Category: family.

family. travel.

travel update.

Team Munchkin Wrangler is still in Germany, and the trip is going swimmingly so far. If you’ve sent me an email or TwitFace message, I’ll probably won’t get around to replying until the middle of next week. They do have the Internets here in Germany, but we’ve been too busy seeing people and doing stuff to spend much time online.

(Also, our Verizon iPhones don’t work on the European GSM network, which makes it hard to just check mail and dash off a quick update on the run.)

And now we’re off to see some more relatives down in Hessen. Later, imaginary Intertubes pals!

family.

ten years of us.

Robin and I got married on this day ten years ago. The ceremony took place in a ramshackle little Baptist church on Chapman Highway and was performed by a little preacher with a speech impediment. His wife managed to blur every single shot she took with my camera. The day couldn’t have been more perfect.

Happy tenth anniversary, my love. I don’t know how I managed to con you into putting up with me, but I’m glad I got so lucky.

aminals. family.

doggy broke. so’s the owner.

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Doggie #2 of 4 has a hematoma on his ear flap. Taping down the ear to prevent him from shaking it didn’t work, and the hematoma has increased in size. So I’m about to take him to the vet again, which will make my third vet visit in four days. He will likely need a surgical drain & staple procedure, which runs about the price of a new iPad these days.

For Christmas, everyone is getting a dozen chicken eggs this year. Maybe there’ll be enough left in the till to buy the kids a copy of “101 Fun Games With Perishable Ovoids”.

family. new hampshah. writing.

41.

IMG_0138

I’m not much of a photographer, but this picture is probably my favorite of all the ones I’ve taken. It’s the cemetery right up the road after the surprise late October snow we had last year. I used no filters or any post-processing, and the camera was the lowly built-in iPhone 4 one.

I’m 41 today. The sun is out, and the day looks a lot like that picture, minus the white frosting.

Lately, I’ve been feeling a lot like Tolkien’s Bilbo Baggins—thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread. I think I’ll turn the computer off for the rest of the day and take the kids out for some lunch and a bike ride out in the green. The writing will be here when I get back, as it always is. I have two novels to finish by the end of the year, but it won’t hurt things to take the day off from the regular routine. I need to recharge the batteries a little and think about how to spend my forty-second ride around the sun.

family. friends. travel.

team munchkin wrangler’s 2013 european tour dates.

My brother’s 40th birthday is in February, and we’ve been waiting for an opportunity to visit the family again, so we decided to roll two birthday parties and a family get-together into one and go over there, kids and all.

I just booked the tickets, and boy howdy, does it cost a chunk of change to fly two adults and two kids to another continent. We’re flying from Boston to Amsterdam (the most convenient large airport from my brother’s place), with a stopover in Iceland because we’re going by Icelandair, and their 757s don’t quite have the legs for a transatlantic hop. I was hoping for a longer layover so we could maybe do some looking around in Reykjavik on the way, but it’s just an hour-long pit stop to refuel that Viking long-plane, and I’m sure we won’t be able to see more than the inside of the terminal at Keflavik International.

This will be interesting. We haven’t been back to Germany since 2005, when Quinn was ten months old and Lyra was still in the planning stages. Now the kids are seven and five, and they’re old enough to a.) not be a nuisance on the plane, and b.) be aware of the trip and able to remember the event. Quinn is actually turning eight on the day of our arrival, so he’ll get a little birthday party in Germany.

We’ll be in Germany for just a little under two weeks, which should be plenty of time for family business and some sightseeing. I’m planning to take the wife and kids on day trips around the area, and there’s a lot to see within just a few hours of my brother’s place. Amsterdam is only two hours away, so I suspect we’ll go there for a day—I haven’t been to A’dam since at least 1995, and I’m really looking forward to going back there.

My brother has three kids in the five-to-ten bracket. We’re bringing our two. That’s five children of kindergarten-to-fifth-grade age under the same roof for almost two weeks, and a birthday bash thrown into the mix. I’m sure we’ll be just fine, and I know it will be a lot of fun, but you can also bet your caboose that I’ll be taking the maximum allowable quantity of New Hampshire-bought hooch I can get into Europe duty-free.