Oh My Anna

Okay, I cannot figure out how to rotate photos yet, sorry. I even tried to rotate it before uploading, no help. Anyhoo, this is a shot from this morning. I told Anna she had to get dressed for the exciting trip to the doctor. She wanted to keep her nightgown on and thought she had me fooled. It was all around her tummy and I saw the bulge. This is right after I pulled it down and you can see, she was thrilled to be caught.

As we were driving today she was gazing out the window and wistfully said, "I can't wait until I can ride my motorcycle." Umm, good luck with that.

Spoiled Doctor's Wife

No, Sean didn't stop at the diamond shop in the airport in Vegas (he did call to laugh about how the naughty husbands must stop there before their flights home), but he does always handle the kids when they are sick. Well, Megan was up at 5:30am to tell me her ear hurt which has never happened before. She has the usual crud and has had it for a week now, no signs of letting up. So, I had to break down and call for an appt. I have never done this but I succeeded, winning myself the opportunity to take all 3 kids to the hospital at 10am. Whoo-hoo! So my question is, how do you stop at the liquor store afterwards when you have the kids? That weak beer at the grocery is not going to cut it this weekend.

Survivor Week

No, not the show Survivor, which I'm always surprised to hear is still on, but a little money saving tip I just read. You know the articles in women's magazines that tell you ways to save money which are always common sense, well I read them anyways just in case I missed out on the announcement that gas is free on Tuesdays. Well, the latest tip is to play Survivor Week and just live on food that's already in your cupboard, calling for some creative meals. I can't help but think of a Simpson's episode where Marge is gone for some reason (Sean could tell you) and Homer and the kids are eating something with Tom Collins mix and ketchup. We never reach those depths of the cupboards but we do play that game a lot but for a different reason. It's called, "Too Lazy". Yes, too lazy to go to the grocery store. Play it all the time. At least I always have the stuff on hand to make bread which comes in extra handy for a week like we've had, also known as Toast Week. I guess I've been too sick to think of the money we've saved on groceries but I'm sure Sean is putting it to good use at the roulette wheel. Red, baby!

Vegas, Daddy, Vegas

Well, the biggest gamble of Sean's trip has paid off... his car made it to the airport without shaking to pieces. Now he can relax until Sunday when he has to get it back here in one piece. He fears I am going to be bashing him on the blog but really, I am happy he's going to see his good friends from residency, especially as these are the guys who got him into his moonlighting group. Ah, it pays to be nice to the people you work with. There are always a few who only look out for themselves and don't care who they screw over. Well, they don't get invited to join. It's the best job you can get where you can work in sweats in the comfort of your home. Except for being a stay-home mom of course, which pays slightly less. ha

Anyway, don't feel sorry for me as it's only 4 days, not the 6 months that we will eventually face. I don't think we can get out of Iraq quickly enough to avoid a deployment, but we still cross our fingers (and plan medical profiles that will make him undeployable, haha, just kidding.... if I run Sean's foot over with the van it is totally an accident).

Oh, and I will be spending the next 4 days figuring out what gear I need for the photography class I am taking with the Jen's. I've always wanted to do this and perhaps now I will have the poker winnings to do it right!

Dark Horse

I actually thought to myself last night when going to sleep that the house was awfully quiet. A little while later Megan starts her coughing and then shortly after that Patrick wants a snack. So much for introducing him to cereal last night, that didn't work. Anyway, then I debate who is going to interrupt my sleep the most... Megan or Patrick. I think we all know how this one is going to end... with a little voice calling my name from the bathroom: ANNA!!

Yes, she filled the sink with barf. Rather impressive that she didn't get a drop anywhere else as this is the girl who peed on the couch out of forgetfulness apparently. So I wipe her up, send her back to bed, bleach the sink. A hour later, repeat, with most in the sink, some on the nightgown, some on the rug. Perfect! Remember I don't have a dryer that works right now. Wipe her up, change her pajamas, back to bed, bleach the sink. A half hour later... all in the bed. Strip that off (having visions of laundry hanging all over my house in the morning), put down a towel, wipe her up, back to bed, bleach the sink just in case. By this time it is 1:30 and I know that if she can just hold out a while longer Sean will be up at 3am to moonlight. At least then if it is slow, he can at least handle a quick barf change. 2:45am... close enough. So I wake him up and he is all confused. Why, what has been going on? Oh yeah, your shift is starting early tonight. He pulls out the spare mattress for her and she is fine the rest of the night. Around 5am I hear Patrick and it turns out that his days as wingman are numbered because he likes to pound on the keyboard now. But, Sean did keep him occupied for a half hour so that was nice. At least we weren't all sick on the same night, that's so much worse.

Well, time to hang up some blankets and bleach the sink one more time. Cheers!

Is this a bad sign?

So I noticed that the dryer has been getting louder and louder and today when I open it up, little metal shavings are all around the bottom. A bag sign, yes? No, that's a good sign. That's a sign that I won the contest and I get a new dryer before Sean gets a new car! He wouldn't let me get a new set until something broke and we debated how it would shake down. Would there be a fire in the dryer? Would the washer stop completely due to the extremely hard water that built up in it in Texas? Well, at least that battle is over and the new set arrives on Friday, when Sean is in Vegas and too happy to complain. In the meantime I am drying that last load of laundry on the banister in the living room. Classy.

A Little Help Here

Anna has a couple questions for everyone:

1. Why do boys have eyebrows?

my answer: everyone has eyebrows

her response: not animals

2. Why are the Buffalo Bills so bad? (she was looking at the Little Bills Fan bib)

my answer: ask your dad

her response: he doesn't know

Fat Tuesday

I realize everyone else celebrated Fat Tuesday weeks ago, but after a bout of the 12 hour flu yesterday, we are ready to eat today! I was in the lethargic stage when the sitter came yesterday afternoon and if it wasn't for Anna running around like a maniac, it might have appeared that we had a carbon monoxide leak. Luckily Sean and I staggered our worst times so he was able to drive Megan to school and I was able to tell the sitter to pick her up.

So today is recovery, trying to de-germ the house and regain the 10 lbs we think we lost. Need to throw out all the food we have leftover from Sunday's dinner as we'll never eat that again. Anna will not have free rein of the house either, which I think she really enjoyed. I did reward her with a trip to Panera this morning. Megan was a bit suspicious when Anna ran and got dressed and I even changed out of my pajamas. Something wasn't quite right... Anna actually kept it a secret, although did let on that "we aren't going anywhere". How easily the lies roll off her tongue.

Check this Mess

Okay, I don't know how to rotate those vertical shots, so turn your heads. Yes, the girls live in that pit of a room and they come home and spread school stuff, in this photo Valentine crap, all over the floor. I know I am not the only one who lives with these critters. Oh and good news, the green sofa is off to a good Army home. Props to Heather for turning me on to the concept of keeping at least one room clean at a time so you can retreat there and breathe. Somehow the girls and their entourage of toys manage to invade every space and most nights I fight the good fight and at least pile them up. I would have posted a shot of the kitchen diaster zone tonight but Sean, who is earning points for Vegas next week, did the dishes before I could find the camera.

We Do Love Kansas- Seriously

Okay, some peeps have made comments where they assume we don't like Kansas. Let me clarify, I mock all parts of my life and living in Kansas is just one of them right now. I am afraid that my lame home-body self doesn't live the most exciting life and thus, my blog isn't going to convince anyone that it's great living here, but we really do love it. Initially we were excited to move to Kansas just knowing that by September we might see a temperature of less than 100 degrees. Oh sweet fall, how we missed thee. Of course the move also signified the end of 10 years of post-graduate training for Sean, so our lifestyle was going to be much more relaxed in Kansas.

So a few things we love after living here 1.5 years.... the traffic, or rather lack thereof. So easy to get around and never takes long to get anywhere. Sean's commute is so short that he has a hard time justifying getting rid of often-mocked old Volvo. Everyday he looks at that and thinks, it can go another 12 miles. He'd rather take that car payment to Vegas. We also continue to be shocked by how easy going everyone is and how trusting. I just got a piece from the local art gallery here and the owner insisted I take it home first and try it out and then if I like it, just come back in and pay sometime. Umm, okay, do you want my name first? I put up a link to the gallery on the right here, check it out. Right now they are doing a photography show with Mark Feiden and Edward C. Robinson III. So, if you want to see how diverse the landscape is in Kansas (seriously) and how beautiful, pull up some of their pieces. The photos I take off our deck don't do it justice. I am taking a photography class here soon, yet another advantage of living in a university town, so we'll see if that helps. You really just need to see it for yourself though and as always, we love having visitors. Don't forget we have wine! ha

Random Thoughts, Fo' Shizzle

We have convinced the girls that it is normal to pay to watch TV. It was a gradual process, starting with the "tickets" they got each day to either use for a show or save up for something fun, which ended up being the Great Wolf Lodge. Well, what motivates them now that birthdays and Christmas are over is money for toys. It is a long time between gift giving occasions with these winter birthdays (of course the relatives still manage to find other holidays worthy of gifts). Anyway, now if Anna asks to watch TV I tell her it is 25 cents and she usually isn't willing to part with that. Of course when they are bugging us after a long day, we have been known to offer a free show or free movie (that means I am upstairs drinking wine too, ha), and then that is a huge treat, oh what generous parents we are!

In other news, I snagged the latest issue of People and it had an article with new mom Christina Aqu-something. You all won't believe this but she just makes up little melodies to sing to her son on the spot. Holy crap, wow, she is so so talented!! Granted, her voice is a little better than most moms (including my own whom I predict will comment on this post by saying we used to put our hands over her mouth when she sang to shut her up), but obviously everyone makes up stupid little songs to distract the baby. And no worries, her baby is so so good, he is a really good napper. Yeah, 1 month old, I think that is all most babies do then. OF course if she had gotten a colicky baby (God bless those moms), no worries.... she has a 24 hour baby nurse anyway. She was also kind enough to share with everyone that she scheduled a c-section at 37 weeks because she was afraid of vaginal tears. Really, did we need to know this? Well, you ALL know this now. I've heard that c-sections have zero risks associated with them, so clearly the best choice. Keely, any comments on that?? ha

Also, inspired by Keely I am attempting to not feed Patrick every time he wimpers at night so last night I told Sean to go in and get him, as he was still up playing on the computer anyway. So his solution was the exersaucer. Yep, Patrick had a grand old time playing in the middle of the night until he just leaned over and fell back asleep.

Tonight is our usual date night and Sean said he has been invited to some drug rep dinners lately but due to the rules now you can't bring a spouse unless they are medical too. Plus, he has no interest in listening to drug reps and if he wants to hang with his work buddies, well he can do it for $2.25 down in the cafeteria at lunch time. Anyway, he heard that they are going to be doing the drug rep dinner at our usual Thursday night spot so this will be interesting. Well worth the money to not have to talk about all the usual "hate on the hospital" topics that come up anytime a group of them get together. And I don't have to admit that I have a medical background in transcription, ha ha. Oh those 1st jobs out of college....

Okay, this is a bit freaky

I just went on Google maps and was able to take a walking tour of our old neighborhood in San Antonio. So I can see what the rednecks who bought our house have done to it... I think the girls would cry to see that any changes have been made, they still insist that it is bigger than our current house too. Um, no. Now, to figure out who else to go spy on.... Not all areas have walking tours yet and you can't find our new house on there yet unless you know where to look. They haven't updated the roads yet so we can still run around naked in the backyard without fear of the google.

Who Invented Church?

Yeah, the kids would like to know the answer to that one and they aren't buying my response that religion is how each culture expresses their quest for a higher being. Sean gave up trying to coax Anna to stay in her Sunday school class after she screamed out, "I hate God". Decided she needed some blessings after that and brought her into mass... Time to go tour the Catholic school I guess.

Celeb sightings

Okay, after hearing that Bill Murray was at Doe's recently, I got to thinking about who I'd like to see sporting around the Lil' Apple. In this order:
1. George Clooney
2. Jude Law
3. Matt Damon
4. Patrick Dempsey

Suggestions of how to lure them here? I don't think the mall is going to do it... Also, I feel this list should have 5 but I am blanking on who is usually my #5. When dressed as a pirate, Louis Meng looks EXACTLY like Johnny Depp and I think that is probably as close as we're going to get to another sighting. I'll see if he'll let me post his photo...

Little House on the Prairie

Okay, we are 12 pages into Little House on the Prairie, which a friend recommended that we read to Megan. I started reading it in the van for everyone and Sean and I are convinced that it is a comedy, although I recall my dad calling the show Little Tragedy on the Prairie. Anyway, Sean said that if it was our family the story would have ended on page 2 after he would have told me his plan to pack up and move to a place with even fewer people (Pa didn't like that a wagon would drive past their house almost every day!) and I would have said heck no. Ma was a good sport though when they took off in the freezing weather, leaving their furniture behind because Pa could make more (and here I chuckled to myself at the image of Sean making our furniture). So far our favorite part is when the wagon gets stuck in the mud for a week and there is no mention of big fights breaking out. You know Ma is muttering, I told you so under her breath. So next time Megan is whining non-stop on the 1.5 hour drive to Great Wolf Lodge, we'll ask if she'd like to hop in the wagon for Indian country.

Serenity NOW because I'm running out of wine

Between feeling behind the times in what kids should hand out for Valentine's Day at school, and then dealing with the mess that comes home in their bags, I'm not so much a fan of that holiday anymore. Jen P was representin' with her adorable bag toppers, thankfully no one in the girls' classes had moms that creative. The crazy kid in Megan's class was apparently trying to make up for all the problems he causes by sending in big bags of candy and BRATZ tattoos. So of course I immediately tramp stamped up my 6 year old. Oh and those sugar dipper candy things, right in the trash.... I mean, candy is one thing, colored sugar is another... why don't we just let them snort that? I sent in little tubs of playdough for each kid, figured at least it wasn't candy, but I'm sure I'm being cursed by at least one mom who is trying to get it out of her couch right now.

Speaking of couch, Anna decided to pee on mine the other day, hence the title of this post. Usually she just pees on the bathroom floor, sometimes waits too long and then still needs to strip down, always a bad scenario. No idea what got into her the other day but gave me the chance to follow through on the ultimate threat that we have been using for months now. Yes, ducky got snipped. Her most favorite itchy duck blanket is now missing a strip. I know it's cruel but more effective than spanking. Now she is constantly reminded of how naughty she was and now she knows that once in a while we actually do follow through. Sean has assured me that there is no medical problem behind her behavior, she really just hates taking a break to go potty. I haven't told her yet that the reason we don't have cats anymore is because they kept peeing on my carpet....

Like most people, I'm not a fan of the smell of pee permeating (I can't get spell check to work, I know that doesn't look right) my house, let alone coming from the couch I spend the most time on. Turns out that the Sunbrella fabric I used really does repel liquids and also washes up quite nicely. Finally had no choice but to see how that would go, so I stripped down the cushions and threw the covers in the washer. Looks even better now, I think they were a bit dingy from a year of feet on the couch. I fear some did soak down into the base of the couch so anyone who comes over, please don't smell too low to the ground in the living room. Just take the glass of wine I'm handing you and we'll go in the other room...

Chippies

Continuing in the long tradition of Grandpa Timer and her daddy, Anna is quite the consumer of tortilla chips, or as she lovingly calls them, "chippies". I was packing her a lunch today and a teeny piece of chip fell to the ground. Within seconds she had swooped in and eaten it. Oh yeah, off the ground, no hesitation. She begs for them with (as) every meal and I won't admit how many times she has them for breakfast. Whatever I have to do to stop the screaming at that hour of the day... I have at least convinced her that Sun Chips are just as delicious and according to the bag, each serving contains 1/3 the recommended amount of whole grains. So by the end of the day that makes 100%.

It could be worse as her other favorite food is bacon. We fear for her cardiovascular health so we make her run laps around the outside of the house when it's not freezing out. Megan does it too; we time them and have convinced them that they aren't racing against each other (oh the crying when that happens), but they are racing against their best time. I learned that on Franklin, thank you very much TV. "Hey, it's Franklin. Coming over to pla--ay." Everybody sing!

Wolves not so scary anymore?

Well, thanks to some road condition tips from Jennifer Walker (the 2nd as we call her since we had a good friend with the same name in TX) we found out that it was safe to leave the bomb shelter. Yes, after driving one entire block in terrible snow conditions we discovered that the roads were 100% dry and clear. Felt like we had been duped by the weather guys. Oh well, just meant Sean got to procrastinate even longer on the oil changes that he was supposed to do before we left. (oh, so close to killing the volvo... good effort).

Anyway, we endured 1.5 hours of Megan complaining about how long the drive was, which confirmed that she would never survive the trip to Disney. (Ah, can't wait to relate this story to her when she is older so she can take the blame for that decision.) Started off with the dinosaur restaurant, thinking we would check that off the list quickly only to discover that they immediately start begging to come back again the next day. We compromise and sign the contract to come back just before we head home on Friday. Well, Sean signs it at least, I secretly plan to ditch them and go shopping around there, he heh.

Then we check into the Great Wolf Lodge and Megan finally notices all the wolf decor... she has obviously not made the connection before. I should mention that Megan is deathly afraid of wolves to the point where she will not go anywhere in our house by herself, always takes Anna, the bodyguard/wolf bait. This annoys me to no end because sometimes I need Megan to just go grab me something from another room and it turns into this big ordeal. I recently asked her if she really thought I was going to open the door and let a wolf in? She was horrified and said, "don't give me more ideas to be afraid of". Please... I won't let a housecat in, why would I let a dirty wolf in on my new carpet and furniture?? (as an aside, we will have to move if she ever sees the coyote that my parents saw howling right outside the guest room when they were here once. not sure coyote is any better than a wolf...)

Back to the original story, the girls had a great time at the water park and got really tired out, victory! Patrick did well sleeping for a few hours and then discovered that we wouldn't let him cry long in a hotel (not sure why I thought others would be bothered by this as it has been proven that I am the only one who can hear him cry at night), so he played that card frequently and got to sleep on one of us on the couch most the night.

I didn't let that slow me down the next day though as I took him shopping with me while Sean took the girls to the water park and to various other moneymaking activities that the hotel has figured out. Patrick tried hard to be really fussy while I tried on clothes, following instructions from Daddy no doubt. I still managed to spend what I call "Vegas" at a few stores down in Kansas City. Sean was suspicious of my purchases until I reminded him of how much he'd be spending just on the ticket alone for his guys' weekend in a few weeks. After I find out how much he loses at the poker table I will then resume shopping...

Anyway, all in all we decided that it was the perfect little vacation for us... 2 nights away was enough and 1.5 hours of driving was about all we could stand. Also great to get back on a Friday afternoon so we could have a few days to relax and catch up on laundry, aka my day job. Oh, I also realized that this was the first time I had left Manhattan in 3 months. I hadn't even noticed either so I guess that's a sign that we do enjoy life in the little Manhattan. A few great restaurants and a lot of great internet shopping and I'm good to go... Megan just told me tonight that she never wants to move so I think she loves it too. Or maybe she finally believes me when I tell her that there are no wolves in this part of the country...

Snow Day

Why of course we have a snow day on the one day we were planning to drive to the Great Wolf Lodge. Still hoping the roads clear sometime today, if not at least by tomorrow morning. In the meantime I will be keeping the girls happy with a steady stream of M&M's. Another bad thing about the snow day is that we had just extended the school day by 12 minutes to make up for the days off during the ice storm, so I am wondering what they will do now. I can't keep adjusting my mental clock for pick up times. It took me a month to figure it all out last fall, I would set timers to remind me to leave the house. Now they change it on me (and rob me of 5 very very valuable minutes of yelling in the morning). Now will they change it again?? Or just make the kids go extra days in the summer? Fascinating stuff, I know.

Aunt Maureen is coming to stay with us for a few days to help Jay settle into his apartment here, so I have been cleaning so she won't trip down the stairs, etc. I found a lot of interesting stuff in the girls' bedroom, including Sean's Minnesota medical license paperwork in Anna's nightstand drawer. Well, at least she recognized that it was important enough to put in her secret drawer and not to be colored on. I'm not sure where the old chocolate Santa was hiding but the girls had that for breakfast. Of course they hated the Barefoot Contessa blueberry muffins I made... not sure why I bother except I do love to eat.

Well, I know they will never plow our street, but I need to go check and see how they're doing on the highways. Wish us luck! The hotel is already paid for!

Bribery 101 & You Should Be a Doctor!

We are way into bribery with our kids because it actually works. So during Christmas break I came up with a plan to give them 3 tickets each day for TV shows and if they didn't spend them all I would give them points on a chart which they could use for fun outings (things we were planning to do anyway, shhhh). Well, it actually worked and I don't have to listen to those annoying shows nearly as much now. We are taking the kids to Great Wolf Lodge for a couple nights this week for 200 tickets (sorry kids, Disney is 20,000 tickets- good luck!) and Megan also gets to miss some school. Up until this past Friday she was always begging to skip school, but then her teacher announced that they were so good they would have pajama day this coming Friday, yes a day we are gone. Megan finally figured that one out last night, oh the sobbing. I just can't win.

We do give the girls a free pass for movie night on Fridays when a new kid movie arrives from Netflix. The adults desperately need 92 minutes and 15 seconds of peace and quiet by the time Friday night rolls around. Sean is so burned out from all the bad attitude he gets from the GS employees at the hospital. There is a misconception among them that the doctors get paid too much and so I am making a flyer for him to hand out at work that will look something like this:

So You Wanna be a Doctor?

4 years of med school:
---acquire great debt either in years of service to the military or in student loans while everyone else you know is making money
---study every waking moment you aren't in the hospital
---stitch up the heads of prisoners who are chained in a back hallway at the training hospital (watch where you leave your scapel!)
--- 2 final words: rectal exams
Internship:
---finally get paid, less than you did as a bagger in high school (qualify for WIC if you have a baby!)
---work 126 hour weeks and when you do go home to sleep briefly, worry about which patients may die while you're gone because you may have made a mistake during your 18 hour work day
---3 final words: MORE rectal exams
Residency:
---get paid a tiny bit more but those student loans are earning interest every day
---work 119 hours a week, come in one hour later than your intern slave
---try to have a family like your non-medical friends, see your children only while they sleep
---4 years and 3 huge exams to get board certified

Staff doctor:
---after NINE years of training you finally get a real salary
---must start paying back those loans or years of service to the military (make a fraction of what the civilian docs do!)
---be responsible for the mistakes your staff make and if you try to discipline them for said mistakes, be prepared to deal with their union
---deal with bitter staff who resent that you get paid more than they do and thus they enjoy making your job harder

Good times! Fill out your med school application now! Hope you worked your butt off for four years in undergrad!

Funnel Cake Good

Funnel cakes plural, not so good. I decided to finally use up the funnel cake mix I bought on a whim last year when I was apparently weak with hunger at the grocery store. I thought it would go with the Superbowl theme of eating really unhealthy food, so I made them after the kids went to bed last night. That first one was delicious but I am still sick just thinking about the 2nd one.

Back to the Superbowl for a moment, can you imagine socializing with the Mannings? You couldn't even mention anything your kids had accomplished, without them trumping you. Oh, so your son got promoted to assistant manager at Chuck E. Cheese? Well, maybe you heard our sons won back-to-back superbowls? Snap.

Get Your Nomination Forms Ready!

I know, I know, you've all been trying to hone your essays on why I should be Mother of the Year, so let me help you out with some recent material. Patrick has been rather fussy lately, I figure it's just the months and months of teething before an actual tooth breaks through so if he won't calm down at night after I've tried everything else we just top him off with a dose of Tylenol. Well, let me tell you what Tylenol doesn't fix: a messy diaper. I guess I have a bit of a cold and didn't notice he was so stinky and didn't realize that was the problem.... poor 3rd child.

I also call him "baby girl" sometimes, which is a step beyond messing up the kid's names like so many of us do. (George Foreman was on to something when he named all his kids George). At least I have resisted the urge to dress Patrick in some of the cute girl clothes I bought before we knew he was a boy. My grandma didn't succeed in that department. As my dad was her 3rd boy she finally gave up and just dressed him in dresses. Oh and not just as an infant, we have home movies showing him in a dress throwing rocks at birds.

In other nomination news, Megan had a sock hop for Daisy scouts last night with Sean. Her scout leader (who is also her CCD teacher, clearly someone you might actually nominate) told me a lot of the girls wear poodle skirts to the dance. She had me at "it's really easy" and lost me with "first you get out your sewing machine". Sorry but really easy is ordering online from a place that already has my login info so I can get it done in about 3 clicks and a knock on my door from my trusty UPS man. How I love my men in brown uniforms.

Date Night, Feelin' Fly

Hitting the streets of Manhattan is a little different in this Manhattan, but we have still found a way to feel hip. We go to Harry's. I know, those of you who have been there are thinking of all the old people there. Well, last week when we sat in the bar area and had appetizers, we were the youngest by a good 30 years. I even got carded. Seriously. I think the waitress was just being nosy though. Anyway, I felt so stylish, so young, so hip compared to everyone around us. Plus, the food is good, old people know how to eat.

Going to Aggieville, the other option, reminds us that it's not just the minivan... we have never been cool and being surrounded by teeny college girls with pre-childbearing hips does not encourage one to enjoy dessert. And if you live here in town, hurry to Harry's so you can enjoy their chocolate dessert selection right now, oh my. Good stuff. Now I need to hit the streets of Manhattan for a long long walk.