June 2026

July 23, 2026 by Brigham Barnes

Here’s stuff we did in June that wasn’t me going to Chicago.

June 6: ORB, Liz’s video game music band, played a video game convention at the Fairgrounds. Or should I say they opened for famous band Green Jell-o (Jelly), who some of my friends liked in High School? Because they did!

June 13: Fun day trip to Troy, OH…passing through Urbana on the way so you know we had to shop at Crabill’s!

Why were we going to Troy? Main reason: to try K’s Hamburger Shop and BOY did I like it! Hard if not impossible to top Crabill’s, but K’s was an ideal meal in an ideal venue for me.

Downtown Troy itself was a wonderful collection of vintage shops, comic book stores, book stores, and assorted other sights.

Goodbye Troy, goodbye K’s, hope to see you again someday!

June 27: A walk around the neighborhood.

Then we saw Toy Story 6 (Great!) with the Gardners and went to check out a little military museum…but on the way, saw this Buddhist temple place from the freeway and had to check it out.

Oh and then there was a farm market…

And THEN we got to the little military museum…turns out it wasn’t that little! Tons and tons and tons of stuff to see, quite the collection.

June 28: With a few days to go before our first house official sells, Liz and I pay one last visit to Dlyn street. Too excited/glad to have it sold to feel too nostalgic about it, but it was a good little house. Lots of nice memories there.

This is the kind of memories we’re making in the new house now.

Juneteenth in Chicago

July 20, 2026 by Brigham Barnes

“Thanks” to holiday disparity between Liz’s work calendar and mine (don’t get us started!) I drove home to Chicago for a nice weekend with Mom and Dad. Halfway home I stopped for sliders at Power’s in Fort Wayne, another Hamburger America spot checked off the list! They really were like if a person made you White Castle with care and the onions were rather thickly sliced. Nice.

I left for Oak Park from work around noon and ran into just some of the worst Chicago traffic coming in. Just how it had to be. The drive took a few more hours than I expected. Just how it had to be. I did eventually get there and that’s what matters.

And after a nice dinner at home with Mom and Dad, a walk around the neighborhood with Mom and Dad, followed by additional Brigham solo-walking.

On Friday the 19th I set off on a huge walk that eventually got too huge. First I walked down to the L station, passing OPRF construction along the way..

And then I made my way from the West Loop to the Loop and ate at a Hawaiian restaurant that did not meet hopes or expectations.

From lunch we go to the Art Institute for a bit.

From the Art Institute, a walk up Michigan Avenue

The main goal of my walk up Michigan: a visit to Chicago’s new Leica store, to see if they had the new 35mm f/1.2 Noctilux. Which they did. And to see if they’d let me try it out. Which they did.

$10,000 is quite the price for a lens (and not nearly the most expensive Leica lens, either). But consider this photo and the far beyond 100% close up on the lens…look how clear and sharp that lettering is, at f/1.2. That’s not nothing.

From the Leica Store I backtrack and eventually make it all the way back home. 25,000 steps doesn’t seem the right number.

Saturday: Up and at ‘em and down to the Oak Park Farmer’s Market with Dad.

Then we went with Mom to Palmisano Park, a quarry park right in the middle of a part of Chicago I don’t know that I’ve ever been to before. We had a nice explore and worked up the perfect Johnnie’s hunger.

Saturday afternoon: I walk to downtown Oak Park to mail a postcard. To whom? Oh you know who!

And that evening, a little family walk. On Sunday we went to church and celebrated Father's Day and then my drive home to Columbus took a lot, lot longer than expected. Seems I should adjust my expectations. Anyway. Nice Chicago weekend.

May 2026

July 11, 2026 by Brigham Barnes

I am going to make this post out of order, time wise, to make it more interesting. I mean to start with something more interesting. Because if I made the post in chronological order, then it would start with lots of pictures from walks without any people in them. And that’s a little less interesting of a way to start a post.

But here’s a great way to start a post: With a wedding! On May 16 I went with Liz to the wedding of a former coworker of her’s and it was a really lovely affair, like just the best and sweetest time. And also, we had just gotten an offer on our house after it only being on the market for one day. So Liz and I were riding high and enjoying that wedding! (…however, those would be buyers would eventually become not buyers, but guess what, I’m writing this post in the middle of July and we’ve completely sold the old house, so all’s well that ends well).

Another thing that had me in a great wedding mood is I finally had an occasion to wear my blue seersucker JPress suit, at last, and I was really feeling myself. As I believe I should have been. Shout out to Keith for the talking to about wearing a pocket square he had given me a few years back. In this occasion it was certainly the thing to have done.

Okay now we jump back in time to May 9 when I needed to go to the old house for some reason and took some Hardesty Heights pictures. It’s a cute place to live! Or to have lived! (but don’t worry I am still alive a ghost is not writing this).

And another cute place to live is our current house, a.k.a. our new house!

On May 11 I took a day off from work so that I could go to this marshy place near our house and see what kinds of animals or birds I might see in the very early morning. The answer: normal birds, some deer. It was nice, though.

May 15 we went and celebrated Anne’s birthday at a favorite Italian restaurant where they kicked us out of our private room right after dropping the check. Hrrmmm. Pasta was good as always, though. Maybe we’ll be back at PF Chang’s next year?