When I'm Sixty-Four

And I made it! Too bad Lennon and Harrison didn't. Paul and Ringo got there before me, though. I remember when it sounded remote ("many years from now"), but at least I'M not losing my hair.

On the Road Again: Vacation 2011, Day One

It's our first night of our 2011 vacation. We;re rentiuging a condo/cabin on the grounds of the Nemacolin Woodlands Resort in western Pennsylvania, just down the road from Washington's Fort Necessity. We're tired and worn out so videos etc. will wait a day or so. I did use Twitter a bit from my phone but only did three tweets. Edited t remove typos introduced by my fat fingers on a phone keyboard, they were:

9:30 AM. Car loaded and ready to roll. Dog has the most luggage but did not help pack or load. Slacker.

Out of driveway 9:34 AM. Willie. Nelson singing "On the road again" on stereo.

5 pm At Nemacolin Highlands Resort since about 2:30. Morwe n Dunn blog. All is well despite initial problem with the Wifi.

Nothing earthshaking there. Traveling with the dog limits options for lunch and dinner, so it was drive-thrugh MacDonalds for lunch in Cumberland, MD, and carry-out pizza for dinner. Once we stock the kitchen we''ll have more options. Still, travel with a neurotic dog has its downsides.

"Gotcha Day" Celebrations and a Video

Today, as I already noted, was out 10th celebration of "Gotcha" Day.  Sarah, now 11 and ready to begin Middle School in September, joined us at the Sackler and Freer Galleries of the Smithsonian to look at Chinese art, then we went home and watched the videos of our original meeting, and then went out to one of her favorite Chinese restaurants, the Hong Kong Palace.

"Gotcha" Day, Ten Years Later

Ten years ago today, at about 1 pm China time (about 1 am DC time) in the Beijing Meeting Room of the Grand Sun City Hotel in Changsha, Hunan, China, Tam and I met our daughter for the first time. Chang Xiao Chao, then 14 months old, is now Sarah Grace Dunn, 11 and off to Middle School in September.

The official adoption took place in Chinese government offices the next day, and her American citizenship dates from her first setting foot in the US (in LA, unfortunately), but July 2 will always be "Gotcha" Day, the day we were united with her.  Along with her birthday, it's a key date we celebrate, and the 10th anniversary is particularly meaningful.

"Who are these strange-looking people?":

I'm Baaack ....

Do the title in your best Schwarzeneger/Terminator. With our decision to include Sarah's face more often it becomes much easier to put our pics and videos here and elsewhere. I also have left this site latent too long. It's summer. There will be a vacation, though destination still being determined since our plans to go to Joplin were, literally, blown away. We'd be in the way out there. But if you come here you'll find me here a lot more often. Stay tuned.

Christmas 2010

I imagine most of you reading this blog already are on our e-mail or Facebook lists, but for any who aren't, you can read our Christmas letter here.

Holidays

I'll be blogging again over the holidays. It's just that we're so busy, occasional Facebook is all I've had time for.

The Wired Family Room

I was talking about technology earlier. I looked up from my computer and saw the accompanying view: four screens on for a three-person family. The TV is presumably on for the dog. So I pulled out my phone (fifth screen) and took the picture. I put it immediately on Facebook but, for old times' sake, put it here as well.

A Farewell and a Reunion

Remember the movie The Big Chill? This weekend was something like that. One of my oldest friends, Bruce Carter, a friend since undergraduate days, died on Columbus day. Bruce, an avid athlete in great shape, died of a massive heart attack, totally unexpected, so it was a shock to those of us in a lot worse shape than he.

The memorial service was this weekend in his native Bristol, PA., north of Philadelphia. Many old friends, including some who live nearby but I never see and others farther afield, gathered to remember and tell stories. I told the story of how we once traded Bruce's dog for car repairs, a story I must record here sometime soon.

It was an emotional day, full of memories. And after many tales of long ago road trips, the drive up and back (though Tam drove) left us drained, so today is a crash day.

Sometimes when I remember the 1960s and 1970s, it seems pretty recent. Then I look up and see my daughter and her friend playing "Super Mario Strikers" on the Wii on a wide screen TVm and remember how fascinating "Pong" seemed when it was introduced. I love the resources technology makes available and the force multiplier effect, but sometimes I do feel my age.

Days Five through Seven

I've been remiss about posting, but then, I didn't have much to report. Let me first give you a brief précis of the last couple of days. Today (day 7) I missed the main event, so I hope Tam and/or Sarah will fill the gap. Tam, in fact, has already posted on day 7 before I got to days five and six.

Day Five: August 25. When last I left our little adventure, we'd decided to bug out of Franklin for Asheville due to poor Wi-Fi. We did so, but intending to spend the day around Franklin before going, and letting Sarah do gem-hunting (a local activity which allows kids to get very muddy). In the morning, we went to downtown Franklin so Sarah could visit Ruby City, which is to your usual rock shop what Tiffany is to the jewelry counter at Wal-Mart. I visited the town bookstore, and Tam a gourmet kitchen shop she'd liked two years ago. Apparently small towns in Western North Carolina carry things you can't find in Metropolitan Washington, DC.

Anyway, since most places (with the exception of Ruby City, which invited us to bring Coco in) aren't dog friendly, at each spot one of us had to stay outside with the dog. During the gourmet kitchen shop phase, it was I. Franklin has old-fashioned benches in front of the Main Street businesses, so I sat on one, with my cane (from my surgery, but still occasionally useful) and Coco. This being a small southern town I naturally nodded or spoke to most passersby. We have begun to learn that if Coco is being held, he is less likely to try to attack every passing person. So I held him tight. Many people addressed him ("Hello, puppy." Or in one case. "Hi, stubby puppy." When Sarah heard this she started calling him "stubby puppy.") He was pretty stoic, not barking at nearly as many people as usual.

Along the way I suddenly had an epiphany: while I still think like I did at 35 or 45, I've actually become the white-haired old guy sitting on a Main Street bench in a small Southern town, with his hound dog, leaning on his cane and making pleasantries with the locals. I'm just one stop shy of settin' and whittlin' on the front steps of the courthouse.

The next step was to be the gem mining. Sarah did it first when she was three or four and again two years ago and loves it. She likes the "seeded" buckets that guarantee you'll find pretty semi=precious stones but also won't likely produce the rubies and sapphires that really are found there. The Sheffield Mine where we'd been before still has the best reputation so we set out, but with us having lefgt our Franklin hotel I figured we'd just keep the dog on the sidelines since there was nowhere for me to stay with him. When we got there, we were greeted by a great, friendly, tongue hanging out happy-to-see-us southern coonhound (He was eager to meet Coco; Coco was eager to attack him) and a "No dogs allowed" sign. After trying to think of ways to square the circle (I go back to town while they stay at the mine? I sit with Coco in either a brutally hot car for several hours or one in which we run the air and use up a full tank of gas,

Assured we would go to the Gatlinburg Aquarium, Sarah acceded to the idea we just couldn't make the mining work.

So day five ended driving to Asheville, checking in, and Sarah spending time in the pool. Nobody took any video.

Day 6: August 26. Asheville and the park We took the Blue Ridge Parkway towards Great Smoky Mountains National Park. We picked up a picnic lunch but, thrown off the parkway by repair work from a storm, we found a barbecue place in Waynesville and bought that two. Once in the park we had a picnuc lunch (with the BBQ; the rest is spoiled now). On to New Found Gap on the state line. Lots of pictures and the video is up.

Day 7: August 27. Over the mountains to Tennessee, to Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. Tam's post on the Aquarium visit will have to serve since I was waiting in the hotel with the dog. They were profligate in their photography and we'll produce a movie from their clips and stills.

A Note on the YouTube videos: As you may recall, I didn't upload the two part Day Four video from Franklin because of the poor Internet connection. Last night in Asheville I tried three more times without suceess, though Part Two went up without a glitch, as did yesterday's Day Six video. Tonight, in Pigeon Forge, I finally got Part One of Day 4 to upload. So on YouTube (where they're displayed, like this blog, newest first) the order is from oldest to newest Day Four Part Two/ Day Six/ Day Four Part One. (There is no Day Five.)

Days Two and Three: Coco Gets Crazier

So far I've done better at getting video up at YouTube than blogging here; but then, Tam and Sarah's intents to blog haven't produced a post yet. So let me catch up a bit. The videos are at YouTube, though the most video-ready moments of the trip have been missed, the bear cub I mentioned on day one, and another bear-related story for later in this post.

Yesterday, day two, was the second day of travel down, and again mostly engaged in burning miles. When we weren't on the Interstates however, Sarah began to understand the appeal (and variety) of old roads, as we went through the towns of Southwest Virginia, ranging from industrial and railroad towns that were long strips of trailer parks with double-wides, to charming towns like Abingdon, where the State Theater of Virginia is located and there's a flourishing artistic community. Otherwise we cut across northeastern Tennessee via the Tri-Cities and the new (well, we first used it two years ago, so still new to us) I-16, down to Asheville.

It was a nice hotel, a Comfort Suites, and dog-friendly as well. But we've discovered that many pet-friendly places put all the pet rooms in a single corridor. In Asheville, as in Roanoke, there was a dog in the room across the hall. Actually, in Asheville apparently two, crated, and while never actually seen, clearly of the small, shrill, yippy persuasion. When they started out, Coco responded with wild barking and a furious attempt to go through the door. Fortunately the desk clerk actually found this amusing, but I think he was off duty when it started up again around dawn. Tam and I thought we were off-duty too, being sound asleep, until our dachshund went off.

Now, this was not the first problem of the day. In the afternoon, Sarah wanted to swim in the pool and since the night before we'd had no time and the next few days would be poolless, we decided Tam would watch her while I either stayed with the dog in the room , or walked him outside. We tried the latter first, but when he saw them going to the pool but me pulling him the other way he started barking, leaping about madly, and trying to bite through his leash.

You see, Coco tolerates me. He understands that during the school year, I'm home on Fridays and no one else is, so I'm his sofa/food source, but when either Sarah or Tam is available, I'm dog food. He's a ladies' dog; I'm the only adult male he doesn't act like he wants to dismember, and he's not much better with males Sarah's age. We think his bark is worse than his bite, but don't plan to test it.

As for other dogs, forget it. Though we met Coco at an adoption fair where he was around a lot of other dogs, as he was at his (brief) foster home, he has challenged other dogs at every opportunity, not just on his home turf but in public places. At the vet's to get checked out for the trip he tried to go after a Rottweiler; once at Great Falls he tried to go after a pair of mastiffs; he's also confronted a German Shepherd. That any of these dogs could snap him in two with one bite seems to elude him; dachshunds, or at least Coco, seem unaware that they're five inches tall. Of course, they were bred to go after European badgers, so perhaps foolhardy courage against impossible odds is in their DNA.

We've already decided we need to get him a chain-based leash. Two of the three we brought on vacation are partly chewed through by day three.

But this maniacal hound of hell is not the homebound Coco. He's a sweet, loving, totally loyal ultimate cuteness, so long as no other dogs, or adult males other than me, or most females for that matter, enter his field of vision. (My physical therapist after my surgery came to our house three times a week for three weeks and he went berserk every time.)

Of course, we decided to get him obedience training. We even paid for the course. Then I broke my hip.

Anyway, we need to keep him fairly sequestered, so logistics are a problem. Day three (today if I post this by midnight: anyway, Monday, August 23, was spent mostly in Cherokee, NC. I'll post more on it later, though, except for this one story alluded to earlier: our second missed video moment. Sarah and I were shopping while Tam had Coco duty; we'd just switched shifts She was walking him when they came upon one of many bear sculptures in Cherokee (like a number of places they encourage artists to address a common theme: Norfolk does mermaids, Winchester, apples, and Cherokee, bears.

Well, as Tam tells it (I hope she'll tell it herself here), Coco saw one of these bear statues, and started barking and growling at it, all the while with his tail between his legs. He wasn't, apparently, trying to attack this bigger challenger.

But what kind of hound dog doesn't know a statue from a real animal?

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Roanoke: Day One

Day one of the 2010 vacation was mostly a driving day, pushing to Roanoke, VA. The dog behaved well in the car, but not so much around other people and, particularly, other dogs. Though we did end up taking the Interstate the last 75 miles or so of the 250 mile trip, we also did one stretch of Skyline Drive.

And what surely was the high point of the day came on Skyline Drive, when we came upon a black bear cub playing by the side of the road. Despite having three cameras, plus three phones that take pictures as well (also a Nintendo DSi) for a total of at least seven photographic devices (not counting the webcams), of course none of us got a picture. Wed didn't linger because we assumed Mama bear was somewhere nearby.

Besides not getting much sleep last night, I find that my surgeon was right and I need to move around every hour or so; long stretches in the car are uncomfortable.

More as we have something to report; Tam and Sarah say they want to post too, so keep watching this space.

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Counting Down to Vacation

Saturday we leave on a delayed and truncated vacation, giving the family some much-earned respite in a difficult summer largely devoted to Tam and Sarah having to nurse me through my broken hip, surgery, and convalescence. (And Tam settling into a new job: same organization but new department.)

Instead of two weeks driving across country to Missouri and back in July, we're making do with a one week trip to the Great Smokies in August. And because we're insane, we're doing it with Coco, our dog. That means not a lot of eating in restaurants; lots of picnics, drive-through, carry-out, or delivery to the hotel. We might save money.

We'll be carrying two laptops, a netbook, and two smartphones so we should be pretty well wired and equipped to post to the blog, Flicker, and YouTube. Tam wants to blog more, and Sarah wants to try it, so you may see both of them here. The Flickr and YouTube accounts, because they show Sarah's face, are family-and-friends only, and while we've invited many to join our list few have, but the invitation is still open. (Either post a comment in the comments box (click on "Comment" below) or send me an E-mail.) We may also do short posts on Facebook from time to time, though we'll keep our main posts here. Though I have a dormant Twitter account I don't tweet: too talkative for that. Can't keep to 140 characters. (My work blog, the MEI Editor's Blog, does feed post titles to the MEI Twitter feed.) Besides YouTube videos we might try a podcast our two.

So do drop by.

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On the Road with Coco

The summer that disappeared is proceeding apace with tomorrow being the first of August. Plans for a two week driving vacation to Missouri in July were vetoed by my broken hip and the doctors saying I couldn't drive so far so soon (they're right: I need to stretch my legs frequently). We're going down to the Great Smokeys for a week in August instead, and will try for Missouri later, perhaps over the holidays.

We are, wisely or unwisely, thinking of taking the dog along on the trip to the mountains, and to try out the feasibility, we're doing an overnight tonight in Winchester, VA, only 75 miles or so from home (in case we had to bail). We're at a Comfort Inn; our usual Hampton Inns don't take pets. So far, it's working. He gets upset when one of us isn't with him, but is enjoying the outdoor time. A video of the day, or parts of it, is on the private YouTube channel.

More blogging coming, I hope.

The Space Station, the Shuttle, Venus and the Moon

In 1957, a month after I turned 10, I watched the launch vehicle of Sputnik I go by in orbit (the satellite itself wasn't visible 5to the naked eye, but the booster remained in orbit too). Though I didn't become a father till past 50, tonight I took my daughter out to watch the moon and Venus in conjunction, as well as the International Space Station passing by the moon and Venus with the Shuttle Atlantis in pursuit, on Atlantis' last mission.

Three quarters successful. In the 15 minutes between the ISS' passage and the pursuing Atlantis' scheduled arrival, some light clouds rolled in near the horizon, and whereas ISS went up to 52 degrees elevation, Atlantis was much lower down and so we didn't see the shuttle, but she did see the station sail past Venus and a crescent moon lit by earthshine. Cool.

Mother's Day Weekend

A fairly quiet Mother's Day weekend. Everybody was tired. Saturday was an errand-running day; Sunday included a Mother's Day brunch at our local Indian restaurant, and not much else.

Baltimore Again

A great, warm day. Almost summery. We went to Baltimore. Rejoined the Aquarium. Visited the much hyped jellyfish exhibit. (Fascinating, if a little smaller than some of the TV ads had implied.) I took 19 video clips. Sarah took 184. I will put this together evenutally, but since Sarah may have essentially videotaped the whole aquarium, it isn't going to work as a ten minute YouTube.

Tomorrow, we're going to try to get the dog out somewhere, which has not worked as well as we might have wished.

Into Spring: The Dog is Crazy but the Snow is Gone

After the record-breaking snows of winter, which amounted to 57 inches at National Airport and 62 inches at Dulles, spring is welcome relief. Last weekend was in the low 70s, sunny, no humidity. So we took the family — dog and all — to Great Falls.

Coco is mostly a very sweet dog. He loves human contact, whines when we go to work, is pretty gentle except when protecting a bone. But Great Falls this weekend was dog walking central: everybody was out, and so Coco, who is none too tolerant of other dogs, simply went completely Incredible Hulk on us. Violent conniptions, trying to chew through his leash, etc. Even a proffered hot dog did not assuage him. Among those he sought to challenge were two enormous mastiffs who could have swallowed him whole without stopping to chew. For his safety and ours, we departed quickly. This is not a good augury: he hates to be home alone, but if he's going to melt down in public if other dogs are present, we can't take him on our day trips on weekends. He needs some dachshund school.

Other news: Tam is shifting jobs, still within AFA, but moving from the magazine to the membership side; we hope it will be a good move. My job has been crazy due to deadlines and staff transitions, but as we come into spring I hope to blog more.

Also: Sarah has her own computer now. The hand-me-down Windows ME computer I had given her a couple of years ago isn't good for much more than a paperweight these days, so we bought her her own Dell laptop for schoolwork and other things. Mostly she watches video on it, but that's okay if homework is done.

I really do intend to spend more time here.

Relaxed

May everyone be this relaxed.

A Thaw from The Long Winter Silence

It's been such a godawful winter — Washington broke all existing snowfall records with something like 56 or 58 inches (and that's at the airport, where the measurements are usually lower than places farther from the river), mostly in three big storms of about two feet each. Work's been stressful, we've been dealing with some (non-serious) medical issues, and the snows were horrendous. I've dropped out of sight on this blog.

Today was still chilly and breezy, but it's March, it was at least sunny, and a lot of people were on the road. I think we all are hungry for spring. Left, Coco and Mom feeling good about things at Jammin Joe's BBQ, a barbecue joint with only outdoor tables.

More soon, but we're coming back, and I don't plan to ignore this blog so much.