Four Plates on Each Side

The weddin' is over and I am back in the great state of Indiana. I've spent the past few days in Colorado and Nebraska, visiting with family and celebrating my sister's union with my newly-minted brother-in-law. Both Nebraska and Colorado are beautiful states that I'd like to revisit, but it seems as though Indiana sensed my wayward eyes and got itself a makeover to re-win my affections, because when I returned, she was looking just about as pretty as I've ever seen her. It's all to do with the word "crispness," that of the gently turning leaves and the subtle autumn wind. Speaking of which, it's blazing hot in Colorado! I thought it was supposed to be tundra out there!

I find myself rather proud of my sister in that she did not kowtow to common convention in regards to certain elements of wedding tradition. For example, the bridal party wore their own clothes! In other words, the gals didn't have to fork out for a dress that they may never wear again and the blokes did not have to subject themselves to the huge production of getting fitted for tuxes. I find myself rather proud of my sister for other reasons as well.

My brother and I have collaborated musically a few times in the past, but our efforts at the wedding reify my suspicion: the final production is usually about 75% as good as your best rehearsal. We should have made our best rehearsal better.

I watched a lot of rugby while on the road. Let me complain about Jonny Wilkinson for a moment.The leading WC point scorer of all time is registering one of the worst kicking percentages of the top 20 teams! A man renowned for being one of the most accurate place-kickers ever is struggling to hit shots right in front of the goal. Counter-intuitively, Wilkinson's methodical nature may be responsible for his poor showing. He's like a precision instrument that is designed to be exact but can be off-set by negligible stimulus. Also, he's doing something weird with his leg now before he kicks.Get it together, Wilko!

Erin Go Braugh!

I'm getting pretty good at writing papers on airplanes.

PR'ed with a 405 squat this morning.

I got to visit the Rocky Mountain National Park while in Colorado. That brings my total number of National Parks visited to four. Better get moving on that.

-Ryan