Happy Halloween

Vacuum Cleaner Man at the Concert

It's hard enough to get a series of good concert pictures when some members insist on wearing costumes, but then I had to deal with vacuum cleaner man,

who was not only a distraction by doing his own conducting with the hose,

he insisted on having his picture taken, and had to tell me several times that his business slogan is, "We really suck."

Arcadia, Joce's Latest Theatre Appearance

Joce was one of the stars of this facinating Tom Stoppard play that combined love, math and time warps while explaining the universe.

Au Revoir aux Etudiantes Francaise

Departing Bainbridge Island. They will come back again some time and I for one, plan to visit them in France

Police Visit

When a police officer knocked on the door, I thought it might be about some teenage prank that happened or their music being too loud, but no -it was ME! Apparently the owner of the vacant lot next door reported "illegal dumping". I plan to move the debris to the other side of the path this weekend. We wouldn't want Daniel, who contributed to this crime, to be extradited from Holland.

Scene of the crime.
This is just the kind of thing Dan would make a big loud sigh about and shake his head. So I didn't tell him about it.

Hannah straightens Marie's hair

Before

After

Fun at Work

A Schoolbus for Holland

As we all know, Holland is so well organized that students do not ride in cars or even buses to school, they ride bikes. When they go on field trips, the class goes by bicycle. Daniel recently went on a school field trip that was 3 hours by bicycle! The country recently conceded to buy a few school buses, but of course they are only for handicapped children who cannot ride bicycles.

Pumpkin Patch

An infrared image of a pumpkin farm near Mt. Vernon.
Use the link to the Infrared Gallery for more infrared pictures.

Hi Mary, Hi Jacques

Mary - just want you to know that we are feeding Rob and Hannah.
Jacques - Marie is sometimes ignored by Becky who is way too studious, so we have Rob and Hannah around to entertain her. She'll tell you all about our dinner conversations when she gets back.

Spartan Football

The important elements of a football game

The band

cheerleaders

having fun with your friends

being part of the school crowd, see there's Marie and Ann

the snack bar (where I worked non-stop for four hours [except for the ten minute break to take pictures] right after working downtown all day and not even getting dinner)

Oh, and there is a football game to watch

Pumpkin decorators

Marie and I created beautiful pumpkin decorations while Becky was off at some boring concert.

Pumpkin Farm

Do you see the boy in the picture?

Cousin David

We haven't seen each other in at least fifteen years. Amazingly, we both look the same!

I found out that at our grandparents 50th wedding anniversary he'd gotten a little too much to drink and almost got busted by the police. This is why you need to get together with your cousin once in a while.

No Bag Yet

...so shopping was necessary

Marie est arrive, encore!

Ann's suitcase arrived with her this time!

Mathilde with her Bainbridge family. (Her suitcase arrived.)

Marie! Her suitcase did not arrive. But British Airways is kind enough to give you a $50 allowance to buy necessities, and they give you a little packet of essentials. (Daniel, fly British Airways next time.)

Write a Novel

Does everyone know that November is National Write a Novel Month?
After Mary got through her kvetching about her haircut (does it look bad? No! Please let her know) she told me about this website where you register:
http://www.nanowrimo.org/
Go there to check out the details, but basically, you write a novel of at least 50,000 words and send it in to them by the end of November.
Starting next month, this is what we'll see in the bakery every day as people write furiously.

Mel, You'd better get over here

...you're missing all the fun

French Fashion

According to today's New York Times, this is the latest look in Paris! I love it! Speaking of French fashion, MARIE is coming back! She arrives Saturday with a bunch of her classmates and even though Becky is not doing the exchange this year, we finagled getting Marie to stay at our house. Then we will find out if this is really the latest style.

(photograph by Elizabeth Lippman)

Office Antics

This is what goes on at my new office. The boss will be glad to know that Greg did not waste all the post-it notes, he stacked them all back together

Update on Gallery Show

Kim in front of her photos.

Kim reports excellent response (as well as some sales) to her photographs. There is still plenty of time to hustle down to The Shooting Gallery in LA and see for yourself.

Video Karroke Guy

Was everyone else who went to Costco this weekend as impressed as I was with Timothy who demonstrated the Video Karroke set up ($349.99)? Not only was he a good singer and entertaining, he enriched my whole Costco experience. He more or less invented this job for himself, but would like to move into creating his own recordings.

Football Hero Returns Home

"He's so dreamy!"

The research department has uncovered a fascinating tidbit of background information regarding the unassuming, golf-playing, Yale-graduate, John. He was a high school football hero! (We also discovered his hamburger eating record but will not go into that.) Apparently he was quarterback for "one of the most successful Freemont High School football teams" [Nebraska Fremont Tribune] and led his team to a world championship. A team reunion was held at last night's homecoming game, where one graduate remarked that this year's team was lame compared to the tough champions of the good-old days.

Volleyball Highlights