Do they know it's Christmastime at all?

What a silly question to ask. Of course they do. Hobbes' inability to go to bed for the last two weeks was evidence enough. Throw on top of that three Christmas parties, the Christmas decorations, and the Christmas music we've been playing at home, and I'm thinking everyone in our household was well aware that Christmas was coming.



We did not travel at all this year. It was a 'quiet' Christmas at home. Christmas Eve we wrote letters to Santa, left out cookies and lemonade (there were concerns the cats would knock over the milk before Santa had a chance to drink it), and hung the stockings by the front door with care. The kids were sent to bed with admonishments that they were not to leave their room before 7am. (Stop snickering.) Ma (in her kerchief) and I (in my cap) settled our brains for a viewing of Twilight (which was better than I expected, although a tad self-indulgent)(aimed at teens?).

The clatter arose at 6:30am, when Hobbes arrived upstairs declaring that he had been awake since 3am, and that to wait anymore was "torture". Ma tried the "wait until your brother wakes up" trick, but, alas, Calvin was awake, too. So, like dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly when met with an obstacle mount to the sky, Sweetie got up and made coffee. All adjourned to the living room for the opening of stockings. Santa was generous with the candy this year, and the kids had a good sugar buzz going as Sweetie make a french toast dish. Cleverly she served the boys the ones soaked in Grand Marnier (don't worry, most of the alcohol cooked off). She claims it was a mistake, but I think she was trying to keep the volume down around 11.

Like many families (apparently) we had made plans to Skype my folks and sister on the East Coast. I fired up the laptop, but they were not online yet. So we began opening presents. Santa had a big surprise for the Things this year. They got a Wii, something (surprisingly) neither had asked for. What a reaction. (Video to be posted shortly.)



We finally got the call from the East Coast. Initially there were connection problems (something to do with the other 15 million people using Skype, perhaps), but we finally got a stable connection and had a nice 90 minute chat and got to watch each other open presents. Things got a little intense for the cats. Kevin had to sit in a bag for a while. Then he curled up amongst the presents (and got a wrench put on him). Happy just tried to stay out of the way.



The kids got a few games for the Wii and lots of Legos, of course. Hobbes got a sleeping bag and a hiking stick. Calvin got a remote control car and several games. All in all, a noisy happy Christmas.

Christmas dinner was a very nice prime rib with mashed potatoes and green beans almondine. It was very delicious. The next night, as we were eating a delicious shepherd's pie that Calvin was not enjoying, we quizzed him on how different meals rated on a scale from 1 to 10. The shepherd's pie got a 4; Christmas dinner got an 8. What got 10s? Hot dogs, pizza, and Kraft mac & "cheese". Our little gourmet.

Now the hullabaloo is past. Okay, now Christmas is past. Hullabaloo still lurks. There has been much haggling over Wii time since. Unreasonably, we parents take the stance that running around outside is good for them, while the kids are on the side of Wii Forever.

Happy New Year all! And to all a good night!

Backyard BBQ

The backyard BBQ is a time-honored American tradition, dating back to the first time Dolly Madison set the outdoor kitchen on fire. It is also a well-loved (yet little known) show of local music put on every week by WXYC (a great radio station, even if their DJs are mostly terrible and their format obscure). Right now we don't really have a backyard BBQ. Our grill is on the side of the house because that was the large flat area that didn't turn into a mud pit when it rained. But I didn't name this posting "Sideyard BBQ" and I'll tell you why. (This is a blog, after all, not an online sweepstakes.)

You may have heard me mention working on the backyard in this blog. I've talked about it several times since we moved in two and a half years ago. Let's revisit the back yard as it was, year and year ago:

Yes, and lovely, wasn't it. Sorry I don't have a shot of it when it rained. Or when the big branch fell out of the eucalyptus tree.

Well major work has been completed. We put in a shed. We put in a deck, and now we've completed the terraced garden area. If only we could them to cut down the damn tree. We still plan to put pavers down in all the remaining dirt areas, but that will come when the rainy season ends. A few photos showing off our handiwork:




Much better, no? Now I just need to drag the grill around back and we can have a backyard BBQ.

No way to start a conversation

So last night we're watching one of the Star Wars films and Calvin turns to me and says, "Dad, you need to drink less beer." (I was drinking one at the time.)

A bit taken aback, I said, "Why? Am I a bad dad when I drink beer?"

"No, but it fills up the recycling with bottles and then it's heavy."

NB 1. We have the boys take our recycling down to the recycling collection point.
NB 2. The recycling collection point is about 25 feet away from our house now.
NB 3. For the record, I drank exactly two beers this weekend.

I'm a rambling....rambling guy

So, what's up? Long time no write. It's times like this I wish I were an inspired writer who had witty things to say about observations I made that day of human behavior or the natural world or politics or whatever, but I spend most days in a concrete block room staring at two computers. Sometimes I wear shoes. A lot to complain about, I know.

I was recently chatting with a friend and asked how the weather was on the East Coast, and she said "It's warm - 70 degrees. How is it there?" And I replied...wait for it..."It's cold - 70 degrees." Ahahahahahahhha. I'm so witty.

Anyhoo...turns out Cub Scouts teaches some practical skills. Hobbes had been working on his Engineering Activity Badge, so I called him out on it. I took him in the backyard and made him help me figure out how many pavers we'd need to finish the back yard. First we drew a sketch of the back yard - where the deck is, where the shed is, where the gardens are, where the tree is. Then we blocked out areas the stone will go. Finally we measured and calculated the area to be covered. Practical math! Hobbes was reluctant to work on this at first because, you know, it sounded like work. But he warmed to the task, and I think by the end he would even admit he had some fun.

For her birthday, Sweetie got (from me) a new blender, (from Calvin) a little box with shells glued all over it, and (from Hobbes) new bicycle tires. Okay, one out of three romantics isn't great. This weekend we finally got around to putting on Sweetie's new tires. Hobbes and I made it into a photojournalism project. Through the magic of blogging, it will seem like no time at all while I go get the camera and upload our pictures. Okay, there are too many to post here, so I'll put them in a Picasa Web Album. I changed the front tire as a demonstration, and then let Hobbes have at the rear tire. He did a great job! The next day we were able to go for a family bike ride to Ballast Point and Well's Beach. Then I tried to fix Hobbe's bike and now it has to go to the shop. Moving on...

We didn't fix Sweetie's bike last weekend because we were, as they say, "over town". Sweetie was there to attend a Catalina Conservancy research symposium, and I was taking the boys to the USC v Stanford football game (Beat the Tree!) It was Homecoming, so campus was crazy. We got there around 9am and there were already popups all over campus with hordes of cardinal-and-gold-clad fans of all ages. We braved the Bookstore so Hobbes could get a sweatshirt, and, of course, Calvin ended up with a new jersey. (For the weekend, I didn't have to pay for the tickets, our lodgings, the parking, or brunch, so I thought I could splurge.) We then headed over to the brunch at the University Club, hosted by a couple who are not only donors to the Wrigley Institute, but also sponsors of the Song Girls, check that, the World Famous Song Girls. Alas, it being Homecoming, the Song Girls couldn't attend the brunch (they normally do). The boys were very polite to these delightful people. We headed over to the game with the rest of the horde. Hobbes would be sitting with our friends, and Calvin would be with me. We had nose-bleeds in the end zone, but it's not like there's a bad seat in the Coliseum. Calvin had a great time. He knew when good plays happened, and when bad plays happened. He clapped along with the fight song and flashed his "V". In the end, Stanford really whipped USC - quite unexpected. Calvin wasn't too disappointed. We met back up with Hobbes. He had a good time, too. We drove back to the apartment exhausted. Sweetie was also exhausted from her day, so we had a quiet dinner and called it a night.

So that was chronologically a little out of order, but that's all right. It adds flavor - keeps the reader off-balance - they'll never expect it when the end of the entry suddenly

Weekend Adventures

Well, with the start of school and Scouts, fund-raising can't be far behind. And having procrastinated for about two weeks, I thought it was time for Hobbes and Calvin and I to make an attempt at selling some delicious Trail's End popcorn! So we headed down to the center of, uh, town (such as it is) and began the difficult task of selling popcorn. Why is this so difficult? Because we don't actually have the popcorn to sell; it's order-based. So since most of the foot traffic is tourists, they're not too keen on ordering popcorn that will be delivered to us on the island with no good way of getting it delivered to them. And also many of them come from communities that have Cub Scout Packs of their own and have already purchased popcorn. And then there was that large group of Indian Guides that didn't seem too keen on supporting a rival organization (okay, actually they were preoccupied with fishing). But we did get some people who sent snacks to the troops overseas and a few people just made a donation to the Pack. It was a good lesson in the practical difficulties in selling anything to anyone.

In the afternoon, we went to Shark Harbor for the first time in a while. The tide was way out, which gave Sweetie an opportunity to take some pictures of intertidal critters. The waves ranged from 1 to 4 ft, but were coming straight in, so the whole wave would crest and curl at the same time all the way across the beach. So not optimal for surfing (body, boogie, or otherwise), but we had a good time jumping around in the waves. Hobbes got his first lessons in body surfing and had some success. Calvin got tumbled once and popped back up immediately, but he was a bit more wary of the waves after that.


Sunday was soccer day. Calvin's team won handily again, but there were two events worth noting. First, the Yellow Team finally scored. They were pretty excited, as were most of the parents from both teams. Second, Calvin scored! I managed to miss the event, being on the far side of the field at the time and couldn't see through the mass of kids. He was happy, but pretty nonchalant about it. We had some celebratory ice cream afterwards.

As we crested the last rise before the descent into Two Harbors on our way home, we saw this enormous ship in Isthmus Cove. I mean, it must have been about the same size as Bird Rock. It was huge! It was some Navy vessel, I think, but not one that I could readily identify. (I know 'aircraft carrier' and 'battleship' and 'submarine' and this was none of those.) So we took a quick bike ride out to Lion's Head point to get a better look. I'll have to ask about why it was here at work tomorrow. (There's always someone who knows in a small town.)

Activities

Well, you'd think that being stuck on the lonesome end of an underpopulated island, where there's only a one-room schoolhouse and 7 kids, the activities would be rather limited. Fortunately (?) in Avalon (a mere 20 miles away over dirt roads) they have more kids, and thus we have Calvin signed up for youth soccer, and both Hobbes and Calvin signed up for Cub Scouts. I have agreed to be the Tiger Den Leader this year, as well. On top of being PTA President, I'm starting to feel, not over-extended yet, but perhaps fully-extended.

Soccer games are Sunday at noon. Avalon has enough U-8 kids for two teams, Green and Yellow. Calvin was quite reticent to play when we first approached him about it. There was a lot of whining about not wanting to drive across the island, but it was something else that was bothering him. Since we had already signed him up, we told him he would go week 1 and see how it goes. So we get there and the first thing that happens is Calvin gets his uniform, including shin guards, and he's told he can keep them. Calvin is now sold on youth soccer. He is very excited to play. Now this being Southern California, a large majority of the kids there are hispanic, and a large number of them (for, I guess cultural trend reasons) have their hair slicked up into fauxhawks. Calvin stuck out like a sore thumb on the pitch because 1) he's the smallest one out there, and 2) he's blond. Well, after some practice kicks, the coaches arrayed the kids across the pitch, the ref blew the whistle, and amoeba soccer (props to my friend Mary for introducing the term to me) began. Hobbes has never been interested in competitive sports, so this is our first experience with it. It was an odd feeling, watching my boy out there on the field: pride, anxiety, excitement. For his part, Calvin was so excited to be out there in the action. Huge grin, running around after the ball, kicking it a few times, getting knocked down and, one time, getting hit "in the tenders" (his words) by the ball. Hilarious. Afterwards we had lunch and drove back to Two Harbors. Calvin slept hard the whole way.

We ended up driving back across the island Monday for Cub Scouts. Two days in a row is kinda hard, but it looks like we may be doing it many weeks this winter. We've got 4 in the Tiger Den right now. I've been realizing/remembering that being a Den Leader means you have to organize meetings. So I found my files from when I was Hobbes' Tiger Den Leader and I pulled out Hobbes' Tiger book and started planning out some meetings. The Webelos I leader (Hobbes' group) said she thinks that they're going to try to do most of their advancement work during weekend campouts once a month, rather than weekly meetings. We'll see how that works out. It would be good to get more camping in. The Pack in Avalon is probably 25 kids, and the Scout Troop is about 15. They meet together once a month. The program has only been going on for about 7 or 8 years, I think. The oldest Scouts are just now getting to the upper ranks (Star, Life and Eagle) [Speaking of which, can anyone explain to me why the Scouts switched to those drab beige rank patches? I liked the old ones much better.]

Tonight we also had Back To School Night. The new Ms Frizzle is great; she's got a lot of energy, and has a strong background both educationally and experience-wise. She explained the structure of the school day and then the kids showed us some of what they'd been working on. The mornings are all about math and reading/grammar. Then in the afternoons they have "enrichment", which can be PhysEd, Art, Music or Science. She has everyone, even the first graders, learning cursive. Both Things are enjoying school, although there are the usual complaints about the usual things.

Okay, I'm going to try to load some video now. We'll see if it works. Okay, apparently I need to fill up this disk before I can get any video off it. I'll have some killer stuff when I do. Well, at least I have some pictures, thanks to Sweetie.

These pictures are from week 2 of soccer, so Calvin is sporting his very own fauxhawk. Here he is getting kitted up:


During warm-ups, his shoe came off. Classic.


And now the action shot - Calvin goes in for the strike!

Underwater adventures

First, an aside: Driving into the lab Sunday morning I saw a large bird flying. I thought it was a great blue heron, until I realized it was carrying something, and then I thought "that could be an osprey." Sure enough, the bird landed on top of a power pole. I ran up to get the small binoculars I have in my office and then climbed to the third floor to get a better look. It was an osprey with a big fish, and he warily started pecking away. Apparently the fish didn't like this, because its tail was flapping around. Ten minutes later, the fish's tail was still flapping around occasionally. Ugh. Some days it's better to be the osprey, huh? (But it's always better to be the birder.)

So I've been taking SCUBA lessons. This whole thing started in July and has now managed to stretch into September. I've done training dives both Saturday and Sunday for the last two weeks, and I've passed the swimming, diving and written tests, so I am now officially a novice diver. The training dives were quite fun, although on the first two I think I spent more time trying to figure out how to dive, rather than enjoying it. The first two dives were in Big Fisherman Cove, which is where WMSC is located. We dove 20-30ft down to sandy bottom and saw bat rays, skates, a sanddab (flatfish), sheepshead, kelp (calico) bass, and along the rocks near the pier, some garibaldi and spiny lobsters. This weekend we dove in kelp forest. Saturday was Chalk Cliff Cove. That day we saw some abalone, a horn shark and an octopus, along with much of the stuff we saw previously. Kelp forest was cool to dive in - like swimming through bushes. We also hit a thermocline. It was very interesting to see the visual distortion caused by the differing densities of water. Sunday we dove Pumpernickel Cove, which was also kelp forest. Here we saw some green abalone, bunches of snails and large sea urchins, garibaldi, lots of kelp bass, some really big sheepshead, lobsters, and a kelpfish. A fun couple of weekends, but exhausting. Diving is hard enough, but do it in cold water and you're pretty much done for the day.
The Dive Master at the lab (who taught the class) is very enthusiastic about having some more resident divers, so maybe Sweetie (after she re-certifies) and I can get some good diving in while we're here. There's certainly a lot to see down there.

Foreign Policy

Today at lunch, the Things and I (Sweetie) started talking about wars in which the United States is currently involved. Hobbes was confused about which war was which... He knew the two countries involved were Afghanistan and Iraq, but not the rationale behind why we invaded each of these countries. I explained the different situations to him and reassured him that this was a common source of confusion in the minds of many people, not only nine-year old boys, but also those who should know better.

We talked about the attacks of September 11, 2001 and who was responsible and why we invaded Afghanistan in response to those attacks. I showed them the pages from my scrapbook that included newspaper clippings and my personal account of that day and the days that followed. Both Things were surprised by the ferocity of the terrorist attacks and wondered why anyone would do such a thing. This led to a discussion of repressive religions and how they prey on the poor, disenfranchised, and uneducated members of their society, creating an environment in which flying airplanes into buildings seems like a reasonable way to get one's point across. Both boys were amazed to learn that education was forbidden most people in the Taliban-led Afghanistan, including boys, but especially girls. I was so proud when Hobbes pronounced this "Stupid." The Things asked why the Taliban attacked us and I said that they thought that the Americans were bad people and that the United States was bad. Calvin piped up with a gem: "Dude! Don't they know? We've won, like, a thousand soccer games." [Eds note: That's my boy!]

Ms. Frizzle is a girl!

So, this is the first post by me, Sweetie. Mr. Life in TH says that I can post anytime I want, but I've noticed that he hasn't given me the password to his blogspot account... I think he's planning to maintain editorial control of this blog.

Anyway, I wanted to share a funny story about one of the Things and his view on gender:

Calvin came home from kindergarten one day and we were sitting on the couch in the living room, watching something on TV. He turned to me and said, “Mom, can boys turn into girls?” I was a bit startled by his questions -- I really wasn’t sure about where this was going! But I have learned not to panic at off-the-wall questions, but first to find out what they really want to know… I answered, “Well, not really.” Transgendered folks out there might balk at my response, but, you know, he was five years old. I didn’t think he was ready for a conversation about how sometimes one’s gender and anatomy don’t match. He looked at me, satisfied, and said, “I thought so. So Ms. Frizzle is a girl.” (Ms. Frizzle was his kindergarten teacher.) I made some noise about how, yes, Ms. Frizzle is a girl. Calvin continued, “She just has short hair.”

Peculiarities of living in Two Harbors

I've got two little things to relate today. One is a hazard of living in Two Harbors, the other is just local color.

Last night, Hobbes and Calvin and I went down to the General Store for some ice cream for dessert (Sweetie is teaching right now, so she was still at the lab). As we sat at a picnic table and ate it, a pair of young boys started playing a game at the volleyball court - not volleyball, of course, but one in which the older boy was making up the rules to the younger boy's detriment. When my boys finished, I suggested that they go see if the other boys wanted to play a bit, since we don't have much chance to play with kids around here. This lead to me meeting the mothers of the children. Now this is a common occurrence around here. Having a lot of visitors, you meet a lot of people in passing, and many of them are very friendly and interested in the fact that you live on the island, etc. One of the women was very talkative. She was a middle school teacher from somewhere in the LA area. We talked about sharks - she's terrified of them having witnessed a shark attack when she was younger (a girl lost her leg), so she was trying to overcome her fear of the ocean by coming out to Catalina on her friends' sailboat with her kids. She also said she wanted to instill in her boys a sense of an adventurous life. Apparently, she used to do adventurous things with her dad when she was a kid, and now she was trying to pass that on. We talked for quite a while until it was nearly dark. The boys didn't mind; they were playing in the sand (oblivious to the other children about). I guess there's no real point to this anecdote (in my fraternity, they referred to these as "Cheese stories", since my nickname was Cheese), just that this happens all the time and is a nice benefit of living in a tourist destination. (Well, this tourist destination, anyway.)

On our way back to the house, we saw the local insane cat sleeping in the middle of the road. For some reason, this cat likes to curl up in a little ball on the dusty, hard-packed road surface. Usually, it's just off to the side, where it's only about 10% likely to be run over, but on this evening, with the light fading, it was dead smack in the middle of the road. The first time I saw it, I thought it was one of the feral cats that are all over town, but this one, despite its matted coat and odd behavior, has a collar with a tag. The owners have even gone so far as to put out a traffic cone with a sign that reads "Caution Lazy Cat". I've got to get a picture.

Life in the TH, baby.

Exhausting weekends

I've recently decided that my weekends were too restful, and I needed to really start over-exerting myself. So I've had a variety of weekend activities over the past few weeks (since we got back from vacation). Last weekend was digging out the backyard slope for a retaining wall (we're slowly trying to get our backyard to not be a dust/mud bath), and hiking out to Ben Weston. This weekend it was dive class Saturday morning, more digging for the retaining wall Saturday afternoon, bike maintenance this morning, cleaning the house in the afternoon, and more bike maintenance.

The dive class was pretty fun. The waterfront officer at WMSC occasionally offers an open water (basic) dive class. This go 'round I decided to sign up. (Of course, then we went on vacation and I missed half the classes.) Having finally got my physical, I was allowed in the water this weekend, but I had to stay at the surface since my blood work isn't done yet. I'm not exactly sure what they might see in the blood work that would suggest imminent danger that wasn't apparent in the EKG or chest x-ray, but whatever. So we learned how to examine and handle an air tank, how to attach it to a BC (that's buoyancy controller), how to attach the regulator and test it and how to inflate and deflate the BC. Curiously, when you're diving and you have all that gear on, you still need weights to actually achieve negative buoyancy in the water, so we got weight belts and trundled down to the water. We learned how to gear up, how to enter the water, how to breathe through the regulator (all pretty basic stuff, yeah?). Then we got into some of the basic emergency stuff: what do you do if your regulator falls (or is pulled) out of your mouth, how do you clear your mask of water, what do you do if you lose your mask, and finally what to do if you run out of air. The other person in my group then got to practice all this at a depth of about 10 feet, but I had to stay at the surface. :( All that took about 4 hours, so it was lunchtime when I returned to the house.

Having "wasted" the morning, I thought I should work on one of my house jobs in the afternoon. I attempted to finish the kitty cage - this will go on top of the shed, with an entrance from the bathroom window so our indoor kitties can enjoy the outside. This was a no go because the shop at the lab was locked, and I couldn't find any scrap 2x4s. So I returned home thwarted. This meant I had to go back to work on the retaining wall. Sigh. Nothing like digging in the brick-hard clay to make you appreciate a desk job. I did manage to get the last of the digging done, though, and I moved all the stones we have (about 1/3 of what we need) into the yard and build part of the wall. Even unfinished, we can see how much better the yard will look with it.

The Sunday bike maintenance was prompted by my troubles with my front derailleur. I ended up breaking out my new bike tools (thank you Hobbes and Calvin), and pulling and cleaning the chains from my bike, Sweetie's bike and an old bike of Hobbes' that Calvin is inheriting. Calvin's bike has been sitting for a while, so it needed some work. I swapped the seat with Calvin's current bike because this one was cracked and didn't hold its angle. Then I had to try to loosen up one of the pedals - not sure we have a permanent solution there; we may need new pedals. And then I removed the cable to the front brake since one of the connectors was bent. This bike has the pedal-backwards friction braking, so the hand brakes are redundant. Now it was time to tackle the derailleur. I watched a few videos on YouTube before I started to increase the chance I was doing this correctly and then got to work. After fiddling around with it for about an hour and a half, I can now get the bike to go into low gear (which it wasn't doing before) and into middle gear, but it can't quite get into high gear. I'm not sure what the problem is. Could it be related to chain stretching? Maybe I need a new chain.

Tomorrow: work! A day to rest. (Actually I have a grant that's due, so I'll spend the day collecting paperwork and editing the proposal. Sigh.)

Calvin's Birthday

Yesterday was Thing 2's birthday. Being blond and trouble and six, I was thinking about changing his blog nickname to 'Calvin'. But then I'll need to come up with something new for Thing 1 as well. Hmm. For today, anyway, we'll call him 'Calvin'.



Calvin had a pretty good birthday. The night before, we let the Things stay up late because our neighbor had his nieces and nephews in town, and the kids were all playing after dinner. It sounded like good after-dinner, summertime play. They came in sweaty and exhausted and thirsty and hungry. While they were having a drink and a snack, they found the Chicken Little movie on TV ("Uh...what were we talking about?") and seeing as how they were having the perfect summer night, Sweetie and I decided they could stay up to watch it. So that was a nice lead-in to the big day. We decided to have a party, but with it being summer, many of the school kids were off at camp or vacation, or whatever, so we had rather a mish-mash guest list including many adults, and some visitors who Calvin didn't know from Adam (alas, the neighbors nieces and nephews had left earlier that day). Oh, and Bean the dog and his owner. Did this matter to Calvin? Not a bit. The party was the Standard Two Harbors Cook-out on the Beach. The kids got wet and sandy while I grilled up some organically-fed beef, nitrate-free hot dogs and chicken and veggie kabobs. Sweetie got out the sides and cupcakes. [Funny aside here. Sweetie had the nice idea of decorating the cupcakes with M&M's, but the day before she asked Calvin if he wanted some M&M's for a snack and he said, "I don't like M&M's." Back to the drawing board.] Everyone ate their fill. Some friends wandered up who hadn't necessarily been invited, but happened to be taking a walk on the beach, so they joined the festivities. Finally it was cupcake and presents time. Calvin got some baseball gear from Mom and Dad (bat, glove, balls), a Bakugan from Thing 1 (not important if you don't know what that is - really), and some other things. He was very happy a) getting presents, b) opening presents, c) being able to tell Thing 1 not to touch his presents, and d) generally being the center of attention.



What else goes on? Oh yes, I'm taking an open water SCUBA class. Or at least I'm sort of taking it. I've only just had most of the required physical done today (still need the blook work). I missed two of the four classes and all of the water work so far, although I think I'm going to catch up on that this weekend. So, like I said, I'm kinda taking it. Sweetie was certified years ago, so she'll take a refresher soon, and they maybe we can take in some of the kelp beds from below, rather than above. :)

Sweetie is gearing-up to teach a course in August. She also taught this class last year. It's for SEA, a study-abroad program run by (or through, or near) Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute's Marine Biological Laboratory. This class is all high school age kids, but it's taught at a college level. Sweetie really liked the professor running the class and the TA's last year (and they liked her) so she agreed to do it again this year.

It's been hot here. And humid. Now before you laugh too much, look here. You'll see that the average humidity was a respectable 83%, with a high over 90%. And while the air temperature wasn't that high, it's been very sunny without much wind, which makes it hot here. For a day, I almost wished we had air conditioning! Hrm. I'm not sure I'm garnering any sympathy here. Well, at least the water has warmed up to 70F, so we can cool off in the water without going into shock.

I'd tell you about our hike to Ben Weston, but you should really read about it here.

Vacation 2009 - Day 10

My Birthday

Today was all about my special day. I was the center of attention all day. Everyone showered me with good wishes and presents.

Okay, that's not really true. Today was about Parks, both the state and national.

After a quick breakfast of doughnuts (complete with a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday") we headed off to Cabrillo National Monument. Juan Roderiguez Cabrillo was the first European to reach this area. Only so much is known about him. He was likely Portugese, but made his fortune in Guatemala. He was given command of a couple ships and told to claim more land for Spain, look for gold, and look for a supposed channel between the Atlantic and Pacific. He did find land, which he named San Miguel. (A later explorer, Vizcaíno, renamed it San Diego, in spite of orders to maintain earlier namings.) He later died somewhere in the channel islands from an infection. A nice exhibit talked about his ship and route. There was real chainmail the Things could try on, and the ranger let them hold a replica sword.



This park is at the tip of Point Loma Peninsula, so it was and is the perfect location for a lighthouse. The exhibit at the lighthouse focused on the Israel family that lived there from - . The house was open, but the tower was closed, so we looked at the fresnel lenses in the assistant lighthouse keeper's house. The lenses are beautiful, lots of prism-like cuts designed to reflect all the light from the lamp out horizontally. The original lamp was 159 candlepower and could be seen up to 39 miles away.



The area was used by the military from the late 1800's to control the bay. Thing 1 liked the military history exhibit. It showed a shell from a 16-inch gun, and talked about how the range of the 16-in guns was 25 miles. It also said that the lighthouse was used as a signaling station; incoming ships had to send the correct signal or they would be shelled.

Cabrillo NM is also very well known for tidepools, so we also visited the rocky shoreline. We were there at highest tide, however, so there weren't really any tidepools to see. We did manage to see limpets, chitons, crabs, anemones, periwinkles, and gooseneck barnacles. We also looked at seaweeds: kelp, sea lettuce, sea grass and feather boa kelp. Sweetie really wants to come back in the winter when the tides are lower.



The Things got another Jr Ranger Badge:



After lunch, we drove across the Coronado Bay Bridge, which had great views of the shipyards where many Navy ships were being worked on, and into the traffic of Coronado. Being Saturday, it took us a while to work our way down 75 to Imperial Beach. Then we stopped at Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve. This was our birding stop. We took a short hike down to where the Tijuana river meets the ocean. There were many shorebirds there: brown pelicans, double-crested cormorants, a great egret, Caspian terns, black skimmers (very cool), willets, whimbrels, long-billed curlews (very cool), marbled godwits, and a bunch of smaller sandpipers. Sweetie saw a red knot. We think we saw an osprey sitting in the background. On the walk to the estuary, we saw meadowlarks, common yellowthroats, house finches, and a Northern Harrier. We had to double-time it back to the Visitors' Center because it was getting late and they locked the gates at 5pm (Thing 2 did not appreciate this hurrying at the end of a long and tiring vacation). Sweetie was pretty pleased with the birding, but lamented our lack of a spotting scope. She wants to return in the winter.

And then we all got haircuts and took dancing lessons.




And that was it. Vacation was over, save for the drive north (which was uneventful). We hit traffic on the 405 (shocking, I know), but still made it back to San Pedro by 7:30. Our whole vacation consumed less than two tanks of gas. Tomorrow we go back to the island. A successful vacation - there's lots of tears tonight.

Vacation 2009 - Day 9

Maritime Museum

Today's theme was boats. We went down to the Maritime Museum first, which comprises 6 craft, three sailing ships, two submarines, and a ferry. First was the Star of India (originally the Euterpe). This is the oldest iron-hulled sailing ship still afloat. It circumnavigated the globe 21 times, doing things like carrying emigrants to New Zealand (who would voluntarily emigrate from England to New Zealand in the 1800's?) before 'retiring' to an Alaskan trade route. It was a cool ship. Lots of sails on this one, and a video of a similar ship sailing through an Alaskan storm. Terrifying. It didn't seem like fun to work on this ship.



Next we visited a Foxtrot class Soviet submarine. In order to go into it you had to crawl through one of the pressure hatches (I guess so the larger tourists don't get stuck inside?) It was built in 1974 and had wooden toilet seats. The Things really liked it, mostly because there was one room where you could push buttons and it would make submarine noises. I thought the political officer's room was amusing. It really was just like Red October - there was basically a loyalty officer on board. And a guard outside the warhead 'room' that took anything that could potentially be used to sabotage the missiles. Can you say trust issues? Didn't look like fun to work on this ship, either.



Next up was the Rose, which played the HMS Surprise in the Master and Commander movie. Here we learned about scurvy and how the British figuring out how to cure it changed the balance of naval warfare. We also learned about how warfare on a ship worked. The Things liked the cannons. Sweetie and I thought it was a beautiful ship.



The Berkeley was next. This was a huge steam-powered ferry boat that operated around San Diego Bay. Most of the main deck was given over to a museum showing scale models of all sorts of different boats, many of them US Navy. The upper deck was set up with seats the way it was when it was a working ferry. Very fancy woodwork and stained glass windows.



We toured the USS Dolphin, a small US submarine built around the same time as the Soviet one. It was much nicer and more modern. The Things preferred the Soviet one, because it made noises. The last ship we saw was the Medea, a wooden pleasure boat built by a Scotsman to take him to remote areas of Scotland for hunting trips. It ended up being bought by the French military and used in WWII for a variety of things. A peculiar little history. I liked that one because one could call the steward from just about anywhere on the boat via a buzzer system.

In the afternoon, we visited the USS Midway. It served from 1947 to 1991 and was home to 245,000 men and women in that time. 4500 seamen crewed it. It is a very big boat. Thing 2 didn't really have the stamina to see the whole boat, and we didn't really have the time to listen to all 62 stops on the audio tour, so we just sort of wandered around. We looked at the hangar and the crew's quarters and the ready rooms for both the helicopter and jet pilots and then headed up to the flight deck. There were lots of planes and helicopters up there. I relayed much of my airplane lore to Thing 1 while Sweetie and Thing 2 listened to the docents and learned true information. Thing 1 really wanted to try the flight simulator, so we went on it while Sweetie and Thing 2 got a snack. In the simulator we were some sort of plane from WWII fighting some Japanese Zeroes. I have to say it was pretty fun except for when we got shot down. You spin out of control while heading for the ground.



We were pretty toured out at this point, so it was off to a new hotel (room on the 21st floor across from the Presidential Suite - so I guess we were in the Secret Service room). Their pool was under repair, so no swimming :( We decided to splurge and go out for seafood, so it was back to the waterfront. We ate at the Fish Market, which had a relaxed atmosphere and very good food. Thing 2 was being stubborn, so despite our appeals for him to try some seafood, he had pizza. Thing 1 had panko shrimp (and liked it). Sweetie and I had halibut, although hers was mesquite grilled and mine was a picatta.

One more day of vacation.

Vacation 2009 - Day 8

Balboa Park

Today was a bit of a choice day. Balboa Park has many other things to do than the Zoo, and we had to choose what we wanted to see. Not getting a particularly early start, we drove over to the park, while looking at our choices. One thing that caught Sweetie's eye was the Museum of Man, an anthropology museum, which had an exhibit of Mayan culture. They had reproductions of several stelae, with descriptions of the king depicted and translations of the text, all of which was both mystifying and interesting. The Mayans were very into calendars and time since they believed that time was on a cycle and the world was regularly re-created. We learned about the Bird god and the World Tree which figured prominently in this king's depictions.

We moved upstairs to an excellent exhibit on the evolution of Homo sapiens. Thing 1 had been asking how people were made, and this exhibit may have been a little over his head, but I think he learned something about how humans evolved. Thing 2 was mostly bored. We went to a further room that had exhibits on both brains and human reproduction (believe it or not). I was sort of hoping Thing 1 would go through the reproduction displays, but they were very scientific (starting with meiosis and karyotyping), so he got bored and quit before stuff got interesting.

We then looked at some more exhibits on primate evolution, and saw a model of a giant extinct primate (Gigantopithecus blacki) that looked to me like the Big Foot from Harry and the Hendersons. We also saw the stuffed remains of Mbongo, a gorilla that lived at the SD Zoo in the early part of the century. His brain was also on display in the brain display in the other room. The Museum of Man also has a few mummies, one Egyptian and one Peruvian, and a number of Egyptian coffins and other artifacts. Thing 2 really liked building a pyramid out of wooden blocks with Sweetie.

We had another picnic lunch and then visited the Japanese Friendship Garden. San Diego's Japanese sister city is Yokohama, and the good people of Yokohama started a Japanese garden in Balboa Park as a symbol of (duh) friendship. The Things were very funny in the garden. We talked with them about how the concept of a Japanese garden was a restful, peaceful place. So they adopted a solemn aspect and meditated anytime we stopped moving forwards. We looked at 'restful rocks' and pointed out how they and the mini trees were supposed to mimic mountain scenery. There was a great Koi pond there with an island in the shape of an island, representing good wishes for longevity. It was a very nice place.



Continuing a theme of Places the Things Won't Necessarily Like to Go, we next visited the Timkin Museum, an art Museum that has a nice collection. It's free, and limited in size, which makes it a good place to introduce art to Things. I had an extensive conversation with Thing 1 about how much of art has a religious subject matter. He is now well versed in "Madonna and Child" and icons of Saints. Both Things commented on the statue of Mercury - both wondering why his willy wasn't covered. Sweetie was showing Thing 2 around. They talked about how old the pictures were and what you could learn about the people in the pictures by what they were wearing. This was a greater success than I thought it would be.



We wandered past a very nice lily pond (that even had some blooming lotus in it) on our way to the model railroad. This was a miniature diesel train you could ride on. The engineer was quite enthusiastic about his job, which made the ride fun. They also had After that we took a ride on the carousel. Sweetie tried for the brass ring, but the guy in front of her got it. Ah well, it was time to go anyway. We returned in time for a swim in the pool, which is always a treat, and retired more tired than we thought we'd be.



Two more days of vacation. Tomorrow, the maritime area.

Vacation 2009 - Day 7

San Diego Zoo

It was another hot day in San Diego. Fortunately, the Zoo is in shady Balboa Park. First off, I have to say I found the most awesome parking space. (But that's only because I'm trying to annoy Sweetie:)) First off we took the Skyfari cable ride to the far end of the park. We started with some gazelle-like things (we started calling them either "bags of meat" or "meat on a stick" depending on the size and shape of the fauna). We saw some of the same stuff we saw at the Wild Animal Park (WAP), naturally, since the animals bred at the WAP feed into the zoo. They also have the polar bears out there. They were snacking. One was chewing on what looked like a cow's thigh bone. Another was crunching on carrots. (An odd juxtaposition.) We wandered down through the Lost Forest section seeing otters, monkeys, tigers, a hippo, tapirs, lots of birds, and many other critters, fuzzy and otherwise. Sweetie really enjoyed seeing the harpy eagle. About the time we returned to the front of the park, Thing 2 was having a bit of a meltdown, so we thought it would be a good time to stop for lunch.



Afterward, we headed over to the Discovery Outpost, which is set up for the smaller zoo patrons. Thing 2 really liked the petting zoo. We also had a great time in the insect house. The naked mole rats were a bit of a disappointment, but the red panda was pretty cool. We then visited the Reptile House. This was a big hit with the Things. The anaconda and the Burmese python were both huge and enthralling. Their Burmese was butter yellow because of a color mutation. They also had rattle snakes and emerald tree boas and a great lizard pit with lots of cool lizards head-bobbing and eating crickets. We saw the Galapagos tortoises and the gharial, and a peacock showed up.



Getting tired from all the walking, we decided to take the bus tour. I guess the zoo is really big, because we drove around for about 40 minutes and didn't ever achieve a full stop until the end. It was sort of like the tour in Jurassic Park, in that we'd pull up to an exhibit, the critter wouldn't be in evidence, and we'd move on. Rather anemic. The only good thing was that we were sitting on the right side of the bus, which turned out to be the correct side of the bus because most of the exhibits we drove by were on that side.

One nice thing about the bus tour was that we could map out what else we wanted to see before we left. When we returned, we once again took the cable car to the far side of the park and this time wandered the other direction toward Elephant Odyssey. This first took us past the takins (odd hooved creatures from Asia), then to the elephants, where there was also a dung beetle exhibit, and then down to the camels and condors.



At the bottom of that section was a meerkat exhibit. This troop had four babies, who were absolutely adorable. We went up Big Cat Trail and saw the striped and spotted hyenas, the singing dogs, a black jaguar, and the legs of a cougar (sticking out of his/her cave). Then we took the Sun Bear Trail back to the park entrance. The Sun Bears were very cute - little black bears, one of which was rolling around in a blanket. As we were leaving the park, some of the evening entertainment showed up. A 'living vine' (read "woman on stilts in a viney costume"). This totally freaked out Thing 2. After a little shopping, it was back to the hotel for a swim.



So that wraps up our major parks for this vacation. Tomorrow we return to Balboa Park to sample what else there is to offer.

Vacation 2009 - Day 6

Old Town San Diego

Enough of the parks already! We're exhausted! So today, we go somewhere with a slower pace. Old Town San Diego.

We learned quite a bit about California history, the mission/presidio era, the Mexican era, the rancho era, the US/Mexican war. We also learned about some of the families that lived in old San Diego and how they lived. We saw one house in which descendants of the original family lived until 1968.



It was very interesting to learn about how cow hides were basically cash back then, and many of the goods you owned were bought off trading ships that happened by on occasion. You could order things from back east, but who knows if or when they'd ever arrive.



We took a tour, had a picnic lunch, visited the blacksmith, and the stage station, where we learned about the various routes from the midwest to the west and how to hold the reins for a team of six horses. Thing 1 was pretty interested in it all; Thing 2, not so much. So we made an early (for this vacation anyway) day of it, and returned to the hotel for some swimming in the pool.

The pool at the hotel is only 3ft deep, which is great for our Things. I didn't have any serious concerns about drowning since either one could always simply stand up. Stress free swimming, good.

Back to exhaustion tomorrow.

Vacation 2009 - Day 5

Sea World

Today was our visit to Sea World. As you can tell from the posts so far, we're sort of on a marathon pace, especially considering one of us is just out of kindergarten. I think we're all getting a little exhausted, but, as I said to the family, "We're not quitting until you're so tired that you're crying, and I'm talking about Mom here!" So off we went to Sea World.

Sea World seemed much more crowded than the other parks we've been to. Not sure why, but it was. So upon entering, we headed straight over to the Shamu 'Believe' show, which was amazing at several levels, and quite conflicting. So, yes, it's pretty cool to see those enormous creatures flying through the air and interacting with humans in a non-predatory way. But on the other hand, it's amazing that these huge, predatory creatures are willing to interact with humans in a non-predatory way, and it's amazing that humans (tourists) find it entertaining to turn these incredibly dangerous creatures into pets doing parlor tricks. The Things were both pretty enthralled with the whole thing, although Thing 1 complained a little because we weren't in the 'splash zone'. (I thought having 50F salt water splashed in my face didn't sound like fun, but as it continued to heat up, I was changing my mind.) Sweetie thought it stupid that a great deal of the show was devoted to splashing the audience. I loved the parts where the orcas pushed the trainers high in the air, but thought the music and text of the show was over-the-top New Agey.



The next thing we encountered was the Shipwreck Rapids, a flume-type ride. It was quite popular, and we ended up waiting in line about 45 minutes, but it moved along more than our bad experience with the Sky Cruiser and had a much better payoff. Sweetie got the worst of it, but we all got pretty wet, which is what the Things were hoping for, and it wasn't so extreme a ride that Thing 2 was scared, so a good time was had by all.

We looked at a number of exhibits, finding some of them (the sea turtles) kind of sad, and most of them not very educational. We decided to see a dolphin show. For that one, we sat in the splash zone. This was working out pretty well until the let out the pilot whales. Those things can move some water. At one point I saw a wall of water heading towards me, so I just ducked my head. We were pretty wet by the end, but it was again cool to see the amazing flips, etc the dolphins can do. The Things were very pleased.

We also decided to see the sea lion show. I will note here that Sea World understands that people show up early for the shows in order to get good seats. So to keep the little ones from complaining too much about sitting in the hot sun for 20 minutes, about 15 minutes before the show, there's a sort of pre-show. For the Shamu show it was a goofy, new-agey movie. For the dolphins, it was a guy playing guitar and leading a sing-along. For the sea lions, it was a bit of a comedy routine, with a guy acting out tv shows. Very well done; very funny. The sea lion show was also very funny. Thing 2 was absolutely entranced, clapping and dancing along with the action on the stage.



Immediately afterwards we went to the dreaded Sesame Street 4D movie, that seemed entirely harmless until Sweetie noticed a sign that said "You will get wet in this attraction." Now she was getting a little tired of being wet, having gotten soaked twice already. But we were already in line and Thing 2 was not about to leave over a little water. The movie was cute and occasionally a small amount of water was sprayed on us. At one point a thunderstorm started in the movie and water dripped from ceiling and Sweetie, expecting a drenching, turned to me and I just laughed. Good times. Good thing it was only those few drips, too. Sweetie's still talking to me.



It was getting late, so we saw a few more exhibits, sharks, manatees, and the freshwater aquarium. Then we decided to feed the sea lions. The Things had fun tossing fish at the noisy crowd. Some gulls and egrets were also there trying to poach fish. After that, we were tired and hungry, so we left. The place we're staying for the next few days is a suite with a full kitchen. This has been magic for putting the Things to bed. Score one for us.



Tomorrow, we slow it down a bit.

Vacation 2009 - Day 4

San Diego Wild Animal Park

This park was originally supposed to be only a captive breeding center for the San Diego Zoo. Apparently they parked 23 rhinos in the middle of farmland and turned some heads of the passers by. Sweetie visited the Wild Animal Park in 1974. Her great uncle was a carpenter who actually worked on the construction of the park. That's my attempt at backstory. On to our day...


It was going to be hot today, so we planned accordingly. The first thing we did when we hit the park was zip on down to Heart of Africa for the Journey Into Africa tour. Okay, well we had one stop to see the baby cheetahs, which were adorable. They had long lanky legs and a gray, spotted mohawk that ran all the way down their back (possibly an attempt to mimic the bad-tempered honey badger, although Sweetie doesn't buy it). The trainers were in with them, and the three kittens were licking and biting them and each other. Very cute.


On to the tour. This is a tram that takes you around the 900 acres of open ground where a large number of animals are kept. We saw black rhinos, cheetahs, ostriches, zebras, sables, cape buffaloes, wildebeest, many different types of antelope (eland, gemsbok, springbok, gerenuk) that I can't hope to keep straight, and a white rhino. Oh, and giraffes. The animals were already pretty motionless. It was hot. About 95. We took a long walk around to see a lot of fowl - flamingos, bustards, storks, hornbill, an active secretary bird, egyptian and gray vultures - and also some more animals - warthogs, gerenuk, duiker, okapi, gazelles, eland and bontebok. We saw the lions (very sleepy), and then decided it was time to rehydrate and have some lunch.


Afterwards, we went up to see the gorillas and then it was off to the Petting Kraal. They have a number of gazelle type critters that kids can go in and pet. They are remarkably habituated to youngsters running up to them, getting hands in their face, poking screaming, etc. I was surprised no one got kicked or bitten. Thing 2 had a great time. He found some leaves from their lunch and was feeding two of them.


We walked up the hill to the elephant pen and were rewarded by the herd of elephants being elephants. There was one little baby, three or four young, and then five or six adults. They wandered around, then some took mud baths in a puddle while others took dust baths. The baby nursed. Others scratched against fences, rocks and each other. A youngster ran up to an adult and greeter her with trunk rubbing. One peed. Very elephanty. At this point the Things were getting pretty tired, but we were very close to the condors, which Sweetie wanted to see, so we trudged across one more hot wooden walkway to see the lovelies.


Now it was time to cool down. We rode on the carousel, which Thing2 was quite nervous about before it started. Thing 1 and I went in a Dino-4D ride which was much more 4D than the Legoland variety. The seats threw you around every which way while the 3D movie played. Thing 2 thought that would be too scary, so he didn't go, and in fact it was a little too scary for Thing 1. It was the end of a long, hot day. We did a little shopping, had a snack, and then headed back to the hotel for a well-deserved swim.

Vacation 2009 - Day 3

Legoland, part II

We got up early this morning and had breakfast at the hotel ($$). The park doesn't open until 10am, so the Things and I went to the pool while Sweetie packed up the room (her choice). At the appointed hour, we once again walked over to LL.

This time we broke right, over to Pirate Cove. Things weren't really open there yet, so we did a boat ride, where you steer it yourself. I was with Thing2, and he did alright negotiating the curves. Thing 1 was getting frustrated, and, since he decided to take a boat by himself, had no parental unit to bail him out. Still, he made it around the course. Then it was back up to Pirate Cove where the key word was 'water'. We went on a log flume (Treasure Falls), and a ride with water guns that you shoot at other riders and other patrons in the Cove (while they shoot back) (Splash Battle), and then there's a mini water park complete with a huge bucket that dumps a LOT of water on anyone in the way about every 10 minutes (Soak-N-Sail). We had put the Things in bathing suits this day because we knew they'd get wet. They got soaked. Thing 1 at one point said "I couldn't get any wetter!" Everyone had a great time, but it was time to move on to Funtown.


Our trip to Funtown started with an airplane ride similar to the Dumbo ride at Disney. The Things went on their own on that one. Then the whole family participated in the Fire Academy, competing against 3 other groups to get their truck down the course, hit the target with the hoses, and get the truck back. We won! It was very exciting. Continuing the theme of do-it-yourself driving, we next hit the Driving Schools, one for Thing 1's age group, another for Thing 2's. Again, the lines were not long at all. Even though it was now the weekend, we weren't waiting more than 15 minutes for rides. Crazy. Thing 2 performed very well on his racetrack, avoiding some smaller kids who really had no idea what they were doing. Thing 1 also did quite well, although at one point he was going the wrong way down the street and crashed (well, bumped) head-on into another car. This would have been easier to sort out if the cars had a reverse, but they don't, so an employee had to drag them apart. A good time was had by all.


We had a quick lunch, and then made our one mistake of the visit to Legoland - we decided to go on the Sky Cruiser, which looked like it gave a nice view of the park. Alas, it was the one line of any length we decided to stand in. When we queued up, we were next to a sign that said "60 minutes from this sign" and darned if it wasn't accurate to about 2 minutes. It was so long I had to take Thing 2 to the bathroom in the middle of it. We told the Things that on some days all the rides would have lines this long, but that didn't make them feel better, especially once we got on the ride and they found out that a) it wasn't that good a ride, and b) it wasn't that long a ride. Thing 1 was INCENSED when we rounded that last curve, and Thing 2 said that it wasn't worth more than a 15 minute wait. I'm not sure why that one ride had so long a line, maybe the post-lunchtime timing, who knows. Fortunately we had no other experiences like it.


From there we ran over to Lego Racers 4D, which was similar in form to the Bob the Builder in 4D we saw yesterday, but was much more exciting and engaging for the Things. We liked that a lot. Then it was back down to Dino Island, where we found another roller coaster - Coastersaurus. Thing 2 loved this one because it was similar in form to the Dragon, without the dark, loud set pieces. He decided that was his favorite ride. At this point, everyone was exhausted. We hit the Big Store, bought some - you guessed it - Legos, and then started heading back to hotel. We told the Things they could each ride on one more ride. Thing 1 chose Project X. Thing 2 chose the Driving School. So we split up, accomplished our last Legoland fun, and drove on to Escondido and the Wild Animal Park.

Vacation 2009 - Day 2

The next morning, after a quick breakfast in our hotel room, we took off for parts south. We drove down the I-5, and in relatively short order were at our hotel. We had a quick lunch (in our new hotel room) and then hoofed it over to Legoland.

I wasn't sure what to expect. My friend John said that when he was there with his kids the main element to the park was long lines, which doesn't sound so fun. The entrance we went through was on the back side of the park. This meant that any crowds that may have entered through the front hadn't necessarily gotten to our part of the park yet, so at first I wasn't too surprised that lines were short, but as the day wore on, I realized that there just weren't that many people at Legoland. We had short lines ALL DAY. I think the longest we waited in line for a ride was 15 minutes. So Legoland was GREAT!

Legoland, Part I
We started off in Castle Hill, rode some tamer rides to warm up, and then tried the Dragon, a small roller coaster. Thing 1 loved it right off the bat. Thing 2 seemed to like the coaster part, but the section prior to that, which was dark and loud, scared him.


We wandered down through Miniland USA, which is an insane reconstruction of seven cities in Legos. This was where I figured out that Thing 2 was the perfect age for Legoland, because he went running ahead, so excited about these set-ups. They had the Washington, DC section set up to show Obama's swearing in. Sweetie was greatly amused by the 'giant' brown-headed cowbirds invading the towns. We took a boat ride, which gave nice views of a number of things like their Mount Rushmore, and then moved on to The Imagination Zone.



There we found a somewhat wet ride, which was nice on a hot day, so we did it twice. We saw a '4-D' movie, the Things and I did a whirly ride that would've made Sweetie throw-up, then Thing 1 and Sweetie found Project X, which is a more serious rollercoaster than the Dragon - it had a much steeper drop. Thing 2 and I decided to sit that one out, but Thing 1's quote afterwards was "That was really scary. Let's go again!"


We moved on to the Land of Adventure, which had a fun ride with laser guns, and a plane ride that the Things enjoyed. There was also a play place with air guns that shot foam balls. That place was crazy, but still not crowded.

We ate an early dinner at the park, worked our way back to the egress, stopping by the Dragon for one last ride (or two), then headed back to the hotel. For rest? No, to go swimming! Thing 2, now that he can swim, is very enthusiastic about pool time. And Thing 1 now swims well enough that I'm not convinced he's going to drown if I'm not watching him all the time. It was a great pool. A lot of it was only 3ft, and the deepest it got was 5ft. Also, there was a hot tub that even hot (unlike some hotel spas). Needless to say, everyone was pretty tired that night, and we all agreed Day 2 was a great day.