Marching Towards Ann Arbor

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Marching with the Band

M's enthusiasm for marching is infectious.

Last Friday, hundreds of lucky Pioneer High School football fans were treated to the musical stylings of the marching band, starring M and a cast of dozens.


The marching band graces the field at Pioneer.


M is the middle saxophone in this picture. And by the way, I didn't say so before, but in case you didn't know already, M is going to be the Drum Major next year.

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A New Work Building


This is the sidewalk to what was formerly the main entrance to our building in Dexter.

After 22 years in the same building, my company is moving to a new Ann Arbor location. Most of my coworkers have already moved, and the rest of us will move this weekend.

I'll miss the old building, although it is time to move on and drive a different direction in the morning. The new building is a little closer to home than the Dexter office, so I will save a few minutes each day.


I'll also miss Cameron Balloons, one of the few companies in the world that makes hot air balloons. Here's a picture I took a few days ago behind their building - they're running a fan to fill the balloon with air, and the guy sitting on the ground looking at his phone is holding a rope or cable of some kind that's attached to the top of the balloon. To keep it from flying away, I guess.

As we have been moving out of the old building, we have been throwing out the junk that's accumulated over the years. Some of the items go onto tables, where they will either be recycled or grabbed for use by another employee. I found an old pair of speakers and thought I'd do a project with them.


Just your run-of-the-mill computer speakers.



I took the speakers out and replaced them with computer case fans. The idea was to have some fans that looked like speakers, and the transplant was successful. However, the mesh covering the fans blocks a lot of the air from the fans, and the vibrations of the fans in the light plastic casing makes them fairly noisy. So, the experiment didn't really work out, but it was worth a try.

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A Drawing, Some Links, and a Quote

I love the artwork of Mattias Adolfsson, as you already know from some of my other blog posts.

September Linkfest
Not a whole lot of news from my house, other than school starting. M is marching in the band, K is playing JV tennis, and school is in full swing. I have a few links to share, so let's get to it.

If you haven't seen Grit Laskin's guitars, especially his inlay art, you've been missing a lot.

A self-balancing stick. I wasn't sure whether this was real, but it seems to be.

The National Beard Championship.

If you're ever in a rainstorm and need a light, I suggest this lighter in a waterproof case. There are many beautiful items for sale at this site as well.

It's still part of a Kickstarter campaign, but I'd like two, please. One to fidget with all the time, and a backup in case that one breaks.

Over and Out
I'll leave you with a quote from Maya Angelou:

“This is a wonderful day, I have never seen this one before.”

JHS 30th Anniversary Reunion

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Old friends Margaret Medina Clark, me, and Gary Lykins. If you see Gary or me, ask us about the $10 bet.

Even though I'm not nearly old enough to be 30 years removed from high school, I attended my recent class reunion in Jackson. About 100 alumni gathered at Grand River Brewery, where we squinted at each other, trying to make out faces, and took quick glances at nametags to help dust off our memories. Some people looked exactly like they did in high school, some had less (or grayer) hair, but most of us looked similar enough to our senior pictures that it only took a second or two to remember each other.


Left to right: Rob W., a first-grade classmate, me, Mary C., who was in one of my preschool classes, and Denise B., one of my best high school/college friends. Lots of history!

As Grand River Brewery was closing for the night, many of us went east to Hard Knock Grill, where the band Smoke and Mirrors was playing. One of Smoke and Mirrors' guitarists is a fellow '86er. Great music!

The night before the reunion, JHS had a football game at home, and I drove down for mini pre-reunion reunion. After the game, we went to The Hunt Club to catch up a little more and renew some old friendships.

Dennis, Laura, me, Scott, and part of Jeff at the pre-reunion Jackson High football game.

It was fun to catch up with people I hadn't seen in so many years.

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Over the course of a few weekends, I slowly cleaned and reorganized the workshop area in the basement. Here's a panoramic picture of it, which makes it look really big.

It's clean - now I have to do something with all those flat surfaces...

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