Rotach: Anoka Halloween Week

Anoka is the Halloween Capital of the world. Don't believe it? It's right there on the web: Anoka Halloween

Monday

8 mile run - Mercy Hospital route. Man, I have a sinus headache. I can't wait to have this go away.

Lilly and I cleaned the leaves off the driveway. Mainly because we wanted a leaf pile. Lilly even ran the blower for a little while. Dropped the leaves off down in the leaf pile then carried a garbage can full of Lilly back up the hill.

Carving pumpkins! Lilly digging out the slimy stuff:

Holly's masterpiece (she used a stencil):

Holly's "mean" pumpkin and my traditional Jack-o-lantern:

Mothballed and buttoned up the boat. Now I just need to throw the huge tarp over and we're done until spring. Part of this exercise was torching open the storage door in the lower garage as the driveway sealer people had tarred it shut.

Tuesday

Lilly's preschool "Fall Festival". Pumpking bowling, goop, Teddy Grahms, leaf rubbings. It was fun.

Mountain bike ride with Dave, Tom, and Jason. Man Dave has the singletrack dialed. Even in the dark. I kept up some of the time but usually made one handling mistake that would have me off the back. Endo-ed over a waist high log pile twice. Lost Tommy C a couple times and never did see him again after the last one. Dave heard from him on the phone so we knew he was alive. I was really warm the entire night except for the ride home from the woods. Great ride.

Wednesday

7 mile run with Joe at lunch. I wanted to try a double day to see how my legs felt. I felt really good and was able to keep up with Joe after I made the mistake of telling him I felt good. We did the last two miles around 5:30 pace.

4 is Fun! After swim we met Holly at Wilson Elementary in Anoka for a kindegarten readyness class called, "4 is Fun". There were various activities (cutting paper, drawing, matching shapes, storytime/listening, music/dance) setup throughout the school. We had fun and Lilly even saw her old friend Connor from Kindercare.

A highlight was meeting another girl named Lilly:

Thursday

Rollerblading with Bob M. What a great guy. Good to catch up and hear some race stories from inline skating.

Picked Rob up from the cycle shop and grabbed some beer and BBQ. Watched a little of the World Series and then dropped Rob off. Boo came along to run hot laps with Riley dog while Rob and I shot some hoops on a 8 foot rim. We need a basketball hoop - that was a blast.

Friday

Did a quick ride to the dam and back early in the dark. It was misting and 45 degrees but I was cooking warm as I overdressed a little. Remembered a ride I did on a summer evening and how different it was to be riding in sandals and cruising along at 5 mph.

Lilly's preschool conference. It was good news and another reasurance that Ms. SeAnn is a great teacher for Lilly. Some cute stories of Lilly helping other kids.

1/2 day vacation (Holly took the whole day) to catch the Parade of Little People. I didn't get home in time to see the parade but was able to walk home with Holly and Lilly.

Grandma and Grandpa Rotach showed up and Holly and I were able to take a quick lap through the park.

Saturday

Trimmed some branches above the boat and threw the tarp over. Plenty of overlap and now we just have to tie it down.

Anoka Grey Ghost Run (5K) - I got 9th place with a time of (18:03). 44 seconds slower than last year. Ouch. Really burned my lungs. Went out too quickly and blew up about halfway through. Was able to recover enough to pass someone back for 9th place.

Green shirts this year. Met the walkers (Holly, Jerry, Kelsie, Alex, Aimee) at the finish. Holly and Kelsie ran the entire 1 mile. Kelsie is doing the 5K next year!

Lilly, Alex and most of the others stayed for the Grand Day parade. Jerry and I went back to the house and cleaned his bike. Talked about skiing and wakebaording and it had me wishing it was spring instead of fall.

Bike to the wood park. Me, Lilly, Holly, Jerry, Shonna and Alex biked to the Elm Creek wood park while Aimee and Kelsie drove. Played a bit and biked home. Aimee and Kelsie were able to bike home and Alex, Holly and Lilly drove back. I was warm biking but jeez it gets cold as the sun goes down. Here's a nice pick of fall colors:

Kelsie and Lilly on the tire swing:

The group hanging around eating mellocreme pumpkins:

Sunday

Bought a gas powered leaf blower and gave my electric one to Jerry. He thinks Alex might like using it.

Afternoon bike ride for around an hour and a half. Down the Anoka side of the river to the dam, across the corridor trail to the park, back home the shorter way through the park. It was super WINDY but it wasn't bad until the last leg towards home. I ended up being pretty warm and even stopped and packed my jacket part way.

Rotach