Bettendorf

A couple weeks ago Ben and family came out from Chicago to meet us in Iowa for our niece's high school graduation. He hit it off with Josh, their next door neighbor. Josh was a year older, a little smaller, but much more adept at climbing trees. Josh's father is Greek and married to a Louisiana girl. He shared some pretty select Cabernet Savignon with us. Dix and Ben both want to move to Bettendorf.

I found a little project to occupy my time. Dix's brother-in-law is not mechanically inclined and I saw an easy fix to his basement flooding problem. Water management is a big part of mining. He has a sump pump that pumps water out of the basement after every rain storm. We bought ten feet of gutter and and a couple elbows and rerouted the discharge from half of his roof to a channel that slopes toward the street. I was pleased to learn that the sump pump did not activate even during their recent deluge.

So now their only child is about to spring from the nest for a new life at college. It may be even more life changing for the parents.