Indianapolis and back again:
This was my first trip to Indiana. We flew in over the Indianapolis Race track.
Typical, my camera was packed up in my bag on the way in and we did not fly over it on the way out, maybe next time.
I will be traveling to Indianapolis with work for the coming 2 , 3 months.
It's part of the reason I am not going to England this year and can not get away to go back with the family over the coming few weeks.
I had a chatty lady next to be on the plane to Indianapolis Tuesday morning. She worked for Continental Airlines as a gate agent and was considering writing a book, which she said she'd title ' The life of a Gate Agent'. I'm sure there are plenty of stories there.

I did not yet get much time to see Indianapolis as is often the case with short weeks away, and I am located north of the city. So the usual opportunities being limited to morning and evening views out of a hotel window.
I did have a small balcony which was a nice touch and it was so nice to be able to have fresh air blow into the room at night. Not something one can do in Houston.
The temperatures were in the 70's which was great and it was sunny which is more than one can say for the rest of the Mid West and East coast area which are suffering from much flooding, and Houston for that matter this weekend.
I have been thinking recently back over all the places I have travelled to and during my conversaiton with the passenger next to me realised I have seen a lot of places in the world and and a lot of cities and beautiful places since being in the the US also.
I'm going to recount all the places at some point.


I return Indianapolis on the 10th July via Cincinnati Airport stop over for an hour.
I wonder if that counts as visitng another state? Never been to Ohio, yet.

During my attempt at logistics for the coming weeks, I made a decision on where my weekend away will be.
Found a great price on an airfare to Reno, Nevada with the help of my resident travel agent after my return and meal out at the Cattle Company, where I met Hazel Timothy and our neighbours Danelle and Trip, on my way home from the airport Thurday night.
( http://www.hazeltravel.globaltravel.com/ ).
Now she has left I have to use the site myself, but its easy, I'm told.

Reno is close to Tahoe and the Mountains and as I was really wanting to visit somewhere Mountainous and different from Houston, it sounds ideal. It is probably also a little safer than Copper Canyon in Mexico which is still high on the list of places to visit, but probably the wrong time of year to be going there.
I will head off to Reno from Indianapolis mid July once Jonathan has left for England.
Today was the day I took Hazel and Timothy to the airport for their mamoth 4,5 weeks in the England, with a visit to Corfu a week after Jonathan joins them in England.

Saturday was a final pack up day. I helped Timothy, the budding photographer and video camera operator, pack up all the camera equipment he was taking with him.

As you will see in the photorgraph we had his legs shortened with a well establihed operation called the 'Toulous-Latrec Operation' so it will feel like there is more leg room in the plane. Jon might need this also before he flies in a week or so, he's just getting too tall.

So Saturday am, we watched the football. Don't you just hate penalty shots as a way of deciding a game. I think they should keep playing until they all drop from exhaustion or someone scores the final goal.
Congratulations Portugal, goodbye England, I have never one the lottery either, and if your going to get sent off with a red card maybe Rooney you should have kicked the guy harder in the testicles.
It's also goodbye to Sven-Goran Eriksson, back to Sweden no doubt and Beckham, good luck in Milan now you resigned as England Captain. Are rumours true that you might end up in the Worlds Soccer 'back water' the USA?

Better luck next time England. I was 6 last time they won a world cup maybe I'll be 66 next time, and my youngest is already 12 and is missing out on this experience.

Of course I'm sure everyone will welcome Cristiano Ronaldo from Portugal back to Manchester United, after finishing England off, both with helping encourage the referee to give Wayne Rooney the red card and the that final penalty shot. So many good player from other countries in our home teams, no wonder we can not put a winning side together for a World Cup.
An associate from Portugal advises me that Ronaldo dedicated the goal to his father who died this year.

Maybe England should dedicate their efforts to Fred Trueman from Yorshire, who died Saturday, a most famous Legend in the UK Cricket world, a legend of his time and household name. The first man to claim 300 wickets in Test Cricket. That was in the the 1960's. That era of course was the last time England won the Football World Cup (1966).

So Saturday turned out to be thus stressful and dissapointing TV watching experience, during the football, for all, epsecially for Timothy who was looking forward to watching England win the World Cup whilst over there.

After football we grabbed a 3.00pm lunch out and watched Brazil get beaten by France on the big screen TV in the restaurtant we went to. Good to see that there are enought people over here in the US interested in the World Cup that Football ( soccer) actualy gets air time on the public TV's.

Once I dropped Hazel and Timothy to the airport, I headed back home.

It had been raining again all day. Not just lightly, but torrents of the stuff. Not exactly relax in the garden type of day.
A couple of inches of water on in the back garden and out the fron porch also.
This morning again more storms and strong gusts of wind, ended up blowing the tables around outside again. The heavy one on its side.
On my return from the airport, I had the urge to use a gadget, so I got a handle on a task I had been meaning to do for some weeks, but could not do with people milling around the house, getting in the way.

I cleaned the carpets. Lounge, Bedroom, Study, Stairs, Rugs in Kitchen and around the walking areas in the Dining rooom.

Believe me it was another scary cleaning task, much like vacuumming the settees last time Hazel was away. This was a well overdue task, but now one can roll around on the carpets without danger of getting some rare disease or something.
Macie hid upstairs and gave me odd stares from between the banister rails with 'what are you doing?' kind of looks, whilst I manouvered furniuture off the carpets and used this machine around the downstairs floors.

Jon did ask me how he was supposed to get downstairs whilst the carpets dried, once I had done the stairs , I was forgetting he was still up there in fact. Slide down the banisters...!!!

Once finished about 1.30am, I went out and walked Macie. The rains had stopped and it was humid now and there was fog around. It alomost felt surreal. The closest analogy I can think of is it was like when you walk into a bathroom that you've just run a hot bath or shower, in and the door had been close on it.
It made for an interesting walk. When back I crashed in bed until mid morning Sunday.