It's Official

As of Monday, January 7th, Sam is an official employee of Pfizer, Inc. We drove out to Connecticut on Thursday (Jan. 4) with a Jeep packed to the gills. After unpacking and seeing the sights in Connecticut (see the pics!). I had to come back home. Unfortunately, Sam had to stay.

We're just completing our first week apart. So far...we're surviving. It's not great, but we do get to see each other via Skype, we email during the day, and talk & text each other frequently. It doesn't exactly make up for not having any physical contact, but it's a drastic improvement upon writing letters back & forth.

In the meantime, stay tuned for a second post tonight on suggestions for staying in closer contact with family/friends. It's gonna be good.

The Big Announcement

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Originally uploaded by vlauria

It may be a moot point, since this blog enjoys a readership of approximately 5 people, all of which have probably heard this news already. Oh well...it's such a major lifechanging event that there's no way I could leave it out of the blog.

A couple of months ago Sam interviewed with Pfizer in Groton, CT (where her parents moved) for a position in the Clinical Pathology Lab. She (of course) was offered the position, and has accepted it as well.

While this means major upheavals and doing a few things we don't really enjoy doing (1. Moving away from family, 2. Leaving Ben's Whitmore Lake teaching job, 3. Moving (it sucks)), the opportunity was something that she simply couldn't turn down. She has described this position as her "dream job," and I don't like to be one to stand in the way of anyone's dreams, especially my wife's.

Sam starts her new position on January 7, and we're driving out to Connecticut on the 3rd. We decided that I'll finish my school year before moving out, so in the meantime we have about 6 months living 736 miles apart. We're both a little worried about that piece- but as Ice Cube says, "Life's not a track meet, it's a marathon." 6 months isn't all that long, right?

I'm excited to live outside of Michigan (I'm the only family member to never have live out-of-state), but wish I could take our friends, family, and my job with me.

This blog may become more prominent as we move further away from those that read it, I guess I'll have to work on updating more frequently!

New Flickr Account!

OK...so it's not really new, but I've started putting all our photos on it recently. Originally I created an account to use with my high school classes, but my idea for using it didn't pan out.

I added a little widget on the right that starts with the pictures I've uploaded most recently (too bad it doesn't go in chronological order). 

To view all the photos I've uploaded, click here!

The Worst Video Post Ever

Here's an attempt to make up for not posting for a couple days during the "Post Every Day in November" campaign. I apologize for the quality. And by quality I'm not referring to anything technical, but rather the performance. Remember, I really am smarter than I appear. I promise. :-)

Back to School & Labor Day Preview

Wednesday of this week was the first day teachers had to report at Whitmore Lake High School for the 2007-2008 school year. It'll be my 6th year teaching already. I pretty much feel ready for school, though I haven't worked out a lot of specific plans as of yet. It all comes together in the end.

Sam and I are also flying out on Friday to visit her parents in their new Connecticutian home. I'm not sure how to manipulate Connecticut into an adjective or pronoun as of yet. Are her parents now Connecticutians? Connecticuts? Connoosiers? Somebody needs to look that up.

So far our plans for our weekend out east include a trip to Block Island in Rhode Island (which will be the 30th state I've visited), checking out some restaurants her parents have tried or heard were good, visiting Yale, and seeking out Washington Depot; the town that looks eerily similar to Stars Hollow from Gilmore Girls.

We'll miss the rest of the Wildeboer family at West Lake. :(

**Upon Further Research**
It turns out, the official name for a person from Connecticut is Connecticuter. However, many other terms exist, such as "Connecticotian" (used by Cotton Mather), "Connecticutensian" (used by Samual Peters), and "Nutmegger" (I have no clue). Personally, I think "Conn Person" has a nice ring.

New Header

I thought I'd try to fancy this place up a bit...I think it looks nicer. I'm still trying to work out the kinks though...I'm not very good with this whole personalization thing with the blog.

Whaddya think?

New Bike!

I've been wanting to get a new bike for a few years (probably ever since someone didn't properly lock up my bike in college), but didn't see it as necessary enough to put money into. So when I received a stipend for participating in some environmental education research last week, I **update** Sam and I thought putting it towards a new bike would be perfect.


I went for a long bike ride today (mainly because my calf is sore so I'm avoiding running), and I must say that I think I like the new bike.

What a Weekend! (Sunday: Larry Steeb 10K, Dinner & a Movie)

Unfortunately, our plans for Saturday didn't mesh well with our plans for Sunday. This year the traditional Whitmore Lake 4th of July festivities weren't held on the 4th of July. Instead they had the 10K race, Kiwanis chicken BBQ, and parade on Sunday the 1st, with the fireworks Tuesday the 3rd.

I have always done the 10K race, and this year it was renamed the Larry Steeb Memorial Independance Day Race, in honor of the long time Whitmore Lake teacher, cross country and track & field coach who passed away this February. So...I didn't feel like I couldn't do the run this year. However, the race started at 8:00am, we weren't preregistered, and we live in Saline (30 minutes away). As a result, we had to wake up after a scant 4 hours of sleep.

I can definitely say I didn't feel my best doing the run, but I had lots of extrinsic motivation to not just walk the course. There was (of course) a large number of students and alumni from Whitmore Lake High School, and I didn't really want to look like I was dogging it. In the end I finished with a pretty good time of 46:08.

Sam and I both went back home and took long naps. Later that afternoon we went out to Quarter Bistro- a New Orleans style restaurant- for dinner with her parents. We followed that up with a trip to the movie theater for a showing of Ratatouille, which I definitely recommend. It was quite funny & cute.

What a Weekend! (Saturday, Part 2: German Park & The Metro Cafe)

Our fun didn't end with the ball game...we had somewhat unknowingly planned two seperate outings for Saturday. As a result of our slight lapse of planning, we went right from the ballgame to meet the Jamies at German Park.

I didn't take any pictures of the festivities at German Park, but it's held on property privately owned by the German Park Recreation Club, which is made up of families of German descent. There's a review of the event by arborweb.com. The last Saturday in June, July, and August, they open up the park, serve German food (spätzle, two types of sausage, sauerkraut, etc.), and of course, German beer (I believe they sell Miller & Budweiser too, but why buy American beer at a German festival?). This Saturday the park was packed! The festivities begin at 4pm and run until 11. We arrived about 8:45pm, I got in line for beer and was told they were out of my first choice, and barely had any beer left at all. Much of the food was gone already too. However, that didn't ruin the mood; they still had cookies left and it was a beautiful night.

We left German Park with the Jamies around 10:30 or so (if I remember correctly) and went to The Metro Cafe in the Kerrytown area of Ann Arbor. It has a great patio below street level and boasts having the largest martini menu in Ann Arbor. The girls decided that they did have an excellent selection of martinis, but they weren't quite as high quality as the martinis available at Goodnight Gracie (their favorite location for martinis). We ended up staying out waaaay past our bedtimes...

What a Weekend! (Saturday, Part 1: The Tigers Game)

Our weekend has not yet been boring. Even better, our weekend has been not been boring in a fun way.

Friday was farily typical: softball game at 9:00 (we won!) and then we went to bed.

Saturday was a little more noteworthy. We started with breakfast at the City Limits Diner (of course), then we went home to approximately 16,000 strawberries that the Steenbergens had just bought at the Ann Arbor Farmers' Market. Sam and her mother spent a long time cleaning & de-greening them, then they proceeded to make strawberry jam. Yum!

We had too leave off helping with the strawberries because we were meeting several people from church at 2:30 to go to the Detroit Tigers game. We had seats waaaayyy up high, but right behind home plate (note picture), so we had a good view of the game.

The Tigers didn't look all that stellar, and ended up losing 8-5 (click the picture for a better view of the final line).

I must note at this time that this blog is being censored and lacks true 1st Amendment freedoms. While some bloggers are free to post goofy pictures, other blogs first must meet the censors approval. :-) Here is Sam trying to not get her picture taken, but I managed to sneak a good one. There were several others which I thought the masses might like to see, but didn't get "approval" (they were destroyed on the spot!).




Another interesting item...there is a well-known mural of whales by David Wyland on the Broderick Tower that is a prominent part of the Detroit cityscape visible from Comerica Park (seen here from a picture taken in 2005).














We noticed on our visit to the park that it has been covered by a massive version of the "Can you hear me now?" guy (see pic). At first we speculated that it gets covered with advertising for nationally televised games, but after doing some research it turns out that the Broderick Tower (empty since 1985) is being renovated for commerical space and residential lofts/condos. The ad now permanently covers the mural (though the mural is still under the ad) raising $600,000 for the renovation. I can't say I'm a big fan, although at least the money for the advertisement is (hopefully) going towards downtown revitalization.

Sad News

This Monday was Pfizer's big announcement day about their restructuring. Going into it Sam was apprehensive since her position has always been slightly tenuous. If they decided to move some studies from Ann Arbor to another location her job could easily be pinched out. Well...as it turned out (as I'm sure you've heard) Pfizer decided to shut down the entire Ann Arbor facility. 2,100 high tech, high income jobs gone. Kaput.

To try to find a bright side for us, Sam's been looking into other jobs for the last year or so because of the lack of stability at her position, so we've been at least somewhat mentally prepared for her to lose her job. Sam did have an interview on Monday at the University Hospital, which seemed providential given what went down. She's supposed to hear back next week, so I guess we'll see where providence is leading us.

The down side (which there is an awfully lot of) is that many good friends of Sam lost their jobs as well. Her mother in fact; who moved to Ann Arbor three years ago because Pfizer shut down the facility she worked at in Skokie, IL. It just seems like everyone we know either worked for Pfizer or is related to someone who does. There'll be a lot of movement away from Ann Arbor in 2007.

As for now, we're hoping to stay here, but Sam has put in her resume at several bio-tech companies in the Boston area. I told her I'm fine with moving if she can find a job she'd really like. I would like to live in another part of the country at least for awhile, but I really enjoy my current position at Whitmore Lake and moving seems a little scary right now.

Thank you to all of you who have called, emailed, or otherwise expressed your condolences. We're still getting over the shock. Keep us (and the thousands of other people affected) in your prayers.