Wonders of Garrett

Garrett and Dara went down to SJ State last week for orientation, and Garrett stayed overnight. Among the discoveries:

• Garrett is inclined to major in... English. Doesn't need to make up his mind yet, but still.

• He is really enthused about spending a year abroad.

He signed up for classes and met people he liked. He claimed his Mom embarrassed him during the campus tour, so it looks like things are right on track. I think he moves in to the dorm on Aug 18.

Murder City

This is not the kind of story I really want to read about when Kyla is getting ready to go off to DC for the next two years. The worst of all worlds: a "crime emergency," "ineffective policy," and "race and class tensions simmering." Hot town, summer in the city.

Keeping Cool

Since I mentioned our friends who were into Mindstorms and robotics in the comments on Keith's last post, I thought I'd show you what they did during the recent heat wave to keep cool. Home made air conditioning. Now if they could just couple it with a robot to deliver the drinks, they'd be all set. We cranked up the one window air conditioner in the house (in Garrett's room) and sweated a lot.

Lego's Robot Redux

Lego's Robot ReduxI hope Dan wants this so I can play with it. We have built a bunch of legos over the years but he doesn't need my help anymore, at least not for the ones that don't move.

Priority 1

As usual the return from vacation is met with an overgrown lawn, a few pissed off customers, and a very skinny cat. One E-Mail did get my attention and lifted me from the mundane routine of getting back on track. ARE YOU READY FOR SOME FOOTBALL. I have been contacted by my fantasy league and there is only 35 days left till draft day, plus they have decided to go to a pay league this year. Almost all my hopes for fantasy football have come true, I get to play against the same guys I've been playing with, plus the league has been doubled in size now requiring 2 divisions and the best part is its for money. Im not sure how they will decide to split it up but there should be at least a couple of thousand available for winners. Now if I could finish in the money all those hopes would be realized. I have been playing for 2 seasons, my rookie year I finished 2nd to last, last year I was only one spot out of the playoffs, so it stands to reason this year I will trophy. Thats a whole lot of wishfull thinking but I will give it my best and see what happens. By the way I did feed the cat before I checked my e-mail. Now its on to a day of weedeating and bushhogging.

Fla. Vacation gone but not forgotten

It started like a traditional Fla family vacation with a visit to Kennedy Space Center, you guys have probably all been there but it was our 1st trip and it was impressive. The size of the building necessary to house and work on the shuttle is certainly the largest most technical structure I could ever imagine. The whole tour was quite an eye opener for me and I left with a better understanding of the whole space program and a little more respect for NASA and their mission. Then it was on to Discovery Cove and a chance to swim with dolphins and other sea creatures. It was really a nice place and offered some things you just can't do at Sea world or Disney World. We all had a great time there and we all agreed it was way above any theme park we have been to. We spent a day at sea world also probably the heighlight there was sitting in the "splash zone" at Shamu's show, Dan insisted and they wern't kidding when they said you were going to get wet, we left completely soaked from head to toe, but it was from the fins of a killer whale which I guess made it a little more fun. From there we went to Naples and enjoyed the company of Mom and Dad for the remainder of our stay in Fla. It always feels like home when we're at Mom and Dads we were able to kick back and really get comfortable while visiting. Combine that with a few meals both in and out and it doesn't get much better. Our comfort level [ours and Mom and Dads] was raised considerably by Missy and Mike who were gracious enough to let us use their beautifull condo. I mean this place is 5 star and way above any accomodations we could have booked plus it is walking distance from the main attraction of Naples for us, Mom and Dad. Dan and I tried to take on grandma at scrabble but failed miserably, I left with my tail between my legs as Dan somehow managed to beat me in the process. The Auto train back presented no problems and we are now resting comfortably back in Front Royal with another great family vacation under our belts.

New Sudoku Challenge

Lacking anything interesting to post about, I thought I'd pass on this new gift opportunity for you Sudoku fans.

UK Pictures

We had dueling cameras this time, as you will see in some of the pictures I took of Dara with camera in hand. I posted and titled about 45 pictures from the trip on Flickr. Here are some of my favorites with some explanation.

The Royal Mews (uppity Brit talk for garage behind the house) was one heck of a garage. Kyla never kept the horse stalls in the Yale barn this clean. They had a bunch of carriages used by the Queen and King over hundreds of years, as well as the various Rolls Royces used mostly today.

The walls of the old York Castle surrounded the old town, and we could walk along the walls as a way to get back to our B&B, which was just outside of one of the gates.

Dara loves waterfalls, so when we took the train out to Goathland on the moors, we could not resist a very long hike out to see a waterfall called Mallyan Spout.

Where we stayed outside of Inverness overlooked Loch Ness, but was also a short walk to the Falls of Foyers. There were a lot of hiking paths going various which ways, all the way down to the loch if you wanted. Also, this was just a great picture of my two favorite backseat drivers.

On the way to Isle of Skye, we stopped in a small town called Kyle of Lochalsh. I told you the Internet access wasn't so easy, but at least we found the way to the one computer in town.

I love the joyful look on Dara's face. This was the ride back to the barn. Here we are at a place called Borlum Farm, still overlooking Loch Ness, but from the opposite shore from where we stayed.

Swimming With the Irises

Swimming With the IrisesI saw this and thought of Dara and her love for Irises. Just when you thought you had exausted your planting possibilities, the backyard pool is only a minor detail. It will also cut down on time spent weeding.

Vacation time

Kirsti Dan and I are leaving this AM on vacation for a week. We are taking the Auto Train to Fla. where we will visit Kennedy space center 1 day. It seems we may get to look at the space shuttle which landed there last week. Then on to Discovery cove, a sort of interactive water park that focuses on sea life. After that we are going to spend some time with Mom and Dad. I always dread the theme park and touristy destinations but usualy wind up having fun after all. Spending time with Mom and Dad is always a safe bet for a good time, this time we are going to test drive Missy and Mike's condo for our stay, making it a safe bet for Mom and Dad also. Just for a little excitement I may try that driving on the wrong side of the road thing, although it's probably not much of a challenge with 4 lanes.

UK Wrapup

There was no in-house computer set up for Internet access in Edinburgh or Inverness, so I am doing the wrapup back at home. Edinburgh was great. There is an "old town" and a "new town," the old one dating from the dawn of time and the new one dating from Victorian times. The stunning Edinburgh Castle is on top of a high hill/mountain overlooking the town, and there is a street called the Royal Mile between it and Holyrood Castle at the other side of the town. We learned about Mary, Queen of Scots, and her rivalry with Elizabeth, saw the birthplace of Robert Louis Stevenson, and visited various other touristy sites by bus. The Iris Lady and I spent one morning touring the Royal Botannical Gardens, from which our hotel was right across the street. It's a bit strange to be in Scotland seeing some plants that came from California. We sampled the local food at various places, although I resisted the haggis in favor of pigeon. The waiter said it was served pink, because "it's best that way." I ate it, but I would not recommend it, and I might be more inclined to go with the rat next time.

After Edinburgh it was on to Inverness, the so called capital of the highlands. There we picked up a car and I got to put the week-and-a-half of mental practice of driving on the left side of the road into reality. A steering wheel on the right side of the car, driving in the left lane, in a manual transmission car with the gearshift on my left side, with first gear down and to the left (not reversed from our style, which would feel more natural) was a bit stressful for driver and passengers. However, I was armed with two expert back seat drivers who drew straws to see who would get the death seat. They would patiently coach me ("okay, when you get to the intersection, you're going to make a right and stay in the left lane now") while praising me ("verrry well done turn, and you ended up in the left lane!!!"). And that was just the first five minutes in town to reach the parking lot so we could get some lunch and a well-deserved pint o' ale (just kidding, although the passengers could have used it). After that the driving got more interesting, because the standard road in the highlands is something they call "single track with passing places." People drive at 60mph on roads not really wide enough for one car, with carved out areas for passing. Fortunately those areas are often marked with a sign, because believe me it ain't obvious when you're supposed to be able to fit two cars side-by-side sometimes. The object of the game is that when you see a car coming at you, you both want to end up at the passing place at the same time without cutting your speed much if at all. Then the car with the passing place on his side swerves into it just in time for the other one to zip past, and you wave at each other as if to say "Thanks, mate, for not killing me." I will say that in three days you can actually get quite good at this as you go up and down hills, through tree lined passages, and around hairpin blind turns.

We stayed about 30 miles out from Inverness proper (which is at the northeastern end of Loch Ness), at a kind of handyman special B&B overlooking Loch Ness. It was near a great waterfall and hiking paths. On one of the days we were there we went on a terrific horseback ride, and on the other we drove across to the western side to the Isle of Skye. Stunning scenery everywhere, and we had warm mostly sunny weather. We had expected cold drizzle, but we ended up in a heat wave. The sun rose around 4:30AM and set around 10PM, but it really never got dark. On our last day we left around 9AM to Fort Augustus at the other end of Loch Ness and then drove back to Inverness. At 8:30PM we boarded the sleeper train to London, arriving at 8:30AM the next morning. The sleeper train was cool, although it's not as easy to sleep on a train as you might think. We then hauled our luggage about 6 blocks through the record London heat to the Kings Cross station Underground and then out to Heathrow, and we ended up back home around 8PM. I remembered to drive on the right. Great trip, but as they say, there's no place like home.

The shot of a lifetime

I said I would tell you how paint ball with the pros went. Fortunately for me almost every game was parents against kids so I only had to face off against trained killers twice and that ended up 1 and 1. Regardless of training there is a distinct advantage to being small ,the kids really did well, their ability to hide and dodge served them well and they won their share of the battles. Part of life on the river here is dealing with drunken floaters as the conoe company is about 1/2 a mile down stream. Over the years I've seen my share of foating abusers and their trail of trash. As we started our 1st paintball battle I noticed some floaters on our beach, they were trashed, appantly some of the kids took a couple of shots at them, when I arrived on the scene 2 guys were yelling "go ahead shoot me" one was foolish enough to moon me. I couldn't resist and fired 3 or 4 times till paintball met bare ass from about 20 yards. I'm sure the pain was dulled by liquor but it obviously hurt as I saw him jump a few feet. After a few tense words they got over it and left peacfully. It was a great moment of satisfaction for me after years of cleaning up after these guys, and it provided quite a laugh for everyone including the victims companions.

York, We Knew It Well

We stayed in a nice B&B here in York and are on our way this morning by train to Edinburgh. Kyla and I did a fun ghost tour the first evening, but it was too light to feel very creepy. We also toured York Minster and the viking museum. The best part was what they called the undercroft below the Minster. They had redone the foundations years ago and had done a great job with an excavation down through the Roman times, so you could get a tour of the foundations from the Roman road and sewers up through the Norman times and then up through the medieval. Yesterday we took an old stea train up through the moors and got off at Goathwalk. We took a hike down to see a waterfall. This is apparently the town and train station that they filmed some of Harry Potter at (Hogsmeade). Beautiful, and fortunately it was great weather. I'll report again if we have internet access in Edinburgh.

London Report

We made up 540 steps to get to the top of St. Pauls and take in the view of London on the first day. The second included the touristy bus tour around town and a same-day-tkts entry to a musical about that popular English music style, Motown. Yesterday we did the Tower of London, which was great. For some reason, I thought the Tower of London was a, er, tower, as opposed to the massive castle complex it is. We went to see the musical AvenueQ last night, and it was terrific. The subway, on the one year anniversary of the 7/7 bombings on the London underground, was completely jammed last night after the show. Off this morning to see Westminster, and then it's off to York tomorrow. Our feet are sore, but we're having a great time.

Paintballin with the pros

Dan invited some friends over next weekend for what is called "redneck paintball" that means you are not at an official paintball facility and out in the woods. Some of the parents want to participate also and asked me to join in as well, sounded like fun till I found out the other parents consist of 2 ATF agents and a member of the regional drug taskforce. I could be in for a long and colorfull day. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Tally Ho

Dara, Kyla, and I are off to the UK tomorrow. London and York in England, Edinburgh and Inverness in Scotland, and back home. Garrett is holding down the fort while we traipse through museums, castles, and other old stuff. Maybe we'll do some blogging over there, who knows. It will be almost all trains while we're there, although yours truly is signed up for driving a manual transmission car on the left side of the road in Inverness. I was hoping Garrett would come along to drive, since he would have to be better at the hand-eye coordination shift than me. As a warm up, I've been trying to practice eating without laying down my knife between bites, but even that's not working so well. I've had to overcome this vague feeling I was going to get swatted for bad table manners.