Dad, Cam, and I will be taking the fifteen hour trip to South Korea. I hope it wont be too bad with movies and food but the anxieties leading up to the take off will probably be a little high.
We are waiting on the passports to be delivered. I guess we need a travelers visa or something like that.
December 8th we are taking off and get home on Dec. 16th. Which means there will be a birthday celebration taking place in Seoul.
Hopefully everything will be ok in the world at that time so we have less to worry about.
See ya soon Emph and Luke.
Mom dont worry we will see you soon there after.
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Monday, October 23, 2006
This weekend
Jill and I had a fun weekend. On Friday we went to the movie called "The Departed" it stars Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Walhberg, Martin Sheen, & Alec Baldwin. In otherwards it was star studded. The movie was based in Boston and was about a mafia-like group. Corrupt cops and undercover cops as bad guys. It was very intense with twists and turns in the plot and action all the time.
On Saturday we had a Halloween party. We dressed up as Ozzy and Sharon Osborne. Since Jill already had the long hair she got to be Ozzy.
We didnt win the costume contest. Boo!
They also had a pumpkin carving contest. Jill is the artist of us two so she did her best. What do you think?
Here are some more pictures of the fall. This is outside our front window. And looking into the park for those of you that havent been to our place this park is just one house away from ours.
On Saturday we had a Halloween party. We dressed up as Ozzy and Sharon Osborne. Since Jill already had the long hair she got to be Ozzy.
We didnt win the costume contest. Boo!
They also had a pumpkin carving contest. Jill is the artist of us two so she did her best. What do you think?
Here are some more pictures of the fall. This is outside our front window. And looking into the park for those of you that havent been to our place this park is just one house away from ours.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
A nice surprise
On Monday there were some rumors swirling around by the staff. None of the kids knew at all. Until our front entrance was filled with the tallest guys Milwaukee has to offer. The entire Bucks team ducked their heads through our doors. Some had to keep their heads ducked until they got into one of the rooms.
This wasnt a day for them to come and do basketball stuff. They are tired from training camp and decided to have an hour where they didnt have to think about that. If you remember I said the whole team, and I meant the whole team. The superstar Michael Redd, injured star Andrew Bogut, the rookies and veterans trying to make the league. It was great.
They went to every part of the Club. I took 7 foot 3 Ha, an Asian man that every kid thought was Yao Ming, to the cafeteria along with two others who sat and hung out with the kids. One of them even ate a lunch with them. Bologna. Others were in the library helping with homework, in the computer lab, selling candy in the concession stand, playing pool, foosball, ping pong, and even the dancers were here to teach the girls a routine.
They were here for about an hour and ended up with a small talk by Michael Redd giving the normal stay in school type of talk to all the kids.
It was the best because all the guys were just being guys. Although they did have to sign a lot of autographs, pictures taken and news cameras in their faces.
Hopefully it wont be the last time the come over for a visit.
Picture 1 = Redd playing in game room
Pic 2 = Bogut doing homework
Pic 3 = Ha letting the kids know that I am not that tall after all
Friday, October 13, 2006
Disappointments
I had high hopes for the Twins this post season. I really think it was their year. A couple bad pitches and bounces and it hurt them. It was an amazing season and there will be high hopes next year when all the pitching will be back.
Another disappointment happened last year when the Gophers fumbled away a win against the Wisconsin Badgers. I still cant believe that game.
Jill and I will be in Madison this weekend as the Gophs seek revenge. I hope that it is a complete reversal of fortunes so they can feel the pain. Madison is one of the best places to watch a game. I was in the student section last weekend as I cheered for the Badgers in a blow out win. I went with my old roommate Steve. His brother goes to school there. We had a lot of fun but this weekend plans to be even better. All of Jills co-workers and friends will be out in Madison this weekend. It is Homecoming and Madison is known for throwing some big events.
If you havent heard Phyliss died yesterday. So if you know emails for Luann I am sure she would be happy to hear from you. I dont so if you could send me it then I wont feel like the only one who isnt showing my support. Thanks
That also might change plans for Steve and Peter Woitock. They were going to be heading out to Madison as well but if the funeral is on Sat. they will be heading to the farm.
I will be back soon.
Another disappointment happened last year when the Gophers fumbled away a win against the Wisconsin Badgers. I still cant believe that game.
Jill and I will be in Madison this weekend as the Gophs seek revenge. I hope that it is a complete reversal of fortunes so they can feel the pain. Madison is one of the best places to watch a game. I was in the student section last weekend as I cheered for the Badgers in a blow out win. I went with my old roommate Steve. His brother goes to school there. We had a lot of fun but this weekend plans to be even better. All of Jills co-workers and friends will be out in Madison this weekend. It is Homecoming and Madison is known for throwing some big events.
If you havent heard Phyliss died yesterday. So if you know emails for Luann I am sure she would be happy to hear from you. I dont so if you could send me it then I wont feel like the only one who isnt showing my support. Thanks
That also might change plans for Steve and Peter Woitock. They were going to be heading out to Madison as well but if the funeral is on Sat. they will be heading to the farm.
I will be back soon.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Reds, Oranges, and Yellows
Hey everyone.
It is definitely fall here in Milwaukee. The colors are at their peaks. My car is covered every morning. It is cool and crisp fleece wearing weather.
I am not sure how much you get of fall in your far off lands but I know that it is your favorite time of year. I will try and get a few pictures I took up in the next few days.
Jill and I went for a bike ride this past Sunday. Milwaukee built a nice new path along the South shore of the lake. It starts just down from where you and Grandma were dancing. It was beautiful out. We did a little exploring and found a neighborhood that looked like the houses were made of gingerbread. Then we rode up past this great big condo complex that is right on the lake. The views were amazing.
Well I just wanted to get a page up since no one else is sticking with it.
I will write again soon.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Nothing new here
Jill and I have not doen anything too exciting in the past week or so. It was gorgeous out yesterday and today. We went out and played football. I won.
Good to see both Mom and Emph are back writing their own blogs.
Yoga week two: The moves are actually easier than I thought. I dont have the full range with flat feet and hands but I can feel the energy. I really like the relaxation part. I can feel each part tingle a bit when the instructor mentions it. I do wish our instructor was a bit nicer. She gives off this negative feel. She is kind of grumpy and really short with her answers to people. So instead of asking questions about what we need to know or do in the time in between sessions we just went through the motions and got out of there.
We will be sticking it out and if we feel some results we might check into a different place to go.
Is there anything that we should know going in? Like what is amaste?
Some other points of interest to you two. But I am sure that you have already heard about.
Minneapolis will host the Republican Convention.
Jill and I just got cable with Tivo(awesome)
Good to see both Mom and Emph are back writing their own blogs.
Yoga week two: The moves are actually easier than I thought. I dont have the full range with flat feet and hands but I can feel the energy. I really like the relaxation part. I can feel each part tingle a bit when the instructor mentions it. I do wish our instructor was a bit nicer. She gives off this negative feel. She is kind of grumpy and really short with her answers to people. So instead of asking questions about what we need to know or do in the time in between sessions we just went through the motions and got out of there.
We will be sticking it out and if we feel some results we might check into a different place to go.
Is there anything that we should know going in? Like what is amaste?
Some other points of interest to you two. But I am sure that you have already heard about.
Minneapolis will host the Republican Convention.
Jill and I just got cable with Tivo(awesome)
AL Central Champs
Here is an article from Reusse that tells it all about Sunday at the Dome. Get your Homer Hankies ready.
The Twins and their fans achieve bedlam
A Joe Mauer batting title was fine, but the crowd wanted more ... and got it.
Patrick Reusse, Star Tribune
The Tigers and the Kansas City Royals already had been playing for an hour in Detroit when the Twins' Carlos Silva threw the first pitch in the Metrodome on Sunday afternoon.
Detroit was holding a 6-0 lead, and it was the third inning. A Tigers victory would guarantee them the tiebreaker at the top of the AL Central and give the Twins a playoff date with the Yankees on Tuesday night in the Bronx.
The lead and stout Jeremy Bonderman on the mound made for strong evidence that only one bit of drama would play out in the Dome on this final day of the regular season.
That would be whether Joe Mauer could become the first American League catcher to win a batting title.
Seeing the local hero capture this Silver Bat would have been a fine consolation prize for the announced crowd of 45,182, but the fans wanted more. They wanted an AL Central championship and first-round date with Oakland, rather than with the $200 million Yankees.
Nearly four hours later, the wishes had been fulfilled and the Dome had turned to the pandemonium of Octobers past. This exuberance was difficult to forecast when Silva started by giving up a first-inning run, and the Twins then resumed the offensive dearth they had been featuring in this final series with the White Sox, the dethroned champions.
The crowd did not get a chance to demonstrate any giddiness until Mauer slapped a double near the left field line leading off the fourth. That started a rally that gave the Twins a 3-1 lead.
And then the scoreboards in the left field and right field corners started to indicate Kansas City was undertaking another comeback against the Tigers. This was a Royals team that had arrived in Detroit on Friday with 100 losses and a 1-15 record against the Tigers.
And now these Dome dreamers of the impossible were becoming curious whether K.C. could barbecue Jim Leyland's crew again.
The Royals had been down 5-0 on Friday and came back to win, but the Twins could not take advantage. The Royals had scored seven runs in the first on Saturday and held on to win, and the Twins could not take advantage.
The Twins entered Sunday rooting hard for Mauer to win this batting title, and that first hit seemed to relieve much tension with the entire lineup. The three runs were followed by another in the fifth. Included was a second Mauer hit, guaranteeing he would be a batting champion at the tender age of 23½ years.
The large crowd enjoyed Mauer's successful opposite-field slaps, and soon the scoreboards revealed Kansas City actually was closing in on Detroit. A chant of "Let's go Royals" rose from down the left field line.
The Royals went ahead, Detroit tied it 8-8 on a Matt Stairs' home run and then the crowd was more focused on what was happening there than with the Twins.
Jason Bartlett, the late-arriving shortstop who rates very high on the Twins' MVP list, threw out Ryan Sweeney to end a 5-1 victory that enabled his club to finish 30 games over .500 (96-66). It was 4:07 p.m., and a roar accompanied the players as they congregated near second base.
Once this ritual was concluded, the big screens went to the telecast from Detroit. And that's when a scene for the ages played out.
There was still a mob -- call it 35,000 -- in the Dome, and these now-rabid folks wouldn't go home until they found out whether these Royals could offer a final gift to the Twins.
The indoor zanies agonized with every pitch as Kansas City's Joe Nelson and Jimmy Gobble worked out of a bases-loaded, one-out situation with the score still 8-8 in the bottom of the 11th.
Bert Blyleven, the Twins' television analyst, was standing in the back row of the press box, transfixed by a crowd going crazy over something that was happening two Great Lakes away.
"This is unbelievable," Blyleven said. "This reminds me of '87, when 50,000 fans were here to welcome us back from Detroit."
Blyleven was the co-ace of the '87 pitching staff with Frank Viola. The Twins were returning after wiping out the favored Tigers 4-1 in the ALCS. "Seems like strange things take place when it's us and Detroit," Blyleven said.
The strangeness became otherworldly a few minutes later, when Kansas City scored twice in the top of 12th. The 35,000 cheered for every called ball, every baserunner and both of those runs.
By then, Torii Hunter, Luis Rodriguez and other Twins were in front of the dugout, acting goofy and signaling for the crowd to get louder.
And it did. Bedlam, '87-style.
Gobble got three more outs in the bottom of the 12th -- the last on a Sean Casey groundout. It was 4:44 p.m. Officially, the fans had stayed for 37 minutes for the chance to share this moment with their heroes.
And here the Twins came, racing from the dugout and staging a wilder tangle behind the pitcher's mound than was the case six nights earlier when a wild-card berth was guaranteed. Now, they were champions of the Central.
"How crazy has this whole thing been?" Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "Our last game had been done for a half-hour before we got into first place by ourselves for the first time all year."
The Twins chased the Tigers in reverse for more than two months, then surged and still trailed Detroit by 12 games on the first night after the All-Star break.
So, it wasn't avoiding the Yankees that caused this madness from the Twins' players. Oakland has better pitching than the Yankees and will be an armful in this division series.
The madness came from being rewarded for a relentless pursuit -- for winning 71 of 104 since June 8, for playing .683 baseball for 16 weeks, for doing it ultimately without Liriano, without Stewart, with Radke gritting his teeth on every pitch, with Bartlett and Punto and Tyner and Reyes and Neshek going from afterthoughts to vital parts.
On the last day, the Twins and their newly raucous fans had a first-place finish to celebrate -- and a chance to start baseball's grand second season under their Teflon sky.
"Now they can come into here ..." said Gardenhire, shouting through a hand-held microphone to the fans still not wanting to leave, "and play baseball in our house."
The Twins and their fans achieve bedlam
A Joe Mauer batting title was fine, but the crowd wanted more ... and got it.
Patrick Reusse, Star Tribune
The Tigers and the Kansas City Royals already had been playing for an hour in Detroit when the Twins' Carlos Silva threw the first pitch in the Metrodome on Sunday afternoon.
Detroit was holding a 6-0 lead, and it was the third inning. A Tigers victory would guarantee them the tiebreaker at the top of the AL Central and give the Twins a playoff date with the Yankees on Tuesday night in the Bronx.
The lead and stout Jeremy Bonderman on the mound made for strong evidence that only one bit of drama would play out in the Dome on this final day of the regular season.
That would be whether Joe Mauer could become the first American League catcher to win a batting title.
Seeing the local hero capture this Silver Bat would have been a fine consolation prize for the announced crowd of 45,182, but the fans wanted more. They wanted an AL Central championship and first-round date with Oakland, rather than with the $200 million Yankees.
Nearly four hours later, the wishes had been fulfilled and the Dome had turned to the pandemonium of Octobers past. This exuberance was difficult to forecast when Silva started by giving up a first-inning run, and the Twins then resumed the offensive dearth they had been featuring in this final series with the White Sox, the dethroned champions.
The crowd did not get a chance to demonstrate any giddiness until Mauer slapped a double near the left field line leading off the fourth. That started a rally that gave the Twins a 3-1 lead.
And then the scoreboards in the left field and right field corners started to indicate Kansas City was undertaking another comeback against the Tigers. This was a Royals team that had arrived in Detroit on Friday with 100 losses and a 1-15 record against the Tigers.
And now these Dome dreamers of the impossible were becoming curious whether K.C. could barbecue Jim Leyland's crew again.
The Royals had been down 5-0 on Friday and came back to win, but the Twins could not take advantage. The Royals had scored seven runs in the first on Saturday and held on to win, and the Twins could not take advantage.
The Twins entered Sunday rooting hard for Mauer to win this batting title, and that first hit seemed to relieve much tension with the entire lineup. The three runs were followed by another in the fifth. Included was a second Mauer hit, guaranteeing he would be a batting champion at the tender age of 23½ years.
The large crowd enjoyed Mauer's successful opposite-field slaps, and soon the scoreboards revealed Kansas City actually was closing in on Detroit. A chant of "Let's go Royals" rose from down the left field line.
The Royals went ahead, Detroit tied it 8-8 on a Matt Stairs' home run and then the crowd was more focused on what was happening there than with the Twins.
Jason Bartlett, the late-arriving shortstop who rates very high on the Twins' MVP list, threw out Ryan Sweeney to end a 5-1 victory that enabled his club to finish 30 games over .500 (96-66). It was 4:07 p.m., and a roar accompanied the players as they congregated near second base.
Once this ritual was concluded, the big screens went to the telecast from Detroit. And that's when a scene for the ages played out.
There was still a mob -- call it 35,000 -- in the Dome, and these now-rabid folks wouldn't go home until they found out whether these Royals could offer a final gift to the Twins.
The indoor zanies agonized with every pitch as Kansas City's Joe Nelson and Jimmy Gobble worked out of a bases-loaded, one-out situation with the score still 8-8 in the bottom of the 11th.
Bert Blyleven, the Twins' television analyst, was standing in the back row of the press box, transfixed by a crowd going crazy over something that was happening two Great Lakes away.
"This is unbelievable," Blyleven said. "This reminds me of '87, when 50,000 fans were here to welcome us back from Detroit."
Blyleven was the co-ace of the '87 pitching staff with Frank Viola. The Twins were returning after wiping out the favored Tigers 4-1 in the ALCS. "Seems like strange things take place when it's us and Detroit," Blyleven said.
The strangeness became otherworldly a few minutes later, when Kansas City scored twice in the top of 12th. The 35,000 cheered for every called ball, every baserunner and both of those runs.
By then, Torii Hunter, Luis Rodriguez and other Twins were in front of the dugout, acting goofy and signaling for the crowd to get louder.
And it did. Bedlam, '87-style.
Gobble got three more outs in the bottom of the 12th -- the last on a Sean Casey groundout. It was 4:44 p.m. Officially, the fans had stayed for 37 minutes for the chance to share this moment with their heroes.
And here the Twins came, racing from the dugout and staging a wilder tangle behind the pitcher's mound than was the case six nights earlier when a wild-card berth was guaranteed. Now, they were champions of the Central.
"How crazy has this whole thing been?" Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "Our last game had been done for a half-hour before we got into first place by ourselves for the first time all year."
The Twins chased the Tigers in reverse for more than two months, then surged and still trailed Detroit by 12 games on the first night after the All-Star break.
So, it wasn't avoiding the Yankees that caused this madness from the Twins' players. Oakland has better pitching than the Yankees and will be an armful in this division series.
The madness came from being rewarded for a relentless pursuit -- for winning 71 of 104 since June 8, for playing .683 baseball for 16 weeks, for doing it ultimately without Liriano, without Stewart, with Radke gritting his teeth on every pitch, with Bartlett and Punto and Tyner and Reyes and Neshek going from afterthoughts to vital parts.
On the last day, the Twins and their newly raucous fans had a first-place finish to celebrate -- and a chance to start baseball's grand second season under their Teflon sky.
"Now they can come into here ..." said Gardenhire, shouting through a hand-held microphone to the fans still not wanting to leave, "and play baseball in our house."
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