My Kind of Town

Friday, April 25

After saying goodbye to the aunties, I loaded up my lone suitcase (R took the other two bags when he flew home yesterday) and headed back to O'Hare to return the car. It was pouring rain when I got to the gas station (figures!) in Park Ridge, but I managed to fill up and stay fairly dry, thanks to my spiffy new raincoat! From the Multi-Modal Facility, I rode the tram back to Terminal 2 and then walked to the Blue Line station to take the train downtown. $5 for the CTA vs. $50 for an Uber - no brainer!

Sing the Song

When R and I watched the Cubs beat the Padres in San Diego last April, we finally broke our streak of attending losing games. Then the boys joined us for a night game at Wrigley in September which had a more typical ending (Pirates 5 - Cubs 0), bringing our collective record to (drumroll, please...) 1-8. 😩

For today's Cubs-Diamondbacks game, we got tickets with four of our longtime friends. Like we did for the game in September, R and I parked in the remote lot off Irving Park Rd. and rode the shuttle over to meet up with them.

Snowbirds

Most snowbirds migrate from colder climates to warmer ones. We, however, traveled in reverse since airfares are somewhat cheaper after the holidays. So, for a week R and I braved the cold Illinois weather for the opportunity to check in on my folks and see some friends and family while here. I don't have a lot of photos to post, but there are a few highlights that I wanted to capture on the blog for future reference...

Like a Rolling Stone

We arrived home from DC on Wednesday night. Not being ones to gather moss, we were on the road again less than 36 hours later for a quick weekend trip up US-395N to the Lake Tahoe area for the wedding of our friends' son.

This is what ChatGPT gave me when I asked for a rolling stone with no moss 🤣

Pick Your Battles

To date, we haven't traveled very much in this part of the United States. Aside from visiting Manassas National Battlefield Park with the family in 2010 and Monocacy National Battlefield while on solo business trips in 2017 and 2022, our NPS checklist is missing a lot of units interpreting sites from the eastern theater of the Civil War. (Gettysburg really needs a re-visit because I was in grade school, and the cyclorama is the only thing I vaguely recall.) Needless to say, I was looking forward to today's first stop: Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania County Battlefields Memorial National Military Park! 

Thought this was R's 200th unit, but I miscounted! Doh.

It's the Great Pumpkin

Besides visiting the grandparents, there were two other reasons for the timing of this trip back to Illinois... my hometown's annual Pumpkin Festival and my high school class reunion. 

57th Annual!

If you've ever used Libby's Pumpkin for any recipes, chances are pretty high that it was grown and harvested from fields in Central Illinois and canned at the Nestlé plant in Morton. The "Pumpkin Capital of the World" has held an annual 4-day celebration of everything pumpkin each September since 1967. Imagine a stereotypical small town fair (carnival rides, competitions, entertainment, food, parade, etc.) but on steroids - the Chamber of Commerce and its army of volunteers does an excellent job! However, the bigger draw for me is the chance to catch up with old friends since many people come back to see friends/family who are still in town.

As a bonus for my parents, my brother G and niece C also decided to visit when they heard we would be there (my sister-in-law couldn't come due to work 😢), so they had all of their grandkids together for the first time since before the pandemic.  

Out of Luck

Saturday, July 8

We grabbed breakfast this morning from Aloha Specialties, where SPAM and Portuguese sausage rule! On our way to UNLV for the second day of games, we stopped by Leilani's Attic to see if they carried the yummy cornflake cookies that we had on Kauaʻi in 2021. No dice.

After going thru security, we headed straight over to Cox Pavilion for the Miami-Boston game. M and J were sporting their UCLA gear since their fellow Bruin, Jaime Jaquez, Jr., was drafted by the Heat a couple weeks ago. Unfortunately, after we sat down, we quickly figured out that Jaime wasn't going to play at all because he wasn't even dressed during warmups. Bummer. 

Disappointed Bruins

Generational Talent

Even though M and J are now officially adults, it's nice to know that they still are up for going places with us. Guess it helps that Mom and Dad are picking up the tab for the hotel room, meals, and tickets to watch two days of NBA Summer League games in Las Vegas. Ha! But since both of them are gainfully employed this summer, they can play in the casino with their own hard-earned cash.

Because M needed to work remotely this morning, we picked up the boys in LA yesterday evening and started the drive to Vegas from there, stopping in Victorville for dinner at Freddy's and arriving at our hotel close to midnight. However, the late hour was not a deterrent for J, who was eager to make his donation to the house coffers since he wasn't old enough yet to gamble the last time we were here. M and R went with, but this tired driver kept her money and went to bed.

Escape from New York

To start off our last day in New York City, we walked with MH over to Central Park, stopping by Grabstein's Bagels on the way. We sat on a bench near the East Meadow to enjoy our picks. My toasted bagel with a schmear of cream cheese was sooo good!

Get Me to the Church On Time

Today was the primary reason for our trip to New York... the wedding of our dear friends' daughter! Since the ceremony wasn't taking place until later this afternoon, I figured we had some time to squeeze in a visit to yet another nearby national park unit, Sagamore Hill National Historic Site.

☑ #174 of 424 NPS units for me (#168 for R)

Unfortunately, I goofed up the date when tickets for guided tours of the Roosevelt home would become available online. When I checked the website in mid-May, tickets for the 10:00AM tour were already sold out, and there was only one spot left at 11:00AM, which I immediately nabbed. To complicate matters further, the visitor center/museum didn't open until 11:00AM, so we wouldn't be able to go through the exhibits there beforehand either. Doh! 🤦🏻‍♀️

Ten Crucial Days

When R and I received an invite to the wedding of our close friends' daughter, we decided to tack on some extra days and make a vacation out of it! Working son (M) and college son (J) didn't come with, so just us two empty-nesters flew into Newark yesterday. 

The air quality is so much better than it was a week ago!

Travel tip: Seats 48A/B on a Boeing 777-200 are great because there is no third seat in the row = extra room for economy price!

Divide and Conquer

Wednesday, January 4

Taking advantage of cheaper air fares after the holidays, R and I flew back to Illinois for a welfare check on our folks. But we decided to split up so that we each would get more time with our respective parental unit(s). After the norovirus debacle last year, my secondary objective was to make sure to get some Lou's this trip.

Who cares how cold it is outside when you have hot pizza in your belly?

Out of Office

After being home for only a week, I found myself on another plane early Sunday morning, this time to the East Coast. I was traveling with two of my colleagues from work to a scientific conference in Frederick, Maryland. We landed at Dulles around 4:00PM, but by the time we retrieved our luggage and picked up the rental car it was already after 5:00PM.

I had no problem convincing my friends to take a quick field trip into Washington, DC straight from the airport, especially since I was the one driving the car! The last time I visited DC was in late September/early October 2010. We pulled the boys out of school to see the nation's capital together with another family - what a fun trip! But that was pre-blog, so I don't have any details posted online.

Washington Monument from Constitution Gardens

Backup Plan

Knowing that tours to the USS Arizona Memorial have been cancelled in the past due to high winds or dock repairs, when I made reservations eight weeks ago, I bought tickets for both today and Monday, just in case. The cost was minimal ($1/person), so it was well worth it to give us two shots on goal.

As it turned out, all tours out to the memorial were suspended the day we arrived on Kauaʻi because the shoreside dock required repairs. I have been stalking the Pearl Harbor National Memorial Facebook page for updates ever since. Yesterday I saw a post that visits were set to resume tomorrow. Yay!

So, our backup plan for today was a scenic auto tour around the island!

Hot Dog!

J and M made plans to hang out with their cousin D today. So, his mom (R's cousin K) picked up the boys after she finished work at O'Hare, and then brought them back out to their house in the northwest suburbs. D scored some guest passes to his fitness center, so the three of them went to work out and then play pick-up ball. J was definitely prepared - he even packed his basketball shoes for the trip!

Somewhere under all that stuff is a hot dog

While they were out, R and I went over to Dad's place to spend the day with him. For lunch, the three of us ended up going to Byron's on Lawrence for Chicago hot dogs, although I confess that I ordered a cheeseburger (sacrilege!) It's not one of our usual food stops when we come back to Illinois, so it's been ages since we've been here.

Testosterone Day

J's final game was supposed to start at noon today, but they were running about 45 minutes behind (the facility wasn't opened as scheduled). Fortunately, another parent texted us about the delay, so we could take our time getting over to Henderson. J stayed out late bowling with his teammates at South Point last night, so he definitely needed the extra sleep this morning.

Here's another clip of J driving the lane, putting up a floater, and getting the "and 1"! (Thanks to another team parent for the highlight!)

They're Playing Bas-ket-ball

Game day! J's first game was at 11:00AM at the Black Mountain Recreation Center in Henderson. The team played well for the majority of the game, but fell short at the buzzer. Here's a clip of our favorite point guard in action (📹: M)...

The Ninth Hawaiian Island

Yep, we're back in Las Vegas again, but this time it's for a weekend of basketball for J! The tournament is hosted by the Hollywood Dodgers, a historically Japanese-American youth basketball organization from So Cal. As a kid, R played in a similar league, the Chicago Nisei Athletic Association (CNAA), so it's especially fun to see things come full circle. J wanted to play with his good friend and joined his team for their senior season. And since J is Yonsei (4th generation), he doesn't count against the team's non-JA limit. Woohoo!

March Madness

Since both the college freshman (M) and the "how-long-until-SAT|ACT|AP-tests are over" junior (J) have spring break this week, we decided to take a quick road trip. Not sure how many more opportunities we'll have to travel like this as a family, so I'm thankful that they still want to go places with us. J's only request was that we visit someplace "Instagram-worthy". 

Hmmm, that's a tall order, son...

Gotta Catch 'Em All

Since Pacific Crest was officially ending their tour today, their last order of business was to clean up their housing site, and then go back to Lucas Oil Stadium to watch the final 12 corps compete. Because all of the kids from all of the corps are descending upon the Indianapolis airport in the wee hours for their flights home on Sunday, we thought it would be easier to pick up M's stuff before it was loaded onto the buses and have him walk back to our room at the Hampton Inn downtown instead of dealing with mass of humanity at IND. Totally worth the 90-minute round trip to Hauser Jr./Sr. High School in Hope, IN this morning!