Daddy Dopey turns 60

Dr Dopey's Daddy celebrated his 60th birthday today with a party at his place. There was food and balloons and presents and a cake custom made by the Dopey Sisters

The night finished up with a killer game of pool which I think the Birthday Boy was expecting to win except he got knocked out in the first round by Elaine.

Immense concentration as Daddy Dopey focuses on his next move and his pool partner, Belle in disbelief as he misses once again. Elaine, the victor, showing off her stuff while her son Michael watches on in awe of the grand master.

Bowling Baby, Bowling

After several unsuccessful attempts Voula was finally able to get her work buddies out of the office and out on the town for a few games of friendly disco bowling (previous suggestions of Latin dancing had already been rejected).

There were some interesting bowling techniques

...and constructive comments from the side lines

The dark horse of the competition, sorry friendly match, was Simon (on the left below) who showed remarkable talent at the beginning of the first game and continued to impress throughout the second.

And the final scores? Cant see them, what a shame.

Last stop.....Iowa

The final leg of this trip was a visit to my family in Carroll, Iowa, located about 2 hrs drive west of the Iowa State capital, Des Moines (for the Aussie's, Iowa's the next state to the west of the state that Chicago is in). I was all ready for a relaxing weekend of eating, gossiping and card playing (in that order) but my family had other plans.....

It all began well as I woke up to the smell of freshly baked carmel rolls, followed by pepperoni pizza and root beer for lunch and to top it off German Chocolate cake. A nice relaxing day out on the deck catching up on the news and a few family pics.

Dr Dopey with Grandpa Dopey......

Grandma Dopey........

Dopey cousin Andy.....

and Dopey Aunts Linda and Lois

In the evening my Uncle Dink (on the right below) hosted a BBQ dinner around the bonfire. Perfect, right?

Dopey Uncles

Dopey Aunt Joan with the latest addition to the Dopey family, Olivia

Dopey Grand and Great Grand Kids

Dopey Cow

Last stop....Iowa (Part 2)

So as I was saying, I was expecting a nice relaxing weekend of eating, gossiping and card playing but my family had other plans.....

My visit was timed with an important event in the area - the town my Grandma grew up in, Dedham, was having its 125th birthday. A parade had been organised through the town along with games for adults and kids, including tractor pull, dunk-the-spunk (I made that name up, but its where someone is sitting above a pool of water and you throw a ball at a target to dunk them in), bingo and giant inflatable jumping castles. It was my first experience of this kind of event and I was a little unsure what to expect given that the town's population is around 250.

So my Grandma's side, the Tunning's along with the Dopey's, had put together a float for the parade with the theme "Tunning back into Dedham" and had converted a large flat bed truck into a giant radio. They also had really attractive lime green T-shirts made up for us all to wear. For those of us that decided to walk the mile long route (had to work off the carmel rolls somehow!) it was our our job to hand out the beer.

I was really impressed with the turn out as there were about 250 entrants in the parade and the mile long route was lined with people. My favourites were the old fire engines with matching not-so-buff-possibly-too-many-donuts firemen and the old John Deer tractors.

1946 Fire Engine

Dedhem parade - John Deer tractors

Dopey Aunt Joan

Unfortunately a rogue group of Tunnings had decided to make their own float with a very similar theme! Disaster!

Nevertheless, the parade was a success and great experience, made even better by the grilled hamburgers afterwards.

San Francisco

San Francisco is one of my favourite cities in the US, I love going for a ride on the cable cars up and down the steep hills. We were in a great hotel too, on the top of Nob Hill with great views of the city and the cable car riding right past.

San Francisco sunrise from hotel room

Nob Hill is right on top of one of the biggest hills in San Francisco as we found out, the hard way. We walked down the hill to the bay along Fisherman's Wharf from Pier 39 around Fort Mason for views of the Golden Gate Bridge. We ended up at the Ghirardelli chocolate shop to pick up a few things and then round to Boudin for some clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl, yum. There was a huge queue for the cable car back up the hill to our hotel so we decided to walk instead, great exercise.

View of the walk up Nob Hill to our hotel

We caught up with Terrie and Paul for dinner on their last weekend in the US before they head to Guatamala for the last part of their 3 year stint overseas. They took us to the North Beach region of the city also known as Little Italy, the main street lined with Italian restaurants, which reminded me of Lygon Street back home.

Our second day in San Francisco saw a drastic change in weather from sunny hot temp of 95oF to a much cooler, foggy day with temps in the low 60's. Also our plans to ride the cable car all day long were thrown away when it broke down so had to settle with taking the bus instead. This in combination with bad sushi (you know its not good when the chef walks through the restaurant holding a side of frozen salmon, with the Glad Wrap falling off) put me in a bit of a cranky mood. Oh well, back to work tomorrow.

LA

The flight from Boston to LA was uneventful and not too bad when your in first class, 3 course meal, wine and freshly baked choc chip cookies, yum. Even driving around LA was ok once I got used to staying on the RHS of the road, though would have been completely lost without the GPS. We had a spare afternoon and on advice from Voula, headed to Santa Monica which is by the sea, about 20 min from LA.

It was a nice sunny day with temps in the low 100's and we were looking forward to dipping our feet in the water but when we got to the beach the view was non-existent due to the smog - see below, yes that is the beach taken from the Santa Monica Pier

I've never seen anything like it. Even if you don't believe in the Greenhouse effect and global warming, you've got to look at that and think what are we doing?

While walking back from the beach up to the shopping strip we came across these squirrel-like animals which were pretty cute and very tame, probably the highlight of our Santa Monica experience, which is kind of sad really

NYC - Connecticut - Boston

On our last day in NYC we got up early to beat the crowds for the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. This time it was quiet and we were able to get out there without having to wait. It was still hazy so the views weren't the best but it was worth the trip out there. We then headed up to central park, down 5th Avenue to do some unsuccessful celebrity spotting and finished up at Times Square, where Sarah pointed out one of the Spice Girls, not sure which one but she was tiny and no one seemed to be paying her any attention.

Other interesting sights in NYC:

- An older woman pushing a childs stroller through GAP containing a small dog with a pink bow in its hair

- While sittting eating lunch in a diner, a woman was hit by a taxi while crossing the road, she ended up being ok but the taxi driver was looking very nervous (law suit?)

- Train ride from Connecticut to Boston was great, yes it mean no airports, delayed flights due to thunderstorms, etc but the views along the way were pretty good.

Even the work part has been ok, off to LA tonight