The Indiana Trip aka Things Never Change First of all, my apologies if this page takes a bit to load. We took most of these pictures with a wide angle lens because it seemed "neat" and I thought the wide angle was the only true way to show the beauty of my home. Yes, I'm an idiot. I don't think any professional photographers should worry about their jobs with people like me around. Anyway ...

I'm a Hoosier. Yeah, I know, in some parts of the country, that's not exactly something to brag about, but I wear it with pride. I recently (ok, I'm slow at updating this site - it was a few months ago) returned home for a reunion of sorts, and managed to get pictoral evidence that things never change. It follows. Read at your own risk.

We started out the weekend in Greencastle, Indiana, which is technically my hometown. I have about 4, but that's where I spent ages 13-17, so I'm sticking with it.

I've been back a few times, so this isn't a big shock to me, but our old football field is now a parking lot:

If you look closely, about halfway down on the left, you'll see where I took a knee on the sidelines for many years, which was our version of sitting on the bench. Luckily, one of my good buddies managed to bruise his spine during a game my senior year, and I got to start after that. I ever have the letter jacket to prove it!

Oh, and for those of you that don't like dark humor, Kelly (the buddy that bruised his spine) is doing fine - he even returned later that year to kick the longest field goal in school history.

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This is one of my favorite things about Indiana, although the picture doesn't really do it justice. This is a picture of our basketball gym, which is one of the bigger ones in the state, especially for a high school the size of GHS. My graduating class was around 150 students. If you don't understand Hoosier Hysteria, one tour around this gym will spell it all out for you. It seats a couple thousand folks, and is in immaculate condition.

There's an old saying in Indiana. There are three things that are important in life - God, family, and basketball, and not necessarily in that order. I don't know what that means, but it seems to be relevant for some reason.

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Hey, there's the high school! How's that for exciting? Ok, when you wake up, you can read that this is the place where I learned that girls were mystic and magical creatures that never seemed to want to date me. Other things I learned:

- Always keep one hand on your shorts, lest you get "depants" in front of a group of people
- Freshmen suck
- I had no idea what I want to do in life
- Purple is a primary color (that was one of our school colors)
- At certain times while in class, clocks will actually go backwards

Things I've learned since:

- Always keep one hand on your wallet, lest you get "dewalleted" in the city
- Traffic sucks
- I have no idea what to do in life (hmm ... that one seems to be lingering)
- Purple is not a primary color, and it's pretty rare that people wear it every single day in the real world
- At certain times while at work, clocks will actually go backwards

See what I mean about things not changing much?

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Ok, regression time. After the whole Greencastle thing was done, we decided to take a tour of my old haunts. I had to poke my lovely lady friend awake about every 10 minutes, but she made it through. If you're smart, you'll bail now.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is where I went to school from grades 3 to 6. Interesting notes from this time period:

- Our principal had an artificial leg and pointed at people with his middle finger (probably not that funny now, but it is when you're 8).
- I learned how to do The Hustle at some point ... please hold your applause.
- I once got in trouble for singing the song "Dancing Queen" by Abba in class. My teacher at the time was gay, which was a HUGE thing in Indiana. Everyone used to whisper about his man purse. BFD.
- I traveled to this school on one of the rowdiest buses ever. A quick story from that bus:

One day, some kids were throwing raw corn around the bus. Yeah, it sounds dumb, but if you've ever been hit with a handful of it, it stings like the dickens. Anyway, I was bending down to pick some up for retaliation, when a young lady was getting off the bus. Unbeknownst to me, as I was bending over to pick up the corn, someone pinched her booty as she walked by me. I sat up, and got a nice slap across the face. The bus driver even thought I was guilty - she looked at me and said "was it worth it?"

To this day, I maintain my innocence. Stupid corn.

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We lived in a number of different houses at different times, and here are a few that I remember.

House #1 - Home of Fritz the Dog

Memories from this joint:

- Fritz the Dog was possibly the meanest German shephard on the face of the earth. Fortunately, people didn't sue back then for dog bites, or we would've been in court more often than Bobby Brown and Whitney Houston.
- Um, I was, like, 2 years old. How many memories are there of those years? Let's just move on.

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House #2 - Levitt Street

Memories:

- One of my buddies told me that there was a house down the street with a spider in the basement, and that the spider was the size of the basement! Of course, I believed him, and from that day on, I made a pretty wide berth around that house when riding my bike past it.
- I got my first case of lice here (yes, there was more than one). Very proud!
- I remember my grandfather would visit sometimes. Now, my grandfather was this little Italian dude, but when you're 5 years old, he seemed huge. He always seemed to be angry, and rarely spoke English. Kind of like Charo on a bad hair day.
- This was the site of the infamous "kiss it and make it better" story. If you haven't heard (those that have, stop rolling your eyes), here it is. I had just learned to whizz on my own, and one time, the toilet seat fell and whacked me right on the ... um ... you know. So, I ran out of the bathroom crying, and my mom came over and asked me what was wrong. I told her, and asked her if she could kiss it and make it better. Needless to say, she got me some ice.

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"House" #3 - The Trailer!

Good memories here:

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Hmm ... let's just go with memories, period:

- My mom had a friend visit one day, and she had this way cute little daughter with her. Well, I decided to show off by riding my bike with no hands, and had one of the better wipeouts in the history of bike riding right in front of the cute chick. I also got grounded for a week. Crud.
- I got into a fight with a neighborhood buddy and got a black eye. I told everyone at school that I ran into a doorknob. Quick thinking was never really my forte.
- The family car for one of my neighbors was a Pacer. If you've ever seen one, you understand why that's just funny in general.

When the lady friend and I went back to check this place out, it was a mess. Most of the trailers in the trailer court were gone, and there was junk all over. 'Course, our old trailer was still there (someone decided to spruce it up a bit by painting it blue). It's like a cockroach. Her comment: "I know you said it was by a prison, but I didn't realize it was right next to it!"

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This next picture is basically the view from the end of our street. The road was paved back then, and this was where we did all of our skateboarding. Man, that hill seemed HUGE back then. I guess, in retrospect, we weren't too gnarly with respect to our skateboarding prowess.

More coming soon! 1

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