While today is a somber day, I am going to be a little bit ofa rebel and post about the living and the celebration of life instead of death. I won't go on expounding on where the hell bin Ladin s head is (or rather why it's not on a pike displayed for all in Washington). I won't go on about the stupidities of the follow-up with respect to Iraq's occupation and rehabilitation. Others are doing the ranting far better. Instead, I am going to talk, briefly, about the fun and amusement that we had this weekend, as a family, instead.
On Staurday, after a much delayed leave-taking, we - Avrora, Lyuda, and myself - took off with a friend for Six Flags Marine World up in Vallejo. We arrived at about 11 AM and stayed until about 6:30 PM. We had a very good time. We rode a lot of rollercoasters: Medusa, Boomerang, Roar, etc. The only ones we didn't do were Kong and Cobra. Cobra's a bitty one and Kong has only one car on it so it takes forever to get through the line. Lyuda and Tom made it through to almost the end - a 45 minute wait - to find out they were doing a 10 minute shutdown and chased everyone out of line. We visited a few of the animal exhibits: dolphins, stingrays, penguins, and butterflies. I was hoping to get some picts of Avrora with the dolphins, but...not this trip. We'll go back again, of course. Lyuda screams VERY impressively on the rollercoasters, actually. At least until she lost her voice. The Boomerang - a rollercoaster where you ride first forward and then backwards on the same track you just traversed - is what did her in at the end. We had a very good time.
Yesterday, Lyuda needed to study, so Avrora and I split. We ran up to Forest Knolls in Marin for a walk and other reasons. Then we ran some errands back in the East Bay: car maintenance related and such mostly. Then we ran over to get a gift for my wife, a belated anniversary gift because we had spent so much on the trip to San Deigo. We got her an Ipod Nano. Avrora bolted out the Apple Store with the bag with the Ipod like a bat out of hell. She zipped out to the right and kept going. It was funny, but a little scary being her father and worried she'd run out into the street. I finally caught her after chasing her with the stroller while people were very amused with her antics. Dorks. I swapped the Ipod with a bottle in the bag so she'd not damage what I'd just bought. She was mostly happy with that. We then tried to go to a little beach near us, but when we arrived, the tide had only just receded and all the sand was very, very wet. With the cool wind blowing, it seemed like a less than wise idea to play there. Avrora was unhappy until she saw the parasailing folks zipping back and forth near us. She was very happy with watching that. We ahd a good day. Lyuda was less than happy, but she'd had a headache all day and had to stay inside to study: ie that's understandable. She brightened with her Ipod though.
We had a good weekend. Next weekend won't be as fun since Lyuda has tests on Monday. Bleh.
On Staurday, after a much delayed leave-taking, we - Avrora, Lyuda, and myself - took off with a friend for Six Flags Marine World up in Vallejo. We arrived at about 11 AM and stayed until about 6:30 PM. We had a very good time. We rode a lot of rollercoasters: Medusa, Boomerang, Roar, etc. The only ones we didn't do were Kong and Cobra. Cobra's a bitty one and Kong has only one car on it so it takes forever to get through the line. Lyuda and Tom made it through to almost the end - a 45 minute wait - to find out they were doing a 10 minute shutdown and chased everyone out of line. We visited a few of the animal exhibits: dolphins, stingrays, penguins, and butterflies. I was hoping to get some picts of Avrora with the dolphins, but...not this trip. We'll go back again, of course. Lyuda screams VERY impressively on the rollercoasters, actually. At least until she lost her voice. The Boomerang - a rollercoaster where you ride first forward and then backwards on the same track you just traversed - is what did her in at the end. We had a very good time.
Yesterday, Lyuda needed to study, so Avrora and I split. We ran up to Forest Knolls in Marin for a walk and other reasons. Then we ran some errands back in the East Bay: car maintenance related and such mostly. Then we ran over to get a gift for my wife, a belated anniversary gift because we had spent so much on the trip to San Deigo. We got her an Ipod Nano. Avrora bolted out the Apple Store with the bag with the Ipod like a bat out of hell. She zipped out to the right and kept going. It was funny, but a little scary being her father and worried she'd run out into the street. I finally caught her after chasing her with the stroller while people were very amused with her antics. Dorks. I swapped the Ipod with a bottle in the bag so she'd not damage what I'd just bought. She was mostly happy with that. We then tried to go to a little beach near us, but when we arrived, the tide had only just receded and all the sand was very, very wet. With the cool wind blowing, it seemed like a less than wise idea to play there. Avrora was unhappy until she saw the parasailing folks zipping back and forth near us. She was very happy with watching that. We ahd a good day. Lyuda was less than happy, but she'd had a headache all day and had to stay inside to study: ie that's understandable. She brightened with her Ipod though.
We had a good weekend. Next weekend won't be as fun since Lyuda has tests on Monday. Bleh.
1 comment:
I'm sure Lyuda will love the ipod. -- I feel addicted to mine (and all news about things ipod related :P ).
I got my current Ipod for X-mas about 2 years ago (it was actually my 3rd hard drive mp3 player, my first- a 6gig archos, was stolen, the 2nd, a 20gig archos, stopped working.)
The great thing(s) about the ipod relative to my previous players -- automatic sync up with audiobooks I'd purchased through audible.com --- automaic sync with any music I'd purchased through Itunes, good podcasting controls (I currently have mine set to both grab all new episodes of the shows I'm subscribed to and to automatically remove episodes once i've listened to them.)
Also worth noting (as far as audiobooks go) that Itunes is the only place (short of buying the tape or cd) that J.K. Rowling has given permission for downloading the digital audioversion (very good, I borrowed the first few on tape from my employer)of the Harry Potter books.
I'm now on a quest to get one of the latest models that also supports video.... Apple is supposed to be coming out with new products tomorrow and hopefully one item will be a new video playing device with a larger screen and longer battery life.
As for the Nano-- cool device... I keep getting tempted by the fact that it would make a much better work-out device (between the small size and being flash based)-- but honestly I do use my ipod everytime I go walking and for running it's probably safer for me NOT to be 'plugged in'
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