Hanging with the Handley's in Indianapolis, IN

Indianapolis wasn't exactly on our way from anywhere to anywhere else. But I was excited to make a stop there and visit my old college music and rock climbing buddy, Taylor, and meet his wife Wendy and their little man, Noah.

Wendy and Taylor had dinner (salmon stuff with cream cheese) on the stove waiting for us when we arrived from Chicago on Monday evening. Just like other old high school and college friends, I hadn't seen Taylor in many years, but kindred spirits are never far apart. As we nibbled on home made chocolate chip cookies for dessert, Taylor pulled out his mandolin and we sang along to a couple of old Grateful Dead tunes.

Wendy suggested the Indianapolis Museum of Art as a point of interest for Kim the next day. Actually, it worked out really well for me too. Free entry, and free wifi at the museum cafe. The bandwidth was excellent, the coffee was pretty good, the room was huge, with 40-foot ceilings, really quiet, and overlooking a nice fountain. Honestly, one of the best work locations I've found so far on the trip.

Kim really enjoyed the museum. She came down to grab me at 4:45pm and bring me up to her favorite exhibit -- a Rube Goldberg style, multiroom machine than moved a giant ping pong ball up, down, and all around through the walls and back to the start, over about 10 minutes. She was right, I enjoyed it.

I pretty much called it a day at that point, and we headed back to our host's house, which is a really hip neighborhood called Broad Ripple.

For our friends in Austin, it's much like South Congress, with funky little boutiques and soulful pubs. Wendy had a prior engagement with some of her girlfriends, so Kim, Taylor, little Noah, and I took a walk from their house over to a brew pub along a jogging trail in Broad Ripple. We scored miserably on the Tuesday Night Pub Trivia (I think we got 4 out of 20 questions correct, which was actually more than a lot of groups), and enjoyed a nice evening. On our walk back, we passed another bar called Plump's Last Shot...

...owned by one of the real life basketball players from the story that inspired Hoosiers.

I dipped in just long enough to check out the memorabilia on the wall. It was well past Noah's bed time, so we didn't stay for a round, but have a beer for me there if you're in the area!

And just like that, our time in Indianapolis had expired. Thanks Taylor and Wendy for having us! We're hoping to return the favor when you're in Texas in the fall ;-) Cheers!

:-Dustin