Saturday morning at O:dark:thirty, we will be heading for Indianapolis to watch our nieces compete in the Indiana State Music Association high school marching band competition. Dear Husband, Elegante Mother and I will roll out early to make the trip. It’s down to crunch time.
I know that kids will look at you squirrelly if you tell them that it’s an honor to be selected to go to state competition. They feel that you are preparing them for a bad score, but that’s really NOT the case. Only ten bands in Class C will have the chance to go to Indianapolis tomorrow to compete in the Marching Band competition. The kids in those ten bands, and the parents, and the band directors and the staff worked their BUTTS off to get there. It’s not an insignificant achievement.
Trying to convince the kids that going is reward enough is made more difficult because their band earned sixth place three years ago, fifth place two years ago and third last year. Every single one of those kids are wondering: “Will we be second this year? First??”
There’s no way to predict what will happen. At Regionals they were one of five bands chosen to go to State despite the fact that their sound board died just as the band took the field. They must have done something right to overcome the difficulties. With attitude like that, anything could happen. I don’t think this band is going to be overconfident. They’ve watched their competition, and they know it’s going to be tough.
When the competition is over, you’ll be likely to see one band scored higher than the others, and then several will be clumped together, with scores that are hundredths of a point apart. Part of the band director’s job is to help the kids understand the honor of going. He has to validate the effort they put into the past four months regardless of their score.
He won’t have to make any effort on my part. I’m blown away by what these kids have done, and wish I could have been there for every performance. All I can say is:
CONGRATULATIONS, KIDS! KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!!

You could say that I’m fixated on the price of gas, and you’d be right. Today, I filled the tank and paid $2.039 per gallon. We’re SO close to less than two buck gas. Will we make it? Somehow, I doubt it.
The oddest thing about this is that what I paid today was LESS than what they were charging in central Illinois. I suspect the cost is artificially increased there because of all the farm trucks being used right now.
It’s always something!
I blogged earlier about the obscene amount the CEO of Exelon, the parent company of ComEd, is paid ($27,000,000 a YEAR!). I have to agree with Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn, of Illinois. He says that the company, which is seeking to raise the cost of electricity in Northern Illinois by 22 to 55%, needs to consider tightening their belt first.
I realize that rates for electricity have been frozen since 1997, but an increase of 22% the day of deregulation is purely greed. “We can, therefore, we will” take you all to the cleaners, and there’s not a darned thing you can do about it.
Conservatively, I’d guess that we pay approximately $1,500 a year for electricity. ComEd is proposing to increase that by $330 to $825 for the year.
I have the sense that we are recreating the golden age of the Robber Barons.
For more information on this situation, visit this site.

I know….you don’t belive me.
We were in North Central Indiana, getting ready to start the drive home. I stopped to fill the tank before we hit the road, and there it was……$1.969 per gallon! YES!!
It seems that a lot of places closer to where I live are starting to edge back up again. I’ll refill at $2.059 tomorrow, and I suspect that will be the lowest it will get in this area.

What a lovely weekend!
We left at 9:00 a.m. on Friday heading south and east for north central Indiana. We both detest Interstate 80 where it leaves Illinois and crosses Indiana, so we choose instead to make a slightly longer trip through the Illinois farm fields.
Harvest is well under way in both states. Farmers were working to get as much corn harvested before the rain comes this weekend, as possible. Perhaps half the bean fields were cleared, too. We had to slow for a few tractors pulling bins of corn to the co-op, but for the most part, the roads were in good repair and sparsely traveled.
We stopped for lunch at a truck stop sort of a place just into Indiana. We both had soup, a sandwich and fries. It was too much food. It’s a wonder Dear Husband was able to stay awake. He drove the entire way.
Before we left, I selected about a dozen CDs to play. DH is a Mozart aficionado, so I chose about six CDs by different performers. We listened to two hours of Mozart Piano Concertos played by Rubinstein, before we stopped for lunch.
We stopped at a small bakery on the way, and practically bought them out. Sprouted wheat bread, Challa, and Cinnamon bread, lemon bars, Texas brownies, pumpkin bars and cherry-oatmeal crumbles, and cranberry-nut muffins! We had enough for a WEEK! lol My brother-in-law brought home apple cider and a dozen sugary apple donuts (that were to DIE for!), and bagels from Panera. Nobody had to make anything for breakfast of snacks all weekend.
We arrived before the first of the family returned. Frankette #1 drove up after school, and let us in, moaning that she was supposed to clean her room before we arrived. Unfortunately for her, our visit always means that she has to give up her bed, so there were sheets to wash and dry, and re-apply. She got it done in record time.
My sis, Frankie, was the next in, followed by her husband. We were introduced to two new members of the family….Hawkeye, a kitten that was rescued from the fields (having been dumped off by some despicable person!), and Tommy, a long-haired black and white tomcat of a remarkably calm disposition. My brother-in-law made jokes all weekend about sending one of the cats home with us.
Friday night I helped pack uniforms on the trailer, and then we spent a pleasant evening at home with the family. Sis made pasta e fagiole that was really yummy. We all crashed reasonably early. The girls had to be at school well before 6:00, when the bus was leaving.
We drove to the site of the competition and found seats up above the 50 yard line. We lucked out that the stands shielded the field from most of the wind. It was a brisk sunny day in the 50s. The band has a huge number of props that are used to delineate the performance area, and wind could have been an issue. Luckily, everything stayed in place for the performance.
The girls were in the very first band to perform. This is definitely NOT the spot you would choose IF you had a choice. The judges are reluctant to give a perfect score the the first band because they are aware that another band might come along later which could top their performance. The scoring of the top bands is usually fairly close. Often the difference in scores turns out to be just hundredths of a point. So…the girls gave their absolute best performance and hoped that the judges would recognize quality when they saw it.
I didn’t realize it, but most of these bands are now amplifying the flutes and clarinets electronically. Frankette #1 is a clarinet player, and she told me that the equipment on her clarinet malfunctioned just as they took the field. Beyond that, the sound board died as well, so none of the flutes or clarinets could be heard up in the stands. I suspect the music judge was one of the two judges on the field, and that he knew what was happening. Their director chose very challenging music, and it was well performed. Even if WE didn’t hear it, the judges did.
We watched fourteen bands perform over about three and a half hours. The awards ceremony followed the last performance. You heart is up in your throat, and you’re in agony, waiting to hear what judges thought of “your” kids. They announced ratings in the order of performance, so we were the very first to learn that we had earned a GOLD! YES!!!!
Then, we had to wait for them to announce which five of these bands would be going on to compete at State this coming weekend. Again, they reeled them off in performance order. WE were the first announced!! YES!!!! The stands around us erupted with screams of joy!! (My voice may be off for a few days. *G*)
The kids loaded the busses and went to have a late lunch. We headed home to wait for them at the school. Parents lined their cars up facing each other across a wide aisle. Just before sunset, the local fire truck lead the busses into the parking lot. The busses pulled up three abreast and every parent laid on the car horn, saluting the entire band. It was marvelous to see!
We stayed with the kids to watch two videos of their performance. After having seen all 14 of the bands, it was instructive to see their performance again. It had incredible depth and challenge. I can’t wait to see it in the RCA dome in Indianapolis next Saturday.
The girls joined us and we had a wonderful dinner. Three of the six of us at the table were celebrating October birthdays. We had yummy meals, but passed on the desserts. We were too full…and just to tired for any more.
Everybody fell into bed, and slept late. MY sister fixed an incredible noon-time meal (Sunday DINNER for those of you who are interested what we call that meal). We all had the chance to chat once more, before Dear Husband and I took off for home.
We had a lovely trip back. I drove about half of it, and despite my stopping four times along the way, we made good time getting home. Dear Husband has saved me a trip to Morris. We stopped at “Big R” to pick up six 50-pound bags of black oil sunflower seed. What a sweetie.
Half my face is sunburned. My lips are windburned and chapped. My voice is fractured from screaming with joy! I’m stuffed to the GILLS, but I had the most wonderful time! Thank you, Frankie and family, for making our stay perfect! Congratulations, girls! See you at the Dome!

…to see the Wizard… No, No…that’s another trip.
Today, were off to see Frankie and her family. This weekend the Frankettes are competing in the Indiana Regional Marching Band Competition. Their high school has placed fifth and third at State in the past two years, and we hope they will be going to State again this year.
Dear Husband says that I have packed all that I can take. Elegante Mother asked if we needed to tow a trailer. There’s one over-sized soft-side bag of clothes, one hanging bag of clothes, ALL my coats and gloves and scarves, and a LOT of presents. I’m sure we could squeeze in a little bit more!
My oldest sister will be staying with Elegante Mother and our son. They plan to shop and eat and eat and eat, and maybe shop a bit more. Sunday evening they are going to a concert. I know they’ll have a lot of fun.
So….We’re off! I hope you all have a wonderful fall weekend. See you on Monday.

Yup….just this morning. $2.209 for a gallon of gas. Is there hope that we might flirt with $1.999??
It’s a splendid day! Dear Husband and I left the house about 7:45. He was dropping me off to pick up the car, which had needed to have some work done. They repaired the back ball joints, flushed the radiator and winterized it, change the oil, and put in a new battery. The heck of it is, I couldn’t tell it needed all that. I just knew it was time for a check up. We’ll be going to Indiana next week, and I never start a trip without giving the car the once over.
The next stop was the optometrist’s office. My glasses were ready. I was in and out the door in less than ten minutes, and on my way to the Farmer’s Market.
I bought a white pumpkin. I’m still on the lookout for a green Cinderella pumpkin. A woman bought THREE of them right under my nose, and cleaned out the entire supply. As I strolled back to get some leeks for potato leek soup, I discovered that she must have beaten me to all the leeks, too!
I got an armload of fresh eucalyptus, and a dozen deep red glads for the house, and some wonderful sweet peppers: long narrow deep red peppers, and yellow and green bell shaped peppers to use in meals this week.
I stopped at the bank and the post office and the grocery store before heading home. Tomorrow, one of my nieces is coming to visit around noon. We have some work to do to prepare for Elegante Mother’s 90th birthday celebration, and I suspect there might be a few hands of Spite and Malice. None of us give any quarter, and my niece hopes that it’s her turn to win for a while.
I’ve decided to do a tray of things to nibble on because we are going out to dinner tomorrow night. I’m going to roast some garlic, and toast diagonal slices of French bread. Then, I’ll put out chevre, feta, a smoked Gouda and a spreadable cheddar cheese. I think I’ll make a bruchetta topping (the one that Cop Car likes) with tomato, onion, basil, salt, pepper, balsamic vinegar and a little olive oil. And, I’ll add a few crackers, some ham folded in fan shapes, and green grapes. And I have some chocolate-caramel coated popcorn for a sweet. I know….it’s too much, but everyone will find something to eat from that platter! Our house has the best left overs of the neighborhood.
Elegante Mother and I are on our own today. My stepson is off to camp with some friends for the weekend, and Dear Husband is enjoying his last sail of the season. I think I’ll do some gardening, and then work on a quilt for a bit. I may make an elegant little supper of shrimp scampi and rice, with a tomato-cucumber-dill vinaigrette salad. It’s easy to do….looks spectacular, and won’t take me any time at all. What can you say other than YUM!!!!
So, I hope you’re all having a great weekend, too. Happy Fall, everybody!

Will wonders never cease!? I was going on about $2.329 gas and today I managed to fill up for even less! I suppose in Kansas and Indiana gas is back to 25 cents a gallon, right???
Still…it’s nice to think that there’s gas under two bucks somewhere!
So tell me….have we hit the Mother Lode of oil somewhere in the US? What was all the $3.15 gas about other than the oil companies wanting to get richer? I can’t see that anything has changed in terms of supply and demand other than we have gotten through the summer. I know the oil companies think we use more gas in the summer as we go on vacation, but I’ll bet you anything that $3.15 gas curtailed a LOT of vacations.
I believe in the concept of supply and demand, but I’d like to see a little less GREED at work here. And, I’d also like to see natural supply and demand, not those which are artificially created. It’s almost as though we are returning to the era of the robber barons.
It’s nice to see the cost of gas dropping. Now, what would be a reasonable cost for a gallon of gas?

I’ve had to get new eye glasses, not because of a prescription change, but because the right nose piece snapped off. I wore them cockeyed over the weekend, and then visited the optometrist’s office, hoping they could repair them. No such luck. They advised me to take the pieces to a jeweler to see if they could be soldered back together, and I’d have a spare pair of glasses.
One of the women who runs the office for the practice took me back to a wall of frames and proceeded to choose seven shapes that I liked. Then we went to a mirror with good natural light, and she handed me three of the frames, and instructed me to select the two I liked the most. We kept on with that until we narrowed it down to two choices. Then, everyone in the office got to give their opinion. Luckily, everyone liked the pair I liked the best. The glasses will be ready either Friday or early next week.
I’ll be glad to have them. You don’t realize what that little variation in focus will do until you have to live through it for a week.
I’ve ordered progressive bifocals that are frame-less on the bottom edge. The lens is held in place with a thin plastic cord. I’m not a fashion maven. They aren’t Red Hat Lady colors….just a natural look that will last for years. The pair that just died was five years old. Not bad, huh?

YES!!! $2.329 is a far cry from the cost of a gallon of gas this summer. I think the place where I buy gas topped out at $3.159, and I know it was more expensive in Chicago. Yeah, I know that those of you who don’t live in this area are paying less than two dollars a gallon, but I doubt we’ll ever see that here.
Did I tell you that my youngest sis called one day just to tell me that she had driven past a sign for gas that read $1.999 a gallon? Mean, I tell you. She’s just plain mean!