Ahh, Autumn... and Beer

Updated 29 Nov 2013

I'm so glad to be back on the East Coast an changing seasons.  My favorite season is autumn.  I love the crispness in the air, the trees changing color, and all the awesome butternut squash dishes at local restaurants.  I also love the ales of the season, and being close to Wegman's!

Back in Silverdale, if I wanted to try an assortment of new pumpkin ales, I would have to buy a six-pack of each.  Some were pretty nasty, and I poured out several bottles.

Here at Wegman's (awesomest grocery store on the planet!), you can mix-and-match your own six packs, and they have quite a wide variety of pumpkin ales to try.

Of course, if you happen to be in the Northern Virginia area, then I HIGHLY recommend going to Sweetwater Tavern both for their extraordinarily good food AND for their AWESOME pumpkin ale in the fall.  Take a growler to go! 

To help out those of you who AREN'T so conveniently located next to Sweetwater Tavern or a Wegman's, and in order to prevent you from having to buy whole six-packs of what might later get poured down the sink, here's my votes for the pumpkin ales on a thumbs-up / meh-so-so / thumbs-down rating scale.  I still have three more in the fridge to try, so I'll come back and add them to the list later, but for those of you who may be headed to the store soon and are looking for recommendations, here's what I've tried so far (listed in order from good to not-so-good):

New Holland Brewery's Ichabod - Two Thumbs-UP, still my favorite pumpkin ale.  Strong, bold and balanced flavor.  No weird initial or aftertastes.  I anxiously await its arrival on the shelves at Wegman's. 

Dogfish Head Punkin Ale - Thumb$ Up.  Quality and taste were very good - on-par with my favorite Ichabod listed above, but pricey.  It's very good if you don't mind spending the money on 4 bottles instead of a six-pack.

Sam Adams Harvest Pumpkin Ale - Thumbs-UP.  Sam Adams never disappoints with their seasonal ales.  Good flavor, not too strong, very enjoyable.








 

Red Hook Pumpkin Porter - Thumbs-UP.  Very tasty.  Didn't taste very much like pumpkin, but I still enjoyed it.  I'd buy it again.

Devil's Backbone Ichabod - Thumbs-UP.  Like the Red Hook, it didn't have a strong pumpkin flavor, but it was still very enjoyable.  I'd buy it again.

Traveler Jack-O Shandy - Thumbs-UP.  Added 13 Oct 2013, I liked this one a lot.  It was light and crisp, with a good balance between the lemon peel and pumpkin flavors.  There weren't any strong perfumy or heavy-spice flavors.  There weren't any detectable hops flavors either.  I bought this one as a mixed-up six-pack from Wegmans, but I enjoyed it enough that I went back and bought another full six-pack of this.

Saranac Pumpkin Ale - Thumbs-UP.  Flavor was good, although it did leave a slight after-taste.  I wouldn't turn away a bottle if offered, but if going to buy a six-pack for home, I'd look for one of the others listed above.

Weyerbacher Imperial Pumpkin Ale - Thumbs-UP.  Added 13 Oct 2013.  The flavor in this one was pretty strong.  If you're not a pumpkin ale fan, then I would steer clear of this one.  It wasn't overpoweringly perfumy or spice-flavored, so I actually enjoyed it and finished the bottle.  Not much hops either.  Like the Saranac above, I wouldn't turn away a bottle if offered, and if you're picking out a mixed-up six-pack at someplace like Wegman's, then I'd include this in your sampler six pack.  Given how strong the flavor is, I'd be cautious about buying a full six-pack if you haven't tried it first.


 

Southern Tier - Imperial Pumpking Ale - Thumbs-Up.  Added 7 Nov 2013.  Very strong, nutty flavor, but not perfumy like some of the others.  Like the Weyerbacher, if you're not a pumpkin ale fan, then I would steer clear of this one.  Very light on the hops / not a strong hoppy flavor.  I enjoyed it though and finished the bottle.  It has a pretty high alcohol content - 8.9% by volume. 

Post Road Pumpkin Ale - Tough call.  Heavy hops, and I'm not a big fan of hoppy-beers.  If you like hops, you should probably give this a try.  As for me, I won't be going back for this one.  Also, flavor was better when I first opened the bottle.  As I got toward the bottom of the bottle, the taste of the pumpkin spices got pretty strong.  

Blue Moon Harvest Moon Pumpkin Ale - well...  not so much.  Although it has a picture of a pumpkin on the label and says "pumpkin" in small letters under the BIG "HARVEST MOON" label, there's no detectable taste of pumpkin here.  Now, that being said, it was a pretty tasty, standard Oktoberfest type of beer, so I listed it here above some of the "meh" rated beers with weird tastes.





Harpoon's Pumpkin UFO (unfiltered offering) -  Meh.  It was okay.  I finished the bottle at least, but tasted pretty perfumy.  Given the choice of other pumpkin ales on the shelf, I'd skip probably skip this one.

Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale.  Meh.  Fairly light in body. Definitely pumpkin flavored. Tasted a little weird but nothing I could put my finger on. Not something I'd rave about or buy again.



 




New Belgium Pump-Kick.  Meh.  Odd flavor.  It says something about pumpkin and cranberry on the label.  I finished the bottle, but I won't be going back for any more of this one.




 

Shipyard Pumpkinhead - Yech!  Thumbs-DOWN.  It has an amaretto taste to it, and I HATE amaretto.  That being said, if YOU like amaretto, then you might want to give it a try.








Elysian Night Owl Pumpkin Ale - Yech!  Thumbs-DOWN.  Waaaaay too perfumy and overpowering strong flavors.  I couldn't take more than a couple of sips.  Poured the rest of the bottle down the sink.  Poured the rest of the six-pack down the drain, too. 

Shock Top Pumpkin Wheat - Yech!  Thumbs-DOWN.  Similar to the Elysian - too perfumy and very strong flavor.  I did manage to finish about half a bottle of this before I gave up.  I poured the rest of the six pack down the drain. 

Jacques Au Lantern - Blech!  Thumbs-DOWN.  After one sip of this, I poured the rest of the bottle down the kitchen sink.  Like the Elysian and Shock Top - very perfumy and STRONG flavor.

Spring Break - Family Vacation Part 2

After spending the day at the Magic Kingdom on Tuesday, we used Wednesday as a day of rest and hung out by the pool at the resort.

YB playing air-guitar while coming down the water slide at the resort.

Thursday we headed to Sea World. I must say, I was not overly enthused to go to Sea World, but in the end I was pleasantly surprised and very glad we went.

I grew up in San Diego and went to Sea World every time anybody came to visit. When we were stationed in San Diego for my department head tour, we bought the annual passes to Sea World and those were totally worth it. It was really nice being able to just go for an hour or two, do just a couple of things, and leave not worrying about whether you got your money's worth for the price of a full-day's admission.

So my lack of enthusiasm about going to Sea World was mostly a "been there, done that" type of attitude.

However, I didn't object to going because (a) the boys haven't been in a long time (6-year old YB certainly doesn't remember being at Sea World as a toddler), and (b) it was FREE. In case you didn't know, Anheuser-Busch's Here's to the Heroes program offers each military family one free admission per year into any of their parks. We hadn't used ours yet for 2010, so we figured why not?

Well, a lot of the same exhibits are there that have always been there like...

the shark exhibit...

the sting-ray petting pool...
(photo taken by sticking my waterproof Olympus
in the petting pool and pushing the button)

manatees...
(photo by ES)

the penguin encounter...

...and feeding the sea lions.

Each of those exhibits was really cool to see, of course, but then there were a few other things that really made me say to myself, "Self, I'm really glad we came here today."

1. The Dolphin Show

As you can imagine, having grown up in San Diego and been to Sea World dozens of times, I've seen the dolphin show. Been there. Done that. Don't want a t-shirt. Don't need to see it again, but okay, fine, I'll take the boys to see it.

I have to tell you, this show is no longer properly named. They still call it the dolphin show, but it's nothing like what I have seen before. This is more like a Cirque du Soliel show with acrobatics above and into the water. The dolphins make sort of a nice little exhibition appearance in the beginning and again at the end.

Aside from the acrobats though, another thing that made me say, "Wow," was the birds. There were a couple of places in the show where they released several colorful parrots from behind the audience that swooped low over our heads and flew in circles over the audience several times before flying to land on the arms of the trainers at the front of the stage (note the several blue and yellow parrots in the image above). Then there was one occasion when they opened a special box behind the audience and a very large bird of prey with at least a 2 meter wingspan of large black wings swooped down over our heads and flew behind the stage. I couldn't see it's head, so I still don't know what type of bird it was - eagle or condor of some sort. Even so, it was amazing.

2. This Guy


This mime kept us entertained while we waited for the sea lion and otter show to begin. He was hilarious. The sea lion and otter show itself was pretty corny and didn't do much for me, although the cast did a great job of working together when the sea lions didn't conform to the script of the show. The mime act was top-notch.

3. The Rides

I'm not used to doing roller coasters at Sea World. There were three major rides of sorts at Sea World Orlando: Atlantis, Manta, and Kraken.


Journey to Atlantis is a sort of a splash-mountain / log ride where you're gonna get wet. The wait was always between 75 min to 90 min for Atlantis, so I never did that one. I did, however, go on both Manta and Kraken (waits on the order of 30 minutes each).

Manta

Manta is a roller coaster where you lie down flat, and you're essentially flying (click on the link to see a video fly-through on the Sea World website). It was FAST and smooth and I LOVED it. The only part I didn't like about Manta was that it was too short. We waited in line for like 30 minutes and it felt like the ride lasted 30 seconds.

Self portrait in front of Kraken (the sea monster)
(Photo taken before I rode. I don' think I looked
so fierce after the ride.)

Kraken is a roller coaster where you sit up straight. I liked it in the beginning because I like going fast. I don't mind loops or steep drops. I just like going fast. Toward the end of the ride though, this one goes into a rapid series of very tight high-G turns.

I felt like I dislocated my stomach.

When I rode this Kraken, my brother-in-law and nephews were standing nearby watching me. As I came stumbling down the exit ramp from the ride, my nephew said, "Uncle Kevin, I could hear you screaming on that ride. Were you screaming out of terror or awesomeness?" I was glad he left me that way out, "Well, AWESOMENESS of course!"

In the end...

When we asked our kids whether they liked the Magic Kingdom or Sea World better, they didn't even hesitate before they both said, "Sea World." Their main reason was the lines. There was a lot less crowding at Sea World versus at the Magic Kingdom. In addition, I think there were a lot more hands-on things for them to do in static displays (for example, buying some fish and feeding the sea lions, or going to the petting pool, sticking your hands in and petting the stingrays) that didn't involve waiting an hour or more for a ride.

Another nice thing about Sea World is it's a lot easier to get out. When you're in the Magic Kingdom and decide you've had enough for the day and you're ready to go to dinner, you've still got an HOUR trek ahead of you before getting anywhere to eat. That is, unless you (a) made reservations months in advance for one of the sit-down restaurants in the park or (b) want to eat another fast-food-like hot dog (just like the one you ate for lunch). From the time you decide to leave the Magic Kingdom, it'll take you 45 minutes to get to your car and then another 15 minutes to get somewhere else to have dinner.

Not so with Sea World. We decided we had enough and it was time to go, and about 5 minutes later we were walking out the front gate toward our car. It was about 15 minutes later we were at a restaurant up on International Drive and sitting down to dinner. It's nice that Sea World doesn't have that big lake you have to cross to get from the parking area to the park and vice versa. :-)

In summary: It was a great day, and I was very glad we went!

P.S. One last tidbit...

I was living in San Diego when Anheuser-Busch bought the Sea World parks. I remember a lot of joking about Shamu jumping out of the water with a Budweiser sign emblazoned on her side. Sure enough, when visiting Sea World after the take-over, there was the new beer garden and there were Clydesdale horses and Anheuser-Busch emblems and paraphernalia everywhere.

During this visit to Sea World in Orlando, I was again pleasantly surprised. I didn't really see any heavy Budweiser or any other beer-related advertising in the park. There was actually only one place that I noticed the Anheuser Busch emblem... in the restrooms. Their distinctive A symbol was on each of the urinals and the faucets.


(Sorry, no photos of the urinal. Attempting that photo might have gotten me arrested and thrown out of the park.)

SNOW!

Gosh, it's been a while since I posted to my blog, eh?

I just haven't felt inspired to write about anything lately. I've been making a conscious effort to spend more time reading, and an unconscious effort spending more time playing video games on the X-Box. I started to write more about what I've been reading and what I've been playing, but I decided to save that for another blog post.

The main reason I sat down to write today was to share some pictures from our first snow fall of the season.

The fact that it really, no-kidding snowed today really surprised me. The fact that the snow STUCK and we have about 3 inches on our back deck surprised me even more. Last winter the weather forecasters threatened snow on so many occasions and it never came. When the weathermen said it would snow today, I didn't believe them. I just figured they were crying wolf again.

Our Freaky-Tiki deck lights are growing white mohawks.

It amazes me how clumps of snow accumulate on narrow and bare tree branches.

This is a closeup of a branch just outside our family room window.

Chalk this one up as another "milestone" post. First, 8 year old ES wanted to mow the lawn back in the spring. Then, he wanted to rake the leaves in the fall. Now, low and behold...

...he's out shoveling the snow in the driveway.

We didn't even ask him to do it. He got all suited up to go play in the snow. I went to take a picture of him from the living room window and discovered him out there with the snow shovel making himself useful. Will wonders never cease?

Warning: Tangent Ahead.

I enjoyed New Holland Brewery's Ichabod (pumpkin ale) so much that I actually went back to buy more at Wegman's after my pumpkin ale blog post. On my most recent trip to Wegman's I noticed they had New Holland's winter brew called Cabin Fever, so I decided to give it a try.


Although the Cabin Fever bottle says "brown ale" on it, I would have guessed this to be a stout. It's a thick, heavy, dark brew with no detectable hops and a slightly sweet flavor. It goes along nicely with a cold winter night sitting by the fireplace.

End of Tangent. Resuming original line of thought.

I never would have guessed that the view outside my family room window would look so much like the artwork on the Cabin Fever bottle so early this season. I'm excited it happened on a Saturday for once so I can sit and enjoy the view from the comfort of home and not listen to my feet squelch and squirch their way through the cold slush from the bus stop to my office building.

Here in the toasty warm comfort of our home watching the snow fall outside is...

...bliss.

Pumpkin Ale Pass-In-Review

I've mentioned once or twice that I love autumn.

For our anniversary dinner, my wonderful wife and I got to go to Clyde's. We love Clyde's regardless of the time of year. However, autumn is especially awesome at Clyde's. I love having things like acorn squash soup (it was sooooo good!) and spiced pumpkin salad ("apple smoked bacon, pumpkin seeds, caramelized onions, spinach, frisée, radicchio and pumpkin vinaigrette.") My only disappointment there was they put pancetta on our salad instead of apple smoked bacon, and the flavor of the pancetta was a little too strong for me, so I picked it off. Aside from that though, the salad was fantastic. Anyway, I digress. The whole point of this post is really autumn BEER.

One of our favorite restaurants in NoVA is the Sweetwater Tavern in Sterling. They have a micro-brewery right there in the restaurant and have AWESOME brew and food that's just to-die-for. This time of year at Sweetwater, you can get the Ghost Town Pumpkin Ale ("a lightly spiced amber ale made with real pumpkin...available with brown sugar and pumpkin spice garnish.") They sell growlers that you can take beer home with you, too. If you buy a growler of their pumpkin ale, they even give you a little ziplock bag of the brown sugar and pumpkin spice garnish to put on the rim of your beer mug at home. I love it! :-9

I wish we could afford to go to Sweetwater Tavern for dinner every night... and that we had our own personal driver so both my wife and I could enjoy their awesome brews every night... and that we had an extra couple of hours in each day and a personal trainer to help us work off the resultant beer gut... but alas, it is not to be.

So Saturday we were at Wegman's for lunch. I love Wegman's food court. Whenever it seems like none of us in our family can agree on what to have for lunch, there's always the Wegman's food court. I can get the exotic international flavors I want like Indian food or sushi or Thai food, my wife can get whatever suits her fancy (which will NOT be anything anywhere NEAR the Indian, sushi, or Thai counters), and my kids can get their staple pizza or chicken nuggets.

Sorry, I'm digressing onto food again. Stay on target.

In Wegman's they had a big display set up with over half a dozen different varieties of pumpkin ale. As we sat on the balcony eating our lunch, I thought to myself, "Self, you should do a taste test and figure out which is the best bottled pumpkin ale down there." So before we left, I bought a few varieties of the pumpkin ales to try out.

Actually, I bought all but two. I did NOT buy any of the Dogfish Head Punkin Ale or the Weyerbacher Imperial Pumpkin Ale. I know you're thinking to yourself, "Self, why didn't he buy any Dogfish or Weyerbacher?" I'm glad you asked. Somebody at those two companies needs to go take some classes on marketing because otherwise their companies are going to fail miserably.

The Dogfish and Weyerbacher pumpkin ales were sold in 4-packs. When I first walked up to the display, I immediately picked those two up as my first two choices. I liked that I could get a 4 pack and try it out and not have to work my way through a full 6-pack if I didn't really like it.

Then I looked at the price.

Both the Dogfish and the Weyerbacher pumpkin ales were $10 for a 4-pack, so $2.50 per bottle. ALL of the other pumpkin ales in the display were $9 for a 6-pack, so $1.50 per bottle.

Cha-ching! Cha-ching!

Dogfish and Weyerbacher both came out of the shopping cart and back onto the display.

I did get five others to try though, so here for my 5 or so loyal readers who like beer are my thoughts and impressions of the five pumpkin ales I tried out this week. These comments were written in the order I drank them - NOT all in one night mind you!


Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale
(Portsmouth, New Hampshire)

Meh. Fairly light in body. Definitely pumpkin flavored. Tasted a little weird but nothing I could put my finger on. Not something I'd rave about or buy again.






Blue Moon Brewery's
Harvest Moon Pumpkin Ale
(Golden, Colorado)

I took a sip expecting pumpkin flavor. After all, it's got a painting of a pumpkin on the bottle, and it was being sold in amongst half a dozen other pumpkin ales. I detected no essence of pumpkin in this. I re-examined the bottle and at first I couldn't even find the word "pumpkin" on the bottle. I looked a little closer and saw under the BIG words "HARVEST MOON" there is the fine print "pumpkin ale." In any case, it was just okay. I thought it tasted more like Sam Adam's Octoberfest than a pumpkin ale. It was better than the Smuttynose, but again it was nothing that I'd rave about or race out to buy again.

Random Aside about Brewery Websites:

Is it just me, or is there absolutely NO POINT in putting a thing on your website that asks for your birthdate before you can view the website??? That just seems totally useless to me. I could enter any date I want that shows that I'm 21 years old and go on in and browse the website. It's not like it's allowing me to purchase alcohol without proof of ID. It's JUST a WEBSITE. How does putting something like that on your website prevent anybody from accessing the website???

I have this nagging feeling in the back of my head that it has something to do with frivolous lawsuits. I wonder what brewery got sued because some underage kids were viewing the website, and that somehow encouraged them to buy beer under age, and somehow that's the brewery's fault because they didn't ask the kids' age before they viewed the website, so just like the McDonald's-coffee-is-hot lady, some idiot is a millionaire from suing some poor brewery, so now they all have to put some silly widget on their website that asks you to enter your birth date.

Wait... Do I need to put one of those birthdate checker widgets on this blog post? OH MY GOD WHAT IF SOMEONE UNDER 21 IS READING THIS BLOG POST!?!?

Okay, getting off my soapbox now...

Shipyard Pumpkinhead
(Portland, Maine)

The initial taste was like almonds or amaretto. BLECH! I HATE amaretto or anything almond flavored. (Aside: I especially hate almond-smelling soap in public restrooms - it drives me nuts!) After I got over the initial amaretto taste, it actually tasted pretty good. The amaretto flavor wasn't so overpowering that I couldn't finish the bottle. Still, not something that I would seek out again in future beer-purchasing trips to the grocery store.



New Holland Brewery Ichabod
(Holland, Michigan)

The best so far in this taste testing. No weird initial or aftertastes. Strong, bold and balanced flavor. I could go for another one of these right now. I'll seek this one out next time I go to the store to buy beer. Still one more beer to try though...





Brooklyn Brewery
Post Road Pumpkin Ale
(Brooklyn, NY)

This brew had the most hops out of any of the five pumpkin ales I tested. I'm not a big fan of hops, but they weren't unbearable and this Post Road Pumpkin Ale was otherwise pretty bold and flavorful. I'd say it was pretty tasty for about the first two thirds of the bottle. As I got to the bottom of the bottle though, the taste of the pumpkin spices got to be overbearing. It might be a good idea to store prone or upside down to help keep the spices more evenly distributed in the bottle when you turn it up to open and drink.


In the end, the hands-down winner of Blunoz's Pumpkin Ale Taste Test was:

New Holland ICHABOD

I really liked the flavor of the Ichabod and the fact that the hops weren't overpowering. The runner-up award goes to the Post Road Pumpkin Ale. Both Ichabod and Post Road Pumpkin Ale were good enough that I would seek them out in the store and buy them again. The other three - meh, I wouldn't bother.

Rewind back up the page a bit. Has anyone tried the Dogfish Head or the Weyerbacher? Are either of them good enough to justify the extra expense? It's NOT that I'm a total cheapskate. I am willing to pay extra for something if I know it's worth it. Standing there in Wegman's looking at the variety of pumpkin ales to try, I was already looking at buying FIVE of them, so it was an easy-on-the-wallet decision to not buy those two. If someone tells me they're THAT good that I should try one or both of them, then I will.

Update 11/10/2009: Alright, someone recommended the Dogfish Head Punkin Ale, so I decided to give it a shot. It was really good. Strong, bold flavor with just a hint of pumpkin and not a lot of hops. I liked it a lot. However (comma), it was right on par with Ichabod. While it was an enjoyable brew and I will certainly enjoy drinking the rest of the 4-pack, I don't think it's worth the extra dollar per bottle. Long term, I'd go with Ichabod which is just as good but not as expensive.

Moving In and Getting Settled

In my last post, we had just arrived in Ashburn on Monday afternoon and accepted the keys to our house from the realtor. Then we went and met our good friends Corey & Vince and their kids for dinner before checking into a hotel for the night.

Tuesday we got up early to head over to the house and wait for the movers to show up with all our shhhtuff. The Personal Property Office requires you to be at your house from 0800 to 1700 and threatens you with all sorts of bodily harm and heavy financial consequences if you aren’t there when the movers show up.

Of course, the movers were coming from Woodbridge, VA. According to Google Maps, that’s a 45 mile drive ("57 minutes" by Google without traffic), and they’re trying to drive through the DC area during the morning rush hour.

So we were not in the least bit surprised that the movers didn’t actually arrive at our house until 1030.

Hooray Our Shtuff is Here!

In the meantime, the first order of business was to take down the offensive pink fruffy curtains in one of the boy’s bedrooms. The boys were having an absolute caniption fit that there were pink fruffy curtains in the room and they HAD to GO away RIGHT NOW.

Highly Little-Boy-Offensive Pink Fruffy Curtains

(No doubt left behind by some nefarious little girl with malice of forethought to any future little boys who might so happen to move into the house.) Maybe OCA's girls would like them?

As far as inventory control goes (see previous post), moving overseas is considerably easier than moving within CONUS. Moving in CONUS brings up all sorts of previous moving horror stories. Moving overseas, they put it all in big wood crates and nail it shut. The crates don’t get opened again until it’s delivered to you on the other end, so there is almost nothing missing from our inventory. I suspect the three items that were “missing” really are there and the numbers just fell off. (Several things came out of the crates with the inventory stickers missing).

Inventory Control

Assistant Inventory Control Officer

Through the course of the day, three of our new neighbors stopped by to introduce themselves and chat a while. So far they are all really nice, and our next door neighbor is even active duty Navy and takes the same commuter bus I am going to take to the Pentagon and Crystal City.

The neighbors told us that another little boy in 2^nd grade lives across the street and down two houses. ES was very excited to hear this. In fact, he took one of the beach chairs and set up camp at the far edge of our lawn facing toward the other little boy’s house waiting for him to come home from school.

ES waiting for the 2nd Grade boy

down the street to come home from school.

Normally shy ES surprised both my wife and I by asking my wife to walk with him over to the other little boy’s house to introduce himself after the other little boy got home from school.

Meanwhile, inside the house…

The COMFY CHAIR!

[Cue Sound Effect: Angelic Choir Singing Hallelujah Chorus]

After the movers were gone, we all went to Costco to grab a quick bite for dinner and to stock up on lots of basic stuff for the house.

Have I mentioned autumn is my favorite time of year?

[Cue Sound Effect: Angelic Choir Singing Hallelujah Chorus]

Sorry, is that blasphemous to suggest that angels would sing hallelujah about beer?

Walking through Costco was pretty crazy. By the time we got about a quarter of the way through the store, I had already run into two people I knew from the last time we lived here. I spent some time talking and catching up with each of them, so I was afraid we were going to be at Costco a for LONG time if we kept running into more people we knew. We managed to get out of there fairly quick after those first two encounters though.

Wednesday the second set of movers came with our shtuff that has been in storage since we left for Hawaii. Now we're in a sea of cardboard boxes and trying to get stuff put away.

The boys are being super helpful, too - building forts and leaving toys scattered across what little free floor space we have in between boxes.

YB playing "robot" in a box.

(This same box was previously part of a "tunnel" of three boxes across the family room floor and was later part of a "fort.")

On a previous post, I had a special request for a specific statistic, so here's the answer:

37 Number of attempted geocache finds during the big trip across country

33 Number of geocaches actually found during the big trip across country