Crosswalks to Nowhere

This past weekend my daughter Becca turned 18. "Impossible," I say-- it was just a few weeks ago that I brought her home in a carrier that I could hold in one hand.

On Sunday, that same kid ate her fill of bacon-wrapped filet mignon, garlic sirloin, and and a bunch of delicious stuff from the salad bar at Texas de Brazil in Schaumburg. Lisa and I each enjoyed a lovely caipirinha with our meal.

We also ran into an old friend: Nick, the former owner of CNA Snack Shop in Arlington Heights is one of the managers at Texas de Brazil. We didn't recognize him with his perfectly-pressed suit: we we used to seeing him behind the grill.

A great way to wrap up a two-birthday week!

That huge accumulation of snow in the yard is almost entirely melted, and underneath it all I found this little guy-- our rhubarb plant, starting to poke its head out.

I've lived here long enough to know that an early March thaw is always nice, but it's also almost always a tease. I expect one more snowstorm before the patio furniture comes out...

The great thing about this is that now I know Spring and strawberry-rhubarb pie isn't too far off!

...or more accurately, "A Box Full of Negatives from the Past."

A few weeks ago, I sent a huge package of photographic negatives to ScanCafe-- you may remember my previous blog post about the service-- and I just finished going through all of the 2500 initial scans. The images were shot between 1975 and 1999.

The final scanned images should arrive within the next couple weeks, and I'll be sharing some of them here.

The image above is of the sign outside the former Laury's Records on Milwaukee Avenue in Niles, Illinois. This is where I spent many hours (and many dollars) during my high school days. This photo was shot in 1978.

More to come!

This week we're celebrating our third anniversary, so we decided to take off for Las Vegas.

Several days off the grid and out of the race with my soulmate-- it can't get any better.

Well, it's back to reality this week.

One good thing is that the miles we flew on this trip are gonna pay for another trip very soon.

Happy Spring!