You look like a monkey...

...and you smell like one too!

Thinking of you today, Gracie. We love you and miss you dearly.

Vicksburg, MS

While evacuated in Jackson, MS for Hurricane Ike, we ventured over to Vicksburg National Military Park to tour to famous Civil War battlegrounds in Vicksburg, MS. We had a couple of car loads, with Blake Bensen riding with us while his mother Suzann, sister Savannah, and their grandmother followed in the car behind.

I wasn't 50 foot into the drive-thru park when, while attempting to read the inscription on one of the hundreds of monuments located along the drive, I jumped the curb onto to the grass, causing screams from everyone in both cars.

The screams quickly turned to laughter while I gathered myself and tried to keep my eyes on the road. The park design makes that hard to do at times, since many of the less-significant monuments are designed to see from the road and have no particular pull-over. For more prominent monuments there are pull-overs where you can park your vehicle and explore. After our earlier trouble, we soon adopted this method of taking in the park's sites.

We also purchased the driving audio tour at the visitor's center, a narrated CD that is timed to the park's speed limits and explains the monuments your looking at as you drive. This proved very useful and helped us get the most out of the few hours we spent there. The park ends at the cemetery, where therer are several dramatic overlooks of the cemetery and the Mississippi River. I got the shot of Alex & Eric, below, atop one of these overlooks.

Ike = Ouch

Well, we have now evacuated for two hurricanes this season in as many weeks. While Gustav went farther east into Baton Rouge, leaving us pretty much unscathed, this time we were hit much harder.

Due to forecasts showing Ike causing poor weather as far north as Austin, we decided to evacuate to Jackson Mississippi. There, we stayed at a hotel suite that allowed pets and sat around watching news of the storm. Things got ugly very quickly and, while we tried to keep busy with friends who had also evacuated to Jackson, we spent a lot of time worrying. We took in some museums, the Natchez Trace, the battlegrounds in Vicksburg, and a couple of trips to Cock of the Walk for fried catfish. We even fished a while in a local reservoir, even though we were warned it was pretty much barren (it was).

Still, our minds kept returning to what was happening at home and when national news on the storm dried up in favor of news of the financial meltdown that had begun that same week, we became totally dependent on news from the web via my laptop. It's subsequent "crash" left us blind and feeling very isolated until the great tech-guru's at Circuit City got me running again.

It turns out, we had good reason for our fears. The Rozells are blessed again with minimal damage. Where we had more than $30,000 in damage from Rita, who roared in 4 weeks after Katrina in 2005, Ike has left us with exterior damage only, mainly our fence.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Bonny & Steve, and many of our other friends, family, and co-workers. Bonny & Steve's Bridge City home is likely a total loss. Not protected by any seawall of sorts, the storm surge inundated the entire municipality of Bridge City. By some reports, only 13 structures in the entire city was without some degree of standing water. As far Bonny & Steven's home, what with them being essentially on the marsh, they took the brunt of the surge and had at least six feet of moving water, marsh mud and debris. It will take some time to get a full grasp on the damage but, for now, they have arranged to live in a friends trailer in Buna while cleaning up the mess and trying to salvage what they can. Numerous of my co-workers also lived in Bridge City, all suffering serious damage due to the storm surge.

Also lost is much of our beloved beach in Crystal Beach, on the Bolivar Peninsula. The photo on the left is a well-publicized photo from the Associated Press of the devastation there.  We have many friends and neighbors that apparently have lost their property there. Our friends and next-door neighbors Jim & Donna Wade, from whom we frequently rented, have lost both rent homes they owned there. They had two beautiful cabins on the second row. Today, only the slabs remain.

If you read my previous post concerning our evacuation from Gustav only a few days earlier, Ike seems to be the fulfillment of some unintentional foreshadowing. This one was no vacation.

Gustavacation

We ran from Hurricane Gustav after local officials issued a mandatory evacuation for our area of the Gulf Coast.  We camped out at Scooter & Claire's house in Austin along with Bonny & Steve and Vickie & Bailey Moore.  Scooter & Claire were traveling, but we made ourselves at home knowing they expected us to use the place like it was ours. 

Boy, did we take over the place!  What the neighbors must have been thinking!  We had taken all the cars to avoid flood damage and had around 6 vehicles between us.  Of course, we had to take the dogs too!  

The kids played video games (we couldn't very well have evacuated without those!) while we ran around town like we were on a vacation.  In fact, after getting the all-clear and returning home to no damage, Bonnie dubbed the trip our Gustavacation and sent me these photos.

Even Honey looks like she's enjoying herself.

I hope the next evacuation goes as well.  They are a pain, no doubt, but would be fair worse if accompanied by massive damaged upon our return home.

Thanks for the hospitality, Scooter & Claire.  Our only regret was that you weren't home!

Drago Supply sells to Motion Industries

As expected, Drago Supply completed its sale today to Motion Industries. Joe Drago will be retiring as CEO in the near future. His replacement, if any, is yet to be named. There's plenty of speculation to go around, though.

After 77 years as a family-owed firm, Drago is now a subsidiary of a company with over 500 branches in the US and Canada with around 5,000 employees. Motion themselves is a subsidiary on Genuine Parts Company (GPC), a fortune 500 firm with more than 3 billion in sales and more than 30,000 employees. GPC's automotive parts division (NAPA Auto Parts) is the largest of it divisions, but has significant sales from it industrial (Motion) and electrical divisions. In other words, Drago is a very small piece of a much larger pie.

As far as my job is concerned, the official word is for no change. The reality, however, is that my position is in corporate, where there will be inevitable overlap of functions between the two companies. I would expect that when Motion has caught their breath and are ready to take another bite, they will swallow the corporate functions of Drago and eliminate duplication.

That's not to say I won't have a role to play in Motion, it just won't be current role. Or, I may be out altogether. The next several months, maybe even couple of years, are going to prove interesting and full of change.

To Club penguin viewers

Hey Club Penguin viewers. It's greenface200 go to Eric and you will see a video! bye ;)

Eric @ UT Soccer Camp

Eric is taking a break from The Music Man rehearsals this week to attend the UT soccer camp in Austin. It hardly can be called a break. It's extermely hot in Austin this week. They are working in the 95F+ degree heat from 9am to 3pm each day, with an hour lunch break.

Eric loves soccer, though, and Susan reports from her base at Scooter's that he is having a good time.

Did I mention that it's hot?

Cozumel, et al

I took a short break from The Music Man rehearsals to go to Cozumel with Susan and some friends. It was just a few days, but it was a lot of fun and a very needed vacation. We've been to Cozumel numerous times and I made a few dives as usual, but this trip we added a jeep rental and explored the eastern shore of the island.

Too cool! We drove the beach road circling the island, stopping at every beach bar along the way. We ended up at Bob Marley's, the coolest beach bar on the island.

We had a great trip, even though our room had a bizzare energy-saving device that turned off the air conditioner if a motion sensor did not detect movment in the room. Imagine that as you slept, the sound of the air conditioner shutting off would awaken you and you would have to wave your arm in the air to turn the thing back on!  After complaining to the front desk several times and getting promises that it had been "fixed", it was already time to go home.

Thankfully, the breezes were enough to keep things comfortable without constant air conditioning. The rooms were round in shape and were nicely furnished with a full tiled-bath and king sized bed. Cozy!

Practice, practice, practice

Rehearsals for The Music Man are coming along nicely. Eric has made a lot of new friends and appears to be genuinely enjoying the many hours he is spending at the theatre. We are all a long way from being off-book and the set design has been scrapped and started anew, so it looks a little barren on stage for now. Still, I think we are exactly where we should be about now.

It has been my experience that these productions often don't really come together until the final couple of weeks of rehearsal. By then, everyone is off-book and can concentrate on tweaking scenes and choreography, adding the special touches that really can make a good show a great one. I'm looking forward to that phase. It used to make me nervous. Now I just try to trust in the magical theatre fairies who seem to always show up and pull the show together. Wait, ...did I just say theatre fairies? I mean the imaginary winged-ones. Don't want to be feeding any stereo-types here!

Meanwhile, I have been concentrating with the quartet trying to make us sound as good as possible. It's really coming along. Since I don't have what you might call a booming bass voice, I wasn't the first choice for bass in some people's eyes, but I blend pretty well with the rest of the guys. I think we may just surprise them!

Zach is off to Japan

After spending some time in San Diego, where he got to enjoy his time off in the surf, Zach is heading to the Marine Corp Air Base in Iwaknui, Japan. We got to spend a little time with him at Bonny & Steven's, who threw a small send-off party for him at their home in Bridge City. Zach is with the Marine All Weather Fighter Attack Squadron 242 (The "BATS") where he serves as a Naval Flight Officer.

We enjoyed seeing you, Zach! Send us your address when you get settled so we can mail you "BAT" things we can collect from Austin!

The Music Man!

In an attempt to recreate the great theatre experience Alex & I had together in A Christmas Story back in 2001, Eric & I decided to audition for PALT/Lamar Theatre's joint summer musical production of The Music Man, set to open in July. A Christmas Story gave Alex & I some very special memories of time spent together as father & son, so I went into the audition expecting The Music Man to do the same for me and Eric. What I didn't expect, however, was for each of us to land such great roles!

Eric was determined to get the part of Winthrop, and he did. You may remember a little Ron Howard playing the part of the little boy with the lisp in the 1962 film. Eric read and re-read for the part, each time working hard to improve over the last attempt and showing anger with himself for any perceived slip-ups. I was very impressed with his determination. He has a great lisp, practically spitting out his S's all over the director!

Myself, I was content with a chorus role just to be in the show with Eric. I told them as much, but wound up winning a coveted spot as a member of the quartet! My buddy Rich Kilhken had come along to the audition with me to offer his support to the director as a vocal coach for the quartet. They were glad to have him, and I know his input helped win my spot since he was already familiar with my voice and blend.

As a result of our success, we are now looking at a very busy summer. Rehearsals for Eric will be 6 days a week while mine will be less for the show itself, but plenty additional rehearsals specific for the quartet. Just as A Christmas Story dominated the Christmas season of 2001, The Music Man will dominate the summer of 2008. I'm confident it will be worth it.

Trade Day Tycoon

 Eric's class hosted a trade day this past week and Eric showed some real entrepreneurial talent. The challenge was to create a unique product the you would sell or trade for other kid's products. Eric chose to make custom multi-colored crayons that would mark the paper with random multi-colored strokes as you colored with them. He made them by melting down the colors together and then pouring them into cookie molds to reconstitute into new crayons.

Success! His crayons, which he called Fuggies, worked great and was the most popular product of the class. His only mistake was not making enough of them. He sold out quick and had money to burn ...or melt.

Riverfest 2008

We finally were able to enjoy Riverfest this past weekend, after the Chamber decided to move it from Mother’s Day weekend. Every year prior, it was held on Mother’s Day weekend, which meant we couldn’t attend as we would usually be going to Conroe. This year, we spent several hours over the course of three days at the park riding rides (a lot), eating (even more), watching the washer-board tournament, and finally getting to watch the boat races. It was a really good time.

It worked out perfect this year too, since we also had Tom Biesiadny in town for a visit from Fairfax, VA. Tom is a good friend of mine from my days on Port Arthur City Council and he was in town for the week before moving on to Big Bend National Park. Having Riverfest at the same time gave us something extra to offer Tom during his visit. Tom came in via Amtrak, sparking my interest again in travelling by train for a family vacation sometime in the future.

It was good to see you, Tom!

Cute as a Bug - Prom Night for Alex & Kinsey

Yes, cute as a bug... In fact, you could argue that the green suit and glasses make Alex actually look like a bug.

Kinsey is on the drum line with Alex and they are very good friends. Doesn't she look just amazing? Kinsey has always been precious but, wow!

If you know Kinsey, you understand these pictures. Kinsey loves green. No, she is obsessed with green. So when Kinsey and Alex decided to go to prom together, there was no question about what color she would be wearing. The question, then, was what color would Alex be wearing? It turns out, Kinsey had this figured out too.

There's a little shop in Port Arthur called "Colors" ran by a friend of ours, Amore Habash. They run a surprisingly robust business renting and selling the wildest suits and related clothing. You wouldn't think there would be a big market for this stuff... orange, plum, fire-engine red, royal blue, canary yellow... you name it, they have it. The wilder the better. It turns out, the shop is quite popular with the black population in Port Arthur. Kinsey brought Alex and Susan to pick out his suit, where they... get this... bought this green suit. That's right, they didn't rent this thing... they bought it.

The story goes that it was cheaper to buy it than rent it... I'm not sure I buy it.

Anyway, Alex should be set for awhile on what to wear for St. Patrick's day or Mardi Gras for the next few years!

Kinsey and Alex had a great time at Prom. No doubt, they were the most colorful!

A Surprise Visitor for Eric

I took this picture at lunch today. Zach surprised Eric today by making a visit to Eric’s school for lunch and, boy, was Eric surprised!

Eric had stayed back from the rest of his class for some reason and was walking alone in the long corridor of the 3rd grade wing when he spotted Zach standing next to Susan just outside her classroom. Zach wore his uniform flight suit and Eric didn’t recognize him at first.

When Eric realized it was Zach, he screamed and ran to meet him. Of course, there was a collective “ahhh” from all the teachers who saw it.

Thanks, Zach, for visiting Eric. It was a very nice gesture and Eric really appreciated it. He likes to show you off!

Happy Birthday Alex!

Happy Birthday, Alex! Alex turns 17 today. He pointed out a few perks of turning 17 this morning including being able to see R rated movies, going to movies with start times after 9:00pm, and no longer having a legal curfew enforced by the police (although he stills has a practical curfew enforced by Mom & Dad). He and some friends went to Toyko's for a birthday dinner last night and returned to the house for a laid-back party at home watching movies, playing video games, and just hanging out. Another dinner tonight will be family at his restaurant of choice.

We are grateful to God for giving us Alex. He has brought much joy and love into our lives and the lives of many others. He has been a true blessing for our family and it is a pleasure watching him continue to grow into such a wonderful person. Alex, you can change the world. We’re so glad you were born.

Love,

Mom, Dad, Eric, and all of your family.

Eric earns a perfect score on TAKS!

Congratulations, Eric! Eric earned a perfect score on the 3^rd grade TAKS reading test! Way to go, Eric!

Eric is such a bright young man and he always strives to do his best. His teacher said he checked his work over as many as three times, determined to make sure he didn’t miss anything. We were confident he would do well, as he is such a good reader, but he really blew all of us away! We love you, Eric! Keep up the awesome work!

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter!

We spent our Easter Sunday in Conroe, driving in early Sunday morning and returning the same evening. We arrived early enough to have Easter baskets and a quick Easter egg hunt before going with Dad & Phyllis to Easter church services at First United Methodist. This is the same church I attended growing up, although they are now in a nice new building. I was able to visit a little with the parents of my good friend Kyle Landry, who now lives in Austin. They are still members of FUMC, where I had met Kyle through other mutual friends like Charlie Baughman, Johnny Waisath, and Brad Williams. I’m sorry I didn’t get to see any of these guys, though.

We all returned from church to Dad’s for a great lunch by Phyllis with Laura, Kyle, Caylee, and Cayden. Then, we stopped by Johnny and Marilyn’s to visit a couple of hours (or a couple of beers, however you would rather measure it) with Mom, Nana, Cori, Scott, and Scott’s parents. As usual, they tried (but failed) to get us to eat again. You never go hungry on a trip to Conroe. Someone is always eating!

Suga's (i.e. Oh My God!)

Happy 50th Birthday, Lyndi!

Well, that was not on my diet. But it just may have been worth a leg amputation.

Let me explain:

We celebrated Lyndi Roy's 50th birthday tonight at Suga's Deep South Cuisine in Beaumont and, I swear, it was the best food I can remember ever eating. Suga's serves incredible food and desserts (I know the dessert chef personally) and adds an elegant atmosphere and live jazz entertainment to make for a truly memorable evening out to dinner. If you want to stay late, they have an equally elegant jazz club upstairs with an outdoor patio.

In spite of my recent attempt to undertake a 1,500 diabetic diet, I ordered a 14 oz. ribeye with garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus crepes. I don't actually have diabetes, but my most recent bloodwork suggests a diabetic diet would be ideal for me, hence the diet. However, if I could eat this good everyday, diabetes just might by okay! It was pretty pricey for the two of us though, so this kind of dining will have to remain for special occasions.

My diet-busting entree came after an equally incredible appetizer of fried green tomatoes topped with lumped crab meat that I shared (reluctantly) with Susan. We both loved it and could have made a meal of this dish alone. But we didn't. I continued with the entree described above while Susan had a shrimp-stuffed chicken with grilled veggies and a crawfish corn-bread dressing that was the best I've ever tasted. The crawfish was finely ground into the dressing and I think I tasted a hint of brown sugar.

If you haven't tried Suga's, you're really missing something special. Folks, I'm talking good here.

The Austin Songwriter's Group

Alex played again Thursday night at the Logon Café with his friends Scuddy Loupe, Jarod Jones, and Donny Corville. A wonderful surprise for us was that Scuddy had also invited Rick Dana and Rick Busby of The Rick Show fame to play! They were great as usual. During the show, Rick Busby approached me as president of the Austin Songwriter’s Group (I didn’t know this!) to tell me how impressed he was with Alex’s original music and encouraged me to have him enter their spring contest. He said he considered Alex’s music in the top 10% of the music they typically hear from songwriter submissions!

Of course, his mom and me have always thought his music was great, but I felt that was an especially good compliment coming from a person well established in the songwriting business who is a talented songwriter in their own right. Judges for the contest are recognized industry professionals and exposure of Alex’s music in this setting will be great. He’ll be submitting several songs in various categories and winners will be announced in mid-June. Wish him luck and we’ll keep you posted!

National Honor Society

We are so proud of Alex! He just received word that he will be inducted to the National Honor Society on Monday, March 31^st. Family and friends are invited to the induction ceremony at the Port Neches-Groves High School cafeteria beginning at 7:00pm. There will be a brief reception after the ceremony.

In addition to stringent academic requirements outlined by the NHS, consideration for this very high honor requires the inductee to have demonstrated high standards of service, leadership, and character. We are very proud of Alex and are so happy that he is being recognized in such an important way for all of his hard work and dedication!

Way to go Alex!!!

Spring Break

We had a quiet spring break this year. I took vacation to be off with Susan and the boys and we stayed home for a change. Susan spent a couple of days shopping with friends in Houston and Eric played at home with an assortment of buddies who came over to play from time-to-time. We did a lot of spring cleaning and continued our ongoing project of reorganizing cabinets and closets. We have now completed every room in the house except the Library/Game Room and the boy’s rooms, which we will tackle last. The biggest job over the break was the kitchen, where we purged an amazing amount of stuff. It is so much nicer now and easier to work in.

Alex had a couple of day-trips to the beach for surfing on his Uncle Steven’s newly refurbished surf board. When he wasn’t working, he spent his days surfing and driving up and down the beach looking for school friends who were spending spring break at the beach with their families. This was his first Spring Break with his own vehicle. He was in heaven until his car broke down and he had to leave it for repair. He was out of a car for the balance of the break, while I was out $545.00 for a new radiator, idle pulley and belt-tensioner. Bummer.

L'Auberge Du Lac

This was a very different Saturday night. As close as we are to the casinos in Lake Charles, Susan & I have never been there together. Susan has gone along with my mother and my aunt Gracie to Delta Downs a time or two, but we've never been to any of Lake Charles's several other casinos together as a night out, even though the drive is only about 45 minutes. We just have never gotten around to it.

We finally did on Saturday. We joined our friends Rich and Patrice in their new motor home to the L'Auberge Du Lac Resort. It was a nice ride over complete with wine, cheese, and good conversation while watching a James Taylor concert on DVD. Very relaxing. A heartfelt "thanks for driving" goes to Patrice (on the way over) and Rich (coming home).

It was a first trip to the the L'Auberge for all of us and we'll definitely be going back. It is hard to believe such a nice casino is right in our backyard! It looks like something right out of Las Vegas, just smaller.

We had dinner at the casino after our first choice turned out to be a bust. We had hoped for a nice Italian dinner at the Italian Villa, a quaint little restaurant in an old house on Ryan Street that Susan & I had been to many years ago. Sadly, it's now a dress shop. The food at the casino was excellent, though. The really fun part was that we came out $80.00 ahead, which paid for our gas and dinner and still left $20.00 to spare. I wish every night out was as cheap!

Sunday Evening

I do so enjoy Sunday evening. I've never been one to let the cold fact of Monday morning ruin my Sunday evening. Even while the work week looms, Sunday evening is still officially part of the American weekend. Monday will be here soon enough and there isn't anything you can do about it, so why not enjoy the remaining time you have?

This weekend was a good two days. Wallyball was a bust Saturday morning, as we couldn't round up enough people to play. Susan really enjoyed her afternoon at the theatre, though, (she went to see Menopause at the Luther Theatre) and I enjoyed spending Saturday afternoon with Eric and Bailey playing Halo on the X-Box. I'm not very good, and Eric killed me off repeatedly. If you didn't know him any better, you'd think he was ruthless. But he would hug and kiss me after each kill and tell me how good I was doing. Apparently, he didn't want the fact that he'd just killed me to hurt my feelings.

Alex spent Friday night with a friend and then had to work Saturday and Sunday. We saw him just long enough Saturday for him to tell us that his show Friday night was a success. The audience was good and the other bands seemed to appreciate his talent. No pay for this show, just some experience and exposure. After work and studying with friends Sunday evening, Alex joined me on the back porch and played guitar while I enjoyed a glass of wine and a cigar. He played a few of his personal favorites. I really enjoy these moments, since we are beginning to see less of him all the time.

I felt I deserved the wine and cigar. Susan & I worked the entire day Sunday revamping the master bedroom closet, bath cabinets, and dresser/chest/nightstand drawers. It turned out great. We completely purged everything we don't use or need anymore and now everything is better organized with some space to spare. We're both seriously tired (even sore), but it was worth the effort. Now, we just have every other room in the house to do! My only regret was that we had to spend such a beautiful day indoors.

Valentine's Day

Susan & I shared Valentine’s Day dinner together with friends at Easy’s Martini Bar in Beaumont Thursday night. Alex watched Eric for us and they went with their own friends to Casa Ole’. Easy’s was good as usual, although we were surprised by the lite crowd and the slow service. Service has never been slow before and, with the crowd clearly not being enough to have the kitchen overwhelmed, I really couldn’t understand the slow service. Still, it was an enjoyable evening anyway, visiting with our friends. The “Seafood in Parchment” was delicious, wrapped in a thin paper that you cut open to eat, much like you would a baked potato. I wasn’t entirely sure if I was supposed to eat the parchment (some paper is edible, you know), so we left it on the plate. Country come to town…

Thanks to Krista for our Valentine's e-cards! They were a hoot!

Alex plays a show opening for Barely Blind and other bands tonight at The Doorway in Port Neches. 7-7:30pm I think; all acoustic. He’ll play mostly his original stuff as usual.

The weekend is open to do needed things around the house, save Saturday morning for my Wallyball game and Saturday afternoon for Susan’s visit to the Lutcher theatre to see the play “Menopause”. Okay, I guess that really just leaves Sunday.