Chicago… day 2

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fff|ggg|rt2005_day7/P1050663|Ferris Wheel at Navy Pier|ggg|fff

Today in Chicago we visited the [Field Museum](http://www.fieldmuseum.org/), one of the world’s premiere Natural History museums. The museum boasts the largest T-Rex skeleton, as well as some excellent exhibits and artifacts from the Pacific region. My personal favorite was the exhibit on Tibet. We also had an unplanned surprise at museum admission. Many museums have reciprocal agreements where they will offer free admission to employees of other museums. At the last second, Becky thought to request reciprocal admission. So she whipped out her [Historic New England](http://www.historicnewengland.org/) staff card, and she got us in for free! The admission we got would normally have cost $14 per person! Not a bad deal at all…

We also visited [Navy Pier](http://www.navypier.com/), an entertainment complex that juts out into Lake Michigan. It’s sort of like [Pier 39](http://www.pier39.com/) in San Francisco, and a little bit like [Faneuil Hall Marketplace](http://www.faneuilhallmarketplace.com/) in Boston. Shops, restaurants, games, rides, entertainment, etc. We rode on the giant Ferris Wheel, walked around the Crystal Garden, watched a few kids’ entertainment shows, and sat outside on the waterfront to enjoy the nice sunny day.

We wrapped up our day by visiting some television and movie filming locations. UIC Medical Center, where “er”‘s exterior shots come from, and the Randolph/Wabash El stop, where scenes from “While You Were Sleeping” were filmed. “It’s an express?”

Check out our [photos from the day](http://gallery.prwdot.org/rt2005_day7). Tomorrow we’re driving back to Ohio, and Sunday we’re driving back to Massachusetts. And right now, I’m headed to bed. Phew!

p.s. If you’re on Eastern Daylight Time, remember to subtract one hour to get the actual time that I wrote this post (and other posts since Tuesday evening).

Chicagoland

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fff|ggg|rt2005_day6/P1050550|Sears Tower from Millenium Park|ggg|fff

We spent today in the city of Chicago doing touristy stuff. Melanie drove us to Midway Airport, where we took the Orange Line in to the city. We took an Art Deco architecture walking tour, run by the [Chicago Architecture Foundation](http://www.architecture.org/). There are some really amazing Art Deco buildings in Chicago, and our docent gave a great tour of the outsides and insides of buildings around the downtown area. After the tour, we had lunch at [Giordano’s](http://www.giordanos.com/) – traditional stuffed pizza pies. Very tasty. For you Vineyard folks, they’re not related to [that Giordano’s](http://www.giosmv.com/). After lunch we walked around [Millenium Park](http://www.millenniumpark.org/), an incredible combination of landscape design and modern architecture. From there, we walked quite a few blocks to visit the [Sears Tower Skydeck](http://www.the-skydeck.com/homeDefault.htm). I’d been up to the top many years ago, but it was impressive once again to look out from the tallest building in the United States, and one of the three tallest buildings in the world. After the Sears Tower, we made a quick trip to Michigan Avenue to visit some stores. Namely, the [American Girl Place](http://www.americangirlplace.com/agp_chi_splash.php), a must-see for any fan of the American Girl series, and the [Apple Store at North Michigan Avenue](http://www.apple.com/retail/northmichiganavenue/), a must-see for any fan of Apple computers. Finally, we visited the original [Marshall Field’s](http://www.fields.com/common/state_street.jsp) at State Street, the flagship store, and just one of the many sad casualties of the Federated-May Company department store merger.

For photos of our long but very fun day, head over to the (http://gallery.prwdot.org/rt2005_day6).

Interstate 55

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fff|ggg|rt2005_day5/P1050345|The Arch|ggg|fff

We’re settling down for the night at Melanie’s apartment in the southern ‘burbs of [Chicago](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago), after driving up Interstate 55 from Saint Louis. I’ve uploaded our photos from today’s Saint Louis sightseeing, which included the Gateway Arch and the Old Courthouse, both part of the [Jefferson National Expansion Memorial](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_National_Expansion_Memorial), the [International Bowling Museum](http://www.bowlingmuseum.com/), and the [Cahokia Mounds](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cahokia).

Thursday and Friday we will be spending with Melanie doing some sightseeing in Chicago. For now, you can check out photos from [today](http://gallery.prwdot.org/rt2005_day5?page=1), or look at the photos for the [trip so far](http://gallery.prwdot.org/road_trip_2005).

Meet Me In Saint Louis!

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Becky and I are relaxing in our room at the [Ramada](http://www.ramada.com/) in Collinsville, IL, just outside of Saint Louis, MO. Taking advantage of the free wireless internet access in our room. Tomorrow we’re going to do some sight-seeing in Saint Louis, and then we’re heading up to Chicago. Fun!

I’ve uploaded all of the photos from our trip so far. Check out the [Road Trip 2005](http://gallery.prwdot.org/road_trip_2005) album. No captions yet, but you are welcome to create your own captions by way of leaving comments on individual photos if you happen to know the subject of the photo (or even if you don’t…).

Mount Vernon, OH

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All is well here in Mount Vernon, OH. We have been enjoying the past few days, spending time with Mom, Dad, Kirsten and Mark. Our trip was very smooth, and we actually made the drive from Charlton, MA to Mount Vernon, OH in just 12 hours. Saturday night, we had a birthday party for me and Dad. On Sunday, we visited Mark and Kirsten’s [church](http://www.firstalliancemansfield.org/), at which Mark is the Youth Pastor. Today, Becky and I visited the [Airstream](http://www.airstream.com/) headquarters in Jackson Center, OH, and took their factory tour. Very cool. Tonight we had dinner with the fam and then made some “music videos”. If you’re *really* lucky, we might put those online. All in all, it has been great to be back in Mount Vernon, and to get re-acquainted with the town I grew up in.

On Tuesday, Becky and I are leaving for a quick trip to Saint Louis, and on Wednesday we’ll be headed up to Chicago for a few days. We’ll be back in Mount Vernon Saturday evening, and early Sunday morning we’ll be headed back up to Beverly.

We might upload some photos while in Saint Louis, if the hotel has a decent internet connection. It’s still dialup here at home, so uploading would take far too long. Otherwise, we’ll definitely have all of the photos online at some point during the week after we get back to Beverly.

Another Whirlwind Adventure!

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Friday night, Becky and I are heading off on another whirlwind adventure! This time, we’re taking a road trip, the general route of which you can see below:

ppp|2005 Road Trip|ppp

We’re stopping briefly in Charlton, MA on Friday to stay with Kevin and Susie, who are conveniently located near the Mass Pike. Saturday morning we will drive straight through to Mount Vernon, OH to spend a few days visiting with my parents, sister, and brother-in-law. From there we’ll be driving to [Saint Louis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Louis%2C_Missouri) to see the [Jefferson National Expansion Memorial](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_National_Expansion_Memorial) (i.e., the Arch and its environs), and then we’ll be driving up to [Chicago](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago) to spend a few days visiting Melanie and taking in the sights of the Windy City. Finally, we’ll be jumping back to Mount Vernon, and then back home to Beverly on Sunday, October 23. Phew!

It will be a long and tiring trip, but we’ll be spending it in the best of company. And that’s really what makes any endeavor worthwhile.

iPod Hookups

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Thanks to some birthday gift fundage from my parents (*Thanks Mom and Dad!*), I’ve been able to purchase a few useful gadgets for hooking up our iPod in various locations.

The first one is a device manufactured by [USA Spec](http://www.usaspec.com/), and sold at retailers such as [Circuit City](http://www.circuitcity.com/). The [DF-TOY](http://www.usaspec.com/aux2.htm) hooks up to the CD Changer input on our new Corolla’s factory stereo, and provides two sets of RCA auxiliary inputs. This allows us to output sound directly from the iPod into the car stereo, without the need for a radio transmitter (which provides mediocre quality at best) or a cassette adapter (which wouldn’t work in our car, since it doesn’t have a cassette deck).

Installation was a lot easier than I expected:

1. Remove the bezel from around the stereo. This is easily done by working a flathead screwdriver around the edges and popping it out.
2. Remove the four phillips screws holding the stereo in.
3. Plug in the adapter to the cd changer port.
4. Run the cable out from the back of the stereo, down to the opening just above the gas pedal.
5. Connect the cable to the input box.
6. Connect RCA cables from the device of your choice.

Voila! I have crystal clear sound, and I also have an extra set of RCA inputs should I ever want to have TWO auxiliary devices hooked up. Yikes! The only thing I ought to do is find a nice place to mount the input box, and clean up the cables. Right now it’s all sitting on the floor behind the gas pedal. I’ll take and post some photos if I have a chance.

The other gadget that I bought was an [Apple iPod Dock](http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore?productLearnMore=M9868G/A). The iPod model I bought did not come with a dock, and I’ve gotten by just fine with the basic FireWire cable for a while. But at the Apple Store they had a bunch of “refreshed” docks on sale for 50% off the regular price, so I grabbed one of those, and it’s working great. Now our iPod has a nice little home to live in when it’s on the desk.

**Update**

Here’s some [photos](http://gallery.prwdot.org/ipod_hookups) of the Dock and the aux input connectors.

Google Reader

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This is almost week-old news now, but [Google](http://www.google.com/) recently [released](http://www.google.com/press/annc/reader_launch.html) their [Google Reader](http://www.google.com/reader/) software into beta. It is a direct competitor to web-based news aggregators such as [Bloglines](http://www.bloglines.com/). As it is still in beta, there are a number of kinks being worked out. You’ll sometimes get error messages when trying to read the news, and their servers are frequently slow or unresponsive. But as time goes by, bugs get fixed, and they have a chance to scale up to their demand, I think lot of the issues will be smoothed out. There are a lot of things you can do with Bloglines that you can’t do in Google Reader, and I have emailed all of my notes on those matters to the Google Labs folks.

In order to make my testing more effective and directed, I’ve imported all of my Bloglines subscriptions into Google Reader. I’ve also removed all of my links to Bloglines so that I’m forced to use Google Reader to get my news. Overall, I’m quite impressed. As usual, they have given the application those little touches that make an application oh-so-Google-y. Boxes that slide open and closed, search-enabled-everything, colorful icons and labels, etc. And so far I haven’t needed to go back to Bloglines for anything. I’m still getting used to Google Reader’s organizational methods. Reading the news from a specific source in Google Reader takes a bit more effort than it does in Bloglines. As I go along I’m sure I’ll learn some tricks to help make things better.

Anyway, I’d definitely recommend giving it a try. If you’re looking for a way to organize all of the news and blogs you read, check out [Google Reader](http://www.google.com/reader/) today!

Gordon Reunions

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Becky and I have had reunions with various folks from Gordon in the past several days.

Early on Saturday, we had a virtual reunion of sorts with fellow Gordon College alum James Berry, via a comment on Becky’s [post about Pete Holmes](http://prwdot.org/archives/2005/10/calling_all_sweaty_toothed_mad.html). James is living out in Idaho and working on his master’s degree.

Saturday was also Homecoming at [Gordon College](http://www.gordon.edu/). Even though the weather was lousy, that didn’t stop a lot of people from coming out in support of their alma mater. Throughout the day, we had reunions with various Gordon folk: [Jeremy and Angela](http://www.thebiggspicture.org/), Dr. Askew, [Heather Cole](http://gallery.prwdot.org/homecoming_weekend_2005/P1050098), Stephanie Trombley, Dr. and Mrs. Wick, Erin Simmons, Jeff Barraclough, Owen Webb, Brian Hall, Dr. Senning, Prof. Bjork, Prof. Levy, Culley Parris, Emily (Winchell) Card, and Doug and Shannen Rhoda. It was great to get to see all of these folks and catch up with them. It was also fun to walk around Gordon, eat at the cafeteria, and visit our old dorms and classrooms. Lots of good memories.

Saturday afternoon, we got together with Jeremy and Angela, as well as Bob and Leah, who had travelled up from New Jersey with their new baby [Lucas](http://gallery.prwdot.org/homecoming_weekend_2005/P1050113). We all went out to dinner at [Uno’s](http://www.unos.com/), and then came back to our place for dessert – a strawberry cake that we have [previously enjoyed](http://prwdot.org/archives/2004/05/strawberry_heav.html). We had a great time that evening, talking about the good old days and the good new days. Bob, Jeremy and I welcomed Lucas into [our club](http://gallery.prwdot.org/homecoming_weekend_2005/P1050111). We also tried to teach him a [traditional Vulcan greeting](http://gallery.prwdot.org/homecoming_weekend_2005/P1050107), with little immediate success (though he does have a promising future).

Finally, on Sunday we saw Gordon Alum Matt Fitzpatrick at [church](http://www.danestchurch.org/). He just got a job at [Electric Insurance](http://www.electricinsurance.com/), and is living in downtown Beverly with Rob Dokes, another Gordon alum. Matt and Rob were both friends of mine while I was at Gordon, and it’s been over three years since I’ve talked to or seen either one of them. It was good to reconnect.

Finally: For any Gordon folks who are reading this, make sure you head over to our [Gordonexus](http://prwdot.org/gordonexus.html). There you will find a listing of websites belonging to Gordon students, former students, and alumni. Check out the websites and see how many people you can connect with! If you have a site you would like to add to the list, just drop me a line.