Philly Zoo

On June 23rd, a day which turned out to be the hottest of the year thus far with temps around 96°, Mom and the kids joined ranks with some friends and took a day trip up to the Philadelphia Zoo.

More Victory...and More Defeat...

Saturday, June 5th, Mom's morning started quite early as she dashed out the door to take part in her 2nd run of this season. This time it was the 2nd Annual Blue Hen 5k which ran through the heart of the UD campus.

This was Mom's largest event to date with 259 participants. Her results: She finished 68th overall and 6th in her division. Officially, she finished with a time of 26.17, which, while technically her best time to date, in my humble opinion, doesn't reflect her true time as she got held up in the large group off the start.

Mom, along with friend Brenda and Brenda's husband, DJ,
both of whom also competed in the run.

The reason we have only minimal pictures of this achievement was because at the same time, I loaded the kids and myself into the truck (...have I mentioned I got a truck?) and headed south to the Kirkwood Soccer Club (which is curiously close to nothing Kirkwood-related). Alex's team, the GRPC Inferno, had made it to the playoffs with an undefeated record of 6 wins and 1 tie.

The Inferno started off with a 9AM playoff game against the WYMCA Galaxy. The Galaxy was a team they had soundly defeated earlier in the season. Though the Galaxy showed significant improvement, the game still belonged to the Inferno.



The win put the Inferno in the Finals, pitted against the HSC Red Bull; a hulking team with a matching undefeated record that the Inferno had not yet faced. Our boys and girls found themselves hot, tired, and, for the first time all season, nervous about a game.

After an all too brief respite, with the sun bearing down and the heat building, play commenced. The Inferno scored first, injecting some much needed energy into the kids, but the Red Bull tied it up before half time.

The second half kicked off and the score remained tied as time ticked away. We watched these boys and girls give their all as they were roughed up by the opposition. Unfortunately, late in the game, the Red Bull scored. With mere moments left on the clock, the Inferno simply wasn't able to even it up.

At the end of the day, the Inferno took 2nd place in the league. Congratulations, Team!

What follows is a brief highlight reel I assembled as a memento for the team...

Latest Addition

Just over 13 years ago, as a young couple expecting our first child, Mom and I set out on a quest.

At that time, living in our Maryland townhouse, we had a small regular cab Toyota pickup and a Honda Prelude. Neither vehicle was well suited for our impending family. So we put word out on the street that we wanted a family car. The call was answered (on Alex's original due date, coincidentally) with our 1995 Accord.

Purchased by us in 1997, the Accord served us well for 13 years, delivering us safely to Myrtle Beach (1997), Florida (2000), Northern New Jersey and all points in between, as well as making the daily commute to work for 11'ish years. She ran like a top and only ever left me stranded 1 time among the 94k miles (out of 124k) we put on her.

But time marches on. Her age was starting show and our needs have been starting to change. Obviously the need to carry 4 children hasn't subsided, but yard work and house renovations would be made a bit easier with something a bit more...truck'ish.

So this past February, we started a new quest.

Now, after 4 months of research, test drives, selling off my hoarded collection of disjointed car parts and the über-quick sale of our trusty, rusty Accord, we present to you, the latest addition to our family...

Don't We All

Aidan just declared to me;

"I wish 'no' could be 'yes' and 'yes' could be 'no'."