Miles has had a busy couple of months since graduation, including moving into a new apartment with new roommate (hi, Vinny!). They moved to the northeast quadrant of Portland, from the southwest, so it’s definitely new surroundings. And Miles adopted a cat! I’ll let Miles take it from here, here’s his intro to Joanie and some photos of her in their new place. Miles in Portland, OR writes: “So far Joanie has been the best new housemate and friend I could have asked for! She’s has really enjoyed meeting all of my friends, with the exception of my friend max’s…

A couple of weeks back I got a chance to visit the wine-growing region of California called Sonoma, with a couple of old friends. It was hard to say no, the region is pretty famous for its wine and great food, and because of the time difference, I could get in a half day of work, with plenty of time to explore the area, check out a wine tasting and then go to a local restaurant and enjoy all the great local produce of the area.. What was especially nice was if you went for a hike in the morning,…

We also got to see Hillary Clinton speak in Chicago in May. Mary took the train in for it and we all really enjoyed it .

Back in Chicago now and readers will be forgiven for looking at Lake Michigan below and thinking it looks a lot like the Pacific Ocean! Here a few photos from a visit to northerly island this morning. After coming back Kathleen had a latte in the big comfy chair, and we all remarked on how much miles enjoys a coffee in this chair!

Day 3 at the coast started early with John catching the bus from tillamook back to Portland for a flight back to Chicago so he could attend an important meeting on Thursday. The last 3 standing on this trip 😀 spent the morning at the Oceanside beach then visited the final cape in the afternoon. Then we had some lunch and headed off for NEARBY cape meares. Showing this in a map would be a bunch of scribbles but there was a road closed and marked confusing le, and we ended up taking a very long way around to a…

Day 2 morning started with a walk on the beach with tide out. We walked through the tunnel to the Ricky side of the beach, then back through for the sandy stretch. The afternoon of day 2 on the coast was dedicated to exploring 2 of the 3 nearby scenic capes, cape lookout and cape Kiwanda. Cape Kiwanda also has a fish market so we planned for that last to being home fish to grill for dinner. Cape lookout had some really lovely walks that we took but did have some closures due to conditions. I don’t have many photos…

Sunday morning, we had another flurry of activity, with Liam and Mary heading to the airport, me and John meeting our Portland-based friends Alex and David for breakfast, and Paddy and Kathleen taking a stroll around the neighborhood to again admire the lovely gardens. I have a few photos not posted previously to show how high the bar is for Portland gardens! We then checked out of our Airbnb and met up with miles for a walk and coffee before big hugs for the new graduate and piling into our van to drive to the coast. It’s a really pretty…

Graduation day very nicely filled up with all kinds of activities. We had 4 big parts of the day, a history department brunch, the graduation ceremony, dinner, then a party. First, we had a look at flowers blooming in our neighborhood, and when miles came over he opened up his cards. Thanks everyone! Then we walked over to Miles’s professors’ house for a history department brunch. The event was really lovely – the faculty introduced themselves, graduating seniors each gave a summary of their thesis, and in general we got a feel for the intellectual curiosity, good works and really…

We arrived in Portland with a day and a half or so to enjoy the city’s delightful flora, food, friends and fun before Miles’s graduation. We had a yummy pub dinner and then took a walk through Laurelhurst park where we saw the band Johnny Franco play, with Miles’s friend and fellow about-to-graduate L&C student Charlie on drums. Friday morning we went to the Portland Japanese Garden. The docents told us this is the most authentic Japanese garden outside Japan. No argument here! There was a glass art exhibit there too in the gallery. The artist, rui sasaki, put plant…

We had a great visit with Isabelle and Katie at the end of March. So many great photos! They are both very photogenic, did a lot of fun stuff, and were really good at taking and sharing a lot of photos, so I think this is going to be a heck of a winning blog post! Early on, John took them both to Pizza Friendly Pizza (I had tickets to see the Tina Turner musical that night). Then another evening we went to Big Star tacos, where they each enjoyed a “Walking taco” inside a bag of Frito corn chips.…