Cold Spaghetti

We’d been discussing it for years, when would be the best time? Should we wait for Kate to be old enough, or just drag her along when Will has reached the right age? Maybe this spring, we said. Or, maybe next fall.

Then we realized that school was closed for all of Mardi Gras week.

And that Kate, not yet 3, would have free admission.

And Paul secretly called my friend, Alex, to see if she would cover our combined teaching responsibilities for the week. She would.

And so, sometime on Monday, we decided to do it. We drove to Mobile Monday night. Early Tuesday morning, I made hotel reservations and we left from my parents house to drive the remaining 500 miles. It was so spontaneous and so very last minute that we didn’t even tell the kids.

My grandparents worked for Disney for almost two decades. The summers of my formative years were spent with them, in their Kissimmee home, visiting Disney on free and reduced tickets, seeing background pieces of the park(s), swimming in their pool, and fishing with my Grandfather.  My brother and I knew the rides in the Magic Kingdom by heart (often recreating them in lavish imagination at home) and can still sing the theme songs to major attractions.  Even with the obnoxious branding and commercialization of the Disney product, I still love The Mouse.  It wasn’t a question of whether or not we would take the kids to The World, it was just a question of when.

I’ll post about the actual visit with more pictures in separate posts.  But here are some key factors that helped us have a fantastic visit:

— Paul and I had 2 unused, no expiration park days from our visit in 2001.

— We only went to the park 2 days and took a day off in-between.

— The only admission ticket we needed to buy was for Will.

— Our expectations were realistic and based on experience.

— We packed snacks and drinks and ate sparingly in the park.

— We made sure to get out of the park(s) for naptime.

— Each child had a stroller.

— We were there during the “value season” when park attendance is low(er).

— The weather was perfect.

— We stayed outside the park in a Quality Inn… free hot breakfast, free internet, heated pool, kids playground, 2 bedrooms and kitchenette… for a total of $388 during our 4 night stay.

— We chose our attractions wisely.

— We consulted The Unofficial Guide.

Details and photographs to follow!

Amazon River, near Iquitos, Peru.

Can you image your 10(?) year old daughter navigating a little pica-pica boat, with Peruvian Naval ships and huge cargo shipping vessels (not to mention water taxis that U.S. based public health folk could be riding in) on the vast sea that is the Amazon River?

For more Photohunt, visit it’s home.
For more of my Photohunts, visit here.

Foot bridge from the end-of-the-line PeruRail train station to the town of Aguas Calientes, a tourist mecca with the distinction of being the closest habitable place to Machu Picchu. This is exactly the kind of place I try to avoid at all costs. So believe me when I say staying here is worth it, in order to wake up in the middle of the night and get to the sanctuary by dawn.

I will finish that travelogue. I will. I will. I will!

See more bridges and learn about Photohunt here.
More of my Photohunt here.

We’re in the beautiful northern suburbs of Pittsburgh, near where my parents grew up across the street from each other.  The past day and a half have been a blur of fantastic public parks, fun museums, nostalgic family stories, friendly people, and Eat-n-Park.  Will loves the mountains.  Paul finally explained that ‘we can’t afford mountains in Louisiana’ and ‘they only can be built in places where there is a lot of snow and ice in the winter,’ because Will could not understand why we can’t just build up a few winding mountain roads with bubbling streams through the center of New Orleans.  He is also picking up on the fact that people here say things a little differently.  Words like “yins” (like you all, but not) and “worsh” which is something you do to clean things like clothes and dishes.  We’ve been impressing upon him that there are many ways to pronounce words, and along those lines, that maybe he should be a little more gracious when he corrects our American pronouncation French words?  Or at least not visibly roll his eyes and groan when we make the word “poisson” rhyme with “son”.

The kids’ school called me on my cell phone this morning, while I was leaving the bathroom in the basement of the Pittsburgh Children’s Museum with Will.  It did not take long for them to have me pegged as a sucker who can’t say no someone who likes to be involved.  And now, I’m on the School Council (Conseil d’ecole), which is an elected position (when, in situations not like this one, where more than one person throws their name into the ring) required for accreditation from the French Ministry of Education to act as a voice for the class on school issues.  While that description isn’t the most informative, it’s all I know, and am excited to have the chance to learn more about how these cross-national schools work, although I know little about early childhood education and even less about French educational requirements.  Then I was flashing to the LHAN board meetings, which are often in Spanish and where I can follow along reasonably well but have to use English to speak (so embarrassing, but if I have to take the time to think how to talk in Spanish, the conversation has passed me by) — and I began to have visions of these meetings all in French.  Because that would just make sense for me to be involved in two community volunteering roles in two different languages I cannot speak fluently.

While we were in Central Pennsylvania for my cousin’s wedding, Will went fishing for the first time.  On our first day there, my Uncle Corky brought him to a local creek (after their two-man fishing excursion, Will announced that, while the rest of us call him “Uncle Corky,” Will was going to call him “Uncle Cork”).

Then we all joined them for fishing the day after the wedding.  Including my cousins Stephen and Katelin and my Aunt Roxanne.  Will was without the family uniform (waders) so my Aunt and Uncle set up a special chair for Will to hold court for all the fishes that threw themselves to his mercy.  (I think the final count on this was 6.)

They caught and released each one.  When Will let this one go, it sort of floated along belly-up… whoops.  Then, my Uncle did some magic trick holding the fish still in the running water of the stream bed and after a few seconds the previously doomed fish swam away, just fine.

Will actually caught a small mouth bass.  (I can’t remember the other types of fish Uncle Corky and Stephen were quick to identify on Will’s hook… those guys seriously know their fish).  They helped instruct Will on how to hold the rod, when the reel it in, and when to pull on the line.  They were both incredibly good teachers and really let him do the work.

Will not only got skills in how to fish, but he quickly understood how to discuss the fish you catch.  As shown in the picture below:

Then Stephen stepped in for some one-on-one with Will.

When Will decided that he was “inventing a new way of fishing” involving the net, Stephen went along like a true champ.  He completely and totally earned his status as Will’s nomination for WORLD’S COOLEST GUY.

I think if you look really closely in these pictures, you can actually see Will’s little heart growing BIGGER and BIGGER.

We’re back from Boston and wicked exhausted.

Even without the kids, we still managed to make typical blunders and put Murphy’s Law to the test.   We had memorable moments without a camera on hand (like seeing a friend of mine from Junior High that I hadn’t seen in 20 years), were tripod-less in the moments when we really needed it, and had excellent weather only on the days we were stuck inside for the conference.  But all that really didn’t matter because in the end, we really, Really, REALLY loved Boston.  (Don’t even get us started on how much we loved the North End.)

Although we admit having a bit of 4-year moving itch (just try moving after 4-or-less years for your whole life and see what it does to you) we have no grand illusions about moving to Boston.  I don’t remember the area much from our days in the late 70s Boston burbs, but my parents nostalgically relayed some of the key points for us.  Like when I almost lost my thumb to the big, heavy, steel-interior front door.  And The Fourth of July when they gathered wood for a fire to keep out the night’s chill.  But if we had to spend some time for, say, a post-doc or something?  We’d at least consider it, with excitement.  The more likely scenario is that we’ll have to move up there since Massachusetts is the only State to offer Universal Health Care (something so tremendously important that it gets capitalized).

As is the case when we return from any foreign country, our re-intry into the Gret Stet of Looziana has been a bit rough.  Tomorrow is coming hard and fast, filled with teaching English, Doctoral Seminar, late working lunch, and then swimming practice.  My parents were extra awesome for helping with the kids AND leaving leftovers for dinner tomorrow.  Seriously above and beyond the call of duty… especially when you consider they came here directly from the airport after spending a week in Vegas, having at least four car break-downs during the weekend (including one half way between here and Mobile), and with today being the first day of my Dad’s new super-CEO job.  (Go, Dad!)

It was a little windy, the surf was rough, under current strong, and jellyfish out in force (Paul, Will, and PapPap all got stung)… but the kids loved it!
We went to Gulf Shores — paying the $5 to park and use the area of beach protected by the State Park, rather than the crowded public beach. Nice bathrooms, showers, a lifeguard stand (with vinegar spray bottles), and snack shack with shaded tables. Worth the drive from NOLA!

We’ve been back in the States a week and I’m still figuring out how to write about our three weeks in Peru. Part of the issue is that my trusty notebook, with all my travel notes and thoughts, went AWOL about a day after we arrived home. Another issue is the nature of the work… I’m unsure of some of the ownership details of the photographs I took and feel that if I put them online before the Magazine has chosen which they are using that I could get in a sticky situation. The third issue is workflow, which does not exist. This issue relates to how we store photographs, how I process them, and the tools I use to do all of the above. Paul has a great storage system arranged for us… it just takes me hours to use it because my little ‘puter can’t handle much, doesn’t have much in terms of software, and has display problems. The new baby has been ordered, so that last issue should be somewhat fixed in another week or so. Until then, all I’m really doing is cropping photos and trying to organize them.

Some lessons learned about photography gigs:

— They get harder when the gig is everyday for 3 weeks. It’s hard to keep up with the volume, keep equipment ready and waiting, and stay fresh. (That said, I totally loved every minute.)

— Make sure your cameras have the same time/date set. I didn’t do this and because we used two cameras, putting the photos in a chronological order is an ongoing nightmare. Combined with how S.L.O.W. it is to do anything with the photos from my computer, it is a real time-sink… but completely necessary.

— I was up late every night emptying memory cards, checking back-ups to make sure everything was safe, trying to upload backup copies to our home network, and checking that equipment was charged and ready for the next day. These things all sound easy, but were actually very difficult when you’ve been up since 3:30am (we had many days that started before 5am)… the bottom line is that Paul was my saving grace for everything. As always. The perfect partner for all of the work of the trip.

— Anytime you find yourself asking whether you should take something, the answer is YES. Every Darn Time we asked, ‘should we take the tripod?’ or ‘should we take the flash?’ or said ‘maybe we should only take one camera’… every single time we went with the pesky thought, we regretted it. Bottom line: haul it all.

— I am ready for a battery pack. Bring on the weight.

— Although we were in many situations where pick-pockets are plentiful, crime goes unchecked, and poverty and desperation are high… I never, ever felt myself to be more at risk because of my camera(s). Yes, we watched ourselves. Yes, we were smart. Yes, we traveled in groups and always had guides who knew the community. But in the end, I actually think that having the GEAR made me/us more conspicuous. The cameras stood out so much that theft would have been obvious. Better to slink away with a pocket camera than a several pound beast with a wide angle lens attached. Plus, I typically had conversations with those I photographed and explained who I was, what I was doing, and what it was for — this opened a ton of doors for us. While there were some who requested I not photograph, more often than not, people not only were happy to be photographed but offered suggestions and help.

— If I ever do this again, I will approach it completely differently. I didn’t fully grasp how to handle both roles (teaching assistant AND photographer/photojournalist) until the end of the class. It took a few days of doing both to see what worked and what didn’t.

If I could leverage this type of photography within public heath work on a regular basis… wow. Even thinking about it is overwhelming.

Fish market pictures are up. There is a short description there, too…

I am beginning to feel that the Universe is conspiring to keep me away from my photographs. This weekend, we took the kids on a spur-of-the-moment getaway to the beach at Gulf Shores… using my parents’ house as a base. On their computer, I was able to see some of the photos from the end of the trip that hadn’t been deleted from one of the memory cards. It was a shock to see how different they looked on a decent monitor (as opposed to my laptop) and I vowed not to touch them until I could view them decently.

Paul was going to let me view and organize this afternoon on his computer, but for some reason the thing is off the home network and I can’t get to the archive. He’s only gone for an hour or so in a meeting, so it was my one window of opportunity. There are still many pictures I haven’t seen yet, myself. I’ll petition him to let me borrow one of his four (yes, four, apparently, developers need an entire wall of monitors to work — genius requires desktop space, I guess) monitors and hook it up to my laptop tonight.

The exciting news is that we’re resigned to (FINALLY) get an Apple (no, it probably won’t be a new-hotness, nor will it be a laptop — my 6 year old $500 workhorse is doing fine). This desktop would be mine to primarily use for photo and video stuff and I’m thrilled. It’s a heck of a big move for us to consider this within the scope of us loosing $5000-$6000 on the shitty tile job and with the expenses hitting us in the next few months, but we’re reaching critical mass and something is going to give if we don’t move forward a bit. I’m excited about the upgrade but dreading moving to another machine, since I’ve used this one for years with no need of re-boot or cleaning. (What can I say? When Paul fixes up a machine, it WORKS.)

Moving on to other conspiracies… Michael Stipe no longer puts our children to sleep on car rides. Granted, they WERE calm and quiet and on the way to sleep when Paul reached back and put his hand on Will’s leg, so there is a chance that this disturbance interfered with the typical results. Last night, 2 of the 2.5 hours drive from Mobile to NOLA was spent with cranky kids driving us crazy.

In the past, re-entering the United States after weeks abroad has not went well for us. When we returned from the first Honduras trip, Paul was hospitalized with some malaria-ish condition (they couldn’t get blood at the right time to confirm diagnosis), I was stung by a yellow jacket and had an allergic reaction which made me cough so hard I popped out a few ribs and was bed ridden for two weeks, and Paul was laid off from his job. When we returned from Peru two years ago, we found that we had been victims of identity theft (an HR employee at Paul’s company — he is now in federal prison) and our car was dead.

Not withstanding the fact that Spirit Airlines SUCKS, we managed to get back in one piece yesterday — with ALL our luggage and ALL our delicate ceramics unbroken. We enjoyed a wonderful homecoming with the kids, who we picked up from school on the way back from the airport. Then we got home. And the shoe dropped.

The tile was laid in our bathroom while we were gone… we decided to hire someone on great recommendation rather than have Paul and I try to do this when we got back. We were sure his workman ship would live up to our expectations.

It didn’t. We are very disappointed.

The bottom line is that substantial portions will need to be redone.

We’re working on figuring out the next steps there. We’re also working on 800 other things, including getting settled back into our still-disaster-construction-zone house, planning how to spend the weekend re-connecting with our kids, processing the 4000+ photographs taken on the trip, and trying to adjust back to our actual jobs. Thankfully, I planned to NOT start interviews for my study until week after next… it will take that long to get organized.

Details on the trip and pictures posted soon.