Wissahickon Hike

We escaped the heat of the city and hit the Wissahickon River trails last weekend. The Wissahickon is one of three rivers that meet in the Philadelphia area.

Here's a bit of history about the river, for all you history buffs: The river valley was originally settled in the 1600s and the river used for mills built along its banks. The historic Rittenhouse Town was settled by the Rittenhouse family, one of the founding families of the area. They built the first paper mill in North American here. General Washington led the Hessian troops against the British on its banks. Now it part of Fairmont Park, our city park of over 9,2000 acres. It is an oasis of green within the city.

Qbert lives in Baltimore?

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Jack Roarrok has learned me a few very important things over the years. 1) BBB makes a wonderful camping libation, 2) the best way to get a garlic out of his husk is to manhandle it, and, as you can see in the google maps above, 3) Qbert apparently lives in the bay of Baltimore. The last one is perhaps one of the more amazing things that I have seen on google maps. It somewhat frightens me, and its made me be on the lookout for that crazy bouncy snake thing, coily. In case everyone (Rachel falls in this group) didn't grow up an indoor kid envious of the neighbors who owned a CalecoVision, Qbert was an extremely basic video game in the 1980's.

Curiously, on the wikipedia page somewhere they mention that he has "expressive eyes". All I see are the the crosseyes of a spaceball.

Also, click here for some retro- qbert enjoyment.

Roxanne and Jack in Philly!

As promised, here is a photo collection from our weekend with Roxanne and Jack in Philly. (Copyright, Jack and Roxanne. For a full report, visit their blog --linked below.) Here we are with our friends Ping and Laurel, who joined us for drinks after dinner. (Happy Birthday, Laurel!) I'm not sure why Russ is praying or whom he's praying to...

On the way to the bar, we walked past Independence Hall, which was the U.S. capital for 10 years while the White House was being built. It's also where the Declaration of Independence was debated and signed, George Washington was sworn in as president, the Liberty Bell hung in the bell tower before it cracked, and Nicolas Cage vandalized the rooftop in search of clues. We took the tour inside the buildings later that weekend.

The next day, we went to the source of all things cheesy, Geno's Steaks in South Philly. It's the real deal (just like the gigantic cheesesteak at the top of their signage indicates). Here are Jack and Roxanne, eagerly anticipating their cheesesteaks.

We did some sightseeing that afternoon: we saw the Liberty Bell and the Mutter Museum (a medical museum) and we walked around Old City, the historic district of Philly. Because it was "nice" outside (probably "cold" to our Texan friends), we had dinner at the Jamaican Jerk Hut, one of our favorite BYOBs where we can pretend we're in Jamaica. We brought our own rum and beers and thoroughly enjoyed the authentic Jamaican food. We proceeded to Bob and Barbara's, one of the best dive bars in town. It's a shrine to everything PBR, as you can see below. I'm not sure I like how women come off in this one...

Russ knows that I never nag...

On Sunday we did a bit more sightseeing, toured Independence Hall, walked along the Schuykill River path, Jack ran up the art museum steps ala Rocky, and love blossomed at Love Park. It was a wonderful weekend with our friends -- Philly loves you! Come back soon!

Philadelphia: the Madison of the East Coast.

Our fellow ex-Madisonian pals Jack and Roxanne came to visit us over the weekend, although they forgot to bring their (and our) favorite 4 legged creature Louie. We forgave them (this time), and revealed that we had developed an elaborate plan to steal him had they brought him. The weekend was excellent, and as we didn't take photos of the events, I will refer you to "To Austin and Beyond" for the actual pictorial description of the weekend.

In lieu of an elaborate photo-description of the things we did, I've made some semi-elaborate Google maps, which you should check out.

Friday Night
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF&msa=0&msid=104888613734646386343.00044d1e2476a21c37439


Saturday Night
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF&msa=0&msid=104888613734646386343.00044d1ea9da101940974

We had an excellent time, expect an additional post with some photos we hijacked from Jack and Roxanne's camera before they left.