The Boy Scouts trekked over the weekend to the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge near Lawton, Oklahoma. Tommy and John enjoyed hiking wi
th backpacks for several miles, including over the “River of Boulders,” which Tommy said was the best part. They saw buffalo, elk, longhorns and — best of all — prairie dogs. Tommy is to the left of the sign and to the right of the tent. 
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Sofie joined a team of two other students for her required school science fair project. They choose the infamous Mentos in Soda Pop experiment, which you’ve probably seen at its most phenomenal by EepyBird.com. Sofie and her friends put together their version of it, and the judges gave their project an “Honorable Mention.” Way to go Sofie and friends! Let us know if you spot the continuity error. Here’s the EepyBird.com version: And for the science behind it, check out the MythBusters explanation: Sofie said this was the best part of Christmas … making gingerbread houses! Royal icing does the trick! Sofie made inventive use of the trimmings from Tommy’s haircut. He started with a ‘fro, and wound up looking like he was ready for Marine boot camp. Thank you John! Tommy makes use of MacDictate software to extemporaneously compose essays about various gods from Greek mythology. He speaks into the microphone on the headset and the software recognizes his speech and turns the sound into text. For our further edification, the stories of Narcissus and Echo, Prometheus, Daedalus and Echo, and Arachne, as told by Tommy. Lucky us — four snow days in one week! One thing I’ve learned from raising two native Texans: Texans don’t expect they should ever have to wear a coat, even when it’s 7 degrees out. Here’s a taste of our snow day, including the first ever icicles I’ve ever seen on our house. It was a wild day at the zoo! The birthday party started at the carousel and ended up back at the same pesky alligator we saw last fall. Amazingly, it bit Tommy’s head again — and Sofie’s too. Snakes, climbing walls and science experiment posters that took Mom and Da …. I mean … that took the students all night to make. So we spent Christmas at the farm. It was cold. And that beautiful Kansas “brown” was everywhere. Like the state is a giant furry teddy bear in the winter time. Then the snow comes. In this case, it was very very cold, so everything froze, including the livestock tank, which the kids were then able to stand on. And about that wet pants leg on Tommy toward the end of the slideshow; let’s just say the creek wasn’t as frozen as he would have liked. As most people are aware, the Dallas area has more retail space per capita than any other metro area in the United States. So we were supsrised that an exhaustive search through the clothing stores to buy a red blouse for Sofie for the annual Christmas picture ended in a weary “Uncle” from us. It seems the colors for this Christmas season are pink and purple. We should all write our Congressperson. This is an outrage. Then, to add insult to injury, when we arrived at the Santa Village the kids didn’t exactly cooperate as we’d expected and as they have in the past — despite my best efforts at begging and pleading. This year it was all goofing around and making faces and trying to see who could look the whackiest, complete with nerd glasses, as Tommy calls them. So without further adieu …. If you’re thinking of buying the Longstrike for somebody you know for Christmas, here’s a review. Shout out to Sofie for this video, as she was videographer, gaffer and best boy: It’s a beautiful fall, although some remnants of summer can still be seen hiding amidst the red, gold and orange leaves. I can’t remember the name of this critter (dragon lizard or something like that), but it lives about a block away and is the pet of a soldier returned from Iraq who is now attending the nearby community college. I’m told she likes to watch TV. Normally she stays indoors, but I was lucky enough to catch her outside on one of her rare days out in the grass. She’s about 14 inches long and is apparently very smart.  Our neighbor A few recent hikes took us back to one of our favorite places, a local lake, including exploring the shore line a bit. Sofie likes to lead the way and on one of these hikes she brought along her lion backpack, where “Wolfie” hitched a ride. Tommy, thanks to Boy Scout training, was able to point out the White Yucca for us. YO! Thank you Tommy. And then somehow we transitioned into Karate Kid mode and there we have the Crane position. All in all some pretty days for a hike and usually not too chilly despite the cold wind blowing off the water. Yes, we did it again. So, to answer last year’s question, “No, the madness has not stopped.” This year I made the mistake of agreeing to ride with the kids on the “Crazy Mouse” ride. That was a very bad decision. Why did I do this? I don’t know. I will never do it again though. I should have known something was wrong when the ticket-taker declined to take my tickets, waiving me in “free.” I guess he knew he was going to have a big laugh out of my contorted face. The car had barely pulled away from the starting rail and I was saying “Tommy, is it almost over?” My eyes were closed and I prayed the entire time.  Don't be fooled; kids make the fair rides look painless. They aren't. A start-of-school pep rally for the band at Tommy’s school had the kids turn out in their best Blue Man Band attire. The creek near our house made for a nice day for some intrepid explorers on foot and on bike. … demonstrates how to climb aboard an elephant (at the Dallas Zoo). Even temperatures of 100 degrees can’t stop the most intrepid zoo-goers. Here’s our day, from the carousel, to the penguins, to the African savanna, complete with alligators, lion and jaguars. Tommy spent the past week at Dallas Zoo summer camp and he was our guide through the exhibits and took the photos of the animals. Then he got drug by a baby elephant while holding onto its tail, and somehow managed to get his head stuck in the mouth of an alligator. For your own visit to the zoo: Oh yes, and speaking of science, I’d like to recommend a new blog: It’s called Tommy’s A to Z Science Blog and I heard about it from Hammy Jr., who knows all the best science blogs. |
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