one busy day

I went to sleep at 9:30 last night. 9:30! That’s unheard of for me. We got up at 5:45 this morning because we had a rather busy morning planned and wanted to get an early start.

Here’s what our schedule looked like:

1. Vote–The polling place near us, the Senior Center, opened at 7 this morning, and we knew we’d need to be there at 7 to be able to take care of all the other stuff we had going.
2. IHOP–Ok, this wasn’t so much of a had-to-get-done as it was a necessary stop for food. It could have been anywhere, but our friends had a discount card that would get us a free entree, so we decided it was as good as anything.
3. Ultrasound–This was the real reason we were going to IHOP. We were planning on keeping the kids home from school for the morning so we could bring them to Michelle’s ultrasound this morning. We wanted to make it a special day, so we added a nice breakfast in there. However, since the appointment was at 9, we had little time to vote, make the 20 minute drive, eat, and get to the appointment.

We expected voter turnout to be good, but we didn’t expect it to be this good, this early in the morning.

We brought the kids along, but didn’t expect the wind to be so cool. They made do just fine with a blanket from the car.

Voting took 30 minutes (once we found out that our side of town had a much shorter line than the other side of town) and then we took off for IHOP.

Doing our part:

And then we were off to the ultrasound appointment. It was a lot of fun. The baby was active, moving around, not modest at all (which is helpful for the lab tech), and absolutely adorable. While I don’t have the ultrasound pics scanned in, you might be able to find some helpful hints here.

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the latest in scary halloween costumes

This year, I really wanted to get into the spirit of Halloween. I only do this for all of my international students, of course. So, I decided to put together a really scary costume that I could also wear around campus without making people think I was a freshman. Or lonely. Or a fantasy reader.

So, I turned my hat backwards, put on a polo shirt, jeans, and a fake press badge for Jimmy “Pop” A. Razzo, staff photographer for the National Reporter. I grabbed my new camera, the Canon 40D, set it to high speed burst mode (6.5 frames/second), put a flash on (set to the lowest level for the fastest recycling time and lowest battery consumption), and set out to terrorize the campus.

Ok, mostly, I just terrorized my fellow teachers and a few students. And a random guy dressed as a Lego man.

Seriously.

Don’t believe me? Well, here’s the photographic evidence to prove it (except that my badge is flipped around backwards):

I can’t tell you how many times someone asked me if there was any film in the camera. I’d just shake my head in a reassuring way and say no. Then, when they relaxed a bit, I pointed out that it was digital and unloaded the Canon at them.

At the end of the day, I had over 1200 images, 8 exhausted (rechargeable) AA batteries, and a lot more enemies.

Oh, and a video:

I think many people would agree: definitely a scary costume.

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