Fourth Week in June 2010

Monday I made what is likely to be my final trip to Rosenblatt Stadium, and definitely my last College World Series game there. UCLA beat TCU, and although we were rooting for TCU, it wasn't so bad, it featured a very exciting late rally, a highlight reel catch, an arrest in the outfield stands, and Sarah Porter singing the National Anthem.

The CWS is a great event, the city and CWS committee have made the ballpark into baseball shrine, ESPN has helped to make the event relevant on a national stage. However Rosenblatt Stadium has all the inconvenience of a neighborhood ballpark (like Wrigley Field), but with none of the good things that come with it. Don't get me wrong, it's a wonderful ballpark, but parking is ugh, and the neighborhood has about two or three permanent bars, and they're not at all like Wrigleyville. Omaha has a great downtown with a lot do, housing (as in hotels) in the neighborhood of the ballpark, Creighton, the riverfront, and the pedestrian bridge all right there where . Let's just call the park the new 'Blatt, and it looks beautiful going up, it's the right thing to move it downtown.

The weather was as beautiful as it looks here.


Funniest moment of the evening; beach balls fly in between innings. One kept getting hit after the game restarted, security wanted it held, and the people in the stands played keep away, eventually it got knocked on to the field and taken away, the security guy says "That's why you people can't have nice things".


Believe it or not, there was baseball too.

You can see the other 35 pictures I took too.

Tuesday I did lawn work, and not much else. Wednesday evening I hung out on the back porch with Brianne, Merinda joined us too. For some unknown reason, bugs bite Brianne in droves and hardly ever bother me, so eventually bugs killed the pretty evening ... silly bugs.

Thursday I went with Brianne, Sarah A., Troy, and Merinda to see Sarah Porter's latest show, Little Women: The Musical. It was quite marvelous. I love theater in a way that movies and television cannot achieve with me. I know the story, but the acting was really moving, and I can admit I cried, well I might as well admit it, every one else will tell you I did. Thanks Sarah Porter and Rachael S. for a great show and chatting with Sarah A. and I until after 1100.

Friday night was dancing and then IHOP followed by some beautiful night time weather.

Saturday morning I woke up motivated and got all sorts of chores done. I was able to nearly finish my list and was ready for church in plenty of time. This was the latest installment of Mass Chaos and no one died. After Mass Chaos we had an adventure.

First stop, Michael's in the Old Market, next the Summer Arts Festival World Stage, finally Rock Band at Kaleb's until who knows when.

We need a table for five, seven, um ten.


Everyone loves Frank. Photo courtesy of Brianne


Heartland of America Park, fountain, moon, casino ... not seen, absolutely perfect weather.

You can catch the rest of the pictures I took and see if I really can take a good dancing picture.

Sunday I didn't have church for the first time in a while, having gone on Saturday night. First time in quite a while. I knew I wanted to go for a walk, but I really waited until the last minute to decide and go. I drove to Harrah's , parked and walked to the BK Pedestrian Bridge, then down to the Summer Arts Festival ... and back again. I figure somewhere between 5.25 and 5.75 miles total. Which turned out to really not be bad at all. Oh, I had my camera.

The downtown Omaha skyline.


The 'squee' content of this picture is very high.


The weather the last two weeks has been amazing.

Here are the rest of the pictures I took on my walk.

Unsurprisingly, after my walk I came home and napped. Later on I met Sarah at Culver's and had ice cream. Every great week should end with ice cream.

Catholic Voice Article

Here is a link to the Catholic Voice article about Mass Chaos.

Mass Chaos

Enjoy!

Third Week in June 2010

Monday after work Brianne and I got together and planned ahead for a couple months of Mass Chaos. We met at Panera, which is being ignored as a restaurant, I'm kind of sad about it ... people, including me, are so fussy about eating at new places, I hope it lasts, but thinking it might not. Back to the purpose of our meeting, the planning went well. I like being flexible, but everyone is so busy in summer, so I think it will it will work out better being planned out instead of going by the seat of my pants.

Tuesday during early afternoon the Platte River was supposed to crest near Louisville, so I went and got pictures.

This is about 9.67 feet, the record is less than three feet higher. It's a top ten flood, well, top ten since the oppressive western-centric caucasian capitalist chauvinist males started keeping records ... that hurt to say, do people listen to themselves when they say stuff like that? (it's a rhetorical question)

Tuesday evening we had the usual dance practice, but with a twist ... instead of Dan and Giselle on the screen, we had Dan and Gabby in person. We got about a ninety minute semi-private lesson. If I were a good dancer instead of a guy who dances, I might have learned more, but I got one good move out of it and hopefully a couple principles.

Wednesday evening I finished up processing pictures from the wedding and getting them on line. Thursday was kind of sad, I had errands to run near Old Towne Bellevue, so I included Dairy Queen and then a trip to Haworth Park to see what I thought would be a little high water, nope.

Pretty much underwater :-( This is a preview, more to follow.

Later in the evening I hung out on the front porch and watched the storms. I tried to get some lightening pictures, like 70 plus attempts, but it's tough. I love rain, storms, and watching from a porch.

I have a new exercise plan which is meeting with mixed results. I am getting up in the morning and working out and walking. I actually love it, and it's not really an issue, except that I've given priority to getting enough sleep. So the getting up early isn't it, getting to sleep on time is. I'm working on it. I got up early Friday and was working, when a front rolled in. It's was pretty intimidating, but no rain and not much wind.

Full of sound and fury, well not so much sound, and not that furious either. Pretty much signifying nothing.

Friday evening I went to the dance. I'm really excited about dancing lately, not so much about JNO. Still I thought I had a nice night dancing. Saturday I was sick most of the day, and spent it curled up on the couch, so I missed dancing in the Papillion days parade. About 1800, I had napped enough that the medicine had caught up, so I started moving around, and by 2000 I felt well enough to go out. I went to Harrah's and saw Satchel Grande. It was my first time seeing them, but it won't be my last, funkadelic baby. I guess it was when I was leaving that the flooding finally hit home. I was parked in the Harrah's garage and as I was leaving, I looked over the side of the garage into the lower level and saw the Missouri River covering it, I must have stared for a while, Merinda finally said "what's wrong?", I finally got in the car and left.

Sunday I woke up completely recovered from Saturday's headache, and I was ready to go. First up was church and Mass Chaos. We went to Saint Robert Bellarmine, you can read about it here. There was thunder and lightening all around. We ate at Gandalfo's after church, the food is much better than their dumb radio ads.

It was 1430, I knew I had to be at Maeg's by 1730, and so I had some time to mess around, so I decided on an adventure. I drove from church down to Gifford Farm in Bellevue. I parked at the Hitchcock Wetlands Learning Center and walked down the Gifford Boardwalk to the observation tower to the 'Great Marsh'. Okay, let's be clear, the term wetlands completely applied here.

The boardwalk was actually floating, not anchored down. It was like a half mile long walk on a raft.


No rain when I got to the end of the boardwalk, but then...


...it starts raining, and then I spot, um, well, I have no training in tornado spotting, but you know, it looks like something. My situation is I'm standing at the edge of a forest that is under a foot and a half of water, I can run back to my car, a half a mile away on a very slippery path, but then where am I going? I decided to just stay where I was and if I had to take a dive, I'd take a dive. Instead I decided to take some more pictures. Yeah, that worked out pretty well.


IMHO, the best photo I've ever taken.


Looks like me with the famous umbrella.


This is a lake, not a marsh ... well, really it's just an extension of the Missouri River.


I walked back down the boardwalk and over to Gifford Farm, the nearer field is where I usually see the horses in the farther field.


Yes, this picture was taken in the Omaha metro.

I then drove downtown Bellevue, back to Haworth Park to take a few more pictures there. Red, White, and Que, the BBQ contest, concert, and fireworks has been canceled for this year, as if the flooded park wasn't depressing enough, Bellevue's annual festival is now gone too.

These are some sad picnic tables.


I could not believe how still the water was.


I thought this picture was pretty cool too. None of these pictures looked so impressive until I saw them on the computer.

From there I drove south on Hancock Street to the trail access point near the Papio's mouth. It was a little marshy and very full.

This guy was hanging out on the NRD Papio trail.


What more rain? Good thing that's to the east.


I don't think Jenny or Keith are riding down this trail on their bikes any time soon.

And that was the end of the afternoon of being half a fish. You can see all the pictures I took here.

I went from there home, changed into some dry clothes and headed over to Maeg's to play Arkham Horror with the Innsmouth Horror Expansion with her and Ben Cass. Yeah, things didn't go so well, and I'm not really sure how it got all so out of control, but for the first time in a while, we lost. At least I wasn't devoured in real life, instead I had an awesome week.

Second Week in June 2010

Really, I'm so busy, and summer hasn't even officially started yet. Sheesh. Monday I was out, Tuesday I had dance practice, and I was looking forward to nothing to do on Wednesday, when I noticed at lunch that Ben R had posted to his Facebook that he would be playing on the corner of 11th and Harney in the Old Market with Insignificant Other. How could I miss that?

Not pictured: the beginning of the night at The Upstream.


The band allowed us to sing along, or couldn't stop us legally, one or the other ... no, they didn't share any money.


Of course we danced, you had to ask?.

You can see all the pictures I took from our adventure right here.

Thursday I was out and Friday it was on to the dance. We have Dan and Gabby in from Seattle teaching Lindyhop, and so I took a class from them on Friday. It turns out that I was also on the tear down crew, so it's a good thing I did show up.

Saturday was the long await wedding for Micah and Keith. There isn't too much to say about it other than congratulations and God bless, well that and a bunch of pictures.

You can see all the pictures I took from the wedding right here. I'm sure you can barely trip over the internet without hitting about 5,000 more, but just in case, here are Matt's. Check Facebook for more.

Sunday was another adventure for Mass Chaos, you can read about it here.

Sunday evening myself, Brianne, Joe, and (eventually) Frank met at DJ's Dugout in Bellevue to watch the Cubs-White Sox game. I showed up in a Cubs t-shirt and official cap, Joe showed up in a throwback Sox jersey and a cap. You can guess how it went, only you'd be wrong, it was quite the pitchers duel, the Sox pitcher going 7 1/3 innings with no hits, the Cubs pitcher going into the 9th inning with his. We had a lot of fun and ate a lot of food.

Out at Five - I'm Featured!

Yeah, Matt, thanks so much for this.