saturday, to urbana and back (via berwyn)

saturday i got up and went to TBM. loaded the car with prints for the lincoln bindery and for the high dive, and headed south on cicero, to 94 south. plowed through chicago with the windows open, enjoying the relative warmth, listening to the stereo loud: the radio department, battles, kings of convenience, spoon, jawbox, interpol, and a lot of shuffle.

rolled into urbana, got to the lake house at crystal lake park, and helped set up the surprise party. tedra, the woman who binds books for me, had organized a surprise party of about 50 people for her boss, chris, the owner of lincoln bindery for the last 30 years. he arrived, was appropriately surprised, and everyone had a great time. i was surprised to see mare payne, the woman who lived next door to the house where my old band (also called spoon) had practiced in urbana back in 1992. she and her husband, jim, had tried to be patient with us back then, but if i had been in their situation, i would have killed the band.

got a nice long visit with dennis rowan, the former printmaking teacher at U of I who i worked with for two semesters, and who had a profound and lasting effect on diana's work, and her interest in printmaking.

i forgot to mention that di had planned to go along for this trip, but was really feeling the looming deadline for her current book illustration project, and decided to stay home.

great lunch of BBQ and beans and coleslaw. i visited with tedra's mom and deb, dennis' lady friend, and dennis. i heard about both womens' brain tumors, and saw a mock-up a book deb is working on.

by 2:30, the party wound down. i looked at the goslings in the parking lot again, then drove across town to leave the '1993' prints at jupiters, where ward would pick them up later. stopped to pick up a present for ludo's first birthday, and got back on the highway. i listened to radiohead all the way north, and decided to let the GPS tell me how top get to frantz's house in berwyn. i never would have though to take 57 to 80 EAST to 294 northwest to 55 northeast to harlem ave. it worked out fine.

crazy first birthday with a bunch of kids under 4 running around, including arthur & clive, my dudes. turkey and beans and beans and deliciousness. there was a curious george piñata, and pineapple cake.

around 7:30, i took off for home, and decided to try taking harlem most of the way north. good drive.

home, visit, sleep.