4th of July

So I kind of left you hanging in my last post hinting at what we were going to do for the 4th and then never posted. I have a valid excuse this time. When I entered my hours today I already had 29 hours for the week, and that is not counting my DEQ project.

Anyway, the hint went all wrong. The original plan was to go camping on Catalina Island, we had the spot and everything. However, when we realized that for the price of the shuttle we could pay for two parks entrance fees we promptly detoured to a San Diego weekend. One of the perks at JPL is discount tickets to most places in the vallley. We got two day passes to Sea World for something like 25 each. Anyway, I had a 5 day weekend, so we went down and spent Wednesday at Sea World.

It was fun, very commercial compared to aquariums, but still cool. I have to say Monterey still tops my list if you want to see lots of cool sea life. The downside is you won't get to see a massive Orca whale do a flip.

The next day we split up and the family hit the beach. It sounds like they had a great time but Julie will have to fill you in on that part. I went to the USS Midway Museum. It is very cool.One of the docents was talking about experiences in the Navy and he mentioned the Passage to Freedom, I told him that my dad was on the USS Calvert during that operation and he had spent some time on the Calvert as well. It was pretty cool to talk to him.

That night we went back to Sea World after the sun had gone down and it wasn't so hot. We hit the arctic area and it was probably my favorite part. The beluga whales and polar bears were pretty cool.

That night my kidney stone got held up and I couldn't sleep or empty my bladder. So that was the bad omen that began what was to become THE WILD ANIMAL PARK. It was hot on the coast, but in land it was melting fat dudes like me into the pavement. The park charges you to get in, then charges you to get near the animals, then charges you not to be eaten by the animals, then charges you to breathe their oxygen... but it is OK, I am not bitter. It was very hot (I think I mentioned that already) and you had to walk long distances between animals. We were all tired, I was still fighting my kidney stone and cranking up a full blown infection, and it just spiraled into a very bad day. Tyler just cried for most of the time. One bright point was the water play area, the kids enjoyed that. The heat wasn't enough to kill smiles for the camera.

We got home that night and this dude was waiting for us on our window screen. Who needs The Wild Animal Park!
I am now over the kidney stone and caught back up at work. Just don't get me started on El Medico. JPL had me work the weekend to try and get caught up on the dashboard, which I can happily say is done.

That pretty much brings you up to date, you can see a lot more pictures at our flickr account. http://www.flickr.com/photos/rpatterson