Barb & Bob's Halloween Party - October 29, 2011



Joni, Jason & Brock
aka Betty, Barney & Bam Bam Rubble

Oh yeah, Halloween. Ghosts and goblins, costumes and candy, fun, family and frivolity.

Norm's sister (Barb) and her husband (Bob) have been having Halloween parties at their house for years. Each year it gets bigger and a bit crazier. This year was no exception.

It was a good thing that we arrived before dark. It would have completely spooked me to think I was walking into a backyard only to find out it was a cemetery!
I don't know who was in charge of burying all those people but they did a really bad job! There were bones and pieces everywhere.

This poor slob lost his body. He asked me if I could help him get reunited with the rest of his stuff. I didn't know what to tell him, mostly because there was so much stuff laying all around!

Look at this mess! Where do you start?

Its not like bones have serial numbers or anything. I just wished him luck and as I was walking away he started cussing at me. I thought about going back and punting him into the woods but decided he was frustrated so I just ignored him.

I started walking around and found out that it wasn't all rosy and cemetery like. They were actively trying to FILL the cemetery! I ran into Norm's brother Ed who said this guy was going to be the star of the show after dark. I didn't know what to say! How can a guy that has been hanged be the star of a show? He obviously couldn't recite his lines.

I knew Norm was weird but I think his siblings are a bit too weird for me.

I really couldn't take it so I climbed up to cut the rope. Norm & Ed said unless I was willing to join him I should simply climb down and walk away.

I did.

Seriously? I couldn't make up half of this stuff!

I figured the pictures would tell the story of how weird they really are.

Siamese twin Frankensteins....beheaded?

Really?

Where is the bar? I need a drink!

This was the pile next to the tree stump chopping block. I couldn't tell if the one on the bottom had tried to run at first so his feet were chopped off before his head. Considering that only his clothes were left I figured he had already been dumped off in the cemetery.

Not everything was scary. Instead of a regular hay ride they had a pumpkin coach driven by a ghost!

He said when he was still alive he made his living driving a stage coach for Wells Fargo in Nevada when I was a kid. But since the west had been tamed, and he died, it was getting harder and harder to find a good job driving, so he had to settle for Halloween gigs.

Brock was having fun running under this entryway and through the little castle building.

Brock and I had to stop running around for a minute and get our picture taken. We are such good friends that Brock will squish down a little so I don't feel so vertically challenged when we get our picture taken! He is so cool!

I stand on my tippy toes so he doesn't have to squish too much.

Time to eat! Well, at least eat a bunch of cookies before the big show.

Everything looked really neat after it got dark.

Then it was time....

This was taken right after the rope burned through.

That is Barb & Bob. I think they were Ozzy & Harriet.

Don't tell them I said this, but they won't need the costumes much longer! They are grandparents now too!

Unfortunately we had to leave shortly after the fire was started. Rosie needed to eat and get her shot.

It is always a good time seeing family, even if they are stranger than we are.





But that probably explains a lot,

Travis

Pumpkin Parade 2011 - Sycamore, IL

Various places around the country and world claim to have "The Granddaddy" or best of this or that, be it a parade, a festival, a beach or whatever. Sycamore is no different. They claim to have the longest running Halloween themed parade, they call it the Pumpkin Festival Parade.

I have attended a few parades, at different times of the year, but never at the end of October. The weather was blustery at best.

Of course the best part of the parade was hanging with Brock and other family members!

This is an annual event for the family and they always sit at the same corner. People put out "reservation" ropes and stuff all along the parade route the night before to make sure that they get their spot. 

I asked Norm if he had reserved our spot and he said no, not this year. He said that it is such a tradition that they sit at that corner every year that it was open when we got there. I'm thinking he was just lucky that nobody else wanted the smidgen of ground he chose.

Brock and Norm were playing in the leaves at different times during the parade. I told them it looked like fun but that I didn't want to get dirty.

Brock said I was being a fuddy duddy and yanked me out of my chair. I'm glad he did though, I had more fun watching the parade with him than from the chair.

Brock said he heard a train and was straining to see it. Then he asked if I could see it. I told him that Norm was messing with me and holding me back so I couldn't see.

Brock fixed that in a hurry and told Gbody to be nice to me. Ha, take that Norm!

The train was huge. I thought trains needed tracks but they had it rigged to drive on the street! How cool was that?

A little later Brock saw something coming that he had to make sure Ama (Jules) saw. He grabbed her by her finger and brought her right out to the curb.  Sometimes I wish he would grab my finger instead of my hat, but I guess I would need to take my hands out of my pockets first. He usually has me in his clutches before I can get my hands out though.

More throwing of leaves, only this time it was at Gbody! What fun. I made sure that the hand full of leaves I chucked at Norm had a stick in it but claimed it was an innocent mistake. Brock said I should be more careful, so I apologized.

Nearing the end of the parade Brock decided it was time to sit on his dad's shoulders. I think he had a much improved view from up there!

At the end of the parade before everyone took off we decided we should go to a restaurant. When we were deciding where to go it gave me the perfect excuse to get my picture taken with KC & Kyle. I'm glad KC doesn't grab my hat like Brock does!



That was the Pumpkin Festival Parade. Not too many pumpkins walking down the street but there were a few.

Time to go, I'm starvin' Marvin!!!

See ya,

Travis

Pink House Forced Landscaping - October 11, 2011

You know, with all of the projects that I am helping Norm & Jules with all the time, you would think that I could get a bit of credit now and then. Norm sometimes mentions that I'm not the brightest bulb in the box, but I am always open to learning more. One thing that I learned recently, and really didn't ever want to know, is what happens after you flush the commode. I never had given it any thought. Indoor plumbing is cool. You finish, flush and its gone, no problem. Not so at the pink house recently.

Since everything was backing up we had to call a plumber. They had to clear out a plugged up pipe in the yard. So the pipe was "roded" out. They put this squiggly wire like thingy into a pipe called a clean out and keep pushing it in farther and farther until they hit something. Once they unplugged the pipe they send a camera into the pipe to see what else is going on. I wouldn't want that camera's job!

This was the backyard right after being told by the plumbers what had to be done because what they saw wasn't good. I thought, of course it isn't good, they were looking inside a sewer pipe! Duh...

It seems that years ago there was a new invention called Orangeburg pipe. It actually was made from the 1860s through the 1970s. It was used as the sewer pipe that ran from the house to the main city sewer. It was an alternative to metal pipe because it was lighter and cheaper.

Orangeburg pipe is made of wood fiber. At least I know wood fiber is also called paper and why would anyone think paper would hold water? They made the pipe from paper and a glue like substance called pitch. I think we call that tar today. Scratch the tar sealer and water gets into the paper. Anyhow, it was a boom for the plumbing industry back then and still is today! It was outlawed in the 1970s because, like paper does, it collapses when it gets wet! That is what it did in the backyard. The plumbers told Norm that if Orangeburg pipe is found it has to be replaced, you can't fix it.



The FIRST gravel pile

After getting a couple of estimates and finding out that we were told the truth, it had to be replaced instead of fixed, we decided that Valentine Plumbing and Sewer would get the job.

The owner of Valentine Plumbing & Sewer, Tom Bowman, may at first glance seem like a guy that is too young to really know what he is doing, but I'm telling you, if you want an extremely knowledgeable, HONEST, reliable and fair priced plumber, call Tom!

Tom and his crew showed up bright and early on Tuesday and immediately went to work, landscaping the backyard. As plumbers they are great, as landscapers....well not so much.

The pipe is buried between 5 and 9 feet deep.



Clean out on right, pipe in the bottom



The guy running the excavator is Brandon. He uses that machine like a child uses their hand in the sand at the beach, and he has the same deft touch with it.













Old Orangeburg pipe



This is the pipe they dug up. I'm not sure what took so long for the problem to show itself. The entire pipe in the backyard was this same way.

This was the new pipe. It is placed on top of a bunch of gravel and buried in the gravel before the dirt goes back in.



Tom & Andy



There is a lot of work that is done by hand too. All of the pipe has to be angled toward the main sewer and they use the gravel to set the angle.

This is what they did in the alley, where the city main runs.

That's Tom in the red shirt. I wasn't sure what he was thinking while watching Brandon dig out the connection to the main. Considering what he had to do next, I can only imagine.

While Tom was clearing the main pipe from Brandon's digging he did something that convinced me that I will NEVER be a plumber. He had to put his arm, all the way to the shoulder, into the main to clean out the falling dirt.



Nice landscaping job huh? I wondered if they planted flowers when it was done but I couldn't bring myself to ask Tom.


New connection to the main



After hooking up the pipe to the main the entire hole in the alley, except the top 3 inches had to be filled with compacted gravel! No dirt, even though that is what was dug out.

Finish making the connections at the house and putting in the new clean outs (3) and it was time to fill in the trench.

That is where Brandon goes back to work. Although he really is going all day. The crew worked like the entire project was choreographed.

A bit of clean up and call it a day.

Doesn't really look that bad...

A bit of grass seed and some water and it'll be better than it was when they started.

Hahahahahahahaha....

I'm sure that you noticed that I wasn't in any of the other photographs. The explanation is a simple one. I didn't have a hard hat that fit. A city inspector stopped by and said OSHA rules required everyone to have on a hard hat. I think he just didn't like me. I don't know why, maybe it was because he was jealous of my good looks and styling pointy hat.

I figured after he left everything would be jake. Nope. Tom said he and his company could get fined if the inspector stopped back and saw me helping out or just hanging out without the hard hat since we were warned. I had to watch from the house and tell Norm where to take the pictures from. What a hassle!

Make sure to wipe your feet when you go inside,

Travis