He Had A Very Rusty Nose

Christmas is never complete without a weekend in Michigan exchanging sometimes goofy presents with brother Brian.  His nickname is Moose, so we thought it would be fun to get him one of the real thing.  After locating a suitable example of the species and trussing up the poor beast in my pickup bed for the long drive north in freezing temperatures (which he handled quite well - luckily Rusty has an iron constitution), we arrived in Jackson with him.  There were some anxious moments when he was untied and made it into the woods behind Brian's house for a last few hours of moosey freedom, but eventually we corralled him.  Here he is with his new best bud, displaying his trademark steely gaze.

 

Happy Thanksgiving

Once again this year mom was able to visit us Thanksgiving week, and Brian and family stopped in for a night to join in the festivities before they all headed back to Michigan.  What a crew!  We should have served rabbit.

Romney Rally In Lebanon

It was a barn-burner of a Presidential election here in Ohio in 2012, and we saw more of the candidates than maybe any other state.  Usually Republican candidates can be counted on to make a stop in conservative Warren County.  In 2004 George W. Bush spoke in the middle of Broadway, right in front of the Golden Lamb.  Then in 2008 John McCain and Sarah Palin appeared in the same spot and, true to form, the Romney campaign picked this location for an October 13 rally.

It was a huge production, with four semi-trailers pulling in the day before and police cordoning off most of the downtown area.  I registered the day before (as required) and showed up pretty early, which got me a spot about 50 yards from the stage with a view only slightly occluded by a light post.  It was a huge production with a sound system and big outdoor screens playing inspirational tributes to the candidate.  Then a number of Republican warmup speakers took the stage, ranging from Lebanon's mayor to U.S. Senator Rob Portman, who arrived in a bus with Gov. Romney moments before he spoke.  Then Romney himself addressed the very friendly crowd, and gave a good speech full of hard-hitting sound bytes (though not too much actual information). 

I wish I had had a better camera, but with only my little Canon PowerShot I got the usual grainy low-resolution image.  Romney was on the stage, just right of the blue banner in white shirtsleeves, but he shows up poorly - perhaps an omen for election day.

Risen From The Ashes

Several years ago ex-wife Jana moved to Phoenix, Arizona to take a programming job, and she still is there today, doing just fine without me.  She and Jim are retired now, and her parents sold their Florida home so they could all buy a big place west of the city in Goodyear and enjoy their retirements together.

Phoenix is well outside my traditional work travel circuit, but this year we acquired a new facility there and I scheduled a visit to do some training with the staff.  I flew in the weekend before to spend time with Jana and her family.  Here are Johnny and Jana at the lookout atop South Mountain, which has a view of the entire city and the airport.  The planes on approach travel below this vantage point, which is a very cool thing to see.  The weather in Phoenix in September - not so cool.

It's Not Easy Being Pink...

Our big adventure this summer was having the house painted.  It went like this:  The house is REALLY TALL, and we were doing just a little exterior painting around the edges but not at all going full tilt, but we were pretty tired of our house's faded, peeling pink attitude, and then a paint crew working on the house next door gave me a pretty low bid to paint the place for us, including fixing some woodwork and gutter issues way up high, and we take a lot of pride in doing work ourselves but in this case I pulled the trigger and hired the job done.  And here is what it looks like 95 percent finished.

We had problems with the painters, but they did do a lot of work and in the end the house was a new color and we are pretty happy.  Some of the low trim is not done yet and we will be working on that over the next year or so as we strip and repair first floor windows and put on storm windows.  It sure is a lot of house.

National Lampoon's Michigan Vacation

In mid-July Lee Ann and I had a nice driving vacation which mostly took us to historic places.  We went to French Lick Indiana to see the famous restored domed hotel there, then to Chicago for tours of some great architectural landmarks (including Frank Lloyd Wright's home and studio), and on to similar cool places in Michigan City, South Bend, Detroit and finally Akron.  On the way we stopped and visited the Meijer Gardens outside Grand Rapids.  It was our second visit and we liked it even more this time.  Here I am in a case of life attempting to imitate art.

Jackson History Rendezvous

Since my cousin Dawn died, and her family is not too interested in Miller family history, Aunt Jo has been sending me the photos, records and documents they come across.  In June Lee Ann and I drove to Jackson and in the course of an afternoon we sat at Mom's house and pored over hundreds and hundreds of artifacts.  What was even better is that Karyn came, and Brian stopped by too, so we all got a chance to see some classic photos from when Mom was young, and even before, all narrated by her.  We heard some interesting stories, but paused long enough to get a group photo on Mom's front steps.  I'm the good looking one.

Greenhouse Repairs

I have been very bad about posting this year, but I do have some photos that I will post now - before I accidentally delete them from my camera.

This is the greenhouse that is attached to the west side of our house, off the kitchen.  It is perched on a frame knee-wall that had deteriorated and was in danger of collapsing under the weight of all that glass.  We thought about tearing the whole thing off, but instead this spring I rebuilt the knee-wall.  This was a bit tricky because I did it with the greenhouse still in place.  I used a jackpost and did a little at a time, and now the whole thing is buttoned up and ready for new siding.

We had a bit of drama here later, when a drunken painter fell from a walking board and crashed through the greenhouse roof.  That's all fixed now, and the painter was not seriously hurt.  Over the winter I hope to insulate and finish the knee-walls and floor of the greenhouse, ditching the current astroturf carpet in favor of tile.  Maybe we will put a fountain in there too.  This could become my favorite room of the house.   

Two Foxes

Annie is home for Spring Break!! To greet her, Lee Ann positioned her life sized fox in the hallway with a cheery welcome message.

The fox was a winter project for Lee Ann. She started with a clothing display frame from the Tack Trunk, formed a body around it, dressed the creature in hunt attire (boots and all) and finally sewed the head. He turned out to be a striking fellow, and I think Annie has finally met her match.

Driving Back The Wilderness

This stump-dotted landscape once was a jungle of honeysuckle. Through the fall and winter, armed with a pruning saw, I massacred the bushes and piled the brush, and yesterday Lee Ann and I hauled 11 pickup loads to the compost lot. Voila.

I have grass seeded most of this area, and am spading up a little square of it near the old swingset for a vegetable garden.