EFX3 Blogs

I recognize and appreciate some of the ironies of life. Like one that came to me this afternoon: By the time football season ends (in late October or early November, depending on playoff success), snow will be flying through the air. But today, as I finished editing my Week 1 stories, the local temperature was [...]

Ever since her GF moved up here early this year, S had been talking about the three of us visiting an animal farm south of Oshkosh. She took my wife and me there a couple years ago; we had a great time, and I got some goofy pictures, which is almost as important … (That’s an [...]

Apologies for not updating. It’s just been pretty crazy at work, and there has been very little time to collect my thoughts. First of all, an update on David’s broken hand: It’s mending very nicely. The pain seemed to go away quickly, and he’s only on antibiotics now. The main problem is not being able to [...]

What my wife and I did out of town Friday and Saturday is really secondary to what happened to our son David on Saturday afternoon. We got back home about 7:30 p.m. Saturday, and David called Sunday afternoon, just after we finished lunch. He told us he was in an accident the day before. He [...]

Our travels took us to central Wisconsin in mid July. It was partially for David’s benefit–he wanted to go several places in that area, plus some shopping. So my wife and David and I got into the car and drove south to Wausau–about three hours south of our place. The first priority was scratching that shopping [...]

A couple months ago, I found my creative writing groove that had been missing for a while. Ever since, I have been posting more than I had for some time. Posts both private and public. Photos edited and uploaded. Then, all that creative momentum came to a crashing halt. That’s because my photo editing software [...]

Here’s a good argument for taking the path less traveled. We traveled it last Saturday, and it paid off big time. In fact, the road we took home from a one-day excursion may actually get more traffic than the road we took earlier. But it was still the long way home, and I’m glad we followed [...]

Take a look at this picture … It is taped on the wall by my wife’s sewing machine. I took it with my old work camera, back when we were only shooting black and white negative film. It shows our cat, Maggie, at the top of a ladder and our other cat, Frisky, a few steps [...]

Life has been anything but boring lately. On top of that, I am dealing with transitions. The first one you can probably guess: Our cat, Maggie, peacefully left this plane of existence last Wednesday morning. Maggie meant a lot to us, and I am preparing a post about her with some photos from over the [...]

Sad times are inevitable in each of our lives. We will be having sad times in our house soon. Very soon. It’s Maggie, that long-haired calico cat who has spent over 17 human years with us. My wife has said that if she makes it to late July, she will turn 18. But now, it [...]

Pardon me if I look a little tired and bedraggled this week. I am. I got back from my trip to the poly camp on Monday afternoon. We left a day earlier than originally planned–S’s girlfriend was struggling with allergies and had a really hard time sleeping. She did OK for three days, though, and [...]

Last year at this time, B and I were talking excitedly about our imminent first encounter and our trip to the poly camp in southern Wisconsin. In our e-mails back and forth, we had been counting down–the count started when we were in triple digits. Exactly one year ago, it was down to a single [...]

Well, isn’t that nice? Thirty years after the movie made its debut, L’Osservatore Romano, the official Vatican newspaper, has given its official stamp of approval on one of my all-time favorite movies: “The Blues Brothers.” The flick that starred Dan Ackroyd and the late John Belushi has been named on a list of “Catholic Classics,” [...]

All through March, April and May, I had been worrying about our weather. How warm it was–much warmer than normal. Especially how dry it was–much, much drier than normal. And then June arrived. Flipping the calendar to June apparently did the trick: Since then, we have had plenty of rain. Just rain–no thunderstorms. But you [...]

Transition time. Last night, June 9, the Stanley Cup playoffs ended when the Chicago Blackhawks defeated the Philadelphia Flyers in overtime to win the big mug for the first time since 1961. Tomorrow, June 11, the World Cup opens in South Africa. The world-wide soccer competition lasts for a month and will hold much of [...]