March 2024 - College Visit #1 - Indiana Tech

College visits are underway, our first one was to Indiana Tech in Ft. Wayne.  Brandi scheduled it for a Saturday, so as not to disrupt his school days, then snow was forecasted and we snuck out on a Friday night. Awesome dinner at Salvatori's, an Italian joint on the north end, couldn't have been better.  And nearly a good night's sleep, except for me roaring briefly at the cheerleaders partying in the hallway at 10 PM.

It was a visitation event, roughly 100 families or so gathered for the tour. Nick's selected major is Mechanical Engineering, one of three colleges at IT. It was a sunny but cold tour, our guide Haley was outstanding (and chatty), taking us through several buildings, including the dorms (where we temporarily evicted four co-eds and their Dots Pretzels). Ever prof was passionate, and the equipment was impressive. Nick lit up at the mechanical areas of the new facility, dreaming of what he could do with a million-dollar 3D printer. Afterward, he impressed a prof at the tables by explaining thorium energy, and bragged about the cafeteria food, which from what I could surmise was pizza and chicken nuggets (Gen Z food.) Given the reasonable driving distance, the small campus, and the facilities in Nick's area of focus, IT is a real possibility; we have more homework to do, more visits, and Nick will be focused on his GPA for the coming weeks, as things get real.

Before returning home, we stopped a railroad historical society about ten minutes outside of Ft. Wayne, where the project manager Andrew, and one of the 80 volunteers, Tom, took us thru the facility, where Nick hopes to volunteer while he's at school a year from now. I must admit, the idea of him learning in the IT environment, and applying it in this train 'garage' where they refurbish real locomotives, it's an applicable skillset, and real impact. I can see the vision better now.

This was the month for the 'socks of terror', which was a simple shipping error from Amazon, a package that was not ours, but Brandi called the local Sheriff, who came out, and filed a report, all while I was in the shower.  Nick and I discovered a new pizza place in Dundee, River's Edge, and we've already been there twice. He was able to repair a taillight bulb in his car while I was gone on a work trip, in between his fling tests in G-Mod, I assume, and eating his Chernobyl-grade peeps leftover from Easter.

Photos here.

Energy Matters on WGAU

I took a short trip around the south for work, with a workshop in Nashville for the aftersales team at Nissan, a stop in Pinehurst to visit family, and then swung back south to Athens for a weekend.  While in GA, I was invited onto the Energy Matters radio show on WGAU by my colleague from work, my first time on radio.  The fun is keeping up, four segments of eleven minutes each, no prep, the time fills fast.  Here's a link to the show that day in podcast form where we discuss cars, and then specifically alternative powertrains in commercial vehicles.  Link here to Episode 276 from March 2024. 

 

February 2024

Nick drove us out to the Cleveland Auto Show, which was better than anticipated, they combine a new vehicle display with some classics in an adjacent conference center, and the vehicles were well organized. We made a stop at Citizen Pie, Nick's favorite pizza joint in town, as usual.  Was his first long drive on the expressway, he handled the Turnpike well.

Bran bought Nick some new Ikea furniture for his room, the first time she purchased was unsupervised, and she came home with little-people dressers that looked small even next to her. So we made a date night of it and returned to pick up some large cubes, which work much better.  It's tough for Nick to sift through stuff and weed-out what's old and can go in the donation bin, but we cleared out a little.  She setup files for his college paperwork, including one labeled 'Other Shit', which is accurate, just seemed interesting to me for a teenager's room.

January 2024

Nick's birthday was a low-key affair, a pookie and a few balloons.  I had a trip to LA for a clinic this month, so I was gone for a short week, dinner on the beach and a successful clinic in Pasadena, including a couple new bars with the gang, and finally dinner with my team in Huntington Beach.

Warming up fast, not much of a winter, Nick shoveled the one snowfall we experienced.  
The general teenage mysteries continue.  Why does he require a half-dozen alarms and clocks and still sleep through them all? And when we're having a casual conversation, why does he think to ask me about extradition laws, for what purpose?  He did cook a little more this month, I had him working on a roast and gravy, gotta start honing the cooking skills before college.

December 2023

Generally this post is Christmas 2023, once again we traveled to Daytona Beach Shores, second year staying at The Max. Resort was relatively quiet again this year, only a dozen or so rooms booked, since the beach is mostly washed away. (Good staff, but they're no wiser than a year ago, which makes one wonder.) But I'm all for fewer people, and weather was considerably warmer this year, upper 60s to 70F most days, and only rain a couple of the days.  We walked the beach every day until I had blisters on my feet, down the pier, and once we dragged Nick down to Crabby's (if he didn't come along, he didn't eat.) Nick and I played billiards upstairs one evening, he got multiple stops at Buc-ees including Christmas Day, and we returned to our favorite Mexican joint, Seniorita's..

Highlight of the trip was an afternoon tour of St. Augustine by sailboat.  It was a private charter, brand new 38' sailboat, Dale the captain was an incredible host, teaching Nick some points about sailing and letting him sail it relatively independently.  It was a joy seeing the fort and lighthouse from the bay without being near all the tourists. Weather was cool but perfect, Brandi even saw dolphins along the boat.  Makes me want to take sailing lessons, would definitely do it again.  Our best meal of the trip was probably there near the docks at Beaches at Vilano.

Before turning for home, we drove across the state to Sebring to see Earl and the family for a short visit, first time to their place in Maranatha.  They took us on a tour of the resort on golf carts, to see the make-shift golf course, pool and all the activities. Jessica is settling in and dating, and Carrie and the boys are doing well (they are relatively self-entertaining at this age.) The visit was nice, the drive out of the wilderness in the dark and rain was miserable, but we made it.

Earlier in the month we celebrated Matilda's first birthday with Haleigh and the family.  And Nick is now driving us most places, like school and piano, although I didn't have him drive on the FL trip, what a mess of people that was.  Of course there was a quiet Christmas at home, too, with gift opening before we left for the trip. (Shopping is all via Amazon anymore, and my father couldn't figure which was to stage the incoming boxes because there's arrows on every side... it's the Amazon logo, not 'this side up'.)

 Pics here.