Fear the Deer

Yes that is one of the sayings for the Milwaukee Bucks (and yes that is a giant inflatable deer, not a moose).  We attended our first game (well pre-season game) last week.  As always we enjoyed the pizza and cookies at the game while marveling at the athletic abilities of these athletes.  What I find amazing is how often these 6'9" players (or larger) go crashing to the floor and immediately pop back up and continue playing.  Having fallen both running and playing basketball, I found that I didn't usually pop back up like that - especially when they are often crashing into the backboard support as well.  Some of Jo's HR team joined us for the game and it was nice getting to know a few more of them as well.

For the weekend we headed to Madison since Jo had a Chemistry board meeting.  While she was providing deep insights to the Chemistry professors, I had our furnace serviced.  Yes, I do lead an exciting life.  I then spent the afternoon catching up on some sleep along with a bit of reading and planning renovations around the condo.  One of which is the IR sauna (see below for more).  We then went over to Kathy and John's for delicious squash pasta dinner and a few rousing games of Euchre.

Saturday morning was a bright and crisp day, so after getting our cinnamon roll and apple cider from the Farmer's Market we did a nice long walk around Monona Bay before heading to Kathy's for lunch and watching the Badger's play Iowa.  Afterwards we drove home stopping at the hot tub and sauna show at the State Fair grounds to check out Infrared Saunas.  We are considering getting one since they are rumored to be good for arthritis - apparently heating you up from the inside out helps your joints - and one of us is trying hard to get arthritis in every single joint in her joints.  I'm not telling who that is.

Sunday after a long bike ride we settled down to catch up on several days of newspapers and plan out our upcoming week.  Little side venting on biking versus running.  When it is 40 degrees outside, it is superb running weather, but is is freaking cold on a bike.  I obviously don't have enough wind repellent gear to make biking in the cold fun - while the gear I have made running enjoyable down into the teens.  I really miss running.....

Guess Who is a Year Older

Jo crossed that key date in the year, that we all have, last Friday and got a year older.  We celebrated with a trip to Madison for a dinner and a Badger football game.  Friday night we went to the Old Fashioned with Kathy and John for a joint birthday celebration - John's was earlier in October.  While there we ran into an acquaintance of Jo's who let us know that the Capital Steps were playing at the Overture Center.  So after a delicious dinner (I highly recommend the bacon mac and cheese) and a few too many of cocktails (as the name of the restaurant says, I enjoyed a couple of Old Fashioned's) we made an impromptu stop at the Overture Center.  We were able to get seats to the Capital Steps and enjoyed their good nature ribbing of our political system and politicians.  Which as you might imagine in this election year has quite a bit of material to work with.

After the show we headed back to the condo to enjoy the traditional birthday cake.  I attempted a chocolate layer cake and while a bit crumbly and requiring a lot of icing to smooth over the imperfections caused by the cake sticking to the pie pans, I must say it was quite tasty.  Of course, that could be the chocolate, butter cream frosting that I used to glue everything together talking for me.

Saturday morning we toured the farmer's market to pick up some fresh apple cider before heading down to campus to find an "official" Wisconsin poncho since the weather predictions for the game were stormy.  While walking around campus we found that ESPN was broadcasting their Game Day show from the quad so we enjoyed watching the boisterous crowd for a while.  Then it was back to the condo for a little rest before Kathy and John joined us for a pizza dinner (Rocky's sausage pizza - a rival, not an equal to Papa Del's) before walking over to the stadium.

The game was a nail biter and provided the crowd with quite a few highs along with quite a few lows.  But we were lucky in that the predicted torrential downpours didn't happen until after we were back safe and sound in the condo and it wasn't a blow out by Ohio State.  This was our first Badger football game this season and I must say that I enjoy the afternoon games in the bright sunshine and crisp air better.  Night games aren't as enjoyable of an atmosphere - in my opinion.

Sunday we hit a local diner for breakfast on our way out of town.  This was a true diner - it used to be a gas station - with a pancake as big as a large dinner plate.  We each only ordered one pancake and didn't finish them.  Tasty pancake, but still doesn't beat a fluffy Perkins pancake.

Our Old Stomping Ground - Philadelphia

Jo managed to sponsor a conference in Philadelphia and I joined her last week to enjoy seeing where we spent the first 16 years of our life after graduate school.  We caught up with lots of our Philly friends and saw our two houses - both of which looked to be in great shape, although one now has a pool in the back yard.  While Jo was doing her conference stuff, I played tourist and did the Independence Hall tour, which we had done somewhere around 10 times while living there as each new guest would visit.  Remarkably very close to the same information was provided by the park ranger as before.  One new thing is that Independence Hall is now roped off and everyone has to clear security before hand.  Not surprising given the state of the world today, but kind of sad as well.  I also checked out the Liberty Bell before heading down to South street for the real highlight - a cheesesteak from Jim's Steaks.  It certainly didn't disappoint, but if I'm honest, lobster rolls from Captain Scott's in CT rank above a Philly cheesesteak - at least for me.

Hard to not see it say Rohm and Haas

To walk off more meat than I've eaten in a month, I checked out the Philadelphia mint and watched some coins being cranked out and then hit the visitor center to watch a couple of shows on our founding fathers.  Before catching dinner at a local diner and heading back to meet up with Jo after her meeting ended for the day.  Yes, I won for having the most fun that day mostly because of the cheesesteak.

The following day, Jo joined me her meeting concluded around lunch and after a stop at Jim's for a second round of cheesesteaks for me and Jo's first we visited our favorite historic site - Ben Franklin's court.  This was completely redone from when we last visited in 2000 and always enjoyable since Ben was quite the inventor and ladies man.  Next up was the Chemical Heritage museum which opened since we left and celebrates all things chemistry - Yeah!  Fun little museum but it was somewhat eye-opening to see equipment in a museum that we both had used.  Not sure I'm quite ready for my life to be museum aged.  Afterwards, we met up with our friends Jean and Jon for dinner to catch up on the exciting changes in their life since we last saw them.

Friday, we headed out of the city to see our old houses, drive around the area, and have lunch with Holly with whom we spent many a night and weekend playing volleyball.  Next up was a stop in Doylestown to see friends from the old Rohm and Haas days (side note, while in Philadelphia we noticed that Dow has installed two beer gardens on grounds of the old Rohm and Haas home office - which they now own - I'm not sure Otto Haas would have approved).  We had a fun time finding out what everyone has been up to since we left PA and seeing all the changes in Doylestown (the town we have lived in the longest so far).  All too soon it was time to head back to the airport and back home.

Hiking the Lake

Just Starting Out

Little Guy Hiking the Trail with Us

Two weekends ago, Jo and I decided to do our biennial hike around Lake Geneva (and yes I looked up biennial which means once every other year since apparently biannual and semiannual mean the same thing).  The hike circles the entire lake for 21 miles (or 22 or 19 depending on what source you look at).  We were going to head out on Saturday but rain showers kept us inside watching the Badgers lose to Michigan.  While Sunday wasn't a bright, sunny day the rain held off and we had a relatively nice walk.  We naturally admired and critiqued the mansions that line the lake - some of the architecture and siding choices just didn't seem quite right, at least to us.  It also gave us a lot of time to catch up on everything going on with each other along with solving most of the world's problems - you've got to do something for 7 hours.  We came back with only a few minor blisters and some really sore legs.