We enjoyed a good week despite the COVID overtones touching our family. Matt had a busy week of working and coaching at Z-West. We enjoyed spending some time with him this weekend. Abby had a full week of classes at FC. We enjoyed spending a couple days with her this week. Luke remained isolated at home all week. He wrapped up his first nine weeks of the spring semester doing e-learning in his bedroom. Because we were in close contact with him (despite him being fine), we tried to stay away from everyone for a week. I stayed away from the gym and my buddies (they’re old like me) but did manage to walk three days and log about eight and a half miles outdoors. Gas prices as well as the temperatures leveled out this week. The Barneymobile worked double duty for us this week and although it ran like a tank, we need to get Black Betty in to see Jerry next week before the weather gets too hot (Barney’s A/C is only 2/60!). Familywise, we talked with Dad B on the phone for a while and saw Gma & Gigi briefly…we even had a chance to see Katie & Jake for a bit this weekend. The dogs…oh the dogs… Between Lola barking before our work alarms go off and dropping a couple deuces in the house, Molly having constant accidents and having to launder her diapers daily and Delilah galivanting outdoors in the mud and chewing everything in-sight, we found ourselves second-guessing why we had pets this week! But what made this week a good one was that Ann & I shared it together while enjoying lot of good food, some delectable cocktails and seeing all our babies – what more could you ask for? Hello again and welcome back to the Scheu Family Blog.
Monday brought a chilly start to our week. As Ann & I headed into work, we let Luke sleep in as he began his first week of quarantining due to acquiring the COVID-19 virus. He felt good and after finishing his homework for the day, grew increasingly stir crazy due to not begin able to leave the house. He was so bored, in fact, that he cleaned his room! Not only that; but he really cleaned it – like with cleaning supplies. He even put all his stuff away, pitched some old things and rearranged his room. It looks really nice. He was our hero that day due to cleaning up dog messes – especially Molly, who had a touch of diarrhea. To show our gratitude that night, Ann bought him Pizza King pizza – a large chicken, bacon, ranch that he devoured. Meanwhile, I worked on a network outage in our gymnasium complex, where we have a handful of staff working. I spent nearly six hours on it and never did get it resolved. It was not the day I had originally planned it would be, that’s for sure. I completely missed lunch so Vic ran to Taco Bell for us that afternoon. After work, I managed to exercise by walking a little under three miles. There was a nasty, northern wind that was strong, cold and sustained. When we got back home, I got a call from Sandy. She needed me to jump-start the Ford at the station. Once we finished, I went over to her and Mom’s house and hooked up the battery charger to the Crossfire so she could drive it tomorrow. In addition, l brought over our backup desk chair – which we never used. Dad B called that night. It was good to hear from him. He & Lynn are in Florida and doing well, trying hard to stay healthy. We were saddened to hear that Rob & Sharon were both sick. We ate pizza that night and watched our DVR’d shows. I actually fell asleep watching the first one, woke up and rallied to the point where I wasn’t sleepy. I would eventually make myself go to bed sometime around 2 in the morning. Here are random pictures of our recent adventures.
It was another cold start on Tuesday morning but would warm nicely to the mid-forties that afternoon. It was another frustrating day at work for me as we still don’t have the gym building’s network up and running yet. I did manage to get corporate involved and they helped us to do a couple things – get a tech scheduled to come out there and get some new hardware ordered. Hopefully, we can get that network back up and running before the weekend, but we’ll see. I did manage to get the effected staff a workaround so they can do some work at least. I got out of work a tick late and managed only about two and a half miles of walking that afternoon. Luke had another busy day of e-learning and cleaning up his room. He got his closet cleaned out that afternoon and again had to clean up after Molly a couple times. He put the dogs out that afternoon and they stayed out all day until we got home. After successfully getting the dishwasher working a couple weeks ago and the ice machine working this past weekend, Luke & I tried our hand at getting the light pole working again. However, we didn’t have enough time to dive too deep into it before we started losing our daylight. So, we worked on getting the dogs in…and boy were they muddy! Delilah was first. The poor thing had been out digging in the mud for hours – and it showed! She had balls of mud clumped in her fur. Initially I tried cleaning her in the kitchen sink but quickly figured out I needed to use the bathtub for her. I worked on her paws for about a half hour before finally getting her all cleaned-up. Poor Annie cleaned up the tub afterward and then we had to run some Drain-o through it because all the mud had caused a clog! Luke helped me finish with her and we next turned our attention towards Lola and Molly. We were able to get them done in the sink without too much trouble – especially compared to their big little sister! Matt called us that night and we talked to him about his medical issues, wrestling season ending and his follow-up meeting with Cathy about his future. It was good to catch up with him and we look forward to seeing him this weekend. After making a find-your-own dinner, I promptly fell asleep while watching our first TV show that night. I rallied and watched a couple shows with Ms. Ann before calling it a night. Abby really wants us to come visit her this week. We are town between trying to stay away from everyone but still understanding that we feel great, have no symptoms and despite being around Lukey we had the vaccination and SHOULD be good. We’re just a little afraid of being carriers. Sure, we still go to work but we wear masks the entire day and limit the amount of time we spend around coworkers. But we really want to see our little Bu, so who knows what we’ll wind up doing…
Humpday was another busy one for Ann and I. Luke slept in then got up and did his e-learning that morning. He wound up having an easy day, hanging out with the dogs and taking it easy during his COVID quarantine. He didn’t get much cleaning done that day. He ordered Pizza Hut delivery for dinner and had the house to himself for about 12 hours. I finished up the ordering for work that day as well as worked with a contracted vendor and our corporate IT office to get the network back up in our back building. Although we spent over five hours on it and did not get the network restored, we are confident we have identified the issue and have the correct parts on order – which should arrive tomorrow. Ann enjoyed a fast day and told Abby we would come visit her that evening for a little while. She has been wanting us to come see her all semester. Although technically still self-isolating except for work, we decided to break quarantine and go see her. We based our decision on us having been vaccinated a couple months ago, having zero symptoms the whole time and Luke having just that half day of feeling subpar about a week ago. We picked her up and took her out to the Blue Cactus – their local tequila bar. We enjoyed talking and laughing for a couple hours, catching up with Abs and her college life. Gary missed out on the fun as we had amazing tacos, some starters called Fireballs that were so good that there’s no way they were good for us…and we had a couple margs as well. Ann enjoyed a couple blood orange ones while Bu and I had a couple different ones. She started with a dragon fruit one while I had the Agave. We then opted for a Patron Top Shelf marg the second time around. We should’ve started with those, yum! There may have been a flight of tequila involved as well with a shot each of a silver, a reposado and an añejo. We eventually had to say our goodbyes and head back home way sooner than we wanted. When we got home, we talked with Lukey for a bit then turned on a DVR’d show…and promptly fell asleep before it was even half over. I went on to bed and Ann followed suit…damn we’re old… We have lots of social media pictures to share this week.
We were surprised how chilly it was on Thursday morning, given that it was so warm yesterday. Still, the van defrosted quickly and the day warmed nicely into the 50s. After working on our network outage all week, we finally restored it late that morning. We really appreciate all the work put forth by our team to resolve this issue. And I’m glad to have it in my rearview mirror as well. Now that I’m a few days behind on my monthly tasks, I’ll have a lot to do next week. Victor took a little time to do a couple things on the Barneymobile that morning so I took him out for lunch at Snappy Tomato. The afternoon flew by as I did a few IT things, some finance stuff and two weeks’ worth of security reviews. I didn’t pay good enough attention to the time and before I knew it, it was not only past time to go walking, but it was also time to actually leave town. So, I picked up Annie and we went to Kroger to get our groceries brought out to us then stopped at Needlers for a few last-minute things as well. Meanwhile, Luke did his e-learning then Face-timed with Ann and actually prepared our chicken for us in the crockpot! When we got back, the house smelled wonderful. Ann went to work in the kitchen and made us a delicious meal of her chicken enchiladas and Mexican street corn – yum! ???? I finally had a chance to watch the #23-ranked Boilers battle the #25 Badgers from Tuesday. It was a good game with the Boilers coming out on top and may have a shot at a double bye in the Big Ten tourney now! Edey had a career night down low and Wheeler finally lived up to his potential and had a season-high from the outside. They both played good defense as well. After enduring my sports on the big screen, we watched a few of Ann’s favorite DVR’d shows the rest of the night – including The Resident, FBI and NCIS. I missed playing poker with my buddies that night, but it was best that I stay away to keep them safe – just in case – and look forward to getting back at it next week! Instead, I worked on the blog – editing pictures and videos.
We slept in a little on Friday – not on purpose, I just turned off the alarm instead of pushing snooze! We defrosted the car again before taking Ann to work downtown – via the Dunkin drive through, of course. I ran a few errands around town then came back to find Luke had moved-in to my workstation. I guess he forgot I worked from home on Friday mornings. I allowed him to have his space for a little while and went ahead and pushed my start time back a little. Instead, I paid the bills for this pay period. Luke had another good day of quarantine, but he is getting bored and is chomping at the bit to get out of the house. We told him he could go exercise outside by himself but he wasn’t interested. Once he finished, I moved out to the family room and was able to get a few things done before Ann texted, saying she was ready. I picked her up and we went to BWR for a quick lunch and a couple cocktails. We enjoyed catching up with our favorite bartender, Kristen. As well. That afternoon, Ann took a long nap while I worked on my monthly reports for several hours – until it was dark outside. Ann made Fireworks popcorn and cheese for dinner that night and we settled in to watch some of our favorite shows like SEAL Team, SWAT, Oak Island as well as a new one called Debris. I finished up editing pictures and checked in a couple Hot Wheels from the last couple weeks before turning in for the night. Here are pictures of recent additions to my Hot Wheels collection.
Ann & I were up early on Saturday morning – earlier than we had been all week, in fact. We let Luke sleep in (since he was still quarantined), loaded up the Barneymobile and headed up to Franklin to pickup Abby, who was still asleep when we hit the road. She managed to be ready by the time we got to campus, thankfully. We grabbed a quick breakfast at McDonald’s before we hopped on the interstate and drove up to Zionsville. There, Matt was coaching his Z-West wrestling team in the year-end conference tournament. They had wrestled the first couple rounds on Wednesday night and this was the semi-final rounds that morning – and, of course, the finals afterward. Matthew had 8 or 9 wrestlers make it through to the weekend but wound up with only one champion. Arguably his best wrestler – his big 195-pounder – did not make weight. He won last year and was hands-down the favorite for this year as well. Matt’s team battled hard but ultimately only managed 5th place. Still, they beat crosstown rival, Zionsville Middle – so all was well. We ran into my cousin Katie and her husband Jake, who were there to see Brodie wrestle at 120. Unfortunately, he placed 4th but it was fun watching him and catching up with the Aeschlimans. Afterwards, Matt and the team had to put everything away, so the girls and I went junking. We found some clothes for the kids but that was about it. We met Matthew at the brewery in Whitestown that we went to exactly one year ago, called Moontown Brewing Company. We enjoyed a round of their brews first. Ann had their King of Troy (18 IBU), Matt had the hoppy Deadhead Redemption (with an IBU of 60), I had the Hefezkowski (12 IBU) and Abs had an Ash Elm cider called Fleeting Youth. For our second round, we opted for Dankaritas. I had their local sausage for lunch that was so good. Ann took down the name of it and is going to try and see if we can buy some of it. It some sort of bacon brat – yum!! Matt had the chicken, Abs had the pulled pork and Ann enjoyed their brisket which was yummy. We talked and laughed for a while, catching up with Matthew. After a couple hours, though, we had to say our goodbyes and head on our way. We dropped Abs off at her dorm in Franklin after going to Meijer to get her supplies for the 2nd semester as well as some ice cream from Ritters. Luke was anxious to see another human when we got back home and talked with us for quite a while before retreating back to his room to play his new video game that he downloaded on his Play Station console. Ann & I got everything put away and sat down with the dogs in the living room. I put on the Purdue / IU game and Ann fell asleep. The Boilers pulled out a win to put themselves in a good spot for the Big Ten and NCAA tourneys. I watched the truck race and grabbed some leftovers. While watching Ancient Aliens, I too fell asleep. I tried to wake up a couple times before giving it up and just going on to bed. It must’ve been pretty early but I’m not sure how early…
Lola was barking early on Sunday morning, which has become something of a ritual for her on the weekends. I put the dogs out and decided to just stay up and work on a few things on my laptop that I wanted to do last night when I fell asleep. Ann got up a couple hours later when the sun was so bright, it lit up the whole house even with the blinds still drawn. After watching a few DVR’d shows, I got up and did the laundry and dishes. About the time I was making breakfast, Luke came out of his room and wanted to use my space…typical! I worked on my Hot Wheels and music collection that morning while watching some of my favorite shows I had recorded through the week like Ancient Aliens, Unexplained, NASCAR, SNL and Star Trek. That afternoon, Ann worked for several hours in the kitchen to make us a nice meal for dinner. She had chicken breasts, a huge pan of au gratin potatoes and parmesan roasted snap peas. It was really good. Luke gave it a rating of, “straight fire!??? ???? He also found a new favorite snack – cinnamon toast with cream cheese, honey and apples. He is so excited to get out of quarantine tomorrow. He said the first thing he wanted to do was get a new tire put on the Hot Rod Lincoln. We took it easy that night, flopping on the couch. I checked in the rest of my new Hot Wheels and repaired my database. I’m not sure what happened to it, but it’s good now. That took me a couple hours. Ann made plans to have Matthew’s birthday party on his actual birthday this year, but it’ll have to be later because Taylor has to work that day. We wrapped up the night with the dogs and a quiet evening of watching shows on the big screen like Magnum PI, Blue Bloods and The Walking Dead / Talking Dead. It was a relaxing way to wind down a super-fast weekend and put the wraps on another good week.
Next up is our Waybac section, featuring two libraries of photos. First, we have the final batch of old family pix from Ann’s Uncle Red & Aunt Lindy. The second has the next installment of Deana’s digital camera in 2004. We lead off in the 1930s with a photo of two unidentified girls as well as a pic of Thelma June Howe; then we have Ms. Lindy in 1935 and then again in May of ’36; and the one is the senior picture of Ann’s Uncle Walter in about 1963. That was a fun batch of pictures that MaryAnn shared with us. I hope she somehow comes across more in the future! Following that, we have the next fun batch of 2004 pix: May- Abby in the Dixon Dance Revue; June- Luke’s birthday; July- Independence Day fun, Fair Parade and the last day of the county fair, Grace’s birthday, Indy Blues Fest and Sandy’s birthday party; August- Minnie & Charlie; September- Abby’s birthday party; October- Matt’s broken arm; November- MaryAnn’s birthday and Thanksgiving Day pix; and December- Christmas Eve and the Christmas Parade fun.
Next up is our video segment with features one short video (with some possibly recycled clips that I found in an odd spot on my computer this week) as well as several from around the internet.
And that does it for this week’s entry of the Scheu Family Blog. Thanks for keeping up with us this time out and we’ll catch up with you again next time. Until then, have a good one and stay safe out there. We miss ya, Mom.
Later, Scheu