We finished the deck this morning. I put the last eight balusters (the spindly posts that function half as decoration and half as supports for the railing) on this morning. We grilled last night on it for the first time, too. 

Jane helped to coordinate the Evanston Athletic Club portion of the Lance Armstrong Ride for the Cure. She spun downtown outside of the NBC channel 5 news station. 

What a big mess! I went back to school for the first time today and found I had a new room. The buildings and grounds people are taking down the library shleving and I straightened much of it, but there's still HOURS of work to do to prepare for the school year.  

"Is that a pink dog purse?" -- Yes, yes it is. There are some questionable fashion designers out there. 

Here's what the deck looks like from standing on the deck. 

We passed the second inspection on our deck this morning. The structure is complete, and now, we dive into laying the decking, adding hand rails, and building stairs. The excessive curve on the deck is a function of photo manipulation, not construction. 

Yesterday, I staked out all of the posts for my deck, and tihs morning, I'm going to dig all the holes and insert the forms for concrete. 

Can you smell all that wood? I open up my garage and the pungent perfume of freshly cut wood wafts through my backyard. The wood is organized according to my Type A personality traits, by cut and by length. Yes, that is 24 backs of concrete in the corner. No, I hope not to use that many! 

These are two holes that I cut into the blacktop for posts for my deck. I used a circular saw with a masonary blade to make the incisions, then forked it out with a giant crowbar.  

The Interpretation

The Interpretation - Joe's new blog. He's trying to bring an artistic dimension to the world of blogging. I'm still confused, but I'm sure in time it'll come to make some sense. He's a good writer, I'll be interested to read further.

Yuck! I took down the stairs to our backdoor this evening. Tomorrow begins the big construction--I'll be installing the ledgers along the house, measuring out for the posts, and digging the post holes this weekend. 

Jane and I saw Allison Krause last night at Ravinia. We had awesome seats (thanks Joanna) with Brittany and Michael, but Amanda, Paddy, and her mom joined us on the lawn for some pre-concert eats. 

Whoa! We almost didn't get our deck supplies into the back yard, but our handy home depot delivery man somehow manuevered over my tomatoes to safely place our deck materials in the garage.  

John, Kerri, Elizabeth, Erin, and Jane. Erin and John are friends from IU, and Kerri is Erin's sister from Urbana-Champagne. All were in town today because John is presenting a paper at U of Chicago. Elizabeth is so cute (and pudgy!) 

Run, girls, run! 

My buddy Scott organized field day. Yes, ladies, Scott is still single. 

Just a reminder, I do work. This is a picture with Mrs. Coleman and I serving hot dogs at our annual, Greenbay Elementary School field day. Four hundred kids served in under an hour! It was awesome. 

Congratulations, Nancy! Nancy graduated from U of Chicago, and we celebrated with her family down in Chinatown for dinner. 

Michael and Britt joined us for Ravinia. 

Jane and I went to hear Garrison Keillor at Ravinia. We sat on the lawn, ate great food (Thanks, Britt and Michael), and laughed hard at good, old-fashioned midwestern humor. 

What a mess! This is one of the intermediary steps towards our deck project. I removed ten posts from the ground by hand. (Growl here) 

This is a photo-stitched version of my school, Greenbay Elementary, in North Chicago, IL. 

We love Saul! We've been dogsitting for about three weeks now while Amanda has been on her big road trip across America. Our new best buddy will be leaving tomorrow with her mommy. We 

Looks like hell without the deck. After removing the old structure, we found a huge ant investation in the north wall which forced us to remove the foundational plywood, bug bomb, reinsulate, and put up a new wall. Plus side: I practiced my circlular saw skills before working on the deck. 

Voici ma dumpster! We re-packed this dumpster twice to make sure we would get everything in. Said Mike our neighbor, "I've seen many dumpsters over the years, and I've never seen one packed as perfectly as yours." We're type A, what can we say?! 

These are my trumpet buddies from Northshore Concert Band. From left to right, you see Renee (we went to IU together), Herb, Dave, and Barry. Go 3rd trumpets! 

Golf

Tiger Woods: On eve of Western he tees off on a number of issues - I note this story because of the last line. When asked if he had ever thought of reaching the $50 million dollar carreer winnings goal, Tiger replied, "No, God, No. You don't play for money. You play for hardware."

He's a true golf geek. Let's discuss.

Grilling

Right now, I'm manning the medium webber in the backyard, grillin' up some burgers for a little summer grub. Saul, Amanda's chocolate lab, has been hanging with us for the past three weeks and has been keen to watch me carry the platters in and out, hoping that I might drop a bit of burger for him. No luck, though. When I sit down for dinner, I'll serve him up his own meal.

Good news. I reconnected with Chris and Marti over email last night and they have a new baby girl, Lucy. Congrats, Floridians!

Matthew is coming to visit next week for work. I've already got plenty of ideas cooking for fun evenings out for us. I'm excited!