Bill Roper's Journal

Ball State had a short break or a long weekend, depending on how you define it. K had located a bus service that runs directly from the campus to Oak Brook, which meant that coming home was much less of an adventure, so she got home Friday evening and will be heading back at noon tomorrow.

All things considered, this is too short of a visit, but it's been fun.

Well, that was a trip.

We managed to get everything (including the Dodeka cart) to fit into the back of the Edge without blocking any of the windows, so I took that as a major success. We headed out at 6:15 AM, which was close enough to my intended window of departure that we managed to miss all of the congestion on the way out of town. With one stop to grab breakfast at a McDonald's and one to buy gas, we made it to Muncie in 4:15, which was *excellent* time. We got there early enough to be able to stop at a Bob Evans in town and have lunch.

Then it was off to load in. We got there a little bit early. The nice policeman who was directing traffic was explaining to us how there was a waiting list for luggage carts and I interrupted him and told him that we'd brought our own cart. He looked very pleased. Because of some good planning between K and Gretchen, almost everything K brought was packed into four giant rectangular bags that stacked neatly on the cart. I dropped the ottoman, the duffel bag, and the arm pillow onto the top of this and left K to carry the monitor and her backpack separately. I parked the car across the street in the garage, came back, and we rolled directly in and to the kids' room.

The Midkiffs were running a little late, which turned out to combine nicely with our a little early. This gave us time to use my big rubber mallet to knock the bed apart so that we could move it to the height that K wanted. Then we pulled out the bedding and made the bed. We also moved all of the furniture in the room to the "place where it belongs". More unpacking followed. By the time Phil and Max arrived with the Midkiff wagon, we were pretty much done and putting the giant rectangular bags away.

Jen was waiting downstairs for a luggage cart and I suggested that they could expedite the process by borrowing our now empty cart. Off they went and a bit later, we had three Midkiffs and a metric ton of additional stuff. :) More unpacking followed. I practiced staying out of the way and assembling bits for K's desk.

After everything was assembled, we headed over to the food service a couple of buildings over and had some additional lunch (for us; first lunch for Midkiffs). Then I abandoned the party as they headed for the tech store to grab computers, because I had a longer drive home.

Traffic was a bit congested in a few places, but I still made the return trip in 4:30. Yay, me!

Meanwhile, Julie had a successful first day of her senior year in high school.

And Ruby and Calvin continue to try to figure out how to get along. Progress is being made. *Slow* progress...

Anyway, I am very tired and am going to head toward bed.

I am going to miss K coming in to chat every evening. :)

I am getting up at 5:30 in the morning tomorrow in the hope of leaving with K for college in time to get her there by 1 PM. If I do this correctly, there will be slack. If not, well...

We are getting closer and closer to K's departure for college on Thursday -- as well as Julie's return to Maine West on the same day. To say that the tide of chaos is rising from these events is to completely ignore the puppy in the room.

There is *no* way to ignore the puppy in the room.

Just ask Ruby.

It's cooled off a lot outside, but it has been bright and sunny. We have turned off the air conditioning, but the house doesn't circulate air particularly well without it, so the weather outside is lovely, but the weather inside is not so much.

I have turned on the window fan in the bedroom as of several hours ago and we will shortly see how sleeping conditions are in the bedroom. If they aren't good, I can always turn the air conditioning back on.

In other news, I bought a refurb monitor for K for college and then bought another one for me to use in the studio, because the price was attractive. But they came without stands, so I purchased the add-on stand that they were selling, thinking that it was the same one that I'd gotten before. It wasn't. It is a substantially different design that won't work in the studio and is unlikely to work in K's dorm room. And trying to return them is probably more trouble than it's worth.

So I have now purchased a dual monitor stand that *should* work in the studio and will attach the two new/old monitors to it, while K can have the monitor that I've been using in the studio for her desk. With luck, this will all work out. :)

We are now three weeks away from the most probably move in day for K at college. Since Aunt Judy and Uncle Gary were nice enough to send her a Target gift card for graduation, we went there tonight to see what might be good choices for things to take to school. Useful things were found and purchased, along with a Squishmallow that became surgically attached to younger child.

There are a *lot* of decisions that should be postponed until K sees how the room sorts out. We'll see how that goes. :)

Tomorrow morning, K is catching a bus from the Loop down to Indianapolis where Jen will pick her up. Then it will be off to Max's graduation, followed by orientation at Ball State on Wednesday and Thursday. On Friday, she'll board a bus back up here.

Sadly, to make timing work, Gretchen is going to have to contend with Chicago rush hour traffic. It does, however, beat driving to Muncie and back, so we are very grateful to Jen for filling in the gaps. :)

We're back from Ball State, which will shortly officially be where K is starting college next year.

I am fabulously tired. :)

K and I headed out to the district College Fair over at Maine South tonight. She got info on a number of schools, including some that hadn't necessarily been on her radar, so that was all good.

Applications now need to be produced. :)