Best. Weekend. Ever.

So I'm sitting there at dinner with my stone cold fox of a wife (here in a still frame from a video right after she remarked that Levi was a great kid).* And she says to me, she says, are you still thinking of going to Illinois this weekend. This is a Friday night, OK?

* Starting sentences with the word 'so' became very popular in late 2019, early 2020. The use of such term in this forum does not endorse or condone such use of the term. That and putting "super" in front of everything. It's super-annoying.

Anyways, I says to my wife, I says, why not? Text the 'rents and next thing, we're waking up an impromptu trip out west. But before we get there, it's important to capture the memory of those that leave us too soon. Here we take a minute to remember butt baby #2.

Driving over on 64 a couple things struck me. First is the sharing of the radio that now takes place, with Eva liking the top 40 stuff. After they got on tech in the backseat I put on my usual classic rock stations all along 64 (when did Nirvana become classic rock?), and on comes Iron Man by Black Sabbath. And Levi starts to whistle along with the guitar riff. So weird. He's paying attention. The other thing noteworthy about him is he asks a million questions, and his response to ever answer is 'OK.'

I'm walking around the homestead taking pictures of the sky, like some kind of lunatic. Pretty quiet night, first time ever I didn't have a drop to drink the entire day when traveling to paradise.

Up the next morning to fix breakfast (that's what we say in the country, we fix meals, when we are about to do something we say we are fixing to do it, and so on) too many cooks in the kitchen. Long time readers will recall Eva needing a stool just to get her head above the counter top in this kitchen.

Well fed, we venture out on the bikes to watch a river flow. The ol' Wren Bridge crossing. You boys and girls don't try this at home.

In the afternoon, after grading one of the papers I succumbed to the first beer of the day. And the second. I should have known better, after setting up the trouble zone behind the garage. Like John Lewis, who also recently left us, joining baby 2 in heaven, it's "good trouble."

Quote of the weekend: "I will never attend another daytime party without my bush hog." And if you need any bug spray, I'm your man.

The gals rounded up some wood for the first fire in a while.

After much effort, the party moved 50 feet over.

The kids tempted fate on the welded bar off the swing set.

The weasel. Aka Max.

Halfway there I started to throttle back to see if I could get the MPG up. And then it became an obsession. On the way home, even through the hills in Eastern Indiana, I managed to get to the Waddy exit to get some of that sweet, sweet cheap gas. Loaded up to see this when I started the van. #minivanlife