Adventures in hardwood flooring

I went down to help Matt put hardwood flooring in a room he's remodeling in his home in Lockport, IL. It was a great weekend.

I've never driven in Chicagoland, and I studied my maps hard. The traffic was fine, there were a lot of people out and about, but the roads could handle it.

It was incredible to me, this mass of humanity. About ten minutes into Illinois, then all the way to Matt's house, it was developed. Town stretched for 70 miles, and that was just my linear view. My mind is used to the stark difference between urban and rural , and the compartmentalization of towns in Wisconsin. There's woods and farms around towns. There's an artificial glow that signals human presence in the distance when I drive down our rural highways at night. In Illinois, the constant urbanity was only punctuated by occasional spectacular growths of what I consider skyscrapers (I was nowhere near The Loop, but twenty or thirty stories is a big production to me.) This sprawling organism is alive and growing.

So that experience made quite an impression on me. I guess I had never imagined the enormity of this place. Anyone who doesn't think field-trips are worthy educational exercises can stick it.

We worked, my sore legs are proof. We played: geocaching, guitar hero. And we ate and drank well. Nori made us an authentic Mexican lunch on Saturday, and we had Irish lager and margaritas with our movie on Saturday night.

On the way home, I stopped for a quick surprise visit at the Scobeys.