On the road again

Cindy got this nice shot on the way back from White Sands. We're headed southwest on U.S. 70 with the southern section of the missile range on our left.

White Sands

This was a pretty darn cool day trip. From El Paso, we headed west a little to Las Cruces and then north to White Sounds National Monument. There, we found the world's largest gypsum dune field.

The 275 square-mile site was created because there are no rivers to carry away rainwater or the melted snow from the mountains. That means the sun can bake the small lakes that form, leaving behind large gypsum crystals that are then worn down into sand grains by the whipping winds.

And boy, did the winds whip up on us yesterday. It was about 45 degrees and the sun was very nice and warm, but the gale didn't let up for a second. Good thing we dressed for the occasion and got to climb, stand atop and then roll down all the dunes we wanted to. We will definitely go back in the summer - buckets, small shovels and sliding devices in hand - for a picnic and what is advertised as a one-of-a-kind sunset.

Why we love the holidays

1. We don't ever really have to change out of our PJs.

2. We get to watch English soccer on the tube pretty much every available second - and the boys get to wear their new jerseys.

3. We try out/on all our presents in a dizzying 15-minute session, then rediscover two-thirds of them over the next three days.

4. Food and drink.

5. Seconds and nightcaps.

6. We get the chance to escape with that book we've been meaning to start since August.

7. We catch naps during the slower parts of that book.

8. Board games, baby.

As close to an official photo as we'll get

Happy holidays, everyone. May 2008 bring you plenty more of the fingerlickin' good stuff that came your way in '07. And may all the crud that crawled into your life this year stay there as you move on with a smile on your face.

Go Speed Racer

Here's a quick photo from our very nice Thanksgiving trip to Cindy's sister pad in Sevierville. After a filling brunch at Flapjack's, we drove down the road a little and landed at the NASCAR Speedpark.

Unfortunately, there was no open-wheel wonder in sight, but both Sebastian and Geert took a turn burning some go kart rubber. Buddy was Joe Cool, all sunk low in his ride and focused on the obstacles ahead. It took him a lap or two to get in the zone, but once he was in the zone, he was flat out. Good stuff.

I hereby recognize you

We had a busy few days last week. Oma visited from Texas to get away from unpacking boxes, watch Natasja's performance in the American Girl fashion show fundraiser for Special Olympics and to take part in Sebastian's leaf-pile-jumping birthday party. The big man also had his last soccer game for the season, which was followed up by a pizza party.

Earlier, Cindy drove all the way up to Clarksville to see Brittany receive an award from Workforce Essentials for her work in the Jobs for Tennessee Graduates program over the past year. Rock on.

More Mizzou pics

Here's Geert with Kim at the game. And no, she was not wearing a veil. Not this time.

So the big if debate has started inside Geert's head: If Mizzou (8-1, No. 6 in the BCS) wins out — bludgeoning KU along the way — and if it beats OU in the Big XII championship and if both LSU and Oregon lose one more game along the way...

Yeah, that's right: The world is only a small handful of ifs — six favorable results, in fact — away from seeing the University of Missouri Fighting Tigers play for the freakin' national championship. Chew on that for a while.

And while you're chewin', imagine this monster flying a few hundred feet over your head before kickoff. Sah-wheat. Double sah-wheat.

Rudolf burger, anyone?

At Natasja's request, we're posting her recent snappy report on the Old Continent. It covers a lot of ground in a short span and makes trusty Laplanders out of a lot of people who we're sure had no clue they lived in reindeer country. Hey, I'm hungry. We'll have two Rudolf Rump specials with Prancer's Milk. Hold the fur, thanks.

Tiger time

Geert headed up to Mizzou last weekend to watch the Tigers' game against Iowa State. He met up with his friends Kim, Deana and Kevin Pape and hit the old haunts: Shakespeare's, the 'Berg and Flat Branch.

Saturday night, they stopped off at a Halloween party with supremely cool decorations that started 50 feet in front of the house, featured chainsaws and a fog machine and didn't stop until you were startled by the hairy bat over the sink in the bathroom.

The game was a good time, even though the Tigers didn't have their sharpest outing. (We realized soon afterward how thrilled we would have been five short years ago to win a game 42-28, so we didn't fuss for long.) The weather was freakin' awesome, the flyover rocked and we had plenty of opportunities to flinch as the ROTC boys fired the cannon.

The forecast and an APB

Missing: Mr. Autumn

Nickname: Fall Guy

Description: An old friend who shows up in these parts around this time of year and shacks with us for about three months. A cool dude, but often moody and unpredictable. Will bring lots of water and colors with him, but no hot air.

If found, please return to October so people can feel like life is still somewhat normal and so they don't have to worry about displaced polar bears washing up on the shores of Florida.

Running in the suburban rat race

The past few weeks have been marked by a lot of running. We've been runnning to and from school events where the kids have been running — first in Moore Miles (where Natasja teamed up with her friend, Lauren), then in a mile run around Pinkerton Park. In between, we've shuttled to and from play dates, soccer practices, Girl Scout meetings, house guests, doctor visits, pirate parties for mom. Somehow, we've squeezed in the occasional nap to make sure we can keep running.

Coming up: Parent-teacher conferences, a pack of dentist appointments, Sebastian's birthday and Geert's road trip to Mizzou.

But our scampering doesn't hold a candle to what Oma and Opa are doing. They're moving this weekend - from Singapore to El Paso, pictured below.

Prancing princesses

By now, we're closer to Sebastian's birthday - the camera kept disapperaring when we needed to download - but we still need to post these shots from Sophia's recent birthday party. It was a nice night at home with friends, a big castle cake and a couple bottles of vino.

Nature perseveres

One of Cindy's favorite photography themes is the details and colors of nature. And amazingly, despite the hottest and driest August ever recorded in these parts, there is still plenty of color to be found. Easy on the eyes, good for the soul.

Strong debut performances

Both Natasja and Sebastian played their first soccer games of the season yesterday. Natasja's Pink Flamingos came out on top 3-1, buddy's crew won so handily we stopped counting after a while.

Talking to the media, their coaches both said they liked what they saw given that it's early in the season, but that the key to winning a championship is constantly improving and pushing yourself.

Our big metalmouth girl - the braces went on three weeks ago - played well in the field in the first half and kept a second-half clean sheet in goal.

Playing after a downpour drenched everyone to the bone, Sebastian hustled around the field, scored four times and had a hand in several other goals. Man, was he spent come seven o'clock...

Wishful thinking

Why the placid snow scene, you ask? Especially in late August, which is shaping up to be the hottest on record for the Nashville area, with temps topping 100 by 10 o'clock?

Geert's feeling a little bitter about the weather because he raked leaves in the back yard for a good part of the morning in that heat. We finally got some good rain last night (maybe the third shower in six weeks) but it came much too late for one our trees, which began shedding two weeks ago and will be naked by Labor Day.

Upbeat thought: He won't have to rake them in November, when they're all soggy and stinky...

Pandas, apes and booze

See that snoozing black-and-white lump? That's kind of how we felt after traipsing up and down the hills of the San Diego Zoo. (Yeah, I know we said we weren't going to post any stuff from that day, but the public (well, Cindy) called for it, so here we go.)

There were some highlights, including the gorillas, where a young 'un was quite the entertainer as he wrestled wiith an adult and tried to goad Big Papa in the picture into a quick scrap in the dirt. No luck with that: Big Papa was not much fun.

Before that, the sea lions were a good laugh, but there really wasn't much else to wow us. The panda was snoring, the turtles were stationary and we were tiring quickly.

What to do? Why, let's order the biggest freakin' margarita we can find in SoCal! Holy hangover, opa...

"Hey stud, wanna foxtrot?"

Somehow, Cindy found the time and the outfit to do a little glamour session on the hotel grounds in San Diego. If you've got it, flaunt it, right?

California dream

Wow, what a week. Our trip to San Diego was a blast. We mixed fun excursions with a few days at the beach and some nice chill time. The Legoland and beach pics will come first, 'cause we still need to download all the Sea World shots.

Legoland was a great day. The park is well laid out and has a good mix of rides and Lego attractions. We saw a couple of 4D movies to get warmed up, then did a coaster or two before getting down to business with the big water ride. Opa teamed up with Sebastian and Natasja went with Geert, who got nice and soaked by people shooting water cannons mounted on the fences.

Miniland, the collection of building and city replicas, is very impressive. The San Fran, New York and D.C. sections are the highlights, although the detail throughout is sweet.

We spent two afternoons on the beaches of San Diego. The first was in La Jolla, where we walked onto a patch of sand right next to a collection of rocks jutting out into the ocean.

We hung out to watch the tide come in and the seagulls peck and pull at a giant hunk of sea meat before driving south through the coastal towns and down to Belmont Park before turning inland.

The beach pics here are from beautiful Coronado Beach, which is rightfully recommended as one of the family-friendly places to catch some rays. Coronado is a strip of land that sits across the bay from downtown San Diego. It features some very pretty beach homes - a quick price check shows a 1,400-square-foot, three-bedroom Victorian at $1.6M - as well as the famous Hotel Del Coronado.

We met up with Cindy's cousin Tisha and her family and had a blast playing in the sand, boogie boarding and chatting. To the north, we could watch the fighter jets from the Naval Air Station take off and climb into the clouds. Aside from a jellyfish-related clearing of the waters and Sebastian disappearing on us as we were getting ready to leave, it was a very nice afternoon.


What you very likely won't see much of in this or future posts is the one disappointment of the trip, the renowned San Diego Zoo. We were all very underwhelmed by both the layout and many of the animals. Oh well, one down day out of seven ain't bad...

Making a splash

"The water is your friend. You don't have to fight with water, just share the same spirit as the water, and it will help you move."
- Aleksandr Popov

Snapshots of a visit

We had a blast with Sasja before she got back on the plane last Friday. During the week, we played laser tag (where Geert sweated like a pig in the heat), took a nice stroll through most of downtown Nashville and went to a rockin' Sounds baseball game.

In between that, the fam checked out the Rainforest Café, played glow-in-the-dark minigolf and chilled out at the pool. Cindy even got a hold of her for a few minutes to do a photo shoot. Good stuff all around and we can't wait until the next time she visits...

Grab bag o' thoughts

Geert's cousin Sasja is visiting from Belgium. She was nicely jetlagged after an 18-hour trip that included having to turn back to Detroit due to an undisclosed mechanical error. Gulp. She joined the neighborhood for a cookout on the Fourth and we've been out and about to the movies and downtown Franklin since then. Today is a shopping day with Cindy.

After each spending some time with granda Eileen in Kentucky since the end of the school, all the kids are at home. We've signed up Natasja and Sebastian for the local fall soccer league.

Just six days until Geert and Jon from up the street head the speedway for the local IndyCar race. Then he'll head to the Kentucky race in August with some other friends. Before then, the whole crew will head to San Diego.

That crew will include oma and opa, who recently told us they'll be moving to El Paso this fall. Won't that be a nice change from the 14-hour time difference to Singapore? We are going to be good friends with the folks at Continental Airlines...

Told ya they'd be random thoughts. Why not throw in a random photo? (Well, not that random - it kinda follows the post below.) If you can tell us what year this photo was taken, you'll get an amazing prize in 2028.

Everybody needs a reputation

So we're kicking back on a beautiful Friday night in Tennessee with some neighbors. Sophia comes outside with the coaster pictured here. She and a friend made it with dozens of little plastic rings and glued them together with heat. Very nice.

Her friend says, "Sophia, is that for your daddy's water?" Nope, she quickly counters. "It's for his beer."

Britt's big day

So here we are.

Our big girl is going to graduate in two days. And doesn't she look the part? We've got plenty of family coming to town to help her celebrate her entrance into the real world and the weekend party schedule is filling up nicely. A little Wildhorse Saloon here, a little kickin' back there... It's all good.

Next up? A nursing assistant course this summer, a phlebotomy certificate from the Tennessee Technology Center this fall and then on to a nursing degree. Coming soon to an arm near you: Britt with a needle.

Ride cowboy ride...

Yesterday was Rodeo Day at buddy's school and he was definitely dressed for the role. Well, for about 20 minutes anyway...

Cindy went to school to help paint faces, run the various games and keep the chaos factor at a manageable level. It was all good fun and there was plenty of ice cream and candy available to keep the kids up and at 'em.

School pictures!

Uh, there's really nothing else to say, is there...

Hands up if...

...you sucked your thumb as a kid.

We still don't quite know where she got it, but Sophia began doing so a few months ago. Geert will give her a hard time about it, but it's turned into a game, especially in the mornings as he's getting ready to go to work. If he busts her with thumb in mouth, she'll pop it out and hold it two inches from her mouth's wicked smile.

Then, very deliberately, she'll ask Geert, "Daddy, when you goin' to work?" Chances are Geert's on his way out the door, so he'll pretend like he's really leaving, turn the hallway corner and five seconds later pop back into the room just as Sophia is reinserting her thumb. Yell! Scream! Giggle! And Geert's on his way for real this time...

OK, so now this: Hands up if you still suck your thumb...

Da heat is in da house

No, not the cops. Our upstairs AC unit went out a while back. It wasn't that urgent to get it fixed when the highs were in the 70s and the lows in the 50s.

But just like that, the temps jump into the 80s and don't drop below 70 at night, leaving all of us red-faced for a good part of the day. Urgency? Um, yeah. Good thing the Y and its pool are right down the street. And we've got our summer trip to San Diego to look forward to. We'll test that popular notion that it's always 74 in San Diego by heading out there the last week of July. If we all get heat strokes from testing a little too much, you'll see the evidence here first.

So Geert recently got a set of professional shots taken for work. Here's one - and only one - 'cause he's being stingy with 'em.

What else? The kids are counting the days until school is over, Cindy's cousin Nicole is stopping by tomorrow with her baby and Geert is steamed that the American Idol crew of kooks did a flat-as-warm-Coke rendition of 'Paint It, Black' for a Ford ad.

So you're telling us that, even though they charge $625 for a back-row seat, the Stones need the licensing revenue? Besides, there are certain songs you don't cover...

Now he's happy because he just realized that it's less than 75 days until he gets to watch Dan Wheldon and the rest of the IRL dudes and dudettes fly around Nashville Superspeedway. And there's less than four weeks till Indy. Always thinking happy thoughts, that guy.

Diatribe is over and we out.