Heading for "the Bend"

We are on probably our last trip to South Bend, Indiana, and for probably our last graduation of a daughter, either daughter.  Ellen will be getting her PhD (sociology & religion) from the University of Notre Dame on Saturday morning in a ceremony for all the Masters and PhD candidates, and then there will be another bigger ceremony on Sunday for all of this year's degree candidates. Back in 2009 we attended the ceremony when she got her Master's and President Barack Obama was the commencement speaker.  It was very controversial for Notre Dame but very exciting for us!

And below is this year's commencement speaker:

And in the interest of all things always being equal, we were able to attend older daughter Sara's graduation with her PhD in mathematics from Georgia State University back in December, 2013.  Someone asked me the other day if it's hard to get a Master's degree.  My response was that twenty years ago it must have been easy because I got one.  But what I've seen these two girls go through in order to get to these graduation ceremonies, I know it takes a kind of perseverance and focus, and patience with advisors, that I never could have mustered up in myself.  So, we go to these ceremonies with joy and celebration!

Sara after graduation back in December - in the lobby of our hotel in Atlanta

We started out this morning around 11, planning to take two days to get there since we had the extra time.  Our first stop was Johnson's Store in Port Wing for the two cases of New Glarus beer - Spotted Cow and the sampler box - beer that can only be purchased in Wisconsin.  It was requested by the daughters.  Then we made our way to Benoit Cheese in Benoit, WI, up near us.  This was also a request by Ellen for the celebration this weekend - Wisconsin cheese.  So the bags of curds and several kinds of cheese are in the cooler.

Ashland Ford was our next stop to do a QUICK oil change in the EXPRESS LANE.  It looked like it was going to happen just as advertised until ALL the lights went out while we were sitting in the waiting room.  All - no power.  And our main question was whether the car was up on the hoist yet or not.  Turns out it was NOT, but it was INSIDE the garage, BEHIND the 500-pound garage door.  Since getting the oil change today was not crucial, they eventually opened the door somehow, we got our car and were on our way.

All things going well until a few hours down the road when I realized I had left all my medications home on the counter.  I tend to take this blood pressure situation seriously, so I called my clinic and left a pitiful message for the nurse.  In the meantime I got on my "patient portal" on the clinic webpage and got a copy of all my prescriptions.  I was hoping some Walgreen's or someplace similar would take pity on a ditzy traveler and sell me four days' worth of pills.  But...just as we were driving up to the first Walgreen's I was going to try, the nurse in my clinic called and she was able to enter the info for that very Walgreen's!  Yes, technology!!

And no other problems or missteps and we arrived at our intended destination - Fond du Lac, WI - and all is well.  The nice lady at the hotel desk told us how to get down to Lake Winnebago to see the sights.  

Beautiful areas by the lake and lots to explore in the town, too.

We also asked the nice lady at the hotel about restaurants she recommends.  She suggested Faro's, which is a primarily a Greek restaurant.  Perfect!  They had homemade pita, hummus, tzatziki - something I always try to make and it never tastes the same as in the restaurants.  We noticed that the background music was mid-'60's - Petula Clark, early Beatles, Four Seasons - and I asked the manager/owner as we left who chose the music.  His accent told us he was probably the Greek influence in the restaurant and he said he chose it because he liked it!  I told him that I did, too, and every song was like a trip down memory lane.  

And I hear that tomorrow night we will be at a Czech brewery-kind-of-a-place for dinner.  What's Czech for Prost!