Starting this next weekend, I'll be advertising on Mix 94.5 on Saturdays and Sundays!

Listen to my commercial

Well, I am pleased to announce that I survived my surgery and returned home tonight. I was very happy about the lack of pain, I actually hurt much less then the original surgery. The Dr said everything came out very well and no problems at all.

Arizona was nice, but we really didn't have a chance to see much. The first day, we walked to a nearby mall and after that, I couldn't do much walking at all, so we mainly just stayed in the hotel room.

It's good to be home, but no lifting for 2 weeks, no motorcycle riding for 3 weeks and I have to keep packed with ice for another day. Then, I have to take 600 mg of advil/day for the next 3 months along with a long list of vitamins!

But, at least it is done!

Sorry that it's been so long since I've posted. Just a brief recap of some of the things that have been going on this last week.

- Starting next Weekend, my website (MidWestHouseHunter.com) will be advertised on Mix 94.5. I am really hoping that this encourages people to start listing their property. I've started calling people who have listings in the paper and given them 15 days free listings if they sign up, which almost all do. But as soon as that 15 days is over, they don't renew... :( It's starting to get a bit discouraging (and expensive) to keep things going without any revenue coming in.

- Trent Harrison and Austin came down 2 weekends ago and spent 3 days on the farm. It was a blast. We got the upstairs bathroom pretty much taken apart and spent some real quality time out in the shed. We got the old basketball hoop from Uni mostly put up on the South side of the shed (and even had a few late night games of Horse, 21, and such).
We also spent some time on getting the GMC running. We didn't quite get it done, but we did get the electrical stuff all worked out... so, it turns over now and all, but it's not firing. So, I need to spend a little more time working on the distributor/coil to see if something is wrong. That's the nice thing about a '65.. there are about 20 wires in the whole engine compartment, so very easy to track down what is going on.

- We've been doing a lot of work around the house. The downstairs bedroom is mostly done. All that is left is the wood floor, but the windows all have trim! We finished up the tile work on the floor of the master bath and put in closet shelves, which solves our towel storage problem. I've also put up trim around alot of the windows in the living room and kitchen.. and we hung the new (old) cubboard in the pantry..

We are still trying to decide what to do with the upstairs bathroom/laundary room/bedroom...

Tomorrow, Holly and I leave for Tuscon, AZ for my surgery.. unfortunately, it will be a few days of pain/discomfort and no lifting for 2 weeks, but the end-result should be a lot better.

Oh! Alex came down for a visit since my last post as well. He is doing well... he quite his job at Bosch and is planning to move down to Florida to be with Tina. Rumor has it that they are getting married in MA around Thanksgiving.

Finally, I found a Ginko tree at a local Nursey, so I bought 2 (one for me and one for Trent). It is doing well, although I need to stake it down better for protection against the wind.

If you are thinking about going to the Champaign County Fair.. check this out...

Champaign County Fair Association Homepage

The family took a trip out to WV last weekend to visit Holly's Dad, Stepmother, and step sister and brother. It was a very nice trip. They have a house up in the mountains with an in-ground pool, nice basement, nice view. The kids loved playing in the pool and we went hiking, swiming, site seeing, and just had a plain old good time. It took us about 10 hours to drive out, but it seemed to go fast. Their family is doing well and Susannah will be turning 16 this Oct (on my B-day as a a matter of fact).

Sam got a dirt bike several years ago that he has now out-grown, so he was very generous and gave it to Broderick who has been loving riding it around. It is a perfect size for him! We celebrated Sam's B-day and Sam and I saw Star Wars III again. It was much more enjoyable this time around. We sat more towards the back of the theater and I caught a lot of things I missed the first time.

I uploaded pictures from the trip, the 4th of July parade, and some other stuff here, although I haven't had a chance to categorize them yet.

The website is doing nicely, I've started having people sign up their listings which is definitely refreshing. I've got to kick my sales/marketing up a notch if I am going to make this thing work though. I've started to add some advertising on the site which should help generate some revenue as well.

We went to the 4th of July parade in Champaign and saw Trevor... although Holly tried to convince me that it couldn't be him since he was in SC. I found out later that it really was him! We went to the fireworks that night, but didn't hear that they were dealyed from 9:05 PM to 10:10 PM. So, we got there at 8:10 to get a good seat and sat for 2 hours in the rain. We left just as they started them up, so we stopped in a parking lot and watch. The show was alright, but the clouds were so low and with all the smoke the last half of the show was almost completely hidden.

I know there is a lot of economic pressure not to delay, but they really should have waited until the next night or something. The overall turnout was really low. The thing that really got me is that I never heard any announcements while we were there about the delay. It is possible the band could have said something and we missed it... but everyone around us was complaining as well. The band kept saying "Do you want to hear another one?" and the crowd would shout back "No, do the fireworks!". Finally, at 10 PM, someone came out and said that they were hoping the weather would clear up so they could do the show, but the wind was too high... By that time, Broderick was asleep and we were all crabby. :(

They should have had people making announcements all over the place... We would have happily gone back home or done something if the police directing traffic would have said something or if they would have made more clear announcements. Once again... great job Champaign! (NOT)