Lynne scored the only correct guess on last week’s #MiniMoviePosterMonday and, she says, it was solely because of my clue! Yay! Someone was paying attention!

I was reorganizing the fridge to make room for a large container and found these bottles on one of the shelves. No big deal. Nothing bad. Nothing expired. Rather common, really.

For a quick second, I wasn’t sure if I was looking at an Instagram post from my local park district…

Dear Illinois,

I’ll never understand what you did to piss Mother Nature off so much that she just can’t decide what should be going on here weather-wise.

One of the things I’m tasked with checking on websites is the user experience (UX). Think of it as asking “Would the user enjoy or find this website easy to use?” If yes, great. If no, can I think of something that might make it better?

Most things that happen in life supposedly serve some greater purpose whether we realize it or not. Given that, what "greater purpose" is assisted by the existence of seasonal allergies? Tell me! Now! What purpose is served by making us all inflamed and sneezy and runny and drippy and miserable and hate filled?

I’m just curious what kind of person it takes to think, “Hey! My jacket is kinda flat. I’m gonna throw a few tennis balls in the dryer with it and hope for the best!”

It’s never easy coming back from a vacation. Never has been. Never will be.

Would it be bad for resale value to install urinals in the bathrooms of our house?

A friend is sending me something from Georgia and provided a tracking number for the package. Based on this tracking number, this package is making some impossible rounds.

Today, Katie, Nathan, and I went with our neighbors to the Northern Illinois LEGO Train Club show at the Geneva Public Library.

I would like to take a brief respite from the normal drivel I post here to wish a very happy birthday to my beautiful wife. Nathan and I truly love you, hon, and couldn’t navigate our way out of the garage of this crazy ride known as life without you.

The other day, we bought Nathan and new mattress and box spring for the new bed we built for him a handful of months ago. The problem? Katie and I each drive a Hyundai Sonata. Not exactly the best for getting a mattress and box spring home.

We decided to reorganize our pantry and a cabinet or two. In order to achieve this, we ordered a box of stackable plastic containers from Amazon.

Today I realized I had a really old oil change reminder sticker on my windshield that had never been replaced despite having at least one oil change done since this time. Seeing it got me wondering how much I've driven during the pandemic.

As an adult and parent striving to help my son pick up LEGO bricks he missed from the floor, it amazes me to think back to my younger days and how much more dexterous I was and capable of easily peeling up those colorful bits of plastic from hard flooring and carpets.

What is the USPS trying to tell me here?

Over the river and cross the bridge
to the Home Alone house we go.
Apple Maps knows the way to guide our Hyundai
on our annual pilgrimage, yo!

I was just waiting at the bus stop for Nathan to get home and one of our neighbors was there with her 1.5YO daughter. We were talking and suddenly the daughter points at me and says, “It's daddy!”

I'm up to my John Lynch year...

Dear Katie,

People say that time flies when you’re having fun. That must be what’s happened here because today is our 20th anniversary.

I am so confused by the weather right now. We’re still getting 80+°F temperatures here in Chicagoland… in the freaking middle of October!

It’s here! It’s here! It’s finally effin’ here! Our couch! Our couch!! (with apologies to Roy Kent Nation).

It always amazes me how that old maxim “the more things change, the more they stay the same” remains true pretty much no matter what. The latest example?

Aw man, I totally forgot to mention that this past Monday marked the 20 year anniversary of Katie and I deciding to move to Geneva, IL, and live in sin in our first apartment.

This was one of those moments where I wish I had cameras mounted to my car taking pictures in all directions at all times so I could've captured an image of this thing I saw the other day that was just too amazing for words and I had no time or ability to grab my phone and snap a shot myself.

I had a big post written up about new TV shows coming out this fall that I was really looking forward to watching.

I don't get much of a chance to use my MacBook Pro these days. Most of my time is spent on the MacBook Air I have for work. So my MBP sits in a stack of computers on top of my desk just chomping at the bit to be used.

Do you remember me mentioning during my whiny writer’s block post about how I want to “just make it to this coming Wednesday”? Curious why? 

I love when government agencies aren't on the same page internally. 

Sometimes, it's truly a battle to force yourself to keep writing daily on a blog. Most of my daily blogger friends have cut back from doing it daily to mostly daily or just a few times a week while a vast majority have quit entirely. 

Today, we went on our first family theater outing since the opening weekend of Disney/Pixar’s Onward in March of 2020. We saw Disney’s Cruella, the live-action origin story of Cruella De Vil from 101 Dalmatians. 

In our most grandiose attempt at reintegrating ourselves into a world still being ravaged by COVID-19, the three of us went to a minor league baseball game tonight. And it was Harry Potter Night, too!

Over the last half year, we’ve gotten new neighbors on both sides of us and, while we’ve met them, our time spent with them has been zero otherwise. They’ve all been rather hermit-like.

I’ve been aware of Kombucha tea and have wanted to try it for some time. However, because of the price of individual bottles and a lack of desire to buy a large pack of them, I held off actually doing it.