flying in little planes, and other acts of patriotism

(showing off her best impression of an american actress fending off the paparazzi)

there's something about summer that just seems so....american... which is funny because do they not barbecue in other countries? no hose water fights? no absurdly giant balls of ammunition being shot up in the air and then exploding into a bunch of lights and sprinkling depris back down on all the voluntary spectators? (okay, i already know the answer to that one) 

in any case, summer = america. which is why the boy really went all out this year with his fourth of july getup. well, that and he lost a bet to me...

these two looked just fantastic (said with a lisp) at the telluride fourth of july parade. there may or may not have been american flag speedos involved too, but that footage has been burned... just look at 'em waving their flags with pride...

q was proud to be an american but opted for a tutu instead of a speedo. thank our lucky stars

 

next on our list of patriotic activities...and i'm not even sure why this felt patriotic to me - maybe because of the red and blue stripes on the side... was our near death experience in a 6-seater prop plane. 

okay fine, it wasn't a near death experience at all - our pilot definitely knew what he was doing, but if you saw the way we were all gripping to our seats for dear life during the flight, you would think it was. let me rephrase that, the boy and i were gripping the seats for our lives while the pilot was casually flipping through pictures on his ipad!!

at one point during the flight, the boy asked the pilot, "so, what would i do if you suddenly died of a heart attack right now?" i can't say for certain, but i'm guessing the pilot sensed our tenseness...

let's back up. our friends invited us to stay at their family cabin with them in montana (see - doesn't that just sound american somehow?) and we've been wanting to see what flying in a small plane was all about (isn't that a normal curiosity?)

so we connected with a pilot who could take the whole fam out and back to the montana boondocks. because that's just the type of thing we do as a family - load up a carseat with a toddler and a pregnant woman on a teensy little plane for a 3 hour flight. i seriously considered wearing depends. by the way, i'm pregnant again in case i haven't mentioned that yet... yay!

(check out how patriotic i am)

the last, and only, time i was ever in montana was with bug on our way to seattle back in the day. we stopped in butte, or as we called it, butt (no offense to any butteons out there. butteites? butteys?) it was pretty sketchy, but that could have just been because we had about $4.23 to both our names and were looking for the cheapest place we could find to spend the night. i guess anyplace would be pretty sketch when that's your criteria. 

we were patriotic back then too though and went to see the site of the battle of little big horn and custard's last stand. It was a powerful scene, and as we soberly drove away from it, bug reverently and in all seriousness said, "wow, what a battle that must have been between big horn and colonel mustard." ...in the conservatory...with the candlestick... 

anyway, back to montana. q liked the plane. especially singing "la la la" over and over again into the headphones for all traffic control people across the country to hear. so i guess she's more adventurous than her parents in that sense

i'm so glad we lived to tell the tale because when we landed back in colorado, there just so happened to be 70-something parachuters jumping out of planes AT THAT VERY MINUTE trying to beat a world record of some sort (also seems oddly american, huh?). so we got to see them do their thing, which looked something like this:

i know, i know. the jumpers look like little tiny spots in the picture - like when you laugh out loud at something you see while on the computer and eating an oreo and it sprays little crumbs on the screen...

so, i took the liberty to make the jumpers feel more personal to you so you could really get a sense of it all

god bless america and all of its bizarre quirks

christmas rocks!

so if you’ve never taken the opportunity (or even worse – you’ve never even thought about taking the opportunity…shame on you) to see the transiberian orchestra in all their concert glory, you haven’t truly experienced all that christmas music has to offer. also, it’s a great blast to the 80’s, and who doesn’t want that to be part of their holiday festivities?? i’m having a hard time limiting my highlights of the show. let’s just say there were lots of lasers and fire and strobe lights and probably about a thousand band members and a narrator telling a really cheesy christmas story. and a couple of singers with good gravely voices. and everyone had really long hair. and the girls all had blue eyeshadow like barbie and the rockers. and there were a handful of guitar duels and a piano duel and those triangle shaped guitars. and it started snowing inside the pepsi center.

i’m serious – it had every ingredient necessary to make a perfect flashback rock concert. it was awesome. plus, all their music is so fun – what better way to get in the christmas spirit than with a jam session of oh come all ye faithful? i think the absolute highlight for us was the main violinist, anna phoebe, though. she was incredible. she had this custom made bright pink electric violin that she would just wail on – she must have gone through at least a dozen bows. aside from that, i’ve never seen someone with so much energy. 3 hours of running back and forth, doing backbends, running up into the crowd…wow…i’m in love.

meghan and i also learned some things about each other we hadn’t realized before during this concert. another christmas miracle. we both have the exact same pitched “wooo!!” like after a song is over and you’re resisting the urge to throw the beast, so you scream “whoo!!” instead? yeah – identical. and we’d start and stop at the exact same time too. it would’ve been funny to put some poor unassuming person in between us – surround-sound whoo-ing!

il n’y a pas le feu

i’m really just writing this post as an excuse to use my favorite french phrase.


so as it turns out, i could have died the other day. this is my office building



and this is my floor

on the plus side of being the top floor, the 360-view of outside and sunshine(!) are unbeatable. the only thing that would make it better would be if it was one of those spinny restaurants that moves around in circles as you eat. we do have free pretzels and granola bars at my office though, so i guess that’s kind-of the same.

on the down side, you’re always the last to know when the building’s on fire. we were all diligently (lie) working when one of our consultants runs over and announces “um…there are like 100 people on the grass outside...looks like they’re evacuating the building.” i was careful not to use any exclamation points to describe her announcement because there was no exclamation involved. this might be a good time to say that i work for a really laid-back company.

so, after we all got done with what we were working on, picked up all of our personal items and finally started smelling smoke, we decided to join our building-buddies in the grass (after meandering down the 12 flights of stairs). there was lots of smoke. and this is what came to our rescue.

there were probably about 32 fire trucks, a couple of ambulances, a few dozen police cars and even one of those cool unmarked vans you see on csi. it was like a little party – only i was sad everyone forgot the marshmallows (i guess i never knew that word was spelled with an “a” as in mallow. i always pictured an “e” because marshmellows mellow me out. what is a mallow anyway? (it’s a plant…i just looked it up)).

so, tons of flashing lights and smoke and a surprising amount of unalarmed onlookers. i guess everyone was secretly hoping the building would burn down because, hey, day off! i wanted to let my loved ones know that i was a goner so this is the string of texts i sent meghan. i had to keep sending her stuff because she kept not responding (she claims her phone was dead) (i don’t believe her)):

1. maybe my office is on fire
2. that’s it for me!
3. i’m a goner!
4. tell milo i love him very much
5. goodbye cruel world!
6. woman! do you not care that your only sister is dying in a fire here?

i have such a caring family. don’t worry though. i was just trying to scare her. i wasn’t really dying. just sitting on the grass watching the firefighters spray water all over the place. as it turns out, our official office dumpster was on fire..not the actual building. i’m not really sure that it’s our official dumpster, but i assume it is because clearly someone wanted to burn it down and that only happens with official stuff. also, how else would you explain the csi van?

usa! usa!

when planning your fourth of july holiday, there are four necessary ingredients:

1. camping – getting away from “it all” because “it all” reminds us why other countries don’t love americans

2. hanging out at a park – i think our founding fathers used to do this. they’d take their picnic blankets and frisbees to their local park when their hands were cramping up from writing the declaration of independence. we’re only following in their footsteps

3. bbq – all american!! except for the fact that both hamburgers and bratwursts originated in germany…and i’m sure most bbq grills are actually made in china.

4. fireworks – i know they say fireworks represent “bombs bursting in air” but i’m pretty sure they’ve come to define americans – colorful, loud and free to worship however they want (although i’ve never actually seen a firework at church)

i’m very proud (to be an america) to say that my fourth of july incorporated all four ingredients. i started off with a little camping trip. highlights included: strawberry flavored marshmallows (i know – exciting), learning to throw a frisbee with my thumb (way to go mr. thumbman!) and sleeping for almost 3 hours! (this is a significant increase from pretty much all of my other camping trips)

as soon as i got home, it was time for ingredient #2. so meghan and i ventured out to wash park, where the entire cast of the oc has been cloned and multiplied by at least a bajillion and then perfectly clad and positioned in one of a bamillion volleyball courts around the park. you’re only allowed into wash park if you look good in a bikini (boys and girls). meghan and i snuck in wearing our t-shirts and jeans when the bouncers weren’t looking. then we rented a paddle boat, because that’s just what we do.

in case you were wondering, paddle boating in a lake that’s about a half-mile in circumference can keep an average human being entertained for approximately 22 minutes. after that, you start chasing ducks to run them over and play games like “okay, you peddle with only your right leg and i’ll use only my left and we’ll see how fast we can go.” (p.s. you can’t go fast…ever…even if you’re both using all your legs. this is just the gospel of paddle boating apparently. who knew?)

next, we went to a bbq. plenty of brats and sauerkraut (also german – even though the name sounds american). amongst the people there, the only one wearing any sort of american-pride garb was the woman from britain…we played the game “battle of the sexes” over bbq. it reminded me of the revolutionary battle – except for the part where we answered questions and moved plastic pieces around a board instead of actually sacrificing our lives to defend our freedom.

and finally, we crawled up on the roof and watched a firework show that was being shot up well over 5 feet away from us. we were so close to the fireworks, we were literally covered in debris and ash once the show was over. and since nobody caught on fire, it was actually a very cool experience.

Happy Independence Day!!