Our schedule

Here is our schedule for the next two weeks.





We're spending the night of Wednesday, July 4th at the Westin in downtown Atanta.

Since Mike is always staying in hotels, he has lots of hotel points, so the stay is free!





These are both pictures of the Westin. I hope the fireworks don't get rained out like they did last year! I will try to take some pictures to post.

On Saturday, July 7, we are flying to New York for the party at Greg's. Our flight is early in the morning. For some reason, they booked us in first class for that flight!

We'll be staying at the Hampton Inn, Islandia Long Island the first night. Then on Sunday night we are staying at the Doubletree near JFK airport, because our flight Monday morning is early too.

So on Monday we fly to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic.



We'll be returning on Friday, 7/13. I'm sure at that point, even though the vacation was fun, we'll be glad to get home!

GOOD LUCK CHEYENNE!!!

Cheyenne is headed off to college tomorrow!! Good Luck in Millidgeville! Let us know how it goes. We'll all be thinking of you. Here is a picture of her campus:

oh, another picture I had from San Diego

Again, from the balcony of my room. My camera phone does better during the day, I think... This was in the morning.

pictures from emma's office

Just a couple of pictures of her workplace that Emma sent.


I'm guessing that one above is a picture of the plotters...



And a steam-shovel! er, um, I mean, a back-hoe. ;-)

It's not like I would have voted for him anyway...

...but this story shows a surprising lack of judgment, even for a Mormon!

"The reporter intended the anecdote that opened part four of the Boston Globe's profile of Mitt Romney to illustrate, as the story said, "emotion-free crisis management": Father deals with minor — but gross — incident during a 1983 family vacation, and saves the day. But the details of the event are more than unseemly — they may, in fact, be illegal.

The incident: dog excrement found on the roof and windows of the Romney station wagon. How it got there: Romney strapped a dog carrier — with the family dog Seamus, an Irish Setter, in it — to the roof of the family station wagon for a twelve hour drive from Boston to Ontario, which the family apparently completed, despite Seamus's rather visceral protest."

Can you imagine?!! What if I strapped Choppy, in his carrier, to the roof of my car and drove to Pennsylvania!! Unbelievable!

I guess he can kiss the PETA vote good-bye!

Bonnaroo

I wanted to post some pictures from Bonnaroo...
It was a great time, despite the heat and dust. Here are just a few pictures that I have.













(Among many different pieces of art there was a giant zippo lighter that released a flaming smoke ring every so often. We saw this one during the White Stripes concert)

I know what i want for Graduation.

My camera fixed. Yes it broke. :(

NYC

Well, I don't have a spectacular view, but I'm in the greatest city in the world.

Last night I walked around, stopping outside a few different places. Many were closed or too high-priced. I found myself on 46th near 5th outside of a small place called "Via Italia." Reading the menu, I didn't notice the old man with white hair and red suspenders. He said to me, "Itsa the best!"

I was sold.

I enjoyed a delicious caesar salad, some authentic Italian bread and butter, a bowl of penne pasta arrabiata (hot marinara sauce,) and I washed it all down with a glass of chianti.

Delissioso.

San Diego

Well, I tried to upload some pictures that I took myself, but the ones on my cell phone were lame, and I can't seem to send the ones on my Palm Pilot. So I'm posting two that I found on-line. I can see the San Diego Bay and Coronado Bridge (top pic). I am on the 11th floor and it really is pretty spectacular.

Here are my bad pictures:

But I don't feel too badly because even the professional photos don't do it justice.

How would y'all feel about moving to California?? ;-)

Meanwhile, maybe I should take lessons from Emma on how to take pictures with your cell phone. Here is a picture she sent me from Bonnaroo. Upfront in a crowd of 80,000 at the Police concert!!

Sheraton San Diego Marina

Here's a picture of the hotel I am staying at next week in San Diego...

I'm learning to use a compass!

So, I have been meaning to post more old family pictures but at the moment I am at my desk at work.
I wanted to post a few pictures that I took on some job sites last week. Maybe it will give everyone a better idea what I do.

See the pink flag in this picture? Basically when I am in the field go around placing these pink flags in the ground to tell the drillers where to take soil samples. And usually I have to be within a few feet of where the spot was marked on a map. Sometimes, when you are in the middle of a field, it is very hard to find anything to reference to tell you where you are and/or how far you have to go.


Here is a nice view of another area on that same site in Calhoun. I didn't like having to go inside the abandoned chicken houses.


This is a picture of the woods in Buford that I spent all of my friday stomping through. If it is hard to locate a spot in the middle of a field, it is 100 times harder to find a specific dot on a map in a forest. Anyone who was around on Friday got to see the cuts on my arms. But I didn't get bitten by any ticks (even though there was one on both me and Marty) and only came in close contact with one snake so I think I was pretty lucky.



On this site, while marking the spots for holes, I also had to direct a bulldozer through the woods. Here you can see the trail (and the raindrops on the lense and doofy Marty). The bulldozer wasn't very expereinced and at one point his key even broke off in the ignition of the dozer.

After doing all that I have to put together driving directions for the drillers to get to the site, and make up maps, and look at the samples once they are drilled...etc, etc.

That is most of my excitment! Like mom said I am planning the trip to Bonnaroo on Thursday. I have to pack 4 days worth of food/snacks for me and two boys. But I get to see the Police! It will be awesome.

Stay tuned for family pics sometime later today...

Goings on

Well, with everyone home from college things have been kind of hectic. But in good way.

Twila started her internship on Monday, and so far it seems to be going well. It took a few days for her to get a PC at work, but she has it now. I haven't seen her since she was over for dinner last week. Think it was Tuesday. I'll urge her to update the blog, if I can get a hold of her!

Kacie moved in last week. It's quite nice having a little more company around here, with Mike out of town so much of the time. She's working hard at the magazine --- watch for the new issue of "Pregnancy & Newborn" coming to a news stand near you! and when you find it, look for "Kacie Versace" in the masthead. She's also looking for a second job, so if you hear of anything, let her know!

George is now in PA, at Grandma & Grandpas house. We took him to the airport early Saturday morning, and I have to say I miss him already! I wonder if he will read the blog, now that he's away? Meanwhile, I'm sure his buddies back home miss him. I saw poor Skylar in the neighborhood today. I felt a little sorry for him, with George out of town. By the way George; let me know if you need to access your gtmcconnell@earthlink.net email account. I can help.

Emma is getting ready for Bonnaroo. She has got a SERIOUS amount of cooking to do between now and the three day music fest. So be watching for that blur in an apron!

Veronica has been scarcer than hen's teeth, what with that boyfriend taking up so much time! They went to six flags today. And who has time to post with so much to do? She didn't even post the biggest news of all: SHE GOT HER LICENSE last weekend. Congratulations Veronica!

And Cheyenne is spending the night tonight. She will be making her way to college in just a few weeks. She's been working a lot and saving money. I am so excited for her; I can't wait!

Next Sunday I will be leaving for San Diego. I've never been there before, so I'm kind of excited about it.

And OF COURSE WHO COULD FORGET: TOMORROW IS DADDYMIKE'S 50th birthday!!!!!!!!!! so DO NOT forget to wish him well! He will be in Reston Virginia, but he won't be alone. He is going to have dinner with an old buddy of his who was born the same exact day! They celebrated their 18th birthday together, and now they will celebrate their 50th together. Hmmmm, I wonder which will be more fun?

I know you are not that ecstatic about turning 50. But look at it this way --- you are still younger than Play-Doh!

How about that!

June & October are tied for first place. Fans of June, here it is! Make the best of it.

Favorite Month
What's your favorite month?
January 0% 0

February 0% 0

March 0% 0

April 0% 0

May 0% 0

June 42.9% 3

July 0% 0

August 0% 0

September 14.3% 1

October 42.9% 3

November 0% 0

December 0% 0

total votes: 7

The Judge was a Beatles fan...

Apparently this is for real...

Twila's got herself a job!

Well, as some of you may know, I had an interview this past Wednesday of which the outcome was: I'm hired! It's a bit interesting considering they called me back the next day, but I'm not complaining.
The company is called AdvanceMe and they're about to launch a huge financial website of which I don't remember the name currently but there is some possibility for copy-writing on it. It's out on Chastian - in that new office complex they built right off 575. So it's a 15 minute ride for me against the traffic, which is sweet.
It's currently only for 10 weeks and there seems like there's going to be a lot of tedious work (archiving files, etc) but the web guy seemed to really like me in our little chit chat interview - he said he was just like me when he was my age - so maybe he'll steal me away from a bit of the boring stuff.
And, well, Rubbermaid called me today for an interview and I had to turn them down saying I took another position. That was a pretty cool first for me.
I start Monday so I'm pretty excited!
And that's about that, for me.

We'll be Able to Walk Through the World of Harry Potter!!!

OMG!!! Doesn' this look awesome?? It is going to open in Islands Of Adventure in Universal! Its set to open in early 2010! Its going to include Hogwarts Castle, Hogmeade, and the Forbidden Forest! Isn't it cool???