Well, big news in my life:

Starting in March I will begin life for a new employer:
Working on the following:

So if anyone finds themselves in the Moline, IL/Davenport, IA area give me a ring!

Its been a good wrap-up to the end of summer. Lots of people to see and things to do. I even managed to make it home twice in the last couple of weeks! Granted one of the trips was only for a couple of hours, but it still led to a nice dinner.

For work I had the privilege of going down to Peru, IN for three days and taking a driving class at an old air force base. The experience was absolutely awesome, imagine 10 hour days with 8 of them driving a car around, and being paid the whole time, to top it off. I even came away with a trophy in the end which is now proudly displayed on my desk. The best part was that I got to bring a Pontiac Solstice back up to Michigan and had the chance of stopping off at my parents for a couple of hours on the way home. My mom and sister absolutely fell in love with the car, although I did manage to scare them a bit!

That weekend, I had my first what I'll call minor party in my home (about 10 people), for the Woodward Dream Cruise. This is the biggest event of the summer (30,000 old muscle cars), and my new house is about a 1/4 mile away from all the action, so I decided to take advantage. It seemed as though every third house or so was having a party in my neighborhood, and it was almost surreal, until about 2:00 in the morning when it was still really loud. At least its only one day a year I guess. A lot of people actually leave town because they don't want to deal with it. Lots of cool cars though. We ended up cruising around Friday night in an old 5.0 mid 80's Mustang convertible.

I also attended my 10 year high school reunion which was an absolute blast! I had really built it up in my mind and it didn't disappoint. All of my good friends were in town, (Ross, Chris, Luke), and I ended up seeing about everybody at the reunion that I could have wanted. We ended up touring the old place as many construction projects had occurred and then ended up taking a 2 hour tour on lake Wawasee courtesy of The Frog boat. We wrapped things up at the bar, and it was hilarious to see the look on peoples faces to see that Ben Carpenter actually drank beer! For the record I don't think I ever had a drink until I turned 21.

This past weekend, for Labor Day, Tim Fenton and his wife Nicole flew into town, and Tim Staufer, his wife Esther, and their 18 month old Michael drove in, to spend some time together. Tim Fenton was my college roommate for 3 years, so we had some pretty good stories to go around. Ended up doing some typical Detroit things, John K. King used book store, Detroit Jazz Festival, and the Detroit Zoo. At the zoo we had one of the most amazing experiences with one of the polar bears. They have an arctic area this huge glass tube/walkway goes underneath the water. We are inside the tube and this polar bear literally sits right on top of the tube with only six inches of glass separating us. Was one of those moments that you remember for the rest of your life. Very cool. Anyway, we all had an awesome time, reconnecting and making new memories. Also, with an 18 month in the house, I learned about all the things I need to change if I ever have children. Lets just say there were more than one or two small injuries that occurred over the course of several days with Michael.



Until next time!

The last month has been pretty entertaining. Lots of happenings and last week I just got back from a week long trip out to California. Its hard to believe that the summer is almost over, and I've made it through my first six months of home ownership relativity uneventful (up until my range stopped working last week). Some highlights:

I made the second trip to the hospital in the last six years due to kidney stones. How fun. This time was a bit less traumatic, as I actually knew what was causing the extreme pain I was experiencing. Well six hours later and a nice morphine drip and most of the drama was over. Its amazing that these little things can cause your body to feel this much pain. The spec on the left is only a bit larger than a grain of sand. Back to drinking lots more water I guess.

My buddy Kevin had an absolutely amazing luau party with plenty of props ands everything. He really goes all out on these things and his Christmas party is also up there with the best of them. The guy even rented a real karaoke machine, and I was able to get my groove on with a classic rendition of Guns N Roses Knock Knock Knocking on Heavens Door. You should of been there, I was amazing!


I attended my first mud bog last month too, which was quite the experience. Kyle and I rode our motorbikes up to some land his uncle owns and once a month everybody in the area gets a bunch of 4x4's together and creates this huge pit of mud to run them through. It was pretty interesting, and I can only describe it as the most hillbilly type event I have ever been to in my life. Very entertaining though. They took a bit of a break and all the kids (along with a few adults), starting having a good ol time in in the mud. This stuff was waist deep in some places. Sunday of that same weekend I took another bike trip with some guys from work. We did the 2 hour ride over to Hell, MI which is quite an interesting place. Not really much of a town, 4 buildings or so, but there is a restaurant along with an ice cream shop. It is a serious motorcycle destination on the weekends.


Last week I went out to Los Angeles to visit my friend Meghan who was an intern for GM a few years ago. I had an absolute amazing time and the trip changed my entire viewpoint of LA. I had always taken the typical Midwestern viewpoint of the area as too noisy, too crowded, etc, but I really became a fan of the place after experiencing it though the eyes of a local. Also mid to upper 70's everyday with low humidity is really tough to beat! Plus she lived about six blocks off the beach! Some pictures:

Universal Studios Hollywood was pretty impressive, I enjoyed the sites more than the rides.

The War Of The Worlds movie set in which a jet plane crashes: they took a real plane and ripped it apart.The wonderful town of Whoville from the move How The Grinch Stole Christmas. It was funny because this is directly behind the Bates Motel.


There was a volleyball tournament on the weekend that was quite unusual. Thousands and thousands of people and all the teams in it had themes. Even thought the whole purpose was to come up with the most outrageous theme you could, the volleyball players themselves were very talented.
This team had authentic Masters caddie uniforms. They even used golf props when they played.
Attended my first Dodgers game. Thank you very much to Meghan's parents for the seats. I even came back with a Dodgers cap.
The setting for the stadium was absolutely beautiful. Another interesting fact was that Doc Brown (character only) from the movie Back To The Future threw out the first pitch. Only in LA.
Also managed to stop off in Anaheim on my way down to San Diego to see the Red Sox play the Angels. I even scored a free ticket in line out of the kindness of some stranger.

See what happens when a rental car agency screws up a reservation. You end up with a Jeep Wrangler for the week. This was a pretty sweet vehicle for cruising the beach, but you absolutely can't feel safe with anything locked up in them. All it takes is unzipping a zipper to get inside.

The famous Hotel Coronado.Went into Tijuana for an afternoon. I can only describe it as much safer than I had thought, but absolutely 10 times seedier than anything I could have imagined. There were street walkers everywhere!

Walking back across the border it was quite the site to see all of these people selling things in the long line of traffic waiting to go back across into the US.

This past week was the annual GM summer shutdown, so with no plans, what is a boy to do? Spend a week at his parents of course. Everything went great except for the fact that I happened to come home without my glasses. I stopped by Ben Kaminskys parents on the way back to Detroit and they happened to have a jet ski out on the lake. Well you just can't leave a jet ski sit around and not be used can you? In my mind I had every intention of just taking it out on a nice leisurely cruise around the lake, so I happened to leave my glasses on. Well after a couple of minutes of innocent cruising, I decided to push things a little bit. Bad call on my part. I try putting the thing sideways, it catches on the water and I go flying off at about 25 miles an hour. I hit the water so hard that even my life jacket comes half way off, and surprise, surprise, my glasses are no where to be found. Not a huge deal, besides the hassle of getting a new pair this week and luckily I had some spare contacts laying around, and I'm a little sore. Back to the rest of the vacation. I managed to see a good number of people and relatives, but it never seems like there is enough time to see everybody. One of the "highlights" of the week was seeing the worlds largest wooden peg barn. Its this huge barn that was built over by Elkhart to be somewhat of an farmers market/Amish goods store. It was somewhat interesting but I still don't understand peoples fascination with this kind of stuff. Another highlight of the week was spending some time out with the LeCount and Moore family at lake Wawasee. There are now three LeCount small ones and they are absolutely adorable. Pictured is Grandma Terry with her grandson Fisher.

We also worked a bit on the house last week. I now have a blue kitchen! Its not finished yet, as I still have all the trim to paint and the cabinets will eventually get painted white, and I'll install new counter tops, but I'm quite happy with the look. Its pretty strong, but I think it fits my style well. Its also been nice having some extra painters around. Ben's wife moved in with us
about 3 weeks ago, and I now have two live in guest, until they sell there house in Alabama or they get sick of me, whichever may come first. I've also started a little patio area in my backyard, although it severely needs some landscaping. It has become a nice little refuge in that its behind my garage and can't be seen from the sidewalk or road.

I'm guessing that a lot of you saw last week the story of Ben Carpenter from Michigan getting taken for a ride by a semi. Judging from all the e-mails I received, for some reason people found this funny. Anyway if you haven't heard the story I highly recommend reading it. It involved a man who was crossing a stoplight in a wheelchair and a semi didn't see him, and ended up pushing him for around 4 miles. Miraculously the kid (Ben Carpenter) didn't have a scratch on him. Read about it here. By the way I think I had that same shirt as a kid.

The summer seems to be progressing quite nicely here, I've got a bit of an outdoor area set up now with a new grill and patio set. I'm actually sitting back there right now enjoying a wonderful evening, next to my ilegal outdoor fire. Its hard to believe its almost July already, and my first big vacation of the year (if you call going to your parents house a big vacation). I am going out to California in August to see my friend Meghan for a real "vacation" though.

I got to see my ol' alma matter Cedarville participate in the Formula SAE competion up here in Detroit about a month ago. Its always neat to see them participate in these competitions and it always gives me a bit of a sense of pride to see them compete with the big boys. Granted I have never seen them beat the big boys but its still neat none the less. For my senior design project we designed the suspension for this vehicle and it is now in its third iteration.

Memorial day weekend was a blast. As is our tradition a huge group of college friends got together in Canton, OH. We had I believe around 12 people staying at my friends Jenn and Nelsons, which they were great in hosting us. We had two children for the first time as part of the festivities which made the experience all the more special. If anyone is interested I'm planning on having a get together the weekend of August 18th for the one and only Woodward Dream Cruise, which happens to be only a block and a half from my house now.

Took the first motorcycle trip of the year this weekend, nothing too serious, only about 250 miles out and about Michigan. We (Kyle and I) happended to stumble across a Civil War reenactment just outside of Brooklyn. These people are hardcore. Everybody was camping in authentic clothes, and all their supplies and tents were also authentic. We didn't actually get to see any battles or anything but it was still quite the experience. We also had one of those, hey lets check that out, moments. On the map in nice red letters there is supposed to be a Michigan Space Center, outside of Jackson. Well we travel propably 20 miles out of our way, stop and ask for directions and find one of the biggest dissapointments ever. The place was never much of anything, but to top it off it had closed three years earlier and was still labeled on my brand new map. The picture is all that was left of their displays, and it turns out that the center has been moved to Kalamazoo.

Also had a chance to check out the Detroit Festival of the Arts today. I always love this festival because its just not an art fair, but a celebration of the arts and always brings out some strange things. We even saw a showing of the oldest surviving animated film, "The Adventures of Pince Achmed", which was created in 1926. Some highlights:

These guys were all on stilts doing some dramatic theater. Kids were absolutely freaked out by them.

Nothing like taking someones hair and using it as your canvas.

This group was rather interesting, they called their routine physical music.

I really used to be good at blogging, I really was. Every week I could come up with something witty and refreshing (at least in my eyes), and it was easy. Anymore it seems like its all I can do to sit down and dedicate some time to it. I will definitely say that this home ownership thing has shifted my priorties in life. Mostly in a good way. I only watch a couple of hours of TV a week, and I will also say I'm a bit less lazy than I used to be. Granted there is a lot more to do, so I really didn't have a choice, but I will say I'm definitely enjoying it. The picture above is what the front of my home currently looks like, I planted my first ever flowers (the yellow pansies) and I believe they already may be dead or at least severely struggling! Everything else is coming along nicely though and I finally bought my first ever mower last weekend (a big moment in a mans life by the way, third behind having a child, and getting married). Well anyway, here are some highlights of the last month or so, some you may enjoy, others you may not.

Continuing on with the house theme, I managed to get rid of an old green shed that was sitting behind my garage. How do you get rid of a shed you might ask? Non other than craigslist.com. I put the thing up at midnight for free and by 9:00 am the next morning I had 25 replies. In fact I had so many replies that I sent out an e-mail at 5:00 that night and within 30 mintutes it was gone. It is quite the site to see someone driving down the road with a 6'x6'x6' steel shed handing out of their truck, but anyway its gone, and I now have to decide what I want to do with the space. I'm thinking patio funiture, but so far have not been able to find anything I like. Its not a huge space, and I also need to decide what to do with the fireplace, as well as some other nice touches. Its not in bad shape, but at the same time needs a little work. I just found out its illegal to have open fires in my town (pretend you didn't see that photo), so I'm slightly heading towards turning it into a charcoal grill. Or my other option is to continue using it as a fireplace until I get my first ordinance violation.

Managed to attend my first Tigers game the other week. My friend Meghan from California was in the other week and we had a blast. I hadn't seen her in a couple years, and had forgotten how much fun we had had, back when she was an intern in my group at GM. I'm hoping to get out to see her in August in LA and then head down to San Diego for a couple of days. She was in charge of getting tickets and somehow managed to score tickets 11 rows right behind home plate, which made for one of the better games I have seen in a while. Last time I saw a game with her however we had a couple offer us 1st row tickets right on the third base line.

Kyle and I managed to make it to the Our Body, The Universe Within exhibit down at the Detroit Science Center. I don't know how many of you have heard of these type of exhibits but they are quite powerful. People have bascially donated their bodies to science and they have becomed plastizied. For some reason the bodies on display were all Chinese, and were displayed in vaious forms of disection. I was a bit apprehensive before we went, but it wasn't nearly as gross as I had imagined. The worst thing I saw was an entire piece of human skin on display that I can only liken to a bear rug, except with human skin.

I finally got my couches for my living room, which is still a work in progress. I really like them, and they ended up going on sale for another 1100 dollars off after I bought them. After a couple of days on the phone with Macy's I was finally able to get the price I bought them for reduced to the sale price. I still need to get a new end table and a console table for this room, along with a rug and some artwork, but I'm very happy with how its turning out. I'm thinking of pop art for the walls, something along the style of Andy Warhol or Roy Lichtenstein. Should look good when its finished. Speaking of art work I did a little piece of my own the other night. I made a huge collage with every sporting event ticket I've ever gone too. Almost 13 years worth. It turned out pretty nicely and I had planning on doing one for several years now. It was pretty neat to go through the tickets and all the memories they brought back, the different people I had gone with. I'm guessing I was missing a couple, but it turned out to be quite a few tickets.

This past Saturday I had a first for me. I was mentioned in the same newspaper article with Kid Rock. During my home hunting experience I made use of a website called zillow.com . Its a website where it predicts the current value of a home based on several different factors. All you need is an address and you're good to go. While its much more accurate for metro regions its pretty neatto experiment with. Anyway, the Detroit News came to my realtor looking for people who had used the website and she mentioned me. So I got to do an interview and get some pictures taken and low and behold I got a couple of paragraphs and a photo in one of the major papers in Detroit. You can check out the article here . Its been pretty neat having people come up to me at work and say they saw me in the paper.

That crappy room you saw above in the background has now turned green. One room down, only 4 or 5 more to go. Many thanks to my friends Ben and Laura for helping to paint and also in making me be a bit more daring in my color choices. I have some couches that show up for this room in a week and a half and am getting pretty excited. I've decided I'm going with a formal living room (no TV), and think this will be a great place to relax. I'm also painting my basement bathroom red at the moment, which is a bit of a stretch for me, but so far so good. Let me know if you've got any suggestions for my kitchen. I'm going to be painting the cabinets white, and right now a sugestion for the walls has been a darker shade of blue. We'll have to see about that one.

I've also had the pleasure of having some new visitors stop bye a couple weekends in the past month. My friends Jenn and Nelson made their first trip up to Detroit and also my parents came up with my sister Camille and her husband Jeremy. As always experienced some excellent restaurants with them again. My parents have now been coming up once or twice a year for 6 years now, and I don't think we've hit the same restaurant once. We also did some neat exploring of the city. Its amazing all the intesting new things you see everytime you head into large cities. I've been down there dozens of times and it still fascinates me everytime I go. For all the negative stereotypes Detroit has, it has so much to offer. I do describe it as a city you have to learn to love. It doesn't present itself well to outsiders, but is such a neat place if you give it a chance. Here a couple of images from throughout the day.









The Guardian Building










The Spirit of Detroit, and Joe Louis Fist











No trip to the city is complete until you ride the Peopple Mover, our lovely elevated train that takes you in a 3 mile loop and deposits you right back where you started.

Special credit should be given to my sister Camille for the above photos.