A new life; same as the old life?

A few weekends ago, over 4th July weekend, we decided to string a few days together and go away for the weekend.  We left it a little last minute to decide, and so choices were limited.  We settled on Madison, as we had not been in a few years, as we knew House On The Rock was cool to visit, and the kids had not been in a few years. You can find out more about that here . Lorraine however, resourceful as always, also found out about a place called Epic Systems, which is a difficult place to describe! It is a health records software company base in Verona, WI, started in 1979 by a lady in her garage, by the name of Judith (Judy) Faulkner . Not sure why she decided to do what she did with the campus, but it is, in a word, EPIC. There are a few pictures below, but I also linked a couple of video tours that really capture the place.  In short, there are several buildings in the campus, each of which has a theme. Anything from Heaven to Hell, Wizardry (Think Harry Potter), Med...

As you may have read in another post, we recently spent some time in Madison, WI. One of the attractions we stopped into, was an eclectic place called The House On The Rock, put together by a guy called Alex Jordan ; check him out, it is quite the story of a man with a dream, realizing that dream over many years. As I mentioned above, it is a strange place. He was, what in today's terms would be called a hoarder, but also eccentric, as evidenced by the Infinity Room pictured below from the outside.  You can visit the place every day of the year, and they make it really spectacular for Christmas, with ornaments, it seems on every flat surface.  Collections range from the most incredible carousel, to doll houses and dolls, wagon wheels, to circus sets (gotta be seen to be believed), a gazillion carousel horses, to self paying musical instruments, and mechanical machines that play music, and perform; to old weapons, sailing and ocean memorabilia, Tiffany lamps, and incredible org...

This past weekend, I skated in a hockey tournament, in which I have participated for the last several years. A wonderful organization called Pucks For Autism . Each year, they hold a huge event in our area, as well as random opportunities to skate at major arenas around the country.  Through their partnership I have had the privilege to skate on the home ice of the Chicago Blackhawks, the Chicago Wolves and the Rockford Icehogs, all whilst raising money for an incredible charity.  The hocket community really is a truly inclusive group, and I have made many really good friends, this weekend was no exception.  I have participated with Carly's crew, in honor of the sister (Carly) of one of those aforementioned very good friends, Nicole and her family. This past weekend, we raised ~$125k, almost $600 of which came from my friends and family. If you would like to help us get closer to our target of $150k, please click here and donate anything you can. This year, we started we...

The Kentucky Hug has many definitions, the one I know is a slang term for the burn you feel in your chest when you taste a high alcohol content bourbon.  WTF Gordy, why are you sharing this information with me??   Well let me tell you! The fine gentleman to the right, Del worked at one of the distilleries we stopped at down in Kentucky, he was explaining this phenomenon to us...hang on, I need to go further back. Remember that guy who is moving to Portugal, mentioned in my last post? Well, one of the other events that we arranged was a trip to the Kentucky Bourbon trail,  but wait, what, why?  Going even further into the way back when machine for context, I started playing adult hockey about 10 years ago. Adult hockey is commonly known as beer league hockey in the US, meaning that you play some hockey and there is always post game beers involved. A couple of seasons ago, right after COVID, bourbon started to show up in the hockey coolers, and so now it is almost...