August 29, 2005
Done Trippin'
filed under: Idle ChatterAnd we're back.
Max spent most of his visit to Grandma Stefi and Grandpa Bob's Super Grandkid Lakeside Paradise with some variation of the above look on his face: blissed out.
It probably helped that he started most of his days with one of Grandma Stefi's patented "Boat Walks" (so named because the dogs follow along on shore):
It'll take me a while to dig out from under my snowdrift of things-to-do and organize a real trip report, but for now some brief impressions:
- Eating pancakes at Denny's on the northern edge of the Shenandoah Valley at 3:30am with your feverish-and-hence-not-sleeping son in your lap is a unique bonding opportunity. Especially when the child in question is wearing only his car-and-scooter-covered pajamas ("jimmy jams") and no shoes and shouting "panCAKE!" at everyone who comes near.
- Washington D.C. has a brilliantly conceived but miserably executed HOV lane scheme on I-95.
- I-95 blows.
- Denny's makes good pancakes.
- McDonald's has, with their "PlayPlace" indoor jungle gyms, the best marketing-as-brainwashing-indoctrination scheme in history, but their "food" still makes you feel like death. Max didn't even like his McNuggets, and this is a child who adores all things nugget.
- Clouds belong in the sky. Clouds do not belong on highways at night.
- Guinea pigs who spent their youth on the mean streets of Staten Island are unphased by mere multi-state road trips. Kashi: "Whatever. Do I get some hay? Then I'm good. Drive on."
Posted by rjt at August 29, 2005 11:59 AM