Some More About Summer

A few other thoughts about the summer that didn't make the last cut:

• It's fun to watch the wheels work in Matthew's mind. I could just see them churning when we were on Joyce's boat. He just had his eyes gazing out on the water and the splashing of the wake, etc., and you could just see he was absorbing all the stimulation. I see that now at nights as he scans the Richard Scarry "Busy People" book. He sits on his bed for 15 minutes just looking at all the pictures and studying them.

FYI -- that's the exact same copy of the Richard Scarry book that I got in the hospital when I was 7. And now the kids are playing with my Richard Scarry toys from that same era.

• The one glitch in our water skiing trip was when Sammy threw the safety flag into the lake and saw it sink. "Flag go Bye-Bye!"

• We visited Promentory Point on the way home from Idaho. It's where the transcontinental railroad met. I wish we had had more time but we got a late start due to the fire alarm at the hotel in the middle of the night. (FYI -- I wrote asking for a credit of one-half the bill due to the fire alarm, and received it. Yea for writing a letter!) Anyway, at least Josh and Caroline will have a point of reference when they study it in school eventually. Probably only kids in their class who will be able to say "I've been there".

• Best water park ride EVER: The Rapids at Cherry Hills. I LOVED going to Cherry Hills. Just mellow and the right pace for me...and the kids. The rapids aren't over-the-top, but just enough adventure, and getting wet that I loved it. Never been on a better one in my life. Perhaps best 30 minutes of my summer when I just went down in again and again.

• When we lay outside at Joyce's sleep watching a movie before going to bed, Matthew saw a star, and said the "Star Light, Star Bright" poem. His wish: that daddy would sleep next to him outside. It's nice to be the loved Daddy.

And for new stuff now...

• I bought the whole WKRP in Cincinnati series on DVD. Fun to see that some of those episodes really hold up! Also enjoying my Hawaii Five-O DVDs that I watch on business trips.

• In a year of obscure moments, perhaps the biggest was hosting 8 Elvises in Las Vegas at the Eiffel Tower restaurant for a Monopoly World Record. More to follow on that in my Christmas Letter.