A new life; same as the old life?

As I mentioned last week, we planned to go to Fright Fest on Friday night. The weather was perfect, the tickets cheap thanks to season pass holders Steve & Kristi, and the promise of American Halloween alluring. Every time you drive by Six Flags on the Interstate, you can see the spiders climbing on the old wooden rollercoaster. As Brits you generally have the impression that Halloween in the US is a big deal, and it is. People decorate their houses, more than some Brits would for Christmas, with lights, skeletons, ghosts, etc; and Six Flags was no exception. Every ride, every corner of the park had been converted for Fright Fest. We had a great time, the queues were not too bad, although we missed out on one of the best rides, because the queue for that was about 90 minutes. Steve and I went on most things, but the girls were a little more conservative. They had a parade at the end of the night, and of course I took a bunch of pictures.. check them out .

I know there is a lot worse to come, but today was the first time I had to scrape the frost from my windows, winter is definitely on it's way. I have been wearing a coat for the last few weeks, and those who know me well will know how rare that is. This morning as I scraped the windows with my credit card (not yet prepared) I was glad of it. Next week, I might even need gloves! I am off to Six Flags Great America tonight for their Fright Fest, so I had best take some layers. Lorraine doesn't much care for the rides, but she does like the haunted houses and such. Some friends of ours have season passes and cheap tickets, so it should be a fun time. Tomorrow, I will be back at Habitat For Humanity , where the weather promises to be kind to me, at around the mid 60s.

The Chicago White Sox vs The Houston Astros in the World Series. You will have seen that I was quite excited watching the ALCS when we were up in Door County . I decided that we would host the weekend games last weekend, and also attend all the games following in a local bar or two, until this weekend's games, when I might host again, assuming it went that far. I said to several people on Saturday and earlier this week that the Sox would win it in 4 straight games. I said it again when they were 2-0 up and again before last night's again when they were 3-0 up. I am not sure I ever really believed it..but by gosh they only went and proved me right . We watched both of the weekend games at home, and decided to go to watch the mid week games in champs and Cubby Bear North. Game 3 was incredible. We went down 4-0 in the first 4 innings, and entered the 5th in some trouble. However we scored 5 runs in that one inning. The Astros came back in the 8th to level the game. What happens ...

Lorraine and I took our first US road trip this weekend. I wanted to see fall colours and someone at work suggested Door County . I also wanted to do the RV thing, but found out that firstly, it's very expensive, and secondly, trying to book in Door County for the fall, with only a couple of months notice is damned near impossible. We ended up in a Best Western in Sturgeon Bay , driving up in the truck. For a full selection of pictures, click here . We left early(ish) on Friday morning, about 10am :-) and headed up North. The weather was beautiful and we were excited about our first trip out. Lorraine packed a box lunch with crackers, port wine cheese dip and my homemade smoothie. We had a pretty good run up, stopping only for gas, and arrived in Sturgeon Bay at about 2pm. We had arranged to meet Mark , a fellow blogger, so I called and arranged a meeting that night in a nearby bar. The weather was still great , so we decided to get the bikes out of the back and headed off downtow...

I don't know how many of you will have heard of this , but it is a world wide thing that everyone can get involved in. Basically it involves building houses for people who need them but can't afford them. The recipients have to put significant time (about 150 man hours I think) into someone else's house to qualify, then I think about 250 man hours into their own. When it is done, they still pay mortgage payments, albeit reduced, which helps to buy land for future projects. Many of the home owners continue to give their time to the project going forward. Hewitt gives me two days of "Hewitt Time For Hewitt Concerns" to do charitable work, and so I chose to spend mine helping this project and learning new skills all at the same time, everyone's a winner! Last Thursday, I went along with a group from our DTS or PC Support operation, and fellow manager Mike Vega, he is the handsome devil in the pic on the right! We spent the day putting up vinyl siding, finishing o...

We went to Door County this weekend and had a fabulous weekend (more on this later when I sort the pictures out), but we took the opportunity to catch up with a fellow blogger Mark, of Mark's Musings . To quote a well known Harry Enfield character, what a thoroughly nice bloke. Of course initially conversation was a little stilted as with any two people meeting can be for the first time, however we had some beers, some food, and ended up having a great time. Lorraine was pleased to note that he was not a mad axe murderer. (she will post about this later, when our bloody computer link is up again!)

Vegas was a blast! I arrived on Friday at about 11:30, and we were teeing off at 14:00. I called Mike, the CEO and organiser of the weekend to arrange to dump some stuff before heading out for the first round. The first round at the Bali Hai course was a pretty good 101, despite 5 lost balls. My driver was on form with 8 out of the possible 14 fairways hit (the others being par 3). The greens were a little fluffy though, which contributed to my above average 39 putts (I generally shoot around 30-32) We had caddies (one per group), to advise us on the line, club selection, distances, fill our divots, repair our pitchmarks, clean our clubs and balls, read the putts, and generally pick up after us..I felt like a tour pro! Friday night started with a Mexican buffet at the clubhouse, and a few frozen margaritas. The rest of the evening was a relatively quiet affair by Vegas standards. I gambled a little at the Blackjack tables in the Tropicana, and ended the evening $40 ahead! Saturday was ...