Sofa image lost in conversion from blogger.
Here’s the new sofa in its new native environment.

Got a call from Sherry yesterady morning that our sofa had been delivered. Hooooooray!

I haven’t heard anything yet on how the beasties are taking to it.

Sherry’s concerned that the wood on the sofa doesn’t go with the wood on our trim, but–hey–wood is wood. Right?

So, we’re leaving CT and heading to Rhode Island (a state whose smallness boggles my mind), and we’re sitting at a red light when –bump– a lady who also had been sitting behind us at the red light decides it would be fun to run into our rear end. We exit the car and take a look; it doesn’t appear that there’s any damage, so we smile and wave and resume our trip. However, Ken makes sure I write down the license plate number of the car that hit us just in case.

We get to the Rhode Island course in Charlestown. After a series of adventures that Ken is better at recounting, we end up playing the only four holes that have baskets. Ken points out one difference between us on his blog. I’ll point another: My estimation of the situation is that the course is dying. It’s been around a while and is going to pot. The layout is nice and the signs show that hard work went into them at some point in the foggy past, but no one seems to give a rat’s patootie right now. Ken, on the other hand, wants to categorize it as the course is under construction, perhaps a renovation. Well, that’s nice.

Random observation: Something that was interesting in CT was the random appearance of stone walls in the middle of anywhere. Sure, one can understand seeing a wall near a driveway or along the front yard of some house, but we’re out in the middle of the forest playing disc golf and out of nowhere the beautiful flight of a disc is halted abruptly by a stone wall rising out of the pine needles. Wah? My first thought was, wow, someone went to a lot of trouble to put up that wall for no apparent reason; I certainly would not have done such a thing.

Random observation 2: The course in Amesbury, MA shared a park with a ball field. While we were playing a little league game was in progress. Everytime I see a little league game, I feel better about the world to a degree that is not at all comensurate with the sight. I mean, it makes me feel really good. Now, I played little league as a kid. My parents and other family members will remember 3 years of my sitting on the bench doing awful, 1 year (my last year of eligibility in our areas little league) of my actually doing well (except for that one horrendous attempt at pitching which must have been good for my character), and one year of riding pine in high school. Not a stellar career by any stretch. Yet, there it is, I see kids playing ball, and my chest gets all warm and my throat gets all tight and I stop caring for a moment about the fact that I’ve never lived under a President worth naming and about suicide bombers and people driving foreign-oil-guzzling monster trucks on the highway sporting “support our troops” magnets.

Random Observation 3: If you ever stay at the Fairfield Inn in Lowell, MA, consider yourself lucky if Lauren is at the front desk. In addition to being friendly and efficient, she was fantastic answering questions and giving us info about the surrounding area. I normally don’t like interacting with, well, anyone. But after she gave us free cookies, it did not at all feel unnatural to go to the desk asking for reccomendations for eating and such.

Random Observation 4: Ken may be impressed by the number of Dunkin Donuts here in MA, but I still think Chicago makes it look like a barren donut wasteland.

Random Observation 5: Got an email today that my Harry Potter book has shipped from London and is expected to arrive on the 22nd. Sure, I could have had the book land on my doorstep with a thud Saturday morning, but then it would be that bastardized American version where they don’t think kids can figure out that trainers are tennies and boots are trunks.

At any rate, it’s been a good day. Earlier in the day, we stopped at Target to get supplies, and I was able to keep myself hydrated and filled with energy-goodness so that I actually felt good about my rounds. Also talked to my sister and her husband this evening. The handover of their newly adopted daughter took place last night. While there was stuff done by the hospital that made a tough situation even more difficult, they’re home with Mercy and settling into the challenges that come with being a first-time parent. God be with ye.

Courses: 2
States: Rhode Island, Massachussets
Birdies: 1 (and only 1 no matter what Ken says)
Refills on ice tea: 0

Amesbury Course

1. 5
2. 4
3. 3
4. 5
5. 3
6. 3
7. 3
8. 3
9. 3
10. 3
11. 5
12. 4
13. 3
14. 4
15. 4
16. 4
17. 3
18. 3

Total 65

Newark, DE. White Clay DGC. Lose a Gazelle. Find a different Gazelle. Rough. Deuce. Rough. Humidity. Did I say Rough? Humidity. 10 holes. Back to hotel. Shower. Drive.

Drive. About 300 miles today. I need a hero fresh from the fight.

Philadelphia New Jersey SLEEPY HOLLOW!!

Norwalk, CT. Cranbury Park. Mansion. Deuce. Trees. Lots of people in a picnic shelter sounding like a brood of cooing pigeons. Not feeling well. Restorative powers of jelly beans. Stone walls in the middle of the woods. Stop keeping score. Ken 1 over par. New London on the Thames. Sashimi and Samurai Roll. Salty sea air.

These are my impressions of the day. For more detail, see Ken’s Blog.

I did learn something interesting about myself today. I need to pay more attention to what and when I eat. The weather here has not been hot but the humidity is outrageous. When we get done with 10 holes in DE my clothing is soaked, not just damp, dripping. The same in CT. All of this sweating has an adverse effect on me. Around hole 5 at Cranbury I notice that I have no strength. My drives are bland even when I try to crush them. My legs don’t seem to want to lift my feet off the ground as I walk. Around hole 8 or 9, I ask Ken if he has any snacks. He’s mentioned before that he keeps stuff in his bag for an energy burst. He offers me some jelly beans. I take them. Wow. I don’t go back to my good old self, but I don’t feel like dying anymore. Seems those folks at Gatorade have a point. By half way through the round I’d almost drained my water bottle, but the water was doing nothing to balance out my electrolytes. At any rate, tomorrow we’re going to hit a Wal-Mart or some such so that we can replensish supplies. I’m getting some trail mix and Gatorade so that I can play well.

So, tally for the day:

28 holes of golf
2 courses
Delaware and Connecticut

PS: After we get to the hotel, I get some phone calls. Our extra concert tickets sold on ebay, but Sherry had a frustrating day dealing with a watch she bought at the Detroit airport. Hopefully she’ll have a better day tomorrow when the sofa arrives and she gets to see TMBG. My mom called and it seems that all has gone smoothly in the handover of their newly born adopted daughter. We’ve all been praying that that would go well. While there were some snags, it seems that the important stuff has gone well: healthy baby, papers signed, Mercy at home. Yea!

This morning Sherry and I got up early and scooted out the door at 7:30. We made excellent time to Cleveland, and I ended up being checked-in and through security by 9:30. The x-ray operator seemed a bit perplexed by my disc golf bag, but he let me through with no trouble. Given that my flight wasn’t scheduled to leave until 11:45, you could say that I was early.

I used the time to get updates from my family about my new neice and to read the manual to my new camera. It’s pretty cool. Canon A95

The flight was ok. We were in one of those tiny commuter jets, so the ride was a bit bumpy. There was a kid behind me who was on his first flight. He kept telling his parents, “This isn’t scary at all! It’s just a bit too fast.”

I realized this morning that this is the first trip I’ve ever taken that wasn’t about getting to a destination. Sure, we’re going to New England and purpose to visit all of the NE states, but the end of the trip is to play disc golf, not spend a week somewhere. The closest I’ve come to this kind of travel is when Ted and I went to Alaska in 2000. On that trip we set out with a purposeful destination, a specific hike, but we ended up nixing the trip and it became a journey rather than a trip. This trip is all about journey. I’ll be interested to see what that means for me.

I found Ken very easily after disembarking, and my bag was waiting for me by the time we got to baggage claim. However, we did have a bit more difficulty finding the car. The Baltimore airport garage has an odd way of laying out its parking. We eventually did find the car though and went on our merry way. After a brief lunch, we headed off to our first course (well, my first course; Ken’s already played a few on his way here.)

We drove through downtown Baltimore, past the Washington monument and many other interesting places until we came to the zoo. Just past the zoo is Druid Hill Park. Someday, someone will have to explain to me the American fascination with druids. In Atlanta there’s a Druid Hill something or other as well. Anyhoo, the course is almost 20 years old. It’s a very mature course that has had a lot of thought put into it. The first two holes skirt an ancient graveyard. The rest of the holes were very interesting as well.

I made a rather long putt on the second hole to get a birdie. It turned out to be my best hole. The very next hole saw me miss some easy putts and post a 5. After that I settled down into a steady diet of threes and fours. I finished the front 9 at +3. Then the humidity and the length of the holes started to get to me. By hole 16, I was totally gassed. After my drive hit a tree, I still had a long way to go to the hole. My lie had me going uphill a bit, so I bore down and focused on driving forward rather than up. Just as I released the disc, my foot slipped and I went down in a heap. Fortunately I had been able to get enough of a follow through that the disc flew true. After that, I was just trying to survive

As we were leaving the course, a guy was hovering around hole 1. He saw my Toledo Mudhens hat and got all excited. He shook my hand and informed me he was a Baltimoron fan, pointing to the Orioles hat on his head. He then wished the Indians luck. Evidently Joe Walsh likes the Indians and this man was a big Joe Walsh fan.

We then made it without incident to our hotel in Christiana, Delaware.

1. 3
2. 2
3. 5
4. 3
5. 3
6. 4
7. 3
8. 4
9. 3
10. 3
11. 4
12. 4
13. 4
14. 3
15. 4
16. 4
17. 4
18. 3

Total: 63

Courses:1

States: Maryland

So, when we ordered the sofa on the 6th, the saleswoman told us to expect the couch in about 3 weeks. That would have been July 27.

Yesterday, I got a call from Ashley Furniture that our sofa would arrive in Findlay on Wed (13th) and when would I like to have it delivered. Egad! That’s great. However, due to my leaving on the Disc Golf New England Adventure and their schedule, the sofa will be delivered Friday morning, a full 12 days early.

Providing all goes well.

Hoo-ray.

I’m very soon going to be joining my friend Ken on a disc golfing trip to New England. Our tentative itinerary is:

July 13–Todd fly to Baltimore; College Park, MD; and/or Newark, Delaware (White Clay Creek)
July 14–Newark, DE and/or Norwalk, CT (Cranbury Park)
July 15–Norwalk, CT and/or Charlestown, RI (Ninigret Park), and or Boston/North MA Course (TBA)
July 16–Dover or Center Ossipee, NH; Auburn, ME (Dragan Field)
July 17–North MA Course and/or Randolph, Bradford, or Waterbury VT.
July 18–Vermont Course and/or Charlton, MA (Buffumville Lake)
July 19–Warwick, NY (Warwick Town Park) and/or Pitscatawy, NJ (Rutgers)
July 20–Driving/Todd flies back to OH/TBA if any

I’ll be tracking my trip here and Ken will be blogging the trip here.

So, yesterday Sherry and I spent the entire day sofa shopping, made not one but two trips to Findlay, and ended up using the age-old method of rock-paper-scissors to make our decision on which sofa to buy. So, here it is, our new sofa, the Ashley Furniture DuraPella Bark.We had driven to Findlay on Sunday to see what Ashley had to offer, and we were quite impressed with the cost and style of two sofas in the DuraPella line. (DuraPella is their brand name for microfiber fabric.) However, we thought we should shop around a little bit, so we waited until Tuesday to visit Ewald Furniture here in Tiffin. While Ashley is a bit “new” in the way it runs, Ewald is a traditional furniture store in every respect. We left there thinking, “Uh. It costs more, but they have better warranties. But, then, every other sentence out of the saleswoman’s mouth was “…then we see the pet hair and that voids the warranty.” So, we went back home to think and remeasure.

The remeasuring made us realize that some of the sofas we had eliminated at Ashley really could maybe fit our space. So we decided to go back. Once there we quickly came to loggerheads (not with each other but with ourselves). There were two sofas that we really, really liked. Both cost exactly the same amount. What were we to do?

One of the sofas was 85″; the other was 92″. At the beginning of the day, Sherry liked the 92″ better, and Todd liked the 85″, but we both thought that both sofas would be great. After several hours of sitting, discussing, driving back to Tiffin to remeasure and try out some new arrangements of the house, driving back to Findlay, we found that we had switched postitions. Todd now liked the 92″, and Sherry the 85″. In the end, we really did resort to rock-paper-scissors (two best of three competitions) and came away with the 85″-er.

We then went to Best Buy to buy a copy of Milo and Otis, stopped at the Olive Garden for dinner, and went home.

Evangelical Expatriate: “Author Barbara Kingsolver writes that rather than buying into the ‘love it or leave it’ approach to the groups with which we affiliate, a more honorable slogan is “love it and get it right, love it and never shut up.” This, I believe, is the function of evangelical expatriates. These expats have renounced their citizenship in evangelical subculture, but not their faith. They have ventured out into the wider world, but they remain interested, and often emotionally invested, in their culture of origin. They have become skeptical of how the church manifests its witness, but also dedicated to calling it back to its truest expressions. “

I don’t know that I’ve actually attempted to call evangelicalism back to its truest expressions let alone been dedicated to it, but I very much identify with the idea of “renounc[ing] their citizenship in evangelical subculture, but not their faith.”

Being an expatriate would certainly explain some of the tensions I feel when trying to participate in the Christian body (and perhaps my proclivities towards the novels of Nabokov.)

So, as the end credits of War of the Worlds were rolling and I was wondering just how much money Morgan Freeman was pulling in this summer with bit parts in blockbusters, I realized that Steven Spielberg was teaching us 7 very important lessons.

1. Always do a Feasability Study
Obviously the alien forces were led by bull-headed military types or pie-in-the sky visionaries. Who else would spend thousands of years planting equipment, develop wildly advanced technology, and launch a global attack without doing a basic environmental study to see if there was a deadly contagion.

2. Fix the basement.
If you don’t already have a finished basement, start putting away the cash now. Otherwise, you’ll end up having to skulk around in a bug-infested, cobweb-covered, rat-crawling, damp
cellar while aliens use their flexible periscope thingies to probe for you. It’s much better when you have a comfy chair and don’t have to worry about the spiders.

3. Buy a brownstone in Boston.
After your basement is fixed, sell the house and buy a brownstone in a posh neighborhood of Boston. The rest of the world may get crushed, zapped, and sprayed with human blood/alien goo, but evidently aliens don’t like brownstones. Not only will your building not get covered with space roots, you will emerge from the planet-leveling catastrophe with nary a
scratch, smudge, or wrinkle. It’s the latest in personal protection.

4. Angst-ridden teenage sons are like cockroaches.
No matter how big the explosion/fire-fight/battle, even when they run straight into the fire, they always come back.

5. Charge!
On a related note, evidently the best way to survive an alien invasion is to run straight into the path of the laser blasting, blood sucking aliens. While Ray and Rachel have to endure weird
survival nuts that look like Tim Robbins, bubble-gum colored sphincters, and forced marches, all because they ran AWAY from the death-dealing big brothers of those Minority Report probes, Robby gets home without a scratch by charging right at the beasties.

6. When building a city, be sure to check under the rug.
Somehow these tripod streetwalkers remained buried underground without detection despite huge cities with deep sewer systems and subways and skyscrapers with deep, deep foundations. Obviously someone was being careless.

and finally…

7. There’s nothing wrong with a family that a good alien invasion won’t cure.