Turkey Day

Travelled to Northern Virginia for some Turkey and time in traction. The Turkey was good, the weekend was super slow. It's like you enter a time warp when you go into an in-law house. For me, it's super slow and boring. When the wife comes to Massachusetts it's like life just sped up and you have to walk fast to keep up. Up there we have a lot of very cold walks (sometimes in the snow) to, in, and around the local wildlife sanctuary. Two very different experiences at each respective in-law home. Both pretty cool.

To cut down on travel expence we flew on Thursday and Monday. That gave us a great start to the holiday because we were completely stress free on the flights. We got to the airport thanks to Matt and had a leisurly walk through security and down to the gate. Even had time for breakfast at Chik-fil-a. Then at Dulles we strolled out with the crowd... simple as that. Then we were in for feasting and button popping meals. All the food was yummy, Julie's mom made my dad's pumpkin pie recipe. It was good, a bit sweet, we'll have to check out the mole-ass ratio.

Friday we never even left the house. Atlanta has thinned the blood. When it was 29 in the morning we said "no thanks" to walking the dog and it was sedentary from there. Muscle car tv for the boys, kitten puzzle for the girls. Does that sound strange? Stereotypical? A little too Americana? Yes, yes and yes. All of the above, plus some. Very funny. Leftover Turkey was good though, and we enjoyed the relaxing effect of the Thanksgiving coma.

Saturday we actually got up and out of the house . . . for a trip to the movies! Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Pretty good except for Dumbledor. His character was too harsh, too confused and played too much like a mere mortal. Other than him, the movie was pretty good. That Harry Potter, he’s a scamp. Saturday night was Poker night. A fun time for some, not so much for others. Dad-in-law and brother-in-law were not having a good time at all. They pushed all their chips in and called it a night pretty quickly. The rest of us played a bit more, but drifted off eventually.

Sunday was another day mostly inside, punctuated by a trip to the very mediocre International Spy Museum. Not very impressive. They mixed their fictional spy stories and gadgets with their real-life exhibits. James Bond’s Astin Martin was right next to a WWII training video. Pretty cheesy stuff all around. Maybe they were shooting for a younger audience.

Traveling Monday was also very easy. No lines, no hassles. Everyone should try setting Thanksgiving break off by a day, it worked great for us.

Birthday Bash

My birthday was on Friday.... I turned a very dirty thirty. So, we had a Dirty Thirty party. It was complete with two Dirty birthday cakes, Dirty songs, Dirty games, Dirty blow-up-dolls, a Dirty pinata (filled with little liquor bottles etc.), and some good old fashioned streaking. It was a blast. Needless to say I was a bit hung over on Saturday morning.

The hangover didn't last long though, we saw U2 at Phillips Arena Saturday night!!! It was an awesome show. A great way to celebrate your 30th year. They played some new stuff, some old stuff, it all rocked really hard. It was worth every cent of the $350 face value seats. Crazy ticket prices but a great, great show.

The birthday weekend events were spectacular! It was a long weekend for me, so I feel very recharged (even though I'm at work at 7am on a Monday).

Bull Mountain and Drag Queens

Adam and I did the Bull Mountain Loop trail yesterday. That involves 11 miles of up and down; up and down; up and down on the mountain bikes. It was killer on the legs, but pretty fun stuff. The first several miles feel like they are all up-hill. This was a first time for both of us and we'd heard horror stories from Ali and Mr. Vit-One about it being "up-hill in both directions," as well as "very easy to get lost on the trails and have to backtrack (up-hill of course)." We failed to get lost and had a great time once we reached the upper mountain. It's all down-hill from there you see. It was a great ride down. I was riding Drew's bike (thank you Drew) and it did very well. There were a few spots going down an old logging road covered with rocks where I wished I had a full suspension bike. . . it's a little hard on the rear. There was a point where we were cruising down a a pretty good clip, Adam was about 50-60 yards ahead of me, and I hit something in the road. Was it a rock, a log? Who knows, I couldn't see it covered with fallen leaves. The front shock did a good job of absorbing the initial hit, but the hardtail sent me veering off track wildly to my left. Luckily this was a wide road, not single track and I could regain control just as I was heading for the embankment, no spill for me. Other than that we had no falls, no crying, no getting lost.

After a long day of biking, what better night cap than to go to Charlie Brown's Cabaret and see lip-synching female impersonators?!?!! KNB is getting married on New Years Eve and last night was her bachelorette party. It was co-ed, so of course we had to see drag queens. Charlie Brown is a hilariously irreverent queen with a distinct hatred for republicans in her club. She spent a lot of time railing on the two older men who appeared to be from Cobb county. It was very funny. The performers were pretty good too. They ranged from male to very male, from blond to redhead to brunette, from Egyptian to Brazillian to Whitney Houston!! (On a side note: The performer portraying Ms. Whitney Houston is leaving on a world tour to do three months in Australia performing her show. Then she will be doing three months in SouthEast Asia as Ms. Houston... What a life!!!) The odd thing that everyone commented on: lots of them had breast implants. In fact several of them were only wearing pasties. It seems a little like cheating doesn't it? Not being versed in the ways of the Drag Queen, I have no idea if implants are "cheating." I'll have to ask the Lady Chablis. (Some friends at the party have actually seen the Lady at her show in Savannah - I'm jealous) After the show it was definitely bed time, I was all Dragged out.

Slow Times call for Slow Men

Not much going on these days. This weekend was beautiful, sunny and 76 during the day, equally nice at night. Sadly I did not take advantage with any bike riding or outdoor workouts. Does it count if we ate brunch outside on Sunday?

We got to Atlantic Station this weekend. Saw 'Jarhead' on Friday night. It was pretty good. CNN calls it "A war movie without a war." I think the reviewers missed the point. I really like Peter Sarsgaard. He plays the main character's buddy in Jarhead, and he was also in Garden State and Kinsey. I like everything he's been in the last few years, let's hope to see him more. Atlanta Station itself is an interesting little Mall/Development. It is like an outdoor California Mall with restaurants, shops, movie theater, grocery store, condos, office space and bars. Once they get the whole thing finished it could be cool. Although, it seems more like a snotty mall environment (like Lenox) than a downtown community which the developers had promoted. Jury is still out for a final verdict on this one.

I picked up some interesting cases last week. One is an armed robbery case against five teens. Actually, it is around three armed robberies in the span of an hour or two. All the co-defendants are 17 except one who is 18. All charged with death-penalty eligible crimes. None have graduated from high school yet. I also picked up a client who only speaks Korean. She and I had a hard time communicating. I need to find a Korean translator who the county will pay for, so I can tell her why she's in jail.