Let's Go Tigers!

It's late, so just a quick post...

Today was the official end of my birthday (which started on 15 April for those of you keeping track at home). We went to the second Tigers-Braves game of the series and had a blast. Today, we brought along a couple more generations and sat at the very top of the stadium behind home plate. It was a fantastic view - we could call the balls and strikes, but we could also see the Capitol Building, the IBM Building, the Olympic torch (from '96), and the rest of downtown. At least a third of the crowd was dressed in orange, so when the "Let's Go Tigers" chant started, it was pretty darn loud. We sat above the players' parking lot after the game and saw Brian McCann, Jeff Francour, and Warren MI native John Smoltz get in their rides. The strange thing was that when we got on the road, there were several players next to us driving home, two of them in Bentleys. We figured they'd just take a secret Bat-Tunnel or something directly to their manses.

Yesterday the two of us sat in primo seats down by third base, so we could be on the Tigs side of the building. A couple of foul balls and the Jumbotron camera were all very close to us, but no cigar in either case.

Combined with tee ball this morning, it's been a baseballerific weekend. We will probably not attend the Tigers game tomorrow because it's a late one (8:05? We're on the east coast, people!), but hey, we got to see Verlander pitch today and Bobby Cox tie the major league all-time record for game ejections. We saw Ordonez and Pudge get hit by balls, and we got to see a little bit of the city. Good stuff.

Jack and Jen have been Georgia residents for 2 days but we haven't seen them yet. Cartersville isn't exactly a stone's throw away, although it really isn't all that far. Hopefully, we'll see them tomorrow.

TTFN, Mr. Wizard

Bummer alert - Mr. Wizard has gone to the great lab in the sky. He is probably one of the biggest reasons that we both got into science, which is how we met, which is why Gabriel exists. Hmmm... come to think of it, he's basically responsible for our entire lives, hee hee. link

These Shoes Are Made For... Posing

Riley's birthday party was a total blast. First of all, it was a totally original idea - a dress-up tea party complete with a mischievous pixie - and second, the woman who ran the party did such an amazing job with the kids. She was the kind of congenial pretty woman to whom kids flock. The girls dressed as princesses, and the boys were knights. By some miracle (the pixie?), both G and C wore their costumes the entire time. It was a little uncomfortably girly for me, but none of us could help but get caught up in the fun because it was so over-the-top.

The next day was Girls Gone Wild Sunday. Lisa, Skye, and I went to the outlets and filled lots of shopping bags. But it wasn't until today that I found these hottest shoes ever, and Chip found these and wouldn't walk out of the store unless he was wearing them.

Otto is sick, so it looks like we will be spending the week indoors. We couldn't get an appointment for him until Friday morning, and we think he's having transmission problems, and it's really really hot these days, so we don't want to get stranded on the side of the road. The good news is that Global provides loaner cars, so maybe we'll get an S model to cruise around in over the weekend, or if they are out of loaner MINIs, maybe a cool Beemer. p.s. Where the heck's my license plate??!!

Pardon Me, Is That The...

We just had the best weekend ever! Matthew planned a surprise vacation for P&G to Chattanooga, Tennessee. We went up on Saturday afternoon and were on our way back roughly 24 hours later, but it felt like we were there for a week.

We stayed in the Staybridge Suites, which was clean, spacious, and had all the amenities we could want. We highly recommend it. Once we checked in, we went out to the big three tourist attractions of Lookout Mountain, Ruby Falls, the Incline Railway, and Rock City.

Ruby Falls is a ginormous waterfall deep underground. We took an elevator down and then traveled by foot through the cave to reach it. We got to walk around behind the waterfall, and it was a little intimidating but very cool. G would not let us help him through the caves, because he could do it himself.

The Chipster really, really loved the Incline Railway. His mother was pretty scared at first, but when we started moving, I realized that it was a very slow descent and a very safe ride. There are some very lucky people who live next to the railway, and actually, we were amazed at the houses that were at the top. We can't even imagine how much they must cost, but that is some great real estate.

We didn't know what to expect at Rock City, but we knew that it's advertised all the way up to Michigan (kind of like how Frankenmuth has a billboard on I-75 in Florida) so it must be interesting, at the very least. It was amazing. The word "magical" came to mind again and again as we walked through the gardens, in the skinny cracks between the rocks, up to the lookout point ("See Seven States!"), and down into the caves. The last section was a black-lit, gnome-filled, genuine freak-out, but we could see how kids could be totally enchanted. Myself, my mind kept flashing back to the time I descended into Lenin's Tomb and walked around his body, expecting him to sit up and say hello. Kind of the same trepidation.

Although it was late when we got back to the hotel, P&G really wanted to go swimming, so we did, while M waited for dinner to arrive. It was Chip's first time in a swimming pool as far as we can remember, and he LOVED it. It was quite a task to get him out of the water. By the time we left, he was jumping off the side into my arms. The restaurant across the street delivered some great gyros and chicken fingers, and when we finished our shakes, we all went to sleep. G slept in his "big boy bed", which is a sleeping bag.

On Sunday, we went for a ride on an actual Chattanooga Choo-Choo, which was a big thrill for G because, well, he's a little boy, and for us because we're fans of Glenn Miller. We departed from the Grand Junction Station, which had an honest-to-God Burma Shave advertisement ("He tried/To cross/As fast train neared/Death didn't draft him/He volunteered/Burma-Shave") at its entrance. We got to see how they turn the engine around on a big turntable, and where they fix the trains, we talked for a few minutes with an actual blacksmith (he was making a bottle opener at the moment), and the conductor gave us special permission to sit out on the back of the train on the way back to the station. It was really, really fun.

Video to come, but in the meantime...