So today is Saturday and I am sitting here making appointments to look at houses.  We are looking at three more before we make our choice...I hate moving!

Although I am not officially retired, I am taking all my time over the next few months so the University can have me on call after I train my replacement. I am loving being home, which is surprising. I thought I would go crazy. 

I am trying to stop all the cooking so that I don't gain back the weight I lost. But, I am cooking healthy so it's good. 

So, what's everyone up to?  

Heading to Montana

Moving to Montana, so far from family and friends, was a big step for me. My dad always called me the family gypsy, in a loving way. I think I was doing things he always wanted to do. When I told him about the interview and possible job in Montana, he said that when he told his mother he was moving the family "all the way to Franklin Park" from Chicago, she was nearly hysterical. And that was about 15 miles. I knew my mom would be just as upset at my move, which is why I didn't tell her until I got the job.

When I got back Monday from Montana after the unplanned stopover in Denver, I called mom to tell her about the job. She said "how are you going to get there?" Well, drive, of course. I told her the employer was giving me some money once I got out there to help with moving expenses. I was told later she was very upset when I called her; I had called her at work.

I sold all my furniture and most of my other big stuff like my bike. The day I planned to leave, we had a big snowstorm with about a foot of snow. So I waited a day. While I waited, I thought about how I was going to pack my car. I lived in a second-floor apartment on Main Street in Algonquin, Ill., above Vito Buffalo's Butcher Shop. There were quite a few stairs to climb. I was 28 then but still didn't have great knees and I was quite overweight and out of shape. The next day, after the snow stopped, I called one of the photographers at the Cardunal Free Press Daily Herald (which is what our newspaper was now called) to help me. Kurt Butcher said he would, and came over at about 11 a.m. and helped me take stuff down to my car and load it. Kurt was one of the nicest guys at the paper; all of our crew was. We had a good bunch of people at that paper and I remember how much of a family we were: Ken Veloskey, Brenda Webb, Rich Klic****n Dunwoody, Tom Mulhern, Greg Ives, Steve Metsch, Sig Bokalders, Kathy Gorenz, Pat Bombard, Joe Kusek ... if I've forgotten someone, I'm sorry, but memory fades after all these years.

The car packed and the apartment emptied, I hit the road from Algonquin about 2 p.m. Later than I wanted, but I was on the way to Montana. My mom made me promise to call her along the way to tell her I was OK. We had a code: I would call collect every night and she wouldn't accept the charges until I got to Anaconda.

Snow followed me along the way and I had a headache most of the time. I'm sure it was stress. It was dark by the time I got to Austin, Minn., so I stopped for the night at a motel and let mom know I was OK.

The next morning, I hit the road on I-90 to continue on the road. Again, there was snow. The Ford Escort wagon I had bought that year wasn't happy climbing the small hills going into South Dakota. I got to Sturgis, S.D., that night by the time it was dark and stopped for the night. The 1,500-mile trip was taking longer than I expecting. When I went back later, it would only take two days.

From Sturgis, I continued onward to Anaconda into real mountains: the Rockies. When I had to go over the high passes, my little 4-cylinder car just groaned. I was a flatlander, a woman who grew up in the Chicago suburbs. I had never seen mountains before. What did I know about driving in them? When I got to Anaconda and told my new coworkers about this, they laughed and said, "Why didn't you gear down?" Gee, I wish I knew.

That final night, I came over the passes into Butte in the snow, over into Anaconda, with the big smelter smokestack in view. The stack no longer spewed smoke, but it was the sign of the city's heritage. I got to the town that night and stayed in a small motel before contacting my new employer the next day.

I was in Montana. It was a long trip, a big adventure. I was in a new space, away from everything I knew, everyone I knew. I was on my own for the first time in my life.

Now the fun really would begin.

In my final week of work, I have been writing about my 37-year journey in newspapers. I posted two stories on Facebook, but I know a lot of you aren't on FB. So here's Part I, Part II to follow soon.
My first newspaper job almost never happened. I had a job interview after regular business hours on a February evening at the Cardunal Free Press (and yes, that's right: it stands for the communities of CARpentersville, DUNdee and ALgonquin in Illinois) in Carpentersville. Ken was the sports editor of the paper and this was my chance to do what I really wanted to do: be a sports writer.
But I was early, a good half hour early (a family trait, from my mom's Delort side), and there was no one around. The place was locked. I pounded on the door several time and no one was coming to the door. Well, I'd wait 15 minutes at least. You must understand, this was 1979 and there were no cellphones. If I wanted to call, I'd have to go down to the Big Boy and call the paper.
So I went back to wait. Finally, a janitor answered the door. He said no one was there and he didn't expect anyone to be there. I was devastated. I think I actually cried on the drive back to my brother's home in Hanover Park where I was living. I thought I had been stood up.
When I got home, my brother Gary told me the sports editor had called to say he wondered where I was; he came at the appointed time, not long after I left. Well, we rescheduled the appointment for the next day and this time I was on time and so was he. And eventually, I got the job.
Back then, I was certainly a novelty. I certainly didn't read sports stories written by women growing up, and there was only one woman reporting sports on TV in the Chicago area. But this was all I ever wanted to do.
My first assignment was to cover Elgin in a district boys' basketball game (we had two newspapers that came out three times a week; The Elgin Herald and The Cardunal Free Press). The sports editor of the Elgin Herald, Ken Veloskey, told me the game was at Lake Park High School, which was in Roselle, Ill., and the game started at 7 p.m. Remember, no GPS, no Google, all I had was a map.
And I had bad information. There were two Lake Park campuses, it turned out. I went to the wrong one. When I got there, just minutes before the game was supposed to start, I didn't see a lot of cars or crowds of people. So I asked someone where the gym was. "The game is at the West campus." Oh ... well, you can imagine what I said. So I got directions to this campus and hurried over there. I got there by halftime and got first-half stats from the scorekeeper, then settled in for the second half.
When the game was done, I had to deal with getting the coach to come out. The Elgin coach, Bill Chesbrough, was nice enough to come out of the locker room and conducted the interviews for all the reporters at one time. And "Ches" was just the first coach along the way who would come out for the interviews. I was fortunate in that regard.
Chesbrough also was nice enough to give me a quick recap of the first half, even though the other reporters snickered a bit when I asked. He said he understood going to the other campus.
It was the start of my career. The first of many basketball stories, of many interviews with coaches, players, of sitting in gyms. I'd be a sports writer from 1979 to 1996. And even after that, it seems I could never really leave sports behind. As a copy editor, I also worked many years doing sports pages, because often I was the only one who had any sports knowledge.

Hello All,

I am finally home from our vacation. We went through 12 states.  The first five days, we hiked all over Rushmore, a natural bridge in Douglas, WY, and Yellowstone. Once in Yellowstone, we lost cell phone connection, and we lost internet access. So, we were forced to pay attention to where we were going and what we were doing. LOL. I have to tell you that driving through UT, CO, and NM, we had the pleasure to see the most beautiful canyons and mountains. We hiked and walked and played. We did the Mesa Verde Pueblo Cliff dwelling tours and I thought I was going to die but it was so worth it to let the kids experience all of that the cliffs offered.  So, yesterday, after being home for two days, I went to the doctor and I lost ten pounds.  I know! It had to be all the walking. My husband, lost 10 pounds as well.  We at our breakfast at the hotels, we always took a picnic lunch wherever we went, and our dinner consisted of a nice restaurant and I have to tell you, I didn't count calories or carbs. I did eat vegetarian as I do here and it was hard because not all restaurants serve fish. LOL. 

Yesterday, we went down to look at a little house near the AR River.  It's way the hell out in the country but only fifteen miles to our daughter's place one way and fifteen miles to a small town in the other direction.  The house has 3 acres, is fenced, has two small buildings--one is a workshop and the other is a small apartment that we can rent out, if we want.  Also, with the house comes the lease for the land the post office is on which only pays 5000 a year but it is money that will be monthly for 99 years. Of course, we won't live to see the end of the lease but our kids will....Anyway, we are thinking of buying the property.  

For the next few weeks, I am using up all my time that I have accrued at the university and then my real retirement begins. Well, let me get back to organizing my spices.  

I am in Wyoming until mid October. Not sure if we are going home through Denver or not but would be overnight only.  I have a dr appointment on the 18th and have to get home in time for that.