Quick trip to New York

Last weekend Jason and I flew up to New York to surprise Jonathan and see him play in the Army-Navy soccer game on Friday. It was broadcast on national television and Jonathan got some quality playing time. It was sort of rainy and I had a hard time getting good pictures, but here are a few below.......

Jonathan played outside midfield.....Army ended up beating Navy 1-0. This makes three years running that Army has come out on top. Go Army, beat Navy!
On Saturday we drove to New Jersey and caught the ferry to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. Here is a picture of the train station where newly arrived immigrants met friends and family and caught trains bound for every part of the country. However on this day we were going the opposite direction......

We waited for the ferry outside the train station. I loved the gray texture of the pier, the skyline and the seagulls swooping in.
Once we boarded the ferry, this was the view looking back towards the city.
Here's a view of Ellis Island.

Even the gloomy day couldn't hide the history and beauty of all that Ellis Island and America represent for so many people. Not perfect, not pristine but full of beautiful ideals and hope.
This is the great room where the newly-arrived immigrants underwent a medical and legal inspection before being admitted to America.

Each person that made the journey to Ellis Island had their own story. Here are pictures of some of the immigrants who passed through Ellis Island during the peak of migration.
In addition to the historical information about Ellis Island, there were displays on immigration trends and statistics. Here's a moving wall that has pictures of immigrants that flip to reveal the American flag.

After stopping at Ellis Island we took the ferry around the Statue of Liberty. The rain was coming down too hard to get a clear picture.

This is my absolute favorite picture from our trip. While standing on deck taking pictures of the Statue of Liberty, I saw a schoolkid wearing a Statue of Liberty foam hat striking the quintessential Liberty pose. There he was, one single child, and oblivious to the fact that anyone was looking on as he joined the ranks of participation in the American tradition.

Here are Jason, Jim, Sherry and Jonathan at West Point before we headed back home. It was a whirlwind trip but definitely worth it!

The way all work retreats should be!

I spent two days last week in the mountains with my co-workers. It was a phenomenal experience and the view wasn't half bad, either! Here are some pictures of all the beautiful leaves and vistas.....

The camera couldn't even do the colors justice. This tree was practically glowing.

John Henry the steel-driving wonder dog served as our unofficial office mascot. This was about as close as anyone got to him over the course of two days.
Here's the view across the valley....I love it when you can see the shadows of clouds on the rolling hills.

And here's our fearless team: Erwin, Sharon (facilitator), Lewis, Angie, Keith and me.

A big lawyerly day for the both of us

Today Jason got to argue his very first motion in open court and I became a "real" lawyer. Basically, he made a motion/presented me for admission in Wake County and all state courts in North Carolina. The judge gave him grief (since he figured out we were married) but then granted it, so basically Jason has been 100% successful in arguing motions in court! Maybe he should rethink that corporate attorney thing....or maybe not! Here I am taking the oath and swearing to uphold the Constitution.

And here I am, catching Jason's eye and grinning for the camera. It was a long afternoon but fun that we got to go through it together. As the judge remarked to me later, this will make for some interesting conversations around the dinner table (of course, that assumes I cook dinner)!

Surprise, Poppa!

Martha and I pulled off the mac-daddy (pun-intended) of surprises for my dad's 60th birthday. He was originally told he would spend part of the weekend in DC and the remainder in Raleigh. But instead of driving down to NC on Friday night, Martha and her boyfriend Drew kidnapped him and took him to the condo on Smith Mountain Lake. Here are the weary but excited travelers arriving around 2:30AM.....

We told my dad that was the extent of the surprise and that we would spend the rest of the time enjoying the lake. We went out on the Boston Whaler on Saturday and cruised around in the crisp almost-fall weather.
As you can see, Martha always enjoys being out on the boat. She is also sporting the ever-so-stylish Norfolk & Western Members-Only style jacket (see above for my dad's identical one and my version in white).

We even managed to squeeze in some kayaking and floating/tubing. Martha and Drew had kayak races and I made Martha tug me around anywhere I wanted to go. We formed a Martha-powered kayak train to get back to the dock.

Then we implemented Stage Two of the surprise weekend: a trip in to Roanoke for dinner. Of course, what trip to Roanoke would be complete without a stop at Miniature Graceland, a scale model of Graceland carefully constructed in someone's front yard. Complete with a golden statute of Elvis, seen below with my dad.

Here we are posing between Elvis' main house and the chapel. And I promise, it just keeps going! I'm sure you can understand now why trips to Miniature Graceland were a very formative part of my childhood.

Then we walked around downtown Roanoke with my dad, pretending to look in store windows and to try and decide which restaurant to eat at. We finally "decided" on a local sushi place (with other non-fish options for true carnivores like myself). Unbeknownst to my dad, we had gotten in touch with a lot of his closest, dearest friends and invited them all to a dinner in his honor. My dad was so blown away and we all spent the next few (four!) hours laughing, drinking, eating, looking at old pictures and telling funny stories about my dad. Here's a picture of everyone laughing once my dad realized what was going on....

This is my dad and his good friend Adam.

Martha was able to capture some of the stories on her new nifty video recorder and we are 100% sure they will serve as great blackmail material in the future. Martha and my dad are listening to Jay, my dad's college roommate and fraternity brother, as he tells some crazy story about the shenanigans they got into when they were younger.

It was so great that my cousin Richard and his wife Browning were able to join us for the dinner. They already had a social commitment that evening but were able to sneak away to be with us, which meant so much to my dad.

Here's a picture of me, Martha and Livy (Adam's wife). Livy was so thoughtful and took pictures for us as the evening unfolded. She's so sweet!

And here's another shot me, my dad, Jay, Martha and Bill at the end of a really wonderful evening. My dad insists if he knew how great turning 60 would be, he would have done it much earlier! :-)

Payback time....

When Jason started work last year, I thought it'd be really cute to take pictures of him as he left for his first day of work (sort of like the first day of school pictures I endured as a kid). Well, one year later, look who's having to plaster on a cheesy smile and pose for the camera! I started working on Monday and Jason was ever-so-quick to remember the photo shoot incident from last year. He must really have been scarred for life! Anyhow, here I am walking out the door.....

The obligatory pose with my bag on the front steps.
And here I am in the car, getting ready to head to Durham. Ah, to never have to do this again....

Timber!

Last Thursday the two large pine trees in our front yard lost the battle between them and some very determined men with chainsaws. We had grown increasingly concerned with the possibility of them crashing into our house or otherwise causing massive destruction. Besides the fact that I despised the pine cones, pine needles, horrible pollen and the fact the roots caused our water line to burst, the trees were also beginning to drop large limbs dangerously close to our cars. Here is the first picture of Roberto up in the tree.

Roberto "walked" up the tree with spikes on his feet and held himself up with a "belt." He used a chainsaw to cut the limbs off as he scaled the tree.
Then he cut the tree off in sections and pushed the sections to the ground. You can see the top part is tipping in this picture. Can you tell I was fascinated by this process?

Here's some evidence of the destruction on our front lawn last week. One of the trees was dying while the other was healthy (for the time being). But best they came out together so neither one got lonely, right?

I was surprised by the amount of equipment required to do the job. Dump trucks, trucks with trailers, backhoes, stump grinders, etc.

I was kindly asked to park the Explorer out of harm's way

(up the street). Here is more of the debris littering our yard. I was so glad they cleaned it all up before they left! This was the last shot I got before dashing out for a car appointment (ah, the joys of last minute errands before starting work). I do have to say, our house feels so exposed and close to the street now. Jason and I are going to study trees a little bit and hopefully pick a good, sturdy hardwood to plant in the front yard to give us a little more of a visual barrier. We're open to suggestions!

Sometimes the old carpet just has to go....

After 22+ years, it was finally time to bid farewell to the pink (beige?) carpet from the lake condo. I journeyed up to Virginia to wish it well as it was loaded into the back of a van destined for a trash heap. Here's a pile that's ready to make its final voyage....

This is a view of the floor looking back towards the bedrooms downstairs. The toe kick guard hadn't been installed yet, but you can get an idea of what the linoleum looks like. It's lighter than most hardwood floors, but the coloring was hard to capture in these pictures. We're doing a little painting, too, as you can see by the new mint green color in the back bedroom.

The guys had to rip up the carpet and then prepare the area for the new flooring. There was a lot of power-sawing and hammering going on over the two day project. Good thing it was the middle of the week and not many neighbors were around!

Here's another shot of the work-in-progress (at the end of the first day). I had quite a time trying to navigate the "obstacle course" of furniture when I put the final coat of light blue paint on the wall that night.

And here is one final shot of the condo while they were still working on the kitchen. My camera battery died at this point, so you'll just have to come visit to see the final product!