Labor Day Fun

We kept up our semi-annual tradition of male looser behavior this weekend at Camp Saukenauk: Fished most of the day, ate steaks and fried fish, then smoked cigars under the stars, and played cards all night long. We are going on 3 years of this now if memory serves. Each Memorial Day and Labor Day. This is to change however with the advent of aging children. Going forward, we have resolved to include the wives and children more and we are moving the fall time to October to reduce conflicts.

The fishing was horrible this year though. Typically on a 3 day weekend each of us will pull out 50 plus fish. I think I only caught around 20 for the whole weekend. The largest fish went to a first timer who came out Saturday for just the afternoon and dinner - congratulations Dan on your 6 lb bass.

Saturday afternoon I came into town and met Michelle at a sports bar to watch the Illinois Football game. If you haven't heard the news, Illinois pulled off a monumental 4th quarter come back to tie with an overtime win. The game tied the school record for largest deficit comeback resulting in a win. Congratulations to Coach Zook and the Illini for a wonderful season opener.

Watching the game for me took me back to a come back win we had over Minnesota my Junior Year. This was a game that mattered only to the Illini faithful. A game that gives us hope. After the the game against Minnesota, yours truly was doing baseball slides into the inzone through the snow. Had I been at the stadium for the Rutgers game, I probably would be on the field again.

Coach Zook was prophetically quoted before the game as saying he knew bad things would happen and that they should be judged on how they play when those things occur. Well, maybe it was the new coach, maybe it was inspiration derived from the basketball team, or maybe it was drawing on the record setting attendance of over 52,000 people with a new sense of expectation; but regardless - they faced adversity with the poise needed to win the game.

Personally, I like to think of this game as being a microcosm of what is to come: embarrassment changing into heroism. From the first quarter to the fourth quarter, let that be the story of last year to this year. Bring on the change, bring on the pride, and bring on the Illini!

On Sunday we made a brief appearance at the Hoffman Family reunion (Michelle's Grandmother). Jackson enjoyed playing in the park and made friends with a caterpillar. We also taught him that to get Grandpa's attention he should go up and swat him in the butt. That lead to a lot of laughs.

After the reunion, we spent some long overdue time with my Mom. We spent the evening with her and had dinner. We also took the opportunity to call my Uncle George whom we miss dearly as well. Family is the water we renew ourselves with in the well of life.

All in all, we had a great time and hope you did too.