The movie last evening was Cats of Africa. It was good, but not as good as the Chimp movie we saw earlier.

It was another day of spectacularly good weather. We opted for a walk in the park and time at the playground. It didn’t go over very well. But the pool went swimmingly well. Dinner also went well. We went to Pie Five to get customized individual pizzas. We wrote down the ingredients we wanted on each pizza, which made us a big hit with the pizza staff. And of course the ice cream / sherbet with chocolate chips was well received when we got home.

Tonight we’ll be watching a movie about the oceans. Turning the WiFi off was only partially successful last night. I will be collecting tablets at bedtime.

Tomorrow is the last full day together. The forecast is for a cool and rainy day.

The dinner last night was a big hit. The kids weren’t very hungry this morning. Maybe it was the rather large cup of ice cream included with the kids meals at BGR. We watched “Despicable Me 3”. The kids had already seen it, but they enjoyed watching it again.

We went to the Museum of Industry this morning. The museum has improved tremendously since we were last there. B & E spent most of the morning making a video game. You can play the games they made, but you have to really want to. Start Internet Explorer or Firefox. (Edge and Chrome won’t work.) Go to http://videogamewizards.org/. In the search box, type “Bryon”. Scroll down, download, and install the required add-on. Select “Keyboard” game play, and you’re good to go. More than one Elizabeth has created a game. Select the game from July 19.

We went out to a shaded picnic table right next to the harbor and had a bag lunch. Then we went back into the museum for another hour and a half. I enjoyed the antique engines, radios, and TVs. The picture below is of a White and Middleton engine, made here in Baltimore. It was quiet, simple, rugged, reliable, and burned anything from kerosene to natural gas. In other words, it was darn near perfect, and very popular for all manner of industry. I also enjoyed charging our E-car for free while parking for fee in the museum parking lot. Danita enjoyed information about an old factory where her grandmother used to work, information about Bendix (where she used to work), and many of the displays that reminded her of her early childhood in Baltimore. The kids really enjoyed a 1950 sedan that they could climb into and “drive”. It had a 2-speed automatic transmission, heater, steering that really worked, and all manor of old stuff, like window cranks. The car was at a Crown station “gas pump”. They had gas attendant uniform jackets, rags for wiping windows, and in general it was the most fun anybody has had since Jack Benny was on TV.

We came back home in time for two hours of swimming at the pool. After all this, decompression was called for (AKA screen time). The kids went to sleep reasonably early last night, but I plan to start turning the WiFi off at night, just so we don’t start developing some undesirable habits. Dinner tonight will be a burrito buffet.

I hope this finds everybody doing well.

Bryon and Elizabeth arrived at BWI airport just a few minutes late yesterday morning. They really enjoyed the flight and, according to the stewardess, behaved themselves wonderfully. The stewardess carefully checked my ID against the designated pickup person on record and had me sign for both. I was favorably impressed with her friendly attitude and her attention to security. It was an unusually hot and humid day, and our air conditioning had failed the day before. We went home, had a sandwich bar for lunch in our very hot house. Food bars work really well with B & E, because they have different tastes in what they want to eat. With a bar, they take whatever they want and there’s no fussing about eating.

Bryon, Lynne, Suzanne, Addy, Danita, Elizabeth

After lunch, Danita took them to the pool while I waited for the A/C repairman. We had one clap of thunder, which closes the pool for 30 minutes. But the sun was shining, so Danita and the kids played with some other things at the clubhouse. Twenty-eight minutes later, there was a second clap of thunder. Danita decided to come home. That was a good thing, because shortly after that we had a short but heavy rain squall. By this time the A/C was working, but the squall dropped outdoor temperatures faster than our inside temperature dropped. The kids were tired and a little fussy. It wasn’t time for dinner. That’s when we found the true power of screen time (when kids are permitted to use their tablets). Both went to their rooms, were totally silent, and entertained themselves until they felt more social. We had a baked potato bar for dinner, and retired to the basement for a Disney Nature movie about chimpanzees. The movie was unexpectedly good. We all enjoyed the evening.

E & B at the nature center

Today the A/C works, but it’s shut off because the weather is so delightful. We had a breakfast bar and were about to leave for Ed & Lynne’s house when the handle on the kitchen faucet came off in my hands. It could have broken a couple of weeks ago when we had a plumber repairing the garbage disposal. Lynne was home with Suzanne and Addy. The girls were quite excited. Lynne was relieved when we finally arrived. Lynne was prepared with extra bikes, helmets, and rules so they could go bike riding. We were prepared with swimsuits so they could play in a sprinkler. None of that was relevant. The kids had a good time among themselves without any adult supervision or input. After Lynne served a burrito bar for lunch, we all went to the Oregon Ridge Nature Center in Hunt Valley. This got us out of the house and in the direction that Lynne needed to go to take the girls home, and the direction we needed to go to take ourselves home. It was a lot excitement for the kids. They were cranky, but screen time saved the day again. We plan to go out to BGR for dinner. They serve the best hamburgers in town. They have kids meals with hot dogs optional for those who prefer.

We’ve had a pleasant couple of weeks with Mark. The lease on Mark’s apartment expired June 30. He came to live with us for a few weeks before heading out to his new job in San Diego.

We’ve had plenty of activities. The Columbia fireworks on July 4th were spectacular. We met the Chaprnkas at a rock & roll concert at Lurman Woods in Catonsville. Those concerts are always good. We had a neighborhood party, with hamburgers and hot dogs. Mark cooked a couple of fabulous meals for us. Mark is an accomplished cook, plus he used some very good meats that Ryn gave him when he visited her at Mace Chasm shortly before he came to Columbia. The house needed some attention. The garage and deck are spruced up. I still have the back porch to clean and paint. We also have some minor repairs, but that will have to wait until my contractor gets back in town. I have been riding and Danita has been swimming.

Mark is leaving this afternoon to go to Europe for 2 weeks. He and Jiajia are coaching the US Physics Olympics team. That’s convenient, because Bryon and Elizabeth are coming on Tuesday. They’ll be with us through next Sunday.

I hope this finds everybody doing well.

I escorted Mom from WPB to Columbia. Dani had already arrived by the time Mom and I got home. We had a lot of fun relaxing from our travels and catching up. Danita’s food was amazing. We visited Charlestown, a senior independent living community run by Erickson. The visit went well. The next day we had lunch at Gertrude’s, the restaurant at the Baltimore Museum of Art. Then we took a tour of some of the sculptures in the museum. We were hoping to visit the outdoor sculpture garden, but the rain dictated we focus on the pieces that are indoors.

Then we moved up the coast to Bangor / Hermon. Southwest has direct flights from Baltimore to Maine, but they use the airport in Portsmouth, about two hours from Dani’s. Dani and Gail graciously offered to make two round trips to Portsmouth. We enjoyed more amazing food, including an excellent lobster dinner. We visited Solstice, an elderly independent living facility in Hermon. Solstice’s building was beautiful — bright and cheerful. Unfortunately, the rooms were small, they did not have kitchens, and the food at lunch wasn’t very good. We tried to visit a couple of elderly apartments, but they had waiting lists and the owners weren’t willing to show us an apartment.

But we had lots of fun in Maine. The ladies did some shopping while I sat in the “man chairs” and read or played with my phone. We ate at some very nice restaurants. We visited the cabin (very nice!). There was a good amount of rain, but it was mostly at night — just like in Camelot. Mom needed a sun hat and mud boots to make it up and down the trail to the cabin.And Dani and Gayle took delivery of a brand new Kubota tractor. Everybody got to drive the tractor except Mom.

Sunday, it was time to go home. We left Dani’s at 7:30 AM; Mom got home sometime after 7:30 PM. But the travel was all uneventful and everybody arrived safely at their destinations.

There’s plenty of pics below. I hope this finds everybody doing well.

We made it from Assateague to home without incident. When we arrived home, we found that the internet and phones weren’t working. That wasn’t a surprise, because I had lost communication with our home monitoring system, and this was the most likely explanation. I called Verizon. After going through a long menu of stuff, I didn’t punch a number quickly enough and was put in the 30 minute hold queue (as opposed to having them call me back). When I was finally connected, I could hear Verizon, but they couldn’t hear me. I had to hang up and call again. On the second call, I got a loud screeching sound. The third call finally worked. Their call center equipment is in terrible shape. They agreed to come out at 9 on Wednesday, which was good enough for us. The tech showed up at 9, declared the fiber interface was no good, and that he didn’t have one on his truck. By Noon, he had installed his third interface, none of which worked. I found out that we had the “old” interface, which was over 8 years old. After 3 strikes, Verizon updated me to the “new” interface, and our service was quickly restored. All in all, it was 4 1/2 hours to get FIOS working.

I also had some unusual warnings from the sump pump during a heavy rain. My neighbor came over and said nothing was flooding. It could be that the pump was having a hard time keeping up with the water flow, or it could be that the backup pump was running. This turned out to be good news. The pump was running fine, and by the time we got home, the heavy flow of water was over.

The third issue was that parts came loose in our disposal. We aren’t big believers in disposals, but the sink is set up for one, and if you can’t run them the quickly get clogged up. That was a call to the plumber, who replaced it without drama.

I went out for a couple of bike rides this week and was shocked to see how bad the Ellicott City damage was from the flood they had recently. The damage to the historic downtown section was well publicized, but they had much more damage than I knew about. I like riding several roads that run along streams. Most of them are closed, because the streams overran their banks so much that the undercut the roads and the road is totally washed out. I have no idea whether some of these roads will ever be repaired. I’m sure glad Danita and I don’t live in one of those cute houses with a stream in the front yard and a short bridge in the driveway. Whether the house is damaged or not, it’s not very useful if it can’t be reached.

Everything is working. We’re caught up on chores and food prep. It must be time to go to West Palm Beach and start The Great Northern Loop Tour!

I hope this finds everybody doing well.

We went to Dover, DE yesterday. We saw the John Dickinson Plantation (signer of the constitution) and the Air Mobility Museum (all about air transport, at Dover Air Force Base). Then we decided to stop sight-seeing and watch “Oceans 8”. It was a typical summer movie. Since we had to drive through Berlin to get home, we decided to have really good ice cream for dinner. It was a beautiful day and we had a lot of fun.

This is our last week at Assateague. We will check-out about 10:00 Monday, then drive home. We have several days before The Great Northern Loop Trip with Mom and Dani.

I hope this finds everybody doing well.

We spent some time Saturday at an old furnace town near Show Hill. It’s a kind of Jerusalem Mill on steroids, based on an 18^th century iron furnace “company town”. They have a dozen or so buildings reflecting different aspects of life in the town. The day we were there, they had a blacksmith and a printer running their respective shops. Both were interesting people.

We will drive home immediately after work Tuesday. Mark is defending his thesis Wednesday. We will attend his presentation, along with Jiajia, Ed, and Lynne. We aren’t invited to hang while Mark’s committee discusses his thesis with him, so Jiajia will take us to visit the University of Maryland ice cream creamery. Danita and I will take everybody out to dinner Wednesday evening to celebrate. Besides being an interesting and fun day, it gives us an opportunity to take our cold-weather gear home. We will return early Thursday morning, so we can get back in time for a school group presentation we will lead on Thursday.

The last school group visit at Assateague Island is Friday. After that, we will transition to a Wednesday – Sunday work week so we can do traditional interpretive ranger programs with park visitors.

I hope this finds everybody doing well.

Our supervisor Kelly has a new hobby. She is learning how to be part of the Salisbury roller derby team. Saturday they were playing their only home game during our stay here, against the Reading, PA team. Naturally we had to go see it. It was our first roller derby. We don’t know that much about the sport, but it was a lot of fun watching. Too bad the game was so lopsided, with a score of 180 to 105 in favor of the visitors.

That anchored our weekend. We decided that while we were in Salisbury, we should definitely visit the Salisbury Zoo. Unfortunately, we found the zoo was closed, simply because the entrance was under a foot of water. Imagine! After all, a good pair of wading boots is at least two feet high. Who on the Eastern Shore doesn’t own a decent pair of waders?

I was hoping to spend the morning at the zoo, but since that wasn’t going to be possible, we moved on to our next activity, the Ward Museum. This museum is about hand carved duck decoys. I couldn’t imagine anything more boring than a bunch of old, faded carved ducks. When we arrived, the museum “lived up” to my expectations with a retrospective room, a history of duck hunting on the Eastern shore, and a room full of old faded carved ducks. But the room after that go much more interesting. With decoys being made in a factory out of plastic, carving ducks out of wood has become an amazing art form. (Plus, their gift shop had some way cool coffee cups.)

The Ward Museum is home of the world-wide water fowl carving contest. Many winning carvings were on display. The carvings look exactly like a live bird. Artists even carve individual feathers and then place them on their carving to enhance the realism. Some carvings are carefully balanced on impossibly thin support wires, cleverly disguised as part of a wing or tree branch.

We rounded the day out with the movie “Rampage”. It was a combination of Japanese monster movie and an American disaster film. It had every formulaic stereotype in the book. Critics panned it. It was also funny as all get out. Danita and I found it totally entertaining and a great hoot.

We enjoyed an excellent lunch at the Back Street Grill. Today we attended a Church breakfast – all you can eat for $10. The food was good and plentiful, and the money went to a good cause.

Even our professional lives are doing well. The accolades are rolling in, as you can see.

That’s it for this week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.