Carl Hutzler’s Blog

The kids were out of school for fall break so the whole family went off to Seattle to visit my brother, Paul.

We got in around noon and rented our car which took a while as I was cheap and went with an off-site rental location which I always swear I won’t do again but do anyway :-) Once we got into town, we decided to grab some lunch in Ballard which is a neighborhood just north of downtown. We ate a a great mexican place. Then we went over to Archie McPhee’s and scouted the random stuff they have which is always fun to look through - odds and ends of toys and motors and magic 8 balls, and nun chuckers with real flying nuns. You get the idea.

While we were looking around, my brother emailed my mom back in Baltimore telling her he had no phone as he had just moved to a new place. So I would have no way to call him. But he did say he was a coffee house in Ballard (great, that narrows it down). My mom called me and gave me the address. I told her to look up the directions on the web and she did and provided some reasonable instructions. She emailed Paul back and conveyed that we would be there in 15 minutes. I think there is a need for an Email to Phone to Web to Phone to Email gateway. Someone should create something :-)

Anyway, we drove over to “Q Cafe” on 15th Street and after missing the exit and driving backwards up the on-ramp, we arrived. Paul was inside finishing up a café olé. We talked for a while and caught up. He had not seen the kids in a year or so.

First Sighting: Paul drives a Bio Diesel VW GTI.

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Moped Adventure Pix

The Story

Yep, my brother and his friend made it! About two weeks ago they completed their moped oddessy and reached Skagway, AK. Amazing.

Now that he’s been to Alaska, we will have to go back together and really see the place. :-)

 Some pictures from his adventure are now in!

The family went back to the beach for a few days this past weekend. We go the weekend after Labor Day every year because its still warm, its a lot less crowded, and Funland is still open :-)

Anyway, we had a great time surfing the waves, eating chocolate covered pretzels, riding the rides and horse racing at Funland, and eating out at some very nice restaurants. Everything was just great except for my Scrabble game and the fact that my father won Settlers of Catan twice! Ughhh. Enjoy the pix.

My kids had a day off of school today for a teacher workday. What? A day off? How could that be since my kids just started school this week??!!, you ask?

Relax, its OK. This is not some kind of social worker emergency. My kids went back to school way back on July 30th as they are in one of these “all year” schools. So today was just a normal teacher workday break.

Anyway, my parents took the kids and I sailing on a boat co-owned/operated by my Dad and his two life long friends George Hess and Bill Kaufman. We sailed from the Magothy River just north of Anapolis, MD. We motored south and under the Bay Bridge and around some big freighters before actually putting out the jib and running a little. But there was not much of a breeze so we ended up motoring most of the way back too.

But we had a blast playing Scrabble and word games. The kids got to steer a bunch and a good time was had by all.

When we got back, we decided to find some crabs to round out a purely Maryland kind of day. $44 a dozen for some pretty good mediums. And they even came from the bay :-)

We jumped in the car (well, we carried the kids into the car) and hit the road at 6:30am and drove to the beach yesterday. Spent all day there and left around 10pm. It was a long day but a lot of fun….beats staying the night for $200 and spending Sunday in a 125 miles rush hour. :-)

Click on the scary clown for more pix….

I took some pictures of Yessica Toscanini last year when she was at the White Stallion Ranch shooting her SI swimsuit spread. I was there by chance on vacation with my family. Anyway, Portal Tucson saw the pictures and asked for copies which I was happy to provide. Check it out.

A couple of weekends back the family went to Philadelphia to the Franklin museum to see the King Tut exhibit and the science stuff too :-) On the way back we visited Longwood Gardens which is near Wilmington, DE. If you have never been to Longwood, you should go. Anytime of year is amazing. Some more pix here.

There is something about dropping the kids off at Grandmother and Pop Pop’s house that makes you feel like you are back in college. Its likely not that complicated a feeling if you think about it for a few seconds. Rylan (my wife) and I were fortunate enough to get this opportunity last weekend.

We traveled up to Wilmington, DE and stayed at the Hotel Dupont. From there, we drove around the Brandywine River Valley which starts just a few miles from downtown Wilmington and continues into Pennsylvania. If you have never visited, its basically a lot of rolling hills, farms, horses, and some nice old houses. Its really worth a trip for a long weekend if you are within 2 hours of the area, which by my estimates is likely 30% of the population of the USA!

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