HEADlines

The strangest link I've probably ever seen on a website (courtesy of ESPN):

"Report: Ted Williams' frozen head abused in lab"

Your Civics Lesson

I'm teaching intermediate macro-economics this semester. One thing that keeps coming up in this class is the generally low level of knowledge regarding the role and relationship of various actors in the government. This is not some screed about how "kids are so dumb these days", I know plenty of adults who are similarly uninformed about how things work. So here is a quick primer for you:

Confirmation

This should have been really obvious before, but I wanted to make sure you all knew what a colossal geek I am. This summer Sig and I finally agreed to a split in the Lego cache that my mom has been holding onto for all these years.  Not only did I spend a fair amount of time building a Lego town (for the kids, really), but I took pictures.

More importantly, I learned a few things about playing with Lego as an adult:
1. I was a very dirty child. Soiled. Some of these pieces are disgusting. The white bricks aren't so much white as kind of a grayish-brown.
2. You can *always* find a few more pieces to put together a new building.
3. Abby and Madeline don't really share my personal aesthetic regarding Lego towns. (i.e. they play Lego *wrong*)
4. I can totally see how people end up spending lots of money on this. I can think of about 500 things I wanted to add to the town.

Right now the town is back down (playgroup, etc. were not kind to it), but this weekend we're supposed to build a big castle (surprise, surprise).  I will keep my Lego-starved public informed of the progress.

Aunt Siggy Cute

She has cats! Yeah! (Unless you're Kirstin, then Boo!)

Sleepy in Pittsburgh Cute

With Greta, Wyatt, and Max (I think Gavin was still at work):

Anchorwoman Cute

From the children's museum in St. Louis

Please Don't Throw Up Cute

Apparently they both have good stomachs:

Beach Cute

From the Jersey Shore:

Visiting Cape Cod Cute

From Tick Point, one of Kirstin's favorite spots on the planet.

Visting Boston Cute

Here are the girls (yes, that's Abby in the back) with Kira and Owen, some old friends from Houston who've moved up to NH.

Are you still there?

Alright, I have been really bad about updating the blog since just before our big summer trip. (Sorry mom). I'm going to try and get a better routine down for this starting this month.  So this is just to warn that a quick on-rush of material is about to be regurgitated onto your screen.

Summer Geography

Some of you will be intrigued by where we drove, what states we visited, what highways we took (I'm looking at you, Andy).

We went a total of 6050 miles (roughly). We rolled through TX, OK, MO, IL, WI, IN, OH, PA, NY, CT, RI, MA, NH, MD, WV, VA, TN, and AK. 19 total states. We spent significant time on interstates 45, 44, 55, 39, 90, 80, 76, 78, 95, 93, 81, 40, and 30.

We actually stayed the night in 11 different places. Muskogee, St. Louis, Madison, Northbrook, Pittsburgh, Plainfield, Boston, Beach Haven, Lodi, Abingdon, Memphis.

Here's a little map of the adventure:


View Summer Trip 2009 in a larger map

What I did on summer vacation...

Despite appearances, I haven't completely forgotten about this blog. There was a bunch of stuff going on this spring and summer so I wasn't posting as much. Then the great Vollrath family trek occurred, starting July 1st and ending August 9th.

So to catch the world up on our lives, let's get a rundown of our 40 day trip all over the U.S.

On our trip:
- We ate the best BBQ baked beans ever in Muskogee, OK
- We visited the Magic House children's museum in St. Louis
- We got to play with 4 cats at Aunt Siggy's house
- Kirstin got to take lots of Claritin (see above)
- Grandma made lots of hot chocolate with little marshmallows
- Abby went down her first solo water-slide (which was a pitch black tube, no less)
- Maddie got to decorate Great-grandma's birthday cake
- We had to replace our car battery
- We got to play with Dryden's massive Lego collection
- We went to a Brewers game with Andy and his son Scott
- I found out that Derek Gau - a guy I went to HS with - lives almost next door to Andy and Heather outside Chicago
- We got to play with Greta, Wyatt, Max, and Gavin at the McVerry's house in Pittsburgh
- We got to swim in Eck's pool and eat pizza
- We got to attend a pig roast in Pittsburgh (140 pounds of pork!)
- We stayed in the hotel in Boston and ate dinner in bed
- Kir, Abby, and Maddie got to hand out with Karen, Kira, and Owen in Boston
- Kir, Abby, and Maddie got to visit great-grandma on the Cape
- I got to nod off repeatedly during conference sessions
- We drove up to Manchester and saw Eric, Wendy, Nolan, and Carly (with guest appearance by some of the Pease family)
- We spent a week with GG in New Jersey
- We got to visit Flax (uh, Mamlet) in NYC
- We went in a castle, played on a playground, and rode the carousel in Central Park
- Abby and Maddie got to see where Eloise lives in the Plaza
- Abby and Maddie rode their first roller coaster at Sesame Place along with Matt
- Maddie got her picture with Zoe
- Abby went down like a million water slides
- We ate lobster for Kirstin's birthday (and Abby took down most of a claw)
- Maddie fell out of bed and may have mildly concussed herself
- Abby started going off by herself to read books (where'd she pick up that habit?)
- Maddie played about 8000 games of Candy Land
- We got to go to the beach every day we were on the shore
- We found a giant sand crab, thousands of little clams, and a jellyfish
- Kirstin got tan and I took a couple waves to the face trying to body surf in rough water
- Kir and I went up to the Seneca Lake wine region in NY for our anniversary
- We ended up with over a case of wine in the car (how'd that happen?)
- We saw a hot-air balloon festival in Virginia
- I ate BBQ spaghetti in Memphis (and seriously, why has no one told me about this before?)
- We got a flat tire north of Longview, TX and got to hang out at Wal-mart on the last day of our trip
- We found out our upstairs AC was broken when we got home
- We were incredibly happy to have our own stuff and all of our toys around us again.

It was a great trip (but the kind that almost requires another vacation to recover from).  If you let us breeze through your house on the trip, thanks. If you didn't, beware. We will be planning next year's trip before long.

Camel Cute

Not from New Orleans, here they are at the end of year picnic at pre-school. I wish I could impress on you all how nasty a camel smells.

Mom Cute

All the ladies in the house say "whoop whoop"!

Wedding Cute

From the actual ceremony:

Cafe du Monde Cute

We were in New Orleans last weekend for Jason Lee's wedding. Let's just say that some people enjoyed dressing up, riding in a carriage, eating donuts for breakfast, and swimming in the hotel pool.  Here's a few shots of the girls first beignets:

Crash and burn

So speaking of 80's movies, Top Gun was on the other day.  And I reached one inescapable conclusion while viewing it: Top Gun is the gayest movie of all time.  Not "gayest" as is shitty, but "gayest" as in I'm expecting a gay porno to bust out at any minute.

We all know the volleyball scene was just an excuse to get Cruise and Kilmer shirtless, and for a long time I thought this was just for the ladies. Then I think I realized that it had this really homo-erotic jive going with the slow-motion hugs and sweaty pectorals.  But the whole movie now watches like it's a big inside joke.

Kelly McGillis? One of the all-time worst action movie girlfriends in one of the least-believable on-screen couples ever. But Maverick and Iceman? That, my friends, is some sexual tension. Why do you think Iceman is always sniffing when Mav is around?  Pheremones, baby.  He's horny.  Watch some time and see how closely all the men stand to each other in every scene. They're essentially doing the samba.

I think some day we'll look back at the progress in gay rights and point to two important cultural touchstones that turned public opinion in its favor. One, Top Gun will be seen as making people comfortable with male lust. Two, Bert and Ernie will be seen as making people comfortable with two dudes getting married. Trust me on this.  It's no different than Scooby-doo getting people to accept marijuana usage as no big deal.

Bouncy Sun

Just play it -

Desire

Like there aren't already enough Lego sets I want. Now they're planning on setting up a line of "Lego Architecture" sets.  Apparently they're going to start with sets of the Guggenheim and Wright's Fallingwater house. I think Lego has officially moved over to producing for the over 30 crowd.