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Jul. 6th, 2010 01:26 amConvergance was lovely, I do so enjoy seeing and chatting with all my peeps. And meeting random strangers who are amusing, like the couple of teen agers and older dude from Andover who I wound up playing an epic Mille Bournes game with. We made an error in the rules and the game lasted two hours. Very absurd. The Bollywood room party was good fun w/ good food. And I saw a strange movie, which was a campy low budget Japanese horror film called "Hausu" or "House." Entertaining... sort of? I got a piece of art, too, for the first time, which I look forward to hanging in my office (its a pen and ink forest/tumulus picture). Excellent time. We also went to the Original Pancake House not once but twice, and really, that's worth the trip up right there. I ate acres of food and it was lovely. So nice to be in the land where hashbrowns are hashbrowns and good.
Today, however, I went to Wisconsin to see my folks new house. The land and location (near Herbster, WI about a five minute bike to Lake Superior) are excellent, I approve of that. It occurs to me that there is enough land that friends could come up and camp, which would be nice. The house is... unfortunate. Thankfully my brother is a) an architect b) a contractor/carpenter and c) under employed in a month. So they are basically going to gut the place and start over. I spent the day measuring the house with my brother. The former owners are nuts, and essentially swindled my folks out of some cash by submitting a home insurance claim after the offer date and then not repairing the house with it- now my parents have to get the roof fixed before the house can be fully insured. One of the sibling sellers, near as I can tell, deliberately left things in the house so that they would have an excuse to come and get them (they left a note to that effect). Having a bit o' trouble letting go there. Locks will be changed and a gate put up post haste.
And I got to visit Ashland! Ashland is one of my very favorite small towns and is a half hour away from my folks new place. I spent a lot of time there when I was an intern doing archeological survey for the BIA. It did not match my memory perfectly, in some ways it has improved, in others, not so much. There is a food co-op now, which is awesome. More murals, again, pretty cool. The Black Cat coffee shop is still there. And there is now a brew pub, where we had dinner. I had a Mint Coffee Burbon Milk Stout which was excellent, though it almost read more as "cocktail" than beer. I wish I could try their Lavender/Wood Betony Milk Stout as well, I expect that would be fantastic (they were out today). The bad about Ashland is that chain stores have moved in with a vengeance and the water front area has gotten a bit built up with them, the stately white inn was all alone and stately 14 years ago, and now its surrounded and has lost some of its stateliness as a result.
I wonder where my husband is. I cut him loose for the day, but I was expecting he'd return at some point. Not sure what to make of this. Le sigh.
Today, however, I went to Wisconsin to see my folks new house. The land and location (near Herbster, WI about a five minute bike to Lake Superior) are excellent, I approve of that. It occurs to me that there is enough land that friends could come up and camp, which would be nice. The house is... unfortunate. Thankfully my brother is a) an architect b) a contractor/carpenter and c) under employed in a month. So they are basically going to gut the place and start over. I spent the day measuring the house with my brother. The former owners are nuts, and essentially swindled my folks out of some cash by submitting a home insurance claim after the offer date and then not repairing the house with it- now my parents have to get the roof fixed before the house can be fully insured. One of the sibling sellers, near as I can tell, deliberately left things in the house so that they would have an excuse to come and get them (they left a note to that effect). Having a bit o' trouble letting go there. Locks will be changed and a gate put up post haste.
And I got to visit Ashland! Ashland is one of my very favorite small towns and is a half hour away from my folks new place. I spent a lot of time there when I was an intern doing archeological survey for the BIA. It did not match my memory perfectly, in some ways it has improved, in others, not so much. There is a food co-op now, which is awesome. More murals, again, pretty cool. The Black Cat coffee shop is still there. And there is now a brew pub, where we had dinner. I had a Mint Coffee Burbon Milk Stout which was excellent, though it almost read more as "cocktail" than beer. I wish I could try their Lavender/Wood Betony Milk Stout as well, I expect that would be fantastic (they were out today). The bad about Ashland is that chain stores have moved in with a vengeance and the water front area has gotten a bit built up with them, the stately white inn was all alone and stately 14 years ago, and now its surrounded and has lost some of its stateliness as a result.
I wonder where my husband is. I cut him loose for the day, but I was expecting he'd return at some point. Not sure what to make of this. Le sigh.
