Morning all:

Yesterday Marcia made one of her grand sweeps through Lowe’s. This time more bits-n-pieces of deck stuff, with a strong focus on citronella oil lamps. Last night as I sat outside reading my book surrounded by a variety of these small smoking torches it dawned on me; I had become the altar centerpiece of some primeval cult. My reading reverie lasted until I became aware of the fact that the mosquito’s that live and breed in our yard and view our deck as their playground, actually like citronella. That is when I moved inside to the couch, once again picked up my book, and then promptly fell asleep. Jason tells me that I need to plant Catnip in the yard – do cats catch mosquitoes?

I woke up this morning with Mother Nature putting on a wonderful display of sparkles. Lightning and thunderclaps at the rate of about twenty per minute. The media folks from the Jerry Springer show probably orchestrated it to prepare the Ohio citizenry to scream “Jereee” “Jereee” this week when he announces his candidacy – NOT! At least that is my fervent hope. I think it about time that we see a little statesmanship rather than an array of clowns. Once it gets light I’ll have a look to see how much of the yard is floating away in the accompanying rain. In the meantime I’ll write a bit while enjoying my early morning sip of fresh ground coffee mixed with a skootch of DaVinci Gourmet Chocolate syrup.

This week I got to see Ohio up close and personal as I drove criss-cross around the state. In my mind Ohio is much smaller than what I experienced. Next week I’ll end up doing the same thing in Indiana. Ah yes, finally a true road warrior, bound to my cell, watching the flat cornfields fly by. On the family side all is well. Marcia had her evening with our author neighbor, Andrea. Now that she has been published a number of times she showed off a file from her early start – 94 rejection letters. I think that all effort to succeed is the same in that it requires confidence, vision, and heaps of determination. Cathy, Jason and their little Marin are quickly getting into the young and new family routine; this is where the little guy learns how to raise his parents. We spent some time together last weekend and Marin is a delight (parents too). And Adrianne at her Children’s Hospital internship has already learned one thing – her own wacko family appears more and more normal. Kirstin and Vince are doing a great job of minimizing the many miles between us and allowing Derek’s Opa and Oma to share in his growing. Just have a listen to this week’s audio bit (link at top of page)to see how they do it.

Our rental students have moved on, and as the For Rent sign goes up the cleaning begins. This is the prime rental month in that incoming students are starting their house hunting efforts. Is this part of the “cycle of life”? Adrianne is still very comfortable in the downstairs unit where, this past weekend, being the excellent landlord that I am, I hung three new kitchen cabinets. Now, one long week later, only one cabinet has come down – in actuality it just fell off the wall. I suspect that my cabinet wall-mounting technique was solid enough and that it was probably a defective anchor or something. Marcia thinks otherwise. One last thing, please have a look at my brother Pieter’s web-log. My nephew has absolutely blossomed as part of a residential assistance program California has licensed in his community – Creative Living Options (click on “Week’s Best” button – near the bottom of the page). It is heartwarming that these services exist, and it is too bad that a service of this caliber is not available nationwide. Go Pete!

Have a great week; we’ll talk soon as it is only 10 weeks till Tallstacks.

Now as a new thunderstorm starts rolling in, cheers,

Dirk