Lueders Haus Blog

I was finally able to finish Barack Obama’s book, “Dreams from My Father“, while on vacation. It’s the first book by a politician I have read. He wrote the book in 1995 after finishing law school and I don’t think he was thinking of running for president back then. I’m sure he had some hopes of future office in maybe state or local government. I say this because most of the book is focused on his community organizing on Chicago’s south side. Which seemed to be his true passion when he wrote the book and where he wanted to return to. I’d say he went on a little long in that part but the parts on his childhood and his trip to Kenya were very interesting. His father’s “dreams” seemed to involve having as many children with as many different women as possible. Making it near impossible to keep track of all his brothers. Overall it was a good read but I don’t think I’m going to pick up Hillary’s or Edward’s book anytime soon.

My hometown favorites, the Cubs, are up for sale. If only I had a billion dollars to spare. Hopefully the new owner(s) will have enough left over to invest in building a winning team. But the return on investment of the Cubs as a losing team is not too bad.

If the Cubs do, indeed, sell for $1 billion, Tribune will have earned an annual return of almost 15 percent since it bought the team for around $20 million in 1981. Given the company’s recent problems, it’s probably the best investment it ever made.

Just got back from a week in Yellowstone. I uploaded the photos to my new Flickr account for all to enjoy. We did not end up spending as much time in the backcountry as I would have liked but we did get in some good day hikes. The roads were fairly crowded but just get a mile or so down the road and the crowds disappeared.

As the photos show we spent a good deal of time hiking in the burn. Its been nearly twenty years since the burn and most of the new trees are almost eight feet tall now.

I got to go to a few ranger programs while car camping. A few things I learned: Yellowstone is the worlds first national park and the bison in the park were nearly killed off around the turn of the century and had to be repopulated from a ranch. They now total over a thousand and are the last of the wild bison. The elk population skyrocketed when they killed the wolves and actually had to export elk to other parks. Reintroducing wolves had brought back a more natural balance. A pack of wolves can kill a bull bison but the grizzly bear still rules the day.