, but Illinois quarterback Juice Williams responded with a record-breaking performance, helping the Illini outscore the Wolverines 42-6 through the final three quarters of play in a 45-20 Wolverine loss on Saturday (Oct. 4) at Michigan Stadium.

Black Comedy and Drama in the Dark

Since it's Friday, we went to the Mall for the Geezer Workout. It seemed harder this morning, probably because our fearless leader decided we needed to polka. I sat that one out!
Here's our intrepid group:


Richard doing his thing!


The one in the yellow shirt is our Fearless Leader:


Afterwards we did a nice drive around Ann arbor - I LOVE driving around Ann Arbor - did a little shopping and then came home to rest and clean up.

Jan and I went to the movies! Yaaaay! It's one of the perks of living downstate for a while. We saw Burn After Reading, which was a lot more entertaining than I was even expecting. Can't really go wrong with George Clooney, John Malkovich and Brad Pitt! It's a funny, funny movie, with two murders - go figure - it would definitely be called a dark comedy. My favorite character was Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich) - his character was aggressive, appealing, intelligent and silly all at the same time. Jan liked Brad Pitt (Chad) the best. His character was shallow and a little low on the intelligence meter - but funny and cute. Frances McDormand was hilarious as a gym employee who's willing to risk everything for cosmetic surgery - she was priceless. Who knew these actors were comic actors! You had to overlook a lot of bad language, except that after a while the bad language became part of the comedy, believe it or not. We had a great time - it was a fun, fun movie.

After the movie, we went out to dinner with Sniders at the Outback Steakhouse - another great time, and yummy too.

Drama when we got back to the apartment - my door key wouldn't open the door. We were locked out at 9 0'clock in the dark on a Friday night. Dick went to the office and learned that it wouldn't be open until Monday! For a while it seemed like we might have to spend the weekiend with Sniders, wear the same clothes all weekend, and miss tomorrow's football game. Drama, and more drama.

Then a neighbor pulled up and Dick asked her if she knew what we should do - and she went inside her place and got the emergency number for us. In no time at all, a fellow drove up and let us into our apartment! Ta Da! We were very grateful - and thank you Sniders for hanging around and offering shelter :)

An interesting day in many, many ways.

Day Trippers

Beautiful day for a drive. There are so many caches around here that it's tough to pick a destination. It's like being a kid in a candy store!

We went through Saline, Clinton, Tecumseh, Manchester, and some even smaller places if you can imagine that. We had lunch in Tecumseh at a sports bar that was empty at lunch time - we felt like part of the staff! They were friendly and the food was good, so I can't explain why it was empty!

Found 8 caches, and plan to go back to Tecumseh after we solve all of the puzzles for the puzzle caches. My favorite was in rural Saline, where the cache was just down the road from a pig farm. Luckily the wind was in the right direction today, and we didn't even get a whiff. I was surprised at how noisy the pigs are - I never knew that pigs made so much noise! The cache was also my favorite because I discovered its location :)

Hidden Lake Gardens was another favorite. What a fantastic place. I remember coming here 30 years ago - it was very nice then, but it has been expanded and improved so much. It's a delightful drive, reminiscent of the Pierce Stocking Trail without the dunes! The drive has been decorated with figures for Halloween - they are just fantastic - creative and adorable. From a distance, they absolutely look real!

We enjoyed the drive so much, and found the cache we were looking for, but now we have to go back on another day because we discovered that there are several more caches in the Gardens that we hadn't been aware of.

Found it 10/2/2008 You found Quazy Cache #4 (Unknown Cache) We are staying in Ann Arbor for football season and visiting some old haunts while we are here and gathering up some caches on our drives. We have learned that going paperless makes puzzles tough. We managed to work our way through this one and were able to score this cache after a thorough search. We traded sigs and swapped a frog for a clip. Thanks for the fun!

Found it 10/2/2008 You found November 11th. A special day ! (Multi-cache) [visit log]
A great hide, we found it fairly quickly and left our card and a heart. TFTC

Found it 10/2/2008 You found HLG Pothole (Virtual Cache)
We are staying in Ann Arbor for the rest of the football season and visiting old haunts during the week and gathering up some caches along the way. Today we drove down to Tecumseh. We might not have continued on to Hidden Lake had it not been for the owner of this cache. After the effort she put forth on our S2S series, we couldn't pass this one by.
Over 30 years ago this was a turn around stop on day 4 when I taught driver ed. We both loved Botany in college and brought our children out here for Sunday drives. Boy oh boy have the gardens changed. This area was not open to auto traffic then. We loved the Weeping Beech. A lovely spot and a lovely drive, well worth the price of admission. Thanks for bringing us here!

Found it 10/2/2008 You found LaPlaisance (Virtual Cache)
We are staying in Ann Arbor for the rest of the football season. GO BLUE!! During the week we are visiting our old haunts and grabbing some caches along the route. Today we came down to Tecumseh for lunch. When coaching freshman football more than 30 years ago, we played here a number of times. Thanks for giving us an excuse to stop here.

Found it 10/2/2008 You found The LowLands (Traditional Cache)
Had I been running solo today, I would have really been "in Dutch" but fortunately, old sharp eyes was with me and she spotted an anomaly. We found it about 10:30 on our cruise south today and signed the log and left our sigs. thanks for the hunt.

Found it 10/2/2008 You found We Love Libraries (Unknown Cache)
We love libraries too. We were teased when the circulation at the TC public library increased 10% the year we retired and moved north. This is a great one and the nature trail is a plus. We had a problem because we counted a curl of hair as a button. Once that was resolved it was a quick find. Traded an NMC pin for a cat pin and left our sigs. Thanks for the hunt.

Found it 10/2/2008 You found CAMO (Virtual Cache)
Out on an afternoon drive to visit some of our old haunts. It's been over 25 years since we've been in town. Thanks for the fun.

Found it 10/2/2008 You found In memory of our soldiers (Virtual Cache)
Very neat spot. We don't remember a painted Union statue before. Thanks for showing it to us.
We wonder about the WWII date. Where did they get that?

Yes, on that war memorial, they had the dates for WWII as 1941-1946. What's up with that? The WWII that we remember ended in '45.

We watched the Vice-Presidential debate, and were disappointed. In my humble opinion it was uneventful and a little boring overall. The Twit didn't make any amusing gaffes or anything. She did kind of follow her own rules and turned a lot of the questions around to topics she felt more comfortable with, but nobody called her on it, or made her respond to the original question. Biden seemed tired to me, and he was almost too polite and restrained with the Twit. I was sincerely disappointed.

Bomber Breakfast

Van Buren Public Schools retired teachers meet at the Bomber on the first Wed. of every month for breakfast. Today was the day! Last year we were able to attend two of the breakfasts, but because of a different schedule, this will be it for this year. Too bad for us!

It's supposed to start at 10 a.m., but we went early to meet Dan and check on the progress of his treatment and just chat over coffee for a while. It was great to see him - we haven't been with him since his whole ordeal started. He's just the same as ever, mentally - funny, sincere, and very nice.

Then the arrivals began, and we wound up having to use an overflow table - I think there were approx. 20 people altogether. I sat with Diann, Tom F., Dick, Dan, and Linda, and Kay. I also had a chance to talk to John and Jim, and to plan a lunch with Dorothy. It's always a pleasure, and today was no exception.



Back at the Ranch, it was laundry day - Whee!