Damon's Daemon

This Christmas I got a new engine for Twinkie. My mom decreed that June would be the month of Twinkie, that she’d like to see it up and running before it got cold outside again. My dad and I made our plans, and today was the first official day of the rebuild. (We’ve looked over the engines before, but today was the first down and greasy day)

We decided today we’d take apart the new engine, test it out, make sure it was gonna work out for Twinkie. While there was generally very little concern about this, one can never tell what you get on eBay. Also, considering the engine came from an automatic transmission, and Twinkie is a manual, we knew we’d have a little bit of work to do in order to get the conversion back to manual for the transmission worked out.

We started by putting the engine up on a workbench so it was at our height. We noticed immediately that one of the heat exchangers was completely rusted apart. Normally not a worry, as I only drive Twinkie during the summer, but some of the other shrouds around the engine were on their way to Rustville as well. The oil pump did, indeed, have the port for the automatic transmission, so we made note that we’d have to either move the old one over from the old engine or get a new one. Otherwise, everything with the engine (we stripped it down to a short block) appears just dandy. Yay!

The engine’s serial number is AH383063. This translates to a 1600cc dual port engine from 1973-74.

Next weekend we’ll take the old engine out of Twinkie, which I’ve been told mostly consists of removing four bolts.

The Week’s Shopping List
* New set of engine gaskets
* Possibly a new oil pump (there is a bit of concern that the pump from the old engine may have been contaminated from the engine breakdown)
* New driver side mirror
* New battery

Second weekend of work on Twinkie. Today we attacked the old engine.

Started off easy enough. Label all of the wires coming off of the engine so you can reconnect them to the new engine in the proper order. I have to say - I think we need more colors. Keeping track of the different wires was an exercise in naming. Red w/Black, Red w/Blue, Red, Black, Blue, Blue w/Yellow, etc.

The John Muir book, How To Keep Your Volkswagen Running guided the rest of the process for us. The book really does live up to the hype - it is amazing how the author goes into just the right amount of detail for you to get the job done, but explains things well enough that you understand WHY you’re doing WHAT you’re doing.

The only things we ran into which were not covered in the book were:

• Twinkie seems to have a 15mm nut on the transmission bolt on the passenger side of the engine compartment
• The heater control cables were not hooked up
• Due to the type of engine in Twinkie, the driver side engine compartment bolt is reversed - you remove it from underneath the vehicle
• The Muir book doesn’t mention the cross-brace which supports the engine in the rear - we removed the bolts holding on the entire brace and removed it along with the engine rather than try to work around it

Otherwise, the only other notable event was when we went to disconnect the gas line. Next time, make sure you’ve got something much bigger than a pencil handy. I probably got about a quarter gallon of gasoline which ran down my arm while I tried to use a pencil to block the line. Yuk!

We hooked up the existing battery to the charger. It was taking a charge when we left it - we’ll know next week if we need to get a new one or not.

This morning my dad and I did the 30 mile Saint Paul Classic Bike Tour. I’ve never done a bike tour or ride; my dad hadn’t done one since 1971! But, we hitched the bikes up on the rack and drove down near University of Saint Thomas, the starting (and ending) location. We got about a half mile from the University, parked, and rode in.

At first things seemed to be in disarray. There were thousands of bicycles and the riders moving around every which way. But, as we approached the big tent we found the signs directing us where to sign up and did so. About 10 minutes and we were off.

Most of the beginning of the ride was downhill, which made for a very smooth start. All of the streets were closed off, intersections controlled by VERY friendly police officers who were not afraid of giving the bicyclists multiple green lights at a time while traffic waited to cross the route. The route had tons of signs, explaining each turn, rest areas, reminding slow riders to ride to the right, etc. The ride along the river was beautiful. While I had driven the river portion of the route many times before in my car - it wasn’t until this ride that I was able to truly appreciate it and see all the wonderful scenery.

The organizers of the ride claim:

“Is the course difficult?

Ramsey Hill, on the short route, is quite steep and many folks will need to walk their bikes up. On the long route, there are three moderate uphill climbs.”

Both my dad and I agree that while there are three SEMI-moderate inclines, that there were 4-5 other inclines where you still huffed and puffed to get to the top. During the race my dad and I were unsure where the “third” moderate incline was, but upon further reflection I’m guessing we overlooked the first one which was just past 35E on Shepard Road. We agreed that the other two were the ascent as you approached Highway 61 on Warner Road and the climb highlighted on the map on Wheelock Parkway. The other “smaller” inclines were still quite the workout, to be sure.

After we hit our pace, we realized that my dad was quicker on the descents (his bike is much more rigged up for road riding, smaller tubes, etc) and I was quicker on the inclines. It didn’t take us long to adopt the whole “meet you after the hill” idea where we could each go our own pace and end up together again after the course leveled back out.

When I had checked in I noticed my dad’s cousin had also signed up for the race. We kept our eyes open for him, knowing that the odds we’d pick him out in a crowd of so many bikes were next to none. But, as luck would have it, right as we got onto Mounds Parkway we came up upon him and had a great chat as we biked our way to the rest area.

We didn’t stop (other than for quick breathers and to chit-chat with the relative) until we hit the Como Park Pavillion, which at about 23 miles in the ride is a perfect place to stop, get some snacks and refill the water bottles. We got back on the road again and headed for the finish line, completing the 30 mile route in about 2 hours and 25 minutes, or 12.5 miles per hour.

We picked up our t-shirts, rode back to the car and drove on home.

I really enjoyed the ride - certainly the weather couldn’t have been better considering it was 65-75 the entire sunny day with just enough wind to keep things cool. At 31 miles (including the mile to/from the car) it was the furthest I had biked in one day ever. While there were hills, much like the riding I do around the apartment, there were also great level runs which made the ride great for everybody. And I’m so glad my dad came along - being able to chit chat and pace myself with someone I knew made everything that much more enjoyable.

My dad and I both agreed we’d meet again next year and do it all over again. :)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Twinkie Test Successful

Spring Lake Park, Minnesota (PRSOURCE) September 14, 2004 - Tonight, with little fanfare, an ignition test was performed on Twinkie, Damon Durand’s 1968 VW Campmobile. This was a major milestone for the TwERP.

Durand Engineers, with tactical assistance provided by Kelly Industries and Pamela Logistics, have spent many weekend man-hours rebuilding Twinkie’s engine over the past 3 months. Due to parts being sourced from around the nation for such a grand effort, delays were encountered and project schedules had to be pushed back.

A few weeks ago, a no-go condition was raised by the engineering project team due to a malfunctioning fuel pump. Curtis Durand, the Lead Consulting Engineer for the TwERP, led the effort in testing both the primary and backup units but found faults in both which could not be remedied. Luckily, due to the TwERP engineering team’s early design decision to use as many off-the-shelf parts as possible, a third unit was obtained and put into service. Component testing was performed on the new fuel pump and the no-go condition was removed, allowing the project to move forward once more.

Tonight after dinner, Lead Mechanics Engineer and Pilot Damon Durand entered the command compartment and strapped into the pilot’s seat. Lead Consulting Engineer Curtis Durand supervised the engine itself, while a representative from Pamela Logistics was on-hand to supervise safety systems.

Pilot Damon Durand inserted the key into the ignition and turned it to the start position, which engaged the starter motor and began the engine boot sequence. Simultaneously, a throttle up maneuver was made with his foot via the accelerator pedal, per established cold start procedures.

After a rough timing adjustment by the Lead Consulting Engineer, the engine turned over. Quickly thereafter, the pilot moved the key back into the “run” position, which disengaged the starter motor, and a self-sustaining idle condition was obtained. The engine test continued for approximately one minute. Samples were taken of the engine exhaust during the test by a HAND, but there was no oil burning detected by any sensor.

This marks a major milestone achieved by the TwERP. After work is completed on the intake air cleaner system, the TwERP team’s efforts will be completed.

Twinkie’s launch, subject to a possible safety inspection delay, is currently scheduled for September 18, 2004. Another launch window is also available the following day, September 19, 2004, with two more windows the following weekend.

More information on the Twinkie Engine Rebuild Project(TwERP) can be obtained by visiting the project’s webpage.

###

Contact:
Damon Durand
Durand Engineers
twerp@durands.com

Kelly and I slept in today, headed up to my parents’ house around noon. We picked up lunch on the way, which gave everyone time to socialize before my dad and I headed outside.

Once we got outside the first thing to get out of the way was adjusting the timing. My Dad had set it “about right” on Tuesday night for the engine test, but this time we got out the timing gun. Attach it to the battery, place the sensor over the spark plug wire for cylinder 1 and test. Set it right around 28 degrees offset from TDC above 3000 RPM.

Next step was the air cleaner. We fitted the tube which ran from the air cleaner to the carburetor, set the air cleaner in place and measured its height. Since the bracket the air cleaner would normally set on had been removed by a previous owner, when they converted Twinkie to dual carburetors, we had to fashion our own.

My Dad had picked up two “L” brackets and a straight length of angle iron. It took us about an hour and a half, but eventually we came up with a solution. The rear “L” bracket was folded to the proper height and bolted to the body as far back as possible on the passenger side of the engine compartment. The forward “L” bracket just happened to fit perfectly on one of the rear engine shroud’s bolts. The straight length was placed diagonally across both “L” brackets, and then we bungee-corded the air cleaner to the angle iron. The air cleaner is level, placed perfectly out of the way, and we still give ourselves room to remove the battery.

Next was adjusting the automatic choke. Driven by the engine thermostat, it alters the idle speed of the engine. While we were adjusting the speed back and forth we didn’t realize there were two pools of oil forming underneath the engine. In the process of cleaning up a few tools we saw the spots and the worrying began a new. What if the engine was a lemon? All this work for nothing! But, we set our minds back to work, resolved to fix our problem, just like had with every other “issue” we encountered during this effort.

Rather quickly the cause of the first oil pool was tracked down to the valve cover over cylinders 1 & 2. After closer inspection we realized it was the valve cover on which we didn’t replace the seal when we were overhauling the engine. It was thought, at the time, that the existing rubber seal would be just fine. No problem - we still had a spare seal - we replaced the seal and replaced the cover.

The second cause was a bit more difficult to track down, since oil seemed to be all over the bottom of the engine and around the dipstick. After cleaning off the oil already on the engine, we restarted the engine and found the oil was spraying out around the dipstick. With the dipstick out it just gushed. After a moment, my dad realized that the problem was actually a capped off crankcase breather vent which we had capped off due to an incompatibility with the Type 2/Bus air cleaner. (Remember, the engine came from a Bug!) We added an item onto our “future” checklist to obtain the necessary adapters in order to connect the air cleaner and crankcase breather and left the cap off for now.

Now back in the game, we finished connecting the rear engine compartment shroud and started the engine up again. Twinkie was alive. All that remained now was to perform the pre-flight checks.

After checking the lights, we called out Kelly and Mom for the launching ceremony. My Dad brought out some champagne, we all had a toast and we christened Twinkie with a pour from the bottle. I hopped in the driver’s seat, turned Twinkie over and got ready to back Twinkie out of the driveway for the first time in 3 years.

I found reverse, let out on the clutch and back I went. After a small correction to avoid giving myself WAY too much distance from the other cars in the driveway (and driving into the yard) I made it down to the street, turned into traffic and sputtered away.

Finally, after three years and an entire summer of work on it, here I was driving Twinkie down the road.

I took Twinkie around a few blocks and then pulled it back into the driveway. Hopping out, I asked my Dad if he wanted to take Twinkie for a ride and he hopped in himself and drove away. (Once again, after a small course correction, this time to avoid the cars in the driveway!)

He got back; we all stood around and admired the accomplishment. Kelly even hopped up in the driver’s seat (although she didn’t want to drive Twinkie around at all) and admired the large, round steering wheel.

We attached the rear bumper, removed the front license plate (it was an old plate) and cleaned up. Mission accomplished!

I’ve posted some photos from the day here.

As you may have picked up from reading the Twinkie entries, Twinkie was the lucky recipient of a transplant engine from a 1973-1974 Super Beetle. My dad purchased the engine through eBay back before Christmas, which meant the feedback had to be sent before we could get it in and working. After we completed our work, he sent another message to the seller sharing our success with an invitation to go to my website and read all about it. Here was his response (from a week or so ago, his location is obvious when you consider where all the hurricanes have been hitting this year):

From: Shawn Knight
To: Curtis Durand
Re: eBay Item: VW BUG SUPER BEETLE 1600 MOTOR ENGINE

That’s just great, can’t wait till my son is old enough to do similar projects! He’s only 5, but I’m already planning! Your son, a teenager I assume, writes very well. Very interesting reading, though I had to cut it short as we are now up to 50 mile an hour winds during our weekly hurricane test!! Will catch up with you when I can, gotta hunch the power ain’t gonna be on much longer, best wishes to you, your family and most of all Twinkie!!

Well, I dunno if I should be happy that he thought I was a teenager or not (for those of you playing the home game, I’m 28 this year) but it still is cool to connect with the donor in this way.

Met my Grandpa for dinner last night. We had a great time, as we always do.

When I was growing up my dad’s parents were like a second set of parents to my sister and I. (More on that on the family page when I get it done) My Grandpa’s always been a great adviser and a hero of mine.

I got to take Grandpa for a ride in Twinkie on our way to the restaurant. He had contributed funds to Twinkie’s restoration, so I wanted to show off that we finally had her running. Once we got to the restaurant (Uno’s) our discussions really began.

Now this is one of the greatest things about my relationship with my Grandpa. Ever since I can remember, my Grandpa and I have always had these great intellectual discussions. I vividly remember this as far back as junior high. I would go up and stay with my Grandparents in Grand Marias every summer for a few weeks - each day my Grandpa and I would walk into town to pick up groceries or perform some kind of chore while my Grandma stayed back at the cabin to get showered, dressed, etc. During our hour or so walkabout we’d discuss all kinds of things; politics, religion, math, puzzles, human nature, breadmaking, woodworking, fishing, personal histories, family history. You name it, we prbly said something about it. I learned a lot in those summers - I think my Grandpa did, too.

Fast forward to last night. Besides the old mainstay of politics, which often dominates our discussions, we touched a bit on religion as well. (Spurred by my reading of The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene) We’ve discussed this before - I knew my Grandpa and I had similar thoughts on the matter - but this time it was different. More substance about the “Why’s?” instead of concentrating on the “How’s?” Seemed like more of a philosophy discussion than anything else - but with the kind of reasoning two rational, analytical minds bring to the table.

While I’m sorry my Grandma isn’t alive anymore, I’m thankful that my Grandpa is still here and I can share meals like this with him.

So, I need to decide what I’m going to do for Thanksgiving.

The two options are:

1. Travel down to Texas with my parents to have Thanksgiving down at my sister and brother-in-law’s place. Since my sister and brother-in-law are not coming up to visit during the holiday season this may be the only chance to enjoy some family time with them for some time to come.
2. Stay here in town and have Thanksgiving with my Grandpa and Aunt.

Thanksgiving for me is a really important holiday for me. One time a year everyone comes together, sits down around a table and shares a homemade meal. We all bring items to share, someone cooks the big giant turkey. Before we dig in, everyone takes a moment and shares what they are thankful for over the past year. I love hearing what everyone comes up with…and taking the time before hand to reflect on the previous year and come up with what I’m going to share.

But this year, due to circumstances beyond my control, I’m stuck choosing between the two options above. Sure, there will be phone calls to each other I’m sure, but with either option I’m missing people very close to me with whom I want to share my Thanksgiving.

I still don’t know what I’m going to choose, although I need to decide shortly so that each of the groups can make their plans. Of course, the NaNoWriMo decision further complicates the decision…the time down with my sister would be busy visiting, I’m sure, leaving little time near the end of the month for crunch time on the writing.

After work today I snuck over to my Grandpa’s house and scanned a bunch of old (and new) pictures.

84 in all.

There were many more I wanted to scan, but I wanted to get enough material together to put together the About Me and My Family pages for the website.

Look to see many of the pictures either incorporated in those pages as I put them together or I’ll feature individual posts about them.

As I discussed here, it looked like we had the need to have two Thanksgivings this year.

Becky suggested, upon reading my post, that it might work to split it up into two Thanksgivings. Much like one sometimes has to do when they get married. After pondering this a bit I came up with an even better solution than if everything would have remained the same.

The big party room at my apartment complex has a full kitchen, big screen TV, couches, dim lighting, dining room table, etc. But it is always reserved every year for Thanksgiving well in advance. As luck would have it, the Sunday before Thanksgiving isn’t taken. So, making lemonade out of lemons, I’ve reserved the room and will do Thanksgiving this year for the family like I did two years ago.

We can have the Thanksgiving we always have had…just a few days earlier. And that should clear things up for making the trip down to enjoy Thanksgiving with my sister and parents.

Now, the real question…will taking on all this flood my November with too many activities to successfully write my novel?

We’ll see! I’m stoked if you can’t tell!

The first of the 82 photos has made its way up to the website. I skeleton of the Family pages have been uploaded and are ready for your consumption.

Pay special detail to the imagemap…ugh. Took me almost an hour to imagemap that photo!

Also pay attention to the photo…it is proof that I come from a long line of goofy people!

The individual bio pages will be filled out as time allows. I’ve got a huge stack of scanned photos and digital shots which are just waiting to be mated with words and added to the pages.

Tonight I’ve got the irregularly scheduled Durand Family Board Meeting to attend.

I’m looking forward to hearing about Grandpa’s fishing trip, creating plans for the Turkey Day celebration, and catching up with everyone.

In today’s busy world a lot of people don’t make time for their family…I’m glad that even with two Board members in absentia, we can still make time to get together on occasion and touch base.

Reading the end of this entry on iwilldare.com reminded me of a story I remember from my childhood.

It was one of those really long trips in the car you always seem to remember taking in your childhood. Not quite sure where we were going, but my parents were struggling to keep us occupied in the absence of natural light sources.

Mom: Why don’t we try and play a game?
My Sister and/or I: What game?
Mom: The quiet game.
My Sisyer and/or I: How do we play that?
Mom: Well, we see who can stay quiet the longest.
My Sister: OK.
**GAME BEGINS**
**I THINK TO MYSELF…”This isn’t fun at all!”**
Me: Whoops, I lost! Darn!
**EVERYONE ERUPTS INTO LAUGHTER ‘CEPT MY MOM**

Happy Birthday to my MOM

My Mom has always been my favorite mom. (She’d always point out at this point that she’s my only mom, but that’s not important to me!) Her love has never wavered; she was my first best friend and has always been there for me whenever I’ve needed her. She is there to celebrate with me when times are great, she’s there to support me when times are trying.

I love you Mom.

A list of the weekend chores:

• Eliminate at least one of the big piles of boxes still taking up space in my apartment.
• Finish all laundry, clearing out the second bathroom for the repair man next week.
• Finalize plans for Durand Family Turkey Day next Sunday and email information to family participants.
• Go grocery shopping to pick up required items for above-mentioned Durand Family Turkey Day.
• Work on the Novel.
• Finish Pokey build for testing next week.
• Line up tire replacement next week.
• Find some time to relax in the midst of all the pressing matters.

Well, I made it through the night last night using only ibuprofen instead of the vicodin I had been using. Still not sleeping well, but I have been managing to keep food down and the rest of my digestive system is slowly working again.

I made the call at noon today that I was gonna go forward with the Durand Family Turkey Day tomorrow, so now I’ve got some catching up to do in that regard. Need to do the grocery shopping I was gonna do on Thursday night, get all the food stuffs, defrost the turkey, prepare the cranberry sauces and roux tonight. Then get to bed early so I can get up, brine the turkey and get everything going tomorrow so I can still make it to the movie in the morning while the turkey is cooking.

Be a hectic afternoon and evening, but I’ll be much happier tomorrow when everyone comes together and we get to celebrate together before we have to split up.

‘course, tomorrow night I’ll be busy packing for the trip, since I leave for that on Monday at 4pm. Seems like the weather will be beautiful down in Texas, can prbly get away with wearing shorts most of the time. (Much to the chagrin of my sister, I suspect, since it’ll be obvious I’m from up north when I’m walking around in shorts in 70 degree weather!)

I’ll be writing a bunch of journal entries as I have time and getting them up as soon as possible.

Headlines:

• I’m feeling about a 9 out of 10. Still tender, still feeling a bit rundown.
• Durand Family Turkey Day was a hit. Had issues with the turkey and the cranberry sauce, as well as being disappointed a second time with the gravy.
• Excited to leave for my trip
• Got a lot of crap to do before I leave. 1.5 days of work I missed plus my work today condensed into 6 hours.
• Still need to pack, but everything should be washed and dry by the time I get home.

What can I say about the car trip? 15 Hours. We stopped a few times, only for food, stretching, changing drivers. I managed to play Soul Coughing’s “True Dreams of Wichita” while driving past Wichita at 3:15 in the morning. Got my Dad hooked on my iPod, he got hours to play with it in the car and I think he’ll be getting one for Christmas. When we stopped at the McDonald’s in Percell, OK, for breakfast, the family in line before us coincidentally had left Minneapolis at 5:30 the night before, just like we did, and had made identical time. How freaky is that?

The last two hours of the trip were the most stressful. I was going on my 7th and 8th hour driving and we were beseeched by a horrible horrible down pouring of rain which made it impossible to see more than 50 feet. Luckily, the sun had come up by then, which made dealing with it a bit easier, but it was still very stressful. Because I had to be on a conference call with work right as we pulled in, we swapped drivers about 20 minutes out and I had a bit of chill time before having to work the phone.

Upon our arrival, Michelle met us at the front gate to her complex, let us follow her in and we parked and exchanged hugs. I had last seen my sister back in August, so while we’ve gone longer without seeing each other before, it was wonder to see her on her own turf for a change. We went inside and had pastries (beignets, I think they were, along with hot chocolate, mmm!)

We sat around playing with their dogs, Molly and Pogo and saw the apartment. They have a beautiful place, beautiful view. Really feels like a home. Pictures all over of family, friends, their marriage, pets, etc. Really nice place.

We got to go to Chic-fil-a for lunch, it was even better than I can get at home with a much bigger selection. Yum! We then went home, Dad and I had a bit of work to do while Mom and Michelle visited. (Davin had to work today/tonight, but he’s got the rest of the weekend off!) Around 4 Mom, Dad and I left their apartment, found our hotel and checked in. We’re staying at the “Wyndham Dallas North”, so far the room is comfortable, the help has been wonderful and cheerful. All three of us unpacked, took showers.

Michelle called; we decided to go to “Babe’s”. Babe’s is a very cool and folksy restaurant. Your party is seated at a simple table, but each of them is about 6 inches away from each other, so it has a mess hall feel. You choose from 5 meats (tonight’s choices were pot roast, country fried chicken, fried chicken, fried catfish, chicken tenders) and then they haul out these huge bowls of the homemade cream corn, mashed tubers, gravy, green beans and a nice salad. Other than the meat, everything is all you can eat. We each got a different meat (I got the country friend chicken, my sis the chicken tenders, my Mom the catfish and my Dad the chicken) and shared that a bit, too.

During dinner, I was trying to calm my sister after a potentially sharp tease directed in her direction and said in an “inside” voice that “I’m a sensitive guy…I can hug a man and not have it make me any less of a man”. She immediately turns to me and utters, “You can’t say that in Texas…there are conceal/carry laws here!” This became the catchphrase of the night…I would ask her all kinds of asinine questions about everyday things phrased like, “Can you _______ in Texas?”

Afterwards, we went and picked up a showing of “The Incredibles”. The theatre was great…even tho they did mention at the beginning of the show, “Please place any refuse at the end of the show in the white trash receptacles on your way out of the theatre” We all found that utterly hilarious. As for the movie, it was excellent. I had heard good reviews from friends, but even with those slightly heightened expectations it totally surpassed them. It is a bit darker than other Pixar films have been, I think, indeed there is human death in this…even human death at the hands of the heroes of the story. Maybe this means that after Pixar’s split with Disney we’re gonna see them going at more of the adult market? That would be an interesting strategy…are adults willing to accept such a film as more than children’s fare?

Now I’m back in the hotel room, need to be up at 7:00am tomorrow so I can meet Michelle and Davin tomorrow morning at 7:30 so we can go to Central Market and pick up some things for the Thanksgiving feast. Should be fun…they have only incredible things to say about Central Market, it will be interesting to finally see it. Off to sleep…

Woke up at 7:00 this morning. My sister and Davin would arrive at 7:30 to pick me up from the hotel so we could go to Central Market and pick up a bunch of items. We got to Central Market a bit earlier than we thought, since we took the George Bush Tollway out to Plano. After picking up some Starbucks, we headed over to it. It wasn’t quite what I thought it was gonna be. Listening to my sister and brother-in-law talk about it all the time it made it sound like a farmer’s market. This was just a gigantic supermarket.

Least that’s what I thought before I stepped inside. (I hadn’t looked at the website, which would have clarified things quite a bit, I suppose!) When you walk in you land in the produce department, like many supermarkets. But this really was like a farmer’s market inside. The produce department was unfinished, kept around 65 in order to ensure the produce remained fresh. The selection was huge - it really rivaled many of the farmer’s markets I’ve seen. Everything was properly presented, either on ice or room temp, cranberries floating in a “bog”, etc. You’d select your produce, put it in a bag, then walk over to one of many stations. At this station you’d put the produce on a scale, punch in the produce’s number and a sticker would print with all the price information on it.

You then moved into a gigantic butcher area, which rivaled any butcher’s shop. They not only offered ANY cut you wanted, they would steam your seafood selections for you while you finished shopping. Then you walk into a huge wine section with row upon row of fine wines and champagnes. Next up is a huge section of bulk dry goods, then a huge bakery with every type of bread I’ve ever seen (and many I hadn’t!) Top it off with your ethnic foodstuffs, spices, imported goods, florals…I could go on. It is an amazing concept - I can only hope we get one (or someone starts a similar concept) in the Twin Cities area soon.

We then headed back to their apartment, hung out, played a little XBox and read passages from “America: The Book” which I brought down since I saw it on their Christmas list and wanted to give them a little taste of it since I had picked it up a few weeks ago when it first came out. It was a huge hit…we all ended up reading a few pages aloud over the course of the day. Michelle and I checked into work, then my parents arrived and we started the tourism day.

We picked up lunch at Cheddar’s. I was excited…if you know me, you know how much I love Cheddar’s “Smashers”. My sister claimed to eat there all the time, ‘cept she had never heard of them. I didn’t believe it, but sure enough, it wasn’t on the menu down here. I’ve had it in the Rockford, IL, Ann Arbor, MI and Des Moines, IA locations…unbelievable. I managed to get a close second…a chicken tender platter with mashed potatoes and gravy for dipping sauce.

After the meal, we headed down to Dealy Plaza to visit the Sixth Floor Museum. It was a truly moving experience, which I’ll write more about later I think. We spent most of the afternoon there, even viewed the display on presidential TV advertising, which was upstairs on the 7th floor. I really enjoyed visiting such an important place; you could feel the grief still floating through the air 40 years after the fact.

We then scooted home, relaxed around the apartment while Davin did some cooking, I took care of a bit of work that cropped up on our way home and the family visited. We headed out to dinner at “On The Border” which was excellent chain Tex-Mex. Yum. After visiting some more back at the pad, my parents and I said our goodbyes for the evening and headed back to the hotel.

Quite the wonderful day. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, obviously, so the feast is the primary focus of the day. Hopefully we’ll get some gaming in as well…I have a feeling Trivial Pursuit is in our future! Yay!

We decided to sleep in this morning…but considering all three of us (my parents and myself) need to share one bathroom we still needed to get up at a semi-reasonable hour in order to get over to Michelle and Davin’s house around 11am. On our way over we stopped by Starbucks…my mom wanted coffee, and I like their “Iced Lemon Pound Cake”. A yummy treat.

We got over to the apartment and were greeted by a wonderful scent permeating the air. Davin had been cooking and preparing our Thanksgiving feast for hours…all kinds of wonderful smells were about, the ham was in the oven being glazed and bathed in various sugary substances. The turkey was still out on the patio being brined, snacks were out and we all began our day of grazing.

My mom and Davin are VERY into football; my dad and sister are into it as supporting spouses; so we flipped on the games and that filled up most of the attention in the room. I spent some time on my laptop, reading books, paying a bit of attention to the game and the conversation around me.

Around four we sat down to dinner (and told the Tivo to finish recording the afternoon game). We had a great meal - Davin did a wonderful job. The ham was especially well done; he had used the cola method of cooking it, combined with a glaze made from cherries, sugar, etc. It was soooo wonderful. The rest of the meal, including but not limited to the turkey, dressing and wild rice soup was excellent. On top of it all, it was made even better by the fact that Davin did all the heavy lifting/work…I just sat back and enjoyed the meal.

The rest of the night we cleaned up, visited, watched “The Bourne Identity” since I had forgotten I had seen it. (I had seen it…just missed parts of it for some strange reason) Around 11 my parents and I left - it was obvious that Michelle and Davin were beat.

I just got back from the Twin Cities performance of the Barenaked Ladies Holiday Tour down at the Orpheum Theatre. I had purchased tickets for my parents to come along as well, since they got such a kick out of seeing them the last time they came to town. (Last time I had two spare tickets, since I had gotten closer seats nearly the date of the performance, so I let them take my original two) We met for dinner and then drove down there together.

The seats I picked up turned out great (Main Floor Section 4, row N). We had two guys in front of us with a seat between them for a little 3-year-old boy. A family of four (two teenagers, the mom and dad) were seated to the right of them. To our right we had another family of four; immediately to my right (I was on the right end of our seats) there was a couple who came in after the concert started smelling of booze. On our left we had, what appeared to be, a group of four college friends who had come together to attend the show. Behind us, we had more families. Overall, this certainly was a “family” show. (I’m used to all ages at a BNL show, but this was obviously something many families attended together)

The beginning of the show started off with the Shakopee Junior High School Choir singing a few Christmas carols. (I captured one of them with my smuggled-in iTalk and iPod; I’ll link to it tomorrow HERE [Updated 12/14 11:15am] after I get a chance to convert it. I listened to it on the way home, it didn’t turn out half bad!) Then the band came on stage and did a wonderful group sing-a-long with the choir. As the choir left the stage, the guys launched into another holiday tune. Just when I got to thinking it was going to be a strictly holiday concert, they played one of their non-holiday songs and the audience just rocked out. Everyone was moving, shaking, bouncing, doing whatever one can do in the foot-by-foot space provided by the chair boundaries.

About halfway through the concert Steve introduced Sean Cullen and gave him the stage instead of doing an intermission. I thought this was a neat touch…Sean ended up telling us the “untold Christmas story” about how upon Jesus’ birth (named coincidentally after Joseph and Mary’s Mexican gardener) a big robot came down and engaged Jesus in a battle to the death. Wacky beyond belief!

After the came back on stage the band played a bunch more songs, including one where the audience chose who was going to play the drums for the next song. We chose Kevin; he hopped behind the drums while Tyler came out and sang Feliz Navdidad. It was a lot of fun seeing them mix it up a little.

There were two encores, and then the venue lights came up and we all shuffled out like good little cattle.

<rant> Seriously, I wonder where and when the whole “encore” thing became so manufactured that after the concert the audience goes wild (while being kept in the dark) until the band comes out. When they leave the second time, either the lights come up or they stay dark - that’s your hint if it is time to throw on the jacket and sprint for the door or you should continue to scream for more. Not like you’re really demanding anything…since they control the lights, the control how much you get to hear. </rant>

It was wonderful to see my parents so into an act that I appreciate so much. Hearing my mom shout out the “A llama…or an emu!” line from “If I Had $1,000,000” in that BNL-style of mispronunciation was awesome. So was the way they leaned into each other and swayed back and forth to “Call And Answer”. At the end of the performance, my mom exclaimed so happily, “They played EVERY one of my favorite songs!” Even my dad was energized by it, even tho his favorite, “Be My Yoko Ono”, wasn’t played.

An excellent concert, as always. I’m planning to pick up the live recording of the show through the band’s website. The last time they came to town it was right before they made all their shows available online - should be an interesting way to support the band as directly as possible. And while, at times, the holiday music was a bit distracting, I certainly would love to sit through that concert again and again :)

Am I the only one in this world who enjoys grocery shopping?

WARNING: Extremely long remembrance of grocery shopping ahead!!!

I’ve written about having dinner with Grandpa before, but after tonight I just had to celebrate it again. I ended up getting out of work a bit late, so I didn’t get over there until almost 6:45. He greeted me chipper as usual; we hopped back in the warm car and drove off to dinner. Uno’s was the place of choice this week (the last few weeks we’ve been going to Applebee’s, he loves their riblets, so we thought we’d head back to Uno’s again for a change).

It never ceases to amaze me just how great of a man my Grandpa is. Not only does he have (still, at 80!) the intellectual and reasoning capacity, but he’s got such a wealth of experience to draw upon he never fails to be an entertaining and rewarding conversationalist.

Tonight’s highlights included:

• retirement planning
• my grandpa’s love of his new Tivo
• oil change patterns and the whole synthetic/natural oil debate
• the possible labor-related causes of foreign manufacturer’s larger engine oil capacities
• the oddity of 7’1” men bringing 7’0” women as guests to church services
• if we accept that the big bang really happened, what was here before it and, more importantly, why was there a big bang?
• the “bump” method of lock picking
• the wonders of a truck stop gift shop
• arch support and heel replacement on shoes
• the need for another family board meeting next week after my aunt returns from her tour of England
• the home price bubble

3 hours. 3 flavored iced teas, each. (His were raspberry, mine mango) A wonderful evening all-around, once again reminding me of the joys of having such a wonderful Grandpa!

1. I finally got around to checking out the Best Buy Weekly Ad and I found out that Orgazmo was finally released on DVD! Picked it up over lunch…watched it after I got home tonight. I’ve rented it so many times over the years I know the movie by heart…it is wonderful to finally have a DVD version with all the extras.
2. Review today at work. Went well, very few surprises. As my boss said, he’d tell me well before now if I had been doing something incorrectly or inappropriate. Received very high marks on both communication and problem solving - considering I feel these are my two strongest professional aptitudes I was happy to see that they were recognized.
3. Waking this morning to a great spring rainstorm was refreshing. Great to see all the leftovers of winter get washed away, everything getting ready for growth once more.
4. Getting ready for a busy next 72 hours:
   • Drop off my parentals at the airport 5:00am Friday morning
   • Aunt’s 50th Birthday celebration Friday night after work
   • Leave Saturday morning for a quick trip to Dallas to help my Sister and Bro-In-Law move into their new home

Today is my Aunt’s 50th birfday!

We celebrated by picking her up in a limo at work, went for a ride around the lakes and then went to dinner at Kincaids.

My Grandpa, DiAnne (a friend of my aunt) and I all attended the night’s festivities. My Parents provided the limo (they are off on holiday) and my Sister and Bro-In-Law sent a wonderful floral bouquet making sure everyone knew at my Aunt’s work that it was her big day.

We had a wonderful ride, a marvelous meal and listened to many stories from my Aunt’s 50 years in this world. Kincaids sure took care of us…even offering us a bottle of wine when dinner was slightly delayed in arrival.

So, it took two cards to do it justice in real life, but I wanted to say “Happy Birthday” to my Aunt here, too. Here’s hoping she has another great 50 years ahead of her!

First off: I was rudely awakened this morning by a call from 888-587-0496. Therefore, I will rudely awaken this entry with the following message: 888-587-0496 is the phone number for the automated schedule notifier/Care Alerts for Orbitz.com. They don’t tell you this anywhere, nor do they make it available for reverse lookup on the usual sites. I’ll put this here in the hopes that the great Google may look highly enough upon this poor blog post to index the information for others to share.

The trip down to Texas this time came out of an offer to help my Sister and Bro-In-Law move from their apartment into their first house. Although they closed on the house a few weeks ago, waiting for me to visit didn’t really end up being too onerous of a wait. First, the previous homeowners ended up renting the house back from them for a few days while they finished their move out of the house. Then, the remainder of the time my Sister and Bro-In-Law spent painting many of the rooms, getting a fence installed for their dogs and doing other assorted chores best done before you need to move everything in and live in a home.

Today was a busy day around the Texas Durand Family Compound.

First off, Michelle and Davin unpacked the kitchen. Since I really didn’t know where anything went, I asked for a project to keep myself busy and was handed the task of priming and then painting the pantry shelves.

As many readers know, painting is one of the least enjoyable tasks I can be assigned. I’ve never been able to get the hang of it, I guess. I either put on the paint too thick, too thin, leave unpainted corners, spill the paint…if you name the painting-related malady, I’ve experienced it. Luckily, the assignment consisted of some simple MDF pantry shelves, none of which would regularly be seen by anyone (including Michelle and Davin) since they would be covered by foodstuffs almost immediately after installation.

By the time I finished both the primer coat and the paint coat, I felt a bit more confident in my painting abilities. Having a forgiving project took the painting job from being a detail-oriented job and turned it into something I could experiment with a little. I tried both using a roller and a brush, lots of paint with infrequent fill-ups, a little paint at a time, different patterns, etc. In the end, only one shelf came out less-than-ideal…not too shabby if you ask me, considering the confidence I had going into the project!

There were many other tasks to be done around the house. I helped my Sister piece back together their home office desk, installed switchplates throughout the house (which had been removed during all the painting that Michelle and Davin had done prior to my arrival) and explained how the sprinklerheads could be adjusted on their in-ground sprinkler system.

The most notably install of the day were the motion sensor-activated lights in the backyard for both humans and dogs at night. Michelle and Davin had previously picked out three different lights with the idea that each light would cover a third of their L-shaped backyard. They already had some “craptacular” external lights right next to either end of the L, which made installing the lights in those locations a piece of cake. I did the first light, explaining what I did to both Michelle and Davin, then Davin put up the second light. Later after dark, Michelle made the executive decision upon auditing the install that a third light at the angle of the L wasn’t necessary.

We finished off the busy workday with a hearty dinner at Babe’s and a viewing of Orgazmo. We had Babe’s the last time I visited, back in November, and it was just as good as I remembered. Excellent chicken, perfect mashed potatoes and wonderfully creamy gravy. MMMM!

Today was “Wall Day” at Casa De Durand.

“Why Wall Day?” you might ask.

Well, almost the entire day was spent hanging things up on walls.

• New vanity lights in the master bathroom. This required a bit of electrical as well, but anchors came into play in order to provide a solid mount for the new pair of silver 4-bulb lights, one for each washbasin. Mimicking the previous day’s efforts with the motion sensor lights, I installed the first light while my Sister installed the second.
• Hanging new shelves in the study. After Davin and I planned out the placement of the supports, he did most of the work hanging the rails from which the cantilevers hook into to support the shelving. We got away with only one set of anchors being used for the middle rail…the remainder were all installed directly into studs, providing much better support for the piles of books planned to be shelved in the office.
• The previous homeowners left behind most, if not all of their window treatments. All of them had been taken down to facilitate the painting that had been going on around the house over the past week or so. Considering the forecast for tomorrow is for a warmer day, it will be nice to have shade from the sun beating down on us.

Besides the vertically orientated projects, we also found time in the day to go buy Michelle and Davin a new lawnmower, compliments of my Aunt and Grandpa. We also returned the unused motion-sensing lamp from yesterday, exchanged it for a variety of lawn and garden implements. Davin and I also finished off the custom-cut MDF shelves for the rails we installed earlier in the day by ironing on the finishing trim on the cut sides.

Davin and I got some one-on-one time when my Sister left for a bit to attend a work-related function. It is so wonderful to have him in our family. I never had a brother while growing up, but I’m so comfortable around Davin it seems like we’ve known each other for a long time now. My Sister could have picked any number of people to marry, I suppose, but I doubt anyone would have fit so well, not only with her, but with the rest of the family as Davin.

Lunch was another visit to Chick-fil-a, which suited me just fine. I love the fact that Michelle and Davin are such great fans of the chain as well…makes it easy to visit ‘em many, many times during my visit. Dinner was pizza from Cafe Tuscana, an Italian restaurant here in Carrollton. I didn’t care too much for the sun-dried tomato and goat cheese pizza Davin and my Sister ordered, but I loved the canadian bacon and fresh tomatoes that I ordered. Yum!

We finished the day consuming pizza while watching the “Space Mutiny” episode of Mystery Science Theatre 3000, my favorite episode of the entire run. Both Davin and I were in stitches as we reveled in the blaring continuity errors and horrible “com-PUTE-r” graphics. Ha!

Today Davin had to work from 1pm to 10pm at the library, so my Sister and I had almost an entire day to ourselves.

This morning while Davin was still around we did a thorough cleaning of the kitchen, unpacking the remaining boxes and finding a place for everything. I collapsed any empty boxes from the previous three days’ work and prepared them for recycling, while my Sister and Bro-In-Law sorted out what they wanted to do with their reading area. They have close to a thousand books, by my estimate, and it appeared that the existing bookshelves they had would be insufficient to display all of the volumes.

We had lunch together at Sonny Bryan’s BBQ, which was a wonderful choice. Everything prepared wonderfully, bottles of BBQ sauce (each served in an empty beer bottle, oddly enough) and “Big Red”, a childhood favorite of mine, on the soda machine. Afterwards, Davin went to work while Michelle and I drove over to Lowe’s to pick up a variety of items we needed for the day’s projects.

Today’s projects included:

• Installing a peephole in the front door. This was particular difficult for two reasons. One, because it is a hollow metal door, once you drill into it the loose styrofoam insulation on the inside comes spraying out all over. And two, it is very difficult to cut the thin metal making up the door without making it blister out or cave in. I merely provided guidance and support to my Sister, who took on the project and had quite a bit of fun, I think, drilling through her front door.
• The installation of the new doorbell, to replace the “ghetto” doorbell my Sister disliked so intensely, wasn’t so successful. She purchased a replacement yesterday that sat flush against the wall, whereas with the brick finish on the outside of the house was made for one that sat out from the wall in a housing. We didn’t realize this until she had completed all the rewiring; she should be able to do it just fine on her own after she finds a suitable doorbell.
• Unpacking more and more books, placing them on the bookshelves in the reading room and placing said bookshelves in their proper locations. We were fairly successful in this endeavor, although our attempt to purchase another matching bookcase from Target today in order to fill out the reading room was stymied because Target had altered their supplier/design. My Sister said she would attempt to find another online to make sure they all match.
• New toilet seats. The previous owners had those annoying squishy foam toilet seats…not only annoying to sit on, but considering they were prbly years old a pain to look at, too. Out with the old, in with the brand spanking new!

My Sister and I were on our own for dinner. After much contemplation, we decided to go to On The Border for some Mexican food. On The Border offers a “Build Your Own Burrito”, which I took advantage of in order to create my perfect burrito creation. Roasted pepper tortilla, shredded beef, Mexican rice and caramelized peppers - prepared as a chimichanga and covered in ranchero sauce. Yum!

We spent most of the evening, both at dinner and once we got home, talking about our jobs, life and the universe. It is so wonderful to be able to still connect with my Sister, talk about our achievements without engaging in competition and share our theories and thoughts about life and our family. It is amazing to me to consider my Sister a “friend” after all these years and miles, only on a much higher level than we were as children. We’ve each matured and saw many different parts of the same world over the past few years…but we’re still connected in that way long time friends often are.

I leave tomorrow around 4pm, and tonight my Sister seemed to lean towards doing something fun tomorrow before my departure. It will be difficult to leave, knowing there are still so many projects my Sister and Bro-In-Law want to attempt around the house and the fun we’ve had doing many of them together over the past few days. However, I know that part of the joy is doing some of these things on your own, making the house a home. I envy them…apartment living isn’t a home, no matter how hard you try to make it such. Seeing their new house down here, doing all the projects around the house reminds me so much of the house I owned with my ex-wife out in Hudson. Someday I’ll have that again, I know, but having a home is certainly something we all crave. I hope that I’ve given my Sister and Bro-In-Law a head start into making their own house into a home.