The Honey Raspberry Ale has arrived!

I woke at 5:35am and found my downstairs by 5:40am hammering out my sit-ups, push-ups, and curls. The house was quiet save for the soft music coming form the stereo. As I walked Ykraps, I thought through my day, which would include leaving work an hour so early to fetch brother Glenn at the airport. I mentally reviewed what my day might look like and what hurdles, if any, I might have to overcome to make it happen. At the time it didn’t’ seem as though there would be any major issues. My morning went much more like normal. There were no abrupt interruptions, and no loud invasions. Instead, I enjoyed some solitude against the back drop of a mid-summer’s morning. After packing my lunch I made Mindy and I breakfast. Mindy was already awake getting ready for her first official day of work. She had a “school retreat” scheduled for today, which sounded as if it were going to be a ‘pump-me-up’ session. A friend of hers, Daniel, was going to watch the children at our home. I left for work at 7:50am after a few minutes of family guitar time on the deck. Along the route to work I caught wind of the terrorist plot that was foiled abroad and the subsequent security elevated alert. My thoughts immediately turned to Glenn and how his flight might be impacted. He was leaving Portland destined for Columbus at about 5:35am PST. I arrived to work just after 8am under partly sunny skies. The weather forecast called for a slight chance of showers during the day but otherwise summery. Work was busy but not too bad. I made a concerted effort to stay on task so that my leaving early wouldn’t compromise my workload. I never relented. I worked hard up until 12:30pm when I left for my lunch run. The sky was overcast but the temperature warm. It was significantly more humid than the day before, but because the sun was tucked away behind clouds, I broke only a mild sweat. I returned from my run with about 25 minutes to spare before a meeting I was looking forward to attending. The meeting ran up until 3:15pm, and we accomplished everything I had hoped. I tied up a few loose ends and departed for the airport. A quick glance out the window revealed that it was raining rather steadily. And while I was happy for the rain, I was a little perturbed that it was raining right now, since I figured it would hamper traffic to airport & dampen our immediate plans for after the airport. As expected, traffic was backed up at every turn. As the story goes, anytime you are in a hurry, you can expect traffic jams. Today was no exception. Lyman Dr – back-up. I-270 traffic was thick as thieves, and I-70/670 east was no different. It took 40 minutes to arrive at the airport parking garage where I drove all the way to the top in an attempt to avoid circling for a spot on a lower level. Too, I figured I wouldn’t have to remember which level I were on if I parked on the roof. Compared to other airports, port Columbus is not user friendly getting form the parking garage to the terminal. You have to take an elevator down, then cross a lengthy walkway, then take an elevator up. I got off at baggage claim since I was ten minutes later than the schedule flight arrival time. I also knew that the flight showed an eight minute earlier than scheduled arrival time. I was certain Glenn would already be at baggage claim. He wasn’t. I wasn’t sure if he had already retrieved his bags and was gone or if he hadn’t yet made it to baggage claim. The flight monitor indicated that it landed on time and the luggage belt had his flight number displayed, but there were no bags and no passengers. My best guess was that they hadn’t yet deplaned. I went up to the terminal where I witnessed a fairly extensive line at the gate security check point. Some half-assed security officer made a few of us folks waiting passengers step back away form the aisle. Why? Still no sign of Glenn. I walked back down to baggage claim to see if he had somehow slipped by, but I didn’t see how. There wasn’t hardly any arriving traffic just yet – plenty of outgoing, though. Baggage claim was the same as I had left it. I was now convinced he hadn’t yet made it down. I went back up to see that there were lots of folks exiting passed the security check point. And after about three minutes, Glenn became unmistakably visible in the distance. I snapped a couple of photos. We greeted then turned quickly for baggage claim. Glenn surprisingly reported that he had no issue getting my beer here as carry-on despite the heightened security and the “no liquids” ban currently in place across the country. Apparently, his flight left Portland just before the alert was issued. We spotted his unique pack quickly and soon were on our way out of the terminal to my awaiting Trooper. Back through the maze. We paid $2 to leave the garage. I had been there a total of 37 minutes. Our first stop, we agreed, would be Greenlawn Cemetery. It was now just before 5pm and the traffic was tied up at the usual tie-up points. We did our very best to avoid the traffic snarls which equated to us adlibbing our way across town. We cut through German Village and found our way to Thurman/Greenlawn Ave. A mile head was the back entrance to the cemetery. We set out first to find Tiffany’s grave site which was in section 121. We quickly learned that there is little rhyme or reason to the layout, and they’re certainly not in any numbered sequence. After retreating to the posted map at the entrance we found our way to the section in question. After finding the section, we had difficulty finding Tiffany’s site. We called brother Tommy who was at the funeral and he guided us there. It turned out that we were right, but since it’s was so fresh there were no markers in place yet. It seemed so lonely and sad there. We spent about ten minutes about the area and took a couple of pics. Soon we got back In the Trooper and began looking or grandma’s site in section 90. Just like with Tiffany, we had trouble locating the section. And let me tell you, it is so easy to get lost in there due to there being 25 miles of roadways spread out over 444 acres. We ended up at the 62 entrance where a cemetery worker decided to ask if we needed help. He guided us there. Once we were close we both remembered the area. I was a little surprised at the condition of the site – little grass, lots of weeds, and uneven unkempt ground. Too, someone has purposefully painted the surface of many of the tombstones in a back protective type paint. I didn’t care for that. There was an empty plastic V-8 at the foot of grandma’s grave that apparently has held fresh flowers a time or two. There were none there this time, however. We took some pics and by about 600pm we began making our way out of the cemetery. As we approached the RT 62 gate, we saw that it was closed. We turned and left out the Greenlawn Ave exit. I’ll bet that I put five miles on the Trooper in there. We had made arrangements for Tommy to stop over later and so I called Mindy to let her know. She was wanting to put some food in the oven – We agreed on wings. Once home and after the tour, we settled down and had a beer. Mindy already had wings baking in the oven. Soon, Lindsey called and came over with lil’ Rocky. Not long after, Tommy arrived. Suddenly, we had a house full. I fired up the grill so the wings could be grilled for the final ten minutes and through the application of hot sauce. They turned out well and tasted rather good. The Buffalo sauce we used wasn’t that good, though. I think it was Kroger brand. It needed used up. Come 8PM Mindy asked me to red to the kids as they readied for bed. After they were down, we all went back down stairs and talked for a couple of hours. The last hour was spent on the deck. It was a lovely night but the mosquitoes were out in full force. At 10:30pm we called it a night. Tommy left for home despite being invited to stay, and Glenn went to the guest room. Mindy and went to our room. I tuned into the NFL preseason game that was underway, St Louis vs Indianapolis.