Back to School 2023

In early August Cynthia and I went to Pensacola Beach/Navarre and stayed at an AirBnb on the beach. It was awesome and relaxing and awesome.

Waiting for our shipwrecks at Peg Leg Pete's.

Sitting in our same spot each time at Flounder's.

The beach behind our Airbnb.

Out past the barrier reef was a bloom of pink meanie jelly fish. They look like brightly colored steering wheels. We also saw a 5-6 foot tiger shark swim past.

We also visited the Naval Aviation Museum while we were there. 

Then when we got back we went to the state fair! Some of our small group friends met us there and we tried out the Deep Fried Bacon Brisket Mac-n-Cheese Grilled Cheese sandwich. 

It took a year off the end of my life, but it was so good.

The ladies all went on a ride together. I'm not a fan, so I just watched.

One of my favorite pictures of the entire summer, haha.

Emily at band camp! She is the percussion lead in marching band this year, which is super cool. She's a very talented kid.

Then I took Rose to new student orientation at Coe. There are 422 incoming freshmen, so it's a small school. Rose is majoring in Psychology and is excited to start college.

They have each kid ring the bell before they start school and then they will ring it again when they graduate.

Cynthia discovered a gift card to the Macaroni Grill, so we went there for dinner the day before school started. Both girls started school on the same day.

Rose bein' Rose!

After the Derecho

The cleanup after the derecho seemed like it would take years and the piles of tree debris kept growing by the day. Some streets had tree debris piles so large you could hardly see the houses. It also made intersections really dangerous.

Our neighborhood was lucky because we were among the first to have tree debris removed. I think that improved everyone's spirits to see the piles disappearing. All you heard all day every day was the chorus of chainsaws from one end of the street to the other and the rumble of tree debris trucks hauling the piles away.

I had some pictures of tree debris trucks, but I must've deleted them. Instead, here are pics of the growing debris piles along our street:

A completely different skyline stands in stark contrast to the once tree-lined street. We get a lot more sunshine these days:

Then there was the exciting day that Alliant finally removed the old broken utility poles so that Imon could come out and reconnect our internet. We lived off of a hotspot from my phone until then (which actually did a decent job, surprisingly). Aha! I knew I still had a picture somewhere of a tree debris truck:

The Imon guys came along a couple days later. They got out and looked at our dropped line, then started to drive away! I had to run out and yell at them to stop. They said they weren't sure if our line was for Imon or Mediacom. I guess making a phone call or knocking on a door were out of the question. But they got us hooked up again.

Another storm blowing through CR:

Then the tree guys showed up and took down the remaining stuff:

The neighbor's tree took out part of our fence, which worked out OK since it created an opening large enough for the tree guys to get their trucks and equipment into the backyard:

Lily does not care for all the racket outside:

They cut the trunks into 6-foot lengths to make sure the wood could be picked up. since The maximum length the tree debris trucks will pick up is 10 feet, but if the diameter of the wood is too great they can't pick it up. Better to err on the side of caution. 

Grinding out the stumps and the network of roots across the yard:

The only thing scarier than the derecho:

One night Emily and Rose decided to fix up our hair:

Pretty sure you're not supposed to flat iron a beard. Also, it doesn't feel great:

Cynthia and I went on the Tiki Tour through NewBo and Czech Village. That was pretty fun:

Back to school already! It came up fast even though school was delayed by a month due to the derecho. Since the pandemic is still going on they were distance learning, using their Chromebooks to take their classes online.