More Neighborhood eXcitement

On Friday as I was going to work I saw about 5 men in Stuey's old house next door. I'm not sure what they were doing but they all looked like contractor types. Today, I saw a man cutting the grass next door with a riding lawnmower. I can barely contain my excitement. I'm just curious about who our new neighbors will be. Also on Thursday afternoon I saw a man wearing a suit step in the house carrying a briefcase. He looked like he might be an appraiser. I'm unable to make any connection between him and the 5 guys I saw there Friday morning.

Last night there was a party at the house across the way from Stuey's house. There were about 15 cars parked on the street and at one point someone stepped outside and put on a juggling show with flourescent lanterns. I observed the whole show from my kitchen window. It was well done, accompanied by booming music.

Currently Jacksonville Jaguars are playing against the Indianapolis Colts at the Dome. The Jags keep getting the ball down to the red zone but are unable to punch it in for 6. This just in, a Jacksonville field goal has given them a 16-14 lead with about 14 minutes left in the 4th quarter.

Again, I've managed to spend another weekend putting off yard work. As I like to say, I'll get to it "at some point".

More Empty Houses

The house next door to us still sits empty. There is a bag of phone books out front gathering rain and is there no one there to take them home. I haven't brought my phone books in from the cold either. The whole phone book concept seems outdated nowadays. If I need a number I'll go look it up on the web rather than pull out some 2000 page tome to get a listing that might be out of date.

Also, no one has yet moved into Elizabeth's house down the street. I've seen a red pickup in the driveway at times during the day but I've seen nothing going on there. Also around the corner and across from the park is a house that sits empty. It belong to an older woman who has moved somewhere else but has not bothered to sell her house. There are shrubs out in front that have overgrown and obscure the home. I met her neighbor at a Canterbury Board meeting and he was hoping that she would sell it some time.

Now that hound dog Rex is back I have an opportunity to "patrol" the neighborhood again but haven't talked to anyone lately, just observations on empty houses.

I don't miss the roar of motorcycles from next door but Stuey was a pretty good neighbor although I had perhaps 2 conversations over the four years we lived side by side. I hope to be able to chat a bit more often with whoever moves in next door.

Another departure from the neighborhood

I was walking with Rex down the street last night and I saw Elizabeth and Ken loading up the horse trailer in their driveway. The trailer was attached to a large SUV with Washington state plates. The house sold a few weeks ago and the last time I talked to Elizabeth she told me she was moving to Washington with Ken which is where he is from.

Today when I took Rex on our morning jaunt and walked past her house and saw the trailer and SUV were gone. There probably on the road right now. I'm not sure when the people who bought their house are moving in. Also, the vacant but professionally winterized home is still vacant and I doubt anyone has been in the house since I saw the workers over there last Saturday.

Brant and I went to the Colts game Sunday, the home team one in decisive fashion 35-14. It was the first game I'd been to since they lost to Tennessese in 2002. Perhaps this is the year the Colts get to the Superbowl.

Where is Stuey-Lee

I had a next door neighbor over the past four years who I hardly ever spoke to. He has apparently left his home without biding me farewell. He went by the name of "Stuey".

I noticed a moving truck in front of my neighbor's house earlier this week. I thought that he had a roomate moving in or out. On Thursday I noticed an awful lot of stuff brought out for the garbage. I still wasn't sure what was going on.

Today I saw a pickup truck with a dome for a flashing light on top, nothing too official just something similar to what you would see on highway department maintenance vehicle. I saw a guy leaving the house with a few garbage bags full of stuff. I walked over to him and asked, "Do you know where Stuey went to?"

"I'm just working here, I'm hired to clean out the house, it's my job, I don't know nothing else.", he replied. I walked back over to my house trying to figure out what was going on. There are no "For Sale" or "For Rent" signs out in front, if he had sold the house to a friend or family member I imagine he wouldn't hire a guy with a semi-official looking pickup truck to clean up. I wonder if he was foreclosed out of the property. I wouldn't think so but I don't know what else to speculate.

Later this afternoon, after the truck was gone I walked back to the house. I saw a small green and white sign in the front window. It said, "This house has been officially winterized: 10/10/2004." Below the text was a signature presumably of the man I had spoken to earlier today. The front door has a relator's combination lock on it. Perhaps at some point the home will be put on the market.

I never knew my neighbor very well. I talked to a roomate of his a few years ago and once this past summer when I was playing ball with Rex I kicked it over my privacy fence and it went into his yard. I went over there to retrieve it and spoke with him briefly. I never heard much from him except when he and his friends were revving up their motorcycles which they were known for doing at all hours of the night.

Across the street from him, I saw another neighbor moving out. There was a "for sale" sign in the yard about a month ago and I assume the house has sold and she is moving on. I think she just moved in last year. Who knows? Just another neighbor I don't know much about.

I did call Brian Boak who lives down the street from me on Thursday. I invited him to go to the Colts game with me but his mother is visiting from Atlanta on Sunday and they are celebrating her birthday.

I got in touch with Brant and we are going to the Colts game on Sunday. I hope they win as the Colts are my pick for the survival league this week.

Rex released today from CCI

I've just given my blog a new template. It looks pretty cool, perhaps it shall motivate me to write more. Does anyone read this thing? It's been months since I 've seen a comment on it.

Rex was released from Canine Companions for Independence today. He has been in advanced training for about 6 weeks but has been a bit difficult. Rex is a real high-energy dog and we doubted he would pass, still there was hope that he would have made it through the 6 months of Advanced Training and been placed with a handicapped person. Mary is going to Columbus on Sunday to pick him up and take him home. We hope to adopt him out to a family that would like a very nice active dog.

I was watching TV monday night and the "American Experience" had a show on about Robert Kennedy. I only saw the last 10 mintues and it was painful to watch knowing how everything was going to end. The footage from the funeral train was really moving. I got the vibe as a train as a metaphor for life, passing by in a linear fashion a glimpse here and glipse there, onward to the next town.

I ripped most of my "Schau ins Land" CDs into my iTunes so now I can listen to German news and culture without having to find my CD wallet.

At the end they showed the funeral and read from the quote that is on his tombstone.

"He who learns must suffer. In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God"

Aeschylus

What I'm reading right now.

In the fiction category, I'm going through Robert Wilson's "Instruments of Darkness". It's about a British expat in West Africa looking for a missing person amidst intrigue ranging from sheanut trees to dead bodies in swimming pools. Reading the book makes me want to see on a veranda in 105 degree heat and drink whisky on the rocks. All of the European characters are portayed as half crazed drunks trying to hide some deep secret, escape the past or both.

Also I'm reading "Joel on software". It's a collection of articles that Joel Spolsky has written on his website He has some good ideas, one of them being practing your writing skills my updating your blog regularly.

I was talking to Woodie today about his cabin on Lake Wawasee in northern Indiana. He was telling me that he has to close his place up for the winter but wants to keep the heat running so he can go up there over the Holidays and use the place. We were talking about ways to monitor the temperature remotely and I suggested purchase a large digital read out thermometer, mount it on a wall and point a webcam at it. He could just log in from work check his webcam and note the temperature up at his cabin. It would be a hi-low tech solution. Or you could employ some sort of image recognition software that could actually "read" the temperature post it to a database and fire a trigger if the value got below 60 degrees.