My New Bike

I'm sure you have all heard the saying "Getting there is half the fun". Well I am sure that whoever said that was definitely not going anywhere in a suburban with his whole family. I have also decided that whoever said it had a motorcycle.

This is my bike. It is a 2005 Honda Shadow 750cc. You can see the saddlebags and the two seats. Cassie is still to chicken to let me take her for a ride. Maybe in the summer when it warms up.

Here I am sitting on my bike with my new helmet and motorcycle jacket. (A quick note to appease my mother) The jacket has reflective stripes, foam padding and body armor, so if I wreck on the freeway both arms will be dislocated, several ribs will be broken and my spleen may rupture, but my skin will stay on my bones. No worries.

Lastly, it may not be snowing but at 6:00 in the morning when I leave for school, it's cold outside. Factor in the windchill and even I need a little extra covering. My jacket has an extra liner, I wear a scarf, and I just bought some new Gore-tex ski gloves, the only thing I am missing are a pair of sexy chaps.

Ma & Pa cont'd

Sorry the last round of pictures took up too much space so this will have to be a two part post. Here we all are on the way home. Oh how I love the subway (not really it always feels like I'm going to school.)

On Monday we took Mom and Dad to the temple. Since it was Labor Day and 95% of the people out here are 9-5ers the temple was open so that those who did not have to work could go. I have never seen so many people at the temple here. That is not saying too much, our session was only a little more than half full.
After going to the temple we went to "a great and spacious building". The National Cathedral is huge and it is beautiful. I gotta say I think it rivals some of the european cathedrals, and yes I have been to some european cathedrals.
After taking Mom and Dad to the cathedral I took them to the campus and they were impressed. Then for the rest of the week I ignored them and went to school and Cassie went to work, except for Thursday Mom and Cassie drug Dad to a quilt show in Penn. Unfortunately, I had to go to shool. Darn the luck. So who's coming out next?

Ma & Pa visit

Well Mom and Dad have come and gone, to my house anyway and I just thought I would share with you all some pictures of what we did while they were here. The first day Mom got here at 5:00 and I had to go pick her up from the airport, in the middle of rush hour traffic (I'll have to thank Elinor for that one). Then Dad was supposed to arrive at 11:30 pm (his own fault) but I got a call at 10:30 saying he was going to be late (Mother Nature's fault) so we, meaning Dad and I finally got home about 2:00 am. The next day was Sept 1, which was Mom and Dad's 35 year anniversary. So we took Mom and Dad to the zoo. Incidentally, that was the same thing Cass and I did for our anniversary this year. So with no further ado, here are some pictures of Mom and Dad at the zoo.

It was a nice 95 (that is degrees and humidity) at the zoo, but they have these nice misters to keep people cool.
No this is not Mom and Dad in the zoo.
This is Thai Shan, he is the baby Panda that was born at the zoo two years ago. He is still only about 1/2 as big as his parents but he is so much fun to watch. We spent quite some time watching him play and wander around in his little area. Here he is just chillin' in the tree.
Just like all babies Thai Shan is still learning to climb and move around, exploring his environment. Sometimes watching him try to get up and down trees or other obstacles is quite funny. Like watching your parents try to program their VCR.
This is just a really nice shot of the cheetah that Dad took.

Fourth of July

Since moving out to Maryland I have been very busy and with the beginning of school this week I am afraid my time will become ever more precious and elusive. So as I am now waiting to go and pick up dad at the airport I thought I would take advantage of the opportunity to post some updates. Hopefully this will sate some of your appetites for awhile.

I have always enjoyed living in Idaho Falls and I must say that I was quite proud of our fireworks display (props go to Frank). Well some time ago they were having a small party in Washington (July 4th I think) and they were having some fireworks. I went thinking how good can it be? Well word got out that there was going to be a party.

While we were waiting for the show to start it started to rain and rain and rain some more. Eventually they even evacuated the Mall. Then when it was reopened you can only imagine the crush of people that were trying to get back in. All of our stuff was soaked including the blankets that we had planned to sit on. The Metro reported over 100,000 people entering the system after the show. Let me tell you if you thought the Greenbelt was bad...........

They had a few good shells

I also shot some video and spliced it together along with some pictures and I will try to post it here as well. In the end ....

WOW!!!!!!!! the fireworks show here is awesome. It was over twenty minutes long and just phenomenal. If you ever get a chance to go to the show it is worth the effort.

Summertime

This summer we moved out to Maryland so I could start school a little early. Cassie had a little trouble finding work, she had a couple jobs lined up that fell through. This is what most of our summer looked like.

This was my spot. This is where I sat everyday while studying Biochem. I would pop in my DVD and watch the lectures and then I would type up the notes that I had taken, and answer the review questions online. I ended up getting an A- in the class. I also got an A in my policy class.

P.S. My eyes are not closed I am looking at the computer screen.

This was Cassie's spot. She had a very hard time finding things to keep her busy so she kicked me off the desk and played on the computer all day. Now that she is working and I am in school full-time I am taking the desk back.

trips to DC

Here are some of our pictures from our first sight-seeing trip to "the district" as we (we being everyone around here) call it.





Here is the Washington Monument. We weren't able to go up to the top because all the tickets had already been taken when we showed up at 10:00am. Darn tourists. Another day perhaps.

Here George W. needed to go to Starbucks or something. Marine One is landing at the White House. We were too far away to actually see Mr. President.

This is the Lincoln Memorial. He actually is inside you just can't see it from here.

Here is Cassie at "The Wall". The Veitnam veterans memorial. There are a lot of names on that wall.

Another view of George W's humble abode. If you want to go on a tour when you come visit you need to contact your congressman at least 3 months in advance. That is the only way to get tours now.

That us at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. They actually hosted the Little League world series on that same lawn two weeks after we took this picture. How fun would that be.

Stay tuned for more from almost DC.