W^2 or W squared for Wordless Wednesday, July 19, 2023
It is Wednesday, again. I am in Denver, Colorado for another baseball game. Last night’s game didn’t turn out well for my team, but they play 162 games in a season for a reason.
I arrived yesterday morning and had a full day planned, capped with walking to and from the ballpark.
goofing around at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, Denver, Colorado July 18, 2023 10:51 MDT
My plan was to visit the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, lunch with a blogger, then the game. Sometimes things don’t go your way or lot of other people have the same idea. It turned out that I was not the only person who wanted to get a jump start on their day and when I arrived at the car rental facility I was well back in the line. The line moved smoothly and did get my car, but I was more than an hour behind schedule. Continue reading W^2 – bite→
In response to yesterday’s post W^2 – black and white, a reprise of sorts.
In hindsight, yesterday was a million and six times better than the day before.
Our nephew arrived with his wife and young children just as the storms began to roll across the lake. A few minutes later his brother, another nephew arrived. It was wonderful to see them. Since my wife’s parents died, our paths only cross for weddings, funerals, and graduations.
The kids were reluctant to get out of the car, but slowly warmed and by the end of their visit they were playing in the water, exploring the lake, toys, and all that our lake home has to offer.
It was delightful to visit, to catch up, and share our home with them.
Then storms rolled across the lake, one after another, and we stayed off the lake and out of the boats. More than once, we waded out to the boats, turning back when we saw lightning until we decided that we would get wet regardless of whether it was raining or not.
looking west northwest, as rain falls gently
While they boated, Fern and I stayed ashore. I waded into the lake and took the photos for this post. By the end of their visit every single beach towel was soaked, and the kids (and adults) were spent.
clouds over the lake, looking west north west in portrait mode
Yesterday WAS a million and six times better than the day before with family – our nephews and their kids bringing color to the lakeshore on a stormy day.
This morning began with steady rain, but the sun is breaking through and sunshine is on the way. Today is going to be an amazing day, it could be a million and six times better than yesterday. So, I’d better jump up, jump in, and seize the day. Making the days Count, one day at a time, black and white or in color.
W^2, W2, or W squared for Wordless Wednesday, June 28, 2023
Today is Day 23 and yesterday, I took the train from Chicagoland all the way to St. Louis. It was my first real train ride in the United States. Trains in the US were once a BIG deal, but with the advent of the car, a national road system, and air travel trains declined in my lifetime. I don’t recall ever riding a train to go anywhere until my brothers and I visited my father in Europe after my parents divorced. My first rail trip was to Glasgow from London on British Rail. We have a commuter rail system in Chicagoland, but I don’t use it often. However, I did take commuter rail into Union Station yesterday morning.
For this week’s Wordless Wednesday, I have a new peanut image from Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Missouri.
Last night I added to my list of cities where Major League Baseball is played, twenty-three. Every game reminds me of how baseball is an integral part of our culture. I could say sport, but I don’t get this feeling with football, basketball, or other sports and I don’t know why. But last night I sat amongst St. Louis Cardinal fans whom I’d never met and had a great talking baseball and life.
Last night’s seats were the best seats I have ever had for a baseball game. I decided to splurge on these seats when I was planning my trip. To my right were two couples out for the ballgame and to my left was a group of friends, and in front of me were a father and son. None of us were regulars in these seats. The woman to my right was a mom whose thins were headed off to college this fall, JP to right was a graphic artist, and the young man in front of me reminded me who was winning the game – the Cardinals. It was a great night at the ballpark.
I have seven cities left on my list: Denver, Phoenix, Tampa Bay, Miami, Baltimore, Boston, and Toronto.
Today, I have a visit to the Gateway Arch, another baseball game tonight, and a train ride home tomorrow.
Today is going to be an amazing day, it could be a million and six times better than yesterday. So, I’d better jump up, jump in, and seize the day. Making the days Count, one day at a time, watching a baseball game, or enjoying the sights and sounds of a new city.
W^2 or W squared for Wordless Wednesday, June 21, 2023
For this week’s Wordless Wednesday, I have two, errr three, images of summer captured in the spring. I chode baseball, but I could choose just about anything as an image of summer.
It is summer, officially at 10:57 AM CDT, but it’s felt like summer since school let the kiddos free June 2ndand me free the following Monday, the fifth.
a summer game played in the three seasons – April 6 at Target Field Minneapolis, Minnesota. Game time time temp low fifties. Beautiful day and great game Astros 2, Twins 3 in 10 innings
Last summer I got serious about my bucket list goal of visiting every major league baseball stadium with a seven day, seven game, six city, and ten baseball team trip beginning in New York City winding west finishing in Cleveland before driving home to Chicagoland. In all last year, I attended ten ballgames and watched one half of the teams in the MLB. I finished the 2022 season having seen 20 of the 30 present day ballparks.
T-Mobile Park in Seattle, Washington. Looking to left field. May 6th, Astros 5 Mariners 7.
It’s Day 8 of summer break and I have completed one FULL week. Mostly it’s been catching up on the tasks that I said I’d do when school ended or working on the things that needed to be done to close out school, like packing my classroom and moving to another classroom, my twelfth classroom in twenty-two years. Moving is incomplete and I’ll finish moving later this week when I return home.
Oh, I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain. I’ve seen sunny days that I thought would never end.
I have spent Days 4 through 7 (and Day 9) at our lake house.
day lilies, drenched in June rain, awaiting July blooms
Our daughter is spending the summer by the lake working at a local veterinarian. The lake house is about a two-hour drive to where she attends university at Michigan State. When I was in middle school, I wanted to be a veterinarian, but by the time I finished high school I had changed my career path to being an engineer, and a couple of years later I graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history. It wasn’t until I went back to school in 1997 that I finally realized my middle school career aspiration of working with animals. Yes, there is a joke there, a dad joke, but a joke, nonetheless.
It’s been a dry spring in the Midwest and throughout southern Canada. Dry understates the problem.
Oh, I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain. I’ve seen sunny days that I thought would never end.
Wildfires have ravaged southern Canada and for the past month the air has been filled with smoke particles. The skies, normally a brilliant sky blue, have been a grayish white with the sun’s rays scattered as they pass through the atmosphere. Last week major league baseball cancelled three games in the northeast due to wildfire smoke in New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC.
Last week Saturday, June 4th a wildfire, sparked by an untended campfire, burned over 2000 acres near our lake house. Our daughter was here, she sent photos of Forest Service fire planes scooping water from the lake’s surface and helicopters filling buckets filled with water to douse the wildfire’s flames.
List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?
It is Day 1 of summer 2023. I’ve been looking forward to this day for several weeks as my sixth graders began to ‘blossom’ into seventh graders. It happens every year and the answer is an eleven week break to rest, reset, and restore for new year and new crop of students.
Day 1 finds me in my ‘summer office’ plotting and planning the today and the remaining 75 days of summer break. This will be my fourteenth summer of this blog. I have chronicled every summer and fall, winter, and spring since that first post thirteen years ago.
I am trying something new with this post, a response to the daily prompt through WordPress. Today’s prompt is
List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?
Muhammad Ali once said,
“A man who views the world the same at 50 as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.”
I suppose if I had answered that question 30 years ago, or maybe even next week, the answer might be three different books, but at this moment there are three: the Bible, The Giver by Lois Lowry, and Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella.
The Bible I’ve been reading the Bible most of my life. This past winter, I was watching a football game and watched a commercial produced by an organization called, He gets Us. It was a commercial for Christianity and it got me curious. Who is He Gets Us?
After clicking, reading, watching, and clicking some more, I wound up here You Version: Jesus – He Gets Us. I read, clicked, watched, listened, and downloaded the app. I began reading the Bible in a year. Since January 1, I’ve been following a plan to read the Bible in a year. There is so much to learn from the wisdom of the Bible, and I feel like I am only scratching the surface. If you are curious, it’s there for you to be curious, and less judgmental. Continue reading first day of summer ’23→
List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?
It is Day 1 of summer 2023. I’ve been looking forward to this day for several weeks as my sixth graders began to ‘blossom’ into seventh graders. It happens every year and the answer is an eleven week break to rest, reset, and restore for new year and new crop of students.
Day 1 finds me in my ‘summer office’ plotting and planning the today and the remaining 75 days of summer break. This will be my fourteenth summer of this blog. I have chronicled every summer and fall, winter, and spring since that first post thirteen years ago.
I am trying something new with this post, a response to the daily prompt through WordPress. Today’s prompt is
List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?
Muhammad Ali once said,
“A man who views the world the same at 50 as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.”
I suppose if I had answered that question 30 years ago, or maybe even next week, the answer might be three different books, but at this moment there are three: the Bible, The Giver by Lois Lowry, and Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella.
The Bible I’ve been reading the Bible most of my life. This past winter, I was watching a football game and watched a commercial produced by an organization called, He gets Us. It was a commercial for Christianity and it got me curious. Who is He Gets Us?
After clicking, reading, watching, and clicking some more, I wound up here You Version: Jesus – He Gets Us. I read, clicked, watched, listened, and downloaded the app. I began reading the Bible in a year. Since January 1, I’ve been following a plan to read the Bible in a year. There is so much to learn from the wisdom of the Bible, and I feel like I am only scratching the surface. If you are curious, it’s there for you to be curious, and less judgmental. Continue reading first day of summer ’23→
W^2 or W squared for Wordless Wednesday, May 31, 2023
For this week’s Wordless Wednesday, I have ‘Old Glory’ and the moon on a late spring night.
It’s been, too long since I’ve published a post, but there have been many I’ve done in my mind. Things just get in the way of writing and posting.
Speaking of which, there are two school days remaining in this school year and I harken back to a school year gone awry and the birth of Making the Days Count dot org, at first a dot com. That was thirteen years ago; this post is the first of year fourteen.
I spent the evening marking papers, then realized I needed to run a quick errand and walked outside to discover the moon and the flag.
A lot has taken place since that first post thirteen years ago, but theirs is more to tell in the years ahead, just like the flag and moon. There’s more left and beginning Monday at noon, there are 76 days to practice for the time when I won’t be teaching.
Today was a great day, I think I got 140 sixth graders to think about energy transfer when they really wanted to think about summer break and sleeping in. Tomorrow we are on a walking field trip to a local park and Friday will be here and gone before I know it and I’ll be outside waving to school buses as the leave the parking lot one last time.
I’ve got a little formatting to do and then I’ll press publish and this will go live. The day is done, and I am headed to bed to catch some rest before it starts all over anew. Making the days Count, one day at a time, it’s all in a cycle.
W^2 or W squared for Wordless Wednesday, March 29, 2023
terminus of westbound Seven Mile Bridge looking east over the Gulf of Mexico – Big Pine Key, FL Tuesday, March 28, 2023, 7:48 PM
For this week’s Wordless Wednesday, I have the old section of the historic Seven Mile Bridge which is the dividing line between the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico in the Strait of Florida. I love how in the evening light the line between the ocean and the sky blend together.
My wife and I are enjoying a spring break vacation in the Florida Keys. Sunrises and sunsets mark our days and are often spectacular. Sadly, after three days in the Keys, this was our first ‘watched’ sunset though I have yet to miss a sunrise.
The bridge was constructed as part of the Overseas Railroad extension from Miami to Key West in the early twentieth century. The railroad operated until 1935 when massive hurricane wiped out a portion of the railroad. The right of way was sold to the state of Florida and the bridges were used to build a highway from Miami to Key West. The railway bridges were replaced in the early 1980s and the old bridges were disabled and left in place. A portion Seven Mile Bridge and several other bridges were set aside for fishermen. Additionally, a two-mile segment of the old Seven Mile Bridge connecting Knights Key with Pigeon Key.
It is always peaceful and calm when we visit. The temperatures have been in the 80s (28-31C) and there has been plenty of sunshine in between sunrise and sunset.
This morning, I watched the sunrise and I know today is gonna be an awesome day, I know it and I can feel it, so I’d better jump up, jump in, and seize the day. And press publish for the first time in a long while. Making the Days Count, one day at a time, always looking, always watching, wondering.
W^2 or W squared for Wordless Wednesday, January 4, 2023
I’ve been in northern Mississippi since Monday afternoon. I flew Southwest Airlines, yes that Southwest Airlines. The airline that melted down and cancelled hundreds of flights for an entire week beginning the day after Christmas. It’s been my go-to airline since I began travelling to Mississippi to visit my stepmother or care for the house these past three years.
the moon rising at 5:08, can’t see Mars and my stepmom’s home in Oxford
Yesterday, I engaged a realtor to sell the property. The day began with thunderstorms racing through the area and a tornado warning. By noon, the skies were clear. I took care of a few errands and decided to walk around her neighborhood one last time. Oxford is a beautiful town, and I understand how she and my dad came to love it.
fifteen minutes later and Mars is visible
As I finished my walk, the sun had set, and the moon was rising. I’d gotten a message from an app that the moon and mars would be in conjunction and the best viewing time would 5:06 PM. It was still light out and the moon was visible, but Mars wasn’t. I pulled a lawn chair out onto the drive and sat and watched. Within twenty minutes Mars became visible as a small dot above the moon.
I savored the moment; it was a beautiful January evening, and it was pleasant enough to sit outside without a jacket.
twenty-seven minutes after sunset
I’ve enjoyed my visits over the years, but I am hoping this is my last trip to Oxford.
I had entertained the idea of driving to Vicksburg and staying at the Baer House and visiting the Vicksburg battlefield one more time but decided to get home and finish up a few things before school restarts Monday.
It’s a beautiful sunny day at the Memphis airport, but it will be good to get home later this evening.
Today is already an amazing day. I got to the airport ahead of time, I am checked in, and waiting on an airplane. I know it and I can feel it, so I’d better jump up, jump in, and seize the day. Making the Days Count, one day at a time, looking forward to getting home.
I am not one for New Year’s resolutions, I reserve life changing promises for the new year which begins at the end of school, when teachers and students have an entire summer to reflect and reset for a new year. Sometimes these promises work and sometimes, they don’t.
The beginning of 2023 is no different. I’ve been reading posts on the blogosphere and social media disparaging the recently completed year, 2022. I suppose for some 2022 wasn’t the year for them. I read support for the recently completed year, as well.
On the whole, 2022 was, at least for me, an improvement on the previous year. It wasn’t perfect, but most years aren’t.
Early this morning, I discovered a new word – annus mirabilis, or a remarkable or notable year. I found it checking the meaning of another word with my Merriam-Webster app.
I’ve been blogging since the end of the school year in 2010. Blogging was a resolution then, but really it was more of a reaction to an annus horribilis. This post will mark my 728th post that I have published across fourteen consecutive years. That one resolution has changed my life in so many ways.
a Northern Cardinal at the feeder, Monday December 26, 2022
