Still Crazy After All These Years...

Several years ago I tried logging into this blog and couldn't remember the user name or password to save my life. I thought it was hopeless. Then by accident I came across the thing this morning, clicked on "log-in," and by some miracle it just logged me in, somehow remembering the username and password despite two computer changes since my last visit. That, or the thing is so lonely it would have allowed anyone to log in just for the company.

So here we are, oozing through 2017. The kids are 16 and 17--driving, working, trying to finish high school without driving their parents bonkers. We still enjoy doing things together (and the kids remain willing to be seen with us in public without bags over their heads), though it's harder to get out there and do things than it used to be. Someone pretty much always needs to be somewhere. But we still get to Mount Vernon or the park or for walks in the neighborhood when we can...

We've done a few noteworthy things over the years. We've visited Haiti a few times (all four of us once, Nan or I a few other times--and we're studying Creole to help us when we visit again), we've sold the camper we loved when the Expedition died (literally... As in, motor, rear-end, and AC all went, with repairs totaling considerably more than the thing was worth) and at the time we couldn't afford a new towing vehicle so we've taken up tent-camping again (though we call our tent Hogwarts because it's about as big as the castle)... Nothing earth-shattering. But things we enjoy.

Hmmm... You know--

I should post a few pics from some of those events. (Here's one of our sheep-ish dog, Sam. He says hi and wishes you'd stop staring at him. It's giving him the willies.) Maybe, when I'm not supposed to be leaving for work, I'll post a few things here again just for fun. It's more like journaling than blogging because I doubt anyone knows this thing still exists. But it's been fun to go back to see the pictures and all from our "big trip," and maybe it'll be fun a few years from now to remember way back when to today.

Plus, if I don't give the NSA something interesting to read once in a while they start hacking my phone looking for photos to publish in the Weekly World News. It's hard to be an American...

Happy Wednesday, May 16th, 2017

Is this blog still here?

It's been nearly three years since we headed off on "the big trip," and I can confidently say we would go again in a minute if we could. We talk often about places we've visited and things we've seen. Our camper is still with us, though it's not in the greatest of shape. A trip of that many miles with that many bumpy roads takes its toll on a then nine-year-old pop-up. But it still happily takes us to our favorite campgrounds or down to the beach for a weekend here and there.

The kids are 11 and 12 now, while the wife and I are still the same ages we were three years ago. As we move through another year, we remain, proudly, a bunch of weirdos. But that's not likely a surprise. We've found that the big trip has served as a kind of before-and-after event. We learned so much about ourselves and the world around us in what turned out to be a short few months. And that learning has served us well through rainy days and sunny days, happy days and sad. We'd love to hit the road again, and we're cheering on a couple we know who've retired early and are about to take to the road themselves. It appears unlikely we can, unnoticed, hook our camper on the back of theirs, but we can dream...

Sorry I haven't kept up with this blog since 2010, but I trust you've been able to go on with your lives just the same. In truth, I wasn't sure I still remembered how to login, but here I am, memory still mostly intact. If I come up with something to say some day, I might add a little something here on occasion, but don't lay awake at night waiting for it.

In the meantime, Happy Day!

What’s it like being home?

That’s the question we’ve been asked the most over the past week and a half. And it’s a good question. Tough to answer, as it's "like" a lot of things. So far, for me it’s like:

- Watching Nan’s need to “nest” and reorganize the dining room, school room, bedroom, and garage—and being sucked into the nesting vortex along with her;

- Looking at a yard that could be the subject of a full-hour HGTV special titled “Hopeless Grass: Weeds Gone Wild”;

- A six-hour retreat as my first work meeting after four months;

- Watching our new little kitty slowly drop off to sleep, then slowly fall off the couch onto his head (...Nan lobbied for a "camper kitty" throughout the trip, but I managed to hold her off. Once we were home...well, the woman just can't be trusted in a pet store);

- Seeing Bentley get incredibly excited to see us when we went to pick him up, then watching him stand by the car to be sure we weren’t going to leave without him again;

- Being back at my desk at work wondering if I still remember how to do my job;

- Trying to put together a set of pictures to show people, knowing that looking at the pictures is more for us than for them…


Continuing in the spirit of lists, since our arrival home we’ve been chatting often about things from the trip that seem to be at least on the edge of miraculous if not quite worthy of a call to the Vatican. Here’s a partial list of the miracles, large and small, we’ve been discussing:

- Nan actually persuaded me to take a four-month trip. (On several occasions in the months before we left I said, “This will never happen!” and I meant it.)

- We traveled for the full four months without even considering cutting the trip short.

- Over the course of the trip we stayed in or at least passed through a full half of the states in the US of A.

- According to the odometer, we covered a few tenths over 12,407 miles, pulling a trailer for most of it. If someone built a few long, strategically placed bridges and we straightened those miles out, we could have gone about halfway around the earth.

- We didn’t have a single mechanical breakdown of any kind…not so much as a flat tire. If I wouldn’t have left the crank in the back of the camper during week 1, we’d have had a flawless trip. All the tools I brought and the advance preparation for disaster went thankfully unused.

- Aside from Nan getting a few days of something resembling the flu while we were in Alabama, and a couple of runny noses for the rest of us spread across the states, our travels were injury and serious-illness free. All the first-aid supplies and medications we brought were also thankfully untouched.

- Our kids get along so well, it’s astonishing. They are truly best friends. After four months on the road together, sharing an end of the camper, spending every waking and sleeping moment together, they returned home and are now taking turns sleeping in each others' rooms. As I type this, Kerby is sound asleep on the floor in Joelle’s room after a long, happy day playing together with their neighborhood friends.

- Both our kids love to read. They read so many books on the trip that we were looking for bookstores almost as often as we were looking for grocery stores.

- We have friends and family who like us enough to take care of our dog, our cat, our snake, our rabbit, our mail, and our house for four months. And everything is perfectly fine…

- I managed to get a surprising amount of work done while we traveled. Not needing much sleep is quite helpful. I was afraid it’d be impossible to get anything done, but thanks to my early-to-bed/late-to-rise family, things flowed easily.

- We’re still married and not even considering divorce.

…Those are the kinds of things that pass for minor miracles at our house. Alas, The Big Trip has come to an end, and we’re back at home happy as clams. We had such fun. Wonderful memories, great family time, and even some work along the way. For now, it’s time for all of us to get back to life and work—living the dream, as always!

Simon--The Legend with Knobby Knees

The Big Trip's Grand Finale - Minnesota and Iowa

Proving the truth of the old adage “Time flies when you’re having fun,” we’re on the way home. At this moment we’re in a motel in South Bend, IN, just down the road from Notre Dame University. We’ll cover the ground between here and Richmond in either two or three more days, depending on our mood as the days progress, then we’ll be back where this all started. It seems like we just left home, though it also seems like we left years ago. There’s unpacking to do, we’ve got to collect our animals from the wonderful folks who’ve been taking care of them, and we just plain have to get back to the real world after months of traveling around the country. Adjusting to life after a week’s vacation is hard enough—I have no idea how we’ll adjust after our four month odyssey. There’ll be yard work to do, mail to sort, calls to make. The water has to be turned back on, the camper and truck cleaned up, shopping to be done. And so many people to see and thank for their help…

The Big Trip wrapped up with about 10 days in Minnesota and Iowa hanging with my family, adding a couple days to meet Joelle’s biological sister who also lives in Iowa with her adoptive family. I see my family all too seldom these days, and it’s such a gas to have time to spend talking, hanging around, and catching up. I have a funny family, so there’s always lots of laughter going on. We also eat and eat. And we eat. For entertainment purposes only (or at least primarily), some of us took a trip to the great Mecca of capitalism, the Mall of America. We rode the rides and shopped some of the shops and, yes, did some eating. The kids had been talking about the MoA for a week before we went, so they’re always jazzed to go. It really is quite the place. I think our favorite new product (sold in several stores) is the giant beanbags that convert back and forth from even king-size beds to chairs/couches. You've gotta love that there are people out there trying to find new uses for their 70s beanbag chairs.

The toughest part of being back in God's country was seeing how much my mom’s Alzheimer’s has continued to progress. She still seems to be happy and enjoying herself, so that’s something…but all in all it’s hard to see her fading away a little at a time. A thousand cheers for my sisters who live near her and are doing the work of caring for her. Nan and I both choked back tears every time we visited…I’m sure they do the same far more often. It’s such a nasty disease, slowly robbing people of their memories and ability to think. Mom had pretty good visits while we were there, knowing that she knows us (even if she can’t remember our names) and chatting happily about whatever crossed her mind. Still, it’s hard to believe how much she’s lost. Whenever we can’t think of a word or lose our train of thought, my siblings and I all wonder if we’re in the early stages...

Alas, in the morning we’ll be hitting the road for another six or so hours. If we’re in the mood, we may pause in Bowling Green to see my grad-school alma mater, but otherwise we’ll have to keep ourselves occupied across the flats of Indiana and Ohio. We’d initially talked about saving some days to spend for touring across here, but this stretch of I-80 holds a limited number of hard-hitting tourist destinations. (The lyrics to the old John Denver song “Saturday Night in Toledo Ohio” keep popping into my head.) (Ok, you can stop laughing at me for knowing the lyrics to John Denver songs.) But we can take a break and tour if something strikes our fancy… We’ll see how it goes.

As things come to an end, I have to say a giant THANK YOU to Lindsey and Sue who’ve continued along at work without me. For no additional compensation beyond this paragraph, the two of them have had to simply add my work to theirs over the past four months. The good news is they’ve done so with their usual skill and efficiency. The bad news is that they’ve proven I’m mostly a figurehead. (I’m tenured, so I can live with that…) I can’t thank them enough for their support, as without them, we never could have left home.

I’m sure I’ve got more entries in me, but with just one more night on the road I’ll no doubt be sending the next one from home (once we get the cable turned back on). From Richmond to the Everglades to San Diego to Seattle and home again, it’s been quite a ride!

The View from the Ferris Wheel at MoA

Gift Shops of the Greater United States

I’ve alluded to this before, but my wife absolutely loves gift shops. And I mean loves them. I can walk through the door of the average gift shop, make a quick casual loop around an aisle or two (hands always in my pockets so as not to touch or break anything), and head back out happy as a clam. Not so with Nan. For her, each gift shop is a new and exciting experience. She can’t wait to see what’s around every corner. She talks about how so-and-so would want this or someone-else would love that, always handling everything that catches her eye. And she deliberates at length about buying things that seem so impractical to me I can’t imagine what she’s thinking. “Where would we put that?” “What would we possibly do with it?” “What is it and why would anyone pay that much for it?” …But such questions are annoyances. She has a vision for it, and I’m just being a poop. (I’m not a poop, in general, but I can definitely play that role.)

For the first month of our trip, the kids and I had smiles on our faces and wandered happily around the gift shops with Nan. By month two, we were getting bored with the shopping, but we humored mom’s interests as best we could. The third month we attempted a rebellion. We said we wouldn’t go in any more gift shops and that was final. Nan said that was fine, we could just wait outside. At the first gift shop, in she went and outside we sat. A few minutes later I was picturing some odd new piece of art or a set of matching Hawaiian shirts and couldn’t stand it anymore. So I grabbed the kids and in we went, setting ourselves up for another month of gift shops. Now that we’re in the fourth month, we’ve resigned ourselves to the gift-shop tour, and as I’ve accepted the inevitable I find I’ve learned a few things.

First, I’ve learned that gift shops sometimes contain local jokes or information that everyone in the area knows but that are new to us tourists. I’ve chuckled at things like SLO being the widely-accepted and even bragged-about moniker for San Luis Obispo and at t-shirts in Seattle that sported slogans like “To Err is Human—to ARRRR is Pirate” and a ripped off logo for “ARRRbucks Coffee.” We’ve seen information for art shows and vegetable festivals and celebrations of local heroes or people in need. We’ve chatted with gift-shop employees and owners about must-see attractions and the best local restaurants and the life of running a gift shop, and we’ve found that some of the local color is definitely for sale or casual review in gift shops.

Second, I’ve learned that gift shops reinforce the local stereotypes as best they can because that’s what we tourists really care about. We want to buy cheesy replicas of the Golden Gate Bridge or a street car in San Francisco, a pot covered with cactus art in New Mexico, a small plastic pair of cowboy boots in Texas, and the jawbone of an alligator in Florida. Why do we want those things? Did I fall in love with cacti in the desert? Did I have to kill an alligator with my bare hands to save a member of my family in Florida and want to be reminded of my heroics? Do most people in Texas work as cowboys? Are a bridge and some street cars all there is to San Francisco? No to all those questions—but it’s the stereotypes and the well-known attractions that we tourists want to see, want to remember, and want to show off to others saying “Look! We were there!” This stuff isn’t endlessly immortalized in gift shop after gift shop just to keep China’s manufacturing sector fully employed; we tourists really WANT to buy it. And we do so, with joy in our hearts.

And finally, I’ve learned that both gift shops and the people who visit them vary widely in their mindsets. Some gift shops are as cheapo as they can be, providing as many chintzy plastic objects as they can squeeze onto their cluttered shelves. Some mix the cheapo stuff with some better, more interesting stuff—like books, objects that might be considered actual art by local artists, indigenous food, and substantive information about local history or sites. And some gift shops are high-brow, with only nicer things that cost significant money but you can understand why people might pay it. We’ve been in some very nice shops with impressive furnishings, aged wine from local vineyards, clothing that doesn’t have off-color slogans printed on it, excellent educational materials, and one-of-a-kind art objects. And just as gift shops vary, so do their patrons. There are “Lookers” (I’ll admit it—I’m a looker) (so to speak) who wander in, make a quick pass through, then out they go. There are the “Hopefuls” who head in excited at the prospect of buying something or, better, of getting their parents to buy them something. And there are the “Shoppers,” the people who are always on the lookout in every shop for just the right thing for self or other. You can hear them walking around saying, “I LOVE that!” or “So-and-so would LOVE that! “ or “Don’t you just LOVE that?” And the truth is, I often do. I mean, who wouldn’t want a plastic street car, some miniature cowboy boots, a pot with a cactus painted on it, and an alligator's jawbone?

Reprise: Sitcoms in Real Life

A week or two ago I wrote an entry titled "Sitcoms in Real Life" during which I relayed the story of a remarkably patient younger woman listening to an elderly woman jabbering on and on about fish tacos in a deli on Fisherman's Wharf (“Fish tacos are interesting. I think they’re interesting—do you think they’re interesting—fish tacos? I’ve heard of fish tacos lots of times. I’ve never had one, though. I’ve never even seen a fish taco. Have you ever had a fish taco? I’d like to try a fish taco sometime. Do you think they have them here? Fish tacos? I’d like to try one…”). That entry and that woman may not have changed your life, but as of tonight they changed mine.

There we were, ready for dinner, seated in a Sheridan, WY, restaurant called "Olivia's Kitchen" ("Fine Mexican and American Food"). I have a tendency to go with burritos or enchiladas in these kinds of places, but there it was at the top right on the second page of the menu: "FISH TACOS." The description was a little vague, but it seemed to involve tilapia, tortillas, and coleslaw. What's not to like? So in honor of the woman from Fisherman's Wharf who was obsessed with fish tacos, I placed my order. The verdict: It was delicious! Three pieces of fish were cooked perfectly, with each laid on its own double-thick tortilla. On top of each piece was a good-sized spoonful of the spiciest coleslaw in history. Tasty, but flaming hot. So while the bad news for my camper-mates is that I won't likely be a pleasant partner in our small space later on this evening due to the hot coleslaw, the overall combination of tacos, fish, and slaw were excellent.

So I'd like to hereby thank the old lady with the fish-taco fixation for changing my life even just a little. And I encourage you all to push out there on the edge and take the big risk... Try the fish tacos!

I could definitely live here...

Nan and I have had a lot of funny conversations about the places we’ve visited over the past few months. One of our running themes is usually kicked off by Nan saying “I could live here!” and me chuckling about how she's said that most places we've visited. She’s been enamored with many of the cities we’ve seen, campgrounds we’ve stayed at, and lives we’ve observed. And while I’m not as “easy” (so to speak) as she is, I’ve found more than a few places I think I’d enjoy living as well. Here are just a few of the possibilities:

We all very much enjoyed Orlando, particularly the way our friends, the Williams family, live it. They’re right at the back door of Disney, and they’ve found that Disney is wonderfully supportive of home-schooling and just plain a lot of fun. Epcot provides no shortage of learning opportunities and programs, as do other Disney properties and resources. The weather was cold when we visited but is usually nice, and we found much to love as we meandered around the town and its suburbs.

As I mentioned in my Grand Canyon post, I was particularly taken with Williams, AZ, mostly for its small-town feel near such a big natural attraction. Bandon, OR, where our friends the Carbieners have taken up residence (and who treated us like royalty when we visited), was also wonderful. Both towns were beautiful, small, and made me feel like I could walk the streets without a care in the world. Bozeman, MT, and Sheridan, WY, also gave us the same kinds of big/small feelings. And San Marcos, TX, seemed like another place that mixes well attributes of both big and small towns, and we enjoyed it a lot, though having friends there talking up its virtues may have biased us a little. It’s worth noting, however, that in all of these towns we've seen relatively few non-white people. As a bi-racial family traveling the country, we’ve been surprised at how segregated things seem to be. As but one example, Easter Sunday we went to the First Presbyterian Church in Spokane, WA, and found it to be a terrific blend of contemporary and traditional. A genuinely inspirational and engaging service. But counting Kerby and Joelle, there were 4 total non-white faces in a packed house of hundreds of the worshiping faithful. As we've traveled, it's made us wonder if race relations are improving in our country or if we're just better at finding ways to separate ourselves enough to be comfortable. It's also helped us appreciate our own at least somewhat diverse neighborhood. (By the way, “Frank’s Diner” in Spokane was one of our favorite restaurants. It's in a converted train car, the food is good, the service excellent, and the ambience fun…)

Anyway, Malibu was (big surprise!) absolutely beautiful, and living anywhere around there along the ocean coast would be both breathtaking on a daily basis and financially preposterous. In general, California weather has been the best on our trip, but this has been such an odd weather year it’s hard to tell overall if we’d have enjoyed the winter/spring months as well elsewhere. The southern states are all so hot through the summer, and I’m not a huge fan of really hot weather… Of course, I admit to still missing living in Duluth, MN. I’m not sure I’m tough enough to move back up there, and I know Nan’s not a fan of even the idea of spending winter in the great white north, but there’s a quality of life in Duluth that I haven’t seen anywhere else.

I think the winner of the “place where we’d most like to live” contest, among the cities and towns we’ve visited so far, is San Luis Obispo. SLO (the acronym is both funny and a nice description of how things seemed to operate) appears to combine in just the right quantities attributes of a big town with a small-town feel. A few weeks before we visited we read somewhere that every Thursday they hold a Farmer’s Market downtown. So we planned our visit to include a Thursday night, and it turned out to be a lot of fun. At 5:30 the police close one of the main downtown streets, and all kinds of vendors and restaurants and musicians and causes set up booths. Politicians roamed the streets drumming up votes (we Virginians were a disappointment) while individuals set up tables hoping to add signatures to their petitions (my favorite was a totally stoned guy working to legalize marijuana). Various organizations that support the poor were represented, including one that really caught our attention--the Lifewater.org group. They used a number of creative methods to draw people in and inspire a sense of the importance of providing fresh water for the 1 in 8 human beings who live without it. (Check out their website!) There was also food food food, from fresh produce to giant BBQ sandwiches to ethnic foods of many types to mini-donuts and churros. And we ate plenty… Kerby joined a bucket-drumming group for a few minutes, Joelle loved the bubblegum alley, and I had an enjoyable conversation with a couple of CA Highway Patrolmen about the 55mph limit for all vehicles towing trailers (as though anyone in CA drives the speed limit...). All in all, there were a ton of people at the kind of event that many towns hold once a year, but here it’s a weekly thing that people attend in droves. We liked it a lot, and we loved touring the town, hanging out at the beautiful campground, and seeing memorable things in downtown shop windows--like a set of 4 well-dressed manikins, each holding a pair of binoculars as though looking through them at us…yet the manikins had no heads. Odd but amusing.

We also liked that the town seems to be geared around its downtown and its countless small merchants rather than some Wal-Mart-anchored strip-mall off on the highway. We’ve passed an incredible number of Wal-Mart/Home-Depot/PetSmart combos as we’ve crossed this great land. Over and over again they appear. Yet when we visit towns like SLO, or Bandon, OR, or Sheridan, WY, it’s clear to see that most of us who base our communities around the same chain stores have traded a sense of community to save a little money each month. (“Save Money, Live Better”…Makes you wonder.) The words of the German tourists we met in Chokoloskee, FL—the ones who were disappointed to see that all the stores in the US are the same no matter where you go—have rung on in our ears, because they’re too often right. We’ve found it a joy to see places like SLO that work to hold onto their community through some creativity and an ongoing commitment to just plain being who they are rather than to being just like everyone else.

On the whole, one of the things our whirlwind trip around the country has done is show us that there are lots of wonderful places to live. And home is what you get used to—your roads, your neighborhood, your Wal-Mart…I mean stores, your weather. For us, we’re happy in Richmond. It seems pretty likely, because of my job and Nan’s family, that we’ll just keep hanging out in the commonwealth until we retire and decide to become snowbirds, traveling and camping. Assuming we don’t strangle one another or get hit by a bus or win the lottery in the meantime. But once we do have the chance to travel longer-term, it seems likely we’ll be returning to some of these places to stay for extended periods of time. A few months here, a winter there… And we’ve been enjoying the opportunity to do some advance scouting of the various possibilities.

Where's Waldo - Find Nan at the SLO Farmer's Market


Kerby Joining Bucket Busters at the Farmer's Market


You've got to love a good Bubblegum Alley