Dateline: in the loft at Nona's, Terre Haute IN 16 May 2005

Up at 0500 and out to catch my flight to BWI and then to Indy, arriving just after 10 am local. Mother-in-law there to greet me and we drive to realtor's.

Then off to meet the famous local builder and see the last remaining unsold large lot in his sub-development.

I am immediately underwhelmed by the lot, realizing why it is the last to sell: two drainage easements criss-cross the one acre property, joining in a depression that fills up in big rains and then empties through some sewer pipes. The one acre is half-unusable on this basis, and you'd need to build very close to the street. I am severely bummed and it's only 1130.

We look at another lot (just too small and surrounded by too many houses and then tour the builder's spec house (very impressive; everything this guy does represents the extra yard in quality and craftsmanship).

We part around 1:30pm with me expressing my great desire to have him build us a house, but figuring we'll never locate the lot.

So we toodle around the development and notice one sign on another lot off a cul-de-sac. Turns out a local builder bought five lots at the far side of the first builder's development and he's working these lots for himself and four to sell. But the open lot he has also has a number of not-so-cool drainage issues, and at the much higher price, it just seems not for us.

Then we cruise open-field developments where there are lots for sale, but nothing about a former corn field seems to say, "neighborhood" to me, much less "tree."

Then we bottom out by touring one rental property and finding the weird place full of dead bugs, no appliances in the kitcher whatsoever, and lots of wiring unfinished. Yikes!

Now it's four o'clock and the phonecons with spouse Vonne are getting tense. So we head back to realtor's office and she's going to scan more for properties in a wider swath of territory south of Indy, moving us out of the all-important school district that we'll probably never use anyway out of deference to Catholic schools.

Then our realtor comes in with a read-out on the lot on the other side of the cul-de-sac from the one we looked at this morning. Original buyers get cold feet on building and now want to sell. Full acre.

Do we check? Yes. And it turns out to be pretty darn good. I think we may have found the place, just across the street from the original. Wooded lot. Nice crowning of land. Creek nearby but not on property. Buyers motivated to sell.

So I stay longer and discussions get hot and heavy in the morning. . .

Here's what I managed on the planes in:

■ International organizations across the dial

■ The latest on the surviving members of Axis of Evil

■ Security and compliance as the new competitive edge in business

■ 4GW as practiced by Newsweek

■ America moves on in the global economy

■ Leviathan's speed versus SysAdmin's thoroughness: the budget debate begins