Why me

With alarming frequency, for some reason random people tell me things. I have no clue why. More than a few people I am now friends with have said I looked mean or scary or like a prick when they first encountered me, so it’s not like I am some guy who could live around the corner type. So as stated in the previous blog, Lela and I went to Chicago a few weeks ago. I really enjoy going to larger cities, I actually enjoy taking mass transit and getting to feel a little like it would to live in the city. Lela and I have lived in KC or Denver, and both times we were in the ‘burbs which means we drove a lot and didn’t do the mass transit deal. Coincidentally about 4 months after moving from Denver they finished the light rail about a 4 min walk from my last apartment, and taking the light rail would have been much more pleasurable than my 45 min commute downtown. Not that I am bitter or anything.




Anyway, when you take mass transit you encounter interesting people. We were staying outside the loop in Chicago, so we ended up taking buses quite a bit more, which almost seems to bring in more “unique” persons. It was rainy and crazy cool our first day –think 47 degrees, mist and a wife who is threatening to throw me in a very cold Lake Michigan because she didn’t want a cold vacation. So we are sitting on a bus after a lovely meal and a man, who appeared to be an older business professional, turns to me and has the following interaction



Random dude, “You know why it’s so rainy this spring, don’t you?”



Me, “Um, no”



Random dude, “it’s because they are killing the rainforests in South America. I have been there, its all becoming farm land and that makes it so the rainforests can’t contain that water content and it comes up here.”



Me (internally) – weird I thought it had something to do with La Nina or any number of other variables, but apparently just one thing is causing it



Me “interesting, thanks”



Then the guy walks off the bus and everyone starts laughing. First of all I want to state that after our church did a documentary series (what I called church heaven because I got to make lela watch documentaries with me because it was what God wanted us to do) and one week was about Environmental Stewardship, which had us watch “An Inconvenient Truth.” Though that movie is admittedly one sided, we came away from watching it with a strong feeling that we needed to actively be better stewards of our environment by wasting less and doing more to support environmental efforts. Watch the movie, it will change how you think about not recycling, wasting gas or various other things(stepping of my soap box). Anyway, while deforestation could have an effect on it raining in Chicago in may, its just weird why people tell me these things. Coincidentally during another cab ride in Chicago a few years ago, I was given a dissertation by my cabbie about how to create sustainable mini communities after Armageddon hits. Then there is the time when I was asked in a ghetto gas station in Denver if I thought Aurora housing prices could keep pace with the other suburbs when the housing boom was in effect. Not remotely kidding, there are many more instances



So the real reason you read this is for the star of the show, Emma. A few weeks ago, lela and I discussed how we should get some animal crackers for Emma. They seemed like easy to grab snacks that weren’t insanely bad for her and something she might like. This is like saying that Apple thought by creating the iPhone a few years back they might sell a few phones. We created a monster. Emma loves playing with them. She loves eating them. Rarely an hour goes by where we don’t see our Wasian princess look at us, shrug her shoulders and say “cackers?????”. Tantrums have occurred for 20 min time span because Emma wants 5 crackers and we only will give her 2. Oh the animal crackers and the joy they have brought to our lives.



The next post will have some pictures, but right now I don’t think we have any that haven’t been posted.