The 43

I'm calling summer, right here, right now. I will keep blogging summer for a couple more weeks as planned. But I'm backing off The Summer Project because I'm not feeling too summerly. I got some good posts out of it -- not as many as I hoped, but I can revisit next summer, or if I feel inspired anytime before then. Three events today are driving my decision. First, Ben played his first fall baseball game today, a 16-12 victory for the Robins over the Thunder. He walked once and struck out once, and had fun being back on the diamond. Fall ball doesn't have the same vibe, the same optimism as in the spring. That's not a criticism: Fall ball is actually nice and low key, perfect for Ben, and perfect to get some more baseball in that isn't high pressure. But it's definitely a signal that summer is concluding. Lori and I did Big Costco today in preparation for the first week of school. The boys stayed home. As we were driving back, we got a call from a ne...

This was the boys' last hurrah of summer. We went to Olympic Park outside Park City for the afternoon. Lori had bought two discounted all-day passes for the boys to zipline, Alpine slide, traverse rope courses, and enjoy extreme tubing (that's a new feature, though Ben was too young to slide down the ski jumping landing hill) as much as they wanted to. Lori also bought a pass for herself, and I found a shady picnic table and worked for the entire afternoon. They had so much fun, and I was content to watch. Ben especially loved the zip line and the rope courses, and he also did the drop tower in which he stepped off a 70-foot ledge and gradually coasted to the ground via a cable. Michael did the extreme tubing twice and overcome some fear of heights by doing the intermediate ropes course. Lori had fun as well. We went to Five Guys in Kimball Junction for dinner, then headed back to Salt Lake. I almost liked this better than Lagoon -- despite the extreme sports, it was mell...

With Lagoon out of the way and school starting in four days, summer already seems over. Another end-of-summer milestone passed: Michael's last basketball practice after about 10 weeks of multiple days of hoops. He gets a week off before tryouts for the next season. The rest of the day was uneventful. I was tired from the day before and kind of muddled through work. Lori and I went to Michael's class parent meeting at school. I took the dog for a long walk.

Today was our annual (though we didn't go last year, and I'm thinking we didn't go in 2013) trip to Lagoon. Lori's office sponsors a day mostly for clients, but also for employees, at the amusement park, and though both of us had to work into the early afternoon, we still got to spend a good eight hours at the park. We met up with some friends there and spent much of the day with them. A friend of Michael's from school, who he will insist is not his girlfriend, met us there as well (she has a season pass and lives close to the park; her mom just dropped her off). The kids made it on a lot of rides. I escaped with only one spinning ride and twice on a rollercoaster that went upside down (Wicked), plus stayed dry the whole day. The boys, after insisting they weren't going to go on scary rides, went on almost most of them. Michael's friend convinced him to go on a few rides I was stunned he would even consider (adding fuel to to the girlfriend argument), in...

The last week of summer before school has begun. So far, so fun ... Sunday, we all went to the driving range. Lori is playing in a golf tournament (I'm not making that up -- it's being sponsored by a women's business group) in a couple weeks and needed some practice, and Michael has occasionally bugged me to get him back on the links. We bought a large bucket to split among the four of us. It felt good, though I was pushing the ball to the right a little. Michael struggled a bit but eventually got the hang of it. Ben wasn't hitting the ball that far but was driving it surprisingly straight (he was enjoying using my big driver). I grilled dinner later on. Monday, we went to the waterpark later in the afternoon. Michael brought a friend, and Ben found one of his school friends there, so each had fun hanging out and swimming. The waterpark this late looks so end-of-season, as if the management has given up on any sort of maintenance. Nevertheless, I'm glad we went,...

With August 2015 dragging a little, I started thinking about Augusts past, which I've done before in the blog . But the August that is permeating my brain is 1984. I started high school that month , and the few weeks before now seemed like a transition. Of course, it was a transition, but August bridged the two phases more than I could ever imagined. Here's the bizarre thing about those three weeks of August before school began: I don't remember much about them. Summer 1984 was so memorable, but not the end of it. The Olympics had ended. The Cubs weren't collapsing, and the conclusion was foregone by that point that they would win the division. Channel 66, which had been playing music videos all summer, transitioned into a normal TV station (airing an array of old reruns). Most of the music popular around this time I associate with earlier in the summer or September (with a couple exceptions: "If Ever You're in My Arms Again" by Peabo Bryson and "Go...

Thursday morning started with Michael throwing up, We don't think he caught something, but instead was just tired -- he has a history of vomiting when he's overly fatigued, and maybe the long summer just caught up with him. That threw off or Thursday plans a bit (I had hoped to take them to the waterpark), but he was feeling better by the afternoon, and we went bowling in the evening. I won the first two games, but Lori edged me in the third. None of us are good bowlers, but at least I broke 100 twice. The evening was fun. Friday we went to the JCC pool in the afternoon, and then I had the evening to myself while Lori and the boys went on a little campout at Red Butted Garden. I wish I could say I made the most of the solo evening, but I took it easy, going to McCool's for dinner and a beer, then vegging out after walking the dog later. Today, I got Popcorn's nails trimmed in the morning, then we all went to Target and the DI around noon. The rest of the day was mod...