Milestones and such

Another milestone in the family life.  We cleaned their room this weekend!  Oh, and we removed the front jail bars from Janny's crib.  Now she can escape as needed-- not always a good thing, but it is working so far. 

Jill is also on sort of day 2 of trying to potty train Janny.  Today was quite unsuccessful.  At least before daddy's help just before bedtime.  Beginner's luck?  The impetus for the potty training push was a rather disgusting incident that Jill would rather not talk about.  Let's just say that a diaper and the pre-freedom crib were involved.

 Maybe in our next post, I'll show some pictures of our garden.  It's not Midwest Living quality (thanks for the subscription, great grandpa!), but we're getting better at it.  We've been eating various salad greens for a month now, but these are probably coming to an end.  Cherries were much reduced this year compared to last but they were delicious.  Black rasberries are ripening.  We had about 3 last year, and now we have maybe 100!  The girls ate some carrots last night.

Both girls are having fun with rhymes lately.  Sometimes proper english words are used, sometimes they are made up.  My favorite is window-pindow (p is a good default when trying to find a rhyme).

We had our company picnic on Sunday at Allerton Park.  The whole family enjoyed some corndogs, shaved ice, popcorn, and funnel cakes (I ate about 1/3 of one before wisely calling it quits).  A fancier dinner was served later, but we needed to get home for our summer Bible study.  Other highlights included live music, bouncy houses, and mini-golf.  I'm a big fan of private industry!  I didn't get a chance to meet Stephen.  Maybe next time.

I joined the Wildcard Wed night ride for the first time in ages last week.  It was pretty close to a no-drop ride, but still fast enough for me to feel some pain.  One thing I had forgotten was to never take a hard pull just before Dave Stone takes his.  I barely hung on a for a few of the surges.  Since I missed our local crits this year, I'm hoping to do the local cx race.  Must train harder!

The softball regular season is winding down.  If tonight's game counted (we were up 22-6 in the bottom of the 4th when a lightning storm hit), our record is a comfortable 4-4.  My hitting is coming around after a bad stretch before vacation.  I have yet to rip one down the right field line, but that's partly due to pitchers trying to work the outside corner on me (or just happen to toss them there).

Finally, I am getting frustrated with my run of broken bike parts lately.  Granted, nearly of this stuff was used when I bought it.  And most of it is around 10-20 years old.    That said, I have broken
2 saddles (plastic bases cracked)
seat post (dented carbon fiber at clamp)
crank arm (TA pro vis at left axle)
pedals (bushing worn out... Request to all pedal makers:  use real bearings please)
bottom bracket -- clicking that won't go away
left down tube shifter (corroded so as to not really move)
water bottle cage (today at work)
Both of my good bikes are making difficult to diagnose, somewhat random clicks right now.  I think the issue with the Look is the really poorly designed seat tube cluster.  Maybe the problem on the Boulder are the spd pedals.  Nothing big, but I am easily driven nuts by creaking/clicking noises on my bikes.  My rides are needed to clear my mind and relax.  Random noises make me want to grind my teeth (not quite like Tyler back in the day). 

By the way, ever since Lance confessed, I find my interest in pro cycling ever more reduced.  Maybe it's because the mystery of doping is _REALLY_ gone now?  Maybe because no pro has an interesting back story.  Maybe because my commitment to training is waning.  Or maybe I'm just getting old and my kids are crushing these parts of my old life into exhaustion.

Whatever the case, I'm still a happy guy.