Category: Family

Sara and I just got back from a lovely relaxing weekend in San Diego California. She’s finished up her second busy tax season of the year on Friday Oct 15th and I put her on a plane and told her we were going to chill for the weekend. If was great. We did a good bit of site seeing as every good traveler should. I suggest if anyone has time to travel, and you all should – to get a new perspective on where you are from and/or currently living, is to take a town/city history tour and an architecture tour if available. Ya, it’s great to spend the week at Disney if you happen to be going to Orlando, but do you happen to know anything about the city and why it is this way at present? As Americans, who have a lot of wealth compared to all other nations on Earth, we do not travel enough to see other cultures, even in our own country! (just my opinion)

Anyways, we had a great time. We went to the most famous zoo in the country and we did a trolley tour of the city. We spent some time on the beautiful beaches of Coronado, which has been named the second most beautiful beach from the travel channel. Second to some beach in Hawaii, but that doesn’t count 😉

We went to a lot of very nice restaurants and ate tons of food. Toured the USS Midway Aircraft Carrier and saw Shark Tale the movie. We also did a lot of lazy relaxing activities. Sara caught up on a lot of sleep she had lost over the past month or so. It was a great time. The city is beautiful. Oh ya, and to clarify some stories you may have heard…. San Diego had not had a single bit of precipitation in 180 days solid, that’s over 6 months without any rain whatsoever. The weekend we arrived, rain was scheduled. Well very little rain manufactured itself but there was some sort of “rain”. Most here would call it a passing sprinkle or even a slight mist. It was such a non-rain as I’ve ever witnessed, but I guess they were in such a drought state they’d be happy for anything. The meteorologists on the local tv channels there were predicting the rain like they were predicting the blizzard of ’93. “Stay off the roads if you don’t have to go anywhere, there’s 180 days of oil and grease build-up that is sure to make a slippery and potentialy dangerous situation.” That made me chuckle, give me a break Mr. Paranoid. I can’t wait for the next weekend jaunt!

Here are the pictures we took while in San Diego: Link

Sorry it’s been so long everyone! I know we’ve had many visitors and have visited many over the past month and a half. I have finally uploaded more than 500 new photos, from these visits, to our photo site at: www.benjaminmurphy.com/photos.
These events were:

1. My vacation to Denver, Colorado
2. Travis and Amanda Krampy’s Wedding
3. Matt and Sara’s Parents and Grandparents Visits
4. July 4th Visit to PA
5. Mindy’s Wedding Shower
6. Becky and Jane’s Visit
7. The Chicago Air and Water Show
8. Tracey’s Visit
9. My Chicago Friend – Ozzie’s Bachelor Party
10. The Hunting Camp and the Big Knob Fair

We have had a lot of fun with everyone coming out to visit us and also going home and visiting with everyone as well. We really hope that more people can make the journey out here to visit us and get a little taste of Chicago for themselves!

After such a long and tiresome week of moving and cleaning we are finally settled in to our new home on N Seeley St. It took several late night cleaning sessions and plenty of rolls of paper towels but the filth has been lifted and we can sleep in peace and cleanliness. Sara and I love the new place, we are very happy here. The Johnsons have opened up their home to us and we are thankful to them. It’s nice to come home everyday and see the kids (Katy and Drew) as well as the slobbery Wags (the dog) playing in the backyard craving our attention. Here are some of the much anticipated pictures of the inside of our new home. Sara took them so give her props. We are looking forward to our very first visitors from the far east — Becky, Hannah, and Jane. They are privy to seeing the new digs in all its glory. And they might even get to stay here too. The next most privleged person to visit at the end of the month is Tracey. She gets to stay and chill with us for a whole weekend and we are looking forward to it.

On to bigger and better news. Mrs. Sara recieved her promotion from Deloitte to become a “Senior”! That’s big news people. Saramarie you rock!

Thanks for all those that helped us move especially big Jim and my friends Ozzie and Justin. They all hooked up a brother in need. Ok so we are all moved, where’s all the welcome to your new home cookies? Let’s go moms get your spatulas stirring. 🙂 I’m pretty fond of most kinds of cookies.

Update Again:
It’s been brough to my attention that I screwed up the area code on our new numbers. It’s 773 not 733 as I had typed. So I will correct this, but at least I got the address right so there is no excuse for those of you not to send cookies and other home warming treats our way!

UPDATE: Sorry about the mass email notifications sent from me. The server went a bit nutty whenever I sent it out. It’ll never happen again, er hopefully anyways. Please forgive me!

Sara and I ponied up for some new cell phones and decided to ditch the evil empire that is SBC(the monopoly of land utility phone service in the midwest and western United States). So far we’ve been having plenty of fun with them. But they are lacking much needed names to go with them. So instead of saying, “Hey Ben, can I borrow your cell phone?” You could say, “Hey Ben, can I borrow Gina for a second?” My cell phone is a sleek black Sony Ericsson, and I’d prefer a mysterious-sexy female name if possible. Sara’s is a silver Nokia, and I’m sure she’d rather have a name like Sherman and Hank for her phone 😉 (Just kidding, she wants a cool name too, like Sven or Austin.) So if you’d like to help us name our phones please leave us a comment.

The numbers:
Sara’s Cell: 773-490-6651 (She’s has this number for the past two years, so no changes there.)
Ben’s Cell: 773-294-4943 (I’m 24 and this is my first ever cell phone, I think when you become a teenager these days you are issued a phone by your parents or something. I feel like an out of date old fart.)
Our Home phone number is going the way of the dinosaur so please delete it out of your PDAs, cell phones, Outlook Contacts, Calendars, Day Planners, Scrap Pieces of Paper, sidewalk chalk, etc.

New Address as of Aug 1st 2004:
4828 N Seeley St.
Apt #1
Chicago, IL 60625

News:
Sara and I have been packing all weekend for the big move only three blocks away. It’s always nice to move at least once a year to keep the clutter and junk level down to a minimum. There was a wise toad that once told me that you fill the space you are alotted with goods/junk kinda like an aquarium. Well our new place won’t be quite as big as the lap of luxury we spent this past year, but it’s still roomy enough for us.

Super bonus awesome news!!
Much thanks to Gma&Gpap Brown for the much needed hook up that helped to ease our debt sufferings a little bit! And also to enjoy our selves a bit and buy an Xbox to have some fun with on those bitter cold Chicago nights. Since the new place won’t have a roaring fireplace we’ll have to warm ourselves up everynight by playing some dual action Dance Dance Revolution Ultramix!

Wow we’ve been so busy for the past four weeks it’s completely insane. I had my friend Matt Antoline out here for a weekend, then Sara’s parents and Grandparents were out visiting, then we flew home for an extended July 4th weekend, and then Sara’s sorority sister and college roommate flew out here this weekend. Talk about fun all around, but we need a vaca from all the hustle and bustle!

Last night Jim and I went to a double header at the new Soldier Field. It was US Men’s Soccer vs. Poland and then the MLS Chicago Fire vs. New England Revolution. Wow what awesome games! I never realized how large the Polish population is in Chicago until last night. The fans were rabid and diehard to say the least. Three nutty Polska’s (Polska is Poland in Polishese), ran out onto the field like maniacs after Poland scored. They were then cuffed and hauled off. Then after US scored very late in the game to tie it up some crazy dude sitting near us ran down to a bunch of rowdy Polish fans and dropped his pants baring what Jim’s said to be a tribute to the red, white, and blue in some sort of bikini fashion. Well take that you rabid Polish fans, we have crazy fans too, albeit disgusting.

All this just to say, that it was quite the experience. American League Football has nothing on the rivalries that come between two countries and their love of the most popular sport on earth.

The only downer was that I got really sick by the time Chicago Fire started playing and we had to leave a bit early, but the night was not a wash. We got to see two great games and plenty of lunacy from the fans. Oh, and also it was the largest crowd ever to witness a Chicago Fire game. It’d have to be attributed to the Us vs. Poland game though with the Polish fans dominating the attendance. An amazing time.