Tag Archives: camping

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Friday Near 2:00 And All Is Well

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Sorry if you were thinking I might’ve had more to say about my new job this week– didn’t have complete access to my workstation for part of it, and was busy with reviewing procedures, etc., for the rest.

Overall, Oshkosh is just about the way I left it.  There’s a new building here, or a remodeled office there, but things seem to be largely where they were when I last lived and worked here.  I said to someone early in the week, “it’s almost like I dreamed the last two years, and when I woke up, Bobby was in the shower.”

It’s too early to say much about what my new job entails, or “how it’s going,” so to speak, because I haven’t been able to dig in that much yet.  However, I can tell that it’s going to be a lot different than my job has been for the last five years or so.  There are a lot of things I’ll need to learn, more stuff than I can think of that I will need to re-learn, and who knows what else that I can’t predict.  I think it’s going to be exciting and interesting, though.

The commute is OK.  Even after just a few days, I’ve calmed down a bit about the time “wasted” in the car.  I have a bunch of podcasts to listen to, I can try to catch up with some folks on the phone, and as long as I don’t freak out too much about what time I’m getting home, there is still enough of each evening to be productive.

At this point, I can definitely say that the pace in Oshkosh is more my style than Milwaukee ever was– around here, there is enough staff to deal with everything on a day-to-day basis, people are pretty much up to speed on what everyone else is doing, and the students feel calmer as well.  I guess it mostly comes down to time: in Oshkosh, there’s enough of it to get things done, and also explain to one another what’s going on.  In Milwaukee, it always felt like I was just keeping my head above water, and there were a lot of guessing games about who was doing what and when and for what reason.

Anyway, I need to jet for my late errand-running lunch and then get primed up for a camp weekend in the Kettle Moraine.  Here’s hoping the weather holds out.

General, Uncategorized

Time to Enjoy the Summer

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The summer season is undoubtedly, officially here.  I had things to do around the house yesterday evening, but couldn’t bring myself to stay in, after seeing all the people dining outdoors on my bus ride home.

Michelle and I biked on the Oak Leaf Trail (despite the insects breeding like gangbusters in every stagnant pool of water) and we used a restaurant.com gift certificate for dinner at Bayou.  It was a really nice meal– Michelle ordered a catfish fillet entree, and the portion was huge; three whole fillets.  I had a cajun shrimp meal, and if you don’t think 9 little shrimps sounds like plenty of food, let me assure you– it was, and it was tasty.

We sat out on their patio, which overlooks the segement of the Milwaukee River near the corner of Humboldt and Commerce Street— the Humboldt bridge is out, so you have to make a few wacky turns to get there, but it was still a nice view and a pleasant evening.  It was windy, but warm enough that there was no chill whatsoever.

We’ve got a number of summer weekends booked solid already, but there was an opening for next weekend (May 29-31), so we’re going on a weekend camping excursion to the north Kettle Moraine and good ol’ Mauthe Lake.  There are a number of campsites up in that park that don’t require a reservation, so we feel OK about going on short notice.

Back to work and enjoying my open windows for now…

General, Uncategorized

Deeper Appreciation

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When I was a kid, I was pretty active in the Cub/Boy Scouts for a number of years– I wanna say from 2nd grade (or maybe it was 1st?) up through the end of middle school (until I was maybe 14). At that point, I was a bit more interested in sports, and then in HS, I quickly got into the arts, but that’s really neither here or there…

The point is, while kids who grow up in the Northwoods have a unique opportunity to do all the outdoor Scouting activities that people think of first (the camping, hiking, swimming, boating), it is a double-edged sword. I wasn’t conscious of it back then, but I wonder if the accessibility of the outdoors and the wealth of time that I spent in the woods, around wildlife, on the lake, etc., made Scouting sort of blasé after a while.

Now that I’m an adult, I’m finding that I really enjoy the outdoors again. Michelle and I went on road trips the last two years to national parks out west, and we had a great time hiking, camping, horseback riding, and being around nature. We’ve also gone on a few whitewater rafting trips that we really enjoyed, and Michelle taught me how to ski (downhill). As I start to think about some getaway options for this summer, I’ve realized that I’m really anxious to see a number of other national parks (even though we won’t be able to make a big cross-country trip this year). I was saying to Kyle when we visited this past weekend, I really want to go to Grand Canyon National Park, Rocky Mountain, and Voyageurs. Add Isle Royale to that list, too.

I think that becoming an adult and realizing how precious your free time is the heaviest contributor to the change in attitude. When you’re a kid, it’s so easy to take things for granted. Hope that I have time to see and do all these things as time goes on…

General, Uncategorized

Stage Three

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We’re into the third segment of our vacation now as I write this from I-15 about 30 miles south of Great Falls.

The part of Montana is just as gorgeous as the rest. Michelle and I agreed that it feels more remote than the cities along I-90, even though it doesn’t look that different, mile to mile. We attributed this feeling to the fact that neither of us have ever been to this part of the state before.

The last few days at Storyhill Fest were a lot of fun. When we got there, I had this warm feeling of coming home. A lot of the same folks made the trip, but I thought that the overnighters might have actually been a little fewer. I have no actual data to back that up.

We camped in the same spot, and our new tent slept pretty well. Michelle was warm enough with her new sleeping bag– in fact, both of us got a little sweaty the first night. Overnight Monday into Tuesday, it rained off and on throughout the night, and there were a couple times I was woken and lied awake worrying about the fly blowing off in the gusty wind. This was irrational, of course, because the fly was tied to the tent which was staked to the ground and contained two sleeping people to weigh it down. The wind was blustery enough that a little rain did sneak under there and get inside at one point, though.

The performances themselves were great. We bought CDs from The Get Up Johns (a bluegrass brother duo), Meg Hutchinson (folk-pop singer-songwriter), and Edie Carey (see Meg Hutchinson). Aaron Espe and Justin Roth performed again too, but we already have all those CDs. Interesting development in the personal life of one of the artists– last year, Aaron Espe met a girl at the SH Fest, and two weeks ago, they got married. Kinda neat. Chris and John were great in their typical fashion. We heard a couple new songs, but I don’t remember them really specifically. Each of them played a new song that they admitted were works in progress.

As a sidebar, I asked Justin Roth if he had his house concert dates for Wisconsin in October filled up. He said he still had a Tuesday open, but since Milwaukee is so relatively close to his home in Minneapolis, I should just write and let him know if Jen wants to host a show at her house. Might try to do that.

On Tuesday, we skipped out on the daytime Fest activities in favor of a rafting trip on the Gallatin River. There was a place we found online that did a 2-hour trip for a little less than 50 bucks a head. We had a really good time. Our guide was this fun older guy named Jim. He was born in the U.P. and said he spent most of his adult life in Lansing. He knew a lot of Yooper jokes. We shared a boat with a group of four people from Houston who were in the area for a conference of some kind.

The river itself was a bit less challenging than what Michelle and I had hoped for. I think we were both hoping for something that would be a little harder than the trip we took on the Wolf River at home last August. I got the impression from the guides that this is simply a time of year when the river is pretty low and the rapids are not that rough. Maybe we should try coming back earlier in the summer, or specifically try to find a trip that’s tougher.

So with the rest of today we have to make it Glacier and get our tent up. That’s the extent of our plan. Tomorrow, we’re going on a horseback ride mid-morning, and on Friday I want to try to do some hiking and photographing. We’ll be leaving the park again on Saturday, and we’re shooting to take the “low road” (I-90) all the way across to Wisconsin. We’ll have stops back in Bozeman and in South Dakota along the way.

Til then…