Spring Break Trip to Washington, DC

Gail and Ben and I went down to Washington, DC last week to celebrate spring vacation, and try to find spring (it's snowing in Lake Clear today as I type this!)...we had a great time, and can't wait to go again!


On our first day, we went to the National Zoo and met my Auntie Ann there...we had fun exploring the "Wild Asia" exhibit...


We were there before the official opening time (since most of the exhibits are outdoors, you can see all but the inside stuff as soon as it's light)...it was much too early for this fishing cat (Vinnie and Thumbelina still don't believe in a cat that swims for its food, they only reluctantly move for their food, and would prefer it if we would deliver it to the couch for them) to be showing off his stuff in the pool in his enclosure, but he did some nice stretching and grooming and nest-tending...

We were lucky to get to the zoo early enough to beat the crowds to the panda viewing locations, and had great luck seeing the pandas engaging in all of the most common panda-esque activities (I tried to use pandemonium in that sentence, but just couldn't manage it...they're too mellow)...in descending order of likelihood:


a) sleeping


b) eating


c) gently ambling a short way in their enclosure before stopping for rest


By the time we were done checking out the pandas, some of the buildings were opening, and we found this room filled with captive scientists and web-geeks who study the pandas and set up (and choose) the shots for their webcam...it was neat to talk with them and see these reclusive creatures in their natural habitat (dimly lit and dank rooms with flickering computer light and caffeinated beverages all around)


We stopped by the elephant house, which is undergoing an extreme makeover...although this may look like cruel overcrowding, the animals had free access of a whole suite of rooms, and chose to hang out together in this tiny one, throwing dirt on themselves and each other...


There was a baby gorilla in the primate house, but it was tough to get a picture of it...I liked this pensive gorilla though...


While visiting the Gibbons, Ben and Ann did some Gibbon impressions...



Ann did some nice ones, including some sound effects...


This caiman never moved (and may, in fact, have been plastic), but we enjoyed the reptile house nonetheless, and I liked the reflected skull and bones in this picture...


We had a super lunch...Ben's came with an awesome panda-tastic lunch bag, which made all of us want to change our orders...


After lunch, we visited the big cats, which were not surprisingly big, languid, and graceful...


It's amazing to see these beasts lounge around and then effortlessly stretch their way up a smooth 9 foot wall...


Ben loved the idea of the tiger tracking collars...


One of his favorite things in the whole zoo were the seals and sea-lions...the seals were playing an awesome game of tag in and out of the water the whole time that we were there...the sea-lions stretched their flippers (once each) in the whole time that we were there...


It was a great visit to the zoo!


There's a Starbucks right across from the main entrance, and we stopped off for a tricky beverage after the zoo-trip to debrief...


Auntie Ann bought Ben this great panda, named Tai-Shan (and nicknamed Winny)...


We rode the metro all over town the whole time that we were in DC...there was a station only a short walk from our hotel...the only downside was the daunting escalator ride down into the depths of the Earth...


The next day, we headed out to the Mall, excited and primed for another fun day...


We got off at the Smithsonian Station, and walked from there to our stops for the day...


The first stop was the International Spy Museum...it was a really great and immersive experience for all of us...there's enough to see and do for a couple more visits...in the picture above, we were crawling through some ductwork over the main floor of the museum, eavesdropping and spying on the people below us...


After the Spy Museum, we headed over to the Air and Space Museum, and had a super time exploring the incredible exhibits and displays...the fact that we could touch a rock from the Moon blew Ben away, and he kept coming back to the moonrock...


We saw 2 Imax movies while in DC...a cool one on a new NASA program doing stereo mapping of the Sun, and the best Imax I have ever seen...a superb movie on the deep ocean...


Back at the hotel that night, Ben got out his spy kit, and showed us some moves...


The next morning, we got to the Natural History Museum a little early, and Ben used the time to write some postcards...


The museum has a great new ocean exhibit, which included some great displays...this huge shark jaw, an intact Architeuthis Dux, and some other truly bizarre examples of deep-sea life...


Back outside, we enjoyed walking around the Mall, taking in the sights and sounds of spring...there were lots of cherry blossoms still in the height of bloom...


We walked down the Mall to the Washington Monument, then down to the WW2 Memorial, along the Reflecting Pool, and to the Lincoln Memorial...after a sitdown on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, we headed down to the Vietnam and Korea memorials...it was beautiful and Ben loved seeing and talking about and touching all of these memorials and monuments...


One of the key criteria in looking for our hotel for the trip to DC was that it had to have a pool...we spent time in the pool every day, and it was a great way to unwind and unkink after all of the walking that we did in DC...


Ben took this cool pitcure in the pool, using my camera...

Spring Break Trip to Las Vegas

After DC, I left Gail and Ben, and flew out to Las Vegas to meet my sister Sarah for a couple of days of excess...we've done this a couple of times and had a ton of fun each time...this year may have been the best...


We both got in late Friday night, and played blackjack for a couple of hours before going to bed...the next morning, we got up early, grabbed some coffee, and made plans...some of which we stuck to...


We followed that up with a great breakfast at the buffet at our Hotel, the Hilton this year...they had good food and endless champagne...



After some blackjack and comped drinks (2 of my favorite things), we went for lunch at Tony Roma's...there's a ridiculous story about how we ended up at Tony Roma's instead of the best Thai restaurant in the Western US during our last visit to Vegas, but I'll spare you everything except for the fact that we both ended up signing up for Roma's email updates, which come as weekly reminders of a funny time...that being the case, we decided to go back and try it again...


Here you can see me poised to dive into a half-sized onion loaf...the waitress assured me that lots of people get them all the time, but Sarah and I couldn't finish the half-sized one between us...we had a great time at our lunch...


After lunch, we headed south on the Las Vegas Strip via monorail and played video blackjack (smaller stakes and they still comp your drinks) until it was time for our dinner plans...we both did well...


We went to the "Tournament of Kings"...a fun dinner theater experience at the Excaliber Casino...


Merlin came by our section prior to dinner to prep us on the show...


The "Kings" lined up and engaged in jousting and sword-fighting...there were good guys and bad guys and fireworks and magic...it was a blast!


Here is Sarah after the show with our King...the King of France...WE WON!!!


The next morning, Sarah and I were both a little dehydrated (probably the dry desert air), so we fell back on the time-honored cure-all of a power-breakfast at the Hilton's Buffet...forcing fluids and spicy foods fixed up right up, and got us ready for the day ahead!


We followed up the breakfast with Spectacular Bloody Mary's at a bar that I remembered at the MGM, which cemented the cure...


This lion tamer/player/worker was busy cleaning and organizing the lion exhibit at the MGM, inside the enclosure with the lions, and he went over for serious smoochies with this lion...the lion was genuinely happy to see him, and enthusiastic to give kisses...



We went over to Gameworks, a cool arcade that we had visited during our last visit, to shoot some zombies (you pay/play by the hour, not by quarters, which insures a great time)...they had lots of great games, one of the most fun was a ride-version of "House of the Dead 4"...we were strapped in after agreeing to lengthy health waivers, and the ride spun and vibrated and shuddered and blew on us and had google-phonic speakers and was beyond awesome!!!


On the way back to MGM, we stopped off at the ridiculous house of hats...Sarah found a great one...


I unfortunately couldn't find a silly hat...


Back at the MGM Grand, we found our favorite bar and blackjack playplace (not to be confused with MacDonald's playplaces), Centrifuge, a great bar with fun music and feel and wait-staff that dances on the bar every 1/2 hour...as per usual, as long as we were playing, our drinks were free...the last time we were here, a hugely pregnant waitress, likely bound by contract, danced in the corner every half hour while her co-workers danced up on the bar...it cemented the place as a classic in our Las Vegas lexicon...


We had a great time hanging out, people-watching, playing blackjack, drinking free bourbon, and...


...watching the "Centrifuge" dancers...we had a super time and/but missed our planned night out at the Stratosphere Tower restaurant and the topless vampire show, "Bite"...the explanation involves numerous comped bourbons as shown above, a late-afternoon nap, and a too-quiet alarm...we'll catch the dinner and "Bite" the next time we're in town...we still had a great night anyway...


The next morning, we headed down to the opposite end of the strip for some play (and free drinks) in the Stratosphere and the Sahara...we had a fun time until we found this computer/video animated blackjack machine, after which we had a phenomenally fun time...we both won a bunch of money, and had fun trying to engage the dealers...we named this one Penny for reasons which we'll tell you in private...

Sarah headed out around noon, and my flight went out later that night...I spent the intervening hours shooting a few more zombies and catching a movie...

Sarah and I had another spectacular time in Las Vegas, and plan to come back next year...I'm happy to be back in Lake Clear (although the constant snow is a bit of a bummer after the sun and 70s weather in Las Vegas), have finally caught up on my sleep and hydration, and spent the day snuggling with Ben and Penny and Cedar...

I like living like that for a couple of days each year, probably because it's so different from my life in NY...

Penny's Birthday

Our Labra-puppy Penny turned 1 today!!!

Ben and I started off the day by sleeping in, a startling rare occurrence in our household...we eventually got going, and headed into town to do some chores and some playing...our first stop was the laundromat in town...I have a monstrous sleeping bag which smells like trolls have been wrestling in it all winter, hitting each other with dirty-wet gymsocks...it filled our washing machine to capacity and beyond, so I figured that I would let the industrial -sized machines in town handle it, which they did, admirably...it now smells like princesses have been playing badminton in it (sedately), using potpourri instead of birdies...



Next to the laundromat is a playground which we have always referred to as, "the crappy playground next to Stewart's", which I found out today is a misnomer...it's a pretty great playground, with lots of fun and challenging elements...{{{for those who may be wondering if all of my clever names for places in downtown Saranac Lake are misnomers, the Chinese restaurant that we refer to as, "the shitty Chinese place" is justifiably named}}}


Ben was dressed in Adirondack Spring Casual, which means mudboots, shorts, pile-lined Carhart jacket and a t-shirt...it was 15 degrees this morning, and 55 this afternoon, so it worked for him all day long...


Lots of climbing and running around later, we went back to check on the sleeping bag...it was fine, but the laundromat stank strongly like propane...I mentioned this to the sleepy woman behind the counter, and she countered with, "It gets worse as the day goes one, you should be in here around 5, when we close."...nobody should, but someday it'll go boom, and you can say that you heard it here first...


After changing the sleeping bag into a huge dryer (Ben and I could have both fit inside it, no problem), we went off in search of a newly approved geocache not too far from town...it was a small container disguised like a rock hidden somewhere along a ginormous wall of rock...the one Ben is holding is not the geocache, that's just a rock...my plan is to post this picture on the geocaching.com website to get someone to look for this rock instead of the actual container...I'm just mean like that (Ben isn't and has no idea, either of my evil nature or my plan, so don't tell him)...it was a fun hunt on a gorgeous day, and Ben found it when I was about to give up...we were the first to find this particular geocache...yay us!

Auntie Gladys was asking about geocaching, so I assume that other readers of this blog might have similar questions...the best place to learn about it is through geocaching.com and/or to read their FAQ on Geocaching...


We went back to the laundromat, and I held my breath to run inside while Ben stayed in the car, and when I found that the dryer needed 20 more minutes, we went back to the playground, with Ben losing some layering in the heat of the afternoon...


He had a great time at the playground and geocaching, and when the sleeping bag was dry, we went shopping for birthday supplies for Penny...



Traditionally, Sheffield dogs get their birthday cakes at the table, and it's normally carrot cake...but Penny is a princess, so we varied the formula a bit, and got her an aggressively pink layer cake, and she loved it...


She was very happy when we started singing to her, but a little "whatchoo talkin' 'bout Willis?" when the plate with cake started descending towards her mouth...


She got over her trepidation quickly though, and wolfed the whole piece amazingly quickly...she was a little more ladylike on her second helping...

Ben's asleep, Penny's asleep, Cedar's asleep, and Vinnie's asleep...there is snoring coming from every nook and crannie of this house, and it (or the full weekend) is lulling me to an early bed...

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz