Chicago, Chicago - that Toddling Town! - 108-113 of 178 Adventure

1st Goal of Chicago visit accomplished with buddy Dave

Our trip to Chicago this week had a three-fold purpose:
1) see a Cubs game in the same stadium where I saw my first major league baseball game 56 years ago;
2) attend the National Dramatists' Guild Conference; and
3) recall from my childhood memories by finding landmark locations with significance of my mother and grandparents.
     Sounds simple enough.
     On Tuesday, August 20, we made it to Joliet, Illinois, the site of our latest campground.  It was a long day; the 363 miles driven were the most we had traveled in Air Barty One in a day since we bought her.  Our original vow was to drive no more than 300  miles or 5 hours in any one day, so this was a bit on the high side of what we wanted to accomplish.
     We met up with the wonderful Dave Benoit for a cup of coffee in nearby Naperville.  Dave and Diedre had often worked together over the years in educational technology; it seems Dave was always running new companies and often hired Diedre for her expertise.  He has become a wonderful friend over the years.  An interesting guy, Dave played football in high school and was good enough to be offered several full-ride scholarships.  I especially admire that he  had the nerve to turn down Harvard and, instead, took a full-ride at Northwestern, no slouch of a school itself.  Dave and I have shared a mutual interest in sports ever since we met.  And he even flew out to Phoenix to see my first play, "Buzzard Ball."  What a guy!
     Our campground was nice enough, lakeside and all, but the manager there was a total jerk, yelling at us for showing up 5 minutes late after the check-in time.  What, are we back in 5th grade now?!  If you're a fan of the English TV comedy "Fawlty Towers," you'll understand when I describe this guy as the spitting image (and demeanor) of Basil Fawlty, except for Basil's good hygiene.
   

 Wednesday was our big day to go to the Cubs game, the 7th of the 9 games we would be seeing on "Road Trip '13."  Good guy Dave joined us for the game and provided transportation to the tricky area at Clark and Addison.  As usual, we had dinner at the spectacular Murphy's Pub right across the street from the center field bleachers at Wrigley.  That's a tradition with Diedre and me, something we've done for every Cubs game we've seen (about 20) since we met in 1988.
     Before you knew it, the Cubs were down 5-3, but then they rallied, scoring 5 runs in the 5th.  Of course, that was too good to last.  The Washington Nationals tied it in the 7th, then won the game in the 8th on a 2-run home run by a former Minnesota Twin player named "Spam" ... All right, his name is actually "SpaN", but being a guy born in Austin, MN, home of the Hormel Company, I take my spam where I can find it.  Final was 10-8 Nationals.  Funny comment: a home run hit earlier by the nationals player Hairston was hit so high and far into the night sky that Dave remarked, "That ball is going to need flight attendants."
   

 One of the best things about Wrigley is all the hoopla going on that isn't even a part of the game.  First there's the wonderful architecture for this great stadium that was opened in 1914.  Amazingly, the Cubs' ushers are almost as old as the stadium.  The guy in our section had to be 87 and he was one of the young ones.  I noticed that during the 7th inning stretch, he turned his hearing aid down as the crowd bellowed the words to "Take Me Out to the Ball Game."
     The concessionaires were a trip as well.  The Budweiser guy was so excited, bounding up and down the steps near us yelling, "BUDWEISER!!  HEY, I GOT YOU BUDWEISER RIGHT HERE!!"  Of course he was excited: he was selling a can of Bud Light beer for $7.75.  Almost as enthused was the younger guy selling cotton candy and long licorice whips.  He flashed by us in a blur, bounding so high he barely even touched the steps.  He had to have been on a sugar high.  Alas, the poor guy relegated to selling water (at $4.75 a pop) looked quite depressed as he slowly trudged up and down the aisles.  He reminded us of that teacher in the movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," although instead of murmuring, "Bueller ... Bueller ... Bueller," he muttered "Water ... water ... water."
     By the 8th inning, a lot of the "fans" had left.  Now, the 99-year old Wrigley Field had been built with a lot of vertical steel beams holding up the second deck.  And they're still there.  So if you're in the last 20 rows of the first deck, these posts obstruct your vision to at least some parts of the field.  With the fans leaving, I noticed that a lot of the unobstructed seats in front of the posts had become available, yet the Cubs fans in the obstructed seats, being Cubs fans, didn't bother to sneak down into the unobstructed seats.
     Really?!
     I mean, how hard can it be to sneak down into the beamless seats, especially when the only security you had to slip by was an 87-year old usher taking his evening nap.  Maybe the fans just didn't want to see more Chicago losing baseball.  Are the Cubs really that bad?  (Answer: Yes.  They're in last place in the National League Central and have the 2nd worst record in all of the N.L.)
     Thursday was the beginning of the 2nd bi-annual Dramatists' Guild National Conference.  I have been a member of this playwrights' guild since "Buzzard Ball" was produced in 2004.  That's one of the requirements for Guild membership: the production of one of your plays on an established stage.  Since then, I have written 10 more plays, and in doing so, have utilized the Guild's services on a few occasions.  But this would be the first time I would be coming face-to-face with my peers in the industry, so to speak, and I was a bit nervous.  I mean, I'm just some goon writing funny things about sports.
     My lovely and supportive wife Diedre joined me on our train trip into the city of big shoulders; while I would be at the conference, she was going to take advantage of some daytime theatre in the loop.
     That afternoon's sessions and meeting were OK, but nothing to knock my socks off.  That would come on the following day.
     Friday, August 23, Diedre again joined me on our 90-minute train ride into the city.  Things got off to a fine start with a Q-and-A by established playwright and TV writer, Theresa Rebeck.  Her C.V. includes writing for the TV show "NYPD Blue" and being the creator of that recent smash hit, the aptly named "Smash."  It was wonderful to hear about the behind-the-scenes goings-on of the industry.
     And then  it got better.
     The next session was with Stephen Schwartz (composer) and Winnie Holzman (librettist), the creators of that fantastic Broadway hit, "Wicked," the pre-story of the witches of Oz  As was my style, I grabbed a seat in the front row, something that I had never done during my days in high school and college.  I don't know ... I must be getting hard of hearing.  Anyway, I was within an arm's reach of those two wonderful people.  Before "Wicked," Schwartz had been doing animation music, and for the most part, was happy with that.  He was on a Hawaiian scuba vacation with friends.  While on the boat back to shore after a dive, he noticed a friend reading a little-known book titled, "Wicked."  After a brief discussion, Stephen knew he had to have that story.  He thought the writer was a genius for making Elpheba (the wicked witch) not so evil.  His quest for the next year, then, was to transform this story into a Broadway musical.  Interestingly enough, he had to get the rights for it from actress Demi Moore.  She had wanted to do it as a non-musical movie.  Lucky for us Stephen convinced the right people of his vision.
     So that was Ty Cobb ... and now here came Babe Ruth.  (I enjoy the baseball metaphors--could you guess?)  Still in the front row, Bobby Lopez, playwright of the two huge hits, "The Book of Mormon" and "Avenue Q" approached the dais.  And wonder of wonders, his wife Kristen took the seat next to me.  An accomplished writer and singer herself, she has worked with Bobby on a lot of his efforts.  The two of us had a nice, if short, conversation.
     "Why, they're just kids!"  thought the 62-year old novice playwright in his best old fogie manner.
     Kristen spoke often to the assembled multitude from her seat in the audience.  She said that Bobby is into comedy all the time, so much so that once in awhile, needing a break, she'll say to him, "Honey, can't we just watch "Schindler's List" tonight?"  Bobby and Kristen then brought the house down by singing a song they wrote about an interview they heard Stephen Sondheim do.  The song was called, "I Wish I'd Written a Song Stephen Sondheim Wished He Would Have Written."
     The all-star day finished up with a session by the also far-too-young Tony-Award winning playwright of "In the Heights," Lin-Manuel Miranda .  Amazingly, he had gone to the same grade school as Bobby Lopez.  What are the odds?  And get this: he's currently working on a hip-hop musical about Mr. 10-Dollar bill himself, Alexander Hamilton (I am not making this up).
   

 Still on a high from the day's encounters, I joined Diedre that night for a wonderful mystery-comedy play at, of all places, the city's water works.  The play, "Big Lake, Big City" took place at the Lookingglass Theatre in the inner bowels of the ancient Chicago waterworks facility.  And it worked.  The play had been directed by "Friends" TV show star David Schwimmer.  He did a wonderful job.
     The final day of the conference could in no way compare with Friday's events, but I still enjoyed my time there.  In the Dramatists' Guild Conference vendors' room, they had a display there from their archives that included the following pieces of history:
1) a Eugene O'Neill contract from 1918;
2) a 1967 letter from Robert F. Kennedy;
3) Gypsy Rose Lee's application for Guild membership in 1953;
4) a letter from Ernest Hemingway written in 1939;
5) a 1969 note from Arthur Miller; and
6) Tennessee Williams' 1948 Pulitzer Prize announcement letter from the Pulitzer committee.
     This place felt like the Cooperstown of Broadway (There's that baseball thing again.)
     My last session combined my love of history and writing.  There were two people up front speaking about writing the history-based play.  One lady told the wonderful story of her research about the Alabama man who made the first flag for the Confederacy at the start of the Civil War.  It turns out that he secretly supported the Union.  To make things even more confusing, he was also the owner of 4 slaves.  Go figure.  Boy, I certainly want to see that play when it comes out.
   

Alexx at the train depot in Downer's Grove

 Relaxing after the end of the conference on Sunday, our last day in the Chicago area, I dragged Diedre out to find some landmark locales where my grandparents and my mom had lived from the 1930's up to about 1970.   I was able to find the last house where my grandparents lived and where I visited up till I was 15; unfortunately, there was a fence covered with vines at the spot where their driveway would have been.  Being tall enough, I peeked over the fence.  To my dismay, the house was gone and their hobby farmland had been turned into a housing development.
     Ah, progress.  What are you going to do?
     

Side view of the train depot

We then went searching into downtown Downers Grove.  Once there, I immediately spied the old train depot I remembered from when my grandmother would take me into town to get my baseball cards.  Amazingly, the depot is still being used as a waiting room for trains into the big city, but now with a few shops added in.  I especially liked the bakery there called "The John Dough Bakery."
   

We had a 1930's photo of my mom's dog "Laddie" in front of the house where she grew up.  Fortunately this time, the address was on the back of the photo, so with the use of "Penny," our wonderful yet sometimes obstinate GPS, we found the house, still intact, and still identifiable with the Laddie picture.  As we were taking some exterior photos of the house, we noticed the front door was open and a woman was walking around inside.  So spurred on by fearless Diedre, we rang the doorbell.
   

Same view of the house as in the photo with Alexx as the dog

 Carol Ford was the homeowner's name; she had been living there raising her family for the last 21 years.  She couldn't have been nicer, even inviting us in and showing us around the place.  Many parts of the house were identifiable from stories we had heard from my mom.  After a wonderful tour, we bid her a fond farewell.
     

The fireplace in it's original condition.

Our final stop was Avery Coonley, the private school I had heard so much about while growing up.  

There my mom, having skipped first grade, joined her brother John in his 2nd grade class.  The school was built in 1929, and sure enough, it was still there and still functioning as an active school, although a bit enlarged I'm sure.  I had Diedre take a picture of me on what I supposed to be the same front steps where John and Mom's class picture was taken some 80 years ago.
     Wow!
     I'm now going to ask you for a favor:
     Meet me in St. Louie, Louie!
     See you next week.
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Hi All - Diedre here.  Just want to make a few additions of my own for those of you wondering how I occupied my time while Alexx attended his conference.

 I absolutely LOVE Chicago and was thrilled to be back in the city!  The country and scenery we are seeing on this trip is lovely and I do enjoy the little towns we find along the way.  But there is just something about cities like New York and Chicago that just make my heart sing!  Walking issues with my hip and asthma seem to dissipate as I just fly through the streets with an enthusiastic pace (not unlike what Alexx does when we are in a ballpark.)  So having three full days to myself while Alexx was in his conference was noooo problem for me!  I had the joy of seeing two matinees (The Color Purple at Mercury Theater and The Pianist of Willeden Lane at the Royal George Theater.) Both productions were outstanding.  I absolutely love going to the theater by myself.  I never have to worry if the other person is enjoying the show or not and I can totally focus on the play.  I would highly recommend both of these plays.  Especially the later which is only performed by. Mona Golabek, the playwright.  It's the story of her mother who was the lone survivor in her family from the Holocaust.  Due to her mother's talent as a pianist, she was chosen by the parents to board the Kindertransport and escape the Nazi treatment.  Mona tells her mother's story though text and music as a one woman show.  It's absolutely amazing as she allows her mother's story to give flight to the inspiring music and prose that touches the hearts of everyone in the audience.  I was spellbound.  If her  tour comes to your city - definitely see the show.
     

Besides seeing theater and walking the streets of the city - I covered 9 miles on one afternoon and 5 on another and was able to do a quick stop at both Second City and Steppenwolf on my little tour.  I also rode the subway and train but walking was my favorite mode for the best site seeing/people watching.    I managed to look at lots of items in stores without spending a dime!  I especially enjoyed having time for a leisurely lunch of sushi at an exquisite restaurant high above the city.

My third afternoon I spent in the stylist's chair in the Water Tower Place.  I had hoped to go the full 6 months without a haircut and just see how long I could grow my hair.  But the box coloring job I opted for in Michigan over a salon job was now starting to turn orange and my hair was not doing well with the length as it got thinner and less manageable.  

My "Before" picture.

So since I was in the lovely city I thought my odds of finding a qualified stylist were much better than on the backroads of Tennessee.  As luck would have it, I found Susan MacCoy at the Elizabeth Adams studio in the Water Tower Place.  Susan is an expert witness for cosmetology court cases and has styled the likes of Diane von Furstenburg, Barbara Walters and other celebrities so I figured she could handle my issues.  And well she did.  Three hours later I exited with softer tones and three inches less - still long enough to satisfy my agreement with Alexx that if I keep my hair long he won't grow his to pony-tail length - and not a big enough change for him to notice that I had had my hair done which I realized when at dinner he asked me what I did that day! Sheesh!  

My "After" picture

The only disappointment with my afternoon at the hair salon was the loss of one of my favorite earrings.  It apparently disappeared in a towel after the shampoo lady rinsed me as it was not to be found anywhere.  Bummer.  I seem to be acquiring a lot of single earrings! Thank goodness I have three holes in my ears!

     That's about it for me.  Alexx  covered the rest quite well.  Except for the jerk manager at the campground it was another great town on our trip as far as I was concerned!  See you in St. Louis!

Minnesota Return - Days 97-107 of 178 Day Adventure

Alexx taking aim at some giant mosquitos.

On Friday, August 9, we made our way back to our home state, good old Minnesota, the land of 10,000 lakes and a few more than that in mosquitoes.  Soon after landing, we were greeted at the campground by longtime friend Randy "R.J." Johnson and his fiancee Jacqueline.  R.J. and I have known each other since the 9th grade; later, we were both hired by the St. Louis Park Parks and Recreation Department back in 1974 for our first real jobs in the grown-up world.  His lovely fiancee is from England, putting the "lonnnggg" in long-distance relationship.  In a charming trend for us, Jacqueline becomes the 5th English woman who has either become a friend of ours (Jo and Lesley in AZ) or is dating one of our male friends (Mary with college roomie Jim, and Vickie with Sam Campbell, the son of one of our best friends).  It's a regular "British Invasion" all over again.

Jean Alexander with Mick and Jennifer Kirkeby.

    
















 Our main reason for our return trip to Minnesota was to have a party at my mom's house on Saturday, August 10, that would be a combination book-signing party (We finally had been shipped 200 copies of my book, The Fastest Gun in Hollywood: The Life Story of Peter Brown) and a celebration of the last party we would have at the house where I grew up.

Alexx and Scott "Marty" Martin with the book.

 Yes, after 55 years, my mom is putting the old place on the market and moving to the incredible Presbyterian Homes on the Twin Cities premiere lake, Lake Minnetonka.  Newly built, P.H. is 5 blocks of senior housing coupled with some 130,000 square feet of retail shops and restaurants, a 100-room hotel, and a grocery store, all within a block's walk of downtown Wayzata and the lake.  We think it's going to be good for her, and at 86, she won't have to be climbing on the roof anymore cleaning acorns out of the eaves trough, as we caught her doing again last week.

The Mumbleaus enjoying the "spread" of goodies.

     The party turned out wonderfully.  New friends and old along with relatives and neighbors came by to reminisce about the home and parties of yesteryore (Is that even a word?).  



Mom had the place decorated perfectly for a western book signing and Diedre was a wonder in the kitchen putting all the hors d'oeuvres together.  It was a night we won't soon forget, even as we have trouble daily remembering where we left our glasses.

Long time friends Alps, Ax and Annie

Alexx reading to Diedre and all an excerpt

      The following week our dance card was full up.  We played golf with long time friends Cat and Greg, utilizing our usual 9-holes-only, 2-person-scramble format.  We figure if we want to keep playing golf, we really have to like the game, and to like the game, we need to keep it to about 9 holes, or I start bleating, "Is this almost over!?"  The scramble allows us to usually be hitting from somewhere good as most times one of us is in the fairway on any particular shot.  It works for us.

Cat at the Nugget

     Afterwards, we dined at the Gold Nugget.  When I bought my house on Glen Lake in 1984, I found this dumpy little burger place 3 blocks walk away.  For the next 20 years, I was a regular at owner Doug Carlson's Gold Nugget Restaurant.  Great burgers and even greater atmosphere.  Unfortunately for us (not so unfortunate for Doug), a developer bought him out for several million dollars.  He did put up a  new Gold Nugget in the middle of his development; the place is OK, but it will never be the same.  Ahh, progress, I guess.
    
     

     On Tuesday, we had lunch scheduled with Gerry and Judy Turnberg.  25 years earlier, I resigned my position as state athletic director for the Minnesota Recreation and Park Association.  The MRPA board asked me to pick my successor, so I went with Gerry, one of my regional softball umpires-in-chief.  He did a wonderful job over the years and really grew the program.  Now, 25 years later, HE'S getting ready to retire.  Where the hell did the time go?!
   

Judy and Gerry Turnberg

 The Turnbergs have two stunningly beautiful adult daughters.  One of them was a Minnesota Vikings cheerleader.  At lunch, Judy told us how their daughters, along with their three equally stunning cousins (all 5 are blondes) made a video and submitted it to the TV game show, "Family Feud."  And amazingly enough, some old guy producer saw the girls and decided they must be on the show.  They made it through 3 nights of competition and in the end, totaled $21,000 in winnings.  The show was repeated last week and we were able to view one of the night's competitions while in Air Barty One in St. Louis.
     That evening, we had a family dinner at my brother Mark and his wife Linda's house.  As sometimes happens, Diedre mixed her wine and with some very good (and strong) martinis.  You can imagine how that night turned out.  At 2 a.m., I found her on Mark's roof yelling, "I'M KING OF THE WORLD!"  I don't know ... maybe I dreamed that last part.

   

Dennis and Ellen - the newlyweds!

 On Wednesday, we made it out to a Twins baseball game with Ellen Joseph and new husband Dennis.  Ellen and I go way back, our lives intersecting with each others many times over the years.  In high school, she cheered for me when I was captain of the basketball team and she was the head cheerleader.  We found ourselves on the same airplane freshman year of college when we both attended the University of Michigan.  When I was the athletic director for the city of Eden Prairie, MN, I ran into her often as she was married to one of the better softball players in E.P.  And then years later, we reconnected when I was running my Duck Soup Softball Fiasco tournament; the proceeds went for scholarships at the old high school, so I had been recruiting as many of my classmates from the late 60's as I could.  Ellen even made time to come down to Arizona to see my plays, something for which Diedre and I are eternally grateful to her.

Joe Mauer taking his bases on the Home Run Hit

    We had been in the Twins new stadium last year, so it didn't add to our quest of seeing all major league stadiums.  But we were confident of victory, as so far on the trip, we were 5-0 for home teams in baseball games we had attended.  Sure enough, the Twins jumped off to a big 7-3 lead after 7 innings.  However, the Indians of Cleveland tied it in the 8th on a 3-run home run by that noted steroid fan, Jason Giambi.  The Indians then took the lead by scoring a run in the 10th, but in a most exciting , crowd rousing turn of events, local Twins star Joe Mauer tied it up with a line shot home run in the bottom of the inning.  We thought we had the game now, but unfortunately, our  streak came to an end as the Indians scored 1 in the 12th on a sacrifice fly for a 9-8 win.  We drowned our sorrows in beer in the pubs on the walk back to Ellen and Dennis's townhouse.
   

Becca and her Aunt

 Thursday was a big day for us.  After meeting up for an early pre-work breakfast with our wonderful niece Becca (her work, not ours), we ventured out to Roseville, MN, to meet up with artistic director Steve Peterson.  Steve works with senior actor programs and, through one of our Minnesota actors, had heard about my senior softball play, "Buzzard Ball."  We had sent him a script before we left on our trip; today would be decision day for Steve, and sure enough, he informed us he wants to produce my play, probably in March of 2014, in Minneapolis.  Pretty exciting stuff for us both!  It will be the 3rd time BB will have been produced, but the first time since 2004.  We're planning on flying back for opening night.
   

The original Boones Farm Boys hitting the bottle again.

     I mentioned earlier about the house I bought on Glen Lake back in 1984; I lived there for 20 years, joined by Diedre from 1989-2004.  We had sold the house to Chuck Pappas, a high school and work friend who had been our house-sitter for the first 5 years that we split time between Arizona and Minnesota.  When he heard we were finally going to put it on the market, he and his girlfriend asked for the first option on buying it; eventually they did.  This made it easy for us to visit Minnesota and see our old house, complete with 2 decks, swimming pool, and built-in bar, all the comforts one needs in life.
     But all good things must come to an end.  Chuck and now-wife Theresa have decide to downsize, so they put the house on the market.  This after doing a yeoman's job of remodeling, making the house roughly double the size of when we lived there.  So that night would probably be the last time we would be invited to our old house, unless the new owners are really good sports.
     Just like old times, it was a pizza party poolside.  Invited were the usual gang: best friend Steve "Alps" Alpert whom I have known since kindergarten; Dick "The Ax" Anderson, also a friend since kindergarten; and Ken Radde, long time next door neighbor with whom I go back to 1965 playing together on the high school basketball team; and their wives/girlfriends, Jane, Annie, and Bonnie.  It's a good thing we've got the RV now, since with my mom's and Pappas' houses sold, there would have been two fewer places for us to crash on our summer trips home.
   

 On Friday, we took Mom on a day outing.

 Her thing is antiques, so we found one of the oddest "antique" places in the city.

 Hot Sam's is more a combination junkyard/antique store /museum with over 10 acres of oddities.

 It's been described as "a place between a museum and The Twilight Zone.  Much to look at and a lot of laughs.  

You wouldn't believe some of the things they have on exhibit there.

     That evening, close friend Craig Campbell came over to the campground for a cookout.  He's threatening to meet up with us somewhere out west in the remaining days of our trip.  We'll see.

     

On Saturday, August 17, we went over to Mom's house for very possibly the last time.  The family had the house built in 1958 when I was in the 2nd grade.  On this day, the memories really came washing down over me.  

We noticed on my bedroom door that the height measurements of me as a growing boy were still there: the first showed I was 5'5" when I was 12 (3/13/63), and the last one was 6'2" when I was 16 (3/13/67).  Diedre decided I needed one more measurement there, so for the first time in 46 years, I stood against the door for the final time.  My final height was measured at 6'4" (with shoes on) at the age of 62.  I guess I'm still a growing boy.

   

 We ended our time in Minnesota just as it began, with a visit with R.J. and English Jacqueline.  We played a 9-hole scramble at Valleywood Golf Course, the same course where my bachelor party had been contested just over 22 years ago.  With all these dates and measurements of time, can you tell my degree was in history?
   

 
     We spent the next two days in Menomonie, Wisconsin, at Remy and Lisa's, Diedre's younger brother and sister-in-law.  We got there early enough Sunday morning to see Remy preach at his church.  We later took a walk around their beautiful grounds and were able to see the hillside bench on the path that had been dedicated to Barbara (Barty), Diedre and Remy's mother who passed away a year ago July.  It was a most idyllic setting and very comforting to sit on the bench and look down over the rural countryside.

   

Playwright and Author Alexx Stuart with college roommate Jim Schroer

 OK, on to Chicago for a Cubs game and my first ever attendance at the Dramatists' Guild (playwrights) National Conference.  See you there.

Wisconsin - Days 88-96 of 178 Adventure

Before I go on to Wisconsin, there are a couple of things I forgot to tell you about in my previous blogs on Ohio and Indiana:
1) You'll recall that my Over-60 Rockies softball team won gold medals at the National Senior Olympic Games in Cleveland in late July.  Our manager, Jim Erickson, had unfortunately not been able to be with us because of hip surgery.  What I didn't tell you that was during the championship game, in order to make sure that Jim was a part of the victory, my clever wife was most likely the first person in history to broadcast a game via text.  Yes, Diedre Kaye took the time to text Jimmy, back home recovering in Michigan, every play of the championship game.  I figure that has to get her a place in the broadcasting hall of fame.
2) Here's an interesting fact I learned about the great state of Indiana during our stay at the Elkhart campground: it is a state law that you cannot swim in a pool ALONE!  Safety issues, I guess; a little heavy-handed maybe but it may save a few lives.  Really puts the "buddy" in the buddy system.

O.K., on to our time in Wisconsin.
     The following three states (Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Illinois) were going to be a bit tricky for me as they would all recall significant memories from my youth.  More significantly for my emotional state of mind, there was a good chance that these would be the last times I would ever see certain sites and/or people who were part of these great memories.  So join me on my trip down memory lane.
     Wednesday, July 31, we barely made it to Janesville, Wisconsin.  It was the exact halfway point of our 178-day vacation, yet to us, it felt as if we had just left the friendly confines of Cave Creek, AZ, a few days earlier.  Time certainly flies when you're having fun.
     I say 'barely" because about an hour short of our intended destination, some warning lights started blinking on the dashboard.  And these are not just like any car-dashboard lights.  AB1's dashboard lights more closely resemble those of the Starship Enterprise.  We had no idea what was going on.  The fact that the blinking lights, indicating problems with the leveling system that we use to make sure that AB1 perfectly level when we camp, were accompanied by a gentle but consistent ringing of an alarm bell which took us
about 30 minutes to figure out where it was coming from. (Once again, Diedre's yoga practice came into play as it is much easier for her to crawl about and around the interior crevices of the vehicle than it is for a delicate figure such as mine.)  Now, while Diedre has a nodding acquaintance with Mr. Goodwrench, I, on the other hand, am lucky if I can get the gas pump nozzle into our tank.  As an example, a service station attendant once convinced me that my car beams were low and so he sold me some "headlight fluid."
     We managed to stumble our way to my cousin Mona's house in the little unincorporated village of Emerald Grove.  Her farm house sits across the road from the farm house of her father, my Uncle John.  He and my mother were, and still are, very close.  Only a year older than her, John and Mom went through school together in the same class due to my mom skipping the first grade.

     Uncle John is a most interesting guy.  He was in the medical corps during World War II.  He spent his time in Florida where naval pilots were in training for overseas flights.  A lot of these boys never made it out of Florida, often crashing in the Everglades during practice.  One of John's jobs was to go out and find their bodies after such crashes.  It was a little unnerving to be out in the swamps in the middle of the night finding body parts charred to a crisp amidst the wreckages or sometimes high up in trees.  The snakes and alligators didn't make it any easier.  That has to be something that always stays with you.
     After the war, John returned to the Midwest, abandoned his hopes of medical school, and started his own mink farm on land his father had bought in 1949.  Some twenty year later when the mink industry sank, he turned the farm into an Arabian horse farm.  He was nothing if not cleverly inventive.  He also became an accomplished SCUBA diver and a pilot, even developing a landing strip on his farm out back of the house. As a young boy, I was so enamored of my uncle that I vowed to grow a beard someday, just like his. Because of him, I have not shaved off my beard since April 26, 1978, my last day in the Army.
     Our trip to the farm, a place I had been going to for almost 60 years, would probably be my last time there.  The memories just poured down over me as I walked the acreage.
     Once at my cousin Mona's, we tried adding the appropriate fluid to the leveling case as suggested by the faceless voice at 1-800-YOU'RE-SCREWED.  The lights, unfortunately, continued to blink.
   

 Mona's good friend Mark showed up to help in his Packermobile, a convertible he once drove in the snow all the way from Janesville to the deep south to see the Packers in the Super Bowl (go to Packermobile.com for more pictures. The man is clearly not playing with a full deck, and I'm not saying that just because I'm a Vikings fan.)  We were so appreciative of Mark's willingness to crawl under AB1 and fill the resevoir with fluid as Diedre was not volunteering to this caper readily.  His efforts were to no avail.  Fortunately, there was a Forest River (our brand) RV repair shop in Milwaukee, a scant 60 miles away, so that is where we would be going on the 'morrow (Pretty fancy writin', huh?)
     My daily walking of 3-miles streak, instituted shortly after my heart surgery, was now at day 559, but it was in serious jeopardy of being broken on this most hectic day.  So shortly before dark, I made my way to the Emerald Grove cemetery and walked my 3-miles.  It was my first "cemetery walk" of the streak.  I checked our every grave and was amazed by the tenacity of this little town out in the middle of farmland USA.  The gravesites dated back to before the Civil War.  At the top of the slope of the cemetery, I found the final resting places of my grandparents, Clarence "Hack" and Dorothy Hacklander.  I have great memories of those two.  Hack took me to my first major league baseball game, a 2-1 Cubs win over the Cincinnati Reds back in 1957.  Frank Robinson hit a home run that game.  And Dorothy, well among other things, made the very best chocolate chip cookies.  My mom has continued on with the recipe.  My 60-year joy at consuming them has only been interrupted by that sugar-allergy thing I recently developed.
   

Cousin "Mona" (Jean Hacklander) Jenkins and Alexx at their grandparents' grave site.

Just like her father, my cousin Mona is also a most interesting person.  Fluent in Arabic, she was a correspondent for NBC news in Egypt for years and later worked for the Christian Science Monitor news as a radio newscaster.  On a 4th of July night during the Clinton administration when the fall of the Russian communist system occurred, she had gotten Diedre and me on to the White House grounds for the fireworks celebration.  It was one of the most exciting nights of our lives as the President came out to speak to the crowd that night.  We were only about 75 feet away from him.  Mona now lives in St. Louis but had kept the farm place to help keep an eye on her 88-year old father.
     That night Mona took us to a most unusual restaurant.  The name of it, I believe, was "HHFFRRRGGH."

 Seriously.  It's named for one of the doctors in the Steve Martin movie "The Man With Two Brains."  Go figure.  It was actually pretty good.  They even served jambalaya pizza.  You got to love that.
     Our trip to Milwaukee the next day turned out much better than we had anticipated.  Our leveling-reservoir leak was due to a cracked O-ring, just as I had suspected (insert laughter here).  One 79-cent piece of hardware later we were back on our way to Emerald Grove.
   

On Saturday morning, we had one of those classic "small world" moments.  Mona and her husband Scott were in the process of selling their Emerald Grove farmhouse.  The local realtor they had chosen was one Andy Weberpal.  Andy, it turns out had played softball on my Rockies team the previous February in Mesa, AZ.  Andy stopped by the farm house so of course I had to have a picture of the two of us with the traveling Mesa softball league championship trophy.
     After a nice farewell breakfast with my Uncle John, we took off for... Milwaukee? ... again?
     Yes, we were on our way to see niece Nicole, husband Daniel, daughters Zoe, and Alexia, the new baby ... YOU GOTTA SEE THE BAY'-BEE! (Seinfeld referee uninitiated.)
And it was Milwaukee!  Seriously.

     You see, growing up in Minneapolis in the 50's, the Milwaukee Braves were the nearest thing we had to major league baseball in the Twin Cities.  I was a baseball nut already by the age of four; in fact, I even learned to read largely because of the Braves and Hank Aaron.  Since I needed to know every day how he had done in the game the night before, my mom, in her infinite wisdom, showed me how to keep track of Hammerin' Hank by learning to read the box scores.  I never missed a box score of Hank's for over 20 years.  This made Milwaukee a most exciting place in my small, child mind, akin to going to exotic places such as Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, or Pittsburgh.  And now, family was there too. 

    It seems the only RV park near the kids was at the...get this...Wisconsin State Fairgrounds.  (It gets even better.)  And our reservation there was during the ... (again, get this) ... the Wisconsin State Fair!

 It turned out that Air Barty One was parked a scant 100' from the fair's Ferris Wheel.  The fun just never stops on the Diedre-Alexx American Tour '13.   The first morning there I has an interesting confrontation.  Going over to use the campground's showers, I opened the door only to run into a gentleman who had to be at least 6'10". Now at 6'4", I'm not accustomed to seeing too many people taller than me.  But this guy was a tower.  As I stood there gaping, he opened the door for me, smirked, and said, "There you go, Shorty!"  That was my laugh for the day.
     Sunday morning we slept in and watched an old movie, "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad."  That movie had scared me silly when I was a kid.  It was a running joke in my family that whenever it got really scary, I had told my mom that I had to go to the bathroom, exiting the theatre and only returning when the scariness had subsided.  I must have been about 7 at the time. But now these many years later, well, not-so-scary.  In fact, Diedre and I laughed when we kept finding inconsistencies in the movie.  For instance, the galley slaves doing the rowing were wearing Adidas.

   Later that day we joined Nicole at the remarkable Public Market downtown.  The ladies did some  serious food shopping after coffee at a family namesake bistro.  I continued my 3-mile streak walking the riverfront.  I even found a life-sized statue of the Fonz.  Pretty exciting stuff!  The food shopping paid off as we had a wonderful dinner at Nicole and Daniel's.
     Monday was a state fair day, split into morning and late night trips sandwiched around dinner again at Nicole and Daniel's.  On days like these, the following song always flows through my rather porous brain:
     "OUR STATE FAIR IS A GREAT STATE FAIR,
     DON'T MISS IT, DON'T EVEN BE LATE!
     FOR IT'S DOLLARS TO DONUTS THAT OUR STATE FAIR
     IS THE BEST STATE FAIR IN THE STATE."
     I remember that it was sung by Pat Boone in a movie which I can not remember the name of ... I think it was "Judgement at Nuremberg."
   

 Remembering her landmark texting about our gold medal softball game a week earlier, Diedre took it upon herself to text everything we did at the state fair to our Arizona friends, John and Jenny Janezic, originally from the beer city.  John gave as good as he got, texting us regularly informing us of all great things to see and do at the Wisconsin State Fair.  It was like having our own personal fair guide, from only 2,000 miles away.
     Now health conscious, I practiced all things food in moderation.  I had 1 mini-donut instead of a whole bag, 1/2 order of cheese curds instead of my usual 3 orders, 1/2 cream puff instead of a whole one, and a Polish Sausage but with no bun.  I even split a very healthy (there's 2 phrases you usually don't see in the same paragraph - healthy food and state fair) bison quiche with Diedre for breakfast.  I fought off the urge for deep-fried Oreos; that stand was right next to the deep-fried broccoli, so at least I knew they're trying. They even had deep-fried s'mores... that's just wrong on so many levels.  And it being Wisconsin, of course they had ... wait for it ... BEER DONUTS!  And (I am not making this up) you had to be at least 21 to have a beer-donut.  And there were a lot of new "--on-a-stick" items: pizza-on-a-stick, steak & eggs-on-a-stick, deep fried candy bars-on-a-stick.  There were the exotic meats: "WBLT" sandwich (Wild Boar, Lettuce and Tomato) before Diedre brought me to my senses with a swift rolled-up program to the side of the head. There was also bacon ice cream, pork donuts, the list just goes on.  Eventually, so did we.  

     Nephew Daniel was raised in France so he is fluent in both languages.  And he speaks to daughters Zoe and Alexia (I'm pretty sure the name would have been "Alexx" if she had been a boy) only in French.  The girls are 2 and 6 months and there they are, conversing in French when they didn't want me to know what they were talking about.  2 languages for them while I'm still trying to master English.  In fact, the only words I know in French translate roughly to "My uncle is sick, but the highway is green."  We were joined for dinner by sister-in-law and mother to Nicole and super grandmother to all, Lisa.  Does it get any better than that?
     On Tuesday, August 6, we were back on the road, making our way to the idyllic little farm community of Black River Falls to see another one of my Rockies teammates in his alternate identity, Lud Nordahl, and his lovely wife Lydia.  Getting to town late, we made our way Rosario's, a wonderful little pizza place in town. It was there that we both almost met our makers.  Two inebriated gentlemen were having a disagreement with the bartender.  It got so heated that the two of them challenged the barkeep to step outside.  When he threatened to call the cops, they angrily left.  Diedre and I were pretty sure they were going to their car to get a gun, so I started looking around to decide which table dived under would offer the most protection once the lead started flying.  My clever wife took a different tact:  she immediately fashioned a rudimentary MacGiver flame thrower out of a table candle and some Walgreens-on-sale-squirt-bottle perfume (the 1 quart size) she often carries in her purse.  Oh, I cursed myself for bringing my family to the mean streets of Black River Falls, Wisconsin.
     The following night we met up with Lud at his softball game.  I had first me Lud about 4 years ago when we both joined Jimmy and Bruce's softball team.  The very first game we played together, in his very first at-bat, Lud crushed the ball so far, it not only easily cleared the 300' softball field fences, but hit the top of the 50' light tower beyond.  This guy could hit.
     Back in River Falls, well, now remember that he's 65 and his local early league is for young men, most of the guys are around 25-30.  So of course, in the first game, he jacks two out far over the fence and into the corn fields.  The rest of the kids on his team hit none.  He hit another one in the 2nd game, but they lost both times.
     We had gone to dinner earlier and it was then that I began noticing a trend in these small town restaurants.  Their men's rooms were decorated just like the Mayberry jail.  In one, there was a toilet, a sink, and an easy chair ... I suppose you might just want to go in and sit down for a chat with your buddy while he's taking a pee.  At another, same thing, only instead of a chair there was a bookcase.  What, the library doesn't have enough books?
     Moving on.
     The next day we found Lud and Lydia's home out in the wilderness.  When we came up to the top of their hilled driveway, we spotted the prettiest log house you'd ever want to see.  And when the 6'5" bearded Lud came out of the front door of his log "cabin," I was sure I was experiencing the reincarnation of our great president, Abraham Lincoln ... although I quickly recalled that Abe had little power hitting to right field. 

     Lud was sporting his purple Rockies jersey and non-matching bright red shorts (Note well, Bruce, Jerry and Shiela--inside softball joke).  And as with so many other of my AZ softball buddies with whom we've visited, I learned a lot of new and interesting things about Lud:

• He worked over 30 years building the highways of Wisconsin, moving over 11-million tons of dirt per year (that's probably why he's so good at scooping low throws in the dirt while playing first-base.)
• He goes to Canada every fall to help a farmer friend bring in his crops (wheat, barley, canola).  Lud runs the combine for his buddy, yet refuses to take any pay.  Now there's a friend!
• It's a little known fact, but Lud, beyond being probably the most powerful softball hitter in the land, is also probably the best blueberry farmer in the country.  After lunch at their house, he took us out back where his pride of about 50 blueberry bushes grew on the side of a hill.  We tried some and they were the best either Diedre or I had ever eaten.  They were more like grapes than blueberries in their size and juiciness.  Lud gave us each a pail and before you knew it, we had a gallon of blueberries to sustain us in the RV for the next couple of weeks.  When we went into their garage, there was a 6-foot tall freezer that Lud opened, showing us that it was completely full and only contained blueberries.
  

     A cookout that night at our fine campground (the best one yet of the 22 sites we have camped on so far this trip) with Lud and Lydia topped off a wonderful stay.  The next day, we would be off for a return trip to our home state -- Minnesota.

See you there.

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Hi All - Diedre here. 

    Just a quick note to you all and a word of thanks for your interest in our adventures.  It's always fun for me to read Alexx's take on what we have seen and experienced as well as what he imagines ... and we all know how scary that imagination of his can be.  For those of you who don't know me I imagine it's hard to figure out what of his stories is true ... for that matter, it's hard for me sometimes too!  (I had to laugh at the Sinbad reference.  Now, 55 years later when Alexx exits the theater during a movie he tells me the movie is too scary so I don't  think he has to go the the bathroom so often!) Suffice it to say, we are having a grand time and highly recommend this approach to life - at least once retired.  Of course it helps immensely when you can approach each day with humor and always find the fun in the craziest things that can show up.  

     We so enjoy seeing our family and friends along the way and that makes traveling especially fun.  But discovering new places and seeing things we've heard about is also a real joy.  We both agree we live in an amazing country and feel blessed every day that we get to explore it together.

Love to you all and we look forward to seeing you along the way!